I wish to argue that the former is correct. Well, both are, but there is sometimes some blowback on the flat statement "There is no god" because someone inevitably says, "You can't prove that!"
True enough.
Of course, proving there isn't a god isn't my problem -- the onus is on the believers to prove there is since it's their assertion.
Moreso, I posit that one can legitimately make the claim that there is no god, on the simple basis that the god hypothesis has no empirical support.
By analogy, I am not expected to say that I "believe" there is no phlogiston (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phlogiston_theory), or luminiferous aether (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luminiferous_aether), or caloric (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caloric_theory). These are deprecated theories, long since superseded by better explanations of phenomena, and while there is an infinitesimal chance that some observation might lend them some support, no one expects me to be agnostic about them.
I argue that the same applies to the god hypothesis. It is an ancient theory of how the universe works, long since obsoleted by better observations and better evidence, and I should not be expected to pay it even lip service anymore. If evidence turns up, we'll contend with it then, but after ten thousand years or more of human observation, not one single solitary concrete and incontrovertible shred of evidence has appeared.
As such, I shouldn't need to 'believe' there is no god any more than I should have to 'believe' there is no Planet Vulcan (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vulcan_(hypothetical_planet)) between Mercury and the Sun or that the Earth isn't the center of the universe. I can legitimately say, pending an actual offer of evidence, that there is no reason to accept the hypothesis in the first place -- to wit, there is no god.
Thoughts?
I tell them to prove me wrong. They then blather on for a while. No opinions are changed.
Quote from: Gawdzilla Sama on September 02, 2016, 06:22:24 AM
I tell them to prove me wrong. They then blather on for a while. No opinions are changed.
Yes, but that's a tactic for dealing with a believer. I'm just talking about whether it is logically proper to say 'there is no god' rather than the hedge 'I believe there is no god'.
Quote from: trdsf on September 01, 2016, 11:43:26 PM
I wish to argue that the former is correct. Well, both are, but there is sometimes some blowback on the flat statement "There is no god" because someone inevitably says, "You can't prove that!"
True enough.
Of course, proving there isn't a god isn't my problem -- the onus is on the believers to prove there is since it's their assertion.
Moreso, I posit that one can legitimately make the claim that there is no god, on the simple basis that the god hypothesis has no empirical support.
By analogy, I am not expected to say that I "believe" there is no phlogiston (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phlogiston_theory), or luminiferous aether (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luminiferous_aether), or caloric (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caloric_theory). These are deprecated theories, long since superseded by better explanations of phenomena, and while there is an infinitesimal chance that some observation might lend them some support, no one expects me to be agnostic about them.
I argue that the same applies to the god hypothesis. It is an ancient theory of how the universe works, long since obsoleted by better observations and better evidence, and I should not be expected to pay it even lip service anymore. If evidence turns up, we'll contend with it then, but after ten thousand years or more of human observation, not one single solitary concrete and incontrovertible shred of evidence has appeared.
As such, I shouldn't need to 'believe' there is no god any more than I should have to 'believe' there is no Planet Vulcan (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vulcan_(hypothetical_planet)) between Mercury and the Sun or that the Earth isn't the center of the universe. I can legitimately say, pending an actual offer of evidence, that there is no reason to accept the hypothesis in the first place -- to wit, there is no god.
Thoughts?
I pretty much think as you do. Except, I think there is proof god does not exist--any of them. The absence of evidence is proof. I don't have to prove the Tooth Fairy does not exist by producing evidence that she does not exist. That is not possible. But there is no proof of any kind that she does exist. The absence of any evidence for her is proof she does not exist. If a god hypothesis could be produced and then tested, then there might be a chance that god could exist--until the hypothesis was proven false. But that is not possible to construct. The absence of any kind of evidence demonstrates (at least for me) that god(s) don't exist.
This is where belief and faith come in. That is the only way a god can exist; and that is where people make one up and then insist it is real by believing in it and having faith that it exists. I don't believe in anything or have faith in anything. I don't believe the sun will rise tomorrow; I think it will because of all the evidence that suggests it will. If it doesn't, then I'll revise my thinking. I don't need to rely on belief or faith.
For you and I all of that is, of course, true. There is no God, obviously. You can say that with the same confidence that you can say there are no fairies. Just because people believe it doesn't necessitate any lenience when examining any evidence or lack thereof. You have me convinced.
Convincing believers, however, that's a different story. They don't hold actual logic in such esteem as we. Some of them think they do, but they want to redefine logic to mean "whatever makes sense to me". They don't want to hear the real definition of logic. They don't want to know what logic really means. They just want to be able to use the word because if they do it sounds better for their argument.
And let's face it, these people have literally never used a legitimate, honest argument. Think of all the arguments you've heard. You won't find one that's honest. What if you're wrong? Prove there is no God. I know it in my heart. God believes in you. The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was to convince the world he didn't exist. In those arguments you have, "Just accept I'm right", shifting the burden of proof, "I KNOW I'm right so you should just accept it", "Fuck you, I'm right" and "Fuck you again, I'm still right". I cannot think of one single honest, intelligent argument I have ever heard from the religious camp.
These people aren't big on logic. They don't care about honesty (though they think they do. A lie becomes the truth in your head if you just tell one more lie to yourself). And their arguments are very rarely even about convincing us of anything. Their arguments are generally about scoring points. A discussion with the religious is rarely an avenue of discovery. It's almost always a back and forth match where they are very much keeping track of the points they scored, but never yours. They are not trying to impart knowledge. They are not trying to convince you. Oh, it would be nice for them if they could, but only because of how many points that is worth toward convincing them that they are really, really right.
And that's what most of these conversations are really about. They aren't there for you, they are there for themselves. It's a psychological trick they unwittingly play on themselves to help them hold onto their beliefs. When you believe in fantastical things for which there is no evidence certain steps must be taken to maintain those beliefs. The more fantastical your beliefs the more must be done to maintain those beliefs. Think about the type of people you usually have these conversations with. By and large, the greatest share of them I have been in have been with people in the more extreme religions. Fundamentalist, mostly. People who believe that they are under constant attack for their beliefs. But then they say, "Merry Christmas" to an atheist and he says it right back. That's not very attacky. So what do they do? They pick fights. They piss people off. They make us angry and when we're good and steamed they get to say, "Aha! You just called me a jackass! You're persecuting me!"
While your argument is sound and, in my opinion, utterly correct, it doesn't matter. You're preaching to the choir. If you try preaching this to people who have twisted their brains into believing lunacy is logic and logic (real logic) is used by assholes who want to persecute them it will have no effect except to feed their sick psychological need to feel persecuted.
Quote from: Mike Cl on September 02, 2016, 10:35:44 AM
I pretty much think as you do. Except, I think there is proof god does not exist--any of them. The absence of evidence is proof. I don't have to prove the Tooth Fairy does not exist by producing evidence that she does not exist. That is not possible. But there is no proof of any kind that she does exist. The absence of any evidence for her is proof she does not exist. If a god hypothesis could be produced and then tested, then there might be a chance that god could exist--until the hypothesis was proven false. But that is not possible to construct. The absence of any kind of evidence demonstrates (at least for me) that god(s) don't exist.
This is where belief and faith come in. That is the only way a god can exist; and that is where people make one up and then insist it is real by believing in it and having faith that it exists. I don't believe in anything or have faith in anything. I don't believe the sun will rise tomorrow; I think it will because of all the evidence that suggests it will. If it doesn't, then I'll revise my thinking. I don't need to rely on belief or faith.
Oh, you take me back to my days on UFO forums. "Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence", one particularly nutty UFO nut would tell me. That was occasionally right before she told me that absence of evidence of humans making crop circles (each one had to be examined separately so that if the evidence could not be produced
every single time it still left the door open for belief) that was proof that they weren't created by humans.
Again, you are utterly correct in my opinion. Again, though, it doesn't matter to people who believe lunacy is logic.
It depends on the context of the discussion but in most cases I would go with "I believe there is no god." For most people god is a belief based on faith, not physical evidence. When it comes to god I think most theists are saying based on their subjective experience and understanding of reality they believe in god, where based on my subjective experience and understanding of reality, I do not believe. Also if you say "there is no god" as a statement of fact when the overwhelming majority of people in the world believe in some kind of god it is reasonable for the theist to ask for evidence why your extraordinary claim is true.
What's a god? There are millions of different definitions. Some simply define god as the Universe. In that case, we can say that god does exist. If one does not make the claim that god has always existed and does not make the claim that he controls everything in our Universe, that god could exist (computer programmer), but I personally wouldn't consider that to be a god. Many probably would, though. The idea of a god who has always existed as a thinking being with magic powers, is an illogical concept to me. That's as far as I'm willing to go. Calling it an illogical concept. I wouldn't say that I know for a fact that there is no god. I have no problem with people telling their kids that there is no god though, and I certainly wouldn't consider that to be indoctrination. I've always said that telling your kids there is no god is no different than telling them that there are no monsters under their bed.
'I don't believe there is a god.'
"I have no reason to believe there is a god or gods."
Quote from: Mike Cl on September 02, 2016, 10:35:44 AM
I pretty much think as you do. Except, I think there is proof god does not exist--any of them. The absence of evidence is proof. I don't have to prove the Tooth Fairy does not exist by producing evidence that she does not exist. That is not possible. But there is no proof of any kind that she does exist. The absence of any evidence for her is proof she does not exist. If a god hypothesis could be produced and then tested, then there might be a chance that god could exist--until the hypothesis was proven false. But that is not possible to construct. The absence of any kind of evidence demonstrates (at least for me) that god(s) don't exist.
This is where belief and faith come in. That is the only way a god can exist; and that is where people make one up and then insist it is real by believing in it and having faith that it exists. I don't believe in anything or have faith in anything. I don't believe the sun will rise tomorrow; I think it will because of all the evidence that suggests it will. If it doesn't, then I'll revise my thinking. I don't need to rely on belief or faith.
And, it is
not incumbent upon us to keep looking for evidence. If some is presented, that's one thing, but it's the responsibility of the proponents of the hypothesis to come up with it, not for us to just accept it provisionally and try to break it down.
There is no father christmas.
Now obviously there are countless depictions of father christmas all over the world, and there are people who dress up like him, make up new stories about him, but the character is a story we tell children until they learn, and say 'there is no Santa'.
The idea of father christmas can then carry on to when that kid grows up and has children themselves, until their kid says the same, or asks the question 'is he real?".
I remember when I was a kid, and a school friend told me there's no such thing as him, it was then I thought about it, came to my mum, and told her I don't think father christmas is real, and she nodded and told me how it all worked with the cookies and milk and the list to Santa and early night on Christmas eve, it all fell into place.
Why is it, that every other person in the western culture goes through this as a child, and the clarity of realising you've been told a story by your parents to make-believe, that everyone wakes up to that about father christmas.. but not about God?
Quote from: widdershins on September 02, 2016, 10:36:57 AM
While your argument is sound and, in my opinion, utterly correct, it doesn't matter. You're preaching to the choir. If you try preaching this to people who have twisted their brains into believing lunacy is logic and logic (real logic) is used by assholes who want to persecute them it will have no effect except to feed their sick psychological need to feel persecuted.
Well, not necessarily. I have as often gotten the "you can't say you
know" from
our side as from theirs -- but that's because in the main, we
do care about evidence, and we
do care about logic and we
do care about real values of truth and knowledge. So this is about honing the argument, looking for the weaknesses and gaps in it, checking its solidity and validity, and having it in hand for the intramural debate as well as the external one.
And for some reason, I am reminded of a guy I knew in college who described himself as a 'militant agnostic' and was fond of telling people "I don't know and NEITHER DO YOU!"
Quote from: widdershins on September 02, 2016, 10:41:05 AM
Again, you are utterly correct in my opinion. Again, though, it doesn't matter to people who believe lunacy is logic.
Oh I have hit my head against that wall some many times..................One cannot convince a 'believer' with facts. Sad and true.
Quote from: Mike Cl on September 02, 2016, 03:17:59 PM
Oh I have hit my head against that wall some many times..................One cannot convince a 'believer' with facts. Sad and true.
But one can plant seeds of doubt.
That's what happend with me.
Quote from: trdsf on September 02, 2016, 02:30:44 PM
Well, not necessarily. I have as often gotten the "you can't say you know" from our side as from theirs -- but that's because in the main, we do care about evidence, and we do care about logic and we do care about real values of truth and knowledge. So this is about honing the argument, looking for the weaknesses and gaps in it, checking its solidity and validity, and having it in hand for the intramural debate as well as the external one.
And for some reason, I am reminded of a guy I knew in college who described himself as a 'militant agnostic' and was fond of telling people "I don't know and NEITHER DO YOU!"
Unfortunately our arguments are only better in "reality", which is not where these beliefs are based.
Quote from: Mr.Obvious on September 02, 2016, 03:45:55 PM
But one can plant seeds of doubt.
That's what happend with me.
Yeah, there is that hope. But that does not happen very often. And congrats to you for having a brain and using it. :))
Quote from: widdershins on September 02, 2016, 03:57:50 PM
Unfortunately our arguments are only better in "reality", which is not where these beliefs are based.
Again, this is the point that I'm trying to get at: getting the "you can't know" from someone on the
reason side, not the
belief side, for
reason reasons.
Everyone's taking a whack at the low-hanging fruit of the believers and that's not at issue here.
Epistemology ... how do we know what we know? Some of you believe in physics minus metaphysics ... but even Aristotle has you beat there. For Aristotle, physics was natural philosophy, the philosophy of a nature minus gods or G-d ... though he had an impersonal Unmoved Mover ... to avoid infinite regression. We are more comfortable with infinite regression, so we can dispense with an impersonal Unmoved Mover. And I don't propose a personal one in its place. PS - Aristotle wasn't a materialist like Democritus, Democritus tried to solve the same problem of infinite regression (thanks to Zeno of Elea) by his atoms. Atoms weren't known to exist for sure until the early 20th century (thanks Einstein for a paper people forget, on Brownian Motion).
Santa Clause does exist ... as a meme, a marketing ploy, and as a spirit sometimes seen in the actions of parents. The question isn't does Santa Clause exist, but in what form he exists. There are also department store Santas. So Santa can exist as a person, just not as The Santa.
So as go gods or G-d ... gods or G-d do exist ... but in what forms? One form of course is as a belief. How about any other forms? That depends on your metaphysics ... but one can avoid that by sticking your head in the sand and Just Say No To Metaphysics. Thanks Nancy Reagan.
Quote from: trdsf on September 02, 2016, 06:19:24 PM
Again, this is the point that I'm trying to get at: getting the "you can't know" from someone on the reason side, not the belief side, for reason reasons.
Everyone's taking a whack at the low-hanging fruit of the believers and that's not at issue here.
Most of the people who have doubts about there being a god who I've talked to mostly say that it is unlikely or that it cannot be proven one way or the other. And I think there is a way to prove it. God is in the realm of fictional characters. One cannot prove with empirical evidence that Paul Bunyan did not exist. But there is not a shred of evidence that he did. That is proof of nonexistence--at least for me. If one cannot prove something with evidence, then it simply isn't.
Quote from: Mr.Obvious on September 02, 2016, 03:45:55 PM
But one can plant seeds of doubt.
That's what happend with me.
I call that "awakening the reasoning mind".
Quote from: GSOgymrat on September 02, 2016, 11:31:38 AMAlso if you say "there is no god" as a statement of fact when the overwhelming majority of people in the world believe in some kind of god it is reasonable for the theist to ask for evidence why your extraordinary claim is true.
Yeah, but if you said that Zeus is a fictional character or that unicorns don't exist, no one would ask for evidence of this assertion. This requirement to disprove the belief stems entirely from the popularity of the belief.
Quote from: trdsf on September 01, 2016, 11:43:26 PM
I wish to argue that the former is correct. Well, both are, but there is sometimes some blowback on the flat statement "There is no god" because someone inevitably says, "You can't prove that!"
True enough.
Of course, proving there isn't a god isn't my problem -- the onus is on the believers to prove there is since it's their assertion.
Moreso, I posit that one can legitimately make the claim that there is no god, on the simple basis that the god hypothesis has no empirical support.
By analogy, I am not expected to say that I "believe" there is no phlogiston (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phlogiston_theory), or luminiferous aether (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luminiferous_aether), or caloric (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caloric_theory). These are deprecated theories, long since superseded by better explanations of phenomena, and while there is an infinitesimal chance that some observation might lend them some support, no one expects me to be agnostic about them.
I argue that the same applies to the god hypothesis. It is an ancient theory of how the universe works, long since obsoleted by better observations and better evidence, and I should not be expected to pay it even lip service anymore. If evidence turns up, we'll contend with it then, but after ten thousand years or more of human observation, not one single solitary concrete and incontrovertible shred of evidence has appeared.
As such, I shouldn't need to 'believe' there is no god any more than I should have to 'believe' there is no Planet Vulcan (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vulcan_(hypothetical_planet)) between Mercury and the Sun or that the Earth isn't the center of the universe. I can legitimately say, pending an actual offer of evidence, that there is no reason to accept the hypothesis in the first place -- to wit, there is no god.
Thoughts?
Asking whether god exists is just a silly question. It is likely that god doesn't exist, but it is something that is not able to be proven for absolute certain. The only things able to be proven without a shadow of a doubt are mathematical truths derived from a set of axioms.
Quote from: Mike Cl on September 02, 2016, 07:31:51 PM
Most of the people who have doubts about there being a god who I've talked to mostly say that it is unlikely or that it cannot be proven one way or the other. And I think there is a way to prove it. God is in the realm of fictional characters. One cannot prove with empirical evidence that Paul Bunyan did not exist. But there is not a shred of evidence that he did. That is proof of nonexistence--at least for me. If one cannot prove something with evidence, then it simply isn't.
You and I are fictional characters, and not just on this site. You are an unnamed actor playing the part of Mike, and I am the same or different actor playing the part of Baruch. Unlike the morons of the West, the Hindus address this. It is called atman vs brahman. Your atman is your soul, but that is not your ego. Your ego is the part you play, which you mostly ad lib. Atman is who is playing that part. In theory at least, all the many atmans are one, and are one person, called the brahman ... not the same as the Hindu god Brahman. Even if you are completely convinced you are Mike (the guy behind your postings as your alter ego here ... you are just deluded as much as any believer). You believe that your ego is you ... but if you have enough skepticism about that ... then you are on your way beyond where you are now.
Quote from: Gawdzilla Sama on September 03, 2016, 09:00:28 AM
I call that "awakening the reasoning mind".
If you don't have as much doubt as David Hume, then you don't doubt enough ;-)
Quote from: Baruch on September 03, 2016, 11:06:11 AM
If you don't have as much doubt as David Hume, then you don't doubt enough ;-)
I doubt that.
Quote from: DeltaEpsilon on September 03, 2016, 10:54:39 AM
Asking whether god exists is just a silly question. It is likely that god doesn't exist, but it is something that is not able to be proven for absolute certain. The only things able to be proven without a shadow of a doubt are mathematical truths derived from a set of axioms.
People use language loosely. Proof and demonstration are not the same. Proof only applies to mathematics ... and is less correct than people believe. Foundations of Mathematics people have found over the last 100 years, that lots of math are conventions, not even completly consistent, but only relatively consistent. Demonstrations mean empirical evidence. I have empirical evidence that I have a right hand ... and if you were here, I could demonstrate that for you. So people really say, demonstrate that G-d exists ... but the standards for evidence vary ... that is where the rubber hits the road ... standards for evidence. For me ... the existence of my right hand is proof that G-d exists ... and not because it is well designed ... it isn't.
Your god is incompetent?
Quote from: Gawdzilla Sama on September 03, 2016, 11:15:28 AM
Your god is incompetent?
Duh, even Genesis makes that clear. Greek theological ideals are total ouzo induced.
Quote from: Baruch on September 03, 2016, 11:26:35 AM
Duh, even Genesis makes that clear. Greek theological ideals are total ouzo induced.
Not a god then.
Quote from: Gawdzilla Sama on September 03, 2016, 01:17:20 PM
Not a god then.
I'd certainly consider it to be a/ the god. If the first thing to have ever existed, was a thinking being who then created everything else, to me that's God, no matter how shitty it was at creation. Actually, now that I think about it, it probably would make more sense that God would not be the best at creating stuff, because God had no one to teach him how to create. He would have been self taught. He would have had to wing it, so we should expect there to be mistakes. If you go by the definition that most Christians, Muslims, etc. go with, then yes, that wouldn't be the god that they believe in, who is described as a perfect being.
Quote from: Hydra009 on September 03, 2016, 10:42:46 AM
Yeah, but if you said that Zeus is a fictional character or that unicorns don't exist, no one would ask for evidence of this assertion. This requirement to disprove the belief stems entirely from the popularity of the belief.
The majority of people do not believe, and have never believed, Zeus is real or unicorns exist. Humans throughout history in almost all cultures have believed in gods. God(s) in some form is a very persistent belief. To make as a statement of fact that there is no god, there has never been any kind of god and that almost everyone throughout history has been wrong is what I would consider an extrodinary claim, particularly when belief in gods is typically not based on evidence or logic.
I do not believe in god because I have no subjective experience of god and therefore require compelling evidence or a rational explanation of why such a thing exists. Theists have a subjective experience of god, and/or believe based on faith alone, and/or have poor rationales for believing in god-- none of which persuade me to change my belief. I'm not claiming "There is no god", I'm not telling every religious person on the planet "I am right, you are wrong", but saying "I believe there is no god" and for me to change my believe I need to be persuaded.
A woman looks at an abstract painting and sees a unicorn. I look at the same painting and only see colorful geometric shapes. I believe she sees a unicorn, I'm not going to tell her she is wrong, only that I sincerely don't see it.
Quote from: FaithIsFilth on September 03, 2016, 01:27:36 PM
I'd certainly consider it to be a/ the god. If the first thing to have ever existed, was a thinking being who then created everything else, to me that's God, no matter how shitty it was at creation. Actually, now that I think about it, it probably would make more sense that God would not be the best at creating stuff, because God had no one to teach him how to create. He would have been self taught. He would have had to wing it, so we should expect there to be mistakes. If you go by the definition that most Christians, Muslims, etc. go with, then yes, that wouldn't be the god that they believe in, who is described as a perfect being.
Sounds like the godhead is getting grey and going bald.
I would say you would be correct in saying " you don't believe there is a god" because if you made the statement " there is no God" then you would have to be all knowing and we know you are not that.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Quote from: Baruch on September 03, 2016, 11:05:11 AM
You and I are fictional characters, and not just on this site. You are an unnamed actor playing the part of Mike, and I am the same or different actor playing the part of Baruch. Unlike the morons of the West, the Hindus address this. It is called atman vs brahman. Your atman is your soul, but that is not your ego. Your ego is the part you play, which you mostly ad lib. Atman is who is playing that part. In theory at least, all the many atmans are one, and are one person, called the brahman ... not the same as the Hindu god Brahman. Even if you are completely convinced you are Mike (the guy behind your postings as your alter ego here ... you are just deluded as much as any believer). You believe that your ego is you ... but if you have enough skepticism about that ... then you are on your way beyond where you are now.
I quite disagree. I do exist. You can see me and touch me (but be careful where and how :). You can prove I exist--I have a birth certificate and I'm not from Kenya. I am aware of the ego and the other various parts of my personality. Emotion/reason is always in play and are in constant battle. Therefore, I may act one way today and another way tomorrow; both from what I've learned and from the outcome of the emotional/reason battle.
All god(s) are fiction. That, as far as I'm concerned, has been proven beyond a doubt. Just because most people believe something (god exists) does not make it true. Great faith and belief does not turn a belief into a fact. And it matters not how sincere you are. So, when I hear the phrase--He is a man of great and sincere faith.---I just think this guy is exceptionally blindly stupid and willfully ignorant. A fiction is a fiction--something or someone based on imagination and nothing else; fiction can never be fact. I don't care how deeply your yearning is for there to be a god--it is still a fiction and shall remain so for the rest of time.
Quote from: GSOgymrat on September 03, 2016, 04:22:08 PMI do not believe in god because I have no subjective experience of god and therefore require compelling evidence or a rational explanation of why such a thing exists. Theists have a subjective experience of god, and/or believe based on faith alone, and/or have poor rationales for believing in god-- none of which persuade me to change my belief. I'm not claiming "There is no god", I'm not telling every religious person on the planet "I am right, you are wrong", but saying "I believe there is no god" and for me to change my believe I need to be persuaded.
Isn't public disbelief and arguing against the idea a pretty good indicator that you do in fact think the belief is wrong? You might not explicitly say that they're wrong, but you give every indication that you think they're wrong.
Let's say you go to a village and they revere some Naga Queen. Everyone buys into it. They try to proselytize to you but you're not won over. You point out contradictions in their holy text, take exceptions to some especially dubious claims associated with their religion, and generally regard the blind devotion that they show this being as antithetical to modern values of reason and skepticism. They're predictably pretty upset about this condemnation. Hostile, even.
Sensing a violent confrontation, you say that the following: "I'm not saying you're wrong, I just don't buy into this at all. I think it's irrational. I think your holy text was written by people without any sort of divine guidance. I've heard your stories and I don't personally give them any sort of credence. I'm not scared of this alleged curse of the Naga Queen on nonbelievers. I don't anticipate any coming Age of Snakes. I don't view the new moon as holy. I don't believe any of that stuff, but I'm not saying you're wrong."
Do you think this position would be regarded as substantively different from the position of a person who claims that the Naga Queen doesn't exist?
QuoteA woman looks at an abstract painting and sees a unicorn. I look at the same painting and only see colorful geometric shapes. I believe she sees a unicorn, I'm not going to tell her she is wrong, only that I sincerely don't see it.
The meaning of an abstract painting is necessarily subjective. A more true to life example would be a mountain spring that people claim heals the ailments, ranging from the common cold to cancer. Empirical data doesn't bear that out, but people swear by the stuff. Can I tell them they're wrong? Of course.
Quote from: Hydra009 on September 03, 2016, 08:57:41 PM
Isn't public disbelief and arguing against the idea a pretty good indicator that you do in fact think the belief is wrong? You might not explicitly say that they're wrong, but you give every indication that you think they're wrong.
Let's say you go to a village and they revere some Naga Queen. Everyone buys into it. They try to proselytize to you but you're not won over. You point out contradictions in their holy text, take exceptions to some especially dubious claims associated with their religion, and generally regard the blind devotion that they show this being as antithetical to modern values of reason and skepticism. They're predictably pretty upset about this condemnation. Hostile, even.
Sensing a violent confrontation, you say that the following: "I'm not saying you're wrong, I just don't buy into this at all. I think it's irrational. I think your holy text was written by people without any sort of divine guidance. I've heard your stories and I don't personally give them any sort of credence. I'm not scared of this alleged curse of the Naga Queen on nonbelievers. I don't anticipate any coming Age of Snakes. I don't view the new moon as holy. I don't believe any of that stuff, but I'm not saying you're wrong."
Do you think this position would be regarded as substantively different from the position of a person who claims that the Naga Queen doesn't exist?
Perhaps the distinction has to do with level of certainty. If everyone around me agrees that Naga Queen exists and I am the one person who doesn't get it I'm going to question my own perception or interpretation of events.
Quote from: Gawdzilla Sama on September 03, 2016, 06:06:48 PM
Sounds like the godhead is getting grey and going bald.
That is how the Canaanites described El ... a doddering fool, not respectful to grandfathers anywhere. That is why they went with the dying/rising young male god, Ba'al ... as eventually did the Christians (but not Jews or Muslims, who are actual cousins). Also Ba'al usually had the same powers as Zeus ... so important for rain, thunder and lightning. El was on Medicare, since the beginning of time.
GSOgymrat ... another fallacy? Argument from unpopularity? The atomic hypothesis was unpopular for most of history, until the early 20th century. Though by original definition, it was also shown at that time, that atoms are composite, not simple, can be cut ... so Greek atoms do not exist, just the kidnapping of a Greek term slapped onto modern atomic theory ... and Zeon's paradox still stings ... hence the desire to prove planck lengh as a minimum distance/time.
Quote from: Gawdzilla Sama on September 03, 2016, 01:17:20 PM
Not a god then.
Classic strawman .... too bad that fallacy is so popular with the rational. Create an Greek ideal metaphysical god ... and slap self on back when it doesn't exist (except as a concept of course).
Mike ... you and I are not real. Krishna is the only reality, and you and I and every other being, are merely Krishna using the Internet (which as creator he is responsible for ... not Al Gore) ... because Krishna likes to spam and troll himself ... and other more personal things I can't mention ;-) Being a method actor, Krishna gets into all his roles, and forgets he is Krishna.
Quote from: GSOgymrat on September 04, 2016, 03:02:02 PM
Perhaps the distinction has to do with level of certainty. If everyone around me agrees that Naga Queen exists and I am the one person who doesn't get it I'm going to question my own perception or interpretation of events.
Go visit Nagaland in E India then. In some places, you will be the only one who disbelieves ;-) And yes, in ancient times most Greeks believed in Zeus, were not as cynical as the Roman government ... and this is why they executed Socrates. Disbelieving that the Emperor was god incarnate ... would also get you executed.
[quote author=Baruch link=topic=10665.msg1146708#msg1146708 date=1473080493
Mike ... you and I are not real. Krishna is the only reality, and you and I and every other being, are merely Krishna using the Internet (which as creator he is responsible for ... not Al Gore) ... because Krishna likes to spam and troll himself ... and other more personal things I can't mention ;-) Being a method actor, Krishna gets into all his roles, and forgets he is Krishna.
[/quote]
Okay. But even if I'm a simulation being run from on high, I bleed when I cut myself with a knife or I hurt when I hit my fingers with a hammer. As far as I know, I've not seen or heard Krishna do anything. So, in your world Krishna may be the reality, but not in mine. Krishna is and always will be, a fiction.
Quote from: Baruch on September 05, 2016, 09:01:33 AM
Classic strawman .... too bad that fallacy is so popular with the rational. Create an Greek ideal metaphysical god ... and slap self on back when it doesn't exist (except as a concept of course).
Making less sense than normal, guy.
Quote from: GSOgymrat on September 04, 2016, 03:02:02 PM
Perhaps the distinction has to do with level of certainty. If everyone around me agrees that Naga Queen exists and I am the one person who doesn't get it I'm going to question my own perception or interpretation of events.
Exactly the point I made earlier. The distinction in the title is purely a function of popularity. For extinct or obscure cults, you can freely say that they're wrong. For more popular cults, nonbelievers are pushed to publicly eschewing their beliefs while privately believing (but rarely/never voicing) that they're wrong.
I just say, "I don't believe in God," and that's about all the information people are equipped to handle. There's really not much need to nail down my levels of certainty or whether I'm a strong, weak, or agnostic atheist. I just don't believe in God. People in this forum might ask for more information to clarify the specifics, but in the real world, it doesn't make much difference how you state your position, because people are going to make their own opinions about whatever they think it was that you just said, and they will run with that, even if you said something else entirely.
High-tech-philia. Technies want to be Holodeck simulations, so that they can possibly find the cheat codes and change reality or otherwise live forever. It is a high tech wishing-tree. But something low tech like the Gita ... not possible!
Quote from: DeltaEpsilon on September 03, 2016, 10:54:39 AM
Asking whether god exists is just a silly question. It is likely that god doesn't exist, but it is something that is not able to be proven for absolute certain. The only things able to be proven without a shadow of a doubt are mathematical truths derived from a set of axioms.
It's not a silly question, although there are a lot of silly answers.
Do you not think we could (if we haven't already) reach the point that we can say, "Look, there's no reason to accept the hypothesis that a god exists in the first place" and at that point, it becomes legitimate to say "there is no" rather than "I believe there is no"?
I'm not asking for anything more than the level of evidence we have to say that there is no phlogiston or caloric. Or are you saying that I should say I believe they don't exist?
Quote from: trdsf on September 02, 2016, 06:19:24 PM
Again, this is the point that I'm trying to get at: getting the "you can't know" from someone on the reason side, not the belief side, for reason reasons.
Everyone's taking a whack at the low-hanging fruit of the believers and that's not at issue here.
I'm afraid I really have no idea what you're saying there. Too many uses of the word "reason" to be easily reasoned, I guess. My only problem is that once you make the claim that there is no God then it is on you to prove your claim, which is impossible.
It's not like it matters in the grand scheme of things anyway. Rare is the initiate who so much has the desire to understand what you are saying, much less enough remaining ability for thinking critically to process it.
Quote from: widdershins on September 06, 2016, 04:17:11 PM
My only problem is that once you make the claim that there is no God then it is on you to prove your claim, which is impossible.
I must disagree. I don's see the default setting as believing in god(s), or the tooth fairy, or bugs bunny, or Betty Crocker, or Paul Bunyan...............or any other imagined character. For me the default is that nothing and nobody exists. So, if I claim my mother existed, then I need to prove that---which is easy enough to do. The same for everybody and everything in the universe. So, when I say that god does not exist, that is not a 'claim'. It is a statement of fact. Can anybody show me evidence that I am wrong. So, in my statement, I made no claim. However, when a theist says there is a god, then he is making a 'claim' and it is up to him to provide some evidence to establish that god does exist. Why should a person who believes in a fiction, demand that we prove that they are wrong? It is the opposite--the theist needs to prove that they are right, and with evidence.
You don't HAVE TO SAY either of those.
Quote from: trdsf on September 02, 2016, 10:13:51 AM
Yes, but that's a tactic for dealing with a believer. I'm just talking about whether it is logically proper to say 'there is no god' rather than the hedge 'I believe there is no god'.
I've never had a problem with asserting that there are no gods. I do like to be inclusive by using the plural form - I don't like to discriminate. Like Dan Fouts, I'm a polyatheist.
I don't think it's that hard to say there is no god. And you can use "ad populaum".
Since no god has a vast majority of believers the overwhelming majority don't believe in your flavor of god.
Simple history proves that..yes…humanity has had thousands of gods…where did they come from? Everyone will say they came from the imagination of man..except for their god…he is a true god. Or you run into the occasional whacko that proclaims all the gods existed but the god of abraham pummeled them into oblivion sometime…..long time ago…..
Quote from: Mike Cl on September 06, 2016, 05:16:07 PM
I must disagree. I don's see the default setting as believing in god(s), or the tooth fairy, or bugs bunny, or Betty Crocker, or Paul Bunyan...............or any other imagined character. For me the default is that nothing and nobody exists. So, if I claim my mother existed, then I need to prove that---which is easy enough to do. The same for everybody and everything in the universe. So, when I say that god does not exist, that is not a 'claim'. It is a statement of fact. Can anybody show me evidence that I am wrong. So, in my statement, I made no claim. However, when a theist says there is a god, then he is making a 'claim' and it is up to him to provide some evidence to establish that god does exist. Why should a person who believes in a fiction, demand that we prove that they are wrong? It is the opposite--the theist needs to prove that they are right, and with evidence.
There is no "default" in any position. There is only that for which there is evidence and that for which there is not. I very much loath the idea of a "default" because that is what theists believe their position is. They believe if they can shoot holes in anything they don't like, leaving no valid explanation but theirs, they win by "default". The very foundation of Intelligent Design is built on the predication that if they can show that evolution is wrong it makes ID right by default. I will never accept the concept of a "default position" because I have been bashed over the head with that idea so much already that I believe the concept to be dangerous and ignorant and arrogant. Besides, to the theist, theirs is the "default". Saying yours is the "default position" is really just another claim.
And saying "there is no God" is very much a claim, not a "fact". A fact is that which is indisputably true. That God does not exist is hotly disputed, therefore not fact. It IS a claim. When you are stating "This thing is true" you are making a claim unless it is "indisputably true". That your mother existed, THAT is a fact, not a claim. Everybody understands biology and if you say, "I had a mother" nobody is going to dispute that. It is "indisputably true", therefore a fact, not a claim. You have it exactly backward there.
Anyone making a claim has voluntarily taken it upon himself to provide evidence in support of that claim. I've noticed around here lately that we atheists tend to want to excuse ourselves from that requirement. But we cannot. Look, our position is easy. All we have to do is to defend against fantastical claims of great magical powers. That's pretty damned easy to do. We don't need to weaken the standards to do it. But if we weaken the standards for ourselves we then open the door to the theist finding an excuse to weaken the standards for themselves, something they try to do all the time anyway. We have to hold ourselves to a higher standard. Not doing so actually WEAKENS our position.
There are no gods. There are no fairies, no trolls, no elves. There are no ghosts. There is no Bigfoot, no Nessy. No aliens have ever visited our planet. That is what I
believe. But none of those things are "facts" because none of those things are "indisputably true". They are my beliefs. How disputed each is depends on which claim you're talking about and who you're talking to about it. I can't prove any of those things. It's not like trolls not existing leaves nega-troll footprints under bridges that I can find and say, "Ha! Here are footprints of NOT a troll!" I can't prove that there are no trolls, I just don't see evidence for them. But maybe there's someone out there in the world who does believe they have seen evidence to show trolls existed. Theists believe they've seen evidence God exists, often. So how would a conversation go if we believed that there was a default position, that ours was it and that if they could not present evidence we would accept we win by "default"? Side T has a lot of evidence to support it. But side A rejects all of that evidence. Side A has a well thought out rebuttal to all the evidence presented. Of course, side T rejects the rejection of much, if not all of the evidence. They don't accept that this evidence is not valid. But side A insists that it is invalid. After soundly refuting all of the evidence, leaving no evidence remaining unchallenged, side A wins by default. Does that sound about right? I bet you figured out side T was "theists" and side A was "atheists" there. But what if we switched them. Side T is now evolution, side A is now Intelligent Design. THAT is how the arguments go, which is very revealing. It tells me EXACTLY why one would want to claim to have the "default" position. They don't have the evidence to prove their point, so instead they would like to win by just disproving yours. If you argued that the sky was yellow and I argued that it was really purple do I prove I'm right by proving you're wrong? Of course not. That's not how logic works. So I then claim that mine is the "default" position and NOW I can prove that I'm right by proving you're wrong. Like anyone, you want to claim a "default" so that you can prove you are right, but you can't, ever. You can never prove you're right. It's obvious you are to anyone who has looked into it objectively, but you can never "prove" it. But you know what? That's okay. Scientists can never "prove" anything either. There is nothing past theory. Everything in science is no better than "true until we find a truer truth". It's okay to not be able to give a definitive "Aha! I am right and here's the proof!" It's okay to just say, "All the evidence says I am right and until there is evidence to the contrary, that's my position".
I would rather accept that I can't prove it, that I could be wrong, but there is no evidence to suggest that I am, than to weaken my position, my credibility and my critical thought process to pretend that my position is any stronger than it really is. My position is plenty strong already. I don't need to take that extra step toward "I win any and all arguments unless you can prove I'm wrong", which is neither honest nor intellectually sound.
Quote from: widdershins on September 07, 2016, 10:47:21 AM
There is no "default" in any position. There is only that for which there is evidence and that for which there is not. I very much loath the idea of a "default" because that is what theists believe their position is. They believe if they can shoot holes in anything they don't like, leaving no valid explanation but theirs, they win by "default". The very foundation of Intelligent Design is built on the predication that if they can show that evolution is wrong it makes ID right by default. I will never accept the concept of a "default position" because I have been bashed over the head with that idea so much already that I believe the concept to be dangerous and ignorant and arrogant. Besides, to the theist, theirs is the "default". Saying yours is the "default position" is really just another claim.
And saying "there is no God" is very much a claim, not a "fact". A fact is that which is indisputably true. That God does not exist is hotly disputed, therefore not fact. It IS a claim. When you are stating "This thing is true" you are making a claim unless it is "indisputably true". That your mother existed, THAT is a fact, not a claim. Everybody understands biology and if you say, "I had a mother" nobody is going to dispute that. It is "indisputably true", therefore a fact, not a claim. You have it exactly backward there.
Anyone making a claim has voluntarily taken it upon himself to provide evidence in support of that claim. I've noticed around here lately that we atheists tend to want to excuse ourselves from that requirement. But we cannot. Look, our position is easy. All we have to do is to defend against fantastical claims of great magical powers. That's pretty damned easy to do. We don't need to weaken the standards to do it. But if we weaken the standards for ourselves we then open the door to the theist finding an excuse to weaken the standards for themselves, something they try to do all the time anyway. We have to hold ourselves to a higher standard. Not doing so actually WEAKENS our position.
There are no gods. There are no fairies, no trolls, no elves. There are no ghosts. There is no Bigfoot, no Nessy. No aliens have ever visited our planet. That is what I believe. But none of those things are "facts" because none of those things are "indisputably true". They are my beliefs. How disputed each is depends on which claim you're talking about and who you're talking to about it. I can't prove any of those things. It's not like trolls not existing leaves nega-troll footprints under bridges that I can find and say, "Ha! Here are footprints of NOT a troll!" I can't prove that there are no trolls, I just don't see evidence for them. But maybe there's someone out there in the world who does believe they have seen evidence to show trolls existed. Theists believe they've seen evidence God exists, often. So how would a conversation go if we believed that there was a default position, that ours was it and that if they could not present evidence we would accept we win by "default"? Side T has a lot of evidence to support it. But side A rejects all of that evidence. Side A has a well thought out rebuttal to all the evidence presented. Of course, side T rejects the rejection of much, if not all of the evidence. They don't accept that this evidence is not valid. But side A insists that it is invalid. After soundly refuting all of the evidence, leaving no evidence remaining unchallenged, side A wins by default. Does that sound about right? I bet you figured out side T was "theists" and side A was "atheists" there. But what if we switched them. Side T is now evolution, side A is now Intelligent Design. THAT is how the arguments go, which is very revealing. It tells me EXACTLY why one would want to claim to have the "default" position. They don't have the evidence to prove their point, so instead they would like to win by just disproving yours. If you argued that the sky was yellow and I argued that it was really purple do I prove I'm right by proving you're wrong? Of course not. That's not how logic works. So I then claim that mine is the "default" position and NOW I can prove that I'm right by proving you're wrong. Like anyone, you want to claim a "default" so that you can prove you are right, but you can't, ever. You can never prove you're right. It's obvious you are to anyone who has looked into it objectively, but you can never "prove" it. But you know what? That's okay. Scientists can never "prove" anything either. There is nothing past theory. Everything in science is no better than "true until we find a truer truth". It's okay to not be able to give a definitive "Aha! I am right and here's the proof!" It's okay to just say, "All the evidence says I am right and until there is evidence to the contrary, that's my position".
I would rather accept that I can't prove it, that I could be wrong, but there is no evidence to suggest that I am, than to weaken my position, my credibility and my critical thought process to pretend that my position is any stronger than it really is. My position is plenty strong already. I don't need to take that extra step toward "I win any and all arguments unless you can prove I'm wrong", which is neither honest nor intellectually sound.
Ah, thank you, this is
exactly the kind of debate I was wanting.
The position I'm trying to stake out is that the god hypothesis of how the world works belongs to the same category as the caloric theory of heat and the luminiferous æther theory of light propogation -- and scientists quite properly say that there is no caloric and there is no æther without having to qualify it with ''I believe", and their non-existence is essentially considered proven despite the so-called impossibility of proving a negative. And no one is trying to find either of those (or phlogiston, or the four humours, or any one of a countless number of deprecated theories) on the chance that they might have missed something.
Of course, if some observation turned up that could not be explained any other way that required bringing any of those theories back, that would happen. That, as much as rigor and logic, is the real strength of the rationalist position, that when it needs to change, it does so, and based on reality rather than nostalgia.
And the god argument now, I think, belongs in that same category, and that in the same way that I can say there is no æther, I should be able to say there is no god, without qualification.
For me it's, "I don't think there is a god" or "I think there is no god" or "I assume there is no god". I don't like "I believe there is no god" or "I know there is no god". Simply "there is no god" I'm generally fine with, but people mean different things when they say that. Some of them are meaning that that is their assumption. Others mean that this is something that they know for certain.
Quote from: trdsf on September 07, 2016, 02:40:06 PM
Ah, thank you, this is exactly the kind of debate I was wanting.
The position I'm trying to stake out is that the god hypothesis of how the world works belongs to the same category as the caloric theory of heat and the luminiferous æther theory of light propogation -- and scientists quite properly say that there is no caloric and there is no æther without having to qualify it with ''I believe", and their non-existence is essentially considered proven despite the so-called impossibility of proving a negative. And no one is trying to find either of those (or phlogiston, or the four humours, or any one of a countless number of deprecated theories) on the chance that they might have missed something.
Of course, if some observation turned up that could not be explained any other way that required bringing any of those theories back, that would happen. That, as much as rigor and logic, is the real strength of the rationalist position, that when it needs to change, it does so, and based on reality rather than nostalgia.
And the god argument now, I think, belongs in that same category, and that in the same way that I can say there is no æther, I should be able to say there is no god, without qualification.
The problem I have with that is that you're trying to apply scientific principals to a supernatural claim made not made by science. That God exists is not a theory by scientific terms, nor is that God does not exist. As you well know science deals with the physical universe only. While science can be applied to claims of miracles, which are claimed to have a measurable effect on the physical world, God, as an entity, is not himself measurable or quantifiable, only his influence on the physical universe is. This is why science can investigate claims of ghosts or psychic powers. These things are said to affect the physical universe and that can be measured, so science can say that no such evidence exists. Science cannot, however, make the claim that there is no soul. While "soul" and "ghost" generally refer to the same nonsense, a soul is an imagined part of our being while a ghost is a free roaming soul with observable physical effects. Strictly speaking there can be no "god hypothesis" if you are speaking of any god which resides outside of our physical universe.
This is why no scientist worth his salt would ever try to prove there are no gods, or that there are one or more gods. The very concept lies outside the realm of science, the study of the
physical. I posit that if the claim cannot be investigated with scientific method, which it cannot, then we cannot draw conclusions in the same way scientist do. Furthermore, you, yourself, allowed that even though scientists
say there is no æther that does not mean that they are ruling it out with 100% certainty. What they
say and what they
mean are two different things. That is acceptable within science because when they say "Steady State theory is wrong" what they are
really saying is "There is currently more evidence to support Big Bang theory". And when talking to laymen they do use the same language, but they don't do it for the purpose of stating "This is absolutely correct", though it does come off that way to many laymen. They do it because they don't want to explain each and every time how science works. They do it as a convenience. But I doubt your reasoning for not wanting to state "I believe..." or "There is no evidence to support..." is not the same as that of a scientist who is essentially saying, "I don't want to spend 2 hours explaining why I am not making an absolute claim, just expressing what the evidence supports according to current understanding..."
Just because we hold ourselves to scientific standards does not mean we are allowed the same liberties taken by scientists involved in science. You must admit, for scientists to have to explain why they simply state scientific theories as fact and that they don't actually hold them as fact would be tedious and time consuming. Every scientific announcement would be preceded by something akin to an End User License Agreement. You know, those things that pop up when you install software that hardly anyone reads and even fewer read thoroughly. Science, by its nature, is complicated. Even words we use all the time have
completely different meanings in science. When I'm in my car if I am speeding up I, that is acceleration. If I am slowing down, that is deceleration. In physics if I am speeding up, slowing down or maintaining the same speed but changing directions, that is all acceleration. Will you adapt their terminology too? If I slam on my brakes and you hit your head on the dash will you chastise me for my excessive acceleration? Not likely. Science, its terminology and its privilege is for scientists. Like it or not, we mere mortals live by different rules and we cannot borrow just those we like from science to use to our advantage when speaking to other mere mortals.
And now for a little jackasserey. I'm not gay. I have pictures of me not being gay to prove it!
Quote from: aitm on September 06, 2016, 08:36:19 PM
I don't think it's that hard to say there is no god. And you can use "ad populaum".
Since no god has a vast majority of believers the overwhelming majority don't believe in your flavor of god.
Simple history proves that..yes…humanity has had thousands of gods…where did they come from? Everyone will say they came from the imagination of man..except for their god…he is a true god. Or you run into the occasional whacko that proclaims all the gods existed but the god of abraham pummeled them into oblivion sometime…..long time ago…..
Or human imagination is real ... just on a different plane than secular reality.
Quote from: Baruch on September 07, 2016, 05:59:42 PM
Or human imagination is real ... just on a different plane than secular reality.
but us humans always tend to suggest that our imagination is better than animals and their reality is somehow not nearly as defined as ours because of god. Yet if you put a tree, shrub, mosquito, squirrel or human in an device that separates atoms into their own families, you find little difference.
There is no God, and I believe there is no God, so my belief seems to mirror reality.
Mere coincidence? I think not.
Quote from: widdershins on September 07, 2016, 03:58:03 PM
The problem I have with that is that you're trying to apply scientific principals to a supernatural claim made not made by science. That God exists is not a theory by scientific terms, nor is that God does not exist. As you well know science deals with the physical universe only. While science can be applied to claims of miracles, which are claimed to have a measurable effect on the physical world, God, as an entity, is not himself measurable or quantifiable, only his influence on the physical universe is. This is why science can investigate claims of ghosts or psychic powers. These things are said to affect the physical universe and that can be measured, so science can say that no such evidence exists. Science cannot, however, make the claim that there is no soul. While "soul" and "ghost" generally refer to the same nonsense, a soul is an imagined part of our being while a ghost is a free roaming soul with observable physical effects. Strictly speaking there can be no "god hypothesis" if you are speaking of any god which resides outside of our physical universe.
Even if this hypothetical god is outside the universe, the effects this god is supposed to be able to produce are inside it, so it can't be separated entirely from scientific inquiry.
So why shouldn't the god hypothesis be treated the same way as any other? It is, after all, merely a primitive attempt to understand what makes the world work. Lightning? Thunder god. Rain? Rain god. Volcano? Fire god. Good fishing today? Thank the ocean god.
Thousands of years later, we know better: there is no evidence of a guiding intellect. In fact, modern science has essentially done away with determinism, and a theistic universe -- at least one that proposes an omniscient personal, interactive god -- requires determinism in order for omniscience I think. A deistic universe, with an impersonal and uninvolved god, has no observational differences from a non-deistic universe, so the extra theory can be discarded as extraneous.
Either way, I think you can get there from here. There can't be something that affects the universe but is completely outside it, and it's going to take one hell of an interesting observation to disprove that.
Quote from: widdershins on September 07, 2016, 03:58:03 PM
This is why no scientist worth his salt would ever try to prove there are no gods, or that there are one or more gods. The very concept lies outside the realm of science, the study of the physical. I posit that if the claim cannot be investigated with scientific method, which it cannot, then we cannot draw conclusions in the same way scientist do. Furthermore, you, yourself, allowed that even though scientists say there is no æther that does not mean that they are ruling it out with 100% certainty. What they say and what they mean are two different things. That is acceptable within science because when they say "Steady State theory is wrong" what they are really saying is "There is currently more evidence to support Big Bang theory". And when talking to laymen they do use the same language, but they don't do it for the purpose of stating "This is absolutely correct", though it does come off that way to many laymen. They do it because they don't want to explain each and every time how science works. They do it as a convenience. But I doubt your reasoning for not wanting to state "I believe..." or "There is no evidence to support..." is not the same as that of a scientist who is essentially saying, "I don't want to spend 2 hours explaining why I am not making an absolute claim, just expressing what the evidence supports according to current understanding..."
And that's fine, assuming all the terminological baggage -- I
do assume it. That's specifically why I say 'no god' in the same sense as 'no phlogiston' -- if evidence turned up that potentially indicated a god, I would have to take notice of it. But I'm not required to go looking for it, and the better explanations we currently have do a much better job of explaining reality.
No one would bat an eye at "There is no Zeus" or "There is no Ba'al" or "There is no C'thulhu". Yahweh, Allah, and Vishnu belong in the same generalized class -- why should they be treated differently, just because there are large numbers of active adherents to those fictions?
Quote from: widdershins on September 07, 2016, 03:58:03 PM
Just because we hold ourselves to scientific standards does not mean we are allowed the same liberties taken by scientists involved in science. You must admit, for scientists to have to explain why they simply state scientific theories as fact and that they don't actually hold them as fact would be tedious and time consuming. Every scientific announcement would be preceded by something akin to an End User License Agreement. You know, those things that pop up when you install software that hardly anyone reads and even fewer read thoroughly. Science, by its nature, is complicated. Even words we use all the time have completely different meanings in science. When I'm in my car if I am speeding up I, that is acceleration. If I am slowing down, that is deceleration. In physics if I am speeding up, slowing down or maintaining the same speed but changing directions, that is all acceleration. Will you adapt their terminology too? If I slam on my brakes and you hit your head on the dash will you chastise me for my excessive acceleration? Not likely. Science, its terminology and its privilege is for scientists. Like it or not, we mere mortals live by different rules and we cannot borrow just those we like from science to use to our advantage when speaking to other mere mortals.
I
would, in fact, chastise you for the unexpected acceleration -- after I finished cussing you out. I actually do try to adopt the more precise terminology when it's feasible.
But I'm weird. :)
In any case, I don't agree that there are different rules for science and everyday life, terminological or otherwise. I don't need to be an artist to appreciate art or to attempt to produce it, and I don't need to be a scientist to appreciate both science and the scientific method or to attempt to apply it.
Quote from: widdershins on September 07, 2016, 03:58:03 PM
And now for a little jackasserey. I'm not gay. I have pictures of me not being gay to prove it!
And I
am gay, and I
don't have pictures of me being gay to prove it!
For this, you should be grateful. :D
Quote from: trdsf on September 08, 2016, 12:11:33 AM
Even if this hypothetical god is outside the universe, the effects this god is supposed to be able to produce are inside it, so it can't be separated entirely from scientific inquiry.
Ah, but any effect it produces, miracles, if you will, are a separate thing entirely. If you wished to find evidence one way or the other you would start with the miracles. As you are well aware no case of magic has ever been proven. Every miracle ever investigated by science instead of a church has either been disproved or not enough evidence existed to draw a conclusion. All this proves is that these supposed miracles were not caused by a god, but by humans or some natural force. Since, by disproving the miracle, you proved they did not come from any god you have then separated them from that god and they therefore say nothing about that god because they weren't "of it".
Quote from: trdsf on September 08, 2016, 12:11:33 AM
So why shouldn't the god hypothesis be treated the same way as any other? It is, after all, merely a primitive attempt to understand what makes the world work. Lightning? Thunder god. Rain? Rain god. Volcano? Fire god. Good fishing today? Thank the ocean god.
I wouldn't go so far as to give it the status of "hypothesis". More like "fanciful dream". A deity, by nature, is going to have powers and abilities which we would consider "magical". While a sufficiently advanced alien using technology could make it appear to us that he had magical powers he would still not be a deity because the power would be technological, not inherent. Any deity would, by its nature, be "supernatural". Science is not equipped to deal with the supernatural, only the natural.
Quote from: trdsf on September 08, 2016, 12:11:33 AM
Thousands of years later, we know better: there is no evidence of a guiding intellect. In fact, modern science has essentially done away with determinism, and a theistic universe -- at least one that proposes an omniscient personal, interactive god -- requires determinism in order for omniscience I think. A deistic universe, with an impersonal and uninvolved god, has no observational differences from a non-deistic universe, so the extra theory can be discarded as extraneous.
Again, there is a difference between effects on the universe and the existence of any deity. Once you discredit any give magic as having a purely natural cause you have separated it from the supernatural, meaning it now says nothing whatsoever about the supernatural. It is evidence neither for nor against anything supernatural because you have attributed a purely natural cause to it.
Quote from: trdsf on September 08, 2016, 12:11:33 AM
Either way, I think you can get there from here. There can't be something that affects the universe but is completely outside it, and it's going to take one hell of an interesting observation to disprove that.
Contrary to what Mario and Luigi would have us belief as they tackle various ghost houses on TV, science is not in the business of "disproving" things. That a deity affects the universe is nothing but a series of claims for which there are individual lines of evidence/data to be collected. That a deity exists is a whole different story.
It's obvious to we non-Christians that God just doesn't seem to have the power that he used to. In the Old Testament he was creating universes and destroying the world. Really powerful shit. In the New Testament he was healing the sick and raising the dead. Still pretty impressive, but orders of magnitude less so. Today he's answering prayer by giving you not what you asked for and making sure your gas lasts the whole week until payday. Not impressive at all. No better than random chance. This suggests to me that earlier claims of magnificence may have been slightly exaggerated. God is supposed to be eternal, unchanging, yet he has changed drastically over the course of his recorded history, becoming weaker and weaker as people got smarter and smarter. What this says is that magic isn't real. It's made up. What this
suggests is that the whole damned thing is made up. But there's no way for me to test the earlier claims of greater magics. I can't
prove that it's made up, I can only
infer that it is. What's more, even if I were to prove all the claims of magic false all I have done is erase the claimed evidence
for this deity, not provided any evidence
against.
Quote from: trdsf on September 08, 2016, 12:11:33 AM
And that's fine, assuming all the terminological baggage -- I do assume it. That's specifically why I say 'no god' in the same sense as 'no phlogiston' -- if evidence turned up that potentially indicated a god, I would have to take notice of it. But I'm not required to go looking for it, and the better explanations we currently have do a much better job of explaining reality.
I couldn't agree with that more. If you want me to believe something it's not my job to learn all about the subject to prove to you why I should
not believe it, it's your job to present me with the evidence to prove your claim.
Quote from: trdsf on September 08, 2016, 12:11:33 AM
No one would bat an eye at "There is no Zeus" or "There is no Ba'al" or "There is no C'thulhu". Yahweh, Allah, and Vishnu belong in the same generalized class -- why should they be treated differently, just because there are large numbers of active adherents to those fictions?
That is because "There is no Zeus" became fact when it became
indisputably true. No one cares if you say Zeus isn't real. No one disagrees with you. They don't bat an eye simply because they don't care.
Quote from: trdsf on September 08, 2016, 12:11:33 AM
I would, in fact, chastise you for the unexpected acceleration -- after I finished cussing you out. I actually do try to adopt the more precise terminology when it's feasible.
But I'm weird. :)
Lol, you would be the only one I know who would complain about my excessive acceleration when braking.
Quote from: trdsf on September 08, 2016, 12:11:33 AM
In any case, I don't agree that there are different rules for science and everyday life, terminological or otherwise. I don't need to be an artist to appreciate art or to attempt to produce it, and I don't need to be a scientist to appreciate both science and the scientific method or to attempt to apply it.
Certainly you don't need to be a scientist to appreciate science. Most of us here are science nerds and geeks. And you don't need to be a scientist to apply scientific method. Many of us here do that regularly in these discussions.
What I am saying is that we can't take the same liberties scientists take when explaining science to the layman in our everyday lives. We
expect scientists to take these liberties. When I'm watching a show on black holes I don't expect that I'm going to learn the real science behind it. The show would go on for weeks and I would sleep through much of it. I expect to get the interesting facts about it; some not-quite-as-explained details. I know that when two scientists are telling me opposing things what they are really saying is that this is their understanding. I know that because I seek out science information. I expect them to take some liberties for the purpose of brevity and even give me some not-quite-correct information for the purpose of my general understanding of the concept as a whole.
So when a scientist says, "This is so" I understand that what he is really saying is, "This is so according to our current understanding". So, actually, a scientist saying, "There are no gods" is really saying, "I believe..." or "We believe there are no gods according to current understanding". It is a
necessity for scientists to do this because what they have to say is so complex and requires so much specialty knowledge that to not do it would simply cost them, and us, too much in terms of time. It is
not a necessity to us. The concept that there is no evidence whatsoever to remotely suggest the existence of any deities is not a difficult one. It took just under 2/3 of the last sentence to fully articulate the entirety of the idea. That is not a high cost in terms of time or effort.
So I'm not saying you can't respect, appreciate or use science. All I'm saying is that the argument that you can take the same liberties in your everyday life, because you want to, that scientists take in science, out of necessity, is not exactly sound.
Quote from: trdsf on September 08, 2016, 12:11:33 AM
And I am gay, and I don't have pictures of me being gay to prove it!
For this, you should be grateful. :D
Hey, man, whatever makes you happy, it's cool. If being a shutterbug in the sack is what does it for you, by all means, you have yourself some fun. Maybe just don't break out the photo album when I come over. :D
I don't think we can say the Christian god does not exist just because we are free to say Thor does not exist. The problem is that when we say, "Thor doesn't exist," we are actually taking some logical liberties. It's understood that what we are really saying is, "There is no logical reason to believe Thor exists." The same rules of logic are in play if we refer to Thor or the Christian god. You can say Thor does not exist, and you won't get an objection from me, because I read into that you are talking in terms of probabilities, the same probabilities that exist with the Christian god. However, if you say with absolute certainty that Thor does not exist, I won't make a big deal out of that either, but I'm not going to take it literally, unless you can prove to me that Thor is not looking down from somewhere ready to throw his hammer.
Quote from: Unbeliever on September 07, 2016, 09:56:21 PM
There is no God, and I believe there is no God, so my belief seems to mirror reality.
Mere coincidence? I think not.
Feynman would disagree on principle. If you find what you are looking for, you are looking in the wrong place ;-) Confirmation bias is pernicious.
Default position: Nothing exists. So what do we mean by nothing, what by exists? Is this a reductio ad absurdum in itself? Are we trying to outdo Descartes or Sartre? Parmenides started with word definition ... nothing means not exist ... so to him our short sentence is non-sense. Parmenides would say that nothing does not exist, by definition. And that whatever is not nothing, then has to exist. Two pairs, synonymous to each other. Or is Parmenides wrong?
Mike ... your mother exists, does she? If you were adopted, and you are referring to your adoptive mother, is she your real mother? If you are adopted and your natural mother is dead, then you can say your mother doesn't exist ... and your mother does exist ... but the noun refers to two different people ... without you pointing out your slight of hand. If you are referring to your natural mother, and she is still alive, then you can demonstrate that your mother exists ... provided that you credit her with raising you also. If you have a step mother or adoptive mother who raised you ... then "mother" is ambiguous. If your natural mother raised you, and she is still alive, then you are on yet firmer ground to assert that your mother exists. But what if she is dead? Does she still exist? That is exactly what people want to know. She wouldn't then exist in the present, but did exist in the past, at least, though that is less demonstrable with deceased people. So existence is tied to your model of time. If I say that existence only means the present, then if your mother were deceased, then could only say that she doesn't exist, with the implication that past and future are also taken as non-existent. That is where the definition not of mother, but exist ... catches up with us. In the space time continuum of classical physics, determinism rules ... so not only does the past still exist, along with the present, but the future already exists, so basically everyone is both alive and dead, depending on the time cut. And present or not present (in space) based on the space cut. So a person could exist, but not be present in space or in the present time. If one doesn't exist in the present space and time (locally) ... but does exist elsewhere and at some other time, does one exist? Of course quantum mechanics disagrees with all this, and if we add infinite numbers of universes, it gets even worse (As some thing quantum mechanics requires, but not all agree).
Sorry about the delay replying; lots of good meat here to get into, and this may be a long post.
Quote from: widdershins on September 08, 2016, 10:39:18 AM
Ah, but any effect it produces, miracles, if you will, are a separate thing entirely. If you wished to find evidence one way or the other you would start with the miracles. As you are well aware no case of magic has ever been proven. Every miracle ever investigated by science instead of a church has either been disproved or not enough evidence existed to draw a conclusion. All this proves is that these supposed miracles were not caused by a god, but by humans or some natural force. Since, by disproving the miracle, you proved they did not come from any god you have then separated them from that god and they therefore say nothing about that god because they weren't "of it".
If a miracle is an effect of a deity, it's still an effect upon this universe by something alleged to be outside it. And that leaves a flat contradiction and one has to choose between spontaneous miracles with no will behind them, or an ineffective external deity who's barred from interfering in reality.
Of course, the so-called will of god is frequently cited in the demonstrably non-miraculous as if it were a miracle, usually in the form of counterfactuals (if god hadn't made me late, I'd've been on that flight that crashed, that sort of thing). And in the absence of documentation, the MSU (Make Shit Up) principle applies: the Catholic Encyclopedia states in all seriousness, for example that the "estimate that about 4000 cures have been obtained at Lourdes within the first fifty years of the pilgrimage is undoubtedly considerably less than the actual number." And this in the face of the Vatican's own "verified" number of 69 cures, no more, no less.
Let's take the example of Lourdes, which has has about 200 million visitors since Bernadette Soubirous reported her hallucinations. As stated, the RCC has "verified" 69 "miracle" cures, but be it 69 or 4000, that's still no better than the known rates of spontaneous remission for various diseases, and not one single one has ever been something indisputably miraculous, like the restoration of a documented lost limb.
And this can be filed as a sort of negative evidence: "My god did this miracle!" "Well, no, actually what happened was this..."
Even so, if you take miracles out of it, what mechanism remains for an external god to have any effect on the universe? If one is to be satisfied with a completely external god, then Occam's Razor comes back into play, since that means a self-explaining universe and god is unnecessary.
Quote from: widdershins on September 08, 2016, 10:39:18 AM
I wouldn't go so far as to give it the status of "hypothesis". More like "fanciful dream". A deity, by nature, is going to have powers and abilities which we would consider "magical". While a sufficiently advanced alien using technology could make it appear to us that he had magical powers he would still not be a deity because the power would be technological, not inherent. Any deity would, by its nature, be "supernatural". Science is not equipped to deal with the supernatural, only the natural.
I think 'hypothesis' is okay to use here, as it was an early human attempt to explain how the world around them worked, and explicitly was in regard to a god's effects on this world. And I think it fair to say that this explanation has been supplanted by more recent and better observations.
But maybe the 'god explanation' would be a more accurate phrasing.
Quote from: widdershins on September 08, 2016, 10:39:18 AM
Again, there is a difference between effects on the universe and the existence of any deity. Once you discredit any give magic as having a purely natural cause you have separated it from the supernatural, meaning it now says nothing whatsoever about the supernatural. It is evidence neither for nor against anything supernatural because you have attributed a purely natural cause to it.
If you're going to reduce god to being something completely external with no effect to the observed universe, you may as well say there isn't one since it's been completely exempted from observation.
Quote from: widdershins on September 08, 2016, 10:39:18 AM
That is because "There is no Zeus" became fact when it became indisputably true. No one cares if you say Zeus isn't real. No one disagrees with you. They don't bat an eye simply because they don't care.
What's the difference between Zeus and Yahweh that Zeus is 'disproved' and Yahweh isn't? Certainly if the non-existence of Zeus (or Thor or Ba'al or Astarte or whatever) can be demonstrated 'indisputably', so can Yahweh/Jehovah, Allah, Vishnu and any other one you care to name. Whether or not anyone cares is not germane to the point.
Quote from: widdershins on September 08, 2016, 10:39:18 AM
What I am saying is that we can't take the same liberties scientists take when explaining science to the layman in our everyday lives. We expect scientists to take these liberties. When I'm watching a show on black holes I don't expect that I'm going to learn the real science behind it. The show would go on for weeks and I would sleep through much of it. I expect to get the interesting facts about it; some not-quite-as-explained details. I know that when two scientists are telling me opposing things what they are really saying is that this is their understanding. I know that because I seek out science information. I expect them to take some liberties for the purpose of brevity and even give me some not-quite-correct information for the purpose of my general understanding of the concept as a whole.
I'm not sure I would agree that scientists take liberties. They have to simplify when explaining, but even that is subject to the same qualifications. The number of times I've heard something along the lines of "Okay, this isn't
quite how it works, but..." as the preface for an explanation is a large but still technically finite integer, and I wouldn't describe it as 'not quite correct' so much as I would 'incomplete'.
So what liberties they take are carefully constrained.
Quote from: widdershins on September 08, 2016, 10:39:18 AM
So when a scientist says, "This is so" I understand that what he is really saying is, "This is so according to our current understanding". So, actually, a scientist saying, "There are no gods" is really saying, "I believe..." or "We believe there are no gods according to current understanding". It is a necessity for scientists to do this because what they have to say is so complex and requires so much specialty knowledge that to not do it would simply cost them, and us, too much in terms of time. It is not a necessity to us. The concept that there is no evidence whatsoever to remotely suggest the existence of any deities is not a difficult one. It took just under 2/3 of the last sentence to fully articulate the entirety of the idea. That is not a high cost in terms of time or effort.
And in this cast the 'believe' becomes superfluous. There is nothing logically or scientifically inconsistent with the phrase "there are no gods according to current understanding".
Quote from: widdershins on September 08, 2016, 10:39:18 AM
So I'm not saying you can't respect, appreciate or use science. All I'm saying is that the argument that you can take the same liberties in your everyday life, because you want to, that scientists take in science, out of necessity, is not exactly sound.
I'm really not sure I agree with the 'take liberties' part here. Science and scientific argument is above all else rigorous.
Universe ... be definition means nothing is outside of it. So by definition, and your definition of a god/miracle ... there are no gods/miracles ... because given the definitions, it is nonsense (misuse of vocabulary). Nature ... by definition means no miracles. So a god without miracles could exist in nature, and in the universe ... as a kind of superman ... but not as a deity.
To generalize from Nietzsche ... all men are supermen ... keep the kryptonite to yourself.
Is it legitimate to define your words such that the other guy's position is nonsense?
Quote from: Baruch on September 11, 2016, 09:36:06 AM
Is it legitimate to define your words such that the other guy's position is nonsense?
On the surface, no. But this is a semantic minefield. Atheists have been accused of mistakenly defining god as having nonsense characteristics, and then rejecting that god for its nonsense, but there are extenuating circumstances involved in this mistake.
First, like theists who believe in the god they grew up around, atheists don't believe in the god they grew up around. Both theists and atheists make the same mistake here. They define god based on local popularity, rather than substance. Neither defines God on their own, but accepts the popular definition, subject to some personal but usually minor tweaking. But keep in mind that most God definitions are a product of misguided theism. Theism is responsible for defining gods. Atheists mostly react to the definitions, rather than participate in their creations. Atheism is a reaction to what appears to be a human creation, not a creation of it's own.
So do we say an atheist actually creates the gods he disbelieves, or simply reacts to the creations of theists? I think there is a strong case to make that atheists simply react, rather than create. But how much does this matter? I'm pretty liberal about accepting definitions of gods, although not very liberal about buying into them. Almost every popular definition of a god employs some aspect of nonsense already built into its particular definition. The Abrahamic gods have a high degree of nonsense, centered around defying reality, and self contradictory qualities. The Pantheist gods usually include less, but still some quantity of nonsense about deifying totally neutral, but at least real, qualities. I think I can legitimately consider this nonsense on the same grounds that the doorknob, as a higher power advocated as training wheels in Alcoholics Anonymous, is utter nonsense.
Now we can quibble over what constitutes 'nonsense' and take the semantics of the argument to the next level of nonsense. Well, maybe it's just the same argument we were having to begin with? Yeah, probably.
Quote from: trdsf on September 10, 2016, 02:45:02 PM
Sorry about the delay replying; lots of good meat here to get into, and this may be a long post.
If a miracle is an effect of a deity, it's still an effect upon this universe by something alleged to be outside it. And that leaves a flat contradiction and one has to choose between spontaneous miracles with no will behind them, or an ineffective external deity who's barred from interfering in reality.
Of course, the so-called will of god is frequently cited in the demonstrably non-miraculous as if it were a miracle, usually in the form of counterfactuals (if god hadn't made me late, I'd've been on that flight that crashed, that sort of thing). And in the absence of documentation, the MSU (Make Shit Up) principle applies: the Catholic Encyclopedia states in all seriousness, for example that the "estimate that about 4000 cures have been obtained at Lourdes within the first fifty years of the pilgrimage is undoubtedly considerably less than the actual number." And this in the face of the Vatican's own "verified" number of 69 cures, no more, no less.
Let's take the example of Lourdes, which has has about 200 million visitors since Bernadette Soubirous reported her hallucinations. As stated, the RCC has "verified" 69 "miracle" cures, but be it 69 or 4000, that's still no better than the known rates of spontaneous remission for various diseases, and not one single one has ever been something indisputably miraculous, like the restoration of a documented lost limb.
And this can be filed as a sort of negative evidence: "My god did this miracle!" "Well, no, actually what happened was this..."
Negative evidence, yes, but against miracles, not a deity. What I am saying is that miracles and the deities supposedly producing them are two separate lines of inquiry.
Let me give you an example. Let's say you have unlimited wealth and ability to travel and spend your life investigating miracles. In one of your investigations you find that a "miracle" did, in fact, happen. Someone regrew a missing limb. It's undeniable. This happened. Is that the end of your investigation? Or do you go on to try to prove the
cause? In all likelihood you wouldn't simply accept the explanation for the miracle given to you; you wouldn't simply assume that the force behind this miracle was whatever the person thought it was. You would move on to the separate issue of the cause of that miracle.
Quote from: trdsf on September 10, 2016, 02:45:02 PM
Even so, if you take miracles out of it, what mechanism remains for an external god to have any effect on the universe? If one is to be satisfied with a completely external god, then Occam's Razor comes back into play, since that means a self-explaining universe and god is unnecessary.
I sort of agree there. There is the possibility that the god created the universe and then left it alone. Certainly a self-explaining universe is far more plausible. But we can never truly rule out the possibility of divine interference. All we can really do is say that there is no evidence to support this and no need for it as an explanation.
Quote from: trdsf on September 10, 2016, 02:45:02 PM
I think 'hypothesis' is okay to use here, as it was an early human attempt to explain how the world around them worked, and explicitly was in regard to a god's effects on this world. And I think it fair to say that this explanation has been supplanted by more recent and better observations.Quote
Semantics. I was being picky, but it's really unimportant.
Quote from: trdsf on September 10, 2016, 02:45:02 PM
But maybe the 'god explanation' would be a more accurate phrasing.
If you're going to reduce god to being something completely external with no effect to the observed universe, you may as well say there isn't one since it's been completely exempted from observation.
For the purpose of discovery, I agree. However you cannot claim this as fact.
Quote from: trdsf on September 10, 2016, 02:45:02 PM
What's the difference between Zeus and Yahweh that Zeus is 'disproved' and Yahweh isn't?
Certainly if the non-existence of Zeus (or Thor or Ba'al or Astarte or whatever) can be demonstrated 'indisputably', so can Yahweh/Jehovah, Allah, Vishnu and any other one you care to name. Whether or not anyone cares is not germane to the point.
Whether Zeus has been "disproved" or simply fallen out of favor is, itself, up for debate. He certainly wasn't found living on top any mountains anywhere. But all that really means is that part of the story was wrong. That's the thing about belief systems. A believer who really wants to believe can simply pull an explanation out of their asses. The gods moved. They are there, but in a different "realm" that we cannot perceive unless they allow it. They did exist, but they died. When magic is involved any explanation is plausible, which is why any explanation involving magic should be treated as if it is false until evidence to the contrary is presented. But treating it as if it is false is not the same as proving it false.
Quote from: trdsf on September 10, 2016, 02:45:02 PM
I'm not sure I would agree that scientists take liberties. They have to simplify when explaining, but even that is subject to the same qualifications. The number of times I've heard something along the lines of "Okay, this isn't quite how it works, but..." as the preface for an explanation is a large but still technically finite integer, and I wouldn't describe it as 'not quite correct' so much as I would 'incomplete'.
Perhaps "liberties" wasn't the correct word. I don't think we actually disagree on a technical level here. I can't remember any specific examples right now, but I have heard scientific explanations for things which I had enough knowledge of to know that what they were saying was not quite correct, but that if they had given accurate information the explanation required would have killed people from Mississippi and Texas. They do sometimes sacrifice informational accuracy to "dumb it down" and give a rough explanation for things people are interested in. It's not that they are purposely spreading misinformation, though. More like sacrificing the accuracy of the details to deliver the general idea. I guess I do know of one such example. Many describe the Big Bang as being an "explosion", when in reality it was nothing like an explosion. In fact, I have heard scientists complain that they hate that explanation because it is not accurate.
Quote from: trdsf on September 10, 2016, 02:45:02 PM
So what liberties they take are carefully constrained.
And in this cast the 'believe' becomes superfluous. There is nothing logically or scientifically inconsistent with the phrase "there are no gods according to current understanding".
I'm really not sure I agree with the 'take liberties' part here. Science and scientific argument is above all else rigorous.
Again, perhaps "liberties" wasn't the right word there. I did not mean to infer that they in any way changed the information for personal reasons. Just that they tend to talk about evolution as if it were a fact rather than take the time to explain each and every time that science does not consider any theory to ever be fact and give the example of the Earth's revolution around the Sun, which is known to be true but is still "theory" and open for debate.
And while I can certainly see the need to do that and find it perfectly acceptable, there is no doubt that this has caused some confusion among the general public, allowing for the rise of "It's just a theory" in the anti-evolution movement. But science is complicated. Explaining it to laymen is time consuming. They do have to "shortcut", if you like that better than "take liberties", on a regular basis. It is a necessity. It is not a necessity when discussing the possibility of deities. The position is not complicated. There is no time consuming, complex information to relay which would create the need to shortcut and say, "There are no gods" rather than "There has never been any evidence to suggest there are any gods". No complex data or reasoning lies hidden behind the shortcut. It's just a shortcut for the sake of either a shortcut or a desire to claim an absolute. Science doesn't use either of those reasons for using a shortcut. There is a need for it when explaining scientific principals. There are some underlying truths which are assumed, at least by the scientific community and any who know enough about it to know what those underlying truths are.
That is why I can't accept a correlation with scientific explanation as a valid reason for simply stating "There are no gods" rather than saying, "I believe there are no gods" or "There is no evidence to support the existence of any gods". The shortcut isn't that much shorter and there are no assumed underlying truths when you use it. It is not the same as when scientists do it, so that scientists do it for completely different reasons is not a good argument for doing it, whether you're investigating the possibilities of deities scientifically or not.
So let me ask you this. What is your reason for wanting to state simply "There are no gods"? Do you want to make your sentence marginally shorter? Or are you actually stating an absolute? Or is it some third reason I had not considered?
There is no god. I wholeheartedly think so.
Now, will I say that to a believer of any god and expect them to not make the ridiculous assertion that I should prove a negative stance? They will ask for proof for my negative stance, and my only reply will be in the ballpark of stating that any proof of the supernatural doesn't exist (and by definition can't exist, but that's another discussion entirely).
To better explain my position, as an atheist, I will simply state I have no belief in their particular belief in the supernatural to that believer.
What most believers fail to grasp, in my experience, is because they're reared in it and stymied dissent, that they can't imagine their faith to be false, has made a blind-spot in their reasoning faculties. They have no trouble finding Islam to be false but their own Christianity must be true, since everyone else believes the same thing in their close & nearby environment or whatever faith-based "reasoning" it is built upon.
Quote from: widdershins on September 12, 2016, 11:02:51 AM
So let me ask you this. What is your reason for wanting to state simply "There are no gods"? Do you want to make your sentence marginally shorter? Or are you actually stating an absolute? Or is it some third reason I had not considered?
Mostly I just want to explore the logic and semantics of the matter. As it happens, I
do think I am entitled to say "there is no god" in precisely the same way that I might say "there is no phlogiston", "there is no aether", or "there is no caloric", or "the universe is not static" on the simple basis that those explanations of the universe (or parts thereof) have been superseded by better ones, and I
do assume all the unspoken "...to the best of our current understanding/observations" philosophical baggage that is attached to any claim of fact, at least outside mathematics.
There are three points that I think using the demonstrative phrase rather than the conditional "I believe" makes.
First, I'm of the opinion that one can't simply place things out of the bounds of rigorous inquiry -- declaring it supernatural doesn't mean we can't see if the implications and predictions made by a supernatural explanation actually match what we see in the universe around us. We
can test prayer, and claims of telepathy, and astrology -- and in fact we have. Prayer is effective only when the subject knows he's being prayed for: to wit, it's a placebo. Self-proclaimed telepaths can do no better than chance in rigorously designed trials that eliminate eye contact, body language, and other tells. Astrologers provided with the time and place of an individual's birth cannot accurately identify the personality traits of the individual -- and if you give the same natal information to fifty different astrologers, you will get fifty different answers.
Second, I think the "I believe there is"/"there is" marks one of the dividing lines between agnosticism and atheism. I would argue that limiting one's self to "I believe there is no god" is simply a harder form of agnosticism rather than actual atheism because it assumes the agnostic position that the answer is ultimately unknowable: á¼€-γνῶσιÏ,,
a-gnosis, without knowledge - rather than á¼,,-θεοÏ,,
a-theos, without god(s). I am á¼,,-θεοÏ,, not á¼€-γνῶσιÏ,, and while I accept that I am a limited human being with limited understanding, I do not think that is a valid limitation to put on the overall quest for knowledge.
And the third point is that it elevates belief to being a meaningful position in a debate, and that not only cedes
far too much ground to the believers, it also allows them to wiggle out from under the burden of proof ("Well, it's a matter of faith, you'll have to disprove it, I just believe it.")
So I prefer to state my position unequivocally, just so there's no question who should be proving what and who should be the one coming up with the evidence. It's for the same reason I refer to Christian or Muslim or Hindu mythologies rather than theologies. You need a god to have a theology, and I won't cede that ground without a damned good reason first.
Quote from: trdsf on September 12, 2016, 08:59:48 PM
Mostly I just want to explore the logic and semantics of the matter. As it happens, I do think I am entitled to say "there is no god" in precisely the same way that I might say "there is no phlogiston", "there is no aether", or "there is no caloric", or "the universe is not static" on the simple basis that those explanations of the universe (or parts thereof) have been superseded by better ones, and I do assume all the unspoken "...to the best of our current understanding/observations" philosophical baggage that is attached to any claim of fact, at least outside mathematics.
I can certainly see your point there. It does make sense. However, I still can't get past you using scientific examples for why you can speak the same way about something non-scientific. There is a difference between gods and outdated scientific understanding. Gods aren't scientific and never have been. The examples you gave are obviously, indisputably ideas put forth by men and disproved by other men. Their existence or lack thereof is and always has been purely in the realm of human intellect and understanding. Only on the very surface do they even have anything remotely in common with the concept of deities. Under the surface the ideas are really nothing alike. One addresses physical properties, the other the non-physical. One can be examined by science, the other cannot.
Quote from: trdsf on September 12, 2016, 08:59:48 PM
There are three points that I think using the demonstrative phrase rather than the conditional "I believe" makes.
First, I'm of the opinion that one can't simply place things out of the bounds of rigorous inquiry -- declaring it supernatural doesn't mean we can't see if the implications and predictions made by a supernatural explanation actually match what we see in the universe around us. We can test prayer, and claims of telepathy, and astrology -- and in fact we have. Prayer is effective only when the subject knows he's being prayed for: to wit, it's a placebo. Self-proclaimed telepaths can do no better than chance in rigorously designed trials that eliminate eye contact, body language, and other tells. Astrologers provided with the time and place of an individual's birth cannot accurately identify the personality traits of the individual -- and if you give the same natal information to fifty different astrologers, you will get fifty different answers.
All true. In fact, I read an article the other day about a kid that went missing. The parents prayed for her safe return. They then got news that she was dead. The mother, I believe, said, "God answered our prayers, it just wasn't the answer we wanted." No, he didn't. She didn't pray to get news of her daughter's death. The "safe" part of her prayer was the part she was stressing. THAT is what she was praying for. She was neither safe nor returned. There was no prayer answered, but she
thought there was.
However, I can prove miracle after miracle false and I
still haven't taken the first step to proving deities don't exist. Look at the ID argument, for example. The every argument of the ID proponent is actually not for ID, it's
against evolution. So there is actually a really easy way to shut them up. Just tell them to imagine a giant scale. On one side is the evidence for evolution, on the other side you want them to put the evidence for intelligent design. Then throw them a curveball and accept that evolution is wrong. Everything about it is wrong. You are removing ALL the evidence from the evolution side of the scale. So all they have to do to prove their point is put ONE PIECE of evidence on the other side and they've proved their point. They will go through all the arguments in their mind, "...could not have...", "...didn't...", "...not...". They will find that they don't have a single piece of evidence for ID. Not one. On the same note, I accept that there are no miracles, prayer doesn't work, psychics are all bogus, there is no magic, etc. The side of the scale with the supposed evidence for the existence of deities is swept clean. The scales are balanced. Now tip the scale. Without being able to pile on negative evidence you can't.
Quote from: trdsf on September 12, 2016, 08:59:48 PM
Second, I think the "I believe there is"/"there is" marks one of the dividing lines between agnosticism and atheism. I would argue that limiting one's self to "I believe there is no god" is simply a harder form of agnosticism rather than actual atheism because it assumes the agnostic position that the answer is ultimately unknowable: á¼€-γνῶσιÏ,, a-gnosis, without knowledge - rather than á¼,,-θεοÏ,, a-theos, without god(s). I am á¼,,-θεοÏ,, not á¼€-γνῶσιÏ,, and while I accept that I am a limited human being with limited understanding, I do not think that is a valid limitation to put on the overall quest for knowledge.
I am certain there are no gods, but I may be wrong. The universe is vast and it apparently came from somewhere else, which is presumably more vast. It
is, at least currently, unknowable. I cannot know that there is not some other universe with twice the dimensions this one has where the laws of the universe allows for beings whose thoughts can design and create lesser universes like our own. We have yet to even reconcile quantum mechanics with general relativity. It IS unknowable, at least currently.
Quote from: trdsf on September 12, 2016, 08:59:48 PM
And the third point is that it elevates belief to being a meaningful position in a debate, and that not only cedes far too much ground to the believers, it also allows them to wiggle out from under the burden of proof ("Well, it's a matter of faith, you'll have to disprove it, I just believe it.")
They will wiggle out from under the burden of proof regardless. If you make the statement "There are no gods" then you ARE just as burdened as they as you DID just make a claim. It doesn't matter whether you agree with that or not. THEY agree with it, so once you make that statement they have no more burden of proof than you do, at least in their minds.
I just had a though, I think a semantics thing may actually reconcile our positions. I would be okay with, "There is no evidence for any gods" or "There is no reason to believe gods exist" or, what I often say, "The only reason you have for believing is because somebody says so." Anything that is not a claim of an absolute truth and, actually, may more accurately state your position.
Quote from: trdsf on September 12, 2016, 08:59:48 PM
So I prefer to state my position unequivocally, just so there's no question who should be proving what and who should be the one coming up with the evidence. It's for the same reason I refer to Christian or Muslim or Hindu mythologies rather than theologies. You need a god to have a theology, and I won't cede that ground without a damned good reason first.
But in stating your position like this you are CREATING confusion over who should be proving what. Hell, it has come up here before. The MOMENT you state "There are no gods" they start saying, "Ha! You just made a claim! Now YOU have to prove it!" And they're right. You did and you do. Saying that there are no gods is every bit as much a claim as saying that there are one or more gods. If you say the electron exists and I say it doesn't would you feel compelled to prove that it does or would you ask me for my evidence that it doesn't? Since it is commonly accepted that it does you should be asking me to prove my point as yours is already made by science, EVEN THOUGH I was making the "not" claim.
There are no gods. I am sure of that. And I can safely say that in like-minded company. But why would I say that to Christians? To pick a fight. To piss them off. To irritate them. To disrespect them. Every reason I can think of has more to do with emotional rather than logical arguments. And ultimately it IS unknowable. The ONLY way that it could POSSIBLY be knowable is if our position is wrong and either a god makes itself known or we were gods capable of knowing. You should celebrate that it's unknowable. If it weren't, you'd be wrong. It's precisely because you're not wrong that actually makes it unknowable.
Quote from: widdershins on September 13, 2016, 11:15:40 AM
They will wiggle out from under the burden of proof regardless. If you make the statement "There are no gods" then you ARE just as burdened as they as you DID just make a claim. It doesn't matter whether you agree with that or not. THEY agree with it, so once you make that statement they have no more burden of proof than you do, at least in their minds.
I would argue that the 'no god' position should be the default setting: it simply states that the universe is what it is without an additional hidden supernatural layer to it. That strikes me as very nearly axiomatic; it's a simple acceptance of that which is revealed by observations and not positing anything unknown, unless its existence is implied by the observations (dark matter and dark energy come to mind, for example).
And I don't
need to prove there's nothing further. As soon as someone says "And there's also this", that requires evidence, and my gainsaying that doesn't shift that requirement to me. I don't need to demonstrate that I cannot see what I have not seen -- that too is axiomatic, I think. And I can't say to you, "There's intelligent life on the other side of the galaxy -- prove there isn't or I'm right!" -- this is the false game that believers play, and that they must not be allowed to play. As soon as I make that positive claim, it's my responsibility to prove they're there, or retract or modify my claim. This is essentially the same as your example of the scales, really.
So if someone wants to make the 'god exists' claim, without evidence on their part, I have no reason nor even responsibility to take that position seriously, nor to disprove it. Without evidence, it's a null statement and not warranted by the available observations.
Quote from: widdershins on September 13, 2016, 11:15:40 AM
I just had a though, I think a semantics thing may actually reconcile our positions. I would be okay with, "There is no evidence for any gods" or "There is no reason to believe gods exist" or, what I often say, "The only reason you have for believing is because somebody says so." Anything that is not a claim of an absolute truth and, actually, may more accurately state your position.
And I kind of mentally subsume those in the shorter statement -- these are much more accurate, of course, and probably I should make an effort to move in these directions.
I did once have occasion to, actually -- I was visiting friends for the weekend, and their daughter and son-in-law dropped by. As it happened, a program with Stephen Hawking was on, and the son-in-law commented (rather snottily, in fact), "How can he be that smart and not believe in god?" To which I, with remarkable restraint (at least I think I was restrained), replied (okay, maybe a little acidly), "Because there's no physical evidence."
And the matter, happily, dropped there.
Quote from: trdsf on September 13, 2016, 01:44:32 PM
I would argue that the 'no god' position should be the default setting: it simply states that the universe is what it is without an additional hidden supernatural layer to it. That strikes me as very nearly axiomatic; it's a simple acceptance of that which is revealed by observations and not positing anything unknown, unless its existence is implied by the observations (dark matter and dark energy come to mind, for example).
My problem with that is that theists always assume that their position is the default position. It's something I realized years ago with the argument that not teaching anything about religion in schools, either for or against, was "by default" teaching that atheism is correct. I noticed it rearing its ugly head again in Intelligent Design arguments composed of nothing but "negative evidence" against evolution. The idea is that if the other side cannot produce evidence that you will accept or cannot give an alternative explanation that you accept, you win by default. Of course you will never accept any evidence they present because you don't see it the same way they do.
The problem is that in any debate you have to start with several facts which both sides agree on. You have to have a starting point. Some simple examples in a debate with a theist would be that the universe exists and that it has not existed in its current form for an eternity. Those are very basic, but each debate is different with each side willing to start with an acceptance of various facts. That one position or the other should be the "default" position is a premise of the argument neither side is likely to accept from the other. What that means is that by making this a premise of your argument you are setting up your argument to fail to have any effect (if the intention of your argument is to sway the other person, that is). So what is the point of making the argument? Do you just want to piss the theist off? Then it's a great argument. Do you want to have an intelligent debate, already a problem when debating theists? That's not any more likely to happen by setting a default in your favor than it is when they try to set a default in their favor. What's more, as an argument style, it's utterly dishonest. It's "cheating" and it's lazy. You're setting up the argument so that you never actually have to do any work to prove any point, only shoot down anything that comes at you. In this case you, and theists arguing the same, are making the argument "The default is that I am right and if you can't prove I'm not then I win". You wouldn't accept that as a valid premise from them. Why should you expect them to accept it from you?
Quote from: trdsf on September 13, 2016, 01:44:32 PM
And I don't need to prove there's nothing further. As soon as someone says "And there's also this", that requires evidence, and my gainsaying that doesn't shift that requirement to me. I don't need to demonstrate that I cannot see what I have not seen -- that too is axiomatic, I think. And I can't say to you, "There's intelligent life on the other side of the galaxy -- prove there isn't or I'm right!" -- this is the false game that believers play, and that they must not be allowed to play. As soon as I make that positive claim, it's my responsibility to prove they're there, or retract or modify my claim. This is essentially the same as your example of the scales, really.
I agree with all of that. However, in this case the claim would be, "There is
no intelligent life on the other side of the galaxy -- prove there is or I'm right!" By adding that single word and making it a negative am I then allowed that claim? Is this valid because I do not need to demonstrate that I cannot see what I have not seen? Of course not. In this case EITHER claim would be either spectacularly ignorant or fantastically informed.
Quote from: trdsf on September 13, 2016, 01:44:32 PM
So if someone wants to make the 'god exists' claim, without evidence on their part, I have no reason nor even responsibility to take that position seriously, nor to disprove it. Without evidence, it's a null statement and not warranted by the available observations.
And I kind of mentally subsume those in the shorter statement -- these are much more accurate, of course, and probably I should make an effort to move in these directions.
I agree wholeheartedly. I have looked into many, many claims of the supernatural variety. I have spent years of my life looking into Christianity, alone. Years more looking into ghosts, magic, UFOs, etc. Never have I seen the slightest evidence to suggest there was anything to any such claims. I now do dismiss them outright. If you don't have proof, you are wrong. And I do often claim that there is no such thing as magic, which, when you get down to it, is really no different than claiming outright there are no gods. So it's not like I am not, myself, guilty of doing exactly what I am arguing against here. The fact that "magic" is less accepted as a reality is no excuse for allowing myself more latitude. But to be fair, when I make the claim that there is no such thing as magic, I am usually referring to what theists prefer I call "miracles". In this case I am very much taking a jab. I'm not debating a position and my intention is not to sway, my intention is to annoy. So I guess, in that sense, if your intention is to annoy rather than sway, saying "There are no gods" is no different.
Quote from: trdsf on September 13, 2016, 01:44:32 PM
I did once have occasion to, actually -- I was visiting friends for the weekend, and their daughter and son-in-law dropped by. As it happened, a program with Stephen Hawking was on, and the son-in-law commented (rather snottily, in fact), "How can he be that smart and not believe in god?" To which I, with remarkable restraint (at least I think I was restrained), replied (okay, maybe a little acidly), "Because there's no physical evidence."
And the matter, happily, dropped there.
Isn't it funny how they immediately get all indignant and pissed off if you don't see the world as they do? It amuses me that the quickest way to get a theist pissed at you is not to elude to a sexual encounter with his mother, it's to express different religious beliefs. Although it is entertaining to end the former with, "Call me Daddy" or "Now get Daddy a beer". I like the second one best.
Two questions seem essential:
1. What's your definition of the "God" that you claim.
2. What's your evidence of the god that you claim.
Quote from: Solomon Zorn on September 13, 2016, 05:43:20 PM
Two questions seem essential:
1. What's your definition of the "God" that you claim.
2. What's your evidence of the god that you claim.
Adding .... common error engaged in by supposedly rational people ... If A, then B ... turns out B is true, therefor A must be true. This is a fallacy. There could also be a ... If C, then B ... in which case we don't know if it is A or C is true ... or both, or some other letter or combination entirely.
To give an example ...
If no gods, then no miracles ... turns out there are no miracles ... therefor can we conclude that there are no gods?
A correct deduction would be ... turns out there are miracles ... therefor we can conclude that there are no no gods aka there are gods
Quote from: Baruch on September 13, 2016, 07:25:10 PM
Adding .... common error engaged in by supposedly rational people ... If A, then B ... turns out B is true, therefor A must be true. This is a fallacy. There could also be a ... If C, then B ... in which case we don't know if it is A or C is true ... or both, or some other letter or combination entirely.
To give an example ...
If no gods, then no miracles ... turns out there are no miracles ... therefor can we conclude that there are no gods?
A correct deduction would be ... turns out there are miracles ... therefor we can conclude that there are no no gods aka there are gods
That's confusing. And a "miracle" is just magic by another name. One decides whether a particular act of magic is miraculous by one's own definition. Based on the first definition that came up a miracle is really nothing more than magic which has some benefit and is therefore attributed to a deity. If a large pile of money simply appeared before me and I were a religious man I would certainly attribute that to my deity and it would be proof of "miracles" because it cannot be explained by natural means. Unfortunately our understanding of the natural universe is not complete. Maybe you are way, way smart and figured out a way to make a teleport device and sent me that money in exchange for sex, but forgot to tell me. In case that's ever an issue (I'm pretty sure you're a guy, as am I), I don't swing that way, but for enough money I might be persuaded. But no anal. I won't even do that with my wife.
But, since we humans decide what and what is not a "miracle" then we even your "correct deduction" may not be correct. The issues of gods and miracles are different issues entirely. If you prove miracles you still haven't proved either any particular god or gods in general. You've only proved that some form of magic is apparently real. Even that is subject to doubt until the process is at least partially understood and we can know for certain that there wasn't some "natural cause". If we make that determination then we have proved it to be "supernatural". If I prayed for money in secret and then got the exact amount I had prayed for I would certainly attribute it to my particular deity, but that doesn't necessarily mean that was the cause of the magic. Maybe it was a genie. Maybe I had accidentally caught a leprechaun and he granted my wish to gain his freedom without ever making contact with me. Maybe it wasn't a god at all, but something else altogether. Something powerful, to be sure, but not necessarily divine.
This is why I say that you cannot prove nor disprove the existence of any deities by proving or disproving miracles alone. They are two separate issues. Maybe God is on Social Security now and if he does miracles today he'd have to claim it as some kind of spiritual income, which would fuck up his check. He's God. It's not like he's going to cheat the government and at his age his medicines must be, if you'll pardon the term, ungodly expensive. So maybe there is some deity, even a particular one and he just doesn't
do miracles. So the correct deduction would actually be, "turns out there are no miracles...I wonder if there are any gods?"
If we aren't talking logic, how are we speaking of proof? Empirical demonstration is different (especially is defined broadly rather than "current philosophy of science). I wasn't saying that we can claim any miracles ... I was only looking at the common fallacy.
An example of the other vali form of reasoning ...
If A, then B ... turns out A is true ... then we can conclude B is true.
To give an example ...
If gods, then miracles ... turns out there are gods .. therefore we can conclude that there are miracles.
This doesn't touch on whether the syllogism is correct per empirical demonstration ... perfect logic produces perfect falsehood, if the axioms are false (either the conditional or the affirmation of the prior of the denial of the posterior.
Don't try to deny my posterior, I can prove it is real ;-)
Quote from: Baruch on September 14, 2016, 06:44:23 PM
If we aren't talking logic, how are we speaking of proof? Empirical demonstration is different (especially is defined broadly rather than "current philosophy of science). I wasn't saying that we can claim any miracles ... I was only looking at the common fallacy.
An example of the other vali form of reasoning ...
If A, then B ... turns out A is true ... then we can conclude B is true.
That is a common logical fallacy, though.
To give an example ...
If gods, then miracles ... turns out there are gods .. therefore we can conclude that there are miracles.
That is a non sequitur fallacy, though. Gods are not defined as beings which necessarily produce miracles. If I proved the existence of a disinterested god who does not interfere in our universe I have somehow proved that he performs miracles? Of course not. That is why I am saying that proving gods and proving miracle are two entirely different arguments. You could have gods without miracles. You could have miracles without gods. Miracles are normally attributed to gods, but that being the case does not determine that something I hold to be miraculous was necessarily produced by any god at all, much less the particular god I attribute it to.
Quote from: Baruch on September 14, 2016, 06:44:23 PM
This doesn't touch on whether the syllogism is correct per empirical demonstration ... perfect logic produces perfect falsehood, if the axioms are false (either the conditional or the affirmation of the prior of the denial of the posterior.
Don't try to deny my posterior, I can prove it is real ;-)
Haha, you said "gism".
"Does god exist?" is not a valid question. It would be valid, only if there was a completely different concept(s) of god in human history without any mutual ground -human-god-, which there isn't, they are all the same concept of god and exist in the same category of human values, needs and fears.
Nobody would need to prove that it doesn't exist, because applying falsifiability to theology and myth is not rational, not to mention just a belief. Which is something equal to "I know Unicorns doesn't exist, but I can't prove it, therefore I should be agnostic about its existence for the sake of scientific method and 'rationality'." Unicorn is always the same mythical animal, doesn't matter which myth it appears in. It is a horse with a horn on his forehead, doesn't matter what colour it is or if it farts rainbow or not. Vampires do not exist. Doesn't matter if they are artsy fartsy and philosophical as Anne Rice's vampires or ridiculous as Stphenie Meyers' or good in bed as Charlene Harris'.
And also for the same reasons, nobody actually belives in any god. Because it is impossible to believe in any god. Humans believe in themselves and what they created; they survived to this point because of religion and belief; fantasy; design. This is one of the main reasons why we invaded and dominated the planet and became the most successful species on it.
Quote from: drunkenshoe on September 15, 2016, 02:55:46 PM
"Does god exist?" is not a valid question. It would be valid, only if there was a completely different concept(s) of god in human history without any mutual ground -human-god-, which there isn't, they are all the same concept of god and exist in the same category of human values, needs and fears.
Nobody would need to prove that it doesn't exist, because applying falsifiability to theology and myth is not rational, not to mention just a belief. Which is something equal to "I know Unicorns doesn't exist, but I can't prove it, therefore I should be agnostic about its existence for the sake of scientific method and 'rationality'." Unicorn is always the same mythical animal, doesn't matter which myth it appears in. It is a horse with a horn on his forehead, doesn't matter what colour it is or if it farts rainbow or not. Vampires do not exist. Doesn't matter if they are artsy fartsy and philosophical as Anne Rice's vampires or ridiculous as Stphenie Meyers' or good in bed as Charlene Harris'.
And also for the same reasons, nobody actually belives in any god. Because it is impossible to believe in any god. Humans believe in themselves and what they created; they survived to this point because of religion and belief; fantasy; design. This is one of the main reasons why we invaded and dominated the planet and became the most successful species on it.
I actually agree with most of that and I am in no way claiming that anyone needs to prove any particular god or gods in general do not exist. All I am saying is that the claim, "There are no gods" is not provable and, since there are those who believe one or more gods exist, it is not productive. What is the point in making that definitive declaration? Basically, to piss someone off. If an argument isn't productive it's pointless.
Quote from: widdershins on September 15, 2016, 05:14:05 PM
I actually agree with most of that and I am in no way claiming that anyone needs to prove any particular god or gods in general do not exist. All I am saying is that the claim, "There are no gods" is not provable and, since there are those who believe one or more gods exist, it is not productive. What is the point in making that definitive declaration? Basically, to piss someone off. If an argument isn't productive it's pointless.
Yes. That makes sense in a way. But at least from my point of view, I am just writing my opinions like thinking out loud and trying to dig the ones offered to the bottom when I am interested in I guess. Generally not productive. Taken as opinionated by the most people. Perhaps it is.
Quote from: Baruch on September 15, 2016, 06:36:35 PM
My regrets and pride, my hopes and fears may be subjective, but they are real anyway. And quite a bit more relevant than the Higgs boson. Typical Platonism ... only thoughts matter, and the higher the better ... emotions are for barbarians, not true Greeks. I will take Homer's fictional Odysseus and Hector any day ... over any fictional character (mostly fictional Socrates) that Plato ever created.
If one can get two good science teams together, to objectively bracket the true mass of an electron at rest (but it increases as soon as it isn't at rest) ... big deal. Plato was the original Geek, not the original Greek. Pythagoras was so annoying they burned him out of house and home even after he ran away to Italy. Socrates got a fair trial, and got what was coming to him (mostly being too close to aristocrats in general, and Alcibiades in particular).
It's getting a little unwieldy to respond to all points, so I'm going to have to start picking and choosing, especially since I think we agree on more than we disagree.
Quote from: widdershins on September 13, 2016, 04:12:33 PM
The problem is that in any debate you have to start with several facts which both sides agree on. You have to have a starting point. Some simple examples in a debate with a theist would be that the universe exists and that it has not existed in its current form for an eternity. Those are very basic, but each debate is different with each side willing to start with an acceptance of various facts. That one position or the other should be the "default" position is a premise of the argument neither side is likely to accept from the other. What that means is that by making this a premise of your argument you are setting up your argument to fail to have any effect (if the intention of your argument is to sway the other person, that is). So what is the point of making the argument? Do you just want to piss the theist off? Then it's a great argument. Do you want to have an intelligent debate, already a problem when debating theists? That's not any more likely to happen by setting a default in your favor than it is when they try to set a default in their favor. What's more, as an argument style, it's utterly dishonest. It's "cheating" and it's lazy. You're setting up the argument so that you never actually have to do any work to prove any point, only shoot down anything that comes at you. In this case you, and theists arguing the same, are making the argument "The default is that I am right and if you can't prove I'm not then I win". You wouldn't accept that as a valid premise from them. Why should you expect them to accept it from you?
I would describe my position more as "This is what we currently know to be the case, what reason or evidence do you have to add this invisible layer that's not called for by any current observations?" and if they can't provide evidence or even a valid chain of reasoning, I am under no obligation to accept their claim even provisionally. The only thing I assert is that the universe exists as we observe it -- one would hope we could agree at least on that point, although there might be a problem there debating a Buddhist.
Quote from: widdershins on September 13, 2016, 04:12:33 PM
I agree with all of that. However, in this case the claim would be, "There is no intelligent life on the other side of the galaxy -- prove there is or I'm right!" By adding that single word and making it a negative am I then allowed that claim? Is this valid because I do not need to demonstrate that I cannot see what I have not seen? Of course not. In this case EITHER claim would be either spectacularly ignorant or fantastically informed.
Actually, I would with some caveats agree with that assertion, since there's not one shred of evidence to demonstrate there is, in fact, intelligent life on the other side of the galaxy. And in the vast, vast majority of cases, it's going to be true: life-bearing planets will not have produced intelligent life, or at best not yet.
So far as we yet know, there is no intelligent life elsewhere in this galaxy, either on the other side of it, or right next door.
And when I do assert the existence of other intelligences -- and make no mistake, I do -- I do it on the following bases: that their existence is not inconsistent with what we know about biology, geology, astronomy and any other relevant science; that given the potential number of habitats not only in the galaxy but in the universe that it is more probable than not unless there's some impediment to the evolution of intelligence that we do not yet know; and that
it is only a proposal and not proven and I could well be wrong. One may be persuaded by the argument, or one may not.
I should like to think I'm right, but I know perfectly well that it's just a series of unsupported inferences that make sense, and that I think is fairly well reasoned, but outside of a mathematical proof, reasoning is not evidence.
This is entirely not what belief is to a religious person, to whom the mere assertion is sufficient to make the claim of 'proof' or 'knowledge', and the assertion that they make is not consistent with what we know about how the universe works. It neither has the solidity of being based in factual extrapolation, nor the humility to come with the "but I could be wrong", nor the decency to not demand it be accepted by others just on its own assertion.
So I think I stand on the more solid ground, logically.
Quote from: widdershins on September 13, 2016, 04:12:33 PM
I agree wholeheartedly. I have looked into many, many claims of the supernatural variety. I have spent years of my life looking into Christianity, alone. Years more looking into ghosts, magic, UFOs, etc. Never have I seen the slightest evidence to suggest there was anything to any such claims. I now do dismiss them outright. If you don't have proof, you are wrong. And I do often claim that there is no such thing as magic, which, when you get down to it, is really no different than claiming outright there are no gods. So it's not like I am not, myself, guilty of doing exactly what I am arguing against here. The fact that "magic" is less accepted as a reality is no excuse for allowing myself more latitude. But to be fair, when I make the claim that there is no such thing as magic, I am usually referring to what theists prefer I call "miracles". In this case I am very much taking a jab. I'm not debating a position and my intention is not to sway, my intention is to annoy. So I guess, in that sense, if your intention is to annoy rather than sway, saying "There are no gods" is no different.
I'm still not sure how one would differentiate between a god and an extremely advanced ETI anyway.
The flying saucer case is interesting, and relevant.
Digression here: I greatly mislike 'UFO' as a term for alien spaceships, because UFO is universally assumed to mean just that, an alien spaceship. And that's an
identified flying object, not an unidentified one.
Anyway. Have you noticed that flying saucer sightings and photos and videos are on the wane, and that the main thrust of that movement is about personal abductions and encounters?
And the reason for that is that there are now cameras everywhere -- and all of a sudden the classic claims have largely dried up and it's shifted to a more "mystical" kind of encounter.
I mean, think about all the really good, really clear images of the Chelyabinsk bolide when almost the entire astronomical community was looking the other way at the now largely-forgotten 367943 Duende, which was to make a near pass later that same day. There's essentially complete coverage from its entry into the atmosphere to its detonation, to even security camera footage of its fragments splashing down into a small frozen lake. For an unpredictable event that no one was looking for. And the data from the images was so good, astronomers could reverse-engineer its orbit (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chelyabinsk_meteor#Coincidental_asteroid_approach).
As imaging technology became more ubiquitous, the nature of the claims changed to those which were largely proof against the new technology.
This is precisely analogous to what has been going on for thousands of years in the debate between rationalists and religionists.
It was revealed on television recently, that much of the UFO stuff in NM/CO was USAF special ops, making fools out of UFO enthusiasts, so that nobody would believe them, when they actually reported something real. The real being top secret military activity within the US Southwest. Those cattle mutilations were dreamed up by the USAF. They flew actual black helicopters with Hollywood Christmas lights to simulate UFO sightings at night. Of course some will claim that I saw that TV show (and not Alex Jones) earlier this week. One UFO guy they let go insane over what he thought he had seen, just for the fun of it. Counter-intell for keeps back in the Cold War. And sorry, no alien technology.
Quote from: Baruch on September 16, 2016, 04:55:37 PM
It was revealed on television recently, that much of the UFO stuff in NM/CO was USAF special ops, making fools out of UFO enthusiasts, so that nobody would believe them, when they actually reported something real. The real being top secret military activity within the US Southwest. Those cattle mutilations were dreamed up by the USAF. They flew actual black helicopters with Hollywood Christmas lights to simulate UFO sightings at night. Of course some will claim that I saw that TV show (and not Alex Jones) earlier this week. One UFO guy they let go insane over what he thought he had seen, just for the fun of it. Counter-intell for keeps back in the Cold War. And sorry, no alien technology.
Well, that's at least a real-world, rational explanation rather than claiming extraterrestrials.
Cattle mutilations, it turns out, were invented by one person trying to sell books to the credulous and are in fact regular dead cattle that died in a particular environment and were consumed by bacteria that preferentially eat certain parts of the cow first, and after a couple weeks it tends to look like a 'cattle mutilation' when it's actually perfectly natural.
I think the default would be to say neither. I seldom find it necessary to make a positive statement about BigFeets.
Quote from: trdsf on September 16, 2016, 03:45:27 PM
It's getting a little unwieldy to respond to all points, so I'm going to have to start picking and choosing, especially since I think we agree on more than we disagree.
Certainly understandable. I will help a little by quoting only the parts from you I am responding to and try not to respond to every little thing.
Quote from: trdsf on September 16, 2016, 03:45:27 PM
I would describe my position more as "This is what we currently know to be the case, what reason or evidence do you have to add this invisible layer that's not called for by any current observations?" and if they can't provide evidence or even a valid chain of reasoning, I am under no obligation to accept their claim even provisionally. The only thing I assert is that the universe exists as we observe it -- one would hope we could agree at least on that point, although there might be a problem there debating a Buddhist.
Actually, I would with some caveats agree with that assertion, since there's not one shred of evidence to demonstrate there is, in fact, intelligent life on the other side of the galaxy. And in the vast, vast majority of cases, it's going to be true: life-bearing planets will not have produced intelligent life, or at best not yet. So far as we yet know, there is no intelligent life elsewhere in this galaxy, either on the other side of it, or right next door.
Absolutely you are under no obligation to accept the wild claim out of the blue that some particular deity exists. And so long as you don't make the counter-claim that said deity doesn't exist the theist starts the conversation on the offensive, having to provide evidence which doesn't exist for a claim which is clearly false. But we can't
prove it's false. In my early days as an atheist I tried many times to logic God away. It was my fellow atheists who pointed out that I had not accomplished it and could not. I can claim fairies don't exist with impunity
only because I am unlikely to be talking to a person who actually believes in fairies when I make that claim. They are likely to agree with me, not call me on it and demand I prove it. But Christians, especially, like to ask the impossible. How many times have we heard the claim that because science doesn't know X that proves God is real, where X is some thing beyond our current technological ability to know? Asking that we do something they know to be impossible is a favorite go-to for rabid theists who love to argue. Of course any argument style is going to fail when dealing with unreasonable people, but making a claim opposite theirs only gives even the more reasonable ammunition. To the theist, "Prove God doesn't exist" is a perfectly reasonable request. Critical thought, remember, is not their strong suit. So I ask again, what would be the purpose of stating absolutely, "There are no gods"? So far as I can see, only to take a jab.
Quote from: trdsf on September 16, 2016, 03:45:27 PM
This is entirely not what belief is to a religious person, to whom the mere assertion is sufficient to make the claim of 'proof' or 'knowledge', and the assertion that they make is not consistent with what we know about how the universe works. It neither has the solidity of being based in factual extrapolation, nor the humility to come with the "but I could be wrong", nor the decency to not demand it be accepted by others just on its own assertion.
Frigging absolutely true! Their claim NEVER comes with "but I may be wrong"! And that is the very reason they have trouble automatically understanding that this is part of every scientific claim. When they read about evolution they believe that science is making an absolute claim that this IS how it happened and you cannot question it! In fact, Mr. Buttfuck Stein makes that assertion repeatedly in
Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed. He asserts that science is hostile to intelligent design, not because it is a stupid pseudoscience which is significantly responsible for the dumbing down of America and the birth of a frightening mistrust and rejection of many fields of science which has reached even medical science in the form of rejection of inoculations for our very children, but because there is some secret conspiracy among evil sciences to force people to accept evolution as some absolute truth.
It is for this very reason that we need to separate ourselves from this argument style. I think it is very important the the public actually learn what a theory is and what it means; that it in no way says, "This IS how it is, THE END, FUCKERS!" Science has the intellectual high ground by a long shot. It is "unfounded claim asserted as absolute truth which cannot be questioned" verses "evidence based explanation open for debate always and forever". I think it's important to always, always stress that difference as it is a very important difference. One is open minded, the other is stupid.
Quote from: trdsf on September 16, 2016, 03:45:27 PM
Digression here: I greatly mislike 'UFO' as a term for alien spaceships, because UFO is universally assumed to mean just that, an alien spaceship. And that's an identified flying object, not an unidentified one.
We are of a kind here. I used to frequent UFO forums but finally had to quit because I simply could no longer subject myself to the mental gymnastics these people use to maintain belief. One of the things they do is use the term "UFO" to mean "alien spacecraft". The reason they do this is so that they can back out of a claim at any second. When called on something they can say, "I never said it was an alien space ship! I said it was an UNIDENTIFIED Flying Object". The use of the acronym UFO as a generic term meaning far more than something unidentified is by design.
Quote from: trdsf on September 16, 2016, 03:45:27 PM
Anyway. Have you noticed that flying saucer sightings and photos and videos are on the wane, and that the main thrust of that movement is about personal abductions and encounters?
I have not looked into this in years, but I do know that, at least with crop circles, the stories run in cycles. More news coverage ALWAYS equals more crop circles.
Quote from: trdsf on September 16, 2016, 03:45:27 PM
And the reason for that is that there are now cameras everywhere -- and all of a sudden the classic claims have largely dried up and it's shifted to a more "mystical" kind of encounter.
This evolution of belief is one of the things that made me give up looking into the supernatural altogether. I had a "ghost hunter" explain to me what ectoplasm was and how they had hoped to get a sample. I looked it up and found that what it is today is not what it always was. What it was originally was something you could easily get a sample of. Houdini was famous for outing mediums and their tricks and it wasn't long before they were all uncovered as frauds or stopped putting on their shows so publicly. After this time ectoplasm went from being a mysterious substance which emanated from the bodies of mediums in physical from to something more the consistence of spider webs which you could "feel" as you passed through them, but always seemed to mysteriously evade the Petri dish.
As far as I'm concerned if the nature of a thing evolves over time that is pretty solid evidence that thing simply never existed.
I think fundamentally we agree on pretty much every point with the single exception of whether it is proper to say, "There are no gods" or "There is no <particular deity>". And I'm half with you on that, too. There are no deities. I am as certain of that as one can be. However, one cannot be 100% certain ever as our knowledge is limited. Here I can make that absolute claim and nobody will bat an eye. You all understand that I am not claiming to have proof that this is an absolute certainty which is unquestionable. But the mind of a theist is a broken, barely functional thing incapable of even processing the idea that an absolute claim cannot be made. They live in a black and white world where there are only two possible answers to the question of deities and magic, yes it's real or no it's not real. To them, "I don't know" or "We can't know" is a division by zero. It's the answer of a stupid person. It's an admission that we are not as smart as them because we have no answer and they do. That is why I think it is important to ALWAYS say, "We can't know" and explain why. We need to grease the rusty wheels of their brains in the hopes of getting them turning again. Because simply having the argument, that's pointless. You will never win. They will never see reason. All you can do is plant the seed of reason, grease those wheels in the hopes that one day they will begin turning again and the ability to think critically and rationally will return, the long disused parts of the brain firing up once again.
You're never going to win the argument. Neither are they. The ONLY thing you can do is plant a seed; TRY to get them to understand your position, even if they don't accept it; give them a new way to think. If you're lucky they will start using that new way of thinking to try to improve their argument and slowly come to the realization that their argument is stupid. This is what I hope for most of the time. Once they begin to annoy me, however, THAT is when I start making the absolute claim that I know will piss them off.
Quote from: widdershins on September 19, 2016, 02:43:37 PM
Certainly understandable. I will help a little by quoting only the parts from you I am responding to and try not to respond to every little thing.
Absolutely you are under no obligation to accept the wild claim out of the blue that some particular deity exists. And so long as you don't make the counter-claim that said deity doesn't exist the theist starts the conversation on the offensive, having to provide evidence which doesn't exist for a claim which is clearly false. But we can't prove it's false. In my early days as an atheist I tried many times to logic God away. It was my fellow atheists who pointed out that I had not accomplished it and could not. I can claim fairies don't exist with impunity only because I am unlikely to be talking to a person who actually believes in fairies when I make that claim. They are likely to agree with me, not call me on it and demand I prove it. But Christians, especially, like to ask the impossible. How many times have we heard the claim that because science doesn't know X that proves God is real, where X is some thing beyond our current technological ability to know? Asking that we do something they know to be impossible is a favorite go-to for rabid theists who love to argue. Of course any argument style is going to fail when dealing with unreasonable people, but making a claim opposite theirs only gives even the more reasonable ammunition. To the theist, "Prove God doesn't exist" is a perfectly reasonable request. Critical thought, remember, is not their strong suit. So I ask again, what would be the purpose of stating absolutely, "There are no gods"? So far as I can see, only to take a jab.
I don't consider it to be taking a jab as such; certainly no more so than their assertion that there 'definitely' is one. I think it's more intellectually honest to say "Based on the available evidence, there's none to indicate there is any god and claims that there is need to be proven" than "Based on the complete lack of evidence, there is one and you can't prove there isn't".
Whether or not the position is contentious and how it's responded to by those who disagree has no bearing on whether or not it's a proper -- that is to say, evidence-based with the burden of proof pointing in the right direction -- assertion to make.
In full, the assertion I would make is this: "The universe is as we observe it and operates to laws, some of which we have discovered and/or approximated and some of which we're still figuring out, and quite probably some of which have not yet been encountered because we haven't been able to observe on a level detailed or extreme enough. There are no rigorous, repeatable observations that require the presence of a supernatural entity to explain. Such claims of the existence of a supernatural entity require evidence." In short, it comes down to 'the universe is what it is', although that functionally subsumes 'there are no gods' since the universe is considered as a basically self-contained object.
Quote from: widdershins on September 19, 2016, 02:43:37 PM
Frigging absolutely true! Their claim NEVER comes with "but I may be wrong"! And that is the very reason they have trouble automatically understanding that this is part of every scientific claim. When they read about evolution they believe that science is making an absolute claim that this IS how it happened and you cannot question it! In fact, Mr. Buttfuck Stein makes that assertion repeatedly in Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed. He asserts that science is hostile to intelligent design, not because it is a stupid pseudoscience which is significantly responsible for the dumbing down of America and the birth of a frightening mistrust and rejection of many fields of science which has reached even medical science in the form of rejection of inoculations for our very children, but because there is some secret conspiracy among evil sciences to force people to accept evolution as some absolute truth.
I think this is a part of the scientific method that can be explained, and should be. Absolutes are for mathematics; science is about looking for the places where you don't know for sure what's going to happen, not just stopping when you're happy with the result (a good definition of the religious position, I think).
And it's not just the IDiots and other creationists. I have as little sympathy for opposition to the Mauna Kea observatories on the basis that it's "sacred" ground, or for those that want the Kennewick Man handed over to tribal authorities for a proper burial, rather than researched so we can actually learn something about paleo-America.
Quote from: widdershins on September 19, 2016, 02:43:37 PM
It is for this very reason that we need to separate ourselves from this argument style. I think it is very important the the public actually learn what a theory is and what it means; that it in no way says, "This IS how it is, THE END, FUCKERS!" Science has the intellectual high ground by a long shot. It is "unfounded claim asserted as absolute truth which cannot be questioned" verses "evidence based explanation open for debate always and forever". I think it's important to always, always stress that difference as it is a very important difference. One is open minded, the other is stupid.
I think one can stake out a position and remain open minded. I mean, show me some evidence, sure, but until then, there isn't a reason (literally or figuratively) to abandon my position. I do admit that it could happen, although I am doubtful of the odds of it happening.
Quote from: widdershins on September 19, 2016, 02:43:37 PM
This evolution of belief is one of the things that made me give up looking into the supernatural altogether. I had a "ghost hunter" explain to me what ectoplasm was and how they had hoped to get a sample. I looked it up and found that what it is today is not what it always was. What it was originally was something you could easily get a sample of. Houdini was famous for outing mediums and their tricks and it wasn't long before they were all uncovered as frauds or stopped putting on their shows so publicly. After this time ectoplasm went from being a mysterious substance which emanated from the bodies of mediums in physical from to something more the consistence of spider webs which you could "feel" as you passed through them, but always seemed to mysteriously evade the Petri dish.
As far as I'm concerned if the nature of a thing evolves over time that is pretty solid evidence that thing simply never existed.
I think fundamentally we agree on pretty much every point with the single exception of whether it is proper to say, "There are no gods" or "There is no <particular deity>". And I'm half with you on that, too. There are no deities. I am as certain of that as one can be. However, one cannot be 100% certain ever as our knowledge is limited. Here I can make that absolute claim and nobody will bat an eye. You all understand that I am not claiming to have proof that this is an absolute certainty which is unquestionable. But the mind of a theist is a broken, barely functional thing incapable of even processing the idea that an absolute claim cannot be made. They live in a black and white world where there are only two possible answers to the question of deities and magic, yes it's real or no it's not real. To them, "I don't know" or "We can't know" is a division by zero. It's the answer of a stupid person. It's an admission that we are not as smart as them because we have no answer and they do. That is why I think it is important to ALWAYS say, "We can't know" and explain why. We need to grease the rusty wheels of their brains in the hopes of getting them turning again. Because simply having the argument, that's pointless. You will never win. They will never see reason. All you can do is plant the seed of reason, grease those wheels in the hopes that one day they will begin turning again and the ability to think critically and rationally will return, the long disused parts of the brain firing up once again.
You're never going to win the argument. Neither are they. The ONLY thing you can do is plant a seed; TRY to get them to understand your position, even if they don't accept it; give them a new way to think. If you're lucky they will start using that new way of thinking to try to improve their argument and slowly come to the realization that their argument is stupid. This is what I hope for most of the time. Once they begin to annoy me, however, THAT is when I start making the absolute claim that I know will piss them off.
(emphasis added)
I think that's a useful place from which to teach what it means to 'know' something, in a scientific context, that it's always pending further observations and subject to scrutiny -- but that it is also a legitimate assertion to be made based on the available evidence. I 'know' gravity is the warping of space (I'm not so convinced about the exchange of gravitons), but it might not be, it may need to be quantized or it may never be fully unified with the strong-electro-weak force, and
that's why we do research. It might prove to be a mechanism we don't suspect yet.
And still, even not knowing for certain
how it works, I do know
that it works and how it affects me. I know that if I step out of my bedroom window, about one second later I will be in a heap on the lawn arriving with an approximate force of one kilonewton, and probably not enjoying the situation. And no matter what I might believe about antigravity and how much I believe it, that will have considerably less impact than my body would on the grass.
I've also found that if you're careful, you can usually lead a theist somewhere they really didn't expect to be and they will walk away with at least part of their mind lit up. When I used to hang out with the gamers at the University of Toledo, there was an active contingent of the Campus Crusaders that eventually learned to leave me alone after I logic-chopped one into admitting that referring to god strictly as 'he' was imposing a human limitation on that which was not to be limited by humans, and that 'she', 'it' and 'they' were necessarily equally acceptable (full disclosure: I was still an active Wiccan at that time). But even though that encounter was theist meeting theist, I did nudge him towards thinking in a less restricted manner. What it meant to him long-term, I have no idea.
I was just pleased I was avoided by the Crusaders after that. :)
Quote from: trdsf on September 21, 2016, 12:42:25 AM
I don't consider it to be taking a jab as such; certainly no more so than their assertion that there 'definitely' is one. I think it's more intellectually honest to say "Based on the available evidence, there's none to indicate there is any god and claims that there is need to be proven" than "Based on the complete lack of evidence, there is one and you can't prove there isn't".
I don't know if you've ever been religious, but I was a fundamentalist Pentecostal zealot at one time. When they make the claim that it is definitely true, they are not taking a jab at you. They are trying to assure themselves. Jesus is coming back at any second now and if your soul isn't absolutely immaculate when he does, you burn for all eternity. If Jesus had come back at the moment I doubted by soul would have been lost for all eternity. There is no room for doubt. There is no room for critical thinking. Eternity is at stake. Yes, I did get angry at people who didn't agree with me, but not because they didn't agree with me. It was because that what they said could cause doubt and, being the lowly scum I was, it would serve me right to be caught sinning just as Jesus came back because I was such a worthless piece of shit who sinned all the time. Most of the time I didn't consider myself worthy of Heaven anyway. Who the hell can live up to the standards of perfection? So no, it's not a jab, it's a knee-jerk reflex. At least from my experience.
And there is a huge difference between, "Based on the available evidence..." and "There is no God". I don't have a problem with the statement if you take the extra time to explain that you are not stating an absolute certainty but rather stating that this is what the evidence says. There is no reason whatsoever to shield the believer from the reality that the only reason they believe is because someone told them they should.
Quote from: trdsf on September 21, 2016, 12:42:25 AM
Whether or not the position is contentious and how it's responded to by those who disagree has no bearing on whether or not it's a proper -- that is to say, evidence-based with the burden of proof pointing in the right direction -- assertion to make.
In full, the assertion I would make is this: "The universe is as we observe it and operates to laws, some of which we have discovered and/or approximated and some of which we're still figuring out, and quite probably some of which have not yet been encountered because we haven't been able to observe on a level detailed or extreme enough. There are no rigorous, repeatable observations that require the presence of a supernatural entity to explain. Such claims of the existence of a supernatural entity require evidence." In short, it comes down to 'the universe is what it is', although that functionally subsumes 'there are no gods' since the universe is considered as a basically self-contained object.
I think this is a part of the scientific method that can be explained, and should be. Absolutes are for mathematics; science is about looking for the places where you don't know for sure what's going to happen, not just stopping when you're happy with the result (a good definition of the religious position, I think).
Beautifully said.
Quote from: trdsf on September 21, 2016, 12:42:25 AM
And it's not just the IDiots and other creationists. I have as little sympathy for opposition to the Mauna Kea observatories on the basis that it's "sacred" ground, or for those that want the Kennewick Man handed over to tribal authorities for a proper burial, rather than researched so we can actually learn something about paleo-America.
I think one can stake out a position and remain open minded. I mean, show me some evidence, sure, but until then, there isn't a reason (literally or figuratively) to abandon my position. I do admit that it could happen, although I am doubtful of the odds of it happening.
(emphasis added)
I think that's a useful place from which to teach what it means to 'know' something, in a scientific context, that it's always pending further observations and subject to scrutiny -- but that it is also a legitimate assertion to be made based on the available evidence. I 'know' gravity is the warping of space (I'm not so convinced about the exchange of gravitons), but it might not be, it may need to be quantized or it may never be fully unified with the strong-electro-weak force, and that's why we do research. It might prove to be a mechanism we don't suspect yet.
Gravity doesn't exist. We'll have a beer some time and I'll tell you all about the fanciful ideas of this armchair physicist. If you don't know what the hell you're talking about, at least, it's really quite fascinating. If you're a physicist, however, it's probably more along the "laughable" line.
Quote from: trdsf on September 21, 2016, 12:42:25 AM
And still, even not knowing for certain how it works, I do know that it works and how it affects me. I know that if I step out of my bedroom window, about one second later I will be in a heap on the lawn arriving with an approximate force of one kilonewton, and probably not enjoying the situation. And no matter what I might believe about antigravity and how much I believe it, that will have considerably less impact than my body would on the grass.
I've also found that if you're careful, you can usually lead a theist somewhere they really didn't expect to be and they will walk away with at least part of their mind lit up. When I used to hang out with the gamers at the University of Toledo, there was an active contingent of the Campus Crusaders that eventually learned to leave me alone after I logic-chopped one into admitting that referring to god strictly as 'he' was imposing a human limitation on that which was not to be limited by humans, and that 'she', 'it' and 'they' were necessarily equally acceptable (full disclosure: I was still an active Wiccan at that time). But even though that encounter was theist meeting theist, I did nudge him towards thinking in a less restricted manner. What it meant to him long-term, I have no idea.
I was just pleased I was avoided by the Crusaders after that. :)
Knowledge trumps assumption every time. I do not disagree. I would rather actually
know that I don't know something than to
believe that I know something which is wrong.
Quote from: widdershins on September 21, 2016, 10:58:53 AM
I don't know if you've ever been religious, but I was a fundamentalist Pentecostal zealot at one time. When they make the claim that it is definitely true, they are not taking a jab at you. They are trying to assure themselves. Jesus is coming back at any second now and if your soul isn't absolutely immaculate when he does, you burn for all eternity. If Jesus had come back at the moment I doubted by soul would have been lost for all eternity. There is no room for doubt. There is no room for critical thinking. Eternity is at stake. Yes, I did get angry at people who didn't agree with me, but not because they didn't agree with me. It was because that what they said could cause doubt and, being the lowly scum I was, it would serve me right to be caught sinning just as Jesus came back because I was such a worthless piece of shit who sinned all the time. Most of the time I didn't consider myself worthy of Heaven anyway. Who the hell can live up to the standards of perfection? So no, it's not a jab, it's a knee-jerk reflex. At least from my experience.
Oh, I was the devoutest little Catholic until I was about 16, altar boy, lector, even toyed with the idea of going to seminary rather than regular high school, and still considered myself nominally Catholic until I was 18 or 19. And after my 'religious experience' that made a Wiccan out of me, I was quite the devout polytheist for a good twenty years or thereabouts.
But even in both those forms, I was always aware that my 'knowledge' of the existence of the divine was not the same as my knowledge of what happens when you drop two different weights from a height. I was aware that I did not
know, I only
believed, and even though I believed a whole lot, to the point where I was convinced of the truth of it, I knew it was not something that could be independently demonstrated. I actually did take care to refer to my own religious experiences as not evidentiary to anyone but myself, since they were not shared experiences with anyone else and could not be attested to independently. And yes, I considered this a virtue, to have had the experience but not demand others just take my word for it -- though I did expect that they would respect my own choice to accept those experiences as meaningful to myself.
So I was comfortable in my lack of absolute knowledge. I suppose I was pre-primed to eventually move to a rationalist view of reality, on that basis.
Quote from: widdershins on September 21, 2016, 10:58:53 AM
And there is a huge difference between, "Based on the available evidence..." and "There is no God". I don't have a problem with the statement if you take the extra time to explain that you are not stating an absolute certainty but rather stating that this is what the evidence says. There is no reason whatsoever to shield the believer from the reality that the only reason they believe is because someone told them they should.
And I don't mind taking the extra time, if they're at least willing to hear me out. Alas, so few are.
Quote from: widdershins on September 21, 2016, 10:58:53 AM
Knowledge trumps assumption every time. I do not disagree. I would rather actually know that I don't know something than to believe that I know something which is wrong.
Hear hear.
Quote from: trdsf on September 21, 2016, 01:47:33 PM
Oh, I was the devoutest little Catholic until I was about 16, altar boy, lector, even toyed with the idea of going to seminary rather than regular high school, and still considered myself nominally Catholic until I was 18 or 19. And after my 'religious experience' that made a Wiccan out of me, I was quite the devout polytheist for a good twenty years or thereabouts.
But even in both those forms, I was always aware that my 'knowledge' of the existence of the divine was not the same as my knowledge of what happens when you drop two different weights from a height. I was aware that I did not know, I only believed, and even though I believed a whole lot, to the point where I was convinced of the truth of it, I knew it was not something that could be independently demonstrated. I actually did take care to refer to my own religious experiences as not evidentiary to anyone but myself, since they were not shared experiences with anyone else and could not be attested to independently. And yes, I considered this a virtue, to have had the experience but not demand others just take my word for it -- though I did expect that they would respect my own choice to accept those experiences as meaningful to myself.
So I was comfortable in my lack of absolute knowledge. I suppose I was pre-primed to eventually move to a rationalist view of reality, on that basis.
And I don't mind taking the extra time, if they're at least willing to hear me out. Alas, so few are.
Hear hear.
And with that our differences are reconciled, not that they were extreme to begin with. Thank you for a most enlightening and enjoyable conversation.
Quote from: widdershins on September 21, 2016, 03:56:29 PM
And with that our differences are reconciled, not that they were extreme to begin with. Thank you for a most enlightening and enjoyable conversation.
And you! More or less exactly what I was hoping for. :)
The ancient gods were dismissed with a general commonality among early christian historians as mythological, thus the label of mythological has been forcibly stamped on them today and we are quick to accept that "fact" as fact simply because we forget that the historians were christians who did the labeling. Were we to demand as much "proof" from those "authorities" today, we could perhaps give more credence to our general dismissal of all gods.
Yes, many people don't ever stop to think that nobody actually ever "proved" Zeus never existed. It's just commonly accepted. It is considered "fact" only because there's nobody left around who cares to disagree with it.
Quote from: widdershins on September 22, 2016, 10:21:44 AM
Yes, many people don't ever stop to think that nobody actually ever "proved" Zeus never existed. It's just commonly accepted. It is considered "fact" only because there's nobody left around who cares to disagree with it.
That is the status of most facts, and old arguments, here in the Matrix. We don't even know what we used to know. There are neo-pagans in Greece and other places, bringing back the old gods. I say more power to them. Santa Muerta ... a female death angel recently popular in Mexican worship, is clearly a paganism hiding under the Christian dogma (as much local Catholicsm since the beginning) ... she most resembles the old Aztec god, Tezcatlipoca. This is not a good polytheism ;-(
Quote from: trdsf on September 01, 2016, 11:43:26 PM
I wish to argue that the former is correct. Well, both are, but there is sometimes some blowback on the flat statement "There is no god" because someone inevitably says, "You can't prove that!"
True enough.
Of course, proving there isn't a god isn't my problem -- the onus is on the believers to prove there is since it's their assertion.
Moreso, I posit that one can legitimately make the claim that there is no god, on the simple basis that the god hypothesis has no empirical support.
By analogy, I am not expected to say that I "believe" there is no phlogiston (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phlogiston_theory), or luminiferous aether (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luminiferous_aether), or caloric (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caloric_theory). These are deprecated theories, long since superseded by better explanations of phenomena, and while there is an infinitesimal chance that some observation might lend them some support, no one expects me to be agnostic about them.
I argue that the same applies to the god hypothesis. It is an ancient theory of how the universe works, long since obsoleted by better observations and better evidence, and I should not be expected to pay it even lip service anymore. If evidence turns up, we'll contend with it then, but after ten thousand years or more of human observation, not one single solitary concrete and incontrovertible shred of evidence has appeared.
As such, I shouldn't need to 'believe' there is no god any more than I should have to 'believe' there is no Planet Vulcan (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vulcan_(hypothetical_planet)) between Mercury and the Sun or that the Earth isn't the center of the universe. I can legitimately say, pending an actual offer of evidence, that there is no reason to accept the hypothesis in the first place -- to wit, there is no god.
Thoughts?
My first question for you is, could you be wrong about everything you claim to know?
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Quote from: alexxmedeiros on October 14, 2016, 12:47:41 AM
My first question for you is, could you be wrong about everything you claim to know?
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And that would be my first question for you.
Quote from: Mike Cl on October 14, 2016, 09:58:20 AM
And that would be my first question for you.
I could be wrong about a lot of things I claim to know, but not ALL of them for example: I know for certain that the Christian God, the only God, is true and real.
But I asked you the question. Please answer.
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Quote from: alexxmedeiros on October 14, 2016, 01:35:21 PM
I could be wrong about a lot of things I claim to know, but not ALL of them for example: I know for certain that the Christian God, the only God, is true and real.
But I asked you the question. Please answer.
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That's all you do, is ask questions. Your turn to answer some. Why are you certain that your god exists?
Quote from: Mike Cl on October 14, 2016, 04:05:00 PM
That's all you do, is ask questions. Your turn to answer some. Why are you certain that your god exists?
The same reason that you are!
He has revealed it to us that we may know for certain.
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Quote from: alexxmedeiros on October 14, 2016, 09:25:20 PM
The same reason that you are!
He has revealed it to us that we may know for certain.
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Oh, that explains the estimated 4,200 religions that exist in the world. Wait.
Quote from: Blackleaf on October 14, 2016, 09:32:22 PM
Oh, that explains the estimated 4,200 religions that exist in the world. Wait.
Idolatry is popular (:
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Quote from: alexxmedeiros on October 14, 2016, 09:35:02 PM
Idolatry is popular (:
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Good job missing the point. If God had really revealed himself in a way that is so obvious, there would not be so many religions. Why make gods up when you already know that Yahweh is the one true god? Unless you're really stupid enough to think that Muslims do not believe in their religion as honestly as you believe in yours.
Quote from: alexxmedeiros on October 14, 2016, 09:25:20 PM
The same reason that you are!
He has revealed it to us that we may know for certain.
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How did he reveal it to you??
Quote from: Mike Cl on October 14, 2016, 10:07:29 PM
How did he reveal it to you??
No idea.
I don't know how he made a cow either but I know he made it.
He has revealed to everyone enough information to know a. That he exists and b. We are accountable to him and have all failed to match His Glory.
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Quote from: alexxmedeiros on October 14, 2016, 09:35:02 PM
Idolatry is popular (:
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One man's idolatry is another man's revealed truth.
Quote from: Blackleaf on October 14, 2016, 09:41:03 PM
Good job missing the point. If God had really revealed himself in a way that is so obvious, there would not be so many religions. Why make gods up when you already know that Yahweh is the one true god? Unless you're really stupid enough to think that Muslims do not believe in their religion as honestly as you believe in yours.
No the reason that there are so many other religions and atheists and agnostics is not because God hasn't revealed himself but because everyone suppresses the truth in unrighteousness.
Some do it religiously, others with denial, some with substance abuse... etc.
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Quote from: Hijiri Byakuren on October 14, 2016, 10:09:44 PM
One man's idolatry is another man's revealed truth.
Nope, idolatry is worshipping any thing other than. The creator.
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Quote from: alexxmedeiros on October 14, 2016, 10:10:14 PM
No the reason that there are so many other religions and atheists and agnostics is not because God hasn't revealed himself but because everyone suppresses the truth in unrighteousness.
Some do it religiously, others with denial, some with substance abuse... etc.
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Ah. So you really are stupid enough to think that Muslims don't honestly believe in their own religion. Okay.
Quote from: alexxmedeiros on October 14, 2016, 10:10:42 PM
Nope, idolatry is worshipping any thing other than. The creator.
Yup, and one man's idolatry is another man's revealed truth.
Your lack of self awareness is entertaining as always. I also think it's amusing how you treat me, considering what's written atop my avatar on every post I make on the real website (not the dumbed-down Tapatalk version). As I've said elsewhere, you really suck at doing your homework: you're happy to tell us that you're an "entrepreneur" -something so vague it could literally mean you own and operate a lemonade stand- but make no effort to find out who the people are that you're dealing with before casually dismissing them.
Quote from: Mike Cl on October 14, 2016, 11:39:05 PM
That's what I thought.
I'm prettty sure I said more then that in my answer lol...
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Quote from: alexxmedeiros on October 14, 2016, 11:45:54 PM
I'm prettty sure I said more then that in my answer lol...
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It doesn't matter, for it made little sense anyway.
Quote from: Mike Cl on October 14, 2016, 11:46:48 PM
It doesn't matter, for it made little sense anyway.
Oh so you have an objective standard of sense, you mind telling us what that is?
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God is hiding under a rock so heavy that he made that he himself was unable to lift it.
Quote from: alexxmedeiros on October 14, 2016, 11:49:10 PM
Oh so you have an objective standard of sense, you mind telling us what that is?
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I'll only continue with this if you tell me what you are driving at and stop with the inane questions.
Quote from: Sal1981 on October 15, 2016, 08:06:20 AM
God is hiding under a rock so heavy that he made that he himself was unable to lift it.
He just couldn't resist testing that paradox, huh?
A deity that is incompetent is far more horrible to imagine than none at all (which is easy). Thank god the universe is safe from both. LOL!
To believe or not to believe that is the question. I guess you could also punt by saying "There is no god in this part of the universe".
I think telling someone there is no god is like telling a child there is no Santa Claus. It takes time for them to believe that you were lying to them before.(I have to say I think because the first time I heard about santa was in 7th or 8th grade. and my first reaction was why would anybody tell their kids something so stupid as Santa Claus handing out presents)
Quote from: fencerider on December 13, 2016, 01:14:23 AM
To believe or not to believe that is the question. I guess you could also punt by saying "There is no god in this part of the universe".
I think telling someone there is no god is like telling a child there is no Santa Claus. It takes time for them to believe that you were lying to them before.(I have to say I think because the first time I heard about santa was in 7th or 8th grade. and my first reaction was why would anybody tell their kids something so stupid as Santa Claus handing out presents)
Most parents love their children, and want them to have a happier childhood than they had. However telling young people the whole truth and nothing but the truth, is cruel .. honest, but cruel. Once your child grows up, hopefully you have been increasingly honest with them, until such a point as you can have an honest adult conversation with them. At least that is how it worked with my own child.
This isn't to suggest that the notion of presenting a deity as some kind of parent, works on all levels. It doesn't ... if taken too literally, you realize that G-d is a horrible parent.
Quote from: fencerider on December 13, 2016, 01:14:23 AM
I think telling someone there is no god is like telling a child there is no Santa Claus. It takes time for them to believe that you were lying to them before.
LOL Well, it may be a little different. If you tell a 20 year old there is no Santa, he can go ask someone else. Eventually, he will get enough confirmation that Santa was indeed a fake. But you tell a 20 year old that there is no god, and 30 other people tell him there is, he's going to think you were wrong. Unless of course he actually thinks about it himself. I mean actually thinks, rather than just spin mental wheels by begging the questions, our using logic fraught with long strings of non-sequitur.
lying to your child is only a good way to parent when you are teaching your children about honesty and how to spot a lie. It's good to be wise to bullshit at any age. But lying to a child in order to fool them into believing in some fantasy is counter productive. Why not teach your children to be gullible idiots while you're at it? I have never told my children that santa is real. I have always been against telling kids that.
I strongly disbelieve in God, through no fault of my own.
Quote from: PorkPie on December 13, 2016, 10:51:39 AM
I strongly disbelieve in God, through no fault of my own.
That's how I feel. I gave fairy tales a fair shake. Far more than fantastical tales of magical woo deserved. It was my search for God which brought me to the conclusion that there are no gods.
Quote from: PorkPie on December 13, 2016, 10:51:39 AM
I strongly disbelieve in God, through no fault of my own.
I feel the same. I disbelieve--that is my emotional answer. But I like to take 'belief' out of the argument (at least for myself) because that word implies to me that thinking and proof has no room in that process. I like to say that I am a nonbeliever and not an atheist. 'Atheist' means roughly anti-theist, and I'm not that. I'm not against people who are theists. Most are nice people--willfully ignorant--but nice. So, I'm not against them, but don't share any of their belief system or reasoning system. 'Atheist' too often is taken to indicate that a person knows there is a god but is just against god. I don't think that way--I have determined there is no god(s) through thinking and reasoning. Hence I am a nonbeliever.
The default should be (and is for me) that there is no god(s), so why should I think there is one or several? If you believe there is, then it is incumbent upon you to give me some proof to show I am wrong. Too often, the theist wants me to disprove his/her belief. That is not the way it works. Bugs Bunny isn't real and unless I can produce some data to prove otherwise, he is and will remain a fiction. So to with any god--there is not proof. So, I think there is no god(s)--I am a nonbeliever in anything supernatural.
Quote from: doorknob on December 13, 2016, 08:01:20 AM
lying to your child is only a good way to parent when you are teaching your children about honesty and how to spot a lie. It's good to be wise to bullshit at any age. But lying to a child in order to fool them into believing in some fantasy is counter productive. Why not teach your children to be gullible idiots while you're at it? I have never told my children that santa is real. I have always been against telling kids that.
Not selling Santa is fine ... that is an American marketing gimmick from the the 1920s. But your kids are constantly exposed to lies at school, from the teachers and the other kids, and whatever TV etc you let them watch. I accept freedom of speech, and how it can both help or harm my child (when she was little).
Quote from: alexxmedeiros on October 14, 2016, 10:08:58 PM
No idea.
I don't know how he made a cow either but I know he made it.
He has revealed to everyone enough information to know a. That he exists and b. We are accountable to him and have all failed to match His Glory.
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How the hell could anyone -
anyone at all - not fail to match His glory!? How could any finite being match the glory of an infinite deity?
I see the poster's been banned, but he may still read this and ask himself some needed questions.
This is what it feels like here, sometimes:
(http://christianfunnypictures.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/funny-christian-memes-to-make-you-Lol-3.jpeg)
Quote from: PorkPie on December 13, 2016, 10:51:39 AM
I strongly disbelieve in God, through no fault of my own.
I agree with the following addition: I strongly disbelieve in all gods that have ever been presented to me.
And, yes, it is not our fault. If a god exists, and he wants humans to believe he does, the onus is purely his/hers/its/theirs.
I think, a lot of theists have proving the existence of God, confused with proving something in a courtroom. In the courtroom, a defendant's statements are, more or less, true until proven false. But in logic, a premise is, more or less, false until proven true. The problem is, they see themselves as the defendant(being called a liar), rather than the accuser(who makes a positive claim). They think you have to prove them guilty of false belief, rather than proving their own beliefs.
Quote from: Solomon Zorn on December 14, 2016, 06:57:55 AM
I think, a lot of theists have proving the existence of God, confused with proving something in a courtroom. In the courtroom, a defendant's statements are, more or less, true until proven false. But in logic, a premise is, more or less, false until proven true. The problem is, they see themselves as the defendant(being called a liar), rather than the accuser(who makes a positive claim). They think you have to prove them guilty of false belief, rather than proving their own beliefs.
The recent Randy, now in purgatory, attempted to do just that with several posts devoted to the methodology of the justice system as a blue print for proving the existence of God. Although, it got more convoluted than that.
Quote from: SGOS on December 14, 2016, 08:02:53 AM
The recent Randy, now in purgatory, attempted to do just that with several posts devoted to the methodology of the justice system as a blue print for proving the existence of God. Although, it got more convoluted than that.
The method was championed by Josh McDowell, the author of a book, popular when I was in Bible college in the mid 80's, called
Evidence That Demands a Verdict. It's the book that got me interested in apologetics, and led to my taking a class in logic.
I was taking to a Christian on another forum the other day, his 'proof' that God exists is that he had an electrical fault in his house that was going to cost him over £2000 to fix, he offered a prayer to the almighty and lo and behold, the fault rectified itself.
Need I say more.
I have a Christian friend, who is an older lady in my building. Her proof of God, went something like this:
She was visiting a person in the hospital, when something fell on the floor.
She bent down to pick it up, and a feeling came over her that she should pray for the person, so she did.
The person died a short time later.
Therefore God must have told her to pray.
No further proof needed.
Quote from: PorkPie on December 14, 2016, 08:57:16 AM
I was taking to a Christian on another forum the other day, his 'proof' that God exists is that he had an electrical fault in his house that was going to cost him over £2000 to fix, he offered a prayer to the almighty and lo and behold, the fault rectified itself.
Need I say more.
£2000 to fix an electrical fault?
First, he needs to get a bid from another contractor. Second, more likely he's fibbing to make it seem like a bigger miracle. Third, the second is silly, because miracles are not measured by the amount of money you save. Fourth, his whole story is most likely not even true.
It's just a repackaging of the one about the doctor telling you that you died on the operating table while you were having an out of body experience. What kind of a medical diagnosis is that anyway?
"Oh Doctor, the patient's heart stopped."
"Just give him a jolt, and wake him up."
<Pop!>
"There Doctor, he's back to life. Oh wait, now he's dead again."
"Just up the voltage, and give him another jolt."
<Pop!>
"Oh, he's alive again. Doctor, you brought the patient back to life!"
"Yes, Nurse. Make sure you tell that to the patient when he wakes up. They always get a thrill when they hear that. You can also charge them extra."
Quote from: PorkPie on December 14, 2016, 08:57:16 AM
I was taking to a Christian on another forum the other day, his 'proof' that God exists is that he had an electrical fault in his house that was going to cost him over £2000 to fix, he offered a prayer to the almighty and lo and behold, the fault rectified itself.
Need I say more.
I would have him check his local building codes. I highly doubt "God" made it through the licensing procedures to do electrical work. That would raise some red flags and he might be in for some serious fines and then have to have a licensed electrician look it over anyway. I'm not saying God doesn't do good work, but electricians are licensed for a reason.
I did advise him to get a qualified electrician to take a look at Gods handywork, I also pointed out to him that at the exact same time that God was sorting out his electrics for him, a child somewhere in the world was dying.
My comments didn't go down well.
Quote from: PorkPie on December 14, 2016, 12:29:16 PM
I did advise him to get a qualified electrician to take a look at Gods handywork, I also pointed out to him that at the exact same time that God was sorting out his electrics for him, a child somewhere in the world was dying.
My comments didn't go down well.
It won't much when his house burns down while he's sleeping anyway.
I guess I am more of a "I don't believe in that type of god" guy.
I am not sure why the universe just can't be the universe with us in it; type of universe. Why can't we talk about its properties as we can measure them? And wait 'till we can measure more things if we must? Or if we do measure something, why can't we change our opinions based on the new measurements? It just seems odd to me that some people "lock down" a belief despite learning something new.
Quote from: TheCloser on December 17, 2016, 02:40:45 PM
I guess I am more of a "I don't believe in that type of god" guy.
I am not sure why the universe just can't be the universe with us in it; type of universe. Why can't we talk about its properties as we can measure them? And wait 'till we can measure more things if we must? Or if we do measure something, why can't we change our opinions based on the new measurements? It just seems odd to me that some people "lock down" a belief despite learning something new.
People commit to an ideology ... they are lazy or embarrassed to have to change their ideology. Of course, no problem if one is flexible ... just be shameless and admit one is a stupid ape man. Besides, your personality is just the accumulation of the bullshit that is your personal story. The older you are, the deeper the pool.
Quote from: Baruch on December 17, 2016, 03:32:59 PM
People commit to an ideology ... they are lazy or embarrassed to have to change their ideology. Of course, no problem if one is flexible ... just be shameless and admit one is a stupid ape man. Besides, your personality is just the accumulation of the bullshit that is your personal story. The older you are, the deeper the pool.
yeah, I agree with this.
personality types express beliefs. So if someone is full of bullshit life storys their beliefs may just be bullshit. We do see a lot of that.
most times they don't even know what they don't know. Worse than that, many of these bullshit artist think that what they know is all anybody needs to know. And when confronted with their own limited bullshit, they whip out some personal meaning, emotional needs, or some other whoo whoo train of bullshit. I call them literalalist or fundamentalists. Some mystic talkers can be exosed quickly too.
But the non literal people, with normal life experiences, usually can get on the same page very quickly. regardless of what they believe.
I see no evidence of a god, therefore I do not believe there is a god.
I bothered to argue with some JVs recently. They haven't been back...
Quote from: TheCloser on December 17, 2016, 10:22:16 PM
yeah, I agree with this.
personality types express beliefs. So if someone is full of bullshit life storys their beliefs may just be bullshit. We do see a lot of that.
most times they don't even know what they don't know. Worse than that, many of these bullshit artist think that what they know is all anybody needs to know. And when confronted with their own limited bullshit, they whip out some personal meaning, emotional needs, or some other whoo whoo train of bullshit. I call them literalalist or fundamentalists. Some mystic talkers can be exosed quickly too.
But the non literal people, with normal life experiences, usually can get on the same page very quickly. regardless of what they believe.
You said a mouth full right there. Not only do they not know what they don't know, they don't care to know it. What they know fits with what they want to believe. If they learn anything else, that might not be the case, so it's best not to learn anything from "non-supporting sources".
You can't know what you don't know. But you do know that what is irrational is false. Science is a study of what we don't know. Religion is a study of what some think they know that is false.
Bad wording on my part. You can understand that you don't know something, and that understanding is very important. Take climate change and evolution for instance. What is the main difference between deniers and us? We understand that we don't know the science behind it and refer to the experts who do. Deniers think they're capable of learning enough about it to decide for themselves with a couple hours of reading web pages that dispute it. Or sometimes just 5 minutes of a sermon is enough to make them think they know something about the subject.
So is this just class warfare ... the educated against the unwashed masses? The unwashed masses have torn down the universities and burned the professors before.
If people are ignorant and stupid ... and a realist says that they are ... where do you fit in? Are you an ubermensch? If you are human, and humans are ignorant and stupid, spend time fixing your own ignorance and your own stupidity, rather than decrying the ignorance and stupidity of your neighbor. Otherwise you are just another bourgeois to be tossed onto the funeral pyre of civilization.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bTZZHPR5kEo
Misogyny and puritanism aren't new. Trump isn't responsible.
I've not gotten a degree in my life and only attended college for a short amount of time. However I always consider myself open to learning stuff, believing in things being balanced and just accepting shit happens in this world and we do what we do to survive in it. I'm fairly certain there are loads of people who their who have formal and advanced education who aren't developed in certain social constructs, even those with higher education that never learn the simple fact of not being a cunt to people on the lower end of the spectrum.
I got raised by a mother who taught me a load of good moral ideals and didn't force on me anything she wanted, just letting me be myself. I use to believe in stuff like god, spirits, afterlife, magic and all that, but slowly I fell away from all that and that same mother of mine doesn't question it. I honestly believe upbringing and ideals of our piers give us more then any college or university, because we can learn a sea of information, but unless we know what to do with it, it doesn't go anywhere.
Quote from: Baruch on December 27, 2016, 11:36:45 AM
So is this just class warfare ... the educated against the unwashed masses? The unwashed masses have torn down the universities and burned the professors before.
If people are ignorant and stupid ... and a realist says that they are ... where do you fit in? Are you an ubermensch? If you are human, and humans are ignorant and stupid, spend time fixing your own ignorance and your own stupidity, rather than decrying the ignorance and stupidity of your neighbor. Otherwise you are just another bourgeois to be tossed onto the funeral pyre of civilization.
Misogyny and puritanism aren't new. Trump isn't responsible.
Sometimes you say the most profound, funny and sadly true things, all at the same time.
Quote from: widdershins on December 28, 2016, 11:38:42 AM
Sometimes you say the most profound, funny and sadly true things, all at the same time.
My posting technique is like my photography (way back when). If you post enough, or take enough photos, some of them are actually good ;-) But after the fact, you have to appreciate the few good ones from the many "also rans".
Agnostics are fickle little people who think they are relying upon knowledge when all they are doing is sitting on a fence without making a proper decision.
I find that stating the obvious gets to the truth of the matter: there is no god.
Quote from: Sorginak on December 28, 2016, 11:01:58 PM
Agnostics are fickle little people who think they are relying upon knowledge when all they are doing is sitting on a fence without making a proper decision.
I find that stating the obvious gets to the truth of the matter: there is no god.
I used to call myself an agnostic. I did that because I said that one cannot prove god does not exist;can't prove a negative. But I now think that the astounding lack of any evidence of any kind of the existence of any god is proof that none exist. I would love for a theist to come forward (well, hell, they can stay in the background if they wish) and prove me wrong.
I saw a recent video by TJ Kirk/the amazing atheist, where he brought up the fact of how religious people, at first Christians, want to blame atheists for being why more people don't believe in Christianity or god in the west. He brought up the fact that christians target atheists as if their none belief is what is causing this AND for why Islamic fundamentalism is becoming so much stronger in the west, when its nothing to do with atheism, is just that the western world is growing smarter, they are seeing the bible as this book of fairy tales without even saying they are atheists, all on their own.
I believe the spread of information in the current age we live in is what has caused this, that more information is there at the touch of our findertips, and it has made this current generation to look things up more, and question the validity of faith on what is actually is. As he said, even in muslim countries where practicing atheism is a crime, there are people questioning and leaving islam, but doing so in secret for fear of what it will bring to them.
Its not that atheists are trying to destroy religions, despite christians saying they do that which leads to the spread of other faiths like islam, its because the world is growing smarter, its seeing faith for what it is, and honestly, I think counties there christianity is the main religions, those will be the countries that will dismiss faith first, because in countries like america and europe, we don't behead people here (anymore) for not believing in god.
multiple studies have shown that the smarter and more educated you are, the more likely you are to be liberal and atheist, so that makes perfect sense. But religion will always need a bogeyman. Since there is no actual devil, they need to point the finger at people and say, "There! THERE is the cause of all our imagined strife!"
Quote from: widdershins on December 29, 2016, 12:05:46 PM
multiple studies have shown that the smarter and more educated you are, the more likely you are to be liberal and atheist, so that makes perfect sense. But religion will always need a bogeyman. Since there is no actual devil, they need to point the finger at people and say, "There! THERE is the cause of all our imagined strife!"
There maybe no straw man devil ... but there is evil (devil minus d). Unless you are completely amoral libertine.
Quote from: Baruch on December 29, 2016, 12:42:56 PM
There maybe no straw man devil ... but there is evil (devil minus d). Unless you are completely amoral libertine.
Well, evil as an entity doesn't exist, it's a moral standard and those who operate outside of it in the worst way possible belong in that category. Same as their is no god of homosexuality or basketball.
Quote from: Baruch on December 29, 2016, 12:42:56 PM
There maybe no straw man devil ... but there is evil (devil minus d). Unless you are completely amoral libertine.
Bad behavior happens, and some call it "evil." But it's only bad behavior. Even the worst possible behavior isn't "evil" in the religious sense, because according to the Bible
God creates evil (https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Isaiah+45%3A7&version=KJV), and since there's no God then there's no evil that was created by God, in that sense of the word. A lion is evil only from the antelope's perspective; Hitler wasn't evil, either, but he (and his henchmen) did behave very badly according to the opinions of most people in the world.
Again, as with the existence of God, it comes down to definitions, I guess.
Quote from: Unbeliever on December 29, 2016, 04:48:12 PM
Bad behavior happens, and some call it "evil." But it's only bad behavior. Even the worst possible behavior isn't "evil" in the religious sense, because according to the Bible God creates evil (https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Isaiah+45%3A7&version=KJV), and since there's no God then there's no evil that was created by God, in that sense of the word. A lion is evil only from the antelope's perspective; Hitler wasn't evil, either, but he (and his henchmen) did behave very badly according to the opinions of most people in the world.
Again, as with the existence of God, it comes down to definitions, I guess.
You need a long spell in the torture cells of the Spice Trade Guild ;-( You simply are too bourgeois to appreciate Guantanamo. Evil = extremely bad. Not sending you to bed without your supper.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mGygaPaneIo
Similar to the US President taking orders from his master, concerning his machinations ...
(http://vignette1.wikia.nocookie.net/villains/images/9/98/The_Dark_Overlord.gif/revision/latest?cb=20120725025944)
All religion is merely the codified rules of humans successfully existing in large groups, with a little fear of hell thrown in for control. The religion comes after the human rules are shown to work. Religionists try to make it the other way around, but it doesn't fit that way.
Quote from: Cavebear on January 01, 2017, 04:13:32 AM
All religion is merely the codified rules of humans successfully existing in large groups, with a little fear of hell thrown in for control. The religion comes after the human rules are shown to work. Religionists try to make it the other way around, but it doesn't fit that way.
Gobekle Tepe is the world's oldest stone building, built before humans even had agriculture. There were no State-like structures, just wandering hunter-gatherers some of whom apparently could speak the same language (or they couldn't have organized to build stone buildings). So basically you had multiples of extended family units ... but it isn't clear that they were patriarchal, they could have been matriarchal. Again, compare with the San people. People wouldn't have had fear of Hell, that hadn't been invented yet. But we know that even Homo Erectus, much earlier, had a view of an after-life and some formal burials. Religion then was similar to shamanism ... with cult leaders on the male side, and similar ones on the female side ... who practiced mutual exclusive secret societies (gender taboo clubs). Social enforcement would have been primitive, not unlike a street gang. But I don't see the point of arguing chicken-egg. Early humans started out religious, animist in fact. Societies got much more complex, and much more populous after the invention of agriculture ... and that is when you have the first States. You have to organize a sedentary people on a much larger scale, particularly when irrigation is required (early states usually formed along large rivers). Transhumance people like Sami and Bedouin don't need this organization ... but they can get larger than a family or clan ... to tribal size (see Arabia in the time of Muhammad).
Quote from: Baruch on December 29, 2016, 12:42:56 PM
There maybe no straw man devil ... but there is evil (devil minus d). Unless you are completely amoral libertine.
Evil is what men say it is and is not what men say it is not. In America beheading people for disagreeing with you is evil. In the Middle East, it's a Tuesday.
Quote from: Mike Cl on December 28, 2016, 11:07:32 PM
I used to call myself an agnostic. I did that because I said that one cannot prove god does not exist;can't prove a negative. But I now think that the astounding lack of any evidence of any kind of the existence of any god is proof that none exist. I would love for a theist to come forward (well, hell, they can stay in the background if they wish) and prove me wrong.
Most people don't realize this, but the lack of evidence is actually a pretty damning statement. We lack evidence of the existence of leprechauns and faeries as well. Theists like to think that "you can't prove god doesn't exist" is a point for their side. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Quote from: Hydra009 on January 04, 2017, 10:55:24 AM
Most people don't realize this, but the lack of evidence is actually a pretty damning statement. We lack evidence of the existence of leprechauns and faeries as well. Theists like to think that "you can't prove god doesn't exist" is a point for their side. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Amen! Brother............
Quote from: widdershins on January 04, 2017, 10:42:08 AM
Evil is what men say it is and is not what men say it is not. In America beheading people for disagreeing with you is evil. In the Middle East, it's a Tuesday.
That is ... racist. There is nothing wrong with executing people. Culturally approved means will vary. If it is evil here, it is evil everywhere. This isn't about what side of the road the Brits drive on (the wrong side). If words only mean what we say we mean, then aren't we Humpty Dumpty?
“When I use a word,†Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to meanâ€"neither more nor less.†“The question is,†said Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.†... the actual Humpty Dumpty was an English landlord in Ireland, murdered by his outraged tenants.
So you advocate New Speak then?
Quote from: Baruch on January 04, 2017, 06:50:03 PM
That is ... racist. There is nothing wrong with executing people. Culturally approved means will vary. If it is evil here, it is evil everywhere. This isn't about what side of the road the Brits drive on (the wrong side). If words only mean what we say we mean, then aren't we Humpty Dumpty?
“When I use a word,†Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to meanâ€"neither more nor less.†“The question is,†said Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.†... the actual Humpty Dumpty was an English landlord in Ireland, murdered by his outraged tenants.
So you advocate New Speak then?
The Middle East is a place, not a race. Geographist, maybe? I don't know what you'd call someone who doesn't like a place because that place sucks.
Evil is a concept, not a thing. As a concept it is defined by the individual. We don't have a hive mind. There are many who think me evil because I'm an atheist. Those people have never met me, of course. And how do you think Bush justified torture, or guards at Gitmo justified raping prisoners? Those guys were "evil" and had it coming. When a Christian tells us that we're all going to burn in Hell for eternity, in his mind, it's because we're evil and deserve it. Even if you point out that we simply don't believe, it's as mundane as that, in his mind there is something else going on. Why would a person deserve to burn for an eternity for simple disbelief? That's something only an evil person deserves, so there must be something more going on.
And I didn't say "executing people", as in a legal means of terminating the life of an egregious offender. I said specifically beheading people for disagreeing with you. I read one story about a year ago about a man in the Middle East who cut his beard. I don't remember why, but he needed to fit in somewhere. I also don't remember whether he was attacked or just feared he would be, but it was one of those. People were going to/did/would have wanted to murder him for cutting his own beard off because that, not the violent murder, was the truly evil act in their minds.
Evil depend on who is killing who, why they are killing them, and how they are killing them? Not very liberal of you ;-)
"We don't have a hive mind" ... so no memes, no fake news, no culture? i guess you really are Neo ;-)
"There is no god." I say it's a conclusion I have reached by recognizing the complete lack of evidence for a god's existence and the complete lack of reasoning that would make a god necessary.
Quote from: Atheon on January 07, 2017, 12:51:35 AM
"There is no god." I say it's a conclusion I have reached by recognizing the complete lack of evidence for a god's existence and the complete lack of reasoning that would make a god necessary.
Reasoning? We don't need no stinkin' reasoning! There are no posters here who are Vulcans. Humans are not reasonable creatures, not even if they get their ears caught in a harvesting machine accident.
Quote from: Baruch on January 07, 2017, 09:33:14 AM
Reasoning? We don't need no stinkin' reasoning! There are no posters here who are Vulcans. Humans are not reasonable creatures, not even if they get their ears caught in a harvesting machine accident.
Spoken like all christians, or muslims, or hindu, or.....................well, all theists!
Quote from: Mike Cl on January 07, 2017, 09:37:17 AM
Spoken like all christians, or muslims, or hindu, or.....................well, all theists!
Atheists claim to be reasonable, and theists too. It is a rhetorical stance, like my junk is bigger than your junk. But that argument is just ... junk.
Humans aren't very much like Vulcans, we are like Klingons. To which I say, Kplah!
Quote from: Baruch on January 07, 2017, 09:46:03 AM
Atheists claim to be reasonable, and theists too. It is a rhetorical stance, like my junk is bigger than your junk. But that argument is just ... junk.
Humans aren't very much like Vulcans, we are like Klingons. To which I say, Kplah!
Hey, I'm willing to show my junk--but so far, when I do, the theist has absolutely nothing to show; I think their hands are too small, like The Donald, and therefore they have no junk but think they do.
Quote from: Baruch on January 07, 2017, 09:33:14 AM
Reasoning? We don't need no stinkin' reasoning! There are no posters here who are Vulcans. Humans are not reasonable creatures, not even if they get their ears caught in a harvesting machine accident.
Occam's Razor.
There is no evidence for a god; there is no reason to believe in a god; there is no explanatory power in the proposition of the existence of a god.
If there is a god, why would he create a world that functions exactly as would be expected if there isn't one, and then hides all evidence of his existence?
It just makes more sense that there is no god.
Quote from: Atheon on January 07, 2017, 09:57:37 AM
Occam's Razor.
There is no evidence for a god; there is no reason to believe in a god; there is no explanatory power in the proposition of the existence of a god.
If there is a god, why would he create a world that functions exactly as would be expected if there isn't one, and then hides all evidence of his existence?
It just makes more sense that there is no god.
There isn't any god, in any conventional sense (21st century). You have to delve into the POV of ancient people or Hindus, to get outside the Abrahamic/Western perspective on this. You have to channel a non-Western or pre-modern POV to experience living religion. In Western culture, as it has developed, religion has pretty much proved a dead end for explanation or for politics. Darwin explains ... we are omnivorous killers and exploiters, who breed. We need to exploit, kill and breed. If you aren't doing that, then you are useless. People who are pacifist, or vegetarian, or who have an overbearing conscience ... are useless. So yes, Western religion is pretty much dying, just as Nietzsche said. Billionaires kill and eat Millionaires. Millionaires kill and eat White Collar. White Collar kill and eat Blue Collar. Blue Collar kill and eat Unemployed. Big fish eat little fish. Law of the Jungle, and Circle of Life. Hakuna Matata.
either the gods are hiding; for no apparent reason, or they were just a human invention created to manipulate people for the benefit of the ones telling a god story... well I suppose they could have had the indecency to go off and die somewhere else
Quote from: Baruch on January 07, 2017, 12:30:32 PMDarwin explains ... we are omnivorous killers and exploiters, who breed. We need to exploit, kill and breed. If you aren't doing that, then you are useless. People who are pacifist, or vegetarian, or who have an overbearing conscience ... are useless.
Umm...Charles Darwin never made any of those claims. Hitler maybe, not Darwin. Hitler's the one with the mustache in case you get confused.
Implied by Origin of Man (his latter book) ... advocated by Huxley, promoted by Charles Sumner. Can you imagine a Victorian who didn't think the people they colonized weren't unfit?