Empirical Evidence of Supernatural: association between sign and signified

We can't demonstrate empirical knowledge of God to others, even if we feel we have it ourselves. But if we can correlate something that is empirical with God, the effects of God in the world then we could know by association between sign and signified that there is divine reality. Just as the fingerprint betrays the presence of the owner of the fingers that made them, or the track in the snow proves the presence of the creature that made it, so RE as the God correlate points to the presence of God in reality is the effect of the divine upon our lives. As a theological example of this principle we can draw upon the works of Schleiermacher. God is the correlate of RE as God is the correlate of the feeling of utter dependence. In Speeches on Religion to it's Cultured Dispersers he seemed to be making the simplistic argument: “I feel emotional when I pray to God so there must be a God to feel emotional about. [1] By the time He wrote his magnum opus Glaubenslehre (the Christian faith) he had developed a much more sophisticated version. He now understood these religious affections in a particular way, as a feeling of utter dependence. [2] Though critics often interpret the concept of “feeling” as an emotional response the real crux of his argument turns the utter dependence aspect. Rather than merely emotion he's identifying the feeling as indicative of a religious capacity. [3] We could think of it as a “religious instinct,” or more properly a religious consciousness.

It is from this sense of consciousness that doctrines derive their meaning, as verbalization of the sense. This sense of consciousness as part of the basis of religion offers a theoretical framework for connecting the sense of the numinous to the notion of real experience of the divine. Of course it's not a direct unmediated revelatory face to face encounter, but like the track in the snow points to a presence not directly seen. It is the original pre-theoretical consciousness...Schleiermacher believes that theoretical cognition is founded upon pre-theoretical inter subjective cognition and its life world. The latter cannot be dismissed as non-cognative for if the life world praxis is non-cognitive and invalid so is theoretical cognition..He...contends that belief in God is pre-theoretical, it is not the result of proofs and demonstration, but is conditioned solely by the modification of feeling of utter dependence. Belief in God is not acquired through intellectual acts of which the traditional proofs are examples, but rather from the thing itself, the object of religious experience..If as Shchleiermacher...says God is given to feeling in an original way this means that the feeling of utter dependence is in some sense an apparition of divine being and reality. This is not meant as an appeal to revelation but rather as a naturalistic eidetic or a priori. The feeling of utter dependence is structured by a correlation with its whence. [4]

This conclusion might be somewhat deflating for apologists, but there are two of caveats that might make it more palatable: (1) We don't have to reduce religion to just feeling or to consciousness, we don't have toally agree with Schleiermacher, we can understand doctrines and feelings as bound up with the same reaction to reality and the consciousness that obtains from sensing it. (2) we can construe the feeling as a phenomenological approach rather than a definitive commentary upon all of reality. If affections or consciousness based upon affections are primary in belief, this does not mean that arguments are of no value since people rationalize their feelings, and arguments help to clear away the clutter and clarify feelings.

Critics such as John Webster et. al. Attack this notion as a continuation of his mistake from On Religion, that Schleiermacher got the process backwards. [5] It is not feeling that produces doctrine but doctrines that produce feeling. The deep connection to affections is dismissed as his Moravian upbringing, the mark of the romanic era. “...The feeling of utter dependence, which Schleiermacher thought universal is an expression of the salient Christian virtue of humility with a particularly Protestant emphasis on the utter helplessness of man to save himself.” The argument is that Schleiermacher is just generalizing, the feeling is merely a feeling about the world from which he generalizes based upon his Christian upbringing. “All religions do not simply promote awe and connectedness to it.” [6] To the contrary, thanks to the M scale, we now know that these experiences are universal. The feeling of utter dependence is really about a sense of contingency, the radical contingency of all things, and it's great underlying unity, this equates to the sense of the meniscus and undifferentiated unity one finds in mystical experience. While Schleiermacher's feeling is not exactly mystical experience itself it is very closely related. Thus the universality found in RE supplies an answer to the criticism.

Thus the presence of the sign (the experience) informs us of the presence of the signified (God); like finger prints match the finger and thus reveal the person who made the print. The association between the divine and mystical experience is at least theoretically valid in terms of an anthropological perspective; religious experience forms the foundation upon which organized religions are built. [7] The sense of the numinous is a deep all pervasive since of love. The basic assumption made by those who have the experience is overwhelmingly that they have experience God. How can we know this to be the case without already knowing that God exists and what it is like to sense God's presence? We could set up criteria based upon the nature of religious belief. What conditions would one expectorate to prevail or what aspects would one expect to find in sensing God's presence?

Criteria:

(1).Life Transforming and vital in a positive life-affirming sense

(2) It would give us a sense of the transcendent and the divine.

(3) No alternate or naturalistic causality could be proven

These criteria are based upon the nature of religious belief and experience taken from all major world religions. More to the point they are derived from the works of W.T. Stace who argues that in all world religions there are certain claims about certain types of experiences that answer our most basic existential questions [8] These claims about answering the basic questions and positively affecting our lives constitute some of the most basic truth claims of world religions. If these claims are justified we should see these conditions in the criteria met. Religion in general seems to attempt to make sense of the nature of being human, to construct and then explain the Human problematic, or the human condition.. This knowledge is said to tranform the the lives of those who have such experiences. The content of the experiences themselves include a snese of the Holy, a sense of the sacred, the imparting of noetic content, these are all communicated in the texture of the experience itself. This realization accounts for criteria 1 and 2. It is only reasonable to think that the experience might be an experience of a reality involving the divine, since it indicates the validity truth claims of religion. It is equally reasonable and scientific to assume that if no counter causality found the God based conclusion is warranted. Thus, we have Criterion 3. These criteria are fulfilled by the data, and that allows us to derive the following argument from the criteria.

Argument: (1) The affects and effects of mystical experience are real in that they are measurably transformative in a positive sense.

(2)These affects cannot be reduced to naturalistic cause and affect, bogus mental states or epiphenomena (this will be seen in analysis of skeptical counter causality below).

(3)Since the affects of Mystical consciousness are independent of other explanations and the effects are real we should assume that they are genuine experiences of something transcendent of our own minds.

(4)Since mystical experience is usually experience of something, the Holy, the sacred, or some sort of greater transcendent reality we should assume that the origin of the experience is rooted in transcendent reality.

(5)Since mystical experience is usually about the divine we can assume a divine origin.

(6) Since religious symbols are culturally bound, and religious affectations are tied to such symbols, the universal nature of mystical experience implies an objective referent.

Justification for P1 “measurably transformative in a positive sense” is reflected in the findings throughout the 50 year period during which the body of researched has been collected. A huge number of studies corroborate these findings, not all of them use the M scale but they all use various measurements. Many of them use standardized measurements already in place for happiness and self actualization and other such affects. I have selected a range of studies that spans the time period. Two of the first scientifically rigorous scientific studies on the topic were Robert Wuthnow (1978) [9] and Kathleen Noble (1987) [10]Summary of their finds are as follows:

Wuthnow:

*Say their lives are more meaningful,

*think about meaning and purpose

*Know what purpose of life is Meditate more *Score higher on self-rated personal talents and capabilities

*Less likely to value material possessions, high pay, job security, fame, and having lots of friends

*Greater value on work for social change, solving social problems, helping needy

*Reflective, self aware

Noble:

*integration, allocentrism, *psychological maturity,

*self-acceptance, self-worth,

*autonomy, authenticity, need for solitude,

*increased love and compassion

*Experience productive of psychological health

*Less authoritarian and dogmatic

*More assertive, imaginative, self-sufficient

*intelligent, relaxed *High ego strength,

*relationships, symbolization, values,
Lukoff and Lu (1988) conducted a literature search reflects many studies demonstrating the transforming effects of religious experience, some of them using the early version of the M scale.[11] For example Finney and Maloneyh (1985) found contemplative prayer was instrumental in improvement in psychotherapy. [12]Hood (1977) found high correlation between mystical experiences and self actualization, persons of relatively high self actualization were more likely to have had mystical experiences. [13] Other studies (not in Lukoff and Lu) include Greeley who, “found no evidence to support the orthodox belief that frequent mystic experiences or psychic experiences stem from deprivation or psychopathology. His 'mystics' were generally better educated, more successful economically, and less racist, and they were rated substantially happier on measures of psychological well-being.” [14] Sullivan, using a large quantitative base of former mental patients found that 48% identified spiritual practices as crucial to their healing and this was corroborated by those ho cared for them. [15] This is just a small sample of the studies that demonstrate the transformative aspects.

Justification for P2 cannot be reduced to naturalistic cause and effect will be dealt with mainly below in answering the argument on brain chemistry. P3 affects of Mystical consciousness are independent of other explanations and the effects are real we should assume that they are genuine experiences of something transcendent of our own minds. That they are independent of counter causality derived from 2. That they are real is derived from the measurable effects in 1. P4, experience of something: The content of the experience is about the divine, or ultimate reality. Even when the experience is interpreted by the receiver not to be about God the receiver has been known to act in ways that are consistent with belief in God. Moreover, the experiences described tend to match those described as experiences of the divine. Ergo it’s just a matter of interpretation. Secondly, the vast majority of those who have these experiences do believe they are about God. [16]

This final point about the universal nature is of particular interest, When doctrinal explanations and differences of tradition are controlled for, the experiences themselves are the same the world over. Even among atheists, those who have religious experiences respond to them in the same way that religious believers do. This might indicate that these people are all experiencing an objective reality which is external to the human brain. There is a voluminous and ancient tradition of writing about experiences by people from all over the world, who claim to have experienced the divine. Mystics and philosophers have catelogued such writings. Two of the most noteworthy examples are Mysticism by Evelyn Underhill, [17] and Teachings of the Mystics by Philosopher W.T. Stace. [18] Many other such writers have included these experiences. Thirdly, grounded in empirical evidence, the universal nature of such experiences implies a source external to the human mind. When I say “external” I mean it originates externally but is experienced internally. This includes human brain structure and brain chemistry as a conduit not that it circumvents natural processes. W.T. Stace shows that, as Ralph Hood Jr. put it, “within and eventually outside of the great faith traditions mysticism has flourished.” [19]

Stace offers five characteristics that demonstrate the commonalities to mystical experience;these are characteristics that are found universally in all cultures and in all forms of mystical experience:

The contemporary interest in the empirical research of mysticism can be traced to Stace’s (Stace, 1960) demarcation of the phenomenological characteristics of mystical experiences (Hood, 1975). In Stace’s conceptualization, mystical experiences had five characteristics (Hood, 1985, p.176): 1. The mystical experience is noetic. The person having the eerience perceives it as a valid source of knowledge and not just a subjective experience. 2. The mystical experience is ineffable, it cannot simply be described in words. 3. The mystical experience is holy. While this is the religious aspect of the experience it is not necessarily expressed in any particular theological terms. 4. The mystical experience is profound yet enjoyable and characterized by positive affect. 5. The mystical experience is paradoxical. It defies logic. Further analysis of reported mystical experiences suggests that the one essential feature of mysticism is an experience of unity (Hood, 1985). The experience of unity involves a process of ego loss and is generally expressed in one of three ways (Hood, 1 976a). The ego is absorbed into that which transcends it, or an inward process by which the ego gains pure awareness of self, or a combination of the two. [20]

The other aspect of importance to this work is the universality argument. The universality argument could be taken as a warrant for belief, but I use it here to show that there’s a reason to equate these experiences with Supernature. When Hood took out the name specific to a religious tradition (from the M scale) and just asked general questions about experience, the experiences described were the same. This indicates that what is being experienced is the same for all the people having religious experiences. This is actually the same as saying Stace’s theory was validated. If it wasn’t validated they would not describe the same experiences. The indication is that there is an objective reality all of the mystics experience. The reason is because religion is a cultural construct. If they were just describing a constructed set of expectations resulting form culture, the experiences would be conditioned by culture not transcending it. So that means Iranian Muslims experience what they think of as “Allah” and Baptists in Cleveland experience what they think of as “Jesus” in the same way. This is should not be the case if they are merely experiencing culturally conditioned constructs. The implication is that they may be experiencing an objective reality that both understand through culturally constructed filters. Thus, there is a good indication that some external reality is experienced. One would then be warranted in thinking that this external reality is God, since the content of experience and its result on people's lives correlate with the objections of God belief in general.



Sources

[1] Frederick Schleiermacher, Speeches on Religion to it's Cultured Dispersers. New York: Cambridge University Press, Trans. Riichard Crouter,1996, 24-5

[2] Frederich Achleiermacher, On The Christian Faith. Edinburgh: T. and T. Clark, Trans. H. R. MacKintosh and J.R.Stewart, 1986, 76-8

[3] Ibid., 124.

[4] Robert R. Williams, Schleiermacher the Theologian: Construction of the Doctrine of God. Minneapolis MN: Fortress Press, 1978, 4.

[5] John Webster, Kathryn Tanner, and Ian Torrance, ed., Oxford Handbook of Systematic Theology, Oxfor:Oxford University Press, 2007, 421.

[6] Ibid.

[7] David Steindl-Rast, “The Mystical Core of Organized Religion,” Copyright © 1989 by David Steindl-Rast. Used by the Council on Spiritual Practices with permission.First appeared in ReVision, Summer 1989 12(1):11-14. Online resource, URL: http://csp.org/Steindl-Mystical.html (accessed 1/2/16)

[8] Stace, Mysticism and Philosophy,, op.cit., 42-44.

[9] Robert, Wuthnow,"Peak Experiences: Some Empirical Tests." Journal of Humanistic Psychology, 18 (3), (1978), 59-75.

[10]Kathleen D. Noble, ``Psychological Health and the Experience of Transcendence.'' The Counseling Psychologist, 15 (4),(1987). 601-614.

[11] Lukoff, David & Francis G. Lu (1988). ``Transpersonal psychology research review: Topic: Mystical experiences.'' Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, 20 (2), 161-184.

[12]Finney and Maloneyh, “An Empirical Study of Contemplative Prayer as an Adjunct to Psychotherapy,” Journal of Psychology and Theology 13 (4) 284-90.

[13]Ralph Hood Jr., “Differential Triggering of Mysticalo Experiences As A Function O Self Actualization,” Review of Religious Research, 18, 1977, 264-70.

[14]Charles T. Tart, Psi: Scientific Studies of the Psychic Realm, New York: Dutton, 1977, back in print ed. 2001, 19.

[15]W. Sullivan, “It Helps Mev Be A Wholoe Person: The Role of Spirituality Among The mentally Challeneged.” Psychological Rehabilitation Journal, 16 (1993) 125-134.

[16] Ralph Hood Jr. “The Common Core Thesis in the Study of Mysticism.” In Where God and Science Meet: How Brain and Evolutionary Studies Alter Our Understanding of Religion. Patrick Mcnamara ed. West Port CT: Prager Publications, 2006, 119-235.

[17]Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism: A study on the Nature and Development of Man’s Spiritual consciousness. New York: Dutton, 1911

[18]W.T. Stace, Teachings of the Mystics: Selections from the Greatest Mystics and Mystical Writers of the World. New American Library 1960. A good General overview of Stace’s understanding of mysticism is Mystical Experience Registry: Mysticism Defined by W.T. Stace. found onine at URL: http://www.bodysoulandspirit.net/mystical_experiences/learn/experts_define/stace.shtml

[19]Ralph Hood Jr. “The Common Core Thesis in the Study of Mysticism.”op. cit., 119-235.

[20]Robert J. Voyle, “The Impact of Mystical Experiences Upon Christian Maturity.” originally published in pdf format: http://www.voyle.com/impact.pdf. Google html version here: http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:avred7zleAEJ Voyle is quoting Hood in 1985, Hood in return is speakingStace. :www.voyle.com/impact.pdf+Hood+scale+and+religious+experience&hl=en&gl =us&ct=clnk&cd=2&ie=UTF-8

The Nature of Truth

A poster on Cadre blog says that Christianity screwed up truth and spoiled the rich ancient heritage in modernity, as though Christianity is the historical newcomer and modernity has an ancient heritage,

Paplinton:

The word 'truth' and its underlying concept has been so wantonly cheapened over the centuries by the christian experience as to render it meaningless. The only thing we can say is certain about religion, christianity being no exception, is as Prof David Eller, renowned anthropologist eruditely explains, "Religion is essentially social, in both senses of the word. It is an activity that humans do together; it is created, maintained, and perpetuated by human group behaviour. It is also social in the sense that it extends that sociality beyond the human world, to a (putative) realm of non-human agents who also interact with us socially." Any every religion exhibits the very same pathologies based on superstition and ignorance of how the mind works. Its been a tough nut to crack but thankfully science is slowly but inexorably shining a light into those shadowed recesses.So the question about the "Trooth™" of christianity as the 'one and only true religion', or any of the thousands of extinct and extant religions that make the identical claim, is simply enculturated mumbo-jumbo.[1]

He not only spells truth differently but gives it a registered trade mark; nothing could be more appropriate because the modern denuded concept of truth replacing the real idea of truth is a product of 1DM [2] and thus the simulacra truth of the closed realm of discourse (the product of regicide everything to consuming and producing). In his mind he thinks the issue is between fact based empirical science and pretend made up unreliability Christianity, he;s a dupe. He;s duped into that false dichotomy. The scientific model that seems so factual is not factual at all it's the streaming data. The data stream is relative and vanishing based upon the constantly shifting sands of surface level things. The mere existence of the physical is the end of the line for the stream of data. There can be no unseen reality there. Of course there is one, the subatomic level but that;s just part of the inconsistency of ideology. That unseen reality plays a crucial role in scientific theory so it;s necessary but spirit doesn't so it has go.

The Christian ideal of truth is not made up.It's the concept of unseen reality that forms the basis of reality (like the subatomic level). It is unchaining,timeless, the basis of all that is. That is the description of god, In St. Augustine's view God = truth.

Augustine, after he had experienced all the implications of ancient skepticism, gave a classical answer to the problem of the two absolutes: they coincide in the nature of truth. Veritas is presupposed in ever philosophical argument; and veritas is God. You cannot deny truth as such because you could do it only in the name of truth, thus establishing truth. And if you establish truth you affirm God. “Where I have found the truth there I have found my God, the truth itself,” Augustine says. The question of the two Ultimates is solved in such a way that the religious Ultimate is presupposed in every philosophical question, including the question of God. God is the presupposition of the question of God. This is the ontological solution of the problem of the philosophy of religion. God can never be reached if he is the object of a question and not its basis.[3]

In the ideology of scientism God must necessarily be seen as "made up"and any unseen realm not subatomic has to be made up because if surface level of relativity is all there is then there can be no unseen. So the data stream version of truth is based upon ideology of scientism, at least the science oriented version of it is.I still see it as a creature of post human era (circa 1980) and thus akin to 'Trumpism and alt truth. So even tough fundamentalism calls itself "Christian" it has forsaken the Christian conception truth and is really just another product of the same forces that produced new atheism.

Lest there be any doubt that Paplinton is in the scientism way look at his answer to my comment:

"The overwhelming evidence suggests an explanation for why christianity [and all religions for that matter] persists is not that its narrative is true per se but that it is an epiphenomenal by-product of our need to make sense of the genetic and evolutionary drivers for human behavior in the absence of modern scientific knowledge and understanding two thousand years ago that we now are so thankfully privy to." So he has to destroy the concept of truth,make sure is no concept of a grander context in which material reality plays out amid unchanging eternal verities,it has to be relative and made up. It's just epi-phenomenal not even a real phenomenon. It;s based upon the need to explaimn things,which is the only motive for any belief if scientism is your only mode of thought. Because it emulates science.

His sense of history is totally distorted, The Christian concept is closer to teh Greek, having borrowed from it. The modern scientism view narrowed from the Christian. Physicist Paul Davies recognizes that modern enlightenment conceits of laws of physics are merely the residue of the God concept with the personality taken out, French philosphes just retained the powers of God with no will to motivate them.[4] The meta-narrative of scinentisms's ideology would have us believe that only Christianity is an attempt to understand and make sense but the empirical data stream of science is facts and the truth and the true explanation. In reality it is it just another meta-narrative with a different rational but still one that attempts to understand what is beyond its understanding.

Notice he has the social scientist pronounce religion just a social institution. Like that proves that's all it is. But the social sciences (founded largely by Auguste Comte) working out of the early dialectical materialist circles of Saimt-Simon, Fuerbach, and Marx were set in the path of atheist critique from the beginning,

Classical sociological theories are theories of great scope and ambition that either were created in Europe between the early 1800s and the early 1900s or have their roots in the culture of that period. The work of such classical sociological theorists as Auguste Comte, Karl Marx, Herbert Spencer, Emile Durkheim, Max Weber, Georg Simmel, and Vilfredo Pareto was important in its time and played a central role in the subsequent development of sociology. Additionally, the ideas of these theorists continue to be relevant to sociological theory today, because contemporary sociologists read them. They have become classics because they have a wide range of application and deal with centrally important social issues. [5]

Many of those thinkers made a big thing of atheism. I was a sociology major,l competed the whole major, my BA is in sinology and communication. I got out of the field because its disregard of any view other than its grinding number crunching reductionist meta-narrative.

Most modern Theologians base their view of truth upon the correspondence theory, true of Tillich in particular.

[The idea]... that truth is a relational property involving a characteristic relation (to be specified) to some portion of reality (to be specified). This basic idea has been expressed in many ways, giving rise to an extended family of theories and, more often, theory sketches. Members of the family employ various concepts for the relevant relation (correspondence, conformity, congruence, agreement, accordance, copying, picturing, signification, representation, reference, satisfaction) and/or various concepts for the relevant portion of reality (facts, states of affairs, conditions, situations, events, objects, sequences of objects, sets, properties, tropes). The resulting multiplicity of versions and reformulations of the theory is due to a blend of substantive and terminological differences. The correspondence theory of truth is often associated with metaphysical realism. Its traditional competitors, pragmatist, as well as coherentist, verificationist, and other epistemic theories of truth, are often associated with idealism, anti-realism, or relativism. In recent years, these traditional competitors have been virtually replaced (at least from publication-space) by deflationary theories of truth and, to a lesser extent, by the identity theory (note that these new competitors are typically notassociated with anti-realism). [6]

So my notion of truth understands the data stream of science in terms of understanding the physical world but it cant communicate any reality beyond the surface which is empirical existence. Truth with a capital "T" i that which is and it includes eternal necessary being that can neither cease nor fail to be.It is beyond our understanding.

I close with an explanation of my graphic, Why do I use a scene from the Seventh Seal? BTW the mast head photo is also from the same film, the knight plays chess with death, After doing so he finally looses and he and his friends dance off into death symbolic of dying of black pleasure. Art beats science it's the perfect medium to transmit religious tough into the modern world. It's "made up" but not false.It's the symbol of a truth beyond our understanding that has to be mediated through metaphor, science is made phony when scientism pretends it can go beyond itself and explain the transcendent, that really means explicate it away.

we all play chess with death, we are all going to die,we do not know what's over the hill.But we know there is truth over the hill.



Sources [1] Paplinton, "If Christianity were True Would You Become a Christian?" Comment section, Cadre Comments.(April 22) 2017 blog. URL" http://christiancadre.blogspot.com/2017/04/if-christianity-were-true-would-you.html?showComment=1493165487346#c247906903880029801 (accessed April 26,2017)

[2] 1DM is "one-Dimensional Man" Herbert Marcue's concept marking the decline of Western civilization and the ultimate triumph of capitalistic market forces in producing a tantalized system of obedience. It was the ultimate in capitalism induced false consciousness arresting class struggle. The workers get hooked on false needs, they don't perceive their need to rebel

see Marcuse: Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man: Studies in the Ideology of Advanced Industrial Society. Boston: Beacon Press, 1964, 12.

[3] Paul Tillich, Theology of Culture, New York: Oxford University press,1964 12-13.

[4] Paul Davies, “Physics and The Mind of God: the Templeton Prize Address,” First Things, August 1995, on line version
URL:https://www.firstthings.com/article/1995/08/003-physics-and-the-mind-of-god-the-templeton-prize-address-24 accessed Nov 25, 2016

[5] Paul Rtzer and Douglas J.Goodman, Classical Sociological Theory, New York: McGraw Hill 4th edition, 79.

[6] Marian David,, "The Correspondence Theory of Truth", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2016 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL = . First published Fri May 10, 2002; substantive revision Thu May 28, 2015

time for the big scare

The widow of a church elder at my old church sent me a PM on facebook. It is an article about a man who has come farward (to eenagelical chruches) saying he deisged the computer chiop that will deliever the mark of the beas. So the mark is about to be unvailed. Oddly enough here it is election time agaimn The kindof fear tacktics aresudedever time. In `88 I heard a woman in a restirant sain the Michael Dukakis had ordered all or artilloary be disengaed. Think about it, candidaee Michael Dukakis one sneater oefered all our artilliary to be disengaged? In 1980 a guy at my church told us he worked for the gaint computer company tha was about to unveil the mark of the beast he was going to keep us posted. We have had 40 years of this kind of fear mongering and they pull it in every election. Back in 80 the ideas was noised about the grape vine that God is about to bring on the end times but we vote for Reagan he will give us more time. This is because Reagan would stop abortion. This is the same game played evwry four four years. A social coompact.more time to enjoy the pleasure of money in exchange for noise about the evil of abortion. Does it really Make sense that the great man of God would say nothing about this? If Trump really was the greatan of God evangelicals want us to beleive he is wouldn't he be talking aobut how imporiative it is we stop this mark of the beast? doesn't it make more sense to think that the guy in charge of the system taht produces the mark would be in on rhe mark itself?

Prepare to leave

I cannot blog under the conditions of the new regime, looking for new blogger home.

On Break

I've lost a dear friend,Judy Romero who led me to the Lord died loast week. I will retirn to blogging next week.Her daughter gives obit, link

Argument from causal necessity

This is an argument I recently had on a atheist web site, Here"You" is the atheist AndyF2.



Dialogue with AndyF2 aka"you" https://oncreationism.blogspot.com/2020/06/hinmans-cosmological-argument.html

my argument

1. Something exists.
2. Whatever exists does so either because it exists eternally or because it's existence is dependent upon some prior cause or set of circumstances.
3.If all things that exist are dependent for their existnece there is no actual explanation of causes
4. Therefore, there exists at least one  eternal thing
5. The  one eternal thing is the logical explanation for all causally dependent things
6.Any eternally existing cause of all things is worthy of the appellation "God."
7. Therefore God exists.
The False Dichotomy:

YOU: "The first issue is that 2 is a false dichotomy. For example, it may be that the universe appeared spontaneous. Joe objects to this because there is no precedence for things appearing spontaneously. However, the same is also true of something existing eternally."

ME: Show me an example of anything that pops into existence out of nothing! This is a contradiction to everything we  know and suspect, That we have no example of it just underscores the logic of the case that it is a contradiction to reality; Your answer to my argument is based upon the assumption tat  all  of science is wrong.  all logic is wrong, and we everything we observe in reality is wrong,  You basically  relay on magic to oppose God.



YOU: "Of course, in Joe's head, that is quite different, because he starts from the assumption that God exists - but of course that is exactly what he is trying to prove."

ME:--No I started from the assumption that things need causes a notion you apparently have yet to grasp. But it's an assumption made by all of science as nowhere in science do we find a principle of something from nothing,

You: "The simple fact is that we have no precedents for the start of the universe; going on common experience is a bad guide here."

ME:--that doesn't mean magic is a beter guide


His second attack "something eternal."

YOU: "Joe claims anything that is eternal should be called God. but this is just Joe injecting his own idea of how the universe started. If the laws of nature are eternal, would Joe worship them? Of course not!"

Me: --This is proven in the logic of the argument, you have not even addressed the argument,

YOU: "Okay, Albert's object is valid - depending on what Krauss meant by nothing. But so what? This does not prove the universe could not appear spontaneously, only that Krauss' theory is not that, so Joe's objection fails.

Me:--You have yet to give a reason why we should believe in something from nothing Apparently your only reason is to avoid  belief in God. We never see causal popping into existence,why should we accept it? No scientist does, No theory in science proposes the universe just popped up out of nothing. There's always the assumption of a prior structure, yet i;ts never accounted for.
YOU:"Furthermore, if we allow Krauss' theory, but acknowledge the framework within which quantum mechanics might work was eternal, then we have a very real possibility for how the university began. 

Me: So you drop something from nothing? Where did the frame work come from?

YOU"Sure, we cannot explain the framework within which quantum mechanics, but Joe cannot explain God. And the framework within which quantum mechanics is FAR more parsimonious. Joe's objection fails again."

Me: Sure we both work from unknowns but God is a more logical assumption than acausal popping. Notice you never acutely addressed the logic of the argument  which proves that there must be one logical eternal necessary origin and thus this is worthy of being thought God.