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@3RU7AL
My point, if you discount a creator then you are left with chance happenstance - no rhyme nor reason behind the universe, it just is.Not necessarily.If you understand your EPISTEMOLOGICAL LIMITS, then you would simply say, "that claim is beyond our epistemological limits".Oh, yeah, and MOOT.
You operate by one system of thought (worldview) or the other if you have reasoned origins out. You either operate by a naturalistic system of thought or a supernaturalistic system of thought as your grounding principle or core belief that other beliefs revolve around and are built upon. You could believe God/gods wound up the universe and left it to its own means. Nevertheless, that takes the argument back to another step. That step is still, whether the universe is created or it is here because of chance happenstance.
Deism begs the question of what this intelligent designer is like. If so, what is this being like?This is exactly the same as trying to guess what god's favorite color is.No, DEISM "begs" no such question. DEISM doesn't even rule-out Promethean style gods. [LINK]
Yes, it does beg what this supernatural being/begins is like for the reason that if you have the wrong God/gods your theology falls apart since it does not represent this God/gods as that/those being(s) really is like. It raises the question of what this being/beings is/are like? Since all religions have different contrary ideas of God/gods only one, if any, can be true to what God/gods is/are. The problem with gods versus God is are these gods unified in belief and essence? If some are not there is not only contradiction there but some are not as powerful as others. Thus can their existence also be traced to the greater, more powerful being?
Also, if God/gods has/have not revealed Himself/themselves to humanity there could be no surety of how this universe came to be. So, to know or have a reasonable belief there would have to be evidence and revelation that points to a particular Being or beings.
Nevertheless, whether deism, theism, or chance happenstance the universe is still here either by natural means or supernatural means. Either there is the intention behind the universe or the universe is devoid of intent and purpose. Thus, you are still left with two options or the belief that everything is an illusion. Do you want to go down the road of illusion?
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@PressF4Respect
Are you saying the slaughter is not quick?The treatment of the animal, from the moment they are born to their slaughter, is inhumane. Some would argue that it is immoral.
Very true. You bring up some good points. We have to eat. We should treat animals in a humane way, not a cruel way, yet we as humans have dominion over animals. Not only this but do you think we could feed the whole of humanity solely on vegetation? My justification for eating meat is that God has given us permission to eat animals instead of just vegetation? This gets into a wholly different topic, God's existence. So I have reasons for why I believe it is okay to eat meat.
As for immoral, do you think animals think in terms of morality or is that completely a human function?
PS. Are you a vegetarian?
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@3RU7AL
If you deny a personal Being as responsible for creating the universe you would have a naturalistic and materialistic worldview by default.Not necessarily. One could be a DEIST and or an IDEALIST.
A deist still reverts to God/a god or a being as the default cause just does not necessarily support the biblical revelation of God. Thus, Being/beings is/are still the creator(s).
My point, if you discount a creator then you are left with chance happenstance - no rhyme nor reason behind the universe, it just is. Thus, ultimately there are two main options. You could argue for a couple of other options but I don't think they pan out. For instance, you could argue that the universe is an illusion. Experientially, that does not work.
Since you continually deny God and fight for a naturalistic explanation alone your worldview points to chance happenstance as the explanation for our existence.Not necessarily. DEISM does not rule-out an "intelligent" "designer" and or (a non-random) NOUMENON.
Deism begs the question of what this intelligent designer is like. If so, what is this being like?
Are you fighting for deism as an option? Are you saying this god/gods is an ultimate being/beings?
Acts 17:22-28 (NASB)
22 So Paul stood in the midst of the Areopagus and said, “Men of Athens, I observe that you are very religious in all respects. 23 For while I was passing through and examining the objects of your worship, I also found an altar with this inscription, ‘TO AN UNKNOWN GOD.’ Therefore what you worship in ignorance, this I proclaim to you. 24 The God who made the world and all things in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands; 25 nor is He served by human hands, as though He needed anything, since He Himself gives to all people life and breath and all things; 26 and He made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined their appointed times and the boundaries of their habitation, 27 that they would seek God, if perhaps they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us; 28 for in Him we live and move and exist, as even some of your own poets have said, ‘For we also are His children.’
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@3RU7AL
“Because of your hardness of heart Moses permitted you to divorce your wives; but from the beginning it has not been this way.This doesn't sound like "objective morality" to me.
As Jesus said, the intent of marriage was a lifetime commitment. It reflects on our eternal life union as Christians to God for the church or body of believers is the Bride of Christ. "What God has joined together let no man separate." Our covenant with God is in Christ Jesus.
So, there are spiritual truths and teachings in the symbolism and typology of earthly marriage. Marriage conveys a greater truth, a spiritual truth. That is the lesson. We, as Christians constantly see truths in earthly things presented in the OT that are a typology of a greater reality. There are numerous truths we understand in the physical nation of Israel, the land, Jerusalem, the people, the leaders, the feasts, the worship and the items of worship that present a greater truth. They all point towards Jesus Christ.
The actual law of god says, "if you violate the marriage covenant, both violators are to be killed".
The purpose of the law was to show how holy God was and how seriously the covenant they entered into was to be taken.
All you're doing is proving that your hypothetical god constantly changes its mind.
God did not change His mind, human's changed their minds. God does permit us to do our thing, for a season. Eventually, we are all accountable.
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@TheRealNihilist
The is-ought fallacy is a naturalistic fallacy. It grounds morality in what is (nature) to derive its oughts.<br><br>You have no basis for such an accusation. Explain to me how the is and ought distinction is a naturalist fallacy.
"The term naturalistic fallacy is sometimes used to describe the deduction of an ought from an is (the is–ought problem)."
"A naturalistic fallacy is typically built upon the fact that someone uses a factual statement as evidence for a value statement."
God's character/nature is goodDemonstrate it.
What would you accept since you deny Him?
There is always another 'what if.' All I can say is that there is sufficient reason to believe. It is not blind faith. It is not an irrational faith.You don't understand how things work. People just don't change their mind because they hear what you say. People change their mind when you have provided something worth them considering the opposite then changing. You outwardly call people lost causes or in your words people who don't want their mind changed.
It is not for me to decide who is a lost cause and who is not. I can only observe your replies and whether you are open to understanding the biblical position from a Preterist standpoint or not. I believe there is sufficient evidence of biblical prophetic fulfillment in history.
You don't understand me nor can you and the failure resides on you.
I understand you to a degree from a biblical perspective. That is,
But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised.
What I do understand is that I was in the same position that you are in, yet God had mercy on me.
You show just how little ground that your Religion has when all you do is posture about how bad the other side is.
I point out the deficiencies of a position that denies God as you point out all your criticisms of "religion." For me "religion" is a man-made worship system. I see Christianity as a worship of and relationship with God, not mere religious rituals and oughts.
That is not an argument when there is so many different sides.
Again, I understand the basic laws of logic and that contradictory claims cannot all be true. If any, only one can. Truth is narrow.
It would only be fair if we were just talking about 2 different worldviews but there is a ton out there but you don't seem to understand so here we are at your attempt using your feelings to say how bad 1 out of several worldviews are.
Basically, we are. We are talking about God creating as opposed to random chance happenstance as the explanation of why we are here.
It is when we get into God creating that we zero in on God and who God is.
Belief is antithetical to reason. You using as the opposite shows how irrational you are. I don't believe something to be reasonable. I use reason to determine what is true.
Some belief is. That would be blind faith, a belief that is taken without question, or it would be an irrational faith, a belief that is not justified by fact. The Christian faith is neither of those two, yet some people make it so. The Christian faith is a reasonable faith, a belief that has as its basis evidence or facts.
Your reason only extends so far. You refuse to look at the foundation your reason is built upon. Either that is a necessary personal Being or blind indifferent random chance happenstance. You start either with God or chance happenstance and you build from one of those two presuppositional starting points. You fail to see how you continually build or steal from my worldview framework in your reasoning and making sense of things.
You borrow from the Christian worldview in making sense of things. You don't remain in your own worldview, you look outside it.Reason is not a Christian thing unless you are begging the question yet again.
No, you are painting and pigeon-holing Christianity in an unfavourable light because of your bias against it. You might not be aware of it but I am.
Some great thinkers are and were Christian.
You don't even know how to use it so I would expect nothing less from a person who doesn't even know how words are used.
Again, instead of demonstrating how I fail to use reason you attack me rather than my arguments. Thus, your arguments are not reasonable in many cases.
Thus, you live inconsistently to your starting point of core belief.What is my core belief?
If you deny a personal Being as responsible for creating the universe you would have a naturalistic and materialistic worldview by default. Since you continually deny God and fight for a naturalistic explanation alone your worldview points to chance happenstance as the explanation for our existence.
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@PressF4Respect
Abattoir or slaughterhouse.And are you aware of how they treat the animals they slaughter?
Are you saying the slaughter is not quick?
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@3RU7AL
Yet Moses permitted divorce.But only for unfaithfulness BEFORE marriage.If you were unfaithful while married, then you were killed.
There are many examples in the OT where that was not the case upon discovery of adultery. In fact, God compares His relationship with Israel to Hosea's relationship with his wife. God gave adulterous Israel many chances before judgment.
Hosea 1:2
2 When the Lord first spoke through Hosea, the Lord said to Hosea, “Go, take to yourself a wife of harlotry and have children of harlotry; for the land commits flagrant harlotry, forsaking the Lord.”
Israel’s Unfaithfulness Condemned
2 Say to your brothers, “Ammi,” and to your sisters, “Ruhamah.”
2 “Contend with your mother, contend,
For she is not my wife, and I am not her husband;
And let her put away her harlotry from her face
And her adultery from between her breasts,
3 Or I will strip her naked
And expose her as on the day when she was born.
I will also make her like a wilderness,
Make her like desert land
And slay her with thirst.
4 “Also, I will have no compassion on her children,
Because they are children of harlotry.
5 “For their mother has played the harlot;
She who conceived them has acted shamefully.
For she is not my wife, and I am not her husband;
And let her put away her harlotry from her face
And her adultery from between her breasts,
3 Or I will strip her naked
And expose her as on the day when she was born.
I will also make her like a wilderness,
Make her like desert land
And slay her with thirst.
4 “Also, I will have no compassion on her children,
Because they are children of harlotry.
5 “For their mother has played the harlot;
She who conceived them has acted shamefully.
Hosea 2:7
7 “She will pursue her lovers, but she will not overtake them;
7 “She will pursue her lovers, but she will not overtake them;
And she will seek them, but will not find them.
Then she will say, ‘I will go back to my first husband,
For it was better for me then than now!’
Hosea 3:1-5
Hosea’s Second Symbolic Marriage
3 Then the Lord said to me, “Go again, love a woman who is loved by her husband, yet an adulteress, even as the Lord loves the sons of Israel, though they turn to other gods and love raisin cakes.” 2 So I bought her for myself for fifteen shekels of silver and a homer and a half of barley. 3 Then I said to her, “You shall stay with me for many days. You shall not play the harlot, nor shall you have a man; so I will also be toward you.” 4 For the sons of Israel will remain for many days without king or prince, without sacrifice or sacred pillar and without ephod or household idols. 5 Afterward the sons of Israel will return and seek the Lord their God and David their king; and they will come trembling to the Lord and to His goodness in the last days.
Hosea’s Second Symbolic Marriage
3 Then the Lord said to me, “Go again, love a woman who is loved by her husband, yet an adulteress, even as the Lord loves the sons of Israel, though they turn to other gods and love raisin cakes.” 2 So I bought her for myself for fifteen shekels of silver and a homer and a half of barley. 3 Then I said to her, “You shall stay with me for many days. You shall not play the harlot, nor shall you have a man; so I will also be toward you.” 4 For the sons of Israel will remain for many days without king or prince, without sacrifice or sacred pillar and without ephod or household idols. 5 Afterward the sons of Israel will return and seek the Lord their God and David their king; and they will come trembling to the Lord and to His goodness in the last days.
Hosea 4
11 Harlotry, wine and new wine take away the understanding.
11 Harlotry, wine and new wine take away the understanding.
12 My people consult their wooden idol, and their diviner’s wand informs them;
For a spirit of harlotry has led them astray,
And they have played the harlot, departing from their God.
13 They offer sacrifices on the tops of the mountains
And burn incense on the hills,
Under oak, poplar and terebinth,
Because their shade is pleasant.
Therefore your daughters play the harlot
And your brides commit adultery.
14 I will not punish your daughters when they play the harlot
Or your brides when they commit adultery,
For the men themselves go apart with harlots
And offer sacrifices with temple prostitutes;
So the people without understanding are ruined.
Eventually, God judges Israel, His bride for her idolatry and adultery but He permitted it for a time as a lesson and an example of what not ought to be done. And amazingly enough, Josephus records Jerusalem as being stone with catapults of flaming stones by the Roman during the siege in AD 70. In Revelation and elsewhere Jerusalem is spoken of with much imagery as a harlot who eventually gets stoned. The imagery of Judah, the southern kingdom as a wife who is faithless and whom God eventually issues a certificate of divorce can also be seen with all kinds of imagery.
Jeremiah 3 (NASB)
The Polluted Land
The Polluted Land
3 God says, “If a husband divorces his wife
And she goes from him
And belongs to another man,
Will he still return to her?
Will not that land be completely polluted?
But you are a harlot with many lovers;
Yet you turn to Me,” declares the Lord.
2 “Lift up your eyes to the bare heights and see;
Where have you not been violated?
By the roads you have sat for them
Like an Arab in the desert,
And you have polluted a land
With your harlotry and with your wickedness.
3 “Therefore the showers have been withheld,
And there has been no spring rain.
Yet you had a harlot’s forehead;
You refused to be ashamed.
4 “Have you not just now called to Me,
‘My Father, You are the friend of my youth?
5 ‘Will He be angry forever?
Will He be indignant to the end?’
Behold, you have spoken
And have done evil things,
And you have had your way.”
And she goes from him
And belongs to another man,
Will he still return to her?
Will not that land be completely polluted?
But you are a harlot with many lovers;
Yet you turn to Me,” declares the Lord.
2 “Lift up your eyes to the bare heights and see;
Where have you not been violated?
By the roads you have sat for them
Like an Arab in the desert,
And you have polluted a land
With your harlotry and with your wickedness.
3 “Therefore the showers have been withheld,
And there has been no spring rain.
Yet you had a harlot’s forehead;
You refused to be ashamed.
4 “Have you not just now called to Me,
‘My Father, You are the friend of my youth?
5 ‘Will He be angry forever?
Will He be indignant to the end?’
Behold, you have spoken
And have done evil things,
And you have had your way.”
Faithless Israel
6 Then the Lord said to me in the days of Josiah the king, “Have you seen what faithless Israel did? She went up on every high hill and under every green tree, and she was a harlot there. 7 I thought, ‘After she has done all these things she will return to Me’; but she did not return, and her treacherous sister Judah saw it. 8 And I saw that for all the adulteries of faithless Israel, I had sent her away and given her a writ of divorce, yet her treacherous sister Judah did not fear; but she went and was a harlot also. 9 Because of the lightness of her harlotry, she polluted the land and committed adultery with stones and trees. 10 Yet in spite of all this her treacherous sister Judah did not return to Me with all her heart, but rather in deception,” declares the Lord.
God Invites Repentance
11 And the Lord said to me, “Faithless Israel has proved herself more righteous than treacherous Judah. 12 Go and proclaim these words toward the north and say,
6 Then the Lord said to me in the days of Josiah the king, “Have you seen what faithless Israel did? She went up on every high hill and under every green tree, and she was a harlot there. 7 I thought, ‘After she has done all these things she will return to Me’; but she did not return, and her treacherous sister Judah saw it. 8 And I saw that for all the adulteries of faithless Israel, I had sent her away and given her a writ of divorce, yet her treacherous sister Judah did not fear; but she went and was a harlot also. 9 Because of the lightness of her harlotry, she polluted the land and committed adultery with stones and trees. 10 Yet in spite of all this her treacherous sister Judah did not return to Me with all her heart, but rather in deception,” declares the Lord.
God Invites Repentance
11 And the Lord said to me, “Faithless Israel has proved herself more righteous than treacherous Judah. 12 Go and proclaim these words toward the north and say,
‘Return, faithless Israel,’ declares the Lord;
‘I will not look upon you in anger.
For I am gracious,’ declares the Lord;
‘I will not be angry forever.
13 ‘Only acknowledge your iniquity,
That you have transgressed against the Lord your God
And have scattered your favors to the strangers under every green tree,
And you have not obeyed My voice,’ declares the Lord.
14 ‘Return, O faithless sons,’ declares the Lord;
‘I will not look upon you in anger.
For I am gracious,’ declares the Lord;
‘I will not be angry forever.
13 ‘Only acknowledge your iniquity,
That you have transgressed against the Lord your God
And have scattered your favors to the strangers under every green tree,
And you have not obeyed My voice,’ declares the Lord.
14 ‘Return, O faithless sons,’ declares the Lord;
15 “Then I will give you shepherds after My own heart, who will feed you on knowledge and understanding.
So God made a covenant with Israel (i.e., Exodus 24:3, 7 - later divided into two kingdoms) that in many ways has the imagery of a marriage in which God likens Himself to the husband. The bride, the northern and southern kingdoms, are unfaithful and adulterous. God is merciful to Israel for a long time wanting the wife to repent and return to Him but eventually divorces the northern kingdom for her idolatry and adultery. The same case is made against the southern kingdom, Judah. She too plays the harlot and is unfaithful yet God does not stone her for her sins but is merciful and wants her to repent and turn to Him also. She never does, throughout the ages of the OT despite God's warnings to her of judgment. The NT is God's last-ditch effort before He brings that judgment. To her, Israel, the southern kingdom (Judah specifically) God brings His charges against her through His Son, Jesus.
For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of Man will also be ashamed of him when He comes in the glory of His Father with the holy angels.”
And it could also be said by Jesus,
but I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except for the reason of unchastity, makes her commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.
Thus, Jesus gives one reason for divorce, unfaithfulness. The New Covenant is about God's judgment on a faithless wife - Judah - and eventually after calling her to repentance many times, a letter of divorce. Finally, we get the imagery of stoning and God (the Son, Jesus) taking for Himself a new wife after Judah has been stoned. But with the northern kingdom when God issues His letter or decree of divorce I am not aware of Him having her stoned to death. Instead, He sent her away, separated her from His presence. Thus, Jesus could say,
“Because of your hardness of heart Moses permitted you to divorce your wives; but from the beginning it has not been this way.
The same was true of what Moses let happen. Yet, from the beginning, the two were to become one flesh until death. That was God's plan and purpose for marriage, a life long commitment just like He committed Himself to Israel yet she was not willing to live up to the covenant.
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@PressF4Respect
Also, where do you usually get your meat from?Grocery store.Are you aware of how most (if not all) grocery stores obtain their meat?
Abattoir or slaughterhouse.
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@3RU7AL
What is the fornication spoken of if not adultery?Fornication is what unmarried people do.
Fornication is how the KJV translates 'porneia.' Sometimes that is justified but how do you justify a woman fornication and committing adultery with her marriage partner as still being allowed to live? It was a form of adultery in that it did not honour the marriage covenant.
9 And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife, except for immorality, and marries another woman commits adultery.”
How could Moses prescribe something other than stoning, yet he permits divorce.
Adultery is what married people do.Basically you could get divorced if your wife was already 2 months pregnant when you married her.That was it.If your wife or husband broke the marriage covenant, then they were killed.
Yet Moses permitted divorce.
Ipso facto, not divorced.
Divorce it what Moses permitted. How the woman is unfaithful gives the man an exclusion to the marriage vow in the case of adultery, otherwise by issuing a divorce the husband is guilty of the same practice.
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@PressF4Respect
I object also to anyone who causes unnecessary suffering or takes pleasure in killing an animal. The killing of the animal should be done quickly, in the most humane way possible for the purpose of sustaining your life and/or providing you with much-needed nutrients. That is why we give thanks for the food. We, as Christians recognize God permits us to kill animals for our survival and nourishment.If you kill an animal when you aren’t hungry, would that be immoral?
Not if you are going to eat it later. If you let it go to waste it could be considered immoral.
Also, where do you usually get your meat from?
Grocery store.
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@3RU7AL
If I want to keep it, I can keep it.If I want to have it removed surgically, that is my right.It is not a CITIZEN.Yes, it is "alive" in exactly the same way a tumor is alive and a parasite is alive.HoWEver, it is not a CITIZEN.It is not recognized as a citizen because of the propaganda machine and a liberal view that does not recognize all human beings as a personal being or does not even recognize some human beings as human beings.Look, if you want to call a blastocyst/zygote/embryo/fetus a CITIZEN, then everyone must register with the state every single time they copulate.
Again the question is what is being killed? Is it a human being? What do you say???
As for your analogy of copulation, only when the result is the conception of a new human life should the moral aspects apply.
In order to protect CITIZENS, the state must have a record of them. AND every miscarriage must be investigated as a potential manslaughter/murder case as well.Look, if you want to call a blastocyst/zygote/embryo/fetus a CITIZEN, you've got to go 100%.
Again, the terms "blastocyst/zygote/embryo/fetus" devalue what is being killed in that they obscure what is being killed by the human being's stages of development. If its parents are human what kind of being is the blastocyst/zygote/embryo/fetus?
Once you go down the road of not all human beings are equal or should be equally valuable you leave room for such tyrannies as Nazi Germany or any other state that exploits their human occupants as not worth keeping. That is the kind of policy you are promoting whether knowingly or otherwise.
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@3RU7AL
Matthew 19:8-98 He *said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses permitted you to divorce your wives; but from the beginning it has not been this way. 9 And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife, except for immorality, and marries another woman commits adultery.”Thus, God gives one exception for remarriage, immorality. Sexual immorality/adultery.Check the original text. The word used for "immorality" is not the same word used for "adultery".
Even better,
Matthew 19:8-9 (KJV)
8 He saith unto them, Moses because of the hardness of your hearts suffered you to put away your wives: but from the beginning it was not so.
9 And I say unto you, Whosoever shall put away his wife, except it be for fornication, and shall marry another, committeth adultery: and whoso marrieth her which is put away doth commit adultery.
8 He saith unto them, Moses because of the hardness of your hearts suffered you to put away your wives: but from the beginning it was not so.
9 And I say unto you, Whosoever shall put away his wife, except it be for fornication, and shall marry another, committeth adultery: and whoso marrieth her which is put away doth commit adultery.
What is the fornication spoken of if not adultery?
it is distinguished from μοιχεία in Matthew 15:19; Mark 7:21; and Galatians 5:19 Rec.; used of adultery ((cf. Hosea 2:2 (4), etc.)), Matthew 5:32; Matthew 19:9.
From porneuo; harlotry (including adultery and incest); figuratively, idolatry -- fornication.
Nevermind the fact that the bible instructs us that both the man and the woman who engaged in adultery should be put to death.
How could one divorce his wife if he had already stoned her to death?
It would seem to be quite difficult to "re-marry" once that happened.
Yet Jesus says that is the only reason one may remarry, for unfaithfulness.
10 “If a man commits adultery with the wife of his neighbor, both the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death. [LINK]
Yet Jesus came to fulfill the Law of Moses as well as God's laws. He fulfills the OT to establish the NT. Why, instead of stoning her did Moses allow divorce instead?
And you have ignored my example of God as a husband to Israel.
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@PressF4Respect
True, if you are starving, and the only thing to eat is a cow or antelope, you would be justified in killing an animal. However, in the developed world, it is entirely possible to subsist purely off of a vegan diet. https://www.nhs.uk/live-well/eat-well/the-vegan-diet/ This, according to some people, means that eating meat when you don’t have to is immoral, since it leads to the unnecessary death of an animal.Why would that be immoral?<br>Because it causes unnecessary suffering upon the animals killed to provide you with the meat, and causing unnecessary suffering is immoral. This is their rationale.
I object also to anyone who causes unnecessary suffering or takes pleasure in killing an animal. The killing of the animal should be done quickly, in the most humane way possible for the purpose of sustaining your life and/or providing you with much-needed nutrients. That is why we give thanks for the food. We, as Christians recognize God permits us to kill animals for our survival and nurishment.
So, if you were a Christian and believed it is wrong to eat animals I should not pass judgment on you or tempt you beyond what you are able to accept. Maybe one day your understanding would chance. But, if I am invited to a vegetarian's house for dinner I should not offend them by refusing to eat what the offer. In the same way, when my brother-in-law, who is a vegetarian, comes to visit I prepare vegetarian dishes for his stay.Again, I’m not saying that this is my personal stance, but it is certainly a valid one.And, if that is a person's choice then I respect it.Ok, so you and I have different stances on this moral issue, and both of them are acceptable. Is this the case?
What God permits us to eat is not a moral issue for me. What would be a moral issue is the torturing or abuse of animals or taking pleasure in the death of an animal. I take no pleasure in that. I do not like to see suffering.
When I worked on a game reserve bordering the Kruger National Park we used to get tourists (big-game hunters) come in to cull the herds. If we did not cull the herds the environment could not handle the overpopulation and many would starve. The meat was given to the Africans, the skin was sold or converted to some useful item, so very little went to waste. The rest of the carcass was eaten by scavengers like hyenas and vultures. What I objected to was a hunter/guide whose client shot a buffalo in the jaw with an arrow and then go scared about following the wounded animal into a mopane and thorn bush thicket. Thus for days, the animal starved to death and a helicopter was called in to find the animal and kill it as quickly as possible. Everyone in the reserve was disgusted by the cowardness of the guide who should have taken the responsibility to end the buffalo's life quickly.
So, I respect your right to have a choice. If you want to kill a carrot, lettuce, or a green bean and slowly skin it that is your choice. It is a living thing too.
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@PressF4Respect
True, if you are starving, and the only thing to eat is a cow or antelope, you would be justified in killing an animal. However, in the developed world, it is entirely possible to subsist purely off of a vegan diet. https://www.nhs.uk/live-well/eat-well/the-vegan-diet/ This, according to some people, means that eating meat when you don’t have to is immoral, since it leads to the unnecessary death of an animal.
Why would that be immoral?
Also, certain religions ban the consumption of certain meats. For example, in Hinduism, cows are sacred, so killing them would be immoral from a religious perspective.
True, Jews under the Law of Moses were instructed that certain animals were impure, thus people who ate them were more susceptible to disease back then and disobeyed God's decrees. Again, God was teaching a principle of holy and unholy by the use of their diet.
Jesus changed that covenant. It was not a matter of what you ate that made you impure but on what was inside you, your values and the way you lived.
Matthew 15:10-11 (NASB)
10 After Jesus called the crowd to Him, He said to them, “Hear and understand. 11 It is not what enters into the mouth that defiles the man, but what proceeds out of the mouth, this defiles the man.”
Acts 10:13-14 (NASB)
13 A voice came to him, “Get up, Peter, kill and eat!” 14 But Peter said, “By no means, Lord, for I have never eaten anything unholy and unclean.” 15 Again a voice came to him a second time, “What God has cleansed, no longer consider unholy.”
Romans 14:1-3 (NASB)
Principles of Conscience
14 Now accept the one who is weak in faith, but not for the purpose of passing judgment on his opinions. 2 One person has faith that he may eat all things, but he who is weak eats vegetables only. 3 The one who eats is not to regard with contempt the one who does not eat, and the one who does not eat is not to judge the one who eats, for God has accepted him.
14 Now accept the one who is weak in faith, but not for the purpose of passing judgment on his opinions. 2 One person has faith that he may eat all things, but he who is weak eats vegetables only. 3 The one who eats is not to regard with contempt the one who does not eat, and the one who does not eat is not to judge the one who eats, for God has accepted him.
So, if you were a Christian and believed it is wrong to eat animals I should not pass judgment on you or tempt you beyond what you are able to accept. Maybe one day your understanding would chance. But, if I am invited to a vegetarian's house for dinner I should not offend them by refusing to eat what the offer. In the same way, when my brother-in-law, who is a vegetarian, comes to visit I prepare vegetarian dishes for his stay.
Again, I’m not saying that this is my personal stance, but it is certainly a valid one.
And, if that is a person's choice then I respect it.
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@PressF4Respect
Beef, chicken, lamb, poultry, and other meat when travelling in different cultures. I've eaten all kinds of antelope, ostriches, elk, giraffe, buffalo, raw eel, 21-day duck eggs, numerous kinds of fish, etc.Ok. Some people would consider what you are doing to be immoral.
Yes. I would like to know what is their moral outrage based upon? We eat to live. Are we grateful? Some people are starving in parts of the world and would be grateful for an antelope or a cow to sustain them and their families and it could mean the difference between them living and dying.
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@PressF4Respect
Yes, I do.Beef?
Beef, chicken, lamb, poultry, and other meat when travelling in different cultures. I've eaten all kinds of antelope, ostriches, elk, giraffe, buffalo, raw eel, 21-day duck eggs, numerous kinds of fish, etc.
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@TheRealNihilist
I am stating what needs to be the case for morality to AVOID the is-ought fallacy.The case can't be made. You can't avoid that problem, you have to tackle it head on. Even with a God you would still have to answer to the problem. Lets say there is a God. Why ought we follow it? I am not here to entertain this instead please provide a counter to the is and ought distinction. If not then I am taking that as you agreeing morality is subjective.
The is-ought fallacy is a naturalistic fallacy. It grounds morality in what is (nature) to derive its oughts. Nature does not command us to do anything. It just is. Not only so but if humans are machines of chance, determined by genetics and their environment (again, just what is), why should one chance machine act in the same another one does except because of brute force and as a survival mechanism? One human-machine (let's say, Hitler) is conditioned and driven by chance happenstance to kill all undesirables while another human machine is driven and conditioned to protect those same individuals. What makes either of those right and good? It just is what is. What is good or bad about that? The more powerful wins the day.
God's character/nature is good, pure holy but we derive our morality from His commands. So His moral nature is what is and His moral commands establish what ought to be.
From a naturalistic standpoint, moral nature is grounded in what is. There is nothing but what is to direct us to what ought to be. So in such a case, we derive our ought from what is. Not so with God. He is and His nature is good but we do not derive our morality from what is (God) but from His commandments of what ought to be. So we derive our morality from what ought to be because He directs it from His nature and tells us what our moral duties should be. So, as you would expect, our morality is derived from mindful being, but not from our subjective being, but from Him, the objective, and ultimate, and necessary Being.
With God, we recognize (some do) that His authority is greater than ours. We recognize His authority is derived from an all-knowing mind. Thus, since it knows all things it is objective. It knows all the facts for what they are. Thus, His commands and directives should be obeyed for our well being. Thou shall not kill/murder is for our well being. Thou shall not lie is for our well being. Thou shall not steal is for our well being. Thou shall not covet what is someone else's is for our well being. Honour your father and mother is for your well being. That last command recognizes there is an authority above us (our parents) and ultimately is a lesson that God is above all. Honour God is for our well being. Thou shall not worship graven images or things constructed in our image which as false gods that never satisfy is for our well being. They only satisfy for a brief time whereas God satisfies always, beyond this earthly existence.
Can you identify such a necessary measure?Deflection yet again.
I'm asking a question. Am I not allowed? I am trying to learn what you think and why.
Prove He does not exist.It is not my job to prove unicorns do not exist. It is your job to prove the supernatural. You have got this the wrong way around.
My point is that you could not. All you could do is speculate on His non-existence.
It is not my job to prove the supernatural since I have learned I cannot convince someone who does not what to be convinced. There is always another 'what if.' All I can say is that there is sufficient reason to believe. It is not blind faith. It is not an irrational faith.
If you don't have such a measure, then why are you living inconsistently in using the terms 'good' or 'better.'If I don't have an objective how am I living inconsistently? I don't know how you got to that conclusion.
You borrow from the Christian worldview in making sense of things. You don't remain in your own worldview, you look outside it. Thus, you live inconsistently to your starting point of core belief. You say, "This is not good" when you have no sufficient basis for what is good from your starting point - what is.
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@PressF4Respect
Ok. To prevent this from spilling over, I'll leave the abortion thing to the side for now.Let me ask you an unrelated question: Do you eat meat?
Yes, I do. Do you think it is a moral issue?
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@TheRealNihilist
Thus, the case for an objective, absolute, universal, unchanging, omniscient (or else how would one arrive at the good) standard or measure for moral values to be justified as anything more than preference or feelings.Whatever you want to happen isn't an argument. Please refute the is and ought. If you don't then you have no ground to stand on.
I'm not refuting the is-ought fallacy where subjective morality is the case. I am stating what needs to be the case for morality to AVOID the is-ought fallacy.
And any worldview that cannot define or justify the moral good as anything more than relative, subjective feelings or preference (i.e., a like or dislike) is not in a position to preach to others on morality. It brings up the question of 'why should I believe your subjective opinion?' 'What makes it any better than mine.' 'How do I justify better if there is no fixed measure?'More deflection and something I would call moral highroading as in you claim moral superiorty. In this instance you are hypocrite because the same thing can be said about you.
It can most definitely be said and that is why morality needs a fixed, unchanging, ultimate, absolute, objective, omniscient measure. Can you identify such a necessary measure?
God gives me morals. This is not justified.
Unless such a God exists. 1) Prove He does not exist. 2) What is just if there is no equality of the law? 3) If the law is subject to change why should I believe it is just? 4) If there is no unchanging identity for "good" how do you ever reach a state of good or know some things are good in relation to others?
My morals are not subjective. No measurement given.
Only if God exists can this be stated and then only if I rightly interpret or use His moral imperatives. Otherwise, you and I are just expressing our moral preference. What makes that 'good?' What makes yours better than mine? Better implies a measure. If surpasses the 'good.' So what is your 'best' that this can all be measured against? Are you going to make an argument by appeal to popularity? Are you going to make an appeal to force?
I have continually said God is necessary for morality. Otherwise, you only have personal taste or choice or public taste or choice. What makes that good. Hitler and the Nazis had swayed public opinion. What makes that bad?
I just listed out the two problems with your side. If you can meet them you are pretty much the only one I found to do this but alas I don't have high hope given how conversation on another thread.
My question to you is why is what you believe morally good if there is no objective, fixed measure? If you have such a measure, what is it? If you don't have such a measure, then why are you living inconsistently in using the terms 'good' or 'better.'
So, I have a solution to the problem of identifying what is necessary and can make sense of morality as anything other than personal or social convention and preference. I have identified what is necessary.
Try and keep it short as well. I am not retired and I got stuff to do.
That is the best I can do. I needed to develop the argument somewhat.
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@ebuc
PGA, please stop murdering morality and decency. Humanity does not need any more perverts sticking their noses where it has no business being. Sad :--(PGA,, please stop your virtual raping of pregnant women. Stop sticking your nose into a pregnant womans bodily business without her consent.PGA, your actions appear to me to be a sick in the head pervert who does not have the courage ---yet dumb enough--- to stick their nose in the middle of a street fight where again, it has no business being placed.PGA, please go stick your nose into a street fight where it has no business being and see what happens to your nose.We await the results with anticipation of your education and learning processes from your nose engagement in the nearest street fight in you locality.
Look, my intent is not to offend a woman but to argue as to why killing an innocent unborn human being is unjust. If you want an argument on these grounds I have no objection. If not, I have nothing further to say to you on this topic.
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@ebuc
PGA,, please stop your virtual raping of pregnant women. Stop sticking your nose into a pregnant womans bodily business without her consent.Your actions appear to me to be a sick in the head pervert who does not have the courage but --dumb enough--- to stick their nose in the middle of a street fight where again, it has no business being placed.Please go stick your nose into a street fight where it has no business being and see what happens to your nose.We await the results with anticipation of your education and learning processes.
Please do not misrepresent what I am doing. I mean no harm against the woman. I am sticking up for the rights of an innocent human being who has no rights but should if you consider 1) all humans equal or 2) should be equal under the law. If you do not apply the law equally, then what is wrong with whatever one human being does to another since there is no such thing as justice. Justice applies equal fairness to everyone or there is none.
If you can't apply an argument against my position but instead attack me you are operating via logical fallacy since your argument is irrelevant to the points I brought up.
If you have nothing but to attack my character unjustly with insults you need to reexamine your position.
Personal attacks will not be tolerated. The policy prohibiting personal attacks applies site-wide--in debates, forums, private messages, and everywhere else on the site. If you are having a dispute with another site member, the appropriate response is to inform moderation. It is not appropriate to respond with invective or misconduct.
1. Definition of a Personal Attack
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The abusive, insulting, or derogatory nature of a comment will be judged based on how a reasonable individual would interpret it. It is not based upon the intentions of speaker, unless those intentions were stated clearly and explicitly prior to the offending remark. Reasonableness is interpreted solely by the mods. The "just kidding" argument is not a valid excuse for actions which can reasonably be interpreted as personal attacks.
A personal attack is not "anything directed at a person that they find to be unfavorable. Such a definition would stifle exchange and debate. Rather, a personal attack is any abusive or derogatory remark aimed at a site user or site users rather than the content of what those users say or espouse. A personal attack may take any of several common forms, including but not limited to the following examples.
A generalized attack a comment in which a user makes a remark aimed at other users in general, rather than any specific user (e.g. posting "you're all idiots" on a thread).
A direct attack is when a user posts something negative about a specific member. Direct attacks may take place within a thread or may constitute the thread itself. Call-out threads (threads in which a purpose of the thread is to attack another users) are severe examples of direct attacks. Generalized complaints about generalized behaviors are not direct attacks.
Slurs or invective against an entire class of people (such as racist, sexist, homophobic, islamophobic, transphobic, ageist, and ableist slurs, or slurs against religious, political, ethnic, or national groups) are prohibited when aimed against other users. Whether aimed against other users or not, hate speech is treated as aggravating factor in weighing moderation responses to other violations of the COC. Disagreement over what constitutes a religion, race, sexual orientation, ethnicity, etc., is not a legitimate excuse for hate speech.
Cross-thread contamination is when a user brings up disputes elsewhere on the site up in an unrelated thread for the purpose of harassing, mocking, or insulting another member. Treat every new exchange with a member with as much of a "clean slate" as possible.
Threats are, for the purposes of this policy, personal attacks. They are not tolerated. Threats include (but are not limited to):
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Fighting words are posts intended solely to provoke or incite another user into taking prohibited actions. Fighting words are considered personal attacks, even if they themselves might not meet the abovementioned criteria.
The abusive, insulting, or derogatory nature of a comment will be judged based on how a reasonable individual would interpret it. It is not based upon the intentions of speaker, unless those intentions were stated clearly and explicitly prior to the offending remark. Reasonableness is interpreted solely by the mods. The "just kidding" argument is not a valid excuse for actions which can reasonably be interpreted as personal attacks.
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@TheRealNihilist
Morality is whatever anyone chooses it to be. There is no way to objectively get to a moral good. Please see the is and ought distinction if you are not sure on this.
Thus, the case for an objective, absolute, universal, unchanging, omniscient (or else how would one arrive at the good) standard or measure for moral values to be justified as anything more than preference or feelings. If you can't identify such a standard your argument is diminished to your tastes versus the tastes of others and forcing others to adhere to your tastes (i.e., might makes right, or the fallacy of appeal to force).
And any worldview that cannot define or justify the moral good as anything more than relative, subjective feelings or preference (i.e., a like or dislike) is not in a position to preach to others on morality. It brings up the question of 'why should I believe your subjective opinion?' 'What makes it any better than mine.' 'How do I justify better if there is no fixed measure?'
If the distinction isn't clear do ask and I'll hopefully help you understand.
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@PressF4Respect
It depends if that something is intentional and malicious by another person.If this is going where I think it is going regarding the unborn, the unborn is not guilty but innocent of any wrongdoing.So, your moral argument is that the unborn is a human being and that wanting to terminate it is inherently immoral. This is a perfectly valid stance.However, some other people argue that forcing a woman to keep a baby that she does not want is immoral. You clearly have some contentions with this, but would you agree that it is at least possible to argue from this moral stance?
No, I would not agree. Again, it comes down to what is being killed (a human being) and whether all human beings are to be treated equally (either justice or no justice). An inconvenience of nine months is a hardship but killing another innocent human being is murder. What the woman is essentially doing, whether she knows it or not, is killing an innocent human being that has done nothing wrong as yet. Once you go down the road of killing innocent human beings it opens up a Pandora's Box as witnessed throughout human history where a group or class of humanity is unjustly singled out, discriminated against, demonized, dehumanized, and in many cases classed as sub-human or "parasites." Not only is it wrong but the media, gatekeepers of society, Hollywood, education, arts and entertainment, and public opinion is swayed by propaganda to view such groups of classes in an unfavourable manner.
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@TheRealNihilist
Because if there is no reason or meaning why the universe exists why do we keep finding reasons and meaning in such a universe?Why is there a need for an ultimate meaning? You are not answering simply shifting yet again.
The point is that we keep looking for meaning and keep finding it. Is there meaning in our existence or are we ultimately in a universe that is meaningless and indifferent to us? Why do you think we keep looking for meaning in a universe supposedly devoid of meaning? Again, you keep avoiding any answers.
Not only this but why would or how can something without intelligence, reason, or meaning sustain itself indefinitely?I am sorry but humans die and as far as we know we don't retain what makes us as in the brain.
Here again, you and I differ. I believe there is a difference between the mind and the brain.
Are you going to admit this is begging the question as we have no scientific backing for our identity carrying on after death therefore God does it?
I am pointing out I have a reason that comes from a reasoning being that is adequate in making sense of intelligence, reason, meaning. From your starting point or foundational beliefs, you do not.
how do dice roll themselves?You have a double standard. God exists outside of time like you said and the dice doesn't.
Well that is precisely the point, isn't it? The dice are an analogy of the intentional and the unintentional. I have a sufficient reason for the dice rolling with an intelligent being. Without one, what is yours? Then not only that, the constant rolling of the same number suggests the dice are fixed for the very reason that if you rolled the dice one million times how far would you go before the dice rolled different numbers? For me to fix the dice so the same number rolled every time would mean I intentionally did that. Not so with a chance happenstance universe. You see, the intention represents such things as laws of nature. There would be no reason why things remained constant such as laws of nature by chance happenstance. Every roll would be willy nilly. Now, in theory, you can state the probability is reasonable but again, it does not meet the experiential test.
Meaning by you even asking this you are complacent in comparing two vastly different things unless you would like to tell me how dice being moved by something is similar to God being moved by nothing.
The dice rolling a constant would show they are fixed not untampered with and randomly rolled. Plus, with God, you have the means of rolling. With chance happenstance what are the means?
Are you saying my argument makes no sense?No you are not giving an argument. I would have to receive an argument for it to make sense. As of yet all I have got is that God exists outside of time and examples that are comparing two vastly different meaning no argument for God.
The argument is that God gives sufficient reason for understanding existence. It is logical to think that from the living comes other living beings. God would be the necessary being. The universe in itself does not give sufficiency or understanding. You and those who hold your view of existence and the universe build on a foundational belief that does not make sense. Without an intentional being, you are left with your core foundational belief being chance happenstance. That has no ability in and of itself, no intentionality. It is not the simplest explanation.
Then present your arguments for the devil as reasonable to believe and any evidence that backs up your claims.You haven't so I won't either.My argument is why do your feelings trump mine if yours are as subjective as mine?Thank you admitting you bringing your feelings into this not irrespective of it.
I am presenting the case that would have to be without an ultimate, objective, universal, unchanging standard.
I'm saying that two subjective beings without an objective outside source would bring be just as relative. So, from such a position why are your feelings better than mine? Hitler had feelings. His preference was the elimination of over 11 million undesirables. Why is that bad if everything is relative? It is just one preference over another that he had the means to execute.
So, without such an objective standard why is what you believe any better than what I believe? It is not. I just becomes who can win out in implementing their subjective preference of feelings or likes or desires.
I am saying that what your dad likes to eat has nothing to do with quantitative values.I 100% nailed you on that comparison yet you decide to make a different point. You don't how bad the structure of your own arguments were which shows in your lack of explanation of your previous argument here.
You did no such thing. I presented a scenario from what would be you position outside of a necessary being in which we derive morality from. You obviously did not understand what I was getting at.
I'll add not understanding your own argument by giving a non-sequitur as a response to the list.A moral ought describes something that should be, an objective. How do you arrive at a prescriptive from what is descriptive?Is and ought distinction has yet to be falsified. I'll await for you to do so.
What a subjective relativist does is describe what is and the prescribe what ought to be from what is. I can do that too. I like ice-cream (descriptive and explaining what I like). You must like it too or else I will put you in prison (assuming I had the means to do so). What is done in the example is an ought is derived from a like or preference. What makes that good or right? Nothing. The exact opposite could be derived depending on the feelings of the person demanding the consequence. I hate ice-cream. Therefore you must hate it too. Thus the identity of what is good or right is transient. It keeps changing thus it is not logical and therefore inconsistent. It has no fixed address.
Yours is off-limits?You have yet to fulfill your burden of proof and expect me to do what you didn't.
I lost the relevance of this one. What was it in relation to?
Most scientists beg only the natural explanation. Do you think they know better than you do or I do?Basically admitting you are pro science when it suits you but against science when it doesn't conform your worldview.
Do you know the difference between science and scientism?
Again, you seem to think that science is the be-all and end-all of the discussion but I question in regards to origins if it is science or scientism.Again, questioning the very thing we accept to bring the best results. This is anti-science yet again.
Science starts with a philosophical presupposition. There are many things scientists cannot answer. It is the crutch atheism uses, their god if you like. Science says science says...
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@TheRealNihilist
That just takes the process back one step further.Which would contradict God creating the world in whatever days right?
God would be the process, His creating. So, you have a transcendent eternal being (thus without cause) creating the physical, external universe.
We assume that there is a gardener but after waiting a week no gardener shows up.Thank you for pointing out you assume there is a God. I on the other hand state plants can grow without humans yet remain agnostic to God not present the claim that I have a way of understanding the supernatural.
There is evidence for God, as I explained in my last post, evidence that is not easily brushed away. State plants? Not following. Do you mean the state plants? I never stated them except to say that the garden is orderly and ten plants humans eat grow in the garden.
Of course, we can speculate that some things do not have a cause.No you can't. I reject this.
Good, then that makes two of us, yet I have heard the argument for no causality.
No one has yet to find anything that disagrees with the core principle of cause and effect. Please justify this. Don't shift the burden of proof and since this is contingent on what you said later I will stick to just rebutting this.
One such argument is the Steady State Theory which has been refuted by most scientists as implausible.
Another, if a transcendent being did not cause the universe and it came from nothing there can be no cause since nothing would have no cause or need of a cause.
Another is brute facts, that there is no explanation for a fact.
Another is the argument from quantum physics that "there can be effects without causes. And if quantum events do not need causes, then perhaps the universe doesn’t either." https://theosophical.wordpress.com/2012/05/22/do-quantum-mechanics-invalidate-the-causal-principle/
God exists outside of time.Justify this as well. Don't shift the burden of proof or beg the question.
If God created the physical universe then He would have to exist separate from the physical universe. Self-creation is a self-refuting term. So, if you believe the universe came into being and had a cause that cause would have to come outside the universe and be sufficient to create the universe.
Also, time has a beginning. The beginning of the universe is arguably times beginning. What would an eternal being need with time? He has no beginning and no end. We have a beginning. Anything that has a beginning in this physical universe can be explained in a time-relationship.
The claim I am making is that science relies on consistency/repeatability. How does a random chance happenstance chain of events create that sustainability and consistency?Even if I agree with your strawman neither is your worldview consistent with science. You have made that abundantly clear with the R. C. Sproul example. You assume there is a gardener but none shows up. You assume there is a God but none shows up.
What strawman? Does science rely on observation and repeatability? Does it rely on consistency to obtain scientific facts?
My worldview has what is necessary for consistency. How does willy nilly chance happenstance? You have not answered my questions. I am trying to understand how your worldview, apart from God, makes sense of these things.
“While the earth remains, Seedtime and harvest, And cold and heat, And summer and winter, And day and night Shall not cease.”
Colossians 1:17
17 He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.
The R.C. Sproul example/analogy just illustrates a very annoying fact, that there is a garden (the universe) yet no reasonable explanation given for it if there is no gardener. It is certainly an anomaly from anything we witness. When we see an ordered garden we witness its cause is due to someone planting it and usually sustaining it by looking after it.
Principles of mathematics such as natural laws are discovered, not invented.Difference between an invention and discovery? I am not going to challenge the constant shifting of the burden and lack of explanation unless that is all you got.
All I am pointing out to you is that it is most reasonable to believe that if I found a formula for something that is verified outside myself I would think someone else was responsible for it since it conveys information. If I saw a billboard that said "Next service station in 23 miles" I would assume someone put that information there rather than it just materialized for no reason. And 23 miles later when I drove by the service state I would know the information was correct.
Why are you asking that meaningful question?Shifting the burden of proof yet again. Are you going to answer it or is this the question game?
It is not me who is avoiding answering questions. I'm looking for your answers from your worldview because I do not believe you have reasons that make sense. So, I put your worldview on the spot. My explanation came after the barb, per below.
Meaning seems built into our reasoning. We search for it. The absurdity would be looking for meaning in a meaningless universe. We could arbitrarily make it up but at the end of the day, it is meaningless. So the question becomes why are you looking for meaning in a meaningless universe? Does it help you cope? For what reason - it is all meaningless anyway.You basically said there is x because y is absurd. Why would we find meaning in a y universe? This is not explaining nor even sufficiently answering the questions I am posing to you. You are basically deflecting like what you do almost every single scenario just because you can't answer simple questions. I know the answers are complicated but I would've thought you would've at least tried to explain your point of view.
My reasoning is that we are creatures of reason and meaning. It seems built into our DNA. If the universe has no meaning to it then we are creating something that has no ultimate meaning. Yet you continually look for meaning. You debate meaning on DebateArt.com.
As for the two points that I can't answer simple questions and explain my point of view, my point of view is the biblical God has created the universe and in looking to Him and His revelation I find logical answers; answers that make sense and confirm what I witness experientially. I see life coming from the living. I see a person coming from the personal. I see logic coming from logical beings. I see mindful beings coming from other mindful beings. I see those who love coming from others who love. I see those who appreciate beauty coming from others that appreciate beauty.
It is an explanation that satisfies what we witness.It satisfies your feelings. Your eye has no desire but your mind does. You have latched onto something instead of actually having a coherent system to make sure what you latch onto isn't flawed.
It satisfies my feelings? It is not a feeling. It is what I witness. I do not see humans coming from apes. I witness a human being giving birth to another human being. I do not see life coming from something lifeless. I see living being producing more living beings. I do not see a rock that is able to reason. I see human beings that are able to reason. With the last point, it brings to mind how something inorganic could produce something organic in the first place. I am waiting for your explanation. Will I have it?
So one view is capable of making sense of things because from experience we witness them happening and the other view is not.Making sense is also begging the question.
Actually experiencing it or seeing it happen is a factual confirmation.
If it wasn't clear to you whatever confirms God makes sense but what doesn't make sense to you.
I'm not exactly sure of what you are saying here but I will give you what I perceive you are saying.
I witness life coming from the living and God would be the necessary living Being that all other life came from.
Meaning to people who already agree with you they are going to feel like yeah this make sense but when it comes to people who disagree with you. You have to demonstrate it or else you are appealing to a crowd. Remember I don't believe in God so do explain yourself.
What I am saying is I have experiential evidence that what I think is confirmed by what I experience. With an atheist view what you think is not confirmed by what you witness, so you live contrary to experience. Atheists have theories that do not confirm what we witness and science built on scientism.
You just can't stop assuming God is true because it just makes sense. I know you believe in God I just want to know if you know it exists.
And you can't stop assuming that materialism and naturalism are true. You assume this even though it does not make sense from your foundational starting point - chance happenstance.
And the answer is baffling.Okay.I'm trying to get you to think of what is more reasonable, your foundational starting point or mine.Wait so are you implying you are not in no position in changing your mind? All I get from here is you do this while I will put nothing on the line. This has got to be anti-intellectualism. I don't think you will admit to valuing God over truth and say something like well they are both the same thing or something.
I know when someone starts attacking the man instead of the arguments they are bankrupt. This is what you just did.
What dog? Where did this notion of 'dog' as the greatest conceivable Being come from? If your dog spoke the universe into being what is your evidence that dog exists?dog exists outside of time.
That is just an assertion.
Now with God, you knew of Him long before I brought Him up, I'm sure.Is this an appeal to time? I am coining the word. You are using time as a measurement of you being correct. Time does not have the ability to do so unless we are discussing time specifically. We are not. We are speaking about God so this is an appeal to time or an appeal to tradition.
No, when you speak of God you have an image or thought of what constitutes God. Thus, you know of Him while you deny Him.
If so, present your evidence for your dog and why I should believe it.If you are not going to do it for God I won't do it for dog.
I presented various arguments in my previous post.
Again, you are assuming I have no evidence.That entire thing you just wrote was filled with appeal to tradition, anti-science and begging the question.
It was an appeal to the Bible as evidence as well as other arguments.
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@Tejretics
PS. I was wondering whether you agree with the comments of one atheist on the philosophic thread that God has nothing to do with philosophy since you bring up the subject?I haven’t seen the comment, but my guess is I don’t.Anyway, I’m not particularly interested in adjudicating the question of whether God exists. This thread was related more to comparing the relative strength of arguments against God’s existence than (1) discussing various arguments on both sides or (2) checking if this argument actually disproves God in the absolute, rather than relative to other atheistic arguments.
Again, for me, it is not so much the question of whether God exists as to which view of existence is more reasonable and makes better sense in explaining existence. You said in your OP that most arguments for God's existence fail. Well, that is exactly how I view most arguments for atheism.
To me, it seems that you want to discuss the merits against God's existence without examining any arguments for His existence which I find unfair. That is stacking the deck and since you created the thread it is in your purview to do so. I was very interested in your support for your position of atheism, however. You see, I don't see it as sound a position as you would have to believe it to be so, or else you would logically believe something entirely different, or just believe in spite of the evidence against your belief.
So I’m not going to put in much effort in responding to you; my apologies! (Feel free to have the discussion in this thread if you’d like, though, I’m sure other people are willing to engage.)
And I recognize that it is perfectly within your rights. I just am disappointed, however. I liken it to an absentee landlord whose tenants what to bring a grievance against him but he is never there to give an account or answer concerns.
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@TheRealNihilist
Sure we can create meaning but ultimately it means nothing.Why does it have to ultimately mean something?
Why are you asking that meaningful question?
Meaning seems built into our reasoning. We search for it. The absurdity would be looking for meaning in a meaningless universe. We could arbitrarily make it up but at the end of the day, it is meaningless. So the question becomes why are you looking for meaning in a meaningless universe? Does it help you cope? For what reason - it is all meaningless anyway.
But one view is consistent with experience, the other is not. So you live contrary to what you inwardly believe.This is begging the question again. I am not going to explain this because I have already given an answer earlier on that I would've used here.
It is an explanation that satisfies what we witness. The other view does not. So one view is capable of making sense of things because from experience we witness them happening and the other view is not. So, the other view begs the question.
?The two paragraphs after "There would be no intent. How does chaos and chance happenstance explain uniformity of nature and nature's sustainability?" are the same. That is all.
And the answer is baffling. Chance happenstance is nothing in the sense that it has no ABILITY. Chance is a mathematical probability that describes what can happen but how does it make something happen? Why does this point of singularity we call the Big Bang explode?
We could only know if God revealed this, which is what the Bible claims.Are you an agnostic?
No. The speculating is for your benefit. I'm trying to get you to think of what is more reasonable, your foundational starting point or mine.
The Bible reveals God spoke the universe into existence. He said, "Let there be light, and there was light."I found this book called dog and in it and I stated "Let there be bad and there was bad". Is that proof of the devil (evil God)?
What dog? Where did this notion of 'dog' as the greatest conceivable Being come from? If your dog spoke the universe into being what is your evidence that dog exists? Now with God, you knew of Him long before I brought Him up, I'm sure.
Since your notion is different and contrary to my notion at least one of us is wrong in our view. Would you grant that? If so, present your evidence for your dog and why I should believe it.
I am asking for an explanation from a worldview that discounts God and that is reasonable to believe.Please read the prior statement earlier. I stated give me an argument. You said there was arguments in the question themselves. Meaning instead of actually giving evidence for your worldview you instead resort to begging the question by ridiculing the other side. You pretty much implied your side is true without even proving it.
Again, you are assuming I have no evidence. The context in the Bible speaks of historical people, places and events. There is reason to believe at least some of these people, places and events existed because they have been confirmed or mentioned in other secular historical writings.
The time frame of prophecy is also reasonable to believe. The evidence for the OT writings precedes the NT writings. The prophecies contained in the OT come to pass as predicted. That is just another evidence that what was recorded came to pass as recorded.
The evidence for Jesus Christ and His resurrection is reasonable and believable. Numerous secular writings mention Him in various ways including giving information on how He died and what His followers thought for it was reported by these secular historians they believed He rose from the dead. There are also a number of things that sit well with the resurrection accounts and trying to explain them away runs into many difficulties.
As to the OT, the NT Jesus claims it speaks of Him from cover to cover. This typology is seen and explained throughout the NT and makes sense. The intricacy of it is overwhelming for those who are studied on the two covenants. Hundreds of examples could be given by me alone. So, what is said in the NT is backed up by the OT. The promised Messiah would have to come before the Old Covenant was done away with for the OT speaks of the Messiah coming to His OT people. The OT is largely concerned with God's relationship with specific people that He makes a covenant with and they agree to it (Exodus 24:3, 7). God warns these people of blessings and curses (Deuteronomy 28) and what would happen if they were disobedient. Throughout the OT we read of a disobedient people and of God warning these people of judgment as promised in Deuteronomy 28 if they did not repent and turn back to Him, per the covenant. He sends prophets and teachers to them and yet they still ignore and forsake Him. Thus, as prophesied, He brings the promised judgment for disobedience upon them. After AD 70 we no longer see these OT people as able to keep the covenant as stipulated in the Law of Moses. Thus, the prophecies of Jesus and the OT have come about in the exact manner they were said to.
Now, you may think all of this is coincidence or self-fulfilled prophecies but the evidence shows otherwise. I keep challenging others to dispute the evidence but seldom get any takers. I have even gone to the trouble of setting up threads on the subjective yet most have very scanty knowledge of prophecy.
There are also many questions about life and existence that have a reasonable answer biblically. The problem is a way too often that people who hear the evidence already have their minds made up. You can't convince someone who does not want to be convinced. They will think of one-thousand-and-one ways to what if you or deny the evidence.
If there is no intention behind the universe explain how and why it sustains itself and why it must?Why does the universe need intention?
Because if there is no reason or meaning why the universe exists why do we keep finding reasons and meaning in such a universe? Not only this but why would or how can something without intelligence, reason, or meaning sustain itself indefinitely?
I used the analogy of dice rolling themselves and constantly coming up with the same specific number. First, how do dice roll themselves? Second, how does the same number constantly appear (constants), without variation (i.e., natural laws) by random chance happenstance? The same number appearing over and over suggests something is fixed. Why would something be fixed if it is all random chance happenstance? Once you get over that hurdle we can carry on in investigating a blind, indifferent chance universe.
It matters because I can make sense of the 'why' with God and ultimately I do not believe an atheistic worldview can and remain consistent with its starting presupposition - no God.So what I am getting here is that it feels good to see the world in your way so you accept it?
My view f the universe gives a reasonable and sufficient explanation. I do not see yours making sense of anything from your core or foundational starting point (i.e., no mind).
My argument is that granting God these things become explainable and make sense.Begging the question yet again. You know you are not making an argument right?
Are you saying my argument makes no sense? I already gave reasons that are reasonable from my worldview position. I am asking you to do the same from yours that I may examine them.
How about we assume Devil (evil God) to be true? I feel like it explains the world.
Then present your arguments for the devil as reasonable to believe and any evidence that backs up your claims.
Morality makes sense if there is an unchanging, fixed, universal, absolute, ultimate reference point and measure. Without it why is your FEELING any better than mine?Yet again no argument.
My argument is why do your feelings trump mine if yours are as subjective as mine? So, I am asking for the reason that you feel your subjective opinion is any "better" than mine if it is all subjective and there is no fixed, universal identity for morals. Go ahead and explain why. You see, I am interested in how what you perceive as moral is anything other than your subjective preferences or likes? What makes those good? Again, if "good" has an identity then it can not be its opposite but only what it is. So what is it? Take a specific example and explain why it is good rather than just your subjective likes. I like ice-cream. You SHOULD like ice-cream. If you do not like ice-cream you should be put in prison. That is a description of my likes until I enter the word should, then it becomes a moral imperative and something that should be done whether I like it or not. That is what a preference is, a description. It expresses personal taste or something subjective. What should be the case expresses an objective value, something prescriptive.
You are basically saying my dad makes sense of strawberries. Without my dad how do I make sense of strawberries? I just picked up on this argument from authority. Instead of actually providing evidence God did this, you are saying God did this as an authority on the subject. While also shifting the burden of proof yet again.
I am saying that what your dad likes to eat has nothing to do with quantitative values. That is just a preference. It describes something subjective.
A moral ought describes something that should be, an objective. How do you arrive at a prescriptive from what is descriptive?
If you are wrong on origins how much more are you wrong on?You are in no position to question my position.
So, only my view is examinable? Yours is off-limits? That is a rather emotional answer. It attacks the man (me) rather than my argument. Thus, it is fallacious.
At least I don't lie about the reality of things.
How am I lying? You are getting very defensive.
You use the supernatural (unattainable thing) to support your arguments.
I reason we exist (meaning not only us but the universe and going back to the foundation of everything) either because of an original supernatural or natural cause. Can you think of another reason?
You use feelings to support your claims and an old book.
I use logic. I am suggesting one or the other and then I am asking the reason for your answer. The fact that you can't give one yet you eliminate God is not sufficient in my view.
Now, why existence? Why is there something rather than nothing?I don't know. Doesn't mean I will beg the question to be what I would like it to be. I would like to hear an argument instead of this constant deflection.
You don't know yet you look completely to a natural reason unless you include God (the supernatural). Most scientists beg only the natural explanation. Do you think they know better than you do or I do? Can they make sense of something rather than nothing other than through tautology?
How would you know since you deny God His existence, or at least ignore Him? What could I ever give to convince a person who does not want convincing? You would just find another reason to deny Him, another 'what if.'Who said anything about me? I specifically talked about science. Give your findings to science and see what they think of the supernatural. I am going under the suspicion you don't actually want to give your old book to science because you know they don't agree with the findings. If this is true then you are pretty much cherry picking what you understand through science to suit your agenda and discard what doesn't conform to it.
Again, you seem to think that science is the be-all and end-all of the discussion but I question in regards to origins if it is science or scientism. Do you know the difference?
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@TheRealNihilist
It either denies God/gods or it lives and looks at life as though none exists. Thus, its explanation of the universe is materialistic or naturalistic.How about if I take the view that things did exist before the big bang but it wasn't God?
That just takes the process back one step further.
It still does not explain whether the process is a) random chance happenstance or b) initiated by a mindful, intelligent, intentional Being.
I'm asking to make sense of why we can do science or why things continue to function or in the same manner (uniformly) so we can predict outcomes and make equations that explain the way these processes work?Please tell me how God conforms to cause and effect.
I like the scenario R. C. Sproul uses. Suppose we are exploring a new part of the globe and come across a fairly new hoed garden, organized in neat rows, with ten different crops just sprouting that we include in our diet, in the middle of the jungle. We assume that there is a gardener but after waiting a week no gardener shows up. We search everywhere and there is no sign of human life anywhere within hundreds of miles that would tend the garden. The jungle looks pristine except for this one patch of ground. We speculate on all kinds of things but the gardener dies the death of one thousand explanations. Does that mean there is no gardener? We have exhausted our explanation of reasonable causes of the garden's existence. Well, it still does not explain the existence of the garden.
God is an explanation for the universe. God is also a reasonable explanation for the universe. We can trace cause and effect back to a point in time yet no further. For a number of solid reasons, we speculate that the universe had a beginning. We see a causal effect of things up to that point yet no further. Since everything we witness has a beginning we reason it is logical based on the data that the universe has a cause as well. Of course, we can speculate that some things do not have a cause. Those things would be eternal. Is the universe one of those things? Evidence to date suggests otherwise. So we have to have a sufficient cause for the universe if the universe has a beginning. Was the Big Bang the cause of the universe? It begs the question of what caused the Big Bang and why did it happen? Is the explanation for the universe covered within the universe? Jim Wallace, a homicide crime detective who worked for the LA police force and is used to examining crime scenes would look at the scene of death from within the room to determine if the evidence pointed to suicide or murder. If the clues pointed to outside evidence the crime would be investigated as a homicide because the evidence pointed to someone outside the room causing the death.
So the question comes down to can the evidence within the universe point to a sufficient answer or not?
Now, if you are asking if God conforms to cause and effect how can an eternal being have a cause? God exists outside of time.
If God doesn't God has no support in science unless you are making the claim it created it. At that point please stop begging the question and prove to me God exists instead of assuming it is true.
The claim I am making is that science relies on consistency/repeatability. How does a random chance happenstance chain of events create that sustainability and consistency? I am asking for a reasonable explanation from you. I am questioning whether you can provide one that makes sense of science from your foundational starting point - a universe without intent nor intelligence.
Well, granted it does not depend on any of our minds because these principles work whether we think themI did not grant this. Explain yourself.
2 + 2 = 4. Is that always true or can it ever be false? If so, in what universe? Thus, it seems to be a universal truth and something that does not just depend on your mind or mine thinking it. It seems self-evident and necessary and yet it requires mindfulness to think it. Principles of mathematics such as natural laws are discovered, not invented. They take minds to think them yet they are discovered not invented unless you can show that they only exist because you or I think them. The problem is they were operating before we discovered them or thought about them. Thus, we seem to be discovering someone else's thoughts before us. They don't seem to depend as to their explanation on any one human being or human origin since we discover them. We fit these principles into formulas or simple equations such as for gravity --> g = GM/r 2, or the force of gravity on earth --> F g = mg.
The equation for the force of gravity is
That, to me shows the economy and simplicity of God and yet also His complex and incomprehensible mind. Thus, in science, we seem to think God's thoughts after Him.
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@SirAnonymous
I agree. It's just that I can't prove it's valid. Yes, it applies everywhere. Yes, it's self-evident. However, can you prove that it's self-evident or that it applies everywhere? We are forced to assume those things in order to make sense of the world, but even that assumes that the universe can be made sense of.
Try communicating without using the laws of logic. You can't make sense without using them. Words convey meaning and words convey identity. Something is either true or it is not true. It can't both be true and false at the same time and in the same manner. When I say the dog that does not mean the cat. A dog has a meaning and identity that we must understand to communicate effectively.
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@SirAnonymous
I agree. It's just that I can't prove it's valid. Yes, it applies everywhere. Yes, it's self-evident. However, can you prove that it's self-evident or that it applies everywhere? We are forced to assume those things in order to make sense of the world, but even that assumes that the universe can be made sense of.
Is not the necessity of logic proof enough (it is self-evidently necessary)?
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@TheRealNihilist
Not only questions but they are questions to an atheistic worldview.Care to tell me this worldview?
It either denies God/gods or it lives and looks at life as though none exists. Thus, its explanation of the universe is materialistic or naturalistic.
How does chaos and chance happenstance explain uniformity of nature and nature's sustainability?Please put this in more simpler terms. Are you saying how did this universe form without a God?
I'm asking to make sense of why we can do science or why things continue to function or in the same manner (uniformly) so we can predict outcomes and make equations that explain the way these processes work? In a random chance universe, why should things continue in the same way that we and every other human being have experienced them as happening or could reason out the process? There would be no reason for the process. It would be willy nilly.
Randon chance happenstance would be similar to expecting dice to roll by themselves without any intention in them rolling and then expecting them to continually roll the same number millions and billions of times without exception. While such principles can work theoretically they do not work experientially. If you think they do, then roll six exclusively one million times in a row with the same number coming up each time and without intentionally fixing the dice. Thus, unless the dice are fixed do you think you would be able to do this?
Now, with intentionality, you could rig the dice to perform the same outcome every time.
But we formulate mathematical equations that are not invented by us.Who invented this?
That would depend on whether you believe we discover these principles of mathematics that explain the way things function, these natural laws such as gravity or the laws of thermodynamics? Or do you believe we invent them? Do you believe they do not exist without our thinking them?
Well, granted it does not depend on any of our minds because these principles work whether we think them or not it would be reasonable to believe they depend on a necessary mind - God. Thus, there is a reason that we discover them. We, being made in the image and likeness of God think His thoughts after Him. We discover something in the process of how He makes or sustains the universe.
Not only this but we continually seek meaning in what, by atheist standards, would be chance happenstance, an ultimately meaningless universe.You can seek meaning in an ultimately meaningless universe, do you disagree?
Sure we can create meaning but ultimately it means nothing.
Experientially and practically, you keep confirming these things are true, although theoretically and presumptuously you live contrary to those two qualities.You saying it is true doesn't demonstrate it to be the case.
But one view is consistent with experience, the other is not. So you live contrary to what you inwardly believe.
I'm not following.What you said in the paragraph that starts with "2 + 2 = 4 means nothing to a tree or rock" is something you covered in the last paragraph. Things exist outside our mind which was the essence of the two paragraphs which is why I didn't cover it.
?
Mindless, unintentional, purposeless, pointless, irrational, indifferent chance happenstance.Explain how God did so is a more compelling argument.I'll entertain the strawman just here.
We could only know if God revealed this, which is what the Bible claims. Now, if the Bible is what it claims it would, in and of itself, have confirmations that what is said is true or reasonable to believe. I believe I can show that it is reasonable and logical in that history, experientially, philosophically that it does.
The Bible reveals God spoke the universe into existence. He said, "Let there be light, and there was light."
Thus, the created order came from His mind. He thought it into existence. It was no more difficult to God than a thought.
That argument is, make sense of ultimately anything from a chance, chaotic, random, happenstance universe, one without a mind behind it that wills it and sustains it.So you were begging the question? Instead of actually presenting an argument you are assuming it to be true without evidence.
I am asking for an explanation from a worldview that discounts God and that is reasonable to believe. How does that beg the question? If there is no intention behind the universe explain how and why it sustains itself and why it must?
Again, there would be no reason why, yet I bet you can think of many. Immediately you would think of why in terms of gravity and other factors like the distance between bodies like stars and planets and galaxies, in relation to gravitations pulls, etc, etc.
First, with a chance happenstance universe what is the why? It just is. And why should there be a how or what?Why does why matter to you?
It matters because I can make sense of the 'why' with God and ultimately I do not believe an atheistic worldview can and remain consistent with its starting presupposition - no God.
Do you want there to be a God or are you finally going to give an argument for once?
It is not a question of wanting or not wanting but whether there is a God. My argument is that granting God these things become explainable and make sense.
Morality makes sense if there is an unchanging, fixed, universal, absolute, ultimate reference point and measure. Without it why is your FEELING any better than mine?
The reason why you can ask how or what is because we can use what we know to understand what and how occurs.
But do you know or understand origins? If you are wrong on origins how much more are you wrong on?
Asking why requires to know the person doing it.
Why does the earth rotate around the sun? Gravitational pulls causes the orbit (or God as the reason behind gravity).
Why did the mouse eat the poison bait? It was hungry. Did that require I know the person for the explanation?
Why does the water rise at high tide? Because of the gravitational pull of the moon. Does that require I know a person?
Now, why existence? Why is there something rather than nothing?
I don't think you have a connection to God. If you did please present it to science as our best way to find observable evidence.
How would you know since you deny God His existence, or at least ignore Him? What could I ever give to convince a person who does not want convincing? You would just find another reason to deny Him, another 'what if.'
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@SirAnonymous
I used this argument in a different forum and decided that it needs its own topic simply because it is so unusual and counter-intuitive.There is no way to be certain that logic is valid. We can divide any possible argument into the two categories of logical and illogical. Since anything that is not logical is by definition illogical, and vice versa, these are the only two possible categories. My argument follows inevitably from these simple and indisputable premises.P1: Every argument is either logical or illogical.P2: Any attempt to use logic to prove that logic is valid is circular, because the use of logic presumes that logic is valid.C1: It is impossible to use logic to prove that logic is valid.P3: Any attempt to use illogic to prove that logic is valid is inherently contradictory.C2: It is impossible to use illogic to prove the validity of logic.C3: Because of P1, C1, and C2, there is no possible argument that can prove that logic is valid.As a result, no matter how self-evident logic seems or how well it is supported by the evidence, we cannot prove that logic is valid because such arguments are logical and therefore circular. Since it is impossible to be certain that logic is valid, and since all knowledge is dependent on the validity of logic, it is impossible to be absolutely certain that knowledge is true. Consequently, knowledge cannot exist, since any knowledge would be based on the uncertain assumption that logic is valid.So what do you think? I'm guessing we all agree that logic is valid, but do you think it's possible to prove that logic is valid? Is my reasoning correct, or does it have a flaw(s)?In other words, can we prove logic is valid, or do we just have to assume that it's valid out of necessity?
Logic is NECESSARY for making sense of anything. You need to assume it to communicate or prove anything else. Thus, it is a self-evident truth.
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@TheRealNihilist
There would be no intent. How does chaos and chance happenstance explain uniformity of nature and nature's sustainability? One of the reasons science works is because we have confidence that things will work like they have in the past, thus predictability. If there is no mind or intention behind the universe why should we expect that to be the case? Why should we be able to find reasons for such a universe?These are just questions.
They seek understanding.
Not only questions but they are questions to an atheistic worldview. They seek to find out how from the atheist perspective, origins can be made sense of reasonably.
Either the universe owns its existence to a mindful Being, beings, or it is a product of chance. So, what is the reason for each view and how logical and logically consistent is it?
If there is no ultimate mind behind the universe why should we look for meaning and why do we continue to find it?Not an argument for God. Saying people find meaning has no link to God. If you happen to find a link to God.
But we formulate mathematical equations that are not invented by us. We discover these meaningful, to us, PRINCIPLES.
Not only this but we continually seek meaning in what, by atheist standards, would be chance happenstance, an ultimately meaningless universe.
We continue to live as if things matter. The majority of humanity, through existence, continue to seek out God or gods as the answer. Although that proves nothing conclusively in itself (an argument from popularity), it does bring to mind why we do this. We continually live as though things matter so inconsistent with chance happenstance.
They seem to ring true whether we exist or not.There is absolutely no way to verify this to be true.
Experientially and practically, you keep confirming these things are true, although theoretically and presumptuously you live contrary to those two qualities.
The 2 + 2 = 4 paragraph is in essence a repeat of the last paragraph.
I'm not following.
Thus, to date, God is a more reasonable and likely explanation than chance happenstance.Describe to me the contrary position as in the not God argument.
Mindless, unintentional, purposeless, pointless, irrational, indifferent chance happenstance.
If it wasn't clear I am not a fan of your questions. Instead of actually presenting an argument for your side you instead resort to condemning the other. Why not make a compelling argument instead of shifting the burden of proof?
The questions themselves present an argument. That argument is, make sense of ultimately anything from a chance, chaotic, random, happenstance universe, one without a mind behind it that wills it and sustains it.
First, with a chance happenstance universe what is the why? It just is. And why should there be a how or what?
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@Tejretics
PS. I was wondering whether you agree with the comments of one atheist on the philosophic thread that God has nothing to do with philosophy since you bring up the subject?
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@Tejretics
I’ve come to think, however, that possibly the strongest argument against God’s existence—of course, it is very much rebut-able, and it is fairly straightforward to have a long debate about it—is prima facie unlikelihood.
I, contrarily, think one of the best arguments for God is the unlikelihood of the universe without God, a necessary Being.
There would be no intent. How does chaos and chance happenstance explain uniformity of nature and nature's sustainability? One of the reasons science works is because we have confidence that things will work like they have in the past, thus predictability. If there is no mind or intention behind the universe why should we expect that to be the case? Why should we be able to find reasons for such a universe?
If there is no ultimate mind behind the universe why should we look for meaning and why do we continue to find it? We can explain natural functions like gravity and thermodynamics with mathematical formulas. Mathematics is a product of minds. A tree or rock does not think, let alone think in terms of mathematical probabilities. We discover these principles, we do not invent them. They seem to ring true whether we exist or not. Without your particular mind of my mind, they would still be true. Yet they require mindfulness. So the meaning seems built into the universe. The anthropic principle seems like the best explanation.
2 + 2 = 4 means nothing to a tree or rock, yet it is a principle that can be nothing but what it is and is dependent on mindful beings thinking it yet it does not depend on any particular human mind for its existence. Thus, if you have two objects and add two more then you have four objects. Thus, 2 + 2 = 4 is an eternal truth that depends on mindful beings since it cannot be other than what it is unless you want to argue that it can be something other than 4 practically? Since it does not depend on any human mind and we discover these principles to make sense of our world and universe then God is a reasonable explanation.
Thus, to date, God is a more reasonable and likely explanation than chance happenstance.
What about morality? How does relativism equal good? How can a relative, subjective, changing standard make sense of good? We see even in our cultures of Canada and the USA a changing view on what is good. We see what was once taboo, bad, and a moral outrage now embarrassed as good, acceptable, the moral norm. We see other cultures or societies or subgroups disagreeing with ours. That begs the question of what is actually good? Logically, how can two opposing views both be true and right at the same time and regarding the same issue when they contradict? And what is the identity of good in such cases? How can its identity be the opposite of what it is or the contrary depending on who thinks it?
Is it more reasonable to believe that life comes from non-life and what is the evidence other than a naturalistic or materialistic mind frame? how does this happen? We never witness life coming from non-life. Thus, we have to assume it.
Why do we continue to find information and order that seems unlikely from chance happenstance? What kind of information would you expect to find from a random explosion? It would produce chaos.
What we witness is mindfulness coming from other mindful beings.
We see meaning coming from the meaningful.
We see intelligence coming from intelligent mindful beings.
We see life coming from the living.
Thus, the chance happenstance universe continually fails the experiential test. You can think it but you can't live by it. It is inconsistent with daily living and what we witness.
***
So I have not seen these questions adequately met by an atheistic worldview to date. Mostly they are ignored. I would be grateful for your explanation and a discussion on these and other issues since you are a thoughtful person, judging from pass encounters on DDO where I read your responses.
This isn’t quite the same as Occam’s razor or Russell’s teapot or whatever—it’s not about burdens of proof per se. It’s just that, other things equal, it seems bizarre that the universe is created and/or ruled by an interventionist humanlike giant. And we should have a strong prior against that.
As put forth above, I think the opposite is true. It seems bazaar that a chance universe would produce meaning, mindfulness, information, sustainability, and order. And it is not like God is created in the likeness of human beings but rather the opposite. That is, humanity is created in the image and likeness of God, not in a physical sense since God is Spirit, but in our mental capacity to think, reason, love, find purpose and meaning.
So if we’re considering God’s existence from a Bayesian perspective, where H is the hypothesis that God exists and e is any evidence in favor of God, P(H) is low, so P(e | H) would have to be pretty high and P(e | ~H) would have to be pretty low for an argument in favor of God’s existence to not work.
Again, we approach the problem of existence from two different mindsets or worldview. I would argue that yours is inconsistent with the way things are and how they got to be that way.
Not only this but if the Bible is what it claims to be then you would expect confirmations of what it says in regards to history and the sciences, not scientism, since the universe would be created by God's will and exists because of His providence and mercy and it is explained by God. Thus, you would have a fixed source for morality, meaning, purpose, truth, epistemology, etc.
(I am aware of other relatively strong arguments against God’s existence – for example, that God’s existence is possibly incompatible with B theories of time, which special relatively points in the direction of; that minds are processes that could require time as a prerequisite; that God is an efficient cause and not a simultaneous one, and that time is a prerequisite for that, so efficient causation of the universe of any kind is incoherent; various versions “reverse modal ontological arguments,” e.g., God being necessarily existent entails that the universe exists necessarily, which either it doesn’t or it does while contradicting God’s existence; some of the more abstract work in the philosophical literature about God’s spatial location. I nonetheless think the basic Bayesian argument might be stronger.)
We humans live and exist and experience in the A-theory of time whereas God exists in the B-theory of time. We experience life in a physical manner where we begin to exist (a timeline) whereas God is a spiritual Being and since He is timeless He sees the physicality of time events before Him in the present. Past, present, and future are all the present to God in that He sees the whole of time in the present, now. Everything in the physical universe is laid bare before Him and since He created and put this universe into existence He understands it in all its aspects. We, as humans only see it in part (limited) and our experience is guided largely by the physicality of our universe and our existence. It has a beginning. God does not, thus timeless. God's existence is not physical although, in the living Word, the Son, He stepped into His creation and experienced the temporal. The Bible, at various times speaks of two worlds, two kingdoms, two realms (or the kingdom of God versus the kingdoms of the world) of which the realm of God is the greater and everlasting realm.
I probably won’t respond to anything on this thread, but in case you’re interested in discussing with others. This also isn’t a strong opinion or one I’ve thought about too deeply.
That is a shame. It is a peeve of mine when someone initiates a thread that I am interested in, make interesting comments, then step back from it and take little accountability for what they have said. I am glad to see that you have continued to answer questions and respond to comments, however.
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@3RU7AL
If this is going where I think it is going regarding the unborn, the unborn is not guilty but innocent of any wrongdoing.The blastocyst/zygote/embryo/fetus has the exact same legal status as a tumor and or a parasite.
It should not. This is systematic discrimination by making it something it is not.
What is done to any tumor and or parasite that resides INSIDE my body is my business and my business alone.
Once you dehumanize the unborn to nothing more than a parasite or tumour you have the licence to do with it as you please. This is the tactic used by Hitler during WWII regarding the Jews and was copied by Margret Sanger regarding Planned Parenthood in demonizing the unborn. Many have made note of the similarities.
"So how do you get a country to allow humans to be treated worse than animals? You use euphemisms to convince people that these actions are justifiable, or even beneficial."
"The Jews were described as a “parasitic race” by Hitler, while the unwanted child is described “a mere parasite” by Planned Parenthood."
I have done some research on Planned Parenthood by reading as much as I could that was free on the Net about her. Her thoughts on the unborn have been confirmed time and time again and there are many comparisons between her thinking of the unborn and Hitler's thinking about the Jew. I also did some research on Hitler, including reading Mein Kampf. I have read some of the literature available on the Nurenburg trials and also read some of the laws and propaganda disseminated by the Nazis before and during the war. I have understood how people discriminate against other people by dehumanizing them and discriminating against them. This is exactly the kind of thing Pro-choicer's do with the parasitic and tumour language.
"The bodies of the murdered Auschwitz inmates were referred to as “garbage.” Jews were repeatedly referred to as a “disease,” for which extermination was the “cure” or “final solution.”"
"In America’s death camps the victim is usually called a “fetus,” but they have also been called “unseen infections,” “a sexually transmitted disease” and “a cancerous growth”. Abortion supporters have stated that abortion is the “preferred treatment” for “unwanted pregnancy: the number two sexually transmitted disease” and “an aborted baby is just garbage.”"
"In 1943, Himmler referred to the killing of Jews as having “exterminated a germ,” and abortion advocate Natalie Shainess justifies abortion by claiming that the unwanted pregnancy is merely “an alien germ.”
" Hitler actively promoted the destruction of the crippled, poor and unemployed classes, as did Margaret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood. Abortion led to forced sterilization, which led to “euthanasia,” which led to Auschwitz."
“Eugenics is the most adequate and thorough avenue to the solution of racial, political and social problems.”
Margaret Sanger, Founder of Planned Parenthood
If I want to keep it, I can keep it.If I want to have it removed surgically, that is my right.It is not a CITIZEN.Yes, it is "alive" in exactly the same way a tumor is alive and a parasite is alive.HoWEver, it is not a CITIZEN.
It is not recognized as a citizen because of the propaganda machine and a liberal view that does not recognize all human beings as a personal being or does not even recognize some human beings as human beings.
Roe v. Wade changed the way we thought about the unborn as a personal being. Its reasoning has been demonstrated as unwarranted because Justice Blackmun misinterpreted the nineteenth century laws and what they thought of the unborn.
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@PressF4Respect
It depends if that something is intentional and malicious by another person.So if something is done to a woman’s body that is against her wishes, the perpetrator is immoral. Correct?
If this is going where I think it is going regarding the unborn, the unborn is not guilty but innocent of any wrongdoing.
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@3RU7AL
The Bible also makes it clear that it is wrong to have sex outside of marriage.Interesting side-note,The Bible permits divorce and remarriage ONLY when a spouse has been unfaithful before marriage, and it’s not revealed until afterwards. There are no scriptures that permit divorce for adultery—only fornication. [LINK]
Okay, I read your link. Let me give you my view. I was/am not aware of this "before" bit.
Matthew 19:8-9
8 He *said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses permitted you to divorce your wives; but from the beginning it has not been this way. 9 And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife, except for immorality, and marries another woman commits adultery.”
Thus, God gives one exception for remarriage, immorality. Sexual immorality/adultery.
Marriage has spiritual significance for the Christian and a lesson for all of us. Those two points are God's intent in Eden in which God says a man shall leave his parents and be united with his wife and the two will become one flesh. God gives us an example of a physical union that points to a greater truth, a spiritual truth. God gives the example of Adam and Eve as an teaching of far greater significance, our spiritual union with Him. So marriage is a sacred union - a covenant. It is an intimate union between two people and also a lifetime commitment/covenant, until death.
Adultery is being unfaithful to that union or covenant.
God, in the OT, compares Himself to a husband under a covenant. Yet, when Israel (the northern kingdom) commits adultery He divorces her. And Judah also commits adultery and God continually warns her of her promiscuity and warns of the consequences. Finally, in the NT God divorces her too, and takes for Himself a new wife (the Bride of Christ) as He promised He would in the OT. The destruction of Jerusalem and the judgment of Israel in AD 70 is God's letter of divorce against them for adultery. That covenant with OT Israel came to an end in AD 70. After that point in time, Israel (as a whole, not specifically speaking of the Northern Kingdom which had previously been divorced) was no longer able to keep the covenant in the manner they had agreed to do. They could no longer meet the atonement of sin in the prescribed manner after that point in time. They no longer had the representation of the High Priest as their mediator after that point. There was no longer offered animal sacrifices for sin after that point. The feast days could not be met in a specifically prescribed manner as laid out by the Law of Moses.
Thus Jesus could say,
Matthew 5:17-18 (NASB)
17 “Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish but to fulfill. 18 For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished.
In AD 70 their heaven and earth passed away, everything they lived under and experienced under the covenant came to an end. Now, the letters of the law could no longer be met for the very reason that there was now a better covenant that God had established with humanity, the "new Israel of God," the new Bride, a covenant for NT believers, whether Jew or Gentile.
***
So, even God divorces and remarriage for adultery. He is our example.
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@3RU7AL
It is a test. God wants to illustrate what Moses does as a lesson for others.If you know exactly what the person is going to say, then it isn't a "test", it's manipulation and it's also still a lie.
God does know exactly what a person is going to say and do, but the person does not. He wants the person to show his faith or lack of it. There are consequences to which path we take.
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@PressF4Respect
A married woman can willingly yield or submit the control of her body to that of her husband during sex. It is wrong for a man to forcefully take control of a woman's body against her will. The Bible also makes it clear that it is wrong to have sex outside of marriage.Would you say that the woman losing the ability to control her own body is a major reason why rape is a bad thing?
Sometimes lustful feelings are promoted by what the woman wears, thus the Bible discloses inappropriate clothing is wrong because it creates these desires. Yet it is still not right for a man to forcefully control her body for his pleasures/desires without her consent.
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@3RU7AL
God told Moses He would bring judgment upon them fully knowing that Moses would intercede for His people.This is called a lie. If I threaten someone with something I know they will protest and then pretend they convinced me not to do it, then my initial statement is a lie.
It is a test. God wants to illustrate what Moses does as a lesson for others. The covenant God made with Israel in which they agreed to follow and did not stipulates that curses would follow from disobedience. But God is teaching that there is a way that sometimes changes the situation. That gamechanger is the intercession of a righteous person. It shows loving concern for others and puts their best interests before the person's own interests.
Proverbs 10:11-13 (NASB)
11 The mouth of the righteous is a fountain of life,
But the mouth of the wicked conceals violence.
12 Hatred stirs up strife,
But love covers all transgressions.
13 On the lips of the discerning, wisdom is found,
But a rod is for the back of him who lacks understanding.
But the mouth of the wicked conceals violence.
12 Hatred stirs up strife,
But love covers all transgressions.
13 On the lips of the discerning, wisdom is found,
But a rod is for the back of him who lacks understanding.
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@PressF4Respect
Okay! Now is this case against me?No. It's not personal in the slightest.
Just wondering since I have no clue what it is about yet.
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@PressF4Respect
We now have our first point:God (OT and NT God are the same) is a perfect moral being whose unchanging Word not only forms the basis of morality, but whose commands are always moral. Those who disagree/go against his word are immoral.I will set this to the side for the time being. In the meantime, let me ask you an unrelated question:Is rape bad? If so, why?
Yes, it treats a person created in God's image and likeness with more than disrespect. Sexual union is not consensual. It is a brutal act of selfishness that forces another person (the woman or victim) to do what they do not want to do to fulfill an unhealthy desire. The outcome causes problems and scars both lives, the perpetrator and the victim. The perpetrator does not honour another human being but treats her (or him) as an object in which nothing else matters but the perps desires. He, in the case of a male perp, does not have a healthy outlook about the woman and women in general but a disorder.
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@3RU7AL
God is presenting Moses with an if/then choice for Moses to consider, if Moses will intercede for his people, full knowing what Moses' response will be then He will change His mind. Moses does what God required, thus God did not bring judgment.If a human did the exact same thing, it would be called a lie.If I told a kid they'd have to eat worms, and I expected them to protest, and then I "changed my mind" when they calmly explained that they'd prefer ice-cream (as I had predicted beforehand) then my initial statement would quite clearly and obviously qualify as a LIE.
Israel had wronged God. They had broken their covenant promise (Exodus 24:3, 7). God told Moses He would bring judgment upon them fully knowing that Moses would intercede for His people. The lesson is that Moses' intercession appeared to change God's mind, although the intercession is what God was after in the first place. God did not change His mind. He already knew what Moses would do, yet to Moses, it seemed that way. It is a lesson to us and those OT people. Humility (confessing the sinful actions), and asking (prayer) for God's mercy by seeking Him out will at times change our circumstances because of God's grace. Once our sins have reached their measure of God's tolerance He will bring judgment. In the NT the Christian witnesses this by God's discipline. I notice this all the time in my life when I am sinful. There are areas that I battle against and have weaknesses that God works upon as He does with all Christians. It is training towards holiness (being sanctified by the Holy Spirit) and living in love with God. I witness undesirable circumstances when I sin that tend to compound until I confess and change my behaviour. It is not God who changes but it is me. I turn back to Him and His ways when I stray from His paths/ways.
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@PressF4Respect
Okay! Now is this case against me?When I finish building my case, it will reveal itself
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@PressF4Respect
Thanks for the clarification!No prob!So, is your case for the Christian God?My case isn’t directly about god at all.
Well, then I wait for you to bring it.
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@3RU7AL
But not only this, Jesus shows that hatred and lust for women are also the same as murder and adultery...Are you suggesting that people should be thrown into prison for thought-crimes?
What I am saying is that God judges our motives and thoughts.
What I am saying is that we do not meet the righteous requirements of God on our own merit. I know I don't and I know you do not.
Thus, we need a sacrifice that meets that requirement on our behalf. The sacrifice of our 'good' works, our merit, what we do, does not measure up to God's righteousness.
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@3RU7AL
How then do we explain verses that seem to say that God does change His mind? Verses such as Genesis 6:6, “The LORD was grieved that He had made man on the earth, and His heart was filled with pain.” Also, Exodus 32:14 proclaims, “Then the LORD relented and did not bring on His people the disaster He had threatened.” These verses speak of the Lord “repenting” or “relenting” of something and seem to contradict the doctrine of God’s immutability.Another passage that is often used to show that God changes His mind is the story of Jonah. Through His prophet, God had told Nineveh He would destroy the city in forty days (Jonah 3:4). However, Nineveh repented of their sin (verses 5–9). In response to the Assyrians’ repentance, God relented: “He had compassion and did not bring upon them the destruction He had threatened” (verse 10). [LINK]So your argument is basically that your god is a liar? Does your god say they're going to destroy stuff even when they know that isn't true?
Heaven forbid. Not at all.
I'm saying that the Hebraic biblical word in Genesis 6:6 translated to English "repentance" or "regretted" have other meanings that better explain the passage that is not contrary to His immutability.
In the case of Exodus 32:14, God is presenting Moses with an if/then choice for Moses to consider, if Moses will intercede for his people, full knowing what Moses' response will be then He will change His mind. Moses does what God required, thus God did not bring judgment.
7 Then the Lord spoke to Moses, “Go down at once, for your people, whom you brought up from the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves. 8 They have quickly turned aside from the way which I commanded them. They have made for themselves a molten calf, and have worshiped it and have sacrificed to it and said, ‘This is your god, O Israel, who brought you up from the land of Egypt!’” 9 The Lord said to Moses, “I have seen this people, and behold, they are an obstinate people. 10 Now then let Me alone, that My anger may burn against them and that I may destroy them; and I will make of you a great nation.”
God was presenting His case against Israel's idolatry. He was waiting for Moses to present his case and intercede for His people. If Moses would not do that God would bring judgment. God fully knows what Moses will do that. Moses presents his case, then God tells him because of what Moses has said ('then') He will not bring judgment but spare them.
11 Then Moses entreated the Lord his God, and said, “O Lord, why does Your anger burn against Your people whom You have brought out from the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand? 12 Why should the Egyptians speak, saying, ‘With evil intent He brought them out to kill them in the mountains and to destroy them from the face of the earth’? Turn from Your burning anger and change Your mind about doing harm to Your people. 13 Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, Your servants to whom You swore by Yourself, and said to them, ‘I will multiply your descendants as the stars of the heavens, and all this land of which I have spoken I will give to your descendants, and they shall inherit it forever.’” 14 So the Lord changed His mind about the harm which He said He would do to His people.
Thus, from Moses' perspective it appears that God changed His mind, even though God knew what Moses would do.
The lesson, prayer was effective in preventing God's judgment. Now, the whole world has sinned and is guilty before God yet prayer can change their fate, which God is fully aware of and fully aware of the outcome.
and My people who are called by My name humble themselves and pray and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, THEN I will hear from heaven, will forgive their sin and will heal their land.
Now for the rest of the relevance from the passage:
13 If I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or if I command the locust to devour the land, or if I send pestilence among My people,
Thus, from their perspective, God changing His mind was conditional on what they did. Their prayer, humility, and seeking God changed the outcome since God in Deuteronomy 28 presented an if/then promise, either blessings or curses.
A further lesson, the Old Covenant was an if/then covenant. It was a covenant of works or their merit in living up to God's commands. Blessings if they did and curses if they did not. Another way of saying this is IF they were obedient THEN they would receive blessings and IF they were disobedient THEN He would bring judgment.
The lesson from the New Covenant is a different message. It does NOT depend on what we do or have done, it depends on what Another [Jesus] has done. Thus, it does NOT depend on our works or merit but on the merit of Another [Jessu]. Thus, the New Covenant is a covenant of grace, God's grace for those who believe in Jesus and His merit/work. Our salvation CANNOT be attributed to anything righteous we have done so that we could boast about it. Our boasting is on that of Another [Jesus].
Not only this, the Word, the Son becomes a Man to meet the righteous requirements of the Law of Moses so that they, nor we, would have to. God demonstrates throughout the OT that they were incapable of keeping the legal requirements of the law.
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@PressF4Respect
Are you developing a case against the biblical God or are you interested in my thinking?A bit of the latter, not at all the former (at least for this thread).<br>
Okay, thanks for the clarification!
Now, may I ask what is the purpose of all these questions?I’m building a case. Not against the God of the Bible (it may seem like it initially, but it’s not).
So, is your case for the Christian God?
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