Jim Choate answered:

...

From: Matthew James Gering <mgering@ecosystems.net> There is no reason to think that a god does exist, so why would one even need to think about or believe in the negative.

There is no reason to believe one doesn't either. If we take your claim at face value you need to demonstrate your test that shows the irrelevancy of god. God is not a belief in a negative, another straw man, but rather a mechanism or expression of human psychology and the need for humans to find patterns (ie reason) in things.

Mr. Gering, you may have heard the argument that there is also no reason to believe that you exist, except your sense impressions which can be proven to be unreliable and easily falsified. The old 'disembodied nervous system floating in a tank getting poked by graduate students' premise could explain your entire range of perceptions of your childhood, schooling, adolescence, growing up, eating pizza at the office, etc. I wondered for a while, and then I threw it in the waste bin, because it's pointless and a waste of energy to wonder whether or not I exist. I decided to trust my sense impressions well enough to go to the movies and jog in the mornings and go to work and write code. I certainly do not stop living because there is no reason to believe that I exist. There is also no reason for me to believe that you exist, because you could be Toto forging the mail. You didn't sign your message, I don't have your key fingerprint, I doubt I ever will, and besides, maybe someone monitored your keystrokes and stole your key. And in my experience, certain 'sense impressions' lead me to conclude that the existence of 'god' as some sort of cohesive, coherent, universal-scale eternal being is perhaps possible. Looking at cloud formations on the plane, I sometimes feel like an astrocyte wandering a huge purkinje skyscape, or like a star careening through a nebula. And the erosion patterns on the mountains below look just like dribbling water on sandcastles. And so there is something, some kind of underlying order, the effects of which we see at every scale. Though I'm incapable of understanding the transcendent order, or of conceiving what the transcendent order might be, I do not block the possibility from my mind. And that leads to some interesting experiences. No, I don't follow the often arbitrary rhetoric of many organised religions, and in that point I agree with your opinion of the concept. Although, some of them espouse some interesting ideas. To wander back to the thread topic, democracy, and to totally wrench everything out of context, I've heard the same sort of argument used against democratic empowerment. There's no reason to believe that 'the people' are capable of making their own decisions, and there's no reason to believe that stronger, more direct democracy would work as an effective system of governance and organisational decision-making. 'The people' are demonstrably idiotic, moronic fools, sheep, who must be lead by 'those in the know'. By that logic, it follows we should concentrate all power into the hands of a few beneficent rulers, or an educated aristocracy, or perhaps just one -- the philosopher king. I nominate myself. Any objections? Please e-mail for address to send offerings and libations to me, the ruler of the universe. Donations accepted in the form of gifts of $100 or more. Gold and precious stones preferred. Multitudinous blessings to you, free of charge. Mark Hedges __________________________________________________________________ Mark Hedges hedges@infopeace.com www.infopeace.com ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~