Atheists believe in miracles more than believers

[Pogo]

No, special pleading is when no justification is provided

You forgot to demonstrate the existence of this purported god. LOL

 

[cladking]

According to ancient astronaut theorists .... ?

No.

It's all the writing. They said things like "Tefnut makes the earth high under the sky by means of her arms" and "Osiris tows the earth by means of balance". They said over and over that the gods built the pyramids as a new body for their king.

We're too smart to believe them.

 

[SkepticThinker]

No.

It's all the writing. They said things like "Tefnut makes the earth high under the sky by means of her arms" and "Osiris tows the earth by means of balance". They said over and over that the gods built the pyramids as a new body for their king.

We're too smart to believe them.

Did they write "Tefnut built the pyramids." Or is it just random vaguery like the ones above?

 

[leroy]

You forgot to demonstrate the existence of this purported god. LOL

Which is irrelevant, it is steel not special pleading

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

No we don’t know the mechanisms, we have some candidate mechanisms but we don’t know which (if any) would work……this is true both for the eye and the pyramids. Nobody is talking about absolute detail.

But we do know the mechanisms of each.

With eyes, natural selection was applied to genetic variation in biological populations over geological time in environments where vision conferred a selective advantage.

In the case of the pyramids, we know that forces were applied to masses to accelerate them into the form of a pyramid according to a plan.

refute me with a paper, not with your endless semantic tricks

Personally, I won't look at orphan links (links without an accompanying argument offered as arguments). Why? The people who offer them generally don't understand them and can't understand much less refute any rebuttal, and the author's not here to do that for him. The other frequent disappointment when addressing orphan links is the ever popular, "that wasn't the part I meant."

If all you want is a paper, you can Google for one yourself. I wouldn't even provide a link to somebody uninterested in my accompanying argument and willing to dismiss it as "endless semantic tricks" but still asking me to go find answers for him.

And there you go calling semantics a trick again. I don't think you know what the word means given how you seem to equate it with fallacy and deception. The semantics problems on these threads come from the faith-based thinkers, who are unclear and inexact in their word choices or else generating ad hoc definitions in support of an agenda.

Maybe the phrase you are looking for is sophism or specious argumentation, which is deliberately deceptive argumentation. Unlike semantics, that's always a bad thing.

Another area where people make claim like yours but no argument is "You took it out of context." If meant literally and nonjudgmentally, as in citing a quote from a larger passage, OK. So what? But if one means that that contextectomy changed the apparent meaning of the larger passage, then he has a burden of "proof," which he can meet by providing both and demonstrating how with more context, one understands the excised text differently. But to just say, "You've taken the words out of context" is either a trivial claim in the first case or one that can be disregarded if not defended.

special pleading is when no justification is provided

You offer no reason to treat your god differently that a universe or multiverse, yet you do. However hard you work defending the possibility that your god exists and always has, you don't remove the other possibilities even by calling them ridiculous or saying that your god is out of time or any other objection you might offer. Just replace your god with the universe or a possible multiverse, and the argument is just as weak or strong.

The people who were actually there said "the gods built them". Of course we know better. We know there are no gods and that the builders were highly ignorant and superstitious so it's case closed.

We don't believe them. The case is on the back burner pending evidence that they were correct.

The skeptic and critical thinker also doesn't believe the reports that people witnessed a resurrection for the same reason.

 

[ratiocinator]

Now you just have to solve the cosmological principle, and show the logic is physical and not just thinking in brains.

I haven't solved the cosmological principle, I don't even know what you mean by "solving" it.

I gave you the physical evidence, so if you're just going back to your usual extreme solipsism, then YAWN!

 

[Pogo]

Which is irrelevant, it is steel not special pleading

Chat GPT may not be bright, but it is not bad at summarizing simple arguments.

"How is appeal to God an example of special pleading?

An appeal to God can be considered an example of special pleading in the context of logical fallacies because it involves making an exception to a rule or principle without justification. Here's how it fits:
Special pleading is a fallacy where someone applies a standard to others or to a situation but exempts themselves without providing a valid reason for the exemption. When someone appeals to God, they are often invoking a divine authority or special status that exempts their argument from normal standards of evidence or reasoning.
Here’s how an appeal to God can be seen as special pleading:

1. Lack of justification: The person making the appeal to God assumes that their viewpoint or argument is automatically valid because it is attributed to a divine source. However, they do not provide any evidence or logical reasoning to support why God's authority should be accepted in this context.
2. Exemption from scrutiny: By invoking God, the person may be attempting to avoid critical examination or questioning of their argument. They might suggest that because God said so, it should be accepted without question, which bypasses the need for logical consistency or evidence.
3. Unverifiability: Appeals to God often rely on beliefs or interpretations that are subjective and not universally verifiable. This makes it difficult to engage in a reasoned debate because the basis of the argument is not grounded in observable facts or logical premises.

In summary, an appeal to God can be seen as special pleading because it introduces an exception (God's authority) without justifying why this exception should be accepted or why it applies uniquely to their argument. It sidesteps normal standards of evidence and reasoning, which are essential in logical discourse."

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

I haven't solved the cosmological principle, I don't even know what you mean by "solving" it.

I gave you the physical evidence, so if you're just going back to your usual extreme solipsism, then YAWN!

What kind of solipsism is that?

I do believe that the natural universe is real, fair, orderly and knowledable. I just don't have any evidence for that.
What about you?

 

[YoursTrue]

It all depends on your idiosyncratic and occasionally dependent definition of "know". Here is the beginning or the definition from Oxford languages.

"know
/nō/
verb
1.
be aware of through observation, inquiry, or information.
"most people know that CFCs can damage the ozone layer""

This is hopefully true of you and I probably comprehend a whole lot more of the chemistry details though not to the level of quantum chemistry and their are still details of chemical reactions to be studied.

The point being whether you even know what a CFC is or not, or whether I or even any person knows every detail, we know how the process works and if you have these materials and inputs, the reaction or development will proceed.

Absolute detail is not a prerequisite of knowledge though evidence is. We do not need to personally know even more than the broad understanding but understand how to research others knowledge to fill in blanks. The contrary can also be demonstrated "that we don't know" something by someone providing an example that we consider reasonable knowledge that disagrees. At that point we will know more and maybe not know what we originally knew.


This is ultimately the source of rabbit holes you keep digging( as @Dan From Smithville accurately describes them) because you want others to be able to provide absolute detail.

You appear to have a knowledge base that is premised on your beliefs about how the universe, world, whatever should work without specific evidence but with desires. The two intersect in trivial cases. You don't claim aliens for the pyramids but do claim our lack of knowledge because we lack absolute detail even though we could create a new pyramid using temporally appropriate materials and methods.

This attitude appears to apply to @YoursTrue in that nothing short of absolute detail is accepted in spite of no alternate explanation other than goddunit without any methodology.

That we don't and never will know everything should be a given, but humanity survives on the back of our observed behaviour of increasing our knowledge.

As to your questions of going beyond this version of knowledge to is there something more, my position is that I don't care, and no-one has ever given me any reason to.

Yes, well the word know reminds me of a beautiful song from Handel's Messiah..."I KNOW That My Redeemer Liveth..." Yes indeed. Proof beyond belief? Yet to be seen. If you like classical music, worth a listen...

 

[YoursTrue]

QED

A neurologist told me regarding the eye that everything is connected to the brain.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

A neurologist told me regarding the eye that everything is connected to the brain.

Well, did you doubt that? It might be relevant to look into the blind spot.

 

[YoursTrue]

You forgot to demonstrate the existence of this purported god. LOL

It is the hope of some of us that He will make himself indubitably known.

 

[YoursTrue]

Well, did you doubt that? It might be relevant to look into the blind spot.

Scientists can probably have a field day looking into recognition capacity too. Didn't they extract Einstein's brain?

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

It is the hope of some of us that He will make himself indubitably known.

The problem is this. If you are not God yourself, how do you know that God is not tricking you beyound doubt?

 

[cladking]

According to ancient astronaut theorists .... ?

I'd suggest this thread;

Ancient Reality

A response to this statement in another thread wouldn't be appropriate there. Proof isn’t evidence. You keep getting hung up in semantics. Semantics is one of the chief ways we use to create our circular arguments and some use it to demolish other arguments. But semantics isn't real, it's...

www.religiousforums.com

There is no writing recorded from the age in which the great pyramids were built. The little does exist is highly fragmentary and Sumerian. But right after this era there exists very ancient Egyptian writing from the great pyramid building age and even older.

The Pyramid Texts: The Pyramid Texts: 30. Resurrection, Meal, and Ascension of the Deceased King, Utterance 553

The Pyramid Texts, Samuel A.B. Mercer tr., at sacred-texts.com

sacred-texts.com

This is far and away the oldest corpus of writing in existence. That the "Egyptians" built the pyramids is a virtual certainty but if I'm right they weren't even the same species. They were wise and we are omniscient.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Scientists can probably have a field day looking into recognition capacity too. Didn't they extract Einstein's brain?

Can you rephrase that?

 

[leroy]

But we do know the mechanisms of each.

With eyes, natural selection was applied to genetic variation in biological populations over geological time in environments where vision conferred a selective advantage.

Yes but there are many known mechanisms that can produce “genetic variation” + maybe many other mechanisms that are yet to be discovered.

All I am saying is that at this point, we don’t know yet…which of these mechanisms where responsible and played an important role for the evolution of the eye………….this is not supposed to be controversial……….quite frankly it feels like people are just disagreeing for the sake of disagreeing

If all you want is a paper, you can Google for one yourself. I wouldn't even provide a link to somebody uninterested in my accompanying argument and willing to dismiss it as "endless semantic tricks" but still asking me to go find answers for him.

the point that I am making is that there are no papers, because scientists don’t know yet, how the eye evovled

You offer no reason to treat your god differently that a universe or multiverse, yet you do. However hard you work defending the possibility that your god exists and always has, you don't remove the other possibilities even by calling them ridiculous or saying that your god is out of time or any other objection you might offer. Just replace your god with the universe or a possible multiverse, and the argument is just as weak or strong.

The reason I gave is that unlike the universe, God didn’t begin to exist, this is why I am treating God differently. Hence no special pleading

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

...


The reason I gave is that unlike the universe, God didn’t begin to exist, this is why I am treating God differently. Hence no special pleading

How do you know that God didn't begin to exist?

 

[ratiocinator]

Nope,. You are claiming that premise 2 is false ……which means that the minimal requirement is to sow that “past eternal” models are more likely to be true than past finite models…………showing that some models are “possible” is not enough …………you need to show that this models are more likely to be true.

No. I keep on explaining why both premises are false, regardless of the universe being past infinite or not. If you haven't got it by now, you probably never will.

1 does the model cliam that the universe is past eternal?

2 do you afirm that the model is more likely to be true than th standard big bang model?

1 Yes. 2 No.

if you dont answer yes to both questions, then I will dismiss it as irrelevant

See my first point above.

Wrong, (in red lettes) I could not do that forever, eventually I will get tired, or my computer will run out of power, or it will collapse…………….. I grant that you can imagine and make models of something infinite……………but in the real world you can´t really have something infinite.

So you don't understand an 'in principle' argument. No wonder you're struggling with the other concept. The last statement is an unargued assertion. You realise that calculus is based on continua?

The claim that you were born after an infinite number of seconds or an infinite number of events is nonsense (agree)?

No.

1 eternalism or “block universe” is far from “uncontroversialy true” one can adopt presentism without denying GR nor any other scientific law/theory/theorem/fact.... It is false to say that relativity forces us to this interpretation of time………….

I explained why it was necessary. If you think you can reproduce general relativity, or even special relativity, using presentism, feel free to do so

3 from the fact that block universe is true it doesn’t follow that the block universe “just is”.it could still have a cause or a “reason”

It can have a reason, as I've said repeatedly, but your temporal arguments and options no longer apply, and we can ask for the reason for your God.

Ohh so you think that past present and future are equally real and simultaneous?..............this would mean that cause and effect are simulnteous……………….which is nonsense according to the super smart user @TagliatelliMonster

You really do struggle, don't you? Time exists as a direction though the block universe, so events can still be separated by time, just as they can be separated by space. For the same reason, simultaneity still has meaning, although it's relative to an observer/frame of reference in relativity, which is a BIG problem for presentism.

 

[ratiocinator]

I am providing a justification for why God is different form the universe, therefore I am not guilty of committing that fallacy.

What justification?