MATT: Do you believe in God, yes or no?
PETER: It’s a stupid question.
MATT: Why?
PETER: You just explained why.
MATT: Did I?
PETER: The “why question” is the meaning of Philosophy. The distinction between human beings and animals is that question; the question by which we are evolving so much and by which we are constructing so many castles in the air. Our specie is characterized by the continue reformulation of our existence reason, given increasing possible solutions as we increase in number and technology. The “Why” question make us consider our existence and formulate possible explanations to it; it is because of that question that we have researched so much around and inside us for a solution. Religion, science, physics, etc… are all different ways to approach the same question and possible ways to find a solution.
MATT: So why you think that’s the answer?
PETER: I never said “why” is the answer. The majority of people are considering our intellectual evolution a divine intervention, and we assume that our evolving is a positive thing. So are animals in the wrong path because they didn’t decide to ask them self the same question as we are? By the way I’m not a naturalist.
Take an individual and suppose he believes to see somebody who doesn’t exist. In this world we are something more than six billions and suppose he is the only one who can see that somebody. For our medical definitions we should refer to that person as a schizophrenic because affected by hallucination, and much more he believes in what he sees, that we cannot see, much more they would consider him sick. Suppose he claims that the individual he sees is God, but not the God for Christianity nor another known religion. Whether Catholic or not, religious people could refer to that person with the same definition expressed by the doctors, but because nowadays society is very concerned with religious matter, both doctors and spiritual people would start to reconsider the fact in a delicate manner. Then come, somebody could be persuaded by his vision considering it to be true. Suppose those people who start to believe in what the person sees become more and more. Then come, if that person convinces more than three billion people to believe in what he sees, doctors should reconsider their first evaluation.
MATT: What’s the relation with this example and the existence of God?
PETER: Good question. Today the majority of people believe in the existence of a God and their only proof is given by faith; the same faith which could lead more than three billion people to believe in the sight of somebody who before was given for schizophrenic.
MATT: How’s possible that a crazy person could convince so many people?
PETER: I never said that person was crazy, but I said doctors would have considered him schizophrenic at first.
MATT: This is just a problem of words. I mean, how is that possible that a person alone, without any proof, could convince so many people and even the majority of the world population?
PETER: This is a good question too, but history has already shown it. People beliefs are based on our life experience and the majority of our ideas are others’ ideas. You learn to talk and write in your language because you believe in the communication your parents believe in. Much more a person or a thing seems attractive to you, and more it shapes your beliefs; it’s a process of imitation due to analysis and faith.
MATT: So faith is innate?
PETER: Faith is part of everybody existence.
MATT: But faith in God, is that part of everybody existence?
PETER: I’m impressed by your capacity of questioning. God is a word we use in this specific language to identify an idea which is different in everybody because everybody is different one to another.
MATT: So my God is different from somebody else’s God.
PETER: You can say your idea of God is different from somebody else’s idea of God. The way you perceive God is defined by your being, the religion you believe or not, the ideas of God you have achieved and the choice about them you have made.
MATT: So, do I have to assume there is no such a only God because it is him’s, her’s or its’s idea we have in mind, and because of this definition, the number of Gods is the same as the number of ideas related to it?
PETER: I’m impressed by your capacity. God, or the multitude of ideas we relate to God in this world is defined by the sum of the ideas about God, whether one, many, or uncountable, male female or asexual, etc… and because God, or the ideas we refer to him are limited because increasing or decreasing every day, God can be defined by the infinite ideas by which we define him.
MATT: What about people who claim to perceive God in his perfect form, and even if they are not able to explain him, they can feel his infinite greatness.
PETER: Somebody claims to feel God, somebody claims to perceive a part of the entity of God, and somebody claims to not feel God at all. By the fact that there is no proof of God existence we cannot demonstrate that God exists, but because there’s no proof of God non-existence we cannot prove he doesn’t exist at all. When we are asked to think about God we create or interpret an idea we have in mind. People who claim to perceive God are all quite agreed to say they perceive God as infinite.
MATT: So God has to be the infinite.
PETER: So you claim that God cannot be finite.
MATT: Yes I believe God cannot be finite, because it would mean that it would be like one of us.
PETER: So if God is infinite? What is infinite?
MATT: Infinite is something so big that it is bigger than everything I can imagine
PETER: So, what is infinite has to be infinite big because we cannot think about something bigger, but suppose I think about the universe and imagine ten constellations and then I realize the infinite has to be bigger then that so I imagine eleven and twelve constellations. In the moment I achieve a bigger idea I increase the limit of infinite.
MATT: Yes, and infinite is exactly the concept you have expressed: something that has no limit.
PETER: A good definition, but suppose we use it to consider another infinite form; think about something extremely small, after all to imagine something infinite small is as difficult as considering something extremely big. Suppose you try to imagine the infinite smallest thing you can. Then come, every time you consider a form you realize you can imagine something smaller, and every time you conclude there is something even smaller. So, the infinite process takes place also in this case.
MATT: Yes, because in this case too, infinite has no limit, so we can go on and on forever.
PETER: So, we have demonstrated your definition, except, suppose I ask you what’s the difference between the infinite smallest thing you can imagine and nothing, what would be your answer?
MATT: The smallest thing exists and nothing not.
PETER: Why one exists and the other doesn’t?
MATT: Because of the word’s meaning.
PETER: You are right, the meaning of their words imply the presence or not of thing, but can you prove that one exists and the other doesn’t? If you consider a thing, something that you can see with your eyes, like this book and you try to think to the smallest book you can, you begin to break pieces of the book like pages. Every page you cut the smallest the book becomes, and the more close to nothing it is. You keep going until there are no more pages, so you begin to resize the cover by taking apart pieces of it. The smallest the book becomes, again, the closer to nothing becomes. Suppose you keep going forever, and you can cut it with your mind, where would you end up?
MATT: I would get with something even smaller then what I can imagine. There would be nothing in my hands.
PETER: So as you say you couldn’t even imagine it because of its infinite small size. And by the same process of imaging nothing you would imagine something infinite close to nothing, but not nothing. Now, how would you prove that nothing does exist, using the example by which you resize the book? After all your consideration, you would realize that even by opposite perspectives, infinite is not definable by a static concept. Imagine that nothing exists but we can’t imagine it, so convey with me that nothing would be at least equal to the smallest thing we can imagine, but this is not in line with your definition, because in this case the infinite smallest thing wouldn’t be smallest than nothing. Suppose I ask you to consider them and then decide which is the smallest, would you reconsider you definition of infinite?
MATT: So what’s the real definition of infinite?
PETER: The concept we have in mind of Infinite is not the limit or things as by the definition you gave to me or by the one in the example before. The smallest thing in its limit equals nothing but the process of achieving a limit characterizes our idea of infinite.
MATT: So, by imaging the process to achieve a limit we abstract the idea of infinite.
PETER: No. To perceive the infinite as a concept is like to achieve something unachievable. By imaging the process to achieve a limit we don’t imagine infinite, although we start the path which ends in the achievement of the idea of infinite. Because our mind is finite, as all the three components of our existence: space, time and matter, we are able to achieve the finite concepts of things as the finite forms of ideas.
MATT: But if God, as the infinite smallest thing, is something so small, than nobody can see it and maybe nobody will ever see it; or, as the infinite biggest thing, it is something so big that nobody can see it and maybe nobody will ever see it; does it mean we should not believe in its existence because there is no way we will prove the existence of God?
PETER: What is smaller between nothing and the infinite smallest thing? Then come that the idea that God doesn’t exist is not that far from the idea of the infinite form we try to achieve in our mind. But if there is not a big difference in between infinite and finite, whether there was, why could not be God everything, whether existing and infinite big; or nothing, whether not existing and infinite small?
Whether existing or not, everything or nothing, God is the limit we need in order exist.
MATT: So, why if you believe in God, yes or no, is a stupid question?
PETER: Because whether answering yes or no we define our limitation of thinking and we decline the real value of the question “do you believe in God” for its value as a question with no answer, which intrinsically contains the power to increase our reason, and whether existing or not our idea of God.
Marco Negroni – Boston University