They also believe the their deity can “fix” anything, from disabled hands to homosexuals.
Yeah, If you want a recovery from a disease that occasionally goes into spontaneous remission by itself then he/she/it is your man/woman/spirit/vapour/elephant hybrid
(disclaimer - cure not guaranteed, praying does not obligate a response from said deity, be aware that any response may also take the form of a NO! supernatural cures may only be dispensed in the same proportion as the purely naturally occurring spontaneous cures so as to preserve the ineffability of the deity in question…terms and conditions apply)
Yet they remain curiously incapable of growing back lost limbs. Mysterious ways indeed.
I once had one such person tell me: Well, if you have a relationship with god and your sister sees how happy it makes you, she’ll starting believing in god and stop being a lesbian.
I cannot begin to tell you what is wrong with that statement.
That would prove He exists. No more need for faith.
The idea of a permanent afterlife is as scary to me as dying and there beyond nothing beyond. I grew up a Catholic believer, and I remember being in my bed, maybe around when I was 10 or 11, trying to fall asleep and think about the concept of an eternal afterlife. Things just going and never ever ending. Somehow, I felt like I really understood it, and it would scare the shit out of me.
So, really, it’s six to one, half dozen to the other. I don’t find either outcome depressing, but both outcomes are spooky. I suppose the above does not necessarily correlate exactly with atheism vs theism, but the concept of an afterlife is so engrained in me as a theist belief, that that’s the first thing I think of.
I find it much less depressing than any of the popular theist worldviews. I don’t have to worry about the whims of an arbitrary (at best) or monstrously evil (at worst) deity. Further, the atheist worldview allows for plenty of mystery – I don’t know what happens when we die… in fact, no one, at least no one who hasn’t died, knows. Likely nothing, but maybe not. We really have no answers at all, only hypotheses we can make.
I am very hesitant to post in this thread, but since it is probably lacking in non-atheist perspective, I will. I am not even going to power up the personal battle shields, because I am not looking for a battle.
I am a devout Christian and I imagine* the atheist worldview would be depressing.
A couple thoughts:
In the atheistic worldview I am reduced from a body with an eternal soul to just a body. And lets face it, a body is basically a bag of very complex chemical reactions. My wife, daughter and son are just smaller bags of complex chemical reactions. Love, hate, and life are nothing more than these reactions. If I am not concerned when a chemical reaction in a vat ceases, why should I be concerned if people’s reactions (lives) stop? There is nothing more to it.
The Earth gets reduced to a meaningless speck of dust in a very very huge universe. We have no evidence to believe we are not alone (or at least far enough away to be functionally alone). The meaningless becomes even more profound.
For many people the idea (whether it is real or not) of an eternal more blissful existence after death is very comforting. Just like the idea of Christmas coming transforms the entire month of December for kids.
Last, but not least, I have seen how Christianity has had a very positive effect on my family and other families. I have personally seen how how it has brought life back into people that had almost none left. I have seen how it has guided men** to be better husbands and better fathers. Without that, I think it would be depressing to see.
- Note that I didn’t say you should feel it is depressing nor am I trying to convince you it should be. I am not saying your thoughts are invalid. Trying to prove my thoughts wrong will not make you the winner.
** And yes, I specifically mean men. Too many men are either absent or are “in charge” but are not responsible. As a husband and a father, you they responsible the the success of your family. No one is perfect, but they should be doing their best. Display servant leadership just as Jesus washed the feat of his disciples. Men undoubtedly hold most of the power in this society, and they have been using it to pursue their own interest over the interest of others.
Hermitian - thanks for offering your views. Not gonna try to persuade you otherwise, nor will I insult your belief.
Count me in with the folk who do not find existence without belief in a supernatural being depressing, and who find the alternative (raised Catholic) to be depressing.
How do religionists avoid thinking about whether they picked the right god to believe in? I would find it depressing to think that the primary reason I believed in the god of a certain sect was because I was exposed to it by region and/or upbringing, and that I might be angering some supernatural entity by doing/saying/believing false teachings.
Yeah, that always strikes me as a basic question. Frequently return to Homer asking, what if we believe in the wrong god, and every time we go to church he just gets madder and madder? 
Always struck me as quite prideful. The idea that billions of perfectly moral Asians were wrong and were going to hell was what convinced me of atheism as a grade schooler.
Can someone tell me what the atheist world view is? I’m not a very devout atheist so I’m not up on all the dogma.
“just” a body? a body is a remarkable thing.
yep, that pretty much sums it up at a basic level. We are all just chemicals and forces. No evidence exists to suggest anything else is at work. I don’t think that is something to be depressed about. How incredible is it to track the formation of atoms in the heart of the stars through to the complicated mechanisms of the eye of the folding of a protein?
Because though they are purely chemical and electrical reactions the concept of pain and suffering exist and are real to those that experience them. Trying to live in such a way as to minimise such things seems a reasonable way to approach life.
Why do you think the universe owes you an external meaning? There simply may not be any meaning. We can always ask “how” but there is not always a directed purpose that gives us a “why”.
Sure, that is the way I treat the concept of a god and an afterlife. It has the exact same weight of evidence behind it as Santa Claus, fairies or hobbits.
If you are wanting to claim the good for religion then you also have to claim the bad as well.
Plus, I really don’t think that religion is much of a poster child for the betterment of men. There are multiple religious communities who treat women like crap and quite a lot of it stems from their religious texts.
I scribbled it on a post-it note and stuck it to your monitor. It was a cartoon of a monkey on a bike, we’ll just wing it from there.
There are a thousand spaces on the Wheel Of Religion, and you must place the right number of markers, and the right colors of said markers, on the proper space…and a prize that no one has seen and no one can describe supposedly waits beyond a one-way door.
Playing a game like that with my life would certainly be depressing.
The more I read about him, the more he’s my personal hero. I think it started when I read of how he – without knowing the combination – would open the classified file cabinets at Los Alamos and leave behind a note.
Amen (oops). Add that the guy who’s advising you where to place your bet is not the owner of the wheel (of whom you’re not even sure is there at all) but rather one of his employees and you’ve got a wager even Pascal would blanch at.
Yes (to me, not necessarily to you), but probably not in the way you’re thinking. Atheism is the absence of a belief in God, and you presumably don’t know what I mean by God (it’s a concept you’re not using). In my conceptual environment (not necessarily in yours) an atheist perspective would imply the lack of any meaning. Not to “my life” – to anything whatsoever and whithersoever. The absence of any correct answers to any questions that request evaluating the goodness or desirability or relative quality of anything.
This fundamentally depends on the definition of God as a benevolent entity. Something you assume without evidence.
Some are benevolent, some are vindictive, some are indifferent, some are pretty, some are witty and some are wise…but they are all equally without evidence of their existence, and I am atheist in regard to them all until the situation changes.
Hermitian could you please show me one devoutly religioua person to whom the laws of complex chemical reactions do not apply? Who could drink a bottle of poison and not be affected, or walk off a 50 foot building and not be harmed. Believe in god has nothing to do with changing those chemical reactions. Why not get bitten by a poisonous snake and expect god to save you?
And, yes, the whole “Christian” idea that men are better and should be in charge of woman. And god is a “he.” 'Nuff said.
What is depressing about this life on this earth in this time, when so much is possible? What is depressing about living for my own happiness and that of my loved ones, rather than living for a cruel monster in the sky?