Do atheists have any evidence to support their beliefs?

whats the matter?

you all got owned by the atheists. you didn't even reply to their posts. lol. fail debate is fail.

Gabe7 said:

The question was if atheists have proof to support their views on atheism. So far I've seen a lack of evidence presented by them to show there is no God. That being the case, what should I reply to?

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The repeated reply that the burden of evidence is on you.


eudaimonia,

Mark

Gabe7 said:

If I say "God exists.", then the burden is on me.

If you say "God doesn't exist.", then the burden is on you. Atheists say God doesn't exist.

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Wrong. Few of them do, most don´t.

Gabe7 said:

If you say "God doesn't exist.", then the burden is on you. Atheists say God doesn't exist.

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Not all atheists make that claim, but this is quite a different sort of claim. It is basically the result of considering the universe and seeing that it is not in need of any God for its existence, and the overwhelming likelihood that god-concepts are purely human inventions. The reasonable conclusion is that God doesn't exist.

Now, if you want evidence for such ideas, the universe is your evidence, which I gave to you earlier. Examine cosmology, evolution, human cultures, etc. What you will find does not convincingly add up to a universe-creating superbeing that some call "God", at least for atheists.

I'm not suggesting that this is "proof" in some absolute sense, but it is evidence. I personally do not flatly state that "God doesn't exist". I'm an atheist mainly in the "weak" sense of someone who doesn't believe that God does exist.


eudaimonia,

Mark

Fellow Christians is not up to non-believers to prove anything. If they do not believe then they do not believe. We cannot ever prove God exists and it is nonsense to claim that they are in a state of belief that requires proof. We reject all other gods without proof ourselves. They are using the intellect that God gave them and it is up to God to reveal himself to them because we cannot do it. Stop claiming they're in faith and they need to prove anything because it makes us look silly and naive.

We have to start getting real with ourselves here.

Gabe7 said:

If I say "God exists.", then the burden is on me.

If you say "God doesn't exist.", then the burden is on you. Atheists say God doesn't exist. If they can't make the case for that then I think I've made my point about them having faith without evidence for it.

Atheists don't exist.

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Um... I have never said "God doesn't exist". There is a large difference between that and "the idea of a God is implausible to me, and thus I do not believe in one." I don't have to prove anything. It's just what I believe.

Do you believe in the Easter Bunny? What about Big Foot or the Loch Ness Monster? Do you believe in alien abductions? There are numerous children who will swear up and down that Santa is real. The burden of proof falls on the parents who take them to malls to visit Santa, threaten their bad behavior with coal, and so on.

Conversely, when children find out Santa doesn't exist, no one is asked to prove anything. It's just merely something they accept.

If, however, this answer isn't satisfactory, let me put it this way:

I do not believe God exists. I will not say emphatically he doesn't. I was agnostic until I reconciled the difference between saying, "God doesn't exist" and "God might exist, but I don't believe he does." To say atheists are required to support their non-belief is a little ridiculous, especially when most Christians will use personal testimonials and/or scripture quoting to support their belief system. You might as well recite the ABC's. It will have essentially the same effect on an atheist.

Gabe7 said:

The question was if atheists have proof to support their views on atheism. So far I've seen a lack of evidence presented by them to show there is no God. That being the case, what should I reply to?

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What evidence would you accept? What evidence do you think would be produced by a lack of gods?

Gabe7 said:

If I say "God exists.", then the burden is on me.

If you say "God doesn't exist.", then the burden is on you. Atheists say God doesn't exist. If they can't make the case for that then I think I've made my point about them having faith without evidence for it.

Atheists don't exist.

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This is precisely why your OP is a strawman, and even though it has already been pointed out to you numerous times in this thread by other atheists (and some theists!), I will say it again, in hopes that it will correct your error in thinking:

Atheists* do NOT say "There is no god."

Atheists simply lack belief in a god(s).

There is a world of difference between the two. Saying a positive like, "There is no god." is actively believing that there is no god. Lacking a belief is not a positive statement, it is simply lack of belief.

*Most atheist do not make the positive statement that there is no god. Most atheists simply lack belief in any dieties.

Gabe7 said:

Atheists say God doesn't exist. If they can't make the case for that then I think I've made my point about them having faith without evidence for it.

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Well, I'll give you my take on it. I have an atheist icon, but that's not my primary belief. I'm a naturalist. I believe that everything in the universe is purely a function of matter and energy, and the natural behavior thereof. I reject anything supernatural--that is, I don't believe that there are any forces or entities outside the realm of matter and energy than affect their behavior. By logical extension, that makes me an atheist, at least as regards any supernatural gods. Now of course, I can't prove this with absolute metaphysical certainty. And I fully agree with you that such a belief does require faith. But there is evidence, through inductive reasoning, to support faith in naturalism. Throughout history, people have always postulated supernatural explanations for what they didn't understand. But as knowledge has progressed, everything that was once thought to be supernatural, but which is now understood, has been shown to be a completely natural phenomenon. A supernatural explanation has never been proven valid for anything. There are many things about life on our planet and about the universe in general that we still don't know. But, a posteriori, why should I doubt that these unknown things too, are anything but completely natural processes? So I also have faith--there's nothing wrong with that. But it's based on applying induction to the history of knowledge. Your faith seems to be based on a subjective sense of the existential aspects of the universe. And I think we'll have to leave it at that.

selfinflikted said:

*Most atheist do not make the positive statement that there is no god. Most atheists simply lack belief in any dieties.

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I lack belief in dieties. Mine keeps failing.

/typo humor

selfinflikted said:

This is precisely why your OP is a strawman, and even though it has already been pointed out to you numerous times in this thread by other atheists (and some theists!), I will say it again, in hopes that it will correct your error in thinking:

Atheists* do NOT say "There is no god."

Atheists simply lack belief in a god(s).

There is a world of difference between the two. Saying a positive like, "There is no god." is actively believing that there is no god. Lacking a belief is not a positive statement, it is simply lack of belief.

*Most atheist do not make the positive statement that there is no god. Most atheists simply lack belief in any dieties.

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Don't you mean to say that most Atheists don't try to assert their beliefs on others? Because while not all Atheists declare to people that there is no God, is it not evident that they believe it in their hearts? "Lack of belief" is just a less hostile way of saying you think God doesn't exist. After all, you either believe in God, or you don't. In between would be Agnosticism, where you have some faith but it isn't enough for you to make a commitment. Unless you're secretly an Agnostic, I know you believe there is no God. When you talk about not making positive statements and whatnot, it's just dancing around the alleged obligation to prove your belief, because it is impossible for you to do so. Just like Christians cannot offer concrete proof of God's existence, only his Word and our own testimonies (which is what we are told to do). The rest is up to God.

If you just don't want to argue your beliefs that God doesn't exist, you don't have to. I understand that.

Hakan101 said:

Don't you mean to say that most Atheists don't try to assert their beliefs on others? Because while not all Atheists declare to people that there is no God, is it not evident that they believe it in their hearts? "Lack of belief" is just a less hostile way of saying you think God doesn't exist. After all, you either believe in God, or you don't. In between would be Agnosticism, where you have some faith but it isn't enough for you to make a commitment. Unless you're secretly an Agnostic, I know you believe there is no God. When you talk about not making positive statements and whatnot, it's just dancing around the alleged obligation to prove your belief, because it is impossible for you to do so. Just like Christians cannot offer concrete proof of God's existence, only his Word and our own testimonies (which is what we are told to do). The rest is up to God.

If you just don't want to argue your beliefs that God doesn't exist, you don't have to. I understand that.

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You have no understanding of agnosticism or atheism. Please stop embarrassing yourself.

*edit* also, don't pretend you can mindread.

hollyda said:

I lack belief in dieties. Mine keeps failing.

/typo humor

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Well, now I can't correct my typo, because your post wouldn't make sense

Hakan101 said:

Don't you mean to say that most Atheists don't try to assert their beliefs on others? Because while not all Atheists declare to people that there is no God, is it not evident that they believe it in their hearts? "Lack of belief" is just a less hostile way of saying you think God doesn't exist. After all, you either believe in God, or you don't. In between would be Agnosticism, where you have some faith but it isn't enough for you to make a commitment. Unless you're secretly an Agnostic, I know you believe there is no God. When you talk about not making positive statements and whatnot, it's just dancing around the alleged obligation to prove your belief, because it is impossible for you to do so. Just like Christians cannot offer concrete proof of God's existence, only his Word and our own testimonies (which is what we are told to do). The rest is up to God.

If you just don't want to argue your beliefs that God doesn't exist, you don't have to. I understand that.

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Nope. I meant to say exactly what I said, minus spelling errors.

It's like this: I don't believe in god - not that there can't be a god, I just haven't been offered any evidence to sway my position. Of course, if some evidence came along that was satisfactory to me, I would convert. This has yet to happen though. I'm open to the possibility of it, I just haven't been convinced, therefore, I do not believe in DEITIES. ( )

selfinflikted said:

Well, now I can't correct my typo, because your post wouldn't make sense

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*cackle*