(March 2, 2014 at 4:07 pm)JesusLover1 Wrote: Why do atheists not rely on what people say? Why should I believe what anyone says then?
We rely on what people say all the time. But we proportion our belief according to the available prior information. If you say you tied your shoe yourself this morning, most of us will take you at your word...but NOT because testimony is so reliable. Because of our prior knowledge that most people who can type can tie their own shoes, we know it is not an extraordinary claim, so we require very little evidence to accept it. If you say you don't need shoes because you levitate everywhere you go, it will take more than your word to get us to believe you.
The first thing we normally do with claims is evaluate them for 'ordinariness'. If we're theists, we waive that requirement as long as it's just for our own religion.
