Atheism is a belief (Why Atheists don't believe part 2)

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If you come to believe it will be through firstly, objective evidence about yourself and your need for what he offers and secondly, objective evidence about him. Objective enough to convince you - if not everyone else.

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hum... evidence that will convince you but not anyone else... that sounds awful...em.. subjective?

arggggg... this is a very minor but important point - it's not a disbelief or belief in God, it's GodS. Consciously or subconsciously by phrasing it as a problem with a singular god, it's framing it totally in terms of the monolithic religions!It's not a Christian god or atheist thing - it's wider than that! Just because christians try and frame it in terms of a belief of their god or no god, doesn't mean we should allow them to do so!Their god is just one of many I reject!

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The trouble about the word atheist is that it is God-centric. Whereas an atheist is something other than God-centric.

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No it's again a word that deals with GodS not god (singular).Edited by CK, : No reason given.

Have we ever had a thread on Nihilism?Is that how you'd class yourself Robin? As a Nihlist?

If you add all up the various bits of the "literals" claims, he's a terrible god and an awful creator.Created the earth 6000 years ago - was forced to flood it when his creations went out of control and then it's been the end time for the last two thousand years (A 1/3 of it's history!).If he worked at a car factory, he'd be given his cards for shoddy work.

It always comes down to this eventually - the needy desperate pleading or the vague threats, or sometimes a mix of the two.Like me I guess FC doesn't play to pay for his sins because - well he'd be dead and his corpse will be rotting in the ground (leaving aside the fact that Sin is a christian construct and nothing at all to do with the rest of us).As someone else has mentioned - Pascal's wager is an very weak card to play, if we want to follow your insurance policy analogue (which is pretty weak to start with - being based as it is on Pascal's wager) - we have no evidence it pays out, we have no evidence that it's better than any of the other 2000 insurance policies on the marketplace, the terms and conditions make little or no sense and don't add up. The only thing we have to go on is the person selling it telling us that we will be sorry if we don't have it - really sorry. But the problem is that the other 2000 salesmen have just the same sales technique. Oh having said that - your insurance example turns up on the Wikipedia page for Pascal's wager - fancy that!

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In modern times, this criticism is often leveled against evangelistic Christianity, especially those who try to incite fear by portraying such events as the Rapture in popular media. Such a belief is sometimes called "Hell insurance" (or "Heaven insurance"), and is considered heretical by many mainstream Christian denominations.

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Pascal's wager - WikipediaIf you get bored of trying to scare people into the christian god, you might want to turn to Cthulhu, he has a similar "scheme"

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It follows logic thusly:

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1. Cthulhu, if he exists, exists somewhere inaccessible to human beings, so we cannot be certain of his existence or nonexistence.
2. If Cthulhu exists, he will give a quick and less painful death to those who have worshipped him and expressed their belief through self-flagellation and ritual sacrifice.
3. If Cthulhu exists, he will condemn those who have not worshipped him to eternal torture and unimaginable pain.

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* You may worship Cthulhu, and Cthulhu exists, in which case you suffer only finite pain and a quick death.
* You may worship Cthulhu, and Cthulhu doesn't exist, in which case you gain nothing.
* You may not worship Cthulhu, and Cthulhu doesn't exist, in which you gain nothing.
* You may not worship Cthulhu, and Cthulhu exists, in which case you suffer infinite pain and eternal torture.

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http://uncyclopedia.org/wiki/Cthulhu#Cthulhu.27s_Wager Well maybe it doesn't cost but if you are wrong - it could cost us eternal torment at the hands of Allah or Cthulhu or Galactus.Edited by CK, : No reason given.Edited by CK, : All hail Cthulhu.Edited by CK, : Title.Edited by CK, : Added quote from Iano.Edited by CK, : Spelling and making clear quotes are from Iano

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But I've discovered that this is not really a truth; the TRUTH is that we don't want to have a tough time so we reject faith because it's too hard to accept that God is there, if we're having a tough time. Now people might pretend this isn't the case, but I think they know I am right about that.

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Not really because I'm not actually sure what it is you are saying!

just let the christians here all fight out amongst themselves and once they have worked out which one of them has the "clear understanding" of the christian insurance policy - they can let the rest of us know.

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The bible is factual evidence, because He did come down and show us how to do it, we as a race, have just choossen not to.

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To me it is more than just anecdotal evidence, it has become fact in my life, but you will call it subjective.

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Yes because it is - it's subjective unless you (like Iano) want to just* redefine words on the fly.

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That is exactly what I said. You reject or accept it. (although it's not as simple as that) so you have made a choice to believe in something else.

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Not really - Your god is not out there - someone's else's might be - but I'll don't know what I don't know. So it's not so much a belief that god doesn't exist but just that at this present moment he/she/it seems to be absence.* as an aside - I notice that alot, the religious here want to redefine words to include all sorts of things. Scientology is very keen on that practice.

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If you ever go looking however and you are wondering where to begin then you could do worse than check Him out. If you are as sure of your intellect as you say. Sure so as to know you won't be fooled by horseshit then you could do worse than ask him to help you find him. Long before you get to that point (if ever) it may be that your heart (rather than your head) finds it wants him (even if you don't know its him your looking for). He will work with that want. That's all he really wants - is for you to want him - even if you don't know him (like how can you know him before you know him - that'd be intellectually ridiculous!).

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Just as an aside - that's pretty much word for word the approach that Riverrat tries. This is the interesting bit for me: Did you both arrive at the vanity/reverse psychology approach independently or is it a approach that is advocated in a book or a guide?

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To me I find nothing subjective about Jesus promising us the Holy Spirit, and me recieving it.

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so? It's still an entirely subjective point of view.

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Or you haven't sought after Him enough. He is there, you just don't see Him. It's all there waiting for you.

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not interested in the slighest - death and a body rotting in the ground is what is waiting for us all.

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It's aparent in your responses, when you say things like "your god". It's not my god that you need to find, it's your God.

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"Your god" is a reference to YOUR belief in one of the christian gods (whichever particular version it is you follow), it says nothing at all about me. I'm trying to avoid saying "god" (singular) because even you christians (each of you claiming to be TRUE CHRISTIAN) all seem to be following slightly different versions and I'm trying to avoid confusion.

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See, you look for God in religions, a big mistake IMO.

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No I said religious - not religion - it's nice not to misquote people.

em.. because you traveled back in time to when that entity existed?By that logic - if you lived in a time when Jesus never existed and you traveled back further in time and Jesus wasn't there - Jesus never existed!

Yesterday I took a big shit. Today it has gone - I flushed it down the toilet.If I can travel back in time and see it, then it always exists. That makes my shit eternal. Edited by CK, : No reason given.

I was wondering which bit of my economics degree this was covered in - I seem to have missed that element of the course.

If you want to college to study economics or media theory - why would such a course "give god a fair chance"?What would role would god play in such a course?Edited by CK, : No reason given.

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The difference is most scientist will tell you theories can change, and most religious people will tell you that their religion won't change. But not all.

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I belong to a religion that is willing to change to meet the needs of our society, but very carefully.

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When was the last time your central textbook was updated to reflect a better understanding of the world ?Edited by CK, : No reason given.