Why I Am An Atheist

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So, like, if God plays tricks on your perception, hides between the clouds or persecutes lambs even though He's OmniGood, it's your shortcomings that fail to recognize Him.
Eh... Pass.

[Immanuel Can]

Sure, you tell me how you know that this 'God' exists.

Sure. Here's the procedure I recommend.

My experiences won't convince you, I'm sure -- and they shouldn't, since they're not yours; so I won't refer to them. And I'm going to give you credit as if you know the various intellectual arguments, such as the Cosmological and Moral Arguments, and I'm going to assume that for some reason of your own, they don't compel doubt of your Atheism. So let's say they're out. Then there are conceptual-analytic arguments like the Ontological Argument of Plantinga...but most people don't even understand those, let alone have a chance of refuting them, so I'm going to pass by them as well. And apparently you get up in the morning and look at the same created world I do; but you apparently see no design in it, even if I do. So the evidence from the natural world is also gone.

I also assume you're aware of the epistemological impossibility of Atheism. (Even Dawkins knows and admits that one, so I don't doubt you would too.) And apparently even that has not persuaded you away from Atheism, so I guess that's all gone too.

So I'm going to restrict my field to one thing: your experience. In particular, I offer you the following test: take a gospel (one of the first four books in the New Testament). Take one chapter a day, and read it. Ask God, if He's there, to show you. Do it for sixty days. And if, after sixty days, you've found nothing, then you get your Atheism back.

That's my challenge to you. You wanted evidence, and that's how you'll find it.

You may be unwilling to try, I suppose: but I've read "Beyond Good and Evil," (and Hume, and Russell, and other such noteworthy Atheists). Not only that, but I've read the Gita, the Torah, the Koran, the Tao...and a bunch of other such stuff. So I'm going to believe that you have at least as much willingness to address the relevant evidence as I do. Assuming that, then, go and do as I suggest, and we can talk in two months.

But if it should turn out that you simply won't look at the evidence, then would your Atheism be, in any sense, rational?

[Immanuel Can]

OK, but I still need an example.

Reread my last message. Start with "Your example," i.e. the example you requested. You've already got it.

[Immanuel Can]

Hey, Mannie...what's shakin'?

It's all good, bro. You? Still plowing through this site with the old common sense thing, eh?

You've got even more patience (or obstinacy) than I do.

[sthitapragya]

OK, but I still need an example.

Reread my last message. Start with "Your example," i.e. the example you requested. You've already got it.

Oh ok. I see now. God exists. I was completely wrong. You win.

[FlashDangerpants]

It's very rationally sustainable, if someone says something exists then the onus is on them to show or prove it exists. My dog exists is provable by me showing you my dog. Now you can argue its not a dog but you can't argue that whatever it is doesn't exist. So show me your 'God' as until then I can rationally think you are just making it up and have a very strange view of "exists".

That's a perfectly valid counter argument to Nick or Walker - people who claim they know that there is a God, but have great difficulty expressing any reason why you should agree that isn't simplistic stolen and at the same time misunderstood (Nick), or just a stream of nonsense from which there is no good reason to fish for meaning (Walker).

But it is only a counter argument. It has the problem of being equally valid whether there is a God or not, so long as nobody can prove it. If somebody can prove there is a God, it stops working, and if somebody can prove there is not it is superfluous. That other argument that makes it stop is the one that grand theists and grand atheists are always trying to rustle up.

My claim is that these are metaphysically impossible arguments unless God does exist and feels like making his presence knowable. If God does exist and doesn't want to be found, then the theists are trying to outwit their own God, which strikes me as impious and arrogant. The Bible recommends not annoying God with those character failings by the way, so we should all stop arguing about this topic.

[FlashDangerpants]

Well yes. I agree. When I state that I am an atheist, I'm not fooling myself that I know there isn't a God, I just don't believe there is one, or many.

Are you? I didn't know one way or the other. Well, if I may say, you're extraordinarily honest with yourself. Well done.

Arguments that it is ok to believe there is a God or that there is not occupy a similar logical space in that they have some hope of sustainability. Arguments that it is not ok to believe either of the above occupy the other potential space.

I wonder what you mean by "space." And I wonder why it would be "ok" to believe in something if it weren't true. Why would it be ok to be a Theist if one was wrong about God, and why would it be ok to be an Atheist if a God does exist? I also wonder what "some hope of sustainability means," -- unless you're more agnostic than Atheist, which I suppose could be so. Very interesting.

As for Atheism, I think it can have personal space, but the minute it's advanced as a recommendation or postulate for other people it doesn't really have "space" any longer in the field of rational alternatives. For then it musts supply evidence to justify its recommendation or postulate; and that it simply does not have and admittedly cannot get.

I've found that popular Atheism exists only by two means: one, by the attempted negation of some particular form of Theism, or two, by way of prejudgment without evidence. The former is nearly impossible to achieve in all cases, and the latter is irrational. So I think there's not much "space" for that sort of Atheism, if "space" means the realm of the reasonable. It's just not a rationally-sustainable position...at least in anything more than the way of a merely personal confession.

I think it is fairly reasonable to believe a thing while acknowledging it might be mistaken. Much stranger to know a thing and admit the same misgiving.
I don't believe for instance that he moon landings were faked. I f you are American, I don't believe you should vote for Donald Trump. I do belive Elvis is dead, and strongly don't believe that England will the football tournament they are about to play in.

If I were able to enumerate the total sum of all the things I believe, one of them would be that a significant number of the others are mistaken. That last belief, I think, is ok. I can't prove it right now, but I also believe that time will help me out there. But it may not, I might die under a meteorite, or succumb to whatever ailment gives Bob such certainty in absurdity.

I think it is ok to have beliefs based on your interpretation of the available evidence. That seems to be what belief is for. The extension of my beliefs into an argument that you must change yours to match is tricky in some circumstances though. In political debate the arguments presented by either side are often only persuasive to those who hold the right set of beliefs to make them receptive to a certain type of argument, neither side can ever win. In this matter, where the subject is necessarily elusive and all evidence presented is tangential at best, the standard required for an objectively persuasive argument is impossible to meet.

[uwot]

Then there are conceptual-analytic arguments like the Ontological Argument of Plantinga...but most people don't even understand those, let alone have a chance of refuting them, so I'm going to pass by them as well.

I'll give it a shot, Immanuel. How is it better than Anselm or Desacartes? It's not that 'properly basic' bollocks, is it?
The problem I find is the people who don't understand ontological arguments, but believe they are sound anyway.

[Immanuel Can]

I think it is ok to have beliefs based on your interpretation of the available evidence. That seems to be what belief is for.

I think you're quite right. Well said.

Interestingly, a great number of people, particularly some among the Atheists, would argue that "belief" is something you do absent or contrary to the available evidence. They would even say that's definitionally necessary, and furthermore, they'd argue that "belief" is something no Atheist even has to do.

Your view is much more reasonable. "Belief" is how one gets from evidence to conclusion, whether one is Theist or Atheist. And the "belief" in question can be evaluated based on the strength of the evidence and the accuracy of the reasoning. And that's true for everyone.

[Immanuel Can]

Then there are conceptual-analytic arguments like the Ontological Argument of Plantinga...but most people don't even understand those, let alone have a chance of refuting them, so I'm going to pass by them as well.

I'll give it a shot, Immanuel. How is it better than Anselm or Desacartes? It's not that 'properly basic' bollocks, is it?
The problem I find is the people who don't understand ontological arguments, but believe they are sound anyway.

Or those who dismiss them as unsound without really understanding them. Yes, both are problematic.

I wasn't thinking "properly basic," but I'd be interested in hearing if you find the idea of "properly basic" beliefs itself implausible, or just the "properly basic" beliefs Plantinga posits implausible.

[uwot]

I wasn't thinking "properly basic," but I'd be interested in hearing if you find the idea of "properly basic" beliefs itself implausible, or just the "properly basic" beliefs Plantinga posits implausible.

One thing at a time, Immanuel. So what is this ontological argument that is so difficult to understand?

[henry quirk]

"You've got even more patience (or obstinacy) than I do."

Nah...simply: bad habits die hard.

[Immanuel Can]

I wasn't thinking "properly basic," but I'd be interested in hearing if you find the idea of "properly basic" beliefs itself implausible, or just the "properly basic" beliefs Plantinga posits implausible.

One thing at a time, Immanuel. So what is this ontological argument that is so difficult to understand?

Well, a lot of people seem to think the Anselmian-Plantinga argument boils down to "If you think God exists, he must." And they think that something like "Yeah, well, what about unicorns?" is a complete answer. Thus they misunderstand both the argument and the relevant concerns with the argument.

You've surely run into that, if you've ever spoken about the Ontological Argument with anyone, right?

[Immanuel Can]

"You've got even more patience (or obstinacy) than I do."

Nah...simply: bad habits die hard.

Heh, heh.

Good thing, too.

[henry quirk]

HA!