Maybe we CAN disprove God...

[Piggy]

I agree that god as a generic term has essentially no meaning. That does not mean that an individuals' interpretation of god has been proved false.

True. Now, if you care to propose an interpretation of God which you believe may describe something that is potentially real, then there will be a claim to consider.

If not, there is nothing to disprove.

 

[andyandy]

As you keep bemoaning the lack of gods to disprove;

god - a creator entity responsible for the existence of the initial starting conditions at t=0 in our own universe - but existing outside our own spacetime framework.

You can protest that such a god is an irrelevance - but this does not prove such a god does not exist
You can protest that such a god is akin to belief in nothing - but this does not prove such a god does not exist
You can protest that this is not backed up by scientific evidence - but this does not prove such a god does not exist
there is absolutely nothing that you can offer now as proof that such a god does not exist. It may exist one day, but equally such proof may never be available. Conjecture and premise are not proof.

I could put this in blue highlight, but that might look a little condescending

 

[Piggy]

well if we agree that not knowable =! nothing then why do you persist with this as a cornerstone of your argument?

First of all, it's not the cornerstone of my argument. It's simply the first hurdle that the theistic arguments so far have not been able to cross.

Anyway, let's clarify "not knowable != nothing", or "unkown != nothing". This does not mean that "not knowable" cannot = nothing. It can. It just doesn't always.

I'll go back to the earlier example. The stuff outside our light cone is unknowable. But it is not nothing. We know this because the concept of "stuff outside our light cone" is an anchored concept. We know from deduction that there must be something out there, and that we have no access to it.

However, when a term is either (1) left undefined, or (2) given a definition that is equivalent to "I have no clue, and probably couldn't get a clue if I looked", then in that case, the term refers to something indistinguishable from nothing, and so in that case "not knowable" in fact = nothing.

When "God" is left undefined, or defined as "?", then "God" = nothing.

 

[EGarrett]

This would only disprove a paper god(s), not the notion of god(s) in general.

The "notion of gods in general" is nonsense and doesn't have to be disproven.

Hey, to make the disproving easier, just assign qualities to the paper god(s) that you already know are problematic!

The quality of "God created the universe" isn't a fair one? That's not a commonly held property of God?

Oh but you see this god exists outside our universe, maybe in one of those multiverses (the theory that allows anything to be possible), maybe with different laws of physics than our own.

Now you're sliding back into nonsense. You have to decide what God is if you're going to have a discussion with any kind of sense to it. Then once that form of "God" is disproven, move on to others.

 

[Piggy]

We're reduced to unprovable claims like "there are, in fact, things which are unknowable to us, but which are also real. God, however, is not one of those things." What is your evidence for this?

Post 66 explains why God is not a u2. God is not like the stuff outside the light cone. No one who believes in God takes it to be a total unknown that we've never heard of or imagined.

And let's not reverse the burden, or set sail with no boat. If you have a meaningful definition of the term "God" to propose, then we may procede.

If God is an anchored concept, like a black hole, then we have a basis for considering the claim "God may exist".

If God is an "I have no idea what", then God is indistinguishable from nothing at all, and the claim "God is real" has no meaning either, is mere nonsense.

 

[EGarrett]

As you keep bemoaning the lack of gods to disprove;

god - a creator entity responsible for the existence of the initial starting conditions at t=0 in our own universe - but existing outside our own spacetime framework.

"Existing outside our own spacetime framework" is in itself a non-concept. Even putting forth that exists would require believing that something can exist without having any properties of existence, which is probably impossible and thus immediately disproven.

You can protest that such a god is akin to belief in nothing - but this does not prove such a god does not exist

Actually, that might prove that it doesn't exist.

there is absolutely nothing that you can offer now as proof that such a god does not exist. It may exist one day, but equally such proof may never be available. Conjecture and premise are not proof.

Do you consider "X is impossible, therefore, X did not happen" to be a fair disproof?

I could put this in blue highlight, but that might look a little condescending

I think it was necessary. That's an important point, and Piggy is absolutely right in what he said in that paragraph. I don't think he meant it in any condescending way.

 

[Piggy]

I'm not going to apologize for the blue font, btw, b/c it was better than using the rant tag -- I've been chastised for my repetitiveness before, and thought it was best to just go ahead and fess up now. Ok, onward....

As you keep bemoaning the lack of gods to disprove;

god - a creator entity responsible for the existence of the initial starting conditions at t=0 in our own universe - but existing outside our own spacetime framework.

Are you actually proposing this as a definition of God?

If so, then let's discuss it. If not -- if you're just dangling a borrowed God -- then we're still at square zero.

I'm going to be away for a bit, but let me know, and I'll check in later.

Thanks.

Oh, but by the way....

You can protest that such a god is akin to belief in nothing - but this does not prove such a god does not exist

We can dispense with that immediately. It most certainly does mean exactly that. If belief in X is the same as belief in nothing, then X is indistinguishable from nothing, and therefore the claim that "X exists" is nonsense.

 

[andyandy]

We can dispense with that immediately. It most certainly does mean exactly that. If belief in X is the same as belief in nothing, then X is indistinguishable from nothing, and therefore the claim that "X exists" is nonsense.

yes, perhaps i phrased that badly -

you can protest that this is akin to believing in nothing, but this is not the case, and as such this does not prove such a god does not exist.

is more appropriate.

i'll address everything else later....i must do some work, and god keeps on stopping me

 

[Piggy]

The dangling god

A quick note on why we must have an actual proposed definition of a potentially extant God on the table in order to begin, rather than mere "but lookie here" references to randomly selected gods from the cookie jar dangled before us....

The topic at hand is not to list the various definitions of God or gods, but rather to ask whether we are obliged to concede that the claim "God exists" could possibly be true.

Now, suppose we were to do the same with a more mundane object, such as the sun. "Is it possible that the sun exists?" If it's possible, then it would be unreasonable to assert simply "The sun does not exist". Simple enough.

In that case, it would be absurd to start by defining the sun in some outdated mythical way that no one actually believes anymore -- to posit, for example, that the sun is the face of a wrathful giant who, in ancient days, formed the mountains and valleys with his footsteps.

If we were to entertain that definition, we would wrongly conclude that the sun could not possibly exist, because we know the mountains and valleys were not formed in that way.

This case is no different, on that count.

Our purpose is to consider the claim "It is possible that God is real".

Invalid, nonsensical, debunked, and spurious definitions are of absolutely no use to us in this regard. They are simply irrelevant.

Thou shalt not dangle a borrowed god.

 

[Piggy]

Piggy takes a vacation

Sorry to leave the party so soon after joining it, but I leave on a week's vacation tomorrow and will be in "no phone, no lights, no motorcars" mode -- seriously, on a small island looking at nothing but sand, water, sky, and palm trees.

I'm sure when I get back this thread will be much too long to catch up with.

Which is a shame, because there are so many more false arguments yet to come for swift debunking.

That's all right, though. There will be other threads.

I'll see you there.

-Piggy

 

[BillyJoe]

I leave on a week's vacation tomorrow and will be in "no phone, no lights, no motorcars" mode -- seriously, on a small island looking at nothing but sand, water, sky, and palm trees.

God, that sounds like heaven.

 

[andyandy]

Sorry to leave the party so soon after joining it, but I leave on a week's vacation tomorrow and will be in "no phone, no lights, no motorcars" mode -- seriously, on a small island looking at nothing but sand, water, sky, and palm trees.

I'm sure when I get back this thread will be much too long to catch up with.

Which is a shame, because there are so many more false arguments yet to come for swift debunking.

That's all right, though. There will be other threads.

I'll see you there.

-Piggy

we'll put this thread on ice for you

have a nice holiday!

 

[andyandy]

"Existing outside our own spacetime framework" is in itself a non-concept. Even putting forth that exists would require believing that something can exist without having any properties of existence, which is probably impossible and thus immediately disproven

.

i disagree that this is a non-concept - postulates for cosmic origins certainly include concepts which require existence outside our own space-time framework.

Do you consider "X is impossible, therefore, X did not happen" to be a fair disproof?

it would be a fair disproof - but i'd expect some reasoning behind its impossibility

 

[andyandy]

God, that sounds like heaven.

I thought everyone in Australia lived by the beach, down to which they drove in their utes upon which they had regular barbies, grilled a few chucks and opened a few tinnies.....

has Home and Away misled me?

 

[EGarrett]

.i disagree that this is a non-concept - postulates for cosmic origins certainly include concepts which require existence outside our own space-time framework.

Well, to say "space-time framework" implies and makes it seem logical that there is something OUTSIDE the framework. But when you say "space-time framework" you're really saying "everything." Since our space-time framework is actually everything we've ever observed around us. The phrase presumes a "framework" when we literally have never seen any evidence that there IS some frame here to go outside of.

So, "space-time framework" is really referring to everything...and when you look at the phrase as "something exists outside of everything"...you can see why it would probably be a non-concept that is self-refuting.

it would be a fair disproof - but i'd expect some reasoning behind its impossibility

Well, impossible means that something cannot happen with the given laws of our universe. Without getting too much into mathematics, I think we can fairly agree that it would be impossible to add 1 + 1 and get 3. But if you throw out all rules of logic and rationality, then who knows if 1 + 1 might equal 3?

Thus, impossibility means that something cannot happen within the rules of our universe. And with the 1st Law of Thermodynamics (matter cannot be created nor destroyed)...it becomes quite fair to say that creation is impossible. And we've agreed that saying that Creation is Impossible means that Creation has beend disproven. Thus God (assigned the attribute of creator of the universe) is disproven.

 

[andyandy]

Well, to say "space-time framework" implies and makes it seem logical that there is something OUTSIDE the framework. But when you say "space-time framework" you're really saying "everything." Since our space-time framework is actually everything we've ever observed around us. The phrase presumes a "framework" when we literally have never seen any evidence that there IS some frame here to go outside of.

So, "space-time framework" is really referring to everything...and when you look at the phrase as "something exists outside of everything"...you can see why it would probably be a non-concept that is self-refuting.

and yet cosmology embraces multiverse theory -
we have the many-world quantum interpretations, the anthropic principle to explain the universal fine-tuning, whilst there is brane cosmology and postulated brane collision, black hole bounce or bubble world inflation to explain the start of our own universe

and so it may indeed be insufficient to regard "everything" as within our universal spacetime framework

Thus, impossibility means that something cannot happen within the rules of our universe. And with the 1st Law of Thermodynamics (matter cannot be created nor destroyed)...it becomes quite fair to say that creation is impossible. And we've agreed that saying that Creation is Impossible means that Creation has beend disproven. Thus God (assigned the attribute of creator of the universe) is disproven.

Why should we expect the physical laws of our own universe to be shared outside that framework? For example, one of the key assumptions of the anthropic principle is that they are not - and as such the first law of thermodynamics is not a limiting factor for multiverse theory. In any case, whilst such laws would appear applicable to the universe as it exists, it's certainly not clear that they would apply at cosmic origin.

 

[Vintij]

Piggy has not debunked anyone so far. He claims that thiests are not aligned with science yet there are thousands of scientists who will state that they believe in some creator but that creator can not be observed within the universe. Why is that a hard concept for piggy? Has he ever seen dark matter? What about a black hole? Yet we detect those things using mathmatical equations, and most of the time the equations need to be re-done over and over. His claim that mathmatics can disprove god is no better than the pope saying that the bible can prove god.

Unless he comes up with some logical way to disprove him, that does not involve rehtoric and one liners that are not backed by the scientific community, then he is in the same boat as all thiests.

The argument that god MUST be observed within the FRAMEWORK of our universe is not a valid argument. That is the exact claim that put gallilao in prison for not following the FRAMEWORK of the catholic church version of the universe.

If we are able to predict things like multiple universes, atoms, black holes, dark matter.....all of which can not be observed in this universe....then why is it so scientifically impossible to predict some creator OUTSIDE of the universe that can never be observed. Has anyone seen an atom? Can it be observed visually? Yet there are detections of atoms and predictions. Same with god, detections and prediction in specific people, some who are not even religious have claimed to felt god or some outside force.

If anyone is going to argue that god does not exist, then they must be on both sides because there is no way to prove or disprove god, just like there was not way for the ancient egyptians to measure the size of the universe. You have to go with what we know so far, but you can not allow that to be the ultimate answer as we have found out over generations that perfect answers are not always so perfect.

 

[NobbyNobbs]

I'm truly amazed that no one has yet presented this quite simple proof of the non-existence of God.

Now it is such a bizarrely improbably coincidence that anything so mindbogglingly useful [the Babel fish] could have evolved by chance that some thinkers have chosen to see it as a final and clinching proof of the non-existence of God.
The argument goes something like this: "I refuse to prove that I exist," says God, "for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing."
"But," says Man, "the Babel fish is a dead giveaway isn't it? It could not have evolved by chance. It proves you exist, and so therefore, by your own arguments, you don't. QED"
"Oh dear," says God, "I hadn't thought of that," and promptly vanishes in a puff of logic.

 

[EGarrett]

and yet cosmology embraces multiverse theory -
we have the many-world quantum interpretations, the anthropic principle to explain the universal fine-tuning, whilst there is brane cosmology and postulated brane collision, black hole bounce or bubble world inflation to explain the start of our own universe

and so it may indeed be insufficient to regard "everything" as within our universal spacetime framework

Forgive me, I assumed you were making the normal reference to God being outside our reality, not to quantum mechanics.

Anyway, it seems that you're assigning God the property of someone who lives in another multiverse and created only our own universe. If it is believed that our laws of logic and thermodynamics and everything else don't apply to that universe, then it's still at core an argument that literally validates any possible statement at the same time as God.

Why should we expect the physical laws of our own universe to be shared outside that framework? For example, one of the key assumptions of the anthropic principle is that they are not - and as such the first law of thermodynamics is not a limiting factor for multiverse theory. In any case, whilst such laws would appear applicable to the universe as it exists, it's certainly not clear that they would apply at cosmic origin.

Likewise, in that case, the entire idea of "impossible" becomes meaningless and nothing can be disproven. If the only way to show that "X cannot be disproven" is to show that nothing can be disproven, then X is equal to nothing.

 

[andyandy]

Forgive me, I assumed you were making the normal reference to God being outside our reality, not to quantum mechanics.

Anyway, it seems that you're assigning God the property of someone who lives in another multiverse and created only our own universe. If it is believed that the laws of thermodynamics do not apply to that universe (I don't know if that is the case), then perhaps that God cannot be disproven, and as I've said, it's definitely possible to invent Gods that cannot be disproven.

well on that we agree then - i was merely asked to provide an example of a god which could not be proved to not exist.....

But in terms of assigning actual properties to God that are satisfactory for representing the popular ideas...that doesn't fit the property assigned to God as creator, because it leaves the question of who created God's personal multiverse pocket.

It would depend on in which sense you chose to interpret popular ideas - belief in god tends to revolves around our own universal creation - but certainly a loitering multiverse god would create as many questions as it answered

In that case, the entire idea of "impossible" becomes meaningless and nothing can be disproven. If the only way to say "X cannot be disproven" is to show that nothing can be disproven, then X is equal to nothing.

under such constructs impossible may become meaningless, but because something can not be disproven does not mean it can not exist.