RE: Why Something Rather Than Nothing?
October 24, 2014 at 11:13 am
(This post was last modified: October 24, 2014 at 11:22 am by Mister Agenda.)
(October 23, 2014 at 9:10 pm)datc Wrote:(October 23, 2014 at 7:56 pm)bennyboy Wrote: The truest kind of knowledge is the knowledge of that which one makes up. You must not doubt datc's knowledge of God, because it is the truest kind.How can you call yourselves atheists, if you don't even know what it is whose existence you are denying?
First thing that comes up when I Google 'definition of atheist':
a·the·ist/ˈāTHēəst/
noun
a person who disbelieves or lacks belief in the existence of God or gods.
Nothing in there about denying. How are we supposed to believe in something if we not only don't know it exists, but don't know what it's supposed to be? YOU propose your particular God out of the potential infinity of imaginable Gods, and then we evaluate your claim. If your claim is strong, it will be persuasive. Complaining that we're jumping the gun by not believing in your God before you explain it is mere whining.
(October 23, 2014 at 9:10 pm)datc Wrote: Before you can say "God does not exist," you must at least know what the word "God" means.
God/ɡäd/
noun
1.(in Christianity and other monotheistic religions) the creator and ruler of the universe and source of all moral authority; the supreme being.
2.(in certain other religions) a superhuman being or spirit worshiped as having power over nature or human fortunes; a deity
If your God is not that, it's not our fault you've made up your own definition. And by the way, those of us who say 'God does not exist' are a minority around here. I'm sure that Yahweh as outlined in the Bible doesn't exist, it's ridiculous, but you're apparently talking about your own personal conception of God, and its status is, so far: an unsupported contention.
(October 23, 2014 at 9:10 pm)datc Wrote: That God is pure actuality is a proposition so basic and so far-reaching in natural theology that anyone with the remotest acquaintance with the concept of God would recognize it instantly.
It's not basic or far-reaching, it's just what's left when you pare everything off God that is demonstrably nonsense. What's left is an unfalsifiable vagueness that can't be disproven, yet is also completely uncompelling. And there is still no evidence that it's real. But at least you can say it's not a married bachelor.
(October 23, 2014 at 9:10 pm)datc Wrote: Since, of course, you have no idea what "pure act" means, either, you cannot deny that God is pure act.
And I am not here to babysit you.
Apparently you're here to masturbate in our general direction.
(October 23, 2014 at 9:10 pm)datc Wrote: Tell to the evolutionary process which, as some people have boldly asserted, has been able to solve a vast number of problems of building highly complex biomechanical systems in cells, organs, and the entire human body, with the help of trial-and-error random mutations (and natural selection).
Yes, but it didn't do it by thinking. It's just a natural algorithm. There's no more intelligence involved than it takes for water to flow downhill.
(October 23, 2014 at 9:10 pm)datc Wrote: Even a blind watchmaker has some IQ.
Blind watchmakers have brains. Evolution is both eyeless and brainless.
This reminds me of my first exposure to an Orthodox Christian. I had an Orthodox Christian professor teaching Intro to Religion. He made a lot of arguments for God. I started the class thinking of myself as an agnostic. The same semester I was taking Logic 201 and learning about fallacies and the burden of proof. At some point in the semester, I realized I was an atheist. Not from some mean old atheist professor tearing down religion, but from a religious one, obviously intelligent and learned, who inadvertently revealed that there is not a single argument for the existence of God that stands up to reasonable scrutiny. Sometimes I think apologetics is one of the most potent 'atheist-making' tools in existence.
I'm not anti-Christian. I'm anti-stupid.