Why I'm an atheist

[sarahmichigan]

This is going to be kind of anti-climactic since I've been thinking on it for a while and leading up to it, and yet it's going to be short. But here goes.

I'm an atheist because I think the burden of proof is on those who believe in ANY kind of supernatural phenomena. As far as I can tell, material, natural explanations explain the world and how it works and how it came into being just fine.

To me, positing a Higher Being (especially the more specific you get about what this being is like) to explain things is like saying that tiny black fairies contort their bodies to show the time on my digital watch rather than relying on naturalistic, material explantions about electricity and such.

Now, I understand why some people have an intuition that there just MUST be something bigger than us that created the world. That's fine, and I can understand that. (I have trouble figuring out, sometimes, how people go from "some higher being" to "my specific sect or doctrine," but that's another subject.) However, I don't have that intuition.

I remember when I was taking philosophy courses at Western Michigan University, and sometimes the professor would ask, "What's your intuition about that statment or assertion?" This was in the context of many philosophical arguments, not just ones about the existence or non-existence of God. I remember thinking, "Intuition?! This is supposed to be a philosophy course, and not a New Age class about how to fine-tune your ESP."

But really, when it comes to belief in a higher being of some sort, I think a lot of us are going off our gut feeling. My gut says that only the material world exists, and there isn't anything "super" above the natural world. Any weirdness that can't be explained by science can usually be explained by psychology.

Comments

[http://users.livejournal.com/_earthshine_/]

To my understanding, Sarah's position is, "I feel the universe can be explained without reference to God, and I feel that 'God exists' is a stronger claim than 'God doesn't exist,' therefore I choose to believe he doesn't exist. If someone wants to change that belief, they're going to have to provide evidence."

Just to verify correctness, you mean "weaker" rather than "stonger" there, yes?

...that's not a claim so much as it's an opinion. To me, that's a lot different than, "therefore God doesn't exist" (lack of proof is not proof of lack).

Yes. I'm okay with accepting that within certain disciplines, conventions (like Ockham's Razor) suggest better results are more likely when you assume the simpler or "less extraordinary" of two otherwise equally-supported hypotheses. Confusing those conventions with absolutely true bases for factual conclusions is what i'm suggested be avoided.

[bernmarx.livejournal.com]

Just to verify correctness, you mean "weaker" rather than "stonger" there, yes?

It wasn't a mis-speak, I just meant it in a different-than-obvious form of "stronger"; I meant it as in, "A strong claim is one that requires a good deal of evidence to support." So you do understand what I meant, I just didn't say it all that clearly. :)

[http://users.livejournal.com/_earthshine_/]

Oh, i see -- stronger as in "more bold" not "more backed". Gotcha.

Thanks!