What would it take to change your beliefs?
Offline I've often mused over this question: What would have to occur for you to change your beliefs?
For example I'll go first, and I will give my answer to the question.
Current belief: The Christian God exists.
What would it take to get me to change that belief?
The following are what immediately comes to mind:
1. Successful human cloning. By "successful" I mean essentially that a human clone would be indistinguishable in all aspects (physical, mental, emotional, psychological, etc...) next to a naturally bred human being.
2. Undeniable evidence that aliens exists. By "undeniable" I would have to qualify this as me either touching one and attempting to communicate with it, and/or the entire world concurring that aliens exist i.e. they invade our planet or something at that level.
I know I've only come up with silly ones, but I really do believe that they would have the power, if manifested, to do what I claim they could.
I look forward to the antics and hopefully lighthearted discussion. 
The implication that we should put Darwinism on trial overlooks the fact that Darwinism has always been on trial within the scientific community. -- From Finding Darwin's God by Kenneth R. Miller
Chaos and chance don't mean the absence of law and order, but rather the presence of order so complex that it lies beyond our abilities to grasp and describe it. -- From From Certainty to Uncertainty by F. David Peat
- Login to post comments
With six kids, I ain't got much to start with, but OK. LOL!
"With its enduring appeal to the search for truth, philosophy has the great responsibility of forming thought and culture; and now it must strive resolutely to recover its original vocation." Pope John Paul II
If single houses out here are 500k to 10m+, what do you suppose they spent on this thing? http://www.crystalcathedral.com/
For weekly mass, seriously.. really... Whose god needs all this money? (where would he shop?)
Entirely too much, I'm sure, especially since I've always considered it something of an abomination.
"With its enduring appeal to the search for truth, philosophy has the great responsibility of forming thought and culture; and now it must strive resolutely to recover its original vocation." Pope John Paul II
Let's meet part way then. If we agree the mega-churches overkill. Keep the regular ones, sell the monsters and turn that money back onto the world.
As far as evidence that would be sufficient to change my beliefs I have to be more specific. You see I am given "evidence" of specifically christianity all the time. And every bit of "evidence" I am given I have to reject on the same grounds. This has lead me to specify the evidence that I would accept to change my beliefs. Contrary to what you may be thinking reading this little preface, it is not a fallacy of the burden of proof.
(for more information: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burden_of_proof_%28logical_fallacy%29 )
I would accept evidence that is objective, verifiable, and unequivocally supports a specific assertion or position. So far I have recieved nothing but various logical fallacies including but not limited to:
Begging the question: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Begging_the_question
Appeal to Force: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argumentum_ad_baculum
Agrumentum ad Hominem: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem (to be more specific this is when a christian quotes the bible at me, and even more specifically the various points at which it asserts that "a fool says in his heart there is no god". It's also funny because this assertion doesn't apply to me. I may not assume that any god exists, but I also never assert even to myself that no god exists.)
Questionable Cause, most often the correlation implies causation form: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correlation_does_not_imply_causation
Poisoning the well: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poisoning_the_well
Judgmental Language: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judgmental_language
Appeal to popularity: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argumentum_ad_populum
False Analogy (these are always fun): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_analogy
And that's just where I'll end the list. This is not even close to all of them. The other standard where all supposed "evidence" I have been given fails is that it is not objective. I have only ever been given or asked to seek for myself subjective "evidence" for the existence of a god. It will always be possible to find an argument that is persuasive enough for a subject. Thus subjective evidence which only takes into account that argument which the subject, in this case me or whoever presents their experience, found sufficient to convince them, will never be convincing to me, though I may want to accept it. Specifically because if I can't prove it, I can't assert that I know it. Basic epistemology (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epistemology).
It also fails because the evidence given is never unequivocal, by this I mean it never only supports a single conclusion. Usually it never actually supports any conclusion unless I choose to already assume the truth of the conclusion they are trying to support. This is the case when they argue for design. There is no evidence for design in the universe unless one chooses first to presuppose design in the universe.
Finally, naturally, if given evidence is objective it is verifiable, since the evidence itself becomes an object which is available to more than just the subject that one is trying to convince.
Hence these are my reasons for my criteria, this is why I am not merely setting the burden of proof to an impossible level, though the level may be currently impossible. What matters is that it is the standard set for all scientific evidence, and that has not been a problem for gravitation, quantum mechanics, the standard model, evolution, or any other scientific discipline with a significant amount of evidence that meets exactly my given criteria available.
If a god exists it may or may not have evidence available which may support it. If it does I will not chose to believe it exists until that evidence is given to me. And that evidence should meet all of my stated criteria.
Who said we couldn't agree on anything?
The implication that we should put Darwinism on trial overlooks the fact that Darwinism has always been on trial within the scientific community. -- From Finding Darwin's God by Kenneth R. Miller
Chaos and chance don't mean the absence of law and order, but rather the presence of order so complex that it lies beyond our abilities to grasp and describe it. -- From From Certainty to Uncertainty by F. David Peat
But I do believe ! Of course , are you blind ? Those with eyes ?
Devil With A Blue Dress - Mitch Ryder http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D-Iyn5JAKZQ
Let's try RED
....
girl in a red dress doing webcam show http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=etJQXV4ZrvA
Vintage Red Majorette 20s Cig Girl Flapper Dress Leotard http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s80bi016DgQ
all the proof anyone should need !
Atheism Books.
What would incite Atheists to riot is for Theists make claims that affect public policy for which they refuse to put to the test of science. When our country goes to war because the elected politicians feel that god is on our side. When children are indoctrinated with bad science.
Does your this god intervene in the affairs of the natural world? If so, why can't we do a double blind study to prove this is true? Does your god refuse to answer any prayers if scientists are monitoring the results to look for statistical evidence of supernatural intervention. Does your god deliberately skew the results so humans can not discover him through science? He apparently can only be known though this esoteric feeling that only Theists are fortunate to possess.
I think most atheists would want you to put your beliefs in the form of a scientific theory. That way, we can come up with experiments to verify these claims. If you don't do this many of us just assume your beliefs are just wishful thinking and that you don't even really believe these claims yourself because you don't want science to verify these claims. Theists just give us excuses why their god can not be experimentally verified.
It's good you reevaluate your beliefs, most Theists are too scared or ashamed to do this. I think if you're honest with yourself, you'll dump more and more of what you used to believe. Eventually you'll dump everything that can't be experimentally verified or at least call them theories requiring verification.
Your Christian bible says God chooses his people, so he must have choosen not to give us Atheists this feeling, then he refuses to give us any evidence through science.
Taxation is the price we pay for failing to build a civilized society. The higher the tax level, the greater the failure. A centrally planned totalitarian state represents a complete defeat for the civilized world, while a totally voluntary society represents its ultimate success. --Mark Skousen
Well, you're not necessarily calling it a scientific theorem, just a theory of your belief. Besides, it takes more than that to get me to riot... like being out of beer.
"You've got to remember that these are just simple farmers. These are people of the land. The common clay of the new West. You know... morons." - The Waco Kid
Change my beliefs towards what god? Zeus? Thor? Allah? I assume you mean specific evidence proving the christian god/
If there was such evidence, I would worship satan.
No, really. Think about it. God killed millions in the bible--satan killed ten, and only after god let him. Also, a problem with the whole firey hell thing--hell is supposed to be far away from god, and is where all the sinners go. If satan really wanted to get back at god, he would make the most sin-filled godless place imaginable. Therefor, hell would be filled with slot machines, beer volcanoes, stripper factories, and giant reclinable couches that zip you around so you can be lazy.
Well, there's two ways about it (current belief: none), the first one involves solid, conclusive, peer reviewed evidence and whatnot, you know, the rational one.
The other involves more of a Bruce Almighty kind of scenario: god granting me all of it's powers, after that I would confirm with the help of profesionals that I am indeed not going crazy, then I would prove myself by performing truly imposible miracles like telling a mountain to go f... I mean to go plunge itself into the ocean, restoring lost limbs and videotape both of these, etc.
After I got all that done, thus proving that now I am god, I would humanize my predecesor, revive and really buff up all those who got screwed over by my him and have them kick the sh*t out of him (yes, I would make a him out of it, you know all the balls hurt thing) and then after there was nothing left out of him to kick, I would revive him only to have the holy ghost kicked out again, and again, and again, alongside all inquisitors, televangelist, imams, ayatolas, rabis, UFO worshipers and just about any A-hole who stole people's lives in the name of god, until I'm satisfied (Tom Cruise and Mel Gibson, you know you're in that pile).
Then I would go to some out-of-the-way place in the universe and gather all of the supermassive black holes to make one gigantic superflush divine toilet, flush all my powers to it, leaving only some to get me back to earth, and then pulling the chain, sucking all that is divine and holy, like any other douce, into oblivion, alongside the gigantic superflush divine toilet itself.
Then with the last remains of my diviness, I would create a nice house on the mountains of Canada (nothing too fancy) and an eternal supply of food and Jack Daniels, and a nice retire fund for my folks. But not before leaving a graffiti on all of the world's universities: "God is dead, no really".
Yep, all that crap has to happend in order for me to change my belief and accept there is a god, but, if all that does happend, god would be in effect gone forever, so it would be pointless anyhow.
[Edit: Misspells; Yay! I got me 110 points, but what in the heck do you do with them?]
[Another Edit: cuz I'm a sleep deprivated moron who forgot to include the point of that whole story]
Lenore, The Cute Little Dead Girl. Twice as good as Jesus.
All it would take is a miracle?
In chapel at school I had a mate who broke his leg and was told he wasn't going to get his cast taken off for 5-6 months....that day we prayed for him and he got it taken off that week. So if there is no God than he must be tough as nails...
You should check out Mike Guglielmucci...hes just an ordinary bloke like you and me doing awsome stuff...
He's 29 and was diagnosed with terminal cancer, but recently he went to John Wesley's Chapel and was touched by the power of God and healed. So if there's no God than he's the cure to cancer...
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=101830142
Thats his Myspace.
He's apart of a youth conference called Planetshakers. Man its flippin awsome...
www.planetshakers.com
Hope this helps.
Charles.
I AM GOD , what's there to change ?