Existence of God

Atheists don't say that they know for sure that there's no god. What we are sure about is that there's no evidence for god.Draw your own conclusions. To me one conclusion seems obvious, though I grant that conclusion is not totally supported by the premise. Nonetheless it's relatively easy to divide all concepts of god into two categories: 1) those that are contradictory to observation and 2) those that never intervene in the universe. The first kind obviously don't exist. The second kind it wouldn't matter if they did.

Is that what you were basing it on when you made this appeal to numbers:

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Think for a second, will you... do you HONESTLY believe that if the Bible did, in fact, have "many contradictions" that countless millions of people throughout history - including some of our smartest people ever such as Isaac Newton - would have remained believers in the Bible until they died? Would that make any sense?

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Kind of disingenuous to make an appeal to numbers and then criticize somebody else for countering with the same, don't you think?Honestly Joralex it's like you forget what you've said each time you make a new post.

I couldn't have said it better myself. Since intelligent intervention has not been able to create life with the "countless attempts" you speak of, it's reasonable to assume that intelligent intervention was not able to do it in the past. Your evidence makes it pretty clear - life was not created by intelligence.On the other hand we've seen time and again how systems employing natural selection + random mutation can give rise to significantly better designs that intelligence, including designs of great emergent complexity and behavior. So it's reasonable to assume that NS + RM are sufficient to produce life, or something life-like. The wonder is why you can't seem to see that if you're the only one who sees the design, then it's likely that it's just in your head. Design is not a part of objects. It's not a physical phenomenon. It's a quality we ascribe to objects. What's the purpose of a screwdriver in a world without screws?The only way a designer can be "inferred" is by directly observing the designer. You can't infer a designer from an object you believe to have been designed, because objects can be created without design. There's no difference between an object that was designed and one that wasn't.Design may be the most obvious inference to you, but it's certainly not a logical one. Therefore it must be rejected by the logical mind.

Yes, it makes sense. It makes sense in the same way that intelligent Christians say "I don't have to believe the Bible is literally true in every regard to view it as a book that contains God-breathed inspiration on how to live my life." Makes perfect sense to me. Maybe not you to, but then, Issac Newton was way smarter than you. Maybe he has faculties of reasoning that are not avaliable to you?In fact maybe you could explain to me the sense in subsituting your own incredulity for Issac Newton's intelligence? After all I don't see you inventing calculus.

Your God has failed all tests I've put to it. Just like the others. And remember, I made these tests when I was still a Christian, like you, and still believed. So you can hardly say I found what I was looking for. I found the opposite of what I was looking for, in fact.

Simply applying the logic you tend to use. Pretty silly, isn't it? Uh-huh.Tell ya what. I'll throw a handful of pennies on the ground. Then I'll take the same number of pennies and lay them out, piece by piece, in the same manner as the first one.One of these piles is naturally random. The other is designed. Maybe you can explain to me how you'd tell the difference? Since according to you there is one? While you're at it why don't explain to me why you don't assume somebody dropped a lever each time you find a stick next to a round stone. That's your best rebuttal? Please. Why would they be? As I said you can't infer design without the presence of designers. For things of human design, we're surrounded by human designers. Or don't they have humans where you live?There's a big difference, of course, between natural intelligences, like humans or potential aliens, and your supernatural god. We know that natural intelligence exists. That means nothing in reference to the possibility of supernatural intelligence. Says the guy promoting the 4000-year-old fairy tale.

Whoah, wait a minute. You said "all tests." I pointed out that he failed mine.Now, if you're going to characterize "pass and fail" on his terms, rather than my terms, well, then I reserve the right to do the same thing on my next driving test. I failed. Guess what? I never claimed I could pass all tests. You did, however, claim God could. I provided a counterexample, so you're wrong.However I expect you'll figure out a way to special plead for god. I'm beginning to see what you mean about your "invincible ignorance".

Ah, so it's a God of the Gaps theory. Hardly resilient in the face of advancing knowledge, don't you think? Because those fields don't attempt to infer the existence of deisgners from objects, as they don't have to. The existence of humans can be directly established. Once you have the existence of humans known, you can infer their presence from their artifacts.You're attempting to skip that first step. Before you can infer the presence of God from what you see as his design, you have to infer his existence. That can't be done from objects.This is a subtle distinction, and one I expect you'll totally miss. Let the ad hominem ensue.

Let's turn it around - would the notions of general and special relativity EVER have been proposed if it weren't for an intractable difference between the predictions of Newtonian physics and actual observation of celesital objects?Since the answer is probably "no", can we assume therefore that you reject all modern physics in favor of the "invisible angels" theory? If not, why not? Why do you give physics a pass on refining their models through change, and not evolution? Is it because evolution uniquely challenges your personal faith? If so, how is that evolution's problem?You seem insistent on condemning only evolution for acting just like science - revising theory in the light of new observation. So which is it? Does science change in the light of new data, or is it supposed to remain static and dogmatic, like your religion?

Evolution is retained because the "discrepancies" you refer to were not sufficient to falsify the theory. Just as relativistic effects were not sufficient to falsify kinetics, only to stimulate a revision.Can you explain to me the difference between expanding kinetics with the theory of relativity and expanding evolution with the hypothesis of punctuated equilibrium? Says you. On the other hand, we've already explained what conditions could falsify the theory of evolution, and none of these have been met. Clearly you need to examine the difference between a theory that isn't falsifiable, and one that just isn't false. The theory of evolution can't be made to explain all possible observations. It simply explains all the observations we've made so far. Not so - I'm comparing oranges to oranges and wondering why you see a difference. Science is science.

Why is this a problem? There's no information in biological systems.

I think we're all curious, Joralex, of what method you feel leads to truth, besides the asking of questions. Maybe the reason we keep asking you questions is because your answers are so lame? Your perception is in error. The evidence of this is that you tend to bust out this tired "oh, too many questions!" objection after only about three questions. All of them.If you don't mind me pointing out, you've made it clear that the reason you hang out here is not to engage us in conversation, but to act as a guide to those who are seeking truth, or something. Leaving off for a moment the question of whether or not your position is true, don't you think you're setting a bad example by avoiding query? Don't you think a person would look at your behavior and think "Hrm, Joralex seems to have a faith that can't stand up to question." Do you really think an honest seeker of truth is going to be impressed by that?[This message has been edited by crashfrog, 10-29-2003]

I would think this would be obvious.You're asking "of what use would the nerves running to the eye and the brain that analyzes the data be without the eye in the first place"? I would assume that the utility of nerves and brains, even without eyes attached to them, would be obvious to the most casual observer. Same with behaviors in response to sensory input. Ergo it's reasonable to conclude that nerves and brains and behavior predate eyes. There's no need for them to arise simultaneously.Why do you think this constitutes a meaningful challenge to evolution?