Notable Conversations: Young Girl
I AM A CHRISTIAN!!!!!!!!!! I read throughout all your "arguments" for atheism and I can prove you wrong. Whether you want to be is your choose. One of the questions I would love to ask you is that if there is no God, then there is no right or wrong, right? So if you are an american, then the events that happened on Sept. 11 wasn't wrong, If your from Isreal, then Gunich wasn't wrong, if your from Europe, then Hitler's massacure wasn't wrong. Try an d tell me that there is no God, thats the same as saying there is no right or wrong, which there is no matter where your from or what you say you believe. I would love to hear what you say about this. Thank you and can't wait to see my comment posted on your site so the entire world can see.
First of all, IAmAnAtheist.com does not have any "arguments for atheism," as you put it. It does have light-hearted counter arguments to some theistic arguments, but this is not the same thing as an argument for atheism. There is no need to prove that something does not exist -- the people who believe that something does exist are the ones that need to do the proving.
Your argument for the existence of God based on standards for good and evil is both old and -- in my opinion -- weak. Why can't there be good and evil without God? At best, I'd say that there is no guarantee of justice without God, but there still is good and evil.
Let's look at it another way -- how do you, personally define "good"? Can you define it without referring to God? If so, then God is not necessary for the concept of good to exist. If, on the other hand, you define "good" as (for example) obeying God, then the 9/11 terrorists would be "good" if they were correct that they were doing God's will. Obviously, that's ridiculous. I don't think we want a definition of good that might include the inquisition, crusaders, slavery, or mass murder depending on how one interprets scripture.
I'd be happy to continue this discussion with you. If you could define what you mean by "good," that would be a great starting point.
Okay, I was hoping to discuss this topic with you. Atheist have always intrigued me because of their unfaith. Maybe you can explain better why while I explain why I believe. Good. Any dictanary can give you a Good explaination. To be better, to be the best. The list goes on and on. The Christian definition means to follow God and do what is right in His eyes. I know you might think that since no one can really agree on one God, there is none. That is not true. You and your friends might disagree on whether or not there is candy in a jar and what kind. You might each think of different things according to what each of you believe, hope and think is in there. Yet no matter how much you fight over it, there is only one kind of candy in there. Not the best illusion I know, but you get my point. Only one person is right, therefore making every one else wrong. You might argue that no one can be good because we don't know what God wants us to do since we have never talked to Him. We'll get to the part about talking to Him later, but you as a child never knew exactly what your parents and everybody wanted you to do, no matter how many times you listened. You might have a good idea about it, but never was it perfect. Same with God. Also, if your parents said that they knew what was best for you and then told you to stab a knife through your hand, that would be wrong. You know that if God wants you to do something bad, such as murder or steal or terrorize people then it is wrong. He is not God. God, as recorded in the Bible did not allow for His people to do things such as that. I need to go now. Please email me your response. Thank you.
P.S. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodnes, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Against such things there is no law.
I'm going to give a pass to using a dictionary definition of "good," since it won't get to the root of what we're talking about here. Your Christian definition is much more useful for our discussion, and I'll get back to that in a minute.
First, let me say that I'd never say something like, "there is no God because people can't agree about God." In fact, I'd never say that there is no God, because I have no way of proving such a statement. You are also right that when people disagree about God only one person may be right, but what I need is a way to tell which person is the correct one.
Your point about a child not understanding exactly what parents want as a metaphor for knowing what God wants is well taken, but I think it falls a bit short of the mark. I may not have always understood my parents as a child, but I certainly knew when they were talking to me. I never had to worry that some natural phenomena might be a message from my parents, or that how I felt inside was what my parents were trying to say, and I never had strangers tell me that when I thought I was hearing advice from my parents I was really listening to Satan.
In any case, if I am going to use God's will as my standard for good I need to be convinced a) that God exists, b) that he can and does communicate desires to people, and c) that I can tell God's speech from things that are not God's speech. You provide one criteria -- that instructions that are really from God would not ask us to do something that is wrong. The problem here is that if you are defining "good" as obeying God, then by definition anything God asks you to do isn't wrong. Saying otherwise implies that you know the difference between right and wrong whether or not God exists (for example, you say that stabbing yourself is wrong).
Things get even muddier when we look at all the things religious people say God has asked them to do, many of which I would say are immoral. In the Bible, for example, God tells a man to kill his own son, and so far as I can tell there is no discussion of whether or not this was a real request from God since God would never ask for such a thing.
Continuing with the Bible, you say that God in the Bible would not allow his people to, "murder or steal or terrorize people." However, there were killings of whole towns (sometimes excepting young girls) at Moses' command, and the Israelites stole a great many valuables from the Egyptians when they fled. Maybe these things don't count as murder and theft, or maybe they don't count as being done under God's command, but in any case they make it very, very difficult for me to see how you use your religious beliefs to decide right from wrong.
At this point, I still feel that when I open the candy jar you mention, I'm going to find it empty. I look forward to hearing from you again.
While discussing the difference between right and wrong is a very good topic, I feel like it is going nowhere. So since you basically asked me to show you proof that God exists, I will for the moment get off the topic of right and wrong to show you that God exists. Hopefully we shall get back to this topic soon.
I hope you know science because what I am about to say deals heavily in it. One of my aunts has a friend whose name is Micheal Hite. He has helped me get into proving that God exists through science. I give the credit to him and to God.
"Does God exist?" the question that most human beings ask in their lifetime. Either God exists or He doesn't. There is no room in between. What evidence, then proves which part correct?(Note: when I say prove, I do not mean by empirical evidence, a.k.a. the five senses. We cannot prove God the same way we prove a sack of tomatoes.) While empirical evidence is very useful in proving something, it is not the only way to prove that something is in being.
All legal authorities reconize the vality of the prima facie case. This is in effect when enough evidence is available to establish such a high probability of a fact being true that, unless taht particular fact somehow can be refuted, it is considered proven beyond reasonable doubt.The arguement of the thesist(me) is taht there is a huge amount of powerful evidence which forms an unshakable prima facie case for the existance of God, one that is unshakeable. I would like to show you a portion of that evidence for the evidence of God.
The Cosmological Argument- Cosmological of course meaning cause and effect- is the most used argument for the existance of God. It says that the Universe is here and therefore can and must be explained. The universe exists. Anyone who is sane understands that. So pops up the question "How did the Universe get here?" Basic science says that nothing can create itself, otherwise called contingent because it is dependant on something else outside of itself to create it or explain it's existance. The Universe has not as of yet explained to us how it got here or why its here, therefore it is labled as contingent. Here is where the law of cause and effect plays a big part in the cosmological argument. As far as scientific knowledge goes, natural laws have no exceptions. This is definatly true of the Law of Cause and Effect because it is the most universal and most certain of all laws. Simply, the Law of Cause and Effect states that every material effect must have a cause that happens before the effect.
Material causes with no adequete causes do not exist. Also, effects never happen before the cause. In addition, the cause is always greater than the effect. This is why scientists say that every material effect must have an adequete cause. For whatever effects that we see, we must suggust an adequete cause, which brings us back to the original question, How did the universe get here? there are only three possible answers to these questions: 1) The Universe is eternal it will always exist the way it has been doing for eternity. 2) The Universe is not eternal it was created out of nothing or 3) the Universe is not eternal and it did not create itself , rather something (Someone) created it who was superior to the Universe.
I do not understand the statement that a cause is always greater than the effect. In chemistry, for example, the results of a reaction must equal the cause of the reaction. In fact, conservation of energy would imply that causes and effects should be equal.
As for your possibilities of where the universe came from, there are at least two others: 4) The universe is part of a series of universes, and 5) the universe is not eternal and (avoiding the word "created") came into existence from an unknown previous state.
All three of these deserve careful consideration.
The Eternal Universe
The comfort zone for someone who does not believe in God is that the Universe is eternal. However, science today denies this fact, and says that the Universe had a beginning and an end.
Amoung the most important and well established laws of science are the laws of thermodynamics. The first law, also commonly known as Law of Conservation of Energy and/or Matter states that neither matter nor energy can be created or destroyed. The second law also commonly known as the Law of Increasing Entropy states that everything is running down or wearing out. Energy is becoming less and less available to use. Entropy, a measure of randomness, disorderliness, or unstructureness, is increasing. That, of course, means that the Universe is going to wear itself out. This end is referred to by scientists as the heat death. In other words, the universe is like a giant clock that is winding down from the first time it has been wound up. The conclusion from science which is inescapable is that the Universe is not eternal. Eternal things have no beginning or end, nor do they run down. A famous scientist, who happens to not believe in God, Robert Jastrow of NASA wrote "Modern science denies an eternal existance to the universe." He is correct. We now know that scientifically the universe is not eternal.
Created itself out of nothing
Not too long ago, it would have been almost impossible to find any reputable scientist who would be willing to suggest that the Universe created itself out of nothing. Every scientist as well as school children knew and understood that no material thing can create itself. The Universe is the created, not the creator. And until recently it seemed there could be no disagreement on this point. However, since the evidence is so strong that the Universe had a beginning some scientists stated that the Universe created itself. Normally, a statement like that would seem absurb because it denies the basic principles of physics. Yet those who do not believe in God have been willing to defend it. This suggestion is of course in clear violation of the First Law of Thermodynamics. As astronamer Robert Jastrow put it, " The creation of matter out of nothing would violate a cherished concept in science- the principle of states that matter and energy can be neither created nor destroyed. Matter can be converted into energy and vice versa, but the total amount of all matter and energy in the Universe must remain unchanged forever. It is difficult to accept a theory that violates such a firmly established scientific fact." Also, science is based on observation, reproducibility, and empirical data. Yet when pressed for the data that document the claim that the Universe created itself from nothing,they were forced to admit that there is no such evidence to confirm it. The idea that the universe created itself is absurb, both philosophically and scientifically.
The Created Universe
Either the universe had a beginning or it didn't. All available evidence states that the Universe did in fact have a beginning. Logically and scientifically we can safely say that the Universe had a cause since it is here. Cause and effect states that wherever there is a material effect, there must be an adequate antecedent cause. Also, the fact of the matter is that no cause is lesser than the effect.
Since it is obvious that the Universe is not eternal, and the universe could not have created itself, the only remaining possiblity is that the universe was created by something or Someone greater than itself.
Again, I disagree that a cause has to be greater than the effect. The collapsing and subsequent exploding of a previous universe could have resulted in our universe without any divine intervention or greater cause. There is also the possibility of the universe having come into existence because of a causeless, random quantum fluctuation. I would argue that both of these possibilities are more likely than the possibility of a deity.
Also, I would ask you whether a deity would be immune to the requirement of a cause. And if we were to agree that there was at least one thing that had no cause, why couldn't that thing be the universe instead of God? In fact, a universe is so much more simple than a deity that I think its causeless existence is more likely.
For now I must close. I will try and resume this later. I feel that at the moment your head must feel ready to bust, I know mine does with all this science.
I look forward to it!
At this moment I must apologize for my delays. Since it is summer I am very busy with many things and at times am away from a computer for long periods of time. For the next three weeks I will be extreemly busy and hope you will excuse my absence. However, if you feel like it you can still email me, it will just be a while till I answer it. I have just a few minutes so I will use them to answer your previous letter.
I agree with one part of your letter, there is another possible way that the earth came into existance. I do not however understand the difference of number five compared to number three.
The difference is the word "created." Creation, to me, implies a creator, and in the context of this discussion it is somewhat of a loaded word.
If number three is to be placed in effect, the other world would have to be somehow there, and so on and so forth.
That is correct. Our universe could be part of an infinite series of universes.
Also, what particles are you talking about going into and out of existance? I am regretably not understanding that part.
This is a really complex topic that is a bit out of range of this Web site. However, you can probably find more about virtual particles by doing an Internet search for Hawking radiation or Feynman diagrams.
About the cause and effect question, relating to Albert Einstien's theory, an action must have an equal and/or opposite reaction. So while in chemistry there is an equal reaction, everything else must have an opposite, or less reaction.
I don't believe that Newton's theory about equal and opposite reactions can be so easily dismissed. It seems to me that conservation of energy would require that cause and effect be equal. For example, when a bat hits a baseball, some of the cause goes into moving the ball, some into moving the batter, some into generating heat, etc. They should all add up so that input and output are the same. I may be missing your point here -- do you have an example?
Besides the universe, please describe what besides the universe or anything else that is remotely related to Christian beliefs or things like that have a begining but no end?
I don't know if the universe will have an end, and anything else I can think of is part of the universe.
The heat death is, to science, when intelligent life, aka us, will be destroyed. That is what most scientists refer to as the heat death. Insidentally, Christians believe too that the world will be destroyed by heat, or fire. Just add those two together. And I don't know about you, but the universe collasping on itself seems kinda interesting. Don't really know if it'll happen though.
I disagree with your definition of heat death. My understanding is that the heat death of the universe will occur when the universe is in a state of maximum entropy and there is no free energy. My guess is that intelligent life will have died out long before that. Since this state would be very cold indeed, it's sort of the opposite of the Christian belief you mention.
Also, a law in science is always permant. It will always be there. So the first Law of thermodynamics has always existed, whether or not we knew about it yet. And yes, it is impossible to prove what was there before the Universe.
Hefty concepts again. One small counterexample is that some believe that the second law of thermodynamics might be reversed if there is enough energy in the universe to lead to a "big crunch" some time in the far future. Also, we can't "see" before the creation of our universe so we don't know what things were like before that point in time (if it even makes sense to talk about "before" the big bang). It is possible that, for example, cosmological constants were different in a universe that came before ours.
Yet science lets us know that unless we can prove it, it doesn't happen or exists.
On the contrary, science only tells us that unless we have evidence we cannot prove that something exists. Previous universes may exist, science just can't prove (or disprove) it. The same is true for God, and you should welcome this fact because otherwise I would be able to tell you that you have to prove God exists before you believe in him. As it is, all I can say is that you need to prove God exists in order to convince me to believe in him.
Honestly, I have yet to hear a plausible theory. I hear some that twist the laws of science to make sense, and leave things to a one in a billion chance for more than one thing happening. Do your probability. It seems highly unlikely to me that millions of things happened when they only had a one in a billion chance of happening.
There are many interesting an plausible theories of the origin of the universe, including Stephen Hawking's theory that (if I understand it correctly) there is no origin. The problem is that this is a relatively new and incredibly complex area of science, and most of it is in the realm of quantum physics, which is very weird and often difficult to experiment with.
Getting into probability can also be very confusing and misleading. The odds against you, personally, existing are billions and billions to one against, but I wouldn't use this as proof that you do not exist. We also have to contend with the fact that if the odds hadn't turned up in our favor, we wouldn't be here to calculate them. Again, this is an enormous field for discussion.
In your second to last paragragh, why is it easier to believe a random causeless quantum than a diety?
Occam's razor. I don't have to make up anything significantly new to believe that the universe is the result of natural processes. True, there are still some unknowns, but filling those unknowns with an infinitely powerful, eternal, thinking, being that exists outside of this universe is quite a leap, and I need more evidence to make such a big leap.
Let me give you another example along these lines. When I was a kid, there was said to be some uncertainty about how the pyramids in Egypt were built. Some people used this uncertainty to postulate that aliens must have come from another planet and helped build them. By Occam's razor, they should have exausted more plausible explanations before creating all these new, complex ideas. And as it turns out, new knowledge has given us a very good idea of how the pyramids were built by humans alone.
This is a favorite subject of mine so let me give you another example of an application of Occam. Let's say that we find evidence that it was impossible for life to have evolved in the universe. Where does that leave us? Well, God could have made life. But how likely is that? Rather than one infinitely powerful deity, isn't it more likely that there are many less powerful, such as the Greeks believed in? Some people would say that one powerful deity is more likely than many less powerful ones, just because believing in more deities sounds like you're creating more things and therefore is less likely. But look at it this way -- do you think it's more probable that the pyramids were built by a lot of normal humans over a long period of time, or by one really, really big, strong human in a short period of time? Obviously the former. And whenever we appeal to Occam, we have to take into account not just the number of new things being created, but the number of new attributes those new things have.
God has a heck of a lot of attributes that need proving. A universe without a creator has very few.
Your last question at first made me stumble. Yet if a diety exists, then It made the rules and everything. If you created the rules of science, then you are immune to them. Why should you follow science rules when you created them?
The question under discussion is why God can be causeless but the universe can't. It isn't a matter of whether God must follow the rules of science, since we (I hope) agree that God is not within the realm of science. It's a matter of, if we're going to postulate that there are infinite things, then why not postulate that something we're already sure of (the universe) is infinite instead of something outside the universe being infinite?
The laws of physics were created by humans to describe the universe. In the past, there have been many times when we've discovered that we got the descriptions wrong. If there were a law of physics that said everything had to have a cause, then quantum physics has proven it wrong. And even if it hadn't, I'd rather look into changing the law to "everything has to have a cause except for the universe itself" instead of "everything has to have a cause except for an infinite being that exists outside the universe."
Next time I will add more to show to you that God does exist, and answer any questions that goes along with this letter. I hope I have answered your letter to your satisfaction. I have one question to ask you before we close this letter. Does love exist? Science cannot prove love. Most people do say that there is love, but they only see that through faith. Sometimes it takes more faith than science, because sometimes science can be broken. Thank you.
Sure love exists. So do hunger, hope, faith, fanaticism, joy, and insanity. These are human conditions. Science cannot prove love, except for in a boring chemical-reaction-in-the-brain way, but that's okay because it's outside the realm of science. So is faith -- science can't prove it because it's totally subjective and none of science's business. Once you try and put God on science's doorstep, you are going to find yourself struggling quite a bit because they do not fit well together. But if you keep God in the realm of faith, you may lose your hope of proving his existence to the atheistic scientist, but you will also find yourself immune to attacks on your faith from a scientific standpoint.
I would love to continue our discussion if you really think that you can prove to me that God exists. But let me ask you this as I have asked others, are these arguments you're giving me your reasons for believing in God? If I can find holes in all of them, will you stop believing? If not, then why do you use these arguments at all? Why not try and convince me to believe in God for the same reason you believe.
Finally, you're right that sometimes science can be broken. But science has a mechanism for fixing itself. When faith, on the other hand, goes bad, it generally stays bad. That is why I ask people of faith to please, please be careful with it.
I am very sorry that I have not written in a long time and that this must be a short letter. I will tell you why I am writing these letters then I am afraid I will have to close and write another. The only time I have to write you is on some Fridays. I am very sorry. If I am to try and convince you from the way I learned it, there might be some problems. For every question I have asked you and other people, there has been an answer. I am still young in years and have quite a lot to learn, but so far even though you say you have found holes in my questions, I can fill them in my mind though its hard to explain them to others. Plus, I have felt God in my very being and even now, when I really have nothing to say, I am given words to say that make sense and some of it I have never learned. I have been exposed to many other religions and athiesm and Islam both really interest me for several reasons, which is why I am writing to you. I am in a Bible study about atheism and science and I had some questions that only an atheist could answer. Yes, I have not been asking you questions, but I have learned many things. I could not believe that anyone could point blank deny God. I still don't think you do but you are waiting for some proof that you cannot deny. Finally, we are commanded to go into all the world and teach others about God. Since I cannot travel I am writing to you, telling you everything I know in ways that I believe you can understand. I hope that clears it up for you. There is a saying that you will believe what you want to believe. If you really believe you are going to die today then you will. The mind is a powerful thing. If you continually convince yourself that there is no God, then no matter what you will continue to believe that.
Great to hear from you again!
You mention that you feel God in your very being, and of all your reasons for believing in a deity, I'd say this is the best. That's something to keep in mind.
I'd be very interested to hear more about your Bible study, particularly about what it says regarding atheism and science. If you could tell me what kind of group it is (casual, formal, if through a church then what denomination), that would help me understand where you are coming from as well. I certainly welcome any questions you -- or, for that matter, anyone in your group -- might have about atheism.
You say that you could not believe that anyone could point-blank deny God. You're right that I don't do this, in part because "deny" is a bit of a loaded term. For example, I don't "deny" that I'm from Japan, but I'd sure be surprised if it was the case since I was born in California. More to the point, I wouldn't come right out and say that there is no deity, because I can't prove any such thing. But, again, I feel that the evidence is very, very much in line with that conclusion. I wouldn't say that I'm waiting for proof that I can't deny since that would imply that I'm searching for proof of God's existence, but it is certainly true that it would take significant evidence to make me change my mind.
Your beliefs include a command to teach others about God. I'm happy to provide you a forum where thousands of people will read what you have to say. I don't have any divine command compelling me, but I, too, believe that the world will be a better place if we all understand each other's beliefs a little better.
You're right that people often believe what they want to believe. I'm sure we all do some of that (and some do a lot of that <G>). However, I wouldn't put myself in the camp of someone who continually self-convinces that there is no God. My beliefs are the result of many, many years of searching for a belief system that made sense to me, and I spent a lot of time being very religious before I realized that it wasn't something I needed. I have no rancor against religion, and I am always willing to learn. And one thing I've learned is that belief due to need comes in many forms, and we all need to watch for it in ourselves.
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