Atheist, and for me both logically and intuitively Im confident of my position:
Logically
I understand the principles of burden of proof, and general skepticism, and no religion has come close to meeting the required standard to believe the extreme claims.
In philosophy, all the “proofs” of God have been thoroughly debunked (such that study of philosophy is hated virtually as much as evolution, among apologist organizations).
Intuitively
If I’m absolutely honest it wasn’t logical arguments that originally made me atheist. It was science, especially astronomy, and learning how small humans’ place in the universe is and how often we’ve needed to broaden our horizons and perspective to understand phenomena. Also science fiction; thinking about what humans could potentially accomplish if we got our shit together.
When I’d then sit in religious class, and hear about ancient conflicts, and a savior accomplishing…pretty mundane things already by the standard of 20th century tech, it just so obviously seemed like old fashioned folk tales, not a true understanding of this complex universe.
I’m not an atheist nor pagan as those are words that theist’s use and I don’t want to be called by names, no more than a black person does if you use the n-word. I need god as much as a fish needs a bicycle.
I’m ingnostic. I don’t debate of existence of gods as no-one has never given a conscince description what god is. So there’s nothing to discuss about.
I hate all religions equally. They all indocrtinate childs to believe in non-existing things that somehow should be dictating how they should behave. They even mutilate childs so that the child gets a lifelong scar that tells him that he belongs to a certain sect. All their “truths” are non-falsifiable and thus not science.
I’ve read the Bible, which is the only evidence for the Christian God.
It is not convincing (e.g. the Old and New Testaments describe different Gods; the Gospels have contradictions about the resurrection and in any case were written decades after the events they describe.)
I wouldn’t call myself a full blown atheist, but I’ve seen no evidence that a god exists or gives two shits about the world if he does. Too much bad shit has happened to me, and to the world in general, for me to believe in anything except that shit happens.
Not for me. I know we are on our own, and were it not for the distraction of trying to placate an imaginary force, mankind would do much better relying on ourselves and each other.
I’m an atheist and I just can’t bring myself to believe in a God. God existing makes no sense to me.
Also, and I know this is extremely stupid “logic”, but I just can’t bring myself to believe in Christianity because apart from all the usual objections, it’s sheer luck that it ended up as the major religion that it is. Wouldn’t all these same Christians be swearing Mithradates was all real if the cult of Christianity had fallen apart at some point early on?
I guess I always knew, it appears looking back to my early childhood and my reaching out to God. However I felt I was not ready or yet able to search for God (I remember trying to read the Bible in secret but it was too hard, but I was drawn to it at a young age).
As I grew I went through the phase that God has not proved His existence to me, and I’d say some questions arose.
Later in life I hit a bottom in life, very sad and lonely and in tears I lay down on the ground, face on the floor and said to God ’ I surrender, I ask for no terms or conditions’. It was very shortly after that I received by first vision, that of things coming into places and angels dispatched/released into action on my behalf. Visions are things one sees not with one’s eyes but in one’s mind as if they came from one’s eyes, I’ve only gotten a handful but would like to have more. I also received 4 audio messages that day, the first one was ‘I want to free you’. Like visions these messages were not from the ears but they were as if they came from the ears but are in the mind as if so. Both visions and the audio were very detailed and clear. Both are awesome, but visions more so. Sometimes in visions you can look at something and know things about the object or person that is beyond seeing (such as the name of the person you are seeing, or how they feel etc.)
After which God opened my eyes to see how he works in the world, and it’s incredible how involved and active He is in everyday human existence and how willing He is to share what He does and how much He loves us, etc.
And why God doesn’t ‘prove’ Himself to us, why we can’t scientifically prove Him. It’s by design, by His will, He wants us to ask and take a leap of faith, willing to give everything unconditionally to find Him. It’s personal and very individual, it’s a relationship, not a science experiment.
I disagree. To imagine such a being requires substantial amounts of effort.
The universe appears to me to be just as you’d expect were there no external influence, no further effort needed on my part.
Now it might be more comforting for some to imagine a god but to maintian that belief in the face of a howling void of good evidence seems to me to take substantial dedication.
I could write pages on the subject, but one thing that really nails it is what happens when you ask someone “when you explain to me why your religion is right and the other 10,000 are wrong, then you will have stated the reason I believe your religion is also wrong.”
Then there is the fact that religion offers zero explanatory power as to the nature of matter, the world, and the universe. Science that is out there racing ahead, discovering and learning and teaching new things about the cosmos, while religion limps behind trying to shoehorn new information into ancient stories that can never be allowed to change or admit error. Religious explanations of science and technology become more and more comically desperate as it has to incorporate new information.
I admit my account is biased specifically against evangelical Christianity and other religions which, when stripped of their mysticism, are easily seen as rationales invented for some people to control other people, and are pushed by people who want to be in control. I have no beef with non-theistic, non-patriarchal religions that encourage introspection and meditation and other ways of seeking inner peace and meaning without oppressing others.
Long story short, I was raised with religion and always struggled with it. When I was finally able to admit the possibility of there being no god, all fell into place and the world made far more sense. All that I have read since then (mostly from you guys!) has strengthened my belief that there is no god. And if there is one, it won’t ever matter to me (nor I to it).
Interesting view. I would never have thought of “atheist” that way. I suspect you come from somewhere very religious where “atheist” is thrown around like an insult. It wouldn’t occur to me to consider it that way. I have no qualms about describing myself as an atheist.
I see tavaritz’s point. For me it’s more along the lines of being lumped in with other “odd” religions. I don’t want to be labeled as belonging to a religious group, even if that group’s core is non-belief.
I refer to myself as a heathen, more or less tongue-in-cheek.
I’m an atheist because the concept of a God makes no sense to me whatsoever. It just seems like a very convenient way for people to explain away anything they don’t understand and to give justification to their fears, ignorance, prejudices and tribalism.
As my 94 year old mother once said to me ‘it must feel very reassuring to believe in God, shame it’s such a ridiculous idea’.
Nearly all responses thus far have been from atheists and agnostics. I’d be curious to hear some from Christians or other religious folks as well - I know we have a few here on this board, just haven’t heard from most of them yet.
I was raised without any religion (we celebrated Christmas, Easter, and Seder just as celebrations) and just never developed any belief in the supernatural. So, I’m wasn’t sure, but I just lacked any belief. My kids were also raised this way, and similarly have no belief in a higher power.
It was only the SDMB that really got me reading about all the ways that religious belief is contradictory, and I came across things like “Everyone is an atheist regarding just about every god ever proposed. Atheists just go one further.”
But, before reading those kinds of threads, I just had a total lack of belief. Once here, I thought it through more and became much more skeptical. So, before I was apathetic, and now I’m more skeptical, but you could never be sure.