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Does Ath*ism have a future? NO!


theatheismwars

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And the saga continues...

 

Two atheists battling it out over questions of belief and faith within their own ranks.

 

Round 4

 

 

What claim? The claim that an affirmative belief in something for which there is no proof is a belief of faith? That's the only claim I made.

 

Ok, lets take it from the top. That way maybe we can avoid hitting an all time low.

 

You've made several claims so far in this thread, many unsupported and you've apparently changed your stance on a number of occasions.

 

But now you claim you've only made one claim, which happens to be the definition of "faith" in the Merriam-Webster online dictionary.

 

2b(1) firm belief in something for which there is no proof

 

 

The claim we were discussing was another you made: That there are strong atheists who "believe their position to be absolutely true, to "know" they are right."

 

There are two claims there. You claim (1) these people exist and you claim (2) they believe their position absolutely true...

 

We've agreed (I think) that claim 2 is untenable as there is no proof that could confirm such a position, i.e., no one could "know" they are right.

 

And as far as your claim (1), I have yet to see your source or link where a strong atheist makes that claim. If you have one please provide it, otherwise it can only be assumed that it is your unsubstantiated opinion.

 

 

That's an important point, because if indeed strong atheists do not hold that position and are not making that claim, then your view (hypothesis, claim, or whatever you would like to call it) that strong atheism holds "a position of faith much like theism" is meaningless (or falsified), nothing more than your personal opinion.

 

To avoid that conclusion you need to prove that your definition of strong atheism is consistent with what strong atheists are actually saying and publishing.

 

 

Oh, but you've made other related claims, too, that have not been justified:

 

[snip]Another set, strong atheists, claims that there is no possible way that any deities could exist. They exhibit a belief, a claim, that the existence of a deity or supreme being is not even possible and have nothing but faith to base such an affirmative conclusion on. [...] I think those that have an affirmative belief that there are no deities have nothing but faith to rest that conclusion on.

 

This would appear to be yet another unsupported claim upon which you base your conclusion that strong atheists "exhibit a belief" and have "nothing but faith."

 

As I've pointed out to you, strong atheists base their position that god does not exist not on faith but on the fact that there is insufficient reason to believe in them—by showing them as inherently meaningless, contradictory, or at odds with known scientific evidence or historical facts. (See again, if you missed it the second time around Arguments against the existence of God)

 

 

 

Here is another claim you've made:

 

 

IMO, anyone that makes an affirmative claim that anything does or does not exist carries a burden of proof with that claim. Believe what you want but if you're going to tell me you "know" then be prepared to back up your claim.

 

Ok, we have found no one that "knows."

 

So what about the burden of proof? The burden of proof rest on the person(s) making the affirmative claim that god does exist: not on those that deny that god exists, or refuse to believe the concept of god.

 

 

But then you asked me to...

 

Prove there are no atheists that claim with certainty that there are no Gods. That there is no one that claims "B" is true. Ask the owner of NOgods.org what he/she thinks.

 

 

Again, the implicit burden of proof is on the person making the affirmative claim: C1ay.

 

You are the one affirming that strong atheists claim they know with absolute certainty and it is true beyond any doubt that god does not exist. I merely point out that the claim is nothing more than your unsubstantiated opinion.

 

You have not produced a single source where a specimen makes that claim.

 

 

 

I did say that I "believe" there are such people but that is not a claim, it is simply a belief.

 

Here we find your stance change.

 

What makes you "believe" anyone would claim such without evidence or proof? If they exist where are they? Why hasn't any strong atheist published that view in a book, journal, blog, or website?

 

 

It's beginning to look like your "claim" that they don't exist is one of faith though since you have no proof they don't exist except the fact you can't find any.

 

I'm not saying they don't exist. A lack of evidence by itself is not evidence. I have no idea whether they exist or not. They might, though I would be very surprised, since it would be an unreasonable claim.

 

This is simple situation to resolve. Not only did you make the assertion that these people exist, but you claim to know (or believe to know) what their position is on the topic. The burden of proof is on you.

 

Note: Placing the burden on the refutation, rather than on the proof of the assertion is an argument ad ignorantiam: the fallacy of asserting a claim is true as long as it has not been refuted.

 

 

Maybe I should make a another claim though.

 

Sure, why not? :)

 

 

Perhaps that anyone drawing a conclusion that something doesn't exist only because they can't find evidence to support it's existence is a conclusion drawn in faith, an unproven belief in their own conclusion. Do you have faith that there is no one among the 7,000,000,000 people on Earth that claims to "know" there is no God?

 

Again, the lack of evidence by itself is not evidence. I simply can't find a source for your assertions that you "believe" to be true. I doubt your claim because such would be foolish. One cannot sensibly claim to know something that is unknowable by definition.

 

I have backed up my claims (on the strong atheism position) with links and references.

 

You have not backed up your claims by using links or references (except for NOgods.org which fell far short of supporting your claim/belief), so I have no way of verifying what you write.

 

If you wish to refute my claims or counter claims, point out coolly where you think I went wrong (or what you don't understand) and what kind of proof you base your own opinion on.

 

And remember, don't worry be happy. This is a learning process for everyone. If you (and others) have learned something, e.g., that strong atheists are not extremists with a faith-based attitude, then that is a good thing.

 

And if I have helped to clarify that point, and learned something in the process, then for me too it will have been a worthwhile endeavor. What more could someone ask for?

 

 

 

Thank you Hypography. ;)

 

 

 

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CC and C1ay - you are so busy with looking for proof either ways, I guess you missed my post 111. In it I prove conclusively that there is no God. Empirically so.

 

Empirical, scientific proof exist that God does not exist, because the Bible makes claims that interfere in the Scientific domain.

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Actually, I should have written: And the saga continues... Several atheists battling it out over questions of belief and faith within their own ranks. Round 4.

 

Yes I had seen your post Boerseun. But I hadn't taken it seriously until you wrote:

 

CC and C1ay - you are so busy with looking for proof either ways, I guess you missed my post 111. In it I prove conclusively that there is no God. Empirically so.

 

Empirical, scientific proof exist that God does not exist, because the Bible makes claims that interfere in the Scientific domain.

 

Well, C1ay and I were not really looking for proof either way. His point has been that there is a type of atheist that has belief and/or faith in his or her position (those who claim the statement "god exists is false") just as the theist has belief and/or faith in his or her position that god exists. My point has been that belief and faith are not involved.

 

Before looking at your 'proof' I would say, off hand, that proving conclusively that there is no god, empirically, would be quite difficult. I would simply say that there is no empirical proof that gods exist.

 

 

There is no such thing as "God", or, at least, the Abrahamic God with all the bells and whistles attributed to him. And I can prove it. There's no "agnostic" or "We don't know and can't know" pussyfooting about here:

 

Ok, you're talking about one specific definition of god. But that's fine, since the so-called strong atheists deny the existence of all gods. So I suppose what you write below can be extrapolated to all other gods. Would that be correct?

 

God is said to have been around in the time of Jesus. According to Islamic scripture, he was last seen around the time of Muhammed. Keep in mind that this is the same God, the God of Abraham.

 

Alright.

 

He has the following attributes:

1) He is omnipotent,

2) He is omniscient.

 

Don't forget (3) perfect benevolence. This third quality of god, when combined with the other two you mention, introduces an impossibility referred to as the problem of evil. Roughly, if an all-powerful and perfectly good god exists, then evil does not. But there is evil :) in the world... [Just take a look e.g., at those pedophile priests]... Therefore, a perfectly good god does not exist.

 

 

This raises an issue. Being Omnipotent, being all-powerful, implies having access to infinite energy. Having infinite energy implies being of infinite mass, seeing as energy and mass is one and the same thing. According to Einstein's famous equation, E=mc², the only way for E on the left to be infinite is for m on the right to be infinite - seeing as stays constant.

 

While I understand and agree with your conclusion I'm not sure being Omnipotent and all-powerful implies having access to infinite energy. Could you explain that part better? What does that implication follow from? What do you mean by "access to infinite energy"?

 

 

Thus, if God was last seen during Muhammed's tenure in the Arabian world, roughly 1400 years ago, he can't be further away from Earth than a sphere with a radius of 1400 light years. And being of infinite mass to supply him with infinite energy, if God exist he would be the biggest black hole in the history of the universe. If stories of modern miracles are true then God is still close by, and we sure would have known about it. A black hole of the size implied by God's attributes will be pretty hard to miss, especially if that "miracle" happened any time in the recent past.

 

I'm not sure what to respond to there, except that most claims about the existence of god state He is everywhere. Far beyond the 1400 sphere you mention.

 

 

So......... it should be pretty clear that God's existence should be pretty obvious to anybody with a telescope, or he simply doesn't have the attributes assigned to him by superstitious humans. Which would kinda remove the "omnipotence" required to create the entire universe from scratch. Which would make this particular God pretty useless, and not remotely similar to the God that billions of Christians, Muslims and Jews worship.

 

I agree that if god existed (or had existed) then It must have left it's finger prints somewhere, that could in principle be detected. But it could be argued that It existed prior to the creation of the universe, prior to the big bang (if that was indeed the beginning).

 

 

There's my proof. There are no black holes within 1400 light years of Earth. There's no God. None of this spineless "agnostic" pussyfooting, here.

 

Again, I agree with your conclusion, but I'm not sure it follows form your premise.

 

Maybe CraigD, an expert with logic and proofs :), could jump in here.

 

 

Where's Buffy (another expert with logic and proofs) when you need her? :hihi:

 

 

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CC and C1ay - you are so busy with looking for proof either ways, I guess you missed my post 111. In it I prove conclusively that there is no God. Empirically so.

 

No I'm not. I've said what I believe and that doesn't require any proof per se. I believe there are people who know there is no god and if those people exist that their belief without proof is one of faith, a well defined use of the word faith. I just happen to believe there are religious nuts at both ends of the theistic spectrum instead of restricting them to one end.

 

Faith is also a word that offends some people so much that they'll argue for eternity against it :hihi:

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Anyway Boerseun, whether your proof is viable or not takes nothing away from the idea that god is a scientific hypothesis. And as such should be testable accordingly with the scientific method, in principle.

 

That idea has of course been elaborated upon in the relevant literature. And to some extent in this thread: Here.

 

If the claim "god exists" is a meaningful proposition, it would require that whatever "god" is has some affect on the universe. Otherwise the term "exist" has no meaning. It would neither be productive or useful. But in order to say that god has an influence or repercussions on the universe, there must be measurable and testable phenomena which would best be explained by whatever this hypothesized god is.

 

It follows that if god exists, it should be testable via the scientific method. God would be a scientific hypothesis like any other.

 

A common objection to that argument that god is a scientific hypothesis, usually by theists, is the insistence on the claim that one's preferred god (however one decides to define god) cannot be disproven by science. This position relies on an erroneous understanding of the nature of science and the scientific method by which it operates. There is no defensible reason why science should not be able to test the hypothesis of whether god exists or not — just as science is able to test, for example, whether things like aether exist.

 

In his book God: The Failed Hypothesis — How Science Shows That God Does Not Exist, Victor J. Stenger argues against the existence of God on scientific grounds:

 

  • Hypothesize a God who plays an important role in the universe.
     
     
  • Assume that God has specific attributes that should provide objective evidence for his existence.
     
     
  • Look for such evidence with an open mind.
     
     
  • If such evidence is found, conclude that God may exist.
     
     
  • If such objective evidence is not found, conclude beyond a reasonable doubt that a God with these properties does not exist.

 

 

This is the method science would employ to disprove the existence of any alleged entity, force, or event. God is defined in such a way that the hypothesis is testable, at least in principle. Evidence in some form or another should be observed. If that evidence is not found, the hypothesis for the existence of god, as defined, is falsified. The modification limits the sort of evidence to that which can be predicted and tested via the scientific method. That is how a host of entities predicted to exist can be tested via the scientific method.

 

Though few things in science are proven (or disproven) beyond a shadow of a doubt (in the absolute sense). Most everything is provisional in science, pending further investigation and discoveries. But being provisional is an intelligent, pragmatic approach, since it cannot be discounted that evidence will not one day emerge in favor of any given hypothesis. Provisionality is thus by no means a weakness. It leaves open the inevitability that man will continually gain knowledge about the physical universe in which he lives (if not in which He lives :hihi:).

 

This inherent uncertainty is often used as "gap" through which theists attempt to insert their god(s). However, that is not a valid maneuver. Just as it would not be a valid maneuver to stick aether back into a gap despite the null result of the Michelson–Morley experiment.

 

This type of scientific investigation can benefit, in principle, theists as well as everyone else. It may be possible to find evidence that might require a form of supernatural hypothesis in order to better understand a particular phenomenon.

 

If evidence of the type described by Stenger were to be discovered, it could used to justify a belief in the existence of a god that possessed those predicted characteristics. It wouldn’t prove the existence of the god under consideration beyond all doubt, however, since according the scientific method the conclusion would still to be provisional (i.e., It too would be subject to the "gap").

 

 

But then the dilemma arises that it may be possible for the same to hold true for a wide variety of other hypothetical forces, entities or beings invented by the human mind. The sheer possibility of existence is one that could apply to all possible gods, not solely for god a particular theist happens to prefer. Furthermore, there is no reason why the god hypothesis shouldn't apply to Zeus or Odin, as it would to the Christian god.

 

But that's not all. It should apply also to the devil as it does to good gods (not to mention The Gingerbread Boy). So if our consideration is open to the possibility of one god, while ignoring every other ludicrous hypothesis, there is still no good reason to pick out any one god for favorable consideration. Source.

 

The question then becomes; how does one restrict the predictions of one god hypothesis in such a way as to determine which god or entity is real, when hitherto, and a priori, all definitions of god are equally superfluous?

 

 

 

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[snip] I just happen to believe there are religious nuts at both ends of the theistic spectrum instead of restricting them to one end.

 

 

Why restrict nuts to both ends of the spectrum? :hihi:

 

There are nuts throughout the entire 19 octaves of the spectrum. :)

 

Nuts are wavelength independent. :)

 

 

 

"even the hollowest nut wants to be cracked"

(Friedrich Nietzsche)

 

 

 

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Why God never got a PhD

 

1. He had only one major publication.

 

2. It was written in Aramaic, not in English.

 

3. It has no references.

 

4. It wasn't even published in a refereed journal.

 

5. There are serious doubts he wrote it himself.

 

6. It may be true that he created the world, but what has he done since then?

 

7. His cooperative efforts have been quite limited.

 

8. The Scientific community has had a hard time replicating his results.

 

9. He unlawfully performed not only Animal, but *Human* testing.

 

10. When one experiment went awry, he tried to cover it by drowning his subjects.

 

11. When subjects didn't behave as predicted, he deleted them from the sample.

 

12. He rarely came to class, just told his students to read the book.

 

13. Some say he had his son to teach the class.

 

14. He expelled his first two students for learning.

 

15. Although there were only 10 requirements, most of his students failed his tests.

 

16. His office hours were infrequent and usually held on a mountain top.

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