Exposing Atheistic Myths

[Half-Life]

"Supernatural" = "Can't explain how it was naturally occurring... yet"

This implies FAITH that there will be an explanation in the future, which is not scientific.

 

[Half-Life]

half life
e
Where is it biblicaly derived that something exists when god looks at it. Christians seem to know the will, intent, and mind of an all powerful god. How is thjat so if it is not in the bible? Do you just know or does god speak to you?

1. We all use our minds to gather information about the world: empiricism.
2. Empiricism can not show that an external world exists independently of minds because no one has ever been outside of their own mind. (A banana can not be completely red and completely yellow at the same time)
3. To say an external world exists independently of minds requires extra evidence to justify it.
4. Nothing can be described if there are no minds around.
5. Therefore, to claim an external world exists independently of minds is a faith-based statement with no evidence to justify it.

 

[skepticalbip]

half life
e
Where is it biblicaly derived that something exists when god looks at it. Christians seem to know the will, intent, and mind of an all powerful god. How is thjat so if it is not in the bible? Do you just know or does god speak to you?

1. We all use our minds to gather information about the world: empiricism.

Yes.

2. Empiricism can not show that an external world exists independently of minds because no one has ever been outside of their own mind.

However people (at least some people) do possess the ability to reason.

(A banana can not be completely red and completely yellow at the same time)

A banana can't be either. Red and yellow are labels we have assigned to specific wavelengths of light. Bananas are not light.

3. To say an external world exists independently of minds requires extra evidence to justify it.

Indeed so, and there is a hell of a lot of such evidence.

4. Nothing can be described if there are no minds around.

True but it is piss poor reasoning to assume that a mind is needed to describe something for it to exist.

5. Therefore, to claim an external world exists independently of minds is a faith-based statement with no evidence to justify it.

Not faith based but based on reason and rationality.

It takes one hell of an ego to believe that, without you describing something, that something doesn't exist.

 

[abaddon]

This is at the level of stupid with flat-earthers. It's what they do: "It looks flat to me!" "I took a level up in an airplane and it stayed level!"

 

[Half-Life]

It takes one hell of an ego to believe that, without you describing something, that something doesn't exist.

No, it's the sign of a huge ego that thinks they can describe how things were in the past when there were no minds around.

Without minds, you can't describe how anything looks, feels, smells, tastes, or hears.

So yes, pure arrogance based on ego to say, "Let me tell you exactly what happened 7 billion years ago!"

 

[atrib]

half life
e
Where is it biblicaly derived that something exists when god looks at it. Christians seem to know the will, intent, and mind of an all powerful god. How is thjat so if it is not in the bible? Do you just know or does god speak to you?

1. We all use our minds to gather information about the world: empiricism.
2. Empiricism can not show that an external world exists independently of minds because no one has ever been outside of their own mind. (A banana can not be completely red and completely yellow at the same time)
3. To say an external world exists independently of minds requires extra evidence to justify it.
4. Nothing can be described if there are no minds around.
5. Therefore, to claim an external world exists independently of minds is a faith-based statement with no evidence to justify it.

Alternately, no external world exists, and god is just a simulation along with the rest of us.

Unless, of course, you are implicitly assuming that the external world does exist. Can you prove it does?

 

[skepticalbip]

It takes one hell of an ego to believe that, without you describing something, that something doesn't exist.

No, it's the sign of a huge ego that thinks they can describe how things were in the past when there were no minds around.

Without minds, you can't describe how anything looks, feels, smells, tastes, or hears.

True that someone needs a mind to be able to sense things. However you still have not shown that it is necessary for someone to sense something for it to exist external to the mind. Explain what it is that is stimulating those senses. You have it backwards by asserting that sensing something creates it in the physical universe outside the mind.

So yes, pure arrogance based on ego to say, "Let me tell you exactly what happened 7 billion years ago!"

Astronomers observe the universe of 7 billion years ago all the time. They just look at galaxies 7 billion lightyears away.

 

[Half-Life]

half life
e
Where is it biblicaly derived that something exists when god looks at it. Christians seem to know the will, intent, and mind of an all powerful god. How is thjat so if it is not in the bible? Do you just know or does god speak to you?

1. We all use our minds to gather information about the world: empiricism.
2. Empiricism can not show that an external world exists independently of minds because no one has ever been outside of their own mind. (A banana can not be completely red and completely yellow at the same time)
3. To say an external world exists independently of minds requires extra evidence to justify it.
4. Nothing can be described if there are no minds around.
5. Therefore, to claim an external world exists independently of minds is a faith-based statement with no evidence to justify it.

Alternately, no external world exists, and god is just a simulation along with the rest of us.

Unless, of course, you are implicitly assuming that the external world does exist. Can you prove it does?

To quote abaddon in post #913:

That's what Half-Life thinks the materialist's/atheist's position SHOULD be if we were true to strict empiricism the way he thinks we should be. (Strict empiricism = believe only what you directly perceive 'with your mind').

One of his posts contended:

1. a yellow banana doesn't exist independently of perception.
2. because the yellow does not exist independently of perception.
3. therefore the banana does not exist independently of perception.

So, if I have managed to make his nonsense come together into a summary:
Absolutely everything is qualia. So if you're not currently perceiving something, it can't exist... unless another mind is perceiving it. That other mind is the mind of God.

Or that's what I've been able to understand of Half-Life's stance.

The problem isn't that the star doesn't exist until YOU see its light. It's that it doesn't exist if God's not seeing it. Because it's all "ideas", or I think to update that, it's all qualia.

He understands the argument, yet does not believe it. The bold is what you have to understand. Materialism can not show that anything exists without any minds around.

God as the eternal perceiver can get you around the problem of, "How do we know what things were like billions of years ago with no minds around?"


Dead end with materialism.

Full open road highway with immaterialism.

 

[atrib]

It takes one hell of an ego to believe that, without you describing something, that something doesn't exist.

No, it's the sign of a huge ego that thinks they can describe how things were in the past when there were no minds around.

Without minds, you can't describe how anything looks, feels, smells, tastes, or hears.

So yes, pure arrogance based on ego to say, "Let me tell you exactly what happened 7 billion years ago!"

"Minds" should be changed to "observations". Because I bet you can't define what a mind is, and how a mind can be distinguished from our physical nervous system. And it is observations that are used to describe various attributes of reality, not minds.

 

[skepticalbip]

Alternately, no external world exists, and god is just a simulation along with the rest of us.

Unless, of course, you are implicitly assuming that the external world does exist. Can you prove it does?

To quote abaddon in post #913:

That's what Half-Life thinks the materialist's/atheist's position SHOULD be if we were true to strict empiricism the way he thinks we should be. (Strict empiricism = believe only what you directly perceive 'with your mind').

One of his posts contended:

1. a yellow banana doesn't exist independently of perception.
2. because the yellow does not exist independently of perception.
3. therefore the banana does not exist independently of perception.

So, if I have managed to make his nonsense come together into a summary:
Absolutely everything is qualia. So if you're not currently perceiving something, it can't exist... unless another mind is perceiving it. That other mind is the mind of God.

Or that's what I've been able to understand of Half-Life's stance.

The problem isn't that the star doesn't exist until YOU see its light. It's that it doesn't exist if God's not seeing it. Because it's all "ideas", or I think to update that, it's all qualia.

He understands the argument, yet does not believe it. The bold is what you have to understand. Materialism can not show that anything exists without any minds around.

God as the eternal perceiver can get you around the problem of, "How do we know what things were like billions of years ago with no minds around?"


Dead end with materialism.

Full open road highway with immaterialism.

That doesn't show immaterialism but is a rather absurd attempt to explain materialism, "God is watching which creates a material universe."

 

[Half-Life]

That doesn't show immaterialism but is a rather absurd attempt to explain materialism, "God is watching which creates a material universe."

But, materialism can't explain anything without minds.

 

[abaddon]

The reality isn't in the explaining.

The existence of anything isn't in the seeing of it.

 

[Half-Life]

The reality isn't in the explaining.

The existence of anything isn't in the seeing of it.

Then how do you know what exists without minds? You can't describe it, obviously.

 

[skepticalbip]

That doesn't show immaterialism but is a rather absurd attempt to explain materialism, "God is watching which creates a material universe."

But, materialism can't explain anything without minds.

Your ego is showing. Matter doesn't need you to explain it for it to be... it is without you. You are not a necessary component of reality. You are only necessary for you.

 

[atrib]

That doesn't show immaterialism but is a rather absurd attempt to explain materialism, "God is watching which creates a material universe."

But, materialism can't explain anything without minds.

Wrong. The fact is that we cannot demonstrate that the material world exists and is real. In order to assert that the material world is real, and is a product of God's mind or the minds of humans (whatever the fuck that means), you would first have to demonstrate that the material world exists. Which you cannot do. Therefore, at best, you are stuck in the same boat as atheists, and haven't demonstrated anything other than your ability to make up shit, and your lack of understanding of how logical arguments work.

 

[Half-Life]

That doesn't show immaterialism but is a rather absurd attempt to explain materialism, "God is watching which creates a material universe."

But, materialism can't explain anything without minds.

Your ego is showing. Matter doesn't need you to explain it for it to be... it is without you. You are not a necessary component of reality. You are only necessary for you.

But, matter has not been proven to exist, either.

Why do you think Berkeley said, "believing in matter leads to skepticism," because you guys fall for the idea that things can exist independently of minds, which if it's true, erases the need for God.

 

[Half-Life]

That doesn't show immaterialism but is a rather absurd attempt to explain materialism, "God is watching which creates a material universe."

But, materialism can't explain anything without minds.

Wrong. The fact is that we cannot demonstrate that the material world exists and is real. In order to assert that the material world is real, and is a product of God's mind or the minds of humans (whatever the fuck that means), you would first have to demonstrate that the material world exists. Which you cannot do. Therefore, at best, you are stuck in the same boat as atheists, and haven't demonstrated anything other than your ability to make up shit, and your lack of understanding of how logical arguments work.

But you guys go a step further and say, "the material world can exist independently of minds," which is something that can not be observed unless we all left our minds outside of our bodies.

 

[skepticalbip]

Your ego is showing. Matter doesn't need you to explain it for it to be... it is without you. You are not a necessary component of reality. You are only necessary for you.

But, matter has not been proven to exist, either.

And you haven't proven that your mind exists to anyone else either.

Why do you think Berkeley said, "believing in matter leads to skepticism," because you guys fall for the idea that things can exist independently of minds, which if it's true, erases the need for God.

Berkeley said it because he was a piss-poor philosopher trying to prove god exists. He didn't... he only consistently contradicted himself.

 

[abaddon]

The reality isn't in the explaining.

The existence of anything isn't in the seeing of it.

Then how do you know what exists without minds? You can't describe it, obviously.

I wouldn't know what exists without my mind.

Your error is you think scientists or atheists (whoever your argument is directed at) rely entirely on empiricism, as in first-person direct observation only. This is incorrect. Rationality is used also, to take the evidence of the world presented to our senses and extrapolate from there. As everyone does, including you and Berkeley in spite of whatever assortment of words...

You see that Berkeley insisted on strict empiricism, and figure he was more consistent than atheists and/or scientists about that. But only he and you want to stick to that weird, unnecessary standard. And you do it for sophistic reasons, you're worried minds (and God, because you defined God to be a mind) become accessories. Which is correct... minds are accessories. Animals eventually evolved them so they can orient to the world and move about.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Wrong. The fact is that we cannot demonstrate that the material world exists and is real. In order to assert that the material world is real, and is a product of God's mind or the minds of humans (whatever the fuck that means), you would first have to demonstrate that the material world exists. Which you cannot do. Therefore, at best, you are stuck in the same boat as atheists, and haven't demonstrated anything other than your ability to make up shit, and your lack of understanding of how logical arguments work.

But you guys go a step further and say, "the material world can exist independently of minds," which is something that can not be observed unless we all left our minds outside of our bodies.

Okay, so the argument is we can’t prove reality exists if we didn’t exist... and that proves god somehow.