Irregular Times Diaries: Unfit Discussion
In a time of the spring, old paths are obscured and new growth begins.
Irregular Times Diaries: Unfit DiscussionIn a time of the spring, old paths are obscured and new growth begins.
         History of the human race, so far it is available, says that people always were in debate on religion. Because, always there were people who were denying the existence of God and hence rejecting the necessity of religion and others were claiming the existence of God or more than one god. On the other hand those who were trying to prove the existence of God were differing about definition of His existence and attributes. Even followers of one religion were differing each other regarding the same and more than that regarding religious injunctions.
           Sometimes we see that people of different religions debate regarding one or more particular religious injunctions of a religion. It is not a wise method. Rather we should try to solve basic differences. If we can solve those then solving subsidiary questions will become easy.
The Standard or Criterion
           But before entering the debate we have to decide about the standard or criterion. This standard or criterion must be acceptable to all irrespective of religious faith and even to the atheists. Otherwise it will not be possible to reach a solution. We think, the only criterion that may be and should be acceptable to all, however to solve the basic queries of life, (not the queries related to expertise), is the reason.
           Now we have to serialize the questions according to logical preferences. When the first question is solved then we can enter the second one.
Is the Truth Attainable?
           Now the first question:
           To us the first question that must be solved is that whether the truth or the reality is attainable or not. This question always existed throughout the history. Always there were some people who used to argue that truth or reality is not attainable. Their argument is like such: When we are asleep we dream, but in dream we can’t understand that it’s a dream; we think it true or real. Then wake up and can understand that it was not real. May be also our present life is like something like dream and after death we would understand that it is not true or real. Another one of their argument is that our senses are not reliable means of collecting information; sometimes we can clearly understand that those are giving us wrong information. For example, we see a plane in the sky as small as bird, but when it lands in the airport we see that it is a large thing. So we can not trust our eyes. Then if I put one of my hands into a buckets of water having 60 degree temperature and the other in a bucket of water having 30 degree temperature, then I put both of my hands at the same time into a third bucket of water having 45 degree temperature then one of my hands will inform me of hot water and the other will inform of cold water, though the temperature of the water is same.
           The solution:
           Beyond doubt that we can not attain the truth or reality regarding every phenomenon, but we can attain the truth or reality regarding many. For example, may be that the reality of my existence is as I feel or may be actually it is otherwise, but at any condition I can not doubt about my very existence. Because, I feel, I observe, I think, so I have existence (1). I have five senses and five physical organs, so those are true or real (2), though may be those are giving me all the wrong information or some wrong and some correct information. There are some external phenomenon (beyond my existence)(3), though may be those are as I observe or those are different than my observation. I sleep (4), I dream (5) and I awake (6) and I will die (7), I eat and drink (8), I talk and debate (9), I live (10); may be real nature of these phenomenon are different than that I observe, but I can not deny very reality of those. I have an analysis power in me (11) other than my physical senses that can analyze information collected by the senses and detect at least some the wrong information. If we proceed in this way we must find that we can attain the truth or reality regarding uncountable number of phenomenon, though there remain other uncountable number of phenomenon that we know nothing about those or our knowledge is fully or partly incorrect regarding those.
           Human experience says that through sincere effort with truth-seeking mind one can attain the truth or reality at least regarding basic queries of life that are not related to expertise.
Is there any Creator?
           Now the second question:
           Is there any creator behind our existence?
           To reach the goal through a shortest possible way we should try to find the solution through philosophical argument based on reason:
           Any existence may be either essential or possible. A possible existence comes into existence when all the conditions of existence are fulfilled, otherwise not. All kinds of existence within the domain of our “experience” are possible existences which are depended upon causes and effects. The causes that brought a thing into existence are in fact effects of some other previous causes. Thus if we go back and back and back then we must reach to the starting point where there must be a cause or some causes which is or are not effect or effects of other causes. Or in other words there is no other cause or are no other causes before that. In other words, this cause is or these causes are the first cause or causes, or cause/ causes of all causes. Then this cause is or these causes are essential existence or existences which the followers of religions call God or gods.
           However, many material scientists tried to explain the beginning of the existence of material world, though it is not their subject, but it is beyond the jurisdiction of their experience and experiment. Previously in the name of science it was claimed that at the beginning there was motionless primary mater, then accidentally the motion was created and the process of change in the matter started. Recently
Stephen Hockings claimed that the creation started from the primary particle. But none of these theories told us wherefrom did that motionless primary matter or the primary particle come? If there would be nothing before that how did it get its existence? Then who created motion in the primary matter or explosion within the primary particle? When the primary matter or the primary particle was void of cause and effect process or in other words natural rules wherefrom it came? The strange and mysterious collection of causes and effects or natural laws transformed this complex world; who or what did form those laws? Can those come into existence accidentally? The natural rules are many time more complex than the rules conducting a super computer; but also the rules conducting the super computer are part of the natural rules of the world; scientists only discovered and utilized those. Yet the super computer has come into existence after hundred year’s restless efforts of dozens of top-ranking scientists, not accidentally. Then how can these natural rules come into existence accidentally? Moreover, what does the accident means? Does it mean that something may happen without any cause? Only ignorant people may believe it? We face accident due to our lack of previous knowledge about a happening, but no accident is void of cause or causes. When there was no cause and effect process or natural rule then how accident may occur in the primary matter or primary particle? So any reasonable human being must accept that the beginning of the creation started by a willful and conscious essential existence or an Everlasting Great Scientist, whatever may you name Him, Allah, God, Jehovah, Ishwar or any other name.
Oneness of the Essential Existence
           Now the third question:
           Can such essential existence or the primary source of all existences be more than one? The reply of the reason is negative. Because for being essential existence and primary source of all existences that existence must be everlasting, all-knowing, all-powerful, willful, sovereign, free of any need or imperfectness and beyond time, space, change, division or analysis. So He must be void of equals, partners, helpers, spouse or and children. We need those due to our weakness and imperfectness; the essential existence must be free of those weakness and needs. If there would be more than one perfect and sovereign essential existence then all the creations would be destroyed. Because, we know that having two sovereign kings in a kingdom and their peaceful coexistence is impossible. (However, may be two persons termed as ‘king’ may coexist in one kingdom under constitutional bindings, but it is quite clear that none of them is sovereign beyond constitutional bindings.)
           So it is beyond doubt that the essential existence is essentially one.
           Let us discuss about this subject with sincere and truth-seeking mind and arguments based on reason.
           Then we can discuss regarding attributes of the Essential Existence.
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November 9th, 2007 at 12:15 pm
This is basically the old “watchmaker” argument. It says if you see a watch, there must be a watchmaker. A circular argument, since if there is a watchmaker there must be a maker of the watchmaker, and a maker of the watchmaker-maker, etc. etc. ad infinitum.
November 9th, 2007 at 4:39 pm
Thank You Mr. Iroquois for your comment. But a universal truth cannot become old. If you have read my post attentively you cannot term my argument as circular. A circle is formed when the ending point joins the starting point, but the creation is advancing forward. The ever-changing world that is dominated by cause and effect rules surely started from a source i.e. the Essential Existence Who is beyond change or development. So you cannot term it as circular argument.
November 9th, 2007 at 4:39 pm
I have another translation for this argument: “Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and so it is beyond doubt that you must send me a check for $29.95.”
November 9th, 2007 at 7:01 pm
I find the third section particularly weak. It asks a series of questions, implies that there is no known answer to them from the secular scientific world, and then jumps the assumption that there is no known secular scientific answer to the conclusion that therefore there must be a god.
What’s in my hand? You don’t know, Nur Hosain Majidi? Why, then religion doesn’t have all the answers! That means the world is a Fig Newton being eaten by a Giant Squid!
The approach is, to put it bluntly, ludicrous.
November 9th, 2007 at 7:02 pm
I’m deleting the duplicate post, by the way. I assume that the exact duplication was mistaken. I’ll put it back up by request if it was not mistaken.
November 11th, 2007 at 10:06 am
Mr. Hosain’s argument is based on blind faith in principles of monotheism, not on anything that can be proved.
He uses a lot of words to make a simple point, but what he seems to be saying is that the world is “dominated by cause and effect rules”. That is,
I have extended that rule to the creator.
and also to the creator of the creator,
the argument is perhaps more of a spiral than a circle.
Mr. Hosain is saying a creator would be “beyond change or development”. Since a creator is beyond observation by the senses (and so is the observation of the creation of the world), it is not possible to determine this. Saying something is true doesn’t make it true. Perhaps it is the other way around. Perhaps the world is “beyond change or development” and the Supreme Being is “dominated by cause and effect rule”.
Whether you say a supreme being is a First Cause or the physical world is a First Cause, there is no way to prove it.
The last part of the argument is much weaker and I’ll let you figure it out. It breaks down to:
A: God is just like humans. “having two sovereign kings in a kingdom and their peaceful coexistence is impossible” (think Roman triumvirates, modern-day governors, Bill and Hillary, Eva and Peron)
B: God is not just like humans. God must be “everlasting, all-knowing, all-powerful, willful, sovereign, free of any need or imperfectness and beyond time, space, change, division or analysis” (again, why? The Roman envisioned gods as having human emotions, jealousies, and imperfections.)
C: Therefore God is just like humans in the things the believer wants to be just like humans (kingship/monotheism) and not at all like humans in the things the believer does not want to be just like humans (parenting, partnering/rejection of Jesus as divine) “He must be void of equals, partners, helpers, spouse or and children” (He? If God is not capable of having sex, how can you say God is “he”?)(If God is all-powerful, why is God unable to make his own baby) (If God can create a world why can’t he create a few angels or even a devil or two just to keep things lively?)(here is alternately a powerful God capable of creating a world along with everything in it, and a weak God that can’t do anything at all, even on a molecular level. Which is it?)
Mr. Hosain is making a lot of assertions, but where is the proof?
The fact is, there is no proof. It’s just a matter of belief.
November 11th, 2007 at 2:50 pm
Mr. Iroquois,
Thank you for your comment.
What I have said is the verdict of the reason, not blind faith; I reject blind faith regarding vital questions of life, as I mentioned, blind faith may be acceptable only in the fields of expertise. But sorry to say that your argument is nothing but a fallacy. Nobody can deny that the world is dominated by cause and effect rules i.e. natural rules and there must have a source wherefrom the creation of the world and natural rules dominating the world got existence and that source must be above cause and effect i.e. natural rules. Then how can you say that Supernatural source should have a creator?
The reason says that the Essential Existence, the Creator of the universe and natural rules dominating it must be perfect and beyond any imperfectness and need. Then why that existence should have a son? Spouse, children, friends etc. are necessary for us due to our imperfectness or need. You must agree that child of any being must be of the same category of existence and must derive from that very being. Now the question arises: How may it be possible that the Essential Existence should create a son? A created existence is a possible existence, because its existence depends upon fulfillment of the condition of its creation; may be the condition consistos of some natural causes or it is the direct will of the Essential Existence. But a possible existence or a created existence cannot be the son of the Essential Existence. If you produce a computerized robot giving a human shape should we call it your son? Surely it would be ridiculous. However, one can term ones loving pet or loving robot as son or daughter, but that does not make it his/her son or daughter. If the Essential Existence creates those who are called angels in some religious texts that does not matter. Because creation may not be son or daughter of the Creator.
[Regarding using the word “God” and the pronoun “He” for the Essential Existence, as I mentioned whatever you may term the Essential Existence, as God, Allah, Jehovah, Ishwar or any other name that does not matter; the definition and attributes of the Essential Existence is important. However, the Term “God” is well-known to all the readers throughout the world. But regarding “He”; that’s the problem of the English language. In English you can use either “he” or “she” for a human being, though there are some languages where there is no such problem. For example, in Bengali and Persian the same pronoun is used for masculine and feminine. However, “He/ Him/ His” with capital “H”, not only at the beginning, even within the sentence is used for God that indicates God is beyond masculine or feminine.]
I want to discuss later on regarding perfectness or attributes of the Essential Existence. I hope that then it would be more clear.
November 11th, 2007 at 11:49 pm
Now just hold your horses. You want to discuss attributes of God, but you haven’t even proved God exists.
And you’re wrong about the pronoun “he”. Capitalizing it does not turn it into a gender neutral word. If you want that use “it”.
Now about proving your God exists. I do deny the world is “dominated by cause and effect rules”, whatever that is. There is an old song that says “nothing lasts forever but the earth and sky”. So you see the world is changeless. It is not dominated by anything. It just is.
I don’t think you really understand what you wrote. I think you just copied it from someone else. Someone told you what to say.
If there is a God, based on your example of the king, here is what God has to be like:
First of all, when did a king ever do something for himself? Kings don’t do stuff themselves. They get ideas. They write checks. But they themselves don’t DO anything. They have other people do stuff.
For example, when Bush decided to go to war, did he do it himself? No. He got congress to take a vote, to make it look popular, then he got some generals to send some soldiers over there. The soldiers did everything for him.
So you can’t tell me God would create a world by himself. If he’s really God he will be important enough to have someone else do it. Probably not just one person either. Creating a world is a lot more complicated than just invading one little country, so I say God had a team of engineers. God had the idea. God’s engineers created the world.
But now already there’s a problem. You say this god “must be perfect and beyond any imperfectness and need”. Why? Bush is far from perfect, and yet he managed to invade a country without becoming perfect first.
And tell me this. You say God doesn’t want babies because the only reason for wanting babies is “need”. If God is beyond “need” why does God “need” to create a world? You see the world right in front of you, so either God has needs or God doesn’t exist.
November 13th, 2007 at 8:10 am
Mr. Iroquois,
It seems that your aim is to debate only for debate, not to find out the truth. So now you are denying the self-evident truths that so far as I know no sensible person has denied and you are saying something that perhaps you do not believe, but you say only to debate. Do you really believe that the world is not dominated by cause and effect rules? Do you really believe that the earth and sky will last for ever? How can you claim that the world is changeless? You observe continuous changes in everything whatever is within your experience. When you observe changes within the world then how can it be changeless?
You claimed that I haven’t even proved that God exists, but you couldn’t contradict the reason I placed. The verdict of the reason is that this ever-changing world or possible existence must have source beyond change or the Essential Existence. To your knowledge, is there any substitute to it? If any you can put your finding forward.
You have talked so many things regarding subsidiary points, before you come to a conclusion regarding the central point. You have put forward the question of generals, soldiers etc. These questions concern if and when you agree the central point that there is an Essential Existence behind this world. Then the discussion will be fruitful regarding attributes of that Existence which I am committed to do later on. And only after discussing Essential Existence’s attributes we can discuss regarding process or processes of creation, kinds of created existence, such as material and non-material etc. However, in the present post in course of discussion I have just indicated to some of the attributes of the Essential Existence, not discussed.
But here one point I want to mention that no example of the material world can hundred percent match the supernatural Essential Existence due to being different kind of existence. Yet we put example only to make truths beyond our physical or material experience more clear. But I wonder how could you compare the creation of this complex universe with invasion of a country!
Again regarding “He”; in English language “It” is used for inanimate objects and inferior living objects (however, for babies too, perhaps because they have no knowledge and so they are not honourable, perhaps), for superior living beings (human being) they use ‘he’ and ’she’. Would you permit anybody to mention you with “It”? Then how can one use ‘It’ for the superior most existence i.e. Creator of the world including superior living beings? However, those whose mother tongue is English can consider your proposal and if they accept it I have no objection. But I mentioned that there are languages void of gender differences in pronouns, but for grief, those are not understandable throughout the world. When we talk about supernatural affairs we have no other way but using a human language though no language can reflect the exact truth beyond the experience of its people, yet, as I mentioned, only to make a thing clear we have to use such terms and when one explains one’s aim in using a particular term then there is no cause of confusion.
My sincere request to you to leave the ‘debate for debate’ principle and try to reach the Truth.
Again thanks to you.
November 13th, 2007 at 8:46 am
So far, I don’t see anybody here agreeing with you but yourself, Nur Hosain Majidi. What’s your test for “sensible person”? Someone who agrees that what you’re saying contains “self-evident truths?”
There are a lot of very smart people, including physicists, statisticians and philosophers, who doubt that the world is “dominated by cause and effect rules.”
You should at least cite Anselm if you’re going to snatch from the Cliffs Notes version of his argument.
November 14th, 2007 at 4:35 pm
It seems to me that you keep coming back to the same central idea.
Every effect has a cause. Therefore every event was preceded by another event. You cannot have an effect without there being a prior cause.
Am I correct so far?
If the above is true, then there is a chain of events going back in time, but because there cannot be an uncaused event, there must have been a first cause. That first event is God.
If this is your argument, then first of all, it is clearly a borrowed idea, best formulated by St. Thomas Aquinas.
And since your argument is borrowed and paraphrased, then I shall borrow and paraphrase my answer. But I’ll be up front and name who I’m borrowing from–I’m lifting this from Bertrand Russell.
Your first Premiss is that there can be no uncaused events, no uncaused causes.
Your conclusion is that there must be an uncaused event, God, the uncaused cause.
Your (Aquinas’s) conclusion is contrary to your first premiss.
November 18th, 2007 at 1:33 pm
It is strange that some of the readers have resorted to fallacious arguments and baseless claims instead of placing reason to contradict my arguments based on reason.
It has been claimed that I borrowed my argument from others though they do not know me and they have no proof in favour of their claims. I don’t no what Cliffs Notes is. however I knew the name of St. Thomas Aquinas, but I had no opportunity to read his works. Yet if my arguments resemble with anybody’s arguments the situation doesn’t differ. Because, reason is universal standard that should be acceptable to all; nothing else can be treated as universal standard. The truth is everybody’s property, so anyone can talk on the basis of reason and it doesn’t matter that who for the first time told it. Because of its universal nature two persons of different time and place uninformed about each other can raise the same argument.
Instead of moving here and there they should come to the central point. Personal assumptions can not contradict reason. Some times some of the scientists expressed unscientific opinions regarding subjects out of their domains. We see even regarding subjects of their domains they differ each other to some extent or regarding some points; then nobody should accept blindly their opinions on the subjects out of their domains, particularly regarding happenings out of their experiences and experiments i.e. beginning of creation.
They should place the substitute of the Essential Existence. At first they should put forward an universally acceptable solution of the problem of the very origin; a conscious, wise and powerful origin for this scientifically complex world, then they can debate regarding the definition or attributes of that origin.
Let the reason prevail.
November 19th, 2007 at 11:04 am
“Let reason prevail”
I agree with you wholeheartedly. But if you believe that principle, then if your argument fails on the grounds of reason, you need to revise, reject, or respond.
I reiterate: your conclusion contradicts your first premiss. That is contrary to reason.
November 21st, 2007 at 11:02 am
Post#12&13 Beautiful Exchange of Discussion I learned thank you for both of you
November 28th, 2007 at 9:32 am
Mr. Scott,
Thank you. But you have not mentioned how does my conclusion contradict my first premiss. When you are unable to explain the beginning of this material universe without the existence of Essential Existence then why do not acknowledge the Essential Existence?
As follow up of this discussion I invite you and all other readers of Irregular Times to read my second post entitled “Evidence of Essential Existence in the Nature”.
Thank you again.
Thanks to all the readers.
November 28th, 2007 at 10:09 am
Premiss: There are no uncaused events
Conclusion: There is an uncaused event (God)
If you actually wrote these ideas, and didn’t borrow liberally from Descartes, Anselm, and Aquinas, then don’t pretend that you don’t understand.
November 29th, 2007 at 10:23 am
Mr. Scott,
What you have said is nothing but a fallacy. The Essential Existence (or God) is not an event, but beyond event. He is the Eternal Existence beyond birth and death, beyond starting and ending. The very term `event’ is applicable only for created possible existence, not for the Essential Existence, the primary cause or the cause of all causes.
Thank you.
November 29th, 2007 at 3:09 pm
Do you have a reason for that, Nur, or is that just what you believe?
November 29th, 2007 at 3:33 pm
No, Nur, I’m pointing out your fallacy.
If you want to say that God must exist because God is the first cause, then
(i) only events can be causes
(ii) one might expand the defn of causes to include dispositions (e.g. brittleness of glass), but dispositions don’t cause anything themselves, so if perhaps you want to say God’s causality is not because of an event but a disposition, then something other than God must have been the even to set in motion the chain of events, something else is the first cause, or also (in your ambigious terms) has an essential existence.
(iii) if for some reason you now don’t want to posit that God is the first cause, then there can be an infinite chain of events going back in time and no need for a first event. No causal connection between God and the chain of events that is the universe equals hence no need to argue that God is essential to the existence of the universe.
November 29th, 2007 at 8:57 pm
If God is the cause of all causes, he must have caused himself.
If causing something means making something come into being, then there must have been a time when God did not exist (or he couldn’t have made himself come into being, and there would be at least one cause he didn’t cause, and he therefore wouldn’t be the cause of all causes).
So even though he did not exist, God made himself come into being?
Can something that does not exist be its own cause?
Or can there be a cause that does not make something come into being?
November 30th, 2007 at 11:30 am
“If God is the cause of all causes, he must have caused himself.”
–hey Ralph, I know you pointing out an absurdity here, but there is at least one religion that doesn’t ignore this point, and actually embraces it.
If I understand correctly, Scientology believes that “Thetans” (roughly the equivalent of the notion of a soul) willed themselves into existence.
November 30th, 2007 at 12:49 pm
Then the material universe should be able to will itself into existence as well. It wouldn’t have to extend into the past (space-time continuity) infinitely. And why couldn’t the material universe be sentient as well? Why the assumption that God and the physical universe are separate and distinct, and not just attributes of the same essential existence?
Or did someone already think of that back in the 3rd century.
Of course it’s also possible that the physical universe created God, rather than the other way around. That would make the physical universe the First Cause.
November 30th, 2007 at 3:41 pm
If the Thetans willed themselves into existence, how did their wills come into being?
Or did they will themselves into existence without wills?
I’m not so sure I’m pointing out the absurd. I think I might be indicating the miraculous.
The semantic fields of “absurd” and “miraculous” seem different enough, but I’ve been having difficulty of late making a clear distinction between the referential functions of the two terms.
Fortunately as a Purple dingo from Peru, I just kinda, y’know, transcend it all.
November 30th, 2007 at 8:08 pm
Not at all, Ralph. You’re playing, which is where creativity starts. Sometimes the truth even follows.
Obviously the Thetans’ wills were the first Causes.
Hmmm, a bit polytheistic, that. I think our Mr. Noor might freak out.
December 1st, 2007 at 12:30 pm
It is astonishing that some of the readers are running on a labyrinthine way to avoid acknowledging the existence of the Essential Existence though they find no way. None of them has shown the substitute of the Essential Existence for the beginning of the universe or the creation. Existence of the universe and of themselves is the evidence of primary source that must be Essential Existence. Instead of acknowledging that they are putting ridiculous argument of a creator for God or a self-created God(!). How can some one create himself/ herself when he/ she had no existence?
We must agree that creation must have been started from the will of the Essential Existence (or God). Only in this way the creation may start without any element or in other words from nothingness of the possible existence. If one stress upon the Doer then the Essential Existence is the Doer and He has done means He willed and the creation began. Or if one stress upon an event then the will of the Essential Existence may be termed as an event.
But existence of the Essential Existence must be beyond or above events or causes, otherwise He may not be termed as the Essential Existence. Because Essential existence must be above beginning and ending. He must be above time and space, because creation of time and space is related to created possible existence, not to the Essential Existence. However, regarding attributes of the Essential Existence we have to discuss separately and a bit elaborately. But before entering into such a discussion we must reply whether the creation was initiated by an Essential Existence or not. For he who rejects the existence of the Essential Existence discussion regarding His attributes is meaningless to him.
But regarding a comment of one of the readers it may be enough to mention that the existence of the universe is the evidence of the Essential Existence; only in this sense we may call it one of the attributes of the Essential Existence, not in the sense that an attribute is the part of the attributed. Because created material existence can’t be part of the creator Essential Existence. However, the term ‘part’ is not applicable regarding the Essential Existence and we hope to discuss this subject separately.
I want to invite dear readers to read my second post i.e. follow up item of the present post entitled “Evidence of Essential Existence in the Nature”.
Thanks to all of you.
December 2nd, 2007 at 12:03 am
So now something cannot create itself when it has no existence. So God cannot create itself because God does not exist.
If creation starts from will, what creates the will?
If the creator creates itself, the attributes will be created as well.
If we choose a particular religious opinion, then look for arguments to support that view, we are using belief, not reason.
December 3rd, 2007 at 10:35 am
Okay Nur, I think I see how it is.
You think that you have come up with something profound.
I’ll be up front with you, if you were one of my students, I’d give you a pretty decent grade for the initial proposal (so long as you gave credit to the folks who, let’s say, inspired you). But you would lose considerable marks for not being able to respond to criticisims without simply repeating your initial points. The arguments you are proposing are variations on arguments that have been around for a long time, but there have been counter-arguments for just as long.
Your arguments are not as self evident as you think. Believing something with certainty does not mean the same thing as being self evident. The fact that you believe with such certainty is what is making it so difficult to respond to any counter arguments with anything other than ad hominems and repetition, and making it so difficult to recognize that you are (as Iroquois pints out) making a huge leap of faith.
December 3rd, 2007 at 2:22 pm
Your claim that “existence of the Essential Existence must be beyond or above events or causes, otherwise He may not be termed as the Essential Existence” contradicts your definition of the Essential Existence as the “cause of all causes.”
If E.E. is a cause, and caused all causes, then it only follows logically that E.E. must have caused E.E.
But if E.E. is beyond or above causes, then there is a cause it didn’t cause, and it isn’t the cause of all causes.
Now that holds together fine logically, and it’s a sound logical critique of your argument. But dear me, it’s a “labyrinthine way.”
If by “labyrinthine way” you mean an argument that is long, convoluted, confusing, leads you down blind alleys, and circles back on itself, one couldn’t ask for a better example than your own posts.
But it seems you have a different understanding of “labyrinthine way,” i.e. an argument that points out the logical shortcomings of your propositions.
So of course, no one can logically refute you without “running on a labyrinthine way.”
So here’s my challenge to you:
I propose that you are a purple dingo from Peru. Logically refute this proposition without “running on a labyrinthine way.”
December 3rd, 2007 at 2:47 pm
Mr. Scott,
I don’t know whether you are really fit to be my teacher, but I feel lucky not being student of a teacher who only rejects arguments blindly though cannot put a reasonable solution of the problem. Still known of you told how the existence began. At the very beginning of my post I mentioned that regarding such vital questions blind faith is not acceptable and thus I made it clear that I oppose blind faith; blind faith is acceptable only in the fields of expertise. I can believe that the medicine prescribed by the doctor will cure my physical illness, but I cannot follow the blind faith of other people blindly regarding the primary source of mine and the universe even if such other people are known as scholars physics, astronomy, literature or any other subject; only reason can convince me in this regard. Well, if you really ‘believe’ that I couldn’t prove the existence of the Essential Existence through reason then you can try to prove your answer by reason. But alas! still none of you has put forward any answer of this vital query based on reason. Take the ball and try to play.
Thanks.
December 3rd, 2007 at 4:44 pm
You have your answer, Nur. There is no answer based on reason. That is the answer.
You want to know how the universe was created, right? But you weren’t there; I wasn’t there. We didn’t see what happened. So how can we know? We can’t know. You want to be certain about something? You cannot be certain. If you want to think “maybe” something happened, then you can check the religions, and say you “believe” something happened. We say we “believe” something is true when we are not certain.
Scott is completely correct. He studies the same things the best theologians study, and they all say the same thing. There is no proof for the existence of God.
I don’t see any problem with blind faith.
December 3rd, 2007 at 5:51 pm
Nice try Nur,
But impolite comments about who is fit to be whose teacher, ignoring any argument you can wave the “labyrinthine” stick at, and various other specious subterfuges simply do not qualify as rational proofs of anything.
If you really had a rational proof of Essential Existence, I can’t understand why you would need to stoop to such cheap debating tricks to defend it.
December 3rd, 2007 at 5:51 pm
Are you willing to accept that there are uncaused causes?
If no, then your “essential existence” is vacuous. Your “essential existence” is an an uncaused cause.
If yes, then explain why the universe can’t be the uncaused cause. You can say that it’s because individual events in the universe need a cause, but why not the universe as a whole?
Otherwise you are simply committing the “god of the gaps” fallacy. Wherever there is a space in one’s understanding, one smooths it over by filling that gap with God.
Just because you can’t understand the criticisms doesn’t make your conclusions self evident.
December 7th, 2007 at 9:55 am
Well that was Very nice exchange of Reason Nur & Scott, you guys are the Best
I dont Think you guys Reason can Fixed the VOID of existense, I dont think so.
Well Thanks Jim for Keeping/deleted my previous post.
December 7th, 2007 at 1:37 pm
Those who accepted blind faith have nothing to do with the discussion on the basis of reason.
The debate on the basis of reason becomes irrelevant for events that we experienced. We have to resort to reason only regarding the phenomenon beyond our physical senses. When we listen a song behind the wall then we can know that a human being is singing or he/ she had sang & recorded it and now it is being played; thus we conclude that the basically the song was sung by a human being; it has not been created by the blind lifeless nature. We can debate regarding his/ her detailed identity, but can’t deny his/ her existence or being the cause of the song. Thus existence of possible existences prove the existence of a wise and powerful Essential Existence. So our absence at the beginning of creation is no barrier to reach the logical conclusion. Thus the blind faith and uttering doubtful “may be” both are rejected. We can debate regarding attributes of the Essential Existence, but can’t deny the very existence.
Yah, the Essential Existence is the Uncaused Cause of all other causes. The universe can’t be treated as the Uncaused Cause or the Essential Existence. What is the universe? Is it other than its living and lifeless parts from atoms to the galaxies? When all its parts are ever-changing and under cause and effect rule, then how can one term it as beyond cause and effect rule or a uncaused cause? If there would be anything else named by the Universe other than these parts and that would be ever-living, all-powerful and wise enough to initiate the creation and natural rules then we could say the universe as the Uncaused Cause or the Essential Existence.
Dear Friends,
Come to the very basic point of the Initiating Existence, then to its identification or definition or attributes. Have you read my second post entitled “Evidence of Essential Existence in the Nature” published in the Irregular Times?
December 8th, 2007 at 12:22 am
No, Mackers, Jim did not delete your post, there was a computer problem. I found it in google cache and here it is. I kind of like it.
Reminds me of Hermes Trimigistus’ explanation about logos, also didn’t John say in the NT “in the beginning was the word”? (Genesis’-”let there be light”?) Energy first, then matter, but does not violate the principle of *conservation of mass and energy*, as the whole creator thing does.
Hey, that would mean the universe is NOT under rules if those Einstein principles of relativity can be violated by a little creation here and there, that is, if the Mind created vibration energy out of nothing. But if the so-called creator is just changing energy into matter to form a world or two out of energy that already existed, no problem. I suppose the Creator is made of energy too? But no. A mind can’t exist without brain cells and a nervous system. So if God is thought, I suppose God is also part of the physical world rather than merely spiritual.
Do you see the problem with reason? It just creates more and more unanswerable questions and unprovable assumptions. Blind faith is so much better, since you can’t prove anything with reason anyway.
What if the universe is causing itself and changing according to rules? What if it doesn’t have to be wise or powerful or even alive, but only unfold according to rules or an internal code, like a flower–or maybe a virus–unfolds according to its genetic code? Maybe the physical world is like one big, semi-alive virus.
December 8th, 2007 at 2:04 pm
Fallacies have been repeated again. But they have to answer the following questions:
1) If God does not exist, only Thought exists and beyond thought was Emptiness, then whose thought it was?
2) Was the life force energy the Eternal Tranquility? If so who did cause its movement?
3) Endless cosmic Universe? Absurd. Scientists say that the universe is expanding and considering the ever-changing characteristic of the material world of our experience there is no harm to accept it. Even if we accept it as endless then the question comes: Wherefrom it got its existence?
4) Creator is made of energy! Is He “made”? Is he also part of the physical world? What a self-contradictory assumption! If so can He be the Initiator of Creation?
5) The universe is causing itself and changing according to rules! The ridiculous assumption repeated again. How can the universe cause itself when it was not existing? And wherefrom the rules came?
6) Unfolding of the universe according to rules or an internal code? Wherefrom came such rules or code?
Gentlemen!
Why you are not ready to accept the truth i.e. the existence of the non-material all-powerful, ever-existing wise Essential Existence behind the creation of this limited ever-changing material and living world?
December 8th, 2007 at 5:48 pm
Because we haven’t pulled out our credit cards yet, and you haven’t given us the 800 number.
Really, you’re hard to take seriously when you assume the existence of the very things you think you’re arguing for. If you’re really curious about these things and not just fishing for followers, look hard at your last post and try to find a few instances of assuming your conclusions.
December 9th, 2007 at 9:11 am
What I meant for that literally God is nothingness HE was not existed in the physical form That ’s what i agree,Not to the fact that God is not existing.Ofcourse there was God.I Can feel his Energy within,especially when im in Process of Meditatation.
Beyond emptiness/nothingness was God conciousness or the super conciousness His energy was the Eternal tranquility the form of the formeless The spirit of God wihin the Physical form, Evrything is physical in these material world and was dominated by the five elements of Creation, which are the earth,water,fire air and akasha The nature of antimatter, and the five senses of human Phisycal form, We use these elements and senses To survive life in these Material living world.
The Thought exist in the physical form because we have physical body and senses the The mind creates Thought and reason, On the higher Meditation experienced, The Meditators mind goes to the emptiness of the mind, The mind dies on the vacium state of the quantum physics called nothingness, Beyond that Emptiness/Nothingnesss was the energy of the internal Tranquility The Meditator Merges, unite,and absorved the life force energy of the eternal tranquility the omnipresent wihtout begining and the end And Became GOD in physcal form.
Whithout the Pure Thougths of the GOD’S it is impossible to manifest or marterialized the living world.
December 10th, 2007 at 7:28 pm
Here’s why I’m not ready to accept what you’re saying:
You claim your argument is rational, but it is not.
Asking me why I’m “not ready to accept the truth” simply does not constitute a watertight rational explanation for your statements about Essential Existence.
Is it not caused (and therefore not the cause of all causes)? Did it cause itself (before it existed)? Was it caused by something else (therefore once again not the cause of all causes)? Was it caused, but neither by itself nor by anything other than itself (then by what)?
Answering these questions with the question “Why are you not ready to accept the truth?” simply does not constitute a rational argument, which is what you came here claiming to present.
December 12th, 2007 at 12:14 am
The contradiction of the debate base on the logic of rationality goes around in the circus of reasons end up into the void of the unexplainable truth of existence.
Rationality of logical Reason cannot discribed these problem, The Voidness of the Eternal Existence of the uncause cause Therefore there was no reason to proved to be Rational on the above article, Just Because of the missing link Rationality bacame the limited truth.
December 15th, 2007 at 12:27 pm
To posit the existence of a void that is also a cause is incompatible with reason.
Therefore you are a purple dingo from Peru.