God is "dead"

[Syne]

@ DMOE

Yes, "this", as in the comments I was quoting (i.e. commenting on the posting violations of others).

And thanks again for your cooperation.

 

[Magical Realist]

I asked a simple question, which you still have not answered.

Ask it again and I will report you for harassment.

 

[dumbest man on earth]

@ DMOE

Yes, "this", as in the comments I was quoting (i.e. commenting on the posting violations of others).

And thanks again for your cooperation.

Syne, not sure you understood or understand still! But, meh!

Anyway, no need for you to thank me, again, for my cooperation.

Heck, I always Post what I want to Post - no matter what - so...whether or not I am cooperating may indeed yet to be seen.

Syne, may you and yours have a Happy Holiday Season!

P.S. or BTW - would/could it be considered "Trolling" if I said that I was enjoying y'alls little spat?

 

[Syne]

Ask it again and I will report you for harassment.

I do not respond to threats. So...

Do you have trouble modelling the beliefs of others? Do you consider yourself to hold any beliefs?

If you cannot answer these simple, innocent questions, apparently you have decided to play martyr rather than engage in further actual discussion.

P.S. or BTW - would/could it be considered "Trolling" if I said that I was enjoying y'alls little spat?

No, but participation in the topic of the thread is preferred. It is a signal to noise ratio thing.

 

[wynn]

I don't think that anyone disputes that it's a fact that theists believe in the existence of God. (Leaving aside the question of what they take the word 'God' to mean.) The question that MR was speaking about is whether the word 'God' refers to or names some divine object that has independent reality apart from theists' own subjectivities.

If all theists on Earth ceased to exist tomorrow and all recorded references to 'God' were erased, would God still exist? Or would God disappear along with the subjects who once believed in him? Put another more theological way, did God create us and is our being dependent on him, or did we create God and is whatever fictional being that God has dependent on us?

There's a striking lack of clear and unambiguous evidence for the existence of God. Even many theists agree about that, hence theology's problem of the 'hiddenness of God'.

I personally interpret that lack of evidence as itself being evidence (not proof) that God probably doesn't exist.

For those who are more deeply embedded in the theistic tradition(s), especially those that ascribe "omni-" attributes to their deities, the question does arise of why God (hypothetically) chooses not to reveal himself unambiguously, choosing instead to remain hidden. That seems to me to be a problem for theists more than for me. I don't typically spend much time speculating about the hypothetical motivations of what seem to be non-existent beings.

Even you on occasion agree that when using the word "God," it is justified to assume that the person using the word "God" means something by it.

So above, when you use the word "God" what is it that you mean by it?

And why are _you_ using that particular meaning and not some other?


How do you know that there is "lack of evidence of God", when you haven't even finalized your idea on what the term "God" means?

 

[hansda]

Seems to me you just answered your own question...

I only asked a question. What is your answer?

 

[Magical Realist]

Do you have trouble modelling the beliefs of others? Do you consider yourself to hold any beliefs?

Are you implying that I'm autistic again?

 

[Yazata]

If you lack the ability to model the beliefs of others, you will necessarily doubt their self-reported experience and discount anything but objective evidence, which those beliefs do not rely on. So it is quite critically relevant.

You seem to be suggesting that if people don't believe whatever they are told, then they must have psychiatric deficiencies and lack the ability to understand that other people possess psychological states. That's just foolish.

The issue isn't whether or not people have psychological states such as emotions. It isn't even whether or not people have religious experiences.

The philosophical issue here is what, if any, epistemological status other peoples' reports of their private psychological states might have as evidence of objectively existing but otherwise unseen supernatural realities.

 

[wynn]

The philosophical issue here is what, if any, epistemological status other peoples' reports of their private psychological states might have as evidence of objectively existing but otherwise unseen supernatural realities.

No. The real philosophical issue here is the envy and the feelings of being threatened that atheists tend to feel toward theists and theistic ideas.

In and of itself, the existence of "God" is completely irrelevant until one settles on what one means by "God." And this is a matter of a personal decision which atheists, like zealot theists, tend to prefer to leave to their subconscious.

 

[Magical Realist]

No. The real philosophical issue here is the envy and the feelings of being threatened that atheists tend to feel toward theists and theistic ideas.

More atheist bashing. We're autistic. We're envious of theists. We feel threatened. Typical adhoming resorted to by the desperate.

In and of itself, the existence of "God" is completely irrelevant until one settles on what one means by "God." And this is a matter of a personal decision which atheists, like zealot theists, tend to prefer to leave to their subconscious.

That's precisely the point. Noone, not even the most intellectual theist, can point to any objective thing/person that they can call God. The very concept is so vague and subjective that theists can't even agree on it amongst themselves much less theists and atheists. This is precisely what we would expect from a entity that nowhere at no time manifests itself as an objective being to anybody. This is precisely what we would expect if there was no such thing as a God.

 

[wynn]

Q.E.D.

:shrug:

 

[Yazata]

No. The real philosophical issue here is the envy and the feelings of being threatened that atheists tend to feel toward theists and theistic ideas.

That's ad-hominem, Wynn. You know that.

Your eagerness to expose and critique other people's imagined psychological weaknesses is a little hypocritical while you are doing everything that you can to avoid revealing anything about yourself. You've never told us what your own beliefs and motivations are.

But that stuff seems to me to be largely irrelevant. Launching into imaginative attacks on other people's personalities won't defeat their philosophical points. To do that, people need to make even better philosophical points.

 

[lightgigantic]

That's ad-hominem, Wynn. You know that.

Your eagerness to expose and critique other people's imagined psychological weaknesses is a little hypocritical while you are doing everything that you can to avoid revealing anything about yourself. You've never told us what your own beliefs and motivations are.

But that stuff seems to me to be largely irrelevant. Launching into imaginative attacks on other people's personalities won't defeat their philosophical points. To do that, people need to make even better philosophical points.

Meanwhile its legitimate for one party to label another as deluded and working out of a diminished mental capacity despite their reluctance to address key terms intrinsic to their accusations.

 

[Yazata]

In and of itself, the existence of "God" is completely irrelevant until one settles on what one means by "God."

Wouldn't that point be even more applicable to theists? They are the ones who are claiming that God exists. Presumably they think that the word means something.

I don't think that theists all mean the same thing when they speak of 'God'. There's the metaphysical functions. There's whatever the object(s) of mystical experience might be, if anything. There's sources of moral law. There's Yahweh, Vishnu and Allah. There's whatever people think gives the universe and their lives meaning and a human face. Sometimes theists claim to know what God's essential properties are, to be in communication with him and to know his will. Other theists say that God exceeds all words and concepts and can only be approached through a process of unknowing.

But despite all the diversity of the 'God' concepts, theists still use the same word 'God' word to mean whatever subset of that stuff that they are emphasizing at the moment.

Atheism is kind of dependent on theism, in the sense that atheists aren't inventing concepts of God all on their own. They are just expressing their disbelief in the concepts that theists advance.

 

[Magical Realist]

MR was asking about objective evidence, and I clearly answer "no". That says nothing about any possible independent reality either way. God could be an emergent phenomena which would reemerge after being scoured from Earth, and that still would not be determinant of whether it has an independent reality.

One moment you claim God DOESN'T fall in the purview of science. The next moment you claim he does. So now God is an emergent phenomenon, something that clearly can be detected and defined as such scientifically? Where is the evidence for this emergent phenomenon? How is it detected? What are its properties? Remember now, emergent means to come into objective physical reality:

"In philosophy, systems theory, science, and art, emergence is the way complex systems and patterns arise out of a multiplicity of relatively simple interactions. Emergence is central to the theories of integrative levels and of complex systems."---http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergence

 

[lightgigantic]

Wouldn't that point be even more applicable to theists?

It's equally applicable to anyone advocating a for/against policy.

IOW for as long as people are towing a party line for hard atheism (IOW advocating principles based on god not existing) they are also held to the same criteria

Can you think of any issue/event/object involving for/against issues where it isn't?

 

[Syne]

Do you have trouble modelling the beliefs of others? Do you consider yourself to hold any beliefs?

Are you implying that I'm autistic again?

These are simple yes or no questions. I will take your unwillingness to answer as an affirmative of the first and a negation of the second, since you seem unwilling to do anything but allow my unfettered assumptions.

Seems you are being evasive to everyone's questions.

If you lack the ability to model the beliefs of others, you will necessarily doubt their self-reported experience and discount anything but objective evidence, which those beliefs do not rely on. So it is quite critically relevant.

You seem to be suggesting that if people don't believe whatever they are told, then they must have psychiatric deficiencies and lack the ability to understand that other people possess psychological states. That's just foolish.

The issue isn't whether or not people have psychological states such as emotions. It isn't even whether or not people have religious experiences.

The philosophical issue here is what, if any, epistemological status other peoples' reports of their private psychological states might have as evidence of objectively existing but otherwise unseen supernatural realities.

Again, there very well may not be any objective evidence that would satisfy a materialist. In the lack of any objective evidence, a subject such as religion can only be examined using the self-reported data largely relied upon in the social sciences. An inability to model those beliefs leads to an a priori dismissal of them as delusional or false, which necessarily undercuts any objective examination.

OTOH, if you can model the beliefs of others, then you can see that most beliefs have some valid points and benefits, even if you do not generally agree with them. Then the objective evidence extends to the effect the belief has on the lives of those who espouse it.

For example, I can model the beliefs of a materialist. I can see the benefit of a materially pragmatic viewpoint that restricts itself to matters that are more cut and dried and does not embroil itself in more vague issues. But from that perspective, I always wonder why they embroil themselves in these issues anyway, instead of addressing the actual actions they feel religious beliefs encourage.

 

[Syne]

No. The real philosophical issue here is the envy and the feelings of being threatened that atheists tend to feel toward theists and theistic ideas.

This is an ad hominem, Wynn. Try to refrain from arguments that rely solely on the character or feelings of others. While they may or may not be valid, they do not having bearing on the real philosophical issue, other than perhaps motive (which is a fallacy as well).

More atheist bashing. We're autistic. We're envious of theists. We feel threatened. Typical adhoming resorted to by the desperate.

That's ad-hominem, Wynn. You know that.

"Envy" may be a stretch, but it is generally accepted that we do not feel the need to attack things we do not feel threatened by.

Biologically speaking, when we feel threatened, we usually resort to one of 3 reflex-like reactions in order to protect ourselves from more hurt: fight, flight, and freeze. Depending on the situation, our brains try to determine the most likely outcome of a conflict and assess if there is enough time to escape, sufficient strength to fight/win, or if “playing dead” is the best strategy in order to survive. - http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2011/10/23/why-do-we-feel-the-need-to-argue/​

Online there are no real-life repercussions to attack, so that tends to be the go-to response to threats. It is also true that atheists are a very small minority, with the associated lack of power.

While none of this refutes any atheist argument, it is vary far from "atheist bashing" and definitely no worse that characterizing someone as "delusional" (which has generally been allowed here).

 

[Syne]

Wouldn't that point be even more applicable to theists? They are the ones who are claiming that God exists. Presumably they think that the word means something.

I don't think that theists all mean the same thing when they speak of 'God'. There's the metaphysical functions. There's whatever the object(s) of mystical experience might be, if anything. There's sources of moral law. There's Yahweh, Vishnu and Allah. There's whatever people think gives the universe and their lives meaning and a human face. Sometimes theists claim to know what God's essential properties are, to be in communication with him and to know his will. Other theists say that God exceeds all words and concepts and can only be approached through a process of unknowing.

But despite all the diversity of the 'God' concepts, theists still use the same word 'God' word to mean whatever subset of that stuff that they are emphasizing at the moment.

Yet you always balk when shown what attributes of a god are widely agree upon.

Common among these are omniscience (infinite knowledge), omnipotence (unlimited power), omnipresence (present everywhere), omnibenevolence (perfect goodness), divine simplicity, and eternal and necessary existence. - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God​

You cannot have it both ways. Either you accept the majority consensus of attributes, or you assert and advocate your own. If you want to argue specific claims, then you need to seek out those making the claims.

MR was asking about objective evidence, and I clearly answer "no". That says nothing about any possible independent reality either way. God could be an emergent phenomena which would reemerge after being scoured from Earth, and that still would not be determinant of whether it has an independent reality.

One moment you claim God DOESN'T fall in the purview of science. The next moment you claim he does.

There is a significant difference between the "hard" sciences and the social sciences, mostly in terms of available objective evidence. I did not say god does not fall under the purview of science, only that it lacks the objective evidence to be accessible to anything but the social sciences. Do you have a problem conflating different branches of science too?

So now God is an emergent phenomenon, something that clearly can be detected and defined as such scientifically? Where is the evidence for this emergent phenomenon? How is it detected? What are its properties?

You really have a problem parsing sentences, huh? I said, "God could be an emergent phenomena", not that god was. You are the one advocating that religion and god are, at best, byproducts of evolution. As such, they are emergence phenomena evidenced by their ubiquity in the world.

 

[Magical Realist]

These are simple yes or no questions. I will take your unwillingness to answer as an affirmative of the first and a negation of the second, since you seem unwilling to do anything but allow my unfettered assumptions.

Reported for continued harassing accusations of being autistic despite warnings. 3rd time in 2 days..