Something regarding atheism vs religion - not sure yet

I hope to continue the conversation. However, a better venue would be good IMHO, such as a skype call, or just posting text posts on some forum somewhere without these length and time restrictions. -You use the phrase "belief in god is rational". I believe that you mean to discuss "belief in god may be rational, and belief in god would be rational with sufficient evidence".I know many atheists have a prejudiced bias against the so-called supernatural. It often goes by the name "methodological naturalism". This probably is an important point in discussions with atheists. However, this is not a problem for me. You should know this. In the very first post here, I stated that I would be willing to name specific hypothetical evidence that would convince me that the Christian god exists. In a later post, I rejected the usefulness of the natural-supernatural dichotomy. Both imply an acceptance of your claim. You are not reading what I write. You are wasting my time. Please stop wasting my time. Of course, we disagree about the reasonable conclusions that we can draw from the available evidence. You need to name a specific god hypothesis, describe it in some detail, describe what predictions the hypothesis makes, and describe what available evidence you have that supports the hypothesis. Then we can have a discussion about it. I've been wanting that from day 1 of our conversation. You've been avoiding. Please stop wasting my time. -Your notion of evidence and science is overly restrictive and sterile. All first-person experience is evidence, and that's the only kind of evidence. All of the following are kinds of evidence: seeing the results of a blood DNA analysis, being a witness to a crime, hearing the testimony of a witness to a crime, hearing the hearsay testimony of a witness to a crime, hearing voices in your head from a god. Divine revelation is just another kind of evidence, and the use of divine revelation is governed by the same rules that govern the use of any kind of evidence. Divine revelation is not special. I refuse to recognize it as special. God speaking in your head is not fundamentally different than me sending you a text message. The use of both kinds of evidence are governed by the same rules of rationality. Of course, not all evidence should be given equal worth. For example, in the past, we humans over time have seen that hearing direct eye witness testimony is independently confirmed far more often that hearsay testimony. By applying the rule of The Scientist, we thus form an expectation that in the future, hearing direct eye witness testimony will generally be more reliable than hearing hearsay testimony. (This notion of inductive reasoning is closely related to the standard Hume notion of causation of "constant conjunction".) -3) If after covering both these sections the scale is still at 50, I argue that it is just as reasonable to believe in God as not to believe. It is flagrantly ridiculous that you think it's ok to claim and hold a belief X when you also believe that the odds of X being true are 50 50. That's flatly irrational. That's not ok. The only rational option is to apportion your beliefs according to the evidence and proper reasoning. It's irrational to withhold belief when you have sufficient justification at hand for the belief. It's irrational to grant belief when you lack sufficient justification at hand for the belief. Having evidence which indicates 50 50 odds is equivalent to having no evidence at all, and a complete lack of evidence is not sufficient justification for any belief whatsoever. We're all irrational on some topics, but we should strive towards fixing our irrationality when it has been identified. If you persist in holding that it's ok to hold unjustified beliefs, then I see no point to any further communication. (Of course, one's starting foundational beliefs are exempt. See my first post regarding the "regress problem".) This should not be a controversial topic. I am amazed that you do not understand such a simple concept or that you do not already hold that position. -You invoked Pascal's Wager again. (Also, come on. Pascal's Wager is one of the worst arguments in the book. Can't you do any better? Like providing actual specific evidence?)For the way I live my life to make sense, I do have to believe that the likelihood of truth of Christianity is very small indeed, far smaller than 50 50 odds. This a subtle point that is often lost on atheists. However, that's the extent to which you're right. Responding to: First, because the generic God has significant implicationsandMany people, if facing the 50% probability that God exists will choose to live under the paradigm that He does and they are justified in doing so (and so is the atheist/agnostic in not doing so and theists should not claim otherwise).You are flatly wrong in your intended meaning. The list of required and prohibited actions of the various contemporary popular religions are wildly contradictory. Just knowing that one of the contemporary popular religions has it right implies absolutely nothing about how I should live my life - apart from the need to do further research to figure out which religion got it right. Suppose that further research proves inconclusive. If so, that means the simple fact of this god's existence has absolutely no further significance on my life. It's a mere curiosity. Your myopic view of Christianity is unable to acknowledge that there are other religions, and that I believe that being a Christian is just as ridiculous as worshipping Thor (to a first degree of approximation). The inability to even acknowledge the realities of other religious dogmas is another failing of Pascal's Wager. For example, one religion might say that god demands I sacrifice a goat every week, and another religion might say that god will punish anyone who sacrifices a goat. What do I do? Thankfully, in practice my estimation of the existence of any such god is exceedingly small, and I don't have to worry about such shenanigans. -2) If he has gone through the trouble of creating everything and us, He probably has certain expectations and we need to be mindful how we live our lives.How do you know that? Why do you believe that's likely to be true? This seems to be directly pulled out of your anus. Even if I grant the existence of a god that created spacetime (whatever that means), the available evidence strongly supported unguided materialistic evolution for humans, which means that we're just the laws of physics playing out and we're probably just a mere accident on the god's plans. If the god actually cared about us specially, there's no reason to create a trillion trillion stars and 14~ billion years of time just for us. I find it hard to fathom the massive arrogance and self-importance that it takes for you to think that you're so special that a god must care about you. Even if there is a god, it's very likely that humans are just a random fluke of physics that is irrelevant in the grand scheme of the god. The same mistake is clearly visible here: Compare religions - how do they address reasonable issues like suffering and evilFallacious appeal to consequences. The universe does not care if you think it sucks. Deal with reality as it is, not as you want it to be. Only be recognizing reality for what it is can you make effective plans to change the world for the better. -I have no reason to believe that if a god exists, it's described by one of the contemporary popular religions. I have no reason to believe that if a god exists, it has any interest in human affairs. I have no reason to believe that if a god exists, it regularly interferes in our spacetime. Each one of these steps radically lowers the proper estimation of the truth of the proposition. For each step, you need a requisite comparable amount of evidence to support the additional conclusion. That's another failing of Pascal's Wager. You've also frequently invoked the Kalam cosmological argument. This argument and your tactics in general seem to be a script taken from William Lane Craig. The standard takedown: Professional cosmologists say that we do not have compelling evidence that our space-time had a beginning in time. Professional cosmologists say that it's perfectly plausible that time extends infinitely far into the past, and it's perfectly plausible that time has a closed-loop so that if you wait long enough, you'll loop around to the beginning and arrive at where you started. I adopt the standard Hume understanding of causation of "constant conjunction", and so I do not understand what "cause" means outside of time. Ignoring that difficulty, I can be like a parrot and say that the first moment of time might have been uncaused, and that the first moment of time might have been caused by a non-intelligent thing, or anything that's not a god. All of these alternatives are plausible. I have no evidence to favor any of the alternatives. Thus, to a first degree of approximation, as a good Bayesian, I have to give equal odds to all of the alternatives, which means that my estimation of the existence of a first-cause god of any kind is drastically less than 50 50 odds. On this primitive analysis alone, it's more like 1/5 aka 20% estimation aka 20 to 80 odds. There are trillion trillion stars, and I can name a god hypotheses where the god cares about aliens on a planet around that star. Before examining any particular evidence, that's a trillion trillion god hypotheses that are just as likely to be true as any god hypothesis where humans are special. That meas odds of 1 to a trillion trillion against a god that's interested in human affairs. Simple hypothetical evidence could easily overcome this hurdle, and I again invite you to present evidence. I've been waiting quite a while for that. Please stop wasting my time.