Christianity

[iambiguous]

We are shown the logic, actually, and we are invited to consider the data for ourselves. Seems fair.

No, we are presented with Christian assumptions about the universe. And then after science itself "proves" that a God, the God must exist, we are left to just assume that it must be the Christian God and not one of these...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_r ... traditions

...paths to immortality and salvation instead.

That's simply not the Kalaam's proposed job. For that, you need to look to other arguments.

Again, in my view, this is typical of how you wiggle, wiggle, wiggle out of actually responding to the point being made. Many others here have noted it as well in your exchanges with them.

It's not arguments that matter here. Instead, it's the actual evidence that you and other Christians do not provide in connecting the dots between the second law of thermodynamics and the existence of the Christian God.

There are, after all, other arguments:
https://www.patheos.com/blogs/daylighta ... h-already/
https://ncse.ngo/creationist-misunderst ... modynamics

Okay, we are told, the universe exists. And it simply makes more sense that something caused it to exist. Then the narrator points to the second law of thermodynamics which [we're told] tells us that the universe is "slowly running out of usable energy". And if the universe had been here forever, it would have run out of energy by now.

I'm just pointing out these scientific facts. If you find a person who calls himself a "physicist" or "chemist," and does not believe in the second law of thermodynamics, then you can be certain he's no scientist at all.

No, in the video, the narrator connects the dots between the second law of thermodynamics and the existence of "a spaceless, timeless, immaterial, uncaused and unimaginably powerful" God. As though there was absolutely, unequivocally no other possible explanation. And, again, given all that science itself does not understand about our universe:

"It turns out that roughly 68% of the universe is dark energy. Dark matter makes up about 27%. The rest - everything on Earth, everything ever observed with all of our instruments, all normal matter - adds up to less than 5% of the universe."

And since these videos revolve around the belief that this is the Christian God, it too becomes just another flagrant assumption.

Now, will you own up to this? Nope. You'll just profess that your own understanding of the science here at least "proves" that a God, the God does "in fact" exist. And then, supposedly, the rest of the videos provide us with the evidence that it's the Christian God?

Is that where we stand so far here?

But what remains peculiar [to me] in regard to you is that you have demonstrated to me that you do have an intelligent mind in some respects and can exchange some rather sophisticated posts with others here pertaining to Christianity historically and/or up in the spiritual clouds philosophically.

But here you are in turn claiming to have proof that might bring me back around to the Christian God. That my own soul might be saved again once I too have come to grasp that there is, in fact a Christian God "out there" somewhere. And, whether you believe me or not, I truly do want to believe that. I truly am searching for a path that will allow me to jettison the grim belief that my own existence is essentially meaningless and purposeless, that there is a path to objective morality, that immortality and salvation are within reachp.b]

No, I am not. I think you're totally uninterested in that, and I'm quite confident I can't change your mind. You aren't interested in changing.

Think what you will, of course, but I can assure others that, given my truly grim, demoralizing personal philosophy, and given the comfort and consolation I once embodied as a Christian myself, there is nothing I want more than to bump into someone who is actually able to provide me with solid evidence that God does exist. That immortality and salvation are a very real possibility. Watch how fast I abandon a No God point of view given this evidence. Any God in fact. Or any No God spiritual path like Buddhism if evidence for their own belief system is provided.

But that was not what we originally started debating. You asserted that there was no such thing as scientific evidence to support the existence of God. Now you know that there is.

That's your recollection, not mine. As I recall, our discussion got around to the distinction between a leap of faith to God and a belief that there is evidence beyond the "read the Bible" argument that the Christian God does in fact exist. I recall making the comparison between proof that the Christian God resides in Heaven and proof that the Pope resides in the Vatican. That's when you linked me to those YouTube videos.

Now, one by one, I have decided to explore them. Looking for the proof you claim is there that the Christian God does exist.

And, no, I do not know that there is scientific proof for the existence of a God, the God. On the contrary, I only have a Christian narrator connecting the dots between the second law of thermodynamics and the existence of "a spaceless, timeless, immaterial, uncaused and unimaginably powerful" God. Again, as though this necessarily rules out any other possible explanation.

The existence of the Christian God can be definitively established -- proven -- by simply accepting your assertion here

I'm quite bemused by your continual attempts to make me to have said something I never said. it's pretty much clear evidence that you can't handle what I DO say, and have to invent your straw men instead.

No more bemused than I am watching you squirm with each passing video that fails to convince anyone other than a True Believer that the Christian God does exist.

Note to others:

As this unfolds, I challenge you to accumulate the instances of all the clear evidence he provides me that I can't handle.

Also, if I do come to a video noting something that, perhaps, doesn't convince me the Christian God does exist but still manages to surprise me enough to dig deeper, I will definitely own up to that. Again, contrary to IC's misgivings, I really am looking for something -- anything -- substantive that allows me to yank myself up from out of the godawful hole I've dug myself down into: an essentially meaningless and morally fractured and fragmented existence that ends in oblivion.

The Kalaam proves that something HAS to be. We can still say, "We don't know what it is," but That's because an actual infinite regress of causes is impossible. It never starts.

The existence of the Christian God can be definitively established -- proven -- by simply accepting your assertion here that "an actual infinite regress of causes is impossible. It never starts"?

If you understand either basic logic or basic maths, you know I'm right: an actual infinite has not beginning, by definition. It never starts.

Please. That's why I have come to refer to you in "chuckle chuckle" mode as Immanual Cant. By definition?!!! Like you -- like anyone -- can actually take this "thought up" definition and demonstrate it regarding the physical universe itself...empirically, experimentally. In, say, a YouTube video?

As though this is now accepted across the board in the scientific community as, unequivocally, an ontological and teleological fact!!!

It's accepted as axiomatically obvious, by everybody who can do basic maths, actually. (Again, I find myself bemused by your felt need to bring in words I didn't use, like "unequivocally, ontologically and teleologically," but that again just reminds me of how badly you're doing at handling the actual argument.)

What? Someone able to do simple maths can provide us with the E = mc² equivalent of the existence of a God, the God. Then you step in and provide us with the "simple math" equivalent of the Christian God.

Though, sure, I'm more than willing to let others here compare and contrast our respective skills at arguing.

In other words, politics as usual.

I think I see a pattern here. I offer you a reasonable explanation: you reword it into something you view as less reasonable -- often something more absolute, or invoking language I never used -- then you ridicule your own version of the answer, and suppose you've won something.

Absolutely shameless!!!

Unless, of course it is a "condition"?

Amusing, but a waste of both my time and yours.

So I'll just step out here, and leave you to make what you will of the evidence. I've lost interest in explaining to you things you're clearly determined to first mishear and then refuse anyway.

Right, right, you'll step out. Keep me out of your head like AJ has to.

Though from time to time I'll examine one those YouTube videos here. To see if the evidence is actually there or not. Not just that a God, the God exists. But that your God exists.

If the proof is there, I will own up to it. I'll rejoice in it!

So, scrap the exchange if you must but please note my reactions to the videos. In other words, if I do come to one that really does provide this evidence, but I missed it.

[iambiguous]

But here you are in turn claiming to have proof that might bring me back around to the Christian God. That my own soul might be saved again once I too have come to grasp that there is, in fact a Christian God "out there" somewhere.

Well, you do real eyes that first you must believe in the Jewish God - Yahweh? or "---". and then you need to believe in the life\death\resurrection of Christ, and then hope that God converted to Christianity once all that was done.

btw - God is not just 'out there, somewhere' - its in there in every atom of your being, and everything you perceive of reality.

A suggestion if you don't mind...

Take this, uh, philosophy of yours here: https://ilovephilosophy.com/index.php?s ... a458866185

Ask for Ecmandu, Ichthus77 and Meno.

Tell them I sent you.

They'll understand.

[attofishpi]

But here you are in turn claiming to have proof that might bring me back around to the Christian God. That my own soul might be saved again once I too have come to grasp that there is, in fact a Christian God "out there" somewhere.

Well, you do real eyes that first you must believe in the Jewish God - Yahweh? or "---". and then you need to believe in the life\death\resurrection of Christ, and then hope that God converted to Christianity once all that was done.

btw - God is not just 'out there, somewhere' - its in there in every atom of your being, and everything you perceive of reality.

A suggestion if you don't mind...

Take this, uh, philosophy of yours here: https://ilovephilosophy.com/index.php?s ... a458866185

Ask for Ecmandu, Ichthus77 and Meno.

Tell them I sent you.

They'll understand.

Rather odd that you think that someone (IC) that believes every word within the Bible is the literal word of God is the one you hope to convert you back to the fold of having Christian faith - er, good luck with that!

[Harry Baird]

The behaviour definitely exists.

I don't think it does.

Here, then, are a few examples of it. Plenty more could be provided.

In an earlier post, AJ described throwing a rock at an annoying dog and hitting him. The dog "ran back behind his house yelping". Then, "a boxer saw what happened, heard the yelp of the wounded dog, and on its face appeared a look I [AJ] can only describe as compassion and sympathy. It was very distinct. The boxer then ran after the other dog as if to console it."

In another earlier post, Dubious referenced an article which describes animals behaving in ways consistent with a diagnosis of PTSD. One is a cat, Lola, who was in the vicinity of an explosion: "20 minutes after the explosion, Lola was hiding. For the next week, Lola was edgy. She was startled by small sounds and she would follow the author everywhere. Lola would wail when Kumar left the house and be clingy when she returned. She started eating less and losing weight."

Another is a chimpanzee, Elsom, whose mother died when he was 13, and who suffered a serious injury to his arm when he was 15: "He disappeared for a few months afterward and isolated himself from his community. Upon his return, he was different. He was easily agitated and angry. He was more fearful and had difficulty sleeping."

Here's a new example, of my own: a video which shows a herd of cows being released into a field after six months' of winter confinement in a shed. The cows run and leap vigorously.

Let's start with these examples, although there is an effectively unlimited number that could be added.

What I'm looking for is your causal explanation of the behaviour here. I get that some of the behaviour is described above in ways that presuppose a particular causal explanation, so I'll try to be more strictly descriptive in that which follows.

We have two potential causal explanations, and a third to which you've alluded but not described in any detail. So, here's your chance to provide the details. Here's the application of the three causal explanations to the behaviour in the above examples:

1. The dog AJ hit with a rock began yelping because of the sudden and intense suffering that being hit by the rock caused him, and he ran behind his house because of fear of further suffering should AJ have taken further action, as well as to seek relief from his suffering in a place of familiarity and comfort.
2. The dog AJ hit with a rock began yelping because as a mindless automaton he was following the programming installed in him by the deist God to mimic behaviour caused by sudden and intense suffering, and he ran behind his house because, similarly, God had programmed him to mimic behaviour motivated by fear and comfort-seeking.
3. The dog AJ hit with a rock began yelping because ...[hq to fill in a causal explanation]..., and he ran behind his house because ...[hq to fill in again].

1. The boxer looked on with a face that AJ described as one of compassion and sympathy because as a being with a mind, the boxer recognised the suffering of the dog AJ hurt, and actually was compassionate and sympathetic, which then was reflected on the boxer's face, and the boxer ran after the other dog because the boxer actually did compassionately desire to console him.
2. The boxer looked on with a face that AJ described as one of compassion and sympathy because as a mindless automaton the boxer was following the programming installed in the boxer by the deist God to mimic on the boxer's face the look that the boxer would have had if the boxer was a being with a mind who felt compassion and sympathy, and the boxer ran after the other dog because, similarly, God had programmed the boxer to mimic behaviour motivated by a compassionate desire to console a friend.
3. The boxer looked on with a face that AJ described as one of compassion and sympathy because ...[hq to fill in]..., and the boxer ran after the other dog because ...[hq to fill in again].

1. After the explosion, Lola the cat hid, became edgy, became startled by small sounds, followed the author everywhere, wailed when Kumar left the house, clung to her when she returned, ate less, and lost weight because the explosion caused her to suffer from PTSD or some similar emotional malady.
2. After the explosion, Lola the cat hid, became edgy, became startled by small sounds, followed the author everywhere, wailed when Kumar left the house, clung to her when she returned, ate less, and lost weight because as a mindless automaton she was following the programming installed in her by the deist God to mimic the behaviour of a being suffering from PTSD.
3. After the explosion, Lola the cat hid, became edgy, became startled by small sounds, followed the author everywhere, wailed when Kumar left the house, clung to her when she returned, ate less, and lost weight because ...[hq to fill in].

1. Following the death of his mother at 13, and a serious arm injury at 15, Elsom the chimpanzee disappeared and self-isolated for a few months, behaving as though easily agitated and angry, as though fearful, and as though having difficulty sleeping because his mother's death and his arm injury caused him to suffer from PTSD or some similar emotional malady, and he really was easily agitated and angry, and fearful, and really did have difficulty sleeping.
2. Following the death of his mother at 13, and a serious arm injury at 15, Elsom the chimpanzee disappeared and self-isolated for a few months, behaving as though easily agitated and angry, as though fearful, and as though having difficulty sleeping because as a mindless automaton he was following the programming installed in him by the deist God to mimic the behaviour of a being suffering from PTSD, and to mimic the behaviour of a being who really was easily agitated and angry, and fearful, and who really did have difficulty sleeping.
3. Following the death of his mother at 13, and a serious arm injury at 15, Elsom the chimpanzee disappeared and self-isolated for a few months, behaving as though easily agitated and angry, as though fearful, and as though having difficulty sleeping because ...[hq to fill in].

1. The cows ran and leapt vigorously because they were joyful and excited at having been released from their six-month confinement, during which they suffered (at least relatively).
2. The cows ran and leapt vigorously because as mindless automatons they were following the programming installed in them by the deist God to mimic behaviour motivated by joy and excitement.
3. The cows ran and leapt vigorously because ...[hq to fill in].

OK then: so, what is that explanation?

You're anthropomorphizing: that's the explanation.

My supposed anthropomorphising does not cause any of the beings in the examples above to behave in the way that they did, so, no, it can't be the (causal) explanation of their behaviour.

All you're effectively saying here is, "Harry's causal explanation of the behaviour is wrong". You don't, though, say why, nor what your alternative causal explanation is. It must be a very compelling causal explanation with very compelling reasons to believe in it, because it has several hurdles to overcome:

1. Lack of parsimony: a single explanation which fits all the facts is preferable to two which fit the facts, and the commonsense explanation (the first one in the examples above) does fit all the facts, whereas you are proposing that, for the same behaviour, there is one explanation for humans and a different one for non-human living beings.
2. Counter-intuitiveness: the vast majority of us who interact with non-human living beings quite sensibly understand them to have minds as we do, and to experience joy and to suffer as we do, and the proposition that they don't is very, very strange to us.
3. Riskiness: if it is wrong, then falsely believing in it may cause the believer to violate the fundamental rights of other beings, and to cause extreme harm and suffering to them.

Please, then, provide your very compelling causal explanation of the behaviour in question, and the very compelling reasons you have to believe in it - reasons which overcome those hurdles.

[attofishpi]

Harry, I sort of understand the points you are raising with Henry, but unless I am mistaken...I am pretty certain Henry would agree that sentient animals can suffer before they make it to our morning breakfast plate.

I'm pretty certain that Henry would agree that to kill an animal in the most humane way possible is the moral thing to do. Fortunately, animals don't appear to have the intelligence to know in advance what their pending end of life is about, thus we humans CAN end their life in a humane manner.

[Harry Baird]

Harry, I sort of understand the points you are raising with Henry, but unless I am mistaken...I am pretty certain Henry would agree that sentient animals can suffer before they make it to our morning breakfast plate.

As best as I understand, you are mistaken. As best I understand, Henry believes that animals lack minds (and thus aren't conscious as I and most people use the word "conscious"), and are mere (mindless) robots ("automatons"), and thus he believes that they are incapable of suffering - or, indeed, of any emotion.

He is very cagey on what exactly he's saying though, so it's hard to know for sure. [Edit: to avert a potential complaint about this comment, what I mean is that I've offered multiple opportunities for him to clarify what he means, and for us to try to work out where we differ simply on semantics - the meanings of words - and to resolve those differences, and he's ignored those offers - every single one, if I recall correctly.]

I'm pretty certain that Henry would agree that to kill an animal in the most humane way possible is the moral thing to do.

"Humane" treatment of a mindless object (which is what he seems to believe animals are) is meaningless and pointless.

Fortunately, animals don't appear to have the intelligence to know in advance what their pending end of life is about

You're completely wrong about this. Watch some slaughterhouse footage to correct your misapprehension.

[attofishpi]

Fortunately, animals don't appear to have the intelligence to know in advance what their pending end of life is about

You're completely wrong about this. Watch some slaughterhouse footage to correct your misapprehension.

Yes, I have seen some in cases where footage has been aquired by the likes of Animals Australia (i think) in cases where cruelty has been shown and it's pretty bloody horrendous.

Nonetheless, it is possible to terminate sentient beings in a manner where this is not the case. Personally, I think there should be more scrutiny within abatoirs, perhaps a code of ethics where animals are not permitted to be aware of the pending slaughter - even ongoing camera footage of how this is done. Sounds pathetic I know, but there must be a way.

[Harry Baird]

Yes, I have seen some in cases where footage has been aquired by the likes of Animals Australia (i think) in cases where cruelty has been shown and it's pretty bloody horrendous.

I agree, it's horrendous.

Nonetheless, it is possible to terminate sentient beings in a manner where this is not the case.

Firstly, I don't think it is, at least in an abattoir: animals queued up, smelling blood, and hearing the screams of the animals ahead of them in the line aren't going to be fooled no matter what measures are taken.

Secondly, it's not necessary to "terminate" sentient beings in the first place, and therefore we ought not to do it, for the same reasons we don't think humans specifically should be "terminated" where it's not necessary.

Personally, I think there should be more scrutiny within abatoirs, perhaps a code of ethics where animals are not permitted to be aware of the pending slaughter - even ongoing camera footage of how this is done. Sounds pathetic I know, but there must be a way.

Animals Australia and other animal rights organisations also advocate for mandatory live video feeds in abattoirs - but only as a means of harm minimisation while abattoirs (appallingly) still exist, given that those organisations are opposed to the existence of abattoirs in the first place. My position is similar although my concern is that the installation of cameras would lead to complacency and distraction from the imperative to terminate abattoirs outright.

[attofishpi]

Yes, I have seen some in cases where footage has been aquired by the likes of Animals Australia (i think) in cases where cruelty has been shown and it's pretty bloody horrendous.

I agree, it's horrendous.

Nonetheless, it is possible to terminate sentient beings in a manner where this is not the case.

Firstly, I don't think it is, at least in an abattoir: animals queued up, smelling blood, and hearing the screams of the animals ahead of them in the line aren't going to be fooled no matter what measures are taken.

Secondly, it's not necessary to "terminate" sentient beings in the first place, and therefore we ought not to do it, for the same reasons we don't think humans specifically should be "terminated" where it's not necessary.

Personally, I think there should be more scrutiny within abatoirs, perhaps a code of ethics where animals are not permitted to be aware of the pending slaughter - even ongoing camera footage of how this is done. Sounds pathetic I know, but there must be a way.

Animals Australia and other animal rights organisations also advocate for mandatory live video feeds in abattoirs - but only as a means of harm minimisation while abattoirs (appallingly) still exist, given that those organisations are opposed to the existence of abattoirs in the first place. My position is similar although my concern is that the installation of cameras would lead to complacency and distraction from the imperative to terminate abattoirs outright.

This is all getting back to Henry's point (I think) that you are anthropomorphising the way an animal is interpretting its situation. Sure, the animal may hear squeals of other animals - it does not mean the animal has the capacity to comprehend its happy life in the pasture is about to end.

[Immanuel Can]

Amusing, but a waste of both my time and yours.

So I'll just step out here, and leave you to make what you will of the evidence. I've lost interest in explaining to you things you're clearly determined to first mishear and then refuse anyway.

Right, right, you'll step out.

Reread the above. Eventually you will understand it...maybe.

[iambiguous]

ME [STEPPING IN]:

We are shown the logic, actually, and we are invited to consider the data for ourselves. Seems fair.

No, we are presented with Christian assumptions about the universe. And then after science itself "proves" that a God, the God must exist, we are left to just assume that it must be the Christian God and not one of these...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_r ... traditions

...paths to immortality and salvation instead.

That's simply not the Kalaam's proposed job. For that, you need to look to other arguments.

Again, in my view, this is typical of how you wiggle, wiggle, wiggle out of actually responding to the point being made. Many others here have noted it as well in your exchanges with them.

It's not arguments that matter here. Instead, it's the actual evidence that you and other Christians do not provide in connecting the dots between the second law of thermodynamics and the existence of the Christian God.

There are, after all, other arguments:
https://www.patheos.com/blogs/daylighta ... h-already/
https://ncse.ngo/creationist-misunderst ... modynamics

Okay, we are told, the universe exists. And it simply makes more sense that something caused it to exist. Then the narrator points to the second law of thermodynamics which [we're told] tells us that the universe is "slowly running out of usable energy". And if the universe had been here forever, it would have run out of energy by now.

I'm just pointing out these scientific facts. If you find a person who calls himself a "physicist" or "chemist," and does not believe in the second law of thermodynamics, then you can be certain he's no scientist at all.

No, in the video, the narrator connects the dots between the second law of thermodynamics and the existence of "a spaceless, timeless, immaterial, uncaused and unimaginably powerful" God. As though there was absolutely, unequivocally no other possible explanation. And, again, given all that science itself does not understand about our universe:

"It turns out that roughly 68% of the universe is dark energy. Dark matter makes up about 27%. The rest - everything on Earth, everything ever observed with all of our instruments, all normal matter - adds up to less than 5% of the universe."

And since these videos revolve around the belief that this is the Christian God, it too becomes just another flagrant assumption.

Now, will you own up to this? Nope. You'll just profess that your own understanding of the science here at least "proves" that a God, the God does "in fact" exist. And then, supposedly, the rest of the videos provide us with the evidence that it's the Christian God?

Is that where we stand so far here?

But what remains peculiar [to me] in regard to you is that you have demonstrated to me that you do have an intelligent mind in some respects and can exchange some rather sophisticated posts with others here pertaining to Christianity historically and/or up in the spiritual clouds philosophically.

But here you are in turn claiming to have proof that might bring me back around to the Christian God. That my own soul might be saved again once I too have come to grasp that there is, in fact a Christian God "out there" somewhere. And, whether you believe me or not, I truly do want to believe that. I truly am searching for a path that will allow me to jettison the grim belief that my own existence is essentially meaningless and purposeless, that there is a path to objective morality, that immortality and salvation are within reachp.b]

No, I am not. I think you're totally uninterested in that, and I'm quite confident I can't change your mind. You aren't interested in changing.

Think what you will, of course, but I can assure others that, given my truly grim, demoralizing personal philosophy, and given the comfort and consolation I once embodied as a Christian myself, there is nothing I want more than to bump into someone who is actually able to provide me with solid evidence that God does exist. That immortality and salvation are a very real possibility. Watch how fast I abandon a No God point of view given this evidence. Any God in fact. Or any No God spiritual path like Buddhism if evidence for their own belief system is provided.

But that was not what we originally started debating. You asserted that there was no such thing as scientific evidence to support the existence of God. Now you know that there is.

That's your recollection, not mine. As I recall, our discussion got around to the distinction between a leap of faith to God and a belief that there is evidence beyond the "read the Bible" argument that the Christian God does in fact exist. I recall making the comparison between proof that the Christian God resides in Heaven and proof that the Pope resides in the Vatican. That's when you linked me to those YouTube videos.

Now, one by one, I have decided to explore them. Looking for the proof you claim is there that the Christian God does exist.

And, no, I do not know that there is scientific proof for the existence of a God, the God. On the contrary, I only have a Christian narrator connecting the dots between the second law of thermodynamics and the existence of "a spaceless, timeless, immaterial, uncaused and unimaginably powerful" God. Again, as though this necessarily rules out any other possible explanation.

The existence of the Christian God can be definitively established -- proven -- by simply accepting your assertion here

I'm quite bemused by your continual attempts to make me to have said something I never said. it's pretty much clear evidence that you can't handle what I DO say, and have to invent your straw men instead.

No more bemused than I am watching you squirm with each passing video that fails to convince anyone other than a True Believer that the Christian God does exist.

Note to others:

As this unfolds, I challenge you to accumulate the instances of all the clear evidence he provides me that I can't handle.

Also, if I do come to a video noting something that, perhaps, doesn't convince me the Christian God does exist but still manages to surprise me enough to dig deeper, I will definitely own up to that. Again, contrary to IC's misgivings, I really am looking for something -- anything -- substantive that allows me to yank myself up from out of the godawful hole I've dug myself down into: an essentially meaningless and morally fractured and fragmented existence that ends in oblivion.

The Kalaam proves that something HAS to be. We can still say, "We don't know what it is," but That's because an actual infinite regress of causes is impossible. It never starts.

The existence of the Christian God can be definitively established -- proven -- by simply accepting your assertion here that "an actual infinite regress of causes is impossible. It never starts"?

If you understand either basic logic or basic maths, you know I'm right: an actual infinite has not beginning, by definition. It never starts.

Please. That's why I have come to refer to you in "chuckle chuckle" mode as Immanual Cant. By definition?!!! Like you -- like anyone -- can actually take this "thought up" definition and demonstrate it regarding the physical universe itself...empirically, experimentally. In, say, a YouTube video?

As though this is now accepted across the board in the scientific community as, unequivocally, an ontological and teleological fact!!!

It's accepted as axiomatically obvious, by everybody who can do basic maths, actually. (Again, I find myself bemused by your felt need to bring in words I didn't use, like "unequivocally, ontologically and teleologically," but that again just reminds me of how badly you're doing at handling the actual argument.)

What? Someone able to do simple maths can provide us with the E = mc² equivalent of the existence of a God, the God. Then you step in and provide us with the "simple math" equivalent of the Christian God.

Though, sure, I'm more than willing to let others here compare and contrast our respective skills at arguing.

In other words, politics as usual.

I think I see a pattern here. I offer you a reasonable explanation: you reword it into something you view as less reasonable -- often something more absolute, or invoking language I never used -- then you ridicule your own version of the answer, and suppose you've won something.

Absolutely shameless!!!

Unless, of course it is a "condition"?

Amusing, but a waste of both my time and yours.

So I'll just step out here, and leave you to make what you will of the evidence. I've lost interest in explaining to you things you're clearly determined to first mishear and then refuse anyway.

Right, right, you'll step out. Keep me out of your head like AJ has to.

Though from time to time I'll examine one those YouTube videos here. To see if the evidence is actually there or not. Not just that a God, the God exists. But that your God exists.

If the proof is there, I will own up to it. I'll rejoice in it!

So, scrap the exchange if you must but please note my reactions to the videos. In other words, if I do come to one that really does provide this evidence, but I missed it.

HIM [STEPPING OUT]:

Amusing, but a waste of both my time and yours.

So I'll just step out here, and leave you to make what you will of the evidence. I've lost interest in explaining to you things you're clearly determined to first mishear and then refuse anyway.

Right, right, you'll step out.

Reread the above. Eventually you will understand it...maybe.

Chuckle, chuckle.

On the other hand, we still have all the remaining videos. So, sure, I may end up apologizing to you yet.

Not to mention thanking you profusely for saving my soul?

[iambiguous]

Okay, IC, the fifth video:


https://youtu.be/vybNvc6mxMo

The Kalam Cosmological Argument - Part 2: Philosophical

Now, here we take leave of science and explore the existence of a God, the God philosophically. Which of course is all that more problematic. Why? Because at least with science we go beyond words to the actual world itself. With things like the "cosmological argument", however, God is basically just defined and then deduced into existence.

So the narrator starts out way, way out on the metaphysical limb:

Did the universe have a beginning, or has it always existed? So, beyond the science, let's just deduce that it did have a beginning. That way we can speculate about a Creator. Then Western and Eastern philosophers provide various philosophical conjectures about it. Then yet another flagrantly presumptuous "leap of logic"...

"The existence of an actually infinite number of past events leads to absurdity. It's metaphysically impossible."

Right, like the narrator then actually demonstrates that beyond simply asserting it to be true!

Then [what to me] is the simply ridiculous Hilbert Hotel hypothetical. The profound mystery that is the universe and the existence of existence itself gets reduced down to occupancy in this make-believe dwelling! Infinity is treated as something that is fully understood here. And "debunked".

I challenge -- dare -- anyone here to connect the dots between this entirely "thought up" hotel and the existence of a God, the God.

No, really, this hypothetical completely escapes me. Please explain it to me given the real world that we live in. Given, say, occupancy in an actual hotel instead?

Of course: when you go all the way out on the metaphysical limb philosophically in a world of words, any conclusions might be reached. And rationalized.

Then [to me] this equally ridiculous hypothetical regarding Jupiter and Saturn orbiting the Sun. What does it have to do with the actual reality of their orbits? Same with the domino example. A conclusion is reach based on a philosophical assumption regarding infinity itself.

Then of course this flagrant assumption:

"So, if al-Ghazali's two arguments are right, then the universe is not eternal in the past. It must have a beginning. And we know intuitively that whatever begins to exist requires a cause of its existence. Thus, we are led to conclude that the universe has a cause of its existence.

"SO, WHAT CAUSED ITS EXISTENCE?"

Now, Daniel Dennet, we are told, argues that the universe caused itself. But this we are assured is "incoherent".

Why?

"Because to cause itself to come into existence, the universe would have to exist before it existed."

Huh? How is this too not an entirely flagrant leap of "logic" based on assumptions "thought up" "philosophically"?

Then of course: "the cause must be outside of the universe."

You guessed it: it must be "spaceless, timeless, immaterial, uncaused and enormously powerful."

"Much like...God".

And just to make sure you know which God it must be:

"Whoever world draw near to God must believe He exists and that He rewards those who seek him." Hebrews 11:6

Yep, IC's God.

Although, again, that is not argued at all by the narrator. The focus is only on the existence of a God, the God. Nothing is noted to indicate that it is the Christian God other than by way of yet another flagrant assumption.



Anything to add, IC?

[Immanuel Can]

Okay, IC, the fifth video:

Prov. 26:5 "Answer a fool as his foolishness deserves, So that he will not be wise in his own eyes."

[iambiguous]

Okay, IC, the fifth video:

Prov. 26:5 "Answer a fool as his foolishness deserves, So that he will not be wise in his own eyes."

You're actually willing to stick with that, aren't you?

Still, think about it...

These videos are supposed to take us beyond a leap of faith rooted in, "the Christian God exists because it says so in the Christian Bible. And the Christian Bible must be true because it is the word of the Christian God."

Now, we still have 12 more to go. And, as Sherrif Bullard once intimated to Ed, "let's just wait and see what comes out of the river".

[Alexis Jacobi]

Section 44 of Nietzsche’s Der Antichrist.

I paragraphed it by breaking one paragraph into numerous.

—The gospels are invaluable as evidence of the corruption that was already persistent within the primitive community. That which Paul, with the cynical logic of a rabbi, later developed to a conclusion was at bottom merely a process of decay that had begun with the death of the Saviour.

—These gospels cannot be read too carefully; difficulties lurk behind every word. I confess—I hope it will not be held against me—that it is precisely for this reason that they offer first-rate joy to a psychologist—as the opposite of all merely naive corruption, as refinement par excellence, as an artistic triumph in psychological corruption. The gospels, in fact, stand alone.

The Bible as a whole is not to be compared to them. Here we are among Jews: this is the first thing to be borne in mind if we are not to lose the thread of the matter. This positive genius for conjuring up a delusion of personal "holiness" unmatched anywhere else, either in books or by men; this elevation of fraud in word and attitude to the level of an art—all this is not an accident due to the chance talents of an individual, or to any violation of nature. The thing responsible is race.

The whole of Judaism appears in Christianity as the art of concocting holy lies, and there, after many centuries of earnest Jewish training and hard practice of Jewish technic, the business comes to the stage of mastery. The Christian, that ultima ratio of lying, is the Jew all over again—he is threefold the Jew… The underlying will to make use only of such concepts, symbols and attitudes as fit into priestly practice, the instinctive repudiation of every other mode of thought, and every other method of estimating values and utilities—this is not only tradition, it is inheritance: only as an inheritance is it able to operate with the force of nature.

The whole of mankind, even the best minds of the best ages (with one exception, perhaps hardly human—), have permitted themselves to be deceived.

The gospels have been read as a book of innocence… surely no small indication of the high skill with which the trick has been done.—Of course, if we could actually see these astounding bigots and bogus saints, even if only for an instant, the farce would come to an end,—and it is precisely because I cannot read a word of theirs without seeing their attitudinizing that I have made an end of them… I simply cannot endure the way they have of rolling up their eyes.

—For the majority, happily enough, books are mere literature.—Let us not be led astray: they say "judge not", and yet they condemn to hell whoever stands in their way. In letting God sit in judgment they judge themselves; in glorifying God they glorify themselves; in demanding that every one show the virtues which they themselves happen to be capable of—still more, which they must have in order to remain on top—they assume the grand air of men struggling for virtue, of men engaging in a war that virtue may prevail.

"We live, we die, we sacrifice ourselves for the good" (—"the truth", "the light", "the kingdom of God"): in point of fact, they simply do what they cannot help doing. Forced, like hypocrites, to be sneaky, to hide in corners, to slink along in the shadows, they convert their necessity into a duty: it is on grounds of duty that they account for their lives of humility, and that humility becomes merely one more proof of their piety… Ah, that humble, chaste, charitable brand of fraud!

"Virtue itself shall bear witness for us"… One may read the gospels as books of moral seduction: these petty folks fasten themselves to morality—they know the uses of morality! Morality is the best of all devices for leading mankind by the nose!—The fact is that the conscious conceit of the chosen here disguises itself as modesty: it is in this way that they, the "community", the "good and just", range themselves, once and for always, on one side, the side of "the truth"—and the rest of mankind , "the world", on the other…

In that we observe the most fatal sort of megalomania that the earth has ever seen: little abortions of bigots and liars began to claim exclusive rights in the concepts of "God", "the truth", "the light", "the spirit", "love", "wisdom" and "life", as if these things were synonyms of themselves and thereby they sought to fence themselves off from the "world"; little super-Jews, ripe for some sort of madhouse, turned values upside down in order to meet their notions, just as if the Christian were the meaning, the salt, the standard and even the last judgment of all the rest…

The whole disaster was only made possible by the fact that there already existed in the world a similar megalomania, allied to this one in race, to wit, the Jewish: once a chasm began to yawn between Jews and Judaeo-Christians, the latter had no choice but to employ the self-preservative measures that the Jewish instinct had devised, even against the Jews themselves, whereas the Jews had employed them only against non- Jews. The Christian is simply a Jew of the "reformed" confession.