Forums → WEPR → [nec]Christianity vs Atheism
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I am a christian, i and i strongly belive in my lord jesus christ, and i also belive that if you belive in him and except him as your savior, u will go to heaven. and i also believe that he created the world, not the big bang, or that we came from stupid apes.
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Again, I think this conflating the notions of illogical and irrational. To try to show theism itself to be illogical just can't be done in any interesting way. It does not go against any standardly accepted rules of logic. If it does, I'd love to hear which ones.
One overall point I can think of from every theistic belief I'm aware of is like "I don't know how X happened, so I know god/s did it."
Basically it makes a claim of knowledge without actually knowing.
Maybe you're also conflating theism with particular varieties of theism, e.g., Christianity. You may be able to show within a large system of beliefs like Christians have, that there are some inconsistent statements.
Well first of all considering the title of this thread I figured it was a given we were talking about Christian theistic views. Which defiantly violates such laws of logic.
Theism in general doesn't really use logic.
You and I might not accept the kind of evidence that theists of all kinds give for their specific beliefs. Many Christians, for example, see evidence of God's presence and love everywhere in the world. And this is something I think many of them do truly feel.
Yes, I realize there's more to this than what I'm presenting. There are problems of question begging abound. But if we just deny this evidence out of hand, we're not doing ourselves any favors. The conversation has to meet somewhere in the middle.
It's not a matter of just not excepting the evidence presented. What get's claimed as evidence is far from true evidence.
Look at what's presented as evidence, feelings, personal experience, circular reasoning with a collection of stories saying it's real, flat out lies, and debunked artifacts.
There is a reason why this isn't accepted as valid evidence and why it should be thrown out. We shouldn't have to give religion special treatment when it comes to proving it's claims.
Except that a straw-man isn't a logical fallacy - it's an informal fallacy. You don't violate any laws of logic by straw manning someone.
Used in the general sense logical fallacies do encompass informal fallacies.
Again, I think this conflating the notions of illogical and irrational. To try to show theism itself to be illogical just can't be done in any interesting way. It does not go against any standardly accepted rules of logic. If it does, I'd love to hear which ones.
Well the very foundations of theism derive their truth from circular logic, which is fallacious. e.g. the bible is true because it's god's word. god is true because the bible says so.
Yes, I realize there's more to this than what I'm presenting. There are problems of question begging abound. But if we just deny this evidence out of hand, we're not doing ourselves any favors. The conversation has to meet somewhere in the middle.
There is no meeting in the middle. Either there is factual, observable, demonstrable evidence or there is not. Personal experience does not make something a fact. Also, many 'ersonal experiences' are either emotions or events which can be explained by scientific means.
What the hell are you talking about? Whose books? Are you talking about religion now, or theism? It sounds an awful lot like you're talking about religion.
Christianity, Islam, Hinduism. These are theistic faiths which derive their 'truth' from books. Other theistic faiths derive their 'truth' from word of mouth, stories, and fables. All are based on circular logic. Find me one theistic faith which doesn't rely on stories, whether spoken or written, to confirm their tenets.
What logical fallacy? Are you talking about circular reasoning? Because yet again, you seem to not understand what these informal fallacies are. It might be poor reasoning, but it does not generate a contradiction.
Actually circular reasoning is a formal logical fallacy, not an informal one.
You can be justified in a false belief. I had justification for Santa Claus being real - lots of it. But my belief was still false, and it sucked when I found out.
I do not doubt that theists have great justification for their beliefs. I am simply stating that there is no empirical evidence for such a belief, so to put forth that belief as a fact seems irrational. The only authority which these theistic faiths have is derived from a formal logical fallacy. This makes assertion of said belief illogical.
I understand that you are playing 'devil's advocate' here, but you keep playing devil's advocate about that which has already been explained very clearly.
A: my religion is the correct one.
B: how do you know?
A: because my holy book says it is.
B: how do you know your holy book is correct?
A: because it says it is.
I'm not wanting to get into a huge big gimongus argument or anything, but I wanted to put this out there.
Can Atheism or science fill in that empty hole in your heart that you have when you are not a Christian?
When fear overcomes you, can Atheism or science take away that fear and turn it into confidence?
When you feel like nobody understands you, can you turn to Atheism or science and take away that loneliness inside your heart?
Can Atheism or science watch over you and protect you?
Think. Just think. You are reading this right now and thinking. You are thinking that you agree or you disagree. You are thinking that you aren't sure, maybe.
Can an explosion create human thought? Can it create heartsickness?
Thought could only be created by God.
Draw something. Could that just happen suddenly? Your drawing?
No. An artist has to draw that. You have to draw that. Creation is artwork drawn into life by God.
~CrimsonRose~
Can Atheism or science fill in that empty hole in your heart that you have when you are not a Christian?
When fear overcomes you, can Atheism or science take away that fear and turn it into confidence?
When you feel like nobody understands you, can you turn to Atheism or science and take away that loneliness inside your heart?
Can Atheism or science watch over you and protect you?
Absolutely. I do not need a belief in an invisible man in the sky to make me feel good. I take pride in myself as a human being, in my relationships, and in knowledge. In fact, I find Christianity decidedly depressing.
Think. Just think. You are reading this right now and thinking. You are thinking that you agree or you disagree. You are thinking that you aren't sure, maybe.
Can an explosion create human thought? Can it create heartsickness?
Yep, I'm thinking. And no, explosions don't create human thought. Evolutionary necessity has resulted in humans developing the ability to think cognitively as we are doing right now. And the big bang wasn't an explosion anyway. Perhaps you want to brush up on your astrophysics, cosmology, and calculus.
And nope. Explosions don't create heartsickness either. That's a human emotion. It is created by chemicals released by the brain in response to external stimuli.
Thought could only be created by God.
Again, not true. In fact evolutionary biology has shown exactly where thought comes from, how it evolved, and why we have it.
Creation is artwork drawn into life by God.
That is your belief, however it is not fact, it is not the only explanation of creation, and in fact based on empirical, scientific evidence it is the least likely explanation for anything. Cosmology has even shown that the universe can indeed be created from 'nothing'.
I don't care what your religious beliefs are, I'm not trying to deconvert anyone. What I am pointing out is the errors in theistic misconceptions and hopefully promote a desire to apply critical thinking skills to your faith in the same way that you apply them to every other area of your life.
Can Atheism or science fill in that empty hole in your heart that you have when you are not a Christian?
So everyone who is not a Christian has a hole in their heart? I think not, 4 billion people are not depressed because they aren't Christian.
So everyone who is not a Christian has a hole in their heart?
Actually we each have several holes in our hearts. They are what allows blood to enter the heart and be passed through the atriums and ventricles, then be sent to the lungs to become oxygenated. And the analogy is based on an emotional effect, not a biological one, and there are literally thousands of ways to eliminate a psychological state of depression.
I was talking about the emotional "hole in a heart". Thats why I said there are not 4 billion depressed people in the world.
Also, no one has mentioned the number of Christians who suffer from depression and other psychological disorders. God didn't cure them, so what makes you think that God is the only way to cure that feeling? Also, I love how you are implying that everyone who isn't a Christian has a 'hole in their heart'. Seems very bigoted to me that you assume anyone who doesn't subscribe to your faith is somehow suffering or being punished.
A muslim doesn't belive in a god. A muslim follows Mohammed the Prophets words.
Actually Muslims do believe in a monotheistic god. They call him Allah.
I'm not wanting to get into a huge big gimongus argument or anything, but I wanted to put this out there.
Can Atheism or science fill in that empty hole in your heart that you have when you are not a Christian?
When fear overcomes you, can Atheism or science take away that fear and turn it into confidence?
When you feel like nobody understands you, can you turn to Atheism or science and take away that loneliness inside your heart?
Can Atheism or science watch over you and protect you?
Think. Just think. You are reading this right now and thinking. You are thinking that you agree or you disagree. You are thinking that you aren't sure, maybe.
Can an explosion create human thought? Can it create heartsickness?
Thought could only be created by God.
Draw something. Could that just happen suddenly? Your drawing?
No. An artist has to draw that. You have to draw that. Creation is artwork drawn into life by God.
Oh puh-lease. If I may point out several flaws in what you've said.
A. What 'hole'? I'm perfectly content, I don't need a set of irrational beliefs to fill any 'hole in my heart'.
B. Science can indeed take away fear - fear of that which we do not understand can be removed quite easily by reading up on whatever you're afraid of - if it's an animal then you can read up on it's temperament, size, etc which have been documented by Biologists or if it's a more 'mental' fear then you can see psychologists, psychiatrists and miscellaneous other scientists who can help you deal with problems.
C. See my previous point for the 'nobody understand you' bit.
D. Science can certainly protect you from and also cure physical harm - kevlar armor to protect against bullets, smoke alarms to warn you of fire and modern medicine to heal the sick.
E. I should imagine the only human thought an explosion can create is 'Oh no! Something just went boom - am I on fire?' or similar. You're confusion cosmology and evolution I think. On the same note - 'Heartsickness' is merely a human emotion - a chemical response to external stimuli.
F. I've just drawn a snail with wings - I call him Sheldon - by your logic then he is now real and A god am I.
Can Atheism or science fill in that empty hole in your heart that you have when you are not a Christian?
I use to have a "hole in my heart" when I did hold religious beliefs. Though I will note it wasn't becoming an atheist that filled it.
When fear overcomes you, can Atheism or science take away that fear and turn it into confidence?
Yes, I actually find myself feeling far less fearful then I did as a theist.
When you feel like nobody understands you, can you turn to Atheism or science and take away that loneliness inside your heart?
Science has developed many methods of dealing with these feelings. Not just pills, but with aiding in developing psychological treatments.
Since turn to real people and if I lack this my pets to fill the loneliness instead of turning to a likely imaginary being I often can manage to get over such feelings much quicker.
Can Atheism or science watch over you and protect you?
The fruits of Science can most definitely aid in watching over and protecting me. From the locks on my doors to the phone I can take just about anywhere and call someone for help.
Can an explosion create human thought? Can it create heartsickness?
I take it your talking about the Big Bang theory. First off it wasn't actually an explosion but more of an expansion. It also has nothing to do with the origin of life, that's abiogenesis. The Big Bang just deals with the formation of the universe.
I do enjoy people arguing that Atheists have something 'missing' from their lives - it's rather fun to here them blabber about God filling your holes...
I do enjoy people arguing that Atheists have something 'missing' from their lives - it's rather fun to here them blabber about God filling your holes...
you know, you make god sound like a perverted nymphomanic in that post..
Can an explosion create human thought? Can it create heartsickness?
You must feel that this is what we as atheists "believe in". That an expansion, not an explosion, is the answer to our questions, much how God is to yours.
Human thought is created by our consciousness, in our brains. We can generate it on our own. Heartsickness is a change in behavior due to a chemical change from external stimuli. It affects our emotional senses, which is ALSO in our brains. See the connection here?
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