Neil DeGrasse Tyson on Disproving God

[RoadRunner79]

I'm sorry, but at best you have demonstrated that the world wasn't flooded.   It doesn't follow that the hypothetical god in the claim does not exist.
To Test this.

If I claim that a Nonpareil exists that flooded the world in forty days, and we establish that the world was never flooded for forty days.  I have just proven that you do not exist.

Do you agree with the conclusion, that you do not exist?

No. But, again, that is not what I am arguing.

The actual conclusion that your argument allows you to draw - and the thing that I have been saying for this entire time - is that a Nonpareil that flooded the world for forty days does not exist.

This is not complicated.

Ok... I think I see the distinction you are making... Just seems like an odd way of laying it out, and especially from your first post on the issue which would have stated that said nonpareili doesn't exist.   However I don't see the distinction from my first statement quoted above.

[Mister Agenda]

I exist, however if someone proposes a version of me that flew around the moon yesterday, that version of me doesn't exist. Is that clearer?

[Nonpareil]

[quote='Nonpareil' pid='1523213' dateline='1489176727']Just seems like an odd way of laying it out, and especially from your first post on the issue which would have stated that said nonpareili doesn't exist.

None of my posts would have resulted in that conclusion.

However I don't see the distinction from my first statement quoted above.

At this point, it has been stated as clearly as it can be stated, and it is not a complicated issue. I must simply ask that you re-read my posts.

[Nonpareil]

Interact on what medium ?

Touch, smell, hear, et cetera. The ant can interact with the human. It can make quantifiable, objective statements about the human, and support those statements with evidence.

It can sense something is there but does not what it is.  If a dog and human where in the yard the ant may sense both are there but can not distinguish between them, from the point of view of the ant, it senses something, it will not know a human or dog in the way we know it and therefore conclude neither a dog nor a human exists

Simply false.

Assuming sapience on the part of the ant, there are objective, quantifiable differences between the dog and the human that it can understand. One is covered in hair; the other is not. One barks; the other does not. One is a quadruped; the other is not. And so on.

There are no such quantifiable, objective characteristics for God.

[Mister Agenda]

This is why going for a highly specific definition of atheism is fruitless. I am an agnostic atheist. But, I'm a gnostic atheist towards some versions of God (or gods). If the definition of a God includes contradictions, I don't just 'lack belief' in that God, I'm convinced it necessarily doesn't exist, like a married bachelor. That's my position on any God of Theodicy, its proposed attributes are contradictory and when theists try to defend the tripod of the stool of an omniscient, omnipotent, omnibenevolent God; they wind up doing so by sawing one of the legs off (often the omnibenevolence when they think power is God's most important attribute). If the God or god is claimed to have done something and the evidence is that the thing in question didn't actually happen (like a global flood that the Chinese and Egyptians didn't notice even though those civilizations were extant at the time the flood supposedly happened), I don't just lack belief in that being, I conclude that it, or at least that version of it doesn't exist. Thor may be real in some mystical way, but it's clear that lightning happens without his intervention.

But a deistic god, or a retired pantheon that only did some of the things attributed to them, or an omnibenevolent God that created the universe but in only very powerful but not omnipotent and doing the best it can...those I lack belief in. There's not good reason to think any of them are real and they can't all be real in any case; but they're not incoherent and don't have evidence against their actions, so while I think they're unlikely I can't dismiss them entirely.

And that's not even getting into science fiction 'gods'. I think a being should have to supernatural to qualify as a god, but some would give the title to sufficiently advanced aliens, and I'm not even sure they're unlikely; though in my opinion they're unlikely to be very close to us.

---

I exist, however if someone proposes a version of me that flew around the moon yesterday, that version of me doesn't exist. Is that clearer?

 You conclude you exist but you could just be a simulation.  Your existence is finite and temporary do you really exist ?

Are you on drugs right now?

[SteveII]

I'm sorry, but at best you have demonstrated that the world wasn't flooded.   It doesn't follow that the hypothetical god in the claim does not exist.
To Test this.

If I claim that a Nonpareil exists that flooded the world in forty days, and we establish that the world was never flooded for forty days.  I have just proven that you do not exist.

Do you agree with the conclusion, that you do not exist?

No. But, again, that is not what I am arguing.

The actual conclusion that your argument allows you to draw - and the thing that I have been saying for this entire time - is that a Nonpareil that flooded the world for forty days does not exist.

This is not complicated.

RR-what Nonpareil is doing is joining the deity AND flooding into one entity: defining it as a "Flood-causing God". And if there was no flooding, there is no "Flood-causing God".

EDIT. Sorry, i took to long to post the reply and the conversation moved on.

[Nonpareil]

RR-what Nonpareil is doing is joining the deity AND flooding into one entity: defining it as a "Flood-causing God". And if there was no flooding, there is no "Flood-causing God".

Precisely.

Now, to answer the obvious question: yes, I'm aware that this doesn't prove that no deities exist. I never said that it did, and it isn't meant to. It simply points out that we can conclude that specific deities with defined characteristics - such as Ra, Zeus, and yes, even the Abrahamic God defined in the Bible - do not exist.

[Amarok]

I think I found tiger




"I'm  so profound man  wstern atheism sucks..... Ah does anyone have any chips"

[Nonpareil]

It just a simple question, your lifetime is finite.  Do you disagree with this ?

No.

If no, then do you really exist ?  The amount of time that will lapse by between your birth and death is so small compared to the billions of years that universe will exist, you really think you exist ?

Yes.

That is a very stupid question.

[Mister Agenda]

RR-what Nonpareil is doing is joining the deity AND flooding into one entity: defining it as a "Flood-causing God". And if there was no flooding, there is no "Flood-causing God".

EDIT. Sorry, i took to long to post the reply and the conversation moved on.

That's exactly it. The flood-causing version of God does not exist, but some other version of God may.