# Atheist Bus Driver Trys to Convert Students **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [April 21, 2018, 3:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheist-bus-driver-trys-to-convert-students/812864 "2018-04-21T15:52:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2018, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheist-bus-driver-trys-to-convert-students/812864/101 "2018-04-22T22:20:26Z")
> [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](#): > > Well done Chuck! You managed to say exactly the same thing you did before except with cartoons! Damn I wish I could give you a sticker. > > I ask again, do you typically feel superior to those you disagree with? I don’t, but YMMV. I was merely pointing out that my line was an XKCD reference and not something original to me. As for feeling superior to people I disagree with, not necessarily in general, but I damn well feel superior to you. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2018, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheist-bus-driver-trys-to-convert-students/812864/102 "2018-04-22T22:23:29Z")
> [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](#): > > And you, are clearly, a shinning light. Thank you for the recognition.😉 > [@](#): > > So I ask you what, precisely is wrong about the proposition that since we cannot, at present, know for a certainty it is best not to assert certainty? > > I fail to see the idiocy of that proposition. Because if you have no standards for how one establishes the truth of a proposition then anything becomes possible. As has already been pointed out, we can make no certain statements about the non-existence of leprechauns, the Loch Ness Monster, and Santa Claus. By your reasoning we cannot state that they don’t exist. Yet god as usually imagined is far, far, far more implausible than any of these beings, and there is no more concrete evidence. While so far you’ve shown no evidence of a capacity for abstract thought, let’s try this. Imagine, if you will (I doubt you actually can) that you had never heard of the concept of god. What empirical evidence would you cite in order to hypothesize that such a being existed? What evidence would falsify that hypothesis? ---
**Author:** ![Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/4af34b/32.png) [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeke_N.Destroi)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2018, 10:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheist-bus-driver-trys-to-convert-students/812864/103 "2018-04-22T22:24:18Z")
> [@Chimera](#): > > If you postulate a Creator God, why would you choose such a relative upstart as JHVH aka [El Shaddai](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Shaddai) aka [El](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_(deity))? (The cool thing being that they have no clue what ‘Shaddai’ means.) > > Genesis 17:1: “And when Abram was ninety years old and nine, the LORD appeared to Abram, and said unto him, I am El Shaddai; walk before me, and be thou perfect.” > > Exodus 6:2–3: “I revealed myself to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob as Ēl Shaddāi, but was not known to them by my name, YHVH.” > > Clearly derived from earlier Semitic gods. > > Go a bit further back in Semitic and Sumerian gods and you reach **Anu**. > > \*In Mesopotamian religion, Anu was the personification of the sky, the utmost power, the supreme God, the one “who contains the entire universe”. He was identified with the north ecliptic pole centered in Draco. His name meant the “One on High”, and together with his sons Enlil and Enki (Ellil and Ea in Akkadian), he formed a triune conception of the divine, in which Anu represented a “transcendental” obscurity, Enlil the “transcendent” and Enki the “immanent” aspect of the divine. > \* > Gosh, notice a Holy Trinity there too? Same epithets? Lets see, I say, “I don’t know if there is or isn’t. Current science cannot provide a definitive answer. At present I reserve judgement” The response is to launch an attack based on old testament Christian theology and sit back thinking that you have proven something. You want to debate the Bible? I’m not a Biblical scholar (neither are you clearly.) You want to debate theology? I’m not a theologian (neither are you clearly.) I propose that we do not, and currently can not know, so to insist upon certainty is arrogance / ignorance - doesn’t someone have a sig about the true definition of ignorance. The response to an open ended proposition is to decide that I belong to a particular group (which I don’t) and then, based on your own determination tangentially attack me based on precepts of a book that I have no allegiance to. That makes sense. Fighting ignorance my ass. ---
**Author:** ![Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/4af34b/32.png) [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeke_N.Destroi)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2018, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheist-bus-driver-trys-to-convert-students/812864/104 "2018-04-22T22:53:40Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > Thank you for the recognition.😉 > > Because if you have no standards for how one establishes the truth of a proposition then anything becomes possible. As has already been pointed out, we can make no certain statements about the non-existence of leprechauns, the Loch Ness Monster, and Santa Claus. By your reasoning we cannot state that they don’t exist. Yet god as usually imagined is far, far, far more implausible than any of these beings, and there is no more concrete evidence. > > While so far you’ve shown no evidence of a capacity for abstract thought, let’s try this. Imagine, if you will (I doubt you actually can) that you had never heard of the concept of god. What empirical evidence would you cite in order to hypothesize that such a being existed? What evidence would falsify that hypothesis? Right you are. I am incapable of abstraction. But isn’t science about the concrete? Proof, falsifiable proof? Reproducible proof. And check out the conduct of the bright lights on this enlightened board. I say, “maybe maybe not can’t know.” The response is, “since you can’t prove there is a god then you and the other theists are wrong and I can demonstrate that through verbiage. Copious fucking verbiage. Here are the problems with your creator god. Here are the problems with the Bible.” But you never actually stop long enough to realize that I’ve never said there is a god, I’ve certainly never advocated for a creator god and I absolutely have not referred to the Bible. I’ve only said that, at present, we can’t know. Yet all of the geniuses on this site fall all over themselves to discredit the Christian ideology that they have decided (unbeknownst to me) I subscribe to. Then having decided that I am in that group I must be vulnerable on these points. But just because you find it convenient to force me into being something I’m not for your own rhetorical satisfaction I am not forced to abide by the strictures you’d prefer I be bound to. Despite saying many, many times exactly where I stand I am, being spoken to as if I stood somewhere other than where I do. And thus anything I say is immediately discounted and ridiculed as being theologist. In spite of whacks of evidence to the contrary. Wait, evidence pointing one way but arguments insisting it is other and then mockery based on the forced deviation… is that really what science is? ---
**Author:** ![Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/4af34b/32.png) [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeke_N.Destroi)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2018, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheist-bus-driver-trys-to-convert-students/812864/105 "2018-04-22T23:15:19Z")
> [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > I was merely pointing out that my line was an XKCD reference and not something original to me. As for feeling superior to people I disagree with, not necessarily in general, but I damn well feel superior to you. And I was merely pointing out that you felt that using a cartoon that says almost exactly what you had previously said was somehow useful. And, weren’t you the one that accused me of lacking originality? \<— if not I apologize. Still, “I say this” responded to by, “I say this”, “Yeah, well here’s a drawing that agrees with me” is not really meaningful man. Still, enjoy your sense of superiority - since that’s what it’s all about to you. ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2018, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheist-bus-driver-trys-to-convert-students/812864/106 "2018-04-22T23:17:19Z")
> [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](#): > > The response is to launch an attack based on old testament Christian theology and sit back thinking that you have proven something. > > Fighting ignorance my ass. That’s a very defensive attitude toward questioning which human culture’s stories of a supreme god you believe in. It’s a seriously legitimate question. You’ve chosen the Jewish/Christian definition and identity for a supreme ineffable creator god and you react with anger when asked why. Anu likewise is a semitic god. Honestly, we have no damned idea who the first waves of farmers worshipped when they set out from the same area 6,000 years earlier, nor do we know who the Yamna people’s gods were and they lived at the same time. We have no idea who was worshipped in most of the world before 2000 BC (before most of the events in the hebrew scriptures). History goes to those able to record it. Jehovah is just a derivation and evolution of northern semitic sky gods. I have to say if I believe in a creator god, this being is ineffable, in that such a whatever cannot be adequately or accurately described in words. I can’t imagine such a creator caring if I eat bacon or show up to what is essentially a large shared-identity social event every sunday morning. ---
**Author:** ![CarnalK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnalk/32/486_2.png) [@CarnalK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CarnalK)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2018, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheist-bus-driver-trys-to-convert-students/812864/107 "2018-04-22T23:45:58Z")
> [@Chimera](#): > > I have to say if I believe in a creator god, this being is ineffable, in that such a whatever cannot be adequately or accurately described in words. I can’t imagine such a creator caring if I eat bacon or show up to what is essentially a large shared-identity social event every sunday morning. This is always the thing I find hilarious when atheists argue against the existence of god. Like the limits of some rando’s imagination means jack shit. Like “I would never worship such a god!” means jack. ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2018, 11:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheist-bus-driver-trys-to-convert-students/812864/108 "2018-04-22T23:55:17Z")
> [@CarnalK](#): > > This is always the thing I find hilarious when atheists argue against the existence of god. Like the limits of some rando’s imagination means jack shit. Like “I would never worship such a god!” means jack. Are you sure I’m an atheist and why are you so triggered by this sort of thing? Because I do believe in God, just not any god of man. God the creator of Humanity doesn’t come down in a cloud of fire and say “hey you, small tribe. I like you. You’re my guys. Go kill the people around you and take their land.” just like every other 5-and-dime tribal god. The creator definitely doesn’t say “Oh, and don’t blend fibers, let women show skin or drive the goat, right? These things displease me.” Or is this just a defensive reaction caused by insecurity? Your faith is being questioned and you cannot defend it, so attack the messenger and accuse them of all sorts of evil? ---
**Author:** ![QuickSilver](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quicksilver/32/7832_2.png) [@QuickSilver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/QuickSilver)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2018, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheist-bus-driver-trys-to-convert-students/812864/109 "2018-04-22T23:56:50Z")
> [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](#): > > I fail to see the idiocy of that proposition. Don’t worry. We’ve had sufficient time to adjust our expectations. ---
**Author:** ![CarnalK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnalk/32/486_2.png) [@CarnalK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CarnalK)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2018, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheist-bus-driver-trys-to-convert-students/812864/110 "2018-04-23T00:02:28Z")
> [@Chimera](#): > > Are you sure I’m an atheist and why are you so triggered by this sort of thing? > > Because I do believe in God, just not any god of man. God the creator of Humanity doesn’t come down in a cloud of fire and say “hey you, small tribe. I like you. You’re my guys. Go kill the people around you and take their land.” just like every other 5-and-dime tribal god. The creator definitely doesn’t say “Oh, and don’t blend fibers, let women show skin or drive the goat, right? These things displease me.” > > Or is this just a defensive reaction caused by insecurity? Your faith is being questioned and you cannot defend it, so attack the messenger and accuse them of all sorts of evil? I don’t get “triggered”, snowflake. I found something funny, i.e. the idea that the limits of your imagination means anything to anything. So what god do you believe in that squeezes through your great gates of imagination? ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2018, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheist-bus-driver-trys-to-convert-students/812864/111 "2018-04-23T00:06:32Z")
> [@CarnalK](#): > > I don’t get “triggered”, snowflake. I found something funny, i.e. the idea that the limits of your imagination means anything to anything. So what god do you believe in that squeezes through your great gates of imagination? You’re a rando to me, so what the fuck do you matter? ---
**Author:** ![CarnalK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnalk/32/486_2.png) [@CarnalK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CarnalK)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2018, 12:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheist-bus-driver-trys-to-convert-students/812864/112 "2018-04-23T00:09:04Z")
I don’t matter. We just happen to be on a discussion board. Sorry if I hurt your feelings. ---
**Author:** ![QuickSilver](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quicksilver/32/7832_2.png) [@QuickSilver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/QuickSilver)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2018, 12:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheist-bus-driver-trys-to-convert-students/812864/113 "2018-04-23T00:14:19Z")
> [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](#): > > … is that really what science is? JFC, you’re obtuse. Science doesn’t look for god. Science doesn’t try to prove the lack of god. All science does is explain the natural universe and concludes that knowing what we know now, there is no reason to think that a god, or more precisely, a prime mover, exists, or had anything to do with the creation of the universe as we know it. As has been pointed out to you before, the universe does not require a god in order to exist. To say nothing of the fact that throughout history humans have invented more gods than you could shake a stick at and none of them have explained anything about anything. Just because some people (I’m looking at you) have managed to come up with a clever way of hiding god where even science can’t find him, doesn’t mean his existence is any more likely. Finally, to paraphrase a popular refrain, “What does God need with a Universe?” ---
**Author:** ![CarnalK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnalk/32/486_2.png) [@CarnalK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CarnalK)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2018, 12:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheist-bus-driver-trys-to-convert-students/812864/114 "2018-04-23T00:22:15Z")
> [@QuickSilver](#): > > Finally, to paraphrase a popular refrain, “What does God need with a Universe?” What do you need with your extensive tentacle porn collection? Some things may be unknowable. ---
**Author:** ![QuickSilver](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quicksilver/32/7832_2.png) [@QuickSilver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/QuickSilver)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2018, 12:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheist-bus-driver-trys-to-convert-students/812864/115 "2018-04-23T00:32:11Z")
I don’t even know what that means. I’ll google it. But only in the interest of science. ETA: EWWW! ---
**Author:** ![snfaulkner](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snfaulkner/32/433_2.png) [@snfaulkner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/snfaulkner)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2018, 12:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheist-bus-driver-trys-to-convert-students/812864/116 "2018-04-23T00:39:32Z")
> [@QuickSilver](#): > > I don’t even know what that means. I’ll google it. But only in the interest of science. > > ETA: EWWW! Ignorance fought. Innocence lost. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2018, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheist-bus-driver-trys-to-convert-students/812864/117 "2018-04-23T00:57:56Z")
> [@QuickSilver](#): > > JFC, you’re obtuse. > > Science doesn’t look for god. Science doesn’t try to prove the lack of god. All science does is explain the natural universe and concludes that knowing what we know now, there is no reason to think that a god, or more precisely, a prime mover, exists, or had anything to do with the creation of the universe as we know it. Actually 200 years or so science, as personified by the flock of English clerics with time on their hands, did look for god. They found no trace, instead they found an ancient earth. Then Darwin discovered evolution, which knocked one of the main pillars supporting the need for a god right out from under them. Oops. Today science doesn’t, but a lot of science used to. ---
**Author:** ![CarnalK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnalk/32/486_2.png) [@CarnalK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CarnalK)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2018, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheist-bus-driver-trys-to-convert-students/812864/118 "2018-04-23T00:59:17Z")
> [@QuickSilver](#): > > I don’t even know what that means. I’ll google it. But only in the interest of science. > > ETA: EWWW! > [@snfaulkner](#): > > Ignorance fought. Innocence lost. Right. Like me, God and Bosda are the only ones here with extensive tentacle porn collections. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2018, 1:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheist-bus-driver-trys-to-convert-students/812864/119 "2018-04-23T01:25:08Z")
> [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](#): > > Right you are. I am incapable of abstraction. But isn’t science about the concrete? Proof, falsifiable proof? Reproducible proof. > > And check out the conduct of the bright lights on this enlightened board. I say, “maybe maybe not can’t know.” The response is, “since you can’t prove there is a god then you and the other theists are wrong and I can demonstrate that through verbiage. Copious fucking verbiage. Here are the problems with your creator god. Here are the problems with the Bible.” > > But you never actually stop long enough to realize that I’ve never said there is a god, I’ve certainly never advocated for a creator god and I absolutely have not referred to the Bible. I’ve only said that, at present, we can’t know. > > Yet all of the geniuses on this site fall all over themselves to discredit the Christian ideology that they have decided (unbeknownst to me) I subscribe to. Then having decided that I am in that group I must be vulnerable on these points. > > But just because you find it convenient to force me into being something I’m not for your own rhetorical satisfaction I am not forced to abide by the strictures you’d prefer I be bound to. > > Despite saying many, many times exactly where I stand I am, being spoken to as if I stood somewhere other than where I do. And thus anything I say is immediately discounted and ridiculed as being theologist. In spite of whacks of evidence to the contrary. > > Wait, evidence pointing one way but arguments insisting it is other and then mockery based on the forced deviation… is that really what science is? Loud blathering and no response to the question…but that’s no surprise to anyone by now. Are you “agnostic” when it comes to all other gods? ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2018, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheist-bus-driver-trys-to-convert-students/812864/120 "2018-04-23T01:44:22Z")
> [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](#): > > And I was merely pointing out that you felt that using a cartoon that says almost exactly what you had previously said was somehow useful. And, weren’t you the one that accused me of lacking originality? \<— if not I apologize. > > Still, “I say this” responded to by, “I say this”, “Yeah, well here’s a drawing that agrees with me” is not really meaningful man. Still, enjoy your sense of superiority - since that’s what it’s all about to you. I didn’t say something then track down a comic that agreed with it, I was quoting the comic in the first place then, since you didn’t get the reference, pointed out the original source. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m not really into Pokemon. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheist-bus-driver-trys-to-convert-students/812864.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheist-bus-driver-trys-to-convert-students/812864.md?page=7)