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See what I mean? Every time people disagree with you rather than discussing your position openly with them you just claim there is some kind of personal attack against you. There is not.
The only problem we have is you are not working with us here. You are making claims and not backing them up - or worse pretending to back them up with reference to things you also do not back up. The universe is concious but the evidence happens to be in dark matter which you can not present is not an argument and you have to realise why this is insufficient for people on here. Maybe it is sufficient to you because you have already decided the universe is concious so the evidence must be "out there" somewhere.
If you will not present evidence - or worse you present something that is not accessible by anyone let alone yourself - what is there to rebut? You can then - as pointed out - just claim no one is rebutting you.
Poppyseed, hardly! As noted, the law of conservation applies to the quantum fields so energy is eternal, and ti's thus an error to ask whence do they come: they are already there! Ti's s absurd to postulate God as needed to explain why they exist as they do, as theists,particularly Craig and Richard Swinburne do with their personal explanation, and Carneades' argument is that that begs the question of wanted outcomes! That personal explanation is reduced animism per Lamberth's argument from reduced animism. God as the Ultime Explanation is actually no explanation! God did it or explains it means nothing whatsoverver! He can function as an explanation no more than can gremlins or demons. And ti's no rebuttle to prattle that He would be a superior explanantion than they and would explain them when again, He explains nothing! The Flew-Lamberth the presumption of naturalism claims that natural causes and explanantions themselves are the Necessary Being,the Primary Efficient Cause, and the Sufficient Reason; Aquinas's Primary Cause nad Necessary Being and Leibniz's Sufficient Reason fail miserable! This presumption,like its corollaryHume's argument against miracles, demands evidence. As no evidence comes forth, here in line with Charles Moore's auto-epistemic rule and as Victor Stenger notes, where mountains of evidence should appear, and none does, then here evidence of absence indeed is absence of evidence and no argument from ignorance! We naturalists dispose of theists putting new garbage into old can! As a philosopher states, ti's fun, and I add mental exercise! Ti's now a question of psychology as to why theists are theists!Per Lamberth's non-genetic argument, as theists themselves prattle without substantiation with their arguments from angst and from happiness-purpose, they need Him and thus knock the floor out from themselves then to claim that we make the genetic fallacy in querying why they are believers in superstition!
No greater entity can exist, because per Lamberth's ontological argument, the Cosmos itself is the greatest being to which nothing can be greater, in the imagination or otherwise. Per Reichenbach's argument from Existence, as Existence is all, no transcendent being can possibly exist, and to deny that begs the question! His cosmological argument is that the eternal energy explains why Exisence exists and his atelic one is that teleonomy rules so no teleological argument is possible. My arguments make explicit what already is implicit in the literature. Please check out the Prosblogion, that excellent source of argumentation! rifleman, eh?
Why ir's our duty as gnu atheists to procliam our evangel as we share responsibility to educate people so as not to be superstitious and to protect our liberty of non-worship. Why should we let theists get away with woo1 Ti's important to proclaim the truth! Oleg, see we naturalists rebut you successfully on this question! Ben, you and Craig and Augustine are whining! " Life is its own validation and reward and ultimate meaning to which neither God nor the future state can further validate." Inquiring Lynn [: Google] Mystic, to call Yeshua perfect and a great moral leader is the scam of the ages as the deist Miklos Jako notes in ' Confronting Believers!" William James's will to believe is mere prattle for faith, the we just say so of credulity! Reason moves mountains of ignorance whilst faith rests on the argument from ignorance. Google the presumption of rationalism.
Mystic, all religious experience is just people's own mental states at work, and to claim that He has input into them, begs the question! Even we gnu atheists have areligious experience: does that mean then that ti's true for us and thus both sides end up in relativism!
Mystic, so you are a self-declared fideist, who therefore has no reason to believe! Why, that is such a scam! You rank with the woo-meisters Sylvia Brown[e], John Edward and van Praagh: masters of doble-talk. I prefer Prof. Irwin Corey who makes sense compared to you four!
Folks, his inanity!
When the horse reason appears at the race, and the horse faith fails to appear, reason wins! Pascal's Wager thus is stupid! Fr. Griggs http://ignosticmorgansblog.wordpress..com There lies a most important article- the last one. Carneades Skeptic Griggsy Skeptic Griggsy
Last edited by carneadesthatesstratoofga; 06-03-2012 at 07:45 AM..
Reason: addition
How can people have a relationship with God-that square circle?
How do people have communications with God? They pray whilst he uses what physics denies - telepathy.Why then their relationship then means a one-way street with him as just an idea they use to think that they have that relationship. They just feel that religious experience as evidence for Him when they are just misinterpreting their own mental states as evidence as they regularly do with facts. Religious experience reveals no God but just ones own mind at work. To claim that He works that way beg the question. People's religious experiences don't - as far as we know- reflect that of other religions but their own, substantiating that state at work. Even to argue that,as inclusivits would, that all religions reflect the ultimate reality, but as we atheists can have such experiences,no. People's religious experiences of prayer reflect either the post hoc fallacy of coincidences or else the rationalizations of apologists for failed prayer! People's experiences of miracles reflect credulity as all miracles are natural,even fraudulent. As we ignostics find Him a circle that theologians cannot square, people then have such an illusory relationship! Being a fallibilist, I invite others to have their say.
Being a fallibilist, I invite others to have their say.
I see you attacked many strawmen in my absence and attributed many of them to me, carneades. Naturalism is a self-defeating philosophy as it cannot account for consciousness and subjective experience. As it happens I agree that the Cosmos is the greatest being to which nothing can be greater and energy as the ultimate manifestation of that being. The difference is that I know it MUST be conscious because we are conscious . . . and a conscious Cosmos IS God . . . relative to we puny humans. The silly idea that natural causes are their own cause is about as circular as any argument can get . . . but the infinite regress that is usually touted against any first cause is just a straw man. We ONLY have to account for the things that exist and considering them as parts of an existent whole . . . the Cosmos (God) . . . is more than sufficient as the end of the causal chain . . . especially since the Cosmos MUST be conscious to account for our consciousness.
I see you attacked many strawmen in my absence and attributed many of them to me, carneades. Naturalism is a self-defeating philosophy as it cannot account for consciousness and subjective experience.
Says you. But you have not backed up that statement ever. You just repeat it as if that makes it true.
Also even if it has no current explanation for such things at all - that would mean it "does" not account for conciousness. Not "can" not. If science - for example - does not have an answer to an open question at this time - this does not equate to it being unable to answer it. It just means it does not have one now. Neither of us can know it never can or will have such an answer.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MysticPhD
The difference is that I know it MUST be conscious because we are conscious
Says you. But you have not backed up that statement ever. You just repeat it as if that makes it true.
As has been pointed out to you by many users now - myself included - we do not fully understand conciousness. Therefore we are in no position to declare what it must be or not be. Or what it must have or not have. You are pretending to know more than you can know about conciousness and then declaring things about it that you have no basis for.
Science doesn't answer all my questions either. Why believe in that?
There are only so many questions that we can find the answers to. After that, what's the point really?
We could do like a 3 year old and just keep asking "but why" after each answer. Eventually you will run out of answers.
Why do we exist? Who cares! We DO exist! Now lets just make the best of it, play nice and move foward!
I find the subject fascinating but whether one takes a scientific or theological approach the end result is the same: there will always be a why or a how.
I agree, we exist now. How or why we are here is irrelevant, but I believe it is a question that all humans contemplate.
Quote:
Originally Posted by BigCityDreamer
What questions do you think science, reason and logic are not capable of answering?
Uh, well, what happened before the Big Bang for one.
Some scientists will say that we do not know, which is the honest, and correct, answer.
Others will say that the human mind cannot understand what was before the Big Bang since the pre-Big Bang era existed in a time when things like time and space did not exist. So there was no cause and effect, which defies every single thing we know and believe. Which is also an honest and correct answer.
Prior to the Big Bang there was nothingness yet something. How can you explain that? It cannot be done.
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Fideism-that no show!
How can people have a relationship with God-that square circle?
