In regards to atheism.

Discussion in 'Religion' started by garbonzo, Oct 15, 2015.

  1. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

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    No we are "run" as far as nerve impulses are concerned, the sudden undoing of the dis equlibrium condition the "sodium pump" has made. I.e. a rapid influx of sodium ions back into the interior of the nerve axon. This influx rapidly moves from the base of the axon down the lenght of the axon, but can and some times does, "run backwards."

    Normally the interior is at -70mV (called the "resting potential") as the sodium pump has pumped + Na ions out to the exterior. Mussel contraction is a little more complex and I have forgotten the details. ATP plays a very central role.
    to call one name "better" than another, without telling how it is better -For example shorter, easier to spell and write. "god" scores high by those criteria.
    One of the more satisfying answers to that question as Hawkins has said is that the total energy is and always has been zero. I.e. the big bag was the separation of positive energy as in EM radiation, gravity fields, and later when the temperature was much lower, some of the +E condensed into particle masses (E =M^2) and at "t=0," the BB made an equal quantity of negative energy as in "dark matter" and dark or negative energy.

    The suggestion that net positive energy comes from god (or "higher power, if you prefer) is just "sweeping the problem under the rug." Where it god get it from?

    For a money example:
    You can start with nothing, borrow $10 and owe $10. If you only think or remember /know about the +$10 you can have the illusion that your net worth is positive.
     
    Last edited: Oct 17, 2015
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  3. Kristoffer Giant Hyrax Valued Senior Member

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    Are you a cat-mew believer like Spellbound?
     
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  5. sculptor Valued Senior Member

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    I believe that I am literate, and reasonably well educated.
    Anything/everything beyond that is just a curiosity.
     
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  7. garbonzo Registered Senior Member

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    Really? Because growing up with an American education, all I remember is reading books and taking memorization tests on these book. I seem to remember people wanting to reform the education system to be less about memorization and tests and more about actual learning. There's a reason why the United States is 20th in science and 27th in math.... Perhaps China should recruit instead from Singnapore that rank 1st and 2nd in math and science. I hold nothing but disgust for my education. The time I was in Canada was much better.
     
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  8. BrianHarwarespecialist We shall Ionize!i Registered Senior Member

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    Very bright you are...hmm
     
  9. sideshowbob Sorry, wrong number. Valued Senior Member

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    The idea that there is an "it" is your religion. There is no "it" that "we" are trying to explain.
     
  10. sculptor Valued Senior Member

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    Is TAOism a religion or a philosophy?
     
  11. garbonzo Registered Senior Member

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    So friends…based on your written thoughts……If these thoughts are really ATHEISTIC.,,,whose credentials do YOU prescribe to?
    My friends…Like me….you are anti-ORGANIZED-religion…anti-BIBLICAL-myth-CONTROLLING-men-religion.
    Just as i thought about you.
    The Creator of this (your) Universe…IS….sitting in front of your computer… typing a response to me.
     
  12. Dywyddyr Penguinaciously duckalicious. Valued Senior Member

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    The question, as written, is far too open.
    Whose "credentials" for WHICH subject?

    Then, again, you thought wrong.

    Atheism (one more time) is a lack of belief (or denial of belief) in the existence of "god/s".
    Atheists' attitudes toward religion is another topic.


    Um, how do you work that out?
    I doubt many (any?) atheists will claim that.
     
  13. exchemist Valued Senior Member

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    12,451
    "Prescribe to"? Perhaps you mean "subscribe to".

    And what do you mean by "subscribe to" (let alone prescribe to) "credentials"? Do you mean whose credentials do we respect? If that is what you mean, then the answer must obviously depend on the topic in question. One would respect the credentials of a sportsman to advise about athletic training regimes, but not to talk about the US economy.

    If the topic in question here is whether or not there is a God, then the people worth listening to (i.e. with suitable credentials) are philosophers and theologians, though, as with economics, you will get conflicting opinions and no way to settle the issue to everyone's agreement. You can pick a view that seems sensible to you, or choose not to take a position on the matter at all. The latter is what science does, as it is not concerned with such issues. You will find no theories or research papers on that subject in science.
     
    Last edited: Oct 19, 2015
  14. Yazata Valued Senior Member

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    5,902
    That last bit sounds closer to 'scientism', the idea that all questions can be, and can only be, answered by science (whatever 'science' is). That's not synonymous with atheism, but many atheists are also adherents of scientism and often seem to confuse the two. So there's a widespread belief among atheists that reality must be coextensive with whatever scientific physicalism's currently favored ontology is.

    'Higher' in what sense? If an evaluative spin is put on that word so that it means 'better' or 'more desirable', so that it becomes the goal of a spiritual search, then it sounds an awful lot like 'divinity' in all but name.

    Why not? Because you don't conceive of it as being personal?

    Existence exists. And there's a great deal about reality, probably just about everything if we think about things deeply enough and investigate foundations, that remains profoundly mysterious. We are surrounded by cosmic mysteries all the time, we embody the unknown.

    But it seems to me that 'cosmic mystery' isn't exactly synonymous with 'higher power'.
     
  15. Yazata Valued Senior Member

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    5,902
    Agnosticism is the "don't know" position. Thomas Huxley coined the word from the Greek 'a-' (not) and 'gnosis' (knowledge).

    Weak agnosticism is the position that one personally has no knowledge of whatever it is, gods or transcendental things in this case. And strong agnosticism is the position that no human being is in a position to have such knowledge.

    That needn't imply a sitting-on-the-fence response.

    Today many agnostics would agree with the atheists in believing that most likely no god exists, even if they can't know it for sure. (I include myself in that agnostic atheist group.)

    And historically, there's a long established religious tradition in the West, India and China that believes that divinity overflows human cognition, that the divine simply can't be put into words or captured in human concepts. (These very strong ideas of divine transcendence are typically associated with the 'mystical' traditions.) These religious agnostics nevertheless believe passionately in the existence of their transcendent divinity and many would have to be called agnostic theists.
     
  16. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

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    I don't know what the hell you're talking about. It sounds like fake knowledge.
     
  17. Dywyddyr Penguinaciously duckalicious. Valued Senior Member

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    All of which fits with what I wrote.

    Um, no.
    The term "agnostic" is - as Cris wrote - used to imply a "sitting on the fence" position when asked about belief.
    I.e. there are those that claim that they neither believe nor disbelieve.
    Rather hard to do, methinks.
    As Cris wrote in post #47:
    You either hold/ subscribe to a belief (theism) or you don't (atheism).
    There cannot be a "neutral" position with regard to belief.
     
  18. Fraggle Rocker Staff Member

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    Why not? The average agnostic insists that there is not enough evidence for the existence of gods and other supernatural phenomena to warrant belief in such existence, yet at the same time it seems fair to give the theists time to find proof of their beliefs before dismissing them out of hand.

    My problem with this is that the theists don't give a flying fuck about evidence so they won't even bother looking for it.
     
  19. sideshowbob Sorry, wrong number. Valued Senior Member

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    I prescribe a healthy dose of skepticism.
     
  20. Dywyddyr Penguinaciously duckalicious. Valued Senior Member

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    It's quite simple.
    If you hold the belief then you're a theist.
    Any other position (including "undecided") means that you do not subscribe to that belief - atheism.
     
  21. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

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    God is not talking to you.
     
  22. Dinosaur Rational Skeptic Valued Senior Member

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    From Sculptor Post # 4
    I and all the atheists I know are well educated, not ignorant. I guess that you do not know any atheists.

    From Billy T Post #37
    I came from a family with a Quaker father & a Catholic mother. My father had no living relatives other than me, while my mother had 9 siblings & quite a few nieces nephews.

    The atheists I know came from families who were believers, although I am sure that some (perhaps many) come from atheist families.

    BTW: Saying that atheism is a belief without evidence like theism seems erroneous to me.

    Would you say the same about belief in the nonexistence of unicorns, fairies, leprechauns, & other mythical creatures? Must disbelief in these mythical creatures be supported by cogent arguments?

    Belief in existence of some entity without evidence seems like a view that needs supporting cogent arguments, while disbelief does not always requires supporting arguments.

    Perhaps in consideration of the majority belief in the existence of a god or gods, the atheist is more obligated to support his disbelief than one who disbelieves in various other mythical entities.
     
  23. sculptor Valued Senior Member

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    It is really quite simple, and it is just words.
    (Daisetsu Teitaro Suzuki like his master, Soyen Shaku said/wrote that one could not describe/impart zen in words, then proceeded to write reams on the subject.)
    The same has been written about TAO/DAO.....etc... and: "One may not know the name of GOD-One may not say the name of GOD", etc...
    And these words were from adherents to the philosophies/religions in question!
    Words are but shadows of concepts derived from perceptions of reflections and reflections on perceptions.

    If you have no knowledge of deities then you are without knowledge or agnostic(of deities) ergo ignorant(of deities).
    Myth and legend are a whole different subject and are purely obfuscatory when used herein. Any discussion of myths needs include euhemerism.
    Ignorance is the base line and that from which all knowledge has sprung. Knowledge and ignorance are just 2 points on a continuum.
    It is most likely that no one has complete knowledge of all sets and subsets of subjects under discussion. It also seems likely that the same would apply to ignorance.
    oops ramble
    From ignorance we may choose to believe in an unknown deity
    Or we may choose to believe that there is no deity.
    Either choice is necessarily made from lack of knowledge or ignorance.
    Or(exceedingly rare) you may have direct knowledge of a deity, or at least make claim to said knowledge( most people consider those with such claims to be delusional).

    Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence!

    Ignorance is by it's self non biased, having no positive nor negative value.
    Ignorance is a damned good place to begin a quest for knowledge(gnosis).

    ................................
    If memory serves: About 60 years ago, I read a book entitled "Today's Isms"........a tad droll, but had a deep philosophical point of the folly of utilizing constructed isms as delineating boundaries for human interactions.......(memories of that book may have just become the mnemonic file folder into which I later stuffed similar items)..................(ergo: "if memory serves")
    ...................................................
    I find it amazing that these simple words could excite such ego bursts of misunderstanding.
    And position taking.
    ......curiouser and curiouser...........
     

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