Though I find the constant need to rebut an argument then declare it “off-topic” amusing, you are right in a way.
Unless your definition of “God” is so vague as to claim that most(if not all) religions are actually worshiping the same deity, then we are not talking about so-called secondary matters here. We are talking about the very nature of said deity/deities, the age of the entire universe, the age of this planet we live on(millions of years vs. scant thousands), the history of the entire human race, the nature of what happens when we die, and the definition of such words as “good”, “ethical”, “moral”, “sin”, and “eternity”. What all theists agree on is so scant as to be almost nonexistent, and what they disagree on could fill the legendary Library of Alexandria. The atheists agree on this principle: We have not seen enough evidence yet to convince us that any deities exist. That in general is the totality of our convictions, no matter how you want to rephrase it to convince yourselves that we have some sort of belief system.
It’s more a matter of studying the thing you criticize before you criticize it such that you can make valid critiques. What you are seeing is different ways of celebrating the Divine, not different deities.
Let’s say it’s your birthday. Your family decides that for your birthday, you should be taken bowling and so they arrange a bowling party for you. You have a group of friends who decide that taking you to a bar is the perfect way to celebrate you. The gang at work sings you a song and buys you a cake. They have all acted differently, done different things, and said different things but it’s still all about you and your birthday.
Now maybe your family sees you as laid-back and a little dull and your friends think you’re a laugh riot and the impression of your work crew is that you are businesslike and a good guy but not a party animal. None of the celebrations and none of their ideas of you negate the fact that they all know you and that you are the only ‘you’ that’s involved.
Well, that’s the deal with God/Allah/Yaweh/G’d/whoever.
All religions named in the OP do indeed worship the same deity, though they may hold some substantially different beliefs about the deity. Whether those different beliefs are “secondary” or not depends on the context. In the particular issue that forms the key difference between themselves and an atheist like Dawkins, the issue of whether or not God exists—“God” meaning the Supreme Being that Muslims, Christians, and Jews all acknowledge, whether or not they use an English, Arabic, or Hebrew word to refer to God, and whether or not they believe that God did this or that particular thing—those different beliefs are indeed secondary.
Sure, you can say that the different groups mentioned in the OP worship “different deities” in the sense that a fed-up wife might announce to her husband, “You’re not the same man I married,” or a citizen angry over something the President has done might say, “This isn’t the George Bush I voted for!” But then we’re talking about different understandings of the same being, not different beings.
Should theists have to agree on the nature, character, and behavior of God before they argue with atheists? Yes, to the extent that their argument is based on that nature, character, or behavior.
This is perhaps the least convincing argument that theists have at their disposal. It reveals the paucity of theists’ line of arguments that we see it trotted out so frequently. They wish to make a positive assertion, atheists call for evidence. The response is that atheists must prove a negative.
This is ridiculous. Frex, right now some people believe that ivory-billed woodpeckers may still exist in the U.S. They point to evidence in the form of recording of their song and sightings from reliable sources. They do not say, “Prove there are no ivory billed woodpeckers in the US, those who believe it is extinct!” because they know they will be laughed at for making such an assertion. A lot.
I wish theists knew that.
It’s not uninquisitive, it’s a conclusion from inquiry. “Imaginination” is only useful when it come to hypothesizing explanations for observed phenomena. The life cycle of an individual does not present any hint that consciousness exists after death, nor does such a hypothesis even seem possible according to observed data (which strongly indicates that consciousness is an emergent physiological property of the brain), so there is no reason to multiply unnecessary entia and presume that there is anything more to know about the life cycles of animals other than that they are born, they live and they die. There is also no reason to presume any purpose for it. That’s just a self-importannt human conceit, I think.
How are you defining “miracle?” Do you mean anything other than a “gee whiz” response to physical and temporal scope of the universe when compared to human history? An emotional response is not a miracle.
If you mean the universe required some kind of supernatural intervention to come into existence, what would be your reason for believing that?
I know several Jews who get quite cranky at the notion that Christians are dealing with the same god that they are, given the number and nature of the differences between them. It may be a Christian (and Muslim, though I haven’t heard much commentary about that equivalence) belief they are the same, but there is certainly not universal agreement among the Abrahamic monotheists on that point.
Since my gods are among those that many atheists bring up when they want to say, “Nobody worships those gods anymore, why don’t you Abrahamic monotheists get with the program”, I mostly remain amused by the notion that theistic consensus is possible.
It amazes me that the old Argument from Incredulity still has any currency in debates on theism/atheism. Let’s get this clear - just because you look at the universe and go “WTF?” does not mean that everyone does, and it does not mean that it doesn’t make sense. There are lots of people for whom the nature of the Universe and its origin make sense. I have no problem with the Universe arising from nothing.
Just because you theists are deficient in appreciation of cosmology and Physics is not an argument for theism. It says a lot more about something lacking you than it does about the Universe.
I dare you to say this somewhere in Mecca during Haj :rolleyes:
And what aspect of the divine were the priests of Xipe Totec celebrating, anyway?
Something I overheard back when Larry King was still on the radio from a sweet little old lady: “I don’t see why there is so much conflict between the Jews, the Catholics and the Muslims-we all worship Jesus in our own way.”
I realize that I’m rather late to the party, but the OP goes right to the heart of why I’m an atheist.
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Different religions make wildly different claims about the number and nature of gods.
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Since many of these claims contradict each other, some of them – in fact MOST of them – MUST be false.
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Without empirical evidence we have no way to sort the true statements from the false ones. The divinity of Jesus and the divinity of Quetzalcoatl are equally likely.
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Since most religious claims are false and we have no way of determining which, if any, of them are true, the simplest thing to do is to just assume that they’re ALL false until evidence to the contrary appears.
And when theists do argue in that manner, I agree that it’s foolish! In fact, I cringe whenever they do that.
That’s precisely why I do not argue in that manner. If an atheist claims that there is no God, I will challenge that person to prove his claim – but if he fails to do so, I will not pretend that this God’s existence is therefore proven. I will be quick, however, to point out that the statement “There is no God” is a definite and absolutist claim. It must therefore be substantiated, just as the statement “God does exist” should be.
FTR, there are a great many theists – including many classical philosophers – who contend for God’s existence based on axiological, teleological, cosmological, and noölogical arguments, to name just a few. One might disagree with the quality of these arguments or the conclusions that one must draw, but the point remains… it’s intellectually dishonest to suggest (as atheists often do) that theists simply throw up their hands and say, “Oh, yeah? Then prove to me that there is no god!”
What about the statement “There has so far been no valid proof for the existence of God”?
This makes it sound as if a religion is a set of logical propositions that all must have a truth value of either TRUE or FALSE.
I will grant you that some of the claims that the world’s major religions make are fundamentally incompatible, in the sense that they cannot all be right.
But some of the claims that religion makes are metaphorical in nature. In fact, some of the things that religion deals with are things that probably can only be discussed in symbols and metaphors. And it is perfectly possible for two or more different metaphors to clash if you look at them on the literal level, and yet they both describe the same underlying reality. I think that some of the different claims that different religions make are of this nature.
100% right again. This is what Der Thris is for some reason just not getting. You make a claim, then its your burden to back it up.
Making a definitely claim that there is no God, or that god doesn’t exist is just pointless and unnecessary. Though, to be fair, I think a lot of theists have caused a lot of this confusion for isolated non-believers by trying to paint the issues so that they present definitive non-belief, belief, and “not being sure” as the only options, when in fact vehemently disagreeing with the reasons people give for belief is perfectly reasonable, and does not overreach in its claims the way “there is no god” does.
That’s the deal with YOUR perception of God perhaps, yes. But the perception of the vast majority of believers doesn’t think your perception is accurate, and do demand specifics before one is truly accepted to be believing/practicing properly in the “right” God/religion.
You’re right. As Dawkins notes, we should all be Celestial Teapot agnostics. But we’re not, are we? There are too many things to be agnostic about. We just assume they don’t exist until evidence comes down the pipe. So until the Hubble finds the orbiting teapot or I catch a little person in my elf trap I’ll be comfortable being a foolish a-teapotist/elfist, obtaining zero points in the formal debate.
It’s still fine to say there is no evidence, however. That should be the stated formal position.
So the people who believe their cherished myths actually occured, whether it’s Jesus arising from the dead or Muhammad riding around the ME on a flying horse, are just mistaken? I’m pretty sure they still view each other as infidels.
However, most are not. For example, Jesus was either the Son of God or he wasn’t. Either Christianity or Islam is profoundly wrong about a key aspect of its doctrine. That’s not exactly a ringing endorsement of theism.
And why should I put religion in a special catagory ? Like most people, I flatly deny the existence of things more plausible than gods, like elves, goblins and thousand mpg carburetors; why should gods get more respect ?
Denying something exists requires less evidence than saying it does. It’s always the burden of the person claiming something exists to prove it; that’s how people normally operate - except when religion becomes involved. That’s because religon isn’t capable of reaching the standards that exist for virtually everything else. Intellectually speaking, it’s the bottom of the barrel, one of, if not the stupidest, least rational concepts ever to exist.
Or to tie it back to the OP, a good question for the Catholic/Protestant/Muslim panel would be:
“Given that at least two of you are dead wrong about your core beliefs, why should we trust anything you say?”
You don’t think there’s some metaphor involved in calling Jesus the Son of God?