JubalsCall

How does it support the atheist position?

Also what methods can we use to come to the conculsion of if their is a god(s) or not?

Tibbs

TxGLX

I think that Asha'Man covered part of my reason... I studied greek mythology in school, and was humored by the story of Persophone, and how we ended up with winter...

Then, I read the histories of Europe, and was floored by the antics of the religious types (can you say, Serfs?)...

That pretty much did it for me. If 'GOD', following the christian definition that I was raised with, were actually omnipotent, and omniscient, and loved me more than anything, he would have stopped by sometime and at least given me a report card... If my high-school teachers could take the time out for it (and they were constrained by time as well) you would think he could at least send me a post card...

DarkBronzePlant

Quite simply, if it is agreed that people have a need for some supernatural explanation to everything, or a need for some higher being, then it explains most people's willingness to believe in a god as basically a crutch, or because it suits them to do so, not because there is any compelling evidence that any such being exists.
Oh, I didn't mean to suggest that we could research and come to a conclusion as to the existence of a god. I meant that we could probably determine whether people are born "knowing" about god, or whether they need to be taught. Examples: study children who grow up from birth in a controlled environment, where they are not informed about any gods, and then when they are old enough to articulate thoughts, ask them to explain "god." Or, probably better, study civilizations that do not know a thing about western religions, and ask the people there to explain god. Something like that.

pegasus_atheist

Yep... The burden of proof is on the person that makes the positive assertion, for example, "eating paper will supplement your dietary fiber intake". Of course any sane person would look at me as if I am out of my mind and would ask me to show a scientific study proving that this is the case. Now, if I told them that no, they need to prove me that eating paper will not supplement the dietary fiber intake and that unless they prove me otherwise I am going to eat paper because it's good for me and not only that, but I tell them that they need to follow my footsteps or I will cram the paper down their throats "for their own good" what do you think those people would do? Would you say I would be reasonable in asserting that they need to prove that eating paper is not good for you?


Tere is no evidence to suggest that god(s) effect the whole world. People (those that believe and those that don't) effect the whole world. Concepts effect the whole world. There is no evidence that god(s) even exist, let alone them effecting the world.

I will say... "so, you're God? If you're God then you by definition know everything, why do you need to ask why I don't believe in you? You should know why I don't believe in you. So by asking me that question you're pretty much telling me that you're not God, but a wannabe".

Is it so obvious? Quite honestly the existence or nonexistence of God is not so obvious to me. However, what's obvious to me is that most of the assertions in holy texts makes no sense whatsoever. It is obvious to me that the more we know about nature, the less there is a need for the "God" explanation. What is obvious to me is that most believers are pretty much brainwashed from young age into believing the invisible and the imaginary.

Lobstrosity

Tibbs, I'm not sure you understand the second law of thermodynamics well enough to use it as an argument against the Big Bang. It's not anywhere near as simple as nebulously mandating that "order" goes to "chaos." There are actual ways of mathematically quantifying "order" and "chaos" that don't always agree with the typical linguistic connotations of the words. The total entropy of the universe has always increased. There was never a time when universal chaos went to universal order in the mathematical, thermodynamical sense.

Lobstrosity

Well, off the top of my head, I'd venture to say the Casimir Effect and Sonoluminescence.

This doesn't mean we will by default rely upon supernatural explanations until we find something more concrete. We start off with the assumption of "hey, that's weird, I wonder why that happens?" They we progress to testing and mathematical analysis to quantify what's going on. They you look at established theoretical frameworks that might allow for such things. All assumptions are based on specific, reliable, repeatable evidence. Anything that's not is labeled a "hypothesis." Christianity falls under the "hypothesis" category.

Jobar

Zanthor, I moved your post to a thread of its own, in our ~Elsewhere~ forum. You need to be more focused on the subject; if you want to expound on lots of things that is OK, but in the interests of brevity and ease of understanding, break your expositions up into smaller ideas. It makes it easier for people to reply to you. Jobar, moderator.

pegasus_atheist

Further reading on thermodynamics

How Creationists Misuse Thermodynamics

I felt this was a good explanation of the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics.

Cheers!
George

Vespertine

At first, I had a hard time coming up with ideas that would show me that there isn't a god. Now when I think about 'god' and what not, I just think of how silly the notion is and how could I have ever even considered it.

Ganymede

Because when you examine the concept of a god from a purely rational standpoint, it makes no sense.