Atheistic Double Standard?

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Ya, I am sorry, but this is not very interesting. Just live with the fact I shared my thoughts on the chart.

My mistake for thinking you were trying to make a relevant point, I guess.

 

[Jeremiahcp]

My mistake for thinking you were trying to make a relevant point, I guess.

Well I thought it was relevant, but I just don't really feel a deep analysis of the chart would be all that interesting.

 

[Willamena]

And?

 

[Willamena]

... but I just don't really feel a deep analysis of the chart would be all that interesting.

Not to mention irrelevant. The chart delineates sets of atheists.

 

[Vaderecta]

Speaking in general and in your opinion, do non-believers hold a double standard when it comes to religion?

Such as for example: Demanding religious claims be backed by hard evidence, but then not holding the same standards for their own claims.

Faith vs Reason. This is not a double standard IMHO.

 

[gnomon]

Speaking in general and in your opinion, do non-believers hold a double standard when it comes to religion?

Such as for example: Demanding religious claims be backed by hard evidence, but then not holding the same standards for their own claims.

Speaking in general? And your title directed it towards atheists........but speaking in general.

Do non-believers hold a double standard when it comes to religion?

Name any religion, I mean a specific religion, not Christianity or Judaism or Hinduism or Islam, but a specific religion such as Catholicism, Orthodox, the divisions of Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism etc.......name any specific one of those religions and the fact is that the majority of the population would be non-believers of those religions. Their is no single religion that is dominant among a majority of the population of this planet,

All of these religions, which exist in a minority over the entirety of the human population, demand evidence for their claims but the majority do not believe in them for their own various religious or non-religious beliefs. They all hold contradictory demands of proof, or rather faith, for their beliefs. Namely upon specific cultural beliefs.

But they all adhere that others hold the same standards despite their disparate beliefs.

Then.....we have atheists. Who uphold a set of arguments contradicting all religious beliefs while at the same the many different religious beliefs are upholding standards against each other.

What is the standard? Where do you even find a standard?

Okay....I'm picking on the OP. Stating that the various religious beliefs do not adhere to a single standard.

But it is known that atheism holds no belief in a God.......a central force that created the universe and devised moral standards upon humanity. But actually, there are religious beliefs that believe there is a God that created the universe but did not devise moral standards upon humanity.

At this point I'm finding the OP ridiculous. But let's narrow it down to simple religious cosmology. Or in other words whether or not there was a single creative force upon the universe and disregard all mythology and cultural mores as defined by the disparate religions. Simply.....was there a single creative intelligent force behind existence or not?

Well,, many religious traditions have debated this concept within their own culture and devised their own standards and atheism simply adheres to demanding an evidentiary based standard that many religious cultures have tried to answer.

So where is the double standard?

Where is the evidence that atheists are not holding themselves to their own standard while demanding hard evidence?

Their are religious believers who denounced the witch hunts where non-believers did so as well. There are religious believers studying the evolution of the universe and it's expansion alongside atheists studying the same phenomenon.

The OP failed to provide any standards for discussion.

Which religious claims? By whom? Non-believers who are religious discount numerous religious claims made by religious people.

What a stupid ****ing thread.

And what evidence, if any, was presented that atheists are not providing "hard evidence" for their own claims? None.

What a stupid ****ing thread.

Good day. Wa an. My keyboard doesn't have the pinyin capability.

Jiu hao mung.

 

[Jeremiahcp]

Speaking in general? And your title directed it towards atheists........but speaking in general.

Do non-believers hold a double standard when it comes to religion?

Name any religion, I mean a specific religion, not Christianity or Judaism or Hinduism or Islam, but a specific religion such as Catholicism, Orthodox, the divisions of Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism etc.......name any specific one of those religions and the fact is that the majority of the population would be non-believers of those religions. Their is no single religion that is dominant among a majority of the population of this planet,

All of these religions, which exist in a minority over the entirety of the human population, demand evidence for their claims but the majority do not believe in them for their own various religious or non-religious beliefs. They all hold contradictory demands of proof, or rather faith, for their beliefs. Namely upon specific cultural beliefs.

But they all adhere that others hold the same standards despite their disparate beliefs.

Then.....we have atheists. Who uphold a set of arguments contradicting all religious beliefs while at the same the many different religious beliefs are upholding standards against each other.

What is the standard? Where do you even find a standard?

Okay....I'm picking on the OP. Stating that the various religious beliefs do not adhere to a single standard.

But it is known that atheism holds no belief in a God.......a central force that created the universe and devised moral standards upon humanity. But actually, there are religious beliefs that believe there is a God that created the universe but did not devise moral standards upon humanity.

At this point I'm finding the OP ridiculous. But let's narrow it down to simple religious cosmology. Or in other words whether or not there was a single creative force upon the universe and disregard all mythology and cultural mores as defined by the disparate religions. Simply.....was there a single creative intelligent force behind existence or not?

Well,, many religious traditions have debated this concept within their own culture and devised their own standards and atheism simply adheres to demanding an evidentiary based standard that many religious cultures have tried to answer.

So where is the double standard?

Where is the evidence that atheists are not holding themselves to their own standard while demanding hard evidence?

Their are religious believers who denounced the witch hunts where non-believers did so as well. There are religious believers studying the evolution of the universe and it's expansion alongside atheists studying the same phenomenon.

The OP failed to provide any standards for discussion.

Which religious claims? By whom? Non-believers who are religious discount numerous religious claims made by religious people.

What a stupid ****ing thread.

And what evidence, if any, was presented that atheists are not providing "hard evidence" for their own claims? None.

What a stupid ****ing thread.

Good day. Wa an. My keyboard doesn't have the pinyin capability.

Jiu hao mung.

You are so angry all the time it impedes your ability to listen.

Any atheist that makes the assertion they never make an unsubstantiated claim is flat out a lair. That assertion could be anything, like the Moon is made of cheese. That is the double standard.

 

[Jeremiahcp]

Not to mention irrelevant. The chart delineates sets of atheists.

Never said it didn't.

 

[SkepticThinker]

You are so angry all the time it impedes your ability to listen.

Any atheist that makes the assertion they never make an unsubstantiated claim is flat out a lair. That assertion could be anything, like the Moon is made of cheese. That is the double standard.

I'm wondering what such an assertion would have to do with atheism/atheists in the first place. If someone says "the moon is made of cheese," what would being an atheist have to do with it? Such an assertion doesn't relate to the existence of god(s), which is the only thing atheism is actually about.

 

[Jeremiahcp]

I'm wondering what such an assertion would have to do with atheism/atheists in the first place. If someone says "the moon is made of cheese," what would being an atheist have to do with it? Such an assertion doesn't relate to the existence of god(s), which is the only thing atheism is actually about.

I actually already addressed that question earlier in the thread as well. I know it is a long thread to read, but I also don't feel like repeating myself over and over.

 

[1robin]

Saying that something is its own cause is different than saying it has no cause. Most quantum events have no cause. Nothing precedes them that determines that they will happen.

Yes they do. I hear them all the time start by assuming fluctuations in energy fields. Fluctuating fields are mysterious but that are things and are theoretical causes.

And he is wrong in that.

The point is that the 'context' is completely irrelevant to reality. Aquinas assumed certain things about motion which were based on Aristotelian physics. But we know that Aristotle was wrong. So Aquinas' conclusions are based on faulty premises.

No, a prime mover as an explanation of all derivative matter is just as necessary in considering events in time, actual sequential divisions of time, and all state changes in time, etc... All require an uncaused first cause.

Again, you have given no reason why it is impossible to accomplish in an infinite amount of time. It is NOT a contradiction!

Yes it is, if the universe existed an infinite time ago we could not possibly reach now. Claiming an impossibility is possible is a contradiction.

You have merely claimed, without proof, that it is impossible to 'traverse' an infinite number of instants.

Consider two shores separated by an infinite sea, how are you going to build a bridge between them? No matter how long you have been building and no matter what rate your building at you will always be an infinite distance away from your destination. I do not even care of you started building and never stopped, you would still never produce an infinite bridge. I don't care if you pick any point along the bridge being already under construction, you will eternally remain infinitely short of your goal.

But the uniqueness of an uncaused cause is central to your claim.

It is an inference to the best explanation. If we have a current state of affairs, then all past sequential states of affairs must necessarily resolve to an uncaused caused first cause. Like I keep saying, if you have a dollar then someone a finite time ago produced a dollar. If we need to keep looking infinitely into the past to find the person to loan us a dollar we will never have the dollar. Since we have a dollar (a universe or a now) then someone that transcends nature produced a universe a finite time ago. Think of the past sequence of events following having an actual state of affairs in the infinite past (it does not have to do anything with a starting point), how are we going to traverse the infinite stated of affairs necessary to result in the current state? If we ever asked for a dollar (looked for an external reality) and eventually received the dollar then the chain of regression had to end with a guy producing a dollar a finite time ago. How many analogies are required to illustrate an obvious conclusion? Start at any number (you do not even have to start at the beginning, just pick a random number) and begin counting, you will never reach infinity. If you can't add events to create an infinite then you can't subtract actual things to gain an infinity either.

And, again, quantum fluctuation. Specifically, electron-positron pairs come into existence without anything preceding and without a cause.

Wow, you responded to my claim that you always cry "quantum" when your philosophy fails, and you rebut me by using the "quantum".

Please learn a bit about the real world before you make claims about how it 'must' be. Causality is dependent on natural laws, and hence is part of the universe. Because of this, the universe *cannot* have a cause.

There is no known exception to the argument that anything that begins to exist has a cause. There is no known exception to the argument that everything that exists has an explanation. At least none available to 99.99% of the population. My claims are consistent with observable reality, without exception. Your claims exist as a possibility in a tiny corner of a not so well understood theory younger than I am.

Why do you wish so much to live in a universe with a deity?

My faith is not based on wish fulfillment, I had no expectation what so ever (I mean zero) of what to expect concerning encountering the Holy Spirit (or even that it was possible) but as a byproduct of that confirmation of God's existence, there is now reason to hope. Only with a deity is there hope for a paradisiacal eternal life, ultimate meaning to existence, reunion with loved ones, ultimate purpose to the universe, ultimate moral truths, ultimate justice, sanctity in human life, a moral explanation for our claims to biological sovereignty, racial equality, an end, reckoning, and cure for man's moral insanity, etc.......ad infinitum.

My opinion has nothing at all to do with the evidence or the arguments. The arguments you made for the existence of a God are flawed. The evidence is, at best, ambiguous. At worst, it shows that the Christian viewpoint is pure mythology.

I claim the evidence is sufficient, you claim it is not. Let's take a look at one of (if not the) greatest expert on testimony and evidence in human history and see which one he agrees with.


Simon Greenleaf (1783-1853) was the famous Royall Professor of Law at Harvard University, and succeeded Justice Joseph Story as the Dane Professor of Law in the same university, upon Story's death in 1846.

H. W. H Knott says of this great authority in jurisprudence: "To the efforts of Story and Greenleaf is to be ascribed the rise of the Harvard Law School to its eminent position among the legal schools of the United States."

Greenleaf produced a famous work entitled A Treatise on the Law of Evidence which "is still considered the greatest single authority on evidence in the entire literature of legal procedure."

In 1846, while still Professor of Law at Harvard, Greenleaf wrote a volume entitled An Examination of the Testimony of the Four Evangelists by the Rules of Evidence Administered in the Courts of Justice. In his classic work the author examines the value of the testimony of the apostles to the resurrection of Christ. The following are this brilliant jurist's critical observations:

The great truths which the apostles declared, were, that Christ had risen from the dead, and that only through repentance from sin, and faith in Him, could men hope for salvation. This doctrine they asserted with one voice, everywhere, not only under the greatest discouragements, but in the face of the most appalling errors that can be represented to the mind of man. Their master had recently perished as a malefactor, by the sentence of a public tribunal. His religion sought to overthrow the religions of the whole world. The laws of every country were against the teachings of His disciples. The interests and passions of all the rulers and great men in the world were against them. The fashion of the world was against them. Propagating this new faith, even in the most inoffensive and peaceful manner, they could expect nothing but contempt, opposition, reviling's, bitter persecutions, stripes, imprisonments, torments, and cruel deaths. Yet this faith they zealously did propagate; and all these miseries they endured undismayed, nay, rejoicing. As one after another was put to a miserable death, the survivors only prosecuted their work with increased vigor and resolution. The annals of military warfare afford scarcely an example of the like heroic constancy, patience, and unflinching courage. They had every possible motive to review carefully the grounds of their faith, and the evidences of the great facts and truths which they asserted; and these motives were pressed upon their attention with the most melancholy and terrific frequency. It was therefore impossible that they could have persisted in affirming the truths they have narrated, had not Jesus actually risen from the dead, and had they not known this fact as certainly as they knew any other fact. If it were morally possible for them to have been deceived in this matter, every human motive operated to lead them to discover and avow their error. To have persisted in so gross a falsehood, after it was known to them, was not only to encounter, for life, all the evils which man could inflict, from without, but to endure also the pangs of inward and conscious guilt; with no hope of future peace, no testimony of a good conscience, no expectation of honor or esteem among men, no hope of happiness in this life, or in the world to come.

"Such conduct in the apostles would moreover have been utterly irreconcilable with the fact that they possessed the ordinary constitution of our common nature. Yet their lives do show them to have been men like all others of our race; swayed by the same motives, animated by the same hopes, affected by the same joys, subdued by the same sorrows, agitated by the same fears, and subject to the same passions, temptations, and infirmities, as ourselves. And their writings show them to have been men of vigorous understandings. If then their testimony was not true, there was no possible motive for its fabrication."

Greenleaf's only real competition comes from another expert on testimony and evidence and was the only person to hold every high legal office in histories largest empire.

Singleton Copley, better known as Lord Lyndhurst (1772-1863), recognized as one of the greatest legal minds in British history, the Solicitor-General of the British government in 1819, attorney-general of Great Britain in 1824, three times High Chancellor of England, and elected in 1846, High Steward of the University of Cambridge, thus holding in one lifetime the highest offices which a judge in Great Britain could ever have conferred upon him. When Chancellor Lyndhurst died, a document was found in his desk, among his private papers, giving an extended account of his own Christian faith, and in this precious, previously-unknown record, he wrote: "I know pretty well what evidence is; and I tell you, such evidence as that for the Resurrection has never broken down yet."

Evidence That Demands a Verdict - Ch. 10 p. 2
The Testimony of History and Law

My position is very well founded, and cannot be dismissed by mere declaration.

 

[SkepticThinker]

I actually already addressed that question earlier in the thread as well. I know it is a long thread to read, but I also don't feel like repeating myself over and over.

Umm, okay.

 

[Jeremiahcp]

Umm, okay.

 

[Polymath257]

Yes they do. I hear them all the time start by assuming fluctuations in energy fields. Fluctuating fields are mysterious but that are things and are theoretical causes.

No, there is a theory about their occurrence. That theory describes the probabilities of their happening during various time periods, but does NOT propose a cause for them.

No, a prime mover as an explanation of all derivative matter is just as necessary in considering events in time, actual sequential divisions of time, and all state changes in time, etc... All require an uncaused first cause.

Again, that is a claim, but it is unsupported by either evidence of logic.

Yes it is, if the universe existed an infinite time ago we could not possibly reach now. Claiming an impossibility is possible is a contradiction.

Just a second, I am NOT claiming there was a point an infinite amount of time ago. ALL times are a finite amount of time into the past (the duration em to us is always finite). But those durations are unbounded. That is what it means to have time go infinitely into the past. It is *very* different than a start that was infinitely far into the past.

Until you understand the distinction in those last two sentences, please ask until you do. It is crucial.

Consider two shores separated by an infinite sea, how are you going to build a bridge between them? No matter how long you have been building and no matter what rate your building at you will always be an infinite distance away from your destination. I do not even care of you started building and never stopped, you would still never produce an infinite bridge. I don't care if you pick any point along the bridge being already under construction, you will eternally remain infinitely short of your goal.

Right. But that is NOT the claim. There wasn't an infinite amount of time from any point to any other. There wasn't a start that was an infinite amount of time ago. Instead, there was just an infinite amount of time. Do you understand the difference here?

It is an inference to the best explanation. If we have a current state of affairs, then all past sequential states of affairs must necessarily resolve to an uncaused caused first cause. Like I keep saying, if you have a dollar then someone a finite time ago produced a dollar. If we need to keep looking infinitely into the past to find the person to loan us a dollar we will never have the dollar. Since we have a dollar (a universe or a now) then someone that transcends nature produced a universe a finite time ago.

And that is contradictory. Causes are always part of the universe. It is impossible to have a 'cause' that is prior to time or that is not within the universe of existing things.

Think of the past sequence of events following having an actual state of affairs in the infinite past (it does not have to do anything with a starting point), how are we going to traverse the infinite stated of affairs necessary to result in the current state?

I did not claim there was a state of affairs an infinite amount of time in the past. Do you understand the distinction between that and the statement that time is infinite?

If we ever asked for a dollar (looked for an external reality) and eventually received the dollar then the chain of regression had to end with a guy producing a dollar a finite time ago. How many analogies are required to illustrate an obvious conclusion? Start at any number (you do not even have to start at the beginning, just pick a random number) and begin counting, you will never reach infinity. If you can't add events to create an infinite then you can't subtract actual things to gain an infinity either.

Right. Any finite subtraction from a finite number will give a finite answer. No question about that. Any finite addition to a finite start will give a finite answer. Again, no issue with that.

Neither of these are relevant to what I have claimed.

Wow, you responded to my claim that you always cry "quantum" when your philosophy fails, and you rebut me by using the "quantum".

Yes, I do. Quantum mechanics isn't a causal description of the universe. I tis also the *best* description we have ever had. I'm sorry, but I'mnot going to use the older Newtonian version in a situation where I know it doesn't apply.

There is no known exception to the argument that anything that begins to exist has a cause. There is no known exception to the argument that everything that exists has an explanation. My claims are consistent with observable reality, without exception. Your claims exist as a possibility in a tiny corner of a not se well understood theory.

And AGAIN, that is simply wrong. Quantum fluctuations are *literally* uncaused. They happen *completely* randomly. There is *nothing* prior to them that determines what they do. Your claim of 'energy' fluctuations is faulty and shows a lack of understanding of how these things actually happen.

But, I can give other examples. A radioactive decay (pick any you want) will be uncaused in terms of *when* it happens. There is nothing different just before the decay that signals the decay will happen. Instead, there is only a *probability* of decay. No actual cause.

<propaganda snipped>

 

[1robin]

And that misunderstands the nature of causality. Causality *always* depends on time. Whatever causes is prior *in time* to whatever the effect is.

No, your trying to govern the supernatural by the one thing that can't govern it "the natural". God's decisions and actions are not governed by what governs what they are independent of.

God and Necessity

 

[1robin]

I understand both of your claims and I reject both of them.

I don't thing there is another option unless you consider other types of theologies. There are few things in theological debates as obviously true and simplistic as moral ontology. When someone assumes the counter position of every premise and every conclusion regardless of type it starts to look like a tactic instead of sincere conclusions.

I *don't* look to evolution for ethics. I look to evolution to *explain* how ethics come about.

What are you using asterisks to indicate? In this context your distinction makes little difference and you. What ethics came about? Since some societies pray for their neighbors and some prey of their neighbors and there exists no transcendent moral truth to appeal to. Who is right?

Since we are human, human well-being is what we are concerned about and hence, is the basis of our ethics. Giraffes may well have a different ethics.

Since humans subdue every other form of life on the planet then we are left right where we began, might makes right or preference. Every moral argument that excludes God will right back in this same place every single time. Hitler's Germany had their own ethics, Stalin's USSR had it's own ethics, Mao's China their own. By your standards they are just as "right" as anyone else and should have been left alone to do as they prefer.

But I don't justify it that way. I justify it via the fact that we are a species that engages in moral contemplation.

So the mere fact that we can consider moral issues makes our incarceration of cows and pumping them full of hormones ok? What about flooding the lungs of race horses with glucose and baking soda? Or our raising dogs purely to fight? That's all fine because we can thing about ethics?

No, it depends on the opinions of God. That may well be God's 'nature', but that only means that ethics are independent of God's viewpoint. Is that your claim? That God's viewpoint merely aligns rather than defines what is good?

No it does not. God's essence (nature) determines moral values and duties. God is composed of all "great making properties". God's nature is just - this makes injustice actually wrong, not just inconsistent with God's opinion. God has been equated with love its self - which makes hate (and probably indifference) actually wrong, not merely inconsistent with God's opinion.

God did not decide that Murder was wrong one day and decide to let Moses know. Murder had been wrong since before creation existed. The ten commandments were given to confirm that what the moral consciences of most human beings apprehended was in fact true, and to ground those truths in an eternal objective foundation. Euthyphro's dilemma is irrelevant.

On the contrary, none of these actually promote human well-being. That is clear from the millions killed by Hitler. That you see it as potentially serving the well-being of humans shows your complete lack of a true moral sense.

1. Hitler thought the Arian/Tibetan race that eventually wound up in Germany was the superior race.
2. To make the human race stronger he basically attempted to promote the strong and weed out the week.
3. That would naturally lead to Arian breeding farms.
4. Mass exterminations of races thought to be weaker.
5. Euthanizing the old.
6. Sterilizing criminals and the insane.
7. Medically experimenting on the few in hopes of helping the many.
8. ETC.......

It is very easy to see that the above is consistent with social Darwinism on steroids. I am glad the sleeping Christian giant of industrial excellence finally woke up and stopped Hitler. However on your world view, morality is preference based, and lacks any objective standard to determine which preference is actually true, and so we should have left the Germans alone. You can show that the human race would have been stronger on the whole if Hitler's Germany was successful.

If it doesn't depend on God's choice, then God is irrelevant to it. While God's opinion may well coincide with morality, it doesn't determine morality. So it is better to look for what does determine morality (i.e, human well-being) than to look to a deity for our counsel.

So God is either composed entirely of an opinion or he cannot exist. Glad we got that straightened out. You said above God's opinion determines reality and here you say the opposite. Which is it?

 

[Pudding]

I thought that might be your response, so I came up with a witty rebuttal ahead of time: I disagree!

There has to be a reason it is on the chart, whether realized or not, and it certainly can be read the way I read it.

No, the chart is focusing on the categories of atheists

The chart is suggesting there are no subcategories of group A.

What does that have to do with Pudding's chart?

You are joking, right? I would not even know how to begin to start counting all the various branches of monotheism.

@Jeremiahcp, my chart does not suggest there are no subcategories of group A.

My chart haven't mention the subcategories of group A, because my chart is focusing on the subcategories of group B, not group A.

I mention group A in the chart as a basic comparison to group B, after that i focus on explaining the subcategories of group B.

 

[1robin]

You are making the basic mistake of assuming causality to be older than the universe. Not so, the laws that are fundamental to the current state of this universe did not coalesce until 10e-36 to 10e-32 of a second after the bb event.

Whether the laws of casualty existed in what (if anything) was before this universe is a moot point, it is unknown.

Nope, God is independent of time. His actions are not bound by time (unless he chooses to break into time to take some specific action). God is causally prior to time, but not temporally prior to time. God is not bound by the natural, that is why he is called supernatural.

You are right about physics and the singularity but as neither were part of my argument this is irrelevant.

BTW When I say time I am referring to space-time.

 

[Pudding]

And?

You previously say "the claim of atheism is that there is no god".

Do you think "there is no god" must necessarily be the claim of atheism?
Do you think all atheists claim there is no god?

Please explain your full definitions for "atheism" and "atheist".

 

[1robin]

Does Aquinas say anything about why this first cause would exist in the first place?

I do not think so. Leibnitz's argument states that everything that exists has an explanation of it's self either within it's self or external to it's self. God is his own explanation, but what that explanation is does it go any further than that existence is a component of God's nature. I think these are what are called brute fact or properly basic beliefs.