Searching for GOD...

[Alan Burns]

You really think the dishonest pretence that your questions haven't been answered (many, many, many times) and mindless repetition of baseless assertions and fallacies in the face of logic and reasoning is going to achieve that, do you?

But the answers you provide totally fail to explain the ultimate source of my freedom to compose this reply.  It is not just an "experience" of apparent freedom.  It is real, demonstrable freedom which you refuse to acknowledge by trying to label it as a logical impossibility.  And in your conscious attempt to do this you aptly demonstrate the reality of what you deem to be impossible.

[Stranger]

But the answers you provide totally fail to explain the ultimate source of my freedom to compose this reply.

Not only is this patently untrue, it doesn't explain why you keep on asking the same questions as if they were entirely new and had never been answered.

It is not just an "experience" of apparent freedom.  It is real, demonstrable freedom which you refuse to acknowledge by trying to label it as a logical impossibility.  And your in your conscious attempt to do this you aptly demonstrate the reality of what you deem to be impossible.

Once again: this is basically just a lie, for reasons that have been explained to you endlessly and you continue to totally ignore.

It is impossible to demonstrate freedom in the sense you keep on insisting, because it's impossible to do something for reasons and for no reason at the same time. Our experiences and abilities (and we do actually have the freedom to do as we want) are what every single notion of consciousness and free will attempts to explain, claiming them as evidence for yours alone, is blatantly dishonest.

You said before you wanted to "witness to the truth", so why the pretence and dishonesty?

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

But the answers you provide totally fail to explain the ultimate source of my freedom to compose this reply.

This'll be lost on you, but that "But" is a non sequitur. We have no means of knowing whether we could ever know the "ultimate" source of anything. Just inserting "god" into that gap explains nothing at all, and only raises more questions still.   

It is not just an "experience" of apparent freedom.

Yes it is if, by "freedom", you mean your logically impossible concept of the term.

It is real, demonstrable freedom which you refuse to acknowledge by trying to label it as a logical impossibility.

If you think it's demonstrable then demonstrate it rather than just assert it, and it's logically impossible necessarily because it's internally contradictory. Just invoking "it's magic" and calling it "spiritual" doesn't get you off that hook, however much you may wish it otherwise.

And in your conscious attempt to do this you aptly demonstrate the reality of what you deem to be impossible.

Why do you repeat endlessly this same stupidity even though you've been corrected on it scores of times?

[Enki]

People dont believe in God for various reasons....what are yours?

I've never had any reason to believe in him/her/it. If you feel I should then give me one at least.

Yes there are many points which spring from an overall theism.

We either make a decision to ignore these a priori having dismissed God or we do visit them.

For instance Judaism states that we have gone wrong but with a bit of effort and observence we can make it up.

Christianity states that we need salvation.

How do we feel about each of these alternatives.Which is more challenging and which more comforting?.......and how are they so?

As far as visiting Christianity and Judaism is concerned , I was a member of a Methodist Youth Club(in my youth, does that count?), have attended two Alpha Courses(does that count?) and had several Jewish friends which enabled me to visit the local schul from time to time and a reformed synagogue quite recently(do they count?) I have had plenty of interesting discussions with Catholics/Spiritualists/Methodists/JWs/Anglicans/Orthodox Jews/Reformed Jews over the years because I am interested in a wide variety of people's views, being naturally a curious person. As regards your question, I don't even think of Judaism and Christianity in terms of challenging and comforting so I have no preferences whatever.

[Gordon]

Lets shift this out of your usual paint roller and tippex approach to things Gordon and get particular.
Christianity states that we  need salvationn.
How do YOU feel about that?

What I feel about that is very simple: it is incoherent nonsense as it stands.

For example: why do I need it in the first place, what precisely is 'salvation', and why should I think Christianity is correct on the 'salvation' front and can provide it? Remember too, I've yet to encounter an argument for this 'God' of yours that I can take seriously.

[Alan Burns]

Really, I've lost count of the number of times people have taken time out to explain this and here you are coming back as if it was the first time you'd come across it.  All life operates on principals of deep logic, it observes cause and effect, life at the cellular level could not happen without the principal of adequate determinism and everything that happens in minds of higher creatures like us is built on these underlying foundations.  Your incredulity is no more an argument than that of early peoples on hearing that the Earth was spherical and not flat.  It might not be intuitive on first hearing, but it does make sense. Things happen for a reason, this should not be controversial, actions have consequences, this should not be surprising, we, like all life forms, are products of the environment that gave birth to us and nurtured us, do you really think you can 'control' what parents you had or what sort of upbringing you had ? Of course we cannot, and similarly we cannot 'control' where we find Paris on a map or like something we don't like or find something tragic to be hilarious.   Where are 'we' in all that ? We are in the middle of all those information flows, formed by them and contributing accordingly.  Like a hurricane crossing the Atlantic, we are phenomena of sufficient overall stability and duration to merit a name, but nonetheless subject to constant change as air flows interact.  We aren't magic beings, products of some capricious god playing dice, really we aren't, we are living breathing products of Nature and all our doings are consistent with that.

I must admit, Torri, it is a mystery to me how you can possibly come up with all these carefully chosen words and believe they are all just predetermined from nothing but the physically controlled electro chemical activity from material elements.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

I've never had any reason to believe in him/her/it. If you feel I should then give me one at least.

That rather suggests that you rejected all arguments for God  or you have reached some point in the argument where you rejected God without feeling you needed to listen to further argument.

This does interest me because this rejection is on the grounds of materialism or naturalism or scientism usually and any attempt to pin the causes of personal atheism down ends up in an expression of  agnosticism.

The thing is though that naturalism, empiricism and science arent interested in the areas that religion is and assigns precious little interest to anyhing like a self or guilt or ecstacy, value etc.

Eliminating all those things must be a real crutch and comfort for you.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

I must admit, Torri, it is a mystery to me how you can possibly come up with all these carefully chosen words and believe they are all just predetermined from nothing but the physically controlled electro chemical activity from material elements.

It can only be "a mystery" if you are unable or unwilling to engage with the argument you've been given countless times that explains it to you.

[Sebastian Toe]

That rather suggests that you rejected all arguments for God

All of them?
Sounds like you know what they are.
Care to publish the list?

[Alan Burns]

Not only is this patently untrue, it doesn't explain why you keep on asking the same questions as if they were entirely new and had never been answered.

Once again: this is basically just a lie, for reasons that have been explained to you endlessly and you continue to totally ignore.

It is impossible to demonstrate freedom in the sense you keep on insisting, because it's impossible to do something for reasons and for no reason at the same time. Our experiences and abilities (and we do actually have the freedom to do as we want) are what every single notion of consciousness and free will attempts to explain, claiming them as evidence for yours alone, is blatantly dishonest.

You said before you wanted to "witness to the truth", so why the pretence and dishonesty?

Once more I am personally being accused of lies, pretence and dishonesty.

Why can't you see the obvious conflict that such deliberations can't be invoked within the endless physically predetermined chains of cause and effect in an entirely material brain?

[Stranger]

I must admit, Torri, it is a mystery to me how you can possibly come up with all these carefully chosen words and believe they are all just predetermined from nothing but the physically controlled electro chemical activity from material elements.

It's a mystery to me why you continue to cling desperately to an obviously self-contradictory idea of freedom.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

Once more I am personally being accused of lies, pretence and dishonesty.

Yes. The only more charitable explanation is that any critical faculties you may once have had have been so compromised by your faith beliefs that you simply cannot process the arguments that unhorse you. 

Why can't you see the obvious conflict that such deliberations can't be invoked within the endless physically predetermined chains of cause and effect in an entirely material brain?

Why can't you see that, unlike your unqualified assertion here, there's a reason-based argument that tells you why this is utter nonsense?

[Sebastian Toe]

Why can't you see the obvious conflict that such deliberations can't be invoked within the endless physically predetermined chains of cause and effect in an entirely material brain?

Why can't you see that our biological brains are all that we need and there is no need to recourse to magic souls or devils?

[Stranger]

Once more I am personally being accused of lies, pretence and dishonesty.

Why can't you see the obvious conflict that such deliberations can't be invoked within the endless physically predetermined chains of cause and effect in an entirely material brain?

Because there isn't such a conflict.

And once again, the physical world has nothing at all to do with the logic that makes your ideas self-contradictory.

[Alan Burns]

AB,

It can only be "a mystery" if you are unable or unwilling to engage with the argument you've been given countless times that explains it to you.

But the countless times these carefully chosen words of explanation have been used still offer no more than the inevitable conclusion that the concept of freedom must be an illusion in an entirely material brain.  Yet the freedom you display in continuing to choose these words defies the logic you continue to espouse.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

What I feel about that is very simple: it is incoherent nonsense as it stands.

Since you once quite bluntly told me you only posted to point out fallacy not offer explanation I will move swiftly on to say
I find the same with naturalism which asks us to both accept a universe which either is eternal or popped out of nothing and yet forbids us to assign those two qualities to well nigh everything.

I find nothing so monumentally incoherent in theism.

[Stranger]

That rather suggests that you rejected all arguments for God  or you have reached some point in the argument where you rejected God without feeling you needed to listen to further argument.

All the arguments for god(s) I have encountered have been hopelessly and obviously bad arguments.

This does interest me because this rejection is on the grounds of materialism or naturalism or scientism...

None of these -isms are required to spot hopelessly bad arguments.

[Stranger]

I find the same with naturalism which asks us to both accept a universe which either is eternal or popped out of nothing and yet forbids us to assign those two qualities to well nigh everything.

Drivel.

[Alan Burns]

Why can't you see that our biological brains are all that we need and there is no need to recourse to magic souls or devils?

But an entirely material brain does not do the conscious "seeing" that you are advocating, because material elements can only produce reactions to previous events.  The "seeing" involves a consciously driven thought process - not just inevitable reactions.

[Stranger]

But an entirely material brain does not do the conscious "seeing" that you are advocating...

Baseless assertion.

...because material elements can only produce reactions to previous events.

Non sequitur.

The "seeing" involves a consciously driven thought process - not just inevitable reactions.

False dichotomy.

And round and round and round we go.     

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

But the countless times these carefully chosen words of explanation have been used still offer no more than the inevitable conclusion that the concept of freedom must be an illusion in an entirely material brain.  Yet the freedom you display in continuing to choose these words defies the logic you continue to espouse.

I hope someone brings you a nice cup of tea and maybe some biscuits too to you in that cardboard box of unreason you've made for yourself.

I could of course explain to you yet again why this is flat wrong, but as you'll only repeat the same flat wrongness in response I really can't see much point. If ever you feel like putting on your "I feel like being honest for a change today" hat though, just let me know.

[Alan Burns]

Why can't you see that, unlike your unqualified assertion here, there's a reason-based argument that tells you why this is utter nonsense?

Because sources of deliberation do not exist in the physically predetermined scenario where there can be nothing but inevitable reactions.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Stranger,

Drivel.

Do you know, to this day I've never quite worked out whether Vlad posts deep stupidities because he's, well, deeply stupid, or whether there's some intelligence there after all and he's just on a permanent wind up for reasons known only to himself.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

All the arguments for god(s) I have encountered have been hopelessly and obviously bad arguments.

None of these -isms are required to spot hopelessly bad arguments.

Their "badness" as you put it always boils down though to naturalism, physicalism and empiricism" circular arguments all. TO which we can add the caricature of those arguments within the dilletante philosophy of modern atheists who after trying and failing with philosophy childishly dismiss it as crap and not science.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

Because sources of deliberation do not exist in the physically predetermined scenario where there can be nothing but inevitable reactions.

Why can't you see that, unlike your unqualified assertion here, there's a reason-based argument that tells you why this is utter nonsense?