From atheism to tentative agnosticism

[Foxaèr]

Atheism is false if a god exists.

You can continue repeating the same tired line, but it is not going to make a god magically real or any of your arguments suddenly logical.

[Inigo]

You can continue repeating the same tired line, but it is not going to make a god magically real or any of your arguments suddenly logical.

I am just stating what the term Atheism means. I started this thread. It is what I use the term to mean. It is what everyone apart from a fool uses the term to mean. I am arguing that atheism - the view that no gods exist - is false, or at least that there is some good reason to think it is.
If you mean something else by the term, great. But you're not being addressed then, are you? if you think atheism is compatible with a god existing, then nothing I am saying challenges your ridiculous and misleading use of that term. So you shouldn't be disagreeing with me. Yet you are. I have to conclude that you are mightily confused.

[The Grand Nudger]

I am just stating what the term Atheism means. I started this thread. It is what I use the term to mean. It is what everyone apart from a fool uses the term to mean. I am arguing that atheism - the view that no gods exist - is false, or at least that there is some good reason to think it is.

Didn't this argument just go down not a few weeks ago with the last fundie that had a definition in mind that they felt prepared to argue against, ignoring any dissent because they realized that they weren't prepared?

Stick with it buddy, it's totally -not- blowing your "cover".

[fr0d0]

perhaps there's some other way of satisfying those features. But I do not know of it. Perhaps those assumptions are false. But nobody has provided me with any reason to think they are false yet.

Completely agreed

[Angrboda]

Still waiting on answers to the following questions:

1. How would one determine that moral reality, separate from moral phenomena (the "appearance" of moral truths), actually exists?
2. In what way would a god provide for the existence of, what in common parlance is called objective morality, and you call moral reality? (See various on the Euthyphro dilemma.)
3. You realize that your argument is fallacious, right? ("I can't imagine how morality without a god exists, therefore a god must exist" — argumentum ad ignorantum.)
4. There appears to be an unspoken but implied argument from consequences here; yes or no? ("If there is no moral reality, that would be bad; therefore there is moral reality, therefore a god must exist.") So what if there is no "moral reality" ?
5. You use the term "hallucinatory" as another fallacious implied argument, suggesting that because something only exists in the mind, it is not "real" or genuine or meaningful; memories exist only in the mind, are they then to be considered "hallucinations" in the same sense? (See the argument from consequences.) Calling a mental phenomenon a hallucination carries an implied value judgement, this makes using it this way fallacious.
6. What do you consider "real" that you know about by another means than the mind? In other words, is there phenomena and reality, or just phenomena?
7. What are the consequences if moral reality doesn't exist? (In other words, so what?) (this one was redundant)

[Whateverist]

You can continue repeating the same tired line, but it is not going to make a god magically real or any of your arguments suddenly logical.

I am just stating what the term Atheism means. I started this thread. It is what I use the term to mean. It is what everyone apart from a fool uses the term to mean. I am arguing that atheism - the view that no gods exist - is false, or at least that there is some good reason to think it is.
If you mean something else by the term, great. But you're not being addressed then, are you? if you think atheism is compatible with a god existing, then nothing I am saying challenges your ridiculous and misleading use of that term. So you shouldn't be disagreeing with me. Yet you are. I have to conclude that you are mightily confused.

Well you should certainly recognize confused when you see it. Yet you don't.

Why don't you just come clean and confess that you are a die-in-the-wool Christian apologist pretending to be what you aren't in some pathetic attempt to convert the heathen. Ridiculous little man.

[max-greece]

Why is this discussion happening over 2 threads at the same time?

Inigo,

You haven't covered in either thread why morality cannot be a feature of our evolution - with no external agent involved.

Morality appears to simply be the next step in behavioural control, beyond pheromones and instinct - required for intelligent social creatures.

[pocaracas]

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I also wonder why you call this argument painfully obvious, yet you have spent all your life being an atheist up until fairly recently.

Well, because I didn't say that, did I? What I claimed was painfully obvious was the distinction between moral phenomena and morality itself. It is painfully obvious to me and always has been. Confusing moral sensations and beliefs for morality itself is as foolish as confusing beliefs about a chair with a chair. This doesn't stop people from making such foolish mistakes. Indeed, this seems to be 'the' major mistake that most people make when they start trying to figure out what morality might be. Rather than focussing on morality, they give historical accounts of the development of our moral sense and so on (and thereby assume they are giving an account of morality - when they are doing no such thing).

Anyway, what morality 'is' in itself is not obvious and I have never claimed it is. I have, by thinking about the matter carefully, come to the conlusion that there is only one thing morality can be, and that is the instrtuctions of a god. That is not through ignorance of other options. But I find the other options to either fail to capture the instructing nature of morality, or they capture that feature but fail to capture its rational authority. I know of no other way than mine of capturing both fetaures at once, and I think both features are essential. But it isn't obvious that morality consists in the instructions of a god. It takes careful reasoning to see it if, that is, it is true.

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Let's see if I can make sense of what's going on...
You say there are two things:
- moral sensations and beliefs: what each human tribe perceives as its guiding moral compass
- morality: An extra-human source of the moral rules.

It's like (strawman time!)
- Mathematics: An extra-human source for the rules of algebra.
- Algebra: humanity's attempt at solving mathematical problems.

Back to morality... if my understanding of your words is half right, you're defining something as extra-human and then coming to the conclusion that it can only be from a god.
To me, the problem lies in the definition.
If morality is extra-human and horizontal, that is the same for every human society at every time instance, how can we explain that for some very large periods of time, whole societies considered moral something that we nowadays consider immoral? (eg: slavery, child labor)
How can we think that nowadays human morals are the correct ones that this extra-human entity is imbuing into us?

No... it seems that human morals are genetically passed traits that enable us to live in communities.... like lions, wolves, ants, bees, etc... genetic information can provide us with such an inbuilt tendency of behavior. Of course, some people have faulty genes, leading to faulty behavior.... in theory, leading to banishment from the society and not passing on those faulty genes... in practice, it's complicated.
Then we have the instinct for survival and plain old greed to deal with and which would crumble the whole moral building.
So, along with the genetic rules (which, most likely, basically boil down to the golden rule) we have other agreed upon rules in society: the law. These are very mutable and proof of that is that each country has its own law which differs from every other country.

As with many other features of humans, each person's morals end up being a mix of genetic predisposition and rules imposed by the society to which that person belongs.
As far as I can see it, no god is required... unless you're stuck with the perception that your very human ruler is a god.

[Cyberman]

I am just stating what the term Atheism means. I started this thread. It is what I use the term to mean. It is what everyone apart from a fool uses the term to mean.

Hmm, where did you get the well-poison? Seriously, I've looked everywhere and was told they stopped making it.

II am arguing that atheism - the view that no gods exist - is false, or at least that there is some good reason to think it is.

And guess what - we've been agreeing with you for the last several pages! That definition of 'atheism' that your whole entire argument hangs from is, indeed, false.

[Brian37]

My arguments have a god as a CONCLUSION. In other words, I haven't put god in, I've gotten god out.

So your presuppositions lead to a conclusion. But they're still presuppositions right?

Don't try to treat your god claim as equal to scientific method.

Science has a solid foundation of prior tested data, that is not presuming a fucking thing. Invisible friend claims however are naked assertions.

A history of believing in something fictional does not equal truth.

Scientific method and good logic work like this.

Prior tested and established data=tested and established formula=projected outcome

Imaginary friend claims(no testing required)<=made up excuses retrofit to cling to claim<=desired outcome

Imaginary friend claims do not hold a candle to science. Religions are nothing but childish mental toys. Science is the adult tool that allows us to discover and know the nature of reality.