Atheism is not Logical

Discuss philosophical questions regarding theism (and atheism), and discuss religion as it relates to philosophy. This includes any philosophical discussions that happen to be about god, gods, or a 'higher power' or the belief of them. This also generally includes philosophical topics about organized or ritualistic mysticism or about organized, common or ritualistic beliefs in the existence of supernatural phenomenon.
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Steve3007
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Re: Atheism is not Logical

Post by Steve3007 »

Consul wrote:One can draw a distinction between believing-that and believing-in...
Yes, as I recently said to Sculptor1 in another topic. Sculptor1 was expressing the view that "belief and "faith" are, as he put it, "two sides of the same coin". I disagreed. I said that was a specific and relatively uncommon usage of the word "belief". He asked me what usage that was. I said that it is often the usage with the word "in" after it. I express my beliefs about various things probably every day. For example (as I said to Sculptor1) I looked at the sky and said "I believe it's going to rain". That wasn't me expressing my faith in the rain gods.

But as I said a few posts ago, the notion that "belief = certainty" looks like it's not going to go away, along with the notion that "belief = faith". No matter how many times I say that (in my usage and the usage of everyone that I know) belief is not certainty, if I then say "I am an atheist" (which means I believe that there is no God) someone will say "but how can you be so sure?". That's why I've tried putting it in my signature!
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Re: Atheism is not Logical

Post by Steve3007 »

Incidentally, Tegularius, when you sais this:
Tegularius wrote:I don't' believe that's correct.
were you saying that you are certain that it is not correct? Or were you saying that, in your view, based on the evidence, it seems not to be correct?
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Sy Borg
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Re: Atheism is not Logical

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Steve3007 wrote: October 18th, 2021, 3:02 am
Sy Borg wrote:I still say that agnosticism makes sense because we don't know for sure if gods exist.
I agree that we don't know for sure whether God exists. I'm an atheist. Atheism is the belief that God does not exist. Belief is not certainty.

So you still hold that belief = certainty?
I must concede that, technically, there may be small differences between belief and certainty.

The difference between your belief and your certainty in this case is akin to the difference between two ping pong balls from the same assembly line. They may appear identical but one can detect differences under a sufficiently powerful microscope :)
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Re: Atheism is not Logical

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Sy Borg wrote:I must concede that, technically, there may be small differences between belief and certainty.
If that's how you use those words no problem. My own view is that they're entirely different things. As I've said, I think certainties are things like tautologies - things that it would be a self contradiction to deny; that are true by definition; that are true due to the logical structure of the language in which they're written.
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Re: Atheism is not Logical

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Steve3007 wrote: October 18th, 2021, 5:04 am
Sy Borg wrote:I must concede that, technically, there may be small differences between belief and certainty.
If that's how you use those words no problem. My own view is that they're entirely different things. As I've said, I think certainties are things like tautologies - things that it would be a self contradiction to deny; that are true by definition; that are true due to the logical structure of the language in which they're written.
According to the dictionary, certainty is "the state of being completely confident or having no doubt about something". You seem to be using the term "certainty" in a specialised way, as if certainty is an objective state of things rather than a state of mind, as per the above definition. I think uncertainty has a specific meaning in physics, but the issue here relates to subjective certainty.
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Re: Atheism is not Logical

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Sy Borg wrote:According to the dictionary, certainty is "the state of being completely confident or having no doubt about something". You seem to be using the term "certainty" in a specialised way,...
Well, I'd say I'm using it in a way that's appropriate for a philosophy discussion. As we know, it's possible to doubt most things.
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Re: Atheism is not Logical

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On the whole subject of atheism versus agnosticism:

In the past, on the occasions when I gave the subject any thought (like discussions in this section of this site) I'd have described myself as agnostic. This was because, like a lot of people, I made what I would now regard as the mistake of thinking that if I call myself atheist then I'm somehow declaring my faith and/or certainty about something. And I don't have that faith/certainty, so that declaration would be inaccurate. In fact, as you probably recall, that's a thing that is often said by theists to atheists (in places like this, not in real life, where people are sensible enough not to care about such things). They say things along the lines of: "Your atheism is just as much a faith-based position as my theism is!". I've come to realize that this is not true and is based on a misconception about belief.

Obviously, like most people, I don't give these matters much thought outside of places like this because they're irrelevant to almost everything in my life. Atheism isn't a "belief system" in a sense that it would form the foundation of all other beliefs. It's just one, relatively trivial, belief. Another belief I have (for example) is that it's not raining today.
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Re: Atheism is not Logical

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Steve3007 wrote: October 18th, 2021, 5:47 am On the whole subject of atheism versus agnosticism:

In the past, on the occasions when I gave the subject any thought (like discussions in this section of this site) I'd have described myself as agnostic. This was because, like a lot of people, I made what I would now regard as the mistake of thinking that if I call myself atheist then I'm somehow declaring my faith and/or certainty about something. And I don't have that faith/certainty, so that declaration would be inaccurate. In fact, as you probably recall, that's a thing that is often said by theists to atheists (in places like this, not in real life, where people are sensible enough not to care about such things). They say things along the lines of: "Your atheism is just as much a faith-based position as my theism is!". I've come to realize that this is not true and is based on a misconception about belief.

Obviously, like most people, I don't give these matters much thought outside of places like this because they're irrelevant to almost everything in my life. Atheism isn't a "belief system" in a sense that it would form the foundation of all other beliefs. It's just one, relatively trivial, belief. Another belief I have (for example) is that it's not raining today.
Atheism and theism come in varying intensities. I expect that plenty of each group go through their daily lives with nary a thought about their existential situation, just as plenty of others in each group have white hot viewpoints that they want to spread around to others.

I agree with Dawkins that atheists just believe in one less deity than do theists. Theists don't obsess about how much they disbelieve in other religion's gods, just as most atheists rarely give the God issue any thought.
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Re: Atheism is not Logical

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Sy Borg wrote: October 17th, 2021, 5:04 pm
Steve3007 wrote: October 17th, 2021, 7:45 am
Terrapin Station wrote:Right. That should be pretty obvious.

An example...
For reference, this particular strand of conversation started back here.

In that post I made the point (made numerous times before of course) that if I were to suspend [dis]belief about everything of which I am not certain then I would be unable to function because I would have to suspend [dis]belief about all things that aren't tautologies. In your example, you'd have to suspend [dis]belief as to whether your car even exists anymore, never mind where it's parked. Clearly that would be ridiculous. As we know, this has been discussed over and over again. In this context it started with me critiquing the notion that "agnosticism makes sense because we don't know for sure if there is a God". That's like saying "I'm agnostic as to whether my car still exists because I don't know for sure if it does". Clearly doesn't make sense. As you know, this has been discussed previously too.

But I think there are various reasons why none of this won't make any difference. What I've said above won't make any difference. What you've just said won't make any difference.
Almost no one is agnostic about the existence of their car, thus it's an inappropriate example.

I still say that agnosticism makes sense because we don't know for sure if gods exist.
Sorry it is pointless to be agnostic about a concept that is so clearly nonsense. Every quality attributed to god is either inherently incoherent or conflicts some other defintion of god. We definitely have no need to be agnostic about the real existence of Gandalf in exactly the same way, when Gandalf at least has the advantage of being consistent.
We know gods can exist subjectively; that a culture's deity can be real in a person's mind.
That does not make sense, as we all know Ra and Osirus existed in people's minds is not an answer to an empirical question.

To that end, it seems that we don't understand the nature of subjectivity at this stage. I am also unsure that the way humans perceive time and space is objective. I don't know if we live in the first ever universe; it would seem unlikely. If there were prior universes, I don't know if they could have left something interesting behind that permeates this one ... how far can evolution go in trillions of years?

We are famously not evolved to comprehend the biggest questions, only to perceive reality in such a way that it maximises survival and reproductive success. In terms of scientific progress, H. sapiens has been around for about a quarter of a million years, yet science as we know it is mere centuries old. Consider that a civilisation just 10,000 years ahead of us would probably consider today's conceptions of reality to be extremely naive. How about 100,000 years hence, which is not long in evolutionary time scales? Thus, I think it likely that people today have about as much chance of understanding deeper aspects of reality as a toddler has of understanding the intricacies of commercial law. So I'm in no hurry to declare allegiance to a side.

A final note, it strikes me that theists tend to glad that God exists and atheists tend to be glad that it's just a myth.
Last edited by Sculptor1 on October 18th, 2021, 1:50 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Atheism is not Logical

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Sy Borg wrote:I must concede that, technically, there may be small differences between belief and certainty.
Steve3007 wrote: October 18th, 2021, 5:04 am If that's how you use those words no problem. My own view is that they're entirely different things. As I've said, I think certainties are things like tautologies - things that it would be a self contradiction to deny; that are true by definition; that are true due to the logical structure of the language in which they're written.
Sy Borg wrote: October 18th, 2021, 5:26 am According to the dictionary, certainty is "the state of being completely confident or having no doubt about something". You seem to be using the term "certainty" in a specialised way, as if certainty is an objective state of things rather than a state of mind, as per the above definition. I think uncertainty has a specific meaning in physics, but the issue here relates to subjective certainty.
I think there are two issues here, conflated. 1. An issue of vocabulary, and 2. The extent to which we can be certain of anything in the 'real' world.

1. It is convenient for us to have a couple of words to indicate how certain (😉) we are about something. This is in itself confusing, as we are forcing a spectrum into a binary mould. For certainty is surely, in practice, a spectrum. But simple convenience is maybe (🤔) a justification for this?

There is a general (but not universal) consensus here, "Knowing" is when we're sure of something; "belief" is when we think something is probably the case. And degrees of "certainty" express how close to "know" or "believe" we are. This is not an edict, of course, but it is a selection of meanings that are widely used.

The terms we use for this don't matter, but most of us are willing to use "know" and "believe". Those who prefer other ways of expressing this are not wrong, though, as the consensus is not universal among the population and/or among dictionaries.

2. Uncertainty, in all its many manifestations, is prevalent in the real world. There is much debate as to the degree to which this applies, but the scientific concepts of quantum uncertainty and Godel's incompleteness are widely-accepted examples. The metaphysical uncertainty that calls stuff like Objectivism into question is less universally accepted, but still a contributing factor. This is a difficult and involved philosophical matter, as opposed to an issue of vocabulary. Of these two issues, surely the philosophical one is the most relevant to us, here in this forum?

P.S. As far as I can see, Steve is using "certainty" in pretty much the way the dictionary defines it. Certainty is certainly (😉) a personal assertion of 'convincedness' and not an "objective state of things", but it is still used in the dictionary sense, I believe.
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Re: Atheism is not Logical

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Pattern-chaser wrote:P.S. As far as I can see, Steve is using "certainty" in pretty much the way the dictionary defines it. Certainty is certainly (😉) a personal assertion of 'convincedness' and not an "objective state of things", but it is still used in the dictionary sense, I believe.
I use "certain" to mean "couldn't possibly be false". So that would be tautologies and statements about our own personal state of mind.
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Re: Atheism is not Logical

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Pattern-chaser wrote:P.S. As far as I can see, Steve is using "certainty" in pretty much the way the dictionary defines it. Certainty is certainly (😉) a personal assertion of 'convincedness' and not an "objective state of things", but it is still used in the dictionary sense, I believe.
Steve3007 wrote: October 18th, 2021, 8:58 am I use "certain" to mean "couldn't possibly be false".
Yes, that looks to me to be compatible with the dictionary definition Sy Borg offered: "the state of being completely confident or having no doubt about something".


Steve3007 wrote: October 18th, 2021, 8:58 am So that would be tautologies and statements about our own personal state of mind.
...and the lone example of Objective Truth we can knowingly possess, that Objective Reality exists. I think that about covers certainty, as much as we humans have access to.
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Re: Atheism is not Logical

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LuckyR wrote: October 15th, 2021, 6:33 pm
3017Metaphysician wrote: October 15th, 2021, 2:31 pm
LuckyR wrote: October 15th, 2021, 1:10 pm
3017Metaphysician wrote: October 15th, 2021, 9:09 am

Yo Lucky!

Don't take this the wrong way, but your response is not logical.
:)
I agree it is easier and more comfortable trying to throw stones at atheism than defending the ideosyncracies of the most common purveyors of theism.
Lucky!

Actually I think that response only serves to prove the whole (or at least one) point. The logical fallacy of straw man (an intentionally misrepresented proposition that is set up because it is easier to defeat than an opponent's real argument) is committed when one tries to distract or pivot to the two-wrongs-make-a-right approach.

I'm in no way trying to call you out, but instead, wanting to understand how an Atheist justifies his/her belief (system). Again, I've been 'equal opportunity' in the original OP and have attacked both sides from an obvious position of ontology (sentience) and Existentialism. Now, if you prefer to use 'strictly logic', then by all means please provide a simple logico-deductive proposition(s) that would be preferable to make your case.

I hope that clarifies my response to your response.
Sculptor's post notwithstanding, your post contains a few potential errors. First, a straw man fallacy is possible when discussing a topic with numerous possible options, when an irrelevant option for discussion is substituted instead of a relevant one. Theism vs atheism is a duality discussion, ie a zero sum game. Any situation either believes or disbelieves gods. Thus any option is relevant. OTOH if you are only prepared to defend a very narrow brand of theism, so be it. I will retract my comment (as a potential straw man)... right after an acknowledgement that what passes for theism in the vast majority of cases is more illogical than atheism.
Lucky!

Thank you for your thoughts. Just to be absolutely clear on your position, are you essentially saying that the Atheist's belief system is more sound than the Theist's belief system? One reason I'm asking is because we are touching on one of the arguments in the OP. And am not completely understanding (because I'm not an Atheist) how an Atheist reconciles their-at the risk of redundancy-believe system.

For example, I had mentioned both the ontological argument (recently) then the Omni-3 argument (in the OP), as a possible means of proving/disproving EOG relative to one's belief or value system. And so, say, if the Atheist considers the ontological argument not sound, using that same sense of logic, how does he/she arrive at such a different conclusion? Then, alternatively, if the Atheist even attacks the Omni-3 argument, Existentially, how does he/she reconcile things like the nature of one's own conscious existence, which is also logically impossible (like the Omni-3 argument), yet exists?

Does that help any?

Now, one possible way to attack (to help you) the ontological/cosmological arguments would be to make a case for 'mathematical finitude', as I alluded to earlier (?). But that would eliminate or severely limit the Atheists reliance on pure reason, and/or at least make him/her appear weak (since they seem to rely on logic so much to explain existence) in their explanations of reality. So we have a paradox. How does the Atheist resolve that?
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Re: Atheism is not Logical

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Sy Borg wrote: October 18th, 2021, 4:57 am I must concede that, technically, there may be small differences between belief and certainty.
One thing is objectively certain: Subjective certainty entails belief.
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Re: Atheism is not Logical

Post by Consul »

Sy Borg wrote: October 18th, 2021, 5:26 amAccording to the dictionary, certainty is "the state of being completely confident or having no doubt about something". You seem to be using the term "certainty" in a specialised way, as if certainty is an objective state of things rather than a state of mind, as per the above definition. I think uncertainty has a specific meaning in physics, but the issue here relates to subjective certainty.
There is a relevant distinction between psychological or subjective certainty and epistemological or objective certainty:

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/certainty/
"We may philosophize well or ill, but we must philosophize." – Wilfrid Sellars
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