Are you tired of the whole atheist/believer debate?

by nicolaou 115 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

• 

  lonelysheep

  I love a good debate, but do not have enough time to read them all. Can one really be convinced of the opposite? Though it's happened, I don't think it's a reasonably expected result. But that's what debate is...back and forth. Kid A wrote:

  It is exceedingly unlikely that had my parents or society not intervened and implanted the 'god meme' in my brain at a very young age, this construct would likely have never even occurred to me.

  I agree with you completely (and didn't grow up jw or w/any jw relatives-only fundies). This is why I can look back at myself at a very young age, and realize that all the time spent in sunday school at church always felt like a waste of time because I questioned god's existence even then.

  Particularly when I consider that my abandoning the belief in a god required NO external input whatsoever beyond my own subjective perception of the reality around me. The "belief" in god, however, most certainly DID require active input and mental construction from parents, society etc. The "non-believer" is simply subtracting or deleting an implanted "god" file.

  Excellent way to sum it up!

  Faith cannot fill the gap between reasons to believe and proof, it merely props up beliefs that lack a secure foundation of evidence and reason.
• 

  AuldSoul

  The main reason that I believe in God is simple. I have not read every book, volume or article in the Library of Congress' collection of nearly 800 million pieces. If I do not posses that sort of knowledge on a finite level, how can I possibly say that God does not exist or that "harder" evidence of His existence does not exist somewhere.

  I was hoping that someone could point out the flaws, if any, in this arguement. I didn't post it to be ignored

  I apologize. I am not being belligerent in asking this and certainly wouldn't want to rob you of your basis for belief: Do you also believe in Santa Claus? The Easter Bunny? Frosty the Snowman? You get the idea? There may harder evidence for the existence of anything, potentially. Which by the reasoning presented would lead one to believe everything even in the face of proof to the contrary because proof in favor may come later.

  It's okay with me if you choose to do that, but I would think you won't wind up a very "well adjusted" individual (whatever that is).

  Respectfully,
  AuldSoul
• 

  Panda

  My goodness ... such a non-debate... yeah I know no one ever said that. Anyway about Darwin; he built on the theories and careers of those naturalists who preceeded him; just as scientists in the fields related to natural selection have built on Darwin. We are able to learn more because these men have built on observable facts; facts and experiments which are repeatable. Within the last 40 years we have not only recognised the structure of DNA (2 English scientists if I'm not mistaken); but also decoded the human genome. None of this would have been possible without the previous scientific work. We now have nuclear genetics, something Darwin could only dream about. So can science answer everything right now, of course not. but aren't you glad that the genes for cancer, MS, diabetes, auto immune disease, and other illnesses have already been recognised; someday no one will suffer from these sorts of illnesses. Think about this, what has religion done that even comes close to good? Most of the 21st century genocides are religious (Beslan); the 20th century genocides were religious ... sheesh just look at the Holocaust (shoa) ...

  Why is progress possible with science it is because science is a constant building, experimenting and learning AND THEN absorbing the new proven theory which will be built on further; while religious organizations which claim the same Holy Book can't even agree on the contents of said book. And while new discoveries are made of ancient writings many religious folk deny the value of those ex., The Book of Thomas, The Gospel of Mary, The Gospel of Judas, Why is that?

  Religion is belief. Atheism is not the opposite of belief. Atheism is the strong conviction that god in fact does not nor ever has existed. I don't need to have faith or belief when there are the facts for all the world to see and investigate. Proof in science is specific and it doesn't only happen once. Myth is just that, stories made up about how life came about and usually traceable to their sources, which are of course mythical. If the ancients had the advantage of science they wouldn't have needed to make stuff up. But I must admit that in studying anthropology I found religion fascinating. That really got me thinking about my beliefs as a JW, which of course led to my freedom faith and belief.

  Ya' know I have yet to have an atheist try to convert me (when I believed in god) and there were plenty of them at college; now I find many theists all over the chance to show me god's love and goodness.
• 

  Van Gogh

  Objective science and subjective belief and faith are asymmetrical, as I’m satisfied can be established from this debate. They are hard to synthesize as they can be classed as two different things, though part of our realm.
  God, seen as an entity outside our realm, is an entirely different third thing altogether, different in nature from the first two. Maybe God has nothing to do with science.
  Atheism often originates from unanswerable moral questions (the prolonged existence of suffering). I think atheism does require faith, because atheism requires one to actively deny God, something that cannot be done, as it requires proof or evidence of a negative. It originates from an unscientific moral point of view and does not come from a vacuum. Agnosticism, on the other hand, requires no faith or belief. Personally, I fail to see even the slightest beginnings of even the faintest evidence for the non-existence of a God. I can think of many (unscientific) moral arguments against the existence of a God though.
  The fact that a child in Sunday school has no time for God says nothing. The childlike mind somehow having a pure, unblemished state, is simply not true. Babies start out as fundamentally egocentric and are not actively interested in the existence of their parents (they are literally blind to start out with). If a “pure” child would grow up without internalizing unscientific morals and habits (beliefs) from active outside influences, what would it become? Children need to be cultured, otherwise they become irritating pests.
  Of course, bad outside influences can make them into hardened criminals by the same token. In this way the (imo) all pervasive desire for humanity to search out its “parent” and origins can be debased by organized religion, just as any virtue can be degenerated. So I’m not swayed by the argument that religion is such a significant cause evil: they are actually cultural and political differences.
  A feral child may indeed deny the existence of a God, who knows? But it most probably will also deny the existence of its very own blood parents. Its “godlike” blood parents, if observing as if in an experiment from outside the feral’s “realm”, know better, and will consider the “scientific” paradigm (“informed” opinion) of the feral as of no consequence.
  Panda wrote:
  :”Why is progress possible with science it is because science is a constant building, experimenting and learning AND THEN absorbing the new proven theory which will be built on further;”
  It depends on what you believe to be progress. It depends on what progress signifies in your subjective opinion. If it means progress for humanity, then what proof is there for that?
  Science has “superseded” thousand of years of religion, and has inadvertently, within a relatively short time span, managed to become a threat to the very existence of the human race and its home. As a tool in the hands of malicious ones “playing God”, it could in theory intentionally be used to wipe out most life; Technology and science contributed lots to death and destruction during two, essentially non-religious, world wars.
  Panda wrote:
  :“cancer, MS, diabetes, auto immune disease, and other illnesses have already been recognised; someday no one will suffer from these sorts of illnesses”.
  Science and technology have actually been the cause of many of these diseases, or has made them apparent by (sometimes artificially) prolonging life a couple of years. The supposed net benefits of medical science are controversial. Of course one can recognize the short term benefits for us as individuals; the jury is still out for the long-term overall benefits for humanity though. New medical-scientific discoveries in fact only raise even more agonizing ethical dilemmas and so lead to more injustice. Science means nothing without ethics. Where do we get the moral foundation to answer these questions and who has the power to decide their outcome? Ultimately you’ve got to die some day. Somehow people in secular, affluent, scientific societies still have a very hard time to truly accept the finiteness of life.
  Trust in science is just as much a belief, and a very subjective one for that matter.
  VG
• 

  AuldSoul

  I tend to agree, Van Gogh.

  Whereas Science is not a belief system, it is a system through which beliefs arise. It really doesn't matter that these beliefs are classified at the outset as "provisional and subject to change," the very fact that they are subject to change should be sufficient to demonstrate that they are beliefs.

  Respectfully,
  AuldSoul
• 

  kid-A

  "Whereas Science is not a belief system, it is a system through which beliefs arise. It really doesn't matter that these beliefs are classified at the outset as "provisional and subject to change," the very fact that they are subject to change should be sufficient to demonstrate that they are beliefs"

  I agree with your previous statement AuldSoul that there can be no objective proof of a subjective belief. Fair enough. However, I cannot agree with your statement above. Perhaps we have different definitions of what a "belief" constitutes. IMHO, a "belief" in a religious sense is the conviction, based on faith, that something is "true". Belief in this sense does not exist in science. Even if you want to claim that scientists harbour "beliefs" even then, these would, at best, be considered only "provisional beliefs" or temporary theoretical frameworks within which to formulate more hypotheses. What I publish tomorrow may be disproven the next day. We all collectively accept that in scientific research. Indeed, the entire purpose of a scientific experiment is to "test the nulll hypothesis", which is the assumption that our hypothesis is in fact, wrong. We then apply statistics to quantified data which are structured such that we indeed attempting to demonstrate that the null hypothesis is indeed correct, and we are wrong. This is arguably the most rigorous approach to any possible data collection method. The fact that our hypotheses (not "beliefs") our subject to change is sufficient to demonstrate that these are neither beliefs nor convictions. They are simply fluid hypotheses, open to confirmation or disconfirmation depending upon the resulting tangible, quantifiable data.

  Finally, at the macro level, the term "belief" is inappropriately applied to the scientific method. I dont base any of my theories on "beliefs", I base them upon collections of cold, hard, factual evidence, demonstrated by a graph, a statistic or any other tangible, collectively observed phenomena.

  Lastly I would add the following, that seems to have not been mentioned throughout this debate: Religious belief is filtered through a kaleidoscope of human emotions. Scientific theories, are most certainly not. I would never propose that my scientific theories will lead to the eternal salvation of my soul or save my sorry sinners ass at judgement day. Emotion dramatically clouds one's perception of reality, hence the reason so many people reject evolution, they simply cannot divest themselves (in spite of the thousands of pieces of evidence in support of evolution at the molecular, phylogenetic, anatomical and geological levels) that humans could actually (gasp!!!) be the descendents of (gasp!!!!) primates!!! Thus, yet another glaring difference between scientific versus religious frameworks of knowledge.
• 

  kid-A

  "I assumed that the subjective is not falsifiable in asserting that there is no such thing as subjective proof. Do I have that understanding mixed up? If so, please give examples where the subjective has been falsified."

  Sorry, I missed this question. No problem, heres one example from my day to day life in the lab (out of possible thousands of examples I could give you). I wont bore you with details but heres a basic example:

  I 'subjectively' believed that a specific nucleus within the brain would respond to stimulation of a projection pathway arising from another neural region. I formulated my hypothesis and conducted my experiments. I lowered a microelectrode into this collection of neurons and recorded their activity while I applied theta burst stimulation to the afferent neural pathway. My 'subjective' assumption (based on anatomical considerations) was that this neuronal population should respond with action potentials to this stimulation. They did not. My subjectively based hypothesis was falsified.

  Now, was this falsification based on any subjective input from me? No. This event was recorded independently of me. Through a series of bioelectric amplifiers, oscilloscopes and computer software. The data was what the data was. I had nothing to do with how these bioelectric signals were generated. The entire experience took place outside my biases and moreso, I can show this collected data to a colleague and have it independently verified. Falsification of subjective "beliefs" or biases are the norm in the life of research.
• 

  AuldSoul

  And once falsified, it become proven, and therefore objective. Is that correct? If so, then there is no such thing as subjective proof.
• 

  AuldSoul

  Finally, at the macro level, the term "belief" is inappropriately applied to the scientific method.

  Which would explain why I specifically avoided application to the scientific method and stuck with application to that which arises from said method. At the macro level, my understanding of "belief"—which understanding is itself, subjective, as are ultimately all conceptual terms that describe intangibles—applies to the results of the scientific method quite nicely.

  If you get the feeling that I am ignoring most of what you posted please don't take offense. I tend to respond only to that which I believe to be most pertinent.

  At its basis, the scientific method produces provisional facts, any of which may change. Adoption of, adherence to, or use of such constitutes an exercise of faith in the belief that they are true, although they may not be. I don't see how you can reasonably deny that what I just said is accurate, there are ample examples in the literature of the truth of it. While the scientific method is not "belief" it is a "belief" generator. The fact that you don't like it doesn't make it false. That is just an emotional response to having your beliefs challenged. Perfectly normal reaction in humans.

  Respectfully,
  AuldSoul
• 

  heathen

  Yah from what I'm reading in websters --- The subjective contrasts the objective . So basically what it comes down too is how you look at the evidence , alot of the evidence from evolution was disproven after having been declared evidence because they continued to research . They found skeletons they claimed were part of the family tree but then realized that the animal existed alongside man not as part of a mutation . Science can get emotional as well when dealing with the topic and their research is very subjective .

  BTW -- we aren't just talking about man evolving from primates but that single cell animals evolve into fish which then evolve into reptiles which then evolve into rodents which then evolve into mammals and then evolve into man .