I Am Getting Bugged By Atheists

[David Sklansky]

The Jerry Falwell thread was the last straw. No wonder Not Ready and others think of atheism as a faith of its own with ulterior motives behind it.

The god of the bible almost certainly does not exist. But the reason is mainly because the god of the bible is a subset of the larger set of paranormal phenomenon. Which almost certainly does not exist. All the other arguments are very dicey.

[vhawk01]

[ QUOTE ]
The Jerry Falwell thread was the last straw. No wonder Not Ready and others think of atheism as a faith of its own with ulterior motives behind it.

The god of the bible almost certainly does not exist. But the reason is mainly because the god of the bible is a subset of the larger set of paranormal phenomenon. Which almost certainly does not exist. All the other arguments are very dicey.

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't think everyone posting in the Falwell thread was atheists. I bet Christians hate him almost as much as atheists do, in general. Sorry to bug you though, I'll work harder in the future.

[PairTheBoard]

[ QUOTE ]
The Jerry Falwell thread was the last straw. No wonder Not Ready and others think of atheism as a faith of its own with ulterior motives behind it.

The god of the bible almost certainly does not exist. But the reason is mainly because the god of the bible is a subset of the larger set of paranormal phenomenon. Which almost certainly does not exist. All the other arguments are very dicey.

[/ QUOTE ]

How can you be so sure the "god of the bible" is what you think the "god of the bible" is? Because you "can read"?

PairTheBoard

[David Sklansky]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
The Jerry Falwell thread was the last straw. No wonder Not Ready and others think of atheism as a faith of its own with ulterior motives behind it.

The god of the bible almost certainly does not exist. But the reason is mainly because the god of the bible is a subset of the larger set of paranormal phenomenon. Which almost certainly does not exist. All the other arguments are very dicey.

[/ QUOTE ]

How can you be so sure the "god of the bible" is what you think the "god of the bible" is? Because you "can read"?

PairTheBoard

[/ QUOTE ]

Why do you insist on being so needlessly argumentative? You know as well as I do that I am talking about the miracle producing God that most people think the bible portrays. I was just using a shortcut term.

[Justin A]

Are you suggesting that we shouldn't have the other arguments because they are 'dicey'? I for one have learned a lot from this forum in threads where the 'dicey' debates are taking place.

[chezlaw]

[ QUOTE ]
The Jerry Falwell thread was the last straw. No wonder Not Ready and others think of atheism as a faith of its own with ulterior motives behind it.

The god of the bible almost certainly does not exist. But the reason is mainly because the god of the bible is a subset of the larger set of paranormal phenomenon. Which almost certainly does not exist. All the other arguments are very dicey.

[/ QUOTE ]
Does this mean the spice girls can't reform. Sounds like a good thing to me. Not sure what it has to do with atheism.

chez

[PairTheBoard]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
The Jerry Falwell thread was the last straw. No wonder Not Ready and others think of atheism as a faith of its own with ulterior motives behind it.

The god of the bible almost certainly does not exist. But the reason is mainly because the god of the bible is a subset of the larger set of paranormal phenomenon. Which almost certainly does not exist. All the other arguments are very dicey.

[/ QUOTE ]

How can you be so sure the "god of the bible" is what you think the "god of the bible" is? Because you "can read"?

PairTheBoard

[/ QUOTE ]

Why do you insist on being so needlessly argumentative? You know as well as I do that I am talking about the miracle producing God that most people think the bible portrays. I was just using a shortcut term.

[/ QUOTE ]

I guess I'll stop being so "needlessly" argumentative when you stop using such needlessly misleading shortcut terms.

PairTheBoard

[Zeno]

[ QUOTE ]
The Jerry Falwell thread was the last straw.

[/ QUOTE ]

I've often wondered what is after, "the last straw". Obviously, not more straw but something evidentially, one would hypothesize.



Anyway, some of the reactions to the OP on Jerry Falwell's trip to heaven were interesting but not that surprising. One reason that Rev. Falwell generates such strong feelings of hate or love is that he mixed Religion and Politics and did so forcefully and unabashedly and was such a large influence in America in both these spheres. This tends to either bring out the best or worst in people in reactions to a public figure. In my opinion the Rev. Falwell was a buffoon and I think he deserves being satirized – thus the reason for my original post. Beyond that I have no real feelings toward the man one way or another except that he was also very entertaining, so that falls on the positive side of the ledger.

Perhaps reading more Jonathan Swift or Voltaire (or Seneca) would brighten up your outlook - Just a suggestion.

-Zeno

[Zeno]

[ QUOTE ]
Not sure what it has to do with atheism.


[/ QUOTE ]

Only in a peripheral way is atheism (or more properly those that adhere to some form of atheism) involved, in my opinion.

As a thought experiment, imagine Rev. Falwell now discussing Christain theology with John Calvin while walking in a heavenly garden during the cool of the evening.

-Zeno

[Kaj]

[ QUOTE ]
The Jerry Falwell thread was the last straw. No wonder Not Ready and others think of atheism as a faith of its own with ulterior motives behind it.

[/ QUOTE ]

Criticizing the founder of the "Moral Majority" != Atheism is a faith with an ulterior motive

Nice leap, though.

[chezlaw]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Not sure what it has to do with atheism.


[/ QUOTE ]

Only in a peripheral way is atheism (or more properly those that adhere to some form of atheism) involved, in my opinion.

As a thought experiment, imagine Rev. Falwell now discussing Christain theology with John Calvin while walking in a heavenly garden during the cool of the evening.

-Zeno

[/ QUOTE ]
tough to imagine but surely spiceworld alone was worthy of eternal damnation.

chez

[Piers]

[ QUOTE ]
The Jerry Falwell thread was the last straw. No wonder Not Ready and others think of atheism as a faith of its own with ulterior motives behind it.

[/ QUOTE ]
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The god of the bible almost certainly does not exist.

[/ QUOTE ]
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But the reason is mainly because the god of the bible is a subset of the larger set of paranormal phenomenon. Which almost certainly does not exist.

[/ QUOTE ]
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All the other arguments are very dicey.

[/ QUOTE ]
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[aeest400]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
The Jerry Falwell thread was the last straw. No wonder Not Ready and others think of atheism as a faith of its own with ulterior motives behind it.

[/ QUOTE ]
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The god of the bible almost certainly does not exist.

[/ QUOTE ]
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But the reason is mainly because the god of the bible is a subset of the larger set of paranormal phenomenon. Which almost certainly does not exist.

[/ QUOTE ]
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All the other arguments are very dicey.

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[/ QUOTE ]

QFT

[andyfox]

How about if he had said "the God spoken of in the Bible"?

[Lestat]

I didn't even open the Jerry Falwell thread, because I could guess at it's contents and it's not something I'd want to discuss. I will say this, though...

Showing the absurdity of people like Falwell can have merit, if for no other reason than they have a very strong following who take them very seriously. There seems to be two different approaches that have taken form among the atheistic community...

One is shock and awe. Show Christians that it's ok to blasphem. Nothing's gonna happen. No pussy-footing, no cow-towing. Stick it in their face that many of their beliefs are ridiculously prejudiced, and silly, and enough is enough. The time for pretending to be respectful and politically correct is over. It's time to call a spade, a spade. If it's silly, then call it silly.

The other way is the intellectual way and fortunately, is the preferred method on this forum. But the jury's still out on where that gets you. godBoy seemed to have turned the corner, but then had misgivings. It is very difficult to undo brainwashing. Time will tell what method (if any), works best.

[PairTheBoard]

[ QUOTE ]
How about if he had said "the God spoken of in the Bible"?

[/ QUOTE ]

Still misleading in its ambiguity. When you just make reference to what's in the Bible your statement becomes dependent on how the Bible is read. The way many people read the Bible, the "God" spoken of there is something entirely different than what Sklansky has in mind. It all depends on how you understand the Bible to be conveying meaning. A "literal" reading just produces nonsense. "My people have been sheep...", for example. Oh really? They had 4 legs with wool growing on their bodies?


I would have accepted something like, "a god who does things like literally part the Red Sea or cause a Flood to cover the entire globe..."

Of course he doesn't want to put it that way because that makes it clear what a restricted view of god he is talking about.

PairTheBoard

[David Sklansky]

Everyone knows that a literal reading is not synonomous with interpreting obvious figures of speech as literal. In fact everyone else but you knows exactly what type of God I was talking about. One who can and has stopped the rotation of the earth and can arrange for you to be dealt aces ten times in a row. Most religious people think that such a god exists. And I say there that to think it is likely he does (as opposed to hoping it is likely) is shoddy thinking.

[PairTheBoard]

[ QUOTE ]
Everyone knows that a literal reading is not synonomous with interpreting obvious figures of speech as literal.

[/ QUOTE ]

What's "obvious" to you is not obvious to everybody.

[ QUOTE ]
In fact everyone else but you knows exactly what type of God I was talking about.

[/ QUOTE ]

You were talking about the "god of the Bible"? There are a lot of people who don't accept the "type of God" you say you were talking about as the "god of the Bible".

[ QUOTE ]
One who can and has stopped the rotation of the earth and can arrange for you to be dealt aces ten times in a row. Most religious people think that such a god exists.

[/ QUOTE ]

"Most" is questionable. There is certainly a huge population of religious people who don't think God actually stopped the rotation of the earth.

[ QUOTE ]
And I say there that to think it is likely he does (as opposed to hoping it is likely) is shoddy thinking.

[/ QUOTE ]

It's "shoddy thinking" to claim you are using the term "likely" in a strict mathematical sense. If you are speaking loosely with the term, then it just translates to saying that you find it something you cannot believe. It just becomes a statement of your Religious Belief on the matter. Basically, you are just using high falootin language to give the opinion that people who don't share your Religious Belief on this issue are being stupid.

PairTheBoard

[JussiUt]

I don't understand PairTheBoard. Yes, the word "likely" is used in a mathematical sense, the way the word "likely" is being meant to use. One who believes in something without evidence is not being logical or reasonable. Find the definitions of the words "logic" or "reason".

Faith without pfoof cannot live with these concepts. And if you have proof of God, your own personal experiences, then maybe you think you're being reasonable but others who haven't had those kind of experiences or they have but they've interpreted those experiences differently don't have any reason to say that your view is any more likely. It's more likely to you through your perspective, not more likely to the rest of the population.

EDIT: [ QUOTE ]
What's "obvious" to you is not obvious to everybody.

[/ QUOTE ]
The fact that the Bible is not words of God should be obvious to everybody who uses critical thinking, logic and reason. If you disagree, there's nothing really about that worth of discussing. I'm sure you know the history of the Bible etc. so if you believe it's reasonable to claim that people have fair reasons to think the Bible is words of God, the views are so much apart that there's no ground for argument.

[andyfox]

My guess would be that 99 or 100 out of 100 Christian readers of the Bible would understand the reference to sheep as referring to the dictionary definition of a "sheep" as a meek or easily led person, not as a person with wool and four legs. And that a very high percentage (you would know exactly how high better than I) believe that Jesus was the son of God, immaculately conceived, and was resurrected.

Also, I think your analysis of David's religious belief is not accurate. David has analyzed it logically and finds that belief in the existence of the God of the Bible is exremely unlikely. His religious belief is based on logic, and he has explained his thinking often. His conclusion that belief in that God is shoddy and/or wishful thinking is not an opinion, but an analysis of the thinking of the believers. Certainly he cannot be accused of just expressing an "opinion" without backing it up.

[PairTheBoard]

I don't object to use of the word "likely" when speaking loosely. I use it that way mayself. David has admitted that in his use of the words "likely" and "probability" in context of "God" he is often speaking loosely and does not mean to imply a strict mathematical interpretation of the words. I have no objection to that in principle. It's his way of thinking about things. It needs to be clarified sometimes though, especially when he brings in the term "Baysian". The language gives an impression of authority to what he says when all it really amounts to is a figure of speech. Something not always so obvious.

However, he specifically claimed mathematical precision for his use of the terms in this case. He called on the authority of mathematics to legitimize his conclusions based on "probability" arguments. There's no way I'm not going to call him on that. He was bluffing.

[ QUOTE ]
His conclusion that belief in that God is shoddy and/or wishful thinking is not an opinion, but an analysis of the thinking of the believers. Certainly he cannot be accused of just expressing an "opinion" without backing it up.

[/ QUOTE ]

Certainly he has a right his his opinion that the thinking of Believers is "shoddy and/or wishful thinking". But I don't see much more in his "analysis" for that than the loose application of terms like "probability" and "Bayes" in such a way as to appeal to the authority those terms tend to invoke. That's my opinion and I think I have a right to express It.

PairTheBoard

[djames]

[ QUOTE ]
My guess would be that 99 or 100 out of 100 Christian readers of the Bible would understand the reference to sheep as referring to the dictionary definition of a "sheep" as a meek or easily led person, not as a person with wool and four legs.

[/ QUOTE ]

And yet these same 99 or 100 out of 100 readers also literally interpret the "man to lay among men" passage to assert that homosexuality is a sin against god.

[David Sklansky]

"Certainly he has a right his his opinion that the thinking of Believers is "shoddy and/or wishful thinking". But I don't see much more in his "analysis" for that than the loose application of terms like "probability" and "Bayes" in such a way as to appeal to the authority those terms tend to invoke. That's my opinion and I think I have a right to express It."

PairTheBoard

I don't invoke the word Baye's as an appeal to authority. I expect everyone here to know exactly what I am talking about. Which is that unlikely explanations are big favorites over ridiculous explanations. The Salem Witch Trials are (possibly) the perfect example. There may have been extremely damning and convincing evidence which to refute might have needed people to believe some astonishing things. Amazing coincidences, hallucinations, conspiracies among good people, whatever. But if the only alternative was that these girls were actually witches, the right decision (we now know) would be to find them innocent.

I just don't feel like repeating this everytime I talk about the concept.

[PairTheBoard]

[ QUOTE ]
Which is that unlikely explanations are big favorites over ridiculous explanations.

[/ QUOTE ]

There's the rub. How are you determining "unlikely" and "ridiculous" and what has "Bayes" got to do with the principle you are asserting? In order to apply Bayes you say the "ridiculous" is something that is "extremely unlikely". Your conclusion is then an appeal to the kind of conclusion that could be reached if you had a legitimate probability model looking at the relative probablities for your "unlikely" and "ridiculous" explanations. But you don't have that legitimate probability model. You just speak as if you did.

The kinds of things you label "ridiculous" are things for which mathematical statements of probability do not apply in the first place. So what you claim to be irrefutable logic is really just an argument appealing to analogy. The analogy is to the inferences obtained in a mathematical probability model. You don't actually have the model. You are just claiming the situation is analogous to one. You then claim that anybody who doesn't buy your analogy is guilty of shoddy or wishful thinking.

PairTheBoard

[andyfox]

You put "analysis" in quotes as if what David has offered in this forum over the months of debate on religion is only his opinion, without any resort to logic.

[PairTheBoard]

[ QUOTE ]
You put "analysis" in quotes as if what David has offered in this forum over the months of debate on religion is only his opinion, without any resort to logic.

[/ QUOTE ]

In the final analysis it does boil down to his opinion. I agree he backs his opinion up with persuasive arguments to support them. But as I pointed out in my last post, his arguments are appeals to analogy. The tricky thing is, it's an analogy that many people don't have the expertise to recognize as one. Normally, an argument by analogy is readily seen as something other than airtight logic. It always depends on the aptness of the analogy.

What's tricky about David's argument is that it's an analogy to mathematics without actually being mathematics itself. A lot of people don't see this, so they can't look at the aptness of the analogy. To make matters worse, David is recognized as a kind of Authority on matters of Probability. So when he speaks in those terms people tend to credit his arguments with some of that authority. That might be warranted if he were really talking mathematics. But he's not. In fact, with all his brain power I doubt he is even aware of this himself.

PairTheBoard

[Lestat]

Do you think the probability for the existence of any God is greater, less, or equal, to the viracity of the Christian scripture's claim that a man returned from death?

It seems as though you are saying we must accept this to be an equal proposition. Yet, clearly this can't be the case. They can't both be 50/50, unless your logic also allows you to believe the probability of flopping a set in hold'em is also 50/50 (either you do, or you don't). The bottom line is...

The probability for any god is MUCH greater than the probability that the specific God of Christianity exists. You can say they are the same, but then I'd have to assume your logic also tells you that the probability for flopping a set is the same as flopping a pair. Either you will, or you won't.

[David Sklansky]

Math tells us that unlikely explanations become likely explanations if the alternatives are ridiculous explanations. Math doesn't show that an explanation is ridiculous. To do that one uses statistics rather than math. Or perhaps logic and science. So for instance if you wanted to show that there was almost certainly no such thing as dice rushes, and that to think otherwise is "ridiculous" you could point to the logic of "dice have no memory" or better yet point to the statistical fact that no one makes their living playing dice, which would be easy to do if there were dice rushes, and that no one has made 40 passes in a row in the history of the world. Others can extend the technique to the discussions at hand. Strangely though, many atheists don't like this argument because they hate the fact that it implies that God's existence becomes much more likely if Kreskin isn't a fraud.

[Zeno]

[ QUOTE ]
Strangely though, many atheists don't like this argument because they hate the fact that it implies that God's existence becomes much more likely if Kreskin isn't a fraud.

[/ QUOTE ]


The Amazing Kerskin (http://www.kreskin.com/Default.asp?tcode=seo&source=booyah&GCID=S16796x00 3&MATCHTYPE=search&KEYWORD=kreskin&bhcp=1)

Made my day.


-Zeno

[PairTheBoard]

[ QUOTE ]
Do you think the probability for the existence of any God is greater, less, or equal, to the viracity of the Christian scripture's claim that a man returned from death?

It seems as though you are saying we must accept this to be an equal proposition.

[/ QUOTE ]

I am not saying they are "equal propositions". They are different propositions. What I'm saying is that applying terms of probability to either of them is meaningless.

A better comparison would be between the following claims. Suppose for example that we have video tape evidence and scientific observation of a Parting of the Red Sea. Religious people believe that God did it. Scientists have no explanation. However they have numerous conjectures for how it might have happened. None of those Scientific conjectures will be that "God did it". Not only are the Scientific conjectures and the Belief that "God did it" NOT equal propositions, they are not even in the same ball park.

Sklansky's ideas about Bayes, statitistics, and probability can be applied to the various scientific conjectures. But they do not apply to the Belief that "God did it". That is a Religious Belief and not subject to application of those terms. That's why the scientists do not include it as one of their conjectures. It's not science.

PairTheBoard

[PairTheBoard]

[ QUOTE ]
Math tells us that unlikely explanations become likely explanations if the alternatives are ridiculous explanations. Math doesn't show that an explanation is ridiculous. To do that one uses statistics rather than math. Or perhaps logic and science. So for instance if you wanted to show that there was almost certainly no such thing as dice rushes, and that to think otherwise is "ridiculous" you could point to the logic of "dice have no memory" or better yet point to the statistical fact that no one makes their living playing dice, which would be easy to do if there were dice rushes, and that no one has made 40 passes in a row in the history of the world. Others can extend the technique to the discussions at hand. Strangely though, many atheists don't like this argument because they hate the fact that it implies that God's existence becomes much more likely if Kreskin isn't a fraud.

[/ QUOTE ]

They would only hate it if they didn't realize that it's not a fact. God doesn't become more "likely" at all in any kind of mathematical sense. That's because the mathematical terms of probability do not apply to the Religious issue of God to begin with. It might prompt people to come to believe in God. But that's entirely different than saying God is now more "likely" in a mathematical sense.

As I pointed out in your thread on "Belief", if you are using the terms "likely" and "probability" in the philosophical sense of a Baysian probablist, then all they translate to are "degree of conviction". If that's the sense in which you are using them then your statement that Validating Kreskin makes God more likely, just translates into the opinion that Validating Kreskin makes God easier for you to believe in. If you are using the terms in a mathematical sense then you are just off base because they don't apply to God to begin with. You have no frequentist mathematical model of probability that applies to "God".

PairTheBoard

[andyfox]

David is applying math to figure the likelihood that God did it, not to the belief that God did it. And the religious belief then becomes an example of shoddy thinking if logic, math, Bayes, etc., should lead one to believe otherwise.

[PairTheBoard]

[ QUOTE ]
David is applying math to figure the likelihood that God did it,

[/ QUOTE ]

If he is applying math, where is his mathematical model of probability? Just using the term "likelihood" does not make it math. If he is using it in the philisophical sense of the Baysians, all it means is "degree of conviction". Read about Baysian Probablists for yourself. If by "likelihood" he means "degree of conviction" then what he is doing is using high falootin terms that make it sound like he's using math to justifiy a "degree of conviction", ie. a "belief".

PairTheBoard

[David Sklansky]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Do you think the probability for the existence of any God is greater, less, or equal, to the viracity of the Christian scripture's claim that a man returned from death?

It seems as though you are saying we must accept this to be an equal proposition.

[/ QUOTE ]

I am not saying they are "equal propositions". They are different propositions. What I'm saying is that applying terms of probability to either of them is meaningless.

A better comparison would be between the following claims. Suppose for example that we have video tape evidence and scientific observation of a Parting of the Red Sea. Religious people believe that God did it. Scientists have no explanation. However they have numerous conjectures for how it might have happened. None of those Scientific conjectures will be that "God did it". Not only are the Scientific conjectures and the Belief that "God did it" NOT equal propositions, they are not even in the same ball park.

Sklansky's ideas about Bayes, statitistics, and probability can be applied to the various scientific conjectures. But they do not apply to the Belief that "God did it". That is a Religious Belief and not subject to application of those terms. That's why the scientists do not include it as one of their conjectures. It's not science.

PairTheBoard

[/ QUOTE ]

As I explained in the Houdini thread, I make no claims to the likelihood that God "did it" (Andy is wrong about that) but claim only that "it" was not done in a way that breaks scientific laws, know or as yet unknown. My math also does not give a figure for the likelihood of a God who won't or can't stray from science or statistics laws. It only applies to Gods who can and do. Which is the one most people believe in.