Question for debate: Do atheist just missunderstand what evidence means?
Alex O'Connor (Cosmic Skeptic) and atheist philosopher says there is evidence for God. He explains why in the first part of this discussion.
He is not the only one, though. Also, Joseph Schmid explains that there is evidence for God, even though he is agnostic.
Alex explains that evidence doesn't have to fully convince you in order to serve as evidence. Something serves as evidence even if it only moves you by 1% toward belief in God.
If you say, there is no "true" evidence for God then that is the no true Scotsman fallacy. Or if you say anything like that. No true evidence, not actual evidence, not real evidence, etc.
It is either evidence or it is not.
He says, an argument could be successful in the sense that it makes the conclusion more probably true than false.
He says, but another way an argument can be successful is if it makes a conclusion more probably true than sans the argument.
This means that if prior to the argument you thought the probability for God was 1%, then after say the fine-tuning argument, you raise that probability to 2%, then the argument was successful.
There is evidence for God according to Atheist Philosopher
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Re: There is evidence for God according to Atheist Philosopher
Post #41[Replying to benchwarmer in post #39]
How we define naturalism is important. For example, if you define it that it can include objects or things that exist beyond space and time, then the word is very open. This means platonic forms can be natural. It means metaphysical souls would be part of the natural world, and that just seems weird.
One could argue that all of reality only consist of physical things, but that is going to be hard to argue for.
How we define naturalism is important. For example, if you define it that it can include objects or things that exist beyond space and time, then the word is very open. This means platonic forms can be natural. It means metaphysical souls would be part of the natural world, and that just seems weird.
One could argue that all of reality only consist of physical things, but that is going to be hard to argue for.
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Re: There is evidence for God according to Atheist Philosopher
Post #42What a coincidental happenstance. I just wrote a para.on that. Yes, the fact is that naturalism, mechanical or metaphysical, posits that all things are more likely to be natural than not (metaphysical naturalism asserts that they cannot be anything else which is a 100% claim I won't break a spear for). This doesn't mean that the supernatural does not or cannot exist, only that what we call 'supernatural' IF it is demonstrated, becomes a phenomenon, and whether it is natural or supernatural cannot be known until studied, explained and understood. Then it becomes Natural, indeed science. Even a god. Until that happens it is still unexplained, even if a phenomenon that is verified (data), and without that it is merely imaginary. None of which is even bad evidence for a god,let alone a particular one.AquinasForGod wrote: ↑Mon Nov 28, 2022 9:13 pm [Replying to benchwarmer in post #39]
How we define naturalism is important. For example, if you define it that it can include objects or things that exist beyond space and time, then the word is very open. This means platonic forms can be natural. It means metaphysical souls would be part of the natural world, and that just seems weird.
One could argue that all of reality only consist of physical things, but that is going to be hard to argue for.
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Re: There is evidence for God according to Atheist Philosopher
Post #43You'll need to take this up with benchwarmer, then, since he is claiming both of these things are problems.TRANSPONDER wrote: ↑Sun Nov 27, 2022 8:13 pm
Atheist reservations about the God -claim are not based on requiring definitions of what a god is by either side, nor by 'positing various attributes for God without having first observed God'.
Not for the purposes of this thread, since it only concerns the first segment of the video.TRANSPONDER wrote: ↑Sun Nov 27, 2022 8:13 pm
And to get back to the video, I wonder whether I need to go on with it
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Re: There is evidence for God according to Atheist Philosopher
Post #44Okay, but you don't even have to leave this thread to see a real-world example of an atheist making the type of comment that O'Conner addresses in the video. See my comments in post #10.Miles wrote: ↑Sun Nov 27, 2022 8:59 pmIn their claim that there is "no evidence" for the existence of god is an atheist slogan
. . .
As a long-time atheist I don't recall ever hearing such a claim, much less as a slogan, without some kind of qualifier before "evidence," such as "convincing," "rational," "reasonable," "persuasive," or the like.
Clearly, then, this is not a straw man.
Yes, as I already noted in my previous reply, the thing O'Conner is saying he finds "helpful" here is this objection to the kalam argument they are discussing -- namely, that the kalam argument, even if successful, doesn't establish God's existence.Miles wrote: ↑Sun Nov 27, 2022 8:59 pmIs it a game-changing inaccuracy?historia wrote: ↑Sun Nov 27, 2022 7:05 pmYour transcription here is inaccurate and your analysis (in brackets) seem confused. The thing O'Conner is saying he finds "helpful" is this objection to the kalam argument they are discussing, not the kalam argument itself.Miles wrote: ↑Sun Nov 27, 2022 6:36 pm
the two of them did manage to slip in some rather god affirming remarks such as:
HOST "The Kalam doesn't get you all the way to god [implying that it is useful to getting you part way there---it does not] Do you find that helpful?"
GUEST "It's certainly helpful in what it seeks to establish [the existence of god (see note below)]
You left out a few words in your transcription, which, together with your bracketed comments, makes it appear as if he is saying the kalam argument itself is helpful. It appears that you accidentally misunderstood what was being said, transcribed it incorrectly, and essentially got it backwards.
That is what O'Connor said, yes.Miles wrote: ↑Sun Nov 27, 2022 8:59 pmBut is that what was said?historia wrote: ↑Sun Nov 27, 2022 7:05 pm
O'Conner overarching point here is that a single piece of evidence or an individual argument can be "successful" if it is part of a cumulative case. In that way, an argument that gets you from 2% to 3% can be called "successful," not because 97% improbable is itself "success," but because, together with other arguments and evidence, it contributes toward getting you over 50%.
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Re: There is evidence for God according to Atheist Philosopher
Post #45Indeed, I wanted to focus on the part of your post I disagreed with, since your first point that we should define our terms is always well taken, and your second point concerning the nature of evidence doesn't seem to be a problem, as demonstrated by all our points of agreement.
Rather than reply to your recent questions, perhaps we can first clarify the point of disagreement.
You said:
My objection (more clearly stated in my subsequent discussion with Diagoras) was:benchwarmer wrote: ↑Sun Nov 27, 2022 3:39 pm
Many theists think they know what 'God' is and are happy to ascribe all manner of properties to it without ever actually observing the 'God' in question. In other words, it's all just word play and faith.
If cosmologists can posit certain properties for Dark Matter or (an even better example) the Multiverse without having directly observed either, why can't theologians posit certain attributes for God?historia wrote: ↑Sun Nov 27, 2022 6:27 pm
But the point that I'm making above is directly to benchwarmer's criticism -- as I understood it -- that there is something illegitimate in theists positing various attributes for God without having first observed God. Cosmologists have posited various attributes for Dark Matter (or the Multiverse) without having first observed it, and yet benchwarmer doesn't seem to have a problem with that. So this seems like special pleading.
A minor point of clarification:
That's not what I'm saying. By a "sufficient quantity of circumstantial evidence" I mean different types of evidence, not merely a lot of one thing. So, a cage at your house, elephant droppings in your yard, veterinary reports, eyewitnesses who testify to you keeping an elephant, etc., would all be "circumstantial" (i.e., indirect) evidence, which together could be sufficient to make the hypothesis more likely true than not.benchwarmer wrote: ↑Sun Nov 27, 2022 9:37 pmOn this we likely disagree. I'm glad you said "could", but even then, it's very dependent on the actual evidence. A large quantity of 'bad' evidence does not equal a small quantity of 'good' evidence. Nor does the quantity of circumstantial evidence increase the likelihood of truth. You are basically saying that if I showed you 1000 pictures of peanuts, each one in a different place in my house, it would start to build a good case that there is indeed an elephant present (assuming elephants actually eat peanuts in the first place)
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Re: There is evidence for God according to Atheist Philosopher
Post #46Maybe? I don't think God is a scientific hypothesis, if that is what you are asking.
What differences are relevant to the analogy?
We could even add historical hypotheses to the mix here: Historians can't directly observe the past, so can only infer what likely happened based on the available evidence. In that way they are attributing attributes to past people, objects, and events even though they haven't directly observed them.
There are clearly differences between scientific, theological/philosophical, and historical hypotheses, as they obviously employ different methods. But the relevant point on which they are analogous is precisely the point to which benchwarmer objected: attributing attributes to something we cannot directly observe.
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Re: There is evidence for God according to Atheist Philosopher
Post #47Bayes theorem might be helpful here if you're interested in quantifying probability and evidence.brunumb wrote: ↑Mon Nov 28, 2022 12:32 amHow does that work? If you have 50 pieces of information regarding a proposition, each with 2% probability of being true, does that mean that cumulatively they result in the proposition being 100% true?historia wrote: ↑Sun Nov 27, 2022 7:05 pm
O'Conner's overarching point here is that a single piece of evidence or an individual argument can be "successful" if it is part of a cumulative case. In that way, an argument that gets you from 2% to 3% can be called "successful," not because 97% improbable is itself "success," but because, together with other arguments and evidence, it contributes toward getting you over 50%.
Consider an example: Let's say you're a detective investigating a report of a dead woman. The body shows no outward signs of trauma, so initially your suspicion (= hypothesis) that her husband killed her has a low probability.
But, as you discover new evidence, you find that she had poison in her system, her husband had recently purchased poison, an eyewitness can testify to his animosity toward his wife, and cell phone data puts him at the scene of the crime around the time of her death.
Each of those things, by themselves, may only have a low probability of indicating that the husband killed the woman. But the probability that all of these things are simultaneously true given our hypothesis -- and, crucially, the improbability they are simultaneously true on alternative hypotheses -- is what increases the overall probability of our hypothesis.
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Re: There is evidence for God according to Atheist Philosopher
Post #48[Replying to historia in post #47]
Just last night I watched a program on 'zodiac killer found!' I am a sucker for mysteries solved. The case seemed pretty convincing. I watched several other vids and each had 'proved' a different suspect. I noticed that each case selected stuff that supported the case and ignored stuff that refuted it. I suppose the point is that 2% evidence like circumstantial evidence, coincidences made to look significant and biased sample (1) may look like it is a persuasive case, but it could be as wrong as right. Until the validation is there, even a persuasive case really isn't good enough.
I'm also thinking that we have to be careful about evidence that really isn't. And i reckon there isn't. Gaps for God could as well be natural explanation as a god. Evidence like odds against are flawed. I can't think of an argument that even tots up to 2% evidence for a god. Not Kalam, not ID, not cosmic origins, Life, awareness and the universe, and certainly not finding fault with atheists 'slogans', even if the fault -finding is justified.
(1) e.g one bit of evidence was boots that linked him with the air force, but another vid showed the boots could link him with the navy too.
Just last night I watched a program on 'zodiac killer found!' I am a sucker for mysteries solved. The case seemed pretty convincing. I watched several other vids and each had 'proved' a different suspect. I noticed that each case selected stuff that supported the case and ignored stuff that refuted it. I suppose the point is that 2% evidence like circumstantial evidence, coincidences made to look significant and biased sample (1) may look like it is a persuasive case, but it could be as wrong as right. Until the validation is there, even a persuasive case really isn't good enough.
I'm also thinking that we have to be careful about evidence that really isn't. And i reckon there isn't. Gaps for God could as well be natural explanation as a god. Evidence like odds against are flawed. I can't think of an argument that even tots up to 2% evidence for a god. Not Kalam, not ID, not cosmic origins, Life, awareness and the universe, and certainly not finding fault with atheists 'slogans', even if the fault -finding is justified.
(1) e.g one bit of evidence was boots that linked him with the air force, but another vid showed the boots could link him with the navy too.
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Re: There is evidence for God according to Atheist Philosopher
Post #49[Replying to TRANSPONDER in post #42]
But there is no reason to accept natural metaphysics. If there were clear evidence that is the correct view of reality, then we wouldn't have so many bright philosophers, who are atheists that reject it.
This is why I brought up mathematical realism because there are a lot of atheists that accept it. They accept the idea that mathematics is outside space and time. Sir Roger Penrose is one of them, a mathematician and physicist.
But there is no reason to accept natural metaphysics. If there were clear evidence that is the correct view of reality, then we wouldn't have so many bright philosophers, who are atheists that reject it.
This is why I brought up mathematical realism because there are a lot of atheists that accept it. They accept the idea that mathematics is outside space and time. Sir Roger Penrose is one of them, a mathematician and physicist.
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Re: There is evidence for God according to Atheist Philosopher
Post #50<bolding mine>
Scientists have accumulated several pieces of indirect evidence that supports a hypothesis of ‘dark matter’ existing. You don’t seem to have a problem with indirect evidence - see:
Now, I should really have also bolded the part where you said, “posit certain properties”, because I’d argue that’s particularly relevant. These cosmologists aren’t simply deciding on properties that they like - they are constrained by the evidence they are steadily accumulating, so you have statements like, “It doesn’t interact with X so it likely isn’t Y.”you wrote:By a "sufficient quantity of circumstantial evidence" I mean different types of evidence, not merely a lot of one thing. So, a cage at your house, elephant droppings in your yard, veterinary reports, eyewitnesses who testify to you keeping an elephant, etc., would all be "circumstantial" (i.e., indirect) evidence, which together could be sufficient to make the hypothesis more likely true than not.
I suggest that where benchwarmer and I are at odds with your position is in the manner of theologists not constraining themselves in the same way.
The ‘multiverse’ hypothesis is - as you say - a closer analogy, since there’s even less evidence for it, and there are fewer constraints on it (unless maybe mathematically? I don’t know). However, for those reasons, it’s generally regarded as a weaker hypothesis, and is by no means accepted by all scientists.