Why can't some people simply understand the concept of proof?

Question

I'm so sick of hearing: "Look around you . That's proof of God existence." WTF! That is not proof. You either get it or you don't and if you don't you're hopelessly slow. I understand that nobody can defintely prove God's existence or vice versa but c'mon (btw look up Russel's teapot if you're not familiar with it). I'm just curious to know why is it that you believe in God and can I PLEASE get some decent answers? Thanks.

@Premaholic

Thats what I'm talking about. You act like theres proof but then dodge the question.

Answer 1

Then i would suggest reading the following books.

If necessary, let me know, and I'll even buy them for your town's library.

A serious seeker will seek a serious response!

Answer 2

Ok, I'm a maths students. We all know that coincidences have low probabilities. The chances of bumping the same person 3 times in a day in 3 different places is very low. Chances of meeting him 4 times a day is even lower. And meeting him 4 times and then win a lottery on that same day is way even lower.

We know that as more and more coincidences happen in shorter and shorter time span, the probabilities go lower and lower. There are these things where the probabilities approach zero, like the chances of a freaking car crash that involves 50 vehicles with 30 of them burned to ashes and 15 of them crushed out of shape yet no one getting any injury is almost impossible to happen.

What goes inside your head when such kind of things happen? You simply believe that chances are too low for any of these to happen. Easy way out is to ascribe this to G-d's doing. We won't know for sure if this is truly the work of G-d as we lack the perception of G-d.

Let's look at an example of this as recorded in the Torah. I assume we are all familiar with the Exodus, where Moses parted the Red Sea. Now, you might say this is all craps as the Red Sea never parted. However, I request that you to look at this, taken from http://www.christianitytoday.com/tc/2004/004/9.11.html

Volzinger says a 67-mile an hour wind, blowing all-night long, would have left the reef high and dry. And, he says, it would have remained that way for about five hours. "It would take the Jews-there were about 600,000 of them-four hours to cross the 7-kilometer reef that runs from one coast to another," he estimates. "Then, in a half-hour, the waters would come back."
Retrieved from http://www.christianitytoday.com/tc/2004/004/9.11.html
on 20 Aug 2007

Mathematics tells us that it is a possible phenomenan for the Red Sea to part, though the chances of it happening is low. And isn't the chances even lower the parting to occur when Moses and the people of Israel are trapped there? What is the probability for this to happen? Almost zero. How can you explain this? That Moses was really good at predicting the weather? Or did G-d actually gave him a helping hand? Or is it a total mere coincidence?

To me, this is proof of G-d's existence. Too many 'coincidences' to be called 'coincidences'.

Maybe talking about the Red Sea is too far in the past. Let's talk about the present. People begin to believe in G-d when they see too much coincidences in their lives to be called mere coincidences. It appears to them that there is something beyond their comprehension that is running the events. And they call it G-d.

I personally experienced several miracles and coincidences that convinced me that nothing is coincident. All is managed and runned by a higher power, G-d. It is proof enough for myself. You may choose not to believe but my advice is that please, be a good human being and try to contribute to more peace. Let's make this world a better place for our children if not for the Judgement that awaits us in the future.

Answer 3

There are simply different levels in different people at which the facility of wonder clicks over into religious faith.

The universe in a dazzlingly complex and awesome place. Some people get their minds blown by that complexity and it kind of crashes the rational part of them, so you get the error message: Cannot compute - Too incredible. God must have done this.

It's not rational, it's a function of wonder. The more you learn about the universe, the more awesome it becomes. For me - and for you by the sounds of your question - that's only an incentive to understand more. But some people give up on the idea of rational explanations because, let's face it, it makes your brain ache after a while, so they resort to the much simpler, blanket idea that anything too amazing to be directly, simply explained must be supernaturally created.

Answer 4

Saul Bellow said "A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep." As nearly as I can figure, most of us seek to believe that there is a Big Daddy in the sky because its less frightening than believing we are alone in the cosmos. As it is of course, we simply don't know.Nor can anyone prove god's presence or absence. I do suspect that all life is derived from some sort of "greater" source, but I choose not to put a name to it. Nor to cow tow to any man made beliefs built around some nebulous deity. In my opinion, existential angst is what motivates people into churches and temples and keeps them there. Unfortunately it also motivates people to rape, murder, and war against one another in an effort to prove that theirs is the only true god.And to get furious and defensive when anyone dares to question their beliefs.

Answer 5

I have to say that a study of quantum physics - 'everything exists in the void, which is all things potentially and nothing materially, matter is just a wave-form which when observed, collapses into a particle, and becomes solid. as soon as you stop observing it, it goes back into a wave again!' - somehow was a great big eureka for me as to what the whole genesis thing was talking about (but 2000 years or whatever, before there was quantum theory that we have today.) it pulled the whole thing together for me, how GOD could be an actual fact - the initial first point of consciousness in the void, which then contemplated itself, and then there were two, and they went off and contemplated themselves, which ends up with today - we have all of us people all different 'points of view in the void' contemplating eachother, thinking we are separate and having forgotten we are all part of the same void - or quantum field - which contains everything potentially and nothing materially - until we sort of consciously arrange thoughts and put things together. like this computer. the raw materials for it, all existed before some point of consciousness put it all together and made it into a system that works. amazing really. so yeah, i totally believe in God, but not as an external mastermind so much as - we are part of it. all of us are IT. We are God and we are sort of experiencing ourselves as little tiny points of view. but each little tiny point of view is somehow potentially also able to be all of it. damn...it really does make rabbit holes in your mind (good ones) when u try and go to understand this stuff. i say, if you are struggling with outmoded dogma models of God, all distorted by controlling humans anyway, (and which religion to choose?) and your natural aptitude is for science and proof - go for quantum physics. you will come to the same riddle, which is that everything is connected, and nothing exists without consciousness - wow! - that thought creates reality - and you might get to understand how God 'might be one and the same', through that route. good luck!

Answer 6

Why don't you look it up? If you want answers to this puzzle, why would you come here and ask a bunch of anonymous users? Wouldn't it make more sense to evaluate the traditional arguments made by theologians and theistic philosophers? If you could take one look at the people that you are arguing with, I think you would shut off the computer and take a trip down to the local library. This isn't exactly the University of Thessaloniki here.

Answer 7

Hi,
Here's your proof. Life does NOT come from None-living matter. Never did. That's a law of all Science taught in all schools...... even college. Wrap your mind around that for awhile. If life doesn't come from none-living matter, then someone a whole lot brighter created it. That's the only other option. Period. You can try and twist that science fact all you want but the only thing you get out of it is the God factor.

Answer 8

The funny thing is that you are sick of people who dont understand the God concept and then you want to hear why we believe in Him.

That is precisely the reason - no one understands the concept of proof which you are expounding because it is not put out in a simple manner. Well just present it to us in simple everyday english and we will understand.

How do you expect us to understand when you are yourself seeking answers (or comfort about people's believing).

Answer 9

[jumping on soapbox]

You asked two questions. In the body of your text was the question "why is it that you believe in God." On face value that sounds like a question that's inspired by genuine curiosity.

But your opening question is more of a complaint.... "why oh why do people not GET where I'm coming from?"

If you can stay open to others' viewpoints when they express themselves, and allow yourself to disagree without judging them as inferior, then you might find others who believe in God who don't have a problem with your atheism. But you gotta let go of the whining part.... or seeing all believers as ignorant or stupid.

Yes, I understand your frustration with some of us God-upholders -- I roll my eyes at some of them too. But I also roll my eyes at those who uphold "proof" as the be-all/end-all of understanding. Science is as much a belief structure as religion/spirituality -- it's simply established on different premises. And the "fundies" in science can get very hot and bothered when their established theories are challenged. But think about it: there's a lot of honesty in the word "theory." It's about what we "believe" to be true of the known world, and it *is* subject to change.

So is belief in God a theory, and frequently subject to change in the many minds of the multitudinous faithful (religious or not). There are no scientific protocols in this kind of faith. There are lots of opinions.

There is also "gnosis" -- which is "knowing" -- and which can't be assessed or measured. William James wrote about the varieties of religious experience, and Carl Sagan attempted to explain a lot of them away. And I respect both intelligent ponderers for coming up with their own methods for making sense of these phenomena.

Who's to say if someone's direct experience of God is limited to a series of neuronal firings, or the movement beyond three-dimensions into a greater understanding of Total Consciousness?

There IS no proof. Not even in science, which has had to shift its "knowns" many times. But there IS experience, and the decision whether or not to trust that experience. That's for each of us to make as individuals. No religious faith has all the answers, either. They provide roadmaps, just like science. Again, different premises to start with, but a common desire to KNOW. If you don't get bogged down in right/wrong or "everyone thinks that" then you can let go of the need for "proof" and simply savor your own singular experience (while yes, corroborating and comparing it with others, by all means).

[jumping off soapbox]

Answer 10

Yes, I agree! And if they did find absolute proof, It would be on every news channel, every radio station, and every web page that you could find! And it would most likely stay there. Has that happened? Erm....No it hasn't. So when people say that they found proof of God's existence, they no nothing of what they're talking about.

''Look around you . That's proof of God existence!'' No, it's not. As for that being absolute proof, there are other theories...Why couldn't one of the other many Gods have made it? That is not even close to proof. Sorry.


LOL, anyone who gives me a thumbs down secretly agrees with me. ^_^

Answer 11

Okay. No need to look around you, but there is a whole world out there & so many planets & galaxies that it is infinite. Do you honestly think that man did all this? As I've said before: creation =Creator!