Jersey Girl wrote:Explain to me how they are being dishonest with themselves.
Okay, buddy. You're all mine now.
First let me tell you what mistakes you're making in your posting habits. On this thread, you are outnumbered 24/25:1. Yes, I counted. You might like the idea of going up against 24/25 adversaries, but it doesn't make for a real dialogue unless shooting snappy comebacks out of your computer while people mock the crap out of you for it is what you're after. Second, you're spread too thin on too many threads which also increases the potential for your posts to consist of the snappy comebacks. If that's what you're after, keep doing it. If you'd like to have an honest dialogue, knock it off and learn to pick your battles. You're welcome. ;-)
Let's look at what you've written. Keep in mind that this is a God believer replying to you and I'll give you an honest go up until I decide you're playing games in which case, I'll tell you I'm done.
zerinus wrote:Atheism necessarily requires dishonesty. You have to be dishonest with yourself to deny the existence of God, because there is no objective evidence to support such a belief.
Okay, geez. Burden of proof 101. You can't prove a negative. That is to say, you cannot find evidence for nothing. So what you're saying is some kind of logical fallacy twisted up into a pretzel or as I like to call it,
pretzel logic. Atheism is a statement of belief, not an observation of fact.
I have no problem calling Atheism a statement of belief. There are a whole host of folks on this board who will tell you that it is simply a lack of belief, not a belief in and of itself. My conclusion after 18 years on boards like this is that those are word games, okay?
Not an observation of fact...pretzel logic again. You cannot observe the fact that something doesn't exist. You can observe that you have seen no evidence for God and that's as good as it gets.
An atheist is someone who doesn't want there to be a God, and therefore chooses that preference as a statement of belief.
Okay, when you say that an atheist is someone who doesn't want there to be a God, I think that can be true in some cases. For example, the former LDS who had a personal revelation (your terminology, not my own) that the church wasn't true, they studied church history or they came across information that the church never taught them, they became depressed over it, betrayed and then angry as hell in the sense that the church isn't true so bag the whole thing, including God.
That said, there are those who were raised without religion as a world view who see no point to it, who simply lack belief. God just isn't there in their experience, he never was and probably never will be.
There are also those atheists who were once God believers, who acquired information about the veracity of the scriptures or science related information that led them to the conclusion that God doesn't exist.
There are likely other circumstances that I haven't thought more about. What I am saying to you, is that you cannot simply lump all atheists into one pile and make a broad claim about them, because it doesn't work.
It is a fundamentally dishonest position to take. It is dishonesty with oneself to begin with, and by extension dishonesty with everyone else.[/color]
I don't think it's dishonest any more than I think that my spiritual beliefs are dishonest. Both "sides" certainly see each other that way, but I doubt that it's the unvarnished truth.
Each "side" has been indoctrinated and have developed a world view based on that indoctrination. What makes sense to you or I about God and how we experience God has everything to do with what we were taught as children.
In much the same way, most or many of our Atheist friends who once believed in God, have pursued other explanations for the universe and god belief that made sense to them and shifted their world view to something entirely different.
We simply see the world and explanations for the world differently and that's okay. But that's also why these types of debates are unproductive. There is simply no comparison between the two differing world views. They're talking science, we're talking spirituality, and it doesn't work.
Okay, I'm done babbling for the moment. Thank you for answering my question.
