Do Extraordinary Claims Require Extraordinary Evidence?

[Thumpalumpacus]

I don't need evidence for my atheism, because the only claim it makes is about my belief state. I do not say "there is no god." There may be. But I've yet to see any evidence for any god.

I agree, I find it frustrating that Steve thinks he has this though.

If his bullshit was so obvious we would all believe. So he either thinks we are in wilful denial or that we are fibbers. Or, and he won't accept this, he may be wrong.

I think the real answer is that he posits his strawman that all atheists are hard atheists in order to knock down the entire position. I agree that saying "there is no god" is speaking beyond our own knowledge. The most I feel comfortable saying is that I can certainly knock down the Abrahamic god due to internal contradictions; for that particular god, I am indeed a hard atheist. Other gods, such as Thor causing thunder by riding his chariot across the skies, I am comfortable saying, "bullshit", because we've flown above the clouds over a thunderstorm and there ain't no chariots there.

Others, well, I cannot say they don't exist. Of course that can be used either of two ways but the Internet Theist™: they can either say "Aha! So you don't know!" and pigeon the chessboard, or they can say, "But no, not believing is evidence of being closed off to the experience."

Me, I don't give a shit either way. They can believe me when I speak my mind, or they can impute thoughts, but they cannot actually say what I think, so fuck 'em.

This Steve guy is one of those whom I find to be uninteresting for his inability to deal with nuance. And that ain't my problem.

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[...] testimony that is better than 99% of all historical documents.

lol

I've got a bridge you might be interested in. I swear.

Fish, meet hook.

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You seem to have a very distorted idea of how long it takes for events to be mythologized. It can happen in a very short time [...]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cargo_cult