Atheism is unreasonable

[His_Majesty]

Are you arguing an oxy moron? What is a "possibily necessarily"? Either it is a possibility or a necessity, not both.

If 2+2=4, then it is possible for 2+2=4. Right?

There is a series of stages of chemical reactions that lead to a protocell. Are you claiming that there are no series of chemical reactions that can eventually lead to a protocell? Which stage(s) would be impossible?

A series of chemical reactions started and orchestrated by Intelligent Design.

http://www.newscientist.com/blogs/shorts...rna-e.html

That was almost 5 years ago, yet abiogenesis is still not proven?

First off, your arguing as if they're on the same footing. They are not. The nonlife to life you are still working with physicsal stuff while God is an acting, talking intelligence without a physical body.

I can conceive of an immaterial "self". It's not difficult at all.

Actually we have seen consciousness from unconsciousness, think how humans are born. A human starts from a single cell and grows up to an adult. A single cell does not have consciousness while an adult human does.

Right, the cell comes from an adult that was already conscious. You can't get a living cell from something that isn't itself living. Two dead human beings can't procreate, and if you rewind the process all the way back to the very beginning, where would the consciousness come from? It can't come from consciousness, because there IS no consciousness.

So it is bad enough that you have to get this nonliving material living, then you've got to get it thinking. Double whammy.

There is also no physical laws preventing it to. What is your point?

Then we should be able to go in a lab and make shit happen, shouldn't we?

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Heads up folks, I've posted my opening statement in the evolution debate. His_Majesty is quite confident in PM, so we'll see how he handles it.

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[quote='His_Majesty' pid='794016' dateline='1415649008']
Sorry, wrong. Any descriptions and interpretations of the chain of cause & effect are necessarily dependent on the current state of the universe. Since we have no way of describing causality (or even suggesting that causality could exist) in other states, no premises can be made in that regard. Thus the Infinity Problem is one of your invention, not an actual concern until/unless it's possible to show that causality follows the current-state-universal models in other states.

Foolishness. "Shit" was happening, things were going on...regardless of how much you conveniently want to "downplay" causality because you are aware of the implications. By "cause", I mean "things that produce an effect", and there is no special definition that you could give causality that will negate the definition of "things that produce an effect" as it relates to the past history of any naturalist realm that exists in reality.

Then you posit the notion of not "suggesting that causality could exist", which is bullshit. How the hell could causality ever not exist at any point in the past, but exist now in the future (and present).

Makes no sense. You people go through such great lengths to NOT believe in God...so much lengths that you are willing to believe absurd notions...all of this just to not believe in God.

If that is the price of atheism, believing in logical absurdities...then by all means, have at it.

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He did say "Universe", not "the entire cosmos".
And as far as we know, "the entire cosmos" may be the Universe. Whatever lies beyond it, if anything, is unknown. This is a known unknown.

Even, granting your terminology correction, how does that change anything?

It changes a lot. If Vilenkin is saying that the universe began to exist, and Guth is saying the universe may be eternal...and they both made the damn theory together, then they may mean "universe" in different contexts.

The entire cosmos, with its capacity to, somehow (quantum foam?), generate Universes, being of infinite space-time does what for the god hypothesis?

Infinity problem.

[pocaracas]

He did say "Universe", not "the entire cosmos".
And as far as we know, "the entire cosmos" may be the Universe. Whatever lies beyond it, if anything, is unknown. This is a known unknown.

Even, granting your terminology correction, how does that change anything?

It changes a lot. If Vilenkin is saying that the universe began to exist, and Guth is saying the universe may be eternal...and they both made the damn theory together, then they may mean "universe" in different contexts.

Perhaps the theory allows for both interpretations. As such, it is not the final word on the subject that you wish it to be. Have you considered that?

The entire cosmos, with its capacity to, somehow (quantum foam?), generate Universes, being of infinite space-time does what for the god hypothesis?

Infinity problem.

Say it like a little kid: There is no infinity problem.

[Surgenator]

Are you arguing an oxy moron? What is a "possibily necessarily"? Either it is a possibility or a necessity, not both.

If 2+2=4, then it is possible for 2+2=4. Right?

No dumbass, 2+2=4 is necessarily true. A possibility refers when there are multiple outcomes. A necessarily refers to when there is one outcome. For example, when you buy coffee at a coffee shop, you have a possibility of ordering a Latte, but it is necessary to pay for your order.

Since this is the only point of mine you responded to, I assume you couldn't counter my others. Do you now believe that self-replicating molecules exist? Do you now believe that consciousness can arise from unconsciousness or do I have explain how babys are made, again? Did you find an abiogenesis step that would be considered impossible? Finally, do you now believe that abiogenesis has a higher likelihood for the origin of life than god?

[Mister Agenda]

What the hell are you talking about? I said "anything that can be explained or described by natural law has to exist within a universe, and anything beyond that (the natural realm) is supernatural".

And I don't agree with your definition. Since you pulled it out of your ass instead of out of a dictionary, I don't see any logical reason why I should adopt it, especially since it leads to silly ideas like quantum vacuum not within a space-time continuum being 'supernatural'.

A finite universe means that the past is infinitely long...but again, there are some philosophical problems with that...and no physicist will be able to help you out in that regard...you know why?

Because it doesn't make sense to say a finite universe means the past is infinitely long?

Based on the infinity problem and causation...no single event within the universe (and by "universe" I mean all natural reality ANYWHERE) could ever come to past...and if no single event within the universe could ever come to past, that mean that nothing that is within the universe can be used to explain the fact that events DO come to past....and since causes within the universe can't explain it, that would mean that we need to posit a cause OUTSIDE of the universe...and that cause is the source of the universe as a whole, and every part within it.

What did elipses and sentences a paragraph long ever do to you, to deserve such abuse?

You haven't proven infinity is a problem, a similar apparent paradox (Zeno's) indicates you could never walk across a room because there are an infinity of dimensionless points to cross, yet we manage. You've asserted a problem, but not proven it.

And you have no knowledge of whatever greater universe may exist beyond our cosmos, so that the same rules hold outside our cosmos is another assertion.

I did, with Esqualax (whatever his name is). But ok, I will pass the hot potato to you, because it is clear that he couldn't handle it.

If there was an infinite number of births which preceded your birth, how will your birth ever come to past? For every single birth that came to past, there is an infinitely many more births to go..so your birth would never come to past.

Stating the apparent paradox isn't proving it really is a paradox. Zeno's Paradox has never been fully solved, yet Achilles can still pass the tortoise in a race. If there is an infinite past, then it's not a real paradox, because here we are. If God has an infinite past, God has the same 'problem': God will never have gotten around to creating anything.

Or better yet, if me and you are on a road, and I told you to begin walking, and after you've taken an infinite amount of steps on this road, you will receive a trillion dollars...and you began walking...at what point would you "traverse" infinity...and receive the money?

I can never take an infinite amount of steps, but that doesn't prevent me or the road from existing. You might not be able to tell how far along I am if it's infinite in both directions, but I'm on it somewhere.

If you can answer either of these questions adequately, I will become an atheist.

Please don't become an atheist.

I am talking about infinity, and you are talking about some damn quantum foam?

Quantum foam may well be infinite. As I pointed out earlier, it has all the salient features of a creator God except mind, personality, and 'supernaturality'.

Answer the above analogy. If you can do that, then no syllogism is needed.

'If you don't know the answer, that proves me right' is the argument from ignorance in a nutshell.

Logically absurd concepts are untrue.

Logical absurdities can be demonatrated in a syllogism. It's not a logical absurdity, it's absurd in your opinion.

False. Objective moral values mean that things like rape and murder are wrong no matter how many people think that they are right. The "rightness" or "wrongness" transcends what man think or doesn't think.

You say in reply to an example about hypothetical aliens.

So if you have one group of people that believe rape is wrong, and another group that believe that rape is right...which side prevails?

Can you name a group of people that thinks rape is right? Not even rapists think that.

And not only that, but again, where does moral values come from? Nature? Nature doesn't know right from wrong? Where does it come from in the first place?

You keep confusing human nature with nature in general. It's our nature as a social species that has to cooperate to survive and has a myriad of other characteristics in common that determines what is right and wrong for humans, but it's not mystically revealed to us, we have to figure it out, largely by trial and error, in fits and starts, often taking a step backwards for two steps forward.

Well, Charles Manson was asked do he regret anything that he did. And his reply was "No, I wish I had done more."

Well, Charles Manson wasn't most rapists, was he?

So right and wrong is based on what society thinks? So if the society allowed it, then that would make it right?

You are so hard to get through to. No. I JUST said that a society that disallows rape is OBJECTIVELY better to live in that one that allows it. What about the idea of living in a rapey society strikes you as okay just because the people in it think it's acceptable? As a rule, humans don't like being raped. It's traumatizing. It's still traumatizing if it's socially acceptable.

If the Bible has within it the commandments and laws of a omnibenevolent Being who is just and holy, then there is no subjectivity to it.

One, your decision to believe the author is just and holy is subjective to you. You cannot escape using your own judgment. Second, if God determines the laws of morality, they could have been otherwise, and therefore are subjective to him...and pretty arbitrary to boot. If God discerns the laws of morality, then they are inherent and potentially can be discerned without God...and the universality of laws against murder indicates that we can at least figure out the big ones.

You just said above that moral values is objective, now you are down here talking about subjectivity?

That some degree of subjectivity is inescapable does not mean there are no objective facts. We each only have the knowledge, brain, senses, and personal experiences we have with which to work. Even objective facts we can only apprehend with some subjectivity, because we have little choice in the matter. Much of the usefulness of science is that it gives us a means to reduce subjectivity; but science can't tell us what we should value, it can only help us figure out how to best achieve the values we have. Those values nearly all humans have in common are based on our innate moral sentiments. The world is objective (and even that is an axiom), but our perception of it is necessarily somewhat subjective. Our reality as we perceive it is a messy mix of subjective and objective.

So who decides what is best for human beings in the first place?? Individuals? Societies? Civilizations? Governments? Who?

We don't decide what's best for humans. We discover it, gradually, together.

Where does moral values come from, and who decides of all of the moral values, what is right, and what is wrong?

No one person decides that stuff for everyone. The world is a laboratory of competing ideas of how best to live our lives. We can compare them and actually see what arrangements are better to live in. The best ideas tend to gradually catch on. The worst ideas tend to gradually die out. It's similar to evolution in that regard, with societies instead of species. The Nazi experiment was a spectacular failure, the democracy experiment has at least be less bad that all the other alternatives. An animal with thick fur is objectively better adapted to the cold than a less well-insulated animal. A democracy objectively delivers more prosperity and security for its citizens than a dictatorship.

Where does these functions come from?

The environment the organism must adapt to in order to survive.

And how come nature was able to create life from nonlife despite being mindless and blind, when intelligent human beings cannot do it?

You might regret pinning your strategy to the assertion we cannot do it, and you'll ikely regret it in your lifetime.

If you haven't noticed, I keep going back to the question of origins...and also if you haven't noticed, the questions of origins are the most difficult questions for you people to answer...and that isn't a coincidence.

If you find made-up answers adequate, I can see why you would think we're handicapped by not finding them acceptable.

A selection is not a creation. It selects from stuff that is already there.

No kidding.

How did the stuff get there in the first place? It can't select from anything if the stuff that it is selecting didn't come from somewhere else.

There are several possibilities, as you're aware by now. I'm on the team that thinks not making up answers is a virtue, so I don't have a problem with 'I don't know' as the only honest current answer.

Right, given enough time, Jesus can/will return.

He's dead, Jim. Time can't fix that, it just makes it worse. The event you're proposing doesn't require time, it requires a miracle.

Oh, I believe it, I just don't believe that this is the case. You would need wayyyy more time (in my opinion), than the 13.7 billion years since the universe began. That isn't enough time.

Opinion doesn't carry much weight in these matters.

I am a Christian theist.

I am no kind of theist, so kindly stop trying to press gods on me.

Admittedly, the notion of free will stumps me. But then again, on naturalism, there is no free will, because all of my decisions are based on the flow of electrons and neutrons in my brain...but I can't control them but they control me...so my actions are not "free actions", so I am not responsible for anything that I do.

It's kind of a stumper for everyone. Your thoughts don't control you, they ARE you. And though I think there's good science that suggests we aren't nearly as free-willed as we perceive ourselves to be, I don't think it's been extinguished entirely. I suppose I'm a compatibilist, which is perfectly compatible with naturalism, though I'm only a methodological naturalist, not a metaphysical one.

But yet if God doesn't exist then it had to have happened that way, right?

You've switched from 'all the time' to 'at all'. I don't pretend to be able to imagine all the possible ways it could have happened if there's no God, especially if we don't rule out other supernatural causes. I don't rule out ANY causes a priori, but I strongly lean towards the most scientifically plausible ones. If a creator God started the unverse and life off, it clearly didn't want to make it obvious from studying nature.

All of that is irrelevant if you can't go in the lab and start biting, instead of being on internet forms every day barking. In other words, all bark and no bite. Everything that you just said sounds good. It sounds great. It sounds technical. Ok, take all of that information, go in the lab, and get some results that is on your side of things. Until then, keep on barking.

You've got no sense of irony or hypocrisy at all, do you?

You are right, it wouldn't. Wanna know why?

Because you're a hypocrite?

Because that would still prove that for life to exist, you need INTELLIGENT DESIGN to orchestrate the process.

No it would not prove that. It would prove that no supernatural intervention is required for life to exist, though.

The entire process would take some intelligent engineering, wouldn't it?

Synthetic, designed life would. A self-replicating molecule produced by mimicking conditions that held in the Hadean era, on the other hand, would prove a self-replicating molecule can arise spontaneously under the right circumstances, AND it would prove it wasn't even that rare, else even the right conditions wouldn't succeed on a human scale of time.

But you don't get that many chances.

You don't know what the actual odds were, because no one does, and you don't know how many chances there were, because no one does...but it was a LOT of chances.

See, now we are talking about entropy, which is another problem for the naturalist.

Only if you so badly understand the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics that you think the earth ibeing an open system receiving enormous energy from the sun doesn't allow local decreases in entropy.

The entropy had to be low from the very moment of the big bang, and there was only one shot...one try...and it hit the jackpot.

Entropy in the universe is relative. The entropy at the time of the BB bang could have been maximal, and the entropy after more than before, and spontaneous order would still appear if maximum entropy increased faster than actual entropy. For instance.

The constants that govern natural are all precise...all geared to be suited for intelligent life...all made with mathematical precision...and you don't get that kind of precision from a mindless and blind process which was derived from a spontaneous big bang with no intelligent hand guiding the process.

If they were different, they would still be precise. No one has ever proven they CAN be different, it's just a thought experiment. A good case can be made that the constants are what they are beause the universe's energy budget is zero, and a universe's energy budget MUST be zero. In that case, even if there are multiple universes, none of them will be very different from this one, except for being in different stages of development.

Genetic fallacy, and I could say the same thing. I can say that Richard Dawkins goes in the lab and perform experiments that confirms his atheism. How about that?

There's no genetic fallacy to make since they don't actually produce original research. And if you said that, you'd be making it up, whereas the Discovery Institute's position is a fact.

So a dumb, sloppy process created something more complex than a Boeing 757? Wow. Seems pretty smart to me.

Your standards are odd. I'd consider anyone who takes a hundred milllion years to get there an under-achiever if they were as smart as a person.

Yeah, hundreds of millions of years for a mindless and blind process. That time should be reduced drastically since you now have intelligent human beings at the wheel.

Yes it should, and we're already knocking at the door. You know we can synthesize an entire bacteria genome from scratch and insert it in a denucleated cell, and the cell will 'come to life' and reproduce? It took nature millions of times longer to get that far.

[Fidel_Castronaut]

Hey HRH, there's a debate waiting for you:

http://atheistforums.org/thread-29639.html

[abaris]

Do you now believe that consciousness can arise from unconsciousness or do I have explain how babys are made, again?

I'm afraid, you're running against a wall with this one. One of them, can't remember which, came up with the explanation that a ready made soul steps into the baby's body when the time has come.

You probably get something along these lines.

[Whateverist]

Yeah, hundreds of millions of years for a mindless and blind process. That time should be reduced drastically since you now have intelligent human beings at the wheel.

Yes it should, and we're already knocking at the door. You know we can synthesize an entire bacteria genome from scratch and insert it in a denucleated cell, and the cell will 'come to life' and reproduce? It took nature millions of times longer to get that far.

Aha! More evidence of a divine watchmaker! Of course, as far as I know most watchmakers don't make their tools and materials out of thin air so I'm not quite sure how far to go with that analogy.

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Hey HRH, there's a debate waiting for you:

http://atheistforums.org/thread-29639.html

Yes, you're late. You're late for a very important ass-kicking .. err .. debate!

[Surgenator]

Do you now believe that consciousness can arise from unconsciousness or do I have explain how babys are made, again?

I'm afraid, you're running against a wall with this one. One of them, can't remember which, came up with the explanation that a ready made soul steps into the baby's body when the time has come.

You probably get something along these lines.

Even that had a remote possibility of being true, we should be able to detect some kind of change in the body.

Plus, souls have many other problems like the effects we see in brain damage people.

[Thumpalumpacus]

Yes. Christian dogma is that not believing in the Christian god dooms one to Hell.

Well, if the Christian God doesn't exist, you really don't have anything to worry about, do you?

You missed my point, which is that such a dogma necessarily undermines any claim of mercy, or even benevolence, made about that god.

It also has implications regarding your view on free will, which we'll get to in a little bit.

Are you not reading what you write? You wrote: "I don't think omnibenovelence necessarily entails omni-mercifulness." That means that you're saying that you don't necessarily think that your god is perfectly merciful.

Which I don't.

According to Matthew, your god is perfect.

Myself, I don't believe in any gods, which means that I believe this about myself freely.

Then you have free will.

Nonsense. Eternal punishment attaching to one and only one option means that my will is as free as the robbery victim's free choice to surrender his money -- never mind the gun at his head.

If God exists, he isn't forcing you to believe, and if he doesn't exist, you aren't being forced to believe...so either way, the choice is yours.

If your god knows everything, he knows our choices. Can I prove your god wrong by making a choice that goes against what he knows I'll choose? If yes, then your god doesn't know everything. If no, then there's no real choice I can make.

What the heck is omnimax?

I though you'd spent years debating this issue, kid. Here, let me google that for you.

He is merciful, he just isn't omni-merciful, which is something that you erraneously think that he should be...despite it not being a necessary ingredient of benevolence.

Once again, I'm not basing the expectation of perfect mercy on his alleged omnibenevolence; I'm basing it on Matthew's assertion of his perfection. Aquinas and Anselm agree with me, by the way.

It is called "Christian theology".

Yes, and I'm familiar with its vapid claims you're presenting here.

Oddly enough, you're falling back on "Christian theology" here, but immediately above, you're rejecting Christian theology.

How do you reconcile this inconsistency of yours?

I did coherently define him, and all you can do is come up with some mickey mouse objection, objections that were shut down.

Disparaging an objection you haven't rebutted is dishonest argumentation. You've yet to give a coherent definition because the same "problem of infinity" which you claim negsates a naturalistic explanation also bedevils your god. In short, business as us-- er,special pleading.

Also, I notice you didn't present the evidence I asked for, so I will ask again: what evidence do you have for this god-thingy?

On judgement day, you will definitely be reminded why you SHOULD have gave two shits...and you won't be reminded by me, but by God.

Oooh, the argument from fear ... I'm quaking in my boots.

Did I say I was?

You compared yourself to Jesus Christ.

They've been dissected? Yeah ok...and even if they were (emphasis on "if" to the power of infinity), you certainly wasn't the one doing the dissecting.

I've done my share of it; I just didn't have the time to read all the tripe you have the time to post.

The fact that you cannot see that to be the case doesn't mean it hasn't happened; it only means that you're not very percipient.

Sorry, but according to the narrative, everything was wrapped up by the sixth day.

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/humor

No matter how much energy it takes, it will deteriorate over time, regardless. You sit an orange out for an extended period of time, and it will start to degrade as time goes on. There is no "stuff" from the outside that can keep it from degrading. Same thing with the human body, look at the age process of a human, starts off fresh, and over time, the body gets old..it is deteriorating..it is degrading. The universe...it is getting old..it is losing its energy...the entropy is getting high...and soon all energy will be lost.

You'll notice I haven't argued that humans don't age. You claimed that the human body is a closed system, and you've been corrected. But you're too obstinate to admit error.
Also, it appears to have escaped your notice that cancer is a growth, not degradation.

Right, everyone on here is so smart, and I am so dumb

Truth be told, you do appear to be more uneducated than your interlocutors. It was honest advice, freely given; do with it as you wish.

[abaris]

Hey, Parker, I think you made some mistakes with your quoting. I read the first few lines and was flabbergasted to see christian BS presented as your statements. You seem to have inadvertently owned up to HMs quotes