Why Atheism Cannot Be Logically Supported

Garycgibson, Tibbir, and Fanman,

Have you ever considered that some of us atheists (such as myself) are atheists for ETHICAL reasons? We consider the concept of God immoral. I acknowledge the historical necessity of the concept in the social evolution of the human species, but consider the concept now to be outmoded and its continued use and belief to be the surest path toward the mid- to long-term extermination of the species.

While I agree religious wars have caused a lot of grief and destruction. They have also caused a lot of good things to. I might point out that most of the renaisance scientist were searching for truth In what they thought of as the The spirit of Truth AKA the Holy Spirit.

Aethism is to my mind a relatively new phenomenon. For instance Socraties was executed for being an Aetheist.

Have you ever considered that some Christians are christians for ethical reasons.

I am a part of a family which is part of a community which is part of a culture which is a part of the human race. My goal in life is to bring peace to all these people. This is because I strongly believe that we are all part of a thinking entity which is bigger than me at each level up there are more nodes and if we can work together in peace we will have a better global brain.

So tolerance is my by word. That does not mean that I think being an atheist is foolish and so I will argue my case for Christianity.

That does not mean I aprove of the spanish inquisition or the more recent aberation of pedefile priests or the Roman Catholic persistence in condeming Birth control in an over crowded world. The church and the acts done in the name of the Church are far from perfect.

I will continue fighting the Christian cause because I ethically think it is the right thing to do. I think loving your neighbour as yourself is a good start for world peace. Living a life of service is a good thing to do.

I also think that loving the lord my god which subsumes the Universe and this planet is a good reason to fight the ecological problems we are facing. To push for the widest community possible on this planet. Because I think we need as many people thinking about the end of oil which is going get dire within a couple of years and the end of cheap food due to over an over crowded planet are not issues we should all be dealing with individual or in one country but globally as a global ciommunity.

Philosophy for me is a tool to solve these problems. How to unite people into the common cause we all need to look after the human race.

I think on this thread we have got to the point where the theist have stated their case the atheists theirs and there is not much more to say, unless we start listening to each other and helping each other.

Aethism is to my mind a relatively new phenomenon. For instance Socraties was executed for being an Aetheist.

I also think that loving the lord my god which subsumes the Universe and this planet is a good reason to fight the ecological problems we are facing

Aside from a few things in your post which are dubious at best, I'll only mention the two quoted.

If atheism is relatively new and and give Socrates as an example of that then it can't really be new since he died 399 BC unless you think it already started with the Sumerians.

The other part is he was not executed for being an atheist in the way that most understand the term in its modern connotations. Educated Greeks - Athenians in this case - no-longer believed in the Greek Pantheon of deities anyways. The reason Socrates was put to death was for "refusing to recognize the gods recognized by the state" and of "corrupting the youth", really all trumped up charges. Notice "gods recognized by the state" clause! The state - and Rome is also an example - couldn't care less what you believed as long as you showed your "respect" to the state by performing its rituals. If not it was tantamount to treason against the state and that was the real crime. If people would have been executed merely for "atheism" most of the Greek thinkers wouldn't have a biography to their name.

Also, loving the Lord does not in any way qualify as a motive to fighting ecological problems. If we still expect a "viable future", whether we love the Lord or not, we have zero choice. He's not likely to supply us with any alternatives if we screw this one up.

A Poster He or I,

I think that existence itself acts as a demonstration of omnipotent ability. The amount of power that it would take to create something like the sun for example is massive. Not only that; the intelligence that it would take to place the sun in the 'correct' position where it provides heat and light for the earth, but does not destroy the earth, is also massive.

I do not understand the logic, of how an atheist perceives that such an occurance as the power and position of the sun could of happened by chance? Even if it was not placed there by an uncreated omnipotent creator, the circumstance displays clear 'logical' signs of an orderer, as does our entire solar system.

Not by chance, Fanman. By evolution. The universe is a dynamic phenomenon. Dynamic processes evolve. Evolution has one thing going for it that most humans are unable to properly appreciate: Time. Of course if you're the sort of Christian who believes Earth is 6,000 years old, then there is no framework for consideration or discussion of the issue, but I'm guessing based on previous posts that you are not of that opinion.

You refer to the so-called fine tuning of the cosmos needed to produce life. It is a source of frustration to me personally how few people I know or read can't seem to see how completely upside-down is the concept of fine-tuning. Our November book-of-the-month was Victor Stenger's "The Fallacy of Fine-Tuning," and he gets it, but he does a very poor job of presenting his views, so I cannot recommend reading it. More valuable is to read an introduction on complexity theory which provides the conceptual tools for understanding how order arises from chaos spontaneously and could in principle lead to life and the cosmic balances needed to have precipitated such life.

In the meantime, just as you cannot fathom how an atheist could so easily believe that fine-tuning is completely unnecessary to the evolution of cosmic order and life, I cannot fathom why an intelligent person looking at the incredible wonder and complexity of the universe would WANT to posit the existence of some pre-existing, uncreated intelligence capable of conjuring the whole shebang. To me, such a silly idea taken seriously is simply a debauchery of the very wonder that one beholds, especially since rather than explaining anything it simply makes everything inexplicable. It seems like such a weak-minded and fearful way of hiding from the unknown.

Atheism requires a proof comprehensively regarding reality of the non-existence of God, and that cannot be done any more than one can express all possible numbers, geometries and possible maths in some kind of order of non-order or non-cardinality.

There is no requirement of such a proof for atheism. There does not seem to be any possible proof of existence or non-existence of supernatural beings or an unseen world, but again it is not what is called for. The British atheist Charles Bradlaugh said it best from my point of view in his 1864 tract A Plea for Atheism:

The Atheist does not say "There is no God," but he says: "I know not what you mean by God; I am without idea of God; the word 'God' is to me a sound conveying no clear or distinct affirmation. I do not deny God, because I cannot deny that of which I have no conception, and the conception of which by its affirmer, is so imperfect that he is unable to define it to me.

Before any consideration can be given to the truth or falsity of the statement God exists, it must be clear to what notion the word God refers. Theists have written a lot about the ineffable nature of God, which I take it, merely tells us that they do not have any clear idea.

The usual attributes assigned to God—omnipotence, omniscience, omnipresence, omnibenevolence, etc.—are merely negations: meaning only not limited in power, knowledge, presence, or good will. However we know of no being with any one of these attributes nor can we say what they could mean. In truth they are logically incoherent because they refer to nothing we can or do experience and give rise to paradoxes as soon as they are examined. There is nothing in them we can understand.

Garycgibson, Tibbir, and Fanman,

Have you ever considered that some of us atheists (such as myself) are atheists for ETHICAL reasons? We consider the concept of God immoral. I acknowledge the historical necessity of the concept in the social evolution of the human species, but consider the concept now to be outmoded and its continued use and belief to be the surest path toward the mid- to long-term extermination of the species.

So save your logical arguments: I don't CARE if God actually exists or not. If He came and proved His godhood on the spot to me, I would happily slap His face for the evil His existence has brought into the world.

Roderick Chisholm wrote a nice little book called 'The Problem of the Criterion', I like that phrase quite a lot. Viewing an existential, circumstantial finite slice of being replete with mathematically supported meta-template structures for cosmological theories and causality is a problem of the criterion in the ontological sense.

If morality is what people actually do in a social context, then perhaps ethics is a description of the normalized procedures for implementing moral choices. Certainly people seem to choose to do wrong often enough with select ethical criterions, yet perhaps for atheists without belief in a transcendent moral structure there is no wrong, but only evolution. How can it be wrong for Hitler to invade Poland within an evolutionary criterion? For Christians and Dietrich Bonhoeffer that wickedness of the Reich should have been morally and actually opposed?

One may reasonably oppose the existence of a logical condition as being present if their is present some sort of factor that cannot coexist simultaneously. Not (A & B), A or B, A & B

If one can prove these simple conditions to be valid for select, or Universal circumstances inclusive of an omnipotent God then I suppose one would have a hard to defeat bunker position with a clear enough logical field of fire, yet I believe that the presence of evil (if one recognizes evil and is not just atheistically 'evolving' an advantageous position does not satisfy the Universal disjunct logically.

Not simply because complex numbers evidently are used for description in quantum mechanics and one day for quantum computing that transcend the binary 0 or 1 criteria of computers today, but for the reason that God stipulated right out that people have original sin and a fallen nature. The premise is that given immortality mankind might become even more wicked than now. Mankind is given to labor and women to go through childbirth and mortality would abbreviate the evil of human experience.

That doesn't mean that human beingness is bad-only that the human nature to go wrong needs to be overcome through faith, yet I wanted to remain on logical grounds rather than that of faith for the present.

I have no idea what sort of things God might want to accomplish in eternity. I believe that God is tougher than NFL players with those concussive head injuries however, and he might be able to withstand tough things in the Universe that he creates perhaps as stress tests. Certainly human beings going through some of those horrible times were quite remarkably tough. Those Christians eaten by lions or burned alive for their faith were of strong moral character. Even some Buddhists that have burned themselves in protest of war showed a certain ability to overcome the horrors possible of the mortal coil, yet one would think that it should be evil rather than one's self that does evil in-the-world.

Yours is a good argument, however I think that the problem of evil is not something that precludes the existence of the Divine being-especially since He exists for eternity, sent His Son to share the experience and is has enough time to make things right.

-- Updated May 9th, 2012, 4:27 pm to add the following --

Atheism requires a proof comprehensively regarding reality of the non-existence of God, and that cannot be done any more than one can express all possible numbers, geometries and possible maths in some kind of order of non-order or non-cardinality.

There is no requirement of such a proof for atheism. There does not seem to be any possible proof of existence or non-existence of supernatural beings or an unseen world, but again it is not what is called for.

Before any consideration can be given to the truth or falsity of the statement God exists, it must be clear to what notion the word God refers. Theists have written a lot about the ineffable nature of God, which I take it, merely tells us that they do not have any clear idea.

The usual attributes assigned to God—omnipotence, omniscience, omnipresence, omnibenevolence, etc.—are merely negations: meaning only not limited in power, knowledge, presence, or good will. However we know of no being with any one of these attributes nor can we say what they could mean. In truth they are logically incoherent because they refer to nothing we can or do experience and give rise to paradoxes as soon as they are examined. There is nothing in them we can understand.

'Requirements' for atheists to provide logical support for their belief may be an unreasonable expectation. I would not ask such. I merely point out that beliefs unsupported logically may not have validity. A free-floating belief without logical foundation is good enough in modern economic governance I think, at least in Washington D.C.

If the federal government had required that 25% of all gold and silver taken from federal lands went to the government before royalties Fort Knox might be better off today. If atheists realized they had no logical way to prove atheism there might be fewer.

There is a certain pragmatism requisite for philosophers I think. The possibility of a Creator of all things is implicit in the experience of being even if social knowledge increases over time surpassing prior beliefs about causality. One might not want to use sophism to skirt meaningful questions though one must decide if the questions are meaningful.

I recollect sailing a boat and waking up in the cockpit facing the stern. Being in Montana a few days before I was a little out of place and thought the boat was nearly below the surface and I had about thirty seconds before being in the drink-then I realized the situation. Yet as Captain of a small boat one must always be aware of any circumstance, odd noise or whatever-one cannot just disregard any kind of question as unimportant, for the boat may really be in jeopardy.

Living in the Universe could be a critical event with eternal significance though some may not be aware or regard it as such. I have noticed that bureaucracy and establishment in comfort prefer a certain changeless mileau of power and are unconcerned with transcendental concerns (they can probably evolve to the top anyway). Civilizations have collapsed because of the inability to recognize or reform, react to and respond rightly to reality.

Transcendental thought about God isn't dependent upon science or the state of the art of empirical knowledge. Empiricists have now and then sought to make belief in God contingent upon some out-dated physical cosmology or other.

Bertrand Russell took such positions on philosophical questions, yet with W.V.O. Quine one might place philosophical and theological questions within lexical ontology or sets with certain meanings. Obviously some not sharing a given lexicon have the potential for disputing the validity of some lexical sets as meaningful.

Russell working on the Principia Mathematica wasn't inclined, like many scientists today, to give meaning to non-empirical word constructions. One may still use logic to help understand what for some might be regarded as metaphysics, however if one remain purely an empiricist their are probably limits to inferences one might make about being.

One cannot disprove the existence of God. You seemed to agree with that concept, then say that it is not 'what is called for', as if one might or should be able to look into a pluralistic nature of God (more than The Trinity) as one might regard the parts of an automobile from the ground up in order to discover that it is a Car.

I do not believe that people need to comprehend or understand God any more than one needs to understand Einstein's thought process to appreciate G.R. The Son was on Earth and He we may understand well enough through the historical life and works given in the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

I think it is helpful that contemporary cosmology provides many helpful criteria for thinking about the Universe as an entirety, and its simple enough to think of a Divine Being in relation to what one knows or infers of the actual Universe.

Modal logic Universes in infinite number can be considered as one means of God's permutations of purpose in creating worlds or souls to share experience with Him in the eternal mystery of being (not a mystery only for God I think). Yet if an infinite number of Universe can be created in place, or always existed because God is omnipotent and omnipotent-what would be wrong with that, and why should people limit God's potential to simple causal processes that they understand with contemporary physics?

If the entire Universe were given a quantum scale and adjusts from large to small with expansions and contractions exploiting retro-causality because of directional anisotropy of space-time development, would that sort of philosophical cosmology trivia mean that one cannot consider a detached Spirit transcending the quantum disposition of energy or space or of the relationship of the Spirit to one-self?

While physics and physics lexicons may not be up to describing Spirit or the Creator that does not mean that philosophically and theologically minded people can't try a little (even if inaccurately). It is better than living an unexamined life trusting merely that politicians will evolve moral positions before the end of a second term of office and trillions of dollars of public debt.

God stipulated right out that people have original sin and a fallen nature. The premise is that given immortality mankind might become even more wicked than now. Mankind is given to labor and women to go through childbirth and mortality would abbreviate the evil of human experience.

That is the way Christian theologians have read Genesis 3 in the light of Romans 5, but there is no teaching of it by Christ himself. The Ten Commandments given Moses by God and to the Jews contain no hint of an original stain to be overcome. Judaism does not accept original sin despite Genesis 3.

Original sin conceived as inherited corruption appears to be an invention of Paul in Romans 5 to supply a reason for the redemption and a need for the sacrifice of Christ. It explained to those in the early church why God allowed their prophet and teacher to die—all part of the divine plan.

As church doctrine original sin surfaces first in Irenaeus, but there are many different views of it throughout history and among denominations. Some (Church of Christ) even deny it altogether as false doctrine since it appears to put the responsibility for human sinfulness on God for creating the apparatus that transmits sin from generation to generation.

-- Updated May 9th, 2012, 4:49 pm to add the following --

'Requirements' for atheists to provide logical support for their belief may be an unreasonable expectation. I would not ask such. I merely point out that beliefs unsupported logically may not have validity. A free-floating belief without logical foundation is good enough in modern economic governance I think, at least in Washington D.C.

Here you have taken an enormous leap of faith by erroneously equating lack of a proof for non-existence of the supernatural with lack of logical support for disbelief in it. Atheism has a great deal of logical support, theism has little or none, but neither have proof.

" The universe is a dynamic phenomenon. Dynamic processes evolve. Evolution has one thing going for it that most humans are unable to properly appreciate: Time. Of course if you're the sort of Christian who believes Earth is 6,000 years old, then there is no framework for consideration or discussion of the issue, but I'm guessing based on previous posts that you are not of that opinion."

"In the meantime, just as you cannot fathom how an atheist could so easily believe that fine-tuning is completely unnecessary to the evolution of cosmic order and life."

Cosmology is a wondrous thing these days. It is remarkable that virtually anyone can read works of popular cosmology by Nobel Prize winners and consider numerous theoretical cosmological structures for oneself guided by the best.

Hydrogen fusion is just .007% efficient in converting to Helium. If it were more efficient stars would be shorter lived and not create enough quality time for life to evolve in planetary environments. Fine-tuning of the Universe is a fact, and if it were different than it is life would not exist. If there were more or less than three dimensions of space life would not exist, atoms could not form. One does not need to take fine-tuning as a proof of a Divine Being (though one might offer that as an evident point), however fine-tuning is required for life to exist though one might interpret that as a random event selected from an infinite number of Universes.

There may be more than three dimensions and the atoms of this space are also circumstantially adapted to fit it yet that does not mean its not a finely tuned Universe intolerant of infinite numbers of molecular structures. Fine tuning can even be thought of as a scientific tool since one can rule out the existence of structures in the Universe that do not fit within the acceptable parameters.

One of the better examples was Einstein's cosmological constant that he developed to prevent his model of the Universe from collapsing into a big crunch as a result of the field equations of GR. Einstein believed that only the Milky Way existed and that it was a static Universe. Hubble's discovery of the Red Shift an thousands of Galaxies in recession made the cosmological constant seem wrong.

The Omega value for the collapse of the Universe is finely balanced with the amount of mass needed for it to expand-or at least it was thought to be until the discovery of the quickening expansion of space in 1997. Theorists have interpreted that with various tool including VSL.

People often develop a wrong idea about the relationship of Christian beliefs to cosmology, for numerous reasons. There are Christians with wrong cosmological ideas of course, yet they are not cosmologies actually written in the Bible.

Evolution theory and its context is just one slice of experience of life on Earth and of the existence of the Universe-there is more to it than that. Christians may contemplate as well as cosmologists the nature of an infinite number of Universes within an infinite God that can roll any or all of them up any time one believes, if He willed.

One might want to argue about what cosmological theory is right, and if the inflaton really existed, yet that is not basically what the Bible is about. Atheists would need to provide categorical proof for the non-existence of God if they wanted to prove their belief (not possible) as a self-standing logical proof aspire to a shadow of credibility.

Atheists would need to provide categorical proof for the non-existence of God if they wanted to prove their belief (not possible) as a self-standing logical proof aspire to a shadow of credibility.

This is nonsense. In his 1980 book Does God Exist?, the German theologian, Hans Küng, summed up his inquiry as follows:

• It is possible to deny God. Atheism cannot be eliminated rationally. It is irrefutable. • Affirmation of God is also possible, Atheism cannot be rationally established. It is undemonstrable. •If God is, he is the answer to the radical uncertainty of reality. •The fact that God is, can be assumed not strictly in virtue of a proof or indication of pure reason (natural theology), not unconditionally in virtue of a moral postulate of practical reason (Kant), not exclusively in virtue of the biblical testimony (dialectical theology), but only in a confidence rooted in reality itself.

(my emphasis)

Apparently he believes as a Catholic theologian that there is much more than a shadow of credibility to atheism, it is in fact irrefutable even if undemonstrable.

God stipulated right out that people have original sin and a fallen nature. The premise is that given immortality mankind might become even more wicked than now. Mankind is given to labor and women to go through childbirth and mortality would abbreviate the evil of human experience.

That is the way Christian theologians have read Genesis 3 in the light of Romans 5, but there is no teaching of it by Christ himself. The Ten Commandments given Moses by God and to the Jews contain no hint of an original stain to be overcome. Judaism does not accept original sin despite Genesis 3.

Original sin conceived as inherited corruption appears to be an invention of Paul in Romans 5 to supply a reason for the redemption and a need for the sacrifice of Christ. It explained to those in the early church why God allowed their prophet and teacher to die—all part of the divine plan.

As church doctrine original sin surfaces first in Irenaeus, but there are many different views of it throughout history and among denominations. Some (Church of Christ) even deny it altogether as false doctrine since it appears to put the responsibility for human sinfulness on God for creating the apparatus that transmits sin from generation to generation.

Original sin as I think about it, originated at the fall of Adam and Eve. They were physically changed then into mortal form with that strife. Human being as a thermodynamic process is the original sin context that can be overcome through faith alone.

The ten commandments were required because people wander into sundry immoral directions without moral guidance. God provided several opportunities for mankind to become perfect through perfect obedience, yet of course they always flunked.

I read Rosenberg's 'Abraham: The First Historical Biography' last year and really enjoyed it. It is a brilliant intellectual recover and reconstruction of Abraham's life in Sumer from what data is available. It is definitely worth reading.

Rosenberg and Bloom also wrote 'The J Book'. J of course was thought of as the woman of Solomon or Rehoboam's Court who put together from various materials the book of Genesis (as well as a few other,later authors). It is very difficult today to imagine the exact circumstance in which the book of Genesis was put together, yet Rosenberg makes a brilliant, worthwhile effort.

One might also regard the history of Mesopotamia, the migration of human life to the Persian Gulf from Africa perhaps 70,000 B.C. from the Horn of Africa when the sea level was 300 feet lower (it rose quickly about 20,000 B.C.), the loss of the Eden of a Garden like Saudi Arabia and Sahara with global warming, and the later flooding of the earliest civilization on the present day sea floor of the Persian Gulf 300 feet below the surface without a trace remaining. The story of Gilgamesh definitely parallels that of Moses, and the J writer was probably familiar with Abraham's history in Sumer and of Sumerian culture. As a part of cultural history she might have added that to Genesis herself.

If the first civilization in history was lost to the rise of the Persian Gulf and world ocean. If the Bible recounts some of true human history and if the rise of humanity from the condition of innocence as animals before civilization was judged by God and drowned in order that a better civilization with rules (later even the ten commandments) maybe that was progress.

It is difficult to imagine a Universe from then point of view of God. What if he like planets, atoms and molecules and even animals but wanted some intelligent beings to experience existence with? Evolving those creatures would be a difficult process and it would be tough to get them to have a respect for their Creator especially if they make up daft pagan theories, mud gods from the plain of Tillman and cosmology theories about the Universe they experience that bring them to belief in themselves and their ability to understand a fraction of God's creative power, instead of God.

The Bible or Biblos means 'little books'. It is a compilation of many little books with different histories and contexts. I enjoyed reading Pelikan's 'Whose Bible Is It' for some background.

One should not assume (I am not saying you have) that God works with human history from the position of obsolete cosmological artifact constructed by ancient peoples. People over history have done and thought a lot of things, yet God is eternal and ahead of the game regarding human intellectual works. Urartu was transliterated by the Jews as Ararat. The hills of Ararat or Urartu was in contemporary Iraq away from the Gulf some hundred miles or so-its ancient borders may have been closer to the flooded region, that is itself rather historically vague. Yet it was a good place for survivors with Noah to come to rest after the storm with their livestock.

Original sin is in the thermodynamic process of humanity. With immortality and eating of the tree of knowledge (technology, philosophy and so forth) they might rise to consume the entire Universe, or convert it to a quantum computer and pop new Universes into being without being smart enough to pass of safety checks. For that and other reasons humanity has had it garden of Eden wings clipped a little-they just can't follow orders very well even if they are for their own good.

Here you have taken an enormous leap of faith by erroneously equating lack of a proof for non-existence of the supernatural with lack of logical support for disbelief in it. Atheism has a great deal of logical support, theism has little or none, but neither have proof.

The Universal affirmative and Universal negative propositions in the context of the existence of God seem self-standing. I do not think its reasonable to prove one or the other by asking the someone to prove or disprove the other.

My reasons for faith are good enough yet I do not assume that one can prove the existence of God by the failure of atheists to prove the non-existence of God (the Universal negative proposition). One cannot prove the Universal from the particular. If God was found not to exist in 1000 Universes after complete search, he might still have been somewhere else-perhaps in the 1001st (or he might have moved back to a Universe not being searched by scientific atheists).

One cannot disprove the existence of extra-terrestrials just because after thorough searching with technology no sign of alien life or communication has been found. I don't think God either might place a large neon sign somewhere in the Magellenic Cloud and say 'Hey Earth-persons, I'm over here!'. Instead, one has the prophets and The Lord and faith-even with a personal, transcendent relationship.

Expecting to place God in a physically causal and contingent category isn't reasonable.

-- Updated May 9th, 2012, 5:59 pm to add the following --

God stipulated right out that people have original sin and a fallen nature. The premise is that given immortality mankind might become even more wicked than now. Mankind is given to labor and women to go through childbirth and mortality would abbreviate the evil of human experience.

That is the way Christian theologians have read Genesis 3 in the light of Romans 5, but there is no teaching of it by Christ himself. The Ten Commandments given Moses by God and to the Jews contain no hint of an original stain to be overcome. Judaism does not accept original sin despite Genesis 3.

Original sin conceived as inherited corruption appears to be an invention of Paul in Romans 5 to supply a reason for the redemption and a need for the sacrifice of Christ. It explained to those in the early church why God allowed their prophet and teacher to die—all part of the divine plan.

As church doctrine original sin surfaces first in Irenaeus, but there are many different views of it throughout history and among denominations. Some (Church of Christ) even deny it altogether as false doctrine since it appears to put the responsibility for human sinfulness on God for creating the apparatus that transmits sin from generation to generation.

Original sin as I think about it, originated at the fall of Adam and Eve. They were physically changed then into mortal form with that strife. Human being as a thermodynamic process is the original sin context that can be overcome through faith alone.

The ten commandments were required because people wander into sundry immoral directions without moral guidance. God provided several opportunities for mankind to become perfect through perfect obedience, yet of course they always flunked.

I read Rosenberg's 'Abraham: The First Historical Biography' last year and really enjoyed it. It is a brilliant intellectual recover and reconstruction of Abraham's life in Sumer from what data is available. It is definitely worth reading.

Rosenberg and Bloom also wrote 'The J Book'. J of course was thought of as the woman of Solomon or Rehoboam's Court who put together from various materials the book of Genesis (as well as a few other,later authors). It is very difficult today to imagine the exact circumstance in which the book of Genesis was put together, yet Rosenberg makes a brilliant, worthwhile effort.

One might also regard the history of Mesopotamia, the migration of human life to the Persian Gulf from Africa perhaps 70,000 B.C. from the Horn of Africa when the sea level was 300 feet lower (it rose quickly about 20,000 B.C.), the loss of the Eden of a Garden like Saudi Arabia and Sahara with global warming, and the later flooding of the earliest civilization on the present day sea floor of the Persian Gulf 300 feet below the surface without a trace remaining. The story of Gilgamesh definitely parallels that of Moses, and the J writer was probably familiar with Abraham's history in Sumer and of Sumerian culture. As a part of cultural history she might have added that to Genesis herself.

If the first civilization in history was lost to the rise of the Persian Gulf and world ocean. If the Bible recounts some of true human history and if the rise of humanity from the condition of innocence as animals before civilization was judged by God and drowned in order that a better civilization with rules (later even the ten commandments) maybe that was progress.

It is difficult to imagine a Universe from then point of view of God. What if he like planets, atoms and molecules and even animals but wanted some intelligent beings to experience existence with? Evolving those creatures would be a difficult process and it would be tough to get them to have a respect for their Creator especially if they make up daft pagan theories, mud gods from the plain of Tillman and cosmology theories about the Universe they experience that bring them to belief in themselves and their ability to understand a fraction of God's creative power, instead of God.

The Bible or Biblos means 'little books'. It is a compilation of many little books with different histories and contexts. I enjoyed reading Pelikan's 'Whose Bible Is It' for some background.

One should not assume (I am not saying you have) that God works with human history from the position of obsolete cosmological artifact constructed by ancient peoples. People over history have done and thought a lot of things, yet God is eternal and ahead of the game regarding human intellectual works. Urartu was transliterated by the Jews as Ararat. The hills of Ararat or Urartu was in contemporary Iraq away from the Gulf some hundred miles or so-its ancient borders may have been closer to the flooded region, that is itself rather historically vague. Yet it was a good place for survivors with Noah to come to rest after the storm with their livestock.

Original sin is in the thermodynamic process of humanity. With immortality and eating of the tree of knowledge (technology, philosophy and so forth) they might rise to consume the entire Universe, or convert it to a quantum computer and pop new Universes into being without being smart enough to pass of safety checks. For that and other reasons humanity has had it garden of Eden wings clipped a little-they just can't follow orders very well even if they are for their own good.

Here you have taken an enormous leap of faith by erroneously equating lack of a proof for non-existence of the supernatural with lack of logical support for disbelief in it. Atheism has a great deal of logical support, theism has little or none, but neither have proof.

The Universal affirmative and Universal negative propositions in the context of the existence of God seem self-standing. I do not think its reasonable to prove one or the other by asking the someone to prove or disprove the other.

My reasons for faith are good enough yet I do not assume that one can prove the existence of God by the failure of atheists to prove the non-existence of God (the Universal negative proposition). One cannot prove the Universal from the particular. If God was found not to exist in 1000 Universes after complete search, he might still have been somewhere else-perhaps in the 1001st (or he might have moved back to a Universe not being searched by scientific atheists).

One cannot disprove the existence of extra-terrestrials just because after thorough searching with technology no sign of alien life or communication has been found. I don't think God either might place a large neon sign somewhere in the Magellenic Cloud and say 'Hey Earth-persons, I'm over here!'. Instead, one has the prophets and The Lord and faith-even with a personal, transcendent relationship.

Expecting to place God in a physically causal and contingent category isn't reasonable.

Original sin as I think about it, originated at the fall of Adam and Eve. They were physically changed then into mortal form with that strife. Human being as a thermodynamic process is the original sin context that can be overcome through faith alone.

Can you prove it? Can you even justify it from Genesis? Or is it just Paul?

Atheists would need to provide categorical proof for the non-existence of God if they wanted to prove their belief (not possible) as a self-standing logical proof aspire to a shadow of credibility.

This is nonsense. In his 1980 book Does God Exist?, the German theologian, Hans Küng, summed up his inquiry as follows:

• It is possible to deny God. Atheism cannot be eliminated rationally. It is irrefutable. • Affirmation of God is also possible, Atheism cannot be rationally established. It is undemonstrable. •If God is, he is the answer to the radical uncertainty of reality. •The fact that God is, can be assumed not strictly in virtue of a proof or indication of pure reason (natural theology), not unconditionally in virtue of a moral postulate of practical reason (Kant), not exclusively in virtue of the biblical testimony (dialectical theology), but only in a confidence rooted in reality itself.

(my emphasis)

Apparently he believes as a Catholic theologian that there is much more than a shadow of credibility to atheism, it is in fact irrefutable even if undemonstrable.

I think there are many definitions of atheism and the context in which it might be used. For atheism to have credibility as more than an opinion it would need to have some logical support in proving the non-existence of God Universally and in any possible Universe. My values for credibility may differ from others. String theory is unproven for instance yet credible although unlikely to be satisfactory. There are also beyond M-Theory a Darth theory and an Emperor theory that are also unlikely to be absolutely satisfactory. Some physicists say that there may never be a truly final cosmological theory( unless its just the last one people make).

Obviously there are atheist believers in-the-world. If several million Americans follow NASCAR I still won't think its a good use of time or a valuable social activity. A credible theory of value may have in some circumstances a social use criterion, however for some concerns or questions such as God the majority opinion or quantitative beliefs cannot determine the veracity or accuracy of an opinion.

Hans Kung visited a Friends seminary in Houston shortly before I attended there in the summer of 1992 perhaps on a tour during his time of Vatican troubles. While I respect Hans Kung I would not promote him for use in the fallacy of authority.

Since Kung wrote that "Atheism cannot be rationally established. It is undemonstrable" I should leave it at that-that is the point I have been making here.

I think there are many definitions of atheism and the context in which it might be used. For atheism to have credibility as more than an opinion it would need to have some logical support in proving the non-existence of God Universally and in any possible Universe.

Logically incoherent statement since you have no evidence of the existence of universes other than the one we live in. More than that the statement God exists is meaningless without the assurance that God refers to a definite idea and not just a collection of denied attributes.

I think there are many definitions of atheism and the context in which it might be used. For atheism to have credibility as more than an opinion it would need to have some logical support in proving the non-existence of God Universally and in any possible Universe.

Logically incoherent statement since you have no evidence of the existence of universes other than the one we live in. More than that the statement God exists is meaningless without the assurance that God refers to a definite idea and not just a collection of denied attributes.

Your choice of the word 'cohere' seems to refer to coherence theory perhaps, and a coherence theory found in a scientific lexicon. I had pointed out that Quine noted the difficulties with language lexicons and ontologies.

God for instance, can be a definite idea without being reduced to any particular phrase. I think it is somewhat disingenuous for those without faith to offer an opinion that God cannot exist without definite a priori knowledge of attributes of God that are finite. Perhaps that is something like saying that no ultimate physical principle of the Universe could be known unless one knew its description already.

People may have an idea about God without being able to make an exhaustive definition of God. Scientists looking askance may have no idea, or assume that all ideas must be reducible to particular phrases or synaptic biochemical molecular addresses. Perhaps you may trust Kung's statement about God and intuition, rely upon Jesus Christ and Paul or reason from the criterion and infer the existence of God as Creator of all that is created, omnipotent and omniscient. Obviously finite beings cannot encompass the infinite.

I do not need to prove the existence of other Universes to speculate about them. In this context that is a result of modal logic and the logic of necessity. One might I suppose, consider that God would encompass all that could exist necessarily, in all possible Universes that might exist or that ever could or have existed, if there is more than one Universe.

-- Updated May 9th, 2012, 7:15 pm to add the following --

Original sin as I think about it, originated at the fall of Adam and Eve. They were physically changed then into mortal form with that strife. Human being as a thermodynamic process is the original sin context that can be overcome through faith alone.

Can you prove it? Can you even justify it from Genesis? Or is it just Paul?

I had actually quoted most of Genesis Chapters 1-3 and commented on them yet seem to have lost that post.

Perhaps another time-I am out of that. It's good reading though.

Your choice of the word 'cohere' seems to refer to coherence theory perhaps, and a coherence theory found in a scientific lexicon. I had pointed out that Quine noted the difficulties with language lexicons and ontologies.

God for instance, can be a definite idea without being reduced to any particular phrase. I think it is somewhat disingenuous for those without faith to offer an opinion that God cannot exist without definite a priori knowledge of attributes of God that are finite. Perhaps that is something like saying that no ultimate physical principle of the Universe could be known unless one knew its description already.

People may have an idea about God without being able to make an exhaustive definition of God. Scientists looking askance may have no idea, or assume that all ideas must be reducible to particular phrases or synaptic biochemical molecular addresses. Perhaps you may trust Kung's statement about God and intuition, rely upon Jesus Christ and Paul or reason from the criterion and infer the existence of God as Creator of all that is created, omnipotent and omniscient. Obviously finite beings cannot encompass the infinite.

I do not need to prove the existence of other Universes to speculate about them. In this context that is a result of modal logic and the logic of necessity. One might I suppose, consider that God would encompass all that could exist necessarily, in all possible Universes that might exist or that ever could or have existed, if there is more than one Universe.

"Logically incoherent" here simply means that the statement does not make sense within its own context.

God for instance, can be a definite idea without being reduced to any particular phrase.

How? If there are no attributes assignable to the word God, how can it be a definite idea? How is it distinguishable from other ideas? You are telling me "I have in mind an entity I can't describe to you because it's beyond my finite comprehension, but you must believe in its existence unless you can prove it doesn't exist in any possible world."

I do not need to prove the existence of other Universes to speculate about them.

Indeed, but you were not speculating about them. You insisted that an atheist must prove that God did not exist in any possible world, so I presumed that you considered their existence beyond speculation. If you change your statement to

For atheism to have credibility as more than an opinion it would need to have some logical support in proving the non-existence of God Universally and in any possible Universe I might speculate about.

its logical incoherence will perhaps become clearer to you.