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NTWrightfan

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#1 NTWrightfan
Member since 2008 • 166 Posts
[QUOTE="NTWrightfan"][QUOTE="Qooroo"]

These are all assumptions.Qooroo

no actually they are not. They were either backed up by evidence, or are themselves properly basic.

Can you clarify how each wasn't an assumption? Cause I saw no evidence or properly basic-ness.

Let us see: premise 1 of the kalam argument, whatever begins to exist has a cause. This is not an assumption, it is just a reaffirmation of the first principle of metaphysics that being does not come from nonbeing. To say otherwise is worse than magic because when the magician pulls the rabbit out of the hat, you still have the hat and you still have the magician Premise 2 of the kalam argument: the universe began to exist. This is simple, if the amount of moments before right now is infinite, then we should not be here right now because before any moment can arrive, existence must traverse the moment before it, and before that moment can arrive, existence must traverse the moment before that one. So in order to for the present moment to arrive, it must traverse an infinite amount of moments, hence we should not be here right now. Premise 1 of the teleological argument, either the fine-tuning of the universe is due either to chance, physical necessity, or design. surely you cannot give a 4th alternative? Premise 2: It is not due to chance or physical necessity. after all, they are far too improbable (1 in 10^120 for the cosmological constant), and there isn't a shred of evidence for the many-worlds hypothesis, and there isn't a shred of evidence for any mechanism controlling these constants conclusion: therefore it is due to design none of those are assumptions.
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#2 NTWrightfan
Member since 2008 • 166 Posts

Why? Funky_Llama

Simple, if something begins to exist, then that thing has a cause. Since the universe began to exist, it must have a cause. The universe cannot cause itself to exist obviously because in order to cause itself to come into existence, it would have to already exist.

Which is why I am absolutely stunned that Daniel Dennet would seriously tout this counter-argument to the first-cause argument and various cosmological arguments.

And what created God?Funky_Llama
Since God never began to exist, God does not need a cause for his existence, unlike the universe would for the universe is a contingent entity.

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#3 NTWrightfan
Member since 2008 • 166 Posts

[QUOTE="NTWrightfan"] oh wow, wikipedia, the most reliable scholarly source. they're just forms of agnosticism. _Tobli_

Wikipedia has a little something called [citation needed]. Which makes it reliable enough for this sort of thing. 

 

How is weak atheism a form of agnosticism?

 

weak atheism purports itself to lack any claims to knowledge. hence, its agnostic.
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#4 NTWrightfan
Member since 2008 • 166 Posts
[QUOTE="NTWrightfan"][QUOTE="_Tobli_"]

This is incorrect.

Agnostic atheism

Weak atheism

xaos
oh wow, wikipedia, the most reliable scholarly source :roll: they're just forms of agnosticism.

So, just to be clear, any points or sources that contain data you don't like are to be dismissed out of hand, right?

actually I tend to dismiss them out of hand if they are notoriously unreliable and unscholarly sources, like wikipedia.
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#5 NTWrightfan
Member since 2008 • 166 Posts

These are all assumptions.Qooroo

no actually they are not. They were either backed up by evidence, or are themselves properly basic.

These do not prove the premise.

Qooroo
it wasn't intended to be a full fleshed out argument for the resurrection, but just a really basic run down of the evidence. I can back up all of those if you ask me to, but over the next few months I will be making a blog series defending the resurrection of Jesus.
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#6 NTWrightfan
Member since 2008 • 166 Posts

this was C&Ped from the TWeb user "Challenger grim" with some editing

How do you talk someone out of suicide?

Especially someone that has taken your worldview to an extreme of logic and reasoning.

Being close to 17 years old, I can expect about another 60 years of life. Considering how much this existence generally sucks, why should I bother with those coming 60 years? Work hard, scrape together a living, a family all for... what? My contributions will be forgotten within three generations.

Ok ok, maybe I can do something really fantastic. Become another Newton or hell, even Hitler just to ensure I'm "immortal" in the annuls of history. And? Within a few million years, the sun expands to a red giant and earth is no more. All my efforts... nothing.

Oh, but surely by then, mankind will have mastered space travel and spread out to the stars. Then my legacy can be preserved until... the heat death of the universe. And all my efforts will be for... nothing.

So why bother? I should just be expedient and kill myself now. It's the same end result either way.


(In some ways, the "nothing after" view is more comforting. Death becomes the ultimate freedom because I have to no longer bother with the crushing burden of existence.)

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#7 NTWrightfan
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[QUOTE="NTWrightfan"] If you want to stay safe and not make any claims to knowledge, then you will have to call yourself an agnostic. _Tobli_

 This is incorrect.

Agnostic atheism

Weak atheism

 

oh wow, wikipedia, the most reliable scholarly source :roll: they're just forms of agnosticism.
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#8 NTWrightfan
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I find it saddening that people don't even know what 'atheism' is. Many tend to attach ideologies or belief systems to it, while the only thing that atheists share is their absence of belief in deities. MindFreeze
this dogma of yours is really only limited to the new Atheists of the very late 90s and 2000s. any dictionary of philosophy will tell you that Atheism is the belief that no gods exist. If you want to stay safe and not make any claims to knowledge, then you will have to call yourself an agnostic.
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#9 NTWrightfan
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[QUOTE="ChicaQueenWarGa"]Obama doesn't have that power. The school districts decide. Stevo_the_gamer
Obama could "propose" a law requiring schools to continue year around, and spread out the summer break between the year-around school. If Congress passes it, the States have to comply with the federal laws.

I'm pretty sure that the 10th amendment grants control of the school system to the state governments and that the Federal government has no power over the education system.
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#10 NTWrightfan
Member since 2008 • 166 Posts

He would have to give teachers one hell of a raise, the teacher's unions are going to raise hell for taking away weekends and summer vacations