Strong Atheism starts from faith

[tavarish]

I’m not going to quote the pretext anymore it’s getting far too long and convoluted. I've already spent far too much time on this.
1-The amount of faith you have is irrelevant to me. You have the same amount of faith that God exists as in an apple falling up. God hasn’t proved himself to you and you rest in the belief of your materialism, supported by testing of science and by countless proofs to be historically “the way things work”.
3.5- I agree that bias is detrimental to legitimate experimentation. I was referring to any objective truth that could rest outside our realm of how we understand our universe. I did make a positive claim that God exists, allow me to restate.
I believe that God is likely to exist, resting on nothing but faith= I have faith that God exists
I believe I can know aspects of what God would be if he existed, by the evidence cited = I believe in the idea of God
4.3- I posit that my anecdotal evidence isn’t untrustworthy. It’s true but it can’t be used to support the conclusion that God exists objectively.
4.3.1-I did read the links when posted a while ago, down to the references. I’ll accept that the data is relative even though the references weren’t to anything more than broken links, fiction books and subjective news articles. “Persinger believes that religious experiences are the result of so-called "mini electrical storms" in the temporal lobes” Is a faulty assumption because he’s saying all religious experiences are conclusively attributed to these storms. All he really got was hallucinations and out of body experiences, neither of which are on my list of evidence. I agree that neurobiology some day may yield the ultimate answer. I applaud their efforts and am a willing experiment. You however have fell short of convincing me that what I perceive as my experience is attributable to biochemistry. I have no more psychomotor epilepsy, hallucinatory experiences, post-stimulation electrical instability or generate learned seizures any more than you do.
4.3.2- You may have whatever skewed view of my explanations of God as you like. The analogy is flawed so you still don’t understand my perspective.
4.5-No the original analogy of the VW jetta is a faulty one.. see 4.3.2 for same conclusion.
4.6- I have and I do and it is valid. The evidence has been listed over and over again, but rejected because it’s not mathematic of scientific evidence.
4.7-I’ve been other religions and no religion. I’m not opposed to changing those views.
4.8-I do appreciate a little satisfaction that we’re number 2 on the food chain. I do appreciate that lucky things can happen as part of the chaos of life. I didn’t say I was a cow, just no more special in God’s eyes. You’re a haughty prick. By your own words of “I attempted to do it, but it was an exercise in futility as there were simply too many points made to argue every single one in a respectable time frame. I stopped caring and let it go, frankly.” I can see you’re not really here to discuss, you’re here to argue. That coupled with you inability to accept the possibility of a stance other than yours and your haughty and disingenuous attitude solidifies you as a very intelligent troll to me. I’ll stop feeding you now.

1. The way I feel is that if an objective claim is made (God exists), then that requires objective evidence. That's all. Pretty simple.

3.5. Good.

4.3. If it can't be used to verify anything objectively, then what good is it? At this point you're taking someone's word for it on the basis that it agrees with your point of view. That's all. There is no such thing as subjective truth.

4.31. I provided a link with a scholarly, peer reviewed article on the Good Friday Experiment:

Here's a link where it's easier to read and broken up a bit better:

http://www.erowid.org/entheogens/journal...nal3.shtml

And a study by Johns Hopkins University as a followup:

http://www.maps.org/w3pb/new/2008/2008_G...3042_1.pdf

They broke down a religious experience into nine distinct dimensions:

1) Unity

2) Transcendence of space and time

3) A deeply felt positive mood

4) Sense of sacredness

5) Objectivity and reality

6) Paradoxiality

7) Alleged ineffability

8) Transiency

9) Persisting positive changes in attitude and behavior


The second study even found that the psychoactive drugs used for the test produced a long lasting effect on the subjects, that which they felt to be 100 percent genuine. Their verbatim comments don't differ from yours much.

4.32. How is it skewed? I replaced "God" with "unicorn". That's it. You were talking about likelihood. It is not likely an infinitely complex intelligent being, talks to you personally, manifests in reality, leaves no objective evidence, and controls your actions to make your life better. If you care to explain it better, go ahead.

It is much more likely that it is a concept in your mind, which does manifest in reality through your actions, and can only be viewed subjectively because it is simply a personal belief and does not go further than that.

4.5. How is it faulty? Because you say it is? Please provide a reason.

4.6. If your tests are valid, submit them to independent scrutiny. If they are rejected, it's because they are not valid.

Many tests have been made on the claim that prayer works.

http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/g...odccu.html

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16023511

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/31/health....html?_r=1

None support the claim, but they do show several psychological effects at work for both the sender and receiver.

4.7. What made you change to Christianity? What other religions were you? Did you feel that the others were less correct?

4.8. I understand your view just fine. I don't agree with it on the basis that there are no supporting arguments that can be made with verifiable and falsifiable evidence. The arguments that you did present, and can be falsified, have been. I apologize if I was a bit harsh, but this is a topic I can write at length about. I wrote that early in the morning, and I also missed your last 2 points because I was so tired I passed out

I have been a Christian for most of my life, I fully understand what you mean in terms of religious experience. I know how it can be subjective and the same for every like-minded individual. What I'm telling you is that that is irrelevant and does not demonstrate that these feelings or emotions are anything more than our brains doing their own thing.

I'll concede that I do like to argue. You got me there. I like analyzing others' positions as well.

No hard feelings y0