How to show an atheist the possibility of God

Cearbhall said:

The process of evolution.

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How can the process of evolution "design" you. Is evolution a conscious entity capable of designing something?

Davian said:

Ray Comfort, FTW.

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Apparently the singularity that started this universe somehow is also unknowable and undetectable. Yet many atheists and scientists believe it. Interesting...I claim to believe in God and I also claim to have experienced God's love in my life. Can you find love from this unknowable singularity?

The Cadet said:

In terms of epistemology, you could call me a methodological naturalist. I'm not going to say there is nothing beyond nature, but I will gladly say that there is simply no way to make any justified claims about anything beyond nature, including whether or not it exists. I cannot reasonably assert that a God exists (or even if it's possible - the possibility of any given thing is not granted by default but must be demonstrated), and for me, that leaves me with nowhere to go. I don't know how one could justify a supernatural being's existence to me, and I'm not sure how anyone else goes about justifying it.

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How then is it possible to demonstrate the impossible? Look no further than quantum physics. We can demonstrate that the impossible is possible in quantum physics, but when considering God as possible you continue to believe the possibility of God is impossible. This thinking just seems so irrational to me, I'm not sure how you can't see how irrational it seems.

Here I will explain how the idea of God as an absolute conscious mind can potentially explain quantum physics.

Now, let me be as open minded as possible and take the point of view of an atheist in regards to this concept of an absolute conscious mind. Well If I'm an atheist and I truly think about this concept with an open mind to all possibilities, I could find one thing that could potentially prove that this concept is completely false. That one thing that could potentially prove this concept is completely false is the idea of sameness.

If our consciousness can define something as being the same as something else and then we extend that to absolute consciousness, then the absolute consciousness would define absolute sameness, meaning everything absolute consciousness defines must be absolutely the same as itself, thus causing absolute consciousness to have to be exactly the same as consciousness, making this concept appear false. Did that make sense?

If I'm still an atheists and I'm still considering this concept with an open mind, then I am still considering that consciousness can define sameness. Now lets use an example to better explain this:

Our consciousness defines two particles as being exactly the same, except there is a difference between them, the two particles must take up two separate amounts of space, because if they took up the exact same amount of space they would be absolutely the same and if they are absolutely the same they must become one single particle.

This thought is very interesting when considering quantum physics. Lets think about a different example before we get to that:

Remember I'm still an atheist considering this theory with an open mind. Lets say our consciousness defines two ideas to be exactly the same. Well again the two same ideas must be thought of one at a time, thus one same idea is thought of at a point in time and the other same idea is thought of at a different point in time, thus they cannot be absolutely the same because if they where then they would be a single idea at a single point in time. Make sense?

Now considering the possibility that absolute conscious mind has already defined our consciousness as having the ability to define things as the same, we can never define things as absolutely the same and there in-lies the difference between our consciousness and absolute consciousness, they cannot possibly be one in the same. Absolute consciousness can define things as absolutely the same as well as just the same, whereas we can only define things as the same and not as absolutely the same.

Lets imagine that point of interaction between absolute consciousness and our subjective consciousness. Absolute consciousness doesn't not experience time and space and created the universe in a single point of action with no reference to time and space. Now we use our subjective consciousness to view the absolute smallest things in our universe and we observe weird behavior that shouldn't be possible in our objective reality. Material particles behave as if they are waves, seeming to interfere with each other when they should act as separate particles. Could this be a result of a single creation point interacting with our objective reality. That single point of creation doesn't need to be either a particle or a wave because it isn't experiencing time and space, but when we view it from our subjective point of view we see it as both a particle and a wave because of our restriction to time and space.

Loudmouth said:

Why does that even matter? No one is born a christian. We choose which religions we will join. Since it is a choice, does that mean freedom of religion is not a protected right, or a basic human right?

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If you believe in evolution then it would make sense that evolution would eventually cut out any "gay-gene" if there ever was one because obviously being gay does nothing to promote the spread of any particular species. So actually it does matter quite a bit to the survival of a species. The other things you mentioned do not matter for the survival of a species.

Loudmouth said:

It is hard to tell if someone is born with an attraction to people of a different race. You could probably argue that being attracted to someone from a different race is a choice. Does that mean we should stop couples of different races from getting married?

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Again, if a male and female from different races are attracted to each other, this only promotes the survival of the species, being gay does nothing to promote the survival of a species.

Loudmouth said:

What about what we choose to say, what we choose to print in the press, where we choose to gather, or whether we choose to keep the police from entering our premise? These are choices as well, and they are constitutionally protected. In fact, the whole point of freedom is choosing how you want to live your life.

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Actually, I believe the problem with America now is that we value freedom over truth. For me personally, I value truth over freedom.

Loudmouth said:

The real question is whether your beliefs are moral.

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I do believe my beliefs are moral simply because I value truth over anything else. I value doing the right thing over doing something just to please a certain group of people. I'm sure you believe your beliefs are moral as well, unfortunately we both can't be right.

GrimKingGrim said:

Well my two days off is over so I guess it's back to masochism. Lemme grab my reading glasses here.

Wow let's see you. I'm gonna need to play my Matt and Kim, New Glow on repeat for this.



I believe quantum physics is explained by textbooks and Laurence Krauss.



Go for it.



Oh?



What?



NO. With as many O's as I can type before running out of ram.



This is Inane, mundane, insane, and hard to explain. What are you even explaining? You're using words that are so vague and just oh my dear me.

*Turns up Matt and Kim*

I cannot go further. I need my brain to be functioning tomorrow.

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Lol, probably not a good time to come into the thread, I'd suggest starting from the beginning if you care to.

The Cadet said:

How do you answer that question, though? Believe me, I am most certainly interested in the answer to that question. It's an important question! So important that I'm not willing to accept an answer that is just there. The answer has to be demonstrably correct. And "Because a deity wants us to be there" is not demonstrably correct in any meaningful sense.

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For me the answer is that we as subjective beings can never find the absolute truth by searching our objective reality, meaning neither mathematics nor science will lead us to absolute truth. If we don't believe in an absolute truth, then we can't say there is meaning to life because there would have to be an absolute truth in order for life to have meaning. If we do believe in an absolute truth then the only way we could understand it is if something beyond our subjective minds (God) imparts the absolute truth to us. The key is belief. I've explained many times how belief is actually the fundamental function of our subjective minds.

The Cadet said:

But simply believing something does not make it true. I could believe as hard as I wanted that aliens were going to abduct me and that still wouldn't cause them to swoop down and take me. We can believe all we want that our objective reality is true, but that does not necessitate it being true. Even if our beliefs somehow warped the reality we experienced in such a way that I could believe really hard that the bottle in front of me is not empty and the bottle became full, that still would not make my reality involving the bottle any less subjective.

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Right, you can either believe a lie or you can believe the truth, there is no other option. And saying you choose not to believe is actually believing a lie, since I've shown that belief is the fundamental function of our subjective minds.

The Cadet said:

Actually, no, it doesn't. Your belief that, say, I am conscious, does not necessarily grant me consciousness. Belief does not solve this problem. The way I resolve the problem is that it is irrelevant whether anyone else is actually conscious, or merely simulating consciousness to an extreme degree - I still am forced to interact with them as if they were. Pragmatically, it makes no difference.

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How is it irrelevant whether anyone else is actually conscious? You either have to believe they are conscious or believe they are not conscious. They are not irrelevant if you are forced to interact with them, the fact that you are forced to interact with them makes them very relevant.

The Cadet said:

Actually, no, it doesn't. Your belief that, say, I am conscious, does not necessarily grant me consciousness. Belief does not solve this problem.

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I never said that my belief that you're conscious grants you consciousness, I have no control over your consciousness. All I'm saying is that I believe your consciousness is absolute and not dependent on my consciousness, which is the opposite of what you thought I was saying.

The Cadet said:

Because a tentative understanding of reality is all we can muster. At a certain point, we are forced to live our lives. If you waited on absolute certainty before doing anything, you would never do anything. What we do is make models of reality in order to better understand it, and so long as we hold certain things. What's important is that this tentative understanding has a consistent, reliable basis. Science, empiricism, and our senses have a tendency to do this fairly well, as far as we can tell. No other method offers similarly good results.

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Define "tentative understanding" in your own words.

Cearbhall said:

Is there a point to this nitpicking? I'm sure you're well aware that the evolutionary process is not sentient. I already apologized for the fact that my word choice confused you, and I stated that I do not believe in intelligent design.

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Sorry, I'll stop picking on you