What is NOT God?

[Resha Caner]

The argument from popularity is a weak one. Even if everyone on the planet believed in gods, or the same god, it would not necessarily make them real.

Then it is just as weak for science as it is for faith.

 

[Resha Caner]

My point is that it doesn't matter if one person's faculties aren't completely trustworthy, when we have an entire world full of people who can give us verification that our senses are, or are not, correct.

If I were the only person on earth who believed in God, of course I would doubt more than I do. God would need to do a lot more hand-holding to sustain my faith.

But that's not the case, so I still don't see how you have a point.

 

[variant]

No evidence comes with a 100% confidence factor. No evidence comes without a model.

Not what I define "hold up" as.

Observations and ideas not being absolute doesn't make them equal.

I've not asked you to cross check my faith.

Who cares, you compared a system with cross checking to one without.

No, I don't recall saying anything to this effect.

It's the basis for your argument. Your assumption is that the difference between believing in your religion and careful scientific observations is a matter of degrees rather than a category difference.

I don't think you can make your argument without this assumption.

Yes, we agreed on this. You don't know what the evidence looks like.

I also know you haven't presented any.

 

[variant]

Then it is just as weak for science as it is for faith.

Remaking the same poor analogy.

The reason why science works is because it is very careful about observing the world. Popularity among scientists comes from data and evidence available to all.

 

[Resha Caner]

Following that logic, science must be a complete mystery to you. How could we possibly have germ theory, atomic theory, semiconductor theory (for the computers we are now using) etc if that is the way scientific testing works?

You're trying to twist what I said to the complete opposite conclusion I was pointing toward. At some point we trust what science is telling us even if we could take a position of extreme skepticism that says we shouldn't.

That trust in science has to include trusting our senses at least to some extent.

The trust I place in my senses when doing science is the same trust I place in my senses when I experience God. Just as all kinds of people are challenging science to see if it stands up, all kinds of people challenge my faith - and it stands up as well.

Do you acknowledge that your god may be imaginary?

No more so than I'm willing to admit any person in my life might be imaginary.

By what methods have you scrutinized them?

Answering that would get too personal.

Honestly, given the tone this thread is starting to take on, I don't care if people start walking away thinking I'm a complete fool, and a complete failure in my explanation. It's just not worth it to me.

 

[variant]

Honestly, given the tone this thread is starting to take on, I don't care if people start walking away thinking I'm a complete fool, and a complete failure in my explanation. It's just not worth it to me.

Sorry to make you feel bad by pointing out that you are making terrible arguments.

Not really sure how else to get the point across.

The premise: I am a good arbiter of my own personal experiences and you can not question me on this point.

Is of course best questioned by questioning just how careful a philosophical thinker/observer. you are.

I'm not impressed.

 

[Davian]

Then it is just as weak for science as it is for faith.

Only for your strawman of science.

If a scientific test is run, I have to read the instruments with my unreliable eyes. I have to build the instruments with my unreliable hands. I have to remember that the results are repeatable with my unreliable mind ... or read a report about repeatable results - again with my unreliable eyes.

 

[Davian]

If I were the only person on earth who believed in God, of course I would doubt more than I do.

How do you know you are not the only person on Earth who believes in a god? Or your particular god? They may be lying. How can you be sure?

 

[Davian]

You're trying to twist what I said to the complete opposite conclusion I was pointing toward. At some point we trust what science is telling us even if we could take a position of extreme skepticism that says we shouldn't.

I am not advocating a position of extreme skepticism. I am advocating a basic don't-believe-everything-the-used-car-salesman-slash-preacher-tells-you level of skepticism.

That trust in science has to include trusting our senses at least to some extent.

Indeed, but the purpose of scientific methodology is to minimize the influence of demonstrably unreliable perceptions, not to build on them.

The trust I place in my senses when doing science is the same trust I place in my senses when I experience God.

What kind of science can be conducted successfully in that manner?

Just as all kinds of people are challenging science to see if it stands up, all kinds of people challenge my faith - and it stands up as well.

I would say that your faith doesn't so much stand up to challenges, but more that you have described it in such a rarified manner so as to have your critics swinging at air.

No more so than I'm willing to admit any person in my life might be imaginary.

So your perceptions cannot be wrong, even with your senses as unreliable as they are?

Answering that would get too personal.

Then back to Post #63. You trust that you have "met God". How would one discern such a meeting from that which was only imagined? Do you have nothing to offer?

Honestly, given the tone this thread is starting to take on, I don't care if people start walking away thinking I'm a complete fool, and a complete failure in my explanation. It's just not worth it to me.

Not a fool, as I think that beliefs in gods and the like is normal (but not necessary). It has an evolutionary basis.

Why People Believe Invisible Agents Control the World - Scientific American

As for your explanations, they did fail.

 

[Resha Caner]

I would say that your faith doesn't so much stand up to challenges, but more that you have described it in such a rarified manner so as to have your critics swinging at air.

I wouldn't say this is completely wrong.

 

[JohnLocke]

To answer your main questions:
1. God is distinguishable from Nothingness, because it is readily conceivable that one could encounter a pure vacuum that would not be identified as God.

2. God is distinct, because God is a term of individual identity; it is an inherent linguistic consequence.

3. God does not depend on anything for existence anymore than you depend on anything for your existence. While the sudden removal of all other matter would render your existence rather uncomfortable and would quickly end your life, it would not render you non existent. In order for an individual to cease to exist, that individual's existence must be assaulted.

 

[variant]

2. God is distinct, because God is a term of individual identity; it is an inherent linguistic consequence.

Unsupported.

 

[Eudaimonist]

To answer your main questions:
1. God is distinguishable from Nothingness, because it is readily conceivable that one could encounter a pure vacuum that would not be identified as God.

I have no idea how that follows.

3. God does not depend on anything for existence anymore than you depend on anything for your existence. While the sudden removal of all other matter would render your existence rather uncomfortable and would quickly end your life, it would not render you non existent. In order for an individual to cease to exist, that individual's existence must be assaulted.

While you are right that the material of my body would still exist after my death, I wouldn't exist as a human person any longer. My existence as a certain type of being would vanish.

So, all you have really managed to argue for is the idea that if God is made out of some substance, that substance would still exist if God were to die.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[PsychoSarah]

To answer your main questions:
1. God is distinguishable from Nothingness, because it is readily conceivable that one could encounter a pure vacuum that would not be identified as God.

2. God is distinct, because God is a term of individual identity; it is an inherent linguistic consequence.

3. God does not depend on anything for existence anymore than you depend on anything for your existence. While the sudden removal of all other matter would render your existence rather uncomfortable and would quickly end your life, it would not render you non existent. In order for an individual to cease to exist, that individual's existence must be assaulted.

God could be distinct if it was the universe, and we are like ants crawling on it.

 

[Davian]

I wouldn't say this is completely wrong.

Then it follows that your statement "all kinds of people challenge my faith - and it stands up as well" is a falsity.

 

[Resha Caner]

Then it follows that your statement "all kinds of people challenge my faith - and it stands up as well" is a falsity.

There is something curious here, so I wonder if you're saying this because you hope to take a victory lap or because you see something in this to discuss?

 

[Davian]

Then it follows that your statement "all kinds of people challenge my faith - and it stands up as well" is a falsity.

There is something curious here, so I wonder if you're saying this because you hope to take a victory lap or because you see something in this to discuss?

The latter, I hope. It is up to you. Your statement implies that you are here to have your ideas and beliefs challenged, as I am. That a challenge was successful should lead to more discussion, should it not? Are we not in a philosophy forum?

 

[Resha Caner]

The latter, I hope. It is up to you. Your statement implies that you are here to have your ideas and beliefs challenged, as I am. That a challenge was successful should lead to more discussion, should it not? Are we not in a philosophy forum?

That's why I said this is curious. I'm not sure where you think the "falsity" lies. The statement I quoted from post #109 doesn't so much imply I was wrong but that I've not presented anything substantive enough for you to challenge.

I was more or less just acknowledging that. If you think my analogies are bad, that I've not presented anything substantive, that I've left you "swinging at air", I see no reason to say you can't think such a thing. This discussion didn't work for you. OK. I'm not quite sure where to go from there ... and that is a curiosity for several reasons.

First, because our interaction occurs via written text ... and yet I assume you think I'm a person. Second because the little preamble I gave in post #65 seems to have fallen on deaf ears. In asking myself why that might have been, I did some digging. Are you familiar with informal logic? It's a new thing to me, but they seem to do some interesting diagramming of discussions like this.

 

[leftrightleftrightleft]

To me, this means that your God is indistinguishable from a delusion.

If someone claims to have experienced Brahma or leprechauns or unicorns or demons or Zeus or literally anything then their claim has just as much legitimacy as yours.

Are you okay with this type of epistemology?

Variant basically asked me the same question, and essentially the answer is yes because I believe that's what everyone is doing whether they want to admit it or not.

So, I'm not trying to dispute their claim (which is what most people try to do). I'm trying to witness to what God does for me, and why I live by the Bible and not by their claims (Acts 1:8).

(Emphasis mine)

So all claims are equal then.

Do you believe in such a thing as objective reality?

I mean, either leprechauns exist or they don't. They can't both exist and not exist at the same time.

So if someone comes to you and tells you that they have experienced leprechauns, does that make you believe in leprechauns based on the personal testimony alone?


In the same way, either God exists or he does not. If there's no factual basis for it beyond (for lack of a better term) "delusions" in your own head, then in what way does God exist? Does God exist as part of an "objective reality"?

 

[Resha Caner]

So all claims are equal then.

I wouldn't say that. We all trust some sources more than others.

Do you believe in such a thing as objective reality?

Yes, but I believe it's established by the forces responsible for creating that reality. So, in my case, I believe it's God who communicates objective reality. For those who don't believe in God, I'm not convinced there is a way to know objective reality.

I mean, either leprechauns exist or they don't. They can't both exist and not exist at the same time.

So if someone comes to you and tells you that they have experienced leprechauns, does that make you believe in leprechauns based on the personal testimony alone?

What reason do I have to rule it out? It wouldn't be hard to produce a small man dressed in green who makes shoes - even one who would promise a pot of gold or 3 wishes. Given leprechauns are infamous for tricking people and not delivering on their promises, it would be even easier to produce someone who made promises and didn't keep them.

Would I be a fool to believe I'll get that pot of gold or those 3 wishes? Yes.

In the same way, either God exists or he does not. If there's no factual basis for it beyond (for lack of a better term) "delusions" in your own head, then in what way does God exist? Does God exist as part of an "objective reality"?

Well, based on the way I defined it above, you should expect I will say yes, God is part of objective reality.

Since I assume you're saying you've had no personal experiences with God, my phrasing would be that all you have is my testimony (and the testimony of others) rather than calling it "delusions in my head". There would need to be a few more steps in the process before we settle on a conclusion of delusions.