Why is disbelief a sin?

[Hitetlen]

john doran:

again, not true: god didn’t come out of anything. he exists necessarily.

And how can you establish that the universe does not exist “necessarily”? The sentence: “The universe simply exists” does not contradict any natural law that we are aware of, nor does it lead to a logical contradiction.

Of these two possibilities, the possible contradiction to an existing natural law is a “weak” argument, since we can never be absolutely certain that the insofar discovered laws of nature are the “final word”, so to speak. To assert that we know all the laws of nature would claim omniscience.

If, however you could show that the sentence actually leads to a logical contradiction, then and only then could you assert that there is a need for an outside cause.

 

[Hitetlen]

john doran:

i think that dismissing (most) non-self-contradictory propositions out of hand is just another form of the same credulity you’re deploring - namely credulity in the idea of one’s own invincible insight.

No it is not. I am not discarding extrasensory perception because I believe in some kind of insight, I discard it because it has never been shown to be more than wishful thinking. However, I keep an open mind to take it seriously, IF some experiment shows that it a possible proposition. I am under no obligation to show that ESP is nonsense, the proponents of ESP are under obligation to prove that it is a valid proposition. And the same applies for the concept of God.

 

[Redbandito]

Hitetlen:

If you mean that the universe came out of “nothing”, that is not true. It came from a singularity. And since the concept of “time” is not defined outside the context of the universe, it would make no sense to ask: “what was before the Big Bang?” Just like it makes no sense to ask: “what is outside the universe?”.

Furthermore, if you assert that God is “something” and not “nothing”, then you would still have to show how God came into existence - IF you assert that “something” cannot come out of “nothing”.

No. That is simply not true. God is BEING, itself. God is reality, itself. God is eternal. From Him do all things come. God needs no creator, for God always was. God is not matter. God is the creator of matter. Remember, God said, “I AM”.

Now I can accept it as logical if you are to assert that the Universe is some spirit that has always existed and led to the creation of matter. I would simply respond that you are now on your way to believing in God. However, your arguments are off target since you assume wrongly what we claim God to be. You seem to mistake something to mean matter. And you start with the assumption that nothing can be eternal.

As for your first paragraph, I believe you are getting the argument confused. It is not me who is stating that the universe came out of nothing. I believe all creation came from God. I am a theist. Consider that before your next response. Your going to have to define your understanding of singularity and how it applies if you want to use it for this discussion.

Finally, you don’t see me arguing the matter of “time”. As someone who believes in an eternal God, I understand your argument about “time”. With that being said, whether you want to talk about something preceding something in “time” or outside of time, you are still yet to prove that something can come from nothing. You have talked about matter coming from anti-matter, which is not the same thing. Please address this point.

 

[Strider]

Hitetlen:

The problems I first experienced came while I was a child: I prayed to God to grant me certain powers (I recall that being able to fly and become invisible were some of them) and when my prayers went unanswered, I was seriously disappointed. But then I forgot these prayers, and I was a “lukewarm” believer for quite a long time. Indeed my belief was actually strengthened in college, where some very dumb and inept teachers lectured us on materialistic philosophy. Having always been an antagonist, these stupid lectures reinforced me in my beliefs. Only later did I start to really think for myself (at least the discipline of philosophy) and realized how unacceptable the religious worldview is.

Hitetlen,
I’m sorry it has taken me so long to respond, but I have limited time to spend here these days.
This thumbnail bio you gave is very telling, especially the part I bolded. This is not meant to insult, but the insight it gives me is that you have allowed the words and thoughts of man - philosophy - to take precedence over the words and thoughts of God - Bible and religion - in your life. In my experience, this is very dangerous. Man versus God: man always loses.

 

[ncgolf]

Hitetlen:

I am under no obligation to show that ESP is nonsense, the proponents of ESP are under obligation to prove that it is a valid proposition. And the same applies for the concept of God.

That’s it. I see clearly why it is so hard for you. You are lazy. Someone else does the work … explains it to you and on your highchair of reason and intellectualism dismiss this or accept that. That’s not being a seeker that’s just being a critic. It seems you just Simon Cowell each person’s reasons for believing. If you ever want to seriously contemplate God/no God you will do it on your own. Why even ask for other’s thougts? Only you know what is your level of what is acceptable evidence before beginning to believe.

 

[doomhammer]

Hitetlen:

Biblical quotes I don’t care about.

Could you tell us what do you care about? Maybe we can discover someone greater than God! (Well… would be God!)

 

[Hitetlen]

Redbandito:

No. That is simply not true. God is BEING, itself. God is reality, itself. God is eternal. From Him do all things come. God needs no creator, for God always was. God is not matter. God is the creator of matter. Remember, God said, “I AM”.

I agree that there is such a thing as “the concept of a god”. I deliberately chose lower case “g” to embrace all the zillions of gods humans ever imagined - it is not a sign of disrespect. Of all these god-concepts you discard each and every one except one, the God of Christianity. You keep on saying things like the paragraph above, and offer no reason why I should believe it. God is reality? What the heck does that mean? The universe is real, of that can be no doubt. God is eternal? When the concept of time is not even defined outside the universe. What does the word “eternal” mean in this case? God said “I AM”? Where? In the Bible? Why should I take the Bible seriously?

To save time and bandwidth, here is a short version of an old conversation I conducted with many theists:

Theist: There is a God.
Atheist: How do you know that?
Theist: He revealed himself in the Bible.
Atheist: But the Bible was written by humans.
Theist: Yes, but by divine inspriration.
Atheist: And how do you know that?
Theist: God said so, and we cannot doubt the word of God.
Atheist: Aha, and where did he say that?
Theist: Where? In the Bible, of course.

And the poor dog is chasing its tail until it collapses.

Redbandito:

Now I can accept it as logical if you are to assert that the Universe is some spirit that has always existed and led to the creation of matter. I would simply respond that you are now on your way to believing in God. However, your arguments are off target since you assume wrongly what we claim God to be. You seem to mistake something to mean matter. And you start with the assumption that nothing can be eternal.

There is no such thing as an independent “spirit”, if you wish to assert that there is, give me some evidence to take it seriously. There can be no eternity without time.

 

[Hitetlen]

Strider:

Hitetlen,
I’m sorry it has taken me so long to respond, but I have limited time to spend here these days.
This thumbnail bio you gave is very telling, especially the part I bolded. This is not meant to insult, but the insight it gives me is that you have allowed the words and thoughts of man - philosophy - to take precedence over the words and thoughts of God - Bible and religion - in your life. In my experience, this is very dangerous. Man versus God: man always loses.

I certainly would not take your words as insult, they are not insulting at all. As I said, I do not believe in God, because the idea is nonsensical to me. I have two things to go by, which I know about, without any doubt: my intellect and my experiences. Those are my guidelines. If God would wish to punish me for my honest approach, so be it. He certainly would not get any admiration from me, if he did so.

 

[Hitetlen]

ncgolf:

That’s it. I see clearly why it is so hard for you. You are lazy. Someone else does the work … explains it to you and on your highchair of reason and intellectualism dismiss this or accept that. That’s not being a seeker that’s just being a critic. It seems you just Simon Cowell each person’s reasons for believing. If you ever want to seriously contemplate God/no God you will do it on your own. Why even ask for other’s thougts? Only you know what is your level of what is acceptable evidence before beginning to believe.

Hmmm, let’s see if you practice what you preach. How long did you contemplate Zeus on the Mount of Olympus before you decided that you are not going to believe him after all? How about Jupiter of the Roman mythology? Maybe the Sun-god of ancient Egypt? Brahma? You say, none at all? So are YOU lazy?

Of course I am not wasting valuable time to try and disprove all the hare-brained ideas that other people come up with. You don’t either. So why are you on your high horse, talking down to me?

 

[doomhammer]

Hitetlen:

God is reality? What the heck does that mean?

I find it annoying when an atheist has an intelligence far superior than God himself.
Anyway, I’m going to be here till the end of this thread… It’s almost funny.

 

[Hitetlen]

doomhammer:

Could you tell us what do you care about? Maybe we can discover someone greater than God! (Well… would be God!)

In this context I care about logic, reason and evidence.

 

[doomhammer]

Hitetlen:

In this context I care about logic, reason and evidence.

Your logic is malfunctioning, your reason is unreasonable and your evidence is provisional.

 

[DeFide]

Hitetlen:

…And the poor dog is chasing its tail until it collapses.

There is no such thing as an independent “spirit”, if you wish to assert that there is, give me some evidence to take it seriously. There can be no eternity without time.

There’s no reason to bring up silly straw-man arguments. Try this non-circular argument (directed at Sacred Scripture):

catholic.com/library/Proving_Inspiration.asp

How is your reading of Peter Kreeft’s website going? Good, I hope.

A few quick thoughts:

1.) God is not matter (unlike God, matter CAN not exist), so asking where God is positioned is like asking what color Tuesday is. However, there is no God-free sector of the universe.

2.) Time is merely the measure of that which changes (which is almost the definition of matter). Therefore, without change, time is meaningless. You could say that matter and time come into being together. Eternity describes being outside of time, NOT time without beginning or end.

Can you think of any non-contingents? Entities that cannot *not *exist? Can the rules of logic, for example, ever not exist?

Notice we’re not investigating a powerful pink superhero. We are examining the totality of existence itself and why anything exists at all rather than not.

 

[Hitetlen]

DeFide:

There’s no reason to bring up silly straw-man arguments. Try this non-circular argument (directed at Sacred Scripture):

This Catholic Church tells us the Bible is inspired, and we can take the Church’s word for it precisely because the Church is infallible. Only after having been told by a properly constituted authority—that is, one established by God to assure us of the truth concerning matters of faith—that the Bible is inspired can we reasonably begin to use it as an inspired book.

Is this what you had in mind? It contains one seriously unfounded assertion: namely that the Catholic Church is infallibe. If you wish to substantiate this assertion by the Bible, you DO have a circular reasoning.

After all the idea that the church was founded by God DOES come from the Bible, does it not? So it is not “spiral” reasoning, it is old-fashioned circular reasoning indeed. It does not have to be A->B and B->A, it can be A->B, B->C and C->A. It is the same thing witha little transitivity thrown in just to muddle the waters.

DeFide:

Can you think of any non-contingents? Entities that cannot *not *exist? Can the rules of logic, for example, ever not exist?

The rules of logic are concepts. Without a thinking mind there are no concepts. But once a thinking mind develops, the rules are the same, because they are self-evident.

Of course I can: the universe. Since we exist, therefore the universe exists.

 

[Hitetlen]

doomhammer:

Your logic is malfunctioning, your reason is unreasonable and your evidence is provisional.

Since you summed it up so nicely, now would you describe YOUR own attitude? Would you call it courteous, civilized or respectful?

 

[DeFide]

Hitetlen:

Is this what you had in mind? It contains one seriously unfounded assertion: namely that the Catholic Church is infallibe. If you wish to substantiate this assertion by the Bible, you DO have a circular reasoning.

After all the idea that the church was founded by God DOES come from the Bible, does it not? So it is not “spiral” reasoning, it is old-fashioned circular reasoning indeed. It does not have to be A->B and B->A, it can be A->B, B->C and C->A. It is the same thing witha little transitivity thrown in just to muddle the waters.

The rules of logic are concepts. Without a thinking mind there are no concepts. But once a thinking mind develops, the rules are the same, because they are self-evident.

Of course I can: the universe. Since we exist, therefore the universe exists.

I think you’re reading a little too fast. The article shows:

1. Historicity.
2. Truth of Jesus’ divinity from his resurrection and the ensuing actions of his disciples.
3. Belief in Jesus’ Church and the promises he made regarding it (including its perseverence for all time, and its teaching authority).

From that flows infallibility otherwise God is a liar and his teaching Church isn’t teaching His truth.

Next, the rules of logic don’t exist without a mind? Really? So before man came on the scene, if A=B and B=C, then A didn’t have to equal C?

Then, only after man came did A have to equal C? Hmmm… Maybe 1+1 used to equal 3. (Or maybe the Mind of which you speak is a non-contingent one )

 

[Sherlock]

Hitetlen:

Is this what you had in mind? It contains one seriously unfounded assertion: namely that the Catholic Church is infallibe. If you wish to substantiate this assertion by the Bible, you DO have a circular reasoning.
After all the idea that the church was founded by God DOES come from the Bible, does it not? .

Hitetlen,

I haven’t had the time to answer your question adequately ('way back on the last page, post # 34), but I do wish to do so. Having been an atheist myself, I’m interested in how you would respond to arguments that eventually changed my mind. I should point out that it wasn’t one argument but rather the accumulation of arguments.

By the way, you wouldn’t happen to be an Objectivist, would you?

I don’t have time to answer now, but I did want to respond to your post. The idea that the Church was founded by God does NOT “come from the Bible”. The Church predates the Bible, by several centuries actually.

 

[bones_IV]

Hitetlen:

Is this what you had in mind? It contains one seriously unfounded assertion: namely that the Catholic Church is infallibe. If you wish to substantiate this assertion by the Bible, you DO have a circular reasoning.

After all the idea that the church was founded by God DOES come from the Bible, does it not? So it is not “spiral” reasoning, it is old-fashioned circular reasoning indeed. It does not have to be A->B and B->A, it can be A->B, B->C and C->A. It is the same thing witha little transitivity thrown in just to muddle the waters.

The rules of logic are concepts. Without a thinking mind there are no concepts. But once a thinking mind develops, the rules are the same, because they are self-evident.

Of course I can: the universe. Since we exist, therefore the universe exists.

You are assuming that we Catholics rely on sola scriptura. That’s not the truth. Sola scriptura is not valid. We Catholics have the Magisterium, teaching and doctrine, sacred tradition, and the bible. I use faith and reason. Not just reason. Circular reasoning? No not really. One can arrive at the truth through reason.

 

[john_doran]

Hitetlen:

And how can you establish that the universe does not exist “necessarily”? The sentence: “The universe simply exists” does not contradict any natural law that we are aware of, nor does it lead to a logical contradiction.

because there is no material thing (or set of things) that exists in every possible world. to establish that “the universe” exists in every possible world, you would need to establish that this universe is necessarily existent. but then nothing that doesn’t actually exist is possible. which is absurd.

Hitetlen:

Of these two possibilities, the possible contradiction to an existing natural law is a “weak” argument, since we can never be absolutely certain that the insofar discovered laws of nature are the “final word”, so to speak. To assert that we know all the laws of nature would claim omniscience.

so you only believe in things that can be demonstrated to be “absolutely certain”?

Hitetlen:

If, however you could show that the sentence actually leads to a logical contradiction, then and only then could you assert that there is a need for an outside cause.

so you only believe things the denial of which lead to logical contradiction? do you have any beliefs at all?

 

[john_doran]

Hitetlen:

No it is not. I am not discarding extrasensory perception because I believe in some kind of insight, I discard it because it has never been shown to be more than wishful thinking. However, I keep an open mind to take it seriously, IF some experiment shows that it a possible proposition. I am under no obligation to show that ESP is nonsense, the proponents of ESP are under obligation to prove that it is a valid proposition. And the same applies for the concept of God.

ahh, but that’s not what you said. what you said was,

Hitetlen:

They believe in UFO-s, little green men, alien abductions, etc. and cannot accept that their assertions do not merit even a cursory glance.

that decries the possibility of acceptance based on experimental evidence; what you’re saying here is that there are certain (logically possible) propositions that can legitimately be dismissed as false without appeal to things like experimental and predictive success.

how do you differentiate between those bad beliefs and all of your logically consistent beliefs?