K

Seebs:

No, the fact that the IPU is known to be made up is exactly what invalidates the existence of God proofs. If the same proof for the existence of God can be used to prove the existence of the IPU, then the proof is erroneous since we know the IPU is made up.

K

seebs:

Irrelevant. You indicated that a line should not be drawn between internal and external experiences when determining what is real. Dreams are definitely internal experiences and just as real as emotions.

The strawmen started when you attempted to shoot down Biff's argument by saying that he claimed emotions weren't real. All he really claimed was that emotional feelings about some belief are not necessarily indications of the actual truth of the belief.

Biff the unclean

Well, If the IPU were to come to earth in the form of a man and die as a martyr to ransome mankind how would you emulate the IPU?
You are telling me part of your myth. Since this myth is not collaborated by observation (history) and is identical to many known myths (this time Easter and Mithra and not the IPU) then it is not a valid exitensial proof. It's only an unsupported claim
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Sorry, but I don't buy it; there's a substantial gap between "I have information about dozens of people who know this is made up, and no people who believe otherwise" and "I have met people who think this is real".
There is no substantial gap because you are missing the point.

Internal experience is experience nonetheless. I don't see how you can draw a line between "their own emotions" and "an actual incident"; unless you've never experienced emotion in your life, this seems like a very strange line to draw.
I am not aware of any sane person past the age of three who think that things exist merely because they want them too.
Emotions are not evidence of the existence of beings they are evidence only of emotions.
You could draw a line between "internal experience" and "external experience", but you haven't done anything to convince me that the former is "not real".
Because I was assuming that you were sane. Or have you redefined what God is? Are you saying that God is no longer the supreme being, the creator of the universe? Are you saying that God is now an emotion that exists solely in your brain? A form of angst perhaps?

Having had experience of emotion, I'm convinced that it's "real".
Having had experience with them then you probably have noticed that your emotions aren't beings. There is no Mr Happy and Ms Depressed. That they are nothing more than the product of your own brain. If that's what you think God is, the product of your own imagination then we are in agreement.

I am just as willing to avoid things that I think would cause me emotional pain as I am to avoid things that I think would cause me physical pain. In any meaningful sense, my emotions are real things, and they are not entirely volitional, so I may as well treat them as "external", even though they are purely subjective.
You are older than three aren't you? You do know that your imagination does not affect the external world.
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The strawmen started when you attempted to shoot down Biff's argument by saying that he claimed emotions weren't real. All he really claimed was that emotional feelings about some belief are not necessarily indications of the actual truth of the belief.
Exactly so.
When my daughter was in third grade the class had a hamster. One day she came home from school furious about how stupid the kids in her class were. No one knew what sex the hamster was (it's very hard to tell externally) so it was suggested that they vote on whether the hamster was a boy or a girl. Even at that tender age she realized that you cannot vote on a fact. If everyone one in the class voted that it was a female, if in all their heart of hearts they felt deeply that it was a female, if they were willing to die over their faith that the hamster was a female--if it had a penis it was still a male.
Your emotions are proof of nothing more than the fact that you have emotions. That you feel that there is a God, that you are willing to die for you faith in God is only evidence of your mental state and not of God.

Jayjay

I think K hit the nail on the head. IPU is not a generic proof for non-existence of God, but rather a counter-example to a particular class of theistic arguments. In the opening post GeoTheo tries to dismiss IPU as a false analogy by shifting the goalposts from lack of empirical evidence (which is what the analogy is all about) to eyewitness accounts and personal experiences (which IPU obviously does not have), as if this might make theistic arguments like "you can't disprove God, therefore he exists" or "you're not REALLY trying to reach God" or other such nonsense any more convincing.

Eyewitness accounts and personal experiences are an entirely other category.

Arikay

Although I dont think the IPU proves god is false, I do think that it proves that this form of atempted conversion is, um, stupid.

Since you can replace god with IPU whenever a theist says they have proof for god, or tries to condemn someone to hell, or tell them about heaven by accepting their god. You can just replace god with IPU and ask them why they are sending themselves to hell for ignoring the IPU.

Basically it shows that none of this "proof" for god is proof at all, but a belief. And that using this "proof" is not an effective way to try to convert people who can think on their own.
you can convert people based on the beliefs, but as soon as you try to pass off your beliefs as the ultimate (or true) belief above all others, you end up shooting yourself in the foot.

As far as Witness accounts go, the big problem with them is, who do you believe? Which witnesses to god are telling the truth and who are lieing? After all, there are quite a few people who have been guided by god that conflict with each other and contradict each other. So who is telling the truth?

but thats just my tired rambling.

Koyaanisqatsi

The following is the one true testament to the glory and the power of the IPU:

And, of course, it goes on from there. Thirty six volumes and all attested to by the elders of the IPU, whose secret knowledge could never be written officially until a hundred to two hundred years after the fact (though some IPUlogists date even earlier sections--the first of the pinkoptics--to just forty years after the Gluification) in gilded hemp.

Over forty millions in 1954 attest to the truth of the ongoing discussions of the resurrected IPU in the form of a talking mule known forever as St. Mr. Ed, but still, to this day, too many follow a false god! I say to you as sure as you are reading these words you will be hooved to death in the fury of the IPU's hindquarters, but know always as the script says, "Gee, Francis. I didn't think Sally was that type of gal."

So sayeth the IPU. Deny His existence at your peril. I assure you, His wrath is fierce and creepy and swift and without warning, for He kicks in the night with the power and the glory of tenfold the strength of anything you've ever thought of.

This was the whey and the truth from the one true testament to the glory and the power of the IPU, Whoa Horsey. Woe.

Koyaanisqatsi

And if you think that's ludicrous, let me tell you a little story about the baby Jesus....

K

Arikay:

You may be on to something here. I never understood why many theists don't see the IPU for what it is - a counter-example that invalidates many of the proofs they use for the existence of God.

It may be that they think the IPU is an attempt to prove that the existence of God is false. Something along the lines of, "The IPU exists so God doesn't."

That might explain why they don't understand that the know non-existence of the IPU is not a defeater, but an essential part of the IPU argument.

Since you can replace god with IPU whenever a theist says they have proof for god, or tries to condemn someone to hell, or tell them about heaven by accepting their god. You can just replace god with IPU and ask them why they are sending themselves to hell for ignoring the IPU.

The IPU isn't designed to invalidate the arguments based on witness accounts. There are many other ways of discrediting these.

Biff the unclean

The IPU isn't designed to invalidate the arguments based on witness accounts.
But you'll notice K, that most of the Xian "witness accounts" are so flawed that the readily lend themselves to the IPU. The bible makes a couple of references to witnesses. But it never says who they are. It fails to give their reports. Which makes the "witnesses" only another claim and not evidence.
The "witness accounts" given on this very thread are not attributed to any specific person. And on close examination are only reports on individuals emotional states and not on their observation of any beings.
If I concentrate right now on elegant unicorns living in an ancient green forest I can induce in myself very pleasant feelings.

The only existential claim that the IPU can't make is one that can be made for the ball point pen sitting next to my key board. the pen induces no emotions, carries no philosophies with it, makes no promises. But it is actually here right now. You can see it and touch it and do anything with it that you can do with something that is non-fiction. You can't substitute the IPU for the mundane claims you can make for the ball point pen. And you can't make BPP claims about God either.

In other words, for the BPP which is prove-ably real, you can't make the same mundane claims for God. For the IPU which is prove-ably fictitious, you can.

K

Biff:

All true. My only point was that the IPU doesn't invalidate the testimony of a witness (say for instance claiming to have seen a statue of Jesus cry)- unless someone has actually claimed to have witnessed the same thing for the IPU. Of course there are many other reasons to disbelieve the claims of the witness.