Why do atheists claim that the concept of God is so unlikely

[CanOfMountainDew]

Hello, I am hoping someone can explain the atheist viewpoint to me on the validity and probability of God's existence.

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Most atheists will claim that the facts show the concept of a God to be so utterly unlikely as to be considered impossible.

But, this is not what the facts show at all.

The theory of Evolution does not explain the origin of life, nor can it explain the existence of life from the first organic cell onward.

How does natural selection explain the eye, for example? How can atheists claim that complex organs like the eye could have evolved, when everything we know about the eye says that it is useless unless all the components are in place at the same time.

As for reptile-mammal transition evidence, where is it in "evidence"?

What are the actual mechanics that achieve it? Not speculation, actual. Not variation in a genus [which evolutionists cling to as being evolution]. Biological changes where a living entity can be observed to be changing into something different, breaching the barriers of its DNA.

For reptiles to become mammals, that breach must have happened. So, someone please show where reptiles are in a state of doing so today - where that transition is taking place.

The facts show that what is overwhelmingly in evidence is what the Bible itself says, that like begets like, and we  all rely on that to occur in all facets of life, from growing/eating fruit and vegetables through to human/animal procreation.

It seems that the evidence supports the concept of God, rather than the atheistic claim that "God probably doesn't exist".

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Ah... another proponent of the god-of-the-gaps theory.

Think of it like this: if a god is Real, then that god is a part of Reality. If something is a part of Reality, then Science will, sooner or later, somehow, get to it. Until then, god is a nice notion, but has nothing solid to back it up.

Now, the tricky bit for you believers: the god concept appeared in the human mind thousands of years ago, when no science was really available.
What is more likely, given what we can all observe nowadays: that the concept was invented by human imagination or that a god actually appeared and imparted the information onto mankind?
If the latter, why are there atheists, still? Or even multiple belief systems?!
If the former, would the result not be something like what we observe?

I always love a good thought-experiment.

[ProgrammingGodJordan]

RE: Why do atheists claim that the concept of God is so unlikely

This is likely due to ignorance/emotional bias.
I am atheistic, and I had 3 years prior discarded all beliefs.

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In this way, I am able to embrace probabilistic thinking.

Now, atheist or not, gods are likely.

It turns out that one doesn't need belief/faith/certainties to observe probabilities:

https://medium.com/@uni.omniscient.x/god....ksz2akrxg

http://god-is-coming.appspot.com/

[henryp]

How does natural selection explain the eye, for example? How can atheists claim that complex organs like the eye could have evolved, when everything we know about the eye says that it is useless unless all the components are in place at the same time.

Like most questions that I can't answer, I just assume there is a non-fantastical answer I'm unaware of at the moment because historically, that's how it always turns out.   Lot of shit gets blamed on Gods/Magic, and all thatf shit turns out to be very much not Gods/Magic.  At some point Charlie Brown needs to develop a bit of pattern recognition and stop trying to kick the football.

[Minimalist]

How does natural selection explain the eye

How do creatard morons explain the fact that eagles have superior eyesight to your supposed paragon of "creation?"

I know you think you are hot shit.... but you've got the temperature wrong.

[Whateverist]

It seems that the evidence supports the concept of God, rather than the atheistic claim that "God probably doesn't exist".

No, it doesn't seem that way at all.  You're just counting a gap in the account science can provide for how life got to be the way it is as a vacuum requiring a god.  It isn't.

Looks like you may be a one-post wonder.  If this is all you've got, it's just as well.

[vorlon13]

man, I'd much rather spend time trying to work out ocular evolution instead of how a Jewish Apocryphal teacher preaching Jewish religion to Jewish people in a Jewish country managed to fucking mutate into 70,000 Christian denominations . . . .

[Pat Mustard]

Hard thing is telling the Poes from the real theists.

Not too hard when he calls himself yadayadayada.

[Yadayadayada]

I have had many discussions with adherents of biological evolution, but whenever I challenge them to explain how, for example, abiogenesis occurred, or for biological evolution to happen thereafter, they typically resort to ad hominem. Why? Because they never have a valid response.

Given the disparaging personal remarks to me, it is obvious that some members of this forum are no different. It never ceases to amaze me how atheists cannot stop themselves from making personal insults, while at the same time claiming to be "logical" and "scientific". Does it make them feel better, perhaps?

I will ignore the vacuous remarks and instead respond only to those with some vestige of substance.

You not knowing how evolution works is not evidence for a god. That's called a 'god of the gaps fallacy', or an 'argument from ignorance fallacy.' You're arguing that because you're ignorant of how some thing is caused, any explanation you throw at it (i.e. god) is just as likely as any other.

I do know how evolution works, and no, I am not arguing that at all. I, as a theist, am not the one who is "ignorant of how some thing is caused", you are since you cling to a theory that is inadequate to explain how things are caused.

That's not evolution.

Neither is what you have described in your post. The beetles remain beetles. They do not evolve into any other kind of bug. That isn't evolution, but merely variation within a kind. So while you claim that "Evolution works because of natural selection", it does no more than what the Bible creation account in Genesis Chapter 1 allows for when it says, "According to their kind".

If it isn't testable, there can't be any evidence.

Observable consequences are evidence. We can consider the existence of God to be a scientific hypothesis and look for the empirical evidence that would follow. Many of the attributes associated with God have specific consequences.

And even if you go with Pascal's Wager you have to consider Cthulhu's Corollary: What I pick the wrong god?

You are right, but what you have put forward here is a reason for why we should examine the evidence and make sure that we are worshipping the right God; it is not an argument for not picking one at all.

Evolution does not attempt to explain life's origins. I'm not sure why theists want to conflate evolution with abiogenesis.

I did not conflate evolution with abiogenesis. I simply stated that the theory of Evolution does not explain the origin of life, which it doesn't.

However, I'm not sure why atheists try so desperately to distance evolution from abiogenesis. (Though I have a pretty good an idea why that might be).

Unless you concede the existence of God and subscribe to theistic evolution in order to explain the origin of life, abiogenesis must have originally occurred in order to commence the process of Darwinian evolution. In other words, abiogenesis is REQUIRED by evolution as the starting point.

There's overwhelming evidence that the bible is wrong about a lot of things. Some things it gets right, but a lot it gets wrong.

I have heard this said several times, but am so far underwhelmed by the "overwhelming evidence".  Please provide a specific example of where the Bible "gets it wrong".  As (according to you) there is overwhelming evidence, it should be easy enough to do so.

...and since the eye has evolved independently many times, we have splendid examples of eyes in every stage of development, from the eye spots of a tapeworm to the eyes of an eagle.

There are many different organisms alive today, with every step from the most rudimentary eye, to the most advanced.

Yes, but are the eyes of those INDIVIDUAL living entities evolving?

Show me where they are doing so. You cannot.

You are seeking to prove the biological evolution of the eye by looking across life forms that have no relationship to each other!

Doing do is as irrelevant as your appeal to the fossil record as proof of evolution.

To make it seem viable you have to presume that things ARE evolving, yet instead what is in evidence is that like is begetting like, and their are proven limitations therein - for instance, a male donkey and female horse can produce the hybrid mule, but the mule is sterile. Same with the Liger [lion/tiger].

Your commentary about the eye in life forms that have no relationship to one another proves my point. Your seeking to show that the eye has evolved across living entities that, in truth, have no relationship with one another shows that you are doing so on the premise that evolution exists.

Your so theorizing puts the cart before the horse. All it proves is that that is how they are. From thousands of years ago, the strength and keen sightedness of the eagle was recorded in Scripture. What has changed? Nothing. Has the eagle been evolving into something else? No. Do we see any of the apes evolving into humans? No. Orangutans beget orangutans, gorillas, gorillas, chimpanzees...

You picked another good one there, since the fossil evidence for the transition from reptile to mammal is abundant...

We have fossil evidence for a very complete reptile to mammal evolution.

Fossil evidence? A fossil is just that - a fossil. It does NOT evidence any evolving all. That is typical evolutionist dishonesty, contriving something and arriving at the conclusions they want in order to substantiate their preconceived notions.

Variation within a genus that is conserved by natural selection totally counts as evolution, and in fact is a necessary part of evolution. You can't have change at the class level that doesn't start at the species level.

While you claim that "variation within a genus that is conserved by natural selection totally counts as evolution," it does no more than what the Bible creation account in Genesis Chapter 1 allows - "totally".

But there are some very good explanations for how life could have started. And none of them require magic. They all are explained by what is currently known of physics and chemistry.

They are not explained by what is currently known of physics and chemistry - at all.

The FACTS show that Miller-Urey and hundreds of similar experiments DO NOT show that concepts such as abiogenesis are feasible, but are so utterly unlikely as to be considered impossible.

You seem a bit arrogant to believe you are able to refute all of evolution, without the least bit of understanding of the subject.

Actually, it is YOU who does not have the least bit of understanding of what evolution is required to show in order for it to be considered a viable explanation for how life arose.


BrianSoddingBoru4: Yes, it is the 21st Century, and yet, there are still people around who believe that humans evolved from fish. Shocking, isn't it?

People who attempt to dismiss evolution are not to be taken seriously.

Just to be clear, I do not dismiss evolution per se. There is no reason why a person should not believe in forms of 'evolution' such as Microbial evolution and Speciation.

These are the types of evolution that an individual with knowledge of science need not accept, since the evidence is lacking:

1) Macro-evolution. Seeing one type of animal evolve into an entirely different type of animal. For example, a dog-like animal evolving into a bear-like animal. This has never been observed and isn't supported by the fossil record, which shows stasis (giving rise to the Punctuated Equilibrium hypothesis).

2) Chemical evolution. Otherwise known as abiogenesis. The hypothesis that life arose from natural chemical reactions. This is unobserved, non-repeatable. The mechanisms of how this was supposed to have happened are currently not established.

"Which God, BTW ? I'll assume you're in the Christian orbit, Christians have 70,000 different takes on God,  care to narrow it down to a few score or hundred or so ?"

You assume correctly. Christians have one God - Psalm 83:18.

As for your alleged god, I see no evidence that is up to my standards. 

Perhaps it would have been more appropriate if you had said "down" to your standards.

Until that happens, I am unconvinced and will not be making even the tiniest of efforts to look for your imaginary friend in the vanishingly small likelihood that it's anything more than fiction.

This attitude of self-imposed ignorance was well expressed in the Bible:

"In his haughtiness, the wicked one makes no investigation; All his thoughts are: “There is no God." - Psalm 10:4.

Of course, there is no benefit in self-delusion, particularly when one's life is at stake.

"Ah... another proponent of the god-of-the-gaps theory."

Theists are not proponents of the "god-of-the-gaps" theory since the "gaps" you speak of are part of the atheist belief system.

"if a god is Real, then that god is a part of Reality. If something is a part of Reality, then Science will, sooner or later, somehow, get to it."

Not according to US National Academy of Sciences: “Science can say nothing about the supernatural. Whether God exists or not is a question about which science is neutral.”

"Now, the tricky bit for you believers"

Actually, this question is far trickier for atheists.

"The god concept appeared in the human mind thousands of years ago, when no science was really available."

The question here is, how did the concept of God "appear" in the human mind in the first place?

"What is more likely, given what we can all observe nowadays: that the concept was invented by human imagination or that a god actually appeared and imparted the information onto mankind?"

The latter is more likely, given that such a complex, highly intelligent entity could not have been invented by the imagination of primitive, nomadic sheep-herders.

As our scientific understanding has increased, we see now more than ever how accurate the Bible is when it touches on scientific matters. This is far beyond the abilities of the men who wrote it all those years ago.

As an example, consider that the Bible demonstrated knowledge of microbiology thousands of years in advance of scientific discovery when it commanded the Israelites to bury their excrement in the ground. This was when when the most scientifically advanced civilization on earth at the time, the Egyptians, were rubbing faeces on open wounds to heal them.

How do creatard morons explain the fact that eagles have superior eyesight to your supposed paragon of "creation?"

Eagles hunt prey two miles above the ground, humans do not. So, God created eagles with eyesight to see prey from two miles away. Pretty simple.

No, it doesn't seem that way at all.  You're just counting a gap in the account science can provide for how life got to be the way it is as a vacuum requiring a god.  It isn't.

Yes, it does. I do not look to "the account science can provide" as an explanation "for how life got to be the way it is", you do. The "gaps" are in your own belief system, so your argument is moot.

Looks like you may be a one-post wonder.  If this is all you've got, it's just as well.

I have plenty - for anyone who is willing to consider the facts with an open mind.  It is the "evidence for Evolution" that I hear so much about that is sorely lacking. And the evidence that is presented simply does not hold up under scrutiny.

Until any of you can actually SHOW where a life form has turned into a different life form [as Evolutionists claimed happened from simple cell structures into all the life forms we see today], then your theorizing here is as unconvincing to me as my beliefs are to you.

[Jesster]

[ignoramus]