Calgarypuck Forums - The Unofficial Calgary Flames Fan Community - View Single Post - UBC study finds believers distrust atheists as much as rapists

Teh_Bandwagoner · 12-01-2011, 02:36 PM

It is absolutely ridiculous to mistrust someone based on their belief on whether or not God exists. Unfortunately preconceptions based on this belief goes both ways. A theist believing that an atheist is immoral and evil is no dumber than the atheist thinking that the believer is stupid and naive. It's always comments around stuff like this that fuel these pointless arguments on the internet...pssh...in the world.

As far as I can understand it can't be that cut and dry either way, since there's no proof of the existence of God one way or another. Someone said atheism is based on fact and reason. Reason? Based on physical evidence and our perception, sure it is something we can reason. But fact? There are no facts. Facts are simply a pool of things we know. Dark energy and dark matter are things we theorize to exist, but are not yet facts, and these are things we are only recently looking at. Who knows what vast amount of information is out there that we have yet discovered. Just because we haven't seen it doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

Flip it the other way and it's the exact same thing. No theist can outright say that God exists as a fact. To state it as fact is equally wrong. However a lack of evidence doesn't preclude it. Perhaps there is a greater consciousness out there. We as humans can only understand so many dimensions of things. What's to say that there's nothing beyond our perception?

And again beyond any of this I don't like the idea of judging anyone based on either opinion. There are plenty of great people on both sides of the fence, and anywhere in between.

12-01-2011, 02:36 PM	#23
Teh_Bandwagoner First Line Centre Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: The wagon's name is "Gaudreau" Exp:	It is absolutely ridiculous to mistrust someone based on their belief on whether or not God exists. Unfortunately preconceptions based on this belief goes both ways. A theist believing that an atheist is immoral and evil is no dumber than the atheist thinking that the believer is stupid and naive. It's always comments around stuff like this that fuel these pointless arguments on the internet...pssh...in the world. As far as I can understand it can't be that cut and dry either way, since there's no proof of the existence of God one way or another. Someone said atheism is based on fact and reason. Reason? Based on physical evidence and our perception, sure it is something we can reason. But fact? There are no facts. Facts are simply a pool of things we know. Dark energy and dark matter are things we theorize to exist, but are not yet facts, and these are things we are only recently looking at. Who knows what vast amount of information is out there that we have yet discovered. Just because we haven't seen it doesn't mean it doesn't exist. Flip it the other way and it's the exact same thing. No theist can outright say that God exists as a fact. To state it as fact is equally wrong. However a lack of evidence doesn't preclude it. Perhaps there is a greater consciousness out there. We as humans can only understand so many dimensions of things. What's to say that there's nothing beyond our perception? And again beyond any of this I don't like the idea of judging anyone based on either opinion. There are plenty of great people on both sides of the fence, and anywhere in between. __________________ Last edited by Teh_Bandwagoner; 12-01-2011 at 02:54 PM.