Wads4

What about the Incompatible Attributes argument,--the illogicality of an Omnimax God?

Hoosier Daddy

As I asked seebs, which god are you talking about? Jagella is referring to the Christian God of the Bible. Do seebs or you have a specific disproof of Zeus? Thor? Aron-Ra? If not, then can you claim they don't exist?

Any deductive argument would lead to a certain conclusion due to the nature of deductive arguments. I've already pointed out that certainty can't be had, we can only say with something approaching certainty that gods don't exist.

Bobinius

You are probably reffering to the theistic arguments. Those are very weak. That's why irrational faith still rules.

I'll formulate a simple argument as disproof of God. You probably have a strong case as a theist, so there should be no problem dealing with these weak arguments.

The argument

P1: If God exists, there should be observable effects of his existence.

P2: There are no observable effects of God's existence.

-----------------------------------------------------

C: God does not exist.

a. The form of the argument is valid: it is Modus Tollens.

b. In order to refute the conclusion you have two choices:

1. Deny the first premise. This means that if God exists is not necessary that there are observable effects of his existence. But, this means that we cannot differentiate him from non-existence. Non-existence has no observable effects either.

2. Deny the second premise. This can be done by presenting observable effects of Gods presence. Please bring them on. And you have to demonstrate of course that they are caused by God's existence, because otherwise, if they are natural phenomena, that would be evidence against your point.

I am waiting for the quick refutation of this weak argument.

John A. Broussard

This argument is so easy to refute, that I can't understand why theists don't set up the refutation.

Just pray over the stump of an amputated leg. If it starts to grow back a new leg then you and I will start going to church.

Bobinius

What if it was the placebo effect?

Jagella

Hi Lee:

Antony (see the correct spelling) Flew decided to abandon sound reasoning for a vague, cryptic belief in some “god� or other. Why he did so is not clear to me. In any case, Flew acting in this odd way does not detract from the fact that we atheists have won this debate with theists. To deny our victory is to make a mockery of sound logic and accurate information.

First of all, no communist government ever totally eradicated religious belief. Second, I am not a communist and do not advocate communism (“I am not now nor have I ever been a member of the Communist Party, Senator McCarthy!�). Finally, if communist governments have been repressive, then that repression is a result of the stifling of free thought. The actions taken against naysayers by dictators like Stalin could have been taken right out of the pages of the “holy� Bible which advocates violence against unbelievers.

Jagella

Alf

Now now, don't be nasty with the poor theists. They want to belive that it was their praying that healed little Timmy etc and if the miracle happened and the stump did grow out again then undoubtably we would need some form of explanation. Unless you had information about some new medical advances in cell biology that allowed doctors to put on stem cells over the stumb and made it grow back again or some such the answer that "the prayer did it" does indeed seems like at least an explanation we would have to take seriously.

Unfortuantely for the theist, no stumb has so far been known to grow out again so even the debate of praying being placebo in this case will have to wait. For now the ruling must be that God hates amputees and doesn't want to help them. For some reason God consider amputees to be a despicable type of people who he refuses to help for any reason.

There is precedence for this in the bible mind you. Read up the OT and how it tells people with handicaps to stay out of the temple and not pollute it with their presence.

I wonder what would happen in modern day if a church announced that its doors was closed to people who were blind, amputees, deaf, etc... That they required a health check on all people who came to their church and only those who passed the check was allowed entrance. If it was a priest in a mainstream church who did this, I wonder how long he would remain a priest in that church. However, it is undeniable that the OT does outline how you should discriminate people who were different. Either because they were sick, had the wrong race (canaanites was referred to as dogs by Jesus in the bible), wrong belief (all heathens should be put to death except for the virgins who can be kept for the soldier's pleasure), wrong sexual orientation (all homosexuals should be stoned period, along with all those boys and girls who gainsaid their parents).

Christian morality is actually quite horrible if it were applied in modern societies. This is why we frown upon Afghanistan where they did try to apply OT and NT biblical laws (muslim law and old biblical laws are very similar) to a modern day society.

The really weird thing is when fundies tries to argue for ten commandments in court rooms and so on as if modern justice has ANY resemblence with the horrible injustice that was prevailing back in those days.

Now back to the placebo thing. It is more likely to argue about that when the parents pray that little timmy get better in school and lo and behold he does get better in school. Maybe they belived so strongly that he would get better that they were a little more patient with him when helping him with his homework etc so that in the end it DID in a round about way help him. Similar situations can be posed for various minor illnesses that often cures itself given enough time. Was the healing really due to the prayer or was it just nature taking its course and the guy got healed all by himself or was it perhaps that the people praying believed so strongly that they subconsciously changed their ways (ate more healthy food etc) that the prayer did in a round about way have an effect?

Also, don't underestimate the power of your brain. When a believer pray he puts his brain in a special medidative state sort of similar to the way you do while sleeping. Often a good sleep can cure illnesses and your brain produce hormons similar to some of those chemicals you find in some medicine - this is particularly true for psychiatric or mental problems - and thus prayer actually DO have a positive effect. It really DOES help. Not because a sky daddy intervenes and does something but because the believer believes hard enough and that in itself causes changes to his body and brain.

To sum up, praying is a complicated issue but as your simple test shows. It is rather obvious to any individual who care to consider the situation that God either must really hate amputees or there is no god. Which of these is the most likely conclusion I will leave to the reader. :-)

Alf

Jagella

The nonexistence of the Christian God or any God having the traits of omniscience, omnipotence, and omnibenevolence is certain. The errors in the Bible prove that its author(s) could not have been omniscient. Since the Christian God is said to be omniscient and the author of the Bible, he cannot exist because these two traits are mutually exclusive. That is, it is impossible for any being, God or otherwise, to know all things yet commit errors of ignorance.

Seeing that the Christian God does not and cannot exist, we atheists, critics, and skeptics have won the debate with Christians and similar theists.

Jagella

John A. Broussard

Now, you are being unfair. It's the congregation of believers who hate amputees, not god. They pray for cancer victims, cripples, even heroines in soap operas to encourage them not to get abortions.

But, so far as I know, none of them pray for those stumps to grow back.

I say, let's give god a chance.

Pray for the restoration of all those limbs gone missing because of our Iraqi adventure. Just think how much the taxpayer will save in prosthetic devices, and how many veterans we'll be able to send back into action, and the shock to Muslims when they find out how powerful the Christian god is.

The happy results of such prayers are mind-boggling.

breathilizer

We'd all be atheists...