What type of "evidence" of God would an atheist accept?

[Michael]

Michael, a God is not an atheistic belief. How would you expect an atheist to reasonably define what one is?

I'd guess based on the answers I read thus far that atheists tend to 'lack belief' in somewhat 'specific' definitions of the term, supernatural definitions for instance. The framing of their answers tends to provide me with some insight in what they exactly 'lack belief' in. I actually lack belief in lots of definitions of that term too.

At best Christians would only say that is not their definition of God.

That wouldn't surprise me because we're all individuals with slightly different "beliefs" (and lack thereof).

 

[stevil]

In spiritual matters it is not so much a matter of “method” as repeated or similar personal experience. For example, in genuine Buddhism, it is said that if one follows the eightfold path (a specific set of protocols) one will achieve a level of contentment and peace within one’s self and with the universe generally unobtainable by natural persons in their struggle for existence.

How would you objectively measure the level of contentment and peace within one's self?
How would you compare these levels within natural persons vs "not-natural" persons?
How would you distinguish between a natural person and a not natural person?

The fact is that millions of people throughout history (in many cultures and times from both genders all ages with differing levels of intelligence and education from various social strata) have done this and found the approach to not only be sound, but the prediction true.

The scientific method includes processes and procedures as an attempt to remove personal bias and subjective opinion. It seems given what you have said above, the "spiritual method" relies entirely on subjective opinion and looks for patterns e.g. are there multiple people with similar subjective opinions. Then tries to derive conclusions from these patterns.
This is the opposite of science.

How can you argue against, or be in denial of, what ACTUALLY happened to you, that you actually experienced? After millions of people have derived the same result, this is empirical evidence.

What you have described isn't empirical evidence.

I think for science it is about the data, the evidence, and not about the authority of people presenting the hypothesis/claim.

This is not true, otherwise no one would believe in speciation as a means of lower order creatures becoming different higher order creatures (like fish becoming reptiles over time or reptiles becoming mammals over millions of years, or non-living matter becoming alive at some one time unconfirmable spontaneous generation event or process, and so on). These things (and others) ARE believed hypothetically but not based on confirmable fact and have never been observed to be true.

With regards to evolution, there is a preponderance of evidence.There isn't direct observation because speciation of kinds happened a very long time ago and is a very slow process.
But fossil evidence, and DNA evidence and others are used to infer that evolution is a likely process behind this.

 

[stevil]

Continuing on....

Evidence is sometimes in the eye of the beholder.

Indeed! A valid point that I address continually regarding some hypothesis based interpretations of data that many scientists conjecture to be true. Hypothesis based interpretation is faulty because it assumes an already convinced of conclusion before it analyzes the experience or results and then interprets the data through that lens (we see the same thing in competing theologies).

It depends on your epistemology and the method of discovery that you are using.

The scientific method means that evidence is assessed in an objective manner.
But we can't always employ the scientific method. Sometimes we just trust people. For example, if my wife tells me show just watched a certain tv show, I would believe her. I would take her spoken testimony as evidence because I would have no reason to not believe her mundain claim.

My personal experience and intent is the ONLY (and most valid) evidence of an actual fact.

In the scientific method they try to remove the idea of personal experience, because in the personal frame we have personal biases, preconceived beliefs. So they get people to document experiments, they get others to recreate those experiments, they use tools that come up with objective measurements rather than asking the scientist how they personally feel about their experiment.

 

[stevil]

I'd be comfortable with your incredible powers idea for instance, but I also tend to lack belief in a "supernatural" definition of God. I'd assume I'm in the minority position however so there's nothing "wrong" with your definition.

In your belief system, what is god made of? Atoms?
Do you believe that your god created all matter and energy within the universe?
How does your god manipulate the universe? Does god exert the known forces (gravity, electromagnetic, strong and weak nuclear) or does god use some other force?

 

[Michael]

In your belief system, what is god made of? Atoms?

Yes, specifically all the atoms , and all the known forms of energy.

Panentheism - Wikipedia

I would describe myself as a Christian Panentheist.

Do you believe that your god created all matter and energy within the universe?

"Created"? Hmmm. "Sculpted" would be a better term from my perspective. He may have created it, but he may simply shape it to his liking over eternity. It's possible that God 'created' every form of matter and energy that we know about. I really can't be sure.

How does your god manipulate the universe? Does god exert the known forces (gravity, electromagnetic, strong and weak nuclear) or does god use some other force?

AFAIK, no other 'forces' would be 'required'.

 

[pshun2404]

Do you assert that consciousness is personalized?

So you think that consciousness can create all these things, but suddenly has lost the power of creating matter and stuff?

You needn't tell me that - I didn't doubt consciousness. You are implying that consciousness sometimes can create things, and sometimes it can´t. I find that curious.

It isn't "can" or "cannot" it is will or will not (there is a difference), all matter/energy required was brought into being in the beginning (at the big bang moment), and it is unnecessary for consciousness to create ALL that becomes manifest after because there is cause and effect (a law or principle set ion motion) and physical and chemical laws to govern its behavior. For example, from a few genetic pairs of the same organism with the propensity for millions of variations and the effect of mutation each new variety need not be created only procreated (passing on various inheritable traits).

Our individual consciousness is certainly personalized due to our experiencing reality through this temporal form with its limited senses. People hold different views on whether or not the cosmic consciousness (for lack of a better term) is personalized. The Judeo-Christian view is that it is while the Hindu view is it is not and I am sure from a scientific perspective we cannot say one way por the other with assurance from the implications that can perceived by this method.

that it is cannot be denied by any rational person (hence the ability to be rational) but that it is a natural evolvement of dead matter is a hypothesis based assumption which itself only exists because consciousness is real.

 

[Michael]

It depends on your epistemology and the method of discovery that you are using.

The scientific method means that evidence is assessed in an objective manner.
But we can't always employ the scientific method. Sometimes we just trust people. For example, if my wife tells me show just watched a certain tv show, I would believe her. I would take her spoken testimony as evidence because I would have no reason to not believe her mundain claim.

In the scientific method they try to remove the idea of personal experience, because in the personal frame we have personal biases, preconceived beliefs. So they get people to document experiments, they get others to recreate those experiments, they use tools that come up with objective measurements rather than asking the scientist how they personally feel about their experiment.

FYI, most of that "advantage" goes flying right out the window when discussing hypothetical constructs in physics. Any "consensus" on such topics usually includes a healthy dose of 'trust'. Recreating the experiment can become relatively cost prohibitive even if you wished to try, and often times there cannot be a 'control' mechanism applied, so it's more like a 'test' than a real 'experiment'.

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

... All I hear in your words are the echos of a human mind.

You may be interested in a TED talk given by neuroscientist Mariano Sigman, in which he describes, not only how associative semantic analysis of speech and text can accurately predict future mental problems, but also how the same kind of analysis on ancient texts shows that concepts associated with introspection hardly appeared until around 500 years BC, when they increased dramatically (see 6':45" for a graph) : Your Words May Predict Your Future Mental Health.

All of which provides surprising support for the suggestion that, until that time (the start of the Classical period of Ancient Greece), the ideas and thoughts that pop into the mind (joining the internal monologue) were generally interpreted, not as internally generated, but as the voices (comments, suggestions) of the spirits or gods; and the subsequent growth of rationalist natural philosophy led to an introspective reinterpretation based on the relation between conscious and subconscious mental processes.

This has a remarkable correspondence with the description of the origins of modern consciousness in the controversial theory of 'Bicameralism' - and your post suggested to me the possibility that many religious traditions and practices are aimed at reactivating this early dichotomous interpretation (so the celebrant hears parts of his internal monologue as the voices of spirits, angels, or god).

All pretty speculative, of course, but interesting speculation...

 

[Michael]

You may be interested in a TED talk given by neuroscientist Mariano Sigman, in which he describes, not only how associative semantic analysis of speech and text can accurately predict future mental problems, but also how the same kind of analysis on ancient texts shows that concepts associated with introspection hardly appeared until around 500 years BC, when they increased dramatically (see 6':45" for a graph) : Your Words May Predict Your Future Mental Health.

All of which provides surprising support for the suggestion that, until that time (the start of the Classical period of Ancient Greece), the ideas and thoughts that pop into the mind (joining the internal monologue) were generally interpreted, not as internally generated, but as the voices (comments, suggestions) of the spirits or gods; and the subsequent growth of rationalist natural philosophy led to an introspective reinterpretation based on the relation between conscious and subconscious mental processes.

This has a remarkable correspondence with the description of the origins of modern consciousness in the controversial theory of 'Bicameralism' - and your post suggested to me the possibility that many religious traditions and practices are aimed at reactivating this early dichotomous interpretation (so the celebrant hears parts of his internal monologue as the voices of spirits, angels, or god).

All pretty speculative, of course, but interesting speculation...

It was an interesting discussion, if speculative as your mentioned based on the small sample size. Thanks for the link.

I found it interesting that he didn't seem to find a direct link between how introspective their writings seemed to be and future mental health problems, but rather how much/quickly they moved around from one range of topics (semantic neighborhood) to another. I've experienced that sense of 'disjointedness' from people with mental health problems.

 

[stevil]

Yes, specifically all the atoms , and all the known forms of energy.

Panentheism - Wikipedia

I would describe myself as a Christian Panentheist.

Interesting

"Created"? Hmmm. "Sculpted" would be a better term from my perspective. He may have created it, but he may simply shape it to his liking over eternity. It's possible that God 'created' every form of matter and energy that we know about. I really can't be sure.

If your god is made of atoms then that god can not be the creator of all atoms.
If your god is a complex structure, then without the process of evolution, how did such a complex entity come to be?

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

I found it interesting that he didn't seem to find a direct link between how introspective their writings seemed to be and future mental health problems, but rather how much/quickly they moved around from one range of topics (semantic neighborhood) to another. I've experienced that sense of 'disjointedness' from people with mental health problems.

Yes, I think he's found the measure of that disturbing intuitive sense of someone being 'on the edge', or something 'not being quite right' in their thinking.

 

[Michael]

Yes, I think he's found the measure of that disturbing intuitive sense of someone being 'on the edge', or something 'not being quite right' in their thinking.

It will be interesting to see how his models work on a larger sample size.

 

[Michael]

If your god is made of atoms then that god can not be the creator of all atoms.

I don't profess to own God anymore than I own the universe. It makes sense to discuss "my" beliefs about the universe, but it doesn't really make much sense to call it "my universe'. Even if my beliefs about the universe are falsified, the universe itself doesn't go away.

God may indeed be the 'creator' of all forms of solid matter as we understand it. I really can't be sure. Ultimately you might make a case that pure energy existed before God, but even that claim assumes a lot of things you can't be sure about.

If your god is a complex structure, then without the process of evolution, how did such a complex entity come to be?

I can't really say how God came to exist, but God's has enjoyed the whole of eternity to come into being. Checkout Boltzmann brain ideas.

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

... you might make a case that pure energy existed before God...

What is 'pure' energy ?

I can't really say how God came to exist, but God's has enjoyed the whole of eternity to come into being. Checkout Boltzmann brain ideas.

You think God might be a Boltzmann brain ??

How does that square with panentheism?

 

[Michael]

What is 'pure' energy ?

That's a good question. The 'purest' form of energy seems to be a photon. It doesn't contain any rest mass, but it does contain momentum and energy.

You think God might be a Boltzmann brain ??

No, I'm suggesting that given the whole of eternity, intelligence might arise and begin to manipulate the environment. I have no idea how or if God "started", but there are theoretical models to explain how intelligence could form over time.

 

[stevil]

No, I'm suggesting that given the whole of eternity, intelligence might arise and begin to manipulate the environment. I have no idea how or if God "started", but there are theoretical models to explain how intelligence could form over time.

If there was ever a point where there is no energy, no matter, then there was no time, so no eternity.
But I doubt such a point ever existed otherwise we would never get to the now. Not even if god existed.

With evolution (I assume you are well aware of the theory as you seem very smart to me).
We had structures and life forms competing for limited resources. Those more successful became prolific and those less sucessful died off. The process was very simple but over great time created very complex life forms.
I've not heard about this being applied to the history of a god. I certainly haven't heard anyone claim that god is a fluke given almost infinite time that matter just happened to find itself (randomly) in the configuration of a god.

But anyway, I'm not here to challenge your beliefs, I just found the idea of a Christian pantheist as interesting. I'm also interested to understand how Jesus fits into this pantheist belief, was Jesus a god, was Jesus anymore godly than any other human?

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

That's a good question. The 'purest' form of energy seems to be a photon. It doesn't contain any rest mass, but it does contain momentum and energy.

So you're suggesting that a case can be made for the electromagnetic field (and so, presumably, the other quantum fields and spacetime) preceding God?

No, I'm suggesting that given the whole of eternity, intelligence might arise and begin to manipulate the environment. I have no idea how or if God "started", but there are theoretical models to explain how intelligence could form over time.

We already know that, given a few tens of billions of years, intelligence can arise and manipulate the environment - life on Earth is a case in point!

Why propose some ill-defined, undemonstrable entity, when Earth is crawling with intelligent creatures, and we have a fairly good (although still incomplete) idea of how they came to be. Naturally, it's possible, even likely, that intelligent life has evolved elsewhere in the universe, but I don't see how the label 'God' is usefully applied to alien life.

 

[Non sequitur]

I'm curious to know what type of 'evidence' of God that the resident atheists around here might accept, and find compelling? At the present moment, do you believe that there is "no" evidence of God, little evidence of God or just not convincing enough evidence of God for your personal tastes? Do you believe that the topic of God can be studied scientifically? Must all cause/effect relationship be demonstrated empirically in controlled experimentation to your personal satisfaction, or would you accept simple uncontrolled observations as a form of "evidence", even if it's less than convincing evidence?

Can't say, but I assume he would know.

What type of evidence you would accept to believe in Thor?

 

[Michael]

If there was ever a point where there is no energy, no matter, then there was no time, so no eternity.
But I doubt such a point ever existed otherwise we would never get to the now. Not even if god existed.

I tend to agree. Since energy cannot be created or destroyed, some form of energy has existed eternally, and will continue to exist eternally. It's only a question of whether or not it's "organized" and aware. The fact it's organized is pretty obvious, but awareness is a bit trickier to empirically demonstrate on cosmic scales.

With evolution (I assume you are well aware of the theory as you seem very smart to me).
We had structures and life forms competing for limited resources. Those more successful became prolific and those less sucessful died off. The process was very simple but over great time created very complex life forms.
I've not heard about this being applied to the history of a god.

I'm just pointing out that over the whole of eternity, statistically speaking, a cosmological scale form of life would have time to form and take hold, and "design" things as they saw fit.

I certainly haven't heard anyone claim that god is a fluke given almost infinite time that matter just happened to find itself (randomly) in the configuration of a god.

It's really just a statistical look at the problem. If you look at it as a chicken or the egg proposition, even if you assume that energy came first, that would not preclude the existence of God today. It's also possible that God may simply have 'created' every form of mass and energy which we exist in, yet he may exist as a higher form of energy. No matter how you look it, it's pretty much impossible to rule out the possibility of God altogether, even if you look at the question from a purely empirical perspective.

But anyway, I'm not here to challenge your beliefs, I just found the idea of a Christian pantheist as interesting. I'm also interested to understand how Jesus fits into this pantheist belief, was Jesus a god, was Jesus anymore godly than any other human?

I would say the Christ was more Godly in the way that he treated others, and he was a clear reflection and demonstration of God's value system in physical form.

 

[Michael]

Can't say, but I assume he would know.

What type of evidence you would accept to believe in Thor?

As a monotheist, I really don't care what you call "God". It's necessarily still the same God from my perspective, if not the same "religion".