Monday, September 30, 2019

Possum doesn't play dead.

This thread (click).

Point One:

Bad grammar: So? The argument is all that matters, or in this case, the analysis of the argument.

Point Two:

Missing in action. (there seems to be no point two)

Point Three:

In regards to what I read of the post that I was responding to last time, Possum has said,
more then once, that atheists worship (X), or have faith in (Z). This would require knowing what atheists are thinking, thus is special knowledge/mind reading.

Point Four:

Assumes atheists have a "faith". However, yes I looking at what you wrote I was assuming that you were trying to prove God or at least show that God is possible. This assumption was made on the idea that Possum is trying to counter atheists, best way to counter them would be to show God is a thing. Thus my assumption.

Point Five:

In your view this might very well be the case, it would take a whole argument to show that not believing in any gods is, in fact, a metaphysical world view.

Point Six:

Statements can have built in premises. However, Possum doesn't identify what they are in this case. "I lack belief in (X)" does not imply that one knows what (X) is, nor does it imply that (X) is not a thing that exists. It is a statement about the belief (or lack of) of (X) whatever (X) might be.

Belief/Non-belief statements require no burden of proof. You can say you believe in Goblins, Orgers, Dragons, and no one will require you to prove that you believe that G.O.D.'s existence. As we must assume (due to social norms and logic) that you do, in fact, believe in (X). similarly, not believing in (X) requires no proof.

However there is a key difference, saying that I do not believe in (X) does not nessarly imply that I also think (X) does not exist. And there are words that I could add to show my beliefs, or lack there of to clarify the matter.

Examples:

"Yahweh does not exist": I have the burden to show how this can be seen as a logical conclusion.
I am hosting the full burden of proof for this statement.

"I do not believe in Yahweh." I have no burden to show that I do not believe in this, and it is possible that Yahweh exists, I simply do not believe it does exist.

"I believe Yahweh does not exist." I do not have the burden to show that I do not believe this, nor do I have the burden to show that Yahweh does not exist.

"God exists." Requires burden of proof.
"I believe in God" No burden of proof.
"I believe God exists." No burden of proof.

~~~

Point Seven:

God as revealed in the bible. In what way? No one can seem to agree upon God is, as debate is plentiful among believers in what this type of god is. However, this grants the bible far more credit then I would give it. The bible itself must be shown to be true first before I care what it says about anything.

As far as god-of-the-gaps, it depends on the argument at hand.
Again with the claim that atheists worship (X). You do not know that, you can not show that, this is a claim to know things you can not hope to know, it has other logical errors as well.

"If you understood God, then there would be no question as to whether He is"

Translated:

If you apply the method that I want you to apply, in the way I want you to, then you will understand things in the way I desire, and this will lead you to conclude that the conclusion I want you to have is in fact correct.

Point Eight: 

I was trying to make sense of your objections. It seemed that it was perhaps based on the commandments. I could not make heads or tails of what your assumption that atheists have a belief in pagans is based on, so I grasped at a straw that it might be one of the commandments, in this, I did not want to make a straw-man. Perhaps you could just give a clear argument to as how you have arrived at the idea that atheists worship anything.

I assume that you are being honest with your ideas & views. What is in fact true is separate from this.
I'm not sure if I said or suggested that you are, in fact lying, I doubt I did, as I would have to have proof that you did this. However, I do not think I would point it out as it would not negate the argument(s) you presented. If others have accused you of lying, I can not respond to that as it is not my stance. I do consider it my duty to the truth. Getting to that truth, ah there is the rub.

Point Nine:

Assumes atheists have a faith. This leads into all sorts of problems. Is faith good, or is it bad? What do you mean by "faith"?

Produce a valid & sound argument to show that I (or anyone else) has such a world view, and I will agree with it and support it to the best of my ability to do so.

Point Ten:

This is the way (X) word is understood by (% of people). This is all a dictionary can do for us. No, you do not have to agree with it, but you do then have to say what you view (X) word to mean so that others are not confused. It enters into some problems of course.

Lets say that I want to say that the word God is in fact Goblin/Ogre/Dragon. Clearly you would not want to use MY way of using that word, but you might, for sake of debate, allow me to have my version - but for the sake of others we would at least label my idea vs your idea of "God" lets say "God 1" for me, and "God 2" for you, it would, of course, be better if we could agree upon using different words in full, so that others are less confused by our debate.

You might indeed think, assert and submit that the word, to you is (X). This is not how I view this word, nor do I agree with it being used to describe me & my views.

If I was to say Possum means a nitwit poopy head, clearly you would object to that. Its unfair to label Possum in such a way, it might very well be my view, perhaps I have an argument that shows via logic that this is the case. Unless & until I present such an argument, you are free to reject it. Perhaps the correct view of Possum is awesome smart head for all we know. However we must negotiate, compromise, and find something we both can live with.

So then we might agree that awesome can stay, that is subjective, but smart or poopy needs to go, and head along with it, so Possum means awesome, and hey that also rhymes. We can live with this compromise, its not all of what we want, but its good enough.

So to, perhaps rather then simply asserting that you have the right way to view the word atheists you could come to some sort of compromise about it?

Or if you can not, or will not - then produce your argument that is both valid & sound that the word is (X). How will you do that? I suggest this is an impossible task, informal logic refers to "natural language" as being an unsolved problem. What a word "must be" is in that category. Only in an artificial language might we avoid such issues. We are not speaking in that language. So, we have to deal with how the (%) of people use that word, even if we do not agree with that (%), it seems to be the easiest way to understand each other.

Point Eleven:

As far as I can see, scripture is full of errors. Who is to say my concept of God is incorrect? If God made or let humans become flawed, and humans are now in charge of what the Bible says... then the bible might be flawed. I can't trust humans due to God allowing/making humans flawed. Seems like a bad plan that God has there, but I'm not viewing God from YOUR point of view, I'm viewing it though my point of view. Perhaps we are both in error of how to view God... but if so, then again that would seem to be God's fault for allowing this, or making it this way. We could have been error free, but God didn't make it that way, so here we are, error prone. From my view, that is in and of itself, an error.A perfect system would enable a perfect bible. Bleep why even write it down? Just be a God that speaks to humans out loud in there language, bleep have just one language that is free from error! I can think of more ways to make this system better then it is, but clearly, if there is a God - it has allowed us, or made us in such a way that allows for error. The possibility that there is an error means that I can't trust the bible - or any other book about God - to be correct in full. Thus I need a system that is not reliant upon that book or books. I do have a system that does this pretty darn well: logic.

Point Twelve:

Fair enough. Make a positive argument for your ideas, whatever they might be so I can analyze it! :)

Point Thirteen:

I am willing to see what empirical evidence &/or repeatable tests you have for whatever ideas you have.

If you do not have those, then present your valid & sound argument. If you do not have that, then I must be skeptical of your conclusions.

Yes, my comment was a tongue in cheek there. My view of reality - I'm not sure I even shared with you what that is yet.

Faith/Religion Depends on what you mean by "faith"/"Religion" - You need a valid & sound argument for this assertion. Also you would need to answer if faith/religion is good or bad.

You assume a lot of things about me. Ask me what I believe or do not believe and why. (rather then commit the mind-reading fallacy)

Point Fourteen:

I'm willing to concede that I assumed you were doing one thing, when you were doing something else.

Assumes atheists have a faith at all. (Needs an argument and explanation of what those words mean to you, and if it good or bad to have faith).

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Well then that brings us to the end of this thread.
I've taken screen shots of the thread and put them together here:


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So, what is my view of all this? Its not uncommon to find theists that will assert that atheists have faith and/or a religion. This of course full of logical fallacies.

The tu quo (you as well) fallacy. As it tries to put everyone on a level playing field.

Equivocation, The words "religion" & "faith" are changed at whim to be good/bad or whatever the theist needs them to be. Books like "I don't have enough faith to be an atheist" - well then, that name implies that faith is BAD, right? Or is it saying that he wishes he could have MORE faith because it is good? If having faith is bad, then we should not, not believe in God if that is more faith then believing in God, but then, what would be below believing in God in terms of faith? Perhaps not believing at all? Then that makes us a pure skeptic, clearly not the writers intent, but that is the sort of issue you bring upon yourself when you make such a logical fallacy.

Mind-reading/Special Knowledge: It would take knowing what people believed in, or did not to assert they have a faith/religion or do not.

Non sequitur: Atheist: "I do not believe in God." Theist: "Ah ha! That means you do believe in God!"
Wut?

And other fallacies as well, depending upon the wording of the given argument at hand, but in essence I think these are the ones of note when you see this sort of """argument""" pop up.

I need more quotes around argument, as this isn't one. Atheists do not have a faith or religion.
However, in my first Possum post I allowed my otherwise worthy Possum to have his cake, I said sure, fine - we all have faith and religion. Now prove yours is right.

That is something he wasn't trying to do.

But he also didn't show that our faith/religion is wrong either.

So then we can't know what one is wrong or right.

That means we must be skeptical, of the conclusions.

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