Catholic church at it again. This time Holland.

[Coito ergo sum]

Seth, regarding the priest's claim to know about the afterlife, how to reduce time in purgatory, etc. you said, "So? What's your point? Perhaps they do know. Can you prove that they are wrong?"

What is advanced without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.

Of course...or not.

Accept something without evidence is arbitrary. One might as well accept a madman's claim to be Napoleon. Maybe he is.

Maybe you just aren't privy to the evidence.

There isn't any evidence.

If you proceed with your rationale, then there is no reason to disbelieve anything. Everything is plausible and all of science is no more substantiated than magic. We might not be privy to the evidence that the universe is upside down and sideways, and consists of trapezoidal shaped particles, each named Fred, which create reality by playing word games and charades among themselves.

After all, you might not be privy to the evidence.

They are human beings, and there is no evidence that they have any knowledge or information about supernatural or spiritual matters that anyone else doesn't have.

Based on the lack of any basis for their claims, their claims are baseless. QED.

In your view.

In any view. A claim without any basis, is baseless, by definition.

They claim to have a basis. You simply reject that basis and that claim. That does not make the claim invalid.

What basis are you referring to?

But then again you don't have faith.

Right, I don't believe something without proof or evidence.

Evidently, if you go looking for the evidence honestly and with an open heart, it's likely you will find it, or so my religious friends tell me. God, you see, is under no obligation to provide you with evidence unless he wants to do so, and evidently the requirement to be privy to that special knowledge is an honest and open heart. Now, how you go about that I'm not certain of, but my friends tell me that they did so, and they got the evidence they needed to believe.

Again, sophistry and begging the question. How do you know what god is or is not obligated to do?

I see no reason to disbelieve them or deny their experience since I don't know them to be delusional or liars.

Maybe you just don't have the evidence. On what basis do you deny they are delusional or liars?

In reality, priests are just people who are dedicated to education in their religion, and they DO have a hell of a lot of information about their religion that you don't have, and they spend many years studying in the seminary to achieve that knowledge. Whether you believe the knowledge they have or not is completely irrelevant. What is relevant is that THEY believe it, and so do the members of their church.

My suspicion is that most of them know they have no real reason to believe it. I can't prove that. But, I suspect it.

Your skepticism is evidently what prevents you from attaining the knowledge you seek.[/quote]

It's not knowledge you've spoken about. It's faith. Faith is not knowledge.

Those that do actually believe it concern me, because they are basing belief in some extraordinary things on nothing except some ancient writings and tradition.

Which they believe, based on their experiential evidence,

Point me to some report by a priest describing experiential evidence. On what basis do you claim that their beliefs are based on experiential evidence?

to be true. And so what if they are? So long as they aren't hurting others, and it makes them happy and helps them get through the day, who cares what they believe?

The religion itself hurts all of mankind. It infects humanity in its essence - it seeks to teach mankind to stop thinking, and accept that answers are "felt" and that it is o.k. to believe things without proof or evidence. It posits a totalitarian mindset, wherein the common man is a serf who prostrates himself before authorities. It posits infinite punishment for finite offenses, and in some cases even mere "lack of belief."

It is a house of cards, built for the control of the minds of the people.

It says that error is preferable to ignorance, which it is not. In other words, it tells the people "you want answers? here, believe this...at least it's something..."

And, Jefferson said it very well, and his words are as applicable today as they were then: "In every country and in every age, the priest has been hostile to liberty. He is always in alliance with the despot, abetting his abuses in return for protection to his own. It is easier to acquire wealth and power by this combination than by deserving them, and to effect this, they have perverted the purest religion ever preached to man into mystery and jargon, unintelligible to all mankind, and therefore the safer engine for their purposes."

And religion, particularly Catholicism, is much more complex and nuanced than just supernatural claims. It is deeply involved in human psychology and behavior and priests have a good deal of psychological training in addition to their "spiritual" training.

Catholic priests, particularly Jesuits, are some of the most intelligent and well-educated people on the planet, which belies your casual dismissals and insults, and some of the greatest philosophers of all time were Catholic priests.

I didn't opine about their intelligence.

Well, you do so implicitly when you disparage them because you don't think they have evidence for their beliefs.[/quote]

They don't have evidence for their beliefs. They have faith.

So whether or not you believe their spiritual claims is not the metric by which they are judged by their followers, who are the only important people in the equation. If they don't think they are being "fleeced," then they aren't being fleeced and they are receiving value for their investment in the church, which is the definition of a fair deal.

Well, certainly they may be snowed into thinking it's a fair deal. In my view, it's a snow job. Everyone is entitled to opine otherwise, though.

Given the fact that there are a billion of them, and in history more than that, including some of the greatest thinkers and intellects of history, I'd say it's you who has a lack of information, not them.[/quote]

Argumentum ad Populum again.

[Coito ergo sum]

You ask if they have special knowledge. They don't, they have faith, and because of that, they act as if they knew when they don't.

Er, they have faith AND special knowledge.

How do you know they have special knowledge? Where do they get it?

[Svartalf]

You ask if they have special knowledge. They don't, they have faith, and because of that, they act as if they knew when they don't.

Er, they have faith AND special knowledge.

No, because if they actually KNEW, they wouldn't need faith

[Horwood Beer-Master]

...Well, that may be true. Being in a hole in the ground decomposing may indeed be a "better place" than suffering in agony in a hospital bed.

Except being dead is not being in a place. Being dead is not being. If you are dead you exist only in the past tense. You are not in a 'hole in the ground', since the synapses and other essentials of the neural processes that once formed your thoughts and experience are nothing but worthless mush - it's that mush that's in a hole in the ground, you are in the past.

So the most honest thing that could be said to a grieving relative is "he's no longer in the bad place of suffering in agony in the hospital bed", but the reason he's no longer there is because he's no longer.

[Seth]

...Well, that may be true. Being in a hole in the ground decomposing may indeed be a "better place" than suffering in agony in a hospital bed.

Except being dead is not being in a place. Being dead is not being.

That depends on your definition of "being," or perhaps "nothingness."

If you are dead you exist only in the past tense. You are not in a 'hole in the ground', since the synapses and other essentials of the neural processes that once formed your thoughts and experience are nothing but worthless mush - it's that mush that's in a hole in the ground, you are in the past.

But is that "you" or is something else "you?" Are "you" nothing more than the electrical signals racing around your brain, or are "you" the sum of your parts, or more than the sum of your parts? You can say that the physical body of "you" is "being" in the ground while the other aspects of "you" may now reside somewhere else, from heaven to the quantum foam.

So the most honest thing that could be said to a grieving relative is "he's no longer in the bad place of suffering in agony in the hospital bed", but the reason he's no longer there is because he's no longer.

Seems more sensitive and respectful of the feelings of the survivors to be somewhat less...precise...about it. Funerals are, after all, for those who are still alive.

[Seth]

You ask if they have special knowledge. They don't, they have faith, and because of that, they act as if they knew when they don't.

Er, they have faith AND special knowledge.

No, because if they actually KNEW, they wouldn't need faith

Well, you can know some things and have faith about others, you see, so you're incorrect.

[Seth]

You ask if they have special knowledge. They don't, they have faith, and because of that, they act as if they knew when they don't.

Er, they have faith AND special knowledge.

How do you know they have special knowledge? Where do they get it?

I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt because they claim it, and I have no idea because I'm not privy to the special knowledge either.

[Svartalf]

You ask if they have special knowledge. They don't, they have faith, and because of that, they act as if they knew when they don't.

Er, they have faith AND special knowledge.

No, because if they actually KNEW, they wouldn't need faith

Well, you can know some things and have faith about others, you see, so you're incorrect.

Like I know I'll fall if I jump through the window but have faith about our getting to Mars in my life time?

Sorry, but in matters religious, there just isn't any actual, empirical, factual knowledge, it's all faith, and I suspect bad faith.

[Coito ergo sum]

You ask if they have special knowledge. They don't, they have faith, and because of that, they act as if they knew when they don't.

Er, they have faith AND special knowledge.

How do you know they have special knowledge? Where do they get it?

I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt because they claim it, and I have no idea because I'm not privy to the special knowledge either.

Technically, you don't even know that they really have special knowledge. All you know is that that they claim it.

You're guilty of the "Unfalsifiable Hypothesis" fallacy.

[Seth]

Seth, regarding the priest's claim to know about the afterlife, how to reduce time in purgatory, etc. you said, "So? What's your point? Perhaps they do know. Can you prove that they are wrong?"

What is advanced without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.

Of course...or not.

Accept something without evidence is arbitrary. One might as well accept a madman's claim to be Napoleon. Maybe he is.

Maybe you just aren't privy to the evidence.

There isn't any evidence.

No, there isn't any evidence that you're aware of that you are willing to give credence to. There is, however, evidence.

If you proceed with your rationale, then there is no reason to disbelieve anything.

And why is it necessary to disbelieve anything? Can you not simply have no opinion on a subject because you have no evidence that satisfies your need for proof? "I have no opinion regarding the existence or non-existence of God" is a far more rational response than "God doesn't exist because theists don't prove he exists." That is, after all, what actual "atheism" means, isn't it? What you're telling me is that you're not an atheist, who has a simple "lack of belief in gods," rather you are an "explicit" religious Atheist who positively asserts that God does not exist, but does so without any critically robust evidence of that claim, which makes it a religious belief every bit as much as the belief that God does exist.

Everything is plausible and all of science is no more substantiated than magic. We might not be privy to the evidence that the universe is upside down and sideways, and consists of trapezoidal shaped particles, each named Fred, which create reality by playing word games and charades among themselves.

After all, you might not be privy to the evidence.

Indeed. And God may be an advanced, non-corporeal intelligence inhabiting a neighboring membrane universe who created this membrane universe and injected a monoblock of infinitely compressed matter into it as a high-school science experiment...and you may not be privy to that evidence.

They are human beings, and there is no evidence that they have any knowledge or information about supernatural or spiritual matters that anyone else doesn't have.

Based on the lack of any basis for their claims, their claims are baseless. QED.

In your view.

In any view. A claim without any basis, is baseless, by definition.

They claim to have a basis. You simply reject that basis and that claim. That does not make the claim invalid.

What basis are you referring to?

That they claim God exists.

But then again you don't have faith.

Right, I don't believe something without proof or evidence.

Evidently, if you go looking for the evidence honestly and with an open heart, it's likely you will find it, or so my religious friends tell me. God, you see, is under no obligation to provide you with evidence unless he wants to do so, and evidently the requirement to be privy to that special knowledge is an honest and open heart. Now, how you go about that I'm not certain of, but my friends tell me that they did so, and they got the evidence they needed to believe.

Again, sophistry and begging the question. How do you know what god is or is not obligated to do?

I don't. I'm merely relating to you what I've been told about the search for God by those who claim to have found him.

I see no reason to disbelieve them or deny their experience since I don't know them to be delusional or liars.

Maybe you just don't have the evidence. On what basis do you deny they are delusional or liars?

Personal experience.

In reality, priests are just people who are dedicated to education in their religion, and they DO have a hell of a lot of information about their religion that you don't have, and they spend many years studying in the seminary to achieve that knowledge. Whether you believe the knowledge they have or not is completely irrelevant. What is relevant is that THEY believe it, and so do the members of their church.

My suspicion is that most of them know they have no real reason to believe it. I can't prove that. But, I suspect it.

Your skepticism is evidently what prevents you from attaining the knowledge you seek.[/quote]

It's not knowledge you've spoken about. It's faith. Faith is not knowledge.

Faith does not require an absence of knowledge.

Those that do actually believe it concern me, because they are basing belief in some extraordinary things on nothing except some ancient writings and tradition.

Which they believe, based on their experiential evidence,

Point me to some report by a priest describing experiential evidence. On what basis do you claim that their beliefs are based on experiential evidence?

On their personal statements to me. I'm sure, if you look, you can find many examples of personal testimony by people of faith regarding their experiences with God. Feel free to do your own homework in that regard.

to be true. And so what if they are? So long as they aren't hurting others, and it makes them happy and helps them get through the day, who cares what they believe?

The religion itself hurts all of mankind.

So you claim, sans evidence.

It infects humanity in its essence - it seeks to teach mankind to stop thinking, and accept that answers are "felt" and that it is o.k. to believe things without proof or evidence.

Isn't it? You can believe your wife loves you without proof or evidence, can you not? Not everything on earth or in the human mind requires objective physical evidence in order for someone to believe in it.

It posits a totalitarian mindset, wherein the common man is a serf who prostrates himself before authorities. It posits infinite punishment for finite offenses, and in some cases even mere "lack of belief."

So what? If that is what is required to create and sustain civilization and orderly behavior, it's an effective method of enforcing moral behavior. The law is no different, it to demands prostration before authority and punishment for offenses. Religion differs only in the severity of the punishment, which merely reinforces the impetus for moral behavior. Religious moral suasion is no different from secular moral suasion in that respect, and for a long time religion was the only, or at least the most effective tool of social control and moral enforcement.

It is a house of cards, built for the control of the minds of the people.

Perhaps, but so what? Some people evidently need that control, and like it. Government and civilization are "built for the control of the minds of the people" too, and both have survival utility to the species.

It says that error is preferable to ignorance, which it is not.

Upon what basis do you make this unsubstantiated claim?

In other words, it tells the people "you want answers? here, believe this...at least it's something..."

So? Evidently most people don't find comfort in the cold and uncompromising answers of science. Are they to be forced to give up those beliefs that help them and make their lives better and more enjoyable merely because you think that error is not preferable to ignorance?

And, Jefferson said it very well, and his words are as applicable today as they were then: "In every country and in every age, the priest has been hostile to liberty. He is always in alliance with the despot, abetting his abuses in return for protection to his own. It is easier to acquire wealth and power by this combination than by deserving them, and to effect this, they have perverted the purest religion ever preached to man into mystery and jargon, unintelligible to all mankind, and therefore the safer engine for their purposes."

And still people believe. Why is that, I wonder? Perhaps it's because most people need more than cold logic and reason to get through their lives. I won't deny them that, will you?

And religion, particularly Catholicism, is much more complex and nuanced than just supernatural claims. It is deeply involved in human psychology and behavior and priests have a good deal of psychological training in addition to their "spiritual" training.

Catholic priests, particularly Jesuits, are some of the most intelligent and well-educated people on the planet, which belies your casual dismissals and insults, and some of the greatest philosophers of all time were Catholic priests.

I didn't opine about their intelligence.

Well, you do so implicitly when you disparage them because you don't think they have evidence for their beliefs.[/quote]

They don't have evidence for their beliefs. They have faith.

Again, you don't know that, you are making a false claim based on no critically robust evidence to support it.

So whether or not you believe their spiritual claims is not the metric by which they are judged by their followers, who are the only important people in the equation. If they don't think they are being "fleeced," then they aren't being fleeced and they are receiving value for their investment in the church, which is the definition of a fair deal.

Well, certainly they may be snowed into thinking it's a fair deal. In my view, it's a snow job. Everyone is entitled to opine otherwise, though.

Given the fact that there are a billion of them, and in history more than that, including some of the greatest thinkers and intellects of history, I'd say it's you who has a lack of information, not them.[/quote]

Argumentum ad Populum again.

It's a valid argument in this case. They evidently know some things you don't, and you don't have any critically robust evidence that they do not.

[Seth]

You ask if they have special knowledge. They don't, they have faith, and because of that, they act as if they knew when they don't.

Er, they have faith AND special knowledge.

No, because if they actually KNEW, they wouldn't need faith

Well, you can know some things and have faith about others, you see, so you're incorrect.

Like I know I'll fall if I jump through the window but have faith about our getting to Mars in my life time?

Sorry, but in matters religious, there just isn't any actual, empirical, factual knowledge, it's all faith, and I suspect bad faith.

You don't know that, you merely believe it.

[Pappa]

We don't have to prove them wrong, they have to prove they're right. So far, zero evidence for them.

Actually, they don't have to prove anything. It's Atheists who are making the claim that God does not exist, so it's up to Atheists to prove that claim. People of faith are under no obligation whatsoever to prove the existence of God to unbelievers.

Seth, I'm assuming you're following this line of reasoning for sport or something as I know you're not stupid enough to believe it. Atheists have no obligation to prove the non-existence of something for which there is and has never been any credible, objective evidence. Just because millions of people have believed something for thousands of years, it doesn't shift the burden of proof. They still have the burden of proof and will continue to do so until they provide some verifiable evidence.

[Svartalf]

Beside the fact that my belief has more backing evidence (or less unbacked outlandish claims) than the other way around, and the fact that if they KNOW, it's funny how they've failed to give proper demonstration of that knowledge's factuality in the last 2000 years, in spite of the fact that doing so would have cemented their position for good and ensured their dominance?

[Coito ergo sum]

Of course...or not.

Accept something without evidence is arbitrary. One might as well accept a madman's claim to be Napoleon. Maybe he is.

Maybe you just aren't privy to the evidence.

There isn't any evidence.

No, there isn't any evidence that you're aware of that you are willing to give credence to. There is, however, evidence.

What is it?

[Gawdzilla Sama]

We don't have to prove them wrong, they have to prove they're right. So far, zero evidence for them.

Actually, they don't have to prove anything. It's Atheists who are making the claim that God does not exist, so it's up to Atheists to prove that claim. People of faith are under no obligation whatsoever to prove the existence of God to unbelievers.

Seth, I'm assuming you're following this line of reasoning for sport or something as I know you're not stupid enough to believe it. Atheists have no obligation to prove the non-existence of something for which there is and has never been any credible, objective evidence. Just because millions of people have believed something for thousands of years, it doesn't shift the burden of proof. They still have the burden of proof and will continue to do so until they provide some verifiable evidence.

Did you just accuse Seeth of debating honestly?