Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed May 17, 2017 1:08 am
Please do tell.
You do it all the time, I'll not go back looking at all your previous messages to point it out, that's your problem. Far too much work for me to undertake. Here's the deal, when I think of it, I'll point it out as you do it again, and again, and again, deal?
No deal. I'm sincere. I want to see what you allege I missed. I'd like to address it. And there's no reason I should agree to your characterization if there is no evidence to support it.
You can't prove it. I can, but you can't.
You sound like you're about 12 now...
No, again you misunderstand. I'm not angry, upset or hurt...and I've studiously avoided insulting you personally. That I'm not entranced with your views can hardly be held against one on a philosophy forum. Defending your position is what philosophical debate is all about.
I'm calm...so why are you so agitated?
Regarding the Kampala analogy, I was not being merely rhetorical, but giving you information that is true. I've BEEN there. I'm safe in saying you haven't, based on your response. So again, in the case of Kampala, we find an illustration of something of knowledge that I can confirm but you cannot.
The point is that you have no way of saying what another person does or does not, can or cannot know when it comes to the issue of the Supreme Being. For as you see, you cannot even perform the same operation for something as earthly and accessible as the capital city of Uganda.
You don't know God, you say.
Correct!
I agree, if you say so.
OK!
I say I do.
But you can't, you can only believe!
You say I can't.
Because you can't prove that you can!
Of course I can't. God can, because He's God. But I can't tell him what to do.
Consider what you're asking. You're asking me if I can command the Supreme Being to perform for you, so you can come to have knowledge you lack. You can ask Him if He wishes to do so, as I have done: and if He wishes to, He will. But neither you nor I commands the Supreme Being to do anything. I could more easily ask Kampala to go and visit you. It has a greater chance of being at my command.
I think we can both acknowledge the reasonableness of that.
I'd like to know your justification for the claim.
I just said it immediately above! "Because you can't "prove" that you can!"
Non-sequitur. I can't "prove" to you a great number of things, nor you to me. That does not impinge on their existence or non-existence.
I have seen Kampala. You (apparently) have not.
You probably don't own an electron microscope, or a Hubble telescope. Does that mean that electrons and red-shift don't exist? You've not seen them. Are you going merely by the testimony of others, if you believe in them?
Then what do you really "know"? You're just having faith in those who HAVE seen them. But your knowledge is not special, then. You actually don't know they exist.
My position is that any creator of everything has no favorites, at least in any particular type group of things, as it would know of all abilities/inabilities, it's limitations.
So...wait a minute. You are actually going to argue that the Supreme Being you don't believe exists has a constraint on Him, that he can't "play favourites" and let anybody know what you don't know.
It's not a he, it's an it!
Ah! So now you claim you DO know the Supreme Being whose existence you were recently denying. You say you know He is an "it."
How, pray tell? I thought you had not seen Him?
...men of old made him up, in a world where women were property, and had no say. Name me one woman that participated in writing the scriptures...
Oh, that's funny.
Is this the famous "argument from sexism"? The Supreme Being doesn't meet modern feminists' preferences and expectations, therefore He doesn't exist?
See, I want to leave those sorts of horribly bad arguments unnoticed. But you want me to pull them out and showcase them for everyone? Why?
No it's because you're a loser...
Please do look up the
ad hominem fallacy. A person shouldn't get to the ripe and wise old age of 60 without knowing that personal insults simply are not arguments. Basic logic, that.
I know what knowing is, you obviously don't, so I'll refresh your memory yet again, for you thick of skull:
[/color]
"know1 [noh]
verb (used with object), knew, known, knowing.
1. to perceive or understand as fact or truth; to apprehend clearly and with certainty: I know the situation fully."
You're a Positivist?
You think that "know" means "clearly and with certainty?" But Positivism and Verificationism have been discredited, as you surely must know...or maybe not, I guess. Are you under the impression that empirical knowledge can ever be absolutely (though only inductively)
certain? Do you imagine that "know" means "know without doubt"?
But by that standard, no human being, scientist or not, "knows" anything.
For you do not even know for certain you will draw your own next breath.
Descartes handled this nicely a long time ago. Take a look at
Meditations, and you'll see it.
Clearly a supreme being could reveal anything! !
I think so too.
And it would reveal it to everyone as it would understand everything about us.
Non-sequitur. There's no reason to assume that. Your conclusion does not logically follow from your premise. There's no deduction from "can reveal anything" to "must reveal to everyone."
Consider it this way: I
can send you a picture of my family. Where's the deduction from that that I owe to send it to
everyone? If I can choose the person to whom I reveal myself, do you impute less ability to the Supreme Being? Is He obliged when I am not? Why?
truth reigns supreme, and I've come to know it well,
I can take you on and win easily, trust me!
Okay, have a go.
In process, dipshit!
I can't wait. Seriously. When will you start?
You have absolutely no idea how tenacious I can be.
Not a problem.
I invite all reasoned objections to anything I say. I'm just wondering if you have any of those left. You say you do, but you're spending a lot of time on being emphatic rather than substantial. Let's drop the insults, and see what you've got left.
Seriously...the
ad hominem stuff isn't worth your time. It doesn't bother me at all. It's just mildly boring, really. Let's see some arguments here. If you've got anything to say, it can be said calmly and rationally. If it cannot...well, then it's a very weak argument.