quote:enochville wrote: The absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence, meaning just because you don't have evidence of a thing, doesn't mean you have evidence that the thing doesn't exist.
I was wondering when you or someone else would say that. It's a cute catch-phrase, and strictly speaking it's true, but it doesn't mean anything for the purposes of this discussion -- because in this context there's no such thing as "evidence of absence."
If you have no evidence of a thing, then you have every reason to believe that that thing does not exist.
quote:enochville wrote: I did not say it was a bold thing to believe that god does not exist, I said "It is very bold to declare that something does not exist". For those of you who believe you have no evidence that God exists, it is very reasonable for you to believe that he does not exist, but it is bold to declare with 100% certainty that God does not exist. This is a moot point now, because I understand that there are not many people who would stand by that statement.
It is no more bold to make such a declaration than it is to make the equivalent oppposite declaration; you said that it was more bold and because of this atheism is untenable. That's false.
quote:Ecthalion wrote: the assumption that he does/doesnt exhist is inherent in either belief
That isn't an assumption.
quote:Ecthalion wrote: that is irrelevant
Then why did you equate it to one?
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quote: The difference is we know that the Easter Bunny doesn't exist, we don't know that God does not exist.
I'm reluctant to equate these two beliefs, so I ask this under protest, but: why?
How do we know that the Easter Bunny does not exist? Do we not, in fact, merely suspect quite strongly that he (?) is not real?
This brings us back to the Invisible Pink Unicorn argument; after all, if the IPU has taken elaborate steps to hide its existence from unbelievers, how can we disprove that it has not in fact taken those steps? In fact, the unquestioned fact that we can't see any evidence of it "proves" that the IPU must exist.
Or not, of course.
I think there's more evidence that some random god exists than that the Easter Bunny exists, but I don't think it's particularly strong evidence -- and the strongest evidence, which is the avowed personal testimonies of millions of people, is also contradictory and often exclusionary, thus degrading the quality of all such evidence.
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posted
Thanks for the clarification of "God is Dead".
I don't feel like responding to all the dust on the moon, Grand Canyon, and age of the universe posts. Those are but data points that can be cited as evidence of completely different ideas depending on how you organize them. Thus, illustrating my point in my last post.
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posted
alas i must resign for the night... i will however keep track of this to see if anything interesting pops up
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posted
I'll respond to your other points later on, but first I'd like an answer to the question that several other people have raised : How do you know that the Easter Bunny doesn't exist?
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notice that i placed it under an area encompasing all beliefs or philosophical thoughts.
from now on though to avoid confusion i will say Theists and atheists from now on, im sorry if it has caused any confusion
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quote:Ecthalion wrote: yes it is since neither has provable evidence
As I've said at least twice on this thread already, "god does not exist" is the default position barring evidence suggesting that god does exist. "God does not exist" is not a statement that can be supported evidentially, nor should it be.
quote:Ecthalion wrote: notice that i placed it under an area encompasing all beliefs or philosophical thoughts.
from now on though to avoid confusion i will say Theists and atheists from now on, im sorry if it has caused any confusion
posted
King of Men asks: "How do you know that the Easter Bunny doesn't exist?"
KNOW in the ultimate sense? I do not know that the Easter Bunny does not exist for the same reason that I do not know that green ants don't exist. As I have said many times before, it is a very bold statement to declare that something does not exist.
But know in the conventional sense? No adult even claims that he exists, or that he has ever visited them. Everyone says he was made up by storytellers. The concept doesn't make sense, etc. But, we cannot know in the ultimate sense that he does not exist.
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posted
enochville, I think the distinction you may be driving at is whether the experiential evidence of others can or should be accepted as evidence for the existence of god. Posts: 10886 | Registered: Feb 2000
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quote:Ah so. Now then, what about, let's say, the Hindu god Shiva?
Usually this question is formulated with Zeus instead of Shiva (although Huitzilopochtli is popping up more often lately).
My standard answer is that I don't know that X being called a god by Y people doesn't exist. The existence of X is perfectly consistent with my faith, although many particular stories concerning X are not.
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I could repeat my answer for the Easter Bunny, except for the convential "knowing" part.
To explain how I know (conventional meaning) Shiva does not exist would require me to present all my data points that lead me to believe that the God of Abraham is the only and only true God. That will take a long time, but I will do it, just not tonight.
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quote: To explain how I know (conventional meaning) Shiva does not exist would require me to present all my data points that lead me to believe that the God of Abraham is the only and only true God.
Do you believe that your data is more credible than the data we have from Baptists and Catholics who, while sharing your belief in the God of Abraham, otherwise think you're completely wrong?
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posted
TomDavidson: I don't want to offend, but in a word, yes. I am going to bed now, but I'll pick this back up tomorrow afternoon.
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posted
Sorry to make you wait longer, but I have to get some things done before tomorrow and will be unable to present my data points today. But, I am eager to do it and will just as soon as I can.
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quote:In the general case, you can perfectly legitimately consider something to be nonexistent until there is evidence to support the claim that it exists.
Why can't you perfectly legitimately consider something to exist until there is evidence to support the claim that it does not? I have no solid evidence that you really exist, for instance, yet I continue to have faith that you do. Is this illogical?
The notion that we should assume nonexistence rather than existence is simply a part of the typical atheist faith. But it is not necessarily true, by logic. There's no reason to conclude there should be any default belief whatsoever.
What's more, it is flat out wrong to say there's no evidence for God. At the very least, there is the Bible, and countless people claiming they have observed God. This evidence proves nothing for sure, but it is definitely evidence of some sort. Hence, the atheist would need to claim more than simply that nonexistence is the default option when there is no evidence. Rather, the atheist must say it the default when there is some evidence but not enough. I think the atheist can only logically conclude this if there is really some other evidence that suggests nonexistence, and which is stronger evidence than the testimony of the Bible and individuals, among other things.
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posted
Would you consider the stories told about the Easter Bunny as evidence for its existence?
As to the other, logical reasons are one thing; pragmatism another. If you postulate existence as the default, you are left in the absurd position of affirming the existence of the Invisible Pink Unicorn, the Easter Bunny, and my third arm (the one that grows out between my shoulderblades) - after all, you have no evidence against any of these. This may be logically tenable, but it's not a very useful position.
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quote:Would you consider the stories told about the Easter Bunny as evidence for its existence?
Yes, if the people telling them claimed they were true. It is perfectly logical for little kids to conclude the Easter Bunny exists when the only evidence they have is that their parents say he does. Then they grow older and find stronger evidence pointing in the opposite direction.
quote:If you postulate existence as the default, you are left in the absurd position of affirming the existence of the Invisible Pink Unicorn, the Easter Bunny, and my third arm (the one that grows out between my shoulderblades) - after all, you have no evidence against any of these. This may be logically tenable, but it's not a very useful position.
Why would not believeing in the IPU, the Easter Bunny, and your third arm be any more useful? A belief is only useful if there is some reason to believe it is better than other possible beliefs. If I have no reason to think the Easter Bunny doesn't exist and no reason to think he does, why would it be of any use to believe he doesn't? Practically speaking, I might as well believe he does.
Incidently, the only reason I believe none of those things exist is because I do have evidence against each of them.
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quote:How do we know that the Easter Bunny does not exist? Do we not, in fact, merely suspect quite strongly that he (?) is not real?
Extending this theory even further, how do we know that what we think is reality is not, in fact, a highly sophisticated computer program meant to simulate reality while machines use our body heat for powering their own society in the near distant future?
posted
Ah! What is your evidence against the Invisible Pink Unicorn?
As for usefulness, of what possible use is a belief in the IPU, a green tea kettle in orbit around Pluto, little purple men from Mars, or Yahweh? Does it inspire you to find new technologies? Does it give you insight into the nature of the world? Does it make you a better person? (Incidentally, for the latter two, statistical proof is all to the good.)
And JT, I think you'll find a post on the last page asking to dispense with tiresome Matrix references.
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But more than that, it was meant to illustrate that the whole "Easter Bunny" track was in the same family as the Matrix arguments we'd agreed to leave out of the discussion. So it was funny, but with a moral. Although having to explain it makes me think it wasn't all that well executed.
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quote:Ah! What is your evidence against the Invisible Pink Unicorn?
Because I believe invisibility is not something a natural creature can evolve to have.
That, in turn, is based on my belief that the laws of science are correct and are inconsistent with invisibility. And that is based on my trust in scientists, and so on down the line of proof.
This is how belief works. Note that we are not talking about knowledge - stuff that is proven. We are merely talking about BELIEFS, which are often based only on partial evidence, such as other beliefs that are themselves only partially supported by evidence. Whereas you need complete proof to know something, all you need for belief is more evidence in support of it than there is against it.
quote:As for usefulness, of what possible use is a belief in the IPU, a green tea kettle in orbit around Pluto, little purple men from Mars, or Yahweh?
Believing in the IPU or green tea kettles in space are almost totally useless to me. Similarly, believing that those things DON'T exist serves no use to me either. An IPU or green tea kettle in space would not effect me, whether it existed or not. Thus, what I believe in regards to their existence doesn't matter in any practical sense, one way or the other.
God, however, would effect me.
And a belief in purple men from Mars would be quite useful if they did exist, because as a voter, I would some day have to pick a government that would treat these men from Mars appropriately. I wouldn't want any War of the Worlds.
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posted
Um, no. The Matrix could in principle exist, but it's a useless argument. The existence or not of the Easter Bunny can, I hope you'll agree, be settled by evidence. By referring to it, I was hoping to show that the existence of Yahweh can also be settled by evidence, and that there is no evidence in his favour that would be accepted for the Easter Bunny.
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quote:The existence or not of the Easter Bunny can, I hope you'll agree, be settled by evidence.
The only evidence for this argument is the lack of evidence for the existence of the Easter Bunny, which doesn't actually prove anything.
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posted
Right, right, now you're getting there. So do you believe in the Easter Bunny, or not? Come now, this isn't hard.
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posted
I don't have any interest in discussing whether or not the Easter Bunny exists, but you draw a separation between this argument and the matrix argument that simply isn't there.
But condescending to me will surely solve that problem.
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posted
But it is there! If the Matrix did exist, we'd never know about it, right? But we could detect the Easter Bunny, if it did exist. Therefore the question is in principle resolvable by evidence. Right?
Now, the lack of evidence doesn't strictly prove that the Easter Bunny doesn't exist, as you point out. But it does mean that it is not reasonable to believe in the Easter Bunny. Right?
If you agree to the previous two points, then I think you'll also agree that it is not reasonable to believe in a god unless some proof of its existence can be found.
If I understood them correctly, comrade enochville agrees with me on this, but comrade Tresopax prefers to assert that belief is reasonable even without proof, because the lack of evidence does not disprove existence. My point is that lack of evidence doesn't disprove the existence of the Easter Bunny, either, but we don't think it reasonable to believe in it for all that.
Sorry about condescending, I misunderstood the point you were making.
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posted
To me this argument about evidence is moot. Emotional evidence isn't accepted on the same level of visible evidence. So much emotional evidence is bunk so it is *all* labeled as untrustworthy.
But if you rely only on visible evidence, I don't believe you can come to a conclusion about God. What if life is a "Matrix", and nothing we see is true? What if we can only know the truth by reading our emotions accurately?
And what if that is the whole point of this life, to learn how to understand things that can't be seen?
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posted
I'm not at all a philosopher, but nonetheless I feel like this thread is inexorably heading towards, "How do we know what we know, and how do we know that we know it?" Descartes and his "I think, therefore I am" keeps coming up in my mind, for some reason, too.
Carry on. I want to know where this ends up. Posts: 952 | Registered: Jun 2005
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posted
It's very simple. There's no need for proof. It's called faith. What's the point of saying people shouldn't be religious because there's no proof God exists? You've argued in this very thread that nothing can be proved. It's the same with the courts whether people want to believe it or not.
Every time we come up with a new way to, supposedly, prove someone is guilty, there ends up in the public eye that the case is reputable.
Some examples: Once upon a time they might put a burning rock into someones hand and if they didn't get burnt they were innocent. Later, if you suspected someone had committed a crime you might try to scrutinize a confession out of them. If they didnt admit it youd just accept they were telling the truth. In the last hundred years, weve tried to invent ways to quite literally prove that beyond a shadow of a doubt someone is guilty. But some have eventually ended up in the public eye that they could be doctored. And soon they all will, but no one will notice because well have come up with new ways quick enough.
The only way to know if someone is guilty is get a confession out of them without scrutinization or anything for them to gain if they do confess. And to be honest, I dont think Gods going to come down and tell every single one of us that he exists and to stop bickering about it.
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posted
OK - My first post set out to demonstrate that that it is possible for God to exist. The following posts set out to demonstrate that it is plausible or reasonable that God exists. Although KoM may consider that a weak goal, it is about as much as is possible for any one person to demonstrate to another. I believe one can go one step farther, to the point where one knows (convential meaning) that God exists, but that requires gathering the evidence for one's self and having the Lord manifest himself to you.
Now, although I think KoM understands this, it appears that at least some other posters still don't quite get the idea that all I am about to present is data points. Data points do not become evidence until one organizes them as support for their hypothesis. But, just because data points can be shown to support one hypothesis does not mean that there is not a different hypothesis out there that the data supports equally well or better. Example: a defense attorney may use the same evidence that the prosecutor uses to reach an entirely different conclusion. What I am getting at is that if your hypothesis is that God exists, the data points I present can be used to support it, but, if your hypothesis is that God does not exist, you will be able to find an alternative explanation for the data.
The key in determining which hypothesis is more plausible or reasonable is in asking yourself which hypothesis fits the data best. In other words, how hard is it to explain away the data (how many unlikely scenarios have to combine to be able to fit the data to the hypothesis). To do this honestly, we must start on a level playing field, without judging the case before we hear the evidence. In other words, it is just as likely that there is a god as there is not until we start entering the evidence.
In these terms faith is entertaining the possibility that God is real; doubt is refusing to entertain that possibility. I do not practice "blind faith" in which you put your trust in something without having any reason to. There are somethings that I am willing to follow God on or accept although I don't have any idea why, but even in those cases I do it because I already have sufficient enough reason to trust him even into areas in which I am blind.
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posted
I'm fairly sure I'm not willing to agree with those definitions. They're almost exactly opposite of what I hold the words "faith" and "doubt" to mean.
But I shall endeavor to remember how you've defined them while reading your upcoming posts.
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quote:A belief is only useful if there is some reason to believe it is better than other possible beliefs.
Holy crap! Did anybody else notice this? Tres is a utilitarian at heart!
quote:Why can't you perfectly legitimately consider something to exist until there is evidence to support the claim that it does not?
You can, but there is no logical reason to do so.
quote:I have no solid evidence that you really exist, for instance, yet I continue to have faith that you do. Is this illogical?
No, because you do have evidence that I exist -- some 8,000 posts on this forum, pictures of me on Foobonic and from other Hatrack gatherings, and so forth. Most importantly, though, you have plenty of evidence that human beings exist. If there were evidence for the existence of, say, Zeus, I would then consider it much more likely that the other Olympian gods existed as well... but there's only the one Yahweh.
quote:The notion that we should assume nonexistence rather than existence is simply a part of the typical atheist faith.
Nonexistence is the logical default position and has nothing to do with faith, or with atheism (which itself has very little to do with faith either).
quote:What's more, it is flat out wrong to say there's no evidence for God.
Good thing I didn't say that, then, eh? I was very careful to avoid doing so.
quote:At the very least, there is the Bible, and countless people claiming they have observed God. This evidence proves nothing for sure, but it is definitely evidence of some sort.
I addressed this in my very first post to this thread and at least once after that, noting that what constitutes legitimate evidence varies from one person to the next.
My personal position is that the experiences of others make it reasonable to ask the question "does god exist?" Indeed, I have done so, and at some length. I assign no such weight to the Bible, however -- and I say that as someone who read much of it in earnest.
quote:Hence, the atheist would need to claim more than simply that nonexistence is the default option when there is no evidence. Rather, the atheist must say it the default when there is some evidence but not enough. I think the atheist can only logically conclude this if there is really some other evidence that suggests nonexistence, and which is stronger evidence than the testimony of the Bible and individuals, among other things.
No, this is definitely false. All the atheist has to do is make two statements:
1) In the absence of evidence, nonexistence is the logical default position.
2) From my* perspective, there is no valid evidence for the existence of god.
It seems to me that the second statement is the one you differ on, and rightly so as you're a theist -- but I don't think you can legitimately suggest that I should become an agnostic because many other people believe something I don't, or because the Bible exists. The latter statement in particular would give me serious trouble.
*Where "my perspective" is the perspective of a hypothetical atheist.
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posted
Part of the problem with using the "people believe God exists" as evidence for God's existance is that this is not this statement doesn't fully express the active part of people's beliefs here. A more complete statement would be "people believe that their God exists and that everyone else's doesn't"*. Therefore, belief in say a Muslim God directly opposes belief in a Christian one (or say LDS contradicts Baptist belief).
When a bunch of people believe "A, but not B" and a bunch of other people believe "B, but not A", using the combination of these bunches as proof of something makes little sense.
---
* - Yes, yes, I know that there are plenty of religions, my own included, that don't actually believe that. But this is Hatrack, we don't really consider those religions when we're talking about "religion".
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quote:...belief in say a Muslim God directly opposes belief in a Christian...
This isn't true, though. The world's three major monotheistic religions all revere the same deity. There are other elements of Islam and Christianity that are opposed, however.
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quote:The world's three major monotheistic religions all revere the same deity.
No they don't. The deity that Christians worship is a three-part one consisting of God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit. The deity-hood of each of these three entities is central to their faith. Believing that directly contradicts the Muslim central belief that "There is no God but Allah and Mohammed is his prophet." The Muslims do not believe in either Jesus or the Holy Spirit as God.
edit: And, leaving that aside, my wider point is that experience of Allah directly contradicts experience of Jesus which directly contradicts experience of Yahweh which directly contradicts experience of Vishnu and of all the lost deities from religions that the major religions wiped out. Even within each of these religions, experiences of one sect directly contradict those of another sect.
posted
"Allah" is Arabic for "God." I noted that there are additional incompatible elements, and the Trinity definitely qualifies, but the god -- Yahweh -- is the same one.
Added: I do think that your wider point is valid.
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posted
Because I'm in an argumentative mood: I don't think you're giving enough weight to the concept of the Trinity. Jesus and the Holy Spirit aren't merely aspects of God, they are (while unified with God) separate, distinct entities who are worshipped as such. God the Father (or Yahweh if you prefer) is not the central figure from which the other two spring. He is equal to them. The three coming together makeup the Godhood. The Christian God is not adequately represented from a Muslim view as Allah with some attachments. At best, Allah makes up a third, an equal third, of the Trinity.
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quote:A belief is only useful if there is some reason to believe it is better than other possible beliefs.
Holy crap! Did anybody else notice this? Tres is a utilitarian at heart!
Well, yes, I am a utilitarian. But the quote you cited is not utilitarian. All it says is what makes a belief useful, whereas utilitarianism is concerned with what makes an action right.
quote:1) In the absence of evidence, nonexistence is the logical default position.
What is the logical proof that justifies this claim, then? I think there is no logical reason to assume nonexistence any more than there is to assume existence.
And how can you say:
quote:
quote:What's more, it is flat out wrong to say there's no evidence for God.
Good thing I didn't say that, then, eh? I was very careful to avoid doing so.
But then a few lines later claim:
quote:2) From my* perspective, there is no valid evidence for the existence of god.
quote:It seems to me that the second statement is the one you differ on, and rightly so as you're a theist -- but I don't think you can legitimately suggest that I should become an agnostic because many other people believe something I don't, or because the Bible exists. The latter statement in particular would give me serious trouble.
I don't want you to become agnostic - I think that would be a very problematic solution. In my view, refusing to believe without certain proof is a violation of your fundamental moral responsibility to try to have the most accurate beliefs possible in order to make the best judgements possible. If there is one belief that is better than another, I think you have a sort of moral responsibility to believe it, even if you cannot be certain it is true.
I don't want you to become agnostic - I just want to suggest that the reason you believe what you do is NOT because it is some default position, but rather because you have looked at the evidence you have and concluded that the evidence against God is stronger than the evidence for Him.
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posted
If you had noticed the little footnote, you would see that the latter statement was intended to be by a hypothetical atheist.
Now, about the default position : I think we agree that there is no evidence either for or against the Invisible Pink Unicorn, or a green tea-kettle in orbit around Pluto. Do you think it is reasonable to believe in these entities?
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posted
But we DIDN'T agree that there is no evidence for or against the IPU. I specifically gave evidence against it - the evidence that leads me to believe it does not exist. I would say there is pretty overwhelming evidence against the IPU or the tea pot in space, including the laws of science and other things I believe to be true about the nature of the world.
If there were no evidence against it, it would be just as reasonable to believe in it as it would be to not believe. But there IS evidence, so that is not the case there.
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posted
I've only scanned through these posts, and the following point has already been made, and perhaps refuted, but I think it's worth noting.
There's no reason to believe that the IPU, tea pot, or easter bunny can't possibly exist. Perhaps in some alternate universe the IPU is currently ruling over some planet. There's no way to know, and quite frankly, it doesn't really matter because it doesn't affect me. However, if a god does truly exist, then that most certainly would have an effect on me, or at least my perspectives.
The evidence is there, depending on how you decide to interpret it. You can look at prophecies and decide that maybe Cyrus was predicted to conquer Babylon hundreds of years before he was born. Maybe other prophets were able to predict certain events in history. Maybe certain events in Jesus' life were accurately foretold thousands of years in advance. In essence, you can look at any set of numbers and interpret the meaning to support what you want to believe. In the end it really gets you nowhere, and imo, it boils down to what you want to believe. If you want to believe, then yes, you will find a great deal of evidence, though perhaps inconclusive evidence.
Either way, the original question, as I interpreted it, was not as much whether we could all agree that it's certainly possible for a god to either exist or not exist, rather, is a person that chooses to believe that god exists, as KoM describes, an idiot?
I would like to think the answer is no, considering the evidence points to neither conclusion in a definitive manner. So KoM, why is it so idiotic to believe in the existence of something that does not conflict with science and knowledge but attempts to provide answers to questions that science does not attempt to answer?
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posted
camus, I think your description of this conversation relies on the mistaken assumption that most of us care what KOM has to say about this or consider it at all productive to try to discuss it with him.
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quote:Originally posted by King of Men: The good old Ęsir, who incidentally are a lot more sympathetic than Yahweh
Just curious as to why you think the Aesir (The collective Norse gods) are more sympathetic than Yahweh or God?
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posted
Seen a certain way, Yahweh was basically evil. He was a genocidal babykiller who would let Satan screw with your life on a bet. The one virtue he really valued was (generally unthinking) obedience. He threw Adam and Eve out of the Garden because they acquired free will and thus he was afraid of them. He sent a bear to eat some kids because they made fun of the wrong bald guy.
The Aesir, on the other hand, were mostly indifferent to mortals. They helped out from time to time and Odin called for his sacrifices, but they were never ones for much direct intervention, such as causing or ordering their followers to visit horrendous atrocities on the innocent like Yahweh did.
Oh, and there's also the Holocaust, which Yahweh apparently couldn't be bothered to do anything about.
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quote:It is very bold to declare that something does not exist
It is very bold to declare that something does exist.
I would turn your entire argument upside down. It works either way.
It doesn't work either way. Logical, the proving that a thing does exist is far simpler than proving that a thing does not exist.
To prove that a thing exist (take for example a prime number greater than 1 million) all you need to do is find an example of one. To prove a thing does not exist is far more difficult.
The same applies if we are talking about "evidence" for the existence of God rather than strict proof. It is theoretically possible that evidence might exist which supports the existence of God. I find it very difficult, however, to imagine evidence which would suggest no God.
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