I Know That God Does Not Exist

No, it doesn't.
People still debate that a world-wide flood occurred 4000 years ago.
But the idea that a world-wide flood occurred 4000 years ago is no longer in contention.No amount of "argument" changes this fact.
The only thing that will change it is evidence. Then, if God is real, you will be able to show me "God things" as much as you can show me "three things."
If you can't do that... then God remains "only in our imagination." Which is what my claim is. This is exactly what I'm claiming God is: nothing more than an idea in our imagination. I have room for possibilities too.
But... irrational possibilities do not get in the way of rational conclusions.I can rationally say: I know Santa Claus does not exist.
I can rationally say: I know God does not exist.What's the difference? I fully support irrational searches for God (or anything else.)
Just let me know when you find something.I don't let irrational searches for Santa stop me from saying "I know Santa Claus does not exist."
I don't let irrational searches for 4000-year-old-world-wide-floods stop me from saying "I know that 4000-year-old-world-wide-floods do not exist."
I don't let irrational searches for God stop me from saying "I know that God does not exist."What's the difference? That's flipping the context of "know" into absolutes.
And such a thing is incorporated in things we "know."I am saying: Based on the information available to us, the tentative conclusion is - I know that God does not exist.
But "based on the information available to us" and "tentative conclusion" are inherent in all modern knowledge. Therefore they are redundant and can be removed:I know that God does not exist.

It's tempting for the teacher to say, "You failed to learn," when he should be saying, "I failed to teach." Different stage in the investigation. Non sequitur. But I did - the Northwest Passage. I stand by it, whether you like it or not. You're a Northwest Passage denier in a different era. It is not rational to impose expectations before the search is finished. There is no difference. It's just a different stage in the investigation. Every investigation begins with "no previous experience".

Exactly!Once God hits the same stage in the investigation as water-passages - let me know.
I'll change my position immediately.Until then - the conclusion stands. Not true.
If this was true - we go back to not being able to know you can bake a cake.
We haven't searched all the places you could bake cakes in.
Perhaps one of those - we will identify that you actually can't bake cakes and we just thought you could earlier.Different stage of the investigation.The truth is: it is entirely rational to impose expectations before the search is finished - as long as those expectations are based on previously validated experience. Let me know when the irrational search for God hits the stage when we can rationally consider His existence.
That's when we find a rational connection between the imagination of God and reality.
When you get that - I'll stop saying "I know that God doesn't exist."Until then... it continues.
As much as we can say we know ringo can bake cakes.

It's what I said. What you said was out of context. We did though. We had thunder and lightning, for example. Those were dead ends but there's no reason to conclude that all ends are dead. That's some pretty strange mathematics. Me + Tangle + ~1.6 ≠ 1(Apologies to anybody I left out.)

Yes there is: Things that only exist in our imagination will never exist in reality: all their ends will be dead.
Our currently available information shows us that God only exists in our imagination.
Therefore, according to our currently available information - it's reasonable for us to conclude that all the ends for God-actually-existing will be dead.Therefore: I know that God does not exist.Edited by Stile, : heh... "ever" should be "never"

You'll go from "knowing" one thing to "knowing" the opposite overnight. We can't afford to take seriously what you think you "know". I say I know how to bake a cake and I demonstrate that I can bake a cake. Then you say, "But you can't bake a cake while standing on one foot on the summit of Mount Everest." I never said I knew that. You're moving the goalposts.I only need to bake one cake to demonstrate that I know how to bake a cake.

We don't know that they exist only in our imagination until we look.

Such is the issue with "knowing" anything.
Even knowing ringo can bake cakes.
If we find, one day, that ringo actually cannot bake cakes, and we only thought he could before - we will go from "knowing" one thing to "knowing" the opposite overnight.We can't afford to take seriously that you think you "know" you can bake a cake? In one place at one time - yes.
Just like I can demonstrate that God does not exist at one place at one time. That's not true: what I said was:

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We haven't searched all the places you could bake cakes in.
Perhaps one of those - we will identify that you actually can't bake cakes and we just thought you could earlier.

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Just like what you're implying about finding God.I'm actually keeping the two analogies the same - you're the one attempting to put words in my mouth in order to say I'm 'moving goalposts.' Not true - according to you.
YOU'RE the one saying the search isn't done yet - and that we're only at "different stages" of the search.If the search is over for you baking cakes - and you don't have to consider possibly finding out that you were wrong and you actually can't bake cakes...Then the search is also over for not finding God - and I don't have to consider possibly finding out that I was wrong and I actually will find God...There's no rational reason to think we'll ever identify that you can't bake cakes.
Just as there's no rational reason to think we'll ever identify that God actually exists.

How can I go from making a cake one day to not having made it the next day? You are moving the goalposts. You're changing from "I can bake a cake" to where I can bake a cake. If I demonstrate that I can bake a cake, that event can not un-happen. We can not un-find the Northwest Passage. If we find God, we can not un-find Him. It's a one-way street.Edited by ringo, : No reason given.

Because you only thought you did - you didn't actually do it.
You learned later that what you've been doing all this time is not "baking a cake." Nope.
I'm changing from "you know you can bake a cake" to "you know you can't bake a cake" upon learning at future date that you were simply wrong on what you thought "baking a cake" actually was. True - but you can be wrong about what you think "baking a cake" is and what it actually is. We could find evidence that suggests we should find God somewhere - then I can no longer say "I know that God does not exist."
Then we could find more evidence that shows this was wrong - and we still have nothing to say God actually exists - then I can say "I know that God does not exist" again.
Then we could actually find God - and I can no longer say "I know that God does not exist."
Then we could find out we didn't actually find God - we only thought we did, but we were wrong - and we still have nothing to say God actually exists - then I can say "I know that God does not exist again."This is how knowledge works.
Or, at least, it has since the Dark Ages.Knowledge is based on forming tentative rational conclusions from the information available to us.What use are the words "tentative" or "...information available to us" if you demand for our knowledge to never change? If you expect "knowledge" to never change, then you are expecting knowledge to be absolute - and that is Dark-Ages thinking of what "knowledge" is. Edited by Stile, : No reason given.

Are you saying no one has ever looked for God before and found nothing?Strange.

You have to want/need Him. You wont simply stumble upon Him as one stumbles upon an unknown rock in a field. Let me try another argument.(this one is for Stile also)Recently there have been many tragedies and many people killed in high profile tragedies around the world. This is ongoing, but the news media heightens the fear and anxiety and so we become aware of these all-too-real nightmares that other people experience. In times such as these, life often no longer makes sense. it becomes irrational. Trust itself becomes irrational. Many people turn to God. Whether God actually exists or whether God is a panacea in their mind, they equate belief in God with an unwaverable trust---out of desperation. They dont bother to examine whether or not God is good, or rational, or even proveable. They turn to prayers and they often find comfort.

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Deuteronomy 4:29
But if from there you will seek the LORD your God, you will find Him if you seek Him with all your heart and with all your soul.

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Critics claim that God should rationally be able to be found by anyone and everyone should He exist. But consider in context:

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1 Chronicles 28:9
As for you, Solomon my son, know the God of your father and serve Him wholeheartedly and with a willing mind, for the LORD searches every heart and understands the intention of every thought. If you seek Him, He will be found by you; but if you forsake Him, He will reject you forever.

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Jeremiah 24:7
I will give them a heart to know Me, that I am the LORD. They will be My people, and I will be their God, for they will return to Me with all their heart.

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If we are searching for this particular God found in these scriptures, it is evident that not just anyone can saunter into the holy of holies and have a conversation. The idea that everyone has an equal chance(opportunity) at finding God is not scriptural.

My point that I am attempting to get Stile to see is that God is not simply like any other thing that one looks for.Stile will protest and ask why we should think any differently about God than about anything else we look for.Note that he believes that he can find anything I can find without needing God to do so and that his mind can be as content as my mind except that his mind does not incorporate God while I believe that mine does. But how would we ever measure the difference?Getting back to victims of tragedies who seek God out of desperation and find an inner comfort:

We cannot prove that they actually find God. We can show that they do receive comfort.

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We don't often hear of people who seek God "with all their heart" and end up empty. You could claim that you found solace elsewhere...through a secular support group perhaps...but again, how could we measure what precisely it was that the group gave you? How do we know that "God" was not part of it?

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Chance as a real force is a myth. It has no basis in reality and no place in scientific inquiry. For science and philosophy to continue to advance in knowledge, chance must be demythologized once and for all. ~RC Sproul
"A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes." ~Mark Twain "
~"If that's not sufficient for you go soak your head."~Faith

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You can "get answers" by watching the ducks. That doesn't mean the answers are coming from them.~Ringo

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Subjectivism may very well undermine Christianity.
In the same way that "allowing people to choose what they want to be when they grow up" undermines communism.~Stile

I'm not saying that this is impossible.I'm saying there's no rational reason for us to suggest that such a being actually exists in reality.
Therefore, according to our current information analyzed in a rational manner: I know that God does not exist.Then, since "according to our current information analyzed in a rational manner" is inherent in our modern process of "knowing things" - this specification becomes redundant and can be removed.Therefore: I know that God does not exist. I have no problems with people "thinking differently" about God all the like.
I simply have a problem with people "thinking differently" and wanting this to apply to "rational knowledge."Rational knowledge has a framework.
Within that framework: I know that God does not exist.Outside that framework: I don't care (for this thread, anyway.)The thing is... people have traditionally thought of God as "outside this framework" for thousands of years.
They don't want to admit the obvious, unavoidable conclusion when God is placed "within" the framework of "how we know things in a modern sense."

And what about other universes? Do you know they do not exist?Hmmm.Do you believe we could be living in a holographic universe where the duality of waves and particles are reconciled by all of space and volume . We literally do not exist except as a reflection.If I told you there could be such tech, that the Matrix idea could actually be carried out given enough computing power. Could you tell me that is not the case? How would you know? Could some super intelligent aliens be having a laugh?If I told you that this reality you think you are living is like a DVD and every possible scenario that you think is happening has already been concluded which is why the wave function in the double slit experiment can collapses every time into the exact thing it does not based on a observer but because there are no alternative, no multiverse and no free will either. It is all a illusion. How do you know that is not correct.If I told you that the fundamental forces that manifest this universe are planke's size strings vibrating in 11 dimensions fulminating everything that exist.But mention a God and everybody gets ohhh that is to far fetched. lmao.