The Case Against the Existence of God

I don't have a definition. "Belief" is a term from folk psychology. It isn't well defined. It makes for a poor scientific concept. To a first approximation, a belief is an emotional committment to a statement (the semantic content of the statement, not the syntax). Sure. The theory of evolution is objective. Whether or not you believe it is subjective.

Just a snippet of thought that I will mull over came to me reading your post.Organisms function as time processes totally dependent on their environments. Plants for example require sunlight, water, nutrients. Their activities are undertaken and depend on necessities. This is true of animals and humans also.So a human organism is dependent on the environment providing for it's needs. But humans actively undertake a wide range of activities for their survival. Humans engage in seeking, planning, goal oriented activities.If we go out looking for food, or shelter, or a mate, etc. We have to hope, believe, have faith that we might find what we need. In the complex neurology of the motivation and behaviours of the brain a human needs to "believe", or "have faith" that the activities have the hope of success. Faith and belief are aspects of the complex functioning of human consciousness and are an expression of a living organisms complex dependence on it's environment to function and reproduce.My first rough draft of a definition of belief is that is a corrolate of the nervous system's goal oriented functioning.God then would be a personification of the entire environment that humans relate to. This is not limited to the earth and universe but also to the social group and culture and "mental" worlds that humans have developed. Humans have a prolonged dependence of their parents and this personification is often cast in parental terms whether it is the ancestors, or divine mothers and fathers.lfen

Nevertheless people for the duration of Australia's history have rightly believed in the existence of Australia who never could go there, and there are countless similar examples. It's the same thing really. And I'm not so sure you can't "go there" when it comes to believing the witnesses of the Bible either. I could say that I "went there" when I believed, and found it to be quite real.This message has been edited by Faith, 04-07-2006 02:35 PM

Whoa !!! I am not wanting to insult or belittle your position at all Faith. I get the impression you are so use to defending your beliefs that you can not see the other side of the argument.I was simply stating that you hold your beliefs and knowlege of what is true to a different standard. Thats all. And in so doing will not be adequately able communicate to skeptics and scientific minded people from Missouri.

I don't think I took what you said as insulting, not sure what you mean. I simply answered you as I see it -- I do believe it based on facts."Different standard" than what? Not sure what you mean.This message has been edited by Faith, 04-07-2006 02:39 PM

During Australia's history, people have also believed in Atlantis - but not "rightly". When a belief happens to conform to reality, it is pure coincidence. It is not a confirmation that all beliefs reflect reality. And I could say that I "went" to Middle Earth or Treasure Island or Oz, and found them to be quite real - but there is a difference between one person's perception of what is real and what really is real.Going to Australia to confirm its reality includes being able to take anybody else along and show them the reality.If you can't do that, your belief is still not fact.

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I've never used it like that. I just use it to mean that if somebody is convinced that something is true, he believes it. It's not necessarily subjective the way I use it. But if you think it's confusing, give me another term and I will use that.

Maybe not, and then maybe again one can deduce the Truth if one works on it hard enough. To me it's no game. It's important.

In that case, Pixies are God. This is trivial. It doesn't matter what name we call God. If you want to call Him pixies, then do so.

That's fine. However, when it comes to a subject like GOD or Truth that by definition is not testable or verifiable, and all evidence, whether in support of the concept or standing against the concept is immaterial to the reality of the object, I'm not sure what else to call it other than a game.The title of the thread is "The Case Against the Existence of God", but as I explained in the logic statement presented to you, the case simply doesn't matter. If GOD exists, GOD exists. If GOD does not exist, then GOD does not exit. Maybe what you want to discuss is "The Case Against the Belief in God" But that would be grist for some other thread.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Faith's point might be that we all accept things on authority. We accept all sorts of scientific ideas on authority, not having the expertise or the time to study it ourselves. I accept the theory of evolution on authority. I have never examined one piece of physical evidence in person, and I would not know how to examine if somebody showed me a piece of physical evidence.Why do we accept so many ideas on authority? Because we think that the authority is credible, that they know what they are talking about. Accepting things on authority is not at all unreasonable.I have never been to Moscow and will, I think, never go. Nonetheless I am quite certain that a place called Moscow exists. I can't deduce that such a place exists. It is not logically necessary that it exist. I just accept the authorities.

One can't test it empirically, maybe, but one might be able to figure it out deductively. Of course. Nothing I think about God affects His existence or non-existence. But it might have an effect on me.

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The point is that we could verify or falsify those ideas if we did have the expertise and/or time. We accept the conclusions on authority, but the method of drawing the conclusions is one that we can all understand and agree on.The ideas that Faith claims as facts can not be tested in any way, by anybody, regardless of expertise or time to study. That is the fundamental difference.

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Is there a difference between this and agnosticism? Seems the same to me. There might be. I'm not sure yet.This message has been edited by robinrohan, 04-07-2006 02:27 PM