(January 5, 2022 at 3:17 am)The Grand Nudger Wrote: Insisting all through this thread that a gods existence is necessarily tied to and convincingly demonstrated by a causal relationship with every other thing, where god sits at the bottom of it all - the one explanation for all things.  You think the world looks that way (which is awfully empirical..but I digress).  Simply put....If p, then q.

If, however, there is no such causal relationship...say...because we live in a fundamentally acausal universe, then there is no god.  Not q, therefore not p.  QED.

Congratulations for butchering the contrapositive of a conditional statement.

P: "Causality holds"
Q: "God exists"

Assume P=>Q. Now, Not-Q therefore not-P is, in words, No god therefore no causality. No first cause therefore no causality, sounds reasonable.

Back to the issue of causality, I recently encountered an interesting quote in a popular Muslim apologetics group, it's from a recent book: the Kalam Cosmological Argument: A Reassessment.



Sounds like we were right, we were right all along...

That's the trouble. The religious, like yourself..insist that they were right all along. Then something pops up to show how very wrong you've always been. That necessarily erodes the credibility of your faiths...but not as much as any given one of you clinging to being wrong does.

A god argued to exist as a necessity of a causal universe may not exist in its own right by the claims own merits - but...obviously, is a non starter in an a-causal universe.

IDK bud. Figure it out.

Great, now you're quoting other morons who don't understand quantum mechanics.

You have to meet idiots where they are, not where you wish they were, or where they ought to be.

(February 2, 2022 at 4:05 pm)Klorophyll Wrote:

(January 5, 2022 at 3:17 am)The Grand Nudger Wrote: Insisting all through this thread that a gods existence is necessarily tied to and convincingly demonstrated by a causal relationship with every other thing, where god sits at the bottom of it all - the one explanation for all things.  You think the world looks that way (which is awfully empirical..but I digress).  Simply put....If p, then q.

If, however, there is no such causal relationship...say...because we live in a fundamentally acausal universe, then there is no god.  Not q, therefore not p.  QED.

Congratulations for butchering the contrapositive of a conditional statement.

P: "Causality holds"
Q: "God exists"

Assume P=>Q. Now, Not-Q therefore not-P is, in words, No god therefore no causality. No first cause therefore no causality, sounds reasonable.

Back to the issue of causality, I recently encountered an interesting quote in a popular Muslim apologetics group, it's from a recent book: the Kalam Cosmological Argument: A Reassessment.



Sounds like we were right, we were right all along...

All this is assertion. To be able to do the P Q thing you are trying to do you require evidence. You have none. If you did you'd post evidence instead of this bullshit.

Klor is protesting to much. His constant justifications only demonstrate his insecurities with his own belief. That's the only reason he's here, not to convince us that we are wrong but to convince himself that he is right. 

If he sincerely believed his presence here would be not necessary. He'd be content and not continue to waste his time and and ours. Yet he remains.

Uranium decaying into butterflies and/or puppies would violate the Conservation of Energy, which is why such never happens; physicists and chemists (and, other scientists, too) refer to such events as being "forbidden".

In Quantum Mechanics, there is causality, but it doesn't mean what Kloro thinks it means.

Initial conditions determine the probabilities of "caused" events, but do not determine the actual events themselves.

If the Many Worlds interpretation is correct, the multi-verse-wide universal wavefunction evolves as it will - possibly deterministically, but which reality "this version of you" finds itself in is indeterminate.

If causes do not "determine" which 50/50 outcome happens, then one can say that choice was uncaused. But, the fact that such a 50/50 choice emerged in the first place is "caused" by the initial conditions prior to that choice.

Causality still places limits on what is possible, but QM guarantees that the actual results, within what is possible, aren't determined (or, if you like, aren't "caused").

So, if a god is responsible for the universe, it might set up the initial conditions of the Big Bang such that intelligent life is possible. Exactly if, when, where, and in what form it occurs would be a mystery, even to the god (and perhaps it exists only in certain versions of a multiverse).

(February 3, 2022 at 1:25 pm)HappySkeptic Wrote: So, if a god is responsible for the universe, it might set up the initial conditions of the Big Bang such that intelligent life is possible.  Exactly if, when, where, and in what form it occurs would be a mystery, even to the god (and perhaps it exists only in certain versions of a multiverse).

As the late Dr. Carl Sagan said in his Pale Blue Dot, "it is possible that there is a god hiding..."  Still, I like Professor Richard Dawkins' argument about complexity -- we do not observe God, but, we do observe complexity, which either arises from natural processes, whereby, simpler things, over time, give rise to more complex things via natural processes, or, complex things are intelligently created, the sole observable source of such creations being Us, at least at present.  Of course, as Dawkins also notes, God could reveal himself/herself/itself at any time and at any place to settle the matter.  Atheism only requires a suspension of judgment until if and when God decides to reveal himself/herself/itself; of course, if there is no god, then that explains why we do not observe god, unless, of course, god is hiding.  A complex, hiding god without any cause to his/her/its creation, while possible, is superfluous, at least in my opinion; after all, what difference does such make in my life?

(February 2, 2022 at 6:10 pm)Nomad Wrote:

(February 2, 2022 at 4:05 pm)Klorophyll Wrote: Congratulations for butchering the contrapositive of a conditional statement.

P: "Causality holds"
Q: "God exists"

Assume P=>Q. Now, Not-Q therefore not-P is, in words, No god therefore no causality. No first cause therefore no causality, sounds reasonable.

Back to the issue of causality, I recently encountered an interesting quote in a popular Muslim apologetics group, it's from a recent book: the Kalam Cosmological Argument: A Reassessment.



Sounds like we were right, we were right all along...

All this is assertion.  To be able to do the P Q thing you are trying to do you require evidence.  You have none.  If you did you'd post evidence instead of this bullshit.

This is one of the things in logic that many theists seem not to notice.

A valid syllogism is only as good as the soundness of the evidence fed into it.

It is quite easy to create a valid logical argument, that does not demonstrate a thing.