Is Atheism More Reasonable Than Theism?

In this brief video, I discuss the reasonability of atheism against theism. I ultimately strive to show that theism is much more reasonable than atheism.

Sources:
(1) "The Autobiography of Charles Darwin and Selected Letters"
(2) Paul Davies "What Happened Before the Big Bang?"

[trying-to-learn]

We really haven't moved past the problem of universals the Medievals debated!

[adamheywood]

>The most incomprehensible thing about the universe is that it is comprehensible
Not to argue with Einstein, but perhaps if the world around us didn't follow ordered patterns in the first place, we wouldn't be here to wonder at how it makes sense.
It's simply the anthropic principle again.
And bear in mind, this universe barely allows life to exist whatsoever. So if you want to claim a deity must have created an ordered universe, you must also be prepared to accept that this deity did an astonishingly bad job - if, of course, you're assuming this deity constructed the universe in order to sustain life, which is an assumption you must prove to be true.

>If the mind is a product of blind unguided material processes, how can we trust it at all
Assuming the former fallacy. "You believe your brain evolved, and therefore its assessment that it evolved is unreliable; whereas I believe my brain was created by God, and therefore its assessment that it was created is reliable."

Pointing out fundamental assumptions, that we cannot prove or disprove, but must adopt in order to merely function, gets us no closer to showing that God exists. Gee, it's almost as if it took humans thousands of years, and a whole lot of wrong guesses about the universe, before we realised the value of cataloguing and building upon things like experimental data, through processes that are specifically designed to remove as much bias as possible.

Here is an unfillable gap in our knowledge. Therefore God...?

>Theism provides a better explanation for why the universe makes sense
Okay. But if God was able to create stuff, then it must be because he's ordered and organised, otherwise he couldn't function. He would imagine some creation, and produce something different and inconsistent. Order comes from a creator, so where did God's order come from, without having been created?
Or, if God is ordered and yet wasn't created, then order doesn't need a creator. So what do you need God for?

>If the universe was constructed by God, we should expect order
Why? Did God tell you that? How do _you_ know what God was trying to do? How do _you_ know whether this universe of his is a success or failure?

[thoughtfulpilgrim]

Great video! If I had a dollar for every time I explained this to a proponent of Hume and Scientism it might pay for a family dinner at a nice restaurant 😋

[rationalnuance]

This is the usual specific theism vs unspecific atheism.
It seems theism makes ad hoc explanations to match what we see, so the atheist is also able to do this so we can compare specific theism vs specific atheism.

I could say perhaps naturalism has to be this way, and if naturalism has to be this way then we ought to expect it is this way.
Just as a theist would say, If God wants it to be this way then we ought to expect it to be this way.

A theist might ask,
Why would naturalism be that way, what reason made naturalism the way it is?

As I might ask,
Why would god be that way, what reason made god the way god is?


Specific atheism is at least as reasonable and probably more plausible than specific theism.

[Chidds]

The answer is twofold.
First, the world is not entirely intelligible. We do well with planetary exploration, but when we venture into the very big and the very small what makes sense becomes far more hazy. Quantum mechanics and relativity both surpass the comprehensive limits of human cognition. Even when we consider the estimated number of galaxies in the known universe, let alone star systems, it is an incomprehensible number to the human mind.
Second, it makes complete sense for humans to have the ability to comprehend many aspects of planetary exploration. The emergence of the human brain is unlikely, but possible. Our ability to make sense of the world is necessary for successful navigation of the world, and our ability to seek truth is a product of our high complex sociability. The fact that we can do science is merely a coincidence.
Your approach is textbook Texas Sharpshooter fallacy.

[frosted]

Not sure you define the word "rationality" the same way we do.
There is no rational basis for a beLIEf in your imaginary friend. What you do is instead of speaking answers, you seek to answer with a childish placation that blatantly ignores occam's razor or any basis in reality, just to keep yourself in your comfort zone.
We observe regularity. Measure it. You are placing an organizer behind a regularity needlessly, probably due to some indoctrination. The irrationality behind it is staggering when a theist is pressed to be more precise in what they are discussing. Every definition is purposely misleading and vague, goalposts moved, apologetics (fallacious logical arguments) pushed, and in the end a devolved whiny insulting game. These are regularities we find when a child is caught with their hand in a cookie jar until they run out of excuses. Maybe grow up.

[khmuywf]

As usual, more atheists commenting here who have no idea what the nature of "evidence" is. Excellent video!

[hmgrraarrpffrzz]

Eh...
1) Claiming that we intuively understand the entire world makes no sense. Those areas that mattered to us in our evolutionary history we understand intuitively, but the more a subject is away from that the more we have to work hard to make sense of things.

2) I don't think that scientists in general claim that we can trust all our senses to 100% or that we can absolutely prove the existence of an external world. Rather that's the only basis we have to work with. There is no alternative. Therefor we assume that things work that way.

3) Numbers and such don't really exist outside abstract concepts.

4) In general we can rely on reason because of the experience we have with it and the results it yields. It just works.

5) Atheism doesn't claim to offer a foundation.

6) Theism is less reasonable because it requires us to believe something for which we have no good evidence that it's true.

7) If the world has formed naturally and exists because of the interactions of types of matter and energy and so on, then it makes sense that there are regularities. And thanks to evolution we evolved to survive int hat environment. That's why it makes sense to us. On the other hand, claiming that it wouldn't make sense to us unless there would be a deity around sounds quite random. I'd rather say it would lead to the opposite conclusion: if the world around us works the way it does because of unguided natural processes, then there patterns we can learn to identify. But if there'd be a deity behind it all, anything could happen at any moment without us having any idea why. So I'd say that us understanding a world is an argument against theism, not for it.

8) The claim that our minds were "engineered" seems a bit weird, as evolution is actually a thing.

9) If you claim that we can only understand the universe because of God and otherwise couldn't, which is a claim that makes zero sense to me, then I wonder if there is any good evidence supporting that claim, or whether that's just another thought experiment by a theist leading to the conclusion that his theism is correct.

[freedomclub]

It is pretty much the justification of the logical mind/senses used by Descartes/Locke to trust their preferred method of epistemology...

Now, since both their arguments give conclusions that seem to come from their premises, just which is the true one, if at all? After all, revelation, logical inference and sensual data give, at times, contradicting information.

[lme]

Yes. Atheism is simply rejecting the god hypothesis that nobody has ever demonstrated.

Believing in stories about magic, curses, talking animals and unproven gods such as the theistic position is not rational at all.

[sandrajackson]

Atheism is certainly more consistent with reality. and I think most theists are aware of that and understand how easy it would be for someone to become a non-believer especially when considering that most of them doubt the existence of their god at times which is why they focus on atheism so much. They are not getting this worked up over what they believe has no merit and is not the least bit compelling enough to warrant attention. I feel certain that most people who lived long enough have (most on this side), or will at some point question the existence of god.. It's nothing at unusual, or in the least bit nefariously intended as some theists try and portray atheism and certainly neither irrational that with it being the case that most of the population never observed the presence of a god nor personally witnessed any event that rises to the level of the supernatural claims theist attribute to their god) there existng at least some portion of the population unconvinced a god exits. IT really should not be that difficult for anyone to at least understand that.

[iljuro]

*Why does the world make any sense at all why is it intelligible to our puny minds*
Why do we presuppose that there is an answer to that question we can know?

*The belief in objective patterns and uniformity within nature*
There is no rational reason to reject objective patterns and uniformity within nature. Only to question the limitations of objective patterns and uniformity within nature. And we do that.

*The belief that an external world exists outside the mind*
Once again, there is no rational reason to reject that an external world exists outside the mind. You may question whether there is a more real reality, but as long as you only concern yourself with what we perceive as reality, it's fully rational.

*Our cognitive faculties are functioning properly*
As long as we manage to get to work every morning, there is no rational reason to suspect that our cognitive faculties are not functioning well enough.

*If the mind is the product of blind unguided material processes, why should we trust our faculties*
Because all available evidence suggests that it works well enough. It would be unreasonable to believe anything else.

*Now theism on the other hand provides a far better foundation*
Theism presupposes a foundation for which we have no direct evidence. There is no foundation for the foundation.

*There must be an unchanging rational ground in which the logical orderly nature of the universe is rooted*
No, not without a root of chaos and disorder.
Inanimate objects will remain fairly uniform because they can't change willy nilly.

[jibbobdion]

The problem of evil disproves God, an all good god would not drown hundreds of millions of lives, including innocent animals and children. On Top of that every argument for God existing is just garbage. of you watch debates you can see this clearly.

[jibbobdion]

"Is Atheism More Reasonable Than Theism?" Yes, and I invoke Hitchens Razor.

[thinboxdictator]

1:13 - 1:21 up to this point you sounded half-reasonable
now you've just slipped to gibberish.

that's theism.