Religion.

[Roranora]

You cannot disprove the existence of the Christian deity, just as you cannot disprove the existence of many "invisible hand" gods/goddesses. However, saying a god does not exist is the atheist position, the term literally means "godless".
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When a religious person thinks of an Atheist, the last thing they think is "well (s)he might think it's possible for a god (hopefully my god) to exist". The first thing they think is "this person believes there is no god", which already puts the two at odds. Personally I would say "I believe in the possibility of a god, yet I have not seen evidence either for or against such beliefs", is that so hard?

Why do you think science and religion struggle so much to get along? Because the ideas differ? Not really. It's because over the last 50 or so years science has been vilified as Atheistic because of people who misuse the word for selfish and stupid reasons. They want to upset others and it works, it also causes problems for REAL scientists and other educated people who would wish for their children to be educated in scientific areas. The religious, who make up most of the population, are the ones who guide politics, not the poor smuck who wants to be labeled an Atheist because Agnostic isn't a strong enough word. If we turned the public to realize that science is Agnostic and Atheism is illogical and has nothing to do with science - we'd all be better off in the long run.

Agnostic is still open to any possibility though, no? So I'm an atheist because I'm not open to a handful of potentially infinite possibilities? I'm not saying any sort of potential phenomena isn't possible. Saying agnostic is science just seems like it's your fancy, let's-somehow-try-to-feel-better-about-this way of saying "I dunno lol." If "scientific" is meaning ignore everything that is currently ascertained, because X million years from now it might be something drastically different, ok. Yes, it may happen, and then at that point, we'll know if I'm the one saying the earth is flat or religious people are. Sorry I take some form of contentment out of having a stance as opposed to not giving it any thought, and then claiming science is on my side as my saving grace.

As for the doctor analogy, the instant I say no to a specific god, say as christians worship, it'd make me an atheist. Correct me if I didn't use the "right answer." Personally I would say, "I don't believe in the possibility of a god, because, if at the very least, nothing at all supports it; it goes against what is at present biologically defined as living. We've seen no evidence to support that any being can have anything other than a finite amount of viable living material," is that so ignorant?


And just to clarify, I'm not trying to sell or push my thoughts upon anyway; that's what I dislike more than anything. This is all in reply to having my feelings labeled as ignorant/stupid. Maybe someday I can be a REAL educated person.

[Ushallbeasgods]

I think the label is being used under the same context as typical sterotypes. A small number of vocal representatives of a group state their opinion and people unfairly label the entire group as being representative of a smaller segement.

Same thing happens with everyone though. I'm sure many view evanglical (sp) Christians in a stereotypical "Praise the lord" Pat Robertson sort of way. Truth is they can be very nice people but what the average person sees is the most vocal and often misrepresentative side of them.

If your using stereotypes to form your arguement then I discredit whatever you have to say.

[Mystywysty]

Hi first time poster.

That was a disturbing documentary. I feel awful for those children who will grow up delusional. I do take solace in noticing some of the children who appeared to be disinterested in the whole affair (like the child who's parent raised his arms for him lol). Maybe a few of them will grow up to be free thinkers? Please?

[Bwelch]

Sam Harris discussing his book The End of Faith, Religion, Terror and the Future of Reason. Link

Richard Dawkins - The God Delusion. Link

BBC - A War On Science. Link

A defense for Atheism from Zakiechan of YouTube. Link

Richard Dawkins will be on Paula Zahn this Monday.

[Restrat]

I was raised religious as a kid, and so was my family. Even during my early high school I wanted to still have religion, but when you find out you're gay and see that religions don't want you at all, or refuse to admit you even exist, it's hard to take anything they say in at all.

[Maguspk]

I was raised religious as a kid, and so was my family. Even during my early high school I wanted to still have religion, but when you find out you're gay and see that religions don't want you at all, or refuse to admit you even exist, it's hard to take anything they say in at all.

I love debates and watching people on the internet defend themselves so dearly.

So is your sexual preference being homosexuality a choice or an irreversable, uncontrollable factor of your existence?

[Kuya]

I was raised religious as a kid, and so was my family. Even during my early high school I wanted to still have religion, but when you find out you're gay and see that religions don't want you at all, or refuse to admit you even exist, it's hard to take anything they say in at all.

I love debates and watching people on the internet defend themselves so dearly.

So is your sexual preference being homosexuality a choice or an irreversable, uncontrollable factor of your existence?[/quote]

Why as you asking him that question? Do you honestly expect his answer to satisfy you?

Maybe im reading your post incorrectly, but he will most likely tell you he is not gay by choice and that is his natural state of existence. You can argue day and night that he maybe or may not be telling the truth, but when it comes down to it... you can't read people's minds.

So you or anybody else who isn't gay wont ever be able to tell if he is right or not.

[archibaldcrane]

The "atheists don't exist because it is impossible to discount the possibility of an omnipotent being that could render itself completely undetectable" argument is ...garbage.

Atheism is a belief system. Atheists don't believe that god exists. Acknowledging that it is theoretically possible that it does exist but it may be impossible to know this is fine, and is basically the agnostic position. They are not mutually exclusive terms by any stretch of the imagination, as one is a belief system and one is more a way of thinking.

Atheism is the disbelief in the existence of any deities.

Agnosticism is the philosophical view that the truth value of certain claims—particularly theological claims regarding metaphysics, afterlife or the existence of God, god(s), or deities—is unknown or (possibly) inherently unknowable.

[Maguspk]

I was raised religious as a kid, and so was my family. Even during my early high school I wanted to still have religion, but when you find out you're gay and see that religions don't want you at all, or refuse to admit you even exist, it's hard to take anything they say in at all.

I love debates and watching people on the internet defend themselves so dearly.

So is your sexual preference being homosexuality a choice or an irreversable, uncontrollable factor of your existence?[/quote:cb0de]

Why as you asking him that question? Do you honestly expect his answer to satisfy you?

Maybe im reading your post incorrectly, but he will most likely tell you he is not gay by choice and that is his natural state of existence. You can argue day and night that he maybe or may not be telling the truth, but when it comes down to it... you can't read people's minds.

So you or anybody else who isn't gay wont ever be able to tell if he is right or not.

[/quote:cb0de]

I think you missed something lol. That's the whole point, it's a useless fucking argument, just like religious arguments. You can't prove God doesn't exist/does exist, you can't prove homosexuality is natural/choice.

[Kaelan]

When a religious person thinks of an Atheist, the last thing they think is "well (s)he might think it's possible for a god (hopefully my god) to exist". The first thing they think is "this person believes there is no god", which already puts the two at odds. Personally I would say "I believe in the possibility of a god, yet I have not seen evidence either for or against such beliefs", is that so hard?

Highly religious people usually automatically think extremely negatively of Atheists because most (although not all) religions have a book that tells them to hate them for no good reason other than "they don't agree with us.". Obviously they don't say in in terms that explicit, but they instill that idea into them - almost always the people more aggressive to Atheists (such as yourself) are ones that are the most religious - the ones that behave most like their books tell them to. It sounds silly, but you'd be amazed how hard the most basic, simple ideas are to change after they've been forced into people's lives and minds from day 1.

Atheists don't like highly religious people because these insist on pushing their beliefs on others (much like you were doing in the above quoted paragraph, wether you noticed it or not), expecting that belief to be accepted without any valid reason. To an Atheist the argument "God exists, cause I said so" is about as valid as "Little green men from Mars made my car, cause I said so". Most Atheists that actually have a position on the subject, though (as in they're not another one of those people just jumping on another bandwagon cause they saw someone else do it, they actually came to the conclusion about it on their own through thinking about it and listening to what people from all sides have to say) are usually the ones least aggressive towards religion because they realise they're not dealing with just facts anymore, they're dealing with blind faith, beliefs people have held for hundreds, thousands of years. For the most part, Atheists that are aggressive towards religion, are only like that because that's all they've recived from their religious background in the first place, not because they absolutly have to insist that they're right and everyone else is wrong.

I'm not a Theist, but god I hate Atheists with a passion. So ignorant, so unscientific, and yet at the same time they think they're pragmatic and logical. At least the Theist will admit (in most cases) that they just rely on faith for their beliefs.

Agnosticism is true science, it's the only system of thought dealing with the god question that can consider itself logical. Seriously why do people want to claim so badly to being an "Atheist"? Surely if you have any common sense you'd realize that in this you are making a claim that it is not possible for a god to exist, which is just illogical. Save your brain cells, admit to being an Agnostic.

Any given logical argument is assumed false until proven true, not the other way around. You can't go somewhere and say, I believe there's a flying spaghetti monster flying above us right now, but you can't see him cause he's invisible. I can't prove it though, you just gotta believe me - logically, it's true until you can prove that it's not! That's not the way logic works. If there is any lack of evidence to an argument, the burden of proof is never on the person saying the argument is flawed, it's on the person who wants to prove it's true.

When the judicial system is actually working like it's supposed to, if you get arrested, you cannot actually get punished for it unless is whoever pressing charges actually has some sort of case to present against you. They have to prove you did something, you don't have to prove dick until they provide some evidence to back their claims up first. Imagine if it worked like your argument for religion, and people could go to jail "cause a voice in my head said they did something wrong".

This is exactly why it's more logical to not believe, than it is to believe. You can believe whatever you want, honestly anything anyone does in their privacy is imo their own buisness and not mine, nor is it my place to try to change anyone's personal beliefs. But don't try to come openly and put religion and logic together, you're dealing with blind faith and rational thinking; it's like oil and water - they're naturally completly opposite to each other, and just don't go along.

You have to be extremely careful around a subject like religion in regards to what words you're going to use. There are several arguments you could pick for religion, some of which I can even understand people believing in - but trying to back up faith with logic is about the worst one you could possibly pick, considering they are essentially opposites to one another. You can't explain faith with science (short of psychology) and you can't explain science with faith, because their basic premises are completly, absolutly different.