In all my time looking over theological arguments for god, I haven't seen one that proved His existence at all. Philosophy don't even come close to proving the existence of one or more creators in general, much less a muslim or christian god. It's also really annoying to see the same arguments recycled by the religious and it just starts to get tiring. I want to see if there are any good arguments for god that already haven't been debunked, so at least I can have something to think about for awhile.
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@Titilayo: RE: Good arguments for god? If you find one, let us know. Hell, I would settle for a bit of evidence. That seems to be absent as well.
Lol.... The Other possible possibilities crew are looking for a fight. Atheist: Nothing created something that created everything. Theist: Seriously?! Do you believe in magic and the supernatural? Atheist: hahaha, they don't exist. Theist: How come something miraculously came from nothing? Atheist: I don't know. Theist: It's a magic!!!!
reedemption: Wow! You're smoking hot today. Careful you don't set fire to all those straw men.
@reedemption "How come something miraculously came from nothing? Atheist: I don't know. Theist: It's a magic!!!!"
Still peddling the same argumentum ad ignorantiam or "god of the gaps" fallacy I see. Known common logical fallacies don't become less irrational through bloody minded repetition. I wonder what you and your superstitious ilk will move your imaginary deity into if this gap is closed, as all the others you had previously inserted it into were. I note you no longer try to claim earthquakes, and lightning have supernatural causes, it's progress of a kind I suppose.
I like to remember when confronted by stubborn wilful stupidity of the sort you espouse, that in fact you disbelieve in almost as many deities as I do, so you're only one deity away from reality after all. Again this is progress of a sort I suppose.
@reedemption
Your lie is exposed in the first line of your little, creative, story time, narrative:
"Atheist: Nothing created something that created everything."
I have yet to meet an atheist that says that. And even if I did, that is their opinion and has nothing to do with the fact the person is or is not an atheist.
This atheist, (me) I leave it at: "I do not know."
I am also a skeptic, I do not believe anything that is unevidenced because: "faith."
Redemption
And yet, not one of you muppets can actually demonstrate that there is actual 'nothing' nor accurately define it.
Oh look, it's another supernaturalist, who thinks the lame and repeatedly destroyed "atheists think the universe came from nothing" bullshit constitutes some sparkling piece of wisdom, instead of the rectally extracted tripe that it is.
Time for this again.
Let's deal with the "atheists believe something out of nothing" canard once and for all, shall we?
Item one. Atheists dispense with belief altogether. Instead, if they're contemplating a postulate properly, they ask "what evidence exists in support of this postulate?", and look to whichever discipline is supplying the evidence.
Item two. The people who REALLY think the universe came from "nothing", are those supernaturalists who think their imaginary magic man from their favourite mythology, waved his magic todger and poofed the universe into existence from nothing. So even before I move on to the next items, this alone stuffs the "atheists think the universe came from nothing" excrement down the toilet and pulls the flush hard.
Item three. The question of the origin of the universe has nothing to do with atheism. This question is the remit of cosmological physics. And, once again, those of us who paid attention in class, turn to that discipline, and ask what postulates arise therefrom, and what evidence is supplied in support thereof.
Item four. No cosmological physicist presents the fatuous notion that the universe "came from nothing". Instead, cosmological physicists postulate that testable natural processes, involving well-defined interactions acting upon well-defined entities, were responsible for the origin of the observable universe in its current form.
Item five. The question of the origin of the universe is an active research topic, and as a corollary, a number of hypotheses are extant in the field, with respect to the origin of the observable universe. Indeed, it's a measure of how far cosmological physics has progressed, that researchers in the field are able to postulate a number of pre-Big-Bang cosmologies, and then work out how to test those cosmologies and the hypotheses underpinning them. See my above brief exposition on the work of Steinhardt & Turok for an example.
Item six. As an example of the ideas extant in the literature, I'm aware of two papers by Steinhardt & Turok, in which they propose a pre-Big-Bang cosmology centred upon braneworld collisions, and which possesses three elegant features. Namely:
[1] It provides a mechanism for the donation of energy to the newly instantiated universe, facilitating subsequent matter synthesis;
[2] It eliminates the singularity problem from standard Big Bang cosmology;
[3] It provides a testable prediction, namely that the power spectrum of primordial gravitational waves will take a specific form, with the graph skewed towards short wavelengths.
Indeed, [3] above is one of the reasons scientists have been labouring diligently, to produce operational gravitational wave detectors, precisely so that they can test this prediction, once they've learned how to distinguish between primordial gravitational waves and gravitational waves of more recent origin. The moment they learn to do this, the requisite tests will be conducted. Furthermore, if those tests reveal a power spectrum that matches the Steinhardt-Turok prediction, then Steinhardt & Turok walk away with the Nobel Prize for Physics. Anyone exercising reasonable diligence here, will know that I've covered Steinhardt & Turok's work in some detail already on these forums, and the relevant exposition can be found in this post.
Message to all you supernaturalists out there: read the above, and learn from it. The next time you peddle the "atheists think the universe came from nothing" bullshit, you'll know from the above why we regard you with scorn and derision for posting this bullshit.
@ Calilasseia
Fascinating stuff Cal, as usual.
Just a tiny niggle: It is my understanding that physicist Lawrence Krauss does in fact argue the universe came from nothing . I say"it is my understanding" because that's the title of the Youtube clip. I can't claim to understand the physics .
Perhaps you could have a glance :
Oh, It is also my understanding that Stephen Hawking said the same thing..
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_h43G83o5kc
Hawking is asked "What was around before the Big Bang?" His answer: "Nothing was around before the Big Bang"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FJ88kC2Nx8M
I'm confused.
@ Calilasseia
"Item one. Atheists dispense with belief altogether. Instead, if they're contemplating a postulate properly, they ask "what evidence exists in support of this postulate?", and look to whichever discipline is supplying the evidence."
Is Atheism a postulate? If not, what value is it?
If so, what evidence exists to supports its postulates?
I think this article is related to this discussion and I wanted to get your thoughts.
"Multiverse Theories Are Bad for Science"
New books by a physicist and science journalist mount aggressive but ultimately unpersuasive defenses of multiverses By John Horgan on November 25, 2019 https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cross-check/multiverse-theories-are...
"The logical next step, Siegfried contends, would be for us to discover that our entire cosmos is one of many. Rebutting skeptics who call multiverse theories “unscientific” because they are untestable, Siegfried retorts that the skeptics are unscientific, because they are “pre-supposing a definition of science that rules out multiverses to begin with.” He calls skeptics “deniers”—a term usually linked to doubts about real things, like vaccines, climate change and the Holocaust."
"I am not a multiverse denier, any more than I am a God denier. Science cannot resolve the existence of either God or the multiverse, making agnosticism the only sensible position. I see some value in multiverse theories. Particularly when presented by a writer as gifted as Sean Carroll, they goad our imaginations and give us intimations of infinity."
Jo: There you go again trying to STRAWMAN atheism. Why don't you just quit. Being an atheist is like being a non-baseball player. Lets say Theism is analogous to Sports. All the different sports represent all the different religions. Non-sports players, people who do not believe in playing any kind of sport, are called Atheists. Why we do not play sports is as individualistic as each person's thoughts ideas and opinions. We are not a team of people organized not to play sports. We do not have a dogma that says, "Thou shall not play sports." Each of us in our own way has simply elected not to play. That's it. Nothing more;.
Atheism is not a postulate and it has no value. It is a position taken on the claim, "God Exists." Atheists do not believe that claim to be true.
Pairing God to a Multiverse is a false analogy.
* Science cannot resolve the existence of either God or the multiverse..."Cannot?" You mean science has "Not Yet." If your God is out there, it will be a scientist that finds it. In the mean time, we know for a fact that one universe exists. It is not an erroneous assumption to state that there may be others. Please demonstrate any such connection with your God idea.
RE: Agnosticism is the only reasonable position? On that, most atheists would agree. I would think the majority or atheists are Agnostic Atheists. I certainly have never seen any evidence for a god or gods. Given that there is no evidence and no good reason to believe in God or Gods, why choose to believe?
@ Cognostic
“Being an atheist is like being a non-baseball player.”
“Lets say Theism is analogous to Sports.”
I think that is an inaccurate analogy.
You do believe that baseball and sports exists, don’t you?
You do not “believe” in playing any kind of sport?
Don’t you just choose not to?
Electing not to participate in something is very different than not believing something exists.
If someone were to say that God does not exist.
Would you say you do not believe that claim to be true?
Would you say there is no Santa Claus?
Or would you say you do not believe that claim to be true?
The two paragraph on science were quotes from an article I referenced.
“If your God is out there, it will be a scientist that finds it.”
You believe science can find God, if he exists?
That is a claim, and has lots of presuppositions.
I do not believe science can find God, if he exists.
Since you made the claim, it is your responsibility to evidence it.
Do you have any evidence?
Jo, you wrote, “If someone were to say that God does not exist. Would you say you do not believe that claim to be true?”
It seems you simply refuse to comprehend what has been said over and over and over. As an atheist, I do not accept your assertion that a god exists. THAT IS NOT THE SAME as no god(s) exist.
To answer the quoted question, I don’t know if any of them exists.
@ CyberLN
If I asserted that God does not exist, would you not accept that assertion?
Just trying to see if you would answer the same for both claims.
Jo, I do not believe the assertions that gods exist. AND I have no knowledge either way. I am often identified as an agnostic atheist.
@ CyberLN
Sorry, but I didn't see your answer to this question.
Do you not believe the assertion that no God exists?
Can you expand on your meaning of agnostic atheist?
An agnostic atheist does not believe in any gods but admits no knowledge of their non/existence.
@ CyberLN
Would you admit no knowledge of Gods existence?
May I ask why you seem to be answering the questions of God existence, or non/existence, very differently?
There is a difference between knowledge and belief.
Get to the point.
@ CyberLN
My point is that you have not answered one very important question.
Do you believe no God exists?
Depends on the god.
@Jo
Do you think the trick will work with CyberLN?
@ Talyyn
What trick?
The same lying trick you have tried idiotically to peddle from the moment you got here, your desperate lie that atheism is a belief, as opposed to the truth that it is in fact the absence of a belief. See below for evidence of your rank and relentless duplicity. One more reason your beliefs are contemptible if they allow such unabashed mendacity.
@Jo
See the answer from Sheldon #24.
@Jo
Fine lets use something that we know you can understand. You are not a believer in zeus or any of the greek gods right? You do not think those god like entities do not exist right? Maybe perhaps you believe it is just folks confused on the correct god.
How do you feel about zeus and them? Believe he does not exist right? We on the same page yet? Does this analogy work for you?
Is it? Are you sure? You decide not to participate in worshiping and/or believing in zeus and his buddies right? The end outcome is the same right?
I would say "I believe that to be true, but I am not sure, all I do know is god (any god(s) idea) I ever heard of is completely un-evidenced. Because none of the gods are evidenced, I choose not to believe in it due to lack of evidence. If someone were to claim their god is real, I simply ask, for evidence, real empirical evidence, not just talk/writings from very fallible humans.
For the exact same reasons I do not believe in zeus, (not evidenced!) or in the flying spaghetti monster, or giant fluffy super cute puppy dog god I just made up. None of those are evidenced, and neither is your god until you can present some actual testable evidence that connects the claims you make about your god to actual reality.
Same answer, (believers of santa do not read next sentence!)
Not evidenced in anyway, so just like any other idea humans come up with that is not evidence, I take no action on it, and if someone were to come to me and claim santa is real, I would ask for testable evidence.
So how do you think humans will "find" god? Just personal experience and people talking about their personal experience? If that is all you need to believe in something, I would consider you highly vulnerable to false suggestion, as you do not verify in any way what you hear is reality, at least when it comes to your god idea.
I did say I don't believe in gods, because their are unevidenced, so perhaps a claim of: "there is a lack of real, empirical evidence for a god," a claim I do challenge you to refute. And in this case, 3000+ years of a total lack of actual evidence IS very compelling evidence.
I am highly confident you have no actual evidence to refute my claim (that you have no evidence), as I have asked this question many times, and eithir I get no answer or I get answers of non "testable" evidence. Which really is not evidence, it just hearsay, talk, people flapping their lips, it means nothing without actual real evidence behind it.
When it comes down to it, if you are not just trolling for responses, you simply take your unevidenced god idea on "faith" where I, and 99% of everyone who ever lived do not with most never even hearing of your particular god idea/claim. (Many may have placed faith in some slightly or greatly different base god idea then yours.)
@ LogicFTW
"How do you feel about zeus and them? Believe he does not exist right? We on the same page yet? Does this analogy work for you?"
You are correct, I believe Zeus does not exists
I noticed that you said it exactly the same way.
Is that how you would describe God? That he does not exist?
"So how do you think humans will "find" god? " (If not science)
Finding God is not a scientific endeavor.
Since cannot answer the question.
Do you agree?
Why can't you just say that Santa Claus does not exist?
That is how I would say it.
"there is a lack of real, empirical evidence for a god," a claim I do challenge you to refute. And in this case, 3000+ years of a total lack of actual evidence IS very compelling evidence."
This is an often made, but fallacious argument.
1. You are making the claim, yet you want me to refute your claim.
2. You are ignoring that fact that there is also no "real empirical evidence" to show there is no God.
3. You are making the claim that if God existed "real empirical evidence" would be readily available.
You are rigging the question to get the answer you want.
I love my wife dearly, but if you ask for real empirical evidence", I don't think I can provide it.
I cannot show you my love with a microscope or telescope.
I cannot provide a mathematical equation that proves my love.
Does any of those show that I don't love her?
I can't show you God with any of those tools either.
Does that mean he does not exist?
4. You say there has been no evidence in 3000 years, but that is just your opinion.
Billions of people in the last 3000 years have concluded there is evidence for God.
That doesn't prove anything, just as your claim does not either.
Just yours and their opinion.
You are making fallacious argument from ignorance.
Saying because something has not been proven, it does not exist.
5. You say I am wrong because I have no "real empirical evidence".
But neither do you.
So if I am wrong, than so are you.
If "real empirical evidence " is the standard.
Shouldn't the standard apply to everyone.
@ Jo
you still demonstrate your deliberate stupidity at every opportunity do you not?
Actually you are both using the argument "ad populum" which is indeed fallacious.
You Jo, in your feeble attempts to prove your mendacious assertions as to the existence of your particular god still do not get the fact that as an atheist I make no claim. I merely disbelieve yours without proper evidence.
Mr Killens did make a claim and you are entitled to disbelieve him but that does NOT justify your position that a god (of your choosing) exists. It is not even close.
So, Jo, stop playing essentially meaningless word games in the search of a 'gotcha' moment. It is tiresome, whiny and rather pathetic.
@Jo
I do not necessarily feel this way. I was setting you up with a better analogy. You disbelieve zeus, you do not believe zeus exists. The question that follows this is: why do you disbelieve Zeus?
Me personally? My thoughts on god? (any god idea, including yours,) is exactly this:
"God" is a human created idea, (this should be obvious,) and this particular idea is completely unevidenced. I do not believe in completely unevidenced ideas. I also dislike religions as an idea, I feel religions are lies created by people to control other people, and it holds humanity as a whole back from achieving greater things.
You misread me. I never mentioned science in this paragraph you quoted me on. I do fully agree science will never answer the question of god, it is not supposed to nor does it need to. I was asking you, how do you think how humans will find "god"? Do you think never? Or at least not until after the human is "dead"? Do you think your god idea will never be evidenced?
You are correct, I did make the claim that there is no evidence for a god idea. I based my claim on: searching myself, and asking anyone I know that might be willing to answer: to evidence their god. You say you believe in your god, and so far you still avoided providing any actual evidence, I am only seeing excuses for not having evidence so far. So far, you are actually evidencing my claim that there is no evidence for god. You someone speaking for your god idea so far has presented zero evidence for your god idea.
That is a different and separate claim. (That there is no god.) I have made no claim that there is no god. I simply am asking for evidence for you god. NOT an unreasonable request. If you want a conversation about evidence for no god we can have that conversation But I will notice. and not forget the simple fact that: you still failed to provide any evidence for your god idea.
Yes, an order for a "idea" to go from simple thought in your head (that could be all made up, and lies, and wrong) to reality, it needs to be evidenced. Yes there is a lot of people (terrifying percentages of world population,) that do not have this requirement. But for me, as a skeptic, I require an idea to be evidenced, before I accept it to be true. If you want to call it "rigging the question" fine, but I think demanding evidence for an idea before I believe it is an extremely reasonable request. We all demand evidence for most all other things in our lives, just for many people those basic, highly effective rules are suddenly suspended for their god idea. I dont suspend this basic rule for a god idea.
Seems like you do not know what empirical evidence is. I think part of the reason we think very different on this, is we seemingly have very different definitions for "empirical evidence." I can think of tons of empirical evidence of my love for my wife, family and friends.
That would be silly, a microscope or telescope is not built to show love. They are built to show the very small and very far away.
Math is the language of preciseness. I think love could be represented in a mathematical equation, but that would be a silly endeavor.
Okay it is becoming increasingly clear that you and I have very different definitions of "empirical evidence."
And so far you are proving my claim. As has countless other theist apologist and god believing folks before them. You guys try to flip the evidence claim, but meanwhile are utterly unable to provide any actual evidence. I do amend my self, there has been no evidence for roughly 13.8 billion years. Which includes the last 3000 years of many humans trying (and failing) to evidence their god.
I amend my claim:
You have no actual evidence for you god. Am I wrong? Prove it. Cant? Then I stick to it that: your god is unevidenced, remains just an unevidenced human thought and is no more real than fluffy foo foo the crazy cute bunny god I just made up. On the same level of actual reality. Unevidenced thoughts in a human head with nothing to tie the thought to reality that we need/should act upon.
Please show me where I wrote that, in any of my post here. I am saying: your god idea, is unevidenced, and therefore remains just an idea with no way to tie it to reality that we should actually do anything about.
Uh... let me spell this out for you.
I am saying you have no evidence for you god idea. I did not say you are wrong, I am making the claim you have no evidence. And so far you presented zero evidence. To me you are just another person that confirms my conclusion: that no theist has any evidence for their god idea.
It is my standard, and I try to apply it to all ideas I come across. I wish everyone would make it their standard on everything. People that do not require other people's ideas to be evidenced can be easily manipulated and taken advantage of. I do not like being taken advantage of, I would imagine most people would not eithir.
@LogicFTW
Sorry I misread you.
I thought you meant scientific evidence, when you asked for empirical evidence.
Here is a definition of empirical evidence that I think we can agree on.
“Empirical evidence is the information received by means of the senses, particularly by observation and documentation of patterns and behavior through experimentation.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empirical_evidence
I don’t want to waste a lot of time talking about Zeus.
Zeus is said to live on MT Olympus in a human form.
That area has been thoroughly explored for centuries.
Zeus has been evidenced to not exist in that area.
I cannot produce God for you so you can see or taste him.
There is no way to test God, as you would something in nature.
I have a lot of what I would count as evidence.
But not the kind that would force everyone to accept it.
Not in the same way I could show 1+1=2, or that the earth is a sphere.
My “evidence” would be better described as an argument.
The same thing that everyone has on the subject.
Just an argument and no empirical evidence.
“But for me, as a skeptic, I require an idea to be evidenced, before I accept it to be true.”
“It is my standard, and I try to apply it to all ideas I come across. I wish everyone would make it their standard on everything. People that do not require other people's ideas to be evidenced can be easily manipulated and taken advantage of. I do not like being taken advantage of, I would imagine most people would not either.”
I agree with your above statements.
What I am trying to point out is that you are only applying it to those who believe in God.
Can someone who believes God does not exist provide empirical evidence?
Can an Agnostic provide empirical evidence?
Can an Atheist provide empirical evidence?
Do you have any empirical evidence for you claims?
Did you arrive at Atheism through or by empirical evidence?
Everyone is in the same situation.
No one can produce the evidence you want.
Not the Theist, not the Agnostic, not the Atheist, and not the Denier.
When you ask just one (Theist) of the four for evidence.
You make it appear that the Theist is wrong.
But if you asked any of the others, you would get the same lack of evidence.
Lack of evidence is not evidence of absence.
That is an argument from ignorance fallacy.
“It asserts that a proposition is true because it has not yet been proven false or a proposition is false because it has not yet been proven true.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_ignorance
It is true that the one making the claim has the burden of proof.
However, If it is impossible to produce the required evidence.
Then it is just a rigged requirement.
It says nothing about the claim.
It is an attempt to make the claimant appear wrong.
If the standard by which we should judge every idea is empirical evidence.
Than you must require it for all ideas, all “isms".
Hmm, which is it Jo?
You have demonstrated no evidence Jo, and your arguments have all been demonstrated as irrational, because they contain known logical fallacies.
Can you do so for all the deities you believe don't exist, or are you setting a dishonest double standard? As if we don't know.
An atheists doesn't need to evidence their disbelief, as by definition atheism isn't a belief, just why you keep rehashing this lie Jo isn't clear, but it says a lot about you.
Odd you apply this only one way? However you are applying incorrectly, here is the correct definition.
"Argumentum ad Ignorantiam: (appeal to ignorance) the fallacy that a proposition is true simply on the basis that it has not been proved false or that it is false simply because it has not been proved true."
Note that you have repeatedly used the first part of that fallacy, you even use it in this very post more than once. Absence of evidence IS of course evidence of absence, it is not however proof of absence. Do you have proof for the nonexistence of all the deities you don't believe exist Jo? Of course you don't, thus again we see your dishonest hypocrisy in both your belief and your disbelief. As an atheist I at least set the same open minded unbiased standard for all deities.
You are lying so much Jo, that you can't even keep track of what you have said in the same post, as we see here where you keep contradicting your own claims. dear oh dear Jo. Oh what a tangled web we weave, when we do at first practice to deceive. That might have been written specifically for your posts Jo.
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