ELECTROGOD

I'm in agreement.

fast

We agree!
I hit the word count thingy and I was like, "oh my Sun God!". I was gonna say don't feel compelled to reply to ALL if there were parts too trivial, but I didn't--me sorry.

I'll cover just a couple of your points to narrow the focus just a little.

There is one point that you are making that I do in fact want to accept. When you suggest that non-existence is a default position, I want to accept that. I just don't know how to justify it. I didn't mean it quite that way. I mean, I think it's justified--it's just that I don't know if it's logical--I mean, it's logical in that it's justified, but hell, I don't know what I mean. There's just something about it I can't put my finger on. Is there a formal way that proves this?

P3: I know there is a God (t)
P4: I know there is a God (f)

There are a couple entangled things going on here. I'm going to try to separate one so that I can make a case for the second.

The first thing I want to differentiate is between two usages of the term "know". A theist may very well say that they "know God exists". This is either true or false dependent upon which definition of "know" is being used.
There is the generalized, "I know" which can encompass learning--which need not be based on scientific criteria. So, in this instance, P3 is being used by the theist. But, we all know (P3) that is not a very formal view of how the term 'know' is critically used.

I am using P4 whereby we do not have a true justified belief (or scholarly equivalent) in God. So, even if a theist decides to use P3, that does not negate the validity of P4. Either way, my contention is that a theist does not know God exists despite claims to the contrary. After all, they cannot substantiate that they 'KNOW' (P4).

***
P1: I believe there is a God
P2: There is a God

P5: There is not a God

Now that it's a little clearer (maybe ) in what I mean by "know", then now I can move on to the more important issue.

There is no question as to whether or not these are in fact two different claims (p1 and p2). They may be incoherent (given the term God), but let's stick to the issue. It's two different claims.

You say that if P1 is declared, then P2 is implicit. I hold that isn't true. I believe this is a true representation of our perspectives, not to put too fine a point on it.

I feel I've already made my case (and Sun God knows (p3) I likely wasn't clear), but I'll try it from a different angle.

It is quite possible (and probably not all that uncommon) that a theist will recognize that their belief in God does not mean that there is a God. It is irrational to hold: I believe x; therefore, x exists. It's probably more the case that SOME claim x exists because they believe x.

Recap:
P1: I believe there is a God
P2: There is a God
P3: I know there is a God (t)
P4: I know there is a God (f)
P5: There is not a God

You say that's it's irrational to hold P5 if P1 is held. I agree. You conclude that P2 is therefore implicit. I say, "Not the case".

A person can hold P1 and neither hold P2 or P5. Showing me that P5 makes it irrational DOES NOT mean that P2 is therefore the case. Why? Because P2 cannot be inferred from P1. Besides, like I said, P2 doesn't even have to be held. I can recognize that I believe something while all the while refrain from declaring I know (P4) it to be in fact flawlessly true. I may say I know (p3) if only I believe, but that confidence that "I" have need not be conflated with what "is" true.

A theist can recognize that their belief cannot be known (P4). If they knew (as in the P4 variety), they would simply NOT declare to have faith. If they declare that they know (as in the P3 variety), then this changes the dynamics yet again.

I'll stop here--that length thingy feels like it's creeping up.

fast

:wave:

Nice! You have given us a first hand admission from the creator of this concept (you).

Should we ever be lucky enough (won't happen) to confirm with the originator of the God concept that it was made up (probably was but irrelevant), then we could surely then compare your story to the other.

Hmmm, but do we know that you have made up this concept? I tell ya what, I'll assume that you're not pulling the wool over my eyes, and I'll assume that it's true in regards to what you say-- that it is both true that one, it's made up, and two, that you are the one that made it up. Truth is, I really don't know, but I'll trust ya, or at the very least, I'll juxtapose the scenario as you've declared it to be.

Given your testimony and my juxtaposition (did I use that word correctly :banghead: ), then I'll concede your argument and agree.

Given my commentary thus far, I can skip most of what you've written, but I'll take a stab at the following:

I don't necessarily agree, for one can claim non-existence of any self-made-up thing, but for arguments sake, I'll concede your point, for your next statement is that which appears to have more argumentative substance. eta: after reading the way I put it, it sounds negative, but I didn't mean it that way.

Why does one have to hold that God exists (as a positive assertion) in order to declare a belief in such a thing? It can't be assumed (as if it were implicit) that my beliefs in x means that I assert an existence as being true. (edited to restate I can believe something to be true and avoid declaring it as true...it may be that I can't substantiate it, but I can have faith--can't I? I only need to substantate my assertions, and having a belief does not mean that I am asserting--well, I am, but I'm asserting an entirely different thing.

Consider people's thoughts towards O.J. Simpson. We can believe what we want, but I say I believe, it doesn't mean that I hold that it is assuredly true--that's why I believe! Furthermore, just because I believe x and don't hold a positive assertion, it definitely doesn't follow that I therefore hold an assertion that I know it's not true--that would be ridiculous as pointed out by others.

I can believe my middle school teacher is coming to class tomorrow, but that doesn't mean that I can assert with any logical know-how that she is in fact coming, and if I still nevertheless believe it and declare that I don't assert she isn't coming, that doesn't mean that I'm asserting that she's not coming (implicitly or otherwise).

Agreed

Disagree.

The burden of proof lies with who makes the assertion.

If a theist claims that God exists, then the theist is challenged.
If an atheist claims that God does not exist, then the atheist is challenged.

If an atheist discredits theists’ claims, then atheists win. We don't win by proving the impossible. We win by proving that theists have failed to make their case.

Jagella

I’m not sure where you get this stuff about skeptics believing that aliens seeded the earth. I surely don’t believe it.

Huh? How so? If I’ve refuted the claims of some scientists then I don’t see how that means we skeptics haven’t won the debate with religionists.

Which “science� did I disprove, and what has that got to do with the debate between skeptics and religious believers?

Alleged prophecies of those who claim to speak for some God or other have never been substantiated, and in some cases these so-called prophecies have even been discredited. The New Testament, for example, is full of false prophecies. And what does this fortunetelling have to do with being “self-existent�?

OK, at this point you are giving up on claiming that God was never created and substituting the words “self-existent.� So your creationist argument might go something like this: All living things that are not self-existent need an intelligent designer. Of course, you believe there is but one self-existent living thing, God. So we may substitute the word “God� for self-existent, and your argument thus becomes: All living things except God need an intelligent designer. You are assuming God which is what you are supposed to be proving! More question begging. Such sophistry is why I’m perfectly justified in saying that we skeptics have won the debate.

Religion, especially the Christian religion, has a long history of wars, persecutions, superstitions, and other pernicious effects, and it has very often been opposed to progress. Remember Galileo? His scientific pursuits were stifled by the Church. Da Vinci also lived in fear of Christians as he conducted his scientific investigations. Throw in a few other facts such as subjugation of women and slavery, and I’ve made a sound case that Christianity has had very negative social consequences. We skeptics have the facts, and it’s a big factor in our winning the debates we’ve had with religionists.

And they were “materialists� because they knew well the despotism of the Church—a key fact that apologists won’t divulge.

I suppose communists repressed free speech because they knew that it might force them to defend their weak ideology—the same reason that Christians have repressed free speech. The West may very well have followed suit if we became communist. I’m not sure why you’re asking about the West becoming communist.

Jagella

breathilizer

The problem I have with your argument is contained in the sentence above.

Your original assertion was not about mentioning gods; it was about claiming that they exist. Yes, a claim is necessarily a mention, but a mention is not necessarily a claim.

In your paranthetical, you say "What is a god, I never heard of that before?" as someone would say if no one mentioned gods. And I agree with that. But a person can hear of something through other means than just a claim.

What I disagree with is your switch from the word "claim" to the word "concept" and now to the word "mention."

Had your original assertion used the word "concept" or the word "mention," I'd be in agreement with you, but it didn't. You said claim.

By the way, my point is that if no one claimed that gods exist, then we'd all be atheists. Conversely, you said that there would be no atheists at all.

lee_merrill

Hi everyone,

Wait, weren't the communists the naturalists, though? Committed to science, and all?

I know you don't believe this! I'm saying you are disagreeing with people like Leslie Orgel, professor at the Salk Institute, one of the first to propose that RNA was a precursor to DNA, and Francis Crick, co-discoverer of DNA, see here, for example.

Well, you also have to convince the likes of Orgel and Crick that you have refuted them, too! Have they conceded?

Well, here are some examples...

Babylon will never be rebuilt, or reinhabited (Isa. 13:19-20, Jer. 25:12, Jer. 51:26).

Babylon is not rebuilt, you may attempt this if you wish, though you might want to consider the outcome of Saddam Hussein's recent attempt first. This would seem to be a substantiated prophecy.

There will always be Jewish people (Jer. 31:35-37; 33:24-26).

Will you argue that there are no Jewish people, or that no one has tried to destroy them as a people? Hitler could well have made an atomic bomb, it came to the balance of a hair. And yet he failed, this also substantiates a clear prophecy.

There will be Egyptian and Assyrian people up until the fulfillment of Isa. 19:16-25.

Egypt will never again rule the other nations (Eze. 29:14-15).

These are clear enough, and also quite true, and are being fulfilled today, Egypt could also try and rule other nations, this is falsifiable today, even.

This is what I would say here: "fulfilled prophecy ... would imply that God has perceptions that transcend time, and thus God is arguably not within time, and thus he is arguably self-existent."

No, I'm concluding that, based on available evidence, as stated in the previous comment, so you will need to refute my argument, in order to claim your victory!

The question, however, was your point that all religion has to be removed before we can see the effect you have promised! Why is that, may I ask?

More Chesterton would be appropriate here, perhaps...

"I felt that a strong case against Christianity lay in the charge that there is something timid, monkish, and unmanly about all that is called 'Christian,' especially in its attitude towards resistance and fighting. The great sceptics of the nineteenth century were largely virile. Bradlaugh in an expansive way, Huxley, in a reticent way, were decidedly men. In comparison, it did seem tenable that there was something weak and over patient about Christian counsels. The Gospel paradox about the other cheek, the fact that priests never fought, a hundred things made plausible the accusation that Christianity was an attempt to make a man too like a sheep. I read it and believed it, and if I had read nothing different, I should have gone on believing it. But I read something very different. I turned the next page in my agnostic manual, and my brain turned upside down. Now I found that I was to hate Christianity not for fighting too little, but for fighting too much. Christianity, it seemed, was the mother of wars. Christianity had deluged the world with blood. I had got thoroughly angry with the Christian, because he never was angry. And now I was told to be angry with him because his anger had been the most huge and horrible thing in human history; because his anger had soaked the earth and smoked to the sun. The very people who reproached Christianity with the meekness and non-resistance of the monasteries were the very people who reproached it also with the violence and valour of the Crusades. It was the fault of poor old Christianity (somehow or other) both that Edward the Confessor did not fight and that Richard Coeur de Leon did. The Quakers (we were told) were the only characteristic Christians; and yet the massacres of Cromwell and Alva were characteristic Christian crimes. What could it all mean? What was this Christianity which always forbade war and always produced wars? What could be the nature of the thing which one could abuse first because it would not fight, and second because it was always fighting?"


You might want (before responding!) to read what he said further about this, no, this is not a question that has been invariably ignored...

Which would be dialectical materialism. Now which part was weak, the dialectical part, or the materialism part?

Regards,
Lee

Jobar

If you believe something to be existent, and you declare that belief, then you have asserted at least implicitly that the something exists. Remember that theism isn't the belief that 'God is true', it's the belief that God exists. There's a subtle difference between existence and truth. IOW, "I believe in God" means "I believe in God's existence".

seebs, and all theists who come here and declare themselves theists, have made the assertion that God exists. Stating belief in x is an implicit declaration that x exists to be believed in!

But fast, no one questions that OJ exists. And be careful that you don't confuse the several different meanings of the word 'believe' here. Faith (religious belief) isn't the same as opinion (as in "I believe it's raining but I'm not sure.")

Again, watch those various meanings! Believing *in* something isn't the same as just believing something.

But for the atheist, the challenge is met simply by saying that God doesn't exist because there is no evidence of God. See Bobinus' simple disproof. That argument can't be gainsaid without either retreating into deism (denying that God interacts with the universe) or else trying to present evidence of God.

You may be interested in some of the previous incarnations of this particular argument. It's been trampled over by vast herds, over and over! Here's a few of the stampedes which occurred while I was moderating this forum-
Burden of proof on atheism\
"The burden of proof is on the one..." (See my post at the end of the first page)
Burden of Definition
Burden of Proof- Offshoot (VERY long, but good!)
Burden of Understanding
Burden of Proof, redux.

I had to read all of that, and many more too!

And my conclusion is that it's simultaneously unnecessary and impossible to "prove" atheism. You can't show that there's nothing to show; you can't substantiate that there's no substance.

added- you might check out my post here to seebs.

ELECTROGOD

(I apologize from the start because I'm going to get a bit wordy here so read carefully)

Well, every claim is a concept first and you can mention both a concept and a claim.
I mentioned claim first because religions/religious people assert the concept that their god idea is in fact truth, this is in fact a claim (though first the claim was an idea/concept).
So, if an idea/concept and/or claim is not ever mentioned, then even though it may be in one person's imagination (or not even that), then there is no definition "out there" to refer to. This is why I said that it is relevant to inventions. Someone can dream up an idea like what we today call a car. While this is in his mind as an idea or even a more organized concept it still is not known as a car...even if he shares the idea/concept with a friend. If he must define it with a name it is more likely to be "a multi-wheeled mechanical transportation device" but he is not necessairly claiming yet that it can work. If he has never mentioned it and dies before telling anyone or making notes about it then the idea is lost and never realized as a claim or even recognized by anyone else as a concept or even idea (what is a car then).

I also talked about BOTH the reality of a universe without human thought (as it was until recently) which would exclude ideas/concepts AND claims of gods, as well as the possiblity of reality with humans who could form ideas but not of supernatural beings (purely for definition's sake). This would attempt to show if a definition could exist without any criteria to define it. I think it shows that a definition for something that doesn't exist in these circumstances (idea of god, definition of an atheist) cannot exist; at least not until an idea is formed into a concept and shared with at least one other person in order to agree on a definition after which a claim may or may not be made. If a claim is then made this allows other definitions to be formed as they relate to the claim.
Correct me if I am wrong but one of your assertions is that even if one person does imagine the idea of a supernatural being (and not even as a belief) then that is enough to cause everyone who MIGHT not agree with that "idea" (don't know if that could be determined before a concept/claim has been presented), even if they don't know about it because the idea has not been shared yet, to be defined as an atheist.

BTW, when I said "What is a god, I never heard of that before?", it wasn't meant as something that someone WOULD say if no one mentioned gods because there would be no reason for the question. It was an add on that I used to further illustrate the position of the situation.
If no one claimed that gods existed then we would all just be people (probably with some other labels attached).


(if my sub-par english skills are making things confusing, and they might be, then try to read past that to see what I am saying)

Alf

Good.

Whatever formal way you would choose would be based on assumptions etc. If you did not agree on those assumptions it would be very hard to show.

However, there are some reasonable assumptions as to why this is so.

Let us assume the opposite. Let us assume that the default is that X exist solely by someone making the claim that X exist.

So, I claim "Garfumble exist". Somehow magically this is supposed to make Garfumble come into being? No? He presumably existed before I made the claim?

We usually think that it is the other way around. Something exist and THEN I can make a claim "X exist" because I have presumably seen "X" or seen things that could only be explained by supposing X as the most reasonable explanation.

Therefore, the default is to assume X does NOT exist. Presumably the person who claim that X exist has some reasons and arguments as to why he thinks X exist. He saw X or he saw some things that could best be explained by "X was there and did it".

If the person who therefore make that claim does so because he has such reasons, then he better come up with them and not hide them under the table! So, he must give reasons as to why he thinks X exist. The person who thinks X does not, does not have to give reasons why he thinks so until after the first person has provided his reasons. The person who thinks X does not exist will then typically start with the argumetns the first person made and see how reasonable they are. If he finds them credible and reasonable, he will probably agree that X exist, if he finds them incredible or unreasonable he will point out this and presumably give his reasons why he find them so and continue to think that this does not show that X exist.

Therefore the default is to presume X does not exist UNTIL some evidence has been put forth that shows the existence of X.

You appear to think there is a huge difference between what you think is true and what really is true.

To some extent there is a difference. You can see hallucinations or you can misunderstand the situation or for other reasons see thing that you later understand was not so.

However, if you study things over some time so that you are reasonable certain that you are not hallucinating and you have taken into account any possible causes for misunderstanding then I find it very hard to separate the "world as it appears to me" and the "real world as it really is". That second world does not in a sense exist. You can never see or experience that world. The ONLY world that exists and is real is the first one, the world as it appears to you. Thus, if you are reasonably confident that X is true, then X IS true as far as you can tell. It may later turn out that you were mistaken and X was not true at all but then you modify your world view and move on. However, until that happens, you are reasonably certain and you "know" as a fact that X is true. It is not the case that it only appears true to you but you take it as a fact that it really is true. You don't have much choice really since there is no way you could differentiate a "real truth" from an "appearant truth", they both appear true to you. At a later time you can find that one of them changed so it was only an appearant truth. The other did not. However, you can never be sure that it never will, so you can never assert that this is "appearant truth" while that is "real truth".

The "real truth" is only an illusion.

Therefore it seems to me that you try to make a difference between two which really isn't a difference. You cannot in any way tell which is which, so why make a distinction between them?

The point is that you say "I believe there is a god" means that it really is your belief. The only reason why we distinguish between "belief" and "knowledge" normally is to convey some form of confidence. "I believe Mary will come to visit me tomorrow". It means you believe she does but you are not certain.

However, when a christian say "I believe there is a god" he does NOT wish to convey such an uncertainty. He claims he is indeed very certain that there is a god. He is willing to bet his life on it. He knows he cannot prove it and he knows that other people will not readily accept his claims without such proof and so he fall back to the "I believe" part, but he is inwardly certain of it and take it as a fact. Thus, he IS making the claim "there is a god", and his failure to substantiate that claim also give us reasons to not accept his claim on his say so.

Alf

Alf

Probably about time to distinguish between various things here.

You have communism as an ideology. This is a semi-philosophical or pseudo-philosophical understanding of the world economics and how the world functions.

There is nothing inherent in this that dictates repression of free speech per se. However, in so far as this ideology is not in accordance with the real world and a tyrannical ruler want to cloud this fact, he can presumably use repression of free speech as one way to block people from learning this fact.

Then you have communism as a political movement. That is a bunch of people who reading about the coummunistic philosophy wants to realize the conclusions of it and make a society that is ideal according to those principles.

Again, no inherent repression of free speech but again in so far as this movement failed to create this ideal system they might want to have repression of free speech in order to prevent people from finding out this fact.

Then you have communist dictators starting with Lenin, Stalin, Mao, etc to name a few famous ones. These are just tyrants partly using the communist world view as a means to exploit the system to give themselves more power. Some of them really did believe in the system though and perhaps even wanted to try to realize it but in the end they were selfish tyrannical people as we have seen from other places also. Their ideology or lack of such is largely irrelevant in that context.

These people will most likely enforce repression of free speech in order to be able to stay in power even if they did things that was not according to the ideal system they claimed they were working towards. Perhaps even going directly against it.

No, this is not a defence of communism. Communism had its attempt and I think we can largely agree that it was an experiment that flunked the class as nationalism with Hitler had flunked earlier in previous century.

Nor is it a support of capitalism. True, communism has flunked but that does not mean that capitalist economy is ideal. It proves it is better than communism in some ways but doesn't mean it is the best possible.

However, what I am trying to say here is that communist countries did largely deny freedom of speech and that in itself does indicate that communism and free speech may have a tendency to not get along very well. However, it is a tendency, not an absolute. It is in theory possible to think of an "ideal" communist state where you did have democracy and freedom of speech and all that jazz. How long such a state would run under a communist style economy would be a completely different matter. Communistic economy is also largely wrong - i.e. it does not correctly describe how the world works - and as such, such a nation would probably turn away from communism pretty fast. I am just saying that communism per se does not really inherently include repression of the press as one of its tenets.

And to answer your question: Yes and no. Yes, they were materialists. This does NOT mean that all materialists are communists or that all mateiralists have to agree with communism. No, they were NOT committed to science. Yes, they were committed to some science. Physics and math in particular had a golden age in russia during communism. However, if a scientists results did not agree with what a communist bureaucrat's idea of what should be the result they would often be asked first to change their results and if that didn't work, they would be sent off to gulag's. The gulags had many scientists who for one reason or another had opinions or scientific results that did not agree with the official party line. So, no, they were NOT committed to science.

The problem is that this "prophecy" isn't a prophecy. It hasn't been rebuilt yet but that doesn't mean it never will. What if it was rebuilt 100 years from now?

It is a prophecy that can become false some day when babylon is indeed rebuilt but it can never become true. At any point while it is not rebuilt, it can always be rebuilt some later time. The best you can say is that "so far this prophecy appear to be true", you can never say "this prophecy has come to fulfillment". Thus it is no prophecy.

This is of the same kind. It is no prophecy. As long as you have jewish people you can say that "so far this prophecy appears to be true", you can never say "It is true". If some day there are no more jews, then you can say "It is false". Thus it is not a prophecy.

Again, as the above. "will never again" or "will always" does not make prophecies. A prophecy would be "Tomorrow at noon 8 AM you will have tea tomorrow". Now, if you did have tea tomorrow, the prophecy would come true and if you did not have tea it would be false. If I say "You will never have tea again" is actually a prophecy. If you live the rest of your days without ever drinking tea, the prophecy could be declared true on your burial. If you did take tea at any time before that, it could be declared false at the moment you drink your tea.

However, "there will always be jews" doesn't have any such death near it. We could move forward 1000 years ahead and we might still find jews around. Does that make the prophecy true? No, we could only say "so far it appears to be true", we could not say "It is true". True, if we moved 1000 years ahead and we saw no jews and learned that they had all perished in a huge battle 100 years ago when some nazi like people got power and killed them all. Then we could say "It is false".

So the only way you can "confirm" this "prophecy" as true or false is when it is false, you can never confirm it is true.

So while you say it is quite true, it is not so. The best you can say is that "so far it appears to be true". You can in fact NEVER say "it is true". Their wording are simply such that they are not prophecies.

Since 1. they are not prophecies and certainly not "fulfilled". The only way you can "fulfill" those prophecies is to show them false I dare say you have not substantiated your claims here.

Which I just did.

Alf