Why is it impossible to prove a negative?

Originally posted by twhitehead
I used to be a Christian, yet I still don't understand what you mean. So my existence proves your claim false. The point I am making is that the vast majority of theists are not well versed regarding the supposedly core beliefs of their religions, and even when they are, they don't necessarily believe them.
For example I have seen the results of surveys ...[text shortened]... gnificant number of people claiming to be Christian said they did not believe in an afterlife.

How could you ever be a Christian without beleiving that the Christian God is the Creator and thus the ground of all beings? In what sect were you involved?
😵

Originally posted by black beetle
How could you ever be a Christian without beleiving that the Christian God is the Creator and thus the ground of all beings? In what sect were you involved?
😵

I was brought up an Anglican. Were you ever a theist? Have you talked to many theists? I can assure you that most theists do not believe exactly what their Church preaches - or more importantly in this case, even know what it is their Church preaches.

Originally posted by twhitehead
I used to be a Christian, yet I still don't understand what you mean. So my existence proves your claim false. The point I am making is that the vast majority of theists are not well versed regarding the supposedly core beliefs of their religions, and even when they are, they don't necessarily believe them.
For example I have seen the results of surveys ...[text shortened]... gnificant number of people claiming to be Christian said they did not believe in an afterlife.

This is fairly incoherent stuff. That you can't understand what he says merely means you aren't competent to debate this topic.

I'm pretty sure you do understand, though, the sense of the expression 'ground of being' (fons et origo, if you prefer) is perfectly clear.

Originally posted by twhitehead
I was brought up an Anglican. Were you ever a theist? Have you talked to many theists? I can assure you that most theists do not believe exactly what their Church preaches - or more importantly in this case, even know what it is their Church preaches.

I don't see how that matters.

Originally posted by twhitehead
I was brought up an Anglican. Were you ever a theist? Have you talked to many theists? I can assure you that most theists do not believe exactly what their Church preaches - or more importantly in this case, even know what it is their Church preaches.

I was never being a theist but I debate quite frequently with theists of almost every religion, and also with many atheists. Every single one of my interlocutors understands this basic definition, which is accepted by the Anglican denomination too. It 's amazing you are not aware of it😵

Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
This is fairly incoherent stuff. That you can't understand what he says merely means you aren't competent to debate this topic.

I wasn't attempting to debate the meaning of the phrase nor its implications. I also don't see how it would affect my ability to debate the other topics in the thread.
What I am disputing here is his claim:
"God is the ground of all beings" means that the ultimate causation of the existence of the observer universe is attributed to God, and this claim is accepted by all the theists regardless of their religion
Clearly, if many theists don't understand the phrase, one cannot correctly claim that they 'accept' the claim.

Originally posted by twhitehead

"God is the ground of all beings" means that the ultimate causation of the existence of the observer universe is attributed to God, and this clai sts don't understand the phrase, one cannot correctly claim that they 'accept' the claim.

If you don't understand the expression, you can't have much to say about it.

Perhaps we should modify the statement to 'all theists who have the slightest idea what they are talking about'.

Which religions do you know of that say that the universe depends for its existence on something other than God/Tao/etc?

Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
If you don't understand the expression, you can't have much to say about it.

I wasn't saying much about it. I was saying much about theists who don't understand it.

Perhaps we should modify the statement to 'all theists who have the slightest idea what they are talking about'.
Perhaps we shouldn't be making claims about what theists accept when we don't really know what theists do or don't accept. Certainly not 'all theists'.

Which religions do you know of that say that the universe depends for its existence on something other than God/Tao/etc?
I am not convinced that "religions" say anything. Religions are loose groupings of people who hold a very wide range of views on the matter. In fact, a large number of the members of some religions are not theists anyway.
I am fairly sure that most of the traditional beliefs in Zambia had no central God figure - but then I don't know if you would describe them as being a religion. Maybe your definition of 'religion' requires a creator figure.

Originally posted by twhitehead

I am fairly sure that most of the traditional beliefs in Zambia had no central God figure - but then I don't know if you would describe them as being a religion. Maybe your definition of 'religion' requires a creator figure.

Your nitpicking is truly on form today. Try this: According to which theistic religions or belief systems is the universe uncreated, ie. it does not have a First Cause?

Here's one from Zambia, I don't know what the other ones are.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lozi_mythology

I couldn't find any examples of African beliefs that don't have a Creator, or First Cause, here's a whole bunch that do:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_traditional_religion#Khoisan_religious_tradition

Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
Your nitpicking is truly on form today.

Its hardly nitpicking. I was pointing out that any claim about 'all theists' is blatantly false. The same applies to claims about 'all religions'.

I couldn't find any examples of African beliefs that don't have a Creator, or First Cause, here's a whole bunch that do:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_traditional_religion#Khoisan_religious_tradition
Well if you go looking for creator myths, you won't exactly find ones that are not creator myths will you?

Originally posted by twhitehead
Its hardly nitpicking. I was pointing out that any claim about 'all theists' is blatantly false. The same applies to claims about 'all religions'.
... king for creator myths, you won't exactly find ones that are not creator myths will you?

You nitpick the meaning of nitpicking.

Blatantly false, my arse. I'm challenging you to find a theist that doesn't believe in a created universe and so far you've got nothing.

The Wikipedia label says 'African traditional beliefs', not 'creator myths'. If you can find a traditional African belief that combines theism with no 'ground of being' (Source, Creator, Spirit etc) then I will concede the point.

Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
Blatantly false, my arse. I'm challenging you to find a theist that doesn't believe in a created universe and so far you've got nothing.

Now you are confusing "Theism" - which you probably define as "belief in a creator" with "religion".
Or do you define "religion" as "a group of people who believe in a creator" too?
Rather circular then to ask me to give counter examples.

The Wikipedia label says 'African traditional beliefs', not 'creator myths'. If you can find a traditional African belief that combines theism with no 'ground of being' (Source, Creator, Spirit etc) then I will concede the point.
Again, you ask for theism, not religion. Again, I ask, how do you define the two? And I ask, are all African beliefs religious?

I have already pointed out that there are religious people who are not theists. I believe there was at least one on this site who claimed to be both Anglican and not theist.

The situation is this: nearly everyone has at one time asked themselves "is there a creator?" so of course anyone you ask and any set of beliefs you look into is likely to come up with some possible story of a creator. But does everyone actually believe in such a creator? I certainly don't. What makes you so sure that all theists do?

Originally posted by twhitehead
But does everyone actually believe in such a creator? I certainly don't. What makes you so sure that all theists do?

Theism is belief in god(s), by definition.

If you don't believe in some god, you're not a theist. It would be like saying I'm an atheist but still believe in god.

So that leaves room for theists who believe in gods but not creator gods. Hence my invitation to you to find a form of theism that excludes a divine creation (or consider the universe itself divine).

Bearing in mind that we're discussing this statement:


"God is the ground of all beings" means that the ultimate causation of the existence of the observer universe is attributed to God, and this claim is accepted by all the theists regardless of their religion.

Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
Theism is belief in god(s), by definition.

If you don't believe in some god, you're not a theist. It would be like saying I'm an atheist but still believe in god.

So that leaves room for theists who believe in gods but not creator gods. Hence my invitation to you to find a form of theism that excludes a divine creation (or consider the universe ...[text shortened]... to God, and this claim is accepted by all the [b]theists regardless of their religion.[/b]

Maybe this can contribute to the debate?

"God is not apart from the world. Together with the world, God constitutes the spatio-temporal 'totality' of existence. As we saw earlier, the natural-supernatural dichotomy has no place in the African conceptualization of the universe. The thinking is hierarchical, with God at the apex and extra-human beings and forces, humans, the lower animals, vegetation and the inanimate world, in this order, as integral parts of one single totality of existence.

God as creator

God is seen as creator of the world but, because God is not outside the world, this cannot mean that he created the world out of nothing. God is seen as a kind of cosmic architect, 'a fashioner of the world out of a pre-existing manifold of indeterminacy' (Wiredu 1995:313). This raises the question of the origin of the material which was necessary to fashion the world. Wiredu points out that for the Akan people, to which he belongs, this is a meaningless question:

The absolute nothingness entailed in the notion of creation out of nothing ... scorns any ... context. This abolition of context effectively abolishes intelligibility, as far as the Akan language is concerned (Wiredu 1996b:179)."

Teffo, L.J. & Roux, A.P.J. 2002. Themes in African metaphysics, in Philosophy from Africa: A Text with Readings, edited by P.H. Coetzee & A.P.J. Roux, Cape Town: Oxford University Press

Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
Which religions do you know of that say that the universe depends for its existence on something other than God/Tao/etc?

This is interesting; and I’ve pondered it recently in the context of Taoism. The “ground of being” can mean (and often does seem to mean in non-theistic/non-dualist religions) simply that from which, in which and of which all existent beings inseparably are.

[One could call it the universe, without implying that the universe is in any way a separate “thing” from all the entities and their relationships (patterns) that comprise the universe.]

The Tao is the all-of-all-of-all-of-it, just the way (tao) that it all is. It is a way of referencing the Whole as a whole, in the context of the principle of nonseparability. The Whole, however, is difficult to talk about because it itself cannot be observed (from what separate perspective could a separate observer observe it?); the Whole, by definition has no boundaries. In a sense, the Whole is implicit, not explicit.

In all this, however, is the notion of figure/ground: one can only observe and identify individual figures/existents (e.g., a tree), or collective figures/existents (e.g., a forest), because of an implicit ground which provides the necessary context (horizon?). Conceptually, that context/horizon can be expanded to the Whole as a—whole. But no further.

Therefore, one can use the phrase “ground of being” in a strictly non-theistic sense, and without imagining that one can somehow ascribe to the ground any specific attributes of itself, separable from all the attributes and patterns that we can observe among identifiable entities.

This is why the language of such system{ as Taoism and Ren Buddhism is often so paradoxical.

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In his book The Tao is Slient, Raymond Smullyan uses that analogy of a melody. One cannot simply say that the melody is the individual notes, or even a specific string of individual notes: the notes must be played in a certain (coherent) way for the melody to arise. Also, the notes are not first played, and then the melody follows: the melody mutually arises with the notes. And the melody requires not just the notes, but the “spaces” between them as a kind of “ground” (of silence) without which the melody cannot be perceived (the notes played all at once do not yield a melody).

But it seems to make sense to say that one experiences the melody, and not just a string of spaced notes.

Smullyan calls the Tao, by way of analogy, the (complex) melody of the universe. The universe does not depend upon the Tao for its existence; the Tao is just the “melody” (or the “symphony” ) of all of it together.