Originally posted by jammer
Knowing you're the site philospher, I gotta ask .. are you a strong atheist?
I'm curious to hear your views on this as I know you study Philosophy.

How do you answer the argument that to be a strong atheist one must "know everything?"
I can understand not believing in God, but have a hard time saying I know FOR SURE that God does not exist.

Not lookin ...[text shortened]... be you, a philosopher.
Try to keep your answer under 6 letter words .. i'm a HS drop-out.

Yes, I'm a 'strong atheist', but I don't claim to know with certainty that God doesn't exist. I only claim that I know that God doesn't exist. I hope that this distinction between knowing with certainty and merely knowing is clear. Most of the things we know we don't know with certainty. For instance, I know that there are no elves hiding in my closet right now, but I don't know it with certainty. It is logically possible that there are elves hiding in my closet right now, and hence there is some vanishingly small probability that there are, in fact, elves hiding in my closet. I know some here, like KellyJay, want to reserve the term 'know' to cases where one is absolutely certain, but this is not how the term 'know' is generally used (you know you are now awake, even though it is logically possible that you are now dreaming). If you want to use the term in KellyJay's sense, fine. I'm perfectly content with claiming merely that I have overwhelming evidence that God does not exist, and hence that I justifiedly believe that God does not exist.

Originally posted by bbarr
Yes, I'm a 'strong atheist', but I don't claim to know with certainty that God doesn't exist. I only claim that I know that God doesn't exist. I hope that this distinction between knowing with certainty and merely knowing is clear. Most of the things we know we don't know with certainty. For instance, I know that there are no elves hiding in my closet righ ...[text shortened]... God does not exist, and hence that I justifiedly believe that God does not exist.

Would you consider yourself a Bayesian Atheist?

Originally posted by Starrman
Would you consider yourself a Bayesian Atheist?

No, I don't think that much machinery is required, and I have no idea how to go about establishing the priors.

Originally posted by bbarr
No, I don't think that much machinery is required, and I have no idea how to go about establishing the priors.

It was a flippant question, I was just wondering what such a creature would be like. Strangely enough we're doing credence at the moment in Ep & Meth.

Originally posted by Starrman
Would you consider yourself a Bayesian Atheist?

I'm the nominally permuted ghost of a Bayesian atheist, as it happens.

Originally posted by bbarr
Yes, I'm a 'strong atheist', but I don't claim to know with certainty that God doesn't exist. I only claim that I know that God doesn't exist. I hope that this distinction between knowing with certainty and merely knowing is clear. Most of the things we know we don't know with certainty. For instance, I know that there are no elves hiding in my closet righ ...[text shortened]... God does not exist, and hence that I justifiedly believe that God does not exist.

Thanks, that's as good an explaination as i've heard.
I thought that by definition a strong atheist claimed with certainty that God does not exist.
Your distinction between knowing and certainty is clear and kind of turns it into a sematic argument which would probably be pointless to get into.
The meaning of words. The meaning to you; the meaning to me.

Originally posted by jammer
Thanks, that's as good an explaination as i've heard.
I thought that by definition a strong atheist claimed with certainty that God does not exist.
Your distinction between knowing and certainty is clear and kind of turns it into a sematic argument which would probably be pointless to get into.
The meaning of words. The meaning to you; the meaning to me.

He basically is saying what I was trying to say, only with a bit more clarity.

Originally posted by UmbrageOfSnow
He basically is saying what I was trying to say, only with a bit more clarity.

Yeah, when I read your reply I was disappointed that I couldn't find anything to rip you for. 😠

Is that T.O.? I hate that SOB

Originally posted by Starrman
It was a flippant question, I was just wondering what such a creature would be like. Strangely enough we're doing credence at the moment in Ep & Meth.

I think I have described myself at times as a Bayesian Atheist. After many repeated draws, my posteriors have always been alike, and so now I continue my analysis with very strong priors.

Originally posted by jammer
Yeah, when I read your reply I was disappointed that I couldn't find anything to rip you for. 😠

Is that T.O.? I hate that SOB

I think that's Seal.

Originally posted by telerion
I think that's Seal.

could be .. it sure looks like one.

Originally posted by bbarr
If only my father could have hidden his affairs that well...

Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's ass.

Originally posted by telerion
I think that's Seal.

You are correct. I haven't changed my profile picture since the RED KNIGHT SEAL OF APPROVAL era, mainly because I haven't been around. That was a "Seal of disapproval", lame joke, I know, but haven't got rid of it yet.

Originally posted by UmbrageOfSnow
I do not grant nature God-like attributes or powers, or any kind of "powers" at all. Nature is just a concept, not an entity.

I have no idea what you mean by undefinable occurences, although I suppose you are unable to define it😕

I wasn't trying to start an argument about this, I was just explaining my beliefs (or lack thereof).

Let's keep t ...[text shortened]... h me about whether or not atheism is a logically viable position, start a new thread for it.

Although nature may be considered a concept in some respects, there is no getting around its physical reality (as we presently understand both of the terms). When you say you can explain physical reality without the use of God (and necessarily, His creative and sustaining attributes), you have no way of doing so without bringing those same creative and sustaining attributes back into the formula.

Where, then, to place those attributes? One option is to give them to the present physical reality: nature. Nature is responsible for nature.

Another option is to lay the laurel at the feet of the undefinable occurences. This view allows that nature couldn't have created itself, therefore some mysterious unknown universal belching is occuring from time to time, which leads to the eventual rise of personality, thought and reason.

These options take the attributes from God and give them over to either self-creating nature or some nebulous and magical universal Happening. The razor gets rather dull cutting through so much malarkey.

I have no desire to pound out another endless argument; I was merely pointing out the fallacy of your statement.

Originally posted by amannion
Freaky why does nature need god-like powers?
You talk about nature as if it is an entity of some sort. On the contrary I think of nature as just a convenient label we give to the world around us. We call it the universe, we call it nature, we call it a freakin' hamburger if you like - so what?

Undefinable occurances sounds a bit oxymoronic to me. Can you give an example? Of course not. They're undefinable.

I hope my response to UoS answers your question.