Bailey
If something exists before our understanding of it evolves into a science, the items existence, or truth, is not somehow nullified
Of course it is not. However, the existence of something that we have no evidence for or cannot be given properties that we choose to assign it
before we discover that something.
We can reason about the existence of things we cannot see , however, in order to assign any level of certainty{ and science cannot have 100% certainty} to a thing we must first be able to test that thing to see if it exists.
Your denial in God, if that is the case, will not somehow cause Him to desist existence if He indeed exists. In this instance, your belief need not be true or even verifiable to be rational to you, correct?
Incorrect. As an atheist I do not deny the existence of God I simply ask for evidence of the claims made by others for God. Without fail the evidence is non existent. The only thing that they manage to come up with is "what if" stories as though this were sufficient for any thinking person beyond the age of six.
Barring evidence { I am big on that as it helps in the credibility arena} we cannot say there is a God much less what the properties of that God are ,most especially given the propensity of humans to clothe their agendas beneath the blankets of religion.
I am not certain there is no God. I am quite certain that the God contained in "holy books" is so pitifully inadequate to the task of being a creator for the level of subtlety and beauty that is found in the universe that I pay it no mind.
Since rationality and validity requires evidence{ which is verifiable}then I would say that truth demands such first and foremost.
If things we know exist continue to elude our whole understanding, like the greater percentage of our 3 lb. brain that we cannot rationally assign function to,
I see you are among the 10% of a brain myth adherent. Sorry to bust the bubble old man but we use 100% of our grey matter just not 100% of it 100% of the time.
or the concept of love for instance,
Ok then. What is love and how do you conceive it? Should we view it as a feeling related to sexual overtones? That would fail to explain the love we have for our children. Is it the depth of feeling we develop over time for another then why do we sometimes feel love quickly for relative strangers? or is that something else?
Or is it along the lines of the combat soldier who's lives are in the hands of friends under the most brutal and lonely conditions humans can set themselves to as demonstrated by WW1 second lieutenant Wilfred Owen in these verses From
Apologia Pro Poemate Meo
I have made fellowships ”
Untold of happy lovers in old song.
For love is not the binding of fair lips
With the soft silk of eyes that look and long,
By Joy, whose ribbon slips, ”
But wound with war's hard wire whose stakes are strong;
Bound with the bandage of the arm that drips;
Knit in the welding of the rifle-thong.
The difficulty probably does not lie with love itself but how we should define love in the first place.
why should we reasonably deny the incomprehensible rationale of any truth, theistic or otherwise.
Let us see. Hmmm..., because
incomprehensibility cannot be rationalized? {I have to refrain from the added Homer Simpson expletive here}
With this mindset we'd have to deny the rationale of anything we cannot comprehend.
Do you comprehend the structure of atoms? Something that is mostly empty space can form a seemingly hard surface or that the atoms that make up your body today are not the ones you were born with? We all know that as we sit in a chair that gravity is pulling down on us yet few realize that the laws of nature explain that the chair we are sitting in pushes back with an equal force in the opposite direction. Is it rational to deny the existence of atoms?
Do you comprehend that on a day with no wind that the molecules in the air about you have an average velocity of 700 miles per hour? Is it rational to deny the existence of air if you do not?
could it be we need not because we have evidence for these phenomena without fully understanding these subtleties?
Denying the reasoning of something you cannot fully comprehend simply causes mental atrophy and scientific sloth
Denying does questioning does not.
The properties of electromagnetism did not function as a result of our comprehension of them. Denying the theory, or Law, of gravity before it was understood didn’t cause objects to float away.
Of course they did not since we can access{concentrate now}
EVIDENCE! for the phenomena which we cannot do for God and that is the point. Why did you consistently ignore this?
Someone’s family member, let’s say their son, is in dire need of a kidney transplant. Is it irrational for the father, or someone in the family, to sacrifice a kidney to the son in order that he may not die. The donor, or father, survives, and provision is made to allow the son to live. This scenario is realistic, similar incidents occur everyday.
Suppose all of mankind needs a sacrifice to experience a non corporeal existence; that is, survive. Is it irrational for God to provide His Son as a sacrifice for many, providing the Son, or donor, survives along with mankind. Can anyone prove the Deity of Elohim . or Immanuel. Can anyone verify the sacrifice is needed. We can’t even support the truth of any non corporeal being’s existence.
Bailey writes:
The rational remains the same even between these instances. Whether out of love or necessity a sacrifice is to be made by one in order that another may remain in existence. I’m curious whether you agree the rationale between the tangible scenario and the hypothetical scenario are equivocal.
The rationale of the first can be debated because we are dealing with a factual {if hypothetical} situation. The latter,though, assumes things {God} A prori to the hypothetical situation {also A priori assumptions} neither of which are rational since there are no compelling reasons to hold them in the first place. Again we lack the key in all of this which I emphasized once before and shall do again.
EVIDENCE!
If this is the case, in terms of God and His Son, our rational would play no part in its truth. They, too, may or may not exist, separately from one another.
As Feynman once said
"They do not appreciate that the problem is not to demonstrate whether it's possible or not, but whether it's going on or not."
Again in matters such as the existence of God we must have evidence. Why is this concept so difficult to you?
It is quite easy to contemplate the rational of something before it is proved, theistically or otherwise.
Of course it is. However when there is no evidence for the rationale it ceases to be rational. Theism consistently fails to provide evidence. Have we got that word down pat yet?
Bailey writes:
What can mere humans, w/ our limited 3 lb. mass of brain, truly understand about a being who may be timeless, higher dimensional, and all knowing?
sidelined writes:
A being who may be timeless, higher dimensional, and all knowing? This is a question devoid of content. It is only rational to postulate such questions after the establishment of the existence of such a being...Let us rephrase the question with the same level of rationality and you should see what I mean.What can mere humans, w/ our limited 3 lb. mass of brain, truly understand about a jar of coagulated jello who may be beaming love throughout the universe?
Bailey writes:
Again this may not be as difficult as you presume.
Technically, all we would have to do is prove that this “being” cannot be proved false, thereby providing an axiom by which all of our theory may be premised.
But that is the point Bailey. Please prove false to us the existence of either 1} a being who may be timeless, higher dimensional, and all knowing
or
2}a jar of coagulated jello who may be beaming love throughout the universe.
I can't disprove God
Nor can I. However the fact that drills the deepest into the problem is that we cannot evidence God at all. This does not mean that God does not exist. It does however support the other possibility of there being no God at all.Go figure.
What can we, with a finite capacity for learning and acquiring knowledge, understand about something that may or may not exist?
We can know nothing and that is the point. Until we can evidence the concept we cannot say at all. The default position is that there is no God up until there is evidence otherwise.
What can become of an unsubstantiated postulation; a measure to achieve greater ends.
LOL. Only if we make a measurement Bailey. That is why the root word in unsubstantiated is substance.
Let’s go back in time. Suppose we are studying together the behavior and relation between electric and magnetic fields. We determine a medium, permeating all space, must exist by which the propagation of light can be rectified. Though we rely on this medium to form our hypothesis, it proves to be undetectable by any mechanical means so far. Though we are exhausted from hours of testing and formulating theories in regard to this matter, with this postulation the agreement of the results seems to show that light and magnetism are affections of the same substance, and that light is an electromagnetic disturbance propagated through the field according to electromagnetic laws. What can mere humans, w/ our limited 3 lb. mass of brain, truly understand about a luminiferous aether by which, without, the existence of waves of oscillating electric and magnetic fields cannot travel through empty space? Today the aether is regarded as a superseded scientific theory. Over time, the existence of such a medium, permeating all space and yet apparently undetectable by mechanical means, proved more and more difficult to reconcile with experiments. Moreover, it seemed to require an absolute frame of reference in which the equations were valid, with the distasteful result that the equations changed form for a moving observer. These difficulties inspired Albert Einstein to formulate the theory of special relativity, and in the process Einstein dispensed with the requirement of a luminiferous aether.
Even though it ultimately proved inefficient, and even false, it aided in the formulation of the quantitative connection between light and electromagnetism, considered one of the great triumphs of 19th century physics.
But it did so on the basis of experiments that provided that wonderful thing we call
EVIDENCE
Whether we deduce a logical construct of what this “superior being's” characteristics may contain or institute it as an axiom for deducing and applying inference to other (theory dependent) truths, it serves as a starting point by which we may eventually derive worthwhile speculation, potentially on numerous levels.
You are putting the cart before the horse though Bailey. We assume the existence of something before we even get consensus as to what that thing make be. However if you have evidence that even implies God then go for it.
Edited by sidelined, : No reason given.
"The tragedy of life is not so much what men suffer, but rather what they miss."
Thomas Carlyle
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