>> ^gwiz665:

False.
Atheism is a negative position, not a positive one. It makes no claims as to what is, it only says what is not. It is "no belief in X" not, "belief in no X".
>> ^shinyblurry:
atheism denies the existence of a deity. to say you lack belief is an autobiographical statement of your psychology and has nothing to do with the question of whether God exists. If you want to say you don't know, you are an agnostic.

>> ^HaricotVert:
Quote-mining a mischaracterization of atheism. How trite. Atheism is a lack of belief in a deity, not "I believe that no god exists." There is a subtle but important difference.
The concept or existence of a god is precisely not excluded from the realm of possibility. The arrogance of assuming that for some reason every atheist is a "gnostic atheist" who just "doesn't understand" or is "closeminded" to the idea of god is ridiculous. Provide us with scientific evidence, or the messiah appearing at the superbowl (per Maher's rant) and I would be more than happy to reevaluate my current logical position in light of new evidence. To do otherwise would be a violation of the very science and reason I already live by.
Here is a handy chart to clarify the distinction between gnosticism and theism.
>> ^shinyblurry:
of all choices, atheism requires the greatest faith, as it demands that ones limited store of human knowledge is sufficient to exclude the possibility of God.
francis collins human genome project





What a minute.

Atheism IS the belief that there is no God/Deity. Isn't it?

It's agnostics that simply take no position and say they don't believe one way or the other...

False.
Atheism is a negative position, not a positive one. It makes no claims as to what is, it only says what is not. It is "no belief in X" not, "belief in no X".
>> ^shinyblurry:

atheism denies the existence of a deity. to say you lack belief is an autobiographical statement of your psychology and has nothing to do with the question of whether God exists. If you want to say you don't know, you are an agnostic.

>> ^HaricotVert:
Quote-mining a mischaracterization of atheism. How trite. Atheism is a lack of belief in a deity, not "I believe that no god exists." There is a subtle but important difference.
The concept or existence of a god is precisely not excluded from the realm of possibility. The arrogance of assuming that for some reason every atheist is a "gnostic atheist" who just "doesn't understand" or is "closeminded" to the idea of god is ridiculous. Provide us with scientific evidence, or the messiah appearing at the superbowl (per Maher's rant) and I would be more than happy to reevaluate my current logical position in light of new evidence. To do otherwise would be a violation of the very science and reason I already live by.
Here is a handy chart to clarify the distinction between gnosticism and theism.
>> ^shinyblurry:
of all choices, atheism requires the greatest faith, as it demands that ones limited store of human knowledge is sufficient to exclude the possibility of God.
francis collins human genome project

atheism denies the existence of a deity. to say you lack belief is an autobiographical statement of your psychology and has nothing to do with the question of whether God exists. If you want to say you don't know, you are an agnostic.


>> ^HaricotVert:
Quote-mining a mischaracterization of atheism. How trite. Atheism is a lack of belief in a deity, not "I believe that no god exists." There is a subtle but important difference.
The concept or existence of a god is precisely not excluded from the realm of possibility. The arrogance of assuming that for some reason every atheist is a "gnostic atheist" who just "doesn't understand" or is "closeminded" to the idea of god is ridiculous. Provide us with scientific evidence, or the messiah appearing at the superbowl (per Maher's rant) and I would be more than happy to reevaluate my current logical position in light of new evidence. To do otherwise would be a violation of the very science and reason I already live by.
Here is a handy chart to clarify the distinction between gnosticism and theism.
>> ^shinyblurry:
of all choices, atheism requires the greatest faith, as it demands that ones limited store of human knowledge is sufficient to exclude the possibility of God.
francis collins human genome project

Quote-mining a mischaracterization of atheism. How trite. Atheism is a lack of belief in a deity, not "I believe that no god exists." There is a subtle but important difference.

The concept or existence of a god is precisely not excluded from the realm of possibility. The arrogance of assuming that for some reason every atheist is a "gnostic atheist" who just "doesn't understand" or is "closeminded" to the idea of god is ridiculous. Provide us with scientific evidence, or the messiah appearing at the superbowl (per Maher's rant) and I would be more than happy to reevaluate my current logical position in light of new evidence. To do otherwise would be a violation of the very science and reason I already live by.

Here is a handy chart to clarify the distinction between gnosticism and theism.

>> ^shinyblurry:

of all choices, atheism requires the greatest faith, as it demands that ones limited store of human knowledge is sufficient to exclude the possibility of God.
francis collins human genome project

>> ^shinyblurry:

of all choices, atheism requires the greatest faith, as it demands that ones limited store of human knowledge is sufficient to exclude the possibility of God.
francis collins human genome project


No, this is not true. If we are to believe our models of the big bang are correct (and you'd be a fucking idiot not to) then we say "god created the big bang". But then you must ask the question "where did god come from?" And the answer to that question requires more faith than the opinion of not needing a god for the universe to exist.

But also even just in the creation of humans, when you get to the circular "Why are we here?", "God made us", "How do you know?", "Because god says he's always right, and he says he made us", you are asking for a complete leap of faith based on nothing.

On the other hand, if we are to decide that humans were created by certain atoms colliding or reacting with certain other atoms, and various conditions being perfect. And even if it's got a one in a billion to the power a billion chance of happening, we just need to wait for the odds to come up, and we're not exactly short on time on the scale of the universe.

Human emotion is irrational, and believing in god is an emotional choice. I respect the choice, but it cannot be correctly claimed that it makes more sense to believe in god based on any logical argument or physical evidence; you have your own reasons and that's fine by me.

However, i think you understand atheism differently to the meaning i've always known. Accepting god requires faith. The faith to accept something you aren't certain of. You have faith that god is real. Now i can't make that leap; our chemistry is different and i can't accept something that i haven't got evidence for. Now, if i refuse your proposal of how the world, the universe exists, then i must form my own opinions on the evidence that i am presented. That is not a faith, not a belief in something, it is something that i can work out and solve for myself. If you follow the science, it makes sense, and i don't need ANY faith for that; my atheism drops right out of the undeniable logic of maths, and i don't have to keep believing in it for it to be true (in your case, you do).

I think that's the difference between Atheism and Agnosticism.

Atheism: belief that there is (are) no God(s).
Agnostic: lack of belief either way.

"Gnostic" is derived from a Greek word meaning knowing (roughly speaking). Theism and Atheism are Gnostic philosophies as they claim to *know* that there is a God or not. Agnostic is the inverse: not knowing.>> ^sickio:

The faith you speak of isn't mutually inclusive with Atheism.
Not all Atheists believe there are no deities, however all lack any belief that there are any deities.
>> ^shinyblurry:
of all choices, atheism requires the greatest faith, as it demands that ones limited store of human knowledge is sufficient to exclude the possibility of God.
francis collins human genome project

>> ^Pantalones:

religion: a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, especially when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs.
Interesting. Since the second part is an example, Atheism would seem to fit into this definition.

Do you believe a unicorn created the universe? Not believing would seem to fit into your interpretation of the definition of religion.
>> ^shinyblurry:

of all choices, atheism requires the greatest faith, as it demands that ones limited store of human knowledge is sufficient to exclude the possibility of God.
francis collins human genome project

This makes faith sound cheap, not to mention a lousy tool for assessing truth.

>> ^shinyblurry:

of all choices, atheism requires the greatest faith, as it demands that ones limited store of human knowledge is sufficient to exclude the possibility of God.
francis collins human genome project


I assure you it requires no faith at all. BY DEFINITION. You fucking disingenuous piece of shit. Why don't you suck on my fucking balls asshole?

The faith you speak of isn't mutually inclusive with Atheism.

Not all Atheists believe there are no deities, however all lack any belief that there are any deities.

>> ^shinyblurry:

of all choices, atheism requires the greatest faith, as it demands that ones limited store of human knowledge is sufficient to exclude the possibility of God.
francis collins human genome project

>> ^shinyblurry:

of all choices, atheism requires the greatest faith, as it demands that ones limited store of human knowledge is sufficient to exclude the possibility of God.
francis collins human genome project


Jealous?

of all choices, atheism requires the greatest faith, as it demands that ones limited store of human knowledge is sufficient to exclude the possibility of God.

francis collins human genome project

The "explanatory power" of a teapot is irrelevant to my question. Do you believe in it or not? If not, why not? You are dodging the question, and it is painfully obvious why. You find yourself in the same position that Mr. Hitchens did, which is to prove a negative.

You can prove a negative. For instance, there are no US Senators who are muslims. Go to http://www.senate.gov/ to verify.

There is no reason to believe there is a teapot floating in space, but there is reason to believe that the Universe was created by a supreme being. Could there be one in space unknown to all? Sure, and I wouldn't unequivicably state that there are not. Perhaps some astronauts were having a tea party in outer space one day and the teapot floated off. If I did unequivicably state there were none, I would have a burden of proof, and that is why Christopher had to explain himself.

Explanatory power is entirely relevent to the question because you are trying to establish an equivilency between the question of Gods existence and the question of the existence of anything you can dream up in your mind. It is simply to try to trivialize the question to equate the idea of God, which can explain everything from the fine tuning of the physical laws, the appearance of design in biological systems, and the information in DNA, to teapots, unicorns, and fairies, which explain absolutely nothing.

When Christopher attested to the fact that he believes that God does not exist, the burden of proof was on him to prove that He does not. The reason he could not is because he had blind faith in this idea.

of all choices, atheism requires the greatest faith, as it demands that ones limited store of human knowledge is sufficient to exclude the possibility of God.

francis collins human genome project

I don't have faith in a self-creating universe, I just don't see evidence for an all powerful being. As soon as evidence for one appears, my views will change. This is not faith. It is, in fact, the opposite of faith.

So, you're an agnostic? I was once agnostic and did not see any evidence for God or Spirit, although I did not rule out His existence either. Let me ask you this..if Jesus is God, would you turn your life over to Him and follow Him?



>> ^botono9:
>> ^shinyblurry:
A flying teapot explains exactly nothing; it has no explanatory power. The idea of God does. Between evolution and special creation you have exausted all the possibilities. You have faith in a self-creating universe, I have faith that it was designed by an all powerful being. I see evidence of design, and since it is mathematically impossible it happened by chance, God is a far more plausible hypothesis according to the evidence
The "explanatory power" of a teapot is irrelevant to my question. Do you believe in it or not? If not, why not? You are dodging the question, and it is painfully obvious why. You find yourself in the same position that Mr. Hitchens did, which is to prove a negative.
I don't have faith in a self-creating universe, I just don't see evidence for an all powerful being. As soon as evidence for one appears, my views will change. This is not faith. It is, in fact, the opposite of faith.

From Cosmic Variance
Predictions for 2012
by Sean Carroll

So you don’t enter the new year completely unprepared, here are my most secure predictions for 2012. Unlike other prognostication websites, these predictions are based on Science!

1. Freely-falling objects will accelerate toward the ground at an approximately constant rate, up to corrections due to air resistance.
2. Of all the Radium-226 nuclei on the Earth today, 0.04% will decay by the end of the year.
3. A line drawn between any planet (or even dwarf planet) and the Sun will sweep out equal areas in equal times.
4. Hurricanes in the Northern hemisphere will rotate counterclockwise as seen from above.
5. The pressure of a gas squeezed in a piston will rise inversely with the change in volume.
6. Electric charges in motion will give rise to magnetic fields.
7. The energy of an object at rest whose mass decreases will also decrease, by the change in mass times the speed of light squared.
8. The content of the world’s genomes will gradually evolve in ways determined by fitness in a given environment, sexual selection, and random chance.
9. The entropy of closed systems will increase.
10. People will do many stupid things, and some surprisingly smart ones.

Happy New Year, everyone.

It most certainly is a leap of faith to say that there is no God, since you cannot disprove God. You have no evidence that God doesn't exist.

Since you say that you're using logic, and presumably you're a materialist, how do you account for the laws of logic in nature? Could you point to them for me? How do you account for the laws of logic in your worldview?

As far as science goes, why should we prefer empirical evidence as the best way of discovering truth? For science to be done, it must assume a little thing called the uniformity of nature. This is to say that the future will be like the past. Of course, there is nothing to guarantee this will be true even five minutes from now. The only way to justify this is by circular reasoning. It is no better than saying that God justifies God.

I can account for the laws of logic and uniformity in nature in my theistic worldview, how do you account for them in yours? The idea of the Uniformity of nature was a Christian idea which was that God made an orderly universe based on univeral laws and that we could investigate secondary causes to determine what those laws are. That is how science really got its start in Christian europe. You're welcome.






>> ^Drachen_Jager:
>> ^shinyblurry:
of all choices, atheism requires the greatest faith, as it demands that ones limited store of human knowledge is sufficient to exclude the possibility of God.
francis collins human genome project
Complete and utter B.S.
Everything we know about the Universe has been learned through the rigorous application of logic.
There is nothing. Literally nothing that we have gained any other way.
Now you're trying to tell me, that because I am using the deductive tools by which 100% of substantive knowledge has been derived I am the one using faith? Atheism requires no leap of faith. Only the rigorous application of the scientific method, intelligence and logic. Just because you cannot manage some, or all of the skills required to arrive at the correct conclusion does not preclude others from doing so. To believe such would be the worst kind of hubris.
I repeat, total and utter B.S. Shame on you for even mentioning it.

>> ^shinyblurry:

of all choices, atheism requires the greatest faith, as it demands that ones limited store of human knowledge is sufficient to exclude the possibility of God.
francis collins human genome project

Complete and utter B.S.

Everything we know about the Universe has been learned through the rigorous application of logic.

There is nothing. Literally nothing that we have gained any other way.

Now you're trying to tell me, that because I am using the deductive tools by which 100% of substantive knowledge has been derived *I* am the one using faith? Atheism requires no leap of faith. Only the rigorous application of the scientific method, intelligence and logic. Just because you cannot manage some, or all of the skills required to arrive at the correct conclusion does not preclude others from doing so. To believe such would be the worst kind of hubris.

I repeat, total and utter B.S. Shame on you for even mentioning it.