"The New Atheists are back — and dumber than ever"

[Easy Guns]

The real strawman is theists who attempt to attack atheism as if it's some kind of exclusive belief system to which all atheists adhere.

/end thread

[Edwardo Piet]

I suppose I'm also pointing out the hypocrisy of people who lack belief and yet claim God doesn't exist.

I "lack" belief in the FSM... if I claim that the FSM "doesn't fucking exist" does that make me a hypocrite?

[Cato]

Delicate perfectly describes this idiot's relationship with reality.

[drfuzzy]

That's exactly what I'm doing. I'm just pointing out errors in beliefs.

That's fine, but then you make the category error of insisting that the basic atheist position is the belief that gods do not exist, despite being corrected multiple times by people who somehow think they know more about what they do and do not believe than you do. See, if the only way you can get your arguments to work is by having to misrepresent your opponents' position, it might not be their position that's the weak one.

Errors in beliefs.  Whose?  Ours?  I'm sure there are Muslims out there that would be happy to point out errors in YOUR beliefs.  In fact, with over 3/4 of the planet not Xtian, there are around 5 billion people alive today who might point out errors in your beliefs, if they actually wanted to be as rude and offensive as you are.  

My beliefs, or lack of them, my stance on religion is none of your business.  How dare you come into OUR HOUSE and try to point out errors in our beliefs?  If you have the capability to do so at all, imagine, for just one moment, someone walking into your kitchen and belittling you, calling you stupid and incompetent and deluded, because of the things you believe.      You are THAT person.     I pity you.

[Delicate]

I'm not denying anything people believe, per se. I accept that the position they stake out in public is "lack of evidence"

I'm just rejecting the undefended asserted redefinition of atheism and giving my reasons for it.

I suppose I'm also pointing out the hypocrisy of people who lack belief and yet claim God doesn't exist. This serves as evidence that what people believe, and what they SAY they believe might not be the same thing.

Atheism, for the vast majority of atheists, is not an assertion. It is a response to a claim. 

Theists claim that a god exists. Atheists simply are unconvinced by theist's arguments.

So, did you ever stop to consider you are arguing against a straw man of your own construction? Nah, you're way too intelligent to do that...

If you construe it as a response, my question is, what justifies the response?

The answer I've gotten so far is: Nothing.

[drfuzzy]

Atheism, for the vast majority of atheists, is not an assertion. It is a response to a claim. 

Theists claim that a god exists. Atheists simply are unconvinced by theist's arguments.

So, did you ever stop to consider you are arguing against a straw man of your own construction? Nah, you're way too intelligent to do that...

If you construe it as a response, my question is, what justifies the response?

The answer I've gotten so far is: Nothing.

We have given you our justification, quite clearly, dozens of times.  Lack of scientific evidence.  That's all.
You have given us nothing but logical fallacies and abuse.  We have gotten nothing from you, despite all of your claims to have evidence that we are too stupid and incompetent to recognize.   The one who is empty is you.   You give nothing but evil.

[Easy Guns]

Atheism, for the vast majority of atheists, is not an assertion. It is a response to a claim. 

Theists claim that a god exists. Atheists simply are unconvinced by theist's arguments.

So, did you ever stop to consider you are arguing against a straw man of your own construction? Nah, you're way too intelligent to do that...

If you construe it as a response, my question is, what justifies the response?

The answer I've gotten so far is: Nothing.

Why do I need to justify a response to your claim?

That's how an exchange works.

You made a claim, I asked for evidence. You're unable provide any. Therefore I must conclude your claim is likely false.

Seems pretty simple to me.

[Whateverist]

Oh dear. I fear we have disappointed this very discerning theist, inDelicate.[/sarcasm]

[Simon Moon]

Atheism, for the vast majority of atheists, is not an assertion. It is a response to a claim. 

Theists claim that a god exists. Atheists simply are unconvinced by theist's arguments.

So, did you ever stop to consider you are arguing against a straw man of your own construction? Nah, you're way too intelligent to do that...

If you construe it as a response, my question is, what justifies the response?

The answer I've gotten so far is: Nothing.

Oh blood f'n hell!

I am justified to continue my disbelief in the existence of gods based on the continued lack of demonstrable, verifiable, falsifiable evidence, reasoned argument and valid and sound logic to support theist's claims that a god does exists. Pretty much the exact same reasons I disbelieve: alien abductions, witch craft, bigfoot, Tarot card reading, dowsing, talking to the dead, etc, etc, ad nauseam.

The reason why you continue to get "nothing" as a response, is because you continue to not provide us with any evidence for your god claims that will pass the above criteria.

Once again, i am not claiming, with absolute certainty, that a god does not exist. My position is that a case for the existence of a god has never met its burden of proof. As long as the claim that god exists does not meet its burden of proof, my atheism will continue.

But you haven't really been getting "nothing" as a response, have you? What you've been getting, over and over, is requests to provide your evidence for the existence of the god you claim exists. If it meets the above criteria, I will be compelled, by my skepticism and intellectual honesty, to accept, (tentatively) your claim is true.

It is becoming more  and more obvious, that you are intellectually dishonest. Or maybe just dense. You pick.

[Cyberman]

I read that last as "You prick". I do apologise...