| Topic: |
Religions > Atheism |
| User: |
"Eris" |
| Date: |
28 Nov 2007 04:13:14 PM |
| Object: |
Is there "proof" against the existence of God? |
Quote from fairly rational theist in Atheist vs. Christian forum
There's no proof against the veracity of the Bible or
the existence of God
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| User: "Greywolf" |
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| Title: Re: Is there "proof" against the existence of God? |
29 Nov 2007 06:53:44 AM |
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"Eris" <vithant@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:8543267d-dd47-4cd0-a95d-055967aac763@x69g2000hsx.googlegroups.com...
Quote from fairly rational theist in Atheist vs. Christian forum
There's no proof against the veracity of the Bible or
the existence of God
The bible has its problems, as far as biblical 'inerrantists go, in the fact
that not a *single* 'original' book of the bible was, demonstrably, cared
enough about by the deity claimed to have 'divinely inspired' its
composition to have been 'safeguard' for posterity and the legitimate
charges of being 'corrupted'. Not a single book. Says a lot, doesn't it?
As for being 'without error': Try comparing Mark 15:25 versus John 19:14.
Let the bible literalists even *attempt* to prove that Nebuchadnezzar laid
waste to the island-city of Tyre as 'prophesied' in Ezekiel, chapter 26. Let
the bible literalists show how Jesus, using his very own words in Matthew
12:40, spent 'three days AND three nights' in the heart of the earth', ect.
Let the Christian historian find extra-biblical evidence for the historicity
of Matthew 27:50-53. Let the Christian theologian *rationally* explain how
Jesus and 'God' are the very same deity and yet Jesus be the 'first-born' of
all creation (Col. 1:15) and without any 'beginning' whatsoever.
As for the non-existence of 'God': The theist is the one who came out with
the assertion (and with great insistence) that a 'God' exists yet cannot
prove it, falling back instead on the positively unsubstantiated position
that 'faith' proves there's a 'God'.
Isn't the fact that not *one* single human being who's ever taken a breath
of life of planet earth -- including the greatest of our 'Christian'
scientists -- has been able to prove the existence of deity, *any* deity,
proof enough that such a creature resides only in man's imagination?
Greywolf
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| User: "" |
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| Title: Re: Is there "proof" against the existence of God? |
29 Nov 2007 09:24:18 AM |
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"Eris" <vithant@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:8543267d-dd47-4cd0-a95d-055967aac763@x69g2000hsx.googlegroups.com...
Quote from fairly rational theist in Atheist vs. Christian forum
There's no proof against the veracity of the Bible or
the existence of God
OK, I just have complete faith there is no Skypixie.
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| User: "Bill M" |
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| Title: Re: Is there "proof" against the existence of God? |
29 Nov 2007 05:05:53 AM |
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"Eris" <vithant@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:8543267d-dd47-4cd0-a95d-055967aac763@x69g2000hsx.googlegroups.com...
Quote from fairly rational theist in Atheist vs. Christian forum
There's no proof against the veracity of the Bible or
the existence of God
Gross illogic. The only evidence for the non-existence of anything is the
lack of evidence of its existence.
There is NO-NADA objective verifiable evidence demonstrating the veracity of
the Bibles
or the existence of ANY Gods.
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| User: "Bill M" |
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| Title: Re: Is there "proof" against the existence of God? |
28 Nov 2007 11:23:14 AM |
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"Eris" <vithant@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:8543267d-dd47-4cd0-a95d-055967aac763@x69g2000hsx.googlegroups.com...
Quote from fairly rational theist in Atheist vs. Christian forum
There's no proof against the veracity of the Bible or
the existence of God
Proof of something's none existence is the total lack of evidence for its
existence.
A negative cannot be proven positively.
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| User: "Geoff" |
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| Title: Re: Is there "proof" against the existence of God? |
28 Nov 2007 04:49:23 PM |
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Bill M wrote:
"Eris" <vithant@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:8543267d-dd47-4cd0-a95d-055967aac763@x69g2000hsx.googlegroups.com...
Quote from fairly rational theist in Atheist vs. Christian forum
There's no proof against the veracity of the Bible or
the existence of God
Proof of something's none existence is the total lack of evidence for
its existence.
A negative cannot be proven positively.
That being said, we can get a pretty good idea of what truth is to within
some pretty small nth degrees. For example, if you asked me to prove that
there are no dragons in my closet, I could look and look all day but I could
never conclusively prove that none were there. But we can build a theory
based on plenty of circumstantial and direct evidence: no dragons
seen/smelled/heard in closet, no dragons ever observ ed in nature, only
references are works of fiction and myth, etc. Thus we can state beyond a
shadow of a doubt that no dragons are in my closet.
We can do the same for any number of biblical myths: Noah's Ark, Garden of
Eden, Tower of Babel, Exodus, the Conquest of Canaan, the realm of David,
the birth of Jesus, etc. etc.
The Bible Unearthed is a great book that does just this.
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| User: "Apostate" |
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| Title: Re: Is there "proof" against the existence of God? |
28 Nov 2007 06:15:46 PM |
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"Geoff" <gebobs@yahoo.nospam.com> wrote in message
news:FqidnQ7UrdQZbdDanZ2dnUVZ_ommnZ2d@giganews.com...
Bill M wrote:
"Eris" <vithant@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:8543267d-dd47-4cd0-a95d-055967aac763@x69g2000hsx.googlegroups.com...
Quote from fairly rational theist in Atheist vs. Christian forum
There's no proof against the veracity of the Bible or
the existence of God
Proof of something's none existence is the total lack of evidence for
its existence.
A negative cannot be proven positively.
That being said, we can get a pretty good idea of what truth is to within
some pretty small nth degrees. For example, if you asked me to prove that
there are no dragons in my closet, I could look and look all day but I
could never conclusively prove that none were there. But we can build a
theory based on plenty of circumstantial and direct evidence: no dragons
seen/smelled/heard in closet, no dragons ever observ ed in nature, only
references are works of fiction and myth, etc. Thus we can state beyond a
shadow of a doubt that no dragons are in my closet.
We can do the same for any number of biblical myths: Noah's Ark, Garden of
Eden, Tower of Babel, Exodus, the Conquest of Canaan, the realm of David,
the birth of Jesus, etc. etc.
The Bible Unearthed is a great book that does just this.
This takes the intellectual challenge a tad more seriously than it merits,
imo.
We can't prove, even to a prima facie standard of likelihood, that there is
/not/ a china tea set in retrograde orbit around Neptune, and that such a
flight of objects does not have the power to heal disease and confer
deathlessness on any who'll simply believe on them (all of which are as
well-evidenced in advance of the argument as the literal existence, outside
of myth and idle speculation, of any god heard of to date.) We can come up
with whole bunches of similar things to disprove, holding ourselves to
provisional belief pending that the disproof be satisfactorily robust. Why
pay them (the propositions) the compliment? Oh, I hear the credulous
objecting, (I have a fair amount of tinnitus background noise, so what I can
hear is always arguable,) "No! This is an emergency! The laws of reason"
(along with certain other niceties, like principles of constitutional
government) "/MUST/ be set aside to /demand/ belief, however improbable on
its face, until we're really /sure/!" (a variant of the 1% doctrine so loved
by twitiologues in Washington these days.)
I think not, thank you very much. Bring me the affirmative proof, and we'll
talk.
-- Apostate
aa# 1931
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| User: "Geoff" |
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| Title: Re: Is there "proof" against the existence of God? |
29 Nov 2007 10:00:54 AM |
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Apostate wrote:
This takes the intellectual challenge a tad more seriously than it
merits, imo.
We can't prove, even to a prima facie standard of likelihood, that
there is /not/ a china tea set in retrograde orbit around Neptune,
and that such a flight of objects does not have the power to heal
disease and confer deathlessness on any who'll simply believe on them
(all of which are as well-evidenced in advance of the argument as the
literal existence, outside of myth and idle speculation, of any god
heard of to date.) We can come up with whole bunches of similar
things to disprove, holding ourselves to provisional belief pending
that the disproof be satisfactorily robust. Why pay them (the
propositions) the compliment? Oh, I hear the credulous objecting, (I
have a fair amount of tinnitus background noise, so what I can hear
is always arguable,) "No! This is an emergency! The laws of reason"
(along with certain other niceties, like principles of
constitutional government) "/MUST/ be set aside to /demand/ belief,
however improbable on its face, until we're really /sure/!" (a
variant of the 1% doctrine so loved by twitiologues in Washington
these days.)
I think not, thank you very much. Bring me the affirmative proof,
and we'll talk.
Certainly correct. We don't need to waste our time evaluating the evidence
or lack thereof of every imaginary thing: the Tooth Fairy, retrograde
teacups, FMSs, etc. etc. And it'd be rather boring, since few if any believe
in their existence or offer up any kind of basis for the belief.
Not so with Christianity (or any other religion for that matter). As you
imply, no affirmative proof has ever been offered . But lots of claims are
made that can be put to the test...claims that are firmly believed by many
otherwise rational people.
Just asking believers for proof does nothing. They don't have any nor do
they need any to sustain their faith. But they believe some very weird
fantastical things. By getting them to start to question those assumptions
with an objective mind is the first step to freethought. Leastways, that's
how I went from firm believer in walking on water and life after death to
disbelief.
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| User: "David Schwartz" |
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| Title: Re: Is there "proof" against the existence of God? |
28 Nov 2007 04:45:27 PM |
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On Nov 28, 9:23 am, "Bill M" <wm...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
A negative cannot be proven positively.
Nonsense. There are many negatives that can be proven positively. The
most common way is to show that assuming the positive leads to a
contradiction.
For example, I can prove that there is no largest prime number, which
is clearly a negative:
Assume there is a largest prime number. Call that number P. Now
consider the product of all the numbers from one to (and including) P,
plus one. Call this number K. K is either prime or it isn't.
If it is prime, K is a prime number larger than P, and we have a
contradiction.
If K is not prime, it must have at least one prime factor other than
one. Since no number from 2 and including P can be a factor of K, that
prime factor must be a prime larger than P, and we again have a
contradiction.
Note that there are proves of the non-existence of god that follow
precisely this form. For example, consider the typical Judeao-
Christian definition of god as an all-powerful, all-knowing, all-good
being. You can show that assuming such a being exists requires that
there be no evil. (Since he could fix it since he's all-powerful,
would know about it since he's all-knowing, and must fix it since he's
all-good.) Thus the existence of evil (say, either any horrible evil
in this world or, failing that, my erroneous belief that there are
horrible evils in this world which would then itself be evil) proves
the negative that such a god does not exist.
DS
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| User: "NC" |
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| Title: Re: Is there "proof" against the existence of God? |
28 Nov 2007 09:09:17 PM |
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Eris <vithant@gmail.com> wrote:
Quote from fairly rational theist in Atheist vs. Christian forum
There's no proof against the veracity of the Bible or
the existence of God
There's no proof against the existance of such a proof. ZING!
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| User: "Rev. Karl E. Taylor" |
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| Title: Re: Is there "proof" against the existence of God? |
28 Nov 2007 06:11:18 PM |
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Eris wrote:
Quote from fairly rational theist in Atheist vs. Christian forum
There's no proof against the veracity of the Bible or
the existence of God
On the first part you are wrong, there is evidence that disproves the
bible. "The Bible Unearthed" is a good place to start.
Second part, well, prove there are no unicorns. There is no proof
against the existence of unicorns.
--
There are none more ignorant and useless,
than they that seek answers on their knees,
with their eyes closed.
____________________________________________________________________
Rev. Karl E. Taylor http://www.secularity.com/ktayloraz
A.A #1143 http://azhotops.blogspot.com/
Apostle of Dr. Lao EAC: Virgin Conversion Unit Director
____________________________________________________________________
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| User: "sleepykit" |
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| Title: Re: Is there "proof" against the existence of God? |
28 Nov 2007 10:00:56 PM |
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Eris wrote:
Quote from fairly rational theist in Atheist vs. Christian forum
There's no proof against the veracity of the Bible or
the existence of God
It puzzles me most that people ask anyone to disprove god. Just look around
and tell me you honestly think a gentle, kind god would allow for the world
as it is now. That he or she would stand by and idly watch his creations
kill each other in his name? Or if he is a vengeful, angry god then why the
hell did he create us anyway? As his scapegoats?
I'm only human, just one voice out of many, one thought in the grandest
reality. Will my words mean anything? To you, probably not. To god, likely
even less.
--
sleepykit
"I contend that we are both atheists. I just believe in one fewer god than
you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods,
you will understand why I dismiss yours." ~ Stephen Roberts
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| User: "Uncle Vic" |
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| Title: Re: Is there "proof" against the existence of God? |
28 Nov 2007 04:23:55 PM |
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Eris wrote:
Quote from fairly rational theist in Atheist vs. Christian forum
There's no proof against the veracity of the Bible or
the existence of God
Who needs proof against the veracity of the Bible? It shoots itself in
the foot.
--
Uncle Vic
2011
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| User: "Ben Goren" |
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| Title: Re: Is there "proof" against the existence of God? |
29 Nov 2007 09:30:06 PM |
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On Nov 28, 3:13 pm, Eris <vith...@gmail.com> wrote:
Quote from fairly rational theist in Atheist vs. Christian forum
There's no proof against the veracity of the Bible
This one's trivial. Find all the really truly spectacular things
in the Bible, such as the portents at Jesus's death, his miracles
in front of masses, his trial, his ascension, the Herodian
slaughter of infants, and the like. Anything that would have been
the talk of the town all over the middle east and into Egypt,
Greece, and even Rome.
Now examine each and every contemporary and near-contemporary
writings of any kind -- histories, philosophies, plain ol'
personal correspondences, whatever. You will find not one single
mention of *anything* claimed by the Bible in *any* of them.
You will, however, find countless stories of the same sorts
of things happening to other gods and heroes of various
descriptions and origins. Indeed, there isn't a single thing
in the Gospels that doesn't come straight out of the kind
of Pagan stories that Greeks and Romans would have taught
to their children -- and that we still teach today to our
children. Virgin birth? Perseus. Healing the sick and raising the
dead? Aescepulias. Water into wine, mockery of a trial, henious
and unjust execution, descent into Hell, resurrection, ascension
into heaven, and salvation for True Believers (TM)? Osiris,
Dionysus, Bacchus, Orpheus....
The earliest Christians were well aware of this -- see Justin
Martyr for an excellent example. The party line? Oh, well, you
see...all those other gods were false gods that didn't really
exist, but evil demons foresaw the coming of Christ and so planted
all these stories about false gods in order to deceive the
righteous and thereby prevent them from claiming their heavenly
reward...
or the existence of God
This one is also trivial and easy.
Any gods of interest must posess at least one supernatural power.
If there exists but one single natural law that is truly
inviolate, then the supernatural simply cannot exist. There may be
lots of paranormal things that defy our understanding of natural
laws, but we can be certain that everything that exists is
natural, and everything that is supernatural doesn't exist.
And...as it turns out, the world is chock full of inviolate
natural laws. For example, it is perfectly impossible for anybody
-- human, god, hyperintelligent shade of the color blue, or
what-not -- to draw, in a Eudlidian two-dimensional geometry, a
figure with four right angles such that the sum of the angles is
equal to 180 degrees.
You can do it in non-Euclidian geometries. You can draw figures
with four right angles in Euclidian geometries, but they won't add
up to 180 degrees. You can draw figures whose angles add up to 180
degrees, but they won't have four right angles. It is an inviolate
natural law that it is impossible to draw a square Euclidian
triangle.
Similarly, for purely geometric reasons, it is impossible to
exceed the speed of light in Einsteinian space. You could do it
in non-Einsteinian space...just as you could draw a square
``triangle'' in a non-Euclidian space. Going faster than c in our
corner of the universe is impossible, even for the ultra-powerful.
(There are proposals for extra-Einsteinian concepts such as
wormholes that would permit superluminal transportation as well as
time travel. They all involve doing things to make space
non-Einsteinian, if only in a localized manner.)
Some theists try to wiggle out of this with absurdities
such as ``my god(s) can do anything but the logically
impossible.'' First, that's meaningless -- there's no distinction
between ``physically'' and ``logically'' impossible. Once you
realize that ``It's physically impossible for me to run 60 mph,
but a cheetah can so it's physically possible'' is no different
from ``I could draw that square triangle, just not in Euclidain
space, so therefore it's possible,'' it becomes pretty obvious how
it's pure *****.
But, more to the point: there are an infinite variety of things
that, for example, are impossible for any targeted entity to do
that all sorts of other entities can do trivially. For an example,
see my .sig below.
Cheers,
b&
--
EAC Memographer
BAAWA Knight of Blasphemy
``All but God can prove this sentence true.''
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| User: "jcon" |
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| Title: Re: Is there "proof" against the existence of God? |
28 Nov 2007 05:21:38 PM |
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On Nov 28, 4:13 pm, Eris <vith...@gmail.com> wrote:
Quote from fairly rational theist in Atheist vs. Christian forum
There's no proof against the veracity of the Bible
Even if you leave out the scientific and rational absurdities
in the Bible, it's so full of contradictions that it cannot
logically be true:
http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/contra/by_name.html
or
the existence of God
That's correct. I cannot prove the non-existence of God any
more than I can prove there aren't invisible monsters under
my bed.
So?
-jc
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| User: "Budikka666" |
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| Title: Re: Is there "proof" against the existence of God? |
29 Nov 2007 10:05:55 AM |
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On Nov 28, 4:13 pm, Eris <vith...@gmail.com> wrote:
Quote from fairly rational theist in Atheist vs. Christian forum
There's no proof against the veracity of the Bible or
the existence of God
They're the ones who're claiming that, in addition to everything both
sides agree upon, there's yet another thing - namely the god who made
it all. Therefore, the onus is entirely upon them to support their
claim.
The fact that they have not and cannot, and that no one in the history
of the world ever has, and that this god has shown no evidence itself
of its own existence, is all the proof I need.
Budikka
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| User: "" |
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| Title: Re: Is there "proof" against the existence of God? |
28 Nov 2007 04:30:14 PM |
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On Nov 28, 5:13 pm, Eris <vith...@gmail.com> wrote:
Quote from fairly rational theist in Atheist vs. Christian forum
There's no proof against the veracity of the Bible or
the existence of God
Complete *****. Most modern scholars understand that the Christian
bible is a collection of oral legends finally written down a hundred
or more years after Jesus allegedly lived.
http://tinyurl.com/2vhs39
http://tinyurl.com/2kg43d
http://tinyurl.com/3ay5hm
http://tinyurl.com/2wskdr
As far as the existence of gods go, well....it all depends on how the
theist defines his god. Some can be disproven through logic (the
Christian/Jewish/Muslim god of Abraham falls into this catagory), some
through semantics (or is Eric Clapton *really* a god?). Others cannot
be disproven-but IMO, such definitions remove so much power and
awareness out of their gods that I wonder why they bother calling such
an emaciated creature a "god" at all.
They want you to attempt to disprove their god, but want enough wiggle
room to evade any disproof you offer. They'll say, "..that's *your*
definition of God, not *mine*.." Don't fall for their little trick.
Pin the dishonest fuckers down immediatly. Ask *them* straight out to
define what the three letter string g-o-d actually means before you
even bother with such a question. If they don't even know *what* their
fucking god is, then why should you waste time talking about it?
-Panama Floyd, Atlanta.
aa#2015/KoBAAWA!
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| User: "Don Martin" |
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| Title: Re: Is there "proof" against the existence of God? |
28 Nov 2007 06:58:51 PM |
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On Wed, 28 Nov 2007 14:30:14 -0800 (PST), wrote:
If they don't even know *what* their
fucking god is, then why should you waste time talking about it?
Hear! Hear!
WOA (Wicked Old Atheist) #2278
If you can't be a dirty old man,
what is the point of being an old man?
Through a jaundiced eye darkly--rheum with a view.
The Squeeky Wheel http://home.comcast.net/~drdonmartin/
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| User: "stoney" |
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| Title: Re: Is there "proof" against the existence of God? |
08 Dec 2007 03:48:19 PM |
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On Wed, 28 Nov 2007 14:13:14 -0800 (PST), Eris <vithant@gmail.com>
wrote:
Quote from fairly rational theist in Atheist vs. Christian forum
There's no proof against the veracity of the Bible or
the existence of God
Christian ignorance and irrationality is legion.
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| User: "Michael Gray" |
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| Title: Re: Is there "proof" against the existence of God? |
29 Nov 2007 01:43:27 AM |
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On Wed, 28 Nov 2007 14:13:14 -0800 (PST), Eris <vithant@gmail.com>
wrote:
Quote from fairly rational theist in Atheist vs. Christian forum
There's no proof against the veracity of the Bible or
the existence of God
There doesn't need to be.
Don't thay friggin get it???
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| User: "Kelsey Bjarnason" |
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| Title: Re: Is there "proof" against the existence of God? |
02 Dec 2007 01:22:24 PM |
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On Wed, 28 Nov 2007 14:13:14 -0800, Eris wrote:
Quote from fairly rational theist in Atheist vs. Christian forum
There's no proof against the veracity of the Bible or
the existence of God
Doesn't need to be, either. There's no proof you *don't* owe me a million
dollars, payable on demand - so if I say "pay up", are you going to pay?
No, you're going to expect me to prove there *is* such a debt. Just as
I'm going to expect you to prove there *is* a god, if you claim it.
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| User: "MarkA" |
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| Title: Re: Is there "proof" against the existence of God? |
28 Nov 2007 08:48:55 PM |
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On Wed, 28 Nov 2007 14:13:14 -0800, Eris wrote:
Quote from fairly rational theist in Atheist vs. Christian forum
There's no proof against the veracity of the Bible or
the existence of God
If something as "big" as God existed, it would be obvious.
--
MarkA
(This space accidentally filled in)
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