arndt@smurf.DEC (03/28/84)
A word more about belief.
The Atheist says there is no God.
The Agnostic says he doesn't think we can know.
Both positions are unreasonable because they claim to have more knowledge
about the topic than is humanly possible!
Have they looked EVERYWHERE? How do they know that God is not out of town
right now, or hiding from them?
The only three positions that are reasonable are, "still looking" or "found
him" or "given up looking" with the last from lack of interest or too tired.
Remember the "black" Theater of the Absurd a while ago? Their statement was
that life had no meaning. Of course that involves making a meaningful
statement about life! They were driven to the logic of their position
by saying less and less until finally all they had to offer was silence
and the audience drifted away.
The atheist and agnostic positions fall on the floor just so. A little kid
on the edge of the crowd calls out, "How do you know he doesn't exist or we
can never know if he does?" There's an embarrassed silence and the crowd
drifts away.
Unless of course you A & A's out there think you can give reasons why God
doesn't exist or why we can never know if he does!
Let's hear them.
You see the whole problem of how we know what we know is wrapped up in the
proposition that we appear not to be able to know ANYTHING with certainty.
Now does that mean that we can't know ANYTHING? Or does it only mean that
we can only know with degrees of certainty, you know, weights of evidence.
If I say "Please pass the bread" you don't hand me a stone. SOMETHING
was understood between us.
So it would appear that we CAN know something. But not exhaustively
about anything!
We don't insist on knowing all there is to know about any other topic
I think, why should we insist on knowing all there is to know about God?
Why isn't that just as silly a notion as about another topic?
All we really need to field in this discussion is weights of evidence.
But, and it is a big but, we MUST start from a common ground of agreement.
If I appeal to "A" and you appeal to "B", who cares, we pass like ships in
the night and are not really talking to each other.
I suggest reason and things like the Anthropic Cosmological Argument I
mentioned in my last posting. Later we can get to personal experience
and historical documents, etc.
An atheist may not FEEL that there is life after death, but I don't care
how he feels, what are his reasons for that belief?
Enough!
Let's hear some feedback. And don't start calling me names. Speak to the
ideas please.
Regards,
Ken Arndtisrael@umcp-cs.UUCP (03/30/84)
From: arndt@smurf.UUCP
A word more about belief.
The Atheist says there is no God.
The Agnostic says he doesn't think we can know.
Both positions are unreasonable because they claim to have more
knowledge about the topic than is humanly possible!
Given the definitions here, I agree. However, first, you can extend this
argument further with the definition: "The Theist says there is a god",
so the argument applies to the theist as well. Secondly, there may be
(and probably are) A & A's [are they anything like M & M's :-) ] to
whom these statements apply, but I don't think of them as blanket
definitions of the terms. My definitions are more like:
An Atheist says that he believes there is no God.
An Agnostic says he doesn't know if there is a God or not, and has
made no judgements on the subject either way.
A Theist says that he believes that there is a God.
Given these definitions, this argument doesn't apply at all. Now, a
little discussion about the applicability of these. First, the atheist
definition: they are pretty similar, but I've just generalized a little
since if you ask an atheist to prove that the statement "there is no
God" is a fact as opposed to his belief, he cannot (for proof of this
statement, just read net.religion for about a week). Anyway, I can
really accept either position.
However, I cannot accept your definition of the Agnostic position in
the slightest! The Agnostic position is a middle of the road position,
saying "I don't have enough information YET, to make an intelligent
decision on whether to believe there is a God or not", but not saying
that there will never exist that information.
Have they looked EVERYWHERE? How do they know that God is not
out of town right now, or hiding from them?
The only three positions that are reasonable are, "still
looking" or "found him" or "given up looking" with the last
from lack of interest or too tired.
That is not the only positions available. For example, take the
following lines (preceded by an '='), which are all the above lines
of your message, with just one minor modification. See if you can
pick out that modification. :-)
= The Abunnyist says there is no Easter Bunny.
=
= The Aghareistic says he doesn't think we can know.
=
= Both positions are unreasonable because they claim to have more
= knowledge about the topic than is humanly possible!
=
= Have they looked EVERYWHERE? How do they know that Easter Bunny is
= not out of town right now, or hiding from them?
=
= The only three positions that are reasonable are, "still
= looking" or "found him" or "given up looking" with the last
= from lack of interest or too tired.
What is the difference between this argument and yours? Can you prove
to me that the Easter bunny doesn't really exist? Should we then all
either a) believe in the Easter bunny, b) be actively looking for the
Easter bunny, or c) have decided to paint our own eggs this year?
Unless of course you A & A's out there think you can give
reasons why God doesn't exist or why we can never know if he
does!
Let's hear them.
No, I can't give you reasons why God doesn't exist, but then I can't
give you any reasons why he does either. Everything I've seen and
experienced in this world has or can have a natural explanation without
resorting to a supernatural being, I tend to try to use the principle
of parsimony (Occam's razor) for explanations such as this.
You see, my whole problem with this line of argument (that being, you
should believe it because you can't prove it ain't so) is that, if it
can be applied to the issue of the existence or non-existence of a
Deity, why can't it be applied to other things as well? I cannot prove
that I am NOT the only thing in the universe, and everything else just
a figment of my imagination. So maybe I should believe that I am the
only thing in the universe. Or, I also cannot prove that you, Ken
Arndt, are not really God in disguise (or maybe you are just Obi-wan
Kenobi :-)). So then, I guess I should start praying to you and
worshiping you (and it doesn't matter what you say contrary to that,
since If you are really God in disguise, you would protest that you
weren't anyway). Well, enough for now. This is getting long and I'm
getting tired. I'll be awaiting any replies.
--
Bruce Israel
University of Maryland, Computer Science
{rlgvax,seismo}!umcp-cs!israel (Usenet) israel.umcp-cs@CSNet-Relay (Arpanet)