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kraftiekortie
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27 Mar 2015, 10:02 am

I don't believe the syllogistic/algorithmic method of logic necessarily leads to resolutions.

That's what they relied upon in medieval cloisters.

We are past the Renaissance at this point.



badgerface
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27 Mar 2015, 10:27 am

Reading some of the posts over the last few pages, it's so so clear that people who believe in a "god" really have no idea that the more they push their explanation and justification of why they believe in a "god" the more deluded and in some cases laughably ridiculous they sound . . . I now read this thread for amusement.

Seriously, believe in a bearded man sat on a cloud throwing lightning, believe "in your heart" in a pulsating blob of invisible energy suspended somewhere in a magical alternate dimension that has ultimate authority and decides whether or not you can eat a bacon sandwich or f*ck someone of the same gender if you want. But, please know that while you have every right to hold those beliefs, others also have the right to find those beliefs to be utterly f*cking ridiculous.


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Canadian1911
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27 Mar 2015, 10:31 am

Connecting "god" with autism:

It's been a little over a week that I've been a member of this forum. Before I joined, I was under the impression that since I'm autistic and atheist, and every one of my IRL autistic friends is atheist, than autism and atheism must have some connection - one autistic friend of mine said it may be because we are less susceptible to social pressure and thats a major way religion and theism spread.

But having read this thread, and others on the forum - I have been proven wrong, which is sad as I thought maybe us autistics could one day fix the world and eliminate irrational thinking. I have also sadly learnt that autistics can be just as foolish as NT's.



trollcatman
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27 Mar 2015, 10:40 am

Canadian1911 wrote:
Connecting "god" with autism:

It's been a little over a week that I've been a member of this forum. Before I joined, I was under the impression that since I'm autistic and atheist, and every one of my IRL autistic friends is atheist, than autism and atheism must have some connection - one autistic friend of mine said it may be because we are less susceptible to social pressure and thats a major way religion and theism spread.

But having read this thread, and others on the forum - I have been proven wrong, which is sad as I thought maybe us autistics could one day fix the world and eliminate irrational thinking. I have also sadly learnt that autistics can be just as foolish as NT's.


The best predictor of someone's religion is probably location. I've seen more religious people on here than in real life since almost no one is religious around where I live in the Netherlands.



Canadian1911
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27 Mar 2015, 10:47 am

^^

I went to a catholic school, not only did i not fit in because of autism, but I also didn't fit in even more because in grade 6 I told my Educational Assistant that "there is no god"... and I was especially vocal and challenging in High School.

But yes, you tend to be the religion that is native to your region.



appletheclown
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27 Mar 2015, 11:25 am

Still a thread representing the dichotomy of 'true atheism' vs 'agnosticism'.
I'm beginning to think the non-religious are making stuff up.


And you don't tell people about your religion when they are telling you why your wrong, you tell people who want to listen.
That way you won't waste your time trying to swim up a tree.


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AngelRho
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27 Mar 2015, 11:35 am

trollcatman wrote:
AngelRho wrote:
trollcatman wrote:

There are still three problems:
1- I didn't see any proof that an infinite chain of causes is impossible.
2- I didn't see any proof that uncaused causes are impossible.
3- I don't follow the "therefore --> God".

And of course, it does not mean that the "God" is YOUR God, it could just as well be someone else's God(/s) :twisted:

The question was how one can prove there is a God. A logical proof was given. This response is an example of goalpost-moving. You got your proof, so now you're going to demand proof for something tangential?

This is interesting, well…almost…because it demonstrates how quick one can be to unreasonably hand-wave something that is reasonable.


I responded to this: "An infinite chain of causes is impossible, therefore God must exist."
No evidence is given for the first half of the sentence, so I'll just dismiss it for now.
The second half does not follow from the first half, so we are left with pretty much nothing.

Hand waving+goalpost moving = rational thinking?



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27 Mar 2015, 11:38 am

Canadian1911 wrote:
I have been proven wrong, which is sad as I thought maybe us autistics could one day fix the world and eliminate irrational thinking.

Is it possible that believing in God is the rational position and the atheist position is the irrational one?



AngelRho
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27 Mar 2015, 11:39 am

appletheclown wrote:
Still a thread representing the dichotomy of 'true atheism' vs 'agnosticism'.
I'm beginning to think the non-religious are making stuff up.


And you don't tell people about your religion when they are telling you why your wrong, you tell people who want to listen.
That way you won't waste your time trying to swim up a tree.

"Cast not pearls…"



daniel1948
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27 Mar 2015, 11:41 am

Lintar wrote:
daniel1948 wrote:
Lintar wrote:
Everyone has faith in something. Even atheists do. They have the unshakeable faith that they are right...


That's just nonsense. Faith is belief without evidence, or in the face of contrary evidence.


Who told you this? Was it Richard Dawkins or Daniel Dennett by any chance? Was it Hitchens? Harris?

No, what you claim here is simply not true. What you have outlined here is NOT faith, of any kind. You obviously have not examined this issue in any true depth, obviously preferring to parrot the simplistic cliches of the militant atheists in our midst. Faith is as I described it.


You have a very poor understanding of the dogma of your own religion if you don't even know the dictionary definition of "faith" as "belief in things unseen," which is to say, belief without evidence. The fathers of the Catholic Church, and many deeply religious authors like James Joyce and W.B. Yeats were quite specific in believing that faith is most valued when there's no evidence for it.



Lintar wrote:
... Tell me something; the premeditated taking of another life, one not done in self-defence or for any other mitigating reason (ex. in order to prevent the deaths of others in a hostage situation). Just for the 'fun' of it. Is such an act wrong? Yes, no, or 'it depends'?


Why so many "mitigating" factors? I'm a pacifist. I believe killing is always wrong. It's the theists who make up all sorts of excuses for when it's okay to kill people. Look at all the stonings commanded in the Old Testament. Look at all the people burned at the stake for believing the "wrong" religion. Most of the Protestants I know (including all the evangelicals I know) support the death penalty, which is the killing of someone who has already been caught and confined to prevent their further crimes, but the Protestants with their absolute morality demand they be killed.

Lintar wrote:
Lots of cool superpowers?!?! How old are you? The Greek and Roman gods were not gods at all. That's why we use lower-case 'g'. 'God' is not Graeco-Roman (or Babylonian, Aztec...). The old classical gods are irrelevant, because we all know they do not really exist. We've moved on since then.

I'm 66 years old, though that's irrelevant. And your statements are just plain silly. The Judeo-Christian-Islamic God is capitalized because it's used as a proper noun, while the Greek and Roman gods are capitalized when we use their names.

But if the best you can offer as "proof" that your god is the only god, is the common convention of capitalizing the word God, then you have a pretty poor argument indeed.

By the way, your "God" began as one of those myriad "gods" of ancient times. In early Old Testament times, Jahweh was just one out of many gods. He never claimed to be the only god, or to be all-powerful. He was just the one god among many who chose the Israelites to worship him. It was not until much later that Jews and then Christians decided that he was the only god.

You cannot imagine how perfectly silly it sounds for a believer in one religion to insist so fervently that "everyone knows" that the gods of other religions are not real. I've got news for you: No gods are real, and that includes the one whose name you capitalize.

Lintar wrote:
... Humans ARE important...


That sort of ridiculous self-aggrandizement is typical of religion. Humans are important to humans. In the grand scheme of the universe, we are less than a speck on a speck within an infinite volume of space. I think you must be very young if you think that simply asserting that "humans are important" is any sort of an argument for anything other than your own hubris.


aghogday wrote:
... I write free verse poetry, dude.


You call that stuff poetry??? Well, I'm not surprised. There are people who throw buckets of paint at a canvas and call it art.



daniel1948
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27 Mar 2015, 11:46 am

AngelRho wrote:
Canadian1911 wrote:
I have been proven wrong, which is sad as I thought maybe us autistics could one day fix the world and eliminate irrational thinking.

Is it possible that believing in God is the rational position and the atheist position is the irrational one?


It would be if there was evidence for God. The rational position is to follow where the evidence leads. The irrational position is to assume the truth of a two- to three-thousand year-old book and then invent silly arguments to support it. In the absence of any evidence for God the rational position is to not believe there is one.



AngelRho
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27 Mar 2015, 11:54 am

daniel1948 wrote:
AngelRho wrote:
Canadian1911 wrote:
I have been proven wrong, which is sad as I thought maybe us autistics could one day fix the world and eliminate irrational thinking.

Is it possible that believing in God is the rational position and the atheist position is the irrational one?


It would be if there was evidence for God. The rational position is to follow where the evidence leads. The irrational position is to assume the truth of a two- to three-thousand year-old book and then invent silly arguments to support it. In the absence of any evidence for God the rational position is to not believe there is one.

If God created the heavens and the earth, and the heavens and the earth exist, then you have evidence of God.

How is it rational to assume a book is untrue just because it's ancient? The sun, moon, and stars are ancient and have been written about for thousands of years. Is it rational to assume they do not exist?



daniel1948
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27 Mar 2015, 11:59 am

Nebogipfel wrote:
Neoliberalism needs counterpoints sometimes so that entrepreneurs don't feel that they have free reign to kidnap slaves for the auction block. Religion can be a powerful counterpoint.


During the entire period of time when slavery was extant, religion was the bedrock that supported it. Religion was the argument offered in favor of it. The Bible justified slavery and even Jesus, who was ahead of his time on many matters, failed to condemn it. In the southern states of the United States today, there is still a remnant of religious bigots (and only religious bigots) who continue to justify slavery, on religious grounds, and bemoan the outcome of the Civil War.

After the Civil War, religion was the argument and the only argument used to oppose civil rights for the freed slaves and their descendants. Opposition to slavery and support for civil rights came from liberal religion and from non-religious people, but opposition to civil rights came only from Christians, and religion and the Bible were their only argument.



daniel1948
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27 Mar 2015, 12:06 pm

AngelRho wrote:
How is it rational to assume a book is untrue just because it's ancient? The sun, moon, and stars are ancient and have been written about for thousands of years. Is it rational to assume they do not exist?


We don't assume the Bible is wrong just because it's ancient. Rather, we say that because it was written and compiled by people who did not know the first thing about the laws of nature, it is not a reliable source of information. Further, we have clear evidence of numerous errors in it. Therefore it is not inerrant. And if it makes some errors, then nothing it says can be taken on faith without supporting evidence. It also contains so many contradictions, that some of its statements must be wrong.

So we have:

Authors who don't know what they're talking about;
Statements that are demonstrably wrong; and
Internal contradictions.

All of this leads to a very unreliable source. Not everything in the Bible is wrong, but a lot of it is wrong.

You, on the other hand, assume it is true just because it claims to be the word of god.



trollcatman
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27 Mar 2015, 12:09 pm

AngelRho wrote:
trollcatman wrote:
AngelRho wrote:
trollcatman wrote:

There are still three problems:
1- I didn't see any proof that an infinite chain of causes is impossible.
2- I didn't see any proof that uncaused causes are impossible.
3- I don't follow the "therefore --> God".

And of course, it does not mean that the "God" is YOUR God, it could just as well be someone else's God(/s) :twisted:

The question was how one can prove there is a God. A logical proof was given. This response is an example of goalpost-moving. You got your proof, so now you're going to demand proof for something tangential?

This is interesting, well…almost…because it demonstrates how quick one can be to unreasonably hand-wave something that is reasonable.


I responded to this: "An infinite chain of causes is impossible, therefore God must exist."
No evidence is given for the first half of the sentence, so I'll just dismiss it for now.
The second half does not follow from the first half, so we are left with pretty much nothing.

Hand waving+goalpost moving = rational thinking?


How is this goalpost moving? I was responding to that one sentence, which was just a statement without anything to back it up. Maybe the poster gave evidence in the other 82 pages but I can't keep up with this thread.
- "an infinite chain of causes is impossible" no explanation given as to why
- "THEREFORE God must exist" no idea how you can arrive at this conclusion based on the preceding bit

I have not even said anything about the existence of God or anything else, just that this one sentence is pretty useless. I'm personally both atheist and agnostic, I wasn't raised in a religious way so my default position is "probably no gods", but I am aware that I don't know for certain. I don't think any discussion of "first causes" or other causality things are going to give definitive proof of either the existence or non-existence of God/gods.



AngelRho
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27 Mar 2015, 12:15 pm

daniel1948 wrote:
AngelRho wrote:
How is it rational to assume a book is untrue just because it's ancient? The sun, moon, and stars are ancient and have been written about for thousands of years. Is it rational to assume they do not exist?


We don't assume the Bible is wrong just because it's ancient. Rather, we say that because it was written and compiled by people who did not know the first thing about the laws of nature, it is not a reliable source of information. Further, we have clear evidence of numerous errors in it. Therefore it is not inerrant. And if it makes some errors, then nothing it says can be taken on faith without supporting evidence. It also contains so many contradictions, that some of its statements must be wrong.

So we have:

Authors who don't know what they're talking about;
Statements that are demonstrably wrong; and
Internal contradictions.

All of this leads to a very unreliable source. Not everything in the Bible is wrong, but a lot of it is wrong.

You, on the other hand, assume it is true just because it claims to be the word of god.

So it's a rational position to assume that people who don't know every single law of nature must be wrong about everything?