beyelzu

well, I also think that your reasoning is flawed. but I dont think that you should go away. and I really wish that a mod would have edited the post.


emotional, you might do better to remain and not bring up the subject of life after death until you are better prepared to either take the criticism or respond to it. that way you get to hang out and joke around and make fun of xians and what not.

hell, I dont agree with your beliefs but they are much better than xianity.

I do wish you were right, which is more than I can say for the xians here.

beyelzu

tercel, we can detect radio waves they exist after all. we cannot detect god. even if god is not an extraordinary claim he is still a claim. so even if you dont need an extraordinary amount of evidence you still need some. and you have offered none. so please provide me with some pictures or perhaps a videoclip.

also please explain why god is necessary and nonarbitray. particularly that last part the non arbitrary thing, I just dont see how you define that as being god.

Ronin

Yeah, emotional, I've always liked you and considered you a friend in all of your incarnations here at the IIDB.

There are too few of us non-theists around to be squabbling over this kind of nonsense.

Please...hang around.

Amaranth

Are you inferring that the brain recieves signals of some kind from outside itself, and just acts like a translator? If so, I can't wait to see evidence provided. Otherwise, it looks like a false analogy.

Man can make machines, but not machines with consciousness, therefore counsciousness is magical? Argument from ignorance, me thinks.

Amaranth

Amaranth

cult

n.
2. A system or community of religious worship and ritual.

And while we're at it:

myth
n.

1. a) A traditional, typically ancient story dealing with supernatural beings, ancestors, or heroes that serves as a fundamental type in the worldview of a people, as by explaining aspects of the natural world or delineating the psychology, customs, or ideals of society: the myth of Eros and Psyche; a creation myth.
b) Such stories considered as a group: the realm of myth.

Tercel

Just to extend the argument slightly...

The other important consideration in a 'first cause' would be "why does it exist?". Since we are talking about the first cause here, the answer obviously can't be "another entity created it". But is the only alternative "that question has no answer"? I don't think so. And if we can find an alternative to "that question has no answer" then we should prefer the alternative on the basis that systems with gaping holes in the form of questions-with-no-answer should be discarded in favour of systems where the questions have answers. (That seems to be the point of science anyway: to do that and thereby get more answers)
Now, the obvious alternative answer to the question is "it couldn't not have existed". In other words, its non-existence was logically incoherent. In other words there was something about the very concept of the first cause's existence which meant that it had to exist - that it couldn't not have existed.
To state it bluntly:
the very idea of its existence was equivalent to its existence.

Clearly matter flunks this test. The idea of matter existing is not the same as it existing. (eg I can imagine unicorns – they don’t exist because of it) Obviously, whatever is going to meet this criteria is going to be conceptual in nature, since it must be something about the concept of it that makes it exist. A mathematical formula perhaps? But this also fails - we can derive mathematical formula which don't correspond to reality. Any theorem can be true or false, and is not made to exist by it's mere conception.

The solution to this is to take the problem above literally. "The idea of existence of x is equivalent to the existence of x":
x = the idea of the existence of x.
In other words X is a self-referential idea of its own existence. We are entirely familiar with this concept and have a term to describe it: Self Awareness.
A Self Awareness solve the problem – you can’t have the idea of something existing without having a “Mind” for that idea to exist in, can you?

Thus a Self Awareness as a 'first cause' answers the question of "why does it exist?" with a "it couldn't not have because the very idea of it existing is the same as its existence". It solves the pink-fluffy-bunny question of "why couldn't it have been just slightly different?" with a "there are no properties or attributes of it for it to be able to be 'slightly different', it must either exist or not exist at all".

[aside]
As an aside, it's seems clear that any other attempted explanation for everything is destined to fail, here's why:
An attempt to explain that reality is at a base level "rational" (ie "to do with reason itself", which is what my attempt here comes under, since I conclude a rational being is reality) is going to be something that logical argument likes since logical (aka "rational") argument likes things that are rational. An attempt to explain that reality is at a base level something other than "rational" (eg "materialistic", "no ultimate explanation" etc) is going to be inevitably subject to the accusation (in some form or argument) that it is irrational! Because, when it comes down to it, such a system is not rational, favouring something else over reason. And hence reason is going to object to this.
Us rationalists are going to win be default because logic is on our side. Of course the non-rationalists could ignore logic at a certain arbitrary point and say that their system supersedes logic. (Which they usually do) That's fine they're entitled to do that, so long as they realise that in doing so they have just lost their claim to be "logically superior" to any unthinking fundamentalist’s illogical system of thought. (Which they usually don't.)
And in the greatest irony yet, the only true rationalists who are happy to follow the god of "logic" through to it's final conclusion are the believers who accept that reality itself is rational Being.
[/aside]

So, back to the main point, “God as ‘first cause’” proves itself incalculably superior to the other possible first causes, by giving answers to two difficult questions which don’t have answers under the other system - and as I have already mentioned, incidentally solves a number of other “difficulties” which believers sometimes also use as arguments for the existence of God.
I should also point of that (with reference to the TAG), the belief in the existence of a rational reality validates our belief in logic, induction, objective existence yada yada which are otherwise unevidenceable assumptions and have historically plagued philosophers. (See this current thread in the Existence of God forum [read the link from the first post] for further discussion of this)

In other words “Buy God and get SO SO much more FREE” (Gee I sound like a salesman). But it really is true, and I personally am constantly amazed that by accepting the one concept -that the first cause was a consciousness- it answers so many other problems. Hence in terms of parsimony or Occam’s razor or whatever you personally like to call it, the hypothesis of God has more explanatory power than you could shake a stick at!

I really do sound like a salesman… ~sigh~ It’s only because I can’t understand you guys, here we have this really nice hypothesis with nothing against it and everything for it, logically sound and pretty much proven, oodles of explanatory power and simplicity as a hypothesis, something who’s nature we are all entirely familiar with since everything we’ve ever observed has been done from a conscious view-point and every second we remember we’ve had one, not even to mention big emotional benefits to us because of it’s existence (an afterlife, a meaning to life, a foundation for morality etc)…
And you guys want to chuck that all away for “nothing really has any explanation”, “everything is pointless”, “matter is all there is”, “that question has no answer”, “I can assume the universe as a first cause if I want to”, (I can assume pink fluffy bunnies as a first cause too if I want to) “I want to assume that matter (something I can’t even prove exists: eg the matrix or hallucinations etc) is the ultimate reality”.
ARE YOU GUYS NUTS?

You could have everything, absolutely everything anyone every wanted out of their beliefs. You could do so much good to religion and to the world. You could work with me to sweep away the tides of ignorance in religion in favour of logically coherent, unbigoted beliefs, imagine how much effect your combined brainpower could have on religious believers! You could work with a real meaning in the world, helping others and helping humankind grow in love under a framework which says there is an ultimate meaning to everything and that we are something eternal and something more than just atoms and molecules! You could do so much, and you guys have just thrown that all away in favour of nothing! (Yes I know some of you insist you think life still has “value” and “meaning” and whatever, but it’s a damn pale reflection of the theistic version!)

I think that is really what drives me to post here. You guys could be doing so much good! WHY NOT, DAMN IT!?
[/rant]

Thank you for listening to radio Tercel… I hope you enjoyed the show.

Demigawd

In other words:

"Luke, you don't understand the power of the Dark Side!"

And yes, you do sound like a salesman. How's the snake oil trade these days?

Tercel

That's the standard model of the dualistic hypothesis: yes.

What evidence? No scientific evidence nor any we might gather in the forseeable future is capable of providing any evidence whatsoever about whether it is right or wrong.
It has no evidence, your theory has no evidence. Why should I believe your theory over it?
On purely philosophical grounds, I'm inclined to say that my mind seems different to matter and thus I prefer the dualistic theory to your theory. But there's no evidence, just personal opinon.

Argument from knowing what machines are and more especially, what they aren't. They aren't conscious. Computers are mechanical calculating devices. All attempts at "artificial intelligence" have fallen so far short of the optimalist's expectations that only the fanatics dream of creating anything remotely resembling it in the near future. The concept has even been redefined into something we can do. (ie create mechanisms with the ability to improve at task performance over time)

Amaranth

The hypothises has no evidence. Why bring it up? I might as well say the brain is run by hamsters in 5th dimensional hamster wheels.

I presented a theory? Where was I when I did that? Can I get a copy?

Wait, I did just present the hamster theory. I guess I should defend it.

*ahem*

Science has no evidence for or against The 5th Dimensional Hamster Theory, not will any gained in the forseeable future help. It has no evidence, just like your theory. As such, my theory is just as good as yours, if not better, because it includes fuzzy creatures and is therefore more marketable to children.

I assume you mean what they aren't yet? Or is this yet another case of man hasn't done it yet, and therefore never will? It's still an argument from ignorance - You're claiming conciencness cannot be created by man because it hasn't been yet. Man being able to do something or not is a requirement for it to be able to be done, anyways. Man may never create a star - This is no way proves that stars can't be created.

Amaranth

mike_decock

Heheh... Maybe you need to coin a new term to discribe your non-supernatural, spiritual beliefs

-Mike...