Atheists and their jargon of insults

[gnostic]

I disagree. Scientifically we have a lot of information and knowledge about entities categorized under the label 'gods'. It has been more than established that the whole category consists of psychological/social constructs that have evolved over millennia of human thought.

I will certainly agree that God or gods, plus the religions and the scriptures, are all human inventions.

And I will certainly agree that these religions are of psychological & social constructs.

But I did refer to "science" in the contexts of "Natural Sciences":

Neither sides have evidence to back their belief or non-belief. And neither sides have anything to offer to natural sciences.

“Natural Sciences”, as in physics, chemistry, Earth sciences, astronomy & life sciences (eg biology-related sciences)

And in that context, I was talking about science that investigated "nature".

And as to social and psychological constructs would fall under the Social Sciences, eg psychology, sociology, anthropology, political science, economics, etc...not Natural Sciences.

While Natural Sciences and Physical Sciences required to follow the requirements of falsifiability and Scientific Method, the sciences in Social Sciences don't have to.

 

[PureX]

that last one, is an absurd example, because the opposite is just as absurd:

​

"I know I'm a theist and all, but it really is quite possible that God don’t exists, and that my theism is therefore just unfounded bravado"​

Both theism and atheism are just opposite positions & opposite beliefs about the “belief” of the existence of deity or deities. Neither sides have “knowledge” about god or about God’s existence.

No, they are opposing positions regarding the real possibility that God exists. And they are both just blind bravado if we raise them to the level of "belief". Because when we raise them to the level of belief, we are ignoring the very real possibility that whatever we are believing about god's existence is wrong. It's why I constantly post against belief, and in favor of faith. Because faith does not require that we ignore doubt. And both logically and honestly, we should retain that doubt, becaise we could always be wrong.

Neither sides have evidence to back their belief or non-belief.

Actually, both sides have plenty of 'evidence'. What neither side has is provable knowledge.

And neither sides have anything to offer to natural sciences.

It no one's responsibility to offer anything to natural science.

“Natural Sciences”, as in physics, chemistry, Earth sciences, astronomy & life sciences (eg biology-related sciences)

Evidence & experiments (plus data) are the only true commodity for natural sciences, because they are the only means to objectively TEST any model of a hypothesis or theory.

None of this matters in the least, except to people that have raised 'natural science' up in their minds to a level that is absurdly grandiose and illogical.

As I have always said, any science (referring to Natural Sciences or Physical Sciences) required evidence & experiments to test any given model, even if those test would refute the model.

That not the case for either theism or atheism, as there are no way test the existence of god…you cannot perform experiments that would make god observable. And if you cannot observe, test or measure God, then you would have no evidence, as in absence of evidence or zero evidence.

Science does not define what is or is not evidence.

Neither theism, nor atheism, have anything to do with science, and neither of them have “knowledge“.

Science does not define what is or is not 'knowledge'. You are raising science up in your mind to a level that is causing you to draw these absurd conclusions. It's called 'scientism'.

You have only directed the “unfounded bravados” barbs at atheism, but theism is certainly no better, as it provides zero knowledge.

As I stated above, both are guilty of dishonest bravado when they presume to 'believe in' their respective positions.

 

[PureX]

Never. Why would ackowledging a possibility mean that my default position is unfounded?

Because your default position IS unfounded.

What is unfounded is what theists claim of some God existing, as if they know it.

Yes, they are "believers", like you. So they cannot see that they are confusing a fantasy with reality.

I invite believers to explain why they believe,

I invite you to do the same.

or why they think they know, but the answers are not reasoned conclusions based on evidence. It never is.

You don't even know what evidence is. So you're in no position to judge.

Yet here you are trying to argue a position that you think is true.

Humans ignorance just is. It requires no argument as it's self-evident. Or it would be if we were willing to see past our egos.

And you are incorrect to say that critial thinkers are equipped to use their skill in debate against foolish and non-factual claims and beliefs. You see it every day, so I'm not sure why you deny it.

The only critical thinkers I've ever met were self-critical, first. And they would NEVER label themselves that way.

 

[cladking]

What assumption?

#587

Why haven't you?

You must challenge a point.

 

[Clizby Wampuscat]

Sure. It's direct experience. I know my car is in the garage when I see it there. I believe it's in the garage when I don't see it there, but I presume it's there anyway.

OK thanks. I guess I would use belief for both situations. One just has better evidence for the same belief.

 

[ratiocinator]

#587

Okay...

Surely you remember that he assumed consciousness is irrelevant to the nature of change in species or the study of change in species. Dozens of times I've listed his numerous assumptions and proven they were wrong such as the assumption that populations tend to be relatively stable. ALL of his 19th century primitive assumptions were wrong. You can't Look and See reality so Look and See Science means nothing. It can not apply to the reality none of us can see directly.

Conciousness is irrelevant. Hardly a staring assumption. The theory was based on observations and there was no need to include consciousness and not one shred of evidence that it was needed.

Populations are "relatively stable". What do you even mean by that?

What are all the others?

You must challenge a point.

No, you made the claim: "I can show a century and a half of experiment to show he is wrong." You said you could show something, so show it.

ETA: And you ignored: And you have still not justified your absurd assertion that only experiment is relevant to science.

 

[Clizby Wampuscat]

that last one, is an absurd example, because the opposite is just as absurd:

​

"I know I'm a theist and all, but it really is quite possible that God don’t exists, and that my theism is therefore just unfounded bravado"​

Both theism and atheism are just opposite positions & opposite beliefs about the “belief” of the existence of deity or deities. Neither sides have “knowledge” about god or about God’s existence.

Neither sides have evidence to back their belief or non-belief. And neither sides have anything to offer to natural sciences.

My non belief is just that. I don't need evidence to not be convinced of a proposition.

That not the case for either theism or atheism, as there are no way test the existence of god…you cannot perform experiments that would make god observable. And if you cannot observe, test or measure God, then you would have no evidence, as in absence of evidence or zero evidence.

I am not so sure this is true. If god does interact with the world like many theist claim then we should be able to test for that.

 

[MikeF]

I will certainly agree that God or gods, plus the religions and the scriptures, are all human inventions.
And I will certainly agree that these religions are of psychological & social constructs.
But I did refer to "science" in the contexts of "Natural Sciences":

I would suggest that adding the adjective 'natural' to the noun 'science' is a vestigial anachronism that is best left in the past. This characterization was created for no other reason than to shield other academic disciplines from the fundamental realization that necessitated the creation of a scientific approach. It was the realization that any investigator, any thinker or philosopher, has inherent fallibilities that need to be acknowledged and actively mitigated. It was a realization that it did not matter how smart, clever, or educated one was, for it was becoming abundantly clear that relying on personal "intuition" or on reasoning that was not firmly grounded in verifiable reality invariably left one getting lost in the realm of pure imagination.

And in that context, I was talking about science that investigated "nature".

Are not Homo sapiens part of "nature" and hence "nature" would include all of human experience, our behavior, what we think and do?

And as to social and psychological constructs would fall under the Social Sciences, eg psychology, sociology, anthropology, political science, economics, etc...not Natural Sciences.

While Natural Sciences and Physical Sciences required to follow the requirements of falsifiability and Scientific Method, the sciences in Social Sciences don't have to.

The whole concept of falsifiability was created to establish a methodology to provide and maintain a demarcation between which of our abstract thoughts correspond to actual phenomena and events in the real world, and which do not.

Science is not about the subject of our interest, it is about approaching that subject in a manner that acknowledges the inherent fallibility of all human investigators and makes a concerted and disciplined effort to mitigate those fallibilities to the greatest possible extent. This is how we establish some level of objectivity and get beyond the individual, inherently fallible, subjective perspective.

So if objectivity is required along with distinguishing between what is real and what is entirely abstraction, a scientific approach is required, regardless the subject matter.

 

[cladking]

The theory was based on observations ...

YES!!!
And science is based on experiment. Darwin performed no science relevant to gradual change in species caused by survival of the fittest. It is Look and See Science at its worst.

Conciousness is irrelevant.

Yes!!! That was his assumption. He was incorrect.

...there was no need to include consciousness and not one shred of evidence that it was needed.

Darwin didn't know much of anything about genetics and nothing at all about consciousness. If he had known then he could have deduced that consciousness was dependent on the wiring of the brain which is determined genetically and modified in animals through experience and knowledge as we now know. It obviously is not irrelevant to whether an individual lives or dies. It obviously can introduce patterns of behavior and consciousness that vary from generation to generation.

OBVIOUSLY.

This is something a child can understand. We are our genes. Darwin didn't understand because he didn't know what consciousness was and he ASSUMED it could be factored out. I BELIEVE it can NOT be factored out because it is the BASIS of the mechanism for change in species.

This is not rocket SCIENCE. This is simple deduction from known FACTS and existing EXPERIMENT. ALL EXPERIMENT applies to all things at all times.

Your belief that consciousness is irrelevant is why you BELIEVE Darwin. We are homo circularis rationatio we reason only in circles and this is why each of us KNOWS everything. We each reasoned back to our beliefs.

I am not speaking another language. People don't understand me because they don't want to understand. They want me to fall in line with dogma and go go seek out the less fit for extermination.

Darwin was wrong about everything because all of his assumptions were wrong.

If you like I can provide many examples for how consciousness and the behavior the derives DIRECTLY from consciousness can mean lif4e or death to the individual but then this should be OBVIOUS.

 

[cladking]

I am not speaking another language. People don't understand me because they don't want to understand. They want me to fall in line with dogma and go go seek out the less fit for extermination.

Even if I were wrong about everything (and it is possible) why do people think it's OK to berate, demean, lecture, and insult everyone who doesn't agree with scientific scripture and even soup of the day science?

Many people who support science simply don't like having their fundamental beliefs examined. They don't like looking at foundational assumptions. So if they can't "reason" with a creationist or a heretic then the gloves come off and they resort to tactics that can be seen in any alley.

 

[cladking]

Populations are "relatively stable". What do you even mean by that?

Ask Darwin. He said it.

Obviously there were smart people who read the first edition and saw the error. This was back when there were many explanations for the fossil record instead of hegemony. Somebody apparently told him he might be wrong if populations dipped to very low levels but he then went on to ASSUME rthat populations don't drop to low levels except before extinctions. He BELIEVED this was so important a point he stated this assumption in the introduction of a later edition. He was wrong and we see this in nature.

Selective breeding IS the introduction of artificial bottlenecks. When unusual behavior is selected a new species is born. This is experiment. This is the science. Science says Darwin was wrong about everything.

 

[cladking]

No, you made the claim: "I can show a century and a half of experiment to show he is wrong." You said you could show something, so show it.

There are thousands of experiments that put the lie to Darwin's thousands of false assumptions. Let's do them one or two at a time AFTER you prove you can even see the assumption.

People see what we expect *(as shown by experiment) so nobody noticed when every experiment from the very beginning showed Darwin was wrong.

But take it to the darwin was wrong (Darwin's Illusion) thread still on the first page.

 

[ratiocinator]

And science is based on experiment.

AND observation.

You still haven't justified your absurd rejection of observation.

That was his assumption.

No, it wasn't. There was no evidence that it had anything to do with it (there still isn't) and no need for it.

He was incorrect.

Baseless, unargued assertion.

Darwin didn't know much of anything about genetics and nothing at all about consciousness. If he had known then he could have deduced that consciousness was dependent on the wiring of the brain which is determined genetically and modified in animals through experience and knowledge as we now know. It obviously is not irrelevant to whether an individual lives or dies. It obviously can introduce patterns of behavior and consciousness that vary from generation to generation.

You seem to be confusing consciousness with brain function and behaviour and ignoring the fact that evolution applies regardless of whether the organisms are conscious or even have brains. You're looking at a tiny sample of the things that evolve and trying to make it relevant to the basic idea of evolution. That is obviously daft.

ALL EXPERIMENT applies to all things at all times.

Balderdash.

Your belief that consciousness is irrelevant is why you BELIEVE Darwin.

Not even wrong. I don't 'believe Darwin'. He came up with the original idea but things have moved on since then and I don't accept evolution because I assume consciousness is irrelevant, although it obviously is to almost all instances of evolution because they don't involve conscious entities at all.

People don't understand me because they don't want to understand.

People don't accept what you say because you make baseless assertions and never back them up.

Darwin was wrong about everything because all of his assumptions were wrong.

The evidence says otherwise.

If you like I can provide many examples for how consciousness and the behavior the derives DIRECTLY from consciousness can mean lif4e or death to the individual but then this should be OBVIOUS.

So how does consciousness affect the evolution of things that aren't conscious (plants, microbes, viruses,...)?

 

[ratiocinator]

Ask Darwin. He said it.

[citation missing]

Obviously there were smart people who read the first edition and saw the error. This was back when there were many explanations for the fossil record instead of hegemony. Somebody apparently told him he might be wrong if populations dipped to very low levels but he then went on to ASSUME rthat populations don't drop to low levels except before extinctions. He BELIEVED this was so important a point he stated this assumption in the introduction of a later edition. He was wrong and we see this in nature.

You'll need to provide quotes if you want a response, but why the obsession with Darwin? Things have moved on. Bottlenecks do occur and we can see the genetic evidence when they do.

When unusual behavior is selected a new species is born.

Nope.

 

[cladking]

Back in the '80's somebody discovered that you can communicate with severely autistic individuals if you could just find a route through their senses. There were countless thousands of people sitting and using all manner of strange devices to facilitate communication with these individuals. All over the world there were severely profoundly autistic people suddenly painting, writing books, and even solving equations. There was one facilitator who even used ouija boards to communicate. It was a marvelous time.

Of course it was eventually proven these people were not communicating at all and the books were coming from the facilitators and not the autistic.

We have infinite power to delude ourselves. Whole countries can go mad and shovel their population into gas chambers and concentration camps.

We can be wrong for countless centuries and we are apparently on a 4000 year detour from reality even right now. The tower of babel was "real" and we have been confused ever since. We see religion as a collection of fairy tales and unreality even though it is actually the results of science as expressed in confused language by a new species which knows everything after reasoning in circles. This is why creationists often make better reasoned arguments than believers in science: They have better source material as it relates to the the nature of man and his place in the cosmos.

 

[ratiocinator]

There are thousands of experiments that put the lie to Darwin's thousands of false assumptions. Let's do them one or two at a time AFTER you prove you can even see the assumption.

You have yet to post a real assumption and shown it to be wrong. And you need to stop obsessing with one man. Darwin made a start. It's the modern theory, based on all the subsequent evidence that is relevant, not what Darwin himself thought.

 

[MikeF]

There is no evidence at all, far less "scientific evidence" that any of the first known "gods" were believed to be imaginary consciousness that control men's lives. The words appear in sentences that are believed to be magic and incantation.

I am struggling to understand what you are trying to say here. Especially "The words appear in sentences that are believed to be magic and incantation.". I cannot figure out which or who's words you are referring to.

Indeed, I have come to believe there is precious little real science at all in most of the soft sciences from history to anthropology. It is mostly the interpretation of "evidence". Sociology is about statistics and interpolation.

This is such a broad generalization as to be meaningless, frankly. Historically it has been much more difficult to establish an objective position in an investigation of human beings themselves. It is much easier to disentangle and detach one's self from their host of biases when the subject at hand is on the nature of light, for example. But, as I have said before, given time, bad science with out. The efficacy of "soft sciences", as you euphemistically put it, has greatly improved over what was seen 30, 50, or 100 years prior.

You tend to focus on the mistakes of the past without acknowledging and having any appreciation for how those mistakes were overcome.

This opens up many possibilities if "gods" meant something different.

Again, this is too cryptic for me. I don't have enough information to create any context.

 

[cladking]

You have yet to post a real assumption and shown it to be wrong. And you need to stop obsessing with one man. Darwin made a start. It's the modern theory, based on all the subsequent evidence that is relevant, not what Darwin himself thought.

#587

 

[ratiocinator]

#587

#646

 

[cladking]

I am struggling to understand what you are trying to say here. Especially "The words appear in sentences that are believed to be magic and incantation.". I cannot figure out which or who's words you are referring to.

All of the most ancient writing is believed to be magic and incantation by linguists. All of it. Nowhere does it define the nature of "God" or exactly how "Gods" are believed to do anything at all. This is the belief of ALL Egyptologists and Sumerologists. There is the story of Gilgamesh which is widely believed to date back to even before 3200 BC which clearly is not magic and incantation but I do not consider this an exception due to the fact every early version is so highly fragmented it's impossible to determine if it's a "story" or not.

There are new researchers who say that our translations of the story and utterly wrong and the meaning is wholly distinct from what is believed. The professionals got everything wrong because of Champollion. Young was much closer to the reality but Champollion lies at the root of the last two centuries of madness and led to to Darwin, Freud, et al. We reason in circles so when our premises are wrong we are wrong.

It is highly illogical to try to deduce anything at all from a book of magic. But Egyptologists started with the assumption that "gods" (neters) were imaginary consciousnesses because this is what "God" meant to the authors of the "book of the dead". Once you start with a false assumption you will reason back to that assumption which is why I often call our species "homo circularis rationatio". It's what we do and "homo omnniscience" is the result of what we do. By reasoning in circles we have each learned everything giving us both the right and the duty to attack heretics, naysayers, and anyone who argues against Holy Scripture.


Any ancient people or any animal that put its fait in the hands of God would quickly become extinct because their neighbors or their animal competitors would always eat their lunch. Ancient people used logic and science to thrive. Success was based not on "fitness" as Darwin believed nor on "superstition" as archaeologists believe. It was based on consciousness, science, and knowledge (the Holy Trinity) also expressed as "Knowledge> Understanding> Creation". It was behavior and consciousness which invented cities and agriculture and after the tower of babel it created religion and it was religion that gave birth to "Gods" and "God".

If this isn't clear I can clarify or elaborate.