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26 thoughts on “Belief in Belief in God – Daniel Dennett
  1. Well said.

    The way I understand it, this is true for everyone. Everyone puts their trust (belief) in SOMETHING. Its a biological, psychological need – to have that anchor in the ever changing and chaotic world/cosmos.

    That is, we do not differ in the fact that we have an anchor, but in where we have it, whether we know we have it, and whether we are able to move that anchor, when discovered its in a place, we do not want it to be.

  2. I agree wholeheartedly with Dennett. People don't rationalize on belief in God, ithey have an emotional need to believe that sees them clinging to their faith.The need to believe in God is as much a sociological condition as it is religious.

  3. @Godloveyouallthetime:

    How do you know it's a one in a trillion chance? You completely pulled that number out of your ass. And even if it was that much of a chance, it's not that bad considering there's estimated to be over a sextillion planets.

    And those things aren't unexplained by science haha, you merely haven't taken the time to learn about it. And your the one speculating from a distance pretending like you know all. Don't be a hypocrite.

  4. @1qaz6yhn5tgb : Whenever I hear Daniel Dennett speak I am reminded of the statement "Thinking themselves wise they became fools". Some day he will stand before God and have to give account for his words. Maranatha!

  5. I think belief in belief in god is just cultural entrenchment of religion, but there really can be no argument against god or any other arbitrary postulate because they are outside the realm of prove; a zero leaves no evidence, this is why there may be no god, for such a statement denoting probability to be true there has got to be a tiny bit of evidence, but if there is evidence for it then it is no longer within the definition of god. the concept of god is selfrefuting!

  6. I believe he is very flawed in his thinking merely because of his whole point. Sure, you may say that people are not really believing in God, but merely the belief in God, but that is a very lose point. You can say that for any topic really. Do people believe in the wind, no merely the belief in the wind. I think the real problem here is Atheist haven;t a real challenge in quite sometime, not because there isn't one, but because Theists have become lazy and anti- intellectuals.

  7. @eevil123 If faith makes you have no leg to stand on then no one has a leg to stand on. All beliefs involve faith, because nothing can be proven without doubt. When you sit in a chair do you not show faith in that chair that it will hold you up? You don't know if it is weak or broken or will break, but you sit in it believing it will. Having faith in it. A theist's argument is no lessor then an Atheist's argument and believing other wise is an uneducated conclusion that demands evaluation.

  8. @eevil123 I have found that your statement should be reversed. Majority of the Atheist arguments require more faith then the Theist arguments. Everything requires faith to an extent of course, else Skepticism would not exist. I can't even say you exist without a level of faith since I cannot absolutely prove your existence. By the way, I am not a Skeptic, merely an example. I believe on the grounds of knowledge, the Atheists and Theists stand on the same ground. Both have flaws as well.

  9. @eevil123 Also to add to it, belief without doubt does not exist and so under your statement, knowledge does not exist. Some beliefs maybe more believable then others, but not undoubted. What needs to be realized here is that the Atheists do have good and sound arguments as do the Theists. The only problem is about 80 percent of Philosophers out there are Atheist. Why? A good majority of Theists are Christians and they had the assumption that Philosophy is bad. Which is not Biblical.

  10. @eevil123 Oh my that would take too long to answer so I will pick one argument. The universe and how it came to be. We can date it back to a big bang. Before then no one can say without faith what was going on because whatever you say happened to cause the big bang or in the time before then cannot be proven nor tested. Theists believe God is the cause, Atheists believe a multiple of things, but one I heard recently is gravity caused it. Ether way, you must pick a side and have faith its right.

  11. Speak for yourself and not "people" in general. unless you have interviewed everyone, you cannot speak for them. It's a coy way of avoidinjg to personalize your thought…say "I", not "people". You are not my spokesman.

  12. @silverstream314

    The amount of education it requires to do science is such, that most of the people doing science, come from at least a middleclass background.

    Also, the really big science, is done by laboratories funded by big old corporations and social institutions.

    So, in a sense, yes, science is has a perspective biased by wealth.

    I mean, there are very few laboratories staffed by indigenous peoples. Ooh, that may also constitute a racial bias!

  13. @Jcolinsol Well, I agree in a sense regarding the amount of money needed to sustain large research facilities. It is a lot of money, no doubt. The scientists working there however; not so much…

    Also most of these facilities are funded by governments without any 'hidden agenda' that they push. All scientists I know (nuclear physicists) are in it for the love of their subject. I am certain that this is true of all other fields of science as well.

  14. @Jcolinsol Regarding the amount of education, this is certainly true in some countries, depending on the cost of education. In others, where the education is cheap/free of charge, there is no such limiting factor.

    Still you are more likely to enter a scientific field with educated parents than without, regardless of what the education costs, so your point is true in a sense.

  15. @flyingturtle22

    Science is a product of scientists, and will necessarily reflect the perspective of scientists, including considerations of race, class, etcetera. I think that you may well be confusing science with noumenon.

  16. @Jcolinsol scientists are a product of science. science does not belong to anyone or anything. scientists own sociological bias might show in case to case, but the idea that scientists are defensive about the result of their science is shear idiocy, a minimal amount of reflection from your part should suffice to illustrate this.
    science is the only pursuit that seeks to prove itself wrong, as such the science we function on comes from all continents and is beyond race, class, and religion.

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