Atheists - prove it.

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Read any book by the "Four Horsemen of New Atheism"- Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, Sam Harris, or Christopher Hitchens. They all make Well thought-out, complex arguments of why there can be no god and why humanity would not want one.

Here's a random observation that I use in some of my arguments, It takes a woman 20 minutes to reach orgasm, it takes a man 2 minutes, that is pretty solid proof that there is no god.

It is irresponsible to effect such a shift in your beliefs in a handful of minutes. It is bad for you. Every atheist here who was raised to believe in something else became an atheist as a result of lengthy reflection and a gradual accumulation of various information about the living world. Some have done better than others.

For starters, I would recommend educating yourself on both the Islamic Golden Age and the Protestant Reformation. Consider the advent of Ash'ari shool of thought in Islam, and try to grasp why this movement might have taken hold. How does it resemble similar movements in the West? In what ways has it taken a different course, and why? And consider the Protestant Reformation and the subsequent Catholic Revival: what were the consequences of these two movements? Finally, juxtapose the fall of the Islamic Golden Age with the rise of the West, and spend long hours meditating and reflecting on one question: why?

Also, when you are going through the Gospels, read every part of the Bible that is ever referenced by Jesus. Thoroughly. If he references it again, go back and review. Consider whether you agree or disagree with Jesus' interpretations of different parts of Isaiah, Hosea and other books.

Furthermore, I advise that you learn how to find reliable, solid, scholarly articles on neuroscience, and learn how to read and understand them. This means that you should use resources such as NCBI and Web of Science, which you can access at your nearby university library.

Oh, but this isn't going to change your mind on atheism in a few moments. It won't change you over the course of a year. If you are wise, you will shape your beliefs and ideas and views in the same way that every other sensible, intelligent human being does, which is through thousands of quiet moments of meditation and introspection. Earn it the honest way. I can't guarantee that you will eventually agree with atheism, but it will serve to make you a better person.

But I cannot and will not change your mindset for you. Only you can do that.

Sir, I believed at the time that religion was being proposed to me as an easy answer that didn't require me to think, and I think that you would concur that, in light of what I was given to believe, a person of my sensibilities would find it to be a turn-off almost invariably.

Last edited by WilliamWDelaney on 08 May 2011, 6:57 am, edited 2 times in total.

LOL

Oh, God.

Hast not heard?

Dost not know?

Nonexistence does not prove.

All that is available is gripes, often personal, and statements of lack of evidence so far received.

Which have been posted a myriad times in all their clanging array.

I have to ask you - WHY?

Better you should ask kxmode - who is not as bad as some at heart - to tell us just one more time about the end times.

Besides what I said above, Kladky, here are the details of what is wrong with "traditional" Christianity (fundamentalism):



Does not apply to People Who Think Once in a While.

*sighs loudly

The burden of evidence is on the party postulating the existence of a thing, not those who disbelieve in it....

Atheism isn't an active disbelief in God (or it isn't necessarily such), but it is just a lack of belief. The former requires evidence, the latter does not.

It's up to the Religious to prove God, and then prove their God above other Gods. They ask for absolute disproof of God, but they never offer anything remotely like absolute proof of his existence. Double Standards.

Ryan, me lad, leave me out of the "they ask".

I am too old to ask someone to prove a nonexistence, too small-L libertarian to be motivated to try to prove an existence.

Happy to say - if asked - why I believe in ProtoIndoEuropean and explain what I think that is. Happy to listen to another explain why he feels UralAltaic is not a valid category, and what he proposed as an alternative. And similarly with other subjects including divine entities.

But I think we need to bear in mind there is some reason to doubt the bonafides and sincerity of the protoposter.

Sorry, sweeping statements and that . The position I described is a pretty common one around this forum, but I guess it isn't universally held.

The original post does have a ring of "oh, I really am trying to be atheist, but Jesus just won't led me!" to it.

Pas de probleme - I think we agree largely on this poster and on those who ask for proof of atheism with evident sincerity. It gets old faster than I do.

Ok, sure, I am going to focus on Christian theology as that seems to be your belief:

a) This world is not the sort of world that would be created by a good, all-powerful, and all-knowing being.

1) An omnipotent being can actualize any possible world.
2) A perfectly good being always chooses the best outcome from among its choices.
3) If the actual world were created by God, it would be the best of all possible worlds. (1 and 2)
4) This world is not the best of all possible worlds.
5) Therefore, God as defined, does not exist. (3 and 4)

b) The notion "God exists" is not necessary to explain the details of the world.

1) Occam's razor dictates that we ought to accept a simpler idea with less entities before one with more, all else equal
2) God not existing is simpler and has less entities than his existence, but does not add useful explanatory content.
3) Therefore, we ought not believe that God exists.

c) The trinity is not coherent.

Jesus is God, The Holy Spirit is God, and the Father is God. Jesus is not the Holy Spirit though. However, according to logic, that should be the case. After all, if A = B, and C = B, then A = C is valid.

d) Christ's death on the cross makes no ethical sense.

To state the Penal Substitution theory in clear terms: God incarnated himself so that he may take the punishment of mankind, thus fulfilling justice, and allowing mankind to have mercy/forgiveness

Problems though:
1) How can the wrongs of one person be paid for by another? This assumption stands against the basic ethical underpinnings of all of our laws, because I can't have my grandmother pay for my crimes, but rather I have to take the imprisonment.

2) If justice has to be fulfilled, and if the fulfillment of justice is all that is necessary for salvation, in what role do we see mercy or forgiveness? If mercy or forgiveness played a role, then wouldn't we see the lack of need for punishment? After all, if I have mercy on or forgive a person for their actions, I don't punish myself or really anybody. The entire slate is wiped clean. In fact, if we take the model given to us of forgiveness in Matt 18:27, that's exactly what happens.

e) The transformation of the church by the Holy Spirit seems not to have occurred.

If one looks into Christian theology, this is what is to be expected, however, if we look at the church, there is really not this great transformation. In fact, as one theologian wrote quite recently, "Though Jesus hoped the Church would be the proof that he’s for real, the Church today has become the best argument that he’s not!". Instead, the Christian church is comprised of doctrinal disputes, quacks, frauds, middle-class ambitions, failure to engage the truth, inquisitors, etc, instead of the transformed people he asked for, and claimed the Holy Spirit would build. Sure, there are good Christians, but other beliefs have good people as well, thus preventing what is sought.

f) God's character is cruel, even though a good being, particularly a being who IS love, wouldn't be such.

Throughout the Old Testament, God commits acts of genocide, orders his people to commit acts of genocide, threatens insane levels of cruelty (Deuteronomy 28: 16-68 is an overwhelmingly good example), acts in manner to maximize harm to others(such as hardening the heart of pharaoh), tries to kill people for relatively paltry reasons. Even in the New Testament it isn't clear that God is better, as now instead of just threatening earthly torment, he threatens ETERNAL torment, which by its nature is worse than earthly torment.

Note: This contradicts claims that God is good, particularly claims that he is loving. (Unless you think love is physical and emotional abuse)

g) Christianity cannot be reconciled with evolution.

Christianity, through Pauline theology, relies on original sin, an act by Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. Paul's treatment of this presupposes Adam's literal existence as he claims Christ is a second Adam. The issue is that evolution does not allow for a middle-eastern Adam to be the father of the human race, as our evolutionary history traces back to Africa not the middle-east, it would necessarily involve larger groups of people rather than just one person(some even believe that human beings have some descendence from Neanderthals, not just straight down the homo sapiens line), it provides a relatively complete explanation for sin, and so on. All of these are not really reconcilable with a faith in literal Adam, even though this is an NT theology, and one that has historically been maintained by the church.

h) Justified disbelief and the non-obviousness of God is not compatible with the existence of a Christian god.

As Paul states in Romans 1:18-23, all people know about God, as his existence is clearly perceived. The issue is that a clearly perceived God cannot be identified as "hidden", and justified disbelief cannot occur for a clearly perceived God. I have justified disbelief, and I know that I do not clearly perceive God. If my knowledge claim is valid, then Christianity is false. If the theistic arguments fail to prove a clearly perceived God, then a Christian God is false. If the claim that all atheists are suppressing their knowledge and/or are lying is taken as absurd, then Christianity must be false. As such, because I and others like me, who disbelieve in God based upon relatively compelling reasons exist, Christianity must be false.

Even further, if God desires the salvation of all mankind, he can and would do a better job of proving his existence. God is in scripture, not averse to the use of miracles. He even showed himself to doubting Thomas. However, God does not do this, despite his supposed desires. No real explanation for this exists and makes sense. As such, we have to consider this fact incompatible with a God who desires the salvation of all men, as he could do a better job in seeking this.

.....

Well, I think I am getting bored. If you want more arguments, I will happily provide them, as I have a number of others I could present but have not.

To me, part of the problem is that people who make the demand in the OP are not appreciating how much thought and consideration goes into forming a strongly atheistical point of view. They seem to think that atheism consists of the claims, "the universe started to exist on its own with a big bang," and "human emotion is a chemical reaction." They might also assume that "atheists only believe in what they can see" and that "atheists believe in science."

It reflects a poor understanding of how an atheist tends to think about the world in general. To understand the atheist, it is essential to understand the point that atheists, especially those with agnostic inclinations, do not tend to like having to settle on a final conclusion on any topic whatsoever. They find it binding, cumbersome and uncomfortable on one hand, reckless and irresponsible on the other.

As far as I can understand, not intending to speak for everybody although I may seem to, the atheistical mind sees the realm of uncertainty as a realm of cool, tranquil waters, and any conclusive statement about the universe constitutes one of a hundred million sand dunes that could be washed away at any moment. Telling us to "have faith" is like telling us to stand on one of those sand dunes and cut up the canoe for firewood.

We take comfort in a cosmos that has an underlying order that can be understood, although imperfectly, using the rough, primitive tools of systematic discovery. To the atheist, the underlying mathematical rationality behind the universe they can see is the equivalent of God. They have faith that somehow there is a logical explanation for something they can't understand, and the difference is only that they do not always have sufficient information or analytical tools to properly understand it.

The rational universe, where all things tend to calmly flow down the orderly and lawful rails of physics and logical sucession, is something firm and solid that we can anchor ourselves to. We don't always know exactly what those rules are, but they are a constant in a world where so little is truly constant.

And furthermore, it is something that cannot betray us.

The atheist is comfortable with a lifespan that is finite and ends in oblivion because mortality is really not all that scary to an atheist. We have a sense of confidence that the natural universe will continue to glide smoothly along its rails without us having to be there. We realize that our natural fear of obvlivion is an animal reflex, and it is not really all that scary once we have come to grips with this fact. It does not perfectly reflect our wants, but we realize and accept that the universe as a whole is a much larger thing than our wants.

By the same token, an atheist can face a crappy mood by realizing that "being out of sorts" is something that can be explained by imbalances in our brain chemistry that can sometimes be manipulated through dietary changes, exercise, changes in the lighting, or, if we run out of other alternatives, following advice from a trained clinical psychotherapist that is itself based on a logical, rationally ordered concept of how the human mind works. One way or another, there are systematic approaches we can take to dealing with our problem.

When evangelists make the claim, "the Bible offers all of that and more as long as you have faith that it's the only explanation for anything you will ever need," it is like they are telling us, "you can get all the answers you need from this simple book, but you have to burn down the whole library to get anything out of it." Naturally, the atheist's simple answer is, "you are out of your frikking mind." If you haven't been an atheist for very long, you haven't learned to rely on the other books, so burning down the library doesn't seem like such a big deal. If you have been one for a decade, it sounds suicidal.

Now, does that make any sense? Any of it?

Last edited by WilliamWDelaney on 08 May 2011, 10:49 am, edited 1 time in total.

Does this include angostic atheists or only those who are firmly rooted on the fence?

The thing about science is that it works whether or not you believe in it.

I'm really confused by this assertion that since science can only currently explain 1% of reality, we're better off believing that it's magic or something?

What's that about?

I've made a brief study of the japanese language but the only words i understand are "domo arigato," "kawaii," "desu ka," "gomenasai," "neko," and "sayanora". I'm quite sure that if i attempted to use any of these words to communicate with a person from japan, their reaction would be some mix of frustration and amusement.

Should i just pray about it instead?

Question: How could any of us here with finite minds ever assure an accurate conclusion being drawn there?

In any case, just adding "sovereign" along with "good, all-powerful, and all-knowing" characteristics would reveal said being's right to decide the matter all by itself.

Arguments yes. Proofs no.

Find 9 other men?

blauSamstag:

Thou has said:
The thing about science is that it works whether or not you believe in it.

Philologos, even I, say:
Close reading of science and its history says that is not prezackly and consistently true - though a lot of scientific instruments' performance is user neutral.

The thing about God is, he works whether or not you believe in him.