About the Charismatic gifts and their exercise.

[Nearly Sane]

So if there is evidence, why is it so well hidden? Of course I am omniscient, how dare anyone suggest otherwise.

 


I don't think we have a valid definition of god and we have no method to cover evidence for the supernatural, so the statement evidence for god, is as coherent as 'joputre for hudsyby'

[Roses]

 


I don't think we have a valid definition of god and we have no method to cover evidence for the supernatural, so the statement evidence for god, is as coherent as 'joputre for hudsyby'

Now you are trying to confuse my single brain cell.

[SteveH]

Now you are trying to confuse my single brain cell.

It's simple enough: before you look for evidence for God, you have to have a clear definition of the God you're looking for evidence for. This is a problem in other areas. The God many atheists don't believe in is also a God most intelligent, educated Christians don't believe in: the atheists are often attacking a straw man - or rather, a straw God.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

So if there is evidence, why is it so well hidden? Of course I am omniscient, how dare anyone suggest otherwise.

Omniscient? Is that Latin for laughing at your own jokes?
 

[Roses]

It's simple enough: before you look for evidence for God, you have to have a clear definition of the God you're looking for evidence for. This is a problem in other areas. The God many atheists don't believe in is also a God most intelligent, educated Christians don't believe in: the atheists are often attacking a straw man - or rather, a straw God.

I have never come across any evidence to support the existence of the Biblical god, the one with which I am most familiar.

[Nearly Sane]

It's simple enough: before you look for evidence for God, you have to have a clear definition of the God you're looking for evidence for. This is a problem in other areas. The God many atheists don't believe in is also a God most intelligent, educated Christians don't believe in: the atheists are often attacking a straw man - or rather, a straw God.

And evidence is defined by the methodology. As we don't have a supernaturalistic methodology, we don't have a definition of what we mean by evidence.

I think you can really only deal with each individual's definition of god though, and the idea that there is a description believed consistently by ' most intelligent, educated Christians' seems incorrect to me.

[SteveH]

I have never come across any evidence to support the existence of the Biblical god, the one with which I am most familiar.

You mean, judging by your many posts on the subject, the Old Testasment God, who is rasther different from the New Testament one, but even the OT God is a muich more complex figure than your "evil psycho" caricature. You really ought to open your mind a bit, and do some readin of books by liberal Christians. 'Honest to God' by JAT Robinson, very dated though it is in some ways now, having been published in the early 60s, would be one place to start. For a more conservative view, but still an intelligent, educated one, try CS Lewis's 'Mere Christianity', the literary style of which can be excruciatingly patronising in places, but is nevertheless worth reading (Lewis was no good at writing in a popular style, for people less well-educated than himself), or any of his other books of apologetics.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Steve H,

It's simple enough: before you look for evidence for God, you have to have a clear definition of the God you're looking for evidence for. This is a problem in other areas. The God many atheists don't believe in is also a God most intelligent, educated Christians don't believe in: the atheists are often attacking a straw man - or rather, a straw God.

Is that right though? There isn’t a “God many atheists don’t believe in” so far as I’m aware, but rather atheism is just finding the arguments theists attempt to validate their various belief(s) in various gods to be flawed.

I take the point that before you can get to atheism there’s ignosticism – ie, “I have no idea what you mean by “god” (and nor have you), so the white noise you’re proposing isn’t truth apt”, but for the most part there’s a sort of unspoken “OK, let’s treat the assertions you make about your god as a given – what then is the quality of the arguments you make for it?”. On that basis, atheism seems to me to be the inevitable outcome, at least until someone produces an argument for whatever he means by "god" that isn’t hopeless.     

[Roses]

You mean, judging by your many posts on the subject, the Old Testasment God, who is rasther different from the New Testament one, but even the OT God is a muich more complex figure than your "evil psycho" caricature. You really ought to open your mind a bit, and do some readin of books by liberal Christians. 'Honest to God' by JAT Robinson, very dated though it is in some ways now, having been published in the early 60s, would be one place to start. For a more conservative view, but still an intelligent, educated one, try CS Lewis's 'Mere Christianity', the literary style of which can be excruciatingly patronising in places, but is nevertheless worth reading (Lewis was no good at writing in a popular style, for people less well-educated than himself), or any of his other books of apologetics.

The NT version of god isn't any better, imo.  As I have said boringly often no one has provided evidence for god which is verifiable.

[Dicky Underpants]

The NT version of god isn't any better, imo.  As I have said boringly often no one has provided evidence for god which is verifiable.

All these various scriptures are simply "words about God", written by different people - and as Steve suggests, they differ considerably (I would contend that that they differ enormously). The Old Testament god is represented in far more contrasting ways than you continually state. I would distance myself from Steve in suggesting that the New Testament ideas of God are many and various too, and some don't point to a very nice god, as you say. Blanket condemnation of what are simply words on paper by different people is simply avoiding the responsibility of thinking. Cherry-picking is inevitable, unless you take the fundamentalist view - everything about God in the Bible is good.
Conversely, there is your form of resistance to cherry-picking, which is to say that everything said about God mediated by his prophets etc is bad. You seem strangely reluctant to relax this viewpoint. Since the Bible, both OT and NT, calls on humans to be merciful and forgiving, it doesn't reflect well on you if you think these ideas are all part of the portrait of "The Evil God of the Bible". It does not matter that God in some parts of the Bible is portrayed as a sadistic monster - other parts enjoin us to show forgiveness, and indeed portray 'him' as being forgiving. Such qualities are good in themselves, no matter how they are presented by other material in the huge library of the Bible. It is not a matter of believing in supernatural entities - that is not the point at all, as far as I'm concerned.

[Roses]

Everyone is entitled to their view of the Biblical god.

[Dicky Underpants]

Everyone is entitled to their view of the Biblical god.

I don't recognise ONE Biblical god! Just different views by different prophets.

[Robbie]

Yes. V much like your post 109 Dicky. I will read it again and again.

[Roses]

I don't recognise ONE Biblical god! Just different views by different prophets.

Whatever.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Fllo,

Whatever.

Why so rude?

[jeremyp]

So when she claimed that there is no evidence as a fact, then she was wrong.

Is she?

Demonstrate it.

[jeremyp]

It's simple enough: before you look for evidence for God, you have to have a clear definition of the God you're looking for evidence for.

OK. Define God then.

This is a problem in other areas. The God many atheists don't believe in is also a God most intelligent, educated Christians don't believe in: the atheists are often attacking a straw man - or rather, a straw God.

Agreed. Whatever god that is, I don't believe in it. I also don't believe in the Christian god. Or in fact, in any god. You name a god, I don't believe in it.

Also, leprechauns.

[jeremyp]

You mean, judging by your many posts on the subject, the Old Testasment God,

Now you are constructing a straw man. LR never said it was specifically the OT god (or Christian god mark I) that there is no evidence for.

who is rasther different from the New Testament one, but even the OT God is a muich more complex figure than your "evil psycho" caricature. You really ought to open your mind a bit, and do some readin of books by liberal Christians. 'Honest to God' by JAT Robinson, very dated though it is in some ways now, having been published in the early 60s, would be one place to start. For a more conservative view, but still an intelligent, educated one, try CS Lewis's 'Mere Christianity', the literary style of which can be excruciatingly patronising in places, but is nevertheless worth reading (Lewis was no good at writing in a popular style, for people less well-educated than himself), or any of his other books of apologetics.

You know you could end the whole argument simply by telling us what the evidence is that LR claims does not exist. The only reason I can think of for why you are adopting your current tactics is that the evidence LR claims does not exist, in fact does not exist.

[Nearly Sane]

Is she?

Demonstrate it.

It's simply the logical conclusion if you think Floo isn't omniscient. And since you don't , you would simply be illogical to conclude that she cpuld know there is no evidence for something.

[jeremyp]

It's simply the logical conclusion if you think Floo isn't omniscient. And since you don't , you would simply be illogical to conclude that she cpuld know there is no evidence for something.

No. You have made an assertion that LR is wrong in her claim that there is no evidence for god(s). Demonstrate the truth of your assertion.

[Nearly Sane]

No. You have made an assertion that LR is wrong in her claim that there is no evidence for god(s). Demonstrate the truth of your assertion.

No, I took your statement that she wasn't omniscient to its logical conclusion that if you believe that you, jeremyp, would have to argue that she couldn't claim it to be a fact that there was no evidence. The post didn't imply that she was wrong about there being no evidence, but that she was wrong to claim it as a fact.

[jeremyp]

No, I took your statement that she wasn't omniscient to its logical conclusion that if you believe that you, jeremyp, would have to argue that she couldn't claim it to be a fact that there was no evidence. The post didn't imply that she was wrong about there being no evidence, but that she was wrong to claim it as a fact.

If you had claimed she was unjustified, you might have the merest smidgeon of a point, but you didn’ty. You claimed she was wrong.

[bluehillside Retd.]

jeremy,

No. You have made an assertion that LR is wrong in her claim that there is no evidence for god(s). Demonstrate the truth of your assertion.

NS has beaten me to it, but it's the status of the claim that's the problem, not the claim itself. Call it an opinion and no-one could object; call it a fact and it's overreaching into the unknowable.   

[bluehillside Retd.]

Jeremy,

You claimed she was wrong.

For asserting something she could not know to be a fact to be a fact, yes.

[jeremyp]

jeremy,

NS has beaten me to it, but it's the status of the claim that's the problem, not the claim itself. Call it an opinion and no-one could object; call it a fact and it's overreaching into the unknowable.

Nope.

LR claimed that there is no verifiable evidence for God. To falsify her claim, all anybody needs to do is present some verifiable evidence of a god - any god.

Nobody has done that. In fact, nobody has done that in spite of trying to find said evidence for hundreds of years. How long do we have to go on before you accept that there is no verifiable evidence for God? How long is it going to be before you accept leprechauns aren’t real?