The Rational Proof of God's Existence

[TeeJay]

Pickman's, I sometimes wonder what would fill the void in your life if this guy fell off a mountain or something unfortunate.

 

[TeeJay]

..... and then they pull you back in

Isn't it just.

A real slow-down-for-the-car-crash type thread.

 

[Crispy]

Isn't it just.

A real slow-down-for-the-car-crash type thread.

Yes, but the crash was between a Mini and a moped, yet thousands of burning people are staggering from the wreck. Odd...

 

[118118]

I really feel that to say that X is a Y, you would have to previously show that Y is a real concept, otherwise you could not go further than the infomation already contained in X. So in this example you have to show that spirit is a real concpet, or you are not justified in using it to futher our knowldege about fv.
Or this argument is actually valid: tfsm is nice. my dinner is nice. therefore tfsm is my dinner. my dinner exists. therefore tfsm exists.
I think thats what Zword was saying about the existence of spirit. Though he did not actually use it to argue explicitly for its existence, just that fv was it.

 

[Fruitloop]

I reckon the probability of our George 'falling off a mountain or something unfortunate' is quite high actually.

 

[butchersapron]

Is this a fair summary of the last page or so - Teejay returns from ban seething and determined to get someone banned for the same offence that he commited - fails miserably - edits all his posts a few hours later when he fiannly realises this.

Can i also predict that we'll never hear the end of his moans about being banned?

 

[editor]

Teejay: stop acting like a twat and get over it.

 

[slaar]

It must be said that, as anti-capitalist arguments go this is one of the more, well, imaginative.

 

[Santino]

Phil, from where I'm standing 118118 has completely shot your argument down. Are you going to even acknowledge his posts?

 

[Fruitloop]

 

[Doomsy]

Phil, from where I'm standing 118118 has completely shot your argument down. Are you going to even acknowledge his posts?

I've shot his argument down loads of times without response

Damn FSM conspiracy, just mention his noodly appendages and you all rally round...

You all just want to silence any theological theory which doesnt involve the FSM, you fundamentalist zealots. Well it won't work on me, I'll continue to think that it doesn't matter if god exists no matter how many times you strike me down!

 

[gurrier]

I've shot his argument down loads of times without response

Damn FSM conspiracy, just mention his noodly appendages and you all rally round...

You all just want to silence any theological theory which doesnt involve the FSM, you fundamentalist zealots. Well it won't work on me, I'll continue to think that it doesn't matter if god exists no matter how many times you strike me down!

Are you taking his name in vain

* sharpens cutlass *

 

[Doomsy]

uh-oh, I'm the target of a noodly fatwah

*goes into hiding*

 

[ZWord]

You seem to think that if fv meets some of the criterea for being a spirit then we are justified in calling it a spirit, and hence that spirit is real. But the entire concept of spirit must be shown to be real, not just bits of it, or anything could prove anything.A statement that says, X is A and Y is B, is not proved by X being A; or any statement could prove any other, as we could buckle together any two statements of which one is unproved, hence proving it, which is essentially what you have done to make 'spirit'.

That fv meets some of the critera for spirit would only argue for the existence of a "spirit" that had the properties of fv, we could not argue for the existence of a spirit with any additional properties e.g. irreducible, devil-like, unless there was an argument for spirit being these things that showed that these properties were rationally coinstantiated. This would have to be based on more than what the concept means, which is simply convention.

So unless you have an argument for spirit being malign and irreducible that isn't just based on "thats what spirit means" you can't say that becasue fv is malign it is irreducible.

To me this "proof" would seem to boil down to "alot of people a long time ago believed that X was like this" (the devil is malign), though they had no rational reason to believe that their concept of the devil was real (that some things were malign, does not prove it), or that being the devil and being malign co-occur.

Money is evil. The devil is evil (can't argue with that, part nof our concpet of the devil). Therefore money is the devil. Therefore the devil exists. Therefore God exists.

Or. My lunch is nice. The flying spagetti monster is nice (can't argue with that, part of our concept of the flying spagetti monster). Therefore my lunch is the flying spagetti monster. Therefore the flying spagetti monster exists.

This is the exact same argument.

You have to show that the flying spagetti mnonster is more than a coherent concpoet, you have to show that there is reasonable reason to believe that things which are made if spagetti can fly (that the properties we ascibe to it go together, again not just appealing to the meaning of the concept), or that the concept is real in its entirity (not just that the property of being nice is a real property, as you have done with 'spirit').

One would have to show either being malign and being irreducible rationally co-occur, or that 'spirit' is a real concept in its entirity to rationally beleive that fv is spirit.

Well, I don't think the idea that financial value is spirit is provable. I think at best it can be shown to be a plausible idea. But I'm generally convinced of the uncertainty of all inferences. I'm not sure whether that's what Phil thinks, but I seem to remember him saying earlier, that he thought it was "best described as" spirit.

But I was thinking along the lines of, if it quacks like , etc etc, then it's a duck, probably.

I would be the last person to suggest that -the devil is malign, - money is malign- therefore money is the devil - is a sound argument. But I've never included malign as part of my concept of spirit, and i@m kind of surprised to hear you have.

But simply, I would have thought, if there's no case at all for saying that financial value is spirit, or is best described as spirit, then it ought to be very easy to show that, you simply show the properties of spirit in one column, and the properties of financial value in the other, and show what they lack in common.

It's fairly easy. (Though I must say, I did expect some genius like Jo to do this,) I'll start you off, if you like, with my rough explanation of the concept, --spirit-, for what it's worth.

Spirit is a word that's generally held to mean a non-corporeal substance, that can inhabit a material body, but whose existence does not depend on the material body it inhabits, and can continue despite the destruction of the material body.

Then some questionmarks:

? A spirit should also have a mentality, or be a consciousness ?
(and how do we tell when some entity has mentality?)
? A spirit, being a substance, should be the cause of its own existence, not dependent on anything else for its existence. ?

 

[parallelepipete]

Why? (serious question)

I wasn't suggesting that logic could not be assumed to be valid unless a god existed; I was drawing a (mistaken) conclusion from your post that you were saying that.

My mistake!

*retires with headache*

 

[Doomsy]

I wasn't suggesting that logic could not be assumed to be valid unless a god existed; I was drawing a (mistaken) conclusion from your post that you were saying that.

My mistake!

*retires with headache*

*comes out of hiding*

Ah, ok then.

*looks around for Flying Spaghetti Mafia*

*goes back into hiding*

 

[Fruitloop]

I think that phil's actual argument (not wanting to prejudge the issue) is that financial value is something immaterial (in this case an idea) that has agency, and that this is his definition of a 'spirit'.

 

[ZWord]

Doesn't sound completely implausible to me.

 

[phildwyer]

Is this a fair summary of the last page or so - Teejay returns from ban seething and determined to get someone banned for the same offence that he commited - fails miserably - edits all his posts a few hours later when he fiannly realises this.

Can i also predict that we'll never hear the end of his moans about being banned?

Yes, you have discerned the situation accurately. I just had a lovely night's sleep, and now I wake to find that he's changed all earlier his posts, no doubt in an effort to obscure what actually transpired during last night's shenanigans. Its still not that hard to work out the series of events though, if anyone is actually mad enough to bother. Right, I'm going back to bed for a bit--can you guys actually let me *sleep* at least?

 

[Doomsy]

yeah, stop posting so loud you inconsiderate sods

 

[gurrier]

yeah, stop posting so loud you inconsiderate sods

* cutlass wielding noodly appendage wriggles towards doomsy *

 

[parallelepipete]

I think that phil's actual argument (not wanting to prejudge the issue) is that financial value is something immaterial (in this case an idea) that has agency, and that this is his definition of a 'spirit'.

Isn't this whole thing immaterial?

*burns in financial hell*

 

[ZWord]

Sounds quite likely.

 

[butchersapron]

Yes, you have discerned the situation accurately. I just had a lovely night's sleep, and now I wake to find that he's changed all earlier his posts, no doubt in an effort to obscure what actually transpired during last night's shenanigans. Its still not that hard to work out the series of events though, if anyone is actually mad enough to bother. Right, I'm going back to bed for a bit--can you guys actually let me *sleep* at least?

The trick with teejay is to quote his posts back straightaway because he will dishonestly change them if he get's on the losing end of things.

 

[Demosthenes]

This is ridiculous, trying to prove the existence of God is a lost cause.

Either you know it from your own experience, or else you don't.

And money is not the devil, Bush and Blair are, surely everyone knows that.

 

[Doomsy]

* cutlass wielding noodly appendage wriggles towards doomsy *

Ypres!*

*goes back into hiding*






*French for 'eep'

 

[Purdie]

This is ridiculous, trying to prove the existence of God is a lost cause.

Either you know it from your own experience, or else you don't.

And money is not the devil, Bush and Blair are, surely everyone knows that.

And they go to church I wonder if Phil does?

 

[phildwyer]

The trick with teejay is to quote his posts back straightaway because he will dishonestly change them if he get's on the losing end of things.

Right, I should have thought of that. But to be quite honest, it simply never occurred to me that anyone would be so low.

 

[phildwyer]

Phil, from where I'm standing 118118 has completely shot your argument down. Are you going to even acknowledge his posts?

I'd love to, but I have to catch a plane in a couple of hours, and I've got some running around to do first. I'll be travelling pretty continuously for the next ten days, so I won't be online. I'll gladly return to answer all objections if this thread hasn't died of natural causes before I get back. If it has, well, thanks everyone. Its been great fun, I've learned a lot, and I think I've taught a fair bit too. I'll make sure U75 gets a plug in the book. Tata for now...

 

[TeeJay]

Right, I should have thought of that. But to be quite honest, it simply never occurred to me that anyone would be so low.

I'm going to take editor's advice and not bother with you any more, although it is not surprising that you are lying through your teeth about this as about so much.

I won't however take any lessons in being low from you - urban75's very own Professor Cunt.

But then again, now that ernesto is no more, I suppose we do need one someone to fill the roll of uber-troll and all-round gadfly.