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Bringing you atheist articles and building active godless communities takes hundreds of hours and resources each month. If you find any joy or stimulation at Atheist Republic, please consider becoming a Supporting Member with a recurring monthly donation of your choosing, between a cup of tea and a good dinner.
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I think the only valid argument against atheism is evidence of a god, I would have thought that a simple enough.
Is rationalism the only chance for theists?
Rationalism asserts that everything that exists has an intelligible cause, even if that cause cannot be demonstrated empirically, like the cause of the origin of the universe. It privileges reason over the experience of the sensible world as a means of access to knowledge. It considers deduction as the superior method of philosophical inquiry. René Descartes, Baruch Espinoza and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz introduce rationalism in modern philosophy. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, in turn, identifies the rational with the real, assuming the full intelligibility of the latter.
@Ricardo
Oh for Fuck sake ! (again)
How many times do you need to be told before it sinks in?
Atheism is NOT a philosophical position,. Your argument of rationalism is irrelevant .
It really IS this simple: Atheism means that a person does not believe in god(s). There is usually only ONE reason given: a lack of proof.
Theists often ask 'What would atheist accept as proof?"
I can't speak for others. I leave it up to god to come up with a proof I am able to accept. I have no idea what that might be.
I repeat . ; ATHEISM-IS-NOT-A-PHILOSOPHICAL-POSITION.
@cranky47
Doesn't science, philosophy and logic answer your question?
What question?
The existence of God?
Nice try at moving the burden of proof.
It is up to YOU to prove your claims --it is not up to science, philosophy and logic to prove (or disprove) them.
Re: Ricardo - The entire post starting with, "Is rationalism the only chance for theists?"
Hmmm... Color me silly, but I would just about swear that entire post sounds exactly like something that was likely cut/pasted from somebody else's work. Hmmmm... Shouldn't the author be given credit for such borrowed writings?
@Ricardo: RE: "Rationalism asserts that everything that exists has an intelligible cause, even if that cause cannot be demonstrated empirically, like the cause of the origin of the universe. "
THAT'S IRRATIONAL. Where in the hell did you dig that up from? A rational person would have to admit that we might never know how the universe came about.
RE: "It privileges reason over the experience of the sensible world as a means of access to knowledge."
Wrong again. What in the hell are you reading? Reason without experience is pretty much useless. We reasoned the Higgs Boson years before we discovered it. Until the discovery the idea remained a mere hypothesis. We began talking about the Higgs in 1964. It was discovered in 2012.
RE: It considers deduction as the superior method of philosophical inquiry.
"The scientific method uses deduction to test hypotheses and theories. "In deductive inference, we hold a theory and based on it we make a prediction of its consequences. That is, we predict what the observations should be if the theory were correct." NOW - Do you have a better way of determining what is true? If you do, we will all change to that method. Deduction is not a superior method, IT IS THE ONLY METHOD. Eventually you have to take an idea out of your brain and test it against the world around you to discover its validity. Please cite any other way as effective that can lead us to consistent results.
The rest of this appears to be an appeal to authority. Please explain what theories you would like to put in place of rationalism and deduction that can provide the same results. Love to hear about it.
@Cognostic:
I think empiricism gives different results. Are there other theories? if so could you explain to me?
@Ricardo: Look at the examples cited above. The Higgs Boson Rationally existed long before it Empirically existed. There were rational reasons to believe the particle was there before we empirically discovered it. No theory is valid until it can be pulled out of your head and tested. Until it can make predictions.
@Ricardo
How many causes other than natural phenomena can you demonstrate objective evidence for?
So rationalism can hypothesise about causes all it wants, but it can't use inductive reasoning to introduce a rule of no uncaused cause, then conveniently ignore it to rbitrarily define then posit an uncaused deity.
It's also risible to cite cause and effect where every example we understand is a purely natural phenomenon, then use this to posit a completely unevidenced supernatural cause for something.
Its woeful irrational nonsense, please do seek out and read the many objections and refutations to first cause arguments like the Kalam Cosmological Argument.
@Cognostic
"What the hell are you reading? Reason without experience is practically useless. We reasoned the Higgs Boson years before we discovered it. Until the discovery, the idea remained a mere hypothesis. We started talking about the Higgs in 1964. It was discovered in 2012. " Can intuition be a means of acquiring knowledge?
@Ricardo: Anything can be a means of acquiring knowledge. Knowledge is a subcategory of belief. Theists have all sorts of knowledge beliefs that are demonstrably wrong. (The question is; "How low have you set the bar to claim any belief is knowledge?)
My assertion would be, only justified true belief would count. None the less, I fully admit that we all have knowledge claims that are not justified in any way. The difference is this.... When a theist is demonstrated to be demonstrably wrong, he or she wriggles and squirms to avoid the truth and cling to his or her irrational beliefs. When a rational atheist is demonstrated to be wrong, he or she falls back, regroups, and changes his or her beliefs.
@Ricardo
"Can intuition be a means of acquiring knowledge?"
No, but it can lead to an inquiry that does reveal knowledge. Many great scientific discoveries started that way, by someone having an "idea' which at that time was unproven, then going about and proving it.
But any intuition is never proof, and before it can be accepted as valid, it must be tested. Cognostic offered a very good example, where Higgs had a proposal, but only until decades later was it proven anhis proposition accepted.
Idea > testing > acceptance as proof
@Tin-Man
you're right.
excuse me
https://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racionalismo
Ricardo, do not plagiarize again. You will be banned from AR if you do so.
God is that than which nothing greater can be conceived. ---
If you understand the character of God as the maximally great being (which includes necessity), then you understand the above statement and the argument.
@Old Man Re: Leeuwenhoek
...*sniff-sniff-sniff*... *face scrunching*... *pinching nose closed*... Ewwwwww! Hey, Old Man, I think one of your missing socks has returned!... *opening windows*... *spraying air freshener*....
@Leeuwenhoek: "God is that then which nothing greater can be conceived."
Nice assertion. It means about as much as "God is Love" or "God is the trees." Do you have any evidence at all for your claim?
If god is greater than can be conceived? - How do you know it?
HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA..... "Which includes necessity." Please demonstrate the necessity of your god without making another inane assertion.
I bet you can't do it.
@Ricardo: It's not an argument. It's an assertion. To get there a theist must cherry pick facts like they cherry pick verses from the bible. There has never been an Atheist regime or government. There are communists, socialists, Maoists, and other political ideologies that tried to eliminate religion. Atheists, not even the hard atheists are out there killing people, bombing abortion clinics, or killing doctors like the theists. Political ideologies and religious ideas do not equal atheism. It is a Strawman Fallacy. Countries fight wars with each other and have civil wars, it has nothing at all to do with atheism.
I want to know the best irrefutable arguments in favor of atheism?
Ricardo, folks who are theist often argue against that which, to a skeptical mind, seems irrefutable. Review the strings of debate here at AR. You will find that theists do not stop in their tracks when an argument is presented and said, “Gee, that’s an irrefutable argument! I guess I’ll stop believing in my god now!”
Again, trying to move the burden of proof .
It is not up to atheist to prove their position, having made no claims .That responsibility remains with you.
An aside; God cannot be argued into or out of existence. Logic is not a reliable tool for obtaining the truth of anything. A logical inference is true IF AND ONLY ID THE PREMISE IS TRUE.
As a general principle, it is accepted the existence of god is AN UNFALSIFIABLE POSITION. That means it can neither be proved nor disproved.
MY POSITION: I am an agnostic atheist. That means I do not believe in god (due to lack of evidence ) BUT I do not claim to KNOW god does not exist.
In my daily life, I behave as if god does not exist. Part of that behaviour is dealing with disingenuous dropkicks such as your good self.
Bored now. You don't learn. Not wasting any more time on you
I learned a long time ago!
@Ricardo: "The best irrefutable argument in favor of Atheism."
"THEISTS HAVE NOT MET THEIR BURDEN OF PROOF."
@Ricardo
"I want to know the best irrefutable arguments in favor of atheism?"
You want to know the killer app? Here it is .....
"I do not accept your concept of god, please prove it to me."
Because (and this has been repeated to many times) that a theist makes a claim, and thus it is incumbent on them to prove their claim. The atheist does not have to perform any counter-argument or prove anything, just listen.
Rule #1 ... the burden of proof is on the claimant.
That sentiment should be printed up on 3 foot high letters and put in every science classroom. While logic, reason, common sense, etc; are great when you have nothing else to go on; we shouldn't be surprised that the best test of reality, it to actually test something in the real world.
@Leeuwenhoek
"God is that than which nothing greater can be conceived. ---
If you understand the character of God as the maximally great being (which includes necessity), then you understand the above statement and the argument"
Again, just defining a god into existence.
Just because you define your god as maximally great, and necessary, does not mean there is actually a god with that definition that exists.
Please provide evidence (not a flawed argument), that such a god exists.
@Simon Moon
Anselm's apologetics is as likely to justify the existence of Zeus or Thor, as it is Jesus or Allah.
It's risible nonsense of course.
The way I defeat any argument for God easily on Twitter:
How can God create a universe/think thoughts/have knowledge if he doesn't have a brain or neurons? You might answer that God is all-powerful so doesn't need a brain. How can God be all-powerful if we humans are so poorly designed? #atheist
I would add:
There is no evidence where there should be that you can think thoughts without a brain/neurons (this is evidence that there likely isn't such a thing as thought without neurons), God doesn't have any neurons or a brain he is immaterial. If a theist says God is all powerful so doesn't require neurons etc I then debunk this with the argument from Bad Design: How can God be all powerful? This then ties back into the no-neurons/brain argument: Something that has so little power but is intelligent but doesn't have a brain/neurons? This God likely has less intelligence than a human because not even humans would design us this poorly (robots we create don't feel pain, excess pain being a terrible design flaw.) How on Earth could this God create a universe, do the fine tuning, create humans etc? Atheistic naturalism makes most sense. Atheism is very likely true.
I have never heard an argument against atheist that was not a straw-man or that was not based on a complete lack of understanding regarding the definition of atheism.
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