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At 9/19/10 05:58 PM, akmeteor wrote: You can't deny something exists when you have no proof either way.

Yeah. You can. We do it all the time. Like for instance. I reach into my pocket and find that there's no money in it.

If a thing has no intrinsic effective (as oppose to absolute) consequence then it may as well be said to not exist. That is perfectly reasonable.

If matter can't be created or destroyed (same with energy). How did the Big Bang even occur?

OMG! Science hasn't answered everything yet!?

Any argument is incomplete if you entertain infinite potential. And if you have a God to which you can attribute any arbitrary number of actions, then you've always got infinite potential. So, there's really no need to even bring up creation vs thermodynamics.

What the positive and/or negative consecquences of a religion are, are irrelevant next to the question of their truth value. I'm sure there are people who get lots of personal strength from believing that faries help their everyday decisions, but it doesn't mean we should accept "I'll just ask the fairies and they'll know what to do" as an answer in a crisis situation.

That, and as a marxist I do think religion still has a negative influecnce on mankind; when the working classes are taught that a quiet, obidient life will lead to divine reward, they won't make noise, and won't disobey when they have very real needs on earth.

At 9/20/10 03:04 AM, JohnnyWang wrote: That, and as a marxist I do think religion still has a negative influecnce on mankind; when the working classes are taught that a quiet, obidient life will lead to divine reward, they won't make noise, and won't disobey when they have very real needs on earth.

This is something that Marx was incredibly accurate about. I agree with what you said there.

At 9/20/10 03:11 AM, yurgenburgen wrote: This is something that Marx was incredibly accurate about. I agree with what you said there.

Also, before this derails into a flamewar on a different subject; Marx's theories about class struggle and historical materialism were misunderstood, and missapplied. Most of his theories only really apply now, with Globalisation. That, and the whole idea of a historically inevitable revolution doesn't work with a complex species like humanity.

Also, lorkas. You say we don't know what made the big bang, ergo, god did it. Alright. not very sound reasoning, but let's go with that for a while. Now here's the obvious question; which god?

At 9/19/10 05:58 PM, akmeteor wrote: You can't deny something exists when you have no proof either way. You also can't fully accept that same being if you can't prove they do exist.

There's a difference between asserting none existence and not accepting the existence of something.

If you can't deny the existence of something, then you therefore must believe in a giant tea pot that is on the exact same orbit we are but on the other side of sun so we can't see it. There's no proof either way, right?

I also have another question.

If matter can't be created or destroyed (same with energy). How did the Big Bang even occur?

No idea, why do you ask? Are you try to sneak in a subtle gaps argument?

At 9/20/10 04:35 AM, The-universe wrote:

There's a difference between asserting none existence and not accepting the existence of something.

If you can't deny the existence of something, then you therefore must believe in a giant tea pot that is on the exact same orbit we are but on the other side of sun so we can't see it. There's no proof either way, right?

No idea, why do you ask? Are you try to sneak in a subtle gaps argument?

Ok, you seem to be the only one not arguing this like an idiot.

First I'd like to get my beliefs stated and out of the way here. If these are unimportant to you skip to the BOLD LETTERS.

I believe the Big Bang happened, and was created by a god.

I'm also a Christian that believes that Church was created as a control method by power-hungry people who found it as an easy way to do so.

The only reason I've found atheists annoying as of late are the ones who treat it like a RELIGION. Why do you treat something that's supposed to be the opposite of something you hate exactly like that thing you hate? I've seen billboards trying to "convert" people to atheism. That's wrong on both sides of Atheism VS. Religion.

Now that that's out of the way.

I believe that the fact that there is visible or scientific proof that there is not a giant tea pot orbiting the same orbit as us is a good enough reason to think it's not there.

Now a deity, on the other hand, can't be proven to exist or not exist. So denying or accepting are both silly choices. Yet people, like me, see things in this world that seem too good to have just arisen from a massive explosion that seems to have no origin.

Then again, I believe Dante's Hell is accurate representation of one. So what can my beliefs on the situation effect?

At 9/20/10 12:22 PM, akmeteor wrote: Ok, you seem to be the only one not arguing this like an idiot.

Nope, I just made it quick so I couldn't be patronising or condescending.

Now that that's out of the way.

I believe that the fact that there is visible or scientific proof that there is not a giant tea pot orbiting the same orbit as us is a good enough reason to think it's not there.

The tea pot was an example to show the error you're making.

Now a deity, on the other hand, can't be proven to exist or not exist. So denying or accepting are both silly choices.

Maybe I'm interpreting it wrongly, but you're still confusing asserting none existence and not accepting an assertion.

Atheism isn't asserting none existence, it's not accepting the claim a god or gods exist, what those reasons are varies. If not accepting a claim for (whatever) reason on the existence of something that has no evidence is silly, then we'd believe every claim that has ever been made in the history of human thought.

Yet people, like me, see things in this world that seem too good to have just arisen from a massive explosion that seems to have no origin.

The Big Bang was not an explosion but an expansion of space. The cause for this is still unknown however no one said the Big Bang had no origin, we don't know that. Perhaps we never will know it's cause, but I would just be speculating. You seem to be be hovering around the God of Gaps Fallacy.

But it would be interesting to ask, what things are ' too good' in this world? Is it because we are suited for our environment? Is it because we're the most intellectually advanced species?

At 9/20/10 12:35 PM, The-universe wrote: be interesting to ask, what things are ' too good' in this world? Is it because we are suited for our environment? Is it because we're the most intellectually advanced species?

Speaking only for myself... the big bang to me, is like writing a computer program that just ranomly grabs chunks of computer code and throws it together. Then tries to compile it. Except, the result is not only compilable (no errors) but it creates Super Mario 64.... and not just any Super Mario 64... but a bug free version of it.

Oh yeah, and you only get to run the random-code app once.

Maybe it was just dumb luck... or maybe the code being generated isn't as random as we think it is. Maybe it's planned. Or you can take the third option and go with the multi-verse theory... but that too is filled with the same logical fallacies as a creator since you can't prove the multi-verse exists.

At 9/20/10 04:51 PM, CacheHelper wrote: Oh yeah, and you only get to run the random-code app once.

To stretch your analogy a bit... whoever said it was only run once?

At 9/20/10 04:51 PM, CacheHelper wrote: Speaking only for myself... the big bang to me, is like writing a computer program that just ranomly grabs chunks of computer code and throws it together. Then tries to compile it. Except, the result is not only compilable (no errors) but it creates Super Mario 64.... and not just any Super Mario 64... but a bug free version of it.

Oh yeah, and you only get to run the random-code app once.

Or maybe the universe isn't a computer.

The universe is a system of laws that coexist with eachother. It is in no way perfect, it's not 'bug free'. There are plenty of ways to easily wipe out the majority of life on this planet (and it's happened plenty of times). Even humans, the most intellectually superior beings come with their faults. Our universe is a series of laws and processes with a massive amount of time on it's hands, that's all.

However, let's go with your concept for a while. Let's say the universe had a cause and we've ruled out what you define as 'random' or 'accidental'. How did you manage to jump to god as the answer? You've skipped over any number of naturally occurring phenomena to a supernatural one.

Do you know why the multiverse hypothesis is more plausible than a god? Because it removes magic and super powers.

At 9/20/10 05:09 PM, Ravariel wrote: To stretch your analogy a bit... whoever said it was only run once?

No proof it's been ran more then once. No proof means you can't accept that as an answer. it only ran once.

At 9/20/10 05:12 PM, The-universe wrote: Or maybe the universe isn't a computer.

It's just an analogy. Why are you allowed to make them but I'm not? Nobody ever claimed god was a giant tea kettle... double standards and such.

The universe is a system of laws that coexist with eachother. It is in no way perfect, it's not 'bug free'.

I've never broken physics and got stuck in a wall. Rocks don't glitch out and start flying all over the room because gravity has failed it's hit detection. Magic isn't real, therefor the laws of physics, on all scales is perfect.

There are plenty of ways to easily wipe out the majority of life on this planet (and it's happened plenty of times).

This has nothing to do with anything I said.

Do you know why the multiverse hypothesis is more plausible than a god?

But it hasn't been seen or proven... and by your athiest rules you have to accept only what has been seen and proven. To argue for the case of the multi-verse is no diffrent then someone arguing for the existance of God.... your only 'proof' is assumptions and personal reasoning. These things don't count remember?

Besides, even if the multi-verse is real. Thiests could still argue that God created the multi-verse... the cycle continues.

At 9/20/10 12:22 PM, akmeteor wrote:

:Yet people, like me, see things in this world that seem too good to have just arisen from a massive explosion that seems to have no origin.

Then again, I believe Dante's Hell is accurate representation of one.

Dante's Divine Comedy is a work of fiction. It's not even canonical.

And again, even if we believe in a creator, how do you know it is in fact Yahweh, and tha his son Jesus really came to earth to bring us the law?

At 9/20/10 05:12 PM, The-universe wrote: Or maybe the universe isn't a computer.

It's just an analogy. Why are you allowed to make them but I'm not? Nobody ever claimed god was a giant tea kettle... double standards and such.

I never equated the tea pot with god. I was showing that none acceptance was different from asserting the lack of existence.

But your analogy still fails on the basis that the universe isn't perfect nor anything like a simple computer program.

I've never broken physics and got stuck in a wall. Rocks don't glitch out and start flying all over the room because gravity has failed it's hit detection. Magic isn't real, therefor the laws of physics, on all scales is perfect.

I never said physics aren't perfect, unless you want to call every single law "it". I said the universe isn't perfect simply because humans themselves are imperfect. This body of mass we call a planet is imperfect. Our solar system is imperfect. Our galaxy, a galaxy that might collide with another galaxy is imperfect and so on.

Besides, we don't know everything about the physical laws that govern our universe, so do we know that they're perfect?

There are plenty of ways to easily wipe out the majority of life on this planet (and it's happened plenty of times).

This has nothing to do with anything I said.

I was arguing the imperfection of the universe. Would life not thrive continiously on this planet and others if it was? (and made by a designer?)

Do you know why the multiverse hypothesis is more plausible than a god?

But it hasn't been seen or proven... and by your athiest rules you have to accept only what has been seen and proven. To argue for the case of the multi-verse is no diffrent then someone arguing for the existance of God.... your only 'proof' is assumptions and personal reasoning. These things don't count remember?

Firstly, Atheists have no rules. There is no guide book to being an Atheist.

Secondly, I wasn't arguing the multiverse existed (straw man), I was arguing that it was more likely than god but funnily enough, you omitted my reason behind it.

Besides, even if the multi-verse is real. Thiests could still argue that God created the multi-verse... the cycle continues.

Unless the cause for the multiverse is know, if the cause was not know, it would be God of the Gaps fallacy and their reasoning would be redundant.

At 9/20/10 12:22 PM, akmeteor wrote: Ok, you seem to be the only one not arguing this like an idiot.

Excuse me? I make one sarcastic remark and then nothing else I say matters?

Now a deity, on the other hand, can't be proven to exist or not exist.

As is the case with anything supernatural. The condition of being supernatural is the condition of being effectively irrelevant (although alleged otherwise). More relevantly, the condition of being supernatural is a gross presumption, not an exemption. You're treating it as the latter.

Sorry. Saying something can't be proven to exist or not exist is essentially saying that that thing does not exist. Saying, "oh, but this is exempt because it's supernatural," is a tautological presumption (i.e. fallacy).

So denying or accepting are both silly choices. Yet people, like me, see things in this world that seem too good to have just arisen from a massive explosion that seems to have no origin.

And that is also a fallacious argument. It even has a name: Argument from personal conviction.

At 9/20/10 05:21 PM, CacheHelper wrote: No proof it's been ran more then once. No proof means you can't accept that as an answer. it only ran once.

No. False dilemma.

It's just an analogy. Why are you allowed to make them but I'm not? Nobody ever claimed god was a giant tea kettle... double standards and such.

- Your analogy does not apply because you're not allowed to make analogies.
- Your analogy does not apply because the universe does not work like that.

There's a difference between the two.

I've never broken physics and got stuck in a wall.

I'm going to take a bit of both of your positions, and follow the program analogy. I've never programmed a circuit board where And gates sporadically functioned as Or gates.

This has nothing to do with anything I said.

A program crash is a subjectively unintended set of operations. By this I mean... the logic gates did exactly what they should have. The result however, was something a particular user did not appreciate. So, disease could very well be considered a glitch.

At 9/20/10 05:21 PM, CacheHelper wrote:

At 9/20/10 05:09 PM, Ravariel wrote: To stretch your analogy a bit... whoever said it was only run once?

No proof it's been ran more then once. No proof means you can't accept that as an answer. it only ran once.

Not true.

...the laws of physics, on all scales is perfect.

Perhaps, but whoever said we know all the rules?

But it hasn't been seen or proven...

Again, you fail to understand the difference between evidence and proof. There is evidence for a multiverse theory.

Thought I'd throw a curveball to both sides here, just a brief change of pace:

Besides the regular arguments of what religion teaches, do you think one of the main reasons religion ever started, spirituality, is a benefit for everybody?

Or, in simpler terms, is human spirituality a good thing?

At 9/20/10 08:20 PM, BrianEtrius wrote: Or, in simpler terms, is human spirituality a good thing?

It might surprise you, and others, to hear this from me... but yes.

Honestly...I dont Particularly Care For Any Religions...If I Could...Id Make My Own Though...Id Call it Hardstyleism....For Obvious Reason...To Worship The Techno Genre...Of Hardstyle... :D

At 9/20/10 08:20 PM, BrianEtrius wrote: Besides the regular arguments of what religion teaches, do you think one of the main reasons religion ever started, spirituality, is a benefit for everybody?

Or, in simpler terms, is human spirituality a good thing?

Those two questions don't seem to be asking the same thing to me. Could you clear up the grammar in the first?

At 9/20/10 06:29 PM, Bacchanalian wrote: No. False dilemma.

There is zero proof that shows that the big bang has occured more then once or that there are more then one universe in existance. You're belief that the mutli-verse theory or contracting universe theories are valid is no diffrent then a theist saying that their God theory is just as equally valid. If you 'can't belive in god because you have no proof' like you say, then you can't believe in the multi-verse or the contracting universe theory because they also have no proof.

This means, that according to you, it's a fact the big bang only occured once. End of discussion. You might want to accept that there are other universes but you can't because it hasn't been proven... just like you might want to believe in god but you can't because there is no proof.

- Your analogy does not apply because the universe does not work like that.

And nobody here said God was a giant Tea Kettle hiding behind the sun... so your analogies don't work either. Once again, double standards from athiests.

So, disease could very well be considered a glitch.

Why? Who are you to imply that any one version of life is more valuable then any other? Disease has every right to exist..

At 9/21/10 11:58 AM, CacheHelper wrote: Why?

Why are you using arguments that have already been addressed but you find a need to reply to the most vague of responses?

At 9/21/10 11:58 AM, CacheHelper wrote:

At 9/20/10 06:29 PM, Bacchanalian wrote: No. False dilemma.

There is zero proof that shows that the big bang has occured more then once or that there are more then one universe in existance.

You might want to go back and re-check ,y links, because there is evidence for both of those ideas.

At 9/21/10 01:05 PM, Ravariel wrote: You might want to go back and re-check ,y links, because there is evidence for both of those ideas.

The evidence is all theoretical... nobody has proven it. Theroretical evidence doesn't count remember? As much as I'd like to believe the multiverse therory I can't because it's all mainly speculation and wishful thinking. Argument of the gaps type of deal... In the end, it's divided the scientific community and held back science on a whole as people spend way to much arguing over shit that obviously doesn't exist then joining together and working on what we already know is true. Like the cures to cancer.

We would all be better off without such multi-verse based ignorance. It's what's wrong with the world. All multi-verse believers are fucking retarded and only believe it because somebody told them too. They're stupid, weak minded people afraide of the truth.

At 9/21/10 01:53 PM, CacheHelper wrote:

At 9/21/10 01:05 PM, Ravariel wrote: You might want to go back and re-check ,y links, because there is evidence for both of those ideas.

The evidence is all theoretical... nobody has proven it.

Proving yet again that you don't understand the concepts of "proof" and "evidence".

At 9/21/10 02:30 PM, Ravariel wrote: Proving yet again that you don't understand the concepts of "proof" and "evidence".

or "theory" and "theoretical" for that matter.

No matter what you believe, at least 4 billion people disagree with you. Consider that. It's unscientific to just say that they're wrong, and also unscientific to say that 4 billion people can't be wrong. You have to look into why people believe what they believe, and with so many people that it's extremely improbable that the answer is as simple as Atheism being right or just one religion being right.

There's also a lot of evidence to support that there are paranormal occurrences happening everywhere. The prisoner that died in d-block is the first things that comes to mind, in addition to all of the subtle signals that we're part of a collective. The real psychics and healers are also some pretty hard-to-refuse proof, if you ever meet one. The last nail on the coffin is the book "Infinite Mind", a book written by a woman who studied auras and energy healers with NASA equipment, coming up with all sorts of readings that explained physical phenomenon in the way that science was originally meant to.

The best explanation I can come up with for all of this is that everything exists inside perception. You live in your own world and I live in mine. We are partially subjective to each others' worlds, but there is no definite reality by which we base our own off of. Because of this, there is a Christian god who is omnipotent over all that believe in him, although he only is omnipotent within the minds of his believers. And obviously this would make all other religions ring true to their followers as well. What I see here is an opportunity to make whatever you want out of your world, although you first have to abandon your subjectivity to what you thought was reality, and to what other people tell you reality is. You can do this by reshaping your reality and the physical principles of your universe entirely, or you can do it the old fashioned way by preaching what you're passionate about.

At 9/21/10 02:30 PM, Ravariel wrote: Proving yet again that you don't understand the concepts of "proof" and "evidence".

I don't think he's trying to understand. He's still typing the exact same thing that has already been addressed. I think he's ignoring these while nit picking specific sentences and making the same argument against them.

At 9/21/10 03:13 PM, Kwing wrote: There's also a lot of evidence to support that there are paranormal occurrences happening everywhere.

define paranormal in a manner that makes it a legitimate area of research or logical consideration as opposed to something that is simply currently without explanation or "supernatural". go on, we'll be right here whenever you figure that out.

At 9/21/10 03:13 PM, Kwing wrote:

The last nail on the coffin is the book "Infinite Mind", a book written by a woman who studied auras and energy healers with NASA equipment, coming up with all sorts of readings that explained physical phenomenon in the way that science was originally meant to.

That woman should call James Randi and get her million dollars then.