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The stumbling block for atheists.

Freodin

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Tautologies make things nice and tidy, don't they ;-).
Well, if only they held your worldview and accepted the supernatural creator god, they would overcome being atheists. But being atheists, they exactly don't hold to this your worldview. This is basically what makes them atheists.

So what do you propose to overcome this "stumbling block"? I think I have explained quite well in a previous post that simply accepting "undetectable things" doesn't lead to accepting exactly your version. Quite the opposite: when you invoke the undetectable, you also have to deal with the indistinguishable.
 
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quatona

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I do think that evidence is subjective.
No. The way you interprete evidence is subjective (i.e. what you feel it´s evidence for). That´s why I suggested that revealing and explaining the way you arrive from evidence to your conclusion is important. "There´s a rose. It´s evidence for God." or "There´s murder. It´s evidence against God." don´t help the attempt at intersubjectivity. The most important parts are missing.
There's more going on than cut-and-dried objective evidence.
I don´t disagree. Now, unless you are fine with everyone having their subjective realities - I am still waiting for your suggestion what it is that´s going on there and allows for determining objectivity for your ideas.
I think one of the things going on is the worldview of the person interpreting the evidence.
Except that you were talking about evidence for a certain worldview. So possibly you meant to submit that to each person their worldview is evidence for their worldview (completely circular bias-confirmation, if you will): X believes in God because he believes in God. Y doesn´t believe in God because he doesn´t believe in God.
Such a tautology not has little explanatory power.
The greater problem is: You would have to include yourself and your worldview into this general principle. However, what you are trying to attempt here is single out a competing worldview, and exempting your own. This requires more than appealing to a general human traits (even if you´d identify them accurately).
So, what do you do with the four fingers pointing back at you?
As suggested in the OP, if your worldview holds that there's no reality beyond what we can detect, then all evidence will be interpreted in light of the natural world.
And since my world-view doesn´t hold this, you are barking up the wrong tree, to begin with.
However, if your worldview holds that there is reality beyond what we can detect, then evidence can be interpreted in light of the supernatural. This allows for the miraculous, e.g., Creation ex nihilo.
I can assure you that it´s possible to believe that parts of reality aren´t detectable, yet not to jump to concluding the "supernatural" or a "God". It´s only because in your mind these things are inseparably linked that you can´t fathom people being able to approach each of them in their own right.

But, more importantly: Since in your last paragraph you so impressively described the theist´s insurmountable bias confirmation - how are you going to solve this issue in your attempt at using bias confirmation as a case against atheism in particular?

On another note, if believing in the undetectable means believing in the supernatural and thus believing in a God, the same does go for the Pink Invisible Unicorn. Just like God, it´s notorious for being undetectable and supernatural. So, unless you can provide us with a working epistemology of "the undectable" (which pretty much appears to be an oxymoron) and "the supernatural", our stumbling block at least prevents us from ending up helplessly and without any orientation in the world of the supernatural.
 
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Radrook

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Perhaps we should turn the table and present our "really true causes of why Christians attribite false motives to atheists".

Here's mine: Christians are deeply upset by the fact that none of their argument are convincing to rational people - so upset in fact that instead of blaming their arguments they have to blame the recipients
Rational people don't make an inductive leap without an observational pattern to justify it.
 
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Nithavela

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If faith does a person good and they don't use it to do anything to hurt others then there's no reason to harsh their mellow.
They're hurting themselves, though.
 
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Mountain_Girl406

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I'm thinking, as mentioned earlier in this thread, that transformed lives would be compelling evidence. If all Christians showed by their actions that they had the Holy Spirit it would be hard to ignore. However, if Christians as a whole weren't any different, equally capable of being hateful, greedy, violent, and lacking in compassion as anyone else, that would also be noteable.
 
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Freodin

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Rational people don't make an inductive leap without an observational pattern to justify it.
Exactly.

Now if you were just to understand what kind of "inductive leap" and which lack of "observational pattern" we are talking about, you would be one step closer to understand atheists.
 
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Nithavela

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I'm thinking, as mentioned earlier in this thread, that transformed lives would be compelling evidence. If all Christians showed by their actions that they had the Holy Spirit it would be hard to ignore. However, if Christians as a whole weren't any different, equally capable of being hateful, greedy, violent, and lacking in compassion as anyone else, that would also be noteable.
As far as I can tell, there doesn't seem to be too big of a difference. Statistically, christians are more charitable, but they're more prone to ending up in jail, too.

And you still have to consider: even if there is no supernatural aspect to christianity, no god and so forth, the threat of hell and the promise of heaven might still exert some pressure towards being "good". And there could also be a placebo effect.
 
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aachen_hexagon

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I'm thinking, as mentioned earlier in this thread, that transformed lives would be compelling evidence. If all Christians showed by their actions that they had the Holy Spirit it would be hard to ignore. However, if Christians as a whole weren't any different, equally capable of being hateful, greedy, violent, and lacking in compassion as anyone else, that would also be noteable.

I think it is a truism that religion never stopped someone from doing whatever evil is in their heart, atheism never stopped someone from doing whatever good is in their heart and vice versa.
 
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FrumiousBandersnatch

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I'm thinking, as mentioned earlier in this thread, that transformed lives would be compelling evidence. If all Christians showed by their actions that they had the Holy Spirit it would be hard to ignore.
It would only be hard-to-ignore evidence of the strength of their belief, not evidence that what they believed was true.
 
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Chesterton

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As far as I can tell, there doesn't seem to be too big of a difference. Statistically, christians are more charitable, but they're more prone to ending up in jail, too.

Which is proof that atheists are more evil. They don't get caught as much because they're better at crime, more street-smart, more cunning, more devious, you know, like the serpent. You get better at anything the more you do it.
 
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TBDude65

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I think I can understand why atheists are atheists. After all, professing Christians don't love each other as we should. We judge each other too harshly. We get hung up over all kinds of unimportant minutia. To the atheist, Christianity probably just looks like any other kooky cult because we generally don't accurately reflect the nature of our Creator.

But atheism has one fatal flaw. It assumes that the sum total of reality is what can be detected by the senses. Drop this assumption and the "magic" of miracles appears, the "pink unicorns" disappear, and the Creator God can become known.

"To the atheist, Christianity probably just looks like any other kooky cult because we generally don't accurately reflect the nature of our Creator."

How the religious treat one another isn't a reason why I am an atheist (and it isn't a reason any other atheists I know are atheists). It's pretty simple, no evidence of a god to demonstrate the concept is possible = no belief in said god

"But atheism has one fatal flaw. It assumes that the sum total of reality is what can be detected by the senses. Drop this assumption and the "magic" of miracles appears, the "pink unicorns" disappear, and the Creator God can become known."

Couple of things:
1) atheism makes no assumptions. It is the rejection of an assumption
2) I don't know how expanding one's view beyond the "senses" would result in evidence of a god
 
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Mountain_Girl406

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It would only be hard-to-ignore evidence of the strength of their belief, not evidence that what they believed was true.
Perhaps it only works in the other direction, in other words, if there isn't an observable difference in the behavior of Christians and non Christians. it might be hard to argue that the Christians have a part of God indwelling in them.
 
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Radrook

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Exactly.

Now if you were just to understand what kind of "inductive leap" and which lack of "observational pattern" we are talking about, you would be one step closer to understand atheists.
Describe the observed pattern on which you base your conclusion that abiogenesis happens.
 
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bhsmte

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I think that your understanding is severly lacking.

Nailed it.

I just don't believe the story and can't reconcile it with well evidenced reality. If people want to believe it, knock yourself out.
 
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FrumiousBandersnatch

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Perhaps it only works in the other direction, in other words, if there isn't an observable difference in the behavior of Christians and non Christians. it might be hard to argue that the Christians have a part of God indwelling in them.
I think it's hard to argue either way.

I would expect that most of them believe that they 'have a part of God indwelling in them' (why the archaic usage?), but belief, particularly religious belief, is not a reliable guide to reality (consider the number of conflicting beliefs, and the number that claim that only they are correct).

IIRC, there are some small statistical differences between religious people and non-religious people general, but they vary from culture to culture (don't quote me on that, it's a while since I saw the study).
 
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