When Math Becomes Your God
Worshipping the squiggles on the screen.
June 17, 2012 - 9:30 am
Gotta fill that God-Shaped hole with something…
My friends Eric and Rose have a website called The Coming Out Godless Project where they post stories about people who have left their faith. They also sell really awesome shirts on Zazzle.
Last week, I suggested a few math-themed shirts that I’d love to see… and they designed them
If you get one, wear it proudly!
I believe in higher powers… but not god:
It’s cute seeing Atheism dress itself up in religion’s clothes. Good luck, there. Keep trying that for awhile and see how well it works.
It’s not that math is God. God is math.
How does that work?
Wonderfully.
No, I mean the whole “It’s not that math is God. God is math.” If Math = God, then God = Math. It shouldn’t matter which order one states the equation. But then again maybe the basic rules of math don’t apply in Math Theology. You tell me.
A square is a quadrilateral. The converse of that statement is not true.
A person can believe God is in everything and hence God is math (as well as many other things) without assigning all those power to math itself.
Well, to start with, you’re assuming that “is” is a reflexive, transitive, and symmetric relation, but in English the state of being verb also includes other relations, such as subset and set membership, which are reflexive, antisymettric, and transitive. (I am a Republican; not all Republicans are me.)
But in this case, I’m taking more of a Spinozan position: “God” is the Thing that causes everything to be and to act as it does; God is the sum and summit of natural law. Natural law is inherently mathematical. Thus God is inherently mathematical and it follows that God is math.
And this is why I don’t like atheists. You don’t even begin to understad what you purport to believe while at the same time claiming to believe in human understanding. Idiot Popperists dressed up in new materialist clothes.
Well, Mimi, you clearly didn’t have to understand my comment. And you’re welcome to try to explain in what sense I don’t understand the Spinozan concept of God. Cite your sources though.
The question is, which of them doesn’t care if you believe in them or not, which of them is gonna git you, whether you believe in them or not?
F=dP/dt is certainly going to get you, regardless of your beliefs. It has been experimentally verified countless times.
The best thing that can be said about experimental verification of God (which one, what properties?) is that they’ve been inconclusive in the few time they haven’t failed completely.
God isn’t something amenable to scientific study so that isn’t exactly surprising – science is indeed very useful but is far from the arbiter of all truth. It can only describe and process that which exists in the physical universe and cannot comment whatsoever on what exists beyond it.
“It can only describe and process that which exists in the physical universe and cannot comment whatsoever on what exists beyond it.”
This begs the question of how do we know there is anything beyond the physical world. By definition it cannot interact with the physical world, nor can the physical world interact with it. And what is the difference between existing with no effect and not existing at all? Furthermore, your position seems to deny both miracles and the efficacy of prayer.
Note how I said that “cannot comment whatsoever on what exists beyond it.” – not being to comment whatsoever also covers the existence of such – science can’t examine it or postulate about anything boyond the physical world at all – it does not beg the question of its’ existence since it cannot address it.
In addition to my previous response I wish to note that I never said the nonmaterial realm has no effect…merely that such it not a scientific phenomenon – miracles and such are non-repeatable events and cannot be put to scientific inquiry.
In no way do I deny miracles, the effacy of prayer…I am just saying that science is too limited a tool to address them…it can only deal with evaluating repeatable natural phenomena. It can’t reach/touch/examine anything beyond.
I’ve also never heard of V not equaling I time R. And have heard interesting arguments about superconductors implying it is true even for them…
..but that the electrons involved aren’t actually traversing the R across which it would be measured.
In other stunning news, NYC pigeons met to discuss what to do about all these smelly humans cluttering up their fine city!
Just because you can’t comprehend God, doesn’t mean He doesn’t comprehend you.
Atheism doesn’t have to dress itself up in religion’s clothes. It is a religion (well, a set of religions. Similar to, but more fractured than Christianity or Islam).
Most of us don’t need to fill any hole, God-shaped or otherwise.
My reaction to this shirt would be similar to my reaction to those waving “John 3:16″ banners a sporting events: “That’s nice, do you have anything interesting to say?”
“Most of us don’t need to fill any hole, God-shaped or otherwise”
The experience of most of humanity speaks otherwise…religion has been a facet of every culture, everywhere throughout all of time.
So it would seem that such a whole doesn’t exist, despite (vain) modern attempts to use materialism to plug the whole…
The “us” I was referring to were atheists. Obviously, the people who have theistic religions have a God-shaped hole being filled.
Just because you are able to understand phenomena which lesser intellects attribute to a supreme being, does not mean that a supreme being does not cause those phenomena which you are not able to understand.
Thing is, they almost all DON’T understand what they pretend to understand.
And the few–we’re talking one in millions–who mostly understand what is currently understood resort to things like believing in life being seeded on Earth by space-faring aliens so they don’t have believe in a god. Because space-faring aliens seeding life on Earth is very nearly almost certainly impossible, but at least it’s not God.
Honestly, I have never in my life met an atheist with an intellectual problem with God. NEVER. Every one’s had emotional problems with the idea of God. In fact, I can’t count the number of “atheists” who say, “I won’t believe in a god who…” Um, yeah.
There are many, many flatly insurmountable problems for materialists when it comes to what we know about the world. They have no answers for these problems, but it’s not God because they believe it’s not God. And that’s that. They have a faith that’s based on their own desires for how they wan the world to be, apparently oblivious to the fact that atheism has a history as far back as records go. They aren’t new or special. They’re not specially enlightened. They didn’t become atheists because they suddenly grasped thermodynamics. (Heck, my thermodynamics textbook flatly calls the theories of the genesis of life through natural means scientifically impossible–because it is.) They became atheists because they didn’t want to believe in God, or even more commonly and shallowly, they wanted to be liked by people who didn’t want to believe in God. (On the reverse, there are those who make a pretence at religoius conviction because they want to be liked by people who believe in God.)
If the ancient fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God,’ the modern atheist says, “God is what I want him to be, and I’ll call him science, and he will do whatever I want because I can speak for him.”
The pretense that belief in a secular ideology is not as dependent on raw faith as a belief in a religious ideology is simply that – a pretense.
There are absolutely no functional sociological differences.
If it thoroughly floats your boat to be able to say your source of morality derives from a source, individual, cumulative, or committee, that did not channel a divine source as opposed to someone who claims their source did, then good for you. Thrill yourself. You are still utterly dependent on an external source defining your morality based on a completely unprovable first cause. Your assertion that such is not identical to a religious belief is as amusing as a child whose face is covered in crumbs denying he ate the cookies.
Nice writing there…and quite correct.
I am always annoyed when atheists use a pretense of total objectivity/neutrality to claim some form of epistemological high ground – that they somehow don’t have their own set of (mathematically unprovable) assumptions underlying their worldview.
Well said. Thanks.
There’s no such thing as an atheist morality, any more than there is an “a-unicornist morality”. If a person is an atheist, that simply means he does not subscribe to one particular irrational belief. This leaves open the question of what he actually *does* belief. Both Communists and Objectivists are atheists, but their ideologies and moralities could hardly be more different.
In any case, a proper morality derives from facts of reality including man’s nature, not from revelation, authority, or society.
“In any case, a proper morality derives from facts of reality including man’s nature, not from revelation, authority, or society.”
Big words…it is far easier to make such a whopper of a claim and far harder to demonstrate it…far greater philosophers than you have tried to do that, and all have failed. Many have simply given up and either turned to Nihilism or simply decided to arbitrarily aping the dominant morality of their society.
Oh, no, it’s rather easy to demonstrate it. I’d refer you either to the Buddhist Precepts, which are entirely based on the Buddha’s observation that following the Precepts leads to greater peace of mind in this life, or to Adam Smith’s other book, Theory of Moral Sentiments, which constructs a theory of morality that is based entirely on self-love, reason, and benevolence toward others based on empathy — which we now can identify with the feelings that come from “mirror neurons”. We have empathy for others “wired in”.
The pretense that belief in a secular ideology is not as dependent on raw faith as a belief in a religious ideology is simply that – a pretense.
Nor logical differences.
But boy, you sure can piss off a lot of atheists saying that.
God does not play dice with the Universe.
- Albert Einstein
cheers
eon
Albert, stop telling God what to do.
–Niels Bohr
Here we are, in an existential struggle for our nation, and we’re vying for who can be nastier to the other? We should be expending energy to draw together, not to rend apart. That goes for BOTH your houses.
I’m an atheist; it’s not a religion. I do not “believe” there is no god/deity. I simply refuse to suspend my disbelief because of the overwhelming lack of evidence. I have no need to prove the lack of a deity because in the absence of evidence that is the default position. Those who hold the position for which there is no evidence carry the burden of proof.
I think believers like to coddle themselves by accusing everyone of having some groundless belief system. Truth of the matter is not everyone has a compelling need to believe in something regardless of whether there’s any basis for it.
*yawn* Just more angry atheist whining and philosophical equivocation…atheism is the belief that God does not exist and not merely a belief that there is no evidence to suggest it – that would be agnosticism.
As to evidence of God’s existence, this isn’t the place for that sort of discussion really, but have you ever bothered to actually read some material on this topic (as opposed to strawmen set up by people like Richard Dawkins)?
At the very least, you seem to have a very poor philosophical grounding in these topics, given that you don’t even understand the assumptions underlying your own materialistic philosophy. To actually believe that you have no axioms making up your philosophical system would lead to a failure grade in any basic philosophy course. Again – there is no point discussing this here since this has been discussed a million places elsewhere…no need to reinvent the wheel but seriously, try reading something intellectual on this topic – for free (public domain) stuff, maybe something by Thomas Aquinas (old school) or G.K. Chesterton. C.S. Lewis is also worth reading.
Of course, you can just choose to remain at your current level of philosophical naivety – either way have a good night.
Who’s angry? As for the evidence of god’s existence: there isn’t any. If there were this discussion would have ended long ago.
You have the burden of proof and have offered none.
Others on this very post have also dealt with this…if you wish to be, as Sam above wrote “as amusing as a child whose face is covered in crumbs denying he ate the cookies” there is no point discussing anything with you – as you don’t even understand the *basics* of philosophy and logical argument, and are incapable of post-grade school reading comprehension – you did see the part where I stated that “As to evidence of God’s existence, this isn’t the place for that sort of discussion really”, right?
So why go off on the “offered no proof whatsoever” schtick – I wasn’t trying to offer any in that particular post – you need to stop tilting at windmills and actually pay attention to what people are writing.
There is ton of proof out there regarding God as it is – no need for me to reinvent the wheel and walk you through the basics if you are too blind to see. I alrady provided some good reading suggestions assuming you don’t want to remain in the dark.
But discuss with you – no – you are as bad on religion as any leftist is on politics and there is simply no point to it.
I have work to do so I am done here.
Logical fallacy. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
Moot. I’m being asked to accept a premise without verifiable evidence. Of course, it might be true that the lack of evidence is NOT evidence of lack. But there is no logical onus on me to accept the premise just because it *might* be true. It might also be true that the lack of evidence IS evidence of lack.
Further, in view of the failure to produce any verifiable evidence, beyond wishful thinking and creative imagination, over the long course of human history, the probability that the lack of evidence is evidence of lack is far greater than the lack of evidence is not evidence of lack. Hence, it is more logical to deny the premise until such time some evidence is produced to support it.
It is not a logical fallacy to place the burden of proof on those who propose a premise without supporting evidence. Until Neil Armstrong stepped into the dust and left his famous footprint, it was possible that the moon was made of blue cheese. However, because the probability was very low the logical position was that it was not.
No, you do believe there is no God, because you cannot know. Lack of evidence is not evidence of lack. Australia existed even when there was nobody to see it. Also, there are plenty of people who report that God has spoken to them. On what basis do you conclude they are wrong? Maybe God simply doesn’t like us. It is a theory that fits the evidence and cannot be dismissed.
I don’t think unicorns or tooth fairies exist either. You may wish to call that a belief, I don’t. I think it’s the logical and rational position to take until evidence of unicorns and/or tooth fairies is presented. And if you claim unicorns and tooth fairies exist, the burden of proof is yours.
With so many people claiming to have spoken with god or had their prayers answered, I should think some verifiable evidence would be forthcoming. In its continuing absence I conclude that a lot of people engage in wishful thinking and childishness; or hallucinations.
In response to your last, the deists thought god set things in motion and then went off to do other stuff and forgot about us. Not that he, she or it disliked us particularly, just had better things to do than watch our little sketch. Again, show me some evidence. “It can’t be dismissed” is not evidence.
I don’t think anyone is going to want to give you evidence of anything until you get over your philosophical delusions first…if you don’t grasp concepts such as how axoims underlie a given belief system then you are not going to grasp anything more substantive.
However, there are plenty of sources to go to read about the evidence for those so inclined. As I am writing this at work and need to get back to coding, I will leave you with the following: I would first note that earlier in the comments on this post I provided some excellent authors who have much to say on this subject (and Aquinas and Chesterton are public domain -> so they are free). A good way to deepen your intellect even if in the end you do not agree with them.
Or you could read about how strong the historical evidence behind the Bible is…or some good yet accessible modern philosophers like William Lane Craig. You can’t deal with more than really simple stuff in short little blog comments anyway – material on this level requires books or at least substantive articles to do it justice.
You are engaged in the fallacy of shifting the burden of proof. You have made a positive statement: God does not exist. It is up to you to prove it. If you cannot prove it your statement is nothing more than conjecture, i.e. belief. Mr. Swindle is in a similar boat with his assertion that God does exist, but that doesn’t relieve you of your burden. You may say you know unicorns don’t exist, but that means you either don’t know what the word “know” means or you are far too certain of your knowledge.
Your mention of deists is irrelevant. I was offering a counterexample to your putative proof that God doesn’t exist. You say that there is you see no evidence of God. I propose that’s because God doesn’t like us and chooses to hid His existence from us. He does, however, like people like Mr. Swindle and freely communicates with them. You say that everyone who claims God has spoken to them is childish or delusional. You cannot know that. You may believe it, but that means your “proof” is simply a restatement of your belief.
Scepticism is a useful heuristic and a valid belief system. But that is all it is. Fundamentally it is no different than faith.
Good point and nice try. However, this was my original statement:
“I do not “believe” there is no god/deity. I simply refuse to suspend my disbelief because of the overwhelming lack of evidence. I have no need to prove the lack of a deity because in the absence of evidence that is the default position. Those who hold the position for which there is no evidence carry the burden of proof.”
In all cases where an assertion is made without supporting evidence, the logical default position is skepticism and the burden of proof falls upon those making the unsupported assertion. I think calling skepticism a belief system is incorrect. It’s an intelligent reaction to nonsensical and unsubstantiated claims.
If I claim the earth has a dark companion Planet-X orbiting exactly 180 degrees in the same orbit and so we never see it because of the intervening presence of the sun, your logical response is to ask for proof. In the absence of proof, or even the slightest evidence, you have no logical obligation to disprove my claim. If I assert that your skeptical belief system is preventing you from accepting my claim, I’m being silly as well and you can laugh at my silliness if you wish.
Lots of people say they speak to god and god speaks to them and answers their prayers. I don’t recall David Swindle making such a claim, but then I haven’t read everything he’s written. The reason why I’m not particularly impressed by such claims is this.
There are 5 major religions on Earth right now, and probably another half dozen or so semi-major religions. In the course of history there have likely been hundreds. All of these religions, extant and extinct, make or have made claims about the nature of divinity and its relationship to human beings. Many of these claims contradict the claims of others. Yet every single one of them also claims to possess the real truth and all others to possess only phoney baloney.
Even within each of those several major and semi-major religions there are competing sects and factions interpreting the very same religious doctrines and scriptures in different and often contradictory ways. Each faction claims to possess the real truth and asserts that all other factions are mere pretenders offering only phoney baloney.
Multiple contradictory claims can not all be true. So either all are false or only one is true. NONE offers the slightest evidence to support its claims. Therefore the logical default position is to conclude that MOST LIKELY they are all false. The result is skepticism, the refusal to suspend disbelief to accept any of the claims.
Skepticism is reinforced by the additional fact that Christians talk to Jesus, Hindus talk to Shiva and Vishnu, Muslims talk to Allah, etc. Isn’t that interesting? These are NOT the same god in different costumes. They are very different and contradictory concepts of divinity. So either there are multiple gods talking to all these different people or people are imagining they are talking to whatever god their specific religion culturally prepares them for. Since the second possibility is much more likely than the first, I’ll accept that as an explanation until such time as something verifiable shows up to support the first.
Atheism might be called a religion and belief system IF in view of contradictory evidence a self-described atheist refused to consider the evidence and insisted on maintaining his refusal to accept a deity in spite of it. That’s what a lot of religious people do, they refuse to consider evidence that contradicts their belief or even to consider the complete lack of evidence as indicative of anything suspicious. Merely refusing to accept the unsubstantiated claims of multiply contradictory religions does NOT constitute a religion.
In contradiction to the premise of Dave Swindle’s article, some people do NOT need to believe. That’s really what prompted my initial response, plus previous comments regarding atheism. While I’m an atheist, I remain open to examine whatever evidence may be offered. Thus, I am not religious.
I have consistently stated that as long as no evidence is forth coming the logical position is disbelief. I’ve never claimed absolute knowledge about anything. You seem to be intent on arguing about what I claim to know and not know, or that I don’t even know what know means. Were you a lawyer for Clinton?
“I’m an atheist; it’s not a religion.”
Because you’re obviously “better than all that”.
Pfft.
Try a little humility some time, it will turn you from what you are into a human being.
This is a ruse atheists use to avoid having to deal with the fact that atheism/secularism has, in violation of the establishment clause, been installed as the official religion of government schools. “But no, it hasn’t because, like, atheism isn’t a religion, so an atheist/secularist theme for the schools is OK.” Yeah, whatever.
If you’d rather use the phrase “position on religion” than “relgion” to describe your atheism, feel free. It is and always will be a distinction without a difference, boy.
Back to the “I’m better than all that” attitude that every atheist possesses – it has been my observation that almost without exception an atheist isn’t someone who doesn’t believe in God but rather someone who ascribes godlike qualities to themself, or to some philosophical thread.
Hubris is really ugly. Can you not see that is so?
I don’t “believe” in god. I have not seen anything that would suggest there’s any reason to. From that you conclude I lack humility and have transformed myself into something other than human. Curious. You know absolutely nothing about me nor what I have or haven’t done in my life (I’m 67) to try to find meaningful answers to life’s mysteries.
Yet you immediately file me into, what I presume for you, is a convenient category of people you condemn because my answers are not yours. You then project onto me your own anger and hostility; and, accuse me of political advocacy without the slightest knowledge what my political opinions and viewpoints happen to be.
Unlike yourself, I don’t claim to be the final arbiter of truth. And I’m also not trying to convert you or any else. My OP was simply a response to the premise of this article that atheism is just as much a religion as anything else. I don’t think it is.
Most who have responded to my OP accuse me of being angry. I’m not, but it sure seems the rest of you are for some reason.
Mr PC Geek: you seem to think you know a lot about philosophy. If so, please bring it out from under the bushel basket. And, like yourself, I also have work to do and no further time to waste on sophomores.
Nowhere in my post – not one place – did I express anger. Fatigue, perhaps, or boredom, but not anger.
Nowhere in my post – not one place – did I try to convert you to any religion. Unlike atheists, who, when in control of societies, have an ugly track record of attempting to wipe out religious folks, I’m content to live with and tolerate those who disagree with me as long as they don’t attempt to delegitimze me or disenfranchise me or put me into gulags etc.
Nowhere in my post – not one place – did I claim to be the final arbiter of the truth. I am human and therefore flawed. I’m doing the best I can. Of course I believe my religous standpoint is the correct one. Why would I go through life believing that what I have for a value set is wrong? Why would I purposely pursue a POV which I believe to have gotten things wrong? Do you do that? It is evident from your post that you do not. But you accuse anyone confident of their point of view of being a “final arbiter” for others, if said point of view differs from yours. Huh?
Because the best predictor of future behavior is past behavior, I can extrapolate with reasonable accuracy that an atheist will hold certain POVs and have certain politics. For the sake of self-preservation I will presume this is the case until proven otherwise. It is factually correct that nations and indeed any organization, when they become populated with atheists in a majority fashion, waste no time going after religious people with a vengeance. USSR, Red China (with violence), education industry in the West, entertainment industry in the West (with propaganda and delegitimization and blackballing), etc. The last century was vivid proof that while people of any religion can end up being bad or good, it takes an atheist to really do evil and mass killing. Atheists killed and oppressed more people in the last 100 years than died in all the religious wars in history combined. Best predictor, and all that.
If you are part of that statistically insignificant percentage of atheists who, I am told, are tolerant of religious people and don’t try to oppress religious people when they get the chance, please accept my apologies.
I also stand by my comment about hubris. I have never met an atheist – never – who had an ounce of genuine humility about them, or who could resist condescending attitudes towards believers as being subhumans. Anecdotal, I know, but there it is. For example, your words “I think believers like to coddle themselves” lend strong credence to the notion that like all the other atheists I’ve met you believe that even my fairly mild Christian beliefs puts me in the subhuman category.
Thanks. You’re not angry, good.
Atheists have no monopoly on cruelty or oppression. Given control over a society some religions have done the same, Islam for example. The Inquisition, the Albigensian “Crusade” to name a couple more. Seems that cruelty and oppression are pretty common human behaviours in the absence of effective checks and balances. Just about any excuse will do. And in case no one ever told you, socialism and communism share all the relevant traits of religion.
No, you did not claim to be the arbiter of truth in so many words, yet even in your rebuttal you imply it again. While admitting you are a flawed human being, you still insist that you believe what you are convinced is true, because otherwise you say you would not adhere to it. Yet you don’t seem interested in asking questions about it or MY asking questions about it. Maybe you question silently. I’m a very inquisitive person and I accept that many people are not, especially if it makes them feel insecure about their comfortable belief system.
You continue to impute to me attitudes or ideas that I have not expressed or espoused. And then extrapolate my future attitudes and behaviours based on past behaviour of which you have absolutely no knowledge. I have responded to you as an individual. Yet, you seem unable to respond to me as an individual. Instead, I appear to be just a cipher of that evil bunch of atheists just waiting for the chance to string you up at the church door. I’m not. In fact I suspect I am just as tolerant of disagreeing people who don’t try to force their ideas on me as you say you are.
I’m just an aging hippie who has found no convincing evidence of divinity and am not afraid to say so. As I said at the beginning of this thread, I responded simply to say I don’t think atheism is a religion and that many people for some reason need to describe it as such. That seems to have released a lot of pent up hostility.
I have to say that I have met lots of good people. Many of them were as convinced of the validity of their religion as you appear to be; many were doubtful; many didn’t care. Some questioned, some didn’t. Some who needed an excuse to be decent used their religion. In the end, though, most people are pretty decent because it produces better results than the alternatives.
Peace, we’re all in this together, like it or not.
“Mr PC Geek: you seem to think you know a lot about philosophy. ”
Reading comprehension fail: I never claimed to be an expert in philosophy…but I know the basics, enough to point out that you are quite misguided in seeing atheism as a neutral, assumption/axiom free philosophy – as per the definition of atheism ( http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/atheism?s=t) you are *actively believing* the proposition that God does not exist. We exist, as does the universe, and accompanying your worldview, if it is to be taken seriously, is a coherent explanation of how this happened, without any hand waiving. You must assume *many* things to be an atheist to deal with that matter as well as innumerable others.
Your position is no more biased and based on axioms that any theist, and in addition, it would appear that people are naturally religious, and that atheism is the oddity – a natural faculty toward theism would be itself indicative of theism…our other natural faculties all point toward things which do exist (hunger -> food, sex drive -> sex, etc) so I would contend that the natural human inclination toward religion is also pointing us toward something which exists. I would love to see how you explain (without hand waiving or just-so stories) the development of religion in humans if we had a totally naturalistic origin and there is no higher power in all existence. Why would purely material beings ever conceive of non-material existing?
I gave you several good authors to read if you are indeed as open to examining the evidence as you say that you are.
(http://www.bu.edu/childcognition/publications/Intuitive%20Theist.pdf)
Thanks for toning it down a bit. I appreciate that.
I said “you seem to think you know a lot about philosophy.” I neither implied, nor do I think, you are an expert. My guess is that you know a little but have probably confined yourself to a cursory examination of thought that reinforces your viewpoint.
As for the definition of atheism you link: I’d say my position falls more in line with #2. I’ve stated consistently since my OP that I refuse to suspend my disbelief until some verifiable evidence is forthcoming. I’m willing to concede that for some people atheism may constitute a belief system or even a religion as I’ve already stated in my June 19, 2012 – 1:24 pm reply to Jeff Gauch. However, I have not met any of them.
Atheism is neither a belief system nor a religion for me, nor for any other atheist I’ve met. It’s original meaning in Greek is simply “non theist”. The theists claimed the gods existed and the non theists demanded proof before accepting the claim. Since I see no reason to grant theism any degree of validity in lieu of evidence, atheism describes my attitude more accurately than anything else. You can agree or not.
You say “it would appear that people are naturally religious, and that atheism is the oddity – a natural faculty toward theism would be itself indicative of theism…” et al. I’d argue that religion is an irrational response to fear rather than a natural inclination similar to hunger, sex drive, etc which you list as examples. Fear is the natural inclination.
Human beings spent hundreds of thousands of years as primarily inconsequential feed stock for large predators. Apparently, we only survived because we don’t taste good and there were always tastier alternatives. In addition, they evolved self awareness during the last stages of the Pleistocene ice maximum, a harsh environment where survival was a daily struggle, sickness, accident or injury fatal, and life at best short, hungry and brutal. It’s hardly surprising they eventually developed a comforting, imaginary security blanket.
“Why would purely material beings ever conceive of non-material existing?” The wonder of imagination. Do you know, for example, that until relatively recently in terms of human development, ALL material things were thought to embody non-material forces and entities, some benevolent and many malicious? Even today we speak of “mother nature” as if the physical forces of the earth live in some way. And who knows? We may discover that the nature of matter and energy is more mysterious than we think even now, a hundred years into the world of relativity and quantum physics.
I’d like to ask what have I said in this thread to suggest I am a materialist? Do you contend that refusal to accept the deity hypothesis without evidence necessitates materialism? If so, why? And what exactly do you mean by materialism?
Can you conceive that the human body/mind may be something far more miraculous than your concept of deity? Could you entertain the possibility that consciousness and specifically self consciousness is something potentially far more wondrous than any hypothetical deities somewhere out there beyond outer space? Just asking. I often wonder why religionists seem to need a deity to validate what they already have the potential to experience within themselves.
Thanks for your reading suggestions. I’m already familiar with them. I’d suggest that you add to your list: Alan Watts, Kant, Hume, Shankaracharya (Atmaboddha), Plotinus (Enneads), Patanjali (Yoga Sutras).
Finally, while I think philosophy can be fun and useful for learning the discipline of consistent thinking, it really can’t prove anything. For every philosophical proof of something, there is at least one and usually multiple contradictory proofs proving the opposite. As long as they’re internally consistent and not self-contradictory, all are valid. But they’re just arguments. Only real world, verifiable evidence can prove anything. Even then, we still need ALL the evidence to be 100% certain.
Cheers.
Michael, then I’d like you to propose an experiment to falsify the existence of a Superior Being (avoiding the G word since it has so many associations.)
Conjecture: the existence of a Superior Being of sufficient puissance to fit our notions of “God” can neither be proven, nor falsified, by experiment.
Charlie Martin, you’ve got me stumped!
Not really, just kidding. I’ll even forgo telling you that the onus is on YOU to prove the existence, since you’re proposing I devise an experiment with nothing to test.
The default position when presented with a nonsensical and/or unsubstantiated claim is disbelief and request for evidence. Of course there is NO experimental way to disprove OR prove your hypothetical puissant supreme being as long as said hypothetical puissant supreme being chooses to remain totally hidden and reveal zero evidence of his/her/its hypothetical existence.
So the default position remains: disbelief. Further, if totally unknown and unknowable, then the existence or non existence of your hypothetical puissant supreme being makes not the slightest difference to the reality of existing in this universe. Thus choosing to accept or not the validity of the existence of said hypothetical puissant supreme being is moot. And I am logically justified thinking it does NOT exist because there is absolutely zero evidence, AND because YOU can not prove or even present one shred of evidence that it does.
Of course I have to wonder what is the point of being a puissant supreme being, creating a universe with sentient and self aware creatures capable of knowing, if you then remain totally unknown and unknowable. That’s illogical and any puissant supreme being worthy of the name can not be illogical. Otherwise, I who am capable of logical thinking, would possess an ability lacking in the puissant supreme being and it would not be supreme.
Further, it is logical to conclude that if said hypothetical puissant supreme being really does exist and has any relevance or cares whether or not any of us actually accepted the validity of its existence, it would by necessity reveal itself either deliberately or inadvertently to enable us to do so. Since there is no evidence, it is more logical to conclude your hypothetical puissant supreme being does not exist than to believe that it does exist or cares/doesn’t care what what we think about it.
So until presented with evidence to the contrary I remain with the logical default, reinforced by my other points with a very high level of confidence.
For some reason the reply link on your other comment is not working so I posted the reply here:
“As for the definition of atheism you link: I’d say my position falls
more in line with #2. I’ve stated consistently since my OP that I
refuse to suspend my disbelief until some verifiable evidence is
forthcoming. I’m willing to concede that for some people atheism may
constitute a belief system or even a religion as I’ve already stated
in my June 19, 2012 – 1:24 pm reply to Jeff Gauch. However, I have not
met any of them.”
You keep trying to pull the same deal – an atheist is *asserting* that
God does not exist, and with that assertion, in order for atheism to
be even somewhat coherent of a worldview, you have to answer a large
number of questions that this *claim* that no God of any sort exists entails. As a few quick examples, you have to contend with
the very thorny issue of abiogenesis (which thermodynamically is
impossible, as MimiR helpfully mentioned, and even when basic
chemistry and thermodynamics is ignored, you have the most
mind-bogging statistical probabilities imaginable.) you have to
explain how something (the universe) came from nothing – existence from
non-existence. Have fun with that one. Or maybe dealing with the
ramifications of Goedel’s theorem and the human mind. And not to open
a can of worms, but trying to form a coherent moral system from an
atheistic perspective fails horribly as well.
“Atheism is neither a belief system nor a religion for me, nor for any
other atheist I’ve met. It’s original meaning in Greek is simply “non
theist”. The theists claimed the gods existed and the non theists
demanded proof before accepting the claim. Since I see no reason to
grant theism any degree of validity in lieu of evidence, atheism
describes my attitude more accurately than anything else. You can
agree or not.”
Once again you are trying to place non-theism as the starting position
with theism as the upstart that has to prove itself. If you know
anything of human history, it is quite the opposite if anything. If
you are sure God does not exist then you are an atheist, if you don’t
know, then you are an agnostic. Pick one. You can’t seem to get over the fact that you are making a claim and establishing a worldview – you have to argue for your position. It is not as simple as just not believing in something – you are actively believing that something does not exist (as opposed to just not being sure and erring on the side of non-belief based on personal bias) and that thing non-existing has ramifications that need to be dealt with – you have to deal with, in a credible fashion, everything from existence itself to the human mind (including how we somehow developed metaphysical beliefs) and so on. You have to account for these things or your belief system is incoherent and answers nothing.
“You say “it would appear that people are naturally religious, and
that atheism is the oddity – a natural faculty toward theism would be
itself indicative of theism…” et al. I’d argue that religion is an
irrational response to fear rather than a natural inclination similar
to hunger, sex drive, etc which you list as examples. Fear is the
natural inclination.”
Do you have any support from this? Cognitive science or neurobiology,
maybe? Just like you, I need evidence before I can accept a claim as
anything else other than simple storytelling.
“Human beings spent hundreds of thousands of years as primarily
inconsequential feed stock for large predators. Apparently, we only
survived because we don’t taste good and there were always tastier
alternatives. In addition, they evolved self awareness during the last
stages of the Pleistocene ice maximum, a harsh environment where
survival was a daily struggle, sickness, accident or injury fatal, and
life at best short, hungry and brutal. It’s hardly surprising
theyeventually developed a comforting, imaginary security blanket.
“Why would purely material beings ever conceive of non-material
existing?” The wonder of imagination. “”
My question still stands – how does materialistic phenomena come to
believe in non-material phenomena? If you are right than our
imagination is nothing but a chemical computer. Regardless of how hard
your life is, that in *no way* answers how is it that allegedly purely
material beings allegedly conceived of non-material belief to ‘ease
their pain’ – there a million others ways it could have been done
purely within the material realm. You merely evaded my question – you
did not answer it. It is a very large leap to attempt to demonstrate
how a set of chemical processes can actually make that leap from some
sort of simple computation to ‘imagining’ higher concepts gods and
souls and so on. Neither you (nor anyone else) has demonstrated this
at all, and you are making a huge leap of faith here that this is the
case. There is absolutely no evidence for what you are claiming.
“Do you know, for example, that until relatively recently in terms of
human development, ALL material things were thought to embody
non-material forces and entities, some benevolent and many malicious?
Even today we speak of “mother nature” as if the physical forces of
the earth live in some way. And who knows? We may discover that the
nature of matter and energy is more mysterious than we think even now,
a hundred years into the world of relativity and quantum physics.”
You are being quite disingenuous here on 2 fronts. For *some* people
and *some* religions it was believed that all things were sprits but
this was not at all universal – each religion (Christianity, Judaism,
atheism, whatever…) is a different answer to certain questions, and
naturally only one of them (if any) is correct – so the fact that
some are clearly wrong has no bearing on any other of the others. You
can’t conflate all religions together into big pile.
For all of your posturing about the need for evidence, the entire
scientific and historical fields of study that we have today are 100%
the fruit of Christianity – no other faith (including atheism) in the
past produced the Scientific method or anything like that. I find it
highly amusing that you are using (or misusing, really) the very
processes of logic that the Church brought into practice against it.
This ought to be a fun (and short) read on that front:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122178219865054585.html
“I’d like to ask what have I said in this thread to suggest I am a
materialist? Do you contend that refusal to accept the deity
hypothesis without evidence necessitates materialism? If so, why? And
what exactly do you mean by materialism?”
If you are not a materialist then what are you? Almost all atheists
all materialists, so when someone says they are an atheist that is
reasonable assumption. There are exceptions of course, but not many.
You may or may not be one. You would have to tell me.
“Can you conceive that the human body/mind may be something far more
miraculous than your concept of deity? Could you entertain the
possibility that consciousness and specifically self consciousness is
something potentially far more wondrous than any hypothetical deities
somewhere out there beyond outer space? Just asking. I often wonder
why religionists seem to need a deity to validate what they already
have the potential to experience within themselves.”
I see no reason to think that the human
mind is more miraculous than a Being able to create the entire
Universe. However, far more importantly, if there is no Creator, then our minds are just biochemical accidents, and thus how do you know that what they perceive is even reality? All we could know is that our minds and senses aided us in surviving until the present day, not that they are capable of reasoning correctly, or even recognizing that they can or cannot. Can a mind cobbled together from random biochemical chance really be able to understand that and account for its’ own creation? A tough thing to demonstrate, I would think.
“Finally, while I think philosophy can be fun and useful for learning
the discipline of consistent thinking, it really can’t prove anything.
For every philosophical proof of something, there is at least one and
usually multiple contradictory proofs proving the opposite. As long as
they’re internally consistent and not self-contradictory, all are
valid. But they’re just arguments. Only real world, verifiable
evidence can prove anything. Even then, we still need ALL the evidence
to be 100% certain.”
Valid logic with different assumptions will lead to different
results…however all that means is that logic cannot pick which
starting argument is the right one – it can merely derive things given
a starting argument. We need to get the correct starting assumptions
from an external source.
“Only real world, verifiable evidence can prove anything. Even
then, we still need ALL the evidence to be 100% certain.”
A few problems here
1 – how do you know that only “real world” (whatever that means) can
prove anything and nothing else can, and…
2- How would you know when you have “ALL the evidence”? In almost
nothing in life can you get all the evidence – anything from history
to archaeology to court cases you have to make decisions based on less
than in-your-face proof – the only 100% certain proofs are mathematical
proofs, and as you mentioned above those still depend on axioms that
we cannot verify. So by your logic nothing can be known about
anything.
Also – just curious – by “real world” evidence, do you mean just
scientific evidence, or is historical (http://www.tektonics.org/archmony.htm) evidence also acceptable to you? What type of evidence would be acceptable to
you?
I will likely be traveling this weekend to visit family and thus will probably have no real internet access so if you do respond I won’t see it till Monday at earliest.
Great response! Thanks. But I have to say, I’m not going to refute you point by point. Yes, every single point you raise in this response can be refuted thoroughly. Unfortunately, I’m not going to do it because I don’t care enough to do so and don’t have time to write a book for you. If you actually read some of my suggestions then maybe someday you will come to understand yourself a little better and you will do it yourself. That would be a more useful exercise anyway.
I’ve not been “pulling a deal”, or playing semantic games. I have asserted consistently that I see no evidence that an entity you call god exists. Hence I have no “belief” that such an entity actually exists beyond the imaginations of those who happen to believe it does. Nor do I especially care exactly how the notion entered the human imagination. It must have served some useful purpose otherwise it would have died out long ago. I doubt it’s still useful, though. But, hey, I’m not going to drag you out of your closed mind.
To me, atheism simply means: the refusal to accept the theist claim in lieu of supporting evidence. Complementarily, I also have no “belief” that such a god entity does not exist; because the assertion of a nonsensical and unsubstantiated claim does not warrant belief in its opposite. It warrants nothing. And I have consistently called that the default position. I think no god exists because I see the premise as nonsensical, unsubstantiated and unwarranted. I don’t even give it the benefit of “believing” its opposite, I simply dismiss it.
Even though I’ve tried to be clear about my thinking, you consistently insist trying to tell me what I think; that because I use the word atheist as the most apt description of my logical position I must therefore concur and agree with everything you insist describes what an atheist “believes” or what the world view of an atheist must be. Well, I’ve told you repeatedly what I think, and in some detail it is not what you insist it be. Live with it.
Suppose I told you that I have received telepathic communications informing me that the universe is a quantum fluctuation, that the many worlds interpretation of quantum theory is correct and that there are an infinite number of separate, totally independent and isolated universes, each with it’s own supreme being, and that the number of universes increases with every second as an infinite number of quantum possibilities become real. Would you simply accept that as a valid proposition simply because I said so? What would you require as evidence? What if I said you can’t disprove it, so therefore it’s true? Would you say you “disbelieve” it or would you simply think it nonsense and not worth wasting a second of your time on it?
Point of fact, there happens to be more evidence to support my assertion than to support the god hypothesis. Just google “quantum fluctuation” and/or “many worlds interpretation”.
The issues you raise are certainly interesting. Yet I find no compelling reason to go to the god hypothesis when we discover something we don’t understand. The intellectually honest response is simply to admit we don’t understand, not resort to magical explanations that suit some religious prejudice. Besides, that’s a game of diminishing returns. The more we understand how the universe works, the less you can attribute to your magical god. Also, to justify your preconceived conclusion that god exists (some Christian variant, I presume), you don’t look at the evidence objectively and let it lead you wherever it might. Further, others have already done it far more convincingly: the Hindus, the Buddhists, the Platonists, the Neoplatonists, the Yogists, the Taoists to name a few. Ultimately, your magical mystery tour will end on the trash heap of history with all the others.
I think Charlie Martin responded quite adequately to your concerns about an atheist moral system. Buddhists are atheists and I think one could make a compelling argument that the Buddhist moral system is superior to any other.
I certainly do have a world view, that I have not spoken to in this thread. Here I have said simply that the god claim is baseless, silly, logically barren and warrants no further thought. If you have to take it to some higher degree of ramification and exposition, be my guest.
So now you’re asking for evidentiary cognitive science and neurobiology, congratulations. Why don’t you apply it to the biblical story telling? You seem to have accepted that pretty uncritically!
Based on what we’ve learned over the past 100 years, I don’t think the “matter/not-matter” dichotomy holds much water. Whatever is going on here has turned out to be something far more interesting than anyone ever thought before! In The Supreme Identity, Alan Watts suggests that what most people have commonly referred to as “god” is a case of mistaken identity; that, in fact, consciousness is the fundamental reality and self consciousness the personal and individual reflection of the unselfconscious state. In our naiveté we have simply mistaken the ground of our own being for something external. Speculations around quantum physics talk about the same thing; that consciousness is somehow involved in determining the outcome of experiments. Consciousness seems to be the key thing.
I think you are far more of a materialist than I am.
Cheers and the force be with you, Luke.
A couple of things.
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/38806/38806-h/38806-h.htm#link0003
Addresses much of your religious-centric argument in far more detail than I care to go, and probably far better than I could ever hope to. I challenge you to read it. Warning: it’s long and it’s detailed. You will likely be angered, but also possibly intrigued.
I propose that we move this discussion to here:
http://debunkingchristianity.blogspot.ca/
I think it a much better venue than the archives of pjMedia. It will remain current and far more interested people will see it and potentially add their comments to enlarge the scope.
A thought experiment occurred to me.
Let’s say we have some hypothetical Particle X. Let’s further say that Particle X may or may not exhibit identifiable qualities and may or may not interact with observable particles.
We could logically state the following propositions regarding Particle X:
1. If Particle X does not exhibit observable qualities and does not interact with an observable particle, the probability that Particle X exists -> 0 and the probability of its observation = 0.
2. If Particle X exhibits observable qualities and does not interact with an observable particle, the probability that Particle X exists -> 1 and the probability of its observation = 0.5.
3. If Particle X does not exhibit observable qualities but an observable particle exhibits behaviour that might be attributed to some unknown Particle X, the probability that Particle X exists = 0.5 and probability of its observation -> 0.
4. If Particle X exhibits observable qualities and interacts with an observable particle, the probability that Particle X exists -> 1 and the probability of its observation = 1.
Cases 2, 3 and 4 require that there exist either direct or indirect observable evidence for Particle X, in the absence of which, case 1 applies. Therefore: the default position is to deny Particle X until such time as some verifiable evidence is observed which could logically be attributed to Particle X.
Further, I think it logical to expect that any supreme being who/which created a universe of rational entities with the expectation that those entities recognize and/or revere said supreme being would most likely exhibit case 4. I can think of no reasonable explanation for exhibiting cases 2 or 3.
Well, I see something of Divine grace in Perelman’s proof of the Poincare Conjecture, but I guess that’s just me.
No proof of God. Yes, there is. Pray. Humble yourself before God. Pray for something for which you might be deserving, but be humble (like a child asks for something from his parents). I have done that and my prayers have been more than answered. But it begs the questions, what constitutes proof for you, and have you ever tried to find proof?
No God-shaped hole? Yes, there is. We are hardwired to worship. Part of the right forefront of your brain lights up when worshiping. Does not light up for anything else.
Marc, the problem is that the same trick works if you replace God with Allah, or Ahura Mazda, and even works for Buddhists who don’t believe in Gods at all. (We’d refer to a Bodhisattva or even to a Sutra — Nichiren Buddhists “pray” to the Lotus Sutra for guidance.)
Not to mention those of us who have tried it and gotten back nothing.
God is the truth. Mathematics is an expression of the truth. So, whats the problem?
mimiR
Well said! Did someone put sour milk in your coffee this morning?
And could you be more specific whom you’re responding to: Dave Swindle, who is definitely NOT an atheist; Tom or Charlie Martin?
I thought both Tom’s and Charlie’s expositions quite clever and bang on.
Neither Tom or Charlie claims to be atheist. Maybe Charlie’s reference to Spinoza set you off? Yet Spinoza wasn’t an atheist either. Maybe a pantheist or non-dualist. Very true he was not a bible toting Christian. Still, bit of an overreaction, don’t you think?
After all, Charlie just posited “more of a Spinozan position” for the sake of discussion. He didn’t actually say he was a Spinozan or even agreed with Spinoza beyond the statement made to support the consistency of his exposition.
So, to recap: Alla youse donks stay the h#)) outa my wallet, and alla youse pachyderms stay the h#)) outa my bedroom, and ALL y’all (that’d be the plural inclusive form) stay the h#)) outa my pew. There, we good now?
Hello MW
“ Great response! Thanks. But I have to say, I’m not going to refute you
point by point. Yes, every single point you raise in this response can be
refuted thoroughly. Unfortunately, I’m not going to do it because I don’t
care enough to do so and don’t have time to write a book for you. If you
actually read some of my suggestions then maybe someday you will come to
understand yourself a little better and you will do it yourself. That would
be a more useful exercise anyway.”
That is an interesting debate tactic…simply tell the other person that they are wrong and then wash your hands of the matter. Well, it is effective at one thing…there is no point in debating anything with you if you are just going to hand-waive everything and somehow declare that a victory.
“ I’ve not been “pulling a deal”, or playing semantic games. I have
asserted consistently that I see no evidence that an entity you call god
exists. Hence I have no “belief” that such an entity actually exists beyond
the imaginations of those who happen to believe it does. Nor do I
especially care exactly how the notion entered the human imagination. It
must have served some useful purpose otherwise it would have died out long
ago. I doubt it’s still useful, though. But, hey, I’m not going to drag you
out of your closed mind.
To me, atheism simply means: the refusal to accept the theist claim in
lieu of supporting evidence. Complementarily, I also have no “belief” that
such a god entity does not exist; because the assertion of a nonsensical
and unsubstantiated claim does not warrant belief in its opposite. It
warrants nothing. And I have consistently called that the default position.
I think no god exists because I see the premise as nonsensical,
unsubstantiated and unwarranted. I don’t even give it the benefit of
“believing” its opposite, I simply dismiss it.
Even though I’ve tried to be clear about my thinking, you consistently
insist trying to tell me what I think; that because I use the word atheist
as the most apt description of my logical position I must therefore concur
and agree with everything you insist describes what an atheist “believes”
or what the world view of an atheist must be. Well, I’ve told you
repeatedly what I think, and in some detail it is not what you insist it
be. Live with it.”
I am not telling you what to believe – you defined your belief for me, and by any philosophical dictionary the belief you subscribe to is called agnostiscm. This is just a matter of definition, and is not really a point of argument. 2 + 2 = 4 no matter what you think. I also like how your other hand waiving done above about how “It must have served some useful purpose otherwise it would have died out long ago” – again – you assume you are correct and then simply call that victory.
“Suppose I told you that I have received telepathic communications
informing me that the universe is a quantum fluctuation, that the many
worlds interpretation of quantum theory is correct and that there are an
infinite number of separate, totally independent and isolated universes,
each with it’s own supreme being, and that the number of universes
increases with every second as an infinite number of quantum possibilities
become real. Would you simply accept that as a valid proposition simply
because I said so? What would you require as evidence? What if I said you
can’t disprove it, so therefore it’s true? Would you say you “disbelieve”
it or would you simply think it nonsense and not worth wasting a second of
your time on it?
Point of fact, there happens to be more evidence to support my assertion
than to support the god hypothesis. Just google “quantum fluctuation”
and/or “many worlds interpretation”.”
I am not a qualified physicist (and I suspect that you are not either) but I will note your little pet multiverse theory is far from accepted mainstream science. A quick google search, as per your suggestion , of the quantum goodness and the related multiverse interpretation yielded much skepticism from numerous respected physicists and others who would be in a position to better judge than either of us. I would love to know what evidence you are referring to. Neither of us (unless you are and did not tell me) are qualified physicists so to be honest we mainly have to rely on what the experts tell us here – but even a casual google search took down any notion that this is solid science. An amusing bit of writing by one academic with a particle physics PhD (who is not a Christian btw so no worries that he is not biased in my favor)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2850601/posts
Although not a physicist, another amusing quote from the Skeptical Inquirier (oh that hotbed of Christianity!) “The stark truth is that there is not the slightest shred of reliable evidence that there is any universe other than the one we are in. No multiverse theory has so far provided a prediction that can be tested. … Surely the conjecture that there is just one universe and its Creator is infinitely simpler and easier to believe than that there are countless billions upon billions of worlds, constantly increasing in number and created by nobody. I can only marvel at the low state to which today’s philosophy of science has fallen.”
As I said, I am no expert, but it would seem that multiple universes could just as easily lend itself to a Master Designer as there being only one – maybe even more so since there is so much complexity involved.
For the record, from a Christian perspective there are several views being explored, not all of them against or incompatible with such a theory – after all, the Bible does not say anywhere that no other universe exists – God could be King of more than one universe…who knows? I sure don’t.
” The issues you raise are certainly interesting. Yet I find no compelling
reason to go to the god hypothesis when we discover something we don’t
understand. The intellectually honest response is simply to admit we don’t
understand, not resort to magical explanations that suit some religious
prejudice. Besides, that’s a game of diminishing returns. The more we
understand how the universe works, the less you can attribute to your
magical god. Also, to justify your preconceived conclusion that god exists
(some Christian variant, I presume), you don’t look at the evidence
objectively and let it lead you wherever it might. Further, others have
already done it far more convincingly: the Hindus, the Buddhists, the
Platonists, the Neoplatonists, the Yogists, the Taoists to name a few.
Ultimately, your magical mystery tour will end on the trash heap of history
with all the others.
”
Again – nothing but hand waiving and assertions – I am simply going to ignore any further statements that you make that don’t actually have an argument behind them – simply saying “others have already done it far more convincingly” is not the same as them actually having done so – you need to explain how they have done so if I to take this seriously.
But as for your claim that “The more we understand how the universe works, the less you can attribute to your magical god” – you do realize that Christianity (at the least – I cannot speak for other belief systems) is not trying to explain purely natural phenomena (the only domain science can speak of at all) in supernatural terms. It is dealing with things that are beyond the scope of science to deal with at all – that which is beyond the mechanistic, natural world. So more scientific discoveries do not in any way impede upon the territory of religion. As Issac Newton once said “Gravity explains the motions of the planets, but it cannot explain who set the planets in motion. God governs all things and knows all that is or can be done.” Christianity does not try and say “A wizard did it” to some natural phenomenon. Science actually started in a Christian framework!
” I think Charlie Martin responded quite adequately to your concerns about
an atheist moral system. Buddhists are atheists and I think one could make
a compelling argument that the Buddhist moral system is superior to any
other.
I certainly do have a world view, that I have not spoken to in this
thread. Here I have said simply that the god claim is baseless, silly,
logically barren and warrants no further thought. If you have to take it to
some higher degree of ramification and exposition, be my guest.”
Insults and assertions…moving on…
“So now you’re asking for evidentiary cognitive science and neurobiology,
congratulations. Why don’t you apply it to the biblical story telling? You
seem to have accepted that pretty uncritically!”
More assertions. I need arguments or I just ignore them.
“Based on what we’ve learned over the past 100 years, I don’t think the
“matter/not-matter” dichotomy holds much water. Whatever is going on here
has turned out to be something far more interesting than anyone ever
thought before! In The Supreme Identity, Alan Watts suggests that what most
people have commonly referred to as “god” is a case of mistaken identity;
that, in fact, consciousness is the fundamental reality and self
consciousness the personal and individual reflection of the unselfconscious
state. In our naiveté we have simply mistaken the ground of our own being
for something external. Speculations around quantum physics talk about the
same thing; that consciousness is somehow involved in determining the
outcome of experiments. Consciousness seems to be the key thing.”
See previous answer.
I think you are far more of a materialist than I am.
********
A couple of things.
“ http://www.gutenberg.org/files/38806/38806-h/38806-h.htm#link0003
Addresses much of your religious-centric argument in far more detail
than I care to go, and probably far better than I could ever hope to. I
challenge you to read it. Warning: it’s long and it’s detailed. You will
likely be angered, but also possibly intrigued.”
This is the point where I *really* decided to no longer take you seriously – Robert Ingersoll of all people! Really? His work is a mixture of red herrings, laughable scholarship (especially regarding history and basic sociology), outright fabrication, and just plain idiocy. As one small0 funny example, his little commentary on the Christian teaching of “turn of the other cheek” was outright hilarious and missed the point entirely. Any Bible commentary will inform you that this is referring to being insulted and has nothing to do with total pacifism or no right to self-defense. However, Ingersoll gets it totally wrong (thinking it means total pacifism) and makes basic, fundamental errors like this as easily as I breathe…based on this and a ton of other such incredibly basic errors he has absolutely no reliability to speak on any matter weightier than what I eating for dinner tonight.
Many a skeptic has examined the Bible without any bias toward it (often against it in fact) and been surprised at what they found. That link about history and archaeology from my previous response is a good primer on that. Although we have some other hurdles to get over first, contrary to your repeated assertions that the very notion of God is ridiculous, there is quite a bit of evidence and many brilliant minds throughout history have come to that conclusions, often having first approached the issue from an antagonistic viewpoint. Ingersoll would not be qualified to historically analyze or understand my grocery list so I don’t think his rantings are really worth the time. Check out that link I post below– I would love to see if you agree or not.
Since you kindly linked me to that one work, I will return the favor with a (quite short!) article summarizing what is wrong with him for your reading pleasure. There are others, but this one is short and to the point so I like it.
http://www.tektonics.org/gk/ingersollr01.html
“ I propose that we move this discussion to here:
http://debunkingchristianity.blogspot.ca/
I think it a much better venue than the archives of pjMedia. It will
remain current and far more interested people will see it and potentially
add their comments to enlarge the scope. “
No – I have no respect for John Loftus or his patently dishonest arguments and want nothing to do with his blog. Either make your argument here on ‘neutral ground’ or simply walk away. Your choice. Before you do anything else that I will pay any attention at all to you must respond to the arguments that I made before and *not* just hand waive them away. Assertions != arguments. If you wish to respond again and do not cover them then I will interpret that as you not having a solid argument and simply giving up. Also, try not to make arguments that anyone with any knowledge of the subject whatsoever has seen before – no need to reinvent the wheel.