Belief and Knowledge

[genkaus]

That's not specific at all.

In what way is that not specific? Rise to the occasion and give me one example of something you, as an atheist, believe does not have a natural cause.

Whoa - don't start moving the goalposts just yet. You said non-divine cause, not natural cause.

For example, for a period of time in my past, I was an atheist and still believed in psychic energies. I used to believe that ghosts and apparitions in haunted places were the result of psychic imprint left by the person.

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Bullshit! If you have any opinion about how the world works, either 1) with divine influence or 2) without divine influence, then you have a "worldview." And that worldview does affect other beliefs, like what you believe about religion.

Bullshit! Neither of those positions is a worldview because a worldview necessarily contains more than one belief.

[Neo-Scholastic]

You said non-divine cause, not natural cause... a worldview necessarily contains more than one belief.

Okay, since you're all about semantics, what do you call an opinion that potentially affects everything else you believe about the world?

[Heywood]

For the former, Heywood said early on that abiogenesis is an irrational thing to believe in, as it has never been observed.

I never said abiogenesis is an irrational thing to believe in as it has never been observed.

[Mister Agenda]

Atheists simply don't believe in gods. That's it. No one is qualified to speak for all of us regarding anything else.

That's a cop out though isn't it? Have some balls and nail your colours to the mast. When it comes to the nitty gritty, I don't fall back on theism and say, well, the only thing you can hang me for is that I believe in a god or gods. I get into the detail of what I think. Atheism is a broad term with a simple meaning should we choose that definition. Let's not hide behind it so we can avoid any hard questions.

You can be such an ass, fr0d0. We know you're some flavor of Christian. We don't get stuck on the fact that you're a theist, we want to know more about your position than that. We're still working on getting people to understand atheists come in different flavors. I'm more than happy to defend 'my flavor' but I won't be dishonest and claim atheism is something it isn't for your convenience and satisfaction. I can count on one hand the times a theist has tried to ascertain what my position is beyond mere atheism without prompting. I'm looking forward to the day when we don't have to spend so much blasted time on the fundamentals of what an atheist is and isn't that we can actually get past that to something more interesting. Look how long Heywood has been here and he still has to have the simplest things explained to him.

[Faith No More]

Bullshit! If you have any opinion about how the world works, either 1) with divine influence or 2) without divine influence, then you have a "worldview." And that worldview does affect other beliefs, like what you believe about religion.

No, whether or not you believe in divine influence affects your worldview, but it is not a worldview as is. There are many other factors that come into play, which is why trying to use the term "atheist worldview" is an over-simplification.

[Simon Moon]

For the former, Heywood said early on that abiogenesis is an irrational thing to believe in, as it has never been observed.

I never said abiogenesis is an irrational thing to believe in as it has never been observed.

Neither have the majority of murders.

Yet we are able to examine them after the fact, and determine, with a high level of certainty, the method of death, the type of weapon, time of death, etc, etc.

The only thing necessary to make abiogenesis more rational to believe as the source of life, as compared to a god, is that it has natural explanations for every step and does not break any laws.

The fact that we don't have the exact way it occurred on earth, does not mean we don't have a way it could have happened. There is no need to add a step in the process for 'magic'.

[Esquilax]

You said non-divine cause, not natural cause... a worldview necessarily contains more than one belief.

Okay, since you're all about semantics, what do you call an opinion that potentially affects everything else you believe about the world?

Except that it doesn't have to affect everything else, that's just you making a wild assertion about an entire group of people, of whom you know a comparatively small set. As has been pointed out to you, beyond this one thing in which we lack beliefs, everything else is open to belief for an atheist.

For example, you keep yammering on about how atheists exclude the supernatural because they don't believe in divine creators, but my immediate question in response to that is, since when was "divinity" the only thing contained within the set "supernatural elements."? Atheists don't believe in gods, but you can find atheists who believe in all sorts of magic and spirit stuff, same as you could find theists that would do the same.

What you're doing is pretending that philosophical naturalism is the same thing as atheism, which is an equivocation. And then you're trying to tell us that any opinion which affects other parts of your view of reality is a worldview, but pretty much any opinion one holds affects other opinions; they aren't generally held in a vacuum, after all. In your desperation to win a point you're trying to say that any single part of a cohesive whole is itself its own whole, and that's nonsense. Your opinions and beliefs compose your worldview, but just because they interact and bounce off of one another doesn't make each individual belief a worldview.

[Mister Agenda]

Theists continually attempt to patch together various beliefs into an 'atheist world view'.

That's because atheism logically entails a very specific worldview: a world without the influence of god(s). By default that means that atheists must believe that every known phenomena has a non-divine cause.

Or change their minds if a divine cause turns up.

I'm open to hear of a middle ground that someone actually believes and promotes. If I'm wrong then, I would like to hear something any AF member atheist believes that does not have a natural cause.

Agreeing with you isn't 'middle ground'. Most of us are willing to change our minds. Some of us for reasons that don't nearly have to amount to a miracle. And just because atheists who believe in ghosts or reincarnation are scarce around here doesn't mean they don't exist, or that speciifying AF member atheists because you KNOW that atheists who believe in 'unnatural causes' exist is anything but a rhetorical device to evade acknowledging that simple truth. Rational skeptics have enough of a majority here that we tend to run off the atheist nutjobs who, after all, at least don't think they have a divine commission to change our minds...but that just means this forum can't be used as a reasonable basis for declaring generalities about 'what the atheist viewpoint MUST entail'.

[Heywood]

It's not quite that simple. Lack of belief can be simply not having thought about the matter sufficiently to form a belief, or determining after thought that there isn't enough evidence to decide the matter. Do you believe that my hair is red or perhaps brown? You have no knowledge whether it is or isn't either of those colors. You don't know. Are you failing to commit to a belief that my hair is red, or are you simply saying, I don't know what color Jenny's hair is. I would say you are without knowledge or belief about my hair color. There's no lack of commitment, just a genuine lack of knowledge.

However, when many atheists, me included, say we lack a belief in god, what we mean is I don't believe there is a god because if there were I would expect there to be some evidence of it, but I acknowledge that a negative position can never be proven.

Jenny's hair is red.
Jenny's hair is brown.
Jenny's hair is some other color.
Jenny has no hair.

I have not committed to any of the above propositions. I have no beliefs concerning your hair. Now consider these next two propositions.

Santa Clause is a real person who owns a sled and team of flying reindeer.
Santa Clause and his sled and team of flying reindeer are artifacts of fiction.

I have committed to one of those propositions. I have a belief about Santa Clause.....that he is an artifact of fiction. Now consider these last two propositions.

God probably exists.
God probably does not exist.

I don't know if God exists. That is me making a statement about my knowledge. Nevertheless, I have committed to one of those propositions. Have you? If you have I don't think you can hide behind, "I simply lack belief in God or gods". Lack of belief is lack of commitment. Taking on the label "atheist" and participating in the atheist community certainly suggests to me some sort of commitment.

[FatAndFaithless]

Not accepting the claim "God exists", probably or otherwise, is not the same as asserting the opposite.