No reason justifies disbelief.

[LadyForCamus]

To simply declare that there is no reason to disbelieve is just that, a declaration.

Simply to make a declaration is not to make an argument. 

Some people feel there are reasons to believe. You say there aren't.

People have all sorts of reasons for believing all manner of things.  Whether or not they’re good reasons is another conversation entirely.

[The Grand Nudger]

Oddly enough, god's have yet to flit off the pages that contain them.  I'm not really sure what we're supposed to be talking about if it's not that.

[Pat Mustard]

You may have me confused with someone else. I am not a believer. I am only trying to be careful about how we make arguments.

Your posting history mocks that sentence. Everything you've said on this forum is stated in the logic and language of theistic belief.

[The Grand Nudger]

That's not so remarkable, honestly.  It's called undue deference.  As a consequence of the place that belief has carved out for itself...there are people who don't believe who nevertheless imagine that specious arguments for belief are credible.

"How do you deny the compelling nature of teleological whatsits!" - they ask. 

"Whatabout a first cause, huh, atheists?"- they follow.

That doesn't mean that they're believers....that they aren't atheists, only that they have no idea how to respond to these things themselves...and whn you combine that with the cacophony of religious nonsense..that they hear as much as anyone else, it seems to construct a one-sided narrative. Not that this applies, for sure, to any of our luminaries. Nine out of time times they're feckless trolls who lack the courage of their convictions.

[Belacqua]

I think you are playing fast and loose with word definitions here

I assure you I am not. I am using terms in the best way I know how. If you think I'm wrong that's fine, but don't accuse me of insincerity.

how can imagining something that is not testable in any way increase information, add facts or proof of any kind ?  So when you say 'other types of evidence' what are you talking about, and how does it fit the definition of evidence ? 

If you begin with the premise that only empirical, intersubjectively repeatable, quantifiable results count as evidence, it's impossible to discuss metaphysics at all. 

Religious people generally accept authority, tradition, revelation, etc., as evidence. I'm not saying they're right, only that atheists have a commitment that they're wrong. That is why atheists do have commitments which may be challenged and defended. Atheists generally don't have just a lack, they have metaphysical premises they operate by. 

As for numbers, they are completely meaningless without a something, so saying 5 is completely redundant, it adds no information whatsoever and is a way created by minds to describe 5 of something, not 5 of nothing. 

No doubt math started as counting stuff. It's gone a bit beyond that now. There is a lot of math that takes place in mental math-land, and doesn't map onto physical one apple two apples three apples kinds of stuff. The square roots of negative numbers, etc. Cantor's concepts of infinity. 

Well no, taken as is it is clearly a story, it would have to be necessarily taken in a very different way even to the point of disagreement over which parts should be taken literally or not. A quick look at different sects of any religion will tell you this, This is where evidence and not belief comes in.

Historical or geographical evidence is relevant if we want to know whether an event really happened, or what the original authors meant. But religious texts are usually of a different type. The Book of Job, for example, isn't important as a historical record. And it isn't really important what the original authors and editors had in mind. What's important is what people have made of it. What it means to us who read it. There are better and worse readings, but that doesn't depend on evidence. It depends on wisdom. 

I sincerely hope you don't get in trouble for mentioning any philosopher, my problem is again this just may be me being a little simplistic is that even when i was a theist I saw no merits in these arguments, I always thought of them simply as a way of avoiding saying 'I don't know'

I really hope that most people who use the arguments take it as a given that we don't know. It's not something humans are really capable of being sure about. Belief ("I hold it to be true") stands back from claiming that "I absolutely know it to be true." 

It's not fair, though, to say that the people who work on these arguments are trying to avoid something. In many cases they are sincerely trying to work something out. If you think they're wrong, OK, but don't begin with the premise that they're insincere. 

Or even worse 'A thing that holds everything else in existence', what does that even mean as a way of knowing what god is? 

Well, there you go. That's the result of a long chain of logical argument. It's not easy to follow; it takes work. I'm not saying it must be true; I'm not sure. But many people have worked on it, sincerely found it to be reasonable, and held that it is something like proof. I know a guy at the University of Chicago philosophy PhD program who thinks it's probably true, and he has worked on it among smart skeptics for years. Which is not to make an argument from authority, but just to show that smart people can sincerely hold positions different from you. 

I admire them for trying to answer the questions of the day but don't believe they have answered a question, so much as avoided one.

I don't agree with you about this.

---

People have all sorts of reasons for believing all manner of things.  Whether or not they’re good reasons is another conversation entirely.

Thank you, this is what I always say. 

We tend to have reasons, and we should try to make sure they're good reasons.

[LadyForCamus]

@Belaqua

Are you an atheist?

[Belacqua]

@Belaqua

Are you an atheist?

In the strict since of lacking belief, yes.

I'm not sure what's true, though. And I don't really want to label myself as one thing or another. I'm a not-at-all-important person who's interested in working on these things.

[LadyForCamus]

@Belaqua

Are you an atheist?

In the strict since of lacking belief, yes.

I'm not sure what's true, though. And I don't really want to label myself as one thing or another. I'm a not-at-all-important person who's interested in working on these things.

If you don’t mind me asking, for what reasons do you lack a belief in god?

[Belacqua]

In the strict since of lacking belief, yes.

I'm not sure what's true, though. And I don't really want to label myself as one thing or another. I'm a not-at-all-important person who's interested in working on these things.

If you don’t mind me asking, for what reasons do you lack a belief in god?

Interesting question! 

I'd say: the knowledge that I'm not wise or smart enough to answer the big questions. That far smarter people have believed things that are different. That any individual, even in the Internet age, lives in a very restricted intellectual "belief environment" (what Foucault called an "episteme").

[Jehanne]

Oddly enough, god's have yet to flit off the pages that contain them.  I'm not really sure what we're supposed to be talking about if it's not that.

Only if god/God would post on this board...  (And, I'll wait for the theistic rejoinder.)