burden of proof and religion

many a time i have been discussing religion and get told that, as an atheist, i must disprove the existence of god, that the burden of proof does not go to my religious counterpart in the discussion

upon a brief moment of though i have realized that this opens a messy door for all religious discussion

if as an atheist i must disprove the existence of your god, i must also disprove the existence of every other deity worshipped on the planet

now, let's see a theistic example. the christian would have to disprove the existence of all the other deities worshipped but the trinitarian, unitarian, or gnostic christian god. sure, they'd have 1 less deity to disprove, but wouldn't this create a clog in the discussion?

isn't it just simpler to make people prove their own hypothesis regarding religious belief?

Wouldn't it be easier to say each to their own and leave it be?

I don't understand why each side feels the need to prove they are correct and everyone else is wrong, why can't we just learn to respect each others beliefs without feeling our own beliefs are threatened by doing so.

Or even worse :shk:

Originally posted by GreatTech
shizzle5150, is there tangible proof of atheism?

Now this one I really do not understand???? Greatech replied to this after I stated that there was "no tangible proof of god". Now me thinking of it in a scientific fashion I see my self being tangible proof of atheism. I mean I practice it and I would think that therefore would be proof of its existence. I don't even believe practice is the right word. I simply hold religion to be false until evidence is brought forth proving otherwise.

If you have never seen penn and tellers BS you should check out this
video. I think they make a great point about how the intelligent design folks distance them selves from the group that believes virtually the same thing but that it was aliens rather not god that were the "intelligent ones". I mean whats the difference? If it was proven, it would still be something intelligent designing. Well I guess the only difference would be if you wanted the argument to suit your agenda, and that is exactly what they do.

The burden of proof argument is absolute BS. In science or even logic for example, things are held to be false until evidence is produced showing that "thing" to be true. For example the tooth fairy is false because nobody has presented evidence otherwise. If you take it upon yourself to believe in the tooth fairy, the burden of proof rests solely on your shoulders to present the evidence to the rest of the populace proving the reasoning behind your beliefs. Now the reason this argument goes nowhere is because you are dealing with people who do not believe in science, or if they do they are selective about which part of science they choose to accept. Another fine example of using the argument to suit ones agenda.:shk:

Originally posted by Simon_the_byron
Wouldn't it be easier to say each to their own and leave it be?

I don't understand why each side feels the need to prove they are correct and everyone else is wrong, why can't we just learn to respect each others beliefs without feeling our own beliefs are threatened by doing so.

well, some atheists (ie richard dawkins, sam harris, madnessinmysoul etc) see religion as a malignant force, one that actually hurts the general population, though not intentionally

theists feel the same about atheism, but many think that we're doing it intentionally