Happy Atheist Forum

Is it possible for the God of the Bible to reveal things to us in such a way that we can know them for certain?

Yes.

Assuming for the sake of argument that he exists, that is.

So you have just admitted that I have a path to knowledge. So then how can you, without God, know anything for certain?

QuoteIs it possible for the God of the Bible to reveal things to us in such a way that we can know them for certain?

Let me get this right. You come to an atheist forum wanting to know if we believe that the God of the bible can reveal things to people?

Really?? What kind of answer are you expecting from atheists, like me, who don't even believe that this God exists?

What I'm trying to ask is this:

If, for the sake of argument, the infinite God of the Bible exists, could He reveal things to the human race such that we could know them to be certain?

Quote from: "FaithInGod"So you have just admitted that I have a path to knowledge. So then how can you, without God, know anything for certain?

I don't see anybody saying a god would do that, just that maybe it could, if maybe it existed.  Why do you assume it will (thus also assuming you have some path to knowledge)?  And even if anybody had said that, and it were true, why do you then appear to be leaping to the conclusion that that would be the only path to knowledge?  

Quote from: "Persimmon Hamster"

Quote from: "FaithInGod"So you have just admitted that I have a path to knowledge. So then how can you, without God, know anything for certain?

I don't see anybody saying a god would do that, just that maybe it could, if maybe it existed.  Why do you assume it will (thus also assuming you have some path to knowledge)?  And even if anybody had said that, and it were true, why do you then appear to be leaping to the conclusion that that would be the only path to knowledge?  

You have not explained to me how you know anything for certain. Please tell me anything you know for certain and how you know it to be certain.

Quote from: "FaithInGod"You have not explained to me how you know anything for certain. Please tell me anything you know for certain and how you know it to be certain.

Hah.  That's a funny reply, considering my original response was going to start off as follows:

Define "infinite God of the Bible", "reveal", "things", and "know"/"certain".

Notice I didn't answer your question myself yet.  I would await your definitions first.

Quote from: "Persimmon Hamster"

Quote from: "FaithInGod"You have not explained to me how you know anything for certain. Please tell me anything you know for certain and how you know it to be certain.

Hah.  That's a funny reply, considering my original response was going to start off as follows:

Define "infinite God of the Bible", "reveal", "things", and "know"/"certain".

Notice I didn't answer your question myself yet.  I would await your definitions first.

The God of the Bible is all-knowing and all-powerful. Could this God, if He exists, reveal (show/tell/give) things (knowledge/info) to us in such a way that we could know (understand/believe) it for certain (100%)?

QuoteWhat I'm trying to ask is this: If, for the sake of argument, the infinite God of the Bible exists

And... you lost me right there. To atheists, the god of the bible does NOT exist. Therefore, your question doesn't even deserve an answer. As you say, "for the sake of argument".. Are you feeling a little contentious today?

Quote from: "FaithInGod"The God of the Bible is all-knowing and all-powerful. Could this God, if He exists, reveal (show/tell/give) things (knowledge/info) to us in such a way that we could know (understand/believe) it for certain (100%)?

One would have to first believe God.  IOW, all this knowledge would have to come FROM God specifically to then believe IN God.  Yes?

I just confused myself.  haha.

Quote from: "lundberg500"

QuoteWhat I'm trying to ask is this: If, for the sake of argument, the infinite God of the Bible exists

And... you lost me right there. To atheists, the god of the bible does NOT exist. Therefore, your question doesn't even deserve an answer. As you say, "for the sake of argument".. Are you feeling a little contentious today?

So would you say that it isn't possible?

How can you (and the rest of humanity) know anything for absolute certainty?

I used "for the sake of argument" because that is how the first atheist responded.

Quote from: "FaithInGod"Is it possible for the God of the Bible to reveal things to us in such a way that we can know them for certain?

No; the "God of the Bible" does not exist, therefore it is imposslible for it to reveal anything to anyone.

Quote from: "elliebean"

Quote from: "FaithInGod"Is it possible for the God of the Bible to reveal things to us in such a way that we can know them for certain?

No; the "God of the Bible" does not exist, therefore it is imposslible for it to reveal anything to anyone.

So how can you (and the rest of humanity), without God, know anything for absolute certainty?

QuoteHow can you (and the rest of humanity) know anything for absolute certainty?

I go where the evidence (or lack of), common sense, logic, and reason lead me to.

I can tell you one thing for certain: there is NO evidence, NO logic, NO reason, and NO common sense to be found in the bible.

Yes, he could show us that he exists. Why doesn't he have already done that? Either because he's a prick, or he doesn't exist.

Now, I'm not sure that we could be completely, one-hundred percent certain that it was God. There always exists another explanation for events.That's why we can't really be completely one-hundred percent sure of anything, I think, but we can know things to be true well beyond a reasonable doubt.

Quote from: "FaithInGod"

Quote from: "elliebean"

Quote from: "FaithInGod"Is it possible for the God of the Bible to reveal things to us in such a way that we can know them for certain?

No; the "God of the Bible" does not exist, therefore it is imposslible for it to reveal anything to anyone.

So how can you (and the rest of humanity), without God, know anything for absolute certainty?

Absolute certainty doesn't exist either, so even if your god did, it would still be impossible for it to do as you propose.

Quote from: "FaithInGod"The God of the Bible is all-knowing and all-powerful.

According to whom?  Please cite sources.
Your definition of this god is a logical paradox, so the question seems pointless.  An omnipotent being could lie, and fabricate evidence (beyond our ability to deny) in support of that lie, meaning 100% certainty among human beings cannot exist and that being would be powerless to give it to us, meaning it is not omnipotent.

Quote from: "FaithInGod"Is it possible for the God of the Bible to reveal things to us in such a way that we can know them for certain?

1. Logically possible? Sure. Yet, it's also logically possible for the FSM to reveal the meaning of noodles as well.

2. I don't believe that your god exists, so the question is meaningless.

3. No one knows anything with absolute certainty.

Quote from: "FaithInGod"The God of the Bible is all-knowing and all-powerful. Could this God, if He exists, reveal (show/tell/give) things (knowledge/info) to us in such a way that we could know (understand/believe) it for certain (100%)?

To borrow an idea from Carl Sagan, he could put "I am the Lord thy God" in five-hundred-km-long letters on the surface of the Moon where everyone in the world could see them.

Of course, this doesn't address your point about subjective perception of reality, because let's face it, if you truly believed that we're incapable of perceiving the world the way it actually is, you would likely have already done something fatal.

Nor have you shown how it is only your god's "existence" that enables us to have knowledge.  I've noticed that deer don't run off cliffs thinking they can fly.  Would you do so if you were an atheist?

I didn't think so.

Quote from: "Thumpalumpacus"To borrow an idea from Carl Sagan, he could put "I am the Lord thy God" in five-hundred-km-long letters on the surface of the Moon where everyone in the world could see them.

Thump...I wonder what the probability is that these letters could spontaneously appear in the order you suggest.
Would it be more or less than Man as we know today?  

Discounting the odds of any particular agency putting them there, the strict odds appear to be about 26^16.

As to comparing it to the odds of man being here, they are smaller, given that an evolutionary pathway is composed of an enormous number of contingencies; however, you'd have to explain the pertinence of the question.

Quote from: "Thumpalumpacus"Discounting the odds of any particular agency putting them there, the strict odds appear to be about 26^16.

As to comparing it to the odds of man being here, they are smaller, given that an evolutionary pathway is composed of an enormous number of contingencies; however, you'd have to explain the pertinence of the question.

I suppose my reservation here is if one believes Man arrived here by a certain probability and that probability is more than the probability of 16 letters appearing on the moon in the specific proportions and order you give, how would that prove God to you?  It seems odd that it would take something with less of a "wow" factor to convince the Atheist to a degree of 100%?  Are there not a couple of things in the cosmos whose "timing", if you will, is at a much higher degree?

I mean, given the fact that Man is here...and all the different things that had to come together...given each factor leading up to Man, its probability and then the next and next and next compounding the end being Man...wouldn't that number dwarf the probability number of 16 letters on the moon reading, "I am the Lord thy God" considerably?  That would give 100% proof?

Quote from: "AnimatedDirt"

Quote from: "Thumpalumpacus"Discounting the odds of any particular agency putting them there, the strict odds appear to be about 26^16.

As to comparing it to the odds of man being here, they are smaller, given that an evolutionary pathway is composed of an enormous number of contingencies; however, you'd have to explain the pertinence of the question.

I suppose my reservation here is if one believes Man arrived here by a certain probability and that probability is more than the probability of 16 letters appearing on the moon in the specific proportions and order you give, how would that prove God to you?  It seems odd that it would take something with less of a "wow" factor to convince the Atheist to a degree of 100%?  Are there not a couple of things in the cosmos whose "timing", if you will, is at a much higher degree?

I mean, given the fact that Man is here...and all the different things that had to come together...given each factor leading up to Man, its probability and then the next and next and next compounding the end being Man...wouldn't that number dwarf the probability number of 16 letters on the moon reading, "I am the Lord thy God" considerably?  That would give 100% proof?

Because the message has an explicit meaning.  As I said, "discounting the odds of any agency putting them there," which raises the odds considerably.  What are the odds of a Christian god existing, anyway?  That too would be a factor to consider, which is why I wrote "strictly speaking."

Also, you're wrongly thinking that evolution is teleological.  Evolution didn't aim for man to be here.  It's like drawing a royal flush: it's seems like a miracle (especially if you've got a lot of scrilla on the table), but the odds of a royal flush are identical to a hand of 2,7,10, Jack, Joker, in mixed suits.  Exactly the same.

So, before we go any further, you might want to consider:  we've only "beaten the odds" because we appear to be foreordained.  That doesn't, however, mean that we were.

Quote from: "Thumpalumpacus"Because the message has an explicit meaning.  As I said, "discounting the odds of any agency putting them there," which raises the odds considerably.  What are the odds of a Christian god existing, anyway?  That too would be a factor to consider, which is why I wrote "strictly speaking."

Also, you're wrongly thinking that evolution is teleological.  Evolution didn't aim for man to be here.  It's like drawing a royal flush: it's seems like a miracle (especially if you've got a lot of scrilla on the table), but the odds of a royal flush are identical to a hand of 2,7,10, Jack, Joker, in mixed suits.  Exactly the same.

So, before we go any further, you might want to consider:  we've only "beaten the odds" because we appear to be foreordained.  That doesn't, however, mean that we were.

In context of evolution as you put it, non-teleological. (I learned a new word) the odds remain the same as we are at this point and all instances of chance have lead to this moment in time where Man does exist thus the odds, IMHO, compound, not in a succession of random happenings leading to nothing, but rather those random happenings having lead to Man.

If the letters, then did appear on the moon, the odds fall within the overall odds of Man...and as you also conclude, are smaller than the fact that Man is.  This is why I find it odd that something of more probability would lead to 100% satisfaction of God.

On the odds of a royal flush, if they were the same, wouldn't Vegas then pay out for a hand of 2, 7, 10, J, and Joker in mixed suits?   Actually the odds are almost the same as Man, being that the Joker isn't normally in play, or non-existent.

I certainly could be mis-understanding you...the probability of this is very high.

Quote from: "AnimatedDirt"In context of evolution as you put it, non-teleological. (I learned a new word) the odds remain the same as we are at this point and all instances of chance have lead to this moment in time where Man does exist thus the odds, IMHO, compound, not in a succession of random happenings leading to nothing, but rather those random happenings having lead to Man.

If the letters, then did appear on the moon, the odds fall within the overall odds of Man...and as you also conclude, are smaller than the fact that Man is.  This is why I find it odd that something of more probability would lead to 100% satisfaction of God.

On the odds of a royal flush, if they were the same, wouldn't Vegas then pay out for a hand of 2, 7, 10, J, and Joker in mixed suits?   Actually the odds are almost the same as Man, being that the Joker isn't normally in play, or non-existent.

I certainly could be mis-understanding you...the probability of this is very high.

Pardon me for interrupting.

First of all, you can't calculate or even estimate the probability that we would exist as we do.  It might be very high, or very low.  We need far more data to do so.  

It would also be really difficult to calculate/estimate the odds of those words appearing on the moon, for that matter -- it wouldn't be as simple as 26^16, that's only if you are considering a small mathematical problem with 16 slots and 26 things that can be in those slots.  The actual proposition at hand here is far more complex than that.

How can you compare the probabilities of either, if you know neither?  You can't.  The end.

Also, he did say "spontaneously", an important detail which I took to mean it would happen before my very eyes in a short amount of time, as in not just some geological formation that happens to have been there since before I was around.  If I witnessed something like that happen in real-time, and so did many others, such that I could be convinced I wasn't just seeing things, I would consider it strong evidence that some intelligent being out there is far more powerful than any man or collaboration of men that I am presently aware of.  Though I wouldn't leap to the conclusion that it was a god, or The Christian God.

//edit: In re-reading this thread, I just noticed that you were the one (AnimatedDirt) who added the "spontaneously" clause.  My bad, but that doesn't really change much.

Quote from: "Persimmon Hamster"First of all, you can't calculate or even estimate the probability that we would exist as we do.  It might be very high, or very low.  We need far more data to do so.

Your contention is not with me, but with the person who gave a probability in number form.

Quote from: "Persimmon Hamster"It would also be really difficult to calculate/estimate the odds of those words appearing on the moon, for that matter -- it wouldn't be as simple as 26^16, that's only if you are considering a small mathematical problem with 16 slots and 26 things that can be in those slots.  The actual proposition at hand here is far more complex than that.

How can you compare the probabilities of either, if you know neither?  You can't.  The end.

Also, he did say "spontaneously", an important detail which I took to mean it would happen before my very eyes in a short amount of time, as in not just some geological formation that happens to have been there since before I was around.  If I witnessed something like that happen in real-time, and so did many others, such that I could be convinced I wasn't just seeing things, I would consider it strong evidence that some intelligent being out there is far more powerful than any man or collaboration of men that I am presently aware of.  Though I wouldn't leap to the conclusion that it was a god, or The Christian God.

I'm on my way out...I'll try and get to a reply later this evening.  For now, the words in question come from the Christian Bible and so, it would stand to reason that the one putting the letters up that mimic the bible would be the Christian God.

Quote from: "FaithInGod"Is it possible for the God of the Bible to reveal things to us in such a way that we can know them for certain?

First we need to establish that this god of the bible exists.  So far I've not seen any evidence that he does - and that's after spend nearly five years diligently searching.

Quote from: "AnimatedDirt"Your contention is not with me, but with the person who gave a probability in number form.

You are participating in a discussion (that you initiated) about comparing two probabilities that cannot be calculated or estimated.  My contention is that this exercise is meaningless, and not only for that reason.  The underlying question here seems to be, what would it take to convince an atheist that "the God of the Bible" exists?  One person stated what would convince him.  The thing is, I'd wager he was joking, and even if he was completely serious, that doesn't mean it would convince every atheist.  Me, for example.

Quote from: "AnimatedDirt"I'm on my way out...I'll try and get to a reply later this evening.  For now, the words in question come from the Christian Bible and so, it would stand to reason that the one putting the letters up that mimic the bible would be the Christian God.

So, wait a second.  In this thread, you want to tell me that if something stands to reason then it should be considered evidence and therefore proof, but in the other thread, you want to say the opposite?  It seems you may be choosing whichever definition of "proof" helps advance your argument.

Anyway, I disagree that it would stand to reason that "The Christian God" must have put the words there.  Never mind the fact that "The Christian God" could be a great many different things depending on who you ask.  All I would personally consider it evidence for is what I already said -- some intelligent being out there is far more powerful than any man or collaboration of men that I am presently aware of.  For starters, how about some aliens with a giant laser and a keen wit?

I am 100% certain that if Earth's atmosphere disappeared that all non-bacterial life would be extinguished.

Quote from: "FaithInGod"Is it possible for the God of the Bible to reveal things to us in such a way that we can know them for certain?

If their is certainty then their should be no issue.

Have you be any chance read Descartes' Meditations?

The master has addressed this issue.

Quote"I refuse to prove that I exist", says God, "for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing."

"But", says Man, "the Babel fish is a dead giveaway isn't it? it could not have evolved by chance. it proves you exist, and so therefore, by your own arguments, you don't. QED."

"Oh dear", says God, "I hadn't thought of that," and promptly vanishes in a puff of logic.

"Oh that was easy" says Man, and for an encore goes on to prove that black is white and gets himself killed on the next zebra crossing.

Quote from: "FaithInGod"

Quote from: "elliebean"

Quote from: "FaithInGod"Is it possible for the God of the Bible to reveal things to us in such a way that we can know them for certain?

No; the "God of the Bible" does not exist, therefore it is imposslible for it to reveal anything to anyone.

So how can you (and the rest of humanity), without God, know anything for absolute certainty?

This is where I can see you are confused. Answer these questions:

1. What is meant by knowing with absolute certainty?
2. Why is it necessary to "know with absolute certainty"? By your definition of absolute certainty, of course.
3. Why do we have to presuppose a god in order to have a discussion of what we can or cannot know? Shouldn't there be able to be a discussion of what it means to know, without that presupposition?

Also, your question is stated in such a way that in order to give it the seemingly straightforward answer you want, then an atheist would have to agree to your definitions of god, knowing, revelation, and certainty. We probably won't come to agreement on even those terms.

For the sake of your argument, if I agreed to your god, then in all fairness, we could have discussions of lots of things. Such as:

1. (from the age-old playground question) Can God create a rock so heavy that even he cannot lift it?
2. And the old problem of evil, as stated by Epicurus:

“Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing?       Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?”

Can't really even say I would be willing to waste any more time discussing it, quite frankly. But you go right ahead. You might get some good discussion out of it with some others. Just don't proselytize or preach, and you'll be ok.

Quote from: "FaithInGod"Is it possible for the God of the Bible to reveal things to us in such a way that we can know them for certain?

No,

Because I wouldn't consider anything a GOD. To me GOD's don't exist, even if some entity tried to claim itself as one. GOD is only relative to those that worship it as such. It's a title of opinion.

Quote from: "TheJackel"

Quote from: "FaithInGod"Is it possible for the God of the Bible to reveal things to us in such a way that we can know them for certain?

No,

Because I wouldn't consider anything a GOD. To me GOD's don't exist, even if some entity tried to claim itself as one. GOD is only relative to those that worship it as such. It's a title of opinion.

This is very well put. Nice!

I think all the logic going on here scared our friend off.  He will be mis--- jk.

Quote from: "AnimatedDirt"On the odds of a royal flush, if they were the same, wouldn't Vegas then pay out for a hand of 2, 7, 10, J, and Joker in mixed suits?   Actually the odds are almost the same as Man, being that the Joker isn't normally in play, or non-existent.

They are the same, and you can do the math yourself if you'd like.  The reason why Vegas doesn't pay out on any random hand is that they have no cognitive significance, such as matching suits or numerical continuity.  You see, royal flushes aren't special, except that we humans make them so.  The odds of any randomly predefined five-card hand are (1/52)*(1/51)*(1/50)*(1/49)*(1/48), in a joker-less deck.  (Can you tell I'm not a Vegas kinda guy?)

Quote from: "Persimmon"You are participating in a discussion (that you initiated) about comparing two probabilities that cannot be calculated or estimated. My contention is that this exercise is meaningless, and not only for that reason. The underlying question here seems to be, what would it take to convince an atheist that "the God of the Bible" exists? One person stated what would convince him. The thing is, I'd wager he was joking, and even if he was completely serious, that doesn't mean it would convince every atheist. Me, for example.

For what it's worth, I agree with everything here but the joking part.  I personally would regard such an event as being powerful evidence of Jehovah, and not, say jovial aliens.  But you're absolutely right, this in no way reflects on anyone else, and anyone reading this thread who thinks otherwise, I ask you to abstain from hitting other atheists over their heads with my words.

Quote from: "FaithInGod"You have not explained to me how you know anything for certain. Please tell me anything you know for certain and how you know it to be certain.

Probability.

Certainty is the upper percentage and the lower percentage of likelihood.

For instance, 100% of people born 300 years ago are now dead, to the best of our knowledge. Therefor, we can claim certainty to our knowledge that we will not live to see our 300th birthday. The margin of error will be low enough to be negligeable. Modern day science is trying to push that margin upward, but the rate is reasonably slow.

Uncertainty is the middle of the scale with varying degrees to it. Uncertainty of winning a lottery, for instance, is greater than the uncertainty of catching cold in Norwegian autumn.

So yes, we can know things for certain based on statistics. However, even those things can occasionally be proven wrong or have exceptions.

Quote from: "FaithInGod"Is it possible for the God of the Bible to reveal things to us in such a way that we can know them for certain?

It is my personal experience and through observation of other people's experiences that there is no god of the bible or any other god to reveal anything to us.

Trot out that god from behind the curtain, give everyone on the planet the exact same experience and stigmata at the exact same time and you might have something going there. The only problem with that is how would everyone know that it wasn't Satan or some other god doing the 'miracle' as a joke, per say?

Well I don't think you can be certain of anything, 99.9999999% certain isn't certain, not to me anyway.
Maybe Zhuangzi has gotten tired of butterflies and he's dreaming puddens now.

I think lack of certainty gnaws at some people, and they end up accepting pretend certainty provided by some preacher.
99.9999999% certainty there is no god is good enough for me.

QuoteIf, for the sake of argument, the infinite God of the Bible exists, could He reveal things to the human race such that we could know them to be certain?

No he couldn't do that, it wouldn't be mysterious enough, god works in mysterious ways you know.

Quote from: "The Magic Pudding"99.9999999% certain isn't certain, not to me anyway.

This does, of course, boil down to personal definition range, but that likelihood in daily life IS certainty - just not absolute certainty. You'd have to delve into the realm of physics or very specific statistics or engineering (like space flight trajectories and such) for 99.9999999% to be regarded as uncertain. In most people's life, it's good enough. If the steering on your car is that precise, it's a good car. If your clock is that good, it's probably a chronometer and an expensive one at that. If you have good sex 99.9999999% of the time, lucky you and the list goes on and on and on.

Yes but sometimes nine nines aren't enough.
If we estimate the certainty of an individual female not giving birth to the messiah at 99.9999999%
We could be in trouble.

Quote from: "The Magic Pudding"Yes but sometimes nine nines aren't enough.
If we estimate the certainty of an individual female not giving birth to the messiah at 99.9999999%
We could be in trouble.

Such cases are rare, but they do exist. All I'm saying is that to say that a certainty of ninety nine point seven nines is universally too low is not really wise in regard to our daily life operations since they depend on much lower probabilities and margins of error than that.

I worry you take me too seriously, would it have helped if I said:

Yes but sometimes nine nines aren't enough.
If we estimate the certainty of an individual female not giving birth to the messiah at 99.9999999%
We could be in trouble.
We already have two messiahs in the cells, and if we get any more they might start talking.

Goodnight.

In what way is this a challenge? If there were evidence for God there would be evidence for God.

Quote from: "FaithInGod"Is it possible for the God of the Bible to reveal things to us in such a way that we can know them for certain?

I think the first thing we need to clarify is that God actually exists.  If he were to make that bit of information completely obvious to the world that would go along way to making other things believable.  Do you think God is obvious in the world or is he as cryptic to you as he is to me?

Quote from: "Thumpalumpacus"To borrow an idea from Carl Sagan, he could put "I am the Lord thy God" in five-hundred-km-long letters on the surface of the Moon where everyone in the world could see them.

While you and I both know that Carl Sagan was joking, I'll state for the record that giant words on the moon would convince me of one thing, that some sapient creature (or multiplicity thereof) had the technology and the desire to write giant words on the moon.

A bush on fire with a flame that didn't consume it, words written in stone by invisible cause, an independently motile pillar of flame, an independently motile pillar of smoke, instantaneous replacement of plain water (in a lake or river) with blood, an inexplicable swarm of frogs, an inexplicable period of darkness during the hours that would normally be daytime, and the inexplicable death of the firstborn of a community with no one else dying, would convince me of one thing, that some sapient creature (or multiplicity thereof) had the technology and the desire to make such things occur.

Candidates for the responsible agents might be -

1. Humans in a hidden super-advanced civilization, perhaps underground
2. Extra-terrestrials
3. Time-traveling human from the future
4. Artificial intelligences that had reached and surpassed the threshold of self-awareness
5. Mutant humans in a hidden enclave somewhere, whose mutations included hyper-intelligence

Never for one moment would I think, "Oh no, it's Jehovah!"

If geneticists one day discovered that the human genome can be expressed as numerical data that yields a pattern straightforwardly transposable into ancient Hebrew, yielding the Book of Genesis verbatim, that would convince of me of one thing, that super-advanced extra-terrestrials were playing the most elaborate trick imaginable on humanity, and had been playing it since the first modern human walked the earth.

Nothing would convince me that nature was spawned by the supernatural.  I categorically and unconditionally reject the supernatural as a valid conclusion from any premise, or as a valid premise for deriving any conclusion.  Any phenomenon that exceeded my expectations regarding nature's capabilities would cause me to revise my expectations regarding nature's capabilities.  All phenomena are natural.  That is my foundational premise from which I begin all reasoning, all the time, in all contexts.  All phenomena are natural.  Any contradictory premise or conclusion is anti-life, for it is anti-nature, anti-mind, anti-survival, and anti-progress.

Quote from: "Inevitable Droid"

Quote from: "Thumpalumpacus"To borrow an idea from Carl Sagan, he could put "I am the Lord thy God" in five-hundred-km-long letters on the surface of the Moon where everyone in the world could see them.

While you and I both know that Carl Sagan was joking, I'll state for the record that giant words on the moon would convince me of one thing, that some sapient creature (or multiplicity thereof) had the technology and the desire to write giant words on the moon.

Without trying to start a tooth-pulling debate along the lines of "how many angels ...?" I 'd say that the combination of obvious potency and language would strongly indicate Jehovah.

QuoteCandidates for the responsible agents might be -

1. Humans in a hidden super-advanced civilization, perhaps underground

Easily falsifiable, and easily falsified.  Temperature gradient prohibits underground sanctuary.  Radar shows that it isn't in space.

Quote2. Extra-terrestrials

How would they be aware of the significance of the words?  How, indeed, would they have taught themselves the English language without our assistance?  

Quote3. Time-traveling human from the future

This  would appear to be the likeliest.  I doesn't explain how we would see the lunar letters and yet not see any earth-moving machinery.

Quote4. Artificial intelligences that had reached and surpassed the threshold of self-awareness

The above objection applies to this as well.

Quote5. Mutant humans in a hidden enclave somewhere, whose mutations included hyper-intelligence

This is essentially your point #1, and answered identically.

QuoteNever for one moment would I think, "Oh no, it's Jehovah!"

What test would you use to falsify this hypothesis?  If, in this scenario, you discard something before falsifying it, you are simply bowing to bias.

QuoteNothing would convince me that nature was spawned by the supernatural.

Given that we cannot know what happened before Planck-time, staking out any position is an act of faith.  "I don't know" is the only certifiably true statement we can make about the beginning of the Universe.  Anything else is speculation, and when asserted as truth, amounts to faith.

Quote from: "Thumpalumpacus"Without trying to start a tooth-pulling debate along the lines of "how many angels ...?" I 'd say that the combination of obvious potency and language would strongly indicate Jehovah.

Absolutely any hypothesis would be more credible than Jehovah, who is supernatural, and therefore to be rejected out of hand, because nature is everything, and everything is nature, unless we are willing to credit as reality what our biological and technological sensing devices cannot - on principle cannot nor ever will be able to, on principle - ascertain.

Quote

QuoteCandidates for the responsible agents might be -

1. Humans in a hidden super-advanced civilization, perhaps underground

Easily falsifiable, and easily falsified.  Temperature gradient prohibits underground sanctuary.  Radar shows that it isn't in space.

I wasn't really offering these candidates up as hypotheses to be defended, since giant words on the moon haven't actually been identified - but still, I would think a civilization that could write giant words on the moon to the sudden surprise of all the first world nations could find a way to trick our heat-sensitive and sound-sensitive instruments.  How would such trickery be accomplished?  I have no idea.  Nor do I have any idea how giant words would be written on the moon to the sudden surprise of all the first world nations.  I am merely willing to entertain the hypothesis that if X can accomplish one seeming miracle then X can accomplish another.

Quote

Quote2. Extra-terrestrials

How would they be aware of the significance of the words?  How, indeed, would they have taught themselves the English language without our assistance?

You're seriously suggesting that a civilization capable of crossing inter-stellar space is incapable of monitoring human broadcasts and learning the principles and details of human language therefrom?

Quote

Quote3. Time-traveling human from the future

This  would appear to be the likeliest.  I doesn't explain how we would see the lunar letters and yet not see any earth-moving machinery.

As Arthur C. Clarke so famously said, "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."  Consider that statement to be the premise underlying all of the candidates I put forward, always remembering that we haven't actually identified giant words on the moon, and therefore I'm not seriously suggesting that any of these candidates actually exist.

Quote

QuoteNever for one moment would I think, "Oh no, it's Jehovah!"

What test would you use to falsify this hypothesis?  If, in this scenario, you discard something before falsifying it, you are simply bowing to bias.

See above.  The supernatural as a hypothesis must be rejected out of hand, lest empiricism instead be rejected, for empiricism cannot plumb the supernatural, since our biological and technological sensing devices are limited to the natural.  Either we uphold the supernatural or we uphold empiricism.  We can't have both.

Quote

QuoteNothing would convince me that nature was spawned by the supernatural.

Given that we cannot know what happened before Planck-time, staking out any position is an act of faith.  "I don't know" is the only certifiably true statement we can make about the beginning of the Universe.  Anything else is speculation, and when asserted as truth, amounts to faith.

It isn't faith to uphold that which is logically necessary in order to remain consistent as empiricists.  It is integrity, and rigor, and reasonableness.

Quote from: "FaithInGod"The God of the Bible is all-knowing and all-powerful.

Then the god of the bible doesn't exist, because those two attributes are mutually exclusive.

Can your god do something he didn't know he'd do? If he can, he isn't all-knowing. If he can't, he isn't all powerful.

Logical paradox FTW!

Quote from: "Thumpalumpacus"They are the same, and you can do the math yourself if you'd like.  The reason why Vegas doesn't pay out on any random hand is that they have no cognitive significance, such as matching suits or numerical continuity.  You see, royal flushes aren't special, except that we humans make them so.  The odds of any randomly predefined five-card hand are (1/52)*(1/51)*(1/50)*(1/49)*(1/48), in a joker-less deck.  (Can you tell I'm not a Vegas kinda guy?)

I disagree...and unless I'm mistaking what your point is, this Wiki article on Poker Probability (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poker_probability) seems to also say the Royal Flush is much less probable than any other hand.

My point earlier was simply that it seems odd to me that one would make an instance of a few letters being arranged in such an order on the moon be evidence enough for God/Jehovah when many other things in the cosmos have happened or are within a range much less in probability or even in "tuning".  

I apologize for being absent from this for so long.  I had a death in my immediate family over the weekend and much more of my time is needed to deal with this.  I should return FULLY soon, although I have a trip planned to S. Africa next Wed. so it may be a few weeks before I'm "back".  

Quote from: "Inevitable Droid"Absolutely any hypothesis would be more credible than Jehovah, who is supernatural, and therefore to be rejected out of hand, because nature is everything, and everything is nature, unless we are willing to credit as reality what our biological and technological sensing devices cannot - on principle cannot nor ever will be able to, on principle - ascertain.

So nuch for "unbiased".  Also, it should be noted that my hypothetical would be discernable by both sensation and machination, rendering your only "substantive" objection moot.

By the way, how do you "know" Jehovah isn't natural?

QuoteI wasn't really offering these candidates up as hypotheses to be defended, since giant words on the moon haven't actually been identified - but still, I would think a civilization that could write giant words on the moon to the sudden surprise of all the first world nations could find a way to trick our heat-sensitive and sound-sensitive instruments.  How would such trickery be accomplished?  I have no idea.  Nor do I have any idea how giant words would be written on the moon to the sudden surprise of all the first world nations.  I am merely willing to entertain the hypothesis that if X can accomplish one seeming miracle then X can accomplish another.

... a very convoluted circular argument, but you've got to the first waypoint, in admitting that you "have no idea."  But when you argue "if X can accomplish one seeming miracle then X can accomplish another," -- and yet deny that you would ever believe in god -- you are merely defining god out of existence, or attempting to.  Were you honest, you'd admit: if any being could manage both of the accomplishments, you would be out of your ken, and not know what you were dealing with.

QuoteYou're seriously suggesting that a civilization capable of crossing inter-stellar space is incapable of monitoring human broadcasts and learning the principles and details of human language therefrom?

Yes, I am.  Given that there are good reasons to think that language has a genetic component, combined with the high unlikelihood of any alien race sharing any of our genome (not to mention the fact that it may not use DNA at all), it would be highly unlikely that rhythms, sounds, and tones would be open to anything but the most superficial of readings.  

Can you read, say, Das Kapital in the original German?  Or perhaps the Iliad in the original Greek?  Without visual cuing, how would you propose to crack any foreign language?

QuoteAs Arthur C. Clarke so famously said, "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."  Consider that statement to be the premise underlying all of the candidates I put forward, always remembering that we haven't actually identified giant words on the moon, and therefore I'm not seriously suggesting that any of these candidates actually exist.

In other words, you prefer your own hypotheticals to Christian hypotheticals.  Also, your disclaimer is superfluous.

QuoteSee above.  The supernatural as a hypothesis must be rejected out of hand, lest empiricism instead be rejected, for empiricism cannot plumb the supernatural, since our biological and technological sensing devices are limited to the natural.  Either we uphold the supernatural or we uphold empiricism.  We can't have both.

Excluded-middle fallacy.  There is a third alternative:  Jehovah as a natural being, possessed of powers we have yet to understand.  As you yourself quoted, "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."  What exact knowledge do you possess that tells you that the Jehovah of the Bible is not actually operating some srs bsns?

QuoteNothing would convince me that nature was spawned by the supernatural.

Not even a demonstration that your definition of "supernatural" is too broad?

QuoteIt isn't faith to uphold that which is logically necessary in order to remain consistent as empiricists.  It is integrity, and rigor, and reasonableness.

While I agree with your basic sentiment here, it strikes me that you are claiming knowledge which you cannot possess.  You cannot know that there is no god, generally speaking.  You may dispatch the Christian god on the grounds of internal logic, but there is so much that we do not know.

While I share your atheism, I do not share you didacticism.  To say "I know there is no god" is silly.

A real empiricist is led by evidence to conclusion, and does not practice a priori reasoning.  When you write something like "... who is supernatural, and therefore to be rejected out of hand ...." and then quote Clarke's Third Law in the same post, it's obvious you've not thought the thing through.

Quote from: "AnimatedDirt"I disagree...and unless I'm mistaking what your point is, this Wiki article on Poker Probability (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poker_probability) seems to also say the Royal Flush is much less probable than any other hand.

Not so:

QuoteAny five card poker hand â€" The total number of five card hands that can be drawn from a deck of cards is found using a combination selecting five cards, in any order where n refers to the number of items that can be selected and r to the sample size; the "!" is the factorial operator:

    {n\choose r} = {{n!} \over {r!(n - r)!}} = {52 \choose 5} = {{52!} \over {5!(52 - 5)!}} = 2,598,960

Any one hand is equally possible.

QuoteMy point earlier was simply that it seems odd to me that one would make an instance of a few letters being arranged in such an order on the moon be evidence enough for God/Jehovah when many other things in the cosmos have happened or are within a range much less in probability or even in "tuning".  

It's not so odd when you consider that the Universe doesn't know English.  Therefore, that limits possible sources.

QuoteI apologize for being absent from this for so long.  I had a death in my immediate family over the weekend and much more of my time is needed to deal with this.  I should return FULLY soon, although I have a trip planned to S. Africa next Wed. so it may be a few weeks before I'm "back".  

I'm sorry to hear of your loss, and wish you the best in what are sure to be difficult days.  Hit me up when you get back, and take care until then.

Quote from: "Thumpalumpacus"

QuoteYou're seriously suggesting that a civilization capable of crossing inter-stellar space is incapable of monitoring human broadcasts and learning the principles and details of human language therefrom?

Yes, I am.  Given that there are good reasons to think that language has a genetic component, combined with the high unlikelihood of any alien race sharing any of our genome (not to mention the fact that it may not use DNA at all), it would be highly unlikely that rhythms, sounds, and tones would be open to anything but the most superficial of readings.  

Can you read, say, Das Kapital in the original German?  Or perhaps the Iliad in the original Greek?  Without visual cuing, how would you propose to crack any foreign language?

I would suggest that the aliens tune their television sets (which perhaps they "borrowed" from planet-side when nobody was looking) to a PBS station that broadcasts Sesame Street, which provides ample visual cuing.  Once they gain a basic understanding of our alphabet and common, basic words I would then expect they could manage a variety of methods for understanding everything there is to know about human language.  If we are not limiting them to observing our broadcasts, I might also suggest they infiltrate a human grade-or-pre-school, perhaps wearing a hilarious costume to avoid suspicion.

Forgive me for being repetitive...but I would suggest everyone stop discussing likelihoods/probabilities we have absolutely no way to calculate or estimate.

Thumpalumpacus...on an unrelated note...did you see my latest reply to you at the bottom of page 1 of the literal Genesis thread?

Quote from: "Thumpalumpacus"

Quote from: "Inevitable Droid"Absolutely any hypothesis would be more credible than Jehovah, who is supernatural, and therefore to be rejected out of hand, because nature is everything, and everything is nature, unless we are willing to credit as reality what our biological and technological sensing devices cannot - on principle cannot nor ever will be able to, on principle - ascertain.

So much for "unbiased".

My bias is in favor of unbiased empirical inquiry.  Anything that negates or undermines unbiased empirical inquiry, I am heavily biased against.  I make no apologies for that.  Bias is of the essence of meaning, value, purpose, and standards of conduct.  Bias is good except where it is bad.  It is bad when one is engaged in empirical inquiry.  Since empirical inquiry is impossible with respect to God, I happily remain biased against entertaining the God hypothesis.  

QuoteAlso, it should be noted that my hypothetical would be discernable by both sensation and machination, rendering your only "substantive" objection moot.

Which hypothetical are you referring to?  The words on the moon?  If so, then we're discussing that as an effect begging for a cause.  That cause would remain hypothetical until we could form testable hypotheses, test them, and learn from our tests.  The problem with the God hypothesis is that it can't be tested.  I categorically reject untestable hypotheses.

QuoteBy the way, how do you "know" Jehovah isn't natural?

I'm using Jehovah as a name for God, and God either stands outside nature as its author, or isn't God.  If we ever discover some astonishing creature that arose out of matter three seconds after the Big Bang, fully formed with cosmic potency and cosmic sapience, who knit the first DNA out of its component proteins by deliberate agency, that creature won't be God, despite how inevitable the emergence of a new religion worshipping the thing would be.  I have to say, furthermore, that the existence of such a super-being is far less likely than any of the hypotheses I put forward as candidates in a world where the moon had giant words on it.
 

QuoteWere you honest, you'd admit: if any being could manage both of the accomplishments, you would be out of your ken, and not know what you were dealing with.

Of course.  Initially.  Such is the case constantly in science.  When the scientist first encounters a brand new phenomenon, knowledge of what just happened, and what caused it to happen, is lacking.  But the scientist doesn't just stand there, befuddled, and claim agnosticism toward the phenomenon's cause.  Rather, the scientist forms testable hypotheses, and begins testing them.  Faced with giant words on the moon, scientists would form testable hypotheses and begin testing them, with most tests probably requiring a flight to the moon to investigate the words with all the apparatuses of geology, chemistry, physics, and perhaps even biology.  What the scientists wouldn't waste time on is the formation of untestable hypotheses, such as the God hypothesis.  

QuoteCan you read, say, Das Kapital in the original German?  Or perhaps the Iliad in the original Greek?  Without visual cuing, how would you propose to crack any foreign language?

With respect to modern languages, visual cues abound via television broadcasts.  And while it may be true that spoken language isn't necessary for a species to establish a technological civilization, some sort of language certainly is, since civilization without communication can't exist, as civilization entails organized sapient collectivism, and organized sapient collectivism entails communication.  I have no reason to think a species capable of interstellar travel, which communicated by bursts of light, say, instead of sound, would stand bewildered for indefinite duration by the fact that our species doesn't emit light yet somehow manages to communicate.  These interstellar light-emitters would have to be total morons to fail to question what it is our weird species does with all those sounds coming out of our mouths, and to fail to hypothesize that just maybe what we're doing is communicating.  

QuoteIn other words, you prefer your own hypotheticals to Christian hypotheticals.

True.  Mine would be testable.  Christian ones aren't.  I embrace the testable and reject the untestable, on principle, or, if you prefer, out of bias.

QuoteAlso, your disclaimer is superfluous.

No, it isn't.  I was disclaiming the notion that I had put forward those hypotheses as being worthy of consideration in our real world, where the moon orbits our planet without the indignity of giant words on its surface.  In our real world, my hypotheses are unworthy of consideration, because no data suggests them.  In a world with giant words on the moon, suddenly my hypotheses wouldn't be unworthy of consideration, because suddenly there would be data suggesting them.  What I'm getting at here is important to science.  In science, a hypothesis must be testable, and must be suggested by data.

The God hypothesis might be suggested by data, but it's untestable, and therefore, due to my bias toward science, I reject the God hypothesis out of hand.

QuoteWhile I agree with your basic sentiment here, it strikes me that you are claiming knowledge which you cannot possess.  You cannot know that there is no god, generally speaking.

True.  Very few atheists claim to know that God doesn't exist.  I certainly don't.  We simply place the burden of proof on those who claim God exists, since they're the ones making the claim, and we demand empirical verifiability, via testing.  Rejecting a hypothesis isn't the same as claiming knowledge.  We atheists await a testable hypothesis suggested by data.

Quote from: "Inevitable Droid"Since empirical inquiry is impossible with respect to God, I happily remain biased against entertaining the God hypothesis.

I'll accept this when you demonstrate this.

QuoteThe problem with the God hypothesis is that it can't be tested.  I categorically reject untestable hypotheses.

That rather depends on the claim being made about the god in question, don't you think?

Quote from: "Thump"By the way, how do you "know" Jehovah isn't natural?

Quote from: "Droid"I'm using Jehovah as a name for God, and God either stands outside nature as its author, or isn't God.  If we ever discover some astonishing creature that arose out of matter three seconds after the Big Bang, fully formed with cosmic potency and cosmic sapience, who knit the first DNA out of its component proteins by deliberate agency, that creature won't be God, despite how inevitable the emergence of a new religion worshipping the thing would be.  I have to say, furthermore, that the existence of such a super-being is far less likely than any of the hypotheses I put forward as candidates in a world where the moon had giant words on it.

You are trying to poison the well here.  You will note that I made no claim at all like what you are positing here.  Please, if you're going to answer me, make it relevant to what I'm saying, and not some caricature.  
 

Quote\Of course.  Initially.  Such is the case constantly in science.  When the scientist first encounters a brand new phenomenon, knowledge of what just happened, and what caused it to happen, is lacking.  But the scientist doesn't just stand there, befuddled, and claim agnosticism toward the phenomenon's cause.

Did I urge complacency?  If so, please quote.  If not, you're whacking strawmen here.

QuoteRather, the scientist forms testable hypotheses, and begins testing them.  Faced with giant words on the moon, scientists would form testable hypotheses and begin testing them, with most tests probably requiring a flight to the moon to investigate the words with all the apparatuses of geology, chemistry, physics, and perhaps even biology.  What the scientists wouldn't waste time on is the formation of untestable hypotheses, such as the God hypothesis.

Indeed, that hypothesis ought to be low on the list.  As regarding the OP, though, my answer was assuming that all these steps were undertaken, with negative data.  

QuoteWith respect to modern languages, visual cues abound via television broadcasts.  And while it may be true that spoken language isn't necessary for a species to establish a technological civilization, some sort of language certainly is, since civilization without communication can't exist, as civilization entails organized sapient collectivism, and organized sapient collectivism entails communication.  I have no reason to think a species capable of interstellar travel, which communicated by bursts of light, say, instead of sound, would stand bewildered for indefinite duration by the fact that our species doesn't emit light yet somehow manages to communicate.  These interstellar light-emitters would have to be total morons to fail to question what it is our weird species does with all those sounds coming out of our mouths, and to fail to hypothesize that just maybe what we're doing is communicating.

Anthropocentrism permeates this answer.  You assume they will have eyes working in our favored spectrum of light.  You assume that they will have ears with which to hear our emitted sounds.  

Also, it's entirely possible that they may be perfectly aware that we are communicating, and yet not crack the code.  This phenomenon has been observed in human history, with humans trying to translate ancient human languages and coming up a-cropper.

QuoteTrue.  Mine would be testable.  Christian ones aren't.  I embrace the testable and reject the untestable, on principle, or, if you prefer, out of bias.

Your assumption is that in the hypothetical presented by the OP, your search would turn up data.  My response is based on the premise that if no such explanatory data came up, I'd be forced to regard a god-hypothesis seriously.

Quote from: "Thump"Also, your disclaimer is superfluous.

Quote from: "Droid"No, it isn't.  I was disclaiming the notion that I had put forward those hypotheses as being worthy of consideration in our real world, where the moon orbits our planet without the indignity of giant words on its surface.  In our real world, my hypotheses are unworthy of consideration, because no data suggests them.  In a world with giant words on the moon, suddenly my hypotheses wouldn't be unworthy of consideration, because suddenly there would be data suggesting them.  What I'm getting at here is important to science.  In science, a hypothesis must be testable, and must be suggested by data.

It is superfluous because I'm not so stupid as to not see that much, kthx.

QuoteThe God hypothesis might be suggested by data, but it's untestable, and therefore, due to my bias toward science, I reject the God hypothesis out of hand.

Where "god" interacts with reality, he may well be susceptible to testing.

QuoteTrue.  Very few atheists claim to know that God doesn't exist.  I certainly don't.  We simply place the burden of proof on those who claim God exists, since they're the ones making the claim, and we demand empirical verifiability, via testing.  Rejecting a hypothesis isn't the same as claiming knowledge.  We atheists await a testable hypothesis suggested by data.

Rejecting empirical evidence (unexplained letters on the moon) simply because it doesn't fit one's epistemology is a form of valuing that epistemology above the reality your senses are reporting.

Quote from: "Persimmon Hamster"Forgive me for being repetitive...but I would suggest everyone stop discussing likelihoods/probabilities we have absolutely no way to calculate or estimate.

Very much agreed.  As I made clear in my response to Droid, my position is based on the premise that alternate causes have been already tested and discarded.

QuoteThumpalumpacus...on an unrelated note...did you see my latest reply to you at the bottom of page 1 of the literal Genesis thread?

Not yet, off to read.

Quote from: "hackenslash"

Quote from: "FaithInGod"The God of the Bible is all-knowing and all-powerful.

Then the god of the bible doesn't exist, because those two attributes are mutually exclusive.

Can your god do something he didn't know he'd do? If he can, he isn't all-knowing. If he can't, he isn't all powerful.

Logical paradox FTW!

Those two attributes are mutually impossible. They are so ridiculously so, I could write paradoxes all day long that will collapse that entire GOD concept. And I surely can claim a GOD doesn't exist because that title is a title of opinion. I can simply nullify that concept because there is no thing that could exist that I would ever consider a "GOD". It's really that simple.

Quote from: "FaithInGod"

Quote from: "elliebean"

Quote from: "FaithInGod"Is it possible for the God of the Bible to reveal things to us in such a way that we can know them for certain?

No; the "God of the Bible" does not exist, therefore it is imposslible for it to reveal anything to anyone.

So how can you (and the rest of humanity), without God, know anything for absolute certainty?

Sounds like you are just using the OP to try to set everyone up so that you can make them agree that it is impossible to know anything for certain if a god doesn't exist.

Quote from: "elliebean"

Quote from: "FaithInGod"Is it possible for the God of the Bible to reveal things to us in such a way that we can know them for certain?

No; the "God of the Bible" does not exist, therefore it is imposslible for it to reveal anything to anyone.

I will ask a simple layman question: How do you know the 'God of the Bible' does not exist?

Quote from: "Achronos"

Quote from: "elliebean"

Quote from: "FaithInGod"Is it possible for the God of the Bible to reveal things to us in such a way that we can know them for certain?

No; the "God of the Bible" does not exist, therefore it is imposslible for it to reveal anything to anyone.

I will ask a simple layman question: How do you know the 'God of the Bible' does not exist?

If you say it's Omnipotent, it surely doesn't exist. It's a literal impossible self-contradiction. It's like saying a non-existing object exists when it doesn't exist. And one can not create that which one's self requires to exist. It can't create consciousness for example. It can't create a place for itself to exist in (it's own container) either, or what it's made of. it requires information just as much as we do in order to even know that itself exists, or to do anything like make choices or decisions.. It seems you need to me more clear on what you define as a GOD. Is it being more powerful, or being more intelligent than you are?  I keep hearing that "Knowledge is Power", and yet those that are slave to require it, and be in need of it are magically GOD's?..

I would agree that knowledge is powerful, but those that require it are powerless without it. Entities are not GOD's, and never will be.

Quote from: "Thumpalumpacus"

Quote from: "FaithInGod"The God of the Bible is all-knowing and all-powerful. Could this God, if He exists, reveal (show/tell/give) things (knowledge/info) to us in such a way that we could know (understand/believe) it for certain (100%)?

Nor have you shown how it is only your god's "existence" that enables us to have knowledge.  I've noticed that deer don't run off cliffs thinking they can fly.  Would you do so if you were an atheist?

I didn't think so.

That was wonderful.

Quote from: "Achronos"I will ask a simple layman question: How do you know the 'God of the Bible' does not exist?

While I don't "know", the dearth of evidence is certainly telling.

Quote from: "Achronos"I will ask a simple layman question: How do you know the 'God of the Bible' does not exist?

Because that is the default viewpoint. Because in nature, all gods I have ever heard of, including Yahweh the Nasty Overjew, are unnecessary. Unnecessary AND with no proof AT ALL to support their existence means that they don't exist. The certainty of that is not absolute, of course, but still very reasonable.

Quote from: "Achronos"

Quote from: "elliebean"

Quote from: "FaithInGod"Is it possible for the God of the Bible to reveal things to us in such a way that we can know them for certain?

No; the "God of the Bible" does not exist, therefore it is imposslible for it to reveal anything to anyone.

I will ask a simple layman question: How do you know the 'God of the Bible' does not exist?

Probably the same way you know that the gods of the pantheon don't exist.

God, as described in the Bible, can't exist because the stories don't match with reality/history.  In order to come up with a plausible Bible god you have to consider a lot of the bible to simply be stories meant to teach a lesson rather than accurate accounts of god's actions....and then you are practically a deist by the time you are done!

Quote from: "Asmodean"

Quote from: "Achronos"I will ask a simple layman question: How do you know the 'God of the Bible' does not exist?

Because that is the default viewpoint. Because in nature, all gods I have ever heard of, including Yahweh the Nasty Overjew, are unnecessary. Unnecessary AND with no proof AT ALL to support their existence means that they don't exist. The certainty of that is not absolute, of course, but still very reasonable.

I don't think that viewpoint can be so defined until later in life. One who is born can't merely reject God and of what grounds? I could say to you my default view was God does exist. My proof as a child? Look around you.

The problem I have whenever someone says they don't have to prove God doesn't exist, well that is fallacy because you would make a positive claim about the existence of God; He doesn't exist.

Quote from: "Whitney"God, as described in the Bible, can't exist because the stories don't match with reality/history.  In order to come up with a plausible Bible god you have to consider a lot of the bible to simply be stories meant to teach a lesson rather than accurate accounts of god's actions....and then you are practically a deist by the time you are done!

Doesn't match with 'reality/history', please explain further.

Quote from: "Achronos"I don't think that viewpoint can be so defined until later in life. One who is born can't merely reject God and of what grounds?

One who is in no way familiar with the concept of god, does not believe in it. We are all born atheists. Apatheists, actually, since newborns tend not to care much about the divine... Or oil prices... Or anything outside their immediate surroundings which has no direct influence on their food, warmth nd safety supply.

QuoteI could say to you my default view was God does exist. My proof as a child? Look around you.

You attributed existence to some magical alpha male in the sky..? Why..? You could have just kept it simple and said "I have no idea why a tree is a tree" until you had the knowledge and understanding required to make a better statement.

By the way, a child's position is rarely the default, since we tend to start as pretty blank sheets to be filled with all kinds of crap throughout our lives... And the "crap" is at its most influential when we are young.

QuoteThe problem I have whenever someone says they don't have to prove God doesn't exist, well that is fallacy because you would make a positive claim about the existence of God; He doesn't exist.

This here CAN under certain circumstances be a good point, however, in debating me in particular, you will not hear a statement "god does not exist" unless you state or strongly imply otherwise first. Basically, if you say "(a certain) god exists", I'll say "I don't think so". Then, it is up to you to prove its existence. I WILL, however, state that a god, as described in the Bible, does not exist because it can not.

In general, the burden of proof is on the believers regardless of the wording of the opposition though. Gods are an unnecessary concept in our day and age. They explain nothing without heavy usage of imagination and bring about more questions and suppositions than is healthy. Their existence is hypothetical to such a degree, that it can be called fictitious. As such, it's up to those who believe to prove otherwise.

For instance, you can say you don't believe in dark matter. Without an advanced physics degree, who could blame you?! And the burden of proof would lie with those who do. However, if you dispute a standing scientific fact or a massively supported theory, like gravity, evolution or Ohm's Law, however, THEN you would sit with the burden of proof to a negative claim.

Quote from: "Asmodean"One who is in no way familiar with the concept of god, does not believe in it. We are all born atheists. Apatheists, actually, since newborns tend not to care much about the divine... Or oil prices... Or anything outside their immediate surroundings which has no direct influence on their food, warmth nd safety supply.

I would side with you on saying apatheism would be the better term, but is it so much as 'care' than it is the actual thought that would cross their own mind? Therefore they couldn't care about something with which they have no thought of.

QuoteYou attributed existence to some magical alpha male in the sky..? Why..? You could have just kept it simple and said "I have no idea why a tree is a tree" until you had the knowledge and understanding required to make a better statement.

By the way, a child's position is rarely the default, since we tend to start as pretty blank sheets to be filled with all kinds of crap throughout our lives... And the "crap" is at its most influential when we are young.

There's this old saying: "An eccentric professor, thinking to have some fun with a small boy who was reading a Sunday school paper, said to him, “Tell me, my good boy, where God is, and I will give you an apple.”
The boy quickly looked up at the man and replied, “I will give you a whole barrel of apples if you tell me where He is not.”

All the terms used in the science books,"law," "necessity," "order," "tendency," and so on, are really unintellectual, because they assume an inner synthesis, which we do not possess. The only words that ever satisfied me as describing Nature are the terms used in the fairy books, "charm," "spell," "enchantment." They express the arbitrariness of the fact and its mystery. A tree grows fruit because it is a MAGIC tree. Water runs downhill because it is bewitched. The sun shines because it is bewitched. I deny altogether that this is fantastic or even mystical. We may have some mysticism later on; but this fairy-tale language about things is simply rational and agnostic. It is the only way I can express in words my clear and definite perception that one thing is quite distinct from another; that there is no logical connection between flying and laying eggs. It is the man who talks about "a law" that he has never seen who is the mystic. Nay, the ordinary scientific man is strictly a sentimentalist. He is a sentimentalist in this essential sense, that he is soaked and swept away by mere associations. He has so often seen birds fly and lay eggs that he feels as if there must be some dreamy, tender connection between the two ideas, whereas there is none. A forlorn lover might be unable to dissociate the moon from lost love; so the materialist is unable to dissociate the moon from the tide. In both cases there is no connection, except that one has seen them together. A sentimentalist might shed tears at the smell of apple-blossom, because, by a dark association of his own, it reminded him of his boyhood. So the materialist professor (though he conceals his tears) is yet a sentimentalist, because, by a dark association of his own, apple-blossoms remind him of apples. But the cool rationalist from fairyland does not see why, in the abstract, the apple tree should not grow crimson tulips; it sometimes does in his country.

This elementary wonder, however, is not a mere fancy derived from the fairy tales; on the contrary, all the fire of the fairy tales is derived from this. Just as we all like love tales because there is an instinct of sex, we all like astonishing tales because they touch the nerve of the ancient instinct of astonishment. This is proved by the fact that when we are very young children we do not need fairy tales: we only need tales. Mere life is interesting enough. A child of seven is excited by being told that Tommy opened a door and saw a dragon. But a child of three is excited by being told that Tommy opened a door. Boys like romantic tales; but babies like realistic tales, because they find them romantic. In fact, a baby is about the only person, I should think, to whom a modern realistic novel could be read without boring him. This proves that even nursery tales only echo an almost pre-natal leap of interest and amazement. These tales say that apples were golden only to refresh the forgotten moment when we found that they were green. They make rivers run with wine only to make us remember, for one wild moment, that they run with water. I have said that this is wholly reasonable and even agnostic. And, indeed, on this point I am all for the higher agnosticism; its better name is Ignorance. We have all read in scientific books, and, indeed, in all romances, the story of the man who has forgotten his name. This man walks about the streets and can see and appreciate everything; only he cannot remember who he is.  Well, every man is that man in the story. Every man has forgotten who he is. One may understand the cosmos, but never the ego; the self is more distant than any star.  Thou shalt love the Lord thy God; but thou shalt not know thyself. We are all under the same mental calamity; we have all forgotten our names. We have all forgotten what we really are.  All that we call common sense and rationality and practicality and positivism only means that for certain dead levels of our life we forget that we have forgotten. All that we call spirit and art and ecstasy only means that for one awful instant we remember that we forget.

But though (like the man without memory in the novel) we walk the streets with a sort of half-witted admiration, still it is admiration. It is admiration in English and not only admiration in Latin. The wonder has a positive element of praise. This is the next milestone to be definitely marked on our road through fairyland. Optimists and pessimists in their intellectual aspect, so far as they have one.  Here I am only trying to describe the enormous emotions which cannot be described. And the strongest emotion was that life was as precious as it was puzzling. It was an ecstasy because it was an adventure; it was an adventure because it was an opportunity.  The goodness of the fairy tale was not affected by the fact that there might be more dragons than princesses; it was good to be in a fairy tale.  The test of all happiness is gratitude; and I felt grateful, though I hardly knew to whom.  Children are grateful when Santa Claus puts in their stockings gifts of toys or sweets. Could I not be grateful to Santa Claus when he put in my stockings the gift of two miraculous legs? We thank people for birthday presents of cigars and slippers. Can I thank no one for the birthday present of birth?

QuoteI WILL, however, state that a god, as described in the Bible, does not exist because it can not.

What leads you to this conclusion?

QuoteFor instance, you can say you don't believe in dark matter. Without an advanced physics degree, who could blame you?! And the burden of proof would lie with those who do. However, if you dispute a standing scientific fact or a massively supported theory, like gravity, evolution or Ohm's Law, however, THEN you would sit with the burden of proof to a negative claim.

Dark matter and dark energy are fascinating, just the mere observation that our universe is accelerating its expansion. God created a universe so large that it would take a person between 200 and 500 billion years to travel around the universe at the speed of light (186,000 miles per second). He created the world out of atoms so small that it would take the whole population of the world 180 million years to count the atoms in a cup of water, counting at one per second. If you were in a bit of a hurry you could count at two per second and only take 90 million years.

It's stuff like that which creates such an amazing sense of humility.

Quote from: "Achronos"I would side with you on saying apatheism would be the better term, but is it so much as 'care' than it is the actual thought that would cross their own mind? Therefore they couldn't care about something with which they have no thought of.

An apatheist is per definition an atheist - as is someone who has never been introduced to the concept of god and has not come to a conclusion based on that. Atheism does not imply conscious rejection of the divine.

QuoteThere's this old saying: "An eccentric professor, thinking to have some fun with a small boy who was reading a Sunday school paper, said to him, “Tell me, my good boy, where God is, and I will give you an apple.”
The boy quickly looked up at the man and replied, “I will give you a whole barrel of apples if you tell me where He is not.”

The kid disregarded the burden of proof, like most religious types do.

QuoteAll the terms used in the science books,"law," "necessity," "order," "tendency," and so on, are really unintellectual, because they assume an inner synthesis, which we do not possess.

Scientists assume, but do not present their assumptions as truth. Religious types do. A scientific fact, for instance, is a very difficult thing to intelligently dispute, as is a theory which is out of its infancy.

QuoteThe only words that ever satisfied me as describing Nature are the terms used in the fairy books, "charm," "spell," "enchantment." They express the arbitrariness of the fact and its mystery.

Sorry, which mystery are we talking about..?  :P Your description of how science - or scientists work is extremely inaccurate... To the point of ridicule, in fact.

QuoteThis elementary wonder, however, is not a mere fancy derived from the fairy tales; on the contrary, all the fire of the fairy tales is derived from this. Just as we all like love tales because there is an instinct of sex, we all like astonishing tales because they touch the nerve of the ancient instinct of astonishment. This is proved by the fact that when we are very young children we do not need fairy tales: we only need tales. Mere life is interesting enough. A child of seven is excited by being told that Tommy opened a door and saw a dragon. But a child of three is excited by being told that Tommy opened a door. Boys like romantic tales; but babies like realistic tales, because they find them romantic. In fact, a baby is about the only person, I should think, to whom a modern realistic novel could be read without boring him. This proves that even nursery tales only echo an almost pre-natal leap of interest and amazement.

A child is programmed to believe what authority figures tell it. It was once, and often still is, the only way for the kid to survive and in nature, survival is the ultimate ideology.

QuoteThese tales say that apples were golden only to refresh the forgotten moment when we found that they were green. They make rivers run with wine only to make us remember, for one wild moment, that they run with water. I have said that this is wholly reasonable and even agnostic. And, indeed, on this point I am all for the higher agnosticism; its better name is Ignorance. We have all read in scientific books, and, indeed, in all romances, the story of the man who has forgotten his name. This man walks about the streets and can see and appreciate everything; only he cannot remember who he is.  Well, every man is that man in the story. Every man has forgotten who he is. One may understand the cosmos, but never the ego; the self is more distant than any star.

No. Not many people have forgotten who they are. Many people have simply not found their place in the world.

QuoteThou shalt love the Lord thy God; but thou shalt not know thyself. We are all under the same mental calamity; we have all forgotten our names. We have all forgotten what we really are.  All that we call common sense and rationality and practicality and positivism only means that for certain dead levels of our life we forget that we have forgotten. All that we call spirit and art and ecstasy only means that for one awful instant we remember that we forget.

I'm sorry, but what exactly is the base for all this gibberish? No offence - it is pleasant to read, after all - but still..? How do you justify what you have just said?

QuoteBut though (like the man without memory in the novel) we walk the streets with a sort of half-witted admiration, still it is admiration. It is admiration in English and not only admiration in Latin. The wonder has a positive element of praise. This is the next milestone to be definitely marked on our road through fairyland. Optimists and pessimists in their intellectual aspect, so far as they have one.  Here I am only trying to describe the enormous emotions which cannot be described. And the strongest emotion was that life was as precious as it was puzzling. It was an ecstasy because it was an adventure; it was an adventure because it was an opportunity.  The goodness of the fairy tale was not affected by the fact that there might be more dragons than princesses; it was good to be in a fairy tale.  The test of all happiness is gratitude; and I felt grateful, though I hardly knew to whom.  Children are grateful when Santa Claus puts in their stockings gifts of toys or sweets. Could I not be grateful to Santa Claus when he put in my stockings the gift of two miraculous legs? We thank people for birthday presents of cigars and slippers. Can I thank no one for the birthday present of birth?

On and on and on we go... Were I not at work, I'd pick it apart sentence by sentence. Overall though, why not send a thanks-card to mom and dad for having sex your age plus nine months ago..? As for legs, thank your genes and your govertnment for not placing too many landmines outside your door. And that cab driver for not running you over... And evolution for not giving you fins in stead...  

QuoteWhat leads you to this conclusion?

The attributes of such a god being mutually exclusive for starters.

QuoteFor instance, you can say you don't believe in dark matter. Without an advanced physics degree, who could blame you?! And the burden of proof would lie with those who do. However, if you dispute a standing scientific fact or a massively supported theory, like gravity, evolution or Ohm's Law, however, THEN you would sit with the burden of proof to a negative claim.

QuoteDark matter and dark energy are fascinating, just the mere observation that our universe is accelerating its expansion. God created a universe so large that it would take a person between 200 and 500 billion years to travel around the universe at the speed of light (186,000 miles per second). He created the world out of atoms so small that it would take the whole population of the world 180 million years to count the atoms in a cup of water, counting at one per second. If you were in a bit of a hurry you could count at two per second and only take 90 million years.

It's stuff like that which creates such an amazing sense of humility.

It's stuff like burden of proof that you completely disregard. You have made a ton of claims without substantiating but one.

Quote from: "FaithInGod"You have not explained to me how you know anything for certain. Please tell me anything you know for certain and how you know it to be certain.

I've decided to go back to what seems to be the underlying thought that started this thread; I.e., the notion that certainty is impossible, or is impossible without God, presumably such that, certainty of God's non-existence is impossible, or, certainty about anything is impossible except as grounded in revelation.  

I am 100% certain of nothing except that I perceive, think, emote, lust, and decide.  All else that I take for granted is either of a high probability but less than 100%, or else is accepted for reasons of utility and/or sanity.  Nothing in the plain fact that I perceive, think, emote, lust, and decide, logically necessitates God, nor do I perceive God, and so I have no reason to associate God's agency with the very limited range of phenomena, about which I can claim certainty.

As for taking things for granted if they have a high probability, I am comfortable with doing so, just as I am comfortable with taking things for granted for reasons of utility and/or sanity.

Alleged revelation will never do me any good because I will never attribute any event, however tremendous or unprecedented, as deriving from that which, not of nature, is author's nature, my definition for God.  Never.  No matter how tremendous or unprecedented.

The impossibility of being certain of God's non-existence doesn't bother me in the least.  That which, not of nature, is author's nature, is on principle unknowable to me, because my senses, and any technological sensing devices I might employ, can only probe nature.  That which is on principle unknowable to me, I reject on principle as having any legitimacy as a premise or assumption.

As others have noted, the OP has not made any more posts (anywhere) since the first 1.5 hours after starting this thread.  Hit and run!

Quote from: "Asmodean"

Quote from: "Achronos"that there is no logical connection between flying and laying eggs. It is the man who talks about "a law" that he has never seen who is the mystic. Nay, the ordinary scientific man is strictly a sentimentalist. He is a sentimentalist in this essential sense, that he is soaked and swept away by mere associations. He has so often seen birds fly and lay eggs that he feels as if there must be some dreamy, tender connection between the two ideas, whereas there is none. A forlorn lover might be unable to dissociate the moon from lost love; so the materialist is unable to dissociate the moon from the tide. In both cases there is no connection, except that one has seen them together. A sentimentalist might shed tears at the smell of apple-blossom, because, by a dark association of his own, it reminded him of his boyhood. So the materialist professor (though he conceals his tears) is yet a sentimentalist, because, by a dark association of his own, apple-blossoms remind him of apples. But the cool rationalist from fairyland does not see why, in the abstract, the apple tree should not grow crimson tulips; it sometimes does in his country.

Not that it matters, but through this paragraph, I shed all the respect you have managed to build with me over the course of your last posts   Your description of how science - or scientists work is extremely inaccurate... To the point of ridicule, in fact.

I felt the same way in "Faith is the Issue" when he said this about evolution:

Quote from: "Achronos"...unless we have some doctrine of a divine man, all abuses may be excused, since evolution may turn them into uses. It will be easy for the scientific plutocrat to maintain that humanity will adapt itself to any conditions which we now consider evil. The old tyrants invoked the past; the new tyrants will invoke the future evolution has produced the snail and the owl; evolution can produce a workman who wants no more space than a snail, and no more light than an owl. The racist white employer need not mind sending a black to work underground; he will soon become an underground animal, like a mole. He need not mind sending a diver to hold his breath in the deep seas; he will soon be a deep-sea animal. Men need not trouble to alter conditions, conditions will so soon alter men. The head can be beaten small enough to fit the hat. Do not knock the fetters off the slave; knock the slave until he forgets the fetters.

Quote from: "Achronos"

Quote from: "elliebean"

Quote from: "FaithInGod"Is it possible for the God of the Bible to reveal things to us in such a way that we can know them for certain?

No; the "God of the Bible" does not exist, therefore it is imposslible for it to reveal anything to anyone.

I will ask a simple layman question: How do you know the 'God of the Bible' does not exist?

How do you know He exists?

Quote from: "Inevitable Droid"I am 100% certain of nothing except that I perceive, think, emote, lust, and decide.

Whilst this is true, but the discernment into what is good and bad also come into play.

Quote from: "Achronos"Whilst this is true, but the discernment into what is good and bad also come into play.

Eh..? Good and bad are so imperfect constructs that it's not always a certainty which is which, even on a personal level.

The murder of another is characterised as what then? Rape of another is characterised as what then? Theft of another is characterised as what then? Adultery of another is characterised by what then? And on and on and on.

So from what I have gathered we wouldn't know the certainty of which is bad and which is good, heck it's all subjective anyway right?

Quote from: "Achronos"The murder of another is characterised as what then?

Depends on circumstances and the perspective.

Vengeance, justice, necessity, murder... A bunch of other things one can characterize a killing as, depending on who does it, for what reasons and who is doing the characterizing.

QuoteRape of another is characterised as what then?

Depends on who you ask. The rapist? The victim? Society? Me?

QuoteTheft of another is characterised as what then?

Read above

QuoteAdultery of another is characterised by what then? And on and on and on.

Read above

QuoteSo from what I have gathered we wouldn't know the certainty of which is bad and which is good, heck it's all subjective anyway right?

Highly subjective, yes. The closest we've ever come to objective good or objective bad is still only on society scale. (Larger propositions just don't work)

Murder is murder, let's not change the definition of what murder is:

1. The unlawful killing of one human by another, especially with premeditated malice.

Again that is not out of necessity, vengence or justice.

Rape again the defintion:
1. The crime of forcing another person to submit to sex acts, especially sexual intercourse.
2. The act of seizing and carrying off by force; abduction.
3. Abusive or improper treatment; violation:

So I am to assume the one who commits the act is not in the wrong? But the very definition contradicts it.

Quote from: "Achronos"1. The unlawful killing of one human by another, especially with premeditated malice.

The murderer may, however unlawful, be able to subjectively justify his actions and justify them well. This is a matter of perspective. For a given society, it's bad. For the victim, it's bad. For the murderer, possibly for whoever he's working for, it can be a very good thing indeed.

QuoteAgain that is not out of necessity, vengence or justice.

Ah! A revenge murder is, by your definition, not a murder..? Ok. (Sorry, but you did start a definition game with me, so I'm going with it) And how do you know the person was not murdered out of necessity or justice..? Maybe the asshole killed your dog and, according to you, deserves to die for it..? Or maybe killing him will get you out of bankrupcy..?

A matter of... What was the word again..? Perpesc... Persec... Ah! Perspective.

QuoteSo I am to assume the one who commits the act is not in the wrong? But the very definition contradicts it.

As the society and the victim (at least) see it, he most likely is. As he sees it, is another story. And another story still are all the people who don't give a flying duck whether or not he wronged somebody as long as the somebody wronged is not too close to home.

Quote from: "Achronos"The problem I have whenever someone says they don't have to prove God doesn't exist, well that is fallacy because you would make a positive claim about the existence of God; He doesn't exist.

Wrong.  My atheism is not a positive claim that your god cannot or does not exist; the only positive claim I'm making in saying that is that I find the utter lack of evidence entirely telling, and that I live my life without any god.  

Do you believe in unicorns?  Why or why not?  

Quote from: "Whitney"Doesn't match with 'reality/history', please explain further.

The Bible says that Tyre was to be wiped off the face of the earth, never to be occupied by residents again.  Of course, it is a thriving town.

Also, your Bible states that there are waters above the firmament, which is obviously not the case, as shown by mankind's many space probes.

Additionally, you bible states that plants were grown before there was a sun to nourish them.  

The Bible refers to whales as fish, bats as birds, and asserts, indirectly, that the value of π is an even three.

I could go on (and on  and on and on ...) but I'll let you challenge your own beliefs by giving you some points to consider  and seeing if you're brave enough to ask questions of your own faith.

 

You tell me why I should consider this ridiculous Bronze-Age mythology as anything more than a historical curiosity now being sold on television.

Quote from: "Achronos"Murder is murder, let's not change the definition of what murder is:

1. The unlawful killing of one human by another, especially with premeditated malice.

Again that is not out of necessity, vengence or justice.

I don't think you want to use "unlawful" in your definition of murder if you're going to discuss morality, because then even if O.J. killed his ex wife and her dude, he'd not have committed "murder" by this definition (because he was found not guilty in a court of law). When you're discussing morality, even the laws should be under scrutiny. Because when you're discussing morality, I doubt the concern is whether someone made a law about it or not, but more likely whether you agree or not that it is a good or bad thing to do. Using "unlawful" in your definition of murder also creates the problem of subjective societal opinion that goes against the very idea that morality is objective and murder is one of those objective morals.

Case in point: most people would think that killing someone who was trying to kill you (killing in self defense) would be morally justifiable, however with having "unlawful" in your definition of murder, this scenario would be murder in some places and not in others, would be different if the person killing in self defense was a woman or not. It's not very objective to have the same thing be murder in one place and not in another or to be murder if a woman does it but not a man.

Quote from: "Achronos"Rape again the defintion:
1. The crime of forcing another person to submit to sex acts, especially sexual intercourse.
2. The act of seizing and carrying off by force; abduction.
3. Abusive or improper treatment; violation:

So I am to assume the one who commits the act is not in the wrong? But the very definition contradicts it.

Again, I don't think you want to bring something so subjective as "crime" for your definition, because it creates the same problems with your argument as "unlawful" because they essentially mean the same thing. By using "crime" in your definition: in the middle east it's not a crime for a man to force his wife to have sex with him, however in the U.S. it is a crime. So your definition intrinsically has problems with subjectivity where it seems that you want objectivity.

Quote from: "Asmodean"As the society and the victim (at least) see it, he most likely is. As he sees it, is another story. And another story still are all the people who don't give a flying duck whether or not he wronged somebody as long as the somebody wronged is not too close to home.

I bring you this scenario

"Your honor. my client John Smith is innocent of Murder. As you can see by this chart, the movement of his arm is merely a series of electrical and chemical connections resulting in the plunging of a knife into the decedents chest."

"Plus, what we are calling a "knife" is merely a collection of minerals and bonding agents in a particular sequence that we label as "A Knife", but in reality the term has no meaning in the absolute sense. It is just inanimate stuff."

"In fact, the so called person who stands before you accused, is not "really".. John Smith. That is just a conventional label put upon him by his parents ( so called) in order to identify him. However, he is just a collection of chemicals and reactions and electrical impulses, without any sort of "soul" or existence outside these chemical  and electrical reactions. The same goes for the decedent, "Mary Smith" who has no identifiable existence apart from being a big bag of chemicals."

"In sum, there was no "murder" because there is no independent existence of either objects or persons. Everything and everyone is a soulless object whose every action is the result of friction, electrical impulses or chemical reactions"  

"Plus, his cousin did it."

Nice straw man.  Where's my torches?

It is a fallacious conclusion that there is nothing more to existence when a chemical reaction can be detected. There is no reason that the reaction is the be all and end all of the event.

Science has already demonstrated that there can be ex-dimensional existence. Science has already demonstrated the malleability of time and space.That lays out the context in which claims of spiritual existence are based. Therefore, an objective inquirer must admit that existence of Spiritual Beings up to and including the existence of an Ultimate Supreme Being is plausible.

Quote from: "Achronos"It is a fallacious conclusion that there is nothing more to existence when a chemical reaction can be detected. There is no reason that the reaction is the be all and end all of the event.

And this is a straw-man of the position of most atheists, which is why I'm pointing out your fallacious thinking.

QuoteScience has already demonstrated that there can be ex-dimensional existence.

"Ex-dimensional"?  Do you mean "extra-dimensional"?

QuoteScience has already demonstrated the malleability of time and space.That lays out the context in which claims of spiritual existence are based.

This is no more evidence of spirituality than the existence of stars is evidence for starships.  You are staking everything on a hypothetical.

QuoteTherefore, an objective inquirer must admit that existence of Spiritual Beings up to and including the existence of an Ultimate Supreme Being is plausible.

Were it not for other, more serious objections to most versions of said Being.

It is more than well established that it is likely that we live in a "Multi-Verse" where there are many if not infinite Universes. Here is a simple explanation from the History Channel's show "Universe". There are many more clips on you tube like this one if you want to see more:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XmyrE9I8 ... re=related (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XmyrE9I8HNg&feature=related)

So here we have the valid scientific framework you have asked for. It is plausible that existence is far more complicated than the mechanical model you seem to like so much.

Therefore, all that we propose is plausable. No longer can you rely on 19th century Science to say if something is "invisible", it cant be real.

Why did Science delve into metaphyics? Starting with Einstein, scientists have desired to formulate a theory that would explain everything, the so called Unified Theory. This has led to the discovery that existence is not what we thought it was. The possibility of things like Multiple Universes and Super Strings were discovered.

These things impact Religion which describes existence based on Revealed Truth. Things that were thought of as nonsense previously, like being two places at the same time, or life in another dimension of time and space, are now plausible...Go figure.

So I guess the truth is not an idea but a person.

Quote from: "Achronos"I bring you this scenario

"Your honor. my client John Smith is innocent of Murder. As you can see by this chart, the movement of his arm is merely a series of electrical and chemical connections resulting in the plunging of a knife into the decedents chest."

"Plus, what we are calling a "knife" is merely a collection of minerals and bonding agents in a particular sequence that we label as "A Knife", but in reality the term has no meaning in the absolute sense. It is just inanimate stuff."

"In fact, the so called person who stands before you accused, is not "really".. John Smith. That is just a conventional label put upon him by his parents ( so called) in order to identify him. However, he is just a collection of chemicals and reactions and electrical impulses, without any sort of "soul" or existence outside these chemical  and electrical reactions. The same goes for the decedent, "Mary Smith" who has no identifiable existence apart from being a big bag of chemicals."

"In sum, there was no "murder" because there is no independent existence of either objects or persons. Everything and everyone is a soulless object whose every action is the result of friction, electrical impulses or chemical reactions"  

"Plus, his cousin did it."

:|

EDIT: I will make a bit more out of this post after all, I think.

Who exactly is the solicitor (I suppose) preaching to..? A judge..? Who exactly does the judge work for? So who is it that says that the said product of electrochemical reactions and all the other cool stuff straight out of science books was actually wrong..? Apparently, the solicitor, at least, thinks it was perfectly reasonable. So to him, the named act was not a bad thing, now was it..? Besides, he does get paid for defending people who do "bad" things, yes..? So would not "bad things" inflicted of on others be "good things" for him and his?

Quote from: "Achronos"It is more than well established that it is likely that we live in a "Multi-Verse" where there are many if not infinite Universes. Here is a simple explanation from the History Channel's show "Universe". There are many more clips on you tube like this one if you want to see more:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XmyrE9I8 ... re=related (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XmyrE9I8HNg&feature=related)

So here we have the valid scientific framework you have asked for. It is plausible that existence is far more complicated than the mechanical model you seem to like so much.

Therefore, all that we propose is plausable. No longer can you rely on 19th century Science to say if something is "invisible", it cant be real.

Why did Science delve into metaphyics? Starting with Einstein, scientists have desired to formulate a theory that would explain everything, the so called Unified Theory. This has led to the discovery that existence is not what we thought it was. The possibility of things like Multiple Universes and Super Strings were discovered.

These things impact Religion which describes existence based on Revealed Truth. Things that were thought of as nonsense previously, like being two places at the same time, or life in another dimension of time and space, are now plausible...Go figure.

So I guess the truth is not an idea but a person.

I do not find it in the least surprising that you expect to win your argument by picking and choosing popular contemporary scientific hypotheses that seem to validate it from a sea of other contemporary scientific hypotheses that do not seem to--this is precisely how you have operated on the Bible in convincing yourself of your argument.  I emphasize the word "seem" because even if what you said above were wholly inerrant (which it isn't) it would not point to a religious conclusion.

You have made some key mistakes in your word usage in the above, let me list some:
- more than well established
- likely
- valid
- plausible
- mechanical model
- invisible
- metaphysics
- Unified Theory
- discovery

Make an effort to understand the commonly accepted definitions of these terms, and you should find your entire post falls apart.

Quote from: "FaithInGod"

Quote from: "lundberg500"

QuoteWhat I'm trying to ask is this: If, for the sake of argument, the infinite God of the Bible exists

And... you lost me right there. To atheists, the god of the bible does NOT exist. Therefore, your question doesn't even deserve an answer. As you say, "for the sake of argument".. Are you feeling a little contentious today?

So would you say that it isn't possible?

I used "for the sake of argument" because that is how the first atheist responded.

Atheists of course don't accept the existence of a deity, but for the sake of discussion I will agree that if such a god exists then yes, it should be possible for that god to communicate with humans of his choice.  Do you think you've been communicated with?  Is that why you asked the question?

If we look at the subject of comparative religion it does become apparent that numerous contradictions exist among people of faith, in regards their faith.  Given these numerous discrepancies why would you think that a single god had ever communicated his will to humanity?  He must have left the native aborigines of many lands to fumble around in the dark without divine assistance for thousands of years.  Where is the evidence that he ever communicated to them what he communicated to the Christians?  Maybe he is selective in who he communicates with?

Quote from: "FaithInGod"How can you (and the rest of humanity) know anything for absolute certainty?

I was reading yesterday of the success of the Japanese Hayabusa space probe.  They sent the probe to the asteroid Itokawa, placed it in orbit, descended to the surface, collected dust, and returned the sample safely to Earth.  They could do this even though the asteroid was tumbling and moving at some 25 km/sec.  It occurs to me that to carry out such maneuvers the scientists, who are part of humanity, must know a great deal with considerable certainty, maybe with near absolute certainty.  It seems to me it is possible to know a great many things and maintain considerable confidence in the accuracy of that knowledge.

Maybe you could clarify which things you don't think it is possible to know; and given the disagreement, regarding details of faith, how can you claim -- as a person of faith -- to know anything for certain when what you believe contradicts what others of faith believe?  I think you have something of a dilemma on your hands.

Quote from: "Achronos"It is more than well established that it is likely that we live in a "Multi-Verse" where there are many if not infinite Universes. Here is a simple explanation from the History Channel's show "Universe". There are many more clips on you tube like this one if you want to see more:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XmyrE9I8 ... re=related (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XmyrE9I8HNg&feature=related)

So here we have the valid scientific framework you have asked for. It is plausible that existence is far more complicated than the mechanical model you seem to like so much.

Therefore, all that we propose is plausable. No longer can you rely on 19th century Science to say if something is "invisible", it cant be real.

Ah, I wondered where this was going: God is invisible so he too might be real.  Multi-verses are intriguing, and I see no reason to discount them, but where can you find the God hypothesis in scientific circles?  I don't think there are any credible scientific hypotheses for the possible existence of deities.  Besides, if one deity might exist then why not many?  Also, why must a deity possess those characteristics that Christians find admirable?  

I think this kind of reasoning for the possible existence of an invisible deity gets one no where.  You might then also contemplate the existence of invisible fairies.  I'll stop there, but I think the list of invisible, supernatural things could be made quite long.

Quote from: "Achronos"This has led to the discovery that existence is not what we thought it was. The possibility of things like Multiple Universes and Super Strings were discovered.

Oops!  Multi-verses and string theory are not proven.  They have not been discovered.  They are hypothetical only.

Quote from: "Achronos"These things impact Religion which describes existence based on Revealed Truth. Things that were thought of as nonsense previously, like being two places at the same time, or life in another dimension of time and space, are now plausible...Go figure.

Where in science is there any room for revealed truth?  The thing about revealed truth is that it speaks different things to different people and is dependent on religious beliefs and interpretation of religious scriptures.  Revealed truth has the bad habit not requiring confirmation beyond received holy texts.  

I can see, however, how this argument became necessary.  There is no evidence of God in the world.  Nothing points conclusively to his existence, nothing at least that anyone not of faith can recognize. Hence the growing need of believers to find arguments showing that invisible things, that we cannot detect, might actually exist.  Thus, like multi-verses and string theory, God might or might not exist.  Believers, I think, still need a working hypothesis to explain how a deity could come into existence.

Quote from: "Achronos"It is more than well established that it is likely that we live in a "Multi-Verse" where there are many if not infinite Universes. Here is a simple explanation from the History Channel's show "Universe". There are many more clips on you tube like this one if you want to see more:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XmyrE9I8 ... re=related (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XmyrE9I8HNg&feature=related)

Hey, the very first sentence of your link said "There may be other Universes."  Anyone who tells you they know what exists outside of our Universe is pissing on your leg and sayin' it's raining.  

So, how about a scientifically- and not an entertainment-based source or two?  I'm familiar with the concept, and actually I think it's entirely possible, but there is to my knowledge no evidence for it one way or the other right now.

QuoteSo here we have the valid scientific framework you have asked for. It is plausible that existence is far more complicated than the mechanical model you seem to like so much.

Not necessarily.  I don't think The History Channel, an entertainment enterprise, is a valid scientific resource.  Also, even if there is a multi-verse, you'll need to explain how that would militate against a mechanistic explanation.  After all, those universes may well be exactly as mechanistic as ours is.

QuoteTherefore, all that we propose is plausable. No longer can you rely on 19th century Science to say if something is "invisible", it cant be real.

Please quote and link where I said this, or retract this statement.  I've said no such thing, and for you to imply otherwise is dishonest.

QuoteWhy did Science delve into metaphyics? Starting with Einstein, scientists have desired to formulate a theory that would explain everything, the so called Unified Theory. This has led to the discovery that existence is not what we thought it was. The possibility of things like Multiple Universes and Super Strings were discovered.

Yes, I'm well aware of this, thx.

QuoteThese things impact Religion which describes existence based on Revealed Truth. Things that were thought of as nonsense previously, like being two places at the same time, or life in another dimension of time and space, are now plausible...Go figure.

So I guess the truth is not an idea but a person.

I dismiss your claim that religion is "revealed truth" because I don't believe in your revealer.  To base an attempt to change my mind on an assertion of "revealed truth" is merely a poorly-disguised circular argument, and shall therefore be disregarded.