When Atheists Can't Think Episode 1: No Evidence for God?

[drfuzzy]

Who is the broader world of intellectual inquiry?

The fact is that I reject a belief in god because I see no evidence of God. Definition of atheism =  disbelief or lack of belief in the existence of God or gods.

I don't know anything about God, I don't know he doesn't exist or that he does exist, I know nothing about him apart from heresay which I don't believe in.  Definition of an agnostic =  a person who believes that nothing is known or can be known of the existence or nature of God.

https://atheistforums.org/thread-9794-po...#pid211908

Your explanation goes back to my previous dilemma: People can see no evidence of God because they have competently examined the evidence and found it lacking, or they are simply incompetent and incapable of seeing the evidence.

Which are you?

EVIDENCE.  You yammer on and on and on about "evidence", you ignore responses and keep yammering about "evidence", and even when we ask for "evidence" you keep yammering on and give us nothing.  Zip.  Nada.   Pages upon pages upon pages of people asking for your "evidence".  You give us absolutely nothing.  Worse than nothing - you ignore everything you've been told, and type crap like the nonsense above.  All you do is stick your nose in the air, try to think up a new way to tell us how superior you are, and have fun typing more insults.  

We tell you and tell you and tell you:  Definition of atheism =  disbelief or lack of belief in the existence of God or gods.    We tell you that we have not seen sufficient substantive empirical evidence to support belief in any deities.   Evidence, not something from a book of fairy tales, not stories for people who had "experiences", not philosophical arguments, not "look around you, only an idiot looks at nature and fails to see god" - - - you keep flapping your jaw about evidence, so give us the evidence.  

Put up or shut up.  How much longer are you going to spread shit all over our carpets and try to claim you're throwing pearls before swine?

[robvalue]

Remember that atheism is simply a description. It's not a choice, it's a state of mind. Any professed theist may actually be an atheist. And any professed atheist may be a theist.

Not believing in something until you have sufficient evidence that it is true is perfectly rational. What is considered sufficient evidence is going to vary from person to person, which is why we have the scientific method to try and reduce the effects of biases and preconceptions.

I think it's also important to note that you can hold a perfectly rational belief, and still be wrong. It is rational to believe gravity will continue to work roughly the way it does now tomorrow. However, this belief may be wrong. Gravity could just stop working tomorrow, for whatever reason. That doesn't make my belief irrational, nor the belief that gravity will stop working tomorrow rational, based on the information and evidence I have at the moment. The same is true of "God", whatever it may be. Even if it exists, not believing it exists while insufficient evidence has been presented is rational.

The important point about being a sceptic is being prepared to change your mind when new evidence emerges. Any state of mind in which beliefs are held to be objectively true beyond all doubt and that new evidence is irrelevant is harmful.

[Thumpalumpacus]

If you understood the difference between belief and knowledge, you wouldn't have a category for both in your epistemology.

Love,

Someone who has studied epistemology and actually knows the difference between belief and knowledge. 

PS- Ask me to explain.

Pretty sure that the two terms exist because of the difference.

[paulpablo]

Who is the broader world of intellectual inquiry?

The fact is that I reject a belief in god because I see no evidence of God. Definition of atheism =  disbelief or lack of belief in the existence of God or gods.

I don't know anything about God, I don't know he doesn't exist or that he does exist, I know nothing about him apart from heresay which I don't believe in.  Definition of an agnostic =  a person who believes that nothing is known or can be known of the existence or nature of God.

https://atheistforums.org/thread-9794-po...#pid211908

Your explanation goes back to my previous dilemma: People can see no evidence of God because they have competently examined the evidence and found it lacking, or they are simply incompetent and incapable of seeing the evidence.

Which are you?

Your question is over simplistic and seemingly illogical to ask.

If I am incompetent and incapable of seeing the evidence how would I be aware of this in order to tell you? 

Also you say THE EVIDENCE,  there's more than one claim of evidence, the evidence I've seen so far seems lacking, as far as I know I haven't been incompetent or incapable of observing the evidence.

Also if God does make evidence of his existence alongside his creations which he made incompetent and incapable of seeing the evidence then his goal must be to not be believed in.

Also this dilemma of yours is completely unrelated to what you were originally saying. I was talking about how an atheist can be agnostic and vice versa, now you have skipped the topic of terms and definitions and gone onto a different topic of evidence for god.

If I am an atheist and agnostic because of reasonably viewing evidence or incompetently viewing evidence it makes no difference to the terms and definitions of atheism and agnostic.

[Redbeard The Pink]

I mean...knowledge and belief are only different insomuch as cars and Porsches are different. All Porsches are cars, but not all cars are Porsches.


Likewise, all knowledge is belief, but not all belief is knowledge.


To believe something, you must simply be convinced of it. This might be done through evidence, or it might be done through trickery of the mind (intentional or otherwise, from the self and/or from elsewhere).


To be able to claim that you know something, you must be able to somehow show that your belief is true. Knowledge can be demonstrated by evidence of some kind, whereas mere belief might fail such a test. To put it simply, if you can't show it, you don't know it.


This brings us to the question of the gods. You can insist that whichever one you like is real, and that you have a real relationship with it, and that if we just take the time to hypnotize ourselves into suspending disbelief like you did, we'll become convinced the same way you were.


The problem with that is that I used to do that exact thing. I spent hours and hours praying, singing, reading, ministering, and sincerely believing in Jehovah for over 20 years. I have since realized that there are scientific explanations for my religious experiences that are more likely and more evidence-supported than the conclusions I previously reached from them.


I've also realized that the things I used to accept as evidence (personal experience, confirmation bias, apologetics arguments, etc.) are not actually good evidence that a rational mind should be convinced by. Being an otherwise rational, scientifically-minded person, I could no longer justify the double standard in critical thinking between my rational beliefs and my beliefs concerning the supernatural.

[Cato]

Someone who has studied epistemology and actually knows the difference between belief and knowledge. 

PS- Ask me to explain.

How is it that someone as learned as you in epistemology struggle so with the idea of justified true belief?

[KevinM1]

https://atheistforums.org/thread-9794-po...#pid211908

Your explanation goes back to my previous dilemma: People can see no evidence of God because they have competently examined the evidence and found it lacking, or they are simply incompetent and incapable of seeing the evidence.

Which are you?

EVIDENCE.  You yammer on and on and on about "evidence", you ignore responses and keep yammering about "evidence", and even when we ask for "evidence" you keep yammering on and give us nothing.  Zip.  Nada.   Pages upon pages upon pages of people asking for your "evidence".  You give us absolutely nothing.  Worse than nothing - you ignore everything you've been told, and type crap like the nonsense above.  All you do is stick your nose in the air, try to think up a new way to tell us how superior you are, and have fun typing more insults.  

We tell you and tell you and tell you:  Definition of atheism =  disbelief or lack of belief in the existence of God or gods.    We tell you that we have not seen sufficient substantive empirical evidence to support belief in any deities.   Evidence, not something from a book of fairy tales, not stories for people who had "experiences", not philosophical arguments, not "look around you, only an idiot looks at nature and fails to see god" - - - you keep flapping your jaw about evidence, so give us the evidence.  

Put up or shut up.  How much longer are you going to spread shit all over our carpets and try to claim you're throwing pearls before swine?

This.  Evidence comes from the word evident.  If god were so readily evident, it wouldn't need to rely on overwhelmingly personal (and thus not evident to others) justifications/excuses accounting for its existence.

[LastPoet]

Or half arsed 'arguments'...

[KevinM1]

Or half arsed 'arguments'...

If begging the question is wrong, I don't wanna be right.

[AAA]

https://atheistforums.org/thread-9794-po...#pid211908

Your explanation goes back to my previous dilemma: People can see no evidence of God because they have competently examined the evidence and found it lacking, or they are simply incompetent and incapable of seeing the evidence.

Which are you?

EVIDENCE.  You yammer on and on and on about "evidence", you ignore responses and keep yammering about "evidence", and even when we ask for "evidence" you keep yammering on and give us nothing.  Zip.  Nada.   Pages upon pages upon pages of people asking for your "evidence".  You give us absolutely nothing.  Worse than nothing - you ignore everything you've been told, and type crap like the nonsense above.  All you do is stick your nose in the air, try to think up a new way to tell us how superior you are, and have fun typing more insults.  

We tell you and tell you and tell you:  Definition of atheism =  disbelief or lack of belief in the existence of God or gods.    We tell you that we have not seen sufficient substantive empirical evidence to support belief in any deities.   Evidence, not something from a book of fairy tales, not stories for people who had "experiences", not philosophical arguments, not "look around you, only an idiot looks at nature and fails to see god" - - - you keep flapping your jaw about evidence, so give us the evidence.  

Put up or shut up.  How much longer are you going to spread shit all over our carpets and try to claim you're throwing pearls before swine?

You don't think that information rich cells are reason to believe in a designer? Natural explanations are consistently falling short when it comes to explaining the origin and development of chemical information in all living systems. Also the fine tuning of the universe is an old but good argument for a designer of the universe. You can't change the physical laws of the universe even slightly without making the universe very inhospitable to life. The logical conclusion is that it was designed with specificity to permit life to exist. You say you have not seen sufficient evidence of a God, but I think that you would really have to stretch the evidence to not see it.