(November 20, 2011 at 1:09 pm)chadster1976 Wrote: It does occur to me that we currently postulate and accept many things we cannot directly measure. Think of how we measure and observe things now that were considered impossible only 2 or 3 generations back. I believe dark matter might exist and await confirmation. I believe God exists too. I accept I could be wrong on both of these points.
Personally, I don't understand why you're sick of hearing from theists such a basic philosophical point. I am not sick of hearing atheists tell me God doesn't exist. I enjoy such philosophical discussions and I enjoy scientific discussions. I also believe that we are as near to combining the two as we are to a unified theory. It's not impossible but we are a long way off yet.
We may postulate many things, such as what I just did there - what if the big bang wasn't the start but the nth big bang? There is utterly no way of ever testing that, however it's just a thought I had, but I don't believe it to be true.
Theists believe their own unevidenced untestable theory to be true, and that is the only example of this happening.
You keep on saying it is valid to believe god exists, no it isn't because there is no evidence to back it up
However it is perfectly valid for an atheist to say he doesn't believe there is a god and I don't need to even explain to you why.
You cannot compare the two stances validity.
You are currently experiencing a lucky and very brief window of awareness, sandwiched in between two periods of timeless and utter nothingness. So why not make the most of it, and stop wasting your life away trying to convince other people that there is something else? The reality is obvious.
