Theist logic

Originally posted by scottishinnz
I ask you, good theists of the world (or at least the forums), how many of you believe in alien abduction? Or flying pigs? Santa Claus? The tooth fairy? Or that Vietnamese people have dug tunnels under the entire surface of the planet?

What is my point? I'm sure most of you have got it already - you're a clever bunch. I bet most of you don't be ...[text shortened]... I believe in? God, satan, santa, and my right pinky, or logic and reason?

I don't believe in Santa or the tooth fairy - they're simply not part of our culture. I've never heard of anyone believing in flying pigs or Viet tunnels under the entire surface. Alien abductions are the closest I've come to believing from your list.

To believe in something, one has to ask a series of questions:

1. Is there evidence to believe?
2. Is the evidence reliable?
3. How does that evidence compare to other evidence one has obtained?

By "evidence", I am not simply referring to empirical evidence - I also include personal experience, philosophical argument and human intuition and psychology.

Originally posted by lucifershammer
That would be fun, wouldn't it? LOL

EDIT: I know which avatar you're referring to.

It looks all wrong! Where's the superman dude?

Originally posted by Halitose
It looks all wrong! Where's the superman dude?

He decided he couldn't stop a running train with his little pinky, after all.

Now he wants to be Santa. 😀

Originally posted by lucifershammer
He decided he couldn't stop a running train with his little pinky, after all.

Now he wants to be Santa. 😀

A noble pursuit indeed. 😀

Originally posted by Halitose
A noble pursuit indeed. 😀

Maybe now people like scottishinnz will believe. They seem to like the presents.

Originally posted by scottishinnz
I ask you, good theists of the world (or at least the forums), how many of you believe in alien abduction? Or flying pigs? Santa Claus? The tooth fairy? Or that Vietnamese people have dug tunnels under the entire surface of the planet?

I believe in none of those things, though I do believe there is a phenonemon occurring which people claim "aliens" are responsible for.

What is my point?

Your point is to make God "guilty by association". Exclaiming "If you believe in God, you better believe in Santa!" is easier than providing actual arguments to prove He doesn't exist.

I'm sure most of you have got it already - you're a clever bunch.

Condescension aside... thanks for noticing.

I bet most of you don't believe in any of these things.

I believe in a form of one.

You probably don't believe that I can stop a train using only the muscular power of my right pinky finger.

Another silly idea to drill the point home that God is silly without any logical connection between the two ideas! Powerful stuff. I for one am convinced.

Why? Why not believe in these things?

Like I said, I believe in a form of one of them. The rest are either clearly human conceptions (some based on actualities), or lack any sort of supporting evidence.

Most of you will say something like 'it doesn't make logical sense' or 'we've never seen any of these things'.

The former doesn't apply and the latter is erroneous thinking. Hume got embarrassed with it with a tray of ice cubes.

Pigs can't fly - right? They don't have wings, nor rocket backpacks. They're not terribly aerodynamic, and they are definately heavier than air. We've never seen people stop trains with their fingers before - trains have always run them over. The tendons, muscles and bones in a finger cannot resist the amount of force generated by a train travelling at 120 MPH.

Wow, you really like to hear yourself talk.

Now ask yourself how many planets have you seen created?

You must have 20/20 to be able to survey the universe searching (but unfortunately not finding) planets in the act of creation.

What direct provable evidence do you have that god created the universe?

The fine-tuning of the universe and the kalam cosmological argument do it for me.

You have precisely the same amount of evidence that god created the world that you have for Santa.

Whoa. You ever hear of the term "projecting"? Not everyone plays Halo all day and whines about how hard life is on his cell phone. Some of us have actually looked for and found the evidence for God.

But you don't believe in Santa, right?

Nope. Oh, is this where we see the light? Hmm. Nope. Still dark.

So what?

My sentiments exactly.

The question I believe you have to ask yourself is 'why do i believe in one thing for which I have no undisputable evidence (god), but not this other thing (santa)?'

Have you stopped beating your wife?

Ah, the loaded question. The best friend of the lazy skeptic who doesn't want the hassle of actually proving his assertions.

You'll find you cannot make a logical distinction between the two, Santa and god.

Someone's projecting again. Listen, Scott, not everyone likes Twizzlers and has a mean two incher.

There is no direct evidence for either.

Beg that question, baby. Beeeeeeg.

Have you seen god?

Had a 15th century tropical prince ever seen ice? You guys should have let that die with Hume. 🙁

Talked to him?

Most days. Does He speak back? Not audibly, but so? Mutes can't talk either, bigot.

Has he created a planet before you?

Nope. What would be the point of that anyway?

There is more evidence for alien abductions than there is for god.

I DON'T like Twizzlers, damn it!

There are 100 billion stars in the galaxy. Let's say half of them have planets. 50 billion. Let's say 0.001% of those have planets suitable for life, that leaves you with 500,000 planets. Let's say that 0.1% of those planets with life have intelligent life - we're still at 500 planets out there with intelligent life. Pretty good odds that intelligent alien life exists.

Let's say 0.000% of those have planets suitable for life. That leaves you with 0 planets. Oooooh. Ooooh. Can my stats be official?

So, good people, now is the time to ask myself, what do I believe in? God, satan, santa, and my right pinky, or logic and reason?

And he finishes up with a nice [false] dichotomy.

Scott, do you believe in hygeine or intelligent discourse?

Originally posted by Darfius
Originally posted by scottishinnz
I ask you, good theists of the world (or at least the forums), how many of you believe in alien abduction? Or flying pigs? Santa Claus? The tooth fairy? Or that Vietnamese people have dug tunnels under the entire surface of the planet?

I believe in none of those things, though I do believe there is a pheno ...[text shortened]...
Scott, do you believe in hygeine or intelligent discourse?[/b]

I don't normally recommend your posts - but I liked this one (although it was too abrasive for my taste).

Originally posted by lucifershammer
Maybe now people like scottishinnz will believe. They seem to like the presents.

Yes. It brings the emotional satisfaction of someone out there who actually cares, without the associated responsibility of reciprocation. 😀😀

Originally posted by Halitose
Yes. It brings the emotional satisfaction of someone out there who actually cares, without the associated responsibility of reciprocation. 😀😀

Free lunch etc.

Originally posted by Halitose
The point that eluded you, HG, is that you can't go back indefinitely through history and merely have this "telling" moving from generation to generation -- pretty soon you have to end up with either God or the inception of the idea of God.

Why can't the concept of god evolve, in the way that true stories become exagerated?

Originally posted by DragonFriend
I see your delimma. You're looking at the whole picture and it's too big to swallow, therefore it must not be true.
Tell me, how does one integratea curve in 3 dimentions to find the area under it? With calculus, you say. Yes, but before you could understand calculus you had to understand algegra. And before you could understand alegbra, you had to und ...[text shortened]... le. Trusting the Bible is like trusting your basic math skills. Both can take you far.

DF

Thanks for your interesting post, but I believe that you are missing the point. The point I am making is why believe in god, but not the power of my right finger? You can neither prove nor disprove either. You have precisely the same amount of evidence for both assertions. The question is why believe in one, but not the other?

Originally posted by Darfius
Originally posted by scottishinnz
[b]I ask you, good theists of the world (or at least the forums), how many of you believe in alien abduction? Or flying pigs? Santa Claus? The tooth fairy? Or that Vietnamese people have dug tunnels under the entire surface of the planet?

I believe in none of those things, though I do believe there is a ph ...[text shortened]...
Scott, do you believe in hygeine or intelligent discourse?[/b]

Thank you for making, well, not a single decent point. I'm glad to see your buddies gave you lots of recs for it. That'll make you sleep better at night.

Anyhoo, I have not made god 'guilty by association' I have merely asked you, mr stong-in-faith, how you make a distinction between two things, neither of which you have any evidence for existing? Of course, you know, as I do, that there is no way of providing arguments that he doesn't exist. We also both know that there is nothing in the universe that cannot be explained without the necessity to invoke god. I view god as a fantastical claim, for which there is no evidence, the same way I view all these other things.

Maybe a more basal question is 'if you allow god into your world view, do any other rules or laws continue to be definite?' God could, for example, suspend gravity. Or time. Or any number of these things. These rules would effectively stop being rules. They'd become only mere descriptions of the past - without any predictive value in a universe that can fundamentally change at any given moment. If you drop a cup you'd expect it to fall to the ground and shatter, yes? What if you dropped it now and it levitated in mid air? The law of gravity would be meaningless.

Why is the concept of my right pinky finger stopping trains stupid, but a guy walking on water not stupid then?

"Like I said, I believe in a form of one of them. The rest are either clearly human conceptions (some based on actualities), or lack any sort of supporting evidence."

How can you prove that god is not merely a human conception? What supporting evidence do you have that cannot be explained without invoking god? What evidence do you have the none of the others are real?

Fine tuning of the universe? Easy - anthropic principle. Look it up. It's called circular reasoning.

The Kalam argument fails immediately, in that it is impossible to prove that the universe has not existed forever. Sure there may have been the big bang, but what was before it? Time didn't exist before it, according to current scientific thought, so the universe has existed forever.

I second question, in response to the Kalam argument then.. Why does the universe require a creator, but god does not?

Come on, I'd like to hear 'evidence' of god, better than the circular reasoned crap that you've already served up. btw, I've never played halo and i don't have a cell phone.

Oh, and I don't have a wife either. My question of why believe one thing and not another is not loaded. It is a valid question - why not try something novel and actually answer it? Why do you believe in god but not the tooth fairy?

Projecting? perhaps, but so far you have provided no solid evidence for either god, nor disproved santa. So how can you make a logical distinction? Or, no, wait, let me guess, you're going to avoid the question again...

Sorry, you are right. I made a mistake. I said 'talked to him'. Sorry, I should have said 'talked with him'. As in had a two way conversation.

Are you seriously suggesting that god is mute? Or perhaps he doesn't care to talk to you. Perhaps he doesn't exist. How do you distinguish?
Fell free to call me a bigot or whatever name you wish. You obviously know all about me, my politics, my thoughts and all the other things I've done in my life. oh wait, nope, that was sarcasm.

"Has he created a planet before you?

Nope. What would be the point of that anyway?"

So what direct evidence do you have that god did create the planet then?

0.000% life on planets? Well, that's us stuffed then. What proof do you have to deny the existance of extraterrestrial life? Nasa seems to think it's a worthwhile search.

http://www.nasa.gov/centers/goddard/news/topstory/2005/0801frozenworlds.html

(for example, amongst others)

I don't believe my last sentence was a false dichotomy. There is no direct proof of any of the first group, and therefore none of them fall within 'science' - hence the logic and reason statement.

Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
I believe the Vietnamese dug those tunnels for their flying pigs.

Bosse - They dug them under the guidance of Santa to protect the flying pigs from alien abduction....

Originally posted by scottishinnz
Why can't the concept of god evolve, in the way that true stories become exagerated?

Hold on. Did you say "true"? How do you know the concept holds no truth?

Originally posted by scottishinnz
Thank you for making, well, not a single decent point. I'm glad to see your buddies gave you lots of recs for it. That'll make you sleep better at night.

Anyhoo, I have not made god 'guilty by association' I have merely asked you, mr stong-in-faith, how you make a distinction between two things, neither of which you have any evidence for existing? fall within 'science' - hence the logic and reason statement.

Sure there may have been the big bang, but what was before it? Time didn't exist before it, according to current scientific thought, so the universe has existed forever.

You're kidding?! No time = infinite time? Hmmm... Lets see if I make any sense of it:

No distance = infinite distance? Err... no.

No electrical current = infinite electrical current. Not quite.

Did you think this through? Or is there some amazing property to time - somehow it functions on overdrive when you have an absence of it? A more correct (and subjective) logical approach would be: No time... and then... time, ergo there was a start to time. It's amazing the gymnastics (or as No1 prefers: hands stands) some “scientists” do to avoid the most obvious answer if they have a philosophical objection to it. As Einstein said (I'm paraphrasing): Life should be made as simple as possible - but not simpler. Holmes: When you remove all the possibilities, what’s left - no matter how improbable - is the solution.