They are rejected on the basis that you choose not to believe in them, what other basis is needed?
Whatever a person's reasons for rejecting one god, they only work as far as their reasons still apply.
For instance, "this god that created the world 6,000 years ago doesn't exist because the world is way older than 6,000 years" doesn't work as a reason to reject creator-gods of an old Earth.
(and you really think most people make any distinction between monotheist god concepts?)
Yes, I do. Why don't you?
If you understand the concept of 'police officer', you understand Greek police officer, Norwegian police officer etc.
"There are no police officers in Greece, therefore there are no police officers in Norway." Doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
If you believe all gods are mythical beings created in older cultures to fulfil social and psychological functions then this covers all gods. You understand this happened the world over, you understand they take many forms, you see them as part of the same archetype though.
That could be one approach to reject some gods. Another approach would be "I've seen the top of Mount Olympus and no gods lived there, therefore the Greek gods don't exist." Whether a person can reject the Norse gods on the same basis as the Greek gods depens on why they rejected the Greek gods.
But the reason you gave isn't a rational reason to
reject polytheistic gods; it's only a reason not to accept them. Our bad assumptions are sometimes coincidentally true, so the mere fact that a belief was made up or arrived at for bad reasons doesn't mean it's necessarily false; it's just unreliable. "A stopped clock is right twice a day" and all that.
You say I misrepresent your views, but then keep making exactly the same bizarre point about some kind of imaginary checklist that needs to be gone through one by one.
You're conflating a point I'm actually making with a point I'm not making.
You would need to go through what you consider to qualify as a god god-by-god unless you can come up with categories that can be rejected all together.
This fact doesn't mean that we're talking about every single god that humanity has ever conceived, unless a person's "concept of god" includes them.
You reject the category, not each individual named member of the category.
So then define the category.
Do you believe in fire breathing dragons? No.
Well what about Smaug? No
Drogon? No
Puff the Magic Dragon? No
I don't need to tick them off individually.
If the category "gods" is as easy for you to define and evaluate as the category "fire-breathing dragons," then you may be the only person who conceived of gods this way.
Unique leaps?
Unique leap 1: Understand concept(s)of god(s)
Unique leap 2: Choose to believe gods don't exist.
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No:
- unique leap #1: assume that everyone has a ridiculously simple concept of gods.
- unique leap #2: assume that merely lacking a belief that something is true is the same as rejecting the belief as false.