Is the lack of faith of Atheists due to theists' failure to support their claims?

[Curious George]

There is no reason to suppose that. You are merely equating the most powerful concept they are aware of with God, thus creating a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Yes to the equation, no to the self fulfilling prophecy.

If I believed in an immortal infallible entity could we not consider that I believed in a god? If not, why?

However, excluding God-like concepts until someone declares such a concept "a God" is certainly begging the question with regard to the babies are not theist position.

Edit* removed unnecessary sentence.

 

[Curious George]

Basically, use words as we use them and if we need to use them in ways they generally aren't used, don't do so for pointless reasons unless we are willing to accept the logical consequences?

Yes.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

Yes to the equation, no to the self fulfilling prophecy.

A definition of God as the most powerful concept I am aware of as God would make me something akin to a panentheist, rather than an atheist. ALL humans have something they see as the most powerful concept at all times in their life by definition. That is the sense in which I see your definition as self-fulfilling. The definition demands a positive answer.

If I believed in an immortal infallible entity could we not consider that I believed in a god? If not, why?

Babies don't believe in immortal or infallible, since those concepts are without meaning to them. Same as for a lion cub.

However, excluding God-like concepts until someone declares such a concept "a God" is certainly begging the question with regard to the babies are not theist position. I am glad you see that.

Funny, we generally get along fine near as I can remember, but that last sentence annoys me (being completely transparent). Smacks too much of putting words in my mouth, to be honest.
Babies lack theism. If you don't want to call them atheist because you believe it misrepresents the truth, I can totally get that. Calling them theists is just an unrequired leap of logic, unless you are seeing those lion cubs also as theists.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

Quite possibly. Many cultures have viewed the sun as a God.

Of course they have, but that has nothing to do with whether I saw the Sun as God. I didn't. Never have.

But eventually you learned categories to place the sun in and you did not place the sun in a "god" category.

I never placed the Sun in a God category. God was simply God. There was one. That's what I'd been taught. In truth, my God categories composed of God, and then gods (which included all the other god concepts, but most specifically Classical gods).

However, prior to your awareness of a God construct and depending on how you viewed the sun, it certainly is a possibility that you saw the sun as what we could consider a God.

No. It's possible for someone to view the Sun as God, yes. But I never viewed the Sun as God.

I am not quite sure how you viewed the sun or when you became aware. This is partially why I chose mother, because we can prove awareness of mother before birth so birth or shortly after should be no sweat to say the baby believes in an entity that is their mother.

The bottle they get fed with is as likely to be viewed as God as the mother. You can stretch the definition to whatever you like, that is your choice.

 

[Curious George]

A definition of God as the most powerful concept I am aware of as God would make me something akin to a panentheist, rather than an atheist. ALL humans have something they see as the most powerful concept at all times in their life by definition. That is the sense in which I see your definition as self-fulfilling. The definition demands a positive answer.



Babies don't believe in immortal or infallible, since those concepts are without meaning to them. Same as for a lion cub.



Funny, we generally get along fine near as I can remember, but that last sentence annoys me (being completely transparent). Smacks too much of putting words in my mouth, to be honest.
Babies lack theism. If you don't want to call them atheist because you believe it misrepresents the truth, I can totally get that. Calling them theists is just an unrequired leap of logic, unless you are seeing those lion cubs also as theists.

Babies do not need to be aware of the terms immortal or infallible. They only need to lack the belief in death or fallibility.

Sorry if the comment annoys you. And I do appreciate trying to find a middle ground. I will edit the sentence out.

 

[Curious George]

Of course they have, but that has nothing to do with whether I saw the Sun as God. I didn't. Never have.



I never placed the Sun in a God category. God was simply God. There was one. That's what I'd been taught. In truth, my God categories composed of God, and then gods (which included all the other god concepts, but most specifically Classical gods).



No. It's possible for someone to view the Sun as God, yes. But I never viewed the Sun as God.



The bottle they get fed with is as likely to be viewed as God as the mother. You can stretch the definition to whatever you like, that is your choice.

Stretching definitions is certainly the topic, and certainly what I am doing. The question is, why is this wrong?

 

[FunctionalAtheist]

If they were successful in making their case, wouldn't that cause an effect?

You are projecting a meaningful 'case' on the theists! If their case is not subject to verification, then it is silly to ask what effect verification of their case may have! No?

 

[FunctionalAtheist]

Well then, I'd say you were born with a propensity to disbelieve.

Then how do you explain the fact that I spent 35 years believing, preaching, reading my bible, and serving as a minister?

Nobody is born either believing in God or disbelieving in God.

Agreed 100%. But no one is borne every having heard of god or having any god concept. EVERYONE is born NOT having heard of god or having and god concept.

But when the concept of God is first introduced, it either makes perfect sense or not.

perhaps you don't understand that 'making sense' means congruent with what the senses tell us. If people coming back from the dead 'makes sense' to you, then there is something wrong with you.

If it doesn't make sense and resonate as logical to a person, he may be pressured into believing, often with threats of hellfire for disbelief, but sooner or later, he'll say, "This is nuts. I don't believe a word of it." As Dale Carnegie once said, "A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still."

Nobody had to convince me that there's a God. Nothing could convince you that there is a God. I don't know how you explain the difference. I know a lot of atheists will say, "Well, that's easy. I'm smart enough to see through the BS and you were never able to break free of the indoctrination." I'd say we're just wired differently.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

Stretching definitions is certainly the topic, and certainly what I am doing. The question is, why is this wrong?

I'd characterize it as misleading I guess. I dont know anyone who thinks of theism in the way you're presenting it here (ie. Lack of mortality or fallibility in a being or object).

Whilst I think I understand the point you are trying to make, I think, ultimately we just don't agree.

For clarity, I think you're trying to hold up a mirror, by suggesting that in terms of logic, presupposing theism on a baby is every bit as logically defensible as atheism.

But I suspect you're doing it as a tactic to make me see the absurdity of denoting babies as atheists or some such.

1) If that's true, don't bother. I agree that calling babies atheists is absurd. I think it's technically correct, but its not something I would ever say outside these forums, and indeed I've argued that its ridiculous before in threads.

2) If I'm wrong, apologies. Perhaps you simply have a much broader definition of God than what I see as useful. I can live with that. It's even informative to a degree. But I'm not about to broaden my definition to the point your argument here would require.

 

[leibowde84]

You are projecting a meaningful 'case' on the theists! If their case is not subject to verification, then it is silly to ask what effect verification of their case may have! No?

Do they claim that their case is not subject to verification, or do you see that as a necessary truth?

 

[LuisDantas]

You are projecting a meaningful 'case' on the theists! If their case is not subject to verification, then it is silly to ask what effect verification of their case may have! No?

Perhaps, but doesn't it then follow that they should graciously accept any disagreements about their belief without offering any resistance at all?

Oh, and also be prepared to be demonstrated wrong at any and every point without even a moment's notice?

 

[Desert Snake]

3. I didn't order a Mexican pizza.

Uh...ok? The analogy doesn't involve ordering a pizza

 

[Dhyana]

Now a singularity probably existed before it expanded into space and time, as they are common in nature.

The logician in me (NOT the " theist")
wonders how some "thing" can "exist" apart from a space and time in which to exist? And where it came from?

I can't help but thinking that the presupposition of a singularity common in "nature" just was, is reminiscent of theism. No cause, just was.

"Nature" being the presupposition, singularity being its product, universe bring the product of singularity. No matter what noun is used, nature, God, first cause whatever, to refer to uncaused "just was", it amounts to the same thing IMO. And no noun will come close to doing justice to whatever "just was" before time and space. We humans have only concepts which are the product of time and space and are confined thereby, inapplicable to any other domain and thereby essentially useless beyond our domain.

"Causality can only explain later events by earlier events, but it can never explain the beginning."

-Werner Heisenberg

Note to Shad: this is a direct quote from Physics And Philosophy (1958), yet Heisenberg was paraphrasing others. By your definition, it's still his quote. However, could you say it's my quote since I posted it here? What if I said;

"Causality can only explain antecedent events by precedent events, but it can never explain the beginning."

Though I'm not a physicist, I did read this book. Not quote mining therefore.

 

[Shad]

You are the one who pointed out the separation. Those who believe that God cannot exist are necessarily included in the "lack of belief in the existence of God category. That's why I didn't mention them initially in the OP. Rejection of the belief does not equal belief in the opposite. It just means being without the belief.

That's fine. On second thought, I would say that the OP was aimed at atheists who merely lack a belief in God or gods. Those that who actively believe that God cannot exist would certainly provide different reasoning. But, I fail to see why both "kinds" of atheists couldn't provide their respective answers in one forum.

I am pointing out that regardless of counter claims of "No God" it is still a rejection of a claim and arguments for it as true as much as those that reject arguments for theism without a counter claim. Separation of the two is redundant in the context of the OP since severity is not a defining factor. There is no need to for such a separation at all.

Interestingly, that is not what he attempted to do.

Yes I did as per the separation of "types" of atheists is redundant as rejection of arguments is the main factor not proposed alternative views such as naturalism. In the context of the OP there should be only two types, rational and irrational atheists as per my emotion based example in my first reply to the OP.

 

[FunctionalAtheist]

Do they claim that their case is not subject to verification, or do you see that as a necessary truth?

Neither really. But I do see it as an observational truth that at any time they present a verifiable/falsifiable case, and it is falsified, they fill in a gap which distances their case from verification/falsification rather than seek explanations consistent with observation. Yes I see your point. I guess what I mean is that I do not blame theists for my lack of belief.

I wonder, if a con artist where to attempt but fail to take me, is it his/her failing that I saw through the ruse? I would say it would be the theists fault if I did believe. Adding the statement that it is the theists fault if I don't believe, pretty much covers most situations and implies that my belief (or disbelief) system is due to theists one way or another. Are my beliefs/non-beliefs dependent on theists?

Perhaps, but doesn't it then follow that they should graciously accept any disagreements about their belief without offering any resistance at all?

Oh, and also be prepared to be demonstrated wrong at any and every point without even a moment's notice?

Yes, of course. Assuming they have a single standard of truth based on observation.

 

[Shad]

The baby does not need to understand death for entities which it accepts to not be subject to it. Say I knew of an event of which you never conceived or heard, can entities from your perspective be subject to such an event? Certainly from an objective point of view entities could be subject to such an event, but we are not talking about an objective point of view, we are talking about one entities perception.

Your example does not work since a child can not communicate it's ideas since it lacks a language which we can understand. So you are assuming a belief a child may hold is similar to a God or immortal concept you hold. You are still speculating, nothing more. More so any belief which the person holds that they themselves can not comprehend is not a belief.

 

[Ben Dhyan]

Can science provide atheists with faith where traditional religious teachings fail to inspire..

 

[gnostic]

Can science provide atheists with faith where traditional religious teachings fail to inspire..

Science and religion have nothing to do with each other.

In fact science has nothing to do with atheism for that matter. Atheism only deal with the question of "theism", hence they don't believe that God or gods exist.

Anyone - theist, atheist, agnostic, etc - with education, knowledge or experience can be a scientist, as long as their religious belief or disbelief don't interfere with their work or research as scientists.

And you don't have to be a scientist to be an atheist. Atheist could be a teacher, police, builder, carpenter, plumber, accountant,etc, just like any theist can have such job that don't involve science.

The thing is, that any scientist worth his salt, would try to find evidence or do repeated testing, to refute his own hypothesis, or validated his hypothesis. And that mean discarding hypothesis that don't hold true because of the evidences found or the test results have failed to be proven true; and that's not faith.

Faith it is about something (belief or opinion) being true, regardless of whatever evidences are presented that show the faith is false.

Why is God of the bible or the Qur'an is true, and not the Egyptian, Greek or Hindu deities?

There are no evidences to verify this or that religion is true, other each person or group of people's personal belief.

Neither atheists nor agnostics rely on faith.

Faith is like a carrot in front of the horse, to make the horse pull the cart along, always out of out of reach...never satisfying the horse's hunger. The horse so focus on the food in front of him, it doesn't realise it see nothing else and doesn't realise it being used.

To me, faith in religion is like this horse-and-carrot analogy, giving false hope that this or that invisible deity exist, and false promise of reward (like the afterlife).

Some people become so obsessed with eternal rewards and heaven that they are not living the life they do have. I don't find that all inspiring, Ben. I don't even find the promise of living forever appealing or realistic.

 

[Curious George]

Your example does not work since a child can not communicate it's ideas since it lacks a language which we can understand. So you are assuming a belief a child may hold is similar to a God or immortal concept you hold. You are still speculating, nothing more. More so any belief which the person holds that they themselves can not comprehend is not a belief.

Any belief a person holds...is not a belief. That is question begging at its finest.

 

[Ben Dhyan]

Science and religion have nothing to do with each other.

In fact science has nothing to do with atheism for that matter. Atheism only deal with the question of "theism", hence they don't believe that God or gods exist.

Anyone - theist, atheist, agnostic, etc - with education, knowledge or experience can be a scientist, as long as their religious belief or disbelief don't interfere with their work or research as scientists.

And you don't have to be a scientist to be an atheist. Atheist could be a teacher, police, builder, carpenter, plumber, accountant,etc, just like any theist can have such job that don't involve science.

The thing is, that any scientist worth his salt, would try to find evidence or do repeated testing, to refute his own hypothesis, or validated his hypothesis. And that mean discarding hypothesis that don't hold true because of the evidences found or the test results have failed to be proven true; and that's not faith.

Faith it is about something (belief or opinion) being true, regardless of whatever evidences are presented that show the faith is false.

Why is God of the bible or the Qur'an is true, and not the Egyptian, Greek or Hindu deities?

There are no evidences to verify this or that religion is true, other each person or group of people's personal belief.

Neither atheists nor agnostics rely on faith.

Faith is like a carrot in front of the horse, to make the horse pull the cart along, always out of out of reach...never satisfying the horse's hunger. The horse so focus on the food in front of him, it doesn't realise it see nothing else and doesn't realise it being used.

To me, faith in religion is like this horse-and-carrot analogy, giving false hope that this or that invisible deity exist, and false promise of reward (like the afterlife).

Some people become so obsessed with eternal rewards and heaven that they are not living the life they do have. I don't find that all inspiring, Ben. I don't even find the promise of living forever appealing or realistic.

That's fine gnostic...but if one has found truth, they do not rely on faith, they live according to it...