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Atheism; There is no way to prove god does not exist, yet they believe it strongly.
To talk of immaterial existences is to talk of nothings. To say that the human soul, angels, God, are immaterial, is to say they are nothings, or that there is no God, no angels, no soul. I cannot reason otherwise: but I believe I am supported in my creed of materialism by Locke, Tracy, and Stewart. At what age of the Christian church this heresy of immaterialism, this masked atheism, crept in, I do not know. But a heresy it certainly is. Jesus told us indeed that 'God is a spirit,' but he has not defined what a spirit is, nor said that it is not matter. And the ancient fathers generally, if not universally, held it to be matter: light and thin indeed, an etherial gas; but still matter." letter to John Adams, August 15, 1820 ~Thomas Jefferson
a. INTRODUCTION: Atheism's distinct influence on western culture Atheism is a recent and a rather distinctive western phenomenon in accepted unbelief of the divine. The suddenness of the public shift, from devout believers to unbelievers is quite sudden. What is intriguing however is atheism's rarity in the historical record of other cultures. Only in western culture do we now find such a wide spread public rejection of the divine. Throughout these last fifty years, which is as long as the Gallup Poll (The Gallup Report 1935-1985) has shown that privately Americans regularly answer “Yes,” to the question “Do you believe in god?” However even with this resounding affirmative, the references to god in public discourse are few and far between. America has become a nation of public and practical theists. (Vitz, Faith of the Fatherless, x-xii)
Atheism; The Fight for your mind Atheism has only had a noticeable effect on western culture. No where else in the historical record of other nations, cultures, or countries has atheism had such a large impact on public perceptions of the divine. (Vitz, Faith of the Fatherless) Atheism is a relative newcomer on the theistic stage. Yet in the western world it's pull is undeniable. Atheism does not try and save the soul, instead it attempts to save the mind. Atheists themselves began the psychological approach to the question of belief. Indeed, many atheists are famous for arguing that believers suffer from illusions, from unconscious and infantile needs, and form other psychological deficits. A significant part of the atheist position has been an aggressive interpretation of religious belief as arising form psychological factors, not the nature of reality, Furthermore, this interpretation has been widely influential. In short, the theory that God is a projection of our own needs is a familiar modern position and is, for example, presented in countless university courses. (Vitz, Faith of the Fatherless, 13) The proponents of the idea that theistic belief is inevitably a mental illness was propagated by some of atheism's earliest proponents. Some notable atheists include: Friedrich Nietzsche, Sigmund Freud, Bertrand Russell, and Jean- Paul Sartre. Today Atheists do not only rely on psychology, but science.
Presentation of Research The intention of this paper is to identify atheisms validity as a religion, and to compare and contrast the attitudes that atheists share, dealing with believers and non-believers alike. It would be this students goal to try and show that atheism is indeed a belief system, and is in fact more like theistic religions of the past than a rejection of said religions. Before dissecting atheism's place in todays modern society, an abridged history of atheism will be given. This history of atheism is a vital part of understanding the modern day atheism, and it's current place in science, religion, and the American mind. The term “atheist” is coined from the Greek term atheistos, meaning something like “one who denies the traditional religion of the Athenian establishment.” Denying the existence of God's (as most modern day atheists do) was seen as a punishable offense in Greek society.
Socrates (469-399bc.) was enforced to commit suicide because of his ideas. One of his accusers Melitus said that the “atheist” philosopher had corrupted the children of the city, by telling them not to believe in the cities gods. However compared to the atheist of today, Socrates would find no place in the radical beliefs that all modern day atheists share.(Grath, The Twilight of Atheism,8) Even established theistic religions of today were once thought of being “atheistic.” The first Christan's were thought to be atheist, because they challenged the pagan beliefs of the later classical world. The term of atheism has been throughout time branded to many people, ideas, and even theistic belief systems.
II. Atheism in the Modern Age: The western world has always had a deeply seeded belief in god. Partly because of the large role the church has played in it's history. The church was a stabilizing force for the people. However this was about to change. Around the sixteenth century the protestant reformation took place. However this change was not truly a deformation of the church per se. Both Protestants and Christan's still believed in a God. After years and years of the wealthy, and corrupt church ruling the land the protestant reformation helped to bring about a resurgence of atheistic ideals. (Grath, The Twilight of Atheism,10)
While it can be said that at one time the church played an important role in stabilizing the general populace during the dark ages, after the reformation peoples thoughts about the church began to change. Many felt that the church had grown too powerful, and needed to be restricted. The church was now holding back the intellectual, artistic, and political endeavors. Some men took it upon themselves to try and help the church reform, and turn it from a corrupt and lavish organization to something that resembled the early church. Some notable men include Martin Luther (1483-1546), Huldrych Zwingli (1484-1531), and John Calvin (1509-1564) (Grath, The Twilight of Atheism,11)
With the Protestant reformation, the ideas of the church were being brought into question. Atheism was at first seen, not as a truly applicable belief system, but a tool to use against the church. The historical origins of modern atheism lie primarily in an extended criticism of the power and status of the church, rather than in any asserted attractions of a godless world. (Gratz, The Twilight of Atheism,11) Suddenly the atheistic ideals first imagined by classical philosophers was finding a resurgence in the modern era. The known unbelievers (Atheists) of Europe and America before the French revolution in 1789 numbered fewer than a dozen or two. (Vitz, Faith of the Fatherless,10) Atheism however was slowly growing in some minds. Soon in 1870 Atheism became a respectable belief in academic and intellectual circles.(Vitz, Faith of the Fatherless,11)
Prominent Atheists in the Modern Era During the late 19th and early 20th century atheism had found itself embedded in some of the most brilliant minds of the time. Notable atheists: Friedrich Nietzsche, Sigmund Freud, Bertrand Russell, and Jean- Paul Sartre. (Vitz, Faith of the Fatherless,3) This paper will specifically explore Sigmund Freud's influence on Atheism, and why this titan of psychology proposed that god was nothing more than an oedipal desire of man.
As is generally known, Freud's criticism of belief in God is that such a belief is untrustworthy because of ti's psychological origins. That is, God is a projection of our own intense, unconscious desires.(Vitz, The faith of the Fatherless,6) Freud's influence in the field of psychology is uncontested. Referred to as the 'father of psychology' Freud gave rise to the science of psychoanalysis. It is not a far stretch of the imagination to understand why Freud would believe that belief in god is simply a figment of imagination. In his book “Future of an Illusion” Freud attempts to explain his position on god. He writes: “Religious ideas have arisen from the same need as have all the other achievements of civilization: from the necessity of defending oneself against the crushing superior force of nature.” What Freud is trying to say is that any religious belief can be quantified urges that man kind has always possessed. He continues: “As we already know, the terrifying impression of helplessness in childhood aroused the need for protection- for protection through love- which was provided by the father...Thus the benevolent rule of a divine Providence allays our fear of the dangers of life.” (Freud, The Future of an Illusion, ed. And trans. J. Stachey(New York: Norton, 1961)
Freud's reasoning for the illusion of God may well refute the existence of a divine being. However if we take a closer look at what is mentioned in “Future of an Illusion” it is quite easy to notice that this explanation could be applied to most anything. If every thing created by people was simply nothing but a construct created for the unconscious desires that as human beings we all share, then surely Freud has them his self. If that is the case, then even psychoanalysis is subject to the same scrutiny. If this is true, and in Freud's own words it is undoubtedly so- then Freud himself is arguing the disbelief of god through yet another “projection” of his deepest desires.
However Freud is not wrong to consider that a belief might be an illusion because it is first formed in the unconscious. Instead Freud inadvertently provides a powerful new way to understand an illusion as the psychological basis for rejecting God- that is, a projection theory of atheism.(Vitz, Faith of the Fatherless,9) The Oedipus complex is a male personality developmental stage, pioneered by Freud. A short explanation is as follows: Around the age of 3 a young boy will develop strong desires (sexual in nature) towards his mother. At the same time, the young child will begin to develop a strong hatred and fear for the father. The child would like nothing more, than to 'dethrone' the king, and take his place. The hatred arises from the boys innate knowledge that the father is stronger, and much bigger. This figure stands in the way of the boys desires. The child fears the father because of castration by the father. The son of course does not really kill the father, but instead learns to life with him. Freud goes on later to explain that the neurotic potential of the situation: “the Oedipus complex is the actual nucleus of neuroses.” Freud is just saying that many of mankind's neuroses come from this initial Oedipus complex. (Vitz, Faith of the fatherless,11)
Because Freud has stated that is the epicenter of all of our neuroses, he had developed a sound reason as to why people would try and reject god. The Oedipus complex is completely unconscious, and is formed in the early years of life. It is dominated by the hatred of the father (in this case god) and the unconscious desire for god to not exist. This is represented by the child's wish to kill the father.
Therefore, in the Freudian framework, atheism is an illusion caused by the Oedipal desire to kill the father (God) and replace him with oneself. To act as thought god does not exist reveals a wish to kill him, much in the same way as in a dream the image of a parent going away or disappearing can represent such a wish. The belief that “God is dead,” therefore, is simply an Oedipal wish-fulfillment- the sign of seriously unresolved unconscious motivation. (Vitz, Faith of the Fatherless, 13) Freud has had a profound impact on how the interpretation of a 'God' figure can be interpreted. This complete and utter rejection of the father figure can be seen in todays more radicalized form of atheism.
III. Atheism in Present Day America
It would seem that atheism has come a long way from it's beginnings. In the western world, it grew from a handful of individuals in the 18th century, and today more than 16% of the world population considers themselves to be atheistic, or agnostic in their belief systems. (http://www.adherents.com) In 2000 alone only 20% of Americans had 'belief' in god. (Grath The Twilight of Atheism, 156) However the question comes to mind, 'why is there a sudden and veritable explosion of atheistic belief?' The answer to that question comes in the form of science. “Science is a way of knowing about the natural world.” (God the Failed Hypothesis, 28)
With the advent of post modern science atheists have come a long way in the accusations they have made to further discredit the theistic faith. Science is seen in our post modern world as something that can fainally bring understanding to life. Most people would agree that science bring empirically tested fact about the reality and nature of this world. It has usurped the churches control over the minds of it's converts, and consequently has become atheisms current tool to undermine the teaching of the church.
One of the most prominent, learned and outspoken atheists to date is Victor J. Stenger. He currently resides as an emeritus professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Hawaii and adjunct professor of philosophy at the University of Colorado, He is author of the “Comprehensible Cosmos,” “Timeless Reality,” “The Unconscious Quantum,” “Physics and Psychics,” “Not by Design,” and “Has Science Found God?” In his latest work, Stenger argues that with todays modern scientific techniques and current understanding of the material world, that mankind can finally deny the existence of god, and do so with empirical and scientific fact.
It would seem that with empirical and scientific fact, that atheism could not be seen as a religion. However unbeknown to most atheists they are still placing their faith, and beliefs in an altogether different entity. In “God the Failed Hypothesis,” Stenger's thesis is the following: “The thesis of this book is that the supernatural hypothesis of God is testable, verifiable, and falsifiable by the established methods of science. We can imagine all sorts of phenomena that, if observed by means of methodological naturalism, would suggest the possibility of some reality that is highly unlikely to be consistent with metaphysical naturalism.” Metaphysical naturalism is referencing the inherent and according to Stenger 'supposed' dogmatism that science is naturally materialistic. He further argues that science's influence can go above and beyond these metaphysical constraints. “Any type of dogmatism is the very antithesis of science. The history of science from Copernicus and Galileo to the present, is replete with examples that belie the charge of dogmatism in science.” In Stenger's attempt to try and give a concrete reasoning for the idea that science can observe the supernatural and is not tied down to metaphysical naturalism is absurd.
Science has one major flaw that is inherent in all things. The simple fact is- that the human experience is created by an imperfect means. That is to say that the human body can only receive stimulus from one of the five senses. (Sight, Sound, Touch, Taste, Smell) No matter how hard one may try, it is physically impossible for a human to somehow measure or record a phenomena that is not in some way material. While it is possible to build machines to help us see farther, we still must interpret the data our machines are giving us. In Strenger's thesis he is making the claim that any supernatural god can be testable, verifiable, and falsifiable. It is with this statement that Strenger is assuming that a supernatural god is either materialistic, and or effect's the material world in a testable way. If Strenger were to not state these proofs in his thesis, then his entire study is simply pointless. How does one study something that is immaterial? It just simply cannot be done. In stead Strenger assumes, or more accurately believes this to be true.
Could it be said that one must be a believer to be atheist? While atheism is indeed seen as being anti-theistic, could one not say that atheistic belief is the belief in science? Or more appropriately, the belief in the five human senses? It is not this writers desire to try and drag this into a philosophical debate; yet at the same time, it should be noted that the imperfection of the human senses interpreting our material world is befuddled at best. A short example would be to imagine our sense of sight. The electro magnetic spectrum can be thought of as a wave. A wavelength in the electromagnetic spectrum range from less than 10(-14)m to 10(4) m. The visible spectrum includes wavelengths ranging only from 400 to 700 nanometers.(Sherwood, Fundamentals of Physiology, 139) Our minds understanding of 'light' is so limited, and multiplying this inherent err to all of our senses, one can easily conclude that the simple act of perceiving anything is a belief in itself. Do you really see what is there? Or is the neural pathways going too and from your brain changing the reality of the object?
This is the problem that all people, and science in particular must try and work around. Constrained to a life of limited extrasensory input and understanding. Could man ever truly create a final thesis on the existence or the non existence of god? It seems that Atheists and atheism has deemed that even in the light of their human imperfection that claiming and justifying this statement is very possible. It can be said than that to believe in a theistic belief system is akin to modern atheism. Atheists simply believe in science, and the truth of how their mind interprets reality. Atheism in that sense can be seen as not only a belief but an entire belief system.
Bibliography Stenger, Victor. God the Failed Hypothesis: how science shows that God does not exist. New York: Prometheus 2007
McGrath, Alister. The Twilight of Atheism: the rise and fall of disbelief in the modern world. New York: Doubleday 2004
Vitz, Paul. Faith of the Fatherless: the Psychology of Atheism. Dallas: Spence Publishing 1999
Dawkins, Richard. The God Delusion. Boston, New York: Houghton Mifflin Company 2006
Sherwood, Lauralee. Fundamentals of Physiology: a human perspective. New York: Theomson Brooks 2006
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You would love Christopher Hitchens
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gonna show this to my mom
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Lotta typos and grammatical errors. Also, the in-text citations are inconsistent with themselves and with the bibliography. Organizationally, I thought it flowed very well. I think the part on Freud could be condensed a bit because 5 paragraphs for his beliefs and a few sentences for Sartre, Socrates, etc. is a little unbalanced. Overall I think it's a pretty solid essay and will get you a good grade after you fix the technical errors. I agree with your thesis and conclusion. I think atheists are more passionate about their beliefs than most pious people. Nice work!
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Just a bit of proofreading for you:
"As is generally known, Freud's criticism of belief in God is that such a belief is untrustworthy because of ti's psychological origins."
it's is misspelled
"Freud has had a profound impact on how the interpretation of a 'God' figure can be interpreted"
Interpret interpretations.. I feel like this sentence could be re-worked.
"Science is seen in our post modern world as something that can fainally bring understanding to life" finally is mispeslled
"In Stenger's attempt to try and give a concrete reasoning for the idea that science can observe the supernatural and is not tied down to metaphysical naturalism is absurd."
I think you should remove the word "in" at the beginning of the sentence.
Anyway, I thought this paper was really interesting and thought provoking. I would disagree that atheists put belief in anything, really, besides maybe the assumption that we live in a rational universe, and that our minds are capable of rational thought. Everything else we claim to know follows from that. It's not really as much a belief as it is an assumption, ratified by the fact that we haven't found anything that has disproved the rationality of the universe.
In fact, from my point of view, the disbelief-in-god aspect of atheism should be taken with a grain of salt. Any good atheist won't say that there's a 100% chance that god does not exist. That would be just as unverified as the ridiculous claims of the religious. A better statement would be "from what we can tell, we think that there's a good chance that a benevolent god does not exist."
Finally, the burden of proof doesn't lie on us because we're not the ones making the claim. I'd change my atheistic "belief" in a minute if sufficient evidence was presented to me of god's existence. Until that evidence is given, why "believe" in anything other than what you experience?
My point is summed up by this statement: "Atheists simply believe in science, and the truth of how their mind interprets reality. Atheism in that sense can be seen as not only a belief but an entire belief system."
Is there any person on earth who doesn't trust how their mind interprets reality? Even people in insane asylums trust their minds, even when their minds are giving them false information. I don't see how this "belief" is at all applicable to atheists in particular.
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Can't believe I just read all that...
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I wholly disagree with the drawn conclusion. A scientific look at the world around us demands that we acknowledge that God either does not exist or is incredibly improbable. Calling science and the atheism that results from it a belief system is a very flawed conclusion.
We have probed the natural world to greater and greater depths. Previously, wherever science failed to explain a phenomenon, the Church would step in to say that man could never know such things, and substitute God for actual understanding. Even Newton attributed his magnificent theory of gravitation to the work of God.
But the deeper we probe, the less room there is for God. The God of the Gaps has gone away now. No longer to believers attempt to say that God can ever be measured in any way in the physical world.
While we may never be able to explore every nook, to scan every spectrum, to look everywhere for evidence, God is still a hypothesis. The more we look, the more it seems any evidence of its existence will be hidden very deeply indeed.
So then where do we find this God. If God has no impact on the physical world we interact with, if he can never be examined, seen, probed, or shown to exist in any way, then how are we to say he does exist? An existence independent of the universe we inhabit is indistinguishable from nonexistence!
So Atheists have not made any belief statement. They have examined the available evidence (of which there is ZERO for existence of a God), and come to the logical conclusion that there is more than likely no God.
Despite my disagreement with you, I want to say nice work. I don't usually get so riled up n the internet ^^
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"Belief with evidence is knowledge Belief without evidence is faith Belief despite contradictory evidence is invincible ignorance.
Many religion/cult members claim faith when in fact they are demonstrating invincible ignorance.
For example: Believing the world is less than 10,000 years old despite all the evidence demonstrating the world is much older is not faith but invincible ignorance."
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I should take my English courses more seriously, my professor doesnt even accept essays more than 3 pages long.
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I would disagree that atheists put belief in anything, really, besides maybe the assumption that we live in a rational universe, and that our minds are capable of rational thought
this
If you don't accept this statement, you have nothing, and you are done.
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On December 02 2009 10:54 GeneralStan wrote: I wholly disagree with the drawn conclusion. A scientific look at the world around us demands that we acknowledge that God either does not exist or is incredibly improbable. Calling science and the atheism that results from it a belief system is a very flawed conclusion.
Could you show me some of this evidence that demonstrates that the existence of a God (who for all we know could exist outside of space and time altogether) is at the very best incredibly improbable? How "probable" is chemical evolution? How "probable" is the big bang in resulting in a perfectly ordered universe? Even if the miller-urey experiment wasn't performed under ridiculously contrived conditions, how "probable" is a bunch of random amino acids turning themselves into working, metabolizing, replicating, organized groups of proteins? (replace with nucleotides/nucleic acids, if RNA world is your thing). I'm not going to say that the sheer improbability of these things demonstrates that there must be a God, but it should certainly be enough to make you step back and be humble enough to admit that there are a lot of things we don't understand just yet.
There are as many problems with an atheistic evolution as there are with any theory of creation. Creation theories simply don't fit the scientific method because of occam's razor and the need for falsifiable hypotheses and all that. Atheism is still very much a belief system, as you're choosing to believe in a large set of assumptions about how history created the present that are necessary to extrapolate our current observations into the past. It's a bit circular, but it's the best that the scientific method can do. I'm fine with that, but it doesn't exactly "prove" much past the last ten thousand years or so.
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Athiest can not Disprove god exist, that is true.
You cant disprove prove a all powerful unicorn with powers beyond human understanding vomited the universe because he was sick, that is also true
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I don't think I actually took a position, and I'm certainly not trying to prove anything. I'm not that arrogant.
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What kind of class is this for?
What was the prompt/assignment?
I'm not sure I understand your paper. Do you have MSN or aim so I can ask you about it further?
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On December 02 2009 11:25 PrincessLeila wrote: "Belief with evidence is knowledge Belief without evidence is faith Belief despite contradictory evidence is invincible ignorance.
Many religion/cult members claim faith when in fact they are demonstrating invincible ignorance.
For example: Believing the world is less than 10,000 years old despite all the evidence demonstrating the world is much older is not faith but invincible ignorance."
No one believes the world is less than 10 000 years old and i think you mean the universe which was created from a single point. When you take account that the universe is constantly expanding you will realize that the when you take into account the rate of expanision you realize it is equivalent to the real age of the universe.
Atheisim takes more belief and faith than it does for God, because as francis bacon once wrote "a little science enstranges a man from God, a lot of science brings him back". Computer simulations have calculated that even with infinite time life does not come to be.
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How "probable" is the big bang in resulting in a perfectly ordered universe?
What are you talking about? The universe is certainty not ordered and is not perfect at all. Perfect being pretty vague.
amino acids turning themselves into working, metabolizing, replicating, organized groups of proteins? (replace with nucleotides/nucleic acids, if RNA world is your thing).
okay how life started question... yes we don't know yet. But it is most likely going to be solved in time. But it sounds like you don't think evolutionary chemical reactions isn't likely when it is actual fact. i mean once a living thing in...our vague terms of living...its defiantly not hard to evolve.
No one really can say what reality is. Reality in a sense is a vague term not used in a context. If you want to say reality is what is true and what we know is real . then No one has any idea of what reality is. But ignoring countless observations and breaking any chain of the law of physics is creating an impossibility. Physical laws cannot be broken and the world of reality is beyond your or my understanding. I know im not going to change your mind on anything but know, that we all live in belief that is shaped through our experience, in what we hear said is fact, And what we want to be true, thinking we know or understand in our small unexperianced lives of ignorance. Everyone is like this because that is how we survive. But one must be critical of his own thinking,judgments, and statements without absolute proof with demonstration.(which is science,all experiments are repeatable).
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On December 02 2009 12:31 Weaponx3 wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2009 11:25 PrincessLeila wrote: "Belief with evidence is knowledge Belief without evidence is faith Belief despite contradictory evidence is invincible ignorance.
Many religion/cult members claim faith when in fact they are demonstrating invincible ignorance.
For example: Believing the world is less than 10,000 years old despite all the evidence demonstrating the world is much older is not faith but invincible ignorance." No one believes the world is less than 10 000 years old and i think you mean the universe which was created from a single point. When you take account that the universe is constantly expanding you will realize that the when you take into account the rate of expanision you realize it is equivalent to the real age of the universe. Atheisim takes more belief and faith than it does for God, because as francis bacon once wrote "a little science enstranges a man from God, a lot of science brings him back". Computer simulations have calculated that even with infinite time life does not come to be.
Hi.
As for the rest of your post, I don't even know whether I should rage or fall to the ground laughing.
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On December 02 2009 12:53 Daedes wrote:Show nested quote +How "probable" is the big bang in resulting in a perfectly ordered universe? What are you talking about? The universe is certainty not ordered and is not perfect at all. Perfect being pretty vague. Show nested quote +amino acids turning themselves into working, metabolizing, replicating, organized groups of proteins? (replace with nucleotides/nucleic acids, if RNA world is your thing). okay how life started question... yes we don't know yet. But it is most likely going to be solved in time. But it sounds like you don't think evolutionary chemical reactions isn't likely when it is actual fact. i mean once a living thing in...our vague terms of living...its defiantly not hard to evolve. No one really can say what reality is. Reality in a sense is a vague term not used in a context. If you want to say reality is what is true and what we know is real . then No one has any idea of what reality is. But ignoring countless observations and breaking any chain of the law of physics is creating an impossibility. Physical laws cannot be broken and the world of reality is beyond your or my understanding. I know im not going to change your mind on anything but know, that we all live in belief that is shaped through our experience, in what we hear said is fact, And what we want to be true, thinking we know or understand in our small unexperianced lives of ignorance. Everyone is like this because that is how we survive. But one must be critical of his own thinking,judgments, and statements without absolute proof with demonstration.(which is science,all experiments are repeatable).
By chemical evolution I'm talking about pre-"life" evolution. You can find this assumption in any biology or biochemistry textbook. You say it's fact, but I have yet to see an experiment where complex chemicals do anything but degrade into less complex substituents. Entropy, man! Perhaps you could link me to something in the literature describing how these "facts" were obtained?
By ordered universe I meant the physical laws that enable life as we know it to exist. Where did they come from? They sure are convenient! Why is gravity so weak? Sure is nice, though. The scientific method is only really good at disproving things, not proving them. As such it's still a leap of faith to say that since we can explain how a lot of this stuff works without requiring the existence of a God, there must not be one.
I have no problem at all with either atheism or creationism, as long as they don't try to claim that they have all the answers... because they don't. Is the scientific method still our best bet for discovering those answers? You bet. Don't think that because I'm skeptical of the assumptions that science makes that I think we should throw everything out and believe in whatever the hell we want to.
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On December 02 2009 10:23 Misrah wrote: Atheism; There is no way to prove god a unicorn does not exist, yet they believe it strongly.
To talk of immaterial existences is to talk of nothings. To say that the human soul, angels, God, are immaterial, is to say they are nothings, or that there is no God, no angels, no soul. I cannot reason otherwise: but I believe I am supported in my creed of materialism by Locke, Tracy, and Stewart. At what age of the Christian church this heresy of immaterialism, this masked atheism, crept in, I do not know. But a heresy it certainly is. Jesus told us indeed that 'God is a spirit,' but he has not defined what a spirit is, nor said that it is not matter. And the ancient fathers generally, if not universally, held it to be matter: light and thin indeed, an etherial gas; but still matter." letter to John Adams, August 15, 1820 ~Thomas Jefferson
a. INTRODUCTION: Atheism's distinct influence on western culture Atheism is a recent and a rather distinctive western phenomenon in accepted unbelief of the divine. [1]
The suddenness of the public shift, from devout believers to unbelievers is quite sudden. [2]
What is intriguing however is atheism's rarity in the historical record of other cultures. Only in western culture do we now find such a wide spread public rejection of the divine. Throughout these last fifty years, which is as long as the Gallup Poll (The Gallup Report 1935-1985) has shown that privately Americans regularly answer “Yes,” to the question “Do you believe in god?” However even with this resounding affirmative, the references to god in public discourse are few and far between. America has become a nation of public and practical theists. (Vitz, Faith of the Fatherless, x-xii)
Atheism; The Fight for your mind Atheism has only had a noticeable effect on western culture. [3]
No where else in the historical record of other nations, cultures, or countries has atheism had such a large impact on public perceptions of the divine. (Vitz, Faith of the Fatherless) Atheism is a relative newcomer on the theistic stage. Yet in the western world it's pull is undeniable. Atheism does not try and save the soul, instead it attempts to save the mind. [4]
Atheists themselves began the psychological approach to the question of belief. Indeed, many atheists are famous for arguing that believers suffer from illusions, from unconscious and infantile needs, and form other psychological deficits. [5]
A significant part of the atheist position has been an aggressive interpretation of religious belief as arising form psychological factors, not the nature of reality, Furthermore, this interpretation has been widely influential. In short, the theory that God is a projection of our own needs is a familiar modern position and is, for example, presented in countless university courses. (Vitz, Faith of the Fatherless, 13) [6]
The proponents of the idea that theistic belief is inevitably a mental illness was propagated by some of atheism's earliest proponents. Some notable atheists include: Friedrich Nietzsche, Sigmund Freud, Bertrand Russell, and Jean- Paul Sartre. Today Atheists do not only rely on psychology, but science.
Presentation of Research The intention of this paper is to identify atheisms validity as a religion, and to compare and contrast the attitudes that atheists share, dealing with believers and non-believers alike. It would be this students goal to try and show that atheism is indeed a belief system, and is in fact more like theistic religions of the past than a rejection of said religions. Before dissecting atheism's place in todays modern society, an abridged history of atheism will be given. This history of atheism is a vital part of understanding the modern day atheism, and it's current place in science, religion, and the American mind. The term “atheist” is coined from the Greek term atheistos, meaning something like “one who denies the traditional religion of the Athenian establishment.” Denying the existence of God's (as most modern day atheists do) was seen as a punishable offense in Greek society.
Socrates (469-399bc.) was enforced to commit suicide because of his ideas. One of his accusers Melitus said that the “atheist” philosopher had corrupted the children of the city, by telling them not to believe in the cities gods. However compared to the atheist of today, Socrates would find no place in the radical beliefs that all modern day atheists share.(Grath, The Twilight of Atheism,8) Even established theistic religions of today were once thought of being “atheistic.” The first Christan's were thought to be atheist, because they challenged the pagan beliefs of the later classical world. The term of atheism has been throughout time branded to many people, ideas, and even theistic belief systems. [7]
II. Atheism in the Modern Age: The western world has always had a deeply seeded belief in god. Partly because of the large role the church has played in it's history. The church was a stabilizing force for the people. However this was about to change. Around the sixteenth century the protestant reformation took place. However this change was not truly a deformation of the church per se. Both Protestants and Christan's still believed in a God. After years and years of the wealthy, and corrupt church ruling the land the protestant reformation helped to bring about a resurgence of atheistic ideals. (Grath, The Twilight of Atheism,10) [8]
While it can be said that at one time the church played an important role in stabilizing the general populace during the dark ages, after the reformation peoples thoughts about the church began to change. Many felt that the church had grown too powerful, and needed to be restricted. The church was now holding back the intellectual, artistic, and political endeavors. Some men took it upon themselves to try and help the church reform, and turn it from a corrupt and lavish organization to something that resembled the early church. Some notable men include Martin Luther (1483-1546), Huldrych Zwingli (1484-1531), and John Calvin (1509-1564) (Grath, The Twilight of Atheism,11)
With the Protestant reformation, the ideas of the church were being brought into question. Atheism was at first seen, not as a truly applicable belief system, but a tool to use against the church. The historical origins of modern atheism lie primarily in an extended criticism of the power and status of the church, rather than in any asserted attractions of a godless world. (Gratz, The Twilight of Atheism,11) Suddenly the atheistic ideals first imagined by classical philosophers [9]
was finding a resurgence in the modern era. The known unbelievers (Atheists) of Europe and America before the French revolution in 1789 numbered fewer than a dozen or two. (Vitz, Faith of the Fatherless,10) Atheism however was slowly growing in some minds. Soon in 1870 Atheism became a respectable belief in academic and intellectual circles.(Vitz, Faith of the Fatherless,11) [10]
Prominent Atheists in the Modern Era During the late 19th and early 20th century atheism had found itself embedded in some of the most brilliant minds of the time. Notable atheists: Friedrich Nietzsche, Sigmund Freud, Bertrand Russell, and Jean- Paul Sartre. (Vitz, Faith of the Fatherless,3) This paper will specifically explore Sigmund Freud's influence on Atheism, and why this titan of psychology [11]
proposed that god was nothing more than an oedipal desire of man.
As is generally known, Freud's criticism of belief in God is that such a belief is untrustworthy because of ti's psychological origins. That is, God is a projection of our own intense, unconscious desires.(Vitz, The faith of the Fatherless,6)
Freud's influence in the field of psychology is uncontested. Referred to as the 'father of psychology' Freud gave rise to the science of psychoanalysis. [12]
It is not a far stretch of the imagination to understand why Freud would believe that belief in god is simply a figment of imagination. In his book “Future of an Illusion” Freud attempts to explain his position on god. He writes: “Religious ideas have arisen from the same need as have all the other achievements of civilization: from the necessity of defending oneself against the crushing superior force of nature.” What Freud is trying to say is that any religious belief can be quantified urges that man kind has always possessed. He continues: “As we already know, the terrifying impression of helplessness in childhood aroused the need for protection- for protection through love- which was provided by the father...Thus the benevolent rule of a divine Providence allays our fear of the dangers of life.” (Freud, The Future of an Illusion, ed. And trans. J. Stachey(New York: Norton, 1961) [13]
Freud's reasoning for the illusion of God may well refute the existence of a divine being. However if we take a closer look at what is mentioned in “Future of an Illusion” it is quite easy to notice that this explanation could be applied to most anything. If every thing created by people was simply nothing but a construct created for the unconscious desires that as human beings we all share, then surely Freud has them his self. If that is the case, then even psychoanalysis is subject to the same scrutiny. If this is true, and in Freud's own words it is undoubtedly so- then Freud himself is arguing the disbelief of god through yet another “projection” of his deepest desires. [14]
However Freud is not wrong to consider that a belief might be an illusion because it is first formed in the unconscious. Instead Freud inadvertently provides a powerful new way to understand an illusion as the psychological basis for rejecting God- that is, a projection theory of atheism.(Vitz, Faith of the Fatherless,9) The Oedipus complex is a male personality developmental stage, pioneered by Freud. A short explanation is as follows: Around the age of 3 a young boy will develop strong desires (sexual in nature) towards his mother. At the same time, the young child will begin to develop a strong hatred and fear for the father. The child would like nothing more, than to 'dethrone' the king, and take his place. The hatred arises from the boys innate knowledge that the father is stronger, and much bigger. This figure stands in the way of the boys desires. The child fears the father because of castration by the father. The son of course does not really kill the father, but instead learns to life with him. Freud goes on later to explain that the neurotic potential of the situation: “the Oedipus complex is the actual nucleus of neuroses.” Freud is just saying that many of mankind's neuroses come from this initial Oedipus complex. (Vitz, Faith of the fatherless,11)
Because Freud has stated that is the epicenter of all of our neuroses, he had developed a sound reason as to why people would try and reject god. The Oedipus complex is completely unconscious, and is formed in the early years of life. It is dominated by the hatred of the father (in this case god) and the unconscious desire for god to not exist. This is represented by the child's wish to kill the father.
Therefore, in the Freudian framework, atheism is an illusion caused by the Oedipal desire to kill the father (God) and replace him with oneself. To act as thought god does not exist reveals a wish to kill him, much in the same way as in a dream the image of a parent going away or disappearing can represent such a wish. The belief that “God is dead,” therefore, is simply an Oedipal wish-fulfillment- the sign of seriously unresolved unconscious motivation. (Vitz, Faith of the Fatherless, 13) Freud has had a profound impact on how the interpretation of a 'God' figure can be interpreted. This complete and utter rejection of the father figure can be seen in todays more radicalized form of atheism. [15]
III. Atheism in Present Day America
It would seem that atheism has come a long way from it's beginnings. In the western world, it grew from a handful of individuals in the 18th century, and today more than 16% of the world population considers themselves to be atheistic, or agnostic in their belief systems. (http://www.adherents.com) In 2000 alone only 20% of Americans had 'belief' in god. (Grath The Twilight of Atheism, 156) However the question comes to mind, 'why is there a sudden and veritable explosion of atheistic belief?' The answer to that question comes in the form of science. “Science is a way of knowing about the natural world.” (God the Failed Hypothesis, 28)
With the advent of post modern science atheists have come a long way in the accusations they have made to further discredit the theistic faith. Science is seen in our post modern world as something that can fainally bring understanding to life. Most people would agree that science bring empirically tested fact about the reality and nature of this world. It has usurped the churches control over the minds of it's converts, and consequently has become atheisms current tool to undermine the teaching of the church.
One of the most prominent, learned and outspoken atheists to date is Victor J. Stenger. He currently resides as an emeritus professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Hawaii and adjunct professor of philosophy at the University of Colorado, He is author of the “Comprehensible Cosmos,” “Timeless Reality,” “The Unconscious Quantum,” “Physics and Psychics,” “Not by Design,” and “Has Science Found God?” In his latest work, Stenger argues that with todays modern scientific techniques and current understanding of the material world, that mankind can finally deny the existence of god, and do so with empirical and scientific fact. [16]
It would seem that with empirical and scientific fact, that atheism could not be seen as a religion. However unbeknown to most atheists they are still placing their faith, and beliefs in an altogether different entity. In “God the Failed Hypothesis,” Stenger's thesis is the following: “The thesis of this book is that the supernatural hypothesis of God is testable, verifiable, and falsifiable by the established methods of science. We can imagine all sorts of phenomena that, if observed by means of methodological naturalism, would suggest the possibility of some reality that is highly unlikely to be consistent with metaphysical naturalism.” [17]
Metaphysical naturalism is referencing the inherent and according to Stenger 'supposed' dogmatism that science is naturally materialistic. He further argues that science's influence can go above and beyond these metaphysical constraints. “Any type of dogmatism is the very antithesis of science. The history of science from Copernicus and Galileo to the present, is replete with examples that belie the charge of dogmatism in science.” In Stenger's attempt to try and give a concrete reasoning for the idea that science can observe the supernatural and is not tied down to metaphysical naturalism is absurd. what?
Science has one major flaw that is inherent in all things. The simple fact is- that the human experience is created by an imperfect means. That is to say that the human body can only receive stimulus from one of the five senses. (Sight, Sound, Touch, Taste, Smell) No matter how hard one may try, it is physically impossible for a human to somehow measure or record a phenomena that is not in some way material. [18]
While it is possible to build machines to help us see farther, we still must interpret the data our machines are giving us. In Strenger's thesis he is making the claim that any supernatural god can be testable, verifiable, and falsifiable. It is with this statement that Strenger is assuming that a supernatural god is either materialistic, and or effect's the material world in a testable way. If Strenger were to not state these proofs in his thesis, then his entire study is simply pointless. How does one study something that is immaterial? It just simply cannot be done. In stead Strenger assumes, or more accurately believes this to be true.
Could it be said that one must be a believer to be atheist? While atheism is indeed seen as being anti-theistic, could one not say that atheistic belief is the belief in science? [19]
Or more appropriately, the belief in the five human senses? It is not this writers desire to try and drag this into a philosophical debate; yet at the same time, it should be noted that the imperfection of the human senses interpreting our material world is befuddled at best. A short example would be to imagine our sense of sight. The electro magnetic spectrum radiation can be thought of as a wave. A wavelength in the electromagnetic spectrum range from less than 10(-14)m to 10(4) m. The visible spectrum includes wavelengths ranging only from 400 to 700 nanometers.(Sherwood, Fundamentals of Physiology, 139) Our minds understanding of 'light' is so limited, and multiplying this inherent err to all of our senses, one can easily conclude that the simple act of perceiving anything is a belief in itself. Do you really see what is there? Or is the neural pathways going too and from your brain changing the reality of the object? [20]
This is the problem that all people, and science in particular must try and work around. Constrained to a life of limited extrasensory input and understanding. Could man ever truly create a final thesis on the existence or the non existence of god? It seems that Atheists and atheism has deemed that even in the light of their human imperfection that claiming and justifying this statement is very possible. It can be said than that to believe in a theistic belief system is akin to modern atheism. Atheists simply believe in science, and the truth of how their mind interprets reality. Atheism in that sense can be seen as not only a belief but an entire belief system. [21]
Bibliography Stenger, Victor. God the Failed Hypothesis: how science shows that God does not exist. New York: Prometheus 2007
McGrath, Alister. The Twilight of Atheism: the rise and fall of disbelief in the modern world. New York: Doubleday 2004
Vitz, Paul. Faith of the Fatherless: the Psychology of Atheism. Dallas: Spence Publishing 1999
Dawkins, Richard. The God Delusion. Boston, New York: Houghton Mifflin Company 2006
Sherwood, Lauralee. Fundamentals of Physiology: a human perspective. New York: Theomson Brooks 2006
[1] What about in cultures like modern China where atheism is likely to be even more widespread?
[2] Sudden troll is sudden.
[3] See 1.
[4] You could probably state it better than this. I realize this statement is made for flair, but it is very misleading.
[5] One does not need to challenge a particular set of religious beliefs (or any set of beliefs) in order to be an atheist, but this may be just me misunderstanding the definition you are working with.
[6] University courses in which degrees? And in what context are these ideas presented? Just making this statement tells almost nothing. I mean, if the idea is presented in an English course, it shouldn't be examined in the same way as if it was presented in a Psychology course, and a psychology course would have some kind of experimental data from which they got this idea in the first place - it would do good to talk about this at length.
[7] You might be going a little too far with the semantics here. You can do the same thing with the word 'heretic', for example. It just doesn't mean the same thing today that it did in the past. So while the analogy is intriguing, it does not provide any good demonstration for your thesis.
[8] Which ideals would these be?
[9] Same question as 8.
[10] If the whole point of your paper is demonstrate to me that atheism is a belief system, then it's improper to refer to it as such before the conclusion.
[11] Most psychologists today laugh at the mention of this guy. His ideas were basically what today would be called 'batshit insane', but his methods are what are important and what were kept.
[12] It's the psychoanalysis part that basically no one acknowledges. It's his fundamental assessment of the human mind and its basic components (id,ego,super-ego) that he is acknowledged for. Psychoanalysis is most certainly not a science, and it's not even accepted in practice by modern psychologists.
[13] This stuff is talking about the id,ego, super-ego nature of the mind. I would take out references to psychoanalysis and so on, and just stick with the "humans are motivated by ..." stuff.
[14] This argument is slightly flawed. Freud's ideas on human motivation are so powerful because you can step back and view them from an objective standpoint. You can remove yourself from their influence temporarily by sticking to rational thought. It's actually the very acknowledgment that humans are driven by certain motivations that allows one to do this. When examining these motivations rationally, you are not still 'stuck' with them affecting your examination.
[15] This is a very good analogy to the Oedipus complex analysis that Freud developed. Unfortunately, you'd be hard-pressed for anyone in modern psychology to acknowledge the accuracy or usefulness of this particular idea.
[16] This person obviously has an agenda and certainly can be seen as 'using science' as his tool to pry people away from their various religious beliefs. But as a physicist myself, I acknowledge that science and religion are not mutually exclusive. Science looks for "what?" whereas religions tend to look for "why?". The big bang theory, for example, does not explain the reason the universe came to be, it just explains a possible method of how such a thing happened in terms of mathematics and physical understanding.
[17] One of the most famous problems in philosophy is the fundamental unverifiability of a god-like being. Because something is unverifiable doesn't mean that it doesn't exist. I can't, for example, prove beyond any doubt that I love my wife. How would you do such a thing? Would you measure my heart rate when I say that? That's not conclusive evidence. Do an MRI while questioning me? That's not conclusive evidence either. Maybe I'm distracted and thinking about Matlab functions or something. However, none of that means that I don't love my wife. It's just that some problems cannot be posed such that they can be solved by a scientific analysis.
[18] This is exactly the argument you should use.
[19] This semantic argument fails because science (actual science, and not the interpretation thereof) is explicitly averse to belief in anything.
[20] The thing about science is that it does not acknowledge the observer. We understand electromagnetic radiation goes beyond the scope of our eyes and other senses. In understanding this, we have risen above our limitations and are able to speak about things that we are only able to detect with man-made equipment. This is similar to what I was saying about Freud's analysis of motivation being independent of the motivation which he is analyzing.
[21] I've belabored this point, but science is no help to atheists or theists alike. It is the only purely objective viewpoint from which you can examine anything, but that power comes at the cost of being able to analyze things in a mechanical way that neither requires nor suggests any sort of belief system.
====== Hopefully I've been helpful. In some places, I was just poking fun and being humorous, but I mostly tried to be critical in the manner of someone grading a paper. Good luck on whatever this essay is for.
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Misrah, I think you took great liberties with the definition of "religion" if your paper was intended to prove that atheism is a religion.
From dictionary.com: Religion: a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, esp. when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs.
The key phrases should be "superhuman." Religion implies supernatural being/beings/agency, and necessitates faith. Atheism does not fulfill these requirements, therefore is not a religion. Moreover, atheism does not have a belief system. Simply saying that one believes something does not exist doesn't constitute a religion, or else my disbelief in flying carpets would qualify.
"Atheisim takes more belief and faith than it does for God, because as francis bacon once wrote "a little science enstranges a man from God, a lot of science brings him back". Computer simulations have calculated that even with infinite time life does not come to be."
You're painfully wrong. Atheism takes no faith, and indeed discourages it. Do I need to have faith that flying carpets do not exist? No, because I've seen no indication that they do. Moreover, you'd better cite your source about those "computer simulations", because the science that I study has shown otherwise, through the numerous theories of abiogenesis, which you can wiki as easily as I can link it.
"Could you show me some of this evidence that demonstrates that the existence of a God (who for all we know could exist outside of space and time altogether) is at the very best incredibly improbable?"
No, nor can I show you evidence that the existence of a unicorn is incredibly improbable. The burden of proof is not on the person doubting existence, but the person affirming it. In science, one never proves something is impossible, such is useless and a waste of time. You have to prove something is POSSIBLE.
"How "probable" is chemical evolution? How "probable" is the big bang in resulting in a perfectly ordered universe? Even if the miller-urey experiment wasn't performed under ridiculously contrived conditions, how "probable" is a bunch of random amino acids turning themselves into working, metabolizing, replicating, organized groups of proteins? (replace with nucleotides/nucleic acids, if RNA world is your thing). I'm not going to say that the sheer improbability of these things demonstrates that there must be a God, but it should certainly be enough to make you step back and be humble enough to admit that there are a lot of things we don't understand just yet."
How probable is chemical evolution? Apparently extremely probable, because here you sit(anthropic principle). The amino acids the Miller-Urey experiment worked with shows that organic molecules ARE generated from inorganic particles. So apparently it's quite probable. You seem to be advocating open-mindedness, while here you sit espousing the acceptance of a theory that you have no evidence for. If your main premise is "every scientific theory of the origin of the world seems improbable in my mind, ergo God did it," then you have a very weak case indeed, and it is you who should be rather more open minded and demand more evidence.
"There are as many problems with an atheistic evolution as there are with any theory of creation. Creation theories simply don't fit the scientific method because of occam's razor and the need for falsifiable hypotheses and all that. Atheism is still very much a belief system, as you're choosing to believe in a large set of assumptions about how history created the present that are necessary to extrapolate our current observations into the past. It's a bit circular, but it's the best that the scientific method can do. I'm fine with that, but it doesn't exactly "prove" much past the last ten thousand years or so."
No, I would disagree with your first statement. As many problems? Such as what? Any theory of creation suffers from a complete and utter lack of evidence and relies upon the faith of its believers. Moreover, evolution is not inherently atheistic(see: the majority of Christians worldwide, the majority of evolution supporters, the entire Catholic Church.) Atheism is not a belief system, unless you qualify a belief system as a need for evidence, which is rather silly, bordering on the downright foolish. Moreover, these theories that you rather pejoratively cast off as "assumptions" are hardly that, as an assumption implies a lack of evidence. The Big Bang Theory has plenty of evidence, as a simple wikipedia search could explain.
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I really didn't want this to become flame bait but- i have a few questions to the people that have posted here.
First goes to zulu nation- why are you going to show this to your mom? im just curious lol
The second is to try and stop the flame war that is some how going to start raging. This non-proof read paper is not discussing the validity of atheist or theist religions. Instead it's only purpose is to try and conclude if atheism is a religion in and of it's self, instead of a religion.
Finally my closing thoughts on the entire God debate are the following: With modern day science and conventional wisdom, logic, and understanding of this reality the following is the only conclusion.
Believers in the judo/christian belief is not possible. Currently the only way that a God can exist as at the fringes of metaphysical reality as we have come to know it. The idea of God is now an individualized conceptual entity that may or may not have any real impact on this material world. Basically what i am trying to say is, if God can have effect in a material world he must be material. If that was the case, then god could be falsified.
Because most believers concede that god is not material, they will also concede that god cannot effect the material world, thus relocating him to (as i said before) the fringe of metaphysical existence.
It is impossible to prove that god does not exist, nor is it possible to prove he exists. To state with any certainty that he does or does not is sheer ignorance.
Draconizard, your link is pathetic, and full of error. To anyone looking at that site, i would urge you to disregard it.
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On December 02 2009 13:17 Misrah wrote: ...
Draconizard, your link is pathetic, and full of error. To anyone looking at that site, i would urge you to disregard it.
I believe Draconizard was only posting that link to demonstrate that there are still plenty of people who believe in a sub 10,000 year earth, not necessarily to agree with the viewpoints of some of those that do.
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Defmatix ultra: wow that really is a cretique of my work lol. I think that i may have stated my take on atheism a bit incorrectly, but frankly the use of the word atheist is used incorrectly today. I have somewhere in my paper defining atheism, and the root of the word, and word meaning. Maybe that will help? Thanks for the post- your thoughts are really interesting.
Track: I don't even want to start with you. You do not understand half of the experiments you site, Miller- Urey in particular. To say that atheism does not require a belief is foolish, and obtuse. As stated before in my paper, i don't want to dive into a philosophical debate- however you must concede this: you BELIEVE what your senses tell you, because you have no other way to prove anything shown exists. hence the idea oh solipsism ext ext ext.
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On December 02 2009 13:23 Biochemist wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2009 13:17 Misrah wrote: ...
Draconizard, your link is pathetic, and full of error. To anyone looking at that site, i would urge you to disregard it. I believe Draconizard was only posting that link to demonstrate that there are still plenty of people who believe in a sub 10,000 year earth, not necessarily to agree with the viewpoints of some of those that do.
ohh oops my bad then! I totally failed at english in that post lol. my bad!
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Your concluding statement about atheism is a belief system is incorrect, it's not "believing in science". It is rather an absence of belief.
Science does not just make random assumption and rely on faith. Any hypothesis made are then taken to experimentation and observation. If the hypothesis is unsupported or contradicted by the experimentation or previous knowledge then the hypothesis is then modify and they test their new prediction. Science is found up by evidence.
Anything that we do not know yet is simply "We don't know yet". It doesn't just mean "God did it". Having an answer doesn't mean anything if there's no reliable evidence. Science doesn't try to know everything but it does have a reliable way to look for answers.
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On December 02 2009 13:07 Biochemist wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2009 12:53 Daedes wrote:How "probable" is the big bang in resulting in a perfectly ordered universe? What are you talking about? The universe is certainty not ordered and is not perfect at all. Perfect being pretty vague. amino acids turning themselves into working, metabolizing, replicating, organized groups of proteins? (replace with nucleotides/nucleic acids, if RNA world is your thing). okay how life started question... yes we don't know yet. But it is most likely going to be solved in time. But it sounds like you don't think evolutionary chemical reactions isn't likely when it is actual fact. i mean once a living thing in...our vague terms of living...its defiantly not hard to evolve. No one really can say what reality is. Reality in a sense is a vague term not used in a context. If you want to say reality is what is true and what we know is real . then No one has any idea of what reality is. But ignoring countless observations and breaking any chain of the law of physics is creating an impossibility. Physical laws cannot be broken and the world of reality is beyond your or my understanding. I know im not going to change your mind on anything but know, that we all live in belief that is shaped through our experience, in what we hear said is fact, And what we want to be true, thinking we know or understand in our small unexperianced lives of ignorance. Everyone is like this because that is how we survive. But one must be critical of his own thinking,judgments, and statements without absolute proof with demonstration.(which is science,all experiments are repeatable). By chemical evolution I'm talking about pre-"life" evolution. You can find this assumption in any biology or biochemistry textbook. You say it's fact, but I have yet to see an experiment where complex chemicals do anything but degrade into less complex substituents. Entropy, man! Perhaps you could link me to something in the literature describing how these "facts" were obtained?
Fair enough Pre-life evolution is a very complex topic which i wont get into as i dont have a full understanding myself and what i do know is to vague to prove true. But theorys for pre-life evolution is still in debate but we slowly get more and more clues as we discover more about genetics, a field that is still much unknown. we say we have a assumption because some form of it has to of happen for life to exists.Also chemicals will stop reacting, when not enough energy and resources are there which really isnt a issue since the primordial soup and sun supplys enough of those things to "support" a self replicating chemical reaction.
Yes you can turn complex chemicals into more complex chemicals...we do it all the time
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On December 02 2009 13:26 Lanyth wrote: Your concluding statement about atheism is a belief system is incorrect, it's not "believing in science". It is rather an absence of belief.
Science does not just make random assumption and rely on faith. Any hypothesis made are then taken to experimentation and observation. If the hypothesis is unsupported or contradicted by the experimentation or previous knowledge then the hypothesis is then modify and they test their new prediction. Science is found up by evidence.
Anything that we do not know yet is simply "We don't know yet". It doesn't just mean "God did it". Having an answer doesn't mean anything if there's no reliable evidence. Science doesn't try to know everything but it does have a reliable way to look for answers.
You BELIEVE what your senses tell you, because you have no other way to prove anything shown exists. hence the idea oh solipsism ext ext ext.
If you can tell me how one can 'prove' that i am really typing on a computer, and that the colors that i see are really those colors, and that glass of coffee on my table is really there- i am waiting.
Until then, you believe everything your senses tell you. If i were to cut your 12 cranial nerves from your brain, would you know an external reality existed? would you exist? could you exist?
To take your observations as fact is a believe in your senses. This is an absolute. There is no way to refute this, thus my conclusion is sound.
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On December 02 2009 13:15 Track quoted: A lot of things I didn't say.
You sure put a lot of words in my mouth there, Track! I think you read my posts, but I'm not sure that you actually understood what I was trying to say.
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Misrah:
Do you have msn or aim?
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On December 02 2009 13:15 Track wrote: Misrah, I think you took great liberties with the definition of "religion" if your paper was intended to prove that atheism is a religion.
From dictionary.com: Religion: a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, esp. when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs.
The key phrases should be "superhuman." Religion implies supernatural being/beings/agency, and necessitates faith. Atheism does not fulfill these requirements, therefore is not a religion. Moreover, atheism does not have a belief system. Simply saying that one believes something does not exist doesn't constitute a religion, or else my disbelief in flying carpets would qualify.
"Atheisim takes more belief and faith than it does for God, because as francis bacon once wrote "a little science enstranges a man from God, a lot of science brings him back". Computer simulations have calculated that even with infinite time life does not come to be."
You're painfully wrong. Atheism takes no faith, and indeed discourages it. Do I need to have faith that flying carpets do not exist? No, because I've seen no indication that they do. Moreover, you'd better cite your source about those "computer simulations", because the science that I study has shown otherwise, through the numerous theories of abiogenesis, which you can wiki as easily as I can link it.
"Could you show me some of this evidence that demonstrates that the existence of a God (who for all we know could exist outside of space and time altogether) is at the very best incredibly improbable?"
No, nor can I show you evidence that the existence of a unicorn is incredibly improbable. The burden of proof is not on the person doubting existence, but the person affirming it. In science, one never proves something is impossible, such is useless and a waste of time. You have to prove something is POSSIBLE.
"How "probable" is chemical evolution? How "probable" is the big bang in resulting in a perfectly ordered universe? Even if the miller-urey experiment wasn't performed under ridiculously contrived conditions, how "probable" is a bunch of random amino acids turning themselves into working, metabolizing, replicating, organized groups of proteins? (replace with nucleotides/nucleic acids, if RNA world is your thing). I'm not going to say that the sheer improbability of these things demonstrates that there must be a God, but it should certainly be enough to make you step back and be humble enough to admit that there are a lot of things we don't understand just yet."
How probable is chemical evolution? Apparently extremely probable, because here you sit(anthropic principle). The amino acids the Miller-Urey experiment worked with shows that organic molecules ARE generated from inorganic particles. So apparently it's quite probable. You seem to be advocating open-mindedness, while here you sit espousing the acceptance of a theory that you have no evidence for. If your main premise is "every scientific theory of the origin of the world seems improbable in my mind, ergo God did it," then you have a very weak case indeed, and it is you who should be rather more open minded and demand more evidence.
"There are as many problems with an atheistic evolution as there are with any theory of creation. Creation theories simply don't fit the scientific method because of occam's razor and the need for falsifiable hypotheses and all that. Atheism is still very much a belief system, as you're choosing to believe in a large set of assumptions about how history created the present that are necessary to extrapolate our current observations into the past. It's a bit circular, but it's the best that the scientific method can do. I'm fine with that, but it doesn't exactly "prove" much past the last ten thousand years or so."
No, I would disagree with your first statement. As many problems? Such as what? Any theory of creation suffers from a complete and utter lack of evidence and relies upon the faith of its believers. Moreover, evolution is not inherently atheistic(see: the majority of Christians worldwide, the majority of evolution supporters, the entire Catholic Church.) Atheism is not a belief system, unless you qualify a belief system as a need for evidence, which is rather silly, bordering on the downright foolish. Moreover, these theories that you rather pejoratively cast off as "assumptions" are hardly that, as an assumption implies a lack of evidence. The Big Bang Theory has plenty of evidence, as a simple wikipedia search could explain.
First im an atheist and a student in biology working for Masters in genetics. Want to get that out.
Okay i don't think your grasping what misrah or w/e is saying you are showing some ignorance in your assumption that what science tells you is true. and that there cannot be anything immaterial that cannot be observed. In which atheist takes a faith in beiliving is true. even tho you cannot prove it false.
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On December 02 2009 13:47 AwarE-- wrote: Misrah:
Do you have msn or aim?
ya my aim is velveteencj
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By ordered universe I meant the physical laws that enable life as we know it to exist. Where did they come from? They sure are convenient! Why is gravity so weak? Sure is nice, though. The scientific method is only really good at disproving things, not proving them. As such it's still a leap of faith to say that since we can explain how a lot of this stuff works without requiring the existence of a God, there must not be one.
I want you to think long and hard on on what you just said there because im not going to bother answering that
I have no problem at all with either atheism or creationism, as long as they don't try to claim that they have all the answers... because they don't. Is the scientific method still our best bet for discovering those answers? You bet. Don't think that because I'm skeptical of the assumptions that science makes that I think we should throw everything out and believe in whatever the hell we want to.
I know where your coming from. in the scientific community their is some ignorance of knew ideas that cant be proven or vague or really abstract...but the truth come out eventaully. Also its wise to be sceptical to assumptions so i dont have anything against it, i just sharing my knowlege which i seen know as true, which you can only take for as a word unless you want to spend years studying this
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hm, i messaged you, why'd you sign off?
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On December 02 2009 13:33 Misrah wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2009 13:26 Lanyth wrote: Your concluding statement about atheism is a belief system is incorrect, it's not "believing in science". It is rather an absence of belief.
Science does not just make random assumption and rely on faith. Any hypothesis made are then taken to experimentation and observation. If the hypothesis is unsupported or contradicted by the experimentation or previous knowledge then the hypothesis is then modify and they test their new prediction. Science is found up by evidence.
Anything that we do not know yet is simply "We don't know yet". It doesn't just mean "God did it". Having an answer doesn't mean anything if there's no reliable evidence. Science doesn't try to know everything but it does have a reliable way to look for answers. You BELIEVE what your senses tell you, because you have no other way to prove anything shown exists. hence the idea oh solipsism ext ext ext. If you can tell me how one can 'prove' that i am really typing on a computer, and that the colors that i see are really those colors, and that glass of coffee on my table is really there- i am waiting. Until then, you believe everything your senses tell you. If i were to cut your 12 cranial nerves from your brain, would you know an external reality existed? would you exist? could you exist? To take your observations as fact is a believe in your senses. This is an absolute. There is no way to refute this, thus my conclusion is sound. Your conclusion is sound, but it's not really... useful. So we take your conclusion, then we can pretty much apply that to everything and anything. Anything you posit in your paper is just a belief as you put it. You can say those things if you like, it just doesn't make for very interesting arguments.
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On December 02 2009 14:00 AwarE-- wrote: hm, i messaged you, why'd you sign off?
lol? im online right now! my aim is : VelveteenCj no spaces i just checked, and yes i am online
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Your conclusion is sound, but it's not really... useful. So we take your conclusion, then we can pretty much apply that to everything and anything. Anything you posit in your paper is just a belief as you put it. You can say those things if you like, it just doesn't make for very interesting arguments.
This is pretty much what I came to.
It has already been accepted that belief is the conclusion that something is true. Conclusions without proof are faith. Since the scientific method stipulates nothing can ever been proven, then everything is based on some level of faith.
Pointing this out in a lengthy essay seems somewhat.... misguided. It almost seems that the paper is using the arguing from ignorance fallacy to conclude that atheism is as equally probable or "solid" as theism... which is drawing an unfounded conclusion.
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On December 02 2009 13:33 Misrah wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2009 13:26 Lanyth wrote: Your concluding statement about atheism is a belief system is incorrect, it's not "believing in science". It is rather an absence of belief.
Science does not just make random assumption and rely on faith. Any hypothesis made are then taken to experimentation and observation. If the hypothesis is unsupported or contradicted by the experimentation or previous knowledge then the hypothesis is then modify and they test their new prediction. Science is found up by evidence.
Anything that we do not know yet is simply "We don't know yet". It doesn't just mean "God did it". Having an answer doesn't mean anything if there's no reliable evidence. Science doesn't try to know everything but it does have a reliable way to look for answers. You BELIEVE what your senses tell you, because you have no other way to prove anything shown exists. hence the idea oh solipsism ext ext ext. If you can tell me how one can 'prove' that i am really typing on a computer, and that the colors that i see are really those colors, and that glass of coffee on my table is really there- i am waiting. Until then, you believe everything your senses tell you. If i were to cut your 12 cranial nerves from your brain, would you know an external reality existed? would you exist? could you exist? To take your observations as fact is a believe in your senses. This is an absolute. There is no way to refute this, thus my conclusion is sound. Yes, but atheism has nothing to do with believing your senses/observations, and everything to do with not believing in a supernatural being with no evidence. If you REALLY want to stretch it you can say that you're taking some monstrous leap of faith by not assuming that your senses are bullshitting you and god talks to you every day, sure.
And ya, you could probably live/sense without the cranial nerves. Take anatomy lol
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On December 02 2009 13:33 Misrah wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2009 13:26 Lanyth wrote: Your concluding statement about atheism is a belief system is incorrect, it's not "believing in science". It is rather an absence of belief.
Science does not just make random assumption and rely on faith. Any hypothesis made are then taken to experimentation and observation. If the hypothesis is unsupported or contradicted by the experimentation or previous knowledge then the hypothesis is then modify and they test their new prediction. Science is found up by evidence.
Anything that we do not know yet is simply "We don't know yet". It doesn't just mean "God did it". Having an answer doesn't mean anything if there's no reliable evidence. Science doesn't try to know everything but it does have a reliable way to look for answers. You BELIEVE what your senses tell you, because you have no other way to prove anything shown exists. hence the idea oh solipsism ext ext ext. If you can tell me how one can 'prove' that i am really typing on a computer, and that the colors that i see are really those colors, and that glass of coffee on my table is really there- i am waiting. Until then, you believe everything your senses tell you. If i were to cut your 12 cranial nerves from your brain, would you know an external reality existed? would you exist? could you exist? To take your observations as fact is a believe in your senses. This is an absolute. There is no way to refute this, thus my conclusion is sound.
I'm sorry I don't understand your point clearly anymore. Please correct me if I'm wrong. What you're saying is even if our sense such as sight perceive something such as the colour blue it may be wrong and be actually another colour so we have to believe that your sense are correct? Once again please correct me if I'm wrong.
There are actually ways of collect empirical evidence for you sitting on your computer typing that, or your cup of coffee. Of course I cannot prove these claims because I am inaccessible to where you are and even if I did make random assumptions there are no reasons to accept my claims because I have no evidence. I could show physical evidence of your cup or observing you typing that message but because I don't have access to it I can't.
I think an issue with your argument is that like GogoKodo said is that it's so flexible that it can be applied to anything. Even if I can prove to you something with as much physical evidence as I can you can go "But you don't know 100% because what you see could be wrong and you have to believe that your senses are correct"
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On December 02 2009 13:32 Daedes wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2009 13:07 Biochemist wrote:On December 02 2009 12:53 Daedes wrote:How "probable" is the big bang in resulting in a perfectly ordered universe? What are you talking about? The universe is certainty not ordered and is not perfect at all. Perfect being pretty vague. amino acids turning themselves into working, metabolizing, replicating, organized groups of proteins? (replace with nucleotides/nucleic acids, if RNA world is your thing). okay how life started question... yes we don't know yet. But it is most likely going to be solved in time. But it sounds like you don't think evolutionary chemical reactions isn't likely when it is actual fact. i mean once a living thing in...our vague terms of living...its defiantly not hard to evolve. No one really can say what reality is. Reality in a sense is a vague term not used in a context. If you want to say reality is what is true and what we know is real . then No one has any idea of what reality is. But ignoring countless observations and breaking any chain of the law of physics is creating an impossibility. Physical laws cannot be broken and the world of reality is beyond your or my understanding. I know im not going to change your mind on anything but know, that we all live in belief that is shaped through our experience, in what we hear said is fact, And what we want to be true, thinking we know or understand in our small unexperianced lives of ignorance. Everyone is like this because that is how we survive. But one must be critical of his own thinking,judgments, and statements without absolute proof with demonstration.(which is science,all experiments are repeatable). By chemical evolution I'm talking about pre-"life" evolution. You can find this assumption in any biology or biochemistry textbook. You say it's fact, but I have yet to see an experiment where complex chemicals do anything but degrade into less complex substituents. Entropy, man! Perhaps you could link me to something in the literature describing how these "facts" were obtained? Fair enough Pre-life evolution is a very complex topic which i wont get into as i dont have a full understanding myself and what i do know is to vague to prove true. But theorys for pre-life evolution is still in debate but we slowly get more and more clues as we discover more about genetics, a field that is still much unknown. we say we have a assumption because some form of it has to of happen for life to exists.Also chemicals will stop reacting, when not enough energy and resources are there which really isnt a issue since the primordial soup and sun supplys enough of those things to "support" a self replicating chemical reaction. Yes you can turn complex chemicals into more complex chemicals...we do it all the time
Of course we can make more complex chemicals by controlling the conditions and chemicals present to force reactions towards an intended conclusion. While you can create amino acids by combining a reaction that occasionally produces them with a rig that isolates them once they're created so they don't immediately disintegrate back to their components (how does THAT one work in the ocean?), you can't get them to do anything useful or assemble into anything productive without using a long chain of specialized conditions and reagents designed to get them arrange themselves in a specific order.
Again, I'm not making the argument that since we don't have an adequate explanation for this then the only solution is that some intelligent designer must have put them together... I'm just trying to point out a couple examples of how our current model requires some evidence-less assumptions like this to make sense. So does creation. There's a wealth of evidence that can be interpreted to support both conclusions, and both require the acceptance of as-yet untestable assumptions.
I don't think I'm being close minded by refusing to dismiss the possibility of either option. I think that makes me somewhat more open minded than those who have already made up their mind.
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On December 02 2009 14:13 Biochemist wrote: There's a wealth of evidence that can be interpreted to support both conclusions, Really, there's evidence for creation?
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On December 02 2009 14:11 TimmyMac wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2009 13:33 Misrah wrote:On December 02 2009 13:26 Lanyth wrote: Your concluding statement about atheism is a belief system is incorrect, it's not "believing in science". It is rather an absence of belief.
Science does not just make random assumption and rely on faith. Any hypothesis made are then taken to experimentation and observation. If the hypothesis is unsupported or contradicted by the experimentation or previous knowledge then the hypothesis is then modify and they test their new prediction. Science is found up by evidence.
Anything that we do not know yet is simply "We don't know yet". It doesn't just mean "God did it". Having an answer doesn't mean anything if there's no reliable evidence. Science doesn't try to know everything but it does have a reliable way to look for answers. You BELIEVE what your senses tell you, because you have no other way to prove anything shown exists. hence the idea oh solipsism ext ext ext. If you can tell me how one can 'prove' that i am really typing on a computer, and that the colors that i see are really those colors, and that glass of coffee on my table is really there- i am waiting. Until then, you believe everything your senses tell you. If i were to cut your 12 cranial nerves from your brain, would you know an external reality existed? would you exist? could you exist? To take your observations as fact is a believe in your senses. This is an absolute. There is no way to refute this, thus my conclusion is sound. Yes, but atheism has nothing to do with believing your senses/observations, and everything to do with not believing in a supernatural being with no evidence. If you REALLY want to stretch it you can say that you're taking some monstrous leap of faith by not assuming that your senses are bullshitting you and god talks to you every day, sure. And ya, you could probably live/sense without the cranial nerves. Take anatomy lol
Too bad for you, i have taken anatomy, and physiology, and pathophysiology, and pharmacology, bio chem, micro bio ext ext So i can say that when it comes to talking about the body i know what i am talking about. If your cranial nerves are severed, you have no more feeling with the rest of the world. I am not going to bother answering the rest of your post, because your so so misguided and blinded.
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On December 02 2009 14:25 Misrah wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2009 14:11 TimmyMac wrote:On December 02 2009 13:33 Misrah wrote:On December 02 2009 13:26 Lanyth wrote: Your concluding statement about atheism is a belief system is incorrect, it's not "believing in science". It is rather an absence of belief.
Science does not just make random assumption and rely on faith. Any hypothesis made are then taken to experimentation and observation. If the hypothesis is unsupported or contradicted by the experimentation or previous knowledge then the hypothesis is then modify and they test their new prediction. Science is found up by evidence.
Anything that we do not know yet is simply "We don't know yet". It doesn't just mean "God did it". Having an answer doesn't mean anything if there's no reliable evidence. Science doesn't try to know everything but it does have a reliable way to look for answers. You BELIEVE what your senses tell you, because you have no other way to prove anything shown exists. hence the idea oh solipsism ext ext ext. If you can tell me how one can 'prove' that i am really typing on a computer, and that the colors that i see are really those colors, and that glass of coffee on my table is really there- i am waiting. Until then, you believe everything your senses tell you. If i were to cut your 12 cranial nerves from your brain, would you know an external reality existed? would you exist? could you exist? To take your observations as fact is a believe in your senses. This is an absolute. There is no way to refute this, thus my conclusion is sound. Yes, but atheism has nothing to do with believing your senses/observations, and everything to do with not believing in a supernatural being with no evidence. If you REALLY want to stretch it you can say that you're taking some monstrous leap of faith by not assuming that your senses are bullshitting you and god talks to you every day, sure. And ya, you could probably live/sense without the cranial nerves. Take anatomy lol Too bad for you, i have taken anatomy, and physiology, and pathophysiology, and pharmacology, bio chem, micro bio ext ext So i can say that when it comes to talking about the body i know what i am talking about. If your cranial nerves are severed, you have no more feeling with the rest of the world. I am not going to bother answering the rest of your post, because your so so misguided and blinded. Right. How about the spinal cord then? No sensation through there?
Thanks for coming out.
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On December 02 2009 14:13 Biochemist wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2009 13:32 Daedes wrote:On December 02 2009 13:07 Biochemist wrote:On December 02 2009 12:53 Daedes wrote:How "probable" is the big bang in resulting in a perfectly ordered universe? What are you talking about? The universe is certainty not ordered and is not perfect at all. Perfect being pretty vague. amino acids turning themselves into working, metabolizing, replicating, organized groups of proteins? (replace with nucleotides/nucleic acids, if RNA world is your thing). okay how life started question... yes we don't know yet. But it is most likely going to be solved in time. But it sounds like you don't think evolutionary chemical reactions isn't likely when it is actual fact. i mean once a living thing in...our vague terms of living...its defiantly not hard to evolve. No one really can say what reality is. Reality in a sense is a vague term not used in a context. If you want to say reality is what is true and what we know is real . then No one has any idea of what reality is. But ignoring countless observations and breaking any chain of the law of physics is creating an impossibility. Physical laws cannot be broken and the world of reality is beyond your or my understanding. I know im not going to change your mind on anything but know, that we all live in belief that is shaped through our experience, in what we hear said is fact, And what we want to be true, thinking we know or understand in our small unexperianced lives of ignorance. Everyone is like this because that is how we survive. But one must be critical of his own thinking,judgments, and statements without absolute proof with demonstration.(which is science,all experiments are repeatable). By chemical evolution I'm talking about pre-"life" evolution. You can find this assumption in any biology or biochemistry textbook. You say it's fact, but I have yet to see an experiment where complex chemicals do anything but degrade into less complex substituents. Entropy, man! Perhaps you could link me to something in the literature describing how these "facts" were obtained? Fair enough Pre-life evolution is a very complex topic which i wont get into as i dont have a full understanding myself and what i do know is to vague to prove true. But theorys for pre-life evolution is still in debate but we slowly get more and more clues as we discover more about genetics, a field that is still much unknown. we say we have a assumption because some form of it has to of happen for life to exists.Also chemicals will stop reacting, when not enough energy and resources are there which really isnt a issue since the primordial soup and sun supplys enough of those things to "support" a self replicating chemical reaction. Yes you can turn complex chemicals into more complex chemicals...we do it all the time Of course we can make more complex chemicals by controlling the conditions and chemicals present to force reactions towards an intended conclusion. While you can create amino acids by combining a reaction that occasionally produces them with a rig that isolates them once they're created so they don't immediately disintegrate back to their components (how does THAT one work in the ocean?), you can't get them to do anything useful or assemble into anything productive without using a long chain of specialized conditions and reagents designed to get them arrange themselves in a specific order. Again, I'm not making the argument that since we don't have an adequate explanation for this then the only solution is that some intelligent designer must have put them together... I'm just trying to point out a couple examples of how our current model requires some evidence-less assumptions like this to make sense. So does creation. There's a wealth of evidence that can be interpreted to support both conclusions, and both require the acceptance of as-yet untestable assumptions. I don't think I'm being close minded by refusing to dismiss the possibility of either option. I think that makes me somewhat more open minded than those who have already made up their mind.
Yes i totally agree. I don't think i ever said it was likely or that we have a clear answer. i was just defending that something of the short had to of happen..."based on what we know now"
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On December 02 2009 13:59 Daedes wrote:Show nested quote + By ordered universe I meant the physical laws that enable life as we know it to exist. Where did they come from? They sure are convenient! Why is gravity so weak? Sure is nice, though. The scientific method is only really good at disproving things, not proving them. As such it's still a leap of faith to say that since we can explain how a lot of this stuff works without requiring the existence of a God, there must not be one.
I want you to think long and hard on on what you just said there because im not going to bother answering that
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think you're getting at the "if physical laws were different and the evolution of life were still possible, it would take on a form more conducive to those other physical laws" thing. i.e. the laws of the universe work well for us because we evolved in it. Sure, it's a perfectly logical conclusion and it makes a lot of sense.
It's the whole "it must be true because we're here and the only way that could possibly happen in the absence of a creator is for it to be true" argument. And that's perfectly fine with me, that's the best we can do given the available evidence and the general consensus for what constitutes good science. It's still relying on an untestable assumption.
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And ya, you could probably live/sense without the cranial nerves. Take anatomy lol
You may be able to live as the autonomic processes wont be severed, i think, my anatomy is a bit rusty. But u certaintly wont sense anything without them lol
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On December 02 2009 14:25 Misrah wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2009 14:11 TimmyMac wrote:On December 02 2009 13:33 Misrah wrote:On December 02 2009 13:26 Lanyth wrote: Your concluding statement about atheism is a belief system is incorrect, it's not "believing in science". It is rather an absence of belief.
Science does not just make random assumption and rely on faith. Any hypothesis made are then taken to experimentation and observation. If the hypothesis is unsupported or contradicted by the experimentation or previous knowledge then the hypothesis is then modify and they test their new prediction. Science is found up by evidence.
Anything that we do not know yet is simply "We don't know yet". It doesn't just mean "God did it". Having an answer doesn't mean anything if there's no reliable evidence. Science doesn't try to know everything but it does have a reliable way to look for answers. You BELIEVE what your senses tell you, because you have no other way to prove anything shown exists. hence the idea oh solipsism ext ext ext. If you can tell me how one can 'prove' that i am really typing on a computer, and that the colors that i see are really those colors, and that glass of coffee on my table is really there- i am waiting. Until then, you believe everything your senses tell you. If i were to cut your 12 cranial nerves from your brain, would you know an external reality existed? would you exist? could you exist? To take your observations as fact is a believe in your senses. This is an absolute. There is no way to refute this, thus my conclusion is sound. Yes, but atheism has nothing to do with believing your senses/observations, and everything to do with not believing in a supernatural being with no evidence. If you REALLY want to stretch it you can say that you're taking some monstrous leap of faith by not assuming that your senses are bullshitting you and god talks to you every day, sure. And ya, you could probably live/sense without the cranial nerves. Take anatomy lol Too bad for you, i have taken anatomy, and physiology, and pathophysiology, and pharmacology, bio chem, micro bio ext ext So i can say that when it comes to talking about the body i know what i am talking about. If your cranial nerves are severed, you have no more feeling with the rest of the world. I am not going to bother answering the rest of your post, because your so so misguided and blinded. To state with any certainty that he or she does or does not still have feeling with the rest of the world is sheer ignorance. This is just something which you believe to happen.
You don't get to argue both ways, that's the problem when you decide that atheists have to submit to the conclusion that they are just believers. If atheists must make a leap for belief then I can place the same enforcement on anything that you argue.
edit: If I sound abrasive in that first sentence it's only because I copied it from one of Misrah's earlier posts.
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On December 02 2009 14:41 GogoKodo wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2009 14:25 Misrah wrote:On December 02 2009 14:11 TimmyMac wrote:On December 02 2009 13:33 Misrah wrote:On December 02 2009 13:26 Lanyth wrote: Your concluding statement about atheism is a belief system is incorrect, it's not "believing in science". It is rather an absence of belief.
Science does not just make random assumption and rely on faith. Any hypothesis made are then taken to experimentation and observation. If the hypothesis is unsupported or contradicted by the experimentation or previous knowledge then the hypothesis is then modify and they test their new prediction. Science is found up by evidence.
Anything that we do not know yet is simply "We don't know yet". It doesn't just mean "God did it". Having an answer doesn't mean anything if there's no reliable evidence. Science doesn't try to know everything but it does have a reliable way to look for answers. You BELIEVE what your senses tell you, because you have no other way to prove anything shown exists. hence the idea oh solipsism ext ext ext. If you can tell me how one can 'prove' that i am really typing on a computer, and that the colors that i see are really those colors, and that glass of coffee on my table is really there- i am waiting. Until then, you believe everything your senses tell you. If i were to cut your 12 cranial nerves from your brain, would you know an external reality existed? would you exist? could you exist? To take your observations as fact is a believe in your senses. This is an absolute. There is no way to refute this, thus my conclusion is sound. Yes, but atheism has nothing to do with believing your senses/observations, and everything to do with not believing in a supernatural being with no evidence. If you REALLY want to stretch it you can say that you're taking some monstrous leap of faith by not assuming that your senses are bullshitting you and god talks to you every day, sure. And ya, you could probably live/sense without the cranial nerves. Take anatomy lol Too bad for you, i have taken anatomy, and physiology, and pathophysiology, and pharmacology, bio chem, micro bio ext ext So i can say that when it comes to talking about the body i know what i am talking about. If your cranial nerves are severed, you have no more feeling with the rest of the world. I am not going to bother answering the rest of your post, because your so so misguided and blinded. To state with any certainty that he or she does or does not still have feeling with the rest of the world is sheer ignorance. This is just something which you believe to happen. You don't get to argue both ways, that's the problem when you decide that atheists have to submit to the conclusion that they are just believers. If atheists must make a leap for belief then I can place the same enforcement on anything that you argue.
Yes! now we are spiraling into exactly what i did not want in my paper! everything is a belief, and taking anything as fact, or turning your belief into fact is wrong!!!!! that way everyone loses, no one is right, and lets just live life!
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On December 02 2009 14:36 Biochemist wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2009 13:59 Daedes wrote: By ordered universe I meant the physical laws that enable life as we know it to exist. Where did they come from? They sure are convenient! Why is gravity so weak? Sure is nice, though. The scientific method is only really good at disproving things, not proving them. As such it's still a leap of faith to say that since we can explain how a lot of this stuff works without requiring the existence of a God, there must not be one.
I want you to think long and hard on on what you just said there because im not going to bother answering that Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think you're getting at the "if physical laws were different and the evolution of life were still possible, it would take on a form more conducive to those other physical laws" thing. i.e. the laws of the universe work well for us because we evolved in it. Sure, it's a perfectly logical conclusion and it makes a lot of sense. It's the whole "it must be true because we're here and the only way that could possibly happen in the absence of a creator is for it to be true" argument. And that's perfectly fine with me, that's the best we can do given the available evidence and the general consensus for what constitutes good science. It's still relying on an untestable assumption.
This makes my smile. Okay yes you know i where your coming from and ill give you this. My belief that there is no god is an assumption/faith and i assuming that life must of happened based off past experiments. i still do not know and my belief could be wrong. But i don't draw hypothesis on anything that isn't true or relevent to past experiments, such as god or a intelligent designer. But i cant prove a god/intelligent designer didn't create life
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On December 02 2009 13:33 Misrah wrote: You BELIEVE what your senses tell you, because you have no other way to prove anything shown exists. hence the idea oh solipsism ext ext ext.
The senses are not the only thing available to us, however. We also have our rationality and our logic, our inner monologue. These are separate from the senses and can, in some cases, be used to empirically justify our senses by keeping track in the long term of what they register.
Also, no man is an island. If many others can corroborate what our senses register, then our reasoning leads us to believe that our senses (and the senses of the instruments we build) are valid.
Lulz at the flames in here, some people are so touchy.
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Isn't it against the rules, to use an essay you hand into a prof, outside of class/for another class without permission? Actually, maybe it's just if you use it for another class... Still not a great idea when your professor finds it in a google search.
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"You don't understand what's going on, none of this Santa stuff makes any sense and there's zero evidence for it, why can't everyone just admit that? What's the big conspiracy about? Why is everyone pretending there really is a Santa? Then it slowly dawns on you, around age ten or eleven ... the chilling, horrible truth:
They're Not Pretending. They REALLY Do Believe There Is a Santa Claus.
Egads! Holy Shit! You suddenly feel a little bit lonely at age sixteen as you come to realize that you may surrounded by fully grown adults who are delusional incompetents that cannot distinguish fiction from fact and are enthralled by some kind of massive group hysteria! They're most of them all like that! And they all think you're nuts for not buying into their delusion! What the hell is wrong with these fucking people, can't they see how crazy this shit is?"
I clearly remember that moment...the moment I realized that horrible truth...they REALLY believe...I cried myself to sleep that night.
^ I was reading reddit, and I completely agree with the guy... the whole religion thing is sad, really.
For example, read this article about a mom who expected god to provide food for her children: http://www.nj.com/news/ledger/jersey/index.ssf?/base/news-15/1259894705182640.xml&coll=1
Spoiler: + Show Spoiler +They almost starved to death
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Ughh I don't like the term atheism.
Simply it describes ones stance as to how many 'gods' they are comfortable saying exist. With a few moments of consideration you can see that this is almost a pointless thing to know as first 'god' isn't well defined, and second, this quantity says nothing at all about the worldview of this person, nor their morality. The term is almost always used in an adversarial way, and almost anyone who without prompt will tell you they're an atheist is a smarmy cunt. Furthermore, while words like Christian, or Muslim, or Jew all have an idea of morality implicit to them, atheism does not.
With that said, let me tell you why I am an atheist. To me there are no compelling reasons to believe in 'God,' and if there were I couldn't see any compelling reasons to believe that any one text held Its word, nor that any person could tell me what It thought. Perhaps some event may occur that would give me a reason to believe, but I know my mind is fallible and the event must be emotional, so I could not trust my own analysis.
Now, the debate about God is an interesting one. The case against the existence of God is not really what it's about. That's handled by humility. What the debate really is about is summed up in Hitchens' subtitle, How Religion Poisons Everything. While reading that, I found it remarkable how little time was spent on the thesis God is not Great. Instead, Hitchens argues that religious authority is not made accountable, and this is why religion is a poison. He gives hundreds of pages of examples of religions authority enabling offences to morality and decency. The real objection to religion is about power, not about metaphysics.
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On December 06 2009 14:01 Mooga wrote:Show nested quote +"You don't understand what's going on, none of this Santa stuff makes any sense and there's zero evidence for it, why can't everyone just admit that? What's the big conspiracy about? Why is everyone pretending there really is a Santa? Then it slowly dawns on you, around age ten or eleven ... the chilling, horrible truth:
They're Not Pretending. They REALLY Do Believe There Is a Santa Claus.
Egads! Holy Shit! You suddenly feel a little bit lonely at age sixteen as you come to realize that you may surrounded by fully grown adults who are delusional incompetents that cannot distinguish fiction from fact and are enthralled by some kind of massive group hysteria! They're most of them all like that! And they all think you're nuts for not buying into their delusion! What the hell is wrong with these fucking people, can't they see how crazy this shit is?"
I clearly remember that moment...the moment I realized that horrible truth...they REALLY believe...I cried myself to sleep that night. ^ I was reading reddit, and I completely agree with the guy... the whole religion thing is sad, really. For example, read this article about a mom who expected god to provide food for her children: http://www.nj.com/news/ledger/jersey/index.ssf?/base/news-15/1259894705182640.xml&coll=1Spoiler: + Show Spoiler +They almost starved to death Why would you even bring up religion in that sort of context as the basis for your opinion on religion?
There's much more to religion than some idiot believing that God would magically provide for them.
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