Creating God on Demand

[StuartJ]

I've been preaching "God" as never being shown to be anything more than the invention of human imaginations.

From my Sunday school and Bible class days, I recognised that "God" was only ever happening inside my head and the heads of those around me.

So have others ... and not JUST in the parietal cortex.

"In the last few years," says Dr. Anderson, "brain imaging technologies have matured in ways that are letting us approach questions that have been around for millennia."

"If the equipment and the experiment produced the presence that was God, then the extrapersonal, unreachable, and independent characteristics of the god definition might be challenged."Dr. Michael Persinger

Such neurophysiological effects of religion seem to give the dictum "Religion is the opium of the people" a new level of meaning. https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/322539.php

For what reasons should believers in "God" continue to believe that their "God" exists outside their minds ...?

[Jagella]

For what reasons should believers in "God" continue to believe that their "God" exists outside their minds ...?

Well, obviously apologists aren't going to let some scientific evidence get in their way. They never let such evidence ruin their faith in the past, so why change now?

At any rate, apologists can argue that even though brain imaging can "see God in the brain," God can still be outside of the brain. Or so they hope. It seems these days that a popular apologetic is to use the Bible god to explain the origin of life and the beginning of the cosmos. He might fit into those gaps of knowledge and need not be merely in the brain.

So as long as we have apologists and gaps in our knowledge, we will have apologists stuffing their god into those gaps.

[Mithrae]

So if I have this right...

Various folk claim to experience the presence of god. This experience is not always available to everyone/is available only under certain circumstances, but has been widely and independently reported. By artificially stimulating parts of the brain, we can mimic that same experience.

How exactly does that imply that experiences without that artificial stimulation are misleading?

When artificial brain stimulation is advanced enough to mimic the experience of your parents, will you view it as undermining the legitimacy of your non-induced experiences?

Well, obviously apologists aren't going to let some scientific evidence get in their way. They never let such evidence ruin their faith in the past, so why change now?

Perhaps it would be appropriate to actually provide some evidence before doing a victory dance over your percieved foes It seems some critics aren't going to let obviously shoddy reasoning stand in the way of claiming a win.

[1213]

I've been preaching "God" as never being shown to be anything more than the invention of human imaginations

But what exactly you have searched, when you have searched God? What is your definition for God?

Bible tells God is love. Is there some proof that humans have invented love? What you think love means?

He who doesn't love doesn't know God, for God is love.
1 John 4:8

.For what reasons should believers in "God" continue to believe that their "God" exists outside their minds ...?

It is true, when I look at this world, love doesnt seem to exist in the hearts of the atheists.


Reason why I believe is the Bible, in my opinion it is too brilliant for to be made without God.

[Jagella]

Various folk claim to experience the presence of god. This experience is not always available to everyone/is available only under certain circumstances, but has been widely and independently reported. By artificially stimulating parts of the brain, we can mimic that same experience.

Yes, and this evidence strongly suggests a natural rather than supernatural basis for theism. It appears that those who experience the presence of a god are actually experiencing a physiological change in their brains.

How exactly does that imply that experiences without that artificial stimulation are misleading?

I suppose the answer to this question should be obvious, but I evidently need to spell it out: since we have no verified evidence at all that gods exist outside of the brain but verified evidence that gods do "exist" within the brain, then we might logically conclude that theism results from brain physiology. In other words, it makes better sense to base our conclusions about theism on evidence that we do have rather than base a conclusion on evidence we don't have.

When artificial brain stimulation is advanced enough to mimic the experience of your parents, will you view it as undermining the legitimacy of your non-induced experiences?

Your analogy here is fatally flawed because we have abundant empirical evidence that people have parents but no such empirical evidence for any gods.

Well, obviously apologists aren't going to let some scientific evidence get in their way. They never let such evidence ruin their faith in the past, so why change now?

Perhaps it would be appropriate to actually provide some evidence before doing a victory dance over your percieved foes...

I assume that my readers know more than they do! But allow me to explain that there are some well-known examples I can cite that apologists do tend to oppose any scientific theory they fear is in opposition to their beliefs. Their opposing the Theory of Evolution and heliocentrism are notorious instances of this kind of opposition to science.

In conclusion, I should point out that what you argue here demonstrates an ignorance of both science and the history of science. Scientists--at least ideally--base their conclusions on evidence they do have rather than hold out hoping that evidence for some other view may be forthcoming. In addition, you seem strangely unaware that opposition to this kind of science has been a significant part of the history of religion, a fact that I thought was so well known that it didn't need to spell it out.

[ttruscott]

I've been preaching "God" as never being shown to be anything more than the invention of human imaginations.

...

For what reasons should believers in "God" continue to believe that their "God" exists outside their minds ...?

Since the Solipsistic pov that all one can know is oneself has not be proven wrong, why bother with such a narrow interpretation of it? Descarte looms in the shadow of Gorgias' Solipsism whom Wiki reports was first recorded by the Greek presocratic sophist, Gorgias (c. 483"375 BC) who is quoted by the Roman sceptic Sextus Empiricus as having stated:

Nothing exists.
Even if something exists, nothing can be known about it.
Even if something could be known about it, knowledge about it can't be communicated to others.

Much of the point of the Sophists was to show that "objective" knowledge was a literal impossibility.

Is your question that we answer what has been questioned and debated publicly since c. 375?

[Mithrae]

Various folk claim to experience the presence of god. This experience is not always available to everyone/is available only under certain circumstances, but has been widely and independently reported. By artificially stimulating parts of the brain, we can mimic that same experience.

Yes, and this evidence strongly suggests a natural rather than supernatural basis for theism. It appears that those who experience the presence of a god are actually experiencing a physiological change in their brains.

People experiencing the presence of their parents are experiencing a physiological change in their brain, but it would be irrational to infer from that (or from a hypothetical ability to artificially stimulate the same experiences) that there's no external cause of the experience.

How exactly does that imply that experiences without that artificial stimulation are misleading?

I suppose the answer to this question should be obvious, but I evidently need to spell it out: since we have no verified evidence at all that gods exist outside of the brain but verified evidence that gods do "exist" within the brain,

Both of those assertions are false, so obviously any conclusion drawn from them will be invalid. Would artificially stimulating the experience of your parents be evidence that they exist within your brain?

When artificial brain stimulation is advanced enough to mimic the experience of your parents, will you view it as undermining the legitimacy of your non-induced experiences?

Your analogy here is fatally flawed because we have abundant empirical evidence that people have parents but no such empirical evidence for any gods.

I have no empirical evidence whatsoever for the existence of your parents. As with experience of god, I'm sure that many people have experienced/empirically verified your parents' existence, but that experience is only available to certain people or under certain circumstances.

Well, obviously apologists aren't going to let some scientific evidence get in their way. They never let such evidence ruin their faith in the past, so why change now?

Perhaps it would be appropriate to actually provide some evidence before doing a victory dance over your percieved foes...

I assume that my readers know more than they do! But allow me to explain that there are some well-known examples I can cite that apologists do tend to oppose any scientific theory they fear is in opposition to their beliefs. Their opposing the Theory of Evolution and heliocentrism are notorious instances of this kind of opposition to science.[/quote]

Copernicus, Galileo and Darwin were all Christian theists

[Jagella]

People experiencing the presence of their parents are experiencing a physiological change in their brain, but it would be irrational to infer from that (or from a hypothetical ability to artificially stimulate the same experiences) that there's no external cause of the experience.

In the case of a person perceiving parents, we can most often objectively verify the parents to conclude that the change in the brain is caused by something external to the brain.
In the case of a person perceiving a god, we cannot objectively verify the god to conclude that the change in the brain is caused by something external to the brain.

So you analogy doesn't work. It is flawed. Trash it.

Would artificially stimulating the experience of your parents be evidence that they exist within your brain?

LOL--who's saying that? We are discussing perceptions in the brain--not gods or parents in the brain. Are those perceptions a result of experiencing something external to the brain? Or are those perceptions caused by the brain itself? In the case of parents, the answer is obviously they do exist outside of brains. But in the case of gods, all we have are perceptions in the brain. Since we only have evidence for perceiving gods in the brain, then gods may well only exist in the brain.

I have no empirical evidence whatsoever for the existence of your parents. As with experience of god, I'm sure that many people have experienced/empirically verified your parents' existence, but that experience is only available to certain people or under certain circumstances.

You need to be more careful when you read my posts. I didn't say that you have empirical evidence for my particular parents--you have empirical evidence for any parents. Do you have any empirical evidence for gods? If you don't, then it's nonsense to compare the existence of parents to the existence of gods.

I can cite that apologists do tend to oppose any scientific theory they fear is in opposition to their beliefs. Their opposing the Theory of Evolution and heliocentrism are notorious instances of this kind of opposition to science.

Copernicus, Galileo and Darwin were all Christian theists

I'm not sure what your point is. Are you concluding that since some scientists have been Christians, then other Christians cannot oppose science?

Sheesh--I couldn't post sloppier logic than this if I tried!

[Mithrae]

I can cite that apologists do tend to oppose any scientific theory they fear is in opposition to their beliefs. Their opposing the Theory of Evolution and heliocentrism are notorious instances of this kind of opposition to science.

Copernicus, Galileo and Darwin were all Christian theists

I'm not sure what your point is. Are you concluding that since some scientists have been Christians, then other Christians cannot oppose science?

Sheesh--I couldn't post sloppier logic than this if I tried!

You claimed that apologists "tend to" oppose any scientific theory they fear is in opposition to their beliefs; in fact you originally asserted that "They never let such evidence ruin their faith in the past."
Then - apparently under the misapprehension that you were supporting your claim and proving silly ol' Mithrae's ignorance - you cited a couple of examples in which Christians (many Christians in fact, not just those credited with the initial breakthroughs) discovered, accepted and promoted religiously controversial information. In fact Darwin found his discoveries particularly challenging and ended his life an agnostic. Of course you could always equivocate or pull a no true scotsman on whatever it is you mean when you say 'apologist,' but given that Copernicus was Catholic clergy and both Galileo and Darwin had seriously considered that calling, I think we can safely say that your would-be 'gotcha' moment was poorly chosen at best.

People experiencing the presence of their parents are experiencing a physiological change in their brain, but it would be irrational to infer from that (or from a hypothetical ability to artificially stimulate the same experiences) that there's no external cause of the experience.

In the case of a person perceiving parents, we can most often objectively verify the parents to conclude that the change in the brain is caused by something external to the brain.
In the case of a person perceiving a god, we cannot objectively verify the god to conclude that the change in the brain is caused by something external to the brain.

So you analogy doesn't work. It is flawed. Trash it.

So you're not making any new argument, then; just re-asserting that god's existence cannot be proved, and failing to substantiate the claim that brain manipulation tells us something new. In order for it to tell us something new (ie, that god doesn't exist) you'd have to ask "Is this information consistent with an existing god,or not?" If the information is consistent with an existing god, then it tells us nothing new about whether or not god exists. That should be blindingly obvious to anyone interested in sound reasoning, rather than cheap attempts at point-scoring.

Clearly, the information is entirely consistent with an existing god, since it's also consistent with existing parents. The comparison to something known to exist is the whole point of that most basic step of critical thinking.

Being able to artificially induce any given experience is not in any way evidence that the non-induced experience isn't caused by an external stimulus. It's really quite poor reasoning to imagine that it is. Especially if/when there are many independent verifications of the experience.

[StuartJ]

[Replying to post 3 by Mithrae]

For what reasons should believers in "God" continue to believe that their "God" exists outside their minds ...?