Jaden wrote:
rio wrote:
Zad wrote:
rio wrote:
This is the only one I got wrong, and it's easily refuted:
Quote:
You've just taken a direct hit!
Earlier you agreed that it is rational to believe that the Loch Ness monster does not exist if there is an absence of strong evidence or argument that it does. No strong evidence or argument was required to show that the monster does not exist - absence of evidence or argument was enough. But now you claim that the atheist needs to be able to provide strong arguments or evidence if their belief in the non-existence of God is to be rational rather than a matter of faith.
The contradiction is that on the first ocassion (Loch Ness monster) you agreed that the absence of evidence or argument is enough to rationally justify belief in the non-existence of the Loch Ness monster, but on this occasion (God), you do not.
Methinks this isn't exactly the same thing...
True, but in principle, it's got you.
The principle is: We've explored Loch Ness to death, but we hardly know anything about outer space. Therefore discounting the Loch Ness monster based on lack of evidence is not comparable to discounting God for the same reason.
Take that, inanimate object.
I think you're completely wrong, Rio. Atheism is not a matter of faith. However much we've explored the Loch Ness monster, we've explored God many times more (in material, epistemological, and metaphysical manners) and no solid argument has come out to support God, but many of the contrary.
There is no better reason to believe in God than there is to believe in an invisible Easter Bunny, or the Flying Spaghetti Monster, or more relevantly, the Loch Ness Monster. Yet one will generally claim disbelief in those figures to not be a matter of faith, as they are so logically ridiculous. Yet, God is equally logically ridiculous - in fact, there would be more logical problems with God existing than there would be with a Loch Ness Monster (given his scale).
Atheism is not a matter of faith; it's just about not being convinced of something bloody ridiculous.
Well, I agree, and I would class myself as an atheist for pretty much that reason. And in fact the flying spaghetti monster thing an argument that I have used myself a couple of times.
But linguistically, the quiz has fucked up, I think. The reason I can say comfortably that we have no evidence for Nessie is because we've seen inside Loch Ness and we haven't found anything. It's not simply me assuming it doesn't exist, we have evidence FOR the LACK of evidence, if you will. Exactly the same thing can be said about God, but the questions are different. I think it asked something like "is it enough to assume Nessie doesn't exist based on lack of evidence?". Yes. "Do we need to investigate to determine that god doesn't exist?". Yes. These aren't contradictory, because in the first case the lack of evidence has been determined by investigation. We also require scientific investigation to determine a lack of evidence for God.
