Selsaral

Your purpose is noble and you definitely have class. Your point about Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny was also clever and amusing...no wonder people cannot prove or disprove Santa...we ARE Santa (Now I have a great way to justify my pot belly too, as we approach xmas Santa gains a bit more control of me).

Another point I have been thinking about is the science versus religion thing. I don't think they are at odds, and I don't think the atheistic viewpoint is necessarily a scientific one. (I will however agree that it's suspicious many athiests are scientists). I know you didn't explicitly state this either, but I inferred a sense of this in a couple of your statements. From my personal viewpoint, none of my primary justifications for atheism spring from the ability of science to debunk specific religious claims, or its ability to provide a simpler answer. I don't dismiss spirits or god because science has yet to quantifiably determine their existence, in the same way it has explained basic physics for instance, or because of a lack of scientific evidence about the supernatural. Instead I dismiss the supernatural because it is clear that it is human nature to believe in all sorts of frankly ridiculous things. The vast majority of humans are religious, and many of the religions are radically different. I would also lump big foot, Nessy, aliens, Scientology etc into this group. Humans have a long and distinguished history of believing in all sorts of crazy stuff, which many people scoff at, yet persistently believe 100% in their own crazy stuff.

Jayhawker Soule

Thanks - both for the kind words, and for the clarity and honesty of the response.

You'll soon find that many here do not accept the idea of Received Text, and that is true whether you're talking about the Tanach, the Bible, or the The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language. Specifically, you'll discover that many (if not most) acknowledge two distinct definitions of atheism: (1) the absence of a belief in God(s), and (2) the belief in the absence of God(s).

Be that as it may, I concur that not all God-constructs are necessarilly logically impossible. But, as many have pointed out before, neither is the Faerie Kingdom. As an atheist, I am saying, not that all God(s) are impossible, but that a belief in God(s) is unwarranted.

You seem to have made the same determination with regard to Vishnu. I'd be interested in knowing why.

tronvillain

While you cannot prove a universal negative, you can support it with evidence. My atheism is a matter of evidence, as are most beliefs about the world, and as such is a perfectly rational position.

Anyway, you are trying to inspire thought and discussion? Perhaps you could try something new, because everything you have said has already been done. Oh, and next time leave out the part about evolution - it puts you on par with flat earthers in terms of credibility.

Shadowy Man

How do you know the soul isn't quantifiable? Perhaps we just don't have the equipment sensitive enough yet to measure it. There was a time in the past when we'd never have been able to measure weak magnetic fields; however, I do believe they were there and influencing the way the universe works.

Should we give up on trying to measure the soul? Should we just accept that it exists, that it defies measurement, and not look for it?

Maybe someday we'll go to the doctor for a soul scan, get a nice CCD image of our depression, and receive the appropriate treatment. A hundred years ago, no one could even have conceived of something like MRI.

Biff the unclean

Just to define a bit the discussion a bit I want to start by saying that in the most commonly understood view, atheism is irrational. To borrow an argument:

‘Atheism is a universal negative. Everyone who has studied logic knows that you cannot prove a universal negative. …

First points first.
In it's most commonly understood view, theism is irrational. Those who claim that God exists all (all I've seen around these boards anyway) admit that they have no way to prove such a statement nor do they know of anyone who has such a proof. Therefore since they state that they believe something that they do not, and apparently cannot, know to be true they are not using reason as a bases for said belief. They are then, by definition, irrational.
Atheists take the only rational path which is to not consider this baseless tall tale.
To call Atheism immorality is nothing but slander. One wonders why you add such slander to your OP and then go on to say you want to debate without any animosity.
When you say "We can only quantify what our senses and our brains can wrap themselves around," and then go on to say "If man does have a "spirit" or "soul" then that obviously in concept falls out of the realm of what can be quantified" you are making claims to knowledge which you have already said you cannot posses. That is not a very moral thing to do.

To discount that out of hand simply because it doesn’t fit with our limited senses and can’t be represented mathematically seems a bit ludicrous.
Playing with words is not going to help your case.
You are in effect saying, "You know what? I don't have any way to know if what I am telling you is true. But you would be stupid not to believe me."
I don't think that is a very convincing argument. It didn't work for the Emperor with his New Clothes, and it's not working for you.

The very nature of the subject demands a different method of testing before it can be discounted.
You have that backwards. The methods we have now, which work just fine, thank you, tell us it can be discounted. But science is not religion, if new information is discovered then everything will be reconsidered. But it won't be considered BEFORE it is discovered.

If you found a large structure on a remote planet that resembled the Parthenon in complexity and design you would have no problem coming to the conclusion that it was made by someone’s hand. You would hardly suggest that it occurred naturally due to erosion and geological forces. Why not?
Easy because it would show signs of being an artifact. That is why it stands out from it's background so well. The same with the proverbial pocket watch that is found in a field. It stands out from the field because you can see that it was constructed and the field was not. It is an artifact and the grass isn't. Put the watch in a case of machinery or the Parthenon-isque building in a city and they cease to stand out because everything around them is designed.
You cannot claim that the universe is constructed as an artifact and then use easily recognising a human artifact as an artifact as an argument.
Occam’s Razor can only really be used to discount a gods hand if that god can then be shown not to exist.
But we aren't dealing with any Gods. Only with peoples stories about Gods. Stories which the tellers admit they cannot support with proof.
"All things being equal, the simplest answer is the most probable".
You have to look at what a "simple answer" is. 'God did it ' sounds very simple indeed. But it is the most complicated answer ever given. It would mean that there were miracles, that there was a supernatural. That would mean that EVERYTING WE KNOW IS WRONG. Every single last thing. With miracles and the supernatural two plus two would no longer equal four. Oh, it might equal four or by magic (since that's what the supernatural is after all) it might equal four point zero zero one.
Not a simple answer at all, this God thing.
Or does science do it ("God of the Gaps" reasoning ) too, and is it only different when the theists are guilty of it?
No, science doesn't do it. Science says 'I don't know. Let me find out by looking." The GoG reasoning is 'I don't know. Let me make something up."
Science has often been quick to dismiss out of hand the things it hasn’t seen yet.
If that were true science wouldn't discover anything. Religion, on the other hand, is quick to dismiss what it actually has seen…if it doesn't agree with it's dogma.
Science often makes claims that it has yet to prove by empirical evidence, and sometimes has to recant.
Are you just saying this to get a rise out of people or can you possibly not know how science works?
For example, evolution while in theory it sounds good, it has yet to be proven.
How can you repeat such an obvious lie? Can the public education system have failed you so badly that you know nothing about something so basic as evolution?
I don’t mean to be argumentative, and I am not trying to convert.
Fooled me.

Mooman_FL

I agree totally ReasonableDoubt. I believe I addressed that in my initial argument. Thus the definition of atheism included references to both sides of that belief as did my resulting argument. My bone to pick with that dual definition is that it doesn't fit with the origin of the word. Taking the the word for what it means does not fit with the one. At best I suggest that if you have a absense in the believe in God then your view is better suited to the agnostic view or an as-yet-undefined cross of the two.

As for the existance of the Faerie Kingdom. I also believed I have addressed that point with lumping that argument with the same argument for little green men. Both are unprovable by current method. A better method may not exist and therefore the existance can't be rationally disputed.

To tronvillain: You can support it with evidence if only as I stated in the argument you can view the entirety of existance (both seen an unseen at once) and verifiable prove it to be fasle. At which point it ceases to be a universal negative but a statement of verifiable fact. Neither science nor atheism has done this nor is it capable of it.

As for evolution... since when has it moved beyond the point of being a theory (see above argument on the meaning of hypothesi and theories and their historical track record). As such it does not have a complete set of evidence and if you relegate questioning of a theory based on dogma then you are indeed the one with the flat-earth mentality.

Again I must state that I am not advocating pointless bickering but a discussion of the argument itself.

Hawkingfan

No it's not. An agnostic who says that it is possible to know if a being exists who lives everywhere, cannot be seen or touched or smelled or felt or heard is irrational not to mention contradictory to known scientific facts. It is perfectly logical and rational to deny the existance of something that cannot be seen, heard, touched, smelled, has no mass, no temperature, no electricity.... Saying that such a thing is possible to exist is denying one's own intellect, at the same time ignoring all scientific facts and theories which God plays no role in whatsoever.

Speaking for myself, I feel that my decision is rational not only because it is based on science, but also on the bible. I feel that there is hard evidence in the bible that proves it is a fabricated lie. If the agnostic to says that it is possible the god described in the bible exists then he is being irrational.

[/QB][/QUOTE]Atheism is a universal negative.[/QB]

This is incorrect. Atheism has neither a positive or negative outlook on the world around us, it is simply a realistic view based upon real facts.

[/QUOTE]If you say there is no such thing in the entire universe, for example, as little green men there is no way to prove it.[/QB][/QUOTE]

I wonder if you may be referring to a post I made in another thread. If you are, this is not the context I used it in. I said that I believed that there was a little green man (yet, he is invisible) who lives in my engine and makes it run. Would you take an agnostic view at that statement and say it is possible?

[/QUOTE]You would have to travel to every planet and every star and inside of every star and through every galaxy in the entire universe and come back and tell me that you didn’t see one. When you did, I could just answer “Well you missed him. While you were going that way, he was zigging this way.” To prove the little green men don’t exist you would have to examine every single part of the universe at the same time. So it is impossible to prove that there is no such thing as little green men or angels or God. Therefore atheism is a logical contradiction, and to affirm a logical contradiction is irrational.[/QB][/QUOTE]

First of all, it is ONLY up to the claimant to prove that something exists or something supernatural can be done. It is NEVER up to the one who disbelieves to disprove anything. If nothing can be proved, there is NO NEED to disprove it anyway. As I said in another thread, if I say I can walk on water, it is up to ME ALONE to prove that I can. It is not up to the disbelievers to prove that I cannot. Would you take the agnostic stance and say that it is possible?

Why don't we just agree to disagree. I consider saying that it is possible for something to exist OUTSIDE THE KNOWN LAWS OF SCIENCE irrational, not to mention idiotic.

On what scientific fact or theory do you base the "possibility" of the existence of god?

Yes, it is the case.

Scientific fact (also known as TRUTH) is based upon observation and mathematics PERIOD! Anything that does not hold up to that is goobledygook and hogwash. Your argument above is what is known in Critical Thinking as making an unjustified judgement. You are assuming the existance of the soul to be true and therefore arguing by that conclusion.

Yeah, observation and mathematics. WHAT ARE WE THINKING!!!!!! Whatever.

Such as what? "Looking into ourselves for answers?", "Praying to an unseen hand?"

The current theories Stephen Hawking is working on will include the reason the universe bothers to exist. We do not know the answer to this yet. But it is knowable. I believe some day there wil be a theory.
Are you saying you are smarter than the man who proved to the world that quantum mechanics and relativity can be combined (it was thought that it couldn't be done), and his theories of black holes thirty years ago are now being proven correct, and that his theory of background radiation from many years ago proven correct; smarter than the man who holds the mathematics chair at Cambridge once held by Isaac Newton; smarter than the man who received an honorary doctorate from Harvard in his early forties; smarter than a man who for thirty years has been inventing a new form of mathematics? Are you saying you are smarter than he?
If he does not come up with the Unified Theory of Gravity which will address the universe' reasons for existance, then someone else will eventually. Just because it is not done yet doesn't mean I will say there is a god. No sir!

I strongly suggest you buy a quantum physics textbook and learn about the Sum Over Histories theory. In summation, scientists have concluded that our universe is not only one of thousands of designs, but it is one of the most probable.

Maybe it's complex for you, but not everybody else. No one said anything about a coincidence. Natural selection is not coincidence. Why are you so eager to give up on the pursuit of knowledge?

Whatever.

A hypothesis is an educated guess about what will be the result from a proposed experiment. A theory is a statement of a proposed fact that has yet to be proven from scientific observation or mathematics. A scietific law is a proven theory.

That is why they must be tested before they become law.

No, the difference is that laws are based on proof and god is not.

There is a difference between believing in sharks and rhinos and believing in an omnipotent, omniscient, all-powerful being. The disbelievers in those animals you mentioned made a mistake. This is because the word "shark" and "rhinoceros" imply KNOWABLE characteristics (mass, touch, feel, smell) in their indentities. Not so for the word "god". You are comparing apples and oranges.

[ December 12, 2002: Message edited by: Hawkingfan ]</p>

tronvillain

So, your position on evolution is that "it's just a theory"? *chuckle* Try it over in Evolution & Creation.

I am not sure you actually understand the concept of "evidence." It is a matter of probability, not of proof.

Jayhawker Soule

Actually, he's comparing apples and auras.

Philosoft

I think you are making something of a strawman out of tron's argument. He's not saying we can evidentially prove a universal negative; he's saying we are justified in disbelieving if the evidence doesn't support existence.

<strong> I must say, this has been done before, ad nauseam. The place for it, of course, is Evolution/Creation. I recommend a big stick. The regulars there don't take kindly to questionable characterizations.

[added]
Naturally, tron beat me to it. Mooman, please direct your replies to him.

[ December 12, 2002: Message edited by: Philosoft ]</p>