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You are perfectly capable of applying this logic to anything but your own faith.
Unfortunately John I don't understand the logic you are trying to use:
I don't believe in God because anything that cannot be tested empirically does not exist.
I don't buy that. There's no way for you to prove it. It's a
non-falsifiable belief and you know it. What if I were to use your reasoning in the sciences? We could throw out most of theoretical astrophysics (for example) in one brutal sweep.
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Have you noticed how the faithful have to do all the work? Raise the money, build the buildings, sing the songs, write the books?
What are you talking about? You mean, God doesn't build the buildings?
You know enough about Christian theology to know we have an explanation for that. God does not "prove" Himself because God wants you to go looking for Him. Surely you know that. I bet you don't like that, but you know it.
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that you disbelieve in Santa for precisely the same reasons I disbelieve in your God.
Actually I disbelieve in Santa for several reasons (and I would use a bulleted list if I knew how):
(1)My parents told me so a long time ago (2) lots of people have gone to the North Pole and not seen anything, and if I wanted to I could probably log onto TerraServer and check myself (3) the media and culture and television spend a lot of time on this subject, that parents perpetuate the myth is an inside joke and they wouldn't if there were no Santa Claus.
Note the physical evidence Claus would leave if he were real.
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Funds in the church coiffers have an identifiable source.
That's true. However this is a strawman. Santa Claus, by definition, leaves gifts. God does not, by definition, fund the church.
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Claiming that since you have no kids that your disbelief in Santa is faith-based is nonsensical and diversionary.
Sorry if you don't like it but it is true. Most of my disbelief is faith-based, just as your disbelief in God is faith-based (by definition, because you have no evidence there is no God).
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Do you believe everything until it is proven wrong?
No, but I find it terribly unwise to deny the possibility. And I think it is absurd to snub your nose and ridicule those who believe, when you have no evidence they are wrong. (And even worse to goad them for their lack of evidence, when you yourself have none.)
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By your grey-alien logic, you must not deny the possibilty that Allah is the true God, that Zeus is King of the hill, that Osirus died for our sins?
All of these are possibilities. I do not spend my time trying to convince the local Muslims that Allah is not the true God. Nor would I try to convince followers of any Greek or Egyptian gods.
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Santa's workshop is invisible. Don't you watch the cartoons that run around this time of year?
It's been a few years, but I don't recall an
invisible workshop in any of the cartoons. That was never a part of the myth as I understood it. But there are any number of ways to check for physical evidence: prints in the fireplace, that sort of thing. The only way to make Santa leave no evidence is to basically deify Santa, to turn him into a god. And that defeats the purpose of your example, doesn't it?
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But there is no hard evidence against it, so the possibility is there that there could be Borg in the break room.
Don't be ridiculous. You know that the Borg, like Santa Claus, and unlike God, will leave physical evidence. Is the ambient temperature of your building about 80 degrees Farenheit? Do the snack machines appear to have been gutted for parts? Are the conversations around the water bottle getting
really dull?
Plus other office buildings have never reported Borg. So while there is an infinitesimally small possibility of a Borg infestation of your office building, it is highly unlikely because: (1)Borg would leave evidence and (2)Borg would probably infest other office buildings as well.
The problem here is that you are deliberately choosing absurd analogies. Your problem is that these analogies are absurd for the very reason that they contradict what we know from our senses. They would leave physical evidence if they were real, but there is no physical evidence, so they almost certainly are not real.
God would not necessarily leave physical evidence, so God is not contradicted by our senses, therefore God is not absurd (no matter how much you would like to make Him absurd through bad analogies).
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Exactly. I have never found anything to indicate the existence of a god either.
But God does not necessarily leave evidence like the Borg would.
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While one may not ever see god, there should be clear evidence of 'magic.'
Really? So you believe that belief in God is not non-falsifiable?
Secondly, you believe that God can be empirically proven?
Well great design an experiment.
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It is then reasonable to believe in Slimy?
Yes, though I have a problem with your use of "dimensions".
Also, Slimy the Gnome may not be it's name. It's somewhat contradictory because "Gnomes" are creatures that are supposed to exist in three dimensions and "Slimy" defines a sensory state, and this entity cannot be detected by our sense. It's name might be Thor, Allah, God, or a lower entity like Michael, or may something from Hell like Lucifer. Aside from "Slimy the Gnome" being internally inconsistent I cannot prove that it does not exist, and I don't think I would waste my time thumbing my nose at Slimy's believers, especially if I have no evidence against "Slimy the Gnome".
Your analogies are getting better though. Eventually as you move away from the physical you will move closer to God-like attributes in your analogies. You will have to, in order to avoid physical evidence.
[This message has been edited by gene90, 12-10-2002]
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