The Christian Discussion Thread X: Originally there were 15

[Lord Dominator]

Baaa!

#SheepPrideWorldwide

Better to be a sheep than a goat, oh wait, sorry, baaa!

My heathen allegiance to Overgoat Kyrusia indicates that I must take issue with that

[Soldati Senza Confini]

<cut out for quote ease>
Unlike Tarsonis, I'm not going to resort to copouts or anything like that. I'm going to tell you straight up that we in the physics community--
<cut out for quote ease>

Here's your fundamental problem.

You are trying to answer a metaphysical/theological question in physical terms.

The point of metaphysics is to give meaning to the physical and the prime principles behind the physical. Theology concerns itself with the nature of God and the religion one chooses to explore, but it is along the same lines of meaning.

You can't really come to a debate about a metaphysical inquiry that tries to explain the why of things, and seriously contend your point with physics and science, things that explain the "how" of things, but not the "why".

It's fine if you don't wish to ascribe meaning to the universe, however, that wouldn't necessarily make you a Christian if you at least don't concede the metaphysical point that God created the universe because of whichever reason you prefer to believe in (Clockwork God, Interventionist God, etc.), because then you are implying our existence is without meaning, which is deeply at odds with Christian belief to be honest, as even Clockwork God proponents have come up with reasons why God created the universe.

[Lost Memories]

But the Christians are clearly unthinking and intellectually stupid sheep! They must be told so for another five pages!

Christians truly need the enlightened guidance of the atheist pastors, paragons of theology and interpretation of scriptures, and also patrons of the proper use of subjects in the relevant discussions.


Seriously though, I had enough of playing the game of "chase the headless chicken who runs in circles". I'll leave it to who still didn't have their fill, and I'll enjoy instead the odd tales from a pagan land.
(or whichever will be the next topic, at this point anything is better than chase the headless chicken)

[Hakons]

Grenartia, we're not going there again, all the answers to your objections were already provided in the previous 2-3 pages, go read them, and if you still don't get it, call it a day.

But the Christians are clearly unthinking and intellectually stupid sheep! They must be told so for another five pages!

Grenartia themself is a Christian, so it is beyond me why they so avidly attack Christian arguments.

[Salus Maior]

But the Christians are clearly unthinking and intellectually stupid sheep! They must be told so for another five pages!

Grenartia themself is a Christian, so it is beyond me why they so avidly attack Christian arguments.

They're not.

[Kowani]

ISIS wants to destroy the Kaaba? What?

ISIS are extreme iconoclasts and see the Kaaba as an idol, so they want to destroy it, along with other ancient works of architecture.

Yep, pretty much. Hell, I don’t even like Islam, and I still disagree with destroying it. (I mean, it’s ISIS, you kinda have to disagree on principle, but still.)

[Lost Memories]

Grenartia themself is a Christian, so it is beyond me why they so avidly attack Christian arguments.

Seriously? In their last post the difference with the minecraft guy was getting almost imperceptible.
(unless we got all fooled and the minecraft guy was too some weird form of christian... dun dun duun)

Though I would go with the duck rule, if it quacks...

[Hakons]

Grenartia themself is a Christian, so it is beyond me why they so avidly attack Christian arguments.

They're not.

I must be misreading the signature then?

[Salus Maior]

They're not.

I must be misreading the signature then?

Get in a theology debate with Gren and you'll see.

Although don't, you won't get anywhere worthwhile.

[Hakons]

I must be misreading the signature then?

Get in a theology debate with Gren and you'll see.

So is this a (not unwarranted) dogmatic claim, or do they denounce being a Christian?

[South Afrikan Federation]

Whats with the page long rants?

[Salus Maior]

Whats with the page long rants?

That's NSG for you.

[Tarsonis]

A. It's not my fault you didn't read the context of the discussion between me and New Haven before you interjected.
B. It's further not my fault that either by willful ignorance, or insufficient intellectual capacity, that you can't comprehend the cosmological argument that I have restated multiple times on this thread.

In fact, I did go back and read the context. Also, my interjection was to correct a mistake you made in your representation of the Big Bang (i.e., you stated that the scientific thinking is that everything came from nothing, when this is simply not the case).

Yeah except that's not what I said, so you interjected to correct a nonexistent mistake based on your own understadning of my argument.

I do comprehend your argument.

Clearly, you don't. And here's why:

Its not my fault that through willful ignorance, or insufficient intellectual capacity, you cannot comprehend why the Cosmological Argument is simply the God of the Gaps. The gap, in this case, being the lack of scientific explanation for what existed prior to the Big Bang.

It's not because the lack of a scientific explanation for what existed prior to the Big Bang is completely irrelevant to the cosmological argument. The Cosmological argument isn't staked on a lack of knowledge its staked on a reasonable deduction from what we do know. You've created a false strawman representation of the cosmological argument to tilt at, so that you can call it God of the Gaps. You are simply wrong.

You then stated that nothing comes from nothing, to which I agreed, and applied your own logic to God.

That's actually not what I said. I said nothing is created from nothing. That means it is logically necessary for there to exist something that was not created. An eternal uncreated prime being/force/etc.

I've called you intellectually dishonest, because it is the most I'm allowed to say within the rules of the forum. The reason I've called you intelectuily dishonest is because of your continued God of the Gaps comments. I've explained twice now why it's not applicable to the Cosmological Argument, but you keep repeating it in asinine fashion as if it constitutes a a refutation, and not just an annoying and childish taunt.

You have not explained why it isn't applicable any amount of times,

I have, this is the third time.

and certainly not in any way that makes sense.

to you...

The reason I'm not "proving you wrong" is because you haven't even attempted to make an argument. You just keep repeating "God of the Gaps" like a senile parrot.

Because you keep repeating the Cosmological Argument like a senile parrot.

No. I'm more a Maccaw.

The only thing you're making me question is the merits of democracy.

You're making me question the merits of Yale Divinity School.

The cosomoligical argument does not explain the existence of God,

It certainly begs the question of how God came to exist.

No. It doesn't. Because it's the entire premise of the argument that God didn't "come to exist."

You can identify what created the universe, but then you have to identify what created that, and then what created that, and so on and so on. No matter how far you walk it back eventually you'll have to get to that which was not created.

You have identified what created the universe. God. BY YOUR OWN LOGIC, you now have to identify what created God, and what created what created God, and so on. The entire last sentence is a copout clearly intended to avoid infinite regression.

Because infinite regression is a logical absurdity. As has been stated multiple times by multiple people on this thread. It's not a cop out, it's what the cosmological argument is. It's a deduction based on the fact that infinite regression is logically absurd.

it's entirely predicated on the fact that God is eternal with out cause. It's the entire fucking basis of the argument

Which is a copout.

Seems to be going around.

What happened is I explained the Cosmological argument. Gen interjected on a conversation claiming a "God of the Gaps fallacy."

Correction. You made a factual error about the Big Bang, which I attempted to correct.

As I said above, I didn't. You misunderstood.

You then applied the Cosmological Argument to it,

Nope, it was always about the Cosmological Argument.

and THEN I claimed it was God of the Gaps.

Fallaciously.

I pointed out that this was incorrect

You provided no convincing arguments that my assertion was incorrect.

If you think pointing out that Cosmological Argument and God of the Gaps address two entirely different issues and considerations, is not convincing, you really need to go back to Logic 101.

, as the Cosmological argument isn't concerned with explaining observable phenomena,

In fact, it IS concerned with observable phenomena, because its entire point is that unknown scientific phenomena (I.E., what created the primeval atom, what created what created the primeval atom, etc.) proves there must be a Creator.

No, unknown scientific phenomena is irrelevant to the argument. The cosmological doesn't explain observable phenomena or unobservable phenomena.

If that isn't God of the Gaps, then literally NOTHING is.

No because as has had to be made clear to people multiple times, there is a fundamental difference between how and why. God of the Gaps deals with issues of how. We're all over here talking about issues of why.

it's a logical deduction from reason concerning the nature of existence.

That, as you have applied it, ends in a copout.

Logical necessity is not a copout.

They're not the same field of thought let alone the same question.

Only to one who doesn't bother to connect the loose ends.

are you admitting you're grasping at straws here?

Rather than engage they asininely replied with "nu uh yes it is" and pulled a further taunting tactic with the strike coding. At which point my annoyance that i had suppressed dealing with the summer anti-theists, came out full force.

I have done far better than simply "nu uh yest it is". I have backed my claim with logic.

You've not offered one argument resembling a logical argument until this post, and that argument was wrong.

You simply kept repeating it like, in your own words, a senile parrot.

Repeating an explanation hoping it would drill through the wood and you'd understand it while you simply kept repeating the same falacious phrase over and over again in your uncomprehension. See the difference?

Also, I'm not even a fucking anti-theist. God forbid you actually encounter one, because you can't even seem to handle arguing with a theist!

Oh that characteristic about you has nothing to do with my frustrations, lol.

[Kowani]

But the Christians are clearly unthinking and intellectually stupid sheep! They must be told so for another five pages!

Grenartia themself is a Christian, so it is beyond me why they so avidly attack Christian arguments.

I don’t think this is Devil’s Advocate. Perhaps he has tried to find a satisfactory reason as to how God could exist without a creator, and found the Cosmological Argument unsatisfactory.

[Salus Maior]

Get in a theology debate with Gren and you'll see.

So is this a (not unwarranted) dogmatic claim, or do they denounce being a Christian?

Let's call it a dogmatic claim.

[Washington Resistance Army]

Get in a theology debate with Gren and you'll see.

So is this a (not unwarranted) dogmatic claim, or do they denounce being a Christian?

Grenartia subscribes to some sort of liberal Christianity and it's quite strange from the outsider perspective at least.

[Hakons]

So is this a (not unwarranted) dogmatic claim, or do they denounce being a Christian?

Let's call it a dogmatic claim.

Which I'm fine with.

I don't know their theology, but if they don't profess what is known to be the Christian faith while still holding the title of Christian, then they are dogmatically not a Christian.

[Hakons]

So is this a (not unwarranted) dogmatic claim, or do they denounce being a Christian?

Grenartia subscribes to some sort of liberal Christianity and it's quite strange from the outsider perspective at least.

Liberal theology is Christian as long as it doesn't breech known Christian truths, like, say, the Nicene Creed. For example, believing God created the Big Bang is reasonably within the bounds of Christianity, albeit non-traditional, but believing God did not create the universe is non-Christian. While I usually refrain from calling something unChristian, it is reasonable to apply the term when the action is outside the bounds given to us by the Church Councils, and therefor God.

[Salus Maior]

Let's call it a dogmatic claim.

Which I'm fine with.

I don't know their theology, but if they don't profess what is known to be the Christian faith while still holding the title of Christian, then they are dogmatically not a Christian.

Their theology is more or less just rejection of what they don't like and responding to any criticism or reasoning against it with a resounding "NUH UH" and the plugging of their ears.

It's funny to hear about cop-outs with that in mind.

[Tarsonis]

Grenartia subscribes to some sort of liberal Christianity and it's quite strange from the outsider perspective at least.

Liberal theology is Christian as long as it doesn't breech known Christian truths, like, say, the Nicene Creed. For example, believing God created the Big Bang is reasonably within the bounds of Christianity, albeit non-traditional, but believing God did not create the universe is non-Christian. While I usually refrain from calling something unChristian, it is reasonable to apply the term when the action is outside the bounds given to us by the Church Councils, and therefor God.

The problem most people have is confusing how and why. By saying God created the universe it's not a statement of how, but a metaphysical why the universe exists. The big bang theory, quantum fluxuations, what ever observable theory someone has, could all be true, but has nothing to do with whether or not God created the universe.

[Tarsonis]

Which I'm fine with.

I don't know their theology, but if they don't profess what is known to be the Christian faith while still holding the title of Christian, then they are dogmatically not a Christian.

Their theology is more or less just rejection of what they don't like and responding to any criticism or reasoning against it with a resounding "NUH UH" and the plugging of their ears.

It's funny to hear about cop-outs with that in mind.

They'd be better off trying to argue brute fact as a rebuttal, rather than infinite regression.

[Luminesa]

And once again another call of, "Ooh you're from Yale you should be better at this!" Really Gren? What do you want from Tars? Some sort of denial of the Cosmological argument all together? For him to declare, "THERE IS NO GOD BECAUSE SOMETHING CAN'T COME FROM NOTHING!" For him to use whatever terms you decide to use in an argument for which you've contributed quite little? Find something else to talk about other than, "YALE STUDENT BAD AT THEOLOGY DURR."

[Luminesa]

Grenartia themself is a Christian, so it is beyond me why they so avidly attack Christian arguments.

I don’t think this is Devil’s Advocate. Perhaps he has tried to find a satisfactory reason as to how God could exist without a creator, and found the Cosmological Argument unsatisfactory.

That could very well be, but they could just state that instead of attacking their opponent's credentials and believing that their floppy argument is somehow making others question their faith.

[Luminesa]

Baaa!

#SheepPrideWorldwide

My family once owned sheep. I have no idea why they've become an insult when they're so cute.

They are cute, yush! Be a sheep with us! : D

[Lord Dominator]

Einstein had reason to doubt gravitational waves, because it wasn't possible to examine them at the time, even though the math suggested their existence. Bruno did not have the luxury of mathematical support either.

The point is that plenty of other physicists did expect their existence, despite the lack of apparent possibility to detect them. As for Bruno, he had the logical support, which, at that time, was really all he needed.

Dismissing the Holy Trinity and believing in reincarnation ain't a hypothesis.

No, but rejecting geocentrism is, and it was equally heretical.

Also, why are you trying to justify his utterly barbaric execution? The man was a martyr for free thought.

Indeed, Galileo was put under house arrest in 1633, which is quite important, because he published his letter on Sunspots in 1613, and these outlined his heliocentrism. In 1615 when the inquisition court was called against Galileo, it was the expert Jesuit judges, who ruled in favour of Galileo, that ended his first trial against him, even though it was clear he presented Heliocentric views. Indeed, his ideas went by without the bat of an eye, and indeed enjoyed support, Cardinal Barberini congratulated him on it, in fact. In 1623, the future Pope Urban VIII, who was a cardinal at this time, wrote in homage of Galileo in 1623(!) 10 years after his "heresy" was clearly known. Indeed, the problem was not that the idea itself was heretical, but to present it as beyond a mere hypothesis, was the real issue, indeed at the time there was no evidence of a Copernican system, not until the time of Johannes Keplar, and after his discovery the Church wasn't bothered. Copernicus' hypothesis was used in prior time by the Church, it was simply that it had to be maintained as just an hypothesis, unless evidence could be used to prove it, which eventually happened. With Galileo's tide experiments being incapable to support his hypothesis, there was no reason to believe Copernicus' modal any more than Brahe's modal. Yet, Galileo continued to mock his opponents and this created him a number of life long enemies, and eventually the Pope himself.

When the complaint to the inquisition was filed in 1615, it was actually rejected (thanks to the Jesuits), and indeed, Galileo continued to be a free man between 1613 to 1632, one has to wonder why he was given 20 years of down time for a "heresy" that was clearly identified in at least 1615 and published, himself, in 1613? One has to wonder. The problem with the idea that Galileo was executed for just his ideas is the huge inconsistency, if Galileo was producing this heresy, why wait? If his heresy was so clearly maligned by the church, why befriend him? Unless something latter in life, like his arrogance about his own convictions and his continued production of life-long enemies, began to present Galileo as prideful, rude, unreasonable and arrogant. Galileo eventually turned his friendship into hatred with Urban VIII, when he published his Dialogo, in this work he bi-passed the Papal censorship and put arguments which were very similar to Urban's arguments against Copernicus into the mouth of a character called Simplicio (literally meaning simpleton, and would be the equivalent of calling someone an idiot (or worse) today). Urban always suspected that Simplicio was a caricature of himself, though this wasn't Galileo's intention. Indeed Galileo is a classic example of poor timing, he would eventually be tried by Pope Urban VIII, a pope who would consistently fail in his papacy and was exceeding in nepotism. Indeed if anything the reason for this debacle can be laced with Urban, who as an individual Pope, caused a scientific stagnation of his own accord and will, by both his vanity and greed.

As further confirmation of my point, in 1655 observations were made in the Cathedral of Bologna by Giovanni Cassini to give concrete proof of Kepler's ideas. He showed that Kepler was right and Ptolemy was not. How could the Church see Copernican ideas as heretical but then supply a Cathedral to find evidence in support of it? It's quite clear that it was not Copernican theory itself that was heretical but that to claim it as fact without evidence was where the problem began, even here, however, it took poor circumstance as in Galileo's case to actually be convicted of 'heresy' for it.

Galileo went as far as to not present his discoveries to other scientists of the time, even to Johannes Kepler and believed he was the only one who could make valid discoveries. Quite clear is this fact that Galileo refused to give Kepler one of his telescopes, even though he gave them out to political entities. He ignored Kepler's works and wrote his treatise to Kepler in anagrams. Indeed, Galileo was not experimental in practice and made no critical experimental deduction to prove his hypothesis. The only reason we celebrate Galileo in this area is hindsight, not actual merit, because his attempts to prove Heliocentrism (not that he really tried to) were all failures, these achievements go to Kepler. When Cardinal Bellarmine was conducting the court of inquisition, asked Galileo for evidence to which Galileo refused and had no evidence. When Galileo eventually defended his ideas, he always defended with ideas which had been outdated by Kepler's research, indeed he defended his tides idea until the very end, even though this was clearly incapable as proof. When the Jesuit astronomer Grassi observed comets and claimed them as distant flying objects, Galileo's explanation that they were actually mere reflections of light caused people to abandon Fassi's hypothesis. A clear example of Galileo's distinct lack of respect for evidence.

When the day came for his final trial, Galileo did the utterly unthinkable, and contradicted himself numerous times, even after he was given time to prepare a defence. Galileo stated of his Dialogo that what it is believed to have been said, was actually the opposite, the idea that Dialogo was actual a refutation of Copernicus was clearly deceitful, the judge, and jury, new that Galileo was lying, but instead of showing this clearly by presenting his own letters and books against him, all the court did was require his signature for deposition. His defence of himself would stand in no trial. For he was clearly lying.

Also because I hate these irritating Wikipedia hyperlinks How about I play the game, shall we? Wait? Wikipedia saying something I've been saying for a while? No. That Copernican ideals were aactually fine, but that to present them as truth without evidence was wrong. say what?

As for this:



Allow me to introduce you to Giordano Bruno. Truly a man who was a visionary, and ahead of his time. He hypothesized an infinite universe with no central body, where the stars weren't simply points of light, but other suns, around which other planets orbited, possibly even with their own forms of life. For this, he was tried and convicted of heresy by the Catholic Church, and promptly burned at the stake.

I think I have the sixth sense, because when I made that comment I knew they would say: Bruno! Bruno was a narcissistic nut case. He loved Hermetic Magic and which can be summed up as, well read it for yourself (it's utter nonsense) he also rejected the core Christian teachings and it is this that would get him finally executed. You present a false syllogism, Bruno held heretical doctrine (abandoned the trintiy, and christology), he also held Heliocentrism, he was executed, therefore, he was executed for his heliocentrism; classic post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy. Bruno also presented no evidence for his ideas, evidence which Kepler had began to accumulate in the early 1600's, Bruno's heresy's are what killed him, and Galileo's arrogance and poor timing that killed him. I'm sure I could find a list of Heliocentrist's which were hardly bothered between 1550 and 1642 and they all died of natural deaths for the time: plague, cholera, maybe old age, you'know the usual, but execution? Unlikely.

It is quite clear that Copernican ideas were controversial, but not in and of themselves heretical. That it was used by their detractors as a weapon to dispense with personal grudges, hatreds, and desires, as with Galileo. The idea that the Church persecuted the sciences of it's day? Lacking. The idea that Popes abused their position for power which caused scientific stagnation? Likely.

Both are relevant, but here's also my earlier direct quotation from Wikipedia:

Regarding Bruno from the Wikipedia article, underlining mine. I think the fourth underlining is perhaps the most important one here.

Other scholars oppose such views, and claim Bruno's martyrdom to science to be exaggerated, or outright false. For Yates, while "nineteenth century liberals" were thrown "into ecstasies" over Bruno's Copernicanism, "Bruno pushes Copernicus' scientific work back into a prescientific stage, back into Hermetism, interpreting the Copernican diagram as a hieroglyph of divine mysteries."[57]

According to historian Mordechai Feingold, "Both admirers and critics of Giordano Bruno basically agree that he was pompous and arrogant, highly valuing his opinions and showing little patience with anyone who even mildly disagreed with him." Discussing Bruno's experience of rejection when he visited Oxford University, Feingold suggests that "it might have been Bruno's manner, his language and his self-assertiveness, rather than his ideas" that caused offence.[58]
Theological heresyEdit

In his Lectures on the History of Philosophy Hegel writes that Bruno's life represented "a bold rejection of all Catholic beliefs resting on mere authority."[59]

Alfonso Ingegno states that Bruno's philosophy "challenges the developments of the Reformation, calls into question the truth-value of the whole of Christianity, and claims that Christ perpetrated a deceit on mankind... Bruno suggests that we can now recognize the universal law which controls the perpetual becoming of all things in an infinite universe."[60] A. M. Paterson says that, while we no longer have a copy of the official papal condemnation of Bruno, his heresies included "the doctrine of the infinite universe and the innumerable worlds" and his beliefs "on the movement of the earth".[61]

Michael White notes that the Inquisition may have pursued Bruno early in his life on the basis of his opposition to Aristotle, interest in Arianism, reading of Erasmus, and possession of banned texts.[62] White considers that Bruno's later heresy was "multifaceted" and may have rested on his conception of infinite worlds. "This was perhaps the most dangerous notion of all... If other worlds existed with intelligent beings living there, did they too have their visitations? The idea was quite unthinkable."[62]

Frances Yates rejects what she describes as the "legend that Bruno was prosecuted as a philosophical thinker, was burned for his daring views on innumerable worlds or on the movement of the earth." Yates however writes that "the Church was... perfectly within its rights if it included philosophical points in its condemnation of Bruno's heresies" because "the philosophical points were quite inseparable from the heresies."[63]

According to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, "in 1600 there was no official Catholic position on the Copernican system, and it was certainly not a heresy. When [...] Bruno [...] was burned at the stake as a heretic, it had nothing to do with his writings in support of Copernican cosmology."[64]