Explain why you dont beileve in god if your athiest.

[El_Machinae]

Sorry, I didn't realize you were a follower of Hank and would be offended. I will refrain from criticizing Hank in the future.

Yeah, um, it IS funny.
Everyone else is wrong.

 

[NKVD]

i believe in big bang...

if there is a God why is HE a god and not me... how did he became a god. where is he physically?

hum thats too much for me. Thats why i dont believe in something superior.

 

[BasketCase]

Explain why you dont beileve in god if your athiest.

Nothing but a gut feeling. It's like the phone rings, you pick it up, and the line seems to be dead; sometimes it might be a crank yank, but other times, you just get the feeling there's nobody at the other end of the line.

I get the same feeling when I look out at the world--as if there's nobody actually running the thing.

And if there is a God? The answer to that question is no real help. Why did he put us here?? What does he want??? The only answers to those questions have been given by other humans, so they're no help either. The only thing for it is to figure out good and evil as best I can.

If God is truly good and loving, he'll know I tried my best. If he's not, then, as Conan put it: the Hell with him.

 

[Perfection]

Because all conceptions of God I've seen are either impotent, incompetent, or incorrectly named.

 

[BasketCase]

Well, naturally--all depictions of God must necessarily be created by people.

 

[Perfection]

Well, naturally--all depictions of God must necessarily be created by people.

Numerous scientific and commonplace conceptions of other things don't meet such criteria.

 

[Sidhe]

I don't understand atheism. If you don't see evidence for God's existence, there's still a chance he exists. Therefore, it seems that agnostics hold to the more logical standpoint.

Yup. Although atheism is the more logical standpoint to attack morality of Christians from.

Quotes from my favourite agnostic:-

The fact that a believer is happier than a skeptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one.

No man ever believes that the Bible means what it says: He is always convinced that it says what he means.

Power does not corrupt men; fools, however, if they get into a position of power, corrupt power.

The art of government is the organisation of idolatry.

The best place to find God is in a garden. You can dig for him there.

Why should we take advice on sex from the pope? If he knows anything about it, he shouldn't!

The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got it.

If you must hold yourself up to your children as an object lesson, hold yourself up as a warning and not as an example.

The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man.

You'll never have a quiet world till you knock the patriotism out of the human race.

"Do you know what a pessimist is?" "A man who thinks everybody is as nasty as himself, and hates them for it."

All great truths begin as blasphemies.

When a stupid man is doing something he is ashamed of, he always declares that it is his duty.

There is only one religion, though there are a hundred versions of it.

To be clever enough to get a great deal of money, one must be stupid enough to want it.

Beware of false knowledge; it is more dangerous than ignorance.

George Bernard Shaw

 

[FredLC]

I'll side with Viz in saying that Unser Giftzwerg is mistaken. Whatever is the origin of the terms, their meaning today does not describe atheism as a "positive" claim, or, at least, not necessarily.

Agnosticism is the refusal to form an opinion, under the claim of lack of avaiable data. just that.

Atheism is the dismissal of God. It can be positive (I know/believe there is no God), or negative (I don't see any reason to consider God a viable alternative). AFAIK, the last one is the prevalent among atheists, even if some vocal ones defend the other.

Anyway, in the recent Ask an agnostic thread I argued why I think that atheism has a logical edge over agnosticism. As it was not answered there (at least yet), I submit the same argument here again:

How you position as atheist applies more pragmatical edge?

Yes, well, this is the Gordian knot, isn’t it? The eye of the storm, the issue at hand, the center of the universe, if the universe this thread were?

My take on the issue is, very simply put, that unlike the question is presented, and the answer demanded, in the heated arguments it generates, the question of God, in it’s very nature, is plain and ordinary. It bears no specialty whatsoever, as thesis goes, and once realizing this, the pragmatism in atheism becomes self-evident.

See, it’s very, very true that no utterly conclusive demonstration can be made about God. Thing is, that is also true about most anything. You can’t prove, beyond philosophical doubt, that anything exists, or, au contraire, that anything does not exists. You can’t prove there isn’t an invisible wall in front of you right now, which becomes immaterial if you try to touch, or that the there is actually a chair below your hindquarters, carrying your weight. Our senses are incomplete and untrustworthy and the induction they provide is meaningless. This philosophy, called pyrronic skepticism, quite simply makes any man an isle within himself, lost in endless darkness, incapable of taking a step, for not being sure if the ground is there, if it will support it’s weight, if doing anything won’t lead to disaster.

Pyrronic skepticism has never been disproved as an epistemology. Probably, because it is correct. It’s practical value, however has been utterly shattered by more pragmatic approaches, which allows for a more functional worldview, which won’t paralyze the person: the acceptance of our senses, aprioristically, as basically correct, even if rather sketchy of the entirety of the experiences. As so, we form postulates, constitutions of knowledge and experience, and this is what tells you that it’s rather unlikely that there are invisible walls around you, or trust that sun will rise tomorrow, or that a next step into a different (but alike) section of the ground won’t mean falling into an abyss; extrapolation of what your senses tells you makes you functional, viable, as an entity.

This functionality, practicality, this… pragmatism applies to your daily life and to your mundane questions. But then, comes the question of God… and people expect you to treat it as… “non-mundane”; people say plainly that one can’t apply to God the same standards of choice-making and opinion-gathering that serves you beautifully to anything else. And why? Because God is supposed to be some epitome of truth, something more essential, and out of such grasp.

But Why? Because of God’s nature, of God’s role? That can only be true if you assume, aprioristically that there is some specialty to the idea of God, if you accept upon presentation the correction of part of the idea, what turns the entire argument an very crude form of petitio principii; Hence, by refusing to formulate an answer to the question “there is a God”, even in the light of the complete lack of evidence, applying the same practical rigor with which you treat your ordinary problems, you are, quite simply, creating an undue inequalty, and arbitrarily deciding to treat a claim without proof differently than other claims without proof just because of it’s popularity – politics getting in the way of clear thinking.

This is, though more elaborated, the point I made in my brought-up reply, when I said that “in my perception, agnostics place an arbitrary line and say ‘from now on, I begin to feel in doubt’”;

This is also the reason why “pink invisible unicorns” and “flying spaghetti monsters” are so funny; because, in their absurdity, they show that people are unwilling to indulge such suspension of disbelieve for characters other than their God, even though the arguments excuses and fits them perfectly.

And this is also why atheists have, IMHO, the pragmatical edge in this debate. We treat the thesis “God” just like any other thesis, and dismiss it on the grounds of insufficiency, just like we do with chupa-cabras, vampires, Santa Claus and the wicked witch of the west. We don’t embrace ideas without good cause, just because they are reassuring (like theists), nor refuse to form opinion (like agnostics), excusing ourselves of concluding by means of investigating difficulties, which don’t differ from those of any other claim.

See, this is why the believers places such a high value in faith, and Christians tell with such candor the tale of Saint Thomas; for deep down, they know that there is no reason to give them credit, and something else had to be crafted for that purpose. The logical after this is to admit that when looking at it from the standpoint of pure reason, a dismissal is hardly absurd.

So, as far as I see, an agnostic has two positions he can take. He can be pragmatical and, theoretically, dismiss other absurd claims, but refuse to form an opinion regarding God – an opinion I consider unsustainable for it’s arbitrarity in the terms above described – or can have a pyrronic approach for all ideas, and be as much an agnostic for the spaghetti monster as he is to God (Christian or otherwise), which is, intellectually, a very coherent position, but, unless he says prayers to all zillions entities humanity’s imagination ever created (or at least from time to time concerns himself with the possibility of their existence), suffers from an incoherence between discourse (everything could be) and practice (like there is nothing).

A position of doubt can be the wisest in several questions, but, IMHO, not in this one. The doubt raised by the “God” thesis lacks merit to justify the denial of an answer after thinking it through. As so, I end this part with my favorite punch line for this debate – “to place myself in a position of doubt, I require a doubt of greater virtue than this”.

Regards .

 

[Sidhe]

As I've said before this is only consistent if you accept that dismissing something as non existent absolutely without proof is as consistent as belief absolutely without proof. In other words atheism simply falls foul of the problem of being intrinsically faith. Even science does not weigh in that something does not exist becuase it cannot prove it, or try to argue that that it's rules are not logical by denying them. Complete word play and ultimately meaningless. It answers nothing accept a mans willingness to think that he has won an argument by denying it, forces people to fall back on faith and to swallow it as if it was reason just the same. Trite and ultimately worthless, but then I would expect an atheist to swallow it whole, belief without sound reason or proof is very important to an atheist.

 

[The Last Conformist]

Would you make the same charge against those who don't believe in Santa Claus? If not, why?

 

[FredLC]

And as before, behind the acusation of trite and world play, there is no substance, Sidhe, for you face none of my ideas. In the end, it is but a personal attack. But I won't say that I expect agnostics to "swallow it whole" it from you, for I have no doubts some will face the arguments I laid down - I have no guarded prejudices against your kin.

But for the purpose of proper debating, I have to ask - you, as an agnostic, regards "God" to the same standards of eny other entity (meaning, you also refuses to form an opinion on Santa Claus, Odin or Zoroaster), or do you consider that "only" the question of "God" deserves a "impossibility to answer"?

Regards .

Edit: At the same time, you could answer me the point about the mundane nature of the controversy on "God", and answer why it deserves to be treated differently.

 

[BEHIND_THE_MASK]

Im not an atheist but I am a Confucianist... I believe that there may be a greater being but, not as powerful as a 'god'. It may be greater then us but certantly it does not control every single thing... Cause if he or she did, and i was he/or she then I would just have the sun explode and start over... Cause face it, Humanity is f***ed up.

 

[viz]

I agree FredLC, nice post indeed.

Being agnostic is all well and good when both sides are reasonably equal in probability. But when the odds shift dramatically to one side agnosticism is not only - as I said in my previous post - a bankrupt viewpoint, but it is also fantastically unconvincing.

 

[Sidhe]

And as before, behind the acusation of trite and world play, there is no substance, Sidhe, for you face none of my ideas. In the end, it is but a personal attack. But I won't say that I expect agnostics to "swallow it whole" it from you, for I have no doubts some will face the arguments I laid down - I have no guarded prejudices against your kin.

But for the purpose of proper debating, I have to ask - you, as an agnostic, regards "God" to the same standards of eny other entity (meaning, you also refuses to form an opinion on Santa Claus, Odin or Zoroaster), or do you consider that "only" the question of "God" deserves a "impossibility to answer"?

Regards .

Edit: At the same time, you could answer me the point about the mundane nature of the controversy on "God", and answer why it deserves to be treated differently.

Yes I have it has no proof it has nothing going for it as more rational than agnosticism it simply is worthless as one is better than the other argument, that is my argument. Now prove that the argument that God exists is more consistent than he doesn't or vise a versa, or conceed that it's wordplay and holds no real answers to anything. I await your proofs.

A position of doubt can be the wisest in several questions, but, IMHO, not in this one. The doubt raised by the “God” thesis lacks merit to justify the denial of an answer after thinking it through. As so, I end this part with my favorite punch line for this debate – “to place myself in a position of doubt, I require a doubt of greater virtue than this”.

To place myself in a position of rationality I need logic. Merely saying something is so or not is not proof. The whole thing defines what an agnostic is, and then labours to say that it's crappy deinition of what it means to be agnostic is more consistent than some other doubt based assertion. In other words you are guilty of your quote at the bottom, entirely and in a non ending circle of logical fallacy.

I agree FredLC, nice post indeed.

Being agnostic is all well and good when both sides are reasonably equal in probability. But when the odds shift dramatically to one side agnosticism is not only - as I said in my previous post - a bankrupt viewpoint, but it is also fantastically unconvincing.

This is why you agree you actually think that one side has more proof than another, and it's preposterous. Show me the money. Belief or disbelief are just two sides of the same coin, the further you go one way the more you retreat into faith over reality. Which is why I say his argument would appeal to atheists, they are already steeped in their own mythology of proof.

I here by invoke Atheos. The god of Atheists. A divine being who's sole existance is based on the belief that he doesn't exist.

 

[FredLC]

Yes I have it has no proof it has nothing going for it as more rational than agnosticism it simply is worthless as one is better than the other argument, that is my argument. Now prove that the argument that God exists is more consistent than he doesn't or vise a versa, or conceed that it's wordplay and holds no real answers to anything. I await your proofs.

Even though I have said myself that no perfect demonstration can be made, either about God or about anything else, I can tell you the process which has led to my conclusion.

Which is quite simple. Humanity witness events every day. Sun goes up, sun goes down. Two things can’t occupy the same space simultaneously; Never eating means dying of famine.

Every time we managed to unravel the processes describing why and how these things happen, nothing extraordinary was taking place. Not that these things aren’t marvelous, it’s just that they are nothing but an interaction of rather ordinary factors. Experience has shown, than, that we should expect the mundane, even in the intricate.

I merely extrapolate this dynamics to the most fundamental questions. I certainly don’t know how the universe came to be, but why should I assume that it has had anything but an equally ordinary begin? How, exactly, does my ignorance of the origin of things make it feasible to insert in the event an entity with superpowers?

That, Sidhe, is the question I’d like to see you answer. How can God be spawned from “I don’t know”, and why this opinion should be revered?

To place myself in a position of rationality I need logic. Merely saying something is so or not is not proof. The whole thing defines what an agnostic is, and then labours to say that it's crappy deinition of what it means to be agnostic is more consistent than some other doubt based assertion. In other words you are guilty of your quote at the bottom, entirely and in a non ending circle of logical fallacy.

Come on now, agnosticism, in this terms, is based on lack of knowledge. We don’t know how things have happened, therefore we must render credibility to anything people suggests, Is that what you are defending?

If it isn’t, than kindly explain what does agnosticism means to you, because I don’t get it.

This is why you agree you actually think that one side has more proof than another, and it's preposterous. Show me the money. Belief or disbelief are just two sides of the same coin, the further you go one way the more you retreat into faith over reality. Which is why I say his argument would appeal to atheists, they are already steeped in their own mythology of proof.

Not at all. There is nothing wrong with ascribing possibilities based on experience. You say we can’t do it, but fail every time to mention why we can’t.

I here by invoke Atheos. The god of Atheists. A divine being who's sole existance is based on the belief that he doesn't exist.

Maybe you’ll be answered by Agnostios. A being spawned from the ignorance of if Atheos is real or not.

Regards .

 

[Markus6]

Unser Giftzwerg your logic is flawed my friend, and you are actually missing the point. Just because Gogf said he doesn't rule out the possibility (he is rational after all, as am I) doesn't mean he is agnostic. Agnosticism is a bankrupt position to be in. Everyone who is reasonable is agnostic to say, winning the lottery, even though they know that the odds of achieving such are so that it almost certainly will never happen to them.

If you think the odds of winning the lottery are nothing short of dreaming (16,000,000 - 1 here in the UK). The odds of god existing are FAR, FAR bigger. Almost to the size of infinity to one, so claiming to be 'agnostic' is nothing but insulting.

I agree that telling someone what they are is a bit off. The definition of these words is very subjective. I can define 'idiots' to mean everyone who isn't me. It doesn't mean I should run around telling everyone they are idiots.

However, I don't think you can compare God to the lottery. The probability of God's existence is pretty irrelevant (and I'd love to know how you can calculate it as well) if he exists.

There is no god, because if indeed there was the following would not be true:

Ah! Music to my ears.

1/ The world in which he created his prized creation (humans) would not be 3/4 inhabitable to us.

The bible teaches we are his prized creation, but not his only creation. Why do you think our existence means he should make the seas inhabitable to dolphins? Why do we need to be able to live everywhere? What's wrong with where we are?

2/ Nor would every one of the 12 billion light years worth of space surrounding the pale blue dot we call home (and that's just this universe, there may well be a mutlitude of them).

Well it's easy enough to say that the stars are there because they look pretty to us. That obviously doesn't explain the ones we can't see. However, if there weren't as many stars then the expansion of the universe would be faster and we wouldn't be able to see as many.

Have you any proof that there are a multitude of universes? One of the main reasons to believe in the multiverse it that the chances of the universe being so finely tuned for life are so small that there must be many universes otherwise God has to exist.

3/ There would not be numerous gods.

So God doesn't exist because numerous gods exist? Sorry, could you run that one past me again?

4/ God would would not be the filler of gaps in our scientific knowledge, which is what he is and always will be, gaps which are thankfully getting smaller I might add.

God is not the filler of gaps in our scientific knowledge. God is the creator of all scientific knowledge.

I'll grant that we are obtaining knowledge but it seems the more we know the more we know we don't know. Do you really think we'll someday know everything?

5/ Morals would indeed come from scripture, but it doesn't. We do not stone homosexuals to death anymore, or allow the killing of adulterers, I could go on but the point is, we apply the writing to are own morals as we see them not how the bible (or koran) see them.

Morals would indeed come from God. (see Jesus' thoughts on the stoning of adulterers). Just because we write our own morals doesn't mean the right morals don't come from God. It could mean we're not obeying him.

6/ Jesus would not have been a stereotypical 'hero' in the mould of many before (and after him). Indeed Jesus would never have needed to have been invented at all, God would not have felt the need to punish himself for the sins of his creation (again before and after the fact) which brings we onto the following point.

Jesus wasn't a stereotypical 'hero' in the eyes of the people at the time. He wasn't what they were expecting, or wanting, at all.

Your next point doesn't really make sense (and definitely doesn't disprove God), I can only suggest you look deeper into Christian theology.

7/ As a designer God is inept and sadistic, 3 of the first 4 humans he 'created' disobeyed him. Not only that but they put the rest of humanity in gods 'bad book' only so he could sacrifice himself in order to appease his own satisfaction!

Free will, etc. blah di blah. The question is ancient and I doubt I can add anything new to anwering it. Some people still see it as a theological problem, otherwise don't. I am of the latter.

I could go on, but I think I've gave 'some' reasons for not believing.

As reasons for believing they are fine. As disproofs of God they are not conclusive.

 

[Sidhe]

Even though I have said myself that no perfect demonstration can be made, either about God or about anything else, I can tell you the process which has led to my conclusion.

But although you have no substance or proof you say that your view has more merit than another, based on what? This is the problem atheism comes up against when it's argued as a better view, based on what?

Which is quite simple. Humanity witness events every day. Sun goes up, sun goes down. Two things can’t occupy the same space simultaneously; Never eating means dying of famine.

Are you saying that only that which has been witnessed can ever be true? Or that because you haven't seen it it is less likely to be true, or does not exist, because none of those tennants are logically tenable.

Every time we managed to unravel the processes describing why and how these things happen, nothing extraordinary was taking place. Not that these things aren’t marvelous, it’s just that they are nothing but an interaction of rather ordinary factors. Experience has shown, than, that we should expect the mundane, even in the intricate.

this is an argument for rationalisization not for atheism. You have never studied quantum mechanics obviously. At the heart of everything is an inability to percieve the true nature of matter. If it's simple' it's doing a remarkable job of comlicating everything.

I merely extrapolate this dynamics to the most fundamental questions. I certainly don’t know how the universe came to be, but why should I assume that it has had anything but an equally ordinary begin? How, exactly, does my ignorance of the origin of things make it feasible to insert in the event an entity with superpowers?

This is an assumption based on doubt, I fail to see how that makes it a more valid argument than agnosticism

That, Sidhe, is the question I’d like to see you answer. How can God be spawned from “I don’t know”, and why this opinion should be revered?

Huh? Who cares? My view is that their is no proof either way, with which to make a logical conclusion. God is neither spawned nor banished to non existence by my view.

Come on now, agnosticism, in this terms, is based on lack of knowledge. We don’t know how things have happened, therefore we must render credibility to anything people suggests, Is that what you are defending?

No simply we must not dismiss something if we have no proof as not existing, just that we have no basis of judgement. One of the founding principals of both logic and science. And one it is impossible to get around with denial.

If it isn’t, than kindly explain what does agnosticism means to you, because I don’t get it.

I think you should understand that when I said replacing one doubt based logical system with a doubt based belief system is not a more reasoned argument, to say so is meaningless. But your entire argument revovles around doing just that, by your own means you render your own argument worthless at the end.

Not at all. There is nothing wrong with ascribing possibilities based on experience. You say we can’t do it, but fail every time to mention why we can’t.

ascribing possibilities and claiming that something does not exist are two very different things. However how can you ascribe possibility with a straight face to something philosophical such as Should I beleive in God or does God exist, that is irational. In science I have actual tangible evidence with which I can after many many repetitions assign a possibility to. If I toss a coin it has two sides, possibility 1 in 2 of getting heads. Where do you place god's existence or lack of here? What 1 in 10?

Maybe you’ll be answered by Agnostious. A being spawned from the ignorance of if Atheous is real or not.

Regards .

So you acknowledge he exists then? Prove it.

EDITED: few more points

 

[brennan]

I'm with Fred.

As for 'proof' that God does not exist, talk to a few believers, every now and then they ascribe God with impossible attributes, that makes it kinda easy to say with certainty, 'God does not exist'.

 

[jimbob27]

Several reasons. I don't believe what was written thousands of years ago in "holy scripture". They believed the world was flat and the stars were pinholes in a giant blanket that is put over the world every 12 hours or so. They were stupid back then, and I find it pretty incredible any intelligent human takes the slightest bit of notice towards these ancient scriptures.

Theres also the fact theres sooooo many different religions, all of which are different. If there is a god that wants us to worship him, by default the majority of relgions are completely wrong. Only one of them can possibly be correct, and I don't think it's such a great leap of faith to think if 99% of them are totally made up, then perhaps all of them are completely contrived.

 

[Sidhe]

I'm with Fred.

As for 'proof' that God does not exist, talk to a few believers, every now and then they ascribe God with impossible attributes, that makes it kinda easy to say with certainty, 'God does not exist'.

That is not a logically valid statement. As I say though, atheism is a belief system in itself and appeals to "logic" based on belief will always appeal to the atheist, the irony is the more hard line they become, the more like theists in word and philosophy they come too. The only true non belief system is agnosticism. There is no more proof of God's existence than proof he does not exist, so to assert anything absolutely is illogical. For the same reason to ascribe probability is illogical. For the same reason to say it has more merit logically is false.

Essentially this what your're saying Brenan:

Based on what I've heard people say about something that they have no proof for and can't tangiblly percieve. I can say with absolute certainty God does not exist without any proof, because they are irrational about the nature of God. Does that sound at all consistent or rational to you? Does this follow a logical argument Does A being ≠ to X mean that A is false?

Spot the difference between their beliefs and yours? Not as easy as it seems. Your both basing your arguments on a lack of proof or evidence yes? Both making assumptions.