one watches this debate and sees how civilised both philosophers are in conducting themselves and treating the other with respect...and then one watches a debate with Craig and Krauss.
Although I can concede that Craig is not one of the best philosophers, I've never seen him take pose "anti-intellectual" attitude. He is always tempered and goes straight to the point. Would you really say that non-civilized?
Here is the summary of this hour and a half into what was said. Keith: It's possible there is a god. Arif: Yes, it's possible. But there is no evidence of it so we shouldn't believe it. Keith: You don't need evidence to believe in something. Arif: Yes you do. Keith No you don't. Arif: Yes you do. Keith: No you don't.
It’s possible that there is a god just like it’s possible that that god is the Flying Spaghetti Monster, If we don’t need evidence to believe in something then I claim to be god now worship me until you prove me wrong. That’s what the counters were .
In that case, if it's possible that God exists, one can use Plantinga's Modal Ontological Argument which would prove God exists necessarily. So, God exists.
Appreciate Keith's open heartedness and open mind. I do appreciate Arif's basic premise of empiricism but his application of empiricism seems a bit fundamentalist. In this sense I would disagree with him that atheism allows for more open mindedness, rather I felt Keith's position was far more open.
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The root problem in Empirical Science is the positing that consciousness/mind is mere by-product functioning of brain. Mathematics, reason and logic would be results of this mere by-product functioning of brain called “Mind”. If morality, self awareness, emotions and choice (freewill) are also mere results of Mind (the brain by-product) it would then seem to be just picking and choosing to trust logic over self-awareness or mathematics over morality and in the end become some form of “begging the question”. The only real questions are, "is consciousness trustworthy to know reality and if so, is it also a necessary part of reality itself?" We have in fact only consciousness to rationalize consciousness. All rational inferences, testing models against experienced reality, conceptualizing models, logic and probability theories; arise from consciousness/mind and all of these listed don't and can't exist without consciousness. “Consciousness” or the “Mind” accounts for all reasoning with nothing left outside of this self-awareness that is able to encounter or reason reality otherwise. Consciousness is the substrate of any possible claim to knowledge and thus the starting and ending point to posit a reality or any truth. Why would one limit themselves to posit empiricism (science's founding principle) as the only method of truth, which is also a product/idea of “Mind” but leads to a world-view that to denies one's self, the objective reasoner, as no more than mere biochemical illusory as the result of it's assertions. Empiricism states that knowledge must be restricted to those objects which can be perceived by our senses. At the same time empiricism requires non-empirical foundational presuppositions and these presuppositions are not material themselves, they are metaphysical. Empiricism must assume mathematics, logic and human reason trustworthy; and that the Universe is rational and in line with a rational human consciousness/mind because these are not physical objects which can be perceived by any of our five senses. Mathematics, logic and reason originate and reside in the metaphysical consciousness, the mind. These metaphysical conceptual constructs can not be tested/falsified outside of themselves empirically thus are asserted as objective. Empiricism alone is self-refuting. The theory that all knowledge is limited to what can be empirically known is itself, incapable of being known or demonstrated empirically. When adding the fact that empiricism can not answer for any trustworthy substrate for knowledge that is solely metaphysical (one's self, the objective reasoner); and the fact that the only substrate for claimed knowledge is “one's self, the objective reasoner”, shows empiricism as fallacious at it's core claim of being the only methodology for knowledge. Mind/consciousness is “one's self, the objective reasoner” and only possible source for any claim of knowledge to and of reality. Science may be able to explain what humans are but science can never inform us of who we are; one's self, the objective reasoner to and of reality. C.S. Lewis describes the moral issue from within conscious beings reasoning like this; "My argument against God was that the universe seemed so cruel and unjust. But how had I got this idea of just and unjust? A man does not call a line crooked unless he has some idea of a straight line. What was I comparing this universe with when I called it unjust? If the whole show was bad and senseless from A to Z, so to speak, why did I, who was supposed to be part of the show, find myself in such violent reaction against it? A man feels wet when he falls into water, because man is not a water animal: a fish would not feel wet. Of course, I could have given up my idea of justice by saying that it was nothing but a private idea of my own. But if I did that, then my argument against God collapsed too--for the argument depended on saying that the world was really unjust, not simply that it did not happen to please my private fancies. Thus in the very act of trying to prove that God did not exist--in other words, that the whole of reality was senseless--I found I was forced to assume that one part of reality--namely my idea of justice--was full of sense. Consequently atheism turns out to be too simple. If the whole universe has no meaning, we should never have found out that it has no meaning: just as, if there were no light in the universe and therefore no creatures with eyes, we should never know it was dark. Dark would be without meaning." ~C.S. Lewis Are human observations objective and rational? Is the Universe rational? Because we can not escape our consciousness to test or falsify these question, they are assumed to be objective and rational. Every claim to knowledge originates and is filtered by consciousness and no knowledge exists outside of consciousness to prove otherwise. Calling one conscious experience "objective" over any other is fallacious; including logic over emotions or mathematics over morality. Logic and mathematics can not be falsified/tested outside of their own claims as being objective. Emotions, morality, freewill and self awareness are also emergent phenomena of consciousness. Why posit logic, reason and mathematics as trustworthy and objective and the first group not? The second group can not be validated or falsified outside of their own assertions; so what are you appealing to in order to claim the first list as mere biochemical illusory but value the second list as trustworthy and objective? I don't deny the practical use of science just as I don't deny the practical use of objective moral truth in the justice system and laws. I simply appeal to morals being objective as one would claim mathematics to be objective as in 2+2=4. One first has to assume consciousness is rational and that the universe and experience holds these same rational limitations. Is truth in morality of less value than logic, or less true? Is the life of a psychopath with a 140 IQ but without any empathy of more value than the life a kind man with just a 60 IQ? Freewill to choose ill-moral behavior or even prefer ill-moral behavior may seem to not be objective but once the ill-behaved is treated "badly" they will always contests this as cruel or wrong. Anyone as the victim of ill-moral actions will always desire to escape said ill-moral actions placed on them. This seems to lead to moral objectiveness. Many people may claim to be pro-abortion but if given the “choice” that they themselves stand in as the aborted, only the suicidal would volunteer. No one that values “Choice” would want to be aborted themselves other than the suicidal. The question then would be, not if abortion is moral but is suicide moral. This leaves no doubt about the question that abortion is ill-moral; meaning that the normal person that is pro-abortion would not want to be aborted themselves unless suicidal. Suicide is already against the law, so why is suicide against the law but abortion not? I don't deny reason, logic or mathematics as objective, I just understand the assumptions one must make to assert they are "objective" and apply the same to all results of un-testable consciousness. The error is with someone asserting objectiveness in some results of consciousness and subjectiveness in others without outside "proof". These others would include self-awareness, emotions, moral conviction and freewill. Human consciousness includes all of the above and favors none!
Not really. We don't need a theory of consciousness in order to have knowledge, objectivity, or argue against the claims of religion. We have good reasons to trust logic, evidence, and reason, as they have given us science, technology, increased life spans, cures for diseases, and a host of other things. Religion, not so much as they say these days.
Thanks for the kind words towards Dr. Ward. If you have time, I'd recommend you spend some time reading theist philosophers just so you can see the different worldview. As hard as it was for me to stomach down some of the New Atheist writers, it was worth it (as a theist)
Fantastic debate, probably the best one I've seen on the matter of theism. Keith made a fantastic introduction and laid down the arguments for theism very well, from which I learnt a lot, however there's no question that Arif mopped the floor in terms of the actual debate.
What Arif should have asked is for a method of justification that works rather than asking for evidence because I am not sure whether empiricism and repeated tests can be applied to a priori reasoning, so another method of justification must be given by the religious.
As a free willed (necessary to even be able to make an intellectually free judgment) , rational being of purpose and value.. in a stunningly , impossibly intricate and beautiful world of truth and goodness... its utterly impossible for most rational people with normal minds to deny a supreme being.
This. The existence of free will is contradicting atheist views. Free will exists, so must a higher being exist who gave us this ability to even able to thinkg and decide on our own and not just "follow orders" which are produced through our neural braincells processing data.
Can you explain why you're convincing we have free will? Because the pool of libertarian philosophers seems to be extremely small and shrinking every day.
We have evidence for why some humans have and still believe in gods. Drilling into the christian story it threatens believe or suffer! The Rev doesn't want to suffer. At 1:13 he states that he comes to it by way of his culture/upbringing.
I think Professor Ward didn't win the debate because he didn't give his argument full justice. He was making more of a plausible inductive guess about a greater mind creating a world (that we happen to interact and be affected by) in a similar way that we create our reality by creating a perception of reality (which is the reality we cannot help but live in.) He bases this guess on the proposition that we can't be more certain of an "objective" reality than the reality that we create for ourselves. It is a bit of a leap but it isn't as baseless as Arif's example of the possibility of trees sprouting limbs and walking. I do feel that Arif doesn't make as much of a positive case for how to act in the world or at least leaves it incomplete. He acts more as a skeptic in this case. I feel like he potentially could but that his attention was drawn to other things. I still find his argument more convincing but he should be willing to provide a decent alternative that is more helpful to people who use religion to function in the world.
@@loominatyconfirmed5774 I don't mean observing brain activity or someone's facial expressions. ... I mean the actual thought itself. ..that's in the supernatural.
@@christopherhun6552 Don't quite know what you mean by that but we can measure observe and experience wind so how does that correlate with my statement?
It drives me nuts when educated men attempt to deny they have a worldview. *EVERYONE has a worldview.* It is literally impossible to exist & not have one. Some people may not have thought about their worldview much or questioned what they believe & why they believe it... but they still have a worldview regardless. You can't just not have views about the reality in which you exist.
Arif was wrong on world views at the beginning. There are competing world views, and some may be more wrong than others. Otherwise, little everything Arif said was unreasonable, while the diametric opposite was the case with Keith.
1.01.25 there is the true point …. people see their lives as a mess and they want to change it . to make it better .. what they seem they do generally is avoiding the effort and the work and they just adopting miracles and gods and on the way the try to find reasons to back up the faith they accept as saviour… i much better prefer to do psychoanalysis and find out about myself, and find out my fears, the root of my anger, really ask myself how i can be better etc.. i like to create my own ethics and try them out and see what makes me and my surroundings happy.. all this requires a lot of time , effort, work, which is the very reason one can end up being a really good person, awaken and fulfilled …. this is the advice that i give to all my friends and people that i love.. together we think, we evolve, we value our relationships and we are doing great without any superlative force of any kind …
1.26… 1.26 … same with poseidon .. christianity exists only because there are many believers.. when no believers around then it will die as so many other religions .. fffffff .. cant wait …
..its known why religion survives and why many people use it .. look at behavioural patterns, neurobiology, psychology, and you will find maaaaany good reasons as to why this happens …
Is psychoanalysis pseudoscience? Popper accused Freud of that. Popper did not devalue Freud's work, he only said to be conservative about what is called science.
If you'd just listen carefully...He said that the evidence doesn't decide the issue for him, and nothing does. He's undecided in awaiting further evidence that will lighten the issue.
Yeah, I mean Reg is totally wrong. Arif says there is currently not enough evidence to decide the issue either way. But more evidence coming to light in future may be sufficient to decide the issue. There's absolutely no contradiction in the two statements: "Currently X is not the case" and "in future, X may be the case." It's not just that these are consistent, it's more that I'm baffled by why anyone would think they aren't.
Nice job Arif picking apart Ward. Like Ward and all other religious people on the topic of prayer and the emotion of feeling God is false. Think of how love feels and the heart ache is that God or just human emotions. You feel something in prayer and such cause you want to consciously or not like watching a movie and start crying over something that has nothing to do with you in life but your emotions want to relate
Keith Ward: "we now know that thought arises in the material brain. Can thought be independent of the material? Of course it can!" Am I stupid? I can't follow this.
No, it's fair. In all honesty, I'm still open to the idea of whether thoughts and ideas can be said to exist independently of matter (very boring philsophical debates about this), but I suspect they don't. At the VERY least, seems pretty reasonable to question whether they can, and very presumptuous to base an argument on the idea that they can.
analytical thinking and logic in general has its boundaries and because its the best tool we have to analyze the wotld it doesnt mean there arent things beyond our perception/understanding
I have had experiences every bit as weird as Keith Ward's. But when it comes down to it, you feel "impossibly" extreme elation. From that it is quite grandiose to project that you know the creator of the universe on a first name basis, and know how the universe is constructed. People are so conceited that any voice in their head has to be god and any extreme feeling must be the holy spirit.
This is not grandiose. The Creator God, Our Heavenly Father came to earth, Emmanuel, meaning God with us, and His earthly name is Jesus. He loved us enough to want to save us from our sins and died on the cross and took our punishment for our sins which is, He paid the price for our sins and rose from the dead, conquering sin and death. He endured this because He loves us and He wants a relationship with us. When we trust in Jesus's death on the cross, which was payment for our sins and that He rose from the dead, that proved He was who He said He was, and we ask Him to help us repent of our sins and grow in the Lord Jesus each day, one day at a time, we are saved from our sins. We are sons and daughters of God. He wants a relationship with us. Our choice to receive His free gift of His sacrificial love by paying for our sins, those of us who choose to decide to receive His free gift, will have abundant eternal life with Him in Heaven. When anyone chooses to reject His free gift of forgiveness, upon death with unforgiven sins, will be separated from Him for all eternity. Those who choose to reject Him won't be forced to spend eternity in Heaven with Him. They will be separated from God for all eternity, paying the price for their own sins.
@Polaris Pike I don't see it as grandiose. I also don't feel like I know every thought of God and when I'm led or taught by His Holy Spirit. It is humbling to be a child of God because God chose to save us, and we are so thankful beyond what we can imagine. We actually cannot be thankful enough. If people feel grandiose, perhaps some people may feel that way, it is the wrong way to feel. I feel humbled and thankful that the Creator of the universe and of me and all mankind, loves me so much that He wants to have a relationship with me. I'm very humbled by it. I certainly don't think I know anything close to what God knows and when the Holy Spirit leads me, I feel He chooses to and I'm thankful for His guidance. I don't feel grandiose about it at all. God is choosing to love us and He chose to save anyone who calls upon Him for salvation. Those of us who humbly reply to receive His salvation and then are helped by His guidance, do it with thankfulness and He won't teach us everything He knows, and His Holy Spirit chooses to guide and teach when He does. We humbly accept all that the Lord our God gives us. I don't feel grandiose if the Lord our God offers to us what He offers and those who humbly accept this, have the right attitude. When God offers us what He offers us, it is meant to be received with a humble heart and not with a grandiose attitude. It is He who offers what He offers us and gives what He chooses to give us.
@Jim Scott God didn't created us to sin and then need to be saved. He created us and gave us free will to obey Him. His commandments are for our good, but we all choose to disobey Him. It's our fault. You can believe what you choose to believe. You will be blessed with eternal life with Him if you receive the forgiveness He offers and repent of your sins, which means turn away from sin, and ask God to help you live for Him and pray, study His word, and grow to be more and more like Jesus. Or He won't force you to want Him and receive His forgiveness. You have free will to reject His forgiveness. He gave us free will to choose Him or not. If you die without receiving His forgiveness, you will be separated from Him for all eternity just as you chose to do, paying the price for your unforgiven sins. If you want to believe it's foolishness, that's the choice you make.
@Jim Scott How is this a threat? I only say what God offers. You can choose to believe this or not, which you don't believe. If you don't believe in God and what He offers, how can there be a threat to be in Hell for all eternity? If you believe it's nonsense, you have free will to believe that. If you believe it's not true, then how can I threaten you with something you think is nonsense and you believe isn't true? Expressing what I believe is just telling you what I believe. You don't believe it. You say your point of view, just like I say my point of view. That's all that's going in here.
Early the Rev. skips from there is material (matter) to spritual. What does he skip over students? Energy. A brain, matter, produces thoughts, energy, both measurable.
Hasan Mohammad Owed? I think you don't comprehend the debate. His arguments were riddled with ugly contradicting logic. This video shows how atheism/material is ultimately intellectually indefensible.
Yes. The assertion that something can't be known unless it is observed or empiricism is illogical in that it can't explain the non-empirical evaluation of the observation being experienced. This evaluation dictates the nature of the observation. So if the dictating factor of the observation is of a non-empirical fashion that ultimately is of a metaphysical nature, then how can one assert that material is a dominant force over sentiment? I rest my case.
It's not 'ownage'. It's pure foolishness. Arif is a humean agnostic who says he's agonistic about everything but acts and lives as if he believes in the things he's agnostic about. Skepticism is simply intellectual dishonesty. Moreover, he believes in a skeptical outlook of the world. This belief itself has no 'evidence' in the same category arif is looking for. Sorry. Not ownage.
Despite the quality of debate, I was disappointed with the inclusion of Father Christmas (and the tooth fairy, by a chairman trying desperately to be funny). An analogy is not an argument. It is an exercise in intellectual sleight of hand. At its heart, the point made is, Father Christmas does not exist, therefore god does not exist. You take one thing which no adult believes in and then clam it is the same thing as something believed in by many people, and, about which, people like Neil Degrasse Tyson are agnostic. If you are lucky, it will provoke laughter, which usually represents the death of reason. I suspect Tyson is not agnostic about Father Christmas, the tooth fairy, or, indeed, Poseidon. I can listen to that sort of thing from Bill Maher, who, at least, can land a joke. I don't need to hear it in a serious discussion.
Atheism is the view that there is no God, why does metaphysical naturalism or materialism follow? Also logical laws under an empiricist view, as I understand it, are based on what we observe (based what we can understand of possibility) rather than a sort of ontological dualism.
43:00 that is correct that certain things you come across in your every day life you can expect smaller amounts of evidence... And be reasonable in believing such thing. You say you have a dog it's reasonable to believe you because it doesn't really matter if you do or don't. I was the proper is this shin becomes more extraordinary it needs more extraordinary evidence. So for something just to be possible in the likes of an extraordinary claim like a God it needs extraordinary evidence not just being possible. The weights of the claim should have equal weight of evidence. You shouldn't just believe somebody was up abducted by aliens. Most would agree that requires an extraordinary amount of evidence. Not the same as if somebody said oh I have a dog.
+thetruhoss Interestingly, much of Professor Ward's discussion right at that minute mark decidedly skirts around the issue of truth. Yes, people often long for an experience to take them out of the drudgery of everyday experience. People want to connect together and with a 'mind greater than theirs," or to connect with a "love that comes from a source other than themselves" Those are all correct appraisals of why people want those things. I note he doesn't specifically say at this point it comes from an actual ontological deity. But that doesn't mean that such a mind exists in reality other than as an abstraction or metaphor, which it could exist as with just as much power in the realms of togetherness and longing. The issue, of course, is that many religious people would listen to this and call him a liberal heretic. What he talks of sounds much closer to a kind of philosophical pantheism, or a liberal Christianity. This will not be news to him - he's been subject to those accusations for decades now, on most important Christian doctrines on which he stands or has stood aside aside from orthodoxy, including inerrancy, hell, PSA, Trinitarianism, etc. I have less of an issue with that kind of philosophy, it's relatively harmless and can be safely ignored when it comes to truth and reality, although it sound suspiciously like wishful thinking. Unfortunately, a great many religious people actually believe in an actual God who judges and makes demands, and follow a religion that requires adherents to make demands of those who are not adherents.
Uhhhh continental drift? I mean, Mt. Everest would've never existed if the indian and eurasian plates never collided with each other. Due to this collision, the ground that may have been originally underwater sprung up which eventually formed the himalayas. Plus considering how sea level rose and fell over the lifetime of earth even before humans existed then the plausibility of fossils being found everywhere is possible.
If the ark happened where did all the water go? How did they carry viruses like cancer on the ark ? Why do we still have plants? They would have all drowned being under water. How would the ark carry every animal (including dinosaurs) on earth? Not to mention they needed to have aquatic animals as well since fresh water animals can’t survive in salt water and the other way around. How could they survive with so much methane and only having one window ? How did the terminates not eat the boat ? How could someone make a boat that big and be able to float when the worlds best boat makers couldn’t even come close to the size and what they did make couldn’t float? How come there are stories of the same exact events predating Christianity by hundreds and some thousands of years? Your beliefs are pure idiotic and go against all logic, physics and reality. Wake up there is no god.
All kids outgrow Father Christmas, because they find out that everyone who made them believe in him, deceived them on purpose for fun and innocent reasons. On the other hand... it is because of the sincere belief of those who made you believe in God or Atheism, that most people stick to the beliefs of their parents or those they look up to. He totally misses that the credibility of the witness is paramount for anyone's belief.
If you have ever had an operation under general anesthesia, you know consciousness is not continuous. You watch yourself fade and disappear and after the operation is over, pop back into being, with no sense of time passing. Your consciousness simply was not there during the operation. It is quite different from going to sleep where your consciousness enters the dream state.
I don't remember the context of this statement as it related to the video because I haven't seen the video since the time I made the statement. But I believe my point was along these lines. Whatever Roedy is saying about anesthesia as it relates to consciousness and the survival of the mind after the death of the body--again, whatever he is saying about that-- an anesthesiologist who believes in God knows all of what he's saying and then some and yet it has no effect on his belief or disbelief in God or the afterlife. So Roedy's point is neutralized.
From listening to the debate I'm unable to see where civility has anything to do with it. Perhaps you could deliver some viable evidence that would, if there were any, support any aspect of theism, supply viable evidence and there could be a Nobel Prize somewhere there in the offing for you Ms Bacon! I've not been uncivil just pointing out a relevant point without the use abuse of any kind. Have a read or listen to Douglas Adam's quotes about not discussing religion, he sums up the religionists problem in a nutshell. @@tamarabacon7998
@@jimvanlint8043 Doubtless you are "unable to see where civility has anything to do with it" since the irrelevance of civility is status quo for most atheists when interacting with theists. This debate is an outlier in that "humble atheist" is rather oxymoronic. But God's existence is off-topic here--that was the point of the debate, not my comment. The fact that you either didn't get that or chose to ignore it further validates Doug Wilson's observation . . . There are two tenets of atheism: 1. There is no God; and 2. I hate him.
The bible describes a god far more bizarre than a flying spaghetti monster. The only time a "natural" god arises is during debates when theists attempt to prove that A god exists, when they prune off much of the craziness.
One day the flying spaghetti monster will appear and really shake up a lot of atheists. The existence of God, to me is indisputable, because I have defined the term God as the "source and reason behind reality" or "the answer to the ultimate question". What form this God might take I am very open to, spaghetti based, mathematically based, supernaturally based...this helps me to see that we all share the same curiosity and maybe "purpose".
exactly. both sides offer only speculations and i dont understand why atheists feel like they have a stronger case against theists. both world views are just sides of the same coin
@@norahkalunda1234 Yeah right? a computer works on speculation, and you go and build a bridge based on speculation. Of course, you make a plane fly on speculation.
Are you saying the laws of logic would not exist or numbers if there were no minds? There would be no truth. The laws are dependent on brains. Rationality is subjective not objective.
Michael Burgendy When did I say that? You're misconstruing my words. I'm saying thoughts do not exist without brains, which holds the mind. So Abstract thoughts don't exist. Its a false analogy. abstract numbers do exist because they are independent of the human mind. Abstract thoughts do not. Because it is entirely dependent on a brain. You don't have a brain to think, then you don't have thoughts. Unless you can show me otherwise, that's the case.
If evidence would lead the world, nobody would continue as nothing means nothing in the end. So the evidence thing is not a good argument. I don't think that Einstein spent his life trying to understand the universe is because he had evidence that it was worth something.
Welcome to the english class! Thank you. How's your second language? Your english might be much better than mine, but I thought that we were talking about something different than the language.. You seem to be like many people that give their opinion on the web which is you are trying to win something while I am not.. By the way, I will be happy to be revised as you seem to be a master of the english language.
I thought any philosopher worth its salt would not use a modified version of Pascal's Wager. But i guess that this philosopher from what I heard is not really worth his salt.
Is there a reason to believe in God- 1.We have the supernatural Which confirms lucifers Existence. 2. We have the history of Jesus and other historical records that match the bible. 3. We have knowledge given at a time when , That knowledge was unknown to man, until at least a thousand years later. When it was discovered via scientific means etc. 4. We have prophecies To many for them to have been predicted by chance, to the point of being mathematically impossible to equate the likelihood of them Coming true. 5. Science & philosophy - Ontological argument. Cosmological argument. Teleological argument. Infinite regress. Consciousness/chakra. Entropy. Fingerprints. DNA. Symbiotic relationships. Moral absolutes. Ultimate truths. 6. Other evidences- Bible codes. Giants. Fiction isn’t really fiction. History of the movement for a NWO. Secret societies. Non control of reality/certainty. knowledge as of yet not accessed by mankind. Lack of documentation & evidences based on other theories.
Most amazing atheistic nihilism was from gregarious German leaders and reformers who decided to continue seeking God but not the self. Finding themselves getting closer towards Him by deception of themselves and others that they tried to falsely proclaim. Towards their end, they found many items by subterfuge and thievery.
+TBOTSS "he usually loses" hasn't been my take on the debates i've listened to of his (admittedly only wlc & glen peoples). can you cite some of the debates that he lost in your view?
+Anarkayy The two that were held at Cambridge and went to a vote; Craig/Williams - v- Ahmed/Andrew Copeland(sp) and the three on three debate with Rowen Williams.
If somebody gives you information who has a reputation for giving you solid information, it is rational to act on it. If somebody gives you crazy, implausible information without evidence(e.g. Christianity) then it is not rational to act on it.
Goethe, Swedenborg, Leibniz; three of the highest estimated IQs in history and all three were some form of Christian. All three had philosophical and rational reasoning behind their beliefs. One could go on and on naming all the great genius's of history who believed in some form of a supreme intellect. Newton and Einstein among them. This does not prove the existence of a supreme intellect, but it certainly disproves the argument ascribing irrationality to belief. I may or may not believe in an imaginary God, but you without a doubt sit upon an imaginary high-horse.
myfriend280 > Goethe, Swedenborg, Leibniz; These men would not be Christian today. You would get yourself killed if you questioned the existence of god when these men lived. Christianity was universal. Atheism was not yet an option. Just the same, Goethe was not your standard sheep-Christian; He called the “fairy-tale of Christ” unacceptable. The crucifix, Goethe held, is “the most repugnant thing under the sun.” In letters to Lavater, according to J. M. Robertson, Goethe “wrote quite explicitly that a voice from heaven would not make him believe in a virgin birth and a resurrection, such tales being for him rather blasphemies against the great God and his revelation in Nature.” Swedenborg was a fruitcake: According to The Heavenly Doctrine the Lord had opened Swedenborg's spiritual eyes, so that from then on he could freely visit heaven and hell and talk with angels, demons and other spirits; and the Last Judgement had already occurred, in 1757. However, he tells us that at this day it is very dangerous to talk with spirits, unless a person is in true faith, and is led by the Lord. Leibniz was a mystic, hardly a garden variety Christian
It does not mean that because a famous scientist may have believed in a supernatural being that that should in any way attribute credence to irrational beliefs. Newton, for example, believed in alchemy but we now know that that is just batshit silly; some scientists today believe in some sort of god (even the god of the Bible) and that also is batshit crazy.
myfriend280 I don't agree with his assessment but Einstein did not believe in an orthodox God. He was a pantheist following Spinoza and did not believe in a creator or "supreme intellect" which covers a lot of ground. Furthermore, few elite scientists today believe in a God as we can see from surveys of the American National Academy of Sciences, the Royal Society in Britain, and the list of Nobel Prize winners in the sciences.
I've read all of Spinoza's writings and I feel I have a strong grasp on Einstein's understanding of them as well as Einstein's own view of the question of God. Einstein deconstructed what he considered irrational views of God and these deconstructions are what atheists cling to in order to advance the notion that Einstein was one of them. In fact Einstein despised the explanations of affirmative atheists. That is atheists who positively affirmed there to be no God. Einstein toyed with the semantics of the term atheism as it related to himself and he toyed with the term "God" as it related to himself. In the end if we lay the semantics aside, Einstein believed the universe to possess a kind of harmony akin to intelligence. Understanding Spinoza's works is key to understanding Einstein's statements on the question of God.
WTF is this God people are talking about. I check out 100s of religions and they all claim different things. Then I go into philosophy only to find out that God, BY DEFINITION, is a necessary existence. Why does it have to be God? Why can't it be Ma? It's ridiculous to me how people are willing to believe in one magical beings but not others. The arguments for God could be use to defend made up beings. For example, I can say that Ma is a necessary being, the ground of all existence. Theist would probably say "No, it's not Ma, it's God." Well, how do we determine who's right and who's wrong. If we can't justify the truth of our claims, then why are we believing in such nonsense.
How would a MIND experience any reality if unbodied? Or is that experience purely conceptual and reality is but a dream? This thinking leads to solipsism. I may just be a MIND in a dream like state. This position is pointless - it can not be supported nor refuted.
My only criticism is that if there is no proof or evidence how do we know its there. And what did we lose after father Christmas nothing. What would we lose without religion nothing we'd just crack on with our lives
@@sladegrey9272 it obviously shows that you don't need religion in this world. And even if in non God society if someone causes trouble or harm to others we just simply lock them up because the laws we have benefit for everyone.
@@dafyddllyrdavies6601 - Correct. The sooner we banish religion, the quicker we can move on from this mind manacle and focus on moving our species forward.
Con men say "How dare you not trust me". "How rude to demand evidence my business is legit. I am so insulted." "Requesting evidence is improper". "There is not time to check me out." That is Keith Ward's argument for accepting Christianity on blind trust despite overwhelming evidence it is both untrue and a con.
All thoughts ideas and theories have some basis in reality because the human mind can not create something that is not made of real constitutional parts. Poseidon is one of 12 Olympian gods and he corresponds to Pisces. He is part of an old system of Astrology. I doubt anyone would deny the existence of the constellation of Pisces for example. Father Christmas too is a conflation of multiple characters, ideas and principles all of which are based on reality. All evidence is ultimately subjective, and I would argue there is abundant evidence for anything. Whatever you believe to be true is true.
1 Corinthians 1:20 For it is written: “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise; the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate.” Where is the wise man? Where is the scribe? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know Him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe.…
Dr. Ahmed is fantastic, but he equivocated Dennett's position (and eliminativism in general). Consciousness is false in the sense that it's an illusion, not that we don't perceive its existence. Dennett just tries to show that "qualias" are like "phlogiston", a theoretical construct that doesn't hold water. That doesn't mean that we don't perceive we are conscious. Correct me if I'm wrong, TH-cam people :)
But that is an incoherent point to begin with. Consciousness is the area where all experience occurs. So if we perceive that we are conscious, then we are conscious, Because if we perceive anything at all, then we are conscious. So, in a sense consciousness not only is not an illusion. It is the only thing that can not by definition be an illusion.
+haider939 Agreed. Although, I would say that consciousness is the Achilles' heel of philosophical materialism because we cannot describe consciousness and human experience in strictly materialistic terms. Would you agree?
Severus of Antioch absolutely. there are many problems with materialism to begin with but any notion that tries to explain consciousnesses in terms of just neurons and calcium and potassium ions interacting with each other will fall short of explaining consciousnesses. Unfortunately, most neuroscientists are materialists so it is unfortunate for us that the people who are most skilled at dealing with the contents of the brain dont have a clue of how to approach the problems of the mind.
If your house is being invaded you would call 911 for help If someone hit your car you would call a police for help If you are holding on to a piece of wood after your ship was sink in the dark of the night in the middle of the ocean, who you goanna call for help? You might say Ghostbusters! That is the time you are really being tested. We always in need of help from beings more powerful than us. That would The Almighty Creator Human created week. Just wait and let us not cheat our soul
God is a necessary being, the ground of all existence. It is problematic to attempt to prove God as in God's actual essence through logical propositions and testable data since God is not a thing, not consisting of composite parts, immeasurable and ineffable by definition. We can deduce that God exists from inner subjective experience, which is the only way we can encounter the eternal, immaterial being who connects to our immaterial consciousness. However, the untenable position of physicalism, largely based on new findings of Quantum Physics that states information as more fundamental than matter rather than a property of it, seems to point to an Ultimate Mind in which the universe has its being; an Idealist universe. Uniform, intrinsic intelligibility throughout existence doesn't prove God, but it certainly is a signpost of a Mind as the ground of all being who is beyond the limitations of our finiteness to comprehend without mediation. Consciousness itself implies that Mind is more essential than matter since all experience and knowledge is obtained through subjective apprehension (such as qualia) rather than through the mechanistic operations of the brain (the brain doesn't experience anything, it simply processes neural firings and governs motor function and thus is distinct from the mind). Therefore, the brain must be an emergent artificial processor of mind. Substance dualism is problematic since mind and brain as separate things cannot interact. Property dualism cannot be true since mind isn't a causal process. Therefore, an Idealist reality is the most plausible.
Roedy Green The improper rationale for investigating God is to ask what evidence you want to see. The proper rationale is to ask what kind of evidence you should expect to see. You have to be pure in heart, even if only for a moment, to see God.
I find your statement incredibly irrational. How many people have called on the same god to help them in situations where no other willing humans were around only to have no god intervene? Desperation of there being a god, gods, genies, wishing trolls, ghostbusters, whatever, will not change the situation or make you any less irrational.
What a load of nonses from Prof. Ward. Very weak arguments. Overly philosophical...if I wanted to know about the history of philosophical ideas then it's fine. He argued for spirituality and not the existence of 'God'. Belief and existence are two seperate things.
Overly philosophical? Philosophy isn't some sort of nonsense like theology. It studies logic, reasoning, mind, language, knowledge, reality, values, morality, philosophy behind other ideas/ subjects and more. Everything in philosophy has to be based on logic (logic is the study of valid reasoning logical does not mean true). Overly philosophical would mean overly logical.
Keith Ward is a mixed bag, but this is by far one of his WORST performances. He was absolutely terrible here. Very bad (even face palmingly embarrassing) arguments. Just awful.
58:25 "You're making a decision, a commitment, for which you don't have evidence." No, he's not. Not only is he not, that is literally the exact thing that YOU are doing, and admitted to earlier saying that you didn't need evidence to believe in a god. Seriously, why is it so hard for some people to understand that not believing in something because there is no evidence to do so is NOT a positive belief? It's literally the lack of a belief. This shouldn't be that hard!
What "shouldn't be that hard" is understanding that "the lack of a belief"--in anything--can have consequences. (AKA "argumentum ad ignorantiam".) You just think you already know what they are.
@@tamarabacon7998 That would be correct if the position we are talking about states that because I don't have that belief, the belief is wrong. That's not what non-believers say. We say "I'm not convinced." Unless we add on "...and therefore you're wrong," it isn't argumentum ad ignorantium. There is no "therefore X is wrong" involved here, just "I haven't seen X demonstrated."
@@Thechitogekirisaki You can't prove it as you can't account for how humans come to speak significantly using abstraction ( signified/signifier).If by chance you can't debate academically , better not pollute my mind with nonesense.Thx
@@Espectador666 If you delve into science of sound , human speech and and how thought emanates , you will understand what i mean but you're short of cognitive flexibility and doomed into unilateral understanding of existence which is the highest form pollution and degradation.
Mr. Keith - So Poseidon is less a real god because people have not (by your standard) reasonable discussions about him. So it depends on human standards if a god exists or not? So you set the standard by which it is measured and surprisingly your god is in and the 100000 other goddesses and gods are out. Does this not admit that it is just your opinion?
1:25:45 "It's different because Poseidon isn't in our cultural language. You would be laughed at because Poseidon is a dead god." 🤣🤣🤣 Wow! Great counter! Definitely don't apply that to your own god...
I've watched, for my own mind, countless videos of fully grown adults somehow making hours of talk out of topics that deserve, at most, maybe 10 minutes to clear up. At this point, I'm kind of amazed at how they can keep babbling on about the same topic for their whole life, it's a horribly obvious sign of waste in terms of the allocation of human intellect.
Anything human kind did is liable to be fixed, repared, silenced or activated .this fact falls before MORTALITY as a law of physics .No science ever can silence (' death) or activate ( life) in humans.the day it happens ( it will never happen) then God is an illusion.Humanity is still striving to find better ways of living and coexisting .Why GOD bothers !
Just because you have mind does not mean the entire universe must be organised on similar principles. That is a massive conceit. It is as childish as saying the universe must have feet, and must eat. For that grand an assertion, you need evidence.
A universe of mind and material is a harmonious universe. A universe of pure material is a universe which is crudely interrupted by the consciousness of sentient beings. The question is not reducible to empirical data alone. It's just as much a question of mathematical elegance.
@@FakingANerve The theist, as most of them do, have no evidence of any god, so they attempt to baffle with bull shit. I find that other theists, with a huge case of confirmation bias, have an uncanny ability to shut off their reasoning faculties and just accept this crap.
@@davex444 there’s plenty of evidence for God. However one’s presuppositions determine how one interprets the evidence. In order to interpret evidence one presupposes the existence of universal principles such as identity over time, logic, numbers and ethics. All of these categories cannot be justified in an atheistic worldview and these categories most certainly can’t be presented empirically.
one watches this debate and sees how civilised both philosophers are in conducting themselves and treating the other with respect...and then one watches a debate with Craig and Krauss.
Craig has debated at both Oxford and Cambridge. Wins every time.
Although I can concede that Craig is not one of the best philosophers, I've never seen him take pose "anti-intellectual" attitude. He is always tempered and goes straight to the point. Would you really say that non-civilized?
Oners82 I'm interested to see that
Try to do this in Saudi Arabia.
Craig knowingly lying in a debate? Do tell.
Here is the summary of this hour and a half into what was said.
Keith: It's possible there is a god.
Arif: Yes, it's possible. But there is no evidence of it so we shouldn't believe it.
Keith: You don't need evidence to believe in something.
Arif: Yes you do.
Keith No you don't.
Arif: Yes you do.
Keith: No you don't.
Keith afraid to not believe. Arif cannot find an evidencery reason to believe.
It’s possible that there is a god just like it’s possible that that god is the Flying Spaghetti Monster, If we don’t need evidence to believe in something then I claim to be god now worship me until you prove me wrong. That’s what the counters were .
In that case, if it's possible that God exists, one can use Plantinga's Modal Ontological Argument which would prove God exists necessarily. So, God exists.
cool muso it’s also possible that it’s impossible that there is a god, so one can use the same argument ad nauseam to come to either conclusion.
@@Thechitogekirisaki Please o God, take me to heaven
Appreciate Keith's open heartedness and open mind. I do appreciate Arif's basic premise of empiricism but his application of empiricism seems a bit fundamentalist. In this sense I would disagree with him that atheism allows for more open mindedness, rather I felt Keith's position was far more open.
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Keith Ward talks more in 20 minutes than the average man does in a week!!
The root problem in Empirical Science is the positing that consciousness/mind is mere by-product functioning of brain. Mathematics, reason and logic would be results of this mere by-product functioning of brain called “Mind”. If morality, self awareness, emotions and choice (freewill) are also mere results of Mind (the brain by-product) it would then seem to be just picking and choosing to trust logic over self-awareness or mathematics over morality and in the end become some form of “begging the question”.
The only real questions are, "is consciousness trustworthy to know reality and if so, is it also a necessary part of reality itself?" We have in fact only consciousness to rationalize consciousness. All rational inferences, testing models against experienced reality, conceptualizing models, logic and probability theories; arise from consciousness/mind and all of these listed don't and can't exist without consciousness. “Consciousness” or the “Mind” accounts for all reasoning with nothing left outside of this self-awareness that is able to encounter or reason reality otherwise.
Consciousness is the substrate of any possible claim to knowledge and thus the starting and ending point to posit a reality or any truth. Why would one limit themselves to posit empiricism (science's founding principle) as the only method of truth, which is also a product/idea of “Mind” but leads to a world-view that to denies one's self, the objective reasoner, as no more than mere biochemical illusory as the result of it's assertions. Empiricism states that knowledge must be restricted to those objects which can be perceived by our senses. At the same time empiricism requires non-empirical foundational presuppositions and these presuppositions are not material themselves, they are metaphysical. Empiricism must assume mathematics, logic and human reason trustworthy; and that the Universe is rational and in line with a rational human consciousness/mind because these are not physical objects which can be perceived by any of our five senses. Mathematics, logic and reason originate and reside in the metaphysical consciousness, the mind. These metaphysical conceptual constructs can not be tested/falsified outside of themselves empirically thus are asserted as objective.
Empiricism alone is self-refuting. The theory that all knowledge is limited to what can be empirically known is itself, incapable of being known or demonstrated empirically. When adding the fact that empiricism can not answer for any trustworthy substrate for knowledge that is solely metaphysical (one's self, the objective reasoner); and the fact that the only substrate for claimed knowledge is “one's self, the objective reasoner”, shows empiricism as fallacious at it's core claim of being the only methodology for knowledge. Mind/consciousness is “one's self, the objective reasoner” and only possible source for any claim of knowledge to and of reality. Science may be able to explain what humans are but science can never inform us of who we are; one's self, the objective reasoner to and of reality.
C.S. Lewis describes the moral issue from within conscious beings reasoning like this;
"My argument against God was that the universe seemed so cruel and unjust. But how had I got this idea of just and unjust? A man does not call a line crooked unless he has some idea of a straight line. What was I comparing this universe with when I called it unjust? If the whole show was bad and senseless from A to Z, so to speak, why did I, who was supposed to be part of the show, find myself in such violent reaction against it? A man feels wet when he falls into water, because man is not a water animal: a fish would not feel wet. Of course, I could have given up my idea of justice by saying that it was nothing but a private idea of my own. But if I did that, then my argument against God collapsed too--for the argument depended on saying that the world was really unjust, not simply that it did not happen to please my private fancies. Thus in the very act of trying to prove that God did not exist--in other words, that the whole of reality was senseless--I found I was forced to assume that one part of reality--namely my idea of justice--was full of sense. Consequently atheism turns out to be too simple. If the whole universe has no meaning, we should never have found out that it has no meaning: just as, if there were no light in the universe and therefore no creatures with eyes, we should never know it was dark. Dark would be without meaning." ~C.S. Lewis
Are human observations objective and rational? Is the Universe rational? Because we can not escape our consciousness to test or falsify these question, they are assumed to be objective and rational. Every claim to knowledge originates and is filtered by consciousness and no knowledge exists outside of consciousness to prove otherwise. Calling one conscious experience "objective" over any other is fallacious; including logic over emotions or mathematics over morality. Logic and mathematics can not be falsified/tested outside of their own claims as being objective. Emotions, morality, freewill and self awareness are also emergent phenomena of consciousness. Why posit logic, reason and mathematics as trustworthy and objective and the first group not? The second group can not be validated or falsified outside of their own assertions; so what are you appealing to in order to claim the first list as mere biochemical illusory but value the second list as trustworthy and objective?
I don't deny the practical use of science just as I don't deny the practical use of objective moral truth in the justice system and laws. I simply appeal to morals being objective as one would claim mathematics to be objective as in 2+2=4. One first has to assume consciousness is rational and that the universe and experience holds these same rational limitations. Is truth in morality of less value than logic, or less true? Is the life of a psychopath with a 140 IQ but without any empathy of more value than the life a kind man with just a 60 IQ?
Freewill to choose ill-moral behavior or even prefer ill-moral behavior may seem to not be objective but once the ill-behaved is treated "badly" they will always contests this as cruel or wrong. Anyone as the victim of ill-moral actions will always desire to escape said ill-moral actions placed on them. This seems to lead to moral objectiveness. Many people may claim to be pro-abortion but if given the “choice” that they themselves stand in as the aborted, only the suicidal would volunteer. No one that values “Choice” would want to be aborted themselves other than the suicidal. The question then would be, not if abortion is moral but is suicide moral. This leaves no doubt about the question that abortion is ill-moral; meaning that the normal person that is pro-abortion would not want to be aborted themselves unless suicidal. Suicide is already against the law, so why is suicide against the law but abortion not?
I don't deny reason, logic or mathematics as objective, I just understand the assumptions one must make to assert they are "objective" and apply the same to all results of un-testable consciousness. The error is with someone asserting objectiveness in some results of consciousness and subjectiveness in others without outside "proof". These others would include self-awareness, emotions, moral conviction and freewill. Human consciousness includes all of the above and favors none!
Not really. We don't need a theory of consciousness in order to have knowledge, objectivity, or argue against the claims of religion. We have good reasons to trust logic, evidence, and reason, as they have given us science, technology, increased life spans, cures for diseases, and a host of other things. Religion, not so much as they say these days.
Cool story bro, it just needs more dragons and sht.
J
*****
franciso7
Sorry it took so long to reply back. Sure, I am getting active again in writing and on my channel and Google+...
first guy pretty much gives a lecture on philosophy for all of university. good!
first guy mostly talked out his ass
@Gui Deandrade - yep, he spoke hundreds of words, but said absolutely nothing
Despite being a relatively vigorous proponent of atheism and justified belief, I thoroughly enjoyed the theist in this discussion Keith Ward.
Thanks for the kind words towards Dr. Ward. If you have time, I'd recommend you spend some time reading theist philosophers just so you can see the different worldview. As hard as it was for me to stomach down some of the New Atheist writers, it was worth it (as a theist)
Fantastic debate, probably the best one I've seen on the matter of theism. Keith made a fantastic introduction and laid down the arguments for theism very well, from which I learnt a lot, however there's no question that Arif mopped the floor in terms of the actual debate.
And you don't question the possibility of confirmation bias?
What Arif should have asked is for a method of justification that works rather than asking for evidence because I am not sure whether empiricism and repeated tests can be applied to a priori reasoning, so another method of justification must be given by the religious.
At 1:00, the Rev admits to feeling desolation. This extends the problem with his argument because atheists also experience and resolve it.
As a free willed (necessary to even be able to make an intellectually free judgment) , rational being of purpose and value.. in a stunningly , impossibly intricate and beautiful world of truth and goodness... its utterly impossible for most rational people with normal minds to deny a supreme being.
This.
The existence of free will is contradicting atheist views.
Free will exists, so must a higher being exist who gave us this ability to even able to thinkg and decide on our own and not just "follow orders" which are produced through our neural braincells processing data.
Can you explain why you're convincing we have free will? Because the pool of libertarian philosophers seems to be extremely small and shrinking every day.
We have evidence for why some humans have and still believe in gods.
Drilling into the christian story it threatens believe or suffer!
The Rev doesn't want to suffer. At 1:13 he states that he comes to it by way of his culture/upbringing.
1:00:18 being agnostic on materialism shouldn't make you agnostic on the possibility of a God too?
Atheism and agnosticism aren't mutually exclusive. The former deals with belief while the latter deals with knowledge.
Well in that case energy is matter right. Still not sure how you are equating the two?
I think Professor Ward didn't win the debate because he didn't give his argument full justice. He was making more of a plausible inductive guess about a greater mind creating a world (that we happen to interact and be affected by) in a similar way that we create our reality by creating a perception of reality (which is the reality we cannot help but live in.) He bases this guess on the proposition that we can't be more certain of an "objective" reality than the reality that we create for ourselves. It is a bit of a leap but it isn't as baseless as Arif's example of the possibility of trees sprouting limbs and walking.
I do feel that Arif doesn't make as much of a positive case for how to act in the world or at least leaves it incomplete. He acts more as a skeptic in this case. I feel like he potentially could but that his attention was drawn to other things. I still find his argument more convincing but he should be willing to provide a decent alternative that is more helpful to people who use religion to function in the world.
You can't observe a thought but we all accept thoughts are real.
Hmm depends on how you look at it
@@loominatyconfirmed5774 I don't mean observing brain activity or someone's facial expressions. ... I mean the actual thought itself. ..that's in the supernatural.
Grogster2007 pretty sure that justification makes wind supernatural
@@christopherhun6552 Don't quite know what you mean by that but we can measure observe and experience wind so how does that correlate with my statement?
Grogster2007 You can measure observe and experience thoughts to
It drives me nuts when educated men attempt to deny they have a worldview. *EVERYONE has a worldview.* It is literally impossible to exist & not have one. Some people may not have thought about their worldview much or questioned what they believe & why they believe it... but they still have a worldview regardless. You can't just not have views about the reality in which you exist.
Very thought provoking.
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Arif was wrong on world views at the beginning. There are competing world views, and some may be more wrong than others.
Otherwise, little everything Arif said was unreasonable, while the diametric opposite was the case with Keith.
1.01.25 there is the true point ….
people see their lives as a mess and they want to change it . to make it better ..
what they seem they do generally is avoiding the effort and the work and they just adopting miracles and gods and on the way the try to find reasons to back up the faith they accept as saviour…
i much better prefer to do psychoanalysis and find out about myself, and find out my fears, the root of my anger, really ask myself how i can be better etc.. i like to create my own ethics and try them out and see what makes me and my surroundings happy..
all this requires a lot of time , effort, work, which is the very reason one can end up being a really good person, awaken and fulfilled ….
this is the advice that i give to all my friends and people that i love.. together we think, we evolve, we value our relationships and we are doing great without any superlative force of any kind …
1.26… 1.26 … same with poseidon .. christianity exists only because there are many believers.. when no believers around then it will die as so many other religions ..
fffffff .. cant wait …
..its known why religion survives and why many people use it .. look at behavioural patterns, neurobiology, psychology, and you will find maaaaany good reasons as to why this happens …
Is psychoanalysis pseudoscience? Popper accused Freud of that. Popper did not devalue Freud's work, he only said to be conservative about what is called science.
Does all of that replace philosophy? We haven't even met one other alien species to "compare notes" with, and you are claiming "It's all done."
54:53 agree with Arif, 'we got all our lives to make the decision'...
@58:00
Ahmed: The evidence doesn't decide the issue for me.
Ward: What does?
Ahmed: Further evidence.
If you'd just listen carefully...He said that the evidence doesn't decide the issue for him, and nothing does. He's undecided in awaiting further evidence that will lighten the issue.
Yeah, I mean Reg is totally wrong. Arif says there is currently not enough evidence to decide the issue either way. But more evidence coming to light in future may be sufficient to decide the issue. There's absolutely no contradiction in the two statements: "Currently X is not the case" and "in future, X may be the case." It's not just that these are consistent, it's more that I'm baffled by why anyone would think they aren't.
Read as: The *current* evidence doesn't decide the issue for me.
Only One possible truth without contradiction
yet
Many possible sources for meaning?
Holy shit! A god debate with 4,500 views and only 67 comments. THIS has to be a first and quite possibly a miracle. :-)
Nice job Arif picking apart Ward. Like Ward and all other religious people on the topic of prayer and the emotion of feeling God is false. Think of how love feels and the heart ache is that God or just human emotions. You feel something in prayer and such cause you want to consciously or not like watching a movie and start crying over something that has nothing to do with you in life but your emotions want to relate
Keith Ward: "we now know that thought arises in the material brain. Can thought be independent of the material? Of course it can!"
Am I stupid? I can't follow this.
No, it's fair. In all honesty, I'm still open to the idea of whether thoughts and ideas can be said to exist independently of matter (very boring philsophical debates about this), but I suspect they don't. At the VERY least, seems pretty reasonable to question whether they can, and very presumptuous to base an argument on the idea that they can.
analytical thinking and logic in general has its boundaries and because its the best tool we have to analyze the wotld it doesnt mean there arent things beyond our perception/understanding
I have had experiences every bit as weird as Keith Ward's. But when it comes down to it, you feel "impossibly" extreme elation. From that it is quite grandiose to project that you know the creator of the universe on a first name basis, and know how the universe is constructed. People are so conceited that any voice in their head has to be god and any extreme feeling must be the holy spirit.
This is not grandiose. The Creator God, Our Heavenly Father came to earth, Emmanuel, meaning God with us, and His earthly name is Jesus.
He loved us enough to want to save us from our sins and died on the cross and took our punishment for our sins which is, He paid the price for our sins and rose from the dead, conquering sin and death. He endured this because He loves us and He wants a relationship with us.
When we trust in Jesus's death on the cross, which was payment for our sins and that He rose from the dead, that proved He was who He said He was, and we ask Him to help us repent of our sins and grow in the Lord Jesus each day, one day at a time, we are saved from our sins.
We are sons and daughters of God. He wants a relationship with us. Our choice to receive His free gift of His sacrificial love by paying for our sins, those of us who choose to decide to receive His free gift, will have abundant eternal life with Him in Heaven.
When anyone chooses to reject His free gift of forgiveness, upon death with unforgiven sins, will be separated from Him for all eternity. Those who choose to reject Him won't be forced to spend eternity in Heaven with Him.
They will be separated from God for all eternity, paying the price for their own sins.
@Polaris Pike I don't see it as grandiose. I also don't feel like I know every thought of God and when I'm led or taught by His Holy Spirit. It is humbling to be a child of God because God chose to save us, and we are so thankful beyond what we can imagine. We actually cannot be thankful enough.
If people feel grandiose, perhaps some people may feel that way, it is the wrong way to feel. I feel humbled and thankful that the Creator of the universe and of me and all mankind, loves me so much that He wants to have a relationship with me.
I'm very humbled by it. I certainly don't think I know anything close to what God knows and when the Holy Spirit leads me, I feel He chooses to and I'm thankful for His guidance.
I don't feel grandiose about it at all. God is choosing to love us and He chose to save anyone who calls upon Him for salvation.
Those of us who humbly reply to receive His salvation and then are helped by His guidance, do it with thankfulness and He won't teach us everything He knows, and His Holy Spirit chooses to guide and teach when He does.
We humbly accept all that the Lord our God gives us. I don't feel grandiose if the Lord our God offers to us what He offers and those who humbly accept this, have the right attitude.
When God offers us what He offers us, it is meant to be received with a humble heart and not with a grandiose attitude. It is He who offers what He offers us and gives what He chooses to give us.
@Jim Scott God didn't created us to sin and then need to be saved. He created us and gave us free will to obey Him.
His commandments are for our good, but we all choose to disobey Him.
It's our fault. You can believe what you choose to believe.
You will be blessed with eternal life with Him if you receive the forgiveness He offers and repent of your sins, which means turn away from sin, and ask God to help you live for Him and pray, study His word, and grow to be more and more like Jesus.
Or He won't force you to want Him and receive His forgiveness. You have free will to reject His forgiveness.
He gave us free will to choose Him or not. If you die without receiving His forgiveness, you will be separated from Him for all eternity just as you chose to do, paying the price for your unforgiven sins.
If you want to believe it's foolishness, that's the choice you make.
@Jim Scott How is this a threat? I only say what God offers. You can choose to believe this or not, which you don't believe.
If you don't believe in God and what He offers, how can there be a threat to be in Hell for all eternity?
If you believe it's nonsense, you have free will to believe that. If you believe it's not true, then how can I threaten you with something you think is nonsense and you believe isn't true?
Expressing what I believe is just telling you what I believe. You don't believe it. You say your point of view, just like I say my point of view.
That's all that's going in here.
@Jim Scott We will agree to disagree.
Early the Rev. skips from there is material (matter) to spritual. What does he skip over students? Energy. A brain, matter, produces thoughts, energy, both measurable.
Not trying to be rude, but what's your point?
He shows himself to be ignorant about basic physics and therefore how it is used to provide evidence for reality.
Ok, I see now.
Well said.
Excellent conversation.
1:00:18 OWNAGE BY ARIF
Hasan Mohammad Owed? I think you don't comprehend the debate. His arguments were riddled with ugly contradicting logic. This video shows how atheism/material is ultimately intellectually indefensible.
Functional Savants Could you give m an example of such 'ugly contradictions'?
Yes. The assertion that something can't be known unless it is observed or empiricism is illogical in that it can't explain the non-empirical evaluation of the observation being experienced. This evaluation dictates the nature of the observation. So if the dictating factor of the observation is of a non-empirical fashion that ultimately is of a metaphysical nature, then how can one assert that material is a dominant force over sentiment?
I rest my case.
It's not 'ownage'. It's pure foolishness. Arif is a humean agnostic who says he's agonistic about everything but acts and lives as if he believes in the things he's agnostic about.
Skepticism is simply intellectual dishonesty. Moreover, he believes in a skeptical outlook of the world. This belief itself has no 'evidence' in the same category arif is looking for.
Sorry. Not ownage.
E = mc^2
@@zgrprod 42*
Dude! this looks pretty good! :)
Keith ward didn’t really give any arguments here. He did better against Dennett. This was pretty hard to watch
Great discussion
1:29:55 "There are no serious conferences that discuss whether a man can come back to life after being dead for three days."
🤣🤣🤣
Kevin Reagan one and a half days
You can put it into practice.
"The great I amness" Its a cool idea.
I was waiting for the i think therefore i am line on a few occasions
Despite the quality of debate, I was disappointed with the inclusion of Father Christmas (and the tooth fairy, by a chairman trying desperately to be funny). An analogy is not an argument. It is an exercise in intellectual sleight of hand. At its heart, the point made is, Father Christmas does not exist, therefore god does not exist. You take one thing which no adult believes in and then clam it is the same thing as something believed in by many people, and, about which, people like Neil Degrasse Tyson are agnostic. If you are lucky, it will provoke laughter, which usually represents the death of reason. I suspect Tyson is not agnostic about Father Christmas, the tooth fairy, or, indeed, Poseidon. I can listen to that sort of thing from Bill Maher, who, at least, can land a joke. I don't need to hear it in a serious discussion.
Atheism is the view that there is no God, why does metaphysical naturalism or materialism follow? Also logical laws under an empiricist view, as I understand it, are based on what we observe (based what we can understand of possibility) rather than a sort of ontological dualism.
43:00 that is correct that certain things you come across in your every day life you can expect smaller amounts of evidence... And be reasonable in believing such thing. You say you have a dog it's reasonable to believe you because it doesn't really matter if you do or don't.
I was the proper is this shin becomes more extraordinary it needs more extraordinary evidence. So for something just to be possible in the likes of an extraordinary claim like a God it needs extraordinary evidence not just being possible.
The weights of the claim should have equal weight of evidence. You shouldn't just believe somebody was up abducted by aliens. Most would agree that requires an extraordinary amount of evidence. Not the same as if somebody said oh I have a dog.
+thetruhoss Interestingly, much of Professor Ward's discussion right at that minute mark decidedly skirts around the issue of truth. Yes, people often long for an experience to take them out of the drudgery of everyday experience. People want to connect together and with a 'mind greater than theirs," or to connect with a "love that comes from a source other than themselves" Those are all correct appraisals of why people want those things. I note he doesn't specifically say at this point it comes from an actual ontological deity.
But that doesn't mean that such a mind exists in reality other than as an abstraction or metaphor, which it could exist as with just as much power in the realms of togetherness and longing.
The issue, of course, is that many religious people would listen to this and call him a liberal heretic. What he talks of sounds much closer to a kind of philosophical pantheism, or a liberal Christianity. This will not be news to him - he's been subject to those accusations for decades now, on most important Christian doctrines on which he stands or has stood aside aside from orthodoxy, including inerrancy, hell, PSA, Trinitarianism, etc.
I have less of an issue with that kind of philosophy, it's relatively harmless and can be safely ignored when it comes to truth and reality, although it sound suspiciously like wishful thinking. Unfortunately, a great many religious people actually believe in an actual God who judges and makes demands, and follow a religion that requires adherents to make demands of those who are not adherents.
Why is there marine fossils on Mount everest if the flood never happened
Uhhhh continental drift? I mean, Mt. Everest would've never existed if the indian and eurasian plates never collided with each other. Due to this collision, the ground that may have been originally underwater sprung up which eventually formed the himalayas. Plus considering how sea level rose and fell over the lifetime of earth even before humans existed then the plausibility of fossils being found everywhere is possible.
If the ark happened where did all the water go? How did they carry viruses like cancer on the ark ? Why do we still have plants? They would have all drowned being under water. How would the ark carry every animal (including dinosaurs) on earth? Not to mention they needed to have aquatic animals as well since fresh water animals can’t survive in salt water and the other way around. How could they survive with so much methane and only having one window ? How did the terminates not eat the boat ? How could someone make a boat that big and be able to float when the worlds best boat makers couldn’t even come close to the size and what they did make couldn’t float? How come there are stories of the same exact events predating Christianity by hundreds and some thousands of years? Your beliefs are pure idiotic and go against all logic, physics and reality. Wake up there is no god.
@@Thechitogekirisaki im not a theist but your comment is not very informed
All kids outgrow Father Christmas, because they find out that everyone who made them believe in him, deceived them on purpose for fun and innocent reasons.
On the other hand... it is because of the sincere belief of those who made you believe in God or Atheism, that most people stick to the beliefs of their parents or those they look up to.
He totally misses that the credibility of the witness is paramount for anyone's belief.
Who's supposed to be studying for a high school science exam but instead is watching philosophy debates
ME!
If you have ever had an operation under general anesthesia, you know consciousness is not continuous. You watch yourself fade and disappear and after the operation is over, pop back into being, with no sense of time passing. Your consciousness simply was not there during the operation. It is quite different from going to sleep where your consciousness enters the dream state.
I know anesthesiologists who believe in God.
myfriend280
>I know anesthesiologists who believe in God.
Yes, all doctors believe they _are_ god.
myfriend280
So what?
I don't remember the context of this statement as it related to the video because I haven't seen the video since the time I made the statement. But I believe my point was along these lines. Whatever Roedy is saying about anesthesia as it relates to consciousness and the survival of the mind after the death of the body--again, whatever he is saying about that-- an anesthesiologist who believes in God knows all of what he's saying and then some and yet it has no effect on his belief or disbelief in God or the afterlife. So Roedy's point is neutralized.
Here's an interesting question, how does one know one was conscious moments ago?
I could imagine a flying spaghetti monster what's the difference from a flying beard monster
If a flying beard monster is what you think of God, then there's no difference.
Nobody wants to say, "Resurrection or resuscitation"?
Is Arif Ahmed a muslim?
Professor K Ward didn't seem to get much help from his invisible friend in this debate.
And there goes the civility . . . .
From listening to the debate I'm unable to see where civility has anything to do with it. Perhaps you could deliver some viable evidence that would, if there were any, support any aspect of theism, supply viable evidence and there could be a Nobel Prize somewhere there in the offing for you Ms Bacon!
I've not been uncivil just pointing out a relevant point without the use abuse of any kind. Have a read or listen to Douglas Adam's quotes about not discussing religion, he sums up the religionists problem in a nutshell.
@@tamarabacon7998
@@jimvanlint8043 Doubtless you are "unable to see where civility has anything to do with it" since the irrelevance of civility is status quo for most atheists when interacting with theists. This debate is an outlier in that "humble atheist" is rather oxymoronic. But God's existence is off-topic here--that was the point of the debate, not my comment. The fact that you either didn't get that or chose to ignore it further validates Doug Wilson's observation . . .
There are two tenets of atheism:
1. There is no God; and
2. I hate him.
on the basis of this /slightly slanted debate/ duh......... ahmed killed it
Ahmed keeps saying "good" or "right" in a very annoying way after every question, why?
Kare Sevill Da fuq...
I was expecting a better show from a Professor... :-(
The bible describes a god far more bizarre than a flying spaghetti monster. The only time a "natural" god arises is during debates when theists attempt to prove that A god exists, when they prune off much of the craziness.
Science and medicine sucked 4000 years ago to so what's your point?
The flying Spaghetti Monster never killed nearly all humanity by drowning in a story. The biblical god is so very crazy that it even hurts.
One day the flying spaghetti monster will appear and really shake up a lot of atheists. The existence of God, to me is indisputable, because I have defined the term God as the "source and reason behind reality" or "the answer to the ultimate question". What form this God might take I am very open to, spaghetti based, mathematically based, supernaturally based...this helps me to see that we all share the same curiosity and maybe "purpose".
Nobody observed the Big Bang.
exactly. both sides offer only speculations and i dont understand why atheists feel like they have a stronger case against theists. both world views are just sides of the same coin
@@norahkalunda1234 Yeah right? a computer works on speculation, and you go and build a bridge based on speculation. Of course, you make a plane fly on speculation.
@@Espectador666 damn. Your rhetorical questions are top notch. Typed this comment when I was still battling my faith.... totally out now
Well that was an hour and a half I'll never get back
"Belief in a mind without a body is logical" ? What more proof does one need that philosophy's bunk?
Peace
that itself is a philosophical statement.
numbers can exist abstractly. Why cant thoughts?
Michael Burgendy because thoughts can't exist without a mind which is synonymous with a brain. Show me otherwise and I'll concede.
Are you saying the laws of logic would not exist or numbers if there were no minds? There would be no truth. The laws are dependent on brains. Rationality is subjective not objective.
Michael Burgendy When did I say that? You're misconstruing my words. I'm saying thoughts do not exist without brains, which holds the mind. So Abstract thoughts don't exist. Its a false analogy.
abstract numbers do exist because they are independent of the human mind. Abstract thoughts do not. Because it is entirely dependent on a brain. You don't have a brain to think, then you don't have thoughts.
Unless you can show me otherwise, that's the case.
Arif won every aspect of this debate. Keith was extremely subjective in his thought process
If evidence would lead the world, nobody would continue as nothing means nothing in the end. So the evidence thing is not a good argument. I don't think that Einstein spent his life trying to understand the universe is because he had evidence that it was worth something.
According to you..
So beautifull. You are being so sweet and helping!
Welcome to the english class! Thank you. How's your second language? Your english might be much better than mine, but I thought that we were talking about something different than the language.. You seem to be like many people that give their opinion on the web which is you are trying to win something while I am not.. By the way, I will be happy to be revised as you seem to be a master of the english language.
You won! Not sure what though..
Who is this guy anyway?
I'm just laughing about how nearly everything Aristotle said was false.
I thought any philosopher worth its salt would not use a modified version of Pascal's Wager. But i guess that this philosopher from what I heard is not really worth his salt.
Most artifacts found were more than expected and questionable to the actuality of how much that they followed the Christianity's history.
Is there a reason to believe in God-
1.We have the supernatural
Which confirms lucifers
Existence.
2. We have the history of Jesus and other historical records that match the bible.
3. We have knowledge given at a time when ,
That knowledge was unknown to man, until at least a thousand years later. When it was discovered via scientific means etc.
4. We have prophecies
To many for them to have been predicted by chance, to the point of being mathematically impossible to equate the likelihood of them
Coming true.
5. Science & philosophy -
Ontological argument.
Cosmological argument.
Teleological argument.
Infinite regress.
Consciousness/chakra.
Entropy.
Fingerprints.
DNA.
Symbiotic relationships.
Moral absolutes.
Ultimate truths.
6. Other evidences-
Bible codes.
Giants.
Fiction isn’t really fiction.
History of the movement for a NWO.
Secret societies.
Non control of reality/certainty.
knowledge as of yet not accessed by mankind.
Lack of documentation & evidences based on other theories.
Most amazing atheistic nihilism was from gregarious German leaders and reformers who decided to continue seeking God but not the self. Finding themselves getting closer towards Him by deception of themselves and others that they tried to falsely proclaim. Towards their end, they found many items by subterfuge and thievery.
Keith ward lost this one badly. I have seen Ahmed debate before and he usually loses but here Ward offered nothing.
+TBOTSS "he usually loses"
hasn't been my take on the debates i've listened to of his (admittedly only wlc & glen peoples). can you cite some of the debates that he lost in your view?
+Anarkayy Why do atheists always demean themselves by swearing and engaging in personal attacks?
TBOTSS i view swearing as a lesser sin ( ;) ) than lying.
+Anarkayy Who is lying - Keith Ward or A Seeker?
+Anarkayy The two that were held at Cambridge and went to a vote; Craig/Williams - v- Ahmed/Andrew Copeland(sp) and the three on three debate with Rowen Williams.
Because thousands of people believe in something , does not mean it is true. and is not proof.
If somebody gives you information who has a reputation for giving you solid information, it is rational to act on it. If somebody gives you crazy, implausible information without evidence(e.g. Christianity) then it is not rational to act on it.
Goethe, Swedenborg, Leibniz; three of the highest estimated IQs in history and all three were some form of Christian. All three had philosophical and rational reasoning behind their beliefs. One could go on and on naming all the great genius's of history who believed in some form of a supreme intellect. Newton and Einstein among them. This does not prove the existence of a supreme intellect, but it certainly disproves the argument ascribing irrationality to belief. I may or may not believe in an imaginary God, but you without a doubt sit upon an imaginary high-horse.
myfriend280
> Goethe, Swedenborg, Leibniz;
These men would not be Christian today. You would get yourself killed if you questioned the existence of god when these men lived. Christianity was universal. Atheism was not yet an option.
Just the same, Goethe was not your standard sheep-Christian;
He called the “fairy-tale of Christ” unacceptable. The crucifix, Goethe held, is “the most repugnant thing under the sun.” In letters to Lavater, according to J. M. Robertson, Goethe “wrote quite explicitly that a voice from heaven would not make him believe in a virgin birth and a resurrection, such tales being for him rather blasphemies against the great God and his revelation in Nature.”
Swedenborg was a fruitcake:
According to The Heavenly Doctrine the Lord had opened Swedenborg's spiritual eyes, so that from then on he could freely visit heaven and hell and talk with angels, demons and other spirits; and the Last Judgement had already occurred, in 1757. However, he tells us that at this day it is very dangerous to talk with spirits, unless a person is in true faith, and is led by the Lord.
Leibniz was a mystic, hardly a garden variety Christian
It does not mean that because a famous scientist may have believed in a supernatural being that that should in any way attribute credence to irrational beliefs. Newton, for example, believed in alchemy but we now know that that is just batshit silly; some scientists today believe in some sort of god (even the god of the Bible) and that also is batshit crazy.
myfriend280 I don't agree with his assessment but Einstein did not believe in an orthodox God. He was a pantheist following Spinoza and did not believe in a creator or "supreme intellect" which covers a lot of ground. Furthermore, few elite scientists today believe in a God as we can see from surveys of the American National Academy of Sciences, the Royal Society in Britain, and the list of Nobel Prize winners in the sciences.
I've read all of Spinoza's writings and I feel I have a strong grasp on Einstein's understanding of them as well as Einstein's own view of the question of God. Einstein deconstructed what he considered irrational views of God and these deconstructions are what atheists cling to in order to advance the notion that Einstein was one of them. In fact Einstein despised the explanations of affirmative atheists. That is atheists who positively affirmed there to be no God. Einstein toyed with the semantics of the term atheism as it related to himself and he toyed with the term "God" as it related to himself. In the end if we lay the semantics aside, Einstein believed the universe to possess a kind of harmony akin to intelligence. Understanding Spinoza's works is key to understanding Einstein's statements on the question of God.
WTF is this God people are talking about. I check out 100s of religions and they all claim different things. Then I go into philosophy only to find out that God, BY DEFINITION, is a necessary existence. Why does it have to be God? Why can't it be Ma? It's ridiculous to me how people are willing to believe in one magical beings but not others. The arguments for God could be use to defend made up beings. For example, I can say that Ma is a necessary being, the ground of all existence. Theist would probably say "No, it's not Ma, it's God." Well, how do we determine who's right and who's wrong. If we can't justify the truth of our claims, then why are we believing in such nonsense.
he is not a word he just see what u humans try to do while life moves ..
Huh?
How would a MIND experience any reality if unbodied?
Or is that experience purely conceptual and reality is but a dream?
This thinking leads to solipsism. I may just be a MIND in a dream like state. This position is pointless - it can not be supported nor refuted.
My only criticism is that if there is no proof or evidence how do we know its there. And what did we lose after father Christmas nothing. What would we lose without religion nothing we'd just crack on with our lives
Denmark Switzerland and Sweden proved this pretty admirably. Ditch religion, and life keeps going. In fact, it's usually a damn sight more peaceful.
@@sladegrey9272 it obviously shows that you don't need religion in this world. And even if in non God society if someone causes trouble or harm to others we just simply lock them up because the laws we have benefit for everyone.
@@dafyddllyrdavies6601 - Correct. The sooner we banish religion, the quicker we can move on from this mind manacle and focus on moving our species forward.
You cannot prove the counterfactual, so you really don't know what we would "lose without religion".
@@sladegrey9272 "[P]roved this pretty admirably"? Needs an explanation.
Con men say "How dare you not trust me". "How rude to demand evidence my business is legit. I am so insulted." "Requesting evidence is improper". "There is not time to check me out." That is Keith Ward's argument for accepting Christianity on blind trust despite overwhelming evidence it is both untrue and a con.
Don't feed the trolls
All thoughts ideas and theories have some basis in reality because the human mind can not create something that is not made of real constitutional parts. Poseidon is one of 12 Olympian gods and he corresponds to Pisces. He is part of an old system of Astrology. I doubt anyone would deny the existence of the constellation of Pisces for example. Father Christmas too is a conflation of multiple characters, ideas and principles all of which are based on reality. All evidence is ultimately subjective, and I would argue there is abundant evidence for anything. Whatever you believe to be true is true.
Yet you somehow dont see the irony in taking the time to point that out.
1 Corinthians 1:20
For it is written: “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise; the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate.” Where is the wise man? Where is the scribe? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know Him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe.…
Dr. Ahmed is fantastic, but he equivocated Dennett's position (and eliminativism in general). Consciousness is false in the sense that it's an illusion, not that we don't perceive its existence. Dennett just tries to show that "qualias" are like "phlogiston", a theoretical construct that doesn't hold water. That doesn't mean that we don't perceive we are conscious. Correct me if I'm wrong, TH-cam people :)
But that is an incoherent point to begin with. Consciousness is the area where all experience occurs. So if we perceive that we are conscious, then we are conscious, Because if we perceive anything at all, then we are conscious. So, in a sense consciousness not only is not an illusion. It is the only thing that can not by definition be an illusion.
haider939 Absolutely.
+haider939 Agreed. Although, I would say that consciousness is the Achilles' heel of philosophical materialism because we cannot describe consciousness and human experience in strictly materialistic terms. Would you agree?
Severus of Antioch absolutely. there are many problems with materialism to begin with but any notion that tries to explain consciousnesses in terms of just neurons and calcium and potassium ions interacting with each other will fall short of explaining consciousnesses. Unfortunately, most neuroscientists are materialists so it is unfortunate for us that the people who are most skilled at dealing with the contents of the brain dont have a clue of how to approach the problems of the mind.
haider939 You are a theist then, I presume?
What else would you expect from a Professor of Logic? He is a brilliant mind. I wish that he would debate Islamist/dawists.
If your house is being invaded you would call 911 for help If someone hit your car you would call a police for help If you are holding on to a piece of wood after your ship was sink in the dark of the night in the middle of the ocean, who you goanna call for help? You might say Ghostbusters! That is the time you are really being tested. We always in need of help from beings more powerful than us. That would The Almighty Creator Human created week. Just wait and let us not cheat our soul
God is a necessary being, the ground of all existence. It is problematic to attempt to prove God as in God's actual essence through logical propositions and testable data since God is not a thing, not consisting of composite parts, immeasurable and ineffable by definition. We can deduce that God exists from inner subjective experience, which is the only way we can encounter the eternal, immaterial being who connects to our immaterial consciousness. However, the untenable position of physicalism, largely based on new findings of Quantum Physics that states information as more fundamental than matter rather than a property of it, seems to point to an Ultimate Mind in which the universe has its being; an Idealist universe. Uniform, intrinsic intelligibility throughout existence doesn't prove God, but it certainly is a signpost of a Mind as the ground of all being who is beyond the limitations of our finiteness to comprehend without mediation. Consciousness itself implies that Mind is more essential than matter since all experience and knowledge is obtained through subjective apprehension (such as qualia) rather than through the mechanistic operations of the brain (the brain doesn't experience anything, it simply processes neural firings and governs motor function and thus is distinct from the mind). Therefore, the brain must be an emergent artificial processor of mind. Substance dualism is problematic since mind and brain as separate things cannot interact. Property dualism cannot be true since mind isn't a causal process. Therefore, an Idealist reality is the most plausible.
But if god has no detectable effect, he for all practical purposes might as well not exist. Your god is a bit like a coffee table decoration.
Roedy Green The improper rationale for investigating God is to ask what evidence you want to see. The proper rationale is to ask what kind of evidence you should expect to see. You have to be pure in heart, even if only for a moment, to see God.
myfriend280 Next time you see him, take a picture.
That brilliant reply deserves a brilliant response. Wait for it.
Michael Stieger Do you still believe in that big bang theory given to scientists by the pope?
I find your statement incredibly irrational. How many people have called on the same god to help them in situations where no other willing humans were around only to have no god intervene? Desperation of there being a god, gods, genies, wishing trolls, ghostbusters, whatever, will not change the situation or make you any less irrational.
What a load of nonses from Prof. Ward. Very weak arguments. Overly philosophical...if I wanted to know about the history of philosophical ideas then it's fine. He argued for spirituality and not the existence of 'God'. Belief and existence are two seperate things.
Overly philosophical? Philosophy isn't some sort of nonsense like theology. It studies logic, reasoning, mind, language, knowledge, reality, values, morality, philosophy behind other ideas/ subjects and more. Everything in philosophy has to be based on logic (logic is the study of valid reasoning logical does not mean true). Overly philosophical would mean overly logical.
If you have courage then face Dr Zakir Naik
Poseidon was not a real man with a geneology.Jesus was and is real and has a genealogy going back to Adam.
Keith Ward is a mixed bag, but this is by far one of his WORST performances. He was absolutely terrible here. Very bad (even face palmingly embarrassing) arguments. Just awful.
So the answer is no.
58:25 "You're making a decision, a commitment, for which you don't have evidence."
No, he's not. Not only is he not, that is literally the exact thing that YOU are doing, and admitted to earlier saying that you didn't need evidence to believe in a god.
Seriously, why is it so hard for some people to understand that not believing in something because there is no evidence to do so is NOT a positive belief? It's literally the lack of a belief. This shouldn't be that hard!
What "shouldn't be that hard" is understanding that "the lack of a belief"--in anything--can have consequences. (AKA "argumentum ad ignorantiam".) You just think you already know what they are.
@@tamarabacon7998 That would be correct if the position we are talking about states that because I don't have that belief, the belief is wrong. That's not what non-believers say. We say "I'm not convinced." Unless we add on "...and therefore you're wrong," it isn't argumentum ad ignorantium.
There is no "therefore X is wrong" involved here, just "I haven't seen X demonstrated."
I discovered God via sound and music.You're doomed to utter sound inevitably but not thinking.
Ahmed Dourid god doesn’t exist
@@Thechitogekirisaki You can't prove it as you can't account for how humans come to speak significantly using abstraction ( signified/signifier).If by chance you can't debate academically , better not pollute my mind with nonesense.Thx
@@ahmeddourid4293 No one is trying to pollute your mind man, the fact you are religious is enough to see its already polluted.
@@Espectador666 If you delve into science of sound , human speech and and how thought emanates , you will understand what i mean but you're short of cognitive flexibility and doomed into unilateral understanding of existence which is the highest form pollution and degradation.
Ahmed Dourid god is evil
Mr. Keith - So Poseidon is less a real god because people have not (by your standard) reasonable discussions about him. So it depends on human standards if a god exists or not? So you set the standard by which it is measured and surprisingly your god is in and the 100000 other goddesses and gods are out. Does this not admit that it is just your opinion?
1:25:45 "It's different because Poseidon isn't in our cultural language. You would be laughed at because Poseidon is a dead god."
🤣🤣🤣
Wow! Great counter! Definitely don't apply that to your own god...
I've watched, for my own mind, countless videos of fully grown adults somehow making hours of talk out of topics that deserve, at most, maybe 10 minutes to clear up. At this point, I'm kind of amazed at how they can keep babbling on about the same topic for their whole life, it's a horribly obvious sign of waste in terms of the allocation of human intellect.
Anything human kind did is liable to be fixed, repared, silenced or activated .this fact falls before MORTALITY as a law of physics .No science ever can silence (' death) or activate ( life) in humans.the day it happens ( it will never happen) then God is an illusion.Humanity is still striving to find better ways of living and coexisting .Why GOD bothers !
peter millican
....needs a hair cut
Seen him those philosophy of oxford videos. I’d be more worried about getting that mop chopped rather than debate philosophy
Arif refers to Keith's "interesting world view." I call Keith's views "the wild ramblings of a mad man."
Just because you have mind does not mean the entire universe must be organised on similar principles. That is a massive conceit. It is as childish as saying the universe must have feet, and must eat. For that grand an assertion, you need evidence.
A universe of mind and material is a harmonious universe. A universe of pure material is a universe which is crudely interrupted by the consciousness of sentient beings. The question is not reducible to empirical data alone. It's just as much a question of mathematical elegance.
I enjoyed that. Thanks. I really enjoyed listening to the winding train of thought that tried to lose everyone before it led to no god. Nice try.
...on which side? 😂
@@FakingANerve The theist, as most of them do, have no evidence of any god, so they attempt to baffle with bull shit. I find that other theists, with a huge case of confirmation bias, have an uncanny ability to shut off their reasoning faculties and just accept this crap.
@@davex444 there’s plenty of evidence for God. However one’s presuppositions determine how one interprets the evidence. In order to interpret evidence one presupposes the existence of universal principles such as identity over time, logic, numbers and ethics. All of these categories cannot be justified in an atheistic worldview and these categories most certainly can’t be presented empirically.
Can someone translate this non scientific gibberish for me?
It's not gibberish it's just a diferent subject/discipline you arrogant dipshit.
Again, can someone translate this gibberish into English?
"I don't understand this therefore it's gibberish".
First two minutes-
I disagree.
OK so replace father Christmas with UFO sightings.