(January 31, 2015 at 9:42 pm)Blackout Wrote: We atheists think we're right about the god hypothesis, and in our defense I'd say it's embarrassing to be always right on the same subject. Regardless, not everything we say is necessarily right, accurate or valid; and because I want atheists to grow as a demographic, I've decided to make list of arguments or factual statements that atheists should stop using. For the record, some of them are actually true and can be said in some circumstances, but when it comes to the debate about god's hypothetical existence none of the following proves that god doesn't exist or that atheism is logically correct:
1 - A high percentage of scientists don't believe in god ---> This is an appeal to authority, and it's not any better than the theist argument of Most people in the world believe in god, therefore god exists. Independently of what scientists think, atheism is not composed solely by scientists and just because scientists say so it doesn't mean they are right or that atheism should have a gigantic boost in credibility, since the average atheist is not a copy of Dawkins. This applies to appeals made to any scientist, famous or not. [It's true that most scientists believe in god, it's a fact, it has been surveyed - But this doesn't prove atheism is right; just like if most scientists believed in god it wouldn't prove god exists]
I largely agree with your post, but my experience is that often these arguments are used in ways that make them appropriate in context, as I'm sure you would agree (you were very careful in how you formulated your points). For example 'most of the scientists in the Academy don't believe in a personal god' is a good point to make in response to 'half of American scientists believe in God', and so is pointing out that 50% isn't very impressive in a country where the rate of Christian belief is around 77%. It's often the other chap who brings up scientists, relative IQs, and the like. As an appeal to authority on God, scientists are unqualified, but as an appeal to authority on biology or physics...it really should be called 'appeal to inappropriate authority'. And God claims are often very tangled up in biology or physics.
I'm not anti-Christian. I'm anti-stupid.
