The fact that a "most convincing" argument against deity must exist does not prove that argument is valid
I was being satirical trying to help you notice the absurdity in using mental masturbation to define something into existence without having to describe it, identify it, or even show that it's real.
Also, you seem to think science is merely agreeing with the opinions of someone who is a scientist. It's not... Science is the scientific method. I could care less what Carl Sagan's random opinions are.
Anyways, I'll just end by saying this... I don't believe you are a real Christian. And what I mean by that is I don't think you actually believe in Jesus Christ as your savior, I don't think you actually believe in heaven and hell, and I don't think you actually believe in the Christian God.
Real Christians don't shy away from citing the bible as THE one and only authoritative source that Trumps everything else. Real Christians are proud to claim the label "supernatural" on behalf of their God and they are happy to argue directly for the blood of Christ washing away your sins. They don't make arguments where they equate god to the universe or a force of nature.
You my friend, are not a Christian. You are transitioning to an atheist, you're just not all the way there yet.
And belief is not voluntary. You never chose to be a Christian. And you never chose to start having doubts. And if and when you stop believing entirely, that won't be by choice either. It will simply be the natural result of your growing doubts.
And I will say this... Losing your religion is like going through the five stages of grief, and that's why many atheist's have a reputation for being angry. It's because they are.
Myself, I'm already on acceptance, and personally I like Christianity (real Christianity not fake internet Diest-christianity) and think it's a force for good in the world. I can see how it provides benefits to it's believers.
But like I said belief is not a choice. Once an illusion has been shattered there's no putting it back together even if you wanted to. I wish you luck on your journey and please remember this comment when you enter the anger phase. Remember you'll come out of it just fine in the end and trying to cling to something you know isn't true will only prolong your misery.
Good luck on your journey.
BTW.... I love how people will claim to be Christians yet when confronted with the absolute absurdity and stupidity of Christian doctrine and the bible they refuse to defend it, and instead retreat to generalized Deist arguments, that have NOTHING to do with the highly detailed and specific claims their religion makes.
Classic Motte and Bailey fallacy, and it's laughably transparent, and totally bad faith. Another clear demonstration you aren't pursuing truth.
I wasn't arguing for omniscient or omnipotent (yet),
Then you are admitting that entire tangent was completely pointless because it has nothing to do with how you describe god.
The most convincing argument that gods are fake is in a different class from the most convincing argument that some god is real,
You're very very close to an epiphany here..... The lightbulb is over your head right now just dying to light up.
If the logical thought exercise you put forward can be used to support 2 contradicting claims at the same time, what does that tell you about the validity of your thought exercise?
It means the thought exercise is invalid, and so are any arguments that rely on it. It's pointless mental masturbation that ends with whatever conclusion you want, based on where you choose to start.
Are you willing to admit you made an invalid argument? I don't think so. Because I don't think you actually pursue truth.
Christianity makes many propositions. Mortimer Adler indicated a good proposition to start with is that "one thing in existence is measurably the greatest". This is shared by both Christianity and many other positive systems, but is rejected by nihilistic systems. If you agree with that proposition, then we can exclude the nihilistic class and proceed to narrowing the positive class, by investigate what this "greatest thing" consists of. It seems that every test and corollary has demonstrated that things are measurable and thus one thing is the greatest.
Okay... I think I know where you're going with this now... This is pure sophistry.
This is wrong on 3 main points.
1.) "Greatest" is a subjective opinion, and therefore not something that can be measured. You would have to define an objective trait that can actually be measured such as "largest" or "fastest" or something that's not an opinion.
2.) In order to be testable you have to limit the range of the test. You can do a test to find the biggest animal at the zoo, but finding the biggest animal on earth is nearly impossible. If you're trying to test which animal is the biggest in the universe it's totally untestable. No matter how big of an animal you found, you could never say it's the biggest in existence. And so once again it's not testable.
3.) Even if this argument didn't suffer from those 2 fatal flaws, it still fails because it's logically unsound for the following reasons.
Having the most knowledge in existence ≠ All knowing
Having the most power in existence ≠ All powerful
So even if you could determine which being in the universe knows the most, that doesn't mean it knows everything, or that it matches your conception of god.
Let me apply this same exact argument to my house and you'll see the flaw.... I say I have 80,000 sq foot room in my house filled to the ceiling with gold.
Here's my argument in support of that.... The size of a room can be measured. The amount of gold in a room can be measured. That means out of all the rooms in my house there must logically exist a room that is the biggest. And there must also logically exist a room which contains the most gold.
Therefore with that logic alone, you can know that I have an 80,000 sq foot room in my house full of gold.
Did I just prove I have a Scrooge McDuck sized gold vault in my house, or was that just sophistry?
I see my comment at https://scored.co/c/Conspiracies/p/1994owaTre/oof-salty-loser-spamming-is-not-/c/4ZDugTT19UX had its link helpfully broken by the platform when it intended to point to https://communities.win/c/Atheist/p/141reluACp/-burden-of-proof-is-on-the-one-m/c/4OUfR2Rkd1Q which starts with:
If nothing exists, nothing can be proven (Provine).
Things exist (Descartes).
Things are measurable (Democritus).
A greatest thing can be detected, defined according to its measurability (Adler).
Excuse me... Where is the testable proposition that confirms Christianity?
Thanks!
Is it testable to you, via observation of things, that something that exists is measurably the greatest?
I don't understand your word salad here....
Please give me a test that confirms Christianity. Thanks.
I don't cite the Bible as a source to you when you don't accept it;
But it is in fact YOUR source, is it not? You're just afraid to admit it because you know it's stupid.
Do you recognize that the universe contains the unknown and/or unknowable? Does this give you any pause when you criticize others for saying so?
You are claiming to know the answer though... GAWD did it.... That's the answer... That's where the universe came from.
So since you are claiming to know, I don't accept your appeal to the unknown as supporting evidence.
If you believe a body of laws exists, but it is beyond our current knowing them completely, that would be a much better core because it admits that reality is always greater than our model of it.
You still don't seem to understand the core of my argument....
If something is beyond our ability to know it, then there is no process by which that information can end up in a book without being completely made up.
I linked you 50 propositions that can be tested and falsified, you haven't admitted seeing I did
Was it buried somewhere in your 50 page comments? If you have even 1 single testable claim that would verify ANY aspect of Christianity, tell me what it is and how to test it?
Do you see any contradiction in claiming to pursue truth and then citing as a source of information a book full of appeals to the supernatural, and untestable claims?
No of course you don't. If you could spot contradictions you would notice the bible is full of them and realize it's a bad source of information.
Person 1: "Here's a proposition claiming to know the true origin of the universe. I can't test it, have no way of verifying if it's true, and it presupposes the existence of a supernatural being. I know that I myself am not privy to such information, but yet somehow middle eastern goat herders 4,000 years ago were. And since they didn't leave us any way to test their claims, I'll just take their word for it and accept the claim at face value because obviously the magic man told them the truth."
Person 2: "I know that ancient goat herders had no way of knowing what they were claiming.... And so that means it probably wasn't true. But I still don't want to risk getting punished by the supernatural magic man they told me about, So I'm gonna tweak their claims a little bit to try and sound less stupid, and fit better with things we've since discovered. And hopefully the magic man will accept my partial agreement with goat herder ideology and forgo punishing me, because I'm sure even he knows just how stupid the original claim was."
As dumb as both of those people are person 2 is dumber because he realizes he's being fed bullshit, but still picks around it and tries to eat off the same plate despite knowing that. Someone who accidentally eats shit is not as stupid as someone who intentionally eats it.
Bro, I don't know what you talk about in your subreddit. But I'll tell you this... Of the sects we explicitly mentioned (Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, Mormon, and Jeohova's Witness) all of them can agree on one thing. Someone who's beliefs match with yours is not a true Christian.
And frankly I don't care to argue about who is a true Christian and who isn't. Because in my opinion Christianity isn't true at all, and so none of you are true Christians.
your theory that only testable propositions are true is also untestable
I never said only testable propositions are true.... What I said is that only testable propositions are knowable.
If you can't test it or demonstrate it, you can't know it.
You are making claims about untestable things you can't possibly know, and I'm right to point out that you have no valid basis on which to claim this knowledge.
What is Christianity?
According to you it's whatever you want it to be, because you can interpret it any way you please, and redefine any of the words to mean anything you want.
Ohh and you also get to cherry pick which version of the bible you're reading from too!
And on that note, I don't see the point in engaging in a theological debate with someone who doesn't believe in theology in the first place, because I don't believe in it either, just for different reasons.
Perhaps you don't believe the Big Bang Theory in its supernatural first instant?
I don't recall ever professing belief in the big bang theory.... Which is not actually a scientific theory because there's no way to test it.
And lastly I'll comment on the idea of interpreting scripture for yourself, and coming to your own personalized interpretation.
It's like when a leftist will say they believe in the constitution, but when you actually question them you find out they believe in censorship, don't think you should own a gun, and think the government should go around seizing private property.
And you're like "WTF, that's totally against the constitution."
And then they use a wall of text, sophistry, and word games to explain how according to their interpretation of the constitution, none of those things are actually rights.
It's like... No... You don't believe in the constitution at all... You're just twisting it to say what you want it to say. And in the process you're proving why there needs to be a designated authority to decide the interpretation of the constitution for all of us.
I'm not religious at all, and I don't think god is real at all... But if he was he would DEFINATELY need priests and clergy to enforce the true meaning of his word to keep idiots like you from twisting it into whatever you want.
God does not supersede the laws of nature and reality, as I just implied.
And this right here is why I started off by asking about if it's okay to personalize your religious beliefs to fit whatever you want.
Because what you just said is in total disagreement with 2,000+ years of theologians from all various sects of Christianity, who all read the same book and don't agree with your interpretation.
God is defined as being one with the laws of nature and reality.
Then guess what... You're not a Christian!
Nobody believes the laws of nature came to earth in human form to die on a cross and relieve you of your sins, came back to life, and then floated into the sky. Nobody believes the laws of nature crafted a woman from a mans rib in some primoradial garden. Nobody believes the laws of nature have angels in heaven fighting for it's throne.
Nope that was all the supernatural magic man!
If it sounds stupid, it's because it is stupid. The more you try and change it to sound less stupid, the less right you have to call yourself a Christian.
Do you understand "that all scientific theory and progress in history involves a recognition that certain phenomena remain unexplained
I reject your claim that "supernatural" only refers to things that are not understood.
The true definition of supernatural is something that is not bound by the laws of nature. And it's pretty damn transparent you are afraid to talk about that definition of "supernatural".
Your religion teaches that god literally crafted the entire universe according to his will, and exists outside of space and time. That is an appeal to the supernatural, not an appeal to the unknown.
What do you wish to gain from a conversation where you ask questions but demur at the answers?
I asked you how to settle disagreements on biblical interpretations and you spent like 5 comments changing the subject to talk about things where people already agree.
I asked you about Mormons, Catholics, and Jehovah's Witnesses and you changed the subject to talk about Eastern Orthodox Christians.
I asked you about the claim that your god exists beyond nature, space and time, and you changed the subject to "the unexplained".
You've spent the entire conversation changing the subject and avoiding every point I've made. And I'm honestly done with it.
Now if you want to continue this conversation at all you must answer this question directly with no more games. If your reply doesn't contain a direct answer this is the last you will hear from me.
Is your god bound by the laws of nature? Yes or no?
More likely a propagandist for the machine taking part in predictive programming for 9/11 which was an inside job.
If I'm being totally honest, nothing you have said so far has been interesting enough for me to even pretended to read that giant wall of text. If you wanna take out like 80% of the fluff and repost that comment at a reasonable length I'll be happy to continue this discussion.
But you need to be respectful of my time and attention, and a comment like that is not.
You did fall into a trap by changing my definition from "unexplained" to "supernatural".
You believe in a god that literally supersedes nature, the universe, space and time, and the laws of physics, because you think he created all of that.
Refusing to own the label "supernatural" is to deny the very god you claim to worship.
Most all the 50,000 denominations agree on the essentials of following Jesus, and admit each other to be true followers.
Would Jehovah's Witnesses, Mormons, and Catholics say they are all true followers of the same Jesus?
Most all denominations agree broadly with such elements in verifying such knowledge.
Then how come you refused to verify anything when i asked?
Do you wish to make good on your pursuit of truth by treating me as a person who can be persuaded to greater truth than I already have? If there's no god, I'd want to know that, wouldn't I?
Just because you WANT to know something doesn't mean you can. When someone makes an unfalsifiable claim with no way to ever verify it, I think the logical thing to do is disregard them.
The lack of evidence against their claim doesn't demonstrate anything other than that the claim is of such a baseless nature that it's impossible to gather even the slightest bit of evidence either way.
Just cause you want to know the nature of the universe doesn't mean you get to know. Just because you pretend to know doesn't mean you do.
I don't think I know the answers, But I've seen enough to disregard the one you are putting forward about a sentient magic supernatural being who created the universe for fun.
If you haven't figured out the answer, it's that it's not a problem to us.
Yeah.... See, that's what I was getting at... You believe in a personalized version of god, which is going to have different requirements for his followers depending on who you ask.
In which case, either the rules for getting into heaven are pretty loose, or a hell of a lot of Christians are going to hell for believing the wrong things.
There are sometimes disagreements on nonessentials, there are sometimes disagreements on essentials that get resolved over time, and there are sometimes disagreements on essentials that don't get resolved
There are over 50,000 denominations of Christianity based on differing interpretations of the 900+ English versions of the bible.
It seems to me like you never resolve the disagreements, and instead just fracture into a separate branch and then claim the other side aren't real Christians.
in which case over time it becomes realized that one party was not pursuing truth
Since all of you are asserting knowledge of the truth, and none of you are demonstrating a way to verify that knowledge, I think none of you are actually pursuing truth.
If by "fairy tale" you mean an interpretation lacking a full explanation or understanding,
I mean you claim to believe a story chock-full of supernatural elements.... and yet you can't demonstrate the existence of anything supernatural in the slightest. That makes it a fairy tale as far as I'm concerned.
all good scientists admit that their theory of everything is a fairy tale by that definition. But what other definition could there be to distinguish between us two?
The difference is I don't go around professing faith and absolute belief in scientific theories, nor do I waste my time pouring over them thinking absolute truth is buried in there somewhere as long as I magically come to the correct interpretation of what it says.
"No problem" means "it's not my problem".
Interestingly enough, that's the same way I feel about you wasting your life being in love with a fairy tale.
It's not my problem.
You started with a reasonable question and I indicated how reasonable people can come to agreed interpretations of unclear ancient texts.
Talking about areas where people do agree is avoiding the question which was about the areas where they don't agree.
The question was is it a problem for the "bible only" approach to Christianity when people disagree on interpretations, or is it okay if every Christian has their own personalized version of it?
I do remember about 6 months beofore 9/11 Hal Lindsay (TV evangelist) during one of his rants about signs of the world ending explicitly warned of a terrorist attack from Osama bin laden.
If you don't care what I believe or what I don't believe, then it should be no problem that I'm an atheist.
If you don't believe any god is real, why would it be time for me to demonstrate otherwise?
Because you have to demonstrate HOW you know something in order for me to believe you, otherwise you're just making shit up or going alone with shit someone else made up.
Anyway.... There are in fact many points of disagreement for the correct way to interpret the bible.
What is your answer for that in your "bible only" approach, or is it totally cool if everyone just walks around with their own personalized religion?
Not my fault you didn't read it the first time.
woman?