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Objective evidence of god/religion?

enaidealukal

Well-Known Member
Unless you can figure out some objective measurement and scale for revelation, no. It's subjective. You don't believe a religion because it is the sole objective Truth, but because it is a true way to approach spirituality, community, and ethics in your life: it resonates with you. There may be cultural motivations also, but again those are at least partly subjective.
Theism entails, at a bare minimum, claims of certain causal actions in the world by a god, so the objective measure is the same as it always is; empirical evidence that such events actually occurred. There's nothing subjective about it; if a god created the universe and/or a god intervened in it to cause various changes, reveal certain truths to particular individuals, and so on, there should be worldly evidence which can only be accounted for by the existence and intervention of such a god. Just like with any other sort of event.

People like to minimize the propositional aspect of religion- which is particularly inaccurate in the case of Christianity. Christianity consists, and has always consisted, of certain views or claims about how the world is- about what is true. Of course, truth-claims do not exhaust the religion, there is ritual and ethics and plenty more besides; but as I mention above, most of these are necessarily connected to the truth-claims of Christianity- they lose all significance without these truth-claims.
 

Darkness

Psychoanalyst/Marxist
I am not sure I assent with the implicit ideology present in the opening post. It begins with the presumption that evidence is the way we come to know God. For me, the notion of God-in-the-abstract is a philosophical point, not an empirical proposition. God is the depth of the world. As I am a panentheist, I do not think we need miracles to demonstrate the movement of God in the World. I do not care much for all that flashy demonstration. I rather find the movement of God every time we love another human being. I find God as the reality behind the phenomenal world, not out-there somewhere in the World.
 

dyanaprajna2011

Dharmapala
InChrist said:
I think the uniqueness of prophecy in the biblical scriptures and the accuracy of foretelling future events is objective evidence of the existence of the God who is revealed in the scripture, existing outside human time limitation, and omniscient.

How would you reconcile that with prophecy from other religions and scriptures?
 

DodGrile

New Member
As I am a panentheist, I do not think we need miracles to demonstrate the movement of God in the World. I do not care much for all that flashy demonstration. I rather find the movement of God every time we love another human being. I find God as the reality behind the phenomenal world, not out-there somewhere in the World.

this is why I joined this forum: a roman catholic panentheist. so god is present in human love, or is behind it, or both, or neither? is love a miracle? human love can be capricious, so is god also sometimes capricious? is god's love greater than, equal to, or less than human love from your perspective. what about the eucharist, isn't that a "flashy" demonstration of god's love?
 

Levite

Higher and Higher
Well, for one because we could get the ethics without all of the negative things religion brings to the table; divisiveness and intolerance, arbitrary reinforcement of the status quo, etc. For another, for at least some systems of religious ethics, such as with the Abrahamic faiths, the ethics is sort of a house without a foundation without the doctrinal claims; if God doesn't exist, then his ethical mandates have no force, and barren any other ethical criteria, the whole thing falls apart. But then, given such a criteria, we essentially have created a system of secular ethics.

I think your description of what "religion brings to the table" is a little...lopsided. Fundamentalism brings those things. But not all religion is fundamentalist. Maybe most religion isn't.

And while I agree that religious ethics tend not to work if one does not accept some of the premises for the religion, I presume that those who choose to follow a religion choose to accept some of the premises, for whatever reasons resonate with them.

Your argument is valid if one were proposing that only religious ethics exist, and/or that people be compelled to accept them, or one version of them or another. But that's not what I was saying. I mean that all religions should be in coexistence, alongside all schools of secular philosophy. If people embrace a religion and are able to derive their ethics that way, great. If they embrace a different religion and are able to derive their ethics in that way, great. If they embrace no religion, but are able to derive their ethics from one school of secular philosophy or another, great.

It kind of seems like you want there to be just one way that everyone thinks. But not only has that never been the case, I'm not at all convinced such a vision is at all healthy. Pluralism seems much more vibrant and rich, at least IMO.

Theism entails, at a bare minimum, claims of certain causal actions in the world by a god, so the objective measure is the same as it always is; empirical evidence that such events actually occurred. There's nothing subjective about it; if a god created the universe and/or a god intervened in it to cause various changes, reveal certain truths to particular individuals, and so on, there should be worldly evidence which can only be accounted for by the existence and intervention of such a god. Just like with any other sort of event.

People like to minimize the propositional aspect of religion- which is particularly inaccurate in the case of Christianity. Christianity consists, and has always consisted, of certain views or claims about how the world is- about what is true. Of course, truth-claims do not exhaust the religion, there is ritual and ethics and plenty more besides; but as I mention above, most of these are necessarily connected to the truth-claims of Christianity- they lose all significance without these truth-claims.

Sure, religions propose certain premises about how the world works. But those premises are based in revelatory traditions that, being spiritual and revelatory, are inherently objectively unprovable. What is provable is rational, but the spiritual and revelatory are inherently arational. This is why exclusivist, fundamentalist, aggressively proselytizing theologies are inherently poor theologies. But not all theologies are such-- not even within Christianity or Islam (Judaism does not believe in active proselytization)-- perhaps not even a majority of theologies.

Of course there are kinds of evidence within religion, but they are not ultimately objective: evidence of scripture or prophets, which ultimately means taking the prophet or the authors of scripture at their word for certain things, or of personal anecdotes. All of which are not nothing, it is true, but they ultimately objectively prove nothing, save to someone who has already decided to accept the fundamental premises upon which they are based.

So healthy religion is based on the choices that people make to believe elements of theology that are core to the religion in question, despite the inherent absence of objective proof of those matters. This is why profession of religion is called "faith," not "conclusions based on scientific evidence."
 

Darkness

Psychoanalyst/Marxist
so god is present in human love, or is behind it, or both, or neither?
Human love is the external expression of God's love. Human love is the form that Love with a capital "L" takes.

is love a miracle?
It depends what you mean by the word "miracle". I rather like the quote from Bruce Almighty where God says, "Parting your soup is not a miracle, Bruce. It's a magic trick. A single mom who's working two jobs and still finds time to take her kid to soccer practice, that's a miracle. A teenager who says "no" to drugs and "yes" to an education, that's a miracle. People want me to do everything for them. But what they don't realize is they have the power. You want to see a miracle, son? Be the miracle."

human love can be capricious, so is god also sometimes capricious?
I am not quite certain what you are getting at here. Could you perhaps expound upon the question a little more, so I understand what you intend to ask exactly?

is god's love greater than, equal to, or less than human love from your perspective.
God is the totality of love in the world and the potential well from which all love is drawn. So God's love is greater than any particular human love.

what about the eucharist, isn't that a "flashy" demonstration of god's love?
Speaking in tongues is flashy. Eucharist is a solemn philosophical faith rooted in the notion of essence and appearance.
 

nazz

Doubting Thomas
[FONT=&quot] I think the uniqueness of prophecy in the biblical scriptures and the accuracy of foretelling future events is objective evidence of the existence of the God who is revealed in the scripture, existing outside human time limitation, and omniscient.[/FONT]

Er, not so much. There are prophecies which never saw fulfillment (and they can't be foretelling some event yet to happen). And there are prophecies which did see fulfillment but many are not more compelling than lucky guesses. Plus there is the added problem of not always being able to determine exactly when a supposed prophecy was made (before or after the event).

Let me give you an example. If I stand on a street corner and prophesy that one day there will be a car accident on that corner what are the chances I will one day be correct? Would you consider me as someone who received a divine vision of the future if a car wreck someday occurred?

OTOH, if I say there will be a car accident on January 17, 2015 that will involve a 2013 blue Chevrolet and a 2007 white Nissan and that in one car will be a man named Bob Jones and his three children, Anna, Tom, and Frank, and in the other will be George Smith and his wife Carolyne, and I further describe the injuries they will all receive, then that is something worth noting.

Did you have a biblical prophecy in mind with that level of specificity?
 
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9-10ths_Penguin

1/10 Subway Stalinist
Premium Member
Beliefs are inherently subjective. If religions could be proven objectively, they would be sciences, not religions.

Personally, I think there is too much focus on "proving" the unprovable, rather than utilizing the moral and ethical lessons of religion to try and create more just and compassionate societies.
If a religion was based in truth, how could it be unprovable?

Sure, religions propose certain premises about how the world works. But those premises are based in revelatory traditions that, being spiritual and revelatory, are inherently objectively unprovable.
Any claim about the state of physical things is potentially testable, regardless of its source. Despite Steven Jay Gould's insistence that religion and science should be "non-overlapping magisteria", there's no shortage of religious claims about things in science's wheelhouse.
 

Levite

Higher and Higher
If a religion was based in truth, how could it be unprovable?

Because spiritual things are not physical phenomena. There is no scientific way to measure or analyze spiritual phenomena.

Any claim about the state of physical things is potentially testable, regardless of its source. Despite Steven Jay Gould's insistence that religion and science should be "non-overlapping magisteria", there's no shortage of religious claims about things in science's wheelhouse.

Again, the problem comes with the nature of the difference between religious worldview, which understands the universe as incorporating both physical and spiritual phenomena, and science, which does not. Hence, it will not work to examine religion scientifically.
 

9-10ths_Penguin

1/10 Subway Stalinist
Premium Member
Because spiritual things are not physical phenomena. There is no scientific way to measure or analyze spiritual phenomena.
What do you mean by "spiritual phenomena"? Religious claims run the gamut from "God loves us" to "the Earth is 6,000 years old" or "Lord Rama's monkey army built a bridge to Sri Lanka." Not all religious claims have a physical aspect, but many do.

Regardless, if something can be reliably measured at all, it can be measured scientifically. If it can be measured, then it can be tested. If it can't be measured at all, why believe it?

Again, the problem comes with the nature of the difference between religious worldview, which understands the universe as incorporating both physical and spiritual phenomena, and science, which does not. Hence, it will not work to examine religion scientifically.
... so long as religious claims have absolutely no effect on the physical world. While I'm sure there are some theists whose religion is that irrelevant to the real state of things, I think they're relatively rare.
 

Quintessence

Consults with Trees
Staff member
Premium Member
Feeling is a form of measurement. You can't feel love?

I wasn't going to participate in this thread, but you've got me curious. What metric is used to measure feeling? Fluid ounces? Cubic centimeters? Joules?

I can't say I've ever heard of anybody coming up with a good, quantifiable metric for feelings.
 

9-10ths_Penguin

1/10 Subway Stalinist
Premium Member
I wasn't going to participate in this thread, but you've got me curious. What metric is used to measure feeling? Fluid ounces? Cubic centimeters? Joules?

I can't say I've ever heard of anybody coming up with a good, quantifiable metric for feelings.

Why would you need to? Measurement doesn't necessarily entail quantification. Qualitative measurement (e.g. "I love A", "I don't love B", "I love C more than D") is still measurement.
 

Darkness

Psychoanalyst/Marxist
Why would you need to? Measurement doesn't necessarily entail quantification. Qualitative measurement (e.g. "I love A", "I don't love B", "I love C more than D") is still measurement.
The notion of measurement entails the notion of quantity. Saying X has weight and Y does not have weight is not a measurement. Measurement actually includes a qualitative and quantitative aspect.

Edit: On closer examination, I should like to revise/clarify what I had said. I do agree that feelings/qualia have both a qualitative and quantitative dimension. I can love x more than I love y. What I specifically take issue with is the idea that these qualia can be "measured" in a "empiricist-scientific" manner.
 
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9-10ths_Penguin

1/10 Subway Stalinist
Premium Member
The notion of measurement entails the notion of quantity. Saying X has weight and Y does not have weight is not a measurement. Measurement actually includes a qualitative and quantitative aspect.

Apparently, we're operating from different definitions of the word "measurement".

Regardless, semantic quibbles aside, my point was that if we can perceive aspects of a thing - whether quantitatively or qualitatively - then we can test for it. Bringing the idea of doing something "scientifically" is a red herring here. Science is just the rigorous use of logic to derive conclusions from evidence. If a thing is somehow beyond the reaches of science, it's beyond the reaches of human knowledge generally.
 

9-10ths_Penguin

1/10 Subway Stalinist
Premium Member
Edit: On closer examination, I should like to revise/clarify what I had said. I do agree that feelings/qualia have both a qualitative and quantitative dimension. I can love x more than I love y. What I specifically take issue with is the idea that these qualia can be "measured" in a "empiricist-scientific" manner.

Is any of this relelvant to the central question of this thread? Do you think that God is a quale?
 

enaidealukal

Well-Known Member
I think your description of what "religion brings to the table" is a little...lopsided. Fundamentalism brings those things. But not all religion is fundamentalist. Maybe most religion isn't.
These are not unique to fundamentalism. Indeed, dividing people into in-groups and out-groups and reinforcing existing social norms and structures are two of the evolutionary functions of religion in general; moreover, looking at the history of religion, one cannot say, while maintaining a straight face, that intolerance and divisiveness are unique to particular types of extremist religions- they can be found in virtually all eras, and most religions (including, surprisingly, Buddhism).

And while I agree that religious ethics tend not to work if one does not accept some of the premises for the religion, I presume that those who choose to follow a religion choose to accept some of the premises, for whatever reasons resonate with them.
Then the truth of those premises is significant.

Your argument is valid if one were proposing that only religious ethics exist, and/or that people be compelled to accept them, or one version of them or another.
Well, not really. I'm saying that, if religion offers no substantive literally true discourse about the world, and its proper contribution lies in ethics, then it would seem to be superfluous, since one can get the ethics without any of the other baggage religion brings to the table. Moreover, secular ethics is probably to be preferred anyways, since it makes moral quality a known quantity rather than being contingent upon the will of an unfathomable being.

It kind of seems like you want there to be just one way that everyone thinks.
Well, no, not really. But I am interested in truth, so the old cop-out of "to each their own, whatever floats your boat, blah blah blah" isn't really relevant here; people have every right to believe whatever they want. I, however, am interested in the truth of these various views; in which case, the truth-claims which form necessary, distinctive cores of various religions are extremely salient.

Pluralism seems much more vibrant and rich, at least IMO.
That's great as a social policy, but if we're engaging in scholarly endeavors, its just irrelevant; when pluralism includes views which make mutually exclusive truth-claims, we know that they cannot all be true, even if it is obviously fair and just to allow people to hold whatever views they wish.

Sure, religions propose certain premises about how the world works. But those premises are based in revelatory traditions that, being spiritual and revelatory, are inherently objectively unprovable.
This is non-sequitur; changes or events in the world have effects. Regardless of how knowledge of a particular event is acquired (such as by revelation), if the event actually occurred, this will entail worldly evidence. Thus, doctrinal claims regarding changes in the world can be evaluated in virtue of empirical evidence just as any other changes in the world can. Someone becoming informed of a change or event in the world via divine revelation would not mitigate the simple fact that these changes or events will, if factual, leave behind some evidence. For instance, if God covered the Earth with a flood, killing off virtually life on the planet, whether I found out about this through a divinely-inspired vision, an email, or seeing it first-hand, this event will entail empirical evidence.

What is provable is rational, but the spiritual and revelatory are inherently arational. This is why exclusivist, fundamentalist, aggressively proselytizing theologies are inherently poor theologies.
Theologies which take religious truth-claims seriously, on some level at least, are most definitely the majority of theologies, nor do they coincide with "exclusivist, fundamentalist, aggressively proselytizing" theologies. Even the most moderate theologians, e.g. Hicks, take some aspects of doctrine seriously (for Christian theologians, at the very least the existence of God, and likely the divinity of Christ). Does that mean they claim that such truth-claims are provable (as in, can be shown to a certainty)? No, this is a false dilemma; there are many things which are rationally argued for, and held to be truth-apt, which are not strictly provable. Religion has most certainly been considered one of these.

Of course there are kinds of evidence within religion, but they are not ultimately objective: evidence of scripture or prophets, which ultimately means taking the prophet or the authors of scripture at their word for certain things, or of personal anecdotes.
I'm not sure you're really thinking about what you're saying; think of the sorts of evidence NT scholars concern themselves with, concerning the historicity of various people, places and events in scripture. Clearly religious truth-claims can admit of "objective" evidence in exactly the same fashion that ordinary claims can. Maybe some of them cannot (such as "God exists"), but that should probably raise some red flags in itself.
 
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