“Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn’t go away.” – Phillip K. Dick
Lib, I’ve followed you up until this point. How may a non-existant entity assert something?
I shouldn’t leave this out, either:
Jeff 42
That is exactly the problem. Each consciousness is a closed reference frame. If there is any sort of objectivity, then it is a Reference Frame that is Absolute.
JMullaney
Your Dick is very wise. Whatever is Absolute, of course, will not ever pass away.
Ptahlis
Once that assertion is made (but not until), the entire argument is moot. It is the opposite of begging the question. It is asserting the consequent. (Watch out also for its converse, denying the antecedent.)
I equals I. Before cognition there is the sense of “I.” There can be no sense of I without one who senses. I sense. I sense. I am he. He who senses, that is me. Is that proof enough for thee? (though I cannot prove you to be.)
And proof of that which is outside of me? Painfully obvious for any to see.
Mathematically proven! An impossible notion. Is the idea of perpetual motion. I sense, you see. So, there must be something outside of me, to fuel this action, charge my battery.
Two questions. You are asking that I (or whomever else is arguing with you prove their existence) are you operating from the idea that you exist? There isn’t much point in proving my existence to something that doesn’t itself exist.
Do you believe that something must exist. Or is all non-existence?
OldScratch
You’re absolutely right. And that is no doubt exactly how God sees it. 
Whatever does indeed exist must exist independent of any epistemology.
It must be Absolute, that is, objectively real. It must exist whether or not any closed reference frame can perceive it. Moreover, it must be perceivable by any arbitrary reference frame that happens to exist along with it. But that does not necessarily mean that every reference frame will perceive it, or even cares to.
Erratum.
That should have read:
It must exist whether or not any closed reference frame exists that can perceive it.
I laugh at Libertarian
"You poor silly guy,
this faulty false logic you think people will buy?
Evidence is evidence and evidence will show
A proof of God, sadly no.
Use Occam’s razor, use it truly and fair,
Renounce Descartes, there are others out there.
Unproven God, evidence for man. What’s the problem here?
Get with the plan!
Disproving one does not the other disprove,
Get off this unreasoned stance. Get up! Move!
I once saw a bee.
I think I know that it saw me.
Because it did, I got stung.
I cried, for I was very young.
I can still remember what I did feel.
Damn! Reality’s real!
Notes:
If you choose to quote Descartes
and claim tautology was his art
we will only be impressed with you
if you can prove his existence, too.
If I think, then I exist.
I think.
Therefore, I exist.
Where’s the problem?
for all I know, in your post my monitor is claiming to exist. you haven’t proven that you in fact exist, merely made a claim.
Ah, yes. The question of ultimate reality. In all the talk about what is real, the concept of unreality is frequently ignored. Can a person really be positive that he or she is real? It may be tautologically impossible for a real person to assume his unreality, but what about for an unreal person (in a purely hypothetical sense, of course)? How might a hypothetical existence feel different from a real one? Does existence really “feel” like anything at all? In light of the fact that “reality” cannot be proven, and seems mysteriously to shed off all attempts at reductionistic definition or explanation, is it really a meaningful concept?
I don’t expect answers to unanswerable questions, but I’d like to provoke a little thought. It seems to me that many people are a bit too attached to their axioms.
BlackKnight
It is the same as the problem with this: The Bible says, “Every word in here is true,” therefore, the Bible is true.
JasonFin
It is a meaningful concept in the context of the closed reference frame that perceives it only.
Agreed! I learned that very thing about myself only recently, thanks mostly to Spiritus Mundi.
The science epistemology is of great interest nowadays because of its ability to make rather mundane atomic groupings into rather spectacular atomic groupings (the technology end), as well as its ability to make itself repeatable (the experimentation end). The former, the technology, is merely quaint, and is no different metaphysically from the miracle epistemology. But the latter is more irritating to most theistic apologists who react like deer in the headlights when atheists demand repeatability of their claims about God.
“You say you did such-and-such and found God. Well, I did such-and-such, too, but I did not find God.”
Frustrating. Until you recognize it for what it is, a distraction fallacy. You want repeatability about my experiences with God? Fine, then. Be me. Your measuring machines with their gauges afford you repeatability because if I make a machine the same way you made yours, it will behave the same way in the same circumstance. Your repeatability won’t work if I make a machine that is merely taxanomically similar to yours but fails in its design to do what yours does.
If you are to find God (assuming such a desire), then you must do so using the hand dealt to you: your own consciousness, a reference frame that is closed to me and to everyone else.
I wonder if someone can explain to me the point of this thread, fascinating as it is. As a practical matter, what difference is there between something that can be “proved” in a logical sense, and something that can be assumed to be true as much as is humanely possible? Unless the point is this itself - that no “proof” can be demanded about anything.
(I think JasonFin may have been touching on this issue).
IzzyR
I opened the thread at the request of QuickSilver, as you can see from the Opening Post. We really haven’t had any threads dealing with abstract metaphysics, so I thought it was a good idea.
I think the most interesting and most important point that we could all take from this is one that Spiritus taught me: whatever is objectively real, it is independent of any epistemology.
And one more thing equally important.
Maybe we can all learn to have a bit more patience with one another’s subjective reference frames. Perhaps the man who says “God exists” can co-exist with the man who says “God does not exist,” and the two of them can understand why the other believes as he does, and stop demanding ridiculous proofs of one another.
(seriously out of my league here; a minor leaguer viewing the majors) but here goes:
In order to accept a proof of existence, wouldn’t one have to accept the axioms upon which that proof is based? And aren’t axioms unprovable; they are either accepted or not accepted? So, I don’t think it’s possible to logically argue one’s own existence.
oldscratch says:
Conversely(?)(I am having a little difficulty deciphering this one, oldscratch), there are blind people who have never seen and have no perception of color. There are deaf people who have never heard, and have no perception of sound. Our perceptions, and any logical proof we could give them, would amount to nothing to these people, because, to them, color or sound truly do not exist. The wavelenghts that emanate from objects which reflect light or sound DO exist to them, but not our perception of them. They may perceive some sort of vibration, but not sight or hearing in the way we perceive them.
I may be misinterpreting here, but that is what I conceive of as a closed reference frame; all of ours are different, and inaccessible to each other.
But can I still play? (How about women :)?)
Spider Woman
You are clearly the equal of anyone here, as your analysis is impeccable.
This stuff really isn’t rocket science. It is basically common sense. I just think we tend to take it for granted when we start screaming at each other, “Fallacy! Fallacy! Prove it! Prove it!” I have heard Atheists shred to pieces such arguments as Pascal’s Wager, Descartes’ Meditations, and Lewis’ Dichotomy. But in the end, you have to blame Pascal, Descarte, and Lewis for making such silly attempts.
I think it is fair that, if a person demands proof of God’s existence, she accede to a demand that she first prove her own.