Thread: Is it possible for us as men to have a discussion on God

Originally Posted by JMS

But your missing something Russel. To us who believe in a Grand Designer, the whole universe and everything that happens in our universe is evidence of our belief!

See point 4).

You are presupposing his existence, without which there is no evidence.

The human brain delights in discovering patterns, this is what separates us from much of the animal kingdom (there have been a few studies of pigs and apes (or something) making abstract decisions as well). Those patterns are well defined by mathematics in it's sundry applied fields, but they are still impressive.

What you are doing is applying the presupposition that God exists to those patterns because without full and total knowledge of why they've occurred it seems like a designing force. This is the teleological argument; which holds no water in terms of formal logic.

4) This is again fallacious thinking; presupposing nothingness is the correct course of action for "percieving the environment", followed by proofs of phenomena that fill the nothingness. In other words, to suppose that something exists requires that the supposer provide proof; if there is no proof, there is nothing. This does not work both ways. To prove a negative requires infinite evidence (i.e. until you've examined every subatomic particle in the Universe, you will never be able to prove that an eleprotoneutromupifermiboson doesn't exist, but we have no reason to believe it does), so the logical thought process is start with nothing, and fill in the rest with what is observable and provable.

A four year old is quite adept at this technique. They stick their fingers in their ears, close their eyes, and shout "I can't hear you!" whilst stomping their feet, thus causing the parent urging them to come to the dinner table to cease to exist....

Originally Posted by Russel Baldridge

I'll take a shot at this as well...

The mind and the intellect are just abstracts about the operations carried out by the brain.

We see people who's brains have a tendency to find patterns in numbers, from which derive the study of mathematics. The intellect is the operation of the brain making sense out of the incoming data, in this example numerical data, for a writer it's linguistic data, etc. But it still remains that those words are only abstracts that we apply to things which are more complex than we care to expound on in daily speech.

They're not references to a spiritual being, they are memes.

What causes heartache?

Have you ever experienced it? It is rather remarkable, as it is a physical sensation in your chest, not your head. You may be thinking "Why did my Suzy-Q dump me for Billy-Joe-Bob?" in your head, but you feel it in your heart, a simple pump for circulating fluids through your veins.

That is also a weak analogy; you've sidestepped the part where there is no physical evidence for God, that is impossible to explain in other terms. Right now, God "exists" as a possibility, not a concrete, there is nothing closed minded about demanding solid proof which has yet to be seen.

Does someone want to address the issue that the label "god" is what we put on the novelty of discovering interconnectedness?

Originally Posted by Russel Baldridge

1) This a fallacious weak analogy between something that is manifest in the natural world (electricity) and that which is not (God). Lightning bolts and static electricity create physical evidence of electricity's pressence, there has yet to be a physical example of God that is not better explained by naturalistic science (except for the singularity of the big bang, which isn't a shortcoming because it's status of "singularity" is more of a contingency, pending more research).

What you just said was not accepted as proof for thousands of years even though it was there looking people in the face all that time. As far as a better explanation, isn't that subjective? I think it is far better explained by the truth of the matter that God is creator rather than creation created itself

Originally Posted by Russel Baldridge

2) That is not a logical argument; you've presupposed that A. God exists, B. he has the capacity to affect the netural world C. that he can enumerate his intended affects, and D. that we can know those enumerations. No Logician has ever been able to show that a deity is more likely to exist than not, nor that we would be capable of knowing his intentions if he were to exist.

I won't argue with that! But I still don't have to fire the logician in order to believe in God. Miracles may not be logical but yet it would still be illogical to say they don't exist when you observe one

Originally Posted by Russel Baldridge

3a.) Love and reason are abstract names that we apply to the physical feelings that we encounter and the process of using our abservational skills to deduce truths about our environment, respectively. Those abstract names apply to reality, true, but they do not denote a manifest entity. Look up "Memes" or people who are studying "Memetics"; ideas and the study of them. Ideas are real, but because I can have an idea of a magical lawn gnome doesn't not mean that it is manifest in any realm, natural or otherwise.

I agree

Originally Posted by Russel Baldridge

3b.) You are perfectly safe applying the name "God" to the feeling or sense of interconnectedness that we all feel at times, this is a perfectly acceptable application of an abstract term to describe a physical occurrence. Where you fall short is the extrapolation from naming such an intuitive sense into a manifest being that is in continued communication with us and affects the past present and future of the natural world. That conclusion does not follow necessarily, thus it is illogical (if you like Kant's thoughts on logic).

Although feelings are not material (at least, I don't think they are just so) they are still natural, aren't they? They are not supernatural. If intuition is solely a natural quality, then I guess a leap of faith is required to believe in God's existence. But what of spirit? That too would have to be proven, surely

Originally Posted by Russel Baldridge

4) This is again fallacious thinking; presupposing nothingness is the correct course of action for "percieving the environment", followed by proofs of phenomena that fill the nothingness. In other words, to suppose that something exists requires that the supposer provide proof; if there is no proof, there is nothing. This does not work both ways. To prove a negative requires infinite evidence (i.e. until you've examined every subatomic particle in the Universe, you will never be able to prove that an eleprotoneutromupifermiboson doesn't exist, but we have no reason to believe it does), so the logical thought process is start with nothing, and fill in the rest with what is observable and provable.

I agree completely with what you said. Like I said, "I presupposed that God shouldn't exist because I had never directly seen, heard, felt, or otherwise sensed him with my natural senses." But what I have since observed and seen proven to me was that my previous limitations on my interpretations of what I was perceiving through my natural senses were not the end of the matter. But that in fact underlying the abstract constructs I had created in order to understand what I had directly observed was God. I will argue that God is both observable and provable even though I have never directly observed his natural form or proved his natural form.

Originally Posted by Russel Baldridge

5) See 3a.) Reason is an abstract, the fact that one abstract exists does not prove the existance of others. Other's can exist, but do not necessarily exist as a direct result of that possibility (insert Kant again with wagging finger).

I absolutely agree. And yes there is a difference between reason being immaterial and God being immaterial but I wanted to make a point that the material is not the end of the matter (man I hate to love puns)

Are abstracts natural, or are they supernatural? I am just curious I guess

Anyway, God is a self-existing supernatural and if he is God then of course he is more than an abstract and that is the major difference I think between what we are after and the analogies I've been making to try to make my point that materialism falls short of reasonable argument. But one must first accept that there is more to life than natural matter and energy if one is ever going to admit the possibility of the existence of God. And maybe you do, I am just pointing that out. I think we agree on most points, but disagree because of one particularly important point - I have accepted proof of God's existence and you have not. And like I've said several times, I would never expect you or anyone to accept such proof just because I have, or vice versa. But I would expect that God would have made an effort to show himself to you, at least if nothing else simply through the relationship between the creator and the created.

Originally Posted by Seraphim

What causes heartache?

Have you ever experienced it? It is rather remarkable, as it is a physical sensation in your chest, not your head. You may be thinking "Why did my Suzy-Q dump me for Billy-Joe-Bob?" in your head, but you feel it in your heart, a simple pump for circulating fluids through your veins.

It's an adrenaline rush, the body's response to a percieved "fight or flight" scenario.

You feel it in your chest because the heart begins to beat faster and with more force, the lungs are stimulated in preparation for exertion, the mind begins to "race" so that we can think as fast as possible in the potential battle approaching us.

Emotions are still chemical responses, chemicals that affect the entire body, there's no implication that God lives in the heart anymore than in the adrenal glands.

While I was in microbiology, I told a friend, the more I learn, the more I am convinced there has to be a God. He (my friend, not God) makes race car engines for Toyota, he told me that he likens it to a race car engine. It has 25,000 parts. What if you put all those parts in a box, and shook them up for a billion years. Would they make an engine?

Originally Posted by Russel Baldridge

...there's no implication that God lives in the heart anymore than in the adrenal glands.

You don't say? lol
And yet where do your choices come from? I am curious of those of you who have been participating in this thread whether or not you believe people's decisions and actions are nothing more than naturally necessary behavioral reactions of natural material stimuli or if in fact you really do have a true free option to make your own choices separate from any material influence

Originally Posted by Russel Baldridge

That is also a weak analogy; you've sidestepped the part where there is no physical evidence for God, that is impossible to explain in other terms. Right now, God "exists" as a possibility, not a concrete, there is nothing closed minded about demanding solid proof which has yet to be seen.

Does someone want to address the issue that the label "god" is what we put on the novelty of discovering interconnectedness?

Hmm, well God exists as a possibility then. Niether concretely provable nor improvable, which is the bottom line.

I have had experiences of God, but I cannot prove them. As said above, one of those times in particular I was not even of the mindset that God even existed (I too am a hardened cynic at heart)and yet had that experience none the less.

I could think that love does not exist (and I guess some of you are suggesting that actually it doesn't?):

My wife could have come up to me when we were courting "I love you!"

"That does not compute! Prove it"

"I can't...."

"I thought not...begone woman! Pester me no more with your stories of love and romance"


You have to be somehow open or receptive to love, and or God to experience it


I did have a quick look at Xman's site for cynical, er... critical thinking (actually it was pretty interesting, thanks, X), and both sides of this discussion are basing their viewpoints on an assumption either for or against what is trying to be proved or disproved.

Originally Posted by Russel Baldridge

It's an adrenaline rush, the body's response to a percieved "fight or flight" scenario.

You feel it in your chest because the heart begins to beat faster and with more force, the lungs are stimulated in preparation for exertion, the mind begins to "race" so that we can think as fast as possible in the potential battle approaching us.

Emotions are still chemical responses, chemicals that affect the entire body, there's no implication that God lives in the heart anymore than in the adrenal glands.

I'm not sure I'm buying this explanation. An adrenaline rush feels a certain way (actually finding Suzy-Q with Billy-Joe-Bob, perhaps?...), heartache another.