The Building Blocks Of Life

[Khandro]

I told y'all years ago on AB (oh what quarrels we had on R.&S.) that the life on Earth had its origins 'out there', & that Dawkins & his followers were fools believing that life began here as a 'happy accident'.

https://www.express.co.uk/news/science/1624008/asteroid-news-clues-life-origin-building-blocks-space-study-jaxa-ryugu-hayabusa2

[Zacs-Master]

Pixie, your into semantics now. They believe god doesn’t exist is exactly the same as saying they don’t believe a god exists. Surely even your strange view of the world can’t deny that a belief that something doesn’t exist is still a belief.

[ToraToraTora]

athiesm - is the absence of belief it's not believing a negative.

[ToraToraTora]

gawd I'm agreeing with pixie now!

[pixie374]

Yes, as ttt says. Not believing something, is not the same as disbelieving it.

[pixie374]

Have a lie down, ttt...I'll mop your brow :-)

[ToraToraTora]

"I don't believe any god exist" - ie the absence of belief.
is not the same as
"I believe gods do not exist"
the first one is correct.

[Zacs-Master]

Where does that understanding of atheism come from?

[pixie374]

A theism, means without a god.

[Zacs-Master]

Yes, I do know a little bit about Greek word roots. What I’m saying is, he believes god does not exist. This belief (in the simplest form of the word) means he could be a bigot but as others have pointed out his answers are always well reasoned and non aggressive.

[ToraToraTora]

the prefix "A" means without, thus the absence of.

[Zacs-Master]

Yes as I said…….Greek.
‘Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities’
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atheism

That doesn’t mean it’s incorrect to say that a person can believe that god doesn’t exist.

[ToraToraTora]

ZM: "That doesn’t mean it’s incorrect to say that a person can believe that god doesn’t exist" - it's ok as an English construct but it's wrong because it portrays the belief in a negative rather than the absence of a belief. That gives the god squad ammunition to treat atheism as a belief like their own, and then apply their maxims to that, when it is not.

[Togo]

//athiesm - is the absence of belief//

No it isn't. It is desire to believe in anything but religion ... with even less proof.

[pixie374]

It isn't- it just means not believing in a god.

[ToraToraTora]

can't agree with you there togs.

[pixie374]

I believe in pretty much nothing, unless it is actually proven. I have far more faith in human brains being amazingly complex.

[THECORBYLOON]

From Chambers Dictionary,

"atheism noun the belief that there is no god."

[pixie374]

Or Oxford//lack of belief in the existence of God or gods//

[Atheist]

This thread promised to be interesting, but it's gone down the pan to the realm of nit-picking, angel-counting, semantic dead-ends.

My vote for daftest answer is Togo at 19:53
"No it (i.e. atheism) isn't. It is desire to believe in anything but religion ... with even less proof."

Going back to the OP, whether the 'happy accident' was here on Earth or elsewhere in the universe, it in no way affects anything that Dawkins has written. Khandro, why do you dislike Dawkins so much? I'm sure he doesn't dislike you.

[Togo]

@20.10. Looks like I was right over the target then.