"None of these have to do with theism or atheism."

Yes they do. They are Existential analogies to highlight your flawed logic.

They are important questions that have puzzled philosophers throughout the years. And no one has yet answered those.

So it begs the question, if Atheism can't answer those deep, pragmatic questions of existence, how can it prove that God doesn't exist?

A pretty simple point, no?

But in fact God does exist. — Bartricks

Atheism does not address the question "Does god exist, or does god not exist".

It addresses the truth-values of theism, starting first with it's sin qua non fundamental claims on reality.

Theism is false, therefore god does not exist. Inexplicable "Gods" with no claims/predicates are irrelevant to atheism.

People are arguing the wrong thing. As usual.

And I can prove it to all who undertake to reason ruthlessly. — Bartricks

Doubt it.

"None of these have to do with theism or atheism."

Yes they do. They are Existential analogies to highlight your flawed logic.

They are important questions that have puzzled philosophers throughout the years. And no one has yet answered those.

So it begs the question, if Atheism can't answer those deep, pragmatic questions of existence, how can it prove that God doesn't exist?

A pretty simple point, no? — 3017amen

A. The one question "What is love?" has been answered satisfactorily. So has the question by your, "how do the conscious and the subconscious exist together?" The third is not a question. You have to be able to tell what a quesion is. You are unable to do so.
B. The lack or presence of an answer has no bearing on the deniability of atheism. Remember, atheism says, no more, no less, "I don't believe in god."
C. You have to tie "They are Existential analogies to highlight your flawed logic." to "I don't believe a god exists". That's a pretty tall order. I doubt you can do it.
D. There is no logic to "I don't believe in god" any more or less than to "I believe in god."
E. "if Atheism can't answer those deep, pragmatic questions of existence, how can it prove that God doesn't exist" Again, the umpteenth time for your edification: Atheists can't prove that God does not exist. Theists can't prove that god exists. Atheists are simply on the opinion, or belief, that there is no god or gods.
F. "A pretty simple point, no?" You are so far away from logical thinking and philosophical insight, that you can't even see your nose, in my opinion. If you ask for philosophical insight, and you ignore it, because you can't understand it, then please don't claim victory. If you can' t understand my point in E., then what can you? Probably as much as buttered bread is good, getting hit on the head by a fly ball is bad. I wouldn't venture any further into understanding life's deep, long, unanswerable questions if I were you. And I would definitely not draw conclusions from incongruent analogies.

Jesus. @Bartricks has entered the stage. I am out of here. If you think @3017amen is unreasonable, and unable to understand a simple statement, then beware, because you ain't seen nothing yet, @Swan. @Bartricks is a formidable idiot in my opinion, who will not let go. Best is to not feed him.

Flattery will get you everywhere. Run away, the nasty reasoning man has come to town.

Well, I take it that 'God' denotes a person with the qualities of omnipotence, omniscience and moral goodness. I can prove that a being with those qualities exists.

I won't bother you with questions, I'll just do it and remove your doubts.

1. There are existing prescriptions of reason
2. Any existing prescription is the prescription of an existing person, a subject, a mind (I use those terms interchangeably).
3. Therefore, the existing prescriptions of reason are prescriptions of an existing person, a subject, a mind.
4. The prescriptions of reason are not prescriptions of mine, or yours, or any of ours
5. Therefore, the existing prescriptions of reason are prescriptions of an existing person who is not any of us.

That argument is valid and its assumptions seem, to me anyway, to be beyond question. One can't coherently raise a reasonable doubt about assumption 1 without involving oneself in a practical contradiction.

Assumption 2 enjoys 'default true' status, and so the burden of proof is one anyone who wishes to deny it to provide an uncontroversial example of a prescription that lacks entirely any person as its issuer.

3 is entailed by 1 and 2.

4 is self-evidently true. If I insist that 2 + 3 = 6 that will not mean there is any reason to believe it. And as it applies to every one of us, it narrows the scope of whose prescriptions the prescriptions of reason could be to one person: her. Which is what 5 says.

The prescriptions of reason are the prescriptions of a person: Reason.

This person - the person of Reason - is omnipotent. Why? Because there's nothing higher than Reason. She is not bound even by the laws of logic, for those laws are ones she herself writes. There is therefore literally nothing she cannot do - which is just what it is to be omnipotent.

This person is also omniscient, because for a belief to qualify as an item of knowledge it must be justified. And 'justified' just means 'endorsed by Reason'. She is, the, the sole arbiter of knowledge and is therefore omniscient.

This person - the person of Reason - is also morally good. This is because moral values are the values of Reason. And Reason, being omnipotent, is going to be as she values being. Thus, Reason is morally good because she values being exactly as she is.

There. Reason is an omnipotent, omniscient, morally good person and she exists. Proof: done.

'God' denotes a person — Bartricks

Interestingly, the noun 'person' is derived from the Greek 'persona', derived from 'the masks worn by dramatists'.

I think the theological idea of the 'person-hood' of God, is not that God is 'a person' but is only understandable as 'a being' or 'being' as distinct from some thing or force or energy. And, according to Christian theology, this being manifested as a person, but once, and only once, in the person of Jesus Christ.

That argument is valid and its assumptions seem, to me anyway, to be beyond question — Bartricks

'to me anyway' is a bit of a cheap trick rhetorical dodge, isn't it? For an argument to be valid, it ought to be valid to all and any - otherwise we're no longer engaging in a debate, but a matter of personal conviction.

It's valid according to the canons of logic.

For an argument to be valid, it ought to be valid to all and any - otherwise we're no longer engaging in a debate, but a matter of personal conviction. — Wayfarer

Er, no, the exact opposite. All you're doing is expressing your personal conviction - your personal conviction that the argument is invalid. What I'm doing is reasoning. It is not my personal conviction that God exists. God demonstrably exists.

Reconciliation with mortality would mean perceiving it, in the context of understanding everything that it represents, as nonetheless representing a meaningful as opposed to merely an accidental or logically inevitable conclusion of life. — Robert Lockhart

Interesting, thank you, sorry to be slow in reply. Reconciliation, broadly, is the how of how you get from heah to theah. The bank says I have this much money, but I know I have that much. How I get from one to the other, so they "balance," are reconciled, is by listing omitted items to both, as necessary. But this won't do for death.

With accounts, then, you add or subtract to make them both alike. But there is nothing that can be added to death to make it not-death, nor to the living, to make them while alive, dead. Reconciliation, then, with death, would seem to imply making all the adjustments on one side, to the end not of balance, but of acceptance. Acceptance of death via reconciliation seems to mean attaching to the life in question meanings, values, and understandings not intrinsic to death, that make death ultimately more acceptable as part of a natural process.

And in as much as death is inevitable, it would seem the only value to be gained from it is through the acceptance itself of it. Heidegger covers this ground in detail, at length. His point is that death itself is not the issue, but that anticipation, the inevitability, of it by the living is. His question is not, then, what is death, but, what does it mean for me that I am going to die - as it happens, an astute reconciling question.

Now, you wrote short and I long. Yours would be the better had you written not "representing a meaningful... conclusion of life," but instead, "as nonetheless being a meaningful conclusion of life." The difference being, of course, between that which represents and that that is, the unreal and the real.
But with that, I'd have become again the shorter writer with just two words, "I agree."

It is not my personal conviction — Bartricks

But you said the argument 'seems to me' valid, and by so doing you declare it a matter of personal conviction.

Well, I was leaving open the possibility that I might have equivocated. I don't think I have, but someone who listens more carefully to reason than I do might be able to show me that I have, in which case the argument wouldn't be valid.

Look, it seems to me that 2 + 2 = 4. That doesn't mean it's a matter of personal conviction. That itself is poor reasoning. It seems to me that there's a chair to my left. That doesn't mean whether there's a chair to my left is matter of personal conviction. I do have the personal conviction that there's a chair to my left, but chairs are not made of personal convictions (hence why I'll fall over it no matter how convinced I am that it is not there).

Likewise, for truths of reason. It is my personal conviction that this argument is valid:

1. P
2. Q
3. Therefore P and Q

But that doesn't mean it's validity is a matter of personal conviction. It's valid regardless of whether I think it is.

that's the thing about reality. Our faculties - ultimately via our faculty of reason - give us insight into how it is. But they don't compose it.

But a certain sort of person - one who is fundamentally opposed to philosophy proper and just treats it as kind of self-indulgent exercise in self-expression - thinks otherwise.

The argument I made is valid. Someone who thinks it is invalid just because that's their hunch is not someone I want to debate with - not until or unless they can show me, by appeal to self-evident truths of reason, that it is invalid.

1. There are existing prescriptions of reason
2. Any existing prescription is the prescription of an existing person, a subject, a mind (I use those terms interchangeably).
3. Therefore, the existing prescriptions of reason are prescriptions of an existing person, a subject, a mind.
4. The prescriptions of reason are not prescriptions of mine, or yours,or any of ours
5. Therefore, the existing prescriptions of reason are prescriptions ofan existing person who is not any of us. — Bartricks

Invalid argument. Nothing demonstrated or warranted. 4 contradicts 2. Bizarre anthropomorphic projection fetishes onto reason.

Theists are weird. They need god to exist, it's definitely bizarre.

No, 4 doesn't contradict 2. 4 refers to us lot - humans. It doesn't apply to all subjects. They're consistent, they just entail that Reason is not one of us.

But a certain sort of person - one who is fundamentally opposed to philosophy proper and just treats it as kind of self-indulgent exercise in self-expression - thinks otherwise. — Bartricks

Seems to me that you tar a lot of people with that brush.

Going back to your original claim that there is:

an existing person, a subject, a mind (I use those terms interchangeably). — Bartricks

This is one of your axioms, right? You say 'if P' - but 'P' in this case refers to this proposition. And I think there are very many grounds to question that on. You have repeatedly stated that 'reason is a person', but again, I can't see any compelling grounds, either logical or empirical, to accept that.

And it's also the case that you can form a valid syllogism on the basis of fallacious axioms - 'if all men are monkeys, and Socrates is a man, then Socrates is a monkey' is a valid syllogism, but it's a fallacious argument, because the initial premise is fallacious.

You are talking about an 'agent' like the rest of theists, it is no different from the rest of theists. Your argument is invalid. Atheism addresses the fundamentals.

1. The entirety of existence was created by an immaterial 'being' (agent).
2. Immaterial interacts with material.
3. Immaterial 'being' (agent) created and/or is 'morality', objective morality, etc etc.

Etc., etc.

Your argument is ridiculous and does not demonstrate a "god" ... only that an "agent" is around that you deem 'God'.

Seems to me that you tar a lot of people with that brush. — Wayfarer

It's true of a lot of people. You think ruthless followers of reason are the norm or the exception?

I can't see any compelling grounds, — Wayfarer

that's because you don't recognise a valid argument when you see one.

I have not said that Reason is a person, I have demonstrated that she is by means of a valid argument whose premises are true beyond reasonable doubt.

Once more I am doing the exact opposite of what you say.

I am not expressing convictions. I am arguing.

It's difficult. Try it.

that's because you don't recognise a valid argument when you see one. — Bartricks

Welp, on that one, I'm out of here.

Good luck everyone else.

The argument is not invalid or ridiculous. It is valid. It has a conclusion you don't like.

Welp, on that one, I'm out of here. — Swan

Well, I never realized it was that easy and quick to cook a Swan. And what a disappointingly thin flavour, I must say.

I am not expressing convictions. I am arguing.

It's difficult. Try it. — Bartricks

It's only difficult because you - and only you - recognise your own arguments. You take it that when others don't want to play in your bathwater, that you've 'beaten' them. Run along, now.

Look, you clearly don't know what a valid argument is.

This is valid:


1. There are existing prescriptions of reason
2. Any existing prescription is the prescription of an existing person, a subject, a mind (I use those terms interchangeably).
3. Therefore, the existing prescriptions of reason are prescriptions of an existing person, a subject, a mind.
4. The prescriptions of reason are not prescriptions of mine, or yours, or any of ours
5. Therefore, the existing prescriptions of reason are prescriptions of an existing person who is not any of us.

Can't you see that?

Any living cat is a mammal. Any living mammal has a heartbeat. Therefore, all living cats have heartbeats. Yes? Or do you think that's poor reasoning? Poor, or good?

Now, I'd say that's good reasoning. You'd say "that's just your conviction". Unbelievable!

It's a valid argument. If you can't see that it is valid, then you've got problems.

Arguing against logic using logic will inevitably lead to the equivalent of saying "this sentence is a lie." — Artemis

Well, it is a little bit more elaborate than that.

First, you have that strange conclusion that occurs when you represent sentences as numbers. For every predicate that is calculable about numbers, there exists a sentence that says that it satisfies that predicate.

So, if "green" is calculable, then there will be a sentence provable in such system that says:

I am green.

The corollary is true as well. There will be a sentence provable in such system that says:

I am not green.

That is the notorious Gödel-Carnap diagonal lemma.

Its proof is purely syntactic. Up till now, nobody has been able to produce an intuitive interpretation for this. It is just four or five entirely correct steps in a strange reasoning, and voila, there it is. In the field of metamathematics, you really need good resistance against syntactically correct propositions that otherwise sound nonsensical.

Still, as a side note, propositional logic is just a system of 14 arbitrary beliefs that correspond with absolutely nothing at all in the real, physical world. It is an abstract, Platonic world in itself. Therefore, we should not be surprised that syntactic conclusions in that world mean nothing to us or correspond to nothing we can identify with. In fact, that should rather be expected.

So, from there on, Gödel famously went on to show that provability is just a relation between numbers (=theorems/conclusions) and other numbers (=a set of sentences that proves such theorem), and that therefore, the following sentence is necessarily provable in such system:

I am not provable.

That sentence is also logically true. So, Gödel's first incompleteness theorem created a first consternation about the limitations of logic. Next, Tarski used the same system to show that another sentence would be provable in such system:

I am not true.

However, the problem can still be fixed by disallowed the definition of a "true" predicate in arithmetic. Hence, Tarski's famous undefinability theorem: truth cannot be defined in a system of arithmetic. That is forbidden.

So, yes, the liar sentence plays an important role in Tarski's undefinability theorem. Still, it is not insurmountable. Just ban the practice that allows it to emerge in your system.

OK I will play along (but only so long as you refrain from your habitual sarcasm and gratuitous insults.)

1. There are existing prescriptions of reason
2. Any existing prescription is the prescription of an existing person, a subject, a mind (I use those terms interchangeably). — Bartricks

I have not heard the expression 'prescriptions of reason'. But the word 'prescription' (leaving aside the medical use of the term) is defined as 'a recommendation that is authoritatively put forward' (e.g. "effective prescriptions for sustaining rural communities").

All such prescriptions have originated from someone, ultimately dependent on the introduction of laws, edicts, and the like, presumably in the early phases of civilized culture, and dependent upon the existence of written language and the concept of law..

So a naturalistic objection would be that prior to the development of such domains of discourse, no such prescriptions existed, and it would be meaningless to speak of the 'prescriptions of reason' outside that context. In other words, while it is true that the existence of 'prescriptions of reason' might not be dependent on my mind or yours, they are nevertheless dependent on there having been human agents that devised such laws, and are not, therefore, dependent on the existence of an abstract 'person' known as 'reason'.

that's because you don't recognise a valid argument when you see one. — Bartricks

@Swan, you've seen the oldest bar trick in the trick bag of @Bartrick. The trick involves denying any and all necessities to adhere to logic or reason. Drinking buddies' argument.

You did well in pulling out. If your brick wall does not accept your argument, you leave it there, the argument, and the brick wall, and you go on to do other things.

It's not a trick, it's called 'philosophy'. You know, using reason to figure out what's true.
Take a course in critical thinking.

Here's a question you might encounter on an IQ test: if all As are Bs, and all Bs are Cs, are all As Cs?

What's the answer?

All such prescriptions have originated from someone — Wayfarer

Yes, all prescriptions have some person or persons behind them. But that just confirms my second premise, which says precisely that.

So I am unclear which premise you are disputing.

When you suggest that prescriptions cannot exist absent human discourse you beg the question. Prescriptions do not require humans, they require minds. For it is in virtue of having minds that we can issue prescriptions. And what enables us to develop a discourse in which we are able to express our preferences to one another is precisely that we all have the language of reason to appeal to.

So you're just assuming that all prescriptions have to be human prescriptions and that humans can develop languages without the assistance of reason.

But that's mistaken, as my argument shows. To challenge my argument you need to show one of its premises to be false, or at least to raise some reasonable doubt about one. But so far you have not.

it is in virtue of having minds that we can issue prescriptions. And what enables us to develop a discourse in which we are able to express our preferences to one another is precisely that we all have the language of reason to appeal to. — Bartricks

It pains me to say this, but I think I'm in agreement.

You know, using reason to figure out what's true. — Bartricks

You cannot do that with reason. You can only use reason to verify -- and not to discover -- what is provable.

We are now long past the idea that "true" and "provable" are even related to each other.

Seriously, that misconception was abandoned after Gödel's famous lecture at the Second Conference on the Epistemology of the Exact Sciences on 5–7 September 1930 in Königsberg.

You are almost 100 years behind now.

Well said !
Alas some members rely on pedantry as an excuse for ignorance of the literature.

Well said !
Alas some members rely on pedantry as an excuse for ignorance of the literature. — fresco

:lol: