ARE YOU UNABLE IN PRINCIPLE AND PRACTICE TO REFUTE THE EXISTENCE OF GOD BECAUSE YOU CAN'T PROVE A NEGATIVE?

To say you have proven that God exists is to say, "I prove God does not exist" is false.  To say you have proven that God does not exist is to say, "I prove God does exist" is false.

Proving the negative means you are claiming to prove that something does not exist. It is argued that this is not possible. "You can never prove 'non-God' exists" - as in you cannot prove the non-existence of God.

Many insist that you cannot prove a negative. You cannot prove that God does not exist. You cannot prove there is no Santa Claus. You cannot prove there are no witches.
 
They won't tell you that these points do not matter.

Here is why.

1 Regarding most things we cannot prove, we assume they are nonsense and treat them as such.

2 They are selective. They are trying to manipulate you into thinking there could be a God. They only care about "You cannot prove a negative" when it comes to God. They don't if it is a witch or a magic fairy. Talk about double-standards. If God is a God of truth he would not want you to argue the way they do. The argument insults God.

3 They are talking about proof in the strictest sense. But by proof we mean "beyond reasonable doubt." It is not about the unrealistic effort to show something is false with complete certainty.

4 People say that it comes down to what you mean by proof. If you mean 100% and undeniable proof then there is no proof of God's existence or non-existence. You cannot boast if you are a believer that the atheist is made foolish by being unable to prove atheism. But if you mean proof in the way we usually mean it then God is possibly, plausibly or totally disproved. The disproof could be out there for us to discover. God could be disproved without anybody knowing it.

5 Many negatives can be proven.

OTHER THOUGHTS

One massive reason why lies and errors and antitruth religions thrive and will be around in some form forever is down to the problem of trying to prove a negative. They take advantage of that to make people think, "Maybe it is true. We can't prove it wrong so maybe we should live by it more."

When you say don't believe in God or don't find God credible you are told, "But how do you prove something does not exist? You cannot." This is the topic of "proving the negative" and it comes up predictably in the subject of God. That it dominates with God belief shows that there is bias being paved for.

It cuts both ways. If you cannot prove God is fiction or cannot prove God is true then surely you should be told you can toss a coin and even if there is a God he cannot judge you. Truly respecting unbelief in God demands that you help people be atheist and affirm them if that is their choice. That is not what happens. Baptisms and religious schools make a cold house for atheist children or those who want to be.

How do you prove that a falsehood is in fact a falsehood and wrong? If somebody says there is such an animal that eats fire and is lying then you cannot prove either that it is a lie or that the animal does not exist. The scope for being wrong or fooled is inherent. It is “more” inherent when the falsehood is supernatural or paranormal based. For example, if you say that vaccines somehow in some possibly supernatural or paranormal way cause detachment from God in many people how do you disprove that? You cannot test everybody. It is for that reason irrefutability is a vice.

To say, “An invisible magic man lives down the garden” knowing that nobody can prove the negative - that is prove you wrong - is cheating. If you were not cheating you would say, “An invisible magic man lives down the garden AND/OR there is a goat that nothing can detect in the field AND/OR…AND/OR to infinity. In other words, you have no right to cherry-pick from the infinite options you have. You are cherry-picking because you want to fool yourself which makes it other peoples business for to really fool yourself you must take in others too. You don't care what invisible or magical being may be in the garden at all as long as you want to believe it is a specific one. You are lying as if you care what is real in the garden. You do not.

Some say you need to prove a negative, namely that in no possible way is there a God of any kind, in order to be an atheist. They want to make it too difficult for you but it is enough to show that there is no power out there which loves us and has the power to fix what is wrong in the world and in us. 

Believers in God consider many versions of God to be disproved. For example, if there is a God that does not do anything they deny that such a God exists. Catholics deny the existence of a God who is not all about grace - relating to us as a friend and forgiving and healing our bad side.
As nice proof that there is no God would be, you don't really need it. You would only need it if there was proof of non-existence out there. Proof should be sought when available for the simple reason it helps us see facts.

An atheist is a person is one who has no experience of God or of faith in God that he or she considers valid. This is like how an asexual is not a person who rejects sex but who has no interest. God is not God to such an atheist for God by definition means the infinite good that alone really matters. There is God as in theory and God as in the more important - personal touch. The atheist is an independent person who does not want anybody, especially God to tell them what do do with their life. The atheist because of that BECOMES an indication that there may be no God. Evidence is not just things it is people too. The biggest thing about God, the personal side, is not there.
 
ABSENCE OF EVIDENCE

Absence of evidence for x is not evidence of absence. If the evidence should be there but is not that is warrant for denying x exists even if it's not evidence or proof. Absence of evidence for God is evidence of absence for the concept wrecks the concepts of evidence and proof. 

Believers may put their "You can't prove a negative" argument as follows, "If there is absence of evidence for God's existence, that is not evidence for God's absence." But against that you can say, "If there is absence of evidence for atheism, that is not evidence that atheism is fiction."
Let us experiment with a God that is different from the one that is promoted today. "If there is absence of evidence for Zeus's existence, that is not evidence for Zeus's absence." But against that you can say, "If there is absence of evidence for atheism as regards to Zeus, that is not evidence that atheism as regards to Zeus is fiction."

The bottom line is we need to talk about if the theory we choose has evidence and is coherent. 

Suppose we decide to not remain neutral and choose either to say God is proven or atheism is proven. It then is one or the other. Then the problem is that God is usually seen as a moral code that is given personality and there are different versions. God? Then which one? That is where it goes wrong and the atheist side is the wisest for it keeps it simple, "Its all blind force. There is nothing directing anything."

PHILOSOPHERS

If you say you can prove something does not exist you will be accused of assuming you can prove a negative. As a philosopher would say, "negative existential propositions cannot be proven". But this is itself trying to prove a negative! To say, "You cannot prove anything does not exist" is a negative. You are saying it is proven when it is not. In principle if not in practice it is possible to show that something's non-existence can be proven!

MANY NEGATIVES CAN BE PROVEN
 
Many negatives can be proven.  Enough negatives can be proven.  Who cares if we cannot show that Jesus lost a toe nail in 15 AD after being pushed by a Roman soldier.

You can prove that your mother is not made of ice. In fact you are assuming that there is no God who has made this person of ice while everybody has some disorder from original sin or something that blinds them to it.  Perhaps he makes you feel her warm embrace though it is not warm at all and is sub-zero. Perhaps as creator he is using a force to make her and you think she is not ice when she is. After all he makes you think a table is solid when in fact physics tells you it is empty space almost entirely.

If God has to let a little innocent baby endure months of torment for a mysterious purpose then you have no right to say that he is not giving you a mother made of ice.

Do not see God as a thing but as a statement about an active being that is involved in everything. God is action and activity. See God together with the implications if there is a God.

You are strongly saying there is no chance he is giving you a maternal ice lolly. You are saying it is proven that he is not intervening and cannot be.  You deny the existence of a God who miraculously makes her seem to be of flesh when she is of ice.

So proving the negative about your mother is admitting that there is no God doing this ice thing.  Believers in God are also atheists in many ways. They decide what a God should or should not do and worship that.  So they put themselves before God in the name of God!  So their belief in God is actually self-serving confusion mimicking order and good sense.  That is more atheism itself than belief.

BIAS

We all have our biases. The biggest risk of bias is with the untestable – the supernatural. It is unknown. For these reasons it is wise to assume that the supernatural is just an excuse for bias. It is being biased and hiding it.

POSSIBILITIES

Possibilities do not count unless the evidence is saying they count. But in that case it is not possibilities we have but probabilities. A possibility is nothing but it becomes something when evidence appears and it is no longer a possibility but a probability.

Every believer starts off by thinking God is giving them the light to believe. This is not a probability but a possibility so that is out.

Am I saying then that "possibilities do not count" excludes God and makes God a mere invention? Yes. The intention is to form an invented idea of God. We all have a bias problem and one way that happens is by loving possibilities too much. But what if they find he probably is guiding them. What then? They cannot know that for if we believe what we prefer to believe.
Christians abuse possibility. We are told that it makes sense to listen to hearsay that Jesus rose when we cannot talk to the witnesses and even worse when there is no paperwork to say that anybody did when they were alive. This assumes that it is possible that the hearsay is right therefore it makes it reasonable to believe Jesus rose. That makes no sense. The same people will not hold that their garden gnome really came to life for a few minutes though somebody they trust is saying it.

You cannot take something seriously just because it is a possibility. If believers are making a God out of possibility and basing God on that then do they really make God the big concern they say they do? 

"If it is possible that Dr X was Jack the Ripper for he was not at home the night of the murders that possibility counts but only as far as the evidence allows. It may only count slightly. But if there is nothing at all that suggests he did it then the possibility that he did does not count. We should not even consider it." This is wrong. It is only a suggestion but does not count. That it is something to explore does not mean you give it credence. It only means you are thinking of directions to try out.
 
Possibilities are a necessary evil. In what way? They deny you the certainty you want and need and can lead you astray.
 
Thus if you adopt the concept of God that makes far more possibilities than you need. For example, maybe witches are real then for the supernatural is real if there is a God. It is fine to say there are definitely and absolutely no such things as vampires or werewolves. It seems arrogant for it seems you cannot know that for sure. But we do not think of anybody who is sure as arrogant. And Occam’s Razor says assume what you need and no more so you don’t need to assume they exist.

God allegedly did the big miracle of raising Jesus from the dead. The evidence that Jesus' tomb was empty and that he was seen in visions may be wrong for perhaps none of that happened and the miracle or paranormal event of false memories was done on the witnesses? A miracle cannot count as evidence for you never know what the evidence is for you don't know what the miracle was. Paranormal is distinguished from miracle though it can clearly pass for a miracle which makes it more complicated.

If possibilities do not count, then you cannot say exactly what the miracle was. That is only picking out your favorite possibility. But this is head work and is not about what you want.

BURDEN OF PROOF

The burden of proof means that if you say x is true or untrue you are the one that has to give the evidence. It is not up to the other person.

It is also the burden of having to not just lay out the evidence but explain that it is evidence and why it is evidence. You take the burden of showing that other explanations for the evidence are unlikely or wrong. That actually means a lot of work. With something big such as God or accusing somebody of a major crime, you have to live out, "I take the burden of proving that I have considered and eliminated all other possibilities! And, “I take the burden of proving that I have considered and eliminated all the possibilities and found the best one.”

That warns us that in religion in particular, people are not putting in the work and thus lying to themselves and therefore to us. To lie to yourself is by extension to lie to others.

LAST WORD

If we cannot prove the negative then God is not just an exception. He is the superlative exception ... it is a bigger and more foundational claim that merely saying there is a goblin in the garden. And he is the supreme exception...