Searching for GOD...

[Alan Burns]

So, in addition to all the other nonsense (see #38277), you've now added a religious myth from an old book. If this is an attempt by a god to communicate with its creations, said god has very serious communication problems.

Still, I guess you thought a bit of pointless preaching was easier than actually addressing the gaping holes that have been pointed out in your so called argument...

Just a simple question -
If the death and resurrection of Jesus was shown to be a real historical event, would you still adhere to your current beliefs?

[Gordon]

Just a simple question -
If the death and resurrection of Jesus was shown to be a real historical event, would you still adhere to your current beliefs?

We'll show it was, Alan.

The burden of proof is yours, but remember 'show' requires more than just personal conviction and faith that the story is historically correct.

[Stranger]

Just a simple question -
If the death and resurrection of Jesus was shown to be a real historical event, would you still adhere to your current beliefs?

Which ones? It certainly wouldn't make your assertions about how human "free will" works any less self-contradictory.

[Nearly Sane]

Just a simple question -
If the death and resurrection of Jesus was shown to be a real historical event, would you still adhere to your current beliefs?

What beliefs?

[Outrider]

I fail to see how such a realisation could possibly materialise without the conscious interaction needed to direct your thoughts to such an abstract concept.

Conscious interaction with what?  You keep implicitly defining consciousness as separate from something and needing to interact with that something, but it's not clear what - I don't want to misrepresent what you're saying or set up any straw-men arguments, so could you clarify that?

No doubt this will be labelled as personal incredulity, but without the ability to exert conscious control of my thoughts before I am aware of them, I cannot be held personally accountable.

I get that implication, that's one of the long-standing inclinations towards nihilism that's presumed if you accept the premise that thought processes are entirely deterministic.  That there might be a negative consequence of the realisation, though, in no way undermines the logical sequence by which you arrive at the initial conclusion - that it brings into question the concept of personal responsibility doesn't make the idea that our consciousness is an aftereffect wrong in any way.

O.

[Sebastian Toe]

Just a simple question -
If the death and resurrection of Jesus was shown to be a real historical event, would you still adhere to your current beliefs?

Just a simple question
If it was shown that the absolute truth was that the one and only way to God was through the Muslim faith, would you still adhere to your current beliefs?

[Outrider]

Just a simple question -
If the death and resurrection of Jesus was shown to be a real historical event, would you still adhere to your current beliefs?

It rather depends on the circumstances - there are innumerable instances of people suffering significant trauma and being functionally inert for short periods before being revived by medical professionals, so if it's akin to that then obviously nothing changes.

If we're talking somehow conclusively shown to be dead (and not misdiagnosed, which was not unheard of even much later) and that state lasted for more than two days (which is well in excess of what could reasonably be considered reversible) then I'd concede that something outside of our understanding of science had occurred.

That, in and of itself, is still well short of justifying even the particular claim that whichever depiction of God Jesus claimed to speak for/about was the right one, let alone justify any particular stance on the alleged philosophy espoused by (at best) third hand witnesses decades or centuries later whose words have been selectively edited and modified.

O.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

What is chilling is your capacity to deny you own freedom to think, yet display compelling evidence of such freedom by composing such detailed defence of your denial, together with outright rebukes of any evidence I put forward to illustrate the reality of the freedom we all enjoy

As you seem to be utterly unable or unwilling to grasp what a logical argument entails, could you at least try to grasp some basic principles here:

1. The experience of the “freedom to think” does not contradict the basic principle of thinking being a deterministic phenomenon.

2. How things feel when you experience them is very often a bad explanation for how that experience is happening.

3. No matter how much you’d like things to be, that tells you nothing whatsoever about how things really are. You want  a magic man at the controls because that suits your religious beliefs, but wants tell you nothing at all about reality. As Richard Feynman told us, "For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled."

4. You have never, ever put forward any evidence at all to illustrate your faith beliefs. You have attempted some very bad arguments about how much beliefs can mean to people and suchlike, but so far at least there’s been no evidence for the objects of your beliefs. If you seriously think you have some evidence though then – finally – tell us what it is without collapsing immediately into fallacy, gibberish or irrelevance.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

Just a simple question -
If the death and resurrection of Jesus was shown to be a real historical event, would you still adhere to your current beliefs?

Inasmuch as my “current beliefs” are that reason and evidence are better guides to reality than wishful thinking, if by some currently unknown means the “death and resurrection of Jesus” could be shown to be other than wishful thinking then yes, I would change my mind about that.

Did you see what happened there? You asked a question, and I answered it. Perhaps you should consider extending to me the same courtesy?

[Alan Burns]

AB,
 

Inasmuch as my “current beliefs” are that reason and evidence are better guides to reality than wishful thinking, if by some currently unknown means the “death and resurrection of Jesus” could be shown to be other than wishful thinking then yes, I would change my mind about that.

Did you see what happened there? You asked a question, and I answered it. Perhaps you should consider extending to me the same courtesy?

Thank you for being the only poster so far to give a straight answer to this.

My recollection from replies to my posts are that they comprise many accusations, but rarely direct questions.  If I have failed to answer questions in the past, I apologise and hope that I may get another chance to provide an answer.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

Thank you for being the only poster so far to give a straight answer to this.

My recollection from replies to my posts are that they comprise many accusations, but rarely direct questions.  If I have failed to answer questions in the past, I apologise and hope that I may get another chance to provide an answer.

Thank you. Right then: do you have an argument to justify your faith beliefs ("god", "souls", "Satan" etc) that isn't logically false, incoherent or irrelevant and, if so, what is it?

[Nearly Sane]

Thank you for being the only poster so far to give a straight answer to this.

My recollection from replies to my posts are that they comprise many accusations, but rarely direct questions.  If I have failed to answer questions in the past, I apologise and hope that I may get another chance to provide an answer.

I asked for a clarification. That's not 'not giving a straight answer'. Please apologise for your misrepresenting me.

[ProfessorDavey]

Just a simple question -
If the death and resurrection of Jesus was shown to be a real historical event, would you still adhere to your current beliefs?

My response is similar to others.

First I don't have 'beliefs' in this regards, I have lack of belief - that is different.

But I also consider evidence to be critical in determining what I believe and do not believe in, hence my lack of belief in resurrection of Jesus.

However in a hypothetical scenario where there was clear objective and unbiased evidence that Jesus was genuinely dead (not as Outrider points out misdiagnosed etc), and for sufficient time for current understanding of physiology to consider that length of death to be irreversible. And were it then for there to be clear objective and unbiased evidence that Jesus came alive again following that period of death currently considered to be irreversible, then yes I would of course change my view as I base my views on evidence.

But, and this is a big but, were that to be demonstrated by evidence I would not make the unevidenced jump of 'and therefore god' - rather I would presume that our current theories on physiology were not valid in all circumstances and to look to try to understand how this had happened though science and evidence once again.

Hope that answers your question.

Any chance you might answer Sebastian Toe's question relating to Islam.

[Alan Burns]

I asked for a clarification. That's not 'not giving a straight answer'. Please apologise for your misrepresenting me.

You asked "what beliefs".

Sorry, but I failed to comprehend why you would ask this when I thought it obvious that I was referring to Christian faith.  The resurrection being the foundation on which Christianity is based.

[Nearly Sane]

You asked "what beliefs".

Sorry, but I failed to comprehend why you would ask this when I thought it obvious that I was referring to Christian faith.  The resurrection being the foundation on which Christianity is based.

But you asked whether my beliefs would change. Are you asking 'Would I become a Christian?'

ETA: if you are then Prof Davey's post covers my answer.

[Alan Burns]

Any chance you might answer Sebastian Toe's question relating to Islam.

He did not attempt to answer my question, so I did not feel obliged to answer the question he made in his reply.

But since you ask, nothing in heaven or earth could separate me from the God I know and love.

[ProfessorDavey]

But since you ask, nothing in heaven or earth could separate me from the God I know and love.

So does that mean you expect others to hold to standards (i.e. being swayed by unequivocal evidence) that you aren't prepared to hold yourself to. That sounds a tad hypocritical don't you think.

[Sebastian Toe]

But since you ask, nothing in heaven or earth could separate me from the God I know and love.

Not even the truth, the real actual truth, if it was different to what you believe to be the truth?

[Sebastian Toe]

He did not attempt to answer my question, so I did not feel obliged to answer the question he made in his reply.

That, as they say, is a keeper!

[torridon]

Just a simple question -
If the death and resurrection of Jesus was shown to be a real historical event, would you still adhere to your current beliefs?

Just a simple question -
If the death and resurrection of Jesus was shown to be beyond doubt a literary fiction, would you still adhere to your current beliefs?

[Alan Burns]

Just a simple question -
If the death and resurrection of Jesus was shown to be beyond doubt a literary fiction, would you still adhere to your current beliefs?

My faith no longer depends on the resurrection, or any other past events.
Having discovered God in the here and now, I have no need for past or future confirmation.
Such a view may seem somewhat strange to those who have not yet discovered God, but it is the reality I perceive and live in.  God is a reality I can never lose.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

My faith no longer depends on the resurrection, or any other past events.

That makes you a pretty unusual Christian I’d have thought, but either way presumably that means to your answer to torri is that even if the resurrection story was shown to be fiction that wouldn’t change your mind about your faith?

Having discovered God in the here and now, I have no need for past or future confirmation.

You’re overreaching here – what you have “discovered” is a belief in (a) god. Not only have you no cogent arguments to demonstrate to anyone else that there really is a god rather than just your belief about that, but worse still (from your point of view) is that you seem to have no means to justify that belief to yourself either.

Such a view may seem somewhat strange to those who have not yet discovered God,….

See above. You’ve provided no good reason to indicate that anyone has “discovered god” rather than just a belief about that.

…but it is the reality I perceive and live in.

No-one doubts that it’s your reality, but that’s all it is.

God is a reality I can never lose.

Glad to see you put that “a” before “reality” rather than “the”. A dawning sense of your problem with claiming “the” truth perhaps?

[Stranger]

My faith no longer depends on the resurrection, or any other past events.
Having discovered God in the here and now, I have no need for past or future confirmation.
Such a view may seem somewhat strange to those who have not yet discovered God, but it is the reality I perceive and live in.  God is a reality I can never lose.

When somebody expresses absolute certainty about something, that is always a warning sign of self-deception. When they can produce not even the slightest hint of any objective evidence or logical reasoning to support it, self-deception is all but certain.

You are a sad example of how faith cripples the rational mind...

[Alan Burns]

Glad to see you put that “a” before “reality” rather than “the”. A dawning sense of your problem with claiming “the” truth perhaps?

There is only one reality, one truth, one God, one lifetime to discover the truth.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

There is only one reality, one truth, one God, one lifetime to discover the truth.

Yes we've heard you assert that unqualified faith claim many times now. The question you were asked though is whether you have any argument at all that isn't fallacious, incoherent or irrelevant to justify it. That you've provided none so far doesn't mean necessarily that you don't have one in the locker that you've been keeping a secret, but it does mean that you have to produce it if you expect anyone else to privilege your claims over just guessing about stuff.