The AntiChris

Yup, me.

I know god does not exist, just as I know Santa, pixies, leprechauns and the IPU are figments of the imagination.

I'll gladly reassess my position if you can give me a sound reason.

Chris

Hawkingfan

Amen!!!! Also--There is NO NEED to disprove that which cannot be proved!!!!!!!!!! What would it take to prove to an agnostic that god does not exist anyway? Hmmmmm? We've shown no man lives in the clouds, prayer's do not hold up to proper testing, those who claim miraculous powers are always disproven under proper testing, problems with the bible, SCIENCE!!!!...

I don't call it "faith" in no god. It's common sense.

Philosoft

How about you put that cart back behind the horse and explain how a self-created universe is an impossibility?

Deistic Heretic

Infinity cannot be created from complete nothing.
From one extreme to another; infinity and nothing are both unimaginable. Ponder on this for a moment and you may understand where I am coming from.

Thomas Metcalf

Originally posted by Harumi:
"I think that it can be safely said that an atheist who denies that any God exists is just as unreasonable as a theist who claims that God exists.

Any disagreements?"

Let's be careful with the word "deny." If I deny that P, I think I might just be saying there isn't enough reason for me to believe that P. If this is so, I deny the existence of every God.

Let's also be careful with "any." Do you mean an atheist who denies that any particular God exists is wrong, or that any atheist that claims that every God is nonexistent is wrong? Only the latter seems at all appealing to me. There could be gods that have no noticeable effect on the universe. But there are certainly versions of God that we know can't possibly exist, or that we know probably don't exist.

Thomas Metcalf

Originally posted by Deistic Heretic:
"God has many meanings. You can only carve out the reasons why the theist God(s) cannot exist. Please explain how the creation of the universe is impossible thus leaving the universe to create itself in utter impossibility."

I don't believe that a mindless entity that created the universe would be a god. I do believe that in terms of our experience, most natural events are produced by mindless entities, so there is some probabilistic reason to believe that whatever created the universe, if anything, didn't have a mind. (There are also good reasons to think the universe couldn't have been created, because it always existed.)

Deism, to me, rests on an evidential argument or two that have both been refuted for years. But I'd love to see your arguments, if you have any.

[ December 09, 2002: Message edited by: Thomas Metcalf ]</p>

Synaesthesia

Absolutely. It is one thing to deny the possibility that any sort of God exists, but it is quite another to reject all God theory as untenable and a creation of human gullibility.

The contention that humans create Gods is well supported evidentially. The contention that God created humans is non-existent. The case is anything but symetrical.

luvluv

Thomas Metcalf:

Which arguments would those be?

Keith Russel:

I'd love to see this demonstrated.

Fiach

Again it depends on the definition of God. If God is not a being but a natural phenomenon of the cosmos that creates universes, sets them in motion, then other forces of physics determine the future course. That definition fits what we know pretty well.

If you define God as a conscious being who created the universe you have lots of problems. Why does a creater need consciousness or intelligence? Do copper sulfate solutions need consciousness to form delicate complex crystal fractals when the water evaporates? No.

Argument 2 against a conscious god is that conscious has certain axiomatic purposes. It allows the being to evade predators, seek food, and select reproductive mates. What predators eat gods? What food does God have to grow or obtain or hunt? What beings mate with god to produce little godlings?

Argument 3 against a conscious god is the state of nature. Nature is a tooth and claw jungle in which almost all animals eventually die by being eaten alive, and a rare few die of old age. It looks like a pure darwinian competitive struggle for life selecting out the fittest to survive. If this is a god designed system it shows a very sadistic being, this god. If a conscious god designed humans or made them from a talking mudball, why do babies suffer terminal brain tumours, Tay Sachs Disease, Cystic Fibrosis?

Intelligent design is blown out of the water by the millions of failures, birth defects, vast differences in intelligence, character/personality disorders, insanity.

In summary: Generic God cannot be proven and naturally not disproven since there is no evidence over which to argue. An Intelligent God has many problems that make his/her/it's existence highly improbable, as well as unprovable.

Fiach

luvluv

Fiach:

I disagree with that. Is the intelligent design of a car blown out of the water by flat tires, engine failure, and the like?

The fact that a product malfunctions occasionally is not evidence that it was not designed.