I am an atheist thread 2

[phooney]

@Mr.Bee

I’ve seen that Derren Brown clip before, very interesting! I agree with you though, I find myself having to take it with a grain of salt due to the medium it is presented in, i.e. as entertainment of a kind.

 

[phooney]

@Socrates4Jesus

Welcome back! I was hoping you would notice the new thread, did the last one randomly stop giving you email notifications as well? How is your project coming along?

“(A)From personal experience”

I think we have probably previously agreed at the very least that personal experience isn’t compelling evidence for anybody else besides the one who experiences it in the case of fantastic claims like the existence of God. Where we may disagree is on the validity of personal experience to the person who experiences it, if it is something extraordinary like this.

This just seems like what I think is called positive confirmation bias. Like when I am searching high and low for my keys, I spot things that look vaguely like them all over the place out of the corner of my eyes. Children terrified of the boogeyman watch in horror as the pile of clothes turns into a monster when the nightlight blinks out. Like the astrology example that A pointed out, the passages you heard were probably vague enough to be applied to a huge number of situations. I recall a little experiement conducted by James Randi (I’m not sure how formal it was) whereby he had a sample of people read ‘their’ horoscope and then he asked them if they thought it accurately applied to them. A ludicrously high percentage of the people confirmed that the reading was accurate. Then he asked them to pass their horoscope to the person behind them (person at the back pass to the person at the front). They all had been given the same horoscope.

Of course everything about God has an answer. With a lack of evidence, everything about anything has an answer. Maybe Zeus is using a Yahweh puppet at the moment to amuse himself while he imposes his will. Equally unrefutable and meaningless as the existence of Yahweh himself with a lack of evidence.

Why doesn’t God communicate to you in some verifiable manner as well? Why give up on a good thing he had by writing on stone tablets himself and giving them to Moses? In fact, why didn’t he carve them directly on to the moon for all to see? Suspicious that the rules came in a form that could have been easily man made at the time, rather than on a giant 120" plasma screen hovering in the sky and powered by magic.

Why would a perfect god use such an imperfect, or downright worthless, channel of communication as personal revelation to prophets? Such a method leaves any message subject to such an incredibly large amount of ways to be changed and misinterpreted, both intentionally and unintentionally, same goes for the channel of communication used by the prophet(s) and then leaves those hearing the message trying to decide between what two or more prophets have said, with all of them lacking evidence. I see no reason why an omni-intelligent deity would do something so patently stupid.

“(B) From objective evidence”

Perhaps you would be so kind as to give me your definition of faith? My definition (belief without, or without sufficient, evidence) has not been accepted here though it seems perfectly interchangable with most instances I’ve seen the word used here and in other places. I too am willing to accept the possibility that I am wrong, and I hold no fear in the possibility of learning something new.

Ironically enough, your wording hits the nail on the head for many cases. There is nothing mystical about “predicting history.” or writing about unverifiable. Nobody seems too impressed when I write down my prediction that an ACTOR will become president of the United States in 1981. Nobody seems too impressed when I write that Nostradamus’ prediction “When those of the Northern Pole are united, In the East will be great fear and dread” in 1995 when Santa Claus and the Eskimo King signed a truce.

I gave you a few criteria in the previous thread of the standard of prediction I would (quite reasonably I think) expect from an all-knowing entity, and how far short your example prediction regarding Tyre fell. I would certainly like to add to that set of criteria that the prediction must happen before the event! Our pieces of bible from before the 4th century are pretty thin on the ground. Of course, I’m not saying there aren’t plenty of prophecies left over that were made prior to the event they were supposed to predict, but the number is greatly reduced. Are there any you can produce that meet the criteria I set out previously? If so, how many prophecies meet the criteria out of how many total prophecies? Again this certainly doesn’t disprove a God or Gods, it would just reinforce that there is no good reason to believe in one.

 

[phooney]

@steveb

All notself had to do was point out the flaw in the initial premise, the rest of your argument from then on was meaningless as a result.

He wasn’t suggesting that the universe was neccesarily eternal when he referred to infinite regress, he pointed out that, by your rationale, the designer him/her/itself must be a complex system in order to be able to design such a complex system as the universe, and thus as a complex system would require an even more complex designer, ad infinitum. Hence, his reference to the problem of infinite regress created there.

He also pointed out that the age of the universe given is as measured from the Big Bang. This makes no assumptions about the age of anything, such as the singularity, before the rapid expansion of time and space known as the big bang happened. I too, like you (I think), am of the opinion that “How did the universe start?” is an interesting question with implications for all of us. There is, however, no reason for assuming that God had anything to do with it, when there are pre big-bang hypotheses that are at least as plausible. I say they are at least as plausible because, while they also don’t have enough evidence for them to justify a belief, they are at least mathematically consistent with our observations of the universe that we are able to measure in our present day. Examples of this are M-theory, Superstring theory, I heard of somebody the media are trying to pass off as a surfer-phycisist Garrett Lisi who has proposed “An exceptionally simple theory of everything” which will be testable next year when the LHC at CERN goes online (as will other theories), some theories involve quantum tunnelling, false vacuum fluctuations and the casmir effect, multiverse theory and I would be very hesitant to guess how many other reasonable conjectures have been made. I don’t think many people believe in any of them and nor should they, another mathematically sound hypothesis was known as loop vortex theory, an interesting little thing that involved vortexes in the “ether”. What SHOULD be done is continue to gather the neccessary evidence to see which, if any, match reality. That is what Scientists do.

Science doesn’t ignore design, nor imagine it. Check out physicist Victor Stenger’s book “God: The failed Hypothesis” Chapter 2, “the illusion of design” and “The Self-Made Tapestry” by Chemist/Physicist Phillip Ball.

“Is science comfortable with infinite regression as an answer?”

Who says that is the answer?

“The reason is, anytime one poses a beginning, one poses creation of something, which therefore poses a creator. It’s almost inescapable.”

Nonsensical. You might be correct here, but only in regards to when YOU pose a beginning of the universe. As already mentioned, the postulation of the big bang doesn’t say anything about what caused the big bang, or what happened “before” it (time being merely a dimension of our universe,I still find it difficult to not use temporal words when talking about this kind of causation). Also, guilty like Pax in the previous thread of circular reasoning and begging the question. When most other people pose a beginning, they are actually referring to a transition of some kind. Birth? Not a beginning, every bit of energy (and hence matter) in you already existed before you were born and will exist after you are dead, this is just a transitional phase of various atoms.

“An estimare which you know is a purely arbitrary measurement. Just as the theory of the big bang . But it is science’s way of dating everything and bringing it to its beginning”

Sure, if by “purely arbitrary” you mean “in no way arbitrary at all”. The dating of the big bang and the naming of that point as the beginning of our universe is based on countless man-hours of observations and gathering evidence. Why even call it the beginning of our universe if something existed “before” it? Well, it is postulated that the basic forces of our universe such as gravity and electromagnetism were merged into one before the planck time, which is where our laws of physics break down. Thus it wasn’t really ‘our universe’ before then, our universe ‘began’ much like a new life ‘begins’. It is just a description of the latest development.

“Objects at rest stay at rest unless acted upon. I think Hobbs said that. Things don’t just explode on their own.”

Nor was the big bang an “explosion” it was an expansion of space-time. M-theory has an explanation for this of 2 other universes colliding in the 11th dimension, resulting in the singularity that our universe sprung from. Other theories have explanations that are completely incomprehensible to me, and others I think with careful study I may be able to understand. I will still continue to believe in none of them without sufficient evidence, to do so would be the height of irrationality, and as far as I can gather is the easier road offered by faith.

 

[_A]

The universe isn’t eternal so there is no infinite regress in that example.But it should get one to think, how did the universe start.

If you say that the universe is eternal or is not eternal, you have a lot of evidence to provide before this is accepted as more than your opinion.

*]even science can’t ignore design.

Or maybe just really really really good at who He is.

No, it just means the designer had a plan

Is science comfortable with infinite regression as an answer?

I would suggest they are both hard, but faith IMO is harder.

I can see by your signature that it doesn’t matter if the facts cast doubt on your opinions, you would not doubt them in any case.
Good luck with that.

 

[_A]

@oneGODoneCHURCH

“global warming”

There are people saying the earth isn’t warming up? Regardless, scientific theories are always falsifiable, and thus when new evidence contradicts it, then the theory has to change. It is called progress, and it’s a good thing. I’m guessing that the issue you mentioned is subject to a number of ongoing studies for (according to you) 80 years or more. You might somehow think this is a negative characteristic, a weakness, but scientific theories are untouchable except by contrary evidence and give us the most reasonable expectations about the nature of reality possible to us as finite beings with only natural senses and natural tools available to us to collect information with.

If you say you have a soul through which a divine being grants you information, then cough up some evidence for it. Anybody else could just as easily say they have an invisible, untouchable, unsmellable, silent and tasteless pirate ship in a bottle though which the Flying Spaghetti Monster reveals how he tinkers with Scientists’ measurements to keep us in the dark about reality for his own amusement.

WELL SAID, phooney.

 

[steve_b]

@steveb

All notself had to do was point out the flaw in the initial premise, the rest of your argument from then on was meaningless as a result.

He wasn’t suggesting that the universe was neccesarily eternal when he referred to infinite regress, he pointed out that, by your rationale, the designer him/her/itself must be a complex system in order to be able to design such a complex system as the universe, and thus as a complex system would require an even more complex designer, ad infinitum. Hence, his reference to the problem of infinite regress created there.

the age of the universe given is as measured from the Big Bang. This makes no assumptions about the age of anything,

This is a contradiction of terms (in red)

phooney:

such as the singularity, before the rapid expansion of time and space known as the big bang happened. I too, like you (I think), am of the opinion that “How did the universe start?” is an interesting question with implications for all of us. There is, however, no reason for assuming that God had anything to do with it, when there are pre big-bang hypotheses that are at least as plausible. I say they are at least as plausible because, while they also don’t have enough evidence for them to justify a belief, they are at least mathematically consistent with our observations of the universe that we are able to measure in our present day.

You eliminate God absolutely, yet accept scientific hypothesis backed up with no evidence?
.

phooney:

Science doesn’t ignore design, nor imagine it. Check out physicist Victor Stenger’s book “God: The failed Hypothesis” Chapter 2, “the illusion of design” and “The Self-Made Tapestry” by Chemist/Physicist Phillip Ball.

If design is not ignored, who does Ball say designed the universe?

phooney:

You might be correct here, but only in regards to when YOU pose a beginning of the universe. As already mentioned, the postulation of the big bang doesn’t say anything about what caused the big bang, or what happened “before” it (time being merely a dimension of our universe,I still find it difficult to not use temporal words when talking about this kind of causation).

Seems these are crucial questions. What caused the big bang, and what happened before?

Everything is based on cause and effect.

phooney:

Birth? Not a beginning, every bit of energy (and hence matter) in you already existed before you were born and will exist after you are dead, this is just a transitional phase of various atoms.

Care to explain this further?

phooney:

Why even call it the beginning of our universe if something existed “before” it? Well, it is postulated that the basic forces of our universe such as gravity and electromagnetism were merged into one before the planck time, which is where our laws of physics break down. Thus it wasn’t really ‘our universe’ before then, our universe ‘began’ much like a new life ‘begins’. It is just a description of the latest development.

Gravity and electromagnetism merged? How did these forces even start, and how did they merge?
Looks like a pretty fabulously sophisticated design to me. This didn’t happen naturally, anymore than you can throw parts up in the air and a watch falls to the ground… This took a designer.

phooney:

Nor was the big bang an “explosion” it was an expansion of space-time. M-theory has an explanation for this of 2 other universes colliding in the 11th dimension, resulting in the singularity that our universe sprung from. Other theories have explanations that are completely incomprehensible to me, and others I think with careful study I may be able to understand. I will still continue to believe in none of them without sufficient evidence, to do so would be the height of irrationality, and as far as I can gather is the easier road offered by faith.

Could you clarify what you mean by the underlined, please.

 

[steve_b]

If you say that the universe is eternal or is not eternal, you have a lot of evidence to provide before this is accepted as more than your opinion.

Science, not my opinion, puts a date on the universe. Therefore science is saying the universe is not eternal.

 

[_A]

Science, not my opinion, puts a date on the universe. Therefore science is saying the universe is not eternal.

You are the one saying that the universe is or is not eternal. Back up your claim.

 

[steve_b]

You are the one saying that the universe is or is not eternal. Back up your claim.

Would you accept NASA’s figures?
map.gsfc.nasa.gov/m_mm/mr_age.html
They say they’re accurate to within 1%.

NASA says the universe is 13.7 billion years old +/- 1%

So that means it didn’t exist 15 billion years ago, right?.That means the universe is not eternal

 

[phooney]

@steveb

“This is a contradiction of terms (in red)”

Not if you continue the sentence you quoted until the end.

“You eliminate God absolutely, yet accept scientific hypothesis backed up with no evidence?”

No, I do not eliminate God absolutely, and I don’t know how I could have been clearer about specifically not accepting scientific hypotheses backed up with no evidence. I did say that I thought that some of these hypotheses were more plausible than the God hypothesis due to the fact that they are mathematically accurate as measured against observations of reality. There is no such thing as a mathematically consistent model for God, let alone any specific God, nor do I expect you to provide one, but it would certainly strengthen the case while we look for evidence.

“If design is not ignored, who does Ball say designed the universe?”

You are begging the question again here by assuming that there was a designer. As far as Ball himself is concerned, the hint is in the title of the book “the SELF-MADE tapestry”

“Seems these are crucial questions. What caused the big bang, and what happened before?
Everything is based on cause and effect.”

I agree, these are great questions, but jumping to any conclusion without evidence is an irrational and unreliable way to go about finding truth. Nobody has been able to demonstrate any logical reason for considering the belief in what caused the big bang as a ‘forced belief’ As Carl Sagan said: . “Really, it’s okay to reserve judgment until the evidence is in.” He was talking about aliens, but the idea is no less apt here!

By what authority do you claim that everything is based on cause and effect when the physical laws of our universe do not even apply to before the planck time? Also, I’ve already mentioned that our time is but a dimension of our universe, so it is a fantastically tricky question to consider, and one I certainly don’t think we should jump to any conclusions about. Due to the difficulties inherent in trying to think outside of a temporal framework, it may be that we can never know what happened “before” the big bang. Lack of evidence for any one of those scientific hypotheses is still not contributing evidence towards any God any more than it is contributing evidence towards any one of those scientific hypotheses!

" Care to explain this further?"

Well Steve, when a Mommy and Daddy love each other very much, they lay down on a bearskin rug in front of a fire and play a game called “the beast with two backs”.

In the early moments after the big bang, everything was ridiculously hot and condensed. From the moment of the planck time onwards we know that the first law of thermodynamics applies, which is known as the conservation of energy and states that the amount of energy in the universe remains constant. Were you aware that energy and matter are essentially the same thing? Note Einstein’s famous equation E=MC^2 Energy equals mass(matter has mass) times the speed of light squared. Once things cooled off enough, the first atoms could be formed, the vast majority of which is Hydrogen, but if I recall correctly (I may not) elements up to some isotope of Beryllium. To form heavier elements from existing elements/energy required some supernovas, but everything that was in the universe now, was in the universe in some form at the planck time. The sperm from the father already (obviously) existed before the conception, as did the egg from the mother. As the fertilised egg divides/grows, it is made up of more atoms that are ingested by the mother, and so on until it is born and ingests new atoms and energy of it’s own. Nothing new comes into existence except for the unique way of arranging particular atoms, all of which are already billions of years old. Every material thing in you has been through a supernova already.

 

[phooney]

continued…

“Gravity and electromagnetism merged? How did these forces even start, and how did they merge?
Looks like a pretty fabulously sophisticated design to me.”

They didn’t start out separate and then merge, after the big bang and before the planck time they were already “merged”. What other universes are you comparing it against to say that this is a particularly sophisticated design? How are you measuring this sophistication?

“This didn’t happen naturally, anymore than you can throw parts up in the air and a watch falls to the ground… This took a designer.”

Says who? Perhaps we should continue to gather evidence and if you want to do something useful, come up with something falsifiable about a God. Again, by what authority are you comparing a watch and a Universe? This is merely an argument from ignorance in that you are saying you have no idea how this could have happened…therefore God did it. Ignorance is never evidence for anything except the ignorance itself. Please don’t be offended by my use of the word ignorance, I merely mean it in the sense of ‘unaware of particular facts’. I am ignorant of what my boss had for dinner on February the 2nd last year, but that doesn’t mean she had roast turkey.

“Could you clarify what you mean by the underlined, please.”

Certainly. At this point in time “pre” big bang or “theories of everything” don’t have enough evidence to justify my belief in them over any other theories, therefore I will withold my judgement and continue looking for evidence, as this has time and again proven to be the most reliable way for me to find truth and avoid error. Instead of continuing to look for evidence I could just take it on faith that God did it, and I could cease trying to learn about complicated things, and perhaps get drunk or something. Much easier.

“Science, not my opinion, puts a date on the universe. Therefore science is saying the universe is not eternal.”

Yes, but as already discussed, they are defining the universe as the space-time we exist in since the big bang. Again let me remind you that this doesn’t say anything about what happened “before” the big bang, though there are several hypotheses that are itching to be tested when the LHC is completed.

 

[_A]

Would you accept NASA’s figures?
map.gsfc.nasa.gov/m_mm/mr_age.html
They say they’re accurate to within 1%.

NASA says the universe is 13.7 billion years old +/- 1%

So that means it didn’t exist 15 billion years ago, right?.That means the universe is not eternal

If time didn’t exist either, there would be no such thing as 15 billion years ago.

What is your point?

 

[steve_b]

If time didn’t exist

If?
A:

there would be no such thing as 15 billion years ago.

What is your point?

You gotta be kidding! You’re starting your statment out with “What if” trying obfuscate the issue, then ask me what MY point is?

Science is placing the universe IN TIME. not outside of time. They’re not saying “What if” the universe is 13.7 billion years old. They are saying the universe IS 13.7 billion years old +/- 1%. That means it wasn’t here 15 billion years ago… correct?

As far as credentials go, these folks (NASA)

• landed astronauts on the moon and brought them safely home.
• They launch satelites, space stations, and the hubble telescope
  As scientists, I think they are more than qualified at their job.

 

[phooney]

whoosh…

 

[_A]

If?

You gotta be kidding! You’re starting your statment out with “What if” trying obfuscate the issue, then ask me what MY point is?

What I am trying to say is quite simple, really. If this event (from singularity to universe) is also responsible for initiating ‘time’, then the phrase ‘15 billion years ago’ becomes nonsense in the same way as the phrase ‘-373.15 degrees celsius’ is nonsense.

 

[steve_b]

No,** I do not eliminate God absolutely** and I don’t know how I could have been clearer about specifically not accepting scientific hypotheses backed up with no evidence.

You’re NOT clear. In fact you’re quite contradictory in your thoughts

Do you remember saying

“There is, however, no reason for assuming that God had anything to do with it, when there are pre big-bang hypotheses that are at least as plausible. I say they are at least as plausible because, while they also don’t have enough evidence for them to justify a belief, they are at least mathematically consistent with our observations of the universe that we are able to measure in our present day.”

forums.catholic-questions.org/showpost.php?p=3101875&postcount=265

you’re saying

• pre big bang hypothesis don’t have enough evidence to believe in them
• but if they are mathematically consistent, they are more plausable, than God
  This is eliminating God.the creator for something created. I gotta tell you. I’m concerned about you.

phooney:

I did say that I thought that some of these hypotheses were more plausible than the God hypothesis due to the fact that they are mathematically accurate as measured against observations of reality.

Think about what you just said.

• God is a hypothesis, not real
• Math is more plausable than God because math is accurate and observable
  Good grief!!! All you’ve talked about here in these posts is hypothesis, plausabilities and theories. But you know for sure God isn’t real…

phooney:

There is no such thing as a mathematically consistent model for God, let alone*** any specific God***, nor do I expect you to provide one, but it would certainly strengthen the case while we look for evidence.

In your opening statement (highlighted above) you say you do not eliminate God absolutely, but then you say here, there is no such thing as any specific God.

phooney:

“If design is not ignored, who does Ball say designed the universe?”

You are begging the question again here by assuming that there was a designer. As far as Ball himself is concerned, the hint is in the title of the book “the SELF-MADE tapestry”

When is the last time you saw a self made Tapestry? The very title of his book is a contradiction of terms.

phooney:

“Seems these are crucial questions. What caused the big bang, and what happened before?
Everything is based on cause and effect.”

I agree, these are great questions, but jumping to any conclusion without evidence is an irrational and unreliable way to go about finding truth. Nobody has been able to demonstrate any logical reason for considering the belief in what caused the big bang as a ‘forced belief’ As Carl Sagan said: . “Really, it’s okay to reserve judgment until the evidence is in.” He was talking about aliens, but the idea is no less apt here!

:doh2: nobody knows what caused the big bang? Carl Sagan?, belief in aliens?, yet you know God doesn’t exist? sheesh!!

phooney:

By what authority do you claim that everything is based on cause and effect

Name one effect that wasn’t the result of cause

phooney:

when the physical laws of our universe do not even apply to before the planck time?

Re: planck time

:
The Planck time is the time it would take a photon travelling at the speed of light to across a distance equal to the Planck length. This is the ‘quantum of time’, the smallest measurement of time that has any meaning, and is equal to 10-43 seconds. No smaller division of time has any meaning. With in the framework of the laws of physics as we understand them today, we can say only that the universe came into existence when it already had an age of 10-43 seconds.

Anyway you slice it, science says the universe had a beginning.

 

[notself]

Name one effect that wasn’t the result of cause

By this argument one can say that either God has no effect or God has a cause.

 

[steve_b]

By this argument one can say that either God has no effect or God has a cause.

God is the uncaused cause.

 

[notself]

God is the uncaused cause.

It appears that you argue against yourself.

 

[ontologysue]

If time didn’t exist either, there would be no such thing as 15 billion years ago.

What is your point?

Time/space is a “created” entity. From Abraham Varghese’s book “The Wonder of the World, a Journey from Modern Science to the Mind of God,” "it has been said that space/time IS the interaction of particle-events.

I have also heard a line physicist’s use, “time” is God’s way of keeping everything from happening all at once.

Bottom line, “time/space” has no reality in eternity, that’s one reason it always ‘bugs’ me when people talk about souls spending x amount of time in purgatory…sorry, there is only an eternal now, no more clock watching after death.

(Also, on an earlier question about knowing if personal relvelations are true or hullucinations–“only by the fruits will you know them,” the Islamic terrorist’s did not produce charity, they acted according to the horror of pure evil. If a personal relvelation increases true humility and charity, it was a valid relvelation.)

Back to time, since there is no unified theory in physics, yet, scientists are unable to square the quantum particle world with the general theory of relativity world, because of this it is as yet unknown if or what laws governed reality before the big bang before the universe was billions of times smaller than a hydrogen atom.