Let's imagine a bookmaker has made a mistake is offering 50:50 odds on something that I know has a 5% chance of occuring. I take the bet and wager a small amount of money on it.
1 .If I win the bet was I right to take the best : No
2. If I lose the bet was I right to take the best : Still No
So regardless of the outcome it was not sensible to take the bet, even if I won. My methodology was not sound.
Now how does this tie in to Religion? With religion you are expected to belief something by using faith before there is sufficient evidence to believe it solely using evidence and reason. (If there were sufficient evidence
1. Now lets say God appears to everyone tomorrow. Was I right to be an Atheist - Yes, my methodology was sound.
2. Let's say somehow hypothetically God was disproved - Was I right to be an Atheist - Yes, but not because of the outcome, it was because of the methodology.
So criticism of either the Theist or Atheist position is down to the methodology chosen by the other party. Now the crux of this is: Theists will tend to use the same methodology as Atheists in everyday life. If the magic bean salesman comes to the door and tells them they have to have faith, I really doubt they'd buy them.
Now there are human aspects that will cause people to not rely solely on evidence and reason. Fear, Greed etc can cause people to get scammed. Many many people fall for 419 scams. Again it is their methodology that is wrong. If you could genuinely "prove" someone was going to give you 10 million pounds then of course you should take it.
Whenever you take a faith based position on one thing, but use a completely different methodology for everything else then you need to have a good reason why. I don't consider "That's the only way I can go on believing in a God" a good reason. It is no different to "That's the only way I can go on believing the magic beans will work". What is worse is that in some religious doctrine there is a hell. You are essentially sent there because:
1. Either you used the wrong methodology
or
2. You used the correct methodology (faith), but because faith can't single out the correct religion you still get sent to hell.
Sorry, probably long and boring, but any comments?
1 .If I win the bet was I right to take the best : No
2. If I lose the bet was I right to take the best : Still No
So regardless of the outcome it was not sensible to take the bet, even if I won. My methodology was not sound.
Now how does this tie in to Religion? With religion you are expected to belief something by using faith before there is sufficient evidence to believe it solely using evidence and reason. (If there were sufficient evidence
1. Now lets say God appears to everyone tomorrow. Was I right to be an Atheist - Yes, my methodology was sound.
2. Let's say somehow hypothetically God was disproved - Was I right to be an Atheist - Yes, but not because of the outcome, it was because of the methodology.
So criticism of either the Theist or Atheist position is down to the methodology chosen by the other party. Now the crux of this is: Theists will tend to use the same methodology as Atheists in everyday life. If the magic bean salesman comes to the door and tells them they have to have faith, I really doubt they'd buy them.
Now there are human aspects that will cause people to not rely solely on evidence and reason. Fear, Greed etc can cause people to get scammed. Many many people fall for 419 scams. Again it is their methodology that is wrong. If you could genuinely "prove" someone was going to give you 10 million pounds then of course you should take it.
Whenever you take a faith based position on one thing, but use a completely different methodology for everything else then you need to have a good reason why. I don't consider "That's the only way I can go on believing in a God" a good reason. It is no different to "That's the only way I can go on believing the magic beans will work". What is worse is that in some religious doctrine there is a hell. You are essentially sent there because:
1. Either you used the wrong methodology
or
2. You used the correct methodology (faith), but because faith can't single out the correct religion you still get sent to hell.
Sorry, probably long and boring, but any comments?
