The following has been written as a response to an article that can be found here:
Confirmation bias is the human tendency to affirm prior beliefs by interpreting evidence that agrees with that belief and disconfirms, or pointedly ignores what seems to contradict or oppose whatever presents itself as antithetic to that belief. "Confirmation bias occurs from the direct influence of desire on beliefs." This means, that whatever you believe or don't believe about reality, is likely to be affected by confirmation bias. So, if you believe that nature, or material reality is all that exists, (which is the faith of most atheists) then all your senses are tuned by confirmation bias to explain all phenomena in those terms. So when someone calls some strange, perhaps inexplicable event a "religious epiphany" the confirmation bias of a confirmed naturalist kicks in and it is all explained away in natural terms: "The steak you had for dinner reacted with you to give the appearance or sensation of an epiphany,." "That feeling of sublimity and sense of awe, even worship invoked by the beautiful sunset you expressed is just an appreciation for beauty, and it means nothing more than you have had a good day, and it just so happened the sunset was coincident to the state of endorphins, oxytocin, serotonin, or dopamine in your body". "The fact that you and your brother, practical atheists all your lives, became Christians on exactly the same Easter weekend separted by 100 kilometers, and without any knowledge of what was happening to the other was simply coincidence. A chance event"
And so the only strictly honest and unbiased approach, or conclusion to make from the understanding of "confirmation bias" is that it's utterly useless for informing us as to whether God does or does not exist. And also we can take from it there is no such thing as neutrality. There is no such thing as secular neutrality, and no-such thing as theistic neutrality. But that in no way determines that we cannot be reasonably confident of the truth, but that great care must be taken to account for this reality. If confirmation bias tell us anything it is that whatever view people hold it will be equally effective in either theist or atheist, and thus cancelling each other out for any practical purpose.
Because the graphic as it turns out, only tells us half of the story. Or, to be precise, only two thirds of the story. Two thirds, because there is yet another option. The two options given in the illustration purport to show that there is not a jot of difference between an "imaginary god" and a sentient milk bottle, and so the same answers to any request will give the same three possible results. What the author of this graphic has notoriously failed to take into account, is what happens if a third option is put alongside the other two.
The third option might be that we use a person of indubitable existence. Take my wife for instance. There is not a shred of doubt in my mind that she exists. So then, let us ask a request of her and examine the possible three answers she might give. What shall we then ask? Well all of this thinking has made my throat quite dry and it must be about time for a nice cup of coffee. "Dearest" I ask in my most endearing voice,"will you kindly make me a coffee?" And what answers might we possibly envisage? "Yes darling", "No, certainly not", or perchance "Not now dearest, perhaps when I've finished baking". And, for those with whom the penny has not yet dropped, what might be the point of this little exercise? The point being, that for some the existence of God is as unlikely as a talking, thinking, acting milk bottle, and therefore if both these give the same possible answers then it looks like we have a degree of evidence to suppose that neither of them actually exist. But the introduction of a third entity, one whose existence is not in doubt, demonstrates that the three possible answers to our request has not altered one bit. So, thereby proving that the so called "test" tells us nothing at all about the existence of God or a talking, thinking, acting milk bottle, because the same results are possible from a real person. Following this then, here again, as in the charge of confirmation bias, this too tells us absolutely nothing about the existence or not of God, and is pernicious for the reason that it contains nothing but sophistry and illusion, and is a complete waste of everyones time, including this laborious engagement that has taken all my time to demonstrate.
In fact what the original meme attempts to demonstrate, which is confirmation bias at work in theists, I have demonstrated (to anyone with a modicum of good will) is that it shows the opposite, and that it indicates a tendency of confirmation bias against theism, because of this serious ommission to disclose this other possibility.
The Bottle of Milk Delusion
The author of the piece referenced in the link doesn't claim to be the originator of the milk bottle meme, but obviously goes along with what it claims to do, to lay doubt to the existence of God.
What he has authored though, is his reference to "confirmation bias". However as I hope to show shortly, confirmation bias is a double edged sword.
And so the only strictly honest and unbiased approach, or conclusion to make from the understanding of "confirmation bias" is that it's utterly useless for informing us as to whether God does or does not exist. And also we can take from it there is no such thing as neutrality. There is no such thing as secular neutrality, and no-such thing as theistic neutrality. But that in no way determines that we cannot be reasonably confident of the truth, but that great care must be taken to account for this reality. If confirmation bias tell us anything it is that whatever view people hold it will be equally effective in either theist or atheist, and thus cancelling each other out for any practical purpose.
And speaking of the utter uselessness of this knowledge to our purpose, the same must be said for the graphic in your article.Why so? You may well ask. Here is the original graphic. 
Because the graphic as it turns out, only tells us half of the story. Or, to be precise, only two thirds of the story. Two thirds, because there is yet another option. The two options given in the illustration purport to show that there is not a jot of difference between an "imaginary god" and a sentient milk bottle, and so the same answers to any request will give the same three possible results. What the author of this graphic has notoriously failed to take into account, is what happens if a third option is put alongside the other two.
The third option might be that we use a person of indubitable existence. Take my wife for instance. There is not a shred of doubt in my mind that she exists. So then, let us ask a request of her and examine the possible three answers she might give. What shall we then ask? Well all of this thinking has made my throat quite dry and it must be about time for a nice cup of coffee. "Dearest" I ask in my most endearing voice,"will you kindly make me a coffee?" And what answers might we possibly envisage? "Yes darling", "No, certainly not", or perchance "Not now dearest, perhaps when I've finished baking". And, for those with whom the penny has not yet dropped, what might be the point of this little exercise? The point being, that for some the existence of God is as unlikely as a talking, thinking, acting milk bottle, and therefore if both these give the same possible answers then it looks like we have a degree of evidence to suppose that neither of them actually exist. But the introduction of a third entity, one whose existence is not in doubt, demonstrates that the three possible answers to our request has not altered one bit. So, thereby proving that the so called "test" tells us nothing at all about the existence of God or a talking, thinking, acting milk bottle, because the same results are possible from a real person. Following this then, here again, as in the charge of confirmation bias, this too tells us absolutely nothing about the existence or not of God, and is pernicious for the reason that it contains nothing but sophistry and illusion, and is a complete waste of everyones time, including this laborious engagement that has taken all my time to demonstrate.
In fact what the original meme attempts to demonstrate, which is confirmation bias at work in theists, I have demonstrated (to anyone with a modicum of good will) is that it shows the opposite, and that it indicates a tendency of confirmation bias against theism, because of this serious ommission to disclose this other possibility.
