(December 16, 2008 at 5:47 pm)CoxRox Wrote:(December 16, 2008 at 5:24 pm)LukeMC Wrote: To address the original post, the phrase "I think" is sometimes used out of a lack of confidence. I was going to begin by saying "I think the reason people..." and carry on from there. This is because I was basically gonna make up a suggestion with no real evidence to back it up. "I think" gives me the cover of opinion.
If somebody says "I think there is a God" then you can pose the question "what makes you think this?"
If they present no evidence, dismiss their claim, as it says in Purple Rabbit's sig.
If they do have evidence, dispute it like any other debate. It isn't exactly the same as burden of proof, it's more a case of us asking the thinker to assess their thoughts and back them up. If they cannot do this, their opinion has no ground to stand on. It's just baseless speculation.
Good points Luke. I would just say that it can be frustrating when you present your 'evidence' or reasons for a certain belief but this is rejected. I'll give an example. I think there is a God because of the inference for design. You guys will not accept that there is any inference. You beleive nature appears to show design, it's how our brains are wired. I would say this could be right, but that 'design' is still a possibility. This may be stretching it a bit, but I liken my detection of 'design' as similar to string theorists detecting strings. They detect 'strings' via tangible proofs, things that infer strings, but still they aren't able to prove the strings really exist.
Perhaps the relevent discussion is therefore on the inference for design firstly? If your only evidence for this assumption (nature implies design) is that it seems that way, then we can't take it as a serious point, as it isn't falsifiable. The sun seems to orbit the earth. We cannot disprove that it seems that way, only that it isn't actually that way in reality. With life and the universe, it would be quite hard to figure it all out and then decide whether or not a designer was responsible. It may seem that way to some, but what would it look like if there wasn't a designer?
