The Evil of god

And as Charlie is hacking you to death you would be singing," All I am saying, is give peace a chance...."?

Let's all sing together!

This is an obvious logical fallacy. Firstly, evil is not solely caused by religion or God or any one thing in particular. It is more likely that it is to do with the psychology of human beings. Why a human being would commit murder in the name of God is not down to his religion. As of yet, there is still no explanation as to what would make people kill. What would be gained from such an act. For example, the fighting over land is due to human greed not the belief in God. The wars, terrorists etc. are all due to human needs, competition over one another etc.

Next, we do not reason every single action we do in our minds before doing them. A lot of the things we do are not fully reasoned out. Thus, rationally thought out morals would not work in many circumstances. Rather, to be good, we need to use our conscience that is inherent in everyone.

Welcome to a2k, John.
You may notice in time, the OP is an athiest, hence believes religion to be the construct of men.

In the absence of any evidence what else would a logical, rational person believe?

Explaining my understanding of your POV to a newbie without further comment on its veracity.

Ah but it does have veracity for those who will except the evidence. I do not have the chance to accept your point of view because no evidence is offered...only blind faith.

I'll admit to having only anecdotal and circumstantial evidence. Perhaps not epistemological certainty, but folks have been sent to jail on less.

And I have set fire to some other's claims of certainty from time to time.

Well maybe the first but not the last.

An interesting assertion John,
Is there truly no evidence upon which a rational man can base a belief in a god?

Can you give an example of one?

What's a athiest?

Wunna dem godles heethens. Corse

I'm afraid not, I know of no rational men

Ha, very good I was actually asking if you could give any example of any type of evidence that a rational person might use as a basis for a belief in god. It was a serious question as I can't think of any such examples myself.

Well if there is I havent seen it. I deal in emperical evidence...repeatable, documented, and verifiable. Ya got any like that?

I knew a ditzy woman who went to the DMV and got plates that read "Athiest." When i pointed out to her that that does not spell atheist, she got really pissed . . . at me!

@ John and Rosborne:

Actually, I can think of no rational reasons for “believing” (or blindly guessing) in either direction on the question of the existence or non-existence of gods in the REALITY of existence.

One of the other things that mystifies me is why atheists think it more rational and more logical to “believe” there are no gods than to believe there are.

Only one !

As an atheist I KNOW that "God" is a useless concept for me. I BELIEVE that it is a useful concept for theists. And I KNOW that concepts are all we've got as far as "thinking" is concerned !

Nah, there are plenty of things that mystify me. Readily acknowledge that!




But to suppose there are no gods based on that...is illogical. Besides which, I doubt you actually KNOW it is a useless concept for you.





Are you using "BELIEVE" as a substitute for "guess" or "illogically suppose" in this sentence?





Which covers guessing, illogically supposing, and thinking.

But I was talking about what actually exists...a concept you seem unable (or unwilling) to deal with.