When It Comes to God’s Existence, Who Has the Burden of Proof

I suppose it depends on what someone defines as proof in the
first place. Plus, is it possible that such proof has been made available, but
that one’s personal belief that God doesn’t exist doesn’t allow him or her to
accept the proof.  So something happens
that defies everything we understand about the world, or that suggests
something miraculous did happen.  I’ve
seen more than one atheist shrug and say ‘I’m sure we’ll explain it someday’,
or ‘there’s probably another explanation’, or ‘it was probably just a cosmic
coincidence.’  Perhaps.  But perhaps, the proof is there, but because
of preconceived biases, the individual is incapable of seeing the proof that he
demands.  It’s not as if biases and sympathies
toward a particular viewpoint haven’t clouded folks’ assessment of the facts in
other areas throughout the ages. Of course none of this may ‘prove’ God does
exist.  But maybe, again assuming that
all reality must be proven as we understand it in our day and age, it boils
down to what you are or are not willing to accept.  

 It’s not that he doesn’t see “Gods don’t exist” as a claim, it’s that he’s not CLAIMING that. He’s not claiming anything at all.

There’s actually very few atheists that claim gods don’t exist – even Dawkins doesn’t.

Preconceived biases in this case can be better described as common sense based on basic sensory knowledge. Someone might see a miracle while another sees a lucky turn of chance, but the miracle has a faith-based supernatural explanation with underwhelming or no evidence.

I understand the frustration of discussing with naysayers what’s in your heart and what you would define as evidence of supernatural involvement, but there are hundreds if not thousands of outcomes to those claims (currently unexplainable –> supernatural involvement –> God, Zeus, elemental spirit, ghosts, etc.).

Since everyone shares the same sensory information, though, we can all judge the world better with the evidence we can discover from the tangible world around us.

The only acceptable proof of a gods existence is for him to descend from his sky throne in a very fancy fashion for every one to see, not to send a fucking bird as a “sign” or appear in somebody’s hallucination.

But saying that evidence COULD be staring the atheist in the face is still meaningless unless you can provide evidence that it DOES.

I understand what you’re getting at, and speculation is always fun, but it doesn’t actually advance the discussion.

It’s not speculation though.  My point was, evidence can stare people in the face all the time.  Think of some flat earth creationist.  Boy, you’d think wouldn’t you? But they are so deep in their belief that things must be a certain way, that we could float boats loaded with evidence and it wouldn’t make any difference. 

The point is, was the COULD in that based already on my own biases?.  Maybe, just maybe, it WAS staring in the face, and it was my own biases that interpreted it as so or not as so.  Which got back to the question, am I staring the evidence in the face, or is there more to the simple ‘show me proof’ than I had allowed?

 You’re repeating a common misconception. Correctly understood, atheism makes no claims as to the existence of the supernatural other than to state that there is no evidence to believe in the supernatural.
Theists make a claim of existence.
Stating that there is not enough evidence to prove or demonstrate existence is not a claim of non-existence.
It’s a fine distinction, but an important one.
For example, theists often claim that atheism is a belief system in that we “believe” there are no gods. This is, of course, incorrect as it is not possible to “prove” a negative.
It’s not that I believe there are no gods, but that I do not believe in gods. Again, an important distinction and one that is surprisingly misunderstood even by a few of those who claim to be atheist/agnostic.

It’s the only proof that i will accept as such (and if 7billion people see him descending).
No natural phenomenon or a statistical probability is a proof of a divine presence and should be dismissed. Now if you have something tangible (ie not a personnal experience, miraculous healing or any other usual bullcrap) i will be glad to examine it, until then, there’s no god.

 You have to show a proof and provide the explanatory package about it. Because i could pick up a rock and say that this rock is the proof that pink unicorns prefer blue color if i do not provide any reasonnable explanations i’m probably high as a kite.

 any occurrence that has more than one possible explanation can not be used as evidence for one of those explanations.
I have not yet come across  a situation where the existence of a god was the only explanation for an occurrance.
(And I mean there were other serious explanations, not just somebody thinking up something to be contrary)
‘Chance’ is in many cases a serious possible explanation. Only when an occurrance happens more often than can expected of chance, other explanations become more likely.

“Absence of evidence is most assuredly evidence of absence.”
I see what you mean, but I don’t think it works that way.  Here is one reference:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evidence_of_absence
One can start by looking at the falsifiability, a topic covered somewhat tangentially in the video, and not stated by that name that I remember.  Someone saying a god exists – there’s no way to disprove that.  If someone says no gods exist, then it’s easy to disprove if you can find good evidence of one.

Also, I don’t know if you’re aware of it, but the phrase I quoted might be a distortion of a commonly used phrase.  Neil de Grasse Tyson uses this on occasion:
“Absence of evidence is most assuredly evidence of absence.”

His example is extraterrestrial aliens.  Just because we don’t have proof of them doesn’t mean they don’t exist.  But he’s not going to state an affirmative without proof of it.

What evidence would you want?

What kind do you have in mind?  You’ve already demonstrated my point, though I doubt you get why 

Heh.  An Arminian?  Good one.  But yes, that’s what I’m saying.  Not the ‘because we don’t want to be held accountable’ part.  But simply we don’t want to believe because we’ve already concluded we don’t believe, or we don’t want to, or whatever.  For whatever reason we don’t believe, that not believing is the lens through which we interpret things, and therefore, is it possible – just possible mind you – that there could be moments that might change a person’s mind in other circumstances and yet they are dismissed based on no other reasoning than ‘I don’t believe’? 

 You asked what evidence has been staring us in the face.  Fine.  I simply ask what evidence are you looking for, and perhaps that might
determine what evidence has been staring you in the face.

Uh huh. You may want to ask the others here to explain “burden of proof” to you as well.

“Absence of evidence is most assuredly evidence of absence.”

You meant:
“Absence of evidence is most assuredly NOT evidence of absence.”…correct?

If god exists and is omni-everything, then he knows that I won’t accept as proof anything that can have a natural explanation. So no pictures of Mary on my toast or Jesus in my porridge.

Proof is in the eye of the beholder, so proof of god will be undeniable for me. While it can be denied, it’s not irrefutable proof of god.

“I suppose it depends on what someone defines as proof in the
first place.”

And this is exactly why I cringe when I see atheists try to debate someone who waves about this get-out-of-jail-free card whenever they are intellectually cornered.
Why not simply state that you don’t require evidence in order to hold to your beliefs and leave it at that?
A rhetorical question, because I already know the answer AND I am fairly certain of your response…and they are not the same.

Quote:
“What if the sensory information demands that the simplest explanation is true? ”

 for me, the existence of a god would not be a simple explanation.  It may be a simple statement, but it has many implications for what I know of the world.

I understand the distinction but my point would be that the distinction has no bearing on reality. Sure, no atheist I know of would flat out state that there is zero possibility of the existence of gods, myself included. But that acknowledgement is still entirely compatible (outside a philosophy class) with the statement ‘I believe there are no gods’. For all practical purposes the two are one and the same.

I can certainly hold a belief without it being proven. Almost all my, and your, beliefs are subjective in exactly this fashion. This falsifiability is exactly what makes a rationalist’s beliefs more powerful and meaningful than those of a theist. 100% unbreakable faith does absolutely nothing to nail down reality because no matter how reality might change the belief cannot. It therefore has zero value.

Regardless, my original point still stands, from the theist’s perspective, it is OUR claim which is extraordinary. He lives in a world unencumbered by evidence, reason or rationality. God exists, end of story. How could it be any other way? And make no mistake, the atheist IS making a claim, even if it’s only ‘Gods ALMOST CERTAINLY don’t exist’. It’s a claim about the nature of reality just as much as the theist’s claim ‘God DEFINITELY exists’ is a claim about the nature of reality.

Determining which of the two claims is the most extraordinary requires a value judgement based on the context of the judge as well as the certitude of the claim. For the theist who KNOWS gods do exist, even the claim that they MIGHT not is utterly extraordinary. For the atheist who’s only PRETTY SURE they don’t, the claim that they definitely DO is, in some ways far less extraordinary; we do at least already acknowledge the possibility that they might.

Fundamentally, there’s no way to determine which of the two contexts is valid other than the obvious; one is based in faith, one is based in reason. But the theist and the atheist both disagree about which of the two axioms, faith or reason, is the correct one to use. At the end of the day, you can’t reason a person out of a situation which they didn’t reason themselves into.

Who’s saying that?  I’m saying that one could demand evidence, then stare the evidence in the face, and because of beliefs already held, ignore the simplest explanation simply because it doesn’t fit with what I already believe to be, or not to be, the truth. 

Nobody says that one single bit of evidence would be the all explaining irrefutable proof of God.  My initial observation was that as non-believers, we often say we don’t believe in God because there is no evidence, not for some reason like ‘because we just don’t want to believe in God.’  The implication is that if evidence were shown, we would accept it and concede God’s existence.  My observation was, however, that some things could be evidence and our biases are what cause us to reject the evidence we insist on having!  Again, that was a thought I had in my own agnostic days.

Sure, you have to make sure your experiments have been done correctly and that they would have found evidence were it there to be found. But I’m sure you would agree that every person on the planet does enough experiments every day to determine that the evidence just isn’t there.

I understand, of course, that the presence of an alternate explanation could suggest that the evidence itself cannot be used as proof – as long as the alternate explanation is, itself, valid.   My entire point to begin with was pointing out that as non-believers, could it be we put too many walls up?  Too many barriers?  I mean, put enough barriers up and you can show there is no proof for the moon landings.  Without realizing it.  That something could happen that in any other area of our lives we would say ‘yep, show’s that is true’, but suddenly, because we have such strong feelings about the question of the divine, we immediatly, and with no clear reason, begin to dismiss something that might just be a miracle, on the basis of insisting that it can’t be since miracles don’t happen.  It was just an observation.

To begin with, I take it you’re not disagreeing with the content of the video, am I right? You agree that the person making a claim is the one with the burden of proof. Your issue is the form of the proof or evidence presented.

Making the point “is it possible that such proof has been made available, but
that one’s personal belief that God doesn’t exist doesn’t allow him or her to
accept the proof.” is an attempt to shift that burden of proof, but in doing so presents a new claim that also has a burden of proof.

It is possible that the skeptic is so entrenched in her ideas that she is unwilling to accurately gauge the evidence presented to her. This doesn’t change the burden of proof, it only shows a failure of critical thought. The theist claim maker however must do more than assert this failure, he must show evidence of it, if not for the offending skeptic herself, for everyone else.

That people ignore evidence at times is not in dispute. One cannot use that general claim to assert that a particular person is ignoring specific evidence, without discussing the actual presented evidence.

As an atheist, I have been in search of evidence for any of these “god” claims for years now. I have yet to see any besides (1) flawed logical arguments (such as the cosmological argument); (2) flawed refutations of evolution, abiogenesis, the Big Bang or some weird amalgamation of the three; and (3) personal anecdotes, such as dreams, hallucinations, visions, or “signs”.

It’s certainly not the case that I refuse to believe. That would assume that the evidence is already there, and is compelling, and I am refusing to examine it.If you have some compelling evidence that we should examine, please, by all means, show us.

With a flat-earther, we can SHOW evidence, such as standing at the top of a mountain and seeing the curvature of the Earth, or providing the calculations done by ancient Greek mathematicians that demonstrate the Earth is spheroid.

If I were to simply say, “The evidence for a spheroid Earth may be staring you in the face, and you may simply be letting your personal bias cloud your ability to see it,” that would not be enough. In this case, I can easily show the evidence when that denier asks, “Well, what is the evidence then?”
What you are doing, in this case, is being needlessly evasive and vague. Show us the evidence, then we can move from there. Otherwise, you’re just playing around and we have no need to listen to you.

For the love of Zeus, DG, any evidence you can show us will be acceptable. Now SHOW US already! You keep evading the question, and keep throwing up possibilities and maybes and what-ifs. Stop being vague and show us already.

Sorry, not all atheists believe there are no gods. Many simply lack a belief in any of the gods. There is a difference.

Religious people do that, despite the massive pile of material evidence that exists. The thing is, no (material, plausible, tangible) evidence was ever provided for us to stare at. Yet you claim you have something, please share it with us.

 Any real god would know what evidence I would make me believe.

Sure, no atheist I know of would flat out state that there is zero
possibility of the existence of gods, myself included. But
that acknowledgement is still entirely compatible (outside a philosophy
class) with the statement ‘I believe there are no gods’. For all
practical purposes the two are one and the same.

Christian apologists would be in complete agreement with you.

See my response above.

I’m assuming there’s a Part 2 to this. What was the event that changed your mind?

BTW, no, a book falling off a shelf doesn’t cut it.  Which is why I know of so few people who say
they didn’t believe in God, but suddenly a book fell off a shelf and that
clenched it.  However, if a person was to
say ‘show me a sign now God!’ and a book suddenly and for no other observable
reason fell off a shelf, would that make a difference?  According to you, no it wouldn’t.  And that’s my point.

Right, and if taken in context with the assumption of an actual divine being, it makes perfect sense that I got an A on my project the other week, because I really, really, really wanted to.

If you’re going to come on here and tell us all about how we’re close minded and can’t see the evidence in front of us, then proceed to tell us that you saw something, don’t tell us that there isn’t enough space to write it all.

On a slightly different note this excellent video applies to more than just gods. Unfortunately in the northwest US there are a lot of people who believe naturiopathic quackery or “quackiopathy” as I like to call it. Amusingly the most common defense is “your western medicine science doesn’t apply to quackiopathy.” They miss both the fact that science can be applied rationally to any claim and that they must bear the burden of proof. Even better is the fact that the majority of claims fail when held up to scrutiny. Look at the example where airborne had to get rid of their ridiculous claim on the box when science showed the multivitamin “created” by a school teacher had no bearing on disease. But quackiopathy has become like a religion and as such people hold unjustified beliefs in the face of contrary evidence. What’s worse is people will pay ridiculous amounts of money for some “all natural” concoction yet complain about a $20 copay. They will outright refuse science based medicine for some unfounded claim by a quackiopath and legally the FDA cannot audit them. That’s why there is always the *This product is not intended for the diagnosis or treatment of any specific illness* at the bottom of all the quackiopathic commercials on TV (Enzyte, etc.). So please, the next time you look at some quackiopathic nonsense when you have a cold, look for the burden of proof and be a skeptic.

 When people die, what happens to their love?

Could you explain to me how the existence of a god is simple?

However, if a person was to say ‘show me a sign now God!’ and a book suddenly and for no other observable reason fell off a shelf, would that make a difference?

No, and here’s why: unless I could prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that that book could not have fallen off of the shelf through purely natural means, then I would have no reason to believe a god did it.

If, however, I asked the Hindu gods for a sign, and nothing came… then asked the Norse gods for a sign, and nothing happened… then asked the Christian God for a sign, and the book slowly removed itself from the shelf, as though by an invisible hand, slowly approached me, then whacked me right in the face… then that might very well be evidence. Barring an hallucination (I would have a CT scan to make sure all was well), there would be no other possible explanation for that.

 A better phrasing is “Absence of EXPECTED evidence is most assuredly evidence of absence.”

That’s the hard part, because you would have to get my entire life from about the age of 5 – a long read. Let’s just say I always wanted to see a widget, and that day walking home from exams to my place on 4th street when I somewhat flippantly said ‘you know God, some proof would help’, suddenly a widget appeared that night for the first time with a sign that said ‘check out God’ on it.  Again, cosmic coincidence?  Perhaps. But that would rest on my accepted model of reality in the first place.  Sure if I assume God exists, it’s easy to say it was God.  If I assume God doesn’t, I can dismiss it as coincidence.  But I found, oddly enough, that despite the fact that I accepted a model of reality that didn’t include anything supernatural, it was easier to accept that it could have been God, and the only thing keeping me from seeing it that way was a bias every bit as subjective about the non-existence of the divine as believing in the divine.  And that eventually got me to thinking…. 

See my response below.

So youre saying that anything goes, believe in what you want because who knows maybe there really is a juggling walrus under he skin of Pluto paying homage at a shrine of Margaret Rutherford, we just haven’t found the proof yet.

Sure, but surely you would agree that you have to take a more nuanced approach than true/false/undecided. That’s just not the way the world works. True and false are exceedingly rare as correct answers. Almost all answers are ‘undecided’. Does that mean you think ‘gods exist’ and ‘gods don’t exist’ are equally likely? Of course not. I’m guessing you’d say it’s far more likely that gods don’t exist than that they do. Why would you throw away that information just so you can live in a true/false/undecided world? The purpose of evidence is to allow us to slide our answer along the continuous scale between the two extremes of true and false. If you’re only going to take a position on a question when you’re 100% sure of the answer then you’re never going to get much done are you?

“but it’s no less true about rejecting the existence of a divine being. ” Sorry, no. Rejecting a useless answer is not the same as accepting a useless answer.

If you begin by assuming an all-powerful entity exists and is in control of everything, what WOULDN’T be evidence of its existence?

There may be a divine entity that has an effect on reality, but appealing to ignorance is not a valid way to arrive at that conclusion.

That coincidences happen is not a matter of bias. That the human senses are fallible is not a matter of bias. That supernatural claims through history have made mutually contradicting assertions is not a matter of bias. That many definitions of supernatural entities are logically inconsistent is not a matter of bias. 

I don’t need to dismiss the supernatural a priori to accept these facts, but accepting them makes any supernatural claim too implausible to consider.

Now, I may be shooting myself in the foot here. One might say that I’m admitting that even if a god presented himself to me, I would reject it and therefore proving your point true.

This is true in a sense. I don’t think humans are capable of determining the existence of the omnimax definitions of gods, precisely because of the fallibility of these senses. If normal people in Africa, Alabama or Arabia can convince people to their contradicting claims to an absolute certainty, then any natural entity with the ability to influence human minds could pass itself off as a god and we’d be likely powerless to discern it.

Here’s the thing. An existing god could do several things to make his existence more plausible. If whenever someone prayed to god an audible voice was heard, if everyone in the planet had the same concept of a god embedded in their minds the same way everywhere. If Jesus had presented himself to the Chinese or the Incas instead of churches needing to send missionary troops.

But that’s not where we’re at, is it? We’re still dealing with superstitious allusions to ignorance and personal revelation. We still have mutually contradicting claims of divine opinion.

We could have been living in a world where a god was standing tall before us, like the Jesus statue in Rio de Janeiro and we could still make the points about our epistemological limits. But that would be a different world than this one, and in that would the existence of a god WOULD be a more plausible scenario within our understanding.

Have you ever argued with a flat-earth creationist? 

 If your criteria are arbitrary, then you’re doing it wrong.

It’s not just rare, but it was the timing.  For my whole life, I had been looking for this, er, widget.  Suddenly, the very moment I finally say ‘OK, I’m not saying there’s no God, but I am saying some proof would be nice ya know’, suddenly that little widget that had eluded me appears.  Again, my point isn’t, and wasn’t, that this proves God.  My point was that there was nothing at all that could explain it except that which I was already prepared to accept.  And if I didn’t accept it as a divine occurrence based on ‘God doesn’t exist, therefore it was just a coincidence’, what more was that than a belief claim, and one shutting me off from the evidence I may have asked for?

Well the fact that
people reject the faith of their families means nothing at all. I mean, let’s
face it, for over 50 years the overwhelming commission of society has been
question authority, reject tradition, and rebel against your parents. Heck,
there are kids who go to churches and are rebelling against atheist parents.
That doesn’t mean anything.

But you’ve more or less said what I said (though I’ve tried,
without going into a Call me Ishmael level account of how this moment in my
life got me to thinking about the subjective nature of my expectations when it
came to asking for evidence). The door obviously swings back at people of
religious faith. My point is it swings the other way as well. And how sure are
we that we aren’t, even subconsciously, putting up an impossible standard for
evidence, or saying ‘I say God has to do thus and such or else he doesn’t
exist.’ If you think about it, that’s not the most mature approach. That’s like
the creationist who says unless a scientist has observed evolution actually
happen he can’t prove it. Really?

Not to mention other things that pass as reasons but are, in
fact, belief claims. For instance, someone said the presence of a scientific
explanation can disprove the divine explanation. Since when? The idea that science
explaining gravity means God doesn’t exist or nothing supernatural or divine occurred
is, itself, a completely metaphysical claim. That’s what I was getting at.

As an agnostic, I was quick to say ‘I don’t reject God. If
someone could show me proof, of course I would accept it.’ But in the course of
reflecting on my own views of the subject, I suddenly wondered how open I really
was, or was this just pushing the line back based on ideas I had that were
already as subjective as any Bible waving fundamentalist preacher.

 You said: “So something happens
that defies everything we understand about the world, or that suggests
something miraculous did happen.  I’ve
seen more than one atheist shrug and say ‘I’m sure we’ll explain it someday’,”
Example please. I would like to hear of genuine proof that the laws of physics were broken, and a reasonable inference that the event constitutes a strong support for the God hypothesis. If you can give an example of this anecdote, I would be much obliged, if not it would imply you just made it up.

 It seems pretty clear that you are embarrassed to tell us what this widget was, the simplest explanation, is that it would not seem reasonable upon learning what this widget is, to consider this story supernatural. However in all honesty can you really say after thinking carefully (I know the story has been repeated in your mind so many times that as a matter of human psychology parsing the true answer to this question can be difficult) that you never before even once thought “God if you are real some evidence would be nice”. Because if you had previously thought this, the chance this was coincidence just shot through the roof. The other thing to consider is how many people in history have sincerely thought the same thing and never got this “response”. Would that mean God couldn’t be bothered to respond to them? Was your thought/prayer more important than the kid in Africa praying for food so he would not starve, which was not answered?

Ei incumbit probatio qui dicit, non qui negat.
The onus of proof lies on the proposition, not on the opposition.

 Then I point out that exhausting the existing list of natural explanations isn’t enough, you have to rule out every possible natural explanation that could be thought up in the future, or not thought up at all.  This has all been done before; you are trying to use an “argument from ignorance.” You should stop wasting electrons trying to support a fallacious position.

Fine, define God, and show how he, as part of this equation, is the simplest explanation.

It seems that your biases are preventing you from understanding that a complex god doing something simple still makes that scenario incredibly unlikely because it involves a complex entity. The simplicity of the act isnt what we’re disputing. You’ve somehow convinced yourself that god is simple, therefore anything god does is simple. But “god” can’t be simple if he created this complex universe. Anything involving god is inherently complex.

Have you ever heard of statistics and probabilities?

You don’t say how old you are, but you’ve built a  statistical back-door into your scenario anyway. If you’ve spent your whole life looking for X (where X is an unlikely event), the likelihood that you’ll encounter X naturally increases steadily as time passes. If you’re 30 years old, and X requires 10 seconds to occur, that’s… roughly 95 million opportunities X to occur such that you notice it. Even if we wish to eliminate time spent sleeping or time spent as an infant, and even if we stipulate that only 10% of the time is actually available for X, that’s still nearly 10 million opportunities.

Evolution has a well explained scientific model behind it that makes sense and many components of it are observable.

God is an infinite, nonmaterial being beyond space and time that knows all, can do all, and can be everywhere at once. He requires no creator because he’s eternal. There is no explanation provided, just assertions.

So when a creationist says “unless you can directly observe the entirety of evolution, then you can’t prove it”… that’s not quite fair to compare the two. In fact, direct observation don’t happen a lot in science. We can’t directly observe dinosaurs and their appearance and habits, but we can put together an educated guess based on fossils and other information. We can’t directly observe sub-atomic particles, but we know they’re there based in certain detection methods.

Why then I ask is a theory like evolution only true via direct observation? That seems rather bias, and I know what you’re going to say… You want to know then, “why does the existance of god require direct observation?”.

Well, I’m not sure it does, but if you read the description of what “god existing” asserts than you know that the immensity of your claim must be comparable to the breadth of your evidence. If your evidence for a spectacular claim is shaky, then it’s hard to believe. Is an infinite being beyond space and time with no discernible natural explanation a spectacular claim? You’re darn right it is.

If evolution explains how the model works within our scientific model, then it’s easy to run tests to demonstrate its truth. How do you run a test to demonstrate “god” when no model is provided and the breadth of the claim spans the infinite? I’d contend that it’s not provable, which in the end isn’t an amazing conclusion. Most atheists probably contend that god is a claim that is impossible to prove due to the nature of the claim.

Oh, trust me, I have. I didn’t say the evidence would convince them. I was merely pointing out that I could indeed provide objective evidence that wouldn’t be a personal experience or a story. It would be measurable, demonstrable to everybody regardless of personal experience, physical, and objective.

If I truly have exhausted all of the natural means, then it would most likely be something that we would describe as “supernatural”. This would, to me, also include technology that we have not seen yet (as sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic). Even if it were supernatural, it still doesn’t mean it was a brainless mind that created the universe.

 Do you believe in things that are beyond mathematical probability?

“You can say that as either – “I do not believe in the evidence of God”
or “Based upon the evidence presented I don’t believe in God”. It
reached the same conclusion, which is a belief that God does not exist. 
”

How do you get from statements about presented evidence to a belief in the non-existence of god?

Saying you failed to meet your burden of proof of the existence of god maintains the the god concept to the ‘unproven things’ pile.  What moves it to the ‘non-existent things’ pile is when theists define god in a logically inconsistent manner or if an atheist offers a positive argument against its existence.

 “Of course there is a third way to respond and that is- that is to say
that the  evidence presented is not evidence.  This is an affirmative
claim regarding the only type of evidence that would be credible for the
proof of God.  That is a claim upon which you would bear the burden of
proof”

I agree. And in general atheists do try to meet that burden of proof. I did so in an earlier comment with the example of old texts.

 Such as?

Turn off word wrap before you copy, the formatting won’t go so wonky 😉

I mean, let’s face it, for over 50 years the overwhelming commission of society has been question authority, reject tradition, and rebel against your parents.

Unless, of course, you consider that for all of recorded human history we’ve been influenced by what others think, “going with the crowd” kind of thing. That’s even one of the more common arguments for any given religion in the first place: “[This number] of people can’t be wrong!”

For every anecdotal influence, there’s at least one in another direction. The question is, which one of them is most supported by real research?

And how sure are we that we aren’t, even subconsciously, putting up an impossible standard for evidence, or saying ‘I say God has to do thus and such or else he doesn’t exist.’ If you think about it, that’s not the most mature approach.

Considering the numerous claims for any god’s extraordinary nature and ability, it’s really hard to imagine that any standard of evidence that we set could actually be high enough. We’re not talking about what causes the wind, here, but a being that supposedly created the entirety of human experience. Seriously, what are you proposing is “good enough”?

And more importantly, what reasoning are you giving as to why I should accept your standards?

Once again, you’re coming at it backwards – did you miss the point of this whole post? Anything that anyone can imagine might be possible, but that only addresses our mortal knowledge – it does not mean that physically nothing is impossible. Quite a few things might be, like cold fusion and zero point energy. What can you provide to change from ‘not definitively ruled out’ to ‘probable,’ or even simply ‘useful’?

This might help: http://tinyurl.com/6netbor

For instance, someone said the presence of a scientific explanation can disprove the divine explanation. Since when? The idea that science explaining gravity means God doesn’t exist or nothing supernatural or divine occurred is, itself, a completely metaphysical claim.

No, the claim that needs support is that metaphysics is not an imaginary field. Arbitrarily proclaiming something mystical means absolutely nothing to me – I said in another post, that’s a “What if?” excuse for a valid argument. What if it’s all our imagination? Who gives a damn? Produce something that has some use, effect, or prediction.

As an agnostic, I was quick to say ‘I don’t reject God. If someone could show me proof, of course I would accept it.’ But in the course of reflecting on my own views of the subject, I suddenly wondered how open I really was, or was this just pushing the line back based on ideas I had that were already as subjective as any Bible waving fundamentalist preacher.

I don’t reject faster than light travel. I just don’t see it happening. The word “reject” is a trap, whether yours or someone else’s – it’s an attempt to make the issue emotional, rather than objective.

You seem to think that entertaining any random concept is being open-minded, which is fine for you I suppose, but I see no purpose in it. I don’t put any weight behind ideas themselves; I’m more interested in if they have value, and can stand up against others better. Most cultures the world over have/had some kind of creation concept, but few have any agreement, and none have predicted such basic facts as planetary motion, bacteria, or evolution, and none seem to be doing any good at all at improving interpersonal relations. So I should consider them… why?

Uhhhhh…..in a perfect USA that would be true…..but digressing here, innocent people who haven’t even been accused get thrown into jails now. And not just those that the US claims are terrorists…..check the records for Alabama and a former politician and see how that utopian idea still works….

Try applying scientific method to it. Not an opinion, but the acceptable way things are ascertained and arrived at. And that requires no proof, nor is it just my opinion.

Do you realize what a dumbs you sound like?

No they do not deny any scientific explanation. They operate outside the realm of discover as of yet, with the key word being yet.

Not knowing does not equal jesus. It means we do not know yet. Yet.

YET.

And before you go and try that epistemological shell game of “but if we don’t know, we also don’t know it isn’t god” I say, yes, that is correct. However, it also means we don’t know the answer isn’t five-horned unicorns, Zues, the ghost of John Wayne, Joe Pesci, or perhaps a celestial teapot circling the earth. 

A quick swipe of Occam’s Razor shows us that those options, including jesus and the judeo-christian god is not the answer.

Science does not know the metaphorical answer….YET….and neither does religion. You may believe you know, you may think you know, but you do not know.

If you have some proof of god hanging out and existing, please present it, have it reviewed, defend it and then become world famous for doing what no person has done before…..go ahead…..I’ll wait….What’s that you say? You don’t have any proof?

Then shut up, and let the grown up scientists continue working toward real answers.

In acknowledging his bias against intelligent causes, he wrote in an email to Philip Johnson, where he said “Our philosophical commitment to materialism and reductionism is true” 

What he is saying is that even if the evidence points to a designer, he is philosophically opposed to it and thus would reject it. This is the bias the DG was referring to and prompted my comment. 

sweetie, “proof” is one of those words like “reality” and “evidence.” despite what you people tell yourselves, you don’t get to make up your own definitions and apply them to the reality-based community and the people who live there. proof is conclusive evidence that is verifiable and transparent to all. who will see it. like so many believers and conservatives, you project your own flaws onto those with whom you choose to disagree. 

That is not what he said, and you said you were going to cough up a quote that was an alleged smoking gun. This isn’t it Hoss.

I feel so sorry for your clients….

Here is what I imagine a court room scene with you to be:

You: Judge, my client is not guilty because I have a witness and sworn testimony to prove it.

Judge: Go get it.

You: Well, I found an old email, between tow now relevant people, that says carrots influence tidal waves, therefore two things: Jesus and not guilty.

Client: *face plan* Threat issued from he to you.

Judge: Guilty. 50 years.

You: Judge, it was only a speeding ticket.

Judge: Doesn’t matter. You are a dumbass and just pissed off the court.

we do not have to read your entire life story to “get it”.  That’s just a cop out to avoid presenting this evidence you speak of. Tell us what the widget is/was, and why you accepted it as proof, or you are just jerking us around asking us to take your word for it.
So far  all I’ve heard is that you have to pre-suppose god exists (a serious flaw in the scientific process) so we can then catch all the “evidence” that is plentiful around us. This is, as many have stated here, merely attributing things you see to the deity. That’s a fallacy.  You attribute it to your god, and others attribute it to theirs with the result it doesn’t prove either if it can prove both equally.  
Most non-believers I know became such because they really did want to verify proof of their god. They want it. They would welcome it. Upon not finding it, their only option left is that there is no proof of a god. To presume that we are set against seeing any proof is ludicrous.  I want more than anything for there to be an all-powerful being interested in taking care of me, I just hope it’s not any of the Abrahamic gods. I cannot imagine a more complete hell than having them as a god.

So what is this widget and why did it resonate with you so strongly. If you cannot present it for an unbiased review, then it is meaningless, even to you.

 What kind of response is that dg. I quoted you saying “So something happens
that defies everything we understand about the world, or that suggests
something miraculous did happen.  I’ve seen more than one atheist shrug and say ‘I’m sure we’ll explain it someday’,” ‘I’m sure we’ll explain it someday’,” I reiterated your claim and that fact it included breaking the laws of physics because you said it defies everything we understand about the world or suggest something miraculous happened. If it was standard functioning of the everyday laws that govern our existence thaen in what way would it defy everything we know about the world? You defined the term claim you had multiple specific anecdotes, and then when asked to share just one, asked why it has to conform to the very terms you said you had multiple anecdotes to support. Your response shows a very disingenuous behavior. You do not seem sincere at all in your questions, and it makes it seem that you are lying when you say many atheist have done something specific and when asked for an example you say why does it have to be specific? Ether be truthful or don’t speak. Please look in the mirror and decide if you want to be a lier or sincere seeker of truth.

 One that exists. For fucks sake, stop semantic whoring and answer a goddamn questions.

And that’s how science works. There are a lot of things that have changed human’s understanding of the laws of nature. And you know what? We didn’t throw our hands up, say god did it and take a nap. We went out and figured out why that thing happened, then we adjust the theory to include and explain the new observation. Really, every mystery ever solved has always turned out to be not-magic. The questions: Why should I expect that to change?

 I think you’re deliberately lying. Go look up the conversation between Richard Dawkins and PZ Meyers. They specifically talk about this topic, because Meyers does say that there is no conceivable evidence that would prove a god exists, and Dawkins disagreed with him.

Yeah I should have clarified that in no way do I think someone should ever jump to the “god” conclusion.  Because without ruling out all other possibilities,and without having positive evidence that is was god, you’re basically just filling the gaps with god. 
I was just slightly sympathizing with DG’s position.  Because any evidence for a god that currently exists (I’m not necessarily claiming that there is any) we wouldn’t allow. This is because it is part of the natural world so we would insist that there is a natural explanation for it. 
And we might claim that there is possible evidence that if observed in the future might change our mind.  But if it ever is observed, we’ll change our minds and insist on looking for a natural explanation. I fully think that this is how it should be. But I can see how DG feels he’s in a sort of a lose lose situation.
Which gets me thinking…I think the only evidence that would ever truly make me believe would have to include the actual god.  In other words my amputee example above would have to include a thing claiming to be a god and then saying, “I will now regrow this amputated limb.”  And then it happens.  Course then where would my free will be?

 Saying that there is no scientific explanation for something and thus there is no explanation is just saying that the only explanation that you would accept is a scientific one. This is the presupposition that DG was referring to.

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=umNeukocpVI&

I’m pretty sure that’s it, but i don’t have time to listend to the whole series to make sure.  I should be getting ready for work right now.feature=results_main&playnext=1&list=PL2333DAB27760B6C4

LOL! This is hilarious!!!