but

LordReed:


Yeah someone sees a story then claims someone he knows fulfilled the prophecy. All we have is the word of some unknown people with no contemporary corroboration.



Again another hindsight shoe horning. The names of the kingdoms were not mentioned, the times were not mentioned, no concrete details were given. Nebuchadnezzar was not even the greatest king of that era, Cyrus was greater than Nebuchadnezzar so if that detail was already missed what confidence are you putting in the so called prophecy?



LoL. Why should history disprove it? It is you making a claim, you prove it.



Is Christianity the only religion that claims to change the lives of adherents? If that is the yardstick then Islam, Buddhism, etc all have strong claims.



LoL, my 4 year old daughter speaks in tongues, its not a sign of anything but a lack of inhibition in certain areas of the brain (the speech centers if I recall correctly). Or as some of your brethren eg Ihedinobi3, believe the gift doesn't get given anymore. LMFAO!



OK so who has multiplied bread that you have seen? Or changed water to wine? Or walked on water? Oh I guess its those fun miracles they tell you in church but forget to let you know the person was taking drugs. Ever seen a person with no legs get legs? No? LMFAO!



I predict I will wake up tomorrow and see the sun in the sky. That's the equivalent of the prophecy you are referring to. Earthquakes and rumors of war, na today? Do you know how many earthquakes have been recorded in the past 2000years? How many wars? Those are the most "regular" things to call on as evidence of fulfilment of prophecy.



God didn't write the book, he didn't even compile it. LoL.

You are simply dishonest with yourself. Your unbelief will destroy you.

I am a living proof that Jesus is alive. I live a supernatural life. You are seriously held bound by the devil.

Ken4Christ:
but

You are simply dishonest with yourself. Your unbelief will destroy you.

I am a living proof that Jesus is alive. I live a supernatural life. You are seriously held bound by the devil.

LoL after destroying your arguments, the only thing you can say is I am bound by a devil, typical. LMFAO!

Here is an absolute proof of Sodom and Gomorrah
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vLEJ1sZxjA4

You know this but want to troll after reading deceptive article on Wikipedia

While some of you atheists were busy centuries ago speculating on the true nature of our World and Heavenly bodies the Holy Bible already revealed this thousands of years ago.



* Earth is Round

"It is he who sits above the circle of the earth, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers; who stretches out the heavens like a curtain,and spreads them like a tent to dwell in;" - Isaiah 40:22


* Earth floats in space

"He e stretches out the north over
the void and hangs the earth on nothing." - Job 26:7


* Bible explains how Water got to the cloud (Rain Evaporation and Condensation)

"And every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the LORD God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was not a man to till the ground.
But there went up a mist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground ." - Genesis 2:5-6

OpenYourEyes1:

"On the third day you commanded the waters to be gathered together in a seventh part of the earth, but you made six parts dry and preserved them so that some of these might be sown and cultivated, to be of service before you."
2 Esdras 6:42

Esdras referring to the 6 Continents minus Antarctica

LordReed:


Yes, I have a point which is you do not take the word of a claimant on its own merit there must be a way to verify the claims. But with you and this god claims any talk of independent verification is foolish to you. I post here a few easy things this god claimant could have done with his power to give veracity to the tales but to you its nonsense talk meanwhile you immediately checked and double checked my own claims. Why are you having double standards?

I think you have got your parallels all wrong.

You made a claim. I looked it up on the Web and decided that it didn't make sense.

God made a claim. You "looked it up" in nature and decided that it didn't make sense.

Then you said I have double standards.

That makes no sense since I did exactly what you did. We received evidence and made judgment calls on it. Whether those calls were honest or not remains to be seen.

I could decide that because I never actually saw or met Peter Hewitt there can't be such a person. I could decide that nobody invented fluorescent lamps since I never saw them invented at all. I could decide that I would only believe that you invented fluorescent lamps if you appeared miraculously right in front of me right now holding one so that I can't deny it. I could decide that Google and Wikipedia are figments of people's imagination since I wasn't there when any of it was written and I'm not in the machine to see everything that goes on with the information.

These are all choices I could make regarding the evidence. Whether they are reasonable or not may be argued.

The fact is this: God offers creation, the human conscience and the certainty of physical death as proofs of His Existence and insight into His Nature. The same way I could make any sort of judgment call I please on the information I can access online about fluorescent lamps is the same exact way that you could make any sort of judgment call you please on the evidence God offers too.

And you made yours. You decided that there is nothing in creation that supports the existence of God. You ignore human conscience. You don't care about the witness of physical death. But you made your own list of proofs just to have fun.

As I said, even if God were to miraculously produce all of those proofs right now, you would still make judgment calls on them. And what would prevent you from denying that they are any evidence for God? Only your "feeling of generosity" which, were it ever real, may have already evaporated.

So, again, evidence is not the problem. I am not convinced at all by anything you have said that God could have done better with evidence than He in fact did. Those who don't believe in God will not believe in Him unless they want to, no matter how great the evidence is (and obviously creation, human conscience and death are three far greater exhibits than all of those things you named put together). Those who do will even if there is less evidence than there is. It is a question of free will.

Ihedinobi3:

I think you have got your parallels all wrong.

You made a claim. I looked it up on the Web and decided that it didn't make sense.

God made a claim. You "looked it up" in nature and decided that it didn't make sense.

Then you said I have double standards.

That makes no sense since I did exactly what you did. We received evidence and made judgment calls on it. Whether those calls were honest or not remains to be seen.

I could decide that because I never actually saw or met Peter Hewitt there can't be such a person. I could decide that nobody invented fluorescent lamps since I never saw them invented at all. I could decide that I would only believe that you invented fluorescent lamps if you appeared miraculously right in front of me right now holding one so that I can't deny it. I could decide that Google and Wikipedia are figments of people's imagination since I wasn't there when any of it was written and I'm not in the machine to see everything that goes on with the information.

These are all choices I could make regarding the evidence. Whether they are reasonable or not may be argued.

The fact is this: God offers creation, the human conscience and the certainty of physical death as proofs of His Existence and insight into His Nature. The same way I could make any sort of judgment call I please on the information I can access online about fluorescent lamps is the same exact way that you could make any sort of judgment call you please on the evidence God offers too.

And you made yours. You decided that there is nothing in creation that supports the existence of God. You ignore human conscience. You don't care about the witness of physical death. But you made your own list of proofs just to have fun.

As I said, even if God were to miraculously produce all of those proofs right now, you would still make judgment calls on them. And what would prevent you from denying that they are any evidence for God? Only your "feeling of generosity" which, were it ever real, may have already evaporated.

So, again, evidence is not the problem. I am not convinced at all by anything you have said that God could have done better with evidence than He in fact did. Those who don't believe in God will not believe in Him unless they want to, no matter how great the evidence is (and obviously creation, human conscience and death are three far greater exhibits than all of those things you named put together). Those who do will even if there is less evidence than there is. It is a question of free will.

Actually you are the one with the parallels mixed up.

Claims:

LordReed - I invented florescent lights.
God - I created everything.

Checks:

You - verify who created fluorescent lights and status of person.
You - look at creation.

How is looking at the creation the same with checking up on the actual claim and the status of the creator? That is illogical. You didn't go to the nearest florescent and look at it to see if made by lordreed is written on it so why do you expect us to look at the creation as proof of the creator?

God, if there is one, has provided no evidence of his existence. Attempting to shoehorn reality into fairy tales just doesn't work.

LordReed:


Actually you are the one with the parallels mixed up.

Claims:

LordReed - I invented florescent lights.
God - I created everything.

Checks:

You - verify who created fluorescent lights and status of person.
You - look at creation.

How is looking at the creation the same with checking up on the actual claim and the status of the creator? That is illogical. You didn't go to the nearest florescent and look at it to see if made by lordreed is written on it so why do you expect us to look at the creation as proof of the creator?

God, if there is one, has provided no evidence of his existence. Attempting to shoehorn reality into fairy tales just doesn't work.

Let me see, you asked for proofs of God's existence which are all within Creation claiming that these proofs would have been enough for you but you also consider it unreasonable to look for proof of God's Existence and demonstration of His Nature in the same Creation. That immediately proves that your demand was born of dishonesty. You would have still rejected those proofs as part of creation.

Next, the nature of things restricts what may and what may not be evidence. There may be a fluorescent lamp with "Philipps" written on it. It would be folly for me to assume that Philipps therefore invented it. I know this because I know that there are other brands. For this reason, questions about invention would require me to look not at the fluorescent lamp itself but at the literature on it. Both of them exist and are accessible. One just makes more sense to consider than the other.

But creation is a universal set. That is, for us, there is no way to prove anything about the existence of creation by looking outside of it because we possess no ability to look outside creation. This is actually why we can only know God by Faith (since God is not part of creation). There is no literature outside of creation which we can look at to see who/what made creation. We only have the witness of Creation.

For this reason, you can only look at creation to see if itself is consistent with the claims made about it.

So, of course, my parallels hold. It is impossible to look anywhere else. But it is very possible to both ignore the evidence and to make up your own evidence.

The Bible is preserved.

1. 10 Commandments and The Gospels of our Lord Jesus Christ are the tree of good and evil.
2. The garden of Eden. The Earth generally and Nigeria in particular.
3. The sword used to protect the garden of Eden. The Sun is it. It is The dangling Sword that is our Task Master-RLS.
4. The ark Noah built. The Spirit of Salvation is built in all Born Agains.
5. The tower of Babel. The Result is The Spread of humans into the 7 Continents of The World. There they met Nephilims Sons and Daughters of God with different cultures, landguages and identities.
6. The sites of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. God has built another Culture and Civilization there in the Mediterranean..
7. The storage devices Joseph used for preserving food for 7 years. There are Knowledges to build Storages that can preserve various values for decades and millenia. God is Wisdom, Knowledge and Understanding. As He did it in Joseph of old, Michael Faraday of Electricity memories, so He is still doing it in modern Sciences, Arts and Neumathology.
8. The stone tablets God carved and wrote on. That was old Tech. Christ wrote The Book of The Hebrews in black and white and in Prints.
9. The ark of testament. They constitute The Scrolls, The Septuagints, The Vulgate The KJV and The SAC's Yoruba Bible.
10. The manna God rained from heaven. Miracles are manna, Light, Goodness and the continued Life of Christ in us.
11. The writing on the wall Mene Mene Tekel Upharsin. Some of us have had Formulae written for them in Dreams.

The Truth is you must have the full autonomy of Light, Goodness, Life, Faith, Hope, Peace and Love to have Wisdom, Knowledge and Understanding of God and Jesus Christ our Lord and Saviour.

Ihedinobi3:

Let me see, you asked for proofs of God's existence which are all within Creation claiming that these proofs would have been enough for you but you also consider it unreasonable to look for proof of God's Existence and demonstration of His Nature in the same Creation. That immediately proves that your demand was born of dishonesty. You would have still rejected those proofs as part of creation.

Next, the nature of things restricts what may and what may not be evidence. There may be a fluorescent lamp with "Philipps" written on it. It would be folly for me to assume that Philipps therefore invented it. I know this because I know that there are other brands. For this reason, questions about invention would require me to look not at the fluorescent lamp itself but at the literature on it. Both of them exist and are accessible. One just makes more sense to consider than the other.

But creation is a universal set. That is, for us, there is no way to prove anything about the existence of creation by looking outside of it because we possess no ability to look outside creation. This is actually why we can only know God by Faith (since God is not part of creation). There is no literature outside of creation which we can look at to see who/what made creation. We only have the witness of Creation.

For this reason, you can only look at creation to see if itself is consistent with the claims made about it.

So, of course, my parallels hold. It is impossible to look anywhere else. But it is very possible to both ignore the evidence and to make up your own evidence.

How can the proof of a claim be the claim itself? That is absurd. You did not go to look at a florescent to get evidence for who invented it but your patent deliberate obtuseness allows you to hold creation as proof. Is there anywhere in the world a person can just claim out of the blue that his father built a house and when asked for evidence says *Just look at the house! My father told me he built so it is true because look at the house!". If you believe such absurd things, please come I have several bridges to sell to you and please you'll pay the money before you even see the bridges. LMFAO!

You just argue from ignorance and say because you have no evidence of anything outside of creation therefore god. You always accuse people of intellectual laziness, it is now clear it is merely projection. With no way to rigorously prove your fairytale god claim, you pick on the most absurd way to prove your claim.

You claim god is alive and working yet we have seen no contemporary demonstration of his ability to create anything. The simple things I pointed out that could have been preserved from the fairy tale stories could have been tested very rigorously but deluded fairytale believers like you continue to make absurd excuses but will rigorously challenge claims where you can easily dig up evidence.

So no your parallels do not hold because you are attempting false equivalence and intellectual dishonesty.

Provide incontrovertible evidence for your god claims and stop making absurd claims of proof.

orunto27:
The Bible is preserved.

1. 10 Commandments and The Gospels of our Lord Jesus Christ are the tree of good and evil.
2. The garden of Eden. The Earth generally and Nigeria in particular.
3. The sword used to protect the garden of Eden. The Sun is it. It is The dangling Sword that is our Task Master-RLS.
4. The ark Noah built. The Spirit of Salvation is built in all Born Agains.
5. The tower of Babel. The Result is The Spread of humans into the 7 Continents of The World. There they met Nephilims Sons and Daughters of God with different cultures, landguages and identities.
6. The sites of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. God has built another Culture and Civilization there in the Mediterranean..
7. The storage devices Joseph used for preserving food for 7 years. There are Knowledges to build Storages that can preserve various values for decades and millenia. God is Wisdom, Knowledge and Understanding. As He did it in Joseph of old, Michael Faraday of Electricity memories, so He is still doing it in modern Sciences, Arts and Neumathology.
8. The stone tablets God carved and wrote on. That was old Tech. Christ wrote The Book of The Hebrews in black and white and in Prints.
9. The ark of testament. They constitute The Scrolls, The Septuagints, The Vulgate The KJV and The SAC's Yoruba Bible.
10. The manna God rained from heaven. Miracles are manna, Light, Goodness and the continued Life of Christ in us.
11. The writing on the wall Mene Mene Tekel Upharsin. Some of us have had Formulae written for them in Dreams.

The Truth is you must have the full autonomy of Light, Goodness, Life, Faith, Hope, Peace and Love to have Wisdom, Knowledge and Understanding of God and Jesus Christ our Lord and Saviour.

LoL I knew someone will bring this up. So the tattered and sometimes incomplete manuscripts that were found by chance constitute for you a sign of divine preservation? LoL gosh you are so deluded.

God could not preserve the very tablet he himself carved out and wrote on by his own finger yet you believe tattered manuscripts are a sign from god. Chai! Abeg come I have an invisible house to sell to you. LMFAO!

Easy bro.

LordReed:


How can the proof of a claim be the claim itself? That is absurd. You did not go to look at a florescent to get evidence for who invented it but your patent deliberate obtuseness allows you to hold creation as proof. Is there anywhere in the world a person can just claim out of the blue that his father built a house and when asked for evidence says *Just look at the house! My father told me he built so it is true because look at the house!". If you believe such absurd things, please come I have several bridges to sell to you and please you'll pay the money before you even see the bridges. LMFAO!

You just argue from ignorance and say because you have no evidence of anything outside of creation therefore god. You always accuse people of intellectual laziness, it is now clear it is merely projection. With no way to rigorously prove your fairytale god claim, you pick on the most absurd way to prove your claim.

You claim god is alive and working yet we have seen no contemporary demonstration of his ability to create anything. The simple things I pointed out that could have been preserved from the fairy tale stories could have been tested very rigorously but deluded fairytale believers like you continue to make absurd excuses but will rigorously challenge claims where you can easily dig up evidence.

So no your parallels do not hold because you are attempting false equivalence and intellectual dishonesty.

Provide incontrovertible evidence for your god claims and stop making absurd claims of proof.

Let me get this straight: you jumped straight into ad hominem because I said that your demand was born of dishonesty? You consider that an insult for which you are honor-bound somehow to give back a hundredfold? That is pretty incredible. I did make an accusation of dishonesty but it was it was an argument in response to your arguments. It was dishonest to on the one hand dismiss proof because it is creation and on the other hand demand proof in creation. That was the whole statement and in answer I am "patently and deliberately obtuse" and "deluded"? It is incredible.

Let me remind you what is going on here:

1. You claimed that God could offer better evidence and offered what you believe is better evidence He should have given of His existence.

2. Then I explained that those proofs could not make any difference where the ones that God did give didn't. And I listed the proofs that God gave.

3. You claimed that one of those proofs did not yield the evidence when tested.

4. I told you that it could be a question of honesty since anyone could deny evidence even when it is in abundance.

5. You insisted that the argument for creation is essentially making an assertion, not an argument and that it was no good.

6. And I asked you why you wouldn't say the same about these other proofs if they existed.

7. And you said that it was because you were feeling generous enough that "if they were true then some exertion of godly powers could have provided incontrovertible proof of the tales".

8. And I told you that if you were not feeling generous enough to consider creation sufficient evidence then you couldn't possibly be feeling generous enough to consider these things you demand as sufficient evidence either since the three proofs that God offers are far greater in power than these ones you demand.

9. Then you set about proving that creation is no more than a claim.

10. I answered that it was also an argument. And that thus, if you will not countenance it, it is dishonest to claim that you will countenance other claims which themselves also belong within the claim of creation.

11. And you promptly launched into ad hominem.


I can and will in due course argue for why creation is not only an assertion but a sufficient argument. But for right now, the issue is why your desired proofs are any more convincing than Creation, human conscience and death are.

The fact is that the existence of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil or the Garden of Eden or any of the other artifacts would make no difference if Creation itself, human conscience and the certainty of death don't.

How can the incredible vastness and complexity of Creation not trump a tree, even one so amazing as producing knowledge of good and evil in the eater of its fruit? How can the obvious power of the human conscience which prevents humanity from consuming itself in no time at all be less persuasive than a sword, even if it is one of fire? How can the absolute certainty of death which is so ubiquitous and claims every last human being that has ever lived be less compelling than a ship even one that may be 4000 years old?

Why would you not promptly dismiss the tree, the sword and the ship if you sneer at Creation, human conscience and death? You say that you won't because you feel generous and because they would be more impressive. They are obviously not more impressive at all. And your generosity is unreliable since you are not generous enough to consider evidence that you did not yourself demand. That is my argument.


As for creation being a claim, yes, you are right that the argument for creation is a circular argument. I already explained that it cannot be otherwise since being part of creation prevents us from finding evidence for God elsewhere. We cannot go outside of creation except by Faith. Faith is what you reject. Therefore, all you have are ontological questions about creation, human conscience and death. None of these things can be explained except by appealing to the very nature of creation. That is, they cannot be explained except with circular arguments.

There are only two possible explanations for creation:

1. It has always existed.

2. It was made by something that is outside itself, that is, something non-material but is rather supernatural.

Anyone who accepts #1 cannot question how it is that God has always existed. What is good for the goose is good for the gander.

Anyone who accepts #2 cannot therefore discount the existence of God as Creator.

If creation has always existed, then itself is God and is entirely self-sufficient. But if it is, how do you explain death and decay? A self-sustaining system which is eternal should not suffer any diminishing in quality.

The existence of death and decay points outside of Creation for explanation.

Thus, #2 makes more sense. If Creation is an act of the Will of some Supernatural "Thing", that would explain why there is the possibility of decay and death. That would mean that such a "Thing" can alter the conditions of creation either to sustain and perpetuate it or to rètard and destroy it.

That "Thing", by whatever name any given person or institution may prefer to call it is a Supernatural Creator not bound by this Universe or influenced in any way by it.

Now, if that thing is so, it cannot be known except by its own Will and provision. It is inaccessible to the intelligence in creation except through such means as Itself provides.

Here, the argument of the Bible that the very Creation declares not only the Fact of but also the very Nature of God immediately makes sense. The very existence of Creation and the reality of Death necessitate the belief that something way more complex and expansive and powerful than the Universe exists and it has a Will.

In addition, the very existence of the human conscience directs man to act in ways that seem to suggest innate knowledge of consequence and reward for behavior. That is not explained except by the Existence of Some Moral Authority Who holds man to account for his various choices.

There is no better way to explain these things except to say that "they just are" or "we don't know how they came to be" both of which answers make any questions about the Existence of God hypocritical.

If they just are, then we are claiming that these things are God since they self-exist and explain themselves. That would put anyone advancing such answers on exactly the same philosophical footing as anyone affirming that God exists.

Creation, therefore, is proof that there is a Creator. Death is proof of the Existence of a Personal Creator, that is of a Mind/Intelligence/Person outside of Creation Which has a Will and a Plan. Our consciences both affirm these things (until we silence them) and prove the power of that Creator to preserve His Will concerning Creation.

Your own proofs are meagre in the face of such majestic evidence.

Ihedinobi3:

Let me get this straight: you jumped straight into ad hominem because I said that your demand was born of dishonesty? You consider that an insult for which you are honor-bound somehow to give back a hundredfold? That is pretty incredible. I did make an accusation of dishonesty but it was it was an argument in response to your arguments. It was dishonest to on the one hand dismiss proof because it is creation and on the other hand demand proof in creation. That was the whole statement and in answer I am "patently and deliberately obtuse" and "deluded"? It is incredible.

LoL, don't be crying over what you start.

Let me remind you what is going on here:

1. You claimed that God could offer better evidence and offered what you believe is better evidence He should have given of His existence.

2. Then I explained that those proofs could not make any difference where the ones that God did give didn't. And I listed the proofs that God gave.

3. You claimed that one of those proofs did not yield the evidence when tested.

4. I told you that it could be a question of honesty since anyone could deny evidence even when it is in abundance.

5. You insisted that the argument for creation is essentially making an assertion, not an argument and that it was no good.

6. And I asked you why you wouldn't say the same about these other proofs if they existed.

7. And you said that it was because you were feeling generous enough that "if they were true then some exertion of godly powers could have provided incontrovertible proof of the tales".

8. And I told you that if you were not feeling generous enough to consider creation sufficient evidence then you couldn't possibly be feeling generous enough to consider these things you demand as sufficient evidence either since the three proofs that God offers are far greater in power than these ones you demand.

9. Then you set about proving that creation is no more than a claim.

10. I answered that it was also an argument. And that thus, if you will not countenance it, it is dishonest to claim that you will countenance other claims which themselves also belong within the claim of creation.

11. And you promptly launched into ad hominem.

If I already explained why creation is not sufficient evidence, where then do you get off accusing me of dishonesty? There is no other situation in which you would accept a claim as evidence but with god you can invoke special pleading and I am the dishonest one. What tripe.

I can and will in due course argue for why creation is not only an assertion but a sufficient argument. But for right now, the issue is why your desired proofs are any more convincing than Creation, human conscience and death are.

The fact is that the existence of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil or the Garden of Eden or any of the other artifacts would make no difference if Creation itself, human conscience and the certainty of death don't.

How can the incredible vastness and complexity of Creation not trump a tree, even one so amazing as producing knowledge of good and evil in the eater of its fruit? How can the obvious power of the human conscience which prevents humanity from consuming itself in no time at all be less persuasive than a sword, even if it is one of fire? How can the absolute certainty of death which is so ubiquitous and claims every last human being that has ever lived be less compelling than a ship even one that may be 4000 years old?

Why would you not promptly dismiss the tree, the sword and the ship if you sneer at Creation, human conscience and death? You say that you won't because you feel generous and because they would be more impressive. They are obviously not more impressive at all. And your generosity is unreliable since you are not generous enough to consider evidence that you did not yourself demand. That is my argument.

If all of these things were sufficient then why did god then proceed to prove himself to Pharaoh? Why did he do any of the miraculous acts? Why did he listen to Gideon? He should have told all of those people "get lost, go and look at creation".

As for creation being a claim, yes, you are right that the argument for creation is a circular argument. I already explained that it cannot be otherwise since being part of creation prevents us from finding evidence for God elsewhere. We cannot go outside of creation except by Faith. Faith is what you reject. Therefore, all you have are ontological questions about creation, human conscience and death. None of these things can be explained except by appealing to the very nature of creation. That is, they cannot be explained except with circular arguments.

To me its a very simple solution. When a person makes a claim he must demonstrate or provide a proof of the claim. If I say I can lift a car with my little finger I either demonstrate it or I show say video evidence of me doing it. Nobody is obligated to believe me otherwise. If god is the creator then a demonstration of this ability to create is not out of place. The power to preserve in pristine condition all of the works attributed to his actions would have been sufficient. Barring those a contemporary demonstration is in order to backup the claim.

There are only two possible explanations for creation:

1. It has always existed.

2. It was made by something that is outside itself, that is, something non-material but is rather supernatural.

There's more than 2. I could say there is as many as men care to dream up. For instance if we posit that some nth dimensional material being or civilization created this world as a simulation. The beings are not supernatural but by the nature of their dimension remain unobservable to us simply because we cannot perceive more than 3 dimensions.

Anyone who accepts #1 cannot question how it is that God has always existed. What is good for the goose is good for the gander.

Yes turn about is fair play. If you say god is a timeless non created being then nothing stops us from making the same assumptions for the universe. In which case it makes even more sense.

Anyone who accepts #2 cannot therefore discount the existence of God as Creator.

Discounting a creator is not the issue, evidence is. You are making assertions about things we have no way of observing as of yet and saying it is god. That is straight up argument from ignorance.

If creation has always existed, then itself is God and is entirely self-sufficient. But if it is, how do you explain death and decay? A self-sustaining system which is eternal should not suffer any diminishing in quality.

The existence of death and decay points outside of Creation for explanation.

No it does not. That something is eternal doesn't stop it from decaying. For example the universe itself could be a cycle of birth, death and rebirth ie expansion, collapse and reexpansion.

Thus, #2 makes more sense. If Creation is an act of the Will of some Supernatural "Thing", that would explain why there is the possibility of decay and death. That would mean that such a "Thing" can alter the conditions of creation either to sustain and perpetuate it or to rètard and destroy it.

That "Thing", by whatever name any given person or institution may prefer to call it is a Supernatural Creator not bound by this Universe or influenced in any way by it.

Now, if that thing is so, it cannot be known except by its own Will and provision. It is inaccessible to the intelligence in creation except through such means as Itself provides.

Here, the argument of the Bible that the very Creation declares not only the Fact of but also the very Nature of God immediately makes sense. The very existence of Creation and the reality of Death necessitate the belief that something way more complex and expansive and powerful than the Universe exists and it has a Will.

In addition, the very existence of the human conscience directs man to act in ways that seem to suggest innate knowledge of consequence and reward for behavior. That is not explained except by the Existence of Some Moral Authority Who holds man to account for his various choices.

There is no better way to explain these things except to say that "they just are" or "we don't know how they came to be" both of which answers make any questions about the Existence of God hypocritical.

If they just are, then we are claiming that these things are God since they self-exist and explain themselves. That would put anyone advancing such answers on exactly the same philosophical footing as anyone affirming that God exists.

Creation, therefore, is proof that there is a Creator. Death is proof of the Existence of a Personal Creator, that is of a Mind/Intelligence/Person outside of Creation Which has a Will and a Plan. Our consciences both affirm these things (until we silence them) and prove the power of that Creator to preserve His Will concerning Creation.

There is nothing self-evident about any of this. There is nothing innate about morality except as passed on as instinctive by centuries of reaffirmation. Nobody was born and immediately knows a god exists or have all morality built in.

Death is proof of the tend of the universe towards increasing entropy.

Our conscience is as developed as the societies we were born in.

Your own proofs are meagre in the face of such majestic evidence.

If a god exists and wants my insignificant contribution to his worship then he will do well to provide the same insignificant proofs he provided to others. If according to the tales the devil has seen the majesty of heaven and god and still rejects him, I see no reason why our loyalty is demanded without unequivocal proofs.

LordReed:


LoL, don't be crying over what you start.

Response A

That is even more dishonesty from you. Unless in fact you don't know what the fallacy of ad hominem is.

The fallacy of ad hominem occurs when you ignore your opponent's argument(s) and attack his person instead.

I described your argument as dishonest and explained why (you made a demand that you clearly were not going to honor).

How were you not committing ad hominem yourself?

LordReed:
If I already explained why creation is not sufficient evidence, where then do you get off accusing me of dishonesty? There is no other situation in which you would accept a claim as evidence but with god you can invoke special pleading and I am the dishonest one. What tripe.

Response B

1. I said that it was a dishonest demand to make if you were not going to honor your demand. If you do not consider creation sufficient evidence for God's existence, then you will not accept anything in creation as evidence for His existence either because the argument for creation is exactly the same as the argument for anything within creation.

2. Circular reasoning is not always fallacious. If it was, dictionaries would not exist. All definitions are circular reasoning. This is also true of all axioms and first principles and assumptions. Not everything can be proved independent of itself. There are closed systems that can only be expressed in terms of themselves. God is such a system as I demonstrated. As I have also just shown here, He is not the only situation in which circular reasoning is allowed. So, no special pleading here.

LordReed:
If all of these things were sufficient then why did god then proceed to prove himself to Pharaoh? Why did he do any of the miraculous acts? Why did he listen to Gideon? He should have told all of those people "get lost, go and look at creation".

Response C

Pharaoh did not believe for all the miracles that he witnessed. Gideon already believed so that the signs he asked for only served to strengthen existing faith. This is what I have said to you before: those who believe will do so with whatever proof God offers to help them. Those who don't will not even if God gave them all the proofs they demand. This was a deliberate demonstration on the part of God to preserve for all generations the truth that hardness of heart has nothing to do with His refusal to "prove His existence". It is a deliberate choice to ignore God's Existence and inevitable judgment.

Additionally, each miracle was no different than the very miracle of Creation. Even though each miracle was clearly miraculous just like creation, human conscience and death are, Pharaoh still chose to not believe. Gideon too believed before he ever asked for a sign. And he did not go to scrutinize and check vigorously if there may have been other explanations for the signs that he experienced. He accepted them as proofs. Both of these reactions were free will choices in response to the same kind of thing.

Everyday today, God still works miracles in the Earth, not at the hands of believers, it is true, but definitely miracles and still the vast majority of human beings prefer to not believe in Him choosing instead to follow all sorts of philosophies and fairy tales that they take comfort in.

LordReed:
To me its a very simple solution. When a person makes a claim he must demonstrate or provide a proof of the claim. If I say I can lift a car with my little finger I either demonstrate it or I show say video evidence of me doing it. Nobody is obligated to believe me otherwise. If god is the creator then a demonstration of this ability to create is not out of place. The power to preserve in pristine condition all of the works attributed to his actions would have been sufficient. Barring those a contemporary demonstration is in order to backup the claim.

Response D

Refer to B.1 above. Clearly, my argument has been that God created the Universe and that is the proof you are here demanding again.

LordReed:
There's more than 2. I could say there is as many as men care to dream up. For instance if we posit that some nth dimensional material being or civilization created this world as a simulation. The beings are not supernatural but by the nature of their dimension remain unobservable to us simply because we cannot perceive more than 3 dimensions.

Response E

I understand that you would wish to be able to say that but I'm afraid you can't, not without violating logic.

The Universe is the full set of time, energy and matter, that is, of all things discernible to the material senses including such things as our senses need help to appreciate, for example, ultraviolet light.

That means that whatever you can conceive of which actually exists within the limits of time, energy and matter or is defined in any way by parameters within this universe is NOT OUTSIDE this universe and therefore cannot be said in any way to be the CAUSE of this universe. Because its very existence is the same as the existence of the universe being itself a part of it.

LordReed:
Yes turn about is fair play. If you say god is a timeless non created being then nothing stops us from making the same assumptions for the universe. In which case it makes even more sense.

Response F

Let us see then if you are correct:

If the Universe is timeless, why is decay apparent in it? It clearly diminishes in quality and is clearly subject to causes that damage it.

I find it hard to see how it makes more sense to believe that a Universe which we see is subject to change and in a negative direction is eternal rather than a Being which is not subject in any form to any force outside of Itself.

LordReed:
Discounting a creator is not the issue, evidence is. You are making assertions about things we have no way of observing as of yet and saying it is god. That is straight up argument from ignorance.

Response G

1. The issue here is that you believe that your list of evidence is better, that if God were to provide those proofs, you would be able to believe. But as I have said, in the self-same way that you dismiss Creation as good enough evidence for God's Existence preferring the excuses and questionable alternate explanations that you have advanced here for it, you will dismiss the proofs you demand if you were given them. That makes it unnecessary for those proofs to be given at all.

2. As for making arguments from ignorance, that is your claim. And you make that claim disregarding what argument I have actually made. If I have explained the existence of creation by calling some unknown cause yet to be figured out by science God, then do you not argue from ignorance when you insist that God does not exist because you cannot observe Him?

3. Now that you agree that we have no way of observing anything outside Creation, you must explain how else we can be sure of God's Existence without looking at Creation (and looking at the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil etc is all included in "looking at Creation" as I have demonstrated) and by exercising Faith.

LordReed:
No it does not. That something is eternal doesn't stop it from decaying. For example the universe itself could be a cycle of birth, death and rebirth ie expansion, collapse and reexpansion.

Response H

1. Do you realize that your argument here for which something which is eternal can decay is that:

"[it] could be a cycle of birth, death and rebirth ie expansion, collapse and reexpansion"?

Clearly, you are providing as proof for your claim that something that is eternal cannot decay a speculation?!

And this is supposed to be a superior position to saying that a God Who does not change because He created time and is not subject to it made creation and changes it as He pleases?

2. Still, eternal is a word with a meaning. It means to last without end. Something that goes through a cycle of starting and ending, rinse and repeat, is obviously not eternal. Besides, it should be obvious that what you have described is a situation where something goes out of existence and spontaneously springs back into existence by itself out of nothing. If that is logical and acceptable in your philosophy, then you have absolutely no philosophical grounds upon which to question the Existence of a God Who has always existed without beginning or end. The latter makes considerably more sense than the notion that something can spontaneously spring into existence, decay and die only to repeat the whole process.

LordReed:
There is nothing self-evident about any of this. There is nothing innate about morality except as passed on as instinctive by centuries of reaffirmation. Nobody was born and immediately knows a god exists or have all morality built in.

Death is proof of the tend of the universe towards increasing entropy.

Our conscience is as developed as the societies we were born in.

Response I

Consistent with your aversion to assertions without proof, you should also provide proof of your claims here.

LordReed:
If a god exists and wants my insignificant contribution to his worship then he will do well to provide the same insignificant proofs he provided to others. If according to the tales the devil has seen the majesty of heaven and god and still rejects him, I see no reason why our loyalty is demanded without unequivocal proofs.

Response J

1. Well, if a God does exist, then He exists on His Own Terms and not yours and would not be much of a God if He could be dictated to by you, would He now?

2. God gave you the same proofs He gave the whole world:

Psalms 19:1-6 NASB
[1]The heavens are telling of the glory of God; And their expanse is declaring the work of His hands.
[2]Day to day pours forth speech, And night to night reveals knowledge.
[3]There is no speech, nor are there words; Their voice is not heard.
[4]Their line has gone out through all the earth, And their utterances to the end of the world. In them He has placed a tent for the sun,
[5]Which is as a bridegroom coming out of his chamber; It rejoices as a strong man to run his course.
[6]Its rising is from one end of the heavens, And its circuit to the other end of them; And there is nothing hidden from its heat.

Romans 1:18-21 NASB
[18]For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness,
[19]because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them.
[20]For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse.
[21]For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened.

Romans 2:14-15 NASB
[14]For when Gentiles who do not have the Law do instinctively the things of the Law, these, not having the Law, are a law to themselves,
[15]in that they show the work of the Law written in their hearts, their conscience bearing witness and their thoughts alternately accusing or else defending them

Romans 8:20-22 NASB
[20]For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope
[21]that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God.
[22]For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now.

3. Your loyalty is yours to give to whom you please. But whichever way you choose to vote, you will in the end still answer to God since there is no other Authority but His.

Ihedinobi3:

Response A

That is even more dishonesty from you. Unless in fact you don't know what the fallacy of ad hominem is.

The fallacy of ad hominem occurs when you ignore your opponent's argument(s) and attack his person instead.

I described your argument as dishonest and explained why (you made a demand that you clearly were not going to honor).

How were you not committing ad hominem yourself?



Response B

1. I said that it was a dishonest demand to make if you were not going to honor your demand. If you do not consider creation sufficient evidence for God's existence, then you will not accept anything in creation as evidence for His existence either because the argument for creation is exactly the same as the argument for anything within creation.

See how your disingenuity continues to manifest? You deceptively say it is my argument you are calling dishonest meanwhile it is clear it was my motives you were attacking. You deceitful piece of shit. You are now posing like as if I threw the first blow when you wanted to use underhanded means to insult me. You attribute your sick fantasy motives to me so that you can use style to insult me. I just want you to know you won't succeed that way and I will give it to you every time you try shit.

2. Circular reasoning is not always fallacious. If it was, dictionaries would not exist. All definitions are circular reasoning. This is also true of all axioms and first principles and assumptions. Not everything can be proved independent of itself. There are closed systems that can only be expressed in terms of themselves. God is such a system as I demonstrated. As I have also just shown here, He is not the only situation in which circular reasoning is allowed. So, no special pleading here.

Circular reasoning (Latin: circulus in probando, "circle in proving";[1] also known as circular logic) is a logical fallacy in which the reasoner begins with what they are trying to end with.[2] The components of a circular argument are often logically valid because if the premises are true, the conclusion must be true. Circular reasoning is not a formal logical fallacy but a pragmatic defect in an argument whereby the premises are just as much in need of proof or evidence as the conclusion, and as a consequence the argument fails to persuade. Other ways to express this are that there is no reason to accept the premises unless one already believes the conclusion, or that the premises provide no independent ground or evidence for the conclusion.[3] Begging the question is closely related to circular reasoning, and in modern usage the two generally refer to the same thing.[

Response C

Pharaoh did not believe for all the miracles that he witnessed. Gideon already believed so that the signs he asked for only served to strengthen existing faith. This is what I have said to you before: those who believe will do so with whatever proof God offers to help them. Those who don't will not even if God gave them all the proofs they demand. This was a deliberate demonstration on the part of God to preserve for all generations the truth that hardness of heart has nothing to do with His refusal to "prove His existence". It is a deliberate choice to ignore God's Existence and inevitable judgment.

Additionally, each miracle was no different than the very miracle of Creation. Even though each miracle was clearly miraculous just like creation, human conscience and death are, Pharaoh still chose to not believe. Gideon too believed before he ever asked for a sign. And he did not go to scrutinize and check vigorously if there may have been other explanations for the signs that he experienced. He accepted them as proofs. Both of these reactions were free will choices in response to the same kind of thing.

Everyday today, God still works miracles in the Earth, not at the hands of believers, it is true, but definitely miracles and still the vast majority of human beings prefer to not believe in Him choosing instead to follow all sorts of philosophies and fairy tales that they take comfort in.

So god provides miracles to someone who he knows is going to reject him but refuses for someone who is willing to change his mind should that evidence exist. And all this is known by you o gatekeeper of the knowledge of god. LMFAO! Abegi tell us something real.

Response D

Refer to B.1 above. Clearly, my argument has been that God created the Universe and that is the proof you are here demanding again.

There is no proof to be had so you will refer to your bullshit arguments.

Response E

I understand that you would wish to be able to say that but I'm afraid you can't, not without violating logic.

The Universe is the full set of time, energy and matter, that is, of all things discernible to the material senses including such things as our senses need help to appreciate, for example, ultraviolet light.

That means that whatever you can conceive of which actually exists within the limits of time, energy and matter or is defined in any way by parameters within this universe is NOT OUTSIDE this universe and therefore cannot be said in any way to be the CAUSE of this universe. Because its very existence is the same as the existence of the universe being itself a part of it.
[quote]

Another bullshit argument from ignorance. You don't know anything about how or what created the universe but you believe it is god with no proof available.

[quote]
Response F

Let us see then if you are correct:

If the Universe is timeless, why is decay apparent in it? It clearly diminishes in quality and is clearly subject to causes that damage it.

I find it hard to see how it makes more sense to believe that a Universe which we see is subject to change and in a negative direction is eternal rather than a Being which is not subject in any form to any force outside of Itself.



Response G

1. The issue here is that you believe that your list of evidence is better, that if God were to provide those proofs, you would be able to believe. But as I have said, in the self-same way that you dismiss Creation as good enough evidence for God's Existence preferring the excuses and questionable alternate explanations that you have advanced here for it, you will dismiss the proofs you demand if you were given them. That makes it unnecessary for those proofs to be given at all.

2. As for making arguments from ignorance, that is your claim. And you make that claim disregarding what argument I have actually made. If I have explained the existence of creation by calling some unknown cause yet to be figured out by science God, then do you not argue from ignorance when you insist that God does not exist because you cannot observe Him?

3. Now that you agree that we have no way of observing anything outside Creation, you must explain how else we can be sure of God's Existence without looking at Creation (and looking at the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil etc is all included in "looking at Creation" as I have demonstrated) and by exercising Faith.



Response H

1. Do you realize that your argument here for which something which is eternal can decay is that:

"[it] could be a cycle of birth, death and rebirth ie expansion, collapse and reexpansion"?

Clearly, you are providing as proof for your claim that something that is eternal cannot decay a speculation?!

Unlike you I am not afraid to admit I am speculating. I don't deny anybody their right to speculate but if you can't prove it then it remains a speculation.

If there is a god that exists and interacts with this world let him show himself either in person or by action. No amount of sophistry is going to sway me otherwise.

And this is supposed to be a superior position to saying that a God Who does not change because He created time and is not subject to it made creation and changes it as He pleases?

2. Still, eternal is a word with a meaning. It means to last without end. Something that goes through a cycle of starting and ending, rinse and repeat, is obviously not eternal. Besides, it should be obvious that what you have described is a situation where something goes out of existence and spontaneously springs back into existence by itself out of nothing. If that is logical and acceptable in your philosophy, then you have absolutely no philosophical grounds upon which to question the Existence of a God Who has always existed without beginning or end. The latter makes considerably more sense than the notion that something can spontaneously spring into existence, decay and die only to repeat the whole process.

It is a speculation that one explanation for the existence of the universe is after expanding it will collapse back into a sort of singularity from which another big bang type event occurs again. Nowhere did I say it goes into nothing.

Response I

Consistent with your aversion to assertions without proof, you should also provide proof of your claims here.

I can only provide the seeds for your own search:

Life is fundamentally an unstable process (yes, process). Life seems to prefer higher, more unstable energy states to the lowest energy state, which is what makes it so intriguing. Everything in the universe seems to tend towards higher entropy, or disorder. Indeed, the scientist Nicolas Carnot contrived of a principle to describe that tendency that ultimately became a “law”. So when something appears to do the opposite, it feels strange and somehow intentional by something or someone.
https://www.inverse.com/article/8867-to-beat-death-and-become-immortals-we-first-must-defeat-entropy

Although Darwin seemed to assume that the moral sense was innate, recent research is suggesting otherwise. It now appears that the moral sense is largely developed after birth and requires particular kinds of experience. Right now, the dominant culture is undermining the development of the moral sense--in males and females (but males are affected more).
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/moral-landscapes/201701/is-humanitys-moral-sense-inherited-or-nurtured?amp

Response J

1. Well, if a God does exist, then He exists on His Own Terms and not yours and would not be much of a God if He could be dictated to by you, would He now?

2. God gave you the same proofs He gave the whole world:

Psalms 19:1-6 NASB
[1]The heavens are telling of the glory of God; And their expanse is declaring the work of His hands.
[2]Day to day pours forth speech, And night to night reveals knowledge.
[3]There is no speech, nor are there words; Their voice is not heard.
[4]Their line has gone out through all the earth, And their utterances to the end of the world. In them He has placed a tent for the sun,
[5]Which is as a bridegroom coming out of his chamber; It rejoices as a strong man to run his course.
[6]Its rising is from one end of the heavens, And its circuit to the other end of them; And there is nothing hidden from its heat.

Romans 1:18-21 NASB
[18]For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness,
[19]because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them.
[20]For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse.
[21]For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened.

Romans 2:14-15 NASB
[14]For when Gentiles who do not have the Law do instinctively the things of the Law, these, not having the Law, are a law to themselves,
[15]in that they show the work of the Law written in their hearts, their conscience bearing witness and their thoughts alternately accusing or else defending them

Romans 8:20-22 NASB
[20]For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope
[21]that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God.
[22]For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now.

3. Your loyalty is yours to give to whom you please. But whichever way you choose to vote, you will in the end still answer to God since there is no other Authority but His.

I maintain if a god must convince me of its existence then it should provide unequivocal proof. Sophistry will not move me, hard evidence will.

LordReed:


See how your disingenuity continues to manifest? You deceptively say it is my argument you are calling dishonest meanwhile it is clear it was my motives you were attacking. You deceitful piece of shit. You are now posing like as if I threw the first blow when you wanted to use underhanded means to insult me. You attribute your sick fantasy motives to me so that you can use style to insult me. I just want you to know you won't succeed that way and I will give it to you every time you try shit.

I am really unsure how to respond to this. Can you not tell the difference between your person and your arguments? If you make a dishonest argument, it is no insult for me to tell you that you did any more than it is an insult to tell you that you made a false argument if you did. It is my job to prove such claims when I make them and I did.

The way I see things here, you only want to have a mudfight. Rather than allow your arguments to be challenged, you would stoop to ad hominem. That is what your threat here amounts to. So, you start threads like this one to bait Christians so that you can insult them to your heart's content rather than actually make or defend a real argument.

LordReed:
Circular reasoning (Latin: circulus in probando, "circle in proving"; also known as circular logic) is a logical fallacy in which the reasoner begins with what they are trying to end with. The components of a circular argument are often logically valid because if the premises are true, the conclusion must be true. Circular reasoning is not a formal logical fallacy but a pragmatic defect in an argument whereby the premises are just as much in need of proof or evidence as the conclusion, and as a consequence the argument fails to persuade. Other ways to express this are that there is no reason to accept the premises unless one already believes the conclusion, or that the premises provide no independent ground or evidence for the conclusion. Begging the question is closely related to circular reasoning, and in modern usage the two generally refer to the same thing.[

Here is the full quote from Wikipedia (you neglected to name your source):

Circular reasoning
Circular reasoning (Latin: circulus in probando, "circle in proving";[1] also known as circular logic) is a logical fallacy in which the reasoner begins with what they are trying to end with.[2] The components of a circular argument are often logically valid because if the premises are true, the conclusion must be true. Circular reasoning is not a formal logical fallacy but a pragmatic defect in an argument whereby the premises are just as much in need of proof or evidence as the conclusion, and as a consequence the argument fails to persuade. Other ways to express this are that there is no reason to accept the premises unless one already believes the conclusion, or that the premises provide no independent ground or evidence for the conclusion. Begging the question is closely related to circular reasoning, and in modern usage the two generally refer to the same thing.

Circular reasoning is often of the form: "A is true because B is true; B is true because A is true." Circularity can be difficult to detect if it involves a longer chain of propositions. Academic Douglas Walton used the following example of a fallacious circular argument:

Wellington is in New Zealand.
Therefore, Wellington is in New Zealand.

He notes that, although the argument is deductively valid, it cannot prove that Wellington is in New Zealand because it contains no evidence that is distinct from the conclusion. The context – that of an argument – means that the proposition does not meet the requirement of proving the statement; thus, it is a fallacy. He proposes that the context of a dialogue determines whether a circular argument is fallacious: if it forms part of an argument, then it is. Citing Cederblom and Paulsen 1986:109, Hugh G. Gauch observes that non-logical facts can be difficult to capture formally:

'Whatever is less dense than water will float, because whatever is less dense than water will float' sounds stupid, but 'Whatever is less dense than water will float, because such objects won't sink in water' might pass.

The problem of induction

Joel Feinberg and Russ Shafer-Landau note that "using the scientific method to judge the scientific method is circular reasoning". Scientists attempt to discover the laws of nature and to predict what will happen in the future, based on those laws. However, per David Hume's problem of induction, science cannot be proven inductively by empirical evidence, and thus science cannot be proven scientifically. An appeal to a principle of the uniformity of nature would be required to deductively necessitate the continued accuracy of predictions based on laws that have only succeeded in generalizing past observations. But as Bertrand Russell observed, "The method of 'postulating' what we want has many advantages; they are the same as the advantages of theft over honest toil".

Source: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circular_reasoning

What we can learn from the above is that circular reasoning can be problematic but it doesn't always render an argument invalid or untrue. Two examples given in the Wikipedia article that should illustrate that are:

Whatever is less dense than water will float, because whatever is less dense than water will float' sounds stupid, but 'Whatever is less dense than water will float, because such objects won't sink in water' might pass.

AND

Joel Feinberg and Russ Shafer-Landau note that "using the scientific method to judge the scientific method is circular reasoning"...An appeal to a principle of the uniformity of nature would be required to deductively necessitate the continued accuracy of predictions based on laws that have only succeeded in generalizing past observations.

Not everything can be proved by referring to evidence outside of itself as I said. Axioms, definitions and first principles are all circular arguments but we cannot do anything at all without them.

Here is Britannica:

The fallacy of circular argument, known as petitio principii (“begging the question”), occurs when the premises presume, openly or covertly, the very conclusion that is to be demonstrated (example: “Gregory always votes wisely.” “But how do you know?” “Because he always votes Libertarian.”)....Strictly speaking, petitio principii is not a fallacy of reasoning but an ineptitude in argumentation: thus the argument from p as a premise to p as conclusion is not deductively invalid but lacks any power of conviction, since no one who questioned the conclusion could concede the premise.

Source: https://www.britannica.com/topic/fallacy#ref1102387

The bold text in the quote (emphasis mine) is pretty much what my argument to you is.

LordReed:
So god provides miracles to someone who he knows is going to reject him but refuses for someone who is willing to change his mind should that evidence exist. And all this is known by you o gatekeeper of the knowledge of god. LMFAO! Abegi tell us something real.

From your own words, I have said already that you have no such willingness. If you do possess it, it is not evident in your arguments, so you are really no different than Pharaoh. God is entirely free and can choose to give you any sign He pleases. He is God and it is not my argument that He will not provide whatever evidence you need in order to believe. My argument rather is that it does not follow that His provision of such evidence will make a difference when His provision of similar albeit greater evidence is not sufficient for you.

LordReed:
There is no proof to be had so you will refer to your bullshit arguments.

Not sure what your response here means.

LordReed:
Another bullshit argument from ignorance. You don't know anything about how or what created the universe but you believe it is god with no proof available.

Yet another claim I take for granted that you have no intention of proving. And a claim too that totally ignores my arguments.

LordReed:
Unlike you I am not afraid to admit I am speculating. I don't deny anybody their right to speculate but if you can't prove it then it remains a speculation.

If there is a god that exists and interacts with this world let him show himself either in person or by action. No amount of sophistry is going to sway me otherwise.

I find it hard to believe that you permit everyone to speculate. It was you who regarded my explanations as fairy tales when they could at least have been accepted by you as speculations that you don't need to adopt. Of course I was not speculating, but anyone who was really as generous as you just represented yourself as being would have thought to let me speculate as I please, if they thought that I was only "making it up". Incidentally, that is what you did here: make things up and claim some weird right to speculate. I believe that that is special pleading that you are doing.

If there is a God, would He be swayed by your tantrums?

LordReed:
It is a speculation that one explanation for the existence of the universe is after expanding it will collapse back into a sort of singularity from which another big bang type event occurs again. Nowhere did I say it goes into nothing.

So, death of the universe is not a going out of existence of the universe but you have some kind of problem with the idea that physical death does not mean the going out of existence of a person? That again is special pleading a.k.a hypocrisy.

What is singularity and how does it exist? Is it eternal? Did some "thing" create it? How is any argument for it substantively different from the argument for God's existence.

LordReed:
I can only provide the seeds for your own search:

Life is fundamentally an unstable process (yes, process). Life seems to prefer higher, more unstable energy states to the lowest energy state, which is what makes it so intriguing. Everything in the universe seems to tend towards higher entropy, or disorder. Indeed, the scientist Nicolas Carnot contrived of a principle to describe that tendency that ultimately became a “law”. So when something appears to do the opposite, it feels strange and somehow intentional by something or someone.
https://www.inverse.com/article/8867-to-beat-death-and-become-immortals-we-first-must-defeat-entropy

Although Darwin seemed to assume that the moral sense was innate, recent research is suggesting otherwise. It now appears that the moral sense is largely developed after birth and requires particular kinds of experience. Right now, the dominant culture is undermining the development of the moral sense--in males and females (but males are affected more).
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/moral-landscapes/201701/is-humanitys-moral-sense-inherited-or-nurtured?amp

"Seeds for my own search"? I confess a confusion. I asked you to prove your claims since you are so big on having proof and you offer me seeds for a search? Search for your arguments or for what exactly?

Everything in the above is speculation and downright sleight of hand. Where does it actually substantiate what you have said?

There is not a single culture in the world where good and evil are not recognized as opposite moral poles even if what is considered good and evil may vary in some small respect from one culture to another.

If this is the case, and it is, how do cultures develop any sense of right and wrong and good and evil if individuals are not born with a moral compass? How do whole groups of individuals develop a moral compass when the constituent individuals lack them?

"Death is the tend (sic) of the universe to increasing entropy" is no more than a restatement of my argument. The question is why an eternal universe should tend toward increasing entropy at all when eternity means the perpetuation of a state indefinitely, without end. You were to explain that. Nothing in the above bothered to answer that.

LordReed:
I maintain if a god must convince me of its existence then it should provide unequivocal proof. Sophistry will not move me, hard evidence will.

Why should a God answer to you if He exists?

What sophistry do you mean?

What hard evidence is harder than creation, human conscience and death?

LordReed:
Here are somethings God could have preserved in pristine condition to prove the Bible is true.

1. The tree of good and evil.
2. The garden of Eden.
3. The sword used to protect the garden of Eden.
4. The ark Noah built.
5. The tower of Babel.
6. The sites of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah.
7. The storage devices Joseph used for preserving food for 7 years.
8. The stone tablets God carved and wrote on.
9. The ark of testament.
10. The manna God rained from heaven.
11. The writing on the wall Mene Mene Tekel Upharsin.

None of these things are anywhere to be seen so instead we get so many unsubstantiated tales. These are things that would have been able to be scientifically tested and provided a good basis for accepting the tales of the bible. Here we are empty handed and asked to believe these incredible tales of God's power.

Lol...imagine the insult God is giving us humans by asking us to believe every nonsense written in the bible with not even a single prove

Ihedinobi3:

I am really unsure how to respond to this. Can you not tell the difference between your person and your arguments? If you make a dishonest argument, it is no insult for me to tell you that you did any more than it is an insult to tell you that you made a false argument if you did. It is my job to prove such claims when I make them and I did.

The way I see things here, you only want to have a mudfight. Rather than allow your arguments to be challenged, you would stoop to ad hominem. That is what your threat here amounts to. So, you start threads like this one to bait Christians so that you can insult them to your heart's content rather than actually make or defend a real argument.

Keep forming obtuse. An attack on my motives is an ad hominem attack but you want to cry when I give it back to you. Keep crying you twåt, I will keep giving it to you.

If I didn't want to be challenged I wouldn't bother responding to you.

Here is the full quote from Wikipedia (you neglected to name your source):

Circular reasoning
Circular reasoning (Latin: circulus in probando, "circle in proving";[1] also known as circular logic) is a logical fallacy in which the reasoner begins with what they are trying to end with.[2] The components of a circular argument are often logically valid because if the premises are true, the conclusion must be true. Circular reasoning is not a formal logical fallacy but a pragmatic defect in an argument whereby the premises are just as much in need of proof or evidence as the conclusion, and as a consequence the argument fails to persuade. Other ways to express this are that there is no reason to accept the premises unless one already believes the conclusion, or that the premises provide no independent ground or evidence for the conclusion. Begging the question is closely related to circular reasoning, and in modern usage the two generally refer to the same thing.

Circular reasoning is often of the form: "A is true because B is true; B is true because A is true." Circularity can be difficult to detect if it involves a longer chain of propositions. Academic Douglas Walton used the following example of a fallacious circular argument:

Wellington is in New Zealand.
Therefore, Wellington is in New Zealand.

He notes that, although the argument is deductively valid, it cannot prove that Wellington is in New Zealand because it contains no evidence that is distinct from the conclusion. The context – that of an argument – means that the proposition does not meet the requirement of proving the statement; thus, it is a fallacy. He proposes that the context of a dialogue determines whether a circular argument is fallacious: if it forms part of an argument, then it is. Citing Cederblom and Paulsen 1986:109, Hugh G. Gauch observes that non-logical facts can be difficult to capture formally:

'Whatever is less dense than water will float, because whatever is less dense than water will float' sounds stupid, but 'Whatever is less dense than water will float, because such objects won't sink in water' might pass.

The problem of induction

Joel Feinberg and Russ Shafer-Landau note that "using the scientific method to judge the scientific method is circular reasoning". Scientists attempt to discover the laws of nature and to predict what will happen in the future, based on those laws. However, per David Hume's problem of induction, science cannot be proven inductively by empirical evidence, and thus science cannot be proven scientifically. An appeal to a principle of the uniformity of nature would be required to deductively necessitate the continued accuracy of predictions based on laws that have only succeeded in generalizing past observations. But as Bertrand Russell observed, "The method of 'postulating' what we want has many advantages; they are the same as the advantages of theft over honest toil".

Source: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circular_reasoning

What we can learn from the above is that circular reasoning can be problematic but it doesn't always render an argument invalid or untrue. Two examples given in the Wikipedia article that should illustrate that are:

Whatever is less dense than water will float, because whatever is less dense than water will float' sounds stupid, but 'Whatever is less dense than water will float, because such objects won't sink in water' might pass.

AND

Joel Feinberg and Russ Shafer-Landau note that "using the scientific method to judge the scientific method is circular reasoning"...An appeal to a principle of the uniformity of nature would be required to deductively necessitate the continued accuracy of predictions based on laws that have only succeeded in generalizing past observations.

Not everything can be proved by referring to evidence outside of itself as I said. Axioms, definitions and first principles are all circular arguments but we cannot do anything at all without them.

Here is Britannica:

The fallacy of circular argument, known as petitio principii (“begging the question”), occurs when the premises presume, openly or covertly, the very conclusion that is to be demonstrated (example: “Gregory always votes wisely.” “But how do you know?” “Because he always votes Libertarian.”)....Strictly speaking, petitio principii is not a fallacy of reasoning but an ineptitude in argumentation: thus the argument from p as a premise to p as conclusion is not deductively invalid but lacks any power of conviction, since no one who questioned the conclusion could concede the premise.

Source: https://www.britannica.com/topic/fallacy#ref1102387

The bold text in the quote (emphasis mine) is pretty much what my argument to you is.

Where in all of that negates the need to prove evidence? Even the Britannica you quoted says its ineptitude to use it so what point are you making bring it up?

From your own words, I have said already that you have no such willingness. If you do possess it, it is not evident in your arguments, so you are really no different than Pharaoh. God is entirely free and can choose to give you any sign He pleases. He is God and it is not my argument that He will not provide whatever evidence you need in order to believe. My argument rather is that it does not follow that His provision of such evidence will make a difference when His provision of similar albeit greater evidence is not sufficient for you.

Keep revealing how much of a mind reader you are. You know my mind better than me and can say for sure what will convince me or not. It seems you are even better than the god you profess.

Yet another claim I take for granted that you have no intention of proving. And a claim too that totally ignores my arguments.

LoL! You don't get to flip this, provide evidence for your god not bullshit circular arguments and arguments from ignorance.

I find it hard to believe that you permit everyone to speculate. It was you who regarded my explanations as fairy tales when they could at least have been accepted by you as speculations that you don't need to adopt. Of course I was not speculating, but anyone who was really as generous as you just represented yourself as being would have thought to let me speculate as I please, if they thought that I was only "making it up". Incidentally, that is what you did here: make things up and claim some weird right to speculate. I believe that that is special pleading that you are doing.

If there is a God, would He be swayed by your tantrums?

LoL, I guess I can take it you are merely speculating? Ah good then that clears a lot of things. You should have just said that from the beginning.

If there is a god I expect it to provide unequivocal proof of itself and its godhood claims, not some deliberately obtuse human acting as a gatekeeper giving me bullshit as arguments for its existence.

So, death of the universe is not a going out of existence of the universe but you have some kind of problem with the idea that physical death does not mean the going out of existence of a person? That again is special pleading a.k.a hypocrisy.

What is singularity and how does it exist? Is it eternal? Did some "thing" create it? How is any argument for it substantively different from the argument for God's existence.

Yes the deliberately obtuse dunderhead who is acting like he doesn't understand the meaning of speculation.

Exactly, a creator god speculation is not any different from a collapse to singularity speculation, they are speculations, no proof available.

"Seeds for my own search"? I confess a confusion. I asked you to prove your claims since you are so big on having proof and you offer me seeds for a search? Search for your arguments or for what exactly?

Everything in the above is speculation and downright sleight of hand. Where does it actually substantiate what you have said?

There is not a single culture in the world where good and evil are not recognized as opposite moral poles even if what is considered good and evil may vary in some small respect from one culture to another.

If this is the case, and it is, how do cultures develop any sense of right and wrong and good and evil if individuals are not born with a moral compass? How do whole groups of individuals develop a moral compass when the constituent individuals lack them?

"Death is the tend (sic) of the universe to increasing entropy" is no more than a restatement of my argument. The question is why an eternal universe should tend toward increasing entropy at all when eternity means the perpetuation of a state indefinitely, without end. You were to explain that. Nothing in the above bothered to answer that.

The evidence maybe more involved than I can provide here. Rather than delay my response till I can gather all of it I decided to give you an idea where to look if you are interested. I can always come back to it at a latter time.

Who said individual members of society do not have a moral compass? Here is what I wrote:

There is nothing innate about morality except as passed on as instinctive by centuries of reaffirmation. Nobody was born and immediately knows a god exists or have all morality built in.

Morality develops in societies by reinforcing behaviors that are determined to be of survival benefit to the society or to the individuals that make it up. At no point is it suggested that people have no moral compass, what is being argued is that it is developed by interaction with other members of society. What every creature we have observed is born with is an instinctive drive towards survival behavior, for instance a baby is not taught how to suck but it is not making a moral judgement as to whether it is good to suck breast or not, it is following an instinctive routine evolution has baked in as essential to survival. A child does not know that taking what does not belong to you is bad until it is taught by it's parents or society that that is an undesired behaviour.

Why should a God answer to you if He exists?

What sophistry do you mean?

What hard evidence is harder than creation, human conscience and death?

That's a question best answered by the god, I on the other hand am quite content to live without disturbing myself about a god since no one has provided unequivocal evidence for one.

The sophistry you indulge in.

Contemporary actions that substantiate any god claims, not reports from books laden with ignorance.

frank317:


Lol...imagine the insult God is giving us humans by asking us to believe every nonsense written in the bible with not even a single prove

If it was even god self we fit gree small but na ogboju human beings wey dey talk jargons dey tell us say na god. What ignorant creator doesn't know that the creatures he created have 6 legs not 4? Just ignorance upon arrogance.

LordReed:


If it was even god self we fit gree small but na ogboju human beings wey dey talk jargons dey tell us say na god. What ignorant creator doesn't know that the creatures he created have 6 legs not 4? Just ignorance upon arrogance.

You are now atheist?

MrPresident1:


You are now atheist?

You can call me that even though I don't call myself that.

LordReed:


You can call me that even though I don't call myself that.

So what do you call yourself?

LordReed:


If it was even god self we fit gree small but na ogboju human beings wey dey talk jargons dey tell us say na god. What ignorant creator doesn't know that the creatures he created have 6 legs not 4? Just ignorance upon arrogance.

Arguing with ihedinobi will only end up making simple things complex till he tires u out.

He talks as if he knows so much about the creator of the universe to the extent he even makes excuse for it.

I am even trying to make sense of his interaction with u.

Ihedinobi: the universe, death, everything we see is a proof that God exists.

How does it even make sense to say the proof of God is in his creation? What exactly does tree, man, rock sun or dogs tell us about God?

God does not speak, he can't be seen, man doubts if he is real...I mean, absolutely nothing to show he is the one that created the world. We can't tell if they are two brother Gods, or he is the son of another being or he is a million clan, nothing... All we have is ihedinobi and his bible telling us some unseen being is God. These should stop taking theme seriously.

MrPresident1:


So what do you call yourself?

He does not believe in Yahweh... Feel free to call him anything u like... It does not change the color of his blood.

MrPresident1:


So what do you call yourself?

Rational, reasonable human being.

frank317:


Arguing with ihedinobi will only end up making simple things complex till he tires u out.

He talks as if he knows so much about the creator of the universe to the extent he even makes excuse for it.

I am even trying to make sense of his interaction with u.

Ihedinobi: the universe, death, everything we see is a proof that God exists.

How does it even make sense to say the proof of God is in his creation? What exactly does tree, man, rock sun or dogs tell us about God?

God does not speak, he can't be seen, man doubts if he is real...I mean, absolutely nothing to show he is the one that created the world. We can't tell if they are two brother Gods, or he is the son of another being or he is a million clan, nothing... All we have is ihedinobi and his bible telling us some unseen being is God. These should stop taking theme seriously.

Your assessment is quite apt. Imagine him bringing a definition of his own argument that calls his argument inept and he still insists his argument is solid. He thinks writing voluminous nothings will sway you into thinking he is correct. What a waste.

Honestly, I will soon stop playing this way because indulging in the fairytale makes them think you have an agenda when you really don't give a rats arse.

frank317:


He does not believe in Yahweh... Feel free to call him anything u like... It does not change the color of his blood.

He no longer believes in God Almighty?

LordReed:


Rational, reasonable human being.

Oh, I see.

Rational and reasonable, hmm..., not foolish and unreasonable, lol.

When knowledge came, you treated it with scorn, lol. You are unworthy.

Illuminatus:
My own personal list:

1. God giving a detailed explanation of why and how he created the universe. Using a human as an emissary won’t cut it, he has to deliver this message himself.

2. Jesus proving that he is the son of God. We won’t take his word for it. A DNA test might do, though.

3. God should impregnate someone else whilst we watch - for academic purpose, of course. This has to be a controlled experiment so no bethronement or sending angels to do his dirty work.

4. He explains whilst he says he’s one thing but does the opposite - like say that he loves everyone but asks one people to wipe out another tribe.

5. Explain his obsession with sex and why it’s so important to him that women be inferior.

6. Prove that he didn’t plagiarize the creation stories.

Okay, pause. I think we have gotten off on the wrong foot. The Bible is the problem, not God. Asking God to prove himself is like asking Okonkwo from Things Fall Apart to prove himself.

What we need is proof that the Bible is what it says it is - which the contrary has been proven.

Truly the problem is not God but the impostor called Jehovah.

MrPresident1:


He no longer believes in God Almighty?

Yes, there is nothing like God Almighty

frank317:


Yes, there is nothing like God Almighty

You are now his spokesdriver?