Atheism is the belief that there is no God. So, an atheist is one who categorically denies that there is a God. This is as opposed to an agnostic, who either claims that we cannot know whether there is a God (Immanuel Kant's agnosticism), or who says that they do not know whether there is a God (popular agnosticism).
However, it is impossible to hold such a position dogmatically without falling into absurdity. Albert Einstein once said that we know maybe 5% of all possible knowledge. Regardless of whatever that number really is, the point remains that what we know is a very limited subset of all possible knowledge. So, it logically follows that there always exists the possibility of the existence of God outside our current knowledge.
The only way we could be certain that God does not exist, is if we possessed all knowledge, across all time, in all locations. In order to know for certain that God does not exist, we would have to be omniscient. In fact, for someone to claim with authority that there is no God, that person would actually have to be God.
The best an atheist can actually do, is to claim that God does not exist, based on their current set of knowledge, which is much closer to popular agnosticism, rather than true atheism. Someone who makes the claim that God does not exist period, strikes me as being intellectually arrogant, as they are effectively claiming that they possess all knowledge. Thus atheism is untenable.IL2 FB Activation code
However, it is impossible to hold such a position dogmatically without falling into absurdity. Albert Einstein once said that we know maybe 5% of all possible knowledge. Regardless of whatever that number really is, the point remains that what we know is a very limited subset of all possible knowledge. So, it logically follows that there always exists the possibility of the existence of God outside our current knowledge.
The only way we could be certain that God does not exist, is if we possessed all knowledge, across all time, in all locations. In order to know for certain that God does not exist, we would have to be omniscient. In fact, for someone to claim with authority that there is no God, that person would actually have to be God.
The best an atheist can actually do, is to claim that God does not exist, based on their current set of knowledge, which is much closer to popular agnosticism, rather than true atheism. Someone who makes the claim that God does not exist period, strikes me as being intellectually arrogant, as they are effectively claiming that they possess all knowledge. Thus atheism is untenable.IL2 FB Activation code
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"Atheism is the belief that there is no God."Hmm, so what does that make me? I guess my philosophical position wrt God (any god) is: [my understanding / experience of] the universe does not require me to believe in God.I'm not saying unequivocally that There Is And Can Be No God Ever. I'm saying that I see no necessity to believe in God, so I can make the simplifying assumption that he does not exist.I'd always thought that that made me an atheist, but if you've a better label, I'm willing to hear it..IL2 FB Activation code
Stephen - the question then becomes, what would you regard as sufficient evidence to believe in God? Or what would criteria would you place on any evidence that could you be used for argue for God's existence?Repton - atheism is when you believe that there is abosultely no God. Agnosticism is either the belief that you cannot know if there is a God, or (more commonly) you don't know (and often don't care) if there is a God. Of course it's not always clear cut...IL2 FB Activation code
Stephen - the question then becomes, what would you regard as sufficient evidence to believe in God? Or what would criteria would you place on any evidence that could you be used for argue for God's existence?Repton - atheism is when you believe that there is abosultely no God. Agnosticism is either the belief that you cannot know if there is a God, or (more commonly) you don't know (and often don't care) if there is a God. Of course it's not always clear cut...IL2 FB Activation code
I agree with you that if God is omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, knowable personally (which as an evangelical Christian I believe), then it is very difficult to prove beyond any doubt.However, that is not terribly surprising. God has to balance making there be sufficient evidence available that those who want to find him do, and enough doubt so that those who want to ignore him can. God wants people to choose him willingly - that choice becomes impossible if it is really obvious that there is an omnipotent God. People would choose him out of fear, not love.Having said that, I do believe that the evidence for God is persuasive and compelling. Let me briefly mention 5 reasons (there are of course others, but there's a limit of what I can bring up off the top of my head in a hurry):1) God makes sense because of the universe's origins (cosmological argument).2) God makes sense because of the universe's and life's complexity (telelogical argument).3) God makes sense because of objective moral values (moral argument).4) God makes sense because of the resurrection of Jesus.5) God makes sense because he can be immediately experienced.I hope to write more on each these in the future.IL2 FB Activation code
I agree with you that if God is omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, knowable personally (which as an evangelical Christian I believe), then it is very difficult to prove beyond any doubt.However, that is not terribly surprising. God has to balance making there be sufficient evidence available that those who want to find him do, and enough doubt so that those who want to ignore him can. God wants people to choose him willingly - that choice becomes impossible if it is really obvious that there is an omnipotent God. People would choose him out of fear, not love.Having said that, I do believe that the evidence for God is persuasive and compelling. Let me briefly mention 5 reasons (there are of course others, but there's a limit of what I can bring up off the top of my head in a hurry):1) God makes sense because of the universe's origins (cosmological argument).2) God makes sense because of the universe's and life's complexity (telelogical argument).3) God makes sense because of objective moral values (moral argument).4) God makes sense because of the resurrection of Jesus.5) God makes sense because he can be immediately experienced.I hope to write more on each these in the future.IL2 FB Activation code
Dave Bryant your evidence of god does not make much sense, perhaps it is incomplete? But until you correct that I must say my opinion
1) God makes sense because of the universe's origins.
How exactly does, God just made it, make sense?IL2 FB Activation code
2) God makes sense because of the universe's and life's complexity.
It is complex but I doubt that means it was made by a god, it all seems to be a chain reaction of one thing to another over time.IL2 FB Activation code
3) God makes sense because of objective moral values.
From my viewpoint, God seems quite immoral. (I shall keep my answers short without backup like yours.)IL2 FB Activation code
4) God makes sense because of the resurrection of Jesus.
You are a Christian, so you must believe he was resurrected, but me as an Atheist I have be free to conclude many logical solutions to this story.IL2 FB Activation code
5) God makes sense because he can be immediately experienced.
This I do not understand, what is an experience of omnipotent god?
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Unless of course you are Richard Dawkins - he knows everything. IL2 FB Activation code
I can find two definitions of atheism: 1. A lack of belief in the existence of God or gods. 2. The doctrine or belief that there is no God.IL2 FB Activation code
Every atheist I know (including myself) would subscribe to definition 1, which is not believing in a god as opposed to a definitive belief that there is no god. Since there is no good, objective evidence for a god this is just common sense. IL2 FB Activation code
Therefore the original contention is a straw man.IL2 FB Activation code
The flaw with your argument is the notion that in order to know whether God doesn't exist we would have to be omniscient. This same argument can be applied to fairies, ogres, unicorns, pixies, little green men from the Planet Tralfamadore, etc. You have forgotten that simply because a word can be used to describe something or because a word can be defined by other words, that words are somehow 'real' or reflect 'reality'. This is falling prey to a reification error. IL2 FB Activation code
Humans are mesmerized by language. The words they speak, the books they read, the prayers they petition, the slogans they shout out all affect behavior and worldview, but why? What do words really have to do with reality, with nature, with the physical world? Are words themselves even real or simply things that somehow mirror reality? Perhaps 'mirror' is too strong a descriptor, or 'things' for that matter, since words are constructs that exist only in the mind. This means that words are cognitive objects, virtual referents, artificial placeholders for different types of denotata. IL2 FB Activation code
But what about those words that don't point back to things that cannot be found in nature—words like 'god', 'heaven', 'soul', 'angel', 'ghost', even 'truth' and 'falsity'—words that derive their meaning only by referencing other words? You can point to a tree and you can point to the word 'tree'; you can point to a rock and you can point to the word 'rock'; you can point to clouds and dogs and cats and stars, and point back to all these words as well, but terms like 'god', 'heaven', 'soul', and 'truth' exist only in the venue of words. You can't point to any of them, but only their words. You can say them, but you can't see them because they exist only in the mind as constituents of language. If you take away the language, where do they all go to, where can they be found? Without the use of language, without all that pointing back and forth to words, if we'd never been told of their existence would we have ever assumed belief in of any of them? IL2 FB Activation code
Human beings are sensate creatures. We are born, live, and die in a sensual universe, a physical realm, the natural world, all of which comprises our reality. We are bodies in space, associating with one another in time, effortlessly consorting in a pre-reflective 'lifeworld' (called Lebenswelt by Husserl, Being-in-the-World by Heidegger) which precedes the interior dimensions of language and logic. The eyes and ears, the tongue and nostrils, the muscles and skin—all allow us to interact with our environment and each other without ever needing to conjure the use of words. In this way we are co-equal with the other animals of our planet who communicate via flesh, bone, and blood, naturally and effortlessly, free to experience the immediacy of the world without having to seek approval or guidance through the use of phonics, alphabets, scripts, or equations. This is what it means to be alive in the real world—to embrace the churning performance of the universe without first needing the endorsement of words. We are each of us already vital beings and there is nothing else we need to do that can make us any more vital or lively, but most reject such vitality in the service of language. Most have attributed to words—a collection of artificial mental constructs—greater value and authority than the primal immediacy of their own lives. For the sake of words vibrant human beings would rather sacrifice themselves in the name of 'God', 'Allah', 'Patriotism', 'War on Terror', 'Jihad', 'Honor', 'Country', etc., than to embrace their own lives as the first fonts of meaning and value. Words—particularly those words that have no referents in the Real World—make for the devaulation of human life, the human spirit, the first order magnitude that belongs to each and every one of us. IL2 FB Activation code
I think you'll find many "atheists" do not categorically claim there is no God, but like Dawkins claim there "almost certainly is no God".IL2 FB Activation code
I've written a little about the differing definitions of atheism/agnosticism on my blog, too... IL2 FB Activation code
Soft Atheist, Hard AgnosticIL2 FB Activation code
You wrote: "However, it is impossible to hold such a position [atheism] dogmatically without falling into absurdity." Atheists, as far as I know, hold few if any positions dogmatically, they are totally opposed to that, it is the prison of the mind. We hold that the proof is in the hands of the believer. Prove your god exists, and we'll believe. How can anyone follow the dogma of someone or something that isn't even proven to exist? That means you see the words, you read the print, need no further proof, and follow those words. IL2 FB Activation code
I have found a very authentic book that says that Santa Claus is perfect, all powerful, created the universe and inspired the perfect book that tells about him. He says all we have to do is accept him as our savior and we'll go to heaven. If we don't, we go to hell. He also commands that if anyone accepts Santa and then changes their mind, we other Santa believers must kill him/her. We also must kill anyone who refuses to accept Santa as the savior, along with anyone with brown eyes. As I mentioned, this looks totally authentic to me. Should I follow Santa's dogmatic dictates or not? I don't want to miss the chance of heaven if I goof up. Or do you think I should try to prove that there really is a Santa since a lot of people are going to die if I am wrong? IL2 FB Activation code
Exactly what constitutes proof? He said he's all-powerful, and if he created the universe, that would surely be so. But he gave not a single proof of that creation in his book: not one word that would show future readers that he really had the power and knowledge to create the universe. He could easily have mentioned how many planets there were orbiting the sun, how long each orbit took, how the earth is tilted on its axis to create the long days and nights at the poles, and maybe the times to look out for Halley's Comet. Would that be proof positive? As close as most of us would need. And, since he's all powerful, he could come down and spend an evening with me on the couch explaining why it is so important for me to accept him as savior. That would probably be the clincher, especially if he included a couple of bounces off the moon or something similar along with the visit. Or I could just freeze my brain and say, "It's here in writing, Santa is my savior, that's all the proof I need." IL2 FB Activation code
About four billion people on this planet need no proof their gods exist--they read, they believe, they act. This in an age when maybe just two or three of those people who truly want to follow the murderous dogma of their gods can destroy all life on earth. See the headlines about Osama and his call to the Pakistanis--who you might know have nuclear weapons. I hope all believers in gods will demand proof they exist, the responsibility lies with them. For I, and other nonbelievers, have no belief or faith in any unproven god's genocidal dogma, we are not the threat. To prove your belief, try this: just start reading in Genesis with this thought in mind: God didn't write this book, uneducated, primitive men with no scientific training or knowledge did. Every word instantly makes total sense--the genocidal, murderous, petty, god of the few with his favorite tribe in the small cultural area of his concern becomes understandable. As do the multiple errors, repetitions, endless lists of births and deaths, totally unscientific information, etc.--yes it all now is perfectly clear. Gods didn't make man, man made gods, their writing proves it.IL2 FB Activation code