God probably exists.

[TypicalRussian]

I certainly think it's reasonable to think so until someone throws a tower of cards...I'd say it's the laws that govern the Universe that are designed, but that's just nit picking .

well its a fact-the telelogical argument is sound

 

[bomberfox]

God probably exists for these reasons...

There is no legitimate reason for believing that anything exits beyond thought. In fact Occam inclines us to discard that which adds nothing of use , eg materialism. The idea of materialism (ie, mind independence) serves no purpose other than to deny the existence of God...it serves no other purpose.

So if we naturally (due to Occam's advice) drop materialism (ie. mind independence) we come to the conclusion that the world is a world of thought .

You can naturally descend into solipsism with such a view of reality...the trouble with that is that most of us (ie , the sane ones) feel that we are not all that there is to know...therefore other things (like mathematical theorems) exist outside of us .

If we accept that mind independence can not exist but that other things exist outside of ourselves, then it stands to reason that we exist in an external non-material reality. That external reality must be the product of another mind (since mind independence does not exist).

We exist in another mind (God) much in the same way that the Chrome browser can exist within Windows 10 .Separate but dependent.

..... you wouldnt have chrome without materialism. Occam’s razor is not a universal law of nature, its a rule of thumb that can be useful. You are abusing the concept.

 

[soylentgreen]

I see. Well I agree that the onus is on the one making the claim and you claim "No theist has ever produced any evidence for a god" and surely this a position you reached rationally? based on some evidence?

I can accept that you personally have not seen what you would regard as evidence for a God but it does not follow from that that nobody throughout history has ever produced any evidence for god, if there is an argument leading to this then it is an unsound argument.

Furthermore even if it were true and demonstrable that nobody had ever produced any evidence for god one cannot draw the conclusion from this that therefore god does not exist.

No, You're not following the logic here . It is not the onus is on the one who makes the claim. It is the onus is on the one making the positive claim. I make no claim. I simply point out that any attempts at verifying the theist claims have failed. That is more akin to applying sceptism rather than a claim in of itself.

The theist however is making a positive claim that something exists therefor the onus is entirely theirs.

And no, I do not point out the failures of theists as a personal view. I point it out as an historical fact. If there was an exception then atheism would not exist.

And you are misrepresenting what i said. I did not just stop at the complete lack of evidence. I also pointed out theists failure to produce even one good reason for a god. From those two facts i am left with the position that there is no good reasons for me to even consider a god to be any thing other than another fantasy.

 

[RAMOSS]

So 3 rocks end up on top of each other probably due to erosion...so how long would it take for erosion to make the Eiffel Tower lol?

Seriously , I don't admit defeat unless someone has beaten me lol. Don't get me wrong, if someone shows me the error of my ways I'll admit it...but you ain't even close.

That's one example. Another example is a snowflake. A snowflake is very complex, yet it is only the interaction between oxygen, hydrogen and temperature. Much more complex that a house of cards.

I noticed you ignored the arches too. I can tell you hand wave evidence and examples, yet, are unable to support your thesis about 'god did it', except by logical fallacies.

 

[bomberfox]

That's one example. Another example is a snowflake. A snowflake is very complex, yet it is only the interaction between oxygen, hydrogen and temperature. Much more complex that a house of cards.

I noticed you ignored the arches too. I can tell you hand wave evidence and examples, yet, are unable to support your thesis about 'god did it', except by logical fallacies.

Hell ive done alum experiments that could occur in nature if the right conditions happened and came out with a crystal that looked like this. a professionally cut ring gemstone.

 

[RAMOSS]

Hell ive done alum experiments that could occur in nature if the right conditions happened and came out with a crystal that looked like this.View attachment 67290535 a professionally cut ring gemstone.

Indeed. There are plenty of example where you can find naturally occurring structures that happened because of physical and chemical interactions that do not need a brain behind it, but the brain interprets as 'design', that says more about how the brain works than the nature of the structures.

 

[watsup]

Why the **** do you keep talking about evolution , that's already been dealt with. The program requires a programmer ...unless you can find a monkey to write your posts to show us how low intellect can be creative...:lamo

Why do you keep talking about a designer when there is no indication that one is needed. I keep talking about evolution because that is the way that life has come to its present form on this planet and NO SENTIENT DESIGNER WAS IR IS NEEDED!

A typewritten page becomes legible because the DESIGNER, the HUMAN typist, intended it it say a certain thing. Bringing monkeys into the conversation means nothing at all because they obviously do not have the same mental capacity as a fully functional human. It’s simply a non-starter.

 

[watsup]

Science is not equipped to answer philosophical questions. Reason and logic are not science, science is a branch of those...it helps us predict outcomes in reality, that's it.

So if you believe science can give you the reason why life exists you require a lot of faith...certainly logic and reason have left the room in your church of science.

It depends on what you mean by “why life exists”. If you mean in the philosophical realm, the answer would be different from the scientific realm. Scientists look for the NATURAL PROCESSES that formed life to answer the question “why”. I’m not sure what you’re getting at regarding the philosophical part.
And logic and reason do indeed remain a part of science as TOOLS to help find scientific answers to scientific questions.

 

[watsup]

To make a complex system like a tower of cards requires will...or do you think given enough time you could throw a deck into a tower? So if I look at the complex rules/laws that science and maths have exposed to us why the **** should I assume those rules/laws did not require intention (they are far more complex than a tower of cards after all) . As I have said my idea is falsifiable ...but you had better start throwing those decks of cards now...let me know when you have proved random chance can create a tower using all 52 cards and you would have falsified my claim that such things need intention.

And even your last point misses...I see no reason for believing anything is random ...unless you design a random number generator.

Again you are claiming on the front end that the “rules and laws” of nature require a designer when there is no objective evidence at such is true. The Eiffel Tower and a house of cards are a goal of a human designer, but that does not equate to nature, where there is no intermediate or ultimate goal. Your analogy just doesn’t work because of that.

 

[watsup]

So 3 rocks end up on top of each other probably due to erosion...so how long would it take for erosion to make the Eiffel Tower lol?

Seriously , I don't admit defeat unless someone has beaten me lol. Don't get me wrong, if someone shows me the error of my ways I'll admit it...but you ain't even close.

That’s because you’re not listening very well. A human decided to design and have built the Eiffel Tower, but no force in or out of nature PRE-DECIDED that those rocks would end up on one another in that particular place. It just happened over eons due to the natural forces at work in the area.
The Eiffel Tower was designed and built by humans on purpose.
The rocks just happened to occur their because of NEUTRAL local natural forces.
There is a difference, whether you choose to recognize it or not.

 

[Big Eye]

well its a fact-the telelogical argument is sound

I agree with you.

 

[Big Eye]

..... you wouldnt have chrome without materialism. Occam’s razor is not a universal law of nature, its a rule of thumb that can be useful. You are abusing the concept.

Lol, you really haven't paid attention to the thread have you. The whole point of the thread is that materialism serves no purpose (other than denying God...so it's a political idea), as such we can follow Occam's advice and drop it.

The Chrome /windows thing was to show the relationship between us (Chrome) and reality (Windows). Just saying "you wouldnt have chrome without materialism" is bull****, the whole point is that materialism isn't required to explain reality.

 

[Big Eye]

That's one example. Another example is a snowflake. A snowflake is very complex, yet it is only the interaction between oxygen, hydrogen and temperature. Much more complex that a house of cards.

I noticed you ignored the arches too. I can tell you hand wave evidence and examples, yet, are unable to support your thesis about 'god did it', except by logical fallacies.

You could also point to flowers and many other objects that are formed by the laws of nature. Arches and "towers" are mere examples of erosion occasionally leaving something that roughly resembles objects that require intention (Skyscrapers and bridges for example). So basically you are pointing to interactions of nature and equating them to intentional actions of humans (that's not denying the laws of nature themselves are intentional though) ...which is clearly a false comparison...as I said ,I fully accept that 3 cards can fall on top of each other.

Flowers and snow flakes are not actions of nature , they are products of nature...as such, like the tower of cards , they display design/intent. (to be honest snowflakes are not very complex, they are symmetrical which can give an impression of complexity).

 

[Big Eye]

Hell ive done alum experiments that could occur in nature if the right conditions happened and came out with a crystal that looked like this.View attachment 67290535 a professionally cut ring gemstone.

Patterns can appear without* or with intent , but the Eiffel Tower or E-Type Jags are not mere patterns...neither is the Universe.

* Setting aside the idea that the laws of nature in which patterns form is intentional.

 

[Big Eye]

Why do you keep talking about a designer when there is no indication that one is needed. I keep talking about evolution because that is the way that life has come to its present form on this planet and NO SENTIENT DESIGNER WAS IR IS NEEDED!

A typewritten page becomes legible because the DESIGNER, the HUMAN typist, intended it it say a certain thing. Bringing monkeys into the conversation means nothing at all because they obviously do not have the same mental capacity as a fully functional human. It’s simply a non-starter.

Explain why atoms form life...cheers.

The monkey thing was a demonstration that my theory is falsifiable...get a monkey to write a novel and you would have proved that complex balanced systems do not require intent.

 

[Big Eye]

Again you are claiming on the front end that the “rules and laws” of nature require a designer when there is no objective evidence at such is true. The Eiffel Tower and a house of cards are a goal of a human designer, but that does not equate to nature, where there is no intermediate or ultimate goal. Your analogy just doesn’t work because of that.

How the **** do you know there is no goal for nature? Explain how you "know" that . Cheers.

 

[RAMOSS]

I agree with you.

And, how is the teleological argument sound? Can you show that all the premisise it is true? I mean, even Immanuel Kant, Voltaire and David Hume all pointed out horrible flaws in it

 

[zyzygy]

How the **** do you know there is no goal for nature? Explain how you "know" that . Cheers.

How do you know that there is a goal? Explain how you know it.

 

[zyzygy]

The teleological argument is effectively dead. The last gasp at it was by William Dembski and Michael Behe with "irreducible complexity" (the intellectual core of the intelligent design movement), and they simply failed to understand the actual problem and/or came up with handwaving to state that certain things were impossible, when in fact they were not only possible but there were examples of them.

That evolution provides the mechanism to produce all the complexity of life seen today is no longer in serious doubt; and that simple physical laws suffice to produce all the complexity of the universe is also no longer in serious doubt. The only area not completely nailed down is fine-tuning of universal constants, and that makes for an incredibly weak teleological argument since all we know about reality with different constants is that our familiar physics doesn't work. We cannot predict whether there'd be some other complex physical reality admitting evolution, so we can't tell if the numbers are actually finely tuned and thus whether we should be surprised by them.

philosophy of science - Is the teleological argument for God completely refuted? - Philosophy Stack Exchange

 

[Big Eye]

And, how is the teleological argument sound? Can you show that all the premisise it is true? I mean, even Immanuel Kant, Voltaire and David Hume all pointed out horrible flaws in it

I think it stands to reason that the world looks designed ...that's not the same as saying it is definitely designed though. Atoms have got together to form us for no apparent reason (atoms certainly don't benefit), that suggests that they were compelled to do it. Not just us though, everything around us is formed by
mindless sub atomic particles (I see them as tiny bits of information) which have created this amazingly well balanced world... it doesn't seem feasible that such a chance event would happen...it seems much more likely that such a system would be formed with intent. Certainly as systems go it's far more balanced and predictable than some of the advanced machines we make. The onus is on you to tell me how a mindless system can create such a world because all our available evidence suggests intent is required if we are to add a layer of complex balance to the world .

In your mind it must be reasonable that a tower of cards can be thrown, to my mind that is unreasonable unless someone actually proves it can be done.The world is far more complex than a tower of cards obviously...trillions upon trillions of times more complex and balanced.

So although there are potential weaknesses in the teleological argument it is still a reasonable argument (more reasonable than the world just happened by chance imo). Also the teleological argument plays only a supporting role in my argument that all that exists is thought...but the two work well together and add support to each other.

 

[Big Eye]

How do you know that there is a goal? Explain how you know it.

I don't know that there is a goal, but I think I'm being completely reasonable in asserting that it may be the case that only thought exists, that such a situation requires a thinker creating the Universe, that such a thinker would almost certainly have objectives for us in mind. If you wrote a program you'd want the characters in it to have goals and objectives that benefited them...why else would you bother?

 

[Big Eye]

The teleological argument is effectively dead. The last gasp at it was by William Dembski and Michael Behe with "irreducible complexity" (the intellectual core of the intelligent design movement), and they simply failed to understand the actual problem and/or came up with handwaving to state that certain things were impossible, when in fact they were not only possible but there were examples of them.

That evolution provides the mechanism to produce all the complexity of life seen today is no longer in serious doubt; and that simple physical laws suffice to produce all the complexity of the universe is also no longer in serious doubt. The only area not completely nailed down is fine-tuning of universal constants, and that makes for an incredibly weak teleological argument since all we know about reality with different constants is that our familiar physics doesn't work. We cannot predict whether there'd be some other complex physical reality admitting evolution, so we can't tell if the numbers are actually finely tuned and thus whether we should be surprised by them.

philosophy of science - Is the teleological argument for God completely refuted? - Philosophy Stack Exchange

Evolution may answer some questions related to life and how it adapts but it certainly doesn't answer why atoms went to the bother of making minds that contemplate the meaning of life. It's the atheist side that ends up saying **** just happens lol.:lamo...if **** just happens maybe God can too...:lamo

 

[RAMOSS]

Evolution may answer some questions related to life and how it adapts but it certainly doesn't answer why atoms went to the bother of making minds that contemplate the meaning of life. It's the atheist side that ends up saying **** just happens lol.:lamo...if **** just happens maybe God can too...:lamo

The anthroporphic concept does. If things didn't work out the way it did, then we wouldn't be here to argue it. We do not have any other universes to compare this one to. Therefore, it's nothing but the argument from personal incredulity. We don't know how many 'failed universes' started up and didn't succeed. We don't have anything to compare things with. Therefore, that particularly line of reasoning is null and void.

 

[watsup]

Sherlock seems to have flown the coop. He hasn’t been around for a couple of days. Perhaps he has run out of the particular brand of intelligent design snake oil that he was selling. That’s okay. There are plenty of others here selling hero brands.

 

[watsup]

How the **** do you know there is no goal for nature? Explain how you "know" that . Cheers.

To repeat: There is no objective scientific evidence. And thus I am making the logical conclusion. Anything beyond that is just belief.