Thread: Why Is Atheism Synonymous With Folly?

I think that you need to make a definition of what you call God before you can theorise whether there's a God.
Are you going to call God the thing in the Bible that will magically give us eternal life if we bow down to him?
Are you going to call God simply something that was able to magically create the universe?
Are you going to call God the little green men who zip around the place creating new species from their technology?

Unless you're going to make a definition of what this God is, you're engaging in a fool's argument.

Originally Posted by Baron

What makes this a true statement?

If someone were to say that, in the entire universe, a purples stone with yellow dots on it does not exist then it would be necessary to ask how they had sufficient knowledge of the universe to make such an assertion. To state an absolute negative requires absolute knowledge.

I agree with you up to this point.

This makes the agnostic more honest, and less deluded, than the atheist. Agnosticism is an admission of not knowing, whereas atheism claims to know.

I think this is where your argument goes awry. You're arguing over semantics. Theism literally means belief in a god or gods. When you add the prefix a- to a word, it does not create an absolute negative (consider: moral, amoral; vascular, avascular); it means "without." In the most literal sense of the word, atheism is "without belief in a god or gods" or "no belief in a god or gods."

Many theists believe that agnosticism is some position in between. Agnosticism was a term coined by Thomas Huxley that referred to the inability to know. The Gnostics claimed a certainty of knowledge based on personal revelation from their god. Agnosticism refers to the inability to claim certainty of knowledge of a god (or the metaphysical; supernatural).

Agnosticism isn't an uncertainty; whereas atheism is a certainty. They are terms that exist within different philosophical ballparks. Gnosticism/Agnosticism are epistemological positions. Theism/Atheism are psychological positions. A theist may claim to believe in a god with certainty or without certainty. Those theists who claim no certainty of knowledge are agnostic theists. An atheist may claim no belief in a god with certainty or without certainty. Those without certainty of knowledge are agnostic atheists (or weak atheists some call it).

To claim absolute knowledge of the infinite from a finite position is pure folly.

True. Of course, this statement can be equally applied to both atheists and theists.

Atheists will frequently put down spiritual experience as subjective, try to explain away or deny spiritual healing and miracles.

A "spiritual experience" is as subjective as any other personal experience. The way we interpret our experiences will vary. I have seen atheists discount these experiences, but I've also seen theists become very defensive when their claims of truth regarding those experiences aren't accepted by atheists.

Yet the subjective experience, specially when supported by the subjective experience of others, carries more weight than an absolute denial based on the argument that if science has not discovered God then God cannot exist. Science has failed to find the elusive Higgs boson so does this mean that nuclear physics doesn't really exist?

Subjective experience of the immaterial carries very little weight in an objective sense. It may carry weight among other believers, but it doesn't constitute any sort of scientific proof or truth. Atheists who hold that a god cannot exist because science has not discovered god are pretty rare. Most atheists, even hardcore atheists like Richard Dawkins, allow for the possibility that a god could exist. If you can find an example of a respected atheist who states that a god absolutely cannot exist because science hasn't discovered god, I'd love to see it. And if you find one, I'll concede that that's a highly irrational position to take, but it's also an extremely rare atheistic position. It sounds to me like you're taking a very extreme atheistic position and generalizing it as if it's a common atheistic position, and then offering subjective experience as a more rational position. This is a strawman fallacy.

Atheism is a belief system, plain and simple, held in faith and built on a premise of false knowledge. To try to argue that it's more than this really is folly.

I'd argue that it's far less than that. Atheism, as a term, does not exist except in relation to theism. Belief or faith in a god is needed for theism to exist. All that is needed for atheism is to be without that faith.

Nad

I see you've pretty much started another 'Existence of God' thread here Baron.

To answer your OP, I think it's as foolish to claim to know that a God exists just as much as it is foolish to say one doesn't. No one person has knowledge of everything and shared knowledge leaves no answers either.

Faith is subjective and down to personal experience. Shared experiences and shared symbolism may cause a group of people to believe that there may exist a God but really, no-one knows for certain and they won't until they die (and probably not even then).

Having beliefs can cause comfort, belonging and other pacifying feelings; especially if the believer has been hurt, suffered etc... So can modern Psychological help.

I think the biggest fools are the people who don't believe in themselves. We are all our own Gods really. We are the main controllers of our own destiny. Allow yourself to put your behaviour down to the presence of a 'higher force' that isn't you and then you start to lack any responsibility for the thoughts you think or the actions you take.