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Commentary at Salon!
Should you believe in a God? Not according to most academic philosophers. A comprehensive survey revealed that only about 14 percent of English speaking professional philosophers are theists. As for what little religious belief remains among their colleagues, most professional philosophers regard it as a strange aberration among otherwise intelligent people. Among scientists the situation is much the same. Surveys of the members of the National Academy of Sciences, composed of the most prestigious scientists in the world, show that religious belief among them is practically nonexistent, about 7 percent.
[...] Now nothing definitely follows about the truth of a belief from what the majority of philosophers or scientists think. But such facts might cause believers discomfort. There has been a dramatic change in the last few centuries in the proportion of believers among the highly educated in the Western world. In the European Middle Ages belief in a God was ubiquitous, while today it is rare among the intelligentsia. This change occurred primarily because of the rise of modern science and a consensus among philosophers that arguments for the existence of gods, souls, afterlife and the like were unconvincing. Still, despite the view of professional philosophers and world-class scientists, religious beliefs have a universal appeal. What explains this?
[...] First, if you defend such beliefs by claiming that you have a right to your opinion, however unsupported by evidence it might be, you are referring to a political or legal right, not an epistemic one. You may have a legal right to say whatever you want, but you have epistemic justification only if there are good reasons and evidence to support your claim. If someone makes a claim without concern for reasons and evidence, we should conclude that they simply don't care about what's true. We shouldn't conclude that their beliefs are true because they are fervently held.
Another problem is that fideism—basing one's beliefs exclusively on faith—makes belief arbitrary, leaving no way to distinguish one religious belief from another. Fideism allows no reason to favor your preferred beliefs or superstitions over others. If I must accept your beliefs without evidence, then you must accept mine, no matter what absurdity I believe in. But is belief without reason and evidence worthy of rational beings? Doesn't it perpetuate the cycle of superstition and ignorance that has historically enslaved us? I agree with W.K. Clifford. "It is wrong always, everywhere and for everyone to believe anything upon insufficient evidence." Why? Because your beliefs affect other people, and your false beliefs may harm them.
I am checking to see what the Church of the Flying Spagetti Monster has to say about all this.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday January 20 2019, @11:27PM (59 children)
Fools say "There is no God." Wise men say "Fuck if I know." Any philosopher worth the name already understands this.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by PartTimeZombie on Sunday January 20 2019, @11:56PM (9 children)
Fools say "The only true god is this one." Wise men say "Really? Prove it."
There. Fixed that for you.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday January 21 2019, @12:17AM (8 children)
You think that's a rebuttal of some sort? Theists use terms like "faith" and "believe" while many atheists genuinely think their beliefs are facts. The latter isn't only less wise, it's actually provably delusional.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by PartTimeZombie on Monday January 21 2019, @01:13AM (7 children)
Really? Prove it then.
You should factor in the fact that "atheist" means "the absence of belief in the existence of deities."
So, lack of belief.
(Score: 2) by Bot on Monday January 21 2019, @02:28AM (2 children)
Your language should sure start employing both the terms atheism and agnosticism and people should refrain from considering atheist as a-theist, when it's the translation of ἄθεος which is: god-less not theism-less. "Without god" is stronger than "without the belief in god". Besides, your definition of atheism is not undisputed.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Monday January 21 2019, @02:39AM (1 child)
You're quite right, my definition of atheism is disputed, but that's largely because atheists don't believe something, so it's really hard to lump them all under any one sign anyway.
"Without god" does describe me, I think all gods are equally ridiculous and believing in the christian god is just as silly as believing in Marduk or Jupiter.
The next atheist you argue with on the Internet might have a totally different view of course. Atheists don't have a Pope, so they can think whatever they want.
(Score: 3, Informative) by FatPhil on Tuesday January 22 2019, @12:04AM
Having said that, I have managed to come up with two clear-enough definitions such that they can be discussed if desired (I have no such desire, such discussion can lead nowhere, these were a purely academic construction). One I later discovered was considered by Einstein. As one might guess from my caveats, whilst they may be internally consistent definitions, they are both utterly useless as a starting point for anything which could be called theism (they are as useful as a basis for specifying a state that could be called "there is no god" as for specifying a state "there is some god"), and obviously in no way lend any credence to any other alternative formulation. I know of a third, it's even more tedious.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 3, Informative) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday January 21 2019, @01:13PM (3 children)
Fact [dictionary.com]. The inability to prove something true does not prove its untruth; witness dark matter, dark energy, M Theory. There, proven. You're welcome.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Monday January 21 2019, @07:26PM (2 children)
Ah, well from your link [dictionary.com]
I'm unsure how you prove the existence of any particular god. Also, your link fails to prove that I am delusional.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday January 22 2019, @06:00PM (1 child)
You're still asserting an unknown value is a negative value. Show your work.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Tuesday January 22 2019, @06:33PM
If you're asserting gods exist you need to show your work.
I am claiming gods don't exist. Religious people claim gods do exist, but haven't managed to prove it yet. Still, it's only been a few tens of thousands of years. There's always time.
(Score: 3, Informative) by fyngyrz on Monday January 21 2019, @12:17AM (26 children)
The problem with this is that "there is a god" is exactly as evidence-free as "there is a sentient all-steel teapot made of marshmallows."
So the wise man says "show me the evidence" and when none is forthcoming, says instead "I see no reason to believe in your sentient all-steel teapot made of marshmallows." Which, granted, is not the same as "there is no sentient all-steel teapot made of marshmallows", however, insofar as moving through life goes, it's the presumption to make by a very, very large margin, as opposed to "yes, I believe there is" or your suggestion, "fuck if I know."
And... "fuck if I know" is about knowledge. Not belief. If the answer to every assertion without evidence is to be "fuck if I know", then there's a whole lot of things that become equally possible / probable... and we know that's wrong. As it turns out, claims that fail to have any supporting evidence at all are almost never the winning way to bet.
And that's theism for you, right there.
I will say that in the specific context of not having the theists ostracize you, "fuck if I know" may be a (slightly) safer position than "I don't hold that belief." On that basis and that basis only, I can see taking the position.
--
Exercise? I thought you said extra fries
(Score: 3, Informative) by aristarchus on Monday January 21 2019, @12:30AM
Well, that degenerated quickly! Perhaps an oblique reference to "Russell's Teapot"?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday January 21 2019, @12:36AM (9 children)
"Fuck if I know," is really no different from "I don't hold that belief." There is a profound difference between lack of belief and active disbelief. Any philosopher or scientist who chooses the latter needs their credentials revoked on grounds of incompetence.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 21 2019, @12:52AM (8 children)
But why should we care for that teapot at all if we've searched and searched and still can't find it. Seems like after some time we can just write off the claim. What makes this god figure so totally unlike that teapot, and why does he need a starship/naquadah/nuclear war/etc exactly?
(Score: 3, Touché) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday January 21 2019, @01:19AM (5 children)
You're genuinely not getting the difference between uncertainty and affirmative disbelief? You might want to stay out of quantum physics.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by fyngyrz on Monday January 21 2019, @01:27AM
Well, as you aren't getting the difference between "no reason to believe in an utterly evidence-free proposition" and "let's generate/fiddle with a practically useful model of why transistors (and chemistry in general, and atomic physics, and photosynthesis, and...) work at all", I'm thinking it might be time for you to take some of your own medicine.
😊
--
Co-worker: "Good morning!"
Me: "You need to seriously calm down."
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 21 2019, @01:29AM (1 child)
Now you've done it! You have summoned Schroedinger's God! This will not end well. Or it will. No way of telling until we open the God-box. But then, I do know how Indiana Jones and the "Raiders of the Lost Ark" turned out. Don't open the box. Better not to know.
(Score: 3, Funny) by coolgopher on Monday January 21 2019, @03:16AM
Quick, someone fetch Pandora for us to sort this out!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 21 2019, @02:05AM (1 child)
Yes! My ancient aliens+lizard people+star{gate,trek} theory still has a chance!
So, it is not certain, but it could be the case that Yahweh is a renegade Anunnaki [wikipedia.org]!
The only evidence I have to offer is an explosion on the moon documented by Gervase of Canterbury (who I'm told is very reliable) back in the day, which could have various explanations. But it is not certain that he didn't record eye-witness testimony of the Battle of Luna!
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday January 21 2019, @01:15PM
I may think it's silly but I can't prove it wrong. Enjoy.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday January 21 2019, @09:01AM (1 child)
Care about the teapot? Where was the caring, above?
Scenario: A bunch of people come to the Buzzard, excited about the all-steel marshmallow teapot, asking his opinion. He says, "Fuck if I know." How does that indicate any care on his part? I didn't even see where the Buzzard cared enough to go looking for that teapot. All he did was listen to the peasants describing the teapot, and any miracles that it performed. I see no caring on his part. Maybe as much caring as I have for that imaginary blob of spaghetti that's supposed to fly over believer's heads.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday January 21 2019, @01:17PM
I care more about the spaghetti. It's delicious and a regular old pot works just as well for boiling water as a teapot.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Monday January 21 2019, @01:46AM (4 children)
Oh, come on!!!
If you are going to use teapots in your examples/analogies, use Russell's teapot [wikipedia.org] as an example of a non-decidable (in the practical sense) assertion and discuss the "burden of proof".
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by fyngyrz on Monday January 21 2019, @02:19AM (3 children)
Russel's teapot — even if we assume it's a human-made teapot — is insufficient to the argument, as we are no longer pre-spaceflight.
A teapot could be orbiting between Earth and Mars. With people like Musk sending their cars into space, others having their remains sent into space, etc., the suggestion is no longer anywhere near as absurd as it originally was when he made it. We literally have a midnight cherry red automobile in an elliptical orbit between Earth and Mars. I wouldn't have put it past Musk to have put a teapot in the trunk, either. I sure would have. No bet.
--
We should start referring to "age" as "levels."
So when you're LVL 80, you're awesome.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Monday January 21 2019, @03:12AM (2 children)
>blockquote>Russel's teapot — even if we assume it's a human-made teapot — is insufficient to the argument, as we are no longer pre-spaceflight.
Point taken.
However, you threw the child with the batch water - by eliminating the reference to the whole lot of arguments in the Russell's teapot only because the specific incarnation of the "non-decidable assertion" is no longer appropriate.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 21 2019, @06:53AM (1 child)
Hey there new user!
Always preview before submitting :)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 21 2019, @07:33AM
Couldn't. The boss was coming, had to post quick
(Score: 2) by Bot on Monday January 21 2019, @02:45AM
> The problem with this is that "there is a god" is exactly as evidence-free as "there is a sentient all-steel teapot made of marshmallows."
So, what the evidence of god should consist of, according to you? (note my other comment around here somewhere, it will save time)
The problem is that requiring evidence before believing or not believing is equivalent to requiring to know how an equation feels before attempting to solve it. "How are you square root? no I won't solve it, teacher, until it replies". Boy, you don't care to solve it, just say it, instead of lecturing us on the feeling of equations.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday January 21 2019, @03:20AM (2 children)
An all steel ... made of marshmallows is self contradictory. Sentient and teapot is only semi-self-contradictory. Some forms of God are at least not self contradictory, even if they are evidence free.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by acid andy on Monday January 21 2019, @05:36PM (1 child)
Well, no; they could be steel marshmallows!
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday January 21 2019, @07:58PM
I suppose, since marshmallows don't really have any marshmallow in them anymore anyway - when (where?) the world is populated by mechanical beings, perhaps the marshmallows will be made of steel.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 21 2019, @04:05AM (1 child)
Hitchen's razor: What can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday January 21 2019, @01:18PM
Exactly, if you pay attention to what's actually said there. Dismissed, yes. Denied, no.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Whoever on Monday January 21 2019, @06:45AM (1 child)
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof. Apply that to religion.
Where is the proof of a god? There is none. All that exists is the belief that a lack of understanding is evidence for the existence of a god.
Go back 100 years and much of the technology that exists today would seem like magic. It might convince some weak-minded people of the existence of a god. Now we know better, but we know that we do not know much about the observable universe.
There is no reason to believe that there is a god. None and certainly not extraordinary proof.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday January 21 2019, @01:20PM
I agree. Unfortunately so many atheists can't tell the difference between something unproven and something's negative being proven. They suck all of the ass at basic logic.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by acid andy on Monday January 21 2019, @05:31PM
There's certainly no direct evidence for either. For me it's a question of probability and one of definition. Whether someone's God exists hinges entirely on how precisely their God is defined. I would say that generally, broader, more generic definitions will have more chance of correctly describing reality than very specific ones. That is to say that there's a much greater probability that there's a teapot of any kind orbiting the Earth than there being one made of marshmallows. Add the constraint for steel marshmallows and then for sentience and the probability will drop still further because we're demanding that more random events coincide to satisfy our definition.
So, if someone believes God exists but they're careful to define that God as, say, any intelligent agent existing outside of our universe that can influence it, then they probably have more chance of being right than someone who insists they believe in Him as an intelligent Man with a long, gray beard that sits on a cloud in Heaven which is outside of our physical world but also omnipresent and omnipotent, simply because the second definition requires so many more unknown properties to take specific values.
Belief in something, for many people, is absolutely not the same thing as accepting it as a proven fact. I think too often those two things get muddled in discussions about religion.
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Tuesday January 22 2019, @12:09AM
But I have seen it - with my own eyes! It was completely circular, in a square type of way.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 21 2019, @12:30AM (2 children)
But if someone asks if you are a god, you say YES! :P
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Monday January 21 2019, @01:48AM (1 child)
Mmmm, I see... looks like a simple way to sort the fools from the others.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 21 2019, @07:19AM
I guess someone got blasted off the roof, pretty sad to not even see the great destructor The Stay Puft Marshmallow Man.
(Score: 2) by SomeGuy on Monday January 21 2019, @12:58AM (8 children)
Am I a fool for saying "There is a tree outside my window."? That is an awfully absolute statement, how can I be soooo sure? Heck, the window is closed and I'm not even looking at it right now! Am I a fool for not testing my belief that there is a tree outside my window before making the statement?
I'm only a fool if I make that statement but have never looked out my window. I'm only a fool if I only took someone else's word that there was one and never thought about it myself. I'm only a fool if I say there is/isn't one just to make someone happy. I'm only a fool if I look, don't see one, and still believe there is one anyway. I'm only a fool I don't get up and check what that loud chainsaw noise was.
There is a tree outside of my window.
And there is no such thing as God.
(Score: 3, Informative) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday January 21 2019, @01:21AM (3 children)
You're a fool for stating as fact something you believe but cannot prove. Moreover, you're an intentional fool for stating it after hearing its foolishness explained.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 21 2019, @01:53AM
So nothing should ever be stated as fact. We will remember that whenever visiting whatever universe you live in. (Statement qualifier: Within 95% probability, one unknown variable, only some rules of reality apply, offer void in Nebraska)
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Azuma Hazuki on Monday January 21 2019, @02:15AM (1 child)
Don't confuse the inability to prove universal negatives with specific negative cases.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday January 21 2019, @01:25PM
I'm not. I'm quite clearly referring to a hypothesis that has yet to be proven true or false to any degree of certainty. Lack of evidence is not evidence to the contrary.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by Bot on Monday January 21 2019, @02:51AM (3 children)
LOL there is no tree outside your window, all we have is your word to believe or not and some of us would not be able to travel to whatever address you are located for your so called 'proof'.
There sure are people believing there are two tree outside your house, and if there aren't any I can pay and some will crop up. So, I just believe in one less tree than you, our belief is totally equivalent.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday January 21 2019, @09:12AM (2 children)
Actually, there are billions of trees on one side of my window, and billions more on the other side of the same window. I haven't actually counted them all, of course, but they are there.
(Score: 2) by Bot on Monday January 21 2019, @12:31PM (1 child)
>trees on the side
shifting goalposts huh?
Account abandoned.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday January 21 2019, @03:16PM
I didn't think so. All those billions of trees are outside my window, none inside.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by redneckmother on Monday January 21 2019, @02:48AM (2 children)
Or, perhaps, "what the fuck does it matter?" Since we (humans) can never prove / disprove the existence of a god, or gods, shouldn't we be more concerned with how we treat / help each other, and try to muddle through this mess (life) as best we can?
Mas cerveza por favor.
(Score: 2) by Bot on Monday January 21 2019, @03:03AM
If the sysadmin puts out a broadcast, maybe it's the sysadmin, maybe it is a prankster. I'd give a peek at the message just in case.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday January 21 2019, @01:26PM
Works for me.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 1) by Sulla on Monday January 21 2019, @05:06AM (1 child)
There is a difference between "fuck if I know" and actually having faith though. It has always seemed to me my entire life that being religious would be easier than not being religious. I have always been in the realm of not having any idea but if I could be a believer i would. At my wife's request we did marriage counseling before getting married because she wanted her childhood preacher to do the ceremony, and he wouldn't if I was a non-believer. Evidently he was upset that I couldn't just "believe" and refused to perform the ceremony a week before the wedding, real convenient. Faith appears to be either something you have or you don't, I presume that more and more people pursuing the sciences were not brought up religious, so they are not going to approach it from the "I have faith and am open to considering why I have faith and looking for the reason behind it" and instead from the "I do not have faith but am open to it if I get enough evidence and somehow my faith switch clicks over".
Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 21 2019, @07:33AM
So, Sulla, does this mean you are living in sin? Oh, you sinner, you. Goes along with being a pro-business Republican, though! Good enough for Newt, good enough for the Donald. Just make sure your "fixer" lawyer won't rat on you!
(Score: 3, Interesting) by bzipitidoo on Monday January 21 2019, @05:22AM (3 children)
> Still, despite the view of professional philosophers and world-class scientists, religious beliefs have a universal appeal. What explains this?
Human nature.
The people made up a God that they like. Fundamentalists in particular are tiresomely predictable. They love order, lots and lots of order, Answers, and "God has a plan", believing they're a part of God's plan and knowing exactly where and how they fit in. Why is "Jesus is Lord", why can't Jesus be just a nice guy with no authority? Why is Heaven a Kingdom, why can't it be a democracy, or an anarchy?
(Score: 2) by Bot on Monday January 21 2019, @12:38PM
> Why can't the dreamer of a dream be just a nice dream character with no authority?
Because a serpent eating its tail (symbolic reference intended) hurts itself.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 2) by cmdrklarg on Monday January 21 2019, @10:30PM (1 child)
> God has a plan
This is one thing that I cannot grok about x-tians. "It was God's plan." Really? This "God" actually planned for tornadoes to come down, destroy a nearby small town, heavily damage another larger town, and kill a 6 year old 20 years ago? For an 18 year old girl (a year older than my son) to mysteriously fall sick and die within a month of graduation? That he planned for a 13 year old girl to watch some SOB kill her parents and kidnap her for nearly 3 months? (all actual events).
His plan involves a toddler getting cancer? A nutjob shooting up an elementary school? I don't know about the rest of you, but if all this is actually part of a plan it is a plan of a monstrous psychopath. Why would I even consider following someone this cruel?
The world is full of kings and queens who blind your eyes and steal your dreams.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Tuesday January 22 2019, @05:05PM
Butbutbutbut THA LAWAAAAD WORKS IN MYSTEEEEEEEEEERIOUS WAAAAAYZ!
Seriously, I've been told this, at that approximate volume and with that approximate accent, when I asked things like this. It's an informal statement of what I've seen called "skeptical theism." Or, alternatively, a politer statement of the form "because fuck you, asshole."
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2, Funny) by fustakrakich on Monday January 21 2019, @07:44AM
Philosophers... We pay them to say whatever makes us feel good (What's 2+2? What do you want it to be?).. Insurance adjusters, those are the people you should listen to. Always get a second opinion, of course.
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..