1. tinyurl.com/ywohm
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    28 Jun '07 23:06
    Originally posted by DoctorScribbles
    Anybody who cites any argument of Aquinas as being exemplary of valid reasoning ought to be embarrassed. His arguments are among the most frequently refuted in textbooks on elementary critical thinking. To cite Aquinas is like wearing a T-shirt to a debate that says "I don't have any idea what I'm talking about."

    You don't really think the cited argument is sound, do you?
    Isn't Aquinas the one who said that male fetuses get their souls before female ones?
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    28 Jun '07 23:08
    Originally posted by ahosyney
    [b]Right, but now you are moving from theism to religion which hasn't even got a srap of logic behind it.

    I believe that logic can't say that there is GOD as Quran say. If I can do that without Quran then there is no need for it.

    Logic can lead to only one thing:

    "There is some being that is the soure of this existance. And his existance is con ...[text shortened]... t reasons, power, money , sex, and may be I can say devil.

    Tell me if that is clear...[/b]
    'I believe that logic can't say that there is GOD as Quran say. If I can do that without Quran then there is no need for it.'

    Didn't quite understand the first part of that. Could you rephrase?

    Logic will say nothing of a being. You can't attribute even so much as awareness. Even then its existance would not necessarily be controlled by the laws of our existance as we know nothing of its existance. So far people have just made things up that can't be traced logically.


    As for God contacting us. Why so many religions? Are you saying they are all true? Thats not a belief I've come across before. I've heard other religions (i.e. non christian religions) be described as stepping stones to the one true religion, or alternative, but worse, paths that ultimatly must switch and come through Jesus. But I've never heard anyone say every religion is equally valid. And they can't be. Either God is telling different people conflicting things or all or some are wrong.

    When I say 'why ignore them' I mean why do you ignore prophets of other religions? They too claim to have been spoken to by God, why would any religious person consider them invalid?
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    28 Jun '07 23:13
    Originally posted by DoctorScribbles
    Let us then explore what exactly you think it asserts.

    Propositionally, it is of the form:

    For all x, where x is in the domain of "things," x has the property of "being caused".

    In order for the proposition to be true, it must first be meaningful, which means that the domain of "things" must be specified. What do you understand to be inclu ...[text shortened]... from the domain in question? That is, to what sort of stuff can the term "thing" refer?
    I think I see the problem in the Argument, but I will continue with you with my own thoughts because I don't know what assupmtion were made for the original argument.

    When I think about this premise I think about every thing I can see or know it exists.

    But I think I have to add that the cause is not part of the thing being cause.
  4. Standard memberDoctorScribbles
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    28 Jun '07 23:212 edits
    Originally posted by ahosyney


    When I think about this premise I think about every thing I can see or know it exists.
    Might the domain include God? That is, might you be able to see God or know that he exists?
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    28 Jun '07 23:42
    Originally posted by Jake Ellison
    'I believe that logic can't say that there is GOD as Quran say. If I can do that without Quran then there is no need for it.'

    Didn't quite understand the first part of that. Could you rephrase?

    Logic will say nothing of a being. You can't attribute even so much as awareness. Even then its existance would not necessarily be controlled by the laws o ...[text shortened]... to have been spoken to by God, why would any religious person consider them invalid?
    Didn't quite understand the first part of that. Could you rephrase?

    Quran tell us a lot of attributes about GOD, how did he created everything and why? What he wants from us, and so on,

    For example it tell me that his name is Allah, he knows everything, he is able to do anything, and many more.

    My phrase was to say that logic can't lead to all of that. It could only lead to some part of it. If I can do that with logic alone, there will be no need for any book or message.

    Logic will say nothing of a being.
    I mean my logic, which you might agree with or not. May be the word being is not accurate, but what I say it tell me that there is some sort of existance outside the universe, nothing more.

    You can't attribute even so much as awareness. Even then its existance would not necessarily be controlled by the laws of our existance as we know nothing of its existance. So far people have just made things up that can't be traced logically.

    I'm talking only about things that could be traced logically. If it doesn't logically flow then I will not accept the same way as you do.

    Why so many religions?
    Of course I will talk from an Islamic point of view..

    I believe that there is only one religion , because GOD is one, so if he has a message to tell us then it will be the same one forever.

    So there is only one religion that represent the message the GOD wants. All other religions are human made, and are a variation from the original religion.

    Are you saying they are all true?
    no, they can't be true, if there is only one GOD , there will be only one message.

    When I say 'why ignore them' I mean why do you ignore prophets of other religions?

    Who said we ignore other prophets. All Muslims in all the world believe in all known prophets, that we are sure they came from GOD. Many of them are named in Quran, and other not.

    I believe in Jesus, David,Mosses , Ezak, Jacob , and Ibraham.

    They too claim to have been spoken to by God, why would any religious person consider them invalid?

    To make the idea clear to you:

    GOD are contacting us from the begining through prophets.

    In old days communication between different regions on earth was diffecult. And different nations were formed in different places on earth.

    For every nation GOD sent a prophet telling them his message.

    The message for each nation contains two parts:
    1- Faith. That there is a GOD , only one, and we have to worship him. And that part never change, and is the same for every nation.
    2- Law. That control the relation between individuals in the community as GOD see the best. The basic components of this part are the same. There might be some differences from one nation to the other.

    Because of human nature, and because power, money or similar factors, people start to forget, modify , or ignore the message.

    Every time this happen, GOD sent another prophet to remind people with the message.

    When a new prophet comes, people reaction could be one of two:
    1- follow him and return to the original message.
    2- Ignore him and stick with their older modifed message wich is not from GOD.

    Given that this could happen in different places , so many religions are formed.

    You can see that clearly in the relation between the prophets Mohammed , Jesus and Mosses.

    If you check the original message of Mosses and Jesus and compare it to the message of prophet Mohammed you will find it the same.

    Faith is the same, GOD is one worship him

    Law: If you compare the law of mosses (or what remains from it) and the Islamic law you will find it almost the same (Jesus came with small modification to Mosses law , so he don't have a new law).

    ------
    I hope that I answered you questions.

    They too claim to have been spoken to by God, why would any religious person consider them invalid?
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    28 Jun '07 23:431 edit
    Originally posted by DoctorScribbles
    Might the domain include God? That is, might you be able to see God or know that he exists?
    I usually try to assume that there is no GOD when I do just reasoning, but because we are talking about this specific argument, and according to my faith and thoughts, no GOD can't be included into this domain.
  7. Standard memberDoctorScribbles
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    28 Jun '07 23:46
    Originally posted by ahosyney
    no GOD can't be included into this domain.
    So, you are saying that you cannot know that God exists, correct?
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    28 Jun '07 23:551 edit
    Originally posted by DoctorScribbles
    So, you are saying that you cannot know that God exists, correct?
    I think it is more accurate to say, when I think about the first premise, "I don't know that GOD exists"
  9. Standard memberNemesio
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    29 Jun '07 00:05
    Originally posted by ahosyney
    I think it is more accurate to say, when I think about the first premise, "I don't know that GOD exists"
    Then how is the proof any comfort?

    The proof was to conclude that God exists, but in spite of it you remain
    unsure.

    If the argument is compelling, it ought to be as firm as fact, like proving
    something in Geometry. You don't have 'faith' that the hypotenuse multiplied
    by itself is equal to the sum of the two other sides multiplied by themselves,
    you know it because you can prove it (or understand the proof).

    So, if after reading the premises and conclusions, you're still unsure,
    then the argument must not be very effective at doing its job.

    Nemesio
  10. Standard memberDoctorScribbles
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    29 Jun '07 00:06
    Originally posted by ahosyney
    I think it is more accurate to say, when I think about the first premise, "I don't know that GOD exists"
    OK, so the domain in question would also exclude things like particular planets in other galaxies that you do not know exist, correct?
  11. Standard memberDoctorScribbles
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    29 Jun '07 00:10
    Originally posted by Nemesio
    Then how is the proof any comfort?

    The proof was to conclude that God exists, but in spite of it you remain
    unsure.

    If the argument is compelling, it ought to be as firm as fact, like proving
    something in Geometry. You don't have 'faith' that the hypotenuse multiplied
    by itself is equal to the sum of the two other sides multiplied by themselves, ...[text shortened]... re still unsure,
    then the argument must not be very effective at doing its job.

    Nemesio
    That's exactly right. I was hoping that ahosney would give me shortcut and say that he cannot know that God exists, in which case it would follow immediately that the argument is unsound, since its conclusion claims that God exists, and it is not sensible to say that you cannot know that which is the conclusion of a sound argument.
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    29 Jun '07 00:10
    Originally posted by Nemesio
    Then how is the proof any comfort?

    The proof was to conclude that God exists, but in spite of it you remain
    unsure.

    If the argument is compelling, it ought to be as firm as fact, like proving
    something in Geometry. You don't have 'faith' that the hypotenuse multiplied
    by itself is equal to the sum of the two other sides multiplied by themselves, ...[text shortened]... re still unsure,
    then the argument must not be very effective at doing its job.

    Nemesio
    Yes the whole argument is to prove GOD existance but the first premise is not. It is just a base for the following ones in the argument, which might lead us to think that there might be a GOD.

    So I can't say when I talk about the first premise that I know GOD exist. It will jumping to conlusions.
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    29 Jun '07 00:144 edits
    Originally posted by DoctorScribbles
    OK, so the domain in question would also exclude things like particular planets in other galaxies that you do not know exist, correct?
    Although that I don't know that a particular planet exists, but as long as it is a planet, then the rules applied to known planets could be applied on it. In this case they will have a cause too.

    What we can execlude from the domain are those stuff that we don't have any sort of knowlage about them. I mean they don't have one from their type that we can see or observe. If such a thing exist, then I exclude it from the list. I cann't study or observe them, so I can't make sure that the rule apply on them or not.
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    29 Jun '07 00:20
    Originally posted by DoctorScribbles
    That's exactly right. I was hoping that ahosney would give me shortcut and say that he cannot know that God exists, in which case it would follow immediately that the argument is unsound, since its conclusion claims that God exists, and it is not sensible to say that you cannot know that which is the conclusion of a sound argument.
    I agree, if I can't know that GOD exists, then there is no reason for the argument.
  15. Standard memberDoctorScribbles
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    29 Jun '07 00:20
    Originally posted by ahosyney

    What we can execlude is things from the domain is stuff that we don't have any sort of knowlage about them.
    Let us imagine a hypothetical invention that might exist in the future. Would it be included in the domain? For example, do you suppose Aquinas' intention for the domain in question was to include microwave ovens, about which nobody of his era had any sort of knowledge?

    Also, do you suppose we have any sort of knowledge about God?
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