Atheists: Finding Comfort in Loss

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Only if you believe in God. The 'no limitations' part is unreasonable to those who do not believe in God.

 

Sorry Drew - while I can see what you're saying from a theoretical level, my use of pink unicorns was just a silly example. If you want me to avoid using pink unicorns, Sasquatch, Moby Duck (a 50-ton whale-sized duck that I'm pretty sure does not live at the bottom of the Mariana Trench), etc, I will.

The grander point I was making was this: In the absence of any evidence for the existence of something, regardless of that something being God or something more mundane, I am inclined to think that something does not exist. Or to put it another way, "does not exist" is more probable than "exists". That's why I said that lack of evidence to prove it either way does not mean that you have to assume both possibilities are equally likely.

The pink unicorn was just there for illustrative purposes - an analogy if you will. I was not trying to equate God to a pink unicorn.

 

T2, the no limitations caveat cuts both ways. I'm not speaking of omipotence or omnipresence, here. By no limitations, I refer to definitional limitations. There are many concepts of god, and many are quite vague and nebulous. By the way, I don't believe in God. I've never made any bones about that.

That said, it is far more likely that some being for which we have no strict definition exists somewhere than it is that pink unicorns roam the earth. If pink unicorns a) live on earth, b) are about the same size as horses, and c) live in the same types of climates in which horses live, it logically follows that we'd have noticed them by now...so they almost certainly don't exist. If a non-specific and nebulously defined "god" exists, being noticed by human beings is not a pre-requisite. Specific religions are easy to rationally disprove, since they set conditions that would logically be true if the religion in question were true. On a conceptual level, however, there is no way to prove or disprove God.

@Aldeth: Yes, I was getting semanatical. I too, agree that there is no reason to weight God's existence and non-existence equally. I just didn't like your example.

 

I can't speak for other people, but that's my personal feeling about death. The dying part itself is not what worries, it's the total lack of, well, anything, afterwards. The reason it bothers me is something I touched on earlier - it's something impossible to perceive or imagine, except as the total lack of anything that makes me me. As a very individualistic person I have problems accepting this. Naturally, I'm also quite aware that the world (as in the way things work) doesn't really care and that it will happen nonetheless. I just try not to think about it too much, which brings me to:

That's most probably the best approach and one I take as well. There's no point in contemplating it or thinking about it - it'll happen when it'll happen, and no amount of thinking or worrying will either prepare you for it, or make it easier to accept, or anything.

 

very hard to imagine nothing. Like I know that others here said just think of getting unconscious but this does not help because in death you will *NEVER* wake up... Other posters said that death is just BAM and then nothing... end of all sensation, thought, feeling... But we are using our heads to come up with that conclusion so I can't just casually say that everything ends right away and live with it. Because I think you guys are feeling that you will still exist a small snippet of yourself (because you are so smart and got it all figured out )

So I will say that there is an afterlife, something happens after we die to nourish our minds... I am Orthodox xhristian but it is part of our doctrine that such questions are the limits of human intelligence. Humans cannot comprehend anything larger then the universe, the origins of god or the universe, or cessation to exist.
You say that you just end when you die but there is nothing you can experience or test to see how death will affect you or human mind.

That is why I think that such question is the limit of human imagination. It hurts my head to think about these "impossible" questions.

 

Think about how to explain consciousness then. We´re familiar with it, but can you explain it? Just because it´s hard to grasp a concept, doesn´t make it more or less likely. Heaven and hell are easy enough to understand, but they are just too simplified to be true.

 

for thousands of years people were simpletons
there just hasn;t been any other explanation that I was satisfied with and I am sure some would say that I was just nt looking for one in the first place. Such abstract questions of what happens to the mind after death is either beyond God given human intelligence or is just too stupid of a concept to even think about. One of our founding Church fathers says this about this subject. Such questions are a waste of time he said, which is in line with the theory that such questions are beyond humans to comprehend.

 

What do you mean were?

And no, I'm not exempting myself.

 

When my dad dies, I got told that it was because God wanted him for something better. I was 2 years old, my sister was 6 months and it was mums birthday the night he died. It turned me off God for a long time. However, I still couldn't leave behind the belief that I would see him again in the afterlife.

I think I was a closet Christian!

 

Can we have religion without religious leaders that tell us what to think?

 

A probability calculation with zero points of reference proves nothing except that you failed both logic and statistics.

Don't use the word "likely" because it's pure, 100%, grade A speculation, without anything resembling science or math even anywhere close.

 

Please. I'm stating that it it is possible to disprove the premise of pink unicorns through strong inductive arguments and it is not possible to disprove a vaguely defined "God" using the same method. Since I can disprove one but not the other, it logically follows that a vaguely defined God of undefined nature or purpose that I cannot disprove is more likely to exist than pink unicorns that I can disprove. We all know that pink unicorns are something we just made up in an explicit effort to be absurd. This is not true of God. Maybe we did make God up, but we most assuredly didn't do so in an explicit effort to be absurd if we did. This is a far different thing than saying that God is likely.

I'm saying that, on the continuum of things that are unlikely, pink unicorns are closer to absolutely not existing at all than God is, since we can reasonably prove that pink unicorns absolutely don't exist. Now, if I can reasonably prove that pink unicorns don't roam the earth and I can't reasonably prove that a nebulously defined "God" doesn't exist, doesn't it logically follow that -- based on the available information -- pink unicorns are less likely? and must you always be so insulting, by the way?

 

Logically follows?

I think you left logic behind about there.

It logically follows we have no bloody idea how likely either is. We have no proof of either. You cannot absolutely disprove either. We have no points of reference to make any sort of guess or calculation.

All you're doing is taking a gut feeling based on meaningless semantics and trying to claim it's logic.

 

Taza, If I can prove that "X" doesn't exist beyond any reasonable doubt, but I can't prove the non-existence of "Y" at all, it is reasonable to say that "X" is at least a little bit less likely than "Y". This is not, of course, to say that "Y" is even remotely likely. I was never debating that point.

The pink unicorn argument is a great example for why one might choose not to believe in God. It's not such a good reason to believe God does not exist. I have no more reason to believe in pink unicorns than I have to believe in God, but I have a laundry list of reasons to believe pink unicorns don't exist. The same can not be said for God -- unless you want to start getting specific about God. I believe that pink unicorns and the God of Abraham, Krishna, Vishnu, or the Dark Lord Xenu, for example, are more or less equally unlikely, because I have a laundry list of reasons to disbelieve in them, too.

Apparently you always do need to be insulting.

 

First of all, you can't prove a negative.

Therefore, no, you can't say that.

Or well, you obviously can but it doesn't mean anything - you've abandoned logic right about there.

The word "likely" and probability neither work that way. You're trying to capture light in a bag, trying to extract wetness from water.

 

Logically, if the moon is cheese, on wednesdays from 15:00 am to 15:01 am, if and only if nobody's looking at it to see if it's cheese or not, then I am the ruler of the world.

All hail me, on wednesdays, from 15:00 to 15:01, if nobody's looking if the moon is cheese!

 

I would think that the fact that many people believe in a religion creates somekind of a likelyhood that there is some kind of a deity. The thought of a God has obviously come from somewhere or it serves some purpose because nearly all cultures have developed a religion. Of course there are plenty of non-theological explanations to the origins of religion but they are as impossible to prove true or false as the religious ones.

 

Taza: If you restrict yourself only to deductive arguments, you may have a point...but who ever said that inductive arguments a part of logic or reasoning? Inductive arguments were, last I checked, allowed.

If I can formulate a very strong inductive argument for why pink unicorns don't roam the earth (and believe me, I can) and an inductive argument for why an unspecified God of unspecified nature or purpose doesn't exist isn't as strong, then I have a stronger argument for pink unicorns not existing than I have for God not existing. Classicly speaking, this would meant that God is more likely to exist than pink unicorns.

Now, for the love of "God", stop arguing that I have "abandoned reason". Disagree with me if you must, but there's no need to be a dick.

 

You might think so, but I still call ********.

There's plenty of explanations; including the one that shows a strong evolutionary correlation with religion and survival. Correlation is not causation, naturally, though.

I've answered that point a dozen times. May I refer you to Iku-Turso's post?

 

Taza, prove to me that there is no God. Recognize that, with me, this shouldn't be hard -- since I don't believe in God in the first place. Afterwards, prove to me that pink unicorns don't roam the earth. One will be a lot easier to do than the other.

The argument that we have no more reason to believe in Pink Unicorns or nearly any other absurd piece of nonsense we would prefer to use as an example is absolutely, inarguably true. There is not one shred of evidence upon which to build a belief in God or a belief in pink unicorns. On this, I assume we are in absolute agreement.

I, however, have one very profound reason to believe that pink unicorns don't roam the earth. If pink Unicorns roamed the earth, it would mean that this horse-like animal has coexisted with us on this planet for decades, centuries, milennia, without anyone noticing. Given that humans populate essentially every bit of terrain in which a horse-like creature could actually survive, such a belief would be more than just a little absurd, so I most assuredly have a reason to believe that pink unicorns don't roam the earth.

I have no reason to believe in God, so I don't, but I also have no reason to believe God doesn't exist, so I don't do that either. If we were talking about Yahweh, Jehovah, the Angel Moroni, Vishnu, Ganesh, Jesus, Zeus, Apollo, the resurrection of Appollonius (The Roman who supposedly came back from the dead in 70AD, not the main character from Sousei no Aquarion), Beowulf, Satan, the Dark Lord Xenu, or the Flying Spaghetti monster, it is very easy to find strong reasons to believe they do not exist -- just as it is with pink unicorns or any other nonsense you wish to use as an example -- but a nebulously defined "God" of unknown nature or purpose? I see no reason to believe there is no such entity, and just as you assert that it's absurd to believe there is a God without reason, I assert that it is just as absurd to believe there is no God without a reason.

I listed some reasons to believe there are no pink unicorns roaming the earth. Give me an equally strong reason to believe there is no "God" and I'll admit that I am wrong.