I’m hoping that living in the 21st century we are far enough along to
First, realize that atheism is a self-refuting position simply because God might be hiding. To say there is no God is to know everything and have looked everywhere for him and not find him, in which case the atheist takes on omniscience and omnipresence and refutes his own claim.
Second, that the possibility of God cannot be excluded because, again, he might be hiding in that last place we have not looked.
Third, that if gods exist, only the Hebrew God truly exists, because he declares himself to exist to the exclusion of all other gods. The moment the Hebrew God enters the argument, all other gods are eliminated.
This indicates you still do not understand the point we are discussing. I will try again:
It does not help us either way to answer the question you ask above.
Say we found that the minimum time it takes for such a belief to become established when there was no evidence of its truth is six months. However, we find that the early Christians believed Jesus rose from the dead three months after his death.
I presume, if this were the case, you believe we should conclude from this that we cannot account for this belief by saying it is a false belief that began as a rumour.
But hold on. Suppose we perform the same test for one of the alternative explanations: That Jesus actually did rise from the dead. So we go thru the same process. We determine how often a dead person comes back to life, and we again find that this does not happen.
So now we have two possible explanations, both of which go against what would be expected to happen based on the available evidence.
How do you go from this to determining that an actual resurrection is the most plausible explanation? Neither you nor any other apologist or theologian, AFAIK, has answered this question.
I meant “they” as anyone who isn’t a Christian. I haven’t found any takers for “they” yet on this forum. See this entire thread for evidence of that.
More importantly, even if “they” answered, “they” could be wrong. It’s more important what you think. Perhaps “they” are all following a herd mentality.
Not if the “Whom” tells you that He is the cause. Then it is knowable.
Yes.
You just explained that it was.
Scientists acknowledge that, of the three domains, abiogenesis is the most difficult to engage with. For cosmogenesis we have the ancient light from the stars, and even from the beginning of the universe, that can be analysed and studied. For evolution, there is all of life, the fossil record and DNA to study. But the very first single-celled organisms were not the kinds of things that leave fossils or any consistent record. Abiogenesis is much more difficult to study.
Ok - so you have no argument to explain how life came about, so again, why is my explanation that life was caused by God not more plausible? That’s all I’m asking for you to acknowledge.
Can you acknowledge this? - Right now, based on the evidence we currently have, it is more plausible that life began by a supernatural means.
No. Rather, the best available explanation is “We simply do not know (yet)”. Scientists are comfortable with that. Where we know something, we will say so, where we do not we will also say so.
Let’s also be clear: I’m talking about an abiogenesis event on the order of 4 billion years ago that began the process of evolution. I’m not clear on whether that is what you are claiming God did, or whether you are claiming special creation of life in something close to its current form.
I am happy for you to state that you find a Divine explanation to be the most plausible. The sticking point is that you seem to be insisting that everyone else must share that perspective, whether or not they in face do. Human beings have different beliefs *and that’s OK.
Sure, I’ll answer it. You decide which you’d rather believe in: a miraculous rumor or a miraculous Jesus.
Either way, you believe in the supernatural. So if you believe in the supernatural, which of the supernatural choices is worth believing in and why? That’s up to you. Either way, you’re putting your faith in something or someone.
Again, I’m not asking what we do NOT know. I’m asking, that based on the evidence, is unbelief in God or belief in God more reasonable?
That’s irrelevant to my particular point here.
I do not insist they share that perspective. I’m asking for people to share why their belief is more plausible if they wish. So far, you have not shared why you beliefs are more plausible; though I appreciate the discussion.
Few atheists are dogmatic, most are agnostic in the form “I have not seen evidence that convinces me that a God exists”, rather than “God does not exist”. They may shorthand the former to the latter, or they may confuse rejecting the existence of a particular god with a particular set of characteristics for the existence of any god or godlike being (see my comments below). So, I’m personally happy to accept the philosophical point that the philosophical statement “God does not exist”, if the noun in that sentence is defined to mean all possible gods, is not tenable. But again, see below: particular characteristics claimed for particular gods can be refuted with evidence.
Certainly this is also what I think: which is why I’m agnostic relative to the existence of God/Goddess/gods/a godlike ancient alien, etc. Something that we humans would identify as divine may well exist. The possibility cannot be rejected. But evidence shows that, for example, if such a being exists, s/he doesn’t answer prayers for healing at a rate better than chance. And so on. While the possibility of a god cannot be rejected, certain characteristics claimed for a particular God can be.
Essentially every religious tradition, with the possible exception of the Baha’i faith and some forms of Buddhism, makes this exclusivity claim. Why do you choose to accept it from one religion and reject it from all the rest?
You can follow this thread if you want. The logic of Euthyphro’s Dilemma shows that a moral God can only be good in and of Himself. Only Christianity claims such a god.
Logic also shows that an immoral god would make us unable to determine that he was immoral.
Therefore, the God of Christianity is the only God that can exist.
It’s a fair point. OK: I have never observed a supernatural event. Despite very extensively believing in and praying for such events in an earlier period of my life. I observe natural events all the time. Therefore, when I am seeking the explanation for something, I will seek a natural explanation, and find it more plausible, rather than seek a supernatural explanation. Many phenomena that human beings historically ascribed to supernatural causes, like thunder, have turned out to have natural causes as we explored further. That has been the universal finding, actually: things thought to be supernatural coming to be naturally explained, not the other way around. So, while I am happy to wait in uncertainty for a credible explanation of abiogenesis, nothing in my knowledge or experience requires me to insert a divine explanation in the mean time.
Thanks for the fair reply. To be honest, I have never seen a supernatural event either. BUT I believe in God anyway because I think He is the best explanation for everything I see. What I see is the evidence I described in my initial argument: people believing Jesus rose from the dead, the people who started Christianity being verified by other sources and so on. Alexander the Great is only attested in secondary and tertiary sources. Sources quoted by other sources. On the other hand, we have initial sources who confirm Jesus’ existence. And sources who quote those sources and so on. We have evidence of where the church spread and that it did so early and with the claim of Jesus’ resurrection the whole time.
To me, not witnessing a supernatural event does not make unbelief reasonable. That means you require God to supernaturally prove himself individually to the billions of people who ever lived. Why would all of us not then rationalize that away to a natural event? Probably all of us would assume that we have illusions and no God exists after all.
No. I have a hard time believing that you are a Christian just because that’s your preference and not because you believe Christianity is true. But if that’s really the case, I guess I can only take your word for it.
I do believe it’s true. But believing it’s true also requires faith.
You gave me two supernatural options. So I’m explaining your choices, based on the question you asked. Someone else could come up with alternate explanations. Of course, I wasn’t suggesting the options you posited were the ones I chose from.
Peter is just “not around.” Then who made up Acts and why? Which parts do you think are embellished and which are true and why?
Paul randomly “writes churches about his theology.” When did the churches get established, why is he writing them, and what is his theology?
Peter and Paul “didn’t see eye to eye.” If they didn’t get along, we should see some evidence of their disagreement; different theology perhaps if the stories about Jesus are made up. What do you think it is?
A “variety of Greek speaking people” wrote the gospels: Why did the Greek speakers decide to reference Jewish scriptures / Old Testament themes? Why and when did the church give the gospels the names they have, if they were anonymous?
Some were “troublemakers” and others were “kind” - what in theology explains both of these behaviors?
“A disciple who claimed Jesus arose, a later convert who hallucinated it, and an urban legend to spread” - So which details of the story did Paul and Peter disagree on since Paul only heard later rumors that were started by Peter and they didn’t get along? Which historical details did the writers of the gospels mess up because they were written by later Greeks who weren’t familiar with the area where Jesus preached around 30 AD?
Yeah all of those are fine questions, but there’s nothing there that implies anything miraculous has to happen to answer or explain any of them. Complex novel theologies can develop while steeped in an existing religious culture, for example given how Christianity emerged in a largely jewish culture. Same goes for Islam. Why would anyone “invent” Islamic theology? Well I take it they didn’t really think that they were “inventing” it. I’m certain Muhammad really believed God was revealing things to him, and stories about him managed to inspire a following of people to whom his teachings made sense. All of this took place in a surrounding religious culture and tradition that already existed. We have a large world-religion today with billions of sincere adherents.
We see a similar phenomenon on this very forum. Different Christians wildly disagree on many aspects of theology, even when they have the same documents to read from they take different messages from them or find different aspects of emphasis and meaning. Now imagine a time before these books were written and compiled and copied around, and religious teachings and traditions spread largely through word of mouth.
Why would some Greeks decide to write down early Christian stories or references Jewish and old-testament teachings and themes? Well because they believed in them and thought they were important, and wanted to ensure they would last through the ages and wanted to spread the message as they understood it? I don’t think we have to assume anything nefarious is going on here. I take it they were sincere believers who felt their religious traditions were important, and possibly felt some obligation to ensure they got passed on.
I highly recommend you actually watch some more of Paulogia’s videos on this if you want to know more about how he thinks of early Christianity. Such as his “5 Scholars Attempt my Resurrection “What If” Challenge”
Or “Naturalistic Explanations for the Resurrection Are Lame (Cold Case Response)”
There are several others by him on similar topics.
No they do not. You will need citations to prove your point here. The God of the Hebrews says he alone is God and there is none besides him. I don’t know of any other gods in history who have made that claim.
4 Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.
5 Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me
Sure sounds like the Bible says there are other Gods.
You really should not be trying to do theology. If you knew Scripture you would know he is referring to false gods here. Idolatry. Gods of wood and stone.
