What would count as proof of God

[steve_bank]

Again, there are limited possibilities.

Universe without beginning or end.
Universe sprang into existence form nothing.
A creator did it, without explaining how the creator came to be.

Yes there are unlimited naturalism in the gaps explanations...

Just for the record I don't claim to know how a Creator came into existence. If the Creator did require a Creator that would still make theism true. So what's the point of that argument?

You are stating what you believe not why, in Christtian terms you are testifying. Amen brother Drew. Tell it brother tell t!

Again negatory.

Naturalism points to science as the best means to understand reality. Logic and rationality.
Any new theory anyone proposes must conform or be based on existing science, or it must have a way of being demonstred.
Evolution is based on solid demonstrated science.

Many theories come and go. In the early 20th century htere was competition to develop a theory to explain electric current. The one that was supported by experiment won out. Millikan.

Why do you belive in a creator? A feeling?

Naturalism does not give leave to speculate or invent theory out of nothing, that is relgion and mythology. Pseudo science and naturalism are mutualy exclusive.

 

[steve_bank]

How woud you rate the quality of design of the universe by your creator? Killer asteroids, earthquakes, hurricanes. Birth defects.

Yeah, I'm hoping we get into that. Drew really focuses on 'uncaring forces' in what he poses as The Atheist Model. He seems really, deeply concerned about the universe not intentionally making life.
I look at the death estimate from the latest eruptions, and Harlequin babies, and telemarketers, and wonder just what qualities he's noticed the universe has that reflects 'caring' in its design.
Surely that's the distinction between, say, a deist universe and an atheist one.

Good point.

 

[Elixir]

How woud you rate the quality of design of the universe by your creator? Killer asteroids, earthquakes, hurricanes. Birth defects.

Yeah, I'm hoping we get into that. Drew really focuses on 'uncaring forces' in what he poses as The Atheist Model. He seems really, deeply concerned about the universe not intentionally making life.
I look at the death estimate from the latest eruptions, and Harlequin babies, and telemarketers, and wonder just what qualities he's noticed the universe has that reflects 'caring' in its design.
Surely that's the distinction between, say, a deist universe and an atheist one.

Good point.

It’s a shame we won’t be around to tell them we told you so when God puts the wack on humanity.

 

[pood]

Drew,

You claim that the probability of the universe existing on the assumption of a creator is greater than on the assumption of no creator. This is wrong. The a posteriori probability of the universe existing is 1. The a priori probability is unknown and unknowable, because the concept is undefinable. If the universe is a one-time-only coming-into-existence event, no probability can be ascribed to that. If the universe has always existed in some form or another, which is likely the case, then again it is meaningless to ascribe an a priori probability to this fact because there is no prior state of the universe. Either way your probability argument fails.

Your naturalism of the gaps argument fails. The reason we deploy the god of the gaps argument is because naturalism always supplies a necessary and sufficient explanation for what we see. When there is as gap in our knowledge, we are therefore inductively justified in believing that the gap will be filled not by god but by a natural explanation, because all such gaps have been so filled in the past. For the naturalism of the gaps argument to succeed, it would have to be the case that we had determined that everything we see had been created by a god, and therefore a naturalist explanation for a gap in our knowledge is not warranted. Needless to say this is not the case, and so there is no such thing as a naturalism of the gaps argument.

Your cosmological argument fails. If the universe needs a creator, then who created God? If God indeed needs a creator, then is it creators (turtles) all the way down? Summoning Occam’s Razor.

In Kalam variant of the CA, everything that begins to exist must have a cause. The universe began to exist, on this argument, so it must have a cause. The cause is held to be a transcendent creator who did not begin to exist because the creator is a necessary being.

The argument fails on two counts. Virtual particles come into existence without a cause, so the claim that everything begins to exist has a cause is false. Second, even if the claim were true, there is no evidence that the universe as a whole began to exist. The big bang is not evidence that the universe began to exist. It is evidence at best of a phase transition from a prior state, which will not be understood unless and until we reconcile general relativity with quantum mechanics. The conservations laws, which state that matter and energy can neither be created nor destroyed, powerfully point to a universe with an infinite past and future extension.


Moreover, as others have pointed out, even if the big bang were a temporal past boundary to the existence of the universe, it still follows that there was no time that the universe did not exist and there will be no time that it does not exist. This is because space and time only exist within the universe and there is no prior time to the big bang (if the bang really is a temporal boundary) in the same way that there is no direction north of the North Pole.

You stated that atheists claim to know that there is no creator of the universe. This is false. Atheism is a belief, or lack of belief, claim. Knowledge has nothing to do with it, only evidence and argument. Gnosis = knowledge; a/gnosis, or agnostic, means no knowledge claim. I am an agnostic atheist on that account.

Finally, even if it were true that everything inside the universe that began to exist has a cause, which is not true on the evidence of virtual particles, the argument is a standard composition fallacy. It does not follow that even if everything that begins to exist within the universe has a cause, then the universe itself must have a cause.

All your arguments fail. Do you have anything else?

 

[Rhea]

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.

Then you should ask youself how you can know ANYTHING about this god entity, including its ability to create anything.
It is preposterous that you, a mere mortal existing inside the universe, would know that transcendent beings exist.
Or that they are transcendent.
Or that they are creators.
Or that they are capable of causing.

Simply preposterous.

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?

You keep saying this as if the existence of the universe has anything at all whatsoever to do with your fairy tale abut which you ust above declared it was preposterous that you would know anything.

But the existence of an ever-existing universe completely disproves your goddidit, doesn’t it?

 

[steve_bank]

Sounds like drew should just go ahead and oick up a bble.

 

[steve_bank]

How woud you rate the quality of design of the universe by your creator? Killer asteroids, earthquakes, hurricanes. Birth defects.

Yeah, I'm hoping we get into that. Drew really focuses on 'uncaring forces' in what he poses as The Atheist Model. He seems really, deeply concerned about the universe not intentionally making life.
I look at the death estimate from the latest eruptions, and Harlequin babies, and telemarketers, and wonder just what qualities he's noticed the universe has that reflects 'caring' in its design.
Surely that's the distinction between, say, a deist universe and an atheist one.

Good point.

It’s a shame we won’t be around to tell them we told you so when God puts the wack on humanity.

Well, god says hw would not drown the world again. He didn't say he would not change the climate.

 

[Elixir]

It’s a shame we won’t be around to tell them we told you so when God puts the wack on humanity.

Well, god says hw would not drown the world again. He didn't say he would not change the climate.

… or redirect that killer asteroid, or uncork the Yellowstone super volcano, or unleash a REAL pandemic, or …

 

[steve_bank]

It’s a shame we won’t be around to tell them we told you so when God puts the wack on humanity.

Well, god says hw would not drown the world again. He didn't say he would not change the climate.

… or redirect that killer asteroid, or uncork the Yellowstone super volcano, or unleash a REAL pandemic, or …

Anything is possible if we are just chartacers in god's cartoon animation.

 

[Elixir]

It’s a shame we won’t be around to tell them we told you so when God puts the wack on humanity.

Well, god says hw would not drown the world again. He didn't say he would not change the climate.

… or redirect that killer asteroid, or uncork the Yellowstone super volcano, or unleash a REAL pandemic, or …

Anything is possible if we are just chartacers in god's cartoon animation.

And if we’re not? Does that reduce the range of possibilities?
I doubt it.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Hmm... I'm going to prove my argument is right.

F1: I made an argument.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Anything is possible if we are just chartacers in god's cartoon animation.

(I should probably @excreationist here , too....)

 

[steve_bank]

Let's us do standup.

 

[Gospel]

It all depends on what people consider a god. For me, there cannot be a god with the kind of suffering that's happened on earth. So even if an omnipotent being approached me while juggling the sun, moon, and Andromeda I wouldn't consider that asshole a god.

 

[Drew2008]

You claim that the probability of the universe existing on the assumption of a creator is greater than on the assumption of no creator. This is wrong. The a posteriori probability of the universe existing is 1. The a priori probability is unknown and unknowable, because the concept is undefinable. If the universe is a one-time-only coming-into-existence event, no probability can be ascribed to that. If the universe has always existed in some form or another, which is likely the case, then again it is meaningless to ascribe an a priori probability to this fact because there is no prior state of the universe. Either way your probability argument fails.

The probability of my arguments failing among dyed in the wool atheists is 100%. Its not a probability argument I'm making. Its the legal term probative that I am using.

Examples of Probative value in a sentence

Probative value of evidence means the extent to which the evidence could rationally affect the assessment of the probability of the existence of a fact in issue.

Probative value is instead determined by comparing the probability that the defendant – a person with a prior conviction – will reoffend, with the probability that someone without a prior conviction will offend.

Probative value is determined by reference to a number of considerations pertaining to the inherent characteristics of a piece of evidence,5 for example, an authentic video of a suspect waving a knife would be highly probative of whether that person had a weapon in their hand.Third, the weight of a piece of evidence concerns the relative importance that should be attached to that piece of evidence in deciding whether a certain issue has been proven or not.

I made it clear at the outset of this discussion I was defining evidence as used in the legal system. The universal claim among all atheists I've met is that there is no evidence to support theism. Not one single reason, not a single fact. I'm not attempting to convince atheists that theism is true. I will demonstrate there is evidence, facts and reason to think it might be true. What evidence is there that natural forces we know of could or did cause the universe to exist that would subsequently produce life?

 

[Drew2008]

F1: The universe exists

The answer atheism (not or without God) isn't an explanation for why a universe exists. The counter belief God doesn't exist doesn't require a universe. Theism requires a universe to exist. Any fact required for a belief to be true is evidence its true.

F2: Life Exists

Again this is a fact necessary for theism to be true. Of course there would be no theists around if life didn't exist (or if a universe didn't exist). If life didn't exist theism would again be falsified. Theism is easy to falsify because so many conditions (none of which are necessary for atheism to be true) have to obtain for theism to be true. These conditions are called evidence. They are facts that are more favorable to the theistic explanation then the atheist non-explanation. The idea there is no reason for theists to believe we owe our existence to a Creator is just atheist sloganeering. Many people with no religious upbringing at all believe our existence was intentionally caused. Some of that is due not to belief in God but disbelief in the notion we owe the existence of the universe and life to forces that didn't give a rats ass if the universe or life existed.

 

[Keith&Co.]

You claim that the probability of the universe existing on the assumption of a creator is greater than on the assumption of no creator. This is wrong. The a posteriori probability of the universe existing is 1. The a priori probability is unknown and unknowable, because the concept is undefinable. If the universe is a one-time-only coming-into-existence event, no probability can be ascribed to that. If the universe has always existed in some form or another, which is likely the case, then again it is meaningless to ascribe an a priori probability to this fact because there is no prior state of the universe. Either way your probability argument fails.

The probability of my arguments failing among dyed in the wool atheists is 100%.

Except around here, the pass/fail of an argument is not based on how many readers change their mind, but on how it's constructed.o
If you offer up Strobel's presuppositionist argument, for example, even fellow theists might point out that the argument fails due to its structure, not its effectiveness.

Why not just post the argument already?

 

[Keith&Co.]

. I will demonstrate there is evidence, facts and reason to think it might be true.

Doubt it. I mean, i doubt you will.

What evidence is there that natural forces we know of could or did cause the universe to exist that would subsequently produce life?

See? God of the gaps.
Again.
Try presenting YOUR side, not your rejection of what you insist is the other side.

 

[Keith&Co.]

F1: The universe exists

The answer atheism (not or without God) isn't an explanation for why a universe exists.

Atheism has never been offered as an answer to 'why does the universe exist?'
There are answers to that question which are compatible with atheism, but you conflate the two at your peril.
Tis is incoherent.

 

[Drew2008]

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.

Then you should ask youself how you can know ANYTHING about this god entity, including its ability to create anything.
It is preposterous that you, a mere mortal existing inside the universe, would know that transcendent beings exist.
Or that they are transcendent.
Or that they are creators.
Or that they are capable of causing.

Simply preposterous.

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?

You keep saying this as if the existence of the universe has anything at all whatsoever to do with your fairy tale abut which you ust above declared it was preposterous that you would know anything.

But the existence of an ever-existing universe completely disproves your goddidit, doesn’t it?

We can say P1 The universe always existed. We can't say F1 the universe always existed. P1 the universe always existed is a prime example of naturalism in the gaps. Atheists assert in the gaps of our knowledge the belief the universe always existed. Any number of facts would disprove God if they occurred as well as a number of facts not occurring. The only thing need be true for atheism to be true is God doesn't exist. Some claim for a theory to be potentially correct it must be falsifiable. Only a narrow set of circumstances (which have obtained) would allow anyone to postulate theism is true. Atheism doesn't require a universe to exist or life...theism does and both obtained.