Bill Maher's Religulous

[RemoWilliams]

This reminds me of that Metalocalpyse episode where Murderface tries to choose a religion but ends up hating them all because all they do is bitch and moan and fight with each other.

I'll stay an Atheist thought.

 

[STINNETT]

no, you got me very wrong there.

You said that my analogies were ridiculous because the fantasy characters I cited did not have the impact on the world that religion has. How else was I supposed to take that?

 

[James Murphy]

You said that my analogies were ridiculous because the fantasy characters I cited did not have the impact on the world that religion has. How else was I supposed to take that?

how you take things is your own affair. i however was not in any way shape or form disagreeing with you regarding the absurdity of religion, or it being more or less true than a bugs bunny cartoon.

 

[26]

Will that child eventually ask me about God?

yes.
not so much in a way like the all day misinterpretations of personal gods we are used to, but in questioning its existence. it´s a question of definition.
the original term re ligio means nothing more than "connected back" (in a sense), and whatever you find if you go this way of thought, can be called god.
nature, spirit etc.........

 

[STINNETT]

despite the $5 words, you obviously don't get my "logic" at all. you have me totally wrong here.. you are preaching to the choir for the most part.

"Ab absurdo ad absurdum" or taking the concept of establishing the validity of your argument by pointing out the absurdity of your opponent's position to the point of absurdity. see, i knowz me sum latinz too.

I wasn't throwing around Latin to look smart - I was using the commonly accepted name for a common logical fallacy.
And pointing out a fallacy is nothing like what you're suggesting. That is, quite franky, a laughable assertion.

no sher, shitlock .... i agree 100%. as i said, you took me completely wrong, or rather took my simple statements and attributed qualities of an extended argument to them that i just never claimed.

That wasn't an argument against anything you said, just a general statement to refocus the mood of this thread.

bulletproof... quite a claim.... especially since your "line of reasoning" doesn't really have anything to do with my very simple assertion, as far as i'm concerned.

It has absolutely everything to do with your assertion. It's custom tailored to it, as was the thought experiment of Russel's Teapot. It's designed to show that the burden of proof does not lie with the doubters - that refusal to believe an unsubstantiated claim is not an arrogant position - but the default position and the most logical.

let me now, for the record, restate the ONLY point i tried to make.... it was in response to your assertion that Agnosticism does not exist:

i am not an atheist... i certainly am not a theist, not by the description of any religion i've ever heard of.... i am an agnostic, and i embrace it. i do not subscribe to any religion, i don't believe any books, or sublimate myself to any precept of a particular higher being or force. i do not however believe that no such higher power, force, being, or consciousness exists. i simply make no claim to understand it or know any aspect of what it may be. "ergo" i am an agnostic.....

I never said agnosticism does not exist so why are you arguing against that claim? Talk about a strawman argument......
Quite the contrary, I actually claimed to be agnostic myself and said that all honest people must claim it.
In turn - you claimed that atheism was an arrogant position, which is something that I take offense to and have a right to protest.
I'm giving you the reasons why it's perfectly sensible and perfectly logical. You haven't defeated or even addressed that logic - you've only ridiculed my approach.
In fact, the "Ab Absurdo" applies to your argument perfectly well. Thanks for bringing it up.

You can be as ambigious as you want to be. I'm not going to tell you you shouldn't or can't be - but you cannot prove that your position is more sensible or more logically sound than atheism.

[agnostic |agˈnästik|
noun
a person who believes that nothing is known or can be known of the existence or nature of God or of anything beyond material phenomena; a person who claims neither faith nor disbelief in God.]

now go ahead and apply your own argument here and try to prove or disprove my existence by talking "whimsically" about unicorns and dragons if you like. just remember... Frustra laborant quotquot se calculationibus fatigant pro inventione quadraturae circuli

Your existence is apparent and observable, what does that have to do with anything?

 

[STINNETT]

how you take things is your own affair. i however was not in any way shape or form disagreeing with you regarding the absurdity of religion, or it being more or less true than a bugs bunny cartoon.

So why is an ambigiuous stance concerning the truth of religion any more logical than taking an ambigious stance concerning the truth of Bugs Bunny?

 

[spioraid]

not citing the source for monty python quotes will cause agnostic unicorns to argue you out of existence.

Aw crap, not again. RUN AWAY RUN AWAY!

That is, of course, assuming that belief has causational power But that's another thread.

 

[SocialNumb]

yes.
not so much in a way like the all day misinterpretations of personal gods we are used to, but in questioning its existence. it´s a question of definition.
the original term re ligio means nothing more than "connected back" (in a sense), and whatever you find if you go this way of thought, can be called god.
nature, spirit etc.........

Thats my point. That God would not exist in this child's mind nor would he/she even question said God. Instead the child would only wonder and most likely ask "where did I come from?". The answer received would begin shaping the child's conclusion.

So God can be proven not to exist. I hope your understanding this, I'm having a hard time putting my theory into words.

 

[James Murphy]

So why is an ambigiuous stance concerning the truth of religion any more logical than taking an ambigious stance concerning the truth of Bugs Bunny?

i wasn't at all ambiguous on my position... i'm agnostic. i'm not "cloudy" on that point.. and you were the one that brought up spaghetti monsters, so i was talking about your line of thinking when i used the "bugs bunny" reference. get over it man... we clearly agree on most everything, and you've taken this "discussion" far beyond esoteric. I decline to be a part of taking it any further... it's getting way too prententious at this point. i may well have misunderstood you at the outset to mean that you felt agonsticism was not a valid stance.... and you could have pointed that out after "round one", but somethings tells me you enjoy the sparring even more than i do. now though you're simply calling my stance ambiguous, which i could just as easily say about yours. that's a good signal to me this segment of the thread has run it's course.

and now, thanks to you, Latine loqui coactus sum

 

[STINNETT]

i wasn't at all ambiguous on my position... i'm agnostic. i'm not "cloudy" on that point.. and you were the one that brought up spaghetti monsters, so i was talking about your line of thinking when i used the "bugs bunny" reference. get over it man... we clearly agree on most everything, and you've taken this "discussion" far beyond esoteric. I decline to be a part of taking it any further... it's getting way too prententious at this point. i may well have misunderstood you at the outset to mean that you felt agonsticism was not a valid stance.... and you could have pointed that out after "round one", but somethings tells me you enjoy the sparring even more than i do. now though you're simply calling my stance ambiguous, which i could just as easily say about yours. that's a good signal to me this segment of the thread has run it's course.

and now, thanks to you, Latine loqui coactus sum

Okay with me, but I've got to say that "agnostic", by definition, really means that you're ambiguous on whether or not you believe God exists. What other sort of ambiguity would I be talking about?

Does he or doesn't he exist? How do you feel about it?

 

[JBroll]

Not necessarily.

It means you don't know or don't think it's knowable. Falling back to the standard argument ad dictionarius (fuck you, Latin!), ambiguity with respect to this belief would mean that there were several possible interpretations on belief - when really there's only one and that it's a lack of statement either way.

Jeff

 

[Metaltastic]

Exactly - it's an oversimplification to refute any kind of spiritual existence/presence of any kind, it's just the opposite extreme of believing in the big benevolent white-bearded guy living in the clouds. Issues like this can't be made black and white; there are so many things we can't explain, and while they MAY be one day explained by science, IMO I'm open to the possibility that they also MAY be the result of some intelligent design...

 

[James Murphy]

Not necessarily.

It means you don't know or don't think it's knowable. Falling back to the standard argument ad dictionarius (fuck you, Latin!), ambiguity with respect to this belief would mean that there were several possible interpretations on belief - when really there's only one and that it's a lack of statement either way.

Jeff

Exactly - it's an oversimplification to refute any kind of spiritual existence/presence of any kind, it's just the opposite extreme of believing in the big benevolent white-bearded guy living in the clouds. Issues like this can't be made black and white; there are so many things we can't explain, and while they MAY be one day explained by science, IMO I'm open to the possibility that they also MAY be the result of some intelligent design...

thank you gentlemen, you've crystallized my thoughts exactly.

 

[AdamWathan]

Even the most religious people on earth question God's existence once or twice in their life, it IS impossible to know for sure whether there is a god, so really everyone on earth is agnostic in that regard. Nobody can claim that they know god exists or that they know god doesn't exist, it's about what you BELIEVE. Do you think that it is more likely that there is a god or isn't a god? If you simply say "I don't really think about it and don't really care," then I would say that you DON'T believe in any sort of god because if you did, you would be a bit more concerned about how your apathy would be regarded in any sort of afterlife...

Everyone KNOWS that you can't prove whether there is or isn't a god, so calling yourself agnostic is just calling yourself human... You have to have SOME sort of instict or gut feeling on the subject that decides whether you're a theist or an atheist, agnosticism is just a simple truth, and a complete cop out on the subject of religion...

 

[James Murphy]

agnosticism is just a simple truth, and a complete cop out on the subject of religion...

yes it is, and no it's not.
i believe there is a higher power... i just don't believe any religion that i've ever heard of regarding what that higher power is. so i'm not copping out on religion, i'm outright denying it. i do not however deny the existence of "god", whatever that may be. i just don't claim to know what it is. what's so hard to grasp about that?

 

[Metaltastic]

Even the most religious people on earth question God's existence once or twice in their life, it IS impossible to know for sure whether there is a god, so really everyone on earth is agnostic in that regard. Nobody can claim that they know god exists or that they know god doesn't exist, it's about what you BELIEVE. Do you think that it is more likely that there is a god or isn't a god? If you simply say "I don't really think about it and don't really care," then I would say that you DON'T believe in any sort of god because if you did, you would be a bit more concerned about how your apathy would be regarded in any sort of afterlife...

Awesome.

Everyone KNOWS that you can't prove whether there is or isn't a god, so calling yourself agnostic is just calling yourself human... You have to have SOME sort of instict or gut feeling on the subject that decides whether you're a theist or an atheist, agnosticism is just a simple truth, and a complete cop out on the subject of religion...

Not so awesome - why does someone HAVE to decide between one extreme or the other?

 

[Metaltastic]

Furthermore, I think this is kind of deteriorating into a debate on semantics - regardless of what the terms "theist," "atheist," and "agnostic" mean to everybody, I've made my views clear, and I think everyone else who cares to has as well!

 

[abyssofdreams]

Even the most religious people on earth question God's existence once or twice in their life, it IS impossible to know for sure whether there is a god, so really everyone on earth is agnostic in that regard. Nobody can claim that they know god exists or that they know god doesn't exist, it's about what you BELIEVE. Do you think that it is more likely that there is a god or isn't a god? If you simply say "I don't really think about it and don't really care," then I would say that you DON'T believe in any sort of god because if you did, you would be a bit more concerned about how your apathy would be regarded in any sort of afterlife...

Everyone KNOWS that you can't prove whether there is or isn't a god, so calling yourself agnostic is just calling yourself human... You have to have SOME sort of instict or gut feeling on the subject that decides whether you're a theist or an atheist, agnosticism is just a simple truth, and a complete cop out on the subject of religion...

Now that's part of the problem, lots of people in belief think they KNOW and try to convert/convince/control others with their distorted POV. No matter how you take it, matter of fact is that it is irrational to believe in the Greater Juju living in the trees or on cloud 42.

People always make-up stuff for things they don't know anything about because they're scared of the unknown...

I'll try to reflect Richard Dawkins: If you believe in any religion you're just limiting yourself in the way that you think that there's "more to it", e.g. afterlife/resurrection and you don't exploit life to its fullest extend.

Okay, now it might be too abstract to take that little out of context, I'd suggest anyone to read "The God Delusion", truly an eye-opener

 

[TravisW]

So, at what point is this thread going to cause a split between the Shiite Agnostics and the Sunni Agnostics?

 

[JBroll]

Everyone KNOWS that you can't prove whether there is or isn't a god, so calling yourself agnostic is just calling yourself human... You have to have SOME sort of instict or gut feeling on the subject that decides whether you're a theist or an atheist, agnosticism is just a simple truth, and a complete cop out on the subject of religion...

If you keep it as general as 'a god', of course. If you restrict the things you consider to be gods and then take logical inconsistency of their traits as sufficient disproof, you can easily arrive at the conclusion that if something is worth calling a god then it can't exist.

Also, the Jonas Brothers disprove any loving god, so we're down to evil bastards and apathetic deadbeat deities, and in neither case can we really count on any religion having inspired truths or supernatural value so it's all really silly at this point.

Jeff