Justify the belief that gods do not exist.

[wiploc]

Some people believe that gods do not exist. (One can call this position "atheism" or "strong atheism" or "anti-theist perversion," anything you want. But we aren't going to argue terminology in this thread. Clarity is good, so you can explain what you personally mean by "atheist," but you shouldn't suggest that other usages are inferior.)

This thread is to make a list of arguments, of reasons to believe that theism is false.

And we can discuss the soundness of those arguments.

I'll start:

1. The Parable of the Pawnbroker.
(I'll just post titles here, so as not to take too much space at the top of each thread.)

2. Presumptive Falsity of Outrageous Claims.



Feel free to add to this list.

[Divine Insight]

So let me get this right, I said that hypothetically, if someone provided good reasons to believe that a creator is the best explanation for the universe, then X would follow.

And what was your X?

Your X was that if they claimed to have the Best Reasons then they must have the Best Reasons, and to ask what those reasons are is irrelevant.

To begin with I flatly reject that to ask what those reasons are is irrelevant. It's not only relevant, its paramount to their claim.

Secondly we could apply your nonsense to anything:

if someone provided good reasons to believe that no creator is required is the best explanation for the universe, then X would follow.

And your same X would need to follow here as well.

Again, they would be immune to having to give reasons for why they are making this claim.

So according to you then, no one ever needs to give any reasoning to back up their claims all they need to do is claim to have the good reasons (which they refuse to reveal) and thus they can lay claim to having the "Best Explanation".

IMHO, that's absurd.

It also wouldn't get anyone anywhere since it can be used to claim that the precise opposite position is also the "Best Explanation".

Just replace "Creator" with "No Creator" in your hypothetical and everything you're arguing for remains the same.

That's not much of an argument.

[Divine Insight]

Yes, because you "challenged" it by asking "who created God?". The answer to that question has no bearing on the above creationist reasoning.

What Reasoning?

That is what you are refusing to address.

Creationist typically give as their reasoning for this position that the universe appears to be intelligently designed, and therefore it must have had an intelligent designer.

Fine. I then ask, "Who then created this intelligent designer?"

And that is a perfectly valid question with respect to the creationists reasoning.

Yet you claim that my question is irrelevant. But for it to be an irrelevant question the creationists would need to offer some other reasoning for their claims.

But that is what you totally refuse to address.

[instantc]

Yes, because you "challenged" it by asking "who created God?". The answer to that question has no bearing on the above creationist reasoning.

What Reasoning?

That is what you are refusing to address.

THE ONE THAT YOU PRESENTED AS AN EXAMPLE IN YOUR VERY PREVIOUS POST , or any other reasoning they attempt to employ for that matter. To put it in even simplier terms, the question "who created God" has no bearing on the question "did God create the universe", Caphiche?

[Zzyzx]

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[Divine Insight]

To put it in even simplier terms, the question "who created God" has no bearing on the question "did God create the universe", Caphiche?

It does when it is being proposed that the universe had to have a creator because it appears to be intelligently designed, and then claiming that logic dictates that it must have had an intelligent designer.

If we accept this reasoning, then this reasoning automatically flows over to the creator. Obviously if there exists an intelligent creator (and logic dictates that all intelligent things must have been designed) then it follows that this same logic dictates that the creator too must have been designed.

So it instantly becomes an infinite regression with no end.

You can't just ignore the logic behind these arguments.

Arguments that have no logic behind them aren't arguments at all. They are nothing but totally empty and meaningless claims that have no basis whatsoever.

[instantc]

To put it in even simplier terms, the question "who created God" has no bearing on the question "did God create the universe", Caphiche?

It does when it is being proposed that the universe had to have a creator because it appears to be intelligently designed, and then claiming that logic dictates that it must have had an intelligent designer.

If we accept this reasoning, then this reasoning automatically flows over to the creator. Obviously if there exists an intelligent creator (and logic dictates that all intelligent things must have been designed) then it follows that this same logic dictates that the creator too must have been designed.

Again, to say that 'all intelligent things must have a creator' leads to an infinite regress of explanations. But to say that the universe appears to be intelligently designed does not imply an infinite regress of explanations and should therefore be judged on its own without any regard to the "next natural question", namely who created the creator. Furthermore, even if it did, can you show that an infinite regress of explanations is impossible? If not, then that objection is moot in any case.

[Divine Insight]

Again, to say that 'all intelligent things must have a creator' leads to an infinite regress of explanations. But to say that the universe appears to be intelligently designed does not imply an infinite regress of explanations and should therefore be judged on its own without any regard to the "next natural question", namely who created the creator. Furthermore, even if it did, can you show that an infinite regress of explanations is impossible? If not, then that objection is moot in any case.

I disagree.

Saying. "The universe appears to be intelligently designed" does not imply that it had an intelligent creator. All this this does is make a statement about how the universe 'appears' to the untrained eye. No conclusions are even yet in order.

In fact, when an eye trained in biology looks at the universe it is clear that the universe is not intelligently designed at all but rather it clearly evolved from a natural process of evolution by natural selection.

If the the person with the untrained eye insists that the appearance of design is too overwhelming and that evolution by natural selection is beyond their ability to understand, then they may take this to the next step.

But then what would the next step be?

Well, the next step would be to say, "Since the universe appears to be intelligently designed can we say anything more from this?"

It is only when posing this question that the logical reasoning emerges and the person thinks, "If something is intelligently designed then it must have had an intelligent designer".

Only now are they in a position to shout, "Eureka! The universe must have been designed by an intelligent designer!"

And why do they believe that this is an epiphany? Well, precisely because they are assuming what you refuse to assume: "all intelligent things must have a creator/designer".

If they didn't have this little tid-bit of assumption they would have no reason to posit that the universe had a creator. so this assumption is paramount to their conclusion.

But then what they fail to acknowledge (as you have been refusing to do for tens of pages now) is that this same logic must then apply to the intelligent creator. Because it's precisely the same reasoning.

~~~~

In fact, I'm glad that you have made such a big thing over this because this is indeed the fatal flaw in the creationist's arguments.

If all intelligent things had to have an intelligent designer (which you must hold if you are going to claim that this must be true for the universe), then so too must the intelligent creator have been designed by an intelligent designer and it becomes a never-ending regression of a need for intelligent designers.

However, the secularists simply say, "Wait a minute". Let's back up and examine the assumptions here.

Let's look at this assumption: 'all intelligent things must have a creator'.

Is that true? Well, no, evolution by natural selection shows that it doesn't need to be true at all. Therefore we can have something like the universe that has evolved to a state of intelligence where no previous intelligence was required.

And so secularism wins the day. The universe is self-explanatory and needs no infinite regression of intelligence designers. It simply evolved on its own by natural processes.

Now the creationist might argue, "But where did this original stuff come from and why is it that it has the ability to evolve into a state of intelligence?"

The secularist is not obligated to answer this question. It doesn't have anything to do with their claim that the universe evolved to become intelligent via natural processes. Their conclusions and explanation does not require an infinite regression of intelligent designers.

Therefore the secularists actually have an explanation for how the universe became intelligent without the need for an infinite regression of intelligent designers.

The secularists then have the stronger position by far.

[instantc]

And why do they believe that this is an epiphany? Well, precisely because they are assuming what you refuse to assume: "all intelligent things must have a creator/designer".

... so this assumption is paramount to their conclusion.

As far as I can see, this is just a middle step that you have made up yourself. Nothing in any of the examples of creationist reasoning that you've given so far necessarily implies this assumption. I agree that IF a creationist explicitly or implicitly makes the argument that all intelligent things must have a creator, then you can rightly say that an infinite regression would follow. But, if the creationist, for example, makes the old tired argument about the complexity of the universe requiring an intelligent creator, then your objection immediately evaporates, since the abovementioned assumption is no longer implicit in their argument.

Furthermore, even if you were right to say that the creationist's argument implies an infinite regression of explanations, I don't see why that would necessarily be bad for the creationist. Next you say:

But then what they fail to acknowledge (as you have been refusing to do for tens of pages now) is that this same logic must then apply to the intelligent creator. Because it's precisely the same reasoning.

So what's the implication, if they concede to this conclusion of yours? An infinite regress of explanations. But, you haven't yet showed that such infinite regression is impossible, so what exactly are you objecting to? Suppose the creationist simply concedes to your argument and acknowledges that there must be an infinite regress of creators, what's next?

[Divine Insight]

Suppose the creationist simply concedes to your argument and acknowledges that there must be an infinite regress of creators, what's next?

Well there would actually be two 'nexts'.

There would be what I would do next and what the creationist would do next.

If the creationist thought that an infinite regression of intelligent designers makes sense to them as a viable explanation then so be it. That wouldn't surprise me at all since they seem to accept things that absurd all the time. But for me, their concession would at least show that they are beginning to understand the problem.

In the meantime I would argue that this infinite regression of intelligent designers is most certainly not the "Best Explanation" even if we allow that it could somehow be possible.

I personally feel that the secular argument that the universe merely began as an unintelligent event and then evolved to a state of intelligence is a far better explanation. Especially considering the overwhelming physical evidence of precisely how this happens via natural processes. Processes that themselves need no driving intelligence.

Actually I'm glad that we had this conversation. Having gone through this with you has actually helped me to more clearly see precisely why the secularists are indeed right. By that I mean that they are right to claim that they have the "Better Explanation". Not necessarily that their explanation is ultimately right. But it's definitely better than the creationist's position.

Having had experience with artificial intelligence programming, robotics, and artificial learning machines, I can understand how intelligence can evolve from simpler non-intelligent elements. So understanding that intelligence can evolve where there was no intelligence before is not difficult for me to understand or accept.

The idea that there had to have been an intelligent designer to design the universe doesn't make any sense even if I were to accept that postulate that an intelligent designer exists. This universe in no way appears to have been intelligently designed to me. What kind of a designer would design creatures to eat each other?

That doesn't sound very intelligent to me.

But I thank you for the conversation. You've actually helped me to better understand why the secularists have a really powerful argument.

[lightbeamrider]

And why do they believe that this is an epiphany? Well, precisely because they are assuming what you refuse to assume: "all intelligent things must have a creator/designer".

... so this assumption is paramount to their conclusion.

As far as I can see, this is just a middle step that you have made up yourself. Nothing in any of the examples of creationist reasoning that you've given so far necessarily implies this assumption. I agree that IF a creationist explicitly or implicitly makes the argument that all intelligent things must have a creator, then you can rightly say that an infinite regression would follow. But, if the creationist, for example, makes the old tired argument about the complexity of the universe requiring an intelligent creator, then your objection immediately evaporates, since the abovementioned assumption is no longer implicit in their argument.

Furthermore, even if you were right to say that the creationist's argument implies an infinite regression of explanations, I don't see why that would necessarily be bad for the creationist. Next you say:

But then what they fail to acknowledge (as you have been refusing to do for tens of pages now) is that this same logic must then apply to the intelligent creator. Because it's precisely the same reasoning.

So what's the implication, if they concede to this conclusion of yours? An infinite regress of explanations. But, you haven't yet showed that such infinite regression is impossible, so what exactly are you objecting to? Suppose the creationist simply concedes to your argument and acknowledges that there must be an infinite regress of creators, what's next?

If God created then who created God? The inverse being if the universe created then who created the universe?