Strongest argument for atheism?

[Ecurb Noselrub]

Bruce, do you place much weight on the idea of original sin and how do you reconcile it with evolution? I think you might have already answered this but my memory isn't what it used to be.

Mine either.  Original sin is a theological construct which began with Paul.  For him, that was his way of reconciling the Old Testament with the Christ event. I'm not as bound to the OT as Paul was, not being a Jew, so it's easier for me just to say that the folks who were writing the OT had an experience of God, but misinterpreted a lot of what those experiences mean.  Jesus moved past the OT pretty quickly, basically doing away with it in his New Covenant.  So original sin is not that big a deal for me.  I think the Adam/Eve metaphor is speaking about what happens in each individual life, not so much an historical event that led to the fall of all human kind.  We all start off innocent, lose our innocence in our own encounter with the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and then experience the separation that takes us out of the "garden." Thus, the conflict between people and with their environment.  Jesus offers individual redemption, taking our concept of sin into himself and removing it so that there is peace between God and man ("Peace on earth, good will to men" by the way - Merry Christmas!).  So, in short, I don't view the "fall" as an historical event as much as an individual condition.

[yodachoda]

I guess I'm an explicit atheist and I made this topic for explicit atheists.  Explicit atheism means you were presumably raised in a religious family and consciously rejected God.  I want to know the strongest reason why you decided to reject him.  For me, it's simply the plausibility that 100% natural processes acting over 3.8 billion years are sufficient to turn a bacterial colony into humans and all other life. 

[xSilverPhinx]

I've always been an atheist, but like I said earlier, I don't see why evolutionary theory and some sort of belief in god to be incompatible. It wouldn't be like regular theism, though, much less a literal interpretation of the creation of the universe. It tends to looks more like deism with theistic elements...the two can and do overlap depending on who you talk to. Ecurb's description looks more reasonable than most.

For instance, instead of saying that there is a god who dictates what morals are, reconciled belief would look more like mankind having evolved, and the capacity to be moral along with us (which is the case). Doesn't say much about objective morality, though. 

Other ideas that haven been mentioned is that we are the first created results (at least to our knowledge, not going to postulate the existence of intelligent aliens here) who, as a species, have achieved some forms of religions. That means something to people who believe in that...

Anyways, I'm an accomodationist. I think that evolutionary theory is only incompatible with a more literal interpretation of religious scriptures.

[Pharaoh Cat]

Anyways, I'm an accomodationist. I think that evolutionary theory is only incompatible with a more literal interpretation of religious scriptures.

I would love to meet someone whose view of God is derived exclusively from extrapolations that start from nature.  This God would favor scenarios of novelty, challenge and opportunity; creatures getting what they can take and keeping what they can hold; winners taking all and winning methods proliferating; with no particular preference for either the solitary life strategy or the communal one, nor for either selfishness or altruism, but only for that which succeeds over that which fails.  Call this the Jungle God.

I would also love to meet someone who believes in God and likewise emphatically agrees that in nature the unlikely is not impossible; that in nature all it takes for an unlikelihood to become inevitable is a sufficient number of attempts; and that until something is discovered that scientists and mathematicians agree is impossible, the God hypothesis has no objective defensibility and so at best can be a symbol for elements of the real, to whom fidelity is given for the wisdom it encourages, a theology we could call Symbolism.

Any Symbolist who professed fidelity to the Jungle God would seem to me to be operating from an intellectual integrity that was admirable.

[yodachoda]

I've always been an atheist, but like I said earlier, I don't see why evolutionary theory and some sort of belief in god to be incompatible. It wouldn't be like regular theism, though, much less a literal interpretation of the creation of the universe. It tends to looks more like deism with theistic elements...the two can and do overlap depending on who you talk to. Ecurb's description looks more reasonable than most.

For instance, instead of saying that there is a god who dictates what morals are, reconciled belief would look more like mankind having evolved, and the capacity to be moral along with us (which is the case). Doesn't say much about objective morality, though. 

Other ideas that haven been mentioned is that we are the first created results (at least to our knowledge, not going to postulate the existence of intelligent aliens here) who, as a species, have achieved some forms of religions. That means something to people who believe in that...

Anyways, I'm an accomodationist. I think that evolutionary theory is only incompatible with a more literal interpretation of religious scriptures.

I'll never understand how people say things like "I don't see how evolution at all affects whether God exists or not."  This is complete BS IMO.  Evolution is the first and only scientific theory so far (well besides maybe the big bang theory, but this is somewhat compatible with God unlike evolution) that drastically affects the God hypothesis IMO.  If evolution is true, then the chance of God existing is like .000000001% IMO.  It's the exact same % as the probability that time traveling invisible intelligent unicorns are working inside the sun to keep it pumping out energy.  The probability of that is like .0000001% and the probability that it is mindless nuclear chemical reactions inside the sun, like scientists say, is 99.99999%.

Remember, the whole idea of God is he is a creator and he's a being with a mind.  That's kinda an important point, and I'm talking about this type of God, not a deistic God.  Evolution is by definition a mindless process.  If we were created by a mindless process with no purpose or foresight, then how does a creator God, who must have a mind and have foresight, have anything to do with us? 

I think there's a type of confusion here regarding the term evolution.  When I say evolution, I don't mean "change over time".  I specifically mean Darwinian evolution, which is a mindless process of the non-living environment naturally selecting who lives and who dies.  The word mindless is key, and I think many people accept evolution but they don't accept the mindless part.  They look at a human being and it's too difficult to believe something mindless could create it.  But indeed, evolution is no more mindful than water is mindful when it turned some rock into the grand canyon by traveling over the grand canyon over billions of years.  The mind that guides evolution is no more conscious than the mind of cold weather that selects woolly mammoths to survive in the ice age and that selects hairless mammoths to die in the ice age.

[The Magic Pudding]

I've always been an atheist, but like I said earlier, I don't see why evolutionary theory and some sort of belief in god to be incompatible. It wouldn't be like regular theism, though, much less a literal interpretation of the creation of the universe. It tends to looks more like deism with theistic elements...the two can and do overlap depending on who you talk to. Ecurb's description looks more reasonable than most.

For instance, instead of saying that there is a god who dictates what morals are, reconciled belief would look more like mankind having evolved, and the capacity to be moral along with us (which is the case). Doesn't say much about objective morality, though.  

Other ideas that haven been mentioned is that we are the first created results (at least to our knowledge, not going to postulate the existence of intelligent aliens here) who, as a species, have achieved some forms of religions. That means something to people who believe in that...

Anyways, I'm an accomodationist. I think that evolutionary theory is only incompatible with a more literal interpretation of religious scriptures.

I'll never understand how people say things like "I don't see how evolution at all affects whether God exists or not."  This is complete BS IMO.  Evolution is the first and only scientific theory so far (well besides maybe the big bang theory, but this is somewhat compatible with God unlike evolution) that drastically affects the God hypothesis IMO.  If evolution is true, then the chance of God existing is like .000000001% IMO.  It's the exact same % as the probability that time traveling invisible intelligent unicorns are working inside the sun to keep it pumping out energy.  The probability of that is like .0000001% and the probability that it is mindless nuclear chemical reactions inside the sun, like scientists say, is 99.99999%.

Remember, the whole idea of God is he is a creator and he's a being with a mind.  That's kinda an important point, and I'm talking about this type of God, not a deistic God.  Evolution is by definition a mindless process.  If we were created by a mindless process with no purpose or foresight, then how does a creator God, who must have a mind and have foresight, have anything to do with us?  

I think there's a type of confusion here regarding the term evolution.  When I say evolution, I don't mean "change over time".  I specifically mean Darwinian evolution, which is a mindless process of the non-living environment naturally selecting who lives and who dies.  The word mindless is key, and I think many people accept evolution but they don't accept the mindless part.  They look at a human being and it's too difficult to believe something mindless could create it.  But indeed, evolution is no more mindful than water is mindful when it turned some rock into the grand canyon by traveling over the grand canyon over billions of years.  The mind that guides evolution is no more conscious than the mind of cold weather that selects woolly mammoths to survive in the ice age and that selects hairless mammoths to die in the ice age.

green=devils god's advocate.
My god is all powerful, all knowing.
In a time past beyond your imagining he set the universe in motion.  Comets striking Jupiter don't surprise him, it's how he planned it.  The grain of sand between your toes, he can tell of the ancient stars he created so it would be there.  I don't know if the abiogenesis which led to us occurred on Earth or Mars or elsewhere, but he does and he intended it to and he planned for it to lead to you.

God lets his presence be known but humans have always had trouble comprehending its grandeur.  Most of us have always known he was there, some have tried to describe his grandeur but we always fall short.  You say the misconceptions of ancient men undermines the truth of god, no it merely illustrates the fallibility of man.

I could do an equally airy fairy defence of a pantheist or deist god, there other gods besides Yahweh.

[Pharaoh Cat]

Evolution is by definition a mindless process.

No it isn't.  Evolution, by definition, is a change in the gene pool of a population over successive generations via the processes of mutation, natural selection, and genetic drift.  Science assumes mindlessness but that's different from demonstrating it.  Mindlessness is neither empirically verifiable nor logically necessary.  Mindlessness is taken as axiomatic because the theory of evolution can accommodate it, and a commitment to Occam's Razor favors it.

Out of Occam's Razor comes atheism.  Atheists reject the God hypothesis because it isn't needed to explain current data, and any hypothesis that isn't needed and which postulates elements otherwise indiscernible is rejected out of hand.  The theory of evolution is what makes the God hypothesis unnecessary.  It doesn't disprove the God hypothesis.  It merely makes it unnecessary.  Occam's Razor then cuts the hypothesis away so we can discard it.

Believers who accept the theory of evolution deliberately defy Occam's Razor and posit God for reasons having nothing to do with the data.  They posit God because they allow emotion to dictate belief.  This is their great error.  They don't understand the respective roles of emotion and reason.  Emotion rightfully has the last word in the values domain, and reason, rightfully, in the beliefs domain.  Improper mixing gives us emotional beliefs or allegedly objective values, both delusional.

Nevertheless, if an invisible super-being was manipulating the mutation processes on land and sea by act of will, the theory of evolution would remain true, nor would its truth be compromised even in the slightest.  This is what believers hang their hat on, because they like their hat - it feels good on their head.

[yodachoda]

Evolution is by definition a mindless process.

No it isn't.  Evolution, by definition, is a change in the gene pool of a population over successive generations via the processes of mutation, natural selection, and genetic drift.  Science assumes mindlessness but that's different from demonstrating it.  Mindlessness is neither empirically verifiable nor logically necessary.  Mindlessness is taken as axiomatic because the theory of evolution can accommodate it, and a commitment to Occam's Razor favors it.

Out of Occam's Razor comes atheism.  Atheists reject the God hypothesis because it isn't needed to explain current data, and any hypothesis that isn't needed and which postulates elements otherwise indiscernible is rejected out of hand.  The theory of evolution is what makes the God hypothesis unnecessary.  It doesn't disprove the God hypothesis.  It merely makes it unnecessary.  Occam's Razor then cuts the hypothesis away so we can discard it.

Believers who accept the theory of evolution deliberately defy Occam's Razor and posit God for reasons having nothing to do with the data.  They posit God because they allow emotion to dictate belief.  This is their great error.  They don't understand the respective roles of emotion and reason.  Emotion rightfully has the last word in the values domain, and reason, rightfully, in the beliefs domain.  Improper mixing gives us emotional beliefs or allegedly objective values, both delusional.

Nevertheless, if an invisible super-being was manipulating the mutation processes on land and sea by act of will, the theory of evolution would remain true, nor would its truth be compromised even in the slightest.  This is what believers hang their hat on, because they like their hat - it feels good on their head.

I'm pretty sure Darwin himself said the mind behind evolution is no more mindful than the mind behind the water that carved the grand canyon from rock.  And he basically invented the term evolution (Darwinian evolution to be specific), so when he says it's mindless I think it's mindless.  Also, we can observe natural selection ourselves and we can see evolution in the lab.  It looks mindless.  There's not a hint of any supernatural intervention.  When we pollute a forest full of brown moths, making the trees black, it strongly appears like hawks/predators attacking brown moths but not white is a mindless process.  There's no hint that a deity is telling the hawks to attack the moths that are conspicuous and not the ones camouflaged.  It seems like the hawks/predators simply select the black moths because they don't even notice or see them. 

You said mindlessness can't be tested, but what about a random process?  The outcome of a random process is, by definition, uncontrollable and unpredictable therefore a deity can't control the outcome.  Genetic drift, mutation, and genetic shuffling/recombination are random.  These three are part of evolution. 

[xSilverPhinx]

I'm going to use green for this too:

I know that Kenneth Miller, who is a theistic biologist, says that he even finds it offensive that someone could suggest that his god interferes with evolution. He was even an expert witness in the Dover Trail, against ID, which says that there were some steps in the evolutionary process that are too complex to have evolved and had to have a god give it a little nudge.

An omniscient theistic god would've known the result of not only evolution but all other environmental and random factors that have and will occur, so actually for such a being there wouldn't be much of a differentiation between "result" of a process and "goal" of that same process. Direct interference is actually not necessary.

As for deistic gods, those are deterministic. God sets up the dominoes, flicks the first one over and doesn't interfere in the domino effect that takes hold after that one event. I don't see how such a scenario would be any different from one we experience though.  

[Pharaoh Cat]

I'm pretty sure Darwin himself said the mind behind evolution is no more mindful than the mind behind the water that carved the grand canyon from rock.

I've been googling for anything resembling this quote and can't find such a thing, except from the likes of Dennett.  Please provide it if you can.

In any case, it's important to distinguish between science and philosophy.  For example, Darwin said -

(1) "I cannot persuade myself that a beneficent and omnipotent God would have designedly created parasitic wasps with the express intention of their feeding within the living bodies of caterpillars."
(2) "What a book a devil's chaplain might write on the clumsy, wasteful, blundering, low, and horribly cruel work of nature!"
(3) "The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference."

All of that is philosophy, not science.  Who says God can't be malevolent, impotent, clumsy, wasteful, blundering, low, cruel, blind, or indifferent?  Certainly science says nothing of the kind.  Science says, "God?  Sorry.  No data."

Darwin also said this: "The mystery of the beginning of all things is insoluble by us; and I for one must be content to remain an agnostic."

Science, when allowed to stick to its knitting - to happily mind its own business - is apatheistic, ignoring everything but the empirically verifiable and the logically necessary, God being neither.  Science only ventures into atheism when forced to do so by assailants who want to force alien perspectives like Christianity onto a discipline that would lose all integrity if made to accommodate what it should never even be made to consider.  A book that contained every scrap of scientific knowledge and every drop of properly scientific hypothesis would not, in all its pages, even once mention the name of God, not even to debunk the concept.  Only in defending itself against alien invaders, such as the Intelligent Design people, does science find itself bereft of any alternative but to say, "No, no God, no design, not here, not in our discipline, not where only the empirically verifiable and the logically necessary are entertained." 
 
I say all this as one whose hard agnosticism and hard antifaith position coalesce into an inevitable and inescapable atheism.  But all of that is an extrapolation from science, and the successes of science, rather than being scientific in and of itself.  Science just wants the God people to leave it the hell alone.

You said mindlessness can't be tested, but what about a random process?  The outcome of a random process is, by definition, uncontrollable and unpredictable therefore a deity can't control the outcome.  Genetic drift, mutation, and genetic shuffling/recombination are random.  These three are part of evolution. 

A so-called "random" future is one we humans can't predict because we lack sufficient knowledge of the present.  When I say a process is random, I'm saying no human is controlling that process, and no human can predict its outcome in advance, because no human has sufficient knowledge of the present so as to support an ironclad prediction.  I'm not saying a damned thing about the universe, or nature, or reality.  If I was standing in a room with you and holding a penny in my hand, and you knew enough about my body and my history, and enough about the atmospherics and geometries in the room, you could predict infallibly whether my next toss would come up heads or tails.  All is causality.  Outside of causality, nothing.

[Gawen]

What is the strongest argument for MY atheism?

I do not "believe" in the super/unnatural. Simple as that.

[Will]

The strongest argument is, in response to a religious claim, simply replying, "Prove it."

[Crocoduck]

1.  Creates strong appearance that the creator doesn't exist, meaning he'd have to know that by using evolution few people would believe in him once humanity discovers evolution.

On the Origin of Species, published on 24 November 1859

Christianity: 2.1 billion
Islam: 1.5 billion
Secular/Nonreligious/Agnostic/Atheist: 1.1 billion
Hinduism: 900 million
Chinese traditional religion: 394 million
Buddhism: 376 million
primal-indigenous: 300 million
African Traditional & Diasporic: 100 million
Sikhism: 23 million
Juche: 19 million
Spiritism: 15 million
Judaism: 14 million
Baha'i: 7 million
Jainism: 4.2 million
Shinto: 4 million
Cao Dai: 4 million
Zoroastrianism: 2.6 million
Tenrikyo: 2 million
Neo-Paganism: 1 million
Unitarian-Universalism: 800 thousand
Rastafarianism: 600 thousand
Scientology: 500 thousand
From http://www.adherents.com/Religions_By_Adherents.html

I'm not sure how accurate the above statistics are, I got then from the first site Google hit. Regardless of whether there spot on or not it goes to show that in the 150 years or so since On the Origin of Species was published there are more then a "few people" who still believe.

[yodachoda]

1.  Creates strong appearance that the creator doesn't exist, meaning he'd have to know that by using evolution few people would believe in him once humanity discovers evolution.

On the Origin of Species, published on 24 November 1859

Christianity: 2.1 billion
Islam: 1.5 billion
Secular/Nonreligious/Agnostic/Atheist: 1.1 billion
Hinduism: 900 million
Chinese traditional religion: 394 million
Buddhism: 376 million
primal-indigenous: 300 million
African Traditional & Diasporic: 100 million
Sikhism: 23 million
Juche: 19 million
Spiritism: 15 million
Judaism: 14 million
Baha'i: 7 million
Jainism: 4.2 million
Shinto: 4 million
Cao Dai: 4 million
Zoroastrianism: 2.6 million
Tenrikyo: 2 million
Neo-Paganism: 1 million
Unitarian-Universalism: 800 thousand
Rastafarianism: 600 thousand
Scientology: 500 thousand
From http://www.adherents.com/Religions_By_Adherents.html

I'm not sure how accurate the above statistics are, I got then from the first site Google hit. Regardless of whether there spot on or not it goes to show that in the 150 years or so since On the Origin of Species was published there are more then a "few people" who still believe.

Yeah but many many people don't accept evolution as true despite the piles of evidence from many different fields and professions supporting evolution.  Evolution made Darwin and most evolutionary biologists atheists, and learning evolution made me an atheist. 

[xSilverPhinx]

How important was the literal account of genesis to you before you learned about evolution?