Theistic Arguments: Claims and proof
April 11, 2012 at 2:23 am
(This post was last modified: April 11, 2012 at 2:31 am by Voltair.)
First of all for anyone reading this post I am not trying to be insulting but I am hoping that perhaps someone will read this and MAYBE not create another pointless "Let's play make the atheist explain everything about reality" game. Also I think that if what I am trying to say here is digested properly discussions on this forum might turn a lot more productive.
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When you are making a claim for something such as saying "This is an explanation for such and such" or when you say "You cannot account for A without B" you are making a simple statement. These statements in of themselves do not prove anything and are on their own completely useless. Now these statements can be proven valid if you provide ample evidence for their claims etc.
For example:
"The reason Bob likes Jane is because Bob is a male and Jane is a female". The proof for this lies in biology, hormones, etc and we can prove that Bob is in fact attracted to Jane because he is a male and she is a female.
"Jane is pregnant and her pregnancy cannot be accounted for without her receiving sperm or somehow having a fertilized egg placed inside of her etc". This can once again be proven through biology etc and we can demonstrate that Jane in fact did need to receive sperm or have sperm in some way in her pregnancy.
Here is an example of what does NOT work:
"Bob wakes up and shoots Jane in the face with a shotgun offering no explanation". Now lets say that someone, we will call them Exhibit A, says "Bob shot Jane in the face because he was driven to do so by gremlins from the planet Zebulon!"
Now for whatever reason let's also assume there is a second party, we will call them Exhibit B, involved who says "You haven't provided any evidence for that even being a possibility". Let's also assume that Exhibit B does not assume to know or claim to know the reason why Bob shot Jane either.
Exhibit A counters by saying "Well how do you account for Bob shooting Jane then?" Exhibit A then continues to probe and ask various questions that go in many different directions asking Exhibit B to explain every facet of the scenario concerning Bob and Jane. Let's say that Exhibit B finally answers and says, "I do not know the reason why Bob shot Jane."
Exhibit A then proclaims, "AHA! So since you don't know why that means that my explanation is the valid one."
Now what is the problem with this entire scenario? The problem is that Exhibit A has provided NO evidence for his claims and when Exhibit B questioned him instead of providing evidence he simply asked Exhibit B to explain every detail. Exhibit A's explanation COULD be true if it could be proven but since Exhibit A has provided no evidence there is no reason to give it any reasonable explanatory power.
This same scenario can be applied to arguments for the existence of God. Even if you could prove that no one knew the answer to a lot of questions about our universe you still would not make God more likely. Asking a person with an opposing view to explain everything will prove that the person with the opposing view does not know everything and that's all that it will prove.
However you STILL have NOT PROVEN the existence of God until you PROVIDE EVIDENCE. I have a feeling that this post will probably be largely ignored or that people will gloss over it and miss the point but PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE!.....
1) Provide evidence for what YOU ARE CLAIMING TO BE TRUE
2) If you cannot provide evidence for what you are claiming to be true BE HONEST ABOUT IT
3) Do not turn all of the discussions about God vs. Atheism into a pointless bullet storm of questions about every single facet of reality which doesn't address the likelihood of God's existence AT ALL
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When you are making a claim for something such as saying "This is an explanation for such and such" or when you say "You cannot account for A without B" you are making a simple statement. These statements in of themselves do not prove anything and are on their own completely useless. Now these statements can be proven valid if you provide ample evidence for their claims etc.
For example:
"The reason Bob likes Jane is because Bob is a male and Jane is a female". The proof for this lies in biology, hormones, etc and we can prove that Bob is in fact attracted to Jane because he is a male and she is a female.
"Jane is pregnant and her pregnancy cannot be accounted for without her receiving sperm or somehow having a fertilized egg placed inside of her etc". This can once again be proven through biology etc and we can demonstrate that Jane in fact did need to receive sperm or have sperm in some way in her pregnancy.
Here is an example of what does NOT work:
"Bob wakes up and shoots Jane in the face with a shotgun offering no explanation". Now lets say that someone, we will call them Exhibit A, says "Bob shot Jane in the face because he was driven to do so by gremlins from the planet Zebulon!"
Now for whatever reason let's also assume there is a second party, we will call them Exhibit B, involved who says "You haven't provided any evidence for that even being a possibility". Let's also assume that Exhibit B does not assume to know or claim to know the reason why Bob shot Jane either.
Exhibit A counters by saying "Well how do you account for Bob shooting Jane then?" Exhibit A then continues to probe and ask various questions that go in many different directions asking Exhibit B to explain every facet of the scenario concerning Bob and Jane. Let's say that Exhibit B finally answers and says, "I do not know the reason why Bob shot Jane."
Exhibit A then proclaims, "AHA! So since you don't know why that means that my explanation is the valid one."
Now what is the problem with this entire scenario? The problem is that Exhibit A has provided NO evidence for his claims and when Exhibit B questioned him instead of providing evidence he simply asked Exhibit B to explain every detail. Exhibit A's explanation COULD be true if it could be proven but since Exhibit A has provided no evidence there is no reason to give it any reasonable explanatory power.
This same scenario can be applied to arguments for the existence of God. Even if you could prove that no one knew the answer to a lot of questions about our universe you still would not make God more likely. Asking a person with an opposing view to explain everything will prove that the person with the opposing view does not know everything and that's all that it will prove.
However you STILL have NOT PROVEN the existence of God until you PROVIDE EVIDENCE. I have a feeling that this post will probably be largely ignored or that people will gloss over it and miss the point but PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE!.....
1) Provide evidence for what YOU ARE CLAIMING TO BE TRUE
2) If you cannot provide evidence for what you are claiming to be true BE HONEST ABOUT IT
3) Do not turn all of the discussions about God vs. Atheism into a pointless bullet storm of questions about every single facet of reality which doesn't address the likelihood of God's existence AT ALL