Philosophy Now Forum

A miracle is supposed to be a physical event with a non-physical cause. So, first, there has to be evidence that the event occurred. And our ancestors told countless stories about such events, which nobody rational counts as evidence - unless they're stories about my-team's-god, in which case rationality is out the window.

But anyway, how can a non-physical cause have a physical effect? Or how can a physical effect be evidence for a non-physical cause? What is the causal mechanism? Has anyone come across a rational, plausible answer? Or are we stuck with the infantile credulity of 'it was magic'?

Peter Holmes wrote: ↑Sat Dec 30, 2023 10:52 am A miracle is supposed to be a physical event with a non-physical cause. So, first, there has to be evidence that the event occurred. And our ancestors told countless stories about such events, which nobody rational counts as evidence - unless they're stories about my-team's-god, in which case rationality is out the window.

But anyway, how can a non-physical cause have a physical effect? Or how can a physical effect be evidence for a non-physical cause? What is the causal mechanism? Has anyone come across a rational, plausible answer? Or are we stuck with the infantile credulity of 'it was magic'?

What causes philosophy?
Is philosophy physical?

What causes morality?
Is morality physical?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Dec 30, 2023 6:17 am

So miracles don't "work," if by "work" we mean "permanently prevent all the skeptics from scoffing." But that's hardly surprising.

You've often mentioned the ''causeless cause'' of all that is. Put another way ''The infinite reality of existence'' is this immediate causeless cause, which is self-defining infinity itself.

So there's no need to superimpose the absurd notion of 'relationship' as there is nothing anywhere or any other place outside of infinity itself that could be in relationship to it... the very idea is absurd.

Truth is, the only relationship happening here, is with itself, meaning, a reflection back on itself, the projector and the film being one and the same reality. And that all ''causes'' are in fact fictional stories or dream appearances within the all, the everything, the no thing, the not-a-thing, the nothingness, and wait for it.....the ultimate CAUSELESS.

You IC would simply scoff and be skeptical about such a truth, and thus, the mirror does a 180 degree U turn in this ever spinning two way revolving mirror story of infinity appearing in finite ways, infinitely for eternity, forever uncaused causes.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Dec 26, 2023 4:52 pm

Will Bouwman wrote: ↑Tue Dec 26, 2023 12:14 pmWhat seems inconsistent to me is that you will more readily appeal to the character of atheists, or rather your ideologically motivated Atheists, than to people such as you.

I don't, actually. Check back, and you'll see.

I don't need to check back; it's as if you can't help yourself:

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Dec 26, 2023 4:52 pmWell, Atheists...like Dawkins, Hitchens, Harris, Nietzsche...the proud ones, the ones who trumpet their Atheism, exhibit their own anger and rebelliion against God, and in fact, often declare it as a badge of honour.

These 'proud', 'angry', 'rebellious' men are not your ideological "Atheists"; they are people who, like you, think that religions are false; they just happen to apply it to one more religion than you.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Aug 01, 2023 2:03 am...IF God exists, then objective morality is not at all hard to understand; and even a reasonable Atheist would indeed have to concede that.

Nonsense. A reasonable atheist could reasonably ask whether morality is objective because God says it, or God says it because it is objective. I'm not a mind reader, but based on your previous comments, I'm confident your response to that will be that God's nature is supreme goodness.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Dec 26, 2023 4:52 pmJust as I would concede, quite freely, that IF God did not exist, then there would be no objective morality (and, we might add, subjective morality would be a mere imagining). That's all totally fair.

Well, according to your objective morality, the vast majority of human beings will spend eternity being tortured, but that is the price of freedom. It is hard to imagine a subjective morality that could be worse.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Sep 08, 2023 3:38 pmThe Theist says, "There's evidence," and the Atheist says, "There's none." And the Theist cannot beat the Atheist's strategy, because how can you argue with somebody who simply refuses the evidence before him?

Well again that's projection. You simply refuse the evidence of human evolution. There are thousands of examples of fossils consistent with human evolution, which you ignore in favour of one example of fraud and a few examples of mis-identification.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Dec 26, 2023 4:52 pm...and one that's been justified by the previous debate. For example, the impossibility of an actual regress of causes is an absolute slam-dunk mathematical proof of a First Cause of some kind. What are you to make of people who don't accept the truth of mathematics?

Whatever mathematics proves, it only applies to mathematical proofs. The constants the govern the universe are not determined mathematically, the are discovered by experiment. The fact that numbers go on forever proves nothing about the universe.

Will Bouwman wrote: ↑Sat Dec 30, 2023 11:24 am The constants the govern the universe are not determined mathematically, the are discovered by experiment.

Eeeeh, you just can't stop lying, can you?

Which experiment discovered the speed of light from all reference frames?

Skepdick wrote: ↑Sat Dec 30, 2023 11:55 amWhich experiment discovered the speed of light from all reference frames?

Two things:
How do we know about the speed of light in any reference frame?
How were the constants that Maxwell plugged into his equations established?

Will Bouwman wrote: ↑Sat Dec 30, 2023 12:26 pm

Skepdick wrote: ↑Sat Dec 30, 2023 11:55 amWhich experiment discovered the speed of light from all reference frames?

Two things:
How do we know about the speed of light in any reference frame?

Don't care how you do it for any reference frame.

However you do it - I'd like to know how you get form any to all reference frames.

Will Bouwman wrote: ↑Sat Dec 30, 2023 12:26 pm How were the constants that Maxwell plugged into his equations established?

Soooo... the speed of light is derived from equations, and not empirically?

Will Bouwman wrote: ↑Sat Dec 30, 2023 11:24 am Whatever mathematics proves, it only applies to mathematical proofs.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Dec 29, 2023 9:28 pm

bahman wrote: ↑Fri Dec 29, 2023 7:35 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Dec 29, 2023 7:25 pm So now it IS about you: since you don't like whatever I suggest, then it's about what you would accept as proof. Which, it seems, is "nothing, ever."

As I said it is not about whether I like your argument or not.

Well, yes; that's what you keep saying. But also, that's wrong. It's very much about whether or not there's ANYTHING you would EVER accept as proof of God's existence.

If there's not, then the game is over. And the reason you've lost it is not for lack of evidence, but for lack of anything you would ever agree to accept.

So again, what will you accept?

I don't think there is any valid argument for the existence of God. If you think there is any just bring it in.

Skepdick wrote: ↑Sat Dec 30, 2023 1:36 pm

Will Bouwman wrote: ↑Sat Dec 30, 2023 12:26 pm

Skepdick wrote: ↑Sat Dec 30, 2023 11:55 amWhich experiment discovered the speed of light from all reference frames?

Two things:
How do we know about the speed of light in any reference frame?

Don't care how you do it for any reference frame.

However you do it - I'd like to know how you get form any to all reference frames.

As I said:

Will Bouwman wrote: ↑Sat Dec 30, 2023 11:24 amThe constants the govern the universe are not determined mathematically, the are discovered by experiment.

Skepdick wrote: ↑Sat Dec 30, 2023 1:36 pm

Will Bouwman wrote: ↑Sat Dec 30, 2023 12:26 pmHow were the constants that Maxwell plugged into his equations established?

Soooo... the speed of light is derived from equations, and not empirically?

Well, you derive predictions from equations, but:

Will Bouwman wrote: ↑Sat Dec 30, 2023 11:24 amThe constants the govern the universe are not determined mathematically, the are discovered by experiment.

Will Bouwman wrote: ↑Sat Dec 30, 2023 11:24 amWhatever mathematics proves, it only applies to mathematical proofs.

That's right, because:

Will Bouwman wrote: ↑Sat Dec 30, 2023 11:24 amThe constants the govern the universe are not determined mathematically, the are discovered by experiment.

Will Bouwman wrote: ↑Sat Dec 30, 2023 11:24 amThe constants the govern the universe are not determined mathematically, the are discovered by experiment.

That would be true if the act of measuring/quantifying constants was non-mathematical.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Measure_(mathematics)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Measure_space

It's so peculiar that you don't recognize the "/" symbol in all the SI units of measurements...

bahman wrote: ↑Sat Dec 30, 2023 1:41 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Dec 29, 2023 9:28 pm

bahman wrote: ↑Fri Dec 29, 2023 7:35 pm
As I said it is not about whether I like your argument or not.

Well, yes; that's what you keep saying. But also, that's wrong. It's very much about whether or not there's ANYTHING you would EVER accept as proof of God's existence.

If there's not, then the game is over. And the reason you've lost it is not for lack of evidence, but for lack of anything you would ever agree to accept.

So again, what will you accept?

I don't think there is any valid argument for the existence of God. If you think there is any just bring it in.

IC strongest argument [.. i guess] is this;
https://www.reasonablefaith.org/writing ... l-argument

and note this;

Craig's Kalam Cosmological Argument Debunked
viewtopic.php?p=683974#p683974

Skepdick wrote: ↑Sun Dec 31, 2023 6:32 am

Will Bouwman wrote: ↑Sat Dec 30, 2023 11:24 amThe constants the govern the universe are not determined mathematically, the are discovered by experiment.

That would be true if the act of measuring/quantifying constants was non-mathematical.

Well done for knowing that counting is mathematical.

Skepdick wrote: ↑Sun Dec 31, 2023 6:32 amhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Measure_(mathematics)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Measure_space

Do tell us what any of that has to do with determining constants.

Skepdick wrote: ↑Sun Dec 31, 2023 6:32 amIt's so peculiar that you don't recognize the "/" symbol in all the SI units of measurements...

You're right, I don't. You show me, Skepdick.

bahman wrote: ↑Sat Dec 30, 2023 1:41 pm I don't think there is any valid argument for the existence of God.

You mean "true," not "valid' in the logical sense, I'm sure. There are logically "valid" arguments for all kinds of things. But let that be.

If there is no test you will accept for the existence of God, the reason that you have found no evidence for God is that you do not allow for any. In which case, what evidence there is will remain permanently invisible to you, and nobody can do anything about that...except maybe God Himself.

So I guess that's the end of that road.

bahman wrote: ↑Sat Dec 30, 2023 1:41 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Dec 29, 2023 9:28 pm

bahman wrote: ↑Fri Dec 29, 2023 7:35 pm
As I said it is not about whether I like your argument or not.

Well, yes; that's what you keep saying. But also, that's wrong. It's very much about whether or not there's ANYTHING you would EVER accept as proof of God's existence.

If there's not, then the game is over. And the reason you've lost it is not for lack of evidence, but for lack of anything you would ever agree to accept.

So again, what will you accept?

I don't think there is any valid argument for the existence of God. If you think there is any just bring it in.

And, of course, in his response, IC left out the second sentence when he quoted you. The onus seems to be a hot potato.
I'd ask for a sound argument, by the way, not merely a valid one.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sun Dec 31, 2023 2:53 pm

bahman wrote: ↑Sat Dec 30, 2023 1:41 pm I don't think there is any valid argument for the existence of God.

You mean "true," not "valid' in the logical sense, I'm sure. There are logically "valid" arguments for all kinds of things. But let that be.

If there is no test you will accept for the existence of God, the reason that you have found no evidence for God is that you do not allow for any. In which case, what evidence there is will remain permanently invisible to you, and nobody can do anything about that...except maybe God Himself.

So I guess that's the end of that road.

And where is your argument?