beyelzu

here's a hint drink less absinthe. see less supernatural. be more rational.

beyelzu

my earlier post was for kassiana, not you seebs. (the one about absinthe.)


evolution is a theory with plenty of factual evidence to back it up. the very meaning of supernatural seems to imply the impossibility of proof. which is quite a conundrum for those darn wiccans.


but i did enjoy your point seebs.

seebs

I don't see it as a problem. I don't have any proof that I have free will, but I believe it anyway.

beyelzu

for me it all goes back to the earlier arguments about an affirmative must be proven and failing that the negative is assumed. i see no evidence of the supernatural and thus i assume it doesnt exist. but just one example really would make me change my stance as a metaphysical naturalist.

seebs

I don't do that except in "plain physical reality" where I feel I have a reasonable expectation of evidence of those things which exist. For most fields, I believe the neutral position is "no opinion", not the "negative", and I will migrate to a weakly-held opinion if I see much evidence at all.

beyelzu

seebs, its just one of those areas that we disagree on.

but for the sake of argument.


your god doesnt exist in "plain physical reality?"

seebs

Dunno. Not in general; I'm told He did for a while a couple thousand years ago. Sort of.

God is in the same place in this world that I am in a game of Civ 3 I'm playing. Nowhere in the map, but clearly affecting things...

Kassiana

Beyelzu:
show me one, just one supernatural thing, and i will apologize.

Kass:
Nope, Bey. YOU made a positive claim without evidence that no supernatural exists. Then I made one back at you, because I thought it was obvious I was doing what you were doing.

If you're really that interested in not having claims made without evidence, YOU prove there is no supernatural. I'm especially interested in your disproof of Deism, as most atheists I know of are intelligent enough to admit they can't disprove the Deist God.

I've snipped the rest of your constant insults and nastiness. I'm sorry you don't like Pagans, but that doesn't give you the right to be condescending and rude, honeybunch. I expect a reply that doesn't snipe at me which either proves there is nothing supernatural anywhere in the universe or a retraction of your earlier claim that there is nothing supernatural. One more insult and you're ignored.

I don't expect you to convert, but I do expect you to be polite. Most atheists I know of have no problem being polite to me...what the hell is your problem?

Rousseau_CHN

If Thomas Aquinas was ever logical, he got it from Aristotle--not from the Catholic teaching.

Anyway, who is to say that Aquinas was logical. When asked whether it was right to overthrow a tyrannical regime? He answered "NO." His reason was something similar to that of Ancient China's Mandate of Heaven.

That is logical, bah humbug.

GunnerJ

I've pretty much said what I set out to say on the OP, and the topic starter is here to defend his claims anyway. However, there are still a few points to make.

The difference is, we can provide evidence for evolution, although what would constitue an "example of evolution" I really can't say. Perhaps he means speciation? If so, we have him covered there as well.

Seebs, how is this a servicable argument for free will, and how does it support any argument you're trying to make? Were you just hoping that everyone here believes in free will*, and wouldn't attack a sacred cow?

I'm going to try and stop this muddying of the waters here: proof can mean different things in different contexts. Skeptics are knowledgable enough not to mix these meanings up in different contexts, but they also assume that others can keep up with esoteric uses of the word, perhaps inaccurately. For example, the "burden of proof" could be met many different ways, in math, and I know I don't need to point this out to you, a formal deconstruction of a principle or statement based on other rules and guidlines in order to arive at a new statement is used to compose a "formal proof." In science, physical evidence which corresponds to a hypothesis' prediction is needed for proof. Note that "proof" is not always absolute, though. So, in scientific matters, like the theory of evolution, evidence and proof are soemtimes used interchangably.

Thus, it is a problem for someone to make a scientific calim (that is, one about the working or nature of the Universe) and not back it up with a scientific proof. It's even more problematic when we talk about "supernatural" claims. A better reason for the "impossiblity of proof," which in this context would mean evidence corresponding to a prediction, is because we can't even define what a supernatural event is. Maybe it's something that doesn't conform to what we know about the way the natural world works, but then, we don't have a complete understanding of the natural world.

So, what we really come down to is a simple need for evidence for specific claims. I wouldn't ask for "evidence" of "something supernatural" without first having an idea of what "something supernatural" is. However, people who believe in the supernatural have many ideas about what the supernatural consists of: God, magic, clairvoyance, etc. Therefore, it would be reasonable for someone who believes in one of these things to provide some evidence for their factual existence. That is, if they want their ideas taken seriously.

"No opinion" doesn't help us in a murder trial (I wonder if you'd keep the guy locked up until some negative evidence is found to support his innocence). Nor does it help us in formulating an understanding of the Universe when everyone and his brother has some crackpot theory about cold fusion of young-Earth geology, or something else. I could imagine your opinion of what the burden of proof ought to be being applied to in real world science: "Stop the heliophysics research, guys, I found someone who says that the sun is made of magic crystal that just looks like hydrogen undergoing nuclear fusion, and even though he has no evidence to support it, we really don't know for sure that he's wrong, so we have to divert all our energy to proving he's wrong to continue. Otherwise, we must simply have no opinion on the sun's makeup."

The thing you keep missing, seebs, is what the concept of the burden of proof is intended to do: it allows us to make a decision when a decision needs to be made between two opposing claims. It's not about what we know for sure, it's about what we can assume.

Kass, I'm trying to be as delecite as I can when I say this, but typically, claims with the word "no" in it, as in "there is no supernatural," are negative claims. "No," you see, is a negative qualifier.

A good litmus test is this: re-word someone's statement into the form of a question, and if the answer is no, it is a negative claim. For example: "Do you think there are supernatural phenomena?" Based on Bey's statement, he'd probably answer "no." Thus, a negative claim.

(*For the record, I'm a determinist.)