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Thursday = Thor's day

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Re: Thursday = Thor's day

#101

Post by Alex3917 »

hugh3 wrote: post #71
VictorHo wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many major religions are monotheistic by definition. The entire premise is that only 1 true god exists. Saying we "agree on 519 of 520 and disagree on 1" is a non-statement. The first person's belief in that 1 by definition precludes his belief in the other 519.

I think many people may be missing the point. The point of the argument is to challenge people to question whether the existence of their god is any more plausible than any of the other thousands of deities whose existence has been postulated. It works well against Christians or anyone else whose god has specific and well-defined properties. It doesn't work against deists since their "god" is sufficiently poorly-defi…

"It doesn't work against deists since their 'god' is sufficiently poorly-defined to be more plausible than Thor."

Contemporary thinkers might argue that god is well-defined, but ineffable.

Re: Thursday = Thor's day

#102

Post by scott_s »

Alex3917 wrote: post #88
roc wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure why endeavors wholly separate from the practice of religion should be considered to reflect upon the state of religious practice. Surely one can be religious and practice science. But in what denomination of which religion is it a requirement? The non-religious have performed countless similar studies on religious experience, efficacy of prayer, etc. Are you suggesting their activities reflect on the sta…

Science isn't separate from religious practice, but rather it's one of our contemporary religions. Only instead of the ten commandments, you start with the unprovable beliefs that there is nothing supernatural, the universe can be explained entirely through natural laws, we can learn about these natural laws through observation and measurement, the world exists as we see it and is not an illusion, etc. So in regards…

See Eliezer Yudkowsky's The Fallacy of Gray, HN discussion and essay: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1147767

Re: Thursday = Thor's day

#103

Post by ugh »

Alex3917 wrote: post #19

"You and I are almost identical in our beliefs! If history has named, say, 520 gods, you don't believe in 519 of them, I don't believe in 520 of them." This argument comes from Dawkins book The God Delusion. It's clever, but also kind of dumb. Trying to discredit contemporary religion based on what people believed 2,500 years ago is like trying to discredit science based on alchemy.

I don’t remember anymore whether Dawkins also argued with past beliefs but I do know that he often emphasizes the geographical distribution of religions, not so much the history of religions. You can view a example here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYigmGyN2RQ

I do think it is quite baffling how you can be consciously aware of all the myriad of religions in the world and still not be a atheist. They can’t all be right and there exists no method of picking the right one except trusting you own feelings. I mean, Christians baptize their babies, Jews circumcise their sons – those religions seemingly don’t even want you to consciously decide to join them. It’s just assumed that you will if your parents have that religion.

Re: Thursday = Thor's day

#104

Post by [deleted] »

Nwallins wrote: post #76
Alex3917 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's like saying that because we've already debunked alchemy and astrology, being asked to debunk evolution as well is just nitpicking. If you asked someone at the Harvard divinity school what the most compelling arguments in favor of religion were today, they'd probably talk about Thor to the same extent that your bio101 professor talked about star alignments-- not at all. Whereas oftentimes they're actually using…

> That's like saying that because we've already debunked alchemy and astrology, being asked to debunk evolution as well is just nitpicking. Well, yes. Scientists around the world agree that every scientific topic should be debunked. The ones that are left -- the ones that survive an attempt at debunking -- should be taken as fact, presumably until they are debunked and replaced with something more valid. > If you ask…

[deleted]

Re: Thursday = Thor's day

#105

Post by ErrantX »

grellas wrote: post #73

The logic here doesn't hold with respect to monothestic religions such as Judaism or Christianity. The Ten Commandments, which are common to these two religions, have two "tables," the first of which (commandments 1 - 5) defines the relations between God and man and the second of which defines the relations between men (6 - 10). The very first commandment is "thou shalt have no other gods before me. The next proscrip…

Great rebuttal.

> But this logic falls apart if one assumes there is one true deity

I'd argue that is where the problem lies. Because currently and as far as I am aware the Atheist viewpoint and the Theist viewpoint is equally legitimate and, at some specific point, not empirically provable either way. i.e. the existence of God is purely a belief/non-belief thing (I touched on this in another comment).

From a logical/rational viewpoint the Atheist and the Theist hold disparaging views regarding the Theists god (existence/non-existence). However, they hold essentially the same view r.e. other gods. Because the Theists God cannot be empirically proven the Atheist/Theist view is equally valid - they are equal.

In a case where God is either empirically proven to exist or not exist you are right; the argument breaks down. To my knowledge this situation does not currently exist.

Short version: your argument works perfectly. But if God empirically doesn't exist then the logic is flawed in the same way. From the unproven ground the logic is sound.

Re: Thursday = Thor's day

#106

Post by mixmax »

grellas wrote: post #73

The logic here doesn't hold with respect to monothestic religions such as Judaism or Christianity. The Ten Commandments, which are common to these two religions, have two "tables," the first of which (commandments 1 - 5) defines the relations between God and man and the second of which defines the relations between men (6 - 10). The very first commandment is "thou shalt have no other gods before me. The next proscrip…

This is a very typical religious argument. It puts religion, in this case Christianity, on a piedestal where it doesn't belong if you don't happen to be Christian.

The original statement in it's logic form is this: You believe in 530 gods, I believe in 529 gods. 530 minus 529 is 1, so we agree on not believing in most of the gods.

That's it. Nothing more to it. And assuming the date didn't secretly worship Zeus it's true. It's simply a way of dismissing the subject, knowing that a discussion between an atheist and a true believer is bound to end in an argument. Especially on a first date.

Instead of taking this for what it is there seems to be the need for an elaborate explanation of why there is a god and why that god is the one you happen to believe in. And the whole explanation is based on the premise of Christianity which the other part doesn't believe in.

Please don't take this as a personal attack - it's not in any way meant as one, but it's an interesting discussion.

Re: Thursday = Thor's day

#107

Post by ErrantX »

mixmax wrote: post #94
VictorHo wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with that statement, but it does pain me that this was his big takeaway. There is no decision that is more life-impacting than belief/disbelief in a God. To see someone so quickly silenced/swayed by such simple rhetoric really illustrates how many important subjects are not getting nearly as much thought as they deserve. We will spend months stressing about a job or a start-up, which might affect our lives fo…

That depends entirely on who you are, and I'd say your view is a bit prejudiced. I'm from one of the most atheist countries in the world, and to tell you the truth I don't think I've ever had a serious conversation with friends or family discussing whether God (or a god) exists. To us it would be like having a serious discussion about whether or not the tooth fairy existed. We just don't really care, and think the wh…

This interested me actually. In the UK we have a general baseline of Christianity but I generally thought that the beliefs were mostly agnostic to atheist. But when I happened to mention I was an atheist to my parents (who show no other interest in religion) they were outwardly surprised.

Re: Thursday = Thor's day

#108

Post by mixmax »

ErrantX wrote: post #105
grellas wrote: post #73

The logic here doesn't hold with respect to monothestic religions such as Judaism or Christianity. The Ten Commandments, which are common to these two religions, have two "tables," the first of which (commandments 1 - 5) defines the relations between God and man and the second of which defines the relations between men (6 - 10). The very first commandment is "thou shalt have no other gods before me. The next proscrip…

Great rebuttal. > But this logic falls apart if one assumes there is one true deity I'd argue that is where the problem lies. Because currently and as far as I am aware the Atheist viewpoint and the Theist viewpoint is equally legitimate and, at some specific point, not empirically provable either way. i.e. the existence of God is purely a belief/non-belief thing (I touched on this in another comment). From a logical…

I strongly disagree.

Just because something hasn't been proven to be false it doesn't mean it's true. It hasn't been decisively proven that the Earth wasn't sneezed out of the nose of a giant space-goat, but that doesn't mean that the goat-sneezing theory should be equally valid to other theories which have more empirical evidence to their name.

I have never seen any empirical evidence for the existence of a god, and thus it doesn't seem like a valid theory.

Re: Thursday = Thor's day

#109

Post by mixmax »

ErrantX wrote: post #107
mixmax wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That depends entirely on who you are, and I'd say your view is a bit prejudiced. I'm from one of the most atheist countries in the world, and to tell you the truth I don't think I've ever had a serious conversation with friends or family discussing whether God (or a god) exists. To us it would be like having a serious discussion about whether or not the tooth fairy existed. We just don't really care, and think the wh…

This interested me actually. In the UK we have a general baseline of Christianity but I generally thought that the beliefs were mostly agnostic to atheist. But when I happened to mention I was an atheist to my parents (who show no other interest in religion) they were outwardly surprised.

That is interesting. I've never discussed religion with my parents or other family - just assumed them to be agnostic. Maybe I'm wrong...

Re: Thursday = Thor's day

#110

Post by hugh3 »

lotharbot wrote: post #91
hugh3 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think many people may be missing the point. The point of the argument is to challenge people to question whether the existence of their god is any more plausible than any of the other thousands of deities whose existence has been postulated. It works well against Christians or anyone else whose god has specific and well-defined properties. It doesn't work against deists since their "god" is sufficiently poorly-defi…

> "It works well against Christians" No it doesn't. It amazes me how often I hear Christians say "this argument works well against atheists" and then make an utterly stupid argument that none of the atheists I know would take seriously. This strikes me as much the same -- it's an argument that atheists think should work well against Christians, but that most Christians will think is stupid and misses the point.

Oddly enough I was brought up a churchgoing Christian, but was convinced by arguments of pretty much this same form that Christianity was almost certainly false.
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