How can anyone be an atheist?

[mikkel_the_dane]

Anyone can be anything they want.

Live and let live.

When a particular belief system has an unnecessary dislike for something or someone that absolutely does not affect them in any way, it is then that the problems arise. Stop attempting to control how others live. It's not difficult.

Well, my fellow human. That is wise, but there are both non-religious and religious humans, who don't get that. The divide is not religion or not. It is what it means to be "right" as a human.

 

[Audie]

He doesn't seem to grasp, even remotely, the concept of FAITH, and why people need it, or how it helps people function in a significant way, in their lives. All he talks about is the lack of material evidence for the conceptual icon he had in his brain, labeled "God".

The real problem here is that he grew up in a religion that touted belief in a conceptual religious icon, instead of faith in a great and inexplicable mystery. So he thinks he is an atheist, now, because he rejected belief in the religious conceptual icon he was taught to call "God", when in reality he has never had nor developed a realistic, functional, concept of God. Nor has he ever placed his faith in that concept to discover how faith in the reality of God, helps people. If we asked this "atheist" if love is real, and if trusting in love helps people live better lives, he would certainly agree that it is and it would. And yet this man obviously has made no connection between God, and love. Or God and beauty. Or God and justice. Or God and individual purpose. And why hasn't he? Because the idiotic religion he was raised in only taught him that God is a religious icon, and a religious story, in a religious book. So for him, God was never made real. And the moment he tested that God, it became apparent to him that it wasn't real. And now he thinks he's an atheist. When all he is, is just ignorant of the reality of God, thanks to a religious experience that taught him to "believe in" a religious fictional story of God as if it were the reality of God.

And this s the case with the vast majority of people who call themselves atheists these days. The truth is they never had any idea how God can be real to us, because religions are so woefully inept at teaching people how to recognize the reality of God in their lives. They're too busy, instead, trying to make people "believe in" the trappings and icons and dogmas of the religion.

Do you have any idea how Nessie or Atlantis can be real
to someone?

 

[Goddess Kit]

Anyone can conceive something as real, yet there has to be a line drawn between conceptualization and reality.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Do you have any idea how Nessie or Atlantis can be real
to someone?

Yes, real has no objective referent. Real is in you brain as a belief. So if their belief is real to them, then it is real. Now it is apparently not for the everyday world real in the objective sense, but it is real in the subjective sense.

Now if you are a naturalist, then that the world is natural, is real to you, but you can't show that the world is objectively real. Nor can I show, that the world is God, is real objectively, but it is real to me.

So let the game begin. You have to establish that all of the world is exactly the same as natural, but it is not. Natural is a category of several processes and so on. And one of them is that I can believe in God. That is natural, real and a fact. Indeed I am doing it right now.

So I bet you will confuse metaphysics, subjective and objective if you choose to answer.

 

[PureX]

Anyone can conceive something as real, yet there has to be a line drawn between conceptualization and reality.

Reality IS a concept.

 

[PureX]

Do you have any idea how Nessie or Atlantis can be real
to someone?

Sure, but ...

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Reality IS a concept.

Yeah, I know.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Anyone can conceive something as real, yet there has to be a line drawn between conceptualization and reality.

You can't see reality. It is an idea in your mind just like God.
And you can't see real. That is also an idea in your mind.

 

[Nimos]

I will use gravity and jumping out from a cliff. We agree that for similar cases the outcomes is the same. Any human doing so will die.
Then you make a rhetorical trick. I should trust you and assume truth is the same in all other cases. I.e. in your words:
"But that doesn't mean that we can not say that one thing is more true than something else, based on the evidence we have, when we examine them."

I didn't say anything about you trusting me, you can choose to do it, or you can examine the evidence for yourself, if you are in doubt. If you believe that im wrong, or the scientists are wrong in regards gravity. You are in your good right to question them and examine the evidence. Don't just take my or their word for it, if you think its wrong.

That is the whole point with being a sceptic. Question what people tell you and examine the evidence they put forward.

There is no universal single truth.

I have said several times, that there are no absolute truth. So why would you think I would claim that there is a universal single truth then, that doesn't make sense.

Lets take gravity again, I can assume that gravity will work exactly the same way tomorrow as it does today. Im going to live my life as if that is the case. Do I know for certain that gravity doesn't change in the Universe every 14.7 billion years and that just happens to be tomorrow? Of course not, but does it make sense to live you life as if that is the case, when every time, we test it, it seems to work the exact same way.

I can't and won't try to convince you of anything else, if you don't agree and you want to live your life as if it could. That is fine with me, but that is not a rational way of living and is not what it means to be a sceptic.

But the world is not just the objective and physical, the world is all in some case the subjective and mental.

Can you demonstrate that it is the case?

Doesn't your opinions or subjective thoughts, come from a physical brain or do you believe that they come from somewhere else? And if that is the case, how do you know that?

I just do it mentally, culturally and subjectively differently than you:
I don't have to believe in your "we" and "truth" for all cases, only some.

You don't have to believe anything I say. But simply saying that you do it differently, doesn't prevent you from still having to demonstrate it, if you want anyone to take you seriously. Because people will ask how you reached your conclusions. And if your answer is, "I did it mentally and im subjective different than you" then the discussion is pretty much over at that point, no one will take that seriously.

I just do it mentally, culturally and subjectively differently than you:
I don't have to believe in your "we" and "truth" for all cases, only some.

That is a huge part of science, it doesn't necessarily tell you what is true, but it definitely tells you what is not true.

So here is the joke as to back to the OP. I can believe you, because I understand how you believe. But you can't believe me, because I must be like you, because you hold "we" and "truth".

No, I might believe you if you present me with a case and evidence to back up what you are saying. But you are 100% correct, that if your argument is that you figured out something mentally, then I won't believe you.

No, you don't. You are in effect no different that some religious humans. You claim you hold the "We" and the "Truth". You don't!!! Neither do I. The difference is that I know that is the case for us both.

It has nothing to do with being religious or nonreligious. It's about how you approach something which you don't know. If you don't use a method of how to correctly evaluate things, then you are likely to reach the wrong conclusion, simply because guessing rarely give you the right answer. Which is why, you look for evidence and examine them. But if you don't know how to correctly examine evidence or are not careful, you might still end up with the wrong conclusion. Which is why, science requires peer reviews, before they are just accepted. To both determine whether everything were done correctly. And even then mistakes might happen. Which is why people have to explain in details, how they did their testing, so others can recreate them, if they want to see if they get the same results.

Both religious people and nonreligious people can do this.-

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

I didn't say anything about you trusting me, you can choose to do it, or you can examine the evidence for yourself, if you are in doubt. If you believe that im wrong, or the scientists are wrong in regards gravity. You are in your good right to question them and examine the evidence. Don't just take my or their word for it, if you think its wrong.

That is the whole point with being a sceptic. Question what people tell you and examine the evidence they put forward.


I have said several times, that there are no absolute truth. So why would you think I would claim that there is a universal single truth then, that doesn't make sense.

Lets take gravity again, I can assume that gravity will work exactly the same way tomorrow as it does today. Im going to live my life as if that is the case. Do I know for certain that gravity doesn't change in the Universe every 14.7 billion years and that just happens to be tomorrow? Of course not, but does it make sense to live you life as if that is the case, when every time, we test it, it seems to work the exact same way.

I can't and won't try to convince you of anything else, if you don't agree and you want to live your life as if it could. That is fine with me, but that is not a rational way of living and is not what it means to be a sceptic.


Can you demonstrate that it is the case?

Now, if everything is gravity or rather everything is objective and physical then we can't disagree, because disagreeing is subjective and mental.

Okay, it ends here, unless you get it now. That we can disagree, is evidence of the subjective and mental.

The rest is reduction ad absurdum.

You: You, Mikkel, are wrong.
Me: That is objective and physical.
You: You don't make sense.
Me: That is objective and physical.
You: If you are mental and subjective, there is nothing to talk about.
Me: That is objective and physical.

Let me explain it to you as simple as I can. If the world is objective and physical, then I am that too, because I am in the world and the world is in me, because I am made of old exploded stars and if I am wrong, then that is also objective and physical. Everything is objective and physical and thus there are no differences in any arguments, because both are objective and physical.
You are right and that is objective and physical. I am wrong and that is objective and physical. There is no subjective and mental, it is all objective and physical. So why do you protest? What I do, is objective and physical.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Definitions are fun. So let play with those:
Some atheists are religious without knowing it.
Religious as religion as that relates humanity to supernatural, transcendental, or spiritual elements.
So for the supernatural we get - of or relating to an order of existence beyond the visible observable universe.
So what is it that makes some atheist religious?
They have a belief about objective reality, in that they believe, that they know, what it is other than being independent of the mind. I.e. objective reality is natural, physical and so on.
You can see it explained here:

I'm not in the mood for your distracting pseudo-intellectual semantic games.

Note some people know, that naturalism is a paradigm. Some don't. They treat it as a fact.
Their belief is that objective reality is natural. Mine is that objective reality is God.
Now prove me wrong!
I don't know that if you are a naturalist like this or if you are wrong or right. I know for the everyday world, that you believe differently, if you do so and that you can do so. I accept that.
I don't know if you are a naturalist in this sense or believe you can prove me wrong?
Your turn.

Meet your own burden of proof.
Stop making assumptions about people.
Stop derailing.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

You can't see reality. It is an idea in your mind just like God.
And you can't see real. That is also an idea in your mind.

The point is which ideas hidden in minds are most reflective of the reality that exists outside of those minds.
And when put to the test, one particular scope of ideas wins over the others.

Guess which.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

I'm not in the mood for your distracting pseudo-intellectual semantic games.




Meet your own burden of proof.
Stop making assumptions about people.
Stop derailing.

The burden of proof. You are correct and I am incorrect and both cases are natural. And if we disagree, that is natural and if we agree, that is natural. It is all natural.

 

[paarsurrey]

I watch the atheist experience occasionally and ran into this one, with a women wondering how anyone can be an atheist?

What I would be interested in asking you, especially religious people is, do the explanation given by the hosts makes sense to you? And if not can you give a time (like 1:20) to where you think they are wrong and why you think it is a bad or a wrong argument?

The hosts answered the caller woman who is a Pentecostal Christian and therefore believes that Jesus is/was G-d . But Jesus did not believe that he was G-d, Jesus believed and prayed to God-the-Father and only worshiped Him.

Nevertheless, the Atheism position no-position is sure wrong, I understand, as it has not been put to any tests /observations/experiments by Science to prove it correct. At the most, as I understand, it is only a conjecture or leap in the dark. Right, please?

Regards

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

The point is which ideas hidden in minds are most reflective of the reality that exists outside of those minds.
And when put to the test, one particular scope of ideas wins over the others.

Guess which.

No, but because that is your idea inside your mind and includes your idea that you can decide that how we differently make sense of all of the world.
This is you idea inside your mind: The point is which ideas hidden in minds are most reflective of the reality that exists outside of those minds.

BTW The world outside your mind, is unknown for anything other than be outside your mind. You are doing philosophy and you are bad at it.

 

[Nimos]

Nevertheless, the Atheism position no-position is sure wrong, I understand, as it has not been put to any tests /observations/experiments by Science to prove it correct. At the most, as I understand, it is only a conjecture or leap in the dark. Right, please?

Can you elaborate on what you mean that the atheism no-position is wrong?

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Ideas are cognitive reactions to our experience of existing, and they effect existence, in turn, through our responses. They are in no way divorced from reality, as you seem to be trying to suggest.

I have an idea in my head about a unicorn that is playing poker in the core of Saturn. The great eye, that giant storm, is the entrance.

Is this idea reflective of reality, just because I can have that idea?

What we believe about it is irrelevant to the question of their existence.

It is. But it is NOT irrelevant to the point at hand. That point being, if you are a believer (theist) or a disbeliever (atheist).

Did you forget what we were talking about?

It's interesting, isn't it, that atheists who claim not to "believe in" God can't seem to discuss the subject without bringing up belief every other sentence.

It's called an analogy, which is used to make something clear to someone who has difficulty understanding it without such analogy.

And apparently it failed. It seems you still don't comprehend how atheism is defined by disbelief.

No, but it does mean that the rational justification must be based on something OTHER THAN "proof".

Proof is for math. In natural science and matters of such existence, we speak of evidence only.

And the complete lack of evidence to support the idea of humans being the reality TV show of an alien civilization (or a god) means that there is no rational justification to believe it. Therefor, it is rational to disbelieve it.

If tomorrow evidence shows up that demonstrates these aliens (or gods) exist, then there is rational justification to believe it (and no rational justification to disbelieve it).

Sure, but not based on "proof", which is what the atheist demands of the theist, endlessly

I never ask for "proof". I ask for evidence. "proof" is for math.
And when I ask for "evidence", all I get is hearsay, anecdotes and bare assertions piling on.
I never get actual independently verifiable evidence.

So there seems to be quite the contradictory double standard, there.

Not at all. The only thing that seems to be here, is your strawman and / or misrepresentation.
I don't hold a double standard. I require evidence for every claim before I believe it. And my standards of evidence are pretty much universal for matters of the natural sciences or claims of existence.

In fact, the double standard is entirely on the side of the theist.
In my experience, the kind of "evidence" they claim convinces them of their religion, would NEVER suffice for them to accept anything more mundane.

And yet without being able to "show that it's wrong", the atheist proclaims endlessly that no gods exist because they can't be "shown to be real".

Again misrepresenting what I said, it seems.
I was talking about being wrong of disbelieving the claim. You show such disbelief to be wrong, by showing the claim being disbelieved to being right.

In other words, in order for you to show me that I am wrong to disbelieve in gods, you will have to demonstrate the existence of a god to me.

The burden of proof is on the side of the positive claim. The positive claim in this case, is "a god exists".
You believe that claim.
I don't.

Upto you to justify your belief / meet the burden of proof of your claim.

"Disbelief" doesn't make anyone, anything. Atheism is the philosophical counter-proposition to theism.

Exactly. It isn't anything. It's a single position on a single issue.
Theism is the claim.
Atheism is what one defaults to when not believing the theistic claim(s).

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Can you elaborate on what you mean that the atheism no-position is wrong?

That you lack a belief in gods, is atheism. That you need to prove it is correct, that is not atheism. Atheism is a lack of beliefs or disbelief in Gods. That is about beliefs and beliefs don't need evidence. Beliefs only require belief.

That you feel this need to using evidence, is psychology in you. It is mental and subjective. Not objective and physical.

 

[Nimos]

Now, if everything is gravity or rather everything is objective and physical then we can't disagree, because disagreeing is subjective and mental.

Okay, it ends here, unless you get it now. That we can disagree, is evidence of the subjective and mental.

The rest is reduction ad absurdum.

You: You, Mikkel, are wrong.
Me: That is objective and physical.
You: You don't make sense.
Me: That is objective and physical.
You: If you are mental and subjective, there is nothing to talk about.
Me: That is objective and physical.

Let me explain it to you as simple as I can. If the world is objective and physical, then I am that too, because I am in the world and the world is in me, because I am made of old exploded stars and if I am wrong, then that is also objective and physical. Everything is objective and physical and thus there are no differences in any arguments, because both are objective and physical.
You are right and that is objective and physical. I am wrong and that is objective and physical. There is no subjective and mental, it is all objective and physical. So why do you protest? What I do, is objective and physical.

What?

For something to be said to be objectively true, it means that it is true regardless of whether humans existed or not. Meaning if the existence of evil is objectively true, then evil would exist regardless of whether or not we were here.

Objectivity is a philosophical concept of being true independently from individual subjectivity caused by perception, emotions, or imagination. A proposition is considered to have objective truth when its truth conditions are met without bias caused by a sentient subject.

You making an argument is not objectively true, it is subjective, because it is based on your perception, emotions etc. Which is why, if you want me or anyone else for that matter, to believe you. Your opinion is just not enough. You have to provide something which can convince people.

That things belong to the natural world, is because no one have demonstrated, that it shouldn't be the case. Lots of people make claims about the supernatural, but no one have demonstrated it. And honestly I don't even know how someone would do that.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

What?

For something to be said to be objectively true, it means that it is true regardless of whether humans existed or not. Meaning if the existence of evil is objectively true, then evil would exist regardless of whether or not we were here.

Objectivity is a philosophical concept of being true independently from individual subjectivity caused by perception, emotions, or imagination. A proposition is considered to have objective truth when its truth conditions are met without bias caused by a sentient subject.

You making an argument is not objectively true, it is subjective, because it is based on your perception, emotions etc. Which is why, if you want me or anyone else for that matter, to believe you. Your opinion is just not enough. You have to provide something which can convince people.

That things belong to the natural world, is because no one have demonstrated, that it shouldn't be the case. Lots of people make claims about the supernatural, but no one have demonstrated it. And honestly I don't even know how someone would do that.

Stop doing objective, unless you have solved solipsism.