Fine, your initial post didn’t specifically ask for evidence. You, however, did said that we would not recognize evidence if presented. Why attempt to debate somebody you think won’t listen?
To directly answer your first question: The process we use is the scientific method which is also an epistemology since it is used to know truth.
I am now asking you this:
Nope, since you’re too lazy to look for it, and too dishonest to address it when offered, and doubly dishonest for lying repeatedly it’s not been supplied, why would I indulge someone that dishonest? Besides I have spent a great deal of time finding posts and reproducing them at your request, only for you to slither past them without comment in the end.
Very well, further discussion of this specific topic between us can serve no purpose.
Those things have been objectively evidenced, what have you got for any deity, since it’s your belief, you have to demonstrate your evidence, then we give it due diligence.
Lots of luck getting an honest answer.
I don’t agree, almost every post now demonstrates anew that you cannot demonstrate any objective evidence for any deity. Also that you don’t have the integrity to admit this to be the case. Also they highlight your relentless dishonesty in claiming answers have not been given, when they demonstrably have.One is reminded of a small child thinking it can’t be seen by hiding their face, and thus avoid the inevitable. Like that child we can all see you, and to quote a character from popular science fiction, “The truth is out there, but so are lies.” You should be wary of what both assertions mean for your duplicitous antics here.
Very well. Science does not reveal truth though. You can perhaps give me an example of “truth” that science allows you to “know”?
Science describes what we observe, describes relationships between observable quantities. Science reveals that the universe is apparently mechanistic, deterministic. If God were neither of these then obviously science would not shed light on God surely?
As I said Sheldon, further discussion of this specific topic between us can serve no purpose. If you do want to discuss these subjects then strive to avoid making personal attacks please.
So what science reveals is not in accordance with fact or reality? I must say I am dubious. You might want to look up the definition of truth.
These can be in accordance with fact or reality, this describes the state of being true, ipso facto science can and does reveal things that are true, it’d be a lot less use otherwise.
And as I replied I disagree, as each post demonstrates anew your inability to produce a shred of objective evidence for any deity, and that you lack the integrity to admit this.
I will post what and when I am minded, and those are not personal attacks, they are observations of your posts. I leave the generic personal attacks to you, you started with them, and have now started a thread to pursue them by rehashing your original poisoning of the well fallacy about atheists. You can’t set that tone, and be as dishonest as you have been, then complain when someone points it out.
Shhhhhh… Not so loud with the “critter” word, Cyber. You know how sensitive Kyle is, and he really doesn’t like being called a critter. Makes him all stressed out, and his invisible blue fur starts shedding. And let me tell ya, it ain’t easy sweeping that stuff up.
(Note: I’m quite certain I’ve explained this before, but I’m also pretty sure he ignored it. Nevertheless, it’s still worth repeating, I suppose.)
It’s elementary, my good man. If your god is ALL-KNOWING and ALL-POWERFUL, then your god should know EXACTLY what it would take to convince me it is real. Moreover, it should EASILY be able to demonstrate that which is necessary to convince me. Therefore, if your god is what you CLAIM it to be, then there would be absolute ZERO need for me to analyze whatever evidence your god provides. It really is just that simple. If you cannot understand that, then perhaps you might want to consider changing your moniker from Sherlock to something more intellectually appropriate. Hey, “Slo-Moe” has a nice catchy ring to it, don’t ya think? 
(Edit to analyze my nose hairs.)
Yaaaay! We’re back, well done to everyone who helped get the site up and running again.
Yes, I accept that reasoning.
Well that doesn’t really follow. Intellectual analysis, investigation and reason could well be the mechanism God uses to reveal himself. You can’t argue that because God could reveal himself that he must do so in a way you dictate.
But your position actually amounts to an admission that you do not have such criteria and therefore without said criteria one cannot rationally argue they’ve never ever seen any evidence. You’ll recognize God I suspect, once you become aware of your inherit bias and dogma, this is all about us, each us and how we often lie to ourselves.
Could well be? that’s hilarious fair play. One might as easily posit that hypothetically if a deity exists it is trying to weed out the gullible and irrational. More importantly you have offered no sound rationale for believing any deity exists, especially in the complete absence of any objective evidence.
He didn’t, he was positing a hypothetical based on common claims religious apologists make for a deity. If a deity, wants me to know it exists, and is capable of making me aware it exists, then it is not just rational but reasonable to question why it is hiding from me.
I can say without any doubt you’ve failed to offer any objective evidence for any deity, and this still sounds like an evasive dodge. My criteria for belief is that claims are supported by sufficient objective evidence, and are rational. You have failed on both counts, but then so has every other apologists I’ve ever encountered. You can’t even explain what your criteria is for disbelieving the exact same deities I disbelieve, except for one.
Ah another poisoning of the well fallacy, you see it is this kind of irrational mantra theists so often express that should give an unbiased person pause.
Your refusal to accept evidence is not the same as there being no evidence, you keep getting confused about this.
Prove that naturalism (laws, rational intelligibility, determinism) arose naturally, can you? Of course you cannot a thing cannot be explained by recourse to itself - not in science anyway - and so naturalism has no naturalistic explanation - you need to go there, you need to really think and put your prejudices behind you, you are the obstacle to seeing God not God hiding from you, not God being a myth.
This is a hard lesson, I know first hand, I too was an outspoken unforgiving atheist once, only when I began to be brutally honest with myself did I begin to see things that I could not see before.
This is the crux. If we assume that a god exists, and that she is an all-knowing, all-powerful, and all-loving god (which are typical attributes the jesusites attach to their god), she would certainly know exactly what kind of evidence would convince each and every person that she exists, and be able to provide the evidence to each individual. Also, being all-loving, one would also think that this god wants people to believe. Yet, a lot of people - like us ungodly atheists - have not seen or received exactly the kind of compelling evidence or proof that this god exists. This can only be due to the god being not all-knowing (perhaps she doesn’t know whether people belive or not?) and/or not all-powerful (unable to present the required evidence?) and/or not all-loving (doesn’t care or doesn’t give a shit whether people believe or not?) Or the god simply does not want us to believe. In all of these cases, there is nothing I or any other non-believers can do about that situation, when not presented with the required evidence, or the evidence being actively withheld from us. There is, however, another solution to this - namely that the god simply does not exist. Which to me seems like the more probable answer.
I wrote this several days ago, now that we’re back up:
These are two different things. Science is a branch of study focusing on quantifying anything objectively we can. The scientific method is an epistemology, which is a branch of philosophy. Philosophy is what underlines our entire system of knowledge with things likes science, language, etc being branches off of that. Any PhD is a doctorate in philosophy.
Our shared goal is knowledge; to know truth. Epistemology is what we use for that. Beings like god are unfalsifiable, because they cannot be measured or falsified. They are easy to make up, and impossible to prove. This is why there are over 4000 religions. Falsifiability was only added to the scientific method in the 20th century, but it is a very important addition because it keeps people from making things up.
Notice that we never claimed that we know god doesn’t exist as this would be essentially saying that we could falsify something that is unfalsifiable. The problem is that nobody can justify belief in something that is unfalsifiable without using logical fallacies. If they are using logical fallacies to justify a belief then they don’t actually know. Once again epistemology + facts get us to knowledge. So if there is a flaw in either, then we don’t know.
This takes us to religion. We have people who claim to know that god exists. That is a scientific, objective claim. If they don’t show us how they know, we don’t assume that god doesn’t exist, we assume they are making it up. It is a subtle distinction, but key. We assume that they did not go from ignorance to knowledge, but are still at ignorance. The problem is that they think they are at knowledge.
All religions require faith to operate. Faith is also an epistemology, which is defined as “belief without proof”. The problem is that it can’t get us to knowledge. It attempts to make knowledge claims when it is really a function of will. Faith is really just a mechanism people use to believe whatever they want. It has been my experience that religious people like to dance between faith and scientific proof when one gets knocked down.
Another big issue is that god is not the only unfalsifiable thing that religious people believe in. Christians, for example, believe that god not only exists, but is male, all powerful, can know the future, knowingly created a legal system (sin) where he would have had to know that it would involve impregnating a married teenager (Mary) and going on a suicide mission. This is all so that some invisible organ we all have, instead of going to this loving god’s ultimate torture destination, can instead go to a blissful, happy alternate dimension if we just believe and say a few magic words. All of these things are unfalsifiable, people believe them not because there is objective evidence, but because they want to. Religious people like to focus on god, but they believe, on faith, a bunch of other stuff like this too.
How do we know the rich, Nigerian uncle is real?
Falsifiability is important in science because the universe embodies laws, it is rationally intelligible. But the claim “that’s a fantastic painting” cannot be falsified. To what can we attribute the falsifiability of nature? what gave rise to a universe embodying such laws?
But some have claimed “there is no evidence for God” a claim that has so far not been accompanied by evidence.
I have not discussed religion nor do I do so here. Religion represents human made, human led organizational hierarchies with attendant rules of membership and lists of unquestionable beliefs. That is far from anything I have every posted here. Arguing against religion when discussing theism with me is a strawman, I’d like agree with much of what you’d say too!
Yes science sits entirely on faith, it is based entirely on “belief without proof”. So your argument amounts to saying that science cannot get us to knowledge, is that your view?
Are seeking to compare irrational Christian beliefs alongside irrational atheist beliefs? We can do that. Of course I understand that Christian doctrine can be interpreted very differently by different people but that doesn’t therefor prove that the belief in God or Christ is a false belief.
Frankly I’m not sure where we actually disagree here. We both attest to the utility of science, to falsifiability being desirable in science and so on.
I have never said there is no evidence, the confusion appears to be yours. Again then if you have anything you think is objective evidence present it. I can’t help that i don;t base belief on subjective anecdotes, it’s as if you are sulking because i choose to set a higher and unbiased standard for credulity than you do.
Natural or scientific laws were created by humans, they are descriptive not proscriptive. You are again using an argumentum ad ignorantiam fallacy in an attempt to avoid your burden of proof. I know natural phenomena exist, and I know life and the universe exist, as these can be objectively evidence, you are the one adding inexplicable magic from an a deity you can demonstrate no objective evidence exists. i don’t need to disprove this or present alternative claims in order to disbelieve your claim.
So that’s all you have, subjective biased opinion, not a very compelling argument for the most extraordinary of claims. Applying that rationale would mean you might be the barrier to all the deities you don’t believe in, so quite demonstrably the bias is yours, as you cannot even meet your own criteria. I am treating god claims any differently than I do any others.
All theists BY NECESSITY were previously atheists, instead of stating things that are trivially true, give us what you believe to be the most compelling reason you decided to believe a deity exists outside of the human imagination.
Great, are you going to give some examples for us to examine?