I am calling you out atheists. I believe that atheism is a dishonest position. An atheist says, "There is no God." The only argument that the atheist has for his position is that we cannot scientifically prove that there is a God, therefore, there must not be a God. Yet, that is actually poor logic. Atheism cannot offer any positive proof for its position. Atheism cannot disprove the existence of God, thus, it cannot legitimately say that God does not exist. A more honest position, one that I would understand, is the agnostic who can honestly say, "I do not know if there is a God or not."
Indeed, as a Christian I may not be able to prove via the scientific method that God exists. I believe that there are "proofs" of God's existence, it is just that they are not proofs in the scientific sense. Instead they are proofs in that it is more rational to believe that God exists that to believe there is no God.
Theism explains every issue -- things that atheists cannot explain such as the creation of the world, or a basis for morality. In fact, a belief in God gives meaning to life. What do you atheists live for since, according to evolution, there is no purpose to your life?
The desperation is strong in this one; he claws at the walls as they close in, and strikes back while howling until he suffocates upon his own futility. What rationality is there in believing in an invisible man who cannot be touched or heard or smelled or tasted? Rationality weeps when the unexplainable defaults to someone or something that cannot be proven to even exist. If you cannot find a reason to live without your deity you are indeed a pitiful cretin that has missed out on the true glory that is life. Someone can live for others, to ensure their own personal satisfaction, or care for the community they are a part of. Any deity that is designed for this purpose is artificial, a creation of the human mind, to create a false core to your society and build upon it to allow you justification for your own artificial dogma; to be as kind or hateful as you desire and grant you the excuse that it is not your fault but someone else’s that cannot be argued with.
ReplyDeleteHappy Rapture Day
Uhmm, I had the spaghetti monster last night for dinner. It was good!!!
ReplyDelete"The only argument that the Christian has for his position is that we cannot prove that there is not a God, therefore, there must be a God. Yet, that is actually poor logic."
ReplyDeleteFixed that for you.
OK Tim. "Theism explains every issue." Alright Tim. Explain to me how magnets work? Miracles and magic?
ReplyDelete"What do you atheists live for since, according to evolution, there is no purpose to your life?"
Evolution is the science of how life changes based upon genetic and environmental factors.
You are going to get all bent up out of shape because Atheists do not believe in a god and or invisible man in the sky. Atheist a dishonest position? Believing in something without proof sounds a lot more like a dishonest position.
"as a Christian I may not be able to prove via the scientific method that God exists. I believe that there are "proofs" of God's existence, it is just that they are not proofs in the scientific sense."
So basically you don't have any proof. You believe that "proofs" exist. So just like your god, your proof is also imaginary. Great logic Tim.
The World According to Tim
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-agl0pOQfs
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-agl0pOQfs
ReplyDeleteSWEET ZOMBIE JESUS ON A POGO STICK! NOT THAT!
And I'm still waiting on this non-scientific proof that Tim boasts to have.
The time has come for honesty, Tim. Are you floundering in your faith? Does denigrating the lack of superstition in others provide you with fuel to face another day?
ReplyDeleteDo you want to know what I live for? Fine, I'll humor you, despite knowing that no matter *what* I write, you will find it either inadmissible or unsupportable.
I live for *today*.
I live for the huge smile I received from my daughter when the whole family and lots of friends gathered around an ice cream cake and sang "Happy Birthday" to her today to let her know how incredibly happy we are that we can share in her life.
I live for *tomorrow*.
I live for the day that science can provide a non-invasive *cure* to ensure that no parent goes through what Donna's parents did, for the day that charities such as http://www.donnasgoodthings.org/ no longer need to exist.
I live for the *moment*.
I live for the feeling I get when I receive an exam back that I earned 102% on, knowing that perhaps my moment will lead to my tomorrow, knowing that it will make for a better today for others.
There are so, so many good things out there, and I don't have to believe in the supernatural to revel in them. I don't need an outdated, masochistic, sadistic book to tell me how to live. I need other people and myself to know what is right and wrong.
You think I need "God" to know morality? No. I need to have two fully human emotions called empathy and sympathy to have morality. I need to know how badly it hurts to be called a name to know that I never want someone else to feel that way because of something I have said or done. I need to see the love and trust shining from the eyes of a helpless being to know that I never want to do something to destroy something that precious. I need to see the desperation and even hopelessness in the eyes of a starving child 7600 miles away to know that I need to do something to stop it.
All of these things involve no supernatural, they involve the evolved state that is humanity. We are all humans, Tim; white, black, male, female, rich, poor, homosexual or heterosexual, and we ALL deserve to be loved and treated with respect and kindness for who we are as we are, not as some myopic, ritualistic, outdated superstition believes we should be.
No purpose to life? The first assumption is that we gain understanding of life through evolution, which we do in a biological and scientific manner, but if you're speaking to a philosophical perspective, evolution doesn't address that.
ReplyDeleteWhat I will say is that no where in evolution is there 'no purpose' to life, nor is there purpose. Evolution is not an entity. Evolution is a method or system by which organisms continue on, natural selection is the way that this works most effectively in a changing and stable environment (some environments are stable, some are not, see the red queen hypothesis for more information regarding the outcome of different environments on parasites, asexual reproduction and sexual reproduction). The purpose of life from a purely biological standpoint, is to survive and produce viable offspring that can further your genetic makeup for generations. So in essence, the biological standpoint would place the continuation of one's genetic makeup as the sole purpose. If you mean to ask what the purpose of life is on a grand scale, I ask...does it matter? This is my first question because you can't delve into purpose and meaning on a grand scale immediately. We have to conclude whether or not it matters what the end result of all that is and will be, is important, or if there would need to be a purpose. To that I say it doesn't matter. Whether the universe has no sentient purpose, or does, is irrelevant to us, because we are so small and insignificant that we will never really take part in anything on such a massive scale. Our minute lives will not change or alter if we discover that the universe and all of time has no purpose. Nor will our lives change if we discover that the universe and all of time has a complex purpose. Our lives are small in comparison to time. Humans live, on average, about 80 years. When we examine the time line of the universe, 80 years is merely a microscopic piece of time that on it's own is meaningless, in the way that a speck of dirt is meaningless to the whole of the earth. It would be pointless for a speck of dirt to base it's life or existence on the purpose of the earth, as it's presence is neither felt nor missed. So if you're asking what evolution (because you seem to think we derive all values from evolution for some reason) has planned and what is the purpose of all time and the universe, I say it's irrelevant. A curiosity, certainly, and one I think we should examine, but it's not going to alter or change the fabric of anyone's life if we discover it.
But let's move that and ask the question in a smaller scale. What is the purpose of life on earth? We should also define by what we mean when we say purpose. Do we mean, what is the value of everything on the earth in the context of the whole picture? Where does each individual life lead? In that we have to further define purpose. Do we mean, what is the ultimate end result of the earth? What does each life before that moment mean in the context of the end result? How does each individual life contribute to the end result?
Already we're having trouble defining such an abstract idea. Sure we can examine the dictionary to define it for us, but then we run into further problems. The best form of the definition which will give us a more concrete understanding of purpose essentially defines purpose as a goal, or intended result. This
(to be continued)
is going to pose problems because 'intended' implies consciousness (something we're not entirely sure even we have). Consciousness implies sentience (again, a loose term). So the problem with the concept of 'purpose' is that we don't really know what 'purpose' is, even in a definitional way, we still come to a very loose, abstract idea that is difficult to define in a way that we can all agree.
ReplyDeleteSo in a way you could say that evolution has no purpose, largely because it is not sentient and has no intended goal. That still confounds problems because you're implications are that somehow we attribute evolution to the basis of our ethics (I don't say morality because I see ethics and morality as the same, except that morality is religious and ethics are secular). This is a false idea. Evolution does not work on ethical behavior, it functions to maximize behavior that is conducive to the spreading of genes from one generation to another. More specifically, it further behavior in the individual which provides the most 'fitness' (which is measured generally by how many offspring survive and reproduce, in a basic sense). Evolution then builds on behaviors that are both ethical and not ethical, because evolution is amoral (not IMmoral, A moral, meaning it has no morality much like the wind, or water, or gravity). Ethical behavior can only be exhibited by sentient beings (again, a loose term, and not going to extrapolate it further to define sentience), so evolution can not have ethical behavior. It can only create and propagate the best ideas for survival, such as, the motivation different ethnic groups have to eradicate each other due to limited resources.
My point is, evolution is not the basis for ethics and therefore not the basis for the purpose of life, because it has no stake in it. It's the same as using gravity as a way to define purpose and ethics. They don't fit together. Now we can examine the evolution of ethical behavior in animals and find out why ethical behavior is programed (we have done this already) and utilize the human and animal behavioral models to maximize ethical behavior so that all can benefit from the positive aspects of the universe (if that makes sense to anyone). But to assume that anyone basis their ethical behavior and meaning on evolution is to invoke the naturalistic fallacy, which is absurd.
Ethics and 'purpose' are and individual preference. Religious find purpose and 'ethics' within their doctrines, which when read fully and not cherry-picked can call into question the legitimacy of the claim being presented. There are several passages in the bible where even Jesus condones murder, while then turning around and condoning kindness to others. Gaining morality from a book is a questionable procedure largely because few religious people take extensive amount of time to work out the logic of such a moral choice. If we take gay marriage for example, some will say it's wrong because the bible says so, and when pressed, will express that it's not a natural state for animals. This is generally as far as it goes, because there are hundreds of species which engage in homosexual behavior, including homosexual pairing. If you were to ask these same people, after showing the act being done by other animals, routinely, in nature, there is little reason to have a negative opinion other than to invoke god. I don't see this as commendable, because then you are gaining your 'moral' behavior from someone
purely on the basis of 'I told you so.' This is blindly obedient and can lead far more to immoral (such as genocide, see WWII as a more recent example) behavior because these people do not question or invoke rational thought to explain their behavior. This happens more often than someone might think and there is plenty of psychological evidence to support the fact that people will do horrendous things if they view the person as superior and as having authority. Putting religious people into this position their entire lives, concerns me, because good people, do horrible things out of this 'I told you so' mentality.
ReplyDeleteMy ethical behavior is derived from continuous thought. How do my actions effect other individuals? How do my actions effect humans versus animals? Do each of these groups feel pain, happiness, etc, and to what extent? How do my actions effect the environment, and how would that, on a larger scale, impact the future of the earth, and potentially the universe? My list could go on, but this is a sample of the sort of questions I ask. When confronted with my own values, I ask questions that may or may not challenge them, and I pose possible scenarios for the impact of these values on others, negative and positive. My ethics, are therefore derived from continuous refinement, previous philosophers and their logical arguments, and the potentiality for my behavior on an individual and large scale to invoke harm or good to other humans, animals, the earth, and the universe. In the end, my desire for all other life is to see it respected and to see it content. Is this possible? To an extent and my values reflect this. Is there room for refinement and improvement? There always is and that is the difference between myself and someone who takes their pastor's word for it. My values and ethics change depending on new information that is derived about the world about me and how I, as an individual, can improve that world for everyone. I do not require a man in a pulpit to tell me how to do that, as I am an intellectual, and I am a thinking being who as compassion and motivation. I would even dare to say that my ethics and my values, are superior to any who derive all of their values and ethics from an ancient, and I would be prepared to test that any day.
As far as purpose is concerned. There is no purpose to the universe because the universe is not sentient. It has no goal in mind because it is not sentient. This is not a problem, but a freedom. Consider, if the universe has nothing in mind, this gives us the opportunity to find our place, our individual place, within the world and define ourselves based on how we would that like world to look. If we think of the universe as a pond. A pond has no purpose. A pond is a bowl of water that sustains life, but it has no goal, no purpose mind. It simply is. The fish within it, the algae, the bacteria, the microscopic organisms, are all that is within the universe (if the universe is like a pond). The fish do not define their lives based on the goal of the pond. That would be silly. The fish define their lives based on that which is around them. Their goals, their desires, their motivations, define their purpose in life. Likewise, we define ourselves within the context of our fish bowl. We look to that which is around us, the devastation, the hope, the pain, the happiness, and with our own motivations, we define ourselves and therefore our purpose in life. What are goals besides desires to do something. It is all this which creates purpose on a grander scale.
Now you could say, well, some people want only to hurt others. This is true, no matter the religion of the person, there are, in all species, defectors and cheaters of the system. Religion doesn't make these people better, it obscures them, as they thrive in particular environments if given the chance, and even religious offer the chance to advance oneself despite being a cheater or a defector. However, in the whole of the population, these people are a small percentage as the population can not survive with a large percentage of these people. If they grow too large, their niches start to collapse. Consider if lying was condoned, people would lie all the time and then few people would trust one another, and eventually the system collapses (plenty of science on this, it's a prisoner's dilemma). So you'll always have cheaters and defectors no matter how many religious or nonreligious you have. It's independent of it. So using this would be an invalid critique of defining the self based on personal motivation and desire.
ReplyDeleteMy point to this entire post, is that purpose can be found in the self, and for many of us, is, and then further defined by outside information. With religious, purpose is defined by the self and the church, which again, is questionable. Ethics can be defined without religion as many of us take a great deal of time and pain to meticulously polish our values to suit what maximizes happiness and pleasure among not just humans, but often other species as well.
The invoking of not having morality or purpose, or any such thing against atheism is an old stone that has been thrown and immersed by plenty of logical statements debunking that fallacious argument.
Yawnn!!!
ReplyDelete"How?" is a different question than "Wh?"
ReplyDeleteAll methods have underlying theories and philosophies.
Purpose is unique to the subject. Function is unique to the object. Only a sentient being may mis-purpose an object (against it’s function). The same sentient being may mis-purpose himself.
-Antonia
Atheists are very inconsistent. By the standard that God doesn't exist, then they need to also hold that position for life in other planets and also the appearance of the first life as well as macro evolution. These are all non-proven things that Atheists believe because of their believe in evolution.
ReplyDeleteI want to know, what are the best proofs you have for evolution, why do you actually believe it, because you certainly haven't seen it, you may believe what some scientists say, but is that enough to convince you.
You demand God to show YOU specifically, but when it comes to evolution you believe without seeing and without demonstration.
Please realize that because a bacteria can become "immume", or develop resistance, or adapt, it doesn't proof that it once became a different animal altogether.
Anonymous=Tim
ReplyDeleteNice try, Anonymous...Anonymous does not equal me. :). I never post on here anonymously.
ReplyDeleteNote how not a single atheist has offered a positive argument for atheism.
ReplyDeleteplease read "Wh?" as "Why?"
ReplyDeleteWhy am I bothering with this? ... Here I go.
ReplyDeleteAtheism and theism are beliefs as in, "Do you believe there is a god?" "Why, yes, I do," or, "No sir, I don't like it." Agnosticism and gnosticism refer to knowledge of a particular thing. "Do you know there is a god?" "Why, yes, I know God exists," or, "No sir, I don't have any proof on the matter one way or another."
Once the terms are defined for what they are, it's clear that there are two separate things here being muddled by this Tim character. Anyone who claims gnosticism on the issue of god is misled or a liar-- on either side of the fence-- so we're left with a question of belief. So, "There is no god," is not something any of the above described people would say except a gnostic and those people, as I pointed out, are misguided or charlatans. But the initial call out failed to mention gnostics as the group you were attacking so, I think you were in err. For all intents and purposes, a self-identifying agnostic would most likely go in our camp as at least a skeptic or a scientifically-minded, loose believer-- Probably one of those people who believes in "something" but not any of the crap in those crazy people's books. Not a "real christian."
I'll paraphrase one of my favorite bits of Penn Gillette: If god asked you to kill your child (as it is written he did of Abraham), would you do it? Almost every person posed this question would say no-- they don't have the stuff (faith)that propelled Abraham to bind and prepare to sacrifice Isaac. And if you're a christian who answers "No" to that question, you don't *really* believe in god. You just like the idea of it or want to avoid socially awkward situations. That leaves the people who would answer "Yes," as the only true believers-- the same lot who would pray their children's leukemia away (because science don't know) or some other supernatural nonsense. I'll take this bit a step further and point out that, according to god's list of punishments for all the bad things us dirty, dirty humans can do, not keeping the sabbath (Saturday) holy is to be punished by death. So, yes, if you haven't spent every Saturday of your life in reverence of god, not doing a goddamned thing but sucking up to him, he thinks you should die. Perhaps not go to hell, but certainly be robbed of your mortal life. If this little tidbit was followed, our overpopulation problems would be solved and the deer would rule.
As far as taking theories as truth... maybe, maybe not. The fun thing about non-believers is that we're a lot more open to saying things like "I don't know," or "I believed that before but this thing over here shows that was wrong so I'm going to adapt and change my beliefs." The believer, on the other hand, clings to a belief structure that has not changed since the Bronze Age. Even brilliant theologians (that is to say, really clever guys who got led astray early and threw their lives away on a Trekkie-like fascination) are hamstringed by the writings of a people so archaic and backward they wouldn't live past puberty in the modern age. No new or dynamic changes can happen with religion. Quite a bit of hemming and hawing has to take place before even things like the spherical nature of the earth or its orbit around the sun can even be spoken of without imprisonment or death.
ReplyDeleteWe stand on the shoulders of giants as believers (and non-believers alike, although they piously bite the hand that feeds them). I could never develop the theory of relativity, for instance, but just by the sheer virtue of having been born after its conception, I can read of what greater minds than my own have written and left behind for me. That stated, we, in the now, are smarter than any people, let's say, 500 years ago. Just by the amount of knowledge we have, as a society-- a world culture-- amassed makes the dumbest guy you know present-day probably smarter than the wisest philosopher of ancient Greece, or any of the alleged authors of the bible. And our science changes, it adapts. When proven wrong, it takes it on the chin and looks for what's right. Faith develops a thing called apologetics which is, in essence, a means of trying to square what is an archaic and nonsensical mindset with what people, clearly too smart if only by virtue of their birthdate, are able to tolerate as only slightly bullshit. Just bullshitty enough that the allure of that heaven BS can still tip the scales.
Finally, I'll say that the talking points of morality or "empty lives" is the saddest thing believers bring up and apparently that was the biggest knife you brought to this gunfight, pard, because you closed with it. First, morality, when described as believers like to do so, makes it seem as though the only thing keeping you from rapekilling everything you see is some flimsy tether to a belief system that, if you have any mind at all, is already tenuous at best. "Without the bible, I'd be down at the morgue porking dead kids right now. Thank god I'm not, right? Right?" How about with or without a carrot on the end of that stick, I see a human being, ribs showing, distended belly in the far away land of Africa, dying of sheer neglect and my heart aches? How about if I pass a homeless guy on the street, I reach for my wallet because it's only luck-- a cosmic roll of the dice-- that put him where he is and me where I am? How about, even though I believe (not *know*) that nothing happens when you die (bummer, isn't it?) I would still want to see the "least" of people elevated to the best life possible without the bribe of conversion to my way of thinking? How about I don't need god to be good, I was raised right. How 'bout you?
If the only thing that gives your life meaning, the one and only life you know (gnosticism) you're going to have, then who's leading an empty life, sir? Who?
-Nic Hamilton
"Theism explains every issue ..."
ReplyDeleteEver known a guy who thinks they have the answer to everything? Know-it-alls? They're super-douchey, right? Right.
-Nic Hamilton
Seriously, Atheists should refrain from debating religion. Why do you insist on debating something you know very little of? The Sabbath is only for the old testament and for Jews. All other commands are reiterated by Jesus, and Jesus himself said it does not matter what day you worship or work, he himself did work on the Sabbath.
ReplyDeleteI know you may things just to get other Atheists to go like "Yeah, Good One!!", but please stop lying. If you don't know the facts, maybe you should do research before you post nonsense.
Theism absolutely doesn't explain everything, as in how everything works in micro-detail, but it definitely explains the source and the why of many things, science explains the how, they are very compatible when real science is used.
Abiogenesis is not Science, it is conjecture, Evolution (Macro-evolution) has never been observed, never repeated in a lab, and therefore falls outside the realm of science.
Adaptation and natural selection are definitely things we experience and therefore do belong in science. But to extrapolate a bacteria having a mutation and becoming resistant to antibiotics to a fish turned into a bird after millions of mutations is not Science, this is at most speculation.
The issues with the God doesn't exist statement, is that as Andrew says, he KNOWS God doesn't exist, and this is very narrow minded, gnosticism should be the more rational approach, because after all it is possible.
Does Andrew think that everything that science has not yet discovered doesn't exist? Or he just agnostic about it? Again gnosticism is more rational.
Science has been discovering things that would seem like science fiction a few decades ago, it would have been irrational back then but a very real fact today.
Actually, evolution has been observed, has been repeated in laboratory settings, and you can actually perform an experiment in your own home (if you have the time and the patience --- say about ten years) to induce evolutionary change.
ReplyDeleteAs to the question of the gods -- the burden of proof lies with those making the original or positive claim. Those are the rules of logic. Absence of proof is proof of absence. In order to demonstrate that, according to your line of reasoning, YOU must prove the non-existence of Shiva, Krishna, Uhura Mazda, Zeus, Thor, Ra, and all of the other gods in order to prove that YOUR particular god really does exist. Your "argument" is self-contradictory on its own.
Reminds me of my favorite Ricky Gervais quote "It annoys me that the burden of proof is on us. It should be: “You came up with the ideas. Who do you believe it?”
ReplyDeleteI could tell you I’ve got superpowers. But I can’t go up to people saying “Prove I can’t fly.” They’d go: “What do you mean ‘Prove you can’t fly’? Prove you can!’
Atheism... like a brain aneurism.
ReplyDelete"Actually, evolution has been observed, has been repeated in laboratory settings, and you can actually perform an experiment in your own home (if you have the time and the patience --- say about ten years) to induce evolutionary change."
So you are saying what normally took millions of years can be replicated in 10 years. OK!!!
The only thing that has been observed is very small adaptations that Theists agree and believe. The issue with extrapolating that to macro-evolution.