Do you believe in God?
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Garoad Kuroda
Prophet of Muppetry
Join date: 5 Sep 2003
Posts: 2,989
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12-11-2004 22:40
From: Chip Midnight Nope. Not at all. That statement is based on a common misconception about what atheists believe. Atheists don't deny the possible existance of a god or gods (for the simple reason that you can't prove a negative), they just feel there is insuficient evidence or reason to believe... for the same reasons we don't believe in Santa, flying reindeer, the tooth fairy, and on and on. If you believed in everything you can't absolutely prove doesn't exist you'd have to believe in every possible idea of what "might" be without exception. I'm sure you agree that would be a rather silly thing to do. That's right, I've heard that definition of athiesm before...but... 2 entries found for atheism.
1.
a. Disbelief in or denial of the existence of God or gods.
b. The doctrine that there is no God or gods.
2. Godlessness; immorality.1. a. is a complete almost word-for-word contradiction to what you just said above, from dictionary.com... This sounds more like what you are describing: 2 entries found for agnostic
1.
a. One who believes that it is impossible to know whether there is a God.
b. One who is skeptical about the existence of God but does not profess true atheism.If athiests (whatever they believe) want to redefine the meaning of the word  , that's fine, but if that's the case they should first let everyone else in on it so the dictionary can be updated! I don't know where you got your definition from, and I don't know if you aren't correct in some sense (giving the benefit of the doubt the word may be used differently by some people), but you've got me a little confused now. If atheism is in fact basically the same thing as agnosticism (which is VERY close to what you described unless you want to get uber-semantical?), then what is agnosticism?
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WTF is C3PO supposed to be USEFUL for anyway, besides whining? Stupid piece of scrap metal would be more useful recycled as a toaster. But even that would suck, because who would want to listen to a whining wussy toaster? Is he gold plated? If that's the case he should just be melted down into gold ingots. Help the economy some, and stop being so damn useless you stupid bucket of bolts! R2 is 1,000 times more useful than your tin man ass, and he's shaped like a salt and pepper shaker FFS!
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Corwin Weber
Registered User
Join date: 2 Oct 2003
Posts: 390
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12-11-2004 23:18
From: Garoad Kuroda That's right, I've heard that definition of athiesm before...but... 2 entries found for atheism.
1.
a. Disbelief in or denial of the existence of God or gods.
b. The doctrine that there is no God or gods.
2. Godlessness; immorality.1. a. is a complete almost word-for-word contradiction to what you just said above, from dictionary.com... This sounds more like what you are describing: 2 entries found for agnostic
1.
a. One who believes that it is impossible to know whether there is a God.
b. One who is skeptical about the existence of God but does not profess true atheism.If athiests (whatever they believe) want to redefine the meaning of the word , that's fine, but if that's the case they should first let everyone else in on it so the dictionary can be updated! I don't know where you got your definition from, and I don't know if you aren't correct in some sense (giving the benefit of the doubt the word may be used differently by some people), but you've got me a little confused now. If atheism is in fact basically the same thing as agnosticism (which is VERY close to what you described unless you want to get uber-semantical?), then what is agnosticism? Chip is going from what the word actually means, not a biased dictionary definition. (There are still dictionaries that define atheism as 'immorality or wickedness.' Yeah.... no bias there huh?) Let's look at the word, shall we? Yes. Let's. Atheism. A combination of the word 'theism' referring to the belief in a divine power of some sort, (the greek word 'theos' meaning god or divinity, given the english suffix -ism signifying a belief structure based on the preceding word) and the greek prefix 'A' meaning simply 'without.' Based on this, the meaning of the word atheism is simply 'without belief in gods.' This is the actual meaning of the word. Isn't etymology fun? Agnosticism is slightly different from atheism, and is actually somewhat rare. Many people call themselves agnostics who actually aren't. Combination of the greek prefix 'A' again, (meaning without) and 'gnosticism' (that -ism suffix again, this time with the greek word 'gnosis' meaning 'knowledge,' generally referring to universal or divine knowledge.) It's not (as is commonly believed) that 'we don't know if there's a God' but rather is that 'we CAN NOT KNOW whether God exists or not.' The agnostic asserts that the basic question is unanswerable. As an atheist, I state that the God concept in general has been debunked beyond a reasonable doubt. Now.... if Thor were to pop up one day and say 'Hey guys.... I was in the neighborhood galactically speaking and thought I'd drop in and see how you were doing after all this time.... wow.... you guys have figured out radio.... cool..... and WOW!!!! Ok sorry about that satellite.... didn't realize I'd have to dodge any here....' my position would, of course, change. As a scientist at heart I am humble before fact. However.... since every god concept that humans have come up with that's meaningful in any way (not so broadly defined that nothing can be proved one way or the other about it, such as pantheism or deism) has been conclusively disproven, I'll believe it when I see it. And not before. An agnostic position would be more along the lines of saying that Thor would never show himself even if he did exist, so the question is still unanswerable. |
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Garoad Kuroda
Prophet of Muppetry
Join date: 5 Sep 2003
Posts: 2,989
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12-11-2004 23:42
Argh, here we go into this semantics stuff again... fun fun The etymology, history, and origin of the word is nice to know, but the way it is dominantly used now--whether "technically" correct or not--is the dictionary definition. (Correct me if I'm wrong and there are polls showing that most people use it in the original sense.) I bet we could find alot of words that originally meant one thing and now mean something completely different--but their meanings are not disputed now.
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WTF is C3PO supposed to be USEFUL for anyway, besides whining? Stupid piece of scrap metal would be more useful recycled as a toaster. But even that would suck, because who would want to listen to a whining wussy toaster? Is he gold plated? If that's the case he should just be melted down into gold ingots. Help the economy some, and stop being so damn useless you stupid bucket of bolts! R2 is 1,000 times more useful than your tin man ass, and he's shaped like a salt and pepper shaker FFS!
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Corwin Weber
Registered User
Join date: 2 Oct 2003
Posts: 390
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12-11-2004 23:48
From: Garoad Kuroda Argh, here we go into this semantics stuff again... fun fun The etymology, history, and origin of the word is nice to know, but the way it is dominantly used now--whether "technically" correct or not--is the dictionary definition. (Correct me if I'm wrong and there are polls showing that most people use it in the original sense.) I bet we could find alot of words that originally meant one thing and now mean something completely different--but their meanings are not disputed now. Society can redefine red as green..... you'll still get a ticket. Society is predominantly religious. As such, there's an inherent bias that causes atheism to be defined in ways that are incorrect, because that bias prevents atheism from being viewed in a positive light. The idea that the 'common use' defintion is somehow more correct than what the word actually means just because more people use it that way is silly. |
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Garoad Kuroda
Prophet of Muppetry
Join date: 5 Sep 2003
Posts: 2,989
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12-12-2004 00:03
If red was green (we'd also have to make green = red obviously), I don't see what the problem would be.  So we get tickets on green lights instead? That's a very conservative view of language. I don't think of language as a static thing, I think of it as a dynamic thing that changes with time. (And that change is usually slow.) If everyone switches the meaning of red and green and everyone agrees on it, who's gonna argue? (Besides the guy in the loony bin.... "haha look at that guy, he says red is green what a silly man!" ) This could get very philosophic and semantical, I'm not sure I can take much more of this! 
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BTW
WTF is C3PO supposed to be USEFUL for anyway, besides whining? Stupid piece of scrap metal would be more useful recycled as a toaster. But even that would suck, because who would want to listen to a whining wussy toaster? Is he gold plated? If that's the case he should just be melted down into gold ingots. Help the economy some, and stop being so damn useless you stupid bucket of bolts! R2 is 1,000 times more useful than your tin man ass, and he's shaped like a salt and pepper shaker FFS!
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Chip Midnight
ate my baby!
Join date: 1 May 2003
Posts: 10,231
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12-12-2004 00:10
From: Garoad Kuroda
1.
a. Disbelief in or denial of the existence of God or gods.
b. The doctrine that there is no God or gods.
There's really nothing wrong with this definition, nor is it in any way in conflict with what I wrote. You're looking at it through your own biased eyes. I disbelieve the existence of god because there is no evidence to support the claim, and hence, no reason for me to believe. Therefore, my worldview and philisophy (doctrine) are based on there being no god. 1.a actually covers two different types of atheistic belief. I copied the following from elsewhere, as it's a good overview of the two types... From: someone Atheists do not always assert that God does not exist. There are two broad categories of atheism - "Positive" (or "strong" or "hard"  atheism and "Negative" (or "weak" or "soft" atheism. A "Positive atheist" will say "God X does not exist", whereas a "Negative atheist" will say "I do not believe God X exists" - there is a subtle but important difference. Some (if not all) agnostics may also be considered "negative atheists", as they are not theists (there is an overlap between agnosticism and weak atheism). Agnostics (it means "without knowledge" consider the question of God to be unanswerable - there may be a God, or there may not, but we have no way of ever determining the truth of the matter. Occasionally atheists will refer to themselves as agnostics - the term is often more socially acceptable in a strongly religious region, as some theists have an extremely negative view of atheism and automatically assume that all atheists are "positive" atheists. Depending on the definition of the God in question, the atheist may be either "positive", "negative" or agnostic. Many theists will also have the same reaction towards the deities of other religions. For example, if you give a self-contradictory definition of your God, I will say that it certainly does not exist (like a square circle), but if some group on the other side of the world has a God that I have never even heard of, I am still atheistic towards it as I simply have no belief in it. In that sense, many Christians are also atheists - they just believe in one more God than I do. There's really no contradiction between the definition of atheists and what I described in my earlier post. For example, I don't believe that there are giant invisible zebras dancing a tango on the rings of Saturn, but it would never be possible for me to absolutely prove they aren't there. If I chose to believe in them, despite the outlandishness of the claim and the utter lack of evidence, you'd think I'm a quack. I feel the same way about belief in god. There's no reason to believe, and no way to completely disprove. I don't take my disbelief of god on faith. I take it from deductive reasoning.
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Siobhan Taylor
Nemesis
Join date: 13 Aug 2003
Posts: 5,476
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12-12-2004 00:49
From: Adam Cooper I agree the poll is a little to simplistic......
Here we go putting God in a box again.....
Stop to believe in gods in a box!
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splat1 Edison
Registerd Nut
Join date: 6 Sep 2004
Posts: 353
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12-12-2004 01:02
In short no.
Allthough I do not disrepect the possiabilty of a god.
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Selador Cellardoor
Registered User
Join date: 16 Nov 2003
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12-12-2004 03:36
Chip, <<I don't believe that there are giant invisible zebras dancing a tango on the rings of Saturn>> Ah, but I do believe in The Invisible Pink Unicorn. Blessed be her Hooves! |
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Chip Midnight
ate my baby!
Join date: 1 May 2003
Posts: 10,231
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12-12-2004 08:26
From: Selador Cellardoor Chip, <<I don't believe that there are giant invisible zebras dancing a tango on the rings of Saturn>> Ah, but I do believe in The Invisible Pink Unicorn. Blessed be her Hooves! haha, now there's a religion I can get behind!
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Siobhan Taylor
Nemesis
Join date: 13 Aug 2003
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12-12-2004 10:54
I believe I need a drink!
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Blake Rockwell
Fun Businesses
Join date: 31 Oct 2004
Posts: 1,606
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12-13-2004 05:02
From: Olympia Rebus ...or, for another example, I don't Bill Gates will put me in his will. I don't believe I'll die tomorrow, nor do I believe I'll run into Jerry Springer or Ana Nicole Smith. All these things are theroreticly possible... but not likley enough to be for me to believe they'll come true.
As for things that- to me- seem impossible, I'm always willing to believe if there's decent evidence. For example, if someone said cats could hold articulate conversations with humans I wouldn't buy it, based on my current knowledge and experiences of what a cat is capable of. If I then met a cat who could hold a conversation with me, ruling out trickery, I'd have to reasses my assumptions and beliefs based on new evidence. Actually my Cat understands the word "No". |
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Eggy Lippmann
Wiktator
Join date: 1 May 2003
Posts: 7,939
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12-13-2004 05:30
Praise the all powerful unicorn! fnord!
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Torley Linden
Enlightenment!
Join date: 15 Sep 2004
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12-13-2004 09:13
Humanism is highly underrated. :|
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Darko Cellardoor
Cannabinoid Addict
Join date: 10 Nov 2003
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12-13-2004 09:21
From: Torley Torgeson Humanism is highly underrated. :| So is Posthumanism. |
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Torley Linden
Enlightenment!
Join date: 15 Sep 2004
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12-13-2004 09:22
From: Darko Cellardoor So is Posthumanism. And transhumanism. Mwahahaha. |
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Blake Rockwell
Fun Businesses
Join date: 31 Oct 2004
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12-13-2004 09:41
As an atheist, I state that the God concept in general has been debunked beyond a reasonable doubt. Now.... if Thor were to pop up one day and say 'Hey guys.... I was in the neighborhood galactically speaking and thought I'd drop in and see how you were doing after all this time.... wow.... you guys have figured out radio.... cool..... and WOW!!!! Ok sorry about that satellite.... didn't realize I'd have to dodge any here....' my position would, of course, change. As a scientist at heart I am humble before fact. However.... since every god concept that humans have come up with that's meaningful in any way (not so broadly defined that nothing can be proved one way or the other about it, such as pantheism or deism) has been conclusively disproven, I'll believe it when I see it. And not before. An agnostic position would be more along the lines of saying that Thor would never show himself even if he did exist, so the question is still unanswerable.[/QUOTE] by Corwin Weber
Well..there should be a simple way to actually debunk the truth. Go to a few Church Revivals..do some research on the people that walk out of wheel chairs in regards to their medical history and see if you can disprove it.
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Corwin Weber
Registered User
Join date: 2 Oct 2003
Posts: 390
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12-13-2004 09:49
From: Blake Rockwell From: Corwin Weber As an atheist, I state that the God concept in general has been debunked beyond a reasonable doubt. Now.... if Thor were to pop up one day and say 'Hey guys.... I was in the neighborhood galactically speaking and thought I'd drop in and see how you were doing after all this time.... wow.... you guys have figured out radio.... cool..... and WOW!!!! Ok sorry about that satellite.... didn't realize I'd have to dodge any here....' my position would, of course, change. As a scientist at heart I am humble before fact. However.... since every god concept that humans have come up with that's meaningful in any way (not so broadly defined that nothing can be proved one way or the other about it, such as pantheism or deism) has been conclusively disproven, I'll believe it when I see it. And not before. An agnostic position would be more along the lines of saying that Thor would never show himself even if he did exist, so the question is still unanswerable. Well..there should be a simple way to actually debunk the truth. Go to a few Church Revivals..do some research on the people that walk out of wheel chairs in regards to their medical history and see if you can disprove it. Done and done. Peter Popoff has already been caught faking this, as has every other faith healer that's been checked out. (Psst.... those people that get up out of wheelchairs? Didn't need them in the first place.) |
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Blake Rockwell
Fun Businesses
Join date: 31 Oct 2004
Posts: 1,606
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12-13-2004 09:52
From: Corwin Weber Done and done. Peter Popoff has already been caught faking this, as has every other faith healer that's been checked out. (Psst.... those people that get up out of wheelchairs? Didn't need them in the first place.) So you are saying that Miracles do not happen. Ok. |
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Chip Midnight
ate my baby!
Join date: 1 May 2003
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12-13-2004 09:56
From: Blake Rockwell So you are saying that Miracles do not happen. Ok. There are no such things as miracles. Period.
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Lecktor Hannibal
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12-13-2004 10:00
From: Chip Midnight There are no such things as miracles. Period. that is just not true Go here for miracles
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Chip Midnight
ate my baby!
Join date: 1 May 2003
Posts: 10,231
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12-13-2004 10:01
A study of graduates from a Christian Science college from 1934 to 1983, who avoided conventional medical care as a religious practice, showed that they had a significantly higher death rate than the control population of graduates from a nearby university.* A religious group in Indiana that refused orthodox prenatal and obstetric care had a maternal mortality rate 100 times higher than the statewide rate.**
*Simpson WF: Comparative longevity in college cohort of Christian Scientists. JAMA 1989; 262:1657
**Kaunitz AM, Spence C, Danielson TS, et al: Perinatal and maternal mortality in a religious group avoiding obstetrical care. Am J Obstet Gynecol 1984; 150:826-831
Still believe in faith healing?
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Chip Midnight
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12-13-2004 10:02
excepting the backup singer variety of miracle of course
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Tito Gomez
Mi Vida Loca
Join date: 1 Aug 2004
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12-13-2004 10:13
Who is the true God on this earth should be the question, the common deity of the planet... People love it, work for it, worship it, sell their bodies for it, lie for it, kill for it. Whatever it takes to have its blessing... M O N E Y Offer a religious person $1,000 US DLS not to go to church one Sunday... Offer a religious person $100,000 US DLS to deny the existence of their God just once... Offer a religious person $1,000,000 US DLS to desecrate the symbols of their religion... As always, there are exceptions, but... Another sad but true observation by pessimistic old me. - T - |
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Tito Gomez
Mi Vida Loca
Join date: 1 Aug 2004
Posts: 921
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12-13-2004 10:17
From: someone There are no such things as miracles. Period. Chip, you are wrong! Follow Lecktor's proof From: someone that is just not true Go here for miracles And here is even further proof! http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0349825/- T - |
