I've contended that its not rational to think there is a spirit world, or God. There is no good reason to think they exist.
I've gotten push back in a couple of forms. But I don't think the push back is rational either. I certainly agree that there is plenty we do not know. And, we may never know. A contention seems to be since there are a ton of people who claim there is a spirit world or claim knowledge of God, we ought to give room to think that these really exist. I don't find that's a rational position to hold. Possibility does not become probability simply because its what we want, or because many people want it. Its still just a possibility with seemingly countless reasons to disbelieve it.
I quoted Steven Pinker on a lost keys analogy. I'll expand on that a little here. If you lose our keys what steps make most sense in finding them? It feels like those who defend a spirit world suggest it is a good step to buy a ticket to Tennessee fly there in order to find them, because it is quite possible someone snuck in, grabbed your keys and mailed them to Tennessee. Well I thought it could have happened and since I imagined it, it really feels like it happened. I got to get to Tennessee. Once someone concludes their imagination is correct it's really hard to get them to question that imagined conclusion.
"But it's more likely your keys were simply misplaced or your roommate moved them, isn't it?"
"Hey I've looked. They aren't there. I'm certain my imagination is correct here. It feels like the only possibility is someone snuck in grabbed them and mailed them off to TN."
"But they could be in your car, at your office, in your bag. As you tried to put them in your pocket they could have dropped into the bushes on your way in."
at some point you'd, hopefully prevail and convince this person to stop and think about where the keys might be other than in TN. The concept of a spirit world or God has an awkward hold on our reasoning though. It's much harder to escape because they can't ever be found, unlike the lost keys.
"But there's little reason to think there's a spirit world"
"I've seen evidence in my imagination. It's there. It has to be. So many others agree with me too."
"what evidence are you speaking of? I don't think there is any evidence at all. No one has shown it."
"How do you expect someone to show evidence for something that can't show evidence?"
"so your confident in your position because it's non-falsifiable?"
Another analogy, I think most of us are familiar with, coming from Carl Sagan:
Is there any reason to think the concept of a spirit world is anything more than a person's claim that they have a dragon in their garage? If so, is it not worthless to think there is a spirit world? It seems to be nothing more than an imagined non-place that suffers every ad hoc explanation, or excuse, possible which in the end only explains the place into non existence."A fire-breathing dragon lives in my garage"
Suppose (I'm following a group therapy approach by the psychologist Richard Franklin[4]) I seriously make such an assertion to you. Surely you'd want to check it out, see for yourself. There have been innumerable stories of dragons over the centuries, but no real evidence. What an opportunity!
"Show me," you say. I lead you to my garage. You look inside and see a ladder, empty paint cans, an old tricycle--but no dragon.
"Where's the dragon?" you ask.
"Oh, she's right here," I reply, waving vaguely. "I neglected to mention that she's an invisible dragon."
You propose spreading flour on the floor of the garage to capture the dragon's footprints.
"Good idea," I say, "but this dragon floats in the air."
Then you'll use an infrared sensor to detect the invisible fire.
"Good idea, but the invisible fire is also heatless."
You'll spray-paint the dragon and make her visible.
"Good idea, but she's an incorporeal dragon and the paint won't stick."
And so on. I counter every physical test you propose with a special explanation of why it won't work.
Now, what's the difference between an invisible, incorporeal, floating dragon who spits heatless fire and no dragon at all? If there's no way to disprove my contention, no conceivable experiment that would count against it, what does it mean to say that my dragon exists? Your inability to invalidate my hypothesis is not at all the same thing as proving it true. Claims that cannot be tested, assertions immune to disproof are veridically worthless, whatever value they may have in inspiring us or in exciting our sense of wonder. What I'm asking you to do comes down to believing, in the absence of evidence, on my say-so.
Is it not better for us to be rational agents, going with what we can verify in life, so we aren't running around trying to fulfill our hopes for an imagined world, that each time it gets argued for, shows it's really nothing more than make-believe?