Dear Atheists/Non-Believers

Off Topic Politics and World Issues
284

This argument is circular.

The objection to this objection is explained here:
Gale (1991: 257–58) concludes that if we are to explain the parts of the universe and their particular concatenation, we must appeal to something other than those parts.

And the refutation of this line of reasoning is here:
The principle of sufficient reason can be illustrated in various ways,…but it cannot be proved…. If one were to try proving it, he would sooner or later have to appeal to considerations that are less plausible than the principle itself. Indeed, it is hard to see how one could even make an argument for it without already assuming it. For this reason it might properly be called a presupposition of reason itself. (1992: 87)

In other words, to deny PSR one must invoke it. Hence it violates the law of non-contradiction.

The objection to this objection is:

The theist responds that the PSR does not address logical contingency but metaphysical contingency. One is not required to find a reason for what is not metaphysically contingent. It is not that the necessary being is self-explanatory; rather, a demand for explaining its existence is inappropriate.

The objections raised have their own objections explained with in the same article. I choose it because it does a good job of explaining the to course of argument and rebuttle through out time. Did you miss that? That the objections are also rebutted in the article.

I choose this one because it gives a good concise consensus of what the arguments have been and their attempted refutations and the refutations to those refutations.
I have used this article for years because it’s good back ground and you read some of it, but not carefully enough.

285

How hard have you looked? Just T Nation?

286

No. That’s just the place I’ve seen your arguments on it lose. So unless you have new ones…

287

It’s essentially a cosmological form starting from different predicates. And yes, the solid deductive arguments are Deistic.

288

I encouraged self research. That way you don’t have to take anybody’s word for it.

289

Indeed. And one would need to accept evidence counter to what they hoped was provable.

290

Haha concise? It’s 22,000 words. Its a wall of words with no clear conclusion.

Things like this:

Don’t say what you say. I literally can’t find anywhere in the article that you sourced saying the argument is logically proven with no rebuttle. It’s your source, you should at least be able to find your point. I can then start sourcing rebuttle articles, and we can go around proving the fact that your logic is up for debate and it is not settled.

But I’ve seen you lose enough arguments around here to really keep this up. If the best you can offer is a wall of 22,000 words while not being able to defend your own point, I don’t know have anything else to say.

291

I never said that. I said that the arguments have not been refuted, not that rebuttals haven’t been attempted. I said that opposite of that. lol.

292

huh?

293

lol I started to type more and thought I deleted it. But are you actually doing research? Or are you just looking around for the strongest possible argument for what you want to be true?

You certainly seem to fully ignore anything counter to your beliefs which doesn’t make me think that you are doing “research.” You’ve made your decision and nothing is changing it yet you think everyone else needs to put time into it?

294

Ok. That’s fine with me. If you find the philosophical arguments that lead to the requirement of a “God” or supernatural creator compelling, that’s of course different than saying something has been “proven”. I must have been mistaken in my reading of your comments.

295

How have you determined that they are not refuted? Again, I don’t see that anywhere. Where does your research say it is proven.

296

Well you are wrong.
Yes, people need to put time into it if they care about the topic and want to hold a dependable position. When someone spews garbage like most evil in history was caused by religion, they are poorly informed.
And you definitely need to put some time into it, because you don’t understand the topic. Answer this, why does anything at all exist? Why is there something, anything, rather than nothing?
The fact that anything exists at all is sufficient reason to wonder why? Was it magic? Some infinite spec of infinitely dense, infinitely small spec exploded into this universe 13.7 billion years ago for no reason because nothing happened? Or did it come from somewhere of something? Which explains it better, nothing or something?
Now some physicists have posited that immaterial can become material because the laws of physics grant that possibility. Hawking and Krauss espouse this view, even if we granted that, which is certainly a stretch of credulity and requires ever bit of as much faith as any religious nut, where did the laws of physics come from?
Was there nothing and pow! the laws of physics magically appeared and magically made a universe most of which we don’t even understand?
What is your claim? Can something come from nothing? If so please explain… I am all ears.

297

I would refer you to this thread when you put up all these questions and were routinely owned by SMH23. You lost in that thread and your argument hasn’t changed. Nothing I say will change it either.

You will still be making the same logical fallacies and ignoring them when pointed out.

Go through that thread again and follow along with your demise on this very issue using your current arguments. Doesn’t mean you have to accept defeat that much is obvious but many people who have read that thread come to a conclusion and it isn’t that your point of view is correct.

298

Okay, pick one of the arguments and show me it’s refutation, please. A refutation means something has been proven false beyond the shadow of any doubt. I am not talking about rebuttals I am talking about refutations. They each are very different things. A rebuttle, can question a premise or a part of a premise and raise a possible objection.
Say for example, we were studying the Kalam Argument. A common rebuttle is that that argument assumes that causes always precede there subsequent effect. ← This is a rebuttle. What if there is no time? What if time is an illusion, crap like that. It’s not a refutation, it does not prove the argument wrong. You can refute the cause then effect, in a temporal sense by appealing to simultaneous causation a physical even that has actually been observed in the quantum world. But it was a difficult rebuttle for a while, because it cause people to foray into what time is and whether causation it beholden to it.

A refutation would prove the argument wrong, which is a different thing altogether.
Say you claim and make an argument for that all crows are black. All crows are black because all the crows you’ve ever seen were black and you don’t know a anybody that has seen a different colored crow. All I would have to do is present a crow that is not black and your argument is refuted, dead, done, cooked, not true.

So the fact that the arguments have not been refutted is true. That does not mean rebuttals haven’t been attempted. As a matter of fact these arguments run so deep and go so far that top physicists spend their time trying to refute the cosmological models. That is where inflation theory came in and the supposed multiverse. They are rebuttals to the cosmological arguments, they are not refutations as said models are no where near proven…

299

Do you need your friend to do your bidding for you? You cannot handle yourself? That’s sad, dude. I am not talking to smh, I am talking to you. Do you get you big brother to beat people up for you too? geez.

300

Your “proof of God” claims are the very definition of unfalsifiable, so you should feel quite secure that they will never be refuted to your satisfaction.

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301

Bullshit. Of course they are falsifiable. If they weren’t they wouldn’t be, by default, valid.

There are two basic premises: Existence and causation. All you have to do is disprove one of these premises and the argument is false.

302

Read this part over and over again. Apologize for the text wall but you need to read the thread from the beginning because this has ALL BEEN DONE BEFORE. Why rehash?

SMH 23:

“I can’t prove it. But I don’t think I can. I think you can’t disprove it without fallacy and assumption. I have made this claim repeatedly, and you’ve tried twice. Both times, you have hit a brick wall by taking your conclusion in your premises. I have documented these fallacies clearly and simply. Now, I invite you to try to disprove my proposition. Note that when I say that I invite you to try again, I mean that I invite you to make an actual argument. If you don’t want to, then I’ll consider the debate settled. If you do, please be careful to be precise–e.g., if the concept of “to cause” appears more than once, please use the same term each time, rather than mixing “cause” with “be a factor of” and “come from,” etc.”

Earlier SMH 23: “So, as ever, I await a valid argument that is neither assumptive nor fallacious. You gave an argument in your last post, but I don’t think it’s worth attacking because it is very weak. If you want that to be it, though, then just let me know and I’ll go for it. Either way, we’ve come this far: If this thing can be proved, as you say, then the time has come to prove it.”

Your try (Pat):
“1. Something exists.
2. It is reasonable to ask where this something came from.
3. It is reasonable to ask why this something exists.
4. The definition of something does not prevent it from determining it’s origin.
5. Something exists for a reason.
6. Therefore the existence of something is caused.”

SMH Killing this-

“If you want this to be your argument, then it needs to be changed pretty drastically.
Premises 2 and 3 have no bearing on anything whatsoever and don’t belong here.
Premise 4–what does that mean? What exactly does the first “it” refer to? This clause does not signify anything to me.
Premise 5–This is a hell of a supposition. It needs to be proved.
Edit: And, most importantly, the conclusion does not follow from the premises.”

After back and forth multiple people agree with your logical fallacies explain them to you and how you aren’t making a valid argument.

Dr. Matt says this: Yes, but proving the answer that you provide is another matter entirely, which you have shown unable to do. You may well have given the right answer in this case: God exists and is uncaused. That is definitely a possible right answer, but if you are claiming it is the one and only answer, you must prove it, without logical leaps and assuming unproven facts. Otherwise all you have is a philosophical argument, a strong one to be sure, but not a proven argument.

Suifandy: This is the entire point of the thread (I think). You were supposed to give an argument of PROOF. An “argument as a framework” is just code for “you need some faith to jump to its conclusion” which is what everyone has been trying to say (not just me and smh).

Aragorn takes a shot at explaining it to you: "Pat, you’re really still wrong. The only way you can be correct is if you rule out the possibility that the thing was uncaused. Until you can do that you are deductively and formally invalid. "

At this point you start to admit some of your errors. Not fully on everything, but admit you are wrong in some areas (kudos BTW).

SMH tries for the billionth time to wrap up your dodges:

“So, there is a case in which your premises are true and your conclusion is false. Your argument is invalid. You have already admitted that the T’s are correct in their places. This is not a point that is up for debate. The conclusion states that X is caused without ruling out that it was uncaused. It is obviously invalid. This is settled and done.
If you want to prove that the something is caused, you must prove that it cannot be uncaused. This should be obvious to you.
And that’s it. You fought tooth and nail over nonsense and it got us exactly nowhere. I explained all of this to you like 2 weeks ago.”

“It has been proved to you beyond any doubt that the premises are true and the conclusion is false if X is uncaused. This renders the argument invalid. Kamui has told you so, I’ve told you so, Aragorn has told you so, Sufi has told you so, Matt has told you so. More importantly, we’ve shown why.”

“None of this is controversial. Each piece has been proved beyond doubt and, not without difficulty, accepted by you.”

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303

Yup, I did a poor defense of the PSR, which is like I said a sub argument or the sub argument. PSR is used in an argument for the existence of God, it is not an argument for the existence of God. I should have used one that already existed.
This is exactly as I stated.
Do you know the difference between the arguments for God’s existence and and argument for PSR? Do you know what PSR even is?