Atheism does not exist

[KonstantinosM]

This guy only smokes the dankest reefer. Whatever that means and then posts.


In your reply to me you stated that I am the one that is try to prove a negative.


You cannot simply take anything as a given. You take the existence of your deity as a given.

You can watch this, and if you understand it, we can talk about logic

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A9BfsHsVGNg

[salstimda]

The idea behind atheism is the non existence of god.  This logic is inherently flawed as itself is a negative.  Non existence does not exist.  To say non existence exists is a fallacy.  It is like a riddle.

Likewise, nothing is nothing.  You cannot be nothing, nor can you become something from nothing, nor can you become nothing from something.  Existence is eternal.

You may conceptualize nothingness, perhaps as darkness or void, but you cannot perceive nothing, for nothing does not exist.

Try not to get hung up on the title, you may perceive atheism to exist, though the basis of atheism itself does not exist.

Former atheist that used to believe in nothing.

i recommend the wikipedia article on atheism for some basic infos for you

[Hazir]

Ah, It is this thread again, yeah probably no one here can prove anything so move on, nothing to see here.

PS Why the only option to see if GOD exists is to die?

[FalconFly]

PS Why the only option to see if GOD exists is to die?

Because otherwise the clergymen would have to deal with a whole lot of dissatisfied customers wanting their money back

[Rassah]

With the verification of the Higgs Boson particle; we now know that our Universe has a finite lifespan. As time reaches infinity the Universe will no longer be able to bond atoms together, and then when all the atoms have been broken down, the subatomic particles will fall apart. Everything that once existed will no longer exist in it's current observable state. The result will be a new big bang and a new Universe formed with new matter. Quantum tunneling will cause propagation at various central points all moving relatively together. Time will not exist as it's a non-linear function with no observers moving at un-relative speeds.

The matter within the Universe will become mass-less; the energy is converted to velocity (galaxies are speeding up) and the physical laws of our universe will become null. Without the interaction of the Higgs Field, all atoms will burst into the subatomic particles that compose them.

Fuck that's depressing. Might throw a wrench into my future plans of getting a rickety old cargo hauler space ship and taking up a life of space piracy

Do you know of any sources to your claim? Not disputing, just want to read up some more.

[Rassah]

The Higgs Boson particle was theorized in 1964 but humanity lacked the technology to verify it's existence. It took scientists 49 years to develop the knowledge base that allowed for the verification of this particle. The existence of this particle was therefore un-falsifiable from the time is was theorized until the time when the technology was developed that allowed it to be verified and observed.

That's not what unfalsifiable means (and I suspect you know that). Even if we had no means or tools for getting for the Higgs Boson at the time, we knew what kind of tests could be done to disprove, or falsify it. Regardless of technological ability, everything in science can be proven wrong with the discovery of something that contradicts established theory. God is unfalsifiable, because there is nothing that we can discover that will disprove god. He could always be just out of reach, just like pink unicorns.


None of those questions s are interesting, BTW, since as of yet, none of them have any bearing on our lives or reality. One might as well ask "Do fairies shit in Avalon?"

[tspacepilot]

That's fine when a probability is quantifiable, as in your higgs boson example. What is the probability of the existence of god?

The probability only became quantifiable once a separate problem was solved; allowing scientists to draw up a new question using a better understanding of the old question.

until we can account for all of the variables surrounding the creation of our Universe and the events that took place upon the creation of our Universe the probability can never be anything more or less than 50/50.

For as long as there is a single "wild card" the probability will be un-quantifiable and will revert to basic odds that the existence of God will be either true or false.

Hypothetically, even if you have a probability of 99.99999% that God does not exist and yet you also have a single variable with an unknown magnitude then you still can't answer the question certainly as the entire equation is still off-balance.

The probability that I personally assign to God existing in some manner or another is much greater than pink Unicorns existing. Still, un-quantifiable...

Which is it, p = 0.5 or p = NA ?

There's a difference between ones personal inclination towards a subject expressed as a ratio or probability to illustrate an un-quantifiable thought and a real scientific probability which can be expressed and verified.

It's an oxymoron. I obviously wasn't making a claim to know the probability of either; I thought the context of the statement was clear. I chose the best way to compare the two unknown probabilities in a manner consistent with our previous conversation...

I was providing you with my personal opinion as to the outcome of the question in the form of a comparison.

I can't answer your question where p=probability because I don't know all of the conditions or variables. I can tell you that the raw probability of a yes or no statement is 50/50 as there's no third conclusion to the question.

There *are* ways to estimate the probability of an event whos actual probabililty is not known.  One common such method is maximum likelihood.  In this case, I've never seen any God observations, so p=0 even with MLE.

This thread is so much more serious now that dank has given up.  I was just coming here for the lolz and now you guys are all thinking your brains off about this.

[organofcorti]

There *are* ways to estimate the probability of an event whos actual probabililty is not known.  One common such method is maximum likelihood.  In this case, I've never seen any God observations, so p=0 even with MLE.

This thread is so much more serious now that dank has given up.  I was just coming here for the lolz and now you guys are all thinking your brains off about this.

The maximum likelihood estimator for the existence of god? This is awesome - please share this estimator!

[Hazir]

That's fine when a probability is quantifiable, as in your higgs boson example. What is the probability of the existence of god?

The probability only became quantifiable once a separate problem was solved; allowing scientists to draw up a new question using a better understanding of the old question.

until we can account for all of the variables surrounding the creation of our Universe and the events that took place upon the creation of our Universe the probability can never be anything more or less than 50/50.

For as long as there is a single "wild card" the probability will be un-quantifiable and will revert to basic odds that the existence of God will be either true or false.

Hypothetically, even if you have a probability of 99.99999% that God does not exist and yet you also have a single variable with an unknown magnitude then you still can't answer the question certainly as the entire equation is still off-balance.

The probability that I personally assign to God existing in some manner or another is much greater than pink Unicorns existing. Still, un-quantifiable...

Which is it, p = 0.5 or p = NA ?

There's a difference between ones personal inclination towards a subject expressed as a ratio or probability to illustrate an un-quantifiable thought and a real scientific probability which can be expressed and verified.

It's an oxymoron. I obviously wasn't making a claim to know the probability of either; I thought the context of the statement was clear. I chose the best way to compare the two unknown probabilities in a manner consistent with our previous conversation...

I was providing you with my personal opinion as to the outcome of the question in the form of a comparison.

I can't answer your question where p=probability because I don't know all of the conditions or variables. I can tell you that the raw probability of a yes or no statement is 50/50 as there's no third conclusion to the question.

There *are* ways to estimate the probability of an event whos actual probabililty is not known.  One common such method is maximum likelihood.  In this case, I've never seen any God observations, so p=0 even with MLE.

This thread is so much more serious now that dank has given up.  I was just coming here for the lolz and now you guys are all thinking your brains off about this.

Can you tell us hot to it pls? Im not good with estimating unknown things...

[Lyomon86]

 "Non existence does not exist.  To say non existence exists is a fallacy..." I'm confused!

[J603]

How does such a pointless OP get 15 pages of replies?

Come on, obviously atheism exists...

[Khadaji]

Atheism isn't a believe in the non-existence of god, it is saying "I don't believe you when you claim that god exists, because you don't have any evidence."

That's all.

Simply untrue.

Check with any dictionary, and you'll discover that "Atheism" does indeed mean that you don't believe God exists... as Webster's puts it:

a :  a disbelief in the existence of deity
b :  the doctrine that there is no deity

I disagree, however, that there's anything wrong with believing in the non-existence of something. (Not that I'm an Atheist, mind you!)

[Rassah]

Atheism isn't a believe in the non-existence of god, it is saying "I don't believe you when you claim that god exists, because you don't have any evidence."

That's all.

Simply untrue.

Check with any dictionary, and you'll discover that "Atheism" does indeed mean that you don't believe God exists... as Webster's puts it:

a :  a disbelief in the existence of deity
b :  the doctrine that there is no deity

I disagree, however, that there's anything wrong with believing in the non-existence of something. (Not that I'm an Atheist, mind you!)

What's the difference between "I don't believe that god exists" and "a disbelief in the existence of a deity?"

[tspacepilot]

clause vs noun phrase

[dank]

Noting the prefix uni (one) and the definition "totality of existence," can we also agree that the universe means everything?

Arguable, some may interpret the universe as more a container.

Such as, "everything in the universe" as opposed to "the universe is everything".

For the purpose of this exercise, I'll agree with you

Took a break from this thread.

Okay then.  Let's assign two words for the concepts of negative and positive, those being ego and soul respectively.  Soul is interchangeable with god.  Any other words you prefer will do, nothing and everything.

So since the universe is everything, totality of existence, you are a piece of the universe.  You are a piece of everything, you are a piece of god.

Furthermore, every human has negative and positive feelings derived from their own mind, fear and love.  We each have an ego and soul, yes?  Negative and positive side?

Does this make sense?

[Vod]

I have been wondering, that maybe people shouldn't categorize like that.

non-belief in God, is a state of blindness to reality and truth,

But why make non-belief organized and a form of false god worship or idolatry,

by giving it a label or categorizing it?



A man who believes in Jesus Christ explained to me, that people who believe

in Jesus Christ shouldn't be called 'Christian',

and to be called 'christian' according to my friend, was originally a slander of the early believers in Jesus Christ.

just_me - the word for the people like you is "fool".   

[BCEmporium]

"Christos" is a Greek work, if memory doesn't fail, for "suffering". So indeed an early follower of Yeshua, assuming Yeshua ever existed that is, wouldn't be calling himself "Christian" as such word wasn't yet attached to him.

[tspacepilot]

For those that are so worried about trying to 'prove a negative' consider that it is quite common to do so.  One of the classic techniques is to remove the negation and the show that that assertion leads to absurdity.  Consider the famous proof that the cardinality of the set of prime numbers is not finite.  The statement to be proved contains a negation:

1) The cardinality of the set of prime numbers is *not* finite.

The technique for the famous proof removes the negation from (1) and shows that (2) leads to absurdity:

2) The cardinality of the set of prime numbers is finite.
3) Therefore, there is a largest prime number, call it _p_
4) Consider a new number, _q_, which is the product of all the primes (including _p_) + 1
5) _q_ is obviously larger than _p_ and by hypothesis must be composite (not prime)
6) The factorization of _q_ cannot include any known prime therefore either _q_ is prime or the factorization of _q_ includes a prime larger than _p_.  In either case, _p_ is not the largest prime number.
QED

Perhaps I made a mistake recreating the proof, but reductio ad absurdam is a standard logical technique which uses the negation of a statement to proof the assertion.  Because of the law of universal negatives, this is sound.  Note that P = not(not(P)) for propositional negation.

[zzojar]

"Non existence does not exist.  To say non existence exists is a fallacy..." I'm confused!

Oooh, let me help you understand ... My 1-million bitcoin wallet is "non-existent". But since non-existence is not a possibility, then my 1-million bitcoin wallet actually does exist. ... Now ... I just have to remember where I put it.