Assuming God exists

[Surlethe]

Is assuming God exists in order to disprove his existance a valid argument for atheists to employ? Why or why not? (Created to avoid derailing yet another thread with this argument)

[Darth Wong]

Is assuming God exists in order to disprove his existance a valid argument for atheists to employ? Why or why not? (Created to avoid derailing yet another thread with this argument)

I would actually argue that in most of the cases where it appears that an atheist is assuming God exists, he really isn't. He's just discussing God as if he exists because that's easier than adding the disclaimer "if he really existed, which I don't think is true" after every single time he mentions his name.

[Surlethe]

That's what I meant when I said atheists assume God exists; it's not as though they're actually believing for the course of the argument, any more than I believe any argument when I'm deconstructing it ad absurdum.

[Gaidin]

Wong's got the mark on this one. It's nothing more than a proof by contradiction and running down the list until something doesn't work. Its a rather useful method if you remember it in the right situations. Not sure if this would be a right situation for it though.

[DarkKnight]

Its the only way to disprove a religion. They can claim anything scientific as invalid because of "faith" but internal contradictions are undeniable (although fundies will plug their ears and scream as loud as they can if confronted with them).

[Darth Wong]

That's the thing about the "flying spaghetti monster" argument. Honor&Glory tried to misrepresent it as atheists sincerely pretending to believe in the FSM, but the whole point of the FSM is to say "IF I believed in the FSM, even though I don't."

[Sammur-amat]

you cant disprove religion its among mankind since the beginings...and will stay that way no matter how many "true faiths" or how many believers are out there....any "solid prove to disprove gods exsistence" just want be accepted by people who need sum "divine intervention", and the number of those are great..

[Trey]

What people don't realize is this: you can't ever 'prove' or 'disprove' anything, an atheist could never disprove Christianity, a Christian could never disprove atheism, what it comes down to is what we believe. That is the end all for every thing- almost everything we have an opinion on is because we believe it to be true, not that we know it is true.

[Shaun]

What people don't realize is this: you can't ever 'prove' or 'disprove' anything, an atheist could never disprove Christianity, a Christian could never disprove atheism, what it comes down to is what we believe. That is the end all for every thing- almost everything we have an opinion on is because we believe it to be true, not that we know it is true.

Yes, you can disprove some things. I can prove that I dont have a car, I can prove that i am male, I can prove that i live in a house. And what we believe to be true and what is true can be two entirely different things. I can beleive that I have a car, but i sure as hell dont. See? If a thousand people beleive in a lie, its still a lie.

[Trey]

Yes, you can disprove some things. I can prove that I dont have a car, I can prove that i am male, I can prove that i live in a house. And what we believe to be true and what is true can be two entirely different things. I can beleive that I have a car, but i sure as hell dont. See? If a thousand people beleive in a lie, its still a lie.

I said what we have an opinion on, not material things. Read my post before you criticise it.

[Darth Wong]

What people don't realize is this: you can't ever 'prove' or 'disprove' anything, an atheist could never disprove Christianity, a Christian could never disprove atheism, what it comes down to is what we believe. That is the end all for every thing- almost everything we have an opinion on is because we believe it to be true, not that we know it is true.

You can prove or disprove things beyond a reasonable doubt. You just can't prove or disprove them beyond an unreasonable doubt. There are methods for disproving a story (or alibi) which any jury would consider sufficient to sentence a man to life imprisonment or death, but which religious people would not consider sufficient for disproving their faith.

[Visna]

I have always wondered why on earth it's so important to prove/disprove the existance of God, a divine being, a higher intelligence, call it what you will. Could anyone please enlighten me?
Personally I rate God's existance around 50-50... And my belief is in my heart. I don't force it on anyone, I simply "use" it for spiritual comfort. And as long as people keep spirituality and pretty much eveything else seperated what's wrong with either one?

[Darth Wong]

I have always wondered why on earth it's so important to prove/disprove the existance of God, a divine being, a higher intelligence, call it what you will. Could anyone please enlighten me?

Do you believe that the quest for knowledge is useless in and of itself?

Besides, given that non-religious people are often forced to obey religious rules (as we see quite often in the newspapers with various current political issues such as gay marriage), I think it is indeed important to establish that religion has no claim whatsoever on existing outside of peoples' own desires and beliefs. It is the belief that one's religion has more credibility than mere superstition that gives theists the moral leverage they feel they need in order to force other people to obey their rules.

Personally I rate God's existance around 50-50... And my belief is in my heart. I don't force it on anyone, I simply "use" it for spiritual comfort. And as long as people keep spirituality and pretty much eveything else seperated what's wrong with either one?

They don't keep it separated. Look at the constant assaults on church/state separation from the right wing.

[Visna]

Do you believe that the quest for knowledge is useless in and of itself?

Not exactly useless, but I think it needs a motivating factor. This can be anything from a desire to know more about a certain subject to please an intellectual curiousity to a way to impress members of the opposite sex.

Besides, given that non-religious people are often forced to obey religious rules (as we see quite often in the newspapers with various current political issues such as gay marriage), I think it is indeed important to establish that religion has no claim whatsoever on existing outside of peoples' own desires and beliefs. It is the belief that one's religion has more credibility than mere superstition that gives theists the moral leverage they feel they need in order to force other people to obey their rules.

I guess things function differently at your location. Here the religious objections to almost everything has practically died out. That doesn't mean that some don't object to issues like gay marriage, or even worse gay adoption, but it's my impression that they attempt to base those objections on personal/moral grounds, rather than the guidelines for good behaviour written in an old book.

They don't keep it separated. Look at the constant assaults on church/state separation from the right wing.

Those numbnuts do more damage to religion than all the atheists of the world put together could ever hope to achieve.

Your conclusions are inseperable from the feeling of comfort they give you. Not a sound basing to put forward a probability, even if it is your personal assumption.

Didn't mean to derail the thread, I was merely trying to show that it's possible to be religious and believe in God with your heart, while at the same time using the brain to set a (IMO) likely probabality for the existance of said God. :original:

[I Have a Clever Name]

Is assuming God exists in order to disprove his existance a valid argument for atheists to employ? Why or why not? (Created to avoid derailing yet another thread with this argument)

Assuming God's existence? Certainly not. Entertaining the notion of God for the sake of argument is perfectly acceptable, however. Unfortunately, this is generally a traumatic experience for a few of the less sophisticated theists on the forum and can lead to an imbroglio of superlative proportions.

[I Have a Clever Name]

Personally I rate God's existance around 50-50... And my belief is in my heart. I don't force it on anyone, I simply "use" it for spiritual comfort.

Your conclusions are inseperable from the feeling of comfort they give you. Not a sound basing to put forward a probability, even if it is your personal assumption.

[I Have a Clever Name]

I was merely trying to show that it's possible to be religious and believe in God with your heart, while at the same time using the brain to set a (IMO) likely probabality for the existance of said God.

I hate people referring to the heart metaphorically! I presume you're relating to two aspects of human thought, rationality and sentimentality? Its an interesting perception, perhaps theists listen to the 'heart' side of things rather than the 'brain', and for atheists its vice versa? Being the latter, I cannot however grasp how somebody could come to the logical assumption that God is disprovable beyond reasonable doubt, and yet foster a sentimental 50/50 view. I would propose instead that the distinction would be between what you know is most plausible, and what you wish to believe (hope and purpose aid survival after all).

Interested to hear your thoughts.

[Visna]

I hate people referring to the heart metaphorically! I presume you're relating to two aspects of human thought, rationality and sentimentality? Its an interesting perception, perhaps theists listen to the 'heart' side of things rather than the 'brain', and for atheists its vice versa? Being the latter, I cannot however grasp how somebody could come to the logical assumption that God is disprovable beyond reasonable doubt, and yet foster a sentimental 50/50 view. I would propose instead that the distinction would be between what you know is most plausible, and what you wish to believe (hope and purpose aid survival after all).

Interested to hear your thoughts.

Heh, sorry. Didn't mean to offend you with my whole "heart" thing. I hope you mean that you hate it when people do such things. And not hate the pople who do it. :wink:
But yes, I am referring to rationality and sentimentality. By all means, use rationality to run governments, I too prefer it that way. What i don't understand, though, is the desire which almost approaches unhealthy levels to prove/disprove the existance of God. Something it seems both camps suffer from...
Belief in God gives me a sort of spiritual comfort and it offers something no human relations can possibly match. I just think it's important to keep belief and knowledge seperate. They function on two different levels. Heart and brain. Oooops, it just slipped out.

[Darth Wong]

Someone actually presented an interesting argument that a monotheistic God is actually two conjoined propositions:

1) That this god exists.
2) That all other deities do not exist.

The second proposition means that the conjoined proposition of a monotheistic God is actually defeated by the very "you can't prove he doesn't exist" logic that is common among believers. Anyone who employs that logic must take the possibility of the existence of any supernatural deity seriously. If there are X number of possible supernatural deities, and monotheistic belief systems must deny all other deities, this means that the probability of a monotheistic deity is 1/X. Since X is actually infinity, it means that the probability of a monotheistic belief system being true is 1/infinity, which approaches zero.

Of course, atheism doesn't suffer from this problem because we don't adopt the "you have to take it seriously unless you can prove it doesn't exist" logic in the first place.

[Legatus Legionis]

Is assuming God exists in order to disprove his existance a valid argument for atheists to employ? Why or why not? (Created to avoid derailing yet another thread with this argument)

Like most o you, I have done much thinking on this subject. I cannot prove Gods existence or nonexistence. I can only prove such an existence in not omnipotent. I have decided there must be what I will call a “Grand Architect” of some sort. I say architect in a try for simplicity.

I believe a Grand Architect does exist, but NOT in the traditional Christian sense. Consider the following paradoxes if you will. Once you understand them, which shouldn’t be too hard, your imagination will spark.

God is not all-powerful as he cannot build a wall he cannot jump over.

Being both Omniscient and Omnipotent is illogical. If God can change the future to something unknown by him he would not be omniscient. If he could not change the future to something unknown to him he would not be omnipotent.