Personally, I think he's not seeing the objection. I sympathise with Jibninjas since (from his perspective) I think he probably feels as if he's surrounded by people saying "What are you talking about? 2+2 isn't 4 - prove it!"*

It is possible to prove that 2+2=4 but it's quite difficult (and not something you would expect a layperson to be able to do). Nonetheless, we all know it's true and would probably be baffled to hear people objecting to it.

Where I don't sympathise is in claiming the logic is 'obvious' but then refusing to provide a concrete example. I think (again from his perspective) such a stance should be quite an uncomfortable one to adopt. Especially given that many of us are claiming to not only not see his 'obvious' truth, but to claim it is false. I'd have to ask myself "Why don't I just give them half a dozen examples of actions which constitute 'living as if God doesnt exist'? That'll shut them up.

EDIT: * Perhaps a better analogy would be people claiming that "Some natural numbers are neither even, nor odd".

I understand what you are saying about if God does not exist there is no implications on one's actions, but what you are doing is really making the categories useless. Under your definition of "living as if God does not exist", every action is included.

I don't see it is useful to categorize someone who is living by the implications of believing God exists as someone who is living as God does not exist.

It isn't useful - those categories don't help.

I’m not sure if you’re still reading along Jibninjas, but I thought I’d summarise our conversation as I see it. It seems to me that this tangent arose when you made the following post:
To which I responded:
And you then replied with the claim I find contentious:
One thing you have done several times since is made comments like this:
And this seems completely unwarranted. As I see it, “what we are discussing” is just whatever either of us may bring up. If I had to pick one thing it would be your claim quoted above and my objection to it. The whole point of my argument is that there are some actions which are not affected one way or the other. You nearly conceded this, although when I asked the following for clarity, you didn’t respond:
The point is that if you do think there are such actions, you have something to demonstrate. I can now postulate someone existing who takes only those kinds of actions. I have in fact done so with my (real) friend Dave:
And I think Dave is a counterexample – I don’t think you will place him in either category and if that’s true I will have demonstrated that your categories are not exhaustive as you claim they are. Rather than address this putative counterexample, you have attempted to justify your position along general grounds – attempting to establish that any other category beside ‘living as if God exists’ and ‘living as if God doesn’t exist’ is impossible. However, your justifications for the claim have relied on declaring it a self-evident truth or on a flawed application of the law of the excluded middle (where you brought in an additional premise – namely that “It is not the case that X lives as though God exists” is logically equivalent to “X lives as though God doesn’t exist” which is begging the question as this was precisely the point at issue – I claim they’re not equivalent, you claim they are. An argument which postulates that they are equivalent is not hugely persuasive.
To consider some of your responses, you were at one point asked (by All-In Flynn, I think) “What does it mean to live as thought God does not exist” and you replied:
And this is difficult to respond politely to. You have basically refused to answer his question (beyond asserting that there are many instantiations of it) and then asked yourself a question you’d prefer to answer. What I might identify as your conclusion in this quote (namely “...someone can lack the believe in the proposition "God does exist" while still living their life as if said proposition was true.”) is not in dispute, so I don’t really see how to respond.

Next, you presented an argument by analogy:
And I did respond to this, though we swiftly moved on. I think one difference between living as if the house isn’t on fire and living as if you don’t know if the house is on fire is how you would respond if your wife asked “Is the house on fire?”

Perhaps your analogy will be useful to illustrate what is probably the biggest problem with your schema. You claim (uncontentiously) that if you believe in God it is likely to have consequences in terms of how you act. You therefore proceed to identify these actions (taken as a result of the belief) as “living as if God exists” however this is not all that is entailed by that term. It is also necessary that the actions taken be inconsistent with lacking a belief that God exists – in other words it has to be a logical consequence of not believing in God that you will not take these actions. There may be some loony who has three sugars in his coffee because he believes God told him to. On your account (since this is a direct consequence of his theism) having three sugars is ‘living as if God exists’ and clearly this is silly. The reason it’s silly is because some people who have three sugars do so, even though they don’t believe that God exists. There is nothing odd here – having three sugars is consistent with both believing God exists and not believing God exists. The kind of action we’re seeking is something which believers do which non-believers couldn’t. To return to your analogy:

There will be some people who believe the house is on fire...because they lit the fire and are self-immolating, therefore remaining in the house without doing anything about it. In other words – there is no real way to determine which actions belong in the ‘living as if the house is on fire’ category and which belong in the ‘living as if the house is not on fire’ category. The only way is fiat – you will be forced to just declare that the self-immolators believe that the house is on fire but are living as if it isn’t. What justification do you have for dividing actions in the way you are attempting?

This problem will strike any action you consider to be ‘living as if God exists’. One might suggest it includes “thanking God” when good things happen. Except that there are some non-believers who do that and some believers who don’t. Your only out is to just declare “Ha-ha! That theist is believing but living as if they don’t believe and this atheist is not believing but living as if they do.” Each of them is going to deny your classification and how can it be settled? The theist will say it isn’t necessary to thank God and the atheist will say one can thank God without really meaning it.

Early on you weren’t so reticent in providing examples. You attempted an example with morality which is one illustration of a further problem you face, namely what to do about actions which some theists believe follow logically and some don’t:
And I pointed out that I am a theist who thinks I am making them up as I go along. So am I a lying atheist or a theist living as if God doesn’t exist? I definitely live my life differently and would claim to be living as if God exists. Yet I think I’m making my morals up – I don’t know what God wants, all I have is my subjectively determined set of moral beliefs.

And here you run into the problem again. There are plenty of devout believers living a self-centred manner. How have you decided that this constitutes ‘living as if God does not exist’? You think it is a logical consequence, but they disagree.

This quote ends with what became your standard line for the rest of the thread. Asserting your conclusion:

This isn’t really possible to respond to, other than saying I know you are wrong since I know a guy called Dave who does precisely what you’ve just declared impossible.

The next attempt is a restatement of your claim:
And then an appeal to ignorance.
The way to do it is to take only actions (like the sugar in coffee example) which are consistent with both. What actions are there which are forced upon us and which are inconsistent with theism or are inconsistent with atheism? The only ones I can think of involve honestly answering “Do you believe in God?” or in how you answer other questions “Who made the world?”, “What is it which makes a moral act moral?” and so forth. The honest answers to these questions can be said to be inconsistent with one or other position and not both – what concrete actions are there though? You seemed to deny that you were talking about the propositions people hold to be true and were speaking of actual, concrete actions which would be inconsistent with theism or inconsistent with atheism.
Another restatement. At this point it began to seem to me that your position in fact rests on intuition – as I said to ganstaman, that to you it is as obvious as 2+2=4. This is not a trivial thing to prove, yet we all know it’s true. I’m sympathetic to that plight and it’s part of the reason I am suggesting you provide examples or to address the counterexample of Dave. In my opinion, of course, you won’t be able to sustain your view. Nonetheless, if you’re right, it should be easy to come up with one of the things you think believers do which would be inconsistent with being a non-believer. It should also be relatively trivial to place Dave in one or other of the categories shouldn’t it? Just ask whether he does...<insert definitive action here>.
The closest to an argument you attempted was:
But as you later said:
I hope the previous discussion was clear enough as to why this is not an acceptable application of the law of the excluded middle. The negation of “X lives as if God exists” is “It is not the case that X lives as if God exists” your equating this with “X lives as if God doesn’t exist” is where we are disagreeing – you can’t use it as a premise to establish it as a conclusion.
This is a weird thing to say in my view. Wouldn’t it be necessary if bunny asks you? Why should you ignore my questions unless I hold a particular view (I don’t hold the one you declare as a necessary precondition in this quote). I have essentially two questions that I’m very keen to hear an answer to:
When you answer along these lines:
It reads as quite churlish to me. Who are you to be declaring what I can bring up? I accept that you see no point, but to lay down a condition (‘If you would like to argue that...’) before you’ll entertain the thought strikes me as unhelpful at best and downright patronising at worst.
As far as the first goes – well of course you don’t. Nobody has to do anything. In terms of the second I’d invite you to reconsider, particularly in view of the loony who believes God wants him to have three sugars in his coffee...
Do you see that your label of this as ‘living as if God exists’ is only reasonable if every theist were to choose X? Not only that, but it is only a reasonable label if no atheist were to choose X. Even if one were to accept your statements above – you must prove that everyone is places in situation Y in order for it to have weight – otherwise, people who never have to make the choice are never forced to live one way or the other.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

In summary, I think it might be good to return to your first quote:
I agree that a new thread may be good. Personally, I’d like you to set out your position in a more rigorous way than “I don’t see how....” or “I don’t understand...” or “I think it’s impossible...” In doing so, I think you should pay particular attention to exactly what you mean to refer to with X and Y when you say:
Concrete examples would have to be better, in my view – given so many pages of nobody accepting your claim, I don’t see the attraction in sticking to a ‘proof in the general case’ approach.

I was already in awe of your patience, charity and clarity. After this epic post, I may just convert. Bravo!

Ouch. I mean the response had better be substantial or it just won't be fair. Nice post.

I'm not sure what Jib means here. Usually when theists say that someone is not living as if God exists, they mean that they are not living a moral life. But Jib is sophisticated enough to know that many non-Christians, even non-theists, live highly moral lives--much more so than the average Christian. So I suspect that Jib's statement here is inconsistent with his other views and that is why he is having such difficulty defending it.

Yeah he is capturing them with "One can live as if God exists whilst simultaneously believing he doesn't".

I still think the reason he's having difficulty defending it is because it seems so obvious to him. I am hopeful that, if he takes up the challenge to develop an argument from the ground up he will realise that he is either asserting his conclusion, or that he will be forced to modify the category he is calling 'living as if God exists' to be such a weird construction that the name is no longer relevant.

There are a number of problems with his account we haven't even got to yet (eg If there are two "living-as-if-God-exists" actions X and Y - how do we classify someone who does X but doesn't do Y? At various points he has defined such a person as a member of both groups.)

Most frustrating of all is his continued insistence that, because someone acts differently as a consequence of believing this therefore defines a meaningful class of people. (To use his analogy again - if my house was on fire I would look worried. Nonetheless, it's a strange turn of phrase to suggest that when my wife tells me the cat has escaped again, I immediately 'act as if the house is on fire').

Cheers. Although I don't think my clarity here hasn't been that flash, to be honest. I made several sloppy statements - largely due to the same thing I'm accusing Jibninjas of exhibiting: a belief that the position is so obvious it doesnt need establishing.

Fingers crossed he is interested in beginning that thread...

ok, first I want to say that this is exactly why I did not want to get into this yet. I was purposefully waiting until I had time and fully articulated what my postition actually is and why I believe that it matters (if anything at least why it matters to me.). I admit my position is not as clear as I would like,

in light of bunny taking so much time and effort I feel I should try and clear up my position and address some of the common objections. I have started a post in a word doc at work and am going to take some time to try and cover everything from start to finish. but this is probably going to take a day or two.

I also want to address something that is a fairly common theme in a lot of threads. the fact that 10 people are telling me I am wrong (or any other theist) really doesnt hold too much weight. if you state anything from a theistic worldview, it is going to be objected to be just about everyone as almost everyone is an atheist here. or more specifically, if something does not agree with or is in favor of an atheistic worldview it is blasted. unless i become an atheist, this is going to be how things are. so you have to forgive me if I dont change every thought i have because people here disagree.

Take longer as far as I'm concerned (if ever). I hope you go through with it, but I don't think you should feel obligated (certainly if you're busy). My long post was just as much closure/clarity on my part - I don't think you owe me a reply.
I agree completely - if you think this is what I said, please consider other interpretations. I don't think you should change your mind due to the fact that many people think you're wrong. I think you should be concerned that something you think is so obvious on logical grounds is not finding any support. I didn't mean to imply you're therefore wrong - merely that such a situation warrants spelling out your position in detail and with some rigour.

EDIT: I can't help but mention that when you say: "...if you state anything from a theistic worldview..." are you perhaps including making these sorts of statements as 'living as if God exists'?

i will do it. what we have been discussing is really on a part of it. I want to explain this concept as it is really is actually important to why i hold the postions that i do.

sorry, this part of the post was not directed at you at all.

we will see.

No worries. I look forward to it.
Tease.

I have no problem with your statement above. What is important is the quality and, to a lesser extent, quantity of the arguments against your view, not the amount of people who think it is incorrect. I do disagree however, with your claim that "almost everyone is an atheist here" (especially in light of the fact that the person pushing you hardest on this claim is himself a theist). As this is a common theme for theists here, I'll rebut it by listing the relatively frequent theist commenters I can think of without searching through threads:

Jibninjas
bunny
NotReady
Aaron W.
Concerto
Pletho (not really, but we'll pretend)
Stu Pidasso
Splendour
RLK
Duffe (I think)
Bigpooch
Hardball47
ganstaman
Jerok
JoeyDiamonds (taking "comment" very loosely)
ajmargarine (assuming there is something coherent going on there)
BigErf

OrP,

Yes, there are other theists here, yes. But look around at the threads at the ratio of theist to atheist. Then look an specific "discussions". It is almost always 1 (sometimes 2) theists against 4-5 atheists in a conversations and another 2-4 providing colour commentary.

Bunny does believe in God, but you will notice takes the position of most atheists on a significant amount of subjects. If it was NR or Aaron W or Bigpooch etc then it might give me more pause.

Wow. Just wow.

Explain to me how I'm supposed to take that.

ok, have to crash. But I did not mean that in any sort of negative way. will explain in the morning.

You should accept that you've been wasting your time by trying to have an intelligent debate with Jibby and move on.

Apparently you're not Christian enough for him to take you seriously.

Well I look forward to it, since I'm struggling to find a positive interpretation.

All it means is that you post as if God doesn't exist, obviously. Isn't that what this thread has become about?

[insert smiley to indicate non-seriousness]

I already have plans for Jib $50.
My prop was a long time ago was that this will end with "non-believers don't believe" because there was no escape from his claim on logical grounds.

Splenda is the other poster that uses the idea of "theistic logic" and "theistic math" and Jib tried early to keep the "it's about belief" out of it with pointing to the fact that his claim is about ACTIONS ( factual things) with --

of course, the analogy he gave at that point contradicted his claim, but I'm quite sure in theistic logic that doesn't matter -

The "either" refers they can chose to do X ( as the ones who know their mother is alived do) or not do X ( as the ones who know she's dead do). Yet, his original claim is that people who don't know ALWAYS chose as if she is dead ... not that they can chose to do either.

But in the end, this won't come down to actions people take as he has been yelling all through the thread, but to their beliefs - 'non-believers don't believe." That's why Bunny's etc showing how the logic is wrong doesn't matter .... "they believe wrong".

Do you make it a point to get into arguments on the internet about topics that you don't have a position on?

This might suggest that you just like to argue - what a shocking revelation for a troll.

Man, Jib's really built up those defenses...actually taking time to state that just because he's a theist doesn't mean he's wrong? Perhaps he'd like to quote a particular post from this thread that spurred him to post that?

I think it was his own -
Apparently, it has now become too tough even for him --