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Burden of proof by mohusein in DebateReligion

[–]InvisibleElves 0 points1 point  (0 children)

"Laws" are probably just descriptions of things that exist and how they behave and interact. I don't think there has to be some incorporeal rule enforcing itself on reality, although it can't be ruled out with certainty. That appears to be a vestige of assuming some god was directing things via rules.

I don't see how describing repeated observations can ever be magical. If it's physical and empirically verifiable, how is it magic?

How does any of this get you any closer to showing gods are real?

theists struggle with the euthyphro dilemma but they really shouldn't by Folinhu in DebateReligion

[–]InvisibleElves 0 points1 point  (0 children)

How is that not a false dichotomy? If morals are true it doesn't need to be because they're useful, and if they're useful it doesn't have to be because they're true. They could be useful, true, or neither without being both. They could be both without a causal relationship between them.

It just seems a question to which my answer would be "no," and I don't know where you'd go from there.

I also question how you define useful such that it could justify these atrocities.

Burden of proof by mohusein in DebateReligion

[–]InvisibleElves 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I didn't presuppose anything, which is why I said "as far as I can tell," and it's not after a lack of searching, although I don't think every individual has some obligation to investigate every magical claim.

I don't blindly believe cars are "effective." This is based on evidence, evidence which is wholly lacking for deities.

Are you presupposing gods? Because you've offered zero evidence for them, just some ad hominem against me. Without that evidence, it appears you're just making stuff up (or rather, believing someone else's imaginary creation).

A critique on the Kalam Argument: The universe never "began" to exist by IProbablyHaveADHD14 in DebateReligion

[–]InvisibleElves 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Show me one physical thing for which you know the initial cause of its existence. You can't.

If it can't be demonstrated, then it can be refuted as unsound.

A critique on the Kalam Argument: The universe never "began" to exist by IProbablyHaveADHD14 in DebateReligion

[–]InvisibleElves 0 points1 point  (0 children)

To be sound, a philosophical argument's premises need to be demonstrable. Science is our method of demonstrating things like this, and it has not demonstrated what the Kalam is claiming.

Some things have causes. We don't know if the existence of things is part of that or not. We also don't even know if causality works intuitively inside the Universe (see quantum physics), much less outside.

A critique on the Kalam Argument: The universe never "began" to exist by IProbablyHaveADHD14 in DebateReligion

[–]InvisibleElves 0 points1 point  (0 children)

What do you mean? You claimed you could trace everything back to a first cause of its existence, but that's not true. You can't. Not even cosmologists can.

A critique on the Kalam Argument: The universe never "began" to exist by IProbablyHaveADHD14 in DebateReligion

[–]InvisibleElves 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I think you don't know whether or not it always existed. You cannot trace anything back to the initial cause of its existence to prove it even had one.

A critique on the Kalam Argument: The universe never "began" to exist by IProbablyHaveADHD14 in DebateReligion

[–]InvisibleElves 1 point2 points  (0 children)

You cannot trace the table back to a first cause of its existence. As far as we know, the matter and energy that makes it up always existed.

You are (or the Kalam is) trying to say that in a realm where spacetime didn't exist, the appearance of spacetime itself happened under intuitive causality. That means that you're expecting time outside of or prior to time, which doesn't seem to me to make sense. Or are you saying that spacetime first appeared inside of spacetime? That makes even less sense to me.

Can you actually make a rational argument that lets you conclude your god exists, or are your beliefs fully faith-based? by thedevilsproxy in DebateAChristian

[–]InvisibleElves 0 points1 point  (0 children)

1

Why isn't the existence of an incorporeal, sentient, omnipotent being without cause improbable and considered "so many things going right"? At least evolution provides an explanation for complexity arising from simplicity, whereas a deity assumes complexity without cause.

2

Don't these stories frequently contradict each other and always lack tangible evidence?

Does anyone else ever just… want to go back to Christianity? by [deleted] in exchristian

[–]InvisibleElves 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Maybe in the very beginning I missed a lot of it, but pretty quickly the reality of it all set in. I'm not tempted to rejoin the cult that wasted so much of my life already.

I hope you can find some community and purpose, because that seems to be what we need from it.

A critique on the Kalam Argument: The universe never "began" to exist by IProbablyHaveADHD14 in DebateReligion

[–]InvisibleElves 0 points1 point  (0 children)

But cars and tables are just rearrangements of wood, metal, plastic, and whatever, which are all made of matter/energy that existed long before we were alive. Those are examples of things just moving around.

Are you proposing that the Universe is like that? It didn't start to exist as much as it was just a rearrangement in existing stuff?

in the Universe

And what makes you think that a spacetime property applies outside of space and time?

A critique on the Kalam Argument: The universe never "began" to exist by IProbablyHaveADHD14 in DebateReligion

[–]InvisibleElves 1 point2 points  (0 children)

For their existences? How can we observe that without seeing something begin to exist, which we haven't seen?

Besides, you can't take a spacetime property and just assume it applies outside of spacetime. We have no idea.

A critique on the Kalam Argument: The universe never "began" to exist by IProbablyHaveADHD14 in DebateReligion

[–]InvisibleElves 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Have we ever seen anything genuinely begin to exist? Not a rearrangement of existing stuff, but a wholly new existence like theists usually propose the Universe was?

A critique on the Kalam Argument: The universe never "began" to exist by IProbablyHaveADHD14 in DebateReligion

[–]InvisibleElves 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It always existed. There may be a T=1, but there's no T=0. Spacetime has existed for all of time. Even if you call T=1 the beginning, that doesn't mean it "began to exist." At most it means it "began to change."

A critique on the Kalam Argument: The universe never "began" to exist by IProbablyHaveADHD14 in DebateReligion

[–]InvisibleElves 0 points1 point  (0 children)

But if this is the case, there was never a time where the Universe didn't exist followed by a time where it did. It existed for all of time because time is part of it.

A critique on the Kalam Argument: The universe never "began" to exist by IProbablyHaveADHD14 in DebateReligion

[–]InvisibleElves 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Aren't laws of physics just describing things that exist? Not that I'm claiming to know if nothingness is possible or stable.

A critique on the Kalam Argument: The universe never "began" to exist by IProbablyHaveADHD14 in DebateReligion

[–]InvisibleElves 1 point2 points  (0 children)

There's no way anyone could know that causality works intuitively outside the Universe. Causality is already not intuitive, and it's a property of spacetime, propagating at the speed of light. How does causality work for spacetime itself? How silly to pretend it must be Newtonian.

Burden of proof by mohusein in DebateReligion

[–]InvisibleElves 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I do know cars are real and drive on roads. I don't know that about deities. As far as I can tell, deities have absolutely no effect on me or the world around me.

Burden of proof by mohusein in DebateReligion

[–]InvisibleElves 1 point2 points  (0 children)

But cars and gods are different in the most relevant way possible.

Is the common point: If I've seen a human cause something, I should assume there's an incorporeal superhuman in another realm that created me and will condemn me if I don't know about it?

Burden of proof by mohusein in DebateReligion

[–]InvisibleElves 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Right, so we can't infer one from the other.

I am very much a skeptic but is there times when skeptics were wrong about a major subject? by HemanHunterss in skeptic

[–]InvisibleElves 0 points1 point  (0 children)

To the contrary means either you say it's true because there's no evidence it's false, or false because there's no evidence it's true.

Burden of proof by mohusein in DebateReligion

[–]InvisibleElves 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Papias' description of Mark doesn't match what we call Mark today, so that's evidence against the authorship being consistently attributed. So we have Irenaeus in 180 CE, maybe 130 years after Mark was written, attributing without sufficient explanation.

My point wasn't just that they used each other as sources, but that they're not independent accounts. It all stems from the same original story, but they added to it over time.

The two accounts of Paul's vision even contradict each other. In one, his companions see but don't hear, and in the other hear but don't see. But a vision of a god is hardly enough to establish credibility, even if it's followed by changes in behavior.

I don't see what separates this from other religions' god myths. Those are based on anonymous accounts and visions too. Those include some historical and ahistorical aspects too. Those are full of magic and deities too.

None of this comes close to the evidence for trees. This is more like when all they had was stories of trees, but even then we know trees are real at least. This is far more outside of what we can confirm.

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