Which is most reasonable....belief or doubt?

[Flail]

The question for debate is :

Of the polar extremes of Atheism vs Theism, which is most reasonable and rational?

For purpose of this debate we define Atheism as: "Having no evidence of God, I do not believe in any God"....and we define Theism as: "I believe in a particular God based upon an existing faith or belief system which I have accepted to be absolutely and infallibly true."

Atheists as well as agnostics typically leave the 'door open' to a greater or lesser extent,by accepting the possibility,however remote,of a Supreme Creative force or God....but they await proofs...evidence...some rational or logical verification beyond simply adopting the dogma or belief system of their particular tribe......

Theists,on the other hand, permit no other possibility but the one they have chosen to adopt....if they are Christian,then the God and dogma of Christianity is the only possible truth....it they are Muslim,then the God and dogma of Islam is the only possible truth....Theists offer no option for human error in making a 'God choice.'...whereas Atheists and Agnostics are open to all possibilities as they reason,debate,doubt and await evidence.

IMO, the atheistic or agnostic positon is more reasonable,honest and rational....and if there is a 'God of reason'....would be most pleasing to Him....if there is a 'God of Dogma'...many are doomed by the mere happenstance of birth and a bad guess...to some eternal damnation....

[cnorman18]

I would be perfectly willing to concede that doubt is more reasonable than belief, especially if one chooses to take a strictly objective and materialistic approach. That is not to say that such belief is necessarily wholly unreasonable, and it is surely not to say that it amounts to psychosis.

I have to wonder if asserting that those who profess religious belief are demented and/or clinically insane, or that there is no difference, is really an example of "civil and respectful debate."

There are arguments, and there are insults. Into which category does "If you believe in God, you are no better than a lunatic" fall?

For the record, this is not a case of demanding special treatment for or deference to religion. I would as quickly take exception to anyone who attributed atheism to mental or moral defect as well, and in fact I have done just that in the past.

[Flail]

How can a postion of faith that goes against what is reasonable and which contains no proof, be compared to a position of doubt that is simply asking for evidence?

Isn't it more reasonable to doubt that a man walked on water and arose from the dead than to live your life based upon passages from a book?

[Cephus]

There was a case about a week ago about a crazy guy in Virginia who beheaded his 5-year old son to guarantee he'd go to heaven.

Where did you hear this?

http://hamptonroads.com/2009/02/jailhou ... -young-son

[Cephus]

I am appealing to a general consensus that you do not seem to accept for obvious reasons. Please, do tell us all about your negihborhood, work, and social contacts who consider themselves reincarnations of past historical figures but who are functionally indistinguishable from you!

Argumentum ad populum isn't going to get you anywhere, sorry. Just because there are a lot of theists who want to cast theism in the best light possible doesn't mean anything. While I simply have not seen enough people who consider themselves reincarnations of past historical figures to make a reasonable evaluation of their overall mental state, that doesn't mean there aren't any out there. I've given you one example of someone that, while I would consider them internally insane, they still are completely functional in their day-to-day lives. I have, however, seen plenty of theists that I would consider utterly insane on the large scale and many, many more who are not quite right on the small scale. Of course, that's just personal opinion.

Indeed, we have many poor examples of what the human experience will render. That however is not a commentary on what this thread is about. What people do as a result of belief in God is an entirely different question. Don't go to the lowest common demoninator to prove your point. The fact is there are many theists who do not behave in such irrational ways. Because some will behave irresponsibly should not inform how the entire set will behave.

While you're absolutely right, there are many theists who do not go to such negative extremes, but I contend that belief in the irrational, even if one acts perfectly normal in every other way, is still a negative nonetheless. In the end, there is little difference between the guy at the bus stop having an argument with an invisible friend and a guy on a park bench talking to God. Both of them are just talking to themselves. Neither are likely to become violent, except, of course, if their respective invisible friends tell them to, which unfortunately happens all too often.

Seriously though, I consider that to be one of the biggest problems with most theist thought, the idea that having an invisible friend gives you an out. Christians in particular believe that man is inherently born sinful and can do no good without divine help. That gives them an excuse to be sinful, they simply cannot help it. They also believe, some sects more strongly than others, that simply asking for forgiveness acts as a "get out of hell free" card. Sinning, even violently, is both understandable and forgiveable in that case, that's just the way you are and there's nothing you can do to stop it. I would consider that an absurd belief system on it's face.

As an aside, this fellow-Californian finds offense that you would compare me to your long list of crazies. You do not have to resort to ad hominem to make what I consider a viable point on your part.

There's no ad hominem involved, I never said that *YOU* were crazy, nor did I mention you specifically in any way. Stop taking everything so personally. Further, I don't see what your location has to do anything with finding offense, although I can certainly sympathize with you, living in this crazy, over-taxed state alongside you.

However, I entirely understand your attempt to defend theists and theism across the board. It's like people who believe in Bigfoot will try to defend others who believe in Bigfoot, it's an attempt, ultimately, to defend their own belief system by supporting others who hold a similar system.

[Cephus]

I would be perfectly willing to concede that doubt is more reasonable than belief, especially if one chooses to take a strictly objective and materialistic approach. That is not to say that such belief is necessarily wholly unreasonable, and it is surely not to say that it amounts to psychosis.

The real issue here, I think and I thank you for bringing it up, is what is the most reasonable position one can take? Certainly objectivism, where our view of the world surrounding us is based on more than our own subjective view of it. Otherwise, for people who are color-blind, the world is a less colorful place, for people who are deaf, the world is much quieter, etc. That doesn't translate into an accurate view of the factual world that we all share, however. It seems to me that we ought to all be seeking as accurate a view of the real world as we can possibly achieve, seeking out fact and rejecting fantasy, no matter how comforting the fantasy might be.

As for materialism, I've yet to see any evidence whatsoever for another option. Materialism happens to be entirely supported by the material world around us. If anyone has any objective evidence for supernaturalism, I'd love to get a look at it, but conveniently, such is never forthcoming. Supernaturalism is therefore just an unsupported assertion and unsupported assertions, logically, need to be discarded, at least provisionally pending the actual appearance of supporting evidence.

The person who claims he has invisible, intangible gnomes living on his shoulder is dismissed as insane, whereas the person who believe in an invisible, intangible father figure in the sky is not? Sorry, both claims are similarly irrational, based on the best evidence and critical thinking we can muster.

I have to wonder if asserting that those who profess religious belief are demented and/or clinically insane, or that there is no difference, is really an example of "civil and respectful debate."

How can it not be? If this were a forum of shoulder-gnomists, would pointing out that believing in shoulder-gnomes is irrational and illogical somehow be uncivil and disrespectful? Certainly the shoulder-gnomists might consider it such because they want to desperately cling to their illogical, irrational beliefs, but since the goal of any debate is to discover truth and fact, the fact and the truth is that going by every rational, critical thinking tool we have in our toolbox, there's no reason to believe in shoulder-gnomes. The point of any debate is not to make someone feel good about their irrational beliefs, sorry.

For the record, this is not a case of demanding special treatment for or deference to religion. I would as quickly take exception to anyone who attributed atheism to mental or moral defect as well, and in fact I have done just that in the past.

Obviously you would, but to make such a claim, it is something that you'd have to be able to defend and to date, I have yet to see anyone make a logically-defensible claim that rejecting belief in an unknown and unseen entity is unwarranted. Of course, the only people I've ever seen make such claims are the ones arguing solely from their own individual, indefensible worldviews. They demand, a priori, that whatever they believe is true and therefore, based on that demand, everyone else must be false. That's a logical fallacy in the making right off the bat.

[Vanguard]

I am appealing to a general consensus that you do not seem to accept for obvious reasons. Please, do tell us all about your negihborhood, work, and social contacts who consider themselves reincarnations of past historical figures but who are functionally indistinguishable from you!

While I simply have not seen enough people who consider themselves reincarnations of past historical figures to make a reasonable evaluation of their overall mental state, that doesn't mean there aren't any out there.

Enough people? I would venture to say you haven't seen any. OF COURSE, I am not stating a hard and fast rule. Unfortunately, you'll be able to hide behind the charge for me to profer scientific evidences demonstrating that all who believe they are reincarnations of past historical figures are also dysfunctional.

My 15 years of experience in the mental health field will tell you that I have never met anyone who considers himself the reincarnation of Liberace who also stays off the radar of the mental health/social service systems. Alas, I will have to concede this point however so that you can hang on to your argument that there is ulitmately no difference between the "Betty Davis" sitting on the park bench and the myriad examples of theists who have as good as if not better grasp on rationality than you or I. That is unless in your case you don't think that's possible?

I've given you one example of someone that, while I would consider them internally insane, they still are completely functional in their day-to-day lives. I have, however, seen plenty of theists that I would consider utterly insane on the large scale and many, many more who are not quite right on the small scale. Of course, that's just personal opinion.

Yes, we will have to relegate that to just your personal opinion. On what basis do you consider this person internally insane? That is quite the charge and ulitmately where your hyperbole gets the best of you.

Indeed, we have many poor examples of what the human experience will render. That however is not a commentary on what this thread is about. What people do as a result of belief in God is an entirely different question. Don't go to the lowest common demoninator to prove your point. The fact is there are many theists who do not behave in such irrational ways. Because some will behave irresponsibly should not inform how the entire set will behave.

While you're absolutely right, there are many theists who do not go to such negative extremes, but I contend that belief in the irrational, even if one acts perfectly normal in every other way, is still a negative nonetheless.

How would that be considered a negative?

Seriously though, I consider that to be one of the biggest problems with most theist thought, the idea that having an invisible friend gives you an out. Christians in particular believe that man is inherently born sinful and can do no good without divine help. That gives them an excuse to be sinful, they simply cannot help it. They also believe, some sects more strongly than others, that simply asking for forgiveness acts as a "get out of hell free" card. Sinning, even violently, is both understandable and forgiveable in that case, that's just the way you are and there's nothing you can do to stop it. I would consider that an absurd belief system on it's face.

Cephus, I agree with much of what you say. In certain circumstances, worship begets dysfunction. I get it. You cannot however use those lowest common demoninators as evidence for the whole which you have been doing from the getgo.

As an aside, this fellow-Californian finds offense that you would compare me to your long list of crazies. You do not have to resort to ad hominem to make what I consider a viable point on your part.

There's no ad hominem involved, I never said that *YOU* were crazy, nor did I mention you specifically in any way. Stop taking everything so personally.

Actually, you did mention me specifically:

I could list cases all day, it's simple reality that lots of religious people are out of their minds, these people are not functioning whatsoever, yet you choose to ignore those people, again because you happen to fall in their camp. <bold added>

Stop making it personal and I'll stop taking it personally. By the way, how is that you (yes, I do mean you) know lots of religious people who are not functioning whatsoever but can't find for me one reincarnation of Mr. Ed who might work in your office? Cephus, are you Mr. Ed?

However, I entirely understand your attempt to defend theists and theism across the board. It's like people who believe in Bigfoot will try to defend others who believe in Bigfoot, it's an attempt, ultimately, to defend their own belief system by supporting others who hold a similar system.

Oh yeah?! Well, I entirely understand your attempt to defend silly hyperbole guised as legitimate discourse. It's like people who think they have a good grasp of how others operate only to find that they themselves have been called on an inconsistency but are unable to retract in a public forum because they might be reminded of their own folly!

Hey, this is fun!

Further, I don't see what your location has to do anything with finding offense, although I can certainly sympathize with you, living in this crazy, over-taxed state alongside you.

Perhaps we're both irrational?

[cnorman18]

I would be perfectly willing to concede that doubt is more reasonable than belief, especially if one chooses to take a strictly objective and materialistic approach. That is not to say that such belief is necessarily wholly unreasonable, and it is surely not to say that it amounts to psychosis.

The real issue here, I think and I thank you for bringing it up, is what is the most reasonable position one can take?

That may be "the real issue" for you, but it is not the one I chose to address in my post. See below.

Certainly objectivism, where our view of the world surrounding us is based on more than our own subjective view of it. Otherwise, for people who are color-blind, the world is a less colorful place, for people who are deaf, the world is much quieter, etc. That doesn't translate into an accurate view of the factual world that we all share, however. It seems to me that we ought to all be seeing as accurate a view of the real world as we can possibly achieve, seeking out fact and rejecting fantasy, no matter how comforting the fantasy might be.

Does that not beg the question whether or not beliefs that you do not share are, in fact, nothing more than fantasies?

This is moving beyond "there is no evidence for this" into the realm of "this is absolutely false."

In any case, that is, again, not the issue I have raised here.

As for materialism, I've yet to see any evidence whatsoever for another option. Materialism happens to be entirely supported by the material world around us. If anyone has any objective evidence for supernaturalism, I'd love to get a look at it, but conveniently, such is never forthcoming. Supernaturalism is therefore just an unsupported assertion and unsupported assertions, logically, need to be discarded, at least provisionally pending the actual appearance of supporting evidence.

"Materialism" vs. "supernaturalism" is a false dichotomy. One may believe in the metaphysical and nonmaterial without believing in fairies.

Is belief in the concepts of "good" and "evil," for instance, also evidence of straight-up dementia? How about "beauty" or "ugliness"?

Yet again, though; that is not the issue. Who is actually right is not the subject of my post, and ought not have any bearing on the issue of civility.

The person who claims he has invisible, intangible gnomes living on his shoulder is dismissed as insane, whereas the person who believe in an invisible, intangible father figure in the sky is not? Sorry, both claims are similarly irrational, based on the best evidence and critical thinking we can muster.

There are many conceptions of God other than that of the "invisible, intangible father figure in the sky." I have explicitly and rather emphatically disavowed that notion many times, but you continue to acknowledge no other.

Not to break open that same old can of worms, but the fact that there are conceptions of God that may not be objectively verifiable or provable remains something that you refuse to deal with. Such ideas do exist, and the fact that they are not falsifiable does not make them either false or irrational.

That is my position, and I have never seen any evidence that it is either - only assertions that it must be both, on the very ground that it is hard or impossible to debate. That doesn't follow.

In any case, the fact that a person holds a belief or position that is not conventionally determinable is no excuse for equating it with dementia. THAT is the issue I am trying to raise.

I have to wonder if asserting that those who profess religious belief are demented and/or clinically insane, or that there is no difference, is really an example of "civil and respectful debate."

How can it not be? If this were a forum of shoulder-gnomists, would pointing out that believing in shoulder-gnomes is irrational and illogical somehow be uncivil and disrespectful?

No; but "illogical" and "irrational" are not synonymous with "clinically insane." Saying that there is no difference between theism and dementia is not an equivalent statement, and it is disingenuous to pretend that it is.

Certainly the shoulder-gnomists might consider it such because they want to desperately cling to their illogical, irrational beliefs, but since the goal of any debate is to discover truth and fact, the fact and the truth is that going by every rational, critical thinking tool we have in our toolbox, there's no reason to believe in shoulder-gnomes.

If we're going to talk about "truth" and "fact," I think it would be helpful to demonstrate that there actually are "shoulder-gnomists." As it stands, I see no reason to postulate such a belief except for purposes of (1) gross oversimplification and (2) ridicule.

Again; describing a belief as "illogical" or "irrational" is not the same as saying it's tantamount to clinical psychosis, which you have inarguably done, and repeatedly.

Further, refusing to recognize the differences between belief in gnomes and belief in God, even when those differences have been shown repeatedly, is flat-out intellectually dishonest.

For starters, there are no large academic or religious institutions or organizations dedicated to the study and/or worship of gnomes; no fields of academic study, no enormous corpus of scholarly writings, no professionals who specialize in "gnomology." There are no ethical systems associated with belief in gnomes; there are also no charitable projects, no hospitals, no schools, no orders of monks or nuns, and no youth organizations.

Argumentum ad populum? To be sure; and that certainly does not prove that beliefs in God are true. But it certainly does prove that they are qualitatively different from belief in gnomes, and therefore repeatedly claiming that there ARE no differences is a disingenuous oversimplification and an intentionally offensive provocation.

Dwelling on the one, singular similarity between God and gnomes - that they are both nonmaterial and unproven - is disingenuous. In the same way, saying that atheism is indistinguishable from Communism on the account that both deny the existence of God and the supernatural (which is absolutely true, though not to the implicit point) would be equally disingenuous. There are huge differences and obviously very significant distinctions, and claiming that none of those matter is skewing the argument and inarguably falsifying the atheist viewpoint and position. It would be, in short, a strawman, just as gnomes are.

THAT is the "real issue" here. Equating belief in God with both literal insanity and childish beliefs in fairies is neither probative, nor civil, nor respectful, but intentional and deliberate insult and nothing more.

For the record, this is not a case of demanding special treatment for or deference to religion. I would as quickly take exception to anyone who attributed atheism to mental or moral defect as well, and in fact I have done just that in the past.

Obviously you would, but to make such a claim, it is something that you'd have to be able to defend and to date, I have yet to see anyone make a logically-defensible claim that rejecting belief in an unknown and unseen entity is unwarranted.

You see such claims literally every day here; to wit, that atheists reject belief in God because of a personal preference for unrestrained hedonism, arrogance, spiritual and intellectual pride, obstinacy, and so on. That such claims are not logically defensible is irrelevant; they have indeed appeared here, and I have argued against them, precisely as I said.

Again, the issue I raise here is not who is right, but who is respectful and civil.

Of course, the only people I've ever seen make such claims are the ones arguing solely from their own individual, indefensible worldviews. They demand, a priori, that whatever they believe is true and therefore, based on that demand, everyone else must be false. That's a logical fallacy in the making right off the bat.

I have never made such claims, but that is, again, not the subject here, as I keep repeating.

Logical fallacy is not the issue I have raised. The fact that an argument may be fallacious does not justify or excuse baiting, demeaning conduct, or expressions of blatant contempt.

Saying "There is no rational reason to believe as you do" is NOT THE SAME as saying "There is no difference between you and a certifiably, clinically insane schizophrenic." The former is an issue-oriented statement about a position; the latter is an ad hominem and an obvious personal insult.

The point of any debate is not to make someone feel good about their irrational beliefs, sorry.

I agree that it's not the point of debate to make anyone feel good about ANY beliefs.

The question before us, though, is this: Is it the point of debate to make someone feel bad, foolish, stupid and/or insane?

You deleted and left unanswered the only direct question in my post, to wit:

There are arguments, and there are insults. Into which category does "If you believe in God, you are no better than a lunatic" fall?

Is that a civil and respectful argument?

If so, what would an appropriately civil, respectful and on-point answer be?

[Cephus]

Enough people? I would venture to say you haven't seen any. OF COURSE, I am not stating a hard and fast rule. Unfortunately, you'll be able to hide behind the charge for me to profer scientific evidences demonstrating that all who believe they are reincarnations of past historical figures are also dysfunctional.

Unless you've studied *ALL* people who believe they are reincarnations of past historical figures, you cannot make that statement. The fact is, you can only identify those who are dysfunctional when they let you know that they think they are Napoleon. For all you know, there may be thousands of perfectly functional people out there who think they are Snow White, who simply don't make that public knowledge. As I've said, I can already think of at least one example of someone who holds wholly irrational beliefs, but who is functional in society.

My 15 years of experience in the mental health field will tell you that I have never met anyone who considers himself the reincarnation of Liberace who also stays off the radar of the mental health/social service systems.

Would that include the, presumably, homeless guy I saw yesterday walking across the street screaming at... nobody? We both know that the mental health field does not and cannot institutionalize someone who is not demonstrably a danger to themselves and others. If you tried to lock up all of the people who think the trees are talking to them, but who can otherwise hold jobs and live reasonably unassisted lives, you'd fill up all the hospitals and blow the mental health budget immediately. We both know there are tons of people walking around out there that hold ridiculous, irrational, somewhat insane beliefs, there's a line that we draw between who we pick up to protect those around them and who we do not.

Unfortunately, we both know that religion gets a pass in our society as a matter of course. Take all the crazy people at the Followers of Christ church in Oregon. That's the place that teaches parents not to seek medical treatment for their children, but to pray for healing. Unfortunately, that's led to at least four deaths in just the past year of innocent children who died of entirely treatable illnesses because their parents are religiously deluded. These people *ARE* a danger to themselves and others, yet the idea of putting them away, of taking their children away, is out of the question for most because religion is a protected delusion. Apparently, people have a right to kill their kids, so long as it's religion that demands it of them.

On what basis do you consider this person internally insane?

On what basis do we consider anyone insane? They believe and claim to experience things that simply have no basis in reality.

How would that be considered a negative?

How would someone who talks to trees, but otherwise functions in society be a negative? You tell me.

Cephus, I agree with much of what you say. In certain circumstances, worship begets dysfunction. I get it. You cannot however use those lowest common demoninators as evidence for the whole which you have been doing from the getgo.

However, while those are indeed the extreme cases, you cannot ignore the underpinnings of the beliefs that cause those extreme cases. While not all Christians are going to go out and shoot up abortion clinics, the underpinnings of the beliefs that go into the insane actions stem from Christianity, at least a particular strain of Christianity. While not all Muslims are going to strap bombs to their backs and blow themselves up in crowded malls, the underpinnings of the beliefs that cause those actions stem from Islam, at least a particular interpretation of Islam. I can't imagine you'd get a lot of people willing to go boom without the promise of a reward in the afterlife and yes, while there may be a few suicidal crazies, certainly I wouldn't think it would be the numbers we see now who are deluded by irrational beliefs into actions which harm everyone.

Even if we ignore the extreme cases, we're still left with a lot of people believing in a lot of things for which they have no good, rational reason to believe. When it comes right down to it, all things being equal, there's no functional difference between people believing in a god and people thinking trees are talking to them.

Stop making it personal and I'll stop taking it personally.

I meant you fell into their camp as a theist, not as a crazy. Sorry if it appeared otherwise.

By the way, how is that you (yes, I do mean you) know lots of religious people who are not functioning whatsoever but can't find for me one reincarnation of Mr. Ed who might work in your office?

Um, you might want to look at the furries, there are a LOT of them who are convinced they really are animals living in human bodies. There are thousands of them out there if you just want to go look. Likewise, the 'otherkin' think they're vampires and werewolves and angels and the like. Again... you just have to go look, they're not hard to find.

Perhaps we're both irrational?

For staying in the highest income tax, highest sales tax, highest gas tax, most business unfriendly state in the nation? Yeah, I'm starting to agree with you.

[JoeyKnothead]

From Page 3 Post 27:

Not to break open that same old can of worms, but the fact that there are conceptions of God that may not be objectively verifiable or provable remains something that you refuse to deal with. Such ideas do exist, and the fact that they are not falsifiable does not make them either false or irrational.

As an atheist I must agree with this position and point it out for others who may have missed it. Though cnorman18 does not imply or mention it, I would caution anyone against using this as some kind of carte blanche to think any thought or opinion they have is the word of a God, and then use this to restrict others in what they beleive or do.

In any case, the fact that a person holds a belief or position that is not conventionally determinable is no excuse for equating it with dementia. THAT is the issue I am trying to raise.

Seconded.

No; but "illogical" and "irrational" are not synonymous with "clinically insane." Saying that there is no difference between theism and dementia is not an equivalent statement, and it is disingenuous to pretend that it is.

No matter how thin one may think the line is, it still is there. Seconded to the belief itself, and not actions deriving thereof.

Argumentum ad populum? To be sure; and that certainly does not prove that beliefs in God are true. But it certainly does prove that they are qualitatively different from belief in gnomes, and therefore repeatedly claiming that there ARE no differences is a disingenuous oversimplification and an intentionally offensive provocation.

Guilty. But I'ma lernin'

>opinion based on amateur study/observation, presented as a logical look at things. Observer is advised to measure the merits accordingly<
When looking at folks who, except for their religious stance, can be shown, in their "workaday" life to be perfectly stable, functioning individuals, we can see religious belief, regardless of it accuracy, to be of little to no significance in determining the overall sanity of the individual.
>/opinion<

[Cephus]

Does that not beg the question whether or not beliefs that you do not share are, in fact, nothing more than fantasies?

So long as they cannot be defended or demonstrated in any way objectively, then I see no difference between them and fantasies. Now I know that you acknowledge you cannot defend your beliefs and I'm not asking you to, but seriously, how do you tell the difference between something which cannot be defended and something that doesn't exist at all?

This is moving beyond "there is no evidence for this" into the realm of "this is absolutely false."

No one said that, of course. I would say it is provisionally false, so long as there is no evidence to support it. That doesn't mean that it might not be true in the long run, but so long as there is no good reason to accept it as true, it's illogical to do so.

"Materialism" vs. "supernaturalism" is a false dichotomy. One may believe in the metaphysical and nonmaterial without believing in fairies.

Whatever you want to call it and however many categories you want to introduce really doesn't matter, the fact remains that one, we all acknowledge is real, we all experience it in demonstrable ways every day. The other(s), we do not. Until there is a meaningful way to experience these other categories, why should we accept that they factually exist?

Is belief in the concepts of "good" and "evil," for instance, also evidence of straight-up dementia? How about "beauty" or "ugliness"?

Those are human created concepts that do not exist outside of the human mind. There is no objective beauty, there is no objective good, only what we, as humans, determine in our own heads. Now if you want to assert that belief in a deity is no different, that it's something that only exists in your head, I suppose you can do that but that rather undermines the majority of religions on the planet who claim that their god(s) factually do exist in objective reality.

Who is actually right is not the subject of my post, and ought not have any bearing on the issue of civility.

Yet how is it uncivil to disagree on a proposition? I'm really not interested in how you feel about your beliefs, that's irrelevant to the truth or falsity of them. The idea that someone has to pussyfoot around because you might be made to feel bad about your beliefs is ludicrous. The fact is, if your beliefs are false, you *SHOULD* feel bad about holding them! You *SHOULD* be extremely concerned that the ideas you hold as true actually are, and those things which are not true, no matter how they make you feel, should be rejected.

I certainly wouldn't expect you to get into an argument with, oh, a holocaust denier, and be all that concerned about making them feel good about their foolish beliefs, nor should you. That wouldn't be civility, that would be stupidity, something I know you're not.

There are many conceptions of God other than that of the "invisible, intangible father figure in the sky." I have explicitly and rather emphatically disavowed that notion many times, but you continue to acknowledge no other.

I understand that and you keep popping into discussions where that is specifically being discussed and bring up that you hold a different view. I get it. That doesn't change the fact that you cannot defend your view, even if you believe it inherently cannot be defended, and therefore you're not doing anything to convince anyone that your view is factually true.

No offense, but how exactly is what you're doing any better or different than someone showing up in every discussion saying they believe in invisible, intangible gnomes living on their shoulder, but they can't prove it so they won't even try?

Not to break open that same old can of worms, but the fact that there are conceptions of God that may not be objectively verifiable or provable remains something that you refuse to deal with. Such ideas do exist, and the fact that they are not falsifiable does not make them either false or irrational.

It's not something I've refused to deal with, it's something you refuse to comprehend. Someone can come up with, say, a conception for unicorns that may not be objectively verifiable or provable. Or aliens. Or ghosts. Take your pick. If our goal is to reach factual reality, why would anyone accept the factual existence of any of those things? How does one tell the difference between any of those things and identical things that do not exist at all? If you're going to take the position that simply believing anything because you want to believe it, even if you have no good reason, makes it rational, then rationality loses all meaning. How is that any different than claiming you can fly, you just can't prove it?

That is my position, and I have never seen any evidence that it is either - only assertions that it must be both, on the very ground that it is hard or impossible to debate.

You're posting on a DEBATE FORUM! If you can't debate it, STOP BRINGING IT UP ALL THE TIME!

In any case, the fact that a person holds a belief or position that is not conventionally determinable is no excuse for equating it with dementia. THAT is the issue I am trying to raise.

This has nothing to do with conventional determinability, it has to do with *ANY* determinability at all. If someone claimed they were actually Napoleon, but they couldn't prove it, would you consider that a valid, viable claim? No, you would not. If someone claimed that unicorns were real but it was beyond conventional determination, would you take it seriously? Of course not. If someone claimed they were regularly anal-probed by reptilian aliens, but there was no way they could prove it, would you think them rational? No way. So why does *YOUR* claim suddenly get a pass when you're doing the exact same thing all the rest of them are?

The fact that you simply define away all hopes of ever backing up your claims doesn't make your claims any more reasonable, in fact, it makes them less reasonable. If you can't even define a good reason or rationality for anyone else to believe it, the question remains, why do *YOU* take it seriously in the first place?

Saying that there is no difference between theism and dementia is not an equivalent statement, and it is disingenuous to pretend that it is.

You're playing with alternate standards for religion though. Religion gets a pass when making the same claims with a different object (unicorns, gnomes, ghosts, etc.) you'd have no problem declaring those people to be out of their gourd. God doesn't get special treatment because he happens to be the culturally dominant delusion, sorry.

If we're going to talk about "truth" and "fact," I think it would be helpful to demonstrate that there actually are "shoulder-gnomists."

That's irrelevant to the point, but if you like, I can change to lots of other crazy people. Of course, whenever I compare theism to anything else, you get offended, so it's a lose-lose situation.

Further, refusing to recognize the differences between belief in gnomes and belief in God, even when those differences have been shown repeatedly, is flat-out intellectually dishonest.

Which, of course, you've never been able to demonstrate there is a difference, outside of your argumentum ad populum. Okay, fine, I can play your game. 100 years ago, nobody in their right mind would have believed in Xenu and mind-thetans. Today there are millions of Scientologists world-wide who do believe in them. Does that make their factual existence any more reasonable today than when nobody would have taken it seriously?

Of course not.

But it certainly does prove that they are qualitatively different from belief in gnomes, and therefore repeatedly claiming that there ARE no differences is a disingenuous oversimplification and an intentionally offensive provocation.

No, in fact, it doesn't. It only demonstrates that a lot of people are delusional in the same general direction. Quantity of delusion doesn't equate to quality of belief. In fact, I might argue with you, simply due to the massive number of individual sects even within the same general religion. There are something like 13,000 sects in Christianity, each of whom really, when you get down to brass tacks, believe in a different god, even if it's only slightly different from their neighbors. Even among individual theists, almost all of them have their own personal interpretation of the deity they worship. There simply is no universal concept of who this God is or what this God wants and they're all supposedly getting their information from the same book. The number of people who believe something is so doesn't make it so. It's only so because it's so. 1000 years ago, nobody had any idea that we were all made up of DNA, but it was still true. Belief didn't make it true, nor did lack of belief make it false. Reality is real, no matter who believes in it.

In the same way, saying that atheism is indistinguishable from Communism on the account that both deny the existence of God and the supernatural (which is absolutely true, though not to the implicit point) would be equally disingenuous.

Which is not necessarily true in either case and certainly not for the same reasons, but that's apparently neither here nor there.

Equating belief in God with both literal insanity and childish beliefs in fairies is neither probative, nor civil, nor respectful, but intentional and deliberate insult and nothing more.

Yet you cannot produce a single defensible difference between the two, other than lots of people believing in one and not the other. Just to borrow your comparison here though, many, perhaps even the vast majority of children have imaginary friends when they are young. Does the fact that most children believe in imaginary friends or Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny make those beliefs more likely to be true? No, in fact as children grow, we expect them to recognize that belief in any of those is irrational and if we found adults who truly believed in any of them in adulthood, we'd likely argue they had something wrong with them upstairs.

Again, you're simply applying a double standard for religion. Why is an adult believing in an imaginary friend wrong when believing in an imaginary god not?

I have never made such claims, but that is, again, not the subject here, as I keep repeating.

Yes, but you keep repeating it in the SAME POST! Do you think someone is going to break in mid-stream and correct you?

Is that a civil and respectful argument?

If so, what would an appropriately civil, respectful and on-point answer be?

You'd have to quote where I said that, which you cannot do. However, substitute a whole host of other irrational beliefs and see if it makes sense.

If you believe in ghosts, you are no better than a lunatic.
If you believe in Bigfoot, you are no better than a lunatic.
If you believe in invisible, intangible gnomes, you are no better than a lunatic.
If you believe in unicorns, you are no better than a lunatic.
If you believe in Santa Claus, you are no better than a lunatic.

You keep insisting that God somehow doesn't fall into the same category as the above, but all you can offer as support is a logical fallacy. There was a time when lots of people believed the earth was flat, when they thought it was the center of the universe, when they thought it was 6000 years old (some are still crazy that way), when these were the majority opinions. It didn't make any of them right.