Path: utzoo!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!wuarchive!bcm!dimacs.rutgers.edu!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian
From: rab7166@venus.tamu.edu (BAKER, RICHARD ALAN)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: Why believe?
Message-ID: <Mar.5.00.00.52.1991.28786@athos.rutgers.edu>
Date: 5 Mar 91 05:02:10 GMT
Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu
Organization: Academic Computing Services, Texas A&M University
Lines: 21
Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu

Atheism is proposed to be meaningless because people cann't know everything,
but this same argument can be used to say that any belief is meaningless. 
IE Christians do not know everything therefore they cannot _believe_ that 
there is only one god. This premise could also be used to dismise all beliefs,
but this is kind of silly.  The idea that no one can prove the existence of 
anything is a common philosophical argument.

Thus there is no way that someone can say that when they put there hand in 
fire it will be hot.  Even though every time they put there hand in fire before
it was hot.  Similarly if someone on Earth has never had an experience of a god,
has never meet any one who had an experence of a god, and has noticed that the
most religious people of his acquaintance do not believe in modern day miracles,
this does _not_ mean that tommorrow this same person might not bump into the 
the good old neighborhood god, but there is A LOT of evidence that supports
otherwise.  I do not put my hand in fire; I do not put my faith in ghost, gods,
demons, devils, spirits, ghouls, dragons, flying cows, or any other entity 
that has no evidence of existence or logical mecanism for existence.

					Thanks

					-db