# Religious and atheist Dopers: What makes you so sure? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [June 1, 2021, 3:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-and-atheist-dopers-what-makes-you-so-sure/943328 "2021-06-01T03:12:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2021, 9:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-and-atheist-dopers-what-makes-you-so-sure/943328/101 "2021-06-01T21:37:28Z")
Is there such a thing as a red letter atheist? I do believe that Jesus was written as a good person to set an example in how to live our own lives. I don’t believe that he ever existed, much less was a divine entity, but I do believe that if everyone followed his example, the world would be a better place. ---
**Author:** ![Riemann](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/riemann/32/3133_2.png) [@Riemann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riemann)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2021, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-and-atheist-dopers-what-makes-you-so-sure/943328/102 "2021-06-01T22:02:38Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > On the other hand a claim to knowledge that no gods exist is not justified. Different thing. In over 40 years online I’ve run into one person in this category, and the atheists in alt.atheism pretty much thought he was an idiot. It’s a little unclear what you mean here. If the term “god” is sufficiently defined (the Zeus of legend, the God of the Bible, etc.), you can in principle be confident that something with those properties does not exist. You _can_ prove a negative - if the hypothesis strongly predicts that we should see evidence, and we see none, that’s strong evidence that the hypothesis is false. But there has to _be_ a coherent hypothesis worthy of consideration in the first place. The notion that some other “god” with undefined properties _might_ exist and that you _cannot know for sure_ is in the “not even wrong” category. If there are no properties assigned to this “god”, there is no hypothesis to consider. ---
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2021, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-and-atheist-dopers-what-makes-you-so-sure/943328/103 "2021-06-01T22:20:48Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > Is there such a thing as a red letter atheist? > > I do believe that Jesus was written as a good person to set an example in how to live our own lives. I don’t believe that he ever existed, much less was a divine entity, but I do believe that if everyone followed his example, the world would be a better place. Even this part? _“If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.”_ (Luke 14:26) ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2021, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-and-atheist-dopers-what-makes-you-so-sure/943328/104 "2021-06-01T22:33:52Z")
Sure. One big downside of the bible is that people like to take individual verses out of context and imply that they mean something that they do not. He was not, in that case, telling people how to live their lives. He was, in that case, warning people the very real costs involved in following him, that doing so would endanger their family, their friends, and themselves. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2021, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-and-atheist-dopers-what-makes-you-so-sure/943328/105 "2021-06-01T22:37:39Z")
I’m an atheist, but I don’t pretend to know for sure that a God doesn’t exist. I simply haven’t been shown enough evidence for the question to be worth my time. The principle of parsimony rules - don’t waste your time on fanciful or complex solutions when simpler ones are available. This is my favorite explanation of the difference between an atheist and an agnostic: An agnostic punts on the question by saying “I don’t kmow”, but treats the question seriously and considers the existance of God to be an open question. An atheist says, “Got evidence? Extraordinary evidence for your extraordinary claim? If not, you are wasting my time, and the question of the existence of God is no more interesting than any other mystical claim, such as crystal healing or psychic auras. Until you can come up with serious evidence, spending any time at all pondering the question is just a waste of time and effort.” There simply isn’t enough time in the day to seriously expend effort studying every quack theory. I don’t consider the existence of God to be an open question - I consider it to be an _irrelevant_ question until and if someone can come up with some form of strong evidence. And so far, I haven’t seen any at all. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2021, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-and-atheist-dopers-what-makes-you-so-sure/943328/106 "2021-06-01T22:56:22Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > How do you get from “it seems pretty obvious to me” to “I’m sure”? That’s where the leap of faith comes in. Nobody can produce objective evidence showing that their religious belief is true. The evidence is all hearsay; somebody else has said they had direct evidence of some divine presence. The problem for me is that there are numerous accounts like this. There are people who have witnessed all kinds of different diving presences. These beliefs are often contradictory so they can’t all be true. And most religious believers agree with that and declare most of this evidence to be false. But not all of it. A religious believer will reject ninety-nine percent of testimonial evidence - that which contradicts their religious belief - and believe one percent of testimonial evidence - that which agrees with their religious belief. Me? I reject the same ninety-percent that they reject. And seeing no objective difference between that ninety-nine percent and the remaining one percent, I reject it as well. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2021, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-and-atheist-dopers-what-makes-you-so-sure/943328/107 "2021-06-01T22:59:33Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > That’s where the leap of faith comes in. Is a leap of faith compatible with being “sure and certain”? ---
**Author:** ![Saintly\_Loser](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saintly_loser/32/4045_2.png) [@Saintly\_Loser](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saintly_Loser)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2021, 11:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-and-atheist-dopers-what-makes-you-so-sure/943328/108 "2021-06-01T23:03:13Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > You seem to be a little confused as to what it means to be an atheist-It has absolutely nothing to do with the origins of the universe. I totally get that. For some of us theists, just like for you, theism has little to do with the origins of the universe. It’s much more about soteriology than cosmology. I’ll come back later tonight with an answer (well, at least the best one I can come up with) to the OP… I’ll have more time then. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2021, 11:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-and-atheist-dopers-what-makes-you-so-sure/943328/109 "2021-06-01T23:09:13Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > I do believe that Jesus was written as a good person to set an example in how to live our own lives. I don’t believe that he ever existed, much less was a divine entity, but I do believe that if everyone followed his example, the world would be a better place. I tend to believe there was an actual historical person who was identifiable as Jesus of Nazareth. I just don’t believe in the various supernatural stories that are associated with him. I feel the same way about people like Abraham, Moses, Muhammad, Gautama, Kong, Laozi, Zarathustra, Simon Magus, Joseph Smith, Sun Myung Moon, and L. Ron Hubbard. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2021, 11:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-and-atheist-dopers-what-makes-you-so-sure/943328/110 "2021-06-01T23:11:12Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > > [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > > > That’s where the leap of faith comes in. > > Is a leap of faith compatible with being “sure and certain”? Absolutely. Being sure and certain is all about believing something is true. Which is distinct from something being true. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2021, 11:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-and-atheist-dopers-what-makes-you-so-sure/943328/111 "2021-06-01T23:18:16Z")
> [@"Novelty\_Bobble](#): > > Yes it seems to be a very simple A/Not A position. Atheism is a direct negation of believing in god and there isn’t a third option. But there is, whether you believe in it or not. Not giving a rat’s ass is a wholly reasonable and rational option.\* \*or in classical Doper usage, _cromulent_. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2021, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-and-atheist-dopers-what-makes-you-so-sure/943328/112 "2021-06-01T23:24:14Z")
> [@Novelty\_Bobble](#): > > Yes it seems to be a very simple A/Not A position. Atheism is a direct negation of believing in god and there isn’t a third option. Is a person an atheist if they don’t believe in the divine nature of Zeus? ---
**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:** [June 1, 2021, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-and-atheist-dopers-what-makes-you-so-sure/943328/113 "2021-06-01T23:34:46Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > No. They are equally as accurate, because they are _both_ incoherent. Maybe you missed the part about it only applying if someone insists on statements of belief applying to rocks. > [@MrDibble](#): > > I don’t think you understand what I mean by “incoherent”. It means the statement “belief in god” carries _no_ meaningfull information. You can’t have a true/false conclusion about a meaningless proposition. Even in multi-value logics with an “indeterminant” truth value, you _still_ need clear premises. > > If I say “you kjklkjl hggkjkj”, you _can’t_ say “no, I do not kjklkjl hggkjkj”. Because you have no idea what I really said. Same-same with all propositional statements relating to properties of the incoherent concept “god”. And you seem to be missing that both atheism and theism are statements of the belief status of a person. Belief in X has nothing to do with the existence of X or even the coherency of X. (These do impact whether the belief has merit, but we’re not talking about that.) I can say that I don’t believe in four-sided triangles. That is a coherent statement, even if four-sided triangles are not a coherent concept. Some people say they believe in a tri-omni god, which I suspect we both agree is not a coherent concept. But some theists have internal models of such things, avoiding or denying the situations where the incoherency of the concept becomes obvious. Again, there is nothing incoherent about the concept believing incorrect or even impossible things. ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Pearse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/richard_pearse/32/13144_2.png) [@Richard\_Pearse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Pearse)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2021, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-and-atheist-dopers-what-makes-you-so-sure/943328/114 "2021-06-01T23:34:57Z")
I think there is deliberate atheism, where you consider the subject and come to the conclusion there is/are no god/s, and there is thoughtless atheism, where you don’t care, haven’t thought about it, and still don’t believe in god/s. So you can “not give a rats arse” if you like but you are still an atheist of some sort if you don’t believe in god. It doesn’t take deliberate thought/consideration to not believe something. ---
**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:** [June 1, 2021, 11:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-and-atheist-dopers-what-makes-you-so-sure/943328/115 "2021-06-01T23:35:25Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Is a person an atheist if they don’t believe in the divine nature of Zeus? Maybe you missed the “any god” part of the definition. ---
**Author:** ![P-man](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/p-man/32/3606_2.png) [@P-man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/P-man)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2021, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-and-atheist-dopers-what-makes-you-so-sure/943328/116 "2021-06-02T00:00:34Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > Is there such a thing as a red letter atheist? Works for me. If there were a supernatural being in the sky (which isn’t my concept of god), would he/she/they be fooled by someone falsely claiming to believe? Ol’ Scratch would have a field day with him/her (or them). ---
**Author:** ![Jay\_Z](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Jay\_Z](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jay_Z)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2021, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-and-atheist-dopers-what-makes-you-so-sure/943328/117 "2021-06-02T00:35:02Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > If they exist, then they have seen the universe that we both exist in. That’s an assumption on your part. I am assuming an entity that exists outside our universe, that may have no information to go on. It’s certainly possible to posit consciousness that exists outside our own reality. ---
**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:** [June 2, 2021, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-and-atheist-dopers-what-makes-you-so-sure/943328/118 "2021-06-02T02:18:26Z")
> [@Jay\_Z](#): > > I am assuming an entity that exists outside our universe, that may have no information to go on. It’s certainly possible to posit consciousness that exists outside our own reality. To me, this is answering the mystery by adding more mystery to the mystery. ---
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2021, 2:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-and-atheist-dopers-what-makes-you-so-sure/943328/119 "2021-06-02T02:43:18Z")
> [@Mijin](#): > > **“Man on the street” definitions** > atheism = someone sure there is no god > > **Original, or formal definitions** > atheism = lack of belief in god I would say the different definitions are not so much between “man on the street” and “original or formal”. The difference is more between “The theist on the street when talking at or about atheists” and “Atheists talking about themselves”. I’m not sure it’s fair to describe a definition widely used by the subject of the word as merely “original or formal”. ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2021, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-and-atheist-dopers-what-makes-you-so-sure/943328/120 "2021-06-02T03:14:56Z")
I’m an atheist. I am sure that’s what I am, but I’m very open to persuasion, if anyone ever comes along with a description of a theism that isn’t internally contradictory and illogical, and based on supernatural beings. Look at that word, “supernatural.” As far as I am concerned, it just means “outside of reality.” My “sureness” is based on an internal commitment to do my best to face reality and not run away from it. I can believe many things that I haven’t seen. But I can’t believe in things that contradict every single thing I have learned during my 71 years on this planet. That’s really all it is. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-and-atheist-dopers-what-makes-you-so-sure/943328.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-and-atheist-dopers-what-makes-you-so-sure/943328.md?page=7)