Why atheism is SUPERSTITION according to David Bentley Hart

A summary of Bentley Hart's criticism of atheistic naturalism, as he expressed it in his book 'The Experience of God.'

[@ВячеславВячеславыч-с7с]

"Is there something outside nature" what even kind of question is that? its basically: is there stuff that have no properties of existing but exists", like "this thing exists but not in an existing way, instead of it it exists in non-existing way"

[@sigurdholbarki8268]

Right. The main pillar of atheism from the enlightenment onwards, right through the 19th century, was that the universe as we know it (time, space and matter) had always existed. This contradicted the Judeo-Christian claim that the universe had a beginning. That is why when the Big Bang Theory was put forward it was mocked by atheists of the early 20th century (even the name was coined by detractors). The Judeo-Christian perspective is that God is uncreated and eternal (no beginning, no end) and that he created time, space and matter, not that matter existed before matter was created. Does that explain it better? I'm just trying to make sure you know what the traditional Christian claim is because many atheists are either using a strawman fallacy or genuinely don't know what the Christian position is

[@jamesc3505]

I think it's kind of a bait and switch. "Something outside nature" sounds kind of vague, like maybe there's something we don't know about. That could sound kind of plausible. Then it goes from "something outside nature" to "the supernatural", which kind of sounds like a synonym. Except that monotheists have a pretty specific idea of what "the supernatural" is. Essentially, it's their god. So it goes from "maybe there's something outside nature" to "maybe there's something outside the set of things that aren't my god". That's a very specific claim. Like "maybe there's something outside the set of things that aren't Russell's teapot". Maybe, but probably not.

[@oldensad5541]

Ok... i usually avoid this type of content, but youtube deside (for some reason) to show me this, so i watched it and desided to respond. 1. Atheism is not a belief nor naturalism or anything else aside atheism. Non-theism is literraly what is it. Atheists themselves can hold any beliefs, unless they do believe in god. They can deny any supernatural, some supernatural, or even believe in every single supernatural... thing, aside god. So, you can't argue against naturalism and declair you do some form of gotcha to atheism or atheists. 2. 1:06 here we have a proposition to understand how god definded in great riligious traditions and conclude - atheism is irrational. From point of view of believer? Maybe. If i belived in diety i'd probably was confused why some other people can't see things my way. From point of view of an atheist? No. Why for any non-believer, any religious standings should bare any weight? If i do not belive in god, i do not belive in his word, therefore in his book, therefore any of his claims is pointless to me coz i do not belive he exist and can made them. 3. Naturalism (reminder - is not atheism by default) is not a belif system :) It's a phylosophical idea. Most of the people use it like a lense to analise the world. And most importantly, it can be discarded immediately if it's found to be usless. Or can be combined with any other lense of phylosophical ideas. Unlike religion, coz if you do something like this with your religion, you kinda... bad in the eyes of god of this religion? Am i wrong? And as far as i know, naturalism never condemned anyone who desided to use any other phylosophical idea. Or maybe naturalism is too wrathfull and destroys such traitors on spot so they can't tell their stories. Allways a possibility :) So - with factual errors like this in the FOUNDATION of this critique, you can't go well. Coz you can't decide who you criticizing, for what exactly, and can't accuratly describe ideas you think people you critisizing hold. P.S. English is not my first language, so i hope, it wasn't to much pain to read my comment :D

[@darposdesign4479]

Not all non-theists are atheists. But DBH was targetting the New Atheists which are anti-theists and naturalists

[@oldensad5541]

@Salazar-79 no, I'm absolutely correct in my definition of atheism. I'm not arguing with assertion most atheists are naturalists, but there is absolutely nothing requires atheists to be naturalists. More on that - I personally know several people who spiritual and strongly opposed to the idea of personal god, and one dude who believe in souls and ghost, but agnostic towards idea of creator. And you can look for this combination online, especially considering some new age stuff and weird cults, like Scientology. Lots of them believe in immortal souls, supernatural things like magic, but rejected the idea of any god/ believe God is just an evolutionary stage of humanity. I can be wrong, but Mormons believe we can achieve godhood.

[@oldensad5541]

@Salazar-79 I dunno. Everyone have their own logic throughline. Someone like me, definitely falls under your umbrella description, and I can understand it perfectly fine. But some people are pretty sure supernatural exists, just for some reason can't fit any God in this scenario. And despite my disagreement with their beliefs, I can easily understand them, and follow their explanation. I don't think we have some universal criteria for marking some positions exclusively "consistent" and other exclusively "inconsistent". Usually it's mix of everything. Little bit of logic, rationality intuition, hope and beliefs. Someone for example can believe, as you mentioned, in existence of souls and ghosts, but baffled by famous "problem of evil". This person can become naturalist, and discard any possibility of supernatural, or this person can hold to their beliefs, but came to conclusion any type of Personal God is impossible under our conditions. Both of this conclusion a pretty consistent, and I can't see how second one is necessary flawed in any particular way.

[@joakimrantanen3401]

​@@oldensad5541 I appreciate the civil way of discussion in this comment thread, so I want to drop my thoughts and hope that they clarify the issues. 1. David Bentley Hart's critique is not against all atheists, but specifically "The New Atheists" like Daniel Dennet and Richard Dawkins. These hold a specifically materialistic world-view. The book title "Atheist Delusions" was given by the publisher, and not really approved by DBH. 2. In like manner, DBH specifically does not argue for theism as believed by most (esp. evangelical) Christians. He does not advocate for a belief in an almighty being, but rather a classical divine simplicity that regards God as Being itsel:, the Good, the True and the Beautiful. 3. It is very true that most people (whether atheist or christians) are not in reality concerned with being logically coherent (but few are ready to admit this in youtube comments) but choose their worldview based on intuition, prejudices, upbringing and the values of both society and closer kinship like family and friends. But David Bentley Hart is a very prestigious academic, and his books are mostly aimed for academics and intellectuals (take into concideration that this is a 7min simplification). Try reading his books, and you will quite soon realize that he really likes his fancy vocabulary and is familiar with an enormous amount of litterature in several fields (admittedly, sometimes his prose comes of as supercilious, but that is largely due to a certain taste of humor influenced by H. L. Mencken) Also, DBH is very much not a regular Christian apologetic. His views are not based on the Bible, but mostly on philosophy. His views are not approved generally by Catholics (of whom several think he is a heretic) and even Eastern Orthodox christians have divided opinions of him and his views. Most evangelica christians like his arguments for God but disdain his views of doctrie and inspiration. My point is, DBH is not easily pidgeon-holed to a certain position on any debate.

[@oldensad5541]

@@joakimrantanen3401 well, I have a little involvement in any religiously oriented discourse. So, I lack a deep knowledge of famous figures, and can't say anything about their character or performance and efficiency. So, I can't say anything specific about a majority of your comment. But first point I can address. I don't believe some "new atheists" exist. And they are distinct form some "old atheists" it's more like, with relative safety of internet people was able to express themselves with much more vocal power than before. Dawkins (and other public figures) maybe was inspiring for many, maybe many take some notes and arguments from him at the beginning, but contrary to the topic of this video, atheists are not "reverse religion" and doesn't work the same way. So, we don't have any analog of "spiritual leader" and Dawkins (or any other influential figure in a discourse) can't be representative of "atheists". Anyway, my main issue with this video and this topic in general is - theists very often try to redefine atheism and agnosticism the way it will lead to the conclusion - you think exactly like us, but you believe in different things. Instead of accepting the reality of atheism being absolutely different at its core. Religious and non religious people think absolutely different. Annalise world differently. Have different moral paradigms very often. But time and time again I stumble on someone who will claim straight In my face - you need more faith to be an atheist, or you believe in scientism, or your worldview is irrational etc. It's ridiculous, it's like me telling believers "oh, your lack of faith bring you to your religion". It's nonsensical. And the first step to accomplish this twist - is redefined the word "atheist" or (like in this video) generalize atheists under some umbrella, like naturalism. After that any generalize arguments can be made to pretend atheists are actually all... something-something. Depends on a topic. I strongly believe in accurate communication. If you want to talk about naturalism - call your opposition naturalists. If you talking about new atheists call them new atheists. If you talking about Dawkins - talk about Dawkins. Btw I realize pretty clearly, A LOT of atheists do the same, and lump all believers in some weird Frankensteinish amalgamation, and it's also annoying.

[@hassansci2436]

No... You are deferring to the next instance. Instead of accepting that the universe may be "self sustaining", you instead argue that a supernatural being has to sustain it while failing to see that it itself would have to be sustained by something else. If it were sustained by our natural realm then the whole "natural world - supernatural being" system again would be "self-sustaining" or whatever you guys want to call that. Therefore a non "self-sustaining" system isn't possible without an infinite chain of more super natural beings supporting the less supernatural being all the way down to the natural. He failed to take his argument through to the end. Religious people always conviniently stop whenever you can make a somewhat convincing analogy. Let's humor the analogy used in the video however to deomstrate how flawed it is: when in a box feeling gravity pulling you towards one end you would indeed only be able to tell that you are being pulled to one end. It may very well be that the box is on the floor on earth. It could also be accelerating upward at 9.8m/s^2. Some guy named Einstein figured that out. Now let's say you indeed are on earth on the floor. What sustains the floor? The floor itself. The atoms push each other way so the planet doesn't collapse and the mass attracts the mass together so it doesn't float about.

[@baumholderh8425]

I am pretty sure the box analogy was just meant to be a commentary similar to Plato’s cave. That being we only know what we have experienced, so even if we are told the truth it’s beyond our experience. To that fact, any truth we learn beyond our experience or understand is a belief. It’s really not that crazy of a concept. It happens all the time in a much smaller scale in the material world. Humans experience what looks like a flat world and when people tried to tell the truth most people rejected it. That being said, I’ve never done a scientific test to prove the sphere nature of the world, I just have reasonable faith in what others have told me. It’s not really a proof to god, as others pointed out, it’s more a proof to agnosticism.

[@reuvenpolonskiy2544]

What would be the evidance that our universe is self creating and self sustaining? And why would a supernatural being have to be sustained by anything?

[@sigurdholbarki8268]

No, you're refusing to refute Thomas Acquinas' first cause or unmoved mover.

[@donaldclifford5763]

@@baumholderh8425 Does the Sun rise and set? Every meteorologic report gives the daily sunrise and sunset. Does that mean the Earth is geocentric?

[@jeffm.5071]

yeah, where is the energy coming from to accelerate the box upwards at 9.8 m/s^2? also as @sigurdholdbarki8268 intimated, the fundamental reality is god itself, the unmoved mover, the causeless cause or non-contingent reality that all contingent realities find their basis.

[@niel-w1g]

How did he come to know that most atheist claim that there can be nothing but material in the way he is using it. saying we have no way of knowing if there more that material, is not the same as we know it's all there is. So this all rest on a strawman. There is more that one type of materialism and charry picking one the way his is, feel like a lie.

[@sigurdholbarki8268]

You could argue the latter point against most atheists because they rarely represent actual Christian beliefs when they are arguing against them. Understanding the basis for atheists think isn't hard either. You just have to read all the atheist apologists from Classical Greece to early modern Europe (people like Rousseau, Voltaire, Marx, Hegel, Darwin etc). Having read all those and more (whilst I was an agnostic and later atheist) it is a pretty accurate reading of their world view, so unless you got your atheism from some revelation completely independent to all the prominent atheists in history it's probably the basis of yours. Most atheists are using hand-me-down arguments for which they seldom know the source (or think they came to themselves)

[@niel-w1g]

@@sigurdholbarki8268 I did not bring up Christian beliefs at all. I was 7 or 8 when some lady in primary told the story of the ark and it just pop in to my head the sounds made up. I try more than one to find faith, fasting, praying , reading the bible for days, but I can't. So it was not people like Rousseau, Voltaire, Marx, Hegel, Darwin that got me, it was having nothing to hold on to that did it. Let just say Most atheists are using hand-me-down arguments or don't know the source - so what? Is this how you find truth?

[@captainkelley2339]

@@sigurdholbarki8268 Atheism isn't a worldview, it is the non belief in a specific claim. If you really were an atheist then you would know that.

[@Gazzkirk]

The Box analogy is a theist understanding of knowledge. In naturalism there is no box. There is no hard line where our knowledge ends. It's a fuzzy boundary that keeps growing. If you want to use the box analogy. The box has been getting steadily bigger every year... the more we study the world around us, the bigger the box gets. In the box analogy there are thousands of things inside that box that theists said we caused by God. Thunder and lightening the movement the sun and moon and stars were all things that used to be outside the box and assumed to be god we now know what causes them. And thus our box has gotten bigger. Theists have largely given up on using the material world as proof of God and now claim the immaterial world and claim that if we don't believe in the immaterial we are superstitious.

[@Mcphan9946]

The box is the naturalist assumption that all that exists is the material realm it doesn't matter how big the box gets the box is that you presupose the material realm is all that is

[@lysanderofsparta3708]

But the box cannot account for its own existence. Funny how you missed the point entirely. Immaterial things, such as consciousness and the laws of logic and mathematics, manifestly do exist. On that basis alone, materialism is demonstrably wrong.

[@wesbaumguardner8829]

In philosophy, the negative hypothesis is assumed true until there is sufficient viable evidence to support the affirmative position. The box example claims it is more rational to assume the affirmative position and that the negative position must be supported with sufficient viable evidence before it is accepted. This is just poor methodology, which relies on a carefully crafted example where most people will presuppose the "thing" outside the box exists based off of intuition from their life experience. However, this conclusion does not follow because the entire scenario is purely hypothetical and the box could be floating in outer space, suspended from a crane by a cable, floating in the sea or in an infinite number of other possibilities. There is no way for the people in the box to make the determination of what is outside the box, so the most honest answer they could provide is to simply acknowledge that they do not know what is outside the box and to make no positive claims as to what is outside the box as positive claims are claims to knowledge.

[@protonman8947]

Correct!

[@zbigniewsuszkiewicz5630]

Precisely

[@An_Urban_monk]

You are misrepresenting the argument I think. The negative hypothesis is assumed and found to be lacking in that it presupposes a closed system that is sufficient to explain everything but as demonstrated it can’t explain its own existence using only naturalism. Nor does it attempt to posit anything even remotely possible. As such it is a superstitious belief since it offers no credulous hypothesis. In philosophy there is also the notion of necessary and sufficient conditions and naturalism/atheism lacks the rationalization for the necessary conditions for it to be possible to exist as self-existent.

[@wesbaumguardner8829]

@@An_Urban_monk I am not misrepresenting the argument. In philosophy, ANY positive claim, that is a claim that posits something exists or some phenomena occurs is always assumed to not be correct until sufficient viable evidence is provided to support the claim. It matters not how mundane, extraordinary, simple, complex, possible or improbable the claim is, the same rule always applies. You want special consideration for your god claim, but that is not how philosophy works. A positive claim is a claim to positive knowledge. A person whom makes a claim to positive knowledge whom does not actually have that positive knowledge is a liar. A person whom thinks he has knowledge of a positive claim but does not due to some misunderstanding or misperception is in error. Now as for your claims about atheism, they are just incorrect and misguided. Denying that a god exists, especially a logically impossible, inherently self-contradictory god such as Yahweh, does not require one to hold any other belief at all about whether the universe is an open or closed system or how the universe arrived at its present state. There are practically infinite possibilities that could explain how the universe works, but you want to limit it to just 2 or 3 so you can put it in a box and label it. To date, theists of all religions have yet to provide sufficient viable evidence that a god exists, much less the particular one in which they happen to believe. Pointing to a religious text is not evidence for the mass of claims made within the text, either. The religious text you believe in can be dismissed as readily as you dismiss the claims made in the religious texts which you reject, and for many of the same reasons.

[@wesbaumguardner8829]

@@An_Urban_monk Your argument for necessary and sufficient conditions is a non-sequitur. We exist. Because we exist, the conditions required for us to exist must already be in place. If those conditions were not in place, we would not exist and this conversation could not happen. It is not necessary to posit a false claim to knowledge to prove that we exist and the conditions required for us to exist are in place, as this knowlegde is self-evident. Neither is it necessary to know everything about everything to know that we exist.

[@WestCoastProf]

Common and tired arguments, "Athiests can not prove that the supernatural does not exist, therefore..."

[@regele2020kk]

this video is oversimplified , thats why u think so , these isnt the way DBH would present such arguments , go look at a video in which he talks with his own words

[@auntietheistjuror]

The first argument is irrelevant, it’s just a subtle reworking of ‘shifting the burden of proof’. Not believing in magic should not necessitate a burden of proof. The second argument (which doesn't belong to Bentley Hart), is also irrelevant, as the theist is also bound by the limitations of their consciousness to relay information about the universe, regardless of what they believe. The third argument is problematic as having no answer (honest people), is preferable to having a non-answer with no explanatory power (theists). Beyond that, it has multiple issues regarding causation and time.

[@VisualCatholic]

Ok, thanks for stopping by!

[@velkyn1]

@@VisualCatholic aka the catholic has has nothing to rebut these points.

[@thehighlander6770]

Your first point is countered by the fact that there's lots of evidence for God, such as philosophical arguments. I think that you misunderstand the second argument. The theist's position is that consciousness is a reliable, honest source of information. As stated above, there is evidence for God's existence. Also, don't leave us hanging: what are its issues concerning causation and time?

[@auntietheistjuror]

@@thehighlander6770 Arguments aren’t evidence, they’re arguments! And I think you probably realise I’m quite familiar with most of them. Good evidence however, that would be interesting. “The theist's position is that consciousness is a reliable, honest source of information” That is demonstrably incorrect. As a flippant example nearly 40% of Americans believe in ghosts. At best, our mind provides a ‘useful illusion’ of the universe in which it lives. We trust it due to it’s continued reliability not de facto reliability. It is this continued reliability and ability to corroborate that we use to apportion trust to all ‘minds’. The entry point for the issues with time, is that everything we know suggests that time is a property of our universe. We currently (and possibly ever) can’t investigate the very early universe as our known rules of physics break down. Therefore we don’t know that time is even a coherent concept in that epoch. And that’s just the beginning of it, however, none of it precludes a God. If a God can ‘puff’ any chosen universe into existence last Thursday, then it’s impossible to disprove that, but our inability to disprove it is not evidence that it happened.

[@velkyn1]

@@thehighlander6770 Unsurprisingly, H, you can't show a single bit of this supposed evidence. And those philosophical arguments never get to your particular god. I don't misunderstand the second argument at all. You claim that conciousness comes from your god. No evidence for this at all. Tell me how you would know to start something if there was no time, no idea of "when".

[@Chaturanger]

If there were undeniable and sufficient proof of the existence of God, the scientific world would be in turmoil. All the major scientific journals, all the university faculties would fight to receive the genius behind the demonstration. All the talk-shows, the television news around the world, all the magazines on the planet would offer millions to the lucky person to have exclusive access to the story of his discovery. But nothing happens.

[@JohnCamacho]

Another annoying thing about this video is that it points out the four books by the New Atheists, which are not meant to be philosophical works but to popularize atheism. They also were catalysed by 9/11. It is also interesting to note that Dennett's book - Breaking the Spell - is about religion, not atheism. Atheism is a well defended philosophical position. I urge the author of this video to go read the works of Graham Oppy, Alex Malpass, JH Sobel, Chalmers, etc

[@pedroamaralcouto]

I understand naturalism might be perceived as irrational. But superstition is a kind of irrationality that requires the belief in something that doesn't exist. And, as far as I know, naturalism doesn't imply believing in something you don't believe to exist.

[@DanielRodriguez-zj5il]

I became an atheist because I wanted to seek and prioritize truth among all else. I don't hold the position that nothing supernatural exists, as that would require extensive knowledge. However, I withold my belief in the supernatural until it can be sufficiently demonstrated. It's an effort to believe as many true things as possible and as few false things as possible.

[@sigurdholbarki8268]

Supernatural is just something that can't be measured or described with the material/natural sciences (i.e. biology, chemistry & physics) One of the things I would call supernatural would be trans-personal intelligence, what people are observing when they talk of the madness of crowds, the zeitgeist or team spirit. Then you could talk of consciousness, which people who know a little often scoff at, but people with more expertise are more careful about. It seems to me that people have a very materialistic understanding of "supernatural" (even a lot of Christians), a very literal understanding that people in antiquity and the medieval period would find ridiculous

[@DanielRodriguez-zj5il]

@@sigurdholbarki8268 How do you distinguish between things that CAN'T be measured/described with science, versus things that simply have not yet been measured/described by science?

[@donaldclifford5763]

@@sigurdholbarki8268 That's not supernatural. That's phenomena in search of an as of yet undiscovered explanation.

[@wesbaumguardner8829]

​@@sigurdholbarki8268Supernatural means "above nature." As such, it is something that is outside of nature. Everything we observe is natural, i.e. within nature as we are natural beings that exist within nature. We do not have the ability to observe "outside nature" nor do we have a way to know if that is even possible. Any claim that such things exist can only be conjecture as there is no way to attain evidence for something that is "outside nature." That is the problem with practically all supernatural claims. There is no reason for anyone to believe a claim that has no viable evidence to support it. Of course religious people will point to their religious texts and claim that as evidence when it is not evidence because it is just a huge collection of claims. Claims cannot be evidence for other claims.

[@drooskie9525]

@@wesbaumguardner8829 Except the classical understanding is that there is no "supernatural" as in "Above nature", whatever that is suppose to mean. That's more a cartesian dualism idea.

[@ev_solou9341]

There seems to be some confusion in the comments about the arguments being presented, in particular the first argument. The burden of proof is on those who hold the premise that nature is a self-sustaining system. Currently, we know that there are mechanistic processes in nature but nobody has proved that everything in nature (especially consciousness) is purely mechanistic, let alone that nature is a self-sustaining system. As it stands, the self-sustaining system idea is only a supposition at best. In this system, everything is a finite, mechanical cause and, as a result, there are an infinite number of finite causes causing finite causes and processes. Nobody believes in a self-creating, perpetual motion machine, and yet, this is exactly what the self-sustaining system proposes. Even some rationalists don't agree with this and want to go with the idea that our universe is a simulation created by highly intelligent beings. This is basically a 21st century deism.

[@bluebutterfly2708]

I know many people here have already explained their issues with these arguments, but I'll attempt to do the same, but also show why using simple analogies can be misleading. I used to be a Christian, so I'll also attempt to cover how people might respond to my points. 1) The gist of this first argument is that you can't prove something doesn't exist, therefor it is irrational to assume it doesn't if you have no evidence for it. People have already pointed out that this is shifting the burden of proof onto nonexistence, but I'll try a different tact - if you believe in something purely because you can't disprove it, then the same is true for everything. If you don't want to have a double standard, it is in your duty to believe in EVERYTHING you can't disprove, whether it be in all other religions, aliens, flying hippos or a god that creates gods. It is for this reason that not having evidence for something is enough to disregard it. Now, my problem with this analogy - this only sounds sensible because rooms are something we see every day, and are by definition something that has something externally. Let's say one of people in the room declared that there is an invisible table in the room. When the other searches around and finds nothing, he says there isn't a table. He then continues to berate and belittle the other, proving that anyone who doesn't believe in the table is an awful person - the analogy you used has a hidden message about how atheists behave, and I can't help but see it as bad faith. 2) 'Why would we trust our mind's reasoning that naturalism is true?' I would like to remind you that a mind also reasoned that naturalism isn't true - this is a non-argument because it can apply to almost anything. You can literally make it a blank space, 'Why would we trust our mind's reasoning that _____'. If you're instead arguing that our own senses can't be trusted, then we are left with nothing to trust, except the existence of our own mind ('I think, therefor I am'). 3) This is a particularly funny argument whenever I hear it - it relies on the idea that the universe should have been caused by something, and the idea of something that just exists doesn't make sense. If you haven't figured it out already, this is also a problem theism - if a god caused the universe, what caused the god? And what caused that? And that again? The reason I find this so funny is that many theists will readily believe their gods are allowed to just exist without known cause, but the universe itself isn't allowed to because...? Anyways, there goes my long reply to a month old video that appeared in my recommended for some reason. If you want what I actually believe, I believe in the supernatural as much as I believe in Darth Vader, but I also believe in the nonexistence of the supernatural as much as the nonexistence of Darth Vader.

[@newglof9558]

1. The first argument is not a "shifting of the burden of proof", and atheists do in fact, make claims and will move hell and highwater to avoid being caught dead with the burden of proof (what else is the "lack of belief" nonsense definition of atheism if not a perpetual shift of the burden of proof?) Too often, atheists will assume that burden of proofs apply to only a particular person or group of people, as opposed to claims. Atheists see the theist claiming "God exists" and then therefore, naturally, will say they have to substantiate it. The error is they'll extend this to all philosophical and theological debate, implying that they CAN'T have the burden of proof. They're atheist, after all. So what if the atheist says things like "God is a sky fairy", "there is only the physical world", or "morality is subjective." They're atheist, they're a PERSON without a burden of proof. A person has a burden of proof with respect to a CLAIM they make (of which, atheists do, in fact, make claims regarding the realm of theology). I also contest that atheism is a "lack of belief", as I've seen no evidence that atheism is a lack of belief. Atheism is the proposition that there is no God, and therefore requires substantiation. That naturalism can not be verified extranaturally is a criticism of naturalism, and it is sound. This does not mean there is an obligation for the atheist to believe in Zeus or flying hippos or whatever. It does imply the atheist is obligated to abandon their superstition/abandon naturalism. And atheists do behave that way. You can see several of the comments on this video corroborating that. 2. "Under naturalism, there is no reason to assume your consciousness' perceptions correlate with truth or reality at all. They align with what's evolutionarily favorable." "Oh yeah, well you're limited too, if naturalism is true!" This is a non sequitur. DBH's point that if you're a naturalist, you have no reason to assume that what you perceive with your consciousness is true, but rather, that what you perceive is evolutionarily advantageous to you. The difference between the atheist and the theist here is that the theist does not assume naturalism, and therefore has no need to be consistent with this, since they do not profess it. Again, this is not a call for the atheist to believe in flying hippos or whatever else you like, but it is a call to abandon naturalism. 3. Dude is seriously using "what caused God" excuse. Come on. I thought you were serious for a second. The video showed a rudimentary pseudo-cosmological argument (namely to criticize naturalism, yet again), but you need to contend with what theists actually say. Guess what? If the "who" in "who caused God" actually caused God, then the so-called God in this argument is contingent and not God at all. God is definitionally necessary, noncontingent, noncomposite. The universe itself is not allowed to because the universe is contingent. Ever heard of the Big Bang? Also, DBH, being a classical theist, I think is using this pseudo-cosmological argument in an essentially ordered sense (as opposed to an accidentally ordered one, which assumes temporal causation) Your so-called refutations are anything but. Thanks for playing.

[@xa4445]

the idea that God is created is like the worst objection to theism , stop living on the internet and read a book on the philosophy of religion or something

[@bluebutterfly2708]

@@xa4445 Any book recommendations?

[@brentwalker8596]

I realized that I was an atheist at a very early age and long before atheism or Dawkins/Hitchens were a thing. God is just a name for "I don't know and I'm afraid."

[@beardonder]

I'd argue that's a very Reddit atheist take on religious belief. I believe there to be a god, what form it takes I'm not so sure. For me it's because I had what some Christians I guess would call an "angelic encounter" (and no, my mental health was fine and I wasn't on medication at the time). The idea of an afterlife isn't really high up on the ladder for me, rather it's the universe and where everything comes from that makes me think of a prime mover or whatever you want to call it.

[@brentwalker8596]

@@beardonder It's rather circular. God is everything. Everything is the universe. The universe is the prime mover. A prime mover is "God". The devil is in the details, because your take on it is very close to an atheist's take. The main detail that differentiates Christianity from atheism is, at least in part, the anthropomorphizing of God and the idea the God is whispering in your ear and cares about you in a special way because you said your prayers.

[@weezy894]

The people in these comments have clearly read or listened to a single of harts talks and it shows... great work spreading these ideas.

[@LyovaCampos]

Hart is the biggest heretic of our time

[@weezy894]

@@LyovaCampos I'm assuming you're talking about his views on universalism. He's orthodox; universalism isn't a heresy. That's just a buzzword that freaks people out.

[@LyovaCampos]

@@weezy894 You haven't studied our religion correctly then - universalism AND all of Origen's allegorical blasphemies were condemned by the Church as contrary to Scripture & tradition, so educate yourself, instead of listening to an arrogant pretentious sophist who shamelessly TWISTS the words of both Scripture, St. Nyssa AND the decisions of our Ecumenical council, ok? We eastern Orthodox reject him & all the modernist innovators who try to paint our faith in their own image. Moreover, he & his ilk believe in the pagan Aristotlian god of just 1 act & will, who's like an involuntary machine dependent on his necessities, and has no emotions. They are false prophet who contract the Word of God, so you need to wake up, because he drags innocent souls with him to the everlasting fire of Sheol & FYI THIS is an objective reality which you should fear from, not his imaginary Disney movie of "all shall be saved"🙏❤

[@LyovaCampos]

@@weezy894 You haven't studied our religion correctly then - universalism AND all of Origen's allegorical blasphemies were condemned by the Church as contrary to Scripture & tradition, so educate yourself, instead of listening to an arrogant pretentious sophist who shamelessly TWISTS the words of both Scripture, St. Nyssa AND the decisions of our Ecumenical council, ok? We eastern Orthodox reject him & all the modernist innovators who try to paint our faith in their own image. Moreover, he & his ilk believe in the pagan Aristotlian god of just 1 act & will, who's like an involuntary machine dependent on his necessities, and has no emotions. They are false prophet who contradict the Word of God, so you need to wake up, because he drags innocent souls with him to the everlasting fire of Sheol & FYI THIS is an objective reality which you should fear from, not his imaginary Disney movie of "all shall be saved"🙏❤

[@LyovaCampos]

@@weezy894 @weezy894 You haven't studied our religion correctly then - universalism AND all of Origen's allegorical blasphemies were condemned by the Church as contrary to Scripture & tradition, so educate yourself, instead of listening to an arrogant pretentious sophist who shamelessly TWISTS the words of both Scripture, St. Nyssa AND the decisions of our Ecumenical council, ok? We eastern Orthodox reject him & all the modernist innovators who try to paint our faith in their own image. Moreover, he & his ilk believe in the pagan Aristotlian god of just 1 act & will, who's like an involuntary machine dependent on his necessities, and has no emotions. They are false prophet who contract the Word of God, so you need to wake up, because he drags innocent souls with him to the everlasting fire of Sheol & FYI THIS is an objective reality which you should fear from, not his imaginary Disney movie of "all shall be saved"🙏❤

[@zbigniewsuszkiewicz5630]

As an agnostic, I must admit that your (or Bentley's) arguments are very weak. First - explanation with Deity is far more complicated than just purely stating that nature can uphold itself. Furthermore, even today, there are theories that can explain existence without invoking the supernatural (e.g. Friston's Free-Energy Principle or related Michael Levin's research). Third, of course, if nature is governed by the laws of evolution, then we cannot be sure of anything. Go and read Peirce's synechism and draw conclusions. We can have at least some fallible knowledge because we evolved immersed in such a universe that has let us recognise at least some of its workings. That is why we are able to cope with it. That brings us to the last issue - your (or Bentley's ) arguments give us no clue as to which version of Deity is correct, if any

[@tripp8833]

Great video. This seems to be a more powerful argument for agnosticism. I also don't know what is meant in the last slide where you talk about existence preceding nature... I just have no way to conceptualize that.

[@alphatucana]

The idea is that to cause itself to exist, Nature would need to exist already.

[@fermingarza6357]

God, a nonmaterial omnipotent spiritual being, set off the Big Bang, thus giving existence to not only the material world but also space and time (nature). God is Existence. Therefore, because of God, we exist. God precedes nature.

[@o-...-.-...-..0473]

@@fermingarza6357 Even if we accept that existence is the first cause as it were, the thing that the natural world is contingent on, for existence itself to be God does it not need to have agency and personhood? Otherwise wouldn't it just be a principle not a being one can have a relationship with?

[@sigurdholbarki8268]

​@@o-...-.-...-..0473yes. That is the meaning of "I am that I am" from Exodus. Unlike all other creation stories, the God of Genesis is the architect of Creation itself (all others, whether Roman, Greek, Mesopotamian etc) are created beings in their own stories. The Judeo-Christian God is the very source of being, an intellect that is beyond our full comprehension. We're not describing a created being like ourselves, rather creation himself. That's not meant to persuade you, but to more accurately describe what we mean when we say God. That is why John Lennox told Richard Dawkins "I don't believe in the god you don't believe in either"

[@protonman8947]

@@fermingarza6357 A claim, and nothing more.

[@Lightbearer616]

Superstitions: Superstitions are beliefs or practices that result from ignorance, fear, or trust in magic or chance. It is impossible to be superstitious about something for which there is no proof or evidence e.g. gods. It is impossible to be ignorant about something for which there is no proof or evidence e.g. gods. It is impossible to fear something you know doesn't exist. And atheists certainly don't believe in magic.

[@xa4445]

Superstitions are beliefs or practices that result from ignorance, fear, or trust in magic or chance. => atheism

[@Lightbearer616]

@@xa4445 Seriously is all your stupidity derived from your delusion or do you have a routing of banging your head 50 times against the wall each morning? Prove me wrong: 1. Is it possible to be superstitious about something for which there is no proof or evidence? 2. Is it possible to be ignorant about something for which there is no proof or evidence? 3. Is it possible to fear something you know doesn't exist? 4. What sustainable proof or evidence can you provide that your god isn't just magic you invented? 5. Prove any of those apply to atheism other than that's what you want to believe without proof or evidence.

[@Yakkityyak248]

Don't forget that religion is make believe. And you cannot deny it.

[@linusloth4145]

Like your belief that non-reason gave rise to reason for no reason whatsoever?

[@Yakkityyak248]

@@linusloth4145 lol

[@bltwegmann8431]

Just because physicalists can't explain how nature came about doesn't mean there's a Santa Clause.

[@Joeonline26]

Good job Christians don't believe in any kind of Santa-like figure then, isn't it?

[@regele2020kk]

Just because the atheists live in a delusion doesnt mean atheism's right , its the same thing

[@PRASANTHTHOMAS-hx3nh]

Nobody claims there is Santa Claus.

[@Joeonline26]

@@PRASANTHTHOMAS-hx3nh When are atheists going to realise that Christians don't believe in the conception of God atheists think they do?

[@regele2020kk]

@@PRASANTHTHOMAS-hx3nh bahaha

[@normbale2757]

Belief in a literal Hell is the ultimate perversion.

[@fermingarza6357]

Cold is the privation of heat. Prison is the privation of freedom. Hell is based on your free will, and the result is the privation of the source of all good, which is God.

[@jasonb4321]

Neither atheists nor David Bentley Hart believe in eternal conscious torment (hell). So, why add an irrelevant comment here?

[@AllanPopa-vd9sv]

DBH does believe that hell is real. He simply thinks that at the end of all things, every single existing thing will find its true reality in God.@@jasonb4321

[@moonshoes11]

⁠@@fermingarza6357 Gods that don’t exist can’t be the source of anything.

[@Justmekpc]

@@fermingarza6357hell is a manmade construct to control the weak minded is all Spending eternity kissing some guys ass sounds like hell to me but I don’t believe in heaven either

[@steinjarl4915]

Where do you get your straw?

[@danielmark4869]

David Bentley Hart's writings don't lend themselves to being adequately explained in a short 7 minute video presentation. Oversimplification to the point of misrepresenting him is inevitable in such a format. He's the kind of writer who has to be read and then re-read several times in order to grasp everything he's saying. This video makes him seem easy to dismiss, which he isn't if you actually understand his positions. He's not a garden variety Christian apologist. He's Eastern Orthodox and believes firmly in the doctrine of Apokatastisis, so his theology is radically different from that of the mainly Protestant Evangelicals that militant atheists are used to butting heads with, and he has no real desire to convert anybody. He actually has nothing against atheists as such. He only attacked the 'New Atheists' for being lazy and limiting their attacks to obviously retarded forms of Christianity that any teenager could tear apart rather than taking the time to understand the broader and more mature Christian tradition that would actually require deep study and contemplation. However, DBH always respected Christopher Hitchins and regards him as the only one of the 'New Atheists' that actually made a strong case for atheism with the problem of evil. A debate between DBH and CH was being planned but then CH got really sick and left this world, so it unfortunately never happened. That would have been a debate worth seeing, especially since the two were very alike in the sense that they both shared a strong preference for a strategy of attack rather than of defense. Had this debate happened DBH would have been forced to make his belief in Apokatastisis public much sooner than he actually did because Apokatastisis is the only thing that makes it possible to present a plausible theodicy without compromising either God's omnipotence or omnibenevolence. Hitchins used to wipe the floor with Christian apologists who don't believe in and affirm Apokatastisis because they simply can't offer a plausible theodicy that doesn't make God either impotent or evil or both.

[@matthewlloyd3255]

Generally speaking - everything exists because of an original cause of some sort, so by extension the universe itself most likely exists because it was brought into being by something or someone. As a bit of an agnostic/deist/former Christian - my only argument is with the various specific details many religions are so confident and assured of. The idea of a first cause that was intelligent being responsible for what we see around us is not unusual at all - whether all the specifics argued by various faiths are is another matter.

[@BillDavies-ej6ye]

Generally speaking, that which is not explained by science, is that which is claimed for the 'outside of reality' creator. Religion is the inability to say'I don't know.'

[@VisualCatholic]

Agreed!

[@JohnCamacho]

This is one of the most anti intellectual videos I've seen, featuring an argument from a thoroughly indoctrinated DB Hart who is still so butthurt over the rise of atheism. I don't have time to type this all our properly but let me list some observations and problems I have: 1. Most atheists I have spoken to are willing to change their mind if you show evidence. This also goes for methodological naturalists who don't claim to know that the supernatural doesn't exist. A minority of atheists would claim to know that there is no supernatural or immaterial realm. 2. DB Hart is a philosopher and a religious studies scholar which makes his argument even more disappointing than it would be coming from a non philosopher. DB Hart is a theist version of a New Atheist. 3. Atheism is being called supernatural, yet DB Hart has nothing to show to demonstrate that an immaterial mind can operate without a physical brain. He can complain that strict naturalism has no proof of no supernatural but we have no methodology to do that. By the way does DB Hart also think that non Christian religions are superstition? 4. Believers reading this - Can you be wrong about God?

[@Justin4u4me]

I fail to see how not believing in something for which no credible evidence exists is superstitious

[@Joeonline26]

Honestly, you watched the entire video and this cringe empiricist position is still what you comment? 🤦‍♂Did you understand his conception of God at all? Clearly not if you're asking for pieces of 'credible evidence' to 'prove' that by which everything else 'is' at all. Do you have any credible evidence to 'prove' the presupposition that only things with credible evidence can demonstrably exist?

[@JoergB]

So then, why believe in a atheistic view? It has the same problem! As the video explained and everybody can think out by himself.

[@protonman8947]

@@Joeonline26 Nor do you. Explain the conception of God. We'll wait.

[@Joeonline26]

@@protonman8947 God is the absolute, transcendent principle of all reality. He is beyond all categories of being and non-being, beyond all attributes and qualities. God is not a personal deity but rather the ultimate source from which everything emanates. God is characterized by absolute simplicity and unity, meaning He is undifferentiated and contains no multiplicity within Himself. While God is absolutely transcendent, He is also immanent in the sense that He is the cause of everything. However, this immanence is not understood in a personal or interventionist sense but rather as the presence of God in the order and intelligibility of the cosmos. Compare this with the modern conception of God that atheists like you think Chrisitans believe in: in this modern conception, God is conceived as a personal deity who possesses attributes such as omnipotence, omniscience, and omnibenevolence. God is seen as a personal being who interacts with the world, responds to prayers, and has a personal relationship with human beings. he modern conception of God often involves the doctrine of creation ex nihilo (creation out of nothing). God is the omnipotent creator who brings the universe into existence by a free act of will. The modern God is also often conceived as a personal being who engages in relationships with human beings. No Christian worth their salt believes in this latter conception of God. As an atheist, you are no better than a theist because you share the same set of presuppositions about the nature of God (i.e., as the modern understanding just described above), whereas I, as a classical non-theist, think the set of presuppositions both atheists and theists hold are wrong and hold to th former conception of God shared by Plotinus, Proclus, Dionysius, Augustine, Aquinas etc.

[@zbigniewsuszkiewicz5630]

@@Joeonline26 The burden of proof is on theists

[@Uriel238]

It's an interesting argument. It's very much like the simulated universe hypothesis, that suggest that we live in a very powerful simulation run by a computer (or the Lovecraftian version of it is that we exist as figments and projections in Azathoth's dream, a great brain thing that gibbers in the center of the universe. Some day Azathoth will awaken and we and all the 4.21 x 10^32 cubic lightyears of known universe would vanish to oblivion, as if it never was. -- Lovecraft was big on existential horror) If we suppose the universe cannot exist without something supporting it, like Sauron holding up Barad-dûr, it means the next outer manifold that provides our universe ontological inertia must, itself, have no ontological inertia, and then _that_ manifold must have a higher manifold holding it up as well, repeat to infinity. Once it's finite, the whole model turns into a singularity and collapses. To assert that a prime mover exists that has its own ontological inertia, and that our universe depends on it requires some evidence. But then you might be thinking of the sun. Without the sun, our world would quickly freeze and we would quickly die out. But the sun has been profoundly consistent (though not perfectly so) and doesn't express much in the way of opinions about terrestrial life, human or amoeba or otherwise.

[@protonman8947]

There is nothing interesting about the argument. It is old and tired special pleading.

[@Uriel238]

@@protonman8947 I was going to save that for once he commits to insisting by fiat his god (or his god's manifold) is different just because. But you can skip straight to the reveal at the end if you like. *Edit:* Mobile typo

[@LateNight-zeit]

Was about to mention Azathoth. Many arguments can substitute god with this lovecraftian horror.

[@Superchicken78]

What a waste of 7 minutes. Your arguments are so dishonest. Just strawman arguments and lies to justify believing a ridiculous and horrific story book.

[@lysanderofsparta3708]

I notice that you can't be bothered to provide any counterargument. I wonder why?

[@Superchicken78]

@@lysanderofsparta3708 I don’t need any counter arguments. Atheism is a view on one thing, does god exist. I have spent years looking for evidence of god and been given none. The video talks about consciousness and says it can’t be all from natural processes. Can you give me 1 example of a mind or consciousness without a physical brain?

[@lysanderofsparta3708]

@@Superchicken78 Oh, you don't need any counterarguments? Then I guess you have nothing to say and there is really nothing to discuss. What sneering arrogance! What a cowardly cop-out! By the way, there is no evidence that consciousness is entirely reducible to the physical brain. Perhaps you have never heard of hylemorphism and out-of-body experiences. Consciousness is a mysterious phenomenon that cannot even be grasped by empirical science. That is a fact, whether you like it or not. If consciousness were nothing more than a series of random material accidents of the physical brain and its chemical processes, then you would have no free will and no basis for trusting your own thoughts and perceptions. When that happens, all science and reason breaks down -- and that is the unavoidable nihilistic absurdity of atheist materialism in a nutshell.

[@lysanderofsparta3708]

@@Superchicken78 You don't need any counterarguments? Well, then I guess you have nothing to say and there is nothing to discuss. What a cowardly cop-out! How very typical of your ilk! Ultimately, consciousness cannot all be from random spontaneous natural processes. If all consciousness were simply a material accident of the physical brain and nothing more, then you would have no free will and no way to establish that your own thoughts and perceptions are even rational and reliable. Even AI is the product of an intelligent designer.

[@metatron4890]

The fundamental level of reality doesn't come into being. It is without be6gin or end, and what we see is just the rearrangement of that fundamental stuff that make up the universe. So the universe is eternal intrinsically as the universe is identical to this fundamental stuff. Given that the unuverse is eternal, why suppose that something outside rhe universe needs to keep the universe in existence?

[@donaldclifford5763]

That someone outside would have to also have some form of physical properties. So why a master creator? Existence exists, regardless of why.

[@JohnCamacho]

"why suppose that something outside rhe universe needs to keep the universe in existence" That's the only rationalisation the theists have. God is a giant mystery, created to solve smaller mysteries, but in order to keep God going as an 'explanation' more mysteries need to be claimed.

[@donaldclifford5763]

@@JohnCamacho Well stated. It's more of a crisis of psychology than just lack of good reason. A form of arrested development that clings to deep seated need to believe in some paternalistic "higher power". The ultimate "God of the gaps" assertion.

[@clydeoakes4085]

Dear Visual Catholic, you seriously gone out of your way to extend the simplicity of atheism. You know this, ie that atheism is the simple lack of believe in a god and/or gods. How that comports with naturalism, big bang, metaphysics, etc. is irrelevant, and you know that …. Total misdirection and sad 😔

[@Steve-sg3uz]

Atheism has a lot of logical entailment's that define a particular worldview. To argue they are wrong is to be illogical.

[@js1817]

Exaggerate, not extend.

[@ErroneousTheory]

That’s a lot of words. No, the atheist insists that if we are incapable of seeing beyond the box, then we can know nothing about what’s outside. What happened before time? Don’t know. There is a sky god? You don’t know. You can’t know. You have to go with what we can know

[@ImpossibleWhopper111]

This video fails in all ways of criticizing atheism 😢

[@donaldclifford5763]

A form of arrested development that avoids simple reality.

[@alexissmith5589]

If David thinks Atheism is superstition, he has no idea what word means; superstition /ˌsuːpəˈstɪʃn/ noun 1.excessively credulous belief in and reverence for the supernatural: i.e religion in a nutshell. 2 a widely held but irrational belief in supernatural influences, especially as leading to good or bad luck, or a practice based on such a belief: i.e Again, religion in a nutshell

[@erikt1713]

Exactly. It's just not the right way to use the term.

[@Slohoffman01]

This is similar to when religious people claim that atheism is a religion. My response is always the same, “I assume that you don’t believe in Zeus, is your disbelief in Zeus also a religion?” This is always met with a blank stare. The mental gymnastics that religious people engage in to “prove” to themselves that their beliefs make sense never fails to astound me. This video begins with a fallacy, and then just attempts to build on it. Most atheists don’t claim that there is definitely no god or supernatural realm, we simply suspend our belief until there is evidence, which there is none. A god that exists outside space and time is the definition of something that doesn’t exist. Lastly, the Christian god supposedly DID interact with our physical reality, which would leave evidence. There is none. Thanks, but I’ll keep believing in things that there are evidence for. Religious people are mostly indoctrinated as children (which is a form of child abuse in my view), so rather than beginning with the evidence and following it to logical conclusions, we have people like the guy in this video who begins with the conclusion his parent brainwashed into him, and spends his life piecing together “arguments” like this to make it seem reasonable to himself. It’s quite sad really.

[@iamTheSnark]

"I lack belief in your specific god" as many times as someone's god has been described (not defined, that never happens) by a theist. Deist like Spinoza or Einstein at best. I don't have to prove anything, worship anything, believe anything else. It's just my lack of belief in your god. And anyone else's.

[@donaldclifford5763]

Ask him if he believes in Allah.

[@sody6057]

Is this saying the lack of evidence for the supernatural makes the lack of belief in the supernatural arbitrary? It really sounds like he said that.

[@Kenpassion]

I am an atheist and I thought this video was really well done 👍🏻

[@VisualCatholic]

Thank you, it's kind of you to say that!

[@protonman8947]

Yes, it presented a flawed set of arguments in a visually (but not intellectually) compelling manner.

[@donaldclifford5763]

@@protonman8947 By design no less.

[@leonhard.doerflinger]

The box analogy falls short in one regard: Naturalits do not assume that "the box is sustaining itself in mid-air". For a naturalist there is no reason to assume the existence of air outside the box, or even an "outside the box" at all. As long as any supposed "outside the box" has no detectable interaction with the known inside-the-box, it might as well not exist. On the other hand, if there were any interaction, it could be investigated and thus become part of the known world. This would make it part of nature.

[@linusloth4145]

So, you are denying the existence of a multiverse?

[@leonhard.doerflinger]

As long as there is no interaction between our spacetime (including the stuff within) and another one, there is no reason to assume that there is anything "outside" our universe.

[@linusloth4145]

@@leonhard.doerflinger how do you then explain away the fine-tuning of our universe?

[@leonhard.doerflinger]

@linusloth4145 Fine-tuning has not been explained yet. We don't understand it well enough. It may be the case that the 18-or-so degrees of freedom in the standard model are not as free as it seems (pending a complete unified field theory), or that they happen to be conducive to our form of life by chance, or that there indeed is a multiverse. So far, none of these options seem to be any more likely than the rest. I don't "explain away" fine tuning. I don't have a definitive answer to that question. However, some theoretical physicists have developed very interesting models (from a mathematical point of view) that involve various multiverse-ideas. All theoretical though. See for example Leonard Susskind. More research is needed on this topic.

[@linusloth4145]

@@leonhard.doerflinger Science of the future of the gaps: We don't understand it now but science will surely uncover it in the future...

[@wickhunter7733]

If a supernatural force exists, It doesn't require you to worship it and It's unknowable.

[@donaldclifford5763]

Supernatural means the same as non existent, as in fairy tales.

[@js1817]

​@@donaldclifford5763That's not what it means, that's your belief or opinion ahout whether the supernatual exists.

[@donaldclifford5763]

@@js1817 False. It's pure axiomatic logic, the law of identity. Existence exists.

[@js1817]

@@donaldclifford5763 Super natural means above or outside nature. If there is a God, he created everything else and he is above or outside nature, which is his creation. A fairy tale is a type of story. Neither "supernatural" nor 'fairy tale" mean the same thing as "non existant"; regardless of whether God exists, that's not what those words mean.

[@donaldclifford5763]

@@js1817 It's one thing to casually speak of something miraculous or supernatural, hypothetically, where an obvious explanation is lacking. But when talking about the ontology and epistemology of existence, the terminology needs to be precise.

[@donaldclifford5763]

I like Rene Descart's observation, "I think therefore I am". All else is subject to empericism and probability. The contorted reasoning presented here is a typical attempt to do a work around for fundamental logic attempting to support the logical contradiction of a supernatural.

[@LateNight-zeit]

DBH's definition of superstition seems proprietary and needlessly antagonistic. Why add 'infantile' if not to disparage?

[@douglasrasmussen480]

There is a difference between a theist view of a prime mover of creation which basically guesses that unknown origin must prove good and demonstrably false mythology of formal religions. For the former view, I am absolutely comfortable to say I do not know. For the latter, continuing to believe in disabused mythology makes no sense to me whatsoever.

[@moonshoes11]

What you forgot to do was demonstrate any God exists. Oh right. You can’t.

[@regele2020kk]

i cant prove the existence of a multiverse but most of the atheists believe in such a thing when being met with the fine tuning argument, being biased wont get you anywhere, moonshoes 😂

[@moonshoes11]

@@regele2020kk I’m curious…Are all your friends made of straw, like your argument?

[@afuroLEGEND383]

​@@moonshoes11 hahah what the fuck are u even thinking , reply to his comment , even if he strawmanned the shit out of it u still should be honest enough to look at the problem in an objective view , he was right abt u being biased af lol

[@donaldclifford5763]

@@regele2020kk No atheists don't believe in a multiverse. And a multiverse isn't necessary for atheism which is purely the incredulity of the impossible.

[@JohnCamacho]

@@regele2020kk "i cant prove the existence of a multiverse but most of the atheists believe in such a thing" Jesus Christ, more garbage, like this bloody video. Where is the poll you did that shows 'most of the atheists believe' in the multiverse? Look, just stop throwing unverified claims out there.

[@paulbrocklehurst2346]

I take great issue with the dishonest & to be honest hypocritical accusations made in this video but don't take that on faith (why take _anything_ on faith when _anything_ could be?) Here are just a few example taken word for word from your transcript stating that the new atheists have... *a tendency to criticize belief in God with an attitude of militancy sneering derision and moral certitude in the years that followed* Well I wouldn't entirely agree that this is universally the case with most of those new atheist authors as I've read _all_ of their books but even if it's true to _some_ extent, it's clearly no worse than the sneering attitude of the _Bible_ in verses such as Psalm 14.1 _The fool hath said in his heart, there is no God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, There is none that doeth good._ Then there's the _deeply_ hypocritical accusation from David Bentley Hart: *we can see that the philosophical position of atheism is fundamentally irrational or in his words a Superstition nurtured by an infantile wish to live in a world proportionate to one's own hopes or conceptual limitations* Living according to what one _hopes_ to be true rather than what can actually be _demonstrated_ to be true is precisely what the Bible claims is a _good_ thing according to the famous verse Hebrews 1.11: *Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.* Another dishonest straw man argument against atheists is that they have a so-called 'superstition' when all atheism is is skepticism about all god claims not just _Christian_ ones so to say: *Bentley Hart argues that naturalism which has also been called materialism or physicalism is the most consistent form of atheism naturalism is the position that nothing exists outside the physical order or nature this obviously rules out the existence of the supernatural in my experience this is the most common form of atheism that you encounter in books by the new atheists* But atheism isn't claiming only the natural exists, In fact it's not any sort of claim at all. At root it's simply pointing out that there's no good reason to believe any god claim so trying to pretend atheism necessitates any sort of assumption is dishonest. I should know because I'm an atheist myself & for all I know there might be lots & lots of gods but since there's no good reason to believe claims that any exist I'm skeptical about all such claims just as I am about any other supernatural claim such as the existence of fairies or elves which also have no supportable evidence so why take any god claim any more seriously in light of that fact? Then he goes on to say... *Bentley Hart's first criticism of naturalism showing it to be closer to magical thinking than a reasonably held belief is that the naturalist's position that nature is a closed self- sustaining system cannot be verified either deductively or empirically from within that closed system of nature* This is more dishonest straw man arguing because atheism isn't a claim that only the natural exists, it's simply an acknowledgement that appeals to the supernatural tell us precisely nothing worth hearing other than that there are mysteries which currently science can't answer. Okay that's cl;early true but that's why we have science & philosophy - to see whether we can but theists who like to pretend that their claims _do_ answer them according to 'God X' or 'Y' or 'Z' clearly can't which is why there are so many opinions in the various religions of the world whereas there's only _one_ basis for _all_ science based on whatever _can_ be supported empirically rather than mere _opinion_ like religions try to do. *atheist naturalists on the other hand believe that the natural world is capable of creating and sustaining itself accordingly they propose that belief in the existence of anything outside nature anything extranatural or Supernatural is unnecessary and irrational both theists and atheistic naturalists hold a metaphysical position a position about what is or isn't outside the natural world* No atheism isn't a claim that there isn't anything outside the natural world, it's simply the acknowledgement that claims about a god or if you prefer 'abstainer' somewhere _outside_ it are essentially _meaningless_ because no religion can explain the unexplainable. They may like to appeal to mystery as if that in itself _can_ explain it, but you can't explain _one_ mystery by appealing to _another._ All we have _supportable_ justifications for are understandings about the natural world so we may as well simply call it _the world_ not because we can know that that's all there is because we can't rule out a so-called 'supernatural abstainer' but because no one can come up with any good reason to rule one _in_ & that's the fatal flaw of _all_ god claims not just Christian ones & they can't _all_ be true however they _can_ all be _false_ & that is not an insignificant shortcoming of any of them since they're _all_ equally notional. I'm not saying there's no good reason to believe that a man called Jesus Christ was a real historical character because he probably was but that doesn't mean that the claims he was born of a virgin or walked on water or rose from the dead or any other supernatural claim made about him are remotely likely to be true simply because those claims happen to be popular. Biblical claims that the sun went around the Earth were once extremely popular once upon a time too but just because that's what people believed they were seeing happen every day didn't mean it _did_ but appreciating that things wouldn't look any different if we were standing on an huge sphere rotating once every 24 hours helped us understand the supportable perspective of heliocentrism over Biblical geocentricism _(no thanks to the church who had Galileo imprisoned for life for supply hard evidence for this)._ That begs a similar question: If the cosmos needed no 'abstainer' outside of it how would our universe appear any different from how it may _seem_ to to people who think it appears to have one either? - _Any answers?_

[@zombine555]

....strawmans abound. I was hoping for better.

[@mdug7224]

I think you do not understand atheism. "I don't know." Is a genuine answer to a question with no reliable affirmative or negative evidence. There is negative evidence of the bible and other religious texts and no affirmative evidence of a god. I have had this position since 1976, and going back at least 2400 years, people have shared this view, so I feel new atheism isn't as new as you might think.

[@ВячеславВячеславыч-с7с]

Existing while being non material is the same as not existing

[@joshsuko8185]

Only true if you except that matter is the only thing that exists. How could you possibly know that?

[@ВячеславВячеславыч-с7с]

@@joshsuko8185 what does it even mean to exist without ths existence being material?

[@joshsuko8185]

@@ВячеславВячеславыч-с7с If you’re so indoctrinated by philosophical materialism that you can’t even IMAGINE the possibility of anything else…well that kind of halts the discussion.

[@ВячеславВячеславыч-с7с]

@@joshsuko8185 maybe because i'm as any human have experienced only material things and my imagination have ability only to generate anything as a product of my previous experience But other people take some material stuff(emotions, ideas, math objects, religious experience) and call it non material arbitrarily Emotions exist in a brain, changes in emotional state correspond to state of a brain perfectly and any change in brain change emotional state Ideas are generated by brain, perceived by brain and exist in brain(while being correlated to the world outside of a brain) math objects are some kinds of states of brain(physical object) created through contact of brain in a body with physical world and so on like why are you - someone with as you may think non material experiences of some sort are a human with a sophisticated nervous system and not something else entirely why your as you may think non physical mental state is fully dependent on your relations to physical world what can you think of that is as it may be is not physical and have no relations to physical universe? like everything supposedly immaterial for us to be able to say anything about it manifests itself in one form or another in physical dimension religious "non material" stuff refers in my opinion in most of the times to material thoughts about material objects that are not currently present at the moment and saying that it is in another realm is an excuse to why something someone claim is there have no signs of being there

[@donaldclifford5763]

@@joshsuko8185 Imagining the existence of non existence is a logical contradiction.

[@k-3402]

Philosophical naturalism is an epistemically sound position. DBH's watered-down theology doesn't even make sense even if one is a theist.

[@ElasticGiraffe]

DBH's theology is hardly "watered down." It is very sophisticated and draws from ancient and medieval sources, along with being logically rigorous. He's also quite familiar with Hinduism and Buddhism. Philosophical naturalism, as the belief that nothing exists beyond physical forces and objects, is an unjustified limitation on what is admissable as existing, and "nature" on this definition cannot account for its own origins and contingency. That naturalists have felt so compelled to try to reduce or explain away consciousness and subjectivity -- the one thing we know immediately, that's unlike anything else in our experience -- suggests that perhaps their worldview is too small.

[@donaldclifford5763]

@@ElasticGiraffe By definition if something exists outside of existence, it must of necessity exist as part of existence, by logical necessity.

[@ElasticGiraffe]

@@donaldclifford5763 To say something "exists outside of existence" makes no logical sense, but who is making that claim? The atheistic naturalist or physicalist begs the question by quietly presupposing that the physical world of objects and impersonal forces is all that exists, or can exist, before claiming to have empirically reasoned that God's existence is implausible. God was ruled inadmissible from the start.

[@donaldclifford5763]

@@ElasticGiraffe If God exists that makes him part of natural existence. It's a logical contradiction to both exist and not exist. This is the fundamental logic principle of the law of identity, existence exists. And all that exists is part of existence, necessarily, axiomatic. Can't have it both ways.

[@donaldclifford5763]

@@ElasticGiraffe God exists that makes him part of natural existence. It's a logical contradiction to both exist and not exist. This is the fundamental logic principle of the law of identity, existence exists. And all that exists is part of existence, necessarily, axiomatic. Can't have it both ways.

[@paulthomas1165]

Poor arguments galore. I want my 7 minutes back. 😡

[@mlarowe]

This box argument is so disingenuous. It casts the theist as knowing what "floor" is, and is seen as smart because we all know what "floor" is, but the theist still has no evidence, and it casts the atheist as incurious. Many atheists become atheists because the questions "why" and "how" are insufficiently answered by any given theistic viewpoint. Why do neither of the people push on the edge of the box? If all that exists, as far as either knows, is the box, and they will live out their existence in the box, then does it matter if it's floor or gravity or the backs of 4 elephants outside the box? If Jehovah, the Amazon employee driving the truck, says nothing, then does it matter if the atheist doesnt believe? If Jehovah kills the atheist because he didnt believe, and the theist gets to ride along in the truck telling Jehovah how great he is forever (the length of an Amazon shift), then is Jehovah good? Here's my analogy. Two cave men are standing in a field looking at the moon. One says, "It must be a god!" and the other asks, "Why?" and then they never agree.

[@felixgraphx]

As an atheist, i dont beleive this or that about the creation of the universe. Im just open to not knowing such things and accepting to admit my ignorance on such subjects. This video is just plai silly in trying hard to pin down atheists as being beleivers in scientific explanations yet to be really discovered.

[@lysanderofsparta3708]

Judging by the comments, a lot of enraged atheists seem to be emotionally triggered by this video.

[@1q34w]

I've seen a lot of these attempts of shifting the burden of proof lately. The most pathetic is the one trying to assert that atheism needs perfect knowledge and anything else is agnosticism. But eaan is nice as well.

[@D-Pocalypse]

YOU CLEARLY dont know what the definition of atheism actually is. How can asking for factual verifiable compelling evidence for a supernatural claim be considered a "superstition"? Atheism is simply a question; CAN YOU SHOW ME THE EVIDENCE¿?

[@regele2020kk]

the evidence is a huge biased , most atheists would choose not to believe in a God even if it was proven to be true

[@donaldclifford5763]

@@regele2020kk That would include me because supernatural is not possible in reality, only in perverse imagination.

[@afuroLEGEND383]

​😂😂😂😂

[@EduardoRodriguez-du2vd]

There is a failure in the presentation of the positions that comprise being an atheist. An atheist need not assume that physicalism is the only interpretation of reality. I don't need to assume that there is nothing supernatural to be an atheist. Nor entities that are not made of matter or energy or do not respond to the laws of perceived reality. I am an atheist. That is, I do NOT think that God exists. The idea "God exists" is not in my mind. This absence of an idea has no requirement and does not represent an interpretation of reality. In my case, I have not seen that there is the slightest need to consider that something sustains the existence of reality continuously. But that is not related to my atheism. In any case, I find it contradictory that you affirm that someone affirms that there is nothing outside of reality (being that reality is everything that exists). Stating that there is nothing outside of reality is tautological. The strange position is to affirm that there is something apart from what exists, which also exists. It is not possible for humans to affirm that they possess an objective truth. An objective truth is one that does not depend on people's opinions. It is people who think that something is true and that kills any possible objectivity. No. Existence cannot be prior to what exists. This is absurd. This results from an idealistic interpretation of reality and right here shows its logical flaw. Existence is not an ideal entity that dwells on a supernatural plane. To assert such a thing would be gratuitous and unfounded.

[@Angelmou]

Atheism just means the lack of being convinced that there are thoughtorgan lacking thinkers. Deities are asserted thinkers, despite of lacking thinking organs (brains) to proceed any chains of thoughts and therefore lacking thinking processes in actuality. Deities are also asserted to be watchers/viewers, despite of having no visual organs (eyes) to process lightsignals for real. And they are additionally asserted to be hearers/listeners, despite of having no audio organs (ears) to register any air vibrations, such as prayers for real. This is like to claim squared circles or married bachelors. A self-contradiction and usually a denial of mechanical processes such as thinking works mechanically. To hide this very bold denial standpoint against the mundane mechanical nature of processes (and the overview to talk about) such as the process of thinking or hearing or watching and also how overviews of explainations do work in reality - you find the most absurd and dishonest bad apologies for why this self-defeat shall just be ignored for some vague tummy feelings. Like an also asserted meta-nature/super-nature where HOWEVER never the meta-mechanics of a (supernatural)thinking organ equivalent for a brain organ and their meta-processes / super(nature)-proceedings are ever demonstrated. The claim that there would be a surplus to nature is a positive claim it is not that you could play an UNO reverse card. This is not working. Especially is it not working to put your personal favorite idea. This is why not even a speculation phase works there properly to have a nice conversation about a god/many gods as they are excuse tries to run away from how thinking is a mechanical process. This means when we would for example actually speculate about something in reality like that someday in the future true artificial intelligence (AI) could be a possibility - we would have brain organ equivalents in form of the AI hardware such as microphones for the air vibration detection or cameras for the visual detection. So for the thinking & hearing & seeing process overview presentable to people to have a proper talk about the topic. There we have at least something to talk about as counterpart mechanism. When it comes to barely asserted excuse tries like asserted meta-natures and deities, angels or demons (super)housing them: We all have never any proper talk - not only because of Wittgenstein: *Whereof one cannot speak thereof one MUST be silent* (This alone would kick it out of its meta-waters) But also, because the reason why people even start to use these bad excuses is not reason and clear communication as any goal. People are just dishonest for that reason alone, because people confuse feeling imprints of their personhood like the idea of a relationship with another AGENT with truth claims and facts. You can see this with all creationism to be just denialism (especially of emotional hurtful observations) like the denial of the much younger age of the trait intelligence and also the much younger age of the _to design_ activity long AFTER life already existed and ALREADY diversified. Life is much older in age of history than the intelligence trait and the to design activity. This is why creationism or intelligent design is not a legit opinion a decent human can hold - as it is just a denial of the order of history and the true age of the origin of specific activities and traits- You can see this with theism in general: Where your very own self - this means your own personhood and what YOU hope and what YOU wish and love for isn't cut out from the entire picture to give an (at least approximated) objective statement. But there in religious faith *ALL OF A SUDDEN* it is... about relationships, about your very personal greed for a promised invisible afterlife rewards (paradise) as an assertion or any fear of guilt or sins, about your fear of damnation or the fear to have wasted your entire life in having fear or hope for irreal pictures of a relationship agent, which is simply not there and so on. This comes from the fact how humans usually access the world around them in a WAY more emotional approach. Instead of a truthseeking "I cut all what I feel out of the world to have a photographic rocksolid picture" From early childhood you have your own I and your parents (and sometimes siblings, uncles, grandparents etc.) as counter-I's to your own. This means as counter agents to interact with your own Ego with different tastes, different mood switches and different focus points. An I - You duality. This misleads the vaste majority of humans to assume that nature has counter agents everywhere or that nature itself is an agent (as we use a substantive to describe it) as well - be the idea a lightning and thunder thrower, a riverflower, a life assembler etc. as relationship interactor. Even as surrogate parent as "skydaddy" so to speak in 1 of the primary forms as an emotional shortcut concept. This means humans are naturally selected to survive like you said it and not for the truth - this however is about correct images even when you cut yourself out of the picture. Meaning the mislead from the truth is actually to think there would be a parent - a counter I in or above nature. So theism is actually the mistake mindimage which surfaces from selection reasons in learning to be a personhood and to project personhoods outside. People usually do not understand that personhood - thinking from 1 symbol to the next (thinking in proper sentences in your mind) or that even parents are not coming "upfront" or "before" the base of the mechanical processes. And as overview how the interaction and interconnectivity does work. And also what explainations truly are. This is usually why people starting to assert thoughtorgan lacking thinkers (gods/angels/demons) and why they do not want to have cold, merciless overview of what is actually true even when they have to cut their own "I" all of their hopes, desires and fears out of the picture. They want comfort, tummyrubbings, promises, hopes, relations and all that self.centricism based off-topic nonsense.

[@vanishingpoint7411]

Easy question for the religious . define and describe your God. Atheism is your God claims have not met a burden of proof. That’s it, nothing else .

[@normbale2757]

and when you put on the shroud of Turin you are invisible.

[@dundeemink3847]

No it's the hole cloth that the trinity was made from.

[@airpower7692]

It's awful funny how these religious people try to turn what they believe ask me an imaginary onto what others think but that's been the normal for religion trying to push their beliefs on other people without zero reasonable evidence to warrant their belief. Atheist is simply the position I do not believe your claim a God exists you must demonstrate this with reasonable evidence not the fallacious arguments and flawed non-critical thinking

[@linusloth4145]

Atheism is the belief that non-reason gave rise to reason for no reason whatsoever.

[@ronsmith8340]

How do you address the historical fact that Christianity and Gnosticism originates in Mesopotamia? Or are you going to simply ignore it in order to maintain a position of superiority that seems to permeate so many videos of this ilk? Christianity is built on Paganism - Abraham - or Abrahm in his native country - came from Sumer and his Lord - who had the power of a god over him and his people - was Marduk. Yahweh was Enki and Genesis is largely a re-write of Sumerian mythology. Both science and Spirituality will tell you that there is no external reality. According to Anil Seth your external reality is an illusion, according to Donald Hoffman "The objective reality is that all reality is subjective." Many ancient Spiritual traditions - non-Duality in particular - say something very similar. If I asked you to define God, where would everything you say come from? It certainly wouldn't be from God, it would be from your own belief system and those of others. God didn't decide which books were to be included in the Bible, men did and God didn't write those books, men did. Before you extol the virtues of Christianity and stereotyping atheists - which is usually only good for a feeling of superiority - at least find out what you're putting your beliefs in. What theists don't understand is that atheists do God's work in the way God intended.

[@sndpgr]

Brilliant!

[@rogersacco4624]

Because we experience existential awe about reality it has nothing to do with our man made gods and scriptures.Thankfully we won't live ti infinity .Yikes!

[@jenna2431]

Even IF my non-belief is "superstitious", which defies definitions, the god in YOUR bible is a grotesque malignant narcissist unworthy of the time of day much less worship. Try the new thing called "reading comprehension" sometime on that book of yours.

[@bengreen171]

David Bentley Cope, King of projection.

[@JPVanderbuilt]

Excellent job on this video. Thank you!

[@VisualCatholic]

Glad you enjoyed it!

[@rikardotsamsiyu]

Great animation! Terrible arguments.

[@guillermoenki1069]

I don't agree. What can be more superstitious than believing in imaginary friends?

[@cloud1stclass372]

Thank you for proving the point of this video.

[@victorygarden556]

I’m not even a religious man but you definitely only understand the dumbest of religious people if that’s how you think of them. Is math made or discovered? Answer that and I’ll help you out a bit lol

[@cloud1stclass372]

@@victorygarden556 I can answer for them: “Math was invented by the invisible sky fairy with a white beard! How STUPID!”

[@Honkthentrumpets]

@@cloud1stclass372 Fairy’s live in forests, lakes, rivers and seas. I don’t know of any that live in the sky. The closest thing to sky fairy’s are Aliens. Just so you know.

[@donaldclifford5763]

@@victorygarden556 Apprehended mentally.

[@NoOne-uh9vu]

JimBob laid out the problem of a mechanistic universe much better and explains just how destructive it is to the naturalist worldview on their own terms. If you want to hear those arguments laid out even more philosophically check out Jay Dyer and his version of TAG

[@ryandalion8379]

So much projection

[@gilgamesh2832]

New Atheism didn't end, it's now taken root WITHIN the church with the deconstruction movement.

[@donaldclifford5763]

It is possible to be atheist Christian.

[@donaldclifford5763]

Only if properly understood.

[@munkee59]

As a Christian, I have had the sincere joy of seeing some really smart/thoughtful atheists find and place their hope in Christ. Besides, as the comments here demonstrate, atheism is such tired and boring position to take. ; - )

[@VisualCatholic]

a joy indeed!!

[@williamoarlock8634]

Christ is boring.

[@donaldclifford5763]

It's all psychological. Actually delusional. And very selective and exclusionary. Obviously not Jewish.

[@Chaturanger]

Religions are supertitions.

[@donaldclifford5763]

Religious belief is a form of arrested development, where individuals can't overcome a need for a supernatural contrary to reason and reality.

[@linusloth4145]

@@donaldclifford5763 You are believing that non-reason gave rise to reason for no reason whatsoever. Sound reasonable to me, haha.

[@akilraadwalli8751]

What is really Astonishing is the fact that they undermine an old religion to establish a new one !!! How smart !!!! 😂

[@lordvoldamort4606]

Meh. FSM all the way.

[@jamgill9054]

So much wrong with this. Note the use of 'naturalism' and 'materialism' as derogatory epithets typical of apologists. Also, the circular reasoning doesn't help. In the end, an atheist is someone that hasn't been presented sufficient evidence that any god exists. That's it. No superstition required. What is presented in this video isn't anything more than sophistry. Case in point. This video provides no peer reviewed studies and no information aside from creationist books that only supports their predetermined suppositions. Weak.

[@itsmyytaccount8498]

great vid

[@VisualCatholic]

thanks!

[@normbale2757]

Atheism is growing at 1% annually in USA for 25+ years. Newb atheism is hardly dying.

[@VisualCatholic]

I agree with you that atheism certainly isn't dying!!

[@donaldclifford5763]

@@VisualCatholic As mental health improves, so does atheism.

[@rightpa]

Hart, and those who promote his ideas, sounds like he needs some instruction is basic logic and critical thinking.

[@RootinrPootine]

No they don’t

[@Jordan-hz1wr]

Bless his heart, he’s stupid.

[@rubemartur8239]

Unless you point which terms isnt logic based, i could think you are doing Ad ominen

[@rightpa]

@@rubemartur8239 said, "Unless you point which terms isnt logic based, i could think you are doing Ad ominen." XD LOL proving me right. Seeing as how they don't understand logic it makes sense they would not understand logical fallacies either.

[@whatman956]

@@rightpa BRUH

[@velkyn1]

Its' always hilarious how chrsitains have to lie about others. Unsurprisingly, atheism is simply the conclusion that a particular god or gods don't exist. Claiming it is a "superstition" fails hilariously, since supersitions depend magical nonsense. I, as an atheist, dont' by into magic. Hart seems to be just one more ignorant theist who has to pretend that everyone "really" does agree with him, when we do not.

[@VisualCatholic]

ok, thanks for stopping by anyway!

[@thehighlander6770]

You did a great drop addressing all of Hart's arguments!

[@nature_boy_]

Some heavy intellectual horsepower on display here

[@velkyn1]

@@nature_boy_ thank you.

[@velkyn1]

@@thehighlander6770 I know. thank you. "You did a great drop addressing all of Hart's arguments!"