The lack of logic that encompasses this joint

[_emilysmith]

The OP is terribly flawed for this reason...

Everyone is an atheist in regards to every God except their own.

Does anyone bother making arguments as to why it is impossible for Zeus to exist? No, that would be stupid. MOST atheists don't engage in any kind of debate on the matter because it is just as stupid to argue against the existence of Zeus as it is to argue against the existence of the God of Abraham.

Is it possible that some God in some form exists? Maybe, but the possibility is so remote or the idea of this imaginary God is so foreign that is serves no one any purpose of arguing for His/Her/Its existence.

We don't believe in the God of Abraham because the Bible is fiction. the Israelites were never enslaved as an entire race in Egypt, there was never a global flood, and most that follows is irrelevant... including the New Testament and the Book of Mormon.

If the Old Testament isn't true, then neither is the New Testament, then neither is the Book of Mormon. That is, generally, the premise "atheists" on this and similar forums are working on.

We don't have to prove that there is no such thing as God. We only have to show that the reasonable position is that YOUR God is a cultural construct. Easy enough, too.

The only fall back position, when all arguments are said and done, for anyone who believes in the God of Abraham is that they "feel" that they know it is true. They don't actually know.

Obviously, the argument that "you can't prove it" works both ways since no one can be 100% certain of anything, but scientific method and empiricism have provided us with the tools and processes to generate what is most probable... the result being a blurry version of reality that transcends culture and anecdotal experience and has real world applications that can be and are used every day, reliably, to accomplish tasks in every facet of modern civilization.

Sorry, the OP fails. Claiming there is no God is a more reasonable and logical explanation than something primitive people made up thousands of years ago, then reinvented because the other gods of the era proved to be more powerful.

[_Ceeboo]

I'm sure I've made a comment like this to you personally before.

I am fairly confident that you have.

Ambiguity is what could have been, since my second comment was really the point of my post in the first place. I mean, we've had this exact chat before, and yet you made a comment like that never happened. Makes me wonder if you forgot or wanted to ignore it.

Well, it is difficult, at times, to remeber what a certain atheist said when there are so many atheists with so much to say. :)

Just sayin' man.

No problem man!

Peace,
Ceeboo

[_Some Schmo]

Well, it is difficult, at times, to remeber what a certain atheist said when there are so many atheists with so much to say. :)

I'm hurt that you don't remember all of our meaningful conversations down to the last detail!

(Not really... your comment is completely fair... and I promise that one of these days, I'll get you for this and all the other sensible stuff you've said over the years...)

[_keithb]

Michael Shermer on atheism:

"But this is not the common usage, as we saw in the Oxford English Dictionary. (And we would do well to remember that dictionaries do not give definitions, they give usages.) Atheism is typically used to mean "disbelief in, or denial of, the existence of a God" (not to mention its pejorative permutations). But "denial of a God" is an untenable position. it is no more possible to prove God's nonexistence than it is to prove His existence. "there is no God" is no more defensible than "there is a God." How We Believe : Science, Skepticism, and the search for God, Michael Shermer, 2nd Ed, pg 9.

He puts it in a way that I find most compelling. If you assume the atheist position you assume the burden to prove it. The funny thing in all of this, or mixed up thing if you prefer, is that atheists typically don't believe because they find the notion of belief untenable. Belief in God is untenable therefore I see no reason to believe but the mistake is to make a claim of one's own--that there is no God. As Shermer suggests one cannot disprove the existence of God just as one can't prove such existence. The position of atheism is untenable, but the atheist typically surrenders to that position because he/she finds belief untenable. What a weird position to find oneself in, I'd say. The out for believers is the reason for belief is in faith (meaning the experiences they consider spiritual provide reason to believe), but for atheists they are stuck having to rely on verifyable scientific methods and reasoning to prove his/her position, which is impossible to do. So what we're left with is two untenable positions, one, ultimately with an out, the other filled with hypocrisy, it seems.

This is quite like unto the whining exhibited here regarding LDS folks and LDS defenders. The complaint here is that the LDS defender is merely critiquing a critique of an LDS position, and therefore the LDS defender isn’t supporting his/her position—the positive claims of the Church. And yet, the original critique offered of LDS belief is untenable, as reasoned by the LDS defender. The critics position is untenable, while claiming LDS belief can’t be right because its untenable.

There ya are folks—the very problem you guys have created and have been unwilling and/or unwilling to see or accept.

Stem,

Can you please answer a few questions for me?

1. What is your position on the existence of Zeus?

2. Do you believe that it's possible to disprove the existence of Zeus?

3. What would you say to people that believe in Zeus that say it's YOUR duty to first disprove the existence of Zeus before they'll stop believing in Zeus?

4. If you feel that you can't disprove Zeus, do you find this a sufficient justification to believe in Zeus?

5. Can you generalize these answers to, say, other "supernatural" creatures: fairies, goblins, Thor, Allah, Middle Earth, the Mayan Gods, etc. ?

If you can answer these question, I think that you might come to understand my position on the Hebrew tribal god: Yahweh.

[_keithb]

I don't need to show anything.

unwittingly you have concisely described the problem here again. It is true that the existence of God is insoluble with the tools we have. I, for instance, can't prove to you that God exists just as you can't prove to me He does not. And its also true that many of the claims and ultimately the main claim of the Church is the same way. But the position of "God is not" and the position of "the church is not true" is untenable. You simply can't show me anything, so you hide behind the vitriolic complaints about me personally and take huge wiffs at the air knowing full well your partners here will easily find some confirmation in your illogical inarticulate ways.

With that, I readily acknowledge I can't prove my faith or the reason for my faith to you. I simply have to realize faith is either existent or not, but the question of its existence is not to be found in the realm of scientific inquiry.

Stem,

What if I told you that last night Joseph Smith appeared to me in the form of a werewolf and told me to found a new church or he was going to eat my brain? Can you disprove that this happened? How high of a probability do you assign to it having happened vs. me being delusional?

What if I changed the story slightly and said that Joseph Smith appeared to me in the form of an angel, told me to go dig up a set of golden records in a hill behind my house, and start a new church? Is it more probably that: a) I'm lying b) I am delusional or c) it actually happened?

[_Ceeboo]

What if I changed the story slightly and said that Joseph Smith appeared to me in the form of an angel, told me to go dig up a set of golden records in a hill behind my house, and start a new church? Is it more probably that: a) I'm lying b) I am delusional or c) it actually happened?

D) You're a former Mormon?


Peace,
Ceeboo

[_keithb]

What if I changed the story slightly and said that Joseph Smith appeared to me in the form of an angel, told me to go dig up a set of golden records in a hill behind my house, and start a new church? Is it more probably that: a) I'm lying b) I am delusional or c) it actually happened?

D) You're a former Mormon?


Peace,
Ceeboo

Still, even if I was a former Mormon, it would have to be one of these options. My current religious status would have nothing to do with whether or not the event actually happened.

[Guest]

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[Guest]

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[_Droopy]

There ya are folks—the very problem you guys have created and have been unwilling and/or unwilling to see or accept.

No, the problem we have is with dumb asses who read the same things about atheism over and over and still don't understand it, yet can't help but criticize it anyway.

More likely, Schmo, is that stem has just noticed the lack of critical thinking and the intellectual double dealing that stand in for critical debate around here.