Last warning. Stop posting here unless you’re willing to look into the counterargument.

So let’s clarify some things. Since I have pointed out your contradictory ideas in your post that “God killed millions” by stating that it is impossible for a non-existent God to kill anything, and since I have provided clear prophetical evidence that you are unable to refute, and since I have shown that both history and archeology corroborate the bible, and since you (nor any atheist) are unable to delineate a transcendent ontic referent for objective moral values you stick your head in the sand and resort to saying I am trolling. I would have expected more from someone who claims to be knowledgeable. I would much rather (and I’m sure others too) that you stepped up to the challenge than just resorting to lower level insults which do nothing to show people that you are aptly able to defend the philosophy you are espousing.

In no other religion were the authors of the scriptures supernaturally confirmed with miracles. And no other religion than Christianity has a Savior that was foretold with unbelievable precision. Even the most liberal critics admit that the prophetic books were completed some 400 years before Christ, and the book of Daniel by about 167 B.C.

Professor Peter Stoner, along with 600 students, calculated the mathematical probability of just 8 (of the more than 300) New Testament prophecies being fulfilled in any one person at one chance in a hundred million billion which equates to 1 chance in a trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion. No other religious book offers anything that can compare with these supernatural predictions.

The Old Testament contains scores of prophecies about the coming of the Messiah. Barton Payne’s Encyclopedia of Biblical Prophecy list 191 on them, while Oxford scholar Alfred Edersheim cites 400. Some SPECIFIC major predictions about the Messiah, all of which WERE FULFILLED only in Jesus and could NOT be controlled by any human, was that he would be born of a virgin (Isaiah 7:14), of the seed of Abraham (Gen 12:1-3; 22:18), of the tribe of Judah (Gen 49:10), of the house of David (II Sam 7:12-16), in Bethlehem (Micah 5:2); He would be heralded by the Lord’s messenger (Isaiah 40:3); He would cleanse the temple (Malachi 3:1); He would be “cut off” 483 years after the declaration to reconstruct Jerusalem in 444 B.C. (Daniel 9:24-27); He would be rejected (Psalm 118:22); He would have his hands and feet pierced (Psalm 22:16); He would be pierced in His side (Zechariah 12:10); He would rise from the dead (Psalm 16:10); He would ascend into Heaven (Psalm 68:18); and He would sit down at the right hand of God (Psalm 110:1).

The word faith comes from the Latin fides (fee-days) from which we get fidelity. It’s basic meaning is belief, trust; that which produces belief evidence. Belief proceeding from reliance on testimony or authority. Thus the words faith, belief and trust mean essentially the same. Of course they are only justified if there is hard evidence to back it up.

“The enormous usefulness of mathematics in the natural sciences is something bordering on the mysterious, and there is no rational explanation for it… it is an article of faith.” ~ Eugene Wigner, Nobel Laureate in Physics

“Physics is powerless to explain its faith in the mathematical intelligibility of the universe for the simple reason that you’ve got to believe in the intelligibility of the universe before you can do any physics at all.” ~ John Polkinghorn, Professor of Quantum Physics at Cambridge

“The belief that there are indeed dependable regularities [the sun will rise each day] of nature – is an act of faith, but one which is indispensable to the progress of science.” ~ Theoretical physicist Paul Davies

“Science does not explain the mathematical intelligibility of the physical world, for it is part of science’s founding faith that this is so.” ~ John Polkinghorn, Professor of Quantum Physics at Cambridge

What is the evidence that religious faith is not based on evidence?

Well, since faith is belief without evidence I’d say you’ve asked the single stupidest question I’ve heard in a long time. Please stop trolling this blog. It is clear you’re not listening to counterarguments.

If the only statements that are true are statements that can be verified empirically, then the principle of verification itself would fail the test because of it’s own premise, “only those statements that can be empirically verified have any meaning,” cannot be empirically verified.

Where is the evidence that religious faith is not based on evidence?

It is rather ironical that in the 16th century some people resisted advances in science because they seemed to threaten belief in God; whereas in the 20th century scientific ideas of a beginning have been resisted because they threatened to increase the plausibility of belief in God.

Philosophers of science during the 2nd half of the 20th century came to realize that the whole scientific enterprise is based on certain assumptions that cannot be proved scientifically, but are guaranteed by the Christian worldview: for example, the laws of logic, the orderly nature of the external world, the reliability of our cognitive faculties in knowing the world, the validity of inductive reasoning and the objectivity of the moral values used in science. Science could not even exist without these assumptions, and yet these assumptions cannot be proved scientifically. They are philosophical assumptions, which, interestingly, are part and parcel of a Christian worldview. Thus, theology is an ally to science in that it can furnish a conceptual framework in which science can exist. More than that, the Christian religion historically furnished the conceptual framework in which modern science was born and nurtured.

I like your reasoning but I think your numbers are way off.

I think that if you look closely you’ll find that a lot of the great minds of the 20th century are actually Atheists. I don’t agree to your football field theory (although it does make me pretty unique – one in 3 million).

Moreover I think that there are great people out there that are totally Atheist in much the same I am but don’t talk about it or reveal it. When I find someone who’s an Atheist in the US, I broach the subject after probing gently for a while. And when we both affirm we’re Atheists it’s like we both share some sort of a secret. It’s not easy to be an Atheist in a more then 90% Deist country. I think there are more closet Atheists among us and you can’t really tell. Heck I invoke God every now and then, just to maintain rapport.

My friends obviously know. Not many others do, even people I’m in constant contact with.

Now as far as contribution – I would risk going out on a limb and say that I think Atheists contribute more than their relative number in the general population. Here’s my half-baked and lame rationalization: If you take all the people who don’t question their faith – how can they ponder questions of global magnitude when they don’t know themselves? Atheists living in a Deist world must be holding their faith after pondering the possibility of being a Deist and finding it lacking. These vary people are at least capable of independent thought and hence capable of contemplating other problems. I believe then that per capita Atheists contribute more.

– Arik

I like your reasoning but I think your numbers are way off.

I think that if you look closely you’ll find that a lot of the great minds of the 20th century are actually Atheists. I don’t agree to your football field theory (although it does make me pretty unique – one in 3 million).

Moreover I think that there are great people out there that are totally Atheist in much the same I am but don’t talk about it or reveal it. When I find someone who’s an Atheist in the US, I broach the subject after probing gently for a while. And when we both affirm we’re Atheists it’s like we both share some sort of a secret. It’s not easy to be an Atheist in a more then 90% Deist country. I think there are more closet Atheists among us and you can’t really tell. Heck I invoke God every now and then, just to maintain rapport.

My friends obviously know. Not many others do, even people I’m in constant contact with.

Now as far as contribution – I would risk going out on a limb and say that I think Atheists contribute more than their relative number in the general population. Here’s my half-baked and lame rationalization: If you take all the people who don’t question their faith – how can they ponder questions of global magnitude when they don’t know themselves? Atheists living in a Deist world must be holding their faith after pondering the possibility of being a Deist and finding it lacking. These vary people are at least capable of independent thought and hence capable of contemplating other problems. I believe then that per capita Atheists contribute more.

– Arik

My belief in God is not based on willful delusion, but on empirical (i.e. experiential) evidence. In fact, my acceptance of the religious principles I adhere to are logically built on this evidence. The issue is what you are willing to accept as valid evidence.

As a trained scientific researcher (in the field of information systems), I have strong respect for the scientific method and consider it to be the best means available have for acquiring knowledge. In using the scientific method, scientists make epistemological decisions to only accept as evidence those predictions of phenomena that are measurable, testable, objective, reproducible, and so on.

However, not all phenomena are measurable, etc. However, the fact that a certain phenomenon cannot be assessed using the scientific method does not mean that it isn’t real. It simply means it is beyond the scope of what science can validate. To claim otherwise would be an obvious fallacy.

Many human experiences fall into this category. Most personal experiences are not objective or testable. In my case, my acceptance of the existence of God is based on several instances in my life in which I have experienced or “felt” a communication from God. None of these experiences are verifiable using the scientific method, yet they were as real as anything else I have experienced in my life.

Simply put, I have made a decision to accept these experiences as evidence of the existence of God. In other words, I have broadened my epistemological criteria to accept as valid these profound and highly individualistic experiences.

The willingness to accept spiritual experiences as evidence is a great divider of theists and atheists. Knowledge gained through spiritual experiences is obviously not scientific, but millions if not billions of people have accepted such knowledge as the basis for their belief. Such acceptance is not unfounded or thoughtless, but rests on experiences that these people consider very real.

My belief in God is not based on willful delusion, but on empirical (i.e. experiential) evidence. In fact, my acceptance of the religious principles I adhere to are logically built on this evidence. The issue is what you are willing to accept as valid evidence.

As a trained scientific researcher (in the field of information systems), I have strong respect for the scientific method and consider it to be the best means available have for acquiring knowledge. In using the scientific method, scientists make epistemological decisions to only accept as evidence those predictions of phenomena that are measurable, testable, objective, reproducible, and so on.

However, not all phenomena are measurable, etc. However, the fact that a certain phenomenon cannot be assessed using the scientific method does not mean that it isn’t real. It simply means it is beyond the scope of what science can validate. To claim otherwise would be an obvious fallacy.

Many human experiences fall into this category. Most personal experiences are not objective or testable. In my case, my acceptance of the existence of God is based on several instances in my life in which I have experienced or “felt” a communication from God. None of these experiences are verifiable using the scientific method, yet they were as real as anything else I have experienced in my life.

Simply put, I have made a decision to accept these experiences as evidence of the existence of God. In other words, I have broadened my epistemological criteria to accept as valid these profound and highly individualistic experiences.

The willingness to accept spiritual experiences as evidence is a great divider of theists and atheists. Knowledge gained through spiritual experiences is obviously not scientific, but millions if not billions of people have accepted such knowledge as the basis for their belief. Such acceptance is not unfounded or thoughtless, but rests on experiences that these people consider very real.

Well what I am trying to say is that we are not all the so do not write us all off. For every Osama bin Laden or Dick Cheney, there is a Mother Theresa or Mahatma Gandhi. For those of us that want to make the world a better place, atheists included, need to be willing to accept each other as individuals and to form alliances as communities.

I personally am not an Atheist. I was brought up in a deeply religious context and it is woven into my soul (/neural pathways), I would feel empty without the rhythm of bread and wine, Christmas and Easter, weddings and funerals, scripture readings, prayer and silence.

However, as a middle-of-the-road English Christian, I would be considered as liberal heretic by most fundamentalist Christians in the US. For example, I do not believe in the death penalty (which is state murder), I do not believe in gun ownership (which is nuts), I do not believe in withholding abortion (which just leads to backstreet and dangerous abortions) or withholding contraception (which leads to teenage pregnancy), I do not believe in static gender roles (or even in static sexualities), I believe in Darwinism and Evolution and so on and so on.

Well what I am trying to say is that we are not all the so do not write us all off. For every Osama bin Laden or Dick Cheney, there is a Mother Theresa or Mahatma Gandhi. For those of us that want to make the world a better place, atheists included, need to be willing to accept each other as individuals and to form alliances as communities.

I personally am not an Atheist. I was brought up in a deeply religious context and it is woven into my soul (/neural pathways), I would feel empty without the rhythm of bread and wine, Christmas and Easter, weddings and funerals, scripture readings, prayer and silence.

However, as a middle-of-the-road English Christian, I would be considered as liberal heretic by most fundamentalist Christians in the US. For example, I do not believe in the death penalty (which is state murder), I do not believe in gun ownership (which is nuts), I do not believe in withholding abortion (which just leads to backstreet and dangerous abortions) or withholding contraception (which leads to teenage pregnancy), I do not believe in static gender roles (or even in static sexualities), I believe in Darwinism and Evolution and so on and so on.

Yup I agree with you completely, wherever you believe truth comes from, no one has a monopoly on it, that is not a rationally sustainable argument in any worldview (except inside a Hollywood movie).

>I’d say 99% of deists are not like that.

Well the number is probably less that that but I think we basically agree on ‘most’.

It is also an interesting idea about how we define deists and atheists. I sure the amount of people in the world that consciously describe themselves as ‘atheists’, in the deep and eloquent way you have described, would easily fit into one football ground with space to spare, (i.e. Manchester United total capacity: 76,212), but if even 1% of those who believe in religion are as I have described, then we are still talking about 40 Million people or more.

So if we think about the major problems facing the world today, climate change, HIV, poverty, wealth imbalance, war and corruption.

So given that it is just a few highly educated intellectuals in the west, it is quite unlikely that Atheism has any real hope of making a major difference/improvement to the world. Whereas if we can get 5% or 10% of religious people to care about these issues and act differently, then you have hundreds of millions of people working to make the world better.