Is there any proof God exists?

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So now you are all the way back to an un-caused First Cause, just like everbody else.

I'll tell you what I can't believe; I can't believe this thread is still going!

Well, I can believe it, because I can see it

Seriously though, although I firmly sit on the "no" side of the answer to this question, and have dipped in with some input, at quite length waaaay back around page 10, 20 or something; I must applaud the relentless determination of several contributors from both sides of the argument. Regardless of my opinion of some of the evidence/reasons given to believe or not to believe, the conviction with which they have been put forward is admirable. Not a single post on this thread has made me budge even the slightest from my opinion (in fact only strengthened it), and it is clear that this is the stance by pretty much everyone else that has contributed. I can't help but respect those who intelligently and eloquently put forward their beliefs, regardless of what they are on this with such steadfast and absolute certainty - it makes this thread a very interesting read; strong opinions intermittently seasoned with a few laughs and aghogday's metaphorical, mystical ramblings and footage of Superhuman Gym achievements

Last edited by badgerface on 10 Mar 2015, 10:41 am, edited 2 times in total.

While this is true, we are also stepping into Invisible Pink Unicorn-territory.

It surely stands as PPR's longest thread. I think it also stands as WP's longest thread of continuous discourse. The longer threads are just game threads (counting/say something random etc.) or places for people to talk about their feelings that day (Rants/Raves).

I understand your position, but I consider belief in god or gods to be the default perspective for humans historically. From that perspective, your position is a step towards atheism.

I'd suggest that Dent's holding to empiricist methods is probably sufficient to consider him an empiricist, though I'm not sure why you need it expressed overtly. Perhaps I'm missing some past context here.



Why assume grass is green? Our opinions and beliefs are the consequence of our understanding, not presuppositions.

Consider my background. I was raised by an atheist, but not as an atheist. I was given no parental instruction on the matter, was given freedom to work it out to my own satisfaction. Throughout my childhood I was taught that God exists in school, and in church - I attended a parish school and was invited to join the church choir solely because of my singing voice. Despite the efforts of choirmasters, vicars, teachers, other adult Christians and my junior peers, I never became a believer. I found the argument for the Christian God to be deeply flawed, and continue to do so to this day.

In short, I came in contact with Christianity with no preconceptions, and left its clutches aged 15 with the opinion that the Christianity is a dog and pony show. I retain my passion for choral music, however.



And in our view, that position is inherently illogical. Allow me to demonstrate.

* There is no such thing as the fifteen testicle'd mocking burbleglap *

Would you consider this to be an extraordinary claim?



You want evidence of absence yet expect us to believe based on absence of evidence? How can you possibly justify that logic to yourself?



It's a perfectly effective refutation of the entire premise of the first cause argument for God - a being who conveniently cannot be measured or tested, yet Christians claim to know so much about his (its?) properties. Again you mention choosing beliefs, a concept that I dismiss as inductive folly.



What?



"We already know that everything that begins to exist has a cause - except this uncaused cause that we've given anthropomorphic traits and can't actually provide evidence for."

Why is sentience a necessary trait of this hypothetical first cause?

With the granted exception that cultures from ancient history forward have believed in gods or God based on a fundamental property of perception that we have of the universe. Gods and goddesses we have lots of temples, statues, figurines, and records of ritual to. No such natural impulse bends toward the invisible pink unicorn - regardless of how objectively real it could be somewhere beyond the scope of our experience or what a stately and wonderful creature it may very well be.

So the Minotaur, Cerberus, Pegasus, etc are all 'reasonable' alternatives to the invisible pink unicorn?

I'll let you handle that one, if your convinced their inventors meant them as fully real/physical things rather than concepts.

YOU ARE lots of fun, a different name.

Have a great day.

Thanks, I just enjoy entertaining folks.

And OH my GOD, yes, in real life that is so much more fun, than here.

But never the less, for folks who really get what I am doing here, I appreciate it.

Dude, humans create symbols first in oral tradition, and then in written language and other forms of human art to communicate the human experience and CONDITION, in all its nuances.

Some folks get the EMOTIONAL nuances more fully and some FOLKS just do NOT, AND YES, SCIENCE HAS SOME GOOD EVIDENCE OF WHY SOME do not.

Many folks have no idea how to get in touch with their emotions and or strengths internally, WITH LANGUAGE AND EMOTION, SYNCHRONOUSLY CONNECTED.

The Greek and Roman GODS, AS MYTHS, in sculpted, oral, and written tradition, provide a way for language and emotional integration FOR MORE FULLY BALANCED Human being in mind AND BODY BALANCE.

IN OTHER words, as in all religions and myths the path and journey is an inner emotional exploration of human being that science has no real handle on, as the life of human emotion IS A NON-REPEATABLE UNIQUE experiment among EACH AND EVERY HUMAN BEING.

MYTHS AND RELIGIONS FOCUS ON GENERAL HUMAN ARCHETYPES OF THE INNER SUBCONSCIOUS and conscious EMOTIONAL LIFE OF HUMAN BEINGS.

But of course, only for the elite among masses, then, as science shows, even in the renaissance era, approximately 95% of the herd, is left out in the cold.

People who do not experience a complex life of nuanced pro-social emotion(S), usually, have no need for these type of metaphors, in religion, literature, or myths, overall.

Perhaps they could use 'em, IF MORE FULLY EMPLOYED but they don't FEEL LIKE THEY COULD USE 'EM, and simply do not grow more of their human potential in neuroplastic and epigenetic way for greater, more fully realized potential in human intelligence(S).

And by the way; yes, I am familiar with poets who speak almost just like you, in written communication, and nah, overall, they haven't got a clue what my metaphors mean, either. That's not an Autism Specific issue and/or deficit, by far.

And as far as linguistics goes, I can count the emotional metaphors used here in written language, to determine what spoken language likely is, in real life, in 'affect', per spoken speech.

I do not do things by the book, and IN DOING SO, I go places in real life that many people cannot imagine going to; and nah, to be clear, it ain't a literal physical place I go.

It's mystical, dude.

And 'mystical' does not exist, for folks without the incredible UNIQUE potential human intelligence(S) to go tHere....

That part of life never changes until folks BREAK THROUGH, IN AN INTERNAL MYSTICAL 'QUANTUM' LIKE JOURNEY TO THE GREATEST UNIVERSE THAT TRULY EXISTS, WHICH IS THE HUMAN MIND and body in balance, MORE FULLY EXPLORED, FIRST HAND, with no lesson or instruction from other human beings.

And those words often do mean gibberish to folks who do not experience this but a smile as wide as the Universe of human mind, for many of those folks who do. It's overall a common experience repeated in words of metaphor similar to these, from the beginning of written recorded history, about the FULLER HUMAN CONDITION.

AND THAT MY FRIEND, IS WHAT RELIGION AND PHILOSOPHY, AT CORE, IS TRULY ABOUT.

Politics is like a soap opera; boring and stagnant.

I CATCH up, every 6 months or so. Or the two or three times anything of real new interest comes up in this forum during the span of about a half-a-year.

And remember, if you care to; I speak to the entire reading audience here, folks who are not posting included, in mind OR NOT.

The darkness or light that comes in the wake of my monologues is always for inspiration for me no matter how dark or light it is intended or not to be.

IN other WORDS, I AM NOT LOOKING FOR AFFIRMATION HERE, I GET THAT from crowds of people more than I am comfortable with everyday when I dance the real life of dance in REAL FLESH AND BLOOD LIFE.

Honestly, sometimes YOUNG WOMEN, almost throw their bras at me, and truly even worst than that PER SEXUALITY AND SENSUALITY EXPRESSED, as they come and rub their butt up against my front, with a man who wears his wedding ring, in what the 'new agers' refer to as bootie dances, IN THE CLUB, I do my exhibition of dance, every week that by the way is rated as one of the top 100 dance clubs, over here in great big America, named Seville Quarter, in Pensacola, FL.

SERIOUSLY dude, there are NO emotional buttons to press here, for me. Try as you may, when you do that, I just giggle and sometimes I 'almost pee on myself a little bit'.. And to be crystal clear that is PRECISELY WHAT I MEAN WHEN I STATE 'YOU ARE FUN, A DIFFERENT NAME'.

Yes, I am already stamped with approval, from head to toe, in what really counts, AS flesh and blood life, more than I can almost tolerate.

Matter of fact, not being liked here is kind of a countering and refreshing balance to all that attention wanted or not, I get in real life, every frigging day, I entertain, my metro area, to inspire them to develop and attain, mind and body balance, through creative interpretative dance, as well.

And yeah, from the feedback of the general audience, it's working.

Honestly, this is what my life is like, in real life, linked below, and remember I'm just monologuing here, and not necessarily speaking to you directly. All you are, is a first cause, of sorts, in this context of my human condition, fully expressed here..

I AM LITERALLY, A MUSE OF DANCE, IN MY LOCAL METRO AREA. The link I provided, before, is literally more than metaphor, per God's Muse of Dance.

TRUST ME BABY, There's so much applause it almost hurts my ears, in REAL FLESH AND BLOOD LIFE.

And Yeah, I do wear ear plugs, when I RAVE, BABY, AND THE FRIGGING applause is STILL FRIGGING LOUD..

God is currently MIA.

That's truly the best literal answer I've heard yet, as God is the literal force of ALL action and not a discernible concrete thingy, other than everything that is perceived.

Yes, in other words, the forest, at times, can go missing in the action of focusing on much smaller, discrete trees..

Sorry to be a pedant but this is somewhat of a contradiction

So far, any discussion of the logical necessity of an uncaused First Cause has not even been approached because the illogical ideologues insist on a straw man notion of some anthropomorphic material beast that is inferior in every way to their inflated view of themselves.

I will suggest, though, to those that have a capacity to reason, that anything that changes or is changeable cannot be eternal because anything that changes is not what it was, or what it will be, and any change must have a cause for the change that is greater than the result.

It all boils down to the fundamental self-evident premise that a thing that does not exist cannot cause itself to exist.

I will contend that Faith and Reason are entirely compatible and any apparent conflict between them is because the understanding of one or the other, or both, is wrong.