[Serious] Literal and Not Literal

[Belacqua]

Yes, but here's the thing. If you can actually explain how what they're saying is wrong, most of them (I bet) will pay attention and correct their stances on this matter. But in this whole thread, I haven't seen anyone (theist or atheist) show that (almost certainly) Genesis was meant to not be taken literally from the start. Instead, when I asked for supporting argument from Acrobat, I got the kind of response that showed they don't have a good understanding of how myths can start and then develop. Stories progress over time with more details and tend to be more elaborate over time to the point it becomes almost a different story from the original. Furthermore, it is clear that people in the past took for granted all sorts of absurd things we don't accept anymore thanks to modern science (a skim through a history of religion book would do good for those who question this).

I don't think anybody knows what was in the minds of the first authors of Genesis. 

If someone makes the claim that the stories were meant to be literal, that claim needs some back-up beyond intuition. It may be true, but I see no reason to believe it, given what we know of how ancient societies wrote myths. 

One current theory (based on historical and linguistic research) is that both the northern and southern Jewish kingdoms wrote similar creation stories out of whole cloth, intended to give a national identity that could counter the influence of stronger countries to the north. The authors knew full well that there was no empirical reason to make stories like this; they were spiritual, national, self-justifying myths from the beginning. Again, I don't know if that's true. But it's backed up by more than intuition. 

As I have said many times, it's true that stories progress and often lose their original meanings. This is a good and useful thing about myths. But it does nothing to strengthen the idea that the myths were originally meant literally.

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In the case of God, then one can reasonably believe God (in the supernatural sense) does not exist because the evidence that is strongly expected for such a grand entity just isn't there. If it isn't there, then it's very likely such a being does not exist. If someone says they're sure, though, based on lack of evidence, then that would be unreasonable.

Here we get back to the constant problem of what a god would be like, and therefore what evidence would be required to identify it.

For the most part, when people say there is no evidence for one, they have in mind (tacitly or not) some idea of what a god would be like, and how we could detect it. Then based on their definition, they are reasonable to state that there is no evidence. 

And as always, we get back to the problem that the god they imagine is more like Zeus than like the god of the theologians. I completely agree that Zeus if he existed could be detected with scientific means. Since there is no evidence for him, and moreover good reason to think that such a creature would be incompatible with what we know of the world, it is reasonable to conclude that he never existed. 

It's very difficult to get past that type of god -- the one that anti-religion people are busy not believing in. But people who study the history of ideas all agree that such a god is impossible. Including all theologians. This leaves unanswered and unaddressed the kind of god the theologians talk about.