Questions for Atheists

nozzferrahhtoo · 29-11-2010 11:50am

sebastian4jc wrote: »

God is not the same as unicorns, I thought we had established this pages ago. The usual strawman tactics from the atheist side then. I'm not impressed at all.

You are attacking a strawman yourself by replying to something people are not saying.

What they ARE saying is that both god and unicorns have the same amount of evidence, arguments, data and reasons on offer at this time for them. That is: None.

Pointing out that they share this attribute at this time is not the same as saying they are "alike". My pencil and my car both have rubber in them... that does not mean i am saying cars are like pencils.

Zombrex · 29-11-2010 1:08pm

sebastian4jc wrote: »

it is trying to twist my words if you're trying to imply something like comfort when I said no such thing. I believe in God because it provides answers. Atheism (by your own admission) doesn't provide any. I'm all about getting the best answer to understand things. This atheism doesn't even provide any of those so why would you take up a position like that.... which doesn't even explain anything at all?

Because if you are being sensible you don't take up a position, you follow what ever position seems to be true or supported, not which ever one you want to take.

sebastian4jc wrote: »

Why you people so content just to live in ignorance, it astounds me really.

You say that as if there is an option, which again speaks to the difference between you an us.

You think you can just pick the answer you want and that this is some how a valid thing to do, the answer you wants becomes the answer. It doesn't work like that.

sebastian4jc wrote: »

Yes, that's what I'm doing. I think believing in God is the best position because it explains the most about reality.

So you don't care if it is true or not, just that explains the most things?

Of course the best answer is the true one, even if it explains nothing.

Stercus Accidit · 29-11-2010 1:13pm

One of the A&A regulars had a little quote in their sig which alway made me smile;

Who stole the cookies from the cookie jar?

I DON'T KNOW SO IT MUST BE GOD

A lot of the analogys in this thread are reminding me of that, with Seb4JC revealing the answers to our cookie conundrum at the top of his voice.

29-11-2010 1:28pm

Stercus Accidit wrote: »

One of the A&A regulars had a little quote in their sig which alway made me smile;

Who stole the cookies from the cookie jar?

I DON'T KNOW SO IT MUST BE GOD

A lot of the analogys in this thread are reminding me of that, with Seb4JC revealing the answers to our cookie conundrum at the top of his voice.

that's me o/

I got a bit bored of it and changed it

sebastian4jc · 29-11-2010 8:15pm

nightwick wrote:

Because if you are being sensible you don't take up a position, you follow what ever position seems to be true or supported, not which ever one you want to take.

Wait a second, if atheism I thought atheism doesn't make any claims about truth, so how can you say it's true then? And if you are making a claim of truth, then you will need to support it. It's that simple. So far people haven't done that.

As for the childish remarks pertaining cookies and storks, I don't see how that has anything to do with God. It's just a field of strawmen at this stage. The absurdity continues, first it was unicorns.
You need to realise that mentioning things like that does not disprove God. I'm sorry but you'll have to do better than that.

MagicMarker · 29-11-2010 8:24pm

sebastian4jc wrote: »

Wait a second, if atheism I thought atheism doesn't make any claims about truth, so how can you say it's true then? And if you are making a claim of truth, then you will need to support it. It's that simple. So far people haven't done that.

As for the childish remarks pertaining cookies and storks, I don't see how that has anything to do with God. It's just a field of strawmen at this stage. The absurdity continues, first it was unicorns.
You need to realise that mentioning things like that does not disprove God. I'm sorry but you'll have to do better than that.

There is no facepalm epic enough tbh.

I really can't see how even a neanderthal wouldn't grasp the very simple points people are making here, yet you dismiss them as if they mean nothing.

Can we close this thread please?

Delirium · 29-11-2010 8:38pm

sebastian4jc wrote: »

Wait a second, if atheism I thought atheism doesn't make any claims about truth, so how can you say it's true then? And if you are making a claim of truth, then you will need to support it. It's that simple. So far people haven't done that.

Thats not what Wicknight (not nightwick which you attributed the quote to for some reason) said. Re-read the quote, and pay attention to the word in bold.

Wicknight wrote: »

Because if you are being sensible you don't take up a position, you follow what ever position seems to be true or supported, not which ever one you want to take.

As for the childish remarks pertaining cookies and storks, I don't see how that has anything to do with God. It's just a field of strawmen at this stage.

How? It's an example of someone not having an understanding of biology and subsequently filling in the gaps with the story of storks delivering the newborn.

Much like some religious people who don't know how the universe came about and just put a story of deity that created it into the gaps of knowledge.

The absurdity continues, first it was unicorns.
You need to realise that mentioning things like that does not disprove God. I'm sorry but you'll have to do better than that.

You continue to miss the point regarding why people were mentioning unicorns.

If you don't believe in God, then there's really no difference between God and a unicorn. They're just two mythical creatures mentioned in a book.

Dades · 29-11-2010 10:22pm

sebastian4jc wrote: »

Wait a second, if atheism I thought atheism doesn't make any claims about truth, so how can you say it's true then? And if you are making a claim of truth, then you will need to support it. It's that simple. So far people haven't done that.

Atheism is a belief that your claims about religion aren't true. Your claims are the ones that haven't been backed up.

mikhail · 29-11-2010 11:29pm

sebastian4jc wrote: »

Wait a second, if atheism I thought atheism doesn't make any claims about truth, so how can you say it's true then? And if you are making a claim of truth, then you will need to support it. It's that simple. So far people haven't done that.

As for the childish remarks pertaining cookies and storks, I don't see how that has anything to do with God. It's just a field of strawmen at this stage. The absurdity continues, first it was unicorns.
You need to realise that mentioning things like that does not disprove God. I'm sorry but you'll have to do better than that.

How about this, then? Because if you can't give an honest answer to this, you really are trolling.

mikhail wrote: »

...Have you considered that there's no more evidence for Christianity than for Buddhism? Why do you think that is?

robindch · 30-11-2010 12:19am

sebastian4jc wrote: »

if atheism I thought atheism doesn't make any claims about truth, so how can you say it's true then? And if you are making a claim of truth, then you will need to support it. It's that simple.

Atheism does make truth-claims.

Specifically, it says that your religious beliefs are almost certainly false, and that it is up to you to provide some evidence that they are true. So far, neither you nor any other christian, has provided any evidence beyond hearsay, "personal revelation", kind-of-liking-the-sound-of-it etc.

The continued existence of this forum is predicated upon the fact that at some point -- however distant in the future -- you or one of your fellow believers may indeed provide such a convincing shred. I can assure you that in this case, we are the open-minded party.

Over to you.

nozzferrahhtoo · 30-11-2010 9:27am

sebastian4jc wrote: »

I thought atheism doesn't make any claims about truth, so how can you say it's true then?

It does make claims, just not the ones you wish to assign to it.

It, for example, makes the claim that YOUR claims that there is a god are thus far entirely unsubstantiated in every way.

The evidence that this claim is true is that you have not substantiated your claims thus far in any way.

QED.

sebastian4jc · 30-11-2010 10:45pm

MagicMarker wrote:

I really can't see how even a neanderthal wouldn't grasp the very simple points people are making here

Remarks like that are childish and only poison the discussion. Can people please refrain from personally attacking me? If people keep this up I will have no choice but to report posts. Thanks.

mikhail wrote:

How about this, then? Because if you can't give an honest answer to this, you really are trolling.

mikhail wrote:

...Have you considered that there's no more evidence for Christianity than for Buddhism? Why do you think that is?

I ignored that question because it has nothing to do with the discussion. The topic is 'questions for atheists' and you want to talk about Buddhism. People can be Atheist and Buddhist.

robindch wrote:

Atheism does make truth-claims. Specifically, it says that your religious beliefs are almost certainly false, and that it is up to you to provide some evidence that they are true.

Eh no it doesn't. It doesn't make any claims about religious beliefs beyond the existance of God.

MagicMarker · 30-11-2010 10:49pm

Are you capable of answering any question put forward to you?

robindch · 01-12-2010 1:22am

sebastian4jc wrote: »

[...] atheism doesn't make any claims about truth, so how can you say it's true then?

sebastian4jc wrote: »

robindch wrote:

Atheism does make truth-claims. Specifically, it says that your religious beliefs are almost certainly false [...]

It doesn't make any claims about religious beliefs beyond the existance of God.

Starter for ten: can you spot the important difference between your first post and the second?

:rolleyes:

Zillah · 01-12-2010 2:09am

God and unicorns are the same FYI. However silly you think unicorns sound, it's not even the tip of the iceberg of how we feel about your sky-daddy crap.

legspin · 01-12-2010 2:27am

Zillah wrote: »

God and unicorns are the same FYI. However silly you think unicorns sound, it's not even the tip of the iceberg of how we feel about your sky-daddy crap.

And at this point OP, nowt more really needs to be said. Until such time as your side provide hard, testable evidence, this the arguement in a nutshell.

Zombrex · 01-12-2010 11:36am

sebastian4jc wrote: »

Wait a second, if atheism I thought atheism doesn't make any claims about truth, so how can you say it's true then?

I don't know what that is referring to? Who said atheism isn't true?

sebastian4jc wrote: »

And if you are making a claim of truth, then you will need to support it

I can easily support my claims

sebastian4jc wrote: »

So far people haven't done that.

You didn't ask me to until now.

sebastian4jc wrote: »

As for the childish remarks pertaining cookies and storks, I don't see how that has anything to do with God. It's just a field of strawmen at this stage. The absurdity continues, first it was unicorns.

God, unicorns, storks, what is the difference. They are all simple yet imagined answers to more complex questions about nature. You tell children babies come from storks because you don't want to explain sexual reproduction to them. God is the equivilant for adults, and easy answer because the actual answer is far too complex and hurts the brain.

You said so yourself, you like "God did it" because it explains something in terms that are easy to understand. I imagine you wouldn't say that about M-theory.

sebastian4jc wrote: »

You need to realise that mentioning things like that does not disprove God.

You can't disprove God since God either doesn't exist or is invisible and untestable. In both instances the world looks like God isn't there, and as such there is nothing to test.

You can though look at humans, how humans a prone to imagining human-like agents in nature to provide easy to understand answers to various questions, and easily conclude that humans invented the concept of gods in order to explain things because they didn't know what was actually happening. This explains all human religion, not just Christianity.

sebastian4jc wrote: »

I'm sorry but you'll have to do better than that.

You don't strike me as someone who is open to challenging their faith. Perhaps I'm wrong. Can you explain what it would take for you to abandon faith in God?

Galvasean · 01-12-2010 11:42am

Wow this Sebastian guy is good (or bad depending on how you define it). I don't think I've ever seen Robin roll his eyes at someone! :eek:

robindch · 01-12-2010 11:48am

Galvasean wrote: »

I don't think I've ever seen Robin roll his eyes at someone! :eek:

It's only because boards doesn't have a facepalm smiley

Galvasean · 01-12-2010 11:56am

robindch wrote: »

It's only because boards doesn't have a facepalm smiley

kylith · 01-12-2010 1:25pm

sebastian4jc wrote: »

And it's just as I suspected. You people can't state any answers atheism provides. Belief in God provides answers to important questions. I'm going with the best explanation possible, which is providing answers that your atheism can't.

How lucky we are that most people don't think like that. If they did we'd all still be living in caves and dying of the most trivial diseases.

Where can we find shelter? God provides it
What causes disease? God does
What cures disease? God does
Where do babies come from? God makes them
What's on the other side of this ocean? If God wanted us to know he'd part it and lead us there.
Why is the ground shaking? It's a judgement from God

Saying 'God does it' is a viable answer just because we haven't worked it out yet is ridiculous. Centuaries ago it was disease and natural phenomina, now it's the origin of the universe, but saying 'God did it' is still nonsense.

ColmDawson · 01-12-2010 1:49pm

liamw · 01-12-2010 3:49pm

I think I might quit being an atheist. It's tiring

Knasher · 01-12-2010 6:42pm

sebastian4jc wrote: »

it is trying to twist my words if you're trying to imply something like comfort when I said no such thing. I believe in God because it provides answers. Atheism (by your own admission) doesn't provide any. I'm all about getting the best answer to understand things. This atheism doesn't even provide any of those so why would you take up a position like that.... which doesn't even explain anything at all? Why you people so content just to live in ignorance, it astounds me really.

Atheists generally believe that "god did it" is not an answer to why something happens because in that case you have to ask the questions how god did it and why he did it, to which the answer generally is "god is all powerful" and "you can't know the mind of god". To which I'd have to ask how is god all powerful? Religion doesn't provide a single answer, it just boils all the questions down to a single unanswerable question and expects you to accept that as a solution.

Atheists on the other hand generally take the approach that we don't know why something happened so perhaps we should try to find out. Thats not to say all of us do, a lot of us probably won't really care beyond general curiosity but some of us care enough to try and find a logical explanation that fits with what we know of the universe. Atheists are simply aware that they are living in ignorance and want to fix that, theists are the ones that are content with it.

sebastian4jc · 01-12-2010 8:40pm

robindch wrote: »

Starter for ten: can you spot the important difference between your first post and the second?

:rolleyes:

I don't see a problem here. The first one is phrased as a question. I'm still meeting atheists all the time who have different views. Atheism is not a position I hold and so I don't feel that it's my place to say what an atheist claims or doesn't claim.

I see some people are still trying to divert the discussion, with some childish drawing being the latest ploy. If your plan is to somehow try to annoy me or something like that know that I have found peace in the lord and that acting childish like that will not work.

liamw wrote:

I think I might quit being an atheist. It's tiring

Well my friend, maybe some of the points I've made have finally hit home, I don't know. Just know that God is always there for you ready to listen to you.

Wicknight wrote:

I don't know what that is referring to? Who said atheism isn't true?

Atheism can't be true if God exists, just the same as Theism can't be true if God doesn't exist. Both make claims of truth about the universe, there was a creator or there wasn't.

Wicknight wrote:

I can easily support my claims

Great, go right ahead. I'd like to see that please.

Wicknight wrote:

You didn't ask me to until now.

Well I guess that's totally my fault for not taking the time to address you personally, I didn't know you required special treatment to be explictly told to do so.

Wicknight wrote:

You can't disprove God since God either doesn't exist or is invisible and untestable. In both instances the world looks like God isn't there, and as such there is nothing to test. You can though look at humans, how humans a prone to imagining human-like agents in nature to provide easy to understand answers to various questions, and easily conclude that humans invented the concept of gods in order to explain things because they didn't know what was actually happening. This explains all human religion, not just Christianity.

How do you know God is untestable? By your reasoning we could go back in the past before microscopes and claim bacteria didn't exist.
Then your next argument (and some others have made similar ones as well) is that because humans make up things, therefore God is imagined. I don't follow that line reasoning at all.

Wicknight wrote:

You don't strike me as someone who is open to challenging their faith. Perhaps I'm wrong. Can you explain what it would take for you to abandon faith in God?

I think that's a very judgemental statement to make. However, to answer your question I think that if there was some reasonable complete explanation, as to how the universe got here that specifically ruled out the posibility of God being involved then I would be open to looking at the evidence for that.

MagicMarker · 01-12-2010 8:44pm

What would it take for you to believe in unicorns?

Knasher · 01-12-2010 9:04pm

sebastian4jc wrote: »

However, to answer your question I think that if there was some reasonable complete explanation, as to how the universe got here that specifically ruled out the posibility of God being involved then I would be open to looking at the evidence for that.

Ah okay, so you want proof, presumably using the laws of the universe as we have discovered them to refute the existence of an entity which you believe is in no way bound by the laws of that universe. Yep I'll get right on that then.

strobe · 01-12-2010 9:21pm

sebastian4jc wrote: »

I think that's a very judgemental statement to make. However, to answer your question I think that if there was some reasonable complete explanation, as to how the universe got here that specifically ruled out the posibility of God being involved then I would be open to looking at the evidence for that.

See this is the crux of the thing Sebastian. You say you would be willing to look at that evidence if we could present it, that is perfectly reasonable, but until we do and you are convinced by it, you are going to continue living your day to day life the way you have been. Until someone gives you evidence that convinces you the above is true you will work on the default presumption it is untrue.

Now take your attitude above and you will understand our attitude in regards to your god. We would all be willing to look at any evidence you have for your god if you can present it, but until you do and we are convinced by it, we are going to continue living our day to day lives as we have been. Until someone gives us evidence that convinces us your god is true we will work on the default presumption it is untrue.

This is what everyone has been trying to get across to you for the last 20 pages, but it just won't sink in.

Now looking at what you say in your quote above and what I have replied to you, do you see where we are coming from? Just apply your attitude towards a universe being created without god to the existence of god and you will be one of us. wiggle waggle wiggle waggle on of us one of us

Mark Hamill · 01-12-2010 11:25pm

Sebastian, I am going to use your logic and lets see what I get:

I am god. I created the universe. Unless you can prove that this isn't so, then it must be true.

Wow, your logic answers all kind of questions:rolleyes:

Zombrex · 02-12-2010 1:23am

sebastian4jc wrote: »

Atheism can't be true if God exists, just the same as Theism can't be true if God doesn't exist. Both make claims of truth about the universe, there was a creator or there wasn't.

Not if the Christian God exists. Atheism is a rejection of theist claims. If theists claim "We have spoken to God and he wants X, Y, Z" and atheists say "Yeah I don't believe you" then obviously if the theists are right the atheists are wrong.

It doesn't require that a creator of the universe doesn't exist, atheists are quite happy to say we don't know what if anything created the universe. We just believe you don't either.

sebastian4jc wrote: »

Great, go right ahead. I'd like to see that please.

Sure. Scientific studies of humans, including children, have shown that in times of stress and feeling of out of control we create the notion that supernatural agents exist in nature and are acting in our best interest. We view nature itself as some human like force. We do this because it is easier, mentally, to process the world around us in the terms we are familiar with, those being human to human interactions. A large amount of our brain is taken up dealing with human to human interactions and applying this to nature saves us the need to have other parts of the brain dedicated to processing non-human interactions.

So we imagine, quite naturally, human-like causes behind nature. Something happened because supernatural human-like agent X did it for human-like reason Y.

This is where religion comes from, not from actual interactions with supernatural gods, but imaginings of these supernatural beings as part of nature.

sebastian4jc wrote: »

Well I guess that's totally my fault for not taking the time to address you personally, I didn't know you required special treatment to be explictly told to do so.

I don't. I simply require that you don't complain I haven't done something that you haven't asked me to.

sebastian4jc wrote: »

How do you know God is untestable?

Because He is defined as omnipotent. You cannot test something that can be anything since each result is indistinguishable from any other result.

sebastian4jc wrote: »

By your reasoning we could go back in the past before microscopes and claim bacteria didn't exist.

Bacteria are not omnipotent. They can only be bacteria and act as bacteria. As such they can be tested because they will or won't confirm to a specific set of behavior.

sebastian4jc wrote: »

Then your next argument (and some others have made similar ones as well) is that because humans make up things, therefore God is imagined. I don't follow that line reasoning at all.

It isn't that complicated. Humans imagine gods in nature for various evolutionary reasons. In the last 15 years this process has become increasingly well understood. That explains all non-Abrahamic religions (ie religions with different gods).

For some reasons believers are happy with that when applied to other religions, but feel that while human may imagine other gods they don't believe they are imagining their god.

This seems rather stupid. If you are doing something everyone else does, and there is an explanation for what everyone else does, it is reasonable that the explanation also applies to you.

sebastian4jc wrote: »

I think that's a very judgemental statement to make.

Fair enough. I base it on your comments in this post. Perhaps if you feel it is a misrepresentation you should consider changing your aggressive posting style.

sebastian4jc wrote: »

However, to answer your question I think that if there was some reasonable complete explanation, as to how the universe got here that specifically ruled out the posibility of God being involved then I would be open to looking at the evidence for that.

Firstly such an explanation would no doubt simply cause believers to shift what God is responsible for. So instead of being responsible for the universe God simply becomes responsible for the thing that is responsible for the universe.

This is the history of the interactions between science and religion. Religion claimed that God created the Earth. We then found out that the Earth was created through the dust of an exploded star. So theists simply said "Ah but who was responsible for the Star". So God then becomes responsible for making the star. We then find out that the star came from the Big Bang. So theists simply said "Ah but who was responsible for the Big Bang". And so on. I have little doubt that if we find out what causes the Big Bang theists would simply say "Ah but who was responsible for the thing that causes the Big Bang"

Perhaps I'm wrong, and perhaps you think that is judgmental but I remain skeptical given ease which theists before you have simply moved God to what ever is not understood.

Secondly, why do you require an alternative explanation in order to not believe in God? Surely God is either a reasonable thing to believe in or it isn't. "God did it" isn't automatically true because scientists are being honest and saying we don't yet know what caused the Big Bang.

Even if scientists say "We don't know" that doesn't mean it was God. It means we don't know, and this should mean more to theists. If scientists cannot determine what caused the Big Bang what makes you think you are able to by just reading a holy book and imagining God exists?

Questions for Atheists

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