Apologies.
I didn't realize you would find holding yourself to the same standard as you hold others so traumatic.
Scientists discover that atheists might not exist, and that’s not a joke
- Thread starter Jan Ardena
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I didn't realize you would find holding yourself to the same standard as you hold others so traumatic.
One asks the question: how did we get here, without recourse to circular reason, and one comes to the honest conclusion that one doesn't know. Couple this with the realisation that one doesn't need to stick one's flag to any mast. I.e. realisation that belief on the matter is not a necessity, and one ends up not knowing, and no reason to believe one way or the other. Simples, really. One has ended up not believing in God, if one is honest with oneself.
One need construct no other philosophy, hold no other mindset, than these, although one may have to for other things that belief in God might have offered them, and to which they might cling, thus preventing them from not believing until resolved. But that will be different from person to person, I think.
If one wants to take it further and hold the belief that there is no God, well, I can't speak for them. Needless to say, it is not necessary to believe God does not exist to simply not believe in God.
And the agenda of the OP falsehood is dealt unto the table.
Without the falsehood of the OP, that would make no sense - obviously the billions of people who lived and died as atheists over the centuries and now could not possibly explain why they did not believe in Jan's God, or why Jan's God did not exist (a much different question),
and clearly if people have to learn all about Jan's God before Jan will believe they have no knowledge of God capable of supporting a theism there is a problem with the logic,
but all that disappears if Jan can somehow sell the notion that everyone believes in Jan's God whether they know it or not, whether they have ever heard about such an entity or not, etc.
And that would provide a foothold for Jan to deliver judgments and insults and accuse others of the kind of dishonesty and bad faith and character flaws visible in Jan's posts.
The actual goal, imho. Just a guess, but it fits the evidence - and it's familiar from the outside world, dealing with theists.
Let’s just simplify the discussion and assume that everything that exists can be physically described. Therefore any entity, whether sensible flesh and blood, or unseen ethereal phenomenon, can be assumed to be physically real. So under this universal condition there is no distinction between one process or another, it’s all physical. Any identifiable process is just a manifestation of the greater whole. Gods, humans, alternate consciousnesses, they would all be physical subsets of a larger physical universe.
We only have evidence that sentience is a product of biology. There may be other paths to sentience, but we are not yet in a position to know them.
It’s not clear that any consciousness is responsible for this phenomenal world beyond the influence of known biology. Biologic consciousness may very well be an embryonic state for higher forms of consciousness, including those of gods. Given enough time a sufficiently evolved conscious entity might be able to replicate the naturally created celestial formations. So are we living in a naturally created universe or a personally created one? Who knows? Not me, and I seriously doubt that you or anyone else does either.
There's a difference between simplifying and dumbing down. If you want to equate description with "physical reality" you are once again begging the question, since this is the primary issue in question.
IOW the "playing field" that we, the unlimitedly limited, bring our senses to.
But even to ride with this notion of "one process", the technical hurdles in successfully presenting an explanation on how to manufacture and pilot a jumbo jet to ants seems to be clear evidence this notion lacks a thoroughly practical counterpart (ant behaviour and human behaviour is ultimately one process, right?). IOW if we are toying with empiricism as an authoratative epistemology, things start to rapidly degenerate if it lacks a practical element.
(IOW you are degrading empiricism by taking it outside of its authoratative field).
By "we" I assume you mean those explaining things exclusively in empirucal terms.
Its not clear why one would bring biology to a problem of cosmogyny (cosmogyny being the "physical field", if we are to insist on discussing things in a purely "physical observable" sense, of Gods consciousness). If biology is looking for mysteries to ponder, no need to go further than a fruit fly.
The fact that you can't even begin to answer these sort of q's in any meaningful way with the discipline of biology or the broader one of empiricism was my point. Talking about what can and cannot be tenable under biology regarding God is just as praiseworthy as discussing what can and cannot be tenable in the realm of examining bathroom hand basins regarding marine life.
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I would mean you and me.
And that makes a fairly decent explanation of why even a demonstration of the inadequacy of scientifically informed human reason to handle some question
- a demonstration which you cannot begin to provide, btw, having no grounds whatsoever except the circumstance that after a couple of hundred years it hasn't completely succeeded yet
- would not suggest a deity. Anyone who worshipped a God on such grounds would be equivalent to an ant worshipping a jet plane pilot - not even the Boeing engineering department, just the pilot.
Agree
- When Scientists understand the conditions before the Big Bang
- have access to those conditions
- use those conditions to create a universe
- it's possible religion should vanish
Religion would shift gears
"Ah ha. god created the conditions before the Big Bang which created the Universe, which is the same as god creating the Universe"
You are an atheist, a person for whom there is no God. I already know that.
If God Is. Then God Is.
There is no just for me.
Now we find ourselves in a situation where there are theists, and there are atheists.
Just because you don't believe in God, (your position), doesn't mean that there is no God. It only means there is no God, for you. That's all it can mean.
That's a silly statement, if I may say so.
There is no reality without God. You cannot even envision a reality without God. All you can do is reject, and deny God. There is nothing you can do, or offer, to show your position is anything more than rejection and denial.
You're the one who rejects, and denies God. Can you account for that? You are becoming incommunicable, because you can't account for it.
Can you explain how God, cannot Be?
Explain how the pursuit of truth, even through evidence, can be attained without God?
Yet you deny, and reject God.
That's about as false as it gets.
Nobody denies, and rejects things that aren't real.
People have no idea of what is not real, what it means to be real, without a standard model.
What is your standard model, if not God?
How do you know if something is true?
Of course you do. That's why it's become a position.
Like I said, nobody rejects and denies something that does not exist. Because there is nothing to reject.
I didn't say it was a fact.
Facts can change, due to circumstance, or in light of new evidence.
God is not a hypothesis, or a theory. Nobody theist ever makes that claim.
When you ask for evidence of God, you aren't talking about God. You create a fictional account of God, then ask for evidence of that.
As it is your account, you decide whether or not that God exists.
No atheist who eventually accepts God, ever comes to that via evidence.
What do you actually know?
What makes you think people didn't with the same process?
How do you think the ancients built great structures, like the great pyramids?
Do you think it just came about through luck?
This is you burying your head in the sand.
There is so much information out there. Rich in essence, truth, and knowledge. But you choose to pass it off as the mumbling of idiots, who stumbled upon some things, by dumb luck.
You have no idea what you're talking about.
I think I'll leave it here, and see if you can come with something, where you actually utilise the intelligence you have, in a different way.
jan.
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I'm not sure what gave you the idea that these were grounds for worshipping God. I mean I am pretty sure you wouldn't expect the bathroom hand basin as being sufficient grounds for lodging claims about marine biology, right?
I was examining, at Capracas's behest, biology/empircism/the "physical" and observable realm, as grounds for discerning the validity of God's existence. The conclusion was, if you think, on the basis of empirical authority, one could hope to go further than an opinion -either for or against - one is either deluded and/or merely succumbing to politics/meme bashing.
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People aren't theists because they know, or think they know how we got here. People are theist despite that.
It is the same with atheists. They do not need to know how we got here, to be an atheist. People are atheist despite that.
The question I asked purely pertains to the act of believing there is no God, outside of rejection, and denial.
What would a purely atheist world be like?
IOW deciding for yourself that you do not need belief in God to live your life.
But how do you decide there is no God, without denying and rejecting, theism, and it's goal?
You'll no doubt say that lack of evidence, not rejection, and denial, lies at the heart of this decision.
But how can you determine what is evidence of God, if you reject, and deny, God within yourself, and your ability to determine what is true, and what is false?
God either Is, or is not. There is no in between, or waiting to see how it turns.
If however one perceives that to be the case, it has to be concluded that there is no God, as far as they are aware. Even if they don't see it like that.
If one relies on science, and philosophy, in order to decide God is acceptable, then there is no God, as far as they are aware.
Because if we assume that one is trying to base evidence on the theistic claim that there is a God, then one must also experience God the same way the theist say he/does.
The theist does not base their theism on science and philosophy, yet the atheist wants to do just that. Then we are in a situation where the atheist has just rejected, and denied God, without even knowing, or even meaning to.
No. My belief is in God.
I accept that God Is.
You don't. That is the difference between us. And that's what makes us theist, or atheist.
So what is a prerequisite for not believing in God?
So you're saying it is possible to be an atheist, but not think there is no God?
Can you elaborate on that?
jan.
If you went a step further, to the position of concluding there is no God, what new behaviours would you adopt?
Xelasnave.1947
Valued Senior Member
You are behind the times I have selected Thor as my God so I am not a atheist.
That does not worry me.
You can imagine whatever you wish but as I have said just saying things does not make them true...but as I said go ahead...there is no God I guess that is rejection and denial..if someone wants to present God they can...or rather they cant.
..no race car in the garage...money talks bullshit walks..etc...You aint got the goods.
OK dont worry if you have nothing I was not expecting a thing...how could I expect you to provide evidence of a non existent God...I never thought for a moment you would come up with anything and you always prove I am right.
Nothing.
All that I need to know.
They probably hired some clever atheists who would have done things without using superstition I guess.
Then you need not worry about what I say and talk to your God and ask him why I am always right.
I have come up with something ... the God story is made up and I have already provided evidence proving that so there is not much to add.
You have nothing to offer I knew that you never did so I am not disappointed.
Thor created the universe with his hammer ... all give Thor a pat on the back.
Alex
You said earlier; ''You can imagine whatever you wish but as I have said just saying things does not make them true..''
Yet here you are making something up, and claiming it to be true.
You say no one was there at the creation of the material world.
Wrong! God was there.
You don't have to accept that, obviously. But it just make you an atheist. Nothing more.
jan.
Xelasnave.1947
Valued Senior Member
Perhaps but the recorded account clearly was provided by a human who was not there...that is clear...the account was made up.
Alex
There is no evidence that God exists. Are you asking if there's evidence of no evidence? The answer to that would be yes - there are plenty of cases where X was held up as a reason "God had to have done that" only to find a reason it could have happened naturally.
Yet you said you believed in Santa Claus. Why is a rotund man in a red suit who lives at the North Pole and visits every single child on Christmas Eve more believable than an anthropomorphic rabbit who does the same?
Most of them. The God of the Bible, for example, lacks any evidence of his existence. Indeed, since many of his acts in the Bible are either not possible or provably didn't happen, there is a proof of lack of evidence.
However, you could define God in some way that God does exist, like saying "God is love." Great - then if love exists, then God exists. But that's just word games, like defining the Easter Bunny as the guy who sells easter baskets.
You're a liar, billvon. I never said I believed in Santa Claus.
Only that he was real, in the capacity as he is known and understood.
Your lying only gives credibility to the essential theme of the article.
You cannot defend your position, because there is nothing to defend.
jan.
When there is nothing to defend, the attacker looks like a fool.
Baby Iguana's only seconds after being hatched, is born with certain knowledge, without any experience whatsoever. How? DNA?
God can transmit what, and to who, God likes.
Anyhow, enjoy this piece of action from a David Attenborough series. Maybe you have already seen it, but it is quite amazing.
www.bbc.com/earth/story/20161114-from-planet-earth-ii-a-baby-iguana-is-chased-by-snakes
jan.
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