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originally posted by: Barcs
originally posted by: Krahzeef_Ukhar
The top 3 popsci atheists I would say are Hitchins,Krauss and Dawkins.
All of them have entered religious debates so they cannot (and haven't) say that there are no arguments.
What they say is that they are unconvincing.
Bingo. The arguments (ontological or otherwise) can never be linked to objective evidence. Nobody is denying that the arguments exist. People are saying they don't prove anything objectively and that they rely on numerous assumptions. The arguments themselves aren't enough to prove anything. People can make arguments for almost anything including flat earth, fake gravity and space being water. It would be ridiculous to proclaim that since the arguments have been made, that they hold weight or become an equal part of knowledge as science and verifiable objective evidence. They don't.
originally posted by: Krahzeef_Ukhar
a reply to: chr0naut
Neither arguments are convincing, either for or against God.
It's no different to the arguments for/against Bigfoot.
originally posted by: chr0naut
If any one of them has any weight, atheism is disproven.
originally posted by: chr0naut
There are six empirical arguments for the existence of God according to Wikipedia. An empirical argument is one that relies upon measurables - accumulated evidence - some of it objective.
Atheist arguments are fewer and less evidenced.
... and don't go back to the usual circular argument that 'science is evidential for the atheist case'. It isn't, for all the reasons previously addressed.
A single piece of oppositional evidence demolishes a theory. As Popper put it, "evidence of a single black swan disproves the theory that 'all swans are white". Even if the evidence could be considered weak, it is stronger than a theory based upon no evidence at all.
Not that I consider this evidential in any way but consider putting the words "proof" and "God" into the search field on the Amazon website. There are lots of results (actually over 115,000), the majority of which purport to prove the existence of God through various methodologies such as mathematics, physics, reason or philosophy. This does not indicate the evidential strength of these arguments in any way but it does indicate the likelihood that there are such valid arguments. If any one of them has any weight, atheism is disproven.
originally posted by: Barcs
originally posted by: chr0naut
There are six empirical arguments for the existence of God according to Wikipedia. An empirical argument is one that relies upon measurables - accumulated evidence - some of it objective.
Yes, and there is a huge difference between drawing conclusions directly from the testable research and referencing some facts or research and drawing your own conclusion. You have to be very careful not to fall into that logic trap.
In normal conditions, 212 degrees F is the boiling point of water. Therefor, if you leave 1 gallon of water on a stove set at 212 degrees or higher, it will boil until all of the water is eventually converted into gas.
The premise is verified and testable, there are no assumptions, the logic is valid, and there is a tangible connection between premise and conclusion. I have not seen any arguments for god like that. They seem to mostly rely on defining god by their assumed properties limited to human knowledge or imagination and then build everything on top of those assumptions. Even the so called empirical arguments rely heavily on defining things that can't really be defined.
Atheist arguments are fewer and less evidenced.
... and don't go back to the usual circular argument that 'science is evidential for the atheist case'. It isn't, for all the reasons previously addressed.
I honestly do not see many atheists arguing that science is on their side.
Atheism is the logical default due to the lack of evidence of god. So atheism is a logical position, but not a scientific one.
A single piece of oppositional evidence demolishes a theory. As Popper put it, "evidence of a single black swan disproves the theory that 'all swans are white". Even if the evidence could be considered weak, it is stronger than a theory based upon no evidence at all.
Unfortunately, I have never seen a single piece of opposing evidence. Maybe we will in the future. Maybe we won't.
Not that I consider this evidential in any way but consider putting the words "proof" and "God" into the search field on the Amazon website. There are lots of results (actually over 115,000), the majority of which purport to prove the existence of God through various methodologies such as mathematics, physics, reason or philosophy. This does not indicate the evidential strength of these arguments in any way but it does indicate the likelihood that there are such valid arguments. If any one of them has any weight, atheism is disproven.
There is a big difference between claiming to have proof, and actually proving something. Tons of people claiming they have proven god doesn't increase the likelihood of being correct. Hell, just search youtube for the word proof along with dozens of other ridiculous concepts and you will get hits. Humans are very imaginative.
And come on! Your results are skewed. 100,000? First, you returned the results of all departments which includes items like a beer pong "god loves beer" table. Second you didn't even use quotes, so it returned all results that contained the word proof and the word god somewhere in the description, regardless of the context. If you search properly, and look in the books section you will be returned approximately 300 results. Like you said, it bears no weight whatsoever on on the validity of atheism or god.
The majority of people in the world are theists, so it kind of makes sense that more people would have written books about claiming to prove god than to prove atheism. It could also be that atheists don't try to argue that their position is proven. They just deny your explanation with the absence of evidence.
edit on 12/9/2016 by chr0naut because: (no reason given)
originally posted by: Barcs
I honestly do not see many atheists arguing that science is on their side. Atheism is the logical default due to the lack of evidence of god. So atheism is a logical position, but not a scientific one.
originally posted by: PhotonEffect
originally posted by: Barcs
I honestly do not see many atheists arguing that science is on their side. Atheism is the logical default due to the lack of evidence of god. So atheism is a logical position, but not a scientific one.
Hey Barcs, hope all is well
Shouldn't agnosticism be the more logical default?
Isn't atheism a belief as well? (i.e. a belief in the non existence of a deity of any kind)
originally posted by: BigBrotherDarkness
a reply to: PhotonEffect
No true atheism means it doesn't matter of there is a god or not; life and reality still occurs. If you can reach down and touch the dirt it's there real and tangible and you use it in the very many real and tangible ways you can use it... not get lost in a day dream wondering why it is there that is of no use in that moment unless creating works of fiction or forming a hypothesis which would also be moot to putting that soil to actual scientific use, and instead become philosophy not science.
originally posted by: Noinden
a reply to: chr0naut
The problem with this argument, is that it infers that atheists are a subset of scientists. OR that only atheists do science. While you've not obliquely stated this, it is inferential.
This is easily proven to not by the case, there are many theistic scientists. This has been proven here in ATS (we've had besides myself, a Jew, several Christians, a Buddhist, and a Hindu post in these sorts of threads) and in History (Isaac Newton anyone? Many many more than him as well).
Science is not concerned with the presence or absence of Deities, be that singular, or be that multiple.
Science is: the intellectual and practical activity encompassing the systematic study of the structure and behaviour of the physical and natural world through observation and experiment.
Deities are not observable, physical entities, and are super natural. QED, science can not, and does not have a part in proving and/or disproving them.
The realm of intellectual endevours to go to would be theology, religious studies, and philosophy. If you draw a ven diagram, you will find that science does not overlap with all of those, it overlaps with philosophy, but on the side opposite to the side with theology and religious studies.
So, are you too lazy to quote the actual citations in that WIkipedia entry for your argument, or the books from Amazon? Because generally Wikipedia is not considered a legitimate reference, and the number of books written on a subject do not mean it is any more credible than one with one book written on it. Again the quality of the writing is important.
originally posted by: chr0naut
That is not universally true. it only works is the pressure if the water is at 14.7 pounds/square inch. Lower the pressure and it boils at a lower temp. Higher pressures = higher boiling point/s (i'm just being pedantic, though).
Sam Harris, Daniel C. Dennett, Richard Dawkins, Victor J. Stenger, and Christopher Hitchens, probably the most major proponents of atheism in this century, have ALL used this argument. For instance, In his book The God Delusion, Richard Dawkins writes that "scientific theories are superior to a God hypothesis". Victor Stenger wrote books such as God: The Failed Hypothesis—How Science Shows That God Does Not Exist and The New Atheism: Taking a Stand for Science and Reason. Daniel Dennet co-authored the book Science and Religion where he directly suggests that atheism is valid and theism isn't, on the basis of science. Sam Harris is famous for his assertion that science should supplant religion in the moral arena and that religion should be abolished, in books such as The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values, The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason and Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion. Hitchens has stated his belief, several times, that belief in a 'heaven' is the basis of all conflicts and that "there is no scientific evidence for heaven".
originally posted by: PhotonEffect
Shouldn't agnosticism be the more logical default?
Isn't atheism a belief as well? (i.e. a belief in the non existence of a deity of any kind)