INDISPUTABLE Rational Proof That God Exists (Or Existed)

[ladybug77]

If you go so far as to say that god is proven by the idea that we have "thought" then yes. If you propose that "god" is beyond that then "thought" doesn't actually prove anything.

Fair enough.

 

[Thief]

That simply changes the definition of god. That doesn't produce an argument for religion. If I call Communism Democracy it doesn't make it any more or less appealing.

I for one...have no religion.....no dogmatic faith.

But I do believe in Something Greater.
That much will stand to reason.

 

[McBell]

If my faith is that 'God' is 'thought'...then its supported and proven.

No it isn't.
At least, outside your choir it isn't.

 

[Thief]

No it isn't.
At least, outside your choir it isn't.

What's the matter?.....can't sing?

 

[McBell]

What's the matter?.....can't sing?

Faith proves nothing other than someone has faith.
Faith is nothing more than a circular argument with no intentions of becoming anything better.
That is why so many people hide behind faith.

 

[Thief]

Faith proves nothing other than someone has faith.
Faith is nothing more than a circular argument with no intentions of becoming anything better.
That is why so many people hide behind faith.

So....you don't get the 'point'.
And at the 'point' of singularity....you can't choose between Spirit?....or substance?.... first.

 

[McBell]

So....you don't get the 'point'.
And at the 'point' of singularity....you can't choose between Spirit?....or substance?.... first.

There is no point when you rely upon faith for your point.
Your ability to hide to behind your faith reveals nothing other than your willingness to hide.

One cannot help but wonder what it is you fear so much you have to hide.

Now comes the denial.

Same old same old you been preaching for years here on RF.

 

[Thief]

There is no point when you rely upon faith for your point.
Your ability to hide to behind your faith reveals nothing other than your willingness to hide.

One cannot help but wonder what it is you fear so much you have to hide.

Now comes the denial.

Same old same old you been preaching for years here on RF.

Stands to reason....Something had to be First....in mind and heart.

If you insist on substance first then all of spirit is born of chemistry....and terminal.
There would be no cause for life....
Man is a mystery without purpose or resolve.

and you wanted to speak of reason?

 

[McBell]

Stands to reason....Something had to be First....in mind and heart.

If you insist on substance first then all of spirit is born of chemistry....and terminal.
There would be no cause for life....
Man is a mystery without purpose or resolve.

and you wanted to speak of reason?

I say substance came first.
Now if perhaps you can ever come up with a meaningful definition of "spirit"...

Now we know what it is you fear.
What you deny.

What caused your faith based hiding place.

 

[Thief]

I say substance came first.
Now if perhaps you can ever come up with a meaningful definition of "spirit"...

Now we know what it is you fear.
What you deny.

What caused your faith based hiding place.

'You'...are spirit.
The substance you live in is dust.

You don't know the difference?

 

[McBell]

'You'...are spirit.
The substance you live in is dust.

You don't know the difference?

round and round and round we go, where we stop nobody....

Oh hell, this merry-go-round of yours has always ended in the same place, you hiding behind your faith.

 

[Thief]

round and round and round we go, where we stop nobody....

Oh hell, this merry-go-round of yours has always ended in the same place, you hiding behind your faith.

Address the singularity.

 

[1robin]

You make an excelent piont that has dumbfounded me with your logic and grace. I concede the entire argument and now will convert to Christianity.

I did not think you could escape that inexorable reason. I was testing something end forgot to erase it. A thousand pardons.

 

[1robin]

With reference to Craig’s amendment to the Kalam Argument, and his quoted passage in the link you gave me, I’m saying it isn’t a question of whether or how God acts but why, that is to say for what purpose? Craig rules out a deductive truth or a scientific explanation for the world coming to be and maintains that only leaves a personal explanation involving an agent doing something for a reason. Now, please, may I ask you to go back and look at the argument I’ve twice given you (post 2653) that shows there can only be two reasons for bringing the world into existence and both run to a contradiction and hence to an absurdity.

Holy Heck this is a lot of stuff. If I reply to all of this and you disappear then may a toothless yack gum your grandmothers wheat thins!!!!

I went back and looked. It seems your questions is what is God's reason for making the universe or Earth. If so it was to facilitate beings that can freely choose to love him or reject him. Once that purpose is understood then everything flows from it. If that was not the question then what your asking escapes me. If so where does the contradiction lie?

So how to explain the world? Well, we can’t because its origin is unknown. However, in our ignorance we may want to propose two hypotheses:

1) An unknown external agent created and sustains the world (God)?

This presents no logical absurdities or lack.

2) An unknown internal source sustains the world (the world itself).

This one lacks any reason to adopt it.

In the case of (1) we have a difficulty because while nothing in the world is seen to be created, causation is observed and belongs in the already existent world, whereas creation isn’t a requirement in the case of

Causation is no like E=mc^2 or any other natural law. It is a philosophical or abstract concept that has no dependence on the natural world. They just are (brute facts of reason) and there is no reason to think they cease to exist if nature did.



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2) because it doesn’t create anything but only causes change to occur in matter. But we may ask isn’t this unknown, internal source, subject to the same problem that an external agent has in being constrained by a contingent principle and hence a contradiction?

Nature is constrained by a contingent principle, necessary beings are not.

And so how could either hypothesis have the appellation “Necessary Being”? Indeed, that is so. But something still exists, even if it needn’t. And that something is the world. That much we do know. And the advantage that (2) has over (1) is that as a sustaining entity it doesn’t have to try and explain the creation of the world from nothing since it already exists.

The disadvantage 2 has over 1 is it's impossibility. There are all kinds of reasons to suggest nature is not the explanation of it's self. If you pick your favorite version of 2 then we can get into them. I can't explain why all of the vagaries and fantasies theoretical scientists can invent are wrong (I did supply why Vilenkin said the top 3 were). I might be able to handle one or two. The supernatural option has no theoretical impossibilities. It is not bound by natural law like thermodynamics, efficiency and loss, and the lack of a single known infinite. It can do anything. You might say that is convenient, you might say that is less than a proof, or the data is still not in. What you can't say is that it has any known actual flaws.

1. Yes we do know for a fact that stuff exists.
2. We know it must either be eternal or began to exist a finite time ago. All evidence suggest it began to exist.
3. Nature never has, never will, and does not even have the theoretical potential to self create.
4. Nothing has no causal potential and that is why every single scientists that claims nothing produced anything has to turn nothing into some

In conclusion, a causal and sustaining power within the world (2) can still be contingent and but not constrained by time, for we are not forced to conclude a necessary existence in order for the world to continue existing indefinitely, and nor does contingency imply a creator since that is to presuppose creation as a necessary principle when we can demonstrate logically that it is not.

It is no indictment to suppose a creation has a creator. It is not complicated. Put everything that constitutes nature in a set. Natural law, time, space, matter, etc. Now is the evidence better that everything in that set began to exist or is the evidence better that any subset is infinite. That is it, it is not complex, it does not require $100 semantic labels, it does not require a hundred page dissertation. All the evidence we have suggest the set and everything in it began to exist. If it did not exist it could not create it's self by any known or reliable theoretical process.

Continued:

 

[1robin]

The opposing thesis (1) has two problems to contend with. The first is the concept of “creation”, which is no more than an arbitrary act of the mind, devoid of any intelligible explanation. And the second is the dependency upon a contingent principle and the need to borrow from the actual world in order to argue beyond the world, which immediately puts any supposed worlds within the concept of time and an infinite regression. And on that account God would be in want of a cause. It also directly contradicts the concept of an Absolutely Necessary Being, which makes God impossible.

Creation is the bringing into existence from non-existence. It had to occur if anything began to exist as the great philosophers for 4000 years have claimed. That is the explanation. I do not need to know why 2 + 2 = 4. I just need to know it does. The same is true of mundane things like gravity. We have not a clue how it works, why it works or what it is. It suffers no loss of credibility for that. Your confusing what is true of proof and what is true of existence. It may be true we need the natural to use as a "lens" to see God through but God would be no less real if nature did not exist.

The above is an example of a well known occurrence in academics. Things which have marvelous application are pushed beyond al use and relevance in every field of study. It is the same principle that gets everyone promoted at least on step beyond competence. A practical limit is never binding on an arrogant race. We always go beyond the point where things are useful. If you are familiar with Schopenhauer's 38 ways to win an argument (not to be right, simply win), half of them are tactics for obscuring simple concepts. I do not believe you are doing so on purpose but I believe you are borrowing from fringe philosophers or at least fringe philosophy that has only that purpose. Again the argument is intuitive, has no known exceptions, obeys al logical principles, and has been accepted for thousands of years by top scholars.

1. The "world" exists.
2. It must be eternal or have begun to exist from nothing.
3. ALL evidence suggests it began to exist.
4. There is no known example or reason to think it could ever have created its self.
5. It's cause must be beyond nature.

Those 5 are consistent with all known reliable evidence and theory. Even if they are wrong we have no reason to suspect it at present. No despite the fact these 5 are the best conclusion available that does not mean people who think way too much or have preferences effecting their logic do not do everything they can to obscure them.

6. That cause is God. This one is not exactly inescapable but very very logical and reasonable.

Multiple worlds are concepts. They are possible, but are they likely? I have my doubts.

Ok, then if multiple universes do not exist and this universe has every single indication of youth where is the eternity you need for your alternative theories? There are even philosophers who claim that multiverses produce proofs of God. IMO they are overreaching semantic parlor games like what you stated above, and that is why I do not use them. The deep end of cosmology, philosophy, and physics is very interesting but almost never reliable nor productive. I stay in the far more reliable, far less ambiguous end of the pool. The cosmological argument fits right in that reliable band of philosophy and every one of its detractors is flailing around in Mariana's trench of logic and reason.

“God” is a concept. So to speak of his “true nature” is not informing us of any fact, objective truth, or possible experience; as an argument it is evidently specious.

BY concept I mean the Biblical description of God and it contains the most profound potential truths man has ever known and presents a very practical and useful concept of God.

 

[Enai de a lukal]

If my faith is that 'God' is 'thought'...then its supported and proven.

That thought exists is fairly self-evident. If God is nothing more than thought, then sure, God exists- but not the Christian deity. You're just offering a peculiar change in terminology- one which we have no reason to accept, since we already have a perfectly good word for thought (namely, "thought").

 

[Enai de a lukal]

Address the singularity.

What singularity? The singularity predicted by a theory which we know to be mistaken? Why bother? Do we need to address heliocentrism and the spontaneous generation of matter as well?

 

[Thief]

What singularity? The singularity predicted by a theory which we know to be mistaken? Why bother? Do we need to address heliocentrism and the spontaneous generation of matter as well?

Just saw this morning a recent science documentary on this topic.
Only a few have let go of the singularity.

Even the priest held his ground quite well with the same notion.

There had to be a beginning.

 

[metis]

What came before "the beginning"?

 

[Enai de a lukal]

Only a few have let go of the singularity.

That's probably not accurate. Unless you're talking about the general public, rather than professional scientists in a relevant field- I'd imagine there, many if not most have abandoned the notion of the initial singularity pictured by classical physics (which we know to be wrong).

There had to be a beginning.

We all understand full well that this is your belief; unfortunately, its a belief based on virtually nothing more than faith. There are no credible, well-corroborated reasons for thinking "there had to be a beginning"- not from logic, and not from science. It remains an open question whether the universe had a beginning or not, and even if it did have a beginning, that any supernatural entities had anything to do with it does not follow anyways.