Really?
He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,
Just sayinâ
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Add to that the historical understanding of creatio ex nihilo by the church fathers, as creation being out of God´s essence.
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If I help to sustain a business, is the business âliterallyâ part of me?
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I have no problem with that version of âsustainingâ and I think that is exactly the sort of thing meant by the passage in Hebrews chapter 1. But anybody can create a universe in their dreams which vanishes when their attention turns elsewhere as DoKo described. Without any independent existence such a figment of the imagination is just a part of the dreamer and it is pantheism or at most panentheism (if you complain that the dream should not be identified with the dreamer but is at least to some degree something which the dreamer experiences). The point is that the dreamer doesnât create anything real or of substance. It is like carpenter who makes a table and then has to hold it together to keep it from falling apart â that is no carpenter at all. However, keeping the wood of the table protected from things that would damage it, is something very different â much like your example of someone who watches over a business and keep it going by guarding it against the things which would destroy it.
Letâs say there is a non-believer who claims there is no blue cheese. Is everyone who disagrees with this claim relying on faith just as the original claimant?
The answer to both queries, yours and mine, is no. But I have demonstrated that the situation is symmetrical and so my statement about them being the same stands. The answer is no because in both cases a person can disagree without any thought, logic, or rationality. But the moment they use logic to make any conclusion then they have to accept premises on faith in order to do so.
So is every person who says they donât believe in God for a day without any thought, an atheist? There are a lot of Christians who like to say they were an atheist and then they saw the light. Or do you think some thought, logic, and reasoning on the subject required? Do think that theists use more thought, logic, and reasoning than atheists do? If you include infants in your counting of atheists then this would certainly be the case.
I think you should carefully consider the words used by most (if not all) atheists. Atheism is defined as a lack of belief in a God or Gods. By that definition, infants too would fall into Atheism category.
Atheism is not a claim that Gods do not exist. It would be crazy for me to claim that Gods do not exist, since âGodsâ are not always defined. For example, if you define âGodâ as a âUniverseâ then I would submit that Universe does exist, albeit I wonât call it âGodâ.
As far as using thoughts or logic, I think there are bright people on both sides, and not so bright ones too. But to be a theist, you must put a personal God into a separate category, and must believe that he answers prayers even while there are no amputees being healed.
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Thatâs interesting that God is currently sustaining reality. How could this claim be tested?
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That wouldnât be such a reach if the God in question was seen as much less omni-everything. If one asks then why pray to God at all, I think the proper answer is why reflect on anything? Reflecting on concerns for which one doesnât immediately know what to do is something we all do when other avenues (such as research) do not pan out. It could be that prayer focusses the mind on layers of wisdom not readily available to our conscious minds. We all know more than we can readily access at any moment. Perhaps addressing God in prayer is a way to focusing on what it is we need to know while also listening for a voice that is not just a puppet of our conscious minds. If the God of prayer is wiser but not all powerful, amputees canât be laid at His door. This position could be called Theism Lite.
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And so would rocks, finger nail clippers, and filing cabinets. To insist on this is to empty the word âatheismâ of nearly any useful social meaning; almost as if it required no thought, no reflection, no brain activity at all. If I were an atheist I would take offense that my position should shelter in such associations.
As distasteful as so many of you seem to find it, wouldnât it be better to let atheism just rest (for now) in its recently historical, and still commonly accepted use: as a reaction against theism? I know that many atheists now want to think of it as its own category somehow independent of all âantiquatedâ theisms. But if that were really the case then perhaps âtheyâ need to shop around for a different name that doesnât have the damningly telltale âtheismâ right in it. They should call themselves âpeopleâ or some such thing with no explicit reference to any gods or god-accepting â-ismsâ whatsoever.
But meanwhile, as long as theism is still amazingly staggering about after its umpteenth historic funeral, I guess âatheismâ remains the most accurate descriptive category. And is that really so bad? We are, all of us on either side, a thinking lot after all - even if doing so badly. If that leaves such a distaste in oneâs mouth as to make them contemplate the better company of rocks and other non-thinking things (or infants) then I guess we theists ought to appropriately feel the sting of the snub. 
Sorry Mitchell, wasn´t directed at you this time.
Once again that is agnosticism.
Atheism is the positive assertion that there is no God. Your charge of âGodsâ not being always well defined is fair though and, similarly to the defninition of âAtheismâ, that is a problem of modernity which constantly confuses concepts.
However, since both theism and atheism are metaphysical propositons, both require positive assertions. For an uncontroversial (among philosophers) example: The theist claims the rationality of the world, as it is outlined by the principle of sufficient reason and that the line of vertical explanation therefor therminates in a self-explanatory, necessary fact. The atheist must hold that the world terminates into an unintelligible, therefor contingent, brute fact.
Both made positive metaphysical assertions here. The idea that the latter is merely a denial of the former is therefor a modern myth, repeated by people who haven´t engaged with the traditions.
No. Many philosophical theists I know are not religious. Look at the neo-aristotelian and -platonic tradition for example.
By analyzing the validity of the metaphysical arguments which led to that conclusion? The nature of âexistenceâ is hardly an empirical concept.
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You may be right in saying this. After all, we donât have A-Santa Claus-ists, right? And, of course, had we had them,
Right?
I disagree. Technically, everyone is an agnostic, even theists. Theists have faith that there is a God. So, they would be called Agnostic Theists. I donât have faith that there is a God, so I am an Agnostic Atheist.
A negative is next to impossible to prove. Take Santa Claus for example. How would you prove that Santa doesnât exist? At what point, in your view, is a person justified in being A-Santa-Clauist?
A business always requires someone to maintain it at all times. Likewise there must be a reason why everything is actualised at this point in time
I do not think there are any good atheist objections to theism. â There might be, if it were the case if I came to believe via rational argument but, like Martin Luther described, I did not come to faith via reason. I just, one day, realized I believed. The only argument that I can imagine as a serious objection to theism is the success of science. But in my case it is a counter-productive argument from the perspective of atheism, because the more science I learn the more I see God, not the less. â â
I am, of course, speaking only for myself. Any projection is purely unintentional.
â That is different from saying that there could not be faith-crushing evidence produced in the future, such as indisputable proof (or even merely compelling evidence) that the gospels were fictions created as part of a conspiracy.
â â Even more compelling is the fact that we make any scientific progress at all. Science is, in my opinion, completely impotent as an objection to theism.
You can disagree all you want but what you describe is a perfect example of modern confusion. Do we have metaphysical premises which we can accept beyond reasonable doubt? Sure there is, take the law of the excluded middle. Or that there is an external world at all. We don´t want to undercut the scientific method, don´t we? What does follow from those accepted premises? What does theism need as premises? What does atheism? Are those premises compatible with the already accepted premises or are they not?
So your method of just throwing hands in the air when we approach dangerous territory won´t do it. The charge of you not being able to prove a negative is ridicolous and repeated by people who don´t know what they are talking about. You don´t find such things within the philosophy of religion from an atheistic perspective. Analyze the theistic concept and judge it by it coherence. This is what the ontological argument requires. If the God argued for is incoherent, then he doesn´t exist. That´s it.
By the way, the empiricist approach you try to draw is a self-refuting concept and doesn´t have a leg to stand on when it comes to metaphysics.
Did you ever EVER engage with the actual literature offered by e.g. Catholics? The philosophical foundation of it? Catholicism is a very metaphysics-heavy denomination, so its not hard to get hands on it.
The problem is that you talk about Santa Claus, supposed improvability and Dawkins. From everyone familiar with the literature or the positions of people like Aristotle, Plato, Aquinas, Scotus, Suarez, Leibniz, Mamoinedes, Avicienna, al-Ghazali or their modern interpreters you at most get an annoyed eyeroll.
Those childish objections don´t even work for the more anthropomorphic versions as they are defended by the likes of Plantinga, Swinburne or Craig. And for the classical theist they aren´t even in the correct category.
Unless, of course, you âmakeâ God into a scientific hypothesis, like the ID movement does.
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We could employ the same empty rhetoric to define theism as a lack of belief that there is no God.
Why not?
Because there is nothing important to be gained by including in your numbers the infants and people who havenât even considered the question â as if you want to characterize those in your group as people who know nothing and havenât really thought about things. This right by default nonsense is lamest tactic ever devised. In this the new atheists are trying to compete with the fundies of religion for the greatest dishonesty and irrationality. If that is a trophy they want then I have no doubt they can win, and welcome to it. Then atheists can be as embarrassed at sharing their label with such people as Christians are embarrassed to share the label of Christianity with those who are that head blind.
Before I start engaging with the literature, I want to understand HOW you came up with realization that there must be a God who sustains everything currently? From my experience and understanding, people donât use reason to arrive at a religious belief. Instead, they believe first and then come up with reasons.
The problem with this approach, is you can come up with justification for anything, including Santa Claus. All you need to do is to come up with an âinvisibleâ Santa Claus concept and then keep piling on additional attributes as needed (i.e. he must be able to climb chimney unnoticed, he must be able to bypass chimneys as not every house has them, etcâŚ). I find religious thinking goes along the same lines. Itâs very convincing to fellow believers, who already believe, but no so much to nonbelievers.
I donât think you would have to use theism for that (Theos (God) and -ism). You would need something like a-atheism or equivalent.
Also, I like the phrase âIf Atheism is a belief, then OFF is a TV channel.â
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