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Most of the times people use argument from "authority", at least we know that "authority" exists.
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Scientists discover that atheists might not exist, and that’s not a joke
- Thread starter Jan Ardena
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Most of the times people use argument from "authority", at least we know that "authority" exists.
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Before evidence can be offered in support of the existence of a god, there would have to be a determination that the existence of such an entity is consistent with reality, and an ability would have to exist to differentiate god from non god. So until humans have the capacity to accomplish these tasks, it would be impossible for for them to know their god exists as conceived.
No, the game stops here. Humans have the capacity to determine the nature of evidence within the confines of their perceived local reality, that capacity does not extend to the greater reality beyond our perception. For the foreseeable future, this relegates the possibility of knowing one’s god to just wishful thinking.
We are not talking about evidence of God.
We are talking about the problems of advocating the atheist position of "absence of belief".
Your posts in this thread say otherwise.
Perhaps you are not starting from here :
www.sciforums.com/threads/scientists-discover-that-atheists-might-not-exist-and-that’s-not-a-joke.160736/page-94#post-3537017
Obviously, since I started from here:
http://www.sciforums.com/threads/sc...that’s-not-a-joke.160736/page-96#post-3537339
Not at all. Your dictionary definition doesn't disagree with "supernatural" being mythical. I think of gods the same way as you think of pixies - a cute little story that somebody made up to amuse children.
That isn't true. I would accept the same evidence for gods as for pixies, the same evidence as for Bigfeet, the same evidence as for Loch Ness monsters, the same evidence as for UFOs, the same evidence as for elephants, the same evidence as for France. I will accept real evidence for anything that is real.
Show the inconsistency.
At least you're being honest - for once. It is the God of the Bible that you're talking about, not just some woo-monster "everything" god. If course, that makes you responsible for everything the Bible actually says about God, not just the fun bits.
You should attribute that quote to Romans 1:20. Paul disagrees with the concept of evidence. He claims, as you do, that people can "perceive" invisible things and that the conclusion is God.
Yet again you fail to point out why it's "nonsensical". Here it is again: Even if there was any evidence that some "god" existed, there would be no reason to extrapolate that evidence to conclude that it had created anything, much less everything. Try again. Tell us why it isn't true.
"True absence" is a nonsensical concept. We don't say that something "is" absent. We say that evidence for its presence is absent.
Well, now at least you know where to start from.
Gawdzilla Sama
Valued Senior Member
Still existing.
Nobody is "advocating" absence of belief. A bald man doesn't advocate baldness. In many cases, he wishes he had hair. baldness is the inability to grow hair. Atheism is the inability to believe.
I know.
Yet that is the position you are trying to secure.
You are still stuck with the same problem because by saying that, you are bringing knowledge (and not an "absence") to the field.
Otherwise, how come you can spot a bald person in a crowd?
Or how come you can determine that there are no rabbit horns or a loch ness monster in the room?
Or determine that a person saying, "Hi, I am God", is not God?
By what criteria do you know the evidence for such things is absent?
No it isn't. You keep making that mistake and I keep trying to correct you.
Not knowledge, evidence.
Asked and answered. What you spot is the presence of the person. If the person wasn't present, there would be no "absence" to spot. Absence is not a thing.
Evidence is evident - i.e. anybody can see it. The bullet hole in the body is evident. The identity of the killer is not (yet).
If there was evidence for God, it would be evident to everybody. God is not evident. You're prematurely concluding the identity of the killer.
As I said, this is the precise thing Buddhism has a field month with.
You can literally play pretending you can evidence something without knowledge until you drop dead (or until you develop alzheimer's or some other state of imposed ignorance, which is the only accessible window to "true absence" .... although admittedly one is not in a state to recognize it).
So what is an example of something that is evidenced (or conversely, deemed as not being evidenced) that precludes knowledge?
So far, you haven't been able to provide anything remotely close.
What?
The presence of a person with hair?
Or a person without hair?
Yeah, you would say there is a room with no bald people .... which would be totally impossible to say unless you knew what (there's those words again that continue to make you the butt of a 2500 year old buddhist joke) a room with bald people looked like ... much like a room with the loch ness monster or rabbit horns or even a room with the loch ness monster wearing rabbit horns
It most certainly is a thing.
Its a type of knowledge.
In Buddhism (and Advaitavada) they even have a series of special words for it, since there are different types of absences that arise from different types of knowledge.
If you were expert in google-fu, you could probably do yourself a favour and find them.
This whole "true absence" is just some bullshit invented by a goofy atheist with no philosophical training.
swish
And to think for all these years we have been wasting billions on employing forensic scientists to perform tasks that fry cooks on minimum wage could just as competently perform.
So spit out : What is the criteria for evidencing God?
If everyone (apparently) knows it, why can't you say it?
Everytime you reject something as evidence of God, by what criteria do you measure such rejection?
You can bring such criteria to do it with bald people, dead people, bald people pretending to be dead people, bald people pretending to be dead people in front of the loch ness monster, and even bald loch ness monsters.
And suddenly when we come to God, you have a resolute determination, claiming there is no evidence and a complete unwillingness to bring forth a scrap of criteria that would make such a claim meaningful.
Smells like belief, sounds like belief, walks like belief, etc etc.
The presence of a person. Hair is an attribute.
When you can put "absence" on the lab bench and measure it, you can call it a thing.
I said that anybody can SEE the evidence. They do have to present the evidence in court, you know, and there may be fry cooks on the jury.
I have said it. Maybe it was in another thread. Photo ID would work. ANY kind of ID would be a start in establishing existence. Then, once an entity was established as existing, we can move on to studying what godly powers it has.
Again, it's the same criteria that I would use in examining the dead body with the bullet hole. If the head is lying ten feet away, I might question the bullet hole as the cause of death.
I'm not claiming there's no evidence. I'm saying I haven't seen any, just like I haven't seen evidence to conclude that Bigfeet, Loch Ness Monsters, pixies or little green UFO pilots exist. Show us the evidence.
The interest in that kind of posting lies in how characteristic it is of overt Abrahamic theists on these science forums.
Other kinds of posters type gibberish, of course, but it's different stuff. Other people misuse words and muddle through poor reasoning, but not like that. That style of meaninglessness, that manner of fogging with words so aggressively suggestive and dishonestly innuendo-supporting in the middle of its incoherency, is almost a field mark.
And it field marks this entire thread, from the initially dishonest OP through 90+ pages of avoiding the issue of the dishonesty of the OP.
Seattle
Valued Senior Member
Is that the highest compliment that a person can receive..."I admire your philosophical training"?
Are you Jan?
The reason people can easily dismiss your pantheon of bald people and loch ness montsters is that there is no agreement as to what we are talking about.
It's not so with God. It's a slippery subject. One minute it's an old man with a beard, then it's a spirit, then it's everything in nature, next it's inherent in each person's personality. Of course no one can say what would or would not prove or disprove God.
You can't disprove something that is too amorphous to be described but then you know that and find some pleasure in beating this dead horse.
A condition of absence is contextual knowledge of missing elements.
A condition of absence is a thing, and is knowledge. It could refer to absence of a justifiable element, or an element that has no justifiable basis in reality.
Having knowledge that God can exist, and having knowledge that God does exist.
Is this evidence of absent knowledge?
That no one has the capability to determine that God can exist.
The Earth is an environment that is compatible with the existence of the entities above, and it would be reasonable to assume that with sufficient effort their existence could be confirmed or denied.
Nope, it’s just the facts ma’am.
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Jan Ardena:
As far as I can tell, you're putting up the entire universe and everything it as "evidence for God". But how is that evidence for God? Presumably, you need to make the argument that God is responsible for all that stuff existing, and also argue that all that stuff couldn't and wouldn't exist if God didn't exist. In the past, you've made a few weak attempts at making that kind of argument, but without much success.
Is that all you've got, or is there more?
I'm aware of a number of philosophical arguments for God, but apart from the argument from design they aren't based on evidence. The argument from design itself is flawed, since nobody seems to be able to point to anything in our universe that requires a God to design it, beyond dispute.
But by your own admission, your belief in God is not rational. You don't need reasons to believe in God, you tell us. You just believe.
Or, maybe you do have reasons, but you're not telling us what they are. Maybe they are secret, personal, reasons.
You seem to be incredibly bogged down.
Like what?
As far as I can tell, you're putting up the entire universe and everything it as "evidence for God". But how is that evidence for God? Presumably, you need to make the argument that God is responsible for all that stuff existing, and also argue that all that stuff couldn't and wouldn't exist if God didn't exist. In the past, you've made a few weak attempts at making that kind of argument, but without much success.
Is that all you've got, or is there more?
Which classical arguments are you thinking of?
I'm aware of a number of philosophical arguments for God, but apart from the argument from design they aren't based on evidence. The argument from design itself is flawed, since nobody seems to be able to point to anything in our universe that requires a God to design it, beyond dispute.
Wait! You have obvious evidence? Okay then. Please present it. Obvious is good.
A number of the atheists here - myself included - have already answered your question in detail.
Maybe. So what? That tells us about people, not about God.
If your belief in God was rational, you'd only have to realise that the arguments for God that current persuade you that God is real are all flawed.
But by your own admission, your belief in God is not rational. You don't need reasons to believe in God, you tell us. You just believe.
Or, maybe you do have reasons, but you're not telling us what they are. Maybe they are secret, personal, reasons.
Everybody agrees on that, Jan. There is no dispute here about who identifies as what. Can't we move past that and consider (a) why we identify that way, and (b) whether there is any valid justification for our respective positions?
You seem to be incredibly bogged down.
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