There is no evidence for God, so why do you believe?

[Yerda]

Evidence for anything has to be evident to the senses. After that, mind interprets the bare apprehension - first, what does it signify is true about reality, and then, how we feel about that. That's true not just for scientists, but for all sentient creatures of sufficient intelligence. Are you claiming to sense a deity? Are you saying that your nervous system apprehends a god?

If so, you are saying that you have an apprehension that your mind tells you means that a god exists and is present. Thats empiricism (science). If you can do it, so can scientists. If they can't do it, neither can you. Believers have no special senses or neural circuits that allow them but not scientists to apprehend God. The difference has to be elsewhere. It's in the second step - the signification (interpretation) of the apprehension, as when one observer says that such-and-such is evidence for a god for him and another says that it is not. Same apprehension, different signification.

You've explained your viewpoint really clearly here. Good work.

 

[blü 2]

But isn't your seeing evidence against God a matter or how you feel also?
Oh that's right, there is no evidence against God, it is just that any evidence for God is not good enough for self indulgent skeptics and is not even evidence, and us believers have to come up with something better for you or you won't believe.

You STILL haven't got your argument to the starting line.

What real entity do you intend to denote when you say God? What objective test will tell us whether any real candidate is God or not?

And if we can't find somthing better it must mean that us believers have it wrong in believing and need to come back to what you claim is the default position of non belief because you believe that only objective evidence that is falsifiable is good enough.

You may be very content believing, and be far more comfortable not examining your beliefs to see whether they're factual or not. I respect your right to believe anything that pleases you and is not harmful.

But on the debate boards here, as I said before, it's completely proper to ask you to justify your position and not merely assert it.

So why, in your view, should the assertion that a real God exists NOT be supported by examinable evidence, testable theories, repeatable experiment? Why would a real God be exempt from the accepted standards of dealing with real things?

 

[Brian2]

If it adds nothing, why keep it? I think that's a good principle in general.

Science is dealing with the physical world and materials and finds out physical possibilities only and a spirit God adds nothing to an explanation about the physical. In real life however we know that this does not eliminate a possible necessity of a spirit God.
In a story we might be running to catch a train and the story could be told along with our arrival and departure on the train and train journey without ever mentioning the train driver.

My impression is that it involves a lot of randomness. By that I mean if we were given the same starting point for life 100 times, I would expect the overall outcome after x amount of time had passed to look something like a random walk. I suppose this difference in perspective is why I'm an atheist and you're a theist.

My impression is that for each environment there are optimum types of creatures and those creatures have optimum types of eyesight, hearing etc etc which have been developed through natural selection.
IMO if life started again the same or similar results would ensue.
I read a Dawkins book where he spoke a computer programme which ended up with our types of eyes through natural selection. The end product sees pretty fixed imo.

 

[ppp]

Science is dealing with the physical world and materials and finds out physical possibilities only and a spirit God adds nothing to an explanation about the physical. In real life however we know that this does not eliminate a possible necessity of a spirit God.

It doesn't eliminate the existence of a spirit spider, either. Nor a spirit kumkwat. "Not eliminating the possibility" is weak tea.

 

[Brian2]

I'd be happy to argue that learning about reality using reasoned enquiry (including scientific method) is reasonable.

We all learn about reality using reasoned enquiry, including scientific method.

Moreover, if God is real, has objective existence, then the followers of reasoned enquiry are the only people actually looking for a real God, Certainly the churches aren't ─ to take one example, they profess to believe in miracles but show not the slightest inclination to study how miracles are done. They don't think miracles are an aspect of objective reality.

Miracles are certainly an aspect of objective reality or the people who have seen them would not have seen them. But what you say about them and those who believe they happen does not make sense.

You're free to believe as pleases you, but on the debate boards at RF it seems fair to ask you to justify your position and not merely assert it.

I do justify my position but you don't like my justification and say that I don't justify my position. I suppose that means you might be blind to what I say. (that would be confirmation bias. )
Do you justify your position?

 

[blü 2]

We all learn about reality using reasoned enquiry, including scientific method.

But my question is, if God is real, why is God exempt from the procedures of reasoned enquiry?

Miracles are certainly an aspect of objective reality or the people who have seen them would not have seen them. But what you say about them and those who believe they happen does not make sense.

Unfortunately for your claim, the number of authenticated miracles remains at zero. On the other hand, extraordinary coincidences happen all the time ─ to put that at its simplest, think of any big lottery win.

I do justify my position but you don't like my justification and say that I don't justify my position. I suppose that means you might be blind to what I say. (that would be confirmation bias. )

How do you justify your position, other than by faith?

If I asserted the reality of Superman and the only justification I offered was that I had faith Superman was real, would you then accept the reality of Superman?

Do you justify your position?

As best I can, yes. How else would I ever learn anything?

 

[Brian2]

This was in response to, "What I said was, "The explanation works just fine without inserting god into it." If you think that the explanations require gods intervention, then it's on you to show that. It's not on everyone else to just believe that until it's shown to be false."

You don't seem to understand what I am saying. Science does not know if God is needed or not and it does not claim one way or the other. In that respect it seems you don't know the limits of what science can claim and what it cannot claim. Science does not claim that God is not needed but you seem to be claiming that God was not needed.
All science can do (in the situation under discussion) is say that in the right circumstances and with all the chemicals in place, we can expect a certain outcome, and you want to take that further and say that God was not needed to set up circumstances or bring all the chemicals together or even create chemicals so they would react in certain ways for the outcome that science shows could happen.
I am not saying that the explanation requires God's intervention but what I am saying is that neither you nor science knows that God is not needed. Science acknowledges that.

This was in response to, "If you're claiming that god is needed, then it is indeed on you to show that God is needed.
There is no error on my part here. The error is in your lack of understanding of how the rules of logic and reason operate.
You are not using logic here. All of the arguments you've given rest upon logical fallacies, which means you are not exercising logic."

This does not address what I said. You're just falling back into your default mode where you think atheists are asserting that god(s) don't exist, instead of reading the words I am typing to you. You are most definitely claiming that god exists. You also claimed that DNA repair is evidence for god's existence.

I'm saying it's on the person(s) claiming that God is needed to intervene in natural processes, to show that God exists and can do such things.

Until then, I don't see any reason to take the assertion seriously. In the same way that I don't take into consideration that a universe-vomiting tortoise accidentally created everything we see.

I claim that I believe God exists and that I look at things through those eyes and see subjective evidence that confirms that for me.
This is not anything to do with science (which it seems you want an explanation in terms of) and is not even a scientific hypothesis about God's existence.
I'm not even saying God is needed,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, but as above I'm saying that neither science nor you know that God is not needed and science admits that and it seems that you, like other skeptics, want to take what science can claim just a step further than what it can claim.
You should be saying, as science does, that it does not know if God is needed and that you do not know. I should not have to try to explain why to you.
If you want to go with science then you agree with me also.

This was in response to, "In scientific explanations that work just fine without needing to insert god into them.
Have you ever shown that a god is required for our explanations of the things we observe in the universe to make sense? If not, why should anyone even bother considering god(s) in the first place? For the same reason we don't assume universe-vomiting tortoises are required to explain how the universe works - our explanations work just fine without them."

Science, not we, it is science that does not assume universe-vomiting tortoises or God. You are implying that I am against science and that you are for science.
Science does not know if any universe-vomiting tortoises are involved however and neither do we.
I don't need to scientifically show God to exist to be in agreement with science. You seem to be implying that I need to do that and need to show that this God is needed in all things that happen in the universe or it is irrelevant. And yes it is irrelevant in science.
Explanations of how chemicals react etc etc don't need a God and God would be superfluous to the discussion. I suppose we are in agreement.
IMO God created things to do certain things, for a purpose, and they work as designed, but neither of us, nor science, know if God set up an environment where things could happen as planned by Him. I believe that is what happened and it seems you do not, and in that we both go beyond what science says about God or universe-vomiting tortoises.

This was in response to, "I really, really need you to understand how logic works. I really do.
You need to show some reason that we would need to consider god(s) in the first place. You seem to think the default position is "there is a god" when it is not. Perhaps because you're starting from a place where you already believe in god, and a very specific god, at that."

So you start from the position you want to believe, and go from there. That's called confirmation bias. It seems your entire basis for believing rests upon several different logical fallacies. I've implored you to apply some kind of logic to your position and all you seem to want to do is double down on the illogic of it.

As I've said, faith is unjustified belief. Faith is the excuse people give for believing something when they don't have good evidence. Otherwise, they'd present the evidence. So faith is not a pathway to truth, because anything can be believed on faith, as you've just demonstrated.

You also show that anything can be believed on faith. On faith you believe that God is not needed, but that is in your imagination and not in anything that science has shown.
If you cannot see that then it is confirmation bias I guess.

Is that what I claim? Where?

If you claim that no God was involved in the origins of the universe then you are claiming "" that the universe developed all by itself and life came about all by itself,""
You do see this I hope.

You've tried this one already and I already pointed out that I've used those as examples to help illustrate my point. I actually took the universe-vomiting tortoise from a Stephen King novel. Why don't you consider universe-vomiting tortoises? Why don't you consider the great juju at the bottom of the sea? They are just as likely as any other creationism claim out there. Instead of assuming I'm trying to mock and offend you, why not consider that other people have, and do, believe all kinds of claims about how the universe got here? You're so sure yours is the right one ... why? You can't seem to present any evidence for it.

Really? You really think that spaghetti monsters etc have any evidence at all but claim that the Bible God has no evidence?

Oh do they? Well please point out what you think skeptics are confused about what science shows or doesn't show.

If you think science shows God is not needed then you are confused.

Saying that the explanations for the workings of nature around us don't seem to require the input/inclusion of any gods isn't a statement of faith. I've explained this every which way from Sunday. I don't know how else to explain it to you.

Saying that you don't know about that is not a statement of faith but saying that don't require the input of any god is a statement of faith.
But you added "seem" to it and really that is like saying that you don't know, and if you say that, it is not a statement of faith.
Expecting science to be able to tell us of the doings of a spirit God is a belief of faith.

When has anyone even demonstrated the existence of a god in the first place? Since that hasn't even happened, please explain how and why anyone should appeal to a deity that hasn't even been show to exist in the first place.

The Bible God has shown Himself to exist imo, but that is a matter of faith and something I cannot prove even if I believe I see fulfilled prophecies there.

And here it is. You don't mind being illogical when it comes to your belief in god. I honestly don't know what to say to that. I mean, you've just admitted that you don't actually care about discerning fact from fiction. You've just admitted that you're going to believe what you want to believe, because you want to believe it. Which is fine for you, but you don't get to pretend that you're exercising any kind of logic at all.

What I said in this post is logical to me even if you pretend that it is not. That to me is gas lighting if done on purpose but I presume you just did not understand what I was saying and now that you do we agree.

When you can define spirit and show that there is such a thing, then it will be considered. Until then, you're just making stuff up.

I think it's reasonable to believe things when sufficient evidence is available, and not before. Your claim that things exist that are undetectable by the only tool we have that has shown itself capable of discerning fact from fiction but detectable by yourself somehow, is nonsensical.

God reveals Himself to people of faith. It's not me detecting God it is God revealing Himself.

You've demonstrated quite well, I think, that faith is not a reliable pathway to truth.

Yes there are lies and truth out there and one lie is that science shows that God is not needed.

I'm sure some do. I don't. So instead of arguing with those other people, how about sticking with the arguments I've actually made here? Cool?

But you don't know if God is needed or not. I presume that is what you are saying.

 

[Brian2]

Why? What evidence? The Bible is the claim(s).

The Bible is the claim and the evidence.

Why? Do you believe that people experienced Apollo in the past? Do you believe that people experienced Thor in the past?

I believe they may have experienced something.

It has the same amount of evidence in its favour that god claims have.
No, rather it is my example of a non-intelligent creation of the universe. You assume it must have intelligence behind it, why?

This was in response to , "Which one? Why? Please explain how that is reasonable.
Is it also reasonable to believe in a universe-vomiting tortoise that vomited the universe into existence? Why, or why not?
What makes the a god belief more reasonable than a belief in a universe-vomiting tortoise, in your opinion?"

I take it you don't see evidence in fulfilled prophecies.

 

[ppp]

The Bible is the claim and the evidence.

Water is wet. Fire is hot. The Bible was written by Yog Sothoth. This post is the evidence of itself. This post is perfect, entirely true, and there are no contradictions in it.

 

[blü 2]

Science does not know if God is needed or not and it does not claim one way or the other.

But as I've already pointed out to you, this is because there is no clear description, no definition of "god" appropriate to a real entity at all. It's as meaningless, as trivial, as saying science doesn't know if the shlopzl exists, or the ik, or the splongic reblyt. or the gummu.

In that respect it seems you don't know the limits of what science can claim and what it cannot claim. Science does not claim that God is not needed but you seem to be claiming that God was not needed.

Science makes the perfectly legitimate observation that until "god" is sufficiently defined, no question can arise as to whether "god" is needed or not, whether the gummu is needed or not.

I claim that I believe God exists and that I look at things through those eyes and see subjective evidence that confirms that for me.

And I point out that if God is not real, on the basis you state above you'll never even notice ─ in your case God is an unsupported assumption, a personal psychological phenomenon, not an aspect of objective reality.

 

[Brian2]

But as I've already pointed out to you, this is because there is no clear description, no definition of "god" appropriate to a real entity at all. It's as meaningless, as trivial, as saying science doesn't know if the shlopzl exists, or the ik, or the splongic reblyt. or the gummu.

Science makes the perfectly legitimate observation that until "god" is sufficiently defined, no question can arise as to whether "god" is needed or not, whether the gummu is needed or not.

Yes I think I made the same point.

And I point out that if God is not real, on the basis you state above you'll never even notice ─ in your case God is an unsupported assumption, a personal psychological phenomenon, not an aspect of objective reality.

God is real for me and can be real for you, and for both of us, if God is real then we will both eventually know it.

 

[blü 2]

God is real for me and can be real for you, and for both of us, if God is real then we will both eventually know it.

God can be real for me with a satisfactory demonstration of a real god. Meanwhile the only way [he]'s know to exist is a set of ideas in various individual brains.

And you didn't tell me why God is exempt from reasoned enquiry when such is appropriate for all real things.

 

[Brian2]

God can be real for me with a satisfactory demonstration of a real god. Meanwhile the only way [he]'s know to exist is a set of ideas in various individual brains.

And you didn't tell me why God is exempt from reasoned enquiry when such is appropriate for all real things.

If people can find a way to find out about God then doing that sounds OK by me.
I have found the way, and that is the way told us by the God in question.
But it is not to your taste it seems.

 

[timothy1027]

I’ve been reading through a couple of threads, and I see that it is said that there is no evidence for a god, it’s an unfalsifiable idea. We all agree on this? If you don’t, care to explain the evidence there is for god?
I’m in agreement. I used to believe my personal experiences to be subjective evidence for god, but I know now that’s not the case. I am not a theist anymore because I recognize I was a Christian thanks almost completely to my environment. That’s why I believed. I was brought up in it. Wasn’t because of any proof or anything,
So, theists, why do you believe? Is it mainly because of your environment and geographical location? There is no proof for god (right?), so what logically keeps you believing? Or is logic not supposed to be a factor when it comes to faith? Is it too jarring, the idea of leaving the comfort that religion and belief in a god brings?
I am curious about personal evaluations on why you believe. It can’t be because of logic, as there is no proof of god, right?

To me the simple truth is, religious people appear to be delusional. I know, I used to be one!

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

To me the simple truth is, religious people appear to be delusional. I know, I used to be one!

Yeah, I know. I am one of them as relgious. But that can also be spotted in some non-religious people.
The problem is a bit more complex that just religion or not.

 

[Brian2]

True or not, it's interesting.

 

[Brian2]

You STILL haven't got your argument to the starting line.

What real entity do you intend to denote when you say God? What objective test will tell us whether any real candidate is God or not?

I intend to denote the Bible God.

You may be very content believing, and be far more comfortable not examining your beliefs to see whether they're factual or not. I respect your right to believe anything that pleases you and is not harmful.

But on the debate boards here, as I said before, it's completely proper to ask you to justify your position and not merely assert it.

So why, in your view, should the assertion that a real God exists NOT be supported by examinable evidence, testable theories, repeatable experiment? Why would a real God be exempt from the accepted standards of dealing with real things?

Science deals with the material universe, but if there are things beyond that and different in nature to that then how would science find out?

 

[Brian2]

It doesn't eliminate the existence of a spirit spider, either. Nor a spirit kumkwat. "Not eliminating the possibility" is weak tea.

So?

 

[Brian2]

But my question is, if God is real, why is God exempt from the procedures of reasoned enquiry?

Science has found tests about the efficacy of prayer but they are trying to study God as if He is an it and God does not comply if God does not want to be found except through faith.
The truth is afaik, that God does answer prayer and sometimes with what could be called miracles.

Unfortunately for your claim, the number of authenticated miracles remains at zero. On the other hand, extraordinary coincidences happen all the time ─ to put that at its simplest, think of any big lottery win.

In my book God answers prayer and with miracles. If skeptics do not believe that then so be it.

How do you justify your position, other than by faith?

There are plenty of ways to confirm faith as in the fine tuning of the universe and earth for life and the complexity of the first life (as in the video in post 4736. Maybe it confirms faith more than produces faith.

If I asserted the reality of Superman and the only justification I offered was that I had faith Superman was real, would you then accept the reality of Superman?

No. But I don't do that, it is just that you want something science can study and tell you that God is real.

As best I can, yes. How else would I ever learn anything?

And I do the same and move forward in my faith that way.

 

[blü 2]

I intend to denote the Bible God.

What real thing am I actually looking for?

What objective test will tell me whether any real suspect is the bible God or not?

Science deals with the material universe, but if there are things beyond that and different in nature to that then how would science find out?

If they're real then they don't depend on human imagination or conceptualization to exist.

They're out there somewhere in the universe, and since they're real they must interact with the part of the universe that isn't them. If they do that in a distinct way, such as an anomalous way, then they're detectable.

If they're not out there in the universe then the only way they exist is as a concept or thing imagined in an individual brain.

If you disagree, please

(a) describe to me the manner in which they exist independently of other living things, and

(b) what real quality distinguishes them as "gods", and

(c) how your answers can be tested empirically, which is the way one deals with propositions about real things.