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Proof of God

Proof of God: Existence as a property

I have only skim read partly through your post, but I'd like to pick up on one point. You talk about existence being a property. One argument for the existence of God is that, if God as we understand the concept, has every perfection, then that perfection must include existence. However, existence is not a property of a thing or person; it is statement of number.
For example, if you say the an army has 1000 soldiers, what is the 1000 a property of? Is it the army, is it the soldiers? No, it is a property of instances of the unit soldier.
If you say that something exists, what you are say is that there is 1 instance of something. Therefore the property of existence of something relates to the number of instances of the thing, not the thing itself. Therefore, you cannot presume that God must exist because existence is a property that he, by definition, must possess.
 
Mancunian said:
I have only skim read partly through your post,
Click to expand...

You're about 1,600 posts and a good three months or so late, I'm afraid. Dustin is long gone from this thread, and the discussion has moved on quite considerably...
 
Hardenbergh said:
Yes, people were stoned to death as punishment (in Israel). Do you see anyone here being put to death for working on the Sabbath? Then don't worry about it.
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So are you going to cherry-pick only those parts that you like from that black-book. If so, that will be your idea of a so-called god. And of course everyone else who believes that black-book as being the so-called words of a so-called god will cherry-pick it and make up their own so-called god. And of course other people can believe that other books, etc are the so-called words of a so-called god and will cherry-pick those writings and make up their own so-called god. So once again, which so-called god do you believe in.

Paul

:) :) :)
 
OK, let's start with something we all agree on:

You shouldn't use gods to fill gaps in knowledge

OK?

No consensus on the time/change thing, however BJ's claim was:

"Time without beginning or something from nothing"

So if time and change are more or less the same thing we can substitute and reformulate:

"Change without beginning or something happened for no reason".

The first is basically "turtles all the way down", so maybe we can park it.

So here is my basic list possibilities for the so-called origins problem:

1. At least one thing exists which did not begin to exist AND/OR;
2. At least one thing began to exist without a source or cause AND/OR;
3. At least one event occurred with no cause AND/OR;
4. Causality is not unidirectional

Is there something I have missed? Probably.

Can we narrow it down? Probably not.

Is this a gap in our knowledge? Absolutely.

And don't forget that we all agree that you shouldn't use gods to fill gaps.

So what about the eternally existing deistic god?

We have no use for that hypothesis.
 
Hardenbergh said:
Yes, people were stoned to death as punishment (in Israel). Do you see anyone here being put to death for working on the Sabbath? Then don't worry about it.
Click to expand...

Well this still isn't an answer. What is so hard about saying "yes" or "no"? But I'll assume your answer is "no". Of what value are the Ten Commandments then? Other than the prohibitions on murder, theft, and defamation (which are common prohibitions certainly not unique to the Bible) what about the Ten Commandments, in either list, is relevant today? How many of them do you observe?
 
Hardenbergh said:
Lack of agreement among various divisions with Christianity and Judaism makes it very difficult to reach a consensus about how the Ten should be printed for display in public locations. Usually, the preferences of Jews, Roman Catholics and some Lutherans is overruled, and the Protestant format is chosen.
Click to expand...

So it all depends which God you worship. Big surprise.
 
Robin,

We're pretty close.

But I see no point in adding: "There is no god".
Especially when you actually mean something else.
And the "burden of proof"/"you can't prove a negative" argument doesn't change that.



It is interesting that skeptigirl believes god can be disproven (perhaps I am overstating her view) and dismisses the "you can't prove a negative" argument as being irrelevant in the case of god, whereas MobySeven uses that very argument to justify his proclamation that "there is no god" (even though he doesn't actually mean that exactly).


BJ
 
Robin said:
OK, let's start with something we all agree on:

You shouldn't use gods to fill gaps in knowledge

OK?

No consensus on the time/change thing, however BJ's claim was:

"Time without beginning or something from nothing"

So if time and change are more or less the same thing we can substitute and reformulate:

"Change without beginning or something happened for no reason".

The first is basically "turtles all the way down", so maybe we can park it.

So here is my basic list possibilities for the so-called origins problem:

1. At least one thing exists which did not begin to exist AND/OR;
2. At least one thing began to exist without a source or cause AND/OR;
3. At least one event occurred with no cause AND/OR;
4. Causality is not unidirectional

Is there something I have missed? Probably.

Can we narrow it down? Probably not.

Is this a gap in our knowledge? Absolutely.

And don't forget that we all agree that you shouldn't use gods to fill gaps.

So what about the eternally existing deistic god?

We have no use for that hypothesis.
Click to expand...

QFE


And a note to BillyJoe - when I say, "There is no god," I mean exactly the same thing as when I say, "There is no bigfoot," or, "There is no cold fusion."

Moreover, I mean the same thing as everone else does as well when they say those things, even if they do not consciously realise it - after all, there are not many who actually analyse the meaning in the language they use.
 
Perhaps you haven't had time to address my post #1611, Hardenbergh.

I'll repeat it for you. My source is the Skeptic's Annotated Bible.

Originally Posted by Hardenbergh
I think that the verses of scripture answered your question. Those were the Old Covenant laws under Moses. As I said, I'm just an amateur Bible scholar. You'll have to study the Bible and you can judge for yourselves.

I've heard this false claim before.

Here are some passages for you to study from the New Testament where Jesus himself advocates all kinds of violence.

For example:

Quote:
Mark 7:10 "Whoso curseth father or mother, let him die the death."

Jesus criticizes the Jews for not killing their disobedient children as required by Old Testament law.
And Jesus tells us to follow the Old Testament laws as well.

Quote:
Matthew 5:19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.
 
Mobyseven said:
And a note to BillyJoe - when I say, "There is no god," I mean exactly the same thing as when I say, "There is no bigfoot," or, "There is no cold fusion."

Moreover, I mean the same thing as everone else does as well when they say those things, even if they do not consciously realise it - after all, there are not many who actually analyse the meaning in the language they use.
Click to expand...


Perhaps I just expected more on a forum such as this. :)
 
BillyJoe said:
Robin,

We're pretty close.

But I see no point in adding: "There is no god".
Especially when you actually mean something else.
Click to expand...
I didn't say there is no god. I said we had no need of that hypothesis.
And the "burden of proof"/"you can't prove a negative" argument doesn't change that.
Click to expand...
And I have argued pretty consistently that you can prove a negative, for example my previous discussion about "The Earth has exactly one moon".

You can't prove a negative about an undefined god, but see my "God Proposition" thread about the Christian God, which I feel is pretty much disproven, at least beyond reasonable doubt.
 
BillyJoe said:
It is interesting that skeptigirl believes god can be disproven (perhaps I am overstating her view) and dismisses the "you can't prove a negative" argument as being irrelevant in the case of god, whereas MobySeven uses that very argument to justify his proclamation that "there is no god" (even though he doesn't actually mean that exactly).
Click to expand...

"There is no god until proven otherwise".

Does that sound better to your sensitive ears ?
 
Robin,

It seems we're even closer than I thought. :)

I didn't say there is no god. I said we had no need of that hypothesis.
Click to expand...


But what we do have a need for is a hypothesis about origins and, if the best we can do is some sort of multi-dimensional circular spacetime continuum, have we really done much better than a god hypothesis?

regards,
BillyJoe
 
Belz... said:
"There is no god until proven otherwise".
Click to expand...


This is clearly a false statement.

If it turns out that there is a god, the fact of his existence is not dependent on evidence for his existence becoming available.
Which is what you statement implies.

:)

regards,
BillyJoe
 
BillyJoe said:
This is clearly a false statement.

If it turns out that there is a god, the fact of his existence is not dependent on evidence for his existence becoming available.
Which is what you statement implies.

:)

regards,
BillyJoe
Click to expand...
We are still waiting for this so-called proof, please hurry, I haven't got billions of years to wait.

Paul

:) :) :)
 
skeptigirl said:
Perhaps you haven't had time to address my post #1611, Hardenbergh.

I'll repeat it for you. My source is the Skeptic's Annotated Bible.

Originally Posted by Hardenbergh
I think that the verses of scripture answered your question. Those were the Old Covenant laws under Moses. As I said, I'm just an amateur Bible scholar. You'll have to study the Bible and you can judge for yourselves.

I've heard this false claim before.

Here are some passages for you to study from the New Testament where Jesus himself advocates all kinds of violence.

For example:

Quote:
Mark 7:10 "Whoso curseth father or mother, let him die the death."

Jesus criticizes the Jews for not killing their disobedient children as required by Old Testament law.
And Jesus tells us to follow the Old Testament laws as well.

Quote:
Matthew 5:19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.
Click to expand...

I found some articles that might give the reader a better understanding of Matthew 5:19:

http://www.pbc.org/library/files/html/14702_4904.html
http://www.pbc.org/library/files/html/4406.html

http://www.pbc.org/library/message/verses?verses=Matthew+5:19

My Bible reads this way:

10 For Moses said, Honour thy father and thy mother; and, Whoso curseth father or mother, let him die the death: ~ Mark 7:10
Click to expand...

Moses was mediator and communicator of the law.

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Mark 7:10;&version=9;
 
Last edited:
BillyJoe said:
This is clearly a false statement.

If it turns out that there is a god, the fact of his existence is not dependent on evidence for his existence becoming available.
Which is what you statement implies.

:)

regards,
BillyJoe
Click to expand...

How about "We can safely assume that there is no god until evidence to the contrary is presented" ?

We can dance like this for years, Billy. The fact remains that "There is no god" is a concise way of putting it. That _you_ don't believe the statement makes no difference.
 
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