@Huckster The forum is more than just a place to exchange/argue ideas, it has resources to assist anyone dealing with issues. On the top of this page, “Resources”.
Dude, you are alone, many in here have encountered similar problems. We debate, we fight, we kiss and make up, but we also support each other. I strongly suggest you hang around in here. I did, and the knowledge I have received has been of great help to me.
I also recommend you hold off telling your family, because once you cross the Rubicon, there is no going back from any damage that may follow.
Thanks for the reply, David Killens. On your earlier question about my brother, I can’t remember for sure, but I think they had some car trouble during a storm or at least a heavy snow, but managed to fix the problem and cautiously drive on.
I’ve scanned the resources here and noticed the support group link. Might check it out.
I like your ‘Cross the Rubicon’ phrase, referring to Julius Caesar I think?
I don’t think my wife or mother would be shocked to hear about my lack of beliefs. My folks know I don’t go to church, and know my attitude about it. But with the way the whole family acts so ‘chwisthtiany,’ I’m sure everyone would be ‘disenchanted,’ ha.
The closest I came to ‘letting the cat out of the bag’ was when I told my mother that when I sit by myself and try to sense god, I feel nothing. She responded, ‘you’re letting the devil mislead you.’
I rolled my eyes and brushed her off. I can’t remember how we got into the discussion, but I was glad she didn’t pursue the issue.
Well you seem to be arguing against unevidenced hypothetical arguments for a deity.
Since first cause arguments are irrational, in that they make unevidenced assumptions about that cause, in the argument for it, that’s a begging the question fallacy. For me that alone is enough to reject first cause arguments.
However the first premise of these arguments, everything that has a beginning has a cause. Is also flawed, since…
a) We can’t know that claim applies outside of the temporal conditions of the material universe, so how can they simply assume the universe had a start when time itself doesn’t exist?
b) They’re creating a rule of first cause for everything, but then ignore the fact these causes are in every single instance natural phenomena. Instead making the unevidenced claim the universe need a supernatural cause, they can neither evidence even once, or explain in any rational way.
c) Having assumed everything that begins must have a cause, they then make the unevidenced assumption that a deity would not, see the begging the question fallacy at the start of the post.
So we don’t need to create hypothetical counter arguments to first cause arguments as they can be shown to be irrational.
Selection bias, it’s a texas sharp shooter fallacy. So we need not rationally point out that according to them their deity callously let millions of people, including children, suffer and die while it stepped in to rescue these 2 from their folly.
However you could cite the clinical double blind study of post operative heart patients, which showed that prayer had no discernable effect.
Sadly you can’t dent faith based belief that uses selection bias.
Any rationale that claims a baby falling out of a bedroom window onto concrete below and remains completely unharmed is a miracle, but that a baby that trips and fatally injures itself on the corner of a coffee table is just bad luck, simply can’t be reasoned with
“Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.”
Faith is blind and as such impervious to reason or facts.
Religions is anti reason, anti science and anti intellectual. They can’t have it both ways. Because of those flaws, apologists we get here do not do well when they try to use science or reason. They continue to demonstrate that they understand neither.
It’s no surprise that apologist continue to drag in the first cause/intelligent design argument. They seem oblivious to the facts that it seems to have been first used by Aristotle , then by Aquinas, and has been thoroughly refuted over centuries.
This atheist takes the position that all claims about god(s) are [so far] unfalsifiable. That consequently, God cannot be argued into or out of existence. I demand empirical evidence and will accept nothing less. The apologists we get here ignore that, it’s too hard. Instead, they continue to drag out the same lame unsupported claims. And they wonder why some here treat their claims with ridicule and contempt.