I'm moving all of this from Fiske's "Defense" thread, in hopes that this discussion won't derail yet another conversation (cf. the "Dawkins" thread, now closed in the forum for "The God Delusion".

FiskeMiles: Many atheists, including myself and Frank, among others who have participated on this forum, have offered a perfectly legitimate standard for evidence that would convince us of the existence of the supernatural. You've rejected this because you don't believe such evidence can be found.

Well, it's by no means fair of me to presume this way, but my real objection is that I think you guys would be unlikely to actually adhere to those standards if really put to the test. Niall mentioned Dawkins' response to the Spectator: that a well-documented, widely known worldwide miracle would be enough to change his mind, but that he couldn't imagine what that miracle would be. And think the same case would apply with most methodological naturalists. If nothing else, they'll almost always fall back on the dictum that, in order to justify belief that an event is truly miraculous, you must first demonstrate that its natural occurence is less likely than the intervention of God. But how do you guage the likelihood of God, or that of God's intervention?

On the whole, I think miracles make for poor evidence, for the simple fact that they are never unambiguous -- they always involve interpretation, which is how they get to be miracles in the first place.

Your reason for asserting it results from your own problem with faith, not our close-mindedness.

I don't think it's close-mindedness. I think that you guys haven't really looked at the logical consequences of the standards you've made. I'm not arguing that you've insisted on certain standards in order to dodge theistic belief, but I think that you've insisted on standards that, if followed out to their conclusion, preclude belief, regardless of the veracity of theistic claims.

My change of mind on this issue had nothing to do with your argument concerning evidence, which I think is flawed by your refusal to accept the possibility that no evidence of the supernatural can be found simply because the supernatural does not exist.

I don't refuse that as a possibility. I don't know why so many of you have insisted that my arguments take the existence of the supernatural as a given. It is entirely possible that there is no evidence because there is no supernatural. But I don't think we're capable of determining whether or not that's the case, in part because our criteria for evidence doesn't allow us to consider anything that would actually qualify as unambiguous evidence.

But, as I have previously pointed out, methodological naturalism does not HAVE to work. If it EVER fails, that is, if a natural event is ever recorded which natural causes or processes cannot account for, the existence of the supernatural will be conclusively proved.

Doubtful. In fact, the naturalistic scheme constantly fails, and is constantly under revisions. As it should be. But it's failure doesn't lead naturalists to abandon it, and I doubt it ever well. They maintain a provisional belief, that is never the less maintained in anticipation of future answers. In order for a failure of naturalism to serve as conclusive evidence of the supernatural, you'd probably have to provide an irrefutable, logical proof for why a given failure is impossible to resolve. In other words, you'd have to say not only "naturalism doesn't account for this", but also "and naturalism can never account for this."

An inconsistency with your argument is you assume that methodological naturalism always will work. Though you assert theism, you accept an essentially atheistic premise. In other words, you're conflicted...

I'd say your first sentence is correct -- I do assume that methodological naturalism will always work. I wouldn't, however, say that's an essentially atheistic premise, and I'd be interested to see you demonstrate how it is so. Nor do I think that leaves me particularly conflicted. You have to understand my reasons for saying that meth. nat. will always work -- that it's a cultural conception that was designed to be highly adaptive and to apply only to certain kinds of problems. When it doesn't work, it changes so that it will work, and that's why it will always work.

me: The problem I have with (atheists') defense is that almost none of them provided a convincing account of what that evidence would look like.
LandDroid: Well, how 'bout something like the following?

The test, I'd say, is whether or not you could explain the same phenomenon naturalistically. If everything you described could be consistently and equally well explained as a phenomenon of mass delusion, then that's the explanation most naturalists would accept as most likely. And I'd say that it could.

What's interesting to me is that nearly all of the criteria so far put forward are variations on the miracle theme. In effect, you're all only allowing for one kind of supernatural -- that which intervenes in drastic, demonstrative ways -- because that's the only kind of evidence that you'd be willing to consider.

Chris OConnor: And you fall for it. Each of you theists is gullible enough to actually believe this nonsense happened.

You haven't been paying attention, Chris. Take a look at Frank's miracle thread if you really want to know what I think about miracles. Otherwise, you can spare me your sarcasm.

How about we start over and not ask the atheists to explain what we believe would constitute "proof," and instead ask the affirmative claimants, the theists, what do you personally accept as proof?

I don't. I don't think it's a proveable matter -- at least, not for beings in a naturalistic scheme. What I have been responding to is mostly the contrary -- atheists who think that they've found definitive proof or logical arguments that demonstrate the impossibility of theistic or supernaturalistic claims. I'm not advocating theism here -- I'm advocating epistemic modesty, and through that, understanding.

You're aware that your faith makes no sense and a little embarrassed by being reminded of it.

If that were really the case, would I really jump headlong into discussions like this? I may have some psychological quirk, but you certainly haven't pinned it down here. Thanks, though, for shifting the discussion away from any sort of rational argument and onto an estimation of my character. Very constructive.

It isn't my words or "rant" that are perturbing you so much.

Actually, judging by the tone and content of your post, it looks to me like you're a good deal more perturbed than I am.

If you cannot explain ANY of your beliefs then those beliefs should be suspended, postponed, or placed on hold.

That's a question we raised in that other thread. Why should you're ability to justify your personal beliefs to other people be the final criteria for the viability of those beliefs?

We've been through that before and you know that love is a concept describing a cluster of emotions and chemical responses.

I don't know that. I know that scientists have tried to identify love with chemical responses, but it's a multi-layered concept that arose and took on its meaning before we knew word one about chemical reactions.

I sure hope you're not arguing that your God is merely a concept.

Actually, that is a point I would make, although I don't think I've made it here. I think all religion is a groping towards something that may be true, and in that sense, my God is really just a concept that I think, but can't be sure, correspondes to something real.

Show your intellectual integrity and skip right to the meat of the challenge.

Your challenge has nothing to do with either a) what I've been arguing all along, or b) what I actually believe. You're trying to hold me to the same standard that you've been holding theists to in countless confrontations before, but this isn't the same situation, and it's certainly not the same context, and I'm definitely not the theists you've argued with before.

As I've said before, by belief in God can be (though probably not accurately) boiled down to two lines of thought. One is philosophical -- specifically ontological. It isn't that I can't see how any of this would be what it is without God. Science has given perfectly satsifactory answers to that question, as far as I'm concerned. It's more that I don't see why anything should exist at all, rather than not exist. Nothing within our physical or logical ways of thinking given me any answer to that, so in that regard, God is essentially a something outside of anything that makes causal sense to us.

The other, and more important, line of though it the personal. It isn't traced back to any particular event, and it certainly doesn't have anything to do with a supposedly miraculous event -- which, as I've explained before, I think to be a misleading set of phenomenon, entirely subject to interpretation. It's a daily kind of experience, something that I see in the character of the world around me which I take to be, for lack of a better word, divine.

I'd never say any of this as a way to try to convince you that God exists, but you've asked for my reasons, and there they are. Have a field day.

misterpessimistic: The point is, he has no evidence...he is just trying to point the finger at atheists and saying that WE have no evidence and that there is no need for evidence anyway.

No; if it were possible to have evidence, that would be of momentous import. What I'm saying is a) that it is not logical to insist on evidence if you've precluded the possibility of evidence, and b) that if calls to evidence are the only basis you have for dismissing the possibility of the supernatural, then the intellectual contempt that some atheists have for theists is unwarranted. You seem, again, to be taking my arguments as a kind of backdoor way of getting you guys to let down your guard and consider theism. That isn't my intention at all, so relax.

I still do not understand, given his stand, how he can explain away any fantastic claim on the basis that 'we just dont know' and 'we cannot know' and that any belief we choose to believe is 'a-logical' or 'a-priori' in basis.

I don't. As I've said to Fiske in another thread, some claims are logically inconsistent and others expose themselves to falsification by the very same standards they hope will justify their belief. Appeals to science as a justification for a theistic position (like Young Earth Creationism) or supernatural phenomenon (like Soviet attempts to build a science of ESP) are fantastic claims that can be proven or disproven, precisely because they've accepted naturalism as a standard.

But he talks so well that we will never have answers from him.

I've given plenty of answers. They're just not answers you like.

This is why I have been so pissed about him...he is a slippery fish and there is no way he will let anyone get a hold of just what he is about.

Just ask. I'll answer what I actually believe. If you don't like the answer, that's your problem.

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Mad said The test, I'd say, is whether or not you could explain the same phenomenon naturalistically. If everything you described could be consistently and equally well explained as a phenomenon of mass delusion, then that's the explanation most naturalists would accept as most likely. And I'd say that it could.

What's interesting to me is that nearly all of the criteria so far put forward are variations on the miracle theme. In effect, you're all only allowing for one kind of supernatural -- that which intervenes in drastic, demonstrative ways -- because that's the only kind of evidence that you'd be willing to consider.

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The "miracle" I described included voluminous previously unknown scientific data that would be provided and analyzed later, so a mass delusion couldn't explain that. A dramatic miracle is not the only evidence I would accept - perhaps if some sort of "God Meter" was developed that showed a positive response that was validated by experts such as Shermer, Randi, and Dawkins, then I would probably accept that as well. It's difficult to come up with a non-miraculous incident that would also serve as proof of God, but that's more a lack of imagination than a refusal to consider evidence.

"it is not logical to insist on evidence if you've precluded the possibility of evidence"

We have listed evidence that you may find bizarre, but this shows we haven't precluded the possibility of evidence.

Edited by: LanDroid at: 12/28/06 3:43 pm

Mad:

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atheists who think that they've found definitive proof or logical arguments that demonstrate the impossibility of theistic or supernaturalistic claims. I'm not advocating theism here -- I'm advocating epistemic modesty, and through that, understanding.

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Oh my. Atheists need to show epistemic modesty? We just want some back up to claims made that are trying to be used to influence our societal direction! I have not met many atheists (me included) that says 100% that no gods exist. But I have not met many thiests that will admit that their god may not exist. The thing is, atheists, generally, do not feel we need to show definitive proof showing that something does NOT exist, but we do have to respond to claims that ask us to consider imaginary beings and supernatural existence. See the difference?

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Chris: We've been through that before and you know that love is a concept describing a cluster of emotions and chemical responses.

Mad: I don't know that. I know that scientists have tried to identify love with chemical responses, but it's a multi-layered concept that arose and took on its meaning before we knew word one about chemical reactions.

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People died of scurvy before we understood that citrus fruits could prevent the death...heart attacks happened before our medical science brought help, the sun was the center of our solar system before astronomy showed us this was indeed so...

So...what is your point here?

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I don't refuse that as a possibility. I don't know why so many of you have insisted that my arguments take the existence of the supernatural as a given. It is entirely possible that there is no evidence because there is no supernatural. But I don't think we're capable of determining whether or not that's the case, in part because our criteria for evidence doesn't allow us to consider anything that would actually qualify as unambiguous evidence.

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Maybe it is because you really do NOT answer questions as well and straightforward as you think you do? Maybe? Just Maybe? And again, by this reasoning, ANY idea or concept that anyone thinks up has equal validity. It becomes a waste of time and effort and confuses what we can actually interact with.

I think that we are capable of determining, or at least deciding, in a practical sense, that the supernatural does not exist and should not play such a big role in everyday life. This is the argument of most atheists and secularists. The problems we have today are not atheist driven...they are driven by those of faith that want to impose their will.

If there is NO WAY to say that something is real, we should focus on what we can see is real. Cave or not...we can only acknowledge what we see as real at any given time.

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b) that if calls to evidence are the only basis you have for dismissing the possibility of the supernatural, then the intellectual contempt that some atheists have for theists is unwarranted.

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This is what I mean about your obfuscating your answers and why I get frustrated. What does the above even mean? What does it say? I do call for evidence, for that is all we should be concerned with. If something, ie - the supernatural, cannot be established where we can examine it or even get an inkling of it's existence, it is just not THERE at all and should not be given any clout in our dealings with real life matters.

If we cannot detect or prove something, it should take a back seat to those things we CAN deal with in any real sense...or else, ANY, and I mean ANY claim can be forwarded as something sacred and not subject to logic or reason...or just plain common sense. If people want to join cults and kill each other and others...we really need to step back and let it go, because the beliefs this is based on are 'a-logical' and not subject to rational thinking. And even if one were to use logic, the arguments can be fashioned in such a way that those who accept the premises do and those that do not do not...and we come full circle to the interplay between theism and atheism as you present it: there is no way to say which is correct. You views give full creedence to any whacky ideological system.

Mr. P.

Mr. P's place. I warned you!!!

Mr. P's Bookshelf.

I'm not saying it's usual for people to do those things but I(with the permission of God) have raised a dog from the dead and healed many people from all sorts of ailments. - Asana

The one thing of which I am positive is that there is much of which to be negative - Mr. P.

The pain in hell has two sides. The kind you can touch with your hand; the kind you can feel in your heart...Scorsese's "Mean Streets"

I came to kick ass and chew Bubble Gum...and I am all out of Bubble Gum - They Live, Roddy Piper

Edited by: misterpessimistic  at: 12/28/06 4:29 pm

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Mad: "it is not logical to insist on evidence if you've precluded the possibility of evidence"

Lan: We have listed evidence that you may find bizarre, but this shows we haven't precluded the possibility of evidence.

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Mad also conveniently cast us in a dark place by assuming that anything that would be presented as evidence would be dismissed by us. Wow...give us a chance.

The FACT is, there has never been ANY evidence. But of course...it MUST be us atheists and skeptics that are not being fair!

Done.

Mr. P.

Mr. P's place. I warned you!!!

Mr. P's Bookshelf.

I'm not saying it's usual for people to do those things but I(with the permission of God) have raised a dog from the dead and healed many people from all sorts of ailments. - Asana

The one thing of which I am positive is that there is much of which to be negative - Mr. P.

The pain in hell has two sides. The kind you can touch with your hand; the kind you can feel in your heart...Scorsese's "Mean Streets"

I came to kick ass and chew Bubble Gum...and I am all out of Bubble Gum - They Live, Roddy Piper

Edited by: misterpessimistic  at: 12/28/06 3:48 pm

Dear Mad:

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It is entirely possible that there is no evidence because there is no supernatural. But I don't think we're capable of determining whether or not that's the case, in part because our criteria for evidence doesn't allow us to consider anything that would actually qualify as unambiguous evidence.

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Can you provide an example of unambiguous evidence of the supernatural that the empirical criteria of methodological naturalism disallows?

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Well, it's by no means fair of me to presume this way, but my real objection is that I think you guys would be unlikely to actually adhere to those standards if really put to the test.

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Yes, that is unfair. Witnessing the Cecil B. DeMille version of the parting of the Red Sea would convince me.

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I don't think it's a provable matter -- at least, not for beings in a naturalistic scheme. What I have been responding to is mostly the contrary -- atheists who think that they've found definitive proof or logical arguments that demonstrate the impossibility of theistic or supernaturalistic claims. I'm not advocating theism here -- I'm advocating epistemic modesty, and through that, understanding.

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It seems to me we are agree on this entire issue, with only a few minor differences.

I would have said I don't think the supernatural is disprovable (instead of provable) because I leave open the possibility of an Industrial Lights and Magic style miracle that would conclusively demonstrate supernatural interaction with the natural world. You haven't made a strong case for rejecting this possibility. It seems to me one reason you find it hard to accept is doing so admits an argument against the existence of the supernatural -- because such miracles apparently don't happen.

I agree with you that this argument is not conclusive: that is, the lack of miraculous events does not demonstrate the non-existence of the supernatural. And I absolutely agree that no definitive proof or logical arguments can demonstrate the impossibility of the supernatural.

Oh, another difference is I don't mind calling "epistemic modesty" agnosticism.

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my belief in God can be (though probably not accurately) boiled down to two lines of thought...

I don't see why anything should exist at all, rather than not exist...

It's a daily kind of experience, something that I see in the character of the world around me which I take to be, for lack of a better word, divine.

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Now was that so hard to do? I for one won't pour scorn on you for such reasoning.

The first item doesn't worry me, though I do wonder about it.

I see pretty much the same thing in the character of the natural world which you describe as "divine." The title of Ursula Goodenough's book, "The Sacred Depths of Nature" is perhaps a more accurate portrayal of what I sense. The book makes an argument for tolerance from a naturalistic perspective.

It seems to me that we're just slightly to either side of the line dividing theism from atheism. And it also seems to me that fundamentalist Christians wouldn't hesitate to label you an atheist -- you certainly don't believe in THEIR God.

Fiske

PS: The Universalist Unitarians would welcome you with open arms. Of course, they also welcome Wiccans...

Edited by: FiskeMiles at: 12/28/06 6:04 pm

Now to be fair to Mad, he's only really slippery in any way when he's getting "Are you still beating your wife" style questions.

And his two line confession is hardly new, if considerably condensed.

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It's more that I don't see why anything should exist at all, rather than not exist. Nothing within our physical or logical ways of thinking given me any answer to that, so in that regard, God is essentially a something outside of anything that makes causal sense to us.

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This doesn't really give you any reason to believe in God. To ask "Why is there something rather than nothing?" is not a question about causality. It is a question about contingency and necessity. If we can ask why there is the universe rather than nothing, we should also be able to ask why there is GOD rather than nothing--because surely God is something, and not nothing. The simple answer to this question is that there are certain things that probably don't require an explanation, or else that there are things that are their own explanation--but why we must call this God, or matter, or energy, is beyond me! If this is what you call "god", then it is not clear why you think it is also bound up with the other experiences you have mentioned that felt divine. Why should the "foundation" of existence also provide you with a feeling of awe or the divine?

You're presenting an epistemically strong position: There has never been any evidence, and that's an indisputable fact. But I don't see how you're in a position to know that. I've never seen unambiguous evidence, but then, you couldn't fit everything I haven't seen in the circumference of Jupiter. What I don't get is why you insist on such a black and white view of it.

Edited by: MadArchitect at: 1/2/07 5:06 pm

But all I can worry about are things that have been presented...then make a deduction that nothing else more worthy of what has been presented has occured.

I say that everything that has come up as proof of a miracle has fallen very short of being impressive at all...and if something more spectacular and worthy of attention has ever occured, you would think that it would have been documented and presented. No?


Mr. P.

Mr. P's place. I warned you!!!

Mr. P's Bookshelf.

I'm not saying it's usual for people to do those things but I(with the permission of God) have raised a dog from the dead and healed many people from all sorts of ailments. - Asana

The one thing of which I am positive is that there is much of which to be negative - Mr. P.

The pain in hell has two sides. The kind you can touch with your hand; the kind you can feel in your heart...Scorsese's "Mean Streets"

I came to kick ass and chew Bubble Gum...and I am all out of Bubble Gum - They Live, Roddy Piper

Edited by: misterpessimistic  at: 1/2/07 5:09 pm

Okay, guys, sorry it took me so long to get back to you on this topic. I've had a week off from the Internet. It was kinda nice, actually.

LanDroid: A dramatic miracle is not the only evidence I would accept - perhaps if some sort of "God Meter" was developed that showed a positive response that was validated by experts such as Shermer, Randi, and Dawkins, then I would probably accept that as well.

I don't understand. What would this "God meter" be measuring?

We have listed evidence that you may find bizarre, but this shows we haven't precluded the possibility of evidence.

True, you have listed potential forms of evidence. What I've argued all along, though, is that when it actually comes to the moment of evaluating any supposed piece of evidence, a consistent naturalist will always favor a naturalistic explanation, to the extent that, even if they cannot find a naturalistic explanation, they will simply settle the issue by saying that one is forthcoming. If you're not a committed and consistent naturalist, then naturally that criticism doesn't apply to you.

Mr. P: The thing is, atheists, generally, do not feel we need to show definitive proof showing that something does NOT exist, but we do have to respond to claims that ask us to consider imaginary beings and supernatural existence. See the difference?

I've always seen the difference. What I'm arguing here is that the assertion that a claim is unwarranted is only really more logical if there's some logical way of resolving the question. In this case, there isn't; at least, not one that I've seen, and I've done a hell of a lot of reading and had a hell of a lot of conversations on the subject.

Maybe it is because you really do NOT answer questions as well and straightforward as you think you do? Maybe? Just Maybe?

Ask a straightforward question, get a straightforward response. That's the deal. Of course, if you're question doesn't actually pertain to anything I believe, then the answer isn't going to be what you want, but that can't be helped.

And again, by this reasoning, ANY idea or concept that anyone thinks up has equal validity.

Nope; that's not an implication of what I've been saying. The argument as the basis of what I've been saying lately is this: Belief one way or the other is only logically warranted if we're capable of conceiving a practical way to answer the question being asked. So if someone proposes that rain is consistently caused by performing a certain ritual in a particular way, that's an idea we can test. What's crucial here is that no one has devised a practical way to test for the existence of God (though there are presumably ways to test certain claims made about a proposed God -- eg. that God always answers prayers in the affirmative).

I think that we are capable of determining, or at least deciding, in a practical sense, that the supernatural does not exist and should not play such a big role in everyday life.

I'd agree -- it's entirely possible to say, "we can find practical solutions to our problems that don't involve the supernatural." Of course, you have to leave out certain kinds of problems -- like, how can I preserve my soul after death -- but those aren't really problems that apply once you've jettisoned the idea that you have a soul. What I'm getting at here, though, is that taking a pragmattic stance is not the same as proving your worldview. It doesn't bother me that some people are atheists or secularists -- what bothers me is when they go around castigating others for not being the same.

me: b) that if calls to evidence are the only basis you have for dismissing the possibility of the supernatural, then the intellectual contempt that some atheists have for theists is unwarranted.
Mr. P: This is what I mean about your obfuscating your answers and why I get frustrated. What does the above even mean? What does it say?

Hey, I never mind clarifying what I've said. All you have to do is ask.

What the above quote means: a number of people in this forum have said, in effect, "there is no evidence for the existence of the supernatural, therefore it's illogical to believe that it exists." And I've put forth a number of arguments that have said, in effect, "the argument from evidence is very useful in any scenario where we'd expect there to be evidence -- that's the strength of evidentiary proceedure -- but because the supernatural, by definition, does not strictly follow natural rules, we can't expect there to be evidence in the same sense." So either we have to find a set of criteria that would help us decide when something that is claimed to serve as evidence for the supernatural would actually work as evidence. You see what I mean?

Try this example: Suppose a person is put on trial for a murder, and the defense argues that, because there are no fingerprints connecting him to the weapon, it's unreasonable to suppose that he actually used it. If there's no other evidence to connect him to the weapon, then that's a somewhat reasonable argument, because we would expect the murderer to have touched the weapon, and we expect people to leave fingerprints on the things they touch. It's an ever stronger argument if someone else's fingerprints are there, because the same criteria for evidence then gives us an alternative explanation.

So the question is, what fingerprints would we expect God or the supernatural to leave as a matter of course. Or better yet, what fingerprints could the supernatural not help but leave. It isn't enough to say, "the supernatural might leave this evidence," because that leaves open the equally possible chance that it might have but did not.

If something, ie - the supernatural, cannot be established where we can examine it or even get an inkling of it's existence, it is just not THERE at all and should not be given any clout in our dealings with real life matters.

All I'm asking is that you recognize that, in saying so, you're making an assumption that works for you, but isn't entirely necessary for others.

Nice juxtaposition here:
Mad also conveniently cast us in a dark place by assuming that anything that would be presented as evidence would be dismissed by us. Wow...give us a chance.

The FACT is, there has never been ANY evidence.

I didn't even have to cut and paste to get them next to one another.

FiskeMiles: Can you provide an example of unambiguous evidence of the supernatural that the empirical criteria of methodological naturalism disallows?

I don't think there is any unambiguous evidence in the case of the supernatural, so no, I can't. You should note, however, that that isn't the same as saying that there is no evidence. There may or there may not be evidence -- but if there is, it has so far all been ambiguous enough that no consensible conclusion can be drawn from it.

I would have said I don't think the supernatural is disprovable (instead of provable) because I leave open the possibility of an Industrial Lights and Magic style miracle that would conclusively demonstrate supernatural interaction with the natural world.

To be quite frank, I don't think the parting of the Red Sea would necessarily convince me -- and I already believe in the existence of God. But I'm enough of a methodological naturalist that, even witnessing first hand the parting of the Red Sea, I'd still assume that it was somehow possible as a natural event, no matter how much my eyes bugged out of my head. On the other hand, if I were a Hebrew escaping from Egypt, and saw the same event, I might be convinced. But again, that's not an empirical conclusion -- it's an interpretation based on a personal relationship to the events, which is, I think, how most miracles get identified as miracles.

It seems to me one reason you find it hard to accept is doing so admits an argument against the existence of the supernatural -- because such miracles apparently don't happen.

No, I just don't think miracles are particularly convincing. They always involve an interpretation of the events in a previously assumed cosomological scheme; they involve a denial of the comprehensibility of naturalistic explanation; and naturalistic explanation is elastic enough to account for most reports of the miraculous.

Oh, another difference is I don't mind calling "epistemic modesty" agnosticism.

Heh. I think more is implied by agnosticism. Absolute reliance on sense datum, for instance. But as long as we're clear by what each of us means, it shouldn't cause too much confusion.

Now was that so hard to do? ;) I for one won't pour scorn on you for such reasoning.

Nope. I just like to keep my personal beliefs and my logical arguments in separate boxes when it comes to BookTalk. You may not pour scorn on me, but others aren't so polite.

And it also seems to me that fundamentalist Christians wouldn't hesitate to label you an atheist -- you certainly don't believe in THEIR God.

I fit the category of heretic pretty well.

PS: The Universalist Unitarians would welcome you with open arms. Of course, they also welcome Wiccans...

Fortunately, I'm not really in the market for a church at the moment.

Niall001: Now to be fair to Mad, he's only really slippery in any way when he's getting "Are you still beating your wife" style questions.

I'm mostly slippery when it seems obvious to me that people are asking about my personal beliefs as a way to detract from my logical arguments. If my arguments are logically consistent, then it shouldn't matter all that much whether or not a believe in God, or why.

me: It's more that I don't see why anything should exist at all, rather than not exist. Nothing within our physical or logical ways of thinking given me any answer to that, so in that regard, God is essentially a something outside of anything that makes causal sense to us.
Saint Gasoline: This doesn't really give you any reason to believe in God.

True; which is where the "experience" reason comes into play.

If we can ask why there is the universe rather than nothing, we should also be able to ask why there is GOD rather than nothing--because surely God is something, and not nothing.

I've seen that reductio ad absurdum argument before, of course. I think it's misleading. The reason that I look for something prior to the universe at all is, that the universe itself seems to contain nothing that is not contingent. So, unless I'm convinced by some other argument, it would seem to be in the nature of the universe to be contingent. The same isn't necessarily true of God. It may be that God is contingent, in which case, the pithy question of "What created God" is, perhaps, worth asking. But it's just as reasonable to suppose that God is not contingent, in which case, the whole thing is moot.

Why should the "foundation" of existence also provide you with a feeling of awe or the divine?

Maybe I'm just easy. Trees fill me with awe. People's faces fill me with awe. As for the divine, so much depends on what you mean by that. I tend to read it along the lines spelled out by Rudolf Otto -- that it's rooted in an extreme kind of Otherness; that it mingles feelings of awe and horror; and so on, and so forth.

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Nice juxtaposition here:
Mad also conveniently cast us in a dark place by assuming that anything that would be presented as evidence would be dismissed by us. Wow...give us a chance.

The FACT is, there has never been ANY evidence.

I didn't even have to cut and paste to get them next to one another.

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....aaannnd? What is this supposed to mean. You are asserting there has been evidence then?

Mr. P.

Mr. P's place. I warned you!!!

Mr. P's Bookshelf.

I'm not saying it's usual for people to do those things but I(with the permission of God) have raised a dog from the dead and healed many people from all sorts of ailments. - Asana

The one thing of which I am positive is that there is much of which to be negative - Mr. P.

The pain in hell has two sides. The kind you can touch with your hand; the kind you can feel in your heart...Scorsese's "Mean Streets"

I came to kick ass and chew Bubble Gum...and I am all out of Bubble Gum - They Live, Roddy Piper

Mad

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My belief in God can be (though probably not accurately) boiled down to two lines of thought...

I don't see why anything should exist at all, rather than not exist...

It's a daily kind of experience, something that I see in the character of the world around me, which I take to be, for lack of a better word, divine.

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What mad is demonstrating is another example of the "god of the gaps", but if he feels content to call nature god than so be it.

Mad

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Yeah, there are a lot of people who believe in a lot of different things, and sometimes those people do things that make life really hard for the rest of us. But is it necessary to attack the belief in order to curb the behavior?

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It may be necessary, especially if the belief requires one to challenge/change others to their way of thinking and behaving. Challenging their belief seems to be the only way to show object observers that their rules are not universally accepted or beneficial.

Mad

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If we put two people side by side, and they both claim to believe in Allah, but one is a fanatical jihadist and the other is just some guy that lives next door to you and doesn't cause any problems, is the belief itself the problem, or is the problem more specific to the person?

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The problem is both the belief and the person. The person has the capacity to be nosey and controlling, the belief gives them the justification to act on their feelings.

While I agree that the peaceful Muslim deserves respect for their decision to stay out of other peoples business, what about their family? Might they cause me grief justified by a belief in some imaginary guy?

As I have said before I do not care one way or another what a person's individual beliefs are, but religions are notorious for pushing their beliefs on others.

Later

There are a lot of different reasons that a person might come to believe one thing or another, what I do not understand is the capacity to believe in something in contradiction of the evidence, or lack of evidence.

Why do theists desperately cling to their belief with such conviction?

With very few exceptions I have no real problem accepting new evidence and adjusting my beliefs accordingly.

Why do theists continue to lead a life of servitude to a master that is for all practical purposes nonexistent?

Later

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But if you can think of a supernatural analogy, feel free to suggest it.

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The only useful analogy I can make regarding the supernatural is this:








Mr. P.

Mr. P's place. I warned you!!!

Mr. P's Bookshelf.

I'm not saying it's usual for people to do those things but I(with the permission of God) have raised a dog from the dead and healed many people from all sorts of ailments. - Asana

The one thing of which I am positive is that there is much of which to be negative - Mr. P.

The pain in hell has two sides. The kind you can touch with your hand; the kind you can feel in your heart...Scorsese's "Mean Streets"

I came to kick ass and chew Bubble Gum...and I am all out of Bubble Gum - They Live, Roddy Piper

Frank 013: What mad is demonstrating is another example of the "god of the gaps", but if he feels content to call nature god than so be it.

You may be right about the first half of your statement, but it's inaccurate to suppose that I'm equating God to nature. That's a cosmological position; what I'm talking about is an ontological position.

Challenging their belief seems to be the only way to show object observers that their rules are not universally accepted or beneficial.

That's working pretty well do far, is it?

The problem is both the belief and the person. The person has the capacity to be nosey and controlling, the belief gives them the justification to act on their feelings.

If that's the case, then it looks to me as though depriving a person of one belief will only serve to set them back temporarily. If they're really intent on, say, improving their own situation through violence, then making jihadist Islamicism untenable will only force them to find another justification. It seems more practical to me to put our efforts towards getting people to fit their behavior to a model, and let them adapt their own beliefs to that behavior.

While I agree that the peaceful Muslim deserves respect for their decision to stay out of other peoples business, what about their family? Might they cause me grief justified by a belief in some imaginary guy?

They might. Can the same not be said for every position? You deserve respect to the degree that you don't harm anyone else, but if you raise your children to be atheists, and they use it as a justification to persecute someone else, then ought that to reflect back on your atheism the same way you propose the actions of his family ought to reflect back on his beliefs?

With very few exceptions I have no real problem accepting new evidence and adjusting my beliefs accordingly.

I think it's pretty likely that, for most people, their filter against contradictory evidence is strong enough that they aren't even aware that they're ignoring a piece of evidence. Who knows -- it might be the same for you.

misterpessimistic: The only useful analogy I can make regarding the supernatural is this:

Then I guess we're stuck making analogies to natural phenomenon, which is fine with me, since that's what analogies do.