"Tinkerntom" wrote in message
ps.com...

huge snippage of nothingness

If not believing in god is a religion, then so too is not believing
that the
earth is made of cream cheese.


Huh!

That was a lot of reading and snipping for "Huh!"

Did you not understand?

If you are saying that NOT believing in god is a religion, then so too is
NOT believing in anything else...e.g. that the earth is made of cream
cheese, that Tinkerntom is the reincarnation of Howdy Doody, etc.

snip

As you just said, I cannot prove or disprove what is in your
mind.
Now you make the equally absurd statement that Oprah is a Goddess

I actually doubt I am the only person to ever describe her as such,
even
though I was doing so only for hypothetical purposes.

which again is a figment of your mind

A hypothetical figment. Whereas you really believe that your
supernatural being is real.

Maybe there is evidence that would show that He is not hypothetical,
would that mean He is not a figment of my mind, and in fact is real!

Maybe gravity will end tomorrow. Maybe, maybe, maybe.

The facts are that She exists only in your mind.

and I would again ask you to support that


Nono, you have to prove that Oprah is not god, in the same way you
asked me
to disprove your god.

I am going to have to review our discussion, where did I ask you to
disprove my God? Whatever that means?

If you've never asked me how I know there is no god, I apologize.

I have ask you repeatedly to provide evidence and support the basis of
what you say you believe, "There is no god", or the hypothetical
statement that "Oprah is the Goddess." Which though hypothetical, would
require some sort of evidence to validate any claim to her diety.

Now we are getting somewhere.

You are aksing me to support the basis for my knowing that there is no god.

I am telling you it is impossible to disprove what is only in your mind.

To help you understand this, I am using the Oprah example.

If I (hypothetically) belive that Oprah is god, can you prove to me that she
is not?

You prove to me that you have any basis for the claim,
then I will make counter-claims. What evidence are you providing
for
your claim about Oprah? Do you now believe that God is? You have
some
inside info that Oprah is God? Please share it! What is the nature
of
this God that uniquely identifies her as God. I have never seen any
such evidence, and as far as I know, she does not make the claim
for
herself. So if you only make the claim with no support, no
evidence, no
corobborating statements by God, what is the basis of your Faith,
or is
it Blind Faith? The ravings of a lunatic?

It's a hypothetical. If I were to truly believe that Oprah is a
supreme
being, can you prove me wrong?

See, I already explained this...

Please don't get bent out of shape thinking that I am calling you a
lunatic, unless you believe what you said, which I don't think you
do!
You were making the statements for the benefit of discussion, and I
make mine as a reaction to the absurd proposal as if it was for
real.

It's not very absurd, Tinkerntom. Much less absurd than your belief
in an
invisible man.

You say that I believe in an invisible man! What is your basis for
saying He is invisible. Because you haven't seen Him? How do you know
God is invisible? Again what is the basis for this statement?

Let's take it another way, since you are the one with the belief.

Have you seen god Tinkerntom?

Your first question that you ask, though was more interesting,
"what
would be the basis for saying that I am wrong?" Now this is
something
that we could look into.

The basis has to do with the evidence of the claim. Evidence can be
examined, and compared, and measured, and introduced as evidence of
a
claim. The claim itself may be the figment of someones mind where
we
can't go except indirectly by evidence. You have yet to provide any
evidence for any of your claims, so I will allow you to present
whatever evidence you have as a basis of whatever claim you would
like
to make! Respectfully TnT

No evidence is required for a religious belief system. Since it is
founded
in belief in a supernatural being, there is no evidence. The belief
exists
only in the imagination. If I truly believed Oprah to be a supreme
being,
the evidence for this would be no more or no less than your own
belief in
your own supreme being.

"I still have no idea where you think godtalk and religion depart."

You made this statement above, and considering it with your last series
of comments about the basis of a person's faith in God, I begin to get
a better idea of what you belive about religion, and Godtalk, as I
summarize below in the next paragraph..

God is an invisible man, the product of an over-active imagination.
Religion is the worship practice of the man with the over-active
imagination that believes in the invisible man. Because the man is
invisible, it is really god who is invisible, and so there is no
evidence to support the belief of the invisible man being god. Since
there is no evidence to establish the claims that the invisible man is
God, their is no point looking for evidence that is not there. If
evidence were provided, at best it is evidence of an over-active
imagination, imagining an imaginary invisible man/God, so the evidence
is not even worth any serious consideration, since it could not be
truly evidence of God, since God is invisible and only exist in the
imagination of a particular mans mind, and not in real life, now, or
ever before, or in the future. In real life, god is just the product of
an over-active imagination, and so there are not real life examples or
expressions of God in real life. So any talk about God is unnecessary
and unproductive, and any talk about religion is basically the same,
and of very little difference. Since there is little difference, they
are essentially the same, and since there is no evidence to support
either one as being necessary and productive, there is little need, to
seriously consider either one, and the lack of supporting evidence only
provides proof that there is no reason to believe in God as anything
other than the product of an over-active imagination. So since there is
no evidence for a basis for Godtalk and religion, there is no need to
have a basis for Godtalk and religion, and hence any god is Ok for
someone, if that is what they choose, though there is no evidence,
because evidence is not necessary. Not only is evidence not necessary,
but it is undesirable, since it would tend to point to authenticating
the claims of one particular man about his imaginary god, over the
equally unvalidated claims of another about his imaginary god, and
since all imaginary gods are of equal value, non-value, then having
evidence that supports one god over another is undesirable because it
biases men's imagination. You choose not to provide any evidence to
support your claims because it would be unnecessary and undesirable.
You do not endorse one god over another, and each person is welcome to
their own imaginary God, since it really does not make any difference
at all. You can not prove what is in the mind of a man, and since there
is no evidence to believe in a particular God, then you can believe in
any one of them or none of them for equal benefit. You can not prove
what each imagines in his mind about his god, and the evidence that
forms that basis of belief is non existant, and unnecessary, and
undesirable, so you choose to not believe in any particular god since
he is invisible and imaginary. Which gets me back to where I started
this paragraph.

How am I doing so far with understanding what you are saying? TnT

Let me try giving an example:

A manager claims that the bank is robbed, but in actuality there was no
robbery. The police show up and look for evidence. Because the robbery
is just in the mind of the manager, there can be no evidence of a
robbery. Any evidence that is found may be evidence of something
happening, but it could not be evidence of a bank robbery. The police
not wanting to look inept, bag and classify a lot of evidence, and work
on building a case. They may even come up with a description of the
imaginary robber. Now the banker may feel safer with all the police
around, and the police feel good because they are hot on the trail to
solve a case, and the imaginary robber feels good because he will never
get caught. He becomes known as the invisible bank robber, because
there is never any evidence left at any of the hundreds of banks he has
held up. We as consumers can know that our money is safe because of all
the police protection, and the adequate security measures that the bank
manager has in place to protect our money. Any future robbery the
police don't look for evidence, since they know there won't be any left
at the crime scene, and evetually they may even stop coming at the
sound of the burglar alarm. But the manager is ok with that since he
has never lost any of the money entrusted to him. And the robber is
happy because the police have released 100s of pictures of him, and not
one is close, but it really does not matter because any one of them
will do, since he is the invisible robber.

All this works out just fine until there is a real robbery at the bank.
The bank manager has now lost alot of money, the police don't come, and
the real robber gets away with no good description because everyone
thought he was the invisible bank robber.

So truth in reporting, evidence, and valid descriptions does matter in
RL and in Godtalk! Maybe not in religion, which is where the two
depart, since there are plenty of religions without any of the above,
that men trust to be led by the invisible god. Personally I prefer the
visible God who makes Himself known to them who seek Him! TnT

Er. But he/she still only exists in your imagination, just like the robbery
that never happened.

The fact that you could contrive a lie, get people to believe it, and change
their behaviour as a result is not in dispute. That's exactly what religion
is.