Present Evidence Here II

[stromboli]

So did all of the evidence you were given come from Christians in forums like this, a long ago Sunday school class, or what?  I'm just curious as to the venues in which you received such terrible evidence or lack of evidence regarding God and/or Christianity?

You can count on me to NOT use this thread to give any kind of testimony.  Some Christians have what they consider a miraculous testimony that is supposed to wow folks, but that certainly isn't my story.  I do find it interesting that this it the kind of thing you'd be expecting.  I could be wrong, but that suggests to me that you've run into a lot of Christians from the so-called "Charismatic" churches, which is to say Pentecostal, Assembly of God, etc...  There are certainly a lot of good Christians within those churches, but my experience has been relatively shallow understandings and a higher than average proportion of error being taught and/or believed within those churches.  As a result, they come off to many of us in the Christian community as not the best representatives of Christianity or Christ.

I'm not really trying to be negative with regard to my fellow Christians, but I'm just being honest regarding my own experience & views.

And thank you for sharing your opinion on the "present evidence here" thread. Here is my evidence.
http://www.kyroot.com/

446 reasons Christianity is false. This could be wrong 400 times and there are still 46 reasons why xtianity is a made up religion.

Only have to post 1 link, I could post many more. Please do read the linked evidence and respond, disproving all 446. I'll check back in a few days.

[the_antithesis]

Um, I've never met Dembski, so I wouldn't actually call him a friend of mine.  Nor am I trying to 'hock' anyone's book.  The thread was asking for evidence, and I was aware of a book that included such evidence.  Therefore, I decided to provide the title so that anyone truly interested in the evidence can check it out.

What you had posted was nothing but an advertizement and we do not appreciate it.

It is basically a logical fallacy known as "argumentum verbosium" or proof by verosity. We get that shit from christians all the time. "Read the bible and you'll understand." In response, I say go read the Library of Congress and you'll see why the bible is a load of hooey.

[the_antithesis]

what is your problem with the KCA?  Just curious...

It's an admission of defeat on your part.

A the natural world has been explained, your kind have to find places that are ill-defined to hide your gods because your gods cannot withstand scrutiny. At this point, you have run out of places to hide them, so you must use the beginning of the universe, and the general ignorance of the scientific examination of that area.

You despite knowledge and loathe understanding but delight in ignorance and deception.

you treat your gods like a marble in a shell game and it is frustrating and pointless to talk to you because you cannot even see how you deceive yourself.

[Odoital778412]

Unless you have evidence the premises were true, an argument is a waste of time.


It's not about intellectual curiosity, I checked and the book is not available in my library, and I am not going to pay for such a book as I don't the financial flexibility.

I did find one review of the book and it's not very promising

http://confessionsofadoubtingthomas.blogspot.ca/2012/01/evidence-for-god-arguments-8-16-science.html

Yeah, generally speaking, one wouldn't waste time making a deductive argument unless there was significant evidence that the premises were true.  After all, you have no working deductive argument at all if they aren't.

Well, intellectual curiosity does generally have something to do with it, but if you say it doesn't, I'll just take you at your word.  Having said that, if you're looking or a negative review to make the book less enticing, it's often possible to find one.

I found the review interesting though.  I wish there'd been some more substantial & specific reasons for why the book was inadequate and less of the gainsaying, hand-waiving, and condescending dismissals, but I guess we are talking about a review and not a rebuttal.  There are a lot of other books out there though.

[stromboli]

Ooh ooh OOH!

Check your sources. Dembski is a Intelligent design proponent and a Creationist.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_A._Dembski#Discovery_Institute

William Albert "Bill" Dembski (born July 18, 1960) is an American mathematician, philosopher and theologian. A proponent of intelligent design (ID), specifically the concept of specified complexity, he serves as of 2013 as a senior fellow of the Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture (CSC).[1] In 2012, he taught as the Phillip E. Johnson Research Professor of Science and Culture at the Southern Evangelical Seminary in Matthews, North Carolina near Charlotte.[2]

Dembski has written books about intelligent design, including The Design Inference (1998), Intelligent Design: The Bridge Between Science & Theology (1999), The Design Revolution (2004), The End of Christianity (2009), and Intelligent Design Uncensored (2010).

The concept of intelligent design involves the argument that an intelligent cause is responsible for the complexity of life and that one can detect that cause empirically.[3] Dembski postulates that probability theory can be used to prove irreducible complexity (IC), or what he calls "specified complexity."[4] The scientific community sees intelligent designâ€"and Dembski's concept of specified complexityâ€"as a form of conservative Christian creationism attempting to portray itself as science.[5]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discovery_Institute

The Discovery Institute (DI) is a non-profit public policy think tank based in Seattle, Washington, best known for its advocacy of the pseudoscience "intelligent design" (ID). Its "Teach the Controversy" campaign aims to teach creationist anti-evolution beliefs in United States public high school science courses alongside accepted scientific theories, positing that a scientific controversy exists over these subjects.[4][5][6][7][8]

In Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District (2005), the United States District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania found:

The proper application of both the endorsement and Lemon tests to the facts of this case makes it abundantly clear that the Board's ID Policy violates the Establishment Clause. In making this determination, we have addressed the seminal question of whether ID is science. We have concluded that it is not, and moreover that ID cannot uncouple itself from its creationist, and thus religious, antecedents.[9]

This federal courtâ€"along with the majority of scientific organizations, including the American Association for the Advancement of Scienceâ€"say that the Institute has manufactured the controversy they want to teach by promoting a false perception that evolution is "a theory in crisis"[10] through incorrectly claiming that it is the subject of wide controversy and debate within the scientific community.[11][12][13] The court ruled that the Discovery Institute pursues "demonstrably religious, cultural, and legal missions",[10][12][14] and the Institute's manifesto, the Wedge Document,[15] describes a religious goal: to "reverse the stifling dominance of the materialist worldview, and to replace it with a science consonant with Christian and theistic convictions."[16][17] It was the court's opinion that intelligent design was merely a redressing of creationism and that, as such, it was not a scientific proposition.

If you are a proponent of ID, Creationism or any other such refuse, you are already on the losing side. The Dover decision, rendered by a devoutly Christian judge, overwhelmingly determined that ID/Creationism is not science and not relevant in any realistic way. Try again.

[Odoital778412]

And thank you for sharing your opinion on the "present evidence here" thread. Here is my evidence.
http://www.kyroot.com/

446 reasons Christianity is false. This could be wrong 400 times and there are still 46 reasons why xtianity is a made up religion.

Only have to post 1 link, I could post many more. Please do read the linked evidence and respond, disproving all 446. I'll check back in a few days.

You don't even have to post that one link.  I've looked through that page a bit, and most of that stuff has been thoroughly debunked for years.  Only the uninformed would actually find that problematic, to say nothing of convincing.

[Odoital778412]

What you had posted was nothing but an advertizement and we do not appreciate it.

It is basically a logical fallacy known as "argumentum verbosium" or proof by verosity. We get that shit from christians all the time. "Read the bible and you'll understand." In response, I say go read the Library of Congress and you'll see why the bible is a load of hooey.

Except that I didn't make any such claim.  I never asked you to read the Bible, and I never said that you'd understand.  My view is that reading the Bible wouldn't do you a lot of good.  The thread was asking for evidence, and I knew of a book that purports to give that very thing, so I provided the title.  If you want to turn that into an advertisement rather than seeing it for what it really was, that's entirely up to you.  I wish you well in your pursuit.

[stromboli]

Right, all 446 reasons. And you, rather than debunking a single one, merely blow it off as irrelevant. What a good Christian you are. 446 reasons. Go ahead, disprove every single one. Even if some are wrong or misstated, even one out of that number puts a divot in your golf course.

[Odoital778412]

It's an admission of defeat on your part.

A the natural world has been explained, your kind have to find places that are ill-defined to hide your gods because your gods cannot withstand scrutiny. At this point, you have run out of places to hide them, so you must use the beginning of the universe, and the general ignorance of the scientific examination of that area.

You despite knowledge and loathe understanding but delight in ignorance and deception.

you treat your gods like a marble in a shell game and it is frustrating and pointless to talk to you because you cannot even see how you deceive yourself.

But do you have an actual objection to the argument itself?  Or does it suffice to engage in personal attacks?

[Hydra009]

Having said that, the physical effects of a creator can be seen, but typically there is always a rationalization to close the eyes.

This is an common theistic talking point, that all sorts of stuff that exists in our world somehow points to a god, and specifically, whatever God they already believe in, and that atheists either deliberately ignore this connection or are blind to it.



However, these connections only really exist in the minds of theists.  To everyone who doesn't already believe in god, these sorts of arguments come across as non-sequiturs.  If you look up at the night sky and see a god, for example, that's only because you've been conditioned to think that.  If you were not raised as a theist, you wouldn't look at the night sky and conclude that a god had made it.

So yeah, these sorts of "evidences" for a god are about as effective as proving the existence of a god by reciting bible verses.

[the_antithesis]

Except that I didn't make any such claim.  I never asked you to read the Bible, and I never said that you'd understand.

Stop being an obtuse little cunt.

I didn't say you did and you know I didn't say you did. You are only going this route because you are dishonest.

What you did was say, read this book. You didn't present any of the evidence given. You had just said go read this book and you were called on how inappropriate that is in this context.

Grow up and deal with your past mistakes.

But do you have an actual objection to the argument itself?  Or does it suffice to engage in personal attacks?

There is no argument. KCA is basically "I don't know, therefore god." Well, you don't know so we only have you to discuss using that stupid, stupid, stupid argument.

Never use it again.

[stromboli]

Please watch this:

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/ancient/bibles-buried-secrets.html

Buried Secrets of the Bible. Explains a few things, like how and why Judaism grew from a polytheistic to a monotheistic religion, how the Old Testament/Talmud was created, the how and whether of Exodus and so on.

The whole picture of your religion is that it is a product of human minds, not presented by a god to man. The logic is pretty simple; there are thousands of religions observed by human kind over centuries. Every religion but one is supposedly wrong, a product of the human mind. Is your religion the only true one? Or maybe.like the others, a human invention.

Fundamental beliefs in the bible are demonstrably false; the Garden of Eden is an allegorical tale borrowed from the Babylonians. Noah's Ark is also an impossibility and a borrowed fable, the Epic of Gilgamesh. There is no evidence that the Exodus happened, and if it did not anywhere close to the scale the bible describes. Tower of Babel?

You can't even conclusively prove that Jesus was anything but (A) a personage based on some messianic claimant of the time- of which there were many- or (B) made up of whole cloth by later writers using previous mythological stories as a model.

Sorry, you lose.

[PickelledEggs]

Wait. Did somebody find actual evidence supporting the bibles claims?

Oh. No?

Ok... 

Sent from your mom.

[Odoital778412]

This is an common theistic talking point, that all sorts of stuff that exists in our world somehow points to a god, and specifically, whatever God they already believe in, and that atheists either deliberately ignore this connection or are blind to it.

However, these connections only really exist in the minds of theists.  To everyone who doesn't already believe in god, these sorts of arguments come across as non-sequiturs.  If you look up at the night sky and see a god, for example, that's only because you've been conditioned to think that.  If you were not raised as a theist, you wouldn't look at the night sky and conclude that a god had made it.

So yeah, these sorts of "evidences" for a god are about as effective as proving the existence of a god by reciting bible verses.

I understand what you're saying, though I obviously wouldn't agree.  These are the kinds of dismissals that Christians run into all of the time.  I do think that there is a need to provide good arguments and evidence, but that is not the only thing required.  My suspicion is that often, people are so hostile to the very idea of God, the supernatural, etc... that the other requirements simply aren't there in sufficient measure to make any evidence, even good evidence, sufficient.  Sometimes, that's not true, but it's a rare individual who would put themselves firmly into the atheist camp and also possess that which is necessary to make any evidence meaningful.

[Odoital778412]

Stop being an obtuse little cunt.

I didn't say you did and you know I didn't say you did. You are only going this route because you are dishonest.

No, you were addressing me with what you say you get in here all the time from other Christians, as if I were saying the same thing.  I was not.  I simply pointed out that I didn't say it.  In addition, there is a difference between the Bible and a book, at least from my perspective.  You can declare that my having pointed out that I didn't say that is somehow dishonest, but making such a declaration won't make it anymore true than it was before.  Nor will engaging in name calling change anything about the objective facts.

What you did was say, read this book. You didn't present any of the evidence given. You had just said go read this book and you were called on how inappropriate that is in this context.

Grow up and deal with your past mistakes.

I did in fact offer a book title, incase there was interest.  You may read it or not.  That's entirely up to you, but of course, we both know what your choice will be.  Regarding it's propriety, you'll forgive me if I don't trust that you have a corner on that market, given your behavior.  In any case, I wish you well.

In addition, to provide a little clarity, the thread started out:

So here we are. If you claim to have evidence that supports your god(s), please post it here:"

I then posted the following book recommendation.

I'd recommend "Evidence for God: 50 Arguments for Faith from the Bible, History, Philosophy, and Science" Edited by Michael Licona and William Dembski as a starting point.  I hope that helps.

As you can see, I neither told you to read it or had any significant expectation of your understanding it.  Truth be told, the only thing I expected in return were dismissals, rationalizations, and personal attacks either on me or my faith.  Interestingly enough, that's precisely what I received.  Again, you may read or not.  You may understand or not.  You're obviously and intelligent person, so whether what is required for any evidence to be meaningful is actually in your possession is really up to you.