[extropy-chat] Atheists launch inquisition...

[Samantha Atkins]

Mike Lorrey wrote:

>--- Samantha Atkins <sjatkins at mac.com> wrote:
>
>  
>
>>How so?  The Simulation Argument says such may be possible.  But "may
>>be or is possible" is not a sufficient ground for believing "it is
>>so". 
>>    
>>
>
>On the contrary, the SA says that the odds of us living in a simulation
>universe are very much greater than that we live in a non-simulation
>universe. A non-simulation universe would be one without a
>creator-god-metasysop-uberhacker. Ergo, an atheist believes what he/she
>believes in spite of odds to the contrary, thus believes in the
>practically impossible.
>  
>

You left out previous posts in this series.  That the odds are good 
(though not as high as originally thought) that we are in a sim, that is 
not the same as certainty.   Also as previously pointed out by myself 
and others even that we probably are in a sim doesn't mean the 
creator[s] of the sim are in any way like the normal Christian (or any 
other) notion of God.   So again, your argument does not hold.

>Secondly, that the atheist believes in an impossible proof (a proof
>that claims that no god exists, when it is impossible to prove a
>negative), demonstrates that atheists have an unfounded faith in two
>degrees of impossibility.
>  
>

The atheist does not believe in such a proof.  The atheist simply 
believes that the best thinking she can do on the subject leans most 
strongly to there being no God.   That is all.    Even if the Sim 
Argument led to the likelihood of a creator that cares about the 
creation sufficiently this is still a far cry from a God much less one 
of say, Chrisitian configuration.   You can't just wave the Simulation 
Argument and some bogus logical trap that no real atheists are caught by 
and thereby fairly accuse atheists of being people of faith.   What in 
heck is the point of your even attempting such an exercise anyway?

- s