question no. 17 for atheists

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curious to know...how can you be certain there is no 'god'. do you have proof? i do not.

it's the same question i would ask believers. they, of course,would say they just know. there is no proof. believers simply make my brain hurt (and that's difficult to do)!

i consider myself an agnostic. i would say i'm 99% certain there is no god.. help me out. show me how i can get over that last hurdle. what allowed you to be 100% certain there is no 'god'?

perhaps, as is common for me, i am using a bogus dictionary again. do you have to be 100% certain there is no god to be considered an atheist?

The demand that atheists have total certainty there is no God is idiotic. I am not 100% certain there is no tyrannosaurus rex wandering the wilds of the Amazon jungle. We don't live on total certainties. We live on reasonable probabilities and it seems very reasonable there is no God and I structure my life on that. Religion in general strikes me as so unreasonable it cannot be taken seriously.

ok, i'll admit to be being brain damaged....and a white trash slumdweller.....and clueless about human interactions.....and gimpy........and just generally lost.......but i really did not think the question was idiotic or formed by an idiot. i, sir, was in the vietnam war ,so, i have known some idiots. you'll have to agree with that.

so let me try again....what is the difference between an atheist and an agnostic....cause now i'm really confused.

oh, you'll be glad to know....i've walked, ran, bicycled, rowed, you name it, through a good part of the amazon area (wasteland and jungle) and not a sign of a t-rex....not even a velociraptor.

because the concept of "god" is defied of logic.

simply ask: "if there is a god, then why <insert whatever wonders you here> ?"

i don't need proof. it just makes no sense.

Agnostics hold to the opinion that there is insignificant proof to either confirm nor deny the existence of deities - from the Greek Agnostos meaning 'not known' or 'unknowable'.

Atheists, on the other hand, believe that there are no deities.

It is idiotic to ask an atheist for proof of their denial of God or gods because their position is diametrically opposed to theists. Absolute proof is unnecessary to an atheist due to lack of empirical evidence that supernatural beings exist.

Why would one assume that something exists without evidence? There is no proof of any deities. There are many various myths centered around deities but there are also as many stories about Superman and the X-Men. The only reason one has to believe is that they are indoctrinated at some point; whether it's early on in life or later at a point of mental weakness (ie, there are gaps in understand that need to be filled).

To me, god is like the ultimate blue screen: it's a human memory leak where to plug the hole, one simply calls it god or gods.

I was not trying to insult you or imply that you were idiotic. I merely tried to indicate that all knowledge is uncertain and as data is accumulated probabilities can be estimated. We all live in a world of probabilities and when we decide that we can be operationally certain of a situation we stop doubting it until conflicting data is perceived. I have no idea what you encountered as a Vietnam veteran just as you have no idea of what I encountered as a veteran of World War II. I am sure the occurrence of idiocy is common enough so we both are familiar with its characteristics.

Atheism is an attitude I find useful with a very large degree of certainty. I see no point in assigning doubt to the existence of a God as that would play no part in my decisions. An agnostic probably does consider the vague possibility of a God in any action. Neither one of us can be absolutely certain.

When I was about three or four years old I logically deduced that Santa Claus didn't exist.

My mother beamed with pride and said I was a clever little boy.

The next year I logically deduced that the Bible story was a fairy tale.

My mother wasn't at all pleased but she allowed me to quit Sunday School because I was demanding answers to questions that they could not answer.

This has been the pattern of my life ever since. I have been a "seeker after truth" but if someone offers me their "truth" I must do my best to knock it down. I will believe something only if it withstands all my efforts to find fault with it.

I wish I could be a happy little clam. I wish I could "belong" and find meaning in Christianity or Islam or Scientology or Communism or whatever.

So now I an unhappy cynical old curmudgeon but at least I am not a "sucker" to follow some false prophet.

I'll answer. An atheist lives as if there is no god. Absolute certainty isnt needed, just a willingness not to worry about it. Agnosts must worry about it somewhat more because they are hedging their bets. Which is silly. An open mind wont do you a squick of good if you come face to face with an almighty being that demands belief and subservience. You cant hedge your way into heaven.

Next, as said already, the concept of a god as put forth by religions is inconsistent with logic. So even if a logic sustained god did exist, extant religionists are doing it wrong. Knowingly doing something the wrong way is madness. So atheists cannot pretend or even vacillate.

So why exactly are you an agnost?

There is no, and there never has been any empirical basis on which to conclude that supernatural gods exists. It is quite possible that natural beings who mental endowments put them far beyond humans could exist. We have not met any such beings but there is not principle in physical laws that make such natural and advanced beings possible.

The late Arthur C. Clarke said that any technology sufficiently advanced over ours would appear to be magic or miraculous.

ruveyn

Maybe Q from Star Trek would qualify .

thanks to all that have replied. as i agree with almost (there i go again) everything that has been written here, i seem to believe (BEEELIEVE) by most standards i should call myself an atheist. semantics.

i could never belong to a religious group. my one scary/bizarre incident with true believers was enough to keep me from ever going to a 'church'. my contempt for all religious 'leaders' is unsurpassed. ok, i would go to a church to rescue an animal.....but that's it.

i have contact with only one human. she is the veterinarian who cares for my companion animals. her day job is surgeon for several local humane societies/animal rescue groups. she allows me to help with difficult surgeries and she is patient enough to listen to me though my speech difficulties make that trying. we are not 'friends' , i suppose she considers me a project. her father is a baptist preacher. her mother attends a fundamentalist church. she is married to a 'sincere catholic'. she is a true believer. how could she not be?

she has helped me understand nt's in ways i could not do on my own. i am sure that because she is the only human who has ever been 'kind' to me, she has some influence on me. it's hard to believe she is delusional when it comes 'god'.......but of course, she is. she is a very intelligent person and also 'very kind to me' so it is hard to discount her on anything. i may be so emotionally damaged that it's impossible for me to be certain about anything .

as i write this glenn beck is being highlighted on the news. he's in washington, with sarah palin, at 'his' rally and they are talking about taking back america, about turning america back to god. i 'hate' these people. my contempt for them is as great as yours. they want us dead.

i have been discriminated against in every way you can imagine. the worst instances have been by bible thumpers,
in work situations especially. if there is a 'god'.........he's (it's) no friend of mine.

Prove that god exists then

that is impossible. The assertion "God Exists" is empirically without meaning so it can neither be affirmed nor denied empirically. It is like trying to PROVE that Unicorns don't exists. No one has seen any but that in and of itself does not prove the do not or cannot exist.

ruveyn

nice word there - "squick"

i don't think of agnostics as hedging their bets as much as refusing to believe in the existence or the non-existence in god since it can no more be proved than disproved. by that logic this is the only "correct" belief.

but theists believe in a variety of different gods, and each thinks his / hers is the "correct" belief also.

i could be wrong. there could be a god. there could be a loch ness monster. crop circles could be made by aliens. winter could deliberately extend itself six weeks as a result of punxsatawney pete seeing his shadow. the 13th floor in a hotel could be less prone to poltergeist hauntings because it is called the 14th floor, and houses on 13th street could have fewer break-ins because the street is called euclid.

whatever my beliefs i will never be accosting strangers in airports to give them pamphlets, claiming they have holes in their souls and need to be saved.