We know there's a God because...

Thanks. I've only ever used it abbreviated, which is why I forgot.

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Kindly

No, iano, this is not correct. The objective reality outside me is verified with evidence. My perceptions are verified by others, independently and dispassionately, on a daily basis. Because of this I now have some confidence that my perceptions of this reality are, for the most part, accurate. I no longer need independent verification that the light is red and I need to stop or risk death and injury to myself and others. Years of evidence have shown me that when I perceive a red light, objective reality will bite me in the butt if I don’t act accordingly.The perceptions of most humans immersed in objective reality have become so intricately tied to this reality from the benefit of evidence that when we get up in the middle of the night and stub our toes we are certain it is the objective reality of the dresser, not our subjective perception of it, that caused us to perceive pain.Perception, unverified, is also notoriously bad. Many of the rules of evidence in our courts are there because of the long history of faulty human perception. Though closer to accurate as we continually verify them, without constant independent verification our perceptions are apt to be bogus. On the contrary, evidence verifies objective reality. You are not alone in this world. Do you deny the presence of other humans around you? Regardless of my Ex’s viewpoint of me to the contrary, no. Are these others just perceptions? I should hope you would acknowledge that the preponderance of the evidence indicates that other humans are indeed real with corporeal substance.This court of objective reality also limits ones actions regardless of ones perceptions through the laws of physics as well as the laws of man. There is existence outside our individual perceptions, and we are forced (physically and socially), regardless of our perceptions, to act accordingly.Again, there is an objective reality outside our perceptions, we perceive this reality with proper functioning senses and we verify this reality with independent evidence.When your perceptions of this reality differ from the evidence it is not the evidence nor the reality that is faulty.I must reject the contention that objective reality is only perceived and therefore subjective. I will agree, however, that perception, unverified by reality, may indeed be wrong. Even the confidence level I have in my memory of a thought I had 5 minuets ago is suspect. Sounds like a new age valley girl with a pyramid power hat and a mood ring.I do not recognize “categories” of perception.Could it be that you confuse some subconscious emotional need for this “third”?There are studies out indicating that such perceptions can be the result of subconscious activity involving the Orientation/Association Area (OAA) of the brain and its effects on the higher processing levels in the frontal lobe.Decreased blood flow to the OAA can manifest as floating, out of body experiences, religious elation, etc., and a person's emotional state (i.e. deep prayer) can affect the blood flow to the OAA.An overview paper:
410 error - Gone Detailed papers:
http://www.andrewnewberg.com/pub.asp Perceptions of external reality are tested against objective reality constantly. Failure to recognize that reality is either a sensory problem or an internal processing problem.With experience of outside evidence telling us our perception processing unit is functioning within acceptable parameters we can also gain a trust of those perceptions which are based only on internally generated information, but only to a degree.The Yogi declared he levitated because he perceived it, felt it, even saw it from a distance above himself. The video, however, showed otherwise.As the studies in the above sites indicate, even with fully functioning sensory and processing capabilities, depending upon the emotional fervor of the time, some of our perceptions of “reality” can be just plain wrong when tested. This seems to be especially so for the more religiously inclined.

Yes I have and you have ignored or didn't notice. Message 68 refuted the OP. That is what the OP says and you have ignored or didn't notice the reply that refuted.Ray

Hi CFO,
Message 68? Really? Are you sure you meant message 68, because all I saw in that post was a bunch of unsubstantiated assertions, a little macho posturing and a pathetic attempt to quote mine Dennett, so wildly out of context that he sounds like Michael Behe.All I am left to wonder is whether you are really so daft as to believe that Dennett is using the word "design" in the way you want him to mean it, or whether you just don't care how much you misrepresent the opinions of others.You ought to know by now that when biologists use the word "design" it is a shorthand way of referring to the forms that occur through evolution. Attempting to use this quote to back up your argument from design is dishonest.This last line is especially silly; So if anyone disagrees with you, that proves your argument! If that is the case, your argument must be true, because I disagree with you completely.Much as it pains me to admit it, I pretty much agree with Iano on this one. Short of some first hand experience of the divine or miraculous (and possibly not even then), there is nothing in the natural world that would force us to conclude that god(s) exists.

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Mutate and Survive

Both Ray and I have cited evidences which lend observable support to the existence of a creator outside of written text. I cited the fact that all cultures throughout human history have been religious whether primitive or civilized. I cited in that message as well the acclaimed powers of seers and witch doctors etc which most have had in their cultures. This goes all the way from pagan jungle tribes to the major world kingdoms of human history.Ray and I see this as coming from the observance of the wonders of creation. I see it as not only that, but evidence for existing supernatural powers comprising both good and evil realms empowering humans to perform miracle.In Romans 1:20 the apostle Paul alluded to this in his contention that unbelievers were without excuse. Paul said essentially that the invisible things were perceived by the things which were made/created. He went on later in context to criticise them for turning to worshipping the creatures rather than the creator. Edited by Buzsaw, : provide link

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BUZSAW B 4 U 2 C Y BUZ SAW.
The immeasurable present eternally extends the infinite past and infinitely consumes the eternal future.

No you asserted that.

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soon I discovered that this rock thing was true
Jerry Lee Lewis was the devil
Jesus was an architect previous to his career as a prophet
All of a sudden i found myself in love with the world
And so there was only one thing I could do
Was ding a ding dang my dang along ling long - Jesus Built my Hotrod Ministry
Live every week like it's Shark Week! - Tracey Jordan
Just a monkey in a long line of kings. - Matthew Good
If "elitist" just means "not the dumbest motherfucker in the room", I'll be an elitist! - Get Your War On
*not an actual doctor

Hi Buz,I think that the flaw with this line of thinking is that it leaves us with a problem of interpretation. But does this really prove that those religions are true? They certainly can't all be true. In fact they are wildly different to each other. Trying to say that they all support the same God seems bizarre. Wouldn't it be just as reasonable to suggest that the real reason for the ubiquity of religion is the human propensity toward superstitious explanations for any inexplicable phenomena?Even if we do accept that humans worldwide have experienced the supernatural, why would we automatically assume that this proves God? Might it not just as easily prove the existence of ancestor spirits or djinn? The same goes for any argument from design based on nature. As ID'ists love to point out, the designer might not necessarily be God. It could be aliens, extra-dimensional beings or pixies.Stories about miracles don't prove god. They only prove that we like telling stories.

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Mutate and Survive

Blatant misrepresentations caused by the inability to refute. It is really a bad idea to misrepresent because, like I said, it indicates and corroborates the inability to address and refute. Maybe this is why you did not address each line and point in message 68. Could we expect Atheists to say or believe anything else?The observation of design and organized complexity seen in nature and organisims logically corresponds to the work of an invisible Designer or Creator; and the same refutes the claim of the OP.This is why you misrepresent and ignore.But, of course, evolutionists insist that the observation of gradations infers evolution and the same is evidence unlike the observation of design.Again, Message 68 stands as refuting the OP. EvC member Buzsaw has also buttressed the refutation with his contributions which have gone unanswered and ignored.Final thought....There is no evidence supporting evolution - none. This is why over half of all adults in the U.S. are Creationists. There is plenty of evidence for evolution if one first presupposes that the presuppositions of Materialism are true. Since all Atheists support evolution the interpretation of evidence in favor of evolution or material causation is predetermined.Ray

Darwin himself established this fact. Do I need to post the reference?Ray

Like the miraculous story of apes mophing into men over millions of years? Are we to believe that you cannot tell that this claim is bullshit which Atheists MUST believe?RayEdited by Cold Foreign Object, : No reason given.

Since Buzsaw didn't reference Darwin it would be nice if you did provide the reference - then it would not longer be an assertion.

Certainly, I've never heard of a culture that doesn't have some kind of religious beliefs. But one problem with your view that they are independently doing this in relation to some kind of supernatural reality or truth is that they come up with very different religions, and very different Gods. The beliefs contradict one another, and often very directly.So, we know of animism, ancestor worship, polytheism, monotheism, and even cultures that view their chiefs, Kings or Emperors as living Gods. And the Gods in the polytheistic and monotheistic religions are many and varied. Collectively, it looks like people inventing stuff.Another problem for the Buzsaw/Ray hypothesis is the invention of supernatural ideas in many different cultures which we now actually know to be wrong. The idea that diseases are caused by evil spirits is one that crops up all over the place, and we now know these "spirits" are actually living organisms and viruses.That kind of knocks on the head your ideas that because many different cultures come up with supernatural explanations of things means there's any truth underlying them.As they're all wrong about the evil disease spirits, why assume there's some underlying truth in all the conflicting views of Gods or God, and all the contradictory religions and creation mythologies?

I apologize for being so far behind on this: it's been a very busy week. You speak of nature building things and having a certain set of tools to work with (post 36). You ignore that each organism is, essentially, building itself in natural selection theory. You should probably read some evolutionary materials if you weren't aware of this. This is called sexual selection (by some, it's subsumed under natural selection). Male deer in rut, bull elephants in musth, etc. spar with each other under the influence of hormones, and the one who wins gets the girl. You don't win by thinking or being creative: you win by mindlessly doing whatever the female thinks is sexy: intimidating your opponent, kicking their butt, etc (which is accomplished with help from adrenaline and testosterone).What do you think links all the animals' mating seasons for mass spawnings; leads them to congregrate, lek, spar, rut or gather harems; and causes human sex drive? Here's a hint: it's not synapses.Under these observations, I submit that emotions are not evidence for the existence of God. However, this only touches on negative emotions so far. Positive emotions, however, are explained by this (pretty dang good) insight in your post: Ants seem to cooperate with each other because the queen is the mother of all the ants in the colony, and she secretes pheromones that prevent the other females from developing their gonads. Becaused of ant's XX-XO system of sex determination, the queen produces offspring that are more closely related to each other than to her, so it's beneficial for the propagation of the workers' genes to help the queen. Also, she's their only chance for passing on their genes.Wolves eat better when they hunt in packs than if they hunt alone.White blood cells get all their food and nourishment from the bloodstream that they police and protect.Everything else with cooperative behavior receives benefits from the behaviors. At least, everything we've attempted to study up until point. Maybe you'll find an exception in the stuff we haven't yet looked at. So far though, science hasn't found true altruism. Even in humans: would you do anything nice for other people if it didn't feel good to do it? Anyone who says yes is an ignorant and/or lying jackass.A lot of our "positive" emotions can be explained by the social behavior of our common ancestors. So, emotions are not necessarily evidence of God.In fact, I would argue the opposite: intelligence is better evidence for God than emotion. Of all species on earth, only in humans can the nerd in school actually grow up to be the bully's boss. Everywhere else, the nerd gets bullied to death, or at least, out of the gene pool. But, because I'm a human, I have a wife and a son. Abstract intelligence is also harder to explain by natural selection (although it's not impossible, mind you). Remember, CTD, I am a Christian, and I believe in God. I just believe in a laissez-faire God who generally lets nature run its course. I don't believe there's a real rational way to "know" God exists. All the back-and-forth reasoning of the good and bad aspects of life isn't going to discern a God like the one I believe in.

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Signed,
Nobody Important (just Bluejay)

Please do. I would very much like to see the scientific research Darwin did to establish the fact that all cultures throughout human history have been religous. Can you provide me with a the exact number of culures that Darwin studied? it of course goes without saying that failure to provide this number = inability to refute.

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soon I discovered that this rock thing was true
Jerry Lee Lewis was the devil
Jesus was an architect previous to his career as a prophet
All of a sudden i found myself in love with the world
And so there was only one thing I could do
Was ding a ding dang my dang along ling long - Jesus Built my Hotrod Ministry
Live every week like it's Shark Week! - Tracey Jordan
Just a monkey in a long line of kings. - Matthew Good
If "elitist" just means "not the dumbest motherfucker in the room", I'll be an elitist! - Get Your War On
*not an actual doctor

And they also established the facts that the earth is flat and that the stars, moon, and sun move around the earth.I don't think the OP is really concerned about whether it is possible to come to incorrect conclusions about the world; I think Percy's main question really has to do with how we can infer God exists and have some confidence (beyond batshit insanity) that the conclusions are true.

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...Onward to Victory is the last great illusion the Republican Party has left to sell in this country, even to its own followers. They can't sell fiscal responsibility, they can't sell "values," they can't sell competence, they can't sell small government, they can't even sell the economy. -- Matt Taibbi