Atheists... why do you believe that God doesn't exist?

[Coffee Jesus]

I totally understand your frustration chas.

I made the statement in another thread that atheists here make sure everyone understands that atheism is a lack of belief, and they called me a liar and demanded I make a poll.

The whole "atheism is simply a lack of belief" card turns out to be a lie the minute atheists start to defend their lack of belief by giving reasons for it. Once you start making claims for or against an idea then you have stopped being agnostic (that strangely forgotten word) and have started to advocate a position. It's a dishonest bait-and-switch tactic to avoid the burden of proof.

Why should we have the burden of proof? Why explain with things we don't know exist when we can explain with things we do know exist?

Maybe Tod really witnessed divine intervention... or maybe he was loopy from the dehydration... or having a psychotic break... or lying to become popular... or didn't know probably theory... or witnessed the kind of fluke that ~1% of people will witness. We don't need to posit the existence of something that isn't known to exist to explain why Tod is making these odd claims, and that's what atheists don't do. We don't necessarily live as if there is no God, we just live as if God isn't a preferable explanation for things.