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Lorizael
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The Cult Wins
Sep 2001
time: 00:30
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No, Atheism is the realization of observations of the natural world.
One of your starting assumptions about how the universe works is that their is a God. Unfortunately, there is no logically valid reason for you to begin with this initial assumption.
The atheist makes no assumptions. The atheist simply claims that because there is no reason whatsoever to suggest that there are any sort of supernatural entities, that there aren't. The atheist has managed to break past the cultural bias with regards to religion and realize the absurdity of the proposition that a supernatural being exists.
I don't think there is a person in the world that, if raised in a vacuum until maturity and then told that the universe was governed by an omnipotent, omniscient, all-pervasive and invisible god that will shown no sign of his existsence, would be believe it.
And, as well, there is no religion to Atheism. Atheists do not attempt to create a moral code based on their observation of the universe. There are, of course, annoying atheists that like to rail on religious people. But there are stupid people everywhere, attached to all organizations and ideologies. There are also secular humanists, but not every atheist is a secular humanist, and secular humanism does not base its ethical code upon the supposed non-existence of god.
Sorry, threadstarter. Truly sorry...
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Rogan Josh
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quote:
No, Atheism is the realization of observations of the natural world. |
Which observations?  I thought you claimed that "The atheist makes no assumptions."? How can you make observations with no assumptions?
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One of your starting assumptions about how the universe works is that their is a God. Unfortunately, there is no logically valid reason for you to begin with this initial assumption.
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Ahhh, but this isn't an assumption - it comes through observation. We look at the world and there is overwhelming evidence of God.
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The atheist makes no assumptions. The atheist simply claims that because there is no reason whatsoever to suggest that there are any sort of supernatural entities, that there aren't.
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Oh, here we are. Please define supernatural. Do you mean 'outwith the laws of physics'? If so, how do you define 'phyics'. Is the observer in a quantum mechanics experiment outwith 'physics'? If he is, does that make him 'God' in your eyes? If he is not, why do you think you can trust the observation?
You see? You are making assumptions - you just don't realise it. I make assumptions too, but at least mine are logically consistent.
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The atheist has managed to break past the cultural bias with regards to religion and realize the absurdity of the proposition that a supernatural being exists.
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I think, in modern life, it is usually the other way round. We have to break through th lies that the science populists tell us in order to realise that 'God' is not something that contradicts science and our observations.
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I don't think there is a person in the world that, if raised in a vacuum until maturity and then told that the universe was governed by an omnipotent, omniscient, all-pervasive and invisible god that will shown no sign of his existsence, would be believe it.
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I completely disagree. If you kept someone in complete sensory deprivation from birth I imagine that they would develop quite a keen sense of God. They might disbelieve your existence though.
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And, as well, there is no religion to Atheism. Atheists do not attempt to create a moral code based on their observation of the universe. There are, of course, annoying atheists that like to rail on religious people. But there are stupid people everywhere, attached to all organizations and ideologies. There are also secular humanists, but not every atheist is a secular humanist, and secular humanism does not base its ethical code upon the supposed non-existence of god.
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This is just semantics on the definition of 'religion'. But I am interested to know what you base your 'ethical code' on? Isn't your belief that murdering someone is 'wrong' simply an assumption? Aren't you merely exhibiting your 'cultural bias'?
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Lorizael
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The Cult Wins
Sep 2001
time: 00:30
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quote:
Originally posted by Rogan Josh
Which observations? I thought you claimed that "The atheist makes no assumptions."? How can you make observations with no assumptions? |
Bah, yes. I make assumptions about the scientific method and the laws of physics, which have been tested over and over again. There is overwhelming support that they are true, and because I've never not come back down after jumping, I assume that they are true.
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Ahhh, but this isn't an assumption - it comes through observation. We look at the world and there is overwhelming evidence of God. |
This is entirely subjective and biased, really. You were raised with a belief in God, and when you look at the world you see the hand of God. I, with very little religious upbringing (a purely cultural Jew and a non-practicing Catholic for parents), do not see the hand of God.
Anyways, where in nature do you see God? The only place where I think a supernatural being is even remotely necessary is when you look at the origin of the universe. Otherwise... the natural processes we've discovered seem to explain the way of things fairly well.
Now, you may say that these natural processes are a result of God, but I see no reason at all to propose that theory. You may say that only God could create something so wonderful as Man or the Earth or the stars, but that is a wholly subjective evaluation of the environment, with no real meaning in a debate such as this.
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Oh, here we are. Please define supernatural. Do you mean 'outwith the laws of physics'? If so, how do you define 'phyics'. Is the observer in a quantum mechanics experiment outwith 'physics'? If he is, does that make him 'God' in your eyes? If he is not, why do you think you can trust the observation?
You see? You are making assumptions - you just don't realise it. I make assumptions too, but at least mine are logically consistent. |
Supernatural would be that which is beyond the laws of physics, yes. We have, up to a point, a set of rules and laws that describe the workings of our universe.
Why does the observer in a quantum mechanics experiment need to be supernatural? The scope of their existence is beyond the minute detail of an experiment involving quantum mechanics, sure, but their existence is still bound by the laws of physics in other ways. There is no contradiction here.
If there is, then I didn't understand you explanation and I'd ask that you try again with a bit different wording.
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I think, in modern life, it is usually the other way round. We have to break through th lies that the science populists tell us in order to realise that 'God' is not something that contradicts science and our observations. |
Once again, both of our opinions are colored by our views. And, btw, I do not think that God contradicts science. I simply don't see evidence of God. Please, show me evidence of God and I'd be happy to discuss it.
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I completely disagree. If you kept someone in complete sensory deprivation from birth I imagine that they would develop quite a keen sense of God. They might disbelieve your existence though. |
Well, this is a matter of opinion really, and we can't know the answer to this question without getting the ACLU guys angry at us.
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This is just semantics on the definition of 'religion'. But I am interested to know what you base your 'ethical code' on? Isn't your belief that murdering someone is 'wrong' simply an assumption? Aren't you merely exhibiting your 'cultural bias'? |
Okay, you're assuming that I have an ethical code. You're also assuming that I consider murder wrong.
Without religion, without a supernatural being, and without a defined purpose in life, I don't actually have any moral or ethical principles.
The only thing that guides me is an understanding that knowledge is power, and that with more knowledge I might be able to discover the answers to life's riddles. Because of this, I value the free flow of communication. And yes, communication is difficult with a dead person.
Of course, I make the assumption here that knowledge is power. Once again, however, a large amount of observation, evidence, and personal experimentation has shown me that this holds to be true in almost all circumstances, so I stick by it.
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Elok
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Land of Ramen Dragons
Mar 2003
time: 00:30
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quote:
Originally posted by Feephi
Whose reality are we talking about : yours or mine?! Reality is subjective.
Okay so you use a religous example to demonstrate "complete incompatability" with YOUR reality and then you turn around and tell us we can't offer any religous examples of your premise ourselves.....Ming, why isn't this a spam thread?
Sounds to me like you are the troll. |
Insisting on the kind of objectivity you seem to be referring to would make the word "is" obsolete. If there is no absolute truth, all opinions are equally worthless, all judgments are bad, and all actions are wrong.
My example was not really religious...it referred to a very specific, non-dogmatic concept that happened to be held by a Christian about a Christian church. If the example cited went, "Boris Gudonov thinks the NCAA are responsible for communism, fascism, and both world wars," it would not be any more or less stupid.
But you're partially correct, insofar as I do somewhat regret starting this thread now...
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Rogan Josh
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quote:
Originally posted by Lorizael
Bah, yes. I make assumptions about the scientific method and the laws of physics, which have been tested over and over again. There is overwhelming support that they are true, and because I've never not come back down after jumping, I assume that they are true.
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This is a falicy. The laws of physics have only been tested under very restricted circumstances. I have said this before on this forum, but I will again (sorry if you have hread it before): science makes an initial assumption that the universe if predictive. That if you repeat an experiment over and over you will get the same conclusion (at least in a statistical sense). This is completely untested, by definition, because the experimental method used to test such things is invalid if the assuption is wrong.
In fact, I would go so far as to say that it is probably wrong. It is probably a good assumption for most things (physics works very well at describing the universe) but I think it is likelythat there are some non-predictive phenomena.
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This is entirely subjective and biased, really. You were raised with a belief in God, and when you look at the world you see the hand of God. I, with very little religious upbringing (a purely cultural Jew and a non-practicing Catholic for parents), do not see the hand of God.
Anyways, where in nature do you see God? The only place where I think a supernatural being is even remotely necessary is when you look at the origin of the universe. Otherwise... the natural processes we've discovered seem to explain the way of things fairly well.
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Rather then the 'origin of the universe' I would rather say, the origin of universal law. Even if we one day have the 'master equation' of physics - the theory of everything - we will still be unable to answer the ultimate question: why this? (Actually, the ultimate theory is probably not an equation but a statement of symmetry.)
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Supernatural would be that which is beyond the laws of physics, yes. We have, up to a point, a set of rules and laws that describe the workings of our universe.
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But, as I just explained, the ultimate law itself would be 'beyond physics' - would that make it supernatural?
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Why does the observer in a quantum mechanics experiment need to be supernatural? The scope of their existence is beyond the minute detail of an experiment involving quantum mechanics, sure, but their existence is still bound by the laws of physics in other ways. There is no contradiction here.
If there is, then I didn't understand you explanation and I'd ask that you try again with a bit different wording.
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There is a contradiction here, and it is the old Schoedinger's cat one, which has still not been properly explained. Quantum physics is entirely subjective to the observer. In technical terms (i'll assume you know QM), the wavefunction of the object to be measured might not be sitting in an eigenstate of the quantity to be measured.
E.g., in a simplified case, an object can be black or white and you want to measure whether it is black or white. When you make the measurement the object may be neither black nor white but a superposition of black and white. However, when you make the measurement, the wavefunction of the object collapses into either black or white. The measurement changes the system.
This doesn't happen if no observer is present - interference effects between the states can be easily seen in lots of experiments indicating that the wavefunction is directly collapsed by the measurement. But what constitutes a measurement? Why should a 'measurement' made by an electron not be as valid as one made by us?
It seems that we are more than just the sum of the quarks and leptons that make us up. There is something else which is collapsing the wavefunctions in experiments, which is most certainly not explained by physics (yet, at least). By your own definition, this is supernatural.
Incidentally, you can't get round this - hidden variable theories (where the result of the measurement is really deterministic) have been shown to be inconsistent.
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Okay, you're assuming that I have an ethical code. You're also assuming that I consider murder wrong.
Without religion, without a supernatural being, and without a defined purpose in life, I don't actually have any moral or ethical principles.
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Lorizael
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The Cult Wins
Sep 2001
time: 00:30
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quote:
Originally posted by Rogan Josh
There is something else which is collapsing the wavefunctions in experiments, which is most certainly not explained by physics (yet, at least). |
Yes. It's that yet there.
So far, religion has explained very little about the physical universe. It has crafted numerous theories on cosmology, and they've all proven to be wrong.
Now, it's understandable why they were; the technology to observe the universe in a broader way has not existed for the majority of the history of civilization.
Despite this, it has always been science that has eventually explained things. Science has gotten a lot of things wrong too, I know that, but at least it keeps trying. Religion sticks to its beliefs for too long, and then eventually, once the culture of the people has changed, religion will acknowledge that things weren't as they said.
Because of this history, I'd rather put my trust in science to explain the physical universe. Religion can say whatever it wants about the spiritual, or the beyond, or the supernatural, but its implicit irrationality (faith) should not be imposed onto this rational universe. If I see unexplained phenomena, I will wait until a rational explanation is found.
If it can be proven (which I bet would be very difficult, considering that a supernatural being would inherently be beyond logic and rationality) that a thing was done by a being beyond this universe, then I will acknowledge the existence of the supernatural.
But, even then, it will need to be shown to me which mythology (if any) got it right. You assume the inexplicable is the Christian God. Why not Brahma, or Odin, or Baal?
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25-08-2003 10:16
sorry, but an abrasive and dysfunctional sense of humour is also required if you want to be me
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