Does God exist?

[Jeremy E Walker]

what does this categorization have to do with what atheists base their morality on?

secondly, how do you classify Darwin himself:

Evolutionists have no moral standard according to Darwin:

Charles Darwin understood this truth perfectly. He wrote: “A man who has no assured and ever present belief in the existence of a personal God or of a future existence with retribution and reward, can have for his rule of life, as far as I can see, only to follow those impulses and instincts which are the strongest or which seem to him the best ones” (1958, p. 94, emp. added).

the aforementioned categories were supplied to set bounds on what your opponent can claim as his position. he is either a cognitivist or a non-cognitivist, a moral realist or moral anti-realist.

when asking your opponent what category he falls into regarding the two aforementioned categories, it better enables you to determine what his views are and thus how to engage them.

I agree with Darwin, and I believe that every atheist who desires to live consistently must agree with him too.

in a Godless world, there is nothing that obligates me to choose a certain set of morals over any other, other than my own personal desires because I have seen no convincing arguments from the naturalist camp regarding the ontology of objective moral values and duties.

 

[DogmaHunter]

The Cosmological Argument from Contingency William Lane Craig 1. Everything that exists has an explanation of its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause. 2. If the universe has an explanation of its existence, that explanation is God. 3. The universe exists. 4. Therefore, the universe has an explanation of its existence (from 1, 3). 5. Therefore, the explanation of the universe’s existence is God (from 2, 4).

2 is just a statement with no evidence.

Equally valid argument:

1. Everything that exists has an explanation of its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause.

2. If the universe has an explanation of its existence, that explanation is Pixies.

3. The universe exists.

4. Therefore, the universe has an explanation of its existence (from 1, 3).

5. Therefore, the explanation of the universe’s existence is Pixies (from 2, 4)

 

[createdtoworship]

2 is just a statement with no evidence.

Equally valid argument:

1. Everything that exists has an explanation of its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause.

2. If the universe has an explanation of its existence, that explanation is Pixies.

3. The universe exists.

4. Therefore, the universe has an explanation of its existence (from 1, 3).

5. Therefore, the explanation of the universe’s existence is Pixies (from 2, 4)

it follows logically from premise 1,

"1. Everything that exists has an explanation of its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause."

thanks for the reply

 

[Jeremy E Walker]

How is what we consider to be a person a morally neutral matter? It defines how one is treated, what is morally acceptable, etc. To think that somehow what we consider human doesn't matter morally is absolutely ridiculous. Sociopaths don't feel other people to really be people, thus it justifies killing to them, but obviously the Native Americans considered themselves to be human. Just because people justify their actions by any means doesn't make morality any less subjective.

a creature is labeled as a human being if it possesses certain properties.

a cat is not a human being because a cat lacks certain properties that human being possesses.

thus, what a human being is is a matter of whether or not a creature possesses certain properties. a matter of possessing or not possessing certain properties.

people may disagree on what the necessary properties are i.e. the issue of abortion. one may think a human being is a creature that has been born. another may think a creature is a human being at the point of conception.

both those for and against abortion BOTH agree that murder is wrong. They just disagree on what constitutes a "human being".

there are moral implications that stem from these issues to be sure, but the real questions is:

Who determines what is and is not a human being?

 

[createdtoworship]

the aforementioned categories were supplied to set bounds on what your opponent can claim as his position. he is either a cognitivist or a non-cognitivist, a moral realist or moral anti-realist.

when asking your opponent what category he falls into regarding the two aforementioned categories, it better enables you to determine what his views are and thus how to engage them.

I agree with Darwin, and I believe that every atheist who desires to live consistently must agree with him too.

in a Godless world, there is nothing that obligates me to choose a certain set of morals over any other, other than my own personal desires because I have seen no convincing arguments from the naturalist camp regarding the ontology of objective moral values and duties.

very possibly true, I will take note. Thank you.

 

[Jeremy E Walker]

2 is just a statement with no evidence.

Equally valid argument:

1. Everything that exists has an explanation of its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause.

2. If the universe has an explanation of its existence, that explanation is Pixies.

3. The universe exists.

4. Therefore, the universe has an explanation of its existence (from 1, 3).

5. Therefore, the explanation of the universe’s existence is Pixies (from 2, 4)

it follows logically from premise 1,

"1. Everything that exists has an explanation of its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause."

thanks for the reply

Premise 2 would need to be evidenced or supported.

It must be shown to be more plausibly true than its negation.

Why think that premise two of our argument is more plausibly true than its negation or pixies?

Dr. Craig states:

What’s really awkward for the atheist at this point is that premise 2 is logically equivalent to the typical atheist response to the contingency argument. Two statements are logically equivalent if it is impossible for one to be true and the other one false. They stand or fall together. So what does the atheist almost always say in response to the argument from contingency? The atheist typically asserts the following:

A. If atheism is true, the universe has no explanation of its existence.

This is precisely what the atheist says in response to premise 1. The universe just exists inexplicably. But this is logically equivalent to saying:

B. If the universe has an explanation of its existence, then atheism is not true.

So you can’t affirm (A) and deny (B).

But (B) is virtually synonymous with premise 2! So by saying in response to premise 1 that, given atheism, the universe has no explanation, the atheist is implicitly admitting premise 2, that if the universe does have an explanation, then God exists.

Besides that, premise 2 is very plausible in its own right. For think of what the universe is: all of space-time reality, including all matter and energy. It follows that if the universe has a cause of its existence, that cause must be a non-physical, immaterial being beyond space and time. Now there are only two sorts of thing that could fit that description: either an abstract object like a number or else an unembodied mind. But abstract objects can’t cause anything. That’s part of what it means to be abstract. The number 7, for example, can’t cause any effects. So the cause of the existence of the universe must be a transcendent Mind, which is what believers understand God to be.



Read more: Argument from Contingency | Reasonable Faith

 

[createdtoworship]

Besides that, premise 2 is very plausible in its own right. For think of what the universe is: all of space-time reality, including all matter and energy. It follows that if the universe has a cause of its existence, that cause must be a non-physical, immaterial being beyond space and time. Now there are only two sorts of thing that could fit that description: either an abstract object like a number or else an unembodied mind. But abstract objects can’t cause anything. That’s part of what it means to be abstract. The number 7, for example, can’t cause any effects. So the cause of the existence of the universe must be a transcendent Mind, which is what believers understand God to be.

yes that is what I was aiming for, it being plausible in its own right. They lead logically from premise 1, if premise 1 being found accurate that is. And there is no reason why it would not be.

 

[Achilles6129]

I can't tell if you're being serious.

Quite serious.

Indeed, the laws of physics do not revolve around the evolution of life on a particular planet. How is this evidence of a deity?

The earth/moon system produces eclipses that are unique in the solar system. No other planet has a moon that exactly covers the sun during a total solar eclipse, producing a beautiful artistic effect. This is completely unnecessary for life - it is the sort of thing you would expect to find if there were a Creator.

 

[Achilles6129]

Here's one source where you can read the religious Ugaritic texts which provide us with information on the Canaanite gods: Religious Texts from Ugari.

I appreciate your source, but I don't really want to buy a book...is there any way you could give me a citation or maybe another link?

"God spoke to Moshe; he said to him, “I am Adonai. I appeared to Avraham, Yitz’chak and Ya‘akov as El Shaddai, although I did not make myself known to them by my name, Yud-Heh-Vav-Heh [Adonai]." -- Exodus 6:2-3 (Complete Jewish Bible)

Here we see El Shaddai (El of the Mountain) reveal to Moses that he is actually Yahweh and that everyone before had not known him as such.

Correct - this is an interesting passage. Theologians have various explanations for it: for example, God didn't fully reveal his glory to the patriarchs (involving the name YHWH) like he did to Moses.

 

[quatona]

How does that follow from what I said?

You said it wasn´t a moral issue, but a matter of how one defines "human".






You are right in a sense, the answer was different depending on who you asked. If you were to ask a man who saw indians as subhuman savages he might say, well sure its right to kill subhuman savages to ensure the survival of the human race or something.[/quote]
So he would answer "yes" to my question.

If you were to ask a man who saw indians as human beings then he might say, well no, its wrong to kill human beings just because they happen to be a different nationality.

So he would answer "no" to my moral question.
Two different moral opinions.

But both men would not dare say that human beings should just treat human beings any old way they want to. They would both tell you that they believed murder was wrong.

That is my point.

I know. However, it´s a mere semantics point. The word "murder" is defined as "wrongful killing", so rightful killing can´t be called "murder".
That´s merely an agreement on the meaning of a word.

The issue is not that the two men have different views on moral values and duties,

Which, of course, renders this morality a completely abstract idea, void of any practical meaning...

but rather, the difference is on what constitutes a human being which is not a moral issue at all.

So you are back at: Genocide is not a moral issue, but merely a matter of how you define "human being".

But maybe you explain your point using the genocide in Germany in the last century. The Nazi didn´t deny that Jews, Communists, Homosexuals etc. were human beings - nonetheless they considered killing them justified.

 

[Jeremy E Walker]

But maybe you explain your point using the genocide in Germany in the last century. The Nazi didn´t deny that Jews, Communists, Homosexuals etc. were human beings - nonetheless they considered killing them justified.

You sure about that?

The Nazis believed they were justified in killing these people because they saw them as threats to their survival. They saw them as disease carrying vermin who were detrimental to their race.

The Nazis still thought it was wrong for Nazis to just treat their fellow Germans any old way. Which is my point.

The issue is:

Are Jews and gays really disease carrying subhuman vermin?

Well, no, they are human beings. It was their views of Jews and gays that differ than ours, not their views about the wrongfulness of murder.

 

[quatona]

You sure about that?

Yes.

 

[Jeremy E Walker]

Yes.

The Nazis believed they were justified in killing these people because they saw them as threats to their survival. They saw them as disease carrying vermin who were detrimental to their race.

The Nazis still thought it was wrong for Nazis to just treat their fellow Germans any old way. Which is my point.

The issue is:

Are Jews and gays really disease carrying subhuman vermin?

Well, no, they are human beings. It was their views of Jews and gays that differ than ours, not their views about the wrongfulness of murder.

 

[Jeremy E Walker]

In fact, in Peter Haas’ book Morality after Auschwitz, he speaks about how the Nazis were strict moral objectivists:

. . . far from being contemptuous of ethics, the perpetrators acted in strict conformity with an ethic which held that, however difficult and unpleasant the task might have been, mass extermination of the Jews and Gypsies was entirely justified. . . . the Holocaust as a sustained effort was possible only because a new ethic was in place that did not define the arrest and deportation of Jews as wrong and in fact defined it as ethically tolerable and ever good.

Haas’s point is precisely that the Nazis were not moral relativists or nihilists but rather objectivists who had a different value system than those of us who see all persons as intrinsically valuable.


Read more: Our Grasp of Objective Moral Values | Reasonable Faith

 

[quatona]

The Nazis believed they were justified in killing these people because they saw them as threats to their survival. They saw them as disease carrying vermin who were detrimental to their race.

Yes, in other words, they felt justified in killing them (without denying them the status of "human beings"). Others feel they were not justified.
A moral disagreement.

The Nazis still thought it was wrong for Nazis to just treat their fellow Germans any old way. Which is my point.

What point would that be?

The issue is:

Are Jews and gays really disease carrying subhuman vermin?

Well, no, they are human beings. It was their views of Jews and gays that differ than ours,

Sure, it was their view that killing them was justified.

not their views about the wrongfulness of murder.

The wrongfulness of "murder" is a mere tautology. I have addressed this a couple of times now, but you keep ignoring this point.
You have a new user name, but apart from that nothing has changed.

 

[quatona]

In fact, in Peter Haas’ book Morality after Auschwitz, he speaks about how the Nazis were strict moral objectivists:

. . . far from being contemptuous of ethics, the perpetrators acted in strict conformity with an ethic which held that, however difficult and unpleasant the task might have been, mass extermination of the Jews and Gypsies was entirely justified. . . . the Holocaust as a sustained effort was possible only because a new ethic was in place that did not define the arrest and deportation of Jews as wrong and in fact defined it as ethically tolerable and ever good.

Haas’s point is precisely that the Nazis were not moral relativists or nihilists but rather objectivists who had a different value system than those of us who see all persons as intrinsically valuable. http://www.reasonablefaith.org/our-grasp-of-objective-moral-values#ixzz37OMCwGvJ

Nobody here has claimed that the Nazis weren´t moral objectivists. hasn´t even been a point of the discussion. I agree that they were moral objectivists - and, as such, I am happy they are in your camp and not in mine.

 

[Jeremy E Walker]

The wrongfulness of "murder" is a mere tautology. I have addressed this a couple of times now, but you keep ignoring this point.
You have a new user name, but apart from that nothing has changed.

let me spell it out for. you seem to be having trouble.

You and the Nazis both agree that detrimental threats to society should be dealt with so as to make sure that the survival and the well being of the members of said society are safe-guarded. Every society that we know about has as its foundation for its system of laws, that underlying, common theme.

 

[quatona]

let me spell it out for. you seem to be having trouble.

You and the Nazis both agree that detrimental threats to society should be dealt with so as to make sure that the survival and the well being of the members of said society are safe-guarded.

No, that´s not my opinion. Not at all. You are making positions up for me out of thin air, in replacement of addressing my actual arguments. Very bad style. Lying for Jesus again, Elioenai?
Plus, it´s completely irrelevant for what we have been discussing.

Every society that we know about has as its foundation for its system of laws, that underlying, common theme.

The structure and meaning of this sentence is cryptic (even more so its relevance for the topic at hand).

 

[Jeremy E Walker]

No, that´s not my opinion. Not at all.

So you do not think that detrimental threats to society should be dealt with so as to make sure that the survival and the well being of the members of said society are safe-guarded?

Ok.

Forgive me for assuming you did.

 

[quatona]

So you do not think that detrimental threats to society should be dealt with so as to make sure that the survival and the well being of the members of said society are safe-guarded?

Ok.

Forgive me for assuming you did.

No biggie. Compared to your other errors and your disingenious debating tactics, it´s just a minor issue.