Image transcription: a section of a Wikipedia article titled “Relationship with Reality”. It reads “From a scientific viewpoint, elves are not considered objectively real. [3] However,” End transcription.

  • sin_free_for_00_days@sopuli.xyz
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    4
    ·
    1 year ago

    Yes, made up. Just like deities made up in more ignorant times.

    Are you seriously arguing in good faith that “god” exists as anything more than a mass delusion? And you think not believing that is “edgy”? If so, I really think we’re done.

    • starman2112@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      17
      ·
      edit-2
      1 year ago

      Are you seriously arguing in good faith that “god” exists as anything more than a mass delusion?

      No! I’m saying that making a truth claim without evidence is necessarily irrational! I literally said that I don’t believe it. There is a difference between not believing something and believing not something.

      I think that centering your online persona around your lack of belief while making comments about how delusional someone must be to be religious is what’s edgy.

      • sin_free_for_00_days@sopuli.xyz
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        1 year ago

        I would counter that your pedantic hair splitting is what is truly edgy. “I don’t believe in god, but I don’t believe in not god” makes no semantic difference and is rather perfect fence sitting.

        • starman2112@sh.itjust.works
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          5
          ·
          1 year ago

          Okay buddy, you’ve convinced me. Gnostic atheism is much more reasonable and true than agnostic atheism. Saying “I don’t know and don’t much care” is so much edgier than naming yourself “sin free for 0 days” and claiming to know for an absolute fact that there is no god

            • starman2112@sh.itjust.works
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              4
              ·
              1 year ago

              That’s precisely what I’m saying. If you can’t prove that something is true, it’s weird to go to such lengths justifying an affirmative belief that it’s true, instead of taking the position that you simply don’t know and therefore don’t believe any claims made about it either way.

              • sin_free_for_00_days@sopuli.xyz
                link
                fedilink
                arrow-up
                2
                ·
                1 year ago

                If you can’t say god doesn’t exist, you are willing to say anything is possible. I believe 100% the sun will rise in the East tomorrow morning. I guess with your reasoning, I shouldn’t discount the chance that the sun will rise from the horizon in which it set. We don’t know anything!

                • starman2112@sh.itjust.works
                  link
                  fedilink
                  arrow-up
                  4
                  ·
                  edit-2
                  1 year ago

                  I mean we’ve repeatedly demonstrated tens of millions of times throughout human history that the sun rises in the east, we can verify that the earth spins eastward with instruments and spacecraft, and we have extremely reliable models of reality that give us good reason to authoritatively state that the sun will rise in the east.

                  I need you to understand that there are no models or experiments that give us reason to authoritatively state that no deity exists, as surely as the sun will rise in the east in the morning. It is entirely possible that a deity exists. I don’t believe there is one, but until it can be proven that there isn’t one with the same veracity as any other claim, the only reasonable position is “I don’t believe it.”

                  Lemme paint you a word picture here. Don’t pull out a calculator. If I tell you that 11,441,612 divided by 17 is equal to 673,036, is it most reasonable to say that “no, it definitely isn’t” because I just pulled those numbers out of my ass, “yes, it definitely is,” because you have faith in my quick math calculating, or “I don’t know, but almost certainly not?”

                  The big difference between that and a claim about a god is that you can easily pull out a calculator and definitely state whether or not it’s true, but you can’t make that authoritative claim until after you’ve checked it.

                  • mbp@lemmy.sdf.org
                    link
                    fedilink
                    English
                    arrow-up
                    3
                    ·
                    1 year ago

                    Just saying I love that this in depth discussion about truth and how to best dissect the whole is happening. Helps people to recognize this is a communication that needs to happen and what their own personal stance is. I like it

        • Yawnder@lemmy.zip
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          3
          ·
          1 year ago

          Being pedantic? They are just being coherent with the scientific method. Not proving something is real isn’t the same as proving something isn’t.