Quote:Some people do propose that something beyond this universe caused it to exist, yes (e.g. quantum physicists), but not on scientific grounds. Because to propose anything beyond the natural world would be contrary to the principle of methodological naturalism.

Quantum fluctuations and multiverses and suchlike are interesting speculations and would be interesting if they were true. Until then, we have no reason to believe the universe had a cause.

Quote:The reason this universe is not pure actuality I have outlined many times. My argument clearly shows that the universe is impure actuality, in that potentialities come into actuality within it (in time and space), and so potentiality is a fundamental part of this world. It is not pure actuality, because it doesn't meet the ontological requirements of being pure acutality.

Come again? I haven't really followed this thread since it's creation, so I must have missed whatever you outlined. The happenings in time and space spring from the universe, just as time and space themselves come about from the very existence of the "something at all" that the universe happens to be. The mere fact of existence could satisfy your transcedence, as the universe is not required to be defined as "time and space" but merely "the existence of a plane from which time and space can come into being". Much like yahweh.

Quote:It couldn't suit my argument, because the universe is not pure actuality, it is actualised potentiality, and we see potentiality enter into actuality all the time in it, which ontologically differentiates it from being necessary to being contingent.

So your god is allowed to be uncreated but my universe isn't? Why isn't god an actualised potentiality? He just "is" yet my universe must be caused?

(August 12, 2009 at 8:13 pm)Jon Paul Wrote: If you mean the words "actuality" and "potentiality", those words blah... blah... blah...

No I wasn't. I was refering to your use of transcendency.

And stop with the fucking word descriptions. I know what actually and potentially mean and I don't give a shit it was used by Heisenberg to describe the probability function and actuality/actualisation to the observation and subsequent wavefunction collapse.
Crappiest attempt at distraction from my point ever.

My point was no matter what is said you will continually say your God "transcends" it. You will always place your God outside scrutiny. You God is outside science, logic, observation, testability, you-name-it your God "transcends" it.

The FSM transcends all. He is pure energy and we use 'spaghetti' only as a description of his noodly appendages and 'flying' also as a descriptor because he 'transcends' our understanding.

I also can use a cosmo argument to support the existance of the FSM.

(August 12, 2009 at 9:11 pm)Dotard Wrote: My point was no matter what is said you will continually say your God "transcends" it. You will always place your God outside scrutiny. You God is outside science, logic, observation, testability, you-name-it your God "transcends" it.

God is not outside of logic nor testability. But that God is the creator of all things in our world and therefore transcends them all is a biblical doctrine which is present from Genesis 1 to the New Testament, and so the fact that I am a Christian would be enough to tell you that I affirm this doctrine.

(August 12, 2009 at 9:11 pm)Dotard Wrote: The FSM transcends all. He is pure energy and we use 'spaghetti' only as a description of his noodly appendages and 'flying' also as a descriptor because he 'transcends' our understanding.

Flying and spaghetti are attributes of created beings composed of matter within the universe. That stands in direct contradiction to transcendence, and so, your FSM doctrine of god, if it involves transcendence, is logically incoherent.

(August 12, 2009 at 9:41 pm)LukeMC Wrote: where does this leave Noah's flood?

Where it leaves it? Exactly where it is.

Let's take a look at what is really going on in the Biblical account of a global flood. It is a classic apocalyptic symbolism. Because man has sinned against God, there has been a global apocalypse as a consequence of God's wrath, which is necessary for the purification of the race.

The symbol of a global apocalypse is a constant in human history, and it arises particularly in times of great existential unrest. And so today we have widespread belief in a global apocalypse under many secular guises. Nuclear annihilation, global warming, etc. Both Marxism and Naziism are secularized (immanentized) versions of classic religious apocalyptic in which it was necessary to bring about a great purging of humanity through violence and terror. Hitler wanted to burn all of Germany to the ground, in advance of the Allied invasion. By burning the Jews, he was simply being true to his apocalyptic madness.

With the latest, most popular version, global warming, we are consistently told that we have 10 years, no more, no less, to repent of our sins against the planet or risk extinction. But if we put our faith in Al Gore he will save us. He will save us by destroying our capacity to produce wealth, and have us all living as monks.

So the question of whether or not Noah's flood actually covered every inch of the earth or not is patently irrelevant and irrational, since it entirely misses the theological symbolism inherent in the story.

If your question is whether I interpret the events that occured between the Patriarchs and God, such as Noah and the Flood, to be local or global, historical or symbolical/mythical, then the answer is a combination of all four, in a potent combination to create a truly universal conveyance of truth.

The myths about floods in numerous, indeed countless, nearly all other cultures seem to represent the essential universality of the flood and truth in the story in perhaps both a historical and allegorical sense, and numerous of the myths contain even the same elements as Noahs Ark, that man and wife are warned by a god to get into a boat and ride out a storm that will wipe out the rest of humanity (or most of humanity). They bring animals and plants and so forth into the boat with them.

All these numerous floods recorded mythically, orally, etc, are in many cases actual floods that have occured, both single floods in single areas, and major floods in major areas, though focusing strictly on the historicity misses the point. Many of them may be tied to a global temperature rise from 8000 years ago, which is around the time before the Black Sea was formed, that caused the sea levels to rise dramatically, causing many separate, local flooding events, and subsequently many different flooding mythologies, and a global flooding experience. In that context, some have tried to tie Noahs Flood with the specific event of the formation of the Black Sea, which is a speculation that may have some merits, as the flood story says the flood ends upon the lands of Ararat. But I don't think it's central to the story if one focuses on it sheerly for historical details. Literalism is missing the point, as is literalist historicism. "The scriptures were written to show us how to go to heaven, not how the heavens go" (St. Augustine of Hippo)

But there are enough floods, and it would only be strange if there were none in the lands where the people whom the God of the Bible entered into a covenant with resided.

The flood in Noahs story describes exactly that; that a flood came upon the lands the people of God were residing in. The entire world that knew the one True God was flooded, and cleansed, saved through water as in a baptism, in the image of 1 Peter 3, of being saved through this water of the flood and of calamity. And indeed the significance for salvation history globally is signified in that the story of the flood is about the people who knew the one God and the people elected by God for the covenent, the Apostle to the World. And obviously the eventuality of a flood is also a global experience, as seen in all the oral and mythic traditions across the world.

So the flood is both global and local, and both literal and symbolical/mythical, because the literal flood would be of no point without the symbolical point or the intent with conveying it. It would be just an empty anecdote, which is exactly not what the bible is.

So please, let's not beg the question of a narrow, evangelical sola-scriptura literalist interpretation, which squeezes the soul out of the scriptures. I advocate a perspective much like that of G.K. Chesterton about the truth of the mythic.

@ Jon

I've already stated many times that 'objective truth' and 'logic' existing outside of us as in the world being rational and things existing outside of us - doesn't have to be proven. And if you mean it in any other sense then I don't know what you are talking about.

The only way we can have any bearing on it is through our own subjective experience and through evidence. And there's no evidence to anything further; it doesn't have to be absolutely proven. All we can know is through our own subjectivity.

And you have still failed to provide evidence for any so-called 'Objective mind' that you speak of.

P.S: The FSM can transcend logic itself, so it can contradict itself and still exist because it is above logic itself. It can be both material and made of pasta and still be transendent and immaterial because it can do anything, beyond logic. Bow the holy FSM and convert to Pastafarianism before it's too late, mate.

EvF

Not if Flying and Spaghetti are metaphors instead of actual attributes, which if you read the doctrine of the FSM is clearly true.

** REPEATED AS UNANSWERED ***

It's for Youhoo!

Quote:

(August 12, 2009 at 4:56 pm)Jon Paul Wrote:

(August 12, 2009 at 4:41 pm)Kyuuketsuki Wrote: Logic is a reasoning tool that evolved as our minds evolved ... we (humans) invented the concept of contradiction, we define what it is.

And that sentence has no meaning without the presumption of logic.

Its a relative observation thing (tree forest falling cyanide cats, you know) ... some things can only exist when there is an observer (human or otherwise) because they require intelligence to be so.

(August 12, 2009 at 4:56 pm)Jon Paul Wrote: And if we, human beings, define logical truth, then I define p "God exists" as true. A subjectivist definition of logic doesn't account for the non-uniformity of human subjective minds, and cannot. You need to invoke objectivity in contradistinction to popular and subjective opinion for that.

Truth is not something science deals with therefore I reject the concept except as a mathematical concept.

Kyu

(August 12, 2009 at 9:19 pm)Jon Paul Wrote: biblical doctrine which is present from Genesis 1 to the New Testament,

Jon uses the bible to prove the God of the Bible as true.

Quote:Flying and spaghetti are attributes of created beings composed of matter within the universe.

He is pure energy and we use 'spaghetti' only as a description of his noodly appendages and 'flying' also as a descriptor because he 'transcends' our understanding. Metaphors.
I am not the first one to point this out to you, that the FSM transcends all things, yet you continually ignore it chose to focus on the words spaghetti and flying.

Nice example of the blinders of belief.

A wise old man once told me; "Christianity's greatest enemy is Christians".

Ignarus vel distraho ex argument mos non probo vos futurus rectus.

(August 12, 2009 at 8:13 pm)Jon Paul Wrote: Then it is not a falsification of it which you are speaking of. If there could be two contradictory true statements, then the common truth of those statements would be a violation of the law of contradiction, and those statements could not be said to presuppose the law of contradiction, a law that contradicts the statements themselves, a fact that denies the statements their possibility of contradicting the law of contradiction, since that requires the application of the law of contradiction, a law that is in direct contradiction with the statements and unapplicable.

Methinks you have a twisted definition of "falsify"; that or I misunderstood you.

For something to be falsifiable, it must be demonstrated how it could be false, not how it is false. For instance, the theory of Evolution is falsifiable because (as that famous quote goes) "Fossil rabbits in the Pre-Cambrian" would disprove the current theory.

However, fossil rabbits in the pre-Cambrian could be explained by an adjustment to the theory, since Evolution is backed up by various facts in science. It would be the theory that needs an adjustment.

I never claimed that I had falsified the law of contradiction, but the only way to falsify it is to find two contradictory statements that are both true at the same time. This should be obvious, as the law of contradiction says this cannot happen. If it can, then the law is falsified.

Q.E.D

(August 13, 2009 at 2:05 am)Kyuuketsuki Wrote: ** REPEATED AS UNANSWERED ***

It's for Youhoo!

I see no refutation of my argument in your post, just some statements of private opinions, some of which even cosonate with exactly what the argument states in some areas of the epistemic structure and non/affirmation implicit in atheism, so I could only speculate that you didn't state that to consonate with the argument intentionally so, because you hadn't considered it.

(August 13, 2009 at 8:20 am)Dotard Wrote: Jon uses the bible to prove the God of the Bible as true.

Sure, I make reference (and in that sense use it) to the bible because it's biblical doctrine that I am referencing proof for. I am not proving biblical doctrine with biblical doctrine, but making a reference -surprisingly enough- to biblical doctrine because it's biblical doctrine that I am referencing intrinsic/extrinsic proofs for.

If I was proving biblical doctrine with biblical doctrine, then all I would need would be to state biblical texts to begin with, which is not what I have done. So please stop using false accusations like this.

(August 13, 2009 at 8:36 am)Tiberius Wrote: For something to be falsifiable, it must be demonstrated how it could be false, not how it is false.

I agree, no doubt. I just don't see how you would falsify the law of contradiction, if it is itself a premise for that falsification. It's a bit trying to falsify falsification itself, if that is the case.

(August 13, 2009 at 8:36 am)Tiberius Wrote: Methinks you have a twisted definition of "falsify"; that or I misunderstood you.

The problem is that it seems the law of contradiction is what makes falsification possible, and therefore also what makes its own falsification impossible since it has to be invoked in a falsification.

If you find a sentence that contains two real contradictions which are truly contradictory and still both true, then that sentence contradicts the law of contradiction, and the law of contradiction does not apply to that sentence, and the sentence cannot presuppose or invoke the law of contradiction to contradict the law of contradiction, since it cannot exclude the truth of the law of contradiction on grounds of a contradiction between the sentence and the law of contradiction, unless it already presupposes the truth of the law of contradiction which it cannot do without contradicting it self, since it supposedly contains a contradiction of the law of contradiction.

Even trying to express this made it completely incoherent, because I think it does lead to nonsense to even speculate of such a falsification.