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Agnostic theists and atheists believe themselves to be hopelessly ignorant concerning the existence of the supernatural or paranormal. To them, gnostic atheism isn't adequately supported by evidence, and because "absence of evidence isn't evidence of absence," and "all you know is that you know nothing," they suspend judgment on whether or not there is a god, soul, ghost, demon, or afterlife

"There might be a god that doesn't interfere with the world it created, you could never know," they say

But can we know? Can philosophy prove that there is no such thing as supernatural or paranormal? How can we argue against every interpretation of god, soul, ghost, demon, or afterlife, if their existence can't be proved or disproved?

Peter Mortensen
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ActualCry
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    No, we can't prove the non-existence of anything. – Frank Mar 02 '23 at 18:55
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    Start by proving something banal does not exist. For example, count your co-workers, then prove you don't have one more. https://stargate.fandom.com/wiki/The_Fifth_Man – Boba Fit Mar 02 '23 at 19:01
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    You will find Zombies interesting. How can you prove you're not surrounded by them? –  Mar 02 '23 at 19:13
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    Does this answer your question? Asserting that Atheism and Theism are both faith based positions –  Mar 02 '23 at 19:16
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    @eirene Now that I think about it, and re-read the comments, they aren't that different. Thank you for the link – ActualCry Mar 02 '23 at 19:31
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    What does it mean for something to exist, if the thing is cannot be perceived/sensed in any way? It can only exist in human imagination and that we call belief - g-d does exist as a human belief... and I dare say as a belief it does more good and bad than all the scientific knowledge taken together. – Roger V. Mar 03 '23 at 10:09
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    @RogerVadim If there's a tree exists in a forest and no-one is around to see it, does it exist? Whether something can be perceived is distinct from whether it exists. If God only exists as a belief, then God does not exist. Also: So you think all the religious wars and e.g. stoning of people because of how they were born is more good than most technological advancement and modern medicine? Some religious people have done good, sure, but... "With or without religion, good people can behave well and bad people can do evil; but for good people to do evil - that takes religion" -- Steven Weinberg – NotThatGuy Mar 03 '23 at 10:25
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    @NotThatGuy you imply a specific definition of existence. Also, I am not going to take sides pro/against religion. Technological progress have certainly contributed to death in wars, torture, etc. - and a great deal of this was done for reasons unrelated to religion. – Roger V. Mar 03 '23 at 10:35
  • Sometimes, a question provides its own answer. – Agent Smith Mar 04 '23 at 10:04
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    Personally as an Atheist, I often use reductio ad absurdum to "proof" for myself whether something exists. This may not be an absolutely solid proof but for me it is good enough for all practical purposes. Example: if ghosts existed, there would have to be an entity with no body that could think and move. Since they have no body, they have no way to consume energy, which is necessary to think. It could go on and on like this. I added this comment for you to see how atheists think because I don't see myself as hopelessly ignorant regarding the supernatural. – AccidentalTaylorExpansion Mar 04 '23 at 13:21
  • Define "prove". Our epistemic standards for "proving" things are almost never those of mathematics. – J.G. Mar 04 '23 at 19:40
  • This analogy may help understand why the burden of proof is on the extraordinary claim that there is, in fact, any sort of supernatural being: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell%27s_teapot – njzk2 Mar 05 '23 at 12:56
  • If there is a god that never does anything, then we can't know anything about it, since the only way we have to know things is by interacting with them. But then the question is "why should we care?". There is probably an alien throwing a stone somewhere in a galaxy far away, we'll never know. But since the stone will never affect me in anyway, why should I care? – armand Mar 06 '23 at 06:46
  • @AccidentalTaylorExpansion. You have a pretty good comment. Can you make that an answer? – Mark Andrews Mar 11 '23 at 00:49

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You cannot prove it, and that is why the debate is endless.

What you can prove is that it is impossible for all religions to be true, since they make mutually exclusive claims, and you can point out that religions are a form of indoctrination, but those arguments have been made by Dawkins and other for years with little measurable impact.

Of course, a handicap one faces in trying to muster scientific arguments to challenge ideas about the supernatural etc is that science can't yet explain the thing we believe most- consciousness. So if science can't encompass consciousness properly, what else is it missing?

Marco Ocram
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    The scientific question behind consciousness is not whether it exists, but how it exists, how it came to be, how it works, and so forth. Just like we didn't need the theory of relativity to know that objects (that are denser than air) fall when dropped (i.e. gravity exists). There is enough clear evidence to support that conclusion above any other. For supernatural questions, on the contrary, the question is indeed whether they exist, and not how they exist. – NotThatGuy Mar 03 '23 at 09:43
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    @NotThatGuy but that is precisely my point. We know that consciousness exists through our experience of it. We admit that there must be some unknown mechanism that causes it. Physics does not predict the existence of consciousness. So there is at least one phenomenon that exists for which we have no physical explanation. How then, can we be sure there are not others? I should say that I am playing devil's advocate here- I am not a proponent of the supernatural. – Marco Ocram Mar 03 '23 at 10:01
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    But the existence of consciousness has met its burden of proof, regardless of whether we understand the underlying mechanism. – NotThatGuy Mar 03 '23 at 10:12
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    @NotThatGuy why is that relevant to my point? I am not doubting the existence of consciousness. I am simply saying that you can't appeal to physics to rule-out the supernatural. – Marco Ocram Mar 03 '23 at 10:32
  • @Actualcry - It is impossible to disprove the spirit God because, as Francis Schaeffer entitled his book, HE IS THERE AND HE IS NOT SILENT. And He did not remain illusively invisible, but chose to reveal Himself in the first century: B.C./A.D. ( Anno Domini). –  Mar 03 '23 at 22:19
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    @raygrant It is impossible to disprove a 12 year old's imaginary friend because he's sitting right there eating breakfast. Everyone else knows it. You're just not looking right. – candied_orange Mar 04 '23 at 15:18
  • "those arguments have been made by Dawkins and other for years with little measurable impact - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irreligion_in_the_United_Kingdom#:~:text=The%20rise%20in%20irreligion%20was%20confirmed%20in%20the%20UK%27s%202011%20census%2C%20which%20saw%20irreligion%20rise%20from%207.7%20million%20in%202001%20to%2014.1%20million%2C%20a%20rise%20of%2010.3%20percentage%20points.%20The%20local%20authority%20in%20England%20with%20the%20highest%20level%20of%20irreligion%20was%20Norwich%2C%20the%20county%20town%20of%20Norfolk%2C%20where%20the%20level%20was%2042.5%25 – Valorum Mar 05 '23 at 09:41
  • @valorum I eat my words!!! – Marco Ocram Mar 05 '23 at 09:45
  • @MarcoOcram - I don't know whether we can attribute the entire fall to Mr Dawkins' words alone (although he probably would). – Valorum Mar 05 '23 at 09:52
  • @Valorum Very well said! – Marco Ocram Mar 05 '23 at 11:00
  • @candied_orange - But that is just the point: Jesus (God in the flesh) was not an imaginary vision, but a real person seen in time-space history. It is advised that an honest inquirer look in this right place. Gibbons, Durant, Wells, Neander, and other historians know that He was not imaginary. So the next step is to examine the "creative miracles" and other proofs He gave for His Divinity. This would prove whether the "supernatural" (supranatural) exists. –  Mar 06 '23 at 22:38
  • @raygrant a very good point. But conversely I offer the Life of Brian. His gospel shall forever reign supreme at the box office. If all it takes to prove something isn’t imaginary is to say it’s not then we’re having Flying Spaghetti Monster for dinner. – candied_orange Mar 06 '23 at 23:14
  • @ candied - But we aren't dealing with Hollywood fiction. And the legitimate historians aren't indulging in "say so" conduct when writing about Jesus. Your mocking of historical research is not appropriate in SE. –  Mar 06 '23 at 23:25
  • @raygrant I'm not mocking the historical research. I'm pointing to historical counter arguments (that just happen to mock them). If you prefer I can point to historical books that show it is impossible to disprove Big Foot. My faith doesn't require proof because it's faith. Also, I think you're mischaracterizing Edward Gibbon, "Gibbon repudiated all supernatural elements of the Christian system". – candied_orange Mar 07 '23 at 17:22
  • @candied_orange - The point was not that Gibbons was a believer, but that he, as an unbeliever, still recognized the existence of Jesus as historical fact! Both " friend and foe" historians do not escape the presence of the Man from Galilee, but present One who must be reckoned with. –  Mar 28 '23 at 21:28
  • @raygrant actually your point was: "It is impossible to disprove the spirit God" to which I did not argue. Rather I pointed out a multitude of things that are also impossible to disprove. Being impossible to disprove is not that special. – candied_orange Mar 28 '23 at 21:42
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There is a lot of poor thinking one find in theism/atheism discussions, and you have a few as assumptions in this question.

Many falsely think one cannot “show a negative”. But this is how most hypothesis testing is done. Come up with a hypothesis, such as that your neighbor makes their money dealing drugs, and one can make predictions based on this. If the hypothesis is true, the neighbor would have to have a stock of drugs, spend a lot of their time in one on one meetings, in which money and objects change hands, and would need a supply themselves of the drugs. So, check these out. If you search the neighbor’s dwelling and there are no drugs, they don’t spend time in one on one’s with furtive exchanges, etc, then one has shown the negative — your neighbor isn’t actually a drug dealer. This is how all of science operates — “proving” negatives over and over. But as noted above, all of these demonstrations fall short of “logical proof” because EVERYTHING empirical can only be provisionally shown to be true.

A major misunderstanding is the possibility of, and necessity for “proofs”. Whether a particular god exists is an empirical question about our world and logic proofs are not applicable to supporting evidence for or against an empirical question.

This leads into the impossible standard fallacy and false dichotomy of gnostic vs agnostic atheism. Since god questions are empirical questions, and nobody can ever be certain on an empirical question, there isn’t anybody who ever meets the certainty criteria for “gnostic” atheist or theist.

Another is the widely made claim that theism is a faith based view. If one spends much time actually talking with theists about why they believe what they do, and they will cite things like personal prayer experience (first person empiricism), experienced and historical miracles, and the reliability of historical testimony. This is an evidenced, empirical justification.

Atheists likewise, when asked why they think atheism is true, will cite things like the repeated refutations of scripture claims, the LACK of miracles and direct experiences of god in the world, the incoherence or immorality of religious doctrine, and the relative utility of a secular worldview. Actual theists and atheists are not “agnostic” either. Nobody actually falls into any of the four boxes of that silly graphic.

Back to another part of your question: how to refute the “supernatural”. This is a poor term, as one common meaning is “that which is beyond evidence and reasoning”, and if you use that definition then you CAN’T provide either evidence or reasoning against the supernatural, by definition. A far better term would be spiritual.

For an atheist to provide high confidence of the falsity of all spiritual beliefs, the best method to do so would be to show that we can have very high confidence in the truth of materialism. IF materialism is reasonably taken as true, then there isn’t any spirit, and can’t be any Gods.

Dcleve
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    In your example of the drug-dealing neighbour you can prove he doesn’t deal drugs if you can prove the various factors listed but really it moves the problem of proving a negative down the line, since you would need to prove he does not have a stockpile, does not have one-on-one meetings, etc – 11684 Mar 03 '23 at 08:21
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    "If one spends much time actually talking with theists about why they believe what they do, and they will cite things like..." - and if one digs deeper and points out the epistemological problems with those, they will very often resort to some sort of "I just have faith" defence. Well-known apologist, William Lane Craig, infamously presents arguments for God's existence despite saying he will continue to believe "even if all the arguments for [God's] existence were refuted". – NotThatGuy Mar 03 '23 at 09:31
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    Irrespective of the rest of the answer (which I have some sympathy for), your description of hypothesis testing is incorrect. Hypothesis tests never prove anything, they can only disprove things (proof is the wrong word of course, but thats by-the-by) - but the very way a hypothesis is construct means that even if you disprove the positive you are not proving the negative. That is in a hypothesis test rejecting the null does not mean accepting the alternative, and not rejecting the null does not mean accepting the null. – Ian Sudbery Mar 03 '23 at 09:52
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    "For an atheist to provide high confidence of the falsity of all spiritual beliefs, the best method to do so would be to show that we can have very high confidence in the truth of materialism" - materialism is the non-existence of the supernatural, so you seem to be saying the best method to show that all spiritual beliefs are false, is to show that all spiritual beliefs are false. Consider "For non-unicorn-believers to provide high confidence of the non-existence of unicorns, the best method to do so would be to show that we can have very high confidence in the truth of unicorn-non-existence" – NotThatGuy Mar 03 '23 at 09:53
  • Gnosticism can be defined as being as sure as we can be about (religious) claims. Pretty much no-one would claim to be uncertain about the existence of their own family members, even though their existence are empirical questions and we can't have complete certainty on that. To put religious gnosticism on a pedestal that no other existence claim can meet, renders the idea of gnosticism entirely pointless. (You are certainly allowed to feel that "gnostic" doesn't describe you, but don't try to label other people.) – NotThatGuy Mar 03 '23 at 10:39
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    What you described with the drug dealer example looks a lot like what we call in Math "Demonstration by asurd" (direct translation from french, you may know it under a different name). What most people forget about this type of proof is that one must start by showing there is only a limited number of options. If you don't prove this first, showing that alternatives lead to the absurd won't prove anything. In your example the reasoning is not very rigorous – Kaddath Mar 03 '23 at 10:50
  • @Kaddath perhaps you are saying that there are as many gods as there are people, and we can never disprove all of them? – Scott Rowe Mar 03 '23 at 11:43
  • @NotThatGuy. Justifying materialism has nothing to do with refuting the spiritual. What one must do is show that one can reasonably explain the world, most notably the hard cases, by purely material explanations and that these are pragmatically so much better than alternative explanations that there is no point to considering anything else. I do not believe materialists meet either requirement but that is a different question and answer. – Dcleve Mar 03 '23 at 15:13
  • @Kaddath Yes it was not a “rigorous” example, just an easily understandable practical one. If a police detective team have other reasons to consider your neighbor to be a drug dealer they may probe further, looking at bank records and phone contacts etc. some dealers can obscure their profession. But such further investigation would still reach a conditional conclusion. – Dcleve Mar 03 '23 at 15:18
  • @NotThatGuy If you want to redefine the gnostic side of the silly 4 box you will then have to deal with the other half. So, all agnostic atheists think it is impossible to have any evidence for atheism? Impossible to have sufficient? Think they have some evidence but then make a “leap of faith”? The box is just wrong. All propositions are evaluated by four different categories. 1) supported well enough to accept. 2) contraindicated well enough to reject. 3) incoherent question cannot evaluate 4) currently uncertain. Map atheism and theism, agnosticism and uncertainty to these four. – Dcleve Mar 03 '23 at 15:26
  • @ScottRowe There is something of this sort concerning the premise only, yes, but I was more thinking about how people break down this premise in "smaller pieces" that are more provable/refutable. They often forgot other alternatives.. – Kaddath Mar 03 '23 at 15:56
  • @Dcleve yes overall that was an agreement to you saying that you can prove a negative, I just wanted to remind readers that there is a first step that is often skipped in the reasonning – Kaddath Mar 03 '23 at 15:56
  • It's weird to completely ignore the rational basis for theism on a philosophy site and just say that it's an empirical based claim. Some of the most prominent and well respected theologians and theistic philosophers of history would totally reject this idea. Some would say you can reason from empirical facts to the existence of a transcendant being, but the facts employed are basic and it would be absurd to deny them (for instance, to deny that things come into and go out of existence would be absurd). – jaredad7 Mar 03 '23 at 17:17
  • @jaredad7 The logic errors in Thomist 5 Proofs are a standard topic in freshman philosophy. Since the Critique of Pure Readon, the contingency of our world is as well established as anything in philosophy can be. – Dcleve Mar 03 '23 at 20:36
  • @Dcleve it's strange, then, that philosophers like Ed Feser who used to be atheists, used to say that the Thomist 5 Proofs had basic, freshmen-level logic errors, and used to teach these alleged errors to their freshmen students now write papers and books defending them and believe now that at that time they had misunderstood Aquinas. – jaredad7 Mar 06 '23 at 19:04
  • @Dcleve - We are well aware of the procedure of forming a scientific "hypothesis." And the disproving of the hypothesis to see if it stands true. BUT you leave out a very important word dealing with this question: UNIVERSAL! It remains that it is IMPOSSIBLE TO PROVE A 'UNIVERAL' NEGATIVE. This adds a whole different dimension...and impossibility for humans, including atheists. –  Mar 28 '23 at 21:35
  • @raygrant -- universal claims are far easier to test than claims without universals in them. "Everything is colored black", for instance is easy to refute. Itis the NON-universal claims which are a problem. Probabilistic claims, in particular, are EXCEEDINGLY difficult to test. The other issue is, once more, certainty. Empiricism cannot provide certainty, so it can not provide "proof" of any claim, universal or not. – Dcleve Mar 29 '23 at 08:22
  • @Dcleve I can't help but notice that you say "Since god questions are empirical questions, and nobody can ever be certain on an empirical question" - with a seeming certainty. Is your seeming certainty not contrary to the rule you are trying to suggest is certainly true? – Alistair Riddoch Feb 24 '24 at 12:01
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    @AlistairRiddoch -- Empiricism can only deliver increasing levels of confidence in a working hypothesis. One can, and does, act on and live one's life based on uncertain but high confidence working hypotheses. That our world is contingent, and we can never have certainty about it, is a very well supported working hypothesis. It is NOT "certainly true". You are using absolute, analytic truth, that requires truths to be "certain". Empiricism is based on pragmatic truth, and that is the version of truth we live our lives by. – Dcleve Feb 24 '24 at 15:34
  • @Dcleve If I understand you correctly... we both agree the Earth is observably spherical. But you suggest I cannot/shouldn't be 100% certain that it exists in the first place, the limitation of the empirical approach? That's not a mocking strawman. I am curious sincerely if there is a line, where do you choose to draw it? Or is all reality 100% unknowable? I am puzzled. How far you take the "we cannot know"? – Alistair Riddoch Feb 25 '24 at 09:44
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    Nobody can refute the long dream or great Deciever hypotheses, so no, we cannot have certainties. We reject the deception hypotheses because they are not USEFUL. That is pragmatic truth. – Dcleve Feb 25 '24 at 15:46
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    @AlistairRiddoch whoops forgot to at you. – Dcleve Feb 25 '24 at 18:54
  • @Dcleve I think you are playing "long dreams of the gap", akin to the "gods of the gap". Only because the map of all known physics, has a big deep dark chasm of ignorance in the middle... do you consider "long dreams" plausible. It seems to me. (Chasm of Ignorance is what it is called on a cartoon mapping of the known physics that I like... I don't mean to use the term "ignorance" as a slur.) – Alistair Riddoch Feb 25 '24 at 19:13
  • @Dcleve https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fbigthink.com%2Fhard-science%2Fthe-physics-of-everything-in-one-neat-map%2F&psig=AOvVaw3C9YNM_wdZw5iQuNuTZTT9&ust=1708974883835000&source=images&cd=vfe&opi=89978449&ved=0CBUQjhxqFwoTCKjGptmZx4QDFQAAAAAdAAAAABAE – Alistair Riddoch Feb 25 '24 at 19:15
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    @AlistairRiddoch The graphic left out both information and processes, both of which play major roles in physics. Expand that graphic from physics to physicalism, and the chasm would then include emergence and wholism, the tiers of science and how they relate to physics, and both consciousness and abstract objects. Plus how science relates to non science fields of knowledge. Yes, there is a big chasm still in a scientific worldview. And always will be, per empiricism theory. Science is always incomplete. The theory is why we will never be able to refute Great Deciever hypotheses. – Dcleve Feb 25 '24 at 22:40
  • @Dcleve "And always will be, per empiricism theory. Science is always incomplete." I don't understand why there is any expectation these are valid statements? I understand why people might suspect it. But not why they claim it with certainty. – Alistair Riddoch Feb 26 '24 at 00:00
  • @Dcleve don't you suggest here, that being closed to refutation of ones premises, is an indication of pseudoscience, versus science? When you said... "The KEY to being science is not the outward forms, but the openness to and willingness to search for refutations. And the ID community is NOT open to reconsidering its basic assumptions, nor looking for refutations. By miming science forms, and claiming to be science, but rejecting this key attitudinal approach, in practice ID is explicitly a pseudoscience movement." – Alistair Riddoch Feb 26 '24 at 00:03
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    @AlistairRiddoch -- There do not seem to BE any other options for justification other than circularity, abandoning justification, and infinite regress. Science can never complete an infinite regress, so it faces three options of perpetual incompleteness, an abandonment of science, or a fallacy of circular reasoning. This is the Munchausen Trilemma. – Dcleve Feb 27 '24 at 05:48
  • I came up with an idea. I have beaten around the bush a little. There is a question you have asked... "Indirect Realism – what are the main objections?"... I would like to put there... what I expect (might be wrong, but I expect not)...is the answer to fundamental reality. I am not 100% sure what "indirect realism" is. So I am not sure if the answer to everything (if there could be such a thing)... actually fits as "an objection to indirect realism". I will let you decide that. I think it might. At least it will make this exploration easier... cause... pictures. – Alistair Riddoch Feb 27 '24 at 06:42
  • @AlistairRiddoch — Sure post a comment or answer. – Dcleve Feb 27 '24 at 17:00
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No phenomenon in reality is supernatural or paranormal by definition.

Only explanations can be supernatural or paranormal, i.e. outside of known physics.

Gods, ghosts and souls are not existing things, they are just attempted supernatural explanations for natural phenomena. They are not testable scientific theories, they are pure fiction.

Pertti Ruismäki
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Gnosticism is probably best defined not as complete and total certainty, but rather as being as sure as we can be about (religious) claims.

Pretty much no-one would claim to be uncertain about the existence of their own family members, even though their existence are empirical questions and we can't (justifiably) have complete certainty on that.

Pretty much no-one would claim to be uncertain about the non-existence of an invisible unicorn in their back yard, even though we can't have complete certainty on that.

To put religious gnosticism on a pedestal of complete certainty with irrefutable proof, that no existence or non-existence claim can meet, renders the idea of gnosticism entirely pointless.

So to call oneself a gnostic atheist is roughly to say "I'm as sure that a god doesn't exist as I am that there isn't an invisible unicorn in my back yard".

Although atheism is typically more a question of whether to reject existing/known god claims (not any god claim).

Some atheists may concede the possibility of the existence of some unknown god, but this is not a useful question. Given the very fact that they're unknown, we know nothing about them, we don't know what they want or whether there's any consequence to not doing what they want, and we don't know whether they even know that we exist. We would need to wait for their existence to become known before it should reasonably influence our lives in any way.

So that leaves existing god claims, and for that it would be up to theists to provide evidence before you'd become convinced that their claim is true (much like if someone wants to claim there's a unicorn in their back yard). And if you've evaluated their evidence and found it to be lacking, you may be convinced that their claim is false.

NotThatGuy
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    So, it is a lot like a court of law: someone makes a claim / charge, then there is evidence etc and then a decision. Not so hard to understand. God is inexistent until proven otherwise, beyond a reasonable doubt. We just have to pick our Solomon whom both sides would accept an answer from. That's the actual problem: what people are we going to trust? – Scott Rowe Mar 03 '23 at 11:26
  • @ScottRowe The further point is that we only need a Solomon if the invisible-unicorn-owners expect the rest of society to change to support their unicorn. Until then, do what you like. But from that point on, the burden is on the theists to provide evidence. That's the interesting thing about atheism - most societies have theist laws grandfathered-in which never had this test applied, otherwise there'd be no reason to give tax breaks to a church and not to, say, a fishing club. – Graham Mar 03 '23 at 11:59
  • @Graham the Solomon is the person that the unicorn-believers would accept the answer: "No. Doesn't exist" from. That's the sticky point: who, as Mansur Al-Hallaj said, would you trust to kill you (or at least your unicorn)? – Scott Rowe Mar 03 '23 at 17:34
  • @ScottRowe I wouldn't intend to say whether the unicorn does or doesn't exist. Rather, I'd say whether care and feeding of the unicorn is something which should put a burden on the rest of society. – Graham Mar 04 '23 at 18:39
  • @Graham I had a psychology professor who said that a person's values are shown by: 1. how they spend their time, 2. how they spend their money. So, yes, money is important. Society can't pay for all that it arguably should already, so paying for things that don't exist is simply not acceptable. It interests me, because I recently saw the Rouen cathedral and many other religious sites. Upkeep is expensive, the sites bring tourists who bring money to the cities... But the main 'users' are fewer in number, too few to justify a cathedral. The buildings exist, surely. Do we pay for those? – Scott Rowe Mar 04 '23 at 20:10
  • @ScottRowe - Your mention of Solomon is important; because a "greater than Solomon" arrived on Earth (quote from Jesus). And He gave empirical proofs of the existence of God. His testimony has been researched by men like Simon Greenleaf, who was the definitive Harvard expert on judiciary witnesses. He concluded his own research in the booklet, "The Testimony of the Apostles." The Divinity of Jesus was proven "beyond a reasonable doubt." He did creative miracles that can only be characterized as those done by a supranatural Being: raising a decomposed corpse in front of a crowd.) –  Mar 07 '23 at 00:04
  • @Graham- Your comments about unicorns belittles intelligent conversation and doesn't contribute to reasonable dialogue here. –  Mar 07 '23 at 00:06
  • @raygrant We have no empirical proofs of the existence of God. The quality of evidence that historical religious texts provide do not warrant belief in such a life-changing claim as the existence of God (especially given the lack of more modern evidence). The divinity of Jesus was most definitely not proven beyond a reasonable doubt. The far more likely explanation is that any purported "miracles" come from some combination of myth, metaphor, exaggeration, deception and misrememberance. – NotThatGuy Mar 07 '23 at 00:43
  • @Not That Guy - As far as modern proofs, you might examine the Charismatic movement which has been evident around the world and manifest in a great multitude of Christian denominations (See Full Gospel Businessmens Assoc., for example of diverse occurances). It is recommended that one look into the vast research as to the reliability of Biblical writings. The quality of evidence has been the topic for centuries, and as Harvard judicial expert, Simon Greenleaf concluded ,it is impeccable! Most follow the urban myth that the Bible is unreliable. C.S. Lewis is among those who say its not myth –  Mar 07 '23 at 00:54
  • @raygrant I, and many others, have investigated the available historic evidence and evidence of modern spiritual experiences and miracles and found it to be severely lacking. Most [Christians] follow the urban myth that the Bible is reliable. You name-dropping C. S. Lewis demonstrates a lot about your (questionable) epistemology: outside of theology, all he seems to have done was study literature and write some fiction books, which doesn't mean his argument are bad, but it does mean he shouldn't be any sort of authority figure on pretty much anything (except perhaps literature) to an atheist. – NotThatGuy Mar 07 '23 at 01:08
  • @raygrant the Solomon idea was that we need someone today that everyone will accept an answer from, about something posed today. Kind of like, "Only Nixon could go to China" but not a bad person. Who would both sides listen to? It really has nothing to do with a religious idea. It is actually political / social. You can't reach the top of the ladder until everyone can find the first rung. And I mean everyone. – Scott Rowe Mar 07 '23 at 11:08
  • @Not that guy - C.S.Lewis studied all the myths from around the world, and concluded that the story of Christmas-Easter was NOT the stuff of which myths are made of. As a result he came "screaming and kicking" into the Kingdom of God. The evidence could not be dismissed, He is not the "basis" for our acceptance of Christmas, but an example of what happens when the evidence is honestly dealt with. It cannot be considered "an urban myth," as modernist assume. –  Mar 10 '23 at 21:56
  • @raygrant But I still couldn't care less what a random theologian and fiction writer concluded - why do you keep focusing on him after I've already said as much? Even if he were considered the most intelligent person to ever walk the Earth (and his qualifications demonstrate nothing close to that), the emotional appeal of eternal life and other irrational beliefs is strong, and intelligence doesn't make you immune to that. – NotThatGuy Mar 10 '23 at 22:10
  • @ScottRowe "That's the actual problem: what people are we going to trust?". Nah. Wait for trustable understandings and trustable knowledge. Forget people. – Alistair Riddoch Feb 24 '24 at 12:11
  • @AlistairRiddoch yes, if one has the means to prove something for oneself, that is best. But there are countless things I have to take other's word on (verifying as best I can) such as financial advice, major medical procedures, how to use technology, getting the car or furnace repaired... These however have a tangible outcome and people can be penalized for obviously getting it wrong (if you are around to make your case). For everything else, scepticism should be the rule. If I can't see a difference in outcome or hold you to your claim, what point is there to asserting it. Right? – Scott Rowe Mar 06 '24 at 11:57
  • There are times when the explanation of something can be rebuilt from information given, without needing the aid of the information provider to repeat the legwork. You know, when someone is explaining something, but you aren't "seeing it".. then "you see it"... claro... clear... "Ah hah"... like Eureka boy in the bathtub, you don't have to trust that the rising water level indicates displaced water, allowing for the measurement of an object being submerged's volume and therefore allowing its density to be calculated... because once he explained it to everyone..., they "saw it" themselves. – Alistair Riddoch Mar 06 '24 at 13:12
  • @ScottRowe We don't "trust" Archimedes. We recognize his rightness, because we can rebuild what he saw, independent of his presence. Is how I see it. Do you see it that way, when presented that way? – Alistair Riddoch Mar 06 '24 at 13:13
  • I would say Archimedes "assertion" was actually an "invitation to easily see what he easily sees, once he recognized what he was seeing". The less presumptuos approach that gives more recognition of right to autonomy of thought of the reader, or hearer of a claim. Like Newton's last line... "I leave it up to the reader to decide". (regarding the plausability of the existence of actual "forces"... action at a distance across a void... he thought such a notion to be an absurdity and that believing in action at a distance was a sign of mental incompetence in philosophical thought. His words. – Alistair Riddoch Mar 06 '24 at 13:18
  • @AlistairRiddoch I didn't have time to learn and "see" all the stuff my surgeon knew. My coworkers don't have time to just learn all the stuff know about programming and do it for themselves. The world is vastly too complex even for Newton and Einstein, let alone everyone else. There simply isn't enough time to experience everything that we routinely use every day. Without specialists, our technology would be about as advanced as a sailing ship in a bathtub. So, yes, we do need to trust people, billions of them. This is the basis for civilization rather than a world of cowboys. – Scott Rowe Mar 06 '24 at 22:32
  • However, the "seeing the seen" is an indisputable experience. I just don't know how to convey it, or the world would be a quite different place. – Scott Rowe Mar 06 '24 at 22:45
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You can't prove that anything doesn't exist as long as that thing is coherent. However, you can't prove an infinite number of things. You can argue against it in the sense that you can say you have no reason to believe in them. And ultimately, that is all that matters.

  • How many gods can dance on the headland of a planet? Hindus would say: an infinite number. Ding! Ding! Ding! Correct! – Scott Rowe Mar 03 '23 at 11:45
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Statistical: For example, because we all have smartphones now, people are 10x more likely to have a camera with them at any given time, so there should be approximately 10x more serious claims of ghost and UFO photographs - but there aren't anything like that number. That's a "good enough" proof that photos of UFOs and ghosts aren't real.

Graham Laight
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    Maybe digital cameras are unable to capture images of ghosts and UFOs the way film can? Then we would have a sharp decrease in the amount of such photos! – Scott Rowe Mar 03 '23 at 11:31
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To claim the nonexistence of a metaphysical entity, you must show that it would be logically impossible for it to exist. You cannot use observation because your senses are part of the physical, so the metaphysical entity would not be subject to them even if it did exist.

Successful examples of this include mathematical and geometrical proofs, such as the non-existence of the square root of 2 or a squared circle.

For gods or demons, it is unlikely you will succeed, because these beings are generally speaking not all that illogical. I am not aware of any logical argument for the non-existence of God. There are, however, many arguments that God can exist and even must exist, such as those from Medieval philosophers.

Generally the existence of God is not a matter of logical proof but faith. You must have faith that God exists and loves His creation, that if you accept His authority and entrust your life to Him, He will provide that your life will take the appropriate course. This divine guidance would likely not happen in some overt and easily observable way, because by its nature it is a metaphysical phenomenon, and it is ultimately your faith that is being tested and not your senses or your reason. Therefore, believers in God are rarely interested in logical or empirical evidence of His existence which would either fail to promote or possibly even diminish their faith.

The paranormal is an entirely separate thing. It means outside of normal experience and usually refers to apparitions, UFOs, cryptids, psychics and the like. There is nothing inherently metaphysical about these things and paranormal enthusiasts will readily produce naturalistic explanations for their favorite phenomena. To prove that UFOs or Bigfoot or telekinesis don't exist would be the exact same process as proving that Willy Wonka's chocolate factory or your morning cup of coffee doesn't exist. These methods are well documented in many places so I won't reproduce them here, I refer you to the works of Karl Popper and others.

Jessica
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  • You are correct in general. Note that there is a classical proof that omnipotent beings do not exist, and there is also a lemma in linear algebra which says that if quantum mechanics is accurate, then omniscient beings do not exist. So, for example, Jehovah (as described in the Torah, Bible, Quran, etc.) does not exist. – Corbin Mar 05 '23 at 18:57
  • @Jessica - BELIEVERS ARE RARELY INTERESTED IN LOGICAL OR EMPIRICAL EVIDENCE...NOT! The Medieval believing philosophers engaged in logical proofs and syllogisms. And many believing scholars have been very much concerned with empirical evidence ,especially that which was repeatedly demonstrated by the rabbi from Nazareth in front of eye-witnesses both friendly and hostile. The error often expressed today is that "believers have faith in faith." While some succumb to this out of ignorance, it misses the true definition of faith: FAITH IS BELIEF THAT IS A RESPONSE TO A REVOLUTIONARY FACT. –  Mar 10 '23 at 23:14
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    @raygrant What's with the shouting case? Lay off the caps lock, man. – Jessica Mar 30 '23 at 17:10
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tl;dr– It might not make sense to assert that external concepts do-or-don't exist. Below is a story to showcase the ambiguity.

Thought experiment: Intertwined simulated worlds.

Alice and Bob are friends.

Alice and Bob both decide to play SimWorld, which is based on an older game called "The Sims". Basically, Alice and Bob each get to create their own virtual-world filled with artificially-intelligent people called "sims".

Alice and Bob each go home and make their own worlds individually:

  1. Alice tells SimWorld to start with a model like the world she's already in. Partial to stories about magical users who're secretive about their abilities, Alice adds in a magic system that the sims can use.

    Alice chooses to focus on her in-simulation counterpart, Sim-Alice, who she grants powerful magical abilities.

  2. Bob likewise tells SimWorld to start with a model like the world he's already in. Partial to stories about eccentric inventors who're secretive about their abilities, Bob allows sims to have technical skills that allow them to build amazing devices with ease.

    Bob chooses to focus on his in-simulation counterpart, Sim-Bob, who he grants powerful mad-scientist abilities.

The next day, Alice and Bob talk to each-other about their new sim-worlds. Each is amused by the other's fantasy, deciding to have the other's in-simulation counterpart to experience delusions of such abilities in their own worlds. This is:

  1. In Alice's sim-world, Sim-Bob thinks that he has powerful mad-scientist abilities, but doesn't.

  2. In Bob's sim-world, Sim-Alice thinks that she has powerful magical abilities, but doesn't.

Alice and Bob both agree that Sim-Alice and Sim-Bob should meet up in both of their sim-worlds to go flying through the air on a flying-carpet.

  1. In Alice's sim-world:

    • the flying-carpet can fly because Sim-Alice cast a magic-spell causing it to fly;

    • Sim-Bob thinks that he caused the carpet to fly, but didn't.

  2. In Bob's sim-world:

    • the flying-carpet can fly because Sim-Bob instructed his helper-nanobots to fuse anti-gravitational particles to it;

    • Sim-Alice thinks that she caused the carpet to fly, but didn't.

Alice and Bob both submit their simulations to be run on a cloud-server. The same server receives both, and due to its advanced evaluation-engine recognizing an opportunity to fold the work into a single evaluation, runs the same evaluation to effect both Alice's sim-world and Bob's sim-world. The cloud-server reports the result back to both Alice and Bob, having satisfied the evaluation-constraints for both of their simulations.

Reviewing the simulations, both Alice and Bob realize that, in both of their sim-worlds, Sim-Alice and Sim-Bob argued about if magic was real and if their flying-carpet worked magically. Which of them was correct?

Nat
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In Philosophy, there's the concept of Russell's Teapot: an example which acts on the example of "disproving the existence of a tea kettle floating around Saturn"

It's a reference to the fact that some things that are ridiculously unlikely but are also ridiculously hard to prove.

The thing is, though, that this doesn't mean they are impossible to prove.

However, there are two ways I'm aware of to disprove Russell's Teapot, and a third way that doesn't apply to the teapot itself, but some similar claims.

The first is the long way - to disprove at each possible instance. In the case of a tea kettle, take the space of a tea kettle, and simultaneously search a grid of the entire orbit around Saturn with a grid resolution of that size, and if there are no tea kettles, then it is disproven.

The second is the induced way... to find some claim about about the subject in question that doesn't match what is possible, and it requires some impossible aspect of the claim. In the case of the tea kettle, it would be specifically designating a tea-kettle as a human-made object, and going through all human space flights to show that none have put a kettle in orbit around Saturn. Although not as absolute, it's still pretty solid proof.

The third way is if the definition of the "teapot" itself is somehow fully accessible by definition. For example, if instead of a Teapot, Russell's proof said, "a magical lamp that instantly creates a copy of itself in the hands of anyone who dons cream colored pants and a hat." At which point you could disprove the existence of this particular lamp that floats around Saturn using any person that puts on cream colored pants and a hat and seeing that the kettle doesn't suddenly appear in their hands.

All cases of a "Russell's teapot" scenario require at least one full coverage in some aspect to prove or disprove...

  1. Full coverage of Saturn in the first example (Coverage of affected)
  2. Full coverage of teapots in space second example (Coverage of concept)
  3. The Definition including a disprovable full coverage in the third (Coverage of Definition)

Each case, however, will require having a very firm definition of the subject matter. If you're trying to philosophically debate someone on the topic of the supernatural or paranormal, unless it's a purely academic philosophical debate (such as an online religion debate), they're likely going to be highly resistant to actually making a concrete definition and following it to its logical conclusions.

However, for a philosophical debate, the above proofs should be sufficient, even if 1 & 2 are generally impractical for most debates.

In non-philosophical debates, sadly, the solid philosophical proof usually doesn't "prove to people" (in no small part because many people don't fully grasp logic), and frequently people just want to be right without going through the effort to become right.

The times I've had this particular debate in regards to the paranormal with someone, the best I got was "whatever the definition is in the dictionary"... this was an "easy" philosophical solution, as the dictionary I looked it called the supernatural 'outside of what is natural', and then I looked up natural and it was 'not man-made', thereby meaning all man-made things are supernatural by definition... this did not sit well with the person I was debating with.

However, not a philosophical proof against the supernatural, but a physics one making use of full coverage (proof method 2), is CERN's experiments with particle physics. If you consider the supernatural being active non-physical things that influence the physical world, CERN has tracked every particle capable of interacting with fermions (basically, what we're made of), so we are fully aware of all physical interactions with humans - something a soul or ghost would have to do... aannnndd... none of them were potential methods for human interactions by ghosts/souls/etc.

Another argument is that, if you consider humans natural, as "in nature or deriving from nature" is another definition of natural, then anything that exists is, by definition, natural. Therefore, by definition, the supernatural simply doesn't exist, as supernatural becomes a synonym for imaginary or non-existing.

lilHar
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In order to prove the supernatural doesn't exist a person would have to have traversed the whole of the universe...and beyond. But to prove the supernatural (supranatural) exists, all the deity has to do is show up once!

And this is what many eye-witnesses claimed happened in the first century when Jesus showed up! (Christmas comin' down) Of course, anyone can claim to be a supranatural being, but someone who worked miracles that can only be characterized as being done by a deity, would qualify as this deity. Creative miracles (nihil sine deo) beyond the ability of Nature (physical laws), cannot be dismissed when witnessed by credible observers who could not only verify, but if necessary falsify them.

As to the credibility of the various documented witness accounts concerning Jesus, Simon Greenleaf (expert on judicial evidence from Harvard) and other experts have researched and declared them credible! The witnesses were contemporary with Jesus, and were from various walks of life: tax accountant, doctor/historian, businessman, companion for three and a half years, members of the Sanhedrin, etc.

So it is impossible to disprove the existence of the supernatural (supranatural). God has a lot to say about this!