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

[Tiberius]

That is very true about science vs. religion. The past is gone so we cannot undo all the damage done in the name of religion, but if everyone recognized Baha'u'llah and became Baha'is all that warfare and death and suffering would end. Of course we all know that is not going to happen any time soon and the reason it won't happen for a long time is because religious people cling tenaciously to the older religions and that is the primary reason the Bahai Faith has not grown larger, yet.

Why is it that believers so often seem to just say, "Yes, that's a very good point," and then completely ignore the consequences of that point?

My point was that religion doesn't produce the kind of reliable and consistent results we get from science because religion is wrong.

You are right, religion is not doing what it is designed to do because the older religions no longer have what it takes to do what religion was designed to do. The older religions are like old cars that have seen their day and can no longer get people where they need to go. That is one reason that God sent a new Messenger to establish a new religion, to renew religion so it can accomplish God's purpose for religion.

And that's exactly what we'd expect to see if religion was bunk.

“The Great Being saith: O ye children of men! The fundamental purpose animating the Faith of God and His Religion is to safeguard the interests and promote the unity of the human race, and to foster the spirit of love and fellowship amongst men. Suffer it not to become a source of dissension and discord, of hate and enmity. This is the straight Path, the fixed and immovable foundation. Whatsoever is raised on this foundation, the changes and chances of the world can never impair its strength, nor will the revolution of countless centuries undermine its structure. Our hope is that the world’s religious leaders and the rulers thereof will unitedly arise for the reformation of this age and the rehabilitation of its fortunes. Let them, after meditating on its needs, take counsel together and, through anxious and full deliberation, administer to a diseased and sorely-afflicted world the remedy it requireth….” Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, pp. 215-216

“How long will humanity persist in its waywardness? How long will injustice continue? How long is chaos and confusion to reign amongst men? How long will discord agitate the face of society?… The winds of despair are, alas, blowing from every direction, and the strife that divideth and afflicteth the human race is daily increasing. The signs of impending convulsions and chaos can now be discerned, inasmuch as the prevailing order appeareth to be lamentably defective. I beseech God, exalted be His glory, that He may graciously awaken the peoples of the earth, may grant that the end of their conduct may be profitable unto them, and aid them to accomplish that which beseemeth their station.” Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, pp. 216-217

Citing verses from religious texts to show that the religion is true is like producing a comic book to show that Batman is real. It doesn't work. I don't know why you do it.

 

[Tiberius]

Okay, I will try to remember that.

That's true, and they are all personal opinions since they are held by people. Some opinions might be based upon facts and some might not be.

It really amounts to the same thing.

Then you agree with me that religious belief is a particular type of opinion?

 

[Truthseeker]

So your assumption that Mr B was specifically referring to nuclear processes when he wrote that copper can be turned into gold is just a guess, isn't it? For all you know, his alleged knowledge on how to do it was completely different.

I have reason to believe that Baha'u'llah knew that it was nuclear processes, you don't.

 

[Truthseeker]

2) attempts to promote rational and logical thinking
3) attempts to help people out of falling for supernatural crank fiction

You are not helping me at all.

See what I said to someone else:

I don't believe that a religion or Messenger should be believed solely on inner evidence, or just looking at it to see if it is "right for you". Inner inspiration by itself alone is unreliable.

The Baha'i Faith should be investigated to see if the Writings hang together with each other, whether after careful examination with other religious scriptures if they are compatible with Baha'i scriptures since we believe in a lot of Messengers besides Baha'u'llah. Also do we believe from Baha'u'llah's life as well as we can ascertain whether he was deluded, crazy, or lying as far as we are able. Also do the Writings resonate with you in an inner sense. A part of investigation is to be as independent in the investigation as possible from other people. A part people don't usually consider is your own life a reflection of good principles, because that helps you to evaluate whether what the Writings say are good, and increases your possibility of experiencing inner confirmations if they are there.

 

[Aupmanyav]

I pointed out that no one was disputing the reliable recorded history about the life of Baha'u'llah.

The reliable information is from Wikipedia. Information provided by Bahais or their HoJ cannot be termed as reliable because of bias.

 

[Truthseeker]

I'm not clear on this point. However, while we share 99% of DNA with an ancestor we have 100% animal DNA. 0% of our DNA or anything else demonstrable is spiritual.

Besides what I have said, spiritual is not physical at all. You are entitled to your opinion, but physical in my opinion is not all that is.

 

[Aupmanyav]

No. I said that rational people look at the evidence and base the conclusions on that.
It does not matter if lots of people have concluded that certain alleged Messengers have sufficient evidence does not make it true.
What there is to measure cannot be demonstrated until you use the proper method to demonstrate them.
So you have to use the method not knowing if there is anything to measure until you discover it by the method.
I am not suggesting that you conclude anything until you have used the method to determine if there is something measurable.
If God is nonexistent you would be right, but if God exists.....

What evidence are you talking about? Is it what Bahaollah said about himself?
If messengers have sufficient evidence other than their own rants, why have not they placed it before people?
You yourself say that if people conclude that one messenger has sufficient evidence, that does not make the claim true. So what about Bahaollah? He also claimed to be a messenger in the Abrahamic fashion.
Whqat method? Take one messenger as true and the other as false? Why do you not acknowledge Mirza Ghulam Ahmad? He has a following of more people than your Bahaollah.
There is nothing measurable in what these prophets / sons / messengers / manifestations / mahdis say. Ift is only a matter of blindly folloing one or the other.
That is a big 'if'. First give evidence of existence of God or Allah.

 

[Truthseeker]

Cool, could you give one evidence. One actual evidence that stands up to some reasonable standard?

Look at my previous post to you and then we can talk about that maybe. But it is so hard to just give one evidence and be at all convincing to you. You have to investigate it independently in it's totality to really be convinced of anything.

 

[Trailblazer]

The fact that people look at the evidence and reach many different conclusions seems to show that this claim is wrong.

It absolutely does not show that at all. It only shows that all people are coming from completely different perspectives so they all come to different conclusions. Human desires and preferences originate from a combination of factors such as childhood upbringing, heredity, education, and life experiences.

Or did you mean to say, "I believe there is sufficient evidence to decide one way or another but people need to look at that evidence in order to decide."? In which case you believe incorrectly.

I meant what I said. Why would that mean I believe incorrectly?

No you didn't. You said, "Rational people know there can never be testable evidence for Messengers of God so they seek other kinds of evidence."

You are clearly saying that people will look for whatever they can find to justify the beliefs they have decided are true. Once again you are contradicting yourself.

I said that rational people look at the evidence and base the conclusions on that. I also said that rational people know there can never be testable evidence for Messengers of God so they seek other kinds of evidence.

I absolutely did not say that people will look for whatever they can find to justify the beliefs they have decided are true. That is you projecting your thoughts onto what I actually said and making a straw man.

The subjective criteria your faith promotes as correct?

No, the objective criteria I made myself, just like you made a list of criteria for prophecies.
It was not promoted by my faith.

Yes, because no one could feel the wind until we invented wind measuring tools. No one could see light until we invented light measuring tools.

Good job! But the wind and light were still there weren't they, even before we had tools to measure them?
Likewise, God is there even though we have no tools to measure God.

I have done. There was nothing there.

Nothing you were able to see.

Tb said: "The wheat are logical because they know that God is all-powerful so God is the one who will decide what evidence humans will get. The chaff are illogical so they think they can tell an all-powerful God what evidence it should provide."

That's a huge IF you have there.

Yes indeed, it is a pretty big IF.

 

[Aupmanyav]

There's more:

"If we were to deny all that is not accessible to the senses, then we would be forced to deny realities which undoubtedly exist. For example, the ether is not sensible, although its reality can be proven. The power of gravity is not sensible, although its existence is likewise undeniable. Whence do we affirm their existence? From their signs. For instance, this light consists in the vibrations of the ether, and from these vibrations we infer its existence."

"This light consists in the vibrations of the ether, and from these vibrations"
Wow, seriously this is worse than I thought? why can't you see this? He 100% thinks the actual ether is real. Scientists also thought that at that time. He is 100% using his knowledge of current science. Both science and him were wrong.

Please note that the Aether theory was doubted even in 18th Century, and had been completely discarded by Abdul Baha's time (1844 – 1921), but he did not know that. Not surprising, we cannot blame him because he was uneducated. By his time, even the Quantum Mechanics had appeared on the horizon.

"All of those results required the full application of the Lorentz transformation by Lorentz and Joseph Larmor in 1904. Summarizing the results of Michelson, Rayleigh and others, Hermann Weyl would later write that the aether had "betaken itself to the land of the shades in a final effort to elude the inquisitive search of the physicist". In addition to possessing more conceptual clarity, Albert Einstein's 1905 special theory of relativity could explain all of the experimental results without referring to an aether at all. This eventually led most physicists to conclude that the earlier notion of a luminiferous aether was not a useful concept."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aether_theories#Luminiferous_aether

"Quantum mechanics arose gradually from theories to explain observations which could not be reconciled with classical physics, such as Max Planck's solution in 1900 to the black-body radiation problem, and the correspondence between energy and frequency in Albert Einstein's 1905 paper which explained the photoelectric effect. These early attempts to understand microscopic phenomena, now known as the "old quantum theory" .."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_mechanics

 

[Truthseeker]

Yeah God forbid he actually be specific? A God decides to speak through someone and he has to be all cryptic and vague?
It doesn't change the atmosphere and plutonium is synthetically produced.

They are just elements. An actual God could have said the energy in mass would be used in a bomb or any number of things. I'm not cherry picking, I'm looking at ALL of the science he gave. It's either already known or wrong. That is not a revelation. Reading from a science book is not a revelation. Making up science is not a revelation.

Having fun? He is not trying to convince you with this. It's just one small piece. You seem to have this delusion that the Baha'i Faith is all about providing convincing scientific evidence. Isn't there any any other kind of evidence you want? You are confined to science and the physical. The Baha'i Faith or any religion is not about providing science to the world. It is intended to improve the character of people, spiritualize people and unite people in a universal fellowship. I want that, you just want to tear down it appears to me.

The world is now a bastion of skepticism and a world of people trained to believe that only the physical is real. This is mostly religion's fault, because it denied science and started the rift. The world now is in a sad state state because of this. On the one hand, you have those who deny science and independent investigation of truth and reason, and on the other that deny religion's original function of civilizing the world and reform morals and ethics. Without ethics, how will the science and technology be guided for good? Without science and reason how will we avoid falling into superstition? This is part of the perspective of the Baha'i Faith.

 

[Trailblazer]

What evidence are you talking about? Is it what Bahaollah said about himself?
If messengers have sufficient evidence other than their own rants, why have not they placed it before people?

What Baha'u'llah said about Himself, is the claim, it is NOT the evidence.

Baha’u’llah’s Two Bold Claims

All of which leads us back to Baha’u’llah, who made two very bold claims. First, he declared he was God’s messenger for the next one thousand years, having the same divine authority, the same Holy Spirit, the same divine power, as Moses, Christ, Muhammad, and the other founders of the major world religions:

Baha’u’llah made a second and even more challenging claim. He declared he was the promised world messiah foretold in all the prophecies, in all the holy books, of all the religions of the world – the one promised to come on the Day of Judgment, the Day of God, the Time of the End, the End of the World, to establish the kingdom of God on Earth.
https://bahaiteachings.org/what-did-bahaullah-teach?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Below is a list of the primary categories of evidence that support the claims above.

1. His character (His qualities).

That can be determined by reading about Him in books such as the following:
The Revelation of Bahá'u'lláh, Volumes 1-4

2. His Revelation is what He accomplished (His Mission on earth, i,e., the history of the Baha'i Faith).

That can be determined by reading about His mission in books such as the following:
God Passes By (1844-1944)
The Revelation of Bahá'u'lláh, Volumes 1-4, which cover the 40 years of His Mission, from 1853-1892.

3. His Writings which can be found in books that are posted online: The Works of Bahá'u'lláh

4. Baha'u'llah fulfilled all the Bible prophecies that refer to the return of Christ and the promised Messiah. That proves to me He was the Messiah and the return of Christ. Those prophecies and how they were fulfilled are delineated in the following book:
William Sears, Thief in the Night

5. Baha'u'llah predicted many events that later came to pass. Some of these predictions and how they came to pass are listed and delineated in this book: The Challenge of Baha'u'llah

What method? Take one messenger as true and the other as false? Why do you not acknowledge Mirza Ghulam Ahmad? He has a following of more people than your Bahaollah.

Whether he was a true prophet has nothing to do with how many followers he has. That is the fallacy of
Argumentum ad populum.

In argumentation theory, an argumentum ad populum (Latin for "appeal to the people") is a fallacious argument that concludes that a proposition is true because many or most people believe it: "If many believe so, it is so." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argumentum_ad_populum

The converse of this is that if many or most people do not believe it, it cannot be so, and that is fallacious.

There is nothing measurable in what these prophets / sons / messengers / manifestations / mahdis say. Ift is only a matter of blindly following one or the other.

No, it is not measurable and that is why we have to look really hard to find it..

That is a big 'if'. First give evidence of existence of God or Allah.

Yes, the existence of God is A BIG IF.

 

[Truthseeker]

"his light consists in the vibrations of the ether, and from these vibrations"

Wow, seriously this is worse than I thought? why can't you see this? He 100% thinks the actual ether is real. Scientists also thought that at that time. He is 100% using his knowledge of current science. Bothe science and him were wrong.

They thought this ether was physical. for 'Abdu'l-Baha it was not physical. I took a course in electricity and magnetism in college, and there is a vibration that produces electricity and magnetism. Heat is infrared light.

 

[Truthseeker]

The devotees were gullible but not all of them were illiterate like Bahaollah and Abdul Baha.

I guess you didn't notice that despite 'Abdu'l-Baha having so little education He knew quite a lot. He also was very busy serving His Father and serving His fellow men that He didn't have time to read. Where did He get His knowledge, then? You don't know that because you spent so little time investigating, I would bet.

 

[Truthseeker]

So now ether is in the same group as electricity, heat, light....? Those are all 100% sensible?

I think you are confused. The ether is not sensible, which produces sensible phenomenon. They are not in the same category.

 

[Truthseeker]

Also this apologist is twisting what he said in the above quotes. In the first 2 quotes he clearly thinks the scientific ether is real. Clearly. Then in the apologetics the writer tries to deny that but ends up making no sense?
Also you should read some Jane Roberts. She is so much better at this spiritual dimensions stuff.

I don't see that at all. I think you are not seeing clearly.

 

[Truthseeker]

The 7 heavens are from Mesopotamian myths. I don't know what you are talking about with early astronomers? Maybe you should fact check that one?

The early astronomers that are referred to I think are Greek. The Moslems studied Greek knowledge extensively. I haven't checked, but there could be seven heavens under the Greeks, but the Shi'ah Moslems believed that Christ ascended to the fourth heaven. I trust the Guardian. Or maybe they believed in four heavens. The Guardian was knowledgeable.

 

[Trailblazer]

Why is it that believers so often seem to just say, "Yes, that's a very good point," and then completely ignore the consequences of that point?

My point was that religion doesn't produce the kind of reliable and consistent results we get from science because religion is wrong.

That is so terribly illogical I almost fell off my seat and I am not even sitting down, I am standing up! Excuse me while I compose myself.

Okay I'm back. I just explained to you WHY religion no longer produces results, it is because the older religions have see their day and they no longer have what humanity needs. But I guess I did not get through so maybe this will help if you read it.

“All that lives, and this includes the religions, have springtime, a time of maturity, of harvest and wintertime. Then religion becomes barren, a lifeless adherence to the letter uninformed by the spirit, and man’s spiritual life declines. When we look at religious history, we see that God has spoken to men precisely at times when they have reached the nadir of their degradation and cultural decadence. Moses came to Israel when it was languishing under the Pharaoh’s yoke, Christ appeared at a time when the Jewish Faith had lost its power and culture of antiquity was in its death those. Muhammad came to a people who lived in barbaric ignorance at the lowest level of culture and into a world in which the former religions had strayed far away from their origins and nearly lost their identity. The Bab addressed Himself to a people who had irretrievably lost their former grandeur and who found themselves in a state of hopeless decadence. Baha’u’llah came to a humanity which was approaching the most critical phase of its history.” (Udo Schaefer, The Light Shineth in Darkness, p. 24)

The reason what you said was illogical is because comparing the results we get from religion to the results we get from science is the fallacy of false equivalence since religion is not equivalent to science.

False equivalence is a logical fallacy in which an equivalence is drawn between two subjects based on flawed or false reasoning. This fallacy is categorized as a fallacy of inconsistency.[1] A colloquial expression of false equivalency is "comparing apples and oranges".

Characteristics

This fallacy is committed when one shared trait between two subjects is assumed to show equivalence, especially in order of magnitude, when equivalence is not necessarily the logical result.[2] False equivalence is a common result when an anecdotal similarity is pointed out as equal, but the claim of equivalence doesn't bear scrutiny because the similarity is based on oversimplification or ignorance of additional factors. The pattern of the fallacy is often as such: "If A is the set of c and d, and B is the set of d and e, then since they both contain d, A and B are equal". d is not required to exist in both sets; only a passing similarity is required to cause this fallacy to be used.

False equivalence arguments are often used in journalism[3][4] and in politics, where flaws of one politician may be compared to flaws of a wholly different nature of another.[5]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_equivalence

And that's exactly what we'd expect to see if religion was bunk.

No, it is exactly what we would see when religion has deteriorated such that it no longer serves a useful purpose. Then religion becomes barren, a lifeless adherence to the letter uninformed by the spirit, and man’s spiritual life declines.

Citing verses from religious texts to show that the religion is true is like producing a comic book to show that Batman is real. It doesn't work. I don't know why you do it.

You are on some other planet, in some other universe! ~~ I was not citing the verses to show that the religion is true. Did you even read what I said BEFORE the verses?

 

[Trailblazer]

Then you agree with me that religious belief is a particular type of opinion?

Yes.

 

[Truthseeker]

It's like you want to be fooled?

I am familiar with fission. This is called a chain reaction...LOL...yeah it's a chain reaction, as in it's out of control? Uranium becomes radon, then something then lead. That's it. It takes billions of years or a giant explosion. All elements over 84 decay. That isn't turning copper into gold. That was not a metaphor.

Show me where they take copper and put it in a particle accelerator and get gold???

Transmutation of elements was a thing in his day. They actually thought it was going to happen. Newton was also obsessed with it. He clearly once again was riffing off current science.

I don't care what you think about this stuff anymore. There are more productive conversations I could have. I am spending too much time with your efforts to tear down. You will never believe anyway, and others who see this this will see your how misguided you are only interested in tearing down, and will never try to see my point of view.