In what do atheists have Hope?

[Spock]

i have shown you the logical necessity of a non-physical first cause, we know it the same way that we know about subatomic particles, we now it from their effect.

No, you did not. I am going to open a new thread about this and similar subjects.

 

[crowonsnow]

All of us start with our own view of things, but we all share the thought that solipsim doesn’t cut it. We all avoid stepping front of buses.

I was thinking the same thing. It reminded me of elementary school traffic safety instruction and how closing your eyes and covering them with your hands doesn’t make that oncoming car go away.

 

[crowonsnow]

Not the same, by a long shot. Nature is neutral, what we do with its powers is not neutral. As the saying goes: “a hammer can be used to build a house, and it also can be used to bash a head”. It is not the fault of the hammer.

You read my mind.

 

[warpspeedpetey]

Well put. And that is not what JD said. Logic itself is just a tool. A logical argument can be correct and still unsound, based upon the premises.

Every elephant can sing.
Jumbo is an elephant.
Therefore Jumbo can sing.

That is a logically valid, yet unsound argument.

if the premise is demonstrably wrong, of course. no elephant can sing.

Right on. The fundamental question is the nature of existence. STEM is what we know, since (as you said) solipsism does not lead anywhere. Likewise we know that non-physical entites exist.

Concepts and ideas. These are the product of our minds, whch are the products of our brains. Non-physical entities are “inert”, physical existence is “active”.

So we know two types of existence. The queston is, if there is a third type of existence, which is non-physical, yet active, which can influence the physical reality, yet is immune to the active physical actions.

This third kind of existence is what posited by Aquinas.

i dont think that is what he proposes is a third existence. or at least that G-d or a first cause is.

here is why i dont.

if something has any physical qaulities, it is physical, subject to physical laws, or some combination of them, making its behavior at least statistically predictable. i.e vacuum, virtual particles, tachyons, etc

lacking those qaulities would make an object non-physical.

there would seem to be only 2 states, things that are physical, and things that aren’t.

of course as theists, we dont have aproblem with the interaction of the physical and non-physical,

from a secular point, first cause was operative prior to the establishment of any of the physical laws based on our universal constants.

just like two inert chemicals can be used to mix a chemically active compound, there is no reason to believe that a non-physical first cause must be physically ‘active’ to create matter, any more than an inert chemical need be ‘active’ in order to form an active compound with another inert chemical

further, the ‘rules’ that we now see for matter did not yet exist. because, the universeal constants that give us the physical laws, were not yet formed.

as an aside, concepts and ideas are not non-physical entities, apart from the chemical interactions in your brain, they simply dont exist at all.

 

[warpspeedpetey]

No, you did not. I am going to open a new thread about this and similar subjects.

just saying that i did not, is not an answer to the question, please tell me how it is not logically necessary?

give me arguments.

there is no need to start a new thread, you can answer here.