What We Believe But Cannot Prove

[3point14]

Well, let's tease it apart.

In response to

You said

By all means, explain why you invoked Russel's teapot.

I did. As an analogy to express how ridiculous it is to posit something just because it can't be disproved.

Intelligent creators may exist, but believing in them just because you can't disprove them is foolish.




However...

I was wrong about the sharpshooter - I'l swallow that - DAmnit.

 

[punshhh]

Why do you think there's an unknown basis of existence?



ETA: Just because you close your eyes doesn't mean it's dark.

I am not saying that its not known, rather it doesn't appear to be known by humanity.
Correct me if I'm wrong?

 

[punshhh]

You are imbuing the word energy with some sort of mystical meaning it doesn't have.

Wordplay is all you have.

I am only asking what energy is, no one has answered this question.

Now I know what it does, it acts between atoms (and subatomic particles).

Thats all fine I'm quite happy to understand energy as the means by which atoms interact.

But then when I ask what atoms are it turns out they are energy, nothing else.

So what is this energy exerting its force on, energy?

 

[punshhh]

From keyboards to gods in one easy step.

The same natural process may be involved in each.

 

[punshhh]

Your incessant jabber would make anyone tired if they'd exhausted multiple baselines for skepticism and you ignore all of them to continue spurting the same nonsense without regard for evidence.

My point in this thread was very simple and I stated it in a few sentences.

The rest of the thread has been a process of skeptics trying to assert something they are not in a position to assert. Namely that there are no gods and thats its irrational to consider their existence.

Can you tell me there are no gods?

 

[dafydd]

The same natural process may be involved in each.

Don't be so silly. Let us try and keep this on an adult level please.

 

[dafydd]

My point in this thread was very simple and I stated it in a few sentences.

The rest of the thread has been a process of skeptics trying to assert something they are not in a position to assert. Namely that there are no gods and thats its irrational to consider their existence.

Can you tell me there are no gods?

I can tell you that there is not a shred of evidence for any of the long list of gods that mankind has invented.

 

[dafydd]

Namely that there are no gods and thats its irrational to consider their existence.

Consider away until you are blue in the face,if it makes you happy. Everyone needs a hobby. It all depends upon how much time this considering takes. It didn't take me long to consider the total lack of evidence for any imaginary beings.

 

[marplots]

I am only asking what energy is, no one has answered this question.

But you answered it yourself. You said it's the stuff that makes up the material world.

Now I know what it does, it acts between atoms (and subatomic particles).

Sounds good.

Thats all fine I'm quite happy to understand energy as the means by which atoms interact.

Well, you've answered it again then.

But then when I ask what atoms are it turns out they are energy, nothing else.

So what is this energy exerting its force on, energy?

You could look at it that way, yes. A kind of dance.
Words are made up of letters arranged in some order. But aren't letters then just making new words? Yes. Then different sentences are just letters acting on other letters? Sure.

But can't I look at letters as just different colored pixels? Yes.
So it's just pixels acting on pixels? You could look at it that way, yes.

What's the final truth here?
Depends on how you want to look at it. What we are talking about isn't energy or letters so much as how you wish to fit this thing in your head. Same with a brick, for instance. A brick can fit in your head as a collection of energy, part of a wall, a doorstop or a character in a film. The brick isn't changing, just the way you want to look at it and the context you find it in.

 

[laca]

I am only asking what energy is, no one has answered this question.

Liar. It has been answered for you months ago. Interested readers can for example start here to see how it gets explained over and over again to punshhh.

punshhh, just because you can't understand something it doesn't mean it's not been explained. The limitation is yours. Deal with it.

 

[Malerin]

I did. As an analogy to express how ridiculous it is to posit something just because it can't be disproved.

Intelligent creators may exist, but believing in them just because you can't disprove them is foolish.

Fair enough.

But I think Punshhh's point is that there already is evidence that intelligent creators exist (us), so it's not quite the same as just making something up out of whole cloth to suggest other intelligent creators, perhaps quite powerful, also exist.

However...

I was wrong about the sharpshooter - I'l swallow that - DAmnit.

OK

 

[dafydd]

Fair enough.

But I think Punshhh's point is that there already is evidence that intelligent creators exist (us), so it's not quite the same as just making something up out of whole cloth to suggest other intelligent creators, perhaps quite powerful, also exist.





OK

I fail to see the connection between creating a computer keyboard and creating a universe.

 

[Mashuna]

Fair enough.

But I think Punshhh's point is that there already is evidence that intelligent creators exist (us), so it's not quite the same as just making something up out of whole cloth to suggest other intelligent creators, perhaps quite powerful, also exist.

But punshhh is claiming that there's no intrinsic difference between crating a table and creating a universe, just a matter of scale. This is an unsupported equivocation between the different meanings of 'creator'.

 

[dafydd]

But punshhh is claiming that there's no intrinsic difference between crating a table and creating a universe, just a matter of scale. This is an unsupported equivocation between the different meanings of 'creator'.

The keyboard obviously has a creator. The universe doesn't.

 

[punshhh]

But punshhh is claiming that there's no intrinsic difference between crating a table and creating a universe, just a matter of scale. This is an unsupported equivocation between the different meanings of 'creator'.

It is the same principle involved, a human makes a table out of the atoms around them. Same thing with a god they make a universe out of the energies around them.

 

[punshhh]

The keyboard obviously has a creator. The universe doesn't.

How do you know the universe doesn't?

Just because we haven't found it yet?

 

[punshhh]

Liar. It has been answered for you months ago. Interested readers can for example start here to see how it gets explained over and over again to punshhh.

punshhh, just because you can't understand something it doesn't mean it's not been explained. The limitation is yours. Deal with it.

I recollect I was told what energy does, not what is is.
Then I was told it is what it does.
Fine it is an action or activity, I'm ok with that.

Then I asked on what does it act, atoms(sub atomic particles), fine.

Then what are atoms, oh they are energy.

We have a problem we have an action acting on an action, in a void.

Alternatively we have a movement acting on a movement, in a void.

What is it that is moving?

Is this the basis of existence?

 

[Malerin]

I fail to see the connection between creating a computer keyboard and creating a universe.

If you came across a keyboard in the desert, you would not think it just happened to come about through some natural process. Yet many see the finely tuned universe we live in*, and think... it happened to come about through some natural process.







As Hawking puts it:
The remarkable fact is that the values of these numbers (i.e. the constants of physics) seem to have been very finely adjusted to make possible the development of life”. “For example,” Hawking writes, “if the electric charge of the electron had been only slightly different, stars would have been unable to burn hydrogen and helium, or else they would not have exploded. It seems clear that there are relatively few ranges of values for the numbers (for the constants) that would allow for development of any form of intelligent life. Most sets of values would give rise to universes that, although they might be very beautiful, would contain no one able to wonder at that beauty.

 

[laca]

It is the same principle involved, a human makes a table out of the atoms around them. Same thing with a god they make a universe out of the energies around them.

You just don't understand anything. If the energy is already around, then the Universe is already there, only in a different form. Your god is no more a god than a human is a god.

 

[Nonpareil]

If you came across a keyboard in the desert, you would not think it just happened to come about through some natural process. Yet many see the finely tuned universe we live in

Texas sharpshooter fallacy and/or circular logic.

Again.