Atheist Demand for direct Emprical Evidence of God is Special Pleading

This was an exchange on carm with an atheist claiming to be a scientist. It's in answer to atheists constantly changing their mantra "there's no direct empirical evdience, we don't want arguemnts we want facts." This is a new slogan they've come out with recently.

God is beyond our understanding. God is not given in sense data and thus the demand for sense data proving God is silly and useless.

In one of their typically hypocritical moves those who claim they don't believe in the fortress of facts concept will turn around and take a page right off the heart of the fortress concept and demand empirical proof of God and when it doesn't come they will say "this is proof there's no God." But they have arleady been told "God is not amenable to this kind of evidence.

We know form scinece that there are many thing in scinece, whole knowledge levels above the scientific that are not given backed by any direct evidence and yet scientists assume they are real or that they could be real.

*big bang
*singularity
*string membranes
*dark matter (getting close)
*direct observation of *neutrinos (were historically *accepted as real long before any direct evidence, still don't have direct observation of them).
*Hawking's no singularity thing, (although that's pretty much set aside but it was accepted up front on the premise that we can't have direct proof).
Multivese (no direct proof, mathematical doesn't count).

that means not having direct evdience is not any kind of proof that they are not real.

The facts are just that we have to use other means of understanding God. that's all there is to it and theology has met that challenge by developing with scientific thinking, as with process theology.

Several reasons why it's not fair to expect direct evidence:

(1) God is not a thing in creation.

He's not on a par with objects in the world. he's the basis of all reality. that would be like expecting to find a piece of the laws of physics or the door to the unified field.

(2) God is not a big man in the sky but is being itself.

God is in everything. He's too big and too basic to be seen.

(3) God is the mind that thinks reality

we re figments of God's imagination. That means we can't get outside the thought and see what's thinking it. How could we possibility do that? I hate the film "the Matrix" no one bring it up. I prefer the holodeck on Star Trek TNG. how could a character of the Holodeck never know the truth?


(4) God's wants the search.

God doesn't' want to make it obvious. He makes it possible for us to find him but we have to seek. the reasons are laid out in my thing on soeteriological drama.

atheist says


Atheists might say God could make it obvious if he wanted to. Yes, but he doesn't want to because that would frustrate the process of interlinking values. Its' not unfair because the possibility is there. you only have to let go of your ego and seek God though the means that he may be found.

an atheist says:
Lets take a few things off:
*big bang
atheist says:

This comes from using we well verified theory in science (relativity) and extrapolating it back to the early universe after it was observed that the universe was expanding. but I can say the same thing about my arguments. I can say 'this come from using a well verified theory called modal logic ect ect." you want to make exceptions when it's knowledge you control then say all other forms of knowledge are crap. that's not fair.

But you see what he's done in making this response is special pleading. He's doing exactly what the atheists have been telling us we can't do, their slogan: "stop giving us arguemnts we don't want arguments, we want facts." Yet, he comes back on something that has no direct empirical evdience and make an argument that's it's right anyway becuase of the fit with theory, meaning he doesn't have empirical evdience but he's going accept an theocratic argument. That's what we are doing with God arguments, it' sthe thing we do that the atheist say they don't want. This is a logical fallacy called special pleading becuase it means suspend the rules for me but keep them for my opponent.

*singularity
atheist says

This shows that general relativity is incomplete as a physical theory. It signifies that there is a breakdown in the model.

same trick. I have argumetns that i can make make sense when I put them in the proper context. then the atheists say "I don't accept that context because if I did your argument would prove God. so I refuse the context, it's not evidence, therefore, you have no evidence."

there are physicists who say they don't accept the context of the singularity that proves it's not the fortress of facts. it's not a fact it's not solid, it could change. yet no one says "this isn't real becuase I don't have specific empirical evidence."

that is all about managing the context and that's all you are doing in rejecting God arguments.

*string membranes

atheist says

String theory is so for the only model that unifies all known forces at all scales, it can be shown that branes (as they are known) must exist for the theory to be internally consistent.

In other words, it's an argument based upon the fit of the theoretical phenomena with other theory. Same answer applies you don't' have direct empirical evidence I don't' see you saying its not reality. I have seen physicists say we may never have direct empirical evidence of this but you wont call it unreal.

*dark matter (getting close)

atheist says

There are some ideas, certainly but I wouldn't say that anyone is getting close.

This is interesting becasue I say we are getting close to finding empirical proof of dark matter he says "I wouldn't say anyone is getting close." He may have misunderstood what I meant so the meant in another way, it's hard to believe that since it seems so clear to me. Yet in another thread he say "i never said we were getting close." Which only works aginast his argument, makes me think he doesn't even realize what's going on in the whole thread.

you are not calling it unreal either. you just admitted we don't have the kind of evidence for it that you demand of God.


*direct observation of neutrinos (were historically accepted as real long before any direct evidence, still don't have direct observation of them).

atheist says:

Because they were predicted by a theory that was very well experimentally verified in other areas.

Classic example. That's nothing more than what I said. It's not better than I can do with any of my God arguments. I can prove all my God arguments on the same basis. The God arguments can be predicted by theories that are well verified in other areas (in other words, not in direct relation of God). All he is doing is managing the context, that is the context under which such and such a phenomenon is thought of as evidence for something, such as God. He's just managing the context under which these phenomena can be tough of as backed evdience. In other wrongs we don't have direct empirical evidence of them but they are not going to say they don't exist. They would if it was a God argument. The very same basis upon which I can prove my God arguments, indirect, predicted by accepted theory in other vain, but that wouldn't be good enough for the atheists. Yet science does it accept it for other things. it's part of a theory. you don't have empirical proof. and my God arguments are part of a theory. This guy can't understand that every time he argues such and such can be proved real anyway he's backing my case. He thinks he's proving "O scinece works and God doesn't" he's actually proving the basis upon which I claim my God argument is scientific.

*Hawking's no singularity thing, (although that's pretty much set aside but it was accepted up front on the premise that we can't have direct proof).

atheist says:

This is continued in the string model as as it has been explained to you that the beginning of the universe is no longer considered as a singularity.

In other words, it's proved by a model that is itself not the result of empirical data but is also assumed true by its fit with other theory. Meaning he's compounded the problem twice over. Now he establishes the precedent of twice arguing for something that scinece says s real but does not ahve direct empirical data to prove. That stands as the security form yet another theory for which there is no empirical data. So far can they stretch that point. I have God arguments that have to verified by other non empirical theories. No twice overs among my 42 God arguments.


*Multivese (no direct proof, mathematical doesn't count).

There are consequences that can be derived from the multiverse which can be tested and I am also told that they are looking at testing this idea experimentally already.

all the same deal.

All that really means is that without assuming the unverified multivariate they would have no answer temporal beginning argument or to the fin tuning argument.

after enough of this charge of special pleading and explaining what it means:

Originally Posted by this atheist

Absolutely not! proving something via modal logic is completely different to saying, this comes from a well tested model with very good predictive capability. The model comes from experiment, from the real world. Model logic comes from a set of axioms.

No it's not. it's really the very same thing. Yes modal logic is not the same thing as physics but that has nothign t do with the way that argument functions i your utterance. Not all the verification of God arguments is form modal logic, some is form cosmology just like these are.

He did not provide any direct empirical evidence. all he did was manage the context in which you consider the theory to make the anamorphic into evidence. In other words it's dependent upon the paradigm. The proof is that some physicists don't' accept the same big bang paradigm anymore so the big bang evidence is not evidence in their paradigm anymore.

my God arguments are not proof for atheists because they say "that's philosophy and I don't dig philosophy so it's not proof." I say "I dig philosophy so it is proof." that doesn't mean it' snot proof becuase you say it isn't, it is to me. It' just that you are managing the context in which proof is seen as proof.

another atheist chimes in:

Once again meta, you are comparing apples and oranges. We are talking about theories that have predictive capabilities, that have warn out the decades of experimental tests and still have been correct. Singularities appear in such models you know that there is something else to do on the theory.

I have 200 studies that are published in peer reviewed academic journals, everyone of them establishes the fact that religious experience fits the criteria of epistemic judgment, which is verified as valid by our daily epistemic practices. That means we can extrapolate from those findings and say this is verified by proven theory and it can be argued that it supports warrant for God belief. When I say that they go, "those studies don't' have 'god exists' as a finding so you can't extrapolate form it." The things they use to back these physical phenomena were not established on the basis that they back those phenomena. Einstein didn't propose relativity and say "and this valid as backing for a theory that will be put forth some day about neutrinos."

I'm really not doing anything any different than they do in their scientific work. In fact they don't do it, their priests of knowledge, the scientists do it. It's not different than what I do in my God arguments. Yet they allow it for scinece and not for God. That's what logicians call SPECIAL PLEADING!

They are using the difference in philosophy and phsyics like it's a big deal because they are managing the context. but the truth is the theory functions in their utterance the same way it does in mine. the problem is I accept a different theory than the one they conveniently ignore because it not in the one in their template of ideolgoical acceptance. The atheists have a template that spells out the ideologically favored ideas anything off template they ridicule and sweep aside with not thought or compunction.That is how they can condemn all of philosophy in one fell swoop without knowing anything about it. The template is based upon the concept of the fortress of facts. The theoretical big pile of facts that assures their view is truth. Of cousre only scientific fact then not all of them.

atheist says:

String theory reduces to the previous laws which do have good experimental evidence, you don't think that they just dreamed the whole idea up do you?

Meta said:

That does not equate to direct empirical evidence. you are compensating in every single case for not having the kind of evidence you demand of God talk.

you rationalize that lack by special pleading. you say "I can manage the context in which evidence is evidence and do it in such a way as to make up for the lack of what I require of God arguemnts.

you are saying "the rules apply to all the stuff off template but not to stuff on template." we call that "special pleading." In the lgoic world that's what it's called.

as I have explained, it's completely different.

special pleading.

you don't have direct evidence and you know you don't. It's a double standard it's special pleading.

Reflections on Methodology, Science, and Atheist Arguments

 

Ok this is recycled from 2012. Notice the comments. I used to get lots of comments all the time. I miss them. please comment

 

 

I don't think atheists care about evidence. Evidence just means that one has something to reason from. What atheists demand is absolute proof, and at a level that can't be given for anything. I would bet that if for some reason atheists didn't like science, no amount of scientific "proof" wood suffice to prove to them that science works; because they would demand absolute proof, which can't be gotten.

In thinking about the two other threads I initiative over the last few days, and the atheist take on my arguments and their 'dicing' of my thought processes, and their refusal to acknowledge standard responses that I give all the time, I find the following state of affairs to be a good description of the current state of dialectic between atheists and theists on the boards:

(1) Theists have a vast array of knowledge and argumentation built up over 2000 years, which basically amounts to a ton evidence for the existence of God. It's not absolute proof, because true, sure enough, actual absolute proof is just damn hard to come by on anything--even most scientific things; which is why they invented inductive reasoning. Science accepts correlation's as signs of caudal relationships, it doesn't ever actually observe causality at work. But that kind of indicative relationship is not good for atheists when a God argument is involved. Then it must be absolute demonstration and direct observation.

(2) This double standard always works in favor of the atheist and never in favor of the theist. I suspect that's because Theists are trying to persuade atheists that a certain state of affairs is the case, and at the same time we are apt to be less critical of our own reasons for believing that. Atheists make a habit of denial and pride themselves on it.

Why is it a double standard? Because when it works to establish a unified system of naturalistic observation the atheist is only too happy to appeal to "we never see" "we always see" and "there is a strong correlation." We never see a man raised from the dead. We never see a severed limb restored. The correlation's between naturalistic cause and effect are rock solid and always work, so science gives us truth, and religion doesn't. But when those same kinds of correlation's are used to support a God argument, they are just no darn good. to wit: we never see anything pop out of absolute noting, we never even see absolute nothing, even QM particles seem to emerge from prior conditions such as Vacuum flux, so they are not really proof of something form nothing. But O tisg tosh, that doesn't prove anything and certainly QM proves that the universe could just pop up out of nothing!

(3) "laws of physics" are not real laws, they are only descriptions, aggregates of our observations. So they can't be used to argue for God in any way. But, when it comes to miraculous claims, the observations of such must always be discounted because they violate our standard norm for observation, and we must always assume they are wrong no matter how well documented or how inexplicable. We must always assume that only naturalistic events can happen, even though the whole concept of a naturalism can only be nothing more than an aggregate of our observations about the world; and surely they are anything but exhaustive. Thus one wood think that since our observations are not enough to establish immutable laws of the universe, they would not be enough to establish a metaphysics which says that only material realms exist and only materially caused events can happen! But guess again...!

(4) The Theistic panoply of argumentation is a going concern. Quentin Smith, the top atheist philosopher says that 80% of philosophers today are theists. But when one uses philosophy in a God argument, it's just some left over junk from the middle ages; even though my God arguments are based upon S 5 modal logic which didn't exist even before the 1960s and most of the major God arguers are still living.

(5) They pooh pooh philosophy because it doesn't' produce objective concrete results. But they can't produce any scientific evidence to answer the most basic philosophical questions, and the more adept atheists will admit that it isn't the job of science to answer those questions anyway. Scientific evidence cannot give us answers on the most basic philosophical questions, rather than seeing this as a failing in science (or better yet, evidence of differing magister) they rather just chalice it up to the failing of the question! The question is no good because our methods dot' answer it!

(6) What it appears to me is the case is this; some methods are better tailed for philosophy. Those methods are more likely to yield a God argument and even a rational warrant for belief, because God is a philosophical question and not a scientific one. God is a matter of faint, after all, and in matters of faith a rational warrant is the best one should even hope for. But that's not good enough for atheists, they disparage the whole idea of a philosophical question (at least the scientistic ones do--that's not all of them, but some) yet they want an open ended universe with no hard and fast truth and no hard and fast morality!

(7)So it seems that if one accepts certain methods one can prove God within the nature of that language game. now of course one can reject those language games and choose others that are not quite as cozy with the divine and that's OK too. Neither approach is indicative of one's intelligence or one's morality. But, it does mean that since it may be just as rational given the choice of axioms and methodologies, then what that taps out to is belief in God is rationally warranted--it may not be only rational conclusion but it is one rational conclusion Now I know some of the more intelligent atheists will say "hey I'm fine with that." But then when push comes to shove they will be back again insisting that the lack of absolute proof leaves the method that yields God arguments in doubt, rather than the other way around. I don't see why either should be privileged. Why can't we just say that one method is better suited for one kind of question, the other for the other?

and if one of them says 'why should I ask those questions?' I say 'why shouldn't we leave the choice of questions to the questioner?

Atheist Demand for direct Emprical Evidence of God is Special Pleading

This was an exchange on carm with an atheist claiming to be a scientist. It's in answer to atheists constantly changing their mantra "there's no direct empirical evdience, we don't want arguemnts we want facts." This is a new slogan they've come out with recently.

God is beyond our understanding. God is not given in sense data and thus the demand for sense data proving God is silly and useless.

In one of their typically hypocritical moves those who claim they don't believe in the fortress of facts concept will turn around and take a page right off the heart of the fortress concept and demand empirical proof of God and when it doesn't come they will say "this is proof there's no God." But they have arleady been told "God is not amenable to this kind of evidence.

We know form scinece that there are many thing in scinece, whole knowledge levels above the scientific that are not given backed by any direct evidence and yet scientists assume they are real or that they could be real.

*big bang
*singularity
*string membranes
*dark matter (getting close)
*direct observation of *neutrinos (were historically *accepted as real long before any direct evidence, still don't have direct observation of them).
*Hawking's no singularity thing, (although that's pretty much set aside but it was accepted up front on the premise that we can't have direct proof).
Multivese (no direct proof, mathematical doesn't count).

that means not having direct evdience is not any kind of proof that they are not real.

The facts are just that we have to use other means of understanding God. that's all there is to it and theology has met that challenge by developing with scientific thinking, as with process theology.

Several reasons why it's not fair to expect direct evidence:

(1) God is not a thing in creation.

He's not on a par with objects in the world. he's the basis of all reality. that would be like expecting to find a piece of the laws of physics or the door to the unified field.

(2) God is not a big man in the sky but is being itself.

God is in everything. He's too big and too basic to be seen.

(3) God is the mind that thinks reality

we re figments of God's imagination. That means we can't get outside the thought and see what's thinking it. How could we possibility do that? I hate the film "the Matrix" no one bring it up. I prefer the holodeck on Star Trek TNG. how could a character of the Holodeck never know the truth?


(4) God's wants the search.

God doesn't' want to make it obvious. He makes it possible for us to find him but we have to seek. the reasons are laid out in my thing on soeteriological drama.

atheist says


Atheists might say God could make it obvious if he wanted to. Yes, but he doesn't want to because that would frustrate the process of interlinking values. Its' not unfair because the possibility is there. you only have to let go of your ego and seek God though the means that he may be found.

an atheist says:
Lets take a few things off:
*big bang
atheist says:

This comes from using we well verified theory in science (relativity) and extrapolating it back to the early universe after it was observed that the universe was expanding. but I can say the same thing about my arguments. I can say 'this come from using a well verified theory called modal logic ect ect." you want to make exceptions when it's knowledge you control then say all other forms of knowledge are crap. that's not fair.

But you see what he's done in making this response is special pleading. He's doing exactly what the atheists have been telling us we can't do, their slogan: "stop giving us arguemnts we don't want arguments, we want facts." Yet, he comes back on something that has no direct empirical evdience and make an argument that's it's right anyway becuase of the fit with theory, meaning he doesn't have empirical evdience but he's going accept an theocratic argument. That's what we are doing with God arguments, it' sthe thing we do that the atheist say they don't want. This is a logical fallacy called special pleading becuase it means suspend the rules for me but keep them for my opponent.

*singularity
atheist says

This shows that general relativity is incomplete as a physical theory. It signifies that there is a breakdown in the model.

same trick. I have argumetns that i can make make sense when I put them in the proper context. then the atheists say "I don't accept that context because if I did your argument would prove God. so I refuse the context, it's not evidence, therefore, you have no evidence."

there are physicists who say they don't accept the context of the singularity that proves it's not the fortress of facts. it's not a fact it's not solid, it could change. yet no one says "this isn't real becuase I don't have specific empirical evidence."

that is all about managing the context and that's all you are doing in rejecting God arguments.

*string membranes

atheist says

String theory is so for the only model that unifies all known forces at all scales, it can be shown that branes (as they are known) must exist for the theory to be internally consistent.

In other words, it's an argument based upon the fit of the theoretical phenomena with other theory. Same answer applies you don't' have direct empirical evidence I don't' see you saying its not reality. I have seen physicists say we may never have direct empirical evidence of this but you wont call it unreal.

*dark matter (getting close)

atheist says

There are some ideas, certainly but I wouldn't say that anyone is getting close.

This is interesting becasue I say we are getting close to finding empirical proof of dark matter he says "I wouldn't say anyone is getting close." He may have misunderstood what I meant so the meant in another way, it's hard to believe that since it seems so clear to me. Yet in another thread he say "i never said we were getting close." Which only works aginast his argument, makes me think he doesn't even realize what's going on in the whole thread.

you are not calling it unreal either. you just admitted we don't have the kind of evidence for it that you demand of God.


*direct observation of neutrinos (were historically accepted as real long before any direct evidence, still don't have direct observation of them).

atheist says:

Because they were predicted by a theory that was very well experimentally verified in other areas.

Classic example. That's nothing more than what I said. It's not better than I can do with any of my God arguments. I can prove all my God arguments on the same basis. The God arguments can be predicted by theories that are well verified in other areas (in other words, not in direct relation of God). All he is doing is managing the context, that is the context under which such and such a phenomenon is thought of as evidence for something, such as God. He's just managing the context under which these phenomena can be tough of as backed evdience. In other wrongs we don't have direct empirical evidence of them but they are not going to say they don't exist. They would if it was a God argument. The very same basis upon which I can prove my God arguments, indirect, predicted by accepted theory in other vain, but that wouldn't be good enough for the atheists. Yet science does it accept it for other things. it's part of a theory. you don't have empirical proof. and my God arguments are part of a theory. This guy can't understand that every time he argues such and such can be proved real anyway he's backing my case. He thinks he's proving "O scinece works and God doesn't" he's actually proving the basis upon which I claim my God argument is scientific.

*Hawking's no singularity thing, (although that's pretty much set aside but it was accepted up front on the premise that we can't have direct proof).

atheist says:

This is continued in the string model as as it has been explained to you that the beginning of the universe is no longer considered as a singularity.

In other words, it's proved by a model that is itself not the result of empirical data but is also assumed true by its fit with other theory. Meaning he's compounded the problem twice over. Now he establishes the precedent of twice arguing for something that scinece says s real but does not ahve direct empirical data to prove. That stands as the security form yet another theory for which there is no empirical data. So far can they stretch that point. I have God arguments that have to verified by other non empirical theories. No twice overs among my 42 God arguments.


*Multivese (no direct proof, mathematical doesn't count).

There are consequences that can be derived from the multiverse which can be tested and I am also told that they are looking at testing this idea experimentally already.

all the same deal.

All that really means is that without assuming the unverified multivariate they would have no answer temporal beginning argument or to the fin tuning argument.

after enough of this charge of special pleading and explaining what it means:

Originally Posted by this atheist

Absolutely not! proving something via modal logic is completely different to saying, this comes from a well tested model with very good predictive capability. The model comes from experiment, from the real world. Model logic comes from a set of axioms.

No it's not. it's really the very same thing. Yes modal logic is not the same thing as physics but that has nothign t do with the way that argument functions i your utterance. Not all the verification of God arguments is form modal logic, some is form cosmology just like these are.

He did not provide any direct empirical evidence. all he did was manage the context in which you consider the theory to make the anamorphic into evidence. In other words it's dependent upon the paradigm. The proof is that some physicists don't' accept the same big bang paradigm anymore so the big bang evidence is not evidence in their paradigm anymore.

my God arguments are not proof for atheists because they say "that's philosophy and I don't dig philosophy so it's not proof." I say "I dig philosophy so it is proof." that doesn't mean it' snot proof becuase you say it isn't, it is to me. It' just that you are managing the context in which proof is seen as proof.

another atheist chimes in:

Once again meta, you are comparing apples and oranges. We are talking about theories that have predictive capabilities, that have warn out the decades of experimental tests and still have been correct. Singularities appear in such models you know that there is something else to do on the theory.

I have 200 studies that are published in peer reviewed academic journals, everyone of them establishes the fact that religious experience fits the criteria of epistemic judgment, which is verified as valid by our daily epistemic practices. That means we can extrapolate from those findings and say this is verified by proven theory and it can be argued that it supports warrant for God belief. When I say that they go, "those studies don't' have 'god exists' as a finding so you can't extrapolate form it." The things they use to back these physical phenomena were not established on the basis that they back those phenomena. Einstein didn't propose relativity and say "and this valid as backing for a theory that will be put forth some day about neutrinos."

I'm really not doing anything any different than they do in their scientific work. In fact they don't do it, their priests of knowledge, the scientists do it. It's not different than what I do in my God arguments. Yet they allow it for scinece and not for God. That's what logicians call SPECIAL PLEADING!

They are using the difference in philosophy and phsyics like it's a big deal because they are managing the context. but the truth is the theory functions in their utterance the same way it does in mine. the problem is I accept a different theory than the one they conveniently ignore because it not in the one in their template of ideolgoical acceptance. The atheists have a template that spells out the ideologically favored ideas anything off template they ridicule and sweep aside with not thought or compunction.That is how they can condemn all of philosophy in one fell swoop without knowing anything about it. The template is based upon the concept of the fortress of facts. The theoretical big pile of facts that assures their view is truth. Of cousre only scientific fact then not all of them.

atheist says:

String theory reduces to the previous laws which do have good experimental evidence, you don't think that they just dreamed the whole idea up do you?

Meta said:

That does not equate to direct empirical evidence. you are compensating in every single case for not having the kind of evidence you demand of God talk.

you rationalize that lack by special pleading. you say "I can manage the context in which evidence is evidence and do it in such a way as to make up for the lack of what I require of God arguemnts.

you are saying "the rules apply to all the stuff off template but not to stuff on template." we call that "special pleading." In the lgoic world that's what it's called.

as I have explained, it's completely different.

special pleading.

you don't have direct evidence and you know you don't. It's a double standard it's special pleading.

Reflections upon Methodology and Science

I don't think atheists care about evidence. Evidence just means that one has something to reason from. What atheists demand is absolute proof, and at a level that can't be given for anything. I would bet that if for some reason atheists didn't like science, no amount of scientific "proof" wood suffice to prove to them that science works; because they would demand absolute proof, which can't be gotten.

In thinking about the two other threads I initiative over the last few days, and the atheist take on my arguments and their 'dicing' of my thought processes, and their refusal to acknowledge standard responses that I give all the time, I find the following state of affairs to be a good description of the current state of dialectic between atheists and theists on the boards:

(1) Theists have a vast array of knowledge and argumentation built up over 2000 years, which basically amounts to a ton evidence for the existence of God. It's not absolute proof, because true, sure enough, actual absolute proof is just damn hard to come by on anything--even most scientific things; which is why they invented inductive reasoning. Science accepts correlation's as signs of caudal relationships, it doesn't ever actually observe causality at work. But that kind of indicative relationship is not good for atheists when a God argument is involved. Then it must be absolute demonstration and direct observation.

(2) This double standard always works in favor of the atheist and never in favor of the theist. I suspect that's because Theists are trying to persuade atheists that a certain state of affairs is the case, and at the same time we are apt to be less critical of our own reasons for believing that. Atheists make a habit of denial and pride themselves on it.

Why is it a double standard? Because when it works to establish a unified system of naturalistic observation the atheist is only too happy to appeal to "we never see" "we always see" and "there is a strong correlation." We never see a man raised from the dead. We never see a severed limb restored. The correlation's between naturalistic cause and effect are rock solid and always work, so science gives us truth, and religion doesn't. But when those same kinds of correlation's are used to support a God argument, they are just no darn good. to wit: we never see anything pop out of absolute noting, we never even see absolute nothing, even QM particles seem to emerge from prior conditions such as Vacuum flux, so they are not really proof of something form nothing. But O tisg tosh, that doesn't prove anything and certainly QM proves that the universe could just pop up out of nothing!

(3) "laws of physics" are not real laws, they are only descriptions, aggregates of our observations. So they can't be used to argue for God in any way. But, when it comes to miraculous claims, the observations of such must always be discounted because they violate our standard norm for observation, and we must always assume they are wrong no matter how well documented or how inexplicable. We must always assume that only naturalistic events can happen, even though the whole concept of a naturalism can only be nothing more than an aggregate of our observations about the world; and surely they are anything but exhaustive. Thus one wood think that since our observations are not enough to establish immutable laws of the universe, they would not be enough to establish a metaphysics which says that only material realms exist and only materially caused events can happen! But guess again...!

(4) The Theistic panoply of argumentation is a going concern. Quentin Smith, the top atheist philosopher says that 80% of philosophers today are theists. But when one uses philosophy in a God argument, it's just some left over junk from the middle ages; even though my God arguments are based upon S 5 modal logic which didn't exist even before the 1960s and most of the major God arguers are still living.

(5) They pooh pooh philosophy because it doesn't' produce objective concrete results. But they can't produce any scientific evidence to answer the most basic philosophical questions, and the more adept atheists will admit that it isn't the job of science to answer those questions anyway. Scientific evidence cannot give us answers on the most basic philosophical questions, rather than seeing this as a failing in science (or better yet, evidence of differing magister) they rather just chalice it up to the failing of the question! The question is no good because our methods dot' answer it!

(6) What it appears to me is the case is this; some methods are better tailed for philosophy. Those methods are more likely to yield a God argument and even a rational warrant for belief, because God is a philosophical question and not a scientific one. God is a matter of faint, after all, and in matters of faith a rational warrant is the best one should even hope for. But that's not good enough for atheists, they disparage the whole idea of a philosophical question (at least the scientistic ones do--that's not all of them, but some) yet they want an open ended universe with no hard and fast truth and no hard and fast morality!

(7)So it seems that if one accepts certain methods one can prove God within the nature of that language game. now of course one can reject those language games and choose others that are not quite as cozy with the divine and that's OK too. Neither approach is indicative of one's intelligence or one's morality. But, it does mean that since it may be just as rational given the choice of axioms and methodologies, then what that taps out to is belief in God is rationally warranted--it may not be only rational conclusion but it is one rational conclusion Now I know some of the more intelligent atheists will say "hey I'm fine with that." But then when push comes to shove they will be back again insisting that the lack of absolute proof leaves the method that yields God arguments in doubt, rather than the other way around. I don't see why either should be privileged. Why can't we just say that one method is better suited for one kind of question, the other for the other?

and if one of them says 'why should I ask those questions?' I say 'why shouldn't we leave the choice of questions to the questioner?

Another Phony "I'm so Confussed" ploy by an Atheist

Here is a post on CARM, a new poster who is an atheist.Just the basic rendition of the atheist ideology. There's no basis in fact to any of this. This one calls himself/herself "Serpe." it's written form the standpoint "I'm so confused help me know what to think!" the ploy there is "I'm going to presnet what I take to be obvious facts and claim to be confused about them for the purpose of emphasizing the what I think is obvious: science proves atheism..

S:

I believe and still believe that religion had a purpose to unite humans, but has not devolved into dividing humans. Religion causes war.

Meta:

You have no evidence to support it. you have an opinion and it's based upon a stereotype and atheist reasoning which biased and concocted to argue against religion that's not support for a position that claims to be factual.

I don't see why people believe anything in the face of so much evidence to the contrary. But now I'm being told that there isn't that much evidence against religion. In fact, there's as much evidence for religion as there is for evolution.

There are no such facts. This is nothing more than the atheist ideological notion of the "fortress of facts." That is a propaganda piece not a factual scientific statement. Science is not atheism and scinece does not prove. There is no fortress of facts.

I'm a staunch believer in evolution. It's an amazing and sound scientific theory. And for those who cry, “It's only a theory!” misunderstand that theory means scientific explanation that is widely accepted. Gravity is also “only a theory,” my friends.

Evolution is not an argument against the existence of God. Nothing about evolution that contradicts God.

The Universe is beautiful and infinite. There are so many things that had to go right for life to evolve as it has, but the Universe is immensely chaotic and unfriendly to life. Plus, life has to have happened elsewhere in the Universe. It's ignorant to believe otherwise.

Fine tuning a good argument, it takes a lot more time than this little dust off you have given it.

Consciousness is a chemical reaction, as are thoughts and emotions. That being said, when people say, “God is Love,” I hear, “God is a chemical reaction.” I think that God is in our heads.

consciousness is not a chemical reaction.no evidence anywhere proves that that is a propaganda move based upon the ideology of reductionism. No factual basis it's contradicted by the hard problem, Veto power, and top down causation.

But recently, I've been conflicted. I want to believe in God and Jesus. I want to be a Christian. But I feel that I can't, with my beliefs. I feel it contradicts everything I stand for, and I can't go for that. I feel that science and religion can't mix, and when my life has built it's foundations on science, I can't “sink” to religion. Has anyone else ever felt this way? Please share your experiences. Does anyone have any thoughts to help me through this time in my life?

This is so absurdly silly. There is nothing in the basis of scinece that contradicts belief in God. Many major scientists today including the head of the Genome project are Chieftains or other types believers in God. Nothing about scinece that contradicts God.

the fact that all of these unthinking type of atheist (one type) have the impression that scinece somehow contradicts God is merely the result of propaganda and brain washing (socialization).

I'm also going to post this in the Christian side, to see what the believers have to say.The major lesson here is that atheism has gotten as far as it has by catering to ignorance, bigotry and creating a socialization process (brain washing).