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PJM
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OK:shrug: As this is the most evident proof of just One GOD as Creator; what else might have caused it? PLEASE read my reply on POST #16
Hmmmmm
how about reading my POST reply #16 and explain WHY the complexity of both the universe and humanity exist differently from my points.
And what about all the OTHER Miracles that have taken place and science cannot explain?
Your summation is very good, THANKS
GBY
Patrick
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PJM
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steve93
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“If God exists then while is x,y,z allowed to happen?”
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undead_rat
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Of course many other miracles have happened. I choose to mention our Lord’s divine image because that is a miracle that is available to all of us.
For our Atheists and Agnostics the universe is entirely a material thing and can be explained by the laws of physics and chemistry. For them there will always be a rational explanation for the events that the religious community calls miracles.
What I would ask Atheists and Agnostics to think about is that your choice is not as rational as you might think. For if you are right, what have you gained when your life ends? But if you are wrong then perhaps you are not providing your eternal soul with all of the benefits that you could during its earthly journey.
I would ask the religious among us to likewise remember that we are all not so very different and what our Lord said about faith:
"Were your faith the size of a mustard seed you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you."
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Techno2000
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That’s because God has left the memory of himself inside of man… it’s just like an adopted person wanting to know who their real parents are.
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Rhubarb
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Now this is a backhanded compliment if I’ve ever heard one. And I don’t especially appreciate it.
That would be because I wasn’t trying to prove a point, persuade anyone, give every reason, nor take a week to research and prepare a proper argument. Nobody here wants to read me shredding a belief in God, and I don’t want to prep the dozens, if not hundreds, of pages needed to properly have a go at it. I took a degree in philosophy, with specialities in logic, metaphysics, and ethics. I’ve read scores of defenses and attacks on God.
There is quite a lot that you’ve written that at best is contentious and at worst utter hogwash - I don’t find the notion of a necessary supernatural first cause to be logically sound, for instance. The necessary ‘first cause’ could easily have been the universe itself - there are plenty of consistent theories that show how it could be possible. But I didn’t post to engage in a theological debate, try to rob someone of their deeply held belief, or be proselytized to.
I don’t deny God’s existence for many of the reasons people have and can bring up. But I don’t affirm God’s existence either. Because as my history teacher used to say “I’m at a horse show, but I see no horse. I see some hoofprints, and some saddles, and some cowboys. But still I don’t see horses. And the presence hoofprints, saddles, and cowboys can be explained in many other ways.”
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Techno2000
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Maybe some people don’t want to see the horses, you have to want to believe.
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Rhubarb
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I’ve put a lot of thought into that idea. Because having just come off a pretty intense existential crisis, I can assure you I want to believe. Or, perhaps, wish I could believe. But I am not going to cleave to a belief that I don’t feel is safe from doubt.
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thenobes
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Hey, hey hey! You are looking for a superset of standards to judge a set of standards. What further set of standards judge that one? And that further one? And …?
peace
steve
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PJM
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Which is evidence of GOD, the source of all goodness.WRITE ON THERE HEARTS
Rom.2: 15 “They show that what the law requires is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness and their conflicting thoughts accuse or perhaps excuse them”
Heb.8: 10 “This is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put my laws into their minds, and write them on their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.
Jer.31: 33 “But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the LORD: I will put my law within them, and I will write it upon their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people”
The FACT that everyone CAN choose freely both good and evil; is itself evidence of god and more importantly GOD [singular]
Blessings,
Partick
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PJM
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PJM
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GREAT Question: THANKS
First permit me to point out that there are in an absolute sense no such things [in reality] as “Luck” [good or bad; “coincidence” or “happenstance”
Everything; EVERYTHING from the least significant to life-changing events is one of two things:
[1] Either CAUSED by GOD for His possible Glorification and our POSSIBLE sanctification
These are ALL of the good things in ones life. When we acknowledge them GOD is Glorified and we receive God’s grace and are sanctified.
[2] The not so good things and the truly evil things are neither CAUSED nor DESIRED by God; but are PERMITTED by God. WHY?
Because even in these poor and at times souls-endangering freely made choices by man; GOD is Glorified for having given humanity; and humanity ALONE the ability to choose good over evil.
Man for having freely chosen evil over good loses grace and the possibility of being sanctified through making freely a wrong choice.
[3] Then there is the issue of SUFFERING:
Suffering can be God permitted or self inflicted. [Also GOD permitted]
Again God is always Glorified for giving humanity to opportunity to ACCEPT this suffering and offer it up either for one’s own sanctification or someone else’s benefit.
So all SUFFERING too has a dual potential purpose: God’s Glorification and our POSSIBLE sanctification.
.Isa.43: [7] every one who is called by my name, whom I created for my glory, whom I formed and made." & [21] the people whom I formed for myself that they might declare my praise.
Thanks for the Lead!
God Bless you,
Patrick
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PJM
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As the OP, not to disagree but how does science prove the FIRST CASUSE?
Again as the OP, a comment:
I hold that is an emotional, not a objective decision to deny the existence of god and or especially “GOD.”
As my POST #16 evidences; GOD does exist and man exist for a precise purpose, and is granted by GOD the means to make and confirm that fact. So there is no “IF” about eternity.
GOD WILL, BECAUSE TO BE GOD HE MUST IN AN ABSOLUTE SENSE PASS FINAL JUDGMENT UPON EACH SOUL THAT HE CREATES [ALL SOULS] BASED NOT ON ONES PERSONAL CHOSEN BELIEFS; RATHER IT WILL BE AS IT MUST BE BASED UPON WHAT HE; GOD HAS MADE POSSIBLE FOR EACH SOUL TO KNOW, TO ACCEPT AND TO LIVE
I LOVE your final comment here; its truth is staggerkng
God Bless you,
Patrick
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PJM
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THANKS great post!
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PJM
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This is in reply to my REPLY as the OP on POST #16
Actually my friend, I Do and that is WHY i started this particular thread.
So with that degree of education and intelligence; it would seem that one ought to be able to express and refute my post #16 objectively:shrug:
REALLY? The you should have no problem objectively refuting it.
Your charges are higgly subjective and my evidence is completely OBJECTIVE. Please my friend be specific so that I and others are able to respond. Thank you.
I don’t deny God’s existence for many of the reasons people have and can bring up. But I don’t affirm God’s existence either. Because as my history teacher used to say “I’m at a horse show, but I see no horse. I see some hoofprints, and some saddles, and some cowboys. But still I don’t see horses. And the presence hoofprints, saddles, and cowboys can be explained in many other ways.”
That my friend is a SUBJECTIVE and emotional falsehood. My post #16 refutes it with evidence… If you wish to [and I hope you do], to continue this dialog, less emotions and more facts are called for.
As for the evidence of GOD; just look in the mirror; you’re created in His very image. HOW do you my friend explain THAT
And by the Way; I have neither your kind or level of education, nor your intelligence. What I do have however is TRUTH which can be noting else but singular per defined issue and GOD on my side.
Blessings,
Patrick
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PJM
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Tan do this my friend:
as God [if there is one] to help you
Then reread with as little emotion as is possible my POST REPLY #16 and then try to OBJECTIVELY refute it.
I’m praying for you!
Patrick
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Rhubarb
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I can level the same critique against you from where I’m sitting. Which leads me to believe that we’re both not communicating our complete thoughts. And unless you point to specifically what you disagree with and why, I don’t have a place to start from.
But don’t worry about it, because I’m quite done with this thread. Your OP made it seem you wanted to hear another’s point of view. But you are more interested in talking than listening. On top of that, you’ve responded simply 'Nuh-uh" to me, and that’s not the kind of debate I ever look to engage in. You’ve brought up as evidence the laws of science. But this just demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of what a law of science actually is. A scientific law isn’t like a legal law - where someone has commanded behavior. A scientific law is a description of how things actually do behave. They are arrived at through distilling statistical averages.
If you’re looking for a debate on God’s existence, I’m sure others can oblige you. I have no care one way or another how anyone believes about deity.
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KnowtheSilence
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My issues with [1] – [7] arise in [4] (as you predict in [5]) and continue through [7].
You say in [4] that our mind, intellect, and free will are “spiritual realities.” In order to properly formulate a response, I’d need to know what you mean by “spiritual.“ Presumably the word spiritual applies to some sort of nonphysical reality, but does it apply to any sort of nonphysical or only a particular type (in other words, can there be a nonphysical reality that is not spiritual)? And what are the boundaries? If someone is a non-reductive physicalist when it comes to theory of mind, are the mental realities they believe in “spiritual” ones because they don’t reduce to the physical, or are they something else because they supervene on the physical? This will be important later on.
In [5], you ask that if we have objections to [4] (which I’m not sure I do until you define “spiritual“) that we “quantify” our free will in term of “shape, size, color and weight.” You’re setting up a dichotomy that if one doesn’t think that free will, etc., are “spiritual,“ then one must be a reductive physicalist. This is only a true dichotomy if you are defining “spiritual” broadly enough to include the various types of non-reductive physicalism OR if you think that non-reductive physicalism has been disproved, which is something I don’t accept as a given and would need you to argue for.
It’s also worth point out that a reductive physicalist (which I am not, but I consider it a live option) could, in response to your challenge, say that free will does have color, weight, etc., and that question could be answered in principle, but we lack the technology and understanding to answer it in practice. So when you say “We can’t say, yet it exist,“ you are just pointing out the ignorance of the reductive physicalist – which they would admit to – and not showing that they are wrong or that your “spiritual“ explanation succeeds. Your explanation must stand on its own; it doesn’t win by default.
Also in [5] you say “It is a fact that every HUMAN -Soul [for this discussion being defined as that thing which animates Life], has exclusively these spiritual realities permanently attached to it. And it this, what I have come to term; ‘our other self’ that survives the mortal body, and faces eternal judgment; and hence explains the existence of God, the Universe and humanity.” That is a jaw-droppingly bold assertion, and I can’t let it slide.
I view life as a physical process, not as a metaphysical “animating force” of some kind. So how does your view of a “soul” fit with that? Do we say that process itself is what we call a soul? You could make that move, but then what happens to the assertion that the soul survives the body, faces eternal judgment, etc.? It doesn’t work, so you would likely say that I’m wrong and that life is a force.” Alright, show me that, but realize your work does not end there. Even if I accept that there is some sort of “animating force,“ how do I know that it is eternal survives physical death, faces eternal judgment, or explains the existence of God?
On to [6]. You say “like must come from like.“ Man has “spirit,“ and that comes from God who is spirit. If like comes from like, and God is spirit, whence comes the physical? And if we are including non-reductive physicalist theories of mind as being “spiritual” (which you may not, but that hurts your dichotomy in [5]), then we can say that there are instances where like does not come from like.
In [7]d you ask two questions. This first is “WHY does humanity exist?” To this we can supply the standard explanation of humankind arriving through the process of evolution by natural selection.
The second question, “And HOW can we and the universe exist without a first cause?”, assumes that atheists and agnostics reject the idea of a first cause. This is not the case. Very few (I can’t think of any) think the universe came from literally, absolutely nothing. And few believe in something like infinite regress. There are some who do think that there is a “first cause” of some sort, just that this cause does not fit the description of “God” (I’m in this camp, but it’s worth noting that I don’t rule out infinite regress as a possibility). And most, I think, withhold judgment. So it’s not fair to assume that we believe there is no first cause and challenge us on that point.
[cont.]
You say in [4] that our mind, intellect, and free will are “spiritual realities.” In order to properly formulate a response, I’d need to know what you mean by “spiritual.“ Presumably the word spiritual applies to some sort of nonphysical reality, but does it apply to any sort of nonphysical or only a particular type (in other words, can there be a nonphysical reality that is not spiritual)? And what are the boundaries? If someone is a non-reductive physicalist when it comes to theory of mind, are the mental realities they believe in “spiritual” ones because they don’t reduce to the physical, or are they something else because they supervene on the physical? This will be important later on.
In [5], you ask that if we have objections to [4] (which I’m not sure I do until you define “spiritual“) that we “quantify” our free will in term of “shape, size, color and weight.” You’re setting up a dichotomy that if one doesn’t think that free will, etc., are “spiritual,“ then one must be a reductive physicalist. This is only a true dichotomy if you are defining “spiritual” broadly enough to include the various types of non-reductive physicalism OR if you think that non-reductive physicalism has been disproved, which is something I don’t accept as a given and would need you to argue for.
It’s also worth point out that a reductive physicalist (which I am not, but I consider it a live option) could, in response to your challenge, say that free will does have color, weight, etc., and that question could be answered in principle, but we lack the technology and understanding to answer it in practice. So when you say “We can’t say, yet it exist,“ you are just pointing out the ignorance of the reductive physicalist – which they would admit to – and not showing that they are wrong or that your “spiritual“ explanation succeeds. Your explanation must stand on its own; it doesn’t win by default.
Also in [5] you say “It is a fact that every HUMAN -Soul [for this discussion being defined as that thing which animates Life], has exclusively these spiritual realities permanently attached to it. And it this, what I have come to term; ‘our other self’ that survives the mortal body, and faces eternal judgment; and hence explains the existence of God, the Universe and humanity.” That is a jaw-droppingly bold assertion, and I can’t let it slide.
I view life as a physical process, not as a metaphysical “animating force” of some kind. So how does your view of a “soul” fit with that? Do we say that process itself is what we call a soul? You could make that move, but then what happens to the assertion that the soul survives the body, faces eternal judgment, etc.? It doesn’t work, so you would likely say that I’m wrong and that life is a force.” Alright, show me that, but realize your work does not end there. Even if I accept that there is some sort of “animating force,“ how do I know that it is eternal survives physical death, faces eternal judgment, or explains the existence of God?
On to [6]. You say “like must come from like.“ Man has “spirit,“ and that comes from God who is spirit. If like comes from like, and God is spirit, whence comes the physical? And if we are including non-reductive physicalist theories of mind as being “spiritual” (which you may not, but that hurts your dichotomy in [5]), then we can say that there are instances where like does not come from like.
In [7]d you ask two questions. This first is “WHY does humanity exist?” To this we can supply the standard explanation of humankind arriving through the process of evolution by natural selection.
The second question, “And HOW can we and the universe exist without a first cause?”, assumes that atheists and agnostics reject the idea of a first cause. This is not the case. Very few (I can’t think of any) think the universe came from literally, absolutely nothing. And few believe in something like infinite regress. There are some who do think that there is a “first cause” of some sort, just that this cause does not fit the description of “God” (I’m in this camp, but it’s worth noting that I don’t rule out infinite regress as a possibility). And most, I think, withhold judgment. So it’s not fair to assume that we believe there is no first cause and challenge us on that point.
[cont.]
K
KnowtheSilence
Guest
[cont.]
On to 1 – 5:
And finally 5, the Five Ways of Aquinas. You should understand that those five arguments by themselves, if they work (which I’m not sold on all of them), don’t prove they existence of God. They prove the existence of metaphysical properties that theists say are a part of God, but non-theists could say are something else. You need more arguments to show that these metaphysical properties are part of the same thing, and that this thing also has the other qualities would make it God. Aquinas did try to do this with other arguments from the Summa and other works, but it takes a lot more work. Why people share just those five arguments by themselves is beyond me.
On to 1 – 5:
Hoyle’s “airplane in a junkyard“ analogy has been addressed ad nauseum as a straw man by folks on my side of the fence. I’ll leave it to you to find those responses and explain why you think they fail and why you think the analogy holds.
The Earth is the only planet that we know of that can and does sustain life, but it does not follow that it is the only one, and I think you would be hard-pressed to find an expert that thinks that the Earth is “exclusive“ in this way. As far as the sun, moon, etc., being essential to accomplish this, well, of course. Life will only arrive and thrive where the conditions allow it to do so. Are you familiar with Douglas Adams’ puddle analogy?
This is a bald assertion on your part. What are these natural laws you speak of? Who says the did “just happen” and why do you think that they can’t?
I think you may have misphrased something here, first because it comes off as quite circular (God explains the existence of goodness and goodness explains the existence of God) and be you say “Only these evidences can plain logically the existence of a GOD” and if that were true, why have we been talking about all this other stuff?
And finally 5, the Five Ways of Aquinas. You should understand that those five arguments by themselves, if they work (which I’m not sold on all of them), don’t prove they existence of God. They prove the existence of metaphysical properties that theists say are a part of God, but non-theists could say are something else. You need more arguments to show that these metaphysical properties are part of the same thing, and that this thing also has the other qualities would make it God. Aquinas did try to do this with other arguments from the Summa and other works, but it takes a lot more work. Why people share just those five arguments by themselves is beyond me.
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