Debate between theists and atheists is futile

Supernatural:

1. of, pertaining to, or being above or beyond what is natural; unexplainable by natural law or phenomena; abnormal.



Would Gravity, Dark Matter, fit this discriptio?

 

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I consider gravity to be a natural law. You don't?

 

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Late entry

Re: Topic question

Once upon a time I took a gloating pleasure in pointing to the theistic side of the debate and tacking the blame squarely and specifically on Christians, at least in the American forum.

But that's not fair, as is demonstrated by Sciforums, at least; the topic question has much merit.

I'm inclined to think that it's merely a matter of priorities. To me, the question of God's existence and similar issues becomes important in terms of what we do about it.

Which brings us to questions to examine on the theistic side of the aisle: What happens when God's law operates countervalent to human progress? As we leap from issue to issue, view the interconnections present, we see an odd chain working against trends indicative of greater social and human progress. Some Christians in the US, for instance, make vocal opposition to sex ed, opting to "reserve such issues to family" while not acknowledging that in many families those issues don't get talked about. I learned reproduction not from my parents, but from the World Book encyclopedia. One day my father looked at me and realized that the "talk" had slipped by. And he wasn't and isn't a Christian unless there's one more family scandal I don't know about.

And sure, it took until I was 29 to reproduce without planning; I'm generally fortunate in that sense. But then I look to the younger.

When I was in high school, a student caused a minor scandal by inviting as guest speaker a local doctor who was also an advocate of a woman's right to choose an abortion. While the talk was permitted by the school, it enraged my bioethics teacher to the point that she was yelling at the guy. (For background, she had stubbornly carried a guaranteed miscarriage until it almost killed her. Why? Catholic faith. Even with no developing brain, she held out for the miracle that a brain would appear in the fetus magically--by the grace of god--in the next imaging session.) The doctor eventually closed the debate with a very calm: "I understand what you're saying but it's just not practical. I've seen girls from this school, an I've seen some of them more than once." There was a nearly-lethal silence; all the non-Catholics nodded as if to say, "Makes sense." All the Catholics sat in stunned silence; a Catholic getting an aboriton?

And the connection here is simply expressed, once upon a time nearly ten years ago, by a supermodel (Nikki something?) on "Politically Incorrect", who noted that she came up on fashion and MTV to be sure, and people may think her stupid, but her best friend in high school was raised in the kind of household where the friend was "sheltered" by her faith. Straight out of high school the friend started churning out the babies. The first man she laid was the man she married and the relationship wasn't healthy for anyone involved. It was a minor but poignant testament.

And from there we move to fetal tissue research. We've almost reached a plateau where aborted fetal tissue no longer becomes an issue. Larry King, after Christopher Reeve's talk-show tour last year, challenged Dr. Dobson on the point that the research he was objecting to for the sake of an anti-abortion platform no longer had to do with aborted fetuses. Dr. Dobson, of course, managed a "stable" answer insofar as he didn't embarrass himself tremendously, but he was weak on the point. And guess what? Scientists have been able to take a social tragedy and reap some benefit from it.

In each of these cases, theists looked at "adherence to God's law" and chose that route despite the observable fact that such adherence created other challenges to faith: Where opposition to homosexuality has traditionally relied on the Old Testament and the Pauline Evangelization, more and more "liberal" Christians are looking directly at Christ: compassion, reconciliation, harmony ... leave the sinner to God to figure out. Apparently, as is demonstrated in recent debates surrounding the confirmation of Bishop Robinson to the Episcopalian Church of the USA, trusting in God to judge the sinners is an inappropriate method of faith.

I realize I'm picking on Christians here, and there is much to be said as well about Islam and the violence which currently headlines the Muslim presence in the world. I mean, when we get down to a more cooperative society, atheists and others are still going to have to argue about the kinds of points we in America argue with Christians.

And here we can start the transition to the atheist side of the aisle: Do you oppose the notion of God arbitrarily or as part of a larger association of ideas?

The superficial issue that strikes me is a certain amount of disorganization in the atheistic presentation of ideas. To the one we find the atheist complaining about the illogic of the religious assertion. And this is a valid point except that its counterpoint is arbitrary. I understand the idea that God is illogical; I don't hold out for the logic of God. But I do wonder why one counterpoints illogic with the illogical, irrationality with the irrational, unreason with the unreasonable.

To someone like me, looking at the two sides of this argument is a little like asking, "Would you prefer the boiler or the deep-fryer?" Of course, the redemptive theists are also thinking, "Or maybe into the fire?"

In the end, it seems to me that the only valid issue insofar as it can be given practical application is what the presence/lack of God brings.

I, too, dislike the illogic of religions. But that illogic is to a certain degree superficial. It has comparative substance because it tends to set the tone of the debate. It would be nice to say accommodating the slow kids has dragged down the whole class, but in a world where people tend to define things according to dualistic arguments, I'm not about to abandon the slow kids yet.

But What do people want?

Is it just a lack of illogical opposition to one's own irrationality that non-theistic people seek? To be irrational and selfish in peace? And why do the religious folk fear the logical? Admittedly, the Abramic notion of God transcends the necessity of logic, but ... I mean, come on ... at some point we just have to admit that Christians have been making it up as they went. And while that's part of any human endeavor to be sure, one thing that is as true today as it was during the Crusades is that God tells certain leaders to go to war. Jihad, the Bush Administration, and even to a certain degree my American, tax-rebel, second-son forefathers. The list goes on. At what point is "God legitimately giving a leader insight" compared to "he's just making it up as he goes"? It seems that, in practice, it's what side of the line you're on already that determines where your faith of credibility goes.

I admit, I'm not as up on the "God told me to" issues of the train shootings and so forth in India during the 1990s that seem, to these ill-informed American eyes, to have lessened in favor of India-Pakistan tensions. Yes, I'm digressing even further, but I'm also painfully conscious of how much I've restricted myself to Abramism and especially American Christianity.

But myself ... I could care less whether or not God exists insofar as that fact is concerned. Knowledge of that condition would obviously instruct my actions, but I cannot believe that in what seems a visible juxtaposition: Too often I see examples that if one hasn't God to aspire to, one aspires to an irrational degree of selfishness. And that, of course, invokes a wholly separate debate about self-preservation versus excessive selfishness, and that, of course invokes a wholly separate debate about virtue and vice and the foundations thereof.

I think that "every religion thread degenerates" into the god/no-god debate is that it represents a most fundamental difference which allows people to be opposed to one another without the necessity of inward scrutiny comparable to the attention given to criticizing the ideas of others. It's a way of voicing fundamental opposition while keeping issues of substance--which sometimes require effort to address--at arm's length.

Yes it's a lot of words to use for such a simple point, but sometimes that's just necessary.

But what do people want, and why is consideration of God in any way important to that? (If that seems an unfair question because one section of possible respondents get the "easy answer", also consider what "having the easy answer" signifies.)

 

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Okay. Coolsoldier.

I have this invisible, unfeelable, noiseless, smell-less, massless, tasteless (lol), gigantic 20 meter she-dragon floating in my dorm room. She's pretty thin, we both get along.

*cuddles his cuddly dragon*

You can't touch her; your hand passes through her.
She has no mass, she does not affect any forces.

In short, she does not exert any force (none of the four forces of nature) on anything.

We communicate through soul talk. I meditate; I get in touch with her.



Now prove she doesn't exist. There is no physical proof she does exist; and I think according to your logic she WOULD exist?

Shall I introduce you to my little carrot man who is also similar?

 

First of all, read my original post -- I'm saying that because there is no scientific proof for or against the existence of God, arguments about whether or not God exists are POINTLESS. A scientific argument on the issue is impossible because there are no scientific facts to support either side. The case with your she-dragon

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is similar -- A debate about whether it exists would be pointless because there is no physical proof either way. Only you, being the one who (according to your own claims) communicates with her, can ever possibly know whether she actually exists or not.

But you are overlooking that most theists seem to believe their own claims about the existence of God. You, judging from the sarcasm in the last few lines of the post, do not believe your claims about the she-draagon

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Now prove she doesn't exist. There is no physical proof she does exist; and I think according to your logic she WOULD exist?

Shall I introduce you to my little carrot man who is also similar? [/B][/QUOTE]


The Real question is do you find enough evidence in your own mind to believe that she exists.

 

Wayne,

Based on this response and since the description of the dragon is identical in all essential respects to the Christian god then we can assume that the basis for Christian belief is simply that one must feel personally convinced that such a god exists and that no basis in reality is needed? I.e. it is not relevant that the god actually exists or not.

 

That no physical proof is necessary to believe that something exists does not necessarily mean that it's existence is irrelevant. Becoming aware of the existence of something intangible is perhaps enough evidence to believe in it's existence. That does not necessarily mean that it's existence is irrelevant (side note: irrelevant to what?) because "basis in reality" does not necessarily equate to "basis in unrefutable proof".

 

Re: Late entry

While I don't disagree that at some point atheistic arguments also break down into unproven/unprovable assumptions I find that a large part of the problem is that the typical theistic argument breaks upon that rock far earlier. One then has the choice to either argue against the theistic premise or delve into theistic logic in order to refute the various conclusions from within.

The first option is easier and clearer. The problem with this method, as you have pointed out, is that the atheistic premise rests on equally shaky ground but there are several problems with the second method. The main one being that you're generally limited to an interpretative argument which falls to claims of greater authority or proper interpretation.

The theistic side sets the tone of the debate purely because they refuse to play on any field but their own with any rules but their own.

~Raithere

 

Coolsoldier,

You’ve missed the point I think. What Wayne is saying that a personal fantasy is all you need. If you are convinced your fantasy is true then your religion will be equally valid whether the super-object exists or not.

My unsaid point, which I assumed would be obvious, is that this is total gibberish.

 

Raithere: setting tone, disarming God

Indeed, and in part because they've never had to. Part of the challenge is to get people to abandon superstition. And why would they abandon one set of superstitions for another?

The problem that comes with examining the functional relevance of any degree of presumption is that the value judgments change. So we can demonstrate the living inefficiency of this or that religion until we're six feet under, but it doesn't change the fact that living inefficiency is not a problem to, oh, say, a redemptive theist.

When the currency one values most--e.g. a soul--hinges on superstition and faith, what use has one for knowledge?

Such as Paul Hill. The short excerpts from his discussion of his crime and punishment are fairly tame compared to what I saw on the news earlier tonight. He truly does believe that he will become one with his Lord God above. And, like Ignatius of Antioch, he looks forward to his execution because he can finally be with God.

The living inefficiency of murder? No matter to him. He's looking toward something much more important to him.

(Insert blue condemnation of various martyr-syndromes here.)

Koresh, suicide bombers, Eric Rudolph ... we need not stick with merely the murderous. Hosts of bigots across the country ... er ... can I spare the litany for the sake of space?

Once upon a time I decided that the word "God" sufficed for all the things people say about Universal Origins and other such ideas in the sense that even if we figure out what those things are, they are "God" in a certain way. My freshman physics professor in college made the point that "everything in the Universe that could be was determined within a few seconds of the bang itself, meaning that the range of possible elements and the ways in which they would interact, and all the symptoms that come from that were set in motion--determined--in those first few seconds. The "name of God" well could be a mathematical formula describing what happened at that moment. If we could see to the leading edge of the expanding Universe, what would we see? Would we see "creation" in the raw? Is there anything left to see? If we see that leading edge of the energy wave, will it tell us anything fundamental about Universal Origins?

Or the simple idea, mentioned somewhere in this forum, that, as Brian Wilson has it, "God only knows how much I love you." Even to a general atheist who uses colloquial phrases like "God damn it," or "God only knows," or, "Oh my God," there is still a condition in the Universe that the word "God" represents. And that's all God ever has to be. It doesn't threaten you, it doesn't claim dominion, it doesn't tell you what's moral. It simply is.

And so I repeat a common prescription of mine: the general solution is to ideologically disarm God. Redemption and condemnation myths are a massive and evil crock o'shite.

Above the pantheons of the gods in, say, ancient Greece and elsewhere, there existed the idea of a yet-supreme force. Unnamed, unmoving, unknowing. The first principle, and from there we descend into demiurges and such. But what kind of God cannot do a certain thing, and why? This constraint becomes the greater authority than the God; this constraint becomes the God.

If you disarm "God", then "God" becomes a simple rhetorical convenience.

Lysander Spooner noted that the people cannot consent to award their government what the people do not have. Insofar as we acknowledge that gods are of human creation, the same principle applies.

Disarming God becomes a fairly useful venture right there, I'd say. It is people who give God the right to judge. It is people who arm God with the power of fear. It is people who decide what God loves and hates. Disarming God becomes a fairly difficult social process.

And besides, the last time "atheists" set the tone of a vital theological debate, Christianity was the result. (Some pagans found early Christianity so bizarre that they considered it atheistic.)

 

Interesting side note

Godel's theorem states that in any sufficiently complex system, there exist true statements that cannot be proven. I certainly consider reality to be a sufficiently complex system for that to be true, and it seems that whether or not God/gods exist and in what form is one of those unprovable statements.

Edit: The complete text of Godel's Incompleteness Theorem is Available on the web at http://home.ddc.net/ygg/etext/godel/godel3.htm

 

Re: Interesting side note

But is reality a formal system or axiomatic?

~Raithere

 

Not what I said, an Illusion is a Reality to the person having the Illusion, a Graven Image of Reality.

A person's Illusion although they beileve it to be real does not make it a valid Reality, as you say, their Reality is total Gibberish.

 

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The Christian God is very relevant because some kill, many suffer, in the Name of God, a False God.

Anyone that submits to the Reality, Illusion, of a Named God summits to the Reality of a Graven Image, a False God.

God is not a Name, God is just a Word, God is Nameless and can not be spoken of, No One can Speak in the Name of, for, God, something that is No Name, that is Indefinable.


A Name give to a Non-material, Non-Physical, Reality, a Non-Be-ing, is a en-Graven Image of Reality deeply impressed into, fixed in, the Mind, an Illusion said to be, spoken of, named, defined, as being a Reality, a Non-BE-ing an Illusion, a lie, a deception.

Those that worship, that submit to, the Reality of a Material, Physical, God, a Named God, submit to a Non-BE-ing, a False God, a Graven Image of Reality, they are, Idolaters, the Adulterators of Reality, The Whores that Babel-on creating, a confused mixture of sounds or voices, a scene of noise and confusion, tumult, turmoil, uproar, bedlam, clamor, reeking havoc with the World of Reality, creating great suffering.

 

Wayne,

Philosophy is like being in a dark room and looking for a black cat.

Metaphysics is like being in a dark room and looking for a black cat that isn't there.

Theology is like being in a dark room and looking for a black cat that isn't there and shouting "I found it!".

 

EXCELENT I Like that!!!!!!!

 

Disarming God

But how to go about it? Most religion seems to be primarily about the reinforcement of particular cultural beliefs which becomes a self-reinforcing cycle. It seems to me that atheism is indeed part of the answer. No matter the foibles of any particular argument the existence of an opposing argument forces religion to react. As the atheistic meme spreads through the culture the myriad religious assumptions must be addressed as they can no longer be considered axiomatic.

Well, the plain fact of it was that they were not atheists no matter the pantheistic reaction to monotheism. Only recently are we seeing the affect of a true atheistic meme into the culture. The theistic reaction seems to be either a regression towards inane fundamentalism which will eventually be self-defeating (I'm ever the optimist) or a broadening and generalization of the concept of God, which is the beginning of the disarmament we are looking for. Not that I don't see a role for progressive theistic philosophy but it seems to me that the main forces driving this progress are multiculturalism and atheism.

~Raithere

 

Re: Raithere: setting tone, disarming God

Man, IMO that is one of the your best posts ever. Nicely put.

 

Consider for a moment the homebound paraplegic. He has never seen the world. He has been outside a few times, but has never left his block. He cannot observe the outside world, but it certainly affects him. It is his source of food; It is his source of medicine; It is his source of water; It is his source of companionship. He cannot observe it -- He cannot see, hear, touch, or feel it, but he can believe in it's existence on no merit but the testimony of those who have experienced it. He cannot observe it, but at the end of each day, it does not exist any less for his not having observed it.

Our limited senses and limited ability of perception are unable to observe everything that exists. We have "natural laws" that, as scientists, we just accept to be true on no grounds other than the fact that they usually are. These postulates must be accepted without proof because they form the basis on which we draw conclusions from our other observations. I see no reason why these natural laws cannot be accepted as the product of a God -- something that we can only accept on the (written) testimony of the few throughout time who have experienced Him. We cannot observe Him, but at the end of the day, He does not exist any less for our not having observed Him.