Why aren't you an atheist?
>>1369509
because i really, really, REALLY like candles.
>>1369509
"I don't have enough faith to be an atheist.
>>1369513
elaborate pls
>>1369509
I don't have a micropenis
I am not autistic
I am not obese
I am not a male feminist betacuck
>>1369558
This
>>1369520
It's just an old meme as mild comedy.
I think it means: under the same principles of total naturalism, it would require a high amount of faith to believe certain events to occur only through random processes.(oppose in believing theistically)
>>1369509
I'm not ignorant
>>1369509
Because I have a 2 foot long dick.
>>1369509
Choosing atheism requires just as much blind faith that athiests berate thiests for having, and that is some top meme hypocrisy
>>1369509
Because i am not a physicalist.
>>1369634
>it requires blind faith to not believe in something
'no'
>>1369602
> meme
You are more like a meme by refuting that atheism isn't a believe system like any religion, baka.
>>1369602
I don't think it is really fair to describe evolution as a random process
>>1369558
Do you mean that if you suddenly became an atheist, you would get a micropenis and autism?
>>1369634
Not believing in some random claim that has no evidence supporting it doesn't require faith. This is like saying that you need faith to not believe in the existence of dragons, or unicorns.
>>1369645
Scientific exploration is only a part of our existence.
The way we observe reality and process it is biased as we very well know.
Also, subjective experience is still a complete mystery.
>>1369673
I don't really understand how this is related to describing evolution as a random process
>>1369645
Forget fair. It is just wrong.
The full human experience is not causal. We are not a causal robot we only choose to perceive things in a strictly physicalist causal way because it seems to have been more advantageous and maybe still is. It is however, very possible that soon viewing the world as such will become less advantageous.
>>1369645
>>1369666
Evolution doesn't have anything to do with atheism, though. It just happens that the large majority of atheists believe in it.
Atheism in itself is just 'lack of belief in deities", and you don't need an alternative explanation to something to see that believing in a claim that has nothing backing it up is a bit silly.
>>1369676
You mean that it's not really random since physical interactions tend to follow some tendencies?
>>1369667
Hard atheism requires the belief that there was no "creator," whether that's a divine being or some sort of influential force that played a part in the formation of the universe, and that such a thing will never be proven to exist. This requires faith of some sort. The position you may be thinking of is more like agnosticism, which doesn't require faith one way or the other.
And the unicorn/dragon/sky daddy meme is a poor comparison, because those things are disproven by the fact that we haven't found them on earth, and we've explored pretty much all of it at this point. A "transcendent" god, such as the Judeo-Christian one, would have to exist outside of nature if that God played a part in the big bang, and such a being would not be able to be measured according to our current understanding of science, if ever.
It's fine to then conclude that there's not enough evidence for you to believe, but to be one of those fags that concludes there's enough evidence to disprove God, to the point of becoming a bizarro-evangelist, just means you want to be a zealot and you've thrown your hand in with the hot new religion of the day. And make no mistake, hard atheism is a religion.
>people answering anything other than 'I met god'
>>1369673
> Also, subjective experience is still a complete mystery.
And so are objective ones. Even if science does a worderful work in a pragmatic way, no one can use to define a absolute thruth just because of how subjective is our perceiving facuties.
Astheism as we know is strong materialist and uses it as fundament to define thruth, as the religion uses it's dogma. Both try to define thruth with their subjective believes, be it god or the subjective perceiving of the scientifical methodology.
>>1369712
But the point of the other poster was that atheism requires fate, implying that according to atheism, life just happend "randomly". Which is certanly not true, since evolution is not a random process.
>>1369728
This nigga gets it.
>>1369558
>So insecure about his own beliefs he has to insult others in an attempt to reassure himself
>>1369645
Random mutation is inherent to the process. Selection is dependent on it and can't occur without it.
>>1369558
>people with no arms tend not to be truck drivers therefore everyone who isnt a truck driver has no arms
religious/10 logic
>>1369713
>Hard atheism
That's a VERY small portion of the atheist "community", fundamentally speaking, from the average atheist point of view believing that you can disprove the existence of God or any other magical entity is just as, if not more, absurd than believing in one. I doubt that even 1% of the atheists here are hard atheists.
Thinking that every atheist you see is like this is just ignorance of your part.
>And the unicorn/dragon/sky daddy meme is a poor comparison
Sure, make it a transcendent unicorn/dragon/sky daddy then.
> we haven't found them on earth, and we've explored pretty much all of it at this point.
Oh but they are magic beings, and they are good at hiding.
>A "transcendent" god, such as the Judeo-Christian one, would have to exist outside of nature """""if""""" that God played a part in the big bang
You literally don't have any reason to believe in such a thing, only if you use some appeal to ignorance.
> and such a being would not be able to be measured according to our current understanding of science
It requires evidence regardless, saying that something can't be observed doesn't make it's existence true or even plausible.
>>1369751
yes but harmful mutations die out, while beneficial ones survive, removing the randomess out of the equation
>>1369756
We could try and debate this but neither of us is going to convince the other. There is some interesting evidence that suggests the possibility of a creator, but doesn't prove it, and I'm okay with that and don't expect people to believe based solely off that.
But tbhfam, believing in God makes him/it/whatever real and accomplishes the same thing whether the being actually exists in some form or not.
>>1369811
but there is also a process that weeds out randomness, called natural selection
So evolution in itself isnt inheritly random
>>1369558
Correlation ≠causation
>>1369774
>believing in God makes him/it/whatever real and accomplishes the same thing whether the being actually exists in some form or not.
thats pretty retarded senpai
>>1369811
Like I said, I could bring it up but that would just cause a debate that neither if us is going to concede, and the "evidence" is less that and more hints that allow for the possibility of a creator. It is not objective in any way.
>>1369867
How so?
Most people desire some form of mysticism whether they realize it or not, and it's a deep seated part of the human condition. Whether or not what they believe in exists, it still satisfies this need and provides a purpose, and that's the most important thing a religion does.
>>1369869
Don't call it evidence then, you're giving people false hopes.
And debating is good, you get to exercise your mind and you may even do a favor for someone else.
It's less interesting
>>1369884
>Most people desire some form of mysticism whether they realize it or not, and it's a deep seated part of the human condition.
I bet most people don't even get to choose what they want to begin with. If your parents are religious, you will be raised in a religious background and will be receiving influences as you grow up.
>Whether or not what they believe in exists, it still satisfies this need and provides a purpose, and that's the most important thing a religion does.
You don't need religion to have a purpose in life.
>>1369884
>believing in God makes him/it/whatever real
believing doesnt have any effect on anything and it doesnt make it real
>Most people desire some form of mysticism whether they realize it or not
yeah yeah yeah everyone wants it even if they dont
>it still satisfies this need
you sure it doesnt satisfy the "i wont die even when i die" need?
>>1369637
>>1369509
>>1369756
>>1369884
>>1369886
I forgot to put evidence in quotes the first time, since its more subjective "evidence" for my personal belief system.
The problem with using any sort of evidence as the basis for belief is that it becomes a god-of-the-gaps situation, and as soon as that gap is filled by science the belief system becomes questioned and people either give up on it or start damage controlling, as is the case with young earth creationism. What I believe is that there is a compatibility between faith and science when looked at without a bias either way, and certain aspects of the human condition suggest some sort of influence, such as our seemingly unique altruism for an intelligent life form.
Myself and a lot of people I have known have tried to be cold and rational about life with a purely atheistic world-view, but the human desire to find god makes such a lifestyle depressing and unsatisfying. This seems to be a recurring aspect of the human condition across all cultures and civilizations. Therefore, either God exists and wants us to seek him out or our monkey brains evolved this behavior because it had some sort of benefit to us, but that's irrelevant because the results are the same. Could it be that we are smart enough to question existence, even if there is no purpose, and this leads us to be depressed at the realization that there is none? Maybe, but what a sad and unfulfilling life that is to live.
>>1369906
You don't need it, but there's literally no reason not to use it. And what you claim does not explain cases where people raised non- or even anti-religious find religion later in life.
>>1369926
Since 100% of your life is how you interpret your surroundings within your mind, having a belief in something makes it just as real as anything else, to you and only you. It's subjectively real, not objectively.
Also, people seem to latch on to the "heaven/hell" paradigm and the direct influence of God too much when they criticize Christianity. I'm not sure I've ever "talked" to God or if heaven is an actual thing. Perhaps "heaven" is the peace that comes from living a truly good life and it isn't even a place, whether real or metaphysical. But does that really matter? If the effect on the person is the same, isn't that just splitting hairs?
>>1369966
Is being an optimist a bad thing?
>>1370035
>And what you claim does not explain cases where people raised non- or even anti-religious find religion later in life.
And what percentage of religious people do you think they comprise? Also, do you think that these kind of people have thoughtfully thought about the whole existence of gods matter and suddenly just decided to ignore it all or you think they are the type that never cared about these kind of matters from the beginning and started believing in a god due to a harsh emotional period of their lives or some kind of experience they randomly attributed to a god?
>>1370031
Proper evidence wouldn't be considered god-of-the-gaps, I think.
>Could it be that we are smart enough to question existence, even if there is no purpose, and this leads us to be depressed at the realization that there is none? Maybe, but what a sad and unfulfilling life that is to live.
You only think that the lack of an intrinsic purpose is sad and unfulfilling because you believe that we have one to begin with, people can make their own purpose without a problem. There's nothing about life that is unfulfilling in the atheist point of view, quite the contrary. You live because you enjoy living, that's it.
Divine Conservation v. Existential Inertia.
>>1370105
>kind of people
It could realistically be for any of those reasons. One interesting story I read was about a geneticist who was raised agnostic and started believing as his knowledge of the genome and evolution became deeper. But that's just his personal reason. You're right though, it's not a very big percentage of religious people.
>intrinsic purpose
Perhaps, but why has that been such a consistent part of human mythos for all of our history until very recently? And why do we all of a sudden think we no longer need an intrinsic purpose as a society, whether that's just a delusion or not?
>>1370105
>people can make their own purpose without a problem.
Do go into this more.
How do you know this to be the case that people don't seek generally the same thing ultimately? How do you parse it from difference expressions that are caused confused understandings of reality or cultural expression?
I have to head to work but do tell.
>>1369770
As someone who attended an evolutionary biology lecture a few hours ago I can safely tell you that you're wrong.
Natural selection only removes randomness from the equation if the only part of evolution that is valid is Darwin's theory and that mutations happen.
Gene drift for instance is an integral part of evolution and is pretty much just entirely random distribution of allels in the population since the population is finite in size.
>>1370142
You're making wrong assumptions, intrinsic purpose to life isn't something shared by all societies or religions, much like the idea of a divine personal god.
Humans naturally want to know/understand things, and come with all sorts of explanations to them, gods are one of them.
Science can give us some of these answers, but science as we know it's a very recent thing, and the capacity to share information easily is even more recent.
>>1370214
I mainly argue that science can only explain the natural, and certain aspects of the human condition cannot really be explained by science, which is the domain of religion and spirituality.
>>1369509
Can I choose to sit the arguement out?
As others have noted, it's just as ludicrous to assume that the universe suddenly expanded with great energy from a single point over 13 billion years ago as believing that a benevolent being created everything like magic because he said so
Both require faith in something intangible and I am not ready to concede that. I will settle for doing right by people and trying to leave something good in the world.
atheism is the ultimate blue pill
>>1370184
I'm not even saying that some sort of purpose is needed, my point is that if you need such a thing to live go and make one instead of binding yourself to some fixed random purpose that may very well have been invented by some random person. The life is yours, you should live it as you want.
>How do you know this to be the case that people don't seek generally the same thing ultimately?
Why would I even consider such a thing to begin with? Even if you wanted to group every human being on earth together and affirm that they share the same ultimate goal in life, why attribute it to a god instead of to the common ancestry and genetic traits we all share? You can attribute it to anything you want I guess, but can you prove it?
>>1370322
I'm not saying you can't make your own meaning, but what's wrong with using a blueprint that's already out there. How much trial and error did each ancient religion go through to get where it is today? All the theological development and cultural significance of any given religion gives it a lot of appeal. Not that doing shrooms and worshipping a rock doesn't have some appeal, but religions that already have preloaded storylines are pretty appealing tbqh.
>>1370035
>It's subjectively real,
nd how is that different from not real?
>well perhaps my own specific interpretation is true
i guess theres no point in asking for any evidence because literally everything you believe is real to you
> isn't that just splitting hairs?
it stops being harmles when you start manipulating other people with it
>>1370342
Because if you decide to pick some random blueprint you will need to follow everything that's in there, regardless of what's in there, even if you dislike it.
>How much trial and error did each ancient religion go through to get where it is today?
"They all got it wrong but at least today we are right", is that what you are trying to say?
You talk as if you didn't care if your religion is true or not. Are you really going to heaven this way?
>>1369509
I am. Now fuck off.
Because of the law of causality. No matter how we look at it our universe was created by a process that goes against our laws of physics. Something was there before anything, something that did not come into being as a direct result of something.
If that something is a someone, I do not believe it has any contact or knowledge of us but technically it is a god-like being.
Therefore I do not discount the idea of a being that created the universe (by creating the previous events that led to our universe) but I do not practice any religion since if such a being exists our religions are very disconnected from it.
We humans need to accept the fact that we know very little.
>>1370412
Claiming that you know that a God exists is an extraordinarily arrogant claim it isn't being humble and accepting the fact we know very little at all.
>>1370448
But I don't claim I know god exists.
>>1370412
>No matter how we look at it our universe was created by a process that goes against our laws of physics.
What is your physics background?
ITT
>>1370465
I've read literature on physics, though don't have a degree on it. Did 10 courses on it back in school, but it didn't go beyond earth.
>>1370455
Welcome to atheism.
>>1370520
You seen to be struggling with what "faith" means.
>>1369509
I have no wishes of burning in hell with the likes of Steve Jobs and Joseph Stalin
>>1370520
Atheists have always changed their definition of the word to make it more and more public friendly.
First it was the denial of any deity, now it is the absence of belief. My point doesn't fit either of those and I don't attach myself to dictionary definitions.
>>1370520
Well, he can still believe, and not claim to know it exists, making him an agnostic theist.
>>1370524
http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/faith
>>1370530
>Atheists have always changed their definition of the word to make it more and more public friendly.
Sure words do change their meaning over time.
Sinister used to mean left handed.
During the early years of Christianity Christians were often described as atheists by the Romans.
>>1370530
Bullshit, atheism is the absence of belief in the existence of deities and has always been so. Being agnostic or gnostic in relation to this position is just other thing to consider.
>>1370520
You're retarded.
>>1370570
No, you.
>>1369509
Because the Catholics did a bang up job with their apologetics in the middle ages thanks to guys like Aquinas and Scotus being top tier philosophers, and save a few minor holes that need to be filled, which is the case for every theory and belief system, their work mostly holds to this day. I don;t have 100% certain belief in a theistic God, but to me it is very clearly better than the physicalist/naturalistic alternative in terms of explanatory power.
>>1370594
This guy gets it.
>>1370594
>I don;t have 100% certain belief in a theistic God, but to me it is very clearly better than the physicalist/naturalistic alternative in terms of explanatory power.
God has quite literally no explanatory power. It's also not a falsifiable concept
>>1369558
>implying correlation = causation
>>1370594
I know, right? Goddidit is such a marvelous tool with unlimited explanatory power!
>>1369509
I am one, The more I learned about anthropology the more obvious it became that religions are self-serving spontaneous fantasies. Also they insist on impossible premises and seem to attract superstitious people so just that aspect alone makes them unattractive to me.
But I understand the social and ritualistic angle so I get why people practice religions. I only object when they advocate for physical and psychological harm against people.
I care too much about the knowledge and wisdom of the ancient world to reject it for a post modern reductionist ideology.
>>1370720
Anthropology doesn't glean as much insight into the nature of the human consciousness as you think it does anon.
>>1370658
Why belittle the opposition as an argument?
>>1369638
to not believe is a belief, god can't be proven or disproven, atheism is a faith
>>1370781
teapot
>>1370747
Well I studied many other fields as well.
It's just that anthropology in particular gives the constant pattern of humans grappling with observable concepts and extrapolating them onto the unseen world. It's why we personify inanimate objects, apply human emotions and relationships onto god, later you see fields such as alchemy and numerology trying to use chemical process or logic to invent spiritual principles.
>>1370764
Belittle? I'm pointing the fact that goddidit has no explanatory power, if anything it stops people from trying to figure stuff out. Why would someone search for an answer for something if they are told that the '''"explanation"'''' is God did it and that's that.
>>1370781
Not owning a vase is owning a vase.
This is how stupid you sound.
>>1370781
to not believe is a belief, Zupsuldenblergh the magical washing machine god that created the universe and that hides your socks when you aren't looking at them can't be proven or disproven, atheism is a faith
>>1370802
to not believe is an active decision you fucking idiot, just the same as a refusal to act is an act of itself, which is why people which witnessed a crime and had the time to act, but didn't, is then part of the criminal act and will recieve a punishment
>>1370853
>Blaming the listener when they aren't convinced by your speech
>literally equating people who disagree with you with "criminals"
Why are christians such sociopaths?
>>1370867
haha xd upboated
>>1370853
>comparing disagreeing with your ideas to a crime
Literally SJW tier
>>1370620
>>1370658
Falsifiability does'nt matter save in certain very specific fields of inquiry. It is a nice tool for creating applicable quantitative abstractions in experimental science, it isn't particularity useful in ontology or metaphysics. Treating it as something absolute that all knowledge claims require will ultimately be question begging since there is no way to falsify the claim that all knowledge claims must be falsifiable. Hence we cannot have knowledge that such a principle must hold in our general epistemology.
And it is not as if their ontological commitments can be reduced to "God did it", the properties of God and how these work with the natural order have many features to it that is specific to that form of philosophy/theology that you won't find in something like modern Evangelical apologetics. It is true that God is the first principle, but save something like Ghazali's occasionalism, which is extremely austere in comparison to regular scholasticism, the total explanation is allot richer and has more features to it than you are giving the discipline for.
>>1370797
>Why would someone search for an answer for something if they are told that the '''"explanation"'''' is God did it and that's that.
You would be better off studying something before you comment on it.
>>1370797
You're fundamentally misunderstanding certain religions, namely Christianity. Many sects have a belief that God created the universe with concrete natural laws, and by studying these laws we get closer to what the creator did it all for. It's really just the ass-backwards protestant meme sects that Bible-bash and treat it like a scientific text.
>>1370892
>Falsifiability does'nt matter save in certain very specific fields of inquiry.
It kind of does. It means that you admit that you could be wrong about what you propose, which is quite literally the first requirement for critical inquiry
>>1370892
Ontology and metaphysics aren't particularly useful in providing verifiable information about the world around us, aside from actually producing the scientific community.
Flat earthers could use the same logic and have it be relevant to their """"metaphysics""""
>>1369509
I started smoking DMT a few years ago and had mystical experiences that shook up my straight materialist worldview
>>1370412
>No matter how we look at it our universe was created by a process that goes against our laws of physics.
The universe didn't exist before the Big Bang, and that also means that physical laws didn't exist m8.
We don't understand what happened at that place and time, because it is impossible to measure.
>>1370917
Because the experience caused physical changes in your material brain?
Nah, you got your pineal gland unlocked and now you have spirit energy.
>>1370884
wow haha xd here le take my le upboat xd
Unless you're a full-on practicing nihilist, you're not an Atheist. If you believe that there is such a thing as Morales, justice, or objective truth, you have to submit in belief and place faith in those things as if they're, or are apart of, divinities. I believe in those things, therefor I'm not an Atheist.
>>1370530
It literally means "lack of belief"
That is the original Greek definition.
>>1370941
>I believe in those things, therefor I'm not an Atheist.
So how many homeless people have you helped today?
>>1369650
yes
>>1370905
But the fact that scholastics use a deductive system of thought which begins from empirical facts and derives conclusions through those facts and the application of logic means that they can be incorrect. If you have an argument for God's existence and someone can show that you have made an incorrect derivation or your empirical starting point is false then your argument can shown to be false, leaving us no reason to rationally believe the conclusion unless another argument for it holds.
Generally when we talk about it in Philosophy/Science 'Falsifiability" is more specific than that . It has more to do with whether or not we can show that a theory must be necessarily false. Which is great for ruling things out in Science for pragmatic reasons, but it is not the only means in which you can meet the requirement of critical inquiry that you can admit that you have gone wrong in your proposition.
>>1370911
>Ontology and metaphysics aren't particularly useful in providing verifiable information about the world around us, aside from actually producing the scientific community.
Without ontology or metaphysics all you have is experimental results. Once you make a claim that those experimental results actually correspond to something in the world or some hypothesis then you have already moved on to metaphysics/ontology.
>>1370954
>But the fact that scholastics use a deductive system of thought which begins from empirical facts and derives conclusions through those facts and the application of logic means that they can be incorrect.
No, because they never test these conclusions in the real world. Their deductions aren't tied to any real world results or consequences, which makes their investigations as valuable as an average tarot card reading
>>1369509
i am but please dont ever make a thread like this again
>>1370941
>If you believe that there is such a thing as Morales, justice, or objective truth, you have to submit in belief and place faith in those things as if they're, or are apart of, divinities
Or they are simply emergent social behaviors based on our psychology. You don't need to believe in god in order to have morals, justice, or objective truth.
>>1370941
>Morales, justice
I do believe in them, and I believe they are human constructs, and I believe they are good instruments that partially guarantee society's well being and therefore are a good thing.
>objective truth
Elaborate, please.
>>1370781
Burden of proof is on the positive claim to both properly define their falsifiable hypothesis and to prove it.
Actual discussion is basically pointless until at least the first half of that happens because the negative claim can't actually do anything with the statement "God exists" prior to that happening.
God could be an unfalsifiable, featureless, non-sentient particle that creates the universe and I'd have to be an agnostic atheist because of the possibility of this Occam's Razor god.
>>1370892
Falsifiability means that a test could yield results that would reflect whether the statement is true or false.
It is entirely pointless in every field of inquiry to run an unfalsifiable test.
>>1370954
> It has more to do with whether or not we can show that a theory must be necessarily false.
Can you elaborate on this.
>>1370950
None. I didn't say I'm a good person or done enough to help others, or those who call themselves Atheist are bad. I just believe, from the limited experience from thinking about this, that the type of faith in believing in those concepts I just mentioned is essentially near-same as believing in a traditional god deity, that you can't call yourself an atheist if you don't embrace nihilism fully.
>>1370979
> I just believe, from the limited experience from thinking about this, that the type of faith in believing in those concepts I just mentioned is essentially near-same as believing in a traditional god deity
But not enough to actually translate them into actual action apparently, which tells me more than a thousand words ever could
>>1370979
Morals are human constructs.
Justice is a human construct.
There is probably objective truth but we can only approximate it.
Oh wow.
Not diety required.
>>1370967
the burden of proof implies that proof can be found in this universe, if a god is real we'd have no idea where it would be or if it's even a physical entity, "prove this under these premises" doesn't work if the potential proof lies beyond of which you can physically prove
>>1369520
Atheists make leaps of faith because they can not justify reason because they can not appeal to a divine absolute.
The absolute must be
>transcendent
>absolute
>infinite
>personal
>benevolent (not in your opinion, but objectively by the standards of reality laid down by said being)
Essentially God.
Without this the atheist must presuppose his reason, his intellect, his reality, his knowledge, his "truth", all of his first principles.
While the Theist, more specifically the Christian must only presuppose one thing, that being God.
tl;dr
Kant, Berkeley, and Hume = Atheism is 4 retards
>>1371002
A moral axiom isn't equivalent to faith moron.
>>1369728
>thruth
>>1371002
>Atheists make leaps of faith because they can not justify reason because they can not appeal to a divine absolute.
So?
That just means that I have to accept that what I know may very well be wrong, which I have no problem with, nor would any intellectually serious person
>>1369509
I'm Catholic
>>1371026
Knowing and believing are two different things.
A religious person doesn't know God exists either, but they think their faith gives them knowledge, which it doesn't.
>>1370958
You do realize that the whole empirical-experimental enterprise began with 13th century scholastics right ?
Anyways in many cases, there is just nothing to test by experiment in that way. You need to be able to alter things with an experiment in order to "test" them. But if what we are dealing with is fundamental metaphysical/ontological features of reality then you can't do anything to alter anything so to constitute a test. Testing a hypothesis in an experiment like " if we add these chemicals together then this reaction will occur" has "moving parts" with different possible results that could come about from the experiment. If you're working with metaphysics and ontology then you are either A. working for general features of reality that there is something that is one, something that exists, something that is true, etc, or B. taking empirically verifiable features of reality " that change happens", etc and finding what, through deductive necessity, absolutely must follow from those features.
In some cases certain theories of the constitution of matter, claims about the cosmological order, etc were relevant to their arguments. Thankfully where some arguments became outdated because these empirical starting points were shown to be problematic, Scholastic works had a multi-strained argument form where the best group of arguments for any conclusion were presented. So loosing a few of those arguments due to better science does'nt hurt the discipline that much.
Neither one of these mentioned starting points need empirical testing in the same way that a theory of velocity and motion, or chemical reactions, do. They absolutely are tied to the real world though, you are arbitrarily assigning narrow binds to inquiry about the world because you are confusing the scientific experimental enterprise with the conditions needed for knowledge in general.
>>1370963
>emergent social behaviors based on our psychology
Fair point. I should have said "true" or "supreme" morales, justice, or objective truth. As in: yes, what is considered correct and rightly done by one person varies from person to person, but if you believe in such a form that there exist ones which are closer to the truth, or are inherently better than another, it seems -- I believe -- that you have to put faith in an idea that there exist a standard of those things that are the truth.
>You don't need to believe in god in order to have morals, justice, or objective truth.
I don't mean that you have to believe in a God, but you have to place divine belief in those concepts at-least if you want to hold that they exist and can be done correctly or more truthfully, that could potentially argued that they eventually collide with a God or Gods (I haven't done enough thinking of this on my own to come to a conclusion to that).
>>1370964
"Elaborate, please."
That there exists a system beyond our perceptions and senses that contains what is true or not.
>>1370238
>As others have noted, it's just as ludicrous to assume that the universe suddenly expanded with great energy from a single point over 13 billion years ago as believing that a benevolent being created everything like magic because he said so
No, it isn't. We have empirical evidence that points to the Big Bang theory's accuracy. I can't say 100% that its correct, but I can say that it is 100% more logical and provable than the existence of a creator.
>>1371002
>presuppose his reason, his intellect, his reality, his knowledge, his "truth"
You not only presuppose these, but you also presuppose that some being created them. What do you think you used to reach the conclusion that some god exists? Saying that God created all these and that by the means of these you experience God is just circular reasoning.
>>1371034
a faithful person believes god is real, an unfaithful person believes god isn't real, neither can prove eachother wrong or right without using their own arbitrary sets of rules in which the opposite couldn't exist in, yet they believe without evidence in hand.
>>1371043
Is 2+2=4 an absolute truth?
>>1371041
>You do realize that the whole empirical-experimental enterprise began with 13th century scholastics right ?
That has absolutely nothing to do with what I posted. My point is that nothing that what you just posted has any results or any consequences tied to them, which is what falsifiability is mostly concerned with.
If you propose ideas with no testable consequences that can prove them wrong in the real world, then treating them as simply unknowns, for all intents and purposes, makes no difference whatsoever. It doesn't matter whether you wrap your handwaving in a cloak of metaphysics, ontology or any -ology, what I'm concerned with are results and consequences that can prove your ideas wrong
>>1370986
I like to believe that I'm slowly making progress to helpful actions such as that.
>>1370992
If you're admitting that we can at-least get closer to it, aren't you placing faith that some actions are better than others with finding the truth? And the more and more you dissect them and try to find it, the more and more you're placing faith in a system that you acknowledge is out of our perceptions and senses, like those who believe in other deities, and that it's worth placing faith in it as it's beneficially to us the more we get closer?
>>1371049
I'm sorry but you're wrong. Being unfaithful isn't a faithful statement.
>>1371056
I would say that the example you gave is an image of something like it.
>>1371043
> if you believe in such a form that there exist ones which are closer to the truth, or are inherently better than another, it seems -- I believe -- that you have to put faith in an idea that there exist a standard of those things that are the truth.
I tend to agree with Sam Harris that you can evaluate different moral systems by a human psychological and physiological "wellbeing" metric. This would be humanist metric but it clearly lends itself to our empirical realities (health, security, nutrition, development, intellect, freedom). It gets tricked when you start running into subtle grey areas, but along the way you can rule out many morality systems that include very obviously harmful behaviors with scant benefit.
People sometimes complain that this "ignore's spiritual development" but I think that is encompassed by psychological wellbeing combined with essential liberties (to pursue leisure activities such as meditation).
I think that this non-divine standard would produce an objectively true moral system (maximization of wellbeing), and there you have it.
>>1371074
>If you're admitting that we can at-least get closer to it, aren't you placing faith that some actions are better than others with finding the truth?
Between x alternatives, the one which yields the best results is the best one, no? Doesn't mean that better alternatives can't exist, but until they appear you do with what you have.
>>1371090
an active decision to not believe is a belief, just as an active decision to not act is an act
>>1371118
There are an infinity of hypothetical concepts that you personally don't believe in. Is this because you willfully refuse to believe them?
>>1371118
just like not colecting stamps is a hobby?
>anything but agnosticism
>>1370967
There are two ways we can conceive of falsifiability, 1. that we should be able to prove the hypothesis false, and 2. that we should be able to show that we have insufficient means of proving it true. We don't need something as strong as 1 in order to come to meaningful results about God, because we can make a false argument for God's existence.
1. (Principle of Sufficient Reason) Everything needs an explanation
2. The world requires an explanation
3. God is a sufficient explanation for the world, as a first being that created it.
4. Conclusion: God exists.
We look through the argument and notice that God is lacking an explanation which violates premise 1, and we have shown that the claim that God exists has no support here, a better argument is needed. It does'nt matter that we can't prove that God's existence must be false in relation to this argument, because the burden of proof lies on the person making the positive claim.
Likewise, if what is needed is the possibility that a statement is proven false then no empirical science can be used, because the way we do empirical science is through induction. We experience the same results multiple times which increases the probability of the hypothesis being true. If I can't replicate the results that show evidence for my theory then it will not be considered. I need to be able to replicate the results more and more times to have it become increasingly probable. But no matter how many of these results I get it is still possible that even more of the opposite result could come about in the future. This means that any attempt at showing that a hypothesis is false through this method is impossible. Still, until that happens we can say that " I have no reason to believe that this hypothesis is true" just as we have no reason to believe that God exists until a better argument shows up. This is as good as we can do, and science and the scholastic method are no different in this.
>>1371118
>active decision to not believe
Belief or lack of thereof is not a choice. You can't just start believing or not believing in something because you want to, that's like saying you can choose to believe that your blue car is actually red. This kind of belief is false belief.
>>1371118
This.
Most people didn't believe in Leprechauns until they were proven to be real by science.
Not believing in Leprechauns was just as much a belief system as atheism is, now, today.
>>1371135
Are you an agnostic atheist or an agnostic theist?
>>1371132
it could be
>>1371118
No, no it isn't.
Do you believe that Santa Claus doesn't exist?
>>1371112
Correct me if I'm wrong, as I haven't read much into that theory or Sam Harris, but is it saying that what is objective and truth is what we perceive through our senses as being beneficial and pleasant to us with our experiences? If so, does that system allow itself to be persuaded to any given pleasure that we perceive has minimized consequences as being what is objectively better for us and true, and that objective truth lies within our experiences and how we evaluate them? If that's the case, how could it be called objective when it's very easy to skew it by experiences and senses?
>>1371162
ok, youre beyond retarded
>>1371156
you would call it agnostic atheist
that division is stupid tho
>>1371146
No, you haven't. Instead of presenting results that would falsify your ideas, you simply redefine what 'falsifiability' is, conveniently to a definition that shifts from results and consequences.
All you demonstrate is how incredibly weak your ideas are. It can even handle a test in the real world. Instead, it relies on defining it as true and never actually subjecting it to any critical scrutiny, not even deductively.
Your ideas are pisspoor, and you trying to bullshit your way out of having to subject them to any criticism just shows how weak they are
>>1371171
Santa does exist.
Before atheism aka Richard Dawkins and his legions of worshippers with their ridiculous hats Santa delivered everywhere.
>>1371181
Stupid is calling yourself just an "agnostic", because it doesn't explicitly tells your position regarding the subject, it's like you're afraid of criticism or any kind of discussion.
>>1371205
>because it doesn't explicitly tells your position
it does when you think about it for one moment
>>1371217
it doesnt because literally no one knows, agnostic is the default position, even a retarded sjw can tell what he thinks his gender is instead of just saying hes just alive
>>1371217
No because saying "I don't claim to know that my particular belief is true" doesn't say anything about your actual belief.
>>1371186
Man, I bet you think you're being funny too, being all contrarian against fedoras.
>>1369926
>believing doesn't have any effect on anything
Someone's never heard of the placebo effect.
>>1369509
Because reductionism and positivism are bullshit.
>>1371250
Can you link me the study that shows that the placebo effect has been observed distorting reality or giving birth to magical beings? Thanks.
>>1371254
Do you believe in the existence of any god/gods?
>>1371116
>Between x alternatives, the one which yields the best results is the best one, no?
So, what you are saying that what is more objective and true is what we measure as being the best based off all previous and present perceptions we have, but there is always the possibility that what we perceive is deceiving and there exist more objective and truer perceptions out of our grasps, that we must not focus on, and just settle with what we have? If so, shouldn't we be wary of those perceptions in case they are deceiving and hold that there potentially exist better alternatives out there closer to the truth that we must direct some faith in as existing?
>>1371274
no
but i consider it possible
>>1371287
Congratulations, you are (for now) an atheist, and on top of that, an agnostic one.
>>1371265
No, fedora lord, I can't. But feel free to google how the placebo effect can help overcome various illnesses. You said belief doesn't affect anything and I gave you a well-known example to the contrary. I never said anything about God.
>>1371292
>agnostic atheist
no such thing
>>1371250
im the one who said that believing doesnt affect anything, because it doesnt, placebo doesnt actaully heal anything, and im pretty sure even you can recognize that tricking yourself into not fealing a headache is not the same as god existing just because you really want to
>>1371301
how fucking dense are you? every atheist adn theist is an agnostic because no one actually knows you fucking failed abortion of a human being
>>1371313
> because no one actually knows
but some claim to know
>>1371325
and theyre wrong, so fucking what? a lot of people claim to know that obama is a lizard i dont expect you to take the same agnosticism position there
>>1371283
>but there is always the possibility that what we perceive is deceiving and there exist more objective and truer perceptions out of our grasps, that we must not focus on, and just settle with what we have?
I JUST FUCKING SAID "Doesn't mean that better alternatives can't exist, but >>>>>until they appear you do with what you have".
> If so, shouldn't we be wary of those perceptions in case they are deceiving and hold that there potentially exist better alternatives out there closer to the truth that we must direct some faith in as existing?
OBVIOUSLY, if X alternative is proven to yield better results, we should change to X alternative right away! Now, if you are going to say that Y alternative MAY exist and is better and you can't demonstrably show why or how, why should I take it? What use it has if it can't yield practical results nor can be shown to be true/accurate? If "may exist" is your argument, then it's a very weak one.
People are always searching for better alternatives, and so is science. If you have a better one just say.
And stop with the strawmans, fucking please.
>>1369509
With religious extremism on the rise, atheism is too dangerous
>>1371307
The placebo effect has been shown to improve the following in studies: Asthma, Epilepsy, Crohn's disease, ulcerative colitis, MS, Osteoarthritis, and a large number of diseases affecting the digestive system. Of course, that doesn't mean believing in God makes him/it real. but that was never my point in the first place. My point was that belief can have physical effects. Mind over matter and what not.
>>1371335
>so fucking what?
it's their position on religion
>>1371343
>but that was never my point in the first place
>believing in God makes him/it/whatever real
>My point was that belief can have physical effects
just fucknig stop dude
>>1371298
No one is talking about illnesses, you dumbfuck. You're arguing against the claim that "believing doesnt have any effect on anything and it doesnt make it real" with regard to gods with a example regarding medicine.
>>1371346
you didnt answer my question, are you or are you not an agnostic on obama being a lizard
>>1371354
Two different posters, anon.
>>1371362
you didn't even ask the question
also nice appeal to ridicule
>>1371357
Someone said belief doesn't have effects. I felt the need to correct that statement, asshole. The gods part was irrelevant to me.
>>1371371
how is it ridicule, some people assert that hes a lizard, some assert that hes human, are you an agnostic on that? i mean we certainly cant know because the lizard might have some future technology
>>1371184
>conveniently to a definition that shifts from results and consequences.
Justify this claim, just stating it isn't enough to make it true.
I also demonstrated that the definition that was being put forward by you was untenable though, due to the problems inherent to induction. Unless you can show me where I went wrong with argument you have nothing.
>It can even handle a test in the real world.
I love how fedoras think that "the real world" means " in a laboratory setting" , as if deductive demonstrations and utilizing deductive logic don't take place "in the real world".
>>1371360
>why are we here, what is the fundamental nature of reality, and why is it that way
>Religion does not care about these questions
you fucking serious? thats the whole point of most religions
>>1371044
I think you misunderstood his meaning. The big bang theory may prove to be an accurate description of the physical interactions going on at the beginning of the universe, but any physicist not interested in blowing smoke up your ass will tell you that we can't go back any further than that very first instant. Was there a Will that caused the big bang or did it just happen? This is where the God/No-God argument begins. Materialistic science makes no pretension of knowing the answer, whatever Dawkins and his friends may claim.
>>1371360
>"why are we here, what is the fundamental nature of reality, and why is it that way?"
>why
>assuming that we are here for a purpose, and that the fundamental nature of reality is what it is for a reason.
Such a logically infallible position!
>>1371184
Come to think of it this is actually a great exemplar of "intellectually illiterate atheist who thinks they are a scientist".
>Uses common buzzwords they've heard from youtube like "falsifiability" to justify their position without ever actually considering the ramifications of the concepts these words correspond to
> Arbitrarily claims the domain "the real world" for themselves, and bars their opponent from it without any justification
> Does'nt respond to deductive arguments that works against their points, and just calls them either "word games" or a matter of semantics/definition.
> Makes use of gratuitous insults and swearing due how flustered they are that they can't actually answer their opponent
All you are missing is a misapplication of an example from contemporary science to a philosophical problem without realizing you are actually doing philosophy like your opponent is, only you are worse at it.
4/5 Good show.
>>1371174
Well I think it's less about pleasure and more about physical and mental health and personal growth opportunities.
>>1371389
>we can't go back any further than that very first instant.
True, but people are working on it and coming up with hypothesis.
>This is where the God/No-God argument begins.
If ultimately neither side come up with a proof of their position, the answer for the question will just remains "we do not know".
Why don't atheists try to improve religion instead of opposing it. This way no joys Ever.
This is why I am not an atheist. I'm just not, one of the reasons it won't bring anything to fake it too.
But say: It is 100% sure that there is a God. Will prove if necessary, and it is even a reasonable thing to know already and have found out to anyone being honest and wanting or needing to know.
I'm open to showing why it is sure God exists. Can be done in a really very short and easy way
>>1371431
You think that a proof by logic is good enough?
>>1371456
a fitting picture to your sentiment
>>1371456
Most religions don't seem very open to outside "improvement" suggestions.
However religions do evolve in the face of social changes, for example, some religions are now welcoming to homosexuals. This shows that as society changes, untennable religions positions tend to be modified.
>>1371467
Yes, I think this is fucking worthless
>>1371467
And religion clearly has it's mistakes.
Typical/ central
-Christianity: the sex thing
-Islam: mad jihad
- ...
>>1371545
Do you believe that a being such as a god can be demonstrably proven to exist solely based on logic alone, without making use of assumptions?
If a god is a metaphysical being that has influence in our percepted reality, why should a proof based on metaphysical and ontological arguments be the only possible one?
Because I've applied simple logic starting from the very base knowledge that I poses and built my world view from there
>>1371547
>If religion, keyword, cared, as Neil Degrasse Tyson puts it best (in my humble opinion), they would consider their deities as more than that which science and philosophy has yet to tread, and would produce workable evidence as to the existence, claims, and capabilities of such a being.
This is incoherent. Gods are not material entities, and cannot be tested as can, say, the gamma emissions of a star. Attempting to use inductive reasoning on a deity betrays a fundamental misunderstanding of the concept of god.
>Currently God is an ever receding pocket of scientific ignorance.
I can tell you have not studied theology. If you want to brush off the entire field, well, whatever, I won't try to change your mind. I never had much use for it either, it was just a core requirement in college. But don't try to make claims about the field if you've never studied it.
I know NdGT certainly hasn't studied theology, because his statements about even atheistic philosophy can be best described as "barbaric anti-intellectualism."
The so-called new atheists dislike philosophy because it challenges their tiny-minded conceptions of the world, where everything can be concluded with a scientific experiment, every person with a different set of metaphysical beliefs is just a stupid cow, and where scary things like the problem of induction are just superstitious words invented by the modern equivalent of forest shamans. Every question is a math problem, and they've got the math right on all of them. Nice world to live in, if you can keep the door closed and the windows covered.
There's a whole world of serious atheist philosophers of science. But they don't speak in empty quips, and so they do not get book deals.
>>1371547
Gods are metaphysical thoughtforms and transcendent archetypes embodying the distinct and unique aspect of the human experience in the form of apotheosis. Gods are figures of contemplative mystery. They aren't meant to be dissected in the way you're suggesting.
>>1371177
you're
>>1371584
Empirical starting points are to be utilized as well. We use logic to deduce from those starting points. I.E begin from the natural regularities we see in nature, or begin from the fact that change happens, and go from there. Now we could also do an "ontological argument" in the Anselmian sense, though I think that they are usually weaker save the modal ontological argument. You can't quite even do that with pure logic - logic is just "form" content generally has to come from the outside to fill out the form and make sense of reality. Even in the Anselmian "ontological argument" you'll still need definitions.
There is a certain issue where people assume that Science uses purely empirical means based on the world and "reality" where metaphysics is just a matter of apriori logical considerations, based on thought. In reality neither science nor metaphysics fits that dichotomy so neatly.
Some people like to use particular facts about nature being "fine tuned" and all that, which comes off as less "metaphysical". I personally don't buy into those arguments, but I don't think there is anything wrong with them in principle.
Because I think religion is a psychologically healthy thing to believe in, and the Tao is a fine explanation for the primordial conditions that allowed the universe and its laws to come into being.
>>1371705
Religion and spiritual tradition is the definitive and uniquely human aspect within all of existence and the nature of being. The denial of spirituality is the denial of humanity and the rejection of half of our reality.
It would imply I am an all seeing all knowing entity and I'm not so no thanks I'll stay with my agnosticism thank you :^)
>>1371171
lets assume you walk into a horrible crime, but you decide to do nothing, you stand there and watch, you don't call the police, you don't do anything, later the police investigates and finds out you were present at the crime scene, they found out that you did nothing at all.
what do you think will happen in court, if you stood by and did nothing?
you'll get fucked, and that's because a pursuit to not act is an act in of itself, take that railway paradox for example, if there's 2 railway lines, and in one of the lines there's multiple people tied down, you could push the button and let the train go towards the line which is empty or has less people tied down to it, but you decide to do nothing, you'll still be responsible of the deaths of those on the railway.
>>1371142
"1. The act of choosing; selection: It is time to make a choice between the candidates."
it is a choice
>>1371714
Oh don't be histrionic; act as a man is expected to. Rejection of spirituality is rejection of spirituality, nothing more, spirituality itself is just materialism using materials not proven to exist.
>>1369509
>implying Agnostic isn't the only way.
How can you critique a Christian for being adamant in their beliefs which can't be completely proven but you can be completely adamant in your unproven theories.
Also how =/= why.
>>1371732
So, are we to assume that courts are implicitly correct in all matters of philosophy and that we should model all of our philosophical opinions upon how they operate?
Of course not, that's fucking stupid, so kindly stop trying to use courts as your argument.
Passive atheism isn't a belief, it's a rejection of proposed beliefs.
>>1371740
It's the advent of spiritual Tradition that defined humanity and differentiated us from all other living things, it's what allowed us to uplift ourselves from a nomadic existence and create higher ordered civilization.
You're confusing New Age pseudo spirituality with true, metaphysical spirituality which is of the realm of the immaterial. It's our capacity to perceive the metaphysical that makes the human consciousness unique.
>>1371732
>>1371142
and it's that's not the point even, neither side can prove or disprove another using their own set of rules, god could or couldn't exist in the physical sphere which means that we have either not have found out yet or it's impossible to prove through worldly matters, which means that in order to be religious or not IS a belief as there is no proof for either side, if there's no proof, you have to believe that god doesn't or does exist, as it is currently impossible to know
>>1371755
it proves that to not act is an act in of itself
>>1371774
Yeah, that's some unsubstantiated crap there.
>>1371790
What part don't you agree with?
>>1371778
>it proves that to not act is an act in of itself
No, it doesn't, actually. It proves that courts consider it as such because it's socially useful to do so, it in no way proves that concept.
You do have to hold a belief to reject a belief, but rejecting various theistic conceptions of God is not the same as constructing a theistic belief system.
>>1371809
rejecting something without a proof is a belief, just like accepting something without proof is a belief
>>1371803
The fact that you try to claim that what separates us from animals is down to a single thing, or that our shift from hunter-gatherers to civilization comes down to a single thing, or that either of these are fundamental defining features of the human condition that the absence of which somehow renders a person less human. When the first is question, the second is a hotly debated subject, and the third is both fucking false and incredibly arrogant.
God fucking damn, when did religion become the new fedora belief?
>>1371816
Yes, but not the same. When you fail to convince someone of something, it's not their fault that you didn't make a good enough case.
>>1371823
I wouldn't consider the concept of the metaphysical or spiritual Tradition to be a singular thing. Spiritual Tradition encompassed all aspects of life in the ancient world, acting as the central focal point of all civilization.
>he's still an atheist
>he hasn't found the scientifically plausible yet spiritually fulfilling magical world of pantheism
>>1371978
Even if you believe in one true God, all other Gods still exist in a theological context, just as lesser deities, as fallen angels pretending to be Gods themselves.
>>1371732
How does a quote from a dictionary entry of the verb to choose proves that belief is a choice?
>>1371778
>which means that in order to be religious or not IS a belief as there is no proof for either side, if there's no proof, you have to believe that god doesn't or does exist, as it is currently impossible to know
The position "I have no belief in the existence of gods" does not require a proof, as it's a "standard" position. It's the same as any position regarding some unsubstantiated claim. You make it sound as if believing in leprechauns and don't believing in them are equally fair/sound positions.
>>1371683
>Some people like to use particular facts about nature being "fine tuned" and all that, which comes off as less "metaphysical". I personally don't buy into those arguments, but I don't think there is anything wrong with them in principle.
To presuppose fine tuning isn't wrong? It's begging the question.
>>1371816
This affirmation is just plainly dishonest, I don't need a proof to reject a claim that has no evidence supporting it, the burden of proof is with the person that made the claim.
>>1372002
>This affirmation is just plainly dishonest, I don't need a proof to reject a claim that has no evidence supporting it, the burden of proof is with the person that made the claim.
To be fair to that guy, burden of proof isn't a logical rule or anything, it's just good argumentative practice, since making an argument and expecting an opponent to prove it for you is a dick move.
>>1369509
Because computer science really fucked with me and made it evident that pagan gods run the world through a series of otherwordly servers.
>>1372002
>To presuppose fine tuning isn't wrong? It's begging the question.
Only if you presuppose that they are presupposing the fine tuning, rather than finding evidence for it and then inferring that fine tuning is the best explanation. I think the issue lies in the notions of complexity utilized. I don't see how the X degree of complexity they find in nature entails a sentient creator, or what the bottom limit of this complexity would be. They say that the complexity of eyes entail a creator, but this seems relative and too based on subjective feelings of "wonder". You could have a universe where eye's are the simplest feature of it and they would not be pointing to eyes, but something far more complex as the "deciding point" where nature has shown itself too complex to spontaneously arise.
>>1369509
Beer.
>>1369509
Because it makes more sense that some kind of God would exist
>>1369509
But anon, I am an atheist.
>>1371987
>he didn't realise I was talking about scientific pantheism
Linguistically, there is an objective answer to this question, and it is this: you *are* an atheist. Atheism is defined as a lack of belief in a certain, all-knowing and personalized god. Since there are an unknowable amount of gods throughout human history, and your knowledge is bound by the amount of time you are alive (I mean, I guess, by contemporary standards), you cannot believe in gods about which you do not know, and therefore would have to be considered an atheist in regards to said deities. QED.
Of course, this argument is only provable given the assumption that knowledge is limited by one's physical lifetime as established by cognitive functioning - but that means it oughtta hold for a least a few years, amirite?
>>1369509
Because the thought of an infinite unending nothingness paired with meaningless existance is way too much for me to handle as a concept without wanting to literally explode from stress.
Im a catholic for entirely different reasons. Ive seen miracles happen before my very eyes, for me god is very real and physical.
>>1371681
you literally said that not collecting stamps might be considered a hobby, correcting apostrophes doesnt really save you here
>>1371431
You've literally address nothing I said. I'll just repeat my point over and over again until pseudo-intellectual /pol/theists and aquinasfags like you begin to understand it: if your ideas have no results or consequences tied to them that can prove them wrong, then they are complete dogshit and need not be taken seriously by anyone. There is literally nothing that forces me to take your little word game seriously, as your ideas have zero consequences and exist solely in some conceptual realm where you can conveniently set all the parameters in your favor. Deductions can only tell you something about how consistent an idea is with itself, not how consistent it is with reality. Also
>> Makes use of gratuitous insults and swearing due how flustered they are that they can't actually answer their opponent
This must be the single most ironic sentence ever typed by a /pol/fag christian. Your entire thinking system is literally build around namecalling and misrepresentation.
Now why don't you hop along and tell people they're incorrect because they wear a hat
>>1374353
We get it, you have autism. I know people with your condition have trouble with abstract thought.
>>1374360
>>> Makes use of gratuitous insults and swearing due how flustered they are that they can't actually answer their opponent
Again, how fucking ironic
>>1369509
>literally giving up your last hope
Never.
>>1369509
because atheists are mostly positivist faggots
also, because what cannot be proven cannot be disproven
>>1374295
"an activity or interest pursued for pleasure or relaxation and not as a main occupation:"
to actively not collect stamps could be considered a hobby, as it is an activity and can be an interest
>>1375194
How do you remember to breathe?
>>1375194
>to actively not collect stamps is an activity
>>1370520
It think you mean Agnosticism
>>1369509
Not enough faith to believe that I came from an exploding singularity that popped into existence from nowhere and exploded for no reason and somehow created order out of chaos, life out of non-life, and consciousness.
Literally not enough faith to be an atheist.
>>1375194
im betting my balls you cant count to whatever amount of times your mother tried to abort you
>>1369509
Because I'm openminded
>>1369509
Someone MUST have created the universe. It just seems so unlikely that a gas cloud exploded and created us for no apparent reason.
>>1375286
So you're agnostic.
Because i'm a Deist
>>1375259
>For no reason
What makes you think there's any reason to existence?
>>1369509
Being an optimist is cheaper than weed.
>>1375343
What makes you think there isn't?
>>1375351
>Answers a question with a question,
And that's why there's no reason to existence.
>>1375363
>can't even refute my point
Typical.
>>1369509
My spirituality is important to me. It should be to everyone.
I might be a deist, but I still like christian values and the community aspect churches give.
>>1375351
Not him, but there's no evidence to suggest there is.
>>1375343
Knowing what that reason is.
