Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Glen Rosenberg on December 5, 2011 at 3:54pm

Aaron, your take on faith is in keeping with my constipation metaphor.

Faith is the abdication of critical thinking and reason. Regardless of how far-fetched and absurd the religious doctrine, the adherents fill up on shit and are unwilling to let it go. Faith is the sine qua non of all major religions. Take faith, add early indoctrination and an appeal to emotions and wullah-you have the formula to control how the masses think, their position on matters of importance and their attitudes towards others.

Faith is the oxygen of religion; it gives license to moral turpitude, discrimination and all of the ills produced by religion.

Not just sayin. Relayin.

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Permalink Reply by J Stephen Mabrey on December 5, 2011 at 8:23pm

If one is rational, he/she will accept proof that dislodges any opinion (belief) and accordingly change the opinion.  Therefore there are no rational atheists.  We are all agnostic waiting for the miracle. 

However one who is not professing belief is an atheist in the eyes of a believer.  I am willing to ignore the technical difference and carry the mantle of atheist and avoid explaining the difference between agnostic and atheist.  

Sam Harris says that we should not accept the label because the meaning is that we are simply without belief in a supernatural being or power.  We are without belief in one more god than a christian. 

It is the obligation of those professing to prove their theory (theology) before asserting that it is true or expecting others to join them. 

 

 

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Permalink Reply by Madhukar Kulkarni on December 7, 2011 at 9:04am

J Stephen Mabrey

"If one is rational, he/she will accept proof that dislodges any opinion (belief) and accordingly change the opinion.  Therefore there are no rational atheists."

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Permalink Reply by Madhukar Kulkarni on December 7, 2011 at 9:18am

J Stephen Mabrey

"If one is rational, he/she will accept proof that dislodges any opinion (belief) and accordingly change the opinion.  Therefore there are no rational atheists."

I beg to disagree with you on the above quote from your reply. Firstly. if somebody claims that a non-existing thing actually exists, then the onus of proof rests with those making a claim of existance. If they fail to produce any proof, is it not a proof of their falsehood? Secondly, if something does not exist, the proof of it's non-existance can only be indirect. If the faithfuls claim that the universe was created by god and if science discovers how the universe emerged, this is a certain proof about the  non-existance of creator god.  There can be many more such proofs of non-existance of god. To expect a direct proof of a non-existing god is like waiting for Godot! If he does not come, believe in god, is it?

MADHUKAR KULKARNI. 

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Permalink Reply by MCT on December 7, 2011 at 8:15pm

Life on Mars is possible and therefore in the realm of needing additional proof to assert certainty either way. God is not, however, possible and therefore no additional proof that the most basic laws of reality are needed to assert 100% certainty that god cannot be. However you attempt to define it or evade reason, if it is god of any kind, it cannot exist. If it did, it would not be god. If you are not talking about something contradictory, metaphorical or supernatural, then you are not talking about god. Either way life on Mars and god are in two different categories. One is possible. One is not. New evidence of god is oxymoronic. Keeping an 'open mind' to the possibility of evidence for something that contradicts the process of proof is down right silly.

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Permalink Reply by Madhukar Kulkarni on December 7, 2011 at 5:06pm

Aaron R

"However one who is not professing belief is an atheist in the eyes of a believer."

"gnostic atheists like MCT and MADHUKAR KULKARNI."

If this is the definition of an atheist, it fits me completely and I therefire call myself an atheist. What makes me "gnostic atheist"? Before dubbing us in this manner, you should have been kind enough to define your term "gnostic atheist".

MADHUKAR KULKARNI.

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Permalink Reply by MCT on December 7, 2011 at 5:33pm

I am an atheist because I do not believe in any gods. I am a gnostic atheist because I claim to have knowledge that there is no god. Agnostic atheists believe there is no god, but don't claim to have knowledge of this, or do claim that one cannot have knowledge of it.

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Permalink Reply by Madhukar Kulkarni on December 7, 2011 at 5:51pm

Aaron R

"Bertrand Russel - "Am I An Atheist Or An Agnostic?", 1947"

Bertrand Russel explained this by saying that he can neither prove conclusively that god exists nor he can conclusively prove that god does not exist. However, this not the case with me. I have no doubts in my mind and so such a question does not come to my mind.

MADHUKAR KULKARNI.

 

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Permalink Reply by Dr. Terence Meaden on December 7, 2011 at 6:06pm

I approach the same answer this way: either the universe is explicable by science (i.e. science as already known or will be known in the future with further advances) or it is not.

Anyone who thinks that it is not is allowing a degree of supernaturalism to enter---which is not scientific. I cannot accept any level of the supernatural to poke its way in. Therefore I say no to any degree of the supernatural, however remote.

Hence that makes 100% to science and 0% to creator gods. 

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Permalink Reply by Joan Denoo on December 7, 2011 at 6:43pm

How should I refer to you, Terence or Dr. Meaden?

OK, In science, there is always the possibility we don't know what we don't know.  

How do you reconcile the scientific principles with absolute certainty?

Given what I now know I am certain there is no god, 100%!  Doctors of old were certain infection spread by the ether, or whatever it was they used as authority.  It turned out the doctors themselves were spreaders of disease via bacteria and all the ugly unseen infectors on their hands.  If one holds on to certainty in the face of new information, would that not be as foolish as not holding on?

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Permalink Reply by Madhukar Kulkarni on December 7, 2011 at 6:24pm

Aaron R

I am totally committed to science and there is no basis for moving out of its domain. Pl. see my answer above to:

J Stephen Mabrey

MADHUKAR KULKARNI.

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Permalink Reply by MCT on December 7, 2011 at 6:37pm

Revelation and dogma are things of religion. There is no dogmatic decree from anywhere that is followed and no burning bush that says to only doubt what is not fully integrated into a knowledge base without reason and never at the expense of reason. It is commitment to reason and the process of verification that leads to being able to have certain knowledge. Gnostic atheism is claiming knowledge that there is no god. It has nothing to do with the abandonment of reason and evidence. Can you not see that you are asserting with certainty, which you claim is impossible to have, that god is possible and you know it? Or are you just not sure what you are talking about? I mean, surely, you can't be sure.

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