Atheists, to be fair, should more often admit that the belief that there is no God is, in every sense of the word, a belief—as opposed to a fact. It’s a guess. It’s a reasonable guess, to be sure. But it’s absurd to suggest that it’s any more reasonable a guess than that there is a God.
Humans are designed to induce universal truths from limited evidence. Atheists look around, and induce there’s no God. Given the exact same range of evidence, religious people conclude there is.
What atheists cannot then do is pretend that it’s only religious people whose convictions are grounded in what is ultimately a leap of faith. To no less a degree, so is theirs.
Take a leap of faith and join my Facebook fan club here.
![John Shore on The Huffington Post](http://johnshore.files.wordpress.com/2010/03/huffpost.jpg?w=120 "John Shore on The Huffington Post\")
{ 41 comments… read them below or add one }
« 1 2
I must admit that I get tired of people (invariably creationists) referring to "evolutionists" and "Darwinists". There is, simply, no such thing.
Scientific theories are based on evidence. Those that best fit the available evidence are accepted. To accept the theory of evolution by natural selection as the best for for the facts does not make one a Darwinist any more than accepting the theory of gravity makes on a Newtonist, or accepting the general theory of relativity makes one an Einsteinist.
By the way, you will note that I gave the theory its full title above. It's only the "natural selection" part that is theoretical and up for debate; evolution itself is an observable phenomenon and not a theory.
Barry,
I read your blog a bit (and enjoyed it). As you rightfully encourage Christians to approach you with an open mind and a lack of straw man based on their pastoral thinking, perhaps that applies here as well. You're dealing with Christians who will define their terms on their experience. Hence "evolutionists" being a term that seems to make sense within the context of what many believe about evolution being a "theory".
I happen to agree with the merits of your particular point, but consider where you are blogging and with whom you're blogging. There has to be some degree of latitude regarding terms when dealing with such a profoundly different set of filters, yes?
I don’t know, John…I’ve heard this argument before and have never been convinced by it. Here’s why.
Carl Sagan once said that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. Certainly the concept of the Christian deity – all-knowing, all-powerful and all good – is a pretty extraordinary concept necessitating some pretty extraordinary evidence. It seems to me that the burden of proof for any such claim is on the claimant, and not those who have yet to be convinced. It’s true that I cannot prove to you or anyone else that no god exists, because that would involve me showing the universe to you all at once so you could see there was no deity there. Similarly, you could not prove to me that an invisible, intangible parrot sits upon my shoulder and telepathically advises me about political matters. Does that mean you or anyone else should believe in such a parrot?
I’m not interested, however, in getting into a discussion about the existence of your deity, nor do I think your belief in same makes you ignorant or stupid or whatever. However, I think that calling atheism a faith equivalent to, say, Christianity is inaccurate to say the least.
If I asked you whether you believe in unicorns, you would probably say no. (I would.) And yet that is a belief. It's the same with God. In essence, assume nonexistence until existence is proven.
Gee Paul thanks for reviving this thread after six months to tell us the difference between you and us is that your point of view is virtuous and ours isn't.
Seriously thanks because no matter how solipsistic your point seems to me, it gave me a reason to go back and read all of the wonderful and thoughtful comments from six months ago (only two of which were mine!)
If ever there was a question that has been done to death!
The confidence that an atheist has is not the same thing as religious faith. With religious faith, it is a virtue, it is a good thing, to believe without evidence, or in spite of evidence (cf Jesus & Thomas).
I just love it when, in their attempts to portray Christians as idiots, atheists come off looking so idiotic.
Lot of it going on lately, and It tickles me no end
John (and All) – The comments on your blogs are as good as the blogs themselves. This is interesting stuff. Thanks!
But, mcoville, we have evidence that it takes millions/billions of years and we have also seen natural selection in action both in the lab and in nature.
There are gaps in scientific knowledge, but science goes looking for the actual answers as opposed to inserting an evidence-devoid placeholder.
Mike Burns:Darwinists have their own god of the gaps, it’s called TIME. I notice every time a evolutionist can not provide evidence for their belief they say, “it takes millions of years to do that”.
rbfprject: http://www.gotquestions.org/Genesis-days.html
This site shows a great word study of the original hebrew text of the Bible. If you do not use science to determine the age of the earth, and purely rely on the Word of God, then you will see that the days of creation where literal 24hour days.
aaaaaaaand …. scene.
« 1 2