What Would Evidence For God Be Like?

2PhiloVoid said:

Of course they do----that was the existing paradigm in the ANE in which the writer(s) of the Pentateuch wrote. I mean, it's not like the Bible is the only ancient book with a Flood narrative in its dusty pages. And since Genesis is obviously a narrative taken from secondary sources, it probably shouldn't be seen to be of primary quality----as if it somehow fell directly from the lips of God, Himself. But, if that's what you want to believe based on your singularly ex-fundamentalist background, then I can't stop you from doing so.

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You, my friend, appear to be the 'sultan of spin', Yes, I used a reference from the movie 'Thank you for smoking'.

Please tell me why I'm 'interpreting' such authoritative axiomatic text 'incorrectly'?

Noah and the Flood
9 This is the account of Noah and his family. Noah was a righteous man, blameless among the people of his time, and he walked faithfully with God. 10 Noah had three sons: Shem, Ham and Japheth.

11 Now the earth was corrupt in God’s sight and was full of violence. 12 God saw how corrupt the earth had become, for all the people on earth had corrupted their ways. 13 So God said to Noah, “I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy both them and the earth. 14 So make yourself an ark of cypressc]">[c] wood; make rooms in it and coat it with pitch inside and out. 15 This is how you are to build it: The ark is to be three hundred cubits long, fifty cubits wide and thirty cubits high.d]">[d] 16 Make a roof for it, leaving below the roof an opening one cubite]">[e] high all around.f]">[f] Put a door in the side of the ark and make lower, middle and upper decks. 17 I am going to bring floodwaters on the earth to destroy all life under the heavens, every creature that has the breath of life in it. Everything on earth will perish. 18 But I will establish my covenant with you, and you will enter the ark—you and your sons and your wife and your sons’ wives with you. 19 You are to bring into the ark two of all living creatures, male and female, to keep them alive with you. 20 Two of every kind of bird, of every kind of animal and of every kind of creature that moves along the ground will come to you to be kept alive. 21 You are to take every kind of food that is to be eaten and store it away as food for you and for them.”

22 Noah did everything just as God commanded him.

2PhiloVoid said:

You and your hypotheticals;

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Well, if the power of hermeneutics, the tool in which you seem to highlight time and time again, can't even resolve such a black and white assertion, of whether or not the flood actually happened, then yes, let's not proceed....

And furthermore, please think twice about using hermeneutics as a benchmark, or true evaluation tool, in the future

Nicholas Deka said:

Huh? "Just look" is your proof that the doctrine is false? You can't prove that at all. You don't know that Space Lord Xenu didn't drop a bunch of aliens in spaceships that looked just like modern DC-8 airplanes into volcanos on Earth a billion years ago then detonate those volcanos with nuclear bombs and then those aliens possessed the inhabitants of the planet to cause all sorts of ailments and maladies *this is what Scientologists actually believe*. You don't know, and you can't prove it. Show me evidence it's false. Show me evidence of Thetans not existing. Show me evidence that Space Lord Xenu never existed.

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I am not interested in any of the above. As my previous post says, it is about "Scientology doctrine, and the operation and of the e-meter". The doctrine is somewhat incompatible with Christian idea, and my reason of think they are wrong (that we are all sinners) you might disagree.

However the e-meter method is a much bigger target, and can be quantified through scientific methods. There are way too many leads on this from their own books that got discredited by various sources, a simple google will show you.

Steve Petersen said:

So your proof is that they contradict YOUR doctrine!? This is like arguing about whether the sky is made of rock or spun sugar.

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Read my actual original post below:
"Just look at Scientology doctrine, and the operation and of the e-meter. Of course even though those are fairly obvious, they are not the determinate factor. The real fault point is they believe humans are good and can save (or awaken, not sure how to word it) themselves."

So in the case of scientology you don't need any other doctrine, just from their use of the e-meter and their own book you can derive the answer youself.

I did however use the doctorine solely when I converted from Buddhist to Christianity. Buddhism has almost no cracks (and I had a real hard time leaving it), till I realized that we are all sinners, and by our own will we can't save ourselves. By our own will, we will never be able to love others as ourselves.

cvanwey said:

You, my friend, appear to be the 'sultan of spin', Yes, I used a reference from the movie 'Thank you for smoking'.

Please tell me why I'm 'interpreting' such authoritative axiomatic text 'incorrectly'?

Noah and the Flood
9 This is the account of Noah and his family. Noah was a righteous man, blameless among the people of his time, and he walked faithfully with God. 10 Noah had three sons: Shem, Ham and Japheth.

11 Now the earth was corrupt in God’s sight and was full of violence. 12 God saw how corrupt the earth had become, for all the people on earth had corrupted their ways. 13 So God said to Noah, “I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy both them and the earth. 14 So make yourself an ark of cypressc]">[c] wood; make rooms in it and coat it with pitch inside and out. 15 This is how you are to build it: The ark is to be three hundred cubits long, fifty cubits wide and thirty cubits high.d]">[d] 16 Make a roof for it, leaving below the roof an opening one cubite]">[e] high all around.f]">[f] Put a door in the side of the ark and make lower, middle and upper decks. 17 I am going to bring floodwaters on the earth to destroy all life under the heavens, every creature that has the breath of life in it. Everything on earth will perish. 18 But I will establish my covenant with you, and you will enter the ark—you and your sons and your wife and your sons’ wives with you. 19 You are to bring into the ark two of all living creatures, male and female, to keep them alive with you. 20 Two of every kind of bird, of every kind of animal and of every kind of creature that moves along the ground will come to you to be kept alive. 21 You are to take every kind of food that is to be eaten and store it away as food for you and for them.”

22 Noah did everything just as God commanded him.



Well, if the power of hermeneutics, the tool in which you seem to highlight time and time again, can't even resolve such a black and white assertion, of whether or not the flood actually happened, then yes, let's not proceed....

And furthermore, please think twice about using hermeneutics as a benchmark, or true evaluation tool, in the future

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A global flood definitely happened, and the evidences of it is almost everywhere, from sea creature fossils to sandstone everywhere, and almost all ancient civilizations has story of a huge flood. some really reasembls the Noah story.

dcalling said:

A global flood definitely happened, and the evidences of it is almost everywhere, from sea creature fossils to sandstone everywhere, and almost all ancient civilizations has story of a huge flood. some really reasembls the Noah story.

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Before we go a bit further, please clarify one more point, so we do not speak passed each other...

Did the 'flood' happen a few thousand years ago, or way longer?

Then...

Give me just one peer reviewed example, which demonstrates a global flood associated with your timeline?

dcalling said:

I am not interested in any of the above. As my previous post says, it is about "Scientology doctrine, and the operation and of the e-meter".

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These two statements are in direct contradiction with one another. What I described is their doctrine.

Silmarien said:

This presupposes that you have actually run the empirical evidence through logical reasoning in a correct way, unhindered by irrational biases and other considerations. There are good reasons to doubt that this is fully possible at all, so yes, you have automatically gone wrong as soon as you try to reduce any sort of decision making process to some sort of mechanical, easily dissected system. You've taken a flawed conception of human psychology and declared it reasonable.

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I explained my reasoning and judged it to be reasonable as far as I could tell. If that's declaring it reasonable, then I accept this criticism. Is there anything that could possibly be declared reasonable given the problems you've brought up?

Silmarien said:

You would need to establish what constitutes "sinfully negligent" and why. I will be honest with here: I think your entire epistemology is sinfully negligent, as every important question about reality has been reduced to how well it can be studied, categorized, and ultimately placed under human dominion. I don't think nonbelief is necessarily sinfully negligent in and of itself, but approaching theism in this light, trying to dissect and control it, absolutely is. And the two often go together.

That said, I think you're being far too quick to determine what is and isn't indefensible. You're taking one narrow theological narrative and running with it as if it were the only way of addressing the question. I think I've stated that I lean towards universalism, and it is very possible to maintain that disbelief is a sin there. Disbelief is simply another thing that would need to be healed, and the further you've hardened your heart against God, the more difficult that will be. For those whose atheism has turned into a fullblown hatred of the notion of divine authority, that's unlikely to be very pleasant at all (assuming it's even still possible).

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Well, I had thought you were taking the position that failure to believe in God couldn't ever be the result of honest thinking, so I was ready to defend against that. I can appreciate your perspective even if it's deprecating to me and I'm going to meditate on it. One day I'd like to know what you think constitutes a good epistemology since mine, which I find quite useful, certainly isn't it.

Silmarien said:

See, this strikes me as egoistic. If God wants a relationship, it ought to be on my terms, and if he doesn't jump through the right hoops, obviously he's not there or not interested. You're insisting that God submit to the modern need to control and dominate reality, and there's no reason to expect him to do so and good reason to expect that he won't. (Would it even be good for us if he did?)

If the problem is your epistemology, then it's your epistemology that will eventually have to change. You could ask why God hasn't been pushing you to change it, but who can really say that he hasn't been? A life isn't the sort of thing you're going to be able to fully make sense of until after it's over.

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Oh, I'm absolutely egoistic. I'm the one with limitations and God is the one with the powers AND he's the one who wants something from me, so if either one of us should reach out to the other on their terms, it's him. I can only conclude that if he wants to be detected, it's not by any means I'm aware of. It's possible I'm just horribly ignorant and I should hurry up and figure it out, but it's also possible God' just not there. What am I supposed to do?

Silmarien said:

Come on, I'm quite possibly the most cynical person here. If naturalism is true, I think the most important moral question is whether life is a net good or evil. I say the latter, which would honestly have pretty ugly ramifications on a truly moral public policy. Life is an absurd and cruel system of sacrifice that ought to be extinguished in as humane a manner as possible. (This is the sort of questioning of cultural convictions that you would presumably rather not see carried out en masse.)

For a less extreme example, if someone believes that the goal of public policy ought to be the evolutionary success of the species, then they could very argue that modern medicine has thrown a wrench in things because people who would have once been weeded out of the gene pool are now surviving to reproduce, and that this is a danger that needs genuine correction. Enter eugenics once more.

You cannot get to the justification of morality while ignoring teleology. All ethical reasoning is aimed at some sort of end, and ends are something that the modern scientific picture of reality ignores. Which means that empiricism is not enough to get us to public policy, since you cannot empirically determine which ends are to be favored. If someone wants to implement a dictatorship, they can do so with empirically and logically sound policies.

I don't know what type of outdated traditions you're talking about, though. The argument from public policy came from literally nowhere, and I don't see what it has to do with theism itself, as theists can basically be anywhere on the political spectrum.

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Oh man, this would be far more interesting to engage than what we were discussing above but I'll respect the OP and not take us too far off topic. I only brought up my policy bit as an example of how poorly-founded convictions could and historically have led to disastrous public policy, in support of my position that one ought to be able to support one's beliefs with logic and evidence. I had the Religious Right in mind, and because there are cultural taboos against questioning or criticizing people's religion it can be difficult to get those policies reversed, so that's worth getting up in arms about.

gaara4158 said:

I explained my reasoning and judged it to be reasonable as far as I could tell. If that's declaring it reasonable, then I accept this criticism. Is there anything that could possibly be declared reasonable given the problems you've brought up?

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Well, yes. Accepting that you're not a fully rational actor is reasonable. Without that, you're going to be more prone to making errors based on unidentified biases.

gaara4158 said:

Well, I had thought you were taking the position that failure to believe in God couldn't ever be the result of honest thinking, so I was ready to defend against that. I can appreciate your perspective even if it's deprecating to me and I'm going to meditate on it. One day I'd like to know what you think constitutes a good epistemology since mine, which I find quite useful, certainly isn't it.

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I don't think anything that involves too much of an emphasis on verificationism is a good epistemology. There are better forms of skepticism out there than scientific skepticism.

I favor a mixture of rationalism and empiricism, with a fairly strong element of historicism. I'm quite suspicious of totalitarianizing narratives in general, and have come to see secular naturalism as very similar the medieval Catholicism--it's a worldview that can be historically deconstructed and taken apart: replace Augustine with Hobbes, Aquinas with Hume, etc., and you'll end up with a fully self-contained worldview whose development over time is clearly evident. (I think there's more value in Augustine and Aquinas, but the issue of historical situatedness still troubles me too much to convert to Catholicism.)

gaara4158 said:

Oh, I'm absolutely egoistic. I'm the one with limitations and God is the one with the powers AND he's the one who wants something from me, so if either one of us should reach out to the other on their terms, it's him. I can only conclude that if he wants to be detected, it's not by any means I'm aware of. It's possible I'm just horribly ignorant and I should hurry up and figure it out, but it's also possible God' just not there. What am I supposed to do?

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Eh, I think there are a couple problems here. Instant gratification and the need for control, combined with a very clear (and unjustified) idea of who God must be and what he must want. I agree with you that the image of God you've constructed here isn't very persuasive, so stop worrying about it and let it go.

My question would be why are you here? Why do you seek out arguments with Christians at all? Does the possibility that you're wrong actually bother you? Are you legitimately interested in religious issues? If so, there are definitely things you can do.

One thing I always recommend is studying Hinduism. I think a lot of the objections to theism bleed away once you learn to look at it with fresh eyes, unburdened by all the baggage of Western civilization, and India's got the other great religious tradition. It's a nice gateway drug.

gaara4158 said:

Oh man, this would be far more interesting to engage than what we were discussing above but I'll respect the OP and not take us too far off topic. I only brought up my policy bit as an example of how poorly-founded convictions could and historically have led to disastrous public policy, in support of my position that one ought to be able to support one's beliefs with logic and evidence. I had the Religious Right in mind, and because there are cultural taboos against questioning or criticizing people's religion it can be difficult to get those policies reversed, so that's worth getting up in arms about.

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Hmm, I both agree and disagree with you. I'm not sure if you're aware of this, but falsification was originally formulated as a weapon against Marxism, where ideology and metaphysics were interwoven with scientific triumphalism in support of an entire political regime. That is a good example of poorly-founded convictions leading to disastrous public policies.

The Christian Right is another interesting example. I don't know how much of what is going on there is genuinely religious in nature--capitalism, xenophobia, and the 2nd Amendment aren't exactly biblical principles. Some of the social conservativism is more so, though I don't think either side can be easily supported with logic and evidence. Usually it's just emotionalism and reactionism on both sides.

cvanwey said:

Before we go a bit further, please clarify one more point, so we do not speak passed each other...

Did the 'flood' happen a few thousand years ago, or way longer?

Then...

Give me just one peer reviewed example, which demonstrates a global flood associated with your timeline?

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1. I have no idea when the flood happened.
2. I am not here to prove to you a global flood happened. I am simply given some examples of evidences of it might happened outside of scripture.

Nicholas Deka said:

These two statements are in direct contradiction with one another. What I described is their doctrine.

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What you described is only part of what they believe in, which is hard to verify. What I described is part of their doctrine (which is close to their core) that is much easier to verify. All I am saying here is, if I found something that is easier to verify, do that first and decide if it is worth to continue.

dcalling said:

1. I have no idea when the flood happened.
2. I am not here to prove to you a global flood happened. I am simply given some examples of evidences of it might happened outside of scripture.

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So when you stated 'A global flood definitely happened, and the evidences of it is almost everywhere', you weren't prepared to actually back it up?

All I'm asking for is a link to a peer reviewed report which concludes the result from a global flood? Can you provide any?

dcalling said:

What you described is only part of what they believe in, which is hard to verify. What I described is part of their doctrine (which is close to their core) that is much easier to verify. All I am saying here is, if I found something that is easier to verify, do that first and decide if it is worth to continue.

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What I described is the core of their beliefs. It's their Garden of Eden, Original Sin story.

And it's not "hard to verify". It's impossible to verify. You can't prove Scientology wrong, I can't prove the Bible wrong. So what? What does that mean? What conclusions should we draw from pointing out that unfalsifiable things are unfalsifiable?

Silmarien said:

Eh, I think there are a couple problems here. Instant gratification and the need for control, combined with a very clear (and unjustified) idea of who God must be and what he must want. I agree with you that the image of God you've constructed here isn't very persuasive, so stop worrying about it and let it go.

My question would be why are you here? Why do you seek out arguments with Christians at all? Does the possibility that you're wrong actually bother you? Are you legitimately interested in religious issues? If so, there are definitely things you can do.

One thing I always recommend is studying Hinduism. I think a lot of the objections to theism bleed away once you learn to look at it with fresh eyes, unburdened by all the baggage of Western civilization, and India's got the other great religious tradition. It's a nice gateway drug.

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I seek out these debates because I crave intellectual challenge and I don’t get it from my work or my home life. I choose Christianity as a topic because as a former devout SDA I’m familiar with it and I know what it took to persuade me out of it, so I feel that I can discuss it confidently in an adversarial setting. At my worst this means making sport of crackpots and at my best it means introducing myself to new philosophical concepts and even changing my mind. After all, I started out as a Christian here.

I am not bothered by the concrete threats of Christianity or any other religions, but over the past few years I’ve learned that there’s plenty of solid moral and emotional guidance as well as abstract metaphorical truths to be found therein so I’m less apt to throw the baby out with the bath water these days. I know next to nothing about Hinduism but what you say sounds promising so I’ll have to check it out.

cvanwey said:

You, my friend, appear to be the 'sultan of spin', Yes, I used a reference from the movie 'Thank you for smoking'.

Please tell me why I'm 'interpreting' such authoritative axiomatic text 'incorrectly'?

Noah and the Flood
9 This is the account of Noah and his family. Noah was a righteous man, blameless among the people of his time, and he walked faithfully with God. 10 Noah had three sons: Shem, Ham and Japheth.

11 Now the earth was corrupt in God’s sight and was full of violence. 12 God saw how corrupt the earth had become, for all the people on earth had corrupted their ways. 13 So God said to Noah, “I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy both them and the earth. 14 So make yourself an ark of cypressc]">[c] wood; make rooms in it and coat it with pitch inside and out. 15 This is how you are to build it: The ark is to be three hundred cubits long, fifty cubits wide and thirty cubits high.d]">[d] 16 Make a roof for it, leaving below the roof an opening one cubite]">[e] high all around.f]">[f] Put a door in the side of the ark and make lower, middle and upper decks. 17 I am going to bring floodwaters on the earth to destroy all life under the heavens, every creature that has the breath of life in it. Everything on earth will perish. 18 But I will establish my covenant with you, and you will enter the ark—you and your sons and your wife and your sons’ wives with you. 19 You are to bring into the ark two of all living creatures, male and female, to keep them alive with you. 20 Two of every kind of bird, of every kind of animal and of every kind of creature that moves along the ground will come to you to be kept alive. 21 You are to take every kind of food that is to be eaten and store it away as food for you and for them.”

22 Noah did everything just as God commanded him.



Well, if the power of hermeneutics, the tool in which you seem to highlight time and time again, can't even resolve such a black and white assertion, of whether or not the flood actually happened, then yes, let's not proceed....

And furthermore, please think twice about using hermeneutics as a benchmark, or true evaluation tool, in the future

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Well, I guess you told me..............!

gaara4158 said:

I seek out these debates because I crave intellectual challenge and I don’t get it from my work or my home life. I choose Christianity as a topic because as a former devout SDA I’m familiar with it and I know what it took to persuade me out of it, so I feel that I can discuss it confidently in an adversarial setting. At my worst this means making sport of crackpots and at my best it means introducing myself to new philosophical concepts and even changing my mind. After all, I started out as a Christian here.

I am not bothered by the concrete threats of Christianity or any other religions, but over the past few years I’ve learned that there’s plenty of solid moral and emotional guidance as well as abstract metaphorical truths to be found therein so I’m less apt to throw the baby out with the bath water these days. I know next to nothing about Hinduism but what you say sounds promising so I’ll have to check it out.

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Ignore @Silmarien, gaara. Ignore Hinduism. Try Taoism, most particularly because the Tao Te Ching is ... OH! ... so much shorter than the Hindu Scriptures.

(Shhhh! Don't tell Silmarien about what I said, gaara!)

Nicholas Deka said:

What I described is the core of their beliefs. It's their Garden of Eden, Original Sin story.

And it's not "hard to verify". It's impossible to verify. You can't prove Scientology wrong, I can't prove the Bible wrong. So what? What does that mean? What conclusions should we draw from pointing out that unfalsifiable things are unfalsifiable?

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You keep skipping my the one thing that I keep insisting you to pay attention on, the e-meter and its use.

You keep wanting to prove the impossible to prove, but avoid the things that I mentioned is much easier to falsify. It is almost like you are intensionally try to side step

cvanwey said:

So when you stated 'A global flood definitely happened, and the evidences of it is almost everywhere', you weren't prepared to actually back it up?

All I'm asking for is a link to a peer reviewed report which concludes the result from a global flood? Can you provide any?

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I back my assertion by the well know evidences of most of the land mass we are on are once merged in deep water, you can find fossils on high mountains, and that by faith (told in Bible).

And try to find some peer reviewed paper on there is no global flood. It is not something (for or not for) that can be asserted firmly by science. That is why this argument is mainly a faith issue, If you believe in the Bible, you believe what the Bible says. If you don't, then it can go either ways.

2PhiloVoid said:

Ignore @Silmarien, gaara. Ignore Hinduism. Try Taoism, most particularly because the Tao Te Ching is ... OH! ... so much shorter than the Hindu Scriptures.

(Shhhh! Don't tell Silmarien about what I said, gaara!)

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Come on, the Tao Te Ching is pure obscurantism. It's short and interesting, but you might as well take a Rorschach test.

As far as I'm aware, though, Taoism isn't theistic. Hinduism, on the other hand, will definitely get you to a Vedic version of the God of the Philosophers. There's a translation of the Bhagavad Gita I read by Eknath Easwaran that spends a fair amount of time making comparisons with Christian thought.

Silmarien said:

Come on, the Tao Te Ching is pure obscurantism. It's short and interesting, but you might as well take a Rorschach test.

As far as I'm aware, though, Taoism isn't theistic. Hinduism, on the other hand, will definitely get you to a Vedic version of the God of the Philosophers.

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When I studied it (forget if before or after Buddhism, and I constantly now mix them together), it almost feel like the author is trying to describe God, i.e. it is so big you can't see, so loud you can't hear, and it is not something one can describe. It conflicts with all other theist ways in that it claim all come from nothing, but it is also theist in ways that it has something that is above all of us, that we need to learn from.

dcalling said:

You keep skipping my the one thing that I keep insisting you to pay attention on, the e-meter and its use.

You keep wanting to prove the impossible to prove, but avoid the things that I mentioned is much easier to falsify. It is almost like you are intensionally try to side step

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You didn't show me any reason to think the e-meter doesn't work. You said to Google it. I did. I didn't find anything that proves it doesn't work.

Here's the Scientologist claim: the E-Meter detects and assists in the removal of spiritual trauma in the hands of a skilled auditor. So tell me, how exactly you prove the non-existence of "spiritual trauma" or the E-Meter's ability to detect and remove it in the hands of a skilled auditor. "Spiritual trauma" is far too nebulous of a concept to nail down to even talk about. That's why their claims are unfalsifiable. If "spiritual trauma" is made up garbage, you can't show me it not existing. If it's real, you can't know enough about it to tell me where it should be but isn't.

While you're doing that, think about this. Even if you could prove with 100% certainty that the E-Meter is bogus, does that prove that Scientology is bogus?