Ever felt insignificant?

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

er the Milky Way [our home galaxy eh] is 100.000 light years across ..... 100 billion galaxies at recent estimate ... i am going for a walk by the ressy ..... contemplate everything .... i may be gone some time ..... or back yesterday ...

[vinteuil]

Fair enough scotty. I'd rather summarised your position not expecting you to come back on this, so thanks for the clarification and apols for any misrepresentation. But I think I got the gist in my original message: unable as I am to disprove the existence of God, it would be being dishonest to myself let alone anyone else to describe myself as an atheist, as spelt out.

... so, Serial, I hope you will now make a point of describing yourself as agnostic regarding unicorns ( rather than an a-unicornist), an agnostic regarding dragons (rather than an a-dragonist), an agnostic regarding orbiting teapots (rather than an a-orbiting-teapotist), an agnostic regarding spaghetti monsters (rather than an a-spaghetti-monsterist) ??


There are so many things we don't think are out there, in relation to which we do not bother to define ourselves.

Why bother with defining ourselves in relation to a god who we do not think is there, any more than defining ourselves in relation to that magical orbiting teapot?

[MrGongGong]

I'm for the flying teapot myself

[scottycelt]

... so, Serial, I hope you will now make a point of describing yourself as agnostic regarding unicorns ( rather than an a-unicornist), an agnostic regarding dragons (rather than an a-dragonist), an agnostic regarding orbiting teapots (rather than an a-orbiting-teapotist), an agnostic regarding spaghetti monsters (rather than an a-spaghetti-monsterist) ??

There are so many things we don't think are out there, in relation to which we do not bother to define ourselves.

Why bother with defining ourselves in relation to a god who we do not think is there, any more than defining ourselves in relation to that magical orbiting teapot?

Okay, then, S_A can respond in his own way but let's try and make the discussion a bit more productive and slightly less silly ...

Nobody knows for sure yet whether or not there is any form of life on Mars (at least on this matter we do have an excellent chance of eventually finding out!).

Some may claim there definitely is, so the sceptic (quite naturally) will seek some convincing evidence for the claim.

Others may assert exactly the opposite, that they think there is definitely no form of life on Mars even though nobody yet really knows for sure.

So we just accept the second at face-value without requesting any evidence or proof, and, even if the claimant is (quite naturally) asked by the unconvinced to provide some evidence or proof in turn, he/she reverts to prattling on about irrelevancies like teapots and green-eyed spaghetti monsters?

That doesn't seem to me a particularly logical or scientific approach regarding the burden of evidence/proof on any claim of certainty whether it be of a positive or negative nature ?

[heliocentric]

I'm for the flying teapot myself

Let us pray.

[MrGongGong]

Let us pray.

one of the great basslines of all time

[scottycelt]

See what I mean ... ?

[amateur51]

I'm not quite sure of your point here, S_A, but let me try and finally clarify my position. I do indeed challenge the Atheist for his/her insistence that the Believer must provide 'proof' for the existence of God but then swiftly retreats from 'proof' when in turn challenged on the apparent certainty that there isn't. Convenient bluster about being asked to 'prove' the non-existence of 'spaghetti monsters' or whatever will simply not wash.

Let me put it like this:

There is a God ... Believer ... Dogmatic Statement.
There isn't a God ... Atheist ... Dogmatic Statement
Not sure one way or the other ... Agnostic ... Non-Dogmatic Statement.

In many ways the Agnostic view is the most honest as the other two require a great deal of faith beyond the scope of science, which is why atheism is as much a stated belief as any other.

Therefore if the Believer is expected to provide incontrovertible 'scientific' proof for Existence, then the Atheist must surely abide by similar rules for the claimed Non-Existence. From personal experience I have come to believe in a 'woman's intuition'. I cannot 'prove' it and fortunately no one has asked me to do so, but I'm almost certain it exists. I see no reason why I should be expected to 'prove' it exists any more than someone who claims it definitely doesn't.

So, in the case of religious or non-religious belief, I see absolutely no difference between the two regarding any demand for absolute 'proof'.

Hope that finally clarifies it!

What about apatheists, scotty

[Serial_Apologist]

God is just an idea. A unifying idea, if you will, in the absence of a better one.

If, like unbeknighted heathens, we hadn't been told about him or her, the question of God's existence wouldn't arise. Or we'd go on believing in nature spirits or lots of gods or (best of all since it provides all energy needed to sustain life) the sun (small "s").

If language hadn't been developed there'd be no beginnings, middles and endings - we'd just have intuition to go on. Which actually is at the first rung of interconnectedness. Language, "the word", far from being in the beginning, was evolved as a tool for communicating as best it and we can our views. It isn't very good at communicating our feelings, so we evolved rituals to mark the mileposts and fulfilment of the tasks of gathering, growing, making, exchanging, sharing that needed that "beyond" for which we had to find eventual explanations because language had increased our brain capacity.

One of these rituals eventually became The Proms.

Capturing everything we did or needed to understand now came about courtesy the net of language and its symbols and images. As societies grew and scarcities threw groups back on their language-based codes, customs and agreements as to what requirements were expected of imperfect individuals for belonging, and things needed codification for simple instant retrieval in an evermore complex human-dominated world, everything that still lay outside humans' conceptual models remained argued over as matters of conjecture and, inevitably, division.

Then along came Friends of Radio 3, and, soon, everything started to be resolved.

[Pianorak]

Found this quite interesting although somewhat beyond my ken - R4 9am today:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b01mwx64/In_Our_Time_The_Ontological_Argument/

[scottycelt]

What about apatheists, scotty

I confess I had to check that one out in Wiki, amsey ...

I find that position the most extraordinary of all... taking an 'apathetic' stance as whether there is a Deity or not? Surely that is the very antithesis of the normal human urge to learn and explore all possibilities as to the meaning (if any) of life and the universe ?

There is an interesting last paragraph though ...

<Apatheists hold that if it were possible to prove that God exists, their behavior would not change. Similarly, there would be no change if someone proved that God does not exist.>

AH-HAH ... so at least even those most apathetic of apathetic souls appear to have grasped that if proof is demanded of one belief it must also be applied to the other. There is no conveniently deflective talk here of teapots and strange straggly monsters.

Well grasped the even-handed Apatheists!

[Serial_Apologist]

Found this quite interesting although somewhat beyond my ken - R4 9am today:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode...ical_Argument/

I listened until about halfway through, couldn't make head or tail of any of it, and gave up.

[Pianorak]

I listened until about halfway through, couldn't make head or tail of any of it, and gave up.

Much relieved to hear that - so it wasn't just my inadequate ken.

[Serial_Apologist]

I write, therefore I don't exist. (Des Carts)

[scottycelt]

I listened until about halfway through, couldn't make head or tail of any of it, and gave up.

Oh, come on, everything was as clear as mud, S_A ...