Monte wrote:
Nitefox wrote:
I'm assuming you believe he was a real person. You have faith that the people who told his stories and and kept his history were correct. He could have been some guy named Steve that lived in a barn and people just made up stories about him.
I don't "believe" he was a real person, in the context you're implying, which is to say I don't take his existence on faith. There is ample evidence to support that reality. He is not made up. He is not invented. There are official records of his life, his death, letters written in his own hand. He *could be* some guy named Steve, I suppose. But it's not bloody likely that our first President is actually a fake-moon-landing level conspiracy. You see, in the case of George Washington, there is ample objective evidence that he was who he was. There is ample objective evidence that historians have a pretty solid grasp on who he was. It is certain that he was real.
Such evidence does not exist for any god, past or present. And that's why it takes
faith to believe in such an entity. And why it doesn't take
faith to know that George Washington was an actual figure in our history. Our understanding of who he was may one day change. We may one day come to discover that George Washington was actually an extra terrestrial entity. But I doubt it. However, if objective evidence were to surface that showed that to be true, then I would accept it.
No such evidence exists for any such god in our species' history, past or present. That's a pretty powerful argument against the existence of such a deity, in my book. But again, if presented with objective evidence to the contrary, no atheist worth their salt is going to stick their fingers in their ear and say "la la la" to make it go away.
The Agnostic looks at this and says "the existence of god *cannot* be known*. Even with empirical evidence, the agnostic says it is impossible. That's the subtle, but important difference between atheism and agnosticism.
Religion - We know. This is truth.
Agnostics - We cannot know. We cannot fathom the truth.
Atheism - We do not know. We have no evidence. We can rationally conclude that it does not exist, given the preponderance of the objective evidence on hand.
The problem with this entire line of reasoning is that there IS evidence for God, just as there is for George Washington. The problem is that George was around only a little over 200 years ago, while God's major observeable interactions on Earth took place anywhere between about 1,300 and over 5,000 years ago depending which religion you mean (possibly other timeframes as well depending on which religion you mean) and occured at a time when documenting evidence and preserving it was chancy, at best, as have been the conditions for its survival until now.
You can't just say "But there's evidence for George Washington but there isn't any for God" arbitrarily. You have to have a reason, and the supernatural nature of Biblical, Talmudic, or Koranic events isn't a valid reason. That's simply assuming it must be false because it's supernatural, which is a circular argument when the supernatural is what you're arguing doesn't exist.
There is no objective evidence whatsoever that God does not exist. Period. None. Zip. There is some evidence that He does exist, but not enough to constitute proof. To either disregard that evidence and claim He does not exist or to bridge the gap with proof and claim He does exist requires faith.
The only reason you claim it doesn't is A) it makes you feel insecure and B) you think if your position is "non-faithful" that gives it legal grounds to push itself into public policy.
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