Does God Not Exist?

June 20, 2026

Science cannot tell us if God does exist, or does not exist. Yet certain believers have benefited from their belief. This discussion doesn’t assume this proves God’s existence. Rather, this discussion reverses the burden of proof. Here we ask those who don’t believe in God to explain why believers have benefited so much from their belief.


General Ken
	Don’t you have the topic wrong? Does God *not* exist? Isn’t the question normally "Does God Exist?"
Matthias
	Yes, that is the usual way discussions about the existence of God go. There are many books and articles on that subject. Rather than retrace those arguments, I would like to take a different approach. Those who believe in God, specifically Christians, seem to have received measurable benefits from their belief. It might be helpful if those who doubt God’s existence could attempt to explain why.
Blayden Balance
	In a previous discussion we established that science is unable to address the existence of God. Are we going to ignore that now?
Filius X. Publius
	No. The scientific method cannot prove that God does exist. Or that God does not exist. In fact, it cannot even address the question of God’s existence. But for those who don’t believe in God, they can address why people who do believe in God receive material benefits.
Blayden Balance
	What do you hope to prove?
Matthias
	We won’t "prove" anything in the scientific sense. As you two just mentioned, the scientific method won’t help us in this discussion. Fortunately, we humans can know things by means other than the scientific method.
General Ken
	How so?
Matthias
	First, remember that science is only for learning about the laws of nature. It cannot study things that cannot be seen or measured.
General Ken
	Such as?
Matthias
	How about love? Justice? Fair play?

	Does your mother love you? Do you love her? Your spouse? Your children? Do you love your country? These are questions that science cannot answer or even discuss, but we know the answers without scientific study.
General Ken
	What kind of evidence are you planning on using? I hope it isn’t those surveys with questions like "how happy are you?" I don’t think such surveys can be accurate or meaningful.
Matthias
	No, I won’t be relying on such surveys. We will stick to the economic benefits and intellectual progress made by Christians.
General Ken
	So what kind of data are you going to use? And where did you get it?
Matthias
	I will be drawing from the book "The WEIRDest People in the World" by Joseph Henrich.
General Ken
	The WEIRDest people?
Matthias
	Dr. Henrich uses that as an acronym for "Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic."
Blayden Balance
	I’ve read that book. He argues that the Roman Catholic Church changed the rules on who you could marry. Over the centuries the new rules changed Western society. They affected the organization of society. And that led to changes in the psychology of the Western people.
General Ken
	What changes in who you could marry?
Blayden Balance
	The new rules banned anyone from marrying a first-cousin or second-cousin, stepmothers, widows of brothers, sisters-in-law, and aunts by marriage. There were various other limits, too.

	Before the Church changed the who-you-can-marry rules, kin-based relationships dominated society. Your rulers and businesses and even your neighbors decided how to treat you based on who you were. That is, what clan you were in. Any written laws or religious commandments or principles were, at best, a secondary consideration.
General Ken
	What kind of changes in society and psychology did the new rules bring about?
Blayden Balance
	The first result was that clans weren’t as tight-knit as before. This weakened, then demolished Europe’s intensive kin-based institutions. That lead to:
	● societal evolution in how people interacted with each other
	● leading to the rise of voluntary associations
	● and impersonal markets
	● and self-governing cities.

	The psychological shifts gave rise to the notions of:
	● individual rights
	● personal accountability
	● abstract principles
	● and universal laws.

	Those changes led to the growth of:
	● representative governments
	● constitutional legitimacy
	● and the rise of Western law and science.
General Ken
	How could changing the rules on who you could marry cause all that?
Blayden Balance
	Starting in A.D. 305 the Church started changing the marriage rules. Over the following centuries the people started following the new, more restrictive rules, and gradually society changed:
	● the dense social interconnections faded away
	● social life shifted away from relationships to individuals
	● societies had weaker kin-ties and developed impersonal markets
	● favoring individualism and independence
	● people started thinking more analytically
	● people started thinking that individuals had rights
General Ken
	The Church did all that by changing the rules on who you could marry?
Blayden Balance
	I recommend you read the book. In just under 500 pages Dr. Henrich lays out a solid case explaining how the Church’s rules on marriage did accomplish all that. I can’t give you more than the highlights here. The book has more details, explanation, and supporting evidence.
Matthias
	Let’s not repeat the whole book here.

	For this discussion, the main point from the book is that the Christians in Western Europe did follow those rules, they did that to comply with God’s wishes, and they did get those results.
General Ken
	How could the Church plan all of that?
Blayden Balance
	Dr. Henrich doesn’t suggest that they did; in fact, he takes it as a given that they did not. He refers to those marriage rules as "accidental," says that the Church "bumbled across" the new rules, and "unintentionally" created the changes in society.
Matthias
	I agree that the Church did not intentionally cause those changes in society. The Church instituted those rules to comply with God’s plans. I doubt anyone in the Church was looking centuries into the future trying to guess what other changes might result.

	Just as science cannot address the existence of God, science cannot discuss God’s plans for us. The Church did not intend to foster impersonal markets, competing voluntary associations, representative governance, and science. Of course, it may have been God’s intention to bring about those changes.
Filius X. Publius
	But those changes did occur in Western Europe, not anywhere else. "Christians developed science because they believed it could be done, and should be done".
Matthias
	And the Christians in Europe benefitted greatly. They believed that God wanted them to follow those new who-you-can-marry rules. They did follow those rules. Those changes to society did happen, starting in the places where the people followed those rules.

	Those Western Europeans:
	● Developed science
	● Transformed their economies with the industrial revolution
	● Developed strong markets and international trade
	● Learned to sail the oceans
	● Explored the world
	● Built multi-continent empires
Matthias
	They started as agrarian societies. Now they have some the greatest economies in the world.
General Ken
	If God does exist, it is easy to see why believers would benefit. They would be receiving blessings from God.

	But if God does not exist, then they believe in a non-existent God. Why would such people benefit so much from a mistaken belief?
Matthias
	That is a question I hope atheists and agnostics will consider.

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