Argument from "better to seek proper vision".

[Cyberman]

I'm sure you could be more vague if you really tried.

[Mystic]

If I provide details promise you won't cry like a baby that it is too long.

[Mister Agenda]

The following was a reply to Whateverist, and I think deserves its own thread.


LOL, thanks you provided me with a reflection on a proper argument for God.


1. It is better to sincerely try to objectively seek the vision of guidance rather than not.
2. If God doesn't exist, there is no reason to believe one can gain vision of guidance.
3. If there is no reason to believe one can gain vision of guidance, then it is not better to objectively seek the vision of guidance rather then not.

1, 3. If both these premises are true, we can conclude there is a reason to believe one can vision of guidance. Call this premise (4).

4, 2 proves God exists if both premises are true.

And you implicit were stating this, but you didn't know it. I gathered this from your sentiment.

1. Would you define the term 'vision of guidance' please? If I don't know what it is, I can't say whether it's better so seek it or not.

2. Why? All evidence points to people being able to have visions if they do or experience certain things; but the content of the visions is culturally determined. The human brain is more than capable of generating visions without divine intervention being necessary. And many of these vision provide some sort of guidance. So there: a reason to believe it's possible to receive 'visions of guidance' if God does not exist.

3. Well, there you go. The human capacity for self-deception and induced hallucination is sufficient to guarantee that many people who seek such visions will have them, real or not. Whatever they seek hard enough, they will find, even if it's only imaginary.

---

If I provide details promise you won't cry like a baby that it is too long.

You don't have any range between terse paragraph and wall of text?

[emjay]

If I provide details promise you won't cry like a baby that it is too long.

All joking and/or disagreements aside, if you really want to get your arguments across it would help if you kept mystical language to a minimum; it just makes it extra hard for those who don't think in those terms to parse what you're saying. Just a suggestion.

[Cyberman]

If I provide details promise you won't cry like a baby that it is too long.

[The Grand Nudger]

You're coming at it from the wrong angle Em.  The point of these "arguments" is a show of religious devotion.  They're mantras..not meant to argue a position; but to reenforce an existing belief through recitation and response. That's why they contain mystical language, and also why they so often drift into admonishions towards doubt and questions of the motives or nature of any criticism.

It's meant to set up a religious melodrama with dogmatically proscribed boundaries as self fulfilling prophecy, and in so doing further convince the already convinced.

[Losty]

1. It is better to sincerely try to objectively seek the vision of guidance rather than not.

Why?

[The Grand Nudger]

Because a shaman said so.  

[emjay]

You're coming at it from the wrong angle Em.  The point of these "arguments" is a show of religious devotion.  They're mantras..not meant to argue a position; but to reenforce an existing belief through recitation and response. That's why they contain mystical language, and also why they so often drift into admonishions towards doubt and questions of the motives or nature of any criticism.

It's meant to set up a religious melodrama with dogmatically proscribed boundaries as self fulfilling prophecy, and in so doing further convince the already convinced.

It's funny you should say all that because, just out of curiosity, I've started reading the Quran today, and read it for a few hours already... and it struck me that it was very similar to how he talks; framing 'deniers' as destined for hell as willfully rejecting an evident truth (which it is not... just bold assertions and threats to non-believers... so far). So I get what you're saying here about it being a possible melodrama he's playing out, trying to cast us into the role described in the Quran.

ETA: It could also possibly explain another thing that was curious to me; so far, from what I've read, there doesn't seem to be much leniency towards non-believers... in other words it doesn't seem to be a religion all about conversion... it's you either accept it as evident or you reject it and are forever after beyond the pail, destined for hell. So with that in mind, I wondered what his purpose was in preaching to us non-believers... if not conversion, then what else? So what you've said about a self-reinforcing and self-fulfilling prophesy makes perfect sense as a possibility in light of that.

[WinterHold]

So Atlas, you and MK both love that Allah bloke ...
Why do you not agree with each other in godly matters?

Is the qu'ran not clear enough?
If not, why not?

Me and him believe in total different things.

I believe that the Quran is the only divine book guaranteed to be of heavenly origin. Thus; you can really count on the traits God gave you (like logic and understanding and even language) to interpret the book. The evidence for its authenticity is derived from observing the design around us; from the cosmos to life and death.

He; on the other hand; believes that it's impossible to be guided unless you give loyalty to an ancient family (referred to as Ahlu Albayt).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twelver

We might share some beliefs; like the unity of God; but we are so different in everything else. The Twelver belief enforces an agenda that can be read in the link I provided; and agreeing with him or his sect on that; just seems pretty low.