Exposing Atheistic Myths

[DBT]

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.

We get to see the things of the world, the sun, moon, trees, lakes, rivers, people...nobody really argues over the existence of these things. Do we see God, something that has been argued over for centuries? It seems that we don't, and despite numerous claims to the contrary, we never have.

 

[Cheerful Charlie]

Bacteria existed for millions of years without minds to observe them. Unless one wants to claim bacteria did not exist until powerful microscopes were invented.

 

[Half-Life]

Bacteria existed for millions of years without minds to observe them. Unless one wants to claim bacteria did not exist until powerful microscopes were invented.

You only know bacteria through your mind. You are using your mind to say they have been around for millions of years.

Can you please describe to us what "bacteria" looks like without a mind around to perceive it? You can't do this without using your mind to imagine it, which means it's not independent of perception.

"God exists" would solve your conundrum. You're so close!

 

[DBT]

It's not that we now know bacteria with our minds because we have invented instruments that enable us to detect bacteria, but that bacteria existed and acted upon us, disease, etc, even when we had no clue about the existence of bacteria.

 

[abaddon]

... you guys fall for the idea that things can exist independently of minds, which if it's true, erases the need for God.

You talk as if people have a need for God.

"God exists" would solve your conundrum. You're so close!

It's no one's conundrum but yours. You're the one with the need for a stupid-simple answer.

How is this "God" notion not just being yanked out of mythology and then getting applied as an empty answer to conundrums like this?

How are conundrums like this not contrived in order to have a place to squeeze "God" into?

Does this idea have any practical effect in your life? I mean, does immaterialism change how your life feels? No, it's just something you stumbled across that looked like a way to thwart atheists, isn't it?

 

[skepticalbip]

..... you guys fall for the idea that things can exist independently of minds,

You continue to conflate existing and perceiving. Things exist independent of minds. It is perceiving those things that require a mind. If things didn't exist in the physical world then we couldn't perceive them, though we could imagine them.

which if it's true, erases the need for God.

...No shit...

You are starting with the assumption that there is a god, not proving there is a god.

 

[steve_bank]

Bacteria existed for millions of years without minds to observe them. Unless one wants to claim bacteria did not exist until powerful microscopes were invented.

You only know bacteria through your mind. You are using your mind to say they have been around for millions of years.

Can you please describe to us what "bacteria" looks like without a mind around to perceive it? You can't do this without using your mind to imagine it, which means it's not independent of perception.

"God exists" would solve your conundrum. You're so close!

You only know bacteria through your mind. You are using your mind to say they have been around for millions of years.

Can you please describe to us what "bacteria" looks like without a mind around to perceive it? You can't do this without using your mind to imagine it, which means it's not independent of perception.


You can only realize the ridiculous nature of your arguments through your 'mind'. But then what is 'you' vs 'your mind' ? Through the ages inquiring minds have wanted to know.

Is 'you' separate from your 'mind'? Is you and your mind one? s it all semantics for everything that is just a function of the brain? Are you a figment of your mind and imagination?

 

[atrib]

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.

You ignored what I was saying, perhaps because you didn't want to acknowledge it, or more likely because you didn't understand it.

You cannot prove that reality exists, independently of minds, or otherwise. You cannot prove that you are not a brain in a vat immersed in a simulation, and you cannot prove that when your mind is unplugged from the simulation, reality will continue to exist. That is your own argument. Since you cannot prove that reality exists independently of your mind, you cannot prove that there is a god around to sustain reality when nobody else is looking. Therefore, your argument for God's existence fails. And you are guilty of presupposing the very premise you have been accusing atheists of presupposing.

This fundamental flaw in your argument cannot be overcome by pointing at atheists and saying "I know I'm wrong, but look over there". That is just an attempt at distraction. Or, you simply don't understand what the fuck you are talking about, and I am incorrect in believing that you actually have a brain that can be used to think.

 

[Keith&Co.]

I just observed that we can percieve things witjout a mind.
I touched the pan the turkey is in. It's hot. My nervous system did not ask my mind for permission to reaft, it yanked my hand clear on the instant. Later, my mind deconstructed what must have happened, but the signal from nerves to muscles was a short circuit that did not include the mind.

So the whole premise is verklempt, even aside from Halfie's inability to understand his own errors.



So, what other 'atheistic myths' are there that are just excuses to insist that the solution is gawd?

 

[DBT]

Yep, nerve loops. Plants and other organisms also respond to their environment without thought or consciousness as we experience it.

 

[Half-Life]

I just observed that we can percieve things witjout a mind.
I touched the pan the turkey is in. It's hot. My nervous system did not ask my mind for permission to reaft, it yanked my hand clear on the instant. Later, my mind deconstructed what must have happened, but the signal from nerves to muscles was a short circuit that did not include the mind.

So the whole premise is verklempt, even aside from Halfie's inability to understand his own errors.



So, what other 'atheistic myths' are there that are just excuses to insist that the solution is gawd?

Brilliant, Keith! Please explain to all of us how you got outside of your mind and body to touch the turkey pan. This is exciting news!

 

[Keith&Co.]

I just observed that we can percieve things witjout a mind.
I touched the pan the turkey is in. It's hot. My nervous system did not ask my mind for permission to reaft, it yanked my hand clear on the instant. Later, my mind deconstructed what must have happened, but the signal from nerves to muscles was a short circuit that did not include the mind.

So the whole premise is verklempt, even aside from Halfie's inability to understand his own errors.



So, what other 'atheistic myths' are there that are just excuses to insist that the solution is gawd?

Brilliant, Keith! Please explain to all of us how you got outside of your mind and body to touch the turkey pan. This is exciting news!

Nope. Read what i said and go from there. Not from the round hole you're trying to force all pegs into.

 

[Rhea]

I just observed that we can percieve things witjout a mind.
I touched the pan the turkey is in. It's hot. My nervous system did not ask my mind for permission to reaft, it yanked my hand clear on the instant. Later, my mind deconstructed what must have happened, but the signal from nerves to muscles was a short circuit that did not include the mind.

So the whole premise is verklempt, even aside from Halfie's inability to understand his own errors.



So, what other 'atheistic myths' are there that are just excuses to insist that the solution is gawd?

Brilliant, Keith! Please explain to all of us how you got outside of your mind and body to touch the turkey pan. This is exciting news!

Quite obviously, his mind was not doing any heat-perceiving, or he would not have touched it. Yet, there was the heat; existing even without his mind perceiving it.

 

[Half-Life]

I just observed that we can percieve things witjout a mind.
I touched the pan the turkey is in. It's hot. My nervous system did not ask my mind for permission to reaft, it yanked my hand clear on the instant. Later, my mind deconstructed what must have happened, but the signal from nerves to muscles was a short circuit that did not include the mind.

So the whole premise is verklempt, even aside from Halfie's inability to understand his own errors.



So, what other 'atheistic myths' are there that are just excuses to insist that the solution is gawd?

Brilliant, Keith! Please explain to all of us how you got outside of your mind and body to touch the turkey pan. This is exciting news!

Quite obviously, his mind was not doing any heat-perceiving, or he would not have touched it. Yet, there was the heat; existing even without his mind perceiving it.

Berkeley's point was that hot and cold are all in the mind. Some people don't even feel pain and they could touch a turkey pan without flinching. Is the turkey pan both hot and not hot at the same time? Nope. Shows it's only in the mind.

Berkeley is still winning, guys.

 

[Atheos]

For someone who keeps chiding others about not being able to grasp simple concepts it seems odd that you are unable to understand what Keith is describing. He's not describing a mind perceiving that there is hot or cold. He's describing an autonomic reflex that happens without conferring with the mind first. The mind may never register the hot or cold sensation in such an event.

It also happens to be possible for people who have analgesia to experience these autonomic reactions, doubling the fact that the mind has nothing to do with the response. Talk about an argument backfiring. If you actually existed and weren't merely a figment of my imagination I bet you'd be super red in the face right about now.

I notice you still haven't responded to my challenge to prove you exist. As far as I can tell my mind is the entirety of all existence in the universe - the only logical conclusion of this imaginary Berkeley. There's no god, no other people, no computer, nothing. Just my mind living in a tantalizingly complex delusion.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Berkeley's point was that hot and cold are all in the mind.

if tgat were true, i wouldn't flinch. I would have to interpret the sensation and decide to withdraw my hand.
Swing and a miss, Halfie.

Some people don't even feel pain and they could touch a turkey pan without flinching.

i do not believe this to be true. Cite?

Is the turkey pan both hot and not hot at the same time?

once again you conflate perception with reality in a poor attempt tp prop up your fake dilemma.

Nope. Shows it's only in the mind.

no, at best it shows a disparitybetween the mind and any objective reality.

Berkeley is still winning, guys.

Berkelet invented a fake problem for which the only solution was the one he wanted.


You have yet to show that there actually is a problem.

 

[Rhea]

. i do not believe this to be true. Cite?

There are people who do not feel sensations to varying degrees including severe enough to not detect that fact that their own flesh is burning.

However, that fact harms Half-Life’s point even further, as the burnt flesh will testify.

I myself have a toe with no sensation (due to an amputation and reattachment). I stepped on a lit cigarette and only the smell of my burning flesh alerted us.

 

[DBT]

Quite obviously, his mind was not doing any heat-perceiving, or he would not have touched it. Yet, there was the heat; existing even without his mind perceiving it.

Berkeley's point was that hot and cold are all in the mind. Some people don't even feel pain and they could touch a turkey pan without flinching. Is the turkey pan both hot and not hot at the same time? Nope. Shows it's only in the mind.

Berkeley is still winning, guys.

The conscious sensation of hot or cold or sweet, sour, etc, exist only in the mind....but that doesn't mean that the physical states being interpreted as being hot or cold, sweet, sour, etc, by a mind/brain are not there regardless.

 

[steve_bank]

Philosophy and semantics.

Everything we say and think is based in the brain. You can philosophically argue that hot and cold only exists as the mind or brain. But ten you eventualy hae to argue mind and reality as separate or connected.

Mind is connected to reality trouigh perception.

I can say temperature gradients exist based on observation and experience, but then somebody can always say science is arbitrarily and hot and cold dies not exist outside of mind.

Does reality exist if there are no humans to sense it? If a tree falls in the woods and nobody is around does it make a sound?

Heavy questions, before modern science and the perspectives science gives.

 

[DBT]

The evidence strongly supports the proposition that the universe existed long before life emerged and evolved the ability to detect and interact with matter/energy in the form of sensing its properties and responding to them.