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Atheism/Existence of God Debates (Please Read OP)

PDN

This new 'catch-all' thread will operate similar to the Creationism and Protestant/Catholic Debate threads.

Too many threads are spoilt and dragged off topic when a non-Christian poster demands, "What evidence do you have for God?" While some may enjoy such discussion, it is frequently off-topic and derails discussion of other subjects (the very discussion that is the reason for this Forum's existence).

So, in order to protect the Forum and facilitate on topic discussions, all that stuff now belongs here. Anyone who keeps trying to derail other discussions by demanding evidence for God's existence will be warned, and if those warnings are ignored then swift infractions and bans will ensue.

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CerebralCortex

philologos wrote: »

Not even Descartes with whom Cartesian dualism was in earnest a dualist. He believed that mind was something different to body but that both intrinsically depend on eachother. The mind is intimately connected to its appendages in the body via the brain (Descartes thought it might have been the heart but the more likely being the brain).

Fair enough.

philologos wrote: »

I personally think that the mind is constituted from the processes of the brain and from what is stored within it. I believe that spirit is something different than the mind however. It is the essence of our being, it isn't physical nor does it depend on biological matter. It is a descriptor of who philologos is from start to end even if I happen to fall into amnesia which would dramatically alter the mind. One could perhaps say that it is the content of God's mind concerning me. One could speculate on it to a great degree.

But don't you see the problem there? You've just described something that has absolutely no effect, is not needed to describe behaviour, nor is it needed to explain individuality. With causality this essence would have to have a real world effect but guess what it doesn't because it's not there. The brain and it's causal interaction with the world and our understanding of it explains person-hood pretty well and is testable. It seems like this essence nonsense is just wishful thinking in the face of evidence. The implications you also fail to see are reconciling contra causal free will with causality.

philologos wrote: »

There are a lot of things that I don't know and that I'll be probing into until I die.

:rolleyes: Pathetic retreat tbh and wishful thinking at it's most ugly.
"Most people would rather die than think; in fact, they do so."

philologos wrote: »

I don't believe that everything is material.

But you consistently fail to show evidence for this.

philologos wrote: »

The material is only what appears to sense perception. The material itself cannot tell us anything about its ultimate cause. Basing a worldview on materialism is inadequate for this reason.

The sensor itself is material.

Zombrex

philologos wrote: »

As for M-theory as far as I'm aware most physicists would agree that the universe has a beginning and that it will have an end. I'm working on the assumption that we can determine the age of the universe from looking to the spread of the universe since the Big Bang. By that we can conclude that the universe has a finite age rather than an infinite one. Judging on that it seems that the universe is a finite entity, and every finite entity must have an ultimate cause (even if there are intermediary finite causes inbetween).

Perhaps I wasn't clear. M-theory hypothesises (actually one sub-branch of it) that the universe in its current state is the product of a never ending cyclical crashing together and pulling apart of higher dimensional space. This would be the cause behind our current universe and ever other universe. Time goes forward, then backwards, then forward again, then backwards etc

http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2008/02/qa_turok

There is zero experimental support for this idea. But sure when has that ever stop religious people

Is this more or less likely that "God did it"

philologos

If the idea is on the basis of what is more likely then we could say that the M-theory is an interesting hypothesis but not much more.

CerebralCortex: I'm sorry that you aren't happy that I don't know everything, or don't claim to know. But we're working on what seems more sensible that there is a God who created this universe or not.

I've seen nothing to suggest that it is more reasonable to believe that this universe is without purpose or cause. I've seen a lot to suggest that it is more probable to believe that the universe was created rather than not.

Zombrex

philologos wrote: »

If the idea is on the basis of what is more likely then we could say that the M-theory is an interesting hypothesis but not much more.

Can we not say that about everything, including the "God did it" hypothesis? Or do you have some reason to argue that this is a much more plausible explanation than any other?

philologos wrote: »

But we're working on what seems more sensible that there is a God who created this universe or not.

Again, which is more sensible, God did it or M-theory? If you like you can replace M-theory with any other scientific hypothesis currently doing the rounds.

philologos wrote: »

I've seen nothing to suggest that it is more reasonable to believe that this universe is without purpose or cause.

Can you explain how you are judging that?

philologos wrote: »

I've seen a lot to suggest that it is more probable to believe that the universe was created rather than not.

Can you explain why you think this is more probable than, lets say M-theory

philologos

I'm working on what is most currently accepted by physicists about the age of the universe. That it is of finite age, and that it has a finite cause. Even if there were a billion multiverses each creating universe one after another after another, this doesn't explain what caused the first to come into existence. Unless you are suggesting that there is an infinite regress.

To reel this back in, there are more reasons to suggest that God's existence is reasonable including our unfinished assessment of the axiological argument (from morality).

Both the cosmological and axiological beat the lame "what about amputees?" argument presented thus far.

Zombrex

philologos wrote: »

I'm working on what is most currently accepted by physicists about the age of the universe. That it is of finite age, and that it has a finite cause.

What do you mean "finite cause"? There is no accepted theory for what created the Big Bang.

philologos wrote: »

Even if there were a billion multiverses each creating universe one after another after another, this doesn't explain what caused the first to come into existence. Unless you are suggesting that there is an infinite regress.

That is what this branch of M-theory hypothesizes. Why is that more or less likely than an infinite god who created the universe?

philologos wrote: »

Both the cosmological and axiological beat the "what about amputees?" argument.

How exactly?

The furthest you got with the moral argument is that just because morality looks like a product of biological evolution doesn't mean God didn't put that into evolution. Which, like so many of your arguments, relies on what God could have done, which isn't an argument in support of the idea that he actually did.

This is what I said to you at the very start, all your arguments suppose God could have done something and then jump to the position that he did. You can do that with anything.

philologos

Apologies. I meant that each finite thing has an ultimate cause.

As for the amputees: at least the cosmological and axiological actually aim to answer the current question about whether or not God is likely to exist or not. The "what about amputees" simply questions the nature of miracles while begging the question (logical fallacy) at the same time.

Zombrex

philologos wrote: »

Apologies. I meant that each finite thing has an ultimate cause.

That doesn't really help.

What do you mean by ultimate cause? Do you mean something that itself was uncaused? Because no physicist is in a postion to make such a claim. We have little idea beyond very complex simulations as to what did or could have caused the Big Bang. And the hypothesizes include both something that itself would have to be explained, or infinity which explains everything, basically.

philologos wrote: »

As for the amputees: at least the cosmological and axiological actually aim to answer the current question about whether or not God is likely to exist or not. The "what about amputees" simply questions the nature of miracles while begging the question (logical fallacy) at the same time.

It is an argument for why the claims of Christianity seem made up, and thus God as supposed by Christians is probably made up too.

If that is the case then "God" becomes part of the set of things that could exist but probably don't, given the pretty simply logic that the things that can be made up is much large than the things that actual exist and tend to have very little correlation.

If you remove Christianity then God becomes just one of an infinite of things we could suppose created the universe. There seems little reason to pick any on of these over any other one, as demonstrated by how stumped you seem to be over whether M-theory is more or less likely than God did it.

Which takes me back to my original point, supposing that God might exist and might have created the universe is not particularly helpful.

philologos

Wicknight wrote: »

That doesn't really help.

What do you mean by ultimate cause? Do you mean something that itself was uncaused? Because no physicist is in a postion to make such a claim. We have little idea beyond very complex simulations as to what did or could have caused the Big Bang.

I mean that things don't come out of nothing. Nothing that we see or experience comes out of nothing. I don't see why it is rational for me to make an exception in respect to the universe.

As for ultimate cause, I mean something which is of infinite age which itself is uncaused. A terminating factor of sorts.

Wicknight wrote: »

It is an argument for why the claims of Christianity seem made up, and thus God as supposed by Christians is probably made up too.

Which isn't what the topic is about. The topic is about determining whether or not God is likely to exist one that I personally will be keeping to if others don't intend to.

Even if Christianity were a fable, it doesn't back up your position in respect to God that it is unlikely for God in any form to exist. Criticising Christianity doesn't demonstrate what you want to demonstrate. You have much more to do in order to show that God doesn't exist in any form.

I still think that you have a very long way to go to demonstrate that. Perhaps millions of posts :pac:

Wicknight wrote: »

If that is the case then "God" becomes part of the set of things that could exist but probably don't, given the pretty simply logic that the things that can be made up is much large than the things that actual exist and tend to have very little correlation.

We're talking about probabilities. That's why I phrased the terms the way I did. We are talking about likelhood. I don't presume that I can prove God with a mathematical theorem.

Wicknight wrote: »

If you remove Christianity then God becomes just one of an infinite of things we could suppose created the universe. There seems little reason to pick any on of these over any other one, as demonstrated by how stumped you seem to be over whether M-theory is more or less likely than God did it.

That's precisely why I suggested that we should start off with the notion of Creator and then work down. Indeed, it is why I posed the cosmological argument first. There are other cases for God that can begin to help fill in some of the other gaps.

Wicknight wrote: »

Which takes me back to my original point, supposing that God might exist and might have created the universe is not particularly helpful.

I'm not just supposing the might, I'm arguing that God is more likely to exist than not. We just have a lot of work to do to get through everything starting with God as Creator.

dead one

Wicknight wrote: »

That doesn't really help.

voltaire wrote:

"You see many stars at night in the sky but find them not when the sun rises; can you say that there are no stars in the heaven of day? So, O man! because you behold not God in the days of your ignorance, say not that there is no God."...

If you can't see God with Naked eyes..... It doesn't mean "There is no God"..... If science can't test God...... It doesn't mean "There is no God".... Science hasn't proved / disproved yet existence of God.... Than why you have belief "there is no God"... The same way you can also believe, "There is God"

pts

@philologos why do you want to discuss the probability of existence of a very ill-defined and ambiguous god? (the deistic creator) when we have a relatively well defined god (the god of the bible) already?

It is hard to prove/disprove something ambiguous, which is why scientists are so careful when it comes to defining a problem and why they use many caveats.

Penn

But then what created God? This is my problem, I've seen people say before that something absolutely must have created the universe, that it couldn't have just started. Yet, the same logic never seems to apply to God.

I fully agree that something caused the universe to exist, and something caused that to exist etc etc. But we're talking about billions of years. We don't have the ability to find out what all this is, and it could be thousands of years before we do. And even then, we likely will never, ever know, because with each new cause we discover, there was likely something which created it billions of years before.

But you can't just put GOD at the beginning. There is nothing, absolutely nothing which gives the slightest bit of evidence that God created everything. Genesis has been proven in many different ways to be false. And even if you do put God at the beginning, following your own logic, something had to have come before God.

philologos

Barrington wrote: »

But then what created God? This is my problem, I've seen people say before that something absolutely must have created the universe, that it couldn't have just started. Yet, the same logic never seems to apply to God.

Great. That's exactly the question I'd hope someone would ask. The difference between God and the universe is that God isn't claimed to have finite age. If God were of finite age rather than infinite age then your point would work perfectly.

The universe according to most physicists is of a finite age rather than an infinite one. Therefore it cannot just have existed in and of itself.

In the philosophy of Aquinas for example he deals with this by looking into necessary (infinite) and contingent (finite) causes.

Logic would suggest that nothing comes out of nothing. Therefore something must come from something else. Ultimately by going through a sequence of causes it must end. If there were an infinite amount of causes in creation, creation would still be ongoing rather than completed as the sequence of causes wouldn't terminate. This would suggest a Creator. As for who or what that Creator is we need to discuss further.

philologos

pts wrote: »

@philologos why do you want to discuss the probability of existence of a very ill-defined and ambiguous god? (the deistic creator) when we have a relatively well defined god (the god of the bible) already?

Because I can bet you anything that if we discuss the God as defined in the Bible immediately we will go back to the discussion of whether or not all things were created.

We need to sort out the prerequisites before we can get into any thorough investigation of the Bible.

"Is there a Creator?" is the question we need to ask before we can ask "Is that Creator the God of Christianity?". You will have to be patient if we are going to do this thoroughly.

pts

philologos wrote: »

Because I can bet you anything that if we discuss the God as defined in the Bible immediately we will go back to the discussion of whether or not all things were created.

We need to sort out the prerequisites before we can get into any thorough investigation of the Bible.

"Is there a Creator?" is the question we need to ask before we can ask "Is that Creator the God of Christianity?". You will have to be patient if we are going to do this thoroughly.

How can we discuss the deistic creator without defining his properties, nature etc etc? Again it is hard to tackle an ill-defined problem.

For example (and I'm going with he/him here, even though we haven't defined a gender, or lack of gender yet):
Does he exist outside the universe?
Can he effect events inside the universe?
Does he act outside the known laws of physics?

etc etc

EDIT: besides, I don't think a "god of the bible" discussion would necessary revert back to a cosmological argument. I think the conversation would be more like:

Theist: The god of the bible intervenes in the world
Atheist: Show us an example of where god intervened in the world

and so on.

philologos

We can discuss the fact that all that is needs an ultimate cause and then go into describing what that ultimate cause (Creator) is in more detail. Ultimately that will be down to examining the Scriptures to determine whether or not they seem reasonable given the nature of all things. That's going to be a very very long topic indeed more than likely without end. We need to get the first principles right so at least that we have something to work with before we begin.

Of course these aren't the criterion of other parties in this discussion, they can do what they please, but I will be keeping these terms in respect to any discussion that will be had been myself and others on this thread.

It follows logically that if God is creator that He would have to exist outside the universe. If we are to say that God differs in age from the universe, and that the universe cannot cause itself then God must be something other than the universe. Therefore it would seem that He's not bound by its laws either (considering that He would have created them).

Discussing the relationship between God and miracles are something that will have to come later.

Morbert

philologos wrote: »

I'm working on what is most currently accepted by physicists about the age of the universe. That it is of finite age, and that it has a finite cause. Even if there were a billion multiverses each creating universe one after another after another, this doesn't explain what caused the first to come into existence. Unless you are suggesting that there is an infinite regress.

To reel this back in, there are more reasons to suggest that God's existence is reasonable including our unfinished assessment of the axiological argument (from morality).

Both the cosmological and axiological beat the lame "what about amputees?" argument presented thus far.

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=72375571&postcount=92

Zombrex

philologos wrote: »

I mean that things don't come out of nothing. Nothing that we see or experience comes out of nothing. I don't see why it is rational for me to make an exception in respect to the universe.

You already accept that. What did God made the universe out of? Was there another universe he re-arranged to make our one? Where did that come from? Any Christians I've ever talked to says God made the universe out of nothing.

Christians have little trouble with the notion that God made the universe out of nothing because they don't assume that God operates under the same rules as the universe he made.

Equally there is little reason to suppose anything else external to the universe does either, including non-intelligent processes.

philologos wrote: »

I'm not just supposing the might, I'm arguing that God is more likely to exist than not.

Ok, and what is the argument for this.

What is the argument that is is more likely than an intelligent creator, one of an infinite number of variations, created the universe than the universe was created by a non-intelligent process, of which there are an infinite number of possible variations? I've used M-theory but you could use any hypothesis you like. I hope you aren't going to say the existence of morality because we have already dealt with that.

Zombrex

dead one wrote: »

If you can't see God with Naked eyes..... It doesn't mean "There is no God"..... If science can't test God...... It doesn't mean "There is no God".... Science hasn't proved / disproved yet existence of God.... Than why you have belief "there is no God"... The same way you can also believe, "There is God"

Just because ... you decide to ... separate every ... few words ... with dots ... doesn't mean ... you said ... something profound .... or intelligent

You know the truth dead one, just look into your heart and stop hiding behind your selfish immaterialistic ways.

Zombrex

philologos wrote: »

Great. That's exactly the question I'd hope someone would ask. The difference between God and the universe is that God isn't claimed to have finite age. If God were of finite age rather than infinite age then your point would work perfectly.

What "God".

You just said we need to start working with an undefined notion of a creator, and then you say God isn't defined as this.

Why do you get to define a property of this god when you are telling us not to do that?

I've decided I want to discuss a finite created God that created this universe

See how unhelpful your original proposal is. You are only interested in actually discussing your God.

Penn

philologos wrote: »

Great. That's exactly the question I'd hope someone would ask. The difference between God and the universe is that God isn't claimed to have finite age. If God were of finite age rather than infinite age then your point would work perfectly.

The universe according to most physicists is of a finite age rather than an infinite one. Therefore it cannot just have existed in and of itself.

In the philosophy of Aquinas for example he deals with this by looking into necessary (infinite) and contingent (finite) causes.

Logic would suggest that nothing comes out of nothing. Therefore something must come from something else. Ultimately by going through a sequence of causes it must end. If there were an infinite amount of causes in creation, creation would still be ongoing rather than completed as the sequence of causes wouldn't terminate. This would suggest a Creator. As for who or what that Creator is we need to discuss further.

So, if nothing comes out of nothing, and God came out of nothing, God is nothing?

Here is where your argument fails. You are applying a trait to God (infinite) which is not possible

pts

philologos wrote: »

We can discuss the fact that all that is needs an ultimate cause and then go into describing what that ultimate cause (Creator) is in more detail. Ultimately that will be down to examining the Scriptures to determine whether or not they seem reasonable given the nature of all things. That's going to be a very very long topic indeed more than likely without end. We need to get the first principles right so at least that we have something to work with before we begin.

Of course these aren't the criterion of other parties in this discussion, they can do what they please, but I will be keeping these terms in respect to any discussion that will be had been myself and others on this thread.

I don't agree with you in regards to the structuring of the discussion, but lets do it your way so the conversation can be furthered.

Before we start discussing the need for a creator lets answer a very important question, what question are we asking?

Are we asking who/what created the universe or how was the universe created.

You seem want to want to answer who/what created the universe, while we have to answer the how.

You can hypothesize that the universe was created by a creator and I can hypothesize that is was created by a unknown natural process, bound by (as of yet unknown) physics.
For example I could imagine that there has always existed a naturalistic process which periodically destroys the current universe, then creates a new one.

We have both answered the who/what question, but both answers are exceptionally hard to disprove. It is also hard to attach a probability to either hypotheses.

However if we try to answer the how question we can start eliminating unlikely/impossible hypotheses. To do so you would need to explain how
a creator created the universe (in as much detail as possible

) and I would need to explain my recycling universe hypothesis in more, falsifiable detail.

EDIT: I think Wicknight is touching on the same question (but as always, in a more articulate way

)

philologos

Wicknight wrote: »

You already accept that. What did God made the universe out of? Was there another universe he re-arranged to make our one? Where did that come from? Any Christians I've ever talked to says God made the universe out of nothing.

By saying "comes out of nothing". I mean that nothing is uncaused. The universe came from God if we're using that understanding. You're correct to say that it was formed without material in the Christian understanding.

Wicknight wrote: »

Ok, and what is the argument for this.

I've given it in part already.

Wicknight wrote: »

What is the argument that is is more likely than an intelligent creator, one of an infinite number of variations, created the universe than the universe was created by a non-intelligent process, of which there are an infinite number of possible variations? I've used M-theory but you could use any hypothesis you like. I hope you aren't going to say the existence of morality because we have already dealt with that.

We've not dealt with the axiological argument at all. You've wished it away by invoking evolution, what caused the evolutionary process arise and how does it ensure harmony in terms of basic principles of morality? Why does the evolutionary process preclude God? The answer is of course it doesn't.

I will be discussing this in respect to C.S Lewis' Mere Christianity when I get a bit more time to do so.

Barrington wrote: »

Here is where your argument fails. You are applying a trait to God (infinite) which is not possible

How is it not possible?

Zombrex

philologos wrote: »

By saying "comes out of nothing". I mean that nothing is uncaused. The universe came from God if we're using that understanding. You're correct to say that it was formed without material in the Christian understanding.

Ok, so why can't anything else, including a non-intelligent extra-universe process do this as well, create something out of nothing?

philologos wrote: »

We've not dealt with the axiological argument at all. You've wished it away.

Not at all. We explained how evolution explains it far better than the existence of an actual objective morality.

All humans have particular moral instincts, that in the specifics take different shapes and forms but follow general patterns. These evolved to regulate successful social interaction. I don't try and kill you because you then might try and kill me. I don't rape your wife because then you might kick the crap out of me. I don't kill my children because then I would not be selected by natural selection etc etc.

They can be thought of as objective in the sense that they are by and large universal to human kind, but they are a product of a natural process.

You proposed that that this doesn't mean God didn't put it into evolution. This is true, it doesn't mean that.

But equally if you accept they could come about by the natural process of evolution (and you seemed to say you accept evolution) then it is illogical to propose that they themselves are evidence for the existence of this creator.

Arguing that God might have done it only works if you have another argument for the existence of God in the first place. You can't use the argument that God might have done something as evidence of God's existence in the first place.

Penn

Why is the creation of the universe just happening all by itself not possible?

philologos

Barrington wrote: »

Why is the creation of the universe just happening all by itself not possible?

I've already explained this. Finite things must have an ultimate cause.

philologos

Wicknight wrote: »

What "God".

Until we apply any form of Biblical definition, you can assume God <=> Creator. Interchangable terms.

Zombrex

philologos wrote: »

Until we apply any form of Biblical definition, you can assume God <=> Creator. Interchangable terms.

Ok, and why is he infinite and uncaused again?

philologos

Wicknight wrote: »

Ok, and why is he infinite and uncaused again?

Finite things must have an ultimate cause. A terminating factor for their existence. I've explained a few posts ago as to how postulating an infinite regress makes no sense philosophically or logically. I'd advise you to go back and read so that we don't have to repeat ourselves.

As for your other point. Even if we assume that evolution informs the conscience (I personally don't believe this because natural science and moral philosophy are evidently different), if it is to be an effective argument it must also demonstrate as to what caused the evolutionary process to occur which ultimately will leave us at the territory we are discussing in the cosmological argument. You can see why I suggested talking about that first.

Zombrex

philologos wrote: »

Finite things must have an ultimate cause. A terminating factor for their existence. I've explained a few posts ago as to how postulating an infinite regress makes no sense philosophically or logically.

I'm not postulating an infinite regress. I'm saying we have no reason to suppose that the creator of the universe is infinite (or finite for that matter).

For all we know the regression is 3 lengths long, there is an infinite creator (who had nothing to do with our universe), who created a finite being who created a finite being who created our universe (you can replace 3 with any number you like.)

So why propose the creator was or wasn't infinite? We know nothing about reality before our outside of our universe, we have no idea if there are 20 finite beings or 10 infinite beings.

Again you seem only interested in supposing the Christian version. Which is fine, but then you tell us to ignore the Christian version for the time being. You can't do that and then just skip over all other alternatives because they don't lead to the Christian version.

philologos wrote: »

As for your other point. Even if we assume that evolution informs the conscience (I personally don't believe this because natural science and moral philosophy are evidently different), if it is to be an effective argument it must also demonstrate as to what caused the evolutionary process to occur

Nonsense you are just moving the goal posts. It just has to explain human morality, which it does. Simple proto-cells 3 billion years ago didn't have any morality so what caused them to exist is irrelevant to the question of where human morality came from.