The definition of GOD

Actually, it's not.But what about responding to the more substantive point in that post instead of displaying your utter inability to engage in logical reasoning?

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If I had a million dollars, I'd buy you a monkey.
Haven't you always wanted a monkey?
-- The Barenaked Ladies

I think this may be your main confusion. It's actually the exact opposite that's true. And you're falling into a small trap of equivocation.Possible has two meanings - we can imagine something, or something can actually exist. They are different, and you know the difference (I think you've demonstrated this, anyway)."all things are possible unless proved otherwise" is only true in our imagination. It is the opposite that is true when dealing with reality, though:The general rule when dealing with reality is that all imaginable things are actually impossible unless proved otherwise.Otherwise we'ed have to spend every second of every day worrying about all the things we could possibly imagine that could be having an effect on our lives. This obviously isn't true. That is actually most unreasonable. Reason doesn't show us something should exist unless we have observations from the real world that show us something should exist. What you're doing here is going back to the imaginable-possibility-realm and confusingly thinking it has any bearing at all on reality. Reality doesn't care about what you can imagine. This is a true statement on it's own, but irrelevent to what we were talking about. The universes I described only held a single number. "1", or "2", or "3"... and so on. 1.1 or 1.11 or 1.111 didn't exist in any of the universes I was talking about. Your point has no effect on the validity that 'infinite' doesn't have to exist in any particular universe, even if we do have an infinite number of universes. The very fact that you state it as 'debatable' means that your GOD is no longer the Ultimate God of Identity. Therefore, your GOD is no longer the Ultimate God. You can say that maybe being the Ultimate God of Identity isn't important. But then, why would being the Ultimate God of Power be important? Or Wisdom? Why is being the Ultimate anything important? Then your whole arguement falls down. So yes, you need to include your God as the Ultimate God of Identity if you claim your God to be the Ultimate God of Everything. And, well, it's trivial to show that your Ultimate God of Identity doesn't exist (I am unaware of His existence). Therefore, you're assumption of God being the Ultimate of Everything is wrong.So you can have it either way, either the assumption of God being the Ultimate of Everything is wrong because He's obviously not the Ultimate of Identity. Or we can get rid of the assumption all together. Either way, the entire thesis is based on an invalid definition of God. You're certainly free to go about claiming anything you'd like. I'm interested in what you can show. And you aren't able to show that your thesis has any validity in reality. The main reason for this is because you're equivocating between 'possibility in imagination' and 'possibility in reality'. They are two entirely different definitions, and using them interchangeably results in the kind of confusion that is all over this thread.

What you finally decide is real isn't all that relevant. Granted, plenty of things flow out of what you decide - and you give an example above. It is a curious example in that you seem to need observations from the reality you have decided is independant of yourself to help you decide what is reality.My main point was that you are always the final court of appeal for what is real - however you arrive at that decision. This: ...doesn't alter that.

I don’t think we are though. The whole purpose of the analogy I used regarding how fast you could run was designed specifically to show that I do not accept all imagined possibilities to be valid. However I would point you in the direction of some of stile’s posts as he/she has argued the case much better than I have. Proof by contradiction is a problematic area, especially when discussing hypothetical ideas like what may or may not be possible in areas where there is no means of determining the validity of either proposition by observation. How should I attempt to disprove the possibility that you might be able to run at 100mph using 'proof by contradiction'?Rather than dealing with each reply separately, I’m going to combine everything into one post. So I want to move onto Message 207. If you read what I wrote you will see that I actually disproved your point. I hate having to continually produce probability scenarios, but you are clearly unable to grasp what is being said to you, so it looks like we need to break this down into steps that you are able to understand.If we flip the coin twice, the probability of two heads occurring is 25%. If we add a third flip, the probability of a ”all heads’ does indeed reduce to 12.5%. This means the probability of a ”no head’ situation has increased, but this is where you are struggling. When the coin was flipped twice, there were only four possible outcomes. Flipping the coin a third time increases the number of possible outcomes to eight. So whilst the ”all heads’ possibility has decreased, so have all other specified outcomes. This is important because the YES-GOD outcome was a specified outcome.There is another point you are failing to understand about probabilities. You have continued to assert that x to the power of infinity equals zero. This can only ever be the case if x started as zero. In the coin tossing analogy you have chosen, x started at 50%. As we saw above, when the coin is flipped twice, each possible sequence has a 25% chance of occurring. When it is flipped three times, each possible sequence has a 12.5% of occurring. What we see is that when we add together the sums of each individual probability, the total will always equal 100%, with each individual possibility being equally probable. So to find out the possibility of any specified outcome, all we need to do is divide 100% by the number of possible outcomes. Even if an infinite number of coins are flipped, each outcome has a chance of 100% divided by infinity, which will always be greater than 0%.This fact alone invalidates one of the central arguments of your thesis, namely that it is impossible to flip an infinite number of heads.Moving on to Message 208. No I didn’t ignore the preceding explanation; I discounted it. There is a big difference. I discounted it because it is complete and utter nonsense. Let me explain.You claim the NO-GOD possibility has little bearing or influence over anything. That’s a bit like saying a YES-SUNLIGHT possibility has an overwhelming influence over the nature of reality, but the NO-SUNLIGHT possibility has little or none. This is clearly nonsense.What we find is that the YES-SUNLIGHT possibility produces a different environment than the NO-SUNLIGHT possibility, but the idea that one possibility is any less influential than the other is clearly not supported by observation in the real universe.All we can say about the differences between a NO-GOD possibility and a YES-GOD possibility is that they are likely to result in different realities . and that is all we can say.

I know. Um, that's why I agreed with you, the word directly preceding the very sentence you quoted of me was "Correct." That means I agree with you. I don't understand why this is curious. If I have decided that reality is independant of myself, how else can I gain knowledge of what reality is like apart from getting observations of that reality?It's the same as when I decide that you are independant of myself. The only way I can gain knowledge of you is from getting observations of you. Observations of what you say, observations of what you do... The same way I've decided that I have no direct control over you, I've also decided that I have no direct control over reality. You are who you are. Reality is what reality is. My imagination has no control over who you are. My imagination has no control over what reality is. (Or so I've decided, anyway).

I see it. The chances of all heads are exactly the same as any other sequence, no matter how many times we flip the coin.

well done. well said.so what is the reality of "existence"?

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keep your mind from this way of enquiry, for never will you show that not-being is
~parmenides

And what observations could we make to determine whether or not these things were independent?- Could you give an example of an experiment that would do one of these things?

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If I had a million dollars, I'd buy you a monkey.
Haven't you always wanted a monkey?
-- The Barenaked Ladies

Ruler is also proceeding backwards if he were truly doing this in a scientific manner. In science, the theoretical framework is what is being tested -- these are the things that we are trying to determine are true or false. One uses these as part of the premises in a logical argument to produce a conclusion, the so-called predictions of the theory. One then checks the prediction against observation -- if the observations show that the prediction/conclusion is wrong, then we conclude that the premises/theories are wrong.So, if one is trying to determine the existence of God scientifically, the existence of God isn't the conclusion, but rather an assumption as part of the theoretical framework to be tested.For example:If God exists, then all ducks are green.
God exists.
Therefore, (by modus ponens) all ducks are green.Then one checks whether or not all ducks are green. If they aren't, then at least one of the premises must be false (or, like the discovery of the planet Neptune, the overall set of premises must be altered). If every duck is green, then the theory is tentatively confirmed until further testing indicates otherwise.(Of course, in this case, there may be competing theories about why ducks are green. Or one may want to discuss the theory on a deeper level, like why the existecne of God would imply anything about the greenness of all ducks.)Ruler is doing quite the opposite. He is setting up a logical "theoretical" framework from which God comes out as a conclusion -- that is, the existence of God is what is to be observed in order to evaluate his theoretical framework. Now that he has concluded that God exists, I, as a "scientist" trying to confirm or refute his theory, try to determine whether God does or does not exist. As far as I can see, God does not exist. Therefore, I know that something must be wrong with his theory.You see? The way he is trying to use logic is very different from the way logic is used in science.(Of course I am writing this pretending that ruler wrote something more than word salad to begin with.)

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If I had a million dollars, I'd buy you a monkey.
Haven't you always wanted a monkey?
-- The Barenaked Ladies

its the science of existing that leads to God.how is existence possible?why is existence possible?where was existence possible?what is existence?when was existence possible?who, what, why, when, where.objectively, what is reality?

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keep your mind from this way of enquiry, for never will you show that not-being is
~parmenides

I don't want to get into too much here, since it's starting to lead away from the main focus of this thread. But here's my quick answer:I don't know what the reality of 'existence' is. I'm waiting for more information. That is, I'm waiting for more observations from the real world. I'm not exactly biting my nails in anticipation of getting this information though, it's likely not going to be available in my lifetime. But I don't know that for sure either The only think I do know is that existence seems to be independent of my imagination of existence. Or, at least, I've yet to find a contradiction to this assumption.But what is the reality of existence? I don't know, and I've yet to hear of any information or observations that can be verified about such knowledge. It would seem to me that in order to answer this question, we'ed have to get observations of existence from beyond the bounds of this reality. Such a task seems rather difficult to me.I don't see how it matters much, in a practical sense, though. Regardless of what the reality of existence is, existence and reality are here, and we are a part of it, and we are capable of observing it. I suggest we use what we're capable of (observing existence and reality) in order to gain whatever knowledge we can.

Absolutely. So many of the misconceptions that exist regarding improbabilities are related to the psychological significance we tend to attach to certain sequences or outcomes.If we were both to flip a coin 1,000 times and yours all came up heads and mine a random sequence of heads and tails, there would be those who would immediately seize on your sequence and proclaim it too improbable to have come about by chance.My sequence, on the other hand, would not be given a second thought; it would be considered the ”expected outcome’. However the exact order of the sequence of heads and tails I flipped would have exactly the same probability of occurring as yours, yet nobody would suggest it too improbable to have come about by chance.

Yes. A very glaring and important point. One I feel I'm incapable of imprinting on him. That's why I tend to stay away from such arguements and attempt alternate routes of bringing the problems to the surface. I mean that as a failure on my part, not as futility in any way on your part. I do fully hope you're capable of reaching the point of paradigm shift with him. Actually, I hope any of us are. The light at the end of the tunnel is beginning to dim, though. Here's hoping some lurkers are learning I've made the same assumption while writing all my responses

yes, and to further kill the conversation concerning it, you can click my name and e-mail me to further pursue an observation of science that led me to a conclusion of what i can or cannot say concerning existence. but for a quick reference, here's a link that will show you what i mean.http://EvC Forum: Before Big Bang God or Singularity -->EvC Forum: Before Big Bang God or Singularityexistence is in my belief, the true name of God as our language can describe.Edited by tesla, : last sentence.

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keep your mind from this way of enquiry, for never will you show that not-being is
~parmenides

A common emoticon used at TheologyWeb is that of an almost comatose smiley drooling all over himself.Maybe we need such a thing here.

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If I had a million dollars, I'd buy you a monkey.
Haven't you always wanted a monkey?
-- The Barenaked Ladies