Agnosticism vs. Atheism

Mr Jack, Let's have that positive evidence, then. I'm not interested in you being able to falsify peoples notions of what a god is like, but to falsify the entity itself.Mark

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That's what I think too.------------------
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Sorry, mark24 but I consider that playing games. Gods are what are worshiped, revered or acknowledged by religous types. The non-existence of god is shown by the falsification of their notions of god. Which one of my evidences do you disagree with? Who's god-notion haven't I covered?

Mr Jack, It is not playing games. Even if you could falsify the characters these people associate with their Gods, you have provided no positive evidence whatsoever that god/s don't exist, be they the same or different. You haven't covered the notion that god is an entity utterly unkown & unrevealed to man.Gods existences are not falsified by falsifying characters that are not factually & definately a part of that gods character, a christians say so isn't fact. You could reasonably not believe in a god for this reason, but it presents no positive evidence with which to falsify.Mark------------------
"I can't prove creationism, but they can't prove evolution. It is [also] a religion, so it should not be taught....Christians took over the school board and voted in creationism. That can be done in any school district anywhere, and it ought to be done." Says Kent "consistent" Hovind in "Unmasking the False Religion of Evolution Chapter 6."

Mark24, A god that is unknown and unrevelaed to man isn't a god. Gods are what religions are based around, nothing else.Even ignoring this, a god that is entirely unknown and unrevealed is a zero-hypothesis with no predictions or properties. Therefore it doesn't exist. Just as the invisible bunny rabbit watching me right now doesn't exist.Also, I'm unclear as to what you mean by positive evidence, please explain? As far as I am aware, evidence is either for, against or neutral with respect to something positive/negative doesn't come into it.

Mr Jack, It is if it created the universe. Quite agree, but they could all be wrong and there still be a god. Who said it didn't have properties? They are just unknown to you.And wrong, it would be a non-sequitur, it is quite incorrect to come to a conclusion of non-existence, you are basically affirming the consequent which is of the form, if A then B, B therefore A. If god doesn't exist there would be no evidence, there is no evidence, & therefore god doesn't exist. But the invisible incorporeal one might. Positive evidence is exactly the same as used by science. It is an observation of something, not nothing.Mark------------------
"I can't prove creationism, but they can't prove evolution. It is [also] a religion, so it should not be taught....Christians took over the school board and voted in creationism. That can be done in any school district anywhere, and it ought to be done." Says Kent "consistent" Hovind in "Unmasking the False Religion of Evolution Chapter 6."[This message has been edited by mark24, 09-24-2003]

Well, religions across the world have worked very hard to explain to people what kind of god they worship, so I just take them at their word. I assume that, given thousands of years of religious experience, humans have more or less identified most of the gods that are worth believing in. Every single one of those is falsifiable from the lack of evidence that we would expect from them.I grant that I cannot falsify a god who takes no action. But even as an atheist I feel no need to, because it doesn't matter if such a god exists or not. It's very inaction is tantamount to non-existence, in any practical sense. Yes, and if I falsify one quality of the god they're talking about, then I falsify their god. If they believe in a god with certain qualities, and the god that exists has different ones, then the god they believe in doesn't exist. It's not a falsification of all gods but it is a falsification of their god.If I falsify all gods worth believing in - the ones that act in this world - then all that's left are the potential gods that never act, and they're as good as non-existent anyway, by definition. A god? Or all gods? One particular definition of god, or all definitions of god? Like I've said, I can do the former, but not the latter.

Crashfrog, Or that has taken action that you cannot detect.You can falsify all the human myths you like, & you still haven't falsified God. It does matter if it created the universe, or universes, even. You simply would not exist without it.Mark------------------
"I can't prove creationism, but they can't prove evolution. It is [also] a religion, so it should not be taught....Christians took over the school board and voted in creationism. That can be done in any school district anywhere, and it ought to be done." Says Kent "consistent" Hovind in "Unmasking the False Religion of Evolution Chapter 6."

How would you know? To know that, you'd have to know that universes don't just get created - that there has to be a god to create them.Wouldn't that put you in the position of having to have evidence that universes that aren't created by gods don't exist? And wouldn't that put you in the position of having to have evidence of non-existence? Which, you seem to argue, is impossible?

After 6 or so pages it seems the discussion has gone back to a point made in post 3... It can be said that certain gods don't exist, however it can't be said that all gods don't exist.So non-theists seem to fall into two groups: "don't know", and "don't care".mark (and i) would fall under the first group... we don't want to make an assertion either way for the gods that haven't been though of...while crashfrog goes in the second group... he just doesn't care about gods that have no impact on our life. It seems like he agrees that we can't know, but knowledge either way just simply doesn't matter.

You're either missing what I'm saying, or not agreeing with it. I'm not sure which. I maintain "if it isn't worshipped by humans as a god, it isn't a god. It's just some new made up thing like the invisible incorpreal bunny". In other words, I don't consider your unknown and unrevealed entity to be a god. No. I'm saying if god exists there would be evidence, there is no evidence, therefore no god. I'm also saying that anything that has no possible evidence doesn't exist. There Is A Real World. It Corresponds To Our Senses. That is a statement of faith, and it's one I hold. Under those conditions the bunny does not exist. You'll notice however that there is nothing about that statement that requires the non-existence of god. You can only get positive evidence of things that exist. To ask for positive evidence against something doesn't make sense.

Jack, Let me qualify, I think everyone would agree that an entity that created the universe is a god, whether humans presume to know about it is neither here nor there. BUT,even if they did, falsifying one aspect of someones "god" doesn't falsify the whole, in the same way falsifying PE only falsifies PE, not the entire theory of evolution. This is denying the antecedent; If A then B Not A Therefore, Not B. God is supposed to be benevolent to it's followers, clearly he isn't therefore he doesn't exist. PE is a part of evolution, there is no evidence of PE, therefore evolution is false. And I'm telling you, as a point of FACT that an argument of this form is flawed; affirming the consequent; if A then B, B therefore A. If god doesn't exist there would be no evidence, there is no evidence, & therefore god doesn't exist. You've flipped the argument from evidence of non-something to evidence of something. In context your challenge would be to provide evidence that the bunny doesn't exist. So what positive evidence of giant squids was there before there we knew they never existed? By your argument giant squids didn't exist, then they did.It is entirely possible something exists & that you have no evidence for it, this is why affirming the consequent is a flaw. But this still misses the point, in order to gain knowledge of somethings non-existence you have to have evidence that it doesn't exist, put another way, to make a positive assertion you need positive evidence, thus far I have seen nothing but logical flaws. I don't write the rules on logic, Jack, but I do try to stay consistent with it.I maintain it is impossible to falsify the existence of god/s.Mark------------------
"I can't prove creationism, but they can't prove evolution. It is [also] a religion, so it should not be taught....Christians took over the school board and voted in creationism. That can be done in any school district anywhere, and it ought to be done." Says Kent "consistent" Hovind in "Unmasking the False Religion of Evolution Chapter 6."

I think Mr Jack's argument is more along the lines of :- if A then B, not B therefore not A.His argument is similar to the one we all use when arguing against a global flood. We know that a global flood would leave evidence, given that this evidence isn't evident we conclude the there was no global flood.------------------
He hoped and prayed that there wasn't an afterlife. Then he realized there was a contradiction involved here and merely hoped that there wasn't an afterlife.
- Douglas Adams, The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy

I do not accept your nameless creator thingy as a god. Even if it were, it will be rendered redundant when we explain the creation of the universe. You'll note that although I claim knowledge of the non-existence of god is possible, I do not yet claim we have certainity on this point. I am not denything antecedent. I'm using logic of the following formA => B, !B therfore !A.This is a valid form.Of course merely arguing for the invalidity of one part of one god doesn't disprove the whole of all gods, that's why I presented a range of arguments. You are mis-stating my argument again. I'm not saying !god => !evidence, !evidence therefore !god, I'm saying god => evidence, !evidence therefore !god. There is a fundemental difference in the two arguments. Your bunny has no possible evidence. Therefore it doesn't exist. Where did you get that from? Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. I've never claimed it was.