richardhutnik said: badgenome said: richardhutnik said: In regards to Hitchens, one could argue there is ONE thing that religious people, like say Mormons, are able to do which he seemed to not be able to do, and that is avoid smoking and drinking which shorten one's life.  Hitchen confessed that his smoking and drinking caused him to get cancer: I am not religious. I don't drink, and I have never smoked. There are religious people who do both. What point are you even trying to make anymore? Hitchens argues that atheism is morally superior, but fails to shows in practice, particularly his life, that it is so.

It was not immoral for hitchens to smoke and drink as much as he did. You may call it stupid, since he shortened his life, but he didn't hurt anyone but himself. Also, him staying in a marriage that didn't work would be immoral, him getting a divorce was the most moral thing he could do (or his wife, depending on who wanted to separate). In other words, you fail at pointing out immoral acts that he did.

On the moral side though, he did a lot of good for the world during his career as a reporter, so much that it would net him a lot of plus on the morality scale. In other words, your argument double fails.

Torillian said: BenVTrigger said: Torillian said: But all that means is we can't disprove something that exists outside the laws of what we know.  Which is true since you take away every tool we've ever come up with for measuring or observing things around us.  That doesn't prove there is such a thing, just that we can't make you stop believing in it.  If I said that the land of My Little Pony was in another dimension you couldn't really disprove that either. Also, the true view from a science perspective (which is the bulk of what atheism is based on) is that we just don't know how the universe came to be, but we're working on it.  it's true that science has not yet reached a satisfactory understanding of what that beginning was like, but it doesn't mean we should just assume some god did it.  That defeats the whole purpose. Its not assumption its logic.  See my previous post.  The notion that science and a belief in god cant co exist is absurd and one of the biggest problems in modern day "scientific circles" Of course they can co exist, the second we have reproducible experiments or even mathematical theories that prove god exists.  Until that point science and belief in god coexist in much the same way as science and any other mythology that can't be proven or disproven.

At this point the beliefe of a self replicant universe is mythology as well because there is no observable evidence to prove it.  So yes currebtly all forms of first cause lie firmly in the personal belief section

BenVTrigger said: No most atheists are not agnostic that Ive come across in personal experience.  Perhaps Im mistaken and if so my apologies.

Yeah, that's a huge assumption on your part. The only atheists you know are probably the vocal atheists who hate religion. You never hear about the quiet ones unless the topic is brought up. 

I don't know the religiosity of 80% of the people I know. I've just never cared to ask. Of the other 20%, they are either extremist Christians or atheists. I don't know the moderate Christians or atheists because they never care to talk about it. So it would be silly for me to assume that all Christians or atheists are like the ones I know about, because those people are the extremes.

Jay520 said: BenVTrigger said: Jay520 said: BenVTrigger said: Answer the question.  If you came up to the Mona Lisa or Statue of David which is more logical.  To believe that they created themselves or that a sculpture / painter made them. Poor argument. You are bringing up human-made objects and asking if they were created. Of course they were created by humans. But for every human-made object, there's infinitely many more natural objects in the universe. And you can't use human-made objects to infer things about nonhuman-made objects. Sure you can.  The single cell alone pretty much trumps the idea of chance.  You get into the whole realm of irriducibly complex parts and systems that had to coalesce simultaneously but that alone is a novel in itself. So just because you have proved that some things were created, that means all things were created? I....I don't know what to say to that.

Of course you dont know what to say.  Your dodging the debate.

Explain to me how the single cell, the basic building block of life, has irriducibly complex parts and systems that had to simultaniously come together happened by chance.

Go ahead.  And this is a single cell were talking about here.  We havent even gotten deep yet were still treading in the shallow water.

BenVTrigger said: Torillian said: BenVTrigger said: Torillian said: But all that means is we can't disprove something that exists outside the laws of what we know.  Which is true since you take away every tool we've ever come up with for measuring or observing things around us.  That doesn't prove there is such a thing, just that we can't make you stop believing in it.  If I said that the land of My Little Pony was in another dimension you couldn't really disprove that either. Also, the true view from a science perspective (which is the bulk of what atheism is based on) is that we just don't know how the universe came to be, but we're working on it.  it's true that science has not yet reached a satisfactory understanding of what that beginning was like, but it doesn't mean we should just assume some god did it.  That defeats the whole purpose. Its not assumption its logic.  See my previous post.  The notion that science and a belief in god cant co exist is absurd and one of the biggest problems in modern day "scientific circles" Of course they can co exist, the second we have reproducible experiments or even mathematical theories that prove god exists.  Until that point science and belief in god coexist in much the same way as science and any other mythology that can't be proven or disproven.   At this point the beliefe of a self replicant universe is mythology as well because there is no observable evidence to prove it.  So yes currebtly all forms of first cause lie firmly in the personal belief section

Yep, which brings us back to my original point, that the true answer for an atheist scientist is "we don't know yet".  I agree with you that just believing in a self replicant universe based off of nothing is silly, it's just a theory that could explain what we see, but the belief in a god to explain those things is just as silly from a scientific standpoint.  That said I'd like some kind of proof that the majority of atheists believe in a self replicant universe as this is the first I've heard of it.  

Torillian said: BenVTrigger said: Torillian said: BenVTrigger said: Torillian said: But all that means is we can't disprove something that exists outside the laws of what we know.  Which is true since you take away every tool we've ever come up with for measuring or observing things around us.  That doesn't prove there is such a thing, just that we can't make you stop believing in it.  If I said that the land of My Little Pony was in another dimension you couldn't really disprove that either. Also, the true view from a science perspective (which is the bulk of what atheism is based on) is that we just don't know how the universe came to be, but we're working on it.  it's true that science has not yet reached a satisfactory understanding of what that beginning was like, but it doesn't mean we should just assume some god did it.  That defeats the whole purpose. Its not assumption its logic.  See my previous post.  The notion that science and a belief in god cant co exist is absurd and one of the biggest problems in modern day "scientific circles" Of course they can co exist, the second we have reproducible experiments or even mathematical theories that prove god exists.  Until that point science and belief in god coexist in much the same way as science and any other mythology that can't be proven or disproven.   At this point the beliefe of a self replicant universe is mythology as well because there is no observable evidence to prove it.  So yes currebtly all forms of first cause lie firmly in the personal belief section Yep, which brings us back to my original point, that the true answer for an atheist scientist is "we don't know yet".  I agree with you that just believing in a self replicant universe based off of nothing is silly, it's just a theory that could explain what we see, but the belief in a god to explain those things is just as silly from a scientific standpoint.  That said I'd like some kind of proof that the majority of atheists believe in a self replicant universe as this is the first I've heard of it.

I already apologized to atheists.

And dont worry were just starting to get deeper into why I stand on the intelligant design side, though that mostly should have already been clear

BenVTrigger said: Jay520 said: BenVTrigger said: Jay520 said: BenVTrigger said: Answer the question.  If you came up to the Mona Lisa or Statue of David which is more logical.  To believe that they created themselves or that a sculpture / painter made them. Poor argument. You are bringing up human-made objects and asking if they were created. Of course they were created by humans. But for every human-made object, there's infinitely many more natural objects in the universe. And you can't use human-made objects to infer things about nonhuman-made objects. Sure you can.  The single cell alone pretty much trumps the idea of chance.  You get into the whole realm of irriducibly complex parts and systems that had to coalesce simultaneously but that alone is a novel in itself. So just because you have proved that some things were created, that means all things were created? I....I don't know what to say to that. Of course you dont know what to say.  Your dodging the debate. Explain to me how the single cell, the basic building block of life, has irriducibly complex parts and systems that had to simultaniously come together happened by chance. Go ahead.  And this is a single cell were talking about here.  We havent even gotten deep yet were still treading in the shallow water.

First of all, I am no biologist or evolutionist and I'm not going to pretend I am. Aside from what's required from 10th grade biology and an introductory Physical Anthropology class, I don't know much about cells. But there's a lot of things I don't know and I won't pretend to be an expert in those fields. And you won't see me making any definitive claims about the possibility of life coming from nonlife. I simply don't have the education to do so. And neither do you (do you?). I strongly advice you to refrain from making any definitive claims about any subject until you're sure you've learned everything necessary to know about it.

So no. I cannot explain how a single cell can or can't form. I can't even tell you what the components of a cell are. But there are probably some scientists and books you could research on your own instead of asking an ignorant person such as myself.

But here is my big point: Even IF no scientist can explain how life can come from nonlife, that would prove anything. You're making the argument "we can't explain it, therefore God did it!" This is one of the most premature and ignorant responses anyone can give. In the past people have made the same arguments for thunder, illness, the movement of the sun, etc., all because they were ignorant AT THE TIME. Now you're using the same argument about cells & the universe. It makes no since. Our current ignorance is not indicative of an almighty creator. It just isn't. Just because we dont know doesn't mean we know its God, nor does it make God a likely possibility. No, it means we don't no. Simple as that.

What makes you so confident that intelligent design is more probable than life from nonlife? More specifically, how educated are you on biology, evolution, chemistry, etc. to be so confident?

BenVTrigger said: Jay520 said: BenVTrigger said: No not really.  The Universe obeys by its own laws.  Just like the figures in thw drawing do.  No where in the known Universe do we see examples of creation out of wholly nothing.  It has laws.  Just like the figures in the drawing coildnt suddenly become 3 dimensional beings or jump out of the paper.  One law we observe in the universe is matter is pretty much a constant and cant just self create itself. A God however would exist outside of the Universe and wouldnt have to obey by its laws.  Just like you yourself can be 3 dimensional and capable of things your 2 dimensire onal drawings could never imagine as being real.  The belief the Universe created itself also hinges on the belief that from chaos naturally things gain order, another non observable trait that defies known science and logic. observable universe =/= Universe We have no idea what goes on outside the observable universe and thus have no idea of its laws. So no, we don't know what laws it obeys by.  So you have nothing against the universe that can't be applied to religion. Religion has all the problems of the universe creating itself +1. Also, I hope you have found out what atheism encompasses since we aren't talking about atheism. Most Atheism believes the Universe is self replicant.  Something I just cant behind when weve never observed it. we HAVE observed someone creating something however and logically speaking it just seems like a more sound choice.  Again Ill use another thought experiment to illustrate my point. Imagine you take 2000 bricks, a couple pounds of cement, and a bunch of TNT.  You put them all into a pile and blow up the TNT.  You repeat this process every time for 1 million years.  The pieces after the explosion never come together to build a house. In fact there is always pure chaos withpieces strewn everywhere without order.  The big bang (something most people who believe in Universe self creation believe) is this on an unimaginably bigger scale.  We never even get a house after a small explosion and Im expected to believe something as infinitly complex as the Universe is possible after the same senario? If you walk up and see a house which is more logical.  That the house built itself or that a carpenter built it.

Your analogy of blowing up a stack of bricks and other materials is really just a form of Hoyle's Fallacy.

Also, Big Bang is just a name. Big Bang theory doesn't describe an explosion of any kind, but an expansion of a singularity. Nobody knows what was before the singularity. After the singularity we know quite a bit. Also, nobody in science thinks anything complex came together almost instantaneously, but rather through lengthy periods of slow increases in complexity.

PS: Are you really doubtful of Big Bang Theory and it's supporting evidence?

BenVTrigger said: stuff

1. Atheism is not  a religion. It is simply a rejection of the claim that God exists as it is not testable.

2. We do actually have evidence of something from nothing in quantum physics and  dark matter. Empty space weighs something. The existence of matter is nothing more than a potentiality equation for wave-form collapse, which upon observation conforms to exist or not to exist.

3. There is no scientific evidence for Intelligent Design, which is just rebranded religious theory in an attempt to align itself with science. No scientist is researching intelligent design as it has no explanatory power, so it is entirely obsolete to science.

4. Anyone suggesting God and Science are incompatible is foolish, so I agree with you here. However, anyone suggesting the personal God of religious texts is compatible with science is equally as foolish.

BenVTrigger said: Torillian said: Yep, which brings us back to my original point, that the true answer for an atheist scientist is "we don't know yet".  I agree with you that just believing in a self replicant universe based off of nothing is silly, it's just a theory that could explain what we see, but the belief in a god to explain those things is just as silly from a scientific standpoint.  That said I'd like some kind of proof that the majority of atheists believe in a self replicant universe as this is the first I've heard of it.   I already apologized to atheists. And dont worry were just starting to get deeper into why I stand on the intelligant design side, though that mostly should have already been clear

If I'm reading it right, it's because of the old watchmaker philosophy.  You can't have something this complex without someone behind it.  Which is a point we'll have to disagree on.  

And you're correct that using what you've seen to logic out how things work that you can't see is pretty standard scientific method but there are certainly examples of things that it doesn't work for.  Probably the best example are quantum fields where you start to deal with things so tiny that they no longer follow the standard logic we use for things on the scale we're used to thinking about.  We've never seen an electron so trying to picture something that can only exist in certain states around the nucleus instead of a continuum between those states makes very little intuitive sense and is not the way people imagined it when they first found discovered the electron.  In fact I'd venture to say that most times when people just try to common sense out something that's on the edge of scientific knowledge they usually come out wrong so I guess that's the reason I'd state for not believing in intelligent design due to the examples you give.