can you proove there isn't a deity?

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Many atheists do not understand the single most major fallacy there is to atheism. Atheists often imply there is no god but the only way they can say this for sure is if they are absolutely certain and can provide evidence that a god does not exist. No evidence exists which is the big issue. Atheists will fit god into a bubble and usually in a Christian context then state that this god does not exist. I may agree with this statement in regards to many religion but Atheists never rule out all plausibility and even then certain definitive forms of god cannot be ruled out no matter what.

A god with no evidence is a god that has no detectable effect on physical things. If you're happy believing in an utterly irrelevant god, that's your prerogative. Personally, I don't really care that much about the hair-splitting distinction between a god that actually doesn't exist and a god that merely may as well not exist. Either way, you would have nothing to base your beliefs on. Maybe you coincidentally stumbled on the right answer in an "even a stopped clock is right twice a day" kinda way, but that still wouldn't make your position rational.

Do you care about being rational?

 

[1robin]

How do you figure that 2 billion claim supernatural experience?

There have been at least 4 billion people who claim to be Christians. I used 50% as a very conservative percentage who are actually Christians.

You like to make as if all Christians have felt they experience God and/or Jesus....I would give an arbitrary ratio of 1/200 at best for Christians who truly think and feel like this. Vast majority are only lip-service religious or spiritual in any sense - it only comes out for special occasions or religious social times. Aside from that their specific religion or non-religion doesn't make a hoot of difference in their day to day life or experiences.

You really goofed here. That claim lets me know that you know very little about the faith and it's adherents in absolute terms. I have been a prayer councilor for years. I have been asked to write papers on salvation it's self for groups. I have studied salvation experiences and doctrines at least ten times more often than all the other doctrines combined. Three certain conclusions are derived from all that plus several prayers answered as well.

1. The Bible and Christ make it unmistakable that what makes a person a Christian is a personal experience with God. All the apostles had the same. That is why they went from shrinking violets to roaring lions over night.
2. All major Christian denominations include a born again experience as a necessity for salvation and being a Christian. Some add additional details but all include that aspect.
3. Of the thousands of Christians I know and have counseled at least 90% have claimed a supernatural born again experience. Now I live in a place that would have a high percentage. Some periods of Roman Catholicism would have been less spiritual. But no meaningful data set would yield numbers even in the same realm as yours. 50% is a reasonable number. The actual percentage is probably higher at least for the US.

I can agree that Christians do not exhibit as much change as we should. Chesterton received a letter that asked "What is wrong with Christianity" he said "I am". Sincerely G. K. That is a little humor but your comments are not accurate but contain truth. The most generous demographic on earth is conservative Christians, but our divorce rate is nothing to be proud of. We have built more hospitals than any cultural group, yet our rates of miraculous healings is not that high. We have built the most successful and benevolent nation in history, yet we have fought many wars. We created the greatest education system in the world, yet we have allowed secularism to ruin both.

However the greatest lesson can be taken from a miracle, not from the absence or miracles. Let me explain. If just one single miracle has ever occurred God must exist, however all the expected miracles that never materialized prove nothing about God. You are viewing data incorrectly because of your desire for an outcome. That is if your data is accurate to begin with.

Superficial religion and philosophy isn't unique to Christians and they are most definitely not immune to it. If your community or church has Christians who all actually live and breathe God, Jesus, and the Holy Ghost more power to you guys. I haven't seen that in real life and never knew anybody else who has said it exists either.

You will never hear me deny Christianity is full of false claimers to being Christians. There is nothing unique or meaningful in that. All beliefs contain significant numbers of lip service believers (some contain almost all that type). The meaningful data concerns the true believers. You do not judge a teacher by the students that do not listen but by the obedient students. Have a great Christmas.

 

[Sha'irullah]

A god with no evidence is a god that has no detectable effect on physical things.

Agreed.

If you're happy believing in an utterly irrelevant god, that's your prerogative.

You obviously have not the slightest clue about me then.

Personally, I don't really care that much about the hair-splitting distinction between a god that actually doesn't exist and a god that merely may as well not exist.

Not relevant.

Either way, you would have nothing to base your beliefs on. Maybe you coincidentally stumbled on the right answer in an "even a stopped clock is right twice a day" kinda way, but that still wouldn't make your position rational.

But that is not my position. It seems you are making massive straw man fallacies here.

Do you care about being rational?

I do, but I would like to ask you the same question since this is not exactly the first time you have made an entire paragraph filled with straw man claims. In all honesty you have done this before and I just find it laughable you have the need to pay no attention to the claims being presented by the person you are arguing against. You are essentially talking to the wind here and have made a checklist of arguments which have no relevancy to me.

 

[Sees]

Merry Christmas to you too brother. I will say I have spoken to many my self on their beliefs and experiences, people of all faiths and most especially Christians. When I was a young guy who believed in born-again Christian experience I used go everywhere with a new testament in my back pocket and talk about related beliefs and experiences. I would walk to every church within a 2-3 mile radius of my house to discuss and try to figure out why so many didn't lead so called spirit-filled lives.

In my experience people who looked at their beliefs logically, had at least a few good arguments for being Christian, and felt spiritually guided on a regular basis...all pretty dang rare even among the pastors and preachers.

It depends on what people have been through, if they are culturally Christian or convert, how exposed they are to emotionally charged and fired up preaching, etc.

In a different post of another thread, I mentioned how some churches were known to intentionally let the hot, humid air of the south circulate and use shouting and/or singing to give people an emotional experience they could really feel. To the ignorant, God was there in that experience whether true or not.

People have been mixing "ah-ha!" moments of clarity and feelings of pleasure, dizziness, joy, etc. with the divine for a long time but it's not really proof. The more I studied non-christian experiences, the better I understood christian ones.

There have been at least 4 billion people who claim to be Christians. I used 50% as a very conservative percentage who are actually Christians.

You really goofed here. That claim lets me know that you know very little about the faith and it's adherents in absolute terms. I have been a prayer councilor for years. I have been asked to write papers on salvation it's self for groups. I have studied salvation experiences and doctrines at least ten times more often than all the other doctrines combined. Three certain conclusions are derived from all that plus several prayers answered as well.

1. The Bible and Christ make it unmistakable that what makes a person a Christian is a personal experience with God. All the apostles had the same. That is why they went from shrinking violets to roaring lions over night.
2. All major Christian denominations include a born again experience as a necessity for salvation and being a Christian. Some add additional details but all include that aspect.
3. Of the thousands of Christians I know and have counseled at least 90% have claimed a supernatural born again experience. Now I live in a place that would have a high percentage. Some periods of Roman Catholicism would have been less spiritual. But no meaningful data set would yield numbers even in the same realm as yours. 50% is a reasonable number. The actual percentage is probably higher at least for the US.

I can agree that Christians do not exhibit as much change as we should. Chesterton received a letter that asked "What is wrong with Christianity" he said "I am". Sincerely G. K. That is a little humor but your comments are not accurate but contain truth. The most generous demographic on earth is conservative Christians, but our divorce rate is nothing to be proud of. We have built more hospitals than any cultural group, yet our rates of miraculous healings is not that high. We have built the most successful and benevolent nation in history, yet we have fought many wars. We created the greatest education system in the world, yet we have allowed secularism to ruin both.

However the greatest lesson can be taken from a miracle, not from the absence or miracles. Let me explain. If just one single miracle has ever occurred God must exist, however all the expected miracles that never materialized prove nothing about God. You are viewing data incorrectly because of your desire for an outcome. That is if your data is accurate to begin with.





You will never hear me deny Christianity is full of false claimers to being Christians. There is nothing unique or meaningful in that. All beliefs contain significant numbers of lip service believers (some contain almost all that type). The meaningful data concerns the true believers. You do not judge a teacher by the students that do not listen but by the obedient students. Have a great Christmas.

 

[Enai de a lukal]

Many atheists do not understand the single most major fallacy there is to atheism. Atheists often imply there is no god...

Only atheists who like to pussyfoot. Since atheism is the belief that theism is false, and that there are no gods, atheists generally do a heck of alot more than imply that there is no god.

... but the only way they can say this for sure is if they are absolutely certain and can provide evidence that a god does not exist.

"Saying something for sure" and being "certain" are pretty much the same thing, so this is a vacuous tautology. You're basically saying "the only way they can say this for sure is if they can say this for sure". Not very insightful.

No evidence exists which is the big issue. Atheists will fit god into a bubble and usually in a Christian context then state that this god does not exist. I may agree with this statement in regards to many religion but Atheists never rule out all plausibility and even then certain definitive forms of god cannot be ruled out no matter what.

This isn't strictly speaking correct. For "god" to be a general term, there's gotta be some universal commonalities, in virtue of which something qualifies as a particular god- there is something "godlike", that makes something a god. If, however, this/these necessary, sine qua non properties of gods are incoherent, then this is extremely compelling and conclusive evidence that there are no such things. And, as it happens, these essential properties of gods are incoherent- namely, transcendence and action/causal potency. Put simply, a transcendent cosmic creator/intervener is contradictory, and could not exist, even in principle.

Such an argument completely bypasses your objection. Showing that the conjunction of "round" and "square" are contradictory proves that round squares do not exist- and similarly with gods. We don't have to look around to see if they exist, because we can see that the very concept is incoherent.

 

[Copernicus]

Many atheists do not understand the single most major fallacy there is to atheism. Atheists often imply there is no god but the only way they can say this for sure is if they are absolutely certain and can provide evidence that a god does not exist. No evidence exists which is the big issue. Atheists will fit god into a bubble and usually in a Christian context then state that this god does not exist. I may agree with this statement in regards to many religion but Atheists never rule out all plausibility and even then certain definitive forms of god cannot be ruled out no matter what.

Here is how I imagine an atheist could respond to your post:

"Many theists do not understand the single most major fallacy there is to theism. Theists often imply there is a god but the only way they can say this for sure is if they are absolutely certain and can provide evidence that a god does exist. No evidence exists which is the big issue. Theists will fit god into a bubble and usually in a Christian context then state that this god does exist. Theists may agree with this statement in regards to many religions but theists never rule out all plausibility [of nonexistence] and even then certain definitive forms of god can be ruled out no matter what."

In other words, neither atheists nor theists can be "absolutely certain" of their position. Nor is it a requirement for them to be in order to maintain their position. It all comes down to which belief is reasonable, not which belief can be maintained with absolute certainty.

 

[Enai de a lukal]

It all comes down to which belief is reasonable, not which belief can be maintained with absolute certainty.

:yes:

You just dropped the mic.

 

[idea]

It comes down to a personal choice.

 

[Sha'irullah]

Here is how I imagine an atheist could respond to your post:

"Many theists do not understand the single most major fallacy there is to theism. Theists often imply there is a god but the only way they can say this for sure is if they are absolutely certain and can provide evidence that a god does exist. No evidence exists which is the big issue. Theists will fit god into a bubble and usually in a Christian context then state that this god does exist. Theists may agree with this statement in regards to many religions but theists never rule out all plausibility [of nonexistence] and even then certain definitive forms of god can be ruled out no matter what."

The existence of god is purely a semantical issue and is only relevant on what a person accepts as proof of god. I hold to a fairly strong panentheistic acceptance of god so you can easily imagine that I do not find anything special about god.
The reason for being a panendeist are as reasonable as being an atheist. No matter how you re-quote what I said earlier it will do you no benefit since you are only speaking in circles about a subject matter.

In other words, neither atheists nor theists can be "absolutely certain" of their position. Nor is it a requirement for them to be in order to maintain their position. It all comes down to which belief is reasonable, not which belief can be maintained with absolute certainty.

It is not a matter of if you are gnostic or not it is a matter of how you remove yourself from the loop of agnosticism. Theists hold to some sort of proof or conclusion based upon odds that the existence of a particular deity is evident. Atheists on the other hand usually just rebuttal the existence of 1 particular god or a select few in the category yet have no answer for the non acceptance of the existence of other deities or theologies.

There are your gnostic theists and gnostic atheists yet being a gnostic about a particular matter can be a major fallacy as it will rely upon the burden of proof.
Atheism is not a standpoint on the opposite end of the nonexistence of god, there is no line where you atheism on one side, agnosticism in the middle and theism on the other. Atheism purely means the lack of disbelief in a god yet many atheists like yourself conclude that you are an atheist to the existence of all gods.

If you refutation to this is that you find no evidence to conclude that a god exist then you are making an agnostic argument but if you say you have found significant proof(the validity of it does not matter) that no god exists at all then you must readily attempt to refute ALL religions and theologies.

The burden of proof relies upon both parties not on the party making the positive

 

[Trantorfuzz]

You can't prove the non-existence of anything.

It's naive to think that definitive disproof of God is required to make atheism reasonable. Consider two factors which, while meaningless in and of themselves, together form a reason to disbelieve in God.

First: lack of evidence: The lack of empirical evidence for God doesn't mean much by itself. There is also a lack of empirical evidence for the notion that one of my fifth century ancestors liked to play games of chance. But since we know that such things are possible, it would be foolish to dismiss this notion out of hand.

Second: lack of explanation: The lack of an explanation for how God could exist doesn't mean much by itself. Before anyone had a clue what nuclear fusion was, there was no explanation for the fact that the sun was still shining after untold millions of years. And yet, we wake up to the light of empirical evidence that the sun has been shining to this day.

First AND Second: Though they don't mean much by themselves, taken together, the latter considerations mean a great deal. There is no empirical evidence for the existence of God AND no explanation for how a limitless field could have a limitless number of effects and behave in a manner consistent with arbitrarily high intelligence. AFAICT, these considerations leave the rationalist with no good reason to believe in God.

A militant agnostic could stick to the claim that the latter argument warrants only a suspension of judgment. However, no one could actually remain so intransigent for the purposes of any real-world inquiry. Did Mr. X murder Ms. Y? Well, there's no evidence that Mr. X did the deed, and no explanation of how Mr. X could have killed Mr. Y, since Mr. X has been in a coma for the last five years, up to and including the time of the murder.

Suspension of judgment is not a rational response in this instance. Neither is it rational to suspend judgment on whether non-believers are damned for all time in the face of a) no evidence for the claim, and b) no explanation of how this claim could be true.

I think that the OP might be unaware of the distinction between strong atheism and weak atheism. Strong atheism is the claim that the evidence against the existence of God is good enough to rule out theism. Weak atheism is the claim that there is no good reason to believe in God. I've posted on religious forums for years, and have met many weak atheists. I'm sure I've met one or two strong atheists, but I can't remember who or when.

 

[Contemplative Cat]

A god with no evidence is a god that has no detectable effect on physical things. If you're happy believing in an utterly irrelevant god, that's your prerogative. Personally, I don't really care that much about the hair-splitting distinction between a god that actually doesn't exist and a god that merely may as well not exist. Either way, you would have nothing to base your beliefs on. Maybe you coincidentally stumbled on the right answer in an "even a stopped clock is right twice a day" kinda way, but that still wouldn't make your position rational.

Do you care about being rational?

Well God is not a physical Thing, it is the primordial life in all. It is Conscious-Energy, everything you see is God. Due to the labeling of qualities of Divine Nature, we are fooled into seeing the illusions in place of God.
We are organisms of Gods Body, our inner self is Gods very spirit. We are created like Adam and Eve in Gods garden. We eat the fruit of knowledge of good and evil and accept a culture, when we were made to live in Nature.

Theist talk about some God person, and Atheist will speak often. About empiricism. But the truth is much more facinating than most people can even conceive.

 

[Sha'irullah]

:yes:

You just dropped the mic.

You spoke to soon

 

[Sees]

Check out the "are babies atheists?" Thread
Quite a few who are strong atheists and defend strong atheism as the only good, rational, useful definition of atheism.

It's naive to think that definitive disproof of God is required to make atheism reasonable. Consider two factors which, while meaningless in and of themselves, together form a reason to disbelieve in God.

First: lack of evidence: The lack of empirical evidence for God doesn't mean much by itself. There is also a lack of empirical evidence for the notion that one of my fifth century ancestors liked to play games of chance. But since we know that such things are possible, it would be foolish to dismiss this notion out of hand.

Second: lack of explanation: The lack of an explanation for how God could exist doesn't mean much by itself. Before anyone had a clue what nuclear fusion was, there was no explanation for the fact that the sun was still shining after untold millions of years. And yet, we wake up to the light of empirical evidence that the sun has been shining to this day.

First AND Second: Though they don't mean much by themselves, taken together, the latter considerations mean a great deal. There is no empirical evidence for the existence of God AND no explanation for how a limitless field could have a limitless number of effects and behave in a manner consistent with arbitrarily high intelligence. AFAICT, these considerations leave the rationalist with no good reason to believe in God.

A militant agnostic could stick to the claim that the latter argument warrants only a suspension of judgment. However, no one could actually remain so intransigent for the purposes of any real-world inquiry. Did Mr. X murder Ms. Y? Well, there's no evidence that Mr. X did the deed, and no explanation of how Mr. X could have killed Mr. Y, since Mr. X has been in a coma for the last five years, up to and including the time of the murder.

Suspension of judgment is not a rational response in this instance. Neither is it rational to suspend judgment on whether non-believers are damned for all time in the face of a) no evidence for the claim, and b) no explanation of how this claim could be true.

I think that the OP might be unaware of the distinction between strong atheism and weak atheism. Strong atheism is the claim that the evidence against the existence of God is good enough to rule out theism. Weak atheism is the claim that there is no good reason to believe in God. I've posted on religious forums for years, and have met many weak atheists. I'm sure I've met one or two strong atheists, but I can't remember who or when.

 

[Contemplative Cat]

God is the One. We are all connected, everything we do has an impact no matter how small, on the entire universe.
By seeing your self, the Spirit, God, in all we get high, we feel love for no conceived reason. It is the most powerful drug, the root cause of all 'other' happiness.

 

[Contemplative Cat]

God is the One. We are all connected, everything we do has an impact no matter how small, on the entire universe.
By seeing your self, the Spirit, God, in all we get high, we feel love for no conceived reason. It is the most powerful drug, the root cause of all 'other' happiness.

 

[McBell]

Check out the "are babies atheists?" Thread
Quite a few who are strong atheists and defend strong atheism as the only good, rational, useful definition of atheism.

and?

Quite a few are weak atheists and defend weak atheism as the only good, rational, useful definition of atheism.

In my opinion they are both mistaken.
Each is one side of a two or more sided coin.

 

[McBell]

God is the One. We are all connected, everything we do has an impact no matter how small, on the entire universe.
By seeing your self, the Spirit, God, in all we get high, we feel love for no conceived reason. It is the most powerful drug, the root cause of all 'other' happiness.

Nice sermon.
Careful, proselytizing is frowned upon on this message board.

 

[Sees]

and?

Quite a few are weak atheists and defend weak atheism as the only good, rational, useful definition of atheism.

In my opinion they are both mistaken.
Each is one side of a two or more sided coin.

The man said he had only seen a few claim strong atheism all together after quite a length of time on forums... I'm saying in that thread alone there is a few by itself.

I agree it's a side of the coin... Atheism is a very broad category with particular characteristics being vague and unnecessary.

 

[Contemplative Cat]

Nice sermon.
Careful, proselytizing is frowned upon on this message board.

Don't mean to preach, the point is is that a abrahamic view of God is certainly should not beused to represent all theists.

 

[McBell]

The man said he had only seen a few claim strong atheism all together after quite a length of time on forums... I'm saying in that thread alone there is a few by itself.

I agree it's a side of the coin... Atheism is a very broad category with particular characteristics being vague and unnecessary.

My apologies.
I misunderstood the context of your reply.