Fellow atheists.
I am curious, have you ever come across a single argument from the other side that seemed somewhat compelling.I think it would be a fun topic.
Do share your views.
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No a one. have you???
No they are all sad because every theist I have talked to will avoid the hard questions and tap dance around the easy ones
Some are funnier and more ridiculous than others, but no. Not one I've ever heard made me think, "oh maybe"
I agree.If there was a single piece of a conclusive argument we would not be atheists, but we can surely categorise them in order of their increasing ridiculousness.I mean, the banana argument, which I'm sure you have heard of, is just plain senseless and laughable especially when compared to the Goldilocks argument, not that it proves anything but I'm sure many of us have found mildly interesting, if not compelling.
By Goldilocks are you referring to the teleological arguments?
I was referring to the argument from improbability which is used interchangeably by many with the teleological argument.
And I can see it has an appeal to it, but has failed to conclusively prove the existence of a supernatural being especially when faced with our understanding of biology and natural selection.
Right right. They do use that. However they have no way of determining the probability that god did it, so if you can't compare the two, what's more likely? And who's to say that anything could be different? For all we know we're in the only possible universe. It's not the worst, but it sure isn't strong. I think the argument from morality is annoying. And the one where they go:"just look at the trees... "Haha. I want to say : what? It's a freakin' tree....
Sorry if it doesn't directly answer the question but when I was very new to being an atheist, I'd get tripped up in convoluted arguments for god (transcendental, teleological, etc) and second-guess myself. They sound very sophisticated and I'll be the first to admit that William Lane Craig's "word soup" has made me wonder if I made the right choice. I have gotten better at seeing through the fluff and one thing I realized that was huge for me is that "proofs for god" are merely hypotheses that theists claim as fact. Take the argument from design for example, stuff is complex and complexity doesn't come from non-complexity so it must have come from a complex origin. Ok, so that is a hypothesis, not a fact or proof for god. Same goes with every other argument.
For what it is worth, complexity doesn't have a universal scientific definition. It means slightly different things in different fields. In my experience you won't be able to get a creationist to define it in a way where it can be used. After all, if they did that, you might be able to test their claims; and they don't want that!
@Sans deity
I also admit that these arguments are not completely trivial, especially the argument from improbability.When I first learned about it I could not present a counter argument, but that's maybe i didn't know anything about evolution by natural selection.I also remember someone(I don't remember the name) say that the chances for life to exist are nearly as much as a Boeing 747 being assembled by a hurricane from scrap.
Then I realised that one-time events like these are very improbable but the same is not true for a gradual process like natural selection which has very little to do with random chance.
And also, even if the complexity of life suggests a design and therefore a designer, then the 'design of the designer' would have to be more complex, and the origin of such a designer would need an explanation.This ultimately leads to an infinite regress and therefore is not a good argument.
What helps me with the argument from improbability is that yes abiogenesis is highly improbable, so in order for it to occur, we would need a very large and a very old universe, and that's exactly what we have. We would also need billions of these experiments to be occurring constantly throughout the universe, which is the case. It's like saying that winning the lottery is highly improbable, say 1 in 1,000,000. WIth those odds how is it possible that someone can win the lottery? Because 1,000,000 people are playing it.
Note: Argument from improbability is more focused on abiogenesis, or life from non-life. It doesn't have much to do with evolution which is the process that started once life was formed.
Sans Deity,
All life comes from non-life. Your body is composed of assorted atoms. Are atoms living things?
@sans deity
'Argument from improbability is more focused on abiogenesis, or life from non-life. It doesn't have much to do with evolution which is the process that started once life was formed'
Sure, but many theists extend this argument towards the complex life too. Haven't you ever heard a theist say ' look how complex the structure of life is, do you think it all got here by chance'