Default position

[mikkel_the_dane]

The same problem is with Bahaollah as well. Was he hallucinating or was he intentionally trying to fool others?
Why do you presume that if God spoke to me, I would not understand him? Let him talk to me, I will put him right.

To me as a skeptic I can't rule out that other humans have a line to God. But what I can do, is to check if I can do it differently. Thus I don't claim that that they don't have a line to God. I just state that I can do it differently.

 

[Aupmanyav]

To me as a skeptic I can't rule out that other humans have a line to God. But what I can do, is to check if I can do it differently. Thus I don't claim that that they don't have a line to God. I just state that I can do it differently.

Mikkel, then you have to prove two things. 1. Existence of God, 2. that other people have a line to God which you do not have.

 

[ratiocinator]

Nobody knows if a different choice could have been made, but even if under the same circumstances one would have made the same choice that does not mean they were not free to choose what they chose when they chose it, so that is not an argument for determinism.

I know nobody knows. That's not the point. The point is that it can only be one or the other. The second part makes no sense. If there is no way, given all the circumstances (internal and external to your mind) that you could have done differently, then you're on 'tramlines'. Your choices are inevitable. That isn't to say that you didn't choose, of course you did, it's just that the process you went though was entirely deterministic. Free will can make sense from our point of view, but not from that of an omniscient god.

At the end of the day there is not logical alternative. Either the world, our minds and everything is a deterministic system or it isn't. It's a yes/no question.

Everything has a cause, even things that seem to happen at random.

This appears to be more blind faith. How do you know?

No, there are not things that cannot be proven that are factual, because what makes things factual is that they have been proven.

There are different ways of using the word: fact - something that actually exists; reality; truth.

You are wrong about that because all evidence is not factual evidence. Only verifiable evidence is factual, but all evidence is not verifiable so not all evidence is factual.

I am so not interested in any colloquial use of the words. I am only interested in solid evidence that consists of checkable facts.

I pray to God that someday you will realize the difference between evidence and proof -- evidence indicates something is true and proof proves it is true as a fact.

It's you who seems confused. There are the legal concept of 'proof' (either beyond reasonable doubt of on the balance of probabilities) and the technical sense of absolute proof, that is only available in mathematics and pure logic, not about anything in the real word. Science accepts that it can never prove anything in that sense, so always refers to evidence. As I said before, there can be evidence (e.g. for Newton's theories) that is way beyond reasonable doubt and yet is wrong.

No, I have no objective facts that support the idea that God is real, nothing could be more absurd than such a request.

Nothing could be more absurd than claiming you have evidence without any facts.

You want proof that God exists...

No, I don't, I want proper evidence, not vague hand-waving about supposed 'messengers'.

You are just plain wrong. Evidence does not consist of facts that either support a given hypothesis or falsify it. Only proof consists of facts.

Even the link you posted refers to evidence as facts:

The word evidence is commonly used in law, court, or criminal investigations. In these settings, evidence refers to the various facts in a case that point to guilt.​

..​

Science also uses the term evidence to prove theories. These are the facts that suggest a scientific hypothesis is true.​

​

[my emphasis]​

Obviously the writer is no scientist because no scientist would ever say that theories are proved, but the point about facts remains.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Mikkel, then you have to prove two things. 1. Existence of God, 2. that other people have a line to God which you do not have.

I don't have to prove anything. I just have to act differently that you. You have to prove that the method of proof works as a positive on everything.

Remember I am skeptic and I do false/different and not proof.
So if you claim proof, I just try to see if I can do it differently. For God that is in practice not science, but philosophy just as your belief system.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

True _ atheist requires proof.

No.

He ascended back to heaven and is coming back down from the clouds in the sky with his Holy Angels following him.

Yes yes. any day now......

yawn

Magical or actually returning to render judgement on this planet. Governments over the world are already watching the skies and wondering what's going on up there - sooner than later the world just may know and have their proof.

again, "any day now"

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Just because YOU don't see it as evidence that does not mean it is not evidence.

Baha'u'llah was an imposter. I know this because the ghost that never lies told me and that is the evidence that Baha'u'llah was an imposter.
Just because YOU don't see it as evidence, that does not mean it is not evidence.

If you do not think this is evidence for a Messenger of God, what would constitute evidence? In other words, hypothetically speaking, let's say that a man was actually a Messenger of God. What would be the evidence? How would we know that he was a Messenger of God?

Here we come to the very core of the problem.

Before you even can have evidence, you need a falsifiable model.
A falsifiable model, is a model that makes testable predictions.

Data becomes evidence for/against a model when it fits / contradicts those predictions.

Without a falsifiable model, you can't have any evidence.

This is why unfalsifiable models are totally worthless (and potentially infinite in number).

So..... you tell me what the falsifiable model is and what testable predictions natural flow from said model.
After you do that, I will tell you what would constitute evidence.

If you can't give me such a model, I can't tell you what would qualify as evidence. And the reason is simply because there couldn't be any evidence by definition.

If a man was actually a Messenger of God do you think there would be a way to know that?
If so, how would we know that a man was a Messenger of God?

Why does this already sound like an acknowledgement that there can't be any evidence by definition?

Baha'u'llah could be a Messenger of God and you would not know that if you don't know what the evidence would look like.

Again: we would need a falsifiable model first.

 

[Aupmanyav]

I don't have to prove anything. I just have to act differently that you. You have to prove that the method of proof works as a positive on everything.

Remember I am skeptic and I do false/different and not proof.
So if you claim proof, I just try to see if I can do it differently. For God that is in practice not science, but philosophy just as your belief system.

Read the proof here: Samkhya - Wikipedia (Arguments against Ishwara's existence)
The proof is perhaps more than 2,000 years old.
Since there is no God or Goddess, they cannot be talking to some privileged people.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Read the proof here: Samkhya - Wikipedia
The proof is perhaps more than 2,000 years old.
Since there is no God or Goddess, they cannot to talking to some privileged people.

Yeah, it is philosophy and a case of cognitive relativism.

 

[Aupmanyav]

Yeah, it is philosophy and a case of cognitive relativism.

People make simple things complicated.

"Critics of relativism typically dismiss such views as incoherent since they imply the validity even of the view that relativism is false. They also charge that such views are pernicious since they undermine the enterprise of trying to improve our ways of thinking."​

Well, I have not studied philosophy and therefore I am ignorant of philosophical terms.
Cognitive Relativism | Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Relativism | Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

You are just plain wrong. Evidence does not consist of facts that either support a given hypothesis or falsify it.

I don't know what else to say to that.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Well, I have not studied philosophy and therefore I am ignorant of philosophical terms.

The problem is this. All the arguments are cognitive in a given brains as rationalism but the moment you turn to observation you can observe that other people think/feel/act differently.
In effect if your link as for truth was universal and objective in the strong sense, then other people couldn't think/feel/act differently. It is that simple.
You can think something is universal and objective, but it is only so if you can observe it as so for all humans.

 

[Trailblazer]

Mystics also did just the same thing as Bahaollah did, said and wrote.

Show me any mystics who wrote 15,000 tablets.

Bahá'u'lláh revealed over 15,000 tablets. Some are long (several hundred pages) but most are a page or two, written to a specific individual to answer a question or convey encouragement. Shoghi Effendi translated about a thousand pages into English in His lifetime.

Number of tablets revealed by Bahá'u'lláh

 

[Trailblazer]

View attachment 76630

I don't know what else to say to that.

I suggest you get a dictionary.

Evidence: anything that helps to prove that something is or is not true: EVIDENCE | definition in the Cambridge English Dictionary

Evidence: the available body of facts or information indicating whether a belief or proposition is true or valid: https://www.google.com/search

Evidence is anything that you see, experience, read, or are told that causes you to believe that something is true or has really happened.
Objective evidence definition and meaning | Collins English Dictionary

Only verifiable evidence can be validated. Verifiable evidence is proof because it establishes something as a fact.

Proof: evidence or argument establishing or helping to establish a fact or the truth of a statement: https://www.google.com/search

Fact
something that is known to have happened or to exist, especially something for which proof exists, or about which there is information:
fact

Fact: a thing that is known or proved to be true.
what is a fact - Google Search

There is no proof that God exists, since there is no verifiable evidence of God's existence.

There is evidence that Messengers received communication from God, but there is no proof.

 

[osgart]

The problem is this. All the arguments are cognitive in a given brains as rationalism but the moment you turn to observation you can observe that other people think/feel/act differently.
In effect if your link as for truth was universal and objective in the strong sense, then other people couldn't think/feel/act differently. It is that simple.
You can think something is universal and objective, but it is only so if you can observe it as so for all humans.

I find a pattern of universals in virtues vs. vices. A lot of human nature is to grapple with these general principles and natures. Cooperation vs. confrontation, conflict vs. harmony, love or neutrality or hate, benevolence vs malevolence, indifference vs. proactive interest, exclusive vs. inclusive, cause vs. baselessness; all these things are common themes.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

I find a pattern of universals in virtues vs. vices. A lot of human nature is to grapple with these general principles and natures. Cooperation vs. confrontation, conflict vs. harmony, love or neutrality or hate, benevolence vs malevolence, indifference vs. proactive interest, exclusive vs. inclusive, cause vs. baselessness; all these things are common themes.

Yeah, they are common. But for how to do them and you get different answers.

 

[osgart]

Yeah, they are common. But for how to do them and you get different answers.

There's a lot more freedom in virtues then vices. As for how to apply them that's situational, and a judgment call. As long as I'm dealing with virtues and not vices, I'm pleased to deal with whatever that comes with. Everyone worth the time is going to consider what deserves, and what is trustworthy and act accordingly the way they see things. There's no cookie cutter application of these things. I'm sure there are enough philosophies out there that aren't wrong, but just a matter of who it's right for.

 

[Trailblazer]

I know nobody knows. That's not the point. The point is that it can only be one or the other. The second part makes no sense. If there is no way, given all the circumstances (internal and external to your mind) that you could have done differently, then you're on 'tramlines'. Your choices are inevitable. That isn't to say that you didn't choose, of course you did, it's just that the process you went though was entirely deterministic.

I think you just contradicted yourself. If I chose that means I have free will to choose. I already told you that I believe free will is deterministic in the sense that it is 'determined' by many factors.

I believe our choices are determined by our heredity and previous experiences, but that does not mean we do not make choices. Free will is simply the will/ability to make choices based upon our desires and preferences, which come from a combination of factors such as childhood upbringing, heredity, education, adult experiences, and present life circumstances. All of these are the reasons why we choose one thing or another.

How free our choices are varies with the situation. Certainly what we refer to as “free will” has many constraints such as ability and opportunity but we have volition as otherwise we could not do anything.

Free will can make sense from our point of view, but not from that of an omniscient god.

How does an omniscient God restrict our free will? What God knows in no way causes anything to happen. What causes things to happen is our choices and ensuing actions.

“Every act ye meditate is as clear to Him as is that act when already accomplished. There is none other God besides Him. His is all creation and its empire. All stands revealed before Him; all is recorded in His holy and hidden Tablets. This fore-knowledge of God, however, should not be regarded as having caused the actions of men, just as your own previous knowledge that a certain event is to occur, or your desire that it should happen, is not and can never be the reason for its occurrence.” Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, p. 150​

​

Question.—If God has knowledge of an action which will be performed by someone, and it has been written on the Tablet of Fate, is it possible to resist it?​

Answer.—The foreknowledge of a thing is not the cause of its realization; for the essential knowledge of God surrounds, in the same way, the realities of things, before as well as after their existence, and it does not become the cause of their existence. It is a perfection of God......​

Some Answered Questions, p. 138​

At the end of the day there is not logical alternative. Either the world, our minds and everything is a deterministic system or it isn't. It's a yes/no question.

Determinism is the belief that all actions and events result from other actions, events, or situations, so people cannot in fact choose what to do.

Determinism definition in American English | Collins English Dictionary

Determinism definition: Determinism is the belief that all actions and events result from other actions, events,... | Meaning, pronunciation, translations and examples in American English

www.collinsdictionary.com

Look at the contradiction in that definition, it's glaring.
Of course all actions and events result from other actions, events, or situations people have encountered in their lives, but people can still choose what to do based upon those preceding actions, events, or situations.

What happens 'to people' randomly is what they 'do not choose', what someone else did to them, like causing a car accident.

This appears to be more blind faith. How do you know?

Logic. Everything has a cause. The cause of some things is that we choose them and make them happen. The cause of other things that happen to us is what someone else chose to do that affected us, like causing a car accident. Some things, like getting a disease, we did not choose, but it was caused by something in our bodies.

There are different ways of using the word: fact - something that actually exists; reality; truth.

I'll buy that, but that does not mean that everything that exists in reality can be considered a fact. Something can be a reality and truth without being able to be proven as a fact. In other words, everything that is true cannot be considered factual. It is only factual if it can be proven as a fact.

I am so not interested in any colloquial use of the words. I am only interested in solid evidence that consists of checkable facts.

You can't check facts about Jesus but you can check the facts about Baha'u'lalh.

It's you who seems confused. There are the legal concept of 'proof' (either beyond reasonable doubt of on the balance of probabilities) and the technical sense of absolute proof, that is only available in mathematics and pure logic, not about anything in the real word. Science accepts that it can never prove anything in that sense, so always refers to evidence. As I said before, there can be evidence (e.g. for Newton's theories) that is way beyond reasonable doubt and yet is wrong.

Okay, so do you accept that there can be no absolute proof that God or Messengers of God exist?

Nothing could be more absurd than claiming you have evidence without any facts.

Nothing could be more absurd that claiming that all evidence is factual evidence. It is not. Only verifiable evidence is factual evidence, but there are other kinds of evidence that are not verifiable. For example: 15 Types of Evidence and How to Use Them

However, I do have facts about Baha'u'llah and that is part of my evidence. Other evidence are the prophecies that He fulfilled by His coming and what He did on His mission and the predictions that He made that have come true.

No, I don't, I want proper evidence, not vague hand-waving about supposed 'messengers'.

I have asked you what you would consider 'proper evidence' and you won't tell me. This is an exercise in trying to get you to think
If a man was actually a Messenger from God, how would we know that? How could we know that? If God sent Messengers and there is no way we can determine of they are Messengers, what would be the point of God sending them? How just and fair would it be for God to send Messengers if we can never recognize them as Messengers?

Even the link you posted refers to evidence as facts:

The word evidence is commonly used in law, court, or criminal investigations. In these settings, evidence refers to the various facts in a case that point to guilt.​

..​

Science also uses the term evidence to prove theories. These are the facts that suggest a scientific hypothesis is true.​

​

[my emphasis]​

Obviously the writer is no scientist because no scientist would ever say that theories are proved, but the point about facts remains.

You are correct. Objective evidence consists of facts, but that does not mean that evidence is the same as proof.

Objective evidence refers to information based on facts that can be proved by means of search like analysis, measurement, and observation. One can examine and evaluate objective evidence.https://askinglot.com/what-does-objective-evidence-mean

Subjective evidence is evidence that we cannot evaluate. In fact, we have two choices; to accept what somebody says or reject it. ... Objective evidence is evidence that we can examine and evaluate for ourselves.
Objective evidence - definition and meaning - Market ...

We can examine and evaluate the evidence for Baha'u'llah for ourselves because there are facts surrounding the person, life, and mission of Baha'u'llah, so in that sense we have objective evidence.

 

[SDavis]

No.



Yes yes. any day now......

yawn


again, "any day now"

I wonder who will be running around screaming alien invasion

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2021/05/17/ufo-sightings-navy-ryan-graves/

And there are many other officers who are coming forth

Jimmy Carter files report on UFO sighting | September 18, 1973 | HISTORY

Future President Jimmy Carter files a report with the International UFO Bureau on September 18, 1973, claiming he had seen an Unidentified Flying Object (UFO) in October 1969. During the presidential campaign of 1976, Democratic challenger Carter was forthcoming about his belief that he had seen...

www.history.com

1974 Reagan UFO sighting over Bakersfield makes news in Korea

An old tale about former President Ronald Reagan seeing an unidentified flying object over Bakersfield has made news in Korea.

www.bakersfield.com

Obama on UFO videos: 'We don't know exactly what they are'

The Navy has for years confirmed the legitimacy of videos from jet fighters that tracked unidentified objects.

www.nbcnews.com

And Trump's space force ( scared him) - will they unite with the 200 million from China that is going to March against the Lord when he comes down

https://www.npr.org/2019/12/21/790492010/trump-created-the-space-force-heres-what-it-will-do

Two more prophecies and when those two begin with all the rest of them that are being fulfilled no one will jest any day now. They'll be too busy receiving the mark of the beast _ *microchipped*

 

[Aupmanyav]

Show me any mystics who wrote 15,000 tablets.

You mean who wrote the most blah? Bahaollah possibly wins.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

I suggest you get a dictionary.

Evidence: anything that helps to prove that something is or is not true: EVIDENCE | definition in the Cambridge English Dictionary

Evidence: the available body of facts or information indicating whether a belief or proposition is true or valid: https://www.google.com/search

Evidence is anything that you see, experience, read, or are told that causes you to believe that something is true or has really happened.
Objective evidence definition and meaning | Collins English Dictionary

Only verifiable evidence can be validated. Verifiable evidence is proof because it establishes something as a fact.

Proof: evidence or argument establishing or helping to establish a fact or the truth of a statement: https://www.google.com/search

Fact
something that is known to have happened or to exist, especially something for which proof exists, or about which there is information:
fact

Fact: a thing that is known or proved to be true.
what is a fact - Google Search

There is no proof that God exists, since there is no verifiable evidence of God's existence.

There is evidence that Messengers received communication from God, but there is no proof.

All of your definitions are in line with evidence being data that either supports or contradicts a hypothesis / model / theory / proposition / claim.

IOW: none of the definitions you yourself have provided, are in line with the silly statement you made.