atheists

[Paul98]

Believing there is no G-d without proof that there is no G-d is similar to believing there is a G-d without proof that there is a G-d.

Two sides of the same religious coin.

Don't confuse Atheism with Agnosticism.

MotionMan

Not even remotely. Let me try to put it this way, if I made up a story about something that lives in the center of a star 100 light years away. Would you believe my story to be true?

 

[MotionMan]

Not even remotely. Let me try to put it this way, if I made up a story about something that lives in the center of a star 100 light years away. Would you believe my story to be true?

Do I get extra holidays off from work if I do?

MotionMan

 

[theeedude]

You can accept the principle that the simplest explanation is the most plausible, and have the view that "things just happened this way" is a simpler explanation than "some deity had a detailed plan for all of this"

 

[mattpegher]

A religion is a cult that succeeded

religion = popular cult

but there are many cults that arent basically religious in nature, ie White supremacy, Naziism, communism.

Communism is the best example of a non-religious ideal that gave power to corrupt individuals that then abused said power. The only reason communism banned religion is because it didnt want the competition.

 

[micrometers]

A religion is a way of life. Pure and simple. Yes, there is a mythological belief system, but on some level the followers of a religion are responding to the community that it provides.

 

[Paul98]

Do I get extra holidays off from work if I do?

MotionMan

That could only change what you say you believe not what you actually believe.

 

[Mr. Pedantic]

Not collecting stamps is not a belief regarding the existence or non-existence of a deity, so, no.

MotionMan

This is what people call an analogy. An analogy is not intended to be completely equivalent to the original scenario in every conceivable way.

 

[mattpegher]

Not even remotely. Let me try to put it this way, if I made up a story about something that lives in the center of a star 100 light years away. Would you believe my story to be true?

This is actually a good place to discuss the "empiric argument". Or Evidence of abscence argument http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evidence_of_absence .
If I said that a new species of bacteria existed on pluto, or as you put it a living (growing, reproducing) organism lived in the center of stars, we would both say that there is no evidence that such a thing exists, but I would not be able to say that such a thing is impossible. My first question would be why do you believe that one exists.

As for why people believe in the supernatural, it stems from two perceptions. Man's need to explain the world and man's need to explain himself.
The first we know is science. The latter is metaphysics. Why is it wrong to kill, to rape, to hurt others. Simple explainations said that these things were "evil" and in order to explain them we contemplated the existence of an ultimate judge. One that knew all and would punish these deeds. Modern atheistic explainations propose that such activities are counterproductive to civilized human interaction.

So the answer to my question is that for thousands of years man has contemplated the nature of his existence, one theory is that sentience is somehow extracorporeal and one is that it is not.

For an argument to support that something does not exist, one needs to find logical inconsistancies. For me the logical inconsistencies exist in the definition of god.

 

[MotionMan]

A religion is a way of life. Pure and simple. Yes, there is a mythological belief system, but on some level the followers of a religion are responding to the community that it provides.

There are religious members of a religion and cultural members (and some are both). For example, many of the Jews I know are cultural Jews more than religious Jews.

MotionMan

 

[MotionMan]

That could only change what you say you believe not what you actually believe.

I may actually start to believe if it gets me off of work a few more days a year.



MotionMan

 

[MotionMan]

This is what people call an analogy. An analogy is not intended to be completely equivalent to the original scenario in every conceivable way.

An analogy needs to be closely related enough to be of some use in the discussion. Collecting stamps is not close enough to religious belief to be useful.

MotionMan

 

[Paul98]

I may actually start to believe if it gets me off of work a few more days a year.



MotionMan

I don't think you know what the word believe means.

 

[MotionMan]

This is actually a good place to discuss the "empiric argument". Or Evidence of abscence argument http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evidence_of_absence .
If I said that a new species of bacteria existed on pluto, or as you put it a living (growing, reproducing) organism lived in the center of stars, we would both say that there is no evidence that such a thing exists, but I would not be able to say that such a thing is impossible. My first question would be why do you believe that one exists.

As for why people believe in the supernatural, it stems from two perceptions. Man's need to explain the world and man's need to explain himself.
The first we know is science. The latter is metaphysics. Why is it wrong to kill, to rape, to hurt others. Simple explainations said that these things were "evil" and in order to explain them we contemplated the existence of an ultimate judge. One that knew all and would punish these deeds. Modern atheistic explainations propose that such activities are counterproductive to civilized human interaction.

So the answer to my question is that for thousands of years man has contemplated the nature of his existence, one theory is that sentience is somehow extracorporeal and one is that it is not.

For an argument to support that something does not exist, one needs to find logical inconsistancies. For me the logical inconsistencies exist in the definition of god.

Every religion tries to present proof by way of testimonials of people who claim to have witnessed events that prove the religious beliefs.

MotionMan

 

[MotionMan]

I don't think you know what the word believe means.

Do children start believing in their religion before they are taught the details of the religion and/or start following the rituals of their religion, or vice versa?

MotionMan

 

[mattpegher]

I will use an analogy from medicine. When a patient presents with palpitations, I gather a history, do an exam then place the patient on a monitor. More often than not, their exam is normal, their history suggest something happened, but the monitor shows only normal rhythm. Now I know something happened that gave the patient that symptom but I have no empiric evidence to prove what it was. Many factors suggest to me what likely caused the symptom, but only by history.

Thinking about it this way it makes me wonder, what kind of empiric evidence would suggest the prescence of a deity. Likely any event that was in stark contradiction to known laws of physics would be explained by altering the laws of physics. The sudden prescence of a nonsolid humanoid sentient would mostlikely be explained as some alien. Any manifestation on the physical universe would be mostlikely by some other unknown physical phenomenon.

 

[MotionMan]

I will use an analogy from medicine. When a patient presents with palpitations, I gather a history, do an exam then place the patient on a monitor. More often than not, their exam is normal, their history suggest something happened, but the monitor shows only normal rhythm. Now I know something happened that gave the patient that symptom but I have no empiric evidence to prove what it was. Many factors suggest to me what likely caused the symptom, but only by history.

Thinking about it this way it makes me wonder, what kind of empiric evidence would suggest the prescence of a deity. Likely any event that was in stark contradiction to known laws of physics would be explained by altering the laws of physics. The sudden prescence of a nonsolid humanoid sentient would mostlikely be explained as some alien. Any manifestation on the physical universe would be mostlikely by some other unknown physical phenomenon.

Applying logic and science to religion. This should go well.

MotionMan

 

[mattpegher]

Every religion tries to present proof by way of testimonials of people who claim to have witnessed events that prove the religious beliefs.

MotionMan

But I will postulate that "miracles" are contradictory to the nature of god.
An omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent god would not need to alter the laws of physics to make things occur in ways that it desired.

The only argument I can see is that appearent miracles would be predetermined to occur at certain times to manipulate human beliefs. Sort of like, the one in 100 million chance of winning a lottery, makes 200 million people buy tickets.

 

[Mr. Pedantic]

An analogy needs to be closely related enough to be of some use in the discussion. Collecting stamps is not close enough to religious belief to be useful.

MotionMan

Let's take the example that you gave; collecting stamps does not include the non-belief of a diety. Well, no shit. That's why it's an analogy. The whole idea is to compare something like the non-belief of a diety with a similar but non-identical situation. Guess what? The belief of a diety falls into the non-identical category. It's still a reasonable analogy.

 

[Muse]

Asking a person if God exists is like asking him if there's a being other than himself who has dominion, a prescription for schizophrenia.

 

[micrometers]

There are religious members of a religion and cultural members (and some are both). For example, many of the Jews I know are cultural Jews more than religious Jews.

MotionMan

You just proved my notion I think. Why do the cultural jews even bother with the religious rituals? For the community aspects obviously.

 

[mrCide]

MotionMan, I just want you to know that you sound _extremely_ silly going on and on about how atheism is or is like a religion.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

Do children start believing in their religion before they are taught the details of the religion and/or start following the rituals of their religion, or vice versa?

MotionMan

Take a child and raise him in a completely non-theistic world. Belief and disbelief in God are non-existent; the very concept has never been considered. When he becomes an adult, introduce him to a religious individual who insists there is a God. The now-adult listens to what he has to say, examines the evidence, and comes to the conclusion that the religious individual is saying things without tangible proof and denies his assertions. Has the now-adult just converted?

 

[MotionMan]

Let's take the example that you gave; collecting stamps does not include the non-belief of a diety. Well, no shit. That's why it's an analogy. The whole idea is to compare something like the non-belief of a diety with a similar but non-identical situation. Guess what? The belief of a diety falls into the non-identical category. It's still a reasonable analogy.

It is a crappy analogy because the collection or non-collection of stamps does not include any type of belief. It is not like people differ over the existence of stamps.

MotionMan

 

[MotionMan]

Take a child and raise him in a completely non-theistic world. Belief and disbelief in God are non-existent; the very concept has never been considered. When he becomes an adult, introduce him to a religious individual who insists there is a God. The now-adult listens to what he has to say, examines the evidence, and comes to the conclusion that the religious individual is saying things without tangible proof and denies his assertions. Has the now-adult just converted?

Nope. The now-adult was always an atheist (i.e. he never believed in deities), even if he did not know it.

MotionMan

 

[HamburgerBoy]

Nope. The now-adult was always an atheist (i.e. he never believed in deities), even if he did not know it.

MotionMan

But he was never introduced to the concept and had never explicitly denied a deity. You've made the distinction between atheist and agnosticism earlier in this thread; please elaborate on it because it is clearly not how I would distinguish between them.