I wasn’t trying to be an ass, but it irks me when such flimsy arguments are used in an ostensibly serious discussion. Flippancy is cool, sarcasm is interesting, but pure sophistry and fallacious logic never advance one’s case.
Being totally serious for a moment (about as long a span a time as I can muster right now), that appeal to popularity seems to be the most pervasive argument in favor of religion I’ve seen. The good old “1.25 billion Christians can’t be wrong” saw rings sorta false to me- after all, 2 billion Muslims all can’t be wrong, either, can they?
Oh, to be charitable they could each be groping a different part of the elephant, but to me it seems they’re all just blind.
True! He seeks fallacies inside my argument and such a fallacy does exist which proves my point exactly, but such a fallacy exists not inside my argument but inside his mind. He found it but at the wrong place my dearie!!!
C’mon, Beena! I wasn’t seeking a fallacy- you thumped us over the head with it! Say what you will about me, but you can’t claim with a straight face that the line I quoted from your post wasn’t a fallacy so obvious that an 8th grader coulda caught! Assuming it wasn’t mean facetiously.
Why do you think this is all about proving the non-existance of God? Why not look at is as many people raising questions of interest for other to respond too. We are not here to get each other off to disproving something. Yes, a large protion of people are probably not for proving the existance of God but that doesn’t make this forum all about non-existance of God.
Phaedrus, do you mean to say that you would like to see the discussion proceed honestly from YOUR part? Who is stopping you from doing that I wonder? :giggle:
Good work, BJ. If you got nothin’, get personal! Have the guts and integrity to admit your error- an 8th grader could see it easily, why deny it? It’s textbook fallacy.
It would benifit you to learn if you ever want to be taken seriously by anyone that can think.
Here, assuming you are here for intelligent conversation and debate and not just mental masterbation, you should read this and learn. fallacyfiles.org/propfall.html
Perhaps once you understand these basic principles you will be able to present a sound argument…we can only hope!
I think BeenaJain’s argument doesn’t technically have a fallacy, it was just worded strangely. There is a problem with it though: It’s based on a premise that no productive audience could agree with.
No atheist is going to agree with this. Why? Because they already know there are a billion people out there that believe in God. Obviously, [i]they [/i]think people can seek after things that don't exist. For your argument to move anybody, you'd need to shore up this premise quite a bit. But you just kind of take it for granted and go from there, from what I can see.
To give you a starting point, you say that people seek things that they know exist, or why would they be seeking it. Well, why can’t people seek things that they hope exist, or things that they believe exist, but don’t believe certainly?
If people sought things that they hoped existed, or things that they believed existed, but didn’t believe certainly, then wouldn’t the people be just hoping or believing but not actually seeking? If they are seeking a thing, doesn’t it naturally mean that that thing exists?
I dunno, what are all those people looking for Bigfoot or UFO's or El Dorado (back in the day) doing?
You can use the word however you like. If you want to say that 'seeking' means 'looking for a thing that actually exists', then the skeptic is free to say that religious believers aren't [i]seeking [/i] at all, they're just 'hunting' or 'looking' or whatever word means 'looking for a thing which may or may not exist'.
Ya, I was pretty sure you were here for mental masterbation and to hear yourself speak, but now I’m sure.
I won’t was’t my precius time responding to your drivel again,
Good day.
Look, if you are going to use words like falacy in the context of logic, use it correctly, or not at all.
Anything less is outright lying.
here is her original quote
Literally, she is saying god has to exist because the ‘majority’ (even though that isn’t even close to true, less than 1/3 of the worlds population is christian) believes he does.
This is a first day logic student brazen undeniable in your face example of argumentum ad numerum.
in fact, I even found a site that uses her exact argument as an example of an ad numerum fallacy. answers.com/topic/argumentum-ad-numerum
wonders why people paint themselves into undefendable corners yet continue to struggle rather than admit mistake
No, literally I meant that even if one person seeks God it means that God exists. I only used the word majority because majority population believes in God or a Higher Power and a lot of them out there like Buddha, Christ, Mahavir, etcetera and the general population, do seek Him.
If you believe that my argument has a fallacy then you’re entitled to that view just as I am to disagree with it.
Babymine, you underestimate the worth of one individual human being against a majority population even in the face of the fact that, most inventions and discoveries happened alone. God Himself is just one. Heh! Heh! Heh! Just because people advertise the worth of group work in everything nowdays, don’t undermine the worth of one individual alone. Let’s end this discussion right here. I am from my side because there is nothing more to discuss.
Assuming it wasn’t mean facetiously.