Invitation for Atheists to Debate a Christian via Skype

[Belacqua]

When someone can describe to me how a thing can act or exist atemporily, I’d be happy to listen.

This might be an interesting thing to discuss.

It doesn't have to be demonstrated, though, to understand the difference between a temporally ordered series and an essentially ordered series.

[Cecelia]

I find that people generally aren't as interested in debating on a message board as they are in volume for one of a few reasons:

A. They like to speak over their opponents
B. What they said can be used against them
C. They want a friendly audience who will go with them
D. They know all of the above, and want to be able to say "Nobody's reasonable enough to debate me" (AKA The Ben Shapiro Technique)
E. All of the Above

[LadyForCamus]

When someone can describe to me how a thing can act or exist atemporily, I’d be happy to listen.

This might be an interesting thing to discuss.

It doesn't have to be demonstrated, though, to understand the difference between a temporally ordered series and an essentially ordered series.

Could you elaborate on that? I’m ignorant of what you mean.

[Jehanne]

When someone can describe to me how a thing can act or exist atemporily, I’d be happy to listen.

This might be an interesting thing to discuss.

It doesn't have to be demonstrated, though, to understand the difference between a temporally ordered series and an essentially ordered series.

You are free to believe that planets move because there are invisible fairies that are pushing them; ditto for the major sport of your choosing. I doubt that any scientific journal will publish your paper on such, though.

[brewer]

Apparently the more humans grow and learn the less applicable Aristotle and Aquinas become.

To make this apparent to everyone, I think you'd have to do two things:

1) Address the actual arguments they made, and not the very different Kalam argument, and 

2) show why modern science proves that their arguments on this matter are wrong. I've seen metaphysical and ideological arguments against them, but never anything from science.

See the science in the problems section: https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Argument_f...e#Problems

[Belacqua]

See the science in the problems section: https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Argument_f...e#Problems

Glancing over this, I see the common and reasonable objections to a temporally-ordered series, but none to an essentially-ordered series. 
If they address this somewhere, I'd be grateful if someone would point it out to me.

---

Could you elaborate on that? I’m ignorant of what you mean.

I wrote a simple example about pool balls earlier on this thread. Did you read that?

[SenseMaker007]

I think the consensus is the concept of causality does not closely reflect any actual fundamental mechanism, it only empirically describe highly probable sequences of macroscopic appearances.  

I never disagreed with that.

At the deepest level, things literally happen just because of nothing.  It just happens.

And that is completely different and not what indeterminism or acausality suggests.

---

But the outcome of happens follows interrelated probabilities and do so by no discernible mechanism.  

You've already contradicted yourself in the next breath. If things happen because of interrelated probabilistic laws then that's not nothing. "Things happen due to interrelated probabilistic laws" doesn't mean "things happen for no reason at all."

---

But that framework will eventually break down if larger events are interatively broken down into their consentient subevents

The map is not the territory. No known explanation doesn't imply no explanation. Like I said, quantum theorists may as well give up on quantum theory if they think they've come to a point where there's no explanation to be found. That's not how science works. We don't assume that there is no explanation just because we haven't found one.

I think it's just an example of how egocentric humanity is when humans think that because they can't find the reason for something then it must mean that there is no reason. Very hilarious.

[LadyForCamus]

See the science in the problems section: https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Argument_f...e#Problems

Glancing over this, I see the common and reasonable objections to a temporally-ordered series, but none to an essentially-ordered series. 
If they address this somewhere, I'd be grateful if someone would point it out to me.

---

Could you elaborate on that? I’m ignorant of what you mean.

I wrote a simple example about pool balls earlier on this thread. Did you read that?

No, I hadn’t seen that; apologies. It’s a good analogy, thank you. I agree that actions in the absence of space-time would be an interesting topic for discussion.

[Belacqua]

It’s a good analogy, thank you. 

Thank you!

It's all a bit counterintuitive for us moderns, I think. Not because science has disproved it, but because our use of the word "cause" has narrowed over the last 1000 years or so. For Aristotelians, if A is necessary for B to exist, A can be called a cause. Even if it takes no action. 

I agree that actions in the absence of space-time would be an interesting topic for discussion.

This is also a tricky part of the argument. 

It's essential for Aristotle that the First Cause takes no action. 

It is eternally unchanging, actus purus, entirely without potential for change. It is called a cause not because it reaches down and pushes something, but because (they argue) it has to be there for even space-time to exist. 

Another way to say it is that the First Cause is existence itself. Not a thing that exists, but existence. Without it -- without existence -- there would obviously be nothing. 

And of course lots of other arguments are necessary if they want to show that the First Cause is also intelligent, good, etc.

[Jehanne]

It’s a good analogy, thank you. 

Thank you!

It's all a bit counterintuitive for us moderns, I think. Not because science has disproved it, but because our use of the word "cause" has narrowed over the last 1000 years or so. For Aristotelians, if A is necessary for B to exist, A can be called a cause. Even if it takes no action. 

I agree that actions in the absence of space-time would be an interesting topic for discussion.

This is also a tricky part of the argument. 

It's essential for Aristotle that the First Cause takes no action. 

It is eternally unchanging, actus purus, entirely without potential for change. It is called a cause not because it reaches down and pushes something, but because (they argue) it has to be there for even space-time to exist. 

Another way to say it is that the First Cause is existence itself. Not a thing that exists, but existence. Without it -- without existence -- there would obviously be nothing. 

And of course lots of other arguments are necessary if they want to show that the First Cause is also intelligent, good, etc.

It needs to also be pointed out that Aristotle, even though he was an empiricist who believed that heavier objects fall faster than do lighter ones, rejected Aristarchus' model of a moving Earth.  Now, it is possible to detect the motion of the Earth (Foucault pendulum or dropping a ball down into a deep hole near the equator), but no one had done those experiments because they lacked the physics, and hence, any motivation to do the experiments.  In fact, the Greeks universally accept Euclid's parallel postulate, and it was not until the 19th-century that non-Euclidean geometry was discovered:

Wikipedia -- Non-Euclidean geometry

This fact alone should end any and all appeals to "Aristotelian philosophy"; it does not matter what Aristotle thought, rather, only what matters is what modern philosophers and scientists think, and most of those do not believe in a personal God, or for that matter, any god:

Philosopher survey
Nature -- Leading scientists still reject God