You cite the drake equation, I’ll cite the fermi paradox.

We have ONE example of life on a planet in the entire universe. Which means we have absolutely no way of determining how probable or likely life is, beyond one occurrence in a universe over 13 billion years.

We can hope we are not alone, but there is no rational basis to believe that we are not alone.

The deist example is simply to show that faith in a creator doesn’t actually take much faith. Faith in Yahweh is much harder to sustain.

If you as an atheist have faith in things, then your atheism will influence what you choose ot have faith in…. and those things are where the ‘colour’ comes in.

My understanding of the philosophy behind ethics is that facts and values are very different. I’m a relativist, so I don’t think value is based on anything more than context and circumstance. I don’t believe that because its fun… I think its simply a condition of humanity.

So, if you start removing some of the constraints of the equation, like that the aliens are intelligent (or even sentient or conscious) and that they are living at the same “time” as us (whatever time means when you would have to travel for millions of years just to visit these theoretical planets), I think it’s rather illogical to suggest we are alone in the universe.

Now, if you are speaking of atheists who believe we’re being visited on a regular basis and the government has been covering it up since Roswell… Ok, yeah – illogical.

So, I guess I have to retract what I said and just speak from a subjective personal account. My atheism, which is a product of my ability to reason and use logic, cannot be said to colour my reality. On that much, I hope you will agree.

Yes, I will make the claim that it takes more faith to believe than to not believe. We were talking about the religious the entire time. Your post is about religion in politics. Why did you bring deists into this? Just to prove a point? haha, come on. Like you (or someone) said in your post on Dawkins – even he admits he can’t be 100% sure. So, I guess if we suggest that faith cannot be quantified, then belief that we were created by the supernatural (who then stood back and never interfered again) takes relatively the same amount of faith as to say “no, i don’t believe that”. Yeah, I’ll agree with that.

However, I was explicitly talking about a guy who was christian. Do garden noms come alive at night? Person A believes yes, Person B believes no (because there is no evidence to suggest they do). Do both people require faith in their answer? Do they require the same amount of faith? No. I hope you’ll agree. It seems you do based on what you wrote above.

Also, I apologize if I led you to believe I have no faith in anything. That’s simply not true. Everyone requires some measure of faith. There’s no evidence to suggest we will ever have scientific laws about biology, neuroscience, the brain, and how they all impact human morality. So, I therefore must have faith in the progress of human kind to find these things – for I feel they would be incredibly beneficial. I have faith that the scientific method will be applied and that we will eventually discover whatever nature will allow us to discover. If you feel that detracts from my argument, well… I have no problem with that because I think differently.

Even you said: ethics is still not a science… That sounds like you have the inkling this may not always be the case. When humans start to learn a bit more about ethics (possibly through neurology), it may turn our to have laws and actually fall under your definition of science . If that were to happen, would you not then say it was a science all along, just majorly undeveloped? I realize this is philosophical and proves nothing about whether it is or isn’t; I just want to show you our views are not so different.

the point is that the method for deciding those opinions is based on a foundation of reason, logic, facts, and any experimental results

Sorry, but that is simply not true. I have met hundreds of atheists at dozens of meetups and a few conferences. People are atheists for all sorts of reasons. Some because the church treated them badly, some because they are anarchists or hedonists, some for philosophical reasons, some for scientific reasons.

I know people who are atheists who believe in aliens, who believe in the coming singularity rapture, who believe Ayn Rand is the prophet of our time, and some who think science is a male construct. Being godless, says quite little about a person.

it takes just as much faith to NOT believe in god as it does to believe.

Well, you can make the claim that believing in ‘something’ requires more effort than not, but if a person is a deist, the difference is actually very small. The real problem for religious people is not that they have faith in a creator, but rather that they have faith in a very specific kind of creator… whose attributes and actions are often in conflict with logic and observed reality.

As for ethics. I’d say it is in fact a science – just a highly (highly!) undeveloped branch.

So you hope it’s science someday… now that actually sounds like faith.

“So, all Peter and I are saying is that the other side (my side) of this argument is not “coloured” by logic and reason.

So, what Peter is saying is that we cannot consider his views “coloured by logic and reason”; it wouldn’t make sense. At least, not in the same way a religious person’s views could be skewed from reality if they ignored data in the face of religious doctrine.

We’re seeing this right now with the Catholic Church vs Mandatory Birth Control debate in the US.

My two favourite counter-arguments to this debate that I’ve heard so far are:

1. The church has a problem with basic health care providing contraception to women, but makes no argument for providing viagra to men; even unmarried men who are obviously engaging in pre-marital relations. Why is there no uproar about that?

2. The church has no problem paying money to people who would be receiving the birth control. Obviously, if they deny them the health care, they will buy contraception with the money they earn from working for the church. Is the church not then enabling them?

Granted, the second argument is slightly weaker than the first… but I still enjoy it.

Anyway, a religious person would be likely to see a difference between viagra and contraception because their view is jaded by this false belief that god condemns contraception. They’re skewed view is putting the rights of the church above the rights of humans. So, we Peter and I are saying is that the other side of this argument is “coloured” by logic and reason. It isn’t skewed by reality. It IS reality! The rights of humans should supersede the rights of the church. This shouldn’t be up for debate. There are much bigger things to be debating and it’s a shame that there are still people (en mass) who can be so delusional about their world view and priorities.

I had a discussion on FB the other day with a guy who said it takes just as much faith to NOT believe in god as it does to believe. This is wrong. It doesn’t take faith to NOT believe in something. And reality shouldn’t be considered a belief system that colours one’s opinions.

As for ethics. I’d say it is in fact a science – just a highly (highly!) undeveloped branch. So for that, I’m hopeful to see progress.

But, regardless, I have yet to see this ‘atheistic’ worldview you are talking about. In my experience, if you have two atheists in a room, when it comes to questions of value, you usually get 3 or more opinions. Ethics is still not a science.

It would truly make no difference what belief system a candidate had if the majority realized morals aren’t – or at least shouldn’t – be derived from the church.

Well, if everyone was a humanist, this would be true… but you’re talking about the elimination of religious belief, not a simple modification. Muslims believe the Koran is the final word, Catholics believe the Pope is, and protestants believe the bible is. You can’t really be part of those religions and not believe that. The whole point of freedom of religion is that ‘even if’ you believe this, you allows others to believe as they would.

You want to be religious? Go ahead. Just give up on your ideas of a theocracy. Your faith doesn’t equal
policy.

Joe, I believe the “And no, I won’t apologize for that.”, was intended as a joke. Romney released a book last year entitled “No Apology: The Case for American Greatness”, and that line appears several times throughout – though Romney never apologizes for Mormanism’s history of deception; which is what makes Peter’s joke so witty.

Also,

Their faith colours their whole world view and it should be open season for commentators and the electorate.

The quoted portion uses the word “faith” but you (Peter) called it “belief system” in the preceding line. I think that’s a better word for it (though, I understand why you didn’t use it twice). For the candidates, faith is a good descriptor because they happen to all be religious – but belief system is a better one for people in general; or at least a population that includes those who do not believe.

I tend to agree with Joe about the religious test. Article 6 is pretty clear about it. I also agree that a person’s lack of faith colours their decisions. I think that my freedom from religion is what clears the path for how I come to my own moral decisions.

What wasn’t stated by Joe (not that it was necessary) is that the basis of argument used by the majority of Americans – and Canadians too – who would not ever vote for an atheist is flawed. It’s just good marketing by the church that they’ve indoctrinated the majority to believe the church holds the absolute moral compass. That is the true ideology that has to change.

It would truly make no difference what belief system a candidate had if the majority realized morals aren’t – or at least shouldn’t – be derived from the church.