IF GOD EXISTS, THEN HE CERTAINLY DOES NOT CARE FOR YOU AT ALL

[Brian37]

I have all the evidence I need thanks. I'm doing fine. Thanks for your concern.

Liking what you believe does NOT count as evidence.

Tradition does NOT count as evidence.

Personal "experance" DOES NOT count as evidence.

For any claim to be universal in an empirical sense it has to go outside one's brain into a demonstrable lab and have control groups to insure quality of data, and even after that it has to be handed over to independent review to replicate and VERIFY.

No religion or god claim meets those standards.

We do however have pleanty of evidence of dead gods no one longer believes in and we also have plenty of evidence that humans can and do make up bullshit and falsely believe it to be fact.

YOU THINK you have evidence, but you DONT have any, otherwise you'd be at the patent office and have a Nobel Prize by now.

You have all the "evidence" you need. Good for you, and some people think they are Napoleon too and have "evidence" for such.

Oh and when the word DOES NOT end, today/tomorrow, depending on what part of the planet you live on, many people are going to be as sure about their "evidence" that the world will end as you do in claiming your invisible sky fairy too.

---

I admire reason, I respect it, but sometimes it falters on many levels.

Reason doesn't; the misuse of it does.

I forgot who said it, but "We are all intitled to our own opinions, but not our own facts".

And people missuse logic or flat out dont understand how good logic works. I would't use the word "reason" because everyone has a "reason" and fail to see that their is a difference between a good reason and no reason or a bad reason.

Bad use of logic leads to bad reasoning and in the end a bad reason leading to a bad conclusion.

When a claim(ON ANY SUBJECT) starts out as a naked assertion, anything that follows it is hollow crap.

Bad logic looks like this.

Naked assertion<=pretty stuff, looks nice or "sciency" or wordy, or feels good<=desired conclusion

Good logic works like this.

Prior established data=prior established formula=projected outcome

Anything outside of tested and proven data is nothing but mental masturbation and will fuck up logic and reason every time.

[clemdog14]

Lion, here is the Kierkegaard quotation. I have also included information from the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (which one of my undergraduate professors founded).

"The decision rests in the subject; the appropriation is the paradoxical inwardness that is specifically different from all other inwardness. Being a Christian is defined not by the “what” of Christianity but by the “how” of the Christian. This “how” can fit only one thing, the absolute paradox. Therefore there is no vague talk that being a Christian means to accept and accept, and accept altogether differently, to appropriate, to have faith, to appropriate in faith altogether differently (nothing but rhetorical and sham definitions); but to have faith is specifically qualified differently from all other appropriation and inwardness. Faith is the objective uncertainty with the repulsion of the absurd, held fast in the passion of inwardness, which is the relation of inwardness intensified to its highest. This formula fits only the one who has faith, no one else, not even a lover, or an enthusiast, or a thinker, but solely and only the one who has faith, who relates himself to the absolute paradox."

Soren Kierkegaard, Concluding Unscientific Postscript, Vol I Hong p. 610-611

Here is the backstory describing this quotation:

Søren Kierkegaard, arguably the father of existentialism, was a profound religious thinker. He came up with an unequivocal view of faith and reason much like Tertullian’s strong incompatibilism. If Kant argued for religion within the limits of reason alone, Kierkegaard called for reason with the limits of religion alone. Faith requires a leap. It demands risk. All arguments that reason derives for a proof of God are in fact viciously circular: one can only reason about the existence of an object that one already assumes to exist. Hegel tried to claim that faith could be elevated to the status of objective certainty. Seeking such certainly, moreover, Kierkegaard considered a trap: what is needed is a radical trust. The radical trust of faith is the highest virtue one can reach.

Kierkegaard claimed that all essential knowledge intrinsically relates to an existing individual. In Either/Or, he outlined three general forms of life individuals can adopt: the aesthetic, ethical, and ethico-religious. The aesthetic is the life that seeks pleasure. The ethical is that which stresses the fulfillment of duties. Neither of these attains to the true individuality of human existence. But in the ethico-religious sphere, truth emerges in the authenticity of the relationship between a person and the object of his attention. With authenticity, the importance is on the “how,” not the “what,” of knowledge. It attains to a subjective truth, in which the sincerity and intensity of the commitment is key. This authenticity is equivalent to faith understood as “an objective uncertainty held fast in an appropriation-process of the most passionate inwardness.” The coexistence of this “objective uncertainty” with “passionate inwardness” is strikingly paradoxical. Kierkegaard makes a similarly paradoxical claim in holding that “nothing historical can become infinitely certain for me except the fact of my own existence (which again cannot become infinitely certain for any other individual, who has infinite certainty only of his own existence) and this is not something historical.” Thus faith can never be a matter of objective certainty; it involves no reckoning of probabilities, it is not an intellectual acceptance of a doctrine at all. Faith involves a submission of the intellect. It is not only hostile to but also completely beyond the grasp of reason.

-James Swindal, Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy

---

How exactly does [reason] falter?

Philosophically, I have to accept certain things as givens. Based on my understandings from Descartes, I have to accept certain faculties, such as my five senses and even reason as givens.

How can I truly know that these "givens" are working properly 100% of the time? How can I know that my reason is true 100% of the time? How do I know that I am not being fooled by an evil genius as Descartes stated?

The thing with reason, intellect, and my other senses is that I have faith that these faculties are working correctly. I can never truly test whether these faculties are telling me the truth. How can I test my facilities?

I could not test them by myself (because my faculties may be malfunctioning).

I could not ask bystanders (because they may be deceiving me).

I could not ask a higher power (because how do I know that it is not deceving me).

So how can I know?

I can't.

Therefore, I have to have faith that these faculties are telling me the truth.

So how does reason falter? Reason falters because I have to have faith that my reasoning is functioning correctly. I am not downplaying reason, rather, I am admitting that I have to use other things besides reasoning in order to accept it.

This quotation:

I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason and intellect has intended for us to forego their use.

is accurate because God gave me these faculties so that I could use them.

So why don't I just limit myself to reason? Reason itself has its limitations. Once again, I have to take a leap of faith into believing that my faculties (including my reason) are functioning correctly.

How can I truly know that my reasoning is correct?

I can never truly know. Therefore, I acknowledge that I have to have faith in certain things (including reasoning).

Furthermore, this does not conflict with my faith. In other words, I have to abandon my reason in order to take a leap of faith in believing in Christ. I have to have faith in the "absolute paradox.". See my post on Kierkegaard for this notion.

[Faith No More]

I think what you mean then is that your ability to reason falters, not reason itself, correct?

[Brian37]

I think what you mean then is that your ability to reason falters, not reason itself, correct?

I hate mental masturbation and merely using words replacing observation.

Again, you cant replace a universal tool with mere words.

Whatever we call our thoughts, it still cannot replace actual method in collecting data, observation, control groups and independent peer review.

"Reason" is a subjective word and is still subject to the same independent skepticism and review as "logic". Because people can and do have bad reasons, bad reasoning skills, and bad logic, and bad use of logic.

When you have competing claims on ANY SUBJECT, even within science, you have to compare and contrast, and subject the claim to a thorough shit kicking. If it survives the kicking to the point that all sides in that dispute agree to the conclusions, then you have something.

I think philosophy is dead and is a hollow shell compared to REAL empirical scientific method.

It still amounts to "We are all entitled to our own opinions, but not our own facts".

[Lion IRC]

You are right. It is not rational for me to believe in God. I have to abandon reason in order to have faith in God. As Kierkegaard would say, faith is an absurdity, yet I still cling to it.

Really clemdog14?

Thinking that God exists is entirely rational for me.

---

I dont suppose you could put up the Kierkegaard ''faith is an absurdity'' quote in full could you?


I dont remember it.

Thanks for the quote.

I didnt get from it what you appear to have.

How does..."the repulsion of the absurd" lead to ''faith is an absurdity'' ?

And thanks for the backstory bit too.

But again, I'm reading...

''faith requires...''

''It demands...''

''...faith is the highest virtue one can reach.''

Where is the absurdity?

[Brian37]

Where is the absurdity?

A brain with no brain, no material, no location that is everywhere and nowhere at the same time who can make magic babies and survive rigor mortis.

[median]

So why don't I just limit myself to reason? Reason itself has its limitations. Once again, I have to take a leap of faith into believing that my faculties (including my reason) are functioning correctly.

How can I truly know that my reasoning is correct?

I can never truly know. Therefore, I acknowledge that I have to have faith in certain things (including reasoning).

Furthermore, this does not conflict with my faith. In other words, I have to abandon my reason in order to take a leap of faith in believing in Christ. I have to have faith in the "absolute paradox.". See my post on Kierkegaard for this notion.

This is one of the most absurd things I've ever heard. You are attempting to justify your faith in the alleged Jesus (which anyone, of any religion, can do for their deity), while rejecting reason, by arguing that reason is limited? Your conclusion does not follow from your premises. Taking a leap in the dark toward your particuar interpretation of your particular deity is not justified by merely pointing out a fact of reality. So we can't know with absolute certainty that our reasoning is applying to some absolute "objective" reality...so what! This fact doesn't get you to Yahweh, Elohim, Jehovah, Jesus. It should get you to skepticism, testing, critical thinking (and most importantly) consistency. Why don't you start rejecting reason for other things in life? How about when a salesman comes to your door, or when someone claims they have swampland in Arizona to give you (just sign here!)? You are practicing hypocrisy.

Do you apply the same standards of evidence to your own religious beliefs, that you do to other extraordinary claims?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4OMyAexMTKM

[The Grand Nudger]

Or, Clem, you could accept that your faculties are faulty, that your reason may fail you, that others may deceive you, and with-hold faith in them while still applying them for practical effect. Faith -is not- a requirement, and is very often a detriment.

[Faith No More]

The task of finding fulfillment without faith is a daunting task for some.