After reading a discussion about different beliefs I realized that the difference between an atheist, an agnostic and a theist can be summarized with their responses to the simple question
Do you have a dog?
The atheist will simply answer, “no”. If you go to his house and search for a dog, you’ll never find it. There will be no signs in the house or the yard that there ever was a dog there. None of his relatives or friends will remember having seen a dog there. They’ll ask, “Does he have a dog? How could I not have known?”. And they’ll be absolutely right. There’s no signs of there ever having been a dog at the atheist’s house or indeed anywhere he spends his time. Not at his home, not at his work, nowhere is there any sign of a dog.
The agnostic who thinks that there’s not sufficient proof of the non-existence of the earthly gods will be more unsure. When asked, she’ll look around her house searching for traces of a dog. When pressed, she’ll say, “Oh, I’ve searched my house, but what’s to say that there’s not a dog in my garage as I’m searching the house, and what’s to say that dog isn’t going to be in my house while I search my garage?”. If asked, “Do you really believe you have a dog, despite there being no signs of it?”, she’ll answer firmly, “There’s simply not enough evidence against the fact that I don’t own a dog to draw that conclusion.”
Then there’s the agnostic who thinks the gods various people have believed in and still believe in on Earth are bogus, but doesn’t exclude the posibillity that there is a god out there. When asked, he’ll say, “I have no dog at home, that’s for sure.” But, pondering the question further, he’ll say, “But, obviously, I can never be all at once. There must be some small posibillity that there’s a dog out there somewhere that’s got a collar saying I’m the owner. That I don’t know about it isn’t sufficient proof that it doesn’t exist.” Needless to say, you’ll find no traces of a dog at his home either.
Finally, there’s the theist. When asked, she’ll answer an empathic “yes!”. But if you go to her house and search for a dog, you’ll not find a trace of a dog there either. Nowhere is there a dog to be found. Naturally you’ll ask her why she said that she has a dog when it is nowhere to be found. You can find relatives and friends who also say the theist has a dog. But they’ve never seen it. Never heard it, never felt it licking their face. “It’s a matter of faith,” the theist will proclaim, “I have faith in this ancient book that says so. My friends say so. My parents said so. You must not question the Dog.” When asked for evidence of this alleged dog, she’ll repeat that you must not question the Dog, or refer you to ancient scripture.
Of course, if you replace the question
Do you have a dog?
With the question
Is there a god?
You’ve got it.
Filed under: agnosticism, atheism, humor, religion, theism | 7 Comments
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Is it realistic to assume all things will be made obvious to us upon demand?
You point out that the theist has no evidence of the dog in her home. However she has this old book, which cannot be questioned, that describes the dog. If this is the limit of the theist’s evidence I would say she is crazy. I could write a book about the “Giant Spaghetti Monster” and claim that I have one since I have a book about it.
However is it not because of books that we have, limited, knowledge of things which are? Take the spinning of the earth on its axis? How do you know it is really spinning? Because you have a book that says so? Did you not already show that you can not prove the existence of a thing because of a book? So how can you know something is true without experiencing it? And how, when you experience, can you know that what you think you experienced was in fact real? (Think if an airplane pilot who, if it were not for his instruments, could not tell if he was going up or down). How can we know anything to be true?
We discover what be believe is true by observing various details about the thing and then reason as to whether it is true or not. The scientist reasons that the earth is spinning on its axis because of the various (plural) things he can observe. The theist says his ancient book is true because he has read it and, based on other observations in the world around him, has determined its contents are true. Neither of these observations can be seen upon demand… rather they require careful study and consideration.
The difference between The Bible and a science book, though, is that the former makes no attempt to prove its claims, while the latter is worthless if it isn’t based on evidence. The earth spinning about its axis is a well-proven fact. I can look up a large body of evidence on it if I really want to.
Faith based opinions and evidence based opinions are very different. A faith based opinion has no more credibility than any other theory, because it rejects any form of evidence and logic, and those are the only things we have with which to tell true from false claims apart. An evidence based opionion is much different. It’s got at least something going for it: the evidence. Any opinion with less evidence, or less credible evidence, can be safely rejected. Any opionion with more or more credible evidence for it will immediately replace the previous opinion.
What observations does the theist have for her case?
Not quite. There are multiple books arguing for the existence of God, but they disagree on everything, including in most cases the most abstract metaphysics. The Bible depicts a different metaphysics from the Vedas.
In contrast, take the Earth’s spinning. There’s a plethora of books showing the Earth is spinning, which by and large agree, even on small details. They come to the same conclusion by taking many independent paths, just like historical details are usually corroborated by many different primary sources of different types.
The hypothesis “The Earth is spinning” makes falsifiable predictions that nonetheless came true: that we’ll observe a parallax effect, that satellites orbiting at a precisely quantifiable altitude will be geostationary, that there will be a precisely quantifiable centrifugal force at the Equator, that storm patterns will exhibit a consistent Coriolis effect, and that the Sun will turn out to be so much more massive than the Earth that their common center of gravity will be far within the surface of the Sun.
Alon and Simen,
First, Happy New Year!!
I apologize for not responding earlier. Work and family events have consumed all of my free time over the recent holiday.
This will be the subject for my next post. I’ll put the link here when it is done so that you can comment/provide rational objections.
Alon…
Individual opinions on the metaphysics of a god will, in my opinion, never agree. God is believed to be a sprit… an entity none of our senses can experience unless God reveals himself to man. (This is why Christians hold the Bible in high regard. They believe that the Bible is God’s revelation of Himself to man.) Many people disagree on various scientific theories until it can be reproduced in a lab (or observed in nature) at which time the theory becomes a law. Science is simply the discovery of laws that have been in place for millions/billions of years. In the case of the earth’s rotation, people do (in the case of the undeveloped world) or did not believe it occurred until it was observed and made obvious to them. The existence of God has not been made plane to you. Does that therefore mean that there is no god? As I said in my first comment, it is unrealistic to assume all things will be made obvious to us upon demand.
Happy new year to you.
Yes, do tell. I’m curious as to what observations someone (assuming they are sober and reasonably intelligent) could make that would lead them to the conclusion that something supernatural or connected to God has happened.
Nobody has ever seen any sign of God. Those who claim to do so always have so vague or even non-existant proof that I’m compelled to liken them to those who claim to have seen UFOs, ghosts or the Lock Ness monster. I find it unrealistic that something for which we have no evidence should be true.
Unfortunately for those who believe in God, the above quote also applies to the Flying Spaghetti Monster and the Pink Unicorn.
Unfortunately for those who believe in God, the above quote also applies to the Flying Spaghetti Monster and the Pink Unicorn.
You’ve forgotten the venerable “Russell’s Teapot”! The MSM, a humble deity, issues a warning: Next time, it’s the noodle strop for you!
I make it a point to visit and comment on as many Carnival of the Godless sites as I can. You are to be commended.
Naomi, assistant to
Martian.Anthropologist
You are welcome to visit us anytime!
So, are there aliens somewhere in the universe? The atheist will say, “No, of course not, I’ve never seen one.” The agnostic, on the other hand, will say, “Well, I don’t have access to the universe, so I can’t rule them out. However, I have no reason to believe that there are, and at any rate, it doesn’t really matter to me until they visit, assuming they exist.” The theist? He makes weather balloons out to be UFOs.