Faith necessarily irrational and unjustified?

antiskeptic

At nozzferrahhtoo's request, I'm opening a new thread to discuss the stability of his thinking belief irrational and unjustified. Due to time constraints and the fact that the discussion has progressed somewhat in the Christianity forum, I may have to limit myself to prioritizing responding to nozzferrahtoo - should he choose to partake.

nozzferrahhtoo wrote:

There might be such evidence, I simply have not been presented with it yet. I am not close minded enough to declare there is none. I will only declare that I have been shown none, and do not hold out any high expectation that I shall be.

My slogan is that I have not been shown "any arguments, evidence, data or reasoning that lends even a modicum of credence to the suggestion there might be a god". Of any type. And if there is nothing whatsoever to ground a belief, then I do think that belief irrational and unjustified.

I would agree with your statement - clearly a person should have something on which to ground their belief.

Would you accept that God, (if he existed and was Creator) would be in a position to demonstrate his existence to you personally in such a way as to leave you in no doubt as to his existence, but without that personal demonstration being something that could be shared with equal effect with another person?

If you did accept that possibility, then would you not also have to accept that belief based on such an event would be both rational and justified.

smacl

antiskeptic wrote: »

Would you accept that God, (if he existed and was Creator) would be in a position to demonstrate his existence to you personally in such a way as to leave you in no doubt as to his existence, but without that personal demonstration being something that could be shared with equal effect with another person?

If you did accept that possibility, then would you not also have to accept that belief based on such an event would be both rational and justified.

By definition for an atheist, to accept the possibility that former is true is in itself irrational, and therefore not a reasonable basis on which to build rational belief.

Delirium

antiskeptic wrote: »

At nozzferrahhtoo's request, I'm opening a new thread to discuss the stability of his thinking belief irrational and unjustified. Due to time constraints and the fact that the discussion has progressed somewhat in the Christianity forum, I'll limit myself to responding to nozzferrahtoo should he choose to partake.





I would agree with your statement - clearly a person should have something on which to ground their belief.

Would you accept that God, (if he existed and was Creator) would be in a position to demonstrate his existence to you personally in such a way as to leave you in no doubt as to his existence, but without that personal demonstration being something that could be shared with equal effect with another person?

If you did accept that possibility, then would you not also have to accept that belief based on such an event would be both rational and justified.

How would someone distinguish between someone who had a personal demonstration that proved Gods existence and someone telling a tall tale if there are no ways of proving the demonstration occurred?

gaynorvader

antiskeptic wrote: »

At nozzferrahhtoo's request, I'm opening a new thread to discuss the stability of his thinking belief irrational and unjustified. Due to time constraints and the fact that the discussion has progressed somewhat in the Christianity forum, I'll limit myself to responding to nozzferrahtoo should he choose to partake.





I would agree with your statement - clearly a person should have something on which to ground their belief.

Would you accept that God, (if he existed and was Creator) would be in a position to demonstrate his existence to you personally in such a way as to leave you in no doubt as to his existence, but without that personal demonstration being something that could be shared with equal effect with another person?

If you did accept that possibility, then would you not also have to accept that belief based on such an event would be both rational and justified.

What if you were just hearing voices a.k.a insane. How can you tell from delusion?

smacl

SW wrote: »

How would someone distinguish between someone who had a personal demonstration that proved Gods existence and someone telling a tall tale if there are no ways of proving the demonstration occurred?

Its got to be the pillar of salt thing, anything less is just smoke and mirrors. On the off chance the almighty does put in an appearance, and is willing to humour us poor doubters, I'm sure my mother in law could do the honours and volunteer.

antiskeptic

smacl wrote: »

By definition for an atheist, to accept the possibility that former is true is in itself irrational, and therefore not a reasonable basis on which to build rational belief.

What's the former?

Brian Shanahan

antiskeptic wrote: »

Would you accept that God, (if he existed and was Creator) would be in a position to demonstrate his existence to you personally in such a way as to leave you in no doubt as to his existence, but without that personal demonstration being something that could be shared with equal effect with another person?

The demonstration would have to be verifiable by others, falsifiable and repeatable before I'd accept the existence of god, but if said demonstration were accomplished, yes I would accept god (this is one thing that seperates theists from atheists, c.f. the Nye vs. Ham debate, where Nye said he would accept creationism if anyone could come up with proper evidence, whereas Ham had to admit that there is no way he'd ever accept evolution no matter the evidence). Your problem is that there has not been one single instance in human existence where there has been evidence for god, and to be honest here, there is a hell of a lot of circumstantial evidence agains the existence of god (viz. specifically that nothing we know of has been shown to need a god to exist).

If you did accept that possibility, then would you not also have to accept that belief based on such an event would be both rational and justified.

But belief would not be rational still, because belief in something means holding that thing to be true/false when there isn't sufficient evidence to guarantee the likelihood of the belief or, like with religion, where the preponderance of the evidence is against the proposition. If we had sufficient evidence for god, we would accept him, not believe in him.

antiskeptic

SW wrote: »

How would someone distinguish between someone who had a personal demonstration that proved Gods existence and someone telling a tall tale if there are no ways of proving the demonstration occurred?

Not relevant to the query posed in the OP. Sorry but I've not the time for sidetracks

antiskeptic

gaynorvader wrote: »

What if you were just hearing voices a.k.a insane. How can you tell from delusion?

The OP asks whether God could do it (notice who the onus is on). How he does it isn't relevant.

antiskeptic

Brian Shanahan wrote: »

The demonstration would have to be verifiable by others, falsifiable and repeatable before I'd accept the existence of god,

So you are saying that it is beyond God's ability to demonstrate his existence to you personally.

Yet you would place your faith in another means he put in place whereby you could be made confident of his existence (namely: empirical method)

It seems strange that you would accept one means of confidence-raising which would have (in the case he turned up empirically) shown its provision to stem from God ... but not in another stemming from God.

If both systems (empirical and non) stem from God, how do you raise one above the other?

If we had sufficient evidence for god, we would accept him, not believe in him.

As it happens, the biblical sense of faith isn't evidential-less belief. Rather, it's belief based on a particular form of evidence. Evidence not available to those who are blind.

We believe because we see. Which is rational enough.

The assumption you make is that you are equipped to see all the evidence that there can be - and find none for God. But what if you can't see all the evidence there is to be seen?

Mark Hamill

antiskeptic wrote: »

Would you accept that God, (if he existed and was Creator) would be in a position to demonstrate his existence to you personally in such a way as to leave you in no doubt as to his existence, but without that personal demonstration being something that could be shared with equal effect with another person?

If I couldn't prove something I experienced to someone else, then I would have plenty of doubts about it's existence.

Mark Hamill

antiskeptic wrote: »

So you are saying that it is beyond God's ability to demonstrate his existence to you personally.

Yet you would place your faith in another means he put in place whereby you could be made confident of his existence (namely: empirical method)

It seems strange that you would accept one means of confidence-raising which would have (in the case he turned up empirically) shown its provision to stem from God ... but not in another stemming from God.

If both systems (empirical and non) stem from God, how do you raise one above the other?

Circular reasoning. You are starting with the assumption that god exists, to assert that all forms of confidence-raising comes from him, to argue that all forms of confidence-raising are equally valid because they all come from him.

antiskeptic wrote: »

As it happens, the biblical sense of faith isn't evidential-less belief. Rather, it's belief based on a particular form of evidence. Evidence not available to those who are blind.

We believe because we see. Which is rational enough.

The assumption you make is that you are equipped to see all the evidence that there can be - and find none for God. But what if you can't see all the evidence there is to be seen?

Then, to use your circular reasoning, we are blind because god makes us so and that makes god a cruel bastard who makes us blind so he can punish us for eternity for walking into walls (spiritually speaking).

Delirium

antiskeptic wrote: »

Not relevant to the query posed in the OP. Sorry but I've not the time for sidetracks

:rolleyes:

God can't communicate to one single person and not leave evidence of existence. To communicate with a person he would have to operate in this reality or remove the person to another reality. Both of which would leave after-effects of the event. A creature that created this universe would be instantly detected as a huge power-surge appearing on Earth.

Penny 4 Thoughts

antiskeptic wrote: »

I would agree with your statement - clearly a person should have something on which to ground their belief.

Would you accept that God, (if he existed and was Creator) would be in a position to demonstrate his existence to you personally in such a way as to leave you in no doubt as to his existence, but without that personal demonstration being something that could be shared with equal effect with another person?

If you did accept that possibility, then would you not also have to accept that belief based on such an event would be both rational and justified.

Hi Antiskeptic,

I hope you don't mind me posting in your thread, I am new to Boards.ie but found your question interesting.

Before I consider an answer can you define for me a bit more what you mean by "demonstrate" her existence?

If an all powerful creator existed and wanted us to believe she existed surely she could just make us all believe she existed. By switching on what ever neurons or some such we have in our heads that make us believe in the existence of something.

Is that what you mean by "demonstrate her existence"?

Penny

Brian Shanahan

antiskeptic wrote: »

So you are saying that it is beyond God's ability to demonstrate his existence to you personally.

Wrong, dead wrong. And this is why I usually don't respond to you. What I said was that to demonstrate god's existence to my satisfaction was that his existence would have to be demonstrated in exactly the same way as any other hypothesised physical phenomenon. Now granted I'd probably need an expert to walk me through the proof very slowly, but I'm still not asking for anything special.

But then again you don't really want to know what would constitute proof of god do you? You just want to make the baseless (given the current evidence) assertion that he exists, and when we don't fall down worshipping your deity, retreat back into your toddler mentality persecution complex, "they're not believing in god, even though I told them he's real. Mammy they're big meanies over there. waaaaaaaaah!"

Michael Nugent

antiskeptic wrote: »

I would agree with your statement - clearly a person should have something on which to ground their belief.

Would you accept that God, (if he existed and was Creator) would be in a position to demonstrate his existence to you personally in such a way as to leave you in no doubt as to his existence, but without that personal demonstration being something that could be shared with equal effect with another person?

If you did accept that possibility, then would you not also have to accept that belief based on such an event would be both rational and justified.

No.

I do accept that possibility in principle, and it does not follow from accepting that possibility that belief based on such an event would be both rational and justified.

That is because the test for rational and justified belief is not merely whether something is possible, but whether the belief is proportionate to the likelihood of the belief being true.

So you have to take into account such factors as

• the lack of overall evidence for the existence of a creator god that communicates with humans on planet Earth;
• the large amount of overall evidence that humans on planet Earth invented the idea of a creator god that communicates with some of us;
• the knowledge that many people believe that this supposed creator god has communicated itself to them personally but that each of them believe they have received different messages;
• the knowledge that each or most of these people believe that the other people who believe they have received other messages are mistaken;
• our increasing knowledge of the neurophysiology of belief;
• the relative probabilities of all of the people who believe this god has demonstrated itself to them being mistaken, versus all of the other people except you being mistaken;
• etc., etc., etc.

In effect this means that - even if the event actually happened, and belief in it therefore happened to be accurate - the belief itself would still not be rational or justified without further evidence.

As another example, would you accept that it is possible that I personally am god and I have just this moment dismantled the Eiffel Tower and reassembled it made out of blue cheese, but without that event being something that could be shared with equal effect with you?

If you did accept that possibility, then would you not also have to accept that belief based on such an event would be both rational and justified?

antiskeptic

Mark Hamill wrote: »

If I couldn't prove something I experienced to someone else, then I would have plenty of doubts about it's existence.

Spoken like an Empiricist.

Empiricism might be true. But so might what I'm suggesting.

The trouble with Empiricism is that it presumes what it cannot detect cannot be. Or isn't even likely to be. As my old maths teacher used to say: "show me your work"

antiskeptic

Mark Hamill wrote: »

Circular reasoning. You are starting with the assumption that god exists, to assert that all forms of confidence-raising comes from him, to argue that all forms of confidence-raising are equally valid because they all come from him.

You err, in that the context set by the OP is IF/THEN. No claim is made about God's existence other than in that context.

IF God exists AND reveals himself personally THEN nozz's (implied) assertion that non-empirically based belief is necessarily "irrational and unjustified" would be false.

Similarly:

IF a person would, in principle, accept God's existence were He to reveal himself in 'empirically verifiable fashion' (even if he hasn't done so yet) THEN they have hung themselves on the noose of accepting, in principle, any means God might reveal himself - including personally. They would, in principle, be accepting that all methods of revelation would necessarily stem from God-designed systems and as such, rely on God's assignation for their ultimate validity.

Like, to which foundation would you attach empirical method to when utilising it in deciding it's Creator exists. If not it's Creator, that is?

Then, to use your circular reasoning, we are blind because god makes us so and that makes god a cruel bastard who makes us blind so he can punish us for eternity for walking into walls (spiritually speaking).

Spare me the hand wringing will you? It's beyond tedious at this stage.

antiskeptic

SW wrote: »

:rolleyes:

:rolleyes:

God can't communicate to one single person and not leave evidence of existence. To communicate with a person he would have to operate in this reality or remove the person to another reality.

Or add another level of reality to the commoner garden one. Not exactly trouble for a reality-Creating being. Is it?

Both of which would leave after-effects of the event. A creature that created this universe would be instantly detected as a huge power-surge appearing on Earth.

You seem to be relying on Leaving Cert Physics (lower level) for your argumentation here.

Delirium

antiskeptic wrote: »

:rolleyes:

Or add another level of reality to the commoner garden one. Not exactly trouble for a reality-Creating being. Is it?

No idea. Maybe it is, maybe it isn't. I have no idea if a being can create a universe/reality or how easy/difficult it is to do. Nevermind altering it once it has grown to the proportions it is now.

You seem to be relying on Leaving Cert Physics (lower level) for your argumentation here.

Feel free to explain where my error is.

antiskeptic

Penny 4 Thoughts wrote: »

Hi Antiskeptic,

I hope you don't mind me posting in your thread, I am new to Boards.ie but found your question interesting.

Hi Penny4. Welcome..

Before I consider an answer can you define for me a bit more what you mean by "demonstrate" her existence?

Would you mind if don't? For two reasons:

1) I don't if you've lurked here a while before posting but one trouble with net-discussions of any ilk is that they can veer away from the central point very easily and you've folk joining mid-stream, who know nothing of the context, taking issue with the very last post you've written - whereas if they stuck to context they'd not have posted at all. The more I veer from track the more folk will respond to my veering, etc...

2) Does it matter how God would demonstrate his existence given that IF God THEN whatever means he chooses to demonstrate his existence derives its 'conviction factor' from God's assigning the level of conviction factor to it. He could, for example, assign a greater confidence quotient to non-empirical means than he does empirical means. Making the former a more rational and justified way to be cleaving to belief in his existence than anything he might do empirically.

If an all powerful creator existed and wanted us to believe she existed surely she could just make us all believe she existed. By switching on what ever neurons or some such we have in our heads that make us believe in the existence of something.

Could of course. But if not wanting to force belief then might apply criterion to be satisfied before switching on those neurons.

Applause for seeing, in one (if erroneous, according to Christian belief) sense, what it boils down to. So many concentrate on "the evidence" without realizing that it's the effect on the brain which matters - not the evidence which causes it. If the same effect on brain could be achieved by sticking in a probe then the person would believe the same thing...

Is that what you mean by "demonstrate her existence"?

Not quite - although neurological change must be a consequence of what happens.

Rather it's another dimension added to the person - namely a spiritual element brought to life by God and which he communicates through. That spiritual element, being attached to the brain and body just as intimately as the brain is attached to the body (as experienced by an atheist) means the knowledge of God infuses the whole. Practical example:

Lots of people look to the heavens at night and are awed: the expanse, the scale, the infinity, the sense of miniscule size of self, the humbling, the watching that movie with Jody Foster with the great pan-out from planet Earth and going "friccin hell..."

I look at it now with that same awe but have now attached, the sense of the Creator who was mighty enough to pull that into being. Such a conviction could be expected to cause all but the most thoughtless serious discomfort - by virtue of coming up against such a scale of being - yet He is my father. A moniker decided by Himself to describe a most important aspect of Himself.

Which sets me at ease. Not without some trembling. But not the kind of fearful, terrified trembling which rightfully attaches to one coming up against such Magnitude without knowing something of him first.

antiskeptic

Michael Nugent wrote: »

I do accept that possibility in principle, and it does not follow from accepting that possibility that belief based on such an event would be both rational and justified.

Let's look then..

That is because the test for rational and justified belief is not merely whether something is possible, but whether the belief is proportionate to the likelihood of the belief being true.

Could you clarify here?

You say "the belief is based on an event". The event is God demonstrating himself to a person. If it could happen in principle in could happen in fact. If it happens (or has happened) in fact then thus is it: the person's belief is both rational and justified because God, in fact, has turned up.

We're not at all concerned with whether they can demonstrate his having turned up to them, to you. That they can't won't affect the rationality and justification for their belief. At least, we'll need some argumentation to support that notion. Presumably below..

the lack of overall evidence for the existence of a creator god that communicates with humans on planet Earth;

• the large amount of overall evidence that humans on planet Earth invented the idea of a creator god that communicates with some of us;
• the knowledge that many people believe that this supposed creator god has communicated itself to them personally but that each of them believe they have received different messages;
• the knowledge that each or most of these people believe that the other people who believe they have received other messages are mistaken;
• our increasing knowledge of the neurophysiology of belief;
• the relative probabilities of all of the people who believe this god has demonstrated itself to them being mistaken, versus all of the other people except you being mistaken;
• etc., etc., etc.

Whilst these are all pretty standard (and, within the confines of the worldview that creates them, valid) objections, none of them actually impact on the position above.



I mean, so what that there's increasing "knowledge of the neurology of belief" if God exists and turns up (something you accept he can, in principle do)? By "neurology of belief" you mean "reasons why people, for purely naturalistic reasons, believe God exists" What relevance has that to a situation where God turns up, actually?

In effect this means that - even if the event actually happened, and belief in it therefore happened to be accurate - the belief itself would still not be rational or justified without further evidence.

You'll have to elaborate. You're envisaging a situation where God exists and decides to demonstrate himself to a person but that they need further evidence?

To which system, other than a (they must now suspect) God-designed system should they turn to to further evidence? Which system, to put it another way, stands outside the Creator of said system, such as to be able to satisfactorily demonstrate the Creator, independently of the Creator being necessarily involved in assigning value to each system of demonstration.

It seems to me that if once relying on the Creator for the system of His self-demonstration then any system He chooses is as good as he chooses it to be. Which means non-empirical means might be better than empirical ones for the purposes of his self-demonstration. And if so, then no need for a person to look further on God's self demonstration by non-empirical means.

As another example, would you accept that it is possible that I personally am god and I have just this moment dismantled the Eiffel Tower and reassembled it made out of blue cheese, but without that event being something that could be shared with equal effect with you?

If you did accept that possibility, then would you not also have to accept that belief based on such an event would be both rational and justified?

The OP isn't interested in this question. It's interested in the validity of nozz's position on irrationality and justification only. In the sense of demonstrating that his position is both irrational and unjustified.

antiskeptic

SW wrote: »

No idea. Maybe it is, maybe it isn't. I have no idea if a being can create a universe/reality or how easy/difficult it is to do. Nevermind altering it once it has grown to the proportions it is now.

Feel free to explain where my error is.

It was supposing to be fact (in your prior post) what you above now say you're not at all sure of.

Michael Nugent

antiskeptic wrote: »

The event is God demonstrating himself to a person. If it could happen in principle in could happen in fact.

No, that is not the case.

To accept that it could happen in principle is a hypothetical position based on my lack of certainty that it could not happen.

But whatever you or I believe about it, in reality it is either the case that (a) it could happen in fact or (b) it could not happen in fact.

Whether (a) or (b) is true is an independent fact, that does not follow from whether or not I accept in principle that it could happen.

If there is no god, then it could not happen in fact, regardless of whether I accept that it could happen in principle.

antiskeptic wrote: »

If it happens (or has happened) in fact then thus is it: the person's belief is both rational and justified because God, in fact, has turned up.

Again, that is not the case.

Whether a person's belief is rational and justified depends on the thought processes of the person, not on whether they happen to be correct.

For example, you could believe that 2+2=5, and you could also believe that 4+4=7. From that you could believe that 2+2+4+4 equals 5+7 which equals 12. As it happens, 2+2+4+4 does equal 12, but your belief is not rational and justified.

Or you could believe that you saw me going into room, when in fact you saw somebody else going into the room. From that you could believe that I am in the room. As it happens, I may or may not be in the room, independently of that other person having gone into it, but whether or not I am in the room, your belief is not rational and justified.

.

Mark Hamill

antiskeptic wrote: »

Spoken like an Empiricist.

Empiricism might be true. But so might what I'm suggesting.

The trouble with Empiricism is that it presumes what it cannot detect cannot be. Or isn't even likely to be. As my old maths teacher used to say: "show me your work"

No, spoken like a rationalist. I am not infallible, I can be mistaken. If I cannot convince anyone else of something I supposedly experienced why shouldn't I doubt it?

The rest of your post is a transparent false equivalence and an obnoxious ignorance of the sum of human endeavour.

Michael Nugent

antiskeptic wrote: »

You'll have to elaborate. You're envisaging a situation where God exists and decides to demonstrate himself to a person but that they need further evidence?

Yes.

Here is such a situation.

I am God, and I have decided to demonstrate Myself to you now, by telling you that I am God on this internet forum, without using a computer to make My comment appear here. I just willed this comment to appear on this forum, and it did, as My demonstration to you that I am God.

Do you now accept that I am God, or do you need further evidence?

antiskeptic wrote: »

To which system, other than a (they must now suspect) God-designed system should they turn to to further evidence? Which system, to put it another way, stands outside the Creator of said system, such as to be able to satisfactorily demonstrate the Creator, independently of the Creator being necessarily involved in assigning value to each system of demonstration.

To which system, other than a (you must now suspect) system designed by Me as God should you turn to to further evidence? Which system, to put it another way, stands outside Me, such as to be able to satisfactorily demonstrate Me, independently of Me being necessarily involved in assigning value to the system of demonstration of Me willing this comment to appear on this forum without the aid of a computer?

antiskeptic wrote: »

It seems to me that if once relying on the Creator for the system of His self-demonstration then any system He chooses is as good as he chooses it to be. Which means non-empirical means might be better than empirical ones for the purposes of his self-demonstration. And if so, then no need for a person to look further on God's self demonstration by non-empirical means.

It should then seem to you that if once relying on Me for the system of My self-demonstration as God, then any system I choose is as good as I choose it to be. Which means non-empirical means might be better than empirical ones for the purposes of My self-demonstration. And if so, then no need for you to look further on My self demonstration by non-empirical means.

Do you now accept that I am God, or do you need further evidence?

.

Mark Hamill

antiskeptic wrote: »

You err, in that the context set by the OP is IF/THEN. No claim is made about God's existence other than in that context.

The OP can be simply countered by apply the contrary IF NOT/THEN NOT. If god doesn't exist, then the reveals aren't genuine and nozz's assertion is not false. In order to claim your version is more valid than the NOT version, you need to start with the assumption that god exists, which is circular logic.
But, to debunk in another way:

antiskeptic wrote: »

IF God exists AND reveals himself personally THEN nozz's (implied) assertion that non-empirically based belief is necessarily "irrational and unjustified" would be false.

A guess that is right is still a guess. Even IF god exists AND he reveals himself, your (or my) own surety of that reveal is not a measure of its validity, as you (or I) have no way of knowing if that surety is genuine or not. Different people are equally sure of the existence of contradictory gods, so it is clearly possible for people to achieve absolute surety of non-existent gods.

antiskeptic wrote: »

Similarly:

IF a person would, in principle, accept God's existence were He to reveal himself in 'empirically verifiable fashion' (even if he hasn't done so yet) THEN they have hung themselves on the noose of accepting, in principle, any means God might reveal himself - including personally. They would, in principle, be accepting that all methods of revelation would necessarily stem from God-designed systems and as such, rely on God's assignation for their ultimate validity.

Like, to which foundation would you attach empirical method to when utilising it in deciding it's Creator exists. If not it's Creator, that is?

This was a non sequitor the first time you tried arguing this years ago and its been a non sequitor every time since.

antiskeptic wrote: »

Spare me the hand wringing will you? It's beyond tedious at this stage.

Tedious? From the guy spouting universe spanning arrogance about how he is special enough to see the evidence only gods chosen can see while the rest of us are blind?

Michael Nugent

antiskeptic wrote: »

IF a person would, in principle, accept God's existence were He to reveal himself in 'empirically verifiable fashion' (even if he hasn't done so yet) THEN they have hung themselves on the noose of accepting, in principle, any means God might reveal himself - including personally. They would, in principle, be accepting that all methods of revelation would necessarily stem from God-designed systems and as such, rely on God's assignation for their ultimate validity.

antiskeptic wrote: »

2) Does it matter how God would demonstrate his existence given that IF God THEN whatever means he chooses to demonstrate his existence derives its 'conviction factor' from God's assigning the level of conviction factor to it. He could, for example, assign a greater confidence quotient to non-empirical means than he does empirical means. Making the former a more rational and justified way to be cleaving to belief in his existence than anything he might do empirically.

So do you accept My means of revealing Myself as God to you, by willing My comments to appear on this internet forum without the aid of a computer, or do you need further evidence?

Delirium

antiskeptic wrote: »

It was supposing to be fact (in your prior post) what you above now say you're not at all sure of.

no, I'm saying that God can't operate in this reality without leaving some sort of mark upon it. You say I'm wrong but won't explain why.

antiskeptic

SW wrote: »

no, I'm saying that God can't operate in this reality without leaving some sort of mark upon it. You say I'm wrong but won't explain why.

You're saying you're right without explaining why*. Which kind of stalemates the point.

*assuming the mark you're talking of need be empirically detectable

Delirium

antiskeptic wrote: »

You're saying you're right without explaining why*. Which kind of stalemates the point.

*assuming the mark you're talking of need be empirically detectable

yes, I'm making that assumption. And I'm asking you to explain why I'm wrong. Put another way, can we currently interact with an intelligence that isn't empirically detectable?

pauldla

antiskeptic wrote: »

Spoken like an Empiricist.

Empiricism might be true. But so might what I'm suggesting.

The trouble with Empiricism is that it presumes what it cannot detect cannot be. Or isn't even likely to be. As my old maths teacher used to say: "show me your work"

Your maths teacher spoke well. Show me your god.

antiskeptic

Michael Nugent wrote: »

No, that is not the case.

To accept that it could happen in principle is a hypothetical position based on my lack of certainty that it could not happen.

But whatever you or I believe about it, in reality it is either the case that (a) it could happen in fact or (b) it could not happen in fact.

Whether (a) or (b) is true is an independent fact, that does not follow from whether or not I accept in principle that it could happen.

If there is no god, then it could not happen in fact, regardless of whether I accept that it could happen in principle.

Might well have happened for all you know. If it has then it would be fact despite you not knowing it has happened. Is what I meant to communicate

Again, that is not the case.

Whether a person's belief is rational and justified depends on the thought processes of the person, not on whether they happen to be correct.

IF God is in fact the Creator AND he turns up to your empirical satisfaction THEN the 'processes' you rely on to conclude God exists would be now known by you to have been God-designed. That is to say, all the certainly you obtain feel by having used these processes would have occurred because God has assigned the processes those characteristics / designed us that way.

We can not conclude God exists independently of a creator God. And if God can demonstrate himself one way and that way be rational and justified (on account of his assigning those qualities to the process) then he can demonstrate himself other ways and assign those same qualities to it.

Indeed, he could well assign greater confidence giving to a non-empirical method.

antiskeptic

pauldla wrote: »

Your maths teacher spoke well. Show me your god.

The only work on show here is related to the OP. The only work required by me here is that supporting an argument contra the OP/supporting nozz's position

antiskeptic

SW wrote: »

yes, I'm making that assumption. And I'm asking you to explain why I'm wrong. Put another way, can we currently interact with an intelligence that isn't empirically detectable?

I'll refer to the OP. nozz is making a positive statement about belief (in the sense of making factual claims). In order for him to do that he needs to close off possibilities.

Which would be your task too. Assuming God need leave empirical mark is an assumption. An assumption doesn't close possibilities.

antiskeptic

Mark Hamill wrote: »

No, spoken like a rationalist. I am not infallible, I can be mistaken. If I cannot convince anyone else of something I supposedly experienced why shouldn't I doubt it?

Suppose that experience and subsequent investigation gave you reasons why others couldn't be convinced.

The rest of your post is a transparent false equivalence and an obnoxious ignorance of the sum of human endeavour.

Hail mighty mankind (he say's looking out his window and taking a good, long look at what mankind get's up to in the world). I can't say I'm unequivocally impressed.

Delirium

antiskeptic wrote: »

I'll refer to the OP. nozz is making a positive statement about belief (in the sense of making factual claims). In order for him to do that he needs to close off possibilities.

Which would be your task too. Assuming God need leave empirical mark is an assumption. An assumption doesn't close possibilities.

but it does show that belief in God with current understanding of reality is irrational. How can someone believe in an entity that has no evidence for it?

pauldla

antiskeptic wrote: »

The only work on show here is related to the OP. The only work required by me here is that supporting an argument contra the OP/supporting nozz's position

I'll read that as "I can't", then.

antiskeptic

pauldla wrote: »

I'll read that as "I can't", then.

Is the problem that I can't show or that you can't see?

antiskeptic

SW wrote: »

but it does show that belief in God with current understanding of reality is irrational. How can someone believe in an entity that has no evidence for it?

That there is no empirical (or at least the empirical indications are read in a way which precludes conclusion "God") evidence doesn't mean there is no evidence/ non-empirical means for God to demonstrate himself and communicate with people.



See also my post to Michael Nugent above re: the comparative worth of empiricism (vs. any other method God might use) when it has to deal with it's creators existence.

pauldla

antiskeptic wrote: »

Is the problem that I can't show or that you can't see?

If a person wants to believe that they can see a blue spacemonkey that others can't see (note to self: poss TV comedy), I don't see how there is any problem at all, as it is none of my business. I hope it can continue to be none of my business. But how seriously should I take the person who sees things that cannot be shown to others?

antiskeptic

antiskeptic wrote: »

That there is no empirical (or at least the empirical indications are read in a way which precludes conclusion "God") evidence doesn't mean there is no evidence/ non-empirical means for God to demonstrate himself and communicate with people.

How can you tell the difference between those non-empirical means and total fiction or delusion? (Either for yourself or for others.)

How can you tell that those non-empirical means are accurate?

Either you can't do either of these things and non-empirical means are not very useful, or you can but only through empirical means.

What else can you show or know to be true using non empirical means, or is God a special case?

robindch

antiskeptic wrote: »

Assuming God need leave empirical mark is an assumption.

And assuming that the deity is there when there's no evidence is a much larger assumption. Particularly when the deity concerned is supposed to be a deity willing to intervene at the drop of a prayer, but who seems curiously unwilling to intervene.

The non-interactive and the non-existing look very much alike.

antiskeptic

robindch wrote: »

And assuming that the deity is there when there's no evidence is a much larger assumption.

I'm not sure how you manage to arrive at relative size of assumption.

Joe1919

'Faith' and 'Belief' are not the same.

I think much confusion comes about by interchanging these terms. e.g.
https://www.google.ie/#q=difference+between+faith+and+belief

I remember reading a very good book about this. (Paul Tillich, Dynamics of Faith).
http://www.amazon.com/Dynamics-Faith-Perennial-Classics-Tillich/dp/0060937130

Polarix

I would agree with your statement - clearly a person

Would you accept that God, (if he existed and was Creator) would be in a position to demonstrate his existence to you personally in such a way as to leave you in no doubt as to his existence, but without that personal demonstration being something that could be shared with equal effect with another person?

If you did accept that possibility, then would you not also have to accept that belief based on such an event would be both rational and justified.

Would you accept that equally the person could be self deluded and that no one, including the person themselves could tell the difference ?

Brian Shanahan

antiskeptic wrote: »

You seem to be relying on Leaving Cert Physics (lower level) for your argumentation here.

And as I've pointed out you don't understand scientific concepts I've no problem explaining to my five year old cousin. So you disparaging others' knowledge is kind of laughable don't you think?

Mark Hamill

antiskeptic wrote: »

Suppose that experience and subsequent investigation gave you reasons why others couldn't be convinced.

So what? Again, if I cannot convince anyone else of something I supposedly experienced why shouldn't I doubt it?

antiskeptic wrote: »

Hail mighty mankind (he say's looking out his window and taking a good, long look at what mankind get's up to in the world). I can't say I'm unequivocally impressed.

He says on his computer on the internet.

sopretty

Nozzferathoo does believe there is something out there.

sopretty

And here's the proof.

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

Of course there is "something". If there was not, then we would not be here. I believe there is "something" too. We exist, we are in a universe, and there is an explanation for that. We do not know what that explanation is, but that is the "something" whatever it may be.

Polarix

Believer types forget there is no evidence for alien life either, the possibility of alien life does not evidence make.