The Problem with Christians

[Silver]

I am not most atheists. I have no qualms in stating with an authority of certainty that god does not exist.

I'm interested to know how you could be so confident.

The same way that most people are confident that leprechauns do not exist, despite there being no evidence for or against their existence.

[Angrboda]

Let's say we all accept that at some point life came from non-life. Let's say we also agree that from the laws of physics and from natural phenomena, we cannot explain how this happened. Until such time as a rational explanation can be offered, tested and proved, it would be reasonable to label abiogenesis as a supernatural event (using the definition as supplied).

That would be an abuse of the term 'supernatural'. Supernatural doesn't just mean that science has failed to explain the phenomena. It refers to there being no natural explanation of the phenomenon in principle, that no explanation would be correct, whether by accident or otherwise.

[abaris]

It refers to there being no natural explanation of the phenomenon in principle, that no explanation would be correct, whether by accident or otherwise.

Most importantly that it could actually be tested. That's where all so called supernatural events fail miserably. They can't be put to any test, so they stay in the realm of hearsay and word of mouth. There is no supernatural phenomenon, since all we have are observations by people of something they couldn't explain.

[robvalue]

For people who believe everything was made by magic in the first place, I don't know how they can consider anything natural.

[The Grand Nudger]

There really no reason that you can;t test the supernatural in any case.  If someone says they can levitate by chanting a magical spell...it's not as if there's no way to tell.

"My god is supernatural/did that supernaturally" isn't -actually- a defense against testing it's failure as a proposition.

[ignoramus]

Yeah, but it's not God's fault that he lives outside of our testable universe!

[abaris]

Yeah, but it's not God's fault that he lives outside of our testable universe!

Careful, AW just might take you seriously. I've got the feeling, the irony gene isn't strong with this one.

[Angrboda]

But don't you understand?! Everything happens because God made the universe orderly! It's all supernatural! All the way down! Except where it isn't.

[AJW333]

Please do

I explain all this there. I'll post it again in case you missed it.

http://youtu.be/J5u5-Bg2ENQ

OK, I am up to speed. You seem reluctant to acknowledge "laws" and prefer to talk about "models" just in case the law should suddenly up and change itself. I'm not sure whether you believe there are any concrete laws of nature at all. Do you think there are?

Considering gravity, if I was to observe a heavy rock just float off into the sky, would that be a violation of the law of gravity or would we have to change our "model" of how gravity works?

[abaris]

Considering gravity, if I was to observe a heavy rock just float off into the sky, would that be a violation of the law of gravity or would we have to change our "model" of how gravity works?

Why don't you alert us, if you actually observe the above?