(November 2, 2016 at 10:57 pm)snowtracks Wrote: Atheist pretend they don't believe in God's existence by feigning they have problems with the data.

For me, it's not a pretence. Get better data.

(November 2, 2016 at 11:26 pm)Minimalist Wrote:

Quote:The evidence is Creation and Scripture

Bullshit.  Your fucking 'scripture' is heavily edited propaganda written by and for the ruling class of a bunch of goat herders.  And as far as 'creation' goes your ass would drip honey if it had 1/1,000,000 of the evidence that the Big Bang has.

The Big Bang supports the universe via creation and rules out randomness.
The universe's expansion rate has been balanced at just the right rate to make advanced life possible. If the expansion rate were to rapid, stars and planets would not form since gravity wouldn't have adequate time to pull together the gases and dust that make up these bodies. If the expansion rate weren't rapid enough, the stars formed would rapidly collapse and become black holes or neutron stars. What determines this expansion rate is gravity and dark energy (a property that stretches the universe's space/time surface. In the book 'The Grand Design' by Hawking, Modinow, of which I have in eBook form, in chapter 7 this statement is made. "The laws of nature form a system that is extremely fine-tuned, and very little in physical law can be altered without the possibility of the development of life as we know it". Goes on to say that the Cosmological Constant (the energy density that causes the universe's expansion, referred to as dark energy) has a value 10^120” (as a comparison, the est. atoms in the observable universe is 10^80) ---  http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=how+many+atoms+in+the+universe ---  Continuing "the one thing that is certain is that if the value of the Cosmological Constant were much larger than it is, our universe would have blown itself apart before galaxies could form--once again--life as we know it would impossible".   
 

*facepalm* Dear, Sweet Uncle Loki -- Not the fucking Fine Tuning Argument.

Look, Snowtracks, it's very simple: In any universe where the various constants did not support stability and the chemistry necessary for life, we simply would not be here talking about it. Discussions such as these can only occur in a life-supporting universe, so all you are seeing is merely the illusion of design.

I do not see evidence that any god caused the Big Bang, but I'm reasonably sure that the god described in the Bible is much too stupid to have done it. IIRC, it got blindsided by a Talking Snake™ 3 chapters into Genesis, and it didn't do a particularly good approximation of pi, either. Trying to design atomic valence is way above its pay grade.

This scientific article, by an atheist:

http://atheistforums.org/thread-46062.html

Unfortunately, God is likely non-omniscient, non-omnipotent and mortal.

Why would god need fine tuning to create and sustain a universe? All powerful god has to obey laws of physics to get things done? When it comes to life , god needs people to be mammals like chimps and racoons? Seems to me these things are evidence for no god existing.

Question: if any of the cosmological constants were changed sufficiently, would God be unable to create life in that universe?

God could have made improvements to the constants, if he was tuning it for life.  The argument generally ignores this because, ofc, there would be no argumnt if they acknowledged it.  So they posit what would happen if, for example..the cosmological constant was higher....rather than lower. Not only do we know that there is a range that we are within, however seemingly infinitesimal to people who don't understand how decimal points work...we also know that it could have been ever so slightly lower and lead to a more amenable universe for the same reason that it being too much higher would have gone the other way.

While subtely assuming their conclusion, they ignore counterfactuals that -must- be true if their claim is true. If the range is small, and tiny alterations lead to vast discrepences...the order of magnitude of their gods fuckup in leaving the constant where it's at while being simultaneously said to have "tuned" them.... is too much for them to consider.

(November 9, 2016 at 12:57 am)snowtracks Wrote: Continuing "the one thing that is certain is that if the value of the Cosmological Constant were much larger than it is, our universe would have blown itself apart before galaxies could form--once again--life as we know it would impossible".  

The narrowness of the cosmological constants does not argue in favor of a god, or at least one that is omnipotent.

If your god was forced to create our universe with the current set of cosmological constants in order for life to arise and survive, then he is following some plans that he is unable to deviate from.

A universe that looks as if is able to run without the constant input for a god, is a universe that is indistinguishable from a purely natural one.

For our universe to be evidence of a god, it would seem as if it was unable to support life, yet we would still exist.

(November 9, 2016 at 3:25 pm)Rhythm Wrote: God could have made improvements to the constants, if he was tuning it for life.

Oh, there are numerous ways to attack the fine-tuning argument.  I think that the limiting nature of it is what should undermine it most clearly for theists.  I don't think you'll find many creationists who will agree that God would be confounded by a universe that was not properly tuned... especially since He created it.  Therefore, the universe does not need to be fine-tuned for life.  If it does... God is invalidated.

It's like the 'complexity' argument, where the complexity of the universe (or a cell, or a protozoan, or a fly, etc) is supposed to be evidence for a hyper-smart and hyper-powerful designer.  The thing is, complexity is typically indicative of a bad designer, or one dealing with limitations (lack of technology, lack of knowledge, lack of resources, etc).  Look at almost any "creation" and imagine how easy it would be to improve it significantly while also simplifying it drastically, and then remember that nothing is impossible for you to do.  Would you have designed human knees that way?

(June 25, 2015 at 11:22 am)Psychonaut Wrote: I know the question seems nonsensical, but hear me out. 

I've often encountered my fellow atheists say that there's no evidence for God's existence. This seems true, but I think that the answer may be fairly loaded.
Does it come across to anyone that people sometimes assume we can get evidence to begin with? or is it just me? 
I know a fair portion of atheists would disagree, and that everyone knows that you're really saying

"no, and there really is no way to get evidence for such nonsense".


If we can't get evidence, because evidence (at least by scientific standards) is by it's very nature falsifiable,
(something which the god claim can't provide [currently]) then what would anyone constitute as evidence? Are those who use the "we don't have evidence yet" claim literally, deceived?

Seeing it with our own eyes? How would we know it's not a hallucination?
If by some chance we are provided falsifiability, how would we know we aren't deceived by an alien hallucination inducing device?
(Pardon the bong logic format)

If evidence can't point us toward or away from answers to this kind of question, are they even reasonable to ask? 
How could anyone who is honestly seeking an answer be expected to come up with one in the face of such obstacles?

Given what is said, does anyone think that there is evidence that would convince them that God exists?

Bring back my dead relatives in front of my eyes and after a long chat with them I'd make a choice.