Why I'm an atheist, a point of confusion for many theists

[vorlon13]

Well we have 'made up' tooth fairies, leprechauns, and werewolves, but they all pale in their 'made-upness' when compared to all the shit Joe Smith came up with.

[brewer]

People often equate belief in God or Christianity with following a certain prescribed set of rules or things they must accomplish.  This is where Christianity differs from all other religions.  Salvation has nothing to do with following rules or living a certain way.  Yes those things may come, but they are not a prerequisite.

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None of that matters, unless you can provide demonstrable, falsifiable evidence and reasoned argument to support your case that a god actually exists, and created a system that requires 'salvation'.

It appears to me the Bible itself, and the events depicted in it, and the life of Christ, are among the strongest evidence for God.  The Bible is testable.  If you find it to be true then what it claims should hold some weight.  At the end of the day it is still entirely up to the individual if they desire to subscribe to it.

Not in any way  is the Bible evidence for the existence of the god character depicted in it. The Bible is the claim.

How is the Bible 'testable'?

Yes, this. How testable? Is it all testable or only cherry picked sections?

[Catholic_Lady]

I'm confused!!

[Faith No More]

You're Catholic. We know you're confused.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

I agree that the Bible is testable.  It can be tested for absorbency, flammability, aerodynamic properties, to see it it's the proper height to even out that wonky table leg, lots of things. In fact, I tested all four of my Bibles to see which one was the right thickness to wedge my (nearly complete) collection of 'Doc Savage Magazines' on the book shelf. One of the KJVs fit like a glove.

Boru

[Minimalist]

The Bible is testable.

And it has failed.  Try again.

[vorlon13]

God 'confusing the tongues' at the Tower of Babel refuted by the Bible itself recording different tongues in use prior to flood.

Matthew noting Christ's followers need to maintain the Law, Apostle Paul refuting the requirement.

Jesus crucified on Friday claim refuted by another gospel claiming Thursday.

Bible claim Jesus was sired by God, claim refuted by Bible documenting descent thru Joseph.



No shortage of stuff claimed and refuted in the Bible itself.

[robvalue]

Nice OP. I tend to vault right over all this and go straight for why I reject religions of all kinds. I find them irrelevant, and often immoral, regardless of whether they contain any truth.

People often equate belief in God or Christianity with following a certain prescribed set of rules or things they must accomplish.  This is where Christianity differs from all other religions.  Salvation has nothing to do with following rules or living a certain way.  Yes those things may come, but they are not a prerequisite.

This is just your interpretation. Many Christians do not agree.

It appears to me the Bible itself, and the events depicted in it, and the life of Christ, are among the strongest evidence for God.  The Bible is testable.  If you find it to be true then what it claims should hold some weight.  At the end of the day it is still entirely up to the individual if they desire to subscribe to it.

Yes, many of the events in the bible have been analysed and found to be almost certainly fictional. Even if they were not, part of the bible being true does not mean all of the bible is true.

[Asmodee]

People often equate belief in God or Christianity with following a certain prescribed set of rules or things they must accomplish.  This is where Christianity differs from all other religions.  Salvation has nothing to do with following rules or living a certain way.  Yes those things may come, but they are not a prerequisite.

And where potato worshipers differ from all other religions is that there aren't any.  But that's a "difference", not a "reason to believe".

It appears to me the Bible itself, and the events depicted in it, and the life of Christ, are among the strongest evidence for God.  The Bible is testable.  If you find it to be true then what it claims should hold some weight.  At the end of the day it is still entirely up to the individual if they desire to subscribe to it.

Really?  The Bible is "evidence"?  Because I've read it and it looks like a bunch of claims to me.

As for the Bible being testable, what test do you propose?  Your argument here is essentially circular.  "If you find it to be true then what it claims should hold some weight" is really just saying, "If it's true then it's true".  But what tests are you capable of doing on the Bible?  I can certainly show you right now that the Bible isn't true in its entirety.  It has different genealogies leading up to Jesus, 2 different accounts of creation with man being created on by the first and sixth days, and some things like the great flood that all the evidence tells us didn't happen.  Even Bible literalists don't take the Bible, in its entirety, literally.  They don't obey the command on what to eat, for instance.  Yeah, it's literal, but doesn't apply any more, or only applied to the Jews God was speaking to at that point.

So is the Bible "testable"?  That really depends on what you mean.  Certainly none of the magic bits are testable.  Nothing ever has tested positive for magic powers.  And if someone claims that isn't true the default state is to doubt it, UNLESS it's what we want to believe.  A few years ago I read an article about a doctor in India confirming, for the second time in his career, that some guru had not eaten or drank anything for 40 years.  You know what I got from that?  Don't seek medical help in India.  I didn't need to see the documentation.  I didn't need to look up the doctor's credibility.  Our default state when it comes to magical claims is to simply dismiss them outright, unless it's our own favored belief.

That being the case, if all you can test are the mundane bits, does that really lend any credibility to the magic bits?  If I read Stephen King's It and discover there really is a state of Maine do I now have to beware of giant, alien, sewer dwelling spider-things when traveling there?  The mundane may be true, but that lends no evidence to magic.

Question here, and I know it's a stupid question, but bear with me. When you analogize a god or a number of gods to the tooth fairy, etc. are you saying they are equally improbable? In that sense, are you saying straight-out they don't exist, or just that they are highly improbable of existing?

We do not know all the mysteries of the universe.  Somewhere out there it is possible that there is a god, something which matches the description of our tooth fairy, a Pauly Shore fan, etc.  We would have to know everything to say with absolute certainty that is not the case, including what there is other than our universe.

[zebo-the-fat]

Question here, and I know it's a stupid question, but bear with me. When you analogize a god or a number of gods to the tooth fairy, etc. are you saying they are equally improbable? In that sense, are you saying straight-out they don't exist, or just that they are highly improbable of existing?

The probability of gods, pixies etc. is so low as to be not worth considering