Can you make a God claim?

[h4ym4n]

God's not going to prove anything to you, it's the other way around, you have to prove something to him.

Is that what you did?

Please describe the outcome.

[John V]

I take the point alpha male, I could have done better in my OP. The consistency part was perhaps a bit overdone, it was an attempt to stop absurd claims that make utterly no sense, or which make wild unsubstantiated assumptions. Let's focus on a testable claim. And as cat sniper pointed out, this means it must be falsifiable. Or else it's just a proclamation of truth, or presentation of the unknowable.

People accept claims that aren't falsifiable all the time.

One night I woke up suddenly. I made it a point to never look at the clock when I awoke during the night. The clock was dark by default. Hitting a button lit it up for a few seconds. I've read that light can disturb your sleep, so I had the rule to never do it. But, this time I did, and I did begin to wake up. Ten minutes later the phone rang. It was my mother, calling to tell me that my father had just died.

One day I relayed this story to a coworker who to my knowledge is not at all religious. He said that he used to think those things were just coincidence, but over the years he's heard enough similar accounts that he now believes there's something to it.

So, this claim - that god gave me a little nudge when my father died - is not falsifiable, yet a non-religious, intelligent business man accepted it to some extent. Note that the other instances were presumably each unfalsifiable as well.

Also do a little research on atheists. They don't all fit the scientism norm we see on this board. A significant number are new agers (or whatever the current term is) and believe in what you would call unfalsifiable woo.

[h4ym4n]

Where is GC when we need him.

I asked him to not be a coward earlier today.

I think I scared him away.

[John V]

Maybe I can summarize my position like this.

I'd say OP boils down to, Given that scientific evidence is the only valid evidence, make a valid claim about god.

But, many people would reject your presumed given.

[strawdawg]

You missed out the rest of my quote where I said that if you are throwing out current theory, this must be justified. In einsteins case, he did justify it.

That doesn't mean you can just ignore reality as you see fit without justification.

If you are making a claim which is meant to improve on previously established claims, then you need to justify why that is. It's possible the claims before were wrongly accepted.

Maybe I didn't explain that very well in my OP. Sure, there are always issues of epistemology and so forth. But we're dealing with demonstrated knowledge and theories, which we are justified in thinking is correct based on information at that time. I'm not talking about absolute truths, only practical demonstrations beyond reasonable doubt.

Reality? There are two realities. Natural, which we live in, and spiritual reality which is just as real and has the ability to overrule the natural.

[robvalue]

Sure, not all atheists are scientifically minded. And you're right, that's an unfalsifiable claim, at least given our own level of understanding. Therefor, I would say that the scientific community, or your average sceptic, would say that the claim has no value other than to the person making it. You can convince someone sure. Not everyone accepts claims in the same way.

But forgot about the reality part if you want, and go for a coherent, falsifiable testable claim. I think making one about God is extremely hard if not impossible.

[FatAndFaithless]

Reality? There are two realities. Natural, which we live in, and spiritual reality which is just as real and has the ability to overrule the natural.

...Huh?

[robvalue]

Erm, no. Spritual realms have not been demonstrated as anything other than fantasy. Unless you have a study I can look at?

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Yes, I'm saying that science is the only way to find actual truth about reality. If you have another system which you think is better for establishing real truth and has a demonstrably reliable track record, I'd be very interested

Religious claims always fall conveniently outside the scope of testability, so that they can not be disproved. Neither can they be proved to be anything other than fantasy.

[John V]

Sure, not all atheists are scientifically minded. And you're right, that's an unfalsifiable claim, at least given our own level of understanding. Therefor, I would say that the scientific community, or your average sceptic, would say that the claim has no value other than to the person making it. You can convince someone sure. Not everyone accepts claims in the same way.

But forgot about the reality part if you want, and go for a coherent, falsifiable testable claim. I think making one about God is extremely hard if not impossible.

I agree. But as falsifiable, testable claims are not the only way that people determine what they know about reality, I don't see that it's problematic for theists.

[robvalue]

How else do you determine whether something is true if it's unfalsifiable? What other methods are there, that amount to more than emotion or speculation?

More importantly, how can you convince someone else of these truths?

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I'm not trying to be difficult, I genuinely see no other way. How can you differentiate between two unfalsifiable explanations competing for the same thing? If you have some way of finding which is true, then they are testable. So I'm interested what this testing entails.