I'm a very empathetic person. I can put myself in other people's shoes in very high levels. Our internal universe of the mind, seems to have a longing for the missing chunk of meaning and purpose. The how and the why of creation. I can see the doubt. I can see the skepticism. I can feel the fear. I can feel the loneliness that causes frustration. That it's "on us" to complete the puzzle subjectively. The core of all athiesm is rooted in physical evidence and personal proof as a reservation that couples with expectation. All the arguments boil down to this. I feel this is the only topic that demands attention. Without assertions, lets examine some facts and questions?
Fact 1. We do not know.
We do not know how this reality is possible. We do not know what's beyond this reality. We do not know how or where this came from or why. We do not know what happens when we die but yet we have a sense of eternity (hence the great debate) We do not know. We do not know. We do not know.
So life will always be in the questioning of one's self (not others). No one will be able to answer for what's inside of you. The Mirror of Truth. It begs the question, who is that, inside of you?
Since we do not know. Then why can't any of us just leave it alone? We should just be able to leave it at that. Ah, but there is this silly conviction that won't seem to go away. What created all of this? What gave us life? Out of all the countless forms of life, why are we hue-mans the only ones singled out to have these convictions? There seems to be a significance about it? We should be able to see all sorts of creatures in some progression of evolution gaining some kind of questioning intellect. But we don't, it's only us. Why are we the only corrupted part of nature, where we use everything in a delusional perversion of what was intended? Leaving the world worse and worse for our children's generations to come? No other species is doing this? Why are we the only threat to life? Constantly coming up with new ways to save the planet that we are killing? Why does history repeat? There must be a part of the human condition that is flawed, that no other living thing has. What could it be?
Fact 2. We are created by design or by random accident.
I don't know which one is is more frightening? If there is no significance about us being singled out over all created things? If it were just random accident? Then oh my goodness. Everything goes, no rules, survival of the fittest and dog eat dog, do what thou wilt becomes the whole of the law. None of it's ever going to matter without a master placer. No meaning, no purpose, no time that will last. What about an Afterlife? Who knows? Once again, without a intelligent master placer of design, there wouldn't be a distinguishable afterlife. If there is some random afterlife? Would Hitler get the same thing as Dr Martin Luther King Jr? Or would it matter? Nothing would be there to appropriate correct Incorruptible judgment in any way. Random accidents is all we are. Looks kind of like the world we live in today. With the way people live. There is no source of information that validates the authority on this. So let your imagination fire away.
If there is design behind creation? What would that be? Would it be intentional? Would it be powerful? Would it be personal? Would it know what it is doing? Would it have a plan? Would there be information that validates this authority? Would we want to know?
Fact 3. We haven't seen the ending.
If there is an end game to all of this? What do you think it would be? I guess death is going to be the only complete proof. I wonder if who we are, what we choose and determine, matters? As we cross the threshold of death. "The big reveal" sounds so exciting.... Do you need more proof? Or are you ready?
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Hey! GH! You're back! How ya doin'? I have to give you a bit of credit here. This OP is much better than your first one. I actually read the whole thing. Good news and bad news, though. Bad news is that there is still nothing in there that could be considered overwhelmingly convincing. Good news, however, is that there are a couple of questions you asked that would make for somewhat entertaining philosophical discussions.
In particular, I like, "Why are we the only threat to life? Constantly coming up with new ways to save the planet that we are killing?" I actually got a bit of a chuckle reading that one. I find it to be an intriguing thought, for some reason. May have to bounce that one around in my ol' brain bucket for a bit. Cool. *chuckle*
Thanks tin man. I'm well. I learned a lot from my first post. I'm just kind of winging all of this. I don't know why I'm so inspired. I'm giving up sleep for this lol.
I think that's the whole point of God making it our choice. We are not going to get anything overwhelmingly convincing other than what we have already been given. I would Love to just be able to summon God on command, and tell God to show the world His splendors. But for some reason He wont do what I have in mind. So I learned it must boil down to our own questioning. How good are we at questioning further and deeper? What lengths are we willing to go before we give up? I continued writing after I posted this. Here are some more facts. Tell me what you think. I am getting really tired so I didn't really go over them yet. I just kept writing lol
Fact 4. People lie.
People lie, so it's important to question what you've been told. Like in fact 1 life is in the questioning of one's self (not others). Discernment is truly a gift.
Fact 5. What you want, is not always what you get.
What do you want? Why do you want? Will it be enough for you if you get it? How long will it last? Can some outside power take it away from you? What do you want to believe? Can wants change?
Fact 6. Experience is personal proof.
If you wanted experience? What would you be willing to do to get it? If you had experience? Would it matter to you if no one believes you? If you wanted to gain experience with what created us? What would that look like? How long would it take? How far would you go to get it?
Fact 7. Evidence is reality.
That's it. That's all. We didn't have anything to do with it. (Hence the search)
Welcome back Great hope. Yes, your OP is a lot less confusing, but you are still injecting more than one argument into it. But I will offer my opinion on your questions.
Fact 1. We do not know.
So what? Do you know everything in great detail? Did you fall asleep at 10:42 or 10:43? Did the cop you saw driving by have a coffee with or without sugar? In your neighbor's back yard, did 31 or 32 bugs die last night in the bug zapper? The point is that we live our daily lives surrounded by unanswered questions, and are very comfortable with that.
Of course we want answers for the big questions in life. Where did we come from as a species? What happens to us when we die? So what do we do, invent fairy tails just to get an immediate answer, or investigate and try to put logical and reasonable answers into the holes? For myself, many atheists and theists, and scientists, we are comfortable with unanswered questions,. But we are comfortable with that situation because we know that scientists are working to solve those questions.
My response is: we do not know ... yet.
I would rather take the time to get to the truth than invent something that may be wrong just to get a quick answer.
Fact 2. We are created by design or by random accident.
Right off the bat you inject an assumption into the very question. You are assuming we are "created". So I will put off answering that question until you re-phrase it and remove the "we are created" part.
Fact 3. We haven't seen the ending.
Of course not. But I have a very good idea what the future holds. I will die, finis. This planet will eventually be swallowed by our sun in approximately 6 billion years as it gets into it's last stages of life (stars evolve) and goes through it's red giant phase, and then the sun will contract into a white dwarf. Over many billions of years it will lose it's energy to become a black dwarf, just a cold lump of matter drifting in space. Eventually this known universe will run out of energy and one day the last sun will turn off, leaving a black void.
Only then can we state that we have seen the ending. But of course, our planet would have been swallowed up by our sun and who knows what will happen to mankind.
Fact 4. People lie.
So? Some animals are deceitful.
One of my dogs knew the other could not avoid going after a squeaky toy, even though she was indifferent to squeaky toys. When the one that liked squeaky toys was chewing on a bone, the other would grab a squeaky toy, make it squeak. Of course, the one that could not stop reacting to squeaky toys would drop what she was chewing on, and run over to get the squeaky toy. And then the other would run over and get hold of the nice bone she wanted.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qhmSpetyHgk&t=1s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqCvdGTHV9A
Fact 5. What you want, is not always what you get.
I wanted a huge penis and a million dollars. But I didn't get that.
That's life, suck it up buttercup, deal with it.
Fact 6. Experience is personal proof.
Partially, yes. But it is proof only to the person who had the experience. It is not proof to others. We have many people locked away in mental institutions who really did see weird shit you and I would reject. For proof, it must be verified by something a lot more stringent than just the word of a person.
Fact 7. Evidence is reality.
Partially yes, again. Empirical evidence is reality. You made the definition of "evidence" very vague and open to interpretation. I just offered my opinion and some clarification on what is evidence.
Additionally, if something is true, then it can be tested, and proven.
edit: forgot Fact 5, added commentary.
@ David killens. Your fact 5 is hilarious
@"I would rather take the time to get to the truth than invent something that may be wrong just to get a quick answer."
I think that is exactly what I am doing. That might be my core dilemma. In my view athiesm is the quick answer. You literally don't have to do anything. You just can live and then die. Like, that already happens by default. Correct me if I'm wrong? There will never be a way to disprove God. Except for death. By then it's not going to matter. Your choice to seek or not has been made. Looking at our history and time lines. Who the heck it this Christ guy. He had some serious business going on. Enough for us to place time around Him. I apologise for always going to the death thing. But gosh darn it. What if God really did do this and Christ is the redemption? We can not rule this out as 100% impossible! I mean we can't even rule it out on highly unlikely. It is the most documented source in antiquity. Number 1 in every category. Nothing even comes close. Homers Iliad and the Odyssey. Is second, by 6 times less historical accuracy. The Bible has stood the test of time and has been verified fact by the specific dates, names and places. That we can check up on. It's there. People can not make this stuff up. So I seek the only thing that will change life after death, seeking the truth is my life's work. The whole truth and nothing but the truth. Does what we do here matter? For what happens when we die? I've have had alot of traumatic experiences when I was younger. Like, my dad killed himself. Also 2 of my friends that I knew from school when I was young eventually killed themselves. My uncle drank himself to death when I rode my bike over to his house to find him lying naked on the ground stone cold dead when I was 8. My grandma was dying and one of the care takers was stealing her meds. So when she died my mom told me that it looked like my grandpa was poisoning her. We didn't find out for years before the caretaker came clean. That one messed me up quite a bit. And when I was 12 I watched as my grandpa was having a stroke late one night when I was staying the night, he was asking me to take the chains off of him and he was making motions of pulling chains out of his mouth, he kept asking me to get the chains off of him as he was crossing the threshold of death. I called 911 and he died. I struggled with meaning and purpose, the origins of life, what happens afterlife. All the above. I struggled with my own will to live. I grew up in Las Vegas Sin City. Everything is accessible here. I lived real hard, and real fast, always trying to learn as much as I can about everything. I was restlessly Reckless to the extreme. I cared for nothing and no one and had a kingdom of my own established. Evil entities made it very easy for me. I'm a strong guy and I got really close to death. So I'm kind of obsessed with it. That might be why I can't imagine giving up on this persuit?
@"Fact 2. We are created by design or by random accident".
Right off the bat you inject an assumption into the very question. You are assuming we are "created". So I will put off answering that question until you re-phrase it and remove the "we are created" part.
We were created at the spontaneous combustion right? By Design or Not By Design. I think we are still created. Is there another way to put it? We are created. We just don't know if that implies to a Creator or no creator of what's been created. Right?
@ Great hope
" In my view athiesm is the quick answer. You literally don't have to do anything. You just can live and then die. Like, that already happens by default. Correct me if I'm wrong? There will never be a way to disprove God. Except for death. By then it's not going to matter. Your choice to seek or not has been made."
It is just the opposite. having being raised in a christian family, the easy way out would have been to blindly and meekly accept what I had been told, and be a sheep.
Instead I did LOT of soul-searching, researching, and looking under every rock for any proof of any deity. it was not done in a day, it was a forty year journey of hard examination, deep thinking, and challenging what I believed were my core beliefs.
I was swimming against the current, not floating downstream.
"Who the heck it this Christ guy. He had some serious business going on. Enough for us to place time around Him. I apologise for always going to the death thing. But gosh darn it. What if God really did do this and Christ is the redemption? We can not rule this out as 100% impossible! I mean we can't even rule it out on highly unlikely. It is the most documented source in antiquity. Number 1 in every category. Nothing even comes close."
False. In that era the Romans documented a lot, scholars in that area made copious entries. Yet the one and only mention of this jesus person is in the bible. In fact, biblical scholars have zero proof that this individual existed,
Zero proof. If you desire to refute my claim, please provide sources outside of the New Testament that prove this individual walked this planet.
"athiesm is the quick answer."
Atheism isn't an answer at all, it is the lack or absence of one single belief.
"There will never be a way to disprove God. Except for death. "
This is a begging the question fallacy, you have assumed there is anything to disprove? What objective evidence can you demonstrate that any deity exists? It's useless to just quote claims from the bible, as these are not objective evidence.
@ Great Hope
You are an admitted christian, and amongst all this wonderful jungle of colorful (yet meaningless) verbiage is there one single contemporary proof or even probable evidence that would convince anyone that such a character as the 'Jesus' described in the gospels existed?
You seem to be putting the woo before the unicorn. Or the supposition before the inquiry.
Very good, yes. I woke up before my alarm because of dreaming about conclusions *excited chuckles, gripping pillow*. Great thoughts to ponder at work. I'll get back to both of those soon. Thank you.
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Save the Planet? I wished you people would get it right. The planet don't need saving. It will be here long after we, the human species, are gone. What we need to be doing is saving the biosphere. Not the planet, but the biosphere. It is the biosphere we are poisoning. Perhaps poisoning it to the point it may be uninhabitable by us humans. And if we do, then we deserve extinction.
Sorry to be so blunt, but yes, if we do not change how we treat the biosphere of this planet, then we are doomed.
Just for an example. The United States alone feeds about 40% of the world's population. However, we are currently draining the Ogallala Aquifer at a rate that it will no longer have any water left to grow the crops we grow in about another 100 years. When we cannot grow enough food to feed out own population, what is the rest of the world going to do?
Look at the Aral Sea. It is practically completely gone. And that is just in the last 50 years.
The doom is coming quicker than we like.
rmfr
Duh, I've never heard someone say save the planet in reference to the rocks, so why would you think that? The word planet obviously refers to the life that is on it.
And the idiots are still running free.
Planet — a celestial body which is in orbit around a star or remnant, has sufficient mass to assume hydrostatic equilibrium (a nearly spherical shape), and has "cleared the neighborhood" around its orbit.
Life has nothing to do with a planet being a planet.
Thus when anyone says, "Save the planet," they ain't talking about the life upon it. If they wish to talk about the life upon the planet, then they should say such. And you said you are now going into cognitive science? What exactly is that again?
rmfr
They are talking about the life that is on it. The sole purpose of language is to communicate one's thoughts to another person. As such it is your job as the listener to understand how a speaker is using words. Dictionaries are descriptive not prescriptive; therefore looking up the word planet and latching on to its definition, has effectively isolated you from the rest of the planet, which does use planet to signify the life that is on it.
Well I still see at least one person here has no comprehension skill of the English language.
And planet means planet. Not biosphere.
And I do understand. When you say planet, you are speaking of the planet.
Although a planet can be composed of the lithosphere, atmosphere, hydrosphere, and biosphere, when "planet" is used to refer to a terrestrial type planet it is automatically referring to ONLY the lithosphere (the rocky part) since a planet ONLY needs a lithosphere to be a planet.
If you wish to convey the idea of a planet's biosphere (the life on it) then you must be specific and say "Save the Biosphere."
C'mon John. Do you honestly expect me to believe you are actually in college with such retarded stupidity? Again, you say are into Cognitive Science yet you lack to cognitive skills to know the difference between a planet and the life that may be on it.
rmfr
Well that's the beautiful irony of this whole situation. That I am in college, I do study cognition, and you do not.
And have never taken a course in Language Comprehension?
rmfr
I've taken something better, a course on the entire psychology of language. Which is why I can confidently tell you that humans make extensive use of figurative, non-literal language, in which they go beyond the literal meaning of words
Generally speaking, it is assumed we process non-literal langue in three stages. First, we find the literal meaning. Secondly, we test the literal meaning against the context. Thirdly, we seek alternative interpretations (see Clark & Lucy, 1975).
You seem to be getting stuck at the first stage. You derive its literal meaning, but fail to contrast that with the context and subsequently adapt your understanding to the meaning of the speaker. Now, there is enough evidence to suggest people are capable of moving on to the second and third stage. Which leads me to believe you are purposefully stopping yourself from doing so. It appears that in an effort to argue against so-called "absolutists" you have yourself become an absolutist regarding the meaning of the word planet.
Reference
Understanding what is meant from what is said: A study in conversationally conveyed requests. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 14, 56–72
Oxford English Dictionary
Atheism
Noun
Disbelief or lack of belief in the existence of God or gods.
Try again.
"We do not know how this reality is possible. We do not know what's beyond this reality. We do not know how or where this came from or why. We do not know what happens when we die "
You missed out a couple of facts...there is no evidence that anything exists outside of reality, and there is no evidence that anyone survives their own physical death in any meaningful way.
You seem to be using an argument from ignorance fallacy. Also a begging the question fallacy, because you are calling everything "creation" which assumes the very thing you're arguing for. What objective evidence can you demonstrate for a creator?
"Fact 2. We are created by design or by random accident."
False dichotomy or false dilemma is a type of informal fallacy in which something is falsely claimed to be an "either/or" situation, when in fact there is at least one additional option. ... The false dilemma fallacy can also arise simply by accidental omission of additional options rather than by deliberate deception.
Similarly, when two options are presented, they often are, although not always, two extreme points on some spectrum of possibilities; this may lend credence to the larger argument by giving the impression that the options are mutually exclusive of each other, even though they need not be.
I wish apologists would learn the art of brevity. It's always all or nothing. Pages of overly verbose verbiage, or cryptic one word or single sentence clues. The latter in stark contrast to the norm is usually when they are confronted with a question they don't care to give a candid answer to.
We've all seen John Breezy obfuscate in this dishonestly evasive fashion enough times.
They'll rant on with interminable rambling guff, until they're asked a pointed question then clam up like a broken slot machine.
@ Sheldon
And that is sometimes my problem. When I get started, it is sometimes hard to stop. When it comes to ranting, I need someone like Hancock to stop that train... And hope there is no passengers on it...
rmfr
I never understand how people find the thought of something just developing into existence is so implausible.
Lets take the very biological event that brought us all here, sex.
Now, we all know how we reproduce and in that act a male sperm count from an ejaculation can vary from 20m -100m per ml of ejaculate with the amount of the later ranging from 1.5ml to 5ml.
so, potential 500m potential humans in one fell swoop.
Lets proceed further and say for argument sake, the couple attempting to reproduce do so during ovulation, that's roughly 7 - 10 days of fertility.
lets again, take the high end given a healthy and fertile human.
If the couple was to just have intercourse once a day over 10 days, that is 5 billion!
So you in actuality are anywhere between a 1 in a billion to possibly 5 billion chance.
Giving those extreme odds that you as an individual can become a conscious entity, is it that difficult to believe that everything within the cosmos can happen?
It always saddens me when I hear a religious person claim that the universe just coming into being is so against the odds, and yet so are we and we can accept that.
Is it random? is it deterministic? who knows! But at least it is a far more interesting path of discovery as oppose to just throwing up our arms and declaring that god willed it or something of the like.
I have just found out that I am expecting, So it's of even more of interest lol
Well, congratulations...
I personally think the design route is far more interesting than just throwing up our arms to chance and calling it a day.
However I'm not sure if your example is good. The odds of a single specific person winning the lottery could be one in a billion, but as a whole no one is surprised if someone wins because there's basically 100% chance of someone winning.
There's an implausibility to humans existing in the first place, that isn't quite the same as that of reproduction.
Congrats on the baby.
@ʝօɦռ 6IX ɮʀɛɛʐʏ
"I personally think the design route is far more interesting than just throwing up our arms to chance and calling it a day."
I do not see any atheists throwing their arms up. You are muddying the waters with such comments. Is that your tactic?
Almost all atheists and a great percentage of scientists have high confidence that the present theories, such as evolution and the formation of this universe, were not just anyone throwing their arms up, but rather the end of decades, nay centuries of collecting data and tens of thousands of people using logic and other valid tools to arrive at these theories.
You do a great disservice to all who have worked on such theories, and the scientific method.
Besides, this is not a popularity contest or finding the most emotionally comfortable answer, but getting to the truth. This is what it is all about, finding the truth instead of accepting bed time fairy tales. It is not about "interesting", but rather the truth, no matter how uncomfortable it may be.
That is my tactic, I basically flipped the structure of her own sentence to reverse the meaning.
It wasn't hard to figure out. When we get close to the truth, you throw a pail of muddy water on the windshield.
You seem to have an issue with the truth.
Have I caused you to doubt your views on what is true? Is that what you mean by muddying your windshield lol?
You have zero effect on my opinion. What you are doing is distracting and derailing the conversation. My opinion is it is attention-seeking by engaging in troll behavior.
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