Atheists: What would be evidence of God’s existence?

[Sheldon]

If you want to prove me wrong, just present a single explanatory model where your deity fits in and makes it work better, offers us testability and disprovability.

A reasonable request, demonstrating that a deity is possible would be a good start of course, but also that theistic belief has any explanatory powers that go beyond bare subjective assertion.

 

[Hidingfromyou]

Not even that, disbelief is all I am prepared to infer from bare subjective claims, a denial is reserved for when there is an epistemological or rational challenge to a claim.

I like this answer.

I've had some theists tell me that atheism is the denial of the existence of their deities.

I wasn't particularly upset with their wording, since I don't believe their deities exist and "I deny their existence" seems pretty similar.

But reserving denial for positions with actual claims seems the better option.

 

[Hidingfromyou]

A reasonable request, demonstrating that a deity is possible would be a good start of course, but also that theistic belief has any explanatory powers that go beyond bare subjective assertion.

You'd think they'd hop on that challenge, given how often they claim their deity created this or that, but nooooooo, believers just get very upset when I make such requests.

I bet you any money that Thor believers don't get so upset! They just point and say, "look, lightning. Thor is mad. Or having fun. That's him. My god."

 

[muhammad_isa]

..If you want to prove me wrong..

I don't. You are free to believe whatever you like.

 

[Trailblazer]

Humans evolved, as have all living things, this is supported by a weight of objective evidence beyond any reasonable or rational denial.

I agree that humans evolved as that is a Baha'i belief.
However, somewhere during the process of evolution humans developed a brain and a will so they could think and act for themselves and be responsible for themselves.

God did not create life; the parents created life when they had sex and had children.

 

[Trailblazer]

No. All make believe has exactly the same validity, which is zero. Your make believe is equal to any fiction.

Zero I'm afraid.

If you want to prove me wrong, just present a single explanatory model where your deity fits in and makes it work better, offers us testability and disprovability.

You won't be able to, but don't feel bad. Make believe doesn't do that well.

What you believe is make believe has exactly the same validity, which is zero. What you believe is make believe is equal to any fiction.

Asserting that God or a religion is make believe is the fallacy of argument for ignorance for the reasons noted below.

Argument from ignorance asserts that a proposition is true because it has not yet been proven false or proposition is false because it has not yet been proven true. This represents a type of false dichotomy in that it excludes a third option, which is that there may have been an insufficient investigation, and therefore there is insufficient information to prove the proposition be either true or false. Nor does it allow the admission that the choices may in fact not be two (true or false), but may be as many as four,

1. true
2. false
3. unknown between true or false
4. being unknowable (among the first three).[1]

Argument from ignorance - Wikipedia

 

[Hidingfromyou]

I don't. You are free to believe whatever you like.

Ah, thanks. You too!

 

[Sheldon]

God gave humans a brain and free will

somewhere during the process of evolution humans developed a brain and a will so they could think and act for themselves and be responsible for themselves.

Hmm, which? One is an objective fact, the other is not objectively evidenced at all, and rather contradicts the fact of evolution.

 

[Hidingfromyou]

What you believe is make believe has exactly the same validity, which is zero. What you believe is make believe is equal to any fiction.

Asserting that God or a religion is make believe is the fallacy of argument for ignorance for the reasons noted below.

Argument from ignorance asserts that a proposition is true because it has not yet been proven false or proposition is false because it has not yet been proven true. This represents a type of false dichotomy in that it excludes a third option, which is that there may have been an insufficient investigation, and therefore there is insufficient information to prove the proposition be either true or false. Nor does it allow the admission that the choices may in fact not be two (true or false), but may be as many as four,

1. true
2. false
3. unknown between true or false
4. being unknowable (among the first three).[1]

Argument from ignorance - Wikipedia

We can actually test whether a claim about the nature of reality is make-believe. Claims that deities exist, that mythologies are real, are claims about the nature of reality. We can test those claims by producing hypotheses based on them, their logic, and see if they produce any results. Additionally, we can insert the deities of any given religion into our scientific models to see if they help the models.

If the claims cannot be tested, if they worsen our explanatory models, the claims are most likely make-believe.

I'll start with point two: inserting "God" or "Thor" into our explanatory models. Do they strengthen the model? Turns out that's a no. Thor doesn't help explain storms or weather. In fact, putting Thor into our explanations ruins our explanations because then we have to ask questions about Thor - "why did Thor make this storm? What does this storm say about Thor?" These questions are unanswerable and therefore meaningless. Thor doesn't exist.

The same is true with the Abrahamic deity. Any explanatory model you try to fit it into ruins the model. For ex., let's stick him in Einstein's relativity. Suddenly, we have God questions - "why did God make the speed of light this value? What was God thinking when making Mercury?" etc. Does nothing for our science, gives us meaningless, unanswerable questions.

Neither God nor Thor provide any usefulness to our explanatory models. They are therefore most like make-believe. Given that they both enjoy equal validity, which is to say zero, I'm safe in assuming they're fictions.

So, I did not make the argument from ignorance. But thank you for pointing out that fallacy - lots of people try to stick their deities into our ignorance. But our ignorance doesn't make a good home for them.

 

[muhammad_isa]

One is an objective fact, the other is not objectively evidenced at all, and rather contradicts the fact of evolution.

It really doesn't.
If one asks, "what is the cause of evolution?", it can be answered "it is a natural law and has no cause".

..but who/what gave the universe its nature?
..that would be G-d.

 

[Trailblazer]

Hmm, which? One is an objective fact, the other is not objectively evidenced at all, and rather contradicts the fact of evolution.

Somewhere during the process of evolution humans developed a brain and a will so they could think and act for themselves and be responsible for themselves. It was at that point during the process of human evolution that humans were given a rational soul by God and from that time on humans were differentiated from other animals who do not have a soul. Other animals only have an animal spirit.

Those are not contradictory. Since God is responsible for the process of evolution God can intervene at any time.

However, you are correct in saying that evolution is an objective fact, whereas what God did is not objectively evidenced at all, nor can it ever be objectively evidenced. That is why it is a religious belief and not a scientific fact.

 

[Trailblazer]

We can actually test whether a claim about the nature of reality is make-believe. Claims that deities exist, that mythologies are real, are claims about the nature of reality. We can test those claims by producing hypotheses based on them, their logic, and see if they produce any results. Additionally, we can insert the deities of any given religion into our scientific models to see if they help the models.

If the claims cannot be tested, if they worsen our explanatory models, the claims are most likely make-believe.

You cannot prove that God does not exist or that religions are make believe with science.....

Religious claims cannot be tested with science, that is highly illogical.
As soon as you start to conflate science and religion you are being highly illogical.

 

[Trailblazer]

The same is true with the Abrahamic deity. Any explanatory model you try to fit it into ruins the model. For ex., let's stick him in Einstein's relativity. Suddenly, we have God questions - "why did God make the speed of light this value? What was God thinking when making Mercury?" etc. Does nothing for our science, gives us meaningless, unanswerable questions.

Unanswerable questions does not mean that God does not exist. There are reasons that humans do not have all the answers. One reason is that we do not need all the answers and another reason is because we could not understand the answers even if they were revealed to us by God through His Messenger and we would be completely overwhelmed by such knowledge. That is why Baha'u'llah did not reveal everything that He knew.

“Oh, would that the world could believe Me! Were all the things that lie enshrined within the heart of Bahá, and which the Lord, His God, the Lord of all names, hath taught Him, to be unveiled to mankind, every man on earth would be dumbfounded.

How great the multitude of truths which the garment of words can never contain! How vast the number of such verities as no expression can adequately describe, whose significance can never be unfolded, and to which not even the remotest allusions can be made! How manifold are the truths which must remain unuttered until the appointed time is come! Even as it hath been said: “Not everything that a man knoweth can be disclosed, nor can everything that he can disclose be regarded as timely, nor can every timely utterance be considered as suited to the capacity of those who hear it.”

Of these truths some can be disclosed only to the extent of the capacity of the repositories of the light of Our knowledge, and the recipients of Our hidden grace.”
Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, pp. 176-177

 

[Sheldon]

It really doesn't.

Oh ok, then could you cite a worthy peer reviewed journal, or any validated scientific research in the field of evolution, that includes evidence of a deity using inexplicable magic?

 

[Sheldon]

It really doesn't.

Yes it really does.

If one asks, "what is the cause of evolution?", it can be answered "it is a natural law and has no cause".

Can it? We have objective evidence that evolution is driven by the mechanism of natural selection, beyond that I'm not sure what you are claiming, or whether the scientific theory of evolution remotely evidences your assumptions. I am pretty sure it does not evidence, nor does it need any deity or anything supernatural.

..but who/what gave the universe its nature?
..that would be G-d.

That would be unevidenced assumption.

 

[Hidingfromyou]

Somewhere during the process of evolution humans developed a brain and a will so they could think and act for themselves and be responsible for themselves. It was at that point during the process of human evolution that humans were given a rational soul by God and from that time on humans were differentiated from other animals who do not have a soul. Other animals only have an animal spirit.

Those are not contradictory. Since God is responsible for the process of evolution God can intervene at any time.

However, you are correct in saying that evolution is an objective fact, whereas what God did is not objectively evidenced at all, nor can it ever be objectively evidenced. That is why it is a religious belief and not a scientific fact.

If you don't mind me pointing out, animals have brains, too. Personalities, emotions, goals. Our brains, larger and more sophisticated than theirs, but from the same place.

Also, how did you decide when humans got a "soul"? And why animals don't? Is this a measurable thing?

 

[Hidingfromyou]

It really doesn't.
If one asks, "what is the cause of evolution?", it can be answered "it is a natural law and has no cause".

..but who/what gave the universe its nature?
..that would be G-d.

The causes of evolution are the following:


- DNA that can encode for proteins and instruction sets
- mutations that occur to DNA
- unequal survival
- unequal reproduction rates

 

[Hidingfromyou]

Unanswerable questions does not mean that God does not exist. There are reasons that humans do not have all the answers. One reason is that we do not need all the answers and another reason is because we could not understand the answers even if they were revealed to us by God through His Messenger and we would be completely overwhelmed by such knowledge. That is why Baha'u'llah did not reveal everything that He knew.

“Oh, would that the world could believe Me! Were all the things that lie enshrined within the heart of Bahá, and which the Lord, His God, the Lord of all names, hath taught Him, to be unveiled to mankind, every man on earth would be dumbfounded.

How great the multitude of truths which the garment of words can never contain! How vast the number of such verities as no expression can adequately describe, whose significance can never be unfolded, and to which not even the remotest allusions can be made! How manifold are the truths which must remain unuttered until the appointed time is come! Even as it hath been said: “Not everything that a man knoweth can be disclosed, nor can everything that he can disclose be regarded as timely, nor can every timely utterance be considered as suited to the capacity of those who hear it.”

Of these truths some can be disclosed only to the extent of the capacity of the repositories of the light of Our knowledge, and the recipients of Our hidden grace.”
Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, pp. 176-177

Unanswerable questions AND the fact that deities ruin our explanatory models.

Here's the thing: I can make up any fiction and it'll have equal validity to your claims about your deity. To me, that's pretty good evidence that your claims are fiction.

 

[Hidingfromyou]

You cannot prove that God does not exist or that religions are make believe with science.....

Religious claims cannot be tested with science, that is highly illogical.
As soon as you start to conflate science and religion you are being highly illogical.

The tests I have outlined demonstrate that religious claims are equal to the claims of fiction. I can therefore reject religious claims as easily as I reject fictional claims. Conflating science and religion would be making claims closer to what many believers make: that mythologies are somehow real and make accurate descriptions of reality.

And I'm not conflating science and religion. I'm using science to show that the claims of religion are equal to fiction in their explanatory power.

Please note that I see religion itself as a cultural system.

 

[Sheldon]

Somewhere during the process of evolution humans developed a brain and a will so they could think and act for themselves and be responsible for themselves.

The evolution of the brain didn't start when we evolved into humans.

It was at that point during the process of human evolution that humans were given a rational soul by God

At what point? Could you explain exactly where you claim a deity inserted this soul?

Sahelanthropus tchadensis
7 million years ago

Orrorin tugenensis
6.1 - 5.8 million years ago

Ardipithecus kadabba
5.8 - 5.5 million years ago

Ardipithecus ramidus
4.4 - 4.2 million years ago

Australopithecus anamensis
4.2 - 3.8 million years ago

Australopithecus afarensis
3.8 - 2.7 million years ago

Kenyanthropus platyops
3.5 - 3.2 million years ago

Australopithecus africanus
3.0 - 2.4 million years ago

Paranthropus aethiopicus
2.7 - 1.9 million years ago

Australopithecus garhi
2.6 - 2.5 million years ago

Paranthropus boisei
2.3 - 1.4 million years ago

Paranthropus robustus
2.0 - 1.0 million years ago

Homo rudolfensis
2.3 - 1.9 million years ago

Homo ergaster
2.0 - 1.5 million years ago

Homo habilis
2.0 - 1.6 million years ago

Homo georgicus
1.8 million years ago

Homo erectus
2.0(?) million - 50,000 years ago

Homo antecessor
800,000 - 200,000 years ago

Homo heidelbergensis
500,000 - 200,000 years ago

Homo Neandertalensis
300,000 - 28,000 years ago

Homo floresiensis
? to 18,000 years ago

Homo sapiens sapiens
200,000 - present

and from that time on humans were differentiated from other animals who do not have a soul. Other animals only have an animal spirit.

So how come we are still evolving?

Those are not contradictory. Since God is responsible for the process of evolution God can intervene at any time.

They are entirely unevidenced, are not remotely needed or evidenced in all of evolutionary science, and the other claims are just meaningless bare assertions.

However, you are correct in saying that evolution is an objective fact,

Well it is science that evidences this, not me.

God did is not objectively evidenced at all, nor can it ever be objectively evidenced. That is why it is a religious belief and not a scientific fact.

Then what are you basing your claim it is part of a scientific fact like species evolution on?