Richard Dawkins: Why There Almost Certainly Is No God

edgarblythe wrote:

The ultimate ego trip has got to be the notion that "God" takes personal interest in an infinitesimal speck in this grand universe, to the extent he/she/it sacrifices a portion of itself by way of tortured, murdered flesh, so that a human may save his/her soul. Ego to expect that a god would think to bestow a soul in an animal that evolved the same way all the rest of the animals did. (The soul entered at what juncture of evolution?) Sigh . . .

At what juncture in evolution did consciousness begin?

How is it that, suddenly , organisms became 'self aware' by sheer accident?

Please.

...and the beat goes on...

real life wrote:

edgarblythe wrote:

The ultimate ego trip has got to be the notion that "God" takes personal interest in an infinitesimal speck in this grand universe, to the extent he/she/it sacrifices a portion of itself by way of tortured, murdered flesh, so that a human may save his/her soul. Ego to expect that a god would think to bestow a soul in an animal that evolved the same way all the rest of the animals did. (The soul entered at what juncture of evolution?) Sigh . . .

At what juncture in evolution did consciousness begin?

How is it that, suddenly , organisms became 'self aware' by sheer accident?

Please.

RL just demonstrated the "Argument from Incredulity". Right out of the creationist playbook.

An argument from incredulit goes like this...

It is inconceivable that (fill in the blank) could have originated naturally. Therefore, it must have been created.

This argument, also known as the argument from ignorance or "god of the gaps," is implicit in a very many different creationist arguments. In particular, it is behind all arguments against abiogenesis and any and all claims of intelligent design.

In reality, the claim is simply "I can't conceive that (fill in the blank)." Of course, others might be able to find a natural explanation; and in many cases, they already have. Nobody knows everything, so it is unreasonable to conclude that something is impossible just because you do not know it. Even a noted antievolutionist acknowledges this point: "The peril of negative arguments is that they may rest on our lack of knowledge, rather than on positive results" (Behe 2003).

The argument from incredulity creates a god of the gaps. Gods were responsible for lightning until we determined natural causes for lightning, for infectious diseases until we found bacteria and viruses, for mental illness until we found biochemical causes for them. God is confined only to those parts of the universe we do not know about, and that keeps shrinking.

real life wrote:

edgarblythe wrote:

The ultimate ego trip has got to be the notion that "God" takes personal interest in an infinitesimal speck in this grand universe, to the extent he/she/it sacrifices a portion of itself by way of tortured, murdered flesh, so that a human may save his/her soul. Ego to expect that a god would think to bestow a soul in an animal that evolved the same way all the rest of the animals did. (The soul entered at what juncture of evolution?) Sigh . . .

At what juncture in evolution did consciousness begin?

How is it that, suddenly , organisms became 'self aware' by sheer accident?

Please.

You haven't even come close to pushing this off. You've simply dug a hole for your own argument.

Throw some flowers on it and push the dirt back in.

Your argument is stone cold gone.

Real Life pronounces me the loser in the argument. That guarantees I am on the right track.

Your argument against the existence of the 'soul' is DOA, EB.

real life wrote:

rosborne979 wrote:

real life wrote:

True science would not begin with a presupposition that everything has a natural cause.

True science does start with the assumption that everything has a natural cause.

real life wrote:

Why would it?

Because without it, magic would be used to explain everything, and the process of scientific inquiry would come to a halt.

Nonsense.

Modern science flourished, was actually established by many who believed in a supernatural God who had created the world.

There's a difference between allowing for the possibility of the supernatural (things outside of science), and using those possibilities in a scientific methodology.

...and the beat goes on...

snood wrote:

...and the beat goes on...

and once again, without any substantial post from Snood....you really like coming into threads and complaining, but without any thoughts/ideas.

maporsche wrote:

snood wrote:

...and the beat goes on...

and once again, without any substantial post from Snood....you really like coming into threads and complaining, but without any thoughts/ideas.

Well, here goes another thread in the toilet.

Here's some additional information on methodological naturalism:

The naturalism that science adopts is methodological naturalism. It does not assume that nature is all there is; it merely notes that nature is the only objective standard we have. The supernatural is not ruled out a priori; when it claims observable results that can be studied scientifically, the supernatural is studied scientifically. However, it gets little attention because it has never been reliably observed. Still, there are many scientists who use naturalism but who believe in more than nature.

* The very same form of naturalism is used by everyone, including creationists, in their day-to-day lives. People literally could not survive without making naturalistic assumptions. Creationism itself is based on the naturalistic assumption that the Bible has not changed since the last time it was read.

* Naturalism works. By assuming methodological naturalism, we have made tremendous advances in industry, medicine, agriculture, and many other fields. Supernaturalism has never led anywhere.