Supreme Court Nominee

[Empty_of_Clouds]

Ignoring evidence of God is not the same as a lack of evidence.

You have asserted that there is no God without evidence. You have dismissed your own position.

Okay, you're up. Show the evidence FOR god. I'll wait. BTW it will need to be validated evidence and not just opinion.

[Chip]

Nor hearsay.

[kazoolaw]

Ignoring evidence of God is not the same as a lack of evidence.

You have asserted that there is no God without evidence. You have dismissed your own position.

What evidence?

I've practiced field science for most of my adult life and have never seen any.

It's there every day in the life around you.

[kazoolaw]

Nor hearsay.

"You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”
You realize that what we know of Julius Caesar is based on what you would characterize as "hearsay"

[Chip]

You realize that what we know of Julius Caesar is based on what you would characterize as "hearsay"

I have no idea what you know.

[Empty_of_Clouds]

Ignoring evidence of God is not the same as a lack of evidence.

You have asserted that there is no God without evidence. You have dismissed your own position.

What evidence?

I've practiced field science for most of my adult life and have never seen any.

It's there every day in the life around you.

Please give examples, how they are linked and why you think it's evidence for a god. Right now, reading between the lines, it sounds like you only have opinions.

[Chuck Naill]

You realize that what we know of Julius Caesar is based on what you would characterize as "hearsay"

I have no idea what you know.

There is a form of evangelism whereby the Christian asks if the person they are witnessing to believes Plato or Caesar or another exists. The person says yes and the Chrisitan points out that there is more fragments about Jesus than those guys.

[TSherbs]

You realize that what we know of Julius Caesar is based on what you would characterize as "hearsay"

I have no idea what you know.

There is a form of evangelism whereby the Christian asks if the person they are witnessing to believes Plato or Caesar or another exists. The person says yes and the Chrisitan points out that there is more fragments about Jesus than those guys.

The man called Jesus of Nazareth very likely existed. That's not the real debate about the existence of God or the divinity of Jesus. No one calls Plato the Son of God.

[kazoolaw]

Ignoring evidence of God is not the same as a lack of evidence.

You have asserted that there is no God without evidence. You have dismissed your own position.

Okay, you're up. Show the evidence FOR god. I'll wait. BTW it will need to be validated evidence and not just opinion.

The Existence of the Universe
Can we agree the universe exists? I think so.
The Big Bang theory, as explained by NASA, is that the universe began as a single point, then expanded and stretched to grow, and is continuing to grow: “Thinking about how it all started is hard to imagine.” https://spaceplace.nasa.gov/big-bang/en/
The Big Bang, where matter, space, time, and energy began, would be where the universe began. Given that the universe began, it had a cause for its existence. To bring matter, space, time, and energy into existence where they did not exist before requires something to cause the Bang. “Cause” here is distinguished from “reason.” Science does not answer the “why” there is life, or the reason for life.

Design of Life
Life, whether vegetable, animal, or human, requires a series of chemical processes performed in a precise order, in a precise fashion, which is repeatable. Life also requires the presence of favorable conditions for life, including the ratios of oxygen, nitrogen, carbon dioxide and water vapor, and ozone in the atmosphere. When all of these factors are present, there also needs to be something to record the processes and the sequences to reproduce life. Some would explain that this all occurred by chance, likening the creation of DNA, photosynthesis, reproduction, etc. to successive successful spins of a roulette wheel.
There is much more written about the biological and chemical bases for belief.

The Historical Jesus
There are non-Christian authors to mention the historical Jesus. Josephus, writing somewhere around 93 A.D., makes reference to Jesus. One of his references is often written off as being changed to turn a negative account into a positive one, but the second one refers to James as the brother of “Jesus, the so-called Christ.”

Two Roman writers, Pliny and Tacitus, mention Jesus. Tacitus writes that Jesus was executed while Pontius Pilate was the Roman prefect in Judea. Pliny wrote the Christians worship Christ as God. Jewish rabbis denounced Jesus as an illegitimate child of Mary.
There are, of course, the Gospel writers Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. The Gospels record the miracles of Jesus, and also the opposition to, and the denial of, His divinity. There is also the record of lives being changed by Jesus, and the spread of Christianity through the world.
Each person will weigh what they determine the evidence to be and make their decisions. Not what has been done in His name, but focusing on Jesus’s words and teaching.

[kazoolaw]

Ignoring evidence of God is not the same as a lack of evidence.

You have asserted that there is no God without evidence. You have dismissed your own position.

What evidence?

I've practiced field science for most of my adult life and have never seen any.

It's there every day in the life around you.

Please give examples, how they are linked and why you think it's evidence for a god. Right now, reading between the lines, it sounds like you only have opinions.

See above.

[kazoolaw]

You realize that what we know of Julius Caesar is based on what you would characterize as "hearsay"

I have no idea what you know.

There is a form of evangelism whereby the Christian asks if the person they are witnessing to believes Plato or Caesar or another exists. The person says yes and the Chrisitan points out that there is more fragments about Jesus than those guys.

The man called Jesus of Nazareth very likely existed. That's not the real debate about the existence of God or the divinity of Jesus. No one calls Plato the Son of God.

Kind of off point: people do acknowledge Jesus as the Son of God.

[kazoolaw]

You realize that what we know of Julius Caesar is based on what you would characterize as "hearsay"

I have no idea what you know.

If you know anything about Julius Caesar it's based on what you characterize as "hearsay"

[Empty_of_Clouds]

Ignoring evidence of God is not the same as a lack of evidence.

You have asserted that there is no God without evidence. You have dismissed your own position.

Okay, you're up. Show the evidence FOR god. I'll wait. BTW it will need to be validated evidence and not just opinion.

The Existence of the Universe
Can we agree the universe exists? I think so.
The Big Bang theory, as explained by NASA, is that the universe began as a single point, then expanded and stretched to grow, and is continuing to grow: “Thinking about how it all started is hard to imagine.” https://spaceplace.nasa.gov/big-bang/en/
The Big Bang, where matter, space, time, and energy began, would be where the universe began. Given that the universe began, it had a cause for its existence. To bring matter, space, time, and energy into existence where they did not exist before requires something to cause the Bang. “Cause” here is distinguished from “reason.” Science does not answer the “why” there is life, or the reason for life.

Design of Life
Life, whether vegetable, animal, or human, requires a series of chemical processes performed in a precise order, in a precise fashion, which is repeatable. Life also requires the presence of favorable conditions for life, including the ratios of oxygen, nitrogen, carbon dioxide and water vapor, and ozone in the atmosphere. When all of these factors are present, there also needs to be something to record the processes and the sequences to reproduce life. Some would explain that this all occurred by chance, likening the creation of DNA, photosynthesis, reproduction, etc. to successive successful spins of a roulette wheel.
There is much more written about the biological and chemical bases for belief.

The Historical Jesus
There are non-Christian authors to mention the historical Jesus. Josephus, writing somewhere around 93 A.D., makes reference to Jesus. One of his references is often written off as being changed to turn a negative account into a positive one, but the second one refers to James as the brother of “Jesus, the so-called Christ.”

Two Roman writers, Pliny and Tacitus, mention Jesus. Tacitus writes that Jesus was executed while Pontius Pilate was the Roman prefect in Judea. Pliny wrote the Christians worship Christ as God. Jewish rabbis denounced Jesus as an illegitimate child of Mary.
There are, of course, the Gospel writers Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. The Gospels record the miracles of Jesus, and also the opposition to, and the denial of, His divinity. There is also the record of lives being changed by Jesus, and the spread of Christianity through the world.
Each person will weigh what they determine the evidence to be and make their decisions. Not what has been done in His name, but focusing on Jesus’s words and teaching.

Not seeing any actual evidence here. Making the leap from a supposed 'First Cause' to a god is just wishful thinking not evidence. I could just as easily posit that the First Cause was perpetrated by aliens of alternate dimensionality and it would be just as 'reasonable' as making up a god.

Multidisciplinary science - evolutionary biology, paleobiology, geobiology, etc - easily explain the how life arises and mutates. It is well-understood in its process.

Historical Jesus - what is this evidence of exactly? That a man with that name existed? That a man with that name existed and was a social influencer of his day? Lord Gautama existed, it's in the records. He is not a god though, nor ascribed to be the scion of a god. That people with certain names exist is not evidence of a god.


So far you have given no testable evidence for god/gods.

[Bold2013]

Kazoolaw I appreciate your efforts.

[Empty_of_Clouds]

What? His efforts to avoid presenting actual testable evidence?

This is one of the defining aspects of discussions on this subject: science will constantly ask questions, religion will persistently avoid answering.

[TSherbs]

On the other thread, Bold said that these questions were answered 2000 years ago.

I knew this thread would go this way once it took the turn.

[Bold2013]

What? His efforts to avoid presenting actual testable evidence?

This is one of the defining aspects of discussions on this subject: science will constantly ask questions, religion will persistently avoid answering.

I love science, truly

[Empty_of_Clouds]

And yet are happy to apply it unevenly. That is a problem.

[Bold2013]

EOC. Serious question. Have you ever doubted your believe about the absence of God?

[Empty_of_Clouds]

I was brought up as C of E, which now that I think on it is somewhat ironic as I post here as E of C, but I digress.

Seriously though, christened and brought up Church of England, attended Sunday School regularly, and was a boy scout which is associated with the church here (not sure if that's the same everywhere). At both primary and secondary school there were weekly assemblies with compulsory hymn singing and prayers. At secondary school (ages 11 through 16/18 - depending on trajectory), for the first three years we had compulsory Religious Education classes, based on the Christian faith of course.

My father's ancestry is Unitarian. Not sure what Mother's was precisely.

As I exited childhood, as Paul would have it, I put away childhood things and started to reason as an adult. And while Paul suggested that we would look through a glass, darkly, it was not at the end of days nor through a mythical god that I was able to see things more clearly, but through the teachings of Lord Gautama, the living (and evidentially documented) Buddha.

Since I shrugged off the doctrines that were imposed upon, not chosen by, me from my earlier life, not once have I ever doubted that there is no god. At least not in the sense that the Abrahamic religions understand the term.

That said, I do not dismiss all theistic scriptures, as there is often wisdom in the writings of the men who strove to convey their beliefs. Some of which is repeated across various religions and which possibly form some kind of universal human truths.

Does that help?