People have asked me how do I know with any certainty that deities do not exist - not just deities of certain religions like Yahweh/Allah/ but deities in general. I have many reasons to believe that deities do not, never did, and cannot exist. I will list some of my reasons:
1.) Deities are by definition either supernatural (unnatural) beings, or beings with supernatural powers. Now what is supernatural? No one has appointed out the supernatural in reality - because it is supernatural, duh!
Another word for supernatural is unnatural. Unnatural things do not exist in reality. Deities are supernatural by definition - therefore, deities do not exist.
2.) Consider the things that are supernatural in human religions and cultures: Fire breathing dragons, griffins, phoenixes, elves, dwarves, trolls, gnomes, fairies, leprechauns, smurfs, gargoyles, sea serpents, mermaids, sirens, unicorns, centaurs, minotaurs, demons, angels, etc. You know, beings and creatures that have not been demonstrated to exist in reality but only in fairytales, stories, and religious books. Deities and demigods are just like the above - only demonstrated to exist - in the human imagination.
3.) Consider the deities that have been worshiped and revered in the past like the Greco-Roman gods and the Norse gods. Lightning was for millenia evidence of the power of Zeus. Lightning was magical, supernatural. Who threw the lightning bolts? What is lightning made of? It's all in the power of Zeus, of course! That is, until it was figured out that lightning was just atmospheric phenomena with perfectly natural causes - nobody makes and throws lightning bolts, they just happen. What is Zeus without lightning? And so on with Apollo who rode the chariot across the sky with the Sun in it, and with Poseidon ruler of the ocean depths, etc. These deities all had attributes that explain phenomena that is now understood to be natural. What are these deities without their raisons d'etre?
This is not an exhaustive list of why I know that deities do not exist but these are the main ones. And I'll be more than happy to discuss things further with you guys.
1.) Deities are by definition either supernatural (unnatural) beings, or beings with supernatural powers. Now what is supernatural? No one has appointed out the supernatural in reality - because it is supernatural, duh!
Another word for supernatural is unnatural. Unnatural things do not exist in reality. Deities are supernatural by definition - therefore, deities do not exist.2.) Consider the things that are supernatural in human religions and cultures: Fire breathing dragons, griffins, phoenixes, elves, dwarves, trolls, gnomes, fairies, leprechauns, smurfs, gargoyles, sea serpents, mermaids, sirens, unicorns, centaurs, minotaurs, demons, angels, etc. You know, beings and creatures that have not been demonstrated to exist in reality but only in fairytales, stories, and religious books. Deities and demigods are just like the above - only demonstrated to exist - in the human imagination.
3.) Consider the deities that have been worshiped and revered in the past like the Greco-Roman gods and the Norse gods. Lightning was for millenia evidence of the power of Zeus. Lightning was magical, supernatural. Who threw the lightning bolts? What is lightning made of? It's all in the power of Zeus, of course! That is, until it was figured out that lightning was just atmospheric phenomena with perfectly natural causes - nobody makes and throws lightning bolts, they just happen. What is Zeus without lightning? And so on with Apollo who rode the chariot across the sky with the Sun in it, and with Poseidon ruler of the ocean depths, etc. These deities all had attributes that explain phenomena that is now understood to be natural. What are these deities without their raisons d'etre?
This is not an exhaustive list of why I know that deities do not exist but these are the main ones. And I'll be more than happy to discuss things further with you guys.
