Arguments and evidence for deism, theism, and miracles

Post by **otseng** » Mon Jan 06, 2014 9:51 pm

We have agreed to debate the following:

Is there sufficient evidence to conclude the existence of a deistic God?

And if so, is there sufficient evidence to conclude a theistic worldview whereby this God intervenes in human affairs? Specifically, is there evidentiary justification for concluding that some claims of intervention are authentic whereas others aren't.

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A thread has been created for followers of this debate to post comments:
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... hp?t=24538

no evidence no belief · Thu Feb 20, 2014 4:55 am

Hey, I think we made a lot of progress. See a few comments below, and after that I think we're ready for your argument from fine tuning.

otseng wrote:
no evidence no belief wrote: for clarity I will refer to the "product of the big bang" as "universe", and to the "totality of existence" as UNIVERSE.
OK.

Also, as a general comment, I agree with the definitions of universe, nature, and supernatural since they line up with standard definitions. Though I accept your definitions of UNIVERSE, NATURE, and SUPERNATURAL, I just want to point out that they are not standard usages of the words.

So, we're accepting 4 premises:
1) As per your definition above, UNIVERSE is a set containing everything which exists.
2) As per previous statements you made, universe is a subset of UNIVERSE, containing only those things which started existing at the big bang
3) God exists
4) God did not start existing at the big bang
OK.

On the basis of these premises I can formulate this syllogism
1) UNIVERSE is a set which contains God
2) universe is a set which does not contain God
3) Therefore UNIVERSE and universe are different sets
4) Also, the universe is a subset of the UNIVERSE
OK.

The definition of UNIVERSE you provided above is accurate. It defines UNIVERSE as the "totality of existence", (thus of necessity it must include the entity that caused the big bang, because that entity exists), and then it goes on to give some examples of objects included in the "totality of existence" set.
However, I kinda doubt that the Wikipedia definition had in mind to include God in the definition of the universe. The second paragraph I quoted states:
The observable universe is about 46 billion light years in radius. Scientific observation of the Universe has led to inferences of its earlier stages. These observations suggest that the Universe has been governed by the same physical laws and constants throughout most of its extent and history. The Big Bang theory is the prevailing cosmological model that describes the early development of the Universe, which is calculated to have begun 13.798 Â± 0.037 billion years ago.
It states here the age of the Universe to be around 14 billion years old. This clearly refers to your universe, not UNIVERSE.

Right. Well, I think that the anonymous author who wrote this wikipedia entry got himself turned around slightly. He goes back and forth between describing the UNIVERSE and describing the universe.

He starts by calling it "totality of existence" and then he goes on to describe that which is contingent on the Big Bang. Either the author believe that the universe IS the totality of existence and nothing exists outside the universe (a notion we can discard since we both disagree with it, as does the scientific community as a whole), or the guy is getting confused. Clearly the universe isn't the totality of existence. Clearly the UNIVERSE didn't start at the Big Bang.

Does IH posit that of necessity it's impossible that God created anything other than this universe?
I'm staying with my original claim that only one universe exists and God only created our universe.

To clarify: Later in this post you say something to the effect "we have a lot on our plate as is, no need to discuss other causes for other universes". That, I may tentatively agree with, but it seems that above you're making a different kind of statement.

It seems you are making the positive claim that NOTHING other than the universe and the single entity responsible for causing it, exist.

Just before I get into disagreeing with you, can you confirm that you positively claim the existence of only two items in the UNIVERSE: The universe and God. And that you positively claim the non-existence of anything else.

If conversely, you're just saying "we don't need to account for anything other than the universe and that-which-caused-it, until such additional material manifests itself", then I can accept that.

If God is SUPERNATURAL/EXTRANATURAL/NON-NATURAL, then he does not exist.
I think we can exclude discussing the SUPERNATURAL, EXTRANATURAL, and NON-NATURAL. By definition, there is nothing that is SUPERNATURAL or EXTRANATURAL or NON-NATURAL.

Yup. "That which does not exist" doesn't merit much discussion

To draw the line at the event horizon is arbitrary and baseless, much like it would be to draw the line at our galaxy, at our planet's stratosphere, or at the edge of the forest near our village.
Actually, the line is our universe, not just the cosmic event horizon.
No. The line, as per the definition YOU presented, is "the totality of existence". If something which caused the big bang exists, then he must be part of this "totality of existence" called UNIVERSE/NATURE/REALITY.
The Wikipedia definition does not match your UNIVERSE, but it does match your universe.

Portions of the wikipedia definition match UNIVERSE and definitely do NOT match universe (the "totality of existence"), other portions match universe but not UNIVERSE (the portions that describe the universe's age, etc). There is no reason to assume that the person who entered the wikipedia article is any more qualified than us or has a clearer understanding than us. Therefore I'd say his definition was a good starting point to refine ours, but the usefulness of his vague and possibly self-contradictory conflation of UNIVERSE and universe probably ends there.

Do you agree that the above is an argument from ignorance?

1) We don't know how X came to be
2) Therefore either Y or Z caused X
Sure.
Ok. So your definition of miracle is based on an argument from ignorance. I'm not trying to play gotcha. This is complicated stuff, so no pressure to nail it exactly the first time. I messed up definitions of stuff too. But do you agree that your current definition of miracle is untenable and we must reformulate, or at a minimum scrap the portion of it contingent on ignorance?
No, I do not agree that IH falls into your example. My argument is not simply we don't know how the universe originated, therefore God caused it.

This portion of our discussion stems from your definition of miracle.

"A miracle is an event that is supernatural in origin, and does not obey any of the known laws of nature."

I accept the first portion of your definition and, as per other discussions earlier which you agree to, would just refine it thus:
"A miracle is an event that is directly caused by the supernatural". This solves the problem that everything that is caused by nature can eventually be traced to the big bang which is supernatural.

The portion of your definition I have a problem with is the second one "and does not obey any of the known laws of nature".

If an event is caused by the big bang or anything subsequent, then it's natural. If it's caused by something other than the big bang (like how the big bang itself was caused by IH/NIH, or how the asymmetry of the universe was caused by the gravitational pull of extra-universal matter), then it's supernatural.

If an event obeys the known laws of nature, or is known to obey laws of nature irrespective of whether we understand those natural laws fully, then we know it's natural.

If an event obeys the known laws of supernature, or is known to obey supernautral laws irrespective of whether we understand those supernatural laws fully, then we know it's natural.

If we don't know whether an event obey natural law, then by definition we don't know whether it's caused by the natural or supernatural.

If we don't know whether it's caused by the natural or the supernatural, then we don't know if it's a miracle or not.

If we don't know whether it's a miracle or not, we cannot say that it IS a miracle. Why? Because we don't know if it is!

Objectively, disassociated from our knowledge, there are only two sets: Miracles and non-Miracles. That which is downstream of the big bang in the causal chain, and that which is upstream or outside of it.

If we superimpose our knowledge onto this dichotomy, then there are three distinct sets:
Set A: That which we know was caused by the big bang
Set B: That which we know was not caused by the big bang
Set C: That which we don't know one way or the other.

The first half of your definition says that the term for Set B is miracle. I disagree with the term, but agree with what you're saying.

The second half of your definition claims that Set C is a miracle. "That which doesn't obey any known law". If we don't know whether it's a miracle or not, then we can't say it's a miracle!

It's simple:
Set A: Non-Miracle
Set B: Miracle
Set C: Can't say one way or the other because we don't know! Stop calling it a miracle! Stop trying to poach it under set B. If we don't know whether it belongs in set B then we can't put it there!

1) If an event occurs that wasn't caused by the big bang, then it's called a smiracle
2) All things which were not caused by the big bang either caused the big bang or are unrelated to the causal link that resulted in the big bang
3)NIH posits the universe was caused by the big bang
4) Therefore NIH was a smiracle
Actually, no, I don't agree the conclusion follows the premises. You left out the correlation between NIH and an event that wasn't caused by the big bang.

Meh, just sloppy wording from my part. We're on the same page.

In other words, wouldn't Jesus rotting in his tomb be as much of a smiracle as Jesus rising from the dead?
Jesus rotting in the tomb would be a result of bacteria decay. There is no need to invoke a supernatural cause for that. Jesus rising from the dead has no natural explanation and would have a supernatural cause.

Well, you have to be careful here not to invoke the second half of your previous definition of miracle. In other words, make sure that the argument you're making is NOT "It's not caused by any known natural event, therefore it was caused by the supernatural". If it was not caused by any known event, then it could have been caused by something natural OR by something supernatural. We don't know. If we don't know which one it was, we cannot arbitrarily jump to the conclusion that it was caused by either. To say "It's not caused by any known natural event, therefore it was caused by the supernatural" is as absurd as saying "It's not caused by any known supernatural event, therefore it was caused by the natural".

Ok, so the cause of the asymmetry in the universe has been empirically observed to be caused by causes external to the universe, namely the gravitational pull of matter outside the universe. That would be a smiracle by our definition then, right?
By our definitions, yes, it'd be a miracle.

Suppose we see your chair start to float up. There is nothing attached to the chair to make it go up. There are no magnets, no strings, nothing that is in the room, the earth, or even in this universe that caused the chair to go up. We posit that some force (could even be some "gravitational" force) from outside our universe caused the chair to go up. That would fall under being a miracle.

Simply positing that some force outside the universe caused the chair to lift, on the basis of not being able to find any intra-universal explanation for it, is not sufficient to deem something was supernatural. That's trying to incorrectly place an item which belongs in Set C, into set B. You would need positive evidence.

Suppose we see stars move. There is nothing in our universe that caused the stars to move. We posit that something outside our universe is exerting a force on it to move. It would still fall under being a miracle.

It wasn't sufficient that we posited it. As per your general principle, it became reasonable to believe one explanation instead of alternative explanations when evidence and logic supported it more than alternatives. Namely, when, according to the issue which we are referring to, "hard evidence" was found for extra-universal forces being involved, then it became reasonable to call it a miracle. If you disagree that "hard evidence" was found for extra-universal forces, then you disagree that it was a miracle.

The fact that the cause is outside our universe and violates natural laws makes it a miracle.

Yes. The fact that the cause IS outside our universe, not the fact that we can't find any cause inside our universe and therefore posit the cause might be outside of it.

Even if "argument from ignorance" is not the correct term for this type of logical fallacy, it clearly is logically fallacious.
You cannot say that my argument is an "argument from ignorance" if you say that it is not the correct term to use. What exactly is the correct term for the fallacy that you claim I'm making?

I thought it was "argument from ignorance". If that's not the correct word for it, then maybe there isn't an already coined term for this type of logical fallacy. I will create one now: "Argument from concluding that something belongs in one set on the basis of not knowing whether it belongs to that set".

You are saying the definition of a miracle is "Something that doesn't occur in accordance with known natural laws". Simply not knowing if something belongs in one set or the other, is not sufficient to conclude it belongs in one set.

If you claim "I don't know whether Luca wrote down an even or odd number, therefore it was an even number", then it's an argument from ignorance, and is invalid.
I'm not even making this type of argument. Where have I said, "it's either IH or NIH, therefore IH"?

You've said "We don't know if it was caused by the natural or supernatural, therefore it's supernatural". The second part of your definition of "miracle" was "and does not obey any of the known laws of nature". This is wrong.

Let me put my disagreement in one last format. There are 4 types of events/laws/causes/circumstances that can cause something:
1) Known natural
2) Unknown natural
3) Known supernatural
4) Unknown supernatural.

These 4 possibilities are the result of superimposing our knowledge onto the true objective dichotomy, which is just natural VS supernatural. An unknown natural remains natural, and an unknown supernatural remains a supernatural.

Now, if something, as per your language, "does not obey any of the known laws of nature", then it means it's not a known natural. It doesn't belong to group 1). That means it could be an unknown natural (group 2) or an unknown supernatural (group 4). To define as a miracle something that COULD be caused by an unknown natural is absurd.

We earn the right to call something natural when we have evidence it's natural. We earn the right to call something supernatural when we have evidence it's supernatural. If we don't know, we don't know. Absence of knowledge that it is natural doesn't make it supernatural, absence of knowledge that it's supernatural doesn't make it natural.

Agreed?

simply define smiracle as an event that was caused by something which in turn was NOT caused by the big bang?
Sure, we can define miracle as that.

Ok. Lets. Do you hereby agree that we should not define miracle as an event that was caused by something which we don't know whether it was in turn caused by the big bang or not?

Instead if we limit it to things directly caused by something which in turn was not caused by the big bang then it's clearer. The big bang would be a smiracle, but the formation of galaxies wouldn't, because the big bang was directly caused by IH/NIH, whereas the formation of galaxies was indirectly caused by IH/NIH - namely the galaxies were formed by the universe cooling off, which was caused by it's expansion, which was caused by the big bang which was caused by IH/NIH.
Right, we only need to consider short causal chains (or perhaps just a single link).

I'd say just a single link is the most logical way to go.

An argument from ignorance is when you derive a conclusion from ignorance.
Ignorance of what specifically?
Ignorance of whether a event obeyed laws of nature.
I think we both agree that the origin of the universe violates the laws of nature. Or do you not agree with this?

Absolutely. We agree axiomatically that the line between natural and supernatural is drawn across the causal chain at the point of big bang. By definition, the beginning of the universe is where the boundary between natural and supernatural is.

I don't know if "violates" is the best word. It's probably more accurate to say the big bang "Created" the laws of nature, but, yeah, we're on the same page. The events antecedent to the universe are not governed by the laws of the universe. They are governed by UNIVERSAL laws that may or may not manifest equivalently in and outside of the universe.

Every event we've ever determined the cause for, turned out to be caused by a naturalistic cause.
The issue are things we do not have a naturalistic explanation for, specifically, the origin of the universe.
Well, NATURE is defined as the "totality of existence". Therefore of necessity everything has a NATURALISTIC explanation because nothing can be caused by something which does not exist.
OK, but we are talking about a naturalistic cause, not a NATURALISTIC cause.

Ok, the creation of the universe was obviously not naturalistic as we define it, namely as following the laws of the universe. Nonetheless I'm not willing to concede that just because the event didn't follow the laws as they manifest inside the universe, therefore the event happened willy-nilly, governed by nothing. I would imagine that outside/before the universe stuff like gravity, magnetism, strong and weak nuclear force, etc, exist in some form and govern things. I don't know if this random opinion of mine is in any way germane to the discussion.

The only thing left to determine is whether this unspecified cause which in turn was NOT caused by the big bang is intelligent or not.
That'll be investigated next when we discuss fine-tuning.

I'm ready when you are.

I guess my position is that there are underlaying laws of NATURE which nothing which exists can defy.
I think we already identified at least one - the laws of logic. The laws of logic apply universally to NATURE.

Yup.

If we observe that almost everything has a naturalistic cause, isn't it more reasonable to operate under the tentative assumption that the next thing we investigate will also have a naturalistic cause?
Well, by the definitions you just gave, the origin of the universe does not have a naturalistic cause, but has a supernaturalistic cause.

Yes. I'm talking about something else. It's an argument against IH. I'll present it later, in parallel with your argument from fine-tuning, rather than here on this post dedicated to wrapping up definitions.

Are you saying that it's not an argument from ignorance because there indeed are only two options (goddidit, and god didnt do it). You have two options, and you pick one on the basis of not knowing if it's the right one. How is that not an argument from ignorance?
Yes, there are only two options on the table. And by this fact alone, it disqualifies it from an argument from ignorance.

I don't care if we call it an argument from ignorance.

Do you agree that the argument below, however you want to call it, is bunk?

"I don't know if A or B is right, therefore A is right" ("I don't know if it's natural or supernatural, therefore it's supernatural")

If the claim is "God caused the big bang" and we find out he did not, it falsifies the notion that God caused the big bang, not that God exists.
If God did not cause the universe, the whole foundation of deism falls down. This is pretty much the central tenet of deism. The Bible states that God created the heavens and the earth. If this is falsified, then the Bible is just a bunch of fables. (Note: This is only my position, not all Christians would say that it would falsify Christianity if a naturalistic explanation was found for the origin of the universe.)

Does the Bible say God created the heavens and the earth DIRECTLY?

Think of the statement "Luca nailed the painting to the wall". Imagine me hammering a nail into the wall. It's not really me pushing the nail into the wall. It's the hammer. I cause the hammer to move towards the nail, and the hammer causes the nail to sink into the wall. The causal link in actuality being longer than just one step doesn't make it incorrect to say "Luca nailed the painting to the wall".

Similarly "God created the heavens and the earth" doesn't have to mean he did so directly. God could have used NIH to cause the big bang much like I would use a hammer to hang a painting.

Therefore there would be absolutely no restriction on you still positing a God even if NIH was established.

Which makes NIH falsifiable and IH ultimately unfalsifiable. All it takes is to falsify NIH is that at some point upstream of the big bang, intelligence is established to exist. It could be the entity that caused the big bang, or the entity that caused the entity that caused the big bang, or... etc. Whereas no matter how many non-intelligent causal steps we find upstream of the big bang, you'll always be able to say "but I betcha that this last thing was caused by God".

Why couldn't you say that God caused the event that caused the big bang?
That'd be the easy way out and just having a retreating God.

Just because it's easy, it doesn't mean that it's logically viable. And God has been retreating for the last 6000 years. If you didn't believe in a retreating God you wouldn't allow your wife to speak in church, you wouldn't wear 50% cotton 50% polyester t-shirts, and you'd believe the planet was a pizza shaped disk created 6000 years ago in 6 days time.

Anyway. Let's put a pin in this argument, as it is an argument for NIH. Lets do fine-tuning next and come back to this, if you don't mind.

Smiracle: An event directly caused by an entity not natural.
OK, but I'll continue to use the word "miracle".

See my solution below.

Blind faith: To believe that a claim is true, despite the fact that there is no [strike]more[/strike] evidentiary and logical support for it [strike]than there is is for alternatives, or if alternatives have greater support[/strike].
I struck out the parts I think is unnecessary.

ok

But this debate is available to see to all users of the site. You and I, after 77 exchanges and tens of thousands of words, are finally (hopefully) on the same page. Another user who might peruse this thread, might skip past the first 8 pages and jump to subsequent material, and in so doing skip the section where we clearly define "miracle" (and "supernatural") in a way that fits some standard definitions, but conflicts with others.
OK, I see your concern. How about we can try to include the definition when the term miracle is used? Can't guarantee it'll always happen, but you can remind me or you can clarify the usage in your following post.

I think I have an even better solution. I will create shortly a post on this thread that isn't part of our current back and forth, but just a detailed explanation of what we've agreed to mean by miracle, supernatural, etc, and I will include my reservations and disclaimers.

Whenever we use miracle, supernatural, etc, later in our debate, let's not just write them out as plain text, but let's url link them to the explanation post which I will create. This way, any third party reading our exchange can easily refer back to the definition, no matter what portion of the thread he is reading, and clear up any misunderstanding.

If you want, I'll send this definitions post as a PM first so we can tweak it together, and I'll post it here only once we both agree on the language.

What do you think?

Similarly, "supernatural" is an equally possibly misleading term, so as I suggested in the past, I would like to limit ourselves to "extra-universal".
If possible, we can use the two words together "supernatural/extra-universal" in sentences.

Not necessary. I can use the word extra-universal, you can use supernatural. As long as we both link it back to the post which I will create and which clarifies what the words mean, it will be fine.

no evidence no belief · Thu Feb 20, 2014 10:56 am

error correction:

I wrote

If an event obeys the known laws of nature, or is known to obey laws of nature irrespective of whether we understand those natural laws fully, then we know it's natural.

If an event obeys the known laws of supernature, or is known to obey supernautral laws irrespective of whether we understand those supernatural laws fully, then we know it's natural.

What I meant was:

If an event obeys the known laws of nature, or is known to obey laws of nature irrespective of whether we understand those natural laws fully, then we know it's natural.

If an event obeys the known laws of supernature, or is known to obey supernautral laws irrespective of whether we understand those supernatural laws fully, then we know it's supernatural.

Just a typo

Post by **otseng** » Fri Feb 21, 2014 9:58 am

no evidence no belief wrote: Right. Well, I think that the anonymous author who wrote this wikipedia entry got himself turned around slightly. He goes back and forth between describing the UNIVERSE and describing the universe.

He starts by calling it "totality of existence" and then he goes on to describe that which is contingent on the Big Bang. Either the author believe that the universe IS the totality of existence and nothing exists outside the universe (a notion we can discard since we both disagree with it, as does the scientific community as a whole), or the guy is getting confused. Clearly the universe isn't the totality of existence. Clearly the UNIVERSE didn't start at the Big Bang.

I would go with the first one that the Wikipedia article believes the universe is the totality of existence. Of course, you and I disagree with that.

I would not go so far as to say that the scientific community as a whole agrees that there exists something outside the universe.

To clarify: Later in this post you say something to the effect "we have a lot on our plate as is, no need to discuss other causes for other universes".

I'm not implying here that other universes actually exist. I'm just saying that discussing the current topic -- the cause of our universe -- is difficult enough to try to explain.

It seems you are making the positive claim that NOTHING other than the universe and the single entity responsible for causing it, exist.

Not exactly. I accept that things exist in the UNIVERSE that are outside our universe. It could be stuff like angels, demons, spiritual beings, heaven, hell, etc. But, I don't believe that other universes exist other than ours (eg multiverse).

Just before I get into disagreeing with you, can you confirm that you positively claim the existence of only two items in the UNIVERSE: The universe and God. And that you positively claim the non-existence of anything else.

No, I do not claim that only our universe and God make up the UNIVERSE.

If conversely, you're just saying "we don't need to account for anything other than the universe and that-which-caused-it, until such additional material manifests itself", then I can accept that.

Yes.

If God is SUPERNATURAL/EXTRANATURAL/NON-NATURAL, then he does not exist.
I think we can exclude discussing the SUPERNATURAL, EXTRANATURAL, and NON-NATURAL. By definition, there is nothing that is SUPERNATURAL or EXTRANATURAL or NON-NATURAL.
Yup. "That which does not exist" doesn't merit much discussion

Good.

Therefore I'd say his definition was a good starting point to refine ours, but the usefulness of his vague and possibly self-contradictory conflation of UNIVERSE and universe probably ends there.

I would agree that there are internal contradictions with the Wikipedia article. I think this again reveals that a naturalistic view of the universe -- even trying to just define it -- has self-contradictions.

If an event obeys the known laws of nature, or is known to obey laws of nature irrespective of whether we understand those natural laws fully, then we know it's natural.

Yes, I agree.

If an event obeys the known laws of supernature, or is known to obey supernautral laws irrespective of whether we understand those supernatural laws fully, then we know it's natural.

I don't understand this. What are the "known laws of supernature"?

If we don't know whether an event obey natural law, then by definition we don't know whether it's caused by the natural or supernatural.

How about we amend the definition to be "violates a known law of nature" rather than "not obey any known law of nature"?

If we superimpose our knowledge onto this dichotomy, then there are three distinct sets:
Set A: That which we know was caused by the big bang
Set B: That which we know was not caused by the big bang
Set C: That which we don't know one way or the other.

Not entirely sure I like the terminology of being "caused by the Big Bang". I think it's clearer to say that something has a naturalistic cause. Saying something is caused by the Big Bang would have a rather long causal chain to prove.

The second half of your definition claims that Set C is a miracle. "That which doesn't obey any known law". If we don't know whether it's a miracle or not, then we can't say it's a miracle!

I think the resolution would be to say it violates a known law, rather than not obey any known law.

Well, you have to be careful here not to invoke the second half of your previous definition of miracle. In other words, make sure that the argument you're making is NOT "It's not caused by any known natural event, therefore it was caused by the supernatural". If it was not caused by any known event, then it could have been caused by something natural OR by something supernatural.

Would you accept it if the definition was amended to use "violation" instead?

Simply positing that some force outside the universe caused the chair to lift, on the basis of not being able to find any intra-universal explanation for it, is not sufficient to deem something was supernatural.

Sure.

Even if "argument from ignorance" is not the correct term for this type of logical fallacy, it clearly is logically fallacious.
You cannot say that my argument is an "argument from ignorance" if you say that it is not the correct term to use. What exactly is the correct term for the fallacy that you claim I'm making?
I thought it was "argument from ignorance". If that's not the correct word for it, then maybe there isn't an already coined term for this type of logical fallacy. I will create one now: "Argument from concluding that something belongs in one set on the basis of not knowing whether it belongs to that set".

Well, I'd prefer if you charge me with a logical fallacy to present one that is already predefined, rather than you making a new term up.

Do you hereby agree that we should not define miracle as an event that was caused by something which we don't know whether it was in turn caused by the big bang or not?

I think if we use the term violate, then it should make things clearer.

So, my amended definition of a miracle is "an event that has a supernatural cause and violates a known law of nature".

Do you agree that the argument below, however you want to call it, is bunk?

"I don't know if A or B is right, therefore A is right" ("I don't know if it's natural or supernatural, therefore it's supernatural")

Sure. And it applies equally if A is IH or NIH.

Does the Bible say God created the heavens and the earth DIRECTLY?

I don't believe that God created the universe through purely naturalistic processes if that's what you're asking.

God could have used NIH to cause the big bang much like I would use a hammer to hang a painting.

Adding NIH to IH would be superfluous. It'd be like me adding IH adding NIH. "Yeah, I agree that NIH is true. But, God created NIH." For discussions here, we can assume that NIH and IH are separate and unrelated to the other.

And God has been retreating for the last 6000 years.

Actually, I would disagree. I think rather science has been coming around to what religions have been saying all along.

At this moment it seems as though science will never be able to raise the curtain on the mystery of creation. For the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream. He has scaled the mountains of ignorance; he is about to conquer the highest peak; as he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries.
- Robert Jastrow

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Robert_Jastrow

and you'd believe the planet was a pizza shaped disk

The flat-earth claim is a myth propagated by non-Christians. We can debate this later when it's more appropriate.

I think I have an even better solution. I will create shortly a post on this thread that isn't part of our current back and forth, but just a detailed explanation of what we've agreed to mean by miracle, supernatural, etc, and I will include my reservations and disclaimers.

OK. Go ahead and provide the definitions and we can fine-tune them (pardon the pun).

I can use the word extra-universal, you can use supernatural. As long as we both link it back to the post which I will create and which clarifies what the words mean, it will be fine.

Sounds good.

no evidence no belief · Fri Feb 21, 2014 1:55 pm

otseng wrote:
If we don't know whether an event obey natural law, then by definition we don't know whether it's caused by the natural or supernatural.
How about we amend the definition to be "violates a known law of nature" rather than "not obey any known law of nature"?

No. That change in wording does nothing to address the issue that I have.

My problem is with use of the word "known".

If an event violates a KNOWN law of nature, it could be for two reasons:

1) It's because it's actually being caused by something external to the universe, such as the asymmetry of the universe caused by gravitational pull from matter outside the universe.

OR

2) It's because it's actually being caused by an unknown law of nature.

For example: Assume we know NOTHING about magnetism.

We see a piece of iron move upwards towards another object hovering above it.

This event violates a known law of nature: Gravity.

There are two possible types of explanations for the apparent violation of the law of gravity

1) It's being caused by something external to the universe, such as a goblin in Narnia pulling at the piece of metal with an invisible inter-dimensional string made out of fairy's pubic hair

or

2) There is a force inside the universe that we know nothing about which overrides the force of gravity: magnetism.

It truly could be either of these.

An event that violates a KNOWN law of a nature irrefutably could be caused by either natural or supernatural causes.

Therefore, by defining supernatural as something that violates a KNOWN law, you are defining supernatural as "something that could be either supernatural or natural".

That is a violation of the first two logical absolutes, the law of identity and the law of non-contradiction.

You are saying "A is either A or Not-A".

I am truly baffled by the necessity to go through this. How can you not get this instantly?

Imagine I tell you "There is a fruit inside a box, it's definitely either an apple or a pear. Can you guess what it is? I'll give you a hint. It's definitely not a RED apple". Is the information I gave you sufficient to determine what fruit it is? Obviously not. It could be a pear, or it could be a yellow apple, right?

Similarly, imagine I tell you "There is a cause for this event, it's either a natural cause or a supernatural cause. Can you guess what it is? I'll give you a hint. It's definitely not a KNOWN natural cause". Is the information I gave you sufficient to determine what kind of cause it is? Obviously not. It could be a supernatural cause, or it could be an unknown natural cause, right?

Natural causes are Set A. Supernatural causes are Set B.

Known natural causes/laws are a subset of Set A. Let's call it Subset-AA

Just because something is not inside Subset-AA, it doesn't mean it's inside Set B. It could be outside subset-AA and yet inside Set A.

Come on Oliver. Logic 101!

Actually, calling it "logic 101" implies that it is at least college level logic. It's not. Statements like "A fruit which is either an apple or a pear and is not a red apple, is not necessarily a pear", or "a cause which is either natural or supernatural and is not a known natural, is not necessarily supernatural" are not even college level. Nor high school, nor middle school. It truly is primary school level logic. I refuse to believe you don't get this.

no evidence no belief · Sat Feb 22, 2014 2:15 am

otseng wrote:
no evidence no belief wrote: Right. Well, I think that the anonymous author who wrote this wikipedia entry got himself turned around slightly. He goes back and forth between describing the UNIVERSE and describing the universe.

He starts by calling it "totality of existence" and then he goes on to describe that which is contingent on the Big Bang. Either the author believe that the universe IS the totality of existence and nothing exists outside the universe (a notion we can discard since we both disagree with it, as does the scientific community as a whole), or the guy is getting confused. Clearly the universe isn't the totality of existence. Clearly the UNIVERSE didn't start at the Big Bang.
I would go with the first one that the Wikipedia article believes the universe is the totality of existence. Of course, you and I disagree with that.

I would not go so far as to say that the scientific community as a whole agrees that there exists something outside the universe.

Fair enough. The consensus is leaning in that direction, but not everybody agrees.

To clarify: Later in this post you say something to the effect "we have a lot on our plate as is, no need to discuss other causes for other universes".
I'm not implying here that other universes actually exist. I'm just saying that discussing the current topic -- the cause of our universe -- is difficult enough to try to explain.

It seems you are making the positive claim that NOTHING other than the universe and the single entity responsible for causing it, exist.
Not exactly. I accept that things exist in the UNIVERSE that are outside our universe. It could be stuff like angels, demons, spiritual beings, heaven, hell, etc. But, I don't believe that other universes exist other than ours (eg multiverse).

Interesting. Obviously I disagree. Lets put a pin in this disagreement until such a time as it becomes germane to our primary discussion, though, ok?

Therefore I'd say his definition was a good starting point to refine ours, but the usefulness of his vague and possibly self-contradictory conflation of UNIVERSE and universe probably ends there.
I would agree that there are internal contradictions with the Wikipedia article. I think this again reveals that a naturalistic view of the universe -- even trying to just define it -- has self-contradictions.

See, this is the problem with using the word nature/universe/reality/naturalistic, etc in a very restrictive way for the purpose of our argument, while in the real world there are all sorts of additional definitions associated with it.

Now I don't know if with the use of the word "naturalistic" above, you mean "the belief that nothing exists other than that which was caused by the big bang" (our definition of "naturalistic") or whether you use the common definition of "naturalistic", which is "disbelief in fairies, ghosts, leprechauns and goblins".

The problem arises because I am NOT a naturalist in the sense that I do not believe that the only stuff that exists is that which is downstream of the big bang in the causal chain. This is our internal definition of nature.

I AM a naturalist however, in that I disbelieve in the supernatural/spiritual, as in "souls, ghosts, angels, curses, magic love potions, tarot cards, prayer, etc".

Seriously, this is how naturalism is defined on wikipedia: "Adherents of naturalism (i.e., naturalists) assert that natural laws are the rules that govern the structure and behavior of the natural universe, that the changing universe at every stage is a product of these laws."

By this definition, a deist is a naturalist! a deist believes that God caused the big bang, infused it with natural laws, and that these natural laws govern everything in the natural universe.

I'm having second thoughts about use of the words "supernatural", "miracle", etc to describe purely mechanistic events that just happen to be upstream of the big bang.

More on the nature of my issue, and my possible change of heart below.

If an event obeys the known laws of supernature, or is known to obey supernautral laws irrespective of whether we understand those supernatural laws fully, then we know it's natural.
I don't understand this. What are the "known laws of supernature"?

So far, the only one we've identified is the laws of logic.

If we superimpose our knowledge onto this dichotomy, then there are three distinct sets:
Set A: That which we know was caused by the big bang
Set B: That which we know was not caused by the big bang
Set C: That which we don't know one way or the other.
Not entirely sure I like the terminology of being "caused by the Big Bang". I think it's clearer to say that something has a naturalistic cause. Saying something is caused by the Big Bang would have a rather long causal chain to prove.

I would have agreed with you earlier. But I'm having second thoughts. I do NOT think it's clearer to say that "something has a naturalistic cause".

The second half of your definition claims that Set C is a miracle. "That which doesn't obey any known law". If we don't know whether it's a miracle or not, then we can't say it's a miracle!
I think the resolution would be to say it violates a known law, rather than not obey any known law.

I disagree. That word changes does nothing to address my issue.

Well, you have to be careful here not to invoke the second half of your previous definition of miracle. In other words, make sure that the argument you're making is NOT "It's not caused by any known natural event, therefore it was caused by the supernatural". If it was not caused by any known event, then it could have been caused by something natural OR by something supernatural.
Would you accept it if the definition was amended to use "violation" instead?

No. This is unfortunately all moot. I reject the use of terms "supernatural" and "miracle" entirely, when describing NIH. Sorry for the time wasted, but I changed my mind. See below for my updated position on this.

Even if "argument from ignorance" is not the correct term for this type of logical fallacy, it clearly is logically fallacious.
You cannot say that my argument is an "argument from ignorance" if you say that it is not the correct term to use. What exactly is the correct term for the fallacy that you claim I'm making?
I thought it was "argument from ignorance". If that's not the correct word for it, then maybe there isn't an already coined term for this type of logical fallacy. I will create one now: "Argument from concluding that something belongs in one set on the basis of not knowing whether it belongs to that set".
Well, I'd prefer if you charge me with a logical fallacy to present one that is already predefined, rather than you making a new term up.

As outlined in my previous post, your definition violates the first and second logical absolutes. It doesn't get much more logically fallacious than that.

Do you hereby agree that we should not define miracle as an event that was caused by something which we don't know whether it was in turn caused by the big bang or not?
I think if we use the term violate, then it should make things clearer.

I disagree completely.

So, my amended definition of a miracle is "an event that has a supernatural cause and violates a known law of nature".

Completely disagree. I disagreed in one way as of a few hours ago. I now disagree in two ways. See below.

Do you agree that the argument below, however you want to call it, is bunk?

"I don't know if A or B is right, therefore A is right" ("I don't know if it's natural or supernatural, therefore it's supernatural")
Sure. And it applies equally if A is IH or NIH.

Right. The difference is I never tried to apply it to anything, wheres you tried to apply it the term "miracle" by trying to define miracle as "something which we don't know if it's a miracle or not".

Does the Bible say God created the heavens and the earth DIRECTLY?
I don't believe that God created the universe through purely naturalistic processes if that's what you're asking.

See. Here you're using the word "naturalistic" in the commonly accepted way, not in the restricted sense that we'd agreed on.

If nature simply means that downstream of the big bang, and supernature is simply that upstream of it, then OBVIOUSLY God and any of his activity is not naturalistic. That's something you shouldn't even have to bring up if that's what you meant.

But if naturalistic means disbelief in fairies, ghosts, souls, demons, angels and other fairy tale characters, then specifying that God didn't create the universe in a naturalistic way, might be something necessary to specify.

This is so confusing.

God could have used NIH to cause the big bang much like I would use a hammer to hang a painting.
Adding NIH to IH would be superfluous. It'd be like me adding IH adding NIH. "Yeah, I agree that NIH is true. But, God created NIH." For discussions here, we can assume that NIH and IH are separate and unrelated to the other.

It's superfluous if NIH has not been established. If NIH HAD been established, then claiming "an inteligent entity with the ability to created caused NIH would be logically plausible, making the existence of an intelligent creator an unfalsifiable claim, because you might choose not to avail yourself of it, but the logical ability to always push it one step back will always exist.

And God has been retreating for the last 6000 years.
Actually, I would disagree. I think rather science has been coming around to what religions have been saying all along.

At this moment it seems as though science will never be able to raise the curtain on the mystery of creation. For the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream. He has scaled the mountains of ignorance; he is about to conquer the highest peak; as he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries.
- Robert Jastrow
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Robert_Jastrow

Well, obviously I disagree with this. We can discuss it another time, but for the record, I think theology is a made up discipline. It's like being an expert in Lord of the Rings lore. It's making up stuff as you go along, because none of it is based on empirical evidence and no statement is truer than any other.

Maybe one day scientists will discover that theologians were right all along and reality/existence/UNIVERSE was part of the perfect plan of a benevolent deity who tortures for eternity those who don't believe that he sacrificed himself to himself to create a loophole whereby people don't have to follow insane rules he had previously created for a desert tribe.

Maybe one day scientists will discover that to be the case. It doesn't matter. The time to believe that, based on your general principle, is when logic and evidence support it, not when theologians assert it.

And let's not forget the slight possibility that maybe, just maybe, religious leaders could be wrong, and stoning to death a bride who is discovered to be not a virgin on her wedding night, is not the best way to go about things.

and you'd believe the planet was a pizza shaped disk
The flat-earth claim is a myth propagated by non-Christians. We can debate this later when it's more appropriate.

Disagreement noted. We can discuss later.

I think I have an even better solution. I will create shortly a post on this thread that isn't part of our current back and forth, but just a detailed explanation of what we've agreed to mean by miracle, supernatural, etc, and I will include my reservations and disclaimers.
OK. Go ahead and provide the definitions and we can fine-tune them (pardon the pun).

Ok. Here is where I explain why I must reject completely the use of the terms supernatural and miracle as they relate to NIH.

You're welcome to continue using them for IH, but I don't want to use them for NIH, or for generic discussion, for that matter.

We used the word nature to define that which is downstream of the big bang in the causal chain and supernature to define that which is upstream of the big bang in the causal chain, or outside of it.

The concept is clear enough, but I reject use of the word nature/supernature to label this dichotomy.

Why?

Because the terms natural, naturalistic, supernatural have other meanings which completely contradict the use we give it here.

To use the term "supernatural" to describe a phenomenon which shares some properties with the supernatural but is different from the supernatural in essential ways, is a fallacy of the undistributed middle.

At least half of the definitions of supernatural out there involve spirits, deities, gods, magic, the occult, spirituality, faith, religion, etc. These are definitions that are antithetical to NIH, and to a general discussion based on your general principle.

Just because A shares some properties with B, it doesn't mean that A is defined as B.

1) NIH posits that stuff happens outside the universe
2) Supernaturalism posits that stuff happens outside the universe
3) Therefore NIH is defined as a supernaturalistic position.

That's a fallacy of the undistributed middle.

1) Mike Tyson has two arms and two legs
2) Hobbits have two arms and two legs
3) Mike Tyson is defined as a Hobbit

Just because A shares some properties with B, it doesn't mean that A is defined as B.

Just because NIH shares some properties with supernaturalism, it doesn't mean that NIH is defined as supernaturalistic.

Just because Mike Tyson shares some properties with Hobbits, it doesn't mean that Mike Tyson is defined as a Hobbit.

When you say "NIH posits that the universe coming into existence is a supernatural event", you are attaching to NIH notions which fall under the definition of supernatural and which DO apply to NIH, such as the notion that NIH implies the existence of stuff outside the universe, but you also are attaching to NIH notions which fall under the definition of supernatural and which do NOT apply to NIH, such as deities, spirits, ghosts, souls, etc.

When you say "I posit that Mike Tyson is a Hobbit" you are attaching to your statement notions which fall under the definition of Hobbit and which DO apply to Mike Tyson, such as the notions of having two arms and two legs, but you also are attaching to your statement notions which fall under the definition of Hobbit which do NOT apply to Mike Tyson, such as possessing magical rings and being buddies with Wizards.

Just because NIH shares some properties with supernaturalism, it doesn't mean that it's ok to define NIH as supernaturalistic.

Just because Mike Typson IRREFUTABLY shares some properties with Hobbits, it doesn't mean that it's ok to define Mike Tyson as a Hobbit.

The exact same argument applies to the word "miracle".

Both the words supernatural and miracle are inextricably intertwined with religion, theism, deism, intelligent design, spirituality, spirits, ghosts, God, heaven, hell, omnipotence, etc.

Just because some properties are shared between NIH and the words "Supernatural" and "miracle", these words simply cannot be used to label a concept (NIH) which is fundamentally antithetical to so many of the core definitional meanings of the words "supernatural" and "miracle".

Just because some properties are shared between Mike Tyson and the words "Hobbit" and "caused-by-a-hobbit", these words simply cannot be used to label a concept (Mike Tyson), which is fundamentally antithetical to so many of the core definitional meanings of the words "Hobbit" and "caused-by-a-hobbit".

Look, the bottom line, is that we agree on the concepts. Everything is clearly defined in our heads. This is just a disagreement on which words to use to describe these clear concepts.

I cannot use the word supernatural to describe a mechanistic event happening outside the universe (such as NIH), for the same reason I cannot use the word "Hobbit" to describe Mike Tyson.

It's a fallacy of the undistributed middle.

If we cannot agree on a word to describe these concepts, then the only solution for now is to describe the concepts rather than attempting to mislabel them.

I think that when we are trying to describe "an event happening outside the universe" we should just say "an event happening outside the universe" rather than trying to use words such as "extra-universal" which you don't like, or "supernatural" which is logically fallacious.

Similarly, for "something caused by an event happening outside the universe", let's just say "something caused by an event happening outside the universe" instead of using the word "miracle" which would be a fallacy from the undistributed middle.

Post by **otseng** » Sat Feb 22, 2014 7:55 am

no evidence no belief wrote: For example: Assume we know NOTHING about magnetism.

We see a piece of iron move upwards towards another object hovering above it.

This event violates a known law of nature: Gravity.

There are two possible types of explanations for the apparent violation of the law of gravity

1) It's being caused by something external to the universe, such as a goblin in Narnia pulling at the piece of metal with an invisible inter-dimensional string made out of fairy's pubic hair

or

2) There is a force inside the universe that we know nothing about which overrides the force of gravity: magnetism.

It truly could be either of these.

Violating a known law is not sufficient to be considered a miracle. It is only one of two requirements to be considered a miracle. The other is that it must have a supernatural origin.

Let me ask you this, suppose something does have its origin from the supernatural, but also obeys known natural laws, would it be considered a miracle?

no evidence no belief wrote:
Not exactly. I accept that things exist in the UNIVERSE that are outside our universe. It could be stuff like angels, demons, spiritual beings, heaven, hell, etc. But, I don't believe that other universes exist other than ours (eg multiverse).
Interesting. Obviously I disagree. Lets put a pin in this disagreement until such a time as it becomes germane to our primary discussion, though, ok?

We can defer it.

I would agree that there are internal contradictions with the Wikipedia article. I think this again reveals that a naturalistic view of the universe -- even trying to just define it -- has self-contradictions.
See, this is the problem with using the word nature/universe/reality/naturalistic, etc in a very restrictive way for the purpose of our argument, while in the real world there are all sorts of additional definitions associated with it.

Now I don't know if with the use of the word "naturalistic" above, you mean "the belief that nothing exists other than that which was caused by the big bang" (our definition of "naturalistic") or whether you use the common definition of "naturalistic", which is "disbelief in fairies, ghosts, leprechauns and goblins".

I use the term in how we are defining nature. Natural is anything in our universe.

The problem arises because I am NOT a naturalist in the sense that I do not believe that the only stuff that exists is that which is downstream of the big bang in the causal chain. This is our internal definition of nature.

Seriously, this is how naturalism is defined on wikipedia: "Adherents of naturalism (i.e., naturalists) assert that natural laws are the rules that govern the structure and behavior of the natural universe, that the changing universe at every stage is a product of these laws."

There is one major problem -- the origin of the universe. This definition of naturalism cannot account for the origin of the universe, because by definition, it can only account for the structure and behavior of the universe, not its origin.

As we both agree to, there must be something external to our universe (which cannot be natural and must be supernatural), that caused the origin of the universe.

By this definition, a deist is a naturalist! a deist believes that God caused the big bang, infused it with natural laws, and that these natural laws govern everything in the natural universe.

By our definition of the supernatural, a deist is a supernaturalist, since she believes in something external to our universe.

I'm having second thoughts about use of the words "supernatural", "miracle", etc to describe purely mechanistic events that just happen to be upstream of the big bang.

That doesn't surprise me.

If an event obeys the known laws of supernature, or is known to obey supernautral laws irrespective of whether we understand those supernatural laws fully, then we know it's natural.
I don't understand this. What are the "known laws of supernature"?
So far, the only one we've identified is the laws of logic.

Just because something obeys the laws of logic doesn't mean it's natural.

I reject the use of terms "supernatural" and "miracle" entirely, when describing NIH. Sorry for the time wasted, but I changed my mind. See below for my updated position on this.

Well, back to the drawing board.

Do you agree that the argument below, however you want to call it, is bunk?

"I don't know if A or B is right, therefore A is right" ("I don't know if it's natural or supernatural, therefore it's supernatural")
Sure. And it applies equally if A is IH or NIH.
Right. The difference is I never tried to apply it to anything, wheres you tried to apply it the term "miracle" by trying to define miracle as "something which we don't know if it's a miracle or not".

Huh? Where did I define miracle as "something which we don't know if it's a miracle or not"?

Does the Bible say God created the heavens and the earth DIRECTLY?
I don't believe that God created the universe through purely naturalistic processes if that's what you're asking.
See. Here you're using the word "naturalistic" in the commonly accepted way, not in the restricted sense that we'd agreed on.

If nature simply means that downstream of the big bang, and supernature is simply that upstream of it, then OBVIOUSLY God and any of his activity is not naturalistic. That's something you shouldn't even have to bring up if that's what you meant.

Yeah, I should've used a different term other than naturalistic. Perhaps mechanistic. I'll define it as some process devoid of teleology, consciousness, intentionality. It follows some process that can be described mathematically, whether in statistical form or determinate form. It can be applied to processes inside or outside our universe.

But if naturalistic means disbelief in fairies, ghosts, souls, demons, angels and other fairy tale characters, then specifying that God didn't create the universe in a naturalistic way, might be something necessary to specify.

We need to define another word for disbelief in fairies etc.

It's superfluous if NIH has not been established. If NIH HAD been established, then claiming "an inteligent entity with the ability to created caused NIH would be logically plausible, making the existence of an intelligent creator an unfalsifiable claim, because you might choose not to avail yourself of it, but the logical ability to always push it one step back will always exist.

For the purposes of this debate, all we need is to determine the immediate cause of the universe - whether it is NIH or IH. We do not need to determine the cause of NIH or IH.

We can discuss it another time, but for the record, I think theology is a made up discipline.

Sure, if NIH is true, theology is just a bunch of bunk and based on fiction. If IH is true, then theology is a legitimate field.

And let's not forget the slight possibility that maybe, just maybe, religious leaders could be wrong, and stoning to death a bride who is discovered to be not a virgin on her wedding night, is not the best way to go about things.

You can't use an extreme case of a single religion to dismiss all of religion. Also, no religious leader is completely right. They are fallible like all people are.

At least half of the definitions of supernatural out there involve spirits, deities, gods, magic, the occult, spirituality, faith, religion, etc. These are definitions that are antithetical to NIH, and to a general discussion based on your general principle.

Wait a minute. All we're saying that the supernatural is according to our definition is simply things that are not natural, that is, things that our outside our universe. It could be that spirits and deities exist outside our universe, but we are not defining that they actually exist. We are simply saying anything outside our universe is considered supernatural. With this definition, it is clear whether something is natural or supernatural, there is no undistributed middle. If something has the property of existing outside this universe, it is by definition supernatural.

I think what you really oppose is the connotation that the supernatural means that fairies, magic, occult, etc actually exist. In our definition, they could exist, but they do not have to exist.

Just because NIH shares some properties with supernaturalism, it doesn't mean that NIH is defined as supernaturalistic.

It all depends on how we define the terms. Again, if we define supernatural as not our universe, then by definition NIH is supernaturalistic.

When you say "NIH posits that the universe coming into existence is a supernatural event", you are attaching to NIH notions which fall under the definition of supernatural and which DO apply to NIH, such as the notion that NIH implies the existence of stuff outside the universe, but you also are attaching to NIH notions which fall under the definition of supernatural and which do NOT apply to NIH, such as deities, spirits, ghosts, souls, etc.

Now this would be the undistributed middle fallacy. I do not claim that deities, spirits, ghosts, souls, etc apply to NIH.

Just because NIH shares some properties with supernaturalism, it doesn't mean that it's ok to define NIH as supernaturalistic.

Here is your definition of the supernatural that we agreed to: "Everything which did not begin to exist at the big bang - Everything which would exist even if the big bang did not happen." This is all that supernatural means. It does not mean that everything supernatural is a deity, spirit, ghost, soul. Some of it could include those, but not everything would be those.

Just because some properties are shared between NIH and the words "Supernatural" and "miracle", these words simply cannot be used to label a concept (NIH) which is fundamentally antithetical to so many of the core definitional meanings of the words "supernatural" and "miracle".

That is why we are trying to lock down on definitions for the purposes of our debate. Once we agree to them, outside definitions would no longer apply.

I cannot use the word supernatural to describe a mechanistic event happening outside the universe (such as NIH), for the same reason I cannot use the word "Hobbit" to describe Mike Tyson.

Yes, we can use the term mechanistic to describe NIH. But, we already agreed to the definition of the supernatural that you had proposed. Are you saying that you want to redefine supernatural? If so, what new definition do you propose?

I think that when we are trying to describe "an event happening outside the universe" we should just say "an event happening outside the universe" rather than trying to use words such as "extra-universal" which you don't like, or "supernatural" which is logically fallacious.

Here is the definition you proposed earlier:
"Actually, I now do have a definition of supernatural: Everything which did not begin to exist at the big bang - Everything which would exist even if the big bang did not happen."

By your definition, NIH is supernatural. There is no logically fallacy here.

no evidence no belief · Sun Feb 23, 2014 12:44 am

otseng wrote:
no evidence no belief wrote: For example: Assume we know NOTHING about magnetism.

We see a piece of iron move upwards towards another object hovering above it.

This event violates a known law of nature: Gravity.

There are two possible types of explanations for the apparent violation of the law of gravity

1) It's being caused by something external to the universe, such as a goblin in Narnia pulling at the piece of metal with an invisible inter-dimensional string made out of fairy's pubic hair

or

2) There is a force inside the universe that we know nothing about which overrides the force of gravity: magnetism.

It truly could be either of these.
Violating a known law is not sufficient to be considered a miracle. It is only one of two requirements to be considered a miracle. The other is that it must have a supernatural origin.

Let me ask you this, suppose something does have its origin from the supernatural, but also obeys known natural laws, would it be considered a miracle?

This is all moot, because unfortunately I changed my mind about use of this set of definitions, and we're back to the drawing board. But for the sake of just wrapping it up, yes, I would say that under our old definition, an event that is directly caused by something outside the universe and follows the laws of nature once it gets here, would be miraculous.

For example, if aliens from a parallel universe were to make an apple materialize on earth, and that apple, once it started to exist, followed the laws of nature, it would be a miracle.

Similarly, if Jesus had never performed miracles, never done anything that violated the laws of nature, and the only thing special about him were that half his genetic code came from outside of the universe, wouldn't Jesus's existence - in conformity with natural law but supernatural in origin - be miraculous?

Anyway. This doesn't matter anymore, we have to scrap the definitions system we had. Sorry about that, bud.

I would agree that there are internal contradictions with the Wikipedia article. I think this again reveals that a naturalistic view of the universe -- even trying to just define it -- has self-contradictions.
See, this is the problem with using the word nature/universe/reality/naturalistic, etc in a very restrictive way for the purpose of our argument, while in the real world there are all sorts of additional definitions associated with it.

Now I don't know if with the use of the word "naturalistic" above, you mean "the belief that nothing exists other than that which was caused by the big bang" (our definition of "naturalistic") or whether you use the common definition of "naturalistic", which is "disbelief in fairies, ghosts, leprechauns and goblins".
I use the term in how we are defining nature. Natural is anything in our universe.

Right, but the way we had defined it, is different from the way the rest of the world defines it. If you and I were stuck on a desert island, we could choose whatever labels we wanted for concepts, and it would not matter that these labels had completely different concepts attached to them in the world beyond our desert island. But we're not debating in a vacuum. Our definitions for any given concept must match as closely as possible to the definitions of that concept used by the rest of humanity.

The problem arises because I am NOT a naturalist in the sense that I do not believe that the only stuff that exists is that which is downstream of the big bang in the causal chain. This is our internal definition of nature.

Seriously, this is how naturalism is defined on wikipedia: "Adherents of naturalism (i.e., naturalists) assert that natural laws are the rules that govern the structure and behavior of the natural universe, that the changing universe at every stage is a product of these laws."
There is one major problem -- the origin of the universe. This definition of naturalism cannot account for the origin of the universe, because by definition, it can only account for the structure and behavior of the universe, not its origin.

As we both agree to, there must be something external to our universe (which cannot be natural and must be supernatural), that caused the origin of the universe.

I agree that naturalism (as defined on wikipedia) doesn't account for the origin of the universe. Therefore we must devise different methods and philosophies to explore that which is outside the universe, or naturalism must be updated.

Whatever word we choose to describe "that which goes beyond naturalism in its current form", it would be ill-advised to choose a word like "supernaturalism", because "going beyond naturalism" is only one of the attributes of the word as per common definitions. In addition to that, the word is commonly understood to also have additional meanings which are religious, theological, spiritual, occult, magical, etc.

Just because word X shares some attribute with concept Y, word X doesn't necessarily define concept Y.

The word "wooden chair" shares some attributes with the concept of a very sharp wooden stick sticking out from the ground. Both the chair and the sharp stick are made of wood. They share that attribute. But a "wooden chair" would be a very poor choice as a word to describe a sharp stick, because while they're both made of wood, you wouldn't sit on a sharp stick, would you?

The word "supernatural" shares some attributes with the concept of an entity that caused the big bang. Both the "supernatural" and the entity that caused the big bang imply existence outside of the universe. They share that attribute. But "supernatural" would be a very poor choice as a word to describe NIH, because while they both imply existence outside the universe, NIH rejects all the attributes commonly associated with the supernatural, such as God, Allah, Zeus, prayer, faith, spirituality, etc.

Consider this Venn Diagram

If A is wooden chairs and B is sharp wooden sticks, then C is that they are both made of wood.

A and B have C in common. Would it therefore be reasonable to use the word chair to describe a sharp stick?

If A is a hobbit and B is Mike Tyson, then C is that they both have two arms, two legs, and two eyes.

A and B have C in common. Would it therefore be reasonable to use the word Hobbit to describe Mike Tyson?

If A is a miracle and B is an event upstream of the big bang in the causal chain, then C is that they both acknowledge something existing outside the universe.

A and B have C in common. Would it therefore be reasonable to use the word miracle to describe an event upstream of the big bang?

By this definition, a deist is a naturalist! a deist believes that God caused the big bang, infused it with natural laws, and that these natural laws govern everything in the natural universe.
By our definition of the supernatural, a deist is a supernaturalist, since she believes in something external to our universe.

Right! By the accepted definition in the real world, a deist is a naturalist, by our definition, a deist is a supernaturalist.

I'm not saying our definition is in and of itself bad. It's internally consistent and elegant. As is the rest of the world's definition.

But can you see why it's problematic to use our own private, internally consistent, definition, if this private internally consistent definition is diametrically opposite to the definition of the human race? Can you see how that might lead to some confusion?

We could decide to define "wooden chair" as any object made of wood. By that definition, a sharp wooden stick sticking out from the ground would be a "wooden chair". That would be an internally consistent definition, and acceptable if there wasn't already a consensus in place among the whole of humanity that "wooden chair" is an object which it's generally safe to sit on. Can you see how that would lead to some confusion?

I think that when deciding what labels to apply to concepts we're discussing, we should avoid definitions that, because of the fallacy of undistributed middle, would result in absurd contradictions such as "a deist is a naturalist/a deist is a supernaturalist" or "a chair is something you can sit on/a chair is something you should NOT sit on".

Do you agree that the argument below, however you want to call it, is bunk?

"I don't know if A or B is right, therefore A is right" ("I don't know if it's natural or supernatural, therefore it's supernatural")
Sure. And it applies equally if A is IH or NIH.
Right. The difference is I never tried to apply it to anything, wheres you tried to apply it the term "miracle" by trying to define miracle as "something which we don't know if it's a miracle or not".
Huh? Where did I define miracle as "something which we don't know if it's a miracle or not"?

When you defined miracle as something that we don't know whether it's following natural law or not.

But I understand that that's just one of the two parameters that something must meet to be miraculous. Therefore this second half of the definition, which I disagreed with, is not logically fallacious. It's just unnecessary.

And in any case, it's part of a definitional system we've had to scrap. Again, my apologies.

Does the Bible say God created the heavens and the earth DIRECTLY?
I don't believe that God created the universe through purely naturalistic processes if that's what you're asking.
See. Here you're using the word "naturalistic" in the commonly accepted way, not in the restricted sense that we'd agreed on.

If nature simply means that downstream of the big bang, and supernature is simply that upstream of it, then OBVIOUSLY God and any of his activity is not naturalistic. That's something you shouldn't even have to bring up if that's what you meant.
Yeah, I should've used a different term other than naturalistic. Perhaps mechanistic. I'll define it as some process devoid of teleology, consciousness, intentionality. It follows some process that can be described mathematically, whether in statistical form or determinate form. It can be applied to processes inside or outside our universe.

That's precisely my point. If we choose a word to describe a concept, but that word has a completely different meaning as per the consensus of a humanity we are part of, we are bound to get confused and sometime use that word as the only two members of this on-on-one debate, and sometime use that word as members of the human race.

For the purposes of this debate, all we need is to determine the immediate cause of the universe - whether it is NIH or IH. We do not need to determine the cause of NIH or IH.

We'll need to get back to this. It is germane to the issue of falsifiability, in my opinion.

We can discuss it another time, but for the record, I think theology is a made up discipline.
Sure, if NIH is true, theology is just a bunch of bunk and based on fiction. If IH is true, then theology is a legitimate field.

I still disagree. Theology is the field of study of things which are not supported by evidence and logic. If it turned out that IH were supported by evidence and logic, then it would indeed be reasonable to consider it true, but in that very instant it would stop being the purview of theology and be the purview of science.

Of course, my thesis on this matter is completely destroyed if you can present an example of a theological claim which is supported by logic and evidence. This needn't be a deviation from our current debate, since all theological claims are irrefutably false if IH isn't true.

And let's not forget the slight possibility that maybe, just maybe, religious leaders could be wrong, and stoning to death a bride who is discovered to be not a virgin on her wedding night, is not the best way to go about things.
You can't use an extreme case of a single religion to dismiss all of religion. Also, no religious leader is completely right. They are fallible like all people are.

I have a rebuttal to this, but don't want the discussion to splinter. Trying to stay on topic.

At least half of the definitions of supernatural out there involve spirits, deities, gods, magic, the occult, spirituality, faith, religion, etc. These are definitions that are antithetical to NIH, and to a general discussion based on your general principle.
Wait a minute. All we're saying that the supernatural is according to our definition is simply things that are not natural, that is, things that our outside our universe. It could be that spirits and deities exist outside our universe, but we are not defining that they actually exist. We are simply saying anything outside our universe is considered supernatural. With this definition, it is clear whether something is natural or supernatural, there is no undistributed middle. If something has the property of existing outside this universe, it is by definition supernatural.

You are misunderstanding me. Our own internal definition of natural/supernatural, in a vacuum, in and of itself, is clearcut, elegant and does not contradict with itself. It does not cause a fallacy of the undistributed middle.

If the entire human race forgot how to talk, and we had to reinvent all languages, and we decided to assign the label "natural" to things which are downstream of the big bang in the causal chain, and "supernatural" to things which are upstream, there would be no problem whatsoever. The definition is perfectly clear, and perfectly functional.

The problem is that we don't live in a vacuum, humanity has not forgotten its languages. Languages already exist and the words "natural" and "supernatural" are already taken.

Incidentally the words "natural" and "supernatural" have been accepted unanimously by the human race to have a more nuanced and extended meaning than the one we were attempting to assign to them, and it just so happens that many aspects of the words have definitions which directly contradict the characteristics of the phenomena we're trying to describe in our debate. It's confusing and counterproductive.

We could decide, for the purpose of discussing who is the best boxer who ever lived, to define a "hobbit" as a person with two arms and two legs. In and of itself, that definition is perfectly fine, clear and not contradictory. Under that definition, Mike Tyson would be a Hobbit. No problem.

But can you see how the fact that to the rest of humanity, there are several other concepts attached to the word "Hobbit", in addition to having two arms and two legs, might create some confusion? Do you see how somebody overhearing our use of the word Hobbit, might think that we're talking about Tolkien's book and not about boxing?

I think what you really oppose is the connotation that the supernatural means that fairies, magic, occult, etc actually exist. In our definition, they could exist, but they do not have to exist.

I understand that in our definition fairies, magic, occult etc are completely unrelated to the dichotomy between natural and supernatural. The problem is that our definition is arbitrarily and unjustifiably fundamentally different from the dictionary definition of natural and supernatural. To everybody in the world, the word supernatural is inextricably intertwined with fairies, magic, occult, religion, faith, theology, dragons, leprechauns, tarot cards, love potions, witches, unicorns, etc.

Natural and supernatural are just bad words to define a clear-cut scientific concept such as the location of an event on a causal chain.

Hey, rather than using the words natural and supernatural, we could use the words magical and non-magical, to define something upstream and downstream of the big bang respectively. But why? Why confuse ourselves and everybody else, by using words that have completely separate meaning from what we're actually talking about.

Here is the definition of "magic": "the power of apparently influencing the course of events by using mysterious or supernatural forces."

Look, here is the bottom line.

Here are some synonyms for supernatural from thesaurus.com: Ghostly, metaphysical, mythical, psychic, mystic, occult, phantom and FAIRY.

Here are some antonyms (opposite words) for supernatural from thesaurus.com: Existent, genuine, true, real.

This is not my opinion. This is from a reputable source.

We are not discussing voodoo, we are not discussing witchcraft, we are not discussing love potions. We are discussing science. We are discussing evidence. We are discussing logic. I refuse to use occult words in this context. It's ridiculous. It completely hijacks the scope of the conversation.

Just because NIH shares some properties with supernaturalism, it doesn't mean that NIH is defined as supernaturalistic.
It all depends on how we define the terms. Again, if we define supernatural as not our universe, then by definition NIH is supernaturalistic.

It all depends on how we define the terms. Again, if we define "hobbit" as a person having two arms and two legs, then by definition Mike Tyson is a hobbit.

But why on earth, of all the words in the world which we could choose to use to describe a person with two arms and two legs, do we have to use a word that has so many additional misleading and confusing connotations?

Why not just use a term like "biarmed biped", or something. Or if we can't think of a good word, why don't we just say "person with two arms and two legs"?

When you say "NIH posits that the universe coming into existence is a supernatural event", you are attaching to NIH notions which fall under the definition of supernatural and which DO apply to NIH, such as the notion that NIH implies the existence of stuff outside the universe, but you also are attaching to NIH notions which fall under the definition of supernatural and which do NOT apply to NIH, such as deities, spirits, ghosts, souls, etc.
Now this would be the undistributed middle fallacy. I do not claim that deities, spirits, ghosts, souls, etc apply to NIH.

You don't. I understand that. But the word "supernatural" in and of itself DOES.

Why use a word that by definition irrefutably means deities, spirits, ghosts, souls, occult, voodoo, mystic, shamanism, when you DON'T MEAN deities, spirits, ghosts, souls, occult, voodoo, mystic, shamanism?

That's as silly as using the word Hobbit to describe Mike Tyson. We could say "Hey, for the purpose of this discussion, let's ignore the portions of the word Hobbit which refer to mythical creatures which own magical rings, and let's just focus on the fact that hobbits have two arms and two legs". If you said that, then technically the word Hobbit would accurately describe Mike Tyson. But WHY? Seriously Oliver. Why?

Just because NIH shares some properties with supernaturalism, it doesn't mean that it's ok to define NIH as supernaturalistic.
Here is your definition of the supernatural that we agreed to: "Everything which did not begin to exist at the big bang - Everything which would exist even if the big bang did not happen." This is all that supernatural means. It does not mean that everything supernatural is a deity, spirit, ghost, soul. Some of it could include those, but not everything would be those.

I understand completely that this is a definition that I proposed. I was trying to be accommodating, and move the debate along rather than getting it stuck on semantics. I apologize for the waste of time and effort, but I changed my mind. To arbitrarily change the meaning of a word fundamentally can lead to nothing but confusion.

Just because some properties are shared between NIH and the words "Supernatural" and "miracle", these words simply cannot be used to label a concept (NIH) which is fundamentally antithetical to so many of the core definitional meanings of the words "supernatural" and "miracle".
That is why we are trying to lock down on definitions for the purposes of our debate. Once we agree to them, outside definitions would no longer apply.

Well, as long as we're in the business of arbitrarily picking words and assigning to them meanings that have nothing whatsoever to do with their dictionary definition, I would like to define the word "unimportant" as "a person who lived between 2100 and 1900 years ago somewhere in the middle east, rode a donkey, and washed his friends' feet". By that definition, Jesus was unimportant.

If you find my statement above absurd, then you know exactly how I feel.

To define the scientific concept of "upstream of the big bang in the causal chain" with the word "supernatural", which is irrefutably associated with voodoo, witchcraft, tarot reading, love potions, magical spells, unicorns and dragons, is utterly absurd, much like using the word "unimportant" to define one of the most influential figures in human history.

I cannot use the word supernatural to describe a mechanistic event happening outside the universe (such as NIH), for the same reason I cannot use the word "Hobbit" to describe Mike Tyson.
Yes, we can use the term mechanistic to describe NIH. But, we already agreed to the definition of the supernatural that you had proposed. Are you saying that you want to redefine supernatural? If so, what new definition do you propose?

I would like to go back to define the supernatural as "relating to deities, spirits, ghosts, souls, paranormal, voodoo, mysticism, religion, faith, theology, unicorns and fairies", as per the standard definition agreed upon by every dictionary and thesaurus in existence.

I think that when we are trying to describe "an event happening outside the universe" we should just say "an event happening outside the universe" rather than trying to use words such as "extra-universal" which you don't like, or "supernatural" which is logically fallacious.
Here is the definition you proposed earlier:
"Actually, I now do have a definition of supernatural: Everything which did not begin to exist at the big bang - Everything which would exist even if the big bang did not happen."

By your definition, NIH is supernatural. There is no logically fallacy here.

Yes. I was wrong to propose that definition.

If you define supernatural as "everything which did not begin to exist at the big bang" then NIH is indeed supernatural. I agree that there is no logical fallacy there.

If you define Hobbit as "a person with two arms and two legs" then Mike Tyson is a hobbit. There is no logical fallacy there.

The logical fallacy appears when you try to square your arbitrary made up definitions of supernatural and hobbit with the actual definitions that the whole of humanity agrees on.

This is the definition of supernatural, and this is the definition of Hobbit. Let's stick with those. The subject matter of our debate is complicated enough without confusing ourselves and any readers by erratically and arbitrarily picking random and unrelated words to describe concepts.

And until we find a good word to encapsulate "upstream of the big bang" and "downstream of the big bang", let's just say "upstream of the big bang" and "downstream of the big bang", ok?

If you agree with the above, I'm ready for your argument from fine-tuning.

no evidence no belief · Sun Feb 23, 2014 11:33 am

Here are a few synonyms of "supernatural" from synonyms.com:

ghostlike
ghostly
phantasmal
spectral
spiritual
weird
elfin
magic
magical
sorcerous
witching(prenominal)
wizard(prenominal)
wizardly
metaphysical
necromantic
talismanic
witchlike

"Supernatural" is a word commonly used to describe clairvoyants, shamans, leprechauns, fairies, voodoo, witches, incantations, mediums, necromancers, elves, gnomes, unicorns, dragons and Santa.

I'm sorry, but to use such a loaded word to describe a scientific, pragmatic, secular concept such as a locus on a causal chain, in the middle of a debate which stresses the importance of logic and evidence, is beyond the pale.

I apologize for being late to realize this, and wasting our valuable time, but I cannot stand for this.

If we cannot agree on a word to use, when we mean "upstream of the big bang in the causal chain", lets just say "upstream of the big bang in the causal chain".

no evidence no belief · Sun Feb 23, 2014 6:19 pm

Schedule of differences between the concept "Upstream of the big bang in the causal chain" and the word "supernatural" as commonly defined by the entire world.

[mrow]Upstream of big bang[mcol]"Supernatural"[row]Has nothing whatsoever to do with ghosts, phantasms, specters and spirits[col] Related to ghosts, phantasm, specters and spirits in its common use[row]Has nothing to do with elves, goblins, gnomes and hobbits[col] Related to elves, goblins, gnomes and hobbits in its common use[row]Has nothing to do with magic, sorcery or wizardry[col]Related to magic, sorcery and wizardry in its common use[row]Has nothing to do with spirituality[col]Part and parcel with spirituality in its common use[row] Makes no statement whatsoever about metaphysics[col]Related to metaphysics in its common use[row]Has nothing to do with necromancy, witchcraft or occult arts[col] Related to necromancy, witchcraft and the occult in its common use[row]Has nothing to do with fairies, pixies, leprechauns, sirens, mermaids, sprites and gremlins[col] Is related to fairies, pixies, leprechauns, sirens, mermaids, sprites and gremlins[row] Has nothing to do with unicorns, dragons, flying reindeer, phoenixes, three headed dogs and other mythical animals[col]Related to mythical animals in common use[row]Has nothing whatsoever to do with magic talismans[col] Used to describe magic talismans[row] Does not describe the mechanism by which love potions work[col] Describes the mechanism by which love potions work[row]Does not describe the method by which shamans cause rain[col]Describes the method by which shamans cause rain[row]Does not describe the way voodoo dolls work[col]Describes the way voodoo dolls work[row]The concept of a deity is in no way implied in this[col] Most people associate this word with a deity[row]Does not describe the method by which Santa delivers millions of presents in one night[col]Describes the method by which Santa delivers millions of presents in one night[row] Is strictly under the purview of scientific inquiry [col] Is not under the purview of scientific inquiry[row]Is posited on the basis of logical extrapolation of empirically observed facts [col]Is NOT posited on the basis of logic or facts

Schedule of differences between the concept "Upstream of the big bang in the causal chain" and the word "artichoke" as commonly defined by the entire world.

[mrow]Upstream of big bang[mcol]"Artichoke"[row]Is not a vegetable[col] Is a vegetable

I'm not saying we should use the word "artichoke" to describe an event upstream of the big bang. Artichokes have nothing to do with this scientific concept. I'm just saying that if we're apparently in the business of randomly picking absurd words that have nothing to do with anything to describe a clearly outlined and relatively simple concept, then the word "artichoke" presents less problems and potential confusion than the word "supernatural".

I think we should just abbreviate the concept of "upstream of the big bang" to UBB, and "downstream of the big bang" to DBB. Easy, simple, direct, and doesn't accidentally introduce necromantic talismans or nutritious vegetables into the discussion.

Post by **otseng** » Mon Feb 24, 2014 12:40 am

no evidence no belief wrote: Our definitions for any given concept must match as closely as possible to the definitions of that concept used by the rest of humanity.

I agree. That is why the definitions to the terms that I've provided have been from dictionary sources.

By this definition, a deist is a naturalist! a deist believes that God caused the big bang, infused it with natural laws, and that these natural laws govern everything in the natural universe.
By our definition of the supernatural, a deist is a supernaturalist, since she believes in something external to our universe.
Right! By the accepted definition in the real world, a deist is a naturalist, by our definition, a deist is a supernaturalist.

However, even with the Wikipedia definition, a deist is not a naturalist. As we both agree to, the Wikipedia definition does not include the origin of the universe. And I do not accept that the "totality of existence" includes things outside of the universe in the Wiki definition.

But can you see why it's problematic to use our own private, internally consistent, definition, if this private internally consistent definition is diametrically opposite to the definition of the human race? Can you see how that might lead to some confusion?

I would not say that it is "diametrically opposite". Rather, I think there is significant overlap. But, I do agree that confusion can exist.

But I understand that that's just one of the two parameters that something must meet to be miraculous. Therefore this second half of the definition, which I disagreed with, is not logically fallacious. It's just unnecessary.

And in any case, it's part of a definitional system we've had to scrap. Again, my apologies.

I don't think it's unnecessary, but, like you said, since you've decided not to agree to the definitions, this is moot.

For the purposes of this debate, all we need is to determine the immediate cause of the universe - whether it is NIH or IH. We do not need to determine the cause of NIH or IH.
We'll need to get back to this. It is germane to the issue of falsifiability, in my opinion.

Really? OK, we can discuss this.

We can discuss it another time, but for the record, I think theology is a made up discipline.
Sure, if NIH is true, theology is just a bunch of bunk and based on fiction. If IH is true, then theology is a legitimate field.
I still disagree. Theology is the field of study of things which are not supported by evidence and logic.

There is significant dependence on evidence and logic. In (Evangelical) Christian theology, the evidence is primarily the Bible. Doctrines must be formulated by scriptural support. So, you might not agree with the evidence, but it is still supported by evidence (the Bible) and logic.

If it turned out that IH were supported by evidence and logic, then it would indeed be reasonable to consider it true, but in that very instant it would stop being the purview of theology and be the purview of science.

That's quite a claim. I do not see how you can support such a claim.

Of course, my thesis on this matter is completely destroyed if you can present an example of a theological claim which is supported by logic and evidence.

Well, what we're discussing is the very first verse of the Bible.

"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." Gen 1:1

If the entire human race forgot how to talk, and we had to reinvent all languages, and we decided to assign the label "natural" to things which are downstream of the big bang in the causal chain, and "supernatural" to things which are upstream, there would be no problem whatsoever. The definition is perfectly clear, and perfectly functional.

The problem is that we don't live in a vacuum, humanity has not forgotten its languages. Languages already exist and the words "natural" and "supernatural" are already taken.

That's why you suggested to link back to our accepted definitions so that readers would know how we are using terms.

We could decide, for the purpose of discussing who is the best boxer who ever lived, to define a "hobbit" as a person with two arms and two legs. In and of itself, that definition is perfectly fine, clear and not contradictory. Under that definition, Mike Tyson would be a Hobbit. No problem.

We are not defining words to mean things that are totally different. When we say that something is natural means that something is part of our universe, this is totally compatible with accepted definitions. Further, when we say that something is supernatural means something that is outside our universe, again, it is totally compatible with standard definitions.

Natural and supernatural are just bad words to define a clear-cut scientific concept such as the location of an event on a causal chain.

Actually, I think we've already gone beyond the realm of science and entered the world of metaphysics.

To everybody in the world, the word supernatural is inextricably intertwined with fairies, magic, occult, religion, faith, theology, dragons, leprechauns, tarot cards, love potions, witches, unicorns, etc.

Actually, I would not disagree. But even though I do not believe in fairies, tarot cards, and love potions, I am not opposed to the usage of the word supernatural. Sure, people have they own concepts of the supernatural. But, there's not going to be any terms that we use that are free from personal interpretations.

We are discussing science. We are discussing evidence. We are discussing logic.

I would not really say we are discussing "science". But I would agree that we are discussing evidence and logic.

To define the scientific concept of "upstream of the big bang in the causal chain" with the word "supernatural", which is irrefutably associated with voodoo, witchcraft, tarot reading, love potions, magical spells, unicorns and dragons, is utterly absurd, much like using the word "unimportant" to define one of the most influential figures in human history.

Here's part of the problem. Science has only recently been seriously considering that things exist outside our universe. For practically all of history, there was a clear understanding of what is outside our universe/world, and that was the supernatural realm. Now, science is positing the existence of things outside our universe, but of course does not accept the mystical parts of it. Science is in effect intruding on religion. Terminology for things outside our world/universe has always had religious/mystical connotations.

Now, I don't mind if we use another word other than supernatural, provided that we agree to the definitions and that the terms are clear.

I would like to go back to define the supernatural as "relating to deities, spirits, ghosts, souls, paranormal, voodoo, mysticism, religion, faith, theology, unicorns and fairies", as per the standard definition agreed upon by every dictionary and thesaurus in existence.

There are multiple definitions for supernatural. This would not be the primary definition of supernatural in dictionaries. For example, here are the first entry from several dictionaries:

"of, pertaining to, or being above or beyond what is natural; unexplainable by natural law or phenomena; abnormal."
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/supernatural

"(of a manifestation or event) attributed to some force beyond scientific understanding or the laws of nature."
http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/de ... pernatural

"of or relating to things that cannot be explained according to natural laws"
http://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictio ... pernatural

The logical fallacy appears when you try to square your arbitrary made up definitions of supernatural and hobbit with the actual definitions that the whole of humanity agrees on.

Well, our definition lines up with the primary definition of supernatural as I've provided above.

And until we find a good word to encapsulate "upstream of the big bang" and "downstream of the big bang", let's just say "upstream of the big bang" and "downstream of the big bang", ok?

If you agree with the above, I'm ready for your argument from fine-tuning.

As you posted in post 89, the "upstream of the big bang" would actually preclude God. These statements would rule out God:
"Has nothing to do with spirituality"
"Makes no statement whatsoever about metaphysics"
"Is strictly under the purview of scientific inquiry"

So, no, I do not accept "upstream of the big bang".

BTW, are you also rejecting your previous definition of 'natural'?
"Natural is everything inside our universe."