God Is Dead

[Mui]

I just wanted to make the first agnostic/atheist post in the forums... but ye...

God is not real, jesus is not the son of god... there is nothing higher than me, and nothing lower than me.... jesus was pretty coo when he talked about peace and love though... and when he smoked opium...

if there were a god, i dont think he'd expect me to believe fairy tales from 2000+ years ago...

but thas just me

Peace

[HappyHaHaGirl]

Woo hoo! Fuck the Christians! Gas the Jews!

I'm over it now.

[roly]

wow guys! thats was really....uh...whats the word???? bollocks really!

[HappyHaHaGirl]

Who's your daddy?????

[roly]

i'm not gonna do it!
actuallyi can't resist.....he your daddy...yeh thats right HE is. :) xxxxxxxpeace

[Juiceman3000]

Out of Curiousity....

There must be something more to agnostisism and Atheims than 'What it doesnt believe'?

I have to think a belief system is in serious jeapordy if the only thing it can discuss is the problems or distain it has for 'other' belief systems?

Just as a fun challenge - Someone create a topic which asks atheists to post 'Why I believe' in a positive 'pro-active' sense.
The challenge being not to explain or even mention other religions but instead stand or fall on your own.

There must be something?

Good luck on that.. I will look forward to checking it out!

[honeyhannah]

Out of Curiousity....

There must be something more to agnostisism and Atheims than 'What it doesnt believe'?

I have to think a belief system is in serious jeapordy if the only thing it can discuss is the problems or distain it has for 'other' belief systems?

Just as a fun challenge - Someone create a topic which asks atheists to post 'Why I believe' in a positive 'pro-active' sense.
The challenge being not to explain or even mention other religions but instead stand or fall on your own.

There must be something?

Good luck on that.. I will look forward to checking it out!
I am non-religious and do not feel the need to have hatred and hate others that are not. I have no problem with people being wrong, and respect religious people who admit that they aren't positive, but strongly believe and only want to live their lives to the best that they can and feel that way is through their religion.

I don't think its necessary to insult people who are religious and don't base my lack of religion, because I do have beliefs, on religious people. Nor do I call myself a non-believer because I am a believer in many things. I have however seen a lot of atheist/agnostics who are stuck on ridiculing religion as their own mission in life. Let go of the resentment. You will be a much happier person if you do.

[Ginge]

I'm agnostic, but I would NEVER go around bashing organized religions or the people who follow organized religions. O.R. just isn't my cup of tea, because I don't feel one religion is more or less "right" than another. Well, that's one reason, anyway.

[Juiceman3000]

It just seems to me there must be 'something' to atheism besides 'what its not'?

Pick any other belief system - Buddhists, Christians, Alien-seed theorists, etc etc and they could certainly hold entire lengthy discussions without ever even mentioning an outside belief system.

... Obviously they call this 'Church' or 'Mosque' etc and in many countries they just have the one belief system and never even consider others.

Atheism doenst seem to be able to be content with 'standing or falling' on its own merits.

Dont get me wrong - comparing and contrasting with another world view can be very healthy and let you learn about your own views.... often strengthen them.

I just think it would be a fun test to have a running convo WITHOUT having to point out some aspect of another view and what you 'dont like' about it?

[mother_nature's_son]

The way I see it, believing that god does not exist is really no different from believing that god does exist. Both are articles of faith. The definition of 'atheism', to the more perceptive, is simply 'without belief regarding god'. This is actually the literal definition. Many people that label themselves as atheists dont actually believe that god not exist.

Atheism may seem 'negative' to theists because it's nature is largely non-homocentric. Theism generally defines itself, by itself. When you take the vast cosmos into reasonable account, there is not a whole lot of 'positive' definition to give to oneself ;)

[God]

NO I AM NOT! God is not dead!!!!!

[Alsharad]

"The way I see it, believing that god does not exist is really no different from believing that god does exist. Both are articles of faith. The definition of 'atheism', to the more perceptive, is simply 'without belief regarding god'. This is actually the literal definition. Many people that label themselves as atheists dont actually believe that god not exist."
-------------------------------------------------

However, if they are both tenets of faith, then you must have a reason for that faith. It is simply not rational to believe (or not believe) for no reason at all. So the question that Juiceman is asking is simply this: Without bringing any other religion into the argument, can you defend atheism on its own merits? Can you provide stornd deductive or inductive arguments for atheism? Can you justify your own belief (on non-belief) based on more than faith? Can you use logic and reason to defend your belief or are your beliefs simply arbitrary?

[Mui]

what the hell? Show me these atheists who do believe god exists haha

[POPthree13]

I think the hardest thing with a conversation such as this is to define God. I know that their are lots of things (especially religious folks) can say to express what they beleive God to be, but in order to decide wether you beleive in soemthing or not you must first have some kind of definition for it.

With that said I may be an atheist who beleives in God... for this simple reason: I do not beleive in God as defined by any religion that I have yet come into contact with. I do not beleive that God (if it exists) can be defined, understood, or otherwise boxed into a set of descriptions that would accurately give us a 'thing' which could be beleived in. I do beleive there is something 'Other' out there and that life on this planet is not accidental stack of molecules. What it is - I dare not imagine. So I beleive in something, many of you might call it God but without any idea whatsoever what it is, it can hardly be said that I beleive in anything...

[mother_nature's_son]

"The way I see it, believing that god does not exist is really no different from believing that god does exist. Both are articles of faith. The definition of 'atheism', to the more perceptive, is simply 'without belief regarding god'. This is actually the literal definition. Many people that label themselves as atheists dont actually believe that god not exist."
-------------------------------------------------

However, if they are both tenets of faith, then you must have a reason for that faith. It is simply not rational to believe (or not believe) for no reason at all. So the question that Juiceman is asking is simply this: Without bringing any other religion into the argument, can you defend atheism on its own merits? Can you provide stornd deductive or inductive arguments for atheism? Can you justify your own belief (on non-belief) based on more than faith? Can you use logic and reason to defend your belief or are your beliefs simply arbitrary?
Alsharad,

Believing that god does or does not exist are tenets of faith.

However, it is different to have no belief regarding god at all. This is the literal definition of atheism that many atheists ascribe to.

The reason for having no belief, is that faith is not reasonable.

[Alsharad]

"Belief in no God" is not the same as "no belief in God", I agree.

However, you are then stuck in an interesting position. Rocks do not believe, nor do cats or babies, are all these atheists?

You seem to assert that you have no position, no opinion. You "lack belief." The problem is that once you have been exposed to an idea, you must take a position. If I posit that God exists, then you can either agree, disagree, or withhold judgement. In any case, you must justify your position with reasons (if you withhold judgement, you must explain why you withhold it). If you do not, you simply maintain a position for no reason whatsoever (which is completely arbitrary). Also note that you cannot choose to not react. You cannot return to the state of lacking conception of the idea (as a rock, or a cat, or a baby would be).

The point is simply this.. that to simply say you "lack belief" does not excuse you from having to justify your reasons intellectually. In that case, you are in the same boat as those who assert that there is a God or those who assert there is not a God. The only other option would be to withhold judgement (most likely due to not having enough knowledge, i.e. "I don't have enough knowledge to say there is no God, nor do I have enough to say that there is, so I will withhold judgement until more evidence is known"). In any case, you must be able to give reasons for your position (in this case, the lack of belief) or your position can simply be discounted for having arbitrary beliefs based only on your own whim with no rationale or reason.

[themnax]

rocks have no central nervous system. cats and babies do. the difference between an infant and an adult human, other then physiologicly, is only a matter of quantity of accumulated data. the difference between a cat and an adult human is a matter of speculation upon which little can be absolutely certain, save that a cat displays less evidence of being motivated to express themselves creatively.

what this has to do with the existence or nonexistence of nontangable forces and beings i do not know. i only know that there is no natural requirement for them not to, and equaly none for them to bear the slightest resemblence to your, mine, or anyone else's speculations about them.

[God]

I am here, I am here. You can worship me, God.

[themnax]

well i'm sure you don't have to be in your right mind to be mostly harmless.

for my own part i greatly expect i shall continue to hug the unknowable and reflect its affection with out attempting to impose names on it.

[mother_nature's_son]

"Belief in no God" is not the same as "no belief in God", I agree.

You seem to assert that you have no position, no opinion. You "lack belief." The problem is that once you have been exposed to an idea, you must take a position. If I posit that God exists, then you can either agree, disagree, or withhold judgement. In any case, you must justify your position with reasons (if you withhold judgement, you must explain why you withhold it). If you do not, you simply maintain a position for no reason whatsoever (which is completely arbitrary). Also note that you cannot choose to not react. You cannot return to the state of lacking conception of the idea (as a rock, or a cat, or a baby would be).

The point is simply this.. that to simply say you "lack belief" does not excuse you from having to justify your reasons intellectually. In that case, you are in the same boat as those who assert that there is a God or those who assert there is not a God. The only other option would be to withhold judgement (most likely due to not having enough knowledge, i.e. "I don't have enough knowledge to say there is no God, nor do I have enough to say that there is, so I will withhold judgement until more evidence is known"). In any case, you must be able to give reasons for your position (in this case, the lack of belief) or your position can simply be discounted for having arbitrary beliefs based only on your own whim with no rationale or reason.
Perhaps you did not catch this from my last post:

'The reason for having no belief, is that faith is not reasonable.'

This pretty much sums it up.

[chandra anjali]

I just wanted to make the first agnostic/atheist post in the forums... but ye...

God is not real, jesus is not the son of god... there is nothing higher than me, and nothing lower than me.... jesus was pretty coo when he talked about peace and love though... and when he smoked opium...

if there were a god, i dont think he'd expect me to believe fairy tales from 2000+ years ago...

but thas just me

Peace
i don't know which god you are talking about, but the god i know loves it that i believe in fairy tales and happiness...even if it all is in my head!

[Alsharad]

"'The reason for having no belief, is that faith is not reasonable.'

This pretty much sums it up."

Could you please demonstrate (either deductively or inductively) how faith is contrary to reason and logic? It is true that faith does not rest on logical proof or material evidence, but it also cannot contradict it either.

For example, I am married. Now, you can believe that to be true or you can believe it to be false or you can withhold judgement until you get more evidence. If you believe in spite of lacking any logical (save maybe some weak inductive argument) or empirical proof are you being irrational? Of course not. Now, if I say that I have been married for 50 years and you know that I am only 25, then to believe me would be irrational. It runs directly contrary to logic and experience.

Having faith is not at all irrational, unreasonable, or illogical. If you are going to make such a strong statement, you will need to back it up. Faith may extend beyond reason, but you cannot dismiss faith for that reason alone. You may be 99% sure that your car will start today, but when you turn the key without even considering the idea that your car will not start, you are having faith. It cannot be deductively or empirically proven, but still you go to start your car without the slightest hesitation. You believe that the car will start because you do have experience that it has started in the past and no reason to think that it won't start today. Unfortunately, your past experience cannot prove that it will start today and inductive arguments can only show that it is possible (maybe even likely) that the car will start. However, it takes faith that extends beyond logic and empiricism to get in your car and *expect* it to start. But still people do this every day. Faith is a part of life. We could not survive without it.

Again, to sum up, faith may extend beyond reason, but it should not contradict it. Only when faith contradicts reason is it irrational or "not reasonable."

Also, you said that the reason for having "no belief" is that faith is unreasonable. You seem to be holding fast to the idea that "lacking belief" is a logically and intellectually defensible position. It is not. In fact, it is no position at all. So, what position do you take? There is a God. Do you agree, disagree, or do you withhold your opinion until there is more evidence?

[didge]

I just wanted to make the first agnostic/atheist post in the forums... but ye...

God is not real, jesus is not the son of god... there is nothing higher than me, and nothing lower than me.... jesus was pretty coo when he talked about peace and love though... and when he smoked opium...

if there were a god, i dont think he'd expect me to believe fairy tales from 2000+ years ago...

but thas just me

Peace

all is well, but ya say all this,.. god is not real,,, jesus is not the son of god..,, like as if it were FACT. the truth is,,. you DONT KNOW. you cant possibly know! ya can think. by you saying...there is no god, is just as plausible as me saying, there definatly IS a god. we're both just saying wat we think. but neither of us KNOW. so my moral is.. by you judging others, and implying all this stuff, that aint actually fact.. your just as bad as all this religious folk that ya diss so much..

personally, i believe in a God.

and i do believe Jesus existed, just like Plato, Socretes, The Dali Lama, and millions o other peops!

and i believe, that poor Jesus was tortured and fucking killed for something he believed in, and all he preached was love. which is terrible. Jesus can be the son of God , if he wants to be.

[Mui]

I dont remember judging anyone... i think people are just trying to defend their faith in an atheist forum...i never said i thought jesus wasnt real... there probably was a guy called jesus that was loved by ppl an tought love and was killed... but i dont think he is the son of god... thats all i said

I only go by what I perceive in life... and as of now, there is not a spec of evidence that I have seen in my life, that would point toward a god.... or anything higher than me... and thats wh y i believe in what i believe...

Im not trying to convert you.

[mother_nature's_son]

Could you please demonstrate (either deductively or inductively) how faith is contrary to reason and logic? It is true that faith does not rest on logical proof or material evidence, but it also cannot contradict it either.If an article of faith is rationally demonstrated, it becomes an article of faith no longer.

Reason and faith cannot co-exist in the same individual at the same time with respect to the same object of knowledge. The presence of rational demonstration negates the possibility of faith. Because non-rational demonstration is the cornerstone of faith, we conclude that reason and faith are irreconcilable.

The existence of faith as a means of acquiring knowledge, relies on the limits of reason. As the sphere of reason expands, the boundaries of faith diminish. Here we see the critical role of the 'unknowable' in perpetuating faith. Faith depends for its survival, on the unknowable and incomprehensible. Faith cannot live in a natural, knowable universe.

For example, I am married. Now, you can believe that to be true or you can believe it to be false or you can withhold judgement until you get more evidence. If you believe in spite of lacking any logical (save maybe some weak inductive argument) or empirical proof are you being irrational? Of course not. Now, if I say that I have been married for 50 years and you know that I am only 25, then to believe me would be irrational. It runs directly contrary to logic and experience.Premise for analogy: I know you exist (in some form or another).

Topic of discussion: lack of knowledge concerning the existence or non-existence of god.


Having faith is not at all irrational, unreasonable, or illogical. If you are going to make such a strong statement, you will need to back it up. Faith may extend beyond reason, but you cannot dismiss faith for that reason alone. If an article of faith is demonstrated to be rational, reasonable, or logical; it is no longer an article of faith. The inverse also becomes true.


You may be 99% sure that your car will start today, but when you turn the key without even considering the idea that your car will not start, you are having faith. It cannot be deductively or empirically proven, but still you go to start your car without the slightest hesitation. You believe that the car will start because you do have experience that it has started in the past and no reason to think that it won't start today. Unfortunately, your past experience cannot prove that it will start today and inductive arguments can only show that it is possible (maybe even likely) that the car will start. However, it takes faith that extends beyond logic and empiricism to get in your car and *expect* it to start. But still people do this every day. Faith is a part of life. We could not survive without it.The type of faith presented with the car analogy, is in the laws of physics and mechanical components that operate on these laws. We know that everything needed to start that car exists.

We do not know that god exists. Knowledge of the existence of god is the entire dilemma, and you have presupposed this in formulating your analogy for faith.


The term ‘faith’ we are using in the context of this discussion refers to a supposedly reliable method of acquiring knowledge. Any other notion of faith is irrelevant with regard to the existence of god.


Again, to sum up, faith may extend beyond reason, but it should not contradict it. Only when faith contradicts reason is it irrational or "not reasonable."I disagree.

Think of the colors black and white. These colors are opposites, completely different, or contrary to one another. Now imagine the color blue in relation to black. Blue is not the opposite of (or contrary to) black, but it certainly is not black.

Faith does not contradict rationality (because they cannot co-exist in the same individual at the same time with respect to the same object of knowledge), but it does not follow that faith is rational anymore than blue not contradicting black makes it black. Remember the expanding sphere of reason.

As stated above, the existence of faith as a means of acquiring knowledge relies on the limits of reason. As the sphere of reason expands, the boundaries of faith diminish. Here we see the critical role of the 'unknowable' in perpetuating faith. Faith depends for its survival, on the unknowable and incomprehensible. Faith cannot live in a natural, knowable universe.


Also, you said that the reason for having "no belief" is that faith is unreasonable. You seem to be holding fast to the idea that "lacking belief" is a logically and intellectually defensible position. It is not. In fact, it is no position at all. So, what position do you take? There is a God. Do you agree, disagree, or do you withhold your opinion until there is more evidence?Lacking belief is a logically and intellectually defensible position on a subject for which there is not enough evidence to draw a conclusion except with faith. As it is, this is that subject. The position is that which exists apart from the position of faith.

In any case, I assumed it was implied that lacking belief is the same as withholding opinion until there is more evidence.

To believe in the existence or non-existence of god, one would have to commit their consciousness to beliefs for which one has no sensory evidence or rational proof. This I simply cannot do.

:)

[Alsharad]

If an article of faith is rationally demonstrated, it becomes an article of faith no longer.

Reason and faith cannot co-exist in the same individual at the same time with respect to the same object of knowledge. The presence of rational demonstration negates the possibility of faith. Because non-rational demonstration is the cornerstone of faith, we conclude that reason and faith are irreconcilable.
But doesn't that contradict human experience? Hume showed that no matter how many times something was demonstrated you could never empirically prove that something will happen again. However, you could know that something is probable. I can have reason to believe that it is probably going to rain today. There is an 95% chance. That means that I have very strong inductive proof that it is going to rain. However, if I believe that it will rain, I have neither deductively or empirically proven that it is going to rain. You talk as though all there is to logic is deductive proofs and all there is to the world is empirical information. Neither is true. One can make strong inductive arguments which show things to be probable, but to accept the probability, to go ahead and expect that which is probable, requires faith which exists with reason at the same time regarding the same subject. So I guess my question to you is "What constitutes "rational demonstration"?"

Faith depends for its survival, on the unknowable and incomprehensible. Faith cannot live in a natural, knowable universe.
I disagree with parts of that statement. Faith depends for its survival on the unknown, not the unknowable and definitely not the incomprehensible. I do not need to have faith that a square circle exists. I know it does not. I would agree that faith cannot live in a known universe, but just making it knowable does not rule out faith. For example, I can believe that Timbuktoo exists even without any empirical evidence or deductive proof. It is definitely a knowable fact, but I still have only inductive reasoning to back up my believing. Once I have a strong deductive argument or (more likely) empirical evidence, only then does faith go away. Faith exists in varying degrees until the facts are known, but just because the universe is knowable doesn't mean that faith has no place in it.

If an article of faith is demonstrated to be rational, reasonable, or logical; it is no longer an article of faith. The inverse also becomes true.Again, you seem to deny that abstract reasoning and inductive reasoning are aspects of logic. This is simply not true. If I can show that something is very likely through inductive reasoning then it is rational and reasonable to accept that it is true. If you deny that it is true, you must be able to show why you accept the unlikely. Note that just because the unlikely is possible does not stand as evidence for its truth. You must have other evidence or be able to show an error in my inductive reasoning.

The type of faith presented with the car analogy, is in the laws of physics and mechanical components that operate on these laws. We know that everything needed to start that car exists.
No, you don't. You have no reason to expect it to be otherwise, but it is entirely possible that someone stole your distributor cap while you were asleep or your spark plugs (this actually happens too). Perhaps an animal got into your engine and pulled some wires loose or broke them. Perhaps someone tapped your gas tank and your vehicle has no fuel. These are all things that you do not know and yet you just expect them to be there. You expect that nothing has changed while you slept.

We do not know that god exists. Knowledge of the existence of god is the entire dilemma, and you have presupposed this in formulating your analogy for faith.The previous poster said that "faith is not reasonable." The analogy showed that faith is reasonable and that you can use reason to support faith. The analogy regarded the nature of faith and was not analagous to the existence of God.

The term ‘faith’ we are using in the context of this discussion refers to a supposedly reliable method of acquiring knowledge. Any other notion of faith is irrelevant with regard to the existence of god.
No wonder you see it as nonsense that people say "I know God exists because I have faith." Faith is not a method of aquiring knowledge. I don't know any scholars who hold this to be true. You have said that there is only notion of faith that is relevant with regard to God's existence and then you promptly dismiss it as not being a reliable source for gathering knowledge. So your position is that only things reliable for gathering knowledge are relevant with regard to God's existence? I am assuming that you mean that they are relevant with regard to discussions concerning evidence for or against the existence of God.

Faith does not contradict rationality (because they cannot co-exist in the same individual at the same time with respect to the same object of knowledge), but it does not follow that faith is rational anymore than blue not contradicting black makes it black. Remember the expanding sphere of reason.
A good observation. Allow me to clarify. When I say that faith is rational, I mean that faith can be supported by reason and evidence. Faith alone should not be used as evidence in when rational or empirical evidence is needed, but there should always rational or empirical evidence to support faith. As our confidence level grows regarding a certain subject, the necessary faith diminishes (though it will never be extinguished as there will most likely always be things that are unknown in the universe).

Lacking belief is a logically and intellectually defensible position on a subject for which there is not enough evidence to draw a conclusion except with faith. As it is, this is that subject. The position is that which exists apart from the position of faith.

In any case, I assumed it was implied that lacking belief is the same as withholding opinion until there is more evidence.
And we come to the big question. What would you consider as reliable evidence? I leave the answer to you (though please do not make unreasonable demands of Science by demanding empirical "scientific" evidence for something that is entirely non-empirical).

Also, by what reasoning do you draw the conclusion that there is not enough evidence? Refuting evidences for God’s existence does not prove atheism true anymore than refuting an eyewitness testimony of a marriage denies the reality of the marriage. Since atheism cannot be proven (you cannot prove a negative) and since disproving evidences for God does not prove there is no God, you have a position that is intellectually indefensible. At best, you can only say that there are no convincing evidences for God so far presented. You cannot say there are absolutely no evidences for God because you cannot know all evidences that possibly exist in the world (or universe). At best, you can only say that the evidence so far presented has been insufficient. This logically means that there could be evidences presented in the future that will suffice. You must acknowledge that there may indeed be a proof that has so far been undiscovered and that the existence of God is possible. This would make you more of an agnostic since at best you can only be skeptical of God’s existence.

If it is implied that lacking knowledge is the same as witholding judgement, it is the first time that I have heard someone claim it. The reason is this:
To suspend belief on a subject is to hold off judgment until more information is acquired. This is agnosticism, not atheism. It is an admission that not all information is acquired thus logically requiring the possibility of the existence of the thing being considered. This is something atheists do not do by definition, but agnostics do. Agnosticism is the position, in part, that "suspension of belief" is maintained until further information is acquired. You admit that it is possible that God exists and that it is possible that God does not exist and you are abstaining from choosing due to a lack of knowledge. That is straight up agnosticism, not atheism.

To believe in the existence or non-existence of god, one would have to commit their consciousness to beliefs for which one has no sensory evidence or rational proof. This I simply cannot do.
Before I answer this, I would like you to tell me what you would accept as proof? Would you accept a rational proof?

[roly]

I am Christian and i wanna set some things straight.
1. There is a God
2. I have felt this God and i know someone who was healed from terminal disease by prayer and prayer alone
3. I have the authority to say this as i used to be an aethiest and then realised i was sooooooo wrong
4. There is NO logic or reason to believe apart from reading the Bible and my personal experiences...but HEllo?! it's called FAITH you norberts! thasts the point...you embrace the unknown and what you do know about God. ALthough he is the living God and is evident in my life.

God Bless.xxxxx

[Alsharad]

1. There is a God

Agreed.

2. I have felt this God and i know someone who was healed from terminal disease by prayer and prayer alone

I believe that you believe that they were healed by prayer alone. Whether miraculous healing still occurs could be vigorously debated as an in-house debate. You will need to give more details in order for your story to be given any weight as an evidence for God.

3. I have the authority to say this as i used to be an aethiest and then realised i was sooooooo wrong

Good for you! Few atheists I have met have been so open minded. Still, I am not sure that gives you the authority you claim, but it does seem to give weight to your position. However, if we turn it around and say that I was a Christian and then I realized I was sooooo wrong... well... I am not sure that I want simply switching sides to be the grounds for authority. Still, I am glad that you have finally understood.

4. There is NO logic or reason to believe apart from reading the Bible and my personal experiences...but HEllo?! it's called FAITH you norberts! thasts the point...you embrace the unknown and what you do know about God. ALthough he is the living God and is evident in my life.

Here I must disagree. Granted, that is what the topic seems to have turned to, but God is the God of logic and reason too. It seems unlikely that he would make himself knowable through all other means (experience, observation, etc.) and yet hide himself from reason and logic. No, my brother, logic and reason play a definite role in understanding God and strengthening our faith. That is what apologetics is all about.

[roly]

thats quite right...i was rather hasty in my post i feel......

[FreakyJoeMan]

Of course, it all comes down to Godel's law. Ya can't know about a system in it's entirety until you are completely removed from that system. We won't know even a miniscule part of the universe, until we are wholey removed from the universe, which is impossible.

[mother_nature's_son]

Excuse the length of time it took for my reply. I am finishing up high school at the moment ;)
------------------

-I will restate my claim.
'The reason for having no belief, is that faith is not reasonable.’

This claim is very simple. Faith is not reasonable. Faith is not governed by reason. Faith alone is not capable of warranting acceptance according to the epistemological standards of human knowledge.

You may argue that reasoning can be applied to a belief that already exists upon faith, or that faith can contribute to the assurance of an already rational belief; but these things do not warrant the title of 'reasonable' for faith.

(Note the inverse- Reasoning cannot be applied to all articles of faith, and, faith needn't contribute assurance to all (any?) rational beliefs.)


Hume showed that no matter how many times something was demonstrated you could never empirically prove that something will happen again. However, you could know that something is probable. I can have reason to believe that it is probably going to rain today. There is an 95% chance. That means that I have very strong inductive proof that it is going to rain. However, if I believe that it will rain, I have neither deductively or empirically proven that it is going to rain. You talk as though all there is to logic is deductive proofs and all there is to the world is empirical information. Neither is true. One can make strong inductive arguments which show things to be probable, but to accept the probability, to go ahead and expect that which is probable, requires faith which exists with reason at the same time regarding the same subject. So I guess my question to you is "What constitutes "rational demonstration"?"If evidence brings us to believe that there is a 95% chance it will rain today, then the belief that it is going to rain today has been justified. It is a rational belief.

To rationally demonstrate or justify a belief is not synonymous with claiming certainty for that belief. Depending on various factors, such as nature and the amount of available evidence, a belief may be categorized as probable to some degree. Reason demands that the degree of certitude assigned to a belief must be in accordance with the available evidence. Reason does not demand that every bit of human knowledge must be accepted as certain or closed to further investigation.


Faith depends for its survival on the unknown, not the unknowable and definitely not the incomprehensible. I do not need to have faith that a square circle exists. I know it does not. I would agree that faith cannot live in a known universe, but just making it knowable does not rule out faith. For example, I can believe that Timbuktoo exists even without any empirical evidence or deductive proof. It is definitely a knowable fact, but I still have only inductive reasoning to back up my believing. Once I have a strong deductive argument or (more likely) empirical evidence, only then does faith go away. Faith exists in varying degrees until the facts are known, but just because the universe is knowable doesn't mean that faith has no place in it.Ultimately, faith depends for it’s survival on the unknowable and incomprehensible.

You seem to suggest that in order for a belief to be 'rational', 100% assurance of it must exist, and if it does not, that faith must be involved. This is not true. If there is enough evidence to show that the existence of Timbuktoo is a knowable fact, then faith is not needed to accept that Timbuktoo exists.


We do not know that god exists. Knowledge of the existence of god is the entire dilemma, and you have presupposed this in formulating your analogy for faith.
---------------------------------------------------

The previous poster said that "faith is not reasonable." The analogy showed that faith is reasonable and that you can use reason to support faith. The analogy regarded the nature of faith and was not analagous to the existence of God.I do not feel that your analogies demonstrate the nature of faith. I think you have done more to demonstrate the nature of rational beliefs, with your analogies of a 95% chance of rain and a car starting.

In order to demonstrate the nature of FAITH, trying working with a scenario that is not already a rational belief. How about the existence of god?



Faith is not a method of aquiring knowledge. I don't know any scholars who hold this to be true. You have said that there is only notion of faith that is relevant with regard to God's existence and then you promptly dismiss it as not being a reliable source for gathering knowledge. So your position is that only things reliable for gathering knowledge are relevant with regard to God's existence? I am assuming that you mean that they are relevant with regard to discussions concerning evidence for or against the existence of God.
A religious man wishes to claim as knowledge, beliefs that have not been (and often cannot be) rationally demonstrated, so he posits faith as an alternative method of acquiring knowledge. Faith permits the religious man to claim the status of truth for a belief even though it cannot meet the rational test of truth. When a religion claims the ‘truth’, faith as a means of acquiring knowledge has been employed.

To rationally demonstrate a belief is to show that it warrants acceptance according to the epistemological standards of human knowledge. Knowledge applies to rationality. If a man is to acquire knowledge, he must have a may of distinguishing truth from falsity, beliefs which correspond to reality from beliefs which do not. To qualify as knowledge, a belief must be justified; it must warrant acceptance by rational standards. A belief not meeting these standards, that is adopted nonetheless, is an irrational belief.



When I say that faith is rational, I mean that faith can be supported by reason and evidence.
Your idea of what ‘rational’ is, seems to be a bit skewed.

If a belief is supported by a probable amount of reason and evidence, then this belief is not of faith. It is a rational belief. Where rationality ends, faith begins. Saying faith is rational is indeed like saying ‘blue is black’.
An article of faith can have reason applied to it or some small bit of evidence found for it, but this does not make faith rational.



Faith alone should not be used as evidence in when rational or empirical evidence is needed, but there should always rational or empirical evidence to support faith. As our confidence level grows regarding a certain subject, the necessary faith diminishes (though it will never be extinguished as there will most likely always be things that are unknown in the universe).
Your last sentence reads as if it is a rule that all subjects of faith ultimately become rational beliefs. Because this is not a rule, stating that the nature of faith is reasonable or rational does not make sense.



And we come to the big question. What would you consider as reliable evidence? I leave the answer to you (though please do not make unreasonable demands of Science by demanding empirical "scientific" evidence for something that is entirely non-empirical).Sensory evidence.


Since atheism cannot be proven (you cannot prove a negative) and since disproving evidences for God does not prove there is no God, you have a position that is intellectually indefensible. At best, you can only say that there are no convincing evidences for God so far presented. You cannot say there are absolutely no evidences for God because you cannot know all evidences that possibly exist in the world (or universe). At best, you can only say that the evidence so far presented has been insufficient. This logically means that there could be evidences presented in the future that will suffice. You must acknowledge that there may indeed be a proof that has so far been undiscovered and that the existence of God is possible. I have acknowledge this with my statement ‘Lacking belief is a logically and intellectually defensible position on a subject for which there is not enough evidence to draw a conclusion except with faith. As it is, this is that subject.’


If it is implied that lacking knowledge is the same as witholding judgement, it is the first time that I have heard someone claim it. The reason is this:
To suspend belief on a subject is to hold off judgment until more information is acquired. This is agnosticism, not atheism. It is an admission that not all information is acquired thus logically requiring the possibility of the existence of the thing being considered. This is something atheists do not do by definition, but agnostics do. Agnosticism is the position, in part, that "suspension of belief" is maintained until further information is acquired. You admit that it is possible that God exists and that it is possible that God does not exist and you are abstaining from choosing due to a lack of knowledge. That is straight up agnosticism, not atheism.The literal definition of ‘atheism’, as held by many self-proclaimed atheists, is ‘Without belief in god’. A- without. Theism- belief in god.

[Razorofoccam]

MotherNaturesSon

Really well thought out...
Occam will start his comments on this thread with your post.


"-I will restate my claim.
'The reason for having no belief, is that faith is not reasonable.’
This claim is very simple. Faith is not reasonable. Faith is not governed by reason. Faith alone is not capable of warranting acceptance according to the epistemological standards of human knowledge. "

Very true...
Occam would state that the nature of All arguements on this topic are
epistemological..
Rational process demands certain standards.
A thing cannot be a fact without a standard.
Reason demands standard => A [set by rational/methodological epistemology]
Religion seems to offer NO standard..
ANYTHING can be a 'fact' according to the standards of religion.
OCCAM WILL NOT accept such stupid, loose and sloppy standards in his thinking..
Are we fools?
To believe anything we wish to believe?
---------
from Alsharad
"One can make strong inductive arguments which show things to be probable, but to accept the probability, to go ahead and expect that which is probable, requires faith which exists with reason at the same time regarding the same subject. So I guess my question to you is "What constitutes "rational demonstration"?"

One bases ones actions on what reason and probabillity says is probable.
[and the killer..logic]
Reality WORKS BY LOGIC. as we have observed it.
If it 'does not in fact rain today' as probabillity says it may [95%]
Then so what?
If we are rational we have taken this into account...
Logic is POWERFULL
Common sense is more so.
Common sense says that what is probable is not fact...
only probable.
it is LOGIC AND REASON AND PROBABILLITY AND PRECEDENT all in one.

Occam requires NO FAITH in the understanding that there is a 95% probabillity that it will rain today.
Faith. IS belief in a thing with NO method.
Faith is believing it WILL rain today...
No rational being will say such without prescience.
Occam will never say it will rain tomorrow
Occam will NEVER SAY that there will be even an existent sun to shine on us tomorrow.
Such a belief is an act of faith.
Faith is a pointless waste of time.
A thing either IS or IS NOT...
Our believing it is or is not will not change it's status.
Understanding is defining what is probable. What is accurate to reality.
Wisdom is knowing what to do about it.
Faith is used by neither.

MotherNaturesSon
"If evidncence brings us to believe that there is a 95% chance it will rain today, then the belief that it is going to rain today has been justified. It is a rational belief. "

Will it rain today.. That is indeterminate. That is probabillity
It may well rain today...
It is likely to rain today...
NONE can say it will rain today..or not.
---------
from Alsharad
"Faith exists in varying degrees until the facts are known, but just because the universe is knowable doesn't mean that faith has no place in it."

Very astute.
BUT
YOU CALL INSUFFICIENT DATA
'Faith'
WHY is it required to believe a thing is fact without sufficient data?

Occam has never worked this out.
Why is it required that we MUST know if a thing is or is not.
Why is 'insufficient data' not acceptable to any rational being?
It is the inabillity of many humans to accept that human understanding of just about everything is inderterminate at this time.
That has resulted in the word called faith.

IE:Hydrogen wepons exist.
Occam has never seen one.
Does he have faith they exist? No
Then how does he know they exist.
because if they did not.
A huge chunk of related understanding is rendered false. Thus rendering the bulk of human understanding contradictory.
That related understanding and the total lack of contradiction of their existence shifts the existence of hydrogen weapons into
the 99.9% range of probabillity.

Now, if the christian god as described by the bible actually did not exist.
What existent related understanding would be rendered contradictory?

None

And thus faith is born

---------
MotherNaturesSon
"Ultimately, faith depends for it’s survival on the unknowable and incomprehensible."

Occam does not take such an impersonal line...
We are all us.

"Faith is the belief that something is true because one wants it to be true.
It is the antithesis of rational method. It is ego..
It's survival is dependent only on the emotive attachment by human beings of the label FACT, to that which cannot be shown by humans as fact."

------
Yousay
"To rationally demonstrate a belief is to show that it warrants acceptance according to the epistemological standards of human knowledge. Knowledge applies to rationality. If a man is to acquire knowledge, he must have a may of distinguishing truth from falsity, beliefs which correspond to reality from beliefs which do not. To qualify as knowledge, a belief must be justified; it must warrant acceptance by rational standards. A belief not meeting these standards, that is adopted nonetheless, is an irrational belief."

And occam agrees..
Faith is the 'irrational adoption of a proposition as FACT'
It is irational because it adopts based on no standard or rational method.
One must have a rational method that works..
otherwise. One believes a thing based on what......
generally...from experience.
Occam thinks most humans believewhat they believe not through rational method .
But experience first. [forced by reality]
Acceptance second [others believe so i better]
BUT MOSTLY desire.

Many humans occam knows believed the TV show that the moon landings were fake.
When occam asked what understanding they had of space flight, NASA, the moon, newtonian motion, the sytems of tracking and controlling space flight.
the empirical evidence for the landing of apollo 11 exct ext..
They knew ZERO.
How can one decide if man landed on the moon.
IF they do not know where and what the moon is.
What a saturn5 is. or a LEM is or a command module.
What NASA means.
What an 'orbit' means. What orbital velocity is and how we get it.
How far the moon is from earth.
Infact ANYTHING related to leaving the planet and how to do it..

And THEN occam asked " so were the other apollo landings fake?
and the answer has always been so far what other landings.....?

Desire to believe a thing did not happen cause to parrot the
TV show makes them seem knowledgable on the subject..
And controversial :)
And the reverse is also true. Desire to believe.
egoegoegoegoegoego

[for the contentious.occam SAW the LEM/commandmodule orbiting the moon through an 8 inch relector in 1969]
------
By alsharad
"When I say that faith is rational, I mean that faith can be supported by reason and evidence."

Really?
How?

There is a high probabillity that there will be a tomorrow for humanity.
[the sun wont explode]
But it still may.
Thus faith that it will not is irrational.

It either will or it wont.
Just as it will either rain or not.
you try to confuse faith into the lexicon of reason.
When it literally means belief without evidence.
A non-rational state, an emotional one

Thus the church calls its followers the faithfull.
For it well knows what faith is.

A method to understanding has replaced faith.
It has now begun to really look at the question of higher direction
Without holy books and holy men
but withonly reason, curiousity and method.
Religion itself is now turning to science.
For as our rational method begins to really SEE reallity.
It sees evidence of direction.

But so far..,That is all.

No white bearded gods. no messiahs on earth, no etherial hindu dieties.
Nothing.
THEY are 'human words'
And none so far have shown them to be anything more.

Very much like finding out that santa is a story...

Occam

[gdkumar]

When we say there is no God, from somewhere somebody drops in saying we are all God. So difficult it is to get rid of this God-word!

Love..........Kumar.

[Alsharad]

You may argue that reasoning can be applied to a belief that already exists upon faith, or that faith can contribute to the assurance of an already rational belief; but these things do not warrant the title of 'reasonable' for faith.
The error in your thinking is that something must be governed by reason in order to be reasonable or rational. Something is rational if it is governed by *or* is in accordance with reasoning or sound thinking. If faith is in accordance with or conforms to a rational thought process then it *is* reasonable. Faith (or anything for that matter) is irrational only if it contradicts logic and reasoning (meaning that the nature of faith is such that it violates the law of the excluded middle or the law of non-contradiction). Now one might say that faith is "belief that does not rest on logical proof or material evidence" so faith is by definition *not* logical. This is a narrow definition of faith. It is what I call Blind Faith. There are other definitions of faith though. Other definitions of faith that can and do rest on logic and reasoning. Here are three:

"Confident belief in the truth, value, or trustworthiness of a person, idea, or thing."
"Loyalty to a person or thing; allegiance"
"The theological virtue defined as secure belief in God and a trusting acceptance of God's will."

All of these definitions I got from Dictionary.com. Miriam-webster has similar definitions. For you to say that any faith in God at all is the narrow definition of faith seems to speak of your presuppositions. This is only my opinion and please do not be offended, but it seems that you presume that there is no evidence at all so therefore faith in God must be faith without reason or evidence. More on this in a bit... let's move on.

If evidence brings us to believe that there is a 95% chance it will rain today, then the belief that it is going to rain today has been justified. It is a rational belief.
"Rational belief" is a term that communicates to me, but it seems that you are saying that one can have a rational belief but not a rational faith. The english language seems to disagree with you. Here are the definitions for faith from Miriam-Webster and from Dictionary.com:

1 a : allegiance to duty or a person : LOYALTY b (1) : fidelity to one's promises (2) : sincerity of intentions
2 a (1) : belief and trust in and loyalty to God (2) : belief in the traditional doctrines of a religion b (1) : firm belief in something for which there is no proof (2) : complete trust
3 : something that is believed especially with strong conviction; especially : a system of religious beliefs
synonym see BELIEF

And the remaining relevant definiton from Dictionary.com (the others wer mentioned above):

"Belief that does not rest on logical proof or material evidence. See Synonyms at belief. See Synonyms at trust."

Note that they both say that a synonym for faith is belief. So I checked out those definitions:

Meriam-Webster:
1 : a state or habit of mind in which trust or confidence is placed in some person or thing
2 : something believed; especially : a tenet or body of tenets held by a group
3 : conviction of the truth of some statement or the reality of some being or phenomenon especially when based on examination of evidence
synonyms BELIEF, FAITH, CREDENCE, CREDIT mean assent to the truth of something offered for acceptance. BELIEF may or may not imply certitude in the believer <my belief that I had caught all the errors>. FAITH almost always implies certitude even where there is no evidence or proof <an unshakable faith in God>. CREDENCE suggests intellectual assent without implying anything about grounds for assent <a theory now given credence by scientists>. CREDIT may imply assent on grounds other than direct proof <gave full credit to the statement of a reputable witness>. synonym see in addition OPINION

Note that "BELIEF may or may not imply certitude in the believer. FAITH almost always implies certitude even where there is no evidence or proof." That, I think is the key to our little debate. Faith and belief diverge on their degree of certitude, not the amount of evidence. Note that faith implies certitude "even when there is no evidence or proof." "Even when" does not mean that faith cannot be based upon reason. It definitely does NOT mean that faith *cannot* have rational foundations; it simply says that faith is certain even when there is no evidence. So faith, by its own nature can very well be rational and reasonable. Also note that belief CAN imply certitude. So if you have a belief that is 99% certain and you state it as fact (i.e. "it is going to rain today, there is a 95% chance of rain and it smells like rain") then your belief is identical in nature and definition to faith (so long as you allow other defintions for faith).

To rationally demonstrate or justify a belief is not synonymous with claiming certainty for that belief. Depending on various factors, such as nature and the amount of available evidence, a belief may be categorized as probable to some degree. Reason demands that the degree of certitude assigned to a belief must be in accordance with the available evidence. Reason does not demand that every bit of human knowledge must be accepted as certain or closed to further investigation.See the above for how certainty relates to faith and belief. Note that I did not invent new terms or even work out some new concept for a definition. These are definitions and concepts that are accepted as true by literary and linguistic scholars.

Ultimately, faith depends for it’s survival on the unknowable and incomprehensible.Given that we now have common definitions of faith and belief to work from, can you please demonstrate how this is true?

You seem to suggest that in order for a belief to be 'rational', 100% assurance of it must exist, and if it does not, that faith must be involved. This is not true. If there is enough evidence to show that the existence of Timbuktoo is a knowable fact, then faith is not needed to accept that Timbuktoo exists.I am not trying to imply that. If something is 100% assured then it is most definitely fact (actually, some things we accept as fact historically have MUCH less that 100% assurance). However, if it is not 100% assured then yes, somewhere along the line faith must enter the picture. It might not be at the first point (Timbuktoo exists), but it might be further along the line (do you trust your sources? do you trust that you got the information correct? do you trust your own senses? do you trust your reasoning?) At some point, faith / belief will enter the picture.

I do not feel that your analogies demonstrate the nature of faith. I think you have done more to demonstrate the nature of rational beliefs, with your analogies of a 95% chance of rain and a car starting.See the above regarding the nature of "rational beliefs."

In order to demonstrate the nature of FAITH, trying working with a scenario that is not already a rational belief. How about the existence of god? We are getting there... just working on the groundwork so that we can start from the same point.

A religious man wishes to claim as knowledge, beliefs that have not been (and often cannot be) rationally demonstrated, so he posits faith as an alternative method of acquiring knowledge. Faith permits the religious man to claim the status of truth for a belief even though it cannot meet the rational test of truth. When a religion claims the ‘truth’, faith as a means of acquiring knowledge has been employed.
Or he has given strong rational proofs for his position and therefore makes the leap to certainty. You presume that belief in God cannot meet the "rational test of truth." Could you please elaborate on this? What is the "rational test of truth"? Also, regarding that last sentence, I think you are reaching. Suppose that God shows Himself to a human and interacts with him empirically (the human touches, hears, sees, etc.). God also sets a few things down and corrects some incorrect beliefs about him. Let's say the experience is so overwhelming that it removes the human's free will and he cannot disbelieve God's existence. If he then goes about talking about his experience with God and how God is real and how he has the truth about God, has he used faith to aquire knowledge? Just because someone says they have the truth about God doesn't mean that they have used faith to substitute for knowledge. It is entirely possible that they are basing it on factual encounters with God. Just because God hasn't shown himself to *you* doesn't mean he hasn't shown himself to anyone. You cannot just dismiss someone else's testimony because you haven't experienced what they have. You must determine if they are trustworthy. Then you weigh the evidences (including their credibility). Anyway, I just think that your last sentence does not follow sound reasoning.

Continued below...

[Alsharad]

To rationally demonstrate a belief is to show that it warrants acceptance according to the epistemological standards of human knowledge. Knowledge applies to rationality. If a man is to acquire knowledge, he must have a may of distinguishing truth from falsity, beliefs which correspond to reality from beliefs which do not. To qualify as knowledge, a belief must be justified; it must warrant acceptance by rational standards. A belief not meeting these standards, that is adopted nonetheless, is an irrational belief.I think I agreed with this earlier. Faith that contradicts reason is irrational. Faith that is in accordance with reason is rational. Faith that exists beyond the bounds of logic non-rational.

Your idea of what ‘rational’ is, seems to be a bit skewed.

If a belief is supported by a probable amount of reason and evidence, then this belief is not of faith. It is a rational belief. Where rationality ends, faith begins. Saying faith is rational is indeed like saying ‘blue is black’.
An article of faith can have reason applied to it or some small bit of evidence found for it, but this does not make faith rational.The above is only true if one accepts your definition of faith. Also, note that extending beyond logic doesn't make it irrational or contradictory. It simply makes it non-rational. Logic cannot be applied at all. Logic can neither disprove nor prove this kind of non-rational faith beyond the shadow of a doubt. Still, I think it is moot. The difference between a belief and faith (when there is a difference) is a matter of certainty, not of proof or evidence.

And we come to the big question. What would you consider as reliable evidence? I leave the answer to you (though please do not make unreasonable demands of Science by demanding empirical "scientific" evidence for something that is entirely non-empirical).

Sensory evidence.So you *are* demanding sensory evidence of a being that is wholly non-empirical (cannot be sensed with the five senses)? Also, would you trust it if you saw it? Can you fool the senses? Try this:

Put your hand in ice water for about 2 minutes... then turn on the tap and stick your "iced" hand in the water. Is the tap water cold or hot or lukewarm? Now take your "non-iced" hand and stick it in the same tap water. Does it feel the same temperature as it did when you first put your "iced" hand in it? If not, then your senses can be decieved (pretty easily too). Even if God appeared in front of you, would you try to then rationally explain it away (maybe a hallucination or an LSD flashback or some strange latent trauma over this conversation...)? Why do you trust sensory evidence more than a rational proof? Why do you consider sensory evidence reliable?

I have acknowledge this with my statement ‘Lacking belief is a logically and intellectually defensible position on a subject for which there is not enough evidence to draw a conclusion except with faith. As it is, this is that subject.’How is it defensible? You cannot prove it true either through sensory evidence nor can you support it through a logical argument. All you can do is disprove contradictory arguments. Unfortunately, that does not strengthen your "position." So how do you defend it intellectually? Simply saying that it is defensible doesn't make it so. Also, your position is non-falsifiable. I cannot prove that you do NOT have a lack of belief. You have no belief whatsoever. All I can do is agree that you have a lack of belief. Do you understand what I mean? Your lack of belief cannot be challenged because I cannot address something that is not there (i.e. your belief). I can only address the object of your belief or disbelief. So you have a position that cannot be defended and a position that cannot be attacked. That sounds more like a non-position (making the sentence "I lack belief in..." a non-statement from the point of an argument).
I hate posting from other sites but this argument is very well put.

From www.carm.org (http://www.carm.org/):
"If "lack of belief" means that a person chooses to not make an intellectual commitment to a position, but to remain intellectually neutral regarding belief or disbelief, that would be more logical. However, complete neutrality about a concept is impossible since all concepts have an effect upon the hearer and illicit a response. Once you have been exposed to a concept, you categorize it as True, False, Ridiculous, Unsure, etc., but you do not return to a complete mental neutrality or state of ignorance. We do not "lack belief" in invisible pink unicorns. That is, we do not hold a mentally neutral position of the concept. We make a decision to categorize them as True, False, Ridiculous, Unsure, etc. based upon our scope of knowledge and experience. To the extent that this categorization occurs, belief or disbelief is associated with it.
If True, then positive belief is applied.
If False, then disbelief (the positive belief that it is false) is applied.
If Ridiculous, then disbelief (the positive belief that it is false) is applied.
If Unsure, then belief and disbelief are pending with either as the outcome. This is because we realize that belief in the concept (acceptance) is possible as also is disbelief (rejection) depending on further information.
Being unsure about something is as close to "lack of belief" as one can logically get but even this is a categorization with pending commitment to belief or disbelief."

Furthermore, our actions are the results of our beliefs, not our non-beliefs. If I am completely unaware that there is no fuel in my car, I will take no action to refuel it. If I believe there is no fuel in my car, I will fuel it up. That is action based on positive belief in a negative position. If I "lack belief" that there is fuel in my car and remain completely neutral, still I will take no action.
This might not seem relevant, but if our actions reflect our beliefs (though not always our convictions), then we can see what a person believes based upon their actions. If you commit to a position of neutrality when you say that you lack belief and then actively attempt to disprove or discredit theistic proofs and promote atheistic ideals, are you really intellectually neutral? It seems more likely that you have the positive belief that there is no God. Otherwise, attacking theistic proofs while defending atheistic and agnostic ideals would definitely be inconsistent with the idea of withholding judgement. Most atheists I have met side with those who assert there is no God. That belies not a "lack of belief" or a neutral attitude but a positive belief that there is no God.

The literal definition of ‘atheism’, as held by many self-proclaimed atheists, is ‘Without belief in god’. A- without. Theism- belief in god.Here is the definition as given by Miriam-Webster and Dictionary.com:

Miriam-Webster:
1 archaic : UNGODLINESS, WICKEDNESS
2 a : a disbelief in the existence of deity b : the doctrine that there is no deity

Dictionary.com
1. a.Disbelief in or denial of the existence of God or gods.
b.The doctrine that there is no God or gods.
2. Godlessness; immorality.

Before you start dismantling the idea of disbelief, please note what it means: "mental rejection of something as untrue." Disbelief is actively believing the idea is false, not simply having no opinion on it at all. So Miriam-Webster and Dictionary.com do not agree with your literal definition. I understand that they are not the end-all be-all of the english language however, and I do think that they have missed the mark just a tad (though the above is what is recognized as atheism in the public eye). I prefer the following definition:

"active disbelief in the existence of God and/or lacking belief in the existence of God"

I agree that atheists lack belief. What I am trying to point out is that simply "lacking belief" leads to either inconsistent action or to an impossible or non-existent position. At best, it leads to the view that God is unknown and probably unknowable or, more broadly, to not committing to believing in either the existence or the nonexistence of God (which is textbook agnosticism).

[Alsharad]

This is something related to the above. I wanted to know what you guys thought.

The most common argument that I have heard is "there is no reliable evidence for God." Now, for this to be an actual argument it must have at least one premise and a conclusion. Here is how it seems to break down:

1. (Implied Premise) If there is a God, then there will be reliable evidence for His existence.
2. (Stated Premise) There is no reliable evidence for the existence of God.
3. (Conclusion) Therefore, I lack belief in God.

This is not a valid argument because the conclusion does not follow from the premises. The form of the above argument is

If P, then Q
~Q
Therefore R

The conclusion is only remotely related to the premises in that they both contain references to God. That is where the similarities end. The premises deal with the existence of God. The actuality of God's existence is the subject matter of the premises. The conclusion is concerned not with the actuality of God's existence, but with the beliefs of the one posing the argument. The subject matter of the conclusion is the arguer's opinion. The premises and the conclusion are not related (except that they both mention God).

It is possible that the argument might be more complex. In fact, it would have to be if it wanted to be sound. Let's try this:

1. If there is a God, then there will be reliable evidence for His existence.
2. There is no evidence for the existence of God.
3. Therefore, God does not exist.
4. If a thing does not exist, then a person may either lack belief in it or deny its existence.
5. God not existing is equivalent to God being a thing that does not exist.
6. Therefore God is a thing that does not exist.
7. Therefore, a person may either lack belief in God or deny His existence.

The above is a valid argument following this form:
1 If P, then Q
2 ~Q
3 Therefore ~P (from 1 & 2, by modus tollens)
4 If R, then S or T
5 ~P = R (from 3)
6 Therefore R (from 5, by repetition)
7 Therefore S or T (from 4 & 6, by modus ponens)

The above form is valid, but if lacking a belief is a defensible position you must be able to support the premises. Now, even if you can support premises one and two, you must still show how lacking belief is *not* superfluous. Once you reach the conclusion that there is no God, why go about claiming a "lack of belief" when you can show deductively that God does not exist? Either your reasoning is not sound or your position includes by default the conclusion that God does not exist. Why not then simply take the posistion that there is no God?

Again, the first argument is invalid and therefore unsound, the second argument is valid but has some weak premises. It is up to the atheist to support his stated and implied premises.

Of course, I might be completely off the mark. If so, I would appreciate it if someone would please demonstrate the deductive or inductive arguments used to arrive at the conclusion that one may "lack belief."

[Razorofoccam]

This is something related to the above. I wanted to know what you guys thought.

The most common argument that I have heard is "there is no reliable evidence for God." ."
Alsharad

And your following arguments appear reasonable.
the

"1. (Implied Premise) If there is a God, then there will be reliable evidence for His existence.
2. (Stated Premise) There is no reliable evidence for the existence of God.
3. (Conclusion) Therefore, I lack belief in God."

sequence is invalid in occams eyes. [also]

It falls down because no human knows what 'reliable evidence' really means in relation to a god.. And humans have only a keyhole perspective on reality anyway so we CANT see ALL the evidence that may be available.
This alone rules out a valid conclusion to the above sequence.
[ie: step 2 is invalid]

Occam has before stated that in his perspective/opinion. There IS evidence of direction in reality.The very ballance and organisation of it implies direction.
[especially anti-entropic systems such as life. Using entropic mater/energy to build anti-entropic organised systems.]

But few of us think at such a conceptual level.
Athiesm/theism is on earth. A thing of human religions.
Humans accept a religion...And are theists by that brand of belief.
OR NOT.. and become atiests to human religious concepts of god.
All revolve about human religious descriptions.
Both choose to believe or not to believe.
Based in no evidence of those religious descriptions.

The mistake IS.
That religious descriptions of god are taken by default as reasonable.

Occam accepts very few such descriptions as reasonable...
Just about all are rendered as invalid by massive contradiction.

The god of the monotheism is one..[christianity, islam, judeaism]
and all it's offshoots.

Occam, in his path. has decided that the simple observations of our reason.
Science and rational method...
Has revealed far more evidence of direction in reality...
Than any religion has ever done.

Religion talks of a god...
Science/reason..actually sees evidence of one..

Not conclusive evidence...but hey..were still learning to see properly.


Occam

PS
Age has taught occam one thing.
In human understanding.
Everything is grey
except ..cogito ergo...

Aristotle corrupted the western mind.

[Alsharad]

And your following arguments appear reasonable.
the

"1. (Implied Premise) If there is a God, then there will be reliable evidence for His existence.
2. (Stated Premise) There is no reliable evidence for the existence of God.
3. (Conclusion) Therefore, I lack belief in God."

sequence is invalid in occams eyes. [also]

It falls down because no human knows what 'reliable evidence' really means in relation to a god.. And humans have only a keyhole perspective on reality anyway so we CANT see ALL the evidence that may be available.
This alone rules out a valid conclusion to the above sequence.
[ie: step 2 is invalid]I did some more research and it turns out that the argument might be valid. Any conclusion that ends in a logical truth is valid. For example, take this argument:

1. If the sun is round, then it is yellow.
2. Therefore all trees are trees.

The argument is valid. However, it is still unsound because it fails to be relevant. If it is a logical truth that "I lack belief in God", then the conclusion is always true. An argument is only invalid if it can have true premises and a false conclusion. If the conclusion is always true, then, even if the premises are false (as in the argument above), the argument is valid (remember that premises are true or false; only arguements are valid or invalid). Now, I do not think that the statement "I lack belief in God" is a logical truth, because if I say it, it is not true. So I still think that it is invalid, but it is entirely possible that I am mistaken (just ask my wife). Still, even if the argument is valid, the conclusion fails to be relevant to the premises.

Your assessent is correct though. We cannot claim that there is no evidence, only that we haven't found any yet (and even THAT is debatable). (In terms of logic, step 2 is false, therefore the argument is unsound).

But few of us think at such a conceptual level. Athiesm/theism is on earth. A thing of human religions. Humans accept a religion...And are theists by that brand of belief. OR NOT.. and become atiests to human religious concepts of god.
All revolve about human religious descriptions. Both choose to believe or not to believe. Based in no evidence of those religious descriptions.I would disagree here. If there is a God, then everyone who thinks that there is a God (of any type) is at least partially correct. Anyone who denies the existence of any God at all is completely wrong. Theism (in terms of belief in a higher power) is either true or false. Whether humanity exists or not, either there is a God or there isn't one. As such, theism was not necessarily originated by humanity, but is simply the recognition that either God exists or He doesn't and the concious decision to believe the former.

The mistake IS.
That religious descriptions of god are taken by default as reasonable.

Occam accepts very few such descriptions as reasonable...
Just about all are rendered as invalid by massive contradiction.Could you please list these contradictions? Perhaps the issue isn't God, but the understanding or misunderstanding of His attributes.

Religion talks of a god...
Science/reason..actually sees evidence of one..Actually reason doesn't "see" evidence of anything. :)

Seriously though, reason deals with the abstract and the non-empirical. Science deals wholly with the empirical. But I would agree, both seem to point towards at the minimum some sort of intelligent design.

Age has taught occam one thing.
In human understanding.
Everything is grey
except ..cogito ergo...Experience and art and optics has taught me one thing. That grey is nothing but a mixture of black and white. Take a gray issue and break it down far enough and eventually you will get to black and white. Life is like newsprint. The big picture is gray, but look close enought and you'll see that the gray is made up of nothing more than pinpoints of black and white.

[Razorofoccam]

Alsharad

"Could you please list these contradictions? Perhaps the issue isn't God, but the understanding or misunderstanding of His attributes."

Oh hell !!

There you go ...... hell.

The god of love does 'what' to those that do not believe in him.?
[as he cant seem to be able to convince them..even if omnipotent]

He tortures them forever.

Occam

[need occam say more?]

[Alsharad]

The god of love does 'what' to those that do not believe in him.?
[as he cant seem to be able to convince them..even if omnipotent]

He tortures them forever.This is not an uncommon question.

Let's begin with the groundwork. For the explanation, I am going to assume God exists because I really don't feel like typing "God (given that he exists)" every time. Since you mentioned Hell, I am going to go with Christianity (because I do not know how Muslims would answer this question). :)

Okay, God is love but He is also just and holy. This puts God in a unique position in regards to us. His Holiness prevents him from abiding the presence of evil. More importantly than this, evil is an offense to his holiness. To commit any evil in spite of God is an offense against a being of infinite holiness. Enter God's justness. Justice demands that the price for such an offense be equal in measure to the crime commited. Any offense against infinite holiness is infinite in nature, and therefore merits an infinite amount of punishment. God, by His infinite justice alone, MUST punish us.

Now, enter God's love.

God abstained (and still abstains) from punishing us because of his love for us. He withholds judgement even though we, as beings who have commited evil, rightly deserve it. However, God saw that we were in a hopeless situation and decided to act. Please forgive this rather crude example of God's thought process on the matter.

"Well, I love them, but I cannot be unjust. If I refuse to punish them I will be unjust. If but if I love them, how can I let them be separated from Me for all eternity? I know... I will pay their debt FOR them. I am an infinite being and can therefore satisfy the requirements of justice. Then if anyone wants to be with Me, they just have to ask. Of course, I will not be able to force them into accepting My payment because that would be unjust, but if they choose, they can choose to count My sacrifice as their own."

Before God created mankind, He knew that we would fall short of the mark. He knew the sacrifice He would be *required* to make. He is required to make the sacrifice for us because He is love and love sacrifices itself for the good of the beloved.

God doesn't want anyone to go to Hell. However, if one chooses to not accept His grace, then you are choosing to submit to His justice. Justice demands that the punishment be equal in measure to the crime. Since one offence is infinite in nature and we have all comitted at least one offense, none are innocent, and anyone who stands outside of His grace will be subject to a punishment that is by nature infinite.

So you see, there is no contradiction. God is love. We don't go to Hell because He sends us there, we go to Hell because we choose to.

PS: It is His justness that prevents Him from proving Himself beyond the shadow of a doubt. To do so would be to strip us of our free will, which would be unjust.

[Razorofoccam]

So you see, there is no contradiction. God is love. We don't go to Hell because He sends us there, we go to Hell because we choose to.

Alsharad

Ahh!!
Occam CHOOSES to go to hell.
How so?
Well
He does not believe the god described by christianity exists. OR heaven or hell
as described by such.
Now
Why does he not believe it?
Because god gave him reason.
And his reason says that the only christian god/heaven/hell. He has ever experienced are human words or words in a book.
Never as things in themselves/phenomena in reality.

Occam sees the exact same 'existence' of the christian god in reality.
As he does of Zues or Odin.

He cannot reasonably say that the god of the bible exists..Any more than he can say Zues exists [or not]
He cannot say a thing is 'fact'. When he has no information to show it as such. According to his god given reason :)
This is logic.

So he is to burn forever.
For being what he is...
A thinking being.

It seems to occam. That only those who do not question.
Or who accept a set of concepts without question
[because the 'want' to]
Can go to a christian heaven.
Everyone else, those that see no evidence of a christian god or have no
desire such a being to exist , goes to hell.

Occam has no desire to believe in a being that would torture forever.
Anyone.
The concept of eternal torture is to occam,, pure evil..

By the way,,what if a person has never been given the opportunity
to 'choose to'. Has never even heard of christianity
[example: everyone who lived before 1AD]

God is the law giver...?
Who's responsibility is it then. To make sure everyone knows the laws?

His...
And so far he is a disaster.

Occam

[Alsharad]

Ahh!!
Occam CHOOSES to go to hell.
How so?
Well
He does not believe the god described by christianity exists. OR heaven or hell
as described by such.I am sure that you recognize that just because you disagree with a premise doesn't mean that the premise is untrue.

Now
Why does he not believe it?
Because god gave him reason.
And his reason says that the only christian god/heaven/hell. He has ever experienced are human words or words in a book.
Never as things in themselves/phenomena in reality.You are applying a metaphysical reality when you use your mind to apply logic. The mind is a metaphysical reality (even if it is an illusion, the illusion is a metaphysical reality). You say you have reason and then delve into your personal experience. The fact is that there are things that exist wholly beyond your experience, but not outside your capacity to think about it. There is more to existence than experience. If you agree at all, then you must give a more compelling argument then "I have never experienced it." If you say that there is only experience (which is empiricism, by definition), then you will have a hard time saying that your own mind exists (since you cannot sense it empirically). You could say that you have not experienced God in the same way that you experience non-empirical realities (like thought or, possibly, emotion). However, if you follow that line of reasoning then someone who says that they have experienced God that way has as much evidence for God's existence as someone who hasn't.

Occam sees the exact same 'existence' of the christian god in reality.
As he does of Zues or Odin.This alone could spark such a huge debate as to be worthy of another thread. Needless to say, I disagree. For a list of evidences though... well... here's a short list:

The resurrection of Christ
The miracles of Christ (i.e. specific, in-context, purposeful)
The very character and words of Christ
The self-understanding of Christ
The very super-human complexity of Christ's life and words
The changed lives of the apostles
The explosive growth of the early church, in a very hostile environment
The conversion of skeptics/enemies (e.g. Thomas, Saul/Paul)
The radically new, yet balanced ethics of the young church.
The messianic prophecies (e.g. birthplace of Jesus, nature of death)
The "regular" prophecies (e.g. specific predicted international events in OT prophets)
The miraculous birth of Israel from Egypt
The miraculous continued existence of Israel as a people though history
The miracles in the OT (i.e. specific, in-context, purposeful)
The advanced character of the Mosaic Law (both content and argumentation)
The practical impossibility of alternative explanations for the above.
The practical impossibility of consistent atheism: the meaning, purpose, value of life.
Evidence for immortality of the soul
The argument from change
The argument from Efficient Causality
The argument from Time and Contingency
The argument from degrees of perfection
The argument from error-detection-standard
The argument from the definition of the Problem of Evil
The Design argument
The Kalam argument (e.g. whatever begins to exist has a cause)
The argument from contingency
The argument from the world as an interacting whole (e.g. "uni-verse")
The argument from miracles (general form)
The argument from the existence of consciousness
The argument from truth (requiring an eternal mind)
Argument from the origin of the idea of God
Ontological argument (various forms)
The Moral Argument
The argument from conscience
The argument from desire for the Ultimate and eternal
The argument from aesthetic experience or beauty
The argument from religious experience
The common consent argument
The argument from the character of human language
The argument from predictability of natural law
The presuppositional argument concerning knowledge
The self-consistency of the system
The predictive power of God's moral instructions in the Bible
The survival of the scriptures in history
Answered prayer and changed lives.

Now you can debate these to differing degrees, but keep in mind that in each argument above, the Judeo-Christian position is either the most plausible conclusion, or at least a distinctly possible conclusion.

He cannot reasonably say that the god of the bible exists..Any more than he can say Zues exists [or not]
He cannot say a thing is 'fact'. When he has no information to show it as such. According to his god given reason
This is logic.It is good that you are being reasonable. Keep in mind though, that if you have logic and you come to an untrue conclusion, then there is a flaw in your logic. So, state your premises and then ask if your own premises are true. Here's the hard part (for me too), you have to recognize your own prejudices and approach it from the perspective that the other guy might be right and you might be wrong.

So he is to burn forever.
For being what he is...
A thinking being.No, for rejecting the offer God has given you. Only a thinking being can accept it.

It seems to occam. That only those who do not question.
Or who accept a set of concepts without question
[because the 'want' to]
Can go to a christian heaven.
Everyone else, those that see no evidence of a christian god or have no
desire such a being to exist , goes to hell.If you cannot see evidence (of any type, not just for God), then there are three options, you are either blind, you shut your eyes and refuse to see the evidence, or there is no evidence. How do you know you are not blind or that your presuppositions force you to reject the evidence that is there? Until you can justify that there is no evidence, you could very well be blind or in denial. Of course you could prove that you are not blind or that you do not refuse to see the evidence, but you will have a hard time proving one, if not both, of them without reconciling to the statement "I'm just not..." or "I just don't believe I am..."

Please note that this is not a personal attack. It is simply a clarification of your position. If I am wrong, please tell me how and why.

Occam has no desire to believe in a being that would torture forever.
Anyone.
The concept of eternal torture is to occam,, pure evil..I am sorry that you think this is true. I must also point out that you are begging the question.

If the Christian God (TCG) exists, then morality is not relative to the individual.
If morality is not relative to the individual, then any non-diety's opinion of what is evil is not relevant to the question of whether Hell's existence is actually evil.
Therefore if TCG exists, any non-deity's opinion of what is evil is not relevant to the question of whether Hell's existence is actually evil.

If TCG does not exist, then morality is relative.
If morality is relative, then anyone's opinion of what is evil is totally relevant to the question of whether Hell's existence is actually evil.
However, if TCG does not exist, then then there is no Hell.
Therefore, any opinion of Hell is irrelevant because a thing that does not exist has no moral content at all.
Therefore, opinions of Hell both relevant and non-relavent. This is inconsistent.

Here is a summation:
If TCG exists, then Hell exists and is not evil (unfortunate, but not evil).
If TCG does NOT exist, then Hell does not exist and your opinion of its moral implications are irrelevant.
Your position that a loving God would not create Hell has been shown to be in error. A loving God could definitely create Hell and, if just, would be *required* to create it. He would also be obligated to provide a way to avoid it. He did in the person of Jesus Christ.

By the way,,what if a person has never been given the opportunity
to 'choose to'. Has never even heard of christianity
[example: everyone who lived before 1AD]The question is really not relevant to the discussion to the existence of God. If TCG exists he is just and those who haven't heard will be dealt with justly. The Bible says that Abraham had faith and it was counted to him as righteousness. He was saved by his faith that the messiah *would* come. There is also Melchizadech, who was a priest-king of God. He was not a Hebrew or even of Abraham's line at all, yet Abraham paid tithe to him as unto God. If TCG exists, we can be sure that he will take care of those who have never heard. If He doesn't exist, then it doesn't matter.

God is the law giver...?
Who's responsibility is it then. To make sure everyone knows the laws?

His...Yep. And he gave us several ways to find Him. In Romans 2:11-16 it speaks about those who have never heard the Law of God and how they will be judged according to the law that is written in their hearts. The Law written in their hearts is the knowledge of right and wrong. Perhaps God's judgment of those without a proper knowledge of Him is included there where it says that they will be judged according to their own consciences that "bear witness, and their thoughts alternately accusing or else defending them." All I know is that God will do what is right and the only way to have your sins forgiven is through Jesus.

And so far he is a disaster.That is opinion. If it is a statement of fact, then please provide your proof.

[gdkumar]

Dear Occam,

Yet another wonderful surgery with your sharp razor, an enthralling post!

Thank you.



It is always better to reason out things than being a blind believer.

And like you I also could never understand this hell and heaven thing. If we go as per the believers then God should be the most compassionate, merciful and benevolent one. How does the question of hell or heaven come? If God is our father, master and the dearest I can not think of any father sending his children to hell no matter what they do.



And first of all what are these heaven and hell ? Mysteries like God himself ?



Personally, I always believed in energies which can not be seen but their presence is manifested in some forms. I always considered that there is some supernatural power, something that can not be seen but experienced. I have many such personal experiences which can not be explained. Like Nostra Damus who could see future. How? We do not know.



My teacher(Guru), who initiated me into the spiritual world, is somebody whom I had watched very closely. My brief association with him(He is no more) has been my life's most wonderful time. I remember there was an wood apple tree close to his hut. Many of his devotees wanted to fell that tree because its dry leaves used to make the place dirty. He never consented saying that the tree will fall down on its own after his death. Very truly that big tree fell down seven days after his death after a short spell of rain.



One day I was sitting there in front of him, one young man came and touched his feet. He started shouting and reprimanding him saying that instead of trying to board a running train he should start earlier from home and catch a train peacefully.He also told him that everyday he wont be saved. We got the story later from that man, he came late to the station and the train had started moving. He tried to board and slipped and was nearly going in between the gap between the running train and the platform.He felt that somebody pulled him out and he fell on the platform.



Once it was peak of summer and that day it was extremely hot. We were sitting in front of him and discussing about the abnormal heat, he suddenly said, "I will die on one such afternoon.It will be very hot and clear sunny day but do not worry at the same time it will be raining." He died after two years and it all came true.


These are not from hear-say,all are my personal experiences.
Like these there are many other things that I have personally experienced.



I would appreciate your views on this.



With love...........Kumar.

[Razorofoccam]

I am sure that you recognize that just because you disagree with a premise doesn't mean that the premise is untrue.
Alsharad

Correct.
His belief system is based in reason/logic and method. and also on the synerg of this and human mind..its called inuition.If such a system cannot see evidence that the god of the bible is anymore than words...
Then all occam can do is say that the christain god may exist.
This in no way supports the idea that said gods moral code exists.

You are applying a metaphysical reality when you use your mind to apply logic. .............However, if you follow that line of reasoning then someone who says that they have experienced God that way has as much evidence for God's existence as someone who hasn't.
Yes there is more existence than experience. For all beings.
No . "Occam reasons therefore he exists. And thus a reality exists."
This is an absolute subjective AND objective FACT. It is 'direct' empericism with deductive twist. 'Direct' empiricism is that experienced without intervening senses. The experience of it. Is the FACT of it.

No. occam has experienced NO existent phenomena that are connected to the bible description of god.
If NONE of occams capabillities. Perception, logic. reason. exct.
See any existent phenomena related to the bible god..
Then why would he believe such exists?


This alone could spark such a huge debate as to be worthy of another thread. Needless to say, I disagree. For a list of evidences though... well... here's a short list:

The resurrection of Christ
....................
Answered prayer and changed lives.
Firstly, occam does not relate christ to the christian church.
Jesus was a great man...
When did he say his name could be used by an organisation that
only mouths his philosophy...?
And then burns people alive.
If jesus returned today. And found out what humans had done in his name.
He would never stop throwing up.
Where does christianity get off on stealing a mans good intentions.
A mans philosophy.
And tuning them into an empire that has lasted 2000 years.
PLAGARISM.

All the points you make..Occam could assign to other causes.
All the talk about what jesus was.. is just talk
There is NO evidence of ressurection but for human words.
Or miracles.
All words.
Other concepts are expalinable by other means..All of them.
None need be connected to any religion...whatsoever.

If you wish to speak of specific examples...go for it..

Now you can debate these to differing degrees, but keep in mind that in each argument above, the Judeo-Christian position is either the most plausible conclusion, or at least a distinctly possible conclusion.
Yes ... possible...
But hardly the most plausable..Occam can remove 9/10ths of your list
as related to any religion at all..in a few minutes...


It is good that you are being reasonable. Keep in mind though, that if you have logic and you come to an untrue conclusion, then there is a flaw in your logic. So, state your premises and then ask if your own premises are true. Here's the hard part (for me too), you have to recognize your own prejudices and approach it from the perspective that the other guy might be right and you might be wrong.
Occams reason and logic...Are ultimately..for him and us all.
Arbited by reality.
He is reasonable because reality is based on reason.

No, for rejecting the offer God has given you. Only a thinking being can accept it.What if the thinking being has never been offered the choice?
Occam never has.
His understanding of the choice is purely from reffenced info.
Not experience.
He has been in a chuerch half a dozen times in his life.
He was offered no choice.
Not by any god..
If no god has offered occam the choice as you say..
Then he will just have to make his own

If some psycho god sends him to hell for being reasonable...
Then thats the way of it.
At least he had a period of freedom in this world to EXIST.
And learn
Before his potential is thrown in the trash by being sent to hell to suffer forever.
Any god that wastes for no reason..is not too smart by it's own laws of reality. And any god that that can see any purpose for eternal torture.
Is psychotic :)
It achieves what? [nothing. it never ends , so there is no result]

If you cannot see evidence (of any type, not just for God), then there are three options, you are either blind, you shut your eyes and refuse to see..
Please note that this is not a personal attack. It is simply a clarification of your position. If I am wrong, please tell me how and why.
Occam sees no evidence...
His theory is that a god cannot be defined untill there is existent evidence for such..There is to occam . No verifiable existent evidence for the god of the bible.

Occam sees no personal attack..


I am sorry that you think this is true. I must also point out that you are begging the question.

If the Christian God (TCG) exists, then morality is not relative to the individual.
If morality is not relative to the individual, then any non-diety's opinion of what is evil is not relevant to the question of whether Hell's existence is actually evil.
Therefore if TCG exists, any non-deity's opinion of what is evil is not relevant to the question of whether Hell's existence is actually evil.

If TCG does not exist, then morality is relative.
If morality is relative, then anyone's opinion of what is evil is totally relevant to the question of whether Hell's existence is actually evil.
However, if TCG does not exist, then then there is no Hell.
Therefore, any opinion of Hell is irrelevant because a thing that does not exist has no moral content at all.
Therefore, opinions of Hell both relevant and non-relavent. This is inconsistent.

Here is a summation:
If TCG exists, then Hell exists and is not evil (unfortunate, but not evil).
If TCG does NOT exist, then Hell does not exist and your opinion of its moral implications are irrelevant.
Your position that a loving God would not create Hell has been shown to be in error. A loving God could definitely create Hell and, if just, would be *required* to create it. He would also be obligated to provide a way to avoid it. He did in the person of Jesus Christ.
Sorry, but statemants like
"Your position that a loving God would not create Hell has been shown to be in error. A loving God could definitely create Hell and, if just, would be *required* to create it. He would also be obligated to provide a way to avoid it. He did in the person of Jesus Christ."
[/quote]Are we as a species some creature that requires pavlovian conditioning?
Do good,, go to heaven.
Do bad. go to hell.

Please elaborate how a god of love is 'required' to create a hell.
Occam argues that a hell is required because a bunch of self seving sons of bitches in 800ad decided it was a good way of getting people to do what they want..
Where does jesus say that any who do not accept him as savior.Who
choose their own path..will go to a hell?
Where does jesus EVER USE the word HELL.
Nowhere.

So where does hell come from?
Controllers.


The question is really not relevant to the discussion to the existence of God. If TCG exists he is just and those who haven't heard will be dealt with justly. The Bible says that Abraham had faith and it was counted to him as righteousness. He was saved by his faith that the messiah *would* come. There is also Melchizadech, who was a priest-king of God. He was not a Hebrew or even of Abraham's line at all, yet Abraham paid tithe to him as unto God. If TCG exists, we can be sure that he will take care of those who have never heard. If He doesn't exist, then it doesn't matter.

Yep. And he gave us several ways to find Him. In Romans 2:11-16 it speaks about those who have never heard the Law of God and how they will be judged according to the law that is written in their hearts. The Law written in their hearts is the knowledge of right and wrong. Perhaps God's judgment of those without a proper knowledge of Him is included there where it says that they will be judged according to their own consciences that "bear witness, and their thoughts alternately accusing or else defending them." All I know is that God will do what is right and the only way to have your sins forgiven is through Jesus.

That is opinion. If it is a statement of fact, then please provide your proof.Please, dont quote the ink stains in a book as any sort of proof.
If any who never hear the mesage of christ as the bible describes it.
Are judged fairly as you say.
Then why have a test at all?
Obviously
God does not need to test us. He sees our hearts.
So why ANY test?

The test is a farce... God is so incompetent as to be unable to make sure all the players even know the rules.
Actually.The church is incompetent for inventing a tale that logic can refute.
where were the jesuits when all the important stuff was being made up?

Yes TCG may exist.
And so may Zues and odin.
All exist to occam , as logical probabillities.
Logic can be used to show that such a god may or may not exist.
But not that it does. [or does not]

Occam sees direction.
Is this a verification of a god? possibly :)

Occam

[Alsharad]

His belief system is based in reason/logic and methodYou could please demonstrate the logic you have used. So far your argument seems to be:

I see evidence of a higher power, therefore there is probably higher power.
I do not see evidence of the Christian God, therefore the Christian God does not exist.

Both arguments are fundamentally flawed. Even if the argument is valid, you consistently fail to prove your premises as true. You simply assert that they are true. If the above is your argument, then you argument is invalid and therefore unsound. The conclusions might be true, but you cannot use the above arguments to support your conclusion. If you are using logic then you will have either deductive or inductive arguments in favor of your position. Please outline your arguments and detail the method by which you are drawing your conclusions.

and also on the synerg of this and human mind..its called inuition.If such a system cannot see evidence that the god of the bible is anymore than words...
Then all occam can do is say that the christain god may exist.Look, here's a fun argument for God. God (at least the Judeo/Christian/Islamic standards) by definition would have to be non-contingent. Anything that is non-contigent is either logically necessary or logically impossible. God is logically possible, therefore God is logically necessary.

So if it is possible for God to exist, then He MUST exist. You said that it is possible, so you are bound to either admit that He MUST exist or you are irrational. ;)

Anyway, that is not really a part of my response to your post, just a little interjection.

This in no way supports the idea that said gods moral code exists.Wrong thread ;)

I was simply saying that if God exists, then morals would be absolute. If He doesn't, then usind the idea that creating Hell would be 'evil' as an argument against the existence of God would be non-sensical since Hell would not exist and 'evil' would be totally subjective.

Yes there is more existence than experience. For all beings.
No . "Occam reasons therefore he exists. And thus a reality exists."Or it could be that the existence of reality is an a priori synthetic truth. :)

This is an absolute subjective AND objective FACT. It is 'direct' empericism with deductive twist. 'Direct' empiricism is that experienced without intervening senses. The experience of it. Is the FACT of it.But my point was that if the only argument you use to 'disprove' the Christian God is that you have not 'experienced' God, then you have a very weak argument because anyone who *has* experienced the Christian God can make just as strong a claim as you can. Actually, their position is stronger than yours. Why? Because not experiencing something does not, in any way assist in showing that said thing does not exist. Experiencing it, however, gives evidence of said thing's existence. They have evidence that you do not.

No. occam has experienced NO existent phenomena that are connected to the bible description of god.
If NONE of occams capabillities. Perception, logic. reason. exct.
See any existent phenomena related to the bible god..
Then why would he believe such exists?You have yet to show your logic in any formal sense. Your arguments so far seem very weak. Could you please clarify your position. How do you logically conclude that God exists, but that it is not the Christian God.

Firstly, occam does not relate christ to the christian church.
Jesus was a great man...
When did he say his name could be used by an organisation that
only mouths his philosophy...?And what philosophy was that? What did he say? What did he teach? Why do you say that Jesus was a great man?

And then burns people alive.You are using ad hominem.

If jesus returned today. And found out what humans had done in his name.
He would never stop throwing up.
Where does christianity get off on stealing a mans good intentions.
A mans philosophy.
And tuning them into an empire that has lasted 2000 years.Again, what philosophy was that? What did Christ claim?

PLAGARISM.To the best of my knowledge, they have always attributed their teachings to Christ. If they claimed the teachings to be their own invention without acknowledging the originator of the ideas (Christ, in this case), only THEN it would be plagiarism.

All the points you make..Occam could assign to other causes.
All the talk about what jesus was.. is just talk
There is NO evidence of ressurection but for human words.
Or miracles.
All words.There is NO evidence or have you simply seen none? We could get into the evidences, but that would probably need to be another thread. Needless to say, there IS evidence. I do not think your presuppositions and prejudices will allow you to recognize it as evidence, but there IS evidence none-the-less.

Other concepts are expalinable by other means..All of them.
None need be connected to any religion...whatsoever.Except that some of them only work for the Judeo-Christian (and maybe Islamic) ideas of deity. That narrows it down and it DOES exclude several other religions.

Yes ... possible...
But hardly the most plausable..Occam can remove 9/10ths of your list
as related to any religion at all..in a few minutes...Not trying to be a smartass here. Please provide a list of those that are not related to religion at all, by that I mean that they cannot have any religious implications.

Occams reason and logic...Are ultimately..for him and us all.
Arbited by reality.
He is reasonable because reality is based on reason.Other way around, Occam. Reality is what is. Something is true if it is agreement with reality. Reason is a method of determinig what is true.

"you have to recognise your own prejudices."
Yes ..occam does so to the best of his abillity...And deletes them.That's good to hear.

You however...If occam may say such.
Have a preudice that what the bible says...is true...
Occam CARES NOT if ANY religion is true ..or not...Why not? Wouldn't it be in your own self-interest to make sure that certain gods (especially if these gods have a hell to where non-believers go) did not exist? Religions make certain claims. It is irrisponsible of the skeptic to dismiss the possibility of the claims because they are from an organized religion. Note that I am not saying you do that, simply that it would be irrisponsible if you did.

Occam sees no evidence...
His theory is that a god cannot be defined untill there is existent evidence for such..There is to occam . No existent verifiable existent evidence for the god of the bible.But you didn't answer the question. How do you know that your inability to see the evidence comes neither from a failure in your reasoning nor from false presuppositions? How do you know that you are seeing clearly?

Occam sees no personal attack..
Occams beliefs in regard to a god. Are not personal beliefs.
They are results of logical/rational process.Again, please detail this process.

God...Is not a personal thing...
If it is not an objective thing...
It is nothing.I absolutely agree with you here.

Are we as a species some creature that requires pavlovian conditioning?
Do good,, go to heaven.
Do bad. go to hell.No, it has nothing to do with conditioning. We are ALL going to Hell unless someone takes the punishment for us. We can choose to accept the payment that God provided or we can pay ourselves. It is our choice. Hell hasn't thing one to do with conditioning us one way or another.

Please elaboate how a god of love is 'required' to creat a hell.Here's two explanations (note that they are not contradictory explanations, both could be true). The thing to remember is that God is not only the God of love, He is the God of justice.

1) A loving God wants what is best for us, but He also respects our wishes. If we do not want to be with Him, then He has created a place completely devoid of His presence (Hell) and we can choose to go there. He doesn't want us too, but He loves us so much that He is willing to let us go where we choose. He respects our decision and, as the origin of love, let's us have our way.

2) A God of justice would have to punish those who offend His moral laws and His holiness. He might not WANT to, but justice demands that the punishment be equal in scope to the offense. The offense in infinite in scope, so the punishment must be also. God's justice commands it, God's love allows it.

Now, you might say that God doesn't have to be just. If that is the case, 1) we are not talking about the Christian God and 2) we now have a God who would FORCE people to come to heaven. He would want what was best for us regardless of what we wanted. Heaven would be far better than Hell, so everyone would go to Heaven even if it was against their wishes. Could you follow a God that was loving but unjust? I couldn't.

[Alsharad]

WHERE DOES JESUS SAY THAT ANY WHO DONT BELIEVE IN HIM WILL GO TO HELL.
Where does jesus EVER USE the word HELL.
Nowhere.You are mistaken. Here is a short list quotes:

And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. (Matthew 10:28)

As therefore the tares are gathered and burned in the fire; so shall it be in the end of this world. The Son of man shall send forth his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity; And shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth. (Matthew 13:40-42)

And if thy hand offend thee, cut it off: it is better for thee to enter into life maimed, than having two hands to go into hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched: Where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched. (Mark 9:43, 44)

And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal. (Matthew 25:46).

Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels. And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal. (Matthew 25:41,46)

The rich man also died, and was buried; and in hell he lift up his eyes, being in torments, and seeth Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom. And he cried and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame. (Luke 16:22-24).

JESUS is the sole FACT in christianity. HE existed.
And he never saidm the word hellUmm... so none of the recorded speeches of Christ are factual? If not, what did Jesus actually teach? How do you know? To the best of my knowledge, the Bible is the only documentation of his teachings.

So where does hell come from?
Controllers.I think you are speculating. Could you please document your case with historical evidence?

Please, dont quote the ink stains in a book as any sort of proof.Please let's keep it civil. The tone of this statement is condescending at best. There is no need for that. You could just as well say "Please don't use the Bible as proof." But that aside, I was not using it as proof per se, but was simply answering you question.

If any who never hear the mesage of christ as the bible describes it.
Are judged fairly as you say.
Then why have a test at all?What test are you talking about? I never mentioned a test.

But if we ignor the babble of religion.
And look at reality with reason..
We can undersatnd some of the rules.
Reality teaches many to us by simply living.Aren't you the same Occam saying that there is no absolute moral law? What simple laws are you talking about?

In fact occam sees NO evidence in reality to support the descriptions of the bible.
Such a god may exist..But your arguements move occam not an iota closer to believing they do.
All your evidence is words...
Where is a the REAL god..You speak of?Occam, all of logic and reason is 'words.' You refuse to accept a rational proof and there will be no empirical evidence of a non-empirical God. You then talk about how logic and reason will lead us to truth. Stop being inconsistent. If logic can lead to truth, then you have to accept the rational proofs as evidence or you have to disprove them by showing them to be inconsistent or untrue.

You may spout a million psuedorationalities...What 'psuedorationalities' have I spouted? Please detail the offense and then draw a clear conclusion on how my arguments are unsound.

But occam still. sees No christian god in reality.And again, that doesn't mean that He doesn't exist.

[geckopelli]

Alsharad,

I'm curious; what evidence do you believe there is for your god's existence?

Your arguments pretend at logic, but at their core lies the basic assumption that your god exist. If that assumption is not blindly accepted, your logic falls of it's own weight.

What is the reason to accept that assuumption?

[Antimatter235]

Yeah Alsharad, each of your reply always add new (and mostly unrelated) data and have a double-standart with your reasoning: it doesn't matter if what you say rely on faith but there is always a problem with Occam's logic.

For example using the Bible as source of evidence and facts *IS* absolutely right, unquestionable. But, OF COURSE, everything else is questionable.

How can you say you use reason and logic to get to the conclusion God exist if you take for granted that some book is True as the first principle ?

BTW you're talking about things totally unconnected to the Universe: Hell, Heaven, TCG, etc... We have no direct experiences concerning these, just words that came from a handful of people and saved in a book.
Before trying to argue if the universe is like described in the Bible there should first be a RATIONAL CONCEPT made from the Bible alone and in it's entirety.
Then when you have your Christian Theory you can expose it and argue with pure logic. So far, there is no actual Christian Theory that can be exposed to reason/logic for real but only an individuals' shaky Set of Beliefs that have nothing to do with reason in the first place.

Go ahead pull a concept out of the Bible (*good luck*) that is arguable. For now there is nothing to disprove with logic and reason, just mudd-slinging over a couple of beliefs.

[Jatom]

Yeah Alsharad, each of your reply always add new (and mostly unrelated) data and have a double-standart with your reasoning: it doesn't matter if what you say rely on faith but there is always a problem with Occam's logic.


For example using the Bible as source of evidence and facts *IS* absolutely right, unquestionable. But, OF COURSE, everything else is questionable.


It doens’t appear to me that Alsharad is using any passage in any way shape or form, as unquestionable facts, it only appears that passages are used as answers to questions that presuppose the Christian God’s existence and/or the reliability of the Bible. In these cases, quoting Bible is not only a valid practice, but an expected one. For example, Occam claimed that Christ never mentioned Hell, and Alsharad provided verses proving otherwise. In this case I see no inconsistency with Alsharad quoting of the Bible, and your criteria.


How can you say you use reason and logic to get to the conclusion God exist if you take for granted that some book is True as the first principle ?


This is not entirely true, for example He mentions: The presuppositional argument concerning knowledge, The argument from desire for the Ultimate and eternal, The argument from conscience, The Moral Argument, Ontological argument, Argument from the origin of the idea of God, The argument from truth, The Kalam argument, The Design argument, Evidence for immortality of the soul, The practical impossibility of consistent atheism, etc… These, among others, do not require some book to be taken as the first principle.


BTW you're talking about things totally unconnected to the Universe: Hell, Heaven, TCG, etc... We have no direct experiences concerning these, just words that came from a handful of people and saved in a book.


This is not valid reasoning, for one, it completely ignores recent testimony of those who have claimed experience to these “things totally unconnected to the Universe” (be they valid or not). Second, in order to be consistent, you must also discard all other recorded human experiences, which would leave you with very little knowledge. A far better method is to examine the evidence surrounding the claim.


Before trying to argue if the universe is like described in the Bible there should first be a RATIONAL CONCEPT made from the Bible alone and in it's entirety.
Then when you have your Christian Theory you can expose it and argue with pure logic. So far, there is no actual Christian Theory that can be exposed to reason/logic for real but only an individuals' shaky Set of Beliefs that have nothing to do with reason in the first place.


I believe that what you require here is far beyond the space, time, and comprehension of any one Christian writer here. The Christian Worldview is probably far more complex than any other, and would require many many volumes to explain in a systematic way.


Go ahead pull a concept out of the Bible (*good luck*) that is arguable. For now there is nothing to disprove with logic and reason, just mudd-slinging over a couple of beliefs.


It’s apparent that you do not believe the Bible is divine in origin, but please realize that certain questions regarding Christianity, require using Christianity’s source: the Bible. If you don’t like this, simply don’t ask those questions! As for logical arguments, do some research on some of the above mentioned arguments.

[Antimatter235]

"recorded" human experience ? Do we have a way to know the accuracy ? A lot of the texts we can find today is garbage (desinfo), how would we know they are if we had no multiple sources of info and ways to directly verify ?

You just said it. There is no Christian Worldview directly made from the Bible. Just various claims.
The problem is these couple claims are assumed to validate a Christian Worldview that is not even imagined. So people that argue against this ideology are trying to refute a polymorphous idea: you can define various things the way you want, you can accept or deny certain passages of the Bible, you can extrapolate with anything, etc... So what do we obtain in the end?

Christians have no system to defend. Each new discussion brings the same moot points. Result, there's no reasonable system. Just claims to accept (or not) making you buy into commandments.

What is there to learn in this ? Even if you accept some claims you just get a package of magical belief. No exploitable knowledge.
--------

"Divine" is just an adjective... Anything can be labelled divine. The only thing that matters is the quality of the information... What the Bible lack terribly.
BTW, if the Bible was so great of a source of knowledge (especially cutting-edge Truth). Why in all this time nobody created an appliable Worldview out of it ? Whether you "believe in" the Bible or not, everyone is still left to make their own conclusion or buy into a cult of choice.

This is all non-information. Whether or not you believe in it the empirically tested and scientific (what works) Universe is still the same. It may fix moot point though ("before the big bang", etc). Information helps you get a more functional worldview and create new questions.
I know this is not the purprose of christiannity... But christiannity is not knowledge, just an emotional bias with a couple rationalizations.

I'd rather stay without faith, if someone manages to create The Christian Theory then Mankind will be able to start real reasoning on this christian/biblical concept and actually learn from it instead of "becoming Christian".

[Angel_Headed_Hipster]

I just wanted to make the first agnostic/atheist post in the forums... but ye...

God is not real, jesus is not the son of god... there is nothing higher than me, and nothing lower than me.... jesus was pretty coo when he talked about peace and love though... and when he smoked opium...

if there were a god, i dont think he'd expect me to believe fairy tales from 2000+ years ago...

but thas just me

Peace
Maybe your right, but explain to me how you believe the entire world and existence started...

Peace and Love,
Dan

[FreakyJoeMan]

We don't know...none of us know. It is unknowable, and that is the one thing that enflames our egos more than anything else. How did existence become?

[Razorofoccam]

Alsharad

Posts are fragmenting into hair splitting...

As stated before..Occam sees no existent verification for the god described in
the bible..[koran exct]
The bible is a point source reference and cannot logicaly stand alone as any conclusive verification..
As there is no verification of the GOM [God Of the Monotheism] observable to occam.
Then occam cannot make a rational decision as to the existent status of it.
If he cant see it.
If none can show it.
If reality shows no connection to it.
Then how would occam know it existed.?
If you can provide existent evidence. Then please do so.
Otherwise occam can refer only to the current existent evidence.. Which is the bible only.
The logical premise for the veracity of the god of the bible is that the bible says so...

Occam stated that he sees no heaven or hell. Or a christian god.
Or any effect on existent reality related to such.
Except for words in the bible.

You propose a theory.
That a god as described by a book , exists.
Yet like a billion before you.. No evidence is to be had to substantiate
the premise.
Occam simply points out. That in his experience..People believe such because they wish to. Not because there is existent evidence.
That belief is not FACT.
It is opinion.

Occam suggests there is evidence of direction in reality.
This is also opinion.


No human description of a god/direction is as of this now..Any more than a possibillity based on indicative evidence....
That is..Logically. One cannot support any logical conclusion on the existent nature of god based on the evidence observed by humanity.

Where there is insufficient data...Logic must stop.
That is agnosticism

If you can show that data..

Please do so.

If not, then how does the god of the bible have any more credentials for existing than Krishna...Or Odin?

Our Sauron?

Occam

ps

"Or it could be that the existence of reality is an a priori synthetic truth. :)"

Occam suggests that the existence of reality is the ONLY TRUTH
ALL springs from it.

There can be no reason saying.."Cogito ergo sum"
If there is no reality.

Thus to say it is to also say by implication..That a reality exists.

Descartes forwarded 'cogito ergo sum'
Why, he did'nt add
And thus a reality exists..occam knows not.

But occam says it. An proposes it not as an 'a priori' statement.
But an Absolute logical/objective fact.

Any attempt to disprove the existence of reality.. Proves it absolutely.
The very asking of the question.

"does reality exist"

Proves that it does Absolutely [objective and subjective]

The question..is the answer.

[Alsharad]

As stated before..Occam sees no existent verification for the god described in
the bible..[koran exct]
The bible is a point source reference and cannot logicaly stand alone as any conclusive verification..I just wanted to point out the bible doesn't try to prove that God exists. It presumes that God exists and goes from there...

Then occam cannot make a rational decision as to the existent status of it.
If he cant see it.
If none can show it.
If reality shows no connection to it.
Then how would occam know it existed.?
If you can provide existent evidence. Then please do so.It looks like you are repeating the same thing over again. You still haven't answered my question. You see no evidence; that I believe. However, how you know that you are seeing clearly? You reject rational proofs, but you have not shown how they are deficient, nor have you given a logical reason to reject all rational proofs for God. You have evidence. Your presupposition that there is no evidence is preventing you from allowing it.

No human description of a god/direction is as of this now..Any more than a possibillity based on indicative evidence....
That is..Logically. One cannot support any logical conclusion on the existent nature of god based on the evidence observed by humanity.That is not true. Let's say that God is the creator of the universe. I look around and I can, at the minimum, recogize some logical truths. As such, I can deductively reason that God is capable of reasoning.

Where there is insufficient data...Logic must stop.So you cannot use logic to back up your own beliefs at all? If the above is true, then you are arguing in circles. You cannot come to a logical series of beliefs. Perhaps you should refine what you mean by "insufficient data."

Occam suggests that the existence of reality is the ONLY TRUTH
ALL springs from it.The ONLY truth? Are you sure? Can you back this up?

Descartes forwarded 'cogito ergo sum'
Why, he did'nt add
And thus a reality exists..occam knows not.Because it is unnecessary and superfluous to his line of reasoning.

But occam says it. An proposes it not as an 'a priori' statement.
But an Absolute logical/objective fact.

Ummm... can you have a logical fact? :) A logical truth is always true.

Any attempt to disprove the existence of reality.. Proves it absolutely.
The very asking of the question.

"does reality exist"

Proves that it does Absolutely [objective and subjective]

The question..is the answer.Not quite sure what you are getting at. Of course there is a reality. That has never been the issue. However, what that reality is... well... that gets to be a little more complicated.

To bring this all the way around... does anyone still promote that "lacking belief" in God is an intellectually defensible position? If so, please show how you can defend it using a logical argument.

[Antimatter235]

Alsha, so what's your point with that ?
"God exists" is true because nobody can't prove it's non-existence? Give me a break. This fallacy has been discussed many times.

TCG has still no basis. And what's the point of trying to be rational with someone who think faith/belief goes together with reason ? The result will always be biased reasonning.

[MeatWagon499]

hey guys i got a question for you all. lets say you have ingredients for meth in front of a table. now lets say you go in a different room until the scientist brings you back in. there is meth on the table. you have two choices on how it got there:
A. magic
B. the scientist synthesized it using chemical reactions

if you chose A. magic, you probably beleive in some religion. if you chose B. reason, you probably look at things logically and are atheist.

lets call these ingredients the universe. the ingredients over time are attracted to eachother by the scientists (gravity) and over time they form meth, well in the universe all the matter was compressed until something fucked up and it ended up imploding upon itself, sending matter everywhere all over the place.

now being humans, we tend to be greedy and powerful, and lets say some smart fellow explained the beginning of time and where you'd go when you die by telling a fairytale about it and gather up many followers. soon everyone would beleive in it and the storyteller would be head of his church where his religion is taught, giving im extensive amounts of power (just look at the popes throughout history) and wealth. not a hard life eh?

or you could prove that the big bang theory started the universe, and that when you die you obviously go to where you were before you were born (and dont tell me about near death experiences, its just your brain going through all your memories you had in life before you die, kinda like a farewell party?).

[Razorofoccam]

I just wanted to point out the bible doesn't try to prove that God exists. It presumes that God exists and goes from there...
Exactly...
And does a real crappy job of linking it's presumptions to reality.
It's as if the bible were writen by pre-scientific man... :)


It looks like you are repeating the same thing over again. You still haven't answered my question. You see no evidence; that I believe. However, how you know that you are seeing clearly? You reject rational proofs, but you have not shown how they are deficient, nor have you given a logical reason to reject all rational proofs for God. You have evidence. Your presupposition that there is no evidence is preventing you from allowing it.
Occam repeats himself because you answer with questions..
if occam asks "provide verification for existence of TCG."
You vere the debate to other issues..
And so he repeats himself again.
And will do so untill there is an answer
1.the evidence is provided
2.It is not.
The existent staus of TCG. Depends on evidence to support a premise.
Not logical arguement without evidential support.

That is not true. Let's say that God is the creator of the universe. I look around and I can, at the minimum, recogize some logical truths. As such, I can deductively reason that God is capable of reasoning.
Really. Explain these logical truths observed in reality [NOW] that support the existence of the christian god.
Not words in a book. But observable phenomena directly connected to the existence of said god.

So you cannot use logic to back up your own beliefs at all? If the above is true, then you are arguing in circles. You cannot come to a logical series of beliefs. Perhaps you should refine what you mean by "insufficient data."
Then the scientists all aver the world are argueing in circles.
A list of theories that are open.
They are open because there is insufficient data.

Bigbang theory
Evolutionary theory
Unified field theory
Quantum theory
Theory of gravity [there is no accepted human theory]
Theory of time [there is no accepted human theory]
Theory of space [there is no accepted human theory]
and the list continues for pages.

No theory/fact, including the existence of TCG. Can be called a fact.
Unless there is existent evidence and no contradiction to that evidence.
Many use reason/science to apply logic to this question.
Because it works.
And what does logic reveal...
That logic cannot determine if TCG exists..

Just as logic cannot say if there WAS a big bang.
Or that man evolved.
Or what gravity/time/space IS.

Ignorance is NO weakness. When we have a method that works.
We may not know NOW. But a NOW will come when we do.


The ONLY truth? Are you sure? Can you back this up?
Realty, all that exists.[as existent mass/space/energy]
Is all that exists.
Nothing exists that is not real.
Ergo
Truth.The desription of what is real.
Is only a desription of what exists.An no more.
It cannot descibe what does not exist.
Ergo.
As nothing but reality exists
And truth is a description of it.
Then reality is the only truth.

It is a set of one.

Because it is unnecessary and superfluous to his line of reasoning.
Not so.. what exists IS this line of reasoning.
Does TCG exist?

Not quite sure what you are getting at. Of course there is a reality. That has never been the issue. However, what that reality is... well... that gets to be a little more complicated.
To bring this all the way around... does anyone still promote that "lacking belief" in God is an intellectually defensible position? If so, please show how you can defend it using a logical argument.Quite correct.
Who can say they have ABSOLUTELY no belief in a god?
No human occam knows.

His arguement is that a whole lot of people have accepted the descriptions forwarded by religion of what god is..
Those descriptions are rationally ludicrous.

Occam states again.
We have insufficient data to lable ANY belief in a god as FACT
[Fact being that supported by existent verification, without contradiction]

Why is this a problem...?

Cannot we accept that as a race we just do not know enough
yet to understand a god..IT IS NO WEAKNESS.
It is just the current state of our understanding.

Were we fools before we learnt about electricity?
Before were learnt to build flying machines?
No.
Just uninformed.

The first step to understanding. Is to aceept that we are ignorant.
God will not blame us if we are ignorant and do not understand if it exists or not.
After all. Did not god make us this way?

Only a fool of a god would expect beings that he has given reason to.
To act rationally as a race after only a few score generations.
It must, if it exists, have a good laugh over our irrationalisations.
Maybe, All these debates are a product of insufficient data.
Between descriptions of what is evidence and what is not.
Between acceptence , and scepticism.
Between what was known and what may be.

Maybe reason and science are blinkered perspectives/methods.
But, as they seem to work.
The only method that does so at all. [for humans as of this NOW]
What else is to be used?

Occam

[Alsharad]

Antimatter:
Alsha, so what's your point with that ?
"God exists" is true because nobody can't prove it's non-existence? Give me a break. This fallacy has been discussed many times.I have not reasoned that way. I know the argument is fallacious. It is just as fallacious as the argument that says "You can't prove it so TCG does not exist." The premise has to be demonstrated as true (good luck), which will be difficult since no one can know all the evidences available in the universe.

Both arguments fail because they reason from the idea that evidence lends credence to reality. This is not an unreasonable premise. However, the argument would be better formulated as an inductive argument. As such, BOTH would be subject to additional rules (inductive logic has roughly twice as many rules as deductive logic). Still the arguments could be formed (good arguments too) because, at the heart of it, inductive arguments only show that the results are possible in varying degrees.

TCG has still no basis. And what's the point of trying to be rational with someone who think faith/belief goes together with reason ? The result will always be biased reasonning.I think we ALL want to be biased towards the truth, correct? The point of debate is to unearth the truth (not to win). You argue with those who believe in order to clarify your own thoughts and bring your worldview more in line with the truth.

MeatWagon499:
hey guys i got a question for you all. lets say you have ingredients for meth in front of a table. now lets say you go in a different room until the scientist brings you back in. there is meth on the table. you have two choices on how it got there:
A. magic
B. the scientist synthesized it using chemical reactions

if you chose A. magic, you probably beleive in some religion. if you chose B. reason, you probably look at things logically and are atheist.

lets call these ingredients the universe. the ingredients over time are attracted to eachother by the scientists (gravity) and over time they form meth, well in the universe all the matter was compressed until something fucked up and it ended up imploding upon itself, sending matter everywhere all over the place.Your analogy is severly lacking similarity. Meth, in comparison to the universe, is EXCEEDINGLY simplistic. What is the scientist analagous to? Also, you gave two options. Let's look at those options:

Magic: By this you can mean one of two things: 1) Someone cast a powerful spell that created the meth or 2) somehow, the meth just came to be without any scientific or logical explanation.

Scientist: Pretty self-explanatory here. The scientist created the meth using chemical reactions.

Now, if I choose A, how does that show that I am religious? If by 'magic' you mean 'someone cast a spell' then both of your answers include the idea that there was an intelligence that led to the creation of meth. If by 'magic' you mean that 'it just happened without explanation' then this is the atheist's choice. Note what atheism proposes (or supposes): the physical creates the metaphysical, life arises from non-life, precision order comes from chaos, etc. None of these are exaplined to any satisfactory conclusion. As far as the atheist is concerned, 'it just happened.'

So, it looks like your answers are reversed. The atheist says 'magic' and the believer says 'the scientist.'

Also note, being logical does not mean one is an atheist.

now being humans, we tend to be greedy and powerful, and lets say some smart fellow explained the beginning of time and where you'd go when you die by telling a fairytale about it and gather up many followers. soon everyone would beleive in it and the storyteller would be head of his church where his religion is taught, giving im extensive amounts of power (just look at the popes throughout history) and wealth. not a hard life eh?Where are you getting this idea? The theory might work as a theory, but can you show that it actually happened? Last I checked, the religions formed and then were corrupted by power hungry men, but that means that the religions were powerful BEFORE the corrupt individuals took it over. Very few (almost none, I think) of the major relion's founders ever recieved 'vast power' during their lifetimes. Some cult leaders do, but their power is generally far less impressive than the Pope's power (or Billy Graham or the Dali Lama (sp?) etc.).

or you could prove that the big bang theory started the universeThat wouldn't disprove God.

, and that when you die you obviously go to where you were before you were born (and dont tell me about near death experiences, its just your brain going through all your memories you had in life before you die, kinda like a farewell party?).You have made some pretty big assumptions here. You will have a hard time "proving" that you go to where you were before you were born.

[Alsharad]

Occam:
Occam repeats himself because you answer with questions..
if occam asks "provide verification for existence of TCG."
You vere the debate to other issues..
And so he repeats himself again.
And will do so untill there is an answer
1.the evidence is provided
2.It is not.
The existent staus of TCG. Depends on evidence to support a premise.
Not logical arguement without evidential support.And here we go again. Let me try a different approach. There is no evidence of the type that you seek. There is no observable, testable phenomena that, upon application of the scientific method, leaves us with the positive proof that God exists. There never will be. Ever.

Now, let me tell you why this is entirely consistent with TCG.

Why did God let Adam sin? Free will. Why does God allow people to go to Hell? Free will. Why does God allow evil to exist at all? Free will. Why do bad things happen? Free will. Getting the picture? It has always been about free will. God is completely just. He will not force Himself upon us. Now you are probably wondering what this has to do with the lack of evidence. Consider what would happen if there was indisputable proof that TCG existed (this is the kind of evidence that you are looking for). What would happen? Specifically, what would happen to free will? It would vanish in an instant. No one could disbeleive and remain consistent. No one could choose to not believe. Me, personally, I think that TCG is so magnificent that any shred of this kind of proof would be utterly and completely convincing. None could disbelieve even if they wanted to. This, however, is my opinion. However, under any circumstances, this kind of proof would eliminate free will entirely. Free will is so important to God that He died for it. It is not a trivial thing for Him and He takes it VERY seriously. He would not jeapordize our free will by allowing the kind of proof you seek to exist.

So no, the type of evidence you seek does not exist (and thankfully so).

Really. Explain these logical truths observed in reality [NOW] that support the existence of the christian god.
Not words in a book. But observable phenomena directly connected to the existence of said god.A thing cannot bring itself into existence.
A thing and its opposite cannot be true at the same time and in the same respect.
All true/false statements are either true or false.
All trees are trees.
There is no dog that is not a dog.

These are all logical truths that are observed in reality. The original question had to do with the idea that we cannot know anything about God. I said that we can draw conclusions based on the world. Specifically, there are logical truths that exist. That logical truths exist indicate that, if there is a God, He is capable of reasoning and logic. We therefore CAN extrapolate at least some of God's nature based on our own observation.

Then the scientists all aver the world are argueing in circles.
A list of theories that are open.
They are open because there is insufficient data.

Bigbang theory
Evolutionary theory
Unified field theory
Quantum theory
Theory of gravity [there is no accepted human theory]
Theory of time [there is no accepted human theory]
Theory of space [there is no accepted human theory]
and the list continues for pages.

ALL the theries above sit in the exact same situation as human understanding of the God Of the Monotheism.You specifically stated that logic cannot be applied when there is insufficient data. Would you say that of the above theories that you mentioned? You cannot apply logic to the theory of Gravity because we have insufficient data? That seems a little absurd to me. Here is a counter-example:

Given: There is no evidence at all for God.
Statement: God either exists or He doesn't.
Logic used: Law of Non-contradiction

I have applied logic to something for which there is no data. You statement that logic stops when we lack data is false.

Realty, all that exists.[as existent mass/space/energy]
Is all that exists.
Nothing exists that is not real.
Ergo
Truth.The desription of what is real.
Is only a desription of what exists.An no more.
It cannot descibe what does not exist.
Ergo.
As nothing but reality exists
And truth is a description of it.
Then reality is the only truth.An interesting argument, but, I think, a false one. You are changing the definition of truth. Truth is more than a simple description of reality. It is any statement that is in compliance with reality. "My car is silver" is descriptive, but it is only true if my car really is silver. Statements describe our reality and reality is the standard by which our statements are judged as true. Truth is a quality of a statement (or argument, or line of reasoning), not something wholly independent of statements. A statement is qualified as true or false (not having truth). If reality is the standard by which we judge truth, then it cannot, itself, be true in any meaningful sense. Let me give an example:

Red.

True or false? You can't really say. Red exists, to be sure. And red is red. But just red? The quality of redness? Is it real? Yes. Is it true? It is neither true nor false until it is put into some sort of statement.

Red is red. True.
Red is blue. False (logically, because blue has the quality of not-red and red cannot be red and not red at the same time. this violates the law of non-contradiction and is therefore false.)

Reality *dictates* truth, but saying that "reality is the only truth" is logically non-sensical.

Occam states again.
We have insufficient data to lable ANY belief in a god as FACT
[Fact being that supported by existent verification, without contradiction]

Why is this a problem...?It isn't. The problem is that we can say that some lines of thought are more reasonable than others. We can use discernment to label some things true or false based on understanding and experience. Would it make you feel better if people just said that TCG is far more likely than any other religious interpretation of God? If God were more likely than no God?

Cannot we accept that as a race we just do not know enough
yet to understand a god..IT IS NO WEAKNESS.
It is just the current state of our understanding.But what if we DO know enough? What if God said to us "HERE I AM"? Christians maintain that this is what has happened. If God exists, would he not want us to believe? He would want to give us enough information to make an informed decision, but not so much that our choice is removed. Justice requires that we have a choice. It is only a choice if there is something to decide between. If there is NO evidence nor any rational proofs nor historical evidence for God whatsoever, then that is as bad as God appearing before us and commanding us to worship and taking away our ability to say 'No.'

The first step to understanding. Is to aceept that we are ignorant.
God will not blame us if we are ignorant and do not understand if it exists or not.
After all. Did not god make us this way?However, if God made himself known through multiple channels and made all sorts of information available and then we ignored it, He could very justifiably blame us.

[MeatWagon499]

you misunderstood it. to synthesize meth is to do things in a way that makes logical sense. saying you beleive in god would be saying that the scientist waved his magic wand and created the meth (universe). i dont get what was so hard to understand about that.

the meth didnt have to be like the universe, i only wanted to use something that would need to be created how the universe would be.

I'm an atheist, i dont know about you guys but all the atheists i hang out with and discuss religion with think it throug logically and try to explain how the universe was created. I'm sorry but I just cant beleive that god created it, that makes about as much sense as me taking a dump on my front lawn.

[Razorofoccam]

Occam:
And here we go again. Let me try a different approach. There is no evidence of the type that you seek. There is no observable, testable phenomena that, upon application of the scientific method, leaves us with the positive proof that God exists. There never will be. Ever.
Alsharad.
Now THAT, is a sweeping statement.
"There will never be , ever, positive proof hat a god exists"

How do you know this?

Occam believes rational method can and will find conclusive evidence for the
existence of god..If one exists.

He will not force Himself upon us.
Oh yes he will.
If we do not believe in him. We burn forever.
Occam calls THIS the BIGDADDY of forcing it appon us.

The rest of this bit is you trying to convince occam that god canot allow itself to be proven. Or free will goes away...But god wants free will.
So he does not reveal himself.

What a crock


That logical truths exist indicate that, if there is a God, He is capable of reasoning and logic.
And thus god must exist because reason and logic exist...?
No more than occam must exist because DNA exists



You specifically stated that logic cannot be applied when there is insufficient data. Would you say that of the above theories that you mentioned? You cannot apply logic to the theory of Gravity because we have insufficient data? That seems a little absurd to me. Here is a counter-example:

Given: There is no evidence at all for God.
Statement: God either exists or He doesn't.
Logic used: Law of Non-contradiction

I have applied logic to something for which there is no data. You statement that logic stops when we lack data is false.

Read up on gravity..you may profit.

No.. Occam says that becuse we can see the effects of gravity..
EVERYWHERE.
We as a race can define 'the effects of gravity' with diamond precision.
The inverse square law is one.
We know the effects of gravity up and down [nearly]
But this does not mean we know how gravity works.
We do not.

If we have no data to discern the workings of gravity. We cannot logically
define it. With such as gravity. we cannot simply deduct from the evidence.
What the cause is.
We can refer to no other understood effect. [there is NO precedent]
There are many theories..but not complete.
We see the effects.. But have insufficient evidence to understand what it is..
Logic must stop untill we have more evidence /understanding. [data]

Thus the statement 'logic must stop due to insufficient data' s true.

An interesting argument, but, I think, a false one. You are changing the definition of truth. Truth is more than a simple description of reality. It is any statement that is in compliance with reality. "My car is silver" is descriptive, but it is only true if my car really is silver. Statements describe our reality and reality is the standard by which our statements are judged as true. Truth is a quality of a statement (or argument, or line of reasoning), not something wholly independent of statements. A statement is qualified as true or false (not having truth). If reality is the standard by which we judge truth, then it cannot, itself, be true in any meaningful sense. Let me give an example:

Red.

True or false? You can't really say. Red exists, to be sure. And red is red. But just red? The quality of redness? Is it real? Yes. Is it true? It is neither true nor false until it is put into some sort of statement.
Red is red. True.
Red is blue. False (logically, because blue has the quality of not-red and red cannot be red and not red at the same time. this violates the law of non-contradiction and is therefore false.)
Reality *dictates* truth, but saying that "reality is the only truth" is logically non-sensical.


RED is a human interpretation.
Reality only has 'colour' as interpretation by mind.
RED the word. is our interpretation of reflected light from an object.
RED does not exist as a thing in itself. But as an information structure enabled by the operation of many parts of the human mind.
An information structure. Is no more than 'noise' untill interpreted.

Reality IS the only truth..You try to use human interpretations as a way out of this.
But such interpretations are part of the logical set.
'What is real'

They exist only because reality does.
Only because thinking beings define an EM frequency as red.
RED. exists as a set of understanding within the existent human mind.

It cannot exist unless humans do. And they cant exist unless reality does.


But what if we DO know enough? What if God said to us "HERE I AM"? Christians maintain that this is what has happened. If God exists, would he not want us to believe? He would want to give us enough information to make an informed decision, but not so much that our choice is removed. Justice requires that we have a choice. It is only a choice if there is something to decide between. If there is NO evidence nor any rational proofs nor historical evidence for God whatsoever, then that is as bad as God appearing before us and commanding us to worship and taking away our ability to say 'No.'

However, if God made himself known through multiple channels and made all sorts of information available and then we ignored it, He could very justifiably blame us.You stated that he WOULD NOT..Because then there would be no free will.
You wish us to make choices within the allowed parameters by god...
We dont even know if there is a god...
And we are speaking of what he will allow us to know or not...?

But god has not made himself so available...
When that happens.
You will find out what happens.
Speculation is pointless on this issue.


Occam

"He could very justifiably blame us"
[unless god has an ego, and cant be wrong]

Because we cannot ever be blamed for not looking hard enough.
Humans have invested BILLIONS OF MAN DAYS to the search for god.
Each human life is ~25 thousand man days.
If the christian god is not seen..It is not for the want of us looking.
The question of god has occupied human minds to the power ten over anything but survival. And small talk..

PPS.

Just as a reminder.
Occam cares not if TCG exists.
If he goes to hell for being a good man that believes not in TCG.
Then god has rigged the game.

There is no choice between good and evil. Haven and hell.
There is only the choice of 'believe in TCG and go to heaven.
Do not. And go to hell.

So morality according to TCG.. IS believe in me and do the life of the bible.
OR do not , and suffer forever.

Why offer ANY choice.?
Why not just create a race that believes..built in?

For creating a race such as us..
Who CAN THINK RATIONALLY.

Is just asking to get spat on when they are told..'do this or suffer'

[Alsharad]

And here we go again. Let me try a different approach. There is no evidence of the type that you seek. There is no observable, testable phenomena that, upon application of the scientific method, leaves us with the positive proof that God exists. There never will be. Ever.

Alsharad.
Now THAT, is a sweeping statement.
"There will never be , ever, positive proof hat a god exists"I did not say that. You are applying your presupposition that the only evidence is evidence that is testable through the scientific method. This kind of evidence, I believe, is not available. You are looking for evidence that would, in effect, put God on a metaphorical leash. We could demonstrate God's existence at our leisure. I do not believe that God can be put on an examination table. He will not let that happen. As I said, "There is no observable, testable phenomena that, upon application of the scientific method, leaves us with the positive proof that God exists." By this I mean that you will not be given the empirical evidence that you seek.

There is yet another answer. Jesus Christ is God. If you examine the evidence we have surrounding the resurrection, then you have your empirical evidence. However, you will probably dismiss that as "words from a book." So, because you assume that the book cannot be historically accurate, you dismiss the only evidence that you have.

But if you want observable, testable, repeatable phenomena which will conclusively prove the existence of God, then you will not have it. It doesn't exist.

Quote:
He will not force Himself upon us.

Oh yes he will.
If we do not believe in him. We burn forever.
Occam calls THIS the BIGDADDY of forcing it appon us.I am sorry that I miscommunicated the idea. Allow me to rephrase. He will not force Himself on us in the sense that he will not force us to love Him, or even acknowledge His existence. However, there will come a time when we will no longer have the ability to choose. More specifically, we have had the time to choose, after a certain point, we have to live with the consequences of our choice. He will not remove our ability to choose. Now, there will come a time where He will come and judge the world, yes, but at that point, the world will have already made its choice. If a choice has been made then free will has been excercised and God's appearance will not remove our free will at that point.

The rest of this bit is you trying to convince occam that god canot allow itself to be proven. Or free will goes away...But god wants free will.
So he does not reveal himself.

What a crockNow let's keep it civil. I have not called a single one of your ideas a "crock." It is not necessary and is pretty insulting. That is not something this forum needs.

Now, what you haven't done is refute the ideas. My view is internally consistent. Why do you call it a crock? Is it impossible? Does it lead to logical contradictions?

Quote:
That logical truths exist indicate that, if there is a God, He is capable of reasoning and logic.

And thus god must exist because reason and logic exist...?
No more than occam must exist because DNA existsI wasn't trying to prove God's existence. I was rebutting your statement that we cannot know anything about God (if He exists).

If we have no data to discern the workings of gravity. We cannot logically
define it. With such as gravity. we cannot simply deduct from the evidence.
What the cause is.
We can refer to no other understood effect. [there is NO precedent]
There are many theories..but not complete.
We see the effects.. But have insufficient evidence to understand what it is..
Logic must stop untill we have more evidence /understanding. [data]

Thus the statement 'logic must stop due to insufficient data' s true.Just because you cannot make a simple deduction to determine what something is doesn't mean that you cannot apply logic to it. I think you have an inaccurate view of what logic is and how it works. If you say that you cannot apply logic to it, then you cannot form either a deductive or inductive argument at all. That means that you cannot deduct what gravity is, yes. It also means that you cannot deduct what gravity is not. Would you say that we cannot deduct what gravity is not?

"True or false? You can't really say. Red exists, to be sure. And red is red. But just red? The quality of redness? Is it real? Yes. Is it true? It is neither true nor false until it is put into some sort of statement."

RED is a human interpretation.
Reality only has 'colour' as interpretation by mind.
RED the word. is our interpretation of reflected light from an object.
RED does not exist as a thing in itself. But as an information structure enabled by the operation of many parts of the human mind.
An information structure. Is no more than 'noise' untill interpreted.Okay, then let's remove RED and use a different example.

Light with a wavelength of 700 nm.

True or false? Does it exist? Yes. Is it true or false? Not until we make it into a statement.

My car reflects light with a wavelength of 700 nm.

True or false? Unless my car actually DOES reflect that wavelength, it is untrue. Again I say that truth is a quality of a statement. The truth of a statement is determined only when it is compared to reality. All true statements are reflective of reality, yes and that might be what you mean when you say that reality is the ONLY truth, but the statement "Reality IS the only truth" seems a very confusing and cryptic way of saying "only those things that are in agreement with reality are true."

"If there is NO evidence nor any rational proofs nor historical evidence for God whatsoever, then that is as bad as God appearing before us and commanding us to worship and taking away our ability to say 'No.'

However, if God made himself known through multiple channels and made all sorts of information available and then we ignored it, He could very justifiably blame us."

You stated that he WOULD NOT..Because then there would be no free will.No. I stated that the specific form of evidence that you are demanding will not be found. I am not sure that it exists. However, God has provided evidence (regardless of whether you consider it evidence).

You wish us to make choices within the allowed parameters by god...
We dont even know if there is a god...
And we are speaking of what he will allow us to know or not...?

But god has not made himself so available...
When that happens.
You will find out what happens.
Speculation is pointless on this issue.It is only pointless if it does not unearth truth.

Just as a reminder.
Occam cares not if TCG exists.
If he goes to hell for being a good man that believes not in TCG.
Then god has rigged the game.That is your opinion. You can choose to believe what you want.

Why offer ANY choice.?
Why not just create a race that believes..built in?Because love and trust and, yes, faith are not real unless given freely. It is unjust to force someone to love you, God wouldn't do that. So He gives us the choice.

[Razorofoccam]

I did not say that.
Alsharad...

But you did.

quote from your post of..06-01-2004, 08:43 PM
"There is no observable, testable phenomena that, upon application of the scientific method, leaves us with the positive proof that God exists. There never will be. Ever."

Cornered yourself there my friend.

You are proposing in your comment. That we can never understand if TCG
Exists. Not through rational method/science.
But only through...faith?

If you will accept such, so be it. Occam cannot.
Any more than he will accept the existence of Thor, on faith.



I am sorry that I miscommunicated the idea. Allow me to rephrase. He will not force Himself on us in the sense that he will not force us to love Him, or even acknowledge His existence. However, there will come a time when we will no longer have the ability to choose. More specifically, we have had the time to choose, after a certain point, we have to live with the consequences of our choice. He will not remove our ability to choose. Now, there will come a time where He will come and judge the world, yes, but at that point, the world will have already made its choice. If a choice has been made then free will has been excercised and God's appearance will not remove our free will at that point.
[quote/]

You did not miscomunicate. Your above elaboration is no different to the original.
You say a point comes when we must choose... CHOOSE WHAT?
Occam is a moral man. He is often been called a better christian than most christians BASED ON HIS ACTS.
He understands by a method he has put together.
A synthesis of past human undrerstanding. data, reason and experience.
It cannot believe in TCG.. it is not able to classify TCG as any more probable than Odin.
Thus he cannot believe TCG exists.
But also. does not choose to do any evil.
And has been called by many, a good man.
Thus he cannot choose between the ON/OFF choices of christianity.
IF TCG EXISTS. It will make itself known to occam. If it does not. It is because it does not exist. Or it cares not if occam is a good man or not.

God saves those with faith. It tortures all others.
What is faith... How do you propose to teach this one what faith is?
To elucidate with reason the actual truth of faith.
That which is believed without evidence.
[quote]
Now let's keep it civil. I have not called a single one of your ideas a "crock." It is not necessary and is pretty insulting. That is not something this forum needs.
Now, what you haven't done is refute the ideas. My view is internally consistent. Why do you call it a crock? Is it impossible? Does it lead to logical contradictions?
Sorry for calling an idea a 'crock'
Occam did not realise the idea was yours.
Is it?

Calling an idea a crock is no different to saying it is false.
It is not a personal attack.
YOU were never mentioned.

To occam . A god that will not reveal itself because then, We mere puppets will have no choice in the choice of believing in the god or not.
Is a crock.

Sorry :)


I wasn't trying to prove God's existence. I was rebutting your statement that we cannot know anything about God (if He exists).
But earlier you said
"There is no observable, testable phenomena that, upon application of the scientific method, leaves us with the positive proof that God exists. There never will be. Ever."

So how WILL we know about TCG?
Not with reason?
Not with the evidence of the senses?

Then how?


Just because you cannot make a simple deduction to determine what something is doesn't mean that you cannot apply logic to it. I think you have an inaccurate view of what logic is and how it works. If you say that you cannot apply logic to it, then you cannot form either a deductive or inductive argument at all. That means that you cannot deduct what gravity is, yes. It also means that you cannot deduct what gravity is not. Would you say that we cannot deduct what gravity is not?
Occam never said we cannot apply logic to 'IT'
He said that logic cannot be applied without something to apply it to.
Gravity exists.
WHY?
Well does mass reach out to other mass by etherial links.
Like magnetism? Drawing mass to mass.
Or does, as Einstein proposes. Mass warp the 'fabric' of space.

What do we apply logic too?
Logic is a tool. Not an answer.


Okay, then let's remove RED and use a different example.
Light with a wavelength of 700 nm.
True or false? Does it exist? Yes. Is it true or false? Not until we make it into a statement.
My car reflects light with a wavelength of 700 nm.

True or false? Unless my car actually DOES reflect that wavelength, it is untrue. Again I say that truth is a quality of a statement. The truth of a statement is determined only when it is compared to reality. All true statements are reflective of reality, yes and that might be what you mean when you say that reality is the ONLY truth, but the statement "Reality IS the only truth" seems a very confusing and cryptic way of saying "only those things that are in agreement with reality are true."
Yes , maybe your car does so.
But what does 700nm mean?

Where is '700 nm' in reality?

If occam did not understand english[and physics]. Then 700nm means nothing. 700nm is what you call, by agreement with the human knowledge base. A colour.
This does not define the frequency of 700nm.
700nm defines the colour.
Take away the human definition of 700nm and it still exists.

Take away the EM frequency 700nm and both vannish.

Red is not an existent thing.
It is the human definition of a ElectroMagnectic frequency. Interpreteted by our eyes.
If our eyes , and us, go away..The EM radiation still exists.
This is not true in the reverse.

No. I stated that the specific form of evidence that you are demanding will not be found. I am not sure that it exists. However, God has provided evidence (regardless of whether you consider it evidence).
How do you know this?

And no , occam sees no conclusive evidence for TCG.
He believes he will suffer no more for this than NOT believing in the hundreds of other religions the human race sprouts...
Why should he choose between hundreds.
When REASON.
Stands alone.
As a method that works.

It is only pointless if it does not unearth truth.
And what TRUTH. [has]
Speculation unearthed.?
To occam.
That agnosticism is the only rational position.

and yes..it IS his opinion and he WILL choose what he wishes to believe.
That is freedom..
When choice is removed. There is no freedom.
Christianity wishes to believe it has sent the message of the choice to all.
It has NOT.
Thus.
Many have no choice because the message is fouled in transmission by a bungling god and a self serving humanity.

What choice do you speak off?
Occam knows it because he reads a lot.
But may he knows have no real idea of wht it is.

This is shoddy work by TCG.

Because love and trust and, yes, faith are not real unless given freely. It is unjust to force someone to love you, God wouldn't do that. So He gives us the choice.Really

quote you
"However, there will come a time when we will no longer have the ability to choose. More specifically, we have had the time to choose, after a certain point, we have to live with the consequences of our choice. He will not remove our ability to choose."

And What do have to choose from?
Heaven or hell.
Rapture. or torture.
But how many humans know this message?
30% maybe even 50%.
[of ALL humans who have lived/alive]

A real poor effort by TCG.

And a POOR choice.
Believe in him without proof... or scream in pain forever.
And make this choice from a hundred religions.
All saying the same thing..without evidence.
All of them, just as valid to occam as TCG.

ARE YOU SERIOUS?

Occam

[JosieJune]

It just seems to me there must be 'something' to atheism besides 'what its not'?

Pick any other belief system - Buddhists, Christians, Alien-seed theorists, etc etc and they could certainly hold entire lengthy discussions without ever even mentioning an outside belief system.

... Obviously they call this 'Church' or 'Mosque' etc and in many countries they just have the one belief system and never even consider others.

Atheism doenst seem to be able to be content with 'standing or falling' on its own merits.

Dont get me wrong - comparing and contrasting with another world view can be very healthy and let you learn about your own views.... often strengthen them.

I just think it would be a fun test to have a running convo WITHOUT having to point out some aspect of another view and what you 'dont like' about it?


Atheism is a tricky term because the word itself cannot stand without theism. Had man never thought up the gods in the first place, followed by organized religion, the word atheism would not have been born.
Calling oneself atheist is in part describing oneself in a society where theism is strong.
But you are right, atheism merely describes what one does not believe in. Therefore many atheists also describe themselves in other terms as well...such as humanist, freethinker etc.

Paz,
Josie

[Razorofoccam]

Atheism is a tricky term because the word itself cannot stand without theism. Had man never thought up the gods in the first place, followed by organized religion, the word atheism would not have been born.
Calling oneself atheist is in part describing oneself in a society where theism is strong.
But you are right, atheism merely describes what one does not believe in. Therefore many atheists also describe themselves in other terms as well...such as humanist, freethinker etc.

Paz,
Josie
JosieJune

Thank you

A teacher is found,a thing of great value.
You have a gift of pure communication.
What you said was understood.
On first scan.
A rare thing.

Please say more.

Occam

[JosieJune]

JosieJune

Thank you

A teacher is found,a thing of great value.
You have a gift of pure communication.
What you said was understood.
On first scan.
A rare thing.

Please say more.

Occam
Thank you Occam--I can only hope to communicate my thoughts well as my own children will greatly benefit if I do!

I'm not sure what I would add other than perhaps the word atheist in and of itself may be somewhat deragotory because it has the effect of elevating the status of the theist.
This frame of mind runs something like this. Those which lack theistic thinking are without.
If one can take their mind back to the beginnings of human civilization, when superstitions were not organized into religions with various denominations etc, the word theism might not have been appropriate...particularly when we examine the increasing complexity of religious thought which brings us to the present.
With this in mind, one might say that we are and were (in the early days of humanity) born atheist.
It would be more accurate to describe human beings as born with a blank slate...and while the instinct to believe in a higher power has the ability to manifest itself in all human beings...the makings of a theistic mind are taught.

Therefore, perhaps the atheist should not be viewed as being without or lacking, but rather the theistic mind should be viewed as one whom adds or embelishes his/her thinking to incorporate thoughts which cannot be seen, touched or otherwise measured.

Whatcha think?

Paz,
Josie