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Atheists believe in miracles more than believers

This is a believer's mentality.

You're just projecting it onto others.
Faith is the power behind believing in God, The closer we get to the end more and more will fall away from God as you have. The world is controlled by satan who rules the world and the minds of the unbeliever. Those who keep their Faith in God and do not allow Satan to pull them away from God will be rewarded with the New Kingdom of God that he has waiting for only them that keep their Faith and love for him.
 

PureX

Veteran Member
All theists believe by faith. That's a breach of reason ...
Faith is a very reasonable course of action that all humans engage in routinely because it works for us often. Belief is not, since it's both fundamentally dishonest and quite unnecessary, Theists run the whole gamut between the weakest faith and the most intense belief.
That's a mistake to me.
That's because you still don't understand it and you never will because you are an atheist true believer. For you, theism is wrong. Theism is false. Theism is bad. You truly believe this and you will not doubt it. Ever.
A god belief does nothing for the believer that the atheist doesn't accomplish without one.
You have no idea what faith in a wisdom and power greater than ourselves does for those who choose it because you have none. You have no idea what you might have accomplished if you had. So you are in no position to pass judgment on anyone else's faith choices. Yet for some reason you are really keen to do so.
Most atheists deny you claim that they claim no gods exist, ...
Of course they do. They know they can't back it up. But they nevertheless do truly believe in their atheist ideology, just as you do.
I have no need for a god belief.
Few people do.

Faith, on the other hand, is something we all need to engage in. And a lot of people find that putting their faith in their chosen idea of God works out well for them. Way more people than choose atheism.
You describe it as something to hope for. I'm hoping to have a nice day, not to find a way to believe in gods.
No one cares what you believe about God. So why should you? It's silly to believe things that we cannot possibly know to be true.

Faith, however, is a whole different mind-set. But you can't recognize any of this because you are a true believer that any form of theism is false, wrong, bad, and foolish. And nothing is going to change that. Your mind is set on it. Locked tight, and tossed the key.
As I've said before, you and I can agree on much in areas like politics and economics, but when it comes to gods, we're worlds apart, ...
I am not a believer. You are. That's why. I have no interest in theism as a belief. Nor do I have any need for religion. In fact, I find it mostly annoying when I encounter it in others. But I can understand what faith is. And why people choose it, and I can respect it, and engage in it, myself. You cannot. Because you're true believer in your atheism. And that does not allow you to recognize anything reasonable or positive about faith in any sort of god.
 
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SkepticThinker

Veteran Member
Faith is the power behind believing in God, The closer we get to the end more and more will fall away from God as you have. The world is controlled by satan who rules the world and the minds of the unbeliever. Those who keep their Faith in God and do not allow Satan to pull them away from God will be rewarded with the New Kingdom of God that he has waiting for only them that keep their Faith and love for him.
This was in response to, "This is a believer's mentality.
You're just projecting it onto others."



Thank you for helping to make my point for me. :)
 

PureX

Veteran Member
This is a believer's mentality.

You're just projecting it onto others.
Most of the atheists here are true believers in their atheism. Which is why they have to elevate science far above it's rightful place, and then defend it by any means they can muster. And of course these true believers can't see any of this, because they truly believe their absurdly elevated idea of science IS science. They have to. Science is the only pathway to salvation for the atheist.
 
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SkepticThinker

Veteran Member
Most of the atheists here are true believers in their atheism.
I don't know what that means.
I don't believe in atheism. There's nothing there to believe in.
I'm just an agnostic atheist.
Which is why they have to elevate science far above it's rightful place,
Don't see how that follows.
and then defend it by any means they can muster. And of course the true believers can't see any of this, because they truly believe their absurdly elevated idea of science IS science. They have to. Science is the pathway to salvation for the atheist.
Oh I see, you're projecting the same mentality onto me as the other poster was trying to do.

This isn't how my brain works. At all.
 

cladking

Well-Known Member
If that is the way you believe then live your life that away. When God comes down and only saves those who have faith in him and obey him then dont cry like a baby wanting someone you did not believe in to save you. He will not save the unbeliever.

You might misunderstand me.

I do believe all belief is superstition but our species can't exist without beliefs so not all beliefs are "bad" beliefs. Indeed the only bad belief is a belief in Science but not because science isn't worthy but because science metaphysically excludes belief. Believing in Science is anti-science. Believing in God is not anti-science and is much better than atheism for some individuals and most individuals who believe in Science.
 

cladking

Well-Known Member
When God comes down and only saves those who have faith in him and obey him then dont cry like a baby wanting someone you did not believe in to save you. He will not save the unbeliever.

Whether I get into heaven may depend more on Rachel and my dog Rip ("The Hunt") than it does on my beliefs.

Indeed it might even depend on a species of wasp that pollinates fig trees.

To each his own.
 
You might misunderstand me.

I do believe all belief is superstition but our species can't exist without beliefs so not all beliefs are "bad" beliefs. Indeed the only bad belief is a belief in Science but not because science isn't worthy but because science metaphysically excludes belief. Believing in Science is anti-science. Believing in God is not anti-science and is much better than atheism for some individuals and most individuals who believe in Science.
That is why God had the Bible written so we have evidence of him. God tells us how to believe in him until he comes and that is through faith. Faith means believing in what you cannot see right now but hope for in the future of things. 1 Timothy 6:12 Fight the good fight of Faith lay hold for eternal life. Everything that is happening now, Wars, children out of control and the world getting worse is in the bible. The bible was written before all this started happening.
 

It Aint Necessarily So

Veteran Member
Premium Member
are accepting intuition as a source of knowledge?
No. I define knowledge as the collection of demonstrably correct ideas, which only comes from experience (empiricism) or pure reason (mathematical knowledge, where demonstration is in the form of proof, not sensory experience).

Other paths to belief include intuition and faith. I don't consider the ideas arrived at by those methods knowledge.
are you granting “free will” on the basis of intuition?
I'm not granting libertarian free will at all. The belief that one has it may be an illusion, but so powerful and compelling an illusion to most that they accept it as knowledge. But that is just intuition.

Here's a test for whether to call something intuition: "I just know it's true but I can't demonstrate it to be such." We can call that faith as well, but that word covers beliefs simply accepted uncritically such as all of the stuff here I've just been reading about Satan.
Or are you claiming the opposite?
Neither. The question of free will is unanswerable unless it is actually not free and that that is eventually demonstrated. There's some evidence to support that (Libet experiment), but it is not considered enough to draw that conclusion.
I have to put you on "ignore". It is impossible to communicate with anyone who refuses to communicate.
No problem.

I don't know if you'll see these words, but in case you do, I'll explain how I'll proceed from here. My answers won't be for you, which will cut down considerably on which comments I reply to. Several that I had lined up to answer now can be deleted without answers, because I can't imagine anybody else being interested in my responses to any of the following (but they might be interested in this response):
  • "what is it with the word "metaphysics" (basis of science)? Do you disagree, not understand, or is it useless?"
  • "YOU don't get to decide how I use any word AT ALL"
  • "IT IS NOT AWARENESS AS WE DEFINE IT. Am I supposed to write a 4000 word essay for every little point or definition because believers will otherwise REFUSE to parse my words as intended?"
  • "If I said it is "awareness" you'd tell me an acorn is not self aware."
  • "Ancient people didn't experience thought."
  • "No animal experiences thought which we believe makes us self aware."
  • "Being self aware makes you and me sleep walkers."
  • "Most of these people still think that I believe magic is the basis of science."
Those were all areas in which I had hoped to say something helpful to you, but which answers wouldn't be useful or interesting to anybody else, so, I deleted them.

At last, something that didn't get deleted:
I have no doubt some of the problem is me. I believe most of the problem is that the ideas I'm trying to communicate are alien to most individuals.
All of the problem is you, and you have all the evidence you need to conclude that. There are over a half dozen articulate posters participating in this thread. I can understand them all, and they seem to understand me despite my lazy editing. All of them have expressed difficulty understanding you. If you don't see the implications of that, you're fated to forever not recognize what the problem is - the first step in correcting it.

You write about others only seeing what they have concluded in advance, but that's what you're doing. You have decided that it's a them problem despite giving a bit of lip service above to being some of the problem before immediately reverting to it's a them problem again.
The irony here is that i could be wrong about everything without people showing me where I'm wrong despite the fact I can delineate numerous things they have wrong and state specifics of how they went wrong.
There is no evidence that anybody has been able to teach you anything. Nobody can show you that you are wrong without your cooperation. There is no burden of "proof" with somebody who can't or won't examine an argument dispassionately, have the critical thinking skills to determine if it's sound, and be ready to change his mind if shown he is wrong by that method. Whenever I write to you, nothing changes for you.
Faith is a very reasonable course of action
Faith is an alternative to reason. If your reasoning is valid, you don't need faith to believe and neither does any other critical thinker. If you need faith to believe, then you have no reasoned argument to present.
That's because you still don't understand it and you never will because you are an atheist true believer.
I understand faith perfectly. I used to indulge in it myself. That worked out badly, and I learned a better way to make decisions about what is true. There's nothing to understand about faith apart from it being a path to unjustified belief.
For you, theism is wrong. Theism is false. Theism is bad. You truly believe this. and you will not doubt it. Ever.
For me, faith is a mistake and theism is unnecessary. I don't call it false, just unjustified and for me, unnecessary.

And you're probably right that I will never change my mind about faith. Ever. Why should I? I know better now.
You have no idea what faith in a wisdom and power greater than ourselves does for those who choose it
Sure, I do. Why would you think I don't? I saw what it did to me. I see what it's done to you. And I see what it's done to another theist currently active on this thread. None of it is something I want for myself again.
Of course they do. They know they can't back it up
That was an answer to, "Most atheists deny you[r] claim that they claim no gods exist."

This is what faith has done to you:

ME: I neither believe that gods do or don't exist because I have no means to rule them in or out. That describes an agnostic atheist.
YOU: You're an atheist, so you deny that gods exist.
ME: I just told you otherwise.
YOU: You're lying. You have to because you can't support the claim that there are no gods.

That's either a cognitive defect or trolling. Or maybe you have a third possibility to suggest.

Like I said, you don't post like that about politics, government, or economics.
You have no idea what you might have accomplished if you had.
Been there, done that.
So you are in no position to pass judgment on anyone else's faith choices.
Sure I am. Those choices are irrational (not arrived at by applying valid reason to true premises or knowledge gained through prior experience) and generate unfalsifiable beliefs. If that were incorrect, you could successfully rebut it. But you can't and won't try. You might dismiss it or repeat yourself, but you won't falsify it with counterargument.

I'm also able to pass judgment on how faith affects people that indulge in it. In the best case, it gives a little psychological comfort. In the worst, it results in incarceration for storming the Capitol, needless Covid morbidity and mortality, refusal to take climate change seriously and insist on immediate action, and dead bodies at Jonestown and Waco.

The last climate deniers will lose their uninsurable homes to wildfire, tornado, or hurricane, homes that they can't sell due to everybody else realizing before they did that their location was no longer habitable. That's what faith can do to one.
 

leroy

Well-Known Member
No. I define knowledge as the collection of demonstrably correct ideas, which only comes from experience (empiricism) or pure reason (mathematical knowledge, where demonstration is in the form of proof, not sensory experience).

Then I am confused

(using our previous conversation as context)

…………….. How do you “know” that the most parsimonious hypothesis is the best ? how do you know that the laws are the same in all the universe? (say the laws that determine if liquid water will boil or not)

It seems to me from previous conversations that these are things that you claim to know with high degree of certainty……………… but you obviously cant demonstrate that they are correct with empirical science nor math

Wouldn’t you say that we also know things through logic? As in this 2 examples?
 

It Aint Necessarily So

Veteran Member
Premium Member
How do you “know” that the most parsimonious hypothesis is the best ?
The word is preferred, or likeliest to be correct. The most parsimonious hypothesis is not necessarily correct, but if a simpler one accounts for all known evidence, it's the preferred one. If, however, some new discovery falsifies that simpler narrative, we modify it to something that accounts for the new evidence.

Right now the theory of evolution is the preferred explanation for the evidence we find today in support of the theory. But suppose something new was discovered that falsifies the theory. If we cannot modify it to account for that falsifying find, we move to the next simplest narrative that does. We would be into deceptive intelligent designer territory now. Something created our world to look like evolution had occurred, but we now know that it hadn't.

Even then, we'll go with the more parsimonious account: a naturalistic one. An extremely technologically advanced extraterrestrial race of aliens who evolved from an abiogenetically created life form were the deceivers, not a supernatural one.
how do you know that the laws are the same in all the universe? (say the laws that determine if liquid water will boil or not)
That's a good question that I can't answer other than to say that it's an assumption that has never failed. Here's a discussion of that if you're interested. The laws of physics WERE different in the earliest universe before symmetry breaking occurred and the particles and forces we know today first appeared, but not since to our knowledge.
It seems to me from previous conversations that these are things that you claim to know with high degree of certainty……………… but you obviously cant demonstrate that they are correct with empirical science nor math
If the science works, that's demonstration enough that the assumptions and conclusions underlying it are valid for now. Like I said, new discoveries may require some modification to old answers. Newton's treatment of gravity, though incomplete, was adequate to send man to the moon and back. The Einstein predicted that gravity could bend the path of a massless light beam - something that Newton could not account for. The update to Newton's theory of gravitation was not accepted until this was demonstrated.
Wouldn’t you say that we also know things through logic?
Yes. I said as much: "I define knowledge as the collection of demonstrably correct ideas, which only comes from experience (empiricism) or pure reason (mathematical knowledge, where demonstration is in the form of proof, not sensory experience)." We can know that the sum of the squares of the sides of a right triangle equal the square of the hypotenuse through pure reason. We can also determine that empirically by making such triangles, measuring their sides, and confirming the Pythagorean formula.
 
Then I am confused

(using our previous conversation as context)

…………….. How do you “know” that the most parsimonious hypothesis is the best ? how do you know that the laws are the same in all the universe? (say the laws that determine if liquid water will boil or not)

It seems to me from previous conversations that these are things that you claim to know with high degree of certainty……………… but you obviously cant demonstrate that they are correct with empirical science nor math

Wouldn’t you say that we also know things through logic? As in this 2 examples?
God only gives the world 10 easy commandments to follow to live happy lives. Only a few in the Entire world that actually follow them and live to God's standards. Majority of the world lives however they feel, Killing, stealing, lying, hurting others. Then they raise their hands to God and want God's help when God already told them how to live a life that will give them total happiness.
 

Valjean

Veteran Member
Premium Member
Faith is a very reasonable course of action that all humans engage in routinely because it works for us often. Belief is not, since it's both fundamentally dishonest and quite unnecessary, Theists run the whole gamut between the weakest faith and the most intense belief.
But faith is belief, it's just one of several kinds of belief.
Belief covers a wide range, from belief in the completely unevidenced, to belief based on feelings or hunches, to belief based on familiar experiences, to belief based on observable, repeatable, falsifiable, tested theories.
I think you're equating faith with expectation or familiarity here, like faith that you won't float off into space or that your car will start. This type of faith is expectation based on repeated experience.
What we're talking about is ontological faith, based on neither actual experience nor evidenced and tested theories.
That's because you still don't understand it and you never will because you are an atheist true believer. For you, theism is wrong. Theism is false. Theism is bad. You truly believe this and you will not doubt it. Ever.
What "true beliefs" do atheists have, save a belief that God claimants haven't met their burden?
I can't speak for Ain't Necessarily, but for me, Theism is unevidenced and, thus, irrational.Not necessarily wrong, false, or bad.
You have no idea what faith in a wisdom and power greater than ourselves does for those who choose it because you have none. You have no idea what you might have accomplished if you had. So you are in no position to pass judgment on anyone else's faith choices. Yet for some reason you are really keen to do so.
What does that have to do with Theism vs atheism? We're talking about ontology, not utility.
Of course they do. They know they can't back it up. But they nevertheless do truly believe in their atheist ideology, just as you do.
So you're a mind reader....
Few people do.
It seems to me that an awful lot do.
Faith, on the other hand, is something we all need to engage in. And a lot of people find that putting their faith in their chosen idea of God works out well for them. Way more people than choose atheism.
Again, you're defending faith as a utilitarian, psychotherapeutic modality, not as an ontological belief. I'm OK with that, as long as you don't also claim it's ontologically true. That claim would be unwarranted, given the lack of objective, supporting evidence.
No one cares what you believe about God. So why should you? It's silly to believe things that we cannot possibly know to be true.
Exactly!
Faith, however, is a whole different mind-set. But you can't recognize any of this because you are a true believer that any form of theism is false, wrong, bad, and foolish. And nothing is going to change that. Your mind is set on it. Locked tight, and tossed the key.
"Faith" is unwarranted belief -- poorly evidenced or illogical. It's you who are the true believer. Most atheists doubt for the same reason you doubt the Flying Spaghetti Monster -- lack of evidence.
I am not a believer. You are. That's why. I have no interest in theism as a belief. Nor do I have any need for religion. In fact, I find it mostly annoying when I encounter it in others. But I can understand what faith is. And why people choose it, and I can respect it, and engage in it, myself. You cannot. Because you're true believer in your atheism. And that does not allow you to recognize anything reasonable or positive about faith in any sort of god.
A "true believer " believes something. He makes a truth-claim. What claim does Ain't Necessarily make, other than you've presented insufficient evidence to logically justify an ontological belief?
 

Valjean

Veteran Member
Premium Member
The world is controlled by satan 1 John 5:19
so majority of the world believes the way you do not believing in God. It is the true and Faithful one of God that believes in him and will be saved from this world of sin. The unbeliever of God will not be saved. So you do not have to worry on that day because you do not believe in it.
Why do you believe Satan even exists, much less that he controlled the world? Do you have any actual, objective evidence to back this up?
You can only believe what you see that is because Satan controls your mind and he does not care if you believe in him or not just as long as you are doing his will by disbelieving in God. As long as you live your life controlled by satan this is where your world will end on Judgement day.
Again, why do you believe this? Isn't it just one of innumerable, unevidenced myths?
 

Valjean

Veteran Member
Premium Member
Most of the atheists here are true believers in their atheism. Which is why they have to elevate science far above it's rightful place, and then defend it by any means they can muster. And of course these true believers can't see any of this, because they truly believe their absurdly elevated idea of science IS science. They have to. Science is the only pathway to salvation for the atheist.
I'm not a true believer. I'm making no claims to believe in. How is lack of belief a "true belief?"
 

Valjean

Veteran Member
Premium Member
The world is controlled by satan 1 John 5:19
so majority of the world believes the way you do not believing in God. It is the true and Faithful one of God that believes in him and will be saved from this world of sin. The unbeliever of God will not be saved. So you do not have to worry on that day because you do not believe in it.
Please stop preaching Y.F. You're expounding the myth you believe in, but you're providing no evidence for it.
Isn't there just as much reason to believe in Thor and Odin, or Quetzalcoatl and Huitzilopotchli?
 

Valjean

Veteran Member
Premium Member
You might misunderstand me.

I do believe all belief is superstition but our species can't exist without beliefs so not all beliefs are "bad" beliefs. Indeed the only bad belief is a belief in Science but not because science isn't worthy but because science metaphysically excludes belief. Believing in Science is anti-science. Believing in God is not anti-science and is much better than atheism for some individuals and most individuals who believe in Science.
Believing in observable, tested things is science -- and is reasonable. Believing in God is believing in the unobservable, untestable things -- not so reasonable.
 

Pogo

Well-Known Member
You can only believe what you see that is because Satan controls your mind and he does not care if you believe in him or not just as long as you are doing his will by disbelieving in God. As long as you live your life controlled by satan this is where your world will end on Judgement day.
And now we fall back on a conspiracy theory to explain why what we want to happen doesn't happen. LOL
 

cladking

Well-Known Member
Believing in observable, tested things is science -- and is reasonable. Believing in God is believing in the unobservable, untestable things -- not so reasonable.

The first sentence is fine by itself but the second sentence shows that you consider Science to be established fact; with no evidence and no theory of God It can not exist.
 

Dan From Smithville

The Flying Elvises, Utah Chapter
Staff member
Premium Member
Having no ability to hope in God, science is all they have left to hope in. So they have to protect it by any means.
What about theists that accept science? There are at least 3 of us on here and all three of us practice or practiced science professionally too. Just because the atheists, that you don't seem to like, accept and defend science doesn't make that science null and void by default of your bias.
 
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