From: bernt.budde@udac.uu.se (Bernt Budde)
Newsgroups: alt.atheism
Subject: A proof that there is no god
Followup-To: alt.atheism
Date: 24 Jan 1993 14:55:48 GMT
Organization: UDAC (Uppsala Univ. Comp. Centre)
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: macbug.udac.uu.se

Caveat:My old high school teacher in philosophy showed you can't disproof a
theory that changes itself to suit new facts, by asking us to kill the
theory that friction comes from small, green guys sitting on everything and
holding hands.

OK, a bit stronger title than I'm really arguing for, but it got you this
far!

First, let me tell the newsgroup that I'm sorry for posting old
information. I've tried this kind of arguing on theists before and never
gotten a good answer. Please feel free to suggest changes and improvements.

----------------------

Proof:

I'm doing an assumption about the nature of religious faiths: A faith can't
really say that all religions are true, since most religions say that all
other religions are false.

You can split all ways on how to find truths in two groups: external and
internal. With "external" I mean that you look on the world (not
neccessarily experimental or physics here) and draw conclusions from it and
with "internal", that you think things out (or some god tells you them in
your mind).

A) Lets start with externally gained knowledge:

The arguments based on the existence of a world, the existence of
intelligent life, etc are weak. First, because there are models on how it
could come into being (says the physicists, I trust them. If you don't,
study math and physics a decade or two and disprove them! Also, see FAQ for
watchmaker) and second, IF a god existed, how can you be sure it was your
religion's god's footprints you see, and not the Moslim's god or the
Christians?

If you argue that the bible is something that must come from some god,
because of some special reasons, I would counter with lots of errors and
known history falsifications. I can safely say that these arguments are
easily countered; after all, there are many, many more and better witnesses
to that Elvis lives (to steal an old formulation from a local COM system)
than that Jesus came back.

I think we can write off all external proofs for at least christianity.

B) Internal proofs, then? God has told you the truth itself, eh?

The obvious problem are that these things aren't verifiable. But it's well
known that strange chemicals, low blood sugar, repetition of formulas,
certain mental diseases, etc can make you see and hear things. Some self
suggestion probably helps a long way, too (this atheists name for prayer).
One thing these experiences have in common is that you see and hear things
that are in your idea world (not exactly the same, but I think UFO reports
were much more seldom before space flight became a common idea).

Of course, when lots of people have the same insight into how some god has
ordained the world, it counts for something, even though for some strange
reason no one ever hear the voice of some god (that is already worshipped
somewhere else) he didn't know existed before the visions... (If there were
some one true religion, it should be a common occurrence.)

The problem with this is simply that for every person X that is inspired to
believe something about some god, literally a billion++ people are inspired
to believe he is wrong (and they get the one and only truth and X will
burn/freeze in hell/whatever). Now, person X has two avenues. 1) Agree with
the atheist regarding those billion++ people and make the supposition that
they are doing some heavy self suggestion because they need some religion
for whatever reason. 2) Believe that some Satan/whatever has whispered bad
lies into their ears.

One problem with both solutions is that as far as I've been able to
ascertain, there is no qualitative difference between the faith that is
instilled in the believers. E g, people have died for a lot of differing
faiths rather than change their minds, there has been religiously inspired
soldiers fighing to death in the name of a lot of contradicting truths,
etc, etc. If there was a true god and one truth, there should be SOME way
of telling it from all false prophets!

This all speaks for that from the beginning religion was a psychological
mechanism that evolved in people to keep groups working together.

This should safely write off internal ways of gaining knowledge.

QED

What have we reached for conclusion? That there is no rational reasons to
suppose that any religion is true. If some god existed, they could always
prove their own existence, but they seem not to care...


Bernt 'Bug' Budde, UDAC      |    :  #...    | UDAC is quite a fun place,
but
(Uppsala Univ. Comp. Centre) |    :  #       | they don't necessarily agree
Bernt.Budde@udac.uu.se       |    :#####:    | with my opinions. And they
                             |       #  :    | don't care about religion!
Impeach god                  |       #  :    |
 /Richard M Stallman         |    ...#  :    |