A 'Net friend wrote: > Theo wrote:

>

>> an Orthodox friend wrote

>>

>> > And I am frustrated at people who pretend they do not believe in God

>> > and then every time something evil or bad happens imply anger against

>> > Him. Know what I mean Theo.

>>

>> I don't feel anger against your God Greg. I wanted to know how you

>> rationalise this event in the light of your God and continue to pretend

he >> exists.

>

> Theo. I will not get into answering your question, but I understand what

he means. I notice it also. It seems that atheists will argue from the

> point of the existence of God, when it suits them... when in fact they

cannot, > since they don't believe in Gods existence (perhaps they temporarily

forget > that they don't believe in God :), but having argued from that

perspective, > they will then turn around when convenient, and back out/off by using the

> argument of the non-existence of God. I don't know if I am explaining this

> very well, but what I am saying is that an atheist must argue from a

> perspective 'hypothetically speaking' i.e. if God were to exist, or else

they > must ASK believers for THEIR perspective and then argue against that. They

> cannot have it both ways. They cannot argue from a perspective of Gods

> existence, while asserting that non-existence. A lot of atheists comments

here > are really completely irrelevant or inappropriate for this reason.

It is standard procedure when presenting a case against a proposition to assume that proposition and then draw conclusions which are seen to be unlikely or falsified. This works in logic, in science, in maths, in any other area you care to mention.

[Richard Kerr: It's called reductio ad absurdum, or reduction to absurdity. It's a style of argument that has a long history and is an unavoidable technique in some situations.]

In this particular case, where an unbeliever takes a perspective of God's existence for the sake of showing certain consequences or implications, there are a number of possible responses.

(1) Challenge the argument by which the consequences are drawn.

(2) Argue that the consequences are not actually implausible, unlikely or "bad" in whatever sense is appropriate to the discussion.

(3) Charge that the person presenting the argument is being inconsistent by assuming what they do not believe, and hope that noone recognizes the total vacuity of this response.

Best wishes -- Chris

[Richard Kerr: You forgot:

0) Challenge the assumptions of the argument.]

[Andrew Bromage: While it certainly works in logic, science and maths, I think it's less applicable in other areas that I will mention. In general, drawing contradictory conclusions to disprove axioms doesn't work if the system does not lend itself to formal deductive reasoning.

In this case, we're not dealing with algebra, we're dealing with peoples' beliefs. I think the same would apply to politics, to sociology and, to a lesser extent, to economics.

Now of course this isn't to say that it can't be done, just that it's much harder. Moreover, it's much harder to refute such an argument because in my experience, reductio ad absurdum arguments tend to be fairly simplistic, but just saying "that's simplistic" isn't exactly a rhetorically effective response.]

[CHS: .Quite so.

I am not making any comment about the persuasiveness or reliability of this style of argument -- especially in fields that do not lend themselves to formal deductive reasoning. (One is tempted at this point to make a gratuitous remark about fields that use no readily recognizable styles of reasoning at all, but I will resist. :-)

I am merely pointing out that reductio ad absurdum (thanks RK) *is* a well recognized style of argument, and it is very silly to attribute any kind of closet belief for the assumed proposition to a person using the argument.

Of course, in fields where reasoning is sometimes very haphazard, one should expect plenty of such silliness. And so we do.]

Shalom! Rowland Croucher