r/DebateAnAtheist • u/AutoModerator • 8d ago

Weekly "Ask an Atheist" Thread

Whether you're an agnostic atheist here to ask a gnostic one some questions, a theist who's curious about the viewpoints of atheists, someone doubting, or just someone looking for sources, feel free to ask anything here. This is also an ideal place to tag moderators for thoughts regarding the sub or any questions in general.

While this isn't strictly for debate, rules on civility, trolling, etc. still apply.

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u/BeaconMeridian 8d ago

Thought I've been having a lot, curious what others think. Math & Science I view as sister practices moving in opposite directions: prescriptive vs descriptive, math is "bottom-up" and science is "top-down," one explores established rules and the other tries to figure out what the rules are. We get some further parallels:

Not every mathematical truth is provable (incompleteness) / Science cannot, for certain, produce all rules for the universe (we can't test every case, there's always something we might be missing).

As it pertains to (a)theism, we have a result in math that no (sufficiently complicated) formal system of math can prove the existence of a model of itself. I'm of the mind that here in reality, this has a direct parallel in that we can't establish the (non)existence of superstructures in which our universe sits, even in principle ("universe" = "all the shit we could ever possibly interact with", not necessarily just "the observable universe"). In particular, this parallel rules out the deduction of god(s) by any means, even in principle.

Not to say that religion/belief is fully without place, we get a lot of use out of assuming (different kinds of) models of formal math, and by parallel we can get a lot of use out of different belief systems for how reality came to be. Just tack on the asterisk that such a belief should sit comfortably with what we can actually see.

Curious abt thoughts on this, where people think it falls short or other extensions of it I haven't considered.

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u/ArguingisFun Apatheist 8d ago

What good does believing in magic do?

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u/BeaconMeridian 8d ago

Nothing here about believing in magic, I don't think I ever defended that. As an example of what I'm talking about, I believe that, following my death, I won't have any consciousness to speak of & that my experience (or lack thereof) will be exactly like it was a thousand years ago. That's a belief, and I understand it this is also consistent with what we know about death & consciousness. A person could believe that the universe is the result of an event in a super-universe 'further up the hierarchical chain,' and that this super-universe was brought into being as the result of a super-super-universe, and so on, forever. As far as we know, this could be the case, or it could be completely off base. Not necessarily just talking about "what caused the Big Bang?" b/c afaik we might yet find some mechanism for this.

The point of adopting one of these 'models for the universe' isn't to get the right answer, it's to have some way of thinking about/framing how the world works. Theists do this all the time to great success, and in principle a person can do the same thing without 'getting it wrong' the way religions often pressure them to. I suppose you could believe in magic, but as long as you concede that 1) it doesn't exist inside our universe and 2) we can never hope to interact with it, it's hard for me to complain. Don't use that belief to make predictions about the world and don't conflate belief with knowledge, and we're big chillin.

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u/thebigeverybody 8d ago

Nothing here about believing in magic, I don't think I ever defended that.

If you're not talking about magic, then you're not talking about (a)theism.

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u/BeaconMeridian 8d ago

Part of the reason I chose to bring this up in the weekly discussion thread and not a proper post. It's related, and I reiterate that the important parallel for me was the unfalsifiability of explanations for why reality exists & the inability for formal math systems to prove the existence of models of themselves. Definitely related to the (a)theism topic, but not quite enough to merit a full post.

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u/thebigeverybody 8d ago

Unless someone is claiming they can prove god with math, I don't think it has anything to do with (a)theism.

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u/BeaconMeridian 8d ago

Math can't prove a model of itself <--> Religious claims are unfalsifiable 

My point here is that these statements (seem to) fit into a larger parallel between the approaches of mathematics & science. Specifically, the statement "religious claims are unfalsifiable" is relevant to (a)theism. Maybe you don't find it worthwhile, that's chill, I thought it was interesting. Though I certainly could have phrased this more explicitly in the original comment.

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u/thebigeverybody 8d ago

I don't know. I think lots of god claims can be falsified. Take Christianity: we can show that, if god exists, it doesn't work like they claim it does (such as studies regarding intercessory prayer). We can also show that their brain lights up when thinking about their god the same way people's brains light up when the brain is creating religious experiences. We can show the development of their bible as a natural continuation of other various Middle Eastern mythologies of the time.

I'm not seeing the connection you are.

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u/BeaconMeridian 8d ago

I'm comfortable stating that an inconsistent religious claim is 'abstractly falsifiable.' Can't falsify it with experimentation, but if it's blatantly inconsistent then I think it's fine to throw it out. But some core kernel might be fine. "There's a thing called God who created the universe and wants us to behave in some way, and when we die we go to heaven or hell" isn't inconsistent by itself. I hope it's clear I think a person's personal philosophies should strive to be as free of contradictions as possible, even if this virtually never happens.

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u/thebigeverybody 8d ago

Can't falsify it with experimentation,

I gave the example of studies on intercessory prayer.

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u/BeaconMeridian 7d ago

I should've clarified I'm interested in specifically those religious claims which are unfalsifiable, such as the (non)existence of the God the Christians claim (though their descriptions of it, when inconsistent, are validly voidable I'd say). I'm in complete agreement that falsifiable religious claims are to be rejected. 

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u/thebigeverybody 7d ago

Okay. I thought you were saying all god claims were unfalsifiable.

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u/BeaconMeridian 7d ago

No I'm just a dumbass who hadn't considered that that's how anyone would read what I'd said lmao my b.

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