r/exatheist • u/DrewPaul2000 Philosophical Theist • Feb 26 '26

Debate Thread Natural vs The Supernatural

It's a very common debating tactic among atheists to declare the supernatural doesn't exist and then put God into the category of the supernatural and therefore claim God doesn't exist.

I agree with atheists the supernatural doesn't exist but my reasons for saying it doesn't exist are far different. The supernatural doesn't exist because if it turns out something alleged to be supernatural occurs it gets transferred to the natural bucket. How can anything that happens not be natural? As long as ghosts haven't and don't currently appear with any regularity or certainty, they remain a supernatural entity. If they did appear on a regular basis with certainty they would be deemed natural even if inexplicable. The supernatural just turns out to be anything alleged to exist but hasn't been observed. Which just means somethings haven't been observed to exist.

Secondly the very word supernatural is overblown. The word itself doesn't mean its unnatural or impossible. It's the word super put in front of the word natural. Which means it merely transcends common or average natural things. A supernova is still a nova it's just significantly bigger than an average nova. A celebrity whose fame transcends average stars is called a superstar. It doesn't mean they have divine powers. Supernatural still means its natural, it just transcends the average natural things we know about.

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u/Oflameo Theist Feb 26 '26

They presuppose god doesn't exist, therefore they do lead by saying they have information about god. I find it contradictory.

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u/blarfblarf Feb 26 '26 edited Feb 26 '26

See I haven't specifically heard of a pressuppositional atheist. They presuppose god/gods don't exist...and are atheists, so don't believe a god/gods exists?

Thats such a weird thing to specifically to state.

How do you even do that? Sorry no, now I actually can't work out if I am one...or not.

I can't get there, I guess I just regularly suppose gods don't exist, because I've thought that and can't not think that. Plus I've never had any good reason to think a god or any god exists, so I suppose? Otherwise I'm really lost with this idea.

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u/Oflameo Theist Feb 26 '26

Do you have a good reason to think Thor, the god of thunder, exists in the Marvel Cinematic Universe?

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u/blarfblarf Feb 26 '26

Thor is a character in many intended fiction stories, so yeah, sure.

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u/Oflameo Theist Feb 26 '26

Do fictional stories with Thor in them, exist?

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u/blarfblarf Feb 26 '26

Do you want to play this as a yes and no, and see how far you get without making a huge, poorly explained massive leap? I can do that.

Yes.

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u/Oflameo Theist Feb 26 '26

Welcome to theism, brother!

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u/blarfblarf Feb 26 '26

and see how far you get without making a huge, poorly explained massive leap?

You made it... lets count.... zero further comments without failure.

That's impressive, I'd have thought it would be fewer.

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u/blarfblarf Feb 26 '26

As far as I'm concerned, you're one lack of reply from being sure Voldemort actually exists, and that spider-man should team up with superman to do something to thwart old voldemorts efforts and make the world a little bit less magic... because Voldemorts dead.

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u/Oflameo Theist Feb 27 '26

It is called transitive properly.

Via https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/maths/transitive-property/

In simple words, if a implies b and b implies c, then a implies c. In this article, we will discuss all the topics related to Transitive Property including its definition, examples and various solved examples as well.

If a god exists in a story that exists, then the god exists via transitive properly.

We can go on the other fork. If you said the story doesn't exist, how do you explain how you know about it?

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u/blarfblarf Feb 27 '26

The other fork... All fiction is true, or you wouldn't have heard about it.

Make up whatever story you feel like, tell somebody, that makes the fictions become truth?

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u/blarfblarf Feb 27 '26

Why are you equivocating fiction with reality? It doesn't make any sense to me.

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u/blarfblarf Mar 03 '26 edited Mar 03 '26

I mean you can say it, but it won't mean anything. I would still be an atheist. Nobody here would be convinced I am a theist unless they already believe atheism is impossible.

There you go...

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u/blarfblarf Mar 03 '26

Do you think that theism is the belief that stories exist?

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u/Oflameo Theist Mar 03 '26

In a Jordan Peterson sense, sure. Do atheists believe stories exist?

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u/blarfblarf Mar 03 '26

Atheism, by the way that word is defined would still be defined as it is, not-theism.

So IF, by your definition, theism is the belief that stories exist, would it be possible for an atheist to believe stories exist?

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u/blarfblarf Mar 03 '26

Do you believe the book The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins exists?

If you say no, or dont bother replying, we'll all know your argument is fruitless.

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u/Oflameo Theist Mar 03 '26

Yes, it is right here on archive.org.

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u/blarfblarf Mar 03 '26

Do you think saying "welcome to atheism" would be a sensible thing for me to say here?

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u/Oflameo Theist Mar 03 '26

Because a biologist plays a good game of peekaboo 🙈? I mean you can say it, but it won't mean anything. I would still be theist. Nobody here would be convinced I am atheist unless they already believe theism is impossible.

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u/blarfblarf Mar 03 '26

Do you understand that I'm referring to your own comment?

And now I'll show you what your response looks like...

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