Curt's Invitation - Prove God Exists!

[CurtSibling]

CurtSIBLING
That's totally immature of you.
I'm sure you won't take any "proof" simply because you don't want any.
Your answer proves that...

It's not immature.

I asked you to provide these answers, assuming you have the book.
And you are merely trying to offload the responsibility of proof onto me.

You are the religious person in the equation. You have to convince me.

Not the other way around.

.

 

[civ2]

Curt
Your mistake explained by an example:
"I wanna know how do apples taste!"
"So take a bite and find out!"
"NO! I want YOU to explain to ME how do apples taste!"
"But different people would feel slightly different tastes - it's rather personal."
"NO! Explain to me how do apples taste - I won't eat a single until you explain to me!"
"OK. Apples are sour and sweet..."
"So are they sweet or sour?"
"You can say they're both..."
"So are they sweet or sour?"
"Why don't you taste one? You'll find out."
"NO!!! Explain it to me without tasting!!! Or I won't accept your explaination!"
Etc.

Got the point???

 

[CurtSibling]

Curt
Your mistake explained by an example:
"I wanna know how do apples taste!"
"So take a bite and find out!"
"NO! I want YOU to explain to ME how do apples taste!"
"But different people would feel slightly different tastes - it's rather personal."
"NO! Explain to me how do apples taste - I won't eat a single until you explain to me!"
"OK. Apples are sour and sweet..."
"So are they sweet or sour?"
"You can say they're both..."
"So are they sweet or sour?"
"Why don't you taste one? You'll find out."
"NO!!! Explain it to me without tasting!!! Or I won't accept your explaination!"
Etc.

Got the point???

Civ, please reread the rules of the thread on the first post!

I am not going to convert to your religion to find out what it is like.
Neither am I going to stop being Atheist to fulfil your fervour for god.

You are are the god-believer. You are the one who is zealous about the divine.

Now, either you show me the money, and type up what you mean. Or you don't.

I see no reason why I should have to make the effort to find a god
I regard as little more than a fairy tale. Your job is to convince us.

If you are incapable of this, then just admit it, and I will salute
your efforts nonetheless. But I am certainly not the one on trial
here, or are any unbelievers. You are the religious one.

You show us the proof or back down.

I have nothing to justify to you.

You have everything to justify to me.

.

 

[civ2]

Curt
That's what I said already - you are not looking for any proof - you're just mocking religon.
Otherwise you would read a simple provided online source which doesn't make you "convert".
If you're afraid of the consequencies of your reading - it's up to you.
The book is nothing more than just a piece of apple - peeled and prepared for you to bite.
If you refuse (being afraid of its taste) - then there's basically nothing to talk about.
You disappointed me VERY much.

You can't convince a person who denys what is said to him as unreliable.
Neither can you "chew down" any information for one who refuses to swallow it.

44. The Inexplicable
To a fool, that which cannot be explained cannot exist.

The wise man knows that existence itself cannot be explained.

I really think I wasted my time on you - no offense.

EDIT:
In other words - I have to post the entire book here to provide you "proof" - it's not a single quote that's sufficient - it's the whole idea...

 

[Truronian]

44. The Inexplicable
To a fool, that which cannot be explained cannot exist.

That which cannot be explained does not matter

The wise man knows that existence itself cannot be explained.

I actually quite like this quote. God is just a concept people like to use to explain existance. We exist because we exist. There is nothing outside of existance.

 

[civ2]

Truronian
Re-read your post once again.

 

[Truronian]

Truronian
Re-read your post once again.

What? Why we exist doesn't matter.

 

[civ2]

Truronian
Yeah but we are made of matter.
(Just kidding - "nice" to see someone besides Curt. )

 

[Truronian]

Truronian
Yeah but we are made of matter.
(Just kidding - "nice" to see someone besides Curt. )

Ah, the old semantic 1-2. That joke was a bit but I'll forgive you scening as English is not your first language .

 

[FredLC]

1. For Atheists, God must be proven "inside" universe which is impossible since He's not just another part of it (like we all are).
Same goes to logic - we can't "bind" God to logic because logic is both subjective and "bound" to universe.
Therefore proving God "using" universe (and it's parts including logic) is futile and impossible.

Actually, not only God. Anything.

See, the thing is that the reason you men of faith do not apply to God the standards of proof you apply to everything else is the assumption “a priori” that God is something special.

An atheist, by definition, does not consider God special, and hold the God “thesis” to the same standards as anything else – in which case, it fails thoughtfully to convince.

Which is the right – or at least, more consistent – epistemology, however, is theme for another thread, the thread on faith which I mentioned yesterday and probably will open later today.

2.On the other hand, the same Atheists forbid to use personal experience (which is also subjective and material and even logical) as a proof - because "it's personal or it's a hallucination".
I'd say your "science" is not less "hallucination" than anyone's experience.

Actually, I shall recommend you seek the works of David Hume, Emmanuel Kant and Karl Popper. Concepts such as induction, deduction and falseability, which are the elements that separate data-gathering which are scientific from those which are not, might help you to think over the claim we just made.

Contrary to what you think, scientific opinions aren’t arbitrary, and are far less twisted by the personal passions and political opinions of their propagators than the more subjective forms of knowledge.

3. Atheists are so "proud" of the greatness of the universe that they simply "forbid" it to be a subject to somebody higher than it.
It really doesn't matter how big the universe is - it's "function" (according to religion) is clear - to both serve the human and to glorify God.

Well, you have just enslaved the universe as a personal servant of human beings… in the same sentence you have somewhat accused the atheists of blind by “pride”.

To state that nothing is outside the universe is a result of the definition. “Uni” means everything. If you have a part that is “outside” the universe, than it was not the universe you were talking about. If there is a God outside the universe, than universe changes to be: whatever it was before, + God.

4. Atheists take evolution and related science as granted - but deny it's their "belief" (which has no more proof than religion).
They use ridiculous answers as "how do you know Earth is round" - though I didn't see anybody here posting it's flat.
Also the error in such questions is that you CAN check the shape of Earth whilst you CAN'T check what happened before your birth - you must rely on someone's "history".
But Atheists still blindly believe their "historians"-scientists who themselves are no more "proving".
The so-called "dating" of C can't be proved a hair more than the evolution itself - out of the reach of humanity.
(Which leads to the "circle" of "proofs" in science. )
Nobody knows for sure what happened even 1-2 thousands years ago - though we have many sources which SHOULD make it clear.
Some people have doubts in events that took place less than a century ago - what about "millions" of years?

Evolution is not a religion, and saying so until you turn blue won’t change that. Show me people praying to the “survival of the fittest” in the temple of Darwin, and you’ll have a case.

I don’t know who used the example of the earth being round, but it is not such a bad example at all. Do you know that there once was a real controversy around it? I mean, there was indirect, mathematical and optical and gravitational evidence of it since ancient Greece – but while the Sputnik didn’t make it to orbit, people would cover their eyes and ears with their hands and refuse to listen. It’s the same with evolution. The evidence for it is, well… overwhelming. Perfect proof is beyond us now (maybe some day…?), but the indirect one is virtually irrefutable as it is – and the denial of it is just as reasonable as the refusal of the shape of the earth.

5. Atheists fail to understand an obvious thing that time is irreversable (too many "time machine" movies watched??? ) - and that clearly means it's "one-way" and therefore has the beginning.
Btw it's not that important whether it has the end - the important fact is that it has the beginning (which can be "reached" by logically retrieving events backwards.).
Even if universe would be pulsationg (which I don't believe but that's not the point) - the time is so "bound" to matter that the "pulsation" is nothing more than another series of irreversable events (that still can be joined into one big "time-line").

Actually, you have a naïve understanding of time. It is not composed by atomic particles that succeed each other, and can’t be used again once spent. Time is an aspect of matter, and as we normally perceive it, it is just a reference for a succession of events.

Time is influenced by very palpable factors such as size and gravity, and modern theories do speak of the possibility of time traveling, which is why the concept have captured so much minds of movie-makers – and this speaks loudly of the possibility of reversing it. In fact, should the theory of inflationary universe proves true, time will reverse in a very real sense, as space will reverse as well.

But thing is that even if your concept was true, and time was linear as you describe, it does not allow the conclusion that there was a chokepoint in which it all begun. Such as numbers, it could very well exist until the infinite in all directions.

6. Atheists have some kind of an "inferiority complex" regarding the size of Earth compared to universe's.
But since humans are many times smaller than whales - would you say whales are more important than humans?
Size is not the parameter of importance - the "role" is.
Universe in all its glory is nothing more than a tool for humans - with an obvious conclusion that God provided us with immeasurable sources - grab and use.

And again, you enslave the universe.

It’s nothing like an inferiority complex, which would imply that we feel threatened or diminished by our role in the great scheme of things. It’s just that we have gathered data to acknowledge that we occupy a fraction of the universe which is a grain of salt, and we don’t allow anthropocentric megalomania gets in the way of what this implies.

IMHO, however, true glory lies in attempt to transcend this. Remember, at the same time we acknowledge the role we were given, we are free to fight for something better. After all, we are not bound by the divine plans of some entity who knows betters than us. You do. So, who exactly believes to be inferior to something else?

EDIT after reading another thread:
7. Atheists sometimes fail to understnad that God is the Creator and He is the Almighty - meaning He created the universe but didn't "leave" it to humans.
God is the One Who created the world and the One Who observes and sustains it ever since.
Otherwise there would be two gods.

This is what you believe, not a hard fact.

Agree to disagree?

Regards .

 

[classical_hero]

Agree to disagree?

Regards .

Exactly, but some people might disagree with that. This is the whole reason why i will not waste my time here, because no matter what I say, people will still disagree with me no mater what proof and when I do give proof they will say that is it actually not proof, so this is a pointless exercise overall.

 

[civ2]

FredLC
Nice to see a mature person (I can tell it from your posts - not the ideas of them ).
Ok here we go:
1. Yes, God is a-priori different from the material world we see around - or He wouldn't be God but just god (aka idol).
When somebody requests God's definition that implys Him being inside our world - he's not asking for God's definition but for Radioactive Monkey's (I love this word - it is used as a nonsense elsewhere on this forum).
Actually, God can't be defined by humans but we can at least say what doesn't define Him - including our material world.
2. Ok - I'm not a scientist.
Enough calling me immature in that plane.
(Meant for those who do so.)
3. The definition of the universe includes "everything" that is material - it doesn't include eg. angels or even souls.
Ask anyone's opinion if you disagree.
The "universe" you're refering to can be as well called "God" (relatively) - because God is the "universe" of both material and spiritual "universes" (plus something else).
4. Evolution IS a religion with its deity=HUMAN.
And the "service" is made by denying God and saying Nature is everything.
But my point was that it's based on believing and not on actually knowing.
I'm quite annoyed when people say science isn't a religion "because we don't worship anybody" - but you DO!
You "worship" your own intellect by assuming it's flawless!
To remove contradiction:
Atheists believe in what their intellect calls truth.
5. Time can ONLY be defined as sequence - or we again term something else and say it's time.
6. Weird thoughts about "inferiority"...
I didn't catch the meaning.
7. Again back to definitions:
God is God.
Otherwise it's a Radioactive Monkey.

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

Curt
Your mistake explained by an example:
"I wanna know how do apples taste!"
"So take a bite and find out!"
"NO! I want YOU to explain to ME how do apples taste!"
"But different people would feel slightly different tastes - it's rather personal."
"NO! Explain to me how do apples taste - I won't eat a single until you explain to me!"
"OK. Apples are sour and sweet..."
"So are they sweet or sour?"
"You can say they're both..."
"So are they sweet or sour?"
"Why don't you taste one? You'll find out."
"NO!!! Explain it to me without tasting!!! Or I won't accept your explaination!"
Etc.

Got the point???

It's a little different.

What would be a fitting analogy, is you holding a box and telling Curt:

"Hey, want to buy this apple-in-a-box?"
"Can I see the apple?"
"Nope, because it's sealed for freshness"
"But I'm not buying the box if I don't know what's in it"
"Well, if you buy it you will know"

edit: and a little request. Please stop telling me what atheists think. I am one, and I do not recognize myself in it. Thank you

 

[civ2]

ZiggyS
Wrong - Curt IS the one who started this thread.
Ok - suggest how should I refer to Atheists' opinion?

I'm going away from PCs in a few minutes until probably Friday or Sunday.
BYE!

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

ZiggyS
Wrong - Curt IS the one who started this thread.
Ok - suggest how should I refer to Atheists' opinion?

You don't

My opinion in a nutshell:
The big questions cannot be answered (yet?) by us humans. It's impossible, but it also takes away the fun of living and trying to find out for yourself.

(There's a lot more to it, but I'll refrain from throwing that in here)

I try to avoid saying what christians think, since they also tend to disagree on occasions, have different opinions, are individuals and all that hoolah. There are no two people who believe the exact same thing.

Take care

 

[Perfection]

FredLC
Nice to see a mature person (I can tell it from your posts - not the ideas of them ).
Ok here we go:
1. Yes, God is a-priori different from the material world we see around - or He wouldn't be God but just god (aka idol).
When somebody requests God's definition that implys Him being inside our world - he's not asking for God's definition but for Radioactive Monkey's (I love this word - it is used as a nonsense elsewhere on this forum).
Actually, God can't be defined by humans but we can at least say what doesn't define Him - including our material world.

If we can't define God, then how can we know the properties of what you are talking about?

2. Ok - I'm not a scientist.

How can you judge science correctly if you don't understand how it operates?

3. The definition of the universe includes "everything" that is material - it doesn't include eg. angels or even souls.
Ask anyone's opinion if you disagree.
The "universe" you're refering to can be as well called "God" (relatively) - because God is the "universe" of both material and spiritual "universes" (plus something else).

What seperates material from immaterial? What makes a soul different from an atom or a gravitational field?

4. Evolution IS a religion with its deity=HUMAN.

Not really, in fact many people say that evolution isn't even incompatabile with Christianity. Certainly if it was a seperate religion it would be incompatable with Christianity.

And the "service" is made by denying God and saying Nature is everything.

1. Evolution does not deny God's existance, atheism does, get your facts straght
2. How the heck is expressing one's worldview a "service"? When you talk about God are you performing mass?

But my point was that it's based on believing and not on actually knowing.

But it is based on actual knowledge, I can measure evolution! I can go out and physically demonstrate the correctness of evolutionary theory.

I'm quite annoyed when people say science isn't a religion "because we don't worship anybody" - but you DO!
You "worship" your own intellect by assuming it's flawless!

No we don't. That's why science has a large amount of peer review, fact-checking, and skepticism. I understand that I often make intellectual mistakes. However, that certainly doesn't mean that everything I say is wrong.

To remove contradiction:
Atheists believe in what their intellect calls truth.
5. Time can ONLY be defined as sequence - or we again term something else and say it's time.

Einstein's relativity totally blows away the concept of Newtonian time that we experience in daily life. Time is weird. What is simultaneous to one person can occur at two different times for someone else.

6. Weird thoughts about "inferiority"...
I didn't catch the meaning.
7. Again back to definitions:
God is God.
Otherwise it's a Radioactive Monkey.

If you can't define God, how can you talk about it? A word with no definition is meaningless.

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

This is how I see it: neither I nor any human can prove the existence of God, only He can.

When I mentioned the spiritual experiences that led me to believe in God, I called them subjective. That doesn't mean that I don't take them seriously, just that they are useless for convincing other people. For some, belief in God comes naturally. For others, they must do the work to find out for themselves. Some won't try, and that is their prerogative. But if they are wrong and God does exist, then ultimately it is their responsibility for not coming to know Him.

And why does God "hide" Himself or make His existence so non-obvious? Because life is a test. It doesn't consist of one question, "does God exist?" If that were the case, and salvation dependent on theism, God would be very cruel to make it so hard for some to accept Him. Rather, the trick is to become greater than we are now. If it were obvious that God is, I think it would make it harder for some people to put forth the effort to know Him, and it is by effort that we grow.

God also knew that some people would be unable or unwilling to accept Him. Being merciful, He will not condemn the honest and sincere who cannot accept His existence, as long as they still strive to show love to other humans.

So that is why I see proof of God as, not unattainable, but not transferable, so to speak. I am quite sure (not 100%, but faith is the part where I act as though He is) but I can easily understand how others may not be. I could be an agnostic without denying my understanding of the universe.

Because as far as I can tell, the universe we have now could have come into being without a creator. In fact, as a Mormon I do believe that the universe was not created out of nothing but out of pre-existing materials. God was just the organizer. And I can conceive of many different attributes of God. As I said, I don't believe He is omnipotent (which would clearly contradict omnibenevolence) and many different views of God strike me as logically consistent. Including, admittedly, His nonexistence.

 

[FredLC]

Exactly, but some people might disagree with that. This is the whole reason why i will not waste my time here, because no matter what I say, people will still disagree with me no mater what proof and when I do give proof they will say that is it actually not proof, so this is a pointless exercise overall.

I have somewhat of a Zen approach to religious threads; it's like playing the yo-yo. Accomplishing something is immaterial, the fun is in the ups and downs.

FredLC
Nice to see a mature person (I can tell it from your posts - not the ideas of them ).

Well, thank you.

1. Yes, God is a-priori different from the material world we see around - or He wouldn't be God but just god (aka idol).
When somebody requests God's definition that implys Him being inside our world - he's not asking for God's definition but for Radioactive Monkey's (I love this word - it is used as a nonsense elsewhere on this forum).
Actually, God can't be defined by humans but we can at least say what doesn't define Him - including our material world.

While I do consider this an internally consistent argument, I also consider this to be a sophism, rendered impertinent by the manner our society handles God.

You see, we have a society that handles God as a palpable factor (notice: not a palpable entity, but a real factor that should influence your decisions).

To even know what Gods wants and expects from us, to understand to what extent he is willing to sacrifice in our behalf (as in, giving his own son), to be aware what behavior is expected from us, all that will require some degree of knowledge of God. And if we have some knowledge of God, than we can define, excrutinate, that God (granted, this is specific to the judeo-christian overview of God), at least to the extent of that knowledge.

What makes your argument inconsistent is that people behave as if God was mysterious only when it is convenient. But when it is about how people should treat other people, how to position before gay marriage, before other religions, when we speak about the necessity of "spreading the news", etc...

See, either you have that inescrutable entity you decribe, which we know nothing about, not even that maybe he wants us not to believe, for example, or we have a God we can study and conclude about. Can't have both.

And while people will push for behaviors based on what God wants, I'll conclude we are handling the second case here.

2. Ok - I'm not a scientist.
Enough calling me immature in that plane.
(Meant for those who do so.)

Ok. Anyway, I still urge you to please do seek the contours of modern scientific method. It's quite a great tool for thinking things over, adopted as scientific paradigm by the sheer efficacy of it's results.

3. The definition of the universe includes "everything" that is material - it doesn't include eg. angels or even souls.
Ask anyone's opinion if you disagree.
The "universe" you're refering to can be as well called "God" (relatively) - because God is the "universe" of both material and spiritual "universes" (plus something else).

First time I hear someone challenge the semiotics of the term "universe". You know that "UNI" comes from the greek, "OMNI", which means "all", don't you?

Nevertheless, I obviously have a different definition of universe than you... and I assume, rather a large part of scietific jargon as well, though mostly because science does not concern itself with immaterialities.

The universe as you have refered is, in fact, already known in philosophy as the "God of Spinoza", refering to the philosopher Baruch Spinoza, which believed that divinity lies in the whole peristaltic interaction of the random factors of universe - an impersonal intelligence, shall we say.

It is not my take, in fact, for I do disagree that there is a God at whatever level. I don't think there are guiding forces behind the universe, and my acceptance of the possibility of it is down to philosophical honesty - an honest thinker always acknowledge the possibnility of being wrong.

Anyway, it gets down to this (evoking the reason why I brought up my definition) - neither sicentists nor atheists are "proud" of the universe and due to that, refuse a supreme creator. This is a complete misrepresentation. The conclusion that reality is a headless snake comes from whatever data is attestable, not due to the philosophical/religious/political preferences of it's proponents.

4. Evolution IS a religion with its deity=HUMAN.
And the "service" is made by denying God and saying Nature is everything.
But my point was that it's based on believing and not on actually knowing.
I'm quite annoyed when people say science isn't a religion "because we don't worship anybody" - but you DO!
You "worship" your own intellect by assuming it's flawless!
To remove contradiction:
Atheists believe in what their intellect calls truth.

This is, again, a misrepresentation.

No person I know deifies human beings. None grants it a superior condition, except perhaps as the center of our own humane needs - but atheists, in general, acknowledge humans as a factor to be mostly insignificant to the scale of things in the universe - what is hardly a deification of us.

Service is made by denying God? Not really. Not going to religious services is a consequence of not beliving in the premisse of cults - a logical development of one's own ideas. It is not conditioned, nor serves to reinforce a creed. Atheists don't go to church for the same reasons chirstians don't go to mosques - they simply feel no drive to.

Finally, please, point one atheist that thinks that intellect is flawless. I know quite a few, some more intense than others, but none, not one, who thinks that.

I do agree that if atheists DID think that, it would be a cult. As we don't, you are debunking a strawman, my friend.

5. Time can ONLY be defined as sequence - or we again term something else and say it's time.

No, it is not true. Actually, since Einstein's relativity, the concept of time (and space) has turned into things much more complex than our daily handling of it. You said you are not a scientists. Well, neither do I - but I think I have read about more modern, and more precise (even if much more complex) definitions and descriptions of these. lease do look into it. Try Stephen Hawking's books, which offers a relatively simple explanation of modern physics.

6. Weird thoughts about "inferiority"...
I didn't catch the meaning.

In a nutshell: our acknowldgement that we are a small species in a small part of the universe, and not the center of it, nor the reason it exists, does not equal with we having a "complex of inferiority" as you suggests, because we don't feel threatened, but inspired, by the enormity of the challenges this discover presents.

7. Again back to definitions:
God is God.
Otherwise it's a Radioactive Monkey.

What may be true, in the end. Just as an excercize of empathy, accept, "ad argumentandum", that God does not exist, ok?

Than, how is he different than the Radioactive Monkey?

Regards .

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

This is how I see it: neither I nor any human can prove the existence of God, only He can.

When I mentioned the spiritual experiences that led me to believe in God, I called them subjective. That doesn't mean that I don't take them seriously, just that they are useless for convincing other people. For some, belief in God comes naturally. For others, they must do the work to find out for themselves. Some won't try, and that is their prerogative. But if they are wrong and God does exist, then ultimately it is their responsibility for not coming to know Him.

Totally agreed.

But my take on it, is as subjective as yours. We very well both could be wrong, or I could be right. To each his own. But what strikes me as appealing in your post is personal experience. I believe no one can be told how to experiene life and it's big questionmarks. We have to figure it out for ourselves. It's almost unavoidable that we arive at different conclusions since we all differ from each other.

(snip)

I'm sorry I snipped a large portion of your post, but since it is your take on it, I can't argue with it, however I might disagree. If this is the way you believe it is, more power to you.

What I do wonder about is how you can 'know' so much about God? Has this been revealed in your personal experience or are you going from different sources?

Take care

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

My personal experience has confirmed, in my mind, the validity of other sources that claim to have a more direct link to God. Thus I am not only a theist but a specific kind. And part of that is that we have to come to our own beliefs; it is better to get all the truth, but coming to a conclusion that is only part of the truth beats blindly accepting anything.

I say that no one can be led to belief, yet I belong to a proselyting religion. How does that work? As a missionary, I never tried to convince anyone. We would explain how we came to believe what we did and invited others to try. And some people would come to the same conclusions we had, ased not on our but on their personal experiences.