Does a belief in a god show lack of education?

[Sheldon]

(people are generally rational).

I find that claim dubious.

Therefore it strikes me that the underlying argument for atheism if God does NOT exist is "most people are irrational and not rational". I find that ridiculous on its face.

Well of course you do, you designed it to be ridiculous, that is what a straw man fallacy is, a false argument that is easy to defeat. Then you have used a reductio ad absurdum fallacy to pretend is is a generic argument atheism must use.

It's possible for a theist to be rational, though most theists I encounter produce irrational arguments to support their belief at some point, you seem to be doing that in almost every post.

However it is equally plausible that a majority belief can be irrational, if you understand what an argumentum ad populum fallacy means, then you'd know the number of people who believe something tells us nothing about the validity of that belief, yet you keep claiming the opposite and insisting a belief must be rational because the majority hold it?

 

[Sheldon]

One small note about the bold.

For objective reality in itself, it exists, but it is unknown what it is other than it exists. It has no observable properties because that requires a mind and then it is not objective reality in itself.

I wasn't talking about things that may exist but be undetectable, I stated that non-existent things necessarily leave no data to examine.

 

[Heyo]

My apologies, I can clarify:

I understand ad pop, but also that most of the time it follows that when most people believe in an established fact the fact is also true (people are generally rational).

This argument has two problems: 1. being rational is not being right. Until Galilei it was rational to believe in a geocentric model. Until Einstein it was rational to believe in absolute time. But it wasn't true.
And aside from the nitpicking, I don't think that people are rational. Some, maybe even most, of us are capable to think rational (to a degree) but we usually don't. I know that I don't and I have been accused of being exceptionally rational. What I do most of the day and half of the time I post on RF doesn't require much brain grease. I run on automatic and on emotions. What do I have for breakfast? RF or YT? Bach or Deep Purple? The first years of my life I couldn't even explain why I didn't believe in god, it simply felt wrong.
We are naked apes, evolved to survive in the African Savannah, not much deep thinking necessary. We are capable of thinking in a pinch but most people get a headache when they are asked to solve a quadratic equation.
We are mostly not rational.

Therefore it strikes me that the underlying argument for atheism if God does NOT exist is "most people are irrational and not rational". I find that ridiculous on its face.

I have no problem with that but I don't need the meta ad populum argument. I have enough information to decide on the facts. And when that decision leads to the insight that most people are irrational - well, that's where the evidence leads.

 

[Heyo]

Gladly after you address my point:

1) Most people are rational, therefore, despite the occasional use of ad populum, because majority belief does NOT equal truth, in general, when a majority believes in an established fact it IS also a true fact

2) Therefore, the atheist rationale (most people are irrational to believe in a non-existent God) seems highly irrational.

If #2 isn't true, please explain why.

It is false because your premise is false. You say that most people believe(d) in gods. That is right but misleading. Most people also believe in different gods as all the other people.
So even if it were rational to believe in a set of gods because the majority does, it then can't be rational to believe in a specific set of gods as a majority believes in some other gods.

Thus, ad populum isn't only a formal fallacy, it is also contradictory.

(And my claim that most people must be irrational in their believes holds true.)

 

[lukethethird]

Cheers.[/QUOTE]

Let's take the famous four horsemen, one of them being the man, Richard Dawkins. They have a habit of making it not an epistemic entitlement to "belief". Forgetting if God really exists or not, lets say all of that is just blind belief, the idea that people dont have an epistemic entitlement but has to prove their proposition or position is a new thing and most of the Atheistic apologists have adopted that blindly. It is repeated, and indoctrinated.

Some atheistic apologists have a habit of making religion to be the cause of violence throughout history. It is repeated by these so called atheistic big guns in all of their speeches and the hearers are indoctrinated to believe that. Atheists generally have an idea that they hold a monopoly on science and reason, but this is an unscientific and unreasonable claim. When people keep repeating it even though there is no evidence to it it is indoctrination. Two people considered to be atheists wrote probably the most sophisticated book on wars in history. It was called the encyclopaedia of wars. The two gentlemen are Alan and Charles, I cant remember their surnames. One was Axelroid. If you take a count of all the wars only 7% of them can even be remotely associated with religion. So this famous atheistic missionary proposition is just false, but they are indoctrinated to repeat it.

This could go on to be a book.

Cheers.

I have no clue as to what you are on about. Try sticking to one topic at a time.

 

[firedragon]

Cheers.

I have no clue as to what you are on about. Try sticking to one topic at a time.[/QUOTE]

Ah. So you asked to feel good.

Nice. Have a good day.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

I understand ad populum.

Are you claiming that a minority of persons are religious/believe in God/the numinous?

Let's start with most people are religious combined with the context: most of the time, when most people agree on a fact, they are correct.

I'm dealing with atheists at RF, a tiny minority of the population of the world, who are de facto insisting in the extreme irrationality of most people because they believe in an invisible sky god(s).

YOU are highly intelligent and highly rational, how do you respond to atheists who tell you that you are also highly deceived or that your parents or teachers "tricked" you into being religious?

We are talking about your claims and this dance is getting boring.

Explain your claims and provide the logic you are using. That is what I am interested in.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

I'd like for you to address what I wrote. I acknowledge your insistence of my ad populum and know what an ad pop is. I'm asking you to respond to the context, because sometimes the majority believe something true.

1) In most cases, the majority are correct regarding established facts.
2) Most people, past or present, are religious/believe the numinous.
3) Your resolution--most people believe in god despite the facts--is equivalent to "nearly every person is so irrational, they disobey #1 above.

If the majority is correct, how do you explain the proliferation of popular misconceptions viewed as facts? The origin of fortune cookies and the apple that is never mentioned in the Bible are believed to be facts by large numbers of people. In both cases, the majority is incorrect. I am not certain that it is irrational to assume something is true without verifying it, but it is often the case that what is assumed to be true by the majority may not be.

 

[Bird123]

I have no idea what it is you're trying to convey here.



I've not only never claimed this, I have stated more than once that all humans must form beliefs about the world in order to function. However a belief need not be unevidenced.



Theists believe in a deity or deities, atheists do not, that is the difference. beyond that you'd need to ask an atheist what they do or do not believe.



That's nonsense, do you believe in bellygloopolose? Off you go and find the evidence.



You are contently making claims, albeit unevidenced claims, thus you are trying to convince me. I need nothing, if someone makes a claim it is for them to demonstrate sufficient evidence for the claim.



Again you are making a claim that a deity exists, and therefore it is entirely incumbent on you to evidence that claim. I don't know what you think is being undermined, or why?



I have no idea what your analogy is meant to explain? I also know water exists and is possible, I don't know that any deity is possible.



That's a no true Scotsman fallacy, and you're making one unevidenced assumption after another. I don't need to follow anyone, you don't need to feed my beliefs, those are based on how much objective evidence can be demonstrated to support them. You're making a claim, I am asking you to demonstrate some objective evidence to support it. The analogy of the crutches is the no true Scotsman fallacy.



What answers, all I've seen in decades is theists making bare claims, if there is more than a subjective anecdotal belief that allows theists to believe all manner of conflicting ideas they like, then why can they not demonstrate anything?



Another no true Scotsman fallacy, I believe I explained this already, so an irrational claim.



Hang to what? Fight to get away from what/ I have no idea what that means.



It's a meaningless analogy sorry, water I need, and know exists, and is therefore possible. What objective evidence can you demonstrate that any deity is possible or is real? I can't find something until there is something to find. No matter how many other people claim to have found it.

I have pointed the way to Discover God just like I pointed to the water. The rest is up to you.

Are those really claims that I am making?

You are right. There is so very much you do not understand. Every journey starts with a single step. First, one must SEEK!! What do you seek? Your answers should start from within.

Once again, I am not going to convince you, try to get you to believe or follow, nor give you all the answers.
Wisdom is acquired along the journey.

God does not intimidate or interfere with those choices. I will not either. On the other hand, God places knowledge in the world. What anyone decides to do with that knowledge is part of that free choice.

Seek what you will. Perhaps it would be a good idea to Discover why you seek what you seek. Find out who you really are.

Clarity never comes from being convinced to believe. Clarity comes from Discovery.

That's what I see. It's very clear!!

 

[rational experiences]

Science says it taught by thesis as human thought what phenomena conditions were or are.

Reason energy only was released by destruction of mass in converting. By men.

A man's thesis how to.

So he then had to explain as the scientist what he had caused. As God the man's voice image in our gas heavens.

As we the speaking biology owned physical life speaking on the ground.

Science taught us God was the man cause effect that science had caused.

As no reaction existed in a sealed natural earth life living as the human. Inside of the heavens.

Gods O bodily reactions inside of its own mass.

Men in science hence said the planet is a living being as compared to self as bodily reactions were internal.

Pretty basic man's thinking observations.

Man in science sought the memory of cosmic caused reactions.

As they were image vision recorded as a type of dreaming.

No God. No entity. No deity.

Just egotists as healthy men.

Who gave half of human lived natural life to the heavenly change.

As human memory said once biology lived for 200 years of age. Long time ago.

After the ice age humans owned 120 years bio life span.

Changed it back by science fallout to 40 years of life lived mutated sick.

Evolution cooling no science allowed a 100 year biolgical life. Now being removed back to 0 no life can exist. As human biology conceived to every age of human death.

Evidence itself.

What he says is a time shifting thesis going back in time by biology. Just human.

Caused by Satan man thesis conversion to get energy.

God was a teaching O earth an entity was sealed and ours. It's heavens owned by O planet entity. The rock.

Science is the only human who theories lots of different God types for converting science.

 

[BilliardsBall]

The problem is that no humans are in the strict sense rational all the time as far as I can tell. Rationality is a Greek philosophical and it was shown not to work by Rene Descartes. But the idea of rationality lives on as a folk belief.

I never suggested all or even a plurality of people are rational all the time.

I do know that between 90 and 99% of people live making life choices like where to marry, how to raise their children, whether or not to commit sin, and hundreds of other things based on their knowledge of God, many of these people doing so consciously, daily.

That suggests that either God IS or everyone is QUITE irrational.

Your response?

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

I never suggested all or even a plurality of people are rational all the time.

I do know that between 90 and 99% of people live making life choices like where to marry, how to raise their children, whether or not to commit sin, and hundreds of other things based on their knowledge of God, many of these people doing so consciously, daily.

That suggests that either God IS or everyone is QUITE irrational.

Your response?

I don't understand the bold one.

 

[BilliardsBall]

I'm not seeing your point, and an ad populum fallacy is by definition an irrational claim, and you kept repeating it, but now you seem to be admitting that you knew it was irrational?



Are they? That seems like another bare appeal to numbers to me, since it is an unevidenced sweeping generalisation. I'd need to see some objective evidence for that claim, perhaps context would also be valuable.



That seems correct.



The first claim is not mine, it's a straw man you've created, the second claim is another straw man I have never claimed, and it seems like a false equivalence fallacy to me. Though given the number of known logical fallacies you indulge per post, I suspect you're not helping your cause here.

I can't help address what all theists believe as the demographic is pretty diverse, however if you want to present a rational argument for a deity I'm happy to listen. Though i should say up front I don't believe it is possible to argue something into or out of existence, that objective evidence would be required to demonstrate something is extant. If something doesn't exist there would be no data to examine, so I would be inclined to disbelieve any claim for which no, or insufficient objective evidence could be demonstrated. though it would be irrational to claim something was disproved through a lack of evidence, as that is an argumentum ad ignorantiam fallacy.

If a claim is unfalsifiable I must be an agnostic about it, but I would also disbelieve such claims.

I understand your Boolean/overlap diagram and your concepts. I'm not making an appeal to numbers, I'm rather suggesting that you, not I, by implication, are suggesting that nearly every person on Earth is irrational, making countless decisions based on their belief in invisible beings.

Knowing both ad populum and its obvious modifier, that, for example, most people believe gravity enough to not jump off buildings AND they are right, and most people disbelieve in a flat Earth AND they are correct, etc., etc. ad infinitum--people are generally rational--generally adhere to facts and not fiction which modifies an appeal to numbers--YOU have the burden of proof to explain why most of us humans consistently obey or attempt mightily to obey invisible sky gods.

You've explained ad populum and my appeal to numbers over a dozen times, which seems excessive. Perhaps now answer why nearly everyone but a handful of atheists STILL obeys invisible nonexistent sky gods who've never appeared to us in all of recorded history.

 

[BilliardsBall]

This argument has two problems: 1. being rational is not being right. Until Galilei it was rational to believe in a geocentric model. Until Einstein it was rational to believe in absolute time. But it wasn't true.
And aside from the nitpicking, I don't think that people are rational. Some, maybe even most, of us are capable to think rational (to a degree) but we usually don't. I know that I don't and I have been accused of being exceptionally rational. What I do most of the day and half of the time I post on RF doesn't require much brain grease. I run on automatic and on emotions. What do I have for breakfast? RF or YT? Bach or Deep Purple? The first years of my life I couldn't even explain why I didn't believe in god, it simply felt wrong.
We are naked apes, evolved to survive in the African Savannah, not much deep thinking necessary. We are capable of thinking in a pinch but most people get a headache when they are asked to solve a quadratic equation.
We are mostly not rational.
I have no problem with that but I don't need the meta ad populum argument. I have enough information to decide on the facts. And when that decision leads to the insight that most people are irrational - well, that's where the evidence leads.

I hear you but you've yet to prove that most people are MOSTLY IRRATIONAL.

What is rather true is that given a typical fact, it so happens that most people believe in that rational fact.

"Occasional magical thinking" does not explain why most people make countless religious, marriage, sexual, financial, child rearing, etc. decisions constantly believing they are moral agents headed for a date of accountability with a nonexistent invisible sky god.

Please explain. Because if everyone is MOSTLY irrational, why should I accept "evidence" from an atheist who claims omniscience, "no God exists in any part of the known universe or multiverse"? Claiming omniscience IS irrational so perhaps we are all irrational, but I've reasoned through the issue, and disagree--logically speaking.

 

[BilliardsBall]

It is false because your premise is false. You say that most people believe(d) in gods. That is right but misleading. Most people also believe in different gods as all the other people.
So even if it were rational to believe in a set of gods because the majority does, it then can't be rational to believe in a specific set of gods as a majority believes in some other gods.

Thus, ad populum isn't only a formal fallacy, it is also contradictory.

(And my claim that most people must be irrational in their believes holds true.)

Help me flow what you're saying so I understand:

1) 90%-99% (and we know 90% is generous) of people in our modern enlightened times believe in one or more nonexistent beings and live their lives as if those beings will judge them for their moral code

2) Either everyone is a nut job and only atheists are rational or vice versa

3) Occam's Razor -- atheists are either irrational or morally not wishing to have God in conscience or -- as individuals -- have not yet encountered God in their lives

4) Fortunately, the Bible prescribes what to do when you encounter God, reverence God and trust in God for eternal life

 

[BilliardsBall]

We are talking about your claims and this dance is getting boring.

Explain your claims and provide the logic you are using. That is what I am interested in.

1) I claim that 90% (generous!) to 99% (more likely!) of all people in our modern era have not only an awareness of God but live morally in an attempt to please God and await final judgment

2) It is evident that most people are capable of rational behavior--in general, people believe facts and dispel myths

3) Occam's insists that either a very few atheists are rational and all the rest of us theists are nuts--LIVING for, not just BELIEVING in, a god(s) or vice versa--the atheists are either willfully disobedient ("I AM THE GOD OF MY OWN LIFE") or simply as individuals are yet to personally encounter God

 

[BilliardsBall]

If the majority is correct, how do you explain the proliferation of popular misconceptions viewed as facts? The origin of fortune cookies and the apple that is never mentioned in the Bible are believed to be facts by large numbers of people. In both cases, the majority is incorrect. I am not certain that it is irrational to assume something is true without verifying it, but it is often the case that what is assumed to be true by the majority may not be.

Everyone whom I've told that fortune cookies were invented in San Francisco, not China, believed me when I pointed to the facts.

Everyone whom I've told that Genesis does not say "apple" understood the fruit could be something else, for example, there is Jewish literature that says it was pomegranates (as per Temple regalia and etc.).

Almost everyone on Earth, except a few atheists, have God in their conscious and in their lives. I do not accept that most people try to live for facts and not myths except for multifaceted areas of their lives including child rearing, sexuality, marriage, commitment, fidelity, faithful work, etc. because of NONEXISTENT gods.

 

[Sheldon]

I have pointed the way to Discover God just like I pointed to the water. The rest is up to you.

No you haven't, you have just made a bare unevidenced claim, as do many others who find a very different deity to yours.

Are those really claims that I am making?

You will have to give me some clue what you're referring to?

You are right. There is so very much you do not understand.

Indeed, but why don't we focus on your posts, as they are not being very clear, despite being overly verbose.

Once again, I am not going to convince you

Then what are these endless unevidenced claims for?

God does not intimidate or interfere with those choices. I will not either. On the other hand, God places knowledge in the world. What anyone decides to do with that knowledge is part of that free choice.

Do you know what a begging the question fallacy is?

That's what I see. It's very clear!!

Great, but you need to make sure what you're claiming is clear, and that you offer something more than bare assertions.

 

[Sheldon]

I never suggested all or even a plurality of people are rational all the time.

Pretty sure you are have implied precisely that with your false dichotomy about either a deity exists or everyone is irrational. See you believe a deity exists so...well you can see the implication without it being spelled out surely?

I do know that between 90 and 99% of people live making life choices like where to marry, how to raise their children, whether or not to commit sin, and hundreds of other things based on their knowledge of God, many of these people doing so consciously, daily.

Where do you get all these wonderful stats from? As if we didn't know. 99.99999% of all stats are made up on the spot...

That suggests that either God IS or everyone is QUITE irrational.

Your response?

Same as every other time you asked, you're using a false dichotomy fallacy. Firstly there is no one deity, as theists believe in a large number of different deities. Secondly one irrational belief doesn't justify calling someone irrational in an absolute sense, rationality is something you strive for, not something you achieve as an absolute. So people are not either rational or irrational, but rather some people are more rational than others, think of it as a scale, and if someone uses known logical fallacies in pretty much every post, and even repeats them after they are explained, then which end of that scale do you imagine they would be?

 

[lukethethird]

I have no clue as to what you are on about. Try sticking to one topic at a time.

Ah. So you asked to feel good.

Nice. Have a good day.[/QUOTE]
All I know is that you can't deal with atheists, which is your problem, not mine. There are thousands upon thousands of priests indoctrinating their flock every week and you claim atheists are indoctrinated because of four people. Do you realize how silly you sound?