god is a genesis of stupidity

[yes-justice.livejournal.com]

Comments

[joshthevegan.livejournal.com]

This is a great collection of stuff. As usual, I pretty much agree with everything you're sharing here. My only gripe is that atheism is in no way a religion (#9 is implying otherwise).

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

I would agree that atheism is not a religion, but
would you disagree that it is a faith?,
since it assumes more knowledge than we can have.

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

A faith in the absence of something? It's like saying that not collecting stamps is a hobby.

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

But we're talking about beliefs/philosophies, so that I don't think the hobby example stands. If one believes that the basic fundamental nature of the universe is godless without any evidence for it, a sectarian would seem to have some grounds for holding up a mirror to you.

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

If one believes that the basic fundamental nature
of the universe is godless without any evidence for it

Full stop. Preposterous things don't need to be actively disproven but instead, evidence-free claims need to be substantiated.

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

But who gets to decide what is 'preposterous'?

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

The Amazing Randi!

Or if you prefer, the accumulated knowledge of mankind and the scientific understanding we possess.

Otherwise, we're living in a world of spirit mediums, chupacabras and a world created from the bones of Ymir.

[peristaltor.livejournal.com]

Those judging the evidence. (If there is a shred of evidence for a religion, by the way, it no longer stands as a matter of faith.)

[farchivist.livejournal.com]

Utilize Occam's Razor, for one.
Secondly, use the scientific method. What hypothesis best fits the available evidence? If the answer is "There is no God.", then that is the hypothesis used until some other hypothesis best fits the available evidence.

[lafinjack.livejournal.com]

You're presuming there's a hole somewhere in our brains that needs to be filled with religion. I don't have that hole.

If we changed the context to a choice of belief in faeries or sasquatch or dragons or none of the above, is 'none of the above' a belief system?

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

You're presuming there's a hole somewhere in our brains that needs to be filled with religion.

I'm assuming that the origin of the universe is still a mystery. To speak of quantum fluctuations, for instance, is little more than handwaving - it's a good hypothesis, but we don't truly know. That mystery, I think, opens the door to the God question, which may be resolved for you, but it is not officially closed by our top thinkers/philosophers (though the bearded guy thing is probably done).

Why doesn't sasquatch enjoy the same status, that of an open question? I don't really know. Maybe he does. I doubt it, but I cannot think of the answer, except to say that sasquatch and dragons would, in principle, be easier to find, since we would posit their existence to be on this planet, whereas we have the whole universe (and maybe beyond) to search for God.

[joshthevegan.livejournal.com]

Thanks for beating me to this. Exactly what I was going to say. It requires no faith to acknowledge that there is absolutely no proof of the existence of a higher being.

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

Ah, but there is a difference between saying 'there is absolutely no proof of the existence of a higher being' and saying 'there is no higher being'.

[joshthevegan.livejournal.com]

There is no higher being until it is proven there is one. One cannot prove the unknown, nor is it on those of us that disbelieve. The burden of proof is on those that claim that Magic Man Of My Particular Choosing exists.

[enders-shadow.livejournal.com]

No it's not a faith and it does not assume more knowledge than we can have.

Atheism is basically a hard sort of agnosticism. Most atheists break under the "are you SURE?" and admit they could be wrong. It's not a faith--it's a weighted bet. I'd wager there isn't a God, I could be wrong and have lost wagers I've made, but it's not a faith. It's a *lack* of faith--in theism.

If all the arguments for the claim: "I went to the beach last week" fail to meet a basic standard of believability, then it's not a faith based belief to *not* believe I went to the beach last week. I'm not believing you did not Go, I'm not believing you did.

How could the default for belief in anything not be "no"? Even yourself? The thing about yourself is, you've got the best evidence to back it up--first hand experience. But the further you get from yourself, the harder it is to prove any other thing exists. Descartes demon and all. /coffee cup finished.

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

But we are arguing with the definition that atheism means you believe there is no God. That's the way the others have been arguing as well, looking at their terms.

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

I think the superfamous atheists (Dawkins, Hitchens et. al.) have claimed the term to mean "knowing there is no god". If people want to think something else they need to search for better terms that explain how they feel.

Like I've mentioned, I'm ignostic, I don't think the question is valid. This avoids all the epistemological problems of Dawkins' Atheism, as well as takes all religious arguments off the table. If you want your god to be part of the discussion then you need to provide me with a falsifiable experiment regarding god's existence. In short, I've moved the argument from an ontological to an epistemological one. I don't think the former can be won (by either side) and the latter makes the whole discussion irrelevant.

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

Josh the Vegan also argued for such burden placement, but a theist doesn't have to accept that. What kind of God is it that can be caught and pinned under a microscope? No, if our theist cannot have everyone be theists, he will stick to the conventional wisdom - we just cannot know to the satisfaction of the other. He'll take the stalemate rather than be silenced like a child.

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

A weighted bet is still a leap of faith. You're an agnostic, you just don't want to be lumped in with the questioning christians.

I can create an experiment to test the statement "I went to the beach last week", therefore, I can have knowledge of that. I can't do so for "there is no god", therefore I can't have knowledge of that, so to state that as a position is a belief.

You're using the cogito argument to prove the existence of your self, but that works for religious revelation. Plenty of people have spoken directly to god; I'm comfortable to call them deluded, but if you're using cogito to prove your self then you have to face up to the fact that you might be experiencing a delusion (brain in a vat and all that).

Personally, I'll take a social constructivist proof of my own existence (other people believe I exist, therefore I exist), but that's fraught with problems as well, but at least I can take a photo of me and have people agree that it's me, I can't do that with my consciousness.

[enders-shadow.livejournal.com]

Is Richard Dawkins an agnostic? (he admits he could be wrong--I don't see how acknowledging human fallibility prevents one from being an atheist)

I am rather unhappy with this nonsense idea that atheists have to claim something virtually nobody ever claims: "I cannot be wrong about this"

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

Dawkins admits he could be wrong on the god question? I've never seen that; unless of course it's insincere and be using to point out just how ridiculous the religious are "see, I believe in science, I'm open to having my mind changed!" No he's not. He is absolutely and totally invested in his brand of Atheism. If a supernatural being came down and smote him he would be explaining it away as a meteorological phenomenon or the like.

I don't think I'm claiming that atheists have to be able to claim "I cannot be wrong on this"; my issue with atheism is that it puts the lack of existence of god as a statement of fact, which is ridiculous, you can't prove a negative, therefore it's outside the realm of possible knowledge, therefore a ridiculous question. Feel free to say "on the weight of evidence I believe there is no god", but that's a statement of belief, not knowledge. When atheists claim to have knowledge of the lack of existence of a god then they are devaluing the concept of knowledge.

I really have to stress that I am making a point of epistemology, not ontology or metaphysics. What is important here *isn't* whether or not god exists, but "what is knowledge?"

[yes-justice.livejournal.com]

Quite correct.

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

It requires a belief in the existence (or not) of a supernatural being, that makes it a religion.

Better would be to deny the validity of the question, then you don't have to state a belief either way. Ignosticism FTW!

[yes-justice.livejournal.com]

Better would be to deny the validity of the question

This seems like hair splitting to me.

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

It's really not. If we start saying that "there's no good evidence otherwise" is enough to claim knowledge of a fact then we get further from the truth, not closer.