Belief in God will always require ‘some’ faith

[Ella S.]

You are doing the following assumption. That all evidence is objective in effect. That is not the case, when you look closer. Rather if you accept that there in some cases, but not all are subjective evidence, you can explain how the following works:

Someone: I have evidence that the world is material.
Someone else: I have evidence that the world is from God.
Me: I don't have any such positive evidence, yet we are all here.

The problem arrives when you don't account for the following observation of cognitive, moral and cultural relativism.
"Man is the measure of all things: of the things that are, that they are, of the things that are not, that they are not."
Not that everything is subjective, but neither that everything is objective.
Rather that everything is a self-referring concept of elements of objective, inter-subjective and subjective cases.

Using the agreed-upon, formalized definition of a term is not an assumption.

I think all other forms of "evidence" are irrelevant to reasonable considerations.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Using the agreed-upon, formalized definition of a term is not an assumption.

I think all other forms of "evidence" are irrelevant to reasonable considerations.

Here is the core assumption in methodological assumption: Objective reality is real in that it is not a case of Descartes' evil demon or other variants and therefore this is real beyond the assumption. Indeed it is a true fact that you and I live in the real reality.
Or in other words: It with reason in my mind makes sense to believe in an epistemologically fair objective reality, therefore it is fact beyond that it makes sense.
That is your trick. That is in effect not different than God makes sense, therefore God is a fact.

 

[Ella S.]

Here is the core assumption in methodological assumption: Objective reality is real in that it is not a case of Descartes' evil demon or other variants and therefore this is real beyond the assumption. Indeed it is a true fact that you and I live in the real reality.
Or in other words: It with reason in my mind makes sense to believe in an epistemologically fair objective reality, therefore it is fact beyond that it makes sense.
That is your trick. That is in effect not different than God makes sense, therefore God is a fact.

It is not an assumption on my part that objective reality is real. I admit the possibility of Decartes' evil demon, a brain in the vat, simulation theory, even solipsism.

However, I find them all to be unlikely. I think it is most likely that an objective, concrete reality exists external to my own mind, and I can provide various forms of evidence for this.

It is not something that I believe is necessarily true. I do not take it as an a priori assumption like you accuse me of here. I actually wrestled with solipsism for a long time on a personal level after losing my faith in religion, because it caused me to question everything I thought I believed. It was one of the hardest ideas for me to overcome and I am still a little doubtful that you exist.

Still, it is likely enough that you do exist that I think I am justified in claiming that I know you exist in that objective, concrete reality external to my mind. Or rather, that "you" are an emergent phenomenon of that reality.

Whether an idea makes sense or not isn't the point. Of course God makes sense. The question is whether the argument for the existence of God is strong enough to justify belief in one, not whether the belief in God makes sense.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

It is not an assumption on my part that objective reality is real. I admit the possibility of Decartes' evil demon, a brain in the vat, simulation theory, even solipsism.

However, I find them all to be unlikely. I think it is most likely that an objective, concrete reality exists external to my own mind, and I can provide various forms of evidence for this.

...

All of these attempts so far I have come across runs into the following problem. I will use the following notation.
Real objective world as ROW versus other objective world OOW.
You have to show that your likelihood is different for ROW and OOW for the following cases:
ROW causes you to have the effect of likelihood X in your reasoning.
OOW causes you to have the effect of likelihood X in your reasoning.

You can't because the effect is the same: You have in your mind the effect of likelihood X in your reasoning.

 

[Ella S.]

All of these attempts so far I have come across runs into the following problem. I will use the following notation.
Real objective world as ROW versus other objective world OOW.
You have to show that your likelihood is different for ROW and OOW for the following cases:
ROW causes you to have the effect of likelihood X in your reasoning.
OOW causes you to have the effect of likelihood X in your reasoning.

You can't because the effect is the same: You have in your mind the effect of likelihood X in your reasoning.

Not necessarily. Descartes' demon, the brain in the vat, and simulation theory can all be rejected via Occam's Razor. They make additional assumptions about the nature of reality that are unsupported by the evidence.

Solipsism is the one that gives us the most trouble here, but here's the thing: Whether external reality exists or not, it is certainly not comparable to dreaming. I cannot control this "external reality" with my mind. For all intents and purposes, it is external to my control, and it appears to be self-consistent within itself. At that point, additional assumptions must be added to solipsism to explain this, thus it also becomes dismissed via Occam's Razor.

In this particular instance, the version of Occam's Razor I am referring to is the fact that all additional premises in an inductive argument lower the likelihood of a conclusion, due to each premise being probabilistic.

There might be an OOW theory that is more likely than a ROW one, but I have yet to see it.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Not necessarily. Descartes' demon, the brain in the vat, and simulation theory can all be rejected via Occam's Razor. They make additional assumptions about the nature of reality that are unsupported by the evidence.

Solipsism is the one that gives us the most trouble here, but here's the thing: Whether external reality exists or not, it is certainly not comparable to dreaming. I cannot control this "external reality" with my mind. For all intents and purposes, it is external to my control, and it appears to be self-consistent within itself. At that point, additional assumptions must be added to solipsism to explain this, thus it also becomes dismissed via Occam's Razor.

In this particular instance, the version of Occam's Razor I am referring to is the fact that all additional premises in an inductive argument lower the likelihood of a conclusion, due to each premise being probabilistic.

There might be an OOW theory that is more likely than a ROW one, but I have yet to see it.

You are assuming you have evidence, because you assume you are in ROW.
Further Occam's razor is a scientific and philosophical rule that entities should not be multiplied unnecessarily which is interpreted as requiring that the simplest of competing theories be preferred to the more complex or that explanations of unknown phenomena be sought first in terms of known quantities.
It is cognitive in your mind and assumes ROW.
You are doing a circular reasoning. You assume you are in ROW, therefore your experiences are from ROW and thus you have evidence of ROW.

Now I am not nice, but learn your words: "...but I have yet to see it."
See: "perceive with the eyes; discern visually." versus "discern or deduce after reflection or from information; understand." You are taking your thoughts for granted, because you assume you can trust your experiences and thoughts about ROW, because you assume, you are in ROW.

This is old territory. Look up Agrippa's Trilemma.

 

[Ella S.]

You are assuming you have evidence, because you assume you are in ROW.
Further Occam's razor is a scientific and philosophical rule that entities should not be multiplied unnecessarily which is interpreted as requiring that the simplest of competing theories be preferred to the more complex or that explanations of unknown phenomena be sought first in terms of known quantities.
It is cognitive in your mind and assumes ROW.

Logical methodology does not require the assumption of an external reality, but it does lead to that conclusion.

You are doing a circular reasoning. You assume you are in ROW, therefore your experiences are from ROW and thus you have evidence of ROW.

Now I am not nice, but learn your words: "...but I have yet to see it."
See: "perceive with the eyes; discern visually." versus "discern or deduce after reflection or from information; understand." You are taking your thoughts for granted, because you assume you can trust your experiences and thoughts about ROW, because you assume, you are in ROW.

This is old territory. Look up Agrippa's Trilemma.

I think that's an inaccurate assessment.

I do not have to assume anything to state what I experience, either through sense-perception or in some more mental way. Those things just are.

Using observations and experiences as evidence does not necessarily assume that those experiences are a part of an external reality. It's the logical analysis of them that leads to that conclusion, which means that it is justifiably inferred, not assumed. There is a difference.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Logical methodology does not require the assumption of an external reality, but it does lead to that conclusion.



I think that's an inaccurate assessment.

I do not have to assume anything to state what I experience, either through sense-perception or in some more mental way. Those things just are.

Using observations and experiences as evidence does not necessarily assume that those experiences are a part of an external reality. It's the logical analysis of them that leads to that conclusion, which means that it is justifiably inferred, not assumed. There is a difference.

So it is your thinking that leads objective reality to be real objective reality. That is magical thinking. You have reversed the cause and effect of objective reality causes you as the effect to you cause real objective reality as the effect.

 

[Ella S.]

So it is your thinking that leads objective reality to be real objective reality. That is magical thinking. You have reversed the cause and effect of objective reality causes you as the effect to you cause real objective reality as the effect.

No. In no way does coming to a reasonable conclusion about how things probably are mean that I believe that, by reasoning about things, I cause them to be that way.

Reason only gives us what is probably true based on the information available to us (outside of deduction). I could be wrong. In fact, it's potentially true that I am a brain in a vat, it's just less likely than there being an objective reality. I could be wrong that objective reality exists. I admit that.

I think you're probably too far gone if you think logical analysis is magical thinking, though, and I have to cut our discussions off here. I doubt they're going anywhere at this point.

 

[wellwisher]

I never said that it should be convincing to everyone, but "good evidence" requires inter-subjective agreement and peer-review.

The philosophy of science has limitations. It does not work for all possible phenomena that an objective observer can observe. For example, we have all had dreams to know dreams are a common phenomena of the brain. This can be proven with the scientific method through common experiences of the basic dream schema.

However, the details of any specific dream cannot be group verified, by the scientific method, since there are no tools that allow others to monitor your dreams in the third person. Others cannot recreate a very specific dream to determine if all the dream details, actually occurred as specified. How would you peer review dream details without having faith in the person telling the dream? Even if the dream and the person were both objective and valid, it would be called subjective, due to being proof by one, beyond others to verify?

The philosophy of science limited itself to only those things that come into the brain, from the outside from our sensory systems. Tools help to extend this range. It is not as well designed for all those other objective things that consciousness can perceive from the inside. This is the last frontier of science.


Math Proof for God

Science often uses math proof along with physical evidence. For example, nobody has ever gotten up close to a black hole to gather hard evidence. What we know is based on some circumstantial evidence from far away, theory and math. There is some faith involved. Using this same method of semi-math proof, there is a way to infer some of the classic parameters of God.

We live in what is called space-time. The concept of space-time is based on time and space being and acting interconnected. This is modeled with math. This connection between space and time places physical limits on what it possible in physical realty. For example, the fastest that material things can move in space-time is the speed of light.

Say mathematically, we broke down the math variable called space-time, into separated space and separated time, so space and time were no longer mathematically interconnected and dependent on each other. Now they are separate variables for different math. Theoretically, one could now move in space without the constraint of time, and/or move in time without the constraint of space, since the bond is broken.

If one could move in space without the constraint of time, this would allow one to be anywhere and everywhere in the universe at the same time, since space is not connected or dependent on time. This is classically called omnipresence. This feature of God dates way back.

If you could move in time without the constraint of space and if you were observant, you would know both the real time state and history of the entire universe, simultaneously. This is classically called omniscience. It appears religions deal with the math of separated space and time more than the math of space-time.

The simple on-off or binary switch between space-time being connected or not connected, breaks down the universe into two very different and separated realms. This is also a classic claim for the different living spaces for the humans and the Gods.

As far as physical proof that such a state actually exists, where space and time are not exactly connected, as space-time, science theorizes worm holes which are product of theory and math. These move material across the universe faster than a beam of light; warp drive.

There are also quantum affects that can depart from classic space-time. When an atom gives off a photon of energy, we have an affect that goes from inertial speed, to the speed light, in zero time.

Even the inflation period of the early Big Bang Universe can be explained as a special case, where space and time were not yet connected, as space-time, so moving faster than the speed of light was not a problem, even for the whole universe. Once space-time connects things changed.

The most interesting observation of the concept of disconnected space and time is connected to the human imagination. The imagination allows us to think outside the limitations of space-time; science fiction. I can imagine building a ten kilometer long bridge out of wet noodles. This will not work in space-time, due to the imposed limitations on matter and forces. But it is possible to imagine this, since space-time does not place limits on how information arranges itself in the imagination. The matter of the frontal lobe is connected to space-time, but space-time does not place the same limits on how the data can organize.

Innovation, for example, is often ahead of its time; iPad. A concept can appear in the imagination and then the drawing board, standing outside the limitations of space-time, until two realms meet in space-time; product launch. Consciousness appears to bridge the gap and gets information from both disconnected space and time and space-time; visionary and pragmatic.

 

[Vee]

Okay, but why believe the Bible's version of God? Why not the Baha'is version? Or the version of some other religion? Oh, but if the Bible God did all those things that the Bible says he did, I would say there is proof. He parted the seas. Jesus walked on water. Elijah had God send fire from heaven. That God shows himself to alive and well and very active in the happenings of the world. Some Baha'is seem to think God doesn't get involved all the much in the world and that those Bible stories were fictional. And unless God is still active today, maybe those stories were just fiction.

But I know lots of Christians that believe God still heals and sends his angels and gives people prophecies and fills them with the Holy Spirit, and to prove it, he has them speak in tongues. But how many of us trust those Christians? Unfortunately, those Christians are too often found out to be frauds. So, what about the God they say they believe in? It sure makes me mistrust anybody that claims they "know" God.

Once I determined that the existence of God is a reality, that opened the door to a lot of other questions. If God created all things, why did he do that? What's the purpose in life? Why do people suffer and die? What happens after death? Is there a hope for the future or will humans ruin the earth for good? etc, etc, etc. I think we've all asked those questions at some point.
I looked into the basic beliefs of the world's biggest religions, and the only religious text I found that answers all those questions (at least that I know off) is the Bible.
Added bonus, the Bible also gives great advice to live a balanced, healthy life.
I know there are different denominations that identify as Christian and when you start listening to them you realize they know little or nothing about the Bible. It's up to each one of us to study and research, so we can differentiate what has a bible background from other stuff people make up. In a world of almost 8 billion people and so many different cultures, it's not a surprise that so much gets "lost in translation". Lucky for us, we have tools available today that allow us to learn what each religion teaches and why. It's time consuming, but I prefer to have an educated opinion than a confused mind.
Let me know if you have any other questions, and take care of yourself.
Cheers

Vee

 

[CG Didymus]

Once I determined that the existence of God is a reality, that opened the door to a lot of other questions. If God created all things, why did he do that? What's the purpose in life? Why do people suffer and die? What happens after death? Is there a hope for the future or will humans ruin the earth for good? etc, etc, etc. I think we've all asked those questions at some point.
I looked into the basic beliefs of the world's biggest religions, and the only religious text I found that answers all those questions (at least that I know off) is the Bible.
Added bonus, the Bible also gives great advice to live a balanced, healthy life.
I know there are different denominations that identify as Christian and when you start listening to them you realize they know little or nothing about the Bible. It's up to each one of us to study and research, so we can differentiate what has a bible background from other stuff people make up. In a world of almost 8 billion people and so many different cultures, it's not a surprise that so much gets "lost in translation". Lucky for us, we have tools available today that allow us to learn what each religion teaches and why. It's time consuming, but I prefer to have an educated opinion than a confused mind.
Let me know if you have any other questions, and take care of yourself.
Cheers

Vee

Well, I have a never-ending supply of questions, but they are mainly for Baha'is... Since they claim their prophet is the promised return of everybody ever promised in any religion. So, maybe that's a good question for you. Why don't JW's believe that the Baha'i prophet is the return of Christ?

 

[Vee]

Well, I have a never-ending supply of questions, but they are mainly for Baha'is... Since they claim their prophet is the promised return of everybody ever promised in any religion. So, maybe that's a good question for you. Why don't JW's believe that the Baha'i prophet is the return of Christ?

I'm not familiar with the Baha'i beliefs other than a few things I've learned here in RF, sorry. If you can tell me more I'll be happy to let you know you what I think.

 

[TransmutingSoul]

I looked into the basic beliefs of the world's biggest religions, and the only religious text I found that answers all those questions (at least that I know off) is the Bible.

I'm not familiar with the Baha'i beliefs other than a few things I've learned here in RF, sorry. If you can tell me more I'll be happy to let you know you what I think.

It is good to keep an open mind and never stop searching, as knowledge has no boundaries, except what we ourselves constrain it to.

The Baháʼí Faith - Home This is the official Baha'i site and there is a Library link available down the bottom.

Jesus offered there was more Truth to be told and that there would be an age where knowledge was increased, which is our age.

So I would offer in all sincerity, that I think you will find the search has just begun, and I wish you well and happy.

Regards Tony

 

[CG Didymus]

I'm not familiar with the Baha'i beliefs other than a few things I've learned here in RF, sorry. If you can tell me more I'll be happy to let you know you what I think.

Yes, take a look at the link Tony gave. But basically, they believe that the Bab and Baha'u'llah, these titles mean "the gate" and "the Glory of God", were twin end-time manifestations of the one true God. A manifestation is a special creation of God that is a level above a prophet. They bring new teachings to the world and new religion spring up based on their teachings. Baha'is include Abraham, Moses, Jesus, Muhammad and the two Baha'i manifestations along with Zoroaster, Krishna and Buddha. The Bab declared himself a messenger of God in 1844 and said another messenger would soon reveal himself. That was Baha'u'llah who declared himself in 1863. The Bab was killed and Baha'u'llah imprisoned and exiled out of Persian.

The main thing about the Baha'i message is that now is the time for all people in all religions to unite and live in peace and harmony. To do that, Baha'u'llah gave them a bunch of laws and teachings on how to set up a world government. For some Christians, a "world government" is a red flag, and they talk about the beast and the anti-christ as the ones that will set up a world government. So, how do JW's interpret Revelation and what is supposed to happen with Christ and his return and what the beast and the anti-christ are going to do?

 

[Redwing]

I agree.
the only little problem is that you have zero of that evidence.

So, your argument is not much better than saying that the better evidence we have that Superman exists the less faith we will require to believe in Superman.

Do such arguments really give you confidence in your faith? If they do, I am happy for you.

Ciao

- viole

Faith is the evidence. Faith requires spiritual understanding. If one doesn’t apply their spiritual understanding and, instead, uses only their mind’s understanding, they will never have the evidence of God that they want. The evidence still exists whether you are able, or choose, to understand it, or not.

 

[Redwing]

With good enough evidence, you should be able to prove it to others

If others refuse to apply spiritual understanding, then it will not be proven to them. Faith is evidence, but it requires the spirit, not the mind.

 

[viole]

Faith is the evidence. Faith requires spiritual understanding. If one doesn’t apply their spiritual understanding and, instead, uses only their mind’s understanding, they will never have the evidence of God that they want. The evidence still exists whether you are able, or choose, to understand it, or not.

And what on earth is spiritual understanding? Prima facie, it looks like an oxymoron.

Ciao

- viole

 

[Redwing]

In the same way there is no evidence of Superman that everyone would agree on.
Does that make you confident?

Ciao

- viole

How goofy it is to use Superman for comparison to God. Superman is a very well-known fictional character. The only humans who would think him real are children, persons with certain mental illness, and persons existing in obscurity who do not know what books, comics, and tv are.

 

[Redwing]

Inter-subjective agreement is one of the minimum criteria of epistemology as a whole, because to prove that something is external to one's mind you need to demonstrate that other minds can independently verify it.

Peer-review is one of the highest standards of good evidence and it's the backbone of all scholarly fields, because there could be an error in your reasoning that other people are better equipped to catch.

Without these two things, you do not have good evidence. You have anecdotal evidence, potentially even confabulation.

The evidence for God doesn’t exist in the mind.