I heard a scientist recite an incident where, after he had given his lecture on the life of the sun, a questioner asked, “Did you say the sun would burn out in three million years or three billion years?” When the scientist assured him that he had said three billion years, the questioner sat down sighing, “Boy, that’s a relief.”

To be concerned about whether an undefined deity exists somewhere, in some form with some sort of supernatural powers is, to this atheist’s mind, inane. The evidence is both overwhelming and compelling that there is no supernatural causation and that all thoughts and mental processes are the exclusive product of the physical brain. Thus, there is no after-life and all gods are nothing more than figments.

Occam?s razor decisively fails Deism as an explanation. Deism is more complicated than which it purports to explain (the explanandum). All supernatural explanations must fail on Occam?s razor, because supernatural explanations are, as you note, not provable. In other words, supernatural explanations are not susceptible to independent examination and confirmation.

Well, it is rather difficult to debate these things, when theists excel at contradicting between themselves, with some pointing out that supernatural is unable to be “tested”, and others who see that possibility, namely the christian church, who makes a supposedly “rational” test before sanctifying someone. It doesn’t matter if it is a completely stupid study or not, if they test it, they assume it is testable and that’s my point.

But what I pointed out is that Occam’s razor is not a “decider” on the very point you named precisely because it is untestable at least until science figures out how to watch back before the singularity, if “before” even existed, or if “causation” is even a necessity. The fact that Occam’s razor fails to test God doesn’t mean God does not exist, but rather that the method is unable to test the hypothesis. Merely saying that Occam is also unable to test fairy tales does not solve the problem.

Please help me with this sentence:

Occam?s razor is both a criterion of meaning and of knowledge, not of truth

I think I know where you are going here, but it is very ambiguous. It’s like you’re saying the truth doesn’t matter, only “meaning” and “knowledge”. What the (restraining from insulting language)?!?

Are we beginning to be irrational here?

Well, as I offer an actual argument for my position (disposing of Occam’s razor allows infinitely many “invisible elf” alternatives), I might be mistaken but I am not “irrational”.

It doesn’t say anything about the veracity of the theory itself.

Occam’s razor is both a criterion of meaning and of knowledge, not of truth.

It would be helpful if you a) read my comments carefully; I typically mean what I actually say, not what you want me to say, b) introduce actual arguments for your positions and b) refrain from insulting language.

Occam?s razor is a decider.

Well, really! Are we beginning to be irrational here? Occam is a simplifying method, yes, and people really use it as a criterium, but its authority stops there. It doesn’t say anything about the veracity of the theory itself. Only that some theories are more complicated than others, and that we should spend better our time and money researching the simpler ones rather than the complex ones first.

I like that triple A, Adrian. That’s exactly where I stand too.

I’ve checked wikipedia (I know, shoot me) but I think this might work out:

“Apathetic agnosticism - the view that there is no proof of either the existence or nonexistence of God or gods, but since any God or gods that may exist appear unconcerned for the universe or the welfare of its inhabitants, the question is largely academic anyway.”

So, I’m technically speaking an Apathetic Agnostic Atheist. How’s that for alliteration?

…you fail to understand, or simply dismiss the fact that Occam’s razor is not an Ultimate Decider of Things. Occam’s razor is a simple method which scientists use in order to dismiss theories, but it doesn’t mean it is infallible. So it doesn’t prove anything but the fact that it is a more complex answer than other answers.

Occam’s razor is a decider. Depending on how you look at it, however, it might not be the “ultimate” decider; I’m not sure that the concept of “ultimate” decider is coherent.

But Occam’s razor must be an epistemic decider for scientific epistemology; without it the scientific method fails completely. Note that in the case of deism, Occam’s razor is not just differentiating between two falsifiable theories, it’s distinguishing between one falsifiable theory (the universe exists) and the exact same theory with an “invisible elf” (i.e. an unfalsifiable entity) tacked onto it. Without this use of Occam’s razor, the scientific method not only fails to give singular answers, it fails catastrophically and does not give any answers at all.

The concept that time is not a universal truth is a pretty tough one for me to wrap my head around.

You’re getting closer but you’re not quite there. Time is indeed a universal truth: all events in our universe have a time relationship. Time is not, however, a logically necessary truth: a hypothetical universe without a relation between events that looks like our universe’s time would not be logically contradictory.

Adrian:

For me, a god would be some force that started everything off.

This is not a definition of “god”. You specify here a relation (presumably some sort of causal relation), but you are relating the universe to an undefined entity. You are defining this entity entirely in terms of one side of the relation: all you can say about your sort of god is that it is the sort of being that starts this particular universe, which is to say only that this universe actually exists, which is not typically a contentious assertion.

I’m now officially declaring myself a “donotcaric atheist”, a person who doesn’t believe in gods and doesn’t care if he is right or wrong. Agnosticism causes too many semantic arguments.

Another term, perhaps more euphonic, is “apatheist”, a portmanteau of “apathetic” and “atheist”.

I think the point Kieran was trying to make was that all mainstream gods have been disproven by simply tracing them back through history to their human origin. Most agnostic atheists are gnostic atheists in reference to the god of the Bible, of the Koran, etc.

In fact pretty much the only god the agnostic atheist would even consider would be that of the deist god. Given that I’ve just read up on occam’s razor, I’d say that the number of assumptions currently given by science in respect of the “creation” of the universe is around the same number needed to justify a deist god.

I don’t know why it didn’t come to my mind before, but thinking about it, how can one even think about applying a post-big bang human invented principle to something pre-big bang? That logic assumes that physics existed before the big bang, and like Luis said, Occam’s razor isn’t the ultimate decider of things.

I’m now officially declaring myself a “donotcaric atheist”, a person who doesn’t believe in gods and doesn’t care if he is right or wrong. Agnosticism causes too many semantic arguments.

Therefore, we HAVE to be agnostic about every goddamn theory. Even Dawkins aknowledges this, for chrissakes (pun intended)! Of course, that’s an Achilles heel against creationists who are eager to tell us they Know The Truth. But to claim otherwise is not to strengthen the heel, it is to blatantly lie about our knowledge limits, it is the end of rationalism.

Barefoot,

I agree with most that you say. Still, when you say:

“Occam’s razor decisively fails Deism as an explanation.”

…you fail to understand, or simply dismiss the fact that Occam’s razor is not an Ultimate Decider of Things. Occam’s razor is a simple method which scientists use in order to dismiss theories, but it doesn’t mean it is infallible. So it doesn’t prove anything but the fact that it is a more complex answer than other answers.

Perhaps my definition of “god” is inaccurate and far too personalised. For me, a god would be some force that started everything off. For others, it is an intelligent being sat in the clouds. My view of god is far more naturalistic than others since I do not think any form of spiritualism is correct.

By that account, I’m probably a gnostic atheist after all, seeing as the gods I don’t believe in have all been disproven over the ages. Strange how it only takes a few people to change one’s mind :)