Poll: Who believes in God?

[sid]

it is yep though theoretically do-able

the point is.. imagine the piece of paper is current scientific knowledge. Each time you fold the piece of paper you are refining said theories about the world. So it changes all the time and you are apparently getting closer to the truth? No that will never happen.
Which is why its an evidential truth.

The concept of a proof which is unprovable does not make any sense. (edit this space to be used for certain disclaimers)

clear enuff Sid ?

I'm not getting into a debate about empiricism, if you don't want to belive the evidence, no one is forcing you to.

4 forces, 1 theory is the aim for the time being.

 

[yantorsen]

It is interesting that those of a religious persuasion find it necessary to believe that must be an explanation of why we're here at all.

Is it not possible that there is no ultimate purpose?

purpose and why we are here are different things.

 

[tripitaka]

So who decides what to beleive and what not to beleive?

 

[neodude]

see there you go, there taken out of context, and besides which your quoting law books from the old testement, which were replaced by the new covenant. The old testement also says things such as you shouldn't go near a girl when she's on her period or talk to her.

I think the quotes that I posted don't leave a lot of room for ambiguity tbh.

As for them being from the OT, does that matter? Was it a different god in the OT? Did he turn over a new leaf after discovering the joys of parenthood or what? Or are you just saying that we can choose which parts of the bible are correct?

 

[semi-pro waster]

The Santa comparison stands. I would suggest that most Christians are perfectly happy to disbelieve in Santa, for exactly the same reasons as I do. As Christians, they presumably do not beleive in Zeus, Poseidon, Jupiter, Shiva or many other gods that people either do or have done in the past.

So why apply different rules to one specific god? Religious faith by it's nature requires a suspension of disbelief, and it is this I find staggering. These people are quite happy otherwise to live their lives according to evidence based science, yet religion becomes this one area where they chose not to do so.

Ah, a very minor variation on Stephen F. Roberts' oft-repeated line. And the reason why people can believe is because it is a faith, it doesn't require evidence of the form that would ordinarily satisfy a scientist. Why should disbelief in one god (or even every god bar one) mean that you should automatically disbelieve in those remaining? If you are trying to claim a logical position then you really need to be able to answer that question.

The option I want isn't in the poll...

"I'd like to believe, but I don't believe"

You're a Don, the options are surely only limited by your willingness to create a new one.

 

[tripitaka]

purpose and why we are here are different things.

Fair enough.

I prefer to get by without either

 

[tripitaka]

Ah, a very minor variation on Stephen F. Roberts' oft-repeated line. And the reason why people can believe is because it is a faith, it doesn't require evidence of the form that would ordinarily satisfy a scientist. Why should disbelief in one god (or even every god bar one) mean that you should automatically disbelieve in those remaining? If you are trying to claim a logical position then you really need to be able to answer that question.

Consistency? For much the same reason I work on the assumption that the law of mavity applies equally to apples and oranges, or chalk and cheese (although the latter two tend to fall from trees slightly less).

 

[SourChipmunk]

400 votes on the poll now and we see clearly that the Computer Community greatly differs from the majority of the world's general population (who typically don't believe in evolution, either).

 

[ChroniC]

Argh! You're getting tangled in a mess of self-referential definitions here. You can't scientifically prove the ability of the scientific method to prove the existence of God. And that's not a typo, but it's what you're asking me to do.



I think I'm fighting a losing battle here...

Ok il make this as simple as possible.
I have been listening to you say i can not disprove the existence of god, what im asking you to understand is that i dont want to disprove him i want to prove him, however after writing about 20 post showing this is entirely possible but their seems to be absolutely no evidence to suggest that a God exists, you still seem to believe that one does.
Religion is the only thing in the world where people are backwards, where they chose to believe something first before they can prove it, if this was the case for how we treat all other things in life, then the world would decend in to chaos.
So why should we treat it any differently.

I would like a religious or acidehell2 or paradox or anyone supporting them to stop trying to attempt to debate why my logic doesnt disprove their logic, but rather show me why their evidence clearly shows their right, because so far all you have attempted to do is show im wrong. I dont want a debate about who is wrong, i want to debate about which one can support who is right.
I have a feeling i will be waiting a very long time.

So who decides what to beleive and what not to beleive?

You do, and only you. However you should base that belief on knowledge and learning, experience and evidence.

 

[semi-pro waster]

Consistency? For much the same reason I work on the assumption that the law of mavity applies equally to apples and oranges, or chalk and cheese (although the latter two tend to fall from trees slightly less).

Ever heard the phrase "throwing the baby out with the bathwater"? If you are going to reject things simply on the basis of consistency i.e. you've rejected multiple previous attempts/theories then logically you should probably also reject any future ones without examining them, after all most have been wrong thus far, why should any others be right?

 

[tripitaka]

You do, and only you. However you should base that belief on knowledge and learning, experience and evidence.

To clear any misunderstanding, I'm in full agreement with you. That comment was aimed at the 'oh! But you're not supposed to take the old testament literally' brigade

 

[tripitaka]

Ever heard the phrase "throwing the baby out with the bathwater"? If you are going to reject things simply on the basis of consistency i.e. you've rejected multiple previous attempts/theories then logically you should probably also reject any future ones without examining them, after all most have been wrong thus far, why should any others be right?

Que?

I wasn't talking about rejecting a particular religion BECAUSE I had rejected all the others. That obviously wouldn't be a sensible path to follow.

I reject them because they are all implausible. i.e. the consistency comes from applying the same decision making process to each and every case.

 

[easyrider]

So if god would exist without man (assuming there is such a thing as god) then what makes you believe the form would not be the same? It could be the capitalisation that is confusing the issue here but if God would exist without man then how can God also be the creation of man?

God would cease to be conceptualised.

 

[easyrider]

Sorry if this has been covered already, I've not read the whole thread yet.

But, 'faith' can be defined as a belief without proof, not based on evidence.

Therefore, it is only a belief in God that fits in to this category. Whereas atheism and agnosticism fit into the category of rational judgement and are by definition not faith.

Atheism is a belief that god does not exist, this belief is without proof.

How does the Atheist know that GOD could does not exist?

He doesn't his belief is faith.

No different to a person beleiving that god does exist.

 

[semi-pro waster]

Que?

I wasn't talking about rejecting a particular religion BECAUSE I had rejected all the others. That obviously wouldn't be a sensible path to follow.

I reject them because they are all implausible. i.e. the consistency comes from applying the same decision making process to each and every case.

Ah, that clears it up a bit, apologies for the misunderstanding. I would however say that just because you find them implausible doesn't mean that everyone will, they could have applied their own criteria and found the religion to meet it.

God would cease to be conceptualised.

So that doesn't necessarily mean anything about the existence of God or the form they might take.

 

[neodude]

Atheism is a belief that god does not exist, this belief is without proof.

How does the Atheist know that GOD could does not exist?

He doesn't his belief is faith.

No different to a person beleiving that god does exist.

Thats just silly. I have a belief that there isn't a 10 foot robotic killing machine in my garage. I don't know for sure that there isn't, but there isn't a single shred of evidence to support it and the idea of it is so silly that I can safely assume my belief to be correct. Same with god imho.

 

[ChroniC]

Atheism is a belief that god does not exist, this belief is without proof.

How does the Atheist know that GOD could does not exist?

He doesn't his belief is faith.

No different to a person beleiving that god does exist.

arhghghghghghghghghg arhghghghghghghg arghghhghbghgh dear lord

That is what everyone who believes in god says. Atheism is not a belief that god doesn't exist, we just dont start a new religion that say oh god does not exist, i.e. The non god religion.
Atheism is starting with a clean slate and asking something to be proven by logic, evidence i.e by the tool of science, god just happen to be on the agenda of being ilogical and unprovable, so we swept it aside and continued to try and answer rthe bigger questions.

 

[Nitefly]

Atheism is starting with a clean slate and asking something to be proven by logic, evidence i.e by the tool of science.

arhghghghghghghghghg arhghghghghghghg arghghhghbghgh dear lord

 

[tripitaka]

Thats just silly. I have a belief that there isn't a 10 foot robotic killing machine in my garage. I don't know for sure that there isn't, but there isn't a single shred of evidence to support it and the idea of it is so silly that I can safely assume my belief to be correct. Same with god imho.

Having given it careful consideration, I have decided that I am agnostic on the subject of 10 foot robotic killing machines.
Can this be added to the poll?

 

[tripitaka]

Ah, that clears it up a bit, apologies for the misunderstanding. I would however say that just because you find them implausible doesn't mean that everyone will, they could have applied their own criteria and found the religion to meet it.

Perhaps, but I would say that these criteria are unlikely to be the same criteria used in their day to day decision making...