ApostateAbe writes:
quote:
If you disagree, then I would like to know your argument.
Nice try, but that's your job. That is, you're the one making the claim. You're the one who needs to justify it. So far, you've been presented with a significant list of atheists from before Darwin. You've been shown how other scientific theories have had just as much if not more significance to the question of religious dogma.
Now, let's not play dumb and pretend that because there is at least one person who studied the theory of evolution and came to atheism that that is proof that evolution led to a rise in atheism. In order to justify that claim, you're going to have to provide evidence that atheism was rare before evolutionary theory (which so far you haven't done other than mere assertion) and then show that atheism increased afterward (which so far you have failed to do as your own sources show that they came to their opinions before Darwin published).
As was stated elsewhere, there is just as much of a drive to deny god from all other aspects of science. Why would evolution be so special? We kicked the earth away from the center of the universe, set it moving around the sun, put the sun in an insignificant part of a boring galaxy in no special part of the universe and you don't think that was just as important in convincing some people that god wasn't exactly the best idea to be had as evolution?
There are too many atheists using too many other justifications for atheism to lay it at the feet of Darwin.
Do you have any real evidence to justify your claim other than assertion? What would it take to convince you that you are in error?
quote:
Otherwise, it would help to explain an alternative for specifically what caused the rise of atheism in the late 19th century and the 20th century.
Nice try, but that's your job. You're the one making the claim. You're the one who thus needs to show that there was a "rise of atheism" in the late 19th Century into the 20th, for there hasn't been.
quote:
If you think that atheism did not rise in that time period, then give me examples of some names of prominent people who were probably atheists before Darwin, and explain.
Already done. You deliberately and specifically avoided responding to it. It would appear that you are unwilling to accept information that contradicts your claim. Is there anything that you would accept?
quote:
For example, if you somehow think that the Biblical scholar and Catholic monk William of Ockham was actually an atheist, then you will very much need to explain.
You mean you won't do your own homework? What do you know of Ockham's claim that there is no rational basis for believing in god? What have you studied about nominalism? It goes all the way back to Plato.
Now, did he believe in god? Yes. But his formulation about what god was and how god connected to the rest of the world was nothing like what you are putting forth as requiring special creation and would lead to atheism if evolution were allowed.
Why don't you know this? You're the one claiming there was no atheism before Darwin. Haven't you actually studied the philosophers from before evolutionary theory?
Rrhain
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