What would count as proof of God

[Drew2008]

The point is that the creator cannot be an answer to the question 'why do things exist', if the creator is itself a thing that requires a creator in order to exist.

No that's not true. The explanation I exist because my mother and father birthed me is valid even though they have parents and there parents have parents and so forth. I don't claim to know how a Creator came into existence or how such a transcendent creator would cause the universe. Its preposterous that I a mere mortal existing inside the universe would how transcendent beings operate. I do know a universe exists and its necessary for theism to be true but unnecessary for atheism to be true. Did the lack of God's existence cause a universe to exist?

 

[Keith&Co.]

Same with the house. Even if it appeared weirdly to have just "come into existence", you surmise a HOW it can have been built and look for the traces to confirm it. Those traces are evidence. The house itself is not.

Its exactly what evidence is, evidence is a fact that makes a claim more likely. I went through what evidence is before I even listed one fact.

But the fact you listed isn't evidence.
The universe existing is accepted by all attempts to explain the universe existing. It makes no theory more likely than the rest of them.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Did the lack of God's existence cause a universe to exist?

There is evidence that nature abhors nothing, and seeks to fill it by creating thing. The more complete the nothingness, the more thingness created.
So, yes, it is possible to say the lack of gods (and everything else) caused the universe to exist.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Your "logic" (I'm being kind) via an analogy...

God made me a sandwich.
I have a sandwich, this is evidence that God made it.

Analogies are often self-serving...this one no different.

Analogies are oftn self-serving. Mine isn't because it is presented in the exact same angle you are trying to argue from. Something exist -> God. Therefore God made my sandwich. And my sandwich existing is "evidence" of that.

Or how about:

I had sex with Alison Hannigan.
I have a penis, that is evidence that I had sex with Alison Hannigan.

Why is this one better? You're penis would have no probative value its not required to have sex with someone.

Good point. The evidence is that Alison Hannigan exists.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Your "logic" (I'm being kind) via an analogy...

God made me a sandwich.
I have a sandwich, this is evidence that God made it.

Analogies are often self-serving...this one no different.

Analogies are oftn self-serving. Mine isn't because it is presented in the exact same angle you are trying to argue from. Something exist -> God. Therefore God made my sandwich. And my sandwich existing is "evidence" of that.

Or how about:

I had sex with Alison Hannigan.
I have a penis, that is evidence that I had sex with Alison Hannigan.

Why is this one better? You're penis would have no probative value its not required to have sex with someone.

Good point. The evidence is that Alison Hannigan exists.

But penis-in-vagina IS the classic understanding of 'i had sex with.'
Though the biologist definition is "exchanged genetic material with," so two amoeba can have biologist sex, while if you wore a condom when you had classic sex with Alison Hannigan, you did not have sex as a biologist would term it.

 

[Jarhyn]

Well looks like you all have a fine slap fight going. Have fun.

 

[abaddon]

Same with the house. Even if it appeared weirdly to have just "come into existence", you surmise a HOW it can have been built and look for the traces to confirm it. Those traces are evidence. The house itself is not.

Its exactly what evidence is, evidence is a fact that makes a claim more likely. I went through what evidence is before I even listed one fact.

Evidence to support any claim about the house has to be other facts than the house. "The house exists" doesn't support "the house was made" - the first (house exists) is not evidence that make the second (house was made) a claim that's more likely. You're just assuming the conclusion.

To support a claim about the house, you need something else than the house. The facts to support the claim "the house is intentionally made" will have to be facts from within the house if it's impossible to find any facts outside the house. So predict what facts you'll find inside the house, and then see if they are there.

 

[bilby]

The point is that the creator cannot be an answer to the question 'why do things exist', if the creator is itself a thing that requires a creator in order to exist.

No that's not true. The explanation I exist because my mother and father birthed me is valid even though they have parents and there parents have parents and so forth. I don't claim to know how a Creator came into existence or how such a transcendent creator would cause the universe. Its preposterous that I a mere mortal existing inside the universe would how transcendent beings operate. I do know a universe exists and its necessary for theism to be true but unnecessary for atheism to be true. Did the lack of God's existence cause a universe to exist?

Your parents explain why YOU exist. But they don't explain why humans exist, why life exists, or why the world or the universe exist.

When you're seeking to explain the existence of everything, explaining the existence of recent and ephemeral things doesn't get you anywhere.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

To accept that you are wrong is most certainly not a way of be confidently right!

I am not omniscient. There's no way, on any subject, that i can be completely informed and correct to the nth decimal point.

Everything i believe or understand is limited, and based on limited knowledge/understanding.
Even the certainty that 2+2 = 4. That doesn't apply in all situations, in all conditions, at all scales. 90% of the speed of light plus 90% of light speed does not equal 180% of light speed.


So i take it as granted that anything i declare to be true and correct will only partially apply, and only in limited ways. Outside of those, I'm wrong. Or at best, not completely correct.



Thus, "i am wrong" is the ONLY thing i can think of to say which even Bilby won't meaningfully contradict.

That's not what Jarhyn was saying. But that's not true, either. For example, I know that there is a keyboard in front of me. And I'm actually typing on that keyboard. I am not wrong about that. There are plenty of other things I do not know. But not knowing is not the same as being wrong, that is having a false belief. For example, I do not know where there is life in Europa, but I am not wrong about whether there is life in Europa. In fact, since I do not have a belief one way or another, in particular I do not have a false belief.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

Atheism makes claims as well. They claim the universe we observe came into existence apart from a creator. They claim the universe wasn't planned or designed it was natural mindless forces that some how came into existence and wound up unintentionally causing a universe to exist. That's your story and claim and your stuck with it.

Who are "they"? "Atheists"?
I am an atheist, but I do not make those claims. I make no claim that the universe came into existence. It is not even clear to me what you mean by "universe" there. I do make the claim that there is no omnimax (omnipotent, omniscient, morally perfect) agent. But other than that, no claim.

Only one thing needs to be true for atheism to be true. No God, creator or designer of the universe exists.

Going by any of the main philosophical understandings of 'God', it is enough that there is no omnimax agent - where 'agent' is used as broadly as possible, so persons, n-person substance, being, entity, etc. with a mind or that is a mind, etc., will count.

There are other definitions of 'atheism' and 'God', so I would suggest greater precision.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

It is trivial that when someone believes the are wrong about something, they will at the very least be correct that they are wrong. It's the one thing we can be fairly well actually certain of, and something the certainty of which enables us to become less wrong.

That, of course, is not at all what you claimed before. I challenged your previous claim, not this one.

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

How does one define when something began other than simply claiming that it began? It's really juvenile to say that something began at a certain point without explaining your reasoning.

 

[Drew2008]

Evidence to support any claim about the house has to be other facts than the house. "The house exists" doesn't support "the house was made" - the first (house exists) is not evidence that make the second (house was made) a claim that's more likely. You're just assuming the conclusion.

To support a claim about the house, you need something else than the house. The facts to support the claim "the house is intentionally made" will have to be facts from within the house if it's impossible to find any facts outside the house. So predict what facts you'll find inside the house, and then see if they are there.

We'll have to disagree. Of course it supports the contention houses are intentionally built. There are other facts to support that belief but the fact upon which the claim rests is the existence of at least one house. Minus that fact the claim is falsified. If I went to court to prove houses were intentionally made by design the existence of houses would be exhibit A. Just as in most murder cases exhibit A is a dead body. Because you can't have murder without a death and you can't have houses intentionally created if no houses exist.

You can relax though the existence of the universe doesn't prove God exists. Its just one line of evidence that favors the belief.

 

[Jarhyn]

It is trivial that when someone believes the are wrong about something, they will at the very least be correct that they are wrong. It's the one thing we can be fairly well actually certain of, and something the certainty of which enables us to become less wrong.

That, of course, is not at all what you claimed before. I challenged your previous claim, not this one.

That you cannot see how they are the same is the reason this is strike three. Maybe next year.

 

[abaddon]

We'll have to disagree. Of course it supports the contention houses are intentionally built.

Oh, somehow I thought the house was supposed to be analogous to the universe.

I went back to try to comprehend your F1 post better... now I see the posts about a penis existing is evidence the penis fucked someone are apt responses.

Why's it a problem for you if some atheists have said "no evidence for God"? Probably it's the shorthand version of either "no scientific evidence" or "no evidence that'd convince person who aren't already inclined to believe anyway". Is there scientific evidence, or evidence that might convince persons who aren't looking to believe anyway?

 

[Keith&Co.]

You can relax though the existence of the universe doesn't prove God exists.

Pretty sure no one is anxious that you'll make them reject their stance.
But maybe the mods should split this off from the thread?

You're just trying to wedge a gap in the science to justifybyour belief, not prove a god.

 

[Jarhyn]

You can relax though the existence of the universe doesn't prove God exists.

Pretty sure no one is anxious that you'll make them reject their stance.
But maybe the mods should split this off from the thread?

You're just trying to wedge a gap in the science to justifybyour belief, not prove a god.

Yeah like I explained exactly what real burden is required for Christians to prove a god within the "creator" classes exists, and whether there are signs of "metaversal imprinting"

None of them are doing that. To do that you have to go to the very edge of physics and rather than having an idea on what such entities or numbers or truths "ought" be, as if that was coherent or healthy, look for what MAY and MAY NOT be and what evidence would actually qualify an idea for either bin.


And then be prepared to never get answers because they may not be attainable!

 

[Keith&Co.]

You can relax though the existence of the universe doesn't prove God exists.

Pretty sure no one is anxious that you'll make them reject their stance.
But maybe the mods should split this off from the thread?

You're just trying to wedge a gap in the science to justifybyour belief, not prove a god.

Yeah like I explained exactly what real burden is required for Christians to prove a god within the "creator" classes exists, and whether there are signs of "metaversal imprinting"

I suspect Drew's not interested in actual proof because that would be subject to critique and disproof. Rather, yet another believer who'll claim satisfaction for vague reasons with frangible boundaries and anyone who objects is a poopy head.

 

[Jarhyn]

You can relax though the existence of the universe doesn't prove God exists.

Pretty sure no one is anxious that you'll make them reject their stance.
But maybe the mods should split this off from the thread?

You're just trying to wedge a gap in the science to justifybyour belief, not prove a god.

Yeah like I explained exactly what real burden is required for Christians to prove a god within the "creator" classes exists, and whether there are signs of "metaversal imprinting"

I suspect Drew's not interested in actual proof because that would be subject to critique and disproof. Rather, yet another believer who'll claim satisfaction for vague reasons with frangible boundaries and anyone who objects is a poopy head.

So, just another of the long revolving door of "fresh [apologistic] meat"

I wish there were some way to inoculate people from this sophistry BEFORE they got this far, but alas...

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Evidence to support any claim about the house has to be other facts than the house. "The house exists" doesn't support "the house was made" - the first (house exists) is not evidence that make the second (house was made) a claim that's more likely. You're just assuming the conclusion.

To support a claim about the house, you need something else than the house. The facts to support the claim "the house is intentionally made" will have to be facts from within the house if it's impossible to find any facts outside the house. So predict what facts you'll find inside the house, and then see if they are there.

We'll have to disagree. Of course it supports the contention houses are intentionally built. There are other facts to support that belief but the fact upon which the claim rests is the existence of at least one house. Minus that fact the claim is falsified. If I went to court to prove houses were intentionally made by design the existence of houses would be exhibit A. Just as in most murder cases exhibit A is a dead body. Because you can't have murder without a death and you can't have houses intentionally created if no houses exist.

You can relax though the existence of the universe doesn't prove God exists. Its just one line of evidence that favors the belief.

More like a "logic" trap, where the "significance" of existing will be manipulated. We're sorry your mouse trap sprung up before a mouse took the cheese. Honestly, there are only so many ways your (and so many other people) argument can be phrased or parsed.

After all:

God Exists, therefore God was created, am I right?