Whether God's Existence Can Be Proven IX

The remarks made in the previous post reveal a possible confusion people might have concerning the notion of a proof when they assert that it is not possible to prove that God exists. They might tacitly identify provability with empirical verifiability so that their claim regarding the impossibility of proving God's existence actually refers to the impossibility of empirically proving God's existence. By doing this their assertion that God's existence cannot be proven would be more exactly formulated as, "It is impossible to prove empirically that God exists."

But the response I would offer is: this assertion is to be granted - it is impossible to prove empirically that God exists. Even arguments for God's existence which begin with the structure of the world (e.g., Thomas' "Five Ways"), require the introduction of premises which are not verifiable empirically. The problem then is not with the claim that God's existence is not empirically verifiable, but with the tacit assumption that unless a proposition is empirically verifiable it cannot be verified. This assumption encounters the same problem mentioned in the previous post. The assertion that what is provable is limited to what is empirically verifiable is itself not empirically verifiable; therefore, according to the very proposition itself there cannot be sufficient justification or evidence for accepting it.

In this way, it is completely unwarranted to maintain that in order to be a proof, in addition to being sound, an argument must be constituted by premises which are empirically verifiable, for this assertion itself cannot be verified empirically.