The Devil's advocate

[Guest guest]

> The atheists doesn't refer to God when they refer to the supreme being,

> they just say that the supreme being is not all-powerfull. Of course ewe

> can refer to God, but what does it help when we don't give sufficient

> reasons to accept Him?

 

We do, but they don't accept those reasons, because being an atheist means

you don't accept logic and reason. If you accepted logic and reason you

would not be able to maintain an atheistic standpoint. Atheism is exactly

like mayavada, the minute you begin to see the sense of it, you are doomed.

In my discussions with atheists I have found many times my intelligence

telling me that they actually have a point. But that means we are being

contaminated, so then we have to go back to the drawing board and try again.

We have to preach to ourselves more than we preach to atheists because the

fact is that we are deeply contaminated thoughout our whole upbringing by

this demoniac philosphy.

 

> - We claim the supreme being is God

> - They claim it's also a possibility that the supreme being can is also

> subjected to control

>

> According to the dictionary definition the word supreme can be used in

> both these ways, so we can't claim that our definition is the only correct

> one.

 

We can claim that we use the word in the sense of ultimate. To say that the

word can have other meanings is simply obfuscation. It is irrelevant.

 

> If we don't want to argue on their premises then we can just always say:

> The Vedic literature is self-evident, svatah-pranama, and therefore all

> atheists are wrong and ignorant, end of discussion. And no matter what

> they say, even though it actually valid logic, is just nonsense simply

> because they are atheists.

 

There is no logical basis for atheism, so what you are saying is an

oxymoron.

 

> I don't think that's going to be very fruitful.

>

> >It is called the supreme court, which means there is no court beyond it.

> >If a being is supreme, it means by definition that there is no being

> >beyond it.

>

> That might be true for the court, but not for a supreme sportsteam. So the

> word supreme can be used in both ways, and I don't think this particular

> theistic argument is very good, even though it can be used.

 

Maybe you think that because you haven't sufficiently realized how it is a

good argument.

 

>I think

> Prabhupada many times used arguments, even though he knew they could be

> challenged, because if someone accepted them it was good.

 

Vaishnavera kriya mudra vijneha na buddhyaya - apart from that I think it is

our duty as followers of Srila Prabhupada to study his teachings deeply and

understand how they are true. He used the argument of supremacy consistently

throughout his teachings, so it must be a good argument, because he said

that he had come with two purposes - to give Krishna and to defeat atheism.

 

> It depends how we use the word. There's nothing wrong - according to the

> dictionary definition - in claming that someone is the supreme in some

> sport for example, but if it just means that the person got most point,

> then it could be he even lost one or more games in the competition. One

> can be the supreme for some time and then someone else takes over. That's

> the way the word is normally used and it fits the dictionary meaning. So

> I'm not making semantics out of this, I'm simply following the normal use

> of the word.

 

It is completely irrelevant. It is obvious that when we use the word supreme

about God it is as in final and ultimate. To then propose that the word can

be used in a more relative sense is simply obfuscation, which is what the

atheists always do.

 

> If the dictionary definition is wrong and the Vedic definition right -

> that's an other discussion. But it's hard for me to see how the Vedas can

> define what a non-vedic word is supposed to mean.

 

That is also irrelevant. In the Vedas the word used is maybe isvara and

paramisvara. I don't know. But one of the definitions of supreme is final

and ultimate, and that's how the word is used to describe God. It is

completely irrelevant that the word can other meanings. It doesn't make it

less foolish to suggest that maybe there is another supreme above the

supreme.

 

> >Obviously we talk about supreme as in supreme, final, ultimate.

> >To point out that the word can also have other more relative meanings is

> >completely irrelevant to the discussion.

>

> But the whole problem with this is that I don't think we have shown the

> existence of God by this particular argument, no matter how we choose to

> define.

 

That's your opinion and you are entitled to that, but since Prabhupad used

the argument consistently it must be a good argument. Whether we have

understood how it is a good argument is another thing.

 

> >I think we have a very good case. If it is the

> >argument used in Nyaya sastra and if Prabhuapda himself used it, it must

> >be a good argument.

>

> As I see it many of the presented arguments uses premises which has to be

> taken as self-evident axioms before the argument gets started. To me it

> seems that many of these arguments depends on that the debaters both

> accept sastra.

 

You don't have to accept sastra to accept the word supreme in the sense of

ultimate. Besides any discussion of philosophy necessitates a predisposed

acceptance of axioms. If we agree to discuss only on the basis of atheistic

axioms, we will never get anywhere.

 

> For example, you say:

>

> >Prabhupada says that in this world there is always someone who is higher

> >or more powerful than someone else, and therefore there must be some one

> >who is supremely powerful.

>

> We can take that from sastra, but how can we prove it logically or

> empirically? All beings in our material experience seems to be both

> controlled and controllers. Humans can kill germs and germs can kill

> humans. Why suppose that someone is not controlled by anyone?

 

Because otherwise you suggest that everything is relative.

 

> You might be able to reason that even though the most powerfull being in

> our experience can be controlled by some lower being, still that being is

> more powerfull and less controlled in the end. This means that you can

> still make a list of beings that are progressively less controlled. And

> then you have three options:

>

> 1. This list can be infinite (which we can't accept)

> 2. This list can end in a being that is not at all controlled

> 3. Or we can have the circle scenario I was talking about

 

You can't have option three without suggesting that everything is relative.

> I don't think we can make a very strong case for 2 instead of three. But

> I'm open to suggestions.

 

I think your problem is that you haven't understood that the circle scenario

is the same as saying that everything is relative.

 

> >IOW, what he is saying is that because there is relative

> >there must be absolute.

>

> Relativism is self-contradictory and foolish, no doubt.

 

Exactly.