Sword,
I was merely suggesting an alternative approach. If a statement xyz is true, then one can either try and demonstrate it directly (what I assume all the Christians who have been posting here have tried to do), or show that the converse is false.
Provided that is the statement is a coherent one. The conjecture “God” is
incoherent, so
ignosticism is a legitimate response.
Anyways…
Since it appears that not a single post by any other Christian who has been posting here since this forum's inception has had any real breakthrough, I'm taking a different approach.
Well, that could be because the proposition isn’t true at all of course but I’m all for a different approach. Go for it!
The problem as I see it is in the approach being taken: If one takes a scientific approach then the worldview used assumes natural causes and explanations.
But that’s a problem for the theist rather than for the sceptical enquirer. If the former doesn’t want to take a naturalistic approach, then it’s for him to propose another method to distinguish his claims from just guessing about stuff. Many here have been asked for it, but none has been forthcoming
How can such a worldview then be used to examine evidence of a non-natural cause? So I'm not attempting to reverse the burden of proof,…
Actually that’s exactly what you were doing, but let’s start fresh nonetheless…
I'm asking that your worldview be subject to the same criteria that you are expecting from those of religious belief. If your worldview could be proven, there would be no need for any religious belief; end of debate. Since your worldview is not proven, it should at least be falsifiable, and faith is required to hold to it.
What do you mean here by “worldview”, and in what way is it not “proven”? I would say for example that the naturalistic worldview could be shown to be more reliably true than the non-naturalistic one when the former posits leaving a tall building by a lift and the latter by jumping out of the window. Just try each one (I’d suggest the lift option first) and then compare notes.
The worldview used is based on a naturalistic philosophy. So when anything is presented that contradicts it, it must be disproved. That's the problem, and that is why I've suggested an alternative approach. The reality is that both sides are doing the same thing; presenting their case using their worldviews and seeking to disprove anything that contradicts it. That is why no progress is being made, and indeed cannot be made.
No, that’s not the problem at all. The naturalistic “worldview” is investigable and testable by reference to the world as it appears to be (see above). Your problem here is that I can line up before breakfast ten people, each with different “worldviews”: one believes in the Christian god; the next believes in the Roman gods; the next believes in leprechauns; then next believes the royal family to be shape-shifting lizards; the next etc. None of them believe in the worldviews of any of the others, yet all insist their claims to be true for me too on the basis of their personal faith.
How then would you propose that I distinguish the claims of any one of them from any other?
And that’s the real problem. You're asking us just to adopt the un-evidenced and un-argued worldview of the proponent of a non-natural something, and moreover to pick one from the bewildering variety of options available with no means of any kind to distingsuish between them.
