How can one reasonably go from deism to theism and religion?

[pacifica]

I think you probably are responding to an entirely different thread or something. But also, if you don't mind, don't tell me what the purpose of this thread was or invent fabrications about my position. Furthermore i'm an agnostic and not an atheist so its very clear you have no idea what you're talking about; and i've been an agnostic for a very long time. But this red herring you're bringing up is completely irrelevant. I Made this thread to question the logic of going from deism to theism and because I like debates; plus i find them entertaining. Furthermore I don't care whether anyone here thinks im smart and rational; im simply here for the debate and to perhaps find new or better arguments, or perhaps improve my own repertoire. Im here for entertainment and self improvement and not for vanity.

k

Apologies about the atheist/agnostic thing though, I overlooked the last sentence in the OP.

You have 23 posts and its quite obvious that you are new to debate so I will educate you on some basics.

Apart from the laughable condescension, what kind of fallacious logic and baseless assumption is this?

Lets also address your strawman--I never said religion was dumb and worthless.

Oh really?

You want quotes? I'll give you quotes.

. I dont hate religion--i just find it extremely illogical and totally worthless.

So you've never said it was worthless, huh?

Its based on significant reason and some evidence. I just explained that to you. Belief in supernatural mumbo jumbo is no where near the same.

So ill take science and logic you can go with religious mumbo jumbo and feelings. Im on infinitely safer ground.

Shall I educate you on the meaning of the words you yourself have used? I will: "Mumbo jumbo, or mumbo-jumbo, is an English phrase or expression that denotes a confusing or meaningless subject.": i.e. dumb.

So you've actually said religion is both worthless and dumb. I haven't fabricated or even inferred anything about your position, just quoted your own words. There is no strawman. Wait, are crying 'strawman!' and contradicting oneself part of the basics of debate too? Man you've really been schooling me!


Now, as for the rest of you post:

No im not misconstructing your argument whatsoever. My point was that a feeling of awe or desires suggests nothing about the truth of anything supernatural. In addition, im not grossly oversimplying anything. We're not talking about why people go from deism to theism; im not analyzing the cultural, political, or socioeconomic causes that lead to people becoming theists. I understand, as you say, how people initially arrived at animism like your example states; I understand already that there are many reasons, most consisting of non sequitors, why people might go from deism to theism, but I argue that none of them are logical or sensible from an objective person. The thread and my argument is simply that going from deism to theism is illogical for the reasons listed in the op, not that people don't have personal, incorrect reasons for it. Feelings or awe inspiring moments, as I've already stated and argued, are not an effective means of deducing that God cares about anything our species does. For instance, how does the brilliance or dread inspired by something mean it should be worshiped and that its a deity or that it is caused by some unseen intelligence? As i've stated its a non sequitur and just an assumption. You seem to think I am asking why people go from deism to theism--im not--im arguing for the fact that its illogical. You've misconstrued the thread and most of my points.

These questions aren't very interesting. Bronze age laws are entirely senseless in this day and age. Its why most successful countries follow secular laws based on a kind of utilitarianism. If you want bronze age laws check out Iran or other theocracies. Personally im not interested in following laws like stoning homosexuals and adulterers. And do people ascribe their personal attributes to their deity? Almost 100% certainly. Look at christianity where you can see the politics and various cultures of the time directly affecting which of the gospels were included and which were thrown out. You're right though, im completely uninterested in talking about those questions. I am more interested in debating the religious whether going from deism to theism is illogical or not. Apparently it is an interesting debate too since a lot of people jumped in already.

And what I've been arguing is that there is a social and psychological logic to the process of going from deism to theism and that it is wrong to dismiss the process or theism itself as irrevocably worthless&dumb; also I have responded to your question, because I actually agree with you that there is no way a human mind can know God and I addressed that in my previous post.

What I disagree with is the validity of the question itself: "is it logical to go past deism and believe in a theistic God?", isn't really a reasonable question to ask because 1) it's not internally consistent, 2) implies that deism is a itself a reasonable position to hold (when essentially it's the same old "I don't know, therefore magic" stuff) and 3) has an utterly self-evident answer - of course it is not logical. Faith is not logical; by definition it is convinction without proof. Somewhat self-aware believers will never tell you that their assumptions about God are logical in the Aristotelian sense; still they may believe 100% in them because of reasons that are not formally logical and are just as valid to them. In its essence it's no more irrational nor more deserving of contempt than believing in any other irrational tenet of civilization, e.g. that human life is precious: it is absolutely illogical to go from "there are humans" to "their life is precious" or "they have intrinsic human rights" and yet most people hold these purely emotional and unsubstantiated beliefs (arguably a good thing). On the subject of this thread, no believer will ever present an argument to you that will satisfy your requirements, so this thread is basically you trying to show whoever takes the bait what illogical morons they are and that amounts to intellectual onanism. However, as an atheist I understand the urge to bully religious belief so have fun, I guess.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

It seems to me to be a massive, quantum leap to jump from a general belief in God without knowing his specific characteristics to knowing his mind and what he cares about, and his accomplishments.

Deism is no less specific about these sorts of characteristics. Where some other religion claims "God did (insert miracle)", deism claims "God did NOT do (insert miracle)."

It requires such a massive quantity of evidence to say that you know the mind of God and that God has a special connection with you. It demands a truly breathtaking scale of arrogance--an omnipotent, all knowing, immortal, infinitely intelligent entity suddenly cares whether men, for example, exchange bodily fluids with each other. The much more reasonable position is that God nobody knows the mind of God or what his intentions and demands are.

Do you think this really describes deism?

Ultimately it all comes down to this--there is absolutely no way you can jump from deism to theism. You certainly can't prove it, and as ive shown experiences and visions and feelings are insufficient.

Maybe whatever irrationality led to the person accepting deism in the first place could be used to lead them to theism. Deism claims a god that not only has no evidence to support it, but claims that such evidence is impossible. It seems kind of hypocritical to demand evidence to get a deist out of deism when they didn't ask for any evidence to get into deism in the first place.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

False analogy. The moon is an observable object whereas God is inherently not.

Here's a better analogy though--one guy comes up to you: he tells you that a block of cheese is orbiting the planet. Another person comes to you and says: there's a massive floating celestial teapot stuck in the sky. The next person then comes up to you and says: the world is flat and there is no moon. You soon head out side and realize that the a giant cloud of impenetrable fog covers the entire planet (and no ocean so you couldn't observe the effects) and you thus realize that no one could possibly know whats in the sky; the other people with mutually exclusive reports have faith that they're correct though, and they also claim they have a special, magical connection to a satellite in orbit which has assured them of the object they believe in. So you realize that everyone is full of it or delusional or insane or has subconscious desires, or is trying to gain social power by sharing a belief, etc. So your analogy assumes that its easy to see the moon, that the moon really exists, and that it would be inherently silly to question it. All of those assumptions cannot be verified. my analogy is much more accurate because it accounts for the vast discrepancies and inability to observe the thing everyone makes claims about.

Here's an analogy I think fits your argument better:

"All these people are claiming a dragon exists, but they can't agree on anything about it - colour, size, temperment, etc. So instead of just reserving judgement and saying 'I see no reason to accept that any of these claims are right', I'll come up with my own claim: that the dragon exists, but is invisible."

 

[idav]

Here's an analogy I think fits your argument better:

"All these people are claiming a dragon exists, but they can't agree on anything about it - colour, size, temperment, etc. So instead of just reserving judgement and saying 'I see no reason to accept that any of these claims are right', I'll come up with my own claim: that the dragon exists, but is invisible."

It fits. Invisible dragons must me the reason for all the recent forest fires. Obviously with color we would see them.

 

[serp777]

Deism is no less specific about these sorts of characteristics. Where some other religion claims "God did (insert miracle)", deism claims "God did NOT do (insert miracle)."


Do you think this really describes deism?


Maybe whatever irrationality led to the person accepting deism in the first place could be used to lead them to theism. Deism claims a god that not only has no evidence to support it, but claims that such evidence is impossible. It seems kind of hypocritical to demand evidence to get a deist out of deism when they didn't ask for any evidence to get into deism in the first place.

i think it does describe deism fairly well since deism is the position that god exists but is not involved in human affairs. but this implies, since god doesnt communicate with humans, thats its imposible for one to know the mind of god. now i actually do think deism requires evidence too but not nearly as much as the claim that god cares about who we have sex with, or whether the pope can tell me gods will. thus im an agnostic-- but specificslly an agnostic thay doesnt know the probabilities if gods existence. a true agnostic if you will. my position is the most reasonable since one couldnt hope to cslculste the probability of gods existence.

 

[serp777]

Here's an analogy I think fits your argument better:

"All these people are claiming a dragon exists, but they can't agree on anything about it - colour, size, temperment, etc. So instead of just reserving judgement and saying 'I see no reason to accept that any of these claims are right', I'll come up with my own claim: that the dragon exists, but is invisible."

well more like we cant possibly know the attributes of the dragon and our best bet is to say we dont know anything about the drsgon. i never made a claim about a specifc attribute of god. the entire point was that inherently nobody can know any of the attributes or characteristic of god. the burden of proof is on the faithful to show that god intervenes assuming god exists. the burden of proof is not on me to show that god doesnt intervene else youre getting close to an argument fron ignorance. im not comjng up with my own claim that the dragon is invisible, im saying simply that we cannot know anything about god so its faulty logic to assume he intervenes.

my analogy is more accurate since it doesnt suggest that im making amy claim.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

well more like we cant possibly know the attributes of the dragon and our best bet is to say we dont know anything about the drsgon. i never made a claim about a specifc attribute of god.

You suggested a deistic god, so a set of claims is implied.

the entire point was that inherently nobody can know any of the attributes or characteristic of god. the burden of proof is on the faithful to show that god intervenes assuming god exists. the burden of proof is not on me to show that god doesnt intervene else youre getting close to an argument fron ignorance.

If you're going to claim a deistic god, the burden of proof is on you to show that such a god exists.

im not comjng up with my own claim that the dragon is invisible, im saying simply that we cannot know anything about god so its faulty logic to assume he intervenes.

If you don't - and cannot - know anything about god, then it's no less faulty to assume such a god exists in the first place.

my analogy is more accurate since it doesnt suggest that im making amy claim.

If you're claiming deism, then you're making lots of claims.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

i think it does describe deism fairly well since deism is the position that god exists but is not involved in human affairs. but this implies, since god doesnt communicate with humans, thats its imposible for one to know the mind of god.

If you're arguing that God doesn't communicate with humans, then you ARE claiming to know the mind of God.

now i actually do think deism requires evidence too but not nearly as much as the claim that god cares about who we have sex with, or whether the pope can tell me gods will. thus im an agnostic-- but specificslly an agnostic thay doesnt know the probabilities if gods existence. a true agnostic if you will. my position is the most reasonable since one couldnt hope to cslculste the probability of gods existence.

When you say that you're agnostic, do you mean:

- "I don't believe this deism stuff - I'm just assuming a deistic god for the purposes of this discussion", or
- "I'm sure that a deistic god exists and I see no conflict between this and agnosticism"?

 

[Nakosis]

False analogy. The moon is an observable object whereas God is inherently not.

God is observable according to some folks. The moon is not an observable object to someone stuck in a cave.

Here's a better analogy though--one guy comes up to you: he tells you that a block of cheese is orbiting the planet. Another person comes to you and says: there's a massive floating celestial teapot stuck in the sky. The next person then comes up to you and says: the world is flat and there is no moon. You soon head out side and realize that the a giant cloud of impenetrable fog covers the entire planet (and no ocean so you couldn't observe the effects) and you thus realize that no one could possibly know whats in the sky; the other people with mutually exclusive reports have faith that they're correct though, and they also claim they have a special, magical connection to a satellite in orbit which has assured them of the object they believe in. So you realize that everyone is full of it or delusional or insane or has subconscious desires, or is trying to gain social power by sharing a belief, etc. So your analogy assumes that its easy to see the moon, that the moon really exists, and that it would be inherently silly to question it. All of those assumptions cannot be verified. my analogy is much more accurate because it accounts for the vast discrepancies and inability to observe the thing everyone makes claims about.

No, my analogy assumes that what is observable is dependent on individual circumstances. Your analogy assumes everyone is stuck in a cave.

It is certainly not silly to question something you've not verified for yourself. It be silly not to. What's silly is to assume everyone is stuck in the same cave as you.

 

[serp777]

If you're arguing that God doesn't communicate with humans, then you ARE claiming to know the mind of God.


When you say that you're agnostic, do you mean:

- "I don't believe this deism stuff - I'm just assuming a deistic god for the purposes of this discussion", or
- "I'm sure that a deistic god exists and I see no conflict between this and agnosticism"?

If you're arguing that God doesn't communicate with humans, then you ARE claiming to know the mind of God.

First, this is my main argument as posited in the OP, which has a slight but important difference..

"It seems to me to be a massive, quantum leap to jump from a general belief in God without knowing his specific characteristics to knowing his mind and what he cares about, and his accomplishments. It requires such a massive quantity of evidence to say that you know the mind of God and that God has a special connection with you. It demands a truly breathtaking scale of arrogance--an omnipotent, all knowing, immortal, infinitely intelligent entity suddenly cares whether men, for example, exchange bodily fluids with each other. The much more reasonable position is that God nobody knows the mind of God or what his intentions and demands are. Although I would also state that nobody has special knowledge denied to me showing that God definitely exists--the only thing we can do is say that we don't know God exists."

So im not saying I know that God certainly doesn't talk to humans. But I believe I also gave some arguments for why it would be better to assume that God doesn't communicate with humans and doesn't care about the actions of an evolving species of primate. For instance, there is the following logic: if God wanted us to believe and cared about what actions we did, then it would be within his power to unambiguously prove his existence to us so that we believed and so that we knew which laws we should follow. Further there is no good reason to think an infinitely intelligent being is concerned with our lives for the same reason we would not expect the average human to be concerned with a random colony of ants and there sexual habits, etc. They are simply so small and irrelevant that it seems unlikely that God would be involved except to perhaps be slightly curious. In addition, the deistic claim requires much less evidence since it is simply the single claim that God does not intervene in human affairs. That isn't knowing the mind of God--it doesn't claim to know God's morality, or his commandments, or what holy days should be observed, etc. So in other words you have one claim versus hundreds of claims made by the theist which have to be justified. To say that the claim God doesn't intervene in human affairs requires the same amount of evidence that God intervenes in human affairs AND here's what he has intervened in specifically is an immense difference. Indeed the claim that God does intervene in human affairs and the claim God doesn't does have the same burden of proof, But theism necessarily entails a bunch of additional specific claims that are inconsistent with other theistic points of views. Deism does not. surely you see the difference here.

Also my agnosticism resembles option number one more closely, although I would say that I am an agnostic who doesn't even claim to know the probabilities of God's existence. In other words a true agnostic, rather than say a 50/50 agnostic. I am however positing that deism is true for the sake of the argument. I'm not actually a deist and i don't think deism is compatible with agnosticism; just to make that point clear.

 

[psychoslice]

How can one reasonably go from deism to theism and religion?................easy, people believe in just about anything lol.

 

[serp777]

God is observable according to some folks. The moon is not an observable object to someone stuck in a cave.



No, my analogy assumes that what is observable is dependent on individual circumstances. Your analogy assumes everyone is stuck in a cave.

It is certainly not silly to question something you've not verified for yourself. It be silly not to. What's silly is to assume everyone is stuck in the same cave as you.

Actually the moon could be observable to someone in a cave. Suppose the cave looked out into an ocean or a lake. The tides would imply another celestial object orbitting the planet. Furthermore just because some folks think God is observable isn't really relevant, and I don't see how the moon not being able to be seen from a cave defeats my argument or analogy.

[What's silly is to assume everyone is stuck in the same cave as you

So it would be silly to assume everyone is limited by the same laws of physics and human limitations and the same potential knowledge? I don't think so. Not only is there no evidence that any human has a divine hotline to God or that any human is special enough to receive special knowledge that is denied to most other people, but there are many deluded people which casts significant doubt on the whole idea that a few people are selected by heaven. Furthermore calling an infinite, omnipotent being which hasn't been observed by any scientific apparatus and comparing that to a cave analogy is a bit silly itself. I mean the claims are orders of magnitudes different and a cave is a physical entity whereas God is an intangible, abstract, metaphysical being with the ability to create universes and defy the laws of physics like nothing. The scale of these claims demands substantially more evidence and reasoning. My analogy presumes that nobody has a special connection to heaven and that because God is this metaphysical being, he is obscured to everyone. That's a fair presumption until someone has proved that they in fact have communicated with heaven and that heaven exists in the first place and that GOd is even interested in communicating with specific humans who are special for no apparent reasons. So until i see some evidence the other way I think my presumption is a fair one, although I definitely don't claim certainty. I simply state that its more likely that all humans are the same except that some humans have a self inflated ego which makes them think they're in conversation with God.

 

[serp777]

k

Apologies about the atheist/agnostic thing though, I overlooked the last sentence in the OP.



Apart from the laughable condescension, what kind of fallacious logic and baseless assumption is this?



Oh really?

You want quotes? I'll give you quotes.



So you've never said it was worthless, huh?





Shall I educate you on the meaning of the words you yourself have used? I will: "Mumbo jumbo, or mumbo-jumbo, is an English phrase or expression that denotes a confusing or meaningless subject.": i.e. dumb.

So you've actually said religion is both worthless and dumb. I haven't fabricated or even inferred anything about your position, just quoted your own words. There is no strawman. Wait, are crying 'strawman!' and contradicting oneself part of the basics of debate too? Man you've really been schooling me!


Now, as for the rest of you post:






And what I've been arguing is that there is a social and psychological logic to the process of going from deism to theism and that it is wrong to dismiss the process or theism itself as irrevocably worthless&dumb; also I have responded to your question, because I actually agree with you that there is no way a human mind can know God and I addressed that in my previous post.

What I disagree with is the validity of the question itself: "is it logical to go past deism and believe in a theistic God?", isn't really a reasonable question to ask because 1) it's not internally consistent, 2) implies that deism is a itself a reasonable position to hold (when essentially it's the same old "I don't know, therefore magic" stuff) and 3) has an utterly self-evident answer - of course it is not logical. Faith is not logical; by definition it is convinction without proof. Somewhat self-aware believers will never tell you that their assumptions about God are logical in the Aristotelian sense; still they may believe 100% in them because of reasons that are not formally logical and are just as valid to them. In its essence it's no more irrational nor more deserving of contempt than believing in any other irrational tenet of civilization, e.g. that human life is precious: it is absolutely illogical to go from "there are humans" to "their life is precious" or "they have intrinsic human rights" and yet most people hold these purely emotional and unsubstantiated beliefs (arguably a good thing). On the subject of this thread, no believer will ever present an argument to you that will satisfy your requirements, so this thread is basically you trying to show whoever takes the bait what illogical morons they are and that amounts to intellectual onanism. However, as an atheist I understand the urge to bully religious belief so have fun, I guess.

Ok well you should have covered red herring because that's exactly what the first part of this is. Yes i forgot I had said illogical and worthless so that is my mistake and means dumb and worthless for all intensive purposes; ill concede that unimportant point but its completely irrelevant and unimportant to the bulk of the debate im interested in and to the thread i created.

Personally im not interested in going over my opinions regarding religion or whether you think what ive said is militant or not. Debating does not mean militant. But to call it bullying, like you suggest, is absurd and a complete insult to anyone who has actually experienced bullying. Calling an idea dumb and worthless is no where near the same as calling a person dumb and worthless. Stating my opinion about religion isn't bullying for the same reason its not bullying republicans when I say that many of their political positions are idiotic. Im not going up to anyone individual and calling them dumb and worthless. I am sure i have believed things at some point that were dumb and worthless too.

If you were aware of what actual bullying was you would NOT be calling what ive done bullying. Regardless, all of this is simply a red herring and unimportant. Apparently the condescension was warranted because you're clearly trying to distract from the main points of the argument to continue talking about my personal opinions and psychology. Great, we get it, you don't like my opinions about religion. now deal with it and lets move on. I am entitled to my opinion as you are to yours.

And what I've been arguing is that there is a social and psychological logic to the process of going from deism to theism and that it is wrong to dismiss the process or theism itself as irrevocably worthless&dumb; also I have responded to your question, because I actually agree with you that there is no way a human mind can know God and I addressed that in my previous post.

And as i've said previously I am already aware of the psychological reasons and thinking errors people use to go from deism to theism. You're not arguing against anything I said--its not like I had argued that people could not go from deism to theism. I already agreed on that point. Perhaps you should start a thread exploring what the psychological reasons are from going from deism to theism. Im basically here to argue with the faithful who think that their beliefs are rational and logical.

"is it logical to go past deism and believe in a theistic God?", isn't really a reasonable question to ask because 1) it's not internally consistent, 2) implies that deism is a itself a reasonable position to hold (when essentially it's the same old "I don't know, therefore magic" stuff) and 3) has an utterly self-evident answer - of course it is not logical. Faith is not logical; by definition it is convinction without proof.

Its a perfectly reasonable question to ask. First of all how is it internally inconsistent? Second, it implies nothing of the sort--it implies a hypothetical for the sake of argument. Proposing a hypothetical and saying that the hypothetical is a reasonable position to hold is not the same thing whatsoever. Its an assumption made in order to progress in an argument. Third, many people here don't agree that its illogical. People like william lane craig believe that their faith has reason and logic to back it up. Furthermore if its not logical to go from deism to theism then nobody has any reason whatsoever to believe including, as I have even shown, that feelings and experiences are completely unreliable and a slippery slope because then you have to concede your feelings and experiences and that of the terrorist with visions from allah, or that of the christian women who has an experience from jesus to drown her kids (kind of like abraham) are equally legitimate. So in that sense you can argue that personal experience, which people feel is a reasonable reason to go from deism to theism, is fallacious. These same people feel that other's visions and experiences are wrong, thus leading to a contradiction. Either way people do think that experience or feelings is a logical justification to believe, and people do feel it can be justified to go to theism through sacred texts, history, or whatever.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

First, this is my main argument as posited in the OP, which has a slight but important difference..

"It seems to me to be a massive, quantum leap to jump from a general belief in God without knowing his specific characteristics to knowing his mind and what he cares about, and his accomplishments.

But this isn't deism, which you also said you were assuming.

It requires such a massive quantity of evidence to say that you know the mind of God and that God has a special connection with you. It demands a truly breathtaking scale of arrogance--an omnipotent, all knowing, immortal, infinitely intelligent entity suddenly cares whether men, for example, exchange bodily fluids with each other.

Yes, it's almost as arrogant as claiming the omniscience that would be needed to rationally infer a god that doesn't leave any evidence for humanity to find.

The much more reasonable position is that God nobody knows the mind of God or what his intentions and demands are.

That depends what you mean by "reasonable". There are theistic beliefs that flow logically from the premises they assume... I just disagree with the premises. OTOH, whatever this there's-a-god-but-we-know-nothing-about-it god is inherently unreasonable. There is no set of premises you can assume to logically lead you to the conclusion that won't be contradicted by the conclusion.

Although I would also state that nobody has special knowledge denied to me showing that God definitely exists--the only thing we can do is say that we don't know God exists."

How on Earth could you ever begin to demonstrate this?

So im not saying I know that God certainly doesn't talk to humans. But I believe I also gave some arguments for why it would be better to assume that God doesn't communicate with humans and doesn't care about the actions of an evolving species of primate. For instance, there is the following logic: if God wanted us to believe and cared about what actions we did, then it would be within his power to unambiguously prove his existence to us so that we believed and so that we knew which laws we should follow. Further there is no good reason to think an infinitely intelligent being is concerned with our lives for the same reason we would not expect the average human to be concerned with a random colony of ants and there sexual habits, etc. They are simply so small and irrelevant that it seems unlikely that God would be involved except to perhaps be slightly curious.

You're putting the cart before the horse. Why assume God at all? The lack of interference in the world by God fits just as well with the assumption of no gods at all as it does withan interventionist god. Why the need to assume God?

In addition, the deistic claim requires much less evidence since it is simply the single claim that God does not intervene in human affairs.

Hold on one minute: there's at least one other claim that's inherent in deism: God exists.

What evidence could there possibly be for "God exists" that doesn't violate the claim that God doesn't intervene in human affairs?

That isn't knowing the mind of God--it doesn't claim to know God's morality, or his commandments, or what holy days should be observed, etc. So in other words you have one claim versus hundreds of claims made by the theist which have to be justified.

No, you have two claims, and one of those claims makes it impossible to support the other claim without contradicting yourself.

To say that the claim God doesn't intervene in human affairs requires the same amount of evidence that God intervenes in human affairs AND here's what he has intervened in specifically is an immense difference. Indeed the claim that God does intervene in human affairs and the claim God doesn't does have the same burden of proof, But theism necessarily entails a bunch of additional specific claims that are inconsistent with other theistic points of views. Deism does not. surely you see the difference here.

Yes: the more specific the claim, the higher the bar, but deism is one of the few god-concepts where its own premises make it impossible to clearany bar at all.

For most theistic claims, I could conceive of evidence that, if it existed, would support the truth of the claims. This isn't the case with deism.

The small number of claims in your god-concept isn't a point in your favour if the claims that you do have set up a contradiction.

Also my agnosticism resembles option number one more closely, although I would say that I am an agnostic who doesn't even claim to know the probabilities of God's existence. In other words a true agnostic, rather than say a 50/50 agnostic. I am however positing that deism is true for the sake of the argument. I'm not actually a deist and i don't think deism is compatible with agnosticism; just to make that point clear.

Okay - so you're arguing a position you don't believe in?

That's fine if you are. I just wanted to make sure that your descriptions of what you believe aren't supposed to fit into your argument somehow.

 

[serp777]

But this isn't deism, which you also said you were assuming.


Yes, it's almost as arrogant as claiming the omniscience that would be needed to rationally infer a god that doesn't leave any evidence for humanity to find.


That depends what you mean by "reasonable". There are theistic beliefs that flow logically from the premises they assume... I just disagree with the premises. OTOH, whatever this there's-a-god-but-we-know-nothing-about-it god is inherently unreasonable. There is no set of premises you can assume to logically lead you to the conclusion that won't be contradicted by the conclusion.


How on Earth could you ever begin to demonstrate this?


You're putting the cart before the horse. Why assume God at all? The lack of interference in the world by God fits just as well with the assumption of no gods at all as it does withan interventionist god. Why the need to assume God?


Hold on one minute: there's at least one other claim that's inherent in deism: God exists.

What evidence could there possibly be for "God exists" that doesn't violate the claim that God doesn't intervene in human affairs?


No, you have two claims, and one of those claims makes it impossible to support the other claim without contradicting yourself.


Yes: the more specific the claim, the higher the bar, but deism is one of the few god-concepts where its own premises make it impossible to clearany bar at all.

For most theistic claims, I could conceive of evidence that, if it existed, would support the truth of the claims. This isn't the case with deism.

The small number of claims in your god-concept isn't a point in your favour if the claims that you do have set up a contradiction.


Okay - so you're arguing a position you don't believe in?

That's fine if you are. I just wanted to make sure that your descriptions of what you believe aren't supposed to fit into your argument somehow.

But this isn't deism, which you also said you were assuming.

How does that statement disagree with deism? I said its a big leap to jump from a general belief in God to know his specific characteristics and attributes. Presumably Deism would align with that statement since it says God doesn't intervene, thus implying that no one COULD know his specific attributes or accomplishments or cares because he would never have informed anyone.

That depends what you mean by "reasonable". There are theistic beliefs that flow logically from the premises they assume... I just disagree with the premises. OTOH, whatever this there's-a-god-but-we-know-nothing-about-it god is inherently unreasonable. There is no set of premises you can assume to logically lead you to the conclusion that won't be contradicted by the conclusion.

This is a pointless argument really. There are beliefs about leprechauns that logically flow from the premises they assume. So the fact that something can logically follow from a set of premises isn't important whatsoever. Its the logic in conjunction with the assumptions made thats important.

You're putting the cart before the horse. Why assume God at all? The lack of interference in the world by God fits just as well with the assumption of no gods at all as it does withan interventionist god. Why the need to assume God?

GOd, what's the big deal lol? I like debate. This is simply providing a different kind of argument tailored against religions, but not God. The point is to argue that if you have faith in God, religion is still a non sequitor from that particular set of beliefs relating to your idea of God. Im seeing, for the fun of it, if I can get the faithful to admit that, at the very minimum, believing particular religious positions is not reasonable. Its conceding something to the faithful to make it easier for them to concede to my position that deism is more sensible than theism. You can't convince a truly faithful person that God doesn't exist, but maybe you can convince them that all the specific religious mumbo jumbo that they just assumed was true is, in fact, unlikely. its kind of an experiment since I usually just argue much more straight forwardly that religion is illogical. Its arguing the middle ground and playing a kind of devil's advocate. The entire point of hypotheticals though is to put the cart before the horse. We don't need to assume God but this hypothetical we do.

Yes: the more specific the claim, the higher the bar, but deism is one of the few god-concepts where its own premises make it impossible to clearany bar at all.

For most theistic claims, I could conceive of evidence that, if it existed, would support the truth of the claims. This isn't the case with deism.

The small number of claims in your god-concept isn't a point in your favour if the claims that you do have set up a contradiction.

What contradiction are you talking about? This thread presumes the existence of God for the sake of the argument because it could lead to a different kind of argument than just the typical religion is illogical argument. I have seen and been apart of that argument many times before already and so I decided to mix it up. Given that presumption there is no contradiction. I don't see why making an assumption for the sake of argument is such a big deal though. Furthermore the fact that there is no evidence for theism means that it rests on the same unprovable grounds as deism as you're implying (because we can't disprove that Jesus rose from the dead for example). So they're both subject to the same exact limitations regardless if you could conceive of the evidence or not--the only difference is that, in this hypothetical, deism makes one claim while theism makes potentially thousands. And like you said the more specifics listed the higher the bar for evidence is.

And here's my question for you--do you think that theism is more logical than theism?

because that seems to be what you're suggesting else you wouldn't be arguing so strongly against theism being less logical than deism. The claim that God isn't involve in human affairs also has supporting reasoning to go along with it that I provided which you seemed to flat out ignore. One of the best examples was the fact that there have been billions of species on the planet, and we happen to be the particular species of primates, even though there were several different kinds of sentient primates, to receive salvation or intervention from God in a universe where we are the size of viruses compared to larger celestial objects? Its very unlikely that the entire universe was build so that God could intervene in human affairs and care about who we have sex with for instance. In addition if God was interested in our beliefs and morality, he has the power to unambiguously convey to us the what the correct objective morality is and simultaneously convincing us of his existence. So its likely he's not interested in human affairs and that we are more like pond scum compared to him. The theistic position is thus out of all the pond scum that is and ever will be, our pond scum is one that he is interested in and has directly influenced. So we have a lot of good reasons, some of which I didn't even list, to suggest that if God exists the deistic position is much more reasonable. So maybe we don't have evidence per say but we have a lot of good circumstantial reasoning to support the position.

Okay - so you're arguing a position you don't believe in?

No, I believe the position that deism is inherently more logical than theism. That doesn't mean I have to be a deist obviously. It simply means I think deism is more logical than deism and nothing more. I don't have to believe in the premises of a hypothetical I postulate since the entire point is that its a hypothetical.