Two more ways to convince a skeptic that God is real

[Lily_Bernans]

The reason is simple. Since God is supposed to be benevolent, I look for the explanation of “bad” things. If God would supposed to be evil, I would ask for the explanation of good things.

In other words, I am looking for explanations of the discrepancy between reality and the “theory”.

That is exactly the case. The God of the gaps keeps on disappearing, slowly but surely.

Well, I was expecting something more rational from a professor of theology. “Nothing” is a concept, not an ontological entity. The phrase “something from nothing” is nonsense. The universe simply “IS”, it simply “EXISTS”, it is a brute FACT. There is no explanation, and there is no need for explanation.

The Newtonian worldview thought about the universe as a “bubble” of something in an infinite “ocean” of “nothing”. This worldview has been rendered incorrect in the Einsteinian concept of STEM, space, time, energy and matter. The universe is everything there is, to speak of “outside” the universe or “before” the universe are syntactically correct, but semantically meaningless utterances.

You speak of the Big Bang, as if it were the “beginning” of the universe. That is a usual misconception. The Big Bang is the beginning of the current form of the universe. The change of the singularity is an interesting physical problem, but it has no bearing on the metaphysics of the reality. Our current knowledge cannot penetrate the first instances of existence, and it is even questionable to speak of “time” within a singularity (just like to speak of “time” in a black hole). The actual physics of reality is much more complicated than we can currently comprehend.

Please leave my profession out of this discussion.

No, I do not speak of the Big Bang as the beginning of the universe, so I am NOT guilty of that misconception. Material had to exist to cause the Big Bang. Anyone can see that is a given.

Nothing in this world “just is.” That is nonsense. Everything that is was created by someone or something. Things are in flux, but the raw material from which they are made did not simply “spring up.”

Once again, you are trying to wiggle out of providing an answer to a question for which no atheist can provide a coherent answer.

 

[Lily_Bernans]

She never answers anything that she is uncomfortable with. That’s how she operates.

Well, she did say the universe “just is.”

 

[Pallas_Athene]

It’s a false dichotomy to say we have to accept either kind of universal skepticism, as they are philosophical claims, and neither us nobodies nor you philosophers have to believe in either of them.

Considering the meaning of “universal” - “all encompassing” it is a rather logical question to ask, what do you mean by the phrase of “universal skepticism”. Because obviously you do not doubt your own existence.

Gravity only notices changes at the speed of light, so a scientist must allow the possibility it’s gone. True it’s a very remote possibility, but there’s no way, even in principle, to know for certain.

As we seemed to agree, there is no need to expect a 100% certainty for something to be called “knowledge”. The question is the “very remote possibility”. When you sit in a room, it is theoretically possible that all the air molecules will move to the other side of the room, and you will suffocate. Would you doubt that such a phenomenon will NEVER happen? Should one take it into consideration? It is not even theoretically possible that the Sun would “flicker out” of existence - according to our current level of knowledge. And there is no reasonable assumption that our current level of knowledge is deficient in THAT respect.

Science only deals with “reasonable doubt”, not the unreasonable doubt.

I’m skeptical of your claim that an average person isn’t very skeptical since I don’t know what an absolute measure would be to compare it against.

Just look at people in general. Look at the number of poor suckers who get fleeced every day with con-artists. Maybe you remember Jim and Tammy Baker, two notorious con-artists who got millions of dollars from the believers in their “church”. Or Pat Robertson, who asked his followers to donate huge sums of money, because if they do not, then God will smite him! And the followers coughed up those millions.

Hopefully you don’t need as much evidence when a friend tries to convince you it’s worth watching a movie, as you would demand from a stranger who claims that jumping off a high building is good for your digestion. So with that comparison in mind, if someone believes she has encountered God, and finds that her faith helps her get through the day, and she joins a church and meets lots of people who become her friends, and she feels a valued member of that community, why would she want to make a federal case out of it?

If that would be the whole picture, I would have no problem. It would still be a fascinating question how can people maintain two contradictory concepts at the same time, and believe both of them to be valid. But unfortunately the picture is much darker. Look at the poor posters on the Moral Theology forum, who suffer from fear of going to hell, because they indulged in a perfectly normal activity of masturbation.

And of course, look at reality, where the believers would love to legislate away anything that is not “pure” according to their worldview. Their attitude is damaging not only to themselves, but also to others.

 

[CHRISTINE77]

Well, she did say the universe “just is.”

And she seems to know everything.

 

[Pallas_Athene]

Please leave my profession out of this discussion.

Well, it is “cool” to refer to my atheism, but not your profession? I did not say anything pejorative about your profession.

Nothing in this world “just is.” That is nonsense.

How are you going to prove it? That is just another unsubstantiated assumption.

Everything that is was created by someone or something.

Moreover, you said: “Everything that IS was created by someone or something”. You say that God IS. Therefore - according to YOUR proposition God was created by someone or something. But then the super-God exists, so it also must have been created… and so on ad infinitum.

Now you may start to backpedal, and amend to “everything that was created, was created by someone or something”. That would be a tautologically true statement, but then you would need to prove that the universe WAS created. You cannot posit it as both a starting point and the conclusion of your argument. That would be “circular reasoning”.

Things are in flux, but the raw material from which they are made did not simply “spring up.”

I did not say that it did. “Nothing” is just a concept, not an ontological entity. I said that the universe is the ontological foundation of reality, which simply exists. How are you going to refute it? Your simple word would be insufficient.

Once again, you are trying to wiggle out of providing an answer to a question for which no atheist can provide a coherent answer.

Right on. Just like no “atheist” can answer the question: “what exists to the north from the North Pole”? Or “when did you stop beating your wife (or husband)”? Nonsensical questions cannot be answered.

 

[fisherman_carl]

I did not say that it did. “Nothing” is just a concept, not an ontological entity. I said that the universe is the ontological foundation of reality, which simply exists. How are you going to refute it? Your simple word would be insufficient.

.

Basically, you believe that the universe is a ‘brute fact’ without explanation.

I think Aquinas does a satisfactory explanation of the first cause argument to refute that. There must exist something in pure Act as the first cause in order for anything to be actualized. This is true whether the universe is finite or eternal.

 

[Frankenfurter]

The reason is simple. Since God is supposed to be benevolent, I look for the explanation of “bad” things. If God would supposed to be evil, I would ask for the explanation of good things.

In other words, I am looking for explanations of the discrepancy between reality and the “theory”.

That is a wonderful thing to contemplate. A whole other subject asked by all people on their journey of faith. If God is ‘good’ then why are there 'bad things. It appears from your reasoning that you quickly jump to the same conclusion, namely that when two things about God coexist in your mind and do not jibe, then you jump to, ‘therefore, God does not exist’. Is that really the only answer you can think of?

BTW above I meant to say ‘When you reduce god to the UNexplainable…’ But I see you got the correct meaning.

So you agree that the God of the cracks disappears over time BECAUSE of how you have defined him? Is that right? It is your definition that causes him to disappear?

Consider for the moment that God created you with the ability to understand the universe (that is in fact the Catholic position). If you look deeply into nature and understand it, does this process CAUSE God to disappear? That seems silly. Instead, God has created you WITH the ability to understand the universe. That is one thing you know about your creator now.

Another Catholic position is that as you come to understand Creation, you also come to understand the Creator. Just like if you read an author’s novels you learn about them.

Do you reject the existence of an author once you have read his books?

You have a long way to go to getting over the rejection of having God not live up to your expectations as a child. That is not your fault. You are on the same journey as all of us. We all take different paths. You went down a tough road. I feel for you and understand your hurt.

 

[Pallas_Athene]

Basically, you believe that the universe is a ‘brute fact’ without explanation.

Of course. Don’t forget that explanations cannot go to infinity. There must be a “brute fact” which needs no explanation. Atheists choose the universe for this “role”. After all the word universe means “everything there is”.

I think Aquinas does a satisfactory explanation of the first cause argument to refute that. There must exist something in pure Act as the first cause in order for anything to be actualized. This is true whether the universe is finite or eternal.

It is just an unsupported assumption. A brute fact cannot be explained and needs no explanation.

If you look at the theistic and the atheistic worldview, you will see how they “mirror” each other. The theist says: “God is a brute fact, it needs no explanation, it is the ontological foundation of the whole existence”. The atheist says: “The universe is a brute fact, it needs no explanation, it is the ontological foundation of the whole existence”.

If you apply Occam’s razor, then the “God hypothesis” must be discarded, because it has one extra unexplained factor. And, of course, by hypothesizing God, you need to explain, just HOW could an immaterial entity create the material existence. Because the biblical “let there be light”, reeks of sheer magic. It has no explanatory value.

Then the picture gets worse when we go from this deistic, faceless first cause to the stipulated Christian God with all its strange and sometimes nonsensical attributes, especially the “loving nature” of God. I suggest to type in “famine in Africa” into Google and then click on “images”. You look at the result of lack of rain… no matter how hard we humans would try to help (and there are many organizations pouring their heart out) we CANNOT create a rainfall. No matter how hard we try we cannot cure the diseases.

Many apologists try to turn the table by accusing humans for not doing “enough”. As if humans could create rainfalls, and could remedy all the diseases plaguing the region. You can blame anyone if they don’t do everything that they CAN do. No one should be blamed for things which are outside his realm of competence. But God has no limitations. He can do anything and everything except “married bachelors”.

 

[Pallas_Athene]

That is a wonderful thing to contemplate. A whole other subject asked by all people on their journey of faith. If God is ‘good’ then why are there 'bad things. It appears from your reasoning that you quickly jump to the same conclusion, namely that when two things about God coexist in your mind and do not jibe, then you jump to, ‘therefore, God does not exist’. Is that really the only answer you can think of?

I use the same method as you would use if someone stipulated the existence of a “married bachelor”. If there are two contradictory attributes, then there cannot be an entity which fulfills both of them. Or you can say that the stipulated entity is EITHER not a bachelor OR not married. To translate it into the current problem: If God is good, then there cannot be “bad” things. If there are bad things, then God cannot be good.

I don’t want to go deeper into this problem. It is possible that some “bad things” are logically necessary for achieving some “good things”. But that does not jibe with God’s omnipotence.

So you agree that the God of the cracks disappears over time BECAUSE of how you have defined him? Is that right? It is your definition that causes him to disappear?

I do NOT define God. The apologists do, and if they make a logical error, it is not my fault when I point out their error.

Another Catholic position is that as you come to understand Creation, you also come to understand the Creator. Just like if you read an author’s novels you learn about them.

Do you reject the existence of an author once you have read his books?

But here you must prove that the universe is just like that book… both are created. And this is where your problems arise.

 

[Frankenfurter]

If God is good, then there cannot be “bad” things. If there are bad things, then God cannot be good.

Simple logic using simple ideas. Try just a bit harder please. You are being a bit lazy and are clearly more intelligent than that.

God’s ‘goodness’ includes his gift of giving you (and others) a part in creation. This is a potential source of evil. Not necessarily you, but in general. One of the features that we observe about creation is that it has the ability to create. Unfortunately this is not all ‘good’. But God has every right to create it that way. Do you deny that?

But you are also determined to deny that anything was ever created I gather.

Are you capable of creating something yourself? Have you ever tried? Do you deny your OWN ability to create too? Have you ever experienced the joy of creating something?

 

[Pallas_Athene]

Simple logic using simple ideas. Try just a bit harder please. You are being a bit lazy and are clearly more intelligent than that.

Simple logic is that someone can be either a bachelor or married, but not both. Simple is not the same as simplistic.

God’s ‘goodness’ includes his gift of giving you (and others) a part in creation.

No one asked for this “gift”. I see nothing “good” to give a loaded weapon to a psychopath and let him run free in a kindergarten. My problem with you (not personally, but in a generic form) is that you see everything in black and white. Give the same power to everyone from Pope Francis to the most despicable sociopath. No shades of grey in your view.

This is a potential source of evil. Not necessarily you, but in general. One of the features that we observe about creation is that it has the ability to create. Unfortunately this is not all ‘good’. But God has every right to create it that way. Do you deny that?

“Right”? The “right” of a strong bully to beat up on the weak opponent. Sure… God is the strongest bully on the block, so he has the “right” to do whatever he wants to do. It is the manifestation of “might makes right”.

But you are also determined to deny that anything was ever created I gather.

Maybe you confuse me with someone else. I never denied that there are creative people.

Are you capable of creating something yourself? Have you ever tried? Do you deny your OWN ability to create too? Have you ever experienced the joy of creating something?

As a computer programmer I had the joy of creating new programs. What of it? But even if I had the ability to create a new weapon to exterminate other beings at will, I would never create it. Only a horrible person would give a loaded gun to small child, and “order” him not to use it.

 

[CHRISTINE77]

Many apologists try to turn the table by accusing humans for not doing “enough”. As if humans could create rainfalls, and could remedy all the diseases plaguing the region. You can blame anyone if they don’t do everything that they CAN do. No one should be blamed for things which are outside his realm of competence. But God has no limitations. He can do anything and everything except “married bachelors”.

Humans can do a lot. Some humans. Obviously not people like you who sit on their hands and blame God or the lack of God for all the problems of this world. Which is it Pallas - and evil world created by God, or an evil world without any God at all? Because obviously you do not see anything good in this world, with or without God. You are the ultimate pessimist, the hopeless one, the one who willfully will do nothing to help the world.

 

[Lily_Bernans]

Well, it is “cool” to refer to my atheism, but not your profession? I did not say anything pejorative about your profession.

How are you going to prove it? That is just another unsubstantiated assumption.

Moreover, you said: “Everything that IS was created by someone or something”. You say that God IS. Therefore - according to YOUR proposition God was created by someone or something. But then the super-God exists, so it also must have been created… and so on ad infinitum.

Now you may start to backpedal, and amend to “everything that was created, was created by someone or something”. That would be a tautologically true statement, but then you would need to prove that the universe WAS created. You cannot posit it as both a starting point and the conclusion of your argument. That would be “circular reasoning”.

I did not say that it did. “Nothing” is just a concept, not an ontological entity. I said that the universe is the ontological foundation of reality, which simply exists. How are you going to refute it? Your simple word would be insufficient.

Right on. Just like no “atheist” can answer the question: “what exists to the north from the North Pole”? Or “when did you stop beating your wife (or husband)”? Nonsensical questions cannot be answered.

Fair enough on the profession.

I had already identified God as the Prime Mover several pages back. I didn’t think we had to keep repeating and repeating ourselves.

Scientists used to believe that the universe was eternal, but they now have proof that it did, indeed, have a beginning and that it is intelligently designed. They aren’t nonsensical questions. If they were, some of the world’s most intelligent people would not spend their lives trying to find the answers. What is nonsensical is to believe that the universe “just is” when all the evidence points to the contrary.

You are begging the question again, refusing to even consider what you do not believe in. That makes intelligent conversation with you impossible.

 

[Lily_Bernans]

And she seems to know everything.

She doesn’t know the most important thing: God.

 

[Nixbits]

Lily Berlans:

Scientists used to believe that the universe was eternal, but they now have proof that it did, indeed, have a beginning and that it is intelligently designed.

Really? That’s news to me. Which scientists are these? What is the proof that the universe is ‘intelligently designed’?

 

[Pallas_Athene]

I had already identified God as the Prime Mover several pages back. I didn’t think we had to keep repeating and repeating ourselves.

And then you contradicted it by stipulating that “everything that exists must have a creator for its existence”. I simply pointed out your contradiction.

Scientists used to believe that the universe was eternal, but they now have proof that it did, indeed, have a beginning and that it is intelligently designed.

Who are those scientists? I never heard of any scientists who would have asserted that the universe all of a sudden “popped” into existence from “nothing”.

They aren’t nonsensical questions. If they were, some of the world’s most intelligent people would not spend their lives trying to find the answers. What is nonsensical is to believe that the universe “just is” when all the evidence points to the contrary.

What evidence? Investigating the Big Bang has nothing to do with assuming that the universe had a “beginning”. The only thing we can say is that our current level of physics stops before we could penetrate the singularity. That is an honest admission of ignorance.

You are begging the question again, refusing to even consider what you do not believe in. That makes intelligent conversation with you impossible.

Have you heard about the “mote” and the “beam” parable?

 

[Pallas_Athene]

Humans can do a lot.

What about the rest that is beyond our capabilities?

Some humans. Obviously not people like you who sit on their hands and blame God or the lack of God for all the problems of this world. Which is it Pallas - and evil world created by God, or an evil world without any God at all? Because obviously you do not see anything good in this world, with or without God. You are the ultimate pessimist, the hopeless one, the one who willfully will do nothing to help the world.

I suggest that you stop “analyzing” me. You don’t have the data, and it is expressly forbidden to discuss the posters and not the topic.

 

[davidv]

And then you contradicted it by stipulating that “everything that exists must have a creator for its existence”. I simply pointed out your contradiction.

Equivocation and straw man. A more accurate statement of Aquinas’ premise is ‘everything that begins to exist must have a cause which is already in existence.’ There is no contradiction.

Who are those scientists? I never heard of any scientists who would have asserted that the universe all of a sudden “popped” into existence from “nothing”.

What evidence? Investigating the Big Bang has nothing to do with assuming that the universe had a “beginning”. The only thing we can say is that our current level of physics stops before we could penetrate the singularity. That is an honest admission of ignorance.

Have you heard about the “mote” and the “beam” parable?

 

[Pallas_Athene]

Equivocation and straw man. A more accurate statement of Aquinas’ premise is ‘everything that begins to exist must have a cause which is already in existence.’ There is no contradiction.

Why do you blame ME for HER imprecision?

 

[inocente]

Considering the meaning of “universal” - “all encompassing” it is a rather logical question to ask, what do you mean by the phrase of “universal skepticism”. Because obviously you do not doubt your own existence.

Very few people would agree that we can know nothing or must doubt everything (imho the two kinds of universal skepticism). Reminds me of Feynman’s joke: youtube.com/watch?v=X8aWBcPVPMo

As we seemed to agree, there is no need to expect a 100% certainty for something to be called “knowledge”. The question is the “very remote possibility”. When you sit in a room, it is theoretically possible that all the air molecules will move to the other side of the room, and you will suffocate. Would you doubt that such a phenomenon will NEVER happen? Should one take it into consideration? It is not even theoretically possible that the Sun would “flicker out” of existence - according to our current level of knowledge. And there is no reasonable assumption that our current level of knowledge is deficient in THAT respect.

Science only deals with “reasonable doubt”, not the unreasonable doubt.

You seem to be denying that there have ever been any miscarriages of justice through juries deciding on reasonable doubt. Was Newton’s theory of gravity ever 100% certain? Is Einstein’s? Do you crave certainty? Here’s the atheist scientist Fenyman again, saying he can’t be sure about anything, and likes it that way: youtube.com/watch?v=I1tKEvN3DF0

*Just look at people in general. Look at the number of poor suckers who get fleeced every day with con-artists. Maybe you remember Jim and Tammy Baker, two notorious con-artists who got millions of dollars from the believers in their “church”. Or Pat Robertson, who asked his followers to donate huge sums of money, because if they do not, then God will smite him! And the followers coughed up those millions. *

But your claim was “the “average” person has a very low level of skepticism”, which would mean that if you took a sample of 1,000 people, most would have been suckered like that, and I’m not seeing any empirical evidence.

*If that would be the whole picture, I would have no problem. It would still be a fascinating question how can people maintain two contradictory concepts at the same time, and believe both of them to be valid. But unfortunately the picture is much darker. Look at the poor posters on the Moral Theology forum, who suffer from fear of going to hell, because they indulged in a perfectly normal activity of masturbation.

And of course, look at reality, where the believers would love to legislate away anything that is not “pure” according to their worldview. Their attitude is damaging not only to themselves, but also to others.*

Not sure what contradictory concepts you’re talking about. I knew two atheists who believe in an afterlife, and another who believes in angels.

I’ve not seen any empirical studies which show different levels of cognitive dissonance between theists and atheists, and as a skeptic would worry about selection bias. For instance, regarding moral scrupulosity, obviously only religious sufferers are likely to post on that forum. For all I know there could be just a many or more sufferers posting on non-religious forums. Or, if scrupulosity is a form of OCD (not sure), then perhaps it’s more likely to show itself in some other guise in non-religious people. Likewise your last paragraph, I’ve no evidence that applies more to one group than another. For instance, a simplistic banner is often used as a proxy for complex political, tribal and cultural grievances.

But also, we know from the Soviet Union that religion can be banned for generations, and then as soon as the Berlin Wall came down, religion makes a return. It serves many purposes and you as a nonbeliever might love to legislate it away as it’s not “pure” according to your worldview, but your attitude is damaging not only to yourself … well, you get the picture .