RE: If I were an Atheist
April 26, 2015 at 12:45 pm
(This post was last modified: April 26, 2015 at 12:54 pm by Hatshepsut.)
(April 26, 2015 at 12:48 am)Drew_2013 Wrote: [1] I could point to the existence of the universe as evidence it was caused by a personal agent as opposed to impersonal forces and [2] if no one knows how the universe came to be a Creator couldn't be ruled out.
Were Atheism so easily dismissed! As for [2], some people think they do have a general idea of how the universe came to be, although no one can rule out the possibility that a Creator caused the big bang and its sequelae to occur. As for [1], Richard Dawkin's blind watchmaker took up the issue of personal agency in a comparison of watches versus eyes. The pocket watch William Paley found on his lawn already had a plausible agent: the Swiss. Until fairly recently, the agent responsible for making the human camera eye was unknown and presumed to be God because of the eye's complexity and fine Swiss optics. Then a finch shat upon Charles Darwin on a tropical island and, like an apple falling on Newton's head, inspired a theory: Descent with modification followed by natural selection. That's a horrid way to make either watches or eyes, you have to build a whole bunch of models and throw most of them in the trash on your way to refinement. But it's plausible.
It's even happened in my lifetime. As a kid I got penicillin for infections. Then, quite suddenly, we had this MRSA stuff going around and they don't keep the now useless penicillin on shelves anymore.
As a theist I like to think sweet Jesus will await when I close my eyes for good. A better Holy Trinity than the spiteful caricature this trio has morphed into at the hands of priesthood. But I think the wrong questions are circulating in debate. Dawkins distinguished personal from impersonal agents by stating the latter do not have foresight; they can't predict or aim at a final result. But notice that when designing with AutoCAD you have a design environment, the CAD program, and then the design itself on the screen, within this environment. Perhaps the Creator made a design environment rather than the thumbscrew itself. After all, you can draw up millions of screws and delete all but those best fitting the hole they will thread into.
Things like mathematics and the principles of evolution do seem lawful and eternal even though neither has "foresight." Evolution isn't random; it only works with what's available to a conservative son of a bitch. We're still carrying almost the same cytochromes that MRSA bugs have.
I doubt "existence of God" questions are answerable within a framework of empirical data collection plus logic. Reason to believe comes ultimately from the heart. I won't accuse atheists of being heartless: Their challenge has finally unshackled us from the shamans and church bureaucracies that controlled religious thought for so long. It's just that the Atheist Heart didn't settle on the gods. They lost a few old age comforts as a result, yet no decent cosmic creator is going to threaten punishment if they feel belief is against their best interest.
(April 26, 2015 at 1:42 am)robvalue Wrote: The only actual real thing religion has is a book.
Well, it had lots of books and votive figurines and mental disciplines. Then one day, that religious fella got rolled up inside a scroll and suffocated while he was trying to close the canons.