When's the last time there was a post on theology in here?

[rug]

[jgraz]

1. I think it was right before someone posted that pro-gun-control essay on the gun forum

;)

[rug]

10. Lol.

:thumbsup:

[Cant trust em]

2. I was thinking about a theology post while I was...nevermind what I was doing.

It was a whole "Man, this universe is really complex. Could it have all happened by accident?" kind of thing.

[rug]

8. Onan had great insight.

[dmallind]

3. Why not give one a shot? Adoptionism vs. modalism perhaps? NT

[rug]

7. That will just bring out the Sabellians.

:P

[heidler1]

4. I submit that every post in all subjects on DU and else where has a Theological aspect.

Many are critical of popular Theology and many are pro as to a particular brand of Theology like Catholic, but it's still hiding in the words.

Transcendentalism
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This article is about the nineteenth-century American movement. For other uses, see Transcendence.
Transcendentalism was a group of new ideas in literature, religion, culture, and philosophy that emerged in New England in the early to middle 19th century. It is sometimes called American transcendentalism to distinguish it from other uses of the word transcendental

Transcendentalism began as a protest against the general state of culture and society, and in particular, the state of intellectualism at Harvard and the doctrine of the Unitarian church taught at Harvard Divinity School. Among transcendentalists' core beliefs was an ideal spiritual state that 'transcends' the physical and empirical and is only realized through the individual's intuition, rather than through the doctrines of established religions.

[rug]

9. They're more about scatology than eschatology.

[damntexdem]

5. How many posts can dance on the head of a pin?

[rug]

6. If it's 50, the pin bursts into flames.

[skepticscott]

11. There are very few

All of the TB's here bemoan the fact that us mean atheists make hash of any theology thread...waaaaaaaaaaa!

Maybe if there was one that inspired anything but peals of laughter, that would change...

[rug]

12. What do you know of theology?

[skepticscott]

18. Not much at all...

Only that...

A. Its fundamental purpose is to provide a baseline for people who need to be told what to believe and to make the harshness, foolishness, illogic and contradictions of organized religion seem at least superficially reasonable, so that the flock can feel comfortable believing it.

B. There is nothing of consequence that theologians are more certain of now than they used to be.

C. The emperor has no clothes.

[rug]

19. The message box demonstrated the subject line.

[skepticscott]

24. All of which apparently

went completely over your head. Not surprising.

[rug]

27. It didn't go over my head. I simply stepped over it.

[Sal316]

13. Been a while...

...because there's a loud and obnoxious group of atheists here that aren't interested in rational discussion.

Case in point:

All of the TB's here bemoan the fact that us mean atheists make hash of any theology thread...waaaaaaaaaaa!
Look-Alike Jesus Onion Rings are extra.
Defenders of the decaying myths amuse me with their hypersensitivity. Wanna believe in superstitious nonsense? Fine - just shut up about it around rational people.
I feel that highly religious people are in fact worse than the rest of us. Much, much worse. And much more dangerous.

Most of the dogpilers jump in just to shit in someone's cereal.

They speak of believers in stereotypes and generalities.

What they don't realize, though, is that they speak in the same language as "all Muslims are terrorists" or "all Blacks are criminals" or "all Mexicans are lazy" or "all gays are trying to convert everyone"....all the while claiming how rational they are.

Truth is, there isn't a rational bone in their bodies.

They do truly embody the slogan "Atheism: A religion people join to appear smarter."

[Nihil]

17. Oh thanks ...

> "Atheism: A religion people join to appear smarter."

:spray: :spank:

At least it was only water this time ...

[struggle4progress]

14. I posted this 23 May, from a larger theological collection:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=214&topic_id=209285

[rug]

20. That is an interesting post. Thanks.

[Evoman]

15. Probably because theology isn't very interesting or relevant. Post one, and be happy if you get

more than 5 responses.

Both sides prefer pissing and moaning.


Hell, I prefer pissing and moaning.

[rug]

21. I find it to be both. Surely people come here for reasons other than hurling shit.

[Evoman]

23. Hehe...by all means, give it a shot.

Personally, I think hurling shit gets an unnecessarily bad rap :evilgrin:

[Silent3]

16. theology: noun - the study of the nature of God and religious belief

I'd say that a lot of the discussion here is about theology. Since we have a diverse group who follow different religions or none at all, however, who don't agree which, if any, gods exist, you're just not going to see a lot of the kind of theology that gets discussed within specific religious groups, the kind of theology discussed among people presumed to share more-or-less the same beliefs, who are trying to work out the finer details of those beliefs.

If you wanted to discuss, say, the implications of "original sin", the way people who all believe in original sin would do so, this isn't the place to do it if you don't want to have to answer to people who will question whether the idea of original sin, or sin of any sort, has any merit at all.

[rug]

22. Good points. Although it seems few threads get past the god/no god gate.

[skepticscott]

25. And why should it be otherwise?

The most important thing about the nature of God is whether he/she/it exists in any way outside of the minds of believers and whether that existence is anything more than the need of TB's to put the label of "God" on something, anything. Until that question is answered, and answered correctly, theology is not much more than intellectual flailing.

[rug]

26. The flip side is that everything has always existed, in one form or another.

That is also an intellectual dead end.

I don't think there is more of a need to label anything God that there is a need to label people true believers.

Do us both a favor. Come up with something original before replicating the usual god/no god arguments.

[skepticscott]

29. Everything has always existed?

Ok, maybe technically true, but how is it remotely relevant or useful to this issue? Has your computer always existed as a computer, with all of the properties that make it a computer intact? Of course not. So why would it matter if someone's god used to exist only as disembodied matter and energy, in a form that no one would recognize?

And if you don't think that people have a desperate need to label something out there as "god", you haven't been paying very close attention.

BTW, I'd be happy to come up with an original rebuttal if the people trying to argue that god(s) exist would come up with some original arguments or evidence. Since they never do, but just keep rehashing the same lame "proofs" in new packaging, as if they are self-evident and unanswerable, I feel perfectly justified in not being creative myself.

[rug]

31. The irony in your last sentence is throbbing.

[skepticscott]

34. Hey, what works, works.

Sorry if you have a problem with being so unchallenging to refute. But the true irony is your failure to actually address any of the substantial points I made, in favor of a little insubstantial snark. Ironic, and telling, since all you seem to have in your quiver is some semi-mystical woo-woo about how everything has "always existed". Keep trying.

[rug]

35. Sigh. Ok. Where did matter come from?

:eyes:

[skepticscott]

37. Out of the energy

that coalesced in the wake of the Big Bang. Further back than a certain point, we have no evidence for what things were like...at least not yet.

[rug]

38. Where did the matter from which the Big Bang banged come from?

Do you see how tedious and unproductive these god/no god debates become?

[skepticscott]

40. Well, it certainly is tedious

when the same old argument keeps getting trotted out: Science hasn't yet explained how the universe came into being at the very beginning, therefore God must have been involved.

[rug]

44. No one mentioned God, although I find your steadfast belief in the inevitability of a scientific

explanation to be rather familiar.

As I said earlier, you're looking at the other side of an intellectual dead end.

[Silent3]

45. What does "inevitability of a scientific explanation" have to do with this?

Every answer, at least the good ones, brings up more questions. The "failure" of science to infinitely answer infinitely recursive questions does not lend superstitious answers the slightest extra credibility. Sometimes the best answer is "I don't know". What does explaining the origin of matter that can't otherwise be explained by invoking a deity whose origin can't be explained get you anyway? That's simply "needlessly multiplying entities", to use the language of Occam's Razor.

Imagine that scientific detective work solves a crime, say, finds the person who robbed a bank. Suppose scientific inquiry fails to discover the ultimate reason why the perpetrator robbed the bank. Does that suddenly mean that explanations of motive produced by tarot card readers or astrologers have more credence? Or is it better to simply say "I don't know", do what you can with the good data you do have, and move on?

We are not owed all or any of the answers we seek. The failure of one technique to provide us with desired answers in no way obligates the universe to provide alternate successful techniques.

[rug]

48. Apropos your example, I'd rather read Dostoyevsky than say "I don't know" and move on.

"Good God!" he cried, "can it be, can it be, that I shall really take an axe, that I shall strike her on the head, split her skull open... that I shall tread in the sticky warm blood, blood... with the axe... Good God, can it be?"

- Fyodor Dostoevsky, Crime and Punishment, Ch. 5


And when I'm done with Dostoyevsky, I'll look at the Dhammapada and the New Testament and perhaps find an answer while I hear faint epithets of superstition in the distance.

[Silent3]

49. Do you actually think you're evincing some sort of clever wisdom...

...by alluding tangentially to literature, or are you consciously being obfuscatory with deliberate intent?

Yes, I see, you're off on some wonderful journey into being so very, very deep that talk of superstition is so much annoying (fortunately fading and distant) noise, and you can't be bothered with making sense to those who shut themselves out from your kind of deepness. :eyes:

[rug]

50. It's your example, Sherlock.

[Silent3]

51. I should think the analogy I made was not so difficult to penetrate.

If you have an objection to that analogy, you've had plenty of opportunity to make it clearly, but you've chosen obfuscation instead.

[rug]

52. Nor was mine.

[Silent3]

53. Reading Dostoevsky is not a mutually exclusive choice...

...from saying (aloud, or quietly admitting to oneself) that you don't know the answer to a particular question. If you hate admitting ignorance of anything then, I suppose, reading Dostoevsky could be a diversion from facing one's lack of knowledge.

If there's more to your analogy than that, I'll admit flat out that I don't see it. Can you explain it better, or will you opt for some terse and/or flippant remark designed to cast an air of smug superiority over those who don't see the fine weave of the Emperor's clothing?

[rug]

54. Look, knowing, or not knowing, how something occurred is not the sum total of the phenemenon.

Philosophy, theology, and yes, literature, all address what remains, what is not or cannot be explained.

To dismiss that as superstition ignores the reality of what remains unexplained.

[Silent3]

55. Then why ask "where did the matter come from"?

As if not having an answer to that is such a cutting indictment of science?

Besides, we're not just talking about how something has occurred, but if something exists.

Who is dismissing literature as superstition? Or even philosophy? (If you don't know a fictional story is fictional, I suppose then superstition or something akin to it comes into play.)

Do you want to reduce religious dogma to a form of imaginative fiction? That's what I'd call it myself (at best), but most followers tend to object to that sort of classification.

Is an argument about the nature of the trinity akin to an argument about whether Batman would beat Superman in a fight?

[rug]

56. The question both defines and limits the competence of science.

As to theology, most religious thought starts with the acknowledgement that science has its limits. The major religions start with the premise that the answers to these questions cannot be known or discovered through human or natural efforts and the answers are the result of revelation.

If you reject that premise, you believe that ultimately most things are unknowable and develop a philosophy based on that premise.

That is the essential difference. Choose between what you call superstition or choose indomitable ignorance. Either way, you have selected a premise as your starting point.

BTW, yesterday was designated Trinity Sunday. It has nothing to do with comic books.

[Silent3]

57. "indomitable ignorance" is a condition of life, not a choice.

If "revelation" had any sort of consistent track record, it would be a different matter. Even if the supposed information obtained by revelation can't be obtained by what you imagine to be the observational limits of science, why shouldn't that information be subject to standards of repeatability and testability?

Doesn't the fact that "revelations" are wildly inconsistent, and often contradictory, make the whole notion of revelation suspect at best?

Are we supposed to distinguish between "true" revelation and false? If so, how?

Are we supposed to perform the mental gymnastics required to believe that all revelation, even when it (appears, yes, let's just say "appears") to be contradictory, is all true, or all "aspects of the same truth"? Nice bit of diplomacy, perhaps, but that's just singing Kumbaya while sweeping a problematic mess under the rug.

What is consistent about revelation is that it's remarkably similar to what you'd expect to get from the noise already inside people's brains -- hopes, fears, delusions, cultural indoctrination -- without any special channel tuned into The Divine necessary to explain it.

[rug]

58. The "standards of repeatability and testability" are incompetent to test these areas.

That's been discussed above. That is precisely the role of theology, to assess these purported revelations in the light of reason.

[Silent3]

60. Funny word that, "incompetent".

You've got to always get that little dig in, don't you, about how terribly, terribly limited poor old blinkered science is, don't you?

You may think it has "been discussed above", but all I have seen is hand-waving, evasion, attempts to liken religion to math or history which don't stand up, no good reason has yet been given to attribute this alleged "incompetence" to science rather than to the supposed power of revelation.

Besides, how can you talk about "the light of reason" while dismissing standards of repeatability and testability? Do you call taking a boatload of premises "on faith", premises with no sensible grounding in the physical world which come via the rather questionable means of revelation, then playing words games and looking for pretty patterns and pleasing outcomes within such a conveniently constructed framework "the light of reason"?

[rug]

61. It's a perfectly apt word. Learn its meaning.

If you're in this Forum to apply "standards of repeatability and testability" to theological issues, you're an idiot. If you're to discuss theology with a "sensible grounding in the physical world", you lack understanding of both the purpose of theology and the purpose of science.

Or perhaps you're simply here as part of a tenth grade project.

BTW, sorry you feel I blasphemed "poor old blinkered science".

[Silent3]

63. You keep repeating things like...

..."to apply 'standards of repeatability and testability' to theological issues, you're an idiot"?

Why is that idiotic? You've had plenty of opportunity to explain why theological issues are exempt, but you haven't taken them. As far as I can tell the only reason theology wants to be exempt is because it would fail such standards miserably.

I understand the purported purpose of religion and theology. I simply don't think they achieve their purported goals. Similarly, I understand that the purpose of tea leaf reading is prediction of the future, but I can understand that without having to believe that tea-leaf reading works and without having to accept excuses from tea leaf readers why testing tea leaf reading for repeatable results shouldn't be done.

At best religion achieves its goals the way telling a child to clean his room or Santa won't bring presents achieves goals. Parents might get the desired result of a clean room, and a child might get the result of presents, but none of that has any bearing on the reality of Santa Claus. Even when religion and theology strive to get beyond gods of reward an punishment, there's no evidence (there's that dirty, apparently inappropriate to apply word again) they achieve anything at all, other than perhaps intellectual playthings living in isolated worlds of artificial intellectual construction, or side-effect stuff like forming communities, achieving social order, helping some people cope with life, but all in ways essentially disconnected from the particulars of doctrine, achievable under different or even contradictory doctrine, or without any doctrine at all.

You bring up mathematics as something not rooted in physical observation, but something that should still count as a "way of knowing". I disagree with that, in part, for reasons explained earlier, but suppose I give you that in full anyway. Fine. Mathematicians only make claims about what is or is not true within the worlds of premise and logic that they create, however. Physicists have a nasty habit of finding useful applications for even the most abstract mathematics, but that's not necessary for mathematical truth to be achieved.

Do you support a theology which is that dry and detached? What's the theological equivalent of the Pythagorean Theorem? If such a thing exists, does it have practical application, the way the Pythagorean Theorem has practical application for engineers and architects?

You bring up literature. Is religion like that? Just fictional entertainment? Symbolic exploration of the human condition without need for literal truth? I have heard of theologians who don't believe in the literal truth of supernatural doctrines, but they're much more the exception than the rule.

Or do you expect, just on your say-so, that anyone should be convinced that religion and theology represent "ways of knowing" less detached that pure mathematics, more true than literature, and "competent" to explore questions like where everything came from and why we're here and what's good and what's evil and the purpose of life, all of that, while reasonably being exempt from standards of evidence and repeatability at the same time?

[rug]

64. Sorry, too repetitious to read.

[Silent3]

65. I wouldn't keep repeating...

...if you didn't keep evading. Your response was, however, just about what I expected. You can't meet these challenges. You've got nothing.

[rug]

66. Reread the thread, tough guy.

[Silent3]

69. Let's have a re-cap then...

...if your delicate constitution can withstand the unbearable repetition.

Post 26: "The flip side is that everything has always existed, in one form or another." Silly and pointless... gods solve the this issue less than science does. Something, be it a god or a physical universe, either always existed, suddenly came into being, or doesn't fit easily into human conceptions of time allowing us to form a proper origin question. Occam's Razor favors not introducing extra "entities", and you just have to say "I don't know" when you can't figure out more, with or without a god. I guess gods get a built-in pass for being mysterious, however. It's what they do.

Post 35: Still missing the above point, and nothing yet to incidentally answer any of my posts which came later.

Post 38: Ditto.

Post 44: Silly game playing based on holding science to silly standards.

Post 48: Obfuscatory response to my challenge of Post 44's silly game.

Posts 50, 52: Just biding time, avoiding having to say anything of substance.

Posts 54: Finally an attempt at substance, but just something that raises more questions, combined with the silly apparent implication that I'm somehow dismissing literature as superstition. You bring up literature, but have so far refused to answer how religion is or is not like literature.

Post 56: The whole "indomitable ignorance" thing, but nothing of substance to show how religion gets you out of this. So far the argument reminds me of creationists dealing with evolution: just keep bashing the supposed problems and limits of science, holding science to very high (often deliberately impossible) standards, while holding religion to incredibly lax standards, and never explaining how religion can do what science can't. Somehow religion, I guess, automatically gets the benefit of the doubt of being able to do whatever science can't.

Post 58: Here comes the "light of reason", about which you've refused to elucidate further. Simply reiterating that religion should be exempt from "standards of repeatability and testability", trying to make it sound like those standards are the problem, not failure to meet them. Again, no further elucidation. I'm beginning to think you think these pronouncements of yours are inherently unassailable.

Post 61: Nothing but posturing and insults. No substance.

Post 64: The good ol' "I'm so bored with your tedious inability to grasp my genius" gambit.

Post 66: Your challenge to re-read this thread, which I've just met with far more detail than any response that's likely from you.

I'll leave it up to you to re-read the thread and see all of the unanswered questions I posed that remain.

[rug]

71. It all went downhill when you didn't answer 38

yet.

[Silent3]

72. The beginning of my very last post answered exactly that question.

Besides, you apparently can't even follow who you're talking to. You asked skepticscott that question, not me.

How incredibly lazy of you. You just manufacture an excuse to complain about something, and, very predictably, say nothing more to any other issue on the table.

Is every nit you want to pick going to be a 10-word post laid down as a show stopper for you, while you leave scads of questions unanswered?

Here, I'll answer your question to skepticscott: Q: Where did the matter from which the Big Bang banged come from? A: I don't know, and neither do you.

And now I'll repeat from my last post, which addressed the above quite well:

"Something, be it a god or a physical universe, either always existed, suddenly came into being, or doesn't fit easily into human conceptions of time allowing us to form a proper origin question. Occam's Razor favors not introducing extra "entities", and you just have to say "I don't know" when you can't figure out more, with or without a god."

Any other delay tactics or diversions left to get out of the way? Or is it finally time for a terse expression of exasperation to cover your ass on the way out?

[rug]

73. Do you mean to say I have not been speaking with skepticscott all this time?

Who the hell are you?

[Silent3]

74. My screen name is "Silent3". It's right there for you to read.

Your turn: delay, evade, obfuscate, or quit? Oh, one other option (hah!): Actually answer tough questions.

[rug]

75. I don't believe you. Prove it.

[Silent3]

77. This is just childish.

You did manage to combine both obfuscate and evade, for whatever that's worth.

Do you really think you have a deep, significant point there? Claims of all-powerful beings and water turned into wine are equivalent to claims of being a certain screen name on a message port for significance and evidence? My identity is irrelevant to the questions I'm asking anyway, only relevant to your incorrect accusation of me not answering a question of yours.

I guess I can't expect anything more than childish pursuit of pointless tangents from now on. Such theological depth. :eyes:

[rug]

78. Why is your avatar an eclipse?

[Silent3]

80. Because I took the picture myself while in Zambia in 2001 to see the eclipse.

My questions, still unanswered:

Why is that "idiotic" to hold religion to standards of testability and repeatability? You've had plenty of opportunity to explain why theological issues are exempt, but you haven't taken them. As far as I can tell the only reason theology wants to be exempt is because it would fail such standards miserably.

You bring up mathematics as something not rooted in physical observation, but something that should still count as a "way of knowing". I disagree with that, in part, for reasons explained earlier, but suppose I give you that in full anyway. Fine. Mathematicians only make claims about what is or is not true within the worlds of premise and logic that they create, however. Physicists have a nasty habit of finding useful applications for even the most abstract mathematics, but that's not necessary for mathematical truth to be achieved.

Do you support a theology which is that dry and detached? What's the theological equivalent of the Pythagorean Theorem? If such a thing exists, does it have practical application, the way the Pythagorean Theorem has practical application for engineers and architects?

You bring up literature. Is religion like that? Just fictional entertainment? Symbolic exploration of the human condition without need for literal truth? I have heard of theologians who don't believe in the literal truth of supernatural doctrines, but they're much more the exception than the rule.

Or do you expect, just on your say-so, that anyone should be convinced that religion and theology represent "ways of knowing" less detached that pure mathematics, more true than literature, and "competent" to explore questions like where everything came from and why we're here and what's good and what's evil and the purpose of life, all of that, while reasonably being exempt from standards of evidence and repeatability at the same time?

[rug]

81. Answers.

1) From Chapter 102 of Moby Dick:

"Cutting me a green measuring-rod, I once more dived within the skeleton. From their arrow-slit in the skull, the priests perceived me taking the altitude of the final rib. 'How now!' they shouted; 'Dar'st thou measure this our god! That's for us.' 'Aye, priests --well, how long do ye make him, then?' But hereupon a fierce contest rose among them, concerning feet and inches; they cracked each other's sconces with their yard-sticks -- the great skull echoed -- and seizing that lucky chance, I quickly concluded my own admeasurements."

2) Agreed.

3) No. Nothing, the theorem explains a spatial relation; theology attempts to explain why things exist. Theology has no practical application, unless you believe both that there is a reason for things to exist and you'd like to know why.

4) No. However literature, like art, music and sculpture have a resonance that a simple description or explanation of phenemona does not.

5) Why, yes, now that you mention it.

I fear we're speaking different languages.

[Silent3]

83. That first quote seems more to me...

...more about the absurdity of gods, and how people who believe in them can't even agree about them, than anything to be said against the act of measurement.

By the way, to "measure" something does not always require holding a ruler against the thing, putting it on a scale, or isolating it in a test tube. One can measure statistical significance. If a supposed good luck charm actually works, a population that employs the charm should so some sort of increase in things reasonably called "good fortune" when compared to an otherwise similar group that does not employ the charm. Fewer accidental injuries, more lottery winnings, more first marriages lasting -- something statistically significant. And you'd have to deploy "placebo" charms too, to see how much mere belief that one has a charm changes things.

People's self-reported impressions and feelings can even be scientifically measured, given a well-designed study. That's part of how you'd decide if an antidepressant drug is effective.

Theology has no practical application, unless you believe both that there is a reason for things to exist and you'd like to know why.

If the claims of some religions are true, what could be more practical than avoiding death and gaining immortality?

What's at issue is, given the desire to know such things as reasons for things to exist, if theology is up to the task of supplying answers. I still see know reason to judge it up to the task, and plenty of reason to think it mired in delusional thinking. The field does not progress, it just wanders around in a multitude of discordant fashions.

Further, how does thinking you "know" that a God or gods exist solve anything? If you say you exist to play a part in "God's Plan", then why does God need you for a Plan? What purpose is served by God having a Plan? Why does God exist rather than not exist? What I think is afoot here is a psychological effect where being given a "who" has an answer satisfies more than answers of how, what, when, and where. "Agenticity" as a guy called it in a recent Scientific American opinion piece that got chewed on a bit here recently. Why was any young child ever even briefly satisfied with being told "the stork brings them" as an answer to where babies come from? Why was anyone ever satisfied with a giant turtle, which itself would need support, and an answer for how the earth was supported?

As for "resonance" of art and music and literature... sure, I sense these things too, but I don't need mystical explanations for them. I think you're laboring under the misconception that anything that science can't analyze down to the last detail is therefore out of its purview, unscientific, and best left to "spiritual" sensibilities to be understood.

A lot of science, however, is about understanding boundaries and limits. Nothing about the writing of Moby Dick seems outside the known capabilities of human beings. No extraordinary claims of unseen abilities are required to either explain the creation or the enjoyment of that work. That complex, many-layered "resonant" reactions would occur inside a network of billions of neurons being stimulated by words that tap deeply into many thoughts and ideas and memories of sensation is hardly surprising.

As for your fifth answer... well, even if you meant that with a touch of sarcasm, I can't help but wonder if it all really doesn't come down to that. Truth by fiat, take it or leave it, my problem if your truth isn't radiantly self-evident, not yours.

[rug]

85. It shows the idiocy of anyone, theist or atheist, trying to measure God.

[Silent3]

90. I'd have to have a reason to believe...

...there was such a thing as a God before trying to measure it. Or I'd have to know which definition from a multitude of conflicting definitions of God to was in play to determine if "measurement" was apropos or not to validating the existence of that particular flavor of God. By some definitions, I suppose, God might be quite measurable in some dimension or aspect.

For those who call God, "the sum total of the universe", well, all that's required to "measure" such a God is to look around, see nearby pieces of God, and, already having made the decision not to waste my time on the possible but unproductive viewpoints such as solipsism and "living in a dream", say, "Hey! There's God!".

Of course, this God is nothing more than a synonym for "universe" really, and doesn't necessarily have a thing to do with afterlives or human purpose or sin or whatnot, so this God is as uninteresting as it is easily measurable. Then again, a lot of people who would say a thing like "God is the sum total of the universe" probably state one definition and believe another, consciously or not hoping to sneak by with a lot of cultural baggage that they associate with the idea of God under the guise of a more conveniently verifiable definition.

Perhaps you define God as "Something that you can't measure, that you simply have to choose to believe in to believe in", or "Something that you can't measure, that has to be discovered through 'revelation'". Put the lack of measurability right into the definition, and you've got yourself a nice, neat protective seal against any possibility of invalidation - a key quality of delusional thought patterns.

[skepticscott]

91. It seems to be the "in" thing

among "liberal" and "progressive" Christians, as well as those humping for the Templeton Prize, to try to define "God" in such a way as to make his/her/its existence and nature as immune as possible from criticism and rational inquiry, while still leaving the concept as warm and fuzzy as possible. The fact that this usually requires morphing the Christian (or some other) god into a form that is all but unrecognizable seems not to matter one whit.

[trotsky]

93. Absolutely spot on:

Then again, a lot of people who would say a thing like "God is the sum total of the universe" probably state one definition and believe another, consciously or not hoping to sneak by with a lot of cultural baggage that they associate with the idea of God under the guise of a more conveniently verifiable definition.

Haven't ever heard that put better.

[rug]

95. I doubt I'm delusional but given your perseverance I can only repeat

the scientific method is utterly inapplicable in a theological discussion. You may as well measure water with a ruler.

[Silent3]

96. Pour the water into a box...

...measure the width and length of the box, then the depth of the water, and you've got the volume of the water.

But, yes, the scientific method is utterly inapplicable in a theological discussion because, well... because it is!!!

Truth by vigorous assertion.

[rug]

97. Water is not described by measuring volume.

QNED.

[Silent3]

100. That's part of the picture, however.

Things that really exist tend to have some measurable qualities. Those measurements might not completely describe the thing, but there's still something there to measure.

You seem to want to (deliberately?) confuse the merest detection of a thing with the utter and complete understanding of that thing. Decry the straw man of completely understanding a thing through a few simple measurements (of course one can't hope to do that) and use that as an excuse for that thing to be utterly removed from measurement or measurable detection of any kind.

Ah, but I guess being both real and not having one single measurably quality is what makes God so very special. Indistinguishable from invisible pink unicorns and Russell's teapot, but special.

[rug]

101. To a clam, you would not exist.

[Silent3]

102. I would be a detectable stimulus.

Perhaps not distinguishable from a vague category like "possible predator", but I'd still detectable.

(Cue the cloying hallmark sentimentality: Yes, you can see God! In a sunset! In a baby's smile! You just don't realize that's all God!)

Do you think there are clams who consider themselves special clams because they know people exist, pitying their bivalve brethren who are either incapable of sensing the human spark in the world around them or unwilling to open their shells to the human experience?

Or are clams all essentially equal when it comes to recognizing the existence of humans, but among humans, you're one of the better clams capable of detecting gods?

[rug]

103. Clams would be incapable of sensing, measuring, or understanding you.

Or perhaps not.

[Silent3]

106. Evade, evade.

It's your clam analogy. Work within its faults, or explain your way around them.

If human is to clam as God is to human, and we're both human, you can know God no better than I can.

Are you saying that we humans, being smarter than clams, capable at least of imagining the concept of things beyond our ability to measure and detect, should automatically assume that stuff we can't detect is "out there"?

That I can go along with. Since we keep finding out things we never knew before, at a very high rate, it's quite reasonably to believe there's plenty more we can't yet detect, and maybe even a lot that we might never detect.

A God defined as "anything and everything that's beyond our ability to detect" makes for a pretty vague and uninspiring God, however.

If you want to define God in a more inspiring way, well, we're back to some clams claiming to be better than other clams, clams who sadly don't grasp the super-clammy abilities of other, wiser clams.

[rug]

114. Blather, blather.

A human has a limited capacity to sense, measure and describe the universe. Sorry to bust your quasar. A clam is somewhat more limited, but limited nonetheless.

Here's a quote from Aquinas to set you off an extended blather:

"All the efforts of the human mind cannot exhaust the essence of a single fly."

[Silent3]

116. You're a human just like me.

So how is it that you can tell me about this thing that's beyond both of our limited capacity to sense, measure, and describe?

A clam may not be aware of me, but it's also not aware of invisible pink unicorns. Not all things that we might not be aware should be considered real until proven otherwise.

[rug]

117. The converse is also true.

BTW, if you equate theology with invisible pink unicorns, you seriously misunderstand 6,000 years of human culture.

[Silent3]

124. Impart the wisdom of this theology upon us then.

Sure there's a difference. Not too many people have died over disputes about invisible pink unicorns, for one thing. "Invisible pink unicorns" are meant to sound obviously absurd, and theology takes itself far more seriously than that. I have yet to see, however, theology demonstrate or explain why the essential absurdity of gods and invisible pink unicorns isn't the same.

"Invisible pink unicorns" honestly advertise the fact that you can't detect them. Some theologies say this about gods too, but spend pages of dry apologetics explaining how this invisibility is somehow a virtue or a test of faith or whatnot, performing amazing (but so far, as far as I've seen, ultimately futile) mental gymnastics to justify plenty of detailed claims about things defined as essentially unknowable, or how certain kinds of "knowing" which don't involve the dreaded and profane acts of "measuring" and "detecting", otherwise indistinguishable from self-delusion, are better than others.

Show us HOW theology discovers that God can be known to be more real than invisible pink unicorns, how this can be done by us limited creature incapable of detecting neither.

Does theology accomplish the discovery of God using this "pure reason" stuff you haven't elaborated on much yet? Revelation to a select few? Belief by deciding to believe first, as if that's a special kind of virtuous act?

Does it do it by using sufficiently vague definitions of God so that the God which exists could be anything?

Does it do it by insisting that God is immeasurable, undetectable, and, as the cherry on top, undefinable too? We can know that yes, there is a God, but know what knows WTF they're talking about when they say that?

[rug]

126. You have not demonstrated "the essential absurdity of gods".

Nevertheless, the pure reason arguments for God are useful but miss the point.

If God is unknowable, then if it exists, it can only be known through revelation. Not being a Gnostic. I would subscribe to the notion that revelation is meant for all.

Now, if you're over that hurdle, that is the purpose of theology, to attempt to explain and understand revelation to the extent that the human intellect can. If you want to discuss what or who is God, you're having an actual theology discussion.

That can be a far more interesting discussion than whether God exists, which invariably turns into a juvenile bullshit session, especially here.

[Silent3]

128. It's a matter of burden of proof.

To the extent that the known universe can be explained, God is unnecessary. To the extent that it can't, God is indistinguishable from "the thing that does all the things I can't explain", i.e. The God of the Gaps.

As explanations go, it's like saying birds can fly because they are imbued with the essence of flight. There's no increase in knowledge, just a grand sounding excuse for not looking any deeper, a way to dress up ignorance as wisdom, and, when God is the mysterious black box, you get a convenient entity to which you can attach all sorts of cultural baggage that has nothing to do with the limits of inquiry you've stumbled upon.

For me, that makes gods, especially when they are surrounded by rhetorical defenses identical to those employed to protect myths, delusions and lies, entities which are absurd until proven otherwise. I'd prefer not to "multiply entities needlessly". Not that I expect you to accept any burden of proof here. I'm sure you've already defined away that burden with a handy bag of convenient definitions and self-protective rules of engagement.

Now, if you're over that hurdle, that is the purpose of theology, to attempt to explain and understand revelation to the extent that the human intellect can. If you want to discuss what or who is God, you're having an actual theology discussion.

Just how far are a Deist and a Fundamentalist Christian going to get in such a discussion? Are polytheists invited? What about the differences between those for whom "revelation" is merely "a sense of the divine" verses those who think God is revealing to them not only His Existence but details down to what hat to wear on particular days of the week? What about when the conversation is between two people who both believe they've received detailed revelation, but the details are contradictory? What about theological discussions between people who disagree greatly but are both so motivated by the desire to be diplomatic and to get along that they'll sacrifice whatever consistency and logic is necessary to reach (or put on the appearance of) a harmonious accord?

I personally think the hurdles are the most interesting things, especially at the most fundamental level. I suppose once in a while it can be interesting to say, "given that..." and tentatively accept as true things which have not been firmly established, just to see where that leads, but that hardly makes not doing so "juvenile".

What for you counts as "juvenile", apparently, is other people having the temerity not to accept your preconditions for discussion.

[rug]

129. The first part of your post has already been discussed.

The second part I find more interesting.

Theological differences are intriguing. The common ground, the divergences, and the reasons for both lead to fruitful conversations.

However, the precondition for those discussions is a premise of a god or gods. A precondition I didn't make and a precondition you lack.

[Silent3]

148. There aren't any such preconditions for these forums, however.

This thread itself, started by you, was started as a non-theological subject: Questioning when the last post on theology occurred here is not itself a theological discussion, and that question certainly doesn't require belief in God as a starting point.

Then you allowed yourself to become partly engaged in the very god/no god argument you like to dismiss as distracting or juvenile, but won't defend what you've said on that subject, only question others by standards you don't live up to yourself.

[skepticscott]

98. That would only be true

if theological discussions never involved truth claims about the physical world. We both know that isn't the case, even though only one of us will admit it.

So in a sense, you're right...all you can do is keep repeating that claim over and over and over, hoping that you'll one day convince somebody of it.

[rug]

99. If you're talking about alleged miracles, you're right.

If you're talking about the nature of God, you're wrong.

[skepticscott]

109. Well, gee...

Up in #95, you said that "the scientific method is utterly inapplicable in a theological discussion", and now you're acknowledging that sometimes it is applicable. Which is it? Do you have any grasp of this at all?

And even your qualified statement is grossly wrong. If part of God's nature is that he/she/it is capable of influencing and being influenced by events in the physical world (steering the course of evolution, or answering prayers to make the other team miss that field goal, for example), then that aspect of god's nature is, in principle, amenable to scientific inquiry.

[rug]

113. Well, golly...

you embrace obtuseness with passion.

Whether miracles can exist is theological. Sumbitting a bleeding host to a DNA analysis is not.

Your second paragraph is simply bass ackwards.

[trotsky]

118. Did Jesus have DNA? n/t

[rug]

127. Yes. He also pissed standing up.

Look up the hypostatic union.

[trotsky]

131. So if Jesus had DNA,

and the host is LITERALLY his body, why don't we find human DNA in a consecrated cracker?

[rug]

133. Look up transubstantiation.

[trotsky]

138. Already have.

But apparently you have not.

[rug]

140. If you had, you wouldn't have asked such an ignorant question.

[trotsky]

141. If you had, you would have more than your lame one-liner.

Betcha can't let me have the last word.

Betcha!

[rug]

142. If you post anything of substance, it would be an accident.

[trotsky]

143. QED!

:rofl:

[rug]

144. FUBAR

[trotsky]

145. I truly do feel the love of Jesus emanating from you.

What an exemplary Christian! Turning the other cheek, being kind to your enemies, shaking the dust from your sandals, you are a model Christian.

Oops, forgot something: :sarcasm:

P.S. Told you before, my handle has nothing to do with Leon Trotsky. But don't let that stop you from trying, bad hairpiece.

[rug]

146. You're right, I should shake the dust from my sandals. Bye!

:hi:

[trotsky]

147. You're kind of missing the point of that, but oh well.

No surprise. Ta ta!

[Silent3]

125. You confuse obtuseness with rejection of self-serving...

...rhetorical defense mechanisms. Yes, I'm sure you can define yourself into a hermetically-sealed non-falsifiable box. That's a very easy thing to do. One specialty of erudite theology seems to be making those defenses as baroque and labyrinthine as possible, all the better to protect the circular logic going on behind the barriers.

[skepticscott]

134. Whether "miracles" can exist

Is entirely a matter of how you define a miracle, and what qualifies as one. In other words, it is entirely a semantic matter and not a theological one. Or, in the case of the Catholic Church, it's entirely a PR matter... i.e. what can they get away with calling a miracle without looking foolish.

Perhaps you'd enlighten us as to how theology, after 2000 years of trying, defines a "miracle"

[Boojatta]

104. If a large computer contains billions of tiny components...

then can it be made to experience enjoyment? Do you think that legislation prohibiting cruelty to animals should be expanded to also prohibit cruelty to computers? For example, could a monotonous program be painful for a computer?

No extraordinary claims of unseen abilities are required to either explain the creation or the enjoyment of that work. That complex, many-layered "resonant" reactions would occur inside a network of billions of neurons being stimulated by words that tap deeply into many thoughts and ideas and memories of sensation is hardly surprising.

[Silent3]

107. With current computers, I think the point is moot, but in the future...

...who knows? If a computer or robot reaches the point that it seems to experience emotions and act on free will to a similar degree that humans do then it might be fair to say that you have a system worthy of the same rights and protections as a human.

Of course, if computers or robots reach that point but do so in a way that's threatening to humans, we might not be able to afford being so generous in granting equal rights. If you grant a robot the right to vote, then a million duplicates of that robot are created, do they get to cast a million and one votes, or just one?

At any rate I certainly wouldn't insist that the qualities of the human experience, and the things we consider valuable about human life, absolutely are and must remain solely within the domain of wet, squishy protoplasm.

[Boojatta]

108. I don't claim that wetness or squishiness endows a system with consciousness.

On the other hand, is the number of components the issue? A billion pocket calculators connected together in some arbitrary way won't necessarily perform any interesting or useful functions. Presumably a large number of components is a necessary, but not sufficient condition to achieve consciousness.

Your analysis focuses on the number of cells, as though it's not relevant that the basic unit of one cell is already a living being. A single-celled organism has metabolism, the ability to repair itself, the ability to reproduce, etc. A living cell isn't comparable to one mousetrap or one transistor.

Is there any particular reason to believe that it is possible to create consciousness without creating life?

[Silent3]

123. How does my analysis "focus" on numbers?

I mentioned both numbers of neurons and connections between them, which was all I needed to say in the context of my previous comment. To take that as a summary analysis that human consciousness is a simple matter of numbers is absurd.

The complexity of living cells may very well play a part in the nature of consciousness, but to focus on that complexity I think misses the point. A good story might be a collection of a million letters, but that doesn't mean that any collection of a million letters is a good story. The trick to creating a good story is not using extra special letters with amazing powers, it's putting simple letters together in just the right way.

A living cell is certainly more complex than a letter in the alphabet or a single transistor, but not every bit of its complexity necessarily plays a role in consciousness. Perhaps it would take a thousand transistors, perhaps a million, to replicate the important functions of a neuron required in creating consciousness. Perhaps the techniques of quantum computing might somehow be important (see Roger Penrose), but it could also be that anything done by a quantum computer can be replicated or simulated to an arbitrary degree of precision by a sufficiently complex classical computational system.

What I think would be a mistake is to revert to "vitalism", to insist that life and/or consciousness must be some special kind of power or energy or essence beyond the known physics of ordinary matter. While perhaps that could be true, it's a mistake to "multiply entities" until evidence drives you there. The null hypothesis is that known entities can explain known phenomena, and merely not full understanding how an entire process works to the last detail is not an excuse to insist on a new block box which would also beyond current understanding as an explanation.

[trotsky]

59. "most religious thought starts with the acknowledgement that science has its limits."

AKA, God of the gaps, or the Incredible Shrinking Deity.

[rug]

62. Not quite.

The fact that scientific knowledge is limited does not automaticall flow into a proof of God. But it is a staring point for a theological inquiry.

[trotsky]

79. A starting point that shrinks every year, every month, every day, every minute...

that science discovers something new about the world.

[rug]

84. Not really. The larger the universe is seen to be, the larger the questions.

[trotsky]

86. The larger the universe, the smaller the spots left for your god.

Didn't think you'd grasp that.

[rug]

87. Given you've adopted the name of a failure, I'm not sure what you can grasp.

But I'm not surprised you believe that if there is a God, it resides in some spot in the universe.

[trotsky]

88. Says the guy who named himself after an inanimate object that everyone walks all over?

The god "outside" the universe - the ULTIMATE god of the gaps. When you've figured out how something apart from the universe can affect things in it without becoming part of it, you will truly have scored theology's first intellectual accomplishment. Good luck!

[rug]

89. Oh, Trotsky was pretty well walked over.

[trotsky]

92. Thank you for teaching me that the very latest in advanced theology...

is attempting to mock the username of someone on an Internet message board. (Which actually happens to have nothing to do with the historical Trotsky.) With that passing for theological greatness, it's no wonder nothing has come out of it in 2000+ years.

[rug]

94. I'll see your mockery and raise you one irony.

[trotsky]

110. See, atheists can do theology too!

Heck, since you've "elevated" it to one-liner snips and name-calling, even kindergartners on the playground can participate!

[TZ]

111. lol

I'm waiting for the "I'm rubber and you are glue" type of response. Remember when someone said that to you in Health basically? Thats still one of my favorite DU moments..:rofl:

[trotsky]

112. I miss ol' whatshisname...

whose final response to being hammered in an argument was "Whatever."

[rug]

115. I see three have already been here for a while,

[trotsky]

119. You and two friends? n/t

[rug]

120. No, Moe, Larry and Trotsky.

These subthreads illustrate the OP, why there are no theology posts in R/T.

No one can get past the god/no god question and are reduced to mildly amusing nonsense.

[trotsky]

121. We've tried to get you to defend theological thought.

But you don't, when pressed you just regress to one-liners and insults (as perfectly evidenced by these last few posts). You are just as responsible for the supposed lack of theology posts in this forum. I haven't seen you advance any theology whatsoever.

[rug]

122. Look closer.

Since you don't believe in God, you don't believe in theology.

Your points are the same repetitions that it's all nonsense and unicorns.

So, there is no theology of any kind from you.

Do you care to write a theology post or will you once again type a variation on it's all nonsense?

If you choose the latter, I've got a hundred one-liners for you. Even though it's a monumental waste of time.

[trotsky]

130. You have been asked many very basic questions.

Instead of answering any of them with something substantive, you lash out and snip. Keep wasting your time if you must, and further demonstrate what a pointless exercise "theology" is.

[rug]

132. And the reason you post here is?

[trotsky]

137. Mainly to laugh at people like you.

Once again you bow out without even trying to answer any questions. Please have your precious last word now.

[rug]

139. If there was a genuine question, it might be worth an answer. So long, Shemp.

[skepticscott]

135. Oh, we believe in theology

We just believe that it's an intellectual fraud and an utter waste of time, with no accomplishment in almost 2000 years other than providing convenient rationalization to true believers who need them.

[rug]

136. If you choose to believe in an intellectual fraud, that's your business.

You do realize that your three assumptions in that brief post do not make them real?

[skepticscott]

149. I've asked over and over

For examples of theology's intellectual accomplishments over 2000 years, and you can't even supply 2 or 3 good examples. Heck, you can't even come up with any BAD examples. That's very telling, not to mention pretty pathetic.

[rug]

150. Summa Theologica. Critique it after you've read it.

[skepticscott]

154. Funny for a whole lot of reasons

Not the least of which being that the god/no god question that you denigrate as foolish and unproductive was absolutely fundamental to Aquinas. He didn't try anything else until he dealt (he thought) with that first.

But even funnier is that when you had a chance to offer an example of theology's wonderful accomplishments, you offer up a book that was written almost 800 years ago. In any worthwhile and fruitful field of inquiry, knowledge increases and understanding improves over time. So either there are a whole lot of better and more up to date examples of theology's intellectual achievement that you could have cited, but didn't, or theologians have been completely unable to improve on Aquinas and have been doing nothing much except mental masturbation since then.

As far as a critique, it has been critiqued, as I assume you're aware (is it too much to hope that you've actually read any of the criticism?). Why would I waste time re-iterating something that's been done in much greater depth than you're likely to read here or take seriously anyway? But if you want the one most fundamental criticisms, ask yourself if there was any chance at all, in formulating his so-called "proofs" of god's existence, that Aquinas would have arrived at any conclusion other than the one he did? The fact that his conclusion about god's existence was pre-conceived pretty much knocks the support out from under anything else based on it.

[rug]

155. I see. You haven't read it.

[skepticscott]

156. Enough of it to know

that it wasn't worth finishing. And no, that wasn't much. But I'll wager I've read more of it that you have of its critiques, which leaves us with you still giving no remotely substantial responses to 98% of the direct questions that have been posed here. Or is "Go read Summa Theologica and then get back to me" going to be your response to everything now?

[rug]

157. Then you also missed this.

"Some there are who presume so far on their wits that they think themselves capable of measuring the whole nature of things by their intellect, in that they esteem all things true which they see, and false which they see not."

Summa Contra Gentiles

[skepticscott]

158. As I said, not worth finishing

This is nothing more than attacking a silly straw man, and bespeaks a complete ignorance of the distinction between declaring something false and not asserting it as true due to insufficient evidence.

Is this the best that you and theology can do?

[rug]

161. I believe this discussion is not worth finishing.

[skepticscott]

46. Inevitable?

Hardly. There are many questions within its purview that science may never answer, and not even the best and most successful scientific explanations are complete and final. What I am convinced of, with high degree of confidence, is that science will make a more honest and sincere attempt to answer questions within its purview, and be more successful at doing so, than any other manner of inquiry you care to name. History is rife with examples of scientific explanations supplanting those based on religion, faith and superstition, but strangely lacking in examples of the reverse happening. Perhaps you'd care to enlighten us as to why that's so?

[rug]

47. "Yet" implies inevitability. And you're right that science is competent only in its purview.

As to the things that are not, philosophy and theology are rational bases to attempt to answer other questions. Explanations are not, in the end, answers.

[skepticscott]

70. "Yet" implies

that just because no explanation has been found, there is no justification for assuming that none ever will be. Science has been denigrated times beyond count for being unable to explain a certain thing (the ID creationists are especially fond of this), and then over and over again, through reason and dint of effort, it does find an explanation, and one that is far superior to the faith-based gobbledygook that was there before.

And yes, theology is potentially a basis for answering questions that science can't...unfortunately, compared to science, it really sucks at it.

[Sal316]

67. Hmmm...interesting.....

There are many questions within its purview that science may never answer, and not even the best and most successful scientific explanations are complete and final.

You could replace science with theology and still be correct.

The only difference is your bias against people of faith. You sit here, making statements questioning the efficacy and worth of theological discussions, yet you admit that your gods, reason and science, suffer the same deficiencies that are unforgivable for theologians.

Yet, because it's not faith based, it's quite ok.

Interesting, really.

[skepticscott]

68. The difference is that

even though science never arrives at the absolute, final and complete answer to any question within its purview, it continually improves our understanding of the issues it addresses, and comes closer and closer to the truth, even if it never gets there. You can't replace science with theology in that and still be correct..so sorry. Science is not "quite ok" because it's not faith-based...it is because it works in ways that no other manner of inquiry does or ever has. The evidence is all around you.

I posed a simple and direct challenge: tell me how theology's understanding of the nature of the Trinity (an extensively discussed subject within that field of alleged inquiry) has improved and advanced over the last 50 years. You've done nothing but dodge and evade when I've given you a clear opportunity to demonstrate the "efficacy and worth of theological discussions". Would you like me to make you look foolish and list a few hundred things that science has improved our understanding of?

[Sal316]

76. There is no difference.

Theology does the same "continually improves our understanding of the issues it addresses, and comes closer and closer to the truth, even if it never gets there."

Just because you may not like, nor care, about those issues, it doesn't make the contributions theologians have made over the centuries any less valuable than any scientist.

Darwin, whose faith morphed over his lifetime, when writing Origin believed that the universe is so complex it could not have happened by chance.

Newton was a deeply religious man who wrote a 300,000 word treatise on the Book of Revelation.

Galileo believed that the truth of Scripture and the truth of nature were both from God.

Today’s atheists/skeptics seemingly forget that most of history’s greatest scientists were also people of great faith. If they were around today, it’s almost guaranteed they’d be mocked and belittled by atheists FOR that faith. That’s just as lame as the fundies who would mock them for their scientific knowledge.

Oh, just so you know, in my work life, I'm and R&D Chemist for a Defense contractor. So, please, spare me the "theists don't believe in reason" or whatever the pseudo-intellectual atheist stereotype of the day is.

Reason and faith are NOT incompatible.

Faith and reason are like two wings on which the human spirit rises to the contemplation of truth; and God has placed in the human heart a desire to know the truth—in a word, to know himself—so that, by knowing and loving God, men and women may also come to the fullness of truth about themselves - Pope John Paul II

[skepticscott]

82. You evade, delay and obfuscate...nothing more

Theology does the same "continually improves our understanding of the issues it addresses, and comes closer and closer to the truth, even if it never gets there."

So you say, but you continue to avoid providing the concrete examples that I asked for. I can give you a hundred from the standpoint of science, how about giving a few from theology? A declaration is neither evidence nor argument. What "truths" does theology get closer and closer to, and how do you judge when you're getting close?

And as far as your examples of Darwin, Newton and Galileo..so what? Today's religionists seemingly forget that throughout most of the history of science, you weren't allowed NOT to be a person of faith (not if you wanted to hold a civilized job), and that now that this has finally started to change, most of the world's top scientists aren't people of great faith. If Darwin, Galileo and Newton were around today, it's a fair bet that they would fall in the same class.

Faith and reason are like two wings on which the human spirit rises to the contemplation of truth; and God has placed in the human heart a desire to know the truth—in a word, to know himself—so that, by knowing and loving God, men and women may also come to the fullness of truth about themselves - Pope John Paul II

And because JPII said it, it must be true? What exactly is your argument here? That this statement is so cute and pithy that we should all acknowledge it as self-evidently true? Try again. And while you're at it, tell us what you think JPII's response would be to the argument that "reason" shows that transsubstantiation doesn't really happen, since people with wheat gluten allergies still can't eat the host without suffering ill effects? His alleged devotion to reason was nothing but a pompous fraud, since his faith put certain conclusions off limits in principle, no matter how strongly they were supported by reason.

[dmallind]

152. There is a difference

Eventually in discussions of ultimate origins the intelligent spokesman for the "no gods" point of view has to come to the point of saying "we just don't know what happened yet and maybe never will".

That's not at all a dead end. It's in fact the exact opposite of one, because trying to find out is where discovery comes from. He's followed the evidence as far as he can understand and simply stopped where there is no more evidence, and made no more claims.

Eventually the intelligent spokesman for the "gods" point of view has to say "because (whichever god or gods he follows) just are and always were".

That is a dead end because there is never any evidence for this, and yet he has claimed knowledge that the existence of his god(s) of choice is axiomatic in and of itself.

Occam's razor applies here.

[rug]

153. The odds are scant there will ever be a natural explanation for existence.

Aside from ever answering how, the question of why is for another discipline altogether.

That's why I said it is ultimately a dead end.

Philosophy and theology at least recognize the limitations of natural observations and approaches the question of why differently.

Gathering physical evidence can never answer the question of why the physical evidence is there in the first place.

[dmallind]

160. Sure - so the answer is then to make one up?

The final materialist answer for existence to me is not important. It is the search for it. The search for evidence and sound theory that is, not the "Oh we'll never know so let's pretend one set of bronze age semi-literate nomads got it exactly right and go home" kind of search.

Whether the answer can ever be known or not the approaches to the question from the "god" and "no god unless he shows himself" camps are miles apart, and the latter infinitely to be preferred. That's the difference, and why it's not a dead end.

[rug]

162. You haven't been paying attention.

Since humanity cannot finally learn and explain existence before it is itself extinct (science has observed both the inhuman span of the universe and the mortality of every known species), that limit itself must be acknowledged. It matters not in the least if you consider it important.

No one has said, ok, then, let's make an answer up. I think you made that one up.

Had you been paying attention, most theology is based on understanding what is considered to be revelation of a super natural type. It is not based on supplying an answer where none has been posited,

[Silent3]

163. Of course few people plainly say, "let's make an answer up"...

...but if you'd been "paying attention" (with you, apparently, "paying attention" means "acting as if my every pronouncement in this thread so far should be treated as a fully-established fact, and if you'd noticed them, you'd obviously automatically do just that") a fair number of us consider so-called revelation the same thing as making up an answer.

Just because you claim the noise in your brain comes from a divine source does not obligate anyone else to believe in either the supposed source or the noise itself.

[rug]

164. There are many analyses in theology that deal solely with the nature of revelation.

There are volumes on public revelation contrasted with private revelation.

If you reject the notion of revelation, you are not discussing theology at all.

And pay attention does not mean accept the argument. It means try to follow it.

[Silent3]

165. There are many books on astrology...

...but that doesn't mean there's any merit to the subject. The mere number of volumes written about revelation does not impress me as reason to accept the validity of the idea of revelation. Some consistency about that which is revealed -- that would impress me.

And, dare I suggest this, lest I appear not to "follow" the argument? A few confirmable revelations would be nice: just because the supposed information contained in revelation supposedly isn't available directly to the senses, it doesn't follow that once you have that information you that shouldn't at least occasionally find something of consequence in the ordinary realm of the senses that follows from the revelations and can be confirmed.

Ah, but I'm sure that's "misunderstanding" and "not following" too. I shouldn't be the least bit surprised that prophecy is vague and very open to interpretation, that revealed moral teachings are indistinguishable from things people could easily think up on their own, etc.

[ironbark]

166. consistency

“Some consistency about that which is revealed -- that would impress me”.

The Golden Rule is consistent to all living revelations.
http://www.religioustolerance.org/reciproc.htm


“A few confirmable revelations would be nice:”…” something of consequence in the ordinary realm of the senses that follows from the revelations and can be confirmed”


“Do not the unbelievers see that the heavens and the earth were joined together , before we clove them asunder? We made from water every living thing.” Al-Anbiyaa' 21:30

“I built the heaven with power and it is I, who am expanding it.” Qur’an,51:47

“Verily, in cattle there is a lesson for yon. I give you drink from their insides, coming from a conjunction between the digested contents ( of the intestines ) and the blood, milk pure and pleasant for those who drink it.” Qur’an, 16:66

“The constituents of milk are secreted by the mammary glands which are nourished by the product of food digestion brought to them by the bloodstream. The initial event which sets the whole process in motion is the conjunction of the contents of the intestine and blood at the level of the intestinal wall itself. This very precise concept is the result of the discoveries made in the chemistry and physiology of the digestive system over one thousand years after the time of Prophet Muhammad”.
THE QUR’AN AND MODERN SCIENCE by Dr. Maurice Bucaille
http://www.sultan.org/articles/QScience.html

[Silent3]

167. Consistency about things which couldn't possibly...

...be known any other way other than "revelation", that's the key.

The Golden Rule is hardly something that can't be learned any other way than a mystical revelation.

Cherry-picking from old writings and finding things which maybe kind-of sort-of concur with modern science, if you're generous about interpreting words in a very broad way, isn't very impressive either.

The kind of consistency I'm talking about would have lead to disconnected peoples living in distant parts of the world, well before modern communication existed, coming up with much more consistent beliefs via supposed acts of revelation. The closest thing you mention as an example is the Golden Rule. That's hardly a supernatural thing, nor a surprising agreement for a bunch of social animals of common genetic heritage to reach.

[rug]

168. Which is it? Do you accept revelation may exist in theory, subject to your satisfactory proof, or

do you contend revelation is utter abject nonsense?

If it's the latter you're wasting both our time.

[Silent3]

169. I can accept that a lot of things might exist in theory.

I have absolutely no way, for example, to know if I'm really a completely different kind of creature than I think I am, living in some kind of simulation, maybe living in a universe that works in an utterly different way than what I'm used to inside the simulation.

What good does it do me, however, to treat that idea, among numerous other possible ideas that I can't absolutely rule in or rule out, with any more credence than any other such idea?

That's how I feel about the notion of revelation, at least so long as it's carefully defined to be beyond the reach of proof. If it is defined in a way that permits proof, then I'll wait for that proof.

As for wasting time... hey, that's what the internet is for, isn't it? :)

[rug]

170. Well, theology is a study of these speculations.

Like anything, it starts with a handful of premises. With that proviso, I find it interesting.

[Sal316]

28. Wow.. no bias there.

Until that question is answered, and answered correctly, theology is not much more than intellectual flailing.

Being a theologian myself, I gotta tell you that you couldn't be more wrong. While, yes, the existence of God is a big area in theology, there are a vast number of subjects within the theology spectrum that can be discussed, debated, etc.

BTW..what is the "correct" answer?

[skepticscott]

30. Oh, theology is great at discussing and debating

It just does a lousy job of increasing understanding of the subjects it deals with. The nature of the Trinity is a very popular topic among theologians, yes? Tell me what theologians understand about it that they didn't understand 50 years ago.

As far as the "correct" answer, isn't that what theologians are supposed to be finding out? They've had 2000 years or so of trying and they seem no closer to success. In fact, they can't even seen to be clear on whether the questions they're addressing even have a "correct" answer or not. Since not all worthwhile questions do, it helps more than just a teeny bit to know ahead of time which kind of discussion you're entering into. And if theologians are discussing things that have no grounding in reality as if they did, then theological discussions are no more useful than a discussion of the guidance and propulsion systems on Santa's sleigh, or the care and feeding of unicorns.

[Boojatta]

32. "if theologians are discussing things that have no grounding in reality"

Can you explain how the following are grounded in reality?

1. Ideas about justice and injustice (which, presuming that there's some justice in the world, influence actually enacted law in at least some parts of the world).

2. The various things that have been discussed by logicians from the days of Thales to more recent history.

I think that's a very difficult question, but I don't think that the difficulty of the question is a reasonable basis for the conclusion that justice and logic have no grounding in reality. However, I imagine that someone might, after failing to find answers, claim that "justice" and "logic" are nothing more than words used in fairy tales.

[Sal316]

33. Hmmm.. how openminded of you.....

....not.

"And if theologians are discussing things that have no grounding in reality..."

Gee, tell us how you really feel.

Philosophers, ethicists, and even physical scientists have been discussing the same things for millenia as well.... and in many cases haven't come any closer to the 'correct' answer. Do you lump those into the same category as theologians?

Should we just throw out anything that you can't answer a or b to?

[skepticscott]

36. Gee, how about both of you

actually reading and understanding what I wrote, and not quoting me falsely as a result of your ignorance?

What I actually said was: "And if theologians are discussing things that have no grounding in reality as if they did..." Funny how neither of you bothered to include that last part, which pretty much undermines your (already) underwhelming criticism. Of course not every subject (or even any subject) that theologians or philosophers discuss has to be grounded in physical reality to be worthwhile. I neither said nor implied any such thing. I said that if a subject is not grounded in reality, but is discussed as if it were (emphasis added again for those who seem to need it), then the discussion is pretty silly and pointless. Wouldn't you agree that a theological discussion of purgatory isn't very useful if there is no such thing in reality, or likewise for a discussion of transsubstantiation if it doesn't really happen?

And if you had been reading and not just hyperventilating, you would have noticed that I also said not all worthwhile questions have a "correct" answer.

Still waiting for your answer on the Trinity, btw. Hope you didn't have to go to Wikipedia for that...

[struggle4progress]

39. The Trinity is a metaphor, that attempts to indicate a particular attitude about what

should be regarded as divine: as a Biblical metaphor, it has its origin in the story that G-d appeared to Abraham in the form of three strangers

[skepticscott]

41. Do you just make this stuff up

or do you get it from someone even more deluded than you? Are you maintaining that the Father, Son and Holy Spirit have no actual existence outside of the minds of religious believers, and that all of the theologians who have debated the nature of the Trinity are in complete agreement with that position?

[trotsky]

42. It's like some weird combination of The Emperor Has no Clothes...

and a circle jerk. Theologians (and wannabes here) ooh and ahh over the wonderful fabric and mock those of us who say "There's nothing there!", all while congratulating themselves with their one free hand.

[struggle4progress]

43. Do you have a talent for anything other than personal attack? Bye!

[Boojatta]

105. "Of course not every subject (or even any subject) that theologians or philosophers discuss...

... has to be grounded in physical reality to be worthwhile."

That strikes me as an odd statement. Do you believe that there are worthwhile studies of things that are grounded in non-physical reality? What kind of non-physical reality do you believe in?

What is an example of theologians discussing something as if it were grounded in physical reality? Have theologians used telescopes to look for God?

P.S. I apologize for not including the last part when quoting you.

[Meshuga]

151. You can certainly post one if you think it's been too long

Go right ahead.

[TZ]

159. I notice that when he says "theology" he certainly seems to

mean "christian theology". I beleive that you have posted threads about Jewish theology from time to time, actually...which even though I'm secular I find interesting..:)

[Meshuga]

171. Thanks, TZ!

I have been pretty absent from DU lately but wanted to add a belated note here to say that I appreciate your post.

[Name removed]

172. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Dogmudgeon]

173. Right about the last time I made a pro-nuclear post in Energy/Environment/Hemp Advocacy forum

:hide:

:nuke:

--d!