There is no God

[Scott_Waddell]

Alois:

Exceptions don’t set the rules. Or would you like me to point out the Inquisition any time Catholics attempt to take the moral high ground? Be careful of the tools you debate with.

you need to substantiate that the Middle Ages were a stagnant cesspool. And that the modern atrocities were exceptions. They sure are awfully big exceptions. Also, if we grant your presuppositions about the Inquisitions, you need to establish that they were the norm and not an exception. Even if you could, this would not necessarily warrant painting the Middle Ages as a stagnant cesspool.

It’s the people behind the technology, not the technology itself.

I agree which goes directly to my point that there is no discernable moral advancement.

I think we all know that today, the most industrialized countries are also the most “moral”. (perhaps not of Christian morals, but that’s a different issue) Technology on the whole has decreased suffering exponentially more than increasing it.

Again, this does not establish the Middle Ages as a stagnant cesspool.

Either way, knowledge is not a direct result of technology. The two terms are not interchangeable, and I’d enjoy it if you didn’t try to switch them around.

I didn’t.

Ooooooooor, not? I’m sure you have a good enough grasp on history to understand the problems of early civilization, and why civilization today is much more successful.

Again, none of this establishes the Middle Ages as a stagnant cesspool.

 

[EnterTheBowser]

John Doran:

has the universe existed for an infinite, or for a finite period of time?

Let me ask you a question: is the surface of the Earth finite or infinite in area? Now, obviously it is finite; it’s a stupid question. But given that - where’s the edge? Where are the boundaries for this finite surface?

My point is that just because a thing is finite does not mean it is bounded.

 

[hurst]

“Famous atheist renounces atheism.”

1. I doubt the “famous”. I never heard of that guy until he renounced atheism. Perhaps he is famous among thiests because of his renouncement?

Well, others say he is famous

Flew is one of the most renowned atheists of the 20th century, even making the shortlist of “Contemporary Atheists” at About.com. So if he has changed his mind to any degree, whatever you may think of his reasons, the event itself is certainly newsworthy.
secweb.org/asset.asp?AssetID=369

AnAtheist:

1. Millions of people change thier opinion and beliefs over time. What’s the point?

I tried to bold the points in that post. Here they are again:

• He now believes in God more or less based on scientific evidence
• It could be a person in the sense of a being that has intelligence and a purpose, I suppose.
• biologists’ investigation of DNA “has shown, by the almost unbelievable complexity of the arrangements which are needed to produce (life), that intelligence must have been involved,” Flew says
• My whole life has been guided by the principle of Plato’s Socrates: Follow the evidence, wherever it leads.

AnAtheist:

How about this headline: "31.10.1517: Famous catholic theology professor renounces Catholicism."
Is that a good protestant argument against Catholicism?

First, I did not just pass off a headline. I pasted the article and bolded the points. Second, there is nothing wrong with providing arguments this way, but that does not mean it is the final word.

hurst

 

[EnterTheBowser]

hurst:

…

Who made that rule?

Are you “seeking truth”, or are you just trying to force individuals to bear the heavy burden of proof?

…

This suggests that atheists are lazy tyrants. I am not just calling out names here. The basis for laziness is that they 1) refuse to prove their position, 2) refuse to acknowledge they need to, and 3) do not try to keep up on reasons for belief, remaining stuck in some old caricature thereof. The basis for tyrant is that they 1) command the believers to present arguments, defend their cause and prove their points, 2) prevent them from mentioning names of others whose prior work might help them, and 3) accuse anyone (including Flew) who does not keep up on the latest theories explaining a natural cause of everything. I will grant that not all atheists necessarily fall into this categorization, but your statement and general disposition certainly seem to match it. I hope I am wrong, but then why did you make that statement?

The fact is, there is nothing wrong with bringing up the work and thoughts of others, such as Plato or Aquinas or others. You can do the same. In fact, I have seen your side do so, and there is nothing wrong with that.

Finally, I did not just give a name. I pasted in what the article said. (Thank you for the followup info on it.)

I apologize - you also brought up the arguments that concerned Flew. I will also admit that it is not a bad idea to use arguments made by others, and give them credit for it. On the other hand, arguments like: “Bertrand Russel was a brilliant philosopher who was an atheist” are bad arguments - a good argument would be “Bertrand Russel was a brilliant philosopher who was an atheist because…” The “rule” is just good sense; furthermore it’s really just a restatement of the fallacy of appealing to authority.

And do you have evidence that I have refused to advance positive arguments for atheism? Whose beliefs have I carricatured? Is it really such a bad thing to ask my opposition to present arguments?

 

[john_doran]

EnterTheBowser:

Let me ask you a question: is the surface of the Earth finite or infinite in area? Now, obviously it is finite; it’s a stupid question. But given that - where’s the edge? Where are the boundaries for this finite surface?

My point is that just because a thing is finite does not mean it is bounded.

ok. two questions:

1. can you demonstrate that this “unboundedness” does, in fact, mitigate the entailment relation between the propositions “the universe has existed for a finite period of time”, and “the universe began to exist”?
2. can you demonstrate that time is, in fact, unbounded in this way?

 

[EnterTheBowser]

Well, let’s look at the abiogenesis argument this way:
1: Life arose
2: Life could not have arisen from non-life through natural processes
3: Therefore some supernatural force created life; this is God

It’s a positive argument for theism. Now, if you want to make it, support for 2 would be good, none of which has been forthcoming. But to avoid charges of being a lazy tyrant, I’ll try to rebut 2 even before anyone defends it. Four responses:

A: Law of large numbers. Even if abiogenesis is astronomically unlikely, there are trillions and trillions (and trillions) of stars; trillions and trillions of planets in this universe, and billions of years of time. It might be unlikely for life to arise here on Earth, but in the universe as a whole? Probably not.

B: All that is required for abiogenesis is the development of an imperfectly self-replicating molecule. Several of these are known and could have arisen from the conditions we expect to see on an early Earth. I’m going to post a link, again, because I am not a biologist and the article cites thoroughly and explains things quite well. talkorigins.org/faqs/abioprob/abioprob.html

C: The conclusion of the argument does not follow from the premises. Even if it were true that life as we know it on Earth could not have arisen from stochastic processes (random chance) occurring on an early Earth, this does not lead us to conclude a supernatural designer. It might indeed be possible that there are other forms of life that arose in conditions where their arising is highly likely, and that these natural life forms seeded the early Earth with the things necessary for life as we know it to arise.

D: Brute fact. Now, let’s admit, again, that it is astronomically unlikely for life to arise on Earth - or anywhere (see A). But given that, it is possible that it just happened. If we roll a billion-sided die, it is astronomically unlikely to land on a 1 (assuming that there are a billion different numbers on the die and that one of them is a 1). But if it does land on a 1, we probably shouldn’t conclude that someone fiddled with the die to make it land on a 1. So: life just happened.

Remark: as I’ve said previously, science has this amazing habit of explaining things that no one thought it could explain. Once upon a time, earthquakes were the thrashing of Loki in an underground cavern. As science has expanded its horizons, the province of the divine has shrunk, moving further back into the gaps in our understanding. Why should we expect this to be any different?

 

[AnAtheist]

hurst:

I tried to bold the points in that post. Here they are again:

• He now believes in God more or less based on scientific evidence

I guess for each scientist who believes the evidence points to God, there are at least two who believe the opposite.

• biologists’ investigation of DNA “has shown, by the almost unbelievable complexity of the arrangements which are needed to produce (life), that intelligence must have been involved,” Flew says

An often uttered but somewhat unsound argument. For two reasons: 1. If complexity requires intelligence, which is complex by itself (in most arguments of that sort complexer than the design designed by it), how could that intelligence have appeared? 2. It is impossible to calculate the odds for the evolvement of complex structures. We simply do not know not enough about how likely the generation of certain structures under certain conditions is. We only know, that self-organisation does exist in nature, so an external designer is not necessary. That is no disproof a designer of course, but it means, the odds for undesigned DNA or brain structures are not 0.

• My whole life has been guided by the principle of Plato’s Socrates: Follow the evidence, wherever it leads.

Nothing wrong with that.

 

[Gilbert_Keith]

JSMITTY

Indeed, but AnAtheist might have a little bit of a point. The Church teaches that non-believers have morality “written on their hearts,” right? Don’t we call it Natural Law?

Indeed, we do call it that. Unfortunate, atheists don’t call it that, at least not the atheists I know. For them morality is written by common sense. That’s about the best they can do by way of explanation. Again, unfortunately, common sense can be erased from the head and the heart, and we all know how reason (rationalization) can be sooooo effective in doing that. Eve rationalized at the behest of the Serpent. Sinners ever since have been calling good bad, and bad good.

Ah yes, the ultimate god REASON.

That’s why Moses gave us Commandments and so did Jesus … to get those Commandments back up on the barn wall.

 

[estesbob]

(Regarding abiogenesis and the origin of the universe)

Abiogenesis is one of those things which can be explained by natural forces; Alois posted a link to an excellent site, and you see to have ignored it. Additionally, this argument smacks of a God of the gaps argument.

Regarding the origin of the universe: where, then, did God come from? I imagine you will argue that God did not begin to exist and so therefore God need not have come from anything. On the other hand, if time in fact is part of the universe, there never was a time when the unverse did not exist; hence the universe did not begin to exist.

The link offered no proof that life sprung from non-life. It merely offered a theroy on how it mnight have happened-an unproiveable theory and a theory one can accept only through “faith”.

You also have failed to address where the matter that made up this non-life that spontaneously became life came from. I guess we have to take its existnece on Faith also?

 

[AnAtheist]

john doran:

ok. two questions:

1. can you demonstrate that this “unboundedness” does, in fact, mitigate the entailment relation between the propositions “the universe has existed for a finite period of time”, and “the universe began to exist”?
2. can you demonstrate that time is, in fact, unbounded in this way?

Mathematically that is surely possible. We just need to construct a vector space with enough dimensions, and declare time to be an apropriate hypersurface in that space.
The problems start with our perception of time as a linear in one direction flowing something. Hawking has written some clever stuff about the “time arrow” and has identified three “types” of it.

1. The time arrow in all current physical theories, which pretty much works in both directions, think of CPT invariance.
2. The time arrow involved in the 2nd law thermodynamics, i.e. denoting the direction where entropy rises.
3. The time arrow of human perception.
   2 & 3 are possibly the same, he argues that a memory might not work without the entropy arrow. Of course that is all speculation as long as do not have a theory on that 2nd law. nb: That “law” is an empirical observation, not a scientific theory.

 

[EnterTheBowser]

estesbob:

The link offered no proof that life sprung from non-life. It merely offered a theroy on how it mnight have happened-an unproiveable theory and a theory one can accept only through “faith”.

You also have failed to address where the matter that made up this non-life that spontaneously became life came from. I guess we have to take its existnece on Faith also?

You fail to understand the structure of the argument. I’ve made a statement vey like the one I am about to make previously, so I guess you must have missed it.

The atheist does not need to prove that life actually arose through natural forces. The atheist needs to prove that life could have arisen through natural forces. This is enough to rebut theistic arguments from abiogenesis; it is enough to defend atheism.

Regarding “where did all the matter in the universe come from:” Where did God come from?

 

[Gilbert_Keith]

John Doran

*so why don’t we just drop it?
*
Drop what?

Drop defending the faith against people who try to slime it by asserting that secular morality produces better people than Christian morality?

John, sometimes I wonder where you are coming from.

It was of course Marx and Hitler who opposed Christian morality. The evils they engendered were in the the name of Nogod, not God. Do you want to erase their memory from this board for the sake of calmer waters?

And if so, what is your definition of apologetics? To apologize for being a Christian and to praise atheists for every absurdity they utter in this forum?

You and I have been over this ground before, and it pains me to see we are still at it.

 

[AnAtheist]

Gilbert Keith:

Again, unfortunately, common sense can be erased from the head and the heart

Unfortunately,* religious belief *can be erased from head and the heart too, or imposed in both that is. Spend a couple of weeks in brain washing sessions with the right mixture of drugs and you believe anything.

 

[EnterTheBowser]

Regarding atheism and morality, there are two arguments, both bad arguments on the face of it, and there are problems beyond that.

A:
1: Theists are more likely to be good than atheists
2: Therefore theism is true

B
1: Theism can justify morality
2: Atheism cannot justify morality
3: Therefore theism is true

They’re both bad arguments because the conclusions do not follow from the premises. I don’t know how A can be salvaged. To make B work, there needs to be the additional premise “Morality is justified.” As of yet I have not seen support for this premise. Furthermore, there are problems with B1, as I argued in the post at the top of this page.

 

[AnAtheist]

Gilbert Keith:

Drop defending the faith

John Doran does not need to apologise for his faith, and neither need you.
Plus he does need to apologise for ignorance, which you should, as post like this one clearly show:

against people who try to slime it by asserting that secular morality produces better people than Christian morality?

That has nowhere been said in this thread. It has been said, that religious people do not automatically produce better societies. Can’t you see the difference?

 

[Filius_Prodigus]

EnterTheBowser:

Remark: as I’ve said previously, science has this amazing habit of explaining things that no one thought it could explain. Once upon a time, earthquakes were the thrashing of Loki in an underground cavern. As science has expanded its horizons, the province of the divine has shrunk, moving further back into the gaps in our understanding. Why should we expect this to be any different?

Although I share your enthusiasm for science (which my Church helped to build in the last millenium), I do not agree with you in your assertion that “the province of the divine has shrunk, moving further back into the gaps in our understanding”.

1. This phrase of yours reveals that it is you who presupposes a god of the gaps.
2. There is no gap. Remember? Christianity holds that God created everything. If that is your gap, it is one the size of the Universe. The Universe is autonomous… which is analogous to you not needing the watchmaker beside you to push the hands of your wristwatch 24/7.
3. The concept of Christianity that God created the Universe (from the Latin “universus” = poured out as one) under his command, thus, there is only one set of commands that governs the Universe that he created… made it intellectually possible for the first scientists to do inductions from a particular event to the Universe as a whole, therefore promoting scientific endeavor.

Thank you.

Our faith comes from the Love of the Lord. He wants our salvation by means of His Word, which is Truth.

 

[EnterTheBowser]

Filius Prodigus:

Although I share your enthusiasm for science (which my Church helped to build in the last millenium), I do not agree with you in your assertion that “the province of the divine has shrunk, moving further back into the gaps in our understanding”.

1. This phrase of yours reveals that it is you who presupposes a god of the gaps.
2. There is no gap. Remember? Christianity holds that God created everything. If that is your gap, it is one the size of the Universe. The Universe is autonomous… which is analogous to you not having the watchmaker beside you to push the hands of your wristwatch 24/7.
3. The concept of Christianity that God created the Universe (from the Latin “universus” = poured out as one) under his command, thus, there is only one set of commands that governs the Universe that he created. This made intellectually possible for the first scientists to do inductions from a particular event to the Universe as a whole.

Thank you.

Our faith comes from the Love of the Lord. He wants our salvation by means of His Word, which is Truth.

I was trying to argue that the particular argument being advanced seems to be a God of the gaps argument. These sorts of arguments run:
1- Phenomenon X happened
2- Natural forces cannot account for X
3- Therefore supernatural forces caused X; this supernatural force is God
In this case, X was abiogenesis. I don’t mean to argue that a natural explanation of abiogenesis precludes God, or something of that nature.

 

[hurst]

EnterTheBowser:

I apologize - you also brought up the arguments that concerned Flew. I will also admit that it is not a bad idea to use arguments made by others, and give them credit for it.

Thank you.

EnterTheBowser:

On the other hand, arguments like: “Bertrand Russel was a brilliant philosopher who was an atheist” are bad arguments - a good argument would be “Bertrand Russel was a brilliant philosopher who was an atheist because…” The “rule” is just good sense; furthermore it’s really just a restatement of the fallacy of appealing to authority.

While I agree things are not true merely because someone “said so”, it is useful to appeal to persons who have an established reputation and weighty opinions because they are more likely to have studied it thoroughly, are more likely to be smarter than us, and have endured through the test of time and audience. Thus, I would rather trust St. Augustine than myself in an area I have not studied. But this would only work if a person already accepted that authority. This happens between believers when they try to figure something out - discrepancies are often resolved by appealing to authority such as Scripture or the Early Church Fathers.

But I agree it won’t help much with someone who doesn’t already accept a particular authority.

hurst

 

[Filius_Prodigus]

EnterTheBowser:

I was trying to argue that the particular argument being advanced seems to be a God of the gaps argument. These sorts of arguments run:
1- Phenomenon X happened
2- Natural forces cannot account for X
3- Therefore supernatural forces caused X; this supernatural force is God
In this case, X was abiogenesis. I don’t mean to argue that a natural explanation of abiogenesis precludes God, or something of that nature.

Ok, I’m cool with that.

... but not with the rest.

“God of the gaps” argument is truly lame. Unscientific. Uncatholic. The trouble is, American Catholics are so influenced by the fundy B.S. of Protestantism, sometimes you can hardly tell the difference.

(Sorry guys, but what’s true is true).

 

[EnterTheBowser]

For Filius Prodigus and hurst:
I’m glad we can agreee. It’s a nice change from acrimonious discord.