An Agnostic Manifesto

[Leela]

Goodness gracious! I would hope that it is understood that by “evidence,” I mean “convincing evidence.”

What is this tribunal which determines which evidence actually is convincing and which is not? Since neither of us believes in any such great nonhuman power to make such judgments for us, we should agree that there is no other standard for what is convincing than whether it convinces people. Are you still holding out for the notion of a final arbiter of Truth? Do you think that you are speaking for that Arbiter?

I’m sure a leprechaun-believer has all kinds of “evidence” for his beliefs, from personal experience to testimony of others to the existence of rainbows. But none of that is actually evidence for the claim; it’s all irrelevant.

Irrelevant to whom? As non believers we ought to agree that there is no one besides us humans for evidence to be relevant or irrelevant to. Certainly you and a believer can agree on certain facts such as the existence of rainbows. Why not just give reasons why you think that another draws the wrong conclusions from the evidence rather than insisting that no one has offered any evidence?

What do you mean by evidence anyway? It sounds like a strange notion you have if you think that evidence is sometimes not evidence. I suspect that you are begging the question from the start by only calling evidence what you find convincing.

If you really think that believers aren’t interested in evidence and don’t try to have good reasons for their beliefs, then why bother conversing with them to offer your better reasons for your alternative beliefs?

The “evidence” for gods is of this nature. I’ll happily explain why a piece of so-called evidence isn’t actually evidence, but you have to ask me specifically about each piece. Until then – and after then – I will continue to correctly state that there’s no evidence for gods of any kind.

There is a lot of evidence to contradict your claim that no one has ever offered evidence in support of their religious beliefs. Neither of us find such evidence convincing, but to keep insisting that no one has ever presented you with any evidence whatsoever is ridiculous–unless, that is, if you are also insisting that you are the Authority that gets to decide what ought to be worthy of consideration as evidence. If God is dead, why are you trying on his pajamas? Why do you still think it is fun to ring his doorbell and run away? Have you not given up on the notion of a supreme arbiter of truth? If you think that there is some other authority besides what we give to one another and some human duty to a non human like your notion of Evidence, you are not the atheist you seem to think you are. I suspect that you are just deifying Reason and Truth in God’s place.

 

[awatkins69]

“The fool hath said in his hear there is no God.”

Our own existence proves that God exists. The existence of the intellect and free agency prove God exists. Existence period proves God exists.

Affirming the non-existence of God firmly is folly. Doubting the existence of God is folly as well.

The steps to God’s are rather simple.

(1) Objects are in motion.
(2) If something is in motion (contingently), then it must be caused to be in motion by something outside of itself.
(3) There can be no infinite chain of movers/movees.
(4) So there is a first, unmoved mover.
(5) Therefore, God exists.

The only objection is “what caused this unmoved mover?” But this is a contradiction in terms. If something caused this first cause, it is not even a first cause. In fact, it is really an effect. And it would be necessary to ontologically go “back” to the first cause. From this first cause we can deduce the consequential attributes, which are typically the attributes we “predicate” of God.

 

[Leela]

“The fool hath said in his hear there is no God.”

Our own existence proves that God exists. The existence of the intellect and free agency prove God exists. Existence period proves God exists.

Affirming the non-existence of God firmly is folly. Doubting the existence of God is folly as well.

The steps to God’s are rather simple.

(1) Objects are in motion.
(2) If something is in motion (contingently), then it must be caused to be in motion by something outside of itself.
(3) There can be no infinite chain of movers/movees.
(4) So there is a first, unmoved mover.
(5) Therefore, God exists.

The only objection is “what caused this unmoved mover?” But this is a contradiction in terms. If something caused this first cause, it is not even a first cause. In fact, it is really an effect. And it would be necessary to ontologically go “back” to the first cause. From this first cause we can deduce the consequential attributes, which are typically the attributes we “predicate” of God.

Are the above five steps the argument that convinced you to believe in God? I ask because as far as I can tell, such proofs are only found to be convincing by people who already believe the conclusion already without the proof. Those who do not believe in God can always find problems with these proofs and are not swayed by them.

For example, 1) says that objects are in motion. Which ones are these? Actually, every object can be used as an unmoving Galilean frame of reference by which to measure the motion of other objects, so there is no object whatsoever that can’t be thought of as unmoving.

In 2) you’ve completely begged the question by adding “contingently.”

In 3)…well…how do you know? Why can’t we have an infinite chain of causation? And why think of causation as a chain rather than, say, a web? Effects never seem to have one single cause that we can follow in a chain but lots and lots of causes. Everything is related to everything else. Finding this “first cause” then is like finding the center of the universe. Every point can be thought of as the center.

Based on these objections (and others) to your premises, I do not feel at all compelled to conclude 4) or 5) and it doesn’t help your case at all to call me a fool. Can we keep such name-calling out of our discussions in this forum?

 

[awatkins69]

Are the above five steps the argument that convinced you to believe in God? I ask because as far as I can tell, such proofs are only found to be convincing by people who already believe the conclusion already without the proof. Those who do not believe in God can always find problems with these proofs and are not swayed by them.

For example, 1) says that objects are in motion. Which ones are these? Actually, every object can be used as an unmoving Galilean frame of reference by which to measure the motion of other objects, so there is no object whatsoever that can’t be thought of as unmoving.

In 2) you’ve completely begged the question by adding “contingently.”

In 3)…well…how do you know? Why can’t we have an infinite chain of causation? And why think of causation as a chain rather than, say, a web? Effects never seem to have one single cause that we can follow in a chain but lots and lots of causes. Everything is related to everything else. Finding this “first cause” then is like finding the center of the universe. Every point can be thought of as the center.

Based on these objections (and others) to your premises, I do not feel at all compelled to conclude 4) or 5) and it doesn’t help your case at all to call me a fool. Can we keep such name-calling out of our discussions in this forum?

Hi Leela. Sorry if I was calling you a fool. There are many intelligent atheists. My point is that atheism contradicts reason. The proofs of Saint Thomas Aquinas made me accept the reality of God. I’ve been a Christian for three years. If I weren’t Catholic I’d never be an atheist. At the very least I’d be a theist.

Objection 1: You’re thinking only in terms of physical motion. Any object still is in motion in some way, because it exists. It is in a state of actuality (that is, it has being) from a state of potentiality (non-being). In philosophy motion is not defined just as physical motion. I thought since we were speaking philosophically, everybody would understand that when we say motion, we meant it in a philosophical sense. We mean all change. I believe you’d be hard-pressed to deny any change exists.

Objection 2: Let’s just say this. If something is in motion, then it must be caused to be in motion by something outside of itself. Something cannot be both in a state of potentiality and actuality. It is always one or the other. This does not beg the question. It is a self-evident first principle grasped immediately by the intellect.

Objection 3: Web or chain, everything that is caused has an ontological prior to it. It cannot be caused by its own effect. Nobody is denying there may be more than one cause to an effect. Quite the opposite. But these causes are also caused by something else. This cannot go on into infinity or else there would be no first mover. Nothing would be moved out of potentiality into actuality, and there would be no effect.

Therefore, we must arrive at the first mover, which must have no potentiality, and be pure act (the famous actus purus). This “everyone understands to be God”. This may seem like a bare assertion, but we could go on and later draw the consequential classical attributes of God.

Blessings.

 

[awatkins69]

Let me ask you this also. How can free agency develop by purely naturalistic means? If all develops by naturalistic means, then all is simply an interaction of matter. Free will in any form cannot be a simple interaction of matter, because then it is pre-determined by the properties of the matter and by the changes that naturally take place. Or do you believe we have no free will, would accept the necessary conclusion that we have no moral responsibility, and it is really not immoral for me to go out and blast people with my gun?

So there are two things you can reply to me on. I’d love to hear what you think. Take care.

 

[hatsoff]

In philosophy motion is not defined just as physical motion. I thought since we were speaking philosophically, everybody would understand that when we say motion, we meant it in a philosophical sense. We mean all change.

In philosophy, “motion” means ordinary motion unless you lay down a clear alternate definition. Perhaps you are referring to some particular niche in philosophy, such as Thomism or Aristotelianism.

 

[hatsoff]

I know I’m not the person you asked, but I may be of some assistance…

How can free agency develop by purely naturalistic means? If all develops by naturalistic means, then all is simply an interaction of matter. Free will in any form cannot be a simple interaction of matter, because then it is pre-determined by the properties of the matter and by the changes that naturally take place. Or do you believe we have no free will, would accept the necessary conclusion that we have no moral responsibility, and it is really not immoral for me to go out and blast people with my gun?

The terms free will and determinism are problematic at best. I’m not sure what they are supposed to mean, but whatever you have in mind, I recommend you substitute plainer language. As it is, I see no reason why the alleged physical constitution of the universe should bear on our concept of moral responsibility.

 

[awatkins69]

Determinism is the idea that everything works out according to certain natural rules. Because everything works according to certain rules, if we had enough information and could process it all, we could know exactly what will happen next, and 5 seconds from now, and so forth, we absolutely everything. This is a very necessary consequence of the position known as metaphysical naturalism. This position holds that all things can be explained in terms of natural processes (excluding things like God).

Free will is the idea that we can commit acts by our own volition.

The contradiction here is that if metaphysical naturalism is true, then our “free will” does not exist. If all things can be explained completely by natural processes, then our actions can be explained in like manner.

Moral judgments only apply to free agents. If we are only matter, and if we can be explained by completely material causes, then our actions can be explained by entirely material causes. Matter does not bear any responsibility. “I” do not bear responsibility for “my” actions. To speak properly within this context, there is no “I”, there is just a bunch of matter, and there are no actions that are “mine”, there are just effects of a bunch of material reactions. Matter can be the cause of something, but it cannot be “responsible”, at least in the moral sense. All action is non-voluntary if it’s just a bunch of unconscious reactions. Of course, all this goes against our basic common sense and experience. But all of this is the consequence of a materialistic world view.

 

[awatkins69]

In philosophy, “motion” means ordinary motion unless you lay down a clear alternate definition. Perhaps you are referring to some particular niche in philosophy, such as Thomism or Aristotelianism.

Sorry if the first time I was not clear. I did lay down a definition the second time. It is the Aristotelian/Scholastic notion.

 

[_Locke]

I’ve been reading a book called “Atheism Explained” by David Ramsay Steele, (very good, by the way) and I recently finished a section which I think is pertinent to the topic!

---

"Three Types of Unbelief
Someone who does not believe in the existence of something-and the something can be leprechauns, kangaroos, global warming, alien abductions, or God-may or may not assert the nonexistence of that something. If the person fails to believe in the existence of something while not believing in its nonexistence, we can call that person an ‘agnostic’.

‘Agnostic’ is a word deliberately invented by T.H. Huxley in 1869 to refer to anyone who, like Huxley himself, had no belief in God but was not prepared to deny God’s existence. Prior to that date all ‘agnostics’ had been recognized as atheists. ‘Atheist’ comes from two Greek words meaning ‘without God’ and ‘agnostic’ comes from two Greek words meaning ‘without knowing’. An agnostic, then, is someone who ‘does not know’ whether there is a God or not.

To the Victorian ear, ‘agnostic’ sounded a lot less threatening and more respectable than ‘atheist’. However, a number of avowed and notorious ‘atheists’ have been agnostics by Huxley’s definition, including the celebrated nineteenth-century atheist Charles Bradlaugh.

Some people classify agnostics as distinct from atheists while other people classify agnostics as atheists. I prefer the latter usage: I use the term ‘atheist’ to include ‘agnostic’, although I am not an agnostic and my arguments in this book don’t favor agnosticism. Recently some people have started using the term ‘non theist’ to cover both those who merely fail to believe in God’s existence and those who believe in God’s nonexistence. In this book ‘atheist’ means the same as ‘nontheist’.

So there are three types of non-believer in something:

1. The agnostic, who refuses to render a verdict on whether that thing exists.
2. Someone who denies the existence of the thing, but does not believe that the thing’s non-existence can be conclusively demonstrated.
3. Someone who denies the existence of the thing and believes that its non-existence can be conclusively demonstrated. (When applied to the God question, this third kind of non-believer is called a ‘disproof atheist’.)

Which of these three is the best attitude to take to God? My answer depends on what kind of God is being considered."

 

[awatkins69]

I know I’m not the person you asked, but I may be of some assistance…

The terms free will and determinism are problematic at best. I’m not sure what they are supposed to mean, but whatever you have in mind, I recommend you substitute plainer language. As it is, I see no reason why the alleged physical constitution of the universe should bear on our concept of moral responsibility.

Here are good definitions of determinism and free will. This is from JP Moreland’s book “Body & Soul”.

-Determinism: the view that for every event that happens, there are conditions such that, given them, nothing else could have happened: for every event that happens, its happening was caused or necessitated by prior factors such that, given these prior factors, the event in question had to occur. (Now, apply this to what I was saying earlier about free agency and morality in regards to physical/material laws)

-Depiction of free agency: A person (p) exercises free agency and freely does some intentional act (e) just in case
1)p is a substance (hopefully you have studied substance dualism to know what this means) that has the active power to bring about e
2)p exerts active power as a first-mover to bring about e
3)p has the categorical ability to refrain from exerting active power to bring about e
4)p acts for the sake of a reason, which is the final cause or telos for which p acts

These are the necessary and sufficient conditions for a voluntary and intentional act.

 

[Leela]

In philosophy, “motion” means ordinary motion unless you lay down a clear alternate definition. Perhaps you are referring to some particular niche in philosophy, such as Thomism or Aristotelianism.

People around here who speak Aristotelian tend to think that they are speaking a special language called Philosophy that everyone else has an obligation to learn. It has to be one of the ugliest languages ever invented. That isn’t so surprising when you recall that the whole enterprise began with Plato subordinating the Good to the True. We are supposed to be this sort of “Rational” even if it isn’t any good.

 

[Leela]

Let me ask you this also. How can free agency develop by purely naturalistic means? If all develops by naturalistic means, then all is simply an interaction of matter. Free will in any form cannot be a simple interaction of matter, because then it is pre-determined by the properties of the matter and by the changes that naturally take place. Or do you believe we have no free will, would accept the necessary conclusion that we have no moral responsibility, and it is really not immoral for me to go out and blast people with my gun?

So there are two things you can reply to me on. I’d love to hear what you think. Take care.

I see no reason to posit any extra-added ingredient like Free Will or the soul. James’s dictum that any difference must make a difference allows us to drop the free will/fatalism question as a fake metaphysical problem. How could it ever possibly make a difference in practice whether we believe our actions are chosen freely or forced upon us? How would someone behave any differently having chosen either horn of this supposed dilemma? Would someone, for example, give a different answer to this very question if she held a belief in free will or a belief in fatalism? I can’t see how she would.

 

[Leela]

Hi Leela. Sorry if I was calling you a fool. There are many intelligent atheists. My point is that atheism contradicts reason.

As one who acknowledges no great nonhuman powers like God or Reason, I see our duty to be reasonable is only a duty to our fellow humans to engage in the practice of justification of our beliefs. There is nothing contradictory of this practice to not believe in God despite your protests.

The proofs of Saint Thomas Aquinas made me accept the reality of God. I’ve been a Christian for three years. If I weren’t Catholic I’d never be an atheist. At the very least I’d be a theist.

Objection 1: You’re thinking only in terms of physical motion. Any object still is in motion in some way, because it exists. It is in a state of actuality (that is, it has being) from a state of potentiality (non-being). In philosophy motion is not defined just as physical motion. I thought since we were speaking philosophically, everybody would understand that when we say motion, we meant it in a philosophical sense. We mean all change. I believe you’d be hard-pressed to deny any change exists.

Objection 2: Let’s just say this. If something is in motion, then it must be caused to be in motion by something outside of itself. Something cannot be both in a state of potentiality and actuality. It is always one or the other. This does not beg the question. It is a self-evident first principle grasped immediately by the intellect.

Objection 3: Web or chain, everything that is caused has an ontological prior to it. It cannot be caused by its own effect. Nobody is denying there may be more than one cause to an effect. Quite the opposite. But these causes are also caused by something else. This cannot go on into infinity or else there would be no first mover. Nothing would be moved out of potentiality into actuality, and there would be no effect.

Therefore, we must arrive at the first mover, which must have no potentiality, and be pure act (the famous actus purus). This “everyone understands to be God”. This may seem like a bare assertion, but we could go on and later draw the consequential classical attributes of God.

Blessings.

You have mastered the scholastic dictum, whenever you reach a contradiction make a distinction. Therefore, you will never have to be wrong about anything. However, I can’t see what any of the above has to do with the human condition. What am I supposed to be imagining with these images of things that are moving and must have “movers” outside themselves and potentiality and actuality? It doesn’t sound at all to me like you are talking about the world in which we live. Is it really absurd that something can come from nothing? I have no idea. Is it really absurd to imagine an infinite chain of causality? I have no idea. You have such “self-evident first principles grasped immediately by the intellect” that I don’t feel at all compelled to accept no matter how hard you stamp your foot. You have your Reason that all must respect, but I see reason as a rather late development in the unfolding of the universe. It is not something magical that stands apart from the universe it tries to grasp but a tool for making better use of what is around us. I think you are overreaching when you claim certainty about ultimate reality and the infinite based on this notion of a transcendent faculty that humans are gloriously endowed with as an extra-added ingredient to their biological makeup. By mystifying Reason you beg the question. Our reasonings our only ever as good as our assumptions, and I acknowledge no “self-evident first principles grasped immediately by the intellect” that will ensure that our reason never fails us.

 

[awatkins69]

I see no reason to posit any extra-added ingredient like Free Will or the soul. James’s dictum that any difference must make a difference allows us to drop the free will/fatalism question as a fake metaphysical problem. How could it ever possibly make a difference in practice whether we believe our actions are chosen freely or forced upon us? How would someone behave any differently having chosen either horn of this supposed dilemma? Would someone, for example, give a different answer to this very question if she held a belief in free will or a belief in fatalism? I can’t see how she would.

Well, if we came to believe in determinism, we would have no basis of justice. If it is true then legal systems and systems of morality have no real basis whatsoever. If determinism is true then in reality I need not act morally. And if I honestly believed this, why not? You’d have no basis for telling me I’m wrong and to “stop” doing what I’m doing. The only true thing you could say is “You had no choice, and you are not responsible for having 6 million people killed.” Not that I think determinism or metaphysical naturalism are true.

On the other hand, if we acknowledge free will, we do have responsibility for our actions, and can make moral statements and judgments. If reality is otherwise, we cannot. Obviously we can linguistically-speaking, but it contradicts objective reality.

 

[awatkins69]

As one who acknowledges no great nonhuman powers like God or Reason, I see our duty to be reasonable is only a duty to our fellow humans to engage in the practice of justification of our beliefs. There is nothing contradictory of this practice to not believe in God despite your protests.

You have mastered the scholastic dictum, whenever you reach a contradiction make a distinction. Therefore, you will never have to be wrong about anything. However, I can’t see what any of the above has to do with the human condition. What am I supposed to be imagining with these images of things that are moving and must have “movers” outside themselves and potentiality and actuality? It doesn’t sound at all to me like you are talking about the world in which we live. Is it really absurd that something can come from nothing? I have no idea. Is it really absurd to imagine an infinite chain of causality? I have no idea. You have such “self-evident first principles grasped immediately by the intellect” that I don’t feel at all compelled to accept no matter how hard you stamp your foot. You have your Reason that all must respect, but I see reason as a rather late development in the unfolding of the universe. It is not something magical that stands apart from the universe it tries to grasp but a tool for making better use of what is around us. I think you are overreaching when you claim certainty about ultimate reality and the infinite based on this notion of a transcendent faculty that humans are gloriously endowed with as an extra-added ingredient to their biological makeup. By mystifying Reason you beg the question. Our reasonings our only ever as good as our assumptions, and I acknowledge no “self-evident first principles grasped immediately by the intellect” that will ensure that our reason never fails us.

First off, reasoning is not a non-human power. Secondly, you must explain why we have a duty to provide justification for our beliefs. Thirdly, how can we justify anything if you don’t believe in reason? Proving something involves the use of logic, which is inherently reasonable.

Well, the distinction is there. Motion as defined in scholastic terms is different from motion defined in terms of relative physics. If you want I could just use the word “change” in my syllogism from now on. Whatever you prefer.

If you don’t trust your own cognitive faculties, then by definition you are being irrational. Not trying to be offensive, that’s just the truth. You seem to mystify Doubt, even of your own ability to find truth. Of course by doing that, you give yourself a reason to doubt your truths of doubt. It’s interesting that at first you tried to provide reasonable objections, and now you argue that we are overreaching when we claim certainty about ultimate reality. You say that reason is a tool, and I agree that it can be. However, it’s only a tool insofar as it allows us to discover objective truths which can be used for practical purposes. These objective truths can stand alone even if they are not used for a practical application. Reason is not something that is exclusive to me, nor is anything true because it is *my *reason. It is by nature included in every individual of the human species.

If we are going to be reasonable at all we must accept some self-evident truths. If you do not think that the ideas of potentiality and actuality describe things, then I suppose we cannot have a reasonable discussion. If you do not grasp the concept that a piece of wood is potentially on fire, but is actually not, or if you do not immediately understand that my tooth aches but could potentially not, I don’t know what to tell you. If you believe that my hair is both actually 7 inches and 17 inches in length, or that the grass is both actually dry and actually wet, you are free to believe that, though I do have doubts as to whether or not you truly accept it. If you want to believe that a thing can both be and not be, I’m not even going to bother.

All the best.

 

[Mystic_Banana]

What is this tribunal which determines which evidence actually is convincing and which is not? Since neither of us believes in any such great nonhuman power to make such judgments for us, we should agree that there is no other standard for what is convincing than whether it convinces people. Are you still holding out for the notion of a final arbiter of Truth? Do you think that you are speaking for that Arbiter?

Irrelevant to whom? As non believers we ought to agree that there is no one besides us humans for evidence to be relevant or irrelevant to. Certainly you and a believer can agree on certain facts such as the existence of rainbows. Why not just give reasons why you think that another draws the wrong conclusions from the evidence rather than insisting that no one has offered any evidence?

What do you mean by evidence anyway? It sounds like a strange notion you have if you think that evidence is sometimes not evidence. I suspect that you are begging the question from the start by only calling evidence what you find convincing.

If you really think that believers aren’t interested in evidence and don’t try to have good reasons for their beliefs, then why bother conversing with them to offer your better reasons for your alternative beliefs?

There is a lot of evidence to contradict your claim that no one has ever offered evidence in support of their religious beliefs. Neither of us find such evidence convincing, but to keep insisting that no one has ever presented you with any evidence whatsoever is ridiculous–unless, that is, if you are also insisting that you are the Authority that gets to decide what ought to be worthy of consideration as evidence. If God is dead, why are you trying on his pajamas? Why do you still think it is fun to ring his doorbell and run away? Have you not given up on the notion of a supreme arbiter of truth? If you think that there is some other authority besides what we give to one another and some human duty to a non human like your notion of Evidence, you are not the atheist you seem to think you are. I suspect that you are just deifying Reason and Truth in God’s place.

Wo-ho! I’m guessing you’re not particularly scientismtic, Leela, or if you are presumably not so devout - or dogmatic?

Anyway, as atheists go, you’re coming across as relatively open-minded

 

[AntiTheist]

Certainly you and a believer can agree on certain facts such as the existence of rainbows. Why not just give reasons why you think that another draws the wrong conclusions from the evidence rather than insisting that no one has offered any evidence?

Where have you been? I do exactly that every time I am asked about a specific piece of data – that is precisely why I can claim that there is no evidence (Read: convincing evidence) for any god.

It sounds like a strange notion you have if you think that evidence is sometimes not evidence.

This is a problem with the way we’re using words. You’re using “evidence” to mean “any data point that any person gives to support any claim, no matter how woefully irrelevant it is.” Under this definition, if some guy said that the evidence for his claim that he’s Napoleon is that the Prime Minister of Australia is an atheist, you would say, “Well, he’s presented his evidence – why don’t you just explain to him why he’s wrong? Why do you have to be such a meany and tell him he’s got no evidence? You’re wrong! He does have evidence!!”

Under a different definition, “evidence” means “data that adequately supports a claim,” and under this definition, when presented with the example above, I would be well within my rights to tell our Napoleon wannabe that he has no evidence whatsoever for his claim.

I certainly admit that there is room to discuss what we should count as evidence – and I’d be happy to patiently explain for the zillionth time why some dude’s personal experience of a pleasant daydream is not “evidence” that some universe-creating disembodied intelligence exists outside his head – but don’t start jumping down my throat for calling it like it is and saying (correctly) that there’s no evidence for any of these claims.

If God is dead, why are you trying on his pajamas? Why do you still think it is fun to ring his doorbell and run away? Have you not given up on the notion of a supreme arbiter of truth?

Just because there’s not a “supreme arbiter of truth” doesn’t mean that there isn’t truth. And while I’m not “supreme,” I think my conclusions – based as they are on evidence, you know, that little pesky thing – are pretty darn accurate.

If you disagree, let’s see some evidence to the contrary.

I guess it’s all well and good to sit around and twiddle our thumbs and say, “Gee, no one can be extra-super-sure of anything, so let’s all be nice to people who make wild claims that not one single piece of data can justify, and maybe afterwards we can all share some pink lemonade and play in the sun” – but that’s not my approach.

 

[Leela]

If you disagree, let’s see some evidence to the contrary.

I’m not at all tempted to play your game where you get to be the Supreme Arbiter of what is and is not evidence based on some predetermined yet unstated criteria. What ought to be counted as evidence is of exactly what is of issue in discussions on this forum, but you just expect everyone to take your criteria for granted, stick your fingers in your ears–la, la, la–and declare “No Evidence!” Do you really think such behavior is going to convince anyone else of any of your ideas? All you are ever telling us is how convinced you are about your own ideas and how smart you think you are. What is the point of that beyond confirming all the prejudices people already have about us nonbelievers?

 

[Leela]

It’s interesting that at first you tried to provide reasonable objections, and now you argue that we are overreaching when we claim certainty about ultimate reality.

I think you are overreaching because I don’t know how we could ever decide whether or not your basic premises (something can’t come from nothing, no infinite chain of causality, time has a beginning) are any good. They sound reasonable in the way that every culture’s prejudices sound reasonable within their historical context, and they may be just as unreasonable as “curved space” and quantum indeterminacy would have seemed in other times and cultures. It seems to me that something came from nothing at one point, or something was always there (which does not in itself suggest a Supreme Being with omniscience and omnipotence. That something could be the universe itself, the strangeness of which we have only begun to understand.), but I see no way to decide and to be certain that there are not other possibilities that I haven’t thought of yet.

If we are going to be reasonable at all we must accept some self-evident truths.

I agree that reasoning can only occur based on some set of premises that we already believe, but I also recognize that some of our beliefs may not be true.

If you do not think that the ideas of potentiality and actuality describe things, then I suppose we cannot have a reasonable discussion…

My point is that this specialized Aristotelian way of talking is not one I see much value in. It is a lot of wheel spinning about essences that have little that I can see to do with our condition of existence. If you immerse yourself in such ancient Greek philosophizing, you will undoubtedly find that it confirms your Catholic beliefs since the Catholic theology was formed based on Aristotelian thinking to begin with. Since there are lots of other systems of thought available, to me its like using the data that suggested a hypothesis as confirmation of that same hypothesis. Science without the experimentation.

But if you want to discuss Aquinas’s proofs, there are usually lots of threads and lots of people around here who will be happy to do that. I don’t find them convincing or worth my time in discussing because I think they assume too much and are too far removed from the human condition to be of interest.

If these proofs are so incontrovertible, why do you suppose that God is not considered to be proven beyond a reasonable doubt in academic circles in the way that, say, the Pythagorean Theorem is known to be have been proven once and for all?