The Great Prayer Experiment

I was told by a religious friend of mine recently that I had nothing to lose by reaching out to God and praying. If there's no God (which is my position, as you know), then saying a prayer does nothing but take up a minute or two of my time. But if God exists (and of course, she means her Abrahamic god), then I have everything to gain, because her god is a god of Love.

After thinking about it for awhile, I had to agree with her. There really is nothing to lose by praying. As a skeptic, sometimes you have to do research. So I thought I'd do an experiment with God.

Here is how I did it. First, she supplied me with a prayer by a former atheist who, once he said this, found God reaching out to him. So it (anecdotally) worked once already. Unfortunately his prayer would have been untrue for me.

Here it is as he said it originally:

Dear God,

I know (because I can prove it with the certainty that a geometer can prove opposite angles are equal) that you do not exist. Nevertheless, as a scholar I am forced to entertain the hypothetical possibility that I am mistaken. So just in case I am mistaken, please reveal yourself to me in some fashion that will prove your case.

If you do not answer, I can safely assume that either you do not care whether I believe in you or you have no power to produce evidence to persuade me. The former argues you are not beneficent, the latter not omnipotent - in either case, unworthy of worship. If you do not exist, this prayer is merely words in the air, and I lose nothing but a bit of my dignity. Thanking you in advance for your kind cooperation in this matter,

John Wright

First, in my view, John is wrong. As we just discussed in the comments of a previous article, there are atheists who feel we can "know" God doesn't exist. I'm not one of them. I come from the standpoint that you can't prove a negative (and the burden of proof lies on the person making the positive claim, so you don't have to)  Anyway, I can't say the first line. And I think he is weak in his request. He sets it up so that God can be any kind of confirmation bias (a pet peeve of mine). So I rewrote it a bit differently.

Some of his second paragraph is pretty good so I used it. Here is the prayer I came up with:

I Have 2 Dogs, But Neither Is god. I'm Sure.

I'm bored. I have about 5 matters I should be attending to, but I'm uninspired to tackle any of them at the long end of a productive day. So I'm doing what every self-respecting blogger/Geekess/hermit does. I'm stumbling the internet.

Oh, and now is the time to remind you that I officially live under a rock. Someday I'll take a picture of my rock so you can see how nice it is. But suffice it to say, I'm not a newshound, always up on the latest and greatest of everything.

So in my stumbles I come across a BusinessDay article, a South African paper. This is how I learned this awesome explanation of the difference between an atheist, 2 kinds of agnostics, and a theist. Here we go:

The difference between an atheist, an agnostic and a theist can be summarized by their responses to the question: do you have a dog?

The atheist will simply answer, “No”. If you go to his house to search for a dog, you won’t find one. 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 are no signs that there could ever have been a dog at the atheist’s house or indeed anywhere where he spends his time. Not at his home, not at his work, nowhere.

The agnostic who thinks that there’s simply insufficient proof for either having or not having a dog will be a great deal less certain.

Conversations With christians - Beth 5 - Around Again!

Hey everyone! Beth is back for more! I just got her email a bit ago, which is not really good timing. My parents are getting here tomorrow about the time that I get up, so I really don't have any time to reply in detail. But that shouldn't stop you from commenting or emailing replies to heavingdeadcats@gmail.com. I'll be happy to incorporate your replies into the post as well as my reply to her. I feel like I'm on a merry-go-round here!

Here is the email in its entirety. She is replying to my statements (from Conversations With christians 4a) which are not in block quotes:
~
Whether you agree to the label or not is irrelevant. It doesn't make it any less true. What history and science resources are you looking at to come to these conclusions? How are you so sure that you are getting the whole story? Please give some of your resources. I am quite curious as to what you're reading to come to such wild opinions. For instance, name one contemporary document from Jesus' time that refers to him. Better yet, name one person who wrote about meeting him, outside of the gospels. You can't because no such documents or evidence exists. Since you insist that he existed, that he was magical and had special powers and rose from the dead, the Burden of Proof is on you, as you are making the positive claim. Please provide references. Simple inflammatory statements are baseless.

No, I do not agree to the label because your accusation that I am "cherry picking" is baseless in itself. Whether you want to acknowledge that or not is unimportant, however. It does not change the fact you are wrong.

I will gladly share my sources with you. One I use quite frequently is tektonics.org. It has great articles that address many of the issues you appear to have with Jesus and the New Testament especially. Furthermore, I'd like to establish that while I do not doubt that Jesus once walked the earth that the rest, as far as him being the son of God, performing miracles, and being resurrected is all a matter of faith. I cannot prove that to you.

Why didn't jesus write anything down himself? He was a god-man after all. Why not document his life and teachings to share for future sheep to get his message accurately? Why rely on flawed men to write things down 40-80 years after his supposed death? This doesn't bother you in the slightest? You don't find it odd?

Conversations With christians - Beth 4a - With A Little Help From My Friends

So below you'll find the latest email from Beth, which I posted the other day. After chilling out and thinking happy thoughts, I am ready to tackle it with your help. My replies, mixed with your comments, are added below. I am wondering though, why Beth is still talking to me? What is your opinion? Is she trying to get me to change my mind and find the lord? It's obviously not to learn anything. What could be her motivation? I have no idea. Your suggestions are welcome, as usual.

I will never agree with you that I am “cherry picking” as I am not. In fact I was discussing it with another person of no faith and they even wondered how you drew such a conclusion. The Bible, as I stated in earlier messages, is nothing more then a compilation of documents put together by men. As we both concurred, the Holy Book is not without fault and was subject to being edited wrongly. Therefore I turn to history and science to determine what books are authentic and which are not. I do intend to look at what you suggested. I’ve honestly never come across it before. It will definetely be an asset to my research.

Whether you agree to the label or not is irrelevant. It doesn't make it any less true. What history and science resources are you looking at to come to these conclusions? How are you so sure that you are getting the whole story? Please give some of your resources. I am quite curious as to what you're reading to come to such wild opinions. For instance, name one contemporary document from Jesus' time that refers to him. Better yet, name one person who wrote about meeting him, outside of the gospels. You can't because no such documents or evidence exists. Since you insist that he existed, that he was magical and had special powers and rose from the dead, the Burden of Proof is on you,  as you are making the positive claim. Please provide references. Simple inflammatory statements are baseless.

Why didn't jesus write anything down himself? He was a god-man after all. Why not document his life and teachings to share for future sheep to get his message accurately? Why rely on flawed men to write things down 40-80 years after his supposed death? This doesn't bother you in the slightest? You don't find it odd?

What Is Atheism To You? Conversations With Craig the Christian 1

About a week ago, I got an email from a man named Craig. He's a lutheran going to seminary for a masters of divinity. He asked me if I would like to open a dialogue with him about religion. After getting his permission to publish our conversations, I agreed. I'm not good at debating or arguing, but I am always open to learning new things and maybe sharing what I know as well. So here we go. Conversations with Craig the Christian, number 1.

One of our first points of discussion was what exactly is atheism? Craig admitted some probable bias in his definition which he didn't give. He gave me Dictionary.com's definition instead, which surprised me:

Atheism:
1. the doctrine or belief that there is no god.
2. disbelief in the existence of a supreme being or beings.

If you notice that definition says that atheism is a belief or doctrine. See below for an atheist's (that would be me!) definition.
So what is religion? Well, that one was more accurate:

Religion:
1. a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, esp. when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs.
2. a specific fundamental set of beliefs and practices generally agreed upon by a number of persons or sects: the Christian religion; the Buddhist religion.

And one more. We need to know what a belief is. This one is really important:

Belief:
1. something believed; an opinion or conviction
2. confidence in the truth or existence of something not immediately susceptible to rigorous proof
3. confidence; faith; trust
4. a religious tenet or tenets; religious creed or faith

So after these definitions, Craig said:

"Both Atheism and Christianity imply a belief system. Science and Math don't have that. For the most part, education relies on the imparting of facts.

I've been an atheist for 9 years and one thing I'm crystal clear on. Atheism is NOT a belief or a doctrine that there is no god. Luckily Wikipedia does much better:

How Do You Reconcile Belief and Rationality - A Survey

Yesterday I wrote about how different atheists got their stripes, how we all came to the top of the religious mountain by our own path, and how we still all think differently and rationalize in our own ways. I created a survey of 6 questions to start a conversation about this topic. You can take the survey here, or over where I made it at Quibblo. It shouldn't take too long. I really value your input. Comments are also welcome, of course! :)

Quizzes by Quibblo.com

I tried to add a question about superstition but I ran out of time. So feel free to comment on if you're superstitious or not, and/or atheist/religious! Thanks muchly!

Click more for the results:

Burden Of Proof Lies With The Claimant

As an atheist, it's important to understand what the Burden of Proof is, and how it works. Why? Because theists misuse it against us. In return, we need to be better educated and set them straight.

The burden of proof (latin: onus probandi), falls under the maxim 'necessitas probandi incumbit ei qui agit' or, "the necessity of proof lies with he who complains". The burden of proof usually lies with the party making the new claim, in terms of law.

But where we are much more interested is in science, where the burden of proof lies with someone suggesting a new theory or stating a claim. They therefore must supply evidence to support it.

So if someone makes a bold claim, it isn't another person's responsibility to disprove it, but rather the responsibility of the person making the claim.

Also, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, meaning the less reasonable a statement seems, the more proof it requires.