Definitive Proof that GOD Exists?

[amrchaos]

Actually, no

Because everyone believes something is true does not make it true.

For example, belief in a lie does not change the lie into truth. Regardless of how many, or if everyone, believes in that lie.

In other words, it doesn't matter how many people believe there is no such thing as god?

Good point!

OR

How many believe there is a living god..it can go either way and does not clarify what is actually true.

 

[newpolitics]

Neither do you. I actually do debate. I've examined and logically deconstructed each one of Boss's points, so your claims about me not-debating is just baseless shit-talking for the purpose of making someone feel bad. You are in no position to accuse someone of "not debating" given your behavior on this very thread.

Debating rule #1:-

Question,why are you and NP posting in the thread in that case ?

Are you insinuating that I am not debating? I don't think you know what debate is.

 

[Boss]

Are you insinuating that I am not debating? I don't think you know what debate is.

What you've done in this thread is not debate. I have no doubt that, inside your head, you have brilliantly refuted all my arguments and won the debate, but the reality of what you've posted, doesn't show that at all. You continue to want to take up space in the thread, arguing about things that have nothing to do with the topic. Here, you are making an argument that you have been debating. To debate the topic, you have to remain on topic, and you've demonstrated an inability to do that for more than 10 pages.

 

[Hollie]

Oh I have to disagree just a bit. It takes faith to believe according to the evidence available that life began without a designer.

It appears that all the evidence you require can be cut and pasted from Harun Yahya.

Hollie you lack creativity same ol boring responses.

You shouldn't expect cutting and pasting from Harun Yahya to be met with serious consideration.

 

[newpolitics]

Observation does not indicate anything, except that humans have always been intrinsically tied to spiritual belief.

Let me break this down for you. You have two contradictory propositions here, and you don't even know it.

1.) observation does not indicate anything.

2.) Humans have always been tied to spiritual belief

The problem, is that Spiritual belief is acquired only after observation of the world around us, yet, "observation indicates nothing" according to you. You have just admitted that spiritual belief indicates nothing, since it is acquired through observation, which indicates nothing. This runs contradictory to your claim that humans' spiritual belief is a true belief, and is special pleading to say that observations normally indicate nothing, but in the case of spiritual belief , they indicate truth.

 

[newpolitics]

A response to your nonsense invocation of "Darwin":

Humans made up stories about gods to deal with unanswerable questions. We also did not understand death, and so created religious belief to deal with this unknown. If you keep these conditions constant enough for 200,000 years, it becomes natural for us, and it becomes a matter of social pressure to believe. This is where evolution comes in. Anyone that didn't believe was not trusted and considered an outcast, and therefore didn't mate and reproduce. People didn't have a choice to disbelieve. It was a matter of social credibility within the population, which was a matter of life and death. Plus, there was no other way of understanding the world, which gave it a natural incentive for each individual. So essentially, people were forced into religious belief. To This day, atheists are still the most distrusted group, and it is based on our evolutionary upbringing, where religious belief was a matter of life and death: if you didn't believe, you were killed. Therefore, this does not indicate truth about the universe, only about about the way we organized ourselves socially. It is a self-regulatory mechanism for social control and cohesion. Evolutionarily, it makes perfect sense, without the actual existence of the spiritual. This is all religious and spiritual belief has ever been. It says nothing about the actual universe, and whether there is a a god.

If anything, atheists died for their lack of belief in gods. According to your logic, this demonstrates that no gods exist.

 

[Boss]

Actually, no

Because everyone believes something is true does not make it true.

For example, belief in a lie does not change the lie into truth. Regardless of how many, or if everyone, believes in that lie.

In other words, it doesn't matter how many people believe there is no such thing as god?

Good point!

OR

How many believe there is a living god..it can go either way and does not clarify what is actually true.

Right, but I know of no one who thinks there is a "living god" ...as in, physical flesh and blood. God is a spiritual entity, not a physically living being. The non-god-believers keep demanding that proof be presented for god, but they reject the spiritual evidence which proves a spiritual entity. Here, you indicate the notion of a "living" god, which cannot logically exist, since spiritual entities aren't living physical beings.

Now, either one of two things apply here, you believe people who claim belief in god are imagining a person who doesn't really exist, or you know that god is spiritual, and can never be proven with physical evidence alone.

What simply can't be denied, regardless of what your beliefs are, is that human beings have always been spiritually hardwired. It is the defining characteristic which makes us unique among all living creatures. Through years of war and persecution, enlightenment and scientific answers to the great 'unknowns' of ancient man, spiritual nature in humans still remains as strong as ever. It can't be beaten out of man, it can't be enlightened out of man, and it can't be ridiculed out of man. Does that mean it's "real?" Well, it's obvious that spiritual connection to SOMETHING is real, we've been doing it for 70,000 years.

 

[Hollie]

You know, this whole thread is extremely disappointing to me. Page after page of morons wading in to proclaim "there is no proof of god" as if they haven't even read the OP, a few ruthless god-hating warriors, refusing to remain on topic and discuss this reasonably, a few more antagonists who have no intention of an honest debate, and idiots like you, who want to try and manipulate my words into a "gotchya" moment. I wanted to talk with others who realize a spiritual realm, but don't necessarily subscribe to religious dogma. I wanted to explore the possibilities of Astral Projection, and the Astral plane. You know, with OPEN MINDED people who aren't afraid to explore possibilities, because they are too freaking filled with hate for Christianity!

Then why did you title this thread as "Definitive Proof that GOD Exists"? You literally begged for people to come here and expose your nonsense and when they did so you resorted to crude insults because you could not refute their logic and reason. The only person you should be blaming for your disappointment is yourself but it is readily apparent that you lack the inherent honesty necessary to recognize your own shortcomings. You are about as far from spirituality and astral planes as it is possible to get. Discussing spirituality with you would be like discussing quantum physics with a pet rock.

But you don't "expose nonsense" by popping in to say "god doesn't exist." That is simply an emphatic claim with no basis or supporting argument. Logic and reason have been on my side since I posted the OP, and I've pointed out exactly how that is the case.

Definitive Proof that GOD Exists can be interpreted differently, depending on what you are talking about. The evidence which makes the proof definitive, is spiritual evidence, which you don't accept. First two paragraphs of my OP, address this very point. You've not refuted the point, no one has. GOD is a metaphoric term used, in this case, to distinguish the spiritual entity humans have connected with for the duration of the species. You've mistakenly interpreted this term to mean some religious manifestation, and I have repeatedly had to correct this misconception. Finally, the word "exists" and how it does not mean physical existence, since we are not talking about a physical entity. Therefore, a more suitable title might have been: Definitive proof for those who accept spiritual evidence, that some spiritual entity greater than self, exists in a spiritual sense. But you have to actually READ the OP to comprehend this. Those who simply popped in to proclaim "god doesn't exist," have not read the OP, or don't comprehend what was said.

Spirituality is one's own private journey. It has no need to involve anyone else in that process. Everything you need to know to get started and guide you along is in print and is certainly available now on the internet. This bickering about it is stupid.

I suspect the OP'er has suffered from an embarrassing lack of credibility with the ill considered thread title "Definitive Proof that GOD Exists". Such a false and bellicose claim was doomed to fail. Having abandoned that claim, it was on to plow more furrows of "spirituality".

Such are the wages of proselytizing gone bad.

Uhm, there is nothing "ill-considered" about the thread title. You've not proven my argument false, and I am not the least bit embarrassed by that.

Proselytizing? Where have I done that? Oh, that's right, I basically said I was an Atheist, is THAT what you meant? My repeated denunciation of organized religion, might be construed as proselytization... I hadn't considered that. However, I didn't raise this in the OP, it was only mentioned after repeatedly having to correct people who can't distinguish spirituality from religion.

My apologies to those who believe in a Christian God, I didn't mean to be proselytizing.

Here’s a bit of enlightenment for you: I’m not required to disprove anything.
Perhaps you have forgotten but it was you who closed the OP with the falsely attributed comment “So there you have it, in just a few short paragraphs. Definitive proof that God exists!”

You have subsequently attempted to offer an ill-defined and poorly supported term, “spirituality”, as evidence for some alleged supernatural entity or realm that you are unable to effectively communicate, much less offer support for.

Neither I nor anyone else is under any requirement to "disprove" your claims. In no grown-up discussion is there a requirement to disprove the non-existence of anything.

I might have addressed this elsewhere, but for the new folks:

You cannot require "disproof of that which is not" as a standard because you are establishing a fallacious standard by definition. If you can demand, "my claim cannot be disproven” but not demand that the asserter prove there actually is reason to accept a claim, then anyone can counter your demand using your own standard:

Thus, I do have proof disproving your false claim of “Definitive proof that gods exists!”,
prove that I do not. See? You have established that "prove it isn't" is a viable standard, and I am merely accepting your standards and playing it right back at you. I cannot be held to task for this, since if it is okay for you to have such a standard, I can have such a standard as well.

Therefore, it must be the asserter of all positive (i.e., such and such exists) premises to prove their assertion. With equal validity, I cannot "prove there isn't" a Santa Claus, leprechauns, gnomes, werewolves, etc. etc. etc., but we do not go around insisting there be an establishment of proof of non-existence for those things. Why does the assertion of an alleged supernatural entity get past this same standard?

 

[Hollie]

Argumentum Ad Populum (Argument from popularity). It doesn't matter how many people believe something to be true. It doesnt make it true. It wouldn't matter if everyone human ever was devoutly religious... That doesn't mean a god exists.

WTF planet do you live on???

If EVERYONE believes it to be true?

It's TRUE to everyone.

iow? No one would be trying to DISprove it.

Actually, no

Because everyone believes something is true does not make it true.

For example, belief in a lie does not change the lie into truth. Regardless of how many, or if everyone, believes in that lie.

Nicely stated.

As Anatole France has said, "Just because 50 million people believe a foolish thing, it doesn't mean it's not a foolish thing".

 

[Hollie]

In other words, it doesn't matter how many people believe there is no such thing as god?

Good point!

OR

How many believe there is a living god..it can go either way and does not clarify what is actually true.

Right, but I know of no one who thinks there is a "living god" ...as in, physical flesh and blood. God is a spiritual entity, not a physically living being. The non-god-believers keep demanding that proof be presented for god, but they reject the spiritual evidence which proves a spiritual entity. Here, you indicate the notion of a "living" god, which cannot logically exist, since spiritual entities aren't living physical beings.

Now, either one of two things apply here, you believe people who claim belief in god are imagining a person who doesn't really exist, or you know that god is spiritual, and can never be proven with physical evidence alone.

What simply can't be denied, regardless of what your beliefs are, is that human beings have always been spiritually hardwired. It is the defining characteristic which makes us unique among all living creatures. Through years of war and persecution, enlightenment and scientific answers to the great 'unknowns' of ancient man, spiritual nature in humans still remains as strong as ever. It can't be beaten out of man, it can't be enlightened out of man, and it can't be ridiculed out of man. Does that mean it's "real?" Well, it's obvious that spiritual connection to SOMETHING is real, we've been doing it for 70,000 years.

"God is a spiritual entity, not a physically living being"

Your comment might have been valid had you simply appended, "because I say so" to your sentence. We could have pointed and laughed.

Unfortunately, we're left with you making totally unsupported and unproven claims so we're left to... well... point and laugh.

 

[newpolitics]

Are you insinuating that I am not debating? I don't think you know what debate is.

What you've done in this thread is not debate. I have no doubt that, inside your head, you have brilliantly refuted all my arguments and won the debate, but the reality of what you've posted, doesn't show that at all. You continue to want to take up space in the thread, arguing about things that have nothing to do with the topic. Here, you are making an argument that you have been debating. To debate the topic, you have to remain on topic, and you've demonstrated an inability to do that for more than 10 pages.

You presented an argument. I pointed out the logical flaws and have logically shown why your premises don't necessarily give you your conclusions, which is all I need to do. This is called refutation. All together, This is called debate. You seem to think debate it where everyone agrees with you and you have a big party with all of your friends.

 

[Boss]

A response to your nonsense invocation of "Darwin":

Humans made up stories about gods to deal with unanswerable questions. We also did not understand death, and so created religious belief to deal with this unknown. If you keep these conditions constant enough for 200,000 years, it becomes natural for us, and it becomes a matter of social pressure to believe. This is where evolution comes in. Anyone that didn't believe was not trusted and considered an outcast, and therefore didn't mate and reproduce. People didn't have a choice to disbelieve. It was a matter of social credibility within the population, which was a matter of life and death. Plus, there was no other way of understanding the world, which gave it a natural incentive for each individual. So essentially, people were forced into religious belief. To This day, atheists are still the most distrusted group, and it is based on our evolutionary upbringing, where religious belief was a matter of life and death: if you didn't believe, you were killed. Therefore, this does not indicate truth about the universe, only about about the way we organized ourselves socially. It is a self-regulatory mechanism for social cooperation. This is all religious and spiritual belief has ever been. It says nothing about the actual universe, and whether there is a a god.

If anything, atheists died for their lack of belief in gods. According to your logic, this demonstrates that no gods exist.

And I can completely debunk every single point you've raised. No living thing we've ever observed, exhibits behavior it totally made up so it could answer questions. There is no physical or scientific biological evidence that living things need to understand death. Yet, you are arguing this was so essential to early humans, they invented spirituality to deal with it. This defies both nature and Darwinism, but you are still clinging to it as a valid reason.

History shows, an abundance of wars and brutal persecution of humans who professed spiritual beliefs. For the billions of humans who were executed, this certainly wasn't an attribute which contributed to survival of the species. Again, your argument defies Darwin and simply fails. Finally, we have the modern advent of scientific discovery, which has essentially answered ALL questions of the unknown, held by ancient man. IF this were the justification for human spiritual belief, we would have seen a dramatic decline in spiritual belief, much the same as we've seen with superstitions. We don't. As of now, the same relative percentage of humans are spiritual, as they've always been, it is unchanged. In the most "atheistic" country in the world, nearly 75% believe a spiritual realm exists or it's possible. So we see NO indication that man is becoming less spiritual with the advent of scientific explanation. This DESTROYS your argument to the contrary.

I absolutely LOVED this point you made:
Plus, there was no other way of understanding the world, which gave it a natural incentive for each individual.

There was no other way... you said it yourself. The thing that makes humans distinctly different than any other living creature, is our ability to connect spiritually. Our NEED to explain the unexplained, our NEED to understand death, our NEED to answer the unanswered, STEMS FROM our spiritual connection, not the other way around.

 

[Boss]

OR

How many believe there is a living god..it can go either way and does not clarify what is actually true.

Right, but I know of no one who thinks there is a "living god" ...as in, physical flesh and blood. God is a spiritual entity, not a physically living being. The non-god-believers keep demanding that proof be presented for god, but they reject the spiritual evidence which proves a spiritual entity. Here, you indicate the notion of a "living" god, which cannot logically exist, since spiritual entities aren't living physical beings.

Now, either one of two things apply here, you believe people who claim belief in god are imagining a person who doesn't really exist, or you know that god is spiritual, and can never be proven with physical evidence alone.

What simply can't be denied, regardless of what your beliefs are, is that human beings have always been spiritually hardwired. It is the defining characteristic which makes us unique among all living creatures. Through years of war and persecution, enlightenment and scientific answers to the great 'unknowns' of ancient man, spiritual nature in humans still remains as strong as ever. It can't be beaten out of man, it can't be enlightened out of man, and it can't be ridiculed out of man. Does that mean it's "real?" Well, it's obvious that spiritual connection to SOMETHING is real, we've been doing it for 70,000 years.

"God is a spiritual entity, not a physically living being"

Your comment might have been valid had you simply appended, "because I say so" to your sentence. We could have pointed and laughed.

Unfortunately, we're left with you making totally unsupported and unproven claims so we're left to... well... point and laugh.

No, the claim is indeed proven, there is 70,000 years of evidence to support the claim. Billions of first-hand witnesses to the existence of a spiritual god, who profoundly believed in a spiritual entity greater than self, many of whom, gave their lives to defend their belief.

Now.... my claim is indeed, not supported by physical proof. There is no physical god. Unless you acknowledge the spiritual realm, god can never be proven to "exist" because to "exist" only means "in a physical state" to you. Something that does not possess a physical state, can't be "proven" to someone who only accepts physical proof. For us to objectively evaluate the question of a spiritual existence, we HAVE TO look at spiritual evidence, if we've closed our minds to this, and do not consider this valid "proof," then god can't ever be "proven." God does not reside in the physical realm, and has no physical evidence of existence, and it's illogical to expect this.

 

[Boss]

Then why did you title this thread as "Definitive Proof that GOD Exists"? You literally begged for people to come here and expose your nonsense and when they did so you resorted to crude insults because you could not refute their logic and reason. The only person you should be blaming for your disappointment is yourself but it is readily apparent that you lack the inherent honesty necessary to recognize your own shortcomings. You are about as far from spirituality and astral planes as it is possible to get. Discussing spirituality with you would be like discussing quantum physics with a pet rock.

But you don't "expose nonsense" by popping in to say "god doesn't exist." That is simply an emphatic claim with no basis or supporting argument. Logic and reason have been on my side since I posted the OP, and I've pointed out exactly how that is the case.

Definitive Proof that GOD Exists can be interpreted differently, depending on what you are talking about. The evidence which makes the proof definitive, is spiritual evidence, which you don't accept. First two paragraphs of my OP, address this very point. You've not refuted the point, no one has. GOD is a metaphoric term used, in this case, to distinguish the spiritual entity humans have connected with for the duration of the species. You've mistakenly interpreted this term to mean some religious manifestation, and I have repeatedly had to correct this misconception. Finally, the word "exists" and how it does not mean physical existence, since we are not talking about a physical entity. Therefore, a more suitable title might have been: Definitive proof for those who accept spiritual evidence, that some spiritual entity greater than self, exists in a spiritual sense. But you have to actually READ the OP to comprehend this. Those who simply popped in to proclaim "god doesn't exist," have not read the OP, or don't comprehend what was said.

I suspect the OP'er has suffered from an embarrassing lack of credibility with the ill considered thread title "Definitive Proof that GOD Exists". Such a false and bellicose claim was doomed to fail. Having abandoned that claim, it was on to plow more furrows of "spirituality".

Such are the wages of proselytizing gone bad.

Uhm, there is nothing "ill-considered" about the thread title. You've not proven my argument false, and I am not the least bit embarrassed by that.

Proselytizing? Where have I done that? Oh, that's right, I basically said I was an Atheist, is THAT what you meant? My repeated denunciation of organized religion, might be construed as proselytization... I hadn't considered that. However, I didn't raise this in the OP, it was only mentioned after repeatedly having to correct people who can't distinguish spirituality from religion.

My apologies to those who believe in a Christian God, I didn't mean to be proselytizing.

Here’s a bit of enlightenment for you: I’m not required to disprove anything.
Perhaps you have forgotten but it was you who closed the OP with the falsely attributed comment “So there you have it, in just a few short paragraphs. Definitive proof that God exists!”

You have subsequently attempted to offer an ill-defined and poorly supported term, “spirituality”, as evidence for some alleged supernatural entity or realm that you are unable to effectively communicate, much less offer support for.

Neither I nor anyone else is under any requirement to "disprove" your claims. In no grown-up discussion is there a requirement to disprove the non-existence of anything.

I might have addressed this elsewhere, but for the new folks:

You cannot require "disproof of that which is not" as a standard because you are establishing a fallacious standard by definition. If you can demand, "my claim cannot be disproven” but not demand that the asserter prove there actually is reason to accept a claim, then anyone can counter your demand using your own standard:

Thus, I do have proof disproving your false claim of “Definitive proof that gods exists!”,
prove that I do not. See? You have established that "prove it isn't" is a viable standard, and I am merely accepting your standards and playing it right back at you. I cannot be held to task for this, since if it is okay for you to have such a standard, I can have such a standard as well.

Therefore, it must be the asserter of all positive (i.e., such and such exists) premises to prove their assertion. With equal validity, I cannot "prove there isn't" a Santa Claus, leprechauns, gnomes, werewolves, etc. etc. etc., but we do not go around insisting there be an establishment of proof of non-existence for those things. Why does the assertion of an alleged supernatural entity get past this same standard?

If you can't disprove the OP argument, then you need to shut your yap, and move on. No need for you to priss in here and proclaim you've "debunked arguments" and "exposed nonsense" when you haven't.

In my OP argument, the first two points of the argument are centered on definition and understanding of terms. I clearly stated, and you have confirmed, that people who do not accept or recognize spiritual evidence, can never have god "proven" to them, it's illogical and impossible to do so. If the physical evidence to prove god were ever discovered, god would cease to be a "spiritual entity" and would become a supportable physical entity. While it's not entirely impossible that we could discover physical evidence of god, it is highly illogical to expect it. God is not of the physical universe, god is spiritual in nature.

So, how can we "prove" something spiritually exists? We must acknowledge at the spiritual evidence. We have 70,000 years of an upper primate, exhibiting a profound and distinct attribute of spiritual behavior, and according to what we DO KNOW, this sort of thing simply does not occur in nature unless there is something to it. You can give me NO example of ANY living thing, just doing something for all of it's existence, for no apparent reason. Regardless of whether this one point "proves" a spiritual god, it certainly proves humans believe there is something greater than self, and not only do they believe it, they PROFOUNDLY believe it. This belief can't be stomped out of the hearts of man, it remains the most definitive characteristic of the species.

To casually dismiss this as "delusion" or "explaining the unknown" is insulting to science and the spirit of scientific method. You've simply dismissed the problem because of a variable you claim is unknown.

 

[Hollie]

Right, but I know of no one who thinks there is a "living god" ...as in, physical flesh and blood. God is a spiritual entity, not a physically living being. The non-god-believers keep demanding that proof be presented for god, but they reject the spiritual evidence which proves a spiritual entity. Here, you indicate the notion of a "living" god, which cannot logically exist, since spiritual entities aren't living physical beings.

Now, either one of two things apply here, you believe people who claim belief in god are imagining a person who doesn't really exist, or you know that god is spiritual, and can never be proven with physical evidence alone.

What simply can't be denied, regardless of what your beliefs are, is that human beings have always been spiritually hardwired. It is the defining characteristic which makes us unique among all living creatures. Through years of war and persecution, enlightenment and scientific answers to the great 'unknowns' of ancient man, spiritual nature in humans still remains as strong as ever. It can't be beaten out of man, it can't be enlightened out of man, and it can't be ridiculed out of man. Does that mean it's "real?" Well, it's obvious that spiritual connection to SOMETHING is real, we've been doing it for 70,000 years.

"God is a spiritual entity, not a physically living being"

Your comment might have been valid had you simply appended, "because I say so" to your sentence. We could have pointed and laughed.

Unfortunately, we're left with you making totally unsupported and unproven claims so we're left to... well... point and laugh.

No, the claim is indeed proven, there is 70,000 years of evidence to support the claim. Billions of first-hand witnesses to the existence of a spiritual god, who profoundly believed in a spiritual entity greater than self, many of whom, gave their lives to defend their belief.

Now.... my claim is indeed, not supported by physical proof. There is no physical god. Unless you acknowledge the spiritual realm, god can never be proven to "exist" because to "exist" only means "in a physical state" to you. Something that does not possess a physical state, can't be "proven" to someone who only accepts physical proof. For us to objectively evaluate the question of a spiritual existence, we HAVE TO look at spiritual evidence, if we've closed our minds to this, and do not consider this valid "proof," then god can't ever be "proven." God does not reside in the physical realm, and has no physical evidence of existence, and it's illogical to expect this.

Your demands that your subjective opinions cannot be refuted is nonsense. By applying your fallacious "standards", such as they are, we can thus assume the undeniable existence of Bigfoot, space aliens, the Loch Ness monster, conceptions of gods and demons, etc., and all manner of supernatural objects de Art simply because of a history of human fear and ignorance.

 

[Hollie]

But you don't "expose nonsense" by popping in to say "god doesn't exist." That is simply an emphatic claim with no basis or supporting argument. Logic and reason have been on my side since I posted the OP, and I've pointed out exactly how that is the case.

Definitive Proof that GOD Exists can be interpreted differently, depending on what you are talking about. The evidence which makes the proof definitive, is spiritual evidence, which you don't accept. First two paragraphs of my OP, address this very point. You've not refuted the point, no one has. GOD is a metaphoric term used, in this case, to distinguish the spiritual entity humans have connected with for the duration of the species. You've mistakenly interpreted this term to mean some religious manifestation, and I have repeatedly had to correct this misconception. Finally, the word "exists" and how it does not mean physical existence, since we are not talking about a physical entity. Therefore, a more suitable title might have been: Definitive proof for those who accept spiritual evidence, that some spiritual entity greater than self, exists in a spiritual sense. But you have to actually READ the OP to comprehend this. Those who simply popped in to proclaim "god doesn't exist," have not read the OP, or don't comprehend what was said.



Uhm, there is nothing "ill-considered" about the thread title. You've not proven my argument false, and I am not the least bit embarrassed by that.

Proselytizing? Where have I done that? Oh, that's right, I basically said I was an Atheist, is THAT what you meant? My repeated denunciation of organized religion, might be construed as proselytization... I hadn't considered that. However, I didn't raise this in the OP, it was only mentioned after repeatedly having to correct people who can't distinguish spirituality from religion.

My apologies to those who believe in a Christian God, I didn't mean to be proselytizing.

Here’s a bit of enlightenment for you: I’m not required to disprove anything.
Perhaps you have forgotten but it was you who closed the OP with the falsely attributed comment “So there you have it, in just a few short paragraphs. Definitive proof that God exists!”

You have subsequently attempted to offer an ill-defined and poorly supported term, “spirituality”, as evidence for some alleged supernatural entity or realm that you are unable to effectively communicate, much less offer support for.

Neither I nor anyone else is under any requirement to "disprove" your claims. In no grown-up discussion is there a requirement to disprove the non-existence of anything.

I might have addressed this elsewhere, but for the new folks:

You cannot require "disproof of that which is not" as a standard because you are establishing a fallacious standard by definition. If you can demand, "my claim cannot be disproven” but not demand that the asserter prove there actually is reason to accept a claim, then anyone can counter your demand using your own standard:

Thus, I do have proof disproving your false claim of “Definitive proof that gods exists!”,
prove that I do not. See? You have established that "prove it isn't" is a viable standard, and I am merely accepting your standards and playing it right back at you. I cannot be held to task for this, since if it is okay for you to have such a standard, I can have such a standard as well.

Therefore, it must be the asserter of all positive (i.e., such and such exists) premises to prove their assertion. With equal validity, I cannot "prove there isn't" a Santa Claus, leprechauns, gnomes, werewolves, etc. etc. etc., but we do not go around insisting there be an establishment of proof of non-existence for those things. Why does the assertion of an alleged supernatural entity get past this same standard?

If you can't disprove the OP argument, then you need to shut your yap, and move on. No need for you to priss in here and proclaim you've "debunked arguments" and "exposed nonsense" when you haven't.

In my OP argument, the first two points of the argument are centered on definition and understanding of terms. I clearly stated, and you have confirmed, that people who do not accept or recognize spiritual evidence, can never have god "proven" to them, it's illogical and impossible to do so. If the physical evidence to prove god were ever discovered, god would cease to be a "spiritual entity" and would become a supportable physical entity. While it's not entirely impossible that we could discover physical evidence of god, it is highly illogical to expect it. God is not of the physical universe, god is spiritual in nature.

So, how can we "prove" something spiritually exists? We must acknowledge at the spiritual evidence. We have 70,000 years of an upper primate, exhibiting a profound and distinct attribute of spiritual behavior, and according to what we DO KNOW, this sort of thing simply does not occur in nature unless there is something to it. You can give me NO example of ANY living thing, just doing something for all of it's existence, for no apparent reason. Regardless of whether this one point "proves" a spiritual god, it certainly proves humans believe there is something greater than self, and not only do they believe it, they PROFOUNDLY believe it. This belief can't be stomped out of the hearts of man, it remains the most definitive characteristic of the species.

To casually dismiss this as "delusion" or "explaining the unknown" is insulting to science and the spirit of scientific method. You've simply dismissed the problem because of a variable you claim is unknown.

I've yet to be presented with a single, verifiable piece of evidence that supports your opinions regarding this "spirituality", gods, or whatever you are rattling on about but are unable to define.

"Because a lot of people believe it" is hardly a reason to accept something as true or factual.

 

[Hollie]

But you don't "expose nonsense" by popping in to say "god doesn't exist." That is simply an emphatic claim with no basis or supporting argument. Logic and reason have been on my side since I posted the OP, and I've pointed out exactly how that is the case.

Definitive Proof that GOD Exists can be interpreted differently, depending on what you are talking about. The evidence which makes the proof definitive, is spiritual evidence, which you don't accept. First two paragraphs of my OP, address this very point. You've not refuted the point, no one has. GOD is a metaphoric term used, in this case, to distinguish the spiritual entity humans have connected with for the duration of the species. You've mistakenly interpreted this term to mean some religious manifestation, and I have repeatedly had to correct this misconception. Finally, the word "exists" and how it does not mean physical existence, since we are not talking about a physical entity. Therefore, a more suitable title might have been: Definitive proof for those who accept spiritual evidence, that some spiritual entity greater than self, exists in a spiritual sense. But you have to actually READ the OP to comprehend this. Those who simply popped in to proclaim "god doesn't exist," have not read the OP, or don't comprehend what was said.



Uhm, there is nothing "ill-considered" about the thread title. You've not proven my argument false, and I am not the least bit embarrassed by that.

Proselytizing? Where have I done that? Oh, that's right, I basically said I was an Atheist, is THAT what you meant? My repeated denunciation of organized religion, might be construed as proselytization... I hadn't considered that. However, I didn't raise this in the OP, it was only mentioned after repeatedly having to correct people who can't distinguish spirituality from religion.

My apologies to those who believe in a Christian God, I didn't mean to be proselytizing.

Here’s a bit of enlightenment for you: I’m not required to disprove anything.
Perhaps you have forgotten but it was you who closed the OP with the falsely attributed comment “So there you have it, in just a few short paragraphs. Definitive proof that God exists!”

You have subsequently attempted to offer an ill-defined and poorly supported term, “spirituality”, as evidence for some alleged supernatural entity or realm that you are unable to effectively communicate, much less offer support for.

Neither I nor anyone else is under any requirement to "disprove" your claims. In no grown-up discussion is there a requirement to disprove the non-existence of anything.

I might have addressed this elsewhere, but for the new folks:

You cannot require "disproof of that which is not" as a standard because you are establishing a fallacious standard by definition. If you can demand, "my claim cannot be disproven” but not demand that the asserter prove there actually is reason to accept a claim, then anyone can counter your demand using your own standard:

Thus, I do have proof disproving your false claim of “Definitive proof that gods exists!”,
prove that I do not. See? You have established that "prove it isn't" is a viable standard, and I am merely accepting your standards and playing it right back at you. I cannot be held to task for this, since if it is okay for you to have such a standard, I can have such a standard as well.

Therefore, it must be the asserter of all positive (i.e., such and such exists) premises to prove their assertion. With equal validity, I cannot "prove there isn't" a Santa Claus, leprechauns, gnomes, werewolves, etc. etc. etc., but we do not go around insisting there be an establishment of proof of non-existence for those things. Why does the assertion of an alleged supernatural entity get past this same standard?

If you can't disprove the OP argument, then you need to shut your yap, and move on. No need for you to priss in here and proclaim you've "debunked arguments" and "exposed nonsense" when you haven't.

In my OP argument, the first two points of the argument are centered on definition and understanding of terms. I clearly stated, and you have confirmed, that people who do not accept or recognize spiritual evidence, can never have god "proven" to them, it's illogical and impossible to do so. If the physical evidence to prove god were ever discovered, god would cease to be a "spiritual entity" and would become a supportable physical entity. While it's not entirely impossible that we could discover physical evidence of god, it is highly illogical to expect it. God is not of the physical universe, god is spiritual in nature.

So, how can we "prove" something spiritually exists? We must acknowledge at the spiritual evidence. We have 70,000 years of an upper primate, exhibiting a profound and distinct attribute of spiritual behavior, and according to what we DO KNOW, this sort of thing simply does not occur in nature unless there is something to it. You can give me NO example of ANY living thing, just doing something for all of it's existence, for no apparent reason. Regardless of whether this one point "proves" a spiritual god, it certainly proves humans believe there is something greater than self, and not only do they believe it, they PROFOUNDLY believe it. This belief can't be stomped out of the hearts of man, it remains the most definitive characteristic of the species.

To casually dismiss this as "delusion" or "explaining the unknown" is insulting to science and the spirit of scientific method. You've simply dismissed the problem because of a variable you claim is unknown.

I would appreciate you providing, by way of a rigorous exampling of the Scientific Method, a proof of "spirituality".

Thrill us, won't you?

 

[newpolitics]

A response to your nonsense invocation of "Darwin":

Humans made up stories about gods to deal with unanswerable questions. We also did not understand death, and so created religious belief to deal with this unknown. If you keep these conditions constant enough for 200,000 years, it becomes natural for us, and it becomes a matter of social pressure to believe. This is where evolution comes in. Anyone that didn't believe was not trusted and considered an outcast, and therefore didn't mate and reproduce. People didn't have a choice to disbelieve. It was a matter of social credibility within the population, which was a matter of life and death. Plus, there was no other way of understanding the world, which gave it a natural incentive for each individual. So essentially, people were forced into religious belief. To This day, atheists are still the most distrusted group, and it is based on our evolutionary upbringing, where religious belief was a matter of life and death: if you didn't believe, you were killed. Therefore, this does not indicate truth about the universe, only about about the way we organized ourselves socially. It is a self-regulatory mechanism for social cooperation. This is all religious and spiritual belief has ever been. It says nothing about the actual universe, and whether there is a a god.

If anything, atheists died for their lack of belief in gods. According to your logic, this demonstrates that no gods exist.

And I can completely debunk every single point you've raised. No living thing we've ever observed, exhibits behavior it totally made up so it could answer questions. There is no physical or scientific biological evidence that living things need to understand death. Yet, you are arguing this was so essential to early humans, they invented spirituality to deal with it. This defies both nature and Darwinism, but you are still clinging to it as a valid reason.

History shows, an abundance of wars and brutal persecution of humans who professed spiritual beliefs. For the billions of humans who were executed, this certainly wasn't an attribute which contributed to survival of the species. Again, your argument defies Darwin and simply fails. Finally, we have the modern advent of scientific discovery, which has essentially answered ALL questions of the unknown, held by ancient man. IF this were the justification for human spiritual belief, we would have seen a dramatic decline in spiritual belief, much the same as we've seen with superstitions. We don't. As of now, the same relative percentage of humans are spiritual, as they've always been, it is unchanged. In the most "atheistic" country in the world, nearly 75% believe a spiritual realm exists or it's possible. So we see NO indication that man is becoming less spiritual with the advent of scientific explanation. This DESTROYS your argument to the contrary.

I absolutely LOVED this point you made:
Plus, there was no other way of understanding the world, which gave it a natural incentive for each individual.

There was no other way... you said it yourself. The thing that makes humans distinctly different than any other living creature, is our ability to connect spiritually. Our NEED to explain the unexplained, our NEED to understand death, our NEED to answer the unanswered, STEMS FROM our spiritual connection, not the other way around.

Our need to explain is a result of our intellectual ability, which results in our ability to ask questions that can not be left unaddressed, merely by having asked them. They are irresistible questions, and once asked, a non-answer is simply too much for some people to handle. Therefore, if we don't have an answer, we will make one. Everything we don't or can't know, is deposited into a concept called "god." This concept has been ever diminishing. Extrapolating this trend, it is probable that god doesn't exist. This is known as the god of the gaps.

You have not refuted any of the points I have laid out, and again misuse and misunderstood the theory of evolution.

 

[Youwerecreated]

It appears that all the evidence you require can be cut and pasted from Harun Yahya.

Hollie you lack creativity same ol boring responses.

You shouldn't expect cutting and pasting from Harun Yahya to be met with serious consideration.

Hollie are you really this dense ?

 

[Youwerecreated]

WTF planet do you live on???

If EVERYONE believes it to be true?

It's TRUE to everyone.

iow? No one would be trying to DISprove it.

Actually, no

Because everyone believes something is true does not make it true.

For example, belief in a lie does not change the lie into truth. Regardless of how many, or if everyone, believes in that lie.

Nicely stated.

As Anatole France has said, "Just because 50 million people believe a foolish thing, it doesn't mean it's not a foolish thing".

What I keep thinking about naturalists.