Atheists should shut up!

Tab,

I think that the former IS a belief in God but the latter lacks any belief in God, Tab.
How can a lack of belief be the same as a belief?

Well, perhaps if the so-called atheist becomes so emotionally attached to his lack of belief in a God that it becomes more of an obsession, then I daresay if that becomes the case perhaps he is not really a full-fledged atheist.
I may be wrong here though. Humans are such complex creatures. Often we do not know our own minds.

Considering how they go after one another, I can picture them as being interchangeable dolphins and sharks.

Something about that sounded almost poetic to me, Tab.

Perhaps your little “mini” death means that you are not quite finished with your God problem.
(I will send you my bill). :evilfun:

But why do you think you die a little?

I agree with this. Scientists are cool in this way.

MagsJ wrote:

You are a free spirit who is touched by everything good and beautiful in the universe.
You are not bound up nor shackled by any kind of dogma.

I think that Maxfield Parrish had you in mind when he painted the below.

imagesHWZGU7FK.jpg

Stay with it!

Say I meet you in the street one day, with a pamphlet. It has REJOICE on the front in big shiny letters. The blurb reads "Tsathoggua is the one true source of all things and Aston Smith is its prophet. And here it is, isn’t it lovable…?"


Now, you look in my whirlygig eyes and see I absolutely believe its true.

I have a belief in Tsathoggua.

However, you, prior to meeting me, had no conception or knowledge of Tsathoggua whatsoever, and therefore had formed no beliefs about Tsathoggua either way because it’s impossible to think about things you don’t even know you don’t know about.

This is a ‘lack of belief’. An utter absence of belief.

Of course now though, I have introduced you to Tsathoggua, the one true source of all things… So now and only now, do you form a belief concerning its divine sourceness, very probably along the lines of “Tab is a loon and this Tsathoggua business is baloney.” You become an A-Tsathoggua-ist. Denying its greatness. The only difference is now you have a belief about Tsathoggua, whereas before you didn’t have any.

ie. believing god exists is a belief, a thing. And believing god does not exist is also a belief, a thing. They are both just opposing points of view, that revolve around one idea - god. And worse still, an idea that is impossible to prove, or disprove. #-o

Because anyone still debating god/not god really hasn’t gotten past level one of the great philosophy game. Which makes me have a sad.

A lack of theistic belief says nothing about what you do believe in - if you believe in anything at all (if such a thing is possible).
It is a term solely about what you don’t believe in, which in this case just happens to be God/gods.
What you do believe in as an atheist can range from literally anything to any combination of things, just not God/gods. Not believing in that one category of things (God/gods) is literally the only thing atheists have in common.

This is the standard “new-atheist” argument.

It pretty much wraps up the exact way in which “theism and atheism (are) not the same” exhaustively and sufficiently.

Theism is of course unfalsifiable, and probably intentionally so, and no doubt this isn’t even a problem for thinking/honest theists. Christian clergymen with any intellectual ability, who seem to have wrestled with all the issues with their religion over their lifetime don’t even bother to argue that their belief is “knowledge” - they admit it’s meant to be blind faith and that’s the whole point.

Likewise there isn’t going to be any evidence that could prove atheism, because that could only ever be evidence of absense, but there can be logical proof of atheism if some essential characteristic to God/gods is definable and logically contradictory with something that is necessary.
My proof that God doesn’t exist defines this essential characteristic as being at least in part beyond human conception.
This is logically contradictory with the human ability to believe in anything that fully qualifies as God, because entirely within human conception nothing can ever fully qualify as God i.e. something that is at least in part beyond human conception.
The conclusion necessarily follows that anything humans believe in is something less than God, that doesn’t qualify as such, and therefore isn’t God - making God-belief by humans impossible. God doesn’t and cannot exist to us.

But no matter how convinced I am of this syllogism, or how obsessed any atheist is with their lack of belief in God, of course they can still be a fully-fledged atheist. Any common ground between obsession and religion doesn’t make an obsessed atheist religious “and therefore not a fully-fledged atheist”. And the assertion of a premise that is proven false isn’t a belief in the existence of the subject of that premise.

At best, atheist argument posits a provisional existence of a definition of God, which they believe to be true, in order to disprove it.
If that makes atheists theists or “bad” atheists, then argument against anything is proof that it exists - therefore everything logically exists. Including logically impossible square circles.

At best, positing a premise awards “some degree” of existence, but in light of the above, it’s illogical for that to constitute belief in that something based only on that degree of “existence”.

People try to get sophisticated about atheism.

The actual argument is that god hasn’t been born YET!

Why? People are living any fragment of life against their will.

An omnipotent and omnibenevolent creator would make this impossible.

A belief that ‘notX’ is a true statement, especially when ‘notX’ is unprovable, is a belief, and to be honest, also an expression of faith.

If you have knowledge concerning something, whether material or immaterial, you automatically form beliefs about it.

Just as inaction is an action, disbelief is also a belief. This is not rocket-science.

I believe in the existence of god = I don’t believe that god does not exist.

I don’t believe in the existence of god = I believe god does not exist.

You do see the ‘believe’ in both of those right…?

Even a weasley “I do not believe that your conceptualization of god can exist” still equals the statement “I believe your conceptualization of god cannot exist.”

Allow me to turn around your turnaround.

What is this belief in ‘notX’? What is it that you believe in? A lack?

This certainly isn’t close to believing in that which is lacking in existence - it’s the opposite.

If the grammar of “belief that God doesn’t exist” is a belief, but it’s in the logic that when applied to God, results in a logical contradiction.

I am married, I have a piece of paper that tells me so. Joe is not married, as far as I know. He’s a slippery fish sometimes, hard to know for sure.

I believe I am married. I believe I am not single. In my lack of batchelorhood. I believe in a state of the world in which this is so.

I believe Joe is unmarried. That he is single. In a state of the world where he lacks a wife.

An atheist believes in a godless universe. In a state of the universe which has no god, nor requires one. ‘Lack’ implies an certain degree of unfulfilled necessity. Something an aetheist would argue against.

We believe in lacks all the time. I usually believe I have a lack of money, especially near the end of the month. :smiley:

I looked at that, but it doesn’t scan. The ‘if’ clause doesn’t go with the ‘but’ clause - Could you rewrite it a bit more clearly…? It’s early morning, my brain is too dumbz to process.

This is true by definition. In practice, new atheists you find on youtube arguing against theism or in articles online or in ‘newspapers’ or arguing with theists online do share, generally, large chunks of a belief system, often with very similar epistemologies, ontologies (and not just in the negative), modes of interaction, and even attributions of blame for a variety of ills.

So while a theist labeling atheism as a belief or belief system is wrong, they are also on to something in terms of what they encounter in media in discussion forums. And to simply, without qualitification, deny that there is a new atheist subculture with strong commonalities is a kind of falsehood by omission.

Sure, Joe presumably lacks a llama husband and tentacles as well as all sorts of other things (though you did say he was slippery so who knows). But the parenthesised aside, is that his “unfulfilled necessity”?

I’m also guessing Joe is “just being Joe” at that particular point in time, just as you being you has a particular piece of paper in your possession - neither of you are “lacking” until you come up with some “thing” that’s not part of who you are at the time, for the sake of being able to say you now “lack” something.

This just seems a little gratuitous to me.
We might as well say you’re lacking the single status and on those grounds Joe’s not lacking anything.

Belief in a lack doesn’t say anything, except in the context that something irrelevant to your beliefs comes up just so you can say “not that”, in exactly the same way as theists “lack” the first principles that Atheists A, B and C (etc.) have.
Let’s say atheist D believes in “Secularism” - just to frame some kind of belief that an atheist might have (but doesn’t necessarily have) as opposite to something he “doesn’t have”/lacks (which posits something merely to then say “not that”). We might as well then say that “Asecularists” are bad theists and let Faust redo this thread in those terms instead…

This whole “belief in a lack” just doesn’t fly.
Therefore atheists not shutting up is perfectly fine.

My phrasing is always dodgy at least in parts it seems, especially if I just bash something out.

What I meant was something more like this:
If the grammar of “belief that God doesn’t exist” is a belief, then such a belief is merely in logic, such that when said logic is applied to God, it results in a logical contradiction.
Still unwieldy probably, but hopefully it at least scans now.

Yeah, it’s a good argument - can’t really argue against literal definitions.

Yeah sure, in practice many atheists probably have very similar beliefs in the same way that in practice Christians of all kinds have similar enough beliefs to all go under the same umbrella despite having various kinds of disagreements with one another about what Christianity is. But the theory rather than practice is important, because not only does it define atheism properly (by definition as you correctly say) it also allows for atheism to apply just fine to all the atheists that don’t have these very similar beliefs. That’s important, especially when “what’s usual in practice” is being used against atheism.

So yeah, theists are “on to something” in their observations of general beliefs that atheists have in practice, but to only look that far as they so often do is lazy.

More accurately, “there is a newish subculture of people with similar enough beliefs, who also happen to be atheist and it’s probably not that big of a coincidence that they are in practice”.
So it depends what kind of precision you’re after, I guess.
It’s sufficient for most people to lump all atheists in the same box and all theists “in the other box” as though you’re either in one or the other.
Personally I prefer maximum pedantry for maximum precision and insight - but that’s boring for “most people”. Hence why I have to come here to let loose on all you suckers :wink:

Well, sure if the topic is defining atheism, obviously I agree. But if we are looking at what is in many ways a paradigmatic conflict, there are two believe systems clashing. If the theist is trying to argue that atheism is a belief or that all atheists have the same belief system they are wrong. But if we take the most vocal atheists: Dawkins, Harris, etc. and the people who get into arguments with theists as atheists online - iow where the argument/discussion/tension is, we are meeting two groups that have tendencies towards a certain belief system.

I guess my reaction is sure, we can be precise and we should be, but not alone, because the rise of the new atheism, the active one, the one that theists are going to hear about, the atheists the theists will see in the new and online, in general, share much of a system of beliefs in common and often their lack of belief arises or is correlated with these other beliefs. We can be, yes, just pedantic and point out that there are atheists who paradigmatically share little with this group. But I think in the name of charitable interpretation and response, we can ALSO say that, yes, the atheists you are most likely to find slashing your beliefs in books, articles, youtube videos share a belief system, to a great degree. Obviously they have differences, even in that group, as do theists, a group that includes obviously a very wide range of theism outside the already quite variable Christianity.

It’s not a coincidence that many new atheists have some general philosophical ideas in common. The lack of belief correlates with certain beliefs.

Everyone can acknowledge this without accepting that an atheist must have a belief there is not God or whatever. Now will all or ever a significant portion of theists, in response to this more nuanced response, stop arguing that atheism is a belief? Probably not. But it does offer a chance to deescalate and acknowledge what is grounded in the other position. Perhaps some tiny victories here and there.

Sometimes, not in your case, but sometimes when I have seen atheists respond with ‘precision’ it reminds me of when a kid says he did not ‘see’ anyone take the cookies. Cause he purposely closed his eyes when doing it. It’s like hey, atheists, acknowledge what is likely driving the other team to think they are dealing with a set of beliefs, while also being precise on the sdie.

Precision, alone, can be misleading, and in the long run, I don’t think it helps the divide.

Telling the truth can be misleading, if there are omissions.

And this came off pretty condescending - with some indeterminate degree of tongue in cheek involved…

Especially that first sentence. I certainly wasn’t suggesting one lump everyone together.

It speaks volumes that atheists are immediately banned from theist boards, but theists aren’t banned from atheist boards.

Ok, actually, taking a step back and gonna blame Arc for introducing a loaded term. ‘Lack’. Looks likes ‘absence’ but smells more like ‘deficiency’.

My point is/was “theists and atheists hold equally unfalsifiable beliefs” and that someone like me, who lives in box number three, agnosticism, thinks should both be ignored. Not that I expect atheists or theists to ever shut up. Both groups are usually horribly eager to spread the word - another trait they share.

Arc originally queried whether ‘not believing in something’ constituted a belief. I replied that yes, believing something doesn’t exist is - in terms of ‘is that a belief…?’ - just the same as believing something does exist. As long as both parties are aware of the object/non-object in contention, and there is no way to prove it’s existence/non-existence either way.

I then went on to try to provide an example of the transition from ‘no belief at all’ → ‘believing in something’s non-existence’ by introducing Tsathoggua - a character from Lovecraft’s Cthulhu mythos which I was hoping she had no prior knowledge of, it being a bit of a teenage-nerdy cultural trope - to illustrate that only when someone has no inkling of a subject at all, can someone have no beliefs about it, and once they become aware of something’s proposed existence, they cannot help but form a belief about it.

Thanks, a lot clearer. Lol. Okay, so using a belief in logic to try and say anything about an innately paradoxical object - god - is foolish. I see what I did there. :smiley:

But as I said, I’m not talking about god directly. Only that both a positive belief (god’s/Tsathoggua’s presence), and a negative belief (god’s/Tsathoggua’s absence) are both beliefs. And when both beliefs are unfalsifiable, both are equally worthless.

Might help I guess, if you tell me what you think ‘someone having a belief’ means to you. To me, it’s the state of holding an opinion concerning something about which you have insufficient knowledge/experience to prove or disprove empirically. Which I think is rational.

So, if a belief is unfalsifiable, it is necessarily useless? I must be able to demonstrate to others anything I hold to be true - or they must have some way to test it - for such a belief to be useful to me? I don’t think that holds. I understand how it might be useless to others.
Then we need to be 1) confident in our ability to know when something can or cannot be falsified (at some future point in time also, for example when technology changes) 2) confident that we could falsify or confirm all memories a person has that may or may not be a part of useful heuristics about the world. I can’t see a way to be sure about either of those things.

I also notice that people, I mean, everyone, works every day with untested often unfalsiable heuristics about how to handle life. Now, of course, many of these heuristics are poor, but animals have evolved to use unverified and often unfalsifiable ideas because they were good adapations.

Just because it makes sense for the scientific community to not work with unfalsiable ideas since they don’t have a good way to decide if such ideas should move into scientific consensus, this doesn’t mean that all unfalsifiable beliefs are useless.

Yes I guess, in isolation, worthless. There’s a difference though if you suddenly jump from my ‘worthless’ to your ‘useless’.

Obviously, publically proclaiming an unfalsifiable belief - a belief or disbelief in god - isn’t useless if there is benefit in simply being seen to hold such a belief. Dawkins might send me a christmas present, or the pope might induct me into the illuminati.

And ‘empirically’ doesn’t just mean ‘testable’ it also means ‘experience-able’ ie. Though I can’t prove gravity - I don’t have a lab, equipment or frankly, enough maths lol - I can experience it consistantly by falling over a lot.

I cannot however prove god in a lab, nor consistantly experience it.

One can have correct beliefs that are impossible to falsify, at least now, given what we can and cannot do, and these can be useful, even in isolation. I added more above.

I could have heard some guy muttering how he hates women and one day he’s going to fucking rape one. Perhaps I misheard him, certainly others might doubt what I heard if the guy is an unstanding citizen. They cannot falsify the belief, not confirm it. I however can move forward with that belief and tell my wife not to accept a job working for the guy.

If the theists are right or some of them are in their specific beliefs about God and they are in fact, some of them, in contact with God, this might be very useful to the sense of well being or perhaps even the afterlife experiences, even if this is all not falsifiable or verifiable for others. And if, as an agnostic, you are not sure what is the case, then you cannot know if it is useful or not.

There are examples even in the history of science where claims were made that were not falsifiable, at the time, though decades later they were now verifiable, but were true and useful.

We have our own experiences. What we can prove to others or disprove in front of others is not the full set of things that are useful.

Lol, we both edited like crazy.

As I said - empirically also means experientally as well as through theory and logic.

Forgive me, but this is a bad example, or at least a bad comparison with the unfalsifiabilty of god.

In your situation there are many ways to investigate empirically. An outside observer could note that between your experience with this man and afterwards, something occurred that produced an effect. In this case a switch to mistrust. And infer that something did happen. They can also note that the guy you heard has a mouth and vocal chords, and you share a common language, and you have functionimg ears, so such an event was possible.

Then, they could hack this guy’s email, investigate his contacts, past behaviour, etc.etc. The results of which would lend weight to your experience either way.

None of this applies to god. God has no email, we don’t know even if he has a mouth. All past records of god’s behaviour are at several removes - heresay, rumour. There is no empirical point of traction.

First off, I have to start with situations that are more likely to be agreed on to challenge what is presented as a rule. If it is a rule it must apply to all situations. If it doesn’t then more investigation needs to take place. I can’t start with God or even ghosts. If the rule has a problem with one situation, then more discussion is possible and the rule is problematic.

Or not. We both know that it such unfalsifiable situation are ones we encounter all the time in our lives. Sure if I can hire a team to investigate one friend’s accusation against another, I might be able to give some evidence. But generally we are not in such a position. Such a claim is unfalsifiable. And if we find no sexist or violent musings in his hacked accounts we have not falsified our friend’s story.

Actually there is. You could engage in the practices of the religion and see if you have experiences that lead you, you as an individual, come to believe the same thing. Often in these discussions both Christian theists and non.theists (given the dominance of certain Christian models and ideas like ‘leap of faith’ and the idea of faith in general) seem to think theism is non-empirical. But this is very Western and non-indigneous and even in those traditions only one kind of theisms. Most theism have empirical components, and some center themselves on that.

And I get it, those experiences, those empirical facets, are not good evidence for non-experiencers. PRECISELY. We cannot falisfy them, but then, an agnostic cannot possibly rule out that those experiences and the beliefs built from them are not useful.

Of course engaging in the practices might require decades of work. I am not trying to convince you that you should. But there are direct parallels to what one could with my over heard mutterer sitution. Neither process of investigation need provide proof that a court or Nature Journal would accept as scientific. And yet, the beliefs and experiences might be useful, despite a lack of falsifiabity.

Your argument does not attack my example on falsifiability grounds. It may be useful and unfalsifiable.

Further science has often resisted falsification or advanced despite a lack of it. There are also other problems with falsification…
iep.utm.edu/pop-sci/#H3
scroll down to number 3.
blogs.scientificamerican.com/th … scontents/
plato.stanford.edu/entries/popper/#CritEval

The science itself works from axioms that are not falsifiable. Take physicalism itself. What is consider physical has expanded to include fields, masspless particles, things that are in superposition, dark energy and more things that do not match the original ideas of what is physical. Whatever is determined to be real is then called physical. It’s useful to do this, but in the end it is a metaphysical claim which keeps moving the goalposts.

Then, realism itself is not falsifiable.

And then, things get falsified, and then unfalsified.

I don’t think the determination ‘that can or cannot be falsified’ is easy to verify. How do we know what we will be able to falsify or what will turn out not to have been falsifiable. We have no complete knowledge with which to assess an assertion on this issue.