hay monsters and gods
My dear friend Wally, over at Truth in Palmyra, has an excellent post ridiculing evolution. It’s called Evolution of the Hay Monster and I encourage you to read it.
I was so inspired by Wally’s post that I thought I’d attempt something of a poor mirror post (unfortunately without the fancy graphics) about the Christian god God. So, here we go!
For billions of years there was NOTHING. Then BOOM! The Christian god God appeared!!
(Ooops, forgot that the god God is the exception to that really important rule that everything comes from something. He came from nothing, even though it’s clearly laughable to suggest that anything else could come from nothing.)
Start again. For billions of years eternity, the god God was doing NOTHING. Then BOOM! 6000 years ago he got bored and started p-chinging the universe into existence with something that isn’t magic. As he was p-chinging all the various bits of planet Earth, he decided to have a laugh and give the place a history of billions of years. He had loads of fun planting dinosaur bones and fossils all over the place! Voila! A great game that only really intelligent believers would understand.
He made human beings to populate the Earth and loved them all very much!
(Ooops, forgot that for the first 2000 years he was only interested in a tiny little group of them who were happy to viciously kill other humans and slaughter animals on his command. Oh … actually, he didn’t even really like the chosen people much and decided to drown them all with the rest of the world. Except for one family and all the animals in the world.)
Is everyone still with me? Because the story’s not done.
The god God just couldn’t get his human creation to behave in a manner that pleased him, so he decided that someone had to die, given that a blood sacrifice is required to forgive bad behaviour. Why? Just because. It makes sense when you’ve been around for eternity and know everything.
So, part of the god God, in the form of a human son, was born to a girl who had never had sex, lived a blameless life being good and then allowed himself to be killed for no actual reason. The son then came back to life (not a zombie, nothing to do with zombies) and went up to heaven on a cloud (not a horse, that was Mohammed, another religious figure with obviously invented stories).
Since that day, the god God decided that he was interested in the whole of humanity (not just the tiny section he’d previously exclusively loved) and has spread his loving message through tens of thousands of widely varying interpretations of his wishes. Most of his loving followers believe that women should never be in leadership roles, that homosexual feelings are evil, and that most of the human population of the world should suffer in an eternal afterlife.
Really! This is exactly how life happened! And if you don’t believe it, you are clearly being influenced by an invisible evil spirit or you’re just plain evil yourself (although your creator, the god God, is in no way responsible for this).
Hey Violet
That was actually quite well done. Obviously we don’t meet in the middle on this, but well done nonetheless.
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Hey Wally,
Great post!
You’ve got an entire atheist community harrumphing and hallucinating up a storm.
I interpreted your rather artful and articulate post as shedding light on the absurdity of the Fundamental Dogma of Atheism:
Everything just happened all by itself.
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Hey SoM. Thanks. Yes i have seen the post over at Violet’s place.
Yeah, you actually got the point. It is rather absurd that whole argument. Nothing plus nothing equals every thing. Makes perfect sense, right?
Thanks much for coming by and the encouragement.
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As opposed to this invisible creature God happening all by himself….
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Violet,
Atheists seem to find it impossible to reason their way back to the First Cause.
Here is a LINK to a very interesting article called, “Unpacking the First Cause.”
The author does a good job of illuminating the connection between material world and the metaphysical.
That is what is needed in order to understand why God doesn’t “happen” like all created things.
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Well, indeed. In 2010, physicists could explain what happened after 10^-34th of a second after the Big Bang, but not in that instant. Then, the theories fall apart.
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The discoveries of modern science do indeed prove the existence of God.
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Only if you commit the god of the gaps fallacy.
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tildeb,
Scientific proof, by definition, cannot be god of the gaps.
The god of the gaps fallacy is a fallacy precisely because it is a substitution for authentic proof.
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You claim the discoveries of modern science ‘prove’ the existence of some god. So do it: demonstrate the existence of this god and tell us of its divinely empirical properties, please.
Of course, you can’t or you would. You’d shout it from the roof tops.
What you will offer is attribution without being able to link the effects you select to the cause you claim. Without this empirical link, you have no empirical proof for your empirical claim. which means you have no science to support your case. All you have are areas of the unknown where you can freely attribute whatever pixies you want, which is why I claim yours is as always a god of the gaps argument.
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Unpacking the First Cause:
http://www.strangenotions.com/unpacking-first-cause/
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Sorry SOM, you went to the spam tin with this one. I’m freeing you now! 😀
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Thanks Wally. I did enjoy your post on several levels. In terms of agreeing with aspects of it, I find ascribing agency with scientific presentation of evolutionary facts to be absurd. I’ve never understood why information isn’t presented more sensibly, in line with the reality of survival success and development. And the complete lack of understanding you presented along with that sarcasm was verging on genius.
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If you were to say, things cooled and started to arrange themselves, then Yes, that would be correct.
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As he was p-chinging all the various bits of planet Earth, he decided to have a laugh and give the place a history of billions of years
No, that was the dastardly debil who did that.
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Is that the generally held belief? I wonder if Wally would be kind enough to give his opinion on dinosaurs.
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I know Mormons believe Satan buried all the dinasaur bones. Not sure about evangelicals. I think they just believe man and dinosaurs lived together. Ken Ham’s Creation Museum has a diorama of men with dinosaurs. I guess Wally and CS believe that, too. Ask him.
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Yet once more you prove your ignorance zande. You ASSUME things, then build your plastic house with your poor tools. No wonder it falls in the wind by the slightest puff of truth.
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Oh, my apologies. Mormons believe Dinosaur Bones Came from Other Planets
The LDS Church Institute teaches that fossilized dinosaur bones came from other creatures living on other planets that were destroyed when Earth was created. (6)
http://www.topsecretwriters.com/2012/12/10-weird-mormon-beliefs-hidden-not-publicly-talked-about/
Turns out just Evangelicals believe the bonés were buried by Satan
So, John, do you also think Satan buried all the dinosaur bones, like your fellow Evangelicals?
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@jz
If you do not believer there is one God who oversees all His creation, then it appears a tad hypocritical that you should invest time and energy in discussing something above your pay grade.
Btw, you would so love to put me in a box of your own making eh? Kind of difficult that you cannot do it. Must be frustrating. lol
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So, yes or no, do you believe Satan buried the dinosaur bones?
That is, after all, what Evangelicals believe, isn’t it It’s in that link.
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Let me get this straight jz.
You think ‘evangelicals’ are brain dead.
You think God is non existent.
You think Satan is an illusion.
You find the scriptures lacking.
And you want me to give an answer that will be food for your friends-and-hyena fest?
No thank you just the same.
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So, that’s a yes or a no?
Did Satan bury all the dinosaur bones?
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Yellow ochre is a fine understated colour. 😉
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My office is painted in sundried tomato red. It’s gorgeous. That, however, has nothing to do with you believing Satan buried all the dinosaur bones.
Question: Why did Yhwh let Satan bury all the bones?
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I’m a bit confused here Colorstorm. Are you refusing to give the answer you believe to be true for fear of ridicule?
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Ridicule? Ha. I could not give a whit about ridicule.
Truth is always ridiculed. For God’s sake Violet, Christ Himself was thought to have a devil, Paul a madman, and the others mere ignorant fishermen.
What is ridiculous however is how anybody can go through life, not believing in anybody greater than themselves, when life itself is proof of the divine.
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Cool, glad we cleared that up. So, where did dinosaur bones come from?
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This is waaaaaaaaaaay to easy violet.
They come from the same place that atheism and evolution have no answer for.
They come from that place called death, that same place that you and I have our inevitable appointment.
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Your imagination? 😀
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Hey violet;
Gotta be careful there in this context of your hay and God……….
That imagination you speak of? Are you SURE it exists? Can you prove it? Sounds a bit too much like faith eh……..to believe in something that is so intangible.
Are you sure you are not ‘dreaming someone else’s dream?’ Can you prove it?
Careful how you answer, for truth and God’s word are right around the corner………
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True. Along with paranoia, solipsism, garden fairies and Allah. It’s so difficult to choose! I wonder what elimination process you used. 😀
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I have done my share of carpentry violet. I enjoy it. Extremely rewarding to make things using design, planning, sweat, and even more so to make something and give it away.
There are so few books that explain carpentry the WRONG way. There is a right way to do things, and the wrong way hardly needs comment. But in spiritual things, everyone wants a piece of the wrong way. Why? Because man is his own god apart from truth.
Fav. tool? The level. The level does not lie. The carpenters level of your isms, islam-s, outlaws, and guffaws are not level because they have no clue what ‘level’ means. God’s word is the level, and you know it. There is a familiar tune, so unlike the screaming racket of that ‘call to prayer……….’ which resembles poison to my ears.
Then there are those ‘bells’ which ring in simple purity, which testify to the spirit of man which instinctively knows the difference between good and bad.
Cain knew murder was bad…………and you know that the Creator of the stars above is good.
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Weird, I adore the call to prayer.
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So there you have it. Rats enjoy rat poison too, doesn’t mean it;s good for them. 😉
But do you also like the charge to ‘go and kill, and blow up people at airports’ which follows that ‘sweet call to prayer?’
Wake up violet.
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You blaspheming pig
“This Book is not to be doubted…. As for the unbelievers, it is the same whether or not you forewarn them; they will not have faith. God has set a seal upon their hearts and ears; their sight is dimmed and grievous punishment awaits them.” Quran 2:1/2:6-2:10
The Book says it’s True, therefore it is True.
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Hey jz
If you do not know the difference between olive oil and motor oil………….
or being asleep and being awake……….
or the scales of a fish and a butchers scale……..
C’mon, use your God given brain.
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Are you doubting the Truth of the Book? The Book says it’s true, therefore it is.
That is the extent of the reasoning, isn’t it, John?
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Uh jz, I hinted already to the level whereby all else is measured.
After your gripes and lame comparisons, you will come to understand that God’s word is the sole truth whereby all others are found wanting.
This is why your very blog is laced with proof that I am correct. You have not won a single argument against the truth of scripture.
And please stop embarrassing yourself by pretending that the bastard is-lam (monster killers, bomb life ending devils) and the so called tenets of ugh, faith……..are partners with Peter, James, and John.
Light dispels darkness. Please stop for your own sake.
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you will come to understand that God’s word is the sole truth whereby all others are found wanting.
In šāʾ Allāh!
Allahu Akbar!
“This Book is not to be doubted (Qur’an 2:1) …. He that chooses a religion over Islam, it will not be accepted from him and in the world to come he will be one of the lost.” (Qur’an 3:85)
The Book can’t be wrong.
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This sigh’s for you………..
It appears your level is broken. The true God does not expect His people to ‘blow themselves up,’ or to ‘blow other people up……….’ to gain His favour.
And your persistence in citing the pitiful allahoo junk is…………
Wake up. Wake up!
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And you know that the Creator of the stars above is good.
Well, this isn`t true at all.
The Christian narrative states that a maximally powerful, maximally good, all-knowing aseitic being consciously created everything, including man who short-circuited shortly after. This failure resulted in the immediate separation of all earthly things, including man, from the Creator: the Middle Eastern deity named, Yhwh. The objective of life, according to the Christian narrative, is to return to communion with Yhwh. Failure to do so in a finite space of time (a single lifetime of indeterminate duration and unequal resources) will result in Yhwh tossing the individual into an abyss he created for his finest and most beautiful creation, an angel named Lucifer (Ezekiel 28:12,13), who also short-circuited sometime earlier. This is considered by Christians to be the ultimate punishment: an eternal separation from the god, Yhwh.
This narrative is wholesale nonsense.
As a theology (and scaffolding for a tremendously flawed accompanying theodicy), it is an extravagant work of self-annihilating absurdity. As a maximally good, aseitic being, everything was once part of perfection. That’s what aseity means. There was no-thing that was not already perfect. To argue otherwise is to concede Yhwh was not, in fact, perfect. Creation, therefore, destroyed this eternal harmony, this purity, and by this fact alone, the act of Creation can only be called maximally evil. Creation separated things from the perfect goodness. Creation expelled goodness and cast it into a state of imperfection, and that is evil. In the second instance, as Lucifer—Yhwh’s most perfect creation—had already failed, which was itself inevitable, then that means Yhwh consciously flung man into an already corrupted Creation, and that, too, is evil.
As you can see, Yhwh is evil. Maximally evil, in fact.
So, John, you still haven’t answered the question: Why did Yhwh allow Satan to buy all the dinosaur bones?
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@jz
Out of pure respect for your time on this comment, I’ll just say that your perception of God is about as far as light from darkness.
He is blameless, you and I? Eh……
(and the bones were bought? lol)
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First time I’ve seen a Christian use the hay-man fallacy.
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Boom boom , very nice!
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Nothing comes from absolute nothingness. There was no “before” the Big Bang, by the way, since time itself began with the Big Bang. So, why would there be something rather than nothing? There is no “center” of our universe, no “edge,” no “outside,” no “before.” We evolved in three dimensions plus time. Aristotelian logic cannot be applied fruitfully to such questions. There “always” was something, otherwise there would continue to be absolute nothingness. It may not be a “personal” something that will reward us with eternal bliss in an “afterlife” for obeying its rules, but there IS something. And that something is what I call “God.”
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That’s an odd use of the word god.
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“Odd,” Pink? Or is it perhaps a use that you find intriguing? After all, I’m not resorting to the standard childish anthropomorphized “gods” about which people generally chatter. I’m a Deist.
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Odd precisely because you’re deviating from the standard childish anthropomorphized “gods” about which people generally chatter. In that sense calling yourself a deist is somewhat misleading.
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No, Pink! It’s honest. I’ll not let their fantasies interfere with my reality.
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https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2010/oct/12/television-documentary
Theory: the Big Bang happened in a black hole in a parent Universe. Ask Wally what he thinks of that one. I don’t have the branes to figure it out.
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Right, sucked into a black hole in this universe, and spewed out into another. “… the branes to figure it out.” Oh! (Pink and I got it.)
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I agree with Pink. Even if you come to the conclusion there’s more than we know, why would it need an outdated god label?
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That is one of the more annoying aspects of the “new atheism”: It is so obviously an attempt to be hip and current by destroying straw gods and rejecting “outdated” labels. You can call it the “Creative Force” is you please, Violet.
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Is that annoying? The word ‘god’ comes loaded with so many preconceptions, it’s kind of weird to keep using it. The idea that there may be some form of creative force beyond our ken can never be ruled out (unlike all the man-made man and animal image gods).
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Violet, do you really take pleasure in pointing out that which is obvious (to normal people of normal intelligence) to people who believe in fairytales? Yes, fairytales are fairytales. You sure told them!
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It’s not about pleasure, Jim; it’s about trying to help people think better. You could use a dose of that, ensnared as you are by the allure of metaphysical meandering.
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I’m not sure what you mean. I think people of all religious persuasions are normal people of normal intelligence. There’s no accounting for our differences in processing the same information, to date anyway.
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You mean to tell me that you consider fundamentalist Christians who distribute those unintentionally amusing religious tracts to be normal people of normal intelligence? I don’t believe it. Then again, there’s the incorrigibility of first-person accounts, so if you insist that you consider such people to be normal and of normal intelligence, then perhaps I should simply take your word for it.
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Once your head is duped into accepting invisible god stories, it’s easy to believe anything. The god in most of the stories has the power to do anything – anything is possible.
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Hey Jim.
Just a quick challenge to your assertion. Yes, fundamentalist Christians are in fact normal people of normal intelligence. That is one of the issues which makes talking about this reasonably is the rather superior air some such as you have that…..simply because I believe as I do…that I am immediately of less intelligence and less normal than you.
Here is the problem with your starting point. I assume you are all about the facts, as atheism/humanism prides itself on that.
Your assertion. Fundamentalist Christians are, by default and as a whole, not of normal intelligence and not normal. Consider that assertion challenged.
Well, friend, here is one sitting right in front of you so so speak.. Using something resembling facts(i.e studies, standardized tests. work place evaluations, and so on) prove that I am in fact not normal or of normal intelligence. I have heard the term “hay man” argument pointed at me. I concede that my post was full enough of that to explode. This argument about Christians being less intelligent and less normal is also a straw man that immediately relieves the doubter of any responsibility to actually engage.
I am in fact, both normal and of normal intelligence.. As are the vast majority of my fundamentalist friends.
Peace
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Wally, while I agree that Evangelicals are not, generally speaking, in any way physiologically incapable of “intelligence”, they do exercise a tremendous amount of willful ignorance that impedes both their intelligence, and the capacity of others to consider them “fully cognizant” human beings.
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Again John, you have nothing more than your substantial disagreement with my position to back that up.
Look, I consider you quite intelligent, but yet willfully ignorant. We disagree, but that doesn’t alter the fact you are a pretty smart cookie.
That’s the point.
So, again, back your assertion with something that is measured with something besides our opinion of my beliefs. You know…stuff like studies, etcs.
You can’t.
Peace
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Studies? You mean, Evolutionary Theory; that thing taught in Universities across the planet and which is responsible, for example, for the effectiveness (nay, existence) of every medicine you take?
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“This argument about Christians being less intelligent and less normal is … a straw man that immediately relieves the doubter of any responsibility to actually engage.” No more so than viewing people who believe in elves as less intelligent and normal relieves “doubters” of the “responsibility” to engage the elf question.
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Jim
Yeah..ok.
Comparing belief in elves and belief in God are the same. Got it.
Anyway. Back to your assertion that simply by belief Christians are rendered not normal and not of normal intelligence. Got some data to support that? And I don’t mean obscure studies that might sort of kind of say that. I mean measureable data of the sort normally used to measure both “normal” and intelligence. Oh..that also applies across the board to those of faith.
You can’t provide that. Your assertion is false.
Peace
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[For Wally]
“Bible-bangers aren’t the brightest, study shows” (New Zealand Herald website, Sept. 11, 2011)
“The more religious you are, the less likely you are to be intelligent, a new scientific study has found. According to [University of Edinburgh] researchers, Christians–particularly fundamentalists who believe the Bible is God’s word–have a lower IQ than those who are less religious.”
Look Wally, this took me all of about ten seconds to find, but I’m not going to do any more of your homework for you. Tildeb has written another essay for me to grade.
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But Jim, there is no evidence of a creative force that doesn’t look exactly like a natural causal process or function. Your claim is simply a faith-based one and deserving as much respect as any other claim about some version of Oogity Boogity! exercising the magical mechanism known as POOF!ism… namely, none because it’s a claim incompatible with how we know the universe operates through applications, therapies, and technologies that work for everyone everywhere all the time. What you’re offering is just another version of ‘Godidit’. It’s silly, trite, and infantile. It should be treated that way… by anyone actually concerned with finding out what is the case rather than what some people want to believe is the case.
That’s why New Atheism is really all about not privileging such assertions as yours with tacit silence often mistaken for acceptance but a challenge that you substantiate your claims about this reality we share reality FROM this reality we share… and if you can’t, then stop pretending your claim has any merit other just another faith-based belief divorced from the reality it pretends to describe.
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Causality is a temporal phenomenon, tildeb. Nothing “before” our universe was, i.e., “before” time, “caused” it to exist. Furthermore, nature is immanent. Thus, whatever resulted in nature coming into being must be transcendent. Nature didn’t “cause” itself. Its coming into being certainly can’t be reduced to “a natural causal process or function.” Even the atheistic physicists avoid such sloppy language. But this isn’t the first time you’ve been horribly sloppy with your language and reasoning. Several months ago, you mentioned that one can “rest assured” that physical laws “will be the same yesterday, today and tomorrow.” No, tildeb, science doesn’t deal in eternal laws. Nothing could be more metaphysical than that! Scientific “truth” is provisional, i.e., a thing is “true” scientifically … until further notice. If you wish to be taken seriously, you must make a greater effort to understand the scientific method.
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I see. And that ‘better’ understanding of the scientific method involves metaphysics!
Goo grief, Jim. Where’s a paint-shaking machine to loan when you need one?
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“[A] paint-shaking machine to loan …”? They must have one at your place of employment.
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Okay, I see you’re not going to revisit why your argument is baseless so I’ll do the work for you.
Here is the error that introduces the faith-based claim vacuous of descriptive value: Thus, whatever resulted in nature coming into being must be transcendent.
No. (Oh, the joy of making shit up and presenting it as if true… metaphysics in action.)
This conclusion is based first on an assumption you hold that at some point there was no nature and then there was nature. We can use evidence from reality and used evidence-adduced reasoning to go back to moment after the Big Bang but that’s it. We have no clue – and that includes you – what preceded this moment. (Reality has never been an impediment to metaphysics pretensions to describing it accurately.)
The second assumption that is in error is that because there was no nature, something that caused it must be a transcendent creative agency. This is the rabbit hole because simply offering a term ‘transcendent’ doesn’t mean anything. It is a vacuous term. You are awarding to this meaningless term properties of a creative force capable and able to produce (cause) ‘nature’, capable and able of crossing this imaginary boundary between the transcendent and the mundane with a physical mechanism to cause ‘nature’. You’ve got exactly nothing to support this claim… except the appearance of a logical argument. But logic is an axiomatic form, which is why it is so favoured by metaphysicians: you can make make any claim you want appear logical. That doesn;t make the premises or the conclusion descriptive of the reality we share. It simply makes the deduction logical, not accurate. You should know this already and stop making descriptive claims about reality based on a divorced logical form. In other words, you should recognize that your premises for this argument are completely vacuous of evidence but full to the brim of meaningless metaphysics.
You’re welcome.
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You have actually out-babbled yourself this time, tilbed. “We have no clue–and that includes you–what preceded [the moment of the Big Bang].” “Preceded,” tilbed? That is simply incoherent, and I am not alone in this. In response to one who poses the question: “What came before the Big Bang?,” Stephen Hawking is fond of using the analogy of one asking: “What is north of the North Pole?” There was no “before” the Big Bang, tilbed, because there was no time for there to be a “before.” And yet, there you are, trapped in a naïve-realist temporalization of physics, continuing to babble about “befores” and “causes.” Cosmology is thus reduced to an incoherent Tilbedian grand tautology: “Nature is naturalistic, and caused itself … naturally!”
You take issue with my use of the word “transcendent.” It follows from non-immanence, tilbed–whether you care for that word or not. As for the logical form of my argument: “It simply makes the deduction logical, not accurate.” Perhaps you mean “valid, not sound.” Maybe some of this is my fault. I will try to be more patient and gentle with you.
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Thank you, Jim. Patience is a virtue.
Now let’s revisit your reading comprehension: I said we could use evidence adduced reasoning to go back to a – are you ready for it – “moment after the Big Bang but that’s it.”
Now you spend a useless paragraph reaming me out for saying ‘before’ the Big Bang. You want to fix that or must I also do that for you? Oh, right… I just did. I’m so patient that it’s only fair to say that Tildeb, thy name is Patience. And my virtue from your unmanly assault assured.
Your use of non-immanence as if an explanation still has me chuckling… switching a meaningless word ‘transcendent’ with an equally undefined term. There’s more metaphysical thinking in action… just a word game. And, sure, we can use valid and sound to demonstrate that your argument meets its logical form – which I’ve already accepted – but point out the salient feature I raised (because you missed it again) is that that does not make your conclusion an accurate description of reality.
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Jim, the BB is still a hypothesis. A very good hypothesis, but it’s never actually been proven, in so far as something like that can be proven. When we observe the history of the universe we see this distinct movement back towards what appears would probably/em> be a singularity. The problem is, we can’t see past Inflation. We know Inflation began, but as all physics breaks down before that we really can’t say what was actually happening before. Many cosmologists today are of the opinion that this 3D universe came into being when a 4D star collapsed into a black hole. That would certainly give us the “singularity” we think existed, but it also explains where this singularity arose from. The point is, until we can reconcile the problem of quantum gravity we probably won’t know.
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Tilbed, in an earlier post you stated that the Big Bang “look[s] exactly like a natural process or function.” Yes, you have temporalized a “before.” Now, you’ve retreated to a “moment after the Big Bang.” Good for you! You’re making progress. Apparently my patience has paid off.
“Transcendent” is “a meaningless word”? That’s almost as bad as your belief that science deals with eternal laws. Admit it: if you don’t understand something, then you automatically assume that it’s meaningless. You need to develop some intellectual maturity, tilbed.
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Correct, John, we don’t know. I never claimed to know, but I have a major problem with the automatic assumption that nature somehow “caused” itself. You’re not necessarily claiming that, but tilbed is (unless he’s trying to run from that position too now).
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Hi Jim
Not sure Tildeb was claiming to know anything in this regard, which is the point, I think. If we’re the product of a 4 Dimensional star collapsing (which explains really well why the cosmos seems to be so uniform in all directions) then we’re still only dealing with the natural world… albeit one we’re going to have a really, really hard time wrapping our heads around 😉
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I never claimed to know says Jim. But you do supposedly know enough to claim that Thus, whatever resulted in nature coming into being must be transcendent.
I think you’ve misspelled your moniker: Janus seems closer to the product of your writing style here.
I have a major problem with the automatic assumption that nature somehow “caused” itself.
It’s not an ‘automatic’ assumption at all. In fact, summing up my position with this junk statement is actually full of assumption by you that ‘nature’ was somehow caused. As I pointed out twice earlier and now thrice for your benefit, we do have some evidence-adduced reasoning to take us back to a moment AFTER the hypothesized Big Bang. On top of that assumption about ‘nature causing itself’ that you make (not I) rests your claim that the causation therefore MUST be transcendent (or non immanence for those who haven’t a clue what such an unnatural ‘transcendent’ cause might be).
You’re not necessarily claiming that, but tilbed is (unless he’s trying to run from that position too now).
Running away, am I? That’s funny. I haven’t moved. But figuratively, I’m running away from claiming to own your rephrased, chewed up, and regurgitated inaccurate rehash of my position. Hope that doesn’t harm your self esteem but it points out a rather glaring problem with your reading comprehension. To be clear, what I’m saying is that you are exercising a faith-based position about some agency of Oogity Boogity! POOF!ing the universe into existence when you claim that some mysterious ‘transcendental’ and non-imminance causal agency does the trick while pretending that metaphysical mastication describes a reasonable explanatory proposition about our reality. Sorry to disagree but such imaginings I think are just another alluring form of magical thinking clothed in metaphysical garb (and aged to perfection to justify the term ‘garb-age’ to describe its knowledge value) that never has, does not now, and probably never shall yield one iota of knowledge about the reality we share.
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“Immanence,” tilbed, not “imminence.” Just calm down. Besides, with your belief that “transcendent” is a meaningless word, you won’t have to worry about physics … and those meaningless transcendental numbers.
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Again, turning for help to hide behind yet another axiomatic form, eh Jim, as if this miraculously poofs your term about a mystical and magical causal agency into meaning something other than a knowledge empty claim.
That’s a fail.
Note that transcendental numbers is a term to describe undefined numbers like pie and not some numerical causal agent of Oogity Boogity!. You really can’t think very well, can you?
And I am sorry about my spelling mistake. Good eye. My bad. I have to say, though, I’m a little surprised you care about my spelling when you don’t much care for the accuracy of your own. I mean, you repeatedly spell my name incorrectly. Note that I’m not telling you that your sloppiness represents an emotional response on your part as you seem set on doing to attribute to me. That I criticize your claim as faith-based foolishness and stick with it (because it is and you seem unable to grasp the point why it is so) is not diverted by pretending my scientific understanding is therefore lacking because I don’t fall into and stay in the same metaphysical morass as you seem determined to do (what you seem to think of as a more sophisticated scientific understanding that I see as simply typical religious gullibility).
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It wasn’t a simple spelling error, tildeb (“tilbed”). You literally didn’t know the difference between “immanent” and “imminent” (until you looked it up!). Let me guess: you no longer believe that “transcendent” is “a meaningless word,” or at least not necessarily so. C’mon, tell me how you didn’t really call it “meaningless.” Yes, tildeb, I know: “Oogity Boogity!”
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Yes, Jim your reliance on the term ‘transcendent’ to describe the immanent causal agency that you said ‘MUST’ have created nature is a meaningless term because it doesn’t describe any thing (other than this metaphysical assertion that relies on a sense of ‘beyond’ or ‘outside of’ or ‘unbounded’… as if that imported sense makes it into a meaningful thing, like pretending the term ‘super’ accurately describes some thing transcending the ‘natural’). Such terms are the bread and butter of standard metaphysical jargon and are utterly devoid of any descriptive value.
Prove me wrong: describe the transcendent properties of such an immanent causal agency that doesn’t come fully from your own imaginings.
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You see! You’re still doing it: I called you on it and you modified your position (and even tried to deny that you said it!), but you just can’t resist. You’re assuming that there “was” some “immanent causal agency” (or “process” as you’ve called it) that somehow “caused” (a temporal phenomenon) itself. There “was” no immanence or time, tildeb. Thus, whatever resulted in our universe coming into being is by definition “transcendent.” You’re even trying to insist that I treat transcendence as if it were immanent and “describe its properties.” And if I can’t describe them to your satisfaction (preferably by mapping them out using second-order quantification theory), then I’m really not making any sense at all. My statements “lack sense value.” That’s the verification system the logical positivists tried unsuccessfully to create. They were so disappointed in Wittgenstein for breaking ranks. I was correct about you from the start, tildeb: You really ARE an atavistic logical positivist.
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(this conversation is getting weirder and weirder, wish I could take a side…)
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Jim, it’s time to hang up jersey. I’m not going to correct you yet again. You’re not worth it.
All you’re spouting here is diversionary crap. You made a faith-based claim that I challenged you on and you refuse to admit it. All you’re willing to do is pretend the problem is with me, that it’s all my fault you made a faith-based claim that supposedly isn’t. Oh yes, it’s all someone else’s fault.
You made the claim about a causal agency that is supposedly ‘transcendent’. You have nothing to back it up other than more empty metaphysical terms. That’s it, Jim. That’s the sum of your justification and nothing you’ve written here alters it. You own the faith-based claim. You fix it. Or, failing that as you seem determined to do, suck it up and admit that you’re just another run-of-the-mill creationist hiding behind useless descriptive terminology worn out by the likes of WL Craig long before you came along to try to resuscitate this laughable justification for your causal version of Oogity Boogity!. You got nothing, Jim.
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Perhaps one day you can redeem yourself, tildeb. There will be other posts and other issues. My exposing your ignorance of science and exploiting it for fun must sting. And they all witnessed it, tildeb. Maybe we can debate artificial intelligence and I can spank you again.
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By assuming the method of science must include your metaphysical notions is not a poor reflection on me, Jim. Sorry to pop your pretentious little bubble. You still haven’t answered the charge; merely avoided it like the intellectual coward you are.
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James is trying to encourage Wally’s intellectual side, make an apologist out of him.
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Mike, do you dispute my account of how the Hay Monster came to be?
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Wally, you need to spend less time repeating bad arguments against evolution and naturalism and more time thinking. The biblical God doesn’t win by default even if you completely tear down the scientific evidence. You still must present evidence of your positive claim that Jesus is God and the god of the Bible is the creator of the universe.
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Good grief Mike, get an original thought.
Now, do you dispute the account of how the Hay Monster came to be?
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Sorry wally, despite what James is telling you, you just don’t have the intellectual chops for apologetics
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Yeah…and you have it going on, Mike.
Anyway, again. Do you dispute my account of the origin of the Hay monster?
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Sorry wally, it’s just a huge ‘argument from ignorance’ and incredulity. You need to support your positive claim with evidence not just burn down a straw man. You haven’t done that.
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I haven’t made any assertion, Mike. Not today. Not on my post, and not on this one. At this moment I have no positive claim to defend. I wrote a post about a Hay Monster, Violet linked to it. So, Hay Monster is what I was talking about here.
Violet, if I have gotten off topic here, I apologize.
Mike, if you want to debate about the origins of the Hay Monster, come over
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You’re not up to debate yet. You’re just tossing poo
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Like I said, you don’t have the intellectual or theological chops
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Mike, have I tossed a single insult at you here? Nope, didn’t think so.
So, I’ll just move along. Thanks,Violet for the link and the space here
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Don’t let the truth hut you on the ego on the way out
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The other Issue with discussions on your blog is that comments tend to end up missing in action if you deem them to be offensive to the gospel. Not really an honest way of exchanging ideas
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So I’ll pass
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Simply put, I don’t trust you. You have no integrity. But good news… those will aid you in becoming an amateur apologist like james
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I don’t understand how an atheist hallucination can serve as a rational argument.
Aren’t atheists supposed to value something at least resembling reason?
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Did you not like my post then? It’s all factually accurate, isn’t it?
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Violet, please! I actually clicked on Evolution of the Hay Monster and wasted forty-five seconds of my life!
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I did genuinely enjoy it. For a number of reasons, including my love of hay.
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I had a look. It gave a great number of commenters pleasure.
Before the Big Bang, God
lit the blue touchpaper
and advanced
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I think it’s good practice to acknowledge faults in one’s understanding of life. The presentation of aspects of how life evolved is at times absurd. David Attenborough phrases things in the oddest way.
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It’s the how-do-we-know part that differentiates religious claims from scientific, differentiates faith-based beliefs from evidence adduced explanations. Because this how-do-we-know part is omitted by Wally’s story, the version only appears to be equivalent to the evolutionary one. And that’s where theists make their creationist mistake, leave the path of reason and delve into faith, that because things appear designed by function they must necessarily be designed by agency. This is the fundamental mistake: attributing to appearances what one wishes to believe. Just look at creationists: even they try to appear to be reasonable. Clearly, appearances can be deceiving and so we end up with folk who do not understand how we come to know the difference between batshit crazy delusions and explanations that produce applications, therapies, and technologies that work for everyone everywhere all the time. and who think these two are equivalent. That’s how creationists make this kind of towering mistake of false equivalency time and again and think themselves clever.
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The lack of basic observational skills is quite endearing. We can clearly see the co-dependency of species in ecosystems, and the effects that minor changes have, even over short periods of time. To give up all sense of understanding and ascribe every aspect of life to design is odd to say the least. I mean, at least have a good look at chunks of sedimentary rock …
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Once you reject reality’s right to arbitrate claims made about it – which is what apologetics really is all about when you boil away the metaphysical garbage that it hides behind – then nothing can be brought forward from reality to act as evidence contrary to the claim. That’s why so many apologists immediately go after the character and morality of the person daring to introduce real evidence into the discussion about some faith-based claim made describing the reality we share. The problem is painted not to be about the faith-based claim itself – which supposedly deserves respect because it is a faith-based belief, you see – but the nefarious motivations and inherent rudeness of those who care about describing reality as it really is, as best we are able utilizing knowledge and evidence independent of our personal beliefs. That’s what apologists and faitheists like to call ‘militant’ atheism and that’s why New Atheism is a particular target for vilification.
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Well, if I ever saw a literal strawman argument it must be the post by Wally you linked to. Or should I say a hayman argument?
Is it OK to call it stupid, when stupid is what I see when I look at it, and the praising comments from equally ignorant nincompoops? I do not mean they are bad people, just that their ignorance makes them woulnerable to all sorts of delusions.
The implied claims, wich to me makes the post by Wally exeptionally stupid are that science is not a reliable method to evaluate truth claims, and that if the scientific knowledge we have aquired from a host of research fields from physics, chemistry, cosmology, astronomy, biology and geology supporting each other in the conclusions about the age of the earth, abiogenesis, evolution and how the entire universe has formed are extremely wrong, that would somehow make a (metaphysical) guess made by bronze age dudes about something “supernatural” (ie. something we can not possibly even research on any reliable method) the only alternative explanation, or even on any level more true and somehow less ridiculous. No, it would only mean we do not know as much as we thought. Finally the post even implies, that we could somehow recognize the more complex stuff in the universe around us as artifacts created by an intelligence. That is total nonsense, when we have nothing at all to compare the alledgedly designed things to, if everything is indeed designed, as creationism requires it to be, then how could we possibly make any distinction between the designed and the undesigned? The final implication alone is just idiotic, though not abnormal in the sense how many people think that way.
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