Atheist, how did you come to be absolutely certain that there is no possibility of God?

Question

When I say God I don't mean just the religious/personal sense of God I mean how can you straight face say that you are certain no being of a higher power exists?

And you suggest you are scientific and logical?

There is no absolute proof either way!

Phoenix that was an excellent reply... thank you!

I am Agnostic btw.

Answer 1

Believers entertain the question of the existence of God: the faithful following their faith either - as atheist believe there is no god- or -as religious followers believe in God. Agnostics make no leap of faith: the issue is not logical, rational, or in any way approachable by reason. The 'fundamentalists', who want to argue logic (say in the case of evolution or in a proof of the existence of God), reveal their 'fundamental' lack of faith by turning to logic or reason. Either you have the faith or you don't -- may God continue to forgive those who don't believe, but want logic to save them.

Answer 2

There is no absolute proof either way. This is what I told my daughter. She is a non-believer. We could discuss logic, and ancient ruin discoveries, and all types of other "proof." The final conclusion would be no absolute proof.

Does it matter? If we had proof of God's existence, then we could not have faith. Lacking proof of God's existence does not prove anything.

Why can't we be acceptable of others, their viewpoints and just be friends? Isn't there enough intolerance in the world now?

Answer 3

How did you become absolutely certain that there is no Santa Claus? Are you positive? Still positive? Ok, I am being kind of a smart a** here, but I will say that its a similar thing with me. The more I look at the Universe the more sure I become. I remember one night looking at the stars through my small telescope and being blown away by the vastness of what I was seeing. I felt this sense of "joy" rising up in me and exclaimed to my companions "THIS is why I dont believe in God".

Answer 4

How did you come to be absolutely certain that your God doesn't look like a rotten maggot?

Have you ever seen him?

Theists sem to think that we atheists beleive we are absolutely certain about everything.

The only absolute truth is that nothing is absolute, and everything is relative.

Read this if you will:

"A fire-breathing dragon lives in my garage."

Suppose I seriously make such an assertion to you. Surely you'd want to check it out, see for yourself. There have been innumerable stories of dragons over the centuries, but no real evidence. What an opportunity!

"Show me", you say, and I lead you to my garage. You look inside and see a ladder, empty paint cans, an old tricycle - but no dragon

"Where's the dragon", you ask.

"Oh, she's right here", I reply, waving vaguely. "I neglected to mention that she's an invisible dragon".

You propose spreading flour on the floor of the garage to capture the dragon's footprints. "Good idea", I say, "but this dragon floats in the air". Then you'll use an infrared sensor to detect the invisible fire. "Good idea, but the invisible fire is also heatless", I say. You'll spray-paint the dragon and make her visible. "Good idea, except she's an incorporeal (bodyless) dragon and the paint won't stick!"

And so on. I counter every physical test you propose with a special explanation of why it won't work.

Now what is the difference between an invisible, incorporeal, floating dragon who spits heatless fire and no dragon at all? If there's no way to disprove my contention, no conceivable experiment that would count against it, what does it mean to say that my dragon exists? You're inability to invalidate my hypothesis is not at all the same thing as proving it true. Claims that cannot be tested, assertions immune to disproof are veridically worthless, whatever value they may have in inspiring us or in exciting our sense of wonder. What I'm asking you to do comes down to believing, in the absence of evidence, on my say-so.

Carl Sagan.

Answer 5

You're right that there's no absolute proof either way. Just as there's also no absolute proof either way that there's a chocolate cake in our solar system that's orbiting opposite of Saturn right now.

The way I see it, I could spend all my time pondering or arguing about the existance of an orbiting chocolate cake, Bigfoot, or a big invisible man who made people out of clay and ribs...or I could spend time enjoying the short span of life I have and learning about the world. I simply have no need for deity in my life.

Answer 6

Actually there is.

Free will is entirely illusionary, even under the Holographic Universe Theory; even a hypercomputer could not produce free will. The mind is entirely computational, and thus subject to the Church-Turing Thesis.

It is literally impossible for free will to exist in the universe in which we live (though we make choices all the time -- the ability to make a choice is not itself free will, otherwise computers would be free will agents).

Since free will is a necessary consequence of the existence of a deity, the existence of a deity is negated. In formal logic, this follows standard Modus Tollens:

X = deity exists, Y = free will exists.

X -> Y. (premise)
~Y. (given)
... ~X. (modus tollens).

This can be converted to standard modus ponens as such:
X -> Y. (premise)
~Y -> ~X. (converse)
~Y. (given)
... ~X. (modus ponens)

The existence of a deity is thus negated.... unless you want to believe in a deity that doesn't give free will. But then it doesn't much matter WHAT I believe does it?

Answer 7

An atheist who is "absolutely certain" in his own mind is a strong atheist. I am a weak atheist. I lack belief since there is no evidence, and such a unique sort of thing as a god should show up for both natural and moral reasons.

Answer 8

Right- there is no proof whatsoever to suggest the existence of a deity. Am I absolutely certain?... no. I AM, however, justified in saying there is no god due to lack of evidence- simple as that.

How about this- I am my own god...

Answer 9

Most Atheist can say there certain that there is no God because there is no way you could ever prove God existence.

Answer 10

It is certainly possible. Anything is possible. However, it is quite unlikely, unsupported by evidence, and entirely unnecessary. Which is nearly equivalent to "impossible", and close enough for me to forget the whole God thing.

Ask yourself this same question about leprechauns or unicorns or the Loch Ness Monster. While you have to admit that it is possible, the sheer unlikelihood is enough for you to dismiss it out of hand.