Are you drunk?? What the fuck makes you imagine I think the laws of physics are inadequate compared to theism? I don't know what that could even mean.
Sober up and stop talking gibberish. ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <no_re...@yahoogroups.com> wrote : Either tell us where the laws of physics are inadequate compared to theism or shut the fuck up. We're waiting. ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <authfriend@...> wrote : Yet another atheist wannabe who simply cannot lower himself to reading enough philosophy to realize the incoherence of one of his fundamental premises, or that the purported evidentiary problems of theism as confronted by science that he blabs on about so pompously are in fact nonexistent. ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <anartaxius@...> wrote : Hell if I know what a divinity is. I just copied the definition of 'numinous' from the Google search results for 'define:numinous'. I was discussing the nature of informed belief, that is belief based on evidence rather than simply an idea one has in the mind. I was not discussing anything about atheism. Without evidence, there is no case to be made, so arguments for and against are empty. One can argue that Sherlock Holmes smoked a Meerschaum pipe, but the evidence in the illustrations of the stories as originally published indicate he did not, but Sherlock Holmes never existed in reality as a real person, so what one is really arguing about here is not about Sherlock Holmes and his pipe, but the content of the text and illustrations in the stories about a fictional character called 'Sherlock Holmes'. So the argument concerning Mr Holmes is not about a reality but an illusion purporting to be a reality, the actual reality in this case being printed text and illustrations in The Strand Magazine (1891–1950, United Kingdom). The definition of 'divinity' (noun) from the same Google source is 'the state or quality of being divine', and 'a divinity' would then be 'something that has the state or quality of being divine', which seems to imply there could be more than one something that has those characteristics. A saint might be considered divine. Zeus could be considered divine and therefore a divinity. So could Apollo, or Jehovah. Maybe I could be divine. Maybe you could be divine, though there seems to be a preponderance of opinion here that would not likely be the case. It is not incoherent to say 'I just believe in one less divinity than you do'. That is just a statement, a proposition. Some people believe in many divinities, some in just one, some in none. A proposition by itself is not an argument, just a statement that may or may not have truth value, which cannot be affirmed or denied on the basis of the proposition itself. Coherence depends on how a particular proposition aligns logically with other propositions, and aligns with what the proposition(s) point to, if in fact they point to something outside themselves, for if they do not, it is an empty argument, much ado about nothing. In mentioning enlightenment, that particular discipline investigates subjectively the nature of sensory experience and its relationship to thought, and the interpretation by thought of the nature of experience, whether in fact thought can represent 'truth' or is simply a distortion of 'truth', or even whether there really is anything or state that could be thought of as 'truth', that is, whether the word 'truth' has any meaningful correlate that is real. A friend of mine was recently sued for delinquent payment of rent. This was not true, as my friend brought evidence of the fact to court, but the person bringing the suit came to court without any evidence whatsoever, but managed to convince the court — the judge and the person suing being white and my friend, black, to a 90 day stay, so that evidence could be brought — the argument: 'I did not think (the defendant) would show up'. The case was thrown out by a higher judge on the basis that no evidence was brought, and the lower judge showed prejudice in not dismissing the case. This is the situation between non-believers and believers of the religious kind, there are arguments but evidence is unconvincing or absent in spite of the sophistication of the pleading or polemic of the claims being made. Science takes a practical tack in such instances, no evidence, no case. This gets rid of the nutters, so one can focus on actual stuff, but occasionally there are examples of the baby being thrown out with the bath water, but in time the mistake may be rectified. 'Philosophy is questions that may never be answered. Religion is answers that may never be questioned.' — source unknown ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <authfriend@...> wrote : Exactly what is "a divinity"? This is where atheists, especially those with pretensions to scientific understanding but who are deficient in philosophy, tend to get all tangled up and become incoherent, saying things like "I just believe in one less divinity than you do." ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <anartaxius@...> wrote : nu·mi·nous = having a strong religious or spiritual quality; indicating or suggesting the presence of a divinity. Exactly what is a strong religious quality? Exactly what is a spiritual quality? How do these two qualities indicate or suggest the presence of a divinity? If something is indicated or suggested, is that any reason to assume that something is actually there if it has not been directly seen, directly experienced. All that has to be done is demonstrate, unequivocally, what it is that one wants others to see, then you have a reason to define and investigate what that is. It is not necessary to investigate or define what does not exist, since one will never come across a concrete demonstration. One can imagine all sorts of things mentally, but never be able to show that those things exist, and as such, all such ideas are equivalent in that there is no proof, and no possibility of proof that such things have an existence independent of thought. There is reason to believe that what we call an elephant exists, even if we do not know what it is or have a name for it, it can be experienced through the senses, at some point it can be defined, observed, argued about. There is a problem when the subject matter at hand is empty, but is presumed to be real, such as invisible formless gods, or enlightenment. With gods, we have to presume they exist, and are somehow different from us. With enlightenment, there is the problem that it really does not exist, but we think it does. In this case the spiritual path shows us that the idea of enlightenment was an illusion, that what we were seeking was in fact just what we always were, not some new thing we have never experienced before. But it cannot be proved by argument, one just has to be crazy enough to attempt to resolve the issue. In the rarefied atmosphere of abstract theology, if we think that union with the god of one's imagination is the equivalent of enlightenment, then I suspect there will be a real disappointment because at the end of the road, the thing you have to give up is your idea of what that god is.
