We are discussing theology, which isn't fiction. Do we have to take you on another visit to dictionary corner?Evil Jak said:
Poll: Portal Phrase Turned into Atheist Metaphor
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Religious belief isn't irrational. Some people have very good reasons to believe in god. So the quote becomes worthless.Kubanator said:
Theology is the study of a bunch of books people wrote a long time ago.cuddly_tomato said:
The only rational reason would be Pascal's wager, but that would assume a god who didn't know that your worship was false and selfish, meaning a god of limited power.cuddly_tomato said:
I love it when people try to associate Hitchens with logic. Look, Hitchens is a devout Christian, we know. But he needs to stop shoving that crap down everyones throats before he can be taken seriously.Evil Jak said:
Uhm... no. It isn't.Kubanator said:
http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0702/voices.html
You'll have to try a lot harder to blow someone's mind. I read Grant Morrison and William S. Burroughs and GET IT.Lord_Ascendant said:
Atheists do say there is something there to deny; the concept of God. Whether or not there is a literal, omnipotent being who created the Universe and occasionally decides to genocide us, there IS the concept that he exists. You and I both know this because otherwise we wouldn't be able to have this interaction. Pretty much everyone has a concept of God and a lot of trouble comes about if one person has a different concept of God from someone else.
What atheists deny is that the God is a real, definitely existing thing ('thing' here being used to mean 'that which exists in some objective form, rather than merely as an abstract idea'). For instance, 'two' is a concept, but it isn't real. You can have two apples, but you can't have just 'two'. We can imagine 'two' in the same way we can imagine God, we can even make representations of these concepts, but neither are actual realities. I acknowledge that two is a concept but I do not acknowledge that two is a real 'thing'.
However, your final statement is technically accurate; there would be no atheists if there is nothing to refute - that is, there was no concept of God. Everyone would be atheists and hence no one would be atheists, because there would be no concept of God to believe in. The division between atheist and theist would be meaningless, in the same way as 'light' would be meaningless without 'dark'.
*bow right back at you*
The guy is a religious scientist. That still doesn't change theology from the study of a bunch of old books, written by people a long time ago.cuddly_tomato said:
If you rationalize the placebo effect, it doesn't exist. If you have no reason to think prayer will help you, because you every time you try rationalizing it, you can't, it won't.teh_pwning_dude said:
Ohhh you were talking about Christopher Hitchens, Peters brother? You are using their little sibling rivalry as a basis for your entire view of the world, the universe, life, love and all things rational and irrational?Evil Jak said:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Hitchens#On_Morality_and_Religion
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Hitchens#Relationship_with_younger_brother
You carry right on listening to which ever one of the brothers floats your boat.
That is exactly what it does.Kubanator said:
The man came to his conclusions about god and theology because of science and his own experiences, not because of a bunch of old books. I think you will find this is a common occurence. Yes religious people can think for themselves, even if you have difficulty believing that.
Getting back to the point at hand, I can quite easily see "The Cake is a Lie" being used as an atheist metaphor. I'd personally rather swap out "cake" for something like "the afterlife", or "heaven", since that's the metaphorical 'cake' at the end of everything, but the broad strokes of OP more or less hang together well enough.
