(September 17, 2026 at 8:12 am)Belacqua Wrote: For him, the necessity for such evidence has the weight of something like Absolute Truth -- he can't imagine things being otherwise. 

Belacqua positions himself as an elitist, a solitary guardian of the truth amidst an ignorant mass.

(September 17, 2026 at 8:12 am)Belacqua Wrote: (I am not talking about my own beliefs here, just describing what I see as happening.)

Belacqua is deeply afraid of intellectual humiliation. Thats why he joined an atheist forum instead of a forum full of professionals who would challenge his beliefs.


I can do this all.day.long.

If the rest of the staff would just give me one free ban...

(September 17, 2026 at 8:12 am)Belacqua Wrote: I think the disconnect here is clear now.

Sheldon has a passionately held belief that for a reasonable person to believe in God, that person must have an articulable logical argument or set of evidence, which can be produced on demand to strangers on the Internet. 

I'm sure he'll correct me if I'm wrong about that.

You've made it clear that this is not the reason you believe. I don't think he will stop asking you, however, or demanding that you must produce something along those lines, the way a traffic cop demands your driver's license. For him, the necessity for such evidence has the weight of something like Absolute Truth -- he can't imagine things being otherwise. 

So no agreement will be possible.

(I am not talking about my own beliefs here, just describing what I see as happening.)

Bel acts as though he were completely neutral, yet seconds earlier he accused Sheldon of intellectual narrow-mindedness. He washes his hands of the matter while simultaneously adding fuel to the fire. He is trying to elevate himself above the opponents of this discussion while adding nothing to the discussion itself. He is trying to play "fake referee". This is the rhetorical retreat of a snob.

He offers no arguments (see my previous post), so there are no arguments to refute. He is acting like an arrogant sports reporter.

He joins the discussion at a low point to cash in easy (self) gratification. He is attempting to position himself above both the opposing parties, by explaining to them how they are intellectually stuck. He is trying to feed his ego by sitting on his throne above the participants.

all.night.long too

(August 30, 2026 at 2:35 pm)Jal Wrote: Reductionistic atheism is too philosophically deficient to be plausible.

Great, now get to the part where you offer something beyond your unevidenced opinion. 

It's pretty simple, I'll dumb it right down for you...


Your assertion is that it is implausible that everything in the universe can be explained entirely through material causes without needing a deity.

We will skip past your lie that you weren't peddling a deity in your op, and get to you offering something to support this claim, beyond the claim itself.

In his haste to free his god of its own need for a mover he has removed the need of his god -as- a mover for all the things he just can’t understand happening without one.

Likewise, a person could solve their critical thinking problems by diving headfirst onto the pavement….but I don’t know why anyone would want to…

…and so, we’re left with intuitionism. Just one minor problem. My invincible inward witness tells me that his god doesn’t exist.

(September 17, 2026 at 3:29 pm)The Grand Nudger Wrote: In his haste to free his god of its own need for a mover he has removed the need of his god -as- a mover for all the things he just can’t understand happening without one.

Likewise, a person could solve their critical thinking problems by diving headfirst onto the pavement….but I don’t know why anyone would want to…

…and so, we’re left with intuitionism.  Just one minor problem.  My invincible inward witness tells me that his god doesn’t exist.

It's the special pleading in all the first cause arguments I've seen, "everything needs a cause, nothing can go back in an unbroken infinite chain, so god is the first cause", so what caused god? "Nothing, god has always existed..."

Comedy gold..then they move on to the question begging...then when pressed, as jal was, it's the "it makes me feel fuzzy and warm" gambit of personal experience.

(September 17, 2026 at 3:29 pm)The Grand Nudger Wrote: In his haste to free his god of its own need for a mover he has removed the need of his god -as- a mover for all the things he just can’t understand happening without one.

Likewise, a person could solve their critical thinking problems by diving headfirst onto the pavement….but I don’t know why anyone would want to…

…and so, we’re left with intuitionism.  Just one minor problem.  My invincible inward witness tells me that his god doesn’t exist.

Another good one. 

But seriously, I already admitted at the very outset of this thread that there is probably no need for a god.  This is precisely because, as you keep pointing out (the obvious), in a panpsychism there is no SPECIAL first mover needed, every piece of matter has equal potential to be a first mover.

With one slight caveat: in  my opinion the "forces" (gravity, magnetism, etc) are difficult to conceive/define without an especially competent Mover/Pusher. 

I'm also slightly leery about (macro) evolution, even in a panpsychism. Yes everyone here will say that my incredulity should not be a factor in my thinking, but I can't entirely see my way clear of that factor. I agree it shouldn't be taken as a decisive/apodictic factor, but I think it understandably gives one pause.

(September 17, 2026 at 5:03 pm)Jal Wrote:

(September 17, 2026 at 3:29 pm)The Grand Nudger Wrote: In his haste to free his god of its own need for a mover he has removed the need of his god -as- a mover for all the things he just can’t understand happening without one.

Likewise, a person could solve their critical thinking problems by diving headfirst onto the pavement….but I don’t know why anyone would want to…

…and so, we’re left with intuitionism.  Just one minor problem.  My invincible inward witness tells me that his god doesn’t exist.

Another good one. 

But seriously, I already admitted at the very outset of this thread that there is probably no need for a god.  This is precisely because, as you keep pointing out (the obvious), in a panpsychism there is no SPECIAL first mover needed, every piece of matter has equal potential to be a first mover.

With one slight caveat: in  my opinion the "forces" (gravity, magnetism, etc) are difficult to conceive/define without an especially competent Mover/Pusher. 

I'm also slightly leery about (macro) evolution, even in a panpsychism. Yes everyone here will say that my incredulity should not be a factor in my thinking, but I can't entirely see my way clear of that factor. I agree it shouldn't be taken as a decisive/apodictic factor, but I think it understandably gives one pause.

‘GIMME THAT BABY, YOU WARTHOG FROM HELL!’ - Edwina ‘Ed’ McDunnough, Raising Arizona

Boru

What’s the deal? Do you not actually accept the validity of invincible inward witnesses? I’m being dead serious.

Nothing about consciousness as a fundamental does away with the need, if there is a need, for prime movers. You’ve caused yourself all this grief and formed a flatly heretical theodicy for nothing.

Your incredulity shouldn’t just be suspect, your incredulity is demonstrably in error. Speciation has been observed in the lab and in the field. Not just speciation, either, full on cladogenesis.

(September 17, 2026 at 1:54 pm)Jal Wrote:

(September 17, 2026 at 12:24 pm)The Grand Nudger Wrote: It doesn’t, but it very clearly does add even more problems.  This is actually a common phenomena in deeply motivated reasoning.  When we object focus we lose sight of the consequences of our “fix”.  As a thing a brain with limited processing power and severely compromised ability does…basically a Tuesday….but why a ghost would glitch this way is a real mystery.

Ok I guffawed at that one. For 2000 years Christian theologians have tried to explain how an immutable, immaterial God became man, and how an indivisible Trinity has three members (viz. the first one sits on a throne, the second one died on the cross, and the third one was outpoured at Pentecost).
My panpsychism easily resolves all these conundrums, and a few more. 

"It very clearly does add even more problems." I am not aware of any increase in problems. Admittedly every system faces some problems.

-and for 2k years (not really, christianity was dumb as a box of rocks until about the 1200's..but whatever) they never decided that panpsychism was the explanation..even though the idea predated christianity by 400 years or more.  The only times the subject matter came up were when it's component bits and advocates were declared heretical for cause.  

Now you're over here babbling about how panpsychism tells us that 1+1+1=1...but it doesn't, and we already know you reject absurd math in any other form. You don't give a shit about panpsychism. You don't believe a bit of it, you don't even understand what it is. What you are, is willing to believe anything you think can rescue your trinity and your creationism from the problems you yourself appear to see....though I'm willing to bet they aren't even problems..just more of your invincibly witnessed hallucinations. For example..that trinity bit? It's a fucking miracle and that's the point. God is a miracle man, that's how you know he's god. Possibility maker, not possibility taker. If god says 1+1+1=1...then it does. That you find this hard to believe..in a god breathed world...is a you problem, not a god problem.