• Welcome to Religious Forums, a friendly forum to discuss all religions in a friendly surrounding.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to the following site features:
    • Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
    • Our modern chat room. No add-ons or extensions required, just login and start chatting!
    • Access to private conversations with other members.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon!

God and the Absence of Evidence Argument

9-10ths_Penguin

1/10 Subway Stalinist
Premium Member
No, the search is the evidence for the absence of the shovel.
Right: the search is evidence for the absence of the shovel because it found an absence of evidence for the shovel.

Edit: I expect we will never see eye to eye on the positivity of the world engendered by the English language.
I don't need to see eye to eye, but I would like to understand what point you're trying to make. I still have no idea.
 

Willamena

Just me
Premium Member
Right: the search is evidence for the absence of the shovel because it found an absence of evidence for the shovel.


I don't need to see eye to eye, but I would like to understand what point you're trying to make. I still have no idea.
You could return to my first post in this thread, when I responded to the OP by saying, "No, of course not. Nothing is entailed by no evidence."

That's the only significant point. The rest was futile.
 

9-10ths_Penguin

1/10 Subway Stalinist
Premium Member
You could return to my first post in this thread, when I responded to the OP by saying, "No, of course not. Nothing is entailed by no evidence."

That's the only significant point. The rest was futile.
So I should disregard everything after that where you explain how a lack of evidence does entail something?
 

masonlandry

Member
The extent to which absence of evidence is evidence of absence is dependent on the parameters of the thing you are looking for.

An absence of expected evidence is evidence of absence. What evidence would be expected of a god would depend on the god in question. Some proposed gods are described in a way such that there would be expected evidence if they are in fact the way they have been described. Others wouldn't leave any expected evidence to consider.

If a god (or anything else) is proposed but described in such a way that there could be no evidence of it, then the absence of evidence for it is not evidence of its lack of existence, because the absence of evidence is also what you would expect if the thing were real. The most you could say for a claim like that lacking any evidence is that the absence of evidence is a good reason to not believe in the thing, but not (strong) evidence that it is not real.

Another important factor is whether you have no evidence because you have looked for the expected evidence with due diligence and found that it was not there, rather than not having any evidence because you didn't look or didn't do so properly. As for with the cancer example. If you have no evidence of cancer, but you haven't done any radiologic imagine, your lack of evidence is only evidence that you haven't made a good effort to find cancer. If you have done all the available tests and still found no evidence, that is getting close to the point where it would be reasonable and logical to conclude with a high degree of certainty that there is no cancer.

It is also relevant how able we are to detect evidence for a given thing. Again, with cancer, we are fairly sure at this point in medical history that we can detect most cases of cancer with the available technology. That is to say, of all the cases of cancer that we know, it either was or could have been detected with what we have available. Evaluating our ability to detect the supernatural is very difficult because we have no way of evaluating out of how many cases of something being supernatural we were able to detect it. To evaluate that ability, you have to first be sure that the thing you are evaluating actually exists. But if all we are doing is evaluating the effects of the supernatural on the natural world, we could do that more effectively.

For example, if the god proposed is one who responds to prayer in a way that has tangible effects, you can test the outcomes of prayer, which has been done. If the results show that those who prayed got the result they prayed for with a reliable degree of accuracy, that would be good evidence that the prayer had something to do with the outcome. If it was shown definitively that prayer had no effect on the outcome, it would logically follow that the kind of god who answers prayers in a reliable and tangible way did not exist.
 
Last edited:

9-10ths_Penguin

1/10 Subway Stalinist
Premium Member
You'll do what you do.
Regardless of the terms, you do agree that if you search for your shovel and don't find it, this is evidence that the shovel isn't in the place that you searched... right?

Do you think this is also true for God? Would you agree that if we search for God and don't find it, this is evidence that God does not exist (at least within the bounds of our search)?
 

Willamena

Just me
Premium Member
Regardless of the terms, you do agree that if you search for your shovel and don't find it, this is evidence that the shovel isn't in the place that you searched... right?
Yes. That's what I've said all along.

Do you think this is also true for God? Would you agree that if we search for God and don't find it, this is evidence that God does not exist (at least within the bounds of our search)?
Well, the garage is a closed system and the universe an open one. We cannot use the method of "search"--but the same concepts do apply. Evidence of "God" (the absence or existence thereof) will be evidence, not a lack of evidence.
 
Last edited:

9-10ths_Penguin

1/10 Subway Stalinist
Premium Member
Yes. That's what I've said all along.
Just checking, because it's also what I've been saying when you say you disagree with me.


Well, the garage is a closed system and the universe an open one.
Likely the opposite, actually: stuff comes into and out of garages all the time (e.g. shovels and people looking for shovels), but it's not at all clear that anything comes into or out of our universe.

Are you trying to say that the garage is a limited space? Because we apply the same approach in cases where the space isn't precisely defined and where it's impossible to search every inch thoroughly... such as determining that a species is extinct.

We cannot use the method of "search"--but the same concepts do apply. Evidence of "God" (the absence or existence thereof) will be evidence, not a lack of evidence.
I'm not sure what you mean by "we cannot use the method of 'search'."
 

Willamena

Just me
Premium Member
Just checking, because it's also what I've been saying when you say you disagree with me.



Likely the opposite, actually: stuff comes into and out of garages all the time (e.g. shovels and people looking for shovels), but it's not at all clear that anything comes into or out of our universe.

Are you trying to say that the garage is a limited space? Because we apply the same approach in cases where the space isn't precisely defined and where it's impossible to search every inch thoroughly... such as determining that a species is extinct.
The garage is a closed system for the sake of the hypothetical search. I don't want any shovel suddenly showing up in it, or it would be useless as an example.

I'm not sure what you mean by "we cannot use the method of 'search'."
Just that.
 

9-10ths_Penguin

1/10 Subway Stalinist
Premium Member
The garage is a closed system for the sake of the hypothetical search. I don't want any shovel suddenly showing up in it, or it would be useless as an example.
But in a realistic scenario, you couldn't rule that out. Maybe someone decided to play a joke on you and snuck in behind your back to hide the shovel somewhere where you already looked.


Just that.
Its straightforward meaning was nonsensical and obviously false. We can't search the universe? Of course we can. In fact, it's the only thing we can search.
 

Willamena

Just me
Premium Member
But in a realistic scenario, you couldn't rule that out. Maybe someone decided to play a joke on you and snuck in behind your back to hide the shovel somewhere where you already looked.
But it was just a hypothetical.


Its straightforward meaning was nonsensical and obviously false. We can't search the universe? Of course we can. In fact, it's the only thing we can search.
Go ahead, then.

I'll just sit here.
 
Last edited:

Trailblazer

Veteran Member
I didn't say "directly." And it's fine to claim that your god is unobservable, but just understand that this means you have no way to tell what he's like or if he even exists at all.
No, that is not true. The Messengers of God were sent to reveal that information. God runs the post office, the Messengers deliver His mail. We can choose to go to the mailbox and get the mail, open it and read it, or not.
I will say that hearsay isn't a valid path to knowledge, though.
And of course you consider Messengers hearsay.

So what do you think is the path to knowledge about God? If an “omnipotent” God does not want to communicate directly to everyone, how are you going to make an “omnipotent” God do that? If you cannot get the information directly from God, how are you going to get it?
So you can be no more certain of God's existence than you're certain that:

- these "messengers" really are messengers, and
- what they say is true.
That’s correct.
Do you have justification for either of those claims? It seem you've traded one problem for two.
I have justified them to myself. Why would I need to justify those claims to anyone else except myself? What problem have I traded for two?
 

9-10ths_Penguin

1/10 Subway Stalinist
Premium Member
No, that is not true. The Messengers of God were sent to reveal that information. God runs the post office, the Messengers deliver His mail. We can choose to go to the mailbox and get the mail, open it and read it, or not.
This approach assumes the existence of God. If you assume the existence of God while trying to justify the existence of God, then you're begging the question.

And of course you consider Messengers hearsay.
Yes. Don't you?

So what do you think is the path to knowledge about God?
The God you've described? I can't see any.

It seems to me that in your attempt to make God unfalsifiable, you also made him unjustifiable.

If an “omnipotent” God does not want to communicate directly to everyone, how are you going to make an “omnipotent” God do that? If you cannot get the information directly from God, how are you going to get it?
This is an irrelevant question. It's not about "making God communicate directly;" it's about justifying belief in God when we've assumed he doesn't communicate directly.

How do you, using only information you have at your disposal, tell the difference between a God that exists but doesn't interact with humanity directly and a God that doesn't exist at all?

Assume whatever characteristics you want for the god you're claiming, but assume them consistently.

That’s correct.
So then to justify belief in God, you would need to justify believing both of those statements.

I can't see how you could do that without having already established that God exists (among other things).

I have justified them to myself. Why would I need to justify those claims to anyone else except myself? What problem have I traded for two?
The problem of establishing that God exists.

If you feel that your beliefs are justified, fine; I assumed that the reason you're in this discussion is to help other people understand how your beliefs are justified. So far, I'm not seeing how they are.
 

Trailblazer

Veteran Member
This approach assumes the existence of God. If you assume the existence of God while trying to justify the existence of God, then you're begging the question.
No, I did not assume the existence of God before I had evidence for the existence of God. The Messengers are the evidence and that is how I know there has to be a God. Why I believe they are Messengers of God is because of evidence that indicates that they were MORE than ordinary men.
Yes. Don't you?
In a sense yes, since we cannot substantiate that what Messengers said or wrote came from God, but in a sense no, because it is more than a rumor if it comes from someone I consider a Messenger of God.

Hearsay: information received from other people that one cannot adequately substantiate; rumor. https://www.google.com/search
The God you've described? I can't see any.
So you think that maybe you can know about some other god?
It seems to me that in your attempt to make God unfalsifiable, you also made him unjustifiable.
I don’t know what you mean by that.
This is an irrelevant question. It's not about "making God communicate directly;" it's about justifying belief in God when we've assumed he doesn't communicate directly.
Why do you assume that God does not communicate directly to those God shooses as messengers?
How do you, using only information you have at your disposal, tell the difference between a God that exists but doesn't interact with humanity directly and a God that doesn't exist at all?
I can tell the difference by reading what the Baha’u’llah wrote about that God, including His explanation of why God only communicates with Messengers and not to ordinary people, which makes complete sense to me. I cannot say that I would believe in God based upon the Bible or any other scriptures because they do not make any sense to me. I operate on logic, not on emotion.
So then to justify belief in God, you would need to justify believing both of those statements.

I can't see how you could do that without having already established that God exists (among other things).
I understand what you mean because other Atheists have said the same thing to me. They think that first we need to know that God exists before we can say:

- these "messengers" really are messengers, and
- what they say is true.

But that is a catch-22 because the Messengers are the evidence for the God and there is no other evidence. Logically speaking, if God sent them as evidence of His existence then that is what God wanted us to look at as evidence. We cannot make an omnipotent God provide some other kind of evidence. Moreover, if God is omniscient God knows the best kind of evidence to provide.

I have justified them to myself. Why would I need to justify those claims to anyone else except myself? What problem have I traded for two?
The problem of establishing that God exists.
We can believe that God exists and we can know in our mind that God exists but we cannot establish that as a fact, because God is not a material entity that can be proven to exist. There are many underlying premises we have to accept before we are going to conclude that God exists. After I became a Baha’i I assumed that God existed but I never really knew until I understood what Baha’u’llah wrote about God. Then it hit me like a ton of bricks and life has not been the same since. I have my issues with God but I know that God exists, and I know because of Baha’u’llah and what He wrote about God. I just made sense to me.

So you might say that I kind of came in through the back door. I accepted that Baha’u’llah was a Messenger of God but I did not really know that God existed; although I kind of believed in God, it did not mean much to me at all. Later, after I read the Writings of Bahaullah with intent to understand God, I knew God existed.
If you feel that your beliefs are justified, fine; I assumed that the reason you're in this discussion is to help other people understand how your beliefs are justified. So far, I'm not seeing how they are.
All I can do is explain to people how I justified my beliefs to myself. I use logic to justify my beliefs, not emotion. However, not everyone reasons the same way, so not everyone is going to see what I see. In other words, not all logical arguments wind up with the same conclusions. Logic can be applied in many ways.
 
Top