Legitimate reasons not to believe in God

[9-10ths_Penguin]

legitimate: If you say that something such as a feeling or claim is legitimate, you think that it is reasonable and justified.
Legitimate definition and meaning | Collins English Dictionary

In my opinion, two legitimate reasons not to believe in God are as follows:

1. There is no proof that God exists
2. There is too much suffering in the world for God to exist

I believe there are also legitimate reasons to believe in God as either position can be argued and justified with reason.

Other potential legitimate reasons not to believe in God:

- Positive evidence that the universe is godless (i.e. going beyond just the lack of evidence in your reason #1).

- Positive evidence for a system that's inconsistent with God (e.g. strong evidence for a belief system that preaches a closed pantheon without God-with-a-capital-G).

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

I have read Godel, Escher, Bach. In essense, the author argues that artificial intelligence can match human intelligence some day, despite what some people might conclude from Godel's theorem.

You really need to reread the book.

 

[wellwisher]

legitimate: If you say that something such as a feeling or claim is legitimate, you think that it is reasonable and justified.
Legitimate definition and meaning | Collins English Dictionary

In my opinion, two legitimate reasons not to believe in God are as follows:

1. There is no proof that God exists
2. There is too much suffering in the world for God to exist

I believe there are also legitimate reasons to believe in God as either position can be argued and justified with reason.

One reason not to believe in God, is if one lacks self control and cannot follow the moral codes of religion, then a non belief in God can offer an excuse to hide the fact the ego lacks self control.

It is hard to believe in God and also become a pervert, for example, since this will cause constant inner conflict. To end the conflict and be freer to choose the low road, that path can be made easier to walk by getting on the God denial bandwagon. There you will get group support that will tell you this path is good for you and is the new normal.

When I was a teen, I wanted to participate in the things of behavior of youth that adults did not condone. Belief in God became an obstacle since it defined a different path, than the ways of the streets and back alleys. To run in those social circles, easier, I needed to repress parts of my religion that would keep me in conflict, while retaining things that made good social sense, like love your neighbor; honor among the street people. My compromise was selective denial; one leg in each world.

 

[ChristineM]

Not surprising when I think of it, since you don't believe in God. Not interested in arguing the case here. I've never seen an argument work on an atheist.

Works both ways

 

[ChristineM]

Unless of course its reasonable to point out that God is the product of people's imagination.

I can agree with that but very few believers actually believe that

 

[Colt]

legitimate: If you say that something such as a feeling or claim is legitimate, you think that it is reasonable and justified.
Legitimate definition and meaning | Collins English Dictionary

In my opinion, two legitimate reasons not to believe in God are as follows:

1. There is no proof that God exists
2. There is too much suffering in the world for God to exist

I believe there are also legitimate reasons to believe in God as either position can be argued and justified with reason.

Since God is spirit, we can only approach God subjectively.

* There is no proof that life invented itself.

*There is too much good in the world for it to simply be a meaningless material phenomenon.

 

[Evangelicalhumanist]

legitimate: If you say that something such as a feeling or claim is legitimate, you think that it is reasonable and justified.
Legitimate definition and meaning | Collins English Dictionary

In my opinion, two legitimate reasons not to believe in God are as follows:

1. There is no proof that God exists
2. There is too much suffering in the world for God to exist

I believe there are also legitimate reasons to believe in God as either position can be argued and justified with reason.

I don't even think it's so much "reason not to believe in God," but more a question of "whyever would I imagine such a thing in the first place?"

Here we are, living in a world we can't always explain, not quite understanding even how we came to be, except knowing that sex begets, and that we had parents so we were begotten -- but that just leads to a chain of events without a known start. To some extent (not completely) Darwin answered that.

So we make up reasons for what we can't understand, or we simply admit not being able to understand. Typically, we humans don't like the latter. Say I can't find my eye-glasses when I get up in the morning. Should I conjure up a belief in a myopic elf who crept into my room at night and stole them, or is it more likely that, since I had a couple of beers before bed, I put them down and forgot where?

To the non-believer, it is not that so much we have legitimate reasons not to believe, but that we have insufficient reason to propose the question in the first place.

 

[Sand Dancer]

legitimate: If you say that something such as a feeling or claim is legitimate, you think that it is reasonable and justified.
Legitimate definition and meaning | Collins English Dictionary

In my opinion, two legitimate reasons not to believe in God are as follows:

1. There is no proof that God exists
2. There is too much suffering in the world for God to exist

I believe there are also legitimate reasons to believe in God as either position can be argued and justified with reason.

Those are the 2 biggies for me.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Not surprising when I think of it, since you don't believe in God. Not interested in arguing the case here. I've never seen an argument work on an atheist.

We all have our mental models of how the universe works. Most people's mental models agree with what they experience and observe really well, so they have no reason to change them.

... but here's the thing: this is just as true regardless of whether a person's mental model includes some version of God. This tells us that the difference between those models - i.e. God - is irrelevant to what we observe and adds no explanatory value. If we think about it a bit, we can recognize that this fact is itself evidence of God's non-existence.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Since God is spirit, we can only approach God subjectively.

Wait... what? How could this be a coherent argument?

* There is no proof that life invented itself.

Is there any legitimate reason to think our only choices are "life invented itself" and "God created life by magic poofing"?

*There is too much good in the world for it to simply be a meaningless material phenomenon.

How much good is the limit for "a meaningless material phenomenon"? Why would we assume that a meaningless "immaterial" phenomenon would create more good?

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

In my opinion, two legitimate reasons not to believe in God are as follows:

1. There is no proof that God exists
2. There is too much suffering in the world for God to exist ...

1. "proof" is a notoriously problematic term. To the best of my knowledge there is no proof of string theory or the existence of extraterrestrial life. Would you believe that belief in either is illegitimate?
2. Who made up that rule? You pretend to know the qualities of a God that you then deem improbable. Whether or not God exists, the problem is entirely the result of that pretense.

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

I've never seen an argument work on an atheist.

You probably mean a critical thinker. You know what his rules for belief are. If you meet that standard, you will be believed. Here's what theists rarely consider - that they are wrong about gods existing or manifesting. If they are, they will never be able to make a compelling argument that they exist. And that's why

In my opinion, two legitimate reasons not to believe in God are as follows: 1. There is no proof that God exists 2. There is too much suffering in the world for God to exist

The legitimate reason to not believe in gods is that there is insufficient evidence to believe. The empiricist waits for a finding (evidence) that requires positing a god to explain before invoking that hypothesis. Presently, there is none - no evidence that isn't consistent with a godless, naturalistic universe.

I believe there are also legitimate reasons to believe in God as either position can be argued and justified with reason.

There is no intellectual justification for a god belief - no sound argument that ends, "therefore God" - but there are psychological benefits for some, especially older believers. I would encourage younger theists to choose humanism and critical thinking / empiricism. That's when I made the transition, which has beneficially informed my life since. But would it now? I don't see how. It's a lot like travel. Seeing the world when younger beneficially informs one's worldview for decades to come, but if one waits until old age, it's harder and just entertainment anyway at that point.

Does falsifiable mean true?

No. It means that if a statement is false, one can imagine a finding that demonstrates that fact. It's a rule to confine claims to those that describe what can be experienced rather than metaphysical claims. So, the claims of the theory of evolution could potentially be disproved if they are wrong. I say potentially, because one can also imagine that it is untrue, and that falsifying evidence exists but is never found - hence the word imagine. Imagine that a dog gave birth to a cat one day without technical intervention. Goodbye theory. Hence, the theory is falsifiable. But the claims of creationists are different. Even if correct, no evidence of that can be conceived of (imagined) - at least not by me or anybody else to my knowledge.

Belief in God is not contrary to the evidence since there is no evidence that suggests that God does not exist.

And there never will be even if that is the case, because the claim is unfalsifiable. What conceivable finding could rule the possibility of gods out? None to my knowledge.

But you need to be careful when capitalizing it and not using an article - "God" verses "a god." God usually means a specific god. Some of those CAN be ruled out, including the one most commonly called God in the West. The god of Genesis has been ruled out. There is no honest god that created the earth and life on it as described in the Christian Bible. Do you recall the argument? The theory of evolution, if correct, rules that out, but what if evolution were falsified tomorrow? What must be true about the origin of life on earth were that to happen if not naturalistic evolution? There was a deceptive intelligent designer, albeit not necessarily a supernatural one. Extraterrestrials would be more likely, but that's not the main point. Even were it a god, it's not that god. It's more of a Satan or Puck or Loki kind of god.

This is very much unlike Trump losing the election, since there was plenty of evidence that demonstrated that Trump lost the election.

An interesting comparison. It was never demonstrated that the election was fair. What was demonstrated is that there is no evidence that it was unfair. Are those the same thing? I'd say no. When a jury declares not guilty, they are not saying that innocence has been demonstrated, merely that guilt has not.

But we justifiably believe that the election was fair because we don't believe that if it weren't, that could be covered up following multiple audits and recounts of the allegedly most egregious elections. Why? Because absence of expected evidence is evidence of absence, which can elevate belief to beyond a reasonable doubt, but not to disproof.

And this is where gods find themselves as well. We can never demonstrate their nonexistence, just the absence of evidence of their existence, which is not the same, but is treated the same. Everywhere we look that might reveal evidence of a god if one existed ends up being a dead end. The believers in such gods tell us why their gods perfectly imitate their own nonexistence, but after awhile, they have dozens of just-so stores. The reason this god doesn't interfere with free will is that it doesn't want to. The reason its holy books seem like they were written by men is yadda. The reason why this god never manifests except in hearsay is yadda. The reason why children suffer and die of leukemia is yadda. The reason science contradicts scripture is yadda.

I've offered the metaphor of the loaded coin to you before. There exists a coin that many believe is a fair coin, but we are not allowed or able to weigh it or X-ray it to definitively demonstrate that it is a normal, evenly balanced coin. The only test we can do is watch it flip and tally the results. The coin keeps coming up tails. Believers in a fair coin explain after five tails that that is normal for a fair coin. Then it's twenty consecutive tails. Well, that can happen, too. Then a hundred. And then a thousand straight tails. Eventually, concluding that the coin is loaded is the parsimonious explanation for that, but it's never been demonstrated definitively the way we could if we had access to the coin.

This is what I have called the argument by restricted choice. A fair coin can come up heads or tails, but a loaded one only tails. A universe with a god in it might show evidence of that god or it might not (heads or tails), but a godless universe will always manifest as godless (tails).

Now consider your comment in the light of this. I say that we have the same kind of evidence that gods don't manifest in nature that we have that fraud didn't manifest in the election - strong evidence that can never rise to proof.

It is true that if the description of God runs contrary to factual evidence then we know that kind of God cannot exist, but that doesn't mean that there is no God that exists.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Belief in God is not contrary to the evidence since there is no evidence that suggests that God does not exist.

I disagree. There's no shortage of evidence that God does not exist.

 

[Colt]

Wait... what? How could this be a coherent argument?


Is there any legitimate reason to think our only choices are "life invented itself" and "God created life by magic poofing"?


How much good is the limit for "a meaningless material phenomenon"? Why would we assume that a meaningless "immaterial" phenomenon would create more good?

Unless you ever experience sufficient ego deflation to find God within yourself then you won't understand what I mean. It's not an "argument", it's an acknowledgment.

Life was created and fostered through the process of evolution. Primitive life forms didn't suddenly appear and begin envisioning more complex life forms, falling uphill through endless coincidences.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Unless you ever experience sufficient ego deflation to find God within yourself then you won't understand what I mean. It's not an "argument", it's an acknowledgment.

It's incoherent is what it is, and if you're telling me that I'd have to believe in God for it to make sense, what you're really saying is that it doesn't make sense in and of itself.

Life was created and fostered through the process of evolution. Primitive life forms didn't suddenly appear and begin envisioning more complex life forms, falling uphill through endless coincidences.

... so therefore magic poofing by God?

 

[Colt]

It's incoherent is what it is, and if you're telling me that I'd have to believe in God for it to make sense, what you're really saying is that it doesn't make sense in and of itself.


... so therefore magic poofing by God?

Its incoherent to you but not to people of faith.

No, not the "magic poofing" of abiogenesis, deliberate planting and fostering of life forms in the ancient briny seas on a very old earth.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Its incoherent to you but not to people of faith.

So that first post of yours that I quoted was meant to be incoherent to a big chunk of the people reading it?

I don't believe you.

No, not the poofing of abiogenesis, deliberate planting and fostering of life forms in the ancient briny seas on a very old earth.

... tended to by magic poofing of God over the years to encourage it to branch out as God intended, since it could not have developed as it did without significant magic poofing along the way... right?

 

[Colt]

So that first post of yours that I quoted was meant to be incoherent to a big chunk of the people reading it?

I don't believe you.

... tended to by magic poofing of God over the years to encourage it to branch out as God intended, since it could not have developed as it did without significant magic poofing along the way... right?

It wasn't meant to be incoherent, it's just spiritual truth. Defiant atheists are incapable of comprehending spiritual truths. Their goal seems to be to pick flaws and be argumentative just for the sake of it. Thats not my problem.

Evolution is designed with inherent mechanisms to do what evolution does. No magic, Gods way is natural regardless of people calling it miraculous.

 

[osgart]

It's very easy to rule out a benevolent God, and an all powerful God based on the observance of nature. It's very easy to rule out a supernatural God because no one has ever witnessed a supernatural event.

I'm convinced that there is naturalistic teleology in nature. However the source of that could never be called a God. Whatever, or whomever made us and all of life is clearly subordinate to the rules of the physical world. Life has the appearance of being someone's experiment. There's nothing flawless, self sufficient, or moral about the conditions of life. There's nothing superior in quality about the physical world.

I'm afraid I'm stuck with the idea that life is a desparate experiment, and foundational reality is made of consciousness, and stuff of programmable intelligence. Naturalistic meta realities seem quite possible to me, and often likely.

Gods by definition have authority and command over existence. No one has ever witnessed such a being.

The moral argument is the strongest argument for God. However it falls short of being descriptive of reality. There's nothing morally perfect about the world.

 

[F1fan]

It appears to atheists that theists lack adequate answers,

It's more than just appearance. Theists have no evidence that is recognized by a rational mind. Unless you can demonstrate how theists have some sort of magical extra sensory abilities to sense various gods and atheists don't, your claim hre is nonsese. If theists have evidence any objective mind would recognize it. Notice Hindus don;t recognize Christian 'evidence" and Christians don't recognize hindu "evidence". So this isn't a theist versis atheist thing at all. This is a matter of various theists believing in whatever ideological framework they want for personal, non-rational reasons.

and I find that for theists likewise atheists lack adequate answers.

Are you referring to rational answers or alternatives to religious belief that theists don't like?

It does no good to argue either way. Arguing hardens the other's position, because of ego.

Only those who make claims that they can't defend. Atheists defer to the logical default in debate, in that any claim or proposition is by default considered untrue until it is demonstrated as being true.