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So then you make science your god. Nothing wrong with that except that we know science is always changing, always self correcting, and with that, you have to put faith in it.
That science changes is not a problem, because as you say, it changes only in self-correcting ways.
Not only do we not need to put faith in science to never change, we actually trust the fact that it WILL change as appropriate. As we say in the software world, this is a feature, not a bug -- or more concisely, it's "by design". The stark contrast between science and religion can be summarized as follows:
1) Science starts with observable reality and draws conclusions. These conclusions are subject to change because our ability to observe and to draw inferences from those observations may improve in the future.
2) Religion starts with immutable assertions which by definition cannot ever change, as change will undermine them. It then seeks to conform observable reality to those assertions. If observable reality and dogma disagree, then the dogma must be deemed correct and reality wrong or misleading.
(2a -- religion actually has to change or die, like anything else, but it does so slowly and with delays behind secular society of maybe a generation or two, so that any one generation will not very much perceive that changes are actually taking place, which allows religion to continue to claim "timelessness" for its "truths". Ironically, these changes invariably bring it less into conflict with observable reality and science -- the very need for the changes are driven by science. Religion has never forced science to change, it is always the inverse.)
Put more succinctly, science is based on skepticism and doubt and proves what is real by disproving what is not real (or if there is insufficient data, declining to believe in the unprovable); religion is based on certitude manufactured from dogma and asserts whether an observation is true or not by comparing how it conforms to dogma.
Here is why science changing its mind is not a problem. Newton's physics has been proven not so much wrong as incomplete and not accurate at some scales. It still serves perfectly well for most everyday purposes, but Einstein's general relativity is more comprehensive. In turn, quantum mechanics is better still. Yet, Newtonian physics still is all we need to calculate the trajectory of a spacecraft we want to send to Mars.
Most scientific progress is of this kind; it seldom invalidates what came before, it simply refines. When it DOES invalidate, that's fine too. We don't bleed people or use leeches in medical treatment anymore (although we can argue that maybe those practices were not scientifically established, for the sake of argument let's assume that they were). It's a good thing that we have better methods now.
In science, as in life, it's enough by definition if we do the best we can with the light that we have.
Atheism is illogical because you are trying to maintain a NULL position where you say you don't believe in anything. Rubbish. There are very few things that can maintain a 100% airtight position of validity. For example, an atheist person will go to bed believing wholeheartedly that their spouse or children won't murder them in their sleep. There is no 100% proof that it could never happen. Yet you believe without a doubt that this would never happen.
There is at least enough evidence to support the possibility that Christianity is true yet atheists shut the door and proclaim that God is nothing more than a myth as if it was proven fact.
I used to consider myself agnostic for the reason highlighted.
However, someone explained a more humble version of atheism: While it's impossible to be absolutely certain -that is 100% certain- that god does or does not exist, an atheist does not believe it exists. Yes it's true that I'm not absolutely certain one of my coworkers won't kill me today, it seems so unlikely that it's pointless to concern myself about it. [I've been to work literally hundreds of times and no one has tried to kill me.]
This is very much my philosophy regarding the concept of god; it could exist, but since there's no direct empirical evidence I don't believe it does. So while I'm philosophically agnostic, in practical terms I'm atheistic because I'm living my life according to the premise that there is no god, nor afterlife.
But getting back to the original issue... As others I have mentioned, if a very simple, but highly improbable wish were to materialize I'd be much more inclined to believe in god. For instance, I'm going to close my eyes and wish for a banana to materialize in front of my monitor... Well, no banana appeared. If a supposedly omnipotent being can't even give me a simple banana, why should I believe it exists or has any direct control over my life, this planet, or the universe?
Because it isn't about winning. It is about learning. I would think that as a teacher, you'd have understood this by now. Get it?
Do I get that you would have thought this? Of course, you just wrote it.
Do I believe that you are actually any more or less egotistical, any more or less concerned with how you are perceived on these boards, any more or less guilty of feeling superior in some situations, than I?
No, just less candid. Your willingness to sustain this duel is better evidence than the content of your assertions and arguments.
Do I get that you would have thought this? Of course, you just wrote it.
Do I believe that you are actually any more or less egotistical, any more or less concerned with how you are perceived on these boards, any more or less guilty of feeling superior in some situations, than I?
No, just less candid. Your willingness to sustain this duel is better evidence than the content of your assertions and arguments.
Just so we understand one another. You consider our conversation to be a duel, right? I base this conclusion on the fact that you just said that it is. Sorry to disappoint you, but having a rational conversation is not what I consider to be a duel. Perhaps you don't want to have a rational conversation, and if that is the case, then we have nothing left to discuss.
Just so we understand one another. You consider our conversation to be a duel, right? I base this conclusion on the fact that you just said that it is. Sorry to disappoint you, but having a rational conversation is not what I consider to be a duel. Perhaps you don't want to have a rational conversation, and if that is the case, then we have nothing left to discuss.
An extension of your m.o.....you are here dueling, but if you don't call it a duel, then it does not count as a defense of your ego.
You have now invested eleven posts on this topic, all explaining your masterful control over your ego as manifest by your refusal to view yourself as superior. But that isn't a duel, and you aren't superior, just more enlightened.
Readers may believe your words, or they may believe your behavior. I tend to put more weight on what a person does than what a person says.
Atheism is illogical because you are trying to maintain a NULL position where you say you don't believe in anything. Rubbish.
Well at least you had the honesty to rightly describe your previous sentence as rubbish. Because it was. Atheism is not about "not believing in ANYTHING". It is about failing to believe one very specific assertion and one specific assertions only. Atheists simply see no reason, much less from you, to think there is a god. Period.
They believe lots of things. Just not THAT unsubstantiated nonsense claim.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jeffbase40
For example, an atheist person will go to bed believing wholeheartedly that their spouse or children won't murder them in their sleep. There is no 100% proof that it could never happen. Yet you believe without a doubt that this would never happen.
There is plenty of evidence no such thing will happen. And as such coming to a firm conclusion on the matter is warranted. No one except you is claiming "100%" in any of this. We can come to firm and hard to shift conclusions on many matters without "100%" proof. Many atheists subscribe to the methodologies of science too for example. And nothing in science is proven 100% either.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jeffbase40
There is at least enough evidence to support the possibility that Christianity is true yet atheists shut the door and proclaim that God is nothing more than a myth as if it was proven fact.
Is there? I am currently aware of not just very little, but ABSOLUTELY NO arguments, evidence, data or reasoning that lends even a modicum of credence to the assertion that a non human intentional agent is responsible for the creation and/or subsequent maintenance of our universe.
Yet you claim there is not only such evidence but "enough" of it. I am all ears. Please pray tell us what this evidence is that you have been afforded and I have been denied. Present it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jeffbase40
So then you make science your god.
False. A shame you did not put "rubbish" after this sentence too as it would have been equally warranted.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jeffbase40
Faith that a future scientific discovery won't change the scientific "facts" of today.
Actually science methodologies function on the inherent assumption that future discoveries WILL overturn the knowledge of today. If this was not true then science would simply stop. The entire process of science is not about proving things true, but proving them false. I am afraid your tirade here therefore is doing little more than highlighting your own lack of knowledge of the methodologies and processes of science itself.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jeffbase40
It won't change the fact that you have absolutely ZERO proof that there is no life after death.
Nor are we required to present any. Your areas of lack of expertise seem to also extend to the concept of "Burden of proof". There is no onus on anyone to prove there is no life after death. The onus lies entirely with the person claiming there IS life after death to substantiate this assertions.
And I am currently aware of no evidence, argument, data or reasoning that supports the contention that there is life after death. Much less from you.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jeffbase40
As for Christianity, there are numerous evidences to support it.
So you keep saying. But I notice in your fetid keenness to repeat and repeat this self safe assertions.... you have not managed even once to provide a shred of it. Anywhere. Ever.
So you will forgive us for being suspect that you saying there is evidence over and over and over without actually saying what any of it is.... seems to belie the fact that you are no more aware of what that evidence actually might be than we are. Perhaps even less so.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jeffbase40
Just the fact that Christianity is so hated, and exclusively attacked by atheists
Except it is not "exclusively attacked" by atheists. You simply made that up out of nowhere.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jeffbase40
The 2,000 year old book that you casually dismiss happens to be the most important and influential book in the world.
You would do well to look up the "Appeal to Authority" and "Argumentum ad Populum" fallacies, learn what they are, and endevour to stop engaging in them. Because you are making those failures here. In spades.
Even if it were true (and you have not backed up this assertion in any way either which appears to be your modus operandi here) that it was the most influential book in the world.... so what? That would not make it for one moment useful, true or accurate.
Currently, for example, Reality Talent shows like "Xfactor" and "America has got talent" are the most important and influential TV shows on air. So what? That does not for one moment change the fact they are 2 dimensional tosh with no recognizable merit of any sort that simply appeals to the base agendas of the masses.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Grandstander
If those years of higher education didn't make you superior to those you believe need your help, how would you be qualified to help them? You would be one of them.
It is you putting terms like "superior" onto this when there is no reason to do so. We send teachers into our schools to teach things to our children. Do they feel "superior"? I doubt it. They are just doing their job.
You are making this all about individuals and who is superior to who. I think this is a naive approach. The fact is that ignorance prevails in our species as a whole and in any area where knowledge and education is higher in one area of that species than another, it is a good thing that the knowledge and education flows from that are to the other.
What your problem with this is, or what your point even is in the context of this thread, is as opaque to me as I am beginning to suspect it also is to you.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Grandstander
And why do you keep arguing with me about this stuff if your ego is not invested in prevailing?
Simple. Because we learn and grow from such interactions. Debate for me is not about prevailing. It is about NOT prevailing. If I prevail in a debate then I have won nothing. If I fail however then I have learned something. Either by divesting myself of erroneous thought, learning some new knowledge, or both.
It is you making it about prevailing. Not your detractors. I enter into debates to lose and learn as much (if not much much more) to win and posture. That I never "lose" to people like yourself or succeed in learning a single thing from you, does not negate the purity of the attempt. Who knows, you might be right some day... "prevail" and then teach me something I never knew before.
Again however what your point is in the context of the topic of the thread however, is not clear to me and I suspect is no longer even clear to you.
I used to consider myself agnostic for the reason highlighted.
However, someone explained a more humble version of atheism: While it's impossible to be absolutely certain -that is 100% certain- that god does or does not exist, an atheist does not believe it exists. Yes it's true that I'm not absolutely certain one of my coworkers won't kill me today, it seems so unlikely that it's pointless to concern myself about it. [I've been to work literally hundreds of times and no one has tried to kill me.]
This is very much my philosophy regarding the concept of god; it could exist, but since there's no direct empirical evidence I don't believe it does. So while I'm philosophically agnostic, in practical terms I'm atheistic because I'm living my life according to the premise that there is no god, nor afterlife.
But getting back to the original issue... As others I have mentioned, if a very simple, but highly improbable wish were to materialize I'd be much more inclined to believe in god. For instance, I'm going to close my eyes and wish for a banana to materialize in front of my monitor... Well, no banana appeared. If a supposedly omnipotent being can't even give me a simple banana, why should I believe it exists or has any direct control over my life, this planet, or the universe?
So let's say the banana did materialize. How would that constitute proof for other atheists? They could simply say you are lying or hallucinated the experience. The evidence is personal for you. That's why there will never be a simple undisputable evidence that satisfies all atheists. You won't find evidence by crossing your arms and telling God, ok I might believe in you if you do a parlor trick for me right now. From the little I know about God, He looks at the hearts of men, not their actions. If someone has a heart that truly wants to seek and know more about God, He will reveal himself. But I only see anger and hatred from a lot of atheists towards God.
Again however what your point is in the context of the topic of the thread however, is not clear to me and I suspect is no longer even clear to you.
It would require you going back to the first post in the series and reading them all, something you apparently felt was too much trouble before passing judgment on it all.
My one comment for you is that you are also kidding yourself when you claim that your participation here isn't about prevailing.
Now, are you going to prove me right by endlessly arguing this point?
"I have overcome my ego....and here are twenty thousand posts about how I did it and how wonderful I am as a consequence."
"I have no interest in what you have to say...and here are 20,000 arguments against you to prove it."
And that was my point...not my original point, the one you would still need to go back and find if you are actually interested, but the point I was making for orogenicman. The original point, was that there probably isn't anyway, short of emotional trauma which alters the disbeliever's personality, to prove a god to a skeptic.
If it helps any, I do view intelligence as compartmentalized. Superiority in intellectual abilities certainly does exist, but that does not mean the person is superior in everything, nor does it mean that person may be regarded as a superior person. It means nothing beyond what is manifest...that this person is better at a specific task than that person.
So let's say the banana did materialize. How would that constitute proof for other atheists? They could simply say you are lying or hallucinated the experience. The evidence is personal for you. That's why there will never be a simple undisputable evidence that satisfies all atheists. You won't find evidence by crossing your arms and telling God, ok I might believe in you if you do a parlor trick for me right now. From the little I know about God, He looks at the hearts of men, not their actions. If someone has a heart that truly wants to seek and know more about God, He will reveal himself. But I only see anger and hatred from a lot of atheists towards God.
Do you have hatred toward leprechauns? Not likely, since you likely don't believe that they exist. Same with atheists and God. What you fail to understand is that many of us atheists were once theists of many stripes. Many, including myself, started having doubts while we were Christians and sincerely asked God to reveal himself to us so that we could continue to spread his word without hesitation. Of course, that revelation never came and we are now the result of that, among many other reasons. So, nothing you are stating here is new, and I expect your next post to include "You weren't really Christians then". But, before doing so, look up the "No True Scotsman" fallacy.
So let's say the banana did materialize. How would that constitute proof for other atheists? They could simply say you are lying or hallucinated the experience. The evidence is personal for you. That's why there will never be a simple undisputable evidence that satisfies all atheists. You won't find evidence by crossing your arms and telling God, ok I might believe in you if you do a parlor trick for me right now. From the little I know about God, He looks at the hearts of men, not their actions. If someone has a heart that truly wants to seek and know more about God, He will reveal himself. But I only see anger and hatred from a lot of atheists towards God.
If banana did appear as described, I would probably be inclined to believe in some kind of omnipotent being, or 'god'. Not necessarily the Christian god specifically, but something.
Your statement about god revealing himself to me indicates a fundamental ignorance of human psychology. It's entirely possible for an individual to have a seemingly profound experience that is entirely subjective. That is, some persons have had powerful religious experiences that seem to indicate (to them) compelling evidence that god exists when it's something that occurs entirely within her/his own mind.
If you or anyone else has an experience in which god seemingly reveals itself, it could be god, but the overwhelming likelihood is that it was an entirely subjective experience that is only relevant to the person experiencing it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Amaznjohn
Do you have hatred toward leprechauns? Not likely, since you likely don't believe that they exist. Same with atheists and God. What you fail to understand is that many of us atheists were once theists of many stripes. Many, including myself, started having doubts while we were Christians and sincerely asked God to reveal himself to us so that we could continue to spread his word without hesitation. Of course, that revelation never came and we are now the result of that, among many other reasons. So, nothing you are stating here is new, and I expect your next post to include "You weren't really Christians then". But, before doing so, look up the "No True Scotsman" fallacy.
Exactly. For me, hating god would be like hating werewolves, vampires, or Darth Vader: While I'm not absolutely certain that they don't exist, they seen to be fictional beings stemming from the human mind. God seems like a humanized, omnipotent fictional character.
Since most humans are inclined towards anthropocentrism, it was assumed that the being responsible for the existence of everything was just like us. We now know anthropocentrism is a fallacy. The universe is not a human being, and does not operate with human tendencies. Nor does the planet earth, atoms, molecules, or any other facet of nature at it's most fundamental level. The universe and the planet we inhabit appear to be the consequence of a long process of matter and energy randomly interacting in accordance with what we understand about physics. There appears to be no intent whatsoever.
Last edited by Apathizer; 05-08-2014 at 04:51 PM..
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