The religion of Atheism.

[Keelia]

Answer the question. You cant answerer a question with another question. Unless it is a rehitoracle one.

As for breathing my next breath, its not a belief its more so a fact. My brain sends messages to my body to work my lungs and inhale and exhale. Its not a act of god, its a motor function of the human body. Just like walking, blinking, and your heart beating.

Most people dont believe in Santa Clause, Easter Bunny, tooth fairy, ect because they are all stories we were taught as children. But from a logical stand point, it is impossible to fly around the wold and deliever gifts to billions of people in a 24 hour period. Its far fetched and at a certain age you relize this. But in my opnion if you dont believe these stories due to logical thinking they it would be easy to dismiss many bible stories.

Parting of seas, Resurection, Living in fish for extended periods of time, Fitting all the non-water animals in a boat(Do you relize how big it would have to be just to fit 2 of everything? You couldnt even fit 2 of every insect species.

And FYI when spieces die out they dont magicly come back to life. Animals that have gone extinct arent magicly re appearing.

Bible dates the earth being like what a few thousand years old? Back when it was written so......its like what 5-6 thousand years old? According to the bible? Funny that we have dated fossils and bones back to some off 230 Million years ago.

Do you even read or follow Science? Or does the good book tell you everything?

 

[Guest]

Answer the question. You cant answerer a question with another question. Unless it is a rehitoracle one.

I can respond to a question in the manner of my choosing. That said, my question is pointing out the differences between inductive and deductive reasoning. Deductive reasoning is conclusive leaving no other possibilities. Inductive reasoning is inconclusive leaving possibilities.

As for breathing my next breath, its not a belief its more so a fact. My brain sends messages to my body to work my lungs and inhale and exhale. Its not a act of god, its a motor function of the human body. Just like walking, blinking, and your heart beating.

This conclusion is based on inductive reasoning. It is possible you could die before breathing your next breath. Thus, there is no certainty or guarantee that you will breathe it. And wishful thinking does not qualify for deductive reasoning.

So, what is my point? Our perspectives on the world can either be inductive or deductive. Because of the complexity of the world, more often than not our conclusions are drawn through inductive reasoning. Thus, criticizing Christians for reaching their conclusions using inductive reasoning is rather silly. If you want to criticize Christians, do so on the grounds that their beliefs are not supported well enough rather than claiming their illogical (i.e., claimed to be deductive, but really are not).

Granted, I am probably speaking to abstractly here. So, I'm sure my point will fall on deaf ears.

Do you even read or follow Science?

Yes, I do. Do you know what my beliefs are about science and religion? No. So before you go on a rant about my beliefs, I suggest to take the time to read other things I have posted or ask me. Merely assuming what I believe based on your encounters with other Christians will only make you look foolish.

Or does the good book tell you everything?

Nope.

 

[Keelia]

Science and religion cant really co-exist. If u follow one you contradict the other or visa versa

 

[Guest]

Science and religion cant really co-exist. If u follow one you contradict the other or visa versa

Why?

 

[Keelia]

Science and religion cant really co-exist. If u follow one you contradict the other or visa versa

Why?

Because to believe in science puts Genesis aside and relies on factual evedience, not that of 2 people and snakes and such. Reality>fairy tales.

 

[Guest]

Because to believe in science puts Genesis aside and relies on factual evedience, not that of 2 people and snakes and such. Reality>fairy tales.

So, let me understand this correctly. Science and religion are incompatible because a literal interpretation of Genesis is incompatible with science, right?

 

[Vic C.]

Below is the original post. If we cannot stay inline with it, I suggest we just consider this topic closed.

I don't like the direction it's going and if I see ONE more reference to the Bible and Christianity being a fairy tale, banning will proceed.

 

[Keelia]

Are we still talking about the bible or Mother Goose? I tend to get them confused sometimes.

 

[Vic C.]

Unbelievable! Goodbye! :waving

 

[epistemaniac]

Are you seriously telling me that you know what I believe better than I do? I couldn't care less one way or the other regarding the existence of aliens and I think you will find that most Atheists feel the same way in regards to God, this is hardly what I or anyone would call religious faith. Billions of people have faith that lepricorns do not exist but that doesn't make it a religion. If you're so irrational why the deductive reasoning? Unlike yourself, most Christians do not find the belief in God 'irrational' at all, there may not be any hard evidence but we look around us and see the work of God everywhere.

It is not faith that leads Atheists to disbelieve in a god, it is the lack of scientific evidence!

the key phrase here is that atheists (or at least some atheists) disbelieve in god because the claim is that there is a lack of scientific evidence. But here's the thing.... you do not see people positing ontological or cosmological arguments for pink unicorns or aliens.... so the atheist that says something like this is making a direct claim to knowledge, not mere unbelief or non-belief or suspension of belief... the claim is that they have examined the evidence, or at least some of the evidence for the existence of God, and found it lacking. Otherwise they are making a claim based on ignorance, that they have not examined the evidence and yet they still claim that there is no scientific evidence for the existence of God. So, giving the rational atheist the benefit of the doubt, that they have indeed looked at least some of the evidence for the existence of God, and found it wanting, this then becomes a positive statement and truth claim regarding a belief, namely, that based on the evidence, no such being as god exists. If so, they are making a rational deduced positive statement about the nature of reality, namely, that, based on the evidence no such being as god exists. But here is what the atheist does not want to happen, they make these claims, that they merely possess non-belief versus unbelief because they do not want to have to support or defend their own claims. They want the ball to always be in the theists court, as if the theist always has to stand before their bar of rationality. But a statement like "based on the evidence no such being as god exists" is a positive truth claim, and one that is, itself, subject to scrutiny and the need for a rational defense. And the last thing the atheist wants, is to have their own claims scrutinized, because then they leaves open the possibility that their own claims are false. By trying to maintain this stance of a suspension of belief or of non-belief versus unbelief, they think they can have their cake (saying that they do not have to defend their own "abeliefs") and eat it too (insisting that Christians or Theists must defend and prove to them the veracity of their beliefs.) This is inconsistent and, itself, irrational on the part of the atheist making this claim.

But the atheist also continues to make a fundamental error in their thinking. They want to insist that scientific evidence be provided for them because the only propositions that constitutes actual knowledge are those which are testable by the use of the scientific method. However, this very statement "the only propositions that constitute actual knowledge are those which are testable by the use of the scientific method" is not itself able to be verified by the testability using the scientific method. Rather, it is a metaphysical dogmatic pronouncement based on the hidden presupposition of philosophical materialism.

Secondly, this sort of claim commits the Informal Fallacy of a Category Mistake. The atheist insists on scientific evidence for the existence of God, but God is by nature an immaterial being, and is therefore inherently not subject to testability in the scientific sense. Thus, science, due to its very nature and therefore its limitations, cannot ever make metaphysical pronouncements. The claim cannot be made that by demanding physical scientific evidence for a spiritual being, and then, by stacking the cards in this way, only accepting evidence arrived at by use of the physical sciences, then claim that because the existence of God cannot be deduced by use of the scientific method, that therefore the claim "God does not exist" is somehow arrived at in a rational way. In other words, science and the scientific method are simply not the only valid forms of arriving at knowledge, and the lack of physical evidence for a non-material being somehow proves that God does not exist..

"Wise Christians therefore will not feel threatened when challenged to put up (that is to prove something) or shut up. They will respond to this challenge by demanding that the evidentialist (and/or the philosophical materialist- ken) put up or shut up. After all, it is the evidentialist who insists that it is irrational and immoral to believe anything without proof (eg WK Clifford). There is no point in talking about Christianity's evidence until the evidentialist first produces the evidence for the thesis that underlies his challenge to the Christian. The wise Christian will refuse to be backed into the evidfentialists trap. He will not assume that his beliefs are substandard in some way unless he can first prove something". (Worldviews in Conflict, Ronald Nash, p91)

The atheist says that the proof for God's existence is not valid, therefore they are just as epsitemically obligated to offer their own proofs for why this is the case, as the Christian is for offering reasons for the hope that is within them.

1 Peter 3:15 (ESV) but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect"

blessings,
ken

 

[GojuBrian]

Science and religion cant really co-exist. If u follow one you contradict the other or visa versa

Why?

Thousands of scientists would disagree with you. :yes

 

[GojuBrian]

Back on topic as I see the other poster was banned.

I don't really think atheism is a religion, it's a non-religion, or the absence of belief. Completely illogical imo when I see the beautiful world around me.

That being said it leaves us with two forms of religion. Christianity, based on divine accomplishment and all others, based on human achievement. Human achievement will always be disappointed where as christianity realizes sin is unavoidable and we need forgiveness. :nod

 

[Gabe]

Science and religion cant really co-exist. If u follow one you contradict the other or visa versa

Why?

Thousands of scientists would disagree with you. :yes

:D Here is an article about this from The New York Times:

Scientists have been accused of playing God when they clone sheep, and of naysaying God when they insist that evolution be taught in school, but as a new study indicates, many scientists believe in God by the most mainstream, uppercase definition of the concept.

Repeating verbatim a famous survey first conducted in 1916, Edward J. Larson of the University of Georgia has found that the depth of religious faith among scientists has not budged regardless of whatever scientific and technical advances this century has wrought.

Then as now, about 40 percent of the responding biologists, physicists and mathematicians said they believed in a God who, by the survey's strict definition, actively communicates with humankind and to whom one may pray ''in expectation of receiving an answer.'' Roughly 15 percent in both surveys claimed to be agnostic or to have ''no definite belief'' regarding the question, while about 42 percent in 1916 and about 45 percent today said they did not believe in a God as specified in the questionnaire, although whether they believed in some other definition of a deity or an almighty being was not addressed.

The figure of unqualified believers is considerably lower than that usually cited for Americans as a whole. Gallup polls, for example, have found that about 93 percent of people surveyed profess a belief in God. But those familiar with the survey said that, given the questionnaire's exceedingly restrictive definition of God -- narrower than the standard Gallup question -- and given scientists' training to say exactly what they mean and nothing more, the 40 percent figure in fact is impressively high.

More revealing than the figures themselves, experts said, are their stability. The fact that scientists' private beliefs remained unchanged across almost a century defined by change suggests that orthodox religion is no more disappearing among those considered the intellectual elite than it is among the public at large. The results also indicate that, while science and religion often are depicted as irreconcilable antagonists, each a claimant to the throne of truth, many scientists see no contradiction between a quest to understand the laws of nature, and a belief in a higher deity.

The results of Dr. Larson's survey, which he conducted with a religion writer, Larry Witham of Burtonsville, Md., are to appear today in the journal Nature.

Dr. Larson did not try to determine whether the scientists he polled were Christian, Jewish, Muslim or any other creed, whether they went to religious services or otherwise attended to the rituals of a particular faith. He merely wanted to see what had happened in the 80-plus years since the renowned psychologist James Leuba asked 1,000 randomly selected scientists if they believed in God.

Mr. Leuba, a devout atheist, had predicted that a disbelief in God would grow as education spread, and Dr. Larson decided to use the psychologist's exact methods to see if the prediction held.

He polled the same number of researchers as had Mr. Leuba and used the same source for picking his subjects -- the directory ''American Men and Women of Science,'' a compendium of researchers successful enough to win awards and be cited regularly in the scientific literature. He followed Mr. Leuba's survey format to the letter, with the same introduction and the same questions written in the same stilted language, even enclosing the same type of return envelope. More than 600 of about 1,000 scientists answered the questionnaire, similar to Mr. Leuba's response rate.

In addition to the question about a belief in an accessible God, the survey asked whether the respondents believed in personal immortality, and if not, whether they would desire immortality anyway. Here there were some changes in the responses. In Mr. Leuba's survey, 50 percent of the scientists said they believed in personal immortality, a puzzling and inconsistent figure given the more modest 40 percent belief in God. Moreover, many doubters confessed to a strong desire for immortality. Dr. Larson found that his two statistics, a belief in God and in life everlasting matched; and that those who didn't believe in personal immortality had little wish for it. ''I see this as a healthy trend,'' he said. ''People have become more consistent, confident and comfortable with their world views.''

But of the divination that religion was on its way out, Dr. Larson writes, ''Leuba misjudged either the human mind or the ability of science to satisfy all human needs.''

source

 

[Rick W]

Science "says" nothing. Science makes no conclusions. Science is but a tool of man's devise, his thinking.
Science produces data. That all. Nothing else. The scientist or those using science develop the conclusions.

A defense attorney uses science to procure evidence to support the assumption his client is innocent. The prosecutor uses science to procure evidence to support the assumption he is guilty. Each looks for other evidence. Each ignores, overlooks or simply dismisses anything not looked for. Each case begins with an assumption as does any research or study. Nobody looks for something for no reason, no scientist researches an issue without cause. And nobody debates without first making an assumption. All as it should be.

Science is not an entity of it's own. Science "proves" nothing. Man, his mental process influenced by years of worldly experiences and observations, base his conclusions on what he believes is already known to him. Man makes the conclusions upon the evidence he seeks.

 

[Guest]

Science "says" nothing. Science makes no conclusions. Science is but a tool of man's devise, his thinking. Science produces data. That all. Nothing else. The scientist or those using science develop the conclusions.

Well, yes and no. It depends on the meaning of science intended. If one is using "science" to mean the scientific methodology, then you are correct. If one is using "science" to mean the collective knowledge, theories, and people involved, then you would be incorrect. So, before we can conclude science is merely a tool, we really need to understand what the person means by science. So, I agree, but I think we need to be careful here.