walk with me through the argument

[metacrock]

Carrikature says: The basic criteria are treated as givens despite being anything but. It doesn't really matter, though, because I don't claim there is no warrant or justification for belief. On the contrary, I think there is plenty of warrant. I just think that warrant relies on criteria that, like those you provided in that argument, I don't accept. Your support for them there is 100% appeal to (unspecified) authority.

let's just walk through it andf see


Decision Making Paradigm:

Not proof that God exists but warrant for belief. Justification argument.


he has some little quip of wisdom of this of course how could he not? there's nothing wrong with informing the reader of what Paradigm I think I'm using.

God Corrolate: The co-determinate is like the Derridian trace, or like a fingerprint. It's the accompanying sign that is always found with the thing itself. In other words, like trailing the invisible man in the snow. You can't see the invisible man, but you can see his footprints, and wherever he is in the snow his prints will always follow.

We cannot produce direct observation of God, but we can find the "trace" or the co-determinate, the effects of God in the world.The only question at that point is "How do we know this is the effect, or the accompanying sign of the divine? The answer is in the argument below. Here let us set out some general parameters:

what here is treated like a given? of course first it might be good to ask are givens always wrong? can't some things be given?

We can set up criteria based upoIn what we would expect from encounter with the divine: N
A. Life Transforming and vital in a positive life=affirming sense

B. It would give us a sense of the transcendent and the divine.

C. No alternate or naturalistic causality could be proven

This is probably what he thinks is being presented as a given .,is it? see the part where it says "we can expect...?" Clearly it's not a given but is the result of certain expectations. If those are reasonable then it's not just a given and there's nothing wrong with it. notice he has not reason why they are thought to be givens. I think because he doesn't know what paradigms are or criteria in an argument do.

obviously they not merely gi en because I justify them right here:


These criteria are based upon the writings of the great mystics and religious thinkers of history, especially in the Christian tradition, and distilled into /theory by W.T. Stace. The theory is verified and validated by several hundred studies using various methodologies all of them published in peer reviewed journals. The following argument is based upon the findings of these studies. All of this, the studies, the methods used, Stace's theory, these studies and their methodologies are discussed in depth in The Trace of God: a Rational Warrant for Belief by Joseph Hinman, (all proceeds go to non profit) available on Amazon



they are going to be established and justified by the study findings that I'm going to present.


;come to the argument itself I'll deal with it in a second post

[eider]

.....but none of the above post shows that God is especially interested in homo-sapiens above all the rest of everything.
Humans are just such megalomaniacs !

[metacrock]

I don't have to show it. I didn't say it's a Christian argument Christian argument.of course I can show but that's latter. preview, the nature of the experience involves revelation of God's love.

[metacrock]

Read much about the book on the Trace of God blog..

Argument:
(1) The affects and effects of mystical experience are real in that they are measurably transformative in a positive sense.

(2)These affects cannot be reduced to naturalistic cause and affect, bogus mental states or epiphenomena.

(3)Since the affects of Mystical consciousness are independent of other explanations and the affects are real we should assume that they are genuine experiences of something transcendent of our own minds.

(4)Since mystical experience is usually experience of something, the Holy, the sacred, or some sort of greater transcendent reality we should assume that the origin of the experience is rooted in transcendent reality.

(5)Since mystical experience is usually about the divine we can assume a divine origin.

This fulfills the criteria for the trace: therefore, e are warranted in asserting that mystical experience is the trace of God, and this gives us warrant for belief in God.

Each of these statement is a premise they either follow out of the previous statement or they are proved by the study findings. this next bit is called analysis because it's going to analyze what's been said. the reader should understand this from the one word "analysis."


Analysis:

Real Affects of Mystical Experience Imply Co-determinate

that means the thing that is always found with God and that indicates God such as the foot prints in snow indicates someone with feet has been there. the experiences are indicative of God just as foot prints are indicative of someone


now it's going top talk about the nature of the experience and a little about how it's studied.this shows the findings of a couple of studies so you know what they say
(2)Long-Term Effects

Wuthnow:

*Say their lives are more meaningful,
*think about meaning and purpose
*Know what purpose of life is
Meditate more
*Score higher on self-rated personal talents and capabilities
*Less likely to value material possessions, high pay, job security, fame, and having lots of friends
*Greater value on work for social change, solving social problems, helping needy
*Reflective, inner-directed, self-aware, self-confident life style

Noble:

*Experience more productive of psychological health than illness
*Less authoritarian and dogmatic
*More assertive, imaginative, self-sufficient
*intelligent, relaxed
*High ego strength,
*relationships, symbolization, values,
*integration, allocentrism,
*psychological maturity,
*self-acceptance, self-worth,
*autonomy, authenticity, need for solitude,
*increased love and compassion

(3) Trend toward positive view among psychologists. Spiriutal Emergency MYSTICAL OR UNITIVE EXPERIENCE "Offsetting the clinical literature that views mystical experiences as pathological, many theorists (Bucke, 1961; Hood, 1974, 1976; James, 1961; Jung, 1973; Laski, 1968; Maslow, 1962, 1971; Stace, 1960; Underhill, 1955) have viewed mystical experiences as a sign of health and a powerful agent of transformation." (4) Most clinicians and clinical studies see postive. (Ibid) "Results of a recent survey (Allman, et al,. 1992) suggest that most clinicians do not view mystical experiences as pathological. Also, studies by several researchers have found that people reporting mystical experiences scored lower on psychopathology scales and higher on measures of psychological well-being than controls (Caird, 1987; Hood, 1976, 1977, 1979; Spanos and Moretti, 1988)".


Last edited by DesertBerean


now this is arranged so that the worthy opponent says "here's a problem" and I answer it. He was going to just not say. He communed it in a veg way without giving me a change to defend it. he didn't even have the courage to say it in the thread .That is not how the worthy opponent de4alvwith a an argument.

[Carrikature]

For anyone interested, my response is here: http://www.theologyweb.com/campus/sh...l=1#post303483.

[shunyadragon]

We can set up criteria based upoIn what we would expect from encounter with the divine: N
A. Life Transforming and vital in a positive life=affirming sense

B. It would give us a sense of the transcendent and the divine.

C. No alternate or naturalistic causality could be proven

The highlighted above is the problem! It is most likely the fact that neither a transcendent nor the naturalistic causality may be proven. This too high a bar for anecdotal subjective basis for the encounter. It could be aliens.

[metacrock]

The highlighted above is the problem! It is most likely the fact that neither a transcendent nor the naturalistic causality may be proven. This too high a bar for anecdotal subjective basis for the encounter. It could be aliens.

just because it can't be proven doesn't mean it[s irrational to accept it. it's still warranted. That's just artificial hamstring to give you unfair advantage over the believer.

[shunyadragon]

just because it can't be proven doesn't mean it[s irrational to accept it. it's still warranted. That's just artificial hamstring to give you unfair advantage over the believer.

N, it simply makes the argument either way untenable, because neither is subject to proof.

[metacrock]

N, it simply makes the argument either way untenable, because neither is subject to proof.

what's proven is that it's rational to believe in God and there's good reason to believe. Since no one can prove the existence or lack there of but we can't stop asking it makes to go with the next best thin which is warrant for belief.

[Tassman]

what's proven is that it's rational to believe in God and there's good reason to believe. Since no one can prove the existence or lack there of but we can't stop asking it makes to go with the next best thin which is warrant for belief.

No it's not. As always your argument boils down to unwarranted assumptions. But, as David Hume says, "...any combination of natural events, however antecedently improbable, is antecedently more probable than a scenario involving supernatural intervention."

[metacrock]

No it's not. As always your argument boils down to unwarranted assumptions. But, as David Hume says, "...any combination of natural events, however antecedently improbable, is antecedently more probable than a scenario involving supernatural intervention."

unwarranted assumption warranted by 200 studies' I have 200 academic studies in peer reviewed secular journals in psychology and sociology. That is far more than you have. you have no warrant for doubt. none. Your doubt is based no fact.

[Roy]

what's proven is that it's rational to believe in God and there's good reason to believe.

As is usual in this type of apologetic you have skipped the step which goes from
- it's rational to believe in some form of mystical being
to
- it's rational to believe in your specific idea of god.

Have you got anything that suggests your specific deity is a more likely explanation than ghosts, leprechauns, Unkulunkulu or Ptah?

If not, you've merely shown that it's rational to believe that mystical experiences occur, but not rational to believe they have a specific cause.

[Roy]

unwarranted assumption warranted by 200 studies' I have 200 academic studies in peer reviewed secular journals in psychology and sociology.

What you have here is a fallacy.

[metacrock]

As is usual in this type of apologetic you have skipped the step which goes from
- it's rational to believe in some form of mystical being
to
- it's rational to believe in your specific idea of god.

No because I haven't advocated anything specific. I didn't say this is an argument for the God of Bible. Now granted b\I am a Christian but that doesn't mean that all of my arguments have to be about Christianity. I can link them latter but at this point this argument can support any view of /god.

that's why the argument lacks that step not that I CAN'T GIVE IT BUT IT'S NOT IM[PORTAMNT NOW.

Have you got anything that suggests your specific deity is a more likely explanation than ghosts, leprechauns, Unkulunkulu or Ptah?

(1) the content of the experience is not about those things. So o reason to include them in the argument

(2) those are all cotangent and none are creator of all that is not even their own mythology sl they d not apply

If not, you've merely shown that it's rational to believe that mystical experiences occur, but not rational to believe they have a specific cause.

that's wrong. The content of the experience is about the ground of being (God)

[shunyadragon]

No it's not. As always your argument boils down to unwarranted assumptions. But, as David Hume says, "...any combination of natural events, however anticedently improbable, is anticedently more probable than a scenario involving supernatural intervention."

Hume was most likely correct, but again this does not offer any sort of 'proof.'