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Atheist or Agnostic?
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Bad Wolf
Compulsive procrastinator  Religious Views: Agnostic atheist, anti-theist, whovian, misanthrope? (April 3, 2015 at 6:51 pm)datc Wrote: Then your concept of God, i.e., the meaning you attribute to the term "God," is defective. I agree, god is more like the creation of a clever and heartless author like George R Martin. Comic books and their authors fail to convey such evil.
'The more I learn about people the more I like my dog'- Mark Twain
'You can have all the faith you want in spirits, and the afterlife, and heaven and hell, but when it comes to this world, don't be an idiot. Cause you can tell me you put your faith in God to put you through the day, but when it comes time to cross the road, I know you look both ways.' - Dr House “Young earth creationism is essentially the position that all of modern science, 90% of living scientists and 98% of living biologists, all major university biology departments, every major science journal, the American Academy of Sciences, and every major science organization in the world, are all wrong regarding the origins and development of life….but one particular tribe of uneducated, bronze aged, goat herders got it exactly right.” - Chuck Easttom "If my good friend Doctor Gasparri speaks badly of my mother, he can expect to get punched.....You cannot provoke. You cannot insult the faith of others. You cannot make fun of the faith of others. There is a limit." - Pope Francis on freedom of speech  RE: Atheist or Agnostic?
April 3, 2015 at 9:25 pm
(This post was last modified: April 3, 2015 at 9:40 pm by Mudhammam.)
(April 3, 2015 at 9:13 pm)datc Wrote: Is the proposition "God does not exist" also "bullshit bereft of evidence"?It's a proposition that lacks existential import. So, yes, and no. You could ask, "Is the proposition 'Seven headed dragons do not exist' also 'bullshit bereft of evidence'"? There's no evidence that seven headed dragons have ever lived, and there's no evidence that excludes the possibility that seven headed dragons have ever lived. The default position is simply, "I have no reason to believe that seven headed dragons have ever lived."
He who loves God cannot endeavour that God should love him in return - Baruch Spinoza
Bad Wolf
Compulsive procrastinator Religious Views: Agnostic atheist, anti-theist, whovian, misanthrope? (April 3, 2015 at 9:13 pm)datc Wrote: Is the proposition "God does not exist" also "bullshit bereft of evidence"? Let's be clear about who is claiming what. Religion is claiming that a god exists and we should worship him. We atheists are simply saying 'we don't believe you'. I think the sweet jar analogy is very relevant here. Imagine a big jar of sweets, neither you or I know how many are in the jar, there are too many to count. Now you claim that the amount of sweets in the jar is odd. I say, I don't believe you, because you haven't demonstrated that. You have no way of knowing how many sweets are in the jar. Now, because I don't believe the amount of sweets in the jar is odd, does that mean that I believe the amount of sweets in the jar is even? No, of course not. And this is the atheist position. Christianity and all other religions and their followers have not met the burden of proof. They have not provided sufficient evidence for their claims.
'The more I learn about people the more I like my dog'- Mark Twain
'You can have all the faith you want in spirits, and the afterlife, and heaven and hell, but when it comes to this world, don't be an idiot. Cause you can tell me you put your faith in God to put you through the day, but when it comes time to cross the road, I know you look both ways.' - Dr House “Young earth creationism is essentially the position that all of modern science, 90% of living scientists and 98% of living biologists, all major university biology departments, every major science journal, the American Academy of Sciences, and every major science organization in the world, are all wrong regarding the origins and development of life….but one particular tribe of uneducated, bronze aged, goat herders got it exactly right.” - Chuck Easttom "If my good friend Doctor Gasparri speaks badly of my mother, he can expect to get punched.....You cannot provoke. You cannot insult the faith of others. You cannot make fun of the faith of others. There is a limit." - Pope Francis on freedom of speech  RE: Atheist or Agnostic?
April 3, 2015 at 9:45 pm
(This post was last modified: April 3, 2015 at 9:47 pm by datc.)
(April 3, 2015 at 9:25 pm)Nestor Wrote: You could ask, "Is the proposition 'Seven headed dragons do not exist' also 'bullshit bereft of evidence'"? You have to give a yes or no answer to this rather simple question. (April 3, 2015 at 9:31 pm)Bad Wolf Wrote: Now, because I don't believe the amount of sweets in the jar is odd, does that mean that I believe the amount of sweets in the jar is even? In other words, you do not know either that the amount is odd (God exists) or that the amount is even (God does not exist). And this is the agnostic position. 
Agnostic atheism: lack of belief in deities, without claim of certainty.
Agnostic theism: belief in deities, without claim of certainty. Gnostic atheism: lack of belief in deities, with claim of certainty. Gnostic theism: belief in deities, with claim of certainty. Agnosticism: Total amnesia or newborn baby. It's not that difficult to understand, you know.
The truth is absolute. Life forms are specks of specks (...) of specks of dust in the universe.
Why settle for normal, when you can be so much more? Why settle for something, when you can have everything? ![[Image: LB_Header_Idea_A.jpg]](https://images.weserv.nl/?url=i280.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fkk172%2FBlaziken_rjcf%2FLB_Header_Idea_A.jpg)
Bad Wolf
Compulsive procrastinator Religious Views: Agnostic atheist, anti-theist, whovian, misanthrope? (April 3, 2015 at 9:45 pm)datc Wrote: Atheism / theism is a confession of what you claim to believe Agnosticism / gnosticism is a confession of what you claim to know. In this scenario, I do not know how many sweets are in the jar, and because you don't either, I don't believe your claim that it is odd. Therefore I and many others are agnostic atheists.
'The more I learn about people the more I like my dog'- Mark Twain
'You can have all the faith you want in spirits, and the afterlife, and heaven and hell, but when it comes to this world, don't be an idiot. Cause you can tell me you put your faith in God to put you through the day, but when it comes time to cross the road, I know you look both ways.' - Dr House “Young earth creationism is essentially the position that all of modern science, 90% of living scientists and 98% of living biologists, all major university biology departments, every major science journal, the American Academy of Sciences, and every major science organization in the world, are all wrong regarding the origins and development of life….but one particular tribe of uneducated, bronze aged, goat herders got it exactly right.” - Chuck Easttom "If my good friend Doctor Gasparri speaks badly of my mother, he can expect to get punched.....You cannot provoke. You cannot insult the faith of others. You cannot make fun of the faith of others. There is a limit." - Pope Francis on freedom of speech  (April 3, 2015 at 3:48 pm)datc Wrote:(April 3, 2015 at 3:40 pm)robvalue Wrote: That's what makes me so annoyingly smug about being an atheist, making no claims, I have no burden of proof and I can't actually be wrong. I'll give you credit for this, you've accepted advice and shown an understanding of the atheist position that some people simply can't/won't. Anyone making a positive claim, if they want me to believe them, has a burden of proof, yes. That burden depends in the claim; the more extaordinary it is, the more evidence is usually required. And claims of knowledge would typically demand more evidence than those of belief, to be convincing. A belief in the lack of gods is a far more realistic claim than the belief in gods, in my opinion. The total absence of any evidence of gods, combined with the knowledge of all the previous man made gods, make it a claim in tune with reality. To believe in God when there is no evidence seems irrational to me. Feel free to send me a private message.
Please visit my website here! It's got lots of information about atheism/theism and support for new atheists. Index of useful threads and discussions Index of my best videos Quickstart guide to the forum (April 3, 2015 at 9:56 pm)Bad Wolf Wrote: Atheism / theism is a confession of what you claim to believe I do not understand why you partition "belief" and "knowledge" this way. "Belief" is not "blind faith without evidence"; it's a very normal and everyday intellectual phenomenon: an assent to a proposition. Further, knowledge is often defined (not entirely correctly, but that's beyond the scope of this discussion) as justified true belief. Knowledge and belief are not independent of each other. One cannot know P without giving mental assent to, i.e., without extending belief to, P. (April 3, 2015 at 10:12 pm)datc Wrote: One cannot know P without giving mental assent to, i.e., without extending belief to, P. Care to rethink that statement? Because what you just said means you believe in every god ever imagined by mankind. I doubt you're a polytheist.
The truth is absolute. Life forms are specks of specks (...) of specks of dust in the universe.
Why settle for normal, when you can be so much more? Why settle for something, when you can have everything? |
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