Finally come to grips that atheism is just another form of religion then?

Faith in science does not require elaborate effort to maintain.

I would have to disagree with that, as the very foundation of experimental consistency seems to imply you must continuously go threw an elaborate effort that never ends to maintain it, while belief in theism only takes one concrete reason to beleive their is a God. Fortunately the singularity that created the universe seems to provide such a concrete reason to those who are open minded. Or rather those who choose to be. 

If I could believe just anything I wanted to, then I would lose confidence in all my beliefs.

And just how does that follow? If you are conceding that in the end it's more a matter of choice (an admittance that evidence and truth isn't the driving factor in your analysis), then that seems an admittance that you can indeed believe what ever you want even if it isn't true. Yet you simultaneously maintain your faith in science. Seems the only way to avoid being contradicting would be to renounce that as well, but I doubt you will.

Finally come to grips that atheism is just another form of religion then?

That would contradict my point that faith in science if fundamentally different from faith in God because of the testability issue. 

Faith in science does not require elaborate effort to maintain.

I would have to disagree with that, as the very foundation of experimental consistency seems to imply you must continuously go threw an elaborate effort that never ends to maintain it, while belief in theism only takes one concrete reason to beleive their is a God. Fortunately the singularity that created the universe seems to provide such a concrete reason to those who are open minded. Or rather those who choose to be. 

First of all, you consistently misspell the preposition 'through' as if it were the past tense of the verb 'throw'.  Sorry, but somebody needed to tell you.  Might as well be somebody you're already sore at. 

The point about faith in science is that I don't need to verify every scientific claim in order to believe the claims of scientists.  It is the knowledge that all such claims are provisional--subject to repeatable verification--that gives me confidence in their authority.  Faith in God is different.  It requires elaborate rituals that are designed to suppress doubt.  That is why scientists don't constantly need to exhort themselves and their colleagues to "keep the faith" in science.  Belief rests on another foundation: verifiability.

If I could believe just anything I wanted to, then I would lose confidence in all my beliefs.

And just how does that follow? If you are conceding that in the end it's more a matter of choice (an admittance that evidence and truth isn't the driving factor in your analysis), then that seems an admittance that you can indeed believe what ever you want even if it isn't true. Yet you simultaneously maintain your faith in science. Seems the only way to avoid being contradicting would be to renounce that as well, but I doubt you will.

I suggest that you reread the post and pay closer attention to the parts that distinguish belief in science from belief in God.  I choose not to believe in God for the same reason that I choose not to believe I'm a billionaire.  I am unwilling to suppress the counterevidence in my experience of the world.  The cost of doing so would be too high.

One thing I didn't talk a lot about in the OP was the true cost of maintaining religious faith.  It is possible to brainwash oneself into believing just about anything, and the brainwashing techniques can be easily observed in the community of any religious faith--if you choose not to ignore their existence.

Quote from: End Bringer on September 10, 2008, 02:09:08 PM

Finally come to grips that atheism is just another form of religion then?

That would contradict my point that faith in science if fundamentally different from faith in God because of the testability issue. 

Not really. As for one thing I seem to recall a thread where you were totally thrashed on the issue of testibality of religion. Being forced to change your position from there was none at all to narrowing your assertion that religion itself doesn't provide one, and you were proven wrong on all points. For the second thing that would just infer that yours is a fundamentally different kind of religion. Which is rather self-evident.

First of all, you consistently misspell the preposition 'through' as if it were the past tense of the verb 'throw'.  Sorry, but somebody needed to tell you.  Might as well be somebody you're already sore at. 

Sore? But your quibbling always put's a smirk to my face.

The point about faith in science is that I don't need to verify every scientific claim in order to believe the claims of scientists.  It is the knowledge that all such claims are provisional--subject to repeatable verification--that gives me confidence in their authority.

Which is kind of the point I made. You have to go threw an "eloborate ritual" (the scientific method) of experimentation of constant repeatable verification to reconfirm those scientist's claims. Or what? Do you just take any guy in a lab coat's word for it (as long as they don't question evolution)? That would seem an inherently naive position for a so called skeptic.

Faith in God is different.  It requires elaborate rituals that are designed to suppress doubt.  That is why scientists don't constantly need to exhort themselves and their colleagues to "keep the faith" in science. Belief rests on another foundation: verifiability.

The snide comments that shows you aren't listening aside, I see you make a classical self-defeating statement. How do you verify that belief rest's on verification? It seems to fail under it's own standard. No, a wise person rest's his belief on truth and facts. Not odds, or benefits, or verifiability. You certainly don't have any verifiability when you talk about Noah's Flood being plagarized off Summarians, nor in your Christ myth arguements. You quite clearly base your belief on probability in those situations. What does that say about your analysis then?

I suggest that you reread the post and pay closer attention to the parts that distinguish belief in science from belief in God. I choose not to believe in God for the same reason that I choose not to believe I'm a billionaire.  I am unwilling to suppress the counterevidence in my experience of the world.  The cost of doing so would be too high.

No, you already made the admittance: "Finally, I believe that there are no gods, but I certainly don't have any way to prove that negative claim." which is an admittance to not knowing for a fact, while being a billionare you can know for a fact. Either you're being contradicting to claiming there's counterevidence and yet no way to prove it at the same time, or you're post's coming off as an 'inner struggle to resolve a dilemma' is shown to be nothing but a patronizing act  to sell your a priori assertion. Which is it?

One thing I didn't talk a lot about in the OP was the true cost of maintaining religious faith.  It is possible to brainwash oneself into believing just about anything, and the brainwashing techniques can be easily observed in the community of any religious faith--if you choose not to ignore their existence.

The fact that people have an endless capacity to fool one's self seems to be simply a general human quality, and thus is as naive and stupid a position as "Religion is the cause of all violence." And seems to ignore those who are brainwashed in the community where the 'preists' wear lab coats.  

Okay, I just can

Christians tend to think of atheists as people who are making a knowledge claim rather than a belief claim. 

Belief claims stem from knowledge claims.  That is why your billionaire comparison so utterly fails.  You cannot genuinely believe something when you have the knowledge that it isn

But you do not know that you are not a billionaire in an absolute sense.  You might well be suffering a delusion that you are not.  So you are hasty in denying that what you take for "knowledge" can be a delusion.

In which case your arguement must be disregarded out of hand for undermining our own epistimology. As often noted the possibility this is all a dream is a logical possibility. However we infer that it isn't, and go about our daily lives as such.

As for the OP, I never said that I could not prove God's non-existence to my satisfaction.  I merely claimed not to be able to prove it in an "absolute" sense.  All empirical claims are subject to falsification, including those that gods exist.

I see you're shifting around your arguement as always whenever you're backed into a corner Cop. You quite clearly say:

Finally, I believe that there are no gods, but I certainly don't have any way to prove that negative claim.

No mention of "to your satisfaction" (as if reality revolved around your preferences, which seems to be a counter attitude to the prevailing theme of your OP). You quite clearly say "don't have any way" meaning not only in an "absolute" sense, but in any sense whatsoever. Admittedly this would be nothing new to those of us who have noted that atheists (especially positive ones) start out with the presumption and go from there. Nor have Christian's ever claimed the exsistence of God is in fact an empiracle claim as a transcended God is by definition outside the empiracle. Your arguement may have more weight with the ancient Greeks and Egyptians, but if you can't meet Christianity's terms your arguement is useless.

Quote from: End Bringer on September 13, 2008, 02:32:43 PM

In which case your arguement must be disregarded out of hand for undermining our own epistimology. As often noted the possibility this is all a dream is a logical possibility. However we infer that it isn't, and go about our daily lives as such.

Exactly so.  That is because we lack good reasons to take such possibilities seriously.  I lack any good reason to take belief in God seriously.

Yet oppositely lack any proof to dismiss God's exsistence. And I would say given how much you make arguements against God's exsistence that you do indeed have good reason. Ultimately you just choose not to believe.

You and Liz think you have good reasons to license that belief, but I have never heard either of you provide them.

That's a flat out lie for the same reason of constant arguement as above. I have numerously gone threw with you the singularity that created time, space, matter, and all those precious naturalistic rules with you, so saying you've never heard at least my reasoning is ridiculous.

I have written at length on the reasons why I think gods do not exist.

You want to live as if you were a billionare. That's what your reasoning amounts to. I can grant that you have reason to doubt God's exsistence, but that option is closed to you as being a positive atheist you make diffinitive claims.

I'll give you the same answer I gave Liz.  In context, it is clear that I was talking about absolute proof.  All of the other sentences in the paragraph it was taken from back up my answer.

Then if Liz did't point it out I will:

I am no longer satisfied with that first instinct.  Belief is more complex than just having evidence to back up beliefs.  The fact is that most of our beliefs are acts of faith.  I believe that there is no atmosphere on the moon, but I have never been to the moon to check that out.  I believe in the existence of molecules and that water molecules consist of two hydrogen atoms and an oxygen atom, but I do not have never seen, heard, or touched a molecule.  It is easy to see that people lose consciousness with brain trauma, so I believe that they lose it permanently when the brain dies.  I have no proof of that, however.  Finally, I believe that there are no gods, but I certainly don't have any way to prove that negative claim.

I look in vain for the words "absolute proof". All you mention in this is what you believe while lacking a personal empirical experience (though technically you always see, hear, and touch a molecule or in fact millions of them if you want to get picky). As I don't believe the claim that the only things we can absolutely know are threw empirically experiencing them was made (as it's a self-defeating arguement), then this paragraph loses a lot of your implication for it.

Truth be told it actually strengthens the position that we can know God exsists without empirical experience.
 

I really wish that you would use the spell checker.  It would not improve the logic of your argument, but it would make it easier for me to process what you are trying to say.

You should be wondering if I don't intentoinaly leave it in disarray simply to give your linguistical skills a metaphorical noogie.

 

Any argument that makes reference to miracles is empirical (note spelling), because miracles are physical events.  To the extent that a god manifests itself in our reality, it is subject to empirical investigation.

Sure, but that would be the claim of miracles. The occurance of miracles is an impiracle claim, but that this leads to proof of God is an inferrence. God's exsistence is a different matter as that is the core of what you are argueing. Miracles are a side issue that helps provide proof, but the matter does not rest on it.

I agree that a street person who is actually a billionaire is delusional.  That is generally why people like that are on prescription drugs.  However, that is an unusual situation.  Of course, there is also the possibility that someone has a long lost uncle that left them a fortune but they are unaware of it.  That is not delusional because the heir is unaware of the existence of the fortune.  Genuine delusion must have the indisputable evidence to the contrary component and is a sign of a mental illness...

False on both counts.  You have no indisputable evidence to the contrary that there is a china teapot orbiting the sun.  Nevertheless, assuming you are not deluded on this subject, you do not believe that one is orbiting the sun.  And delusions are not necessarily a sign of mental illness.  I don't know about you, but I think that those who fervently believe that Vishnu is the supreme ruler of the universe are deluded.  Any obsessive, strongly held belief for which there is no reasonable evidence can be considered a delusion, even if it happens to be true by accident.  This is not about mental illness, but the obsessive character of the belief.

...Both you and Dawkins seem to not have a problem with stating that 80% of the world$(Bs (Bpopulation has a mental illness because they believe in God.  So, when did you personally interview every person in the world to determine whether they possess indisputable evidence to the contrary???  That hints of supernatural powers.  Pretty impressive for an atheist.  Now, would you like to rethink whether that is condescending or not?

Sorry, but you are wrong about both me and Dawkins.  He was quite explicit about it in his book.  He does not believe that religion is a literal mental illness.  Others have construed his words to refer to a mental illness, and there is such a thing as an "encapsulated delusion" from a medical perspective.  But religious belief is quite normal and pervasive in human society.  It serves the interests of those who hate Dawkins' message to twist it around to something that they can attack more easily.

Can you please stop using the word $(Cde(Blusion$(D a(Blready?  How about $(Cmi(Bsinformed$(D i(Bnstead?  In case you haven$(Bt (Bfigured it out, I do take offense to that particular word.  You are not the first one to use it on me and it triggers some not so nice memories.  If we can$(Bt (Bbase this discussion upon mutual respect, there$(Bs (Bno point in continuing it.  I may disagree with your interpretations, but I do have respect for your ability to come to those interpretations.  I would appreciate the same courtesy.

I'm sorry that you take my use of the word as an insult.  It was genuinely not intended as such, but I understand your feelings.  I have been called delusional for rejecting belief in God, and I certainly do not take people to be claiming that I am mentally ill.  They are claiming that my belief in the nonexistence of God is unreasonable.  Perhaps you do not consider people with a strong belief in fairies and demons to be delusional, but I do.  I do not consider them stupid or mentally ill or even necessarily ignorant.  I will try to remember not to use that word with you, but I do not concede your argument that a delusion is necessarily a pathological condition.

I understand exactly what you are saying which is why I ended my post by pointing out that you may get new information next week that converts you.

I may, but I seriously doubt it.  Similarly, you may get evidence that Vishnu is the supreme deity.  Should that remote possibility shake your faith in Christianity?

Even your bachelor example falls short.  Some married men claim to be bachelors all the time.  I wonder $(H d(Boes this make them delusional or just liars looking to get lucky?   

I would go for the latter.  My example, of course, was not about what people claim.  It was about what the word 'bachelor' means. 

I believe that we have both done that and arrived at different conclusions regarding the existence of gods.  You choose to believe in God, so you engage in all of the mental routines that are necessary to sustain the belief.  I do not, so I don't need to expend the effort.  I am more than willing to hear opinions on why I should.

Oh, for Pete$(Bs (Bsake, Cop.  I was offering a bipartisan hand of compassion to you expressing understanding and all you can do is bite it.

Perhaps we are talking past each other, then.  My statement is in line with the OP.  You described hard choices and sacrifices that you feel your belief forces you to make.  That is part of my point.  Maintaining such faith is costly.  There must be something in your mind that makes it worth the trouble of maintaining it.

You had a crisis of faith, but you never really gave up belief in gods or the mythology surrounding Christianity, so I would not characterize that period as "atheism".  I do think, however, that lots of believers confuse such crises with belief that gods do not exist, which is what atheism is.  Feeling doubt about the existence of God is not quite the same as being pretty sure that gods do not exist.

I am disappointed.  You are making (false) assumptions about what went through my little pea brain.  Let$(Bs (Bmake one thing clear here, Cop.  You aren$(Bt (Ba mind reader.  Unless you have a very specific reason to know what I believed at that point in time this is nothing more than playing $(CWe(Bll, she couldn$(Bt (Bhave genuinely been an atheist because she went back to faith.$(D  (BIsn$(Bt (Bthat some kind of logical error?

Sorry, but we had a discussion about this at the time that you were representing yourself as an atheist.  You said things about Christ and religion that made it clear to some of us that you were not the atheist you felt yourself to be, but someone with profound doubts about her religious beliefs.  I may have misunderstood you, but I base my opinion on my recollection of those discussions.

I think that you make a big mistake in assuming that you have somehow thought through your ideas better than either Dobson or Dawkins, both of whom have devoted much of their much longer lives to thinking about religion.

So?  Isn$(Bt (Bthat an argument from authority?  I mean, just because they thought about it for longer doesn$(Bt (Bmean their thinking is automatically right.  It doesn$(Bt (Bmean it$(Bs (Bwrong either.  I am not impressed by fancy credentials.  I have dissected one too many books written by authorities and found them intellectually lacking and illogical...

That was not an argument from authority.  I was not claiming that your beliefs were wrong because they conflicted with either Dawkins' or Dobson's.  I was merely pointing out that it was presumptuous on your part to think that you had thought through your ideas more thoroughly than they had, especially since neither man is particularly stupid and both had been thinking about religion for longer than you have.

...I have come to is a point where I believe in Jesus for two compelling reasons.  I am convinced of the accuracy of the historical evidence...

I know of no compelling historical evidence that Jesus existed, but that is probably because I do not weigh the "evidence" in the same way that you do.  All of the evidence strikes me as hearsay, and quite a bit of it has been shown to be unreliable (e.g. passages from Josephus and Tacitus).  But that is an argument that has been taken up in other threads here, and there is considerable difference of opinion.

...and I have had too many up close and personal encounters to discount.  Please don$(Bt (Btake this the wrong way.  If I believed that you were actually interesting in hearing what those encounters are with respect, I would happily share them but I am not willing to parade such things for ridicule. It would be like subjecting my marriage to ridicule.  Both are deeply intimate and incredibly personal and deserve to be treated with respect.  Besides, my personal experience is not objective enough to count as evidence for anyone else except me.

You are correct on that last point.  Personal experiences can involve misinterpretation, and they certainly are not reasonable evidence for other people.  I do not encourage you to say things that you are sensitive about, because I fear that you are predisposed to misinterpret my reactions as disrespectful when they are not intended to be.  I'm not going to tell you that your belief in Jesus is unjustified in your own mind.  Clearly, it is justified.  From my perspective, however, it is completely unfounded and unjustified.  You have not presented me with any good reason to believe it justified.

...What I find so depressing about Christianity at times is the doctrine that humans are inherently bad or sinful.  That kind of attitude tends to justify contempt for others.

Only when applied in the wrong way.  $(CLe(Bt him who is without sin cast the first stone.$(D  (BI have actually found that attitude very liberating...

Unfortunately, Christians have found ways of casting that first stone many times throughout history, and the idea that we are all sinners in need of redemption has driven hatred for those who have rejected the Christian prescription for redemption.  You can quote passages from the Bible to support and contradict just about any form of behavior, and I tend to prefer quotes that support your attitude rather than the nastier ones.  (For example, Christians who feel a need to support righteous violence often cite Christ's behavior with moneylenders in the Temple.)

Comfortable should not have anything to do with what we believe.  That is belief based upon self and is one of the greatest hindrances to the growth of the human race.  That type of belief is what kept us flat earthers for how long?  It reminds me of my old AA sponsor years ago who told me to make a list of the attributes I thought God should have and that was who He was.  Even then, I realized that made Him nothing more than a figment of my imagination.  Wholly inadequate.  One of my core beliefs is that there is an ultimate reality which is greater than my flawed perception.  It is not reality that needs to be adjusted, but my perspective of it.  I am not willing to get so harsh as to call it $(Cde(Blusional$(D b(But rather being human.  I don$(Bt (Bhave to like reality or agree with it but reality is the Master and I am the servant.  My quest is to peel away my prejudices and interpretations to get to that ultimate reality.  Is it an impossible task?  Probably but I am not comfortable with the status quo.  It is the lies we believe that keep us in bondage.

And the idea of being in bondage makes you feel uncomfortable.  Look, we are emotional beings.  When I talk about believing in what makes one feel comfortable, that does not mean I endorse wishful thinking, although you have clearly interpreted what I said that way.  You felt very uncomfortable with the idea that Jesus was nothing more than a figment of your imagination, didn't you?  You feel uncomfortable about believing things that are not true.  That was the kind of comfort and discomfort I was talking about.  It is just that some truths may make one less comfortable than others.  Suffering is more bearable when one believes that it will serve a higher purpose in the long run.

We are all full of doubts and contradictions, so we end up placing our faith (or perhaps a better word would be "trust") in certain sources of information that are quite often inaccurate.  I am certainly less skeptical about what a scientist says about the nature of reality than what a priest says.  For many people, it is the exact opposite.  We have different zones of comfort on that score.

I am equally skeptical about both as both are deferring to authority.

You may think that you are, but I do not.  Most of what we believe is based on trust in authorities and sources of knowledge.  That kind of trust is fundamental to our survival as a species.  The trick is to choose reliable authorities, and science is reliable precisely because has a clear method of vetting its claims.  Religion establishes itself as an authority by blocking out other authorities, not by showing itself to be a more reliable source of knowledge.  If you had to prove everything an authoritative source told you, then you would not get far in life.  You would learn too slowly.

Do you not reject the belief in other gods?  What compelling proof do you have that they don't exist?  In fact, you share my view that the vast majority of gods that humans have believed in were delusions, do you not?

No, I do not.  They have a different interpretation of the facts of reality set before them $(H o(Br do not have the same facts that I have.  But I do not believe that they have either invented facts or denied facts.

Not everyone arrives at their beliefs by rational means.  Belief based on authority is ultimately irrational, yet our lives would be impossible if we did not trust in authoritative sources of belief.  The question that fascinates me is why people buy into such wildly divergent religious beliefs and cling to them at extreme cost to their own apparent well-being.  Trust in scientific authority is understandable, since it is always subject to clear verification.  It is provisional belief in that one can easily replace it when it fails.  Religious belief is of another kind.  People cannot as easily overturn religious convictions as they can other convictions.