# Dear Atheists, Questions From A "believer" **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [October 29, 2003, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dear-atheists-questions-from-a-believer/210159 "2003-10-29T03:14:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 18
**Author:** ![Dunderman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecb155/32.png) [@Dunderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dunderman)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2003, 9:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dear-atheists-questions-from-a-believer/210159/341 "2003-11-19T09:06:10Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by IWLN \* > **Let’s see, because I’m a skeptic and require more information. You seem to think I am somehow blindly led, but that’s hardly the case. I like things proved or a reasonable explanation just as much as you do.** Then you should embrace the use of Occam’s Razor and avoid logical fallacies. You don’t seem to accept these without seeing that there’s nothing there not to accept. They’re properties of logic. It’s like 1+1=2. It’s just the way it is. > [@](#): > > \*\*I have to warn you, I’m having a tough time being serious about Santa tonight. As far as I know he doesn’t physically exist and I don’t feel his presence or know anything about him, so I’m gonna say probably not. \*\* Then you should understand why many atheists say God doesn’t exist. > [@](#): > > **Not in our world. They may be subjective, but they are very real.** Can you show them to me? > [@](#): > > **On a computer, not in man.** Opinion. > [@](#): > > **Okay, I thought you said religious people were irrational.** I do, but being religious doesn’t equal going to church, and going to church doesn’t equal being religious. > [@](#): > > **I don’t know how you can think it’s improved with all those killer Christians out there.🙂** Fewer than there used to be. ---
**Author:** ![Dunderman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecb155/32.png) [@Dunderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dunderman)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2003, 12:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dear-atheists-questions-from-a-believer/210159/342 "2003-11-19T12:23:06Z")
Missed this part the first time. > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by IWLN \* > **You just assigned your opinion of their motives for being there.** I made up the people and their motives so they’d fit the example. Any similarities between them and actual persons, living or dead, are entirely coincidental. I just needed an example to get my point across (and my point was a direct answer to a direct question from _you_), so I made one up. > [@](#): > > **I was trying to explain to you that God doesn’t “make” us do anything.** In your opinion. To make the example more palatable to you, I made up the Snyervalians, but apparently that’s not good enough for you either. Let’s try this one final time. Your question was > [@](#): > > Are you convinced that thought and actions that aren’t strictly arrived at with pure logic have no value or are destructive? My answer is no, I am not. The value of actions is judged strictly on their consequences, not on their origin. If person A does good deed X for irrational reason Q, that’s just as good as when person B does good deed X for rational reason P. Do you understand it now? ---
**Author:** ![IWLN](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b5ac83/32.png) [@IWLN](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IWLN)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2003, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dear-atheists-questions-from-a-believer/210159/343 "2003-11-19T22:10:57Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Priceguy \* **Then you should embrace the use of Occam’s Razor and avoid logical fallacies. You don’t seem to accept these without seeing that there’s nothing there not to accept. They’re properties of logic. It’s like 1+1=2. It’s just the way it is.** Okay, I’m trying to see this from your side. I should use OR for determining whether or not God exists. I should explain away any “events” that have happened to me with hallucination, wishful thinking, slight stroke, contaminated medicine, etc. I should ignore his presence now by passing it off to pure emotional need. I should discount completely the mental process that brought me to where I am now. Then I should use OR, fill in the blanks with the most likely facts and because God is not a rational fact, give him the boot? I’m having a tough time with your logic. I can understand using OR to provide most likely answers for a lot of things, but I have a tough time using it to try and prove that I’m mentally unsound. The logic in that is missing for me. **Then you should understand why many atheists say God doesn’t exist.** I do understand why you don’t believe God exists. Logically, with the facts you have; it would be an incredible stretch to believe. Emotionally, I can’t quite get how anyone can not believe. That’s the part of me that says how can you look at this world, the complexities, the beauty, the good and bad and think we’re just part of a random protein fold or whatever the process was. I don’t have a problem at all accepting evolution, I just think it was directed. I know there’s a fallacy named after that one, so don’t go there. **Can you show them to me?** No. Only their consequences. **Opinion.** Give me an example of pure reason. Doesn’t pure reason have to be a product of absolutely no preconceived ideas, no emotion, no ego? **I do, but being religious doesn’t equal going to church, and going to church doesn’t equal being religious.** This point has become very circular, but I will agree that going to church doesn’t necessarily indicate being religious. I thought we were talking about irrational. \*\*Fewer than there used to be. \*\* Are you sure, or has their motive just been redefined. Keep looking over your shoulder.😃 > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Priceguy \* **Missed this part the first time.** I knew it was too short to be true.🙂 **I made up the people and their motives so they’d fit the example. Any similarities between them and actual persons, living or dead, are entirely coincidental. I just needed an example to get my point across (and my point was a direct answer to a direct question from _you_), so I made one up.** Okay, I agree I got side-tracked on your biased example. An action not derived from pure logic can still have good consequences. I was trying to get across the idea that we don’t have to do what we think God wants us to. We still have a fully functioning ability to choose. It was not the point, I realize. Can we bury those nurses now? **In your opinion. To make the example more palatable to you, I made up the Snyervalians, but apparently that’s not good enough for you either.** Yes, I am discriminate about my devinity titles. I prefer GS’s Snozz. It sounds more friendly. **The value of actions is judged strictly on their consequences, not on their origin.** I’m relieved that you realize that. It’s a point I’ve been trying to make with you. Snozz bless you. 😃 IWLN ---
**Author:** ![blowero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/41988e/32.png) [@blowero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blowero)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2003, 11:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dear-atheists-questions-from-a-believer/210159/344 "2003-11-19T23:10:56Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by IWLN \* > I can understand using OR to provide most likely answers for a lot of things, but I have a tough time using it to try and prove that I’m mentally unsound. The logic in that is missing for me. Not to speak for Priceguy, but I rather doubt anyone thinks you’re mentally unsound. We just think you’re mistaken. After all, you think _we’re_ mistaken, so fair’s fair. > [@](#): > > Emotionally, I can’t quite get how anyone can not believe. That’s the part of me that says how can you look at this world, the complexities, the beauty, the good and bad and think we’re just part of a random protein fold or whatever the process was. Ah, another chestnut - the “argument from incredulity”. Let’s take them one at a time: Complexity - you say the universe appears complex to us; therefore it must have been designed by a sentient being. Among the problems with that line of reasoning: A universe that includes God is necessarily _more_ complex than a universe without God, so rather than explaining the situation, you are confounding it. You say a complex universe can’t “just exist”, but an _even more_ complex God CAN “just exist”. Another problem is your unfounded assumption that non-complexity ought to be the default state of existence. In other words, the universe is complex compared to _what_? A third problem is that you are essentially assigning probability to events whose outcome you _already know_. If I drop a handful of pick-up sticks on the ground, they will undoubtedly arrange themselves in a very complex pattern; the odds of duplicating that exact pattern again would be astronomically slim. Does that mean I deliberately arranged them that way? No. Beauty - What is beauty? It’s an emotion, isn’t it? It can be demonstrated that your feeling of “beauty” is caused by electrical and chemical activity in your brain. Doctors have actually elicited feelings of beauty with no stimuli other than an electrical pulse applied to the brain tissue. Let’s take a random example, say, a flower. Is there really anything _instrinsically_ beautiful about it, or is it just our _reaction_ to it that creates the emotion? If you think about it, the petals simply have a particular molecular structure that causes certain wavelengths of light to reflect, and molecules of the nectar waft into the air. We see it as a beautiful color and smell, but the beauty exists only in our thoughts. We have such thought because we are _part_ of nature; it is natural for us to feel harmony with our surroundings. If we weren’t here, the beauty would not exist. Good and bad - also constructs of the mind. “Good” things are those that cause positive emotions. “Bad” things are those that cause negative emotions. If pain and pleasure “felt” the same to us, I doubt we’d still exist as a species, because we would have no incentive to avoid injury or death. I don’t see how adding God explains it any better. ---
**Author:** ![IWLN](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b5ac83/32.png) [@IWLN](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IWLN)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2003, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dear-atheists-questions-from-a-believer/210159/345 "2003-11-19T23:48:57Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by blowero \* **Yes, but _your_ words were “I don’t agree that because some is incorrect that the book has no value.” I did not say the Bible has “no value” BECAUSE “some is incorrect.” I made no such argument; you disagree with a strawman.** Oooof and she crashes again. Okay, I keep getting fallacy bruises. Let me re-word it. So you’re saying the source is questionable and if taken into consideration, that makes the book questionable. Rats, I can’t really disagree with that. If the book were the only evidence I had to consider, I would agree. \*\*For future reference, the word “if” means: a : in the event that b : allowing that c : on the assumption that d : on condition that So if you see a dependent clause beginning with the word “if”, you do not need to answer as to the factuality of that clause. If I wanted an answer, I would have asked “ **Was** your great-grandfather yadda yadda resurrected?”;)\*\* Okay, is this payback for my definition of opinion? My point was, it’s hard to verify much from history. Truce? **Impressive - I’m upgrading you to 20%.** Okay, but I still think I deserve at least 30%. Otherwise all the trouble I’ve gotten in, asking too many questions and not blindly following the doctrine in church will be for naught.☹ \*\*I meant God, but since you mention it, Godless’ knowledge of the Bible is quite impressive. I may nominate him for president at the next Atheist meeting. Oh crap! I wasn’t supposed to tell you about the meetings.😉 \*\* I agree about GS’s knowledge. At first I was kind of surprised and puzzled at how many atheists knew the Bible better than I did(throw in embarrassed and humbled). Your “typical theist” would prefer to think of you as bad people who out to discredit their beliefs. Not people who actually did their homework better and just came to a different conclusion. Hey, you already told me about the raw meat at your last meeting. I’m trying to round up a posse of “born agains” to crash the next one and force you to accept Jesus as your personal saviour. But I can’t do it if it’s on Thursdays. I don’t want to miss Survivor. Friday’s good for me. My email just showed me I have another post from you. Okay, what did I get wrong now? 😛 IWLN ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2003, 12:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dear-atheists-questions-from-a-believer/210159/346 "2003-11-20T00:24:10Z")
I’ve got to give you credit, **IWLN** , you’ve in here in a long thread with some really long posts and some pretty tough opposition without either blowing up in anger or just disappearing from the board like some others routinely do. You’ve even come to see our point of view, at least, even if you still don’t buy it. You have officially been baptized by the Dope. BTW, we’ve been picking on you a lot about logical fallacies but I think that if you learn to recognize them and deconstruct them it will serve you well in a lot of debates and RL situations aside from just religious discussions. Welcome to the SDMB. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![IWLN](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b5ac83/32.png) [@IWLN](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IWLN)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2003, 4:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dear-atheists-questions-from-a-believer/210159/347 "2003-11-20T04:42:18Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by blowero \* > Not to speak for Priceguy, but I rather doubt anyone thinks you’re mentally unsound. We just think you’re mistaken. After all, you think _we’re_ mistaken, so fair’s fair. Good point. Although anyone who just thinks God is just unlikely, isn’t technically mistaken. > [@](#): > > Ah, another chestnut - the “argument from incredulity”. Let’s take them one at a time: Okay, I knew this argument had a name, just couldn’t think of it. Remember I did indicate I knew it wasn’t a valid argument. I’m going to address this, but it’s just my thoughts, not an argument. You’re a good sounding board and I’m going to go out on that limb marked embarrassing concepts, speculations and then you can whip out your chainsaw. Keep in mind I’m really not delusional. I don’t believe I have the “Answers to the Universe”(echo,echo). Only questions. > [@](#): > > Complexity - you say the universe appears complex to us; therefore it must have been designed by a sentient being. Among the problems with that line of reasoning: A universe that includes God is necessarily _more_ complex than a universe without God, so rather than explaining the situation, you are confounding it. You say a complex universe can’t “just exist”, but an _even more_ complex God CAN “just exist”. I don’t see the existence of God as making things more complex, actually more simple. I’m not saying the universe can’t exist without God, I just think it’s unlikely. Let’s refer to God as sentient energy, SE for short. SE basically is the universe. Quit laughing. I think we have made SE entirely more complex than SE is. We’ll leave it at that. > [@](#): > > Another problem is your unfounded assumption that non-complexity ought to be the default state of existence. In other words, the universe is complex compared to _what_? You’re right. Since we’re a bi-product of something that crawled out of the sea, it just seems like it should be simpler, less complex. In my “earthling” concept, everything physical has a beginning and a cause, which isn’t that hard of a concept for our particular world. Complex really starts when you go beyond that. Don’t think that just because I completely believe in SE’s existence that I haven’t had a tough time with SE having no beginning either. Or that I don’t realize that in order for there to be a beginning, there would have to be something before that, so there can’t be a beginning when it comes to the universe. It just is, in one form or another. > [@](#): > > A third problem is that you are essentially assigning probability to events whose outcome you _already know_. If I drop a handful of pick-up sticks on the ground, they will undoubtedly arrange themselves in a very complex pattern; the odds of duplicating that exact pattern again would be astronomically slim. Does that mean I deliberately arranged them that way? No. Hindsight. Hmmm… Okay. > [@](#): > > Beauty - What is beauty? It’s an emotion, isn’t it? It can be demonstrated that your feeling of “beauty” is caused by electrical and chemical activity in your brain. Doctors have actually elicited feelings of beauty with no stimuli other than an electrical pulse applied to the brain tissue. Let’s take a random example, say, a flower. Is there really anything _instrinsically_ beautiful about it, or is it just our _reaction_ to it that creates the emotion? If you think about it, the petals simply have a particular molecular structure that causes certain wavelengths of light to reflect, and molecules of the nectar waft into the air. We see it as a beautiful color and smell, but the beauty exists only in our thoughts. We have such thought because we are _part_ of nature; it is natural for us to feel harmony with our surroundings. If we weren’t here, the beauty would not exist. I agree with that one intellectually, but will still really enjoy my electrical and chemical activity, without giving that physical process credit. Does that explain why I find so many things beautiful, wonderful or awe inspiring and the person next to me thinks it’s just mountain or river or just music, etc. Do I have brain chemical overload or are they defficient?🙂 I can understand why people would find beauty and attraction in each other, but do we think other things are beautiful because of our upbringing? The attraction can’t be from coming from the same sludge, because there are ugly things too. So here comes another lame question I may have asked before. I feel immensely grateful, for all of the things that I find beautiful, awe inspiring, etc. I realize that grateful is an emotion, but it is typically directed out to someone or to SE in particular. Does believing there is no SE take away that feeling or does it become just a generalized to the universe type grateful or does it not exist? > [@](#): > > Good and bad - also constructs of the mind. “Good” things are those that cause positive emotions. “Bad” things are those that cause negative emotions. If pain and pleasure “felt” the same to us, I doubt we’d still exist as a species, because we would have no incentive to avoid injury or death. I don’t see how adding God explains it any better. I agree there, good and bad are definitely subjective. Obviously adding SE doesn’t explain anything, as much as just adds more questions. Okay, I’ll stop thinking out loud. IWLN ---
**Author:** ![IWLN](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b5ac83/32.png) [@IWLN](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IWLN)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2003, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dear-atheists-questions-from-a-believer/210159/348 "2003-11-20T04:52:04Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Diogenes the Cynic \* > \*\*I’ve got to give you credit, **IWLN** , you’ve in here in a long thread with some really long posts and some pretty tough opposition without either blowing up in anger or just disappearing from the board like some others routinely do. You’ve even come to see our point of view, at least, even if you still don’t buy it. You have officially been baptized by the Dope. > > BTW, we’ve been picking on you a lot about logical fallacies but I think that if you learn to recognize them and deconstruct them it will serve you well in a lot of debates and RL situations aside from just religious discussions. > > Welcome to the SDMB. 🙂 \*\* Thanks. It’s been a stretch for me at times and there have been a time or two I briefly wanted to smite someone.🙂 But reason prevailed or my version of it anyway. For atheists, you guys are all right.😃 ---
**Author:** ![Dunderman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecb155/32.png) [@Dunderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dunderman)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2003, 12:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dear-atheists-questions-from-a-believer/210159/349 "2003-11-20T12:29:50Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by IWLN \* > **Okay, I’m trying to see this from your side. I should use OR for determining whether or not God exists. I should explain away any “events” that have happened to me with hallucination, wishful thinking, slight stroke, contaminated medicine, etc. I should ignore his presence now by passing it off to pure emotional need. I should discount completely the mental process that brought me to where I am now. Then I should use OR, fill in the blanks with the most likely facts and because God is not a rational fact, give him the boot? I’m having a tough time with your logic.** You’re basically right. As long as you’re seeing it from my point of view, look at this (based on earlier statements by you): 1. You know God is real because you don’t apply Occam’s Razor to him. 2. You don’t apply Occam’s Razor to God because he’s real. Do you see why I have a problem with this? Since I still don’t know anything about any events, visions etc that you may have experienced, I cannot try to explain them. > [@](#): > > \*\*I can understand using OR to provide most likely answers for a lot of things, but I have a tough time using it to try and prove that I’m mentally unsound. The logic in that is missing for me. \*\* I’m not trying to prove you’re mentally unsound. Far from it. > [@](#): > > **I do understand why you don’t believe God exists.** Thanks, but that wasn’t the point of the Santa deal. You asked me why many atheists say flat-out that God doesn’t exist; I tried to explain. > [@](#): > > **Emotionally, I can’t quite get how anyone can not believe. That’s the part of me that says how can you look at this world, the complexities, the beauty, the good and bad and think we’re just part of a random protein fold or whatever the process was.** Can you see that this is wishful thinking? Can you see that you’d be saying the same thing whether or not you’re created by God or just part of a random protein fold? > [@](#): > > **No. Only their consequences.** Show me those. Show me that good and evil are real. > [@](#): > > **Give me an example of pure reason. Doesn’t pure reason have to be a product of absolutely no preconceived ideas, no emotion, no ego?** Yep. Note that reason can take emotions into account, though. I water my ficus because I empirically know that it needs water to survive, but the reason I keep it around and care to water it is that it makes me happy to see it. I’m not much into giving you examples any more since you have a tendency to attack irrelevant details of the examples themselves, but let me think. I’d say the scientific method is the product of pure reason. If you sit down and work out the best way to test a hypothesis, taking all human flaws into account, you’ll come up with the scientific method. > [@](#): > > **Okay, I agree I got side-tracked on your biased example.** Great. > [@](#): > > **I was trying to get across the idea that we don’t have to do what we think God wants us to.** Of course not, but a genuine believer _will_ try to do what he/she thinks God wants him/her to do, right? As for the final point, I’ve never said anything about actions with irrational bases being automatically bad. Many religious people do good things. I’ve never disputed that. ---
**Author:** ![Julien](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/71e660/32.png) [@Julien](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Julien)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2003, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dear-atheists-questions-from-a-believer/210159/350 "2003-11-20T18:30:17Z")
Ah but IWLN, surely if Man’s views are in some of the bible, mustn’t they also be spread all through it? How can you distinguish between man’s opinion’s and God’s will? Surely, if God were omnipotent and such he would be able guide the writer’s pens to write what was only true of him. I agree with most Doper’s opinions that “God” is just as easily proved as disproved… which is to say, it can’t be done either way. But if the Christian God were the God who created and orchestrates this beautiful universe we lived in, would he not have the ability to ensure that his book were purely of him? I personally subscribe to the Taoist philosophy. That all things are God, and God is all things. That he doesn’t necessarily take a special interest in us. He is aware that we exist, but isn’t aware at the same time. He just -is-. He doesn’t do. Is your philosophy of him then, more of the Taoist sort than the Christian? I was raised very christian, strictly Christian, and I found my way out of that cycle of zealous religiousity thanks to the notion that God thinks like we do. Eternal Punishment for the finite deed of never hearing of Jesus Christ, ergo a sentence to eternal pain for millions of innocents, and generally good people. Unlike most of the Dopers’ here, I understand that when Christ said “No man shall enter the kingdom of heaven except through me.” He meant that you must both hear of and accept Jesus or you are going to hell. There’s something inherently wrong with that. The poor aboriginal tribesman who died 200 years after the death of Christ without ever hearing mention of the man’s name is hellbound, no matter how good he was to his family and his tribe. No matter how kind he was. The native American. The south african. The asian monk. All of them, hellbound, because Christ’s word never got to them. If a God like that did exist, I’d rather an eternal weenie-roast with Stallin and Hitler than be anywhere near that old malevolent goon. ---
**Author:** ![Dunderman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecb155/32.png) [@Dunderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dunderman)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2003, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dear-atheists-questions-from-a-believer/210159/351 "2003-11-20T20:21:27Z")
**Julien** , don’t you realise that you are just as zealous as any of those Christians you despise? You claim to know what Jesus meant when he said a certain thing, while many people (I suspect **IWLN** is among them) subscribe to another interpretation, just as valid as yours, but you don’t seem to accept that. You’re just as bad as they. ---
**Author:** ![IWLN](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b5ac83/32.png) [@IWLN](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IWLN)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2003, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dear-atheists-questions-from-a-believer/210159/352 "2003-11-21T03:54:08Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Priceguy \* > [@](#): > > You’re basically right. As long as you’re seeing it from my point of view, look at this (based on earlier statements by you): > > 1. You know God is real because you don’t apply Occam’s Razor to him. Well that was an interesting way to turn that one around. I knew God was real long before I heard of OR. So if I’m supposed to ignore what I already know, then who needs OR. I can just ignore God. So that’s putting my faith in OR instead of God? > [@](#): > > 1. You don’t apply Occam’s Razor to God because he’s real. Isn’t OR to come up with answers you don’t have? Having to assume that what I know is false in order to do this just doesn’t work. > [@](#): > > Do you see why I have a problem with this? I really do. But I have already admitted to being completely unable to leave my bias behind. I do appreciate being challenged though. It’s good for me. > [@](#): > > Since I still don’t know anything about any events, visions etc that you may have experienced, I cannot try to explain them > I’m not trying to prove you’re mentally unsound. Far from it. There are three choices. The first is that the events were real, the second is they were a manifestation of my imagination and the third is I’m a big fat liar. Well I’m sure the first is true, pretty sure the second is not and positive the third is not true. When you ask me a question, I don’t just toss out the first answers that come to my head. I’ve really given literally hours and days of thought to this damn oops darn thread and the questions asked here. It has made me question a lot of my more casual beliefs/details, but not God. > [@](#): > > Thanks, but that wasn’t the point of the Santa deal. You asked me why many atheists say flat-out that God doesn’t exist; I tried to explain. I get it. It’s too bad there’s not a better comparison. It initially feels like you’re poking fun at God(I’m sure some are and some aren’t). Not good for getting an honest dialog going. But I can’t think of another comparison that everyone has heard of. > [@](#): > > Can you see that this is wishful thinking? Can you see that you’d be saying the same thing whether or not you’re created by God or just part of a random protein fold? Yes. > [@](#): > > Show me those. Show me that good and evil are real. Good=Mother Teresa feeding the hungry. Evil=child molestation. > [@](#): > > Yep. Note that reason can take emotions into account, though. I water my ficus because I empirically know that it needs water to survive, but the reason I keep it around and care to water it is that it makes me happy to see it. So you’re using your plant for self gratification?🙂 > [@](#): > > I’m not much into giving you examples any more since you have a tendency to attack irrelevant details of the examples themselves, but let me think. I’d say the scientific method is the product of pure reason. If you sit down and work out the best way to test a hypothesis, taking all human flaws into account, you’ll come up with the scientific method. Hey, I admitted to getting side-tracked. I WAS WRONG.☹ I am trying. I’m still not quite there on this one though. If a human is taking all things into account, including human flaws; doesn’t the fact that a human is doing this still leave an element in there that affects its pureness? > [@](#): > > Great. Fine. > [@](#): > > Of course not, but a genuine believer _will_ try to do what he/she thinks God wants him/her to do, right? I think there are only a couple of things that I do, that I wouldn’t do, if I didn’t believe. Most of the things that I do have more to do with my value system, not religion. I would obviously not go to church and I probably wouldn’t be quite as careful about how I let someone know when I think they’re being a dumbass.🙂 If I could do this freely, I would use it to answer your final point below. > [@](#): > > As for the final point, I’ve never said anything about actions with irrational bases being automatically bad. Many religious people do good things. I’ve never disputed that. But since I can’t. So what you’re saying is religious people do good for irrational reasons? Isn’t good rational? You do realize that God’s not standing behind us with a stun gun and we aren’t afraid we’re not going to get presents? IWLN ---
**Author:** ![MyOld85MG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/439d5e/32.png) [@MyOld85MG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MyOld85MG)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2003, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dear-atheists-questions-from-a-believer/210159/353 "2003-11-21T04:17:23Z")
Hmm. This thread goes on forever… Anyway, IWLN, I just thought I’d weigh in on the use of Occam’s Razor. Really, Occam’s Razor is a fairly dull paring knife for trying to separate competing hypotheses in the absence of useful evidence. There is some empirical/historical evidence for OR. You can see it when a theory is in trouble and begins to accumulate lots of complex accessories (such as the last days of earth-centered cosmology, in which the planets were said to move on spheres that revolved on other spheres, ad nauseam). History suggests that useful scientific theories are relatively simple and when they get more and more elaborate, there is something wrong with the theory. But OR does not have anything like the status of a natural law or mathematical postulate. I’m sure there are many cases in which a more complex explanation is correct, and will be proven correct when more of the facts are in. Oversimplification is the other side of the “dying theory” coin. I think skeptics (and I am one) try to apply it far too often. It really doesn’t prove anything. One more quibble: “God’s not standing behind us with a stun gun…” Maybe I missed a full explanation of your faith, but where I grew up, God was in full battle with Satan for your soul, and you were in grave danger of spending Eternity in Hell. Whether you were “saved” or not (you could always backslide). So forgive the rest of us if we assume Christianity has its built-in rewards and punishments. -Van ---
**Author:** ![IWLN](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b5ac83/32.png) [@IWLN](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IWLN)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2003, 7:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dear-atheists-questions-from-a-believer/210159/354 "2003-11-21T07:39:43Z")
Julien - If the Bible was going to be _only_ God’s word, I would imagine he would have just dropped the finished manuscript on us, instead of inspiring writers. IMHO(and that is all any of this is) I think that what we’re doing now is what was supposed to happen. I have all sorts of little ideas why, but no answers. > [@](#): > > I agree with most Doper’s opinions that “God” is just as easily proved as disproved… which is to say, it can’t be done either way. What I actually get from here (SDMB) is God can’t be proven and there’s, so far, no likely reason to believe he exists. Although that’s not what I believe, I think it’s a reasonable assumption. (warning - lightweight witness alert:)) Although I fully believe in God, I’m not sure I believe enough about any one religion to honestly identify with it. I think man has **made up** an incredible amount of details about God and since most aren’t that important, I’m not particularly concerned about whether or not they’re true. We missed the boat on the whole purpose of Jesus. It was to show us how to treat each other and to show unconditional love and sacrifice. Religion obscenely made it into a way to exclude decent people from what they somehow thought they deserved more. And gave religion a bad name at the same time. Go figure. IWLN ---
**Author:** ![IWLN](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b5ac83/32.png) [@IWLN](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IWLN)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2003, 8:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dear-atheists-questions-from-a-believer/210159/355 "2003-11-21T08:13:43Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by vknowles \* > Hmm. This thread goes on forever… That’s what happens when a naive little believer thinks she can slip in, ask a few questions and leave.🙂 > [@](#): > > I’m sure there are many cases in which a more complex explanation is correct, and will be proven correct when more of the facts are in. Oversimplification is the other side of the “dying theory” coin. > I think skeptics (and I am one) try to apply it far too often. It really doesn’t prove anything. Well I haven’t heard that here before. I don’t disagree with OR in general, just in this instance. > [@](#): > > One more quibble: “God’s not standing behind us with a stun gun…” > Maybe I missed a full explanation of your faith, but where I grew up, God was in full battle with Satan for your soul, and you were in grave danger of spending Eternity in Hell. Whether you were “saved” or not (you could always backslide). So forgive the rest of us if we assume Christianity has its built-in rewards and punishments. I’ve had a tough time buying into that one, even though I know it’s a common belief. I think it’s more important to live a good life and care about other people because it’s who you are. Doing it out of fear, limits the scope of true decency and reduces it to something you have to do, whether you want to or not. I do better giving freely than when forced to give. I give my loyalty because I love, not because I fear. And I’m sure he’ll straighten me out if I’m getting it really wrong.🙂 IWLN ---
**Author:** ![Dunderman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecb155/32.png) [@Dunderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dunderman)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2003, 10:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dear-atheists-questions-from-a-believer/210159/356 "2003-11-21T10:47:00Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by IWLN \* > **Well that was an interesting way to turn that one around. I knew God was real long before I heard of OR. So if I’m supposed to ignore what I already know, then who needs OR. I can just ignore God. So that’s putting my faith in OR instead of God?** Let me rephrase. You don’t apply Occam’s Razor to God, correct? Do you agree that applying Occam’s Razor to God would likely result in disbelief in God? > [@](#): > > **There are three choices. The first is that the events were real, the second is they were a manifestation of my imagination and the third is I’m a big fat liar.** Since I don’t know anything about the events, it’s hard for me to comment, but in my experience there’s always more choices than these. Misunderstanding, misinterpretation, lack of context and lack of vital information are a few possibilities. > [@](#): > > **Yes.** (About the God/random protein fold deal) Great. I know I’ve been difficult, but it’s really good that you can admit this. Kudos. > [@](#): > > **Good=Mother Teresa feeding the hungry. Evil=child molestation.** Does this somehow prove that good and evil are real rather than abstracts? Also, it’s never that easy. For starters, search the SDMB for Mother Teresa in the last couple of months. There are many differing opinions on her work. Even without those, it’s hard to speak of absolute good. What if the child Mother Teresa saves from starvation grows up to be a fascist dictator causing the rape and torture of thousands? What if the child molestor’s victim grows up to be a tireless fighter of child molestation, since he/she was a victim him/herself, and helps countless children escape molestors? > [@](#): > > **So you’re using your plant for self gratification?** Kinda. Aren’t we all? > [@](#): > > **If a human is taking all things into account, including human flaws; doesn’t the fact that a human is doing this still leave an element in there that affects its pureness?** I don’t see why it would. If we keep using the scientific method as an example, it isn’t an abstract thing; it’s very strictly defined. There’s no room for an “element” in there to affect its pureness. > [@](#): > > **So what you’re saying is religious people do good for irrational reasons?** Some, yeah. Some do good for rational reasons, some for irrational reasons. Some do bad. > [@](#): > > **Isn’t good rational?** Doing good is rational. That doesn’t necessarily mean that a person doing good is rational or doing good for rational reasons. > [@](#): > > **You do realize that God’s not standing behind us with a stun gun and we aren’t afraid we’re not going to get presents?** That’s your perception. Some religious people see it very much like that. ---
**Author:** ![IWLN](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b5ac83/32.png) [@IWLN](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IWLN)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2003, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dear-atheists-questions-from-a-believer/210159/357 "2003-11-21T14:51:05Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Priceguy \* > Let me rephrase. You don’t apply Occam’s Razor to God, correct? Do you agree that applying Occam’s Razor to God would likely result in disbelief in God? Correct, I don’t apply it. No, I actually still can’t figure out how to apply something rationally that will tell me I’m irrational. So tell me how I do this. Do I leave out anything that I can’t explain, do I put it in and then determine that the simplest answer is that I fell asleep standing up. Do I discount the presence that I still feel occasionally as just an emotional need or reaction. Even if I said God’s not likely, then I’m still left with what the hell:) happened to me. > [@](#): > > Since I don’t know anything about the events, it’s hard for me to comment, but in my experience there’s always more choices than these. Misunderstanding, misinterpretation, lack of context and lack of vital information are a few possibilities. I saw him and felt him, so my choices are limited here. Burglar, ghost, maybe I’m going to be the next John Edwards or wacko. I choose wacko over John and nothing was missing after it was over. > [@](#): > > (About the God/random protein fold deal) Great. I know I’ve been difficult, but it’s really good that you can admit this. Kudos. You, difficult? I wish I could comment on that, but this cross I’m carrying keeps getting in the way!!! It was good for me. Made me mad enough to try harder. I hope I don’t lose my kudo here, but what I was admitting to is, I probably would be in the same place with God as creator or protein fold only. I had to really, really step back and look hard at that one. Not that I believe that it is wishful thinking. But I am admittedly very affected by my surroundings. I have never lost my sense of awe. I do understand that a beautiful world doesn’t necessarily mean there is a creator. It doesn’t make me believe, but I think my appreciation is enhanced by my belief. I’ve also stepped back and tried to find an up side to determining there is no God. I can’t come up with one reason. Then I had to decide if I would want to know, if there wasn’t. I don’t know. > [@](#): > > Does this somehow prove that good and evil are real rather than abstracts? The product of good and evil is real. > [@](#): > > Also, it’s never that easy. For starters, search the SDMB for Mother Teresa in the last couple of months. There are many differing opinions on her work. Even without those, it’s hard to speak of absolute good. What if the child Mother Teresa saves from starvation grows up to be a fascist dictator causing the rape and torture of thousands? What if the child molestor’s victim grows up to be a tireless fighter of child molestation, since he/she was a victim him/herself, and helps countless children escape molestors? I wasn’t talking about potential long term good or bad scenarios. Would I feed a hungry child that I knew was going to grow up and be our enemy? Of course I would. And I would hope that he remembered and it made a difference. I did a search on Mother Teresa here and found a lot of unproved assertions, not much else. Things like she took money from bad people, which I like the concept of a bad guys money doing good. I’m not going to defend her. I don’t know enough about her. I would have to agree that condemning birth control when there are so many children starving is wrong in my book, but attending a Catholic church doesn’t mean I buy the whole package either or even half. > [@](#): > > Kinda. Aren’t we all? I’m guilty. My house is filled with plants, candles and rocks. They make me happy. > [@](#): > > I don’t see why it would. If we keep using the scientific method as an example, it isn’t an abstract thing; it’s very strictly defined. There’s no room for an “element” in there to affect its pureness. Uncle.😉 > [@](#): > > Some, yeah. Some do good for rational reasons, some for irrational reasons. Some do bad. Doing good is rational. That doesn’t necessarily mean that a person doing good is rational or doing good for rational reasons. So how would that be different for a religious person versus a non-religious person? I’m starting to feel circular here. So I know it’s a given that you think belief in God is irrational, but that doesn’t make the person irrational, just the belief. > [@](#): > > That’s your perception. Some religious people see it very much like that. I don’t get it. That would make religion or belief in God a negative. Seems like that would kind of suck the anticipation out of joining him. Obviously I haven’t been exposed to that “fear God” indoctrination. I thought that had kind of gone out of style.☹ Hey, I’m still trying to figure out what a fundie is. The dictionary just doesn’t cut it and the references here make it sound like a disease or a very bad insult. I went to one website, but it creeped me out and I couldn’t bring myself to sign in. I keep meaning to go and check out some Christian type websites, because I’m fairly clueless on their stand on a lot of issues. > [@](#): > > Julien, don’t you realise that you are just as zealous as any of those Christians you despise? You claim to know what Jesus meant when he said a certain thing, while many people (I suspect IWLN is among them) subscribe to another interpretation, just as valid as yours, but you don’t seem to accept that. You’re just as bad as they. Hey, you spilled some insult on me with this one.:mad: :mad: IWLN ---
**Author:** ![blowero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/41988e/32.png) [@blowero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blowero)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2003, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dear-atheists-questions-from-a-believer/210159/358 "2003-11-21T18:59:09Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by vknowles \* > I’m sure there are many cases in which a more complex explanation is correct, and will be proven correct when more of the facts are in. Oversimplification is the other side of the “dying theory” coin. Well that’s a problem with the _application_ of the Razor, not the Razor itself, and I assume that was your point. If one ignores solid evidence in favor of unwarranted simplification, then one is not correctly applying the Razor. An example might be an astronomer who insists on pure circular orbits in the face of clear evidence of elliptical orbits. But one cannot appeal to facts _yet to be ascertained_; we can only act on what is available to us at the present. Anything else is merely wild speculation. Occam’s Razor is not magic; it doesn’t foretell the future. And it’s absolutely crucial that we include the proviso, “all other things being equal…”. If we have _evidence_ for a more complex explanation, then OF COURSE Occam’s Razor does not apply. It only applies when a more complex explanation is posited _without_ evidence to support it. And in fact, that’s generally where it comes up. I only mention the Razor when the theist, having exhausted all other arguments for God, resorts to saying “But you can’t _prove_ that God doesn’t exist.” _All other things being equal_, ought we to believe a given proposition MERELY BECAUSE we can’t prove it doesn’t exist? Think about the ramifications of such a question; if you answer yes, you condemn yourself to belief in an _infinite_ number of unproven propositions. We would have to worship an infinite number of gods, simply because they are not disproven. Occam’s Razor is common sense itself. I can’t for the life of me understand how anyone can suggest it is invalid. ---
**Author:** ![blowero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/41988e/32.png) [@blowero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blowero)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2003, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dear-atheists-questions-from-a-believer/210159/359 "2003-11-21T19:37:11Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by IWLN \* > Correct, I don’t apply it. No, I actually still can’t figure out how to apply something rationally that will tell me I’m irrational. So tell me how I do this. Do I leave out anything that I can’t explain, do I put it in and then determine that the simplest answer is that I fell asleep standing up. I have to say I find it a little unfair that you keep bringing up as your trump card this experience you had that you refuse to share with us. As I said before, if God communicated with me in an unambigous way, it’s possible I would consider that experience. But I suspect that this “experience” you had is nothing of the sort. You already admitted that it would not be convincing if you shared it with us, so I can only assume you are exaggerating its import. I think the point you are trying to make is valid: If you have _evidence_ for a more complex explanation, then Occam’s Razor doesn’t apply. As I said in my last post, it only applies when all other things are equal. But what several of us are saying is that you don’t actually _have_ any evidence. We have been able to refute every piece of evidence you have offered, and merely refusing to divulge a piece of “evidence” doesn’t make it valid. Imagine being arrested for murder, and at trial the judge says “We have secret evidence that proves your guilt, but we’re not going to tell you what it is.”😃 > [@](#): > > Do I discount the presence that I still feel occasionally as just an emotional need or reaction. But do you _really_ feel a presence? Isn’t what you really feel simply a belief or emotion? What exactly does “feeling a presence” mean, anyway? Did you physically touch God? Can you describe the texture of God? Again, I’m not trying to make fun of you or suggest that your beliefs are trivial; I’m just trying to get you to see it from another point of view. If you are claiming direct communication from God, you _should_ be able to describe the form this communication took. > [@](#): > > Even if I said God’s not likely, then I’m still left with what the hell:) happened to me.I saw him and felt him, so my choices are limited here. What did God look like? Can you draw a picture of God? What did He feel like? Can you photograph God? I have never heard a satisfactory answer to these questions. It may be that you are the one out of a billion believers who actually _does_ have a satisfactory answer, but then it raises the question of why God only chose to impart this information to you and not the other billion. > [@](#): > > Hey, I’m still trying to figure out what a fundie is. It’s simply short for fundamentalist. That’s what my friend is, the one I described earlier. It’s someone who believes the Bible is the literal, inerrant word of God. I think when you hear it in the derogatory sense that you mentioned, it’s referring to fundamentalists who are _also_ fanatics. There are some of those, but I certainly don’t think they _all_ are. ---
**Author:** ![Dunderman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecb155/32.png) [@Dunderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dunderman)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2003, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dear-atheists-questions-from-a-believer/210159/360 "2003-11-21T20:23:36Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by IWLN \* > **Correct, I don’t apply it. No, I actually still can’t figure out how to apply something rationally that will tell me I’m irrational. So tell me how I do this. Do I leave out anything that I can’t explain, do I put it in and then determine that the simplest answer is that I fell asleep standing up. Do I discount the presence that I still feel occasionally as just an emotional need or reaction.** You look at each event in turn. You examine the possible explanations and determine which is most likely, and go with that. > [@](#): > > **I’ve also stepped back and tried to find an up side to determining there is no God. I can’t come up with one reason.** But that doesn’t really have any bearing on the facts of the matter, right? If I think the world is a better place if 1+1=3, that doesn’t change the fact that 1+1=2. > [@](#): > > **The product of good and evil is real.** What is “good”? What is “evil”? How can you tell them apart? Do you, who claim that rational thought is subjective, really believe that “good” and “evil” objectively exist? > [@](#): > > **So how would that be different for a religious person versus a non-religious person? I’m starting to feel circular here. So I know it’s a given that you think belief in God is irrational, but that doesn’t make the person irrational, just the belief.** A person holding an irrational belief suspends reason for the purpose of that belief, which makes the person irrational at least when it comes to that belief. One can see this principle at work in quite a few scientists. Brilliant critical rational minds… that also embrace a particular religion. I don’t get it. > [@](#): > > \*\*I don’t get it. That would make religion or belief in God a negative. Seems like that would kind of suck the anticipation out of joining him. \*\* I don’t get it either. Those people still exist. > [@](#): > > \*\*Hey, you spilled some insult on me with this one. \*\* Whoops, bad writing on my part. Sorry. The last “they” was supposed to refer back to the zealous Christians that **Julien** despises. I only mentioned you because I suspect you are one of the people who do _not_ believe that, say, a native American who never heard of Christ and thus wasn’t given the chance to believe in God is going to Hell. If I’m wrong you’re welcome to correct me. Again, sorry for the insult. It really wasn’t my meaning. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dear-atheists-questions-from-a-believer/210159.md?page=17) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dear-atheists-questions-from-a-believer/210159.md?page=19)