Main Summary: Impossible Philosophy by Linas Kučiauskas argues that God’s existence, eternal life, and the truth of Christianity can be proven logically. It examines Aquinas’s arguments, the Holy Trinity, creation, hell, love, and evil, offering rational defenses of faith while challenging atheism, cults, and competing worldviews.
Lessons You’ll Learn From This Book
- Proof of God
- Proof of Eternal Life
- How to Find the Truth?
- Explaining the Holy Trinity
- What Kind of Being Could Have Created Our World?
- Why Do People Believe in God?
- What Is Love?
Also read Love The Way to Victory by Kenneth Hagin [Summary]
Everything that explains an effect in reality and possesses all the necessary properties to produce that effect, and which alone could explain that effect if it existed, and whose existence cannot be logically ruled out, is accepted by us as an existing thing or being.
Proof of God
● The author begins by noting that throughout history, people have debated whether God exists, but most philosophers consider His existence impossible to prove.
● Thomas Aquinas created the most famous arguments for God’s existence, yet atheists quickly point out that these arguments are unconvincing and do not constitute proof.
● The first argument, the Unmoved Mover, claims that every object in motion is moved by something else, and this chain cannot be infinite, so there must be a first mover, which is God.
● Modern atheists reject this argument because science shows the Big Bang set everything in motion, and it is physically impossible for a spirit like God to move matter.
● The second argument, based on causation, says that everything cannot cause itself and the chain of causes cannot be infinite, so there must be a first cause, which is God.
● This argument is misleading because things like the number 0 exist by necessity without any cause, and atheists could claim the universe itself has always existed.
● The third argument, based on contingency and necessity, says that everything in the sensory world is contingent, so there must be a necessary cause, which is God.
● This argument fails because logical and mathematical truths exist by necessity, and one would first need to prove that the universe is not necessary and that God requires no cause.
● The fourth argument, based on degrees of perfection, claims that since things have varying degrees of perfection, a most perfect being, God, must exist.
● This proves nothing because different levels of perfection in cars do not imply a perfect car exists, and no one attempts to prove the existence of a least perfect being.
● The fifth argument, based on purpose or teleology, claims that all phenomena have a goal, so there must be a highest goal, which is God.
● This argument fails because many things in the universe appear purposeless, such as comets, matter, and a madman walking aimlessly.
● The author concludes that all five of Aquinas’s arguments are logically flawed or incomplete, and therefore unconvincing.
● To present a real proof of God, one must first consider what counts as proof in different domains, such as mathematics, physics, and law.
● God is not a mathematical or physical object, so the only suitable method is the one used in law to establish things no one has witnessed.
● People often think that if no one sees God, He does not exist, but the external world itself cannot be scientifically proven to exist either.
● Dreams and mirages show that seeing something with real eyes does not guarantee it is real, so we need a method that does not rely on sight.
● The author proposes a method based on effects: if a being has all the properties to produce an observed effect, and only that being could explain it, and its existence cannot be ruled out, then we accept that it exists.
● He illustrates this method with a hidden person in China whose fingerprints reveal his existence, showing that an unseen person can be proven to exist through effects.
● Fairies do not exist because no effect is ever observed that only a fairy could produce, while aliens do not exist because humans could have built the pyramids.
● Applying this method to God, the author argues that we exist and have not existed eternally, and the universe does not exist by necessity, so only God could explain these effects.
● Since God possesses all the properties needed to produce the effect of our existence, and His existence cannot be logically ruled out, God exists.
● The author emphasizes that he does not deny evolution, but evolution does not rule out that the universe is a consequence of God’s existence.
● God may have always willed to create the best possible world, so our universe could be God’s eternal creation.
● Using this method, which is established in law, it is possible to prove that God exists.
God is love, but for such a person, God’s love would be meaningless, because they could neither feel it nor understand it.
Proof of Eternal Life
● The author builds on the previous chapter’s proof of God and now seeks to justify that if God exists, He necessarily had to create eternal life as well.
● He argues that if a loving person loved only stones and not people, animals, or plants, their love would be meaningless because stones cannot feel it.
● God is omniscient, eternal, and omnipotent, so gaining knowledge, living long, and pursuing power are not purposes for Him.
● For God, the only remaining purpose of life is to love and to be loved.
● Human beings are created in God’s image and therefore share the same purpose of life, even though they differ from God in knowledge, power, and immortality.
● The only similarity between God and humans is the purpose of life, which is to love and to be loved.
● If humans were too insignificant to comprehend God’s purpose, it would be unjust for God to create a conscious being unable to understand its own creator.
● A person who loved and felt love for part of their existence, even briefly, had a life worth something.
● But a person who never felt love from anyone and never loved anyone else would have a meaningless and worthless life.
● God is love, but for such a person, God’s love would be meaningless because they could neither feel nor understand it.
● Therefore, God had to create eternal life so that after death human limitations would be healed and every person could feel and understand His love.
● After death, everyone will meet God and feel and understand His love, though the author does not attempt to decide who ends up in heaven or hell.
● Eternal life is meant for everyone, but it would not be necessary if even one person had experienced love throughout their entire earthly existence.
● The author gives an example of a person unable to feel emotions who becomes a gifted mathematician, asking whether their life was meaningful.
● For humanity, such a person’s life was meaningful, but from God’s perspective, they were treated as a calculating robot rather than a fully human being.
● Without eternal life in which such a person could experience love, God would be ultimately meaningless to them.
● The author rejects reincarnation as a solution because a human being’s identity is a combination of body, memories, and way of thinking.
Also read The Doctrine of God by Peter Tan [Summary]
If we were to say that nothing is true, then that statement itself would also be false—which means that some] ething must be true.
How to Find the Truth?
● The author begins by noting that finding the truth is very difficult, as proven by the existence of many religions and ideologies.
● If truth were easy to find, the world would have only one religion or ideology, so we are left to choose what we will believe.
● The only way to discover truth is to evaluate what we observe in this world, since we cannot verify which religions lead to heaven.
● God cannot directly control our thinking, so we are left on our own to find the truth.
● If nothing were true, then the statement “nothing is true” would itself be false, which means something must be true.
● No single person can know the whole truth or distinguish good from evil in every possible matter, since no human is omniscient.
● It follows that religions founded by a single person cannot contain the whole truth or represent all good.
● Followers of a religion containing some error will learn to commit that error, and heaven contains only goodness and complete truth.
● If such people entered heaven directly, they would continue committing that error, meaning error itself would exist in heaven, which is impossible.
● Only one who has already lived in heaven, who is perfect and has learned the entire truth, could know all goodness and all truth.
● The only possible candidate is Jesus Christ, who lived in heaven before being born on earth.
● All other founders of religions came from nothingness and know only what can be learned while living on earth.
● They cannot know the whole truth because truth is one, and complete truth is eternal and does not change over time.
● No religious founder lived long enough to test whether their religion answers every question and endures for eternity.
● If someone who came from heaven taught humanity the complete truth, then that truth is eternal and distinguishes good from evil in every possible matter.
● If some religion claims a greater truth than Christ’s, it claims that a non-omniscient human knows eternal truth better than the omniscient God, which is impossible.
● Only the religion founded by Christ can be the religion of complete truth and complete goodness, because only God is omniscient.
● Hindus claim their religion is based on eternal principles with no human founder, but such a religion is a mixture of ideas rather than a religion.
● There must be order in belief because religions strongly disagree on important ethical and moral questions.
● To say “we agree with everyone” is effectively to say nothing at all and to become empty space.
● Because of its universalism, Hinduism lacks a catechism and authoritative guidance on important moral questions.
● One human person cannot know the whole truth, which is why Christ had twelve apostles, because collectively people can comprehend the whole truth.
● Throughout the history of the Church, the most important doctrines were established collectively rather than by a single individual.
Just as in a court of law two witnesses are required to confirm a fact, so the existence of God is observed by two consciousnesses eternally.
Explain ning the Holy Trinity
● The author begins by explaining that the Holy Trinity consists of three persons, three separate consciousnesses, who always agree because they all know the whole truth.
● He then imagines a scenario where the Holy Trinity does not exist, with only God the Father eternal and the Son created or nonexistent.
● In that case, before all creation, only God the Father existed, but nothing existed to observe His existence.
● The author argues that nothing exists if there is no consciousness to observe its existence, and it is impossible to exist if no one sees you exist.
● He gives the example that before birth, we would say the universe does not exist because we do not see it, and only after being born can we say it exists.
● This is why some claim the Earth is only 6,000 years old, because before humans existed, no one could say whether the universe truly existed.
● Another example is an uninhabited island where we would assume Peter does not exist until we go there and see for ourselves.
● Thus, everything exists only relatively in relation to an observer, and without the Holy Trinity, God did not exist before creation because there was no one to observe Him.
● The theory of the Holy Trinity resolves this problem because the Son and the Holy Spirit observe that the Father exists.
● The Father and the Spirit observe that the Son exists, and the Father and the Son observe that the Holy Spirit exists.
● Just as in a court of law two witnesses are required to confirm a fact, so the existence of God is observed by two consciousnesses eternally.
● Without the Holy Trinity, God could not logically exist.
Also read Now That You Are Born Again by Pst Chris Oyakhilome [Summary]
Thus, our world with all the beings existing in it could only have been created by God according to classical theology.
What Kind of Being Could Have Created Our World?
● The author lists all possible options for what kind of being could have created our world, including a created god, a human who became a god, a creation robot, an advanced civilization, the devil, God according to classical theology, one of many independent gods, and an evil god.
● The first option, a god created by another god, fails because the first god would not know what the second god would choose, and creating such a being could result in eternal war.
● A god who is omniscient could not know the future choices of another god, because if he did, the second god would not be equal but a subordinate being.
● Since the first god would never risk creating a being that could choose evil and cause eternal conflict, our world could not have been created by a god created by another god.
● The second option, a human who reached the level of a god, fails because no human can be omniscient since they had a beginning and cannot know an infinite number like pi in its entirety.
● A non-omniscient being cannot create the best possible world, leaving room for eternal injustice, which a truly good and omnipotent God could never allow.
● Therefore, the true God would never grant a human the power to create a world like ours.
● The third option, a creation robot programmed to do only what it is told, fails because a robot without free will could not create beings with free will.
● If the robot gained free will and chose evil, a good God would have to destroy it, but destroying something with free will is a crime a good God cannot commit.
● An evil god would also not create such a robot because a robot choosing good would spread goodness, which an evil god would not want.
● The fourth option, a highly advanced civilization, fails because our expanding universe would eventually collide with theirs, making it unclear which would be destroyed.
● If such a civilization created our world as a simulation with real humans in beds, synchronizing the simulation with real life would be impossible.
● If humans were programs in a simulation, the human psyche that interprets music and beauty cannot be programmed, so we cannot be merely programs.
● The fifth option, the devil, fails because he possesses only angelic powers and cannot create worlds or truly existing beings by word alone.
● If the devil could create beings by speaking them into existence, he would create an infinite number of them and wage an eternal war against God.
● The sixth option, one of many independent gods, fails because if they all have free will, some would inevitably choose evil, leading to eternal conflict.
● Good gods would fight against bad gods, and no one would have time to create our world or engage in sustained creation.
● The seventh option, an evil god, fails because an evil god would not allow good to spread, and Christianity, with its moral teachings centered on good, would not exist.
● An evil god would never have raised Christ from the dead, because he would not want goodness to spread in the world.
● The only remaining option is God according to classical theology, which has no problems because He is omniscient, has an eternal past, and could create the best possible world.
● Existing as three persons who have eternally chosen to be good toward one another, they do not fight but cooperate.
● He could create humans with free will because He Himself has a similar mechanism of free will.
● He alone has the power to create worlds and beings by word, since He would never entrust such powers to anyone else.
● Thus, our world with all the beings existing in it could only have been created by God according to classical theology.
That is why people believe in God: because Christ was seen alive by someone, but no one has ever seen His dead body, so it is logical to conclude that He is alive.
Why Do People Believe in God?
● The author begins by noting that a person missing without information for 7 years is declared dead, and others may inherit their property.
● Thus, we exist only as long as someone sees us, and other conscious beings believe that we exist only as long as they see us.
● The author asks why people believe in God if no one sees Him, and says the answer is not simple, but he will try to explain it.
● Jesus Christ is God for those who believe in Him, and Christ is a historical figure who existed on earth and had 12 disciples.
● God has been seen by someone, namely His disciples and other inhabitants of Palestine, so belief in Christ is based on the fact that someone saw Him.
● But then the question arises: why do people still believe after 2000 years that God is in heaven, even though no one sees Him now?
● One might ask whether the 7-year rule should apply, after which Christ is no longer seen and could be classified as a non-existent person of the past.
● The answer is that Christ rose from the dead and ascended into heaven.
● Therefore, the fact that Jesus’ bones have never been found proves that He is not dead but continues to exist in another dimension, namely heaven.
● That is why people believe in God: because Christ was seen alive by someone, but no one has ever seen His dead body, so it is logical to conclude that He is alive.
● Therefore, Christianity believes in a God who exists.
Love is a feeling composed of these three things: respect, care, and the desire that everything would be good for someone.
What Is Love?
● The author begins by noting that countless books, films, works of art, and musical pieces try to answer what love is, but one must look reality in the eye rather than fantasize.
● He asks whether love in real life is a feeling or an act of will, as many people like to say nowadays.
● To trace what love is, one should look at the areas where it is clearly present and then examine what it consists of.
● The most obvious example is that children love their parents, and they come into this world and instinctively love them in most cases.
● Judging from children’s unconditional love for their parents, it is clear that love is a feeling rather than an act of will, because children do not think about whether to love or not to love.
● The author argues that love, like any other form of love, consists of three feelings: respect, care, and the desire that the object of love would succeed.
● A person you do not respect cannot be loved, because if a person does not deserve respect in your eyes, you will never love them.
● By care, the author does not mean things like washing socks, but rather that you are consistently interested in how that person is doing.
● The more interested you are in how someone is doing, the more it means you love them.
● For example, with many people you can go 10 years without seeing them, but with some you would really want to meet and ask how they are doing, while with others you feel indifferent.
● The final component of love is the desire that everything would be good for the person you love, and the more you want that, the more it means you love them.
● Therefore, love is not an act of will, because you cannot decide to respect a person, and you cannot decide that their fate will matter to you.
● Love is a feeling composed of these three things: respect, care, and the desire that everything would be good for someone.
● Love is not actions or service, because one can serve even someone whose death one desires.
A Quick Note
What you have just read is only a small taste of what awaits you in Impossible Philosophy: Proofs of God, Truth, Eternal Life, and the Meaning of Human Existence by Linas Kučiauskas.
This book contains 26 chapters in total, each one tackling some of the biggest questions humanity has ever asked.
The chapters you have just sampled include:
● Proof of God.
● Proof of Eternal Life.
● How to Find the Truth?
● Explaining the Holy Trinity.
● What Kind of Being Could Have Created Our World?
● Why do People Believe in God?
● What Is Love?
But 19 more chapters are waiting for you inside, including these:
● How Can One Be at Peace Knowing They Have Done Everything to Go to Heaven After Death?
● If God Is Good, Why Did He Create Hell?
● Can There Be Irrefutable Proof That God Exists?
● Proof of the Divinity of Jesus Christ.
● Where Did God Come From?
● Can a Person Become a God After Death?
● Evolution or Creation?
● Is Life Meaningless if God Does Not Exist?
● Why Do Some People Say That Jesus Christ Did Not Fulfill Any of the Prophecies About the Messiah?
● What Is a Cult?
● What Is Evil?
● How Does Christianity Differ from Other World Religions?
If these summaries sparked your curiosity, the full book goes far deeper with complete arguments, examples, and answers you will not want to miss.
Get your copy here: Amazon
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