Penn Jillette on religion - eviltoast
  • bleistift2@feddit.de
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    8 months ago

    Athiest people who claim they definitely know how the universe works

    The thing is that atheists don’t do that. They are aware how science works and that what we consider to be true is only the current best approximation.

    disproven by Godel’s Incompleteness Theorem

    I don’t know much about most of the fancy words you’re throwing around. But I do know that the Incompleteness Theorem only states that statements can exist that you can neither prove nor deny. We could assume that a deity exists that chooses to hide its existence. This assumption would be such an independent axiom. If we take it to be true, however, then it is subject to reasoning, and we can quickly derive that this deity does not have the properties we usually associate with it. So while a deity may exist, it certainly isn’t the one we’re picturing, from which “God doesn‘t exist” follows necessarily.

    It’s also worth noting that Gödel was talking about an axiomatization of mathematics, not the ‘real world.’

    • RecluseRamble@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      8 months ago

      We could assume that a deity exists that chooses to hide its existence.

      The funny thing is it’s always been hiding at the edge of knowledge. Used to be sun and lightning, now it’s the architect of the supposed simulation we might be living in.

    • doctorskull@lemmy.world
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      8 months ago

      There is no god, that’s the simple truth

      I think this is what the poster was referring to with the overconfidence part

      • Clent@lemmy.world
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        8 months ago

        “There are no unicorns, that’s the simple truth.”

        Is this also over confidence?

        There are a lot of children who believe in unicorns.

        A lot of pictures too. The pictures are more consistent than that of the gods.

        • anguo@lemmy.ca
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          8 months ago

          As I understand it, a statement like that is unscientific. You can say that the likelihood of unicorns existing is extremely small, trace possible mythological origins to show the stories are fabricated, but you can’t categorically prove that something doesn’t exist.

        • jj4211@lemmy.world
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          8 months ago

          To be fair, one is about something that would be observable, and another is an abstract concept that as defined could be completely unobservable.

          Of course, there no practical consequence of that hypothetical. Since we have no evidence we can’t claim to know the will of such a hypothetical being or beings. The problem with a hope or faith in such a hypothetical is really when a human asserts the authority of the divine to their own words, desires, and judgements. So if someone’s faith is truly private and they don’t believe they have any true insight into the nature of their faith, then no need to object since it’s it has zero effect in practice.

          So the agnostic perspective rather than the atheist perspective.