pastor Douglas Wilson: Is there a God?

Above is a debate between atheist Christopher Hitchens and pastor Douglas Wilson regarding God's existence, hosted in the JoyBehar show, by Moxnews. This post will focus on pastor Douglas arguments that there is a God.

When asked to provide a case for God, that God exists [0:48], Douglas said:

“One of the thing I would like to do is ask about where your starting point is. Who has the burden of proof? So does an automobile [Bill] have the burden of proof of demonstrating there was a Henry Ford or there wasn't.”

[...]
Then, he concludes

“I believe the one who denies the self-evident fact that God exists and created the world. I believe that that is the one who carries the burden of proof.”

Understanding that he has implied some premises and a conclusion, below is my rearrangement of his argument.

The argument above has committed Petitio Principii (begging the question) and Appeal to Ignorance.

Douglas uses the conclusion from the Henry Ford case [Premise 2a] as supporting evidence for God case. I mistakenly thought this was a Weak Analogy since God is much different from a human; however, the fallacy didn't occur. Based on the argument, both God and Henry share two similar attributes: their existences being challenged and their self-evident existences. Henry third attribute: whoever challenges his existences carries the burden of proof, is causally related to the two preceding attributes. Thus, this third attribute can be safely applied to the God case, providing that the two preceding attributes are also true for God.

However, this argument does commit Begging for the question. For the analogy between Henry Ford and God to take place, Douglas must establish that God obviously exists [Premise 2b], which is the ultimate conclusion of the argument. This premise is begging for the question: how do you know that God exists. A conclusion can never be, and must never be a premise of itself “Without supporting reasons or evidence, the argument proves nothing. Yet most people who are predisposed to believe the conclusion are likely to accept the argument as a good one“ [Quoted from aplia online Philosophy textbook, chapter 3-4]

Another fallacy this argument has committed is Appeal to Ignorance. Even if Premise 3a and Premise 3b are true, proving that the atheists failed their burden to disprove God, we still can not safely conclude that God does exist. The absence of evidence shall not be treated as the evidence.

Based on the two fallacies, I conclude that this is a bad argument.