Searching for GOD...

[The Accountant, OBE, KC]

Having a little temper tantrum? You accuse others of all the things that you are doing, your posts are hardly sweetness and light. If this forum upsets you so much, LEAVE, I doubt you will be missed.

Ironic. You flounce off repeatedly and come crawling back and when you're not doing that you regularly threaten to leave by way of attention-seeking, looking for people to beg you stay, and yet here you are telling someone else to leave and saying you doubt a poster will be missed. It would be great if you had self-awareness or thought before you post.

Given your history of posts calling people scum, which add nothing worthwhile to the forum, my take is that Steve H's posts will be missed a lot more than yours.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Gabriella,

Well that's clearly incorrect as I just asked you to provide evidence that AB makes claims about objective evidence - so it is a disputed issue until we settle it with some evidence.

That’s not what “disputed” means, but if AB is still here perhaps he’d be so good as to put you out of your misery and confirm that he has on numerous occasions said he has lots of evidence (and logic too by the way).

I will look forward to the evidence to support your claim.

Are you feeling unwell or something?

Testimony and personal experience can be evidence, just not objective evidence. Testimony is always open to challenge about it's accuracy, plausability, bias etc and then people make up their own minds about how plausible they think it is. When many theists talk about "evidence" they don't mean objective evidence as the supernatural can't be investigated or measured or tested.

Dear god. You haven’t understood a word of this have you. Testimony and personal experience are a type of anecdotal evidence, but not evidence for establishing objective facts about the world. That’s why they built the Large Hadron Collider rather than just asked people to testify about the Higgs-Boson. AB claims objective facts about the world (“God”) etc. QED

You are quoting me talking about testimony. Testimony is not necessarily forensics - I wasn't referring to forensics.

You don’t understand the meaning of the word “forensic”. Here’s Merriam-Webster (the first online dictionary I found):

Definition of forensic

1: belonging to, used in, or suitable to courts of judicature or to public discussion and debate 
•   a lawyer's forensic skills

2: argumentative, rhetorical 
•   forensic eloquence

3: relating to or dealing with the application of scientific knowledge to legal problems 

See item 1. You talked about “...testimony under oath can be accepted as evidence (with a penalty for perjury if it is later proved that a person lied under oath)”. Where else would that happen except in a court of law?

[floo]

Ironic. You flounce off repeatedly and come crawling back and when you're not doing that you regularly threaten to leave by way of attention-seeking, looking for people to beg you stay, and yet here you are telling someone else to leave and saying you doubt a poster will be missed. It would be great if you had self-awareness or thought before you post.

Given your history of posts calling people scum, which add nothing worthwhile to the forum, my take is that Steve H's posts will be missed a lot more than yours.

I see SteveH has one person in his fan club.

[The Accountant, OBE, KC]

Good grief. Your memory fails you – there are many theists who precisely do think their beliefs (“God” etc) are objectively true (that’s why they proselytise), and you were given documentation from a religious faith authority (the RCs) that told you that in their schools they do teach these things to children as objective facts about the world.

Nope - they taught them as beliefs. You were asked to show evidence of claims of objective evidence for God in the documentation and you couldn't provide it. As usual you were unable to back up your claim. But i see you are still continuing to refer to the documentation as though you did provide evidence to support your claim. How dishonest of you. If you want to go back to that thread and refer me to a page number and line that claims objective evidence for God, I am happy to take a look.   

You’re confusing historical theology (eg, a “holy” book says a city existed and either it did or it didn’t) with the reification of faith claims (“God” etc) as if they were equivalent objectively true facts about the world.

You're confusing me asking you for clarification on your statement as me taking a view on anything.

Not sure why you think lying here helps you, but that’s up to you.

Not lying - see above. I would say I'm looking forward to finally getting some evidence from you to support your claims, but I'm not seeing that as a realistic prospect given your posting history.

[SteveH]

Having a little temper tantrum? You accuse others of all the things that you are doing, your posts are hardly sweetness and light. If this forum upsets you so much, LEAVE, I doubt you will be missed.

I may occasionally, after much provocation, tell people to perform physically impossible feats, but I don't indulge in non-stop sarcasm.

[The Accountant, OBE, KC]

I see SteveH has one person in his fan club.

If we're comparing Steve H's posts to yours, you don't need to be a fan to state the obvious that his posts are usually more interesting, show some evidence of intellectual thought and are better expressed than yours.

Aren't we due for another one of your attention-seeking posts threatening to leave? They usually seem as regular as bank holidays

[Robbie]

Having a little temper tantrum? You accuse others of all the things that you are doing, your posts are hardly sweetness and light. If this forum upsets you so much, LEAVE, I doubt you will be missed.

I see SteveH has one person in his fan club.

Silly LR! Mr H isn't losing his temper but somewhat exasperated, at least he's not rude.

As for Gabriella being in his 'fan club', you know perfectly well it isn't like that, we're not children, but Steven speaks very well about faith matters, far better and clearer than many other believers on here and is just sneered at and sidelined.

Plenty of people would be sorry to see him leave, he actually makes intelligent contributions, without arrogance, and not just on Christian matters.

[SteveH]

Ironic. You flounce off repeatedly and come crawling back and when you're not doing that you regularly threaten to leave by way of attention-seeking, looking for people to beg you stay, and yet here you are telling someone else to leave and saying you doubt a poster will be missed. It would be great if you had self-awareness or thought before you post.

Given your history of posts calling people scum, which add nothing worthwhile to the forum, my take is that Steve H's posts will be missed a lot more than yours.

Thank you for the complement! I agree with the rest, as well.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Gabriella,

Nope - they taught them as beliefs. You were asked to show evidence of claims of objective evidence for God in the documentation and you couldn't provide it. As usual you were unable to back up your claim. But i see you are still continuing to refer to the documentation as though you did provide evidence to support your claim. How dishonest of you. If you want to go back to that thread and refer me to a page number and line that claims objective evidence for God, I am happy to take a look.

Not sure why you think lying helps you here, but the RC stuff very clearly did say that their faith beliefs should be taught as facts. Why pretend otherwise?   

You're confusing me asking you for clarification on your statement as me taking a view on anything.

It was your statement, not mine. If you want to resile from it though, that’s fine – just say so.

Not lying - see above. I would say I'm looking forward to finally getting some evidence from you to support your claims, but I'm not seeing that as a realistic prospect given your posting history.

The “evidence” is what people I refer to actually say. Why is this difficult for you?

[bluehillside Retd.]

Robbie,

Silly LR! Mr H isn't losing his temper but somewhat exasperated, at least he's not rude.

!

[SteveH]

Silly LR! Mr H isn't losing his temper but somewhat exasperated, at least he's not rude.

As for Gabriella being in his 'fan club', you know perfectly well it isn't like that, we're not children, but Steven speaks very well about faith matters, far better and clearer than many other believers on here and is just sneered at and sidelined.

Plenty of people would be sorry to see him leave, he actually makes intelligent contributions, without arrogance, and not just on Christian matters.

Gosh! [Blushes.]

[SteveH]

Robbie,

!

Well, as I said earlier, not usually, and then only under extreme provocation.

[floo]

I may occasionally, after much provocation, tell people to perform physically impossible feats, but I don't indulge in non-stop sarcasm.

Well I beg to differ, a lot of your posts drip sarcasm or downright rudeness. You were one of the reasons I did my stupid grand flounce last time, and why I will not be posting on that other forum again. You obviously get something out of posting on R&E, and you might do well to consider that before chucking the baby out with the bathwater.

I realise I am far from perfect myself, I sometimes loose it when I am really irritated, which is not to my credit. 

[Stranger]

But you and the others are arguing from a view point of physicalism and some extra unevidenced assumptions namely that it is the default position and that it is the virtuous position to take...and this in the face of physicalism being unevidenced itself.

Utter drivel. Who has assumed physicalism in any argument here?

[The Accountant, OBE, KC]

Gabriella,

That’s not what “disputed” means, but if AB is still here perhaps he’d be so good as to put you out of your misery and confirm that he has on numerous occasions said he has lots of evidence (and logic too by the way).

Nope. What you were asked is to provide evidence that he said he had lots of objective evidence.

Are you feeling unwell or something?

No. Are you?

Dear god. You haven’t understood a word of this have you. Testimony and personal experience are a type of anecdotal evidence, but not evidence for establishing objective facts about the world. That’s why they built the Large Hadron Collider rather than just asked people to testify about the Higgs-Boson. AB claims objective facts about the world (“God”) etc. QED

Clearly I have understood, which is why I asked you to show whether AB had claimed he has objective evidence for God. When you're ready feel free to refer me to the post where he claimed he had objective evidence, as opposed to testimony or personal experience.

You don’t understand the meaning of the word “forensic”. Here’s Merriam-Webster (the first online dictionary I found):

Definition of forensic

1: belonging to, used in, or suitable to courts of judicature or to public discussion and debate 
•   a lawyer's forensic skills

2: argumentative, rhetorical 
•   forensic eloquence

3: relating to or dealing with the application of scientific knowledge to legal problems 

See item 1. You talked about “...testimony under oath can be accepted as evidence (with a penalty for perjury if it is later proved that a person lied under oath)”. Where else would that happen except in a court of law?

Incorrect. I was using meaning 3 in the Merriem-Webster definition so I do understand a meaning of the word "forensic" and was using a different meaning to you. I was using the first meaning of the word "forensics" from the first on-line dictionary I came across - the Oxford English Dictionary :
forensic
fəˈrɛnsɪk/Submit
adjective
1.
relating to or denoting the application of scientific methods and techniques to the investigation of crime.
"forensic evidence"
2.
relating to courts of law.
noun
1.
scientific tests or techniques used in connection with the detection of crime.

https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/forensic

The meaning from the Cambridge dictionary - second on-line dictionary I came across:
related to scientific methods of solving crimes, involving examining the objects or substances that are involved in the crime:

Thanks for clarifying the meaning you are using.

[Stranger]

A category error is when "things belonging to a particular category are presented as if they belong to a different category" [my emphasis] or "a property is ascribed to a thing that could not possibly have that property".

Where is the category error in pointing out that neither god nor leprechauns have any supporting evidence for their existence?

Man up and admit your appeal to ridicule.

I take it from this that:

• You can't see the category error either.
  
  
• You still can't think of a sensible response to #27453.

[The Accountant, OBE, KC]

Gabriella,

Not sure why you think lying helps you here, but the RC stuff very clearly did say that their faith beliefs should be taught as facts. Why pretend otherwise?

If that's true then please point me to page number and line from the documentation to support your claim. By the way, as you're such a fan of definitions, didn't we establish on here that the word "lying" means deliberately telling an untruth. If I am mistaken, you should be able to provide evidence for that rather than just asserting it.

It was your statement, not mine. If you want to resile from it though, that’s fine – just say so.

Feel free to support your claim by quoting the statement that you are referring to. You do know we could save ourselves a lot of time if you just learned to be less vague in your posts.

The “evidence” is what people I refer to actually say. Why is this difficult for you?

See above -  we could save ourselves a lot of time if you were less vague in your posts and just quoted or linked to the evidence.

[Stranger]

I came to this forum a non-realist Christian, as I've said before, believing that religion is a human activity which does not refer to anything outside itself, and which we should be involved in, if we are, without imagining that it does: in short that there is, objectively speaking, no God. However, the immature, adolescent sneering of most of the atheists here, and their pseudo-intellectualism, and the sustained campaign of sarcasm directed at me from one such in particular, which got me suspended for three months, is pissing me off so much that I'm heading back into a realist (though minimalist) version of Christianity out of sheer bloody-mindedness. Well done, atheists!

Well that's as mature and rational basis for deciding that there's a god as any other I've heard...     

[Robbie]

Well I beg to differ, a lot of your posts drip sarcasm or downright rudeness. You were one of the reasons I did my stupid grand flounce last time, and why I will not be posting on that other forum again. You obviously get something out of posting on R&E, and you might do well to consider that before chucking the baby out with the bathwater.

I realise I am far from perfect myself, I sometimes loose it when I am really irritated, which is not to my credit. 

What a turn up for the books! When you 'left' a few weeks ago I felt terribly bad about it as it was me who introduced the subject of grassing on benefit fraudsters which started others off having a go at you for your lack of kindness on the subject. I was so pleased when you came back. I certainly didn't notice StevenH saying anything amiss to you & the only time I've seen him get angry with anyone is when he has been severely provoked. Perhaps if you read posts properly you'd understand.

Oh, what's the point? I give up on this.

[SteveH]

Perhaps it's time to drop the comments about posters and get back on-topic. I can be a pain in the arse and so can LR and many other members here. We can also have interesting, fruitful discussions.

[wigginhall]

In relation to objectivity, I thought that the Catholic Church argues that in transubstantiation, the bread and wine actually become the flesh and blood of Christ.   OK, they don't say 'objectively', but that is the same meaning.   In other words, it's not symbolic or a simile or a memorial or anything like that, which some Protestants say.    I guess that AB accepts this.  Of course, there is no evidence for this, but you do get some hoo-ha about substance and accident, derived from Aristotle, and therefore true!

Council of Trent (1551): "that wonderful and singular conversion of the whole substance of the bread into the Body, and of the whole substance of the wine into the Blood – the species only of the bread and wine remaining – which conversion indeed the Catholic Church most aptly calls Transubstantiation".

I assume the same is true of things like resurrection - for Catholics, these are not symbolic things, but actual historical events, recorded by eye-witnesses.  Hence, this is about objectivity, isn't it, or certainly, factuality.

[The Accountant, OBE, KC]

What a turn up for the books! When you 'left' a few weeks ago I felt terribly bad about it as it was me who introduced the subject of grassing on benefit fraudsters which started others off having a go at you for your lack of kindness on the subject. I was so pleased when you came back. I certainly didn't notice StevenH saying anything amiss to you & the only time I've seen him get angry with anyone is when he has been severely provoked. Perhaps if you read posts properly you'd understand.

Oh, what's the point? I give up on this.

At least you tried - and thanks for that 

I'm wondering what LR meant when she cautioned Steve H from "chucking the baby out with the bath water" in reference to Steve H saying he was heading back into a more realist version of Christianity out of sheer bloody-mindedness. Wonder what the "baby" is in this situation, and what the "bathwater" is. Not a big deal but it caught my eye.

[Aruntraveller]

Perhaps it's time to drop the comments about posters and get back on-topic. I can be a pain in the arse and so can LR and many other members here. We can also have interesting, fruitful discussions.

I think that is sound advice  Steve.

But as it is Easter ,let me take this opportunity to say I think you are all wonderful human beings at the same time as being right royal pains in the arse. A dichotomy to be sure, but isn't that just the thing that makes us wee puny creatures so interesting.

If we could manage to meander back towards the topic in hand that would be as welcome as a lovely large Thornton chocolate egg, decorated with my name, naturally 

[The Accountant, OBE, KC]

In relation to objectivity, I thought that the Catholic Church argues that in transubstantiation, the bread and wine actually become the flesh and blood of Christ.   OK, they don't say 'objectively', but that is the same meaning.   In other words, it's not symbolic or a simile or a memorial or anything like that, which some Protestants say.    I guess that AB accepts this.  Of course, there is no evidence for this, but you do get some hoo-ha about substance and accident, derived from Aristotle, and therefore true!

Council of Trent (1551): "that wonderful and singular conversion of the whole substance of the bread into the Body, and of the whole substance of the wine into the Blood – the species only of the bread and wine remaining – which conversion indeed the Catholic Church most aptly calls Transubstantiation".

I assume the same is true of things like resurrection - for Catholics, these are not symbolic things, but actual historical events, recorded by eye-witnesses.  Hence, this is about objectivity, isn't it, or certainly, factuality.

I don't know if this is a good source - it's the first one I came across but here's an excerpt from the explanation of transubstantiation, and I'm not reading it as anything more than belief and a faith statement/doctrine rather than a fact demonstrated by investigation and measurement.

https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/transubstantiation-for-beginners

Evidently Paul believed that the words Christ had said at the Last Supper, "This is my Body," meant that really and physically the bread is his body. In fact Christ was not merely saying that the bread was his body; he was decreeing that it should be so and that it is so.

Paul and Christians of the first generation understood the doctrine in this thoroughly realistic way. They knew how our Lord demanded faith, as ww read in John 6. Belief in the Eucharist presupposes faith. The body that is present in the Eucharist is that of Christ now reigning in heaven, the same body which Christ received from Adam, the same body which was made to die on the cross, but different in the sense that it has been transformed.

[floo]

What a turn up for the books! When you 'left' a few weeks ago I felt terribly bad about it as it was me who introduced the subject of grassing on benefit fraudsters which started others off having a go at you for your lack of kindness on the subject. I was so pleased when you came back. I certainly didn't notice StevenH saying anything amiss to you & the only time I've seen him get angry with anyone is when he has been severely provoked. Perhaps if you read posts properly you'd understand.

Oh, what's the point? I give up on this.

Good idea.