"If I am right, I go to heaven, if you are right, you die anyway."

[spidergoat]

At least the food he cooks is better than yours.
That is rather important.

Better sounding but ultimately empty calories...

In the Big Rock Candy Mountains there's a land that's fair and bright
Where the handouts grow on bushes and you sleep out every night
Where the boxcars are all empty and the sun shines every day
On the birds and the bees and the cigarette trees
Where the lemonade springs where the bluebird sings
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains

 

[lightgigantic]

If you assume without evidence that there is a realm or force outside the observable, then we will always be left lacking.

So once again we are back with your adamant insistence that empiricism has a monopoly on all issues of evidence ....
:shrug:

 

[wynn]

So once again we are back with your adamant insistence that empiricism has a monopoly on all issues of evidence ....

Because you aren't feeding him the right things. Literally.

Food = empirical evidence.

 

[spidergoat]

So once again we are back with your adamant insistence that empiricism has a monopoly on all issues of evidence ....
:shrug:

Empiricism is the use of reliable evidence to defend a claim. What else is there?

 

[spidergoat]

Because you aren't feeding him the right things. Literally.

Food = empirical evidence.

What other kind of evidence is there? Logical deduction? Logical proofs for God all fail in one way or another. God=wishful thinking, unless you can demonstrate otherwise.

 

[DaveC426913]

If those theories, ideas and misconceptions are exclusive to the atheist creed then they certainly do own them.

So there are no Taoists that have misconceptions about God?
There are no Hinduists that think cloudy Heaven and firey Hell are what the bible purports?
No Christians that (like atheists) think it makes sense that the world was created more than 6000 years ago?

 

[lightgigantic]

Empiricism is the use of reliable evidence to defend a claim. What else is there?

If we take the problem of directly perceiving the president, there are clearly other factors that come to the fore.

IOW in cases where the subject is immensely greater than the applicant, the reliability (or even applicability) of empiricism is ineffective.

 

[lightgigantic]

Because you aren't feeding him the right things. Literally.

Food = empirical evidence.

which in this scenario = starve ... since empiricism is akin to a seasonal food

 

[lightgigantic]

So there are no Taoists that have misconceptions about God?

sure
they tend to go by the title of taoist

There are no Hinduists that think cloudy Heaven and firey Hell are what the bible purports?

sure
they tend to go by the name of neo-hindus

No Christians that (like atheists) think it makes sense that the world was created more than 6000 years ago?

sure
they tend to go by the name of creationists

:shrug:

 

[spidergoat]

If we take the problem of directly perceiving the president, there are clearly other factors that come to the fore.

IOW in cases where the subject is immensely greater than the applicant, the reliability (or even applicability) of empiricism is ineffective.

But if you haven't perceived it directly or indirectly, how do you know it exists? And even if you guess it exists, how do you verify it?

 

[lightgigantic]

But if you haven't perceived it directly or indirectly, how do you know it exists? And even if you guess it exists, how do you verify it?

thats why I propose the example of the president since it answers all these questions

 

[DaveC426913]

sure
they tend to go by the title of taoist

sure
they tend to go by the name of neo-hindus



sure
they tend to go by the name of creationists

:shrug:

OK, so you agree - ideas, misconceptions and theories are not the exclusive domain of atheism. And no, atheism doesn't "own" them. And you retract these statements:

If those theories, ideas and misconceptions are exclusive to the atheist creed then they certainly do own them.

The only way you can weasel out of it is if you play the "implicit atheism of chairs and stones" card (which I anticipate you will be pulling out very shortly)

Because otherwise you've contradicted yourself.

 

[lightgigantic]

OK, so you agree - ideas, misconceptions and theories are not the exclusive domain of atheism.

sure its only the atheist ones that they own ...
:shrug:

 

[Syne]

I am perfectly capable of appreciating literary fiction. Besides, I believe it is the conservative Christians who are literal-minded. Aren’t they the ones who are confident that the Bible is the authoritative Word of God?

The problem is that none of the original manuscripts currently exists and the authors are dead and buried. Don’t you think that the various techniques of hermeneutics only intensify subjectivity? Most agree that genesis 1-11 are literary stories representing mythology rather than history, but what about the gospels. Do you feel that they are literary works or historical?

It is a hasty generalization to correlate an assertion of Biblical inspiration as indiscriminately literal-minded. Being the "authoritative Word of God" does not preclude literary devices in the least.

The provenance of scripture seems to be a non sequitur or red herring here.

How would seeking coherence be more subjective than someone with an admitted cognitive bias appealing to ridicule? Histories are well known to contain subjective embellishments of the chronicler, especially when literacy was rare.

But arguing against the existence of God wasn't your point. Your point was 'atheism is an opinion - that god doesn't exist'. That's wrong.

Atheism is simply a stance - that god is not accepted without compelling evidence.

Perhaps you honestly missed this: "What you find compelling is subjective opinion, short of conclusive evidence."

stance
2 b : intellectual or emotional attitude
attitude
4 a : a mental position with regard to a fact or state
b : a feeling or emotion toward a fact or state
position
2: a point of view adopted and held to
opinion
1 a : a view, judgment, or appraisal formed in the mind about a particular matter
-merriam-webster​

Have I made my point? Giving you the benefit of the doubt, I'm assuming I don't really have to spell it out further.

 

[spidergoat]

thats why I propose the example of the president since it answers all these questions

I can see a consistent image of the president, I can hear him talk, and know that there is most likely a real person behind this image. If I wanted to, I could go to a rally and see him in person. This image is independent of my belief system and can be corroborated by anyone. You cannot say the same thing about God or any supernatural concepts.

 

[lightgigantic]

I can see a consistent image of the president, I can hear him talk, and know that there is most likely a real person behind this image. If I wanted to, I could go to a rally and see him in person. This image is independent of my belief system and can be corroborated by anyone. You cannot say the same thing about God or any supernatural concepts.

So IOW direct perception of the president (that goes beyond accepting the hearsay of persons in authority positions) requires that you meet him in accordance with a framework dictated by the president

 

[spidergoat]

Until I meet him, I don't know if the president really exists. I think it's more likely than not, based on the evidence I have seen, which is mostly audio and video. Do you have audio or video of God?

My second question would be, how would you personally verify the existence of the president?

 

[Syne]

I didn't say "a god does not exist." I am convinced the God of Abraham does not exist, however, and I base this on all the various evidences against it. We've discussed this evidences at length, and they don't simply rely on the correct interpretations of the Bible.

So, still some vague "various evidences"? What we've previously discussed has been shown to be very far removed from the criteria of evidence, or even valid logic.

You're not stupid, so don't pretend you don't understand why I bring up the Mets. Atheism does not inform my overall perspective. It's a position based on evidence (and the lack of it), not a worldview. In other words, atheism is as much a worldview as my Mets fandom is.

So your "Mets fandom" is just as likely to warrant you attacking another's worldview? :bugeye: Fandom opposes competing fandom, not a worldview beyond its own scope.

Being equivalent claims does not therefore make them subjective opinions. I can claim that a corpse is alive, but that does not mean the counter-claim of "the corpse is dead" is therefore a subjective opinion.

Without empirical evidence it does. Claims have no prima facie factual value of their own without objective verification.

It would only be an opinion of one were to say "There is no creator," because it's impossible, at least as of yet, to say one way or the other conclusively. That's what I should have said.

Then what is it you meant to say with regard to atheism not being an opinion?

Do you even hear yourself? "that agency was our first logical conclusion" So there's logic in it after all?!

At the time when these gods were invented, sure. Nobody knew what made thunder happen, or what brought floods or famines. They needed to explain these things, and without science to help them understand the world, they had to come up with something else. And agency would have made sense to people who did not know any better. I mean, you even see those arguments put forward today, so clearly they have a value to people who lack knowledge to the contrary.

You seem to have completely dodged any justification of these being "logical". Is subjective value your criteria for logic?

Well, you were talking about theism overall, not simply Judaism and its schismatic branches. But even then, they all rely on very different claims. I don't see how that can be described simply as "dressing." Is the God of the New Testament really the Allah of the Quran?

Look up why they are all called Abrahamic.

Quite aside from theism not addressing any particular religion, but deity with traits common throughout all religion.

Well, listen, it's no surprise that the religions you're thinking of (the Abrahamic religions) share traits with the pagan religions of the region, since those pagan faiths are the ones the Abrahamic faiths are to varying degrees based upon, and from which Christianity especially borrowed extensively from for political purposes. But as you broaden your scope, the similarities dwindle. If you want to broaden the scope to "theology" as a whole, really the only trait they all have in common is the assertion that the world exists because a god or gods made it so.

Perhaps you should look up deity while you're at it. Ever done any serious comparative religious studies? Might want to take a look at that as well.

 

[DaveC426913]

Perhaps you honestly missed this: "What you find compelling is subjective opinion, short of conclusive evidence."

Have I made my point? Giving you the benefit of the doubt, I'm assuming I don't really have to spell it out further.

No, you haven't. Cherry picking definitional phrases doesn't mean that you have exhaustively defined the only ways the word stance can be used correctly.

Atheism, at its essence, isn't an opinion; it is a structure of logic - that until something is demonstrated compellingly, it is not granted.

 

[Syne]

Atheism, at its essence, isn't an opinion; it is a structure of logic - that until something is demonstrated compellingly, it is not granted.

For the third time now, what you find compelling is subject to opinion. You seem to assume that what people find compelling about theism is not demonstrable to them.

The truly compelling is beyond refute. A lack of evidence cannot constitute being beyond refute unless it is ultimately exhaustive.