Trailblazer
Veteran Member
I don't know. Only you would know your own motivations.
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Atheists: What would be evidence of God’s existence?
- Thread starter Trailblazer
- Start date
Trailblazer
Veteran Member
All claims require evidence if they are to be believed.
Trailblazer
Veteran Member
If Messengers are what God sends as evidence then they are evidence whether that can be established as a fact or not. Moreover, the reason it cannot be established as a fact is because God does not want us to be able to establish it as a fact.
That’s right.
Because I never thought of doing that.
When did I say that?
I would not expect anyone to follow any particular path. Everyone has to follow their own path and no two paths are alike. Most Baha’is probably believed in God before they became Baha’is but I was not raised in a religious home so I had no belief. I was not even searching for God or a religion when I stumbled upon the Baha’i Faith.
osgart
Nothing my eye, Something for sure
Well there is no contingency plan for free will gone bad.
And why should free will go bad at all with a God who can master and correct free will.
Aupmanyav
Be your own guru
Prove me wrong in any of the 27,027 posts that I have made in more than fourteen and a half years I have been on the forum.
Yeah, that is the rider - if one wants to believe, otherwise a claim is a claim and remains just that. And then the evidence is of two kinds, subjective and objective. Something that will satisfy you and does not satisfy others, or something which goes with scientific method. Some claims have been accepted by people without any evidence, a relic from stone ages, for example existence of Gods. Buddha warned against acceptance of such claims in his "Kesamutti sutta".
"It involves careful observation, applying rigorous skepticism about what is observed, given that cognitive assumptions can distort how one interprets the observation. It involves formulating hypotheses, via induction, based on such observations; experimental and measurement-based testing of deductions drawn from the hypotheses; and refinement (or elimination) of the hypotheses based on the experimental findings."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_method
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Trailblazer
Veteran Member
Why does there need to be one?
Because God does not want to correct free will, God wants humans to use it to do good.
Aupmanyav
Be your own guru
The all-loving Allah should have created safeguards against free will going bad for the benefit of the people. A free will gone bad does not restrict itself to the individual but affects other people as well. Your Allah is a incompetent designer, has never done anything right.
Just take the example of sending us Covid-19. 235,438,565infections and 4,811,923 deaths till now, disruption of business and employment, supplies and education among young people. My grandsons have not gone to school or college for one and a half year now.
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Trailblazer
Veteran Member
Can you think of a better design? Should God have created humans as programmable robots?
What makes you think that God sent Covid-19? God is always a convenient fall guy since He is not here to defend Himself.
God did not send Covid-19.
COVID-19
Common question
Where did the COVID-19 come from?
Experts say SARS-CoV-2 originated in bats. That’s also how the coronaviruses behind Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) and severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) got started.Aug 15, 2021
Coronavirus History: How did coronavirus start? - WebMD
https://www.webmd.com › ... › Coronavirus › Reference
ratiocinator
Lightly seared on the reality grill.
Okay, maybe I worded that badly. You can presume if you want but that's all it is without any justification.
It's you who's trying to deflect attention. You switched from god just being the mystery of existence to a creator with a plan. They are very, very different concepts.
So where is it? How about posting some?
Burden of proof
Argumentum ad populum
ratiocinator
Lightly seared on the reality grill.
I think approaching things rationally and trying to only believe what you have reasonable reason to believe are important, yes.
"Most of the greatest evils that man has inflicted upon man have come through people feeling quite certain about something which, in fact, was false. To know the truth is more difficult than most men suppose, and to act with ruthless determination in the belief that truth is the monopoly of their party is to invite disaster."
-- Bertrand Russell
ratiocinator
Lightly seared on the reality grill.
This makes no difference at all to the question begging. Whether you assume things wouldn't be here if they weren't created by god or assume things wouldn't be here if they weren't part of god, is still an assumption of god.
Of course if you simply want to define 'god' to mean 'everything', then I guess it exists but it seems like a rather trivial and pointless idea of 'god' to me.
Aupmanyav
Be your own guru
God's first useless act (even if a God exists) was to create the universe where black holes prey on galaxies. Why could he not be content with his angels? Instead of creating Adam and Eve, he could have created a Goddess and have fun with her. You do one thing wrong then get flooded by wrong things.
And who created such deadly bats?
oldbadger
Skanky Old Mongrel!
You got it.
You wrote '.....so it exists'
and.... 'but seems rather trivial.'.....
Well, compared to a God that interacts with humans and keeps a heaven for some of them I guess that it doesn't quite have so muchr impact; there's nothing to sell.
But the hugeness of everything isn't trivial..... it's huge!
I don't flog Deism and the bosses here don't support proslytizing but I can say that being a Deist helps me with feelings of contented calm. If you can have that without a God then , no probs.
Subduction Zone
Veteran Member
A god should be able to do better than people. But that argument works more with creationists than it does with theists that believe the creation myths. I assume that is not you.
If you do not believe the creation myths this appears to be a misused argument.
Now here he may have you. Is your God all powerful and all knowing? Then he has some questions to answer.
Koldo
Outstanding Member
Which doesn't mean anything. Undeniable evidence is evidence that pretty much every reasonable person would recognize as evidence.
Koldo
Outstanding Member
Everything that we regard to be a fact is presumed to be a fact. Truth is provisional.
And there's absolutely nothing wrong with doing that. Once again, the issue is when we presume that what we regard as a fact must be a fact. If we do that, then it means that no evidence can convince us that we are wrong, we become trapped inside our own misconceptions.
You said before that evidence is something that helps you build a case for a thing. How does the existence of someone who claims to speak for God - since that's all you can really have until you establish that God really did send them - help you build a case for God?
And keep in mind that this is all against a background of countless other people claiming to speak for various gods, none of whom you recognize as "Messengers."
If you really believe this, then why are you surprised that atheists - and any non-Baha'i, for that matter - aren't convinced of your position?
Facts matter to a lot of people.
Well, now you have. Does it change your approach?
That's been most our discussion:
- I tell you that "Messengers" are useless for establishing that God exists.
- you say something to the effect of "but 'Messengers' are all I have."
It's like you're at a store asking to buy a thing. You don't have enough money to pay for it, but you think that if you repeat how much you do have enough times, the salesperson will slash the price and sell it to you for what you have.
I would bet that most people believe in some sort of god before they settle on a particular religion.
This is why your arguments here strike me as putting the cart before the horse.
ratiocinator
Lightly seared on the reality grill.
But the hugeness of everything isn't trivial..... it's huge!
I meant that the definition (that everything is the same thing as 'god') seems trivial to me. Why does calling it 'god' make the slightest difference to anything?
Okay then, I give up. I simply don't understand why just a change of name for 'everything' can help, but if it works for you, then I guess that's fine.
HonestJoe
Well-Known Member
That isn't what I'm claiming. All I am saying is that the existence of people who claim to speak for God is not evidence for the existence (or non-existence) of God. On it's own, the fact such people exist doesn't progress the argument either way and so can be dismissed entirely.
"A supposition or proposed explanation made on the basis of limited evidence as a starting point for further investigation."
In simple terms, you need to define what you're proposing God is, what effects and phenomena you're proposing the existence of God would cause that, significantly, couldn't be better explained by a simpler hypothesis.
I can't, you are the one making the claim here! If you can't explain anything about the God you're saying exists, how can you provide evidence that it does exist?
wellwisher
Well-Known Member
If you were doing animal research, in the field, to seek out and identify new and rare species, these new and rare species do not jump up and down and come to your camp, to be cataloged. You need to figure out and go to their habitat, look for signs and then quietly wait until they hopefully appear.
God is a very rare and elusive species and his habitat is not the science laboratory. Why would he go there? You must seek him out in his own habitat and there look for signs. Atheists claim to be on the side of science but they do not have a clue when it comes to investigative research. How many new species just appear in your lab?
We can use a little inference to find the proper habitat. God is frequently identified as spirit. Looking for God as a material thing, is barking up the wrong tree. That is the wrong habitat. The question is what is the nature of spirit and where is its habitat?
Spirit is close to the concept of consciousness; software and firmware, than it is to the matter of the body. Like the body of a robot, its hardware is inanimate. The software and operating system, is the spirit of the robot that animates the hardware, so the robot can appear alive.
Many religions speak of the inner man. God can be found in the habitat of the firmware and software of the brain's operating system. God cannot be seen with hardware based machines. Software is not a material gear. It is more like an ethereal gear. It requires introspection to observe the workings of the CPU. This is why prayer and meditation are both inward activities. Our robot material body is held stationary and consciousness is immersed within the software of thought and feelings. Saints, for example, are built from the inside out; character. They are not built from the outside in with money and bling; celebrity.
For atheists who are good at doing investigative research, a good science bridge toward the proper habitat of rare spiritual species, would be the Psychology of Carl Jung. He researched the premise of the collective unconscious. To use modern lingo, the collective unconscious are the spectrum of personality firmware common to all humans, which identifies us a species. They are part of the brain's operating system; software and firmware, and are genetic based. This is the bridge to where you may find God, since the spirit of the robot is in its software.
Faith is the belief in things not seen. Faith is not based on what come from the outside; seen things. Instead faith is connected to ideas or intuitions that begins inside; software processing, before it can be proven so others can see. All innovation begins within the matrix of consciousness, before it becomes manifest through material demonstrations; faithless materialists can now see.
The doubter requires that the innovator create a hardware show; robot has to walk, so they can see to believe. But the idea existed to the faithful, way before the hardware demonstration. Faith in God is often a software simulation/extrapolation, of what can be, before the robot walks for the faithless. Michelangelo could see his finished sculptures, inside the block of granite, even before he began. To him all he needed to do was get rid of the encapsulating stone. Those without faith, thought he was weird, until they saw the final works of art.
The science goal of intelligent and conscious computers, would be demonstrated if the computer processed things in ways that go beyond its original program. This would not be hardware based, but would be consciousness adding to what was already there. However, it will also need to sing and dance so the faithless can see to believe. Divine spirit can process revolutionary visions of what can be. The problem i soften the time it takes to remove the encapsulating stone.
God is a very rare and elusive species and his habitat is not the science laboratory. Why would he go there? You must seek him out in his own habitat and there look for signs. Atheists claim to be on the side of science but they do not have a clue when it comes to investigative research. How many new species just appear in your lab?
We can use a little inference to find the proper habitat. God is frequently identified as spirit. Looking for God as a material thing, is barking up the wrong tree. That is the wrong habitat. The question is what is the nature of spirit and where is its habitat?
Spirit is close to the concept of consciousness; software and firmware, than it is to the matter of the body. Like the body of a robot, its hardware is inanimate. The software and operating system, is the spirit of the robot that animates the hardware, so the robot can appear alive.
Many religions speak of the inner man. God can be found in the habitat of the firmware and software of the brain's operating system. God cannot be seen with hardware based machines. Software is not a material gear. It is more like an ethereal gear. It requires introspection to observe the workings of the CPU. This is why prayer and meditation are both inward activities. Our robot material body is held stationary and consciousness is immersed within the software of thought and feelings. Saints, for example, are built from the inside out; character. They are not built from the outside in with money and bling; celebrity.
For atheists who are good at doing investigative research, a good science bridge toward the proper habitat of rare spiritual species, would be the Psychology of Carl Jung. He researched the premise of the collective unconscious. To use modern lingo, the collective unconscious are the spectrum of personality firmware common to all humans, which identifies us a species. They are part of the brain's operating system; software and firmware, and are genetic based. This is the bridge to where you may find God, since the spirit of the robot is in its software.
Faith is the belief in things not seen. Faith is not based on what come from the outside; seen things. Instead faith is connected to ideas or intuitions that begins inside; software processing, before it can be proven so others can see. All innovation begins within the matrix of consciousness, before it becomes manifest through material demonstrations; faithless materialists can now see.
The doubter requires that the innovator create a hardware show; robot has to walk, so they can see to believe. But the idea existed to the faithful, way before the hardware demonstration. Faith in God is often a software simulation/extrapolation, of what can be, before the robot walks for the faithless. Michelangelo could see his finished sculptures, inside the block of granite, even before he began. To him all he needed to do was get rid of the encapsulating stone. Those without faith, thought he was weird, until they saw the final works of art.
The science goal of intelligent and conscious computers, would be demonstrated if the computer processed things in ways that go beyond its original program. This would not be hardware based, but would be consciousness adding to what was already there. However, it will also need to sing and dance so the faithless can see to believe. Divine spirit can process revolutionary visions of what can be. The problem i soften the time it takes to remove the encapsulating stone.