chairman bill wrote:So Seth, does the god Odin exist?

I don't know.

Seth wrote:

chairman bill wrote:So Seth, does the god Odin exist?

I don't know.

Ahh, you're finally learning how this atheism thing works... Good for you!

Thanks Seth. Neither do I. And I don't know about any other gods either. So, I lack any belief in them. Makes sense, doesn't it?

chairman bill wrote:Thanks Seth. Neither do I. And I don't know about any other gods either. So, I lack any belief in them. Makes sense, doesn't it?

But, but, but... you make it sound so easy! And where will Seth find some fun in that?

chairman bill wrote:Thanks Seth. Neither do I. And I don't know about any other gods either. So, I lack any belief in them. Makes sense, doesn't it?

Not really. The fact that I don't know does not mean that I have not also formed a belief about the proposition.

Seth wrote:

chairman bill wrote:Thanks Seth. Neither do I. And I don't know about any other gods either. So, I lack any belief in them. Makes sense, doesn't it?

Not really. The fact that I don't know does not mean that I have not also formed a belief about the proposition.

So do you believe Odin exists?

Ahhh, why NOT?

After all, hasn't the deity been coy for quite long enough?

CookieJon wrote:

Seth wrote:

chairman bill wrote:Thanks Seth. Neither do I. And I don't know about any other gods either. So, I lack any belief in them. Makes sense, doesn't it?

Not really. The fact that I don't know does not mean that I have not also formed a belief about the proposition.

So do you believe Odin exists?

No, I believe that there is insufficient evidence to support the proposition that Odin exists. However, I cannot claim this as knowledge, because the question of the sufficiency of evidence supporting the existence of Odin is not subject to immediate rigorous proofs. Therefore I have a belief about Odin, but not knowledge.

Seth wrote: Therefore I have a belief about Odin, but not knowledge.

And the Toothy Fairy? I suppose you believe she doesn't exist but you're not sure, right?

Seth wrote:

CookieJon wrote:

Seth wrote:

chairman bill wrote:Thanks Seth. Neither do I. And I don't know about any other gods either. So, I lack any belief in them. Makes sense, doesn't it?

Not really. The fact that I don't know does not mean that I have not also formed a belief about the proposition.

So do you believe Odin exists?

No, I believe that there is insufficient evidence to support the proposition that Odin exists. However, I cannot claim this as knowledge, because the question of the sufficiency of evidence supporting the existence of Odin is not subject to immediate rigorous proofs. Therefore I have a belief about Odin, but not knowledge.

There is exactly zero scientific evidence that anything supernatural exists. As you insist, that does not preclude evidence coming to hand at some future point. But more importantly than that, our current understanding of the world does not require any extra entities like Odin. So, until there is evidence for God(s) and/or until something in our theories of Life the Universe and Everything demand we invoke God(s), it is irrational to say they exist. Personal experience of God(s) is meaningless, as that implies an over reliance on the accuracy of that lump of grey meat in your skull.

One can't test for the god Odin, but one can scientifically test for his productions. [Whatever they are-just looking up wiki].

OK, magic, war, and other nonsense. A bullshit catch-all. Magic does not exist, so no Odin!

ginckgo wrote:

Seth wrote:

CookieJon wrote:

Seth wrote:

chairman bill wrote:Thanks Seth. Neither do I. And I don't know about any other gods either. So, I lack any belief in them. Makes sense, doesn't it?

Not really. The fact that I don't know does not mean that I have not also formed a belief about the proposition.

So do you believe Odin exists?

No, I believe that there is insufficient evidence to support the proposition that Odin exists. However, I cannot claim this as knowledge, because the question of the sufficiency of evidence supporting the existence of Odin is not subject to immediate rigorous proofs. Therefore I have a belief about Odin, but not knowledge.

There is exactly zero scientific evidence that anything supernatural exists.

This is a tautology. There is zero evidence that anything supernatural exists because the premise of the statement is that supernatural things cannot exist. The circularity of the argument should be easily perceived. If a thing is supported by (scientific) evidence, then it is ipso facto not supernatural. If it is presumed to be supernatural before the test of evidence is made, then it will never be discovered to be natural because the bias is towards rejecting the proposition because it's...well...supernatural.

This is one of the most common atheistic canards which boils down to "God does not exist because theists claim god is supernatural, and since nothing supernatural can exist, and theists have not presented any scientific evidence that a supernatural god exists (nor could they because he's supernatural) God cannot exist because he's supernatural and there is no such thing as supernatural gods." It's tautology piled on circularity.

This is a fallacy of course because there is nothing that precludes God from being entirely natural and completely subject to scientific examination, qantification and falsification, it's just that we may not be sufficiently advanced in our technology or understanding of the universe and physics to be able to detect, examine, quantify and falsify God. Or, it may be that he doesn't want to be scientifically examined, quantified and falsified, so he's eluding examination.

As you insist, that does not preclude evidence coming to hand at some future point. But more importantly than that, our current understanding of the world does not require any extra entities like Odin.

And this is the "necessity" canard that is a fallacious argument that presumes that merely because some phenomenon (like evolution) CAN be explained by naturalistic processes, that this means it WAS produced by naturalistic means EXCLUSIVELY.

This is false because there is nothing in our understanding of genetics that precludes the possibility of intelligent design or manipulation of genetics through time. We do know for a fact that it is possible to tamper with genetics to deliberately and intelligently design organisms for a specific purpose. Intelligent design is absolutely true because we puny humans have achieved it. What this means is that since our puny intellects can, with relative ease, manipulate genes to create flourescent rabbits, that an intelligence not all that much more advanced than ours could EASILY have done the same thing throughout history. A nudge here, a snip there, to end, split or modify a genetic line. A minor perturbation in the orbit of an asteroid in the Oort Cloud 65 million years ago to reset the genetic clock at the KT boundary. Any of these things are perfectly possible and completely in accord with known science, and none of them require, or preclude a god-like intelligence from existing or choosing to intervene in our planet's history. Is such an explanation "necessary" because, as Dawkins says, it's so much more elegant (and atheistically satisfying) that nature does it by random acts of evolution? No, it's not "necessary,", but then again neither is BT corn, and it exists and stands as proof of the possibility of intelligent design.

So, until there is evidence for God(s) and/or until something in our theories of Life the Universe and Everything demand we invoke God(s), it is irrational to say they exist.

Perhaps. But then again, perhaps theists know more than you are willing to accept.

Personal experience of God(s) is meaningless, as that implies an over reliance on the accuracy of that lump of grey meat in your skull.

It's only meaningless to you because you choose not to acknowledge the fact that there is nothing in science that precludes intimate, brain-to-brain contact or communications from an incorporeal, but entirely natural, albeit possibly extra-universal intelligence to our own brains.

Darwinsbulldog wrote:One can't test for the god Odin,

No, YOU can't test for the god Odin. You cannot say that there is no test for the god Odin because your knowledge of the testability of Odin, or the capacities of science, is imperfect. There may be a test for Odin, but we may not have discovered it yet.

OK, magic, war, and other nonsense. A bullshit catch-all. Magic does not exist, so no Odin!

Tautology. Any sufficiently advanced technology will appear to us as magic. That does not make it magic, it merely means that we are primitive and do not understand the technology involved. So, Odin can easily exist as a creature or entity with god-like powers (to primitives) and a big hammer who manifested himself to the ancient Norse and did things that appeared to be magical, like flying through the air or striking a blow with his hammer that shatters mountains, but that are common technology to his advanced species.

Seth wrote:

As you insist, that does not preclude evidence coming to hand at some future point. But more importantly than that, our current understanding of the world does not require any extra entities like Odin.

And this is the "necessity" canard that is a fallacious argument that presumes that merely because some phenomenon (like evolution) CAN be explained by naturalistic processes, that this means it WAS produced by naturalistic means EXCLUSIVELY.

It's rather ironic that this "canard" came from a Franciscan theologian, Bill of Ockham.

But no such advanced technology exists Seth, or having you been traveling the universe and found some advanced civilization. ?

I was having a little fun about Odin, but Thor's productions can be more parsimoniously explained by atmospheric science, or do you still believe in Thor?

Seth wrote:

CookieJon wrote:

Seth wrote:

chairman bill wrote:Thanks Seth. Neither do I. And I don't know about any other gods either. So, I lack any belief in them. Makes sense, doesn't it?

Not really. The fact that I don't know does not mean that I have not also formed a belief about the proposition.

So do you believe Odin exists?

No, I believe that there is insufficient evidence to support the proposition that Odin exists. However, I cannot claim this as knowledge, because the question of the sufficiency of evidence supporting the existence of Odin is not subject to immediate rigorous proofs. Therefore I have a belief about Odin, but not knowledge.

So you are saying that you have a positive belief that Odin doesn't exist or do you not have a belief in Odin or do you just deny the existence of Odin ?. You can reply - it's not like we're going to burn you on a pile of faggots for your denial.

I think you'll find that the majority of atheists also believe that there is insufficient evidence to support the proposition that 'X' exists where 'X' is a supernatural entity commonly known as a god.

Some atheists take a more practical approach and think that after a few thousand years that the proposition that there is a god is utter nonsense and false and the last thing that they want to do is spend the next few thousand years with more of the same nonsense.

Humanity is like a gambler placing a chip on one of any number of propositions. Each generation gambles on what it thinks is the best position. Many atheists are standing back from the table and some atheists are walking away from the table or never even got into this game to start with.

keypad5 wrote:

Seth wrote:

As you insist, that does not preclude evidence coming to hand at some future point. But more importantly than that, our current understanding of the world does not require any extra entities like Odin.

And this is the "necessity" canard that is a fallacious argument that presumes that merely because some phenomenon (like evolution) CAN be explained by naturalistic processes, that this means it WAS produced by naturalistic means EXCLUSIVELY.

It's rather ironic that this "canard" came from a Franciscan theologian, Bill of Ockham.

You need to read Ockham's Razor a bit more carefully, because he does not claim that the simplest answer IS the answer, merely that all things being equal, the simplest answer has the highest likelihood of being correct. It's a rule of thumb, not a scientific certainty.

byofrcs wrote:

Seth wrote:

CookieJon wrote:

Seth wrote:

chairman bill wrote:Thanks Seth. Neither do I. And I don't know about any other gods either. So, I lack any belief in them. Makes sense, doesn't it?

Not really. The fact that I don't know does not mean that I have not also formed a belief about the proposition.

So do you believe Odin exists?

No, I believe that there is insufficient evidence to support the proposition that Odin exists. However, I cannot claim this as knowledge, because the question of the sufficiency of evidence supporting the existence of Odin is not subject to immediate rigorous proofs. Therefore I have a belief about Odin, but not knowledge.

So you are saying that you have a positive belief that Odin doesn't exist or do you not have a belief in Odin or do you just deny the existence of Odin ?. You can reply - it's not like we're going to burn you on a pile of faggots for your denial.

Must...resist...faggot...joke....

I would say that I believe Odin does not exist.

I think you'll find that the majority of atheists also believe that there is insufficient evidence to support the proposition that 'X' exists where 'X' is a supernatural entity commonly known as a god.

Right, exactly. Thanks for admitting that, it's been like pulling teeth to get such an admission of simple observable facts.

Some atheists take a more practical approach and think that after a few thousand years that the proposition that there is a god is utter nonsense and false and the last thing that they want to do is spend the next few thousand years with more of the same nonsense.

Right, again, thanks for admitting that atheists have beliefs, that's what I've been trying to get at for some time now.

Humanity is like a gambler placing a chip on one of any number of propositions. Each generation gambles on what it thinks is the best position. Many atheists are standing back from the table and some atheists are walking away from the table or never even got into this game to start with.

Nope. Everybody plays except the mentally deficient and the theistically ignorant. Everybody puts down a bet, and nobody wins. But everybody thinks they might win.

Seth wrote: Therefore I have a belief about Odin, but not knowledge.

And the Toothy Fairy? I suppose you believe she doesn't exist... but you're not sure. Is that right?

Basically , Seth has a belief about everything he don't know , but heard something about.