If you believe in god, you have to believe in leprechauns.

Thanks Rosie for trying to stick to topic.

Exactly what does that have to do with this topic?If we go to far we get this thread temporarily closed.

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I don't think that you have to accept my experience, but someday you may just experience that as well, so be warned.

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I think you hit the nail on the head. A belief in God is not a consequence of evidence that we can touch, taste, smell, or see. A belief in God is derived from personal feelings that can not be transferred between two minds. It can be described vocally, but woefully so.The next problem is that some people don't trust their feelings or experiences. Drugs such as LSD can make us experience things that aren't real, but seem so at the time. Chemical imbalances in the brain can cause feelings of euphoria, paranoia, or God like self grandeur. How do I know I am not just fooling myself? Again, I can't know. But this is my own doubt, something I can't explain or have you experience along with me just as your experiences of God. Religion and religious experiences will always remain as articles of faith. It isn't a bad thing, just something that man will never be able to describe in scientific terms.

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Just so you know, I believe in aliens. Not Martians, there is no proof of that and I doubt there ever will be, but I do believe that there are other races of people out there in our universe, maybe even galaxy, but solar system? I don't really think so, because we haven't found any trace of them. That is something I do need visible, tangible evidence for, because unlike a supernatural being, God, life forms are matter. God, I believe is also matter, but in a different way that is very hard to explain, sort of one of those unexplainable things. I know I will be attacked for that, so please don't.

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I won't attack you, I swear. But you do see the difference between supporting something with evidence and faith based beliefs, don't you? For instance, if I believed with all of my heart that there were aliens on Mars would that make it true? I think we can both agree that it would not make it true.Through all of the discussions here, I hope that you understand that I don't want to make you stop believing in God. My only purpose here is to dispel the myth that atheists and agnostics deny the existence of God out of spite. It is quite the opposite. When was the last time you saw an atheist missionary? We aren't out to get you, so relax and (hopefully) enjoy our discussions here in our little corner of the internet.

It had to do with the topic because of ad hominem attack for my religion, Mormon. But we'll quit that discussion.

I know that your disbelief in God, is not out of spite, I think it is just purely that you haven't had an experience that causes you to believe in God. I have, so I'll believe in Him, but I don't want to force you to. I only hope that what you feel is right, is what you'll follow.Just to reassure you.

Sorry.

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I personally think that inter-racial marriage isn't a good idea either, so don't use that one against me. -- Rosie Cotton

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Are you talking about proving God exists or evidence that God might exist? You seem to use the terms interchangably but they are quite different.

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Terms are often vague, sorry for any confusion.When I talk of "proof" I am talking about physical, objective evidence. For instance, I can prove that the Empire State Building is sch and such high. I can prove that helium is lighter than Earth's atmosphere. I can't "prove" that God exists with the same type of evidence, nor can I "prove" that he doesn't. In the same vein, I can't prove or disprove that Leperchauns exist. Evidence is what allows one to prove something. Since no evidence exists one way or the other, faith is used as a tool for discerning TRUTH.Other's may claim that their emotional experiences are evidence of God's existence. However, emotional experiences or personal revelations are not truly evidence of anything but they may be used to construct personal truths. I am not saying that personal revelations or religious experiences don't happen, but they are woefully inadequate for discerning objective reality.Any clearer?

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I know that your disbelief in God, is not out of spite, I think it is just purely that you haven't had an experience that causes you to believe in God. I have, so I'll believe in Him, but I don't want to force you to. I only hope that what you feel is right, is what you'll follow.
Just to reassure you.

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The bigger question is whether or not the same experience you had would be enough for me to ignore what doubt I have. I think it is more of a question of trust than experience, or I could be completely out of my mind.

Welcome,Rosie. Don`t assume you have fallen into a seething pit of atheism. Many here come from a Christian experience, so can give a lot better than they get. Try to look around the threads so you don`t bring up something firmly established on the PRATT List (Points Refuted A Thousand Times). Now, go get `em.

I think you are talking about St. Anselm.It's kind of a silly argument he makes. He basicaly says "first you got to get them to belive in the articles of faith, then that proves god."i.e. Get them to have faith and god is the ultimate conclusion.Altho he says it many, MANY, more words. His proof was ripped apart by a Jewish theologian who wrote an angry response. Most copys of St. Anselms work comes with this theologians counter argument.

Yes, thanks.I disagree, however, that there is no evidence for the existence of God. Granted there is not as much evidence for the existence of God as for the height of the empire state building, but there is some evidence that many find convincing. For example, Biblical prophecies, design in the world, etc. Of course it also depends on how you interpret this evidence, but it is evidence nontheless. So having faith in God is not purely believing in what has no evidence - there is some evidence that leads to this belief.Also, as I pointed out earlier, even all the evidence for the height of the empire state building cannot completely prove it - there is always the possibility that the world is an illusion. This means that the only difference between believing in the height of the empire state building and believing in God is the amount of evidence available for each, since technically neither can be completely proven.

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If you say there no absolutes, I ask you, are you absolutely sure?

Sorry for butting in... but I really wanted to add something. My apologies in advance if I'm not adding value, or if I take your discussion in another direction... I've studied epistemology a fair bit, and I disagree with this view. It's true that this world might be illusory. However, as long as this world is consistent and rule-based, it doesn't really matter. If it's illusory, your measurement is a FACT of the illusory building; if it's 'real' then it's a FACT of some 'true' building. Either way, it's some kind of knowledge; whether the building 'actually' exists or not really doesn't matter at all. I think this way of speaking is using rhetoric (whether intentionally or not) to avoid and confuse. The problem doesn't exist.Our (i.e. each person, individually) perception and understanding of the world is simply our modelling of 'something.' Whether that something is 'an illusion' or 'reality' is something that is probably unknowable, but is really quite meaningless. 'Truth' in this meaning doesn't add any value.Ben

So far most people on this thread seem to agree that there is no evedence of God, and that belief in God has to be taken soely on faith? I would think religious people would think that there WAS a great deal of actual evedence of God.Suprising!But even MORE suprising is the assuption that it is IMPOSSIBLE for there to be any evedence of Gods exsistance. Why do you claim this? what if there was suddenly a rift in the heavens and God said "Yep I'm here, see you in 2000 years!" I know that most would claim that this dosn't PROVE Gods existance but it would be about as good proof as we could expect for anything.It just seems realy weird to me that the religious types here are agreeing that God is impossible to prove.

Great question and one that I think goes to the heart of the issue.You ask: If such a thing happened, and if it was repeatable, and if it could be verified independantly, then I would say the whole issue of whether or not the existence of GOD was proovable would have to be reexamined.But the evidence for or against the existence of GOD that is available today is simply not like that. It is not independantly verifiable. It is not repeatable. It is not subject to testing or objective measurement.Science and knowledge move by disagreement and procedure. We advance our knowledge because two or more people disagree, but they have a set of procedures they can agree on that can then be used to sift evidence to arrive at a consensus. GODs existance or non-existance though is not something that can be tested by those agreed procedures. For one thing the very definition of GOD is such that the test can be manipulated by the subject itself to give arbitrary results. If GOD exists and is as most religions concieve such a being, he could have the tests end up anyway he wanted.There are two other things involved. One is that what is seen as evidence of GOD is not repeatable. We have not yet found a way that miracles can be independantly verified, and if we did, it would strike at the very core of our use of the scientific method. If it was possible to violate the rules of physics at will, would they still be rules?Second, so much of the evidence is subjective instead of objective. I look at the universe we live in and see an order, beauty and unity at the most basic levels that I believe implies a creator. Others simply do not see it that way. And for most things, whether or not that order is the result of creation is simply not important. Regardless, gravity still works, the four forces still function, time still moves in one direction, life evolves.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Thanks for your reply. First off: Did you know we are down to three major forces now? Electromagnitisum has been connected with the weak nuclear force and is now refered to as the Electroweak force.As to your post, I don't quite understand. Are you claiming that God is unprovable becase God could tamper with the results of an experiment? If this is what you are claimning then perhaps God has to regularly preform miracles to keep his exsistance a mystery?Why is it impossible to prove miracles? For example, claims of miraculous healing could be verified or disproven or left ambigious, right? As for the laws of phyiscs, why would Gods ability to suspend them "stike at the core" of the scientific method? We would just have to update our laws to say things like "an object at rest must stay at rest---unless God decides to move it.And why do miracles have to suspend the laws of physiscs anyway? Couldn't God preform miracles by natural means? I know we have a tendancy to seperate God from nature but it's not like Gods actions would be causeless. They would just issue forth from Gods "non-extended spirit matter" or whatever.I still don't see how these things are outside of the relm of science.This message has been edited by The Dread Dormammu, 12-04-2004 09:31 AM