Deistic claims about universe creation by deities go beyond the act of just creating a universe. I can imagine a grad student with control of gravity creating a universe. Deists typically also claim that this creation involves a purpose. A universe created by someone which exists on the other side of an event horizon can be just as random as a universe popping up by itself.
This shows a misunderstanding of evolution. A trait may actually arise that does not bestow a benefit and be carried through many generations as long as it does not hinder the life form or reduce the life form’s chances for reproduction.
Agreed. But the whole point of natural selection is to glean the traits that are useful and have some kind of benefit.
Here’s an article that supports some kind of genetic involvement - why certain genes turn on, we don’t know though. Still so many questions.
Useful only in the sense of providing a reproductive advantage. There are tons of cases (peacock feathers, for instance) where a trait doing this for mating purposes might have other disadvantages.
Not to mention that the male praying mantis probably wouldn’t find the mating behavior that evolved in the female all that useful.
From earlier in this thread,
“No, because being a believer is in itself mentally unhealthy, and causes immense harm to the world directly and indirectly.
It’s not “audacious”, it’s pointing out the obvious. You just need to read the news or a little history to see religion causing harm everywhere. Nor did I say or care if it applies to “every believer”; what matters is the overall effect of religion, which is one of overwhelming evil. There is simply no way that religion could ever do enough good to make up for all the evil it does.”
I assumed anyone who posted regularly in GD had seen this kind of thing repeatedly
No I didn’t. the answer was
What seemed to be happening earlier was god belief is catagorized as irrational and delusional rather casually, by comparisons to IPU or whatever
The point I’ve been trying to make, the one I’m interested in far more than continued unnecessary semantic sidetracks, is judging human belief systems equally to see if god belief is irrational , or any more irrational than how most human belief systems are formed.
Good lord man. You’re about to quote it. It was IMMEDIATELY followed with “I’M AN AGNOSTIC” a rather clear declaration. The reason was that you had just mischaracterized my post as some old theist argument. I thought it might be helpful to let you know I am an agnostic.
You can go over it a hundred times and you’ll still be wrong. I DIDN”T MENTION ATHEISM AT ALL!!! So for you to assume something about my attitude toward atheism from a sentence that doesn’t mention it AT ALL, means YOU READ THAT INTO IT. Rather than simply ask a question for clarification you responded as if you incorrect assumption was correct. That’s on you. I implied nothing about atheism.
This analogy fails for several reasons. 1. Irish and Catholic are two very different categories that answer different questions. Nationality , religion. Theism, agnosticism , and atheism, are three terms often used to describe various positions on one category. God belief.
2ndly, if someone responded to “I’m not Irish , I’m Catholic” with
“I don’t know what definition of Irish you’re using that is mutually exclusive from Baptist” {that’s what you did} then the response might be “Who the hell said anything about Baptist.?”
Now, if it made you wonder about how I looked at things, that’s understandable and the proper form IMO is to ask for clarification rather than assume and then respond to your own incorrect assumption. Since then I have tried to explain my view and that I also understand other views. You think it’s impossible to be agnostic without being a theist or atheist correct? That’s fine if YOU think that , but clearly I DO NOT, so please refrain from telling me I’m an atheist when I’ve repeatedly said I’m not.
Once again , that sentence says NOTHING to indicate I think agnostic is mutually exclusive from atheism or theism. I understand they overlap and the details of belief vs, what we can know. I simply reject the notion that I can’t be just agnostic, or an agnostic.
No, that’s how you’re defining it. I’m defining it as my personal position when it comes to god belief. I haven’t decided one way or the other. It’s still an open question for me, and frankly, I can’t imagine people claiming that’s impossible.
You didn’t show an example in this thread of what I asked for. Again, what you said:
“My only objection is the wode blankets tossed by some atheists that all god belief is irrational and delusional because there’s no objecive proof, all the while exhibiting their own tendency to insist things are factual that they can’t prove.”
The first quote doesn’t even mention being irrational or delusional. The second quote specifically mentions that he didn’t say his claim applied to every believer, but that “religion” could never make up for all the evil it does. Moving on from there, you said “because there’s no objective proof” and “exhibiting their own tendency to insist things are factual that they can’t prove.” You aren’t even close to showing examples of what you claim exist in this thread.
Yes, you did. That does not answer my question.
I never mischaracterized anything! “I’m an agnostic” says nothing about what you believe, according to the definitions of “agnostic” you supplied several times. What does say something about your belief, is the following statements:
*“I’m not a theist”
“I’m not a believer”
“If they answer with ‘No I don’t believe in God or gods’ they are atheist.”*
Yes, you did. I’ve shown you several times.
Wrong. Agnosticism says nothing about whether or one not believes in any gods according to the very definitions you provided. I’ll remind you of your statements regarding agnosticism again:
“I call myself an agnostic because my response to “Does God exist?” is I don’t know, and I don’t think anyone else does either.”
“An intellecdtual honest atheist will acknowledge they can’t really know, just as an honest theist will.”
According to you, agnosticism is regarding knowledge and theism and atheism is regarding belief. You have acknowledged this several times. I can post more of your quotes if you like. According to you, they’re not mutually exclusive. Which is why my analogy works just fine.
You defined atheism as one without belief.
Yes, it does. So do more of your statements which I went over in my last post.
According to your definitions and statements, one can’t be. Again:
*“I’m not a theist”
“I’m not a believer”
“If they answer with ‘No I don’t believe in God or gods’ they are atheist.”
“I call myself an agnostic because my response to “Does God exist?” is I don’t know, and I don’t think anyone else does either.”
“An intellecdtual honest atheist will acknowledge they can’t really know, just as an honest theist will.”*
Unreal! I’ve quoted you defining it that way several times!
Clearly? Yes, it’s clear depending on which post you’re talking about. You use the terms as if they’re mutually exclusive when it suits you and then flip flop. Is it clear that an agnostic can’t be a theist or atheist in this new set of descriptors you provide (bolding mine)?:
That’s not a definition.
Making a decision is not relevant to the definitions of theism, atheism, and agnosticism you provided, until you flip-flopped and gave ridiculous, mutually exclusive definitions of agnosticism to atheism and theism in post 609.
.
I hope what is evident at this point is that I consider myself an agnostic period. I hope it’s evident that I think it’s quite possile to be just an agnostic when it comes to the question of god belief.
,
I don’t believe I said any such thing. Show me specifically where I said this.
My postion when it comes to god belief , and only god belief , is agnostic. I am uncommitted to either theism or atheism. What I do and don’t believe involves a lot more than just god belief.
Personally I think theres a difference between being open to and just acknowledging intellectualy that it’s possible, but that’s a hair we don’t need to split.
Your words (the second from this ) thread:
You’re making this far to complicated by nitpicking and pulling phrases out of context.
I think most people would know I was an agnostic when I said I’M AN AGNOSTIC! but that obviously wasn’t clear enough for you.
I attempted to explain that while I understand the how and where atheism and theism can overlap with agnosticism, my definition has to do with how a person identifies themselves, in simple terms.
As usual my friend your input is appreciated and thought provoking.
I know it varies from person to person but for me it’s a conscious choice to decide how to declare and define my position as either theist, agnostic , or atheist. I’m sure day to day my position and leanings may vary but agnostic is the way I’ve chosen to identify myself for very specific reasons that I put some thought into so it’s not immaterial to me.
btw; I don’t think I’ve ever been a devout deist.
Maybe devout was too strong - and really a joke, since I have no idea of what a devout theist would look like. But you did seem to be into god as the universe.
What you declare yourself is up to you - and what you really are at any given moment only you know.
MAybe the things I said are not mutually exclusive. You remember mutually exclusive right?
Nonsense, You have a habit of pulling a sentence or phrase out of a post an asigning some meaning to the exclusion of all others when it was never intended that way. In doing so you fail to see a larger picture, a broader meaning.
I said I understand the terms agnostic atheist and agnostic theist but I don’t find them nessecary or useful so I don’t use them. It’s that simple. There’s nothing inconsistent about it.
The choice is choosing how to declare oneself when asked? That’s a choice for all three correct?
See above reference concerning semantic hair splitting.
Nope You’re pulling out sentences and phrases and reading them as stand alone and exclusive of other posts. That’s your thing for some reason, and your problem. I get the feeling that if I said “fire is hot” in one post and “fire lights the dark” in another you’d claim I was changing the definition and being inconsistent.
scratch this part, I misread and this is incorrect.
To me, the purpose of life is to live as well and treat others with as much kindness as they can.
Why is it so unacceptable to be an agnostic? (I’m speaking generally here). My dictionary defines an agnostic as someone who neither believes or disbelieves in a deity or deities, yet commonly we hear of agnostic atheists and even agnostic theists. I would suggest the word is being corrupted. I would have thought agnosticism was firmly planted midfield. The agnostic surely can have as much belief as the theist and atheist. Lets not malign that position with prejudices.
Really? Then you should have no problem showing those quotes are factual. Please proceed.
Yes, you did. That does not answer my question.
You’re looking at the wrong post. On page 10 you said
which was not my argument, and why I pointed out I’m not a theist.
Semantic wrangling fail. Nope it doesn’t work. You ignored or purposely avoided the point that in the sentence you quted I didn’t mention atheism AT ALL.
Again, the decision comes in making some sort of public declaration.
My definitions are not mutually exclusive when taken as a whole rather than your appraoch of rigidly parsing then as if each definition must exclude the others.
When I have a little more time I’ll demonstrate what I’m talking about.
It’s not “unacceptable” to be an agnostic - the problem, as this thread shows, is that the overwhelming majority of people that claim to be ‘agnostic’ aren’t truly agnostic - they have a belief one way or the other.
Its virtually impossible these days in our culture not to have a belief with regards to the existence of god(s) - and folks stumble all over themselves trying to finesse what agnostic means.
As stated above “agnostic” speaks to teh knowledge - not the belief - that is why you can have “agnostic (a)theists” - they believe/don’t believe - and then the knowledge aspect is a ‘qualifier’ to that belief. The true agnostic stops at “neither believes or disbelieves” and further states that the knowledge is unknown/unknowable to qualify that belief…
Yet you have already stated that the definition of agnostic you prefer is not regarding belief (until you flip-flop). I have demonstrated this to you multiple times.
Not having a particular belief is not a commitment. I went over this with you several times. Atheists don’t “commit” to being atheists. I have also shown you your definition of atheist many times and what you said about you not being a theist and not believing.
Nonsense. I’ve made it very simple and I asked you to show me how it could be out of context. You said you are not a believer. You said you’re not a theist. You said “If they answer with ‘No I don’t believe in God or gods’ they are atheist.”
I went over this in post 626.
That makes no sense whatsoever. You made this statement:
*My only objection is the wode blankets tossed by some atheists that all god belief is irrational and delusional because there’s no objecive proof, all the while exhibiting their own tendency to insist things are factual that they can’t prove. *
You have still failed to provide evidence of that happening in this thread. It’s not up to me to show that any quotes are factual regarding this.
I have no clue what you’re talking about. I didn’t purposely ignore anything at all.
They are. Again I went over this in post 626. Except of course when you chose to define them differently. Example (but I’m sure I somehow took something out of context):
You clearly are defining agnosticism based on what one “knows” and/or what can be known. (You are also defining “theist” with odd qualifiers I’ve never seen before and “atheist” with odd qualifiers that contradict earlier statements, but that’s besides the point.)
More:
Continues to make that clear.
Which is another way of saying that an atheist will acknowledge also being agnostic (according to your definitions).
Vs:
and
The reader can decide if you flip-flopped definitions and have made multiple statements doing more than just inferring that agnosticism is mutually exclusive to theism and atheism.
Should your description of agnostics not also apply to theists and atheists in as much as the unknown is still just that for both?
^ No. Theism and atheism are in regards to what belief one holds or doesn’t hold. What is unknown is irrelevant to be either.
I do not believe there is a Heaven or a Hell I doubt that our end is no different than a plant or an animal. We just return to the state we were in before we were conceived. I once had my heart stop while having a test in the hospital. I didn’t know this until I came to in the room after the test, and was told to see my heart doctor as soon as possible because I had to be resuscitated. I find a lot of meaning in Life just by living as well as I can. Because my parents had a child I am here. My purpose is just to live the best I can.
I’m assuming by “purpose,” you mean a benevolent purpose. Otherwise the point still stands. Anywho, I doubt a deist would argue if you proposed the idea that a deity created the universe with a benevolent intent for life, and also a secondary motive such as: intellectual creativity, or an unknown practical purpose.