Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Alex C]

I try not to put much thought anymore into whether I'm an agnostic or an atheist (and as I said, I'm an agnostic if I'm anything) mostly because I'm not sure how much my stance on anything important would change if I knew for certain there was a god. Certainly it would change my outlook in some ways, even maybe a lot of ways, but beyond perhaps legitimizing a religion or two, I'm not sure what god could really represent to me other than some nebulous authority figure beyond my understanding. Which, oddly enough, is why the whole idea of Deism and a passive god appeals to me and makes more sense than any of the current Judeo-Christian beliefs. I like the idea that if there is a god it's something wise or kind enough to accept that just because you created something doesn't mean it is just to demand fealty.

Ugh, this kind of thinking always hurts my brain; I was raised Catholic and like most agnostics and atheists (whether they admit it or not) I still actually hold to most Christian values, but not really truly believing there's a definite reason why I absolutely should have stick to those values makes for loads of cognitive dissonance some days.

[jimbunny]

gah. this thread.

[Jackie Blue]

You are such a consistent complainer, jim.  Why do you feel the need to always complain about threads you don't like?  Why don't you just, you know, not post in them or ignore them?

Oh, right, because it makes you look cool to go "gah.  this thread."

[Johnny C]

He is right, though. It's a baffling discussion for a music forum, and besides that its original idea has been twisted so far that it's become the usual Internet Argument On Subjective Morality. And now we're discussing religion. Great!

Gah, this thread.

EDIT: On the other hand, I just realized that the S.A. article has one absolutely fascinating point in it:

But what can you expect from a generation who's mythos is based around night elves and Yoshi? Noah didn't save the animals, Sonic the Hedgehog did by defeating Dr. Robotnik. They've been a survivor, a healer, the first son, and the omega in 8 bit and 3-D. Amen.

[Jackie Blue]

Yeah, but we go off-topic all the time, and some of us don't mind meandering tangents.

Besides, he started this thread as having only a tangential relation to music so it's especially funny for him to complain that it has wandered.

[Inlander]

Most "atheists" I've known that were intelligent, when pressed, admit that they're actually agnostics, since believing in nothing requires as much faith as believing in something.

This is why it really amazes me that somebody like Richard Dawkins can proclaim himself an atheist - and a very obstreperous one, at that. Having studied science at uni, it seems to me that atheism is a supremely non-scientific stand-point: you can no more proclaim categorically that god does not exist, than you can claim that he does exist. This is why I consider myself an agnostic, which has historically been viewed (mainly by atheists, I guess) as a weak and unequivocal position, but which is actually I think the only scientifically rigorous position one can take with regards to religious faith.

As for this thread, if you'll allow me to briefly put on my mod hat: I like it. This is the most interesting and thought-provoking and downright reasonable thread we've had on this forum in bloody ages. I know that technically it's not really a music thread any more, and "technically" it should be moved to I Like Fish, but in all honesty, there's a different crowd down there, and if it was moved down there I think the thread would (A) very quickly get filled with trite one-liner joke posts, and (B) quickly after that devolve into argument and name-calling. Which would mean (C) it'd get locked, quick-smart. I don't want to see that happen. I know technically we're not supposed to talk about religion or politics around here, but those rules are in place, I think, largely because discussions of those topics usually turn into shit-fights. We've got to four pages now without that happening. I think we can keep it up.

[Johnny C]

You raise a fairly good point on both counts, I s'pose. The agnosticism stance is a good point and probably the most reasonable stance you can take, whether or not you believe in anything. It hasn't gotten into a shit-fight yet but it came dangerously close on a couple of points on the last page.

[KvP]

I went to a lecture by Daniel Dennett, who's generally considered a leader of the "bright" movement along with Dawkins and that other guy, and he seemed very deliberate, reasonable, and thoughtful and he refrained from the strong rhetoric of Dawkins. The way that Dennett put it, atheism isn't really a scientific position, but in many ways it is a logical one, at least in opposition to judeo-christian theism. One can believe in a God and still be rational, but the traditional ways of thinking, that God is all good, all powerful, etc. are as-yet impossible to fully defend under heavy scrutiny.

Incidentally, the lecture was about religion as a natural phenomena (memes subject to natural section) and it was fascinating.

Perhaps a thread split is in order? :\

[jimbunny]

You are such a consistent complainer, jim.  Why do you feel the need to always complain about threads you don't like?  Why don't you just, you know, not post in them or ignore them?

Oh, right, because it makes you look cool to go "gah.  this thread."

Well, I am unbearably cool, so it makes sense that I should also look so. And I suppose I am consistent, in that I've done this...more than once? I suppose I did feel a little entitled this time, because I did start this thread. I realize that doesn't mean much, though.

If you want my opinion on atheists, it's that they're wrong. And I'd have an easy time ceding the merits of agnosticism based on science, if I didn't believe that science was a fundamentally inadequate point for examining life, as a whole.

I would support a thread split, if breaking the pretense that this is a forum in which we "talk about music" was OK with everyone else.

[ViolentDove]

Care to elaborate on how you think that science is a fundamentally inadequate point for examining life?

[supersheep]

I've never met a true atheist that wasn't a complete moron.  Most "atheists" I've known that were intelligent, when pressed, admit that they're actually agnostics, since believing in nothing requires as much faith as believing in something.  Not to mention that a lot of atheists (ahem, Dawkins, ahem) are using a rejection of very specific church dogmas as a logical step in rejecting the entire idea of spirituality.

But take that position, and you have to be 'agnostic' about a lot of things. I mean, you have to admit that there could be lots of tiny invisible insubstantial pink unicorns floating around your head right now. After all, there is the same level of evidence for that.
While I am in a certain sense agnostic in this way, it's in the same way that I am agnostic about the sun coming up in the morning, or the operation of cause and effect, or the existence of the universe. I believe God exists about as much as I believe that the room I am sitting in doesn't.

[E. Spaceman]

Care to elaborate on how you think that science is a fundamentally inadequate point for examining life?

I'm not sure if it would be his point, but you have to remember science is based on faith.

[KvP]

That's not quite the case. The Scientific Method is based upon observation to collect data and repetition to ensure the veracity of that data. Anything that cannot be observed, or any experiment that cannot be replicated, is unscientific.

That having been said, the scientific method can't truly prove anything, it can only disprove. It is inductive by nature. Even though every credible scientist on Earth believes in gravity, we could still be wrong about it. But all the best evidence we have points toward the theory that we have, rather than invisible gravity elves or ethereal tethers or whatever. It would take better evidence to make an alternate theory more palatable.

Science is the best thing around. What people around here probably have issue with is arch-materialism, which Dawkins subscribes to.

[Jackie Blue]

I believe God exists about as much as I believe that the room I am sitting in doesn't.

The problem is when people, as stated in the Dawkins-review I linked, tend to "think of God as some sort of chap".  It is ignorant of theology and spiritual history to say that one doesn't believe in "a giant alien in the sky who watches us to make sure we don't do anything bad".

God can be considered a non-"existant" concept even by people who believe in the real fundamental tenets of Christianity, as based on the teachings of a possibly insane anarchist who "hung out with whores and social outcasts".

In other words, in 100 years there will be a religion based on Efrim Manuck's liner notes and lyrics.  And it will be awesome.

EDIT: Oh, and jimbunny?  Speaking from experience, the thing you want to do is be a likeable poster on this forum before being a pissy Negative Nancy.  Otherwise we'll never let you sit at the Cool Kids Table.  Possibly also we will shoot spitballs at you.

[ViolentDove]

Hmm. Science to me is just a tool... a framework of logic which is useful for examining various phenomena and providing an approximate indication of what's going on therein.

While there might be faith involved, it's no greater a leap of faith than that required to walk out of your door in the morning and still expect the world to exist.

I've yet to hear of another viewpoint/system which has proved as useful towards the examination of life, the universe and everything.

[Jackie Blue]

It is also worth noting that, while we can basically agree that gravity works, we still don't really have any idea why.

[supersheep]

It's actually a lot more complicated than that. Karl Popper's falsifiability, Lakatos and Kuhn with research programmes and paradigms, and so on. Feyerabend argues there is nothing separating science from anything else other than the fact we choose to separate it. There's a lot of arguing about what is and isn't scientific, and how you decide what falsifies something - the Duhem-Quine problem, and there's also something about how you tell if an unpredicted result is due to equipment, or the other theories involved (say, for example, the laws of thermodynamics) or if it is your actual hypothesis that is wrong.

Also, I could be wrong, because my knowledge of religion is weighted more towards philosophical rather than theological, but isn't God some sort of definite individual being, at least in some senses?

[Jackie Blue]

Also, I could be wrong, because my knowledge of religion is weighted more towards philosophical rather than theological, but isn't God some sort of definite individual being, at least in some senses?

Not according to many theologians and some religions.  There are many different interpretations, and the knee-jerk assumption that people like Dawkins make that every religious or spiritual person believes that God is some kind of super-sized and super-powerful person is at best wildly ignorant.

[ViolentDove]

And yet, despite this gaping hole in our knowledge regarding gravity, we have put it to good (and bad!) use, for things like skydiving and football.

Much like, despite some inherent problems and "leaps of faith" with science, it's still a remarkably useful tool. For example, I use it on a daily basis to examine why and how various strains of cholera can pick up immunity to antibiotics. Despite some german man with a large moustache telling me that what I'm observing may not be actually happening we can produce practical models and use them in a way that is beneficial to preventing global pandemics of super-bugs.

(Also, is anyone else slightly worried that when they fire up the new large hadron collider it's going to accidentally flick the proverbial reset switch on the universe?)

[jimbunny]

Care to elaborate on how you think that science is a fundamentally inadequate point for examining life?

Life, as a whole. Life in a biological sense, sure - I'm quite willing to ascribe the functions that allow me to walk, breathe, and by extension think and feel to the best answers science has to offer. Similar to the natural world. I'm not going to say that something that science finds - through remarkable examination, observation, and logical connection - to be there, isn't there. But life in as much as it has meaning - e.g. my self-awareness, interaction with others, and moral free will - escapes science, precisely because science has no inherent meaning. This isn't to devalue the pursuit and use of science, and the understanding which is the result, which (perhaps coincidentally) presents itself to meaningful consideration in a myriad of amazing ways. Actually, I just use "meaning" because I can't think of a better word for it. I would look at life as the composition of two basic necessities: the need to sustain life and the need to justify life. (And by the way, if I sound slightly biased, it is because I am a humanities major. Please, accept my apologies and try to meet me halfway.)

Scientific theory may be based on assumptions, but there is something different between those assumptions and what a Christian would call faith.

[Jackie Blue]

Now that's more like it.  I more or less agree with that whole post, especially wrt Free Will.

As expounded on by a University of Texas professor in the film Waking Life.

[ampersandwitch]

(B) quickly after that devolve into argument and name-calling.

But this is the music forum, so highly advanced that we went through that phase ages ago.
I like this thread too.

[KvP]

Now that's more like it.  I more or less agree with that whole post, especially wrt Free Will.

As expounded on by a University of Texas professor in the film Waking Life.

Not that anyone asked me or anything, but being a fairly scientific-minded person, I am a determinist. But my pov (disparaged by that particular professor) is that, like with the question of whether or not gravity is due to the attraction of bodies in space or invisible fey spirits, it doesn't truly matter if all actions are determined on some astronomically high level. Even if it were the case, we'd rather act as though we weren't, and that's fine. We'll never be in a position to predict the future with total accuracy even if it was theoretically possible.

[E. Spaceman]

That's not quite the case. The Scientific Method is based upon observation to collect data and repetition to ensure the veracity of that data. Anything that cannot be observed, or any experiment that cannot be replicated, is unscientific.

That having been said, the scientific method can't truly prove anything, it can only disprove. It is inductive by nature. Even though every credible scientist on Earth believes in gravity, we could still be wrong about it. But all the best evidence we have points toward the theory that we have, rather than invisible gravity elves or ethereal tethers or whatever. It would take better evidence to make an alternate theory more palatable.

Science is the best thing around. What people around here probably have issue with is arch-materialism, which Dawkins subscribes to.

You have to remember we derive all scientific knowledge from axioms. This is why all science is faith based.

[Alex C]

It is also worth noting that, while we can basically agree that gravity works, we still don't really have any idea why.

Yeah, it's a real bitch, isn't it? All we can really "know" from science is that some things can be demonstrated repeatedly and that we can sometimes make useful extrapolations and learn new ways to harness things from what we observe. Science is a terrifically useful way of approaching problems, which is why I find the whole evolution battle so frustrating; I think it's pretty clear that at the least there's some facets of evolution and natural selection as we currently understand them that are demonstrably useful and it really bothers me that some people are willing to throw the baby out with the bathwater because we don't understand every nuance of biodiversity and speciation yet. I just wish people weren't so quick to equate incomplete with incorrect.

[Jackie Blue]

it really bothers me that some people are willing to throw the baby out with the bathwater because we don't understand every nuance of biodiversity and speciation yet. I just wish people weren't so quick to equate incomplete with incorrect.

People like that tend to be in the shallow end of the gene pool so I wouldn't fret too much about it.

[E. Spaceman]

and yes somehow on the upper political echelons!

[calenlass]

Guys all of your arguments need to be rhyming and in iambic pentameter to remain in this thread kthx.

[supersheep]

Extreme belief in any faith or creed
Without a thought to how or why it stands,
Should not be held up as a life to lead
But undergo a rational demand

And Science, too, cannot remain alone
Untouched by any form of doubt or thought
For it too is based on faith and has grown
On what the giants of before have wrought

And yet, one is subject to our disdain
The other raised above all inquiry
No-one questions into science's reign
But we hate religion's authority

Science and faith, for each to hold their own
The truth is something never to be known

SONNET FORM BITCH

[KharBevNor]

Guys, saying science is based on faith is a pretty big misunderstanding. Faith implies an act of will to believe in something either without reason, or without reasonable proof. Yeah, sure, science is not absolute, and this is something a lot of people don't get. However, good science implicitly understands this. Even the most hardened skeptics will normally tell you that they would find nothing more exciting and interesting than, say, genuine proof of ESP or telekinesis. Scientific theorys are the best model we have for understanding our environment at any given time. True, scientific theories contain no inherent truth or substance, being abstract human inventions, however, the independtly verifiable experimental results on which they are based are not abstractions. To suggest that science is equivalent to religious faith is a philosophical abstraction as simplistic and ludicrous as 'there's no point in doing anything because of the heat death of the universe' (already discussed) or saying that there is no proof that anything whatsoever is real. Yeah, you can construct a pretty good argument for it, but it just digs you into a hole and kills all progress. Similiarly to the way that western philosophy has pretty much had to accept that 'I think, therefore I am' in order to get anywhere worthwhile. To say science is based on faith would be to imply that there is no objective reality. It would be to say that it is a miracle every time the heating element in my kettle boils the water within it. It just won't wash guys. Go read some Pirsig.

Also, if you think people go in for creationism because of flaws in the theory of evolution, I think you're mistaken. Pt the eople go in for creationism because they have no true faith, no critical faculties, and no fucking imagination. In order to believe in their religion, they have to cling rigidly to one view of the world, and reject everything else, no matter how preposterous their arguments or proofs. Taking on good faith that at least the majority of creationists are not cynical charlatans milking seminar audiences and church congregations for donations, then there is a hell of a lot of willing self-deception going round. You see it in any such group: all brands of conspiracy theorists, flat earthers, hollow earthers, certain sorts of UFO believers, cultists, a good deal of the less philosophically and theologically sound occultists. Just try talking with them. Rational argument will not work, because they have trapped themselves in a self-sustaining loop of false logic where the conclusions they feel they have to reach form an integral part of the argument for their conclusions, ie:

"You can't question the historical authenticity of the King James Bible, because the King James Bible says it is infallible"
"Of course no creditable academics or news sources will report that Mossad and the CIA did September 11th/George Bush is a 12 foot ananaki vampire lizard/The Masons run the Government, they've all been bought off by the [gigantic conspiracy]"
"Of course there's no peer-reviewed medical studies that support the benefits of homeopathy, conventional doctors are opposed to homeopathy because it'll run them out of business"

And so on, and so forth.

[pilsner]

Guys, saying science is based on faith is a pretty big misunderstanding. Faith implies an act of will to believe in something either without reason, or without reasonable proof.

I largely agree with what you've said, but this definition of faith is wrong.  Used generally, I may say that I have "faith" in you and base it on very reasonable proof -- namely all the times in the past that you've acted honestly, etc.  Even if we accept that "faith" in the religious context has a special meaning, you must admit that many deists believe in miracles which provide, for those who believe they occurred, reason and reasonable proof in the existence of God.  I accept that some deists (ie. believers in one or more gods) take the position that faith may exist outside of reason, and perhaps that God tests the faith of his worshippers by withholding reasonable proof of his existence -- but I've always found this line of reasoning sophomoric.  Indeed, if one defines a deity as a being capable of exercising supernatural powers not explicable by the laws of physics (for instance, an omnipotent God) it becomes difficult not to admit that God has exercised his will directly thereby providing reasonable proof of his existence.  Now I'm certain this discussion doesn't encompass all deists, but I'm not seeking to make a categorical statement.  Rather, I'm pointing out that many (and almost certainly the majority) of deists hold faith in God or gods that is in their opinion buttressed by reasonable proof.

I've never met a true atheist that wasn't a complete moron.

Then I'd suggest that you haven't met very many atheists, or you're overly judgmental.  The very idea of a "true" atheist is a strawman -- rational certainty is not characterized by the absence of any exceedingly farfetched alternate theory (hence the first year college philosophy gem "How do you know the world wasn't created five minutes ago with everyone having memories going back to the beginning of their ficitious lives . . . well you don't but it's just not very plausible, is it?).

I'd be happy to continue this conversation outside of this forum, given the no religion discussion rule (that I just violated).

[KharBevNor]

But believers also have a faith that such miracles are not random chance, and faith as to which deity or force they are attributable to. Believing in Christianity because the bible says Jesus walked on water is another logic loop.

And yes, there are several dictionary definitions of the word 'faith'. I don't have an OED here with me, but I'd say that the two pertinent here are that of trusting in something based on some evidence (but not any certainty) and of belief without reason. Both require an act of will. You have faith in me repaying my debts, but no proof I will. You may have faith in the law, but injustice is still possible. Your faith can be well placed, or not well placed, but we're generally talking about a different thing to religious belief. You can have faith in science, but science is not a faith, if you see what I mean.

[KvP]

Re: Creationism, the only real reason there's even a debate between "Intelligent Design" or whatever they want to call it and evolution is that a staggering number of people who believe they're well-informed are misinformed about what evolution is (they think it's about humanity coming from monkeys or some other straw man bullshit). Natural Selection is as iron-clad as a scientific theory gets at this point. Hell, the catholic church has acknowledged its legitimacy. Of course, the kind of people who would deny Natural Selection probably wouldn't consider catholicism to be christianity anyway.

Re: Miracles, Hume has the last word on it, as far as I'm concerned.

[Jackie Blue]

In Robert Anton Wilson's book Cosmic Trigger 2 (I believe) he has an extended passage regarding a miraculous recovery that he had from an illness.

In said passage, he talks about how he researched so-called "spontaneous unexplainable cures".  There is actually a group of medical PhD's in America that investigates such claims.  As of the writing of the book, they had found insufficient evidence for hundreds of said claims, but there were, IIRC, somewhere between 12 and 17 cases which the panel had no choice but to declare "completely contrary to all established medical knowledge".

One such case involves a man in the 60s who was diagnosed with a disease that literally no one has ever been cured of, period.  The disease caused there to be a massive tumor in his hip - grapefruit-sized or larger.  Since he had been basically told he was going to die and there was absolutely nothing he could do about it, he checked out of the hospital, rented a hotel room, and spent a week watching Marx Brothers films and eating ice cream.

At the end of that week, the tumor was entirely gone and his disease was completely cured, never to return.

Time and again we see evidence that the mind has an incredible ability to affect our body and its health.  Why this should be the case is, as far as conventional science is concerned, a total mystery.

[ViolentDove]

And the moral of the story is, the Marx brothers should be deified.

Also, Supersheep, that's the best summary of a thread in Sonnet form that I've ever seen.

[KvP]

I can't deny that such crazily abnormal cases happen, but they are anecdotal. The doctors made the right call, and I'm sure they were greatly relieved when they were still proven wrong. You can't bank on miracles. Like Hume says, if I have a bag of 100 marbles, and I pour out 99 of them and they're all blue, the only reasonable prediction I could make is that the 100th is also blue. I certainly couldn't bet them all that the last is red.

[Nodaisho]

And the moral of the story is, the Marx brothers should be deified.

Also, Supersheep, that's the best summary of a thread in Sonnet form that I've ever seen.

And Ice cream should be a holy object?

[Jackie Blue]

I can't deny that such crazily abnormal cases happen, but they are anecdotal.

No, the point of my post is that they're not.  There are a significant number of cases which defy explanation entirely.  The doctors didn't "make the right call", they made "the only call" - as I said, this is a disease that has no treatment and no cure and certainly has never just vanished into thin air.  Such things warrant investigation, because the entire point of science is to understand what happens, not just understand "what usually happens".

[Joseph]

(Also, is anyone else slightly worried that when they fire up the new large hadron collider it's going to accidentally flick the proverbial reset switch on the universe?)

Not really, since there has been that worry with every other device of that sort that they've made so far.

[John Curtin]

I can't deny that such crazily abnormal cases happen, but they are anecdotal.

No, the point of my post is that they're not.  There are a significant number of cases which defy explanation entirely.  The doctors didn't "make the right call", they made "the only call" - as I said, this is a disease that has no treatment and no cure and certainly has never just vanished into thin air.  Such things warrant investigation, because the entire point of science is to understand what happens, not just understand "what usually happens".

That is true.  However, what kind of investigation would you propose?  You told us about a man who was cured of a supposedly incurable disease with no treatment whatsoever.  What experiment can a researcher conduct to test the cause of this?  Should they run a test programme where they pick a sample of people with the same tumour and not treat a random group from the sample (the test group), and then, what, not not treat the control group?  What is the placebo here?  What variables can they hold constant and which can they change?

The bottom line is that were you to tell a medical researcher this story, she or he will reply "OK, that is one lucky man.  However, my job is to do what I can to cure diseases".  There's really no investigation that can be done into this guy's story other than "wow this guy was exceptionally lucky for some reason".  A scientist can't investigate something s/he can't control, and "divine intervention" or "random chance" or whatever you want to offer as an explanation can't be controlled.  There's no way to test any theory about why this guy survived, because, unless you're suggesting the Marx brothers cured him, there's no testable hypothesis I can think of that will explain why he survived.

[supersheep]

Thanks VD! It is actually nowhere near a good argument but I was bored and at least I am the only one following the rules which means I win by default!

Faith is probably a bad word to use, due to it meaning both "belief that" - that is, the belief that there is a table over there - and "belief in" - as in belief in God. And Khar, Feyerabend disagrees with you.

[KharBevNor]

I really think that faith implies more willpower than the act of assuming that the objects around us are actually real. I mean, seriously.

[a pack of wolves]

Does it? When I was a little kid I went to a CofE school, and because I was told there was a god I thought this was true. It didn't require any greater willpower than, say, being told there was oxygen in what I breathed in and this was one thing which kept me alive. Losing faith in god was the part that actually required willpower, since I thought about the story of Noah's Ark and realised that I had to choose between belief in god and dinosaurs. I was eight. God lost.

Just because science and religion are both basically belief systems doesn't mean they're the same, they differ massively. But both do require faith in certain things. That's fine with me, just like I know that my atheism is based on belief. It isn't scientifically rigorous but I nevertheless firmly believe that there is no god.

[Jackie Blue]

There's really no investigation that can be done into this guy's story other than "wow this guy was exceptionally lucky for some reason".  A scientist can't investigate something s/he can't control, and "divine intervention" or "random chance" or whatever you want to offer as an explanation can't be controlled.  There's no way to test any theory about why this guy survived, because, unless you're suggesting the Marx brothers cured him, there's no testable hypothesis I can think of that will explain why he survived.

1.  Investigating a single case is not the point.  The point is to investigate why things like this happen a statistically significant number of times.

2.  There are already have been, and continue to be, studies on how the human mind - through positive thinking - can radically affect the body's processes.

[Scandanavian War Machine]

i think i have a solution to everyones problems, if you guys wanna hear it.
i have theory about the universe in which both science and religion win. sort of.

given an infinite amount of space and time, anything is possible. including the birth of a god. however, this would not be a god in the traditional sense. since it evolved and was born it would not be our idea of a god exactly; it would be a god-like creature. it's still all powerful or whatever, it's just not what we've imagined god to be for so long. i say "it" when in all likelyhood, if this were true, there would be many (see: infinity) of these beings. not to mention infinite numbers of infinite variations of said beings.

i say this to remind us that we have no idea what we are talking about and we won't live long enough to find out. so just be good people and try not to worry about it.

[supersheep]

That only stands for things that are physically possible, right? Which almost certainly rules out God, at least, as well as probably an all-powerful, or an omniscient, being. Even if it was the case that the all-powerful being came into existence, unless it was the one that made us, the religious people are still out of business.

I don't see how atheism is unscientific, to be honest. There's no evidence for it, so you believe it doesn't exist. Now, if there was evidence, then belieivng that it doesn't exist would be unscientific, but otherwise, it's fine.

[Jackie Blue]

I don't see how atheism is unscientific, to be honest. There's no evidence for it, so you believe it doesn't exist

There is a difference in "I believe this doesn't exist" and "I don't believe this exists".  And it's a mighty big difference.

[Nodaisho]

Zero is right, though it seems like a matter of semantics at first, there is quite a difference.

[Scandanavian War Machine]

That only stands for things that are physically possible, right? Which almost certainly rules out God, at least, as well as probably an all-powerful, or an omniscient, being.

would you be willing to admit that there is a .000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000001%* chance of an omnipotent being evolving?

because if there is a chance of that happening (no matter how small) then it has already happened and will happen over and over again forever.


*actual percentage much much much lower

[supersheep]

Yeah, there is, but it's only at some levels, I think. The invisible flying insubstantial pink unicorns flying around you at the moment - is it the case that you believe they don't exist or you don't believe they exist?

SWM, on omnipotence, I don't know if it is physically possible for an omnipotent being to evolve - and I am almost definite that a being with the attributes generally assigned to God could not physically evolve. Also, given that we don't know if there is infinite time and space, we can't say that for definite. But yes, given infinite time and space, a being will evolve that reaches the level of what it is physically possible for a being to do, and is at least practically omnipotent. That isn't God, though.