There’s Nothing That Could Convince Me of Theism
And that's okay!
A common question that atheists ask of theists is what could convince them that there is no god. Theists tend not to have a great answer to this question — atheists take this to signal victory! But I don’t think that this is a great question and it’s not a problem that theists or atheists don’t know what would change their minds.
In science, it makes a good deal of sense to know what would change your mind. After all, scientific theories make precise predictions about the world. Thus, if you don’t know what would falsify your theory, that’s a problem for the theory — it can’t make accurate predictions about the world if there’s no prediction that could ever be inaccurate.
But the same is not true of philosophical theories. I’ll provide a few examples.
Modal realism is the idea that everything that’s metaphysically possible actually happens. The reason that people believe in modal realism is because they think that it explains various concepts — modality, causality, properties, and so on. I have no idea what would convince me of modal realism — it doesn’t make empirical predictions. Thus, my answer to what would convince me of modal realism is ‘some convincing argument, plus my objections being refuted.’
Utilitarianism says we should maximize aggregate well-being. I have no idea what would convince me that utilitarianism were false — once again, it makes no empirical predictions. Thus, once again, the answer would be ‘the balance of arguments favoring disbelief in utilitarianism, rather than belief in it.’
But whether god exists is a philosophical question. While there are some things that should raise our credence in a perfectly good god existing — Jesus returning for example — if on philosophical grounds we think that god almost certainly doesn’t exist, it would be reasonable to suppose that, even if Jesus returned from the dead, problem of evil considerations prove there’s no truly perfect god. There is merely a very powerful entity playing magic tricks — or maybe aliens.
Thus, like with philosophical topics, my answer to the question of what would convince me that there is a god would be ‘having my objections refuted, plus having good reasons to believe in god.’ We should stop thinking about god as a scientific theory, and thus reject the requirement of explicit falsification.
Oh Please. If Jesus Christ came back down from Heaven and started turning Wine into Water you would find a way to get yourself into heaven, even if that meant believing in God.