Can we calculate whether any gods exist?
First…an assertion (a couple, actually):
I assert that one cannot establish that at least one god exists using logic, reason, math, or science.
I also assert that one cannot establish that no gods exist using logic, reason, math, or science.
I further assert that one cannot establish that it IS MORE LIKELY that at least one god exists than that no gods exist using logic, reason, math, or science.
And lastly, I assert that one cannot establish that it IS MORE LIKELY that no gods exist than that at least one god exists using logic, reason, math, or science.
I am left to conclude that any AND ALL assertions that “at least one god exists”; “no gods exist”; “it is more likely that at least one god exists than that no gods exist; or “it is more likely that no gods exist than that at least one god exists”…
…are nothing more than blind guesses.
Any thoughts on this from the group?
I assert that one cannot establish that at least one god exists using logic, reason, math, or science.
I also assert that one cannot establish that no gods exist using logic, reason, math, or science.
I further assert that one cannot establish that it IS MORE LIKELY that at least one god exists than that no gods exist using logic, reason, math, or science.
And lastly, I assert that one cannot establish that it IS MORE LIKELY that no gods exist than that at least one god exists using logic, reason, math, or science.
I am left to conclude that any AND ALL assertions that “at least one god exists”; “no gods exist”; “it is more likely that at least one god exists than that no gods exist; or “it is more likely that no gods exist than that at least one god exists”…
…are nothing more than blind guesses.
Any thoughts on this from the group?
Comments (296)
We can establish whether or not a god, or gods exist empirically through science. Empirically, whatever is not part of the current best explanation doesn't exist. So unicorns, invisible teapots and gods all do not exist, except as purely mental concepts.
This, of course, doesn't tell us anything about whether or not a god or gods exist outside of empirical reality. As a metaphysical question, the existence of god can indeed not be established by either logic or maths, which includes probability theory.
Whether or not reason compels us to believe in a god is a tricky question and depends on your understanding of what reason is.
Our assertions about the gods are more than blind guesses. They are culturally engineered facts. In other words, we know that gods exist because we invented them. Bringing gods into existence is a highly significant and distinguished human activity, performed at a time when there were no other means of accounting for the damnable facts of existence: "How and why the hell did we get here?"
Inventing the gods also provided us with a dramatis personae for narratives informing us about why bad things happen to good, or famous, or noble, deserving or undeserving people? Or even more problematic, why do good things happen to disgustingly bad people?
Most people in the world (what, maybe 80%?) believe in some system of divinity. Obviously, belief in the divine (however conceived) is useful and compelling. Religion is compelling because the stories (narratives) are pretty good fiction, and a lot of behavior codes are comfortable vested in religious doctrine--like, "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."
Believers daily reinvest in the gods, but are careful not think of it as "creating gods". Religion works best when the instrumentality of human invention is kept off the stage.
Do the gods really exist or are they mere invention? It just doesn't matter, as long as they are treated as real. The dollars or pounds or euros in your pocket are based on flimsy fictions, but it doesn't matter as long as we believe in them. If we stop believing in them, then we are in deep shit rather quickly.
I'm thinking we cannot establish whether unicorns exist or not...using logic, reason, science, or math. Big universe. An equine with a single horn sticking out of a forehead is not that unreasonable.
Agreed.
It also depends on one's understanding of what "belief" is.
In the area of religion...as in "I believe God exists" or "I believe no gods exist"...
...the words "I believe" seems to be used in place of "It is my blind guess."
Nothing wrong with guessing.
Lots of good points there...but whether a blind guess is made as a result of culturally engineering or not...it is still a blind guess.
Fair enough, I should have specified "on earth, currently". But the point is that the scientific method does provide a "closed system". It always has a clear answer on whether or not something exists. It's either part of our predictions or it isn't.
Quoting Frank Apisa
What I was getting at is that there is an argument that belief in God is reasonable, even if it's just a blind guess. @Bitter Crank hinted at that argument: Perhaps God is a necessary concept in human civilization.
As far as I know we are still not at the bottom of that, did I miss something?
Quoting Bitter Crank
Or maybe as Karl Rahner would say, all human beings have a latent ("unthematic") awareness of God. In his theology, this search for existential meaning is a part of the human condition, because we "pre apprehend" there is something else. We don't know what it is, but as human beings we know it is there on the horizon. Rahner uses the word mystery for God, we have no basis to know what God is, but we seem to have a sense it is there. In other words, there is a search for meaning and an acceptance of such a thing as God, by so many, is because it is real. Maybe not, but maybe so.
Okay...but we have to allow for an inability to do something via the "scientific method" at the current time. Right now...it is not possible for us to determine how existence came to be...or if in fact, it always has been. Our limited abilities in this regard to not require that we have a default of "then it cannot be" because we cannot determine that it does.
.Quoting Echarmion
Make no mistake about it...I have absolutely no problem with anyone guessing that gods exist...or that "God" exists.
I also have absolutely no problem with anyone guessing that no gods exist.
I do have a small problem with people using the words "believe" or "belief" to describe their blind guess, though.
Yup...maybe not...maybe so.
There is a very very big logic fault in equating the no seeum arguments for teapots and unicorns to god. Here is the flaw, all no seeum arguments say the same thing, we looked around, in all the places where we know how to look, and we haven't seen ( fill in the blank), and we would know it if we saw it. So it does not exist.
We know a lot about tea pots, and horses, and flying, and horns on foreheads. We have the ability to look in most all the likely places teapots and unicorns might be. We have no basis at all to know anything at all about what such a thing as God is, nor any reason to think we could even understand how to apply such a thing to a specific time space model we could even investigate.
These are poor analogies.
The entire wonderful history of science is finding stuff it didn't believe existed- until it did. Every generation believes its science has the answers, and looks with bemusement at what science believed just a few generations earlier. Pretty sure some future generations will be bemused at us. Science is just science. Science just does science, and it is wonderful, but be careful not to make a religion out of it.
There are theories for abiogenesis. There are also theories for the formation of the universe. None of the commonly considered ones include a god or gods.
Quoting Rank Amateur
What you call a "no seeum" argument is induction based on absence of evidence, which is permissible. It does not depend on us "looking in most all the likely places". We don't assume a god exists for the same reason we don't assume an arbitrary amount of hitherto unknown forces and particles exist - because they don't feature in our predictions. So we assumed the Higgs Boson existed, even before we could detect it, because it was part of a prediction. But the invisible teapot isn't, and so we don't assume it exists.
Quoting Rank Amateur
I don't claim empirical knowledge is monolithic and immutable. I am just saying that for any given state of empirical knowledge, there is an answer to the question "does X exist empirically" according to the currently most favored (even if just barely) theory. The current answer for God is, as far as I can see, "no".
Okay...my position is that I do not know if the REALITY is that at least one god exists...or if the REALITY is that no gods exist.
Are you saying that you do know one way or the other?
If you are not...
...we are in agreement that neither of us knows.
I have no problem with you making a blind guess that no gods exist...just as I have no problem with Devans making a blind guess that at least one (creator) does...nor do I mind that Devans says his blind guess is based on logic or reason or probability analysis...or that you say yours is a function of logic and reason.
I often make guesses myself. It has cost me at times...at the track or at the tables.
Your conclusion is not correct.
I am not a follower of any specific religion nor believer in any particular god. On the other hand, I recognize that the experience of god is a common human experience. It's something I've felt and I know many others have. Intellectually, I won't say the concept of god is indispensable to an understanding of how the world works, but it seems to me that our prime example of a godless understanding of the nature of reality - science - often misses a lot of the story.
Not sure if you read my post above about Karl Rahner, this is very much in line with his view of what he called "pre apprehension ".
I didn't make up the term no seeum, that is the name of the argument you are describing. And, you may find this hard to believe, but at something as short as 125 -150 years ago there was nothing in physics that predicted the Higgs boson.
All science says, about anything that there is no empirical evidence for, is that there is no empirical evidence. That is all. It is non-scientists who treat science as religion, who turn that into if science does not know it, it does not exist. And they believe this by faith, despite thousands of years of empirical evidence to the contrary.
There is no need to be condescending. To the people a 150 years ago, would it have made sense to postulate a Higgs Boson because it might be discovered in the future? I can't see how. So, I conclude that the people 150 years ago would have been correct, given their empirical data, to think that there is no Higgs Boson.
Quoting Rank Amateur
If that was all, wouldn't science be rather useless? What about induction?
Quoting Rank Amateur
I made a distinction between the purely empirical an wider, metaphysical claims though.
Yes, it sounds like what you and Rahner are talking about is the same sort of thing I am. Many philosophies have similar concepts. In some it's central to the way reality is seen. In others, it seems like an afterthought. Is Kant's noumenon the same as Lao Tzu's Tao?
I am reluctant to say that the experience we are talking about is universal, as you indicate Rahner does. I can't speak for everyone, but I know it is common.
If you had begun your comments with, "Your conclusion may not be correct"...I would have given it some respect.
As it is...you are telling me that MANY PEOPLE guess at least one god exists...but that they are not guessing.
I am less inclined toward respect than I am toward amusement at that.
Perhaps you can tighten your argument up a bit?
That would be true, maybe, if guessing that there is a god and experiencing god were the same thing, which they are not. You and I experience love, water, bratwurst, dogs, other people, and all of the other ten thousand things. Are we guessing they exist? There's a case to be made for that. It's not my impression that's the case you're trying to make.
I'm willing to go along with that if you will agree that our experience of everything is just the illusion of the experience of everything. Or the experience of the illusion of everything.
Besides good evidence or reasons for such a belief, one must also take into account psychological factors or causes for belief. Psychological factors can and do override the best arguments. Furthermore, most people have a difficult time looking at evidence objectively, that is, they tend to be wed to a particular world view.
Sam...there was a time when almost everyone alive on the planet...from every culture, context, and experience...would have "offered testimony" that the Earth was a pancake flat object in the center of the universe and that the sun, moon, and stars circled 'round it. There was a time, ONLY A HUNDRED YEARS AGO...when most scientists would have offered testimony that our galaxy was the entirety of the universe.
If you are suggesting from such universality that ANYONE could KNOW either of those things to be so...you would be wrong.
KNOWING that there are no gods...or KNOWING that there is at least one...
...is a guess, a blind guess at that. Totally blind.
People who make the blind guess "there are no gods" and people who make the blind guess "there is at least one god"...apparently do not like to acknowledge that they are making blind guesses...so they do their best to disguise the fact that they are.
Those who blindly guess there is at least one god mostly disguise their guesses by calling them "beliefs"...and actually ask that others give their blind guesses respect and honor, because they call them "beliefs."
Those who blindly guess there are no gods mostly disguise their guesses by calling them the result of logic, reason, and science.
Those who deal with the issue by saying, "I have no idea of whether there are any gods or not"...are the ones using reason, logic...and if I may, the "scientific method."
Or, at least that is the way I see it.
Almost everything you believe was arrived at through the testimony of others. When you read a book that's testimony, when you sit in a class that's testimony, when you listen to the news that's testimony, so testimony is the primary way we learn things. Of course not all testimony is good testimonial evidence, and in another 100 years what we believe today will be overturned. There are ways of evaluating testimonial evidence, and it's very similar to evaluating an inductive argument. To reject testimonial evidence as a primary source of evidence would be to reject much of what you know. You sure didn't do the scientific experiments involved in quantum physics, you rely on the testimony of those who have done the experiments.
It would add credibility to your pronouncements if, just occasionally, you would provide some support for them. It seems the only thing you need to tell someone they are wrong is your opinion they are. The infallible S has spoken. The problem is you are just a little man behind the curtain, just like the rest of us.
After you make a declarative sentence, add "because " and tell us why please.
Think about what we are discussing here, Sam.
We are discussing whether or not it is possible to calculate the existence or non existence of gods.
If you want to suppose the answer to that can be "YES" because we can ask people around us what they blindly guess...
...by all means suppose that.
I think it is an absurd notion.
Okay?
Testimony is fine as long as it's not just testimony. There needs to be "physical" empirical evidence, including evidence both that the people who originally testified had solid physical empirical evidence backing the testimony and then a chain of evidence that people who bought the testimony had some sort of evidence aside from only testimony to justify buying it. For example, having evidence that so and so won't testify to something unless they had solid physical evidence to support the testimony, even then the person removed from the physical evidence there didn't actually witness the initial physical evidence themselves.
Aside from that, though, the idea of assigning likelihood to something we don't have frequency data for is just nonsensical.
I'm even skeptical of likelihood with frequency data for that matter.
No, god is not everything. Just the opposite. God is just one of the boys, like love, bratwurst, and your dog Sonny. Well, not like Sonny. We all love and believe in Sonny. Good old Sonny.
Good boy Sonny. Aren't we a good boy, yes we are.
Well, yes, I was joking around, but if we leave out Sonny, I meant exactly what I said. Here's what Lao Tzu said, by way of Lin Yutang:
[i]Tao is a hollow vessel,
And its use is inexhaustible!
Fathomless!
Like the fountain head of all things,
Its sharp edges rounded off,
Its tangles untied,
Its light tempered,
Its turmoil submerged,
Yet dark like deep water it seems to remain.
I do not know whose Son it is,
An image of what existed before God.[/i]
S, you ignorant slut. (Who, other than @Bitter Crank, can tell me where that pop culture reference comes from. For double credit, who can tell me the pop culture reference to which this pop culture reference is a pop culture reference.)
When Lao Tzu et. al. talk about the "10,000 things" they refer to all the specific things of the world - love, bratwurst, dogs named "Sonny", quarks, pancakes, galaxies, imaginary wizards, imaginary equine animals, imaginary flying kitchen utensils, etc. And that includes god. God is just one of the specific things of the world - one of the 10,000 things. That was the point I was trying to make.
No, I'm trying to show that each of the 10,000 things, whether you call them profound or trivial, come from the same place. And, if you remember, we weren't talking about god, we were talking about the experience of god. The experience of god is as real as the experience of the smell of salt marsh hay. And as profound. And as trivial.
Dan Akroyd to Jane Curtan, the news desk, SNL, 1975.
The rejoinder is, ”Dan, you pompous ass....”
Gilda Radnor as special correspondent “Roseanne Rosannadanna”.
Riiiiiigggghhhtttt comes from Bill Cosby vinyl album, “NOAH!!! THIS IS GOD!!!” (Riiiigghhtttt) 1964..65....6 something.
Correct. The segment was called "Count, Pointer Count." Without looking at the web, what was that segment a pop culture reference to?
Point/counterpoint was a segment on 60 Minutes usually between Kirkpatrick and Hoffman.
Either just before or replaced by ma main man Andy Rooney
So as it happens, I had not a clue to where it came from. I have huge gaps in my database of popular culture (just for one example). Somebody at work asked me "Are you sure you are gay?" when I couldn't place Donna Summers. I suppose I heard her at the queer bars a thousand times, but I wasn't there for pop-music appreciation. I was busy pursuing carnal goals.
In my dotage I've been going back (with the help of YouTube) to fill in some holes I don't have enough years left to fill them all in, so a lot of the holes will just stay empty.
Pseudo-significant SNL references:
This part.
We know a lot about tea pots, we know what they look like, we know how they move, we would know one if we saw one. We know a lot about horses, and flying and horns on foreheads. With what we know about teapots and unicorns and what we know about where to look for them. This is a reasonable statement, We know what a tea pot is, we know where the space between us and the sun is, we have looked at this space, and we haven't seen any tea pots, and with what we know about this space and teapots, we believe there are no tea pots there. And the same idea for unicorns.
We have no reasonable basis to say anything at all about the nature of God, since we have no reason to believe we know what God looks like, where God is, how God is or anything else at all. So we can't say, we know what God looks like, we know where God would be, we have looked in all the places we think God would be, and we don't see God, therefore there is no God.
The only thing you can say about no empirical evidence for God, is there is no empirical evidence for God. That's it.
Sounds like guessing to me.
I wonder why you folk don't just call it guessing when it is guessing?
I couldn't quite rate it as "greatest SNL sketch ever. Greatest television broadcast event ever. High point of all Western culture. No, really, seriously." But that's just me.
It's always a huge and dangerous risk to reveal what one thinks is really, really funny or really, really outrageous. Did you see Pink Flamingoes, by any chance?
Scientists aren't going to be agnostics about the idea of, say, there being tranvestite ballerinas orbiting some distant star just because there's no evidence of the same. If the idea is clearly bonkers, with absolutely nothing to support anywhere near the notion of something so implausible, they'll just dismiss it until they run across any sort of evidence that suggests it might have some merit.
For some things that are widely accepted, they won't make those rejection moves simply as a public relations matter. But they're not going to get into social hot water by saying that there are obviously no transvestite ballerinas orbiting a distant star.
All science says about things without empirical evidence is there is no empirical evidence. That is all.
All science ever says is our best evidence shows X is.
Or our best evidence shows X is not
If there is no evidence it says nothing
I'll stand behind my judgment. I'm with @ZhouBoTong, whatever crap I say is good is good. "Transformers" is better than "Hamlet." Big Macs are better than the potato and Brussels sprout soup at Ill Capriccio in Waltham, MA. Robert Crumb is greater than Leonardo Da Vinci. Oh, wait. R. Crumb is the greatest artist in all history.
No, I didn't see PF. I tend to avoid films with fat, unattractive drag queens and eating feces, but that's just me. I trust you enough that if you tell me it's the greatest movie in history. Better than "Casablanca" and "Cadyshack," I'll believe you.
This is sound art theory ever since Marcel Duchamp, which is over a century ago, now.
"Science saying something" is scientists saying something. And scientists definitely say that completely implausible, incoherent, etc. things don't exist when there's no evidence for them. They don't remain agnostic on everything.
Have you ever heard of a Boltzmann Brain?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boltzmann_brain
The argument Boltzmann made is pretty much the same as the argument for orbiting transvestite ballerinas.
Sure. I wouldn't say that nothing stupid is forwarded in the name of science. Scientists don't actually have a monobrain. :razz:
It is my understanding that the Boltzmann Brain concept is taken seriously by some non-goofy scientists.
Not only that, only 100 years ago before Hubble 99% of the universe didn't exist. Hundreds of billions of galaxies, they didn't exist, poof, gone!
Absence of evidence is evidence of an absence of evidence.
I think it's more like an attempt to explain color to a blind man. There are thousands of ways one might attempt to do that, which may create the appearance of a great deal of conflict and contradiction even though all the varied explanations are attempting to point to the same thing.
Imho, the divisive nature of thought causes us to assume that a god would be a "thing", something unique and separate from everything else that thus requires a definition, a boundary line between "god" and "non-god". And then of course we begin to argue over the competing definitions.
A better model for god may be the example of space which is everywhere in everything from the smallest to largest scales, but not a separate "thing". Space transcends simplistic dualistic paradigms like "exists vs. doesn't exist" and I suspect the phenomena we label god does as well.
The nature of thought, the way it works, is likely causing to ask a bad question from which we will never derive a good answer.
I'll take one example of this.
Without evidence science does not use words like implausible, incoherent. Without evidence science is completely agnostic.
Science says nothing without evidence, that's what makes it science.
I strongly agree with you here. Wait, no I don't. Yikes, I can't tell whether I agree with you or not. You use words that sound like something I might say, but I can't help but wonder if you mean something different than I do.
In short, even if any and all claims about gods are guesses these guesses lead to strong conclusions depending on how you view reality is.
When hell freezes over is "the moment that [you'll] accept [my] claim." I'll never convince you. You don't have to convince me of the value of science and rationality. As an engineer I use them all the time. I also recognize their limitations, which I don't think you do. As far as I can tell, you don't believe science has any limitations. You define what is real as "what science can explain." So it's a circular argument. It can't be real because it's not what science can explain.
Quoting S
I don't think you mean I'm "not speaking properly." I think you mean I'm wrong. I'll have you know I'm very articulant, articulous .....Me talk good.
Quoting S
I do not know what this means. Maybe something about a talking bird.
Quoting TheMadFool
I agree with part of what you said.
A guess that "there is at least one god" or a guess that "there are no gods"...both emanate from predisposition.
But both ARE JUST GUESSES. They are not "conclusions"...they are guesses.
Correct...
...UNLESS a counter assertion is made.
If a counter assertion is made...as in, "there are NO gods"...then the burden of proof falls on both parties.
I just want to point out that "...you don't 'believe' science has any limitations." ...
...IS NOT THE SAME AS...
..."you believe science has no limitations."
That may become important as the discussion goes on, because "I do not believe there are any gods" IS NOT THE SAME AS..."I believe there are no gods."
And the difference mentioned is significant.
My point about speaking properly wasn't about how articulate you are, it was about wording things in the right logical way, a way which avoids problematic logical consequences. My wording resolves philosophical problems. Your wording exacerbates them.
Thanks, S.
Agreed!
Hard line theism...and strong atheism share a significant characteristic. Both tend to share their "convictions" as though they are truths incarnate.
You're being perfectly reasonable in the sense of your position being very normal. Normal, not a product of reason.
Well, don't worry about agreeing, just investigate for yourself.
Strong atheists are guilty of doing at least some of this also.
The burden you carry is to prove that human reason can generate meaningful credible statements about phenomena the scale of gods, should such a thing exist. The theist carries the same burden in regards to their chosen authority, typically a holy book.
As example, it would be perfectly reasonable for you to ask the theist to prove the qualifications of their holy book for answering the very largest of questions (scope of god claims). If they can not provide such proof, then you can in one sweep of the hand dismiss all claims arising from that source. You know, there's no point in spending years debating each and every Bible verse interpretation if the theist can not demonstrate the Bible is a credible authority on the matters it is speaking to.
What you don't yet get, because you are not yet a person of reason but merely an ideologist, is that everything in that last paragraph applies to you and atheism as well, to the very same degree.
A useful conversation on these subjects does not begin until 1) both chosen authorities have been asked for proof of their qualifications (in regards to the largest of questions), and 2) both authorities are shown to fail that test, and 3) at least some members of the conversation accept what this evidence says and proceed to investigate further based on that understanding.
As to your holy book, human reason, let's put that in some context instead of just blindly believing without question that human reason is relevant and useful.
GOD: A theory about the most fundamental nature of everything everywhere.
REASON: The very poorly developed ability of a single half insane semi-suicidal species only recently living in caves on one little planet in one of billions of galaxies, or maybe one of billions of universes etc.
Automatically assuming without questioning that human reason can deliver useful data on questions of such enormous scale is like believing without questioning that a squirrel can understand the Internet. Such an assumption is very normal and very understandable, and very poor philosophy.
This made me laugh! And even before I've finished the first cup of coffee. :smile:
Members have no idea. Members have no way of finding out. Members could debate the question for centuries, but in the end they'd wind up right where they started because there is no way to resolve the debate.
One way out of this cage is to simply declare the debate about my socks as a fun game which serves no higher purpose than fun. It can be reasonable to choose fun as a meaningful purpose for such an investigation.
Another way out would be to just forget about my socks and go do something else, play golf perhaps. This is reasonable too, because why waste a lot of time debating a question which can never be resolved.
And then there's this.
If one is 1) incurably interested in my socks and can't let that topic go, and 2) also sees there is no way to ever determine the color of my socks, the useful question then becomes...
What is our relationship with the unknown, the unknowable?
The musician Stephen Stills once wrote, "If you can't be with the one you love honey, love the one you're with."
That's the situation we find ourselves in. We want to know! But we can't know. And so the rational act is to love the one we're with, our ignorance.
Think of ignorance as some girl you picked up at a bar. :smile: She's not the one you wanted. Not the one you wanted at all. But now she's in your bed. What are you going to do with her?
"Anyone who denies the law of noncontradiction should be beaten and burned until he admits that to be beaten is not the same as not to be beaten, and to be burned is not the same as not to be burned" - Avicenna.
What's the epistemological grounding of treating physical evidence as qualitatively different from testimony (ignoring for the moment that testimony is physical, so we'd need additional qualifiers)?
I personally believe plenty of things based on testimony alone, so does everyone else as far as I know.
Quoting Rank Amateur
That sounds precariously close to a no true Scotsman. Anyways, as a matter of fact we make plenty of determinations based on lack of evidence. Drug trials come to mind.
Quoting Jake
Again, that's ignoring that empirical science relies on induction as well as deduction. "Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence" is only true in a deductive context.
That's because I am superior to you in regards to such questions, with no credit due to me nor any blame due to you, as neither of us had anything to do with when we were born. I've been doing this since before you were born. We are not equals, even though forum technology may make it seem so.
Quoting S
Now this I agree with. :smile: Seriously, I do this routinely, expect the human realm to be based on reason, in spite of all evidence to the contrary. Age does not cure all ills apparently, at least not in my case.
Quoting S
You can test whether reason is qualified for the task at hand, the analysis of the very largest of questions (scope of God claims).
We will all agree that human reason can be very useful for very many things, but that does not automatically equal human reason being useful for EVERYTHING. You're assuming without questioning and without proof that human reason is qualified for this investigation. You are a person of faith. Who hasn't yet learned you are a person of faith.
All I'm suggesting is that you apply the very same test you reasonably present to holy books to your own chosen authority, human reason. I'm asking only that you be loyal to your own chosen methodology.
Once such an intellectually honest investigation is conducted, and it's seen that nobody's chosen authority can be proven qualified, a (imho) much more interesting area of investigation opens up.
The overwhelming vast majority of reality at every scale is nothing (or perhaps relative nothing). So without reference to any religion at all, using only observation of reality, we can see that nothing is a very big deal indeed.
Not really. I do agree that evidence doesn't point either way of the issue. Not enough to say God exists and not enough to say God doesn't exist. Given so, any claim on either of the two positions appears like guesses but it isn't.
We, depending on our worldview, choose one option based on the arguments that most convince us. Theism/atheism is based on some form of logic and so aren't simply guesses.
Yes, reason is qualified to outline the boundaries of our ignorance. As example, I can use reason to discover that I'm not going to become the next Einstein.
We're doing the same thing in the sense we are using the same methodology. The difference between us is that so far you've only challenged one chosen authority, whereas I am challenging them both.
Once we challenge both authorities, and see that neither can pass the test, the God debate collapses of it's own weight.
Some people will be happy about this, and others will not.
Some people (on both sides) have built a very elaborate and cherished self image out of their position within the God debate, and thus they will resist any threat to the God debate.
Other people will find that while they've become bored by the endlessly predictable and unproductive children's merry-go-round to nowhere patterns of the God debate, they are still incurably interested in investigating further.
To it's credit, the God debate has revealed useful information, we are ignorant in regards to such enormous questions. Thousands of years of God debate and nothing resolved equals ignorance.
So an honest investigator with a sincere interest will take what the God debate investigation has revealed, and follow that trail. We don't have to stop just because we didn't find the answer we were hoping to find.
You are nowhere near my level. You are still foolish enough to jump to conclusions about age or the length of time that one has been doing philosophy, and you still think that you're making a profound point about reason, when others have long since accepted similar criticisms and sensibly moved forward, leaving you and your superiority complex in the dust.
If reason doesn't help in matters like this, then why not believe anything that you want? Why is it that you use reason as I do, and you've even reached very similar conclusions to me? You are in denial, young Jake. Perhaps you'll grow out of that one day.
Hence why I put "physical" in quotation marks, by the way.
The grounding is that the facts can't be wrong about the facts. But a reporter can be, including that reporters can be dishonest/they can weave fictions (so that it would turn out that they're not actually reporters at all), they are biased in many different ways, etc.
You're repeating the point I just made. Yes, the investigation has revealed that we are ignorant. Thus, the entire basis upon which you accept one position within the God debate and reject another has been destroyed. You are left with nothing. A state of affairs which matches the vast overwhelming majority of reality.
Quoting S
Nobody said you should abandon reason. I'm asking you to do reason, to be fully faithful to your own chosen methodology. You've challenged holy books. Good! Now just keep going and challenge all other proposed authorities too, including the one you've chosen.
You're confusing reason and ideology.
Reason will challenge all proposed authorities in an even handed manner with no dog in the fight.
Ideology attempts to use logic calculations to promote and defend a fixed position. When evidence arises that is inconvenient to that fixed position, such evidence is discarded.
Your accusations of me confusing reason and ideology ring hollow. I put it down to your psych. For some reason, your psych is compelling you to fabricate this mischaracterisation, even though it isn't supported by a shred of reason.
Yes, like I keep saying, the problem is resolved, the investigation come to a useful insight. Nobody knows what they're talking about. Your atheism and the whole glorious ego structure you've built upon it is deflated, dead, all gone, bye bye now. Some people can handle that, some can't. We shall see in time which of those people you are.
Quoting S
That's what I'm asking you to do. And you keep refusing to do it. Atheism is not reason. Atheism is a faith which competes with theism.
the entire purpose of drug trails is to establish evidence -
Your whole "argument" amounts to little more than fallacy. The fallacy of ad hominem, the fallacy of guilt by association, the fallacy of false equivalence. "You're an ideologue! You're like a 23 year old! You're just as fanatical as them!". If this is the "wisdom" which comes with old age, I do not want it. You can keep it. Thanks, but no thanks.
My kind of atheism is the kind which has rejected theism and strong atheism, not as impossible, but as unwarranted, and unwarranted due to insufficient evidence in support of them. We've been over this in detail before, as you well know, so your denialism is not excused. You don't actually seem to substantially disagree, you just want to grind your axe like your nuclear weapons thing. Ironically, it seems you're an ideologue.
OK, but that only tells me that testimony is less convincing as evidence, not that I positively need evidence other than testimony for a conclusion. I'd label this a quantitative difference (though I see that this may sound confused). If you see something with your own eyes there are fewer points of failure, but personal observations don't have any special qualities to them.
Quoting Rank Amateur
Sure. But if the drug trial fails to uncover any positive evidence, the conclusion will not be that we're agnostic about e.g. the effect of a drug. It will be that the drug is ineffective.
Your kind of atheism, all kinds of atheism, are just faith. All of it, all flavors of atheism, depend on unproven qualifications of a chosen authority
Quoting S
I will help you debunk me, as you are clearly not capable of it. My illogic is in the persistent unfounded assumption that discussing this on philosophy forums can accomplish anything at all.
Quoting S
Depends on the qualifications of human reason for the task at hand, which remains unproven.
You're just like the theists you are so desperate to be superior to. You want to know. You want an answer, a story, some kind of conclusion, or at least a theory, or at least some method of developing a theory. But you have no such method. So you invent an answer, and then use that fantasy answer to inflate your self image.
At that point the investigation is essentially over, because now all your efforts will be invested in protecting that wonderful self image story.
Anyone can reach a conclusion based on anything they like, no?
I wouldn't be saying what's necessary for all people to reach a conclusion. That would entirely depend on the person in question.
People certainly can and do reach conclusions based on testimony only.
I think that's a horrible idea. I explained why. Not everyone is going to agree with me, no matter what I do.
Your suggestion that reason is unqualified for the task at hand is self-defeating through performative contradiction. You rely on reason to reach the same conclusion that I do. The possible alternatives, though obviously possible, are unwarranted through reason, and should therefore be rejected if we're going to be reasonable, and you've already said that you don't expect either of us to abandon reason, so you're just attention seeking, it seems.
What's so absurd about your rhetoric, is that behind it all, I have reached the same conclusions that you have, and we've both done this through reason. You are shooting yourself in the foot with your own rhetoric, and in your superior wisdom, you don't even realise this.
Is it that you see the word "atheist" and you become like a wild bull who has seen red? That's what I suspect. A bit like "nuclear weapons". It's just a word. We don't even have to call it that. You don't have to get so triggered at the mere mention of it. Calm down, dear. You're not being reasonable when you get yourself all worked up and start spouting nonsense.
that is a conclusion based on evidence. You a mis-understanding me - I am not saying science will not say something does not exist, but they will only say that when there is evidence that it does not exist
Ah, then we agree on that. But who would even suggest that anyone is claiming that something doesn't exist on no evidence?
All I ever said is all science says about lack or evidence is that there is a lack of evidence.
Many here and elsewhere erroneously believe science says something does not exist if there is no evidence for it - science does not.
Science only says something does not exist, where there IS evidence that it does not exist.
The language here is going to cause a lot of people to not understand this.
It's conventional to think of "evidence (suggesting) that F does not exist" is the same as "there is no evidence for F."
No one would be claiming that "science makes claims about whether F exists when there's no evidence to suggest that either F exists or F does not exist"--which is apparently how you're using "no evidence for F." Most people would make an "Evidence for F"/"Evidence against F" distinction. You seem to be using "Evidence for it (for F)" to cover both.
to a scientist they are not the same thing at all
Quoting Terrapin Station
science does. All scientific theory - as the best current explanation of a physical state of affairs, requires evidence.
Saying some X does not exist, as the best current explanation of a physical state of affairs requires evidence as well.
If there is no evidence to the claim it does not exist - science is agnostic on the claim it does not exist.
If there is no evidence to the claim is does exist - science is agnostic on the claim is does exist.
Science, by definition, is agnostic to all claims without evidence. And is doubtful even on the claims with evidence.
To a scientist - all a lack of evidence against any claim is, is there is a lack of evidence.
The important thing in my post was understanding the "evidence for"/"evidence against" distinction. Does that distinction make sense to you? They're both evidence. The difference is whether the evidence is "in favor" of a claim, whether the evidence suggests that a claim is true, or whether the evidence is against a claim, whether the evidence suggests that a claim is false.
And to any strong atheist, what supposed evidence is there that there is no God, and why is it supposedly sufficient support of your conclusion?
Not sure how conventional it is - but they are very different - seems we are in violent agreement
My theism is based on faith - now you can try to make guesswork = faith if you wish.
I have never claimed God is, is a fact. And I maintain that God is, is still not in conflict with reason.
I am not making any claim at all, it seems you are - would you care to make an argument that faith + guesswork I would be happy see what I think.
But more likely you are just trolling for a fight
that is your claim not mine, it is up to you to support it.
I don't have an epistemological issue - you say i do - support your claim or not - as you wish.
for what
Quoting S
state your conclusion
You are being trolled dude. Im guessing because he feels like he’s giving you your own medicine or something but its clear he is being deliberately obtuse and dishonest. I think its a personal issue with you since he isnt always like that...not on purpose like he is here anyway.
I am not - I have no issue or point I am trying to make. S asked, I said faith - He said that equals guessing and wants me do defend it is not. That is his point - not mine. If he wants to make the argument faith = guessing he is free to do so. He doesn't want to do that. I have no desire to prove to him that faith does not equal guessing - I could care less. If he wishes to prove the point to me - he is free to do so.
that is how I see it.
YOU asked if any theist would say why they believe
I said - faith
YOU said that faith = guessing, and asked me to prove it does not
(I have made no claim or effort to argue any of this - you asked - I said faith - that is all)
I feel no need to prove to you that faith does not equal guessing - I could care less what your view is on the topic
I have - however a few times, said if you wish to make some cogent and complete argument on the point , I would respond
That is how I see it - either make an argument, let it go, or throw another barb and move on - I am indifferent to each option
Im sorry, I just cannot believe that. You are refusing to even disagree with him in any real away, yet on and on you argue. You are having a very dishonest exchange here, which you might feel is justified for personal reasons. If you aren’t fucking with him then its very hard to tell what you are up to here aside from just not listening or engaging. To be honest i do not even agree with S’s framing here, but you keep picking up your ball and threatening to go home but linger in the playground. Its dishonest, and its hard not to see it as trolling or vastly more personal than honest engagement of ideas.
There is no sufficient evidence to be found to the best of my knowledge [for either the existence of God or the existence of a space teapot], and you aren't providing any, so it wouldn't be reasonable for me to reach any other conclusion [than that the two positions are on the same epistemological level], would it?
Answer the question.
YOU said Faith = guessing , with no support, and asked me to prove that it does not -
My last post on this - unless you make a full argument
That is not an argument for faith = guessing.
And has little to do with faith. I agree and have like a thousand times said that there is no physical evidence that God ( whatever such a thing as God is) exists ( however such a thing as God exists)
That has nothing at all to do with faith.
I am not ever going to convince you at all about anything I believe about faith, and I have no desire to try. But it seems you do have an issue about faith that you would like to convince me of. If that is the case go ahead - make your point.
We have already had the chat on the difference between teapots and God on the claim of reasonableness of claims of existence. No need to repeat. - Seems a different point to me than the one that started this - that you said faith = guessing. Not sure when that changed.
That faith in God is on epistemological par with guesswork in a space teapot necessarily relates to evidence, even if your faith, like guesswork, has nothing to do with evidence. If the evidence isn't enough to support the conclusion, then in that sense, and in that sense alone, they are on par with each other, and the difference between the subject of the faith or of the guesswork, whether God or a space teapot or something else, is logically irrelevant. Does a teapot have a handle? Yes. Does God? Who the hell knows? But are they both equally unreasonable? Yes. Are they both on the same epistemological level? Yes. Reason takes into account the evidence. Neither are reasonably justified beliefs.
All I want from you is an intellectually honest response to this. Do you accept the equivalence, or is it too much to psychologically handle for a cherished belief of yours to be exposed in this way? You want your faith in God to be a special exception, right? So you deny the analogy, or misconstrue it.
But it's a practical necessity to form opinions and hypothesis based on testimony alone. Plenty of everyday situations reduce your opinion to the absurd. Certainly you wouldn't expect courts to let someone go free merely because only witness testimony is available. Given that there is no form of evidence that is beyond reproach in principle, I don't see how your reasoning is supposed to outweigh the utter impracticality.
Quoting Rank Amateur
But the evidence in question is an absence of evidence. Sure there is data, but what's significant about the data is that it's random (indistinguishable from the control group) in relation to the connection being tested.
But...but...but...any assertion that at least one god exists...or, no gods exist...IS a guess. A blind guess at that.
ANY and EVERY assertion that at least one god exists...IS A BLIND GUESS.
ANY and EVERY assertion that no gods exist...IS A BLIND GUESS.
World view and choices notwithstanding.
Circumstantial ad hominem? What the hell is that? An ad hominem is "an argument directed against a person rather than the position they are maintaining." I wasn't making an argument and I didn't say anything about you. I only said I would not be able to convince you, which is true. What I did say was:
Quoting T Clark
How is that in any way directed against you personally? It is directed against what I understand your beliefs to be.
Quoting S
I'll respond to your challenge when you support your claim that you've had an experience of pain. Or love. Or anger.
When you say:
Quoting S
Seems to me your just saying "disagreeing with me."
As long as you laugh at my jokes and not my philosophy.
Now, back to the point. You still have failed to properly explain yourself. I have had those experiences because I'm a normal human being. Yet if you want me to go by my own interpretation, then no, I haven't experienced God, and neither do I believe that you have. But you appear to be playing a rather immature language game, where you just use "God" to mean a thing like 10,000 other things that we've both experienced, in which case, yes, I suppose I have experienced that by your language game, but I consider that an improper and problematic use of language which suggests that you haven't thought through the logical consequences. But perhaps you just don't care about that. You only care about what some ancient text says.
Let me see if I've got this right. Just as a hypothetical, a completely made up example, if someone were to say
Quoting S
That would be a circumstantial ad hominem. Is that correct?
In reference to love, anger, and pain, you say:
Quoting S
You're using my own argument, which you dismissed earlier, against me. My whole point is based on the contention that many people (read "normal human beings") experience god. That's consistent with what I just read on the web. Pew Forum says that 56% of the people in the US believe in god.
Quoting S
Come on, this must be a circumstantial ad hominem argument by your definition. Anyway, you call it a language game, but it's not a game to me. Just like Horton, I meant what I said and I said what I meant.
But I still disagree with your use of "God" which has rather obvious shortcomings and will likely cause confusion. There's supposed to be controversy, is there not? Or did I imagine that? I was under the impression that atheists and theists were in disagreement about something... :chin:
I use "god" because I believe that what I call the experience of god is closely related to a belief in god. There is an experience which many people have that influences them to believe in god. Not to start us off on a new tangent, but that can also be said of love, pain, anger, and celery. Which is not to say that, if you have the experience, you have to believe.
Most definitely I would. That we can convict someone on testimony only is a horrible, horrible idea in my opinion.
You used forms of "believe" and "belief" four times in that short paragraph, T...and I truly am not sure of what you were trying to convey.
Your first use is considerably different from your second and third use...and your third use seems different from the other three.
You may refuse this next request and consider it a useless, waste-of-time exercise, but I would love to see you write that paragraph not using the words "believe" or "belief"...and give me an idea of what you actually were saying.
Any chance?
That's what you wrote, but what you really wanted to write is:
We're not getting anywhere.
Please prove that human reason is qualified to deliver credible answers, or even credible theories, on the very largest and most fundamental of questions. This is the very same challenge you reasonably present to holy books, but are not intellectually honest enough to present to your own chosen authority. Very normal, very understandable, very bad philosophy.
Quoting S
You're not reading what I'm writing, and are rejecting an assertion of your own invention. I never said reason is unqualified for everything. It may not even be unqualified for the very largest of questions. But you have not proven that it is qualified, so all of your clever fancy pants logic dancing can be dismissed with a casual wave of the hand, just as you dismiss Bible claims for the same reason.
Quoting S
You have no idea what my conclusions are because like most people on philosophy forums you are trapped inside the tiny prison cell of the God debate. Very normal, very understandable, not very impressive or persuasive.
Quoting S
Stick it up your ass my friend, stick it up your ass. Thank you very much. :smile:
That's the whole point for YOU. My contention is that it is the experience itself that matters, not anybody's explanation of it.
How dare you be rational on a philosophy forum. How Dare You!!! You sure won't find me pulling any stunts like that mister.
@Buxtebuddha used to call me "Clarkie." (a tear), although, as you can see, he used to spell it correctly.
Yeah, I don't really like the way that came out either. I've filled this space a couple of times with clarifications then erase them. Now I've come to the conclusion that I can't deal with it without heading off on a big tangent. Maybe I'll start a separate thread.
All I'm saying is people believe based on logic and it's not just guesswork.
So, according to you, we should ignore any kind of abuse that doesn't leave lasting marks? Even if it leaves lasting marks, the identity of the perpetrator can often only be established by witness testimony, so as long as you get away from the crime scene, many kinds of assault would be impossible to prosecute. As would theft and robbery perpetrated using only non traceable utensils, like a kitchen knife.
But it doesn't end there. According to your opinion, I cannot really know anything about the live of other people, unless I was actually physically there. This includes most information about the rest of the world, current and especially past events. Most of the scientific knowledge is right out as well, because it's based on the testimony of scientists or, more commonly, the hearsay testimony of secondary literature.
This makes your approach barely better than the flat-earther's "zetetic method". Given that your justification is that witnesses are inherently unreliable because they might lie or be mistaken, you can not accept any knowledge that is more than tangentially based on testimony. That means you also have to mistrust videos and images because their genesis is only established by witness testimony.
I am fairly certain you cannot actually apply that standard in everyday life. Which begs the question how you could possibly arrive at a position this absurd.
We are in complete disagreement on this, MadFool.
A "belief" in this area is NOTHING more than a blind guess...and the word "belief" is used just to disguise the fact that it is. A blind guess is not based on anything...although often arguments are invented to rationalize blind guesses. Rationalizing a blind guess that no gods exist because evil exists is FAR away from "a convincing atheistic argument"...and there are no ontological arguments that an assertion "there is at least one god" logical.
Anyone who asserts that no gods exist is just guessing. Anyone who asserts there is at least one god is just guessing.
Let's discuss that more...or just agree to disagree.
Legally, in my view we should not prosecute anyone where there isn't "physical evidence" of someone being a perpetrator, yes, definitely. I also think it's outrageous that we prosecute people for murder, say, when there is physical evidence but no body.
Quoting Echarmion
Only I didn't actually say that, and I rather explicitly said otherwise. There just needs to be "physical evidence" at some stage of the process if we're dealing with empirical claims, and then removed from that, good evidence that there was reliable access to physical evidence at some stage in the process. For legal purposes, I'd make direct presentation of evidence necessary, because the future of others' lives is in the balance, but not everything is the legal system.
Quoting Echarmion
Again, I didn't say that. I also didn't say, and there's no reason for you to have known, that on my view relying on testimony only (sans good evidence of reliable access to physical evidence at the initial stage) is worthwhile proportionate to just how important or significant the upshots of trusting the testimony are.
Quoting Echarmion
It's difficult to comment on that without getting rid of the straw man portions first.
That blows a hole the size of a truck into the legal system that anyone with sufficient planning can walk through. You're saying we should ignore evidence even if there are no grounds to distrust the specific evidence in question, on the grounds that such evidence could potentially be forged. That makes no sense.
Quoting Terrapin Station
For the quoted bit, no such physical evidence exists. You even pointed out reporters, specifically, as unreliable.
You have not really explained how this chain of physical evidence is supposed to work. When you write:
Quoting Terrapin Station
This sounds like you're just referring to the person being trustworthy. But of course if that's sufficient, every chain of trustworthy witnesses also has a chain of physical evidence. This would be just a standard evaluation of the weight of the testimony. You obviously mean to set up an additional requirement that can only be met by specific limited kinds of testimony.
What about normal, everyday events? Does someone reporting an event they saw have physical evidence?
Quoting Terrapin Station
You realize that not prosecuting someone also has consequences on other's lifes?
Quoting Terrapin Station
How else am I supposed to interpret your statement?
Quoting Terrapin Station
You explicitly say a witness might be lying, biased or mistaken where physical evidence would not be.
Quoting Terrapin Station
You actually did not give any of these qualifications before. Do you have different epistemological systems for different situations?
Yeah, when it's only people making accusations.
Quoting Echarmion
The grounds are that there's no way to bootstrap testimony-only.
Quoting Echarmion
Say what? No idea what you have in mind there.
I'll answer the rest later, but I don't want to get into increasingly longer posts back and forth. I hate doing that. I'll let you answer this first, and then I'll get back to the rest afterwards . . . unless you respond to this with another couple thousand words. Hopefully not, though.
So you're fine with me walking up to you in the middle of the street, punching you in the face and walking away free? You only have your testimony, and perhaps the testimony of others to convict me.
Quoting Terrapin Station
But you haven't shown why testimony needs to be bootstrapped in the first place. It's potentially unreliable. So is all other evidence.
Quoting Terrapin Station
What's the physical evidence for everyday events? A red car drove by. I saw you punch someone. I performed experiment X with result Y. Do these count as "physical testimony"?
Why wouldn't there be physical evidence re my face and your fist? The bruise on my face, the abrasions or bruise on your fist, etc. aren't only someone making an accusation.
It's very unlikely you can detect any damage on my fist from one punch, especially not hours or days later. There'd potentially be physical evidence that an injury happened, but not who did it. Obviously you can hurt people in ways that don't leave lasting marks.
This is actually not true, unless it was a very light punch--in which case it shouldn't be a legal issue anyway, because there's not going to be much of an effect on the other person, either.
If it was days later, and the punch was light enough to not be able to detect anything days later, then sure. Don't wait days to report something like that unless it's serious enough that evidence would still be detectable.
Quoting Echarmion
I'm not sure what you're referring to here, but I'd not have any hurt that doesn't have a longer-term physical effect as something that's legally prosecutable anyway.
You'd be fine if people came around and slapped you across the face everyday? No physical evidence on the hands of the people that lasts more than hours.
Anyways I can create examples for days, why don't you answer my question?
Quoting Echarmion
I quote what you said word for word, dispute it, and give my reasons for doing so. You reply by saying that I'm rejecting an assertion of my own invention.
You clearly said that we're too ignorant to know what theists and strong atheists claim. This is obviously a conclusion which you've reached. I have reached the same conclusion. You reply by saying I have no idea what your conclusions are.
Then there's your childish retort, "Stick it up your arse".
Then there's your stated opinion I don't care about, namely that, for you, the experience matters, but the explanation doesn't. Well, if you don't care about the explanation, which is a very unphilosophical attitude, then don't bother me with your opinion, just keep quiet about it or go bother someone else.
And it's hilariously absurd that you think that Rank Amateur is being rational when he psychologically closes himself off from engaging his beliefs rationally like that, yet you accuse my highly rational approach of being "just faith".
Yes, what you've written is correct. Please do remember.
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/269170
Nobody is bothering you. Nobody can bother you in this medium. You're CHOOSING to read my posts. If you'd like to make another choice that would be entirely fine with me.
Just forget it.
So stop, and all your problems are solved.
And you are certainly free to do so.
I, on the other hand, would say being able to do that has absolutely no impact on the question, "Does at least one god exist?"
alright i thought about it again and i see what your saying as to how it has nothing to do with the question.
Why rule out other options? Like two or three gods, or one-and-a-half god? Pi gods, anyone?
But think for a minute. What if Brad Pitt walked into a Wal-Mart. Or a McDonalds? How do you think that would turn out. They'd want to talk to the guy, get an autograph, try to become friends. No one would just do their job and get the man his product quickly and efficiently. And worse. Alot of people, more than you might think, would want to be "the guy who spit in Brad Pitt's burger" .. or worse. Infamy. The natural consolation of those who seek fame yet do not find it.
Now imagine that times... I'd say infinity but factoring in the human comprehension probably times 10... yeah it wouldn't work out so good. I've used a metaphor for it before.
Say you have a 10 million dollar inheritance. You want it to go toward your lifelong interest of I dunno fixing up old buildings.. or something. But you're old and dying. Who do you want it to go to? Someone who knows the money is up for grabs and responds to an ad with all the right qualifications or someone who takes a blind low paying ad for the job because they love the work. Not hard to figure out really.
What do you mean by "blind guess"? Last I heard, a blind guess, in matters such as the one you bring up, is an act of assigning a random value to the probability of certain propositions being true.
I believe this isn't the way theists/atheists go about forming their beliefs. There are many arguments for/against god's existence and these seem to provide the bedrock for god-beliefs. This is a far cry from the randomness of blind guessing.
You are free to think of "blind guess" whatever way you choose.
My idea of a blind guess is any guess not made based on reason, logic, math, or science.
If you think ANY of the four assertions I mentioned CAN be obtained through reason logic, math, or science...put it forth. We can discuss it.
Though there are many gods in the Bible: El, Yahweh and Jesus' pop in particular, who are very different. It's a mistake to amalgamate them into one guy as most people do, an artifact.
And many others also, eg the gods of Egypt are mentioned in the Bible, as well as others. They are just not the gods of the Hebrews. But they play their part.
For God:
1. The ontological argument for god
2. The argument from design
3. The Kalam cosmolgical argument
4. The prime mover argument
5. The fine-tuning argument
Against God:
1. The problem of evil
Okay. Let's discuss them.
I'll lead off.
NOT A ONE OF THEM LEADS TO, "Therefore there is a God" or "Therefore there are no gods."
NOT A ONE OF THEM LEADS TO: "Therefore it is more likely that there is at least one god than that there are none" or "Therefore it is more likely that there are no gods than there is at least one."
Not a one of them!
If one of them did...no conversation would be taking place on the issue.
You go.
To say God does/doesn’t exist, must start with a description of the word “god.”
Dictionary explanation: according to certain religion, a superhuman being or spirit worshiped as having power over nature or humans.
If a poll was taken as to the question (does God exist) the majority of believers would be greater than non-believers.
By weighing the (+/- effect) is divided in two groups religious leaders vs scientist. What you get is a potpourri census that neither can prove. There is also a third factor to consider, the impossible made possible (miracles) which requires faith that a request is granted without seeing how it was accomplish without the scientist able to answer what the eyes see and the ears hear. Is the name “God” relevant to what occur, something that no-one can explain, yet many are witnesses to such phenomena. Therefore, the ancient or elders with respect, acknowledge, this act that only an “unseen force/God” could do.
Oh I know what they mean: an amalgamation of El, Yahweh, Jesus, the Holy Ghost and what else... Like a guy who would have read the Three Musketeers a bit too fast, and would think that Aramis, Portos, Athos, d’Artagnan and Richelieu are all one and the same.
A person tells you there are blue pigs everywhere in Australia and another tells you that, if you're lucky, you might spot an orange echidna. You spend a year travelling in Australia and see no blue pigs and no orange echidnas. The quote above is equivalent to saying that blue pigs and orange echidnas are still equally likely, i.e. if you did not see a blue pig, there is a 50/50 chance of them being in Australia, and if you did not see an orange echidna there is a 50/50 chance of them being in Australia.
This is neither logical, reasonable, mathematical or scientific. If blue pigs are supposed to be abundant and orange echidnas rare, the probability of encountering a blue pig is much higher than encountering an orange echidna, thus the probability of not encountering a blue pig much lower than the probability of not encountering an orange echidna.
Neither actually exist, to my knowledge and experience (I was lucky enough to spot a few normal echidnas), and neither have been disproven by my experience (it's still possible that Australia is teeming with blue pigs and I was just unlucky), however: the claim that Australia is teeming with blue pigs is now less likely than the claim about the rare orange echidna.
This is, in fact, how science works. We calculate the probability of a null hypothesis being true given the experimental data. Probability theory being a logical, reasonable field of logical, reasonable mathematics.
If God A is omnipresent, eternal, and interacts with matter and electromagnetic radiation, it has a much higher probability of being detected scientifically than God B who was very tiny, billions of light years away, lived only for one second, and had the scattering cross-section of a neutrino. That is, the probability of not detecting God A ever is much lower than the probability of not detecting God B. Given that neither God A nor God B have been detected ever, God A is a less likely proposition than God B.
And the notion that God A is omnipresent, eternal, interacts with matter and electromagnetic radiation, but is not detectable unless He so chooses is non-scientific, and can be dismissed by scientists on those grounds.
If God A can be said to be less likely than God B, then it cannot be said that, unless proven or disproven, God cannot be said to be more likely to exist or not exist on scientific grounds (or indeed mathematical grounds), whatever characteristics God might have.
As an extra: any monotheistic God has a vanishingly small probability of existence if undetected, since there are an infinite number of possible monotheistic Gods and, by definition, at most one can exist, making the monotheistic God's probability of existence infinitesimal on mathematical grounds, again, no matter His characteristics beyond His monotheism.
All that matters here is to realize that theism/atheism aren't blind guesses as the list of arguments I provided shows. Agreed that each and every one of them is not perfect; nevertheless, their existence bespeaks a wish/desire/hope for evidence.
It might help to look at the history. 'God' or more specifically the concept of god was invented by man. No question. Hence only the concept of god exists. End of story.
Can a believer explain reality by referring to a basic tenet (such as God/Gods) that can be collectively shared and agreed upon - Yes.
Can a scientist explain reality by referring to a basic tenet (observation) that can be collectively shared and agreed upon - Yes.
Does a believer have a methodology to support their belief - yes. Doctrine, lifestyle, contemplation, prayer, anecdotal support, ethical principles, argument and logic.
Does a scientist have a methodology to support their belief -yes. Scientific method, experiment, observation, repeatability of result, hypothesis, ethical principles, argument and logic.
Does a believer observe their belief in action, function or influence of reality. Yes -creation, free will/karma etc, morals, justice, interpersonal relationships, social structures, applicability.
Does a scientist observe their beliefs in action , function or influence of reality. Yes -laws, dynamics, behaviours, interactions, applicability tecnology.
PARADIGM; is a believers understanding of God as reality subject to change, revision, redefinition and incorporation with current conditions? Can new interpretations and explanations be raised to satisfy current argument - Yes; new religions, interpretations etc.
PARADIGM; is a scientists understanding of the laws of nature of reality subject to change, revision, redefinition and incorporation with current conditions? Can new interpretations and explanations be raised to satisfy current argument -Yes. New theories, hypothesis and discoveries.
STABILITY; does the use of the concept of God stand up against the passage of time. Has the argument remained conserved despite millennia of discussion - neither denying or confirming Gods existence? Yes
STABILITY; Does a scientists use of the concept of observation stand up against the passage of time. Has the argument remain conserved despite
Millennia of discussion - neither finding an ultimate answer nor denying that one is achievable by these means? Yes.
The way I see it is that the spiritual and the scientific are observing the same thing - reality. But reality is dynamic and thus can be reasonably explained by either discipline. It is based on what the of evidence satisfies your trust in an explanation. Religion and science are not incompatible and it would be more constructive to unite the two through an understanding of consciousness rather than pointing out the innumerable differences that distinguish them.
If I am the only person who believes in a God and observe the entity all around me is that God real to me? Or am I delusional. If everyone believes in that God is it now real to me or still a delusion? The best description we have for reality is that which most people can agree upon.
Objective reality as perceived by subjects is the culmination of all subjective experiences.
So I believe we are in a constant evolving transition through history from "how reality is" when we do not have knowledge and thus control to "how reality does" when we do have knowledge and control. Going from that which is subject to the all knowing all powerful to that which is the all knowing/powerful.
Quoting 180 Proof
:mask:
They ARE blind guesses.
And there is PLENTY of evidence that at least one god exists...just as there is PLENTY of evidence that no gods exist.
We humans simply cannot tell which it is.
EVERYTHING THAT EXISTS, the stuff we humans know about and the stuff we do not know about is evidence of "at least one god exists" or "no gods exist."
We just cannot figure out which it is.
That does not stop some people from blindly guessing that at least one does exist that none exist; that it is more likely that one exists than that none exist; or that no gods exist than that at least one does.
All of them are blind guesses.
TMF,,,think this over carefully. It is important.
What on Earth does any of that have to do with the comment I made that you quoted?
Here is the quote again: "I further assert that one cannot establish that it IS MORE LIKELY that at least one god exists than that no gods exist using logic, reason, math, or science."
Please deal with that.
Okay...now prove that the concept of god was invented by man...rather than instilled in man by a god of some sort.
Thank you for sharing what you "believe."
But I am interested in the question being asked in the OP...and what I had to say about it.
Imagine the following scenario: Someone comes up to you with a closed opaque box in his hand and says, "what's in this in box?" The only answer you can give has to be a guess, a blind guess. Then this person shows you a second box and says, "there's something in this box. It's not an animal. what's in it?" Here, you have some information to go on and although you may ultimately have to make a guess, certain possibilities are ruled out, no? In other words, you employ logic with the second box, an option unavailable to you with the first box. I think the issue of god's existence is akin to the second box scenario.
By the way, why do you say, "think this over carefully. It is important." :chin:
I did. I even explicitly bring it back to the quote within the text. Did you not really read it? Too long? Brevity is not my strong suit.
Either way, the assertions regarding relative likelihood are poorly chosen, patently false in fact. That is my gist. If you want the details, refer to my previous response.
In the English language - and I assume all languages - it is possible to construct nonsense sentences that are grammatically correct but have no meaning.
"Quadruplicity drinks procrastination." "Colorless green ideas sleep furiously."
The question then arises - can we assign a truth value to such sentences? I'm a plain language person and am not as articulate or knowledgeable about these things as many folks on this forum - but to my limited knowledge there are two schools of thought on this question.
One school of thought basically says "Dammit, Jim! Quadruplicity does not drink procrastination!" :smile: I.e., all nonsense sentences are false.
The other school of thought says you cannot assign a truth value to incoherent sentences.
I'm with that second school - and - to my way of thinking, any sentence in the form "God(s) [do not] exists" is incoherent.
- - - - - - - - -
Before proceeding further I want to make my definitions of words clear.
Exists
When I use the word "exists" I mean physical existence. As someone who tries to follow the discussions on this forum, I am aware that this definition potentially opens up a philosophical can of worms and is subject to endless debate. But as a plain language person I am using the phrase "physical existence" in the same way that the average person on the street would use it. The universe as we know it is composed of atoms, sub-atomic particles that join together to form stars, planets, tables, cats on mats, people, etc
Truth value
When I use the word truth I am using it in the same sense as in a court of law. When you swear to "tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth" you are saying that the words that will come out of your mouth will form sentences that will describe events in the physical world - or at least as accurately as you are capable of.
- - - - - - - - - - -
With those definitions in mind - when I use the word "God" (or gods)? I am referring to a fictional character (or characters) that appear in various works of mythology. Most typically I am referring to the fictional character that appears in the Old & New Testaments.
So the sentence "God exists" is equivalent to the sentence"Harry Potter exists". Both are characters in works of fiction - and these characters have supernatural powers. God just happens to be a lot more powerful than Harry Potter.
So is the sentence "Harry Potter exists" coherent? Can we assign a truth value value to this sentence?
Going back to the two schools of thought I referenced earlier? You might say that of course fictional characters do not exist so this sentence is false - but to my way of thinking any sentence in the form "[some-non-existent-fictional-character] exists" is incoherent based on the definitions of the words.
I cannot make a blind guess about the sentence"God exists" any more than I can make a guess about "[n-leggedness] drinks procrastination". Does at least one [n-leggedness] drink procrastination? Do no [n-legednesses] drink procrastination? All are nonsense questions.
How is the second scenario any less a blind guess than the first...even with the "information?"
And what "information" do you have to make the answer to the question "Is it more likely there is at least one god...or is it more likely there are no gods."
Thank you. I'll pass.
The part of your response that I made bold is the problem, Eric.
"We" in your "...as we know it..." means we humans...the currently dominant life form on a nondescript hunk of rock circling a nondescript star in a nondescript galaxy among hundreds of billions of galaxies in what may be an infinite megaverse.
What makes you think that qualifies us to know what exists? What makes you suppose that what we can perceive with our senses limits what exists?
Your dime. I'll bear it in mind for next time.
Why is "believe" in quotation marks here? It's not exactly up for debate whether beliefs exist nor whether my belief is as permissible as anyone elses. Comes across a little sarcastic/standoff-ish but I dunno I could be reading too much into it. I just gave a perspective on the commonalities between scientific endeavour and religious endeavour.
I put the words "believe" and "belief" in quotation marks just about EVERY time I type either. You would see that by inspecting my posts here in Philosophy Forum...and any of the other half-dozen fora where I participate. (I've posted tens of thousands of comments in various fora over the last two plus decades.)
There is nothing sarcastic about the quotation marks. I have explained my disdain for those two words when used in discussions of this topic on many of occasions...and simply show the disdain by using the quotation marks.
You are totally entitled to "believe" anything you want. Lewis Carroll, who apparently had the same thoughts about "beliefs" as I, had the Red Queen mention that she "believed" as many as six impossible things before breakfast.
Many of the things people "believe" are correct...but many are totally incorrect.
OK good point. My best answer would be along the lines that I don't believe in magic. And by 'magic' I mean something that defies logic, analysis and understanding. Instilling an idea into man by God requires magic. Man inventing the idea of God does not require magic.
Aside from the fact that what you "believe"should not enter the picture at this point...
...I would ask you now to prove that installing an idea into man by a god (NOT God, but a god) requires magic.
Or...anyone here can take a shortcut to showing that I am dead wrong on this issue by simply coming up with a syllogistic P1 and P2 that leads to any of the following C's:
1) Therefore there are no gods.
2) Therefore there is at least one god.
3) Therefore it is more likely that there are no gods than that there is at least one.
4) Therefore it is more likely that there is at least one god than that there are none.
I acknowledge that anyone doing that...would essentially be completely destroying my assertion.
Okay I appreciate the clarification. Thanks :)
I would argue that the installation of a concept of God into humanity is not by magic but rather necessity and furthermore does not strictly work unidirectionally - that is to say by artifcial construction/creation by human minds and applied to the universe, but also from the universe applied to the development and evolution of first perception, then language, and intuitive questioning.
Perhaps some conscious ideas are archetypes that occur naturally without the influence of culture or societal constructs. For example "pattern". I doubt "pattern" is a culturally developed /artificially manufactured idea but rather something a). Necessary for the evolution of conscious beings and b). A quality of the universe which is observable and useful as a natural platform for which aspects of language can be based to qualify such a phenomenon which inherently exists.
Also words like "mother" which naturally derive from the biological parameters required for sexual reproduction and thus continuity if life. Or "cycle" or "food", "sun", "light", "power". All of these things are both required to form life and words constructed by life to identify what contributed to their own existence.
In that sense "God" - though difficult to define and heavily loaded with added cultural annotations and societal revision could have originally been a simple and effective definition for energy, consciousness, origin, creation, continuity, subjectivity, awe, wonder etc. All of which are now considered somewhat associated to general descriptions of the entity/ experience of the universe.
The universe created us. Whether intentionally or by progresive natural physical processes or emergence. In either case, considering the lack of knowledge our earliest ancestors had regarding just about anything non- instinctive or habitual it's quite incredible to develop such a concept as a definition for all of space (omnipresence), all information and perceivable data (omniscience) and all energy, potential and capacity (omnipotence).
Let alone a definition which has remained applicable to this day millennia later.
You are making the implicit assumptions that 1. Beliefs are not a part of philosophy and 2. that syllogisms are.
I disagree with both.
At no point have I suggested "beliefs" are not a part of philosophy...nor have I inferred it. It would be an absurdity to do so. My comment dealt with YOUR "beliefs" about magic...and about something that "YOUR 'belief'" tend to show a defiance of LOGIC.
The assertion that started all this was: One cannot get to "there are no gods" "there is at least one" or the likelihood of either...via logic.
Syllogisms ARE a part of logic...and YOU raised logic.
Are you suggesting that logic should play no part in a philosophical discussion?
Predicates define X,
X lacks predicates,
X is undefined;
~X (i.e. "there is not X").
There are gods,
"gods" lacks predicates,
"gods" is undefined;
~gods (i.e. "there are no gods")
DEEEstroyed, Frankie. :sweat: Been there, done that. :victory:
Indeed. Humanity has been around in it's present form for, let's say, 40K years. it's only in the last 400 years or so that we're beginning to grasp our place in the universe and our knowledge seems to be exponentially expanding. Likely we know as much about the nature of the universe/existence as an ant walking across a stadium field understands the rules of football. OK, maybe a bit more.
So we can hypothesize that there may be whole modalities (for want of a better word) of experience or existence (for want of better words) that we are not equipped for or ready to understand.
But in these hypothetical futures would there even be such a thing as sentences, grammar, semantics, etc? Would there be any way to even express the sentence "God exists"?
Of course there is no answer to this question - since this question is just as incoherent as the original sentence "God exists"
Certainly logic is important but it needs to be rigorous. Syllogisms are not, IMO, logically rigorous.
See earlier thread : https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/414510
Not even close.
In fact...there is not even a mention of "therefore there are no gods" because you know the "logic" is missing. Your syllogism would be laughed at by any logician.
But thanks for trying. I've not had many who even gives it a shot.
Eric, I truly appreciate your intellect and attempt to deal with the problem here, but if you look at your attempt carefully, you will see it as a variation on "I cannot show either side logically, so better to just say that the question itself is incoherent or unworthy."
The question of the true nature of the REALITY of existence...is both coherent and worthy of consideration...even though it is obvious that at this moment in our evolution...we humans are unable to answer questions to which people, for some reasons, want to pretend they know the answers.
Are there any gods involved in the REALITY is such a question.
My point is that one cannot get to X using logic.
Countering that you are essentially claiming that logic is not rigorous enough for the task.
In one way you are defending my position...in another you are unnecessarily and inappropriately maligning LOGIC!
C'mon, AS.
Not sure what that was supposed to mean.
But I do not like the sound of that "Frankie" you are using.
I will be 84 years old in a few weeks. I think I deserve better.
The "logic" in the post in question was not logic...the syllogism was an abomination.
If you consider that an insult...consult a logician (any nearby college or university), and he/she will tell you that there is no logic in what you supposed to be logic.
I do not create a "silly house of cards"...and you have not made a dent in any arguments I have made.
Plus, you did not even attempt to get at any of the C's I proposed.
Lastly, if you refer to me as Frankie, again, I will simply ignore any comments you write from that point on...and that will be a permanent ignore. I hope you do not do it. I enjoy reading what you write, but this stuff stops immediately.
Thank you, 180.
All I can suggest is that you ask a logician about the syllogism that you suppose destroyed my contention. It is fatally defective. All I can do here is to mention that it is. The arguments necessary to establish the validity of my criticism essentially require a detailed lesson in how syllogisms work...which is way beyond what I want to do. If you truly want to check this out...just copy and paste your post above into an email and send it to a professor of logic at a local university.
You certainly can Google "syllogisms valid or invalid" and get a sense of what I mean...but they go on forever.
In any case, as to predicate: I have identified what I mean when speaking about "god/gods" in these discussions. Several times, in fact.
Here are two:
#1:
[b]What do I mean when I use the word “god” in questions like “Do you think it more likely that there are no gods than that there is at least one?”
I mean an entity of agency…something that existed BEFORE this thing we humans call the universe came into being…and which caused or helped to cause it to “come into being.”
I am NOT talking about anything “supernatural.” Anything that exists…is, by definition, a part of existence. If ghosts or spirit beings exist, but we humans cannot sense them in any way…they are part of what exists and are a part of nature, no matter the fact that we cannot perceive them.
I suspect there may be LOTS of things that do exist…that humans are incapable of detecting in any way. We are, after all, just the currently dominant species on a nondescript hunk of rock circling a nondescript star in a nondescript galaxy among thousands of billions of galaxies.[/b]
#2
[b]What I mean when I use the words “God” or “gods.”
Predicates:
It is my opinion that what we humans call “the universe” may well not be everything that exists. All these hundreds of billions of galaxies each containing hundreds of billions of stars…may be just a tiny part of something incomprehensibly larger.
Secondly, even here is this thing we humans call “the universe” there may well exist entities that are not discernable to human senses in any way.
Thirdly, I posit that anything that exists (whether we humans know or do not know it exists) is a part of nature. IT EXISTS. The notion of supernatural (meaning outside of what exists) makes no sense to me.
Okay…with those predicates in mind…when I use the words “God” or “gods” I am talking about any entity (or entities), whatever its make-up or characteristics, that pre-existed this thing we humans call “the universe” and was the cause of its creation or instrumental in its creation in some meaningful way.
The notion, we need to revere, honor, and worship any God or gods that do exist does not enter the picture. (I am not saying such a GOD could not exist.) The need for omnipotence or continued involvement in not involved in what I mean. (I am not saying that could not be the case.)[/b]
And how do we define the word "gods" and "reality" in such a way that the question makes any coherent sense?
Other folks on the forum have said this better than I - all religious talk is a form of poetry. Now I think that I appreciate a good poem as much as the next person. Poetry can be beautiful and it can inspire people to do great and/or terrible things. But the words "true" and "false" do not apply to a poem. We cannot subject a poem to the sort of "either this or that" analysis that you are attempting to do.
Anyway, as you can see, we're looping around here saying the same thing in different words. I'll give you last word here - if you want it that is . . . :smile:
Oh - and thank you for the kind words of praise.
If you truly want to suspend discussion on this topic...makes no sense for me to reply to the questions in your first sentence. I have answered both of those items by giving MY definitions...and would gladly extend those comments. We could then discuss the issue with those definitions in play. (We could have another discussion afterward using your definitions if you choose.)
I do not want there to be a "last word." This is a discussion of something that has captured the imagination and considerations of some of the most learned and intelligent people who have ever lived on the planet...unfortunately to precious little avail.
This is just a discussion of what I consider an extremely interesting topic.
If you would like to continue it...great. If you prefer to drop it...fine.
Not sure how to calculate the probability of those old, sumptuous stories being literal history, but I'd say rather unlikely.
As (mere) characters in stories, a whole lot of fantastic, fictional beings exist, that come to life in the heads of people.
Diametrically opposite, if you will, surely there's plenty unknown to us, so that, in itself, is about certain.
Whatever that may be, perhaps it could include superbeings of sorts, which would then be a "who the heck knows"?
Since this is a philosophy forum, there are other special uses of the term "god" (or in plural), though they'd have to be related to the most common use in some way or other, yes?
These supposed beings aren't shown and don't show, so we'd then need a sufficient characterization of what they're supposed to be instead, something that makes a difference; otherwise we're asked to calculate the plausibility of the independent existence of whatever vague, nebulous entities that come to mind when invoking the words.
Or, are we just talking (ontologized) abstract objects (Platonia style)?
Ignosticism (Wikipedia)
Theological noncognitivism (Wikipedia)
Abstract Objects (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
H = Hypothesis (that god exists)
E = Evidence observed
P(X) = probability that X is true
P(X/Y) = probability that X is true given thaf Y is true
P(H/E) = [P(H) × P(E/H)]/{[P(H) × P(E/H)] × [P(~H) × P(E/~H)]}
That's the reason I use "gods."
I'm talking "gods."
Beings (or a being) that exist...whether we humans can perceive of that existence or not. An entity of agency…something that existed BEFORE this thing we humans call the universe came into being…and which caused or helped to cause it to “come into being.”
I suck at math.
But I can see that if the H is changed to (no gods exist)...
...we can come to the same whatever.
And given that "...given that Y is true" sounds very contrived...gratuitous or self-serving.
Who proclaimed that Y is true...some god?
Maybe somewhat antropocentric/morphic, conducive to people imagining whatever, ...
On par with The Matrix, Bostrom's hypothesis, "real dreamworlds", nondescript (panen)deism, what-have-you, ...
On the other hand, atemporal mind ("outside it all") is incoherent nonsense, so that's one out anyway.
What does it take to be labeled a god/God anyway?
If both what is said, and the negation, are consistent with attainable evidence, then further knowledge thereof is unattainable, and, so, yeah, calculations are another timewaster.
Differentiation makes a difference.
Okay. That happens.
Perhaps we will meet in another thread where you will be more comfortable with the subject matter.
In my opinion, science has determined facts about the universe. This isn’t to say we know everything about the universe, but some things we can be certain of. Of these facts, all are physical in nature. If asserting that at least one God exists violates any of these facts, it is very unlikely to be true, because experience has shown us that these facts have never been violated. To say that the existence of at least one God is just as plausible or likely as the nonexistence of all Gods is to deny the effectiveness of science. IOWs, asking me to accept that the existence of at least one God is just as likely as the nonexistence of all Gods is also asking me to discard all that is known about the universe. And you’re asking me to do this without presenting any evidence whatsoever. Therefore it seems to me that it is more likely that our scientific facts are in fact factual, and that the God hypothesis is highly unlikely to be true.
C'mon, Pinprick. You are smarter than this.
Even you said it early...of the "facts" we think we know (humans have been fooled about that through the years)..."all are physical in nature."
Well...perhaps there are "facts" that are not physical in nature. Perhaps there are "facts" that humans cannot discern. Perhaps we are not nearly as advanced as we think we are. Perhaps we are to truly intelligent beings...what ants are to us.
Any guesses about whether gods exist or not (or for that matter, whether any non-physical beings exist) is nothing but a guess. And just as pre-history people made guesses about the nature of things that we find laughable today...perhaps all that science stuff you are touting will be laughable to humans of a couple hundred years from now.
Guess if you want to that there are no gods. Guess if you want to that it is more likely that there are no gods than that there is at least one...but if you are going to pretend those guesses are any more logical or scientific than guesses that there is at least one god...or that it is more likely that there is at least one...
...you are kidding yourself.
Let's discuss it further. This is good stuff.
All of that can be true, but it misses the crux of the issue; that the existence of a god violates physics. At the moment I have every reason to believe in science, and no reason to believe something that contradicts it. If there was some justification that could explain rationally why science is incorrect, then and only then would both propositions be considered to have an equal probability of being true. But as it stands, belief in the existence of a God requires absolute faith, whereas science does not.
Quoting Frank Apisa
Some of it may be, but wouldn’t you agree that some things we’re right about? Electromagnetism isn’t going anywhere, and neither is inertia or thermodynamics. We understand/know some fundamental things about the world we live in.
You posit that "the existence of a god violates physics." That is as much a "belief" as the theistic guess that there is a GOD.
Actually, most "science" requires as much "faith" as does a "belief in a god." Perhaps you meant math.
Quoting Pinprick
Yeah...and perhaps gravity.
BUT...perhaps we will discover that things exist that most people think cannot possibly exist.
BOTTOM LINE: We cannot calculate the probability of "there is a GOD" "there are no gods" "it is more likely one way or the other."
We simply cannot do it.
And we cannot come to any of those things by logic. Give it a try if you think you can. Here is the C:
Therefore it is more likely that there are no gods than that there is at least one. (Choose the other side if you prefer.)
Please provide the P1 and P2 that gets you to it.
Best to just leave it at "I do not know."
Spot-on. :up: Frank's something of a radical relativist, or dogmatic skeptic like the proto-p0m0 Gorgias, (which, of course, is self-refuting), for whom every good argument is, at best, just "a guess"; it's lost on him, apparently, that his objections are only "guesses" too, and are almost never even arguments - good or bad - themselves.
Frank's obstinately incorrigible on this point: every (theistic) g/G = magic, and magic is inconsistent with - contrary to - physics, and physics obtains in the absence of wholesale falsification; therefore no (theistic) g/G obtains.
So until he acquaints himself with e.g. Sextus Empiricus, or Hume, or Popper/Feyerabend or Haack, Frank's bound to keep on mistaking 'equipollence' where there isn't any and unfortunately drawing epistemic or logical 'false equivalences' that mislead him into disbelieving "seeing faces" in clouds and the clouds themselves and/or just missing the forest fire for unburnt trees, etc.)
BALONEY!
Any one of you could show me to be totally wrong on this issue by expressing a reasonable P1 and P2 to reach a C of:
Therefore there is a God.
Therefore there are no gods.
Therefore it is more likely that there are no gods than that there is at least one.
Therefore it is more likely that there is at least one god than that there are none.
You cannot do it...I realize that and so do you.
Again, making my point. :smirk:
[quote=Frank Apisa]"... g/G = magic, and magic is inconsistent with - contrary to - physics, and physics obtains in the absence of wholesale falsification; therefore no (theistic) g/G obtains."
— 180 Proof
Any one of you could show me to be totally wrong on this issue ... You cannot do it.[/quote]
:up:
Thanks, @Pinprick!
I'll wait for the P1 and P2. They will never come. I've been doing this for about 40 years...and NBEVER has had anything that comes close.
Mostly attempts devolve into mocking the question...which it what is happening here.
Well, sir, Onan's got nothing on you. Carry on ...
Yup...just insults and mocking comments.
If you could defeat the argument...you would do it in an instant. But you cannot, so Onan comes on the scene. My aunt's parakeet has nothing to do with this. (She named her parakeet Onan, because he spilled his seed on the ground.)
If you could show any of my arguments on any thread have not defeated your position - I've given you a lot of targets to take shots at - you would have, Frank, but you can no more defend your position with a valid argument than you can soundly defeat my (or almost any member's) counter arguments. All you ever do is deny deny deny anything anyone expresses that you don't agree with and/or understand with what amounts to "no no no" tantrums. I've not ever tried to persuade you out of your confusion, only expose you as a specimen of garden-variety, anti-philosophical, dogmatic confusion for public display. No "wise men" or "wise women" here, friend, only fools of varying degrees of self-awareness (Dunning-Kruger effect notwithstanding), or at different levels of recovery. So I'll keep on casting my pearls, sir, and you keep on spilling your "no no no" seed. :up:
You've even got the "Onan" analogy wrong.
My immediate contention is that you cannot logically show that it is more likely that there are no gods than that there is at least one (or vice versa)...and it is obvious that you cannot.
That seems to be upsetting you.
Calm down...and deal with it. Best you just acknowledge that you cannot. But you do not seem to be the type to do something like that. If I am correct, it is a trait you share with the current President of the United States.
I am not trolling. I am responding to posts here in a thread I started.
If you sense a troll...perhaps you are detecting....YOU.
C'mon. Kick your game into second gear, at least. You are chugging.
:100:
So accurate, except Ive come to realise Frank is mentally ill, dementia, delusions of grandeur or Bi-polar (though its uncommon for episodes to last so long and consistently so maybe not.).
Its obviously very difficult to pin point his actual problem by his posts, but I think its equally obvious that he has some kind of mental illness. To that end, he deserves our pity rather than our derision. You should just let him be dude, I really dont think he can help himself. Engagement usually feeds the fantasy.
Apologies for being preachy...I just feel a bit bad for him, hopefully he has family or friends who help him through the worst of it. If he needs to act like he does to cope, the behaviour is easy to ignore and might be a needed mechanism for him.
That was lame, Dingo.
BOTTOM LINE: Any of you could destroy my assertion by presenting a reasonable syllogism that shows a conclusion of:
Therefore there are no gods.
Therefore there is at least one god.
Therefore it is more likely that there are no gods than that there is at least one.
Therefore it is more likely that there is at least one god than that there are none.
YOU CANNOT DO IT...because all of those "conclusions" are not actually are conclusions, they are merely guesses.
My guess is that you guys identify as atheists. The people who identify as Christians, Muslims, Hindus, etc...acknowledge "I BELIEVE..." Mostly it is just the atheist who pretend that their guesses are actually logic, reason, and science at work.
Laughable. And so...we get something like this. Accusations of mental illness.
Imagine...being so put out by being told the truth...that you must accuse the messenger of mental illness!
You didn't really address anything (just took a guess at what's in my head instead).
Quoting jorndoe
... say, a definition.
Thus, your definition is exactly what any calculation (and much else) depends on, it's all we have to go on in the first place.
Define so that no calculation is feasible, then so be it. Define so that a calculation is feasible, then calculation it is. Define so that this-and-that, then deal with the implications thereof.
Quoting Frank Apisa
Vagueness aside, can you include something that admits calculation?
Better still, some implications that we can go out and check tomorrow (verifications-falsifications)?
Otherwise you've just set things up so that calculation-verification-falsification can't be done in the first place.
Okay.
Perhaps we can meet in a discussion some time where we are more in tune.
I have found that some people are uncomfortable discussing this topic and do whatever they can to derail it or simply stop it on the tracks.
I have given a definition of what I mean by "god" when discussing the issue.
I have asserted that I have never had anyone give me a logical argument that arrives at any of these four conclusions:
Therefore there are no gods.
Therefore there is at least one god.
Therefore it is more likely that there are no gods than that there is at least one.
Therefore it is more likely that there is at least one god than that there are none.
If you can present an argument, preferably in syllogistic form, that does, please do it. Otherwise, let's just hold off interaction until we find a topic which we can discuss.
Your definition is what sets out whether calculation-verification-falsification can be done from they get-go.
Quoting Frank Apisa
If "the universe" includes time, then "agency" isn't a mind.
Quoting jorndoe
Besides, "before time" is incoherent.
Okay, maybe we can discuss some good movies we've enjoyed recently.
You start the thread. I promise I will visit and contribute.
Ok. If you want to argue that God’s existence would not violate physics, then you would need to provide a definition of God that shows that to be true. Good luck.
Quoting Frank Apisa
How do you define faith? To me it’s believing something without evidence/reason to do so. It must mean something different for you, unless you think we have no reason/evidence to believe in gravity, etc.
Quoting Frank Apisa
Irrelevant. All things we have, or ever will, discover are physical. There’s no way we could ever discover God, if that’s what you’re implying.
Quoting Frank Apisa
P1: Science has discovered physical facts about the universe that are up to this point inviolable.
P2: The existence of God would violate these facts, namely the fact that all real objects and forces are explainable in physical terms, but also causality/determinism.
C: Therefore it is more likely that no Gods exist.
I also have a question for you. If I drop a ball, which is more likely to happen? That it falls towards the Earth, or that it floats up towards the sky? I would also like you to explain your answer.
:up:
You are the one making the assertion that the existence of a god would violate physics. You must mean the "physics" of which we are currently aware. (Even that would be a difficult thing to prove.)
The existence of a god might not violate physics that we simply do not yet know.
I'm willing to go with your definition. But supposing that science has answered questions like "Are there any gods? is an absurdity. If it did, all scientists would be atheists. People like Albert Einstein, Carl Sagan, Stephen Hawking...all cringed at the sound of anyone calling them atheists. They were agnostics...acknowledging that it was an unknown.
Not irrelevant at all. Not by a long shot.
I do agree with you, sorta. My guess would be that we will never confirm that a GOD exists...and my guess would be that we will never confirm that no gods exist...never confirm that it is more likely one way or the other.
Just guesses. We humans are crafty, and may find a way to do it.
Thank you for sharing your guess about that.
That is the worst attempt at a syllogism I've seen in quite a while. You did not even come close, but thank you for the laugh.
Towards the Earth.
Ummm...only three words there. Which one did you not understand?
Ok, finally we agree! :clap: "Pre-exist ... the universe" is synonymous with "supernatural (... outside of what exists)" which, as you say, "MAKES NO SENSE". So you've come around to what I've claimed all along: the so-called "gods" you keep saying you're "agnostic" about "MAKES NO SENSE" (&÷#@$% as pointed out here) and, therefore, you're not even "agnostic", just inadvertantly GODLESS (i.e. atheos).Great work! :up:
Quoting Frank Apisa
I've already called you out on this, man, thoroughly debunking this BULL with their own words. Stop lying, Frank. :sweat:
If you want to think anything that exists...does not exist...be my guest.
AS FOR ALBERT EINSTEIN:
“My position concerning God is that of an agnostic. I am convinced that a vivid consciousness of the primary importance of moral principles for the betterment and ennoblement of life does not need the idea of a law-giver, especially a law-giver who works on the basis of reward and punishment.”
Albert Einstein in a letter to M. Berkowitz, October 25, 1950; Einstein Archive 59-215; from Alice Calaprice, ed., The Expanded Quotable Einstein, Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 2000, p. 216.
AS FOR STEPHEN HAWKING:
In his book on Stephen Hawking, “Stephen Hawking, the Big Bang, and God, Henry F. Schaefer III, writes:
Now, lest anyone be confused, let me state that Hawking strenuously denies charges that he is an atheist. When he is accused of that he really gets angry and says that such assertions are not true at all. He is an agnostic or deist or something more along those lines. He's certainly not an atheist and not even very sympathetic to atheism.
AS FOR CARL SAGAN:
In a March 1996 profile by Jim Dawson in the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Sagan talked about his then-new book The Demon Haunted World and was asked about his personal spiritual views: "My view is that if there is no evidence for it, then forget about it," he said. "An agnostic is somebody who doesn't believe in something until there is evidence for it, so I'm agnostic."
I e-mailed the person who would know Sagan’s views better than anyone: Ann Druyan, Sagan’s widow. I specifically asked her about the quote in my 1996 story (“An atheist has to know a lot more than I know. An atheist is someone who knows there is no God”). Druyan responded:
“Carl meant exactly what he said. He used words with great care. He did not know if there was a god. It is my understanding that to be an atheist is to take the position that it is known that there is no god or equivalent. Carl was comfortable with the label ‘agnostic’ but not ‘atheist.'”
Stop with YOUR bull, 180. You are embarrassing yourself.
180 writes: "I've already called you out on this, man, thoroughly debunking this BULL with their own words. Stop lying, Frank."
I post proof that what I said was correct...and he posts an emoticon.
A person with a bit of ethical backbone would have simply acknowledged that I was correct. Even a LITTLE TINY bit of ethical backbone.
Here's one back atcha: :razz:
But you're not correct, Frank. That's what so laughable. You're so wrong because your statements on this topic are, more often than not, not even false. :lol:
Yeah, because it would. At the very least a definition of God includes an immaterial being that causes physical effects through creation or somehow interfering in our day to day lives. That is physically impossible, because we are able to explain all effects through physical causes.
Quoting Frank Apisa
Unless the physics of the future refutes physical causality the existence of God would still violate physics.
Quoting Frank Apisa
Then explain how science depends on faith instead of reason.
Quoting Frank Apisa
Then show which premise is incorrect, or fallacy I committed.
Quoting Frank Apisa
I mean why would it be more likely to fall towards the Earth? If it’s because the laws of physics make it more likely to do so, then you’re implying that it is unlikely for the laws of physics to be violated, which is precisely the same logic I’m using to show why it’s unlikely that any Gods exist.
At best, Frank's "science depends on faith" depends on faith (even, or especially, to him). Bet you two bits, Pinprick, nothing remotely like the explanation you're asking of him will be forthcoming. Here comes another (more or less) "Because I say so" ...
C'mon, 180. A bit of originality would be welcome from you.
Anyway...of course I am correct.
But you still are not ethical enough to concede it.
My guess: You are an atheist. Just about every person who uses atheist as a descriptor blindly guesses that there are no gods...or blindly guesses that it is more likely that there are no gods than that there is at least one. But they like to pretend that their blind guesses are actually something scientific or logical.
Poor them.
You also lack what it takes to acknowledge the obvious...that one cannot logically or scientifically come to "there is at least one god" or "there are no gods" or "it is more likely one way or the other."
Some people blindly guess one way or the other on those questions...and just cannot acknowledge they are blindly guessing.
You are not using logic to show it is unlikely that any gods exist. You are using stubbornness to show that you do not have the ethical qualities needed to acknowledge that it cannot be done. The finest minds that have ever lived on our planet have tried IN BOTH DIRECTION...and failed miserably. But you suppose you have done it here in this forum!!!
That should be a clue that you are kidding yourself. I doubt you will take it.
Some people blindly guess one way or the other ... and just cannot acknowledge they are blindly guessing.[/quote]
@Pinprick :point: Told ya! :yawn:
Yup...I told the truth.
I coulda told you that!
Lol, logic is stubborn...
Quoting Frank Apisa
How many of these “finest minds” support your claims?
I’m disappointed in you Frank, but not surprised. I gave you every opportunity to demonstrate where my faults are and you refuse to engage me. You just resort to parroting yourself. Maybe eating your own words will make point easier to digest...
Quoting Frank Apisa
Enjoy your just deserts Frank. Bon appetit. :vomit:
:roll:
Yup...undoubtedly two atheists...in a world of denial.
To be fair, theists also are in denial, but at least most theists have the ethical wherewithal to acknowledge they just "believe" the things they "believe." Atheists like you two kid yourselves further by pretending you are reaching your "beliefs" (your blind guesses) via science and logic. Most actual scientists and logicians would never pretend to arrive where you have. (That's the reason people like Einstein, Sagan, and Hawking became angry when called an "atheist.")
But...if the pretense helps make you feel safe...go for it.
It is actually fun to watch.
My guess is you will wake up to the truth at some point. It will be stunning when the realization hits. I hope you are not repairing a roof...or sawing at a tree branch on a ladder when it happens.
Mister Frank is completely effin' delusional. :roll:
Quoting Frank Apisa
It is not I who is delusional.
If you think you have arrived at "There are no gods" or "It is more likely that there are no gods than that there is at least one" through logic or science...
...YOU are delusional.
But if you want to kid yourself...be my guest. It truly is fun to watch.
Stop trolling & projecting.
:mask: :victory:
Happy Solstice back at you, 180.
I am not trolling or projecting. I started this thread. I reply to all postings. Please continue to post. I enjoy replying to your comments.
If "God" exists then there is at least one thing about it that separates it from everything else. If we can't establish what those things are, then it's unclear what we are even talking about (i.e. "God" is unintelligible). However, if we are clear on what properties "God" has and no evidence supports "God" having them, then the "God" we've defined clearly doesn't exist. In that way, the idea that science has no bearing on the matter seems misguided.
I also can't figure out why anyone would want to set the bar any lower.
That was almost beneath you...but like Trump, apparently there is no depth to which you will not sink.
Okay...ya gotta deal with your type if you want to discussing issues on the Internet.
Are you saying that no gods exist...and that you arrived at that "conclusion" through science or logic, Sunlight?
Or are you just trying to eliminate the question by suggesting it to be "misguided?"
The knowledge of them..is there category..
So if we think those categories are alive..then yes..all those Gods exist.. not just as categories of knowledge but as individual beings..
Why don't you man up, if you are able, and acknowledge that the remark was aimed at me? No need to be cowardly about it.
If Sunlight wants to have a conversation with me, I am more than willing. We'll see if he/sh wants to.
In the meantime, I know you cannot calculate the "likelihood" that "no gods is more likely than at least one god" nor "at least one god is more likely than no gods."
Both are nothing but blind guesses.
I get a kick out of atheists pretending their blind guess is something more.
Good on @Sunlight :up: - s/he knows flypaper when s/he sees it.
I did not wiff...and your protestations of being charitable sound like the stuff Trump spews during his "speeches."
If Sunlight wants to discuss this issue with me...I am here to discuss it.
You really shouldn't let the fact that you are as much a "believer" as any theist bother you so. Bad for your blood pressure.