Evidence of God existence

[Shadow Wolf]

The term "God" refers to a mystery.

That is but one of the many possible definitions. It isn't universal or universally binding.

You seem to be imaging that if you can negate the artifice and the rituals that you have somehow negated the ideal. And that's just not so.

Schizophrenic hallucinations aren't real. There is no justification for believing anything else. If there was, then it would be perfectly reasonable and acceptable for someone with paranoid schizophrenia to destroy their clothing due to them believing someone (such as aliens or the government) is bugging them. But that isn't real, and it does no good to encourage such actions.

Stories require no "evidence". They are STORIES.

If someone says "this exists," then, yes, they do need to provide evidence.

 

[Apologes]

Those two qualifications do not really pinpoint on specific individual.

Tell that to the 99% of scholars working in the field, both skeptics and Christians. How many people are there that have been christened by John the Baptist, sentenced to death by crucifixion and had a group of followers who came to believe they rose from the dead? Those are authentic to the Jesus who is the topic of the Gospels. Not to mention, those are just the universally agreed upon facts. There is a whole array of others that may not enjoy support from all scholars, but are still taken very seriously and which bear just as striking of a resemblance to the basic story of Jesus found in the Gospels.

And, no, I'm not out of touch, but rather I can't accept the existence of someone who is supposedly the son of god and savior of humanity without heavy scrutiny. Sure, someone probably did fill the role to inspire the character that Christians developed, but that doesn't make this person (who most certainly would not have been named Jesus) anyone special.

You're moving the goal posts here. The user @Walterbl mentioned evidence for the life and resurrection of Jesus and you responded by saying:

Of which there is none.

in post #24. You didn't just dispute the claim that there is evidence for the resurrection, or Jesus being the Son of God, you disputed the claim that there is evidence for his life as well since you made a general disagreement. By doing so you undermined the exact thing you now concede. Jesus was a very real figure, a first century Jew who had disciples, was christened by John the Baptist, died by crucifixion and was believed by his followers to have risen from the dead.

Whether Jesus was who his disciples believed him to be could be established through arguments that aren't based on the writings of Josephus and Tacitus which you objected to in your post #62 :

There is no evidence. Sure, people claim Josephus, but many scholars believe that what he allegedly wrote about Jesus was a forgery added in later by Christians. With Tacitus, that was over a century after Jesus.

Thus, I stand by my statement that "there is none."

as if these two provide anything particularly useful in that regard. It should be obvious that a jew and a pagan wouldn't endorse a relatively small group's claims of its leader's divinity. It should also be obvious, that this was an attempt to discredit the notion of Jesus' general historicity and not just his divine nature, contrary to what you are saying now.

That doesn't change anything. And it's not just inconsistencies and internal contradictions, but a number of things such as a "righteous man" offering his daughters for gang raping and god punishing people that Abraham lied to. Those are pretty sick behaviors, and very far removed from being called "holy."

The bold is a baseless assertion. As for the rest, I wonder on what basis you make a judgment of what is holy? Perhaps the teachings of Jesus in the New Testament who came to correct the very same law because of their hardness of heart which made Moses permit it? The teachings which laid foundations for the whole ethical system of the west? Regardless, why do you think your moral judgment is adequate to evaluate the ethical status of divine law?

Be that as it may, you're just providing more charges against the notion that everything contained in the Bible is somehow approved by God as good or true which I and the person who you were talking to do not believe.

 

[PureX]

That is but one of the many possible definitions. It isn't universal or universally binding.

Schizophrenic hallucinations aren't real.

Of course they are real. They are just not accurate recognitions of reality. There is no justification for believing anything else. If there was, then it would be perfectly reasonable and acceptable for someone with paranoid schizophrenia to destroy their clothing due to them believing someone (such as aliens or the government) is bugging them. But that isn't real, and it does no good to encourage such actions.

If someone says "this exists," then, yes, they do need to provide evidence. [/QUOTE]Schizophrenic hallucination "exist". They are part of our "reality", even if we do not personally experience them. You are being WAY too vague and ineffective with your definitions of existence, and of what is real and what isn't.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

You are being WAY too vague and ineffective with your definitions of existence,

If something exists, there is a means for it to be known.

and of what is real and what isn't.

What's real and what isn't is one of the few things in life that typically is black and white. And if something is only real to us, is it really real? Planting a false memory doesn't make the memory real.

 

[Apologes]

If something exists, there is a means for it to be known.

That's confusing a thing's epistemic status with its ontological status.

That would imply unknown things do not exist. Just because we don't know that something exists doesn't mean it doesn't exists. There was a time when we didn't know other galaxies existed (we didn't even know what galaxies are) yet one would be insane to say that galaxies didn't exist until we discovered them. After all, if galaxies didn't exist before they were discovered then how could they have been discovered in the first place as discovering them requires them existing.

Same nonsense was promoted in another thread by another user and it's baffling how someone can hold such an incoherent view.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

The user @Walterbl mentioned evidence for the life and resurrection of Jesus and you responded by saying:

I bolded something I think you missed.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

That would imply unknown things do not exist.

No. As I mentioned, there is a means to know the existence of something. Of course the atom has always existed, but we didn't know about it until we had our own means of detecting it.

 

[Apologes]

I bolded something I think you missed.

I literally devoted an entire chunk of my post answering this very objection in advance yet you ignore it. This is just being completely disingenuous.

No. As I mentioned, there is a means to know the existence of something. Of course the atom has always existed, but we didn't know about it until we had our own means of detecting it.

You said clearly that to exist is to have some ways to be known. Unknowable (necessarily or contingently) things would end up not existing just because we do not knkw they don't exist. It's the same absurd principle.

 

[PureX]

The proposition is that if something exists, it can be known to exist. But I can't see how this proposition could possibly be verified without complete omniscience, which no human can or will ever possess. So by the impossibility of that requirement, the proposition invalidates itself.

 

[Apologes]

The proposition is that if something exists, it can be known to exist. But I can't see how this proposition could possibly be verified without complete omniscience, which no human can or will ever possess. So by the impossibility of that requirement, the proposition invalidates itself.

Not sure if they wish to apply the criteria to the truth as well or if they want to limit it to existence alone. If former then it's doubly incoherent.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

I literally devoted an entire chunk of my post answering this very objection in advance yet you ignore it. This is just being completely disingenuous.

No, because there is literally zero proof and evidence of any resurrection. It doesn't happen.

 

[Valjean]

By what reasoning do you assume that to ask any question that science cannot answer is a "straw man"? Because that sounds like an enormous and glaring bias, to me.

I'm not objecting to a question science can't answer, I'm objecting to requiring science to answer logically illegal questions; questions outside its purview. You're dismissing science because it can't answer an impossible question that has nothing to do with science.

That does not negate the question by any reasoning that I am aware of.

Science isn't averse to studying "who," it just has no evidence to work with yet.

Also, there are other methodologies through which we can explore the "why" questions besides science.

What would they be? Keep in mind exploration requires objective evidence.

Please explain by what reasoning you have made this determination. I understand that it does not "fit' into your strictly materialist view of existence, but that does not make the question illegitimate. If anything, it exposes the severe limitation of the materialist view of existence.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-overlapping_magisteria

"Why" presupposes an intentional purpose -- and an "intender."
I don't object to the question, per se, I just see no way to research it in a way that would generate objective evidence. It's a question presupposing an intentional God; an answer seeking a question.

The fact that there is "nothing special about it" is why we seek more and different kinds of resolutions. As an information set it does not inform us of much.

But you're seeking nothing; you believe there's nothing to be resolved.
I'm saying natural selection selected for useful traits, and curiosity was just one of many.
So what, exactly, needs' resolution'?

I don't know what that even means.

It means that you insist every effect must have a cause, then you drop this claim in the question of God by 'defining' Him out of the requirement. Why posit this special exception, if not to remove this exception from consideration?
You're making God axiomatic, so there may be no legitimate questions or criticism of the concept.

Your idea of "real" (strictly material) precludes any possibility of such evidence, in advance. It's a bias so complete that it becomes invisible to itself.

OK, present some evidence. I'll accept any legitimate evidence.

 

[Apologes]

No, because there is literally zero proof and evidence of any resurrection. It doesn't happen.

Good job at being completely dishonest and devoid of substance.

 

[Valjean]

Good job at being completely dishonest and devoid of substance.

But she's right, it's true, there is no evidence. There's only hearsay, apologetics and tradition. It's all based on faith.

If you can produce some actual evidence, or even a first-person account, we'd all be very interested.

 

[Valjean]

The proposition is that if something exists, it can be known to exist. But I can't see how this proposition could possibly be verified without complete omniscience, which no human can or will ever possess. So by the impossibility of that requirement, the proposition invalidates itself.

LOL -- a lot of what we know seemed impossible a century ago: the temperature of the sun's core -- or the earth's; the age of the universe, the movement of tectonic plates, the dates of mass extinctions, &c. The research methodology is a mystery to the average layman, particularly in the U.S.

 

[Apologes]

But she's right, it's true, there is no evidence. It's all based on faith.
There's only hearsay, apologetics and tradition.

If you can produce some actual evidence, or even a first-person account, we'd all be very interested

If you had bothered to read our exchange you'd notice that I didn't even attempt to defend the historicity of the resurrection (that she would pretend otherwise is dishonest and devoid of substance) but the general historicity of Jesus which is hardly even up for debate considering the overwhelming consensus in favor of it.

 

[Quagmire]

Me.

Pffft, it's obvious that you're just a fabrication by desperate apologists.

 

[Sir Doom]

Pffft, it's obvious that you're just a fabrication by desperate apologists.

One can only dream...

 

[Dell]

What would constitute good evidence of Gods existence? Maybe...uh... [God]... or at least an act of God or miracle so called thats totally observable. (Since he himself doesn't want to known visually for what ever reason.)

That's the whole problem in a nutshell... No proof.

Today we know it doesn't require an act of God to bring a universe to present. And we also know it didn't require an act of God to cause life and intelligence. Whether accepted or not, the explanation offered by science is far simpler and superior than the explanation of a God like the one Christian's claim. (BTW an explantion that evolved from the bronze age to present in doctrine only.)

That said what would cause scientists to reconsider the existence of a highly intelligent being that could qualify God like?
Maybe...
1. The discovery of multiverse. One could be seemingly eternal..
2. The discovery of the ability to go back and forth any place in time. One could be 100% perfect...

 

[Shadow Wolf]

The proposition is that if something exists, it can be known to exist. But I can't see how this proposition could possibly be verified without complete omniscience, which no human can or will ever possess. So by the impossibility of that requirement, the proposition invalidates itself.

Really, nothing new is ever discovered. Even new emerging characteristics in a species, existing before we learned of it. Rather, all we have over done is make discoveries of what is already there. As for the god concept, we have no way to know if it exist or not, and we don't even have a means to assess who's claims are accurate.

Good job at being completely dishonest and devoid of substance.

There isn't much other way to put it or more to add to it. Resurrections do not happen..

I didn't even attempt to defend the historicity of the resurrection (that she would pretend otherwise is dishonest and devoid of substance)

Like with Buddha or Muhammad, saying "the life of Jesus" isn't outside the realm of possibility for the "real character" to have existed. But when you add in "life and resurrection," it goes into the realm of mythology and superstition, where the "life of Jesus" typically includes not only the resurrection, but turning water into wine, walking on water, feeding the multitudes, healing the blind, and other events of religious miracles the Gospels refers to.