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

[Ebionite]

you haven't given anything to indicate you have ruled out other possibilities.

Yes I have. I'm not going to waste my time with you, you're on ignore.

 

[joelr]

Logical fallacies seem a bit ridiculous at times. But someone has said they are logical fallacies so does that mean we all have to bow to that?

Fallacies equate to flawed thinking. If you want to understand when you are using arguments that are flawed and do not work and if you care about what is true then you would pay attention to fallacies. You learn by making mistakes.

This whole thing is very complex of course and awesome, but it is the storage and use of the information which is really amazing imo.
We do that in our head somehow, that is amazing also, and the chemical way, without a consciousness in the molecules is at least as amazing

Can the chips and parts and pieces of metals inside your computer act as a fully functioning computer? No.
Same with A.I.
Your lack of knowledge and personal incredulity has no bearing on what is actually true. You could study the basics of neuroscience and gain an understanding of how the brain goes from basic molecules to consciousness, or just not know and say "it must be a God".
It's not fully understood but there is also an evolution of consciousness. The earliest life did one thing, moved left or right. That was it's pre-nervous system. After millions of years simple life. developed slightly more and more complex nervous systems, to feel if something was touching them (an enemy) and to move in multiple directions, away from something that wants to eat it. Insects evolved, fish, reptiles, meanwhile the brains became more and more complex.

It isn't that hard to fathom. It doesn't require a God.

,,,,,,,,,,,,,, and how it does it and got this function in bodies is a mystery imo and would have needed a designer.

Again, single cell life had just a few basic needs, move left/right, eat, run and developed mechanisms to do that. As life became more complex so did these systems.
If genes are hereditary then evolution has no option, it has to happen and many different variations will happen. Eventually one is better at doing things and that becomes the new standard. But it's always working.

Just like a coast line, it's always changing into new shapes, no God is needed. life growing more complex is already set in motion from heritable genes, new variations will always happen. If they work better the changes stick.
That is how the natural laws played out in this universe. A God is not needed for reality to have emergent laws which create.

No biologist or neuroscientists says any God is needed. Yet despite not understanding evolution, neuroscience, consciousness and even historical studies, you still feel you know more?
All because of belief in an ancient story.

 

[joelr]

Yes I have. I'm not going to waste my time with you, you're on ignore.

Then this won't be for you.
Someone came to preach and when actually challenged got b.hurt.

Hmm didn't see an answer to:
"who said? Did you speak with the doctors? Did you read his medical records where doctors reported a lack of explanation? Or did you hear anecdotal retellings from someone or someplace?"

 

[SkepticThinker]

Yes I have. I'm not going to waste my time with you, you're on ignore.

Is there some reason that you are so unwilling to give us details of the story you brought up in the first place?
I mean, why are you making this so difficult?

 

[Ebionite]

Is there some reason that you are so unwilling to give us details of the story you brought up in the first place?

Because you haven't been able to deal with the information that I have given you rationally. The only argument I've seen that was viable was that that patient was lying, but that's highly unlikely since he was known to someone I had known for a number of years. They were flatting together IIRC.

 

[SkepticThinker]

Because you haven't been able to deal with the information that I have given you rationally. The only argument I've seen that was viable was that that patient was lying, but that's highly unlikely since he was known to someone I had known for a number of years. They were flatting together IIRC.

You haven't given me any information. As noted several times.
All I know is there was an intubation tube involved somewhere.

Another poster addressed that and said a lot more than "the patient was lying." He could have been mistaken. He could have been dreaming. There are many possibilities.

But who really knows because you're being incredibly stingy with providing the requested details.

 

[Ebionite]

You haven't given me any information.

Wrong. You're on ignore.

 

[SkepticThinker]

Wrong. You're on ignore.

Cool, should be easy to point out where you provided any information.
I can point out where I asked for it several times.

Or can you totally cop out and put me on ignore. LOL

 

[Bthoth]

Cool, should be easy to point out where you provided any information.
I can point out where I asked for it several times.

Or can you totally cop out and put me on ignore. LOL

Would you be considered 'the fallen' for thinking?

 

[Brian2]

We do not know why. There could be an infinite universes with different circumstances and laws where life is not possible. If you have an infinite amount then all these possibilities can be realized.

"By chance" is just a common apologetic that tries to give religious people a strawman against abiogenesis. Just like "we didn't evolve from a monkey"

The "if something is possible" is a big if but is what you presume to be true. You presume that life did happen naturally, that God did not give life. So you begin with that belief and of course the probability of life coming about naturally is one given that presumption.

Of course it's low. But we have a galaxy with billions of planets and billions of years. Plus a cosmic web of super-super-clusters of other galaxies. A staggering amount of planets. The basic compounds are everywhere.

But if something is impossible in one place then it is impossible in other places also. Time and probability do not make things less impossible. IOWs it's not just a matter of mathematics.

There is a field of math that does this. But we have seen evidence in the lab of many interesting replicating compounds which are used to build basic life. Since we don't yet have all the answers a probability cannot be made but it isn't impossible. Every year there are more advances in the basics of early life and pre-life compounds that begin to replicate and why.
It has reasonable probability, evidence is demonstrating that, but we see life has formed which shows it was probable enough that given a few billion years, water, sun, proper temperature, atmosphere, it will happen.

Some things are too unlikely to happen before the universe dies. particles do appear in and out of existence. Everywhere, constantly. An entire atom, a nucleus and electron popping in and out already attached would be much more rare. Quadrillions of atoms all appearing in one place to properly construct a human would effectively be impossible. It could happen in quantum mechanical rules given maybe 10^100^100^100 years.
Particles follow the probability laws.

Yes and I suppose given enough time the whole of time and space is going to pop into existence, I guess that must be what happened with the B theory of time.
It's a combination of mathematics and human imagination and presumed to be true. It's a godless faith which cannot be shown to be true or false.

I believe that is what the evidence is currently pointing to. There may be a pre-cursor to RNA. There have been many new findings to support RNA-DNA but it's still being worked on. Frontier science takes time and often finds new lines of evidence to follow, like what happened with the pandemic and people thought it was a conspiracy because they don't understand how science works and the doctors didn't say "currently evidence points to this", and then change it when new evidence comes in.
Established science does not change, it expands and gets more details.

If you don't know something then that is the answer. I'm getting the vibe that you don't want to believe any of the science on early life because it conflicts with your beliefs. What I would do is learn about the science, from the actual scientists (not apologetic reworkings) and try to understand where they are and what is known and make your choices that way. A God being real does not rely on abiogenesis not being a naturally occurring phenomenon?

The evidence with the presumption that life came about naturally, points in one direction and without people giving alternative views that direction would be the presumed truth for everyone, as it is for many.
Chemistry is one thing, but presuming only chemistry for life is a faith based on the presumption that it is only chemistry. IOW the evidence of chemistry can only point to the formation of chemicals, but we should not presume that means that it points to how life began and what life is. That part of it is presumed to be chemical in nature.

 

[Brian2]

No. I don't use faith because it's a flawed way to know what is true. So I follow what evidence demonstrates. I haven't even seen ANY evidence for deism never mind theism, which through evidence shows to be a trending mythology. However science has vast information on abiogenesis. It's not solved but papers come out every year with new findings. They are closing the gap.


Now if we had no evidence at all, like in the dark ages, why would I conclude something we don't have evidence for was the cause?






It is becoming clear to me that your insistance on changing language and repeatedly calling evidence " faith" (despite that you probably quite confidently tell those who don't know that the Earth is round, the sun is a star using fusion, germs make us ill, we are made of atoms...all based on good EVIDENCE, not faith) and you haven't made a rational argument as to why evidence is faith (doesn't likely exist) so that leaves a psychological motive.


There is no other reason I know to fail to respect basic concepts and personal epistemologies of other people.

Science looks at what it can study and test but does not presume that God and spirit do not exist simply because it cannot test for those things. That presumption is for individual humans to make or not, as they see fit, and based on maybe other evidence in the world that is available for such decisions, evidence which science cannot test.
So the people who say either yay or nay to the existence of spirit and God do so by taking a leap of faith. You are among them. Those who say nay have probably rejected the evidence that science cannot test and go only by what science can test.
Those who say nay are the ones who say that life is nothing but chemistry and science is showing us that because science is slowly being able to show that the chemicals of life could have formed naturally and organised themselves into life forms naturally.
These people, including you, do not realise that they have a faith that life is chemically based, they think that because science cannot test or find spirits that means that spirits (including God) do not exist and that the only evidence worth considering,,,,,,,,,,,, and believing,,,,,,,,,,, is what science can test. Some even say that only the things that science can test can be called evidence.

Forcing reality to fit into a storybook myth is even worse when you employ denial about the known effectiveness of the scientific method and a rational methodology.


The thinking that gave us all sciences, knowledge of physics, medicines, knowledge of germs, all technology....a world where you don't die from an infected cut or bad tooth, the computer you write on, you compare the thinking that produced that with belief in a mythic book. One belief system gave us the technical, medical and scientific revolution. The other gave us more of the same books with different rules and some say the others have the wrong book.


Wow, great, yay faith.

Religious leaders soon realised that the scientific method was good and embraced it and accepted it's results even when they seemed to contradict their religious books. Some have accepted the results more than others.
I still see the evidence for the Bible as good and see much of what science says about the past as not really good science.

 

[Brian2]

So what did you mean.

Sarcasm

 

[Brian2]

Science doesn't make that claim. It looks for all available evidence, tests it and then trys to debunk it and waits for others to duplicate the tests.
Frontier science is always changing, it's supposed to.

So I am right.

The historical evidence is vast. Literary evidence, styleistic and many other forms. Sometimes we find mentions of older versions in letters that are different. Why you don't study the history of your religion is baffling to me. I'm studying it and I;m not a Christian. I just ordered -God: A Body
by a Hebrew Bible professor at Exiter U.

So are you claiming that differences in OT versions, such as the Septuagint and Dead Sea Scrolls etc show that people were tweaking the scriptures to make it look like prophecies came true?

No. The prophecies are vague and often WRITTEN AFTER THE FACT.

"Written after the fact" comes from skeptic presumptions about when the books were written and then these presumptions and conclusions are then used to say that prophecies were written after the fact. You can see that this is circular reasoning I hope.

Also many many things Yahweh claimed did not happen. So you are cherry picking your favorite. Hundreds of things Yahweh said would happen did not and can never.

over 200 right here:

Skeptic's Annotated Bible / Quran / Book of Mormon

skepticsannotatedbible.com

1. God says that the Israelites will destroy all of the peoples they encounter. But he was unable to keep his promise. 7:1, 7:23-24, 31:3

2. God promises to give Joshua all of the land that his "foot shall tread upon." He says that none of the people he encounters will be able to resist him. But later we find that God didn't keep his promise, and that many tribes withstood Joshua's attempt to steal their land. 1:3-5, 3:10, 15:63, 16:10, 17:12-13, 17:17-18, 21:43-45

3. God promised many times that he would drive out all the inhabitants of the lands they encountered. But he failed to keep that promise 1:19, 1:21-27, 3:1-5

The skeptic don't seem able to read the Bible very carefully and so gets it wrong. God does give conditional promises and the land was subdued and Israel had peace and not war, but Canaanites were left in the land so that the weeds and wild animals would not take over and they were left to test Israel to see if it would be loyal and obey God, which it did not, and then there would be attacks and war again. But eventually the Canaanites were driven out completely.

4. This verse predicts that there shall be five cities in Egypt that speak the Canaanite language. But that language was never spoken in Egypt, and it is extinct now. 19:18

That seems to be a verse about the coming Kingdom after the return of Jesus.
https://skepticsannotatedbible.com/is/19.html#18

5. Isaiah 53 is probably the most often used "prophecy" that is claimed by Christian apologists to refer to Jesus. But the context indicates otherwise. The "suffering servant" that is referred to here is Israel, not Jesus. 53:1-12 also:

• Jesus of Nazareth (the New Testament and Christian tradition) no Hebrew scholar agrees with that
• Rabbi Akiva (y. Shekalim 5:1)[9]
• Moses (b. Sotah 14a)[10]
• The Jewish Messiah (but not Jesus): (Targum Jonathan,[11] b. Sanhedrin 98a-b,[12] Ruth Rabbah 5:6,[13] Midrash Tanchuma Toldot 14,[14] Yalkut Shimoni 476,[15] Midrash Tehillim 2:7,[16] Maimonides[17])
• Jeremiah (Saadia Gaon)[18]

Really? because some Jewish scholars say Isa 53 is not about Jesus, that settles it?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaiah_53#cite_note-18

Some things he said did.
"But Nostradamus posthumously triumphed over his detractors. His quatrains, published in 1555 as Les Prophéties, have never gone out of print and have been claimed to have predicted the execution of Charles I, the Great Fire of London, the French Revolution, the rise and fall of Napoleon and Hitler, the shooting of JFK, the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, the 9/11 attacks, the 2015 mass murders in Paris, even the abdication of King Charles III (of which more later)."



But like the Bible there are many incorrect predictions and some are vague and interpreted to match an event. He had some hits as well, if you cherry pick his work he looks impressive. Same thing people do with the Bible.

There are no prophecies in any religion or otherwise that impress people who look at them without a belief bias and apologetics.

Yes Nostradamus is believed by some and interpreted to mean various events in history.
But imo you still have not shown where the Bible prophecy is wrong.

 

[Brian2]

You say that you don't but you demonstrate that you do.

How?

Why not?

Prayer is not something that we can say "God should answer that the way I have directed people to pray". That is making a mockery of prayer.

This is something that would have to be demonstrated.

No, the scientific insistence that prayer and so God are things that can be studied in this way and that God should answer in a positive way, however science directs people to pray, that is what would have to be demonstrated.

So you throw science aside and declare God did it. Well, sometimes. When prayers are answered. When they're not God didn't do it.

I don't say that.

Science is just a method of observing, recording, measuring, testing, and replicating data. So when you say "too many variables which cannot be accounted for by science" what you're actually saying is that you don't want to test your claims. If you did, you'd submit it to scientific scrutiny instead of just throwing your hands up and declaring "too many variables," without apparently realizing that scientific studies can be done to control and isolate the numerous variables involved. I mean, if we went with your view of science, we'd have to throw our hands up in the air about climate science because well, too many variables! Who knows!

Variables about God and His relationship with people in prayer cannot be accounted for. That they can is a presumption that science would have to show to be true.

Your method appears to be to ignore all relevant information and just declare that the god you believe in exists and answers prayers (sometimes).

What relevant information? You must mean the presumptions and bad methodology of the science.

So, you think God answers your prayers, except when he doesn't?
And when he doesn't you thank him "in faith" for not answering your prayer? Or maybe answering your prayer.
You've just described chance, my friend.

Maybe I described trust in God.

Judging from what you've said in this post, your justification for faith appears to be that you like it. It does not appear to be evidenced-based.

What I would like is for God to do everything I want Him to do. But God has better things to do, like teaching me about Him.

 

[Brian2]

This was in response to, "You're still not getting it. You need to show that Gods are required. Nobody needs to show that gods aren't required."

You've just repeated your earlier claim rather than responding to what I've said.

All I can show is that I believe God is needed.

I don't need to assume it. It's how we solve murders that we weren't witness to. It's how we know the age of the earth. It's how we know organisms evolve over time. Etc., etc., etc.

It is also a potential source of error for science. It has assumptions in it that could be way off.

You don't care if your explanation doesn't explain anything? Well, I do.

And you can never know if that is a correct explanation, because nobody was there to see how things happened in the past.

Please do. So far you've just claimed it.

I did that in my last sentence. Nobody was there. The forensic science of the distant past is built on presumptions of naturalism, that things began naturally because that is how they work.

From reading them.

Hmmm

Not to me. To me, if a prediction takes thousands of years to sort of come true, it was a terrible prediction to start with.

But really is God promises and prophesies what He will do eventually and eventually does it, it shows a God who is real and alive over time. God promised to give Abraham's descendants Canaan and He did. God is a real God who does things and keeps promises and is God over all places and times and other so called gods.

They certainly do. There are people who believe that Nostradamus predicted the rise of Hitler and the fall of the Twin Towers on 9/11. What would you say to those people?

I might want to find out why they think Nostradamus predicted these things.

 

[Brian2]

So above you basically said that your argument is not the "complexity of design" shows that a designer is needed. And then right underneath it you say that complexity of design does point to a designer.

The whole time you're saying that complexity indicates design.

Why is this so hard. My initial argument was not about complexity of design but sometimes complexity can point to a God.

Why?

The 2nd guy installed the internet in a more efficient way.

You agreed with me that the second guy in the scenario would be the better designer.
And then here you want to claim that the first guy is the better designer.

We do know that evolution is a method for many forms of life to have evolved and adapted to all sorts of environments and keep adapting to different environments and possible scenarios.
You are wanting to compare chalk and cheese.

Please respond to what I said.

I did respond.

You're stuck in an analogy you can't get out of.

I don't want to get out of it. I just wish you could understand what I am saying is evidence for a designer.
How did the genome become what it functionally is without a designer?
That confirms my faith in God just as the complexity of the design of the genome also confirms it.

 

[Brian2]

Can the chips and parts and pieces of metals inside your computer act as a fully functioning computer? No.
Same with A.I.
Your lack of knowledge and personal incredulity has no bearing on what is actually true. You could study the basics of neuroscience and gain an understanding of how the brain goes from basic molecules to consciousness, or just not know and say "it must be a God".
It's not fully understood but there is also an evolution of consciousness. The earliest life did one thing, moved left or right. That was it's pre-nervous system. After millions of years simple life. developed slightly more and more complex nervous systems, to feel if something was touching them (an enemy) and to move in multiple directions, away from something that wants to eat it. Insects evolved, fish, reptiles, meanwhile the brains became more and more complex.

It isn't that hard to fathom. It doesn't require a God.

Can a brain and body act as a fully functioning person.
I can only say yes if I fully agree with the presumption that the physical is all there is.
Of course a more complex brain gives a more complex consciousness, but that does not tell us that consciousness is chemically based.

Again, single cell life had just a few basic needs, move left/right, eat, run and developed mechanisms to do that. As life became more complex so did these systems.
If genes are hereditary then evolution has no option, it has to happen and many different variations will happen. Eventually one is better at doing things and that becomes the new standard. But it's always working.

It's the how genes managed to become a control for design and heredity and etc. That is what needed a designer imo.

Just like a coast line, it's always changing into new shapes, no God is needed. life growing more complex is already set in motion from heritable genes, new variations will always happen. If they work better the changes stick.
That is how the natural laws played out in this universe. A God is not needed for reality to have emergent laws which create.

So genes just accidentally fell into their function as part of a control mechanism for body functions and heredity and evolution?

No biologist or neuroscientists says any God is needed. Yet despite not understanding evolution, neuroscience, consciousness and even historical studies, you still feel you know more?
All because of belief in an ancient story.

There are plenty of biologists and neuroscientists who believe in God and say that God is ultimately necessary.
It is the minority of people in the world who say there is no need for God and they also seem to think they know more than the rest of us and are somehow superior because of that belief. And most of them don't even seem to know that it is a belief just like the belief in ancient stories.

 

[SkepticThinker]

Science looks at what it can study and test but does not presume that God and spirit do not exist simply because it cannot test for those things. That presumption is for individual humans to make or not, as they see fit, and based on maybe other evidence in the world that is available for such decisions, evidence which science cannot test.
So the people who say either yay or nay to the existence of spirit and God do so by taking a leap of faith. You are among them. Those who say nay have probably rejected the evidence that science cannot test and go only by what science can test.
Those who say nay are the ones who say that life is nothing but chemistry and science is showing us that because science is slowly being able to show that the chemicals of life could have formed naturally and organised themselves into life forms naturally.
These people, including you, do not realise that they have a faith that life is chemically based, they think that because science cannot test or find spirits that means that spirits (including God) do not exist and that the only evidence worth considering,,,,,,,,,,,, and believing,,,,,,,,,,, is what science can test. Some even say that only the things that science can test can be called evidence.

No. No. No. This is not how it works.

It's incredibly frustrating to me that you are still repeating this stuff, this late into the conversation. When all of it has been addressed many times over.

You need to show evidence that it is necessary to include god(s) in our understanding of the mechanisms of the universe. Not including them doesn't require any leap of faith whatsoever. Just like not including pixies into our understanding of the word around us also doesn't require any faith whatsoever, right? Does it take a "leap of faith" for you to leave pixies out of your explanations about how the world works? Of course not.
Perhaps instead of being offended by that statement because I referenced to pixies, you could ponder it a little more deeply this time.

Religious leaders soon realised that the scientific method was good and embraced it and accepted it's results even when they seemed to contradict their religious books. Some have accepted the results more than others.

It's called intellectual honesty.

I still see the evidence for the Bible as good and see much of what science says about the past as not really good science.

Such as?

 

[SkepticThinker]

How?

By doing it.

Prayer is not something that we can say "God should answer that the way I have directed people to pray". That is making a mockery of prayer.

Oh, so people pray expecting god not to answer? What's the point then?

And what does this have to do with our ability to discern whether or not a prayer has actually been answered by god(s)?

No, the scientific insistence that prayer and so God are things that can be studied in this way and that God should answer in a positive way, however science directs people to pray, that is what would have to be demonstrated.

I'm sorry but this sentence doesn't make any sense to me.
You seem to be asserting that we can't study whether prayers are answered or not (sure we can and do!) though somehow you are certain that they are answered. But only sometimes.

I don't say that.

You have said it repeatedly, in a number of different ways. You just did it above.

Variables about God and His relationship with people in prayer cannot be accounted for. That they can is a presumption that science would have to show to be true.

This is just an empty assertion. You don't seem like a person who is actually interested in testing his claims.

What relevant information? You must mean the presumptions and bad methodology of the science.

Such as?

Maybe I described trust in God.

What you described is chance.

What I would like is for God to do everything I want Him to do. But God has better things to do, like teaching me about Him.

This was in response to, "Judging from what you've said in this post, your justification for faith appears to be that you like it. It does not appear to be evidenced-based."

 

[SkepticThinker]

All I can show is that I believe God is needed.

Can you show that god is required to explain how everything works?

It is also a potential source of error for science. It has assumptions in it that could be way off.

Such as?

Do you think believing at face value all the fantastical claims in an ancient book is a more reliable pathway to truth than using the scientific method to discover how things work? Why and how?

And you can never know if that is a correct explanation, because nobody was there to see how things happened in the past.

This was in response to, "You don't care if your explanation doesn't explain anything? Well, I do."

Not sure how that relates to what I said.

I did that in my last sentence. Nobody was there. The forensic science of the distant past is built on presumptions of naturalism, that things began naturally because that is how they work.

So what? How do you think we solve murders when "nobody was there?"
You weren't there to know if Jesus was actually a demi-god, right? So how do you claim to know that?

We know the natural world exists. That's a verifiable observation. Unlike your claims.

Hmmm



But really is God promises and prophesies what He will do eventually and eventually does it, it shows a God who is real and alive over time. God promised to give Abraham's descendants Canaan and He did. God is a real God who does things and keeps promises and is God over all places and times and other so called gods.

It doesn't show any of that. It shows a vague prediction that took thousands of years to partially come true. That's not a good prediction in any sense of the word.

Not to mention the fact that you believe all of this based solely on the claims in an old book. While all the while crying about how science is biased.

I might want to find out why they think Nostradamus predicted these things.

They did the same thing you did with Bible predictions.