muslim1 wrote:Shinobi wrote:Muslim1,
Every proof of the existence of God (teleological, cosmological, ontological, argument out of miracle) has at least one severe weakness , and vice versa. The only argument whose weakness I am not aware of is Pascal's argument (the disputed immorality of the argument is irrelevant), but it's disputable if it truly is an argument or pure "planing" for the future.
As for the proof you quoted:
The Big Bang is only one of many theories. And, although the best, is still a hypothesis with a lot of tiny and huge holes.
Creation? Can human (a "finite" being) create a finite object? So, why does Man's Creator need to be unlimited? And, why does the Creator have to be "sentient" or "intelligent" or whatever you will.
How can you use the racionalis (in homo racionalis) to prove something unlimited, omnipotent? Or how can you a posteriori prove it?
Everything in the world is limited, finite? Ever heard of Deterministic chaos?
The conclusion is hazy, and not connected with the premises
Do we really need to prove Allah's existence? Perhaps the best proof lies in the fact that when human nature is free from prejudice, it tends to be a believing nature.
An unsubstantiated - and, I submit, unsubstantiable - assertion. Trot out not your agenda but your evidence, assuming, of course, you have any evidence.
Quote:Before anyone accuses me of being too subjective, I would like to relate this interesting story.
Imam Al-Ghazali was a highly renowned scholar who rose to fame in an age which was characterized by its great variety of intellectual and philosophical schools of thought.
It is said that Al-Ghazali was once walking along the street and people were keen to express their admiration and respect of him. A very old woman was not particularly amazed by what she saw. She asked who the man was. Someone answered: "Do you not know him? He is the one who knows one thousand proofs of Allah's existence." The old woman answered: "So what? Had he not had one thousand doubts, he would not have had one thousand proofs." Al-Ghazali overheard this reply. He smiled and offered a little prayer in these words: "My Lord, grant me the strength of faith old people have."
The story is significant in the sense that it is man who determines the level of evidence he requires in order to believe in Allah.
You offer up - unwittingly, no doubt - a rich irony here; you imply objectivity, then present a wholly subjective, anecdotal defense. Anecdote is not evidence. Again, trot out your evidence, not your agenda. As it is, to this point in this discussion, your efforts serve only to confirm and validate the objections and challenges to your poorly thought-out and ineptly executed arguments.
Quote:If he allows his nature to look freely without restraining or checking it by prejudices, social prejudices, personal desires, or interests, he will be so much closer to faith.
This statement amounts to a simple absurdity, demonstrating well the inherent circularity of any deistic religionist proposition. I submit it cannot be demonstrated, objectively and in academically sound, forensically valid manner, that religious faith be differentiable from superstition. I submit further the particular statement here immediately at discussion, in its substitution of purely subjective, personally preferential opinion for objectively observed, dispassionately considered data, in fact equates religious faith with superstition.
Quote:This is indeed the message we understand from the Qur'an. As you realize the Qur'an is above all a book of divine guidance. It concentrates first of all on the basic issue of faith: The belief in the Oneness of Allah and His control of, and supremacy over, all the universe. The Qur'an draws our attention to the world around us and invites us to contemplate on every aspect of creation. It tells us that there are pointers and indications in the universe which prove without any shadow of doubt, that there is no deity save Allah, the Creator of all. If we were to reflect on these, the only conclusion we would derive from them is that Allah is the Creator of all and the Lord of all.
The only valid conclusion to be drawn is that so far your defense of your proposition depends exclusively upon circular reasonining, its authority existing only in your implied or explicit acceptance of your proposition's self-proclaimed, otherwise unevidenced, widely disputed and significantly contra-indicated authority.
Quote:Such indicators are everywhere in the world, but we tend to overlook them because they are so familiar to us. If you consider how a big tree comes from a small seed and the process of planting the seed, its producing a shoot out of the soil, the way it establishes its roots, and how it grows, blooms and yields its specific brand of fruit, you will conclude that only Allah could have given the seed all these characteristics.
Nonsense; only ignorance, fear, and superstition permit any such conclusion.
Quote:But we do not tend to reflect on this, because the planting of trees and plants and waiting for their yield is so familiar to us that we tend to think of it as a simple natural process. It may be so, but who made it so natural? Similarly, the birth of every child is a miracle, but we tend to accept it as the most natural thing on earth. Such birth is certainly a natural phenomenon, but who said that natural phenomena are not miraculous? Since it is beyond man's control, it is definitely subject to the will of a different power, i.e. that of Allah. Man has been studying this process of conception, pregnancy, and birth for centuries on end, but he still cannot influence, amend or change this process. Nor can man determine when to start it or influence its outcome. Not even the best techniques of helping women conceive change the fact that all efforts of man do not amount to more than inducing the start of the process and allowing it to take its course. Otherwise, can man conceive of any method which would bring children into being, without relying on the process of fertilizing a female egg with a male sperm?
Here you perpetrate the purely anthropomorphic reasoning flaw of teleology, which terminal logical falacy is inherent to your proposition, insuperably confirming that proposition's illogical, irrational, emotional, entirely subjective, wholly self-referential foundation. You do not make your case, you defeat it.
