Logically speaking: God is knowable

In your argument agaisnt '7' you insist on knowledge of everything. You explicitly rule out, for instance, observing that the universe is not as it should be if God existed and inferring God's non-existence from that.

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1 doesn't rely on me - it relys on God

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YOUR knowledge necessarily relies on you. Remember this is about you KNOWING that God exists. It IS logically possible for God to both give you extra-human capabilities while you remain merely human. So unless you are claiming that God has exalted you to superhuman status that would let you overcome your human limits your problem remains.

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I don't need data in the sense of supplying it to you

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i.e. when you said that you didn't need data, you meant that you DID need data, but it wasn't in a form that could be convincingly transmitted to someone else.

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The issue is whether a person can know God exists. For that the person themselves needs data. Let me be that person. I have it. God supplied it and logically (for that is what this is about) there is no impediment to him in supplying it.

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So all you have to do is to explain how you can be sure that your jump from this data to the conclusion that God exists is reliable. Just assuming that it is reliable on the basis that IF God existed and DID want to let you know it the experience would be reliable is no good. It begs the question.

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In other words IF God exists AND he gave me the data required to know he exists THEN I know he exist.

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And if God didn't exist and the data came from another source you would still "know" that God exists. To truly KNOW that God exists by your criterion of certainty you must eliminate that possiblity.Edited by PaulK, : No reason given.

I do. To know God doesn't exist means one must know everything and God is not there. To infer something is not to know it I agree. The link in post 1 discusses this. Exhalt is not the word I would chose however. As Robin is wont to say "It sounds boastful". If you can read 'exhalt' without any sense of it being on account of me being something special over and above others not so (or yet) exhalted then I would be comfortable with that.

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I agree. The link in post 1 discusses this.

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No, it doesn't. You just argue that if you happened to be right than you wouldn't be deluded.

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Exhalt is not the word I would chose however. As Robin is wont to say "It sounds boastful". If you can read 'exhalt' without any sense of it being on account of me being something special over and above others not so (or yet) exhalted then I would be comfortable with that.

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You can't have it both ways. Either you are claiming to have been given superhuman capabilites or you are not. Of course if you really believe that then you ought to very seriously consider the possibility that you are, in fact, deluded.

Yes. It is not necessary that the data has that quality. We know stuff all the time without the data being convincingly (read: 100% convincingly) transmittable to another. I think data is essential to anyone knowing anything however. The link in post 1 covers this issue of delusion. In short: I am saying that I (let me be the 'person' for short from now on) know God exists. That is not to say he does exist. I could be deluded. My being deluded doesn't mean I do not know God exists. It has nothing to do with it.Edited by iano, : sorry...mouse trouble

Lets assume for a second that you know things. You cannot demonstrate that you are not deluded in your knowing. That delusion tack hits us all and short circuits the discussion. Okay. As per the link. I claim to sit in a reality beyond the bubble you sit in. Logically possible

Couldn't that work the same the other way though?The person could know that god does not exist. That is not to say he doesn't exist. They could be deluded. Their being deluded doesn't mean they do not know god does not exist. It has nothing to do with it.Eh?If your gonna say its different becuawse logically we can't know something doesn't exist then I would say that it is the same for know something does exist. We can't really know anything.Wadaya think?

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My being deluded doesn't mean I do not know God exists. It has nothing to do with it.

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Then you mean "know" simply in the sense of being absolutely convinced. Thus we are back again to your argument relying on a double standard.

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I claim to sit in a reality beyond the bubble you sit in. Logically possible

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In the same sense that it is logically possible to be omniscient without being God. Yet another double standard.

Good point CS. I'll have a think about it and get back. Its late and I've only got a post or so in me at this point

Not at all. As you can see a (by the worlds standards) deluded person in a bubble whilst yourself residing within a bubble (whose skin thickness is not known to you) so to can I (logically) look at you in a deluded bubble whilst residing in bubble whose skin thickness (God) is not known to me. The bubble I reside in encompasses yours as your does a deluded persons (by the worlds standards)You don't have to be omniscient to see the deluded person residing in a bubble. Nor do I to see you in a bubble.This sounds very me-superior-than-you but I gather you are bigger than that. Its just an illustrationNight by the way. Its been a long week and I'm up early too *sigh*Edited by iano, : No reason given.Edited by iano, : No reason given.

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Not at all. As you can see a (by the worlds standards) deluded person in a bubble whilst yourself residing within a bubble (whose skin thickness is not known to you) so to can I (logically) look at you in a bubble whilst residing in bubble whose skin thickness (God) is not known to me.

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What do you mean "not at all" ? You can say all that but it's hardly plausible that it is literally true. All sorts of things are logically possible but incredibly unlikely. That sort of logical possibility doesn't help your case because it equally applies to the other side.

Indeed. iano neatly stepped round this point in the other thread when I pointed out that with all available evidence then the only way to reach either 1 or 7 is through belief. You have to believe. Belief is not something that actually requires hard data either way.Just because 7 can never be empirically proved, doesn’t mean it is invalid to hold that belief. After all, in the 5000years (ish) of recorded human history, there has not been a single piece of evidence for the existence of the god/s (any of them), and that was not through want of trying either. The true irony is that both 1s and 7s use this same 5000 year dry spell of proof to justify their belief. The 7s because continued lack of evidence for the god/s lends credence to their stance and the 1s because their holy books state that God refuses to give evidence of his existence and thus the lack of evidence IS evidence for the existence of God.IF it is lunacy to believe 7 then it is also lunacy to believe 1.Edited by ohnhai, : tided the gramar

Ohnai,That is exactly my position summed up better than I could have myself!Mark

Do you truly disagree that being 100%Theisitc is diametrically opposed to being 100% Atheistic? Because that is what this 1-7 scale is about . It doesn’t address the logic, data or reason of these positions, but simply creates a linear gradient from one to the other.In the context of the scale then 1 & 7 ARE equivalent. 1 being absolute belief in the existence of God and 7 being the absolute belief of the lack of existence for the god/s. Logic, reason and data have NO baring on it what-so-ever. Edited by ohnhai, : typo fixEdited by ohnhai, : No reason given.