Is Atheism Positive?

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Christians have yet to prove that Jesus’s resurrection really happened and isn’t just a story in the Bible. This they have not proved and never will be able to prove. Therefore it’s likely the resurrection didn’t really happen and is just a story in the Bible.

Argument from ignorance FTW! 👍
If you expect me to comment on any future posts of yours, you will have to do better than this. 🤷
 
If you expect me to comment on any future posts of yours, you will have to do better than this. 🤷
Apologies for using what I thought was an apt analogy. I’ll break it down using your argument as I understand it.
The critics of abiogenesis as an intelligently designed process is that they have yet to prove that abiogenesis occurred by chance instead of by intelligent design.
It’s true that we don’t yet know how life on Earth began. It hasn’t been proven that it occurred by chance, but it also hasn’t been proven that it occurred through intelligent design. On the question of life’s origin on Earth we are ignorant.
This they have not proved and never will be able to prove.
It’s probably true that we’ll never be able to exactly replicate the conditions in which life began on Earth 3.5 billion years ago, but it’s also true that we’ll never be able to observe the handiwork of an intelligent designer 3.5 billion years ago.
One is therefore free to conclude the unlikelihood of chance and the likelihood of design,
While someone might be free to draw that conclusion, it would be, in my estimation, a logical fallacy. We cannot draw conclusions of likelihood based solely upon our ignorance. See Argument from Ignorance.
unless of course one is an atheist who cannot imagine an intelligent designer at work behind creation, a premise that Einstein himself dismissed.
Irrelevant to the argument.
 
If you expect me to comment on any future posts of yours, you will have to do better than this. 🤷
Apologies for using what I thought was an apt analogy. I’ll break it down using your argument as I understand it.
The critics of abiogenesis as an intelligently designed process is that they have yet to prove that abiogenesis occurred by chance instead of by intelligent design.
It’s true that we don’t yet know how life on Earth began. It hasn’t been conclusively demonstrated that it occurred by purely natural processes, but it also hasn’t been demonstrated that it occurred through intelligent design. On the question of life’s origin on Earth we are ignorant.
This they have not proved and never will be able to prove.
It’s probably true that we’ll never be able to exactly replicate the conditions in which life began on Earth 3.5 billion years ago, but it’s also true that we’ll never be able to observe the handiwork of an intelligent designer 3.5 billion years ago.
One is therefore free to conclude the unlikelihood of chance and the likelihood of design,
While someone might be free to draw that conclusion, it would be, in my estimation, a logical fallacy. Just because we can’t yet demonstrate that abiogenesis arose through purely natural processes doesn’t automatically make intelligent design true or even likely. We cannot create knowledge solely from ignorance. See Argument from Ignorance.
unless of course one is an atheist who cannot imagine an intelligent designer at work behind creation, a premise that Einstein himself dismissed.
Irrelevant to the argument.
 
Just because we can’t yet demonstrate that abiogenesis arose through purely natural processes doesn’t automatically make intelligent design true or even likely. We cannot create knowledge solely from ignorance. See Argument from Ignorance.
“Can’t yet prove”? What makes you think it will be possible to prove in the distant future?

What we can logically infer from the likely structure of the first living bacteria is that it’s complexity suggests design rather than accident. There is nothing about that structure that suggests accident.

Because we know design when we see it, we ought to argue common sense rather than the magic of accidental collocation of atoms and molecules.
 
What we can logically infer from the likely structure of the first living bacteria is that it’s complexity suggests design rather than accident. There is nothing about that structure that suggests accident.
Your position confuses me. You seem averse to evolution even though your criticisms pertain to abiogenesis and you recognize that these are separate issues.

Could you give me your opinion of theistic evolution, i.e., the idea that God got life on Earth started and allowed it to evolve to its present state?
 
Could you give me your opinion of theistic evolution, i.e., the idea that God got life on Earth started and allowed it to evolve to its present state?
I am an evolutionist. God did not merely “allow” evolution, but also guided it to the present state according to the laws of nature, which laws did not merely erupt but were planned.

But with abiogenesis we see the first signature of God in the first living cell. That first living cell made inevitable all the manifest wonder, beauty, and variety of nature that followed.
 
I am an evolutionist. God did not merely “allow” evolution, but also guided it to the present state according to the laws of nature, which laws did not merely erupt but were planned.

But with abiogenesis we see the first signature of God in the first living cell. That first living cell made inevitable all the manifest wonder, beauty, and variety of nature that followed.
So God guides evolution. We can’t see any direct evidence of this - it’s entirely what we would describe as natural. Many Christians, including yourself, accept this. You can’t point to a particular evolutionary point and say ‘God actually did this bit’. It’s not possible.

Yet when it comes to the extremely gradual transition from non life to the most basic of what some might call life (it wasn’t like ‘Kazam!’ and there were a gazillion microbes swarming over the planet), it seems like God couldn’t work it be unfold naturally (as He did with evolution), but had to specifically step in and do something divine.

Why couldn’t He have allowed it to unfold naturally? The whole universe did. Just unfolded naturally after He give it the Big Bang it needed. But not this one aspect. He couldn’t set things up so that it was a natural process.

Sounds like you’re saying that God couldn’t do it. He had to have two bites at the cherry.
 
I am an evolutionist. God did not merely “allow” evolution, but also guided it to the present state according to the laws of nature, which laws did not merely erupt but were planned.
I asked because you were defending intelligent design, yet what you describe is not what intelligent design proponents claim. In the textbooks they wanted to use in science classrooms, they defined intelligent design as the instantaneous creation of organisms complete with their familiar features. In other words, they genuinely believed that snakes, birds, wolves, etc., were just poofed into existence and did not have a common ancestor. Can we agree that that version of intelligent design is mistaken?
 
So God guides evolution. We can’t see any direct evidence of this - it’s entirely what we would describe as natural. Many Christians, including yourself, accept this. You can’t point to a particular evolutionary point and say ‘God actually did this bit’. It’s not possible.

Yet when it comes to the extremely gradual transition from non life to the most basic of what some might call life (it wasn’t like ‘Kazam!’ and there were a gazillion microbes swarming over the planet), it seems like God couldn’t work it be unfold naturally (as He did with evolution), but had to specifically step in and do something divine.

Why couldn’t He have allowed it to unfold naturally? The whole universe did. Just unfolded naturally after He give it the Big Bang it needed. But not this one aspect. He couldn’t set things up so that it was a natural process.

Sounds like you’re saying that God couldn’t do it. He had to have two bites at the cherry.
Only one bite was necessary, the Big Bang, which at its creation contained all the potency we observe as actual in the present world.

You speak of God as intermittently interfering with more than one bite. But God is outside time, so he knows all his Creation and its unfolding as a continuous present. He sustains it at every moment but is not inside it at every moment fine tuning as it goes along.

That is unnecessary, because the laws of nature God created have made the universe unfold as it should. To assume otherwise, to assume there is no God, is to assume that the universe is pure accident and without foundation for any law whatever.

Where do you think all the laws of nature come from … pure accident?
 
I asked because you were defending intelligent design, yet what you describe is not what intelligent design proponents claim. In the textbooks they wanted to use in science classrooms, they defined intelligent design as the instantaneous creation of organisms complete with their familiar features. In other words, they genuinely believed that snakes, birds, wolves, etc., were just poofed into existence and did not have a common ancestor. Can we agree that that version of intelligent design is mistaken?
Well, that’s a revelation to me. 🤷

Can you show me a passage from a textbook written to teach the “poofed” aspect of creation?

My own take on intelligent design would be that it is justified in abiogenesis, and that therefore the whole stream of life that followed abiogenesis to the present would be as intelligently guided as was the first living organism that came into being.

To the best of my knowledge, the biochemists who are partial to intelligent design do not deny that evolution occurred; they just deny the atheist presumption that evolution is the result of a **blind **watchmaker. They believe the watchmaker could **see **very well all the parts of the watch he was putting together.
 
Can you show me a passage from a textbook written to teach the “poofed” aspect of creation?
I can show you the definition itself, which was provided in court. As for a larger passage, I don’t care to hunt for a free online version of the book. The definition itself makes it pretty clear what is meant.
Of Pandas and People:
Intelligent design means that various forms of life began abruptly through an intelligent agency, with their distinctive features already intact. Fish with fins and scales, birds with feathers, beaks, wings, etc.
They believe life began abruptly with all features intact. In other words…poof.
My own take on intelligent design would be that it is justified in abiogenesis, and that therefore the whole stream of life that followed abiogenesis to the present would be as intelligently guided as was the first living organism that came into being.
Understood, but just to help you out in the future, everyone will know what you mean immediately if you describe yourself as a theistic evolutionist because there’s only one possible meaning of the term. “Intelligent design” has a tainted history, and most will assume you’re using the more infamous meaning mentioned above.
To the best of my knowledge, the biochemists who are partial to intelligent design do not deny that evolution occurred; they just deny the atheist presumption that evolution is the result of a **blind **watchmaker. They believe the watchmaker could **see **very well all the parts of the watch he was putting together.
While I can understand how someone could get the impression that, say, the human body is “well-made”, I certainly don’t see how it could be considered “well-made by almighty God”. The intricacies of the brain, the structure of the eye, etc., are very impressive, but there are some basic flaws that even a human engineer could have foreseen. Why have us breath and eat through the same orifice? Why dispose of waste and procreate with the same equipment? Why do I have a tailbone that just increases the pain of falling on my buttocks and a largely optional appendix that may rupture and kill me without warning? Why do I have a memory that can recall jingles from commercials I saw a decade ago but can’t recollect a formula I learned a week ago? Why can’t I voluntarily choose to fall asleep, especially when I’m exhausted? You have to admit that this is pretty sloppy on the designer’s part. For a being that can supposedly design the brain, these seem like rookie mistakes.

And I know the standard response is that we’re not supposed to be perfect because we’re being tested, but I thought this life was supposed to be a moral test, right? How is having a poor memory (for example) supposed to test my devotion to God?
 
“Can’t yet prove”? What makes you think it will be possible to prove in the distant future?
We’ve barely begun to scratch the surface on exploring the issue of abiogenesis. It seems unduly pessimistic to assume we won’t make any progress on the question in the next few decades. How likely was it that we’d plant the US flag on the surface of the Moon just 60 years or so after two bicycle repairmen began tinkering with their inventions on the dunes of Kitty Hawk? In any case, I was hoping you would have addressed the salient part of that paragraph – the bit about arguments from ignorance.
What we can logically infer from the likely structure of the first living bacteria is that it’s complexity suggests design rather than accident. There is nothing about that structure that suggests accident.
Because we know design when we see it, we ought to argue common sense rather than the magic of accidental collocation of atoms and molecules.
As I understand it, there is no reason to assume that the first living organisms were as complex as even the simplest modern bacteria. In addition, there is nothing magical or accidental about electro-chemical processes. If we put hydrogen and oxygen atoms together under the right conditions we get water – every time – no magic and no accident.

What does your common sense tell you about this object?

https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/...NhoTZ_WoPt5k_P6vO7MVGlZzvi-VLXMB5QleC9k18mAcA

Intelligently designed or product of a purely natural process?
 
Only one bite was necessary, the Big Bang, which at its creation contained all the potency we observe as actual in the present world.
Precisely my point. Could you stop for a moment and consider why you are agreeing with me?
That is unnecessary, because the laws of nature God created have made the universe unfold as it should.

Where do you think all the laws of nature come from … pure accident?
For the sake of argument, we will agree that God instigated everything. And as you said, that moment when He did so, contained everything that we see around us which evolved within the laws of nature that He Himself set up.

People used to think that creatures were created fully formed (and I am astonished that you can attempt to argue for Creationism, or ID as it is now called, without knowing that this is what the proponents of ID are pushing). But now, post Darwin, we know that evolution occurred in a manner which we describe as naturally. Albeit, as we are agreed (for the purpose of this discussion), instigated by God.

So the Big Bang was God’s hand. And then everything unfurled as per His plan, which was nature itself. Nature (instigated by God) formed the universe. Nature (instigated by God) formed the stars and the planets and galaxies. Nature (instigated by God), formed the variety of life around us today, via the method of evolution. All entirely natural. All instigated by God via Natural Laws.

Except…when it comes to a gradual transition between non-life and what could barely be described as life at all, material that for sure did not have all the attributes that we describe as being required by living forms, which gradually evolved, naturally, to life as we could describe it today…well, no. Charles won’t accept that.

The entire universe is naturally formed by God’s will. Using natural processes that follow laws that God created. Except…for that transitional period.

God created EVERYTHING using His laws of nature. Except for life. That can’t be natural for some reason. That has to be a point where God’s natural laws don’t work in a way that would produce life.

When Darwin wrote his book and people realised that there wasn’t a ‘Poof’ moment, or a ‘Kazam’ moment when everything suddenly appeared, the Christian answer was that, fair enough, science is right, but…it’s all God’s work anyway. OK, everyone said. We’re all happy. We know how it was done and some people want to believe that God did it. No problem.

But now we don’t yet know how his laws of Nature did it’s work, some people are still refusing to accept it was anything other than by unnatural means. They still want their ‘Kazam!’

Why, in heaven’s name?
 
I can show you the definition itself, which was provided in court. As for a larger passage, I don’t care to hunt for a free online version of the book. The definition itself makes it pretty clear what is meant.

They believe life began abruptly with all features intact. In other words…poof.

Understood, but just to help you out in the future, everyone will know what you mean immediately if you describe yourself as a theistic evolutionist because there’s only one possible meaning of the term. “Intelligent design” has a tainted history, and most will assume you’re using the more infamous meaning mentioned above.

While I can understand how someone could get the impression that, say, the human body is “well-made”, I certainly don’t see how it could be considered “well-made by almighty God”. The intricacies of the brain, the structure of the eye, etc., are very impressive, but there are some basic flaws that even a human engineer could have foreseen. Why have us breath and eat through the same orifice? Why dispose of waste and procreate with the same equipment? Why do I have a tailbone that just increases the pain of falling on my buttocks and a largely optional appendix that may rupture and kill me without warning? Why do I have a memory that can recall jingles from commercials I saw a decade ago but can’t recollect a formula I learned a week ago? Why can’t I voluntarily choose to fall asleep, especially when I’m exhausted? You have to admit that this is pretty sloppy on the designer’s part. For a being that can supposedly design the brain, these seem like rookie mistakes.

And I know the standard response is that we’re not supposed to be perfect because we’re being tested, but I thought this life was supposed to be a moral test, right? How is having a poor memory (for example) supposed to test my devotion to God?
I am not at all surprised that you think you could have designed a better human than God did. 😉
 
We’ve barely begun to scratch the surface on exploring the issue of abiogenesis. It seems unduly pessimistic to assume we won’t make any progress on the question in the next few decades.

As I understand it, there is no reason to assume that the first living organisms were as complex as even the simplest modern bacteria. In addition, there is nothing magical or accidental about electro-chemical processes. If we put hydrogen and oxygen atoms together under the right conditions we get water – every time – no magic and no accident.

What does your common sense tell you about this object?

https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/...NhoTZ_WoPt5k_P6vO7MVGlZzvi-VLXMB5QleC9k18mAcA

Intelligently designed or product of a purely natural process?
It is duly pessimistic that no progress will be made in the next few decades. We cannot recreate the conditions that prevailed on Earth when the first living organism appeared. There is every reason to believe that the first living organism was decidedly complex, endowed with the power of metabolism, movement and reproduction simultaneously.

That’s called irreducible complexity. Case closed. 😉

As to the symmetrical structure pictured, everything in the universe was intelligently designed to appear in the universe.

EVERYTHING!
 
But now we don’t yet know how his laws of Nature did it’s work, some people are still refusing to accept it was anything other than by unnatural means. They still want their ‘Kazam!’

Why, in heaven’s name?
Why? I think people know instinctively that the theory of evolution has produced a theory that seeks to deprive nature of being Intelligently Designed. Dawkins himself allowed that evolution made him feel it respectable to be an atheist.

Creationism is an attempt to get the focus back on God and away from the godless evolutionists. The reason evolutionists are so contemptuous of Intelligent Design is that it challenges their atheism.

So I think either kettle or pot calling the other black is virtually inevitable.

However, the subject of evolution is banned in this forum so I won’t be answering any more posts on the subject. I advise others to do likewise or this thread is likely to be closed.
 
Apologies for using what I thought was an apt analogy.
It’s apt. APT! youtube.com/watch?v=3MpRt41tPoc
Christians have yet to prove that Jesus’s resurrection really happened and isn’t just a story in the Bible. This they have not proved and never will be able to prove. Therefore it’s likely the resurrection didn’t really happen and is just a story in the Bible.

Argument from ignorance FTW! 👍
Actually you’re making an argument from ignorance (“that a premise is false because it has not been proven true”), have a look at the article you linked.

Proofs are only possible in deductive reasoning, such as in math, whereas inductive reasoning, as in science or history, only allows a probable conclusion. No one can prove that the Sun will rise tomorrow. It’s highly likely, but it can’t be proved. You have to make your own decisions based on evidence.

btw love the positive arguments you guys are using against ID, but as Charles just said, don’t forget the ban on discussing evolution.
 
My own take on intelligent design would be that it is justified in abiogenesis, and that therefore the whole stream of life that followed abiogenesis to the present would be as intelligently guided as was the first living organism that came into being.
Seems to me that as you’re having to defend your own beliefs, the atheists have proved they can positively get you on your back foot. Might be time to get off ID and back to theism. 👍
 
I am not at all surprised that you think you could have designed a better human than God did. 😉
That isn’t what I said. I said that it seems any potential creator made rookie mistakes.

Imagine a surgeon performs a complex operation successfully. He takes a few shots of whiskey to celebrate and, when sewing the patient back up, he slips and cuts an artery. The patient promptly bleeds to death.

I’m not saying that I could do better than such a surgeon. The patient would be every bit as dead if I had to operate on them, and for all I know that surgeon may have been the only man alive that was qualified to perform the operation. But I don’t think that exempts the surgeon from being criticized for an idiotic mistake.

And so it is with God. The brain? Phenomenal. The eyes? Spectacular, pun intended. Breathing and eating through the same orifice? Not his best work, I’m afraid. And that’s the issue with God. Evolution due to the blind forces of nature would lead to good, but flawed, bodies. A deity allowing for any flaws is puzzling, no matter how good the other features of the body may be.
 
Then we don’t have free will?
“wired” implies we have no choice and aren’t responsible for anything.
So you think the average Catholic ignores the Church’s teaching on abortion, suicide and euthanasia?
More than seven in 10 U.S. women obtaining an abortion report a religious affiliation (37% protestant, 28% Catholic and 7% other).

Seeing as Catholics represent 25% of the population, that would be 12.5% of women are Catholics. And 28% of abortions are carried out on Catholics. So I guess yeah, the average Catholic is ignoring the church’s teaching.

Those who have an abortion are not ignoring the Church’s teaching but giving way to temptation. They feel a sense of shame which is absent in unbelievers and a sense of guilt afterwards.
Not sure about euthanasia or suicide
.

There is far more opposition to euthanasia by Catholic doctors and nurses than among secularists for obvious reasons. As for suicide:
According to the 2003 World Health Organization’s report on international male suicides rates (which compared 100 countries), of the top ten nations with the highest male suicide rates, all but one (Sri Lanka) are strongly irreligious nations with high levels of atheism. It is interesting to note, however, that of the top remaining nine nations leading the world in male suicide rates, all are former Soviet/Communist nations, such as Belarus, Ukraine, and Latvia. Of the bottom ten nations with the lowest male suicide rates, all are highly religious nations with statistically insignificant levels of organic atheism."[13]
But you missed out contraception. I wonder why…
Most methods of contraception do not entail killing the foetus.
Perhaps your standards of evidence are defective in ignoring or rejecting the reality of intangibles like persons, truth, freedom, justice and love…
As you said, they are intangible. Unless you are majoring in the arts or perhaps philosophy, people who go on to higher education tend to deal with (and presumably have a tendency towards) more tangible aspects of life. Although this survey of philosophers showed a huge proportion of atheists: commonsenseatheism.com/?p=13371. My apologies that it’s from a specifically atheist web site.

No sane person ignores the reality of persons, truth, freedom, justice and love even though they cannot be detected by tangible means. Logical positivism collapsed when its proponents realised the sense verification principle couldn’t verify itself. Our starting point is not matter but mind - without which we would know nothing. Contemporary philosophers tend to be analytic and are not representative of the greatest intellectuals like Plato, Aristotle, Socrates, Aquinas, Descartes, Locke, Berkeley, Pascal, Leibniz, Spinoza, Kant, Kierkegaard and Maritain (who contributed to the formulation of the UNDHR) who were certainly not materialists.
So I wouldn’t say that standards of evidence are defective. I would say that there is a tendency to approach evidence from a different direction. And, dare I say, to be more rigorous in that approach. For example, appeals to authority are not held to be as important for some people. Indeed, in some areas of higher education, it is actively discouraged (don’t just accept what I say, tell me why YOU think it is so).
Materialism is the dominant trend in the West but it is not representative of mankind as a whole. Intangibles like human rights and the principles of liberty, equality and fraternity are accepted and respected throughout the world, even though they are often disregarded in practice. They are not human conventions but objective facts regardless of whether we recognise them or reject them.
 
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