If your god is in fact so far beyond the limits our understanding, then that would explain why were just beating a dead horse trying to discern god with logic. I mean you don't see things coming into existence from non-existence, so that's why Craig has a valid argument!
A nonphysical being which could never be subjected to empirical testing could very well be responsible for the formulation of the universe!
How is William Lane Craig even allowed to be called a philosopher, Dawkin's is talking about the factual/empirical foundation of a statement which would be missing if you assume the supernatural creator, the reason William thinks it is preposterous in this situation is because there is no supernatural creator and thus there would need to be infinite explanations because it would never have stemmed from reality, like for example evolution does thus only a finite number of explanations is needed
his argument is in the methodology, he is saying that a true and proveable answer is one which requires no assumptions, God just existing requires an assumption which is unproveable therfore no answer at all and this then becomes a philosphical point not a scientific point,so while there is room to beleive what you want just remember that the church would have burned darwin if they had got the chance and has never been a friend of any knowledge which did not give them power
Lane Craig is a fucking moron. This is about the stupidest thing I have ever even heard, of course 'the magic man done it' isn't an explanation! Who believes this idiocy?
I dont know why people think the big bang was the moment of creation. As far as I'm concerned it was the event that caused the universe to be the way it is today. Why is it so hard to comprehend that their could have been an existance before that? Why is it always rulled out?
@mrcool9191 To defend religion in this way and attack science that, just as it happens has contradicted religious beliefs is so very wrong. We were not put here by a creator along with all the other animals and plants for us to use as we saw fit. A greater power governs us and the universe. Our larger evolved brains has enabled us to find the truth in our quest for knowledge. Chimps are our cousins! One life as there is no other and we will return from whence we came.
It just dawned on me, that Craig's implication that we'd need an explanation of the explanation... isn't a destruction of science, but it is a neverending quest for knowledge. Many scientists agree that science will never be complete, that there will never be a point where the community can stop, look around, and say "Well, that's everything guys, last one out gets the light". So why stop trying to explain things at the beginning of the universe?
@Samuelwhatshisface Well you have to make a verdict because certain terminal questions such as where will I go when I die need an answer. For example certain court cases can go on forever with scores of minute details but judge has to make a ruling at some point based on the currently available evidence.
@Product1999 In a court case, it is to decide the ongoing fate of a person, whereas I don't see any reason to see death as a continuation of anything... I certainly don't think I need to be concerned about where I'm going when I die, but how much I can achieve while I'm alive.
And BTW, you're talking about ends, I'm talking about origins; Craig's statement about an infinite regress is implicative that we look to know everything, when we know we can't.
@Samuelwhatshisface The fact that you don't see death as a continuation of anything does not mean there is no continuation afterward death. As you stated we can't know everything so you being unable to find a reason to believe in something does not negate the existence of said thing. So have fun achieving things when you're alive but i hope you are aware you will die and lose those things.
@Product1999 I see no reason to believe in life after death, as well as any religious belief in particular.
On top of that, let's say for arguments sake, that the judeo-christian afterlife is real. If I live my life furthering man kind, but am tortured for non-belief of something without evidence, would I want to be associated with a being that could implement such a system? No, I wouldn't. Such a being would be, in my eyes, monstrous.
@Product1999 I see what you did there. You followed the pseudo logic of Craig which means you can state pretty much anything and assert it's true because, in your delusional mind, it is an explanation and doesn't need an explanation. That's like me saying "you're an atheist" followed by you refuting it, demanding an explanation which could possibly affirm my claim. I then go "No, no, no! Look, I already explained that you're an atheist. I don't have to explain the explanation."
@Product1999 um why, who "allows" you to make the comments you make?
it's just how i feel. it amazes me that there are ppl out there who actually follow a bs artist. Is it not obvious that THAT's what he is??
Dawkins finds evidence, and reports it. Craig says there's a god in the sky, based off faith. How does this not sound crazy, and why do you want to shut me up?
@trashbash2001 No it is not obvious. a BS artist can't usually backup their claims with logic. Mostly what I hear are personal sweeping attacks such as he is a "BS Artist". That is a meaningless statement if you think he is BSing then refute his argument. Name calling is for people with no argument. Science says the Universe had a beginning Craig uses science to male conclusions as well and furthermore science corroborates the Bible.
How do people who believe in god have any explanation for their belief when there is absolutely NO evidence that god exists? Doesn't the total lack of evidence destroy the credibility of their claim or am I missing something here? I'd like to remain open-minded but in the absence of any evidence that something exists I would tend to think that the thing does not exist. Subsequently discovered evidence may prove otherwise. I will patiently wait and live in hope for some evidence BUT hmmm.
You do need an explanation of a explanation x when explanation x claims the existence of something which we have not yet proven, beyond reasonable doubt, to exist. Craig yet again being a complete dolt.
Dawkins did not ask for an explanation of the explanation. He asked for an explanation of the existence of the designer. There is no infinite regress. Once you explain how the designer came to be, you stop. There's no explaining of explanations, unless of course somebody doesn't understand them and you need to explain. Craig confuses 'God', a character in the explanation, with the explanation itself.
"you don't have to have an explanation of an explanation"
lol, Willy Lame Craig's Cosmological Argument is all about "explanation of an explanation of an explanation..".
"the universe began to exist therefore has a cause".."that cause was God because God hasn't a begining".."this God is a personal God because the universe is designed"
And there's also his typical strawman arguments. "if there was infinity you would never have an explanation for everything which would destroy science" fuckinlol
straw man arguments?...exactly. Thats what he is trying to point out. Asking what created God is a pointless question that atheists always ask as if it is their home-run bat,it doesn't do anything to disprove His existence like he just said and you just admitted.
I don't understand how God doesn't require an explanation. How can something so complicated, that it has the ability to create the entire universe, the laws of physics, life, etc, not? How can that just exist? Like Dawkins has said, when they can explain the origin of the universe, it'll be something very simple that doesn't lead to an infinite regress.
(continued) Similarly with science, we can only measure and prove what our instruments can detect. By the definition of God you can never prove or disprove God's existence. Paradoxically, you cannot even sufficiently define God, because God is something that is so far beyond our realm of understanding, something that the human brain will never be able to compehend.
@bizeeyo Your right, we can't even understand the quantum physics contained in our own universe. Reminds me of what Christ said, "If I have told you earthly things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe, if I tell you of heavenly things?" John 3-12
My biggest problem with dawkins is that he believes that someday everything will be explained. Unfortunately, it seems the more that science reveals, the more that we realize that even more has yet to be answered and revealed. An answer will inevitably create more questions.
The best metaphor i''ve read is that if you comb a lake with a fishing net, every square inch of it, have you caught all the fish? Well it depends on the net. Smaller fish might have slipped through the holes.
@bizeeyo "The best metaphor i''ve read is that if you comb a lake with a fishing net, every square inch of it, have you caught all the fish? Well it depends on the net. Smaller fish might have slipped through the holes."
Exactly. Just like the net, the apparatus of physical investigation man has (science) using human senses can only detect (catch) that which it is capable of catching. Of course it produces results (catches fish) but we have NO way of know what its not catching!
Why is there something rather than nothing shows the limits of science because it isn't a scientific question. Science can only seek the cause of something in something. If it ever postulated nothing it would fail its task. But there is no something that could have given rise to the universe other than something else and that something must be God, it can't come from nothing.
Actually, isn't the "explanation of an explanation" exactly what Science works towards? What is this object? An apple. Where did it come from? A tree. Where did the tree come from? It grew. Where did it grow from? A seed. How did the seed become a whole tree? Metabolisis. Why don't other small objects, like rocks, become trees?
On and on, ad nauseum, right down to atoms, and even beyond that. Science aims to show all the FUNDAMENTAL (i.e. base) truths and reasons behind things....
I don't get how God could condemn someone for not believing in something he himself absolutely cannot believe. The only thing that would make any sense is if he has also been created and is being forced through the same illogically arduous torture that we are apparently subject to.
@correctionguy "I don't get how God could condemn someone for not believing in something he himself absolutely cannot believe."
We have all gone astray from what we know is right. None of us has ever chosen to do right all the time. We have willfully chose the wrong repeatedly. God has no choice but to give us what we chose. Heaven is for those who through patience and much tribulation and endurance demonstrate they chose to do right in the absence of any force to do so.
@nvutube7 Physically speaking, a child can have no knowledge of concepts until it is conscious, capable of language and can obtain and understand the knowledge.
It is also morally wrong and reprehensible to teach a child that they are inherently evil and must believe something without reason or suffer eternal damnation.
Your concept of God is omnipotent, he is all powerful, to say he has no choice is illogical.
@correctionguy Correct, the knowledge of sin is when guilt applies. The age of accountability is different individuals. Only God can know that.
How can anything be morally reprehensible in a universe where nothing *ought* to be any specific way? We are all meaningless sacks of molecules simply acting and reacting to the laws of physics and chemistry.
Its not illogical to say God chooses not to force us to make choices.
@nvutube7 Not true, I have knowledge of sin, but I don't feel guilt over my failure of an impossible task made such due to how I was supposedly constructed by the being that's saying it's wrong to fail the task at hand. A more ideal God would be capable of not only designing a being with at least the possibility of being sinless, but also his own merciful 'forgiveness' of us for his own failure to design us properly in the first place. What I was actually saying is that to have knowledge of...
@correctionguy "A more ideal God would be capable of not only designing a being with at least the possibility of being sinless, but also his own merciful 'forgiveness' of us for his own failure to design us properly in the first place."
True, we are bound to the physical bodies given us, we had no choice in that. But we DO have part in creating our own moral character. When we willfully choose to lie, cheat etc., it then becomes easier the next time to do it. That is OUR doing, not Gods.
@nvutube7 ...anything you must have your brain physically developed to a certain extent.
Because morals are a human concept, a culturally subjective phenomenon. Let's analyse your objective morals for a second for a broader view, God says you can rape the virgins of a people you conquered and to murder every other man, woman and child, culturally that's clearly immoral, but you must believe it is good due to the following two logical fallacies. Firstly, an appeal to authority; you've based...
@nvutube7 ...your morality on an apparent incontrovertible authority and have no personal opinion on what is good, even though I would hope you would agree that rape is immoral, no matter the circumstances. Secondly, an argumentum ad baculum fallacy; out of fear of punishment for doing wrong by your God, who clearly supports rape, slavery and murder throughout the old testament, so long as the victims aren't part of God's special people.
Evolution never states there is no meaning, nor that we...
@correctionguy Nothing new here. Please provide the verse/s you are referring to (such as Numbers and Deuteronomy etc) and lets examine them thoroughly and in context and lets see what you are excluding and over looking.
Nothing wrong with doing what is right out of fear. Fear is a healthy motivator. When doc informs me my smoking is going to kill me if I keep it up, I will and did quit smoking because of the TRUTH told to me and the fear of it's consequences.
@nvutube7 Dude, if you don't even know where it says that, then I'm pretty worried if you actually read the bible and that didn't strike you as disturbing. The record of the attack on the Midianites in Numbers 31.
No, doing something and considering that right BECAUSE of fear is a logical fallacy. The difference there is that you are receiving factual information from a credible source and there is no moral dilemma in that situation. Your comparing highly researched topics to ancient text.
@correctionguy I know the verses. I just want you to pinpoint where YOU believe it demonstrates that God condones rape!
We all have starting presuppositions,which we must take by faith, we can't prove them. Mine is the Holy Bible. If the source of moral absolutes says something is right, then it's right. Though we may not understand why completely in the absence of complete revelation and circumstance. Remember, God is THE judge, THE rightful avenger. He can use humans to carry out judgment.
@nvutube7 Dude, there is no pinpointing these verses, they're throughout the entire bible. What did Moses do after just been given a commandment not to murder? He murdered everyone who disagreed with God. All of Deuteronomy 22 shows that women are considered material for the father and husband. It goes on and on.
Faith must be rationalised though, there is not a shred of evidence for God's existence, yet you assert that your faith is equal to my belief that I just put bread into a toaster.
@nvutube7 If we cannot comprehend something that God says to be true then God is failing in communication, something we can do better and God seems to have trouble doing this through anything other than the medium of ancient book.
Remember, God is NOT evidential, God IS a contradictory. You are attempting to justify rape, you do not see what is wrong with your morals?
@nvutube7 ...are under the complete control of the forces that affect us, because in either case, creation or evolution, the possibility for freewill must be seen in the particles that make up the universe. Spirituality can also exist, but unfounded claims should be treated as such and we should always suspend belief if there is a lack of evidence. I believe we apply our own meaning to the universe. I step away from the solipsistic views of most people and consider us as more of a oneness...
@correctionguy "Spirituality can also exist, but unfounded claims should be treated as such and we should always suspend belief if there is a lack of evidence."
Please first demonstrate that the "spiritual," to be believed and evidenced must come through the scientific method which detects and examines only physical phenomena.
Your asking for physical evidence for an immaterial reality not extended in space. Perhaps as MANY already know, the spiritual is necessarily basic. We simply know.
@nvutube7 Something that is claimed to have interacted with the physical world has to leave some kind of mark or evidence, or it simply can be assumed it didn't exist, or in the least you should suspend your belief until further knowledge can be attained. The supernatural, if it exists, should theoretically be subject to the same observation as anything else physical. If you can sense it, or if it can interact with this world then there is physical manifestation happening and it can be examined.
@correctionguy Biological coded information, instructions carried and transmitted via matter and energy is evidence of mind interacting with the physical world. Software is ALWAYS the artifact of mind. It is ALWAYS produced top down NEVER bottom up. Hardware NEVER accounts for the software running it. Coded information (software) runs life (the hardware.)
John 1:1 In the beginning was the Word (information), and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
@correctionguy Information is immaterial. You again are asking for a physical manifestation of something immaterial. Quite absurd. Yes it certainly does take matter and energy to carry, measure and observe information. Ironically as we have entered into the information age we have also discovered the information at the heart of all life. The Mind that created everything is YELLING VERY LOUD!
@nvutube7 No, I am not, there needs to be evidence for something to believe in it. I'm saying if most of the purported supernatural exists, if mythologies like your God are real, then they have interacted with the universe, there had to be physical manifestation, like the burning bush, if not an illusion of the mind, there would be a physical burning bush and a voice coming from it specifically, Moses should have analysed it before heading off on his shroom trip.
@nvutube7 Which is exactly what is important, if something is an objective belief then it cannot be questioned. If Hitler or Manson's opinions were objective then we'd be screwed, that's the beauty of subjective reasoning and rationality. Thank you for bringing them up, you helped my point completely. There needs to be a choice in the matter of what something means to you, otherwise you cannot justify when something of the objective matter is absurd.
@correctionguy Your missing the point. If there really is no objective moral absolutes, then anything goes. Hitler and Mansons moral opinion is just as valid as yours. Only the theist has a rationally justified moral basis to ground his moral beliefs on. If there is a Law Giver then there is a basis for morality. The atheist cannot live out the moral implications of his own belief. Sacks of molecules (us) stealing from other sacks of molecules can't be right or wrong. There is no "ought" way.
@nvutube7 Yes, anything goes, but that does not mean all moral views are equal. The monotheist is not moral, he is committing an argumentum ad baculum fallacy, as I already stated before, he is being "good" only because he is being threatened, not for the sake of morality. I am making my own morals through rational analysis, the moral system of mine is equal between all humans, causes no suffering and is my own decision and therefore superior to Hitler's...
@correctionguy False. Once you understand Biblical theology, which stands in stark contrast to ALL OTHER religions, you will see why one is saved by grace and what that means. Grace is unmerited favor. I can't earn my salvation by "doing" right. All other religions man must do enough good, must merit his salvation, must make his way to God. In Christianity, God came down to man in flesh and died in his place. Offering Himself. It is a free gift to all who believe.....
@nvutube7 Then you are doing it out of reward. On either end, it is illogical to call it morality. If 'grace' and eternal happiness are the rewards then you are not being moral. You've gone from one extreme to the other. There is no reason why you cannot do good for the sake of loving your fellow human, why must you love God to be good to your community? It's immoral. There is no alienation from something that does not evidentially exist, God is the one alienating himself, why does he hide?
@correctionguy God is hidden from those who do not love righteousness. John 3:19-21 And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh to the light,"
You do not look for God because of sin you are afraid to give up. It's that simple. Thieves dont look for cops.
@nvutube7 So, you're saying that there are no good non-Christians, that Gandhi was an evil sinner, that every person not exposed to Abrahamic religions are just too evil. I'm just too afraid to stop murdering, lying, stealing, committing adultery, coveting, worshipping other Gods, dishonouring my parents, making idols, misusing the name of God and keeping the Sabbath unholy. Great logic, dude.
@correctionguy God has purposely kept Himself from physical testing and observation. Instead chose to reveal Himself to those who have ears to hear and eyes to see perfect morality when it walks in human flesh. God walked among us in perfect righteousness in Jesus the Christ. Anyone who loves the truth will plainly see He was the Truth in perfect righteousness. Enough so to trust and follow by a step of faith that is rewarded with a evidenced relationship! A sin keeps you from God.
@nvutube7 Unless my dislike of rape and slavery is the thing keeping God from contacting me then there is no reason in the bible that I am not perfectly moral and why he can't communicate with me.
@correctionguy ...and that belief evidenced by ones actions. Doing right is the natural expression of that belief! We believe Jesus is the Christ, the Way, the Truth and the Life. If you BELIEVE that you will follow the Truth and the Way of righteousness BECAUSE you believe and agree that is the Way. Not because of a threat or out of fear. When you believe in and love someone you WANT to please them. Your view reveals your alienation from God and righteousness.
@nvutube7 I'm right here in the only place I'm aware of, if he's not here then how can I be alienating myself from him? Also, I've repeatedly shown you that with the existence of reward and punishment you cannot be moral. Morals are nothing but cultural. Good and bad are just perception and that is why they raped the Midianite virgins, there is no possible way that they were acting on objective morality because it is so clearly wrong to our culture.
@correctionguy False, your morals are purely subjective and in NO way objectively superior to Hitlers. It is only superior to YOU. Again, you as an atheist have no basis to justify your moral opinions, hence the absurdity of trying to claim your own opinion is superior to another human beings. Your morals are therefore reduced to mere opinion, and everyone has one.
@nvutube7 There is superiority in subjectivity though, this culture shows my morality to be superior to Hitler's, his wasn't even the popular opinion for his own culture, he just happened to have power. Yes, you're getting it, morals are mere opinion, you are absolutely correct; for instance, various duck species' males must rape the women and both sexes genitalia have become quite complex, talk about battle of the sexes. It is good for a duck to rape for the continuation of the species.
@nvutube7 In no way can you justify the brutality of your God throughout the bible. All the murder, rape and slavery show that even if there were an objective morality, it is not your Gods, therefore, until we can find an objective morality which doesn't support those things, subjective morality is the only form and is far superior.
@nvutube7 Hitler's was unequal, made millions suffer and while his own morals were subjective, they were objective for his own subordinates, if they were to go against his commandments then they would die, much like God and monotheists. You would say that the objective morality of his subordinates is immoral, yet they were in the exact same position as you, threatened by the brutality of a maniacal leader.
@correctionguy False. You admit Hitlers morals where subjective. His subordinates would still be immoral because they would still be subjective even if claimed to be objective. But God's would be OBJECTIVE and CORRECT since He is the SOURCE of moral absolutes. So I am not in the same position.
@nvutube7 But they had no personal choice beyond death or conformance, which isn't as bad as God's which is eternal pain or conformance, Hitler's morality was objectively imposed upon the people.
@correctionguy You are not in a position to say eternal punishment is or is not merited if you are not a God who created a universe with free will moral agents and know the total consequences of sin and its effects. That again is simply your own subjective opinion.
@correctionguy "I am if I can use deductive knowledge to reason that he, due to omniscience, cannot logically send me to hell."
Again, you are applying classical Newtonian logic and finite human reasoning to what a God can and cannot do. He is not bound by natural law. Do we need to mention quantum physics again which tells us such things like one object can actually be in two places at the same time for example?
@nvutube7 How can you really question the logic I've put forth? An infinite punishment for a finite crime which he was completely aware of when he created the being. There is no other way to look at that, you can't just say 'because God', it doesn't hold up, or in the least, God lied about being omni-benevolent.
@nvutube7 You're confusing questioning God with just simply having unquestionable logic. Like 'I think therefore I am' you can't then say 'But the bible says...' because it doesn't override the principal I've set forth.
@correctionguy "You're confusing questioning God with just simply having unquestionable logic. Like 'I think therefore I am' you can't then say 'But the bible says...' because it doesn't override the principal I've set forth."
Again you MUST FIRST demonstrate human reasoning and conclusions in this universe ALSO apply to God who is separate and distinct from this universe. We don't have the luxury to simply assume God is subject to the same natural laws we are.
@nvutube7 I mustn't because God is not apparent anyway. I'm using logic to disprove your God before he's even evidential. It's not a natural law, it's philosophical reasoning, it has nothing to do with nature, it has to do with the words he's purported to have communicated to us and if the communication has failed then the whole religion falls in on itself because God has failed at communication. We can do that better than him and he's the omnipotent one.
@correctionguy "I step away from the solipsistic views of most people and consider us as more of a oneness...Consider that every particles in your body has been part of something else in the universe at some point."
Sounds like the Bible...."God is one," "we live and move and have our being in Him." Jesus said "I in you, you in me and I in the Father."
@nvutube7 ...expanded from a singularity to experience itself subjectively. Consider that every particles in your body has been part of something else in the universe at some point. You’ve probably shared some hydrogen, carbon, oxygen and nitrogen with some truly magnificent people before you and the water molecules you drink have washed through the systems of millions upon millions of organisms before you. We share this universe. The death of others has made possible the life of us and this...
@nvutube7 ...still doesn’t mean spirituality is impossible.
But it is illogical to say it when it's YOUR specific omnipotent and omniscient God; for example, if he already knows the results yet chooses to create us anyway and condemn us to hell regardless, even though we were completely by his own design, including the ‘choice’ to not believe in him, then that is an illogical situation for an apparently omni-benevolent God and it would actually be his responsibility for my design, not my own.
@correctionguy "The only thing that would make any sense is if he has also been created and is being forced through the same illogically arduous torture that we are apparently subject to."
I agree. And that is exactly what happened. Jesus Christ was God in flesh. "The Word became flesh and dwelt among us." "He was tried in all points as we are, yet He was without sin." Jesus Himself had to have faith, trust in God. On the cross He said "my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me," yet trusted.
This "refutation" is bizzare and ultimately self-defeating.
Just because a question such as "who created the creator" leads to an infinite regress does not mean the question can be ignored. Furthermore this is not destructive to science (which is able to tolerate gaps in knowledge) but only to those who insist they have a complete answer (i.e. religion).
Lane uses God to end his infinite regress by claiming that God is causeless and infinite even though, nothing can be causeless or infinite (which is the reasoning Lane himself uses to assert that God exists in the first place). This is "special pleading" and it's spurious. If your claim requires an exemption to work, you DO logically have to explain the exemption, which Lane can't do. Dawkins is right and this is typical Lane pseudo-logic.
729 thumbs down and a thumbs-upped comment that says philosophy of science is bullshit. This is proof that people don't know shit about science in this new pseudo-atheist-science-fan hype. If you read The God Delusion and don't notice how incredibly flawed Dawkins' rebuttal of god is, within the same logic you idolize in the scientific method, then you're just in need of some proper education on history and philosophy of science. Stop being Dawkins' tape recorders.
The infinite regress isn't pseudo-logic, it's just an accepted pain in the arse which we will all run into. The real problem is finding an axiom to end it with, something which is probably going to be done in logic sooner than in faith.
Accepting that there is, at some point in the creation of life chain, a God absolutely does not stop the inquiring mind from asking where did God come from. The greatest question any child can ask is "why?" And there is no shame in answering "I don't know." "God did it" should never be the end of the exploration, any more than "Joe did it," "Mom did it," or "I did it."
@mrvetdvm Nope. By his logic here, Evolution is also crap. They can explain the ancestry of certain species but can't account for how DNA could ever have come about by natural means, or even how inanimate matter began living in the first place. Let's not even go into where the matter for the Big Bang came from...
@chessnotdice Or with that reason, if the theory (i dont believe in it but there are people who do) that the matter have always been there and you reject that as nothing can have excisted forever, nor can something never come from nothing, then how did god come into existence.
Here you can always take your cowards retreat if your religious (im not saying you are but im just continuing your idea here) that god doesnt obey by any laws. This doesnt however explain anything at all..
@Porkusido Clearly though something must have existed 'forever'- there must be something in the universe that had no beginning. I don't think it's necessarily a cowards retreat to say that God doesn't exist within the laws of physics. Any being capable of creating the universe wouldn't be bound by it's laws. The fact is if you go far enough back there was something that was eternal- had no beginning as we understand it. The question is what that was. I am religious, as in I believe in God, but..
If your god is in fact so far beyond the limits of the universe, then why then can it not influence reality? I mean you don't see things magically come into existence for no apparent reason, yet that's the sum or Craig's argument!
A nonphysical magical being which has never been observed is the best explanation for the formation of the universe?
@chessnotdice Well, then you still assume that it is possible for something to excist forever.. How do you know that the universe isnt eternal?
Im just saying that accepting a creator outside of the laws of the universe is the same as saying that there are "materials" that can excist outside of those laws. Why does that have to be god? we dont know anything about that mysterious "materia" so it can be just about anything. All im saying is that the scientific method is the ONLY available option.
@Porkusido The realm of quantum physics is already suggesting that many of our long held ideas about the nature of reality are shaky. What your saying is what certain scientists always say; "If we can't measure or study it, it can't exist." There is some evidence for intelligent design- admittedly a hard sell- DNA being a code/language being I think the best. I do believe in God through the evidence of my personal experience with Him, although that's subjective of course so not accepted...
@chessnotdice I agree totally.There is no other way.Simply the fact that we are finite in knowledge, leaves us only faith.No matter what worldview glasses we put on to view the world, we ultimately have to trust them which we have no way of proving can or even reflects reality correctly.
To say we are"well on our way to learning everything,"is pure faith and complete ignorance.We haven't the slightest clue where we stand and how much is left to learn! But faith is strong even in the atheist!
@Porkusido ...but also I see real hard evidence for his existence. Evolution isn't nearly as solid a theory as the layman realises, and the Big Bang is shaky too (although when they talk about all the matter in the universe exploding outwards- wouldn't that be very like a creation event? Perhaps God has the ability to turn energy into matter? I digress...) I nurture no ill will towards anyone who believes differently to me, but what no one can understand is that no matter what, it will always...
@Porkusido ...take a measure of faith to believe in God. There will always be that leap there, even if we do accept there is evidence. Considering all the gaps, it also takes a certain amount of faith to believe Evolution, and indeed to put all your trust in the scientific method, which perhaps by its very nature, is not qualified to comment upon the spiritual.
@Porkusido ...I never ever use cop out arguments or just repeat what I've been told. I love science and scientific progress in fact, but still believe it has a long way to go.
No natural process exist that will "gather" the seemingly infinite amount/variety of moving, communicating parts into a single working area (cell)... not to mention it's DNA and the encoders with their parts, all which need predetermined, info-imbedded to function. It's been proven that our universe had a beginning. Every watch had a watchmaker, but somehow reality which is millions of times more complex and in need of predetermined laws, planetary alignments, ect... to work didn't have a maker?
The idea behind the answer to "why is there something rather than nothing" is that it will be self-explanatory, as in it will support itself and require no further explanation.
regarding general claims craig's point stands. however, the claim that dawkins refers to is "things exist and since existence of everything must have an explanation obviously the answer is god".
so it's not dawkins that's saying every explanation needs an explanation, it's the argument he is addressing that is saying it. dawkins is simply pointing out that if you assume "all things that exist are created" the answer cannot be "god created them" because "god" is also a thing.
so once again, craig demonstrates his incredible ability to build up a logically flawless argumention upon a basis that he randomly assumes or just puts in his adversary's mouth.
Dr. William Lane Craig is pretty dumb. I might as well say an invisible goblin created the universe and say the goblin needs no explanation, just because I said so.
@MegaParadox69 "Dr. William Lane Craig is pretty dumb. I might as well say an invisible goblin created the universe and say the goblin needs no explanation, just because I said so."
Your still describing THE eternal, immaterial, non-spatial personal God. You just named Him "invisible goblin."
Any uncaused, immaterial, non-spatial personal cause for all that has been caused by definition describes God no matter what you call Him.
Religious people are wrong. We don't have any reason to believe in Heaven or Hell. Prayer can be proven to not work at all. EVER. So what's it all about? Why do you believe in supernatural nonsense? I just don't get it.
Dawkins isn't necessarily implying that at all! Lane craig is actually the one deluded in his own distorted logic. He simply ISNT thinking outside the box. He's applying rules to govern all notions based on a very credible question raised when people assert that the universe is 'desgined'... Like applying a mathmatical formular to Dawkins reply. Besides the altenate then would mean (if craig was correct) That god doesn't exist because the Universe doesn't need an explanation at all.
@SC75116 Wait what? "God doesn't exist BECAUSE the universe doesn't need an explanation?" The hell...? So: "The universe doesn't need an explanation, therefore there is no explanation, therefore that is proof that God does not exist?" You're kidding me right? Sometimes the ignorance of atheists actually amazes me... it really, literally, does. Good luck with that anyway.
@AcAwSk8Vids MY point, which you have clearly failed to understand is that Craig is saying there is no explanation of the explanation (GOD) and Dawkins is saying that there should be. This is not pseudologic AT ALL! In fact it amazing ME how ARROGANT people like him and yourself are. Craig says if you explain the explanation then you have to keep going and going and you can't do that. Well, why not? who decides where the explanations stop? Maybe there were creators of the creator!
@SC75116 No you're saying that the universe should not have an explanation because you don't *want* there to be an explanation because then you would have to accept God and you hate God.
I don't think that's his argument, that you need "an explanation for an explanation". Your explanation needs to be based on evidence, and the God hypothesis isn't. Therefore, the idea of God is not a valid explanation.
The meta-explanation for all explanations is the laws of physics. The criteria for their validity is evidence.
@blackmichael75 The error in your reasoning is in trying to apply the criteria of physical evidence to a non-physical cause which is distinct from the physical world.You must first demonstrate that a non-physical cause NOT extended in space must be / can be observed by physical evidence.Your asking for a physical manifestation of that which is non-physical.
Interestingly, the laws of logic and the absurdity of the contrary point to the same attributes that describe the biblical God exactly.
@nvutube7 No they don't. They don't describe the Biblical God accurately at all. The big bang, the original rapid expansion from which the universe formed, is not outside of the physical world, and needs no metaphysical justification. The ball is in your court, you're the one who has yet to adduce one proof of a supernatural cause.
@blackmichael75 Another means by which we can cross check the existence of an uncaused cause is the fact that the cause of the Big Bang is, according to Einstein’s own definition of space-time, outside of space and time itself – and that any explanation for the origin of the universe which does not invoke infinite regress of causes (which is absurd) requires an uncaused cause. A fully logical answer is a metaphysical cause of the Big Bang.
@nvutube7 That's what I'm saying. You still have all your work ahead of you, because this extra-physical cause that you postulate, one might more accurately call it a process, is not in any way identical to the Abrahamic God, or any other God. It is simply something which we do not know.
@blackmichael75 "You still have all your work ahead of you, because this extra-physical cause that you postulate, one might more accurately call it a process,"
Any *process* that we know of takes place in the context of a physical universe of time and space. Again, you are applying the same laws that where created to the cause. The law of cause and effect does not apply to the original first eternal cause. Something has always existed, unless you accept everything came from nothing.
@blackmichael75 "is not in any way identical to the Abrahamic God, "
I agree, because God is the uncaused cause. A process does not account for or apply to His eternal existence.
Secondly, the fact that communication and information even exist in the universe points to this cause as personal. Information is immaterial. It's cause must be immaterial. These exist only in the realm of mind. Information is ALWAYS top down, NEVER bottom up.
@nvutube7 You really have to start providing evidence for your claims, or you will just end up talking nonsense. Information is not immaterial. It utilises the human body, and human technology. Again it can be explained in completely naturalistic terms, as can consciousness itself.
@blackmichael75 "You really have to start providing evidence for your claims,or you will just end up talking nonsense."
I am,it's simply evidence you don't accept.
"Information is not immaterial."
A blank CD and one full of information (data) both weigh the same. Why? Because information is immaterial, not extended in space. Matter and energy only carry it.
"Again it can be explained in completely naturalistic terms, as can consciousness itself."
@blackmichael75 LOL consciousness itself can be explained in completely naturalistic terms? Write a PhD thesis about it and win the Nobel Prize then, what are you still doing in youtube? From your comment I was under the impression if don't approve of saying anything without "providing evidence for your claims". So either you should be working on that Nobel Prize or you don't know the first thing about the metaphysical discussion on physicalism vs. dualism, qualia and so on.
@MarlosZappa I do have a philosophy degree, believe it or not. I'm not arguing for a naive realism, just for a pragmatic one, maybe, a provisional one. My own position is a materialist one. I do argue against idealism and supernaturalism.That's a perfectly valid philosophical position.
@blackmichael75 My point was that the qualia and consciousness have still not been explained in terms of the brain's neural system. Doesn't make physicalism invalid, of course. It's perfectly valid to be one, IF you studied philosophy, know the metaphysical discussion, understand what dualism is, and concepts like qualia and so on, and are still just not convinced by it. What pisses me off is when people simply repeat Dawkins like tape recorders and don't even know squat about dualism.
@MarlosZappa Well, I did study philosophy, I talked about this at length in my dissertation and in the presentation I had to do. What I argued for was, to coin a phrase, a provisional realism, in line with materialism and opposed to idealism and dualism. A perfectly valid philosophical position. Within that, yes, we know the limits of the scientific method but we have to re-affirm its great pragmatic usefulness.
@blackmichael75 I'm an engineer, I know what you mean. I live from the scientific method and I value philosophy. My original comment was about people repeating Dawkins' and Hitchens' incredibly flawed arguments and saying absurdly stupid things like "philosophy of science? what is this bullshit?". It's not your case, I got that. But there are so many pseudo-atheist youtube trollers that don't have the slightest clue about metaphysics and rant here like Dawkins' tape recorders. Unbelievable.
@MarlosZappa I agree. My position is a pragmatic agnosticism. There are a lot of crude scientific reductionists here, but I think a lot of that comes from being subjected to prejudice from Christians. That may be enough to drive an independently-minded person into reductionism. Also, I think the basic message of Dawkins et al is correct, and to deny that can only be to lend more credence to the religious extremists.
@blackmichael75 And, also, you said consciousness could be perfectly explained in naturalistic terms. Just isn't correct, and I had to point that out, since you were telling someone about how they should be providing evidence for their claims. Other from that I believe you, I'm just said you're an informed, educated minority, and most people just choose a side and babble arguments without thinking about them.
@MarlosZappa Ok, perhaps what I should've said was that consciousness can *potentially* by explained in naturalistic terms, as I believe it can. In any case there is no need for a supernatural explanation. I'm all for philosophical nuances, but we have to be careful that we don't fall into, on the one hand, crude materialism, and on the other, supernatural nonsense. Make your philosophical points but please don't lend credence to the biblical literalists.
@blackmichael75 Hence, "John 1:1-3 In the beginning was the *Word,* and the *Word* was with God, and the *Word* was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made."
What is a word? Information carried by matter in space and time. Jesus Christ was the first born of physical creation. He existed before creation. Jesus Christ is the spoken Word of God. The mind that created the universe.
@nvutube7 It does no good at all to quote the Bible, because the Bible does not hold any particular weight in interpreting the real world. It holds exactly as much weight as any other creation myth. You have to separate your personal beliefs, or something that you read in a book, with the actuality of the universe, as experienced through the senses.
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nvutube7 6 minutes ago
@chessnotdice
If your god is in fact so far beyond the limits our understanding, then that would explain why were just beating a dead horse trying to discern god with logic. I mean you don't see things coming into existence from non-existence, so that's why Craig has a valid argument!
A nonphysical being which could never be subjected to empirical testing could very well be responsible for the formulation of the universe!
BattleshipAgincount 6 hours ago
William still hasn't explained who created the creator.
Ragnarockalypse 13 hours ago
How is William Lane Craig even allowed to be called a philosopher, Dawkin's is talking about the factual/empirical foundation of a statement which would be missing if you assume the supernatural creator, the reason William thinks it is preposterous in this situation is because there is no supernatural creator and thus there would need to be infinite explanations because it would never have stemmed from reality, like for example evolution does thus only a finite number of explanations is needed
fromaginator1 18 hours ago
his argument is in the methodology, he is saying that a true and proveable answer is one which requires no assumptions, God just existing requires an assumption which is unproveable therfore no answer at all and this then becomes a philosphical point not a scientific point,so while there is room to beleive what you want just remember that the church would have burned darwin if they had got the chance and has never been a friend of any knowledge which did not give them power
pmalsmith 1 day ago
It is not the argument that is inept and it is not Dawkins...leaves the door wide open as to whom it is.
nicksynnz 1 day ago
Lane Craig is a fucking moron. This is about the stupidest thing I have ever even heard, of course 'the magic man done it' isn't an explanation! Who believes this idiocy?
HugeJohn51 1 day ago
Magic man done it!
kipsdaddy 1 day ago
also infinity = no eplanation and you wouldnt have science. Dont Christians live for eternity in heven?
mrcool9191 2 days ago
I dont know why people think the big bang was the moment of creation. As far as I'm concerned it was the event that caused the universe to be the way it is today. Why is it so hard to comprehend that their could have been an existance before that? Why is it always rulled out?
mrcool9191 2 days ago 2
@mrcool9191 To defend religion in this way and attack science that, just as it happens has contradicted religious beliefs is so very wrong. We were not put here by a creator along with all the other animals and plants for us to use as we saw fit. A greater power governs us and the universe. Our larger evolved brains has enabled us to find the truth in our quest for knowledge. Chimps are our cousins! One life as there is no other and we will return from whence we came.
currie1967 1 day ago
@currie1967 errm... thanks dude. what religion are you?atheist?
mrcool9191 22 hours ago
Not if the explanation does what it's mean to do: EXPLAIN
AegisMU 2 days ago
Metaphors converge with reality, therefore God exists. *epic face to the palm action*
correctionguy 2 days ago
It just dawned on me, that Craig's implication that we'd need an explanation of the explanation... isn't a destruction of science, but it is a neverending quest for knowledge. Many scientists agree that science will never be complete, that there will never be a point where the community can stop, look around, and say "Well, that's everything guys, last one out gets the light". So why stop trying to explain things at the beginning of the universe?
Samuelwhatshisface 2 days ago
@Samuelwhatshisface Well you have to make a verdict because certain terminal questions such as where will I go when I die need an answer. For example certain court cases can go on forever with scores of minute details but judge has to make a ruling at some point based on the currently available evidence.
Product1999 2 days ago
@Product1999 In a court case, it is to decide the ongoing fate of a person, whereas I don't see any reason to see death as a continuation of anything... I certainly don't think I need to be concerned about where I'm going when I die, but how much I can achieve while I'm alive.
And BTW, you're talking about ends, I'm talking about origins; Craig's statement about an infinite regress is implicative that we look to know everything, when we know we can't.
Samuelwhatshisface 2 days ago
@Samuelwhatshisface The fact that you don't see death as a continuation of anything does not mean there is no continuation afterward death. As you stated we can't know everything so you being unable to find a reason to believe in something does not negate the existence of said thing. So have fun achieving things when you're alive but i hope you are aware you will die and lose those things.
Product1999 7 hours ago
@Product1999 I see no reason to believe in life after death, as well as any religious belief in particular.
On top of that, let's say for arguments sake, that the judeo-christian afterlife is real. If I live my life furthering man kind, but am tortured for non-belief of something without evidence, would I want to be associated with a being that could implement such a system? No, I wouldn't. Such a being would be, in my eyes, monstrous.
Samuelwhatshisface 4 hours ago
Craig: How could the universe have come from nothing?!
Dawkins: I dunno. Maybe it did, maybe it didn't. Kinda' hard to examine.
Craig: But God made the universe!
Dawkins: So where did God come from?
Craig: Umm.. nothing?
Dawkins: *Facepalm*
Me: What the hell is nothing? XD
Storchillarn 2 days ago
@Storchillarn 1st Law of thermodynamics. God is the always present energy by which everything is formed. Take your palm out of your face now.
Product1999 2 days ago
@Product1999 I see what you did there. You followed the pseudo logic of Craig which means you can state pretty much anything and assert it's true because, in your delusional mind, it is an explanation and doesn't need an explanation. That's like me saying "you're an atheist" followed by you refuting it, demanding an explanation which could possibly affirm my claim. I then go "No, no, no! Look, I already explained that you're an atheist. I don't have to explain the explanation."
Storchillarn 1 day ago
'God did it' is NOT an explanation!
jiberish001 3 days ago 3
why do people actually believe that craig's bullshit makes ANY SENSE?!?! It's freakin 2012!!! I cant believe this guy has supporters.
trashbash2001 3 days ago
@trashbash200 Shut up. I can't believe you were even allowed to make this comment.
Product1999 2 days ago
@Product1999 um why, who "allows" you to make the comments you make?
it's just how i feel. it amazes me that there are ppl out there who actually follow a bs artist. Is it not obvious that THAT's what he is??
Dawkins finds evidence, and reports it. Craig says there's a god in the sky, based off faith. How does this not sound crazy, and why do you want to shut me up?
trashbash2001 2 days ago
@trashbash2001 No it is not obvious. a BS artist can't usually backup their claims with logic. Mostly what I hear are personal sweeping attacks such as he is a "BS Artist". That is a meaningless statement if you think he is BSing then refute his argument. Name calling is for people with no argument. Science says the Universe had a beginning Craig uses science to male conclusions as well and furthermore science corroborates the Bible.
Product1999 7 hours ago
Hawkins' argument is unbelievably bad in about three ways. Craig only mentions one of them.
smmclaug75 3 days ago
Ohhh skycake!
jameslove959 3 days ago
How do people who believe in god have any explanation for their belief when there is absolutely NO evidence that god exists? Doesn't the total lack of evidence destroy the credibility of their claim or am I missing something here? I'd like to remain open-minded but in the absence of any evidence that something exists I would tend to think that the thing does not exist. Subsequently discovered evidence may prove otherwise. I will patiently wait and live in hope for some evidence BUT hmmm.
AsTheHawkFlies 3 days ago
You do need an explanation of a explanation x when explanation x claims the existence of something which we have not yet proven, beyond reasonable doubt, to exist. Craig yet again being a complete dolt.
BeestOfSpood 4 days ago
ok....so god is the best explanation?
Kingding6 4 days ago
Dawkins did not ask for an explanation of the explanation. He asked for an explanation of the existence of the designer. There is no infinite regress. Once you explain how the designer came to be, you stop. There's no explaining of explanations, unless of course somebody doesn't understand them and you need to explain. Craig confuses 'God', a character in the explanation, with the explanation itself.
Meanman332 4 days ago
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smbndt 4 days ago
"you don't have to have an explanation of an explanation"
lol, Willy Lame Craig's Cosmological Argument is all about "explanation of an explanation of an explanation..".
"the universe began to exist therefore has a cause".."that cause was God because God hasn't a begining".."this God is a personal God because the universe is designed"
And there's also his typical strawman arguments. "if there was infinity you would never have an explanation for everything which would destroy science" fuckinlol
ZZzzzzzWhat 5 days ago 2
@ZZzzzzzWhat
straw man arguments?...exactly. Thats what he is trying to point out. Asking what created God is a pointless question that atheists always ask as if it is their home-run bat,it doesn't do anything to disprove His existence like he just said and you just admitted.
mo389 4 days ago
@mo389 The question "what created God" is not a strawman argument. search for the meaning of 'strawman argument'.
"it doesn't do anything to disprove His existence" no it doesnt disprove "His" existence because "His" existence was never proved on the first place.
"like he just said and you just admitted." lol really? where did i just admitted?
ZZzzzzzWhat 4 days ago
I don't understand how God doesn't require an explanation. How can something so complicated, that it has the ability to create the entire universe, the laws of physics, life, etc, not? How can that just exist? Like Dawkins has said, when they can explain the origin of the universe, it'll be something very simple that doesn't lead to an infinite regress.
Undertaker3879 5 days ago
So WLC basically says "I don't wanna talk about it" and he wins? Riiiiiiight.
TheBiAtheist 5 days ago
(continued) Similarly with science, we can only measure and prove what our instruments can detect. By the definition of God you can never prove or disprove God's existence. Paradoxically, you cannot even sufficiently define God, because God is something that is so far beyond our realm of understanding, something that the human brain will never be able to compehend.
bizeeyo 5 days ago
@bizeeyo Your right, we can't even understand the quantum physics contained in our own universe. Reminds me of what Christ said, "If I have told you earthly things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe, if I tell you of heavenly things?" John 3-12
nvutube7 5 days ago
My biggest problem with dawkins is that he believes that someday everything will be explained. Unfortunately, it seems the more that science reveals, the more that we realize that even more has yet to be answered and revealed. An answer will inevitably create more questions.
The best metaphor i''ve read is that if you comb a lake with a fishing net, every square inch of it, have you caught all the fish? Well it depends on the net. Smaller fish might have slipped through the holes.
bizeeyo 5 days ago
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@bizeeyo "The best metaphor i''ve read is that if you comb a lake with a fishing net, every square inch of it, have you caught all the fish? Well it depends on the net. Smaller fish might have slipped through the holes."
Exactly. Just like the net, the apparatus of physical investigation man has (science) using human senses can only detect (catch) that which it is capable of catching. Of course it produces results (catches fish) but we have NO way of know what its not catching!
Hense Faith!
nvutube7 5 days ago
Why is there something rather than nothing shows the limits of science because it isn't a scientific question. Science can only seek the cause of something in something. If it ever postulated nothing it would fail its task. But there is no something that could have given rise to the universe other than something else and that something must be God, it can't come from nothing.
socrateskantian 5 days ago
Actually, isn't the "explanation of an explanation" exactly what Science works towards? What is this object? An apple. Where did it come from? A tree. Where did the tree come from? It grew. Where did it grow from? A seed. How did the seed become a whole tree? Metabolisis. Why don't other small objects, like rocks, become trees?
On and on, ad nauseum, right down to atoms, and even beyond that. Science aims to show all the FUNDAMENTAL (i.e. base) truths and reasons behind things....
sdsmith29 5 days ago
I don't get how God could condemn someone for not believing in something he himself absolutely cannot believe. The only thing that would make any sense is if he has also been created and is being forced through the same illogically arduous torture that we are apparently subject to.
correctionguy 6 days ago
@correctionguy "I don't get how God could condemn someone for not believing in something he himself absolutely cannot believe."
We have all gone astray from what we know is right. None of us has ever chosen to do right all the time. We have willfully chose the wrong repeatedly. God has no choice but to give us what we chose. Heaven is for those who through patience and much tribulation and endurance demonstrate they chose to do right in the absence of any force to do so.
nvutube7 6 days ago
@nvutube7 Physically speaking, a child can have no knowledge of concepts until it is conscious, capable of language and can obtain and understand the knowledge.
It is also morally wrong and reprehensible to teach a child that they are inherently evil and must believe something without reason or suffer eternal damnation.
Your concept of God is omnipotent, he is all powerful, to say he has no choice is illogical.
correctionguy 6 days ago
@correctionguy Correct, the knowledge of sin is when guilt applies. The age of accountability is different individuals. Only God can know that.
How can anything be morally reprehensible in a universe where nothing *ought* to be any specific way? We are all meaningless sacks of molecules simply acting and reacting to the laws of physics and chemistry.
Its not illogical to say God chooses not to force us to make choices.
nvutube7 5 days ago
@nvutube7 Not true, I have knowledge of sin, but I don't feel guilt over my failure of an impossible task made such due to how I was supposedly constructed by the being that's saying it's wrong to fail the task at hand. A more ideal God would be capable of not only designing a being with at least the possibility of being sinless, but also his own merciful 'forgiveness' of us for his own failure to design us properly in the first place. What I was actually saying is that to have knowledge of...
correctionguy 5 days ago
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@correctionguy "A more ideal God would be capable of not only designing a being with at least the possibility of being sinless, but also his own merciful 'forgiveness' of us for his own failure to design us properly in the first place."
True, we are bound to the physical bodies given us, we had no choice in that. But we DO have part in creating our own moral character. When we willfully choose to lie, cheat etc., it then becomes easier the next time to do it. That is OUR doing, not Gods.
nvutube7 4 days ago
@nvutube7 ...anything you must have your brain physically developed to a certain extent.
Because morals are a human concept, a culturally subjective phenomenon. Let's analyse your objective morals for a second for a broader view, God says you can rape the virgins of a people you conquered and to murder every other man, woman and child, culturally that's clearly immoral, but you must believe it is good due to the following two logical fallacies. Firstly, an appeal to authority; you've based...
correctionguy 5 days ago
@nvutube7 ...your morality on an apparent incontrovertible authority and have no personal opinion on what is good, even though I would hope you would agree that rape is immoral, no matter the circumstances. Secondly, an argumentum ad baculum fallacy; out of fear of punishment for doing wrong by your God, who clearly supports rape, slavery and murder throughout the old testament, so long as the victims aren't part of God's special people.
Evolution never states there is no meaning, nor that we...
correctionguy 5 days ago
@correctionguy Nothing new here. Please provide the verse/s you are referring to (such as Numbers and Deuteronomy etc) and lets examine them thoroughly and in context and lets see what you are excluding and over looking.
Nothing wrong with doing what is right out of fear. Fear is a healthy motivator. When doc informs me my smoking is going to kill me if I keep it up, I will and did quit smoking because of the TRUTH told to me and the fear of it's consequences.
nvutube7 4 days ago
@nvutube7 Dude, if you don't even know where it says that, then I'm pretty worried if you actually read the bible and that didn't strike you as disturbing. The record of the attack on the Midianites in Numbers 31.
No, doing something and considering that right BECAUSE of fear is a logical fallacy. The difference there is that you are receiving factual information from a credible source and there is no moral dilemma in that situation. Your comparing highly researched topics to ancient text.
correctionguy 4 days ago
@correctionguy I know the verses. I just want you to pinpoint where YOU believe it demonstrates that God condones rape!
We all have starting presuppositions,which we must take by faith, we can't prove them. Mine is the Holy Bible. If the source of moral absolutes says something is right, then it's right. Though we may not understand why completely in the absence of complete revelation and circumstance. Remember, God is THE judge, THE rightful avenger. He can use humans to carry out judgment.
nvutube7 3 days ago
@nvutube7 Dude, there is no pinpointing these verses, they're throughout the entire bible. What did Moses do after just been given a commandment not to murder? He murdered everyone who disagreed with God. All of Deuteronomy 22 shows that women are considered material for the father and husband. It goes on and on.
Faith must be rationalised though, there is not a shred of evidence for God's existence, yet you assert that your faith is equal to my belief that I just put bread into a toaster.
correctionguy 3 days ago
@nvutube7 If we cannot comprehend something that God says to be true then God is failing in communication, something we can do better and God seems to have trouble doing this through anything other than the medium of ancient book.
Remember, God is NOT evidential, God IS a contradictory. You are attempting to justify rape, you do not see what is wrong with your morals?
correctionguy 3 days ago
@nvutube7 ...are under the complete control of the forces that affect us, because in either case, creation or evolution, the possibility for freewill must be seen in the particles that make up the universe. Spirituality can also exist, but unfounded claims should be treated as such and we should always suspend belief if there is a lack of evidence. I believe we apply our own meaning to the universe. I step away from the solipsistic views of most people and consider us as more of a oneness...
correctionguy 5 days ago
@correctionguy "Spirituality can also exist, but unfounded claims should be treated as such and we should always suspend belief if there is a lack of evidence."
Please first demonstrate that the "spiritual," to be believed and evidenced must come through the scientific method which detects and examines only physical phenomena.
Your asking for physical evidence for an immaterial reality not extended in space. Perhaps as MANY already know, the spiritual is necessarily basic. We simply know.
nvutube7 4 days ago
@nvutube7 Something that is claimed to have interacted with the physical world has to leave some kind of mark or evidence, or it simply can be assumed it didn't exist, or in the least you should suspend your belief until further knowledge can be attained. The supernatural, if it exists, should theoretically be subject to the same observation as anything else physical. If you can sense it, or if it can interact with this world then there is physical manifestation happening and it can be examined.
correctionguy 4 days ago
@correctionguy Biological coded information, instructions carried and transmitted via matter and energy is evidence of mind interacting with the physical world. Software is ALWAYS the artifact of mind. It is ALWAYS produced top down NEVER bottom up. Hardware NEVER accounts for the software running it. Coded information (software) runs life (the hardware.)
John 1:1 In the beginning was the Word (information), and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
nvutube7 3 days ago
@correctionguy Information is immaterial. You again are asking for a physical manifestation of something immaterial. Quite absurd. Yes it certainly does take matter and energy to carry, measure and observe information. Ironically as we have entered into the information age we have also discovered the information at the heart of all life. The Mind that created everything is YELLING VERY LOUD!
Software ONLY comes from mind. Can you hear Him?
nvutube7 3 days ago
@nvutube7 No, I am not, there needs to be evidence for something to believe in it. I'm saying if most of the purported supernatural exists, if mythologies like your God are real, then they have interacted with the universe, there had to be physical manifestation, like the burning bush, if not an illusion of the mind, there would be a physical burning bush and a voice coming from it specifically, Moses should have analysed it before heading off on his shroom trip.
correctionguy 3 days ago
@correctionguy "I believe we apply our own meaning to the universe."
Precisely, which is subjective and not objective meaning. Hitler and Charles Manson also applied their own meaning and purpose to the universe.
nvutube7 4 days ago
@nvutube7 Which is exactly what is important, if something is an objective belief then it cannot be questioned. If Hitler or Manson's opinions were objective then we'd be screwed, that's the beauty of subjective reasoning and rationality. Thank you for bringing them up, you helped my point completely. There needs to be a choice in the matter of what something means to you, otherwise you cannot justify when something of the objective matter is absurd.
correctionguy 4 days ago
@correctionguy Your missing the point. If there really is no objective moral absolutes, then anything goes. Hitler and Mansons moral opinion is just as valid as yours. Only the theist has a rationally justified moral basis to ground his moral beliefs on. If there is a Law Giver then there is a basis for morality. The atheist cannot live out the moral implications of his own belief. Sacks of molecules (us) stealing from other sacks of molecules can't be right or wrong. There is no "ought" way.
nvutube7 3 days ago
@nvutube7 Yes, anything goes, but that does not mean all moral views are equal. The monotheist is not moral, he is committing an argumentum ad baculum fallacy, as I already stated before, he is being "good" only because he is being threatened, not for the sake of morality. I am making my own morals through rational analysis, the moral system of mine is equal between all humans, causes no suffering and is my own decision and therefore superior to Hitler's...
correctionguy 3 days ago
@correctionguy False. Once you understand Biblical theology, which stands in stark contrast to ALL OTHER religions, you will see why one is saved by grace and what that means. Grace is unmerited favor. I can't earn my salvation by "doing" right. All other religions man must do enough good, must merit his salvation, must make his way to God. In Christianity, God came down to man in flesh and died in his place. Offering Himself. It is a free gift to all who believe.....
nvutube7 2 days ago
@nvutube7 Then you are doing it out of reward. On either end, it is illogical to call it morality. If 'grace' and eternal happiness are the rewards then you are not being moral. You've gone from one extreme to the other. There is no reason why you cannot do good for the sake of loving your fellow human, why must you love God to be good to your community? It's immoral. There is no alienation from something that does not evidentially exist, God is the one alienating himself, why does he hide?
correctionguy 2 days ago
@correctionguy God is hidden from those who do not love righteousness. John 3:19-21 And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh to the light,"
You do not look for God because of sin you are afraid to give up. It's that simple. Thieves dont look for cops.
nvutube7 2 days ago
@nvutube7 So, you're saying that there are no good non-Christians, that Gandhi was an evil sinner, that every person not exposed to Abrahamic religions are just too evil. I'm just too afraid to stop murdering, lying, stealing, committing adultery, coveting, worshipping other Gods, dishonouring my parents, making idols, misusing the name of God and keeping the Sabbath unholy. Great logic, dude.
correctionguy 2 days ago
@correctionguy God has purposely kept Himself from physical testing and observation. Instead chose to reveal Himself to those who have ears to hear and eyes to see perfect morality when it walks in human flesh. God walked among us in perfect righteousness in Jesus the Christ. Anyone who loves the truth will plainly see He was the Truth in perfect righteousness. Enough so to trust and follow by a step of faith that is rewarded with a evidenced relationship! A sin keeps you from God.
nvutube7 2 days ago
@nvutube7 Unless my dislike of rape and slavery is the thing keeping God from contacting me then there is no reason in the bible that I am not perfectly moral and why he can't communicate with me.
correctionguy 2 days ago
@correctionguy ...and that belief evidenced by ones actions. Doing right is the natural expression of that belief! We believe Jesus is the Christ, the Way, the Truth and the Life. If you BELIEVE that you will follow the Truth and the Way of righteousness BECAUSE you believe and agree that is the Way. Not because of a threat or out of fear. When you believe in and love someone you WANT to please them. Your view reveals your alienation from God and righteousness.
nvutube7 2 days ago
@nvutube7 I'm right here in the only place I'm aware of, if he's not here then how can I be alienating myself from him? Also, I've repeatedly shown you that with the existence of reward and punishment you cannot be moral. Morals are nothing but cultural. Good and bad are just perception and that is why they raped the Midianite virgins, there is no possible way that they were acting on objective morality because it is so clearly wrong to our culture.
correctionguy 2 days ago
@correctionguy Again I challenge you to show me where God condones rape. I challenge you.
nvutube7 2 days ago
@nvutube7 I did, I sent you the passage in one of the previous comments.
correctionguy 2 days ago
@correctionguy False, your morals are purely subjective and in NO way objectively superior to Hitlers. It is only superior to YOU. Again, you as an atheist have no basis to justify your moral opinions, hence the absurdity of trying to claim your own opinion is superior to another human beings. Your morals are therefore reduced to mere opinion, and everyone has one.
nvutube7 2 days ago
@nvutube7 There is superiority in subjectivity though, this culture shows my morality to be superior to Hitler's, his wasn't even the popular opinion for his own culture, he just happened to have power. Yes, you're getting it, morals are mere opinion, you are absolutely correct; for instance, various duck species' males must rape the women and both sexes genitalia have become quite complex, talk about battle of the sexes. It is good for a duck to rape for the continuation of the species.
correctionguy 2 days ago
@nvutube7 In no way can you justify the brutality of your God throughout the bible. All the murder, rape and slavery show that even if there were an objective morality, it is not your Gods, therefore, until we can find an objective morality which doesn't support those things, subjective morality is the only form and is far superior.
correctionguy 2 days ago
@nvutube7 Hitler's was unequal, made millions suffer and while his own morals were subjective, they were objective for his own subordinates, if they were to go against his commandments then they would die, much like God and monotheists. You would say that the objective morality of his subordinates is immoral, yet they were in the exact same position as you, threatened by the brutality of a maniacal leader.
correctionguy 3 days ago
@correctionguy False. You admit Hitlers morals where subjective. His subordinates would still be immoral because they would still be subjective even if claimed to be objective. But God's would be OBJECTIVE and CORRECT since He is the SOURCE of moral absolutes. So I am not in the same position.
nvutube7 2 days ago
@nvutube7 But they had no personal choice beyond death or conformance, which isn't as bad as God's which is eternal pain or conformance, Hitler's morality was objectively imposed upon the people.
correctionguy 2 days ago
@correctionguy You are not in a position to say eternal punishment is or is not merited if you are not a God who created a universe with free will moral agents and know the total consequences of sin and its effects. That again is simply your own subjective opinion.
nvutube7 2 days ago
@nvutube7 I am if I can use deductive knowledge to reason that he, due to omniscience, cannot logically send me to hell.
correctionguy 2 days ago
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@correctionguy "I am if I can use deductive knowledge to reason that he, due to omniscience, cannot logically send me to hell."
Again, you are applying classical Newtonian logic and finite human reasoning to what a God can and cannot do. He is not bound by natural law. Do we need to mention quantum physics again which tells us such things like one object can actually be in two places at the same time for example?
nvutube7 1 day ago
@nvutube7 How can you really question the logic I've put forth? An infinite punishment for a finite crime which he was completely aware of when he created the being. There is no other way to look at that, you can't just say 'because God', it doesn't hold up, or in the least, God lied about being omni-benevolent.
correctionguy 1 day ago
@nvutube7 You're confusing questioning God with just simply having unquestionable logic. Like 'I think therefore I am' you can't then say 'But the bible says...' because it doesn't override the principal I've set forth.
correctionguy 2 days ago
@correctionguy "You're confusing questioning God with just simply having unquestionable logic. Like 'I think therefore I am' you can't then say 'But the bible says...' because it doesn't override the principal I've set forth."
Again you MUST FIRST demonstrate human reasoning and conclusions in this universe ALSO apply to God who is separate and distinct from this universe. We don't have the luxury to simply assume God is subject to the same natural laws we are.
nvutube7 1 day ago
@nvutube7 I mustn't because God is not apparent anyway. I'm using logic to disprove your God before he's even evidential. It's not a natural law, it's philosophical reasoning, it has nothing to do with nature, it has to do with the words he's purported to have communicated to us and if the communication has failed then the whole religion falls in on itself because God has failed at communication. We can do that better than him and he's the omnipotent one.
correctionguy 1 day ago
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@correctionguy "I step away from the solipsistic views of most people and consider us as more of a oneness...Consider that every particles in your body has been part of something else in the universe at some point."
Sounds like the Bible...."God is one," "we live and move and have our being in Him." Jesus said "I in you, you in me and I in the Father."
Yep we are all one.
nvutube7 4 days ago
@nvutube7 ...expanded from a singularity to experience itself subjectively. Consider that every particles in your body has been part of something else in the universe at some point. You’ve probably shared some hydrogen, carbon, oxygen and nitrogen with some truly magnificent people before you and the water molecules you drink have washed through the systems of millions upon millions of organisms before you. We share this universe. The death of others has made possible the life of us and this...
correctionguy 5 days ago
@nvutube7 ...still doesn’t mean spirituality is impossible.
But it is illogical to say it when it's YOUR specific omnipotent and omniscient God; for example, if he already knows the results yet chooses to create us anyway and condemn us to hell regardless, even though we were completely by his own design, including the ‘choice’ to not believe in him, then that is an illogical situation for an apparently omni-benevolent God and it would actually be his responsibility for my design, not my own.
correctionguy 5 days ago
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@correctionguy "The only thing that would make any sense is if he has also been created and is being forced through the same illogically arduous torture that we are apparently subject to."
I agree. And that is exactly what happened. Jesus Christ was God in flesh. "The Word became flesh and dwelt among us." "He was tried in all points as we are, yet He was without sin." Jesus Himself had to have faith, trust in God. On the cross He said "my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me," yet trusted.
nvutube7 6 days ago
This "refutation" is bizzare and ultimately self-defeating.
Just because a question such as "who created the creator" leads to an infinite regress does not mean the question can be ignored. Furthermore this is not destructive to science (which is able to tolerate gaps in knowledge) but only to those who insist they have a complete answer (i.e. religion).
DanielRKirk 6 days ago
Lane uses God to end his infinite regress by claiming that God is causeless and infinite even though, nothing can be causeless or infinite (which is the reasoning Lane himself uses to assert that God exists in the first place). This is "special pleading" and it's spurious. If your claim requires an exemption to work, you DO logically have to explain the exemption, which Lane can't do. Dawkins is right and this is typical Lane pseudo-logic.
daisy20071 1 week ago
729 thumbs down and a thumbs-upped comment that says philosophy of science is bullshit. This is proof that people don't know shit about science in this new pseudo-atheist-science-fan hype. If you read The God Delusion and don't notice how incredibly flawed Dawkins' rebuttal of god is, within the same logic you idolize in the scientific method, then you're just in need of some proper education on history and philosophy of science. Stop being Dawkins' tape recorders.
MarlosZappa 1 week ago
The infinite regress isn't pseudo-logic, it's just an accepted pain in the arse which we will all run into. The real problem is finding an axiom to end it with, something which is probably going to be done in logic sooner than in faith.
TadEatsPeople 1 week ago
@TadEatsPeople Logic and faith aren't enemies.
chessnotdice 5 days ago
Accepting that there is, at some point in the creation of life chain, a God absolutely does not stop the inquiring mind from asking where did God come from. The greatest question any child can ask is "why?" And there is no shame in answering "I don't know." "God did it" should never be the end of the exploration, any more than "Joe did it," "Mom did it," or "I did it."
CharlesInMotion 1 week ago
Philosophers of science? What kind of bullshit is that?
ponchred 1 week ago
@ponchred lol true true
lobenjamin 1 week ago
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@ponchred "Philosophers of science? What kind of bullshit is that?"
Someone with a PhD in a branch of either mathematics, biology, physics or chemistry.
9hello123 1 week ago
what I would find funny is that a comedian were to mock dawkins
dancthegr 1 week ago
You are so dumb... Dawkins is dead on.
mrvetdvm 1 week ago 2
@mrvetdvm Nope. By his logic here, Evolution is also crap. They can explain the ancestry of certain species but can't account for how DNA could ever have come about by natural means, or even how inanimate matter began living in the first place. Let's not even go into where the matter for the Big Bang came from...
chessnotdice 5 days ago
@chessnotdice Or with that reason, if the theory (i dont believe in it but there are people who do) that the matter have always been there and you reject that as nothing can have excisted forever, nor can something never come from nothing, then how did god come into existence.
Here you can always take your cowards retreat if your religious (im not saying you are but im just continuing your idea here) that god doesnt obey by any laws. This doesnt however explain anything at all..
Porkusido 5 days ago
@Porkusido Clearly though something must have existed 'forever'- there must be something in the universe that had no beginning. I don't think it's necessarily a cowards retreat to say that God doesn't exist within the laws of physics. Any being capable of creating the universe wouldn't be bound by it's laws. The fact is if you go far enough back there was something that was eternal- had no beginning as we understand it. The question is what that was. I am religious, as in I believe in God, but..
chessnotdice 5 days ago
@chessnotdice
If your god is in fact so far beyond the limits of the universe, then why then can it not influence reality? I mean you don't see things magically come into existence for no apparent reason, yet that's the sum or Craig's argument!
A nonphysical magical being which has never been observed is the best explanation for the formation of the universe?
BattleshipAgincourt 5 days ago
@chessnotdice Well, then you still assume that it is possible for something to excist forever.. How do you know that the universe isnt eternal?
Im just saying that accepting a creator outside of the laws of the universe is the same as saying that there are "materials" that can excist outside of those laws. Why does that have to be god? we dont know anything about that mysterious "materia" so it can be just about anything. All im saying is that the scientific method is the ONLY available option.
Porkusido 5 days ago
@Porkusido The realm of quantum physics is already suggesting that many of our long held ideas about the nature of reality are shaky. What your saying is what certain scientists always say; "If we can't measure or study it, it can't exist." There is some evidence for intelligent design- admittedly a hard sell- DNA being a code/language being I think the best. I do believe in God through the evidence of my personal experience with Him, although that's subjective of course so not accepted...
chessnotdice 5 days ago
@chessnotdice I agree totally.There is no other way.Simply the fact that we are finite in knowledge, leaves us only faith.No matter what worldview glasses we put on to view the world, we ultimately have to trust them which we have no way of proving can or even reflects reality correctly.
To say we are"well on our way to learning everything,"is pure faith and complete ignorance.We haven't the slightest clue where we stand and how much is left to learn! But faith is strong even in the atheist!
nvutube7 5 days ago
@Porkusido ...but also I see real hard evidence for his existence. Evolution isn't nearly as solid a theory as the layman realises, and the Big Bang is shaky too (although when they talk about all the matter in the universe exploding outwards- wouldn't that be very like a creation event? Perhaps God has the ability to turn energy into matter? I digress...) I nurture no ill will towards anyone who believes differently to me, but what no one can understand is that no matter what, it will always...
chessnotdice 5 days ago
@Porkusido ...take a measure of faith to believe in God. There will always be that leap there, even if we do accept there is evidence. Considering all the gaps, it also takes a certain amount of faith to believe Evolution, and indeed to put all your trust in the scientific method, which perhaps by its very nature, is not qualified to comment upon the spiritual.
chessnotdice 5 days ago
@Porkusido ...I never ever use cop out arguments or just repeat what I've been told. I love science and scientific progress in fact, but still believe it has a long way to go.
chessnotdice 5 days ago
John Holmes created it all with his massive cock!
donnyaldridge 1 week ago
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william lane craig talks bull siht
beightone 1 week ago
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beightone 1 week ago
Dawkins is full of hot air...
dwhite1up 1 week ago
No natural process exist that will "gather" the seemingly infinite amount/variety of moving, communicating parts into a single working area (cell)... not to mention it's DNA and the encoders with their parts, all which need predetermined, info-imbedded to function. It's been proven that our universe had a beginning. Every watch had a watchmaker, but somehow reality which is millions of times more complex and in need of predetermined laws, planetary alignments, ect... to work didn't have a maker?
dwhite1up 1 week ago
The idea behind the answer to "why is there something rather than nothing" is that it will be self-explanatory, as in it will support itself and require no further explanation.
TakeItBySurprise 1 week ago
regarding general claims craig's point stands. however, the claim that dawkins refers to is "things exist and since existence of everything must have an explanation obviously the answer is god".
so it's not dawkins that's saying every explanation needs an explanation, it's the argument he is addressing that is saying it. dawkins is simply pointing out that if you assume "all things that exist are created" the answer cannot be "god created them" because "god" is also a thing.
Izraphel 1 week ago
so once again, craig demonstrates his incredible ability to build up a logically flawless argumention upon a basis that he randomly assumes or just puts in his adversary's mouth.
Izraphel 1 week ago
LOL OWNED
magicthunder666 1 week ago
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nvutube7 1 week ago
Dr. William Lane Craig is pretty dumb. I might as well say an invisible goblin created the universe and say the goblin needs no explanation, just because I said so.
MegaParadox69 1 week ago
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@MegaParadox69 "Dr. William Lane Craig is pretty dumb. I might as well say an invisible goblin created the universe and say the goblin needs no explanation, just because I said so."
Your still describing THE eternal, immaterial, non-spatial personal God. You just named Him "invisible goblin."
Any uncaused, immaterial, non-spatial personal cause for all that has been caused by definition describes God no matter what you call Him.
nvutube7 1 week ago
Religious people are wrong. We don't have any reason to believe in Heaven or Hell. Prayer can be proven to not work at all. EVER. So what's it all about? Why do you believe in supernatural nonsense? I just don't get it.
mouthyweasel 1 week ago
Dawkins isn't necessarily implying that at all! Lane craig is actually the one deluded in his own distorted logic. He simply ISNT thinking outside the box. He's applying rules to govern all notions based on a very credible question raised when people assert that the universe is 'desgined'... Like applying a mathmatical formular to Dawkins reply. Besides the altenate then would mean (if craig was correct) That god doesn't exist because the Universe doesn't need an explanation at all.
SC75116 1 week ago
@SC75116 Wait what? "God doesn't exist BECAUSE the universe doesn't need an explanation?" The hell...? So: "The universe doesn't need an explanation, therefore there is no explanation, therefore that is proof that God does not exist?" You're kidding me right? Sometimes the ignorance of atheists actually amazes me... it really, literally, does. Good luck with that anyway.
AcAwSk8Vids 1 week ago
@AcAwSk8Vids MY point, which you have clearly failed to understand is that Craig is saying there is no explanation of the explanation (GOD) and Dawkins is saying that there should be. This is not pseudologic AT ALL! In fact it amazing ME how ARROGANT people like him and yourself are. Craig says if you explain the explanation then you have to keep going and going and you can't do that. Well, why not? who decides where the explanations stop? Maybe there were creators of the creator!
SC75116 1 week ago
@SC75116 No you're saying that the universe should not have an explanation because you don't *want* there to be an explanation because then you would have to accept God and you hate God.
AcAwSk8Vids 1 week ago
Gods don't exist. any one of them. so go and ride something else then death horse of religin from bronze age.
sedeslav 1 week ago
What a fucking idiot Craig is
mikeyg789 1 week ago
Dawkins wont even debate Craig one on one. Chicken $hit.
He knows Craig would WIPE THE FLOOR with him. LOL.
SerpentSlayer1 1 week ago
@SerpentSlayer1 Do some research they did debate...
SC75116 1 week ago
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449 likes, 698 dislikes and the explanation for this is that 449 didn't get it
correiax 1 week ago
449 likes, 698 dislikes and the explanation for this is that 449 didn't get it
correiax 1 week ago
I don't think that's his argument, that you need "an explanation for an explanation". Your explanation needs to be based on evidence, and the God hypothesis isn't. Therefore, the idea of God is not a valid explanation.
The meta-explanation for all explanations is the laws of physics. The criteria for their validity is evidence.
blackmichael75 1 week ago
@blackmichael75 The error in your reasoning is in trying to apply the criteria of physical evidence to a non-physical cause which is distinct from the physical world.You must first demonstrate that a non-physical cause NOT extended in space must be / can be observed by physical evidence.Your asking for a physical manifestation of that which is non-physical.
Interestingly, the laws of logic and the absurdity of the contrary point to the same attributes that describe the biblical God exactly.
nvutube7 1 week ago
@nvutube7 No they don't. They don't describe the Biblical God accurately at all. The big bang, the original rapid expansion from which the universe formed, is not outside of the physical world, and needs no metaphysical justification. The ball is in your court, you're the one who has yet to adduce one proof of a supernatural cause.
blackmichael75 1 week ago
@blackmichael75 Another means by which we can cross check the existence of an uncaused cause is the fact that the cause of the Big Bang is, according to Einstein’s own definition of space-time, outside of space and time itself – and that any explanation for the origin of the universe which does not invoke infinite regress of causes (which is absurd) requires an uncaused cause. A fully logical answer is a metaphysical cause of the Big Bang.
nvutube7 1 week ago
@nvutube7 That's what I'm saying. You still have all your work ahead of you, because this extra-physical cause that you postulate, one might more accurately call it a process, is not in any way identical to the Abrahamic God, or any other God. It is simply something which we do not know.
blackmichael75 1 week ago
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@blackmichael75 "You still have all your work ahead of you, because this extra-physical cause that you postulate, one might more accurately call it a process,"
Any *process* that we know of takes place in the context of a physical universe of time and space. Again, you are applying the same laws that where created to the cause. The law of cause and effect does not apply to the original first eternal cause. Something has always existed, unless you accept everything came from nothing.
nvutube7 1 week ago
@blackmichael75 "is not in any way identical to the Abrahamic God, "
I agree, because God is the uncaused cause. A process does not account for or apply to His eternal existence.
Secondly, the fact that communication and information even exist in the universe points to this cause as personal. Information is immaterial. It's cause must be immaterial. These exist only in the realm of mind. Information is ALWAYS top down, NEVER bottom up.
The eternal uncaused cause is consciousness.
nvutube7 1 week ago
@nvutube7 You really have to start providing evidence for your claims, or you will just end up talking nonsense. Information is not immaterial. It utilises the human body, and human technology. Again it can be explained in completely naturalistic terms, as can consciousness itself.
blackmichael75 1 week ago
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@blackmichael75 "You really have to start providing evidence for your claims,or you will just end up talking nonsense."
I am,it's simply evidence you don't accept.
"Information is not immaterial."
A blank CD and one full of information (data) both weigh the same. Why? Because information is immaterial, not extended in space. Matter and energy only carry it.
"Again it can be explained in completely naturalistic terms, as can consciousness itself."
Right, I'd love to see you explain them.
nvutube7 1 week ago
@blackmichael75 Again, don't confuse "explanation," with actual evidence.
nvutube7 1 week ago
@blackmichael75 LOL consciousness itself can be explained in completely naturalistic terms? Write a PhD thesis about it and win the Nobel Prize then, what are you still doing in youtube? From your comment I was under the impression if don't approve of saying anything without "providing evidence for your claims". So either you should be working on that Nobel Prize or you don't know the first thing about the metaphysical discussion on physicalism vs. dualism, qualia and so on.
MarlosZappa 1 week ago
@MarlosZappa I do have a philosophy degree, believe it or not. I'm not arguing for a naive realism, just for a pragmatic one, maybe, a provisional one. My own position is a materialist one. I do argue against idealism and supernaturalism.That's a perfectly valid philosophical position.
blackmichael75 6 days ago
@blackmichael75 My point was that the qualia and consciousness have still not been explained in terms of the brain's neural system. Doesn't make physicalism invalid, of course. It's perfectly valid to be one, IF you studied philosophy, know the metaphysical discussion, understand what dualism is, and concepts like qualia and so on, and are still just not convinced by it. What pisses me off is when people simply repeat Dawkins like tape recorders and don't even know squat about dualism.
MarlosZappa 5 days ago
@MarlosZappa Well, I did study philosophy, I talked about this at length in my dissertation and in the presentation I had to do. What I argued for was, to coin a phrase, a provisional realism, in line with materialism and opposed to idealism and dualism. A perfectly valid philosophical position. Within that, yes, we know the limits of the scientific method but we have to re-affirm its great pragmatic usefulness.
blackmichael75 5 days ago
@blackmichael75 I'm an engineer, I know what you mean. I live from the scientific method and I value philosophy. My original comment was about people repeating Dawkins' and Hitchens' incredibly flawed arguments and saying absurdly stupid things like "philosophy of science? what is this bullshit?". It's not your case, I got that. But there are so many pseudo-atheist youtube trollers that don't have the slightest clue about metaphysics and rant here like Dawkins' tape recorders. Unbelievable.
MarlosZappa 3 days ago
@MarlosZappa I agree. My position is a pragmatic agnosticism. There are a lot of crude scientific reductionists here, but I think a lot of that comes from being subjected to prejudice from Christians. That may be enough to drive an independently-minded person into reductionism. Also, I think the basic message of Dawkins et al is correct, and to deny that can only be to lend more credence to the religious extremists.
blackmichael75 3 days ago
@blackmichael75 And, also, you said consciousness could be perfectly explained in naturalistic terms. Just isn't correct, and I had to point that out, since you were telling someone about how they should be providing evidence for their claims. Other from that I believe you, I'm just said you're an informed, educated minority, and most people just choose a side and babble arguments without thinking about them.
MarlosZappa 3 days ago
@MarlosZappa Ok, perhaps what I should've said was that consciousness can *potentially* by explained in naturalistic terms, as I believe it can. In any case there is no need for a supernatural explanation. I'm all for philosophical nuances, but we have to be careful that we don't fall into, on the one hand, crude materialism, and on the other, supernatural nonsense. Make your philosophical points but please don't lend credence to the biblical literalists.
blackmichael75 3 days ago
@blackmichael75 Hence, "John 1:1-3 In the beginning was the *Word,* and the *Word* was with God, and the *Word* was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made."
What is a word? Information carried by matter in space and time. Jesus Christ was the first born of physical creation. He existed before creation. Jesus Christ is the spoken Word of God. The mind that created the universe.
nvutube7 1 week ago
@nvutube7 It does no good at all to quote the Bible, because the Bible does not hold any particular weight in interpreting the real world. It holds exactly as much weight as any other creation myth. You have to separate your personal beliefs, or something that you read in a book, with the actuality of the universe, as experienced through the senses.
blackmichael75 1 week ago
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@blackmichael75 "It holds exactly as much weight as any other creation myth."
Including the creation myth of abiogenesis?You do realize there is ZERO evidence for life from dead inorga