Asymmetric Religion and Philosophy

A taker. Here I go. Thanks for engaging in argument. You must understand that I don't dislike my Atheist brothers. Nor do I find Atheism a silly position.

If you make two assumptions, then it's perfectly reasonable to be an Atheist. The assumptions are:

1. Nothing can exist except the physical (or, there is no other reality except the physical).
2. Matter can create itself.
3. Life can come about through a chemical process.

I just want to correct some flaws in their reasoning.

I posted this on my site: http://bsalert.com/

Link to his site

Let's look at some of your arguments...

This is a case of Richard Harris having his cake and eating it too. He wants to be an atheist yet won't concede that without God, his life is meaningless, at least in the cosmic sense.

You can be hopeful of the existence of some other unknowns in the universe without "believing" one of them is named Thor and is riding a chariot in the clouds and demands we not purchase beer on Sunday.

You misunderstand. I try to make the case that any feeling of meaningfulness without a greater being is just that, a feeling. That’s fine. Just don’t make it out to be more than that.

The problem is theists cannot imagine life being "meaningful" unless there magical sky dude is up there with ice cream bars to give them when they die.

No. It’s just that it isn’t meaningful in the sense that most people mean it.

Atheists and Agnostics (agnostic is a type of atheist) don't have such a shallow view of the world and what it means. It's not as banal as some type of Pavlovian afterlife reward system.

Again, you don’t seem to get it. And you don’t make a case for meaningfulness. You use the same tired insults.

Applying these simple concepts to life's intrinsic meaningfulness we'll see that life needs something outside of itself to give it meaning. Gold, for example, doesn't have intrinsic value. It's only worth something because we say it does. Gold certainly doesn't declare its own value. In order for life to be valuable, in and of itself, it needs to either be proven scientifically (outside of its purview-you can't prove worth like you can prove the atomic weight of gold) or have an authority to declare it so.

While an interesting argument, it's still incomplete and invalid. This is a classic example of begging the question. Even if what you said were true, what make's God valuable? For him and his words to have any meaning, there has to be another external influence; another standard by which his value is measured. And we end up in a circular argument.

God, by definition, is the ultimate giver of value, amongst other things. He needs no other validation. He doesn't need a higher power to validate his worth any more than he needs a creator.

The reality is, happiness, value, meaning, are all abstractions. They can no more easily be quantified than you or I could proclaim that the chord of G-Major is the best chord of them all.

OK. Then richard Harris should stop saying what “meaningful” is. I have it defined for me because I believe in a certain order of things. If God says a G-Major is best, then that’s the best.

And your contention that life needs something outside of itself to give itself meaning.... what makes you think this "thing" cannot be another abstraction, such as a process in one's own mind? After all, that accounts for the belief in imaginary creatures as well.

I can’t. It’s Faith, mostly (though not exclusively).

Beyond all this, there is one truth most people recognize that flies in the face of your flawed logic, and that is that every single person that is alive today, probably can point to something or someone which gives their life meaning and value, that doesn't require anyone else's influence or validation. I can look at a flower, and in the right state of mind, find great value in its beauty. I don't need anyone to tell me that. I do not need a price tag stuck on the flower.

No, you don’t. And that’s fine. But, I was just saying that you just have an opinion. Somebody could think a flower ugly and that would be as valid an opinion as yours.

I love Zeus pictures.