Why are you an Atheist today? (Universe, about, different, before)

[JustNobody]

jackdonekings-"My reason for believing in deity is the cause of all reasons"
Not sure what you meant by this. If you take out "for believing in deity" you get "My reason" "is the cause of all reasons". Basically the problem I have is I have difficulty understanding what you mean.

"Everything is but the mind and this is why our thoughts manifest in certain ways"
Are you assuming that the mind is something apart from the brain? If so, make a case for it. And if everything is the mind, then well good luck proving or disproving that. Certainly everything is not the brain. Believing something because you read it in a book is not the same as knowing something from personal experience.

c'est la vie
"Nice try at backpedalling there"
I'm not sure how I backpedaled. Not sure how what I said is different than my original post. Unless you can make a case for a universe other than the physical, the closest thing you are going to find to a deity is humankind itself. I guess that explains partially why Jesus is worshipped as God.

[c'est la vie]

Originally Posted by JustNobody

....Unless you can make a case for a universe other than the physical...

It should be quite evident that our physical universe had a beginning point (i.e. it is not eternal), otherwise entropy would have long since taken it's toll.

So, our physical universe was caused by something apart from itself (i.e. not of the physical universe).

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But apart from that my meaning was simply that if you limit the type of evidence you will accept to natural (i.e. empirical) evidence, then by definition you are not going to be able to consider the supernatural.

Even if it exists, you have cut off any possibility of finding it by limiting your method.

[Predos]

Originally Posted by c'est la vie

It should be quite evident that our physical universe had a beginning point (i.e. it is not eternal), otherwise entropy would have long since taken it's toll.

So, our physical universe was caused by something apart from itself (i.e. not of the physical universe).

-----------------------------------------

But apart from that my meaning was simply that if you limit the type of evidence you will accept to natural (i.e. empirical) evidence, then by definition you are not going to be able to consider the supernatural.

Even if it exists, you have cut off any possibility of finding it by limiting your method.

Can you say circular arguement? If this unprovable item is true, then all else must be false? Without any proof needed, of course.

You appear to stake out your position and allow for nothing to change it. Isn't that limiting your position?

[c'est la vie]

Originally Posted by Predos

Can you say circular arguement? If this unprovable item is true, then all else must be false? Without any proof needed, of course.

You appear to stake out your position and allow for nothing to change it. Isn't that limiting your position?

Most events of everyday life are 'unprovable' by 'scientific' criteria.

You cannot 'prove' what I ate for lunch a week ago Thursday.

It's a one time event, not repeatable and not observed by independent persons.

Does that mean I didn't eat lunch that day, or simply that you cannot 'prove' what it was that was eaten?

You cannot 'scientifically' prove that I thought about clouds yesterday. Does that mean I didn't.

Most things don't lend themselves to 'proof' in the sense that you mean it.

Do you love your mom? Can you 'prove' it? No.

These things (historical events, thoughts, love) are mostly outside of the scope of 'scientific proof'.

When 'scientifically minded' people claim for science something it cannot do and was not designed to do, they give science an undeserved bad name.

[Predos]

Originally Posted by c'est la vie

Most events of everyday life are 'unprovable' by 'scientific' criteria.

You cannot 'prove' what I ate for lunch a week ago Thursday.

It's a one time event, not repeatable and not observed by independent persons.

Does that mean I didn't eat lunch that day, or simply that you cannot 'prove' what it was that was eaten?

You cannot 'scientifically' prove that I thought about clouds yesterday. Does that mean I didn't.

Most things don't lend themselves to 'proof' in the sense that you mean it.

Do you love your mom? Can you 'prove' it? No.

These things (historical events, thoughts, love) are mostly outside of the scope of 'scientific proof'.

When 'scientifically minded' people claim for science something it cannot do and was not designed to do, they give science an undeserved bad name.

Once again, a circular arguement. A negative is beyond proof. You, however, continue to make simplistic arguements designed by you to "prove" your statements true, discarding any fact in evidence that you do not approve of.

An example: can you prove you are alive and capable of thought? No.

[c'est la vie]

If you've cited any 'facts' that I've discarded, I'm not aware of it.

What 'fact' have you cited?

[Ajeck]

Originally Posted by c'est la vie

Most events of everyday life are 'unprovable' by 'scientific' criteria.

You cannot 'prove' what I ate for lunch a week ago Thursday.

It's a one time event, not repeatable and not observed by independent persons.

Does that mean I didn't eat lunch that day, or simply that you cannot 'prove' what it was that was eaten?

You cannot 'scientifically' prove that I thought about clouds yesterday. Does that mean I didn't.

Most things don't lend themselves to 'proof' in the sense that you mean it.

Do you love your mom? Can you 'prove' it? No.

These things (historical events, thoughts, love) are mostly outside of the scope of 'scientific proof'.

When 'scientifically minded' people claim for science something it cannot do and was not designed to do, they give science an undeserved bad name.

Yes but there are many things we can "prove" (without getting in to pointless debates of whether or not you can be sure you even exist) by finding evidence:

1) You exist you have a CD account or whatever behind the name exists.
2) Sandwiches exist
3) You are most likely human. You need to eat to live.

We can also get an idea of "the probability of whether or not you ate one". Your bill at a grocery store or resturant. If you paid with a credit card we can trace back to where you bought it and what you got. We could look into your eating habits.

The more evidence I get the higher probability I determine you ate one. If this was a game of odds I'd be pretty comfortable saying that you did eat a sandwich with the right odds. But in any case such an action is minuscule compared to proving whether God/Jesus/Allah/etc exist.

The action of eating a sandwich is pretty common these days and somebody seeing you eat one will not cause much of a stir. You claiming you ate a sandwich has no effect on me or anyone else for that matter. So comparing this to salvation or believing in God causes a problem with equivalence. You are not making any excessive claims like "If you do not eat the sandwich you will be damned for eternity", "The sandwich healed me from cancer", and so on... I believe you can get the idea.

Also I'm pretty sure you can get an idea if one has love for their mom by observing their relationship. Its like the saying "actions speak louder than words"

[c'est la vie]

Originally Posted by Ajeck

Also I'm pretty sure you can get an idea if one has love for their mom by observing their relationship. Its like the saying "actions speak louder than words"

What actions specifically would be 'scientific proof' that you love your mom?

[Ajeck]

Originally Posted by c'est la vie

What actions specifically would be 'scientific proof' that you love your mom?

Actions that would be negative to her well being would be against loving her actions that are positive would be for. Depending on what the ratio is one gets a good idea of whether or not he loves her at that point in time. Remember emotions are not static they change with the person as they grow. One can go from love to hate or hate to love. This is why some sciences deal with probability. For an example take a look at this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double-slit_experiment


Also for one to conduct a good experiment you need to have a good definition of love. Tell me when humanity had decided on that one.

Similar concepts can be found in the world. This is just like the biblical saying that Christians will be noticed in the world by the way their live their lives not their words.

[Predos]

Originally Posted by c'est la vie

If you've cited any 'facts' that I've discarded, I'm not aware of it.

What 'fact' have you cited?

What is the point in rehashing facts, when you have channelized your thought processes to reject anything that is inconvienent to you?

Oh yes, you are getting good at ignoring uncomfortable questions asked of you. Typical.

Example: Aren't you limiting your position by ignoring other possibilities? (Slightly paraphrased from message #53)