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 FYI ---- An examination of atheism’s truth claims (52)

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dadman(1703) pic



FYI ---- An examination of atheism’s truth claims

God "Probably" Does not Exist?

Atheists answer that question negatively, so the next move they make is to say that God “probably” does not exist. A recent example of this stance has been the advertorial bus signs that have appeared in various countries the past few years stating: “God probably does not exist.”

This claim, however, is flawed for two reasons. First, it is not the way human beings live many other areas of life they consider important. Few would eat a meal labeled “Probably not poison” and less would board a plane marked “Probably safe to fly.”

Secondly, it ignores the fact that the seriousness of a truth claim dictates the amount of evidence necessary to support it. The atheist truth claim carries with it enormous, irreparable and eternal consequences if it is wrong. That being the case, it is intellectually and morally incumbent upon the atheist to produce weighty and overriding evidence to support his/her position, but they provide nothing to substantiate their limp assertion that God “probably” does not exist.

Add New Argument
1 point

Definition of Atheism

----- Atheism is a faith/worldview that denies the existence of any supernatural deity.

The Oxford English Dictionary provides the following definition: “To believe nothing of a designing Principle or Mind, nor any Cause, Measure, or Rule of things, but Chance . . . is to be a perfect atheist.”

----- Broken down, A (no) and theism (god) simply means “no god.”

Although the word itself and its meaning is certainly straightforward, there are a wide range of philosophical complications and issues that must be addressed and

clarifications that need to be made where atheism is concerned.

1 point

The Problem of "Atheism" as a Definition

----- The first and foremost problem that arises from the word “atheist” is the type of truth claim being made.

Dr. Mortimer Adler describes the difficulty in this manner: “An affirmative existential proposition can be proved,

but a negative existential proposition--one that denies the existence of some thing--cannot be proved.”

----- When a negative existential truth claim is put forward, the one making the claim has shot himself not in the foot but in the head.

Unless the person can be in all places of the entire universe at the same time, he has no way of confirming that whatever he claims does not exist, in fact, does not exist. This is a conundrum the atheist finds him/herself in.

----- Recognizing their predicament, atheists like Richard Dawkins counter such an argument by saying that while they cannot prove a flying spaghetti monster does not exist, it is highly improbable such a thing actually exists, so the wiser intellectual position to hold is one that says such a thing does not exist.

----- However, such an argument commits two errors.

First, comparing God with a flying spaghetti monster commits the logical error of faulty analogy.

Second, just because something is improbable does not rule out its existence.

For example, all scientists admit that humanity’s very existence is inordinately improbable.

Scientific scholars acknowledge that it is against all mathematical odds that all of the universe’s cosmic constants and biological mechanisms necessary for life would come to be. Yet they have, and humanity does exist.

----- The question is not whether the existence of God is improbable, but rather is there logical, reasonable evidence that moves one toward a conclusion that God exists?

Dr. Mortimer Adler describes the difficulty in this manner: “An affirmative existential proposition can be proved,

but a negative existential proposition--one that denies the existence of some thing--cannot be proved.”

Absolutely. Unfortunately, most idiots on the internet took this to mean you can't prove a negative, and I spent two years being called a retard for trying to explain what it actually means.

Pedestrian(151) Disputed
1 point

However, in the case of there being a god, no affirmative existential proposition has been proved.

The prof. was a lifelong atheist until getting baptised in his 50s or later, not sure.

Clearly he did this in attempt to cover his bases.

Goldtop(166) Disputed
1 point

The first and foremost problem that arises from the word “atheist” is the type of truth claim being made.

The term "Athiest" was coined by a theist to describe non-believers. If it is a truth claim, then so is the claim that I don't see Leprechauns riding Unicorns in the Kentucky Derby. In fact, I can make unlimited amount of truth claims of things that have never been shown to exist.

Goldtop(166) Disputed
1 point

First, comparing God with a flying spaghetti monster commits the logical error of faulty analogy.

Why is it faulty, they both share exactly the same properties and characteristics; invisible, undetectable and violates laws of physics.

Second, just because something is improbable does not rule out its existence.

If Gods violate the laws of physics yet are completely undetectable, then they are well beyond improbable.

1 point

God "Probably" Does not Exist?

----- Atheists answer that question negatively, so the next move they make is to say that God “probably” does not exist.

A recent example of this stance has been the advertorial bus signs that have appeared in various countries the past few years stating: “God probably does not exist.”

----- This claim, however, is flawed for two reasons.

First, it is not the way human beings live many other areas of life they consider important. Few would eat a meal labeled “Probably not poison” and less would board a plane marked “Probably safe to fly.”

Secondly, it ignores the fact that the seriousness of a truth claim dictates the amount of evidence necessary to support it.

The atheist truth claim carries with it enormous, irreparable and eternal consequences if it is wrong. That being the case, it is intellectually and morally incumbent upon the atheist to produce weighty and overriding evidence to support his/her position, but they provide nothing to substantiate their limp assertion that God “probably” does not exist.

----- Atheism simply cannot meet the test for evidence for the seriousness of the truth claim it makes. Instead, using a supposed argument from silence, the atheist and those whom he convinces of his position slide into death with their fingers crossed hoping they do not face the unpleasant reality that eternity is an awfully long time to be wrong.

1 point

Science and the Existence of God

----- Some atheists recognize the gravity of this situation; and therefore when pressed for evidence, they take a stand that can be boiled down to “Science has disproven God.” However, there are several reasons that show this claim to be both enormously brittle and not well thought out. But first, to understand the rationale behind the position, a little history is necessary.

----- After the events of 9/11, a branch of atheism--militant atheism (sometimes referred to as hate theism)--aggressively rose up and demanded that society must get rid of all religion. Rather than focusing on religious extremists who use religion to justify violent and murderous actions, the militant atheists lumped all peoples of faith into the same basic bucket and labeled religion, as a whole, dangerous

----- But the question facing the militant atheists was, “How will we get rid of religion?” The apparent agreement was to use science as its bedrock and tool to replace the need for religion. This tactic is nothing new and was the same position put forward by Thomas Huxley in the 1800’s when he sought to install scientists as the new priests for humankind. This “faith” in science is not science at all but scientism, which says that science and science alone is the singular way to discover truth.

Pedestrian(151) Disputed
1 point

“Science has disproven God.

Wrong. Science has failed to prove a god.

Plus the idea after 9/11 of getting rid of all religion is in no way...'militant'

In fact it is the very militancy one can find in all regions (catholics middle ages, inquisition and 1930s when they jumped in bed with Hitler and the Nazis....that is the problem.

And why religion poisons everything.

BurritoLunch(6566) Clarified
1 point

And why religion poisons everything

I agree with this, but 9/11 wasn't religious. It was political. Anybody who genuinely believes the Republicans were simply handed the ammunition they needed to intervene in the Middle East has goddamned peanuts in their head.

dadman(1703) Disputed
1 point

Wrong. Science has failed to prove a god.

What science has proven, is that all life was derived from a source of intelligence ...

The data shows that there is a third fundamental entity in the universe needed for life: information.

1 point

Problems with Scientism

----- While science has indeed delivered many great gifts to humankind, the hopes atheism has for scientism replacing religion are ill-founded.

First, scientism is self-refuting. The statement “we should only believe what can be scientifically proven” cannot be scientifically proven (because it is a philosophical statement), and so based on its own criteria it should be rejected.

----- Second, it ignores other much-respected and used methods for obtaining knowledge. For example, the legal/forensic/historical method of discovering truth is used every day and is very well-respected. The legal method does not ignore testimony or facts because they are not empirically reproducible or testable. By a process of elimination and corroboration, the legal method allows history and testimony to speak for itself until a verdict is reached beyond a reasonable doubt and the balance of probability is achieved.

----- Third, scientism has proven disastrous from a moral perspective. Militant atheism asserts that if religion can be banished, then humankind will have peace and harmony. But even a cursory look backward at history since the Enlightenment says otherwise. Instead of resulting in peace, the Enlightenment ushered in one secular bloody revolution after another that climaxed in the twentieth century--producing the largest mass grave in history. Ironically, one of atheism’s chief heralds--Nietzsche--predicted (correctly) that because he and others had supposedly killed God in the nineteenth century, the twentieth century would be the bloodiest ever.

----- Lastly, rather pointing away from a transcendent Creator, advances in science have--more than ever--confirmed the existence of a theistic God. The death of the steady state theory and the current understanding that the universe as we know it exploded out of nothing into existence, the incredible fine tuning of the universe for human life, the confirmation of specified complexity like DNA that in a single strand contains digital information equivalent to 600,000 pages of intelligence and is mathematically identical to a language all act as pointers to an intelligent source that is behind it all. ----- In truth, atheism’s position on science commits the logical fallacy of the false dilemma. Atheism demands that a person choose between science and God when in fact no such division needs to occur. Such a requirement can be likened to a person being forced to choose between (1) the laws of internal combustion and (2) Henry Ford--as to why a car exists. The fact is the two choices are not contradictory but complementary. The atheist misses the important difference between agency (Henry Ford) and mechanism (internal combustion). In the same way, God is the intelligent agency and efficient cause behind everything with His natural laws and mechanisms carrying out His intentions to produce His desired-end result.

----- In the end, the atheist cannot rely on science to disprove the existence of a transcendent Creator and is forced into the admission that atheism itself is not a fact but instead a belief system that relies on faith. The real clash is not between science and religion but between the atheistic/naturalistic and the theistic worldviews.

1 point

Atheism and Faith

----- This being the case, the atheistic worldview must address two fatal mistakes it makes regarding the concept of faith:

(1) that faith is only a religious concept;

(2) that faith means believing in something where there is no evidence. Neither is true.

----- In terms of the first point, some honest atheists will admit that atheism is a worldview and faith.

One example is atheistic scientist George Klein who wrote: “I am an atheist. My attitude is not based on science, but rather on faith . . .

The absence of a Creator, the non-existence of God is my childhood faith, my adult belief, unshakable and holy.”

----- As to faith being defined as a belief that lacks evidence, nothing could be further from the truth.

Science has faith in logic, mathematics, natural laws, and the intelligibility of the universe and believes all such things are firm and will never change.

People also act on faith every day from meals they eat in restaurants, medicine they take from doctors, and marriages they participate in with their spouse.

----- In the Bible’s New Testament, the word pistis is used for “faith.” It is a noun that comes from the verb peitho, which means “to be persuaded.”

The best lexicons (e.g., BDAG) show the meaning of pistis to be: “a state of believing on the basis of the reliability of the one trusted"; “trust, confidence”; “that which evokes trust”; “reliability, fidelity pertaining to being worthy of belief or trust.” In other words, the idea that faith means blind belief in the face of opposing evidence is foreign in Scripture.

1 point

The Commonality of Faith

----- In conclusion, both atheism and theism make statements on faith that concern ultimate reality. Both must refer back to something that is eternal because each recognizes that everything that exists depends upon and owes its existence ultimately to something other than itself.

----- To the atheist, that ultimate reality is an eternal universe where only physical matter exists. Atheism’s struggle is to explain how the universe is eternal when all scientific discovery shows it had a beginning, and how--since an effect always resembles its cause in essence---an impersonal, nonconscious, meaningless, purposeless, and amoral universe accidentally created personal, conscious, moral beings who are obsessed with meaning and purpose.

----- The theist has no such problem because he holds that a personal, conscious, purposeful, intelligent, moral, eternal God created beings in His likeness and established the universe and its laws to govern their existence.

----- Far from atheism, which one of its chief spokesmen--Jean Paul Sartre--described as, “A long, hard, cruel business,” the Bible says that God created a meaningful and rewarding existence where, “The heavens are telling of the glory of God; and their expanse is declaring the work of His hands. Day to day pours forth speech, and night to night reveals knowledge. There is no speech, nor are there words; their voice is not heard” (Psalm 19:1–3).

----- In the end, Dr. John Lennox makes the choices between atheism and theism clear: “There are not many options--essentially just two. Either human intelligence ultimately owes its origin to mindless matter; or there is a Creator. It is strange that some people claim that it is their intelligence that leads them to prefer the first to the second.”

------------------------------------- Continue >

1 point

Atheists answer that question negatively, so the next move they make is to say that God “probably” does not exist

As an Atheist if you tell me you believe in a god I will ask you for evidence to substantiate your claim, all I’m doing is rejecting your claim there is a god because until I have seen evidence convincing enough to persuade there is otherwise. If and when such evidence was produced I would believe .

. A recent example of this stance has been the advertorial bus signs that have appeared in various countries the past few years stating: “God probably does not exist.

This claim, however, is flawed for two reasons. First, it is not the way human beings live many other areas of life they consider important. Few would eat a meal labeled “Probably not poison” and less would board a plane marked “Probably safe to fly.”

Your analogy is fallacious as in its inserting non supernatural things into the equation to make your example work , this fails easily if one plays the game fairly imagine then instead “ ghosts probably don’t exist “ or “ zombies probably don’t exist “ These claims then are entirely rational as the word probably easily carries the case

Secondly, it ignores the fact that the seriousness of a truth claim dictates the amount of evidence necessary to support it.

Really? Maybe if that’s the case as you assume you can support your god claim by producing large amounts of evidence , that is if the seriousness of your truth claim is to be taken seriously?

The atheist truth claim carries with it enormous, irreparable and eternal consequences if it is wrong

I’m not making a “truth “ claim in rejecting a theists claim until convinced otherwise. If I’m wrong how is the damage irreparable the number of gods put forward as being the “one true god “ is astronomical, what if you’ve have picked the wrong one?

. That being the case,

But it’s not

it is intellectually and morally incumbent upon the atheist to produce weighty and overriding evidence to support his/her position, but they provide nothing to substantiate their limp assertion that God “probably” does not exist.

The burden of proof is with the theist to provide evidence for his claim there is no burden of disproof with the Atheist

So you’re thus deflecting as you’ve zero evidence to back your god claim up it’s just a “limp assertion “ as you put it.

dadman(1703) Disputed
1 point

As an Atheist if you tell me you believe in a god I will ask you for evidence to substantiate your claim

sorry ... but my experience displays the fact that you REJECT the evidence

ie: .... is the painting of the Mona Lisa the result of an intelligence or of mindless / undirected random chance

Jody(1791) Disputed
1 point

sorry ... but my experience displays the fact that you REJECT the evidence

I have not been presented with any evidence so far that I would that is in any way plausible until I do I’m totally unconvinced .

ie: .... is the painting of the Mona Lisa the result of an intelligence or of mindless / undirected random chance

Again you use a fallacious argument as you are comparing two totally different things , the painting of the Mona Lisa was done by a man using his skills and intelligence we know people paint pictures , we do not know of gods or intelligence creating a universe

dadman(1703) Disputed
1 point

or how bout this .............

DNA is biological information sequence

your post above jody .......

are the letters / spaces and punctuation - are they of category A or category B

A = random / mindless / no structured sequence (just where they happened to land) .. or

B = design / code / information / intent / writer-reader / speaker-listener / agenda driven / intelligence

Jody(1791) Disputed
1 point

Your point is lost on me I’m afraid ...................................

Goldtop(166) Clarified
1 point

DNA is biological information sequence

The rings in a tree which indicate not only it's age but the climate conditions of that year, they are also a biological information sequence. Do they require an intelligence to form?

1 point

The atheist truth claim carries with it enormous, irreparable and eternal consequences if it is wrong. That being the case, it is intellectually and morally incumbent upon the atheist to produce weighty and overriding evidence to support his/her position, but they provide nothing to substantiate their limp assertion that God “probably” does not exist.

That is unmitigated bullshit. Disbelief requires no such thing. [It] is simply just that...disbelief. Plus probabilities are a mathematical statement based on mathematical history.

dadman(1703) Disputed
1 point

What the atheist needs to prove, (in order to gain any credibility)

is that life is derived from non-life ie: matter alone

excon(18260) Disputed
1 point

What the atheist needs to prove, (in order to gain any credibility) is that life is derived from non-life ie: matter alone

Hello dad:

We cannot. You can't prove creationist stuff either.. Whether God created it, or matter did, we don't know.. But, we are endeavoring to find out.. That's what science does.

excon

Goldtop(166) Clarified
1 point

So, what you're saying is that the theist doesn't need to prove anything about his God's existence? (in order to gain any credibility)

In whatever way life came about, it had to come from non-life, whether it was from natural causes or your God.

Pedestrian(151) Disputed
1 point

Atheists need prove nothing. Proof is required for such religious assertions.

dadman(1703) Disputed
1 point

[It] is simply just that...disbelief. Plus probabilities are a mathematical statement based on mathematical history. ... Michio Kaku: Is God a Mathematician? .... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jremlZvNDuk <

Kaku: Is God a Mathematician?

I actually agree with you that life has some very puzzling questions to answer about itself and the universe in which it presently exists. I would even go so far as to stipulate that I believe the small amount of knowledge we do have strongly implies some form of design. However -- and this is extremely important -- this is no validation of any religious god or vindication for any particular religion. At best the evidence does not -- at present -- outright debunk the idea of God, and that is the best you can say.

1 point

FYI …………………….. THIS Atheist doesn't agree with you (but then, you know that). This Atheist says straight out "God does NOT exist". The whole concept is impossible and unbelievable IMO. And I DO NOT have to PROVE anything. You believe what you believe, without proof. Same here.

outlaw60(15368) Disputed
1 point

Does the ATHEIST want CATHOLICS crossing the border ???????

AlofRI(3294) Clarified
1 point

I really don't care what religion they are as long as they prove to be better people than you. I've said MANY times I don't care what a persons religion is, or even if they HAVE one. I'd swap YOU for a Catholic that was a better person any day. We could use the improvement, no matter how small. ;-)

outlaw60(15368) Disputed
1 point

Can you FUCKIN IDIOTS explain your confusion on RELIGION ?????????????

AlofRI(3294) Clarified
1 point

Calm DOWN, outlaw, you seem to be losing it! Relax, smoke some weed … or whatever you do that soothes YOUR confusion. It seems to be getting out of control! Maybe you've been LYMFAO so much it's moved you close to a STROKE …. be CALM! ;-)