You are assuming that the probabilities of the six possibilities you identify are all equal.

What is your justification for that assumption?

@andrewk, I assume they are equally probable because there is no way we can know or prove that they are unequal. Whilst these scenarios are likely not equally probable, we can't really know how much more probable a certain scenario is - hence, I assume they are equal for the sake of providing some kind of statistic.

Providing a statistic simply to provide a statistic, while acknowledging that there is no reason to ascribe the value given, is problematic and effectively is making up numbers. It's like me saying there is no way to find out the genders of forum users, so I have different categories and assign them all the same value.

Actually the probability is 50/50, or 1in 2. Because we have a binary choice here.

There are many more creator-candidates beside god, such as in various pagan myths (nordic, aztec etc.), or the flying spaghetti monster, or some natural phenomenon which caused itself from nothing and became the big bang, and so on. One might also add varieties of non-created universes, such as eternal without beginning, or eternally recurring etc.. Is the probability for god still 50/50? I don't think so.

@Javants
I would like to point out that your definition of 'Creator' would place your parents as your creators, and you as 1/2 of your son's or daughter's creator. I like this idea. It's an elegant idea which is quite hard to dispute.
As for you definition of god... That definition, like many others, is flawed. Though it's fine, since judging by the statistical conclusion to your post, It's most likely there is no such being as god anyway.

Well, there's always questions one can ask before even considering the possibility because all your points cannot be proven physically. The closest proof we have are the historical texts, handed down tails, and some would argue passionately: the Bible. But there's still an undeniable point in the fact that all of these were touched by the human perspectively, both culturally and religiously. Such two points are inseparable because they both control each other so really, we can say that our idea of a god came from the human's need for a bigger being, either as a from of control and power or as an escape from the horrors and terrors they face in their lifetimes. A powerful being is the form they've given their hope to, feared, and followed to replace this hard challenge of finding what to do with their lives.

So this really is a chicken or the egg question for me: did we create God or did a God really create us? Ultimately, our thoughts will always come back to the human behavior because if we were to solely question the existence of such a being, it'd be like sticking your head into the sand and expecting light to shine through.

There is either a platypus in my pocket or not, so there's a 50% chance that I have a platypus in my pocket. Seems kind of high odds there. I either have an IQ of 250 or I don't....

Still, whether or not Humans created the idea of a God or not does not detract from these scenarios, as even if God is a human construction, other explanations for our creation and the existence of other beings (such as those above) are still relevant.

There is either a platypus in my pocket or not, so there's a 50% chance that I have a platypus in my pocket. Seems kind of high odds there. — Hanover

Let me help you out here. There is either a platypus, a piece of lint, or nothing in your pocket. It's equal odds (of course), but there's now only a 33% chance of there being a platypus in your pocket. Better?

in your pocket — SophistiCat

If only it were that simple such that I could reach in and find the answer. Now, I'm curious: as much as we'd love to find the answer, and if given the chance, would we be afraid to look at what's in the pocket? Probabilities aside ( thank you for the extremely statistical explanation ) and we could theorize all we want, but what I want to know is whether or not we have the courage to find out.

- If God does exist (and I'm mentioning the omniscient one), then we are left with the answer that our entire existence was under the control of another - that we really have no choice in out lives.
- A god does not exist, what else can one turn to for comfort, in our times of vulnerability?
- Demigods: well, I'm not sure how to react to this one except that I worry for their safety because if they were rare, good luck facing the rest of the world. If they were not rare, then the 'normal' humans would simply become inferior defects.

Of course, a lot of these opinion exist unconsciously in our society today, especially when we worship regular people, imaginary people, and ourselves. But would we be courageous enough to accept any of those probabilities?

Again, finding a definite answer is impossible, but we can explore the scenarios and reactions.

Still, whether or not Humans created the idea of a God or not does not detract from these scenarios, as even if God is a human construction, other explanations for our creation and the existence of other beings (such as those above) are still relevant. — Javants

Probability calculus cannot be applied to explanations:

Take for example the explanation of why the sun shines - that the pressure in the interior of the sun is such that hydrogen (created after the big-bang) nuclei fuse to give helium nuclei and some photons etc. Call this explanation T - it is after all a theory!

Then, in order to apply probability calculus, the following relation must hold:

P(T) = 1 -P('T)

The problem becomes immediately obvious - what is 'T? Whatever it is, it is not an explanation (or a theory), it is not the same sort of thing as T.

So, you can waste your time pretending that applying probability to the existence or otherwise of imaginary beings from your particular culture has any meaning, but once you claim that "God" supplies any sort of explanation, you can't do it anymore.

It is revealing that probability games are often applied to "God", as if more evidence were needed that it is an empty concept.

As such, we can determine that there are six possibilities about our cause and the existence of a God. Thus, we can deduce the probabilities of these outcomes (assuming they are all equally probable).
That no God exists has a 1 in 2 (1/2) chance.
That a God exists has a 1 in 3 (1/3) chance.
That a Semi-God exists has a 1 in 6 (1/6) chance — Javants

That is not probability.

Probability is the proportion of possible out comes under the repeat exercise of a random event. You didn't exercise a random event, you made up a bunch of stuff and assigned values to it.

Also there is no probability for the existence of something; it either exist or it doesn't. God doesn't have a 33% chance of existing, that is just stupid. Either God is there or God is not. Something can have a chance to come into existence but once it is here it is no longer a question of probability.

By suggesting God has a chance to exist you are actually claiming that God currently does not exist but that a future event will give God a chance to exist.

Using that same reasoning there is a fifty-fifty chance that there is a flying pink unicorn next to me chanting in Aramaic, because it either exists, or it doesn't.

These probabilities are made on the basis of how many times the outcome of a God existing is reached when we systematically analyse all the possibilities (as far as we know) of how we come to exist and whether or not other beings exist. Because there are six possible outcomes according to these statements, and two of them happen to be that a God exists, there is therefore one outcome of a God existing per every three (or a 1/3 probability).This is basic probability mathematics.

That said, my numbers are largely invalid because we can never know the true nature of our external universe, but it is stupid regardless to say that the possibility must be 50-50 because God either exists or not (see example at beginning).

Also, probability isn't just to do with random events. Whether or not a God exists isn't like a dice role, where we have no idea of the outcome apart from that it can be one of six numbers. Using the statements in my argument, you can determine the possible scenarios of God existing or not, in which case these probabilities aren't 'random', rather based on how often a circumstance occurs as a result of this reasoning.

By suggesting God has a chance to exist you are actually claiming that God currently does not exist but that a future event will give God a chance to exist. — Jeremiah

Can you explain to me how this is so?

Using that same reasoning there is a fifty-fifty chance that there is a flying pink unicorn next to me chanting in Aramaic, because it either exists, or it doesn't. — Javants

You are not paying attention. Probability requires a chance mechanism. You flip a coin; that coin has a chance to land on heads or tails, but once it lands there is no more chance involved, as it is either heads or tails. That result will not change no matter how many times you look at the coin. The only way for chance to come back into play is to flip the coin again.

This is the basic concept of probability you learn when studying statistics.

This is the academic definition of probability: Probability is the proportion of possible out comes under the repeat exercise of a random event.

Your claim here:

"These probabilities are made on the basis of how many times the outcome of a God existing is reached when we systematically analyse all the possibilities (as far as we know) of how we come to exist and whether or not other beings exist."

Is not a random event.

A random event is either random assignment or random sampling, and it requires all units of a population have an equal probability of being selected (that is how you get your proportion). The randomization is important for many reasons, but mostly to control confounding variables (or what you are calling "possibilities").

It is more than clear that you don't really know what probability is and you know even less about how to apply it. You are using a layman's grasp of probability and trying to use it for things it cannot tell us.

God is either there or is not there. If God exist then there is not a 33% chance that God exist. If God does not exist there is not a 33% chance that God exist. That makes no sense at all. Tell me do you have a 33% chance to exist? Things that exist don't have a chance to exist, only things that currently do not exist can have a chance to exist.

The existence of God is not dependent on the chance values you made up, God's existence is independent of those values.

I assume they are equally probable because there is no way we can know or prove that they are unequal. Whilst these scenarios are likely not equally probable, we can't really know how much more probable a certain scenario is - hence, I assume they are equal for the sake of providing some kind of statistic. — Javants

Also there is a problem with this.

A statistic is any quantity that can be calculated from the observed data. You don't have any observed data. Data are not something you just make up. You gave no evidence for justification of your assumption of equal probability. You simply said I don't know what it is so I am just going to make it up.

I applaud you for trying a scientific method to approach a philosophical dilemma, but the problem is you need to actually learn the science you are trying to use. Remember science is based on empirical data, and lack of these data is not a free ticket to just start making it up.

Let me help you out here. There is either a platypus, a piece of lint, or nothing in your pocket. It's equal odds (of course), but there's now only a 33% chance of there being a platypus in your pocket. Better? — SophistiCat

No, that is not any better, if you say one of these in my pocket and the other two are not. Either a platypus or a piece of lint or nothing.

Then you have three possible scenarios:

You have a platypus, but not a piece of lint.

You have a piece of lint but not the platypus.

You have nothing.

This is where the common misconception of probability is, because each scenario does not have a 33% chance of being in you pocket. One of them is 100% true and the other two are 0% true.

Now I may take a guess but then it is my guess that has the % chance of being right. For example if you rolled a 3 sided die earlier in the morning to pick which to put in your pocket then I could maybe say my guess has a 33% chance of being right. But the chance applies to my guess, not the contents of your pocket. However, there could be confounding variables which compel me to guess one way over the others so not really a 33% chance. I might have a fondness for lint which could cause me to guess lint more often than the other two.

However, if you did not apply equal probability to determine the contents of your pocket then the actual % chance of my guess being right is unknown because I don't know what confounding variables influence your pocket contents form day to day. I would need some type of random sampling procedure to come up with a predictor.

Something people need to understand about equal probability: It generally does not just happen on its own, it needs people to make it happen with some type of equal probability procedure.

Let me reword my hypothesis:

There are six possible conditions of God's existence. One of these is a certainty, and therefore there are no levels of how probable a certain outcome is, because it already exists as a certainty. It is not a random event.

However, as humans who can never come to know the certainty of God's existence, there are six possibilities which can be assigned a probability of how correct we are when we 'randomly' choose one to believe in.

Let me expand this idea further:

• On earth, we can never come to know if God exists or not (see discussion on 'Believing in a God is not irrational, despite being improvable'). Therefore, any assumptions we make about his existence are effectively us justifying a random belief without evidence.
• As such, our choice has a probability of being the correct one. If we choose to believe in a God, that belief has a 1/3 chance of being true. For example, if I asked you to guess whether I had a Cat, Dog, or Fish, even though there is an answer which is already 100% true, you can't know that answer. Thus, you have a 1/3 chance of being correct in your assumption. The same is applicable with these scenarios - whatever we choose to believe has a certain chance at being the correct outcome. Even though the state of Gods existence doesn't have a probability, what we choose to believe has a probability of being right, because it is effectively a random choice.

I hope this clarifies things.

In regards to probability, that is not at all how you from a proper hypothesis, or create a distribution (this is what you are essentially trying to do), and you also don't seem to understand what is "random" in this context or how to use it.

Man, you just need to pick up a book, or take a few courses to educate yourself. Using probability to do a statistical analysis is something you are going to have to actually work at to learn. I can recommend some books to read if you really like, but you need to get that mathematical base down first. If you at least understand college algebra then an intro to statistics course at your local community college would be a great place to start.

You essentially want to create a probability distribution and then use it to test your "hypothesis", and to do that you are going to need some schooling. It is not as simple as you think it is, and guess what it relies on empirical data.

*edit - I would also like to point out that a hypothesis is generally tested at a 90, 95 or 99% confidence level. Testing a hypothesis at a 33% or 50% confidence level is almost worthless (far too much room for error for it to be dependable). Of course you don't actually have a testable hypothesis, all you have is a percentage you have assigned to your personal opinions. For it to be a hypothesis it has to be falsifiable, and to be a statistical hypothesis it has to be falsifiable with in the limits and context of statistics.

The answer to your question of what the probability of God existing is simply that it is a non-trivial problem (ie. more or less unknowable at the moment because of our limited resources, but may not always be unknowable if our situation changes) because knowing what God is or isn't as well as whether he exists or not are non-trivial problems. I could spend some time explaining this but I think someone already mentioned in this post some of the issues of determining the probability of something and how if you don't know enough or really anything for that matter then you end up with just guesses being pulled from thing air.

Another thing I didn't see anyone mention was whether God did his creating or whatever using technology or some kind of magic. If God used technology then I imagine we are speculating about something like some kind of alien life form (which has it's own issues if we want to determine the probability of), but if it is a being that uses magic instead then there is the issue of determining what 'magic' is and how it works if it does exist.

Or maybe it might be easier just to say there are many things about God we don't know or understand, and just leave it at that. or at least l;eave it at that until we are better prepared to answer such things.

The OP does not understand what "probability" is and how it works (as other people have mentioned)...this thread is already null before we can actually get into whether God exist or not.

I have now reworded the question in order to try and produce a more enlightening and productive debate.

I roll a die that you cannot see. Either the die lands on a 6 or it does not. Therefore there is a 50% chance of guessing correctly whether or not a 6 was rolled.

I don't know where you got the 33%, or 1 in 3 from? But as I said before it is a binary choice, hence 50/50.

This is because there can only be two alternative scenarios in the God question. Either our existence was created(scenario a), or it wasn't(scenario b). Any other explanation you can come up with falls under either scenario a, or b. hence we are left with a binary choice.

We can assume, firstly, that you exist. If you perceive a world, you must exist, as otherwise you would not be able to perceive that world ('Cognito, ergo sum'). We can now deduce that there are two possibilities:

That you have a Creator. Something has caused your existence, which could be either a deity, natural phenomena, etc.
That you do not have a Creator. It is inevitable that the first thing to ever exist could not have come from any preexisting thing, and thus must have come from nothingness. As such, you have no creator. — Javants

There are actually a couple of other possibilities, both of which eliminate the possibility of a necessary creator.

1) That there actually isn't a first thing to exist. Causation could continue on forever in both directions. An infinite regress is possible.

2) There is a loop of causation - that the ending is actually the beginning and vice versa.

That Creator is not a God. That which created you is something which has no interaction with you in your life. This is known as Inactive Causation, and hence, a God does not exist. — Javants

An important thought seems to be left out here and that is any effect some "God" would have on my life includes me being created. Every thing I do would be the result of being created by this God. The actions of my children are somewhat caused by me for they would never do the things they do if I had never created them with my wife.

The creator would be even more culpable if they are omnipotent and know all my actions before I perform them, and because it created me with certain functions and limits in mind my life is permanently influenced by the creator.

Also, any effect some other being has on my actions would mean that they are inseparable from the same world I am part of. They would be part of the same causal chain that I am part of, which would lead one to ask who created the creator? How does something come from nothing?

There are actually a couple of other possibilities, both of which eliminate the possibility of a necessary creator.

1) That there actually isn't a first thing to exist. Causation could continue on forever in both directions. An infinite regress is possible.

2) There is a loop of causation - that the ending is actually the beginning and vice versa. — Harry Hindu

Yes, these are possibilities, but they are not alternatives to whether or not you have a creator. In other words, you must have either no creator or a creator. Whether or not you were created in an infinite stream of causation or by a single being which is the first to exist doesn't change the fact that you were, indeed, created (or vice versa).

An important thought seems to be left out here and that is any effect some "God" would have on my life includes me being created. Every thing I do would be the result of being created by this God. The actions of my children are somewhat caused by me for they would never do the things they do if I had never created them with my wife. — Harry Hindu

That's a very good point, but for the purpose of this debate, having something which creates you does not mean it is a God based on the fact alone that it is affecting your life by allowing it to exist. For example, hypothetically, we could have been created by some freak natural phenomena. Even though that phenomena has created us (and thus has the effect of allowing us to act), it cannot really be considered a 'God' because it has not had any further affect on our lives besides causation.