Reasons for belief

[Bad Wolf]

Bad Wolf, atheists believe that their lack of belief is justified. No?

That doesn't make sense. You can't believe something about your own beliefs. If atheists didn't think atheism was justified, they wouldn't be atheists, they would be theists. Beliefs just are....
You can't add anything on to them.

[downbeatplumb]

If you are an atheist because you see no reasons to think otherwise what happens when you loose a debate against someone who has stronger reasoning for an argument than you? Do you instantly switch sides? Or stubbornly continue in your belief?

Without evidence a strong argument is nothing.

We have had good theist debaters here but they have all been unable to come up with anything even approaching evidence to support their faith relying on what boils down to "C'mon guys it could be true if you just believe"

All the arguments I have seen the Kalam, ontological etc can be summed up as above.

[Arthur123]

Fair enough. However its different if someone asserts something is false.

[downbeatplumb]

Fair enough. However its different if someone asserts something is false.

The bible I would say has a lot of demonstrable false hoods in it as does the book of Mormon and indeed all of that class of book.

My wife reads a lot of spiritualist tomes and is totally convinced that she can converse with dead people.

She can't of course, but she is just as convinced in the truth of spiritualism as you are convinced in the truth of Christ.

I think your both wrong.

[Jacob(smooth)]

Good afternoon, I was genuinely curious to hear from you guys what reason(s) you have for believing in atheism or agnosticism. This is not supposed to be an exhaustive thread but rather which arguments you find effective and compelling and perhaps the circumstances that ultimately lead to your conclusion. Please don't respond (though I grant you have every right to do so) religion is dumb only dummies believe in that. Im more interested in a civil explanation of the specifics of your reasoning and foundation for your beliefs.

Kindest regards,

The same reason why I "believe" in the notion that spaghetti monster does not exist, in-spite of abundance of personal testimonials of revelation from his noodliness.

Heretic! Tool of the antipasta!

[Angrboda]

"My friend, I know Christianity is true because God's Spirit lives in me and assures me that it is true ... Now, to try to show you it's true, I'll share with you some arguments and evidence that I really find convincing. But should my arguments seem weak and unconvincing to you, that's my fault, not God's. It only shows that I'm a poor apologist, not that the gospel is untrue. Whatever you think of my arguments, God still loves you and holds you accountable. I'll do my best to present good arguments to you. But ultimately you have to deal, not with arguments, but with God himself."

~ William Lane Craig

[Jackalope]

I'm a poor apologist

~ William Lane Craig

Occasionally, quote mining leads to truth.

[ShaMan]

"God" was created by man to explain the gooey feelings we sometimes have. The source of these feelings is in our DNA. I see nothing wrong with exploring our deep inner-space, but to claim a definitive, and then to impose it onto others, is just cruel, and it speaks to the need for further exploration into our own deep nature.

[Esquilax]

Beliefe in a lack of belief makes sense because you believe your lack of belief is reasonable. But this is a non-important point anyway. Boru, it seems to me, that if atheism is held because of no evidence than in that moment they loose that debate they would in order to stay consistent, convert to theism.

The trouble with debating theists is that religion lends itself very well to ad hoc excuse making. If someone's position holds that there's magic, and a special magic man that can do anything, then that position is already unhinged from everything we understand about reality and also consistent with pretty much any claim you care to make with it. It's very easy to make things up to dodge around opposing arguments when your position doesn't have to match the real world and also doesn't have any reasonable limits to it.

For example, you asked earlier what we thought a designed universe would look like, and my immediate answer is that for one, there wouldn't be any natural disasters and two, the human body wouldn't have so many easily fixed, meaningless problems with it. There's a christian apologetic for that, the claim that all those imperfections entered the world when sin did, and that they aren't the fault of god. Which leads me to ask: how do they know that? And how does that work?

Oh, you believe it because an old book says it if you interpret it a certain way? And it works because magic? Yes, I know that's consistent with this other idea you believe, that magic is real and can do anything, but where's your evidence that it happened? Oh, you just believe it because it's consistent with other things you already believe with no evidence... great...

Religion is made to reinforce its own beliefs and wriggle out of any objection with confabulation and rhetorical sleight of hand. Any theist sufficiently invested in their religion can't really lose a debate if they're already happy just believing on faith; it's when you begin to care about evidence that their arguments tend to lose their luster.

[The Valkyrie]

I don't believe in atheism or agnosticism.

I AM an atheist.

Reasons:

- No proof for a deity
- Contradictory stories in the source of the religion
- Evidence that many of the claims of the bible didn't actually happen
- The need for apologists to defend the above
- The utter hypocrisy of many of the leaders of the religious fanclub.