What am I the only one who can't be stubborn?

Edited by Ivan_Melgar_M - October 02 2010 at 21:04

You see Exitthel, I'm not the only stubborn.

Ivan_Melgar_M wrote: Dean wrote: *sigh* are you so desperate to win that the best you can manage is a synonym dictionary?   inappropriate synonyms: amiss, graceless, improper, inapposite, inapt, incongruous, incorrect, indecorous, inept, infelicitous, malapropos, perverse, unapt, unbecoming, unfit, unhappy, unseemly, unsuitable, untoward, wrong, out of place, out of the way.   Wrong definition:  1a : an injurious, unfair, or unjust act : action or conduct inflicting harm without due provocation or just cause  1b : a violation or invasion of the legal rights of another; especially : tort <- that's the one we're discussing       Hey, you are using another one that declares the exact same thing.   I believe we are talking about the two, that's why I said Illegal or wrong, what is wrong doesn't need to be illegal.   Iván

Well I think you are totally wrong.

Edited by Dean - October 02 2010 at 21:13

Dean, meet Ivan.  Ivan, Dean.

According to the line about half-way down, you shall both cease to exist.  

which is the irresistible object and which the unstoppable force?

140 pages, god ... whoops, I mean wow

Ivan_Melgar_M wrote: You see Exitthel, I'm not the only stubborn.   Iván

Granted there is stiff competition but I hereby anoint you St Ubborn, patron saint of lost causes

I reckon Mike, Ivan and Dean would make an unstoppable legal force. Pretty bloody scary actually. Dot the i's and cross the T's. T could be their bounty hunter

Ok folks ... let's try to summarize the argument here:

Atheism is defined as the lack of belief in any gods. It is a rejection of theism, which (as one common denominator) includes a positive claim that god exists. The burden of proof is on the theists - they need to show that there are good reasons for believing in their hypothesis. Atheists on the other hand don't need to show anything - they're just being skeptical. Consider for example "aleprechaunists" ... they don't believe in leprechauns, and few people would say that their position is unreasonable until they find some evidence that leprechauns don't exist. And if you're a theist and putting your god and leprechauns on the same level offends you - sure, you think that your god is much more profound than leprechauns. But that doesn't change the fact that both have in common that there isn't any good argument to believe in them. There may be some arguments for your god that may seem compelling to you - and there are certainly more arguments for gods than there are for leprechauns - but all of them, or at least all I have heard so far, have been refuted, which is what the video in the first post was about. I'll give you a condensed list of the ones that I think are most important:

• Scripture doesn't prove anything - neither do statements of the church. This is simply an argument from authority, but there's no reason other than faith to accept the authoritative status of either scripture, or religious leaders - who often try to legitimize themselves based on scripture.
  
• The argument from design has been refuted thoroughly. It basically says that the world looks designed, so it must have had a designer. In the biological world this is essentially creationism/intelligent design vs. evolution, and it's obvious that evolution wins hands down. If you're a young earth creationist, you're simply unable to explain the evidence. And as Francis Collins (a "born-again" christian and scientist) said: Even the genetic evidence (DNA) proves common ancestry beyond any reasonable doubt.
• The first cause argument doesn't work either. It essentially says that every material thing had to have a cause - even the universe itself, so we need to assume that there's a divine creator who had to provide the first cause (creation of the universe) to get everything going. Of course what's wrong here is the assumption that this creator doesn't need a first cause - that ruins the whole argument from the get go. Who created the creator? It's an infinite regression. As Carl Sagan pointed out: Why not remove the extra step and say that the universe may have always been there? There's much we don't know about the universe, especially as we go back to the very beginnings - and it may very well be that time slows down infinitely the closer we get to the starting point.
• The argument from fine tuning is clearly flawed. It says that our universe - which is defined by cosmological constants - is so finely tuned to allow for our existence that it must have been designed that way (revisiting the argument from design). That's nonsense - first, it's quite possible that there are variations of those constants which allow life, too - maybe not life as we know it, but we can't assume that our universe is the only one which allows life to form. And even considering our universe - it contains many more planets that aren't suitable for forming life at all. Assuming that the universe was created with the purpose of producing us, as a species, as the end result - this universe seems like an awful waste of resources.
  
• Pascal's wager is equally flawed. Back in Pascal's time it made sense to a degree, since he only needed to consider one religion. The argument essentially says: What if you (the atheist) are wrong? Then you'll burn in hell. Why not convert to Christianity just in case they're right? Well, it's obviously an immoral argument - it's pure opportunism, especially if converting to the religion involves doing things which you would consider to be immoral. But even setting that aside, the argument completely falls down once more religions enter the picture which also have the concept of hell, but teach different ways to avoid it (see next argument).
• The various religions can't possibly all be right - but they can all be wrong. Think about it: You can't possibly lead a life that will grant you access both to the Catholic heaven and Muslim heaven. If you disagree - see the next argument. Once you assume that one of these specific denominations is correct, you negate all the others (including atheism). But if you assume that atheists are correct and all the theist claims are wrong ... it all makes sense, there are no contradictions. If anything, it shows that the atheist position is more reasonable.
• Today religions sometimes preach tolerance, and people present the argument that especially the big monotheisms all worship the same god - so they aren't really contradictive. This argument fails epically. If we assume that it's true, and that this same god exists and accepts all religions, when we build the common denominator we arrive at deism or at the very best, agnostic theism, meaning that since we clearly don't have a clue on what this god wants us to do - or whether he wants us to do anything specific, we might as well continue doing what we think is best. If, on the other hand, we assume that it's wrong, my previous point applies.
• "Without religion there would be no morality". Wrong. Religion gets its morality from the people (societies) which invent it. That is why the bible commands you to take unruly children to the edge of town and stone them to death. Modern societies have advanced moral systems because throughout the ages, and despite of religion, we improved them.
  
• "What about social darwinism and nihilism? Surely those are consequences of a lack of belief in god". No, not really. First of all, darwinism has nothing to do with morality. It explains what we see happening in nature -  those species which are more fit to survive are more likely to pass on their genes. It doesn't say whether that's a thing to be desired - and it certainly doesn't say that we should do this on the individual level. Secondly, there's nihilism ... I've often heard theists asking whether atheists don't believe in anything. That's clearly not the case - and there are many countries today who have large parts of societies being atheists and not resorting to nihilism.
  

That's all for now ... maybe I'll refine this list in the future, or add more arguments that I think are important.


Edited by Mr ProgFreak - October 03 2010 at 03:03

Ivan_Melgar_M wrote: Dean wrote: Well I think you are totally wrong.    does that make you inappropriate?  or just unhappy?   It makes me laugh, it only proves you're as stubborn as me.

Deleted to avoid missunderstandings

Edited by Ivan_Melgar_M - October 03 2010 at 11:29