First, let me say that any atheists I have met seem to be a cut above the ordinary run of mankind. This is not a reflection of atheism, rather a reflection of holding a position that requires a certain courage in a world of theists.

But does not atheism require a leap of "faith"? There is no evidence that a Supreme Being exists but there is equally no evidence that a Supreme Being does not exist.

I don't want to get bogged down in the semantics of the issue (one cannot prove a negative), and I ask it not in the spirit of winning an argument but in the spirit of understanding.

From a purely practical point of view, it seems to me that atheism, widely believed, would not lead to altruism, but to chaos.

On (1) I don't think it's faith, I think it's an assessment of probability. This is not just playing with words. If you can forgive the repetition, here is what I wrote in the other thread:

I don't believe that the existence of God can be disproved: in statistical terms, I don't think its probability is exactly zero. (I don't think it can be positively proved either, by the way.) But I think that its probability is so close to zero that there's no practical difference. Without being flippant, I think the probability of the existence of God is roughly the same as the probability of the existence of Father Christmas.

It isn't a a leap of faith for me not to believe in Father Christmas (nor would it be for you, I suspect). But if I said to you "There are two possibilities: either Father Christmas exists, or he doesn't" I am sure you would point out that the two are not equally probable - and the same is true of the existence of a Supreme Being.

I concede that, no matter what I know (or think I know) about the origins of the universe, it is always possible that there is a supreme being who caused it all to happen that way. However, I use the term "supreme being" in a general sense: if we were talking specifically about the Christian version of God, I would say that it can be disproved.

On your question (2) : I think self-interest would prevent total chaos. Certainly there might be disorder, but I'm not convinced that it would be any worse than the disorder produced by religion. Atheists do not fly planes into buildings under the influence of their atheistic beliefs. (Here I could attach a list of other bad things that religious people do because of their faith, but atheists don't - but I'm sure you get the point.)

Why is the Christian version of God more easily disproved than the Jewish version, or the Muslim version?

Atheists do not fly planes into buildings under the influence of their atheistic beliefs. (Here I could attach a list of other bad things that religious people do because of their faith, but atheists don't...)

Then explain Chairman Mao, Phol Phot (sp?), and Stalin. History is replete with evil men who most definitely were anti-religion and openly antagonistic to the idea of God. I think your argument is fallacious. Such arguments by either side are ineffective.

Last Edited on 19-Aug-2008 10:04 AM

Yes, I do think that to be an absolute and confirmed atheist requires a leap of faith, for I think it is just as impossible to prove empirically the nonexistence of Something that might be broadly defined as "God" as it is to prove empirically the existence of that Something. Where empirical proof leaves off, faith takes over – in both cases. To put it differently, when one asserts with absolute certainty the existence or nonexistence of anything for which there is no empirical evidence, faith (or at least an element of faith) must be involved in one's position on the matter. (I will avoid a discussion of the meaning of the word faith because you specifically said that we should avoid semantics.)

In discussions with self-described atheists, I have often sensed that they do not, in fact, have such absolute faith in the nonexistence of God. They simply have very strong doubts about God's existence. That isn't quite the same thing. For these so-called atheists, the Father Christmas / Santa Claus analogy doesn't hold. I don't think they are by any means as certain, based on available evidence, that God is merely a popular myth as they are that (again based on available evidence) Father Christmas / Santa Claus is a myth. (Allanb may be an exception.)

Most self-professed atheists are, I believe, merely agnostics who lean very strongly toward disbelief. Even Richard Dawkins, a prominent spokesman for atheism, declares at the end of a debate with Richard Collins (published in Time magazine, Nov. 13, 2006): "If there is a God, it’s going to be a whole lot bigger and a whole lot more incomprehensible than anything that any theologian of any religion has ever proposed" (underline is mine). From my viewpoint, the "if" clause leaves open the possibility, however remote, of some loosely defined Supreme Being or Supreme Intelligence. Is this outspoken atheist thus truly an atheist, who accepts on faith that God does not exist?

The absence of faith is better exemplified by the agnostic view, for the agnostic says, "I don't know whether God exists because the absolute certainty that God does or does not exist requires a leap of faith that I am unwilling or unable to make."

As for the hypothesis that "atheism, widely believed, would not lead to altruism, but to chaos," I couldn't really say. In the first place, I don't see that altruism and chaos are direct opposites. There are two questions here: Would widespread atheism result in the demise of altuism? I would say not necessarily because I have not found altruistic behavior to be dependent upon a belief in God. Would widespread atheism create chaos? Possibly it might because historically religious belief has been an important thread in the social fabric. I must be "agnostic" on this point because we've never had global atheism. To be sure, we've had some societies that were based on atheistic principles, but they didn't encompass the entire globe, and non-atheists remained a strong undercurrent even within these societies.

Finally, we can debate forever whether staunch believers in (their) God or nonbelievers have done more to promote discord and chaos. There is sufficient evidence to pin considerable responsibility on either side.
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Rich Turner (The Curmudgeon Himself)

Last Edited on 19-Aug-2008 11:55 AM

You wrote, firstly -

Why is the Christian version of God more easily disproved than the Jewish version, or the Muslim version?

I didn't say it was.

I am taking the Christian version as just one example of a God who is supposed to have particular characteristics, as opposed to a supreme being who is believed to have created the universe but about whom nothing else is asserted.

It may be rational to believe in the latter (although I think it is mistaken). But the followers of the Christian God assert that he is omnipotent, omniscient and benevolent, all at the same time, and that is an impossible combination of properties. Belief in such a God is irrational, as it is irrational to believe that a sphere can simultaneously be a cube, or that (2 + 2) is equal to four and is also equal to seven.

- and secondly -

Then explain Chairman Mao, Pol Pot, and Stalin. History is replete with evil men who most definitely were anti-religion and openly antagonistic to the idea of God.

You make the fallacious assumption that they did what they did because of their unbelief.

Stalin murdered people who opposed his personal dictatorship, or who didn't accept the Marxist system of state control that he imposed. I don't think there's any evidence that he murdered people because he didn't believe in God.

You could say essentially the same about Mao or Pol Pot.

In fact, can you produce an example of someone who didn't believe in God and for that reason committed murder?

I could make a long list of evil acts committed only because of belief in God: all the beheading, stonings, mutilations, and explosions carried out recently in the name of Islam, for example. And you should recognize that Christians were habitually doing similar things only a few hundred years ago, e.g. torturing and burning people, often only because they believed in a different kind of God.

What I find especially horrifying is that belief in God is so often used as righteous justification for such acts. Heresy, blasphemy, apostasy: these "crimes" - and their punishments - were invented by religious people. They have no equivalent in atheism.

Last Edited on 20-Aug-2008 12:26 AM

My assertion is that the total dismissal of any value in human life demonstrated by Pol Pot, et. al. is just one manifestation of their atheism. They didn't commit the atrocities because they were atheists, but because they were atheists they could commit them. There is nothing inherent within atheism that specifically argues against such actions.

There can be no moral standards without a standard giver who is outside of those to whom the standards are being applied. I believe all moral actions must be defined by someone other than myself, which I believe is a personal being called God.

So then, the moral imperatives found in the Bible are, according to historic Christianity, God's requirements not man's.

I'm not here arguing for my position, just outlining it. It has been my experience that discussions such as this often flounder because the parties misunderstand each other or have incorrect information regarding the opposite position.

As to why men (me included!) continue to break the moral code, for Christians it is simple; it's the result of the Fall. That's what Paul was writing about in Romans chapter 7.

Last Edited on 20-Aug-2008 5:36 PM

I'm glad you're willing to discuss this. Obviously we disagree but I really do enjoy the challenge. Please know that I NEVER intend an argument to be personal.

Last Edited on 20-Aug-2008 5:44 PM

I'm not sure we can completely avoid being "personal" since we are, after all, discussing extremely personal beliefs. What's important is that we don't get abusive.

Now I have to go and cut grass. But I will return.

From Constantine to the Enlightenment was roughly 1500 years in which Christianity (or Judeo-Christianity) was the prime social, philosophical, artistic, cultural, scientific, etc., etc., etc. influence. To reduce this to a "headline view" of history and see only the bad does a disservice to the truth.

During this period Christianity and the State were seen as interchangeable. An attack on one was an attack on the other. The political science of the time regarded heresy, blasphemy, etc., as sedition - the idea of religious separation from the State simply did not exist. The Church was the great civilizer as Rome fell and Europe slowly emerged, and the best thinkers could not conceive of a nation that was not held together by a common faith. This remained true even after the Reformation.

Inquisitions and Crusades have to be seen in this light. The Spanish Inquisitors saw the non-Catholics as inimical to the safety of Spain - much how we would define a Fifth Column today. The Crusades were a reaction against a world-expanding Arabian hegemony finding itself united and powerful for the first time and threatening Europe.

To measure Christianity then (or Islam) by today's standards is the worst kind of anachronism. To be sure, evil has been done in the name of religion, but it pales in comparison to the good. From hospitals to education to the role of women in society and in a thousand other ways, Christianity led the way. It continues to provide comfort and solace, contributes to an orderly society, and responds to a need that is common to all people.

I don't think it's fair to condemn the faith of millions because of a few extremists who commit atrocities in the name of Islam. Stalin, Hitler, Mao, etc., all directly persecuted religionists of every stripe. I cannot fathom how these actions did not stem from their atheism. Each clearly made it part of their agenda to destroy belief in God. However, I would not condemn all atheists because of the actions of these dictators.

It's perfectly ok not to believe in God, but to make the leap that belief in God is the cause of so many of the world's ills and therefore to be rejected is not, in my opinion, a rational position.

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One final point - "I think self-interest would prevent total chaos". I couldn't disagree more. Without a moral check, self-interest becomes the law of the jungle and the province of the powerful. Buddhist monks in Burma and Tibet, and liberation theologians in South America are voices raised against the powerful - witnesses in each case rooted in religious belief.

But his anti-religious attitude is well-known and I see no reason whatsoever to give him any credence on this subject.

He takes potshots at whatever displeases him, rarely supporting his position with cogent, well-thought-out reasons, relying exclusively on his fame in another field.

It's a bit like asking Einstein how to have a successful marriage.

As for the idea that religion and science can coexist, there would be some truth in Steven Gould's non-overlapping magisteria(qv), were it not for the fact that that religion is basically a load of rubbish and a wooly mindset which historically speaking starts as the concretisation of metaphore and in adherents results in a rigidity of thought processes that won't permit them to consider things otherwise. I've seen this particularly in older people and it goes in tandem with the general distrust or dislike of novelty that usually accompanies ageing. That is to say such people don't even have faith per say, it's even stronger than that - to them it's part of their very being.

At the end of the day, there is no proof of the existence of god and more to the point, no reason to suggest that there ever might be.

Last Edited on 22-Aug-2008 3:11 AM

As an EFL/ESOL teacher, I have been able to see at first hand how younger language learners end up more completely learning a language than older language learners even though after any one lesson it is the older language learners who generally do best. What it ultimately means is that the older we get, the harder it is to learn new things and to embrace novelty. That is not to say that older people cannot do so only that it takes an increasingly conscious effort to do so. That is not a generalisation, that is a biological fact. It can be tempered somewhat by better education in early life but not stopped. The upshot of this is that when one finds an older person (May I say such as you, Mudge?) who continues to learn and embrace novelty it serves to show what a great effort they are making. So it's a case of "Use it or lose it."

Holding a belief in a religion seems to involve affective learning (see Bloom's taxonomy). Whether what one has learnt is "correct" as such is of no concern here. Bloom's categorisation of affective learning goes through receiving, responding, valuing, organising and finishes with "internalisation" described thus:

"Has a value system that controls their behaviour. The behaviour is pervasive, consistent, predictable, and most importantly, characteristic of the learner. Instructional objectives are concerned with the student's general patterns of adjustment (personal, social, emotional)."

What is not included here is the idea of re-evaluating. The aged person I intended to describe is one who has internalised a belief and internalised not re-evaluating that belief (that would be a blasphemous thought) to the point that it is no longer faith merely just the way they are. To get to this (unfortunate) point usually requires one to be very old but it does not imply that everyone who is very old gets to this point. In vernacular terms this point is "being completely bigoted". Younger people who have unflinching beliefs, it seems to me, exhibit more of a cult-personality that is they appear caught up and obsessed with their newly found faith. (Is that a generalisation too?) This would tie up with the way that young people learn new things.

I hope that clears it up. (I'm middle-aged by the way).

Last Edited on 22-Aug-2008 1:13 PM

You quoted more of the text than you replied to. Looking at it, I may have not explained fully enough what I mean by the concretisation of metaphor. I mean a process like this, people don't understand and are afraid of death, death gets personified in phrases like "death stalked the land," later "death" becomes "the Grim Reaper" and eventually the Grim Reaper is accepted as a real entity. This seems the most likely origin of religion to me. By the way, if you think about it, language itself is a sort of belief system the difference is that nobody will be accused of blasphemy for thinking outside the box.

Last Edited on 23-Aug-2008 12:53 PM

I don't understand your last sentence, Endi.

Last Edited on 23-Aug-2008 1:54 PM

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I'll leave you to work out the solution. Big clue - think outside the box. I'm suggesting that language does not have the same strictures as religion people will redily borrow words from another language but the rules of a religion are far stricter and may not be broken.

Last Edited on 23-Aug-2008 2:27 PM

Last Edited on 23-Aug-2008 2:33 PM

Language is a belief system.

There can be no moral standards without a standard giver who is outside of those to whom the standards are being applied. I believe all moral actions must be defined by someone other than myself, which I believe is a personal being called God.

There's quite a lot to object to here.

First: your assertion means that I, for instance, because I'm an atheist, cannot see any value in human life. This I emphatically deny. I have tried to explain that I feel a moral obligation to other people because we live on the same planet, if for no other reason. This may not be a very good explanation, but I can assure you that whatever moral standards I have are not determined by my lack of belief in God.

If you were right, there could be no moral standards in a society that did not believe in God. I think the example of Buddhism is enough to disprove that.

Second: if "good" and "bad" exist only because God defines them, then God's morality consists of saying "These are my rules: I will reward you if you follow them and punish you if you don't." That is no different from the morality of Uncle Joe Stalin.

I must add that if you look at God's behaviour, as evidenced in the Bible, it's clear that he isn't fit to give moral instruction to anyone. There are many examples: the one that first caught my eye when I was undergoing "divinity" lessons as a child is the instruction to Moses about completing the extermination of the Midianites (he'd killed all the adult men, but that wasn't enough):

Now therefore kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman that hath known man by lying with him. But all the women children, that have not known a man by lying with him, keep alive for yourselves. (Numbers, 31)

This could have been taken as the text for Himmler's instructions to his staff for the extermination of the European Jews (apart from the bit about keeping all the virgins for themselves - I don't think even Himmler thought of that.)

Now of course I'm aware that some Christians try to slide around this problem by dismissing the Old Testament as symbolic or mythological or something like that (or blaming it on bad translation). But if you reject the authority of Numbers, for whatever reason, you must equally reject the authority of the rest, starting with Genesis. What basis is left for the story of the creation, the fall of man, original sin, atonement, and all that?

Please tell us you're not serious. Would you apply the same principle to a debate about military conscription? Or abortion on demand?

Your suggestion that I would not give credence to anyone supporting a position other than mine is a non-sequitur.

I had never heard of Mr Weinberg, but you have given me the information that (a) he is a good physicist, and (b) he is against religion. Neither of those things earns him any more credence - or any less - than any other contributor to the debate.

As a matter of fact the sentence quoted by Endi is not really an argument, just an observation. I don't think it's always true; it is certainly sometimes true (as you yourself said: evil has been done in the name of religion.)

1. Although the credentials of the person who is quoted are relevant, an opinion remains just that, no matter who expresses it. It is an opinion, not a proven fact.
2. A statement about a given subject by an expert in that field may have more credibility than one by someone who is an expert in a different field (or not an expert at all), but that does not necessarily make the expert right and the nonexpert wrong, especially when the statement is an opinion.
3. More important than who said it is the strength of the details given to support the statement. The essence of logical argument is logical support. An appeal to authority may be persuasive, but it is not logically conclusive.
4. Quotations should not be taken out of context.
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Rich Turner (The Curmudgeon Himself)

There seems to have been a roughly equal division between theists and non-theists here (and those in between).

I'm not surprised that the discussion quickly moved to which side had done more (or less) evil over the centuries. It's also not a surprise that "Scriptures" (Christianity in this case) have been used to support both sides.

All the replies have been thoughtful and they have made me reconsider exactly what question I was trying to ask. Rather than "God", I would like to rephrase the question and ask about purpose.

Putting God aside for the moment, what do you think the purpose of existence is? Is death the end?

When AllanB referred to probabilities, I thought that was a good way to approach the issue, but, seeing the same things, I find that the probabilities are in favor of "purpose".

When considering the mind-boggling, awesome nature of the Universe, my mind simply cannot grasp or comprehend how such a thing could be accidental or random - without purpose.

From purpose (teleology) it is, for me, a short step to wondering about the Who (or What) started it all. At their core, all the great faiths examine this question and conclude that purpose is essential. They may, and do, develop different ways of apprehending this mystery but that is probably just a cultural evolution.

Stephen Hawking, asked about what happened before the Big Bang replied, "We can never know, so it doesn't matter". I find this answer - the answer from science - incredibly arrogant. Faith says, "We may never know, but it DOES matter".

and

In discussions with self-described atheists, I have often sensed that they do not, in fact, have such absolute faith in the nonexistence of God.

I don't like the word "absolute" in this context. To say that you have "absolute faith" in the nonexistence of something must mean, I think, that you can disprove its existence. I have said that I think the existence of a Supreme Being cannot be disproved, and so its nonexistence is not "absolutely" certain; I think this is equivalent to saying that the probability of its existence is not "absolutely" zero. It is, however, so close that it makes no practical difference.

TheMudge's comment seems to imply that unless a person is absolutely certain about this, he is not really an atheist. Of course, you can define the word as you wish, but I suggest that there's no point is using it with that meaning. Atheists tend to be sceptical about concepts such as "absolute" when applied to matters of belief, so it's not surprising that you "often sense that they do not have absolute faith".

But there's really no need to complicate the question; if you ask a man "Do you believe in God?" and he says "No", he's an atheist. If you ask "Can you prove it?" and he says "No", he's still an atheist.

As a Christian I maintain that a basic level of morality, part of the Imago Dei, is present within all mankind. Thus many non-religious people are ethical and moral individuals. How is it that we all agree certain conduct is intolerable and by any definition, evil? Torturing babies just for the "fun" of it, for example?

if "good" and "bad" exist only because God defines them, then God's morality consists of saying "These are my rules: I will reward you if you follow them and punish you if you don't." That is no different from the morality of Uncle Joe Stalin.

This is probably too simplistic an answer, but quite simply Uncle Joe isn't God. Since I believe God created the universe he has the right to set the rules. Are God's "rules" sometimes difficult to comprehend? Of course. You must ask, though, what is their ultimate purpose. Apart from reading the Bible I don't think that question can be answered.

You seem to imply that God is some kind of cosmic killjoy who has capriciously established a set of rules
designed to make mankind miserable. I'll take his brand of morality over my own or anyone else's anyday.

... what do you think the purpose of existence is?

I don't think there is any purpose other than those which I make for myself (which may of course be noble, or brutal, or just trivial).

... Is death the end?

Yes, I believe so.

When considering the mind-boggling, awesome nature of the Universe, my mind simply cannot grasp or comprehend how such a thing could be accidental or random - without purpose.

I must say that I have never found this argument compelling, because it seems to me that complexity is entirely relative. The universe seems enormously complex to me, but that may simply mean that it is more complex than my brain. Perhaps a haystack would be mind-boggling and awesome if you were a worm.

It is not the complexity of the Universe that amazes, but the sheer simple is-ness of the thing.

There is little difference here between the individual who claims to have absolute proof one way or the other and the individual who claims a high degree of probability one way or the other. Both are ignoring the mind-boggling enormity of the unknown that precludes any purely rational conclusion.

This is why what either the theist or the atheist presents is an article of faith. It is neither a proof nor a logical argument. In that perspective, "the mind-boggling, awesome nature of the universe" is relevant. The sense of wonder at everything from the enormity of the universe to the complexity of even simple life forms, at life itself, at the mystifying power and beauty of the natural world, at the sense of so much that is beyond explanation – all of this can exist without any rational explanation. In my opinion (it is, I admit, merely an opinion), perpetual attempts to analyze, dissect, and assign probabilities to what cannot be analyzed, dissected, and assigned probabilities undermines this sense of wonder.
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Rich Turner (The Curmudgeon Himself)

Last Edited on 27-Aug-2008 9:59 AM

"...perpetual attempts to analyze, dissect, and assign probabilities to what cannot be analyzed, dissected, and assigned probabilities undermines this sense of wonder".

This seems to me to be a medieval view of the issue. What was once totally mysterious to one generation becomes commonplace to a later generation.

The wonder increases as we learn more and more. In the last century alone, we have gone from a limited understanding of a static universe to a universe that is expanding in ways never dreamed of a short time ago. Whether we will ever get ultimate answers is anybody's guess but we go on anyway.

Even the idea of "God" may be increasingly approachable. Certainly such an idea is much more sophisticated now than it has been in the past. For centuries, mystics of every tradition have told us not to see God in our own terms. God is beyond our notions of what is, they say. Even science now tells us that cause and effect disappears at the quantum level.

Curiouser and curiouser, it gets.