NationStates Jolt Archive

“I contend we are both atheists, I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours.”

Heh but that don't work against people who belive all Gods are the same God.

“I contend we are both atheists, I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours.”

I've never understood that quote, never having been supplied with its context.

“I contend we are both atheists, I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours.”
Hmm... works for the "One true way" crowd... doesn't work for those who chose their belief knowing that it is indeed a belief. ;)

And STILL leaves me with the logic problem. :p

Hmm... Still sounds like splitting the same hair. The first one sound like more Agnostic, i.e. I don't believe in god(s) with (But I allow for some small probability that one/they might exist, small as it is) unsaid.

The second one makes a concrete statement, which is fine as that is their belief and no skin off my nose what they believe.

So it would seem more like the 'soft' Atheist would actually be Agnostic, not Atheist and the 'Hard' Atheist is making a statement of belief.

Not really. The Agnostic view is "I don't know, so I don't make a statement either way", whereas the first type of Atheist's view is "It's not very likely, so I don't believe". The "hard" Atheist's view is "I'm convinced of the non-existence of deities".

Not really. The Agnostic view is "I don't know, so I don't make a statement either way"...

Just to clarify, the more considerate agnostic says, "Through reasoning I know I cannot take a position either way, so the only response I can make is 'I don't know'."

Hey Atheists, got a question for you.

I think I am running into a contradiction for atheism, namely that atheism makes the same ‘leap of faith’ that religions do.

To wit: science cannot of course test or provide direct proof of the existence of god(s). As it has been pointed out to countless Creationists on this board. Science is the realm of the natural world and god(s) belong to the supernatural. This excludes us from ever finding any definitive proof to the existence of god(s).

In the same vein, it is also, of course, impossible for science to prove a negative. One cannot prove the non-existence of anything.

So in other words, god(s) are one big question mark where it’s pretty much impossible for us to say one way or another.

So here’s where I have my question, from the above it would seem that Agnosticism, the position that there may be a god(s), or there may not, but we don’t know and cannot know, would be the logical position for those folks who reason things out without going on something as asinine as a ‘feeling’ or ‘faith’ alone.

So where does the atheist absolute position that there is/are no god(s) come from? It would seem that this position is no more grounded in actual logic or reason than any other religion that claims their way is the one true way because they say so.

Am I missing something here then? Please explain.

I’m busy with lesson planning today so I might not respond back till later, but I will be back. ;)

You are quite right - atheism is a definitive position and therefore does demand of its adherents a level of faith. However, most atheists do not have this faith because their atheism is a matter of convenience for them: they adopt the position to fit in with their materialist/positivist/scientist creed, a creed which usually develops from the Hegelian position whereby faith was deemed to be a lesser mode of thought in the dialectic.

Hegel was quite wrong in this regard: faith is not a lower stage in the dialectic which we all pass at an early period in our lives but is instead the highest form of thought simply because it is so difficult to truly achieve. Faith is an absolute relationship with the Absolute on the basis with the absurd, that is to say an individual relationship with God (or whatever your Absolute is) on the basis of impossibility. That makes it the most lonely and the most difficult path to take because it requires the individual to violate the ethical sphere and thus be without human sympathy. It also requires belief in the utterly implausible: in the case of Christians, that impossibility is represented in the paradox that all things are possible through God.

But, because their position is ultimately derived from Hegelian (not Kierkegaardian) philosophy, they could never confess to having faith, faith being something contemptible to their positivist views. They are essentially vulgar atheists, hypocrites who profess a position without ever having faith in it. They are no better than those people who go to church not because they have faith in God but because they feel they have to attend in order to maintain social appearances.

...whereas the first type of Atheist's view is "It's not very likely, so I don't believe". The "hard" Atheist's view is "I'm convinced of the non-existence of deities".
That really IS splitting the same hair. What would be the difference. You either allow for the possibility of, and therefore are Agnostic, or you reject and are Atheist.

You are quite right - atheism is a definitive position and therefore does demand of its adherents a level of faith. However, most atheists do not have this faith because their atheism is a matter of convenience for them: they adopt the position to fit in with their materialist/positivist/scientist creed, a creed which usually develops from the Hegelian position whereby faith was deemed to be a lesser mode of thought in the dialectic.

Hegel was quite wrong in this regard: faith is not a lower stage in the dialectic which we all pass at an early period in our lives but is instead the highest form of thought simply because it is so difficult to truly achieve. Faith is an absolute relationship with the Absolute on the basis with the absurd, that is to say an individual relationship with God (or whatever your Absolute is) on the basis of impossibility. That makes the most lonely and the most difficult path to take because it requires the individual to violate the ethical sphere and thus be without human sympathy.

But, because their position is ultimately derived from Hegelian (not Kierkegaardian) philosophy, they could never confess to having faith, faith being something contemptible to their positivist views. They are essentially vulgar atheists, hypocrites who profess a position without ever having faith in it. They are no better than those people who go to church not because they have faith in God but because they feel they have to attend in order to maintain social

I don't make any statement about the philosophical value on faith. It's simply irrelavant to me. Does that make me a hypocrite? I don't think so. I'm perfectly honest in my disinterest in personal faith. I do however find the concept fascinating on a psychological level.

That really IS splitting the same hair. What would be the difference. You either allow for the possibility of, and therefore are Agnostic, or you reject and are Atheist.

As I said, the difference is in the perspective.
The "soft" atheist is simply making a statement on personal opinion on the perceived reality. It's entirely subjective to say "I don't believe in god", it doesn't make any statement on reality.
The "hard" atheist on the other hand makes an absolute statement on reality by claiming that god doesn't exist. This position does require faith, the first one doesn't really.

As I said, the difference is in the perspective.
The "soft" atheist is simply making a statement on personal opinion on the perceived reality. It's entirely subjective to say "I don't believe in god", it doesn't make any statement on reality.
The "hard" atheist on the other hand makes an absolute statement on reality by claiming that god doesn't exist. This position does require faith, the first one doesn't really.
Ah! Ok, now I get where you're coming from.

Ah! Ok, now I get where you're coming from.

I think it's a small, but vital difference ;)
Especially when the question of faith comes up.

The "hard" atheist on the other hand makes an absolute statement on reality by claiming that god doesn't exist. This position does require faith, the first one doesn't really.
No it doesn't.
"I am convinced of the non-existence of supernatural entities that created everything."
Everyone stating 'hard' atheism is a leap of faith comes from the background that assumes a god exists in the first place and therefore have a pre-existing bias. You see the idea of that god not existing as impossible and therefore it is a "leap of faith" to believe so with certainty.

No it doesn't.
"I am convinced of the non-existence of supernatural entities that created everything."
Everyone stating 'hard' atheism is a leap of faith comes from the background that assumes a god exists in the first place and therefore have a pre-existing bias. You see the idea of that god not existing as impossible and therefore it is a "leap of faith" to believe so with certainty.
Again though, stating WITH CERTAINTY like that violates the fact that you cannot know. You have no evidence one way or another and never will. It violates logic and is a belief.

No it doesn't.
"I am convinced of the non-existence of supernatural entities that created everything."
Everyone stating 'hard' atheism is a leap of faith comes from the background that assumes a god exists in the first place and therefore have a pre-existing bias. You see the idea of that god not existing as impossible and therefore it is a "leap of faith" to believe so with certainty.

Annnnd what evidance was it that convinced you?

Hey Atheists, got a question for you.

I think I am running into a contradiction for atheism, namely that atheism makes the same ‘leap of faith’ that religions do.

Lacking belief in something does not require a leap of faith.

I lack belief in an infinite number of things, and so do you.

Are you capable of reading a fiction story and not instantly believing in the literal reality of everything it describes? Then congratulations! You lack belief in something, without needing to make any "leap of faith" to do it.

Again though, stating WITH CERTAINTY like that violates the fact that you cannot know. You have no evidence one way or another and never will. It violates logic and is a belief.

It doesn't violate logic anymore than not believing in the teacup.

No it doesn't.
"I am convinced of the non-existence of supernatural entities that created everything."
Everyone stating 'hard' atheism is a leap of faith comes from the background that assumes a god exists in the first place and therefore have a pre-existing bias. You see the idea of that god not existing as impossible and therefore it is a "leap of faith" to believe so with certainty.

It does, I think.
To pull Russell's teapot out again, if I tolw you about a teapot orbiting Mars, could you deny with 100% certainty that there isn't any?
It's impossible to conclusively prove a negative. You can't prove non-existance.
That is the one reason why the burden of proof where religion is concerned lies with the religious, as they claim the existence of something.

This far, god's ecxistence hasn't been proven, and is therefore nothing more than an (unlikely) possiblity. To proclaim with certainty that god doesn't exist does require faith, it cannot be deducted logically.

It doesn't violate logic anymore than not believing in the teacup.

Ah, not believing in the tea cup is rational.
Believing that the tea cup doesn't exist is irrational.

It doesn't violate logic anymore than not believing in the teacup.
*sighs* Again. God(s) = Supernatural. Supernatural is something science cannot touch, taste, smell, test, see, buy, sell, steal, roll in, screw, or anything else. Science (AKA, the best tool we have to describe reality) states, point blank, we don't know and can never know. So saying, "There is no such thing as god(s)" makes a statement that violates both the can't prove a negative and can't touch the supernatural. So, yes, it does violate logic as it is a belief and nothing more.

Teacups, wondrous things that they are, tend to not be supernatural.

Lacking belief in something does not require a leap of faith.

I lack belief in an infinite number of things, and so do you.

Are you capable of reading a fiction story and not instantly believing in the literal reality of everything it describes? Then congratulations! You lack belief in something, without needing to make any "leap of faith" to do it.

Yet beliving in the lack of something without evidance one way or the other is certianly a faith based supposiotion.

Lacking belief in something does not require a leap of faith.

I lack belief in an infinite number of things, and so do you.

Are you capable of reading a fiction story and not instantly believing in the literal reality of everything it describes? Then congratulations! You lack belief in something, without needing to make any "leap of faith" to do it.
So you do hold then that there is the possibility that deities do actually exist?

So you choose to believe that there is/are no god(s) then, right?

There is no belief to choose. Do you consider yourself a teacup agnostic?

There is no belief to choose. Do you consider yourself a teacup agnostic?
Why not?

But let me ask you point blank. Do deities exist?

Ah, not believing in the tea cup is rational.
Believing that the tea cup doesn't exist is irrational.

Pointless exercise for people to cop out on in order to feel 'above' the debate. You don't believe for a second in the teacup because there is no reason to. Quit candy assing.

If I set out to prove that God does not exist, I am faced with infinity. Is it just me, or is infinity more frightening than God ?

EDIT: Canto, I swear I am not stalking you. Same place at the same time, we have words for that that aren't "God" or "harassment" ... right?

Teacups, wondrous things that they are, tend to not be supernatural.

You're right - and the problem with this is that we're using examples that can be proven to explain a point about something that can't.

It would be better to ask - do you believe in zhwiggles?

You might ask 'what the f*** is a zhwiggle?'

To which I'd reply 'I don't know, I just made it up, I'll hypothesize that it creates munkzters from maghrits'

To which you'd rightly assume I was talking absolute bollocks.

It would not be irrational for you to think that I was creating made up words and that anything they might describe does not exist.

It's perfectly rational for people to think the same about 'god'.

*sighs* Again. God(s) = Supernatural. Supernatural is something science cannot touch, taste, smell, test, see, buy, sell, steal, roll in, screw, or anything else. Science (AKA, the best tool we have to describe reality) states, point blank, we don't know and can never know. So saying, "There is no such thing as god(s)" makes a statement that violates both the can't prove a negative and can't touch the supernatural. So, yes, it does violate logic as it is a belief and nothing more.

Teacups, wondrous things that they are, tend to not be supernatural.

So then you waste time considering the possibility that one orbits Pluto.

Congratulations. That's irrational. There is no reason to believe. "All things are possible" is a nice little exercise or a fun thing to say when stoned, but has no practical application.

Leap of faith ?
Here's an example for you.. You cannot prove that there is no chance of there being elves dwarves or aliens in this world.
Of course it comes down to beliefs mosts atheists say that they Do not believe in god or his/her/it's existance ever. I have never met an atheist that claims he/she/it can prove that god does not exist.

Besides there is no point in continuing a discussion like this forever.. And it's silly that believers ask us to prove that god does not exist when they can't prove otherwise themselves.

Yet beliving in the lack of something without evidance one way or the other is certianly a faith based supposiotion.

Do you have faith leprechauns exist and give people pots of gold when they are caught?

You're right - and the problem with this is that we're using examples that can be proven to explain a point about something that can't.

It would be better to ask - do you believe in zhwiggles?

You might ask 'what the f*** is a zhwiggle?'

To which I'd reply 'I don't know, I just made it up, I'll hypothesize that it creates munkzters from maghrits'

To which you'd rightly assume I was talking absolute bollocks.

It would not be irrational for you to think that I was creating made up words and that anything they might describe does not exist.

It's perfectly rational for people to think the same about 'god'.
That.

You're right - and the problem with this is that we're using examples that can be proven to explain a point about something that can't.

It would be better to ask - do you believe in zhwiggles?

You might ask 'what the f*** is a zhwiggle?'

To which I'd reply 'I don't know, I just made it up, I'll hypothesize that it creates munkzters from maghrits'

To which you'd rightly assume I was talking absolute bollocks.

It would not be irrational for you to think that I was creating made up words and that anything they might describe does not exist.
Doesn't work as an example. Again because the supernatural is a defined area with common frames of reference in there. It might be all powerful, or omnipresent, or controls thunder, or even gets you home safe and sees that the roads are regularly repaired, but those are words we can understand.

It's perfectly rational for people to think the same about 'god'.
Why? Again, the best tool we have says it can't touch it. We know we can't prove a negative. So... we're left with 'because I say so' from those people who say so.

Pointless exercise for people to cop out on in order to feel 'above' the debate. You don't believe for a second in the teacup because there is no reason to. Quit candy assing.

You just don't get the difference, do you?
I don't assume that the teacup exist, no. Just as I don't assume that gods exist. But to assert the non-existence of anything without any doubt whatsoever is not logical, it's not scientific and it's not even particularly clever.

So then you waste time considering the possibility that one orbits Pluto.

Congratulations. That's irrational. There is no reason to believe. "All things are possible" is a nice little exercise or a fun thing to say when stoned, but has no practical application.
So in other words you have no answer beyond because I say so.

So then you waste time considering the possibility that one orbits Pluto.

Congratulations. That's irrational. There is no reason to believe. "All things are possible" is a nice little exercise or a fun thing to say when stoned, but has no practical application.

There is a little thing called "probability". It provides a nice balance to "possible".
The teacup is entirely possible. Just not very probable at all. Therefore, it can be assumed the teacup does not orbit Pluto. But there is just no way to prove it either way and be certain.

You just don't get the difference, do you?
I don't assume that the teacup exist, no. Just as I don't assume that gods exist. But to assert the non-existence of anything without any doubt whatsoever is not logical, it's not scientific and it's not even particularly clever.
So you have some doubt in the non-existence of Fizzygort?

You just don't get the difference, do you?
I don't assume that the teacup exist, no. Just as I don't assume that gods exist. But to assert the non-existence of anything without any doubt whatsoever is not logical, it's not scientific and it's not even particularly clever.

Some things are so unlikely as to not be worth entertaining. Orbiting teacups and sky fairies all fall into that category. Pretending they might to appease the superstitious is not clever.

Some things are so unlikely as to not be worth entertaining. Orbiting teacups and sky fairies all fall into that category. Pretending they might to appease the superstitious is not clever.

See my post about probability.

So you do hold then that there is the possibility that deities do actually exist?
I hold that it is impossible for me, as a human, to ever know whether or not deities (as defined by my fellow humans) do exist. Since it is impossible for me to ever know whether there is a God or not, I regard that information as irrelevant to me.

Leap of faith ?
Here's an example for you.. You cannot prove that there is no chance of there being elves dwarves or aliens in this world.
Nope, I can't. But I choose not to believe that there are.

Of course it comes down to beliefs mosts atheists say that they Do not believe in god or his/her/it's existance ever. I have never met an atheist that claims he/she/it can prove that god does not exist.
You haven't been hanging around this board long enough. But in any case, the point ISN'T if they can or not, but the problem that comes with stating that there is/are no god(s) because we run into a statement of fact for which there can never be such. A paradox.

And it's silly that believers ask us to prove that god does not exist when they can't prove otherwise themselves.
I'm sorry, did someone do so in this thread?

Do you have faith leprechauns exist and give people pots of gold when they are caught?

No I do not belive that leprechauns exist, although I might be wrong, it is my irrational belife(belife without evidance) that makes me thing they do not exist.

I hold that it is impossible for me, as a human, to ever know whether or not deities (as defined by my fellow humans) do exist. Since it is impossible for me to ever know whether there is a God or not, I regard that information as irrelevant to me.
I am REALLY starting to believe that there are no actual Atheists then, just Agnostics.

Doesn't work as an example. Again because the supernatural is a defined area with common frames of reference in there. It might be all powerful, or omnipresent, or controls thunder, or even gets you home safe and sees that the roads are regularly repaired, but those are words we can understand.


Why? Again, the best tool we have says it can't touch it. We know we can't prove a negative. So... we're left with 'because I say so' from those people who say so.

Kid hears thunder

'Dad what's that?'
'Umm, that's God being angry'
'What the f*** is a God?'
'It's a great being in the sky that gets angry with us if you don't shut up'
'Dad, are you talking bollocks?'
'Why yes son, yes I am'

Just because we've made pointless definitions to this made up word doesn't make it any more right.

I'm happy to provide a long definition of what a zhwiggle is. I can post it on the Internet and people can read and understand it as a commonly defined word. Alas, someone has done that already, it's called the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

I am REALLY starting to believe that there are no actual Atheists then, just Agnostics.
Atheism, broadly defined, is the lack of belief in God/gods. So I'm an atheist. I am an atheist because of my agnosticism.

I am REALLY starting to believe that there are no actual Atheists then, just Agnostics.

Hehe I suggested such a thing to some atheists a while back, they shouted at me and called me terrible terrible things!

Kid hears thunder

'Dad what's that?'
'Umm, that's God being angry'
'What the f*** is a God?'
'It's a great being in the sky that gets angry with us if you don't shut up'
'Dad, are you talking bollocks?'
'Why yes son, yes I am'

Just because we've made pointless definitions to this made up word doesn't make it any more right.

I'm happy to provide a long definition of what a zhwiggle is. I can post it on the Internet and people can read and understand it as a commonly defined word. Alas, someone has done that already, it's called the Flying Spaghetti Monster.
Still didn't answer my why.

I am REALLY starting to believe that there are no actual Atheists then, just Agnostics.

Oh, there are some strong atheits. Only they're just as irrational as theists in that respect. And they tend not to be quite as many, really.

See my post about probability.

In what way did that not already deal with the nonsense about 'probability.'

Personally I don't make any leap of faith as an atheist - the question "is there a big invisible bloke in the sky controlling everything" is too ridiculous to ask in the first place.

In what way did that not already deal with the nonsense about 'probability.'

I'm not sure what you're asking now. I'm not even sure if that's a question or not?

Oh, there are some strong atheits. Only they're just as irrational as theists in that respect. And they tend not to be quite as many, really.
I still think the theists and the atheists will join together to throw rocks at the agnostics for having the only really logical position. ;)

With that said, I have three classes of 4th graders and I need much more energy to tackle them tomorrow (Skuld's Holy Hammer I wish I had their energy).

So before someone yells at me for abandoning argument, I'm off. I'd ask for not too many pages to wade through, but I'm fairly sure that is going to happen no matter what I say.

Night all.

Personally I don't make any leap of faith as an atheist - the question "is there a big invisible bloke in the sky controlling everything" is too ridiculous to ask in the first place.

In your opinion. I would ask what is it that makes you say this? Why do you consider it a ridiculous question to ask?

Does this not show that your atheisim stems from a place of certianty? Where does such certainty come from, or what evidance have you to make you so certian?

Oh, there are some strong atheits. Only they're just as irrational as theists in that respect. And they tend not to be quite as many, really.
Believing it is impossible for an all powerful being to exist that we have no evidence of is hardly irrational.
I assume you believe it is possible for the Flying Spaghetti Monster to exist.

I'm not sure what you're asking now. I'm not even sure if that's a question or not?
The statement you quoted already dealt with probability.

In your opinion. I would ask what is it that makes you say this? Why do you consider it a ridiculous question to ask?

Does this not show that your atheisim stems from a place of certianty? Where does such certainty come from, or what evidance have you to make you so certian?
Again:

There is an infinite number of "god questions" that can be asked. Just look at the number of gods that humans have already invented, and we've only been around for a tiny handful of years (in cosmic terms).

It does not require "faith" to lack belief in each of the infinite number of god-images that could possibly exist. You are treating each god-image equally in that case, and simply applying blanket non-acceptance to all proposals until further information is provided.

What requires faith is to select one of these infinite number of possibilities and choose to embrace it, even though there is still no more evidence being provided. You are now selecting one of the options and choosing to give it special status that you do not grant to any of the others. You are actively singling out one possibility.

On probability.

In order for there to be probability, there has to be concrete items. A deck of cards, a set of numbers on dice, something. The probability is the chance of finding a certain element in a set. For orbiting teacups you have a set of objects orbiting something, then you can analyze the probability that one of those is a teacup. You cannot have a probability of God's existence. What is the set you are taking the element from?

Believing it is impossible for an all powerful being to exist that we have no evidence of is hardly irrational.
I assume you believe it is possible for the Flying Spaghetti Monster to exist.

I'm pretty sure that there are more mathematical people out there who could actually claculate the probability. And I know it won't be 0.
I don't believe in its non-existence, but it's improbable enough to ignore.

I'm pretty sure that there are more mathematical people out there who could actually claculate the probability. And I know it won't be 0.
No you can't. The element is "God exists" what is the set you are taking it from? Whether or not God exists? That gives its a 50% chance. But the set isn't concrete. You know there are objects, or know that objects can, orbit a planet. Any element you pull from that set is random, you don't know what it is, but it will be something. Will it be a teacup? Don't know, probably not, but it could be in the random set and that is the point.
"God exists, yes/no" is a coin flip, but once you get the final result, you don't have an actual result; you have a theory you can't prove, not a concrete object. There is no probability.


I don't believe in its non-existence, but it's improbable enough to ignore.
So any random, imaginary being people make up on the spot, must possibly exist because you can't say for certain they don't. An absurd position to take just to cover your ass from hypocrisy on made up on the spot beings and more established beings like God.

Again:

There is an infinite number of "god questions" that can be asked. Just look at the number of gods that humans have already invented, and we've only been around for a tiny handful of years (in cosmic terms).

It does not require "faith" to lack belief in each of the infinite number of god-images that could possibly exist. You are treating each god-image equally in that case, and simply applying blanket non-acceptance to all proposals until further information is provided.

What requires faith is to select one of these infinite number of possibilities and choose to embrace it, even though there is still no more evidence being provided. You are now selecting one of the options and choosing to give it special status that you do not grant to any of the others. You are actively singling out one possibility.

Again:

Hey Bottle,

Thanks for your answer, I was actualy asking Rambhutan a specific question based on his/her? post and expecting a reply from him/her so that I could follow the thread of logic I wished to go down.

However.

You are right it does not require faith to lack a not belive in the existance of God or gods, it does however require faith to belive in the non existance of God or gods, although that is not what I asked.

Rambhutan has declared that even asking, does such a things as creative diety exist, is a ridiculous question to ask, I think that sounds like a statement based in certianty, and so I asked from where did this certianty come from.

I'm trying to asertain if Rambhutan does not belive in creative diety, or belives that there is no such thing as creative diety.

So any random, imaginary being people make up on the spot, must possibly exist because you can't say for certain they don't. An absurd position to take just to cover your ass from hypocrisy on made up on the spot beings and more established beings like God.

Anything could possibly exist, the question is simply is it likely enough or is there enough evidence for me to believe and worry about. For me the answer is no in regards to Gods. But anything could possibly exist.

On probability.

In order for there to be probability, there has to be concrete items. A deck of cards, a set of numbers on dice, something. The probability is the chance of finding a certain element in a set. For orbiting teacups you have a set of objects orbiting something, then you can analyze the probability that one of those is a teacup. You cannot have a probability of God's existence. What is the set you are taking the element from?

Ummm tell that to the German mathmaticians that calculted the probibility of God's exsitance just a few months back.

The one and only God is Ego, writ large.

I'm a doughty little agnostic. I stubbornly defend my right not to know, but if I ever do Believe, I'm pretty sure I want more than one God.

God as a single cause, God as the creator of the universe and author of the rules which science seeks, is simply too simple an explanation to satisfy me.

My universe is far more interesting than that.

Again:

Hey Bottle,

Thanks for your answer, I was actualy asking Rambhutan a specific question based on his/her? post and expecting a reply from him/her so that I could follow the thread of logic I wished to go down.

Go peeps! You answer Bottle, yet reserve the space for Ranbhutan to fully answer you. My utmost respect for your clear view in this crowded thread.

You are observing the process, not just your part in it or the point you wanted to make. Nice work. <..the serious smilie..>

However.

You are right it does not require faith to lack a not belive in the existance of God or gods, it does however require faith to belive in the non existance of God or gods, although that is not what I asked.

Rambhutan has declared that even asking, does such a things as creative diety exist, is a ridiculous question to ask, I think that sounds like a statement based in certianty, and so I asked from where did this certianty come from.

I'm trying to asertain if Rambhutan does not belive in creative diety, or belives that there is no such thing as creative diety.

I have the urge to reply to this. But I won't, because it would destroy the point I made above, and cast doubt on the sincerity of my respect. We must be aware of the process, not just the intellectual substance, in order to really debate.

Go peeps! You answer Bottle, yet reserve the space for Ranbhutan to fully answer you. My utmost respect for your clear view in this crowded thread.

You are observing the process, not just your part in it or the point you wanted to make. Nice work. <..the serious smilie..>



I have the urge to reply to this. But I won't, because it would destroy the point I made above, and cast doubt on the sincerity of my respect. We must be aware of the process, not just the intellectual substance, in order to really debate.

Hey thanks for your kind words, it kinda makes my heads swell! Nice to have that instead of 'hey dude your spelling's shit!' Ahhh the human ego.:D

Please feel free to answer, I'll still wait for Rambhutans answer also.

Hey Atheists, got a question for you.

I think I am running into a contradiction for atheism, namely that atheism makes the same ‘leap of faith’ that religions do.

So where does the atheist absolute position that there is/are no god(s) come from? It would seem that this position is no more grounded in actual logic or reason than any other religion that claims their way is the one true way because they say so.

Am I missing something here then? Please explain.You're confusing the issues.

First, agnosticism is an epistemological concept. It doesn't have anything to do with whether or not divinity exists, it is about whether or not divinity is a falsifiable concept.

Of course, the next logical step is to dismiss the concept of divinity, as it indeed is a concept beyond any hope of falsification. To entertain a concept as factual on the basis of a total absence of factual information, is illogical.

But that addresses the Chocolate Goddesses musings more than it does your own. So onwards, Christian S.. uh..

Thing is, NERVUN, you're disregarding that there's a virtually endless bag of evidence against faiths. It's not simply a case of a lack of evidence to support them and a lack of means to falsify their claims. And strictly speaking, all the major theistic religions of the world have been falsified. Believers simply move the goalposts. For example, we have demonstrated beyond any reasonable doubt that natural processes, not a pist hammer-wielding Thor in a goat-kart, cause thunder. Yet no Asatru worthy of the name would consider that falsification. More likely, their thundergod is just having a bad day or something. Likewise, we've demonstrated beyond any reasonable doubt that planets don't form because some sky-dude 'parts heavens', yet no Abrahamite worthy of the name would consider that falsification.

It simply doesn't matter how thoroughly faiths are debunked. It will never be 'good enough' for the faithful. In contrast, if just one Zebra (why Zebra? Because I like 'em) was put together by an invisible entity, in plain sight of the entire world, everyone would declare evolution dead.

Lastly, couple the evidence against faiths with the very thorough falsification of all the falsifiable claims faiths have made, with the fact that the one thing the faithful all have in common, is lack of belief in all the other faiths, and you can't logically conclude that faith is anything but humbug.

This last bit makes me an explicit atheist, despite being agnostic about 'the supernatural'. Ironically, it makes me only very slightly more atheist, and no more explicitly so, than the theists of the world. In most cases, only the rejection of a single of the (if memory serves) around 1.500 faiths practised in the world today, sets us apart. Slightly more in some cases, but those are by far the minority, and they still reject an assload of faiths as make-believe, just like I do.

But yes. If it wasn't for all this, it would indeed be illogical to draw any conclusions on the subject on the validity of faiths. And should the situation ever change, I'll be the first to re-evaluate my stance. It is by no means set in stone. Hell, I'd love to get picked up by a Valkyrie when I die. But compelling as that is, the idea of it is fucking absurd.

Ummm tell that to the German mathmaticians that calculted the probibility of God's exsitance just a few months back.

Well, that has to be bogus science. Mathematicians aren't even scientists, really, but unusually perverse philosophers.

*reaches for wine, thinks better of it*

Science is a branch of philosophy. Such a successful and robust branch that most see it as a free standing tree, rather than a branch of anything else.

Mathematicians are a quite different matter. Mathematics is gay, in every sense. It is happy and joyous, it is pathetic and stereotyped, and it is mostly about anal sex.

Oh, and ... how about a link to that ?

Well, that has to be bogus science. Mathematicians aren't even scientists, really, but unusually perverse philosophers.

*reaches for wine, thinks better of it*

Science is a branch of philosophy. Such a successful and robust branch that most see it as a free standing tree, rather than a branch of anything else.

Mathematicians are a quite different matter. Mathematics is gay, in every sense. It is happy and joyous, it is pathetic and stereotyped, and it is mostly about anal sex.

Oh, and ... how about a link to that ?You win the thread. And that without being the least bit on topic :D

Well, that has to be bogus science. Mathematicians aren't even scientists, really, but unusually perverse philosophers.

*reaches for wine, thinks better of it*

Science is a branch of philosophy. Such a successful and robust branch that most see it as a free standing tree, rather than a branch of anything else.

Mathematicians are a quite different matter. Mathematics is gay, in every sense. It is happy and joyous, it is pathetic and stereotyped, and it is mostly about anal sex.

Oh, and ... how about a link to that ?

Oi Oi less of that my oldest has all the making of becoming a maths genius, I'll not have him put off by gayness.

I still think the theists and the atheists will join together to throw rocks at the agnostics for having the only really logical position. ;)
Agnosticism, done right, is a philosophical position that can logically lead one down a path to any of atheism (like bottle, above), theism (like Vetalia, pg 13 above), pantheism, panentheism or nontheism; or put one in a position to appreciate all of the above at once (mysticism).

First, agnosticism is an epistemological concept. It doesn't have anything to do with whether or not divinity exists, it is about whether or not divinity is a falsifiable concept.

Of course, the next logical step is to dismiss the concept of divinity, as it indeed is a concept beyond any hope of falsification. To entertain a concept as factual on the basis of a total absence of factual information, is illogical.
What you've said here is that agnosticism is an epistemological concept, and that the next logical step is to default back to ontology.

The ancient Cimmerian creation myth speaks in timelines that can be measured in the Billions of years. They claim that 3 billion years ago, a planet in the system which had malevolent life struck the earth. The rest of it was flung out to a great distance in the solar system by the impact. Earth however was then seeded with the life of that world in the form of bacteria.


nice post.

im just wondering where you got this cimmerian creation myth.

In your opinion. I would ask what is it that makes you say this? Why do you consider it a ridiculous question to ask?

Does this not show that your atheisim stems from a place of certianty? Where does such certainty come from, or what evidance have you to make you so certian?

Bottle's answer puts everything far better than I can.

I don't consider anything as certain - but somethings like - there is no obese bearded man wearing red who climbs down chimneys to leave presents once a year - are so close to certain that I don't see any point arguing the difference. That is why I consider myself an atheist not an agnostic but do not see it as a leap of faith.

There was 0 scientific evidence proving black holes at one time. 0 scientific evidence can become 1 scientific evidence over time and from there grow to more.


whoever first proposed the idea of black holes had a reason to. if, however, once he and other scientists did various experiments and observations it was shown that there was no actual evidence of black holes, the idea would have been dropped.

that is the difference between science and religion.

religion has had to retreat into the "god provides no proof because he wants you to have faith" position. there is not only no proof of the existence of any particular god (we can only suppose a god that we can know nothing about and have it stick) there is lots of proof that the stories behind every particular religion are not true.

if religion were run like science, what religion would still be accepted?

Bottle's answer puts everything far better than I can.

I don't consider anything as certain - but somethings like - there is no obese bearded man wearing red who climbs down chimneys to leave presents once a year - are so close to certain that I don't see any point arguing the difference. That is why I consider myself an atheist not an agnostic but do not see it as a leap of faith.

Umm except Bottle appeared to answer a question other than the one which I asked you.

So the lets keep it simple, why is even asking 'does a creative diety exist' a ridiculous question?

Umm except Bottle appeared to answer a question other than the one which I asked you.

So the lets keep it simple, why is even asking 'does a creative diety exist' a ridiculous question?
I was answering that question, though perhaps not in the way you were looking for.

"Does a creative deity exist" is a ridiculous question because even if the answer is "yes," it is "yes, and the creative deity could take any of an infinite number of forms and we have absolutely no way to ever know which it may be."

So it's not so much a ridiculous question as a pointless one, I suppose.

What you've said here is that agnosticism is an epistemological concept, and that the next logical step is to default back to ontology.Not quite. Agnosticism epistemological concept based in context of an objectiv reality. If you reject such a thing, you have no need for concepts about whether or not an idea can have a factual basis in it, and thus no need for agnosticism.

whoever first proposed the idea of black holes had a reason to. if, however, once he and other scientists did various experiments and observations it was shown that there was no actual evidence of black holes, the idea would have been dropped.

that is the difference between science and religion.

religion has had to retreat into the "god provides no proof because he wants you to have faith" position. there is not only no proof of the existence of any particular god (we can only suppose a god that we can know nothing about and have it stick) there is lots of proof that the stories behind every particular religion are not true.

if religion were run like science, what religion would still be accepted?

I'm not sure that either of these statements are true.

Where is the evidance for the theory of dark matter, or what of the competing theories of how mass is achived? There is plenty of guess work in science, and plenty of theory not based on evidance, but indeed lack of it and infereance.

How is infering that 'God did it' much differant from infering 'Ohh dark matter did it'? I mean in the logical steps taken towards such inferance.

As for religoin says God wants us to have faith and so has not provided evidance, wot utter tosh. Maybe some religoins say that, certianly not mine.
As to there being no evidance, there is of course much subject evidance.

Atheism does not need a leap of faith, simply because religion needs faith for it to exist. Athiests have no religion an so you could say subsequently no faith.
But you cannot simply say ''we need a leap of faith to disbeleive a 'God' as there is no evidence that he/she/it does NOT exist''. Evidence is used to prove some theory to be correct, only once this is done can you try and find evidence against the thoery.
For example you would never be able to give evidence against the theory that inside the sun there a little fairies. This is because someone can make it up without evidence or even the possibility to find some proof.

If someone in a situation would be able to give evidence on an event like, Hey they stole my keys. Then you could lie but if it did happen you would be able to get the evidence but if not evidence would prove that you are lying.
There is no way you can give evidence that 'God' exists so how can you give evidence that it doesnt. So until you can prove 'God' exists then to put it in a simple minded sense, it doesnt exist.

This topic is much the same to things like 'how did life start'. We Humans find questions that we cannot possibly answer, when we manage to answer everything else in life we end up starting a lie to answer it, to make us feel more secure and powerful.

I'm not sure that either of these statements are true.

Where is the evidance for the theory of dark matter, or what of the competing theories of how mass is achived? There is plenty of guess work in science, and plenty of theory not based on evidance, but indeed lack of it and infereance.

How is infering that 'God did it' much differant from infering 'Ohh dark matter did it'? I mean in the logical steps taken towards such inferance.

As for religoin says God wants us to have faith and so has not provided evidance, wot utter tosh. Maybe some religoins say that, certianly not mine.
As to there being no evidance, there is of course much subject evidance.

i dont see your point. science is open to questions, evidence, proof (of a sort), experimentation. if our understanding of dark matter can be shown to be crap, its tossed out. or refined until the "story" conforms to the evidence presented.

religion is not. it has the answers and when you show that the stories of the bible (for example) are wrong, the "story" stays the same. no amount of proof that its wrong is enough to disprove religion.

Non-belief in anything is the original position. I did not believe a computer screen can turn on until I witnessed it several times. I did not believe the switch actually turns the light on until I witnessed it several times. In both cases I saw evidence and was explained what was behind these beliefs of mine until I was convinced.

Similarly, it is not the non-believers who need to provide evidence because proving a negative is simply impossible. It is the theists who need to show evidence why they believe in such things. Any evidence at all.

And if some is found, i am more than willing to thouroughly look at it to decide whether this calls for belief. Not only God, but Thor, Zeus, and any other dieties.

As long as there is no evidence in the favor of theism, there is no reason to begin believing in it.

Ummm tell that to the German mathmaticians that calculted the probibility of God's exsitance just a few months back.
Unless it was 0, they fudged some stuff.

I was answering that question, though perhaps not in the way you were looking for.

"Does a creative deity exist" is a ridiculous question because even if the answer is "yes," it is "yes, and the creative deity could take any of an infinite number of forms and we have absolutely no way to ever know which it may be."

So it's not so much a ridiculous question as a pointless one, I suppose.

there is the essence of the problem.

we are not asked to why we dont believe in GOD. (as in jehova) we know and they know why we dont believe in the christian/jewish/islamic god.

they are asking us why dont be believe in some supernatural being that they dont and cant define. a being or beings that might represent any or all or none of the religions of the world that have ever existed. or a being that hasnt been thought up yet but still exists. or maybe one that exists in another plain of existence that we can never access in this life but only in a mysterious afterlife where we will also be supernatural beings.

to pharaphrase CTOAN, we are asked "cant we just give up our rational scientific basis for believing stuff and hold out just a bit of hope for magic"?

they are asking us why dont be believe in some supernatural being that they dont and cant define.

EXACTLY. That's a much better way of putting it!

I've asked, time and time again, for clear and specific definitions of God. I've never gotten the same answer twice, and most people can't even fully define their own individual image of God. At some point it always breaks down into people saying that the human mind can't fully grasp the immensity/omnipotence/etc of God.

If you're going to ask me if I believe in God, you're going to have to be more specific.

EXACTLY. That's a much better way of putting it!

I've asked, time and time again, for clear and specific definitions of God. I've never gotten the same answer twice, and most people can't even fully define their own individual image of God. At some point it always breaks down into people saying that the human mind can't fully grasp the immensity/omnipotence/etc of God.

If you're going to ask me if I believe in God, you're going to have to be more specific.

I believe that we've discussed this before.

Religion is belief - pure faith. You either believe it or you don't.

It's not science (and religious people need to stop trying to imagine that it is).

You obviously have zero faith, and no ability to believe in things, unless they can be scientifically proven. That's ok - you're a purely logical, completely rational person (I'll take your word on that without asking people who know you personally).

The scientific method allows for nothing without proof by the method. If we attempt to "prove" that God exists, we can't do it, because there is no repeatable, observable experiment that proves the hypothesis that a single, all-powerful, omniscient being created the Universe and is interested in our lives.

It wouldn't matter what we say, Bottle, or what definition we gave. You're simply unable to make the leap of faith required to be religious.

I believe that we've discussed this before.

Religion is belief - pure faith. You either believe it or you don't.

It's not science (and religious people need to stop trying to imagine that it is).

You obviously have zero faith, and no ability to believe in things, unless they can be scientifically proven. That's ok - you're a purely logical, completely rational person (I'll take your word on that without asking people who know you personally).

The scientific method allows for nothing without proof by the method. If we attempt to "prove" that God exists, we can't do it, because there is no repeatable, observable experiment that proves the hypothesis that a single, all-powerful, omniscient being created the Universe and is interested in our lives.

It wouldn't matter what we say, Bottle, or what definition we gave. You're simply unable to make the leap of faith required to be religious.

**DING DING DING DING DING**

there ya go. and THAT is the topic eh?

that atheists DONT make a leap of faith into disbelief. we keep our feet on the ground and watch our religious brothers do the leaping.

I believe that we've discussed this before.

Religion is belief - pure faith. You either believe it or you don't.

I don't think that's entirely true. I know a lot of religious people who have plenty of doubts and questionable faith.



It's not science (and religious people need to stop trying to imagine that it is).

You obviously have zero faith, and no ability to believe in things, unless they can be scientifically proven.

Well, that's not accurate simply because you don't prove anything in science.

I think it's fair to say that I don't fully believe in anything unless it can be tested. This requires several things:

-The thing to be believed in must be defined. Obviously you have to know what you're trying to test if you are to be able to test it.
-The thing to be believed in must be accessible to human comprehension. If humans simply aren't able to comprehend something, we obviously aren't going to be able to test it.
-The thing to be believed in must somehow interact with our reality. If the thing to be believed in does not connect with our reality, then we can't test it.

If the thing to be believed in cannot be defined, then it's irrelevant to me.

If it can't be comprehended by me, it's also irrelevant.

If it can't/doesn't interact with me and my reality, it's also irrelevant.

In other words, I'm not really asserting that it doesn't exist, so much as that it really doesn't matter if it exists or not.


That's ok - you're a purely logical, completely rational person (I'll take your word on that without asking people who know you personally).

Now THAT is completely untrue. I have my fair share of irrationality!


The scientific method allows for nothing without proof by the method. If we attempt to "prove" that God exists, we can't do it, because there is no repeatable, observable experiment that proves the hypothesis that a single, all-powerful, omniscient being created the Universe and is interested in our lives.

Again, my problem isn't that God is "unprovable," it's that God is undefined and totally untestable. So God itself is simply irrelevant, in my opinion.

Now, the beliefs that my fellow humans have about God can be very relevant to me. God-belief is relevant. God itself is not.


It wouldn't matter what we say, Bottle, or what definition we gave. You're simply unable to make the leap of faith required to be religious.
I don't know if I'm unable to make that leap. I know that I've never seen any reason to do so.

Try imaging a situation:

You are in a magical amusement park, surrounded by everything that fascinates and inspires you. You see before you an unending array of wonders, and you know you can never possibly have enough time to enjoy them all.

Behind you is a very wide puddle. There is nothing on the other side of the puddle, just flat ground and nothing to see.

Somebody dares you to jump over the puddle.

My reaction is, "Why?" There's nothing on the other side of the puddle that interests me. Maybe I could jump over the puddle, maybe I couldn't. But if I could, I would just want to come back to this side and go explore the amusement park anyways. Jumping the puddle doesn't serve any purpose for me, and I have far more interesting things to do right now.

Perhaps if I find myself in an eternal afterlife, with no limitation on the time I have to explore and learn, then I will decide to try out puddle-jumping and see if I can make the leap.

I believe that we've discussed this before.

Religion is belief - pure faith. You either believe it or you don't.

It's not science (and religious people need to stop trying to imagine that it is).

You obviously have zero faith, and no ability to believe in things, unless they can be scientifically proven. That's ok - you're a purely logical, completely rational person (I'll take your word on that without asking people who know you personally).

The scientific method allows for nothing without proof by the method. If we attempt to "prove" that God exists, we can't do it, because there is no repeatable, observable experiment that proves the hypothesis that a single, all-powerful, omniscient being created the Universe and is interested in our lives.

It wouldn't matter what we say, Bottle, or what definition we gave. You're simply unable to make the leap of faith required to be religious.

You just said exactly what my last post said, only from the religious point of view. Congratulations on finally understanding the matter. Though it is quite funny how you speak proudly of your: great ' ability to make a leap of faith' as if you are proud of it and it sounds as if you are accusing Bottle of being rational oh no he thinks logically, run away! haha this is quite funny. I think though you misphrased the last sentence, it should read instead: 'I am simply able to make a leap of faith required to be religious'. it is very easy to be able to, its just that we choose not to.

i dont see your point. science is open to questions, evidence, proof (of a sort), experimentation. if our understanding of dark matter can be shown to be crap, its tossed out. or refined until the "story" conforms to the evidence presented.

religion is not. it has the answers and when you show that the stories of the bible (for example) are wrong, the "story" stays the same. no amount of proof that its wrong is enough to disprove religion.

Heh yeah I do that, I get ranty and loose the point. Please let me try again.

The point is basicaly one of evidance. There is evidance of gods exsitance, suibjective evidance, but evidance nether-the-less. There is no evidance of dark matter, it is a theory posited to explain the appafent speeding up of the expansion of the universe. While there is no direct evdiance, for it, the theory is sound because of what can be infered from other known aspects of cosmology.

In this both the theory of God's existance and the theory of dark matter are the same, both can be infered.

In this both the theory of God's existance and the theory of dark matter are the same, both can be infered.Eh... How do you infer divinity?

Non-belief in anything is the original position. I did not believe a computer screen can turn on until I witnessed it several times. I did not believe the switch actually turns the light on until I witnessed it several times. In both cases I saw evidence and was explained what was behind these beliefs of mine until I was convinced.

Similarly, it is not the non-believers who need to provide evidence because proving a negative is simply impossible. It is the theists who need to show evidence why they believe in such things. Any evidence at all.

And if some is found, i am more than willing to thouroughly look at it to decide whether this calls for belief. Not only God, but Thor, Zeus, and any other dieties.

As long as there is no evidence in the favor of theism, there is no reason to begin believing in it.


I would have said that non understanding is the default. I did not understand how to turn on a computer screen until I saw it.

The question is though is athieism based on belife or knowledge.

As already said strong atheist, those who deny god or gods with certianty, must belive there is no God. This belife comes not from evidance but from irrationalality.

To deny something and be certain, without proof, does full under the faith catergory.

Heh yeah I do that, I get ranty and loose the point. Please let me try again.

The point is basicaly one of evidance. There is evidance of gods exsitance, suibjective evidance, but evidance nether-the-less. There is no evidance of dark matter, it is a theory posited to explain the appafent speeding up of the expansion of the universe. While there is no direct evdiance, for it, the theory is sound because of what can be infered from other known aspects of cosmology.

In this both the theory of God's existance and the theory of dark matter are the same, both can be infered.

i have no problem with the personal proof that believers have. if god has spoken to you, fine. your belief is not important to me. i have no problem with it.

i only have a problem with someone telling me that *i* have some kind of FAITH in atheism. that it is only rational to hold out some hope for some possible kind of supreme being or more-powerful-than-i-am supernatural being.

until some evidence comes along--even of the indirect sort--holding out hope that the evidence will come along is not the more rational position. not believing requires no leap.

there is the essence of the problem.

we are not asked to why we dont believe in GOD. (as in jehova) we know and they know why we dont believe in the christian/jewish/islamic god.

they are asking us why dont be believe in some supernatural being that they dont and cant define. a being or beings that might represent any or all or none of the religions of the world that have ever existed. or a being that hasnt been thought up yet but still exists. or maybe one that exists in another plain of existence that we can never access in this life but only in a mysterious afterlife where we will also be supernatural beings.

to pharaphrase CTOAN, we are asked "cant we just give up our rational scientific basis for believing stuff and hold out just a bit of hope for magic"?

Again I don't think that is strictly true either. God is, and has been defined, in many ways. Take you pick which one you wish to deny.

Or if it makes it easyer for you let me give you my defintion.

God, the creative source of the univesrse, is all Gods. all percivable aspects of God or any and all names given to God refer to this one and only creative force.

Simply put, God is the one true absolute, and thus all is God.

Now run with that definition any time you get asked, and you will be able to deny not only YHVH, but also Allah, Thor, Ganesh and so on. :)

Eh... How do you infer divinity?

Man lots of ways.

i have no problem with the personal proof that believers have. if god has spoken to you, fine. your belief is not important to me. i have no problem with it.

i only have a problem with someone telling me that *i* have some kind of FAITH in atheism. that it is only rational to hold out some hope for some possible kind of supreme being or more-powerful-than-i-am supernatural being.

until some evidence comes along--even of the indirect sort--holding out hope that the evidence will come along is not the more rational position. not believing requires no leap.

Yes you are right not beliving does not reqiure faith. However I have not said that it does.

What I have said is that if you are certian that god does not exist, that is if you belive that their is no God. Then you do so with no evidance and thus, your belife is based on faith.

Eh... How do you infer divinity?

You drink the holy wine.

You drink the holy wine.

heh or partake of the holy mushroom!

I would have said that non understanding is the default. I did not understand how to turn on a computer screen until I saw it.

The question is though is athieism based on belife or knowledge.

As already said strong atheist, those who deny god or gods with certianty, must belive there is no God. This belife comes not from evidance but from irrationalality.

To deny something and be certain, without proof, does full under the faith catergory.
Apparently I didn't say it well enough the first time
NO

I am certain that there is no deity Fizzygort. How can I be certain without proof - I just made him the fuck up. There is no leap of faith required to not make a leap of faith. Do you believe the wall can turn into a television? Do you not believe the wall can turn into a television? You have no evidence it can, so you believe it can't. There is no faith required. You make an empirical statement based on evidence provided. Calling it faith, and then playing with the definition of faith, is damned sophistry.

Again I don't think that is strictly true either. God is, and has been defined, in many ways. Take you pick which one you wish to deny.

Or if it makes it easyer for you let me give you my defintion.

God, the creative source of the univesrse, is all Gods. all percivable aspects of God or any and all names given to God refer to this one and only creative force.

Simply put, God is the one true absolute, and thus all is God.

Now run with that definition any time you get asked, and you will be able to deny not only YHVH, but also Allah, Thor, Ganesh and so on. :)


so you are saying that none of the stories of any organized religion on earth are literally true since they are mutually exclusive but that there is an undefined "creative force" behind all existence that we can define as "god"?

Yes you are right not beliving does not reqiure faith. However I have not said that it does.

What I have said is that if you are certian that god does not exist, that is if you belive that their is no God. Then you do so with no evidance and thus, your belife is based on faith.

the difference between not believing in god and believing there is not god is far more important to you than it is to me.

having no evidence of something IS evidence that it doesnt exist. especially if all possible tests have been done to test for its existence. that it is not ulitmate "proof" is no more important to me than that there is no ultimate "proof" for evolution.

Apparently I didn't say it well enough the first time
NO

I am certain that there is no deity Fizzygort. How can I be certain without proof - I just made him the fuck up. There is no leap of faith required to not make a leap of faith. Do you believe the wall can turn into a television? Do you not believe the wall can turn into a television? You have no evidence it can, so you believe it can't. There is no faith required. You make an empirical statement based on evidence provided. Calling it faith, and then playing with the definition of faith, is damned sophistry.

Heh aparently you do not get what I'm saying.

I did not make the concept of God up. If indeed the concept of God was made up by somebody that person is now loooooong dead.

So to take you Fizzygort as an example, when you are dead and long gone, when the logs of this toing-and-froing no longer exist and just the idea of Fizzygort remains with no proof that you made it up.

Then the people around who both deny and confirm the existance of Fizzygort, do so from a stance of faith based belife, that is belife with no evidance.

As to the wall, it I have no beliefs about it's ability to turn into a TV. I know that it cannot, I know because of my scientific knowledge, that is not a faith based belife of mine.

What I find telling about this argument(is atheism a belief?) is that many atheists will argue until they are blue in the face, presumedly, not to appear to be at the mercy of irrational beliefe.

Yet when leveing such things towards theists, will also deny that they do so out of any sense of maliciousness.

Why do we think that is?

Me I take the stance that we all have the odd irrational belife, that this is in fact the deafault for us. I feel no shame in admiting my belife in God is irrational, but it does enrich my life. So whats the beef man?

As a side note, how many ways can you spell "belief" :rolleyes:

Get Firefox.

so you are saying that none of the stories of any organized religion on earth are literally true since they are mutually exclusive but that there is an undefined "creative force" behind all existence that we can define as "god"?

I wouldn't know about the stories of organised religoin. I belive that most of them should not be taken litraly(if that helps at all?) I would question wether they are mutually exclusive, or wether it is our perception and understanding of this force that differs.

But yes I belive that there is a creative force behind all existance, however I do belive I just defined it for you.

I think the undefined bit you talk about is more along the lines of differing perceptions, differing cultures with differant impotance placed on differant things.

As a side note, how many ways can you spell "belief" :rolleyes:

Get Firefox.

Heh I'm using firefox. And you'd be supprised how many ways I can speil many words!

Apparently I didn't say it well enough the first time
NO

I am certain that there is no deity Fizzygort. How can I be certain without proof - I just made him the fuck up. There is no leap of faith required to not make a leap of faith. Do you believe the wall can turn into a television? Do you not believe the wall can turn into a television? You have no evidence it can, so you believe it can't. There is no faith required. You make an empirical statement based on evidence provided. Calling it faith, and then playing with the definition of faith, is damned sophistry.

Apparently you have just ignored everything in this thread. I will say it one more time:

There is no status quo about the existence of a creative deity

To state anything about the nature of his existence is always a positive assertion. Unlike the tv which seems like it can't turn into a wall (i.e. the status quo is that the tv cannot turn into a wall because it goes against all science), there is no status quo about the nature of the beginnings of the universe. That is out of sciences reach. You and I may believe that a universe that was created sounds stupid, where it seems obvious that it's not. To someone else, it may seem that the universe just popped out of nowhere sounds ridiculous, as to them the universe seems created. You cannot objectively show who is more rational.

But yes I belive that there is a creative force behind all existance, however I do belive I just defined it for you.

I'm interested (and a little confused).

Can you clarify the definition of this "creative force"?

To be an atheist, you first have to accept that there is a concept called "god." You can't be an atheist without it - the word itself demands it "a" meaning without, "theism" meaning belief in deity.

Belief in deity may or may not be an irrational act, it is certainly an act of faith because belief and faith do not require facts only certainty. Since you can't have atheistm without theism, atheism, by definition, partakes of the same basis as theism, i.e. it does not require facts, only certainty.

Agnosticism does not require the existence of the concept of deity. The word itself does not demand it - "a" meaning without, "gnosis" meaning knowledge. The word itself demands facts and refutes certainty.

Not quite. Agnosticism epistemological concept based in context of an objectiv reality. If you reject such a thing, you have no need for concepts about whether or not an idea can have a factual basis in it, and thus no need for agnosticism.

More accurately, epistemology puts objective reality into context. There is no need to reject anything.

I’m sure that after 24 pages of this thread that someone has already brought up this point but I’m gonna say it anyway. Belief in gods, and the supernatural is ludicrous. I don’t believe Superman, Batman, Santa Claus and God are flying around saving people, creating planets or whatever. Maybe there is some guy in a blue spandex outfit with a red cape flying around and I just missed it ! I really don’t see it as a leap of faith that any of these toons actually exist. On the other hand I can certainly see the social and psychological reasons for people wanting to believe in this stuff

the difference between not believing in god and believing there is not god is far more important to you than it is to me.

having no evidence of something IS evidence that it doesnt exist. especially if all possible tests have been done to test for its existence. that it is not ulitmate "proof" is no more important to me than that there is no ultimate "proof" for evolution.


Are you sure on that? Once again I'll mention dark matter. There is no evidance for it none, none at all. It has never been seen, nor a single particle of it captured. The whole theory is based on inferance. So because there is no evidance you claim that it does not exist?

More accurately, epistemology puts objective reality into context. There is no need to reject anything.My eloquence was dropped on the head as an infant. Just pretend I wrote what you wrote :p

I don’t believe Superman, Batman...are flying around saving people, creating planets or whatever.
BURN THE HERETIC.

BURN HIM!

I’m sure that after 24 pages of this thread that someone has already brought up this point but I’m gonna say it anyway. Belief in gods, and the supernatural is ludicrous. I don’t believe Superman, Batman, Santa Claus and God are flying around saving people, creating planets or whatever. Maybe there is some guy in a blue spandex outfit with a red cape flying around and I just missed it ! I really don’t see it as a leap of faith that any of these toons actually exist. On the other hand I can certainly see the social and psychological reasons for people wanting to believe in this stuff

How about reading the thread.

Apparently you have just ignored everything in this thread. I will say it one more time:

There is no status quo about the existence of a creative deity

To state anything about the nature of his existence is always a positive assertion. Unlike the tv which seems like it can't turn into a wall (i.e. the status quo is that the tv cannot turn into a wall because it goes against all science), there is no status quo about the nature of the beginnings of the universe. That is out of sciences reach. You and I may believe that a universe that was created sounds stupid, where it seems obvious that it's not. To someone else, it may seem that the universe just popped out of nowhere sounds ridiculous, as to them the universe seems created. You cannot objectively show who is more rational.

Ummm you are quite wrong you know.

We have the background microwave measurements streatching right back to the big bang. That is certianly within the sphere science's reach, we can almost see to the universes furthest edge, there are ongoing experiments to allow us to see further than it is possible using light, using gravitaional forces.

Wether you belive that this was started by diety or not though, is still a matter of faith.

Unlike the tv which seems like it can't turn into a wall (i.e. the status quo is that the tv cannot turn into a wall because it goes against all science), there is no status quo about the nature of the beginnings of the universe.
A wall can be a TV. I didn't say what it was made of or what kind of tv it was. You are making assertions based on a lack of knowledge and claiming they are scientific.

We know there is no empirical proof for God, or it would have been put forward already. Your argument is incorrect.

Ummm you are quite wrong you know.

We have the background microwave measurements streatching right back to the big bang. That is certianly within the sphere science's reach, we can almost see to the universes furthest edge, there are ongoing experiments to allow us to see further than it is possible using light, using gravitaional forces.

Wether you belive that this was started by diety or not though, is still a matter of faith.

You are aware that the Big Bang was ridiculed by mainstream scientists, when it was first invented, as being creationist in disguise (i.e. it shows everything was created at once). But this doesn't change anything, what I said is still correct. As you said, what started the big bang? What about the stuff before the big bang? Etc...

I'm interested (and a little confused).

Can you clarify the definition of this "creative force"?

Certianly. God who created the universe. Hehehe.

Okay okay I know. Try this one then.

Within my religion it is said that, that god is a part of and yet a part from the creation. This is translated as before matter, there was only spirit, spirit decided to create matter. And Lo there was light. Spirit(god) is eminant throughout the creation, yet spirit(I guess the intelegence of God) is also seperate from the creation.

There is no evidance for it none, none at all.Not true. There's heaps of theoretical evidence, not just for the possibility of such a thing, but for its presence (or something very similar). It has never been seen, nor a single particle of it captured. The whole theory is based on inferance.Hypothesis. Or hypotheses, really. It's a work-in-progress, not a set of explanatory conclusions.So because there is no evidance you claim that it does not exist?Again, how do you infer divinity? Is there anything, anything at all, that suggests something that fits your criteria for divinity? If so, what is it?

You are aware that the Big Bang was ridiculed by mainstream scientists, when it was first invented, as being creationist in disguise (i.e. it shows everything was created at once). But this doesn't change anything, what I said is still correct. As you said, what started the big bang? What about the stuff before the big bang? Etc...

Hah ohh thats easy 'God did it!':D

To be an atheist, you first have to accept that there is a concept called "god." You can't be an atheist without it - the word itself demands it "a" meaning without, "theism" meaning belief in deity.

Belief in deity may or may not be an irrational act, it is certainly an act of faith because belief and faith do not require facts only certainty. Since you can't have atheistm without theism, atheism, by definition, partakes of the same basis as theism, i.e. it does not require facts, only certainty.

Agnosticism does not require the existence of the concept of deity. The word itself does not demand it - "a" meaning without, "gnosis" meaning knowledge. The word itself demands facts and refutes certainty.

Language is shaped by culture - the greeks believed in gods so the words we have inherited reflect this. Such semantic arguments are not evidence of anything other than the history of language.

A wall can be a TV. I didn't say what it was made of or what kind of tv it was. You are making assertions based on a lack of knowledge and claiming they are scientific.


So you decide to dodge everything I said and focus on one trivial error I made, because I assumed you meant that the tv could turn into a wall on its own. Now address the fucking argument.


We know there is no empirical proof for God, or it would have been put forward already. Your argument is incorrect.

Nice ignoring 26 pages of everything in this thread. When did anyone say that there was empirical proof for God?

Not true. There's heaps of theoretical evidence, not just for the possibility of such a thing, but for its presence (or something very similar). Hypothesis. Or hypotheses, really. It's a work-in-progress, not a set of explanatory conclusions.Again, how do you infer divinity? Is there anything, anything at all, that suggests something that fits your criteria for divinity? If so, what is it?

Okay now I hesitate to type this for fear of the kook label being slapped firmly on me fore head, but I guess it may be too late for that so....


If you read up a bit, to my reply to Bottle about spirit, you will gather that I certianly belive in such a think.

I used to be pagan, I have used magic, I have seen ghosts, spirits, I have experianced guides etc..., and so I have subjective personal proof that such stuff does exist and is real. My leap of faith, and my illogical logic tyes all such things in together and terms it God. Just for the record, my religion, or the religion that I practice, I do so because when I discovered it, it took all of my existing belifes, and workings out, and tied them neatly together.

I don't see even strong atheism as demanding faith (although I tend to be a weak/implicit atheist). It is possible to prove a universal negative if you can show that it's logically incoherent: for example, I can quite confidently say that there exists no rational number which can be squared to equal exactly two (the proof is really nifty). I don't need to remain open minded about the existence of such a number, it simply can't exist. Similarly, it could be argued that there is a contradiction between an entity being omnibenevolent, omnipotent, omniscient loving mankind, and condemning most humans to eternal torture. I'm not keen on this argument myself as it's focused purely on the Abrahamic conception of God and it isn't watertight.

Personally I see every meaningful claim as falling into three categories: that which can be falsified, that which can be verified, and that which can be verified or falsified.

If a claim can only be falsified (e.g. all swans are white) then, after an extensive but fruitless search for non-white swans, we should assume it to be true and that all swans really are white. Naturally we should remain open minded and be prepared to change our opinions if new evidence is found.

If a claim can be either verified or falsified then we should reserve judgement until enough evidence has been gathered to justify an inference either way.

If a claim can only be verified (e.g. a transcendent, personal god exists) then, in the absence of evidence/proof, we should assume it to be false. Presumably God could provide proof of his existence, so the fact that he hasn't should count against him. Again, we should remain open minded but we should assume the negative until the positive has been demonstrated.

What about the stuff before the big bang? Etc...

What about the stuff to the North of the North Pole? :p

As a side note, how many ways can you spell "belief" :rolleyes:

Get Firefox.

R O L A I D... nevermind.

Okay now I hesitate to type this for fear of the kook label being slapped firmly on me fore head, but I guess it may be too late for that so....Fret not. There's any number of things that might make me discount someone as crazy, but this isn't one of them.and so I have subjective personal proof that such stuff does exist and is real.But that's just it. Unless you can objectively falsify (or get others to falsify) such things happen, or are even possible, you have no basis for inferring anything. There's any number of perfectly adequate explanations for your experiences that renders them invalid. You need to exclude them as possible, or at least, likely candidates.

In contrast, the evidence suggesting something like 'dark' stuff isn't subject to personal interpretation. It's there, for everyone who cares to sit down and go over it.

But that's just it. Unless you can objectively falsify (or get others to falsify) such things happen, or are even possible, you have no basis for inferring anything. There's any number of perfectly adequate explanations for your experiences that renders them invalid.

Care to offer up some alternatives?

You need to exclude them as possible, or at least, likely candidates.

I see your point, honestly I do, but the thing is we really can't go around applying that kind logic to everyday living. Think on this, if that was the default we would all be doing it. Also an example.

You are I hope loved? If so then you only have you own subjective personal evidance to back that feeling up. Do you I wonder look for alternatives when told 'I love you', or do you trust the words of the person telling you this?

When somebody performs an act that you feel is consistant with loving you, do you question wether there is another motive behind the action, or do you place faith that the act signifies what you belive it to?


In contrast, the evidence suggesting something like 'dark' stuff isn't subject to personal interpretation. It's there, for everyone who cares to sit down and go over it.

You are quite right on that one.

I wouldn't know about the stories of organised religoin. I belive that most of them should not be taken litraly(if that helps at all?) I would question wether they are mutually exclusive, or wether it is our perception and understanding of this force that differs.

But yes I belive that there is a creative force behind all existance, however I do belive I just defined it for you.

I think the undefined bit you talk about is more along the lines of differing perceptions, differing cultures with differant impotance placed on differant things.

you may have defined it but im not good with the abstract.

let me put your defininition here so we can refer back to it more easily

"God, the creative source of the univesrse, is all Gods. all percivable aspects of God or any and all names given to God refer to this one and only creative force.

Simply put, God is the one true absolute, and thus all is God."

the undefined part is where you dont really define god just refer to him.

so god is "the creative source of the universe"

can you elaborate on that or is that it?

and yes the religions of the world cant all be correct in their details. that means to me that they, under what i get of your undestanding are all wrong in their details. if they werent wrong, you would be.... a hindu if for example they had gotten it right.

Are you sure on that? Once again I'll mention dark matter. There is no evidance for it none, none at all. It has never been seen, nor a single particle of it captured. The whole theory is based on inferance. So because there is no evidance you claim that it does not exist?

i know nothing about dark matter.

inference IS evidence. its not the strongest kind of evidence. i assume that "dark matter" fits a set of observations. and interestingly from that "scientists find nothing" thread, it seems that not all otherwise empty space has this set of observations and is considered to be empty of dark matter also. so its not just a philosophical "there must be something out there" kind of inference.

if we could make the same kind of inference about the existence of god/gods/supernatural beings then it would make rational sense to believe in them.

Unless dark matter is supernatural. Invisible, unmeasurable and unobservable forms of energy and matter that mysteriously affect the rest of the physical world. That sounds rather similar to the conventional idea of a spiritual force if you ask me. Whatever that stuff is, it's not natural in our sense of the world. Of course, what exactly it actually is is still a mystery.

Of course, Bose-Einstein condensates are also just as weird in that regard.

you may have defined it but im not good with the abstract.

And perhaps that is the main diffrerance between the theist brain and the atheists brain?


let me put your defininition here so we can refer back to it more easily

"God, the creative source of the univesrse, is all Gods. all percivable aspects of God or any and all names given to God refer to this one and only creative force.

Simply put, God is the one true absolute, and thus all is God."



the undefined part is where you dont really define god just refer to him.

so god is "the creative source of the universe"

can you elaborate on that or is that it?

I have already done that go back a page or to and look at my reply to Bottle about spirit and matter.



and yes the religions of the world cant all be correct in their details. that means to me that they, under what i get of your undestanding are all wrong in their details. if they werent wrong, you would be.... a hindu if for example they had gotten it right.

No that is not really what I mean. To my mind God is everything that exists, or as I put it above 'God is the one true absolute, and thus all is God' all names and every aspect we attribute to God is correct. If by details you mean what does God want from us, what use is religoin, why be relgioious then yes of course it would be stupid to say that all such belifes on this are correct.

For instance I do not belive that God punishes the unbeliver, and so I would say that any religoin that preaches that has it wrong.

I can though see much that I belive about God present in many other religoins. Being an ex pagan I am more interested in the esoteric teachings of religoin, the wrapping and much of the dogma I have no time for. It is this shared esoteric root in many religoins that I can see.

if we could make the same kind of inference about the existence of god/gods/supernatural beings then it would make rational sense to believe in them.

Ahhh thank you.

Unless dark matter is supernatural. Invisible, unmeasurable and unobservable forms of energy and matter that mysteriously affect the rest of the physical world. That sounds rather similar to the conventional idea of a spiritual force if you ask me. Whatever that stuff is, it's not natural in our sense of the world. Of course, what exactly it actually is is still a mystery.

Of course, Bose-Einstein condensates are also just as weird in that regard.

By supernatural do you include any and all things that cannot or have not yet been seen nor measured by our sceinces?

But if you are saying that you know religion is wrong than you arent' going to be looking for new evidence. If you are looking than you obviously are admiting you don't know in which case you aren't really Atheist...

No, saying that I'm not 100% sure that I'm right doesn't make me "not an atheist." It means that I think there's probably no God (because there is no evidence in favor), but I fully recognize that I could be wrong. Faith admits no possibility of error, therefore, my position is not one of faith.


Uh... careful, that doesn't actually state any evidence that disproves God, just that He/She/It didn't answer those prayers.
My apologies, I was unclear. I didn't mean to imply that prayers having no affect on anything disproves God. What I was trying to demonstrate is the large amounts of faith that theists (generally) have. It takes faith to believe something there is no evidence for-- but it takes more still to believe something that contradicts the evidence. To say that atheists (in general) have the same level of faith at theists (in general) is silly. Atheism is not quite so prone to the infallibility complex that religion is.
The OP is correct there are basicly two types of atheist which I shall describe as strong and weak.

A weak atheist will say that there is no evidance for the existance of God or gods, and so will refuse to belive such a proposition.

A strong atheist will declare that God or gods absolutly do not exist. These atheists in the light of no evidance either way are indeed engagineg in a system of belief.
I don't like your binary classification of atheists. It's not that simple. There's a continuum of belief, like everything else. And most "strong" atheists aren't even quite on the end, we just say "There is no evidence in favor of God, so I am strongly inclined to disbelieve." If convincing evidence (and actual evidence, not silly things like the Ontological argument) arose tomorrow, I'd wager that most atheists would consider the evidence.
That really IS splitting the same hair. What would be the difference. You either allow for the possibility of, and therefore are Agnostic, or you reject and are Atheist.
Again, the binary division, I think, is wrong for this discussion. Most atheists are, strictly speaking, agnostic to a degree.

The thing is, a God who actively designs and takes part in the Universe has serious implications. We can test those implications by testing the things said God is supposed to do. This has been done, and there's pretty convincing evidence against, at least, an interventionist God.

The Deist clockmaker God, admittedly, doesn't really have evidence against him(I will stick to "him" for simplicity, but I don't mean to imply gender). But neither has he any evidence in favor, nor is he necessary. You can remove him with Ockham's razor.

Furthermore, if there is a god/gods, their existence is irrelevant: a god who does no miracles and answers no prayers might as well not exist at all.

Faith admits no possibility of error, therefore, my position is not one of faith.


Sorry I have to disagree with you there. What makes you say such a thing?

Sorry just seen that binary remark. Yep it's just a throw away distinction, I do realise that no one thing is as clear cut as that. On the other hand, I do work in IT so binary is good ya!

Sorry I have to disagree with you there. What makes you say such a thing?

If faith admitted the possibility of error, it'd adapt if new evidence contradicted it. If it did that, it would cease to be faith, because it'd be based on evidence, no?

And perhaps that is the main diffrerance between the theist brain and the atheists brain?


i just know that mine works that way. there are often posts with big words that are meaningful to the poster that i have no idea what it means. i need more concrete examples


I have already done that go back a page or to and look at my reply to Bottle about spirit and matter.

it would be helpful if you quoted what you wrote, its hard to search out previous posts if they arent on the same page. as i recall, it didnt mean much to me. spirit created matter. wasnt that it?




No that is not really what I mean. To my mind God is everything that exists, or as I put it above 'God is the one true absolute, and thus all is God' all names and every aspect we attribute to God is correct. If by details you mean what does God want from us, what use is religoin, why be relgioious then yes of course it would be stupid to say that all such belifes on this are correct.

For instance I do not belive that God punishes the unbeliver, and so I would say that any religoin that preaches that has it wrong.

I can though see much that I belive about God present in many other religoins. Being an ex pagan I am more interested in the esoteric teachings of religoin, the wrapping and much of the dogma I have no time for. It is this shared esoteric root in many religoins that I can see.

no i mean "the world was created in 7 days by one ultimate creator". or "its turtles all the way down" or "uranos the sky came over gaia the earth and created life on earth"

they are not all literally true. to get to any kind of "universal truth" you have to discard barrels full of specific beliefs.

arent you a sikh?

By supernatural do you include any and all things that cannot or have not yet been seen nor measured by our sceinces?

Yes, since they are still outside of the realm of the natural world which science works to measure and understand. As a result, the most accurate term for all unknowns is "supernatural" (I dislike the term paranormal since normal doesn't really exist).

I believe supernatural phenomena exist and will one day be explored scientifically, but we still lack the knowledge and tools necessary to measure and investigate them in an empirical manner. Some progress has been made in creating a science of the supernatural, and we are uncovering more and more strangeness in the natural world, but there is still a ways to go before we have reproducible knowledge of these phenomena. What that knowledge would mean for us is a mystery...as well as what those things might do about us looking.

If faith admitted the possibility of error, it'd adapt if new evidence contradicted it. If it did that, it would cease to be faith, because it'd be based on evidence, no?

No not really. I actualy don't know one religios person that has not justified their belife to themself, or in other words we all have some personal subjective evidance.

My faith and the conditions of my faith have certianly changed much over the years. However I can't objectivly prove the existance of God to you, nor that my personal belifes about God are correct. This does not mean though that if I have other subjective experiances my faith will not shift.

Again, I'll talk about being loved. You feel loved?

it would be helpful if you quoted what you wrote, its hard to search out previous posts if they arent on the same page. as i recall, it didnt mean much to me. spirit created matter. wasnt that it?

Heh for the same reason I'll neglect to do that, I hope you don't mind. Yep basicly God created matter form gods self, who until that time was spirit, thats about the strenght of it.


no i mean "the world was created in 7 days by one ultimate creator". or "its turtles all the way down" or "uranos the sky came over gaia the earth and created life on earth"

they are not all literally true. to get to any kind of "universal truth" you have to discard barrels full of specific beliefs.

Yeah I think many of these types of tales should not be taken literaly. I would not really discard them all though, I think the trick is to try and find what they mean.

arent you a sikh?

Why yes I am!:D

Yes, since they are still outside of the realm of the natural world which science works to measure and understand. As a result, the most accurate term for all unknowns is "supernatural" (I dislike the term paranormal since normal doesn't really exist).

I believe supernatural phenomena exist and will one day be explored scientifically, but we still lack the knowledge and tools necessary to measure and investigate them in an empirical manner. Some progress has been made in creating a science of the supernatural, and we are uncovering more and more strangeness in the natural world, but there is still a ways to go before we have reproducible knowledge of these phenomena. What that knowledge would mean for us is a mystery...as well as what those things might do about us looking.


Yep yep I agree.

No not really. I actualy don't know one religios person that has not justified their belife to themself, or in other words we all have some personal subjective evidance.

My faith and the conditions of my faith have certianly changed much over the years. However I can't objectivly prove the existance of God to you, nor that my personal belifes about God are correct. This does not mean though that if I have other subjective experiances my faith will not shift.

Again, I'll talk about being loved. You feel loved?

I'll concede that faith can, to a degree adjust. I was mistaken to (somewhat amusingly, given my expressed distaste for doing so) create such a binary distinction. I would argue that you, in adjusting our beliefs with new experiences, put yourself somewhere on the continuum between rationality-based belief and faith-based belief.

But the belief that somebody loves you is based, in truth, on evidence. You might not recognize it, but you subconsciously interpret the way that other people act toward you. You feel that somebody loves you when they act in a way that is consistent with human behavior towards loved ones.

EDIT: I'm heading off to class, so I probably won't be replying to any posts made soon.

I don't see even strong atheism as demanding faith (although I tend to be a weak/implicit atheist). It is possible to prove a universal negative if you can show that it's logically incoherent: for example, I can quite confidently say that there exists no rational number which can be squared to equal exactly two (the proof is really nifty). I don't need to remain open minded about the existence of such a number, it simply can't exist. Similarly, it could be argued that there is a contradiction between an entity being omnibenevolent, omnipotent, omniscient loving mankind, and condemning most humans to eternal torture. I'm not keen on this argument myself as it's focused purely on the Abrahamic conception of God and it isn't watertight.

Personally I see every meaningful claim as falling into three categories: that which can be falsified, that which can be verified, and that which can be verified or falsified.

If a claim can only be falsified (e.g. all swans are white) then, after an extensive but fruitless search for non-white swans, we should assume it to be true and that all swans really are white. Naturally we should remain open minded and be prepared to change our opinions if new evidence is found.

If a claim can be either verified or falsified then we should reserve judgement until enough evidence has been gathered to justify an inference either way.

If a claim can only be verified (e.g. a transcendent, personal god exists) then, in the absence of evidence/proof, we should assume it to be false. Presumably God could provide proof of his existence, so the fact that he hasn't should count against him. Again, we should remain open minded but we should assume the negative until the positive has been demonstrated.
That's pretty good.
R O L A I D... nevermind.

I get it

You're not an atheist... You're an agnostic. If you were an atheist you would say that you do know there is no god.

Many people who say they are Atheists are actually agnostic, most people who are clear headed enough to see that religions are a bit nuts are also clear headed enough to know that they can't know such things for sure.

This is pure ignorance, go to wikipedia and look up the origins of agnosticism. People alive 150 years ago who have my position would have been atheists, because the term agnostic hadn't been coined yet. What has changed?

A true Agnostic makes two claims. I do not know if there is a God or not. This is somehow relevant in a religious discussion, so I am entitled to not be called an atheist based on this lack of knowing.

A modern "agnostic" is really someone saying "I don't know what I believe" and/or "you're religion may or may not be true, I'm unsure".

I fit niether category, I am an atheist.

I don't like your binary classification of atheists. It's not that simple. There's a continuum of belief, like everything else. And most "strong" atheists aren't even quite on the end, we just say "There is no evidence in favor of God, so I am strongly inclined to disbelieve." If convincing evidence (and actual evidence, not silly things like the Ontological argument) arose tomorrow, I'd wager that most atheists would consider the evidence.


the only kind of atheist that i would consider "nutty" is the ones who claim that even if there were definitive ultimate evidence of the existence of god, they still wouldnt believe in god.

yes i have seen such a claim made here on NSG. of course i didnt believe it.

How about reading the thread.

ummmm..no ty. Just answering the original post. Last couple of pages since the above quote have been rather interesting and entertaining though

I'll concede that faith can, to a degree adjust. I was mistaken to (somewhat amusingly, given my expressed distaste for doing so) create such a binary distinction. I would argue that you, in adjusting our beliefs with new experiences, put yourself somewhere on the continuum between rationality-based belief and faith-based belief.

But the belief that somebody loves you is based, in truth, on evidence. You might not recognize it, but you subconsciously interpret the way that other people act toward you. You feel that somebody loves you when they act in a way that is consistent with human behavior towards loved ones.

EDIT: I'm heading off to class, so I probably won't be replying to any posts made soon.

Then I'm happy that you concede that point. It seems that in these sort of places that sort of behaviour is in the minority.

The bellief that you are loved is purley subjective. At some point you place your trust that the actions you concive to be consistant with showing love, are so. When somebody tells you that they love you, there is no objective evidance to show their words to be true, you must therefore trust what they say, and trust that they tell you the truth.

The same is true about teaching. You place your faith that what your teachers are trying to impart to you is true.

The point of course is that we all act on faith to some degree in our lives. It is my contention that such behaviour is the default for us.

Again I'll say that I feel no shame in admiting that my religion stems from such a faith based place, that my belifes about God are irrational, be that as it may though my life is still enriched by them.

Am I wrong then to belive as I do?

the only kind of atheist that i would consider "nutty" is the ones who claim that even if there were definitive ultimate evidence of the existence of god, they still wouldnt believe in god.

yes i have seen such a claim made here on NSG. of course i didnt believe it.

The problem with that is that there cannot be "definitive ultimate evidence" of God, which to me and agnostics like me is the unknowable/undefinable in all things, because if there was it would be known and defined.

i.e. it would no longer be God, but the universe.

Theism and atheism are like Yang and Yin, each partakes of the other and the one cannot exist without the other.

The biggest problem I see is that most atheists aren't protesting the existence of deity but the nature of deity - I note that most of them say that they don't believe in god and then describe the god in which they don't believe as the Christian (Jewish, Muslim) god. If you are an atheist, then the nature of god shouldn't be relevent. If you are a theist, then you spend an inordinate amount of time trying to prove the nature of god, which is irrelevent

i.e. it would no longer be God, but the universe.God as an AI... Kind of defeats faith thing, doesn't it?

Then I'm happy that you concede that point. It seems that in these sort of places that sort of behaviour is in the minority.

The bellief that you are loved is purley subjective. At some point you place your trust that the actions you concive to be consistant with showing love, are so. When somebody tells you that they love you, there is no objective evidance to show their words to be true, you must therefore trust what they say, and trust that they tell you the truth.

The same is true about teaching. You place your faith that what your teachers are trying to impart to you is true.

The point of course is that we all act on faith to some degree in our lives. It is my contention that such behaviour is the default for us.

Again I'll say that I feel no shame in admiting that my religion stems from such a faith based place, that my belifes about God are irrational, be that as it may though my life is still enriched by them.

Am I wrong then to belive as I do?

But my point is that trying to figure out if somebody loves you is precisely NOT based on faith.
Through experience, we see the sorts of ways that people behave towards loved ones. We then compare the way that a given person is acting towards us, and determine whether or not they love us. We do this all subconsciously, barely even realizing it, but we do it nonetheless!

Now, yes, we all do act on some degree of irrationality in our lives. I'm not contending that we don't. I do think that rationality is better (in the sense of finding out truth) than irrationality, but that irrationality has its uses as a shortcut, so to speak. We often don't have time to rationalize and think everything out. But if you do have time to think and reflect about your beliefs, I assert that rationalism is far better than faith in finding things out.

But remember what the thread is about: it's asserting that atheism requires the same leap of faith as theism. I contend (as do others) that atheism does not require a comparable leap of faith.

God as an AI... Kind of defeats faith thing, doesn't it?

I don't understand.

God as an AI... Kind of defeats faith thing, doesn't it?

Well, if it could do the things God is supposedly capable of, I don't think it would really matter all that much. It would be as odd as hell, and turn Asimov's The Last Question in to prophetic scripture, but it would still be a God, albeit an unconventional one.

I don't see even strong atheism as demanding faith (although I tend to be a weak/implicit atheist). It is possible to prove a universal negative if you can show that it's logically incoherent: for example, I can quite confidently say that there exists no rational number which can be squared to equal exactly two (the proof is really nifty). I don't need to remain open minded about the existence of such a number, it simply can't exist.
And that's entirely true of theism if theism were falsifiable. But it isn't.
Similarly, it could be argued that there is a contradiction between an entity being omnibenevolent, omnipotent, omniscient loving mankind, and condemning most humans to eternal torture. I'm not keen on this argument myself as it's focused purely on the Abrahamic conception of God and it isn't watertight.
Plus, the Abrahamic deity isn't supposed to be omnibenevolent. And, it hardly refutes theism generally.
Personally I see every meaningful claim as falling into three categories: that which can be falsified, that which can be verified, and that which can be verified or falsified.

If a claim can only be falsified (e.g. all swans are white) then, after an extensive but fruitless search for non-white swans, we should assume it to be true and that all swans really are white. Naturally we should remain open minded and be prepared to change our opinions if new evidence is found.

If a claim can be either verified or falsified then we should reserve judgement until enough evidence has been gathered to justify an inference either way.

If a claim can only be verified (e.g. a transcendent, personal god exists) then, in the absence of evidence/proof, we should assume it to be false. Presumably God could provide proof of his existence, so the fact that he hasn't should count against him. Again, we should remain open minded but we should assume the negative until the positive has been demonstrated.
Does this mean that you think a claim that can be neither verified nor falsified is not a meaningful claim? Because that's what theism is.

The problem with that is that there cannot be "definitive ultimate evidence" of God, which to me and agnostics like me is the unknowable/undefinable in all things, because if there was it would be known and defined.

i.e. it would no longer be God, but the universe.

thats because you have decided on what the unprovable god IS.

if it turns out to be the christian trinity then when you look up on the sky one day to see jesus returning on clouds of glory and all the graves split open and the dead arise to face final jugement THAT will be definitive ulitmate proof that "they" were right and "we" were wrong.

im not holding my breath or anything. im just saying that there are various possible proofs.

Theism and atheism are like Yang and Yin, each partakes of the other and the one cannot exist without the other.

The biggest problem I see is that most atheists aren't protesting the existence of deity but the nature of deity - I note that most of them say that they don't believe in god and then describe the god in which they don't believe as the Christian (Jewish, Muslim) god. If you are an atheist, then the nature of god shouldn't be relevent. If you are a theist, then you spend an inordinate amount of time trying to prove the nature of god, which is irrelevent

if one is an atheist the nature of the claimed gods is the only relevant thing.

the claims of theists tend to be very specific and very demanding (if they were true) of our attention. those are the only "gods" that need considering.

if no one claimed anything about god, why would an atheist think about god at all?

Fossil Record + Extensive Research in Biology, Geology, etc. + Definitive Proof of Evolution* > Old Books Written by People who Thought Drilling into the Head to Release Demons Cures Headaches

I don't want to offend anyone, and I strongly respect religion and the dedication people have to their god or gods, but that's where I stand in my opinion. And that, to me and many others, makes the leap of faith atheists make miniscule in comparison to that of people who believe in omniscient beings.

* In England during the peak of the Industrial Revolution, cities were accumulating massive amounts of pollution, especially in the form of soot and other particles from factories. One species of moth, which was once white, underwent evolution in a matter of years to become almost exclusively speckled with black. One moth was born with a mutation that made it speckled, and hid from predators much better than the starkly contrasting white moths, and so reproduced more, passing its speckled gene onto other moths until they completely replaced the white moths. That's evolution right in front of your face.

no no

its not a mod thing, its a jolt thing. its an anti-spam measure. once you reach 10 posts, youll be fine.

dont go now, we have them on the ropes!

I see that now. Would have been good to know. Did my point get across as it was? I'll go check.

As a devout Christian I can tell you that not all Christian religions teach against evolution. In fact most Catholics support the theory of Evolution.

And all that stuff the "Bible Churches" say about the sciences, that they are a means of trying to disprove God. Well I think that they are wrong, and so do other people of my religion. I know that there was a time when my religion was against the sciences but now we embrace science and believe that it helps us understand God and His creation more.

As a devout Christian I can tell you that not all Christian religions teach against evolution. In fact most Catholics support the theory of Evolution.

And all that stuff the "Bible Churches" say about the sciences, that they are a means of trying to disprove God. Well I think that they are wrong, and so do other people of my religion. I know that there was a time when my religion was against the sciences but now we embrace science and believe that it helps us understand God and His creation more.

I hate this, but I'm going to have to say most Christians in general, and very much Catholics, do indeed claim evolution is wrong. Unless you are talking about the less talkative group. I'm pretty damn sure at my school I'm the only atheist. During the Inquisition, my phrase for when it got out I was atheist, people got a lot more talkative and all I heard was how can I believe science and all of that crap.
I hated having to say that because it creates a prejudice, and I am recognizing that prejudice in myself.

I will say that I am a nondinominational christian and have done much research in religion, science, and philosophy-and know that philosophy is a major part of both.

You cannot disprove the existence of God or gods with science. You cannot disprove science with religion. You cannot prove either at the same time, everything is relative. I could say that everyone here is only one year old clones with inplanted memories up till the one year ago. You cannot disprove it, you cannot prove it. We take a leap of faith everyday just to acknowledge our existance. For all we know are are in a 'matrix' making us feul for robots that took control of the world. Any arguements of this subject is irrelevant for nothing will ever be known with 100% surety. The things we use to test things (science and faith) are relative. Science (and faith) is all based on assumptions that certain things work certain ways. Well, anyway you get what im saying, so I wont get too philosophical about it (probably too late for that).

In the end Im a christian, I take a leap of faith, but so do we all-even the people who dont care enough to believe or disbelieve and gods existence-just by thinking they are alive and that everyone else in the world are more than just figments of their imagination-or that they dont just live in their own plane of existence. Everyone has faith to an extent, those who take a side just have more than the ones who are neutural. I just hope that they will at least live a life with guidlines and virtues-even if they dont want to bow down to anyone.

**oh, yes, and for the post two spots above me, Im pretty sure that the Pope believes in what the bible says about creaton in a pretty Orthodox way (literal way). Which contradicts evolution. Im also pretty sure that most Catholics will agree with anything that the Pope believes-hes the head of their church.--No offence--**

More important than "how can we know whether or not god exists?" is "how can we know what that god would want?" because the latter has more relevance to how religion is applied; people assume about the INTENTIONS of a deity whose existance is uncertain, and that's the particularily questionable part, especially with ridiculous horse shit like "god didn't want humans to experiment on animals" or "god doesn't want people to be gay" etc... what, do they think they can read minds or something? One has to wonder why Moses has so much more claim as to god's intentions than, let's say, Joan of Arc whom the church itself labelled a heretic, IIRC from grade 8 social studies.

So there may be a god, or more than one, fair enough, but that in itself wouldn't tell us what that god's intentions would be.

**oh, yes, and for the post two spots above me, Im pretty sure that the Pope believes in what the bible says about creaton in a pretty Orthodox way (literal way). Which contradicts evolution. Im also pretty sure that most Catholics will agree with anything that the Pope believes-hes the head of their church.--No offence--**

and you would be wrong. the pope is an "intelligent designist". he fully accepts the gradual change of species over the great spans of time but he adds that all evolution is run by the god of christianity.

More important than "how can we know whether or not god exists?" is "how can we know what that god would want?" because the latter has more relevance to how religion is applied; people assume about the INTENTIONS of a deity whose existance is uncertain, and that's the particularily questionable part, especially with ridiculous horse shit like "god didn't want humans to experiment on animals" or "god doesn't want people to be gay" etc... what, do they think they can read minds or something? One has to wonder why Moses has so much more claim as to god's intentions than, let's say, Joan of Arc whom the church itself labelled a heretic, IIRC from grade 8 social studies.

So there may be a god, or more than one, fair enough, but that in itself wouldn't tell us what that god's intentions would be.

yeah.

if this undefinable god cant be bothered to come right out with what he wants from us, why should i be bothered to keep some corner of my brain open to belief in him?

More important than "how can we know whether or not god exists?" is "how can we know what that god would want?" because the latter has more relevance to how religion is applied; people assume about the INTENTIONS of a deity whose existance is uncertain, and that's the particularily questionable part, especially with ridiculous horse shit like "god didn't want humans to experiment on animals" or "god doesn't want people to be gay" etc... what, do they think they can read minds or something? One has to wonder why Moses has so much more claim as to god's intentions than, let's say, Joan of Arc whom the church itself labelled a heretic, IIRC from grade 8 social studies.

So there may be a god, or more than one, fair enough, but that in itself wouldn't tell us what that god's intentions would be.

Ahh, but I would much rather know if I am just a random phenomenon of an evolutionary dice roll or a creation over knowing if the creator likes me or not or if we are just an experiment of his. But all of this are just opinions that will lead to no were or influence anyone in about two days.:D

And to the above post, I myself could think of a plethora of reasons that a God wouldnt want to hang out with us humans and tell us all his little plans. He suposedly gave us free will, so he really doesnt need to, he wants us to find our own way. One reason is that all in all, we are a bunch of jerks in usually more than one way.Another reason: One could imagine if they will that maybe-a god showing itself in all its slendor at a time when the world is so populated as having major consequences. Also According to the bible there HAVE been instances in which god shows himself in some form, but would you believe them? No. Even if it happened only a hundred years ago? Probably not, you want hard evidence during your time period. Undestandable but will most likely not happen without major consequences like I stated above (can anyone say apopcalypse?). I dont really want to argue though, just state my opinions in a civil manner.

no it doesnt.

there is no proof of any god so there is no reason to believe in any god.

pick a god. any god. is there any proof of its existence?

then why would i believe in it?

the amorphous "there must be a creator of all of this but i have no notion of what he might be like or want from me" is not particularly worth considering. its no one's god.

If that's the case, then henceforth I will deny the existence of love.

If that's the case, then henceforth I will deny the existence of love.

Define love and explain your position. I don't understand what angle you're comming from.

If that's the case, then henceforth I will deny the existence of love.

Exactly my point from before, you cant prove anything your looking at exists! let alone something you cant see like your very thoughts or emotions.

You cant prove there is a god, but you cant disprove him, and as far as science works, everything is a theory until disproven.

And remember a good reason To believe in god is that since you cant prove or disprove God is that you could say there are pretty good odds he exists. Im not a gambling man but i'd bet on something like that over the random evolution of this worlds future destroyer-Man.

If that's the case, then henceforth I will deny the existence of love.

you must have a specific theology in mind if you think that love comes from a belief in god.

care to enlighten us?

Exactly my point from before, you cant prove anything your looking at exists! let alone something you cant see like your very thoughts or emotions.

You cant prove there is a god, but you cant disprove him, and as far as science works, everything is a theory until disproven.

And remember a good reason To believe in god is that since you cant prove or disprove God is that you could say there are pretty good odds he exists. Im not a gambling man but i'd bet on something like that over the random evolution of this worlds future destroyer-Man.

yes but what are you betting on? that SOME god exists or that a specific god exists?

you must have a specific theology in mind if you think that love comes from a belief in god.

care to enlighten us?

I am saying that you can not prove that love exists, so why should I believe in it?

yes but what are you betting on? that SOME god exists or that a specific god exists?

Hehe, in all reality, niether or both, whichever you prefer, as I said before this argument as a whole is irrelevent because it deals with things outside of our limited understanding. My point is that no one is going to win an arguement that no one could possibly bring evidence to support, Im just giving philosophical food for thought.

And the only reason Im here talking to everyone is that I like to see the way others think, in all truth I dont feel like im defending Christianity, because everyone else's opinion dont faze me, im just being studious and having fun.

I am saying that you can not prove that love exists, so why should I believe in it?

there is lots of evidence for love.

there is lots of evidence for love.

Like what?

Hehe, in all reality, niether or both, whichever you prefer, as I said before this argument as a whole is irrelevent because it deals with things outside of our limited understanding. My point is that no one is going to win an arguement that no one could possibly bring evidence to support, Im just giving philosophical food for thought.

oh ok. ive been in plenty of those discussions.

the only reason that i am in this argument at all is that claims were made about atheism--my religious position--that i felt were not correct.

oh ok. ive been in plenty of those discussions.

the only reason that i am in this argument at all is that claims were made about atheism--my religious position--that i felt were not correct.

Fully understandable, our reasons for being here are entirely different and dont contradict each other's opinions. And as far as love, Id like to see an example of its proof.

Fully understandable, our reasons for being here are entirely different and dont contradict each other's opinions. And as far as love, Id like to see an example of its proof.

love is an abstract concept, an emotion.

any time you see a person acting against their own best interest in their dealing with a loved one, you are seeing love.

same as when you see a person telling the truth when it is against their own best interest, you are seeing honesty.

same as when you see a man beating the crap out of another man who tried to pick up his girl, you are seeing jealousy.

love is an abstract concept, an emotion.

any time you see a person acting against their own best interest in their dealing with a loved one, you are seeing love.

same as when you see a person telling the truth when it is against their own best interest, you are seeing honesty.

same as when you see a man beating the crap out of another man who tried to pick up his girl, you are seeing jealousy.

Or it could be animalistic reasonings that control us, the alpha male in a pack of coyotes kick the ass of anyone that tries to mate with his femal, then kicks him out of the pack. Is that, love, jealousy? Or just an animals instinct to have it's DNA spread farther than another male's?

Thats the thing with emotions, we still cant really prove them, science might as well say we are really really smart chimps, but are still ran on animal emotions-though advanced they are.

But how can you prove that people don't have their selfish reasons for doing this things? Or that it's instinct, like Ancient Eden said? How can you prove that the person who went against their own best interest to do something for a "loved one" was really doing it to make themself look noble or like "the Good Guy"?

hehehe, this is soo funny though, science can seem really stupid sometimes, If what I said before was true, I doubt we could ever be advanced enough to argue about it. So I basically was just saying the above to prove a poi:Dnt

the whole point is that we cant, we cant prove emotions just like we cant prove a God, there is always a BUT with science's opinion involved.

Or it could be animalistic reasonings that control us, the alpha male in a pack of coyotes kick the ass of anyone that tries to mate with his femal, then kicks him out of the pack. Is that, love, jealousy? Or just an animals instinct to have it's DNA spread farther than another male's?

Thats the thing with emotions, we still cant really prove them, science might as well say we are really really smart chimps, but are still ran on animal emotions-though advanced they are.

as an abstract concept there can be differring definitions of love.

wanting to have sex with an attractive female is not evidence of love.

taking that female into your life, providing her with more than she needs to survive and breed, keeping her after that rush of conquest has passed, staying with her when she is sick and unlikely to provide sex, children or domestic chores, passing up "free" sex with other attractive females, all ARE evidence of love.

as an abstract concept there can be differring definitions of love.

wanting to have sex with an attractive female is not evidence of love.

taking that female into your life, providing her with more than she needs to survive and breed, keeping her after that rush of conquest has passed, staying with her when she is sick and unlikely to provide sex, children or domestic chores, passing up "free" sex with other attractive females, all ARE evidence of love.

Hopefully your right, but I must say (just pulling this off the top of my head-bare with me) There are bird species that will only have one mate there entire life-every year its the same one, if the mate dies-they just dont mate anymore. Is that love-or a complex way to keep the gene pool from being filled with dangerously inbred young?

I really like this thread, very interesting opinions, and by the way, I really do believe in the concept of love, just like I do believe in God.

**oh, and also, I believe love is to be shared with more than just your mate and offspring, but also with family and very close friends**

Atheism does not require a leap of faith. For religion, belief is a strong component of worship. Atheism can be seen then to be a refusal to believe and thus worship even if God was proven to exist. Which as an athiest I do not think is possible.

Secondly, atheism does not require a leap of faith as the idea of God is logically contradictory (the omnipotence paradox, the omnibenevolence dilemma and the omniscience dilemma) which means (at least for we atheists) that asserting that God does exist is the same as believing in square circles which is just ridiculous.

as an abstract concept there can be differring definitions of love.

wanting to have sex with an attractive female is not evidence of love.

taking that female into your life, providing her with more than she needs to survive and breed, keeping her after that rush of conquest has passed, staying with her when she is sick and unlikely to provide sex, children or domestic chores, passing up "free" sex with other attractive females, all ARE evidence of love.

It can also be defined as obligation.

Atheism does not require a leap of faith. For religion, belief is a strong component of worship. Atheism can be seen then to be a refusal to believe and thus worship even if God was proven to exist. Which as an athiest I do not think is possible.

Secondly, atheism does not require a leap of faith as the idea of God is logically contradictory (the omnipotence paradox, the omnibenevolence dilemma and the omniscience dilemma) which means (at least for we atheists) that asserting that God does exist is the same as believing in square circles which is just ridiculous.

I wouldnt jump the gun and say that ALL athiest believe that. And faith can be defined as believing in something you cant prove, so if you cant prove God doesnt exit, but you still believe that, then you DO have faith.

I wouldnt jump the gun and say that ALL athiest believe that. And faith can be defined as believing in something you cant prove, so if you cant prove God doesnt exit, but you still believe that, then you DO have faith.

I'm not suggesting all athiests believe that at all, I was just throwing the idea out there. Like I said previously though, it isn't belief that God doesn't exist as the concept of God is logically contradictory. You don't believe a square circle or a married bachelor doesn't exist, you know they don't exist because they are impossible things.

It can also be defined as obligation.

obligation doesnt do a good job. it does the minimum.


now that i have demonstrated that there is EVIDENCE of love even if you might dispute the evidence, it would be my contention that should god exist (who is after all NOT an abstract concept but an actual supposed being) there should be some evidence of GOD that can be discussed.

I wouldnt jump the gun and say that ALL athiest believe that. And faith can be defined as believing in something you cant prove, so if you cant prove God doesnt exit, but you still believe that, then you DO have faith.

No. This is a clever word game that shifts the responsibility. It's not on me to disprove a claim or have to believe it, it's on the person making the claim to give me a reason to believe or I'm under no more obligation to believe it than I am that creatures from the planet Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaa replaced Bush Sr. and have been ruling the universe (this is also something someone believes and shared on a construction side walk in hundreds of hand written photocopied pieces of paper. He has a text and a belief...).

Not believing in a god or gods presupposes the claim of god and not believing it simply rejects that claim. It is not a claim on its own, no matter what rhetorical device is applied. In order to reject it, a claim must be made. That claim has the burden of proof, not the other way around.

I'm not suggesting all athiests believe that at all, I was just throwing the idea out there. Like I said previously though, it isn't belief that God doesn't exist as the concept of God is logically contradictory. You don't believe a square circle or a married bachelor doesn't exist, you know they don't exist because they are impossible things.

I believe that the is no such thing as impossible though, just very very very very very very very improbable. Also, everything is relative-even--no, especially our concept of what is possible. On this note I rest my case and hope that eveyone enjoyed my arguments as much as I enjoyed replying to yours. (maybe I should joint he debate team at shcool):D

thats because you have decided on what the unprovable god IS.
Yes, through reasoning.

if it turns out to be the christian trinity then when you look up on the sky one day to see jesus returning on clouds of glory and all the graves split open and the dead arise to face final jugement THAT will be definitive ulitmate proof that "they" were right and "we" were wrong.

im not holding my breath or anything. im just saying that there are various possible proofs.
"If it turns out to be" is irrelevant to me. Hey, that rhymes. "Now" is the only reality. (I'm a rhyming daemon.)

Besides which, I am aware of the way in which that particular myth images God as I know it.

obligation doesnt do a good job. it does the minimum.


now that i have demonstrated that there is EVIDENCE of love even if you might dispute the evidence, it would be my contention that should god exist (who is after all NOT an abstract concept but an actual supposed being) there should be some evidence of GOD that can be discussed.

but hes a supernatural being not a physical one in the least, you cant assume the same standards with wanting evidence, its not a case of CSI:Miami. So if you dont accept supernatural evidence, you will have to go evidence hungry I guess.

I believe that the is no such thing as impossible though, just very very very very very very very improbable. Also, everything is relative-even--no, especially our concept of what is possible. On this note I rest my case and hope that eveyone enjoyed my arguments as much as I enjoyed replying to yours. (maybe I should joint he debate team at shcool):D

You may rest your case but it is wrong. There are impossible things! A square circle is impossible. And a married bachelor is impossible. There is no way such things are possible making them impossible, hence it is valid to be able label God as an impossible thing.

You may rest your case but it is wrong. There are impossible things! A square circle is impossible. And a married bachelor is impossible. There is no way such things are possible making them impossible, hence it is valid to be able label God as an impossible thing.

God is impossible? That's news to me, considering logical paradoxes are a perfectly plausible limit on omnipotence unless God does not follow the law of non-contradictions. If that were the case, it would be entirely plausible for God to make a married bachelor or square circle. At the same time, he could be both omnibenevolent and omnimalevolent, among other things.

No. This is a clever word game that shifts the responsibility. It's not on me to disprove a claim or have to believe it, it's on the person making the claim to give me a reason to believe or I'm under no more obligation to believe it than I am that creatures from the planet Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaa replaced Bush Sr. and have been ruling the universe (this is also something someone believes and shared on a construction side walk in hundreds of hand written photocopied pieces of paper. He has a text and a belief...).

Not believing in a god or gods presupposes the claim of god and not believing it simply rejects that claim. It is not a claim on its own, no matter what rhetorical device is applied. In order to reject it, a claim must be made. That claim has the burden of proof, not the other way around.

Ahh, maybe to you, but to me both the claim and the rejection need proof or there is no reasoning for either, in this case there is no reason for either besides faith.

You may rest your case but it is wrong. There are impossible things! A square circle is impossible. And a married bachelor is impossible. There is no way such things are possible making them impossible, hence it is valid to be able label God as an impossible thing.

Epic argument failure. -3 penalty to Debate and Counter-Debate skills.

You may rest your case but it is wrong. There are impossible things! A square circle is impossible. And a married bachelor is impossible. There is no way such things are possible making them impossible, hence it is valid to be able label God as an impossible thing.

Were you listening when I said ALL things are relative? Why is a cicle a circle and a square a square? Where the proof? It just philosophy that we base logic off of, and philosophies are created by man-not a perfect being in the least.

Anyway-though the topic is close, we ARE off topic. This is not a God vs No God debate. Its a debate over athiests having faith or not. And my ground is that they do.

And I also say that no one is right or wrong on this issue, and unless Im contradicted int this statement, ill be taking my leave.

obligation doesnt do a good job. it does the minimum.


now that i have demonstrated that there is EVIDENCE of love even if you might dispute the evidence, it would be my contention that should god exist (who is after all NOT an abstract concept but an actual supposed being) there should be some evidence of GOD that can be discussed.

You have not provided evidence of love. Love can not be proven to anyone but one self. How do you know the love exists? You feel it. You feel love towards someone. People who have not felt love can not believe in it; people who believe in it may think they have never felt it, but they have felt it, perhaps sub-consciously, but they have felt it. The same goes for God. You have to feel Him to believe in Him. You have to let yourself feel Him. God, like love, can only truly be proven to oneself.

Hey Atheists, got a question for you.

I think I am running into a contradiction for atheism, namely that atheism makes the same ‘leap of faith’ that religions do.

To wit: science cannot of course test or provide direct proof of the existence of god(s). As it has been pointed out to countless Creationists on this board. Science is the realm of the natural world and god(s) belong to the supernatural. This excludes us from ever finding any definitive proof to the existence of god(s).

In the same vein, it is also, of course, impossible for science to prove a negative. One cannot prove the non-existence of anything.

So in other words, god(s) are one big question mark where it’s pretty much impossible for us to say one way or another.

So here’s where I have my question, from the above it would seem that Agnosticism, the position that there may be a god(s), or there may not, but we don’t know and cannot know, would be the logical position for those folks who reason things out without going on something as asinine as a ‘feeling’ or ‘faith’ alone.

So where does the atheist absolute position that there is/are no god(s) come from? It would seem that this position is no more grounded in actual logic or reason than any other religion that claims their way is the one true way because they say so.

Am I missing something here then? Please explain.

I’m busy with lesson planning today so I might not respond back till later, but I will be back. ;)

Well, I just think, religion is based off of a bunch of crazy stories. So, if someone told you there was a Flying Spaghetti Monster, would you believe it?

on a side note, this is why I think politics is so screwed up; a lot of stupid positions are simply based on faith and that sucks.
I sometimes wish no one was religious, but that brings to mind the 'time child' south park episode where the atheists of the future were constantly warring, and the religious society was peaceful.

Were you listening when I said ALL things are relative? Why is a cicle a circle and a square a square? Where the proof? It just philosophy that we base logic off of, and philosophies are created by man-not a perfect being in the least.

I was listening, but just because you said it to be true doesn't make it true.

God is impossible? That's news to me, considering logical paradoxes are a perfectly plausible limit on omnipotence unless God does not follow the law of non-contradictions. If that were the case, it would be entirely plausible for God to make a married bachelor or square circle. At the same time, he could be both omnibenevolent and omnimalevolent, among other things.

I was no saying there that God is impossible, I was merely attemtping to demonstrate that it is not impossible to argue the idea that God is impossible.

Anyway-though the topic is close, we ARE off topic. This is not a God vs No God debate. Its a debate over athiests having faith or not. And my ground is that they do.

And I also say that no one is right or wrong on this issue, and unless Im contradicted int this statement, ill be taking my leave.

I realise it is not a "God vs No God" debate. What I am arguing is that a person does not believe that a square circle doesn't exist, they simply know its non-existetence to be true. This is the same for atheists, thus requiring no belief.

Personally I see every meaningful claim as falling into three categories: that which can be falsified, that which can be verified, and that which can be verified or falsified.

If a claim can only be falsified (e.g. all swans are white) then, after an extensive but fruitless search for non-white swans, we should assume it to be true and that all swans really are white. Naturally we should remain open minded and be prepared to change our opinions if new evidence is found.

If a claim can be either verified or falsified then we should reserve judgement until enough evidence has been gathered to justify an inference either way.

If a claim can only be verified (e.g. a transcendent, personal god exists) then, in the absence of evidence/proof, we should assume it to be false. Presumably God could provide proof of his existence, so the fact that he hasn't should count against him. Again, we should remain open minded but we should assume the negative until the positive has been demonstrated.




Does this mean that you think a claim that can be neither verified nor falsified is not a meaningful claim? Because that's what theism is.

Absolutely. A claim (such as one concerning the existence of god) which can neither be verified (since no proof exists) nor falsified (since no proof is possible) is not a meaninful claim and should be dismissed.

Well, I just think, religion is based off of a bunch of crazy stories. So, if someone told you there was a Flying Spaghetti Monster, would you believe it?

on a side note, this is why I think politics is so screwed up; a lot of stupid positions are simply based on faith and that sucks.
I sometimes wish no one was religious, but that brings to mind the 'time child' south park episode where the atheists of the future were constantly warring, and the religious society was peaceful.

yes, lets all base our decisions off of south park episodes! J/K

I realise it is not a "God vs No God" debate. What I am arguing is that a person does not believe that a square circle doesn't exist, they simply know its non-existetence to be true. This is the same for atheists, thus requiring no belief.

Knowing non-existence and not believing in it are the same thing...EXCEPT that you can NEVER KNOW that something is non-existent, never. So I say you just believe that thats so, ok good night everyone!

but hes a supernatural being not a physical one in the least, you cant assume the same standards with wanting evidence, its not a case of CSI:Miami. So if you dont accept supernatural evidence, you will have to go evidence hungry I guess.

*Shrug* if there is no evidence that you can point to that demonstrates god--and remember that with somethings like the big bang they are only best-guess-inferences based on observation--then there is no reason for me to suppose that he exists.

Knowing non-existence and not believing in it are the same thing...EXCEPT that you can NEVER KNOW that something is non-existent, never.

For a relativist argument to work it must be applied to everything. Christians believe in a God, therefore for them God exists. Atheists don't believe in a God therefore it doesn't exist for them. Continuing your relativist theme, I know athiesm doesn't require belief. You on the other hand do know they require belief. But if one is to argue a relativist answer, then you simply come to the conclusion that everyone is right which is far too boring an end to an argument.

Ahh, maybe to you, but to me both the claim and the rejection need proof or there is no reasoning for either, in this case there is no reason for either besides faith.
This means that there is literally an infinite leaps of faith that you make that you are unaware of because you simply have not come across them but until then don't believe them (Yaaaaa, for instance.) This is functionally unworkable.

No, my friend, the burden of proof is on the claim, to believe there is no god pre-supposes the claim, it is not on me to disprove it nor is it an act of faith.
Absolutely. A claim (such as one concerning the existence of god) which can neither be verified (since no proof exists) nor falsified (since no proof is possible) is not a meaninful claim and should be dismissed.
Exactly.

Absolutely. A claim (such as one concerning the existence of god) which can neither be verified (since no proof exists) nor falsified (since no proof is possible) is not a meaninful claim and should be dismissed.

There are a lot of people that have proof of God. Just because it can't be empirically reproduced doesn't invalidate it for them, and that's all that matters.

If I can just address the original question without having to wade through 30 pages of debate (awfully sorry if I repeat anyone's arguments, not my intention):

First off, there are two broad areas of atheism, and this has probably already been covered. Aggressive atheism, which defiantly states it can prove there is no god and cannot be any god, and passive atheism, which reasons that the existence of a god must be proven before believing in it, believing it to be more practical to assume supernatural entities are non-existent. The latter would be the position that I take - aside from the fact that proving a god exists or not is non-falsifiable and therefore non-scientific (hence why ID is such a farce).

I also am extremely cautious because of the huge list of logical fallacies that theists tend to use to convince people, be it appeals to consequences (you will go to HELL!), proof by example (anecdotal evidence), the texas sharpshooter (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_sharpshooter_fallacy) fallacy, and the biggest criminals, appeals to probability (possibly X, therefore X) and wishful thinking.

More acceptable to religious people is the humanistic approach, which has a lot of similarities to passive atheism. It takes the position that even if a supernatural entity does exist, it's probably never going to affect your life, so, in effective terms, it might as well not exist.

You have not provided evidence of love. Love can not be proven to anyone but one self. How do you know the love exists? You feel it. You feel love towards someone. People who have not felt love can not believe in it; people who believe in it may think they have never felt it, but they have felt it, perhaps sub-consciously, but they have felt it. The same goes for God. You have to feel Him to believe in Him. You have to let yourself feel Him. God, like love, can only truly be proven to oneself.
Bad analogy. Love is an emotion-- it's within the person feeling it. Feeling love is sufficient to demonstrate it exists, because if feeling a said feeling demonstrates that that feeling exists. However, a claim about God is a claim about an existent entity. Therefore "feeling" God is not sufficient to prove his existence. What it proves is that people feel that God exists.

There are a lot of people that have proof of God. Just because it can't be empirically reproduced doesn't invalidate it for them, and that's all that matters.

Ah, but most of these lots of people have proof of Gods that contradict each other. They can't all be right, can they?

Ah, but most of these lots of people have proof of Gods that contradict each other. They can't all be right, can they?

It's entirely possible, if we assume said Gods each have an inflated opinion of themselves.

There are a lot of people that have proof of God. Just because it can't be empirically reproduced doesn't invalidate it for them, and that's all that matters.

Well in so far as the realm of science goes not being able to falsify them or the fact that they can not be verified would invalidate them in that area. It becomes a matter of faith at that point and that's fine but its not going to be considered useful "proof."

It's entirely possible, if we assume said Gods each have an inflated opinion of themselves.

Ah, but most religions conflict in ways that not even saying "All the Gods exist, some just have huge egos," will fix. For example, Jainists believe the Earth has always existed, while Christians (generally) believe it's 6,000 years old. It is impossible for them both to be right, yet they both have proved it to themselves through non-empirical methods, as you said. That indicates that those non-empirical methods are irrational and ineffective.

People keep saying that belief in God is irrational and only athiesm makes sense. To me, it seems opposite
Both sides agree that you can neither prove nor disprove the existence of a supernatural figure using natural laws. Its like proving a mathematical theroem using biological laws. Since the existence is in doubt it becomes a cost-benefit analysis.
What is to be gain through athiesm? At most, content feeling of being correct. Religion doesn't really affect the progression of scientists. There are plenty of christian scientists (not to be confused with the religious sect), and many view God and evolution not as mutually exclusive.
What is to be lost by rejecting the existence of God? Well, to start one endures enternal damnation. Hmm, with the chance (however small) of eternal torture on the line, why take the chance?
I believe this is referred to as Pascal's Gambit. It is better to err on the side of God, because it has the best outcome. Betting on the non-existence is illogical. It can't be settled until you're dead (at which point, if you're right, you aren't aware of this victory) and if you're wrong, you go to hell.
Athiesm is really the illogical and irrational position.

I believe this is referred to as Pascal's Gambit. It is better to err on the side of God, because it has the best outcome. Betting on the non-existence is illogical. It can't be settled until you're dead (at which point, if you're right, you aren't aware of this victory) and if you're wrong, you go to hell.
Athiesm is really the illogical and irrational position.

Pascals wager is a bad example to use to show Atheism as irrational as it is full of holes. I still can't believe people use it now.

People keep saying that belief in God is irrational and only athiesm makes sense. To me, it seems opposite
Both sides agree that you can neither prove nor disprove the existence of a supernatural figure using natural laws. Its like proving a mathematical theroem using biological laws. Since the existence is in doubt it becomes a cost-benefit analysis.
What is to be gain through athiesm? At most, content feeling of being correct. Religion doesn't really affect the progression of scientists. There are plenty of christian scientists (not to be confused with the religious sect), and many view God and evolution not as mutually exclusive.
What is to be lost by rejecting the existence of God? Well, to start one endures enternal damnation. Hmm, with the chance (however small) of eternal torture on the line, why take the chance?
I believe this is referred to as Pascal's Gambit. It is better to err on the side of God, because it has the best outcome. Betting on the non-existence is illogical. It can't be settled until you're dead (at which point, if you're right, you aren't aware of this victory) and if you're wrong, you go to hell.
Athiesm is really the illogical and irrational position.
:headbang: Why the hell do people take Pascal's Wager seriously at all? It's one of the stupidest arguments in favor of anything that I have ever heard. Yes, this includes such ridiculous arguments as irreducible complexity. It makes THAT look brilliant in comparison.

Pascal's Wager is stupid because, among other reasons:
1.) It assumes a dichotomy of Theism and Atheism, as far as rewards go. This is stupid. What if you pick the wrong religion? (indeed, might that not worsen your punishment? What if the god is jealous of your misplaced worship?)
2.) It assumes that whatever God might exist would necessarily even reward faith. This is stupid. Maybe God (for the sake of argument, assuming he exists) is a scientist and prefers honest intellectual investigation, no matter where the empirical evidence brings you.
3.) It assumes that an omniscient God wouldn't see through your feigned belief. Since you can't, as a matter of policy, decide to believe in God, (Well, I can't delude myself like that. I believe what I believe-- either the evidence convinces me, or it doesn't. Wanting to believe something for personal gain doesn't make the evidence more convincing.) the best you can do, if you don't believe, is to pretend to believe in God. He'd see right through this if he has the attributes typically given to him.

QED, bitch.

Regardless, there is no pay-off matrix that shows athiesm is better, since the merits of athiesm are faith exempt and can be achieved by people with faith as well. So, faith still remains the logical choice.
I just say this not to convince people to convert (this would be a dishonest, and probably ineffective way) but to combat the statement that FAITH is the irrational stance.

Regardless, there is no pay-off matrix that shows athiesm is better, since the merits of athiesm are faith exempt and can be achieved by people with faith as well. So, faith still remains the logical choice.
I just say this not to convince people to convert (this would be a dishonest, and probably ineffective way) but to combat the statement that FAITH is the irrational stance.

The pay off matrix does not matter as Pascal's wager is a flawed argument and shouldn't even be used. Try to use actual logical arguments instead of ones full of holes which amount to a glorified appeal to consequences.

Regardless, there is no pay-off matrix that shows athiesm is better, since the merits of athiesm are faith exempt and can be achieved by people with faith as well. So, faith still remains the logical choice.
I just say this not to convince people to convert (this would be a dishonest, and probably ineffective way) but to combat the statement that FAITH is the irrational stance.

Fail. The possible consequences of who is right or wrong has nothing to do with the truth value of the statements. Rationality is all about the truth value, not possible consequences if you are wrong.

Furthermore, how do you know that there isn't a God who, for whatever reason, rewards unbelievers (maybe he's really modest)? It's just as likely as one who rewards believers.

Or say there's some third God, whose attitude is "if you're not against me, then you're with me." He therefore rewards all believers in his faith, and all unbelievers, but punishes believers in all other faiths.

Basically, there are so many possibilities for Gods and reward/punishment schemes that no one belief comes out ahead.

Please, use a brain cell or two for your next argument.

I think that not believing in magical creatures is the default position any rational mind would take. To stray from that would be where you take the initial "leap of faith."

This seems so obvious to me, I really can't see how you could argue against it. Did anyone have to make a leap of faith when they found out Santa wasn't real? Did that cause a meltdown of your reality?

Shouldn't a sane person's initial position be based in visible reality and not some crazy stories about fantastic heroes and angry gods?

Regardless, there is no pay-off matrix that shows athiesm is better, since the merits of athiesm are faith exempt and can be achieved by people with faith as well. So, faith still remains the logical choice.
I just say this not to convince people to convert (this would be a dishonest, and probably ineffective way) but to combat the statement that FAITH is the irrational stance.

A lifetime of Sunday mornings off and not needing to constantly worry about which of God's self-appointed intrepreter's of rules and regulations is right is more than payoff enough as your payoff includes an extra notion that a) there might be a God that need sucking up to, but also b) that there is an afterlife that you need to be concerned about.

A lifetime of Sunday mornings off and not needing to constantly worry about which of God's self-appointed intrepreter's of rules and regulations is right is more than payoff enough as your payoff includes an extra notion that a) there might be a God that need sucking up to, but also b) that there is an afterlife that you need to be concerned about.

That too. Not having to follow "God's" ridiculous (in many cases, not all) rules is a nice incentive. :D

EDIT: That's not to say that I support the line of reasoning that says that the consequences of a belief being wrong make that belief more or less likely to be so.

Did anyone have to make a leap of faith when they found out Santa wasn't real? Did that cause a meltdown of your reality?
Just so you know, i believed in Santa until my parents refuse to put up the charade any more. I got more presents that way.

I also hold the position that God rewards people based on how they believe in Him/Her/It. That is, Calvinists flip a coin, Catholics go to purgatory, Hindus come back as cows, Muslims do whatever it is muslims do and Athiests cease to exist or burn in hell. (i'm lutheran, btw)
To me, a rational God would realize that most people would get the theology wrong, and/or be affected by the environment they grew up in. The only thing he would be concerned with is people not to be so arrogant about their existence and acknowledge that there was some higher power at work. Diesm would even work. Faith is faith, as long as you have some.

Just so you know, i believed in Santa until my parents refuse to put up the charade any more. I got more presents that way.

I also hold the position that God rewards people based on how they believe in Him/Her/It. That is, Calvinists flip a coin, Catholics go to purgatory, Hindus come back as cows, Muslims do whatever it is muslims do and Athiests cease to exist or burn in hell. (i'm lutheran, btw)
To me, a rational God would realize that most people would get the theology wrong, and/or be affected by the environment they grew up in. The only thing he would be concerned with is people not to be so arrogant about their existence and acknowledge that there was some higher power at work. Diesm would even work. Faith is faith, as long as you have some.
That whole "no other god before me" and "no graven images" thing seems to contradict that.

"That whole "no other god before me" and "no graven images" thing seems to contradict that."
I have a more liberal attitude toward my religious interpretation. It is humans who wrote the bible; whats to say those laws are what God meant?
It is also easy to swallow if one concludes that all gods are individual interpretation of the same God, so none is before the other.

Faith is faith, as long as you have some.

And how is credulous irrationality a virtue? Why would one want faith? Suspension of disbelief is fine whilst enjoying fiction, but to shape your life around magical deities seems pretty irrational to me.

And how is credulous irrationality a virtue?

There it is again, that statement that faith is irrational.
Has it ever occured to you that you're operating on faith as well? Not just as the thread originally said, but that all things in existence can be proved or disproved? Or that everything exists in the same dimmensions as we do and are subject to the same laws we are? We can transend 2-d laws, does it not make sense that something in a higher dimmension can transend our dimmensional laws and thus we can not prove or disprove it, but it still exists?
Furthermore, you are acting on the belief that our current supposed understanding of the "laws of the universe" are correct and accurate even when applied to phenomena of far greater complexity than what we experience in day-to-day earth.

there is no reason to believe in something that cant be proven. its not a leap of anything to stay where you are--a person with no faith.

it does take a leap to believe in something that cant be proven. you are flying in the face of rationality.

Isn't saying there is no God, something that can't be proven?

Suspension of disbelief is fine whilst enjoying fiction, but to shape your life around magical deities seems pretty irrational to me.

What's wrong with that? Given that pretty much every single aspect of the subjective human experience from art, to music, to literature, to aesthetics and beyond is inherently irrational, it doesn't seem so bad to extend that to the spiritual world as well.

What's wrong with that? Given that pretty much every single aspect of the subjective human experience, from art, to music, to literature, to aesthetics and beyond is inherently irrational, it doesn't seem so bad to extend that to the spiritual world as well.

The difference between those things and religion is that those things aren't claims of truth. Claiming the existence of God is.

The difference between those things and religion is that those things aren't claims of truth. Claiming the existence of God is.

If I say "X is a work of art" or "X is aesthetically appealing", are those not claims of truth?

I have a more liberal attitude toward my religious interpretation. It is humans who wrote the bible; whats to say those laws are what God meant?
It is also easy to swallow if one concludes that all gods are individual interpretation of the same God, so none is before the other.

Isn't this just replacing old bullshit with new bullshit?

no it doesnt.

there is no proof of any god so there is no reason to believe in any god.

pick a god. any god. is there any proof of its existence?

then why would i believe in it?

the amorphous "there must be a creator of all of this but i have no notion of what he might be like or want from me" is not particularly worth considering. its no one's god.

:rolleyes: I always hear the same poop about "proof". Define proof, and tell me what it would take in the name of "proof " to convince you, God exists.

If I say "X is a work of art" or "X is aesthetically appealing", are those not claims of truth?

I guess that depends. If we start out with the beauty in art and perhaps everything is subjective its a far different claim then say the earth is the center of the universe or the world was created in 7 days. But if you assert that the meaning of art or conceptions of beauty aren't subjective you can argue for that.

:rolleyes: I always hear the same poop about "proof". Define proof, and tell me what it would take in the name of "proof " to convince you, God exists.

Something above "I say so" or "I have this book and a guy with a fabulous hat that says so"...

If I say "X is a work of art" or "X is aesthetically appealing", are those not claims of truth?

No, those aren't claims of truth-- except to the extent that you are claiming that you, personally, enjoy X. They are claims of opinion. Much like saying "I prefer pepperoni pizza or mushroom or sausage or whatever." You aren't saying that pepperoni/mushroom/sausage/&c are objectively better, just that you enjoy them more. Some other people can enjoy whatever other sort of pizza they like, and they are not wrong. Nor are they right. It's opinion.

God, however, is claim of objective truth-- either God exists or he(/she/it) does not. Even if it is debatable which it is, or hard to test or whatever, there is a correct answer, and whoever does not agree with this correct answer is wrong on whatever parts they disagree with.

There it is again, that statement that faith is irrational.
Has it ever occured to you that you're operating on faith as well? Not just as the thread originally said, but that all things in existence can be proved or disproved? Or that everything exists in the same dimmensions as we do and are subject to the same laws we are? We can transend 2-d laws, does it not make sense that something in a higher dimmension can transend our dimmensional laws and thus we can not prove or disprove it, but it still exists?
Furthermore, you are acting on the belief that our current supposed understanding of the "laws of the universe" are correct and accurate even when applied to phenomena of far greater complexity than what we experience in day-to-day earth.

Everything you said makes a case for "not knowing" - yet you use it to defend "belief". Why is faith in something magical a virtue? Your dream about an extra-dimensional father figure seems to make as much rational sense as believing in Santa. I understand the many emotional reasons for wanting to believe in some cosmic savior, but I can't think of one rational reason for doing so. The only faith I operate on is that the sensory data reaching my brain is somewhat reliable. I admit that requires some faith, but it is hardly a leap.

I for one take the centuries of searching for evidence of god and failing to find it, as decent evidence of no god.

once again, define "evidence". I mean, really, if you were a cop, and you got called to a murder scene, and when you got there, there was no trace "evidence" to identify the killer, does that mean there is no killer.... Or does it mean that you do not yet have the tech. needed to make this "evidence" appear. :gundge:

God, however, is claim of objective truth-- either God exists or he(/she/it) does not. Even if it is debatable which it is, or hard to test or whatever, there is a correct answer, and whoever does not agree with this correct answer is wrong on whatever parts they disagree with.

But that's only true for people that make a claim of that sort. Just because I believe God exists and I have seen evidence sufficient to me doesn't mean others may share that opinion. Frankly, I couldn't care less whether someone else believes in God or not...I've seen evidence that's good enough for me, and that's all that matters.

once again, define "evidence". I mean, really, if you were a cop, and you got called to a murder scene, and when you got there, there was no trace "evidence" to identify the killer, does that mean there is no killer.... Or does it mean that you do not yet have the tech. needed to make this "evidence" appear. :gundge:

Now, to make this analogy better. Imagine that you arrive at the scene and see the victim in a bathroom, a wet, slippery floor, his neck broken and his head resting at an angle against, say, the bit of an open shower door sticking up off the ground. You could conclude, in the absence of evidence of foul play, that it was an accident.

But that's only true for people that make a claim of that sort. Just because I believe God exists and I have seen evidence sufficient to me doesn't mean others may share that opinion. Frankly, I couldn't care less whether someone else believes in God or not...I've seen evidence that's good enough for me, and that's all that matters.

But you right now are making the claim that he exists. Even if you don't care if others share your opinion, your belief still carries the inherent claim of truth-- yeah, others have their own beliefs, but you believe that they are objectively incorrect, even if it's not demonstrable in practice.

But you right now are making the claim that he exists. Even if you don't care if others share your opinion, your belief still carries the inherent claim of truth-- yeah, others have their own beliefs, but you believe that they are objectively incorrect, even if it's not demonstrable in practice.

But it's only objective in the sense that "X is beautiful", since I am not trying to objectively prove that without a doubt. I am solely making a truth claim in regard to my beliefs.

The problem i am having is that athiests are critizing believers of commiting a logical fallacy, that is taking the fact that one cannot disprove or prove the existence of god as a reason for belief. Believers then ectend the possibility toward the infinite benefits and state this as proof or truth. Athiests take this the other way and say that the fact that one cannot prove or disprove shows that God doesn't exist.
"It doesn't make sense to me, therefore it doesn't exist" (argument from personal incredulity) is just as much a logical fallacy as the one they state people of faith make (argument from personal belief). Thus, faith is no less rational than athiesm.
I'm not trying to convert anyone through logic, just to show the flaw in the label athiests place on religion.

The problem i am having is that athiests are critizing believers of commiting a logical fallacy, that is taking the fact that one cannot disprove or prove the existence of god as a reason for belief. Believers then ectend the possibility toward the infinite benefits and state this as proof or truth. Athiests take this the other way and say that the fact that one cannot prove or disprove shows that God doesn't exist.
"It doesn't make sense to me, therefore it doesn't exist" (argument from personal incredulity) is just as much a logical fallacy as the one they state people of faith make (argument from personal belief). Thus, faith is no less rational than athiesm.
I'm not trying to convert anyone through logic, just to show the flaw in the label athiests place on religion.

I see what you're saying. I think the distinction lies in the word "leap". The thread topic implies that it takes just as huge a leap in faith to disbelieve as to believe. This is where I disagree. I think the rational default position is to not believe. To actively disbelieve in something magical and unprovable does, I admit, require a bit of faith in your ability to percieve reality - but I would not go so far as to call it a "leap". To actively believe in an unprovable magical deity seems to me to qualify as a definite "leap of faith".

Not believe - no leap
Disbelieve - small jump
Believe - definite leap

But it's only objective in the sense that "X is beautiful", since I am not trying to objectively prove that without a doubt. I am solely making a truth claim in regard to my beliefs.

Gah, I'm not good at explaining what I mean, it seems. >.<

Consider the statement "X is beautiful."
There is no objective answer. Beauty of an object depends on whoever is perceiving the object. If you say X is beautiful and I say X is hideous, neither of us are wrong. It's purely subjective. Beauty doesn't exist independent of our opinions, because beauty is an opinion about something.

Contrast this with "God exists."
Even if you're not trying to objectively prove it to anybody else, and even if we can't actually find it in practice, there is, in principle, an objective answer to the God question. It's not a matter of opinion in the way that beauty is-- it doesn't depend on the person considering the question. God exists--or not-- independent of our opinions over Him. If you say God exists, and I say God does not exist, one of us is wrong, even if, from available evidence, it's hard (or impossible, for the sake of argument. I don't really think that statements involving God are automatically undisprovable.) to determine.

Do you see the difference?

I see what you're saying. I think the distinction lies in the word "leap". The thread topic implies that it takes just as huge a leap in faith to disbelieve as to believe. This is where I disagree. I think the rational default position is to not believe. To actively disbelieve in something magical and unprovable does, I admit, require a bit of faith in your ability to percieve reality - but I would not go so far as to call it a "leap". To actively believe in an unprovable magical deity seems to me to qualify as a definite "leap of faith".

No, no it is an inncorrect label to call faith in a deity a leap of faith as opposed to anything else. Indeed, we believe in many things that we can't prove, black holes for instance. The Big Bang theory, Evolution. We believe in the various theories describing how social masses work. Different political theories and their validity on life.
We believe in things we don't understand. the stock market. The theory of relativity. Quantom theory. I could go on, but i don't feel we need to. Whats more, we believe in these things even though most of them are not observable through our senses. (big bang, black holes)
In fact, most thngs we believe in are unable to be proven. If you grew up in an enclosed society void of any environmental influence, you would be far behind where our present society is, because you base most things on faith, no less than a leap than of a god.
There is evidence for all of it, adding credence to a theory, but same with god. Filtering through a certain mindset does not mean the evidence is wrong (see logical fallacies), so faith in god is no different than other faith in lifes things

No, no it is an inncorrect label to call faith in a deity a leap of faith as opposed to anything else. Indeed, we believe in many things that we can't prove, black holes for instance. The Big Bang theory, Evolution. We believe in the various theories describing how social masses work. Different political theories and their validity on life.
We believe in things we don't understand. the stock market. The theory of relativity. Quantom theory. I could go on, but i don't feel we need to. Whats more, we believe in these things even though most of them are not observable through our senses. (big bang, black holes)
In fact, most thngs we believe in are unable to be proven. If you grew up in an enclosed society void of any environmental influence, you would be far behind where our present society is, because you base most things on faith, no less than a leap than of a god.
There is evidence for all of it, adding credence to a theory, but same with god. Filtering through a certain mindset does not mean the evidence is wrong (see logical fallacies), so faith in god is no different than other faith in lifes things

We do have evidence for those things, though, even if we don't have proof.

The existence of black holes, for example, has certain implications on reality. We can and do test those.

We do have evidence for those things, though, even if we don't have proof.
We have indirect evidence for those things, just as we do for the existence of God. Black holes are simply an explanation for an observation. the Big Bang (which, btw, was a christian theory) is one way of explaining something we saw, indirectly. None are more valid than the other, yet people believe they are. Why? I don't know and i don;t believe they do either. God is not anymore illogical a belief than some of these things we do believe in, especially when we consider the evidence for everything

We have indirect evidence for those things, just as we do for the existence of God. Black holes are simply an explanation for an observation. the Big Bang (which, btw, was a christian theory) is one way of explaining something we saw, indirectly. None are more valid than the other, yet people believe they are. Why? I don't know and i don;t believe they do either. God is not anymore illogical a belief than some of these things we do believe in, especially when we consider the evidence for everything

Present your evidence for God, then.

No, not Pascal's Wager again, I already refuted that.
What you going to try? The Ontological argument? The argument from design? The argument from the bible? None of the standard arguments are impressive in any way. But if you really have some evidence I've not considered, by all means, tell me. I'm a fair man; if your evidence is good, I may even change my mind. (though don't expect it immediately. I'd have to think about it first, research possible counter-arguments, &c. But I would at least concede that you had a good point.)

No, no it is an inncorrect label to call faith in a deity a leap of faith as opposed to anything else. Indeed, we believe in many things that we can't prove, black holes for instance. The Big Bang theory, Evolution. We believe in the various theories describing how social masses work. Different political theories and their validity on life.
We believe in things we don't understand. the stock market. The theory of relativity. Quantom theory. I could go on, but i don't feel we need to. Whats more, we believe in these things even though most of them are not observable through our senses. (big bang, black holes)
In fact, most thngs we believe in are unable to be proven. If you grew up in an enclosed society void of any environmental influence, you would be far behind where our present society is, because you base most things on faith, no less than a leap than of a god.
There is evidence for all of it, adding credence to a theory, but same with god. Filtering through a certain mindset does not mean the evidence is wrong (see logical fallacies), so faith in god is no different than other faith in lifes things

Every example you give from black holes to big bang to quantum theory are things or theories that can tested through observation, re-tested, tweaked, rejected then modified, re-tweaked, tested, re-tested and so on forever. We can continually make progress on these things because they are directly or indirectly observable.

There is plenty of evidence black holes exist through gravitational lensing; i.e., the curvature of space caused by an object with a relatively large gravitational field that causes light to bend around it. To a smaller degree, this effect can be noticed with stars as well. It is even possible, not yet proven, that a black hole is at the centre of this galaxy.

The theory of relativity and quantum theory both fit experimental data, although the two theories do occasionally predict contradictory results -- more a question of not enough time yet spent on such difficult questions.

The stock market does exist and does work, and fails occasionally. See the Depression and several recessions to see the effect stock markets have on the world, as well as the growth of the British Empire, which was to a degree funded by speculation. Besides, of all things, the stock market is a purely human device designed for purely human ends; while its mechanisms may seem to work by magic, they can be described -- often after the fact, it is true -- through the social sciences (economics and psychology) as well as mathematics.

Belief does require a leap in faith because it is by nature something that cannot and can never be tested scientifically. This is not to say reason cannot guide one's faith, but instead that at its foundation belief requires acceptance of the supernatural. Non-belief, in particular atheism, avoids supernatural explanations -- if something cannot be explained, it is simply because we do not understand it yet, not because it is inexplicable except through divine (or demonic) intervention.