Theism? Seriously? EVERYTHING from NOTHING?

[Waiting4evidence]

In a recent post, a theist grossly mischaracterized the atheist position.

Instead of accepting the simple definition that an atheist is one who does not believe in deities, he just made up the definition that an atheist is one who believes that the entire universe came from nothing.

We do not know how the universe came into existence, and we don't even know if the universe ever came into existence.

We make NO conclusion based on our ignorance of the universe's origin.

We do NOT, as per the theist's allegation, say "We don't know, therefore nothing did it". We just say "We don't know, therefore let's not pretend we know, but rather let's try to find out".

So, I am hoping we can put that bogus accusation to rest.


But there is another ramification of the theist's absurd accusation.

He (rightly) claims that it's wronng - given our current knowledge - to hold the dogmatic belief that the universe came from nothing.

At the same time, he believes that an entity much more complex than the universe exists.

So I can't help but ask. If it's absurd to think that something as complex as the universe can come into existence from nothing, then how do you account for the existence of something even more complex than the universe?

How did God come into existence? "You don't know therefore nothing did it"?

Do you see the absurdity of your position, given that you accuse atheists of holding a fatal flaw in their belief, while in reality they do not hold that belief, but you do?

[Tired of the Nonsense]

That is one way of being Jewish. In a sense, one born Jewish is a Jew forever, but that does not obligate one to practice the Jewish religion; very many Jews leave it, and many are indifferent, as your friends may be. Some Jews proudly self-identify as Jews without having any interest in the religion whatever; Albert Einstein, Woody Allen, Isaac Asimov, and many others come to mind.

This I suppose is the heart of my question. I was born into Christianity but I no longer subscribe to the most fundamental of Christian beliefs on the existence of God and the divinity of Jesus. As a result I no longer consider myself or call myself a Christian. I know various other individuals like myself who were raised Christians but who no longer consider themselves to be such. But even atheistic Jews still consider themselves to be Jews. One never hears the claim "I used to be a Jew." The retention of a sense of identity as a special and separate people is amazingly strong even after the passage of more than three millennia.

You're quite welcome, but the idea that the Bible, or even any substantial part of it, carries water for the kind of political agenda you're advocating here isn't going to cut much ice with Christians, either; the liberal Christians know all the stuff I've been telling you, and the fundamentalists have their own imposed-after-the-fact agenda of their own to root for.

We were discussing the Torah. And, yes, the Torah does serve a multitude of functions. It's most important overall function however was to give the Jewish tribes, which after all were not always in complete accord with each other, a sense of national unity by recounting their connected historical origins, their mutual historical tribulations, and the eventual historical triumph of their forbears. A triumph which was achieved through the divine intervention of their national god, a god who had not only delivered them from bondage but had chosen them to be his special people.

To effect obedience to their national god hundreds of strictures and requirements were placed on the Jewish nation, and are detailed in the pages of "the law," the book of the Torah. Strictures which must be obeyed by all of the people all of the time, because when god's wrath falls, it falls on the entire nation. Everyone had to work together constantly to keep God's law, a condition which also served to provide a strong sense of national identify and unity. And a perfect condition for establishing and maintaining a form of national governance; an ideal situation for those in the position of governing.

The Torah was written and revised more or less continuously over the course of several centuries, a task which required a good deal of time and effort, and indicates a strong and practical motivation for doing so. If, as we both agree, the terms and language to be found in the Torah was not "inspired" by any celestial Being, then clearly the humans who composed the Torah had a very rather human agenda in mind. So if one asks the question, "who most directly benefited from the hundreds of rules and strictures which are to be found in the Torah," then the obvious and immediate answer is that the priests and the king or government were the clear beneficiaries of the terms and details established in the Torah. For the general population however, well not so much. The rules were often times quite restrictive and onerous. And yes, resentment is reflected in the other books of the Bible. The sweet heart terms accorded to the Levites in the Torah are blatantly and even shockingly self serving. No surprise, since clearly the Levite priests were responsible for the writing and ongoing revision of the Torah. And the Torah perfectly suited the needs of the government by insuring the obedience and conformity of the population. Not by human law, but by divine decree. No surprise then that the origins of the Torah date back to the time of Solomon, legendary for his wisdom. A written covenant with God is a brilliant solution to the problem of governing through insuring the conformity of the governed by the those attempting to govern them. There can by no resistance to the Will of God, after all.

So does the Torah serve multiple functions? Of course it does. There is an awful lot going on in those pages. And all of those functions meld together to serve an overriding purpose... establishing and maintaining control of the Jewish population. For their own good of course. And certainly for the good of the Levites. The extent to which the Levites are singled out as the privileged class in the Torah is astounding. It also gives a good indication of just how much power they were wielding over the rest of the Jewish population that they managed to pull it off for several centuries. Was the Torah written with an agenda in mind? Well, do humans do things for self serving reasons? In fact isn't this GENERALLY true? The agenda is right there in the text of the Torah itself. It's hard to miss, unless one really doesn't want to acknowledge it to begin with. Are people still buying into it three thousand years later? Well do Jews still consider themselves to be a special and separate people after more than three millennia? And of course the influence of the Bible now extends well beyond the people it was originally intended for. For it's impact on world history no other work even comes close. I often say that no one should consider themselves to be truly educated who has not read the entire Bible at least once, both Old and New Testaments, and have made at least some reasonable effort to understand all that is contained there. A large order, certainly.

[Ankhhape]

Waiting4evidence;

Your statement is not entirely true, for the Atheist has made up their mind that there is no god, which is to me, as absurd as someone making up their mind there is one.

Agnosticism is our better choice, I simply admit that I do not know whether there is or is not a god. I weigh the data before me, have my personal ideas and hopes, but at the end of the day I know that I do not really know.

Oh the contrary.. you are also mistating the position of many atheists. Some atheists conclude 'There is a lack of evidence for a god, so until such evidence exists, I do not accept there is one'. I am sure that if someone can provide tangible evidence FOR a God, they will stop being atheists.

I believe this why there are distinct differences between Atheism and Agnosticism.

Atheism is, in a broad sense, the rejection of belief in the existence of deities. In a narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there are no deities. Most inclusively, atheism is simply the absence of belief that any deities exist. Atheism is contrasted with theism, which in its most general form is the belief that at least one deity exists.

Agnosticism is a stance about the difference between belief and knowledge, rather than about any specific claim or belief. In the popular sense, an agnostic is someone who is undecided about the existence of a deity or deities, whereas a theist and an atheist believe and disbelieve, respectively.

[Tired of the Nonsense]

It's worth noting that I myself am a convert -- 30-some years ago, I was a Methodist minister -- and I converted for precisely the kind of reasons that Goat speaks of here. My conversion was intellectually based, not emotional.

This I find intensely interesting. Presumably as a Jewish convert you reached the conclusion that Jesus is not a deity. By process of elimination therefore you no longer believe in the resurrection. What led you, a former Christian minister, to reach such a conclusion? I only ask because I reached the same conclusion myself at about age 13. But I was never a minister.

[East of Eden]

In a recent post, a theist grossly mischaracterized the atheist position.

Instead of accepting the simple definition that an atheist is one who does not believe in deities, he just made up the definition that an atheist is one who believes that the entire universe came from nothing.

We do not know how the universe came into existence,

So how can you say for sure God wasn't involved?

and we don't even know if the universe ever came into existence.

We make NO conclusion based on our ignorance of the universe's origin.

We do NOT, as per the theist's allegation, say "We don't know, therefore nothing did it". We just say "We don't know, therefore let's not pretend we know, but rather let's try to find out".

So, I am hoping we can put that bogus accusation to rest.


But there is another ramification of the theist's absurd accusation.

He (rightly) claims that it's wronng - given our current knowledge - to hold the dogmatic belief that the universe came from nothing.

At the same time, he believes that an entity much more complex than the universe exists.

So I can't help but ask. If it's absurd to think that something as complex as the universe can come into existence from nothing, then how do you account for the existence of something even more complex than the universe?

How did God come into existence?

You don't need an explanation for an explanation. In other words, if we found a large earthen mound containing pottery and tool pieces, we could reasonably conclude that men made those things, without knowing who they were or where they came from.

Well of course....but how in the world to you ever get to any certainty as to the BiibleGoid from the fact that the world exists? I see the world, I think it was created...therefore BibleGod? Come on....be reasonable.

I didn't say it 'proved' the God of the Bible's existence, but it is a piece of evidence in His favor, and more rational than believing that rationality arose from irrationality, and than nothing times nobody equals everything.

[East of Eden]

Waiting4evidence;

Your statement is not entirely true, for the Atheist has made up their mind that there is no god, which is to me, as absurd as someone making up their mind there is one.

Agnosticism is our better choice, I simply admit that I do not know whether there is or is not a god. I weigh the data before me, have my personal ideas and hopes, but at the end of the day I know that I do not really know.

Oh the contrary.. you are also mistating the position of many atheists. Some atheists conclude 'There is a lack of evidence for a god, so until such evidence exists, I do not accept there is one'. I am sure that if someone can provide tangible evidence FOR a God, they will stop being atheists.

I believe this why there are distinct differences between Atheism and Agnosticism.

Atheism is, in a broad sense, the rejection of belief in the existence of deities. In a narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there are no deities. Most inclusively, atheism is simply the absence of belief that any deities exist. Atheism is contrasted with theism, which in its most general form is the belief that at least one deity exists.

Agnosticism is a stance about the difference between belief and knowledge, rather than about any specific claim or belief. In the popular sense, an agnostic is someone who is undecided about the existence of a deity or deities, whereas a theist and an atheist believe and disbelieve, respectively.

Funny how when differences in Christian belief arise, we hear that you therefore can't be sure which is correct. Wouldn't that also be true of the differing varieties of skeptism?

[Ankhhape]

Waiting4evidence;

Your statement is not entirely true, for the Atheist has made up their mind that there is no god, which is to me, as absurd as someone making up their mind there is one.

Agnosticism is our better choice, I simply admit that I do not know whether there is or is not a god. I weigh the data before me, have my personal ideas and hopes, but at the end of the day I know that I do not really know.

Oh the contrary.. you are also mistating the position of many atheists. Some atheists conclude 'There is a lack of evidence for a god, so until such evidence exists, I do not accept there is one'. I am sure that if someone can provide tangible evidence FOR a God, they will stop being atheists.

I believe this why there are distinct differences between Atheism and Agnosticism.

Atheism is, in a broad sense, the rejection of belief in the existence of deities. In a narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there are no deities. Most inclusively, atheism is simply the absence of belief that any deities exist. Atheism is contrasted with theism, which in its most general form is the belief that at least one deity exists.

Agnosticism is a stance about the difference between belief and knowledge, rather than about any specific claim or belief. In the popular sense, an agnostic is someone who is undecided about the existence of a deity or deities, whereas a theist and an atheist believe and disbelieve, respectively.

Funny how when differences in Christian belief arise, we hear that you therefore can't be sure which is correct. Wouldn't that also be true of the differing varieties of skeptism?

Being that this is a totally Christian Debate forum, why would you hear otherwise from me?
That said trust me, I am an equal proponent of all religions, not just the Abrahamic ones.

[Flail]

Waiting4evidence;

Your statement is not entirely true, for the Atheist has made up their mind that there is no god, which is to me, as absurd as someone making up their mind there is one.

Agnosticism is our better choice, I simply admit that I do not know whether there is or is not a god. I weigh the data before me, have my personal ideas and hopes, but at the end of the day I know that I do not really know.

Oh the contrary.. you are also mistating the position of many atheists. Some atheists conclude 'There is a lack of evidence for a god, so until such evidence exists, I do not accept there is one'. I am sure that if someone can provide tangible evidence FOR a God, they will stop being atheists.

I believe this why there are distinct differences between Atheism and Agnosticism.

Atheism is, in a broad sense, the rejection of belief in the existence of deities. In a narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there are no deities. Most inclusively, atheism is simply the absence of belief that any deities exist. Atheism is contrasted with theism, which in its most general form is the belief that at least one deity exists.

Agnosticism is a stance about the difference between belief and knowledge, rather than about any specific claim or belief. In the popular sense, an agnostic is someone who is undecided about the existence of a deity or deities, whereas a theist and an atheist believe and disbelieve, respectively.

Funny how when differences in Christian belief arise, we hear that you therefore can't be sure which is correct. Wouldn't that also be true of the differing varieties of skeptism?

Admittedly there are varied connotations of skepticism but for most inveterate skeptics like myself, it refers to a questioning attitude toward other's mere opinions or beliefs that they insist are factual; or a general doubt to what others commonly take for granted.

Religious skepticism is an application of this questioning attitude to un-evidenced beliefs in and claims about supernatural beings, based primarily upon, in the case of Christianity, first century storytelling as to what should rationally be viewed as implausible.

[catalyst]

Waiting4evidence;

Your statement is not entirely true, for the Atheist has made up their mind that there is no god, which is to me, as absurd as someone making up their mind there is one.

Agnosticism is our better choice, I simply admit that I do not know whether there is or is not a god. I weigh the data before me, have my personal ideas and hopes, but at the end of the day I know that I do not really know.

Oh the contrary.. you are also mistating the position of many atheists. Some atheists conclude 'There is a lack of evidence for a god, so until such evidence exists, I do not accept there is one'. I am sure that if someone can provide tangible evidence FOR a God, they will stop being atheists.

I believe this why there are distinct differences between Atheism and Agnosticism.

Atheism is, in a broad sense, the rejection of belief in the existence of deities. In a narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there are no deities. Most inclusively, atheism is simply the absence of belief that any deities exist. Atheism is contrasted with theism, which in its most general form is the belief that at least one deity exists.

Agnosticism is a stance about the difference between belief and knowledge, rather than about any specific claim or belief. In the popular sense, an agnostic is someone who is undecided about the existence of a deity or deities, whereas a theist and an atheist believe and disbelieve, respectively.

Funny how when differences in Christian belief arise, we hear that you therefore can't be sure which is correct. Wouldn't that also be true of the differing varieties of skeptism?

Hello East Of Eden... been a while..

You make a good point in that, there ARE differences in "christian" belief, so therefore it cannot be SEEN as the "absolute truth" as many a christian claim it is.

Perhaps that has a lot to do with the reasons behind the alternative scepticism... as to actually noticing that these self-professed christian's DON"T and cannot agree on what supposedly IS or supposedly is NOT correct.

Something too that christians really should understand.. Like it or not, atheism is not just about rejecting YOUR chosen god model. It is not a "special" one and in fact, he's merely an also ran in the "godly" buffet out there of offer. Don't take it personally as it is not about YOU, but rather, the "stuff" you choose to believe is some sort of "absolute truth".

Catalyst.

[Ankhhape]

Obviously the definition of Atheism is not understood here.
Greek (atheos), meaning "without god", used as a pejorative term applied to those thought to reject the gods worshiped by the larger society.

Atheists REJECT any & all Theism, IMO they are as guilty as Theists in rendering their conclusion based on Faith and not the Known.

If You have a skeptical uncertainty about Faith/Religion that does NOT make you an Atheist, for Atheists have decided there is no Faith/Religion, no gods.

Those that question and are skeptical fall into what is defined as Agnostic.
Agnostic (from Ancient Greek (a), meaning "without", and (gn�sis), meaning "knowledge") was used by Thomas Henry Huxley in a speech at a meeting of the Metaphysical Society in 1869.

[catalyst]

Obviously the definition of Atheism is not understood here.
Greek (atheos), meaning "without god", used as a pejorative term applied to those thought to reject the gods worshiped by the larger society.

Atheists REJECT any & all Theism, IMO they are as guilty as Theists in rendering their conclusion based on Faith and not the Known.

If You have a skeptical uncertainty about Faith/Religion that does NOT make you an Atheist, for Atheists have decided there is no Faith/Religion, no gods.

Those that question and are skeptical fall into what is defined as Agnostic.
Agnostic (from Ancient Greek (a), meaning "without", and (gn�sis), meaning "knowledge") was used by Thomas Henry Huxley in a speech at a meeting of the Metaphysical Society in 1869.

Then by Huxley's definition, it could mean an agnostic can only be one who has not heard of ANY "god" model, whether it be the Abrahamic one or otherwise.

That is why I personally say that I AM agnostic, IN MY atheism, to those god models I know nothing about or nothing of. I cannot make ANY determining on something that I don't know to "exist" (even if that "existence" is originally in the minds of others and then forwarded on to me via oral or written example). It is only from the acknowledgement that OTHERS believe something, that I can then research and check it out and make an assessment as to whether it IS viable or not. IF someone... a believer IN some "god" wants to tackle me on their particular "chosen" god model as being the FAIR DINKS, then it is up to them to provide evidence to support that their "god" IS what they claim it is. I am open to new info... I have not seen ANY of them scurrying to show WHAT they believe IS right though.... purely because MANY of them actually don't research anything more than what they have been conditioned to believe... "is so".

I have though and with all confidence, I can say that the god models I HAVE been presented with, don't fill the bill of WHAT, even by the "believers" believe, FIT WHAT they WANT to believe IS "THE" god. he/she it... ALWAYS falls short, even of their OWN promotional material.

So, where do I "sit" in your conclusion Ankhhape as to this supposed "guilt" I am purported to be harbouring over the "unknown"? I accept that I don't know anything of the UNKNOWN.... of the "KNOWN" though... different story.

So....from YOUR observation, would I be "considered" an atheist or not?

I would also be interested in where you personally sit on this "label table" and WHY.

Thank you


Catalyst.