# Thoughts about my atheism **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [December 22, 2006, 8:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-about-my-atheism/385204 "2006-12-22T08:58:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Zerc](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/82dd89/32.png) [@Zerc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zerc)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2006, 8:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-about-my-atheism/385204/1 "2006-12-22T08:58:44Z")
I don’t believe in a god(s) so I guess I’m an atheist. At the same time, however, I am open to the idea there may be a being that created the universe from their own dimension/bigger universe/some other place. If there is such a being I don’t believe that they have any interest in us and if they did that interest is of the same level as a scientist being interested in the bacteria in his petri dish. As an offshoot of my beliefs I sometimes wonder if I may be living in a simulation. If I am living in a simulation then I’m not sure if anyone else exists although it is entirely possible that everybody else is sharing the simulation with me. I’m wondering if any other Dopers sometimes have the same beliefs as me or am I just thinking too much about it? Also, does the fact that I don’t completely discount a creator prevent me from considering myself an atheist? I don’t think so because I don’t believe in a God who should be worshipped. Thanks for your replies ---
**Author:** ![Charger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/df788c/32.png) [@Charger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Charger)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2006, 9:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-about-my-atheism/385204/2 "2006-12-22T09:05:56Z")
I would say you would fall under the category of agnostic. I am a Christian who has wondered much of what you have. When I look at issues like Intelligent Design, I see it as there being an architect to the laws of nature, which could be a race of alien beings for all we know. I think the smart thing about issues of religion is to always be open to the possibility that you may be completely wrong, and to always be aware that you are statistically likely to be wrong about something. ---
**Author:** ![MEBuckner](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mebuckner/32/2896_2.png) [@MEBuckner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MEBuckner)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2006, 9:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-about-my-atheism/385204/3 "2006-12-22T09:17:11Z")
[QUOTE=Charger] I would say you would fall under the category of agnostic. [/QUOTE] That’s a common misconception, but in fact many (most?) people who call themselves atheists have similar beliefs, in the sense that they don’t flatly rule out any possibility of some sort of creator or God or gods, but on the other hand they just aren’t convinced that there _is_ a God or gods, either, and so lack belief in same; also, such an atheist may believe that a _particular definition_ of God has been definitively disproven, is impossible by definition, etc. See [An Introduction to Atheism](http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/mathew/intro.html) for more discussion. ---
**Author:** ![Oakminster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/77aa72/32.png) [@Oakminster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oakminster)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2006, 9:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-about-my-atheism/385204/4 "2006-12-22T09:30:36Z")
[QUOTE=Zerc] As an offshoot of my beliefs I sometimes wonder if I may be living in a simulation. If I am living in a simulation then I’m not sure if anyone else exists although it is entirely possible that everybody else is sharing the simulation with me. I’m wondering if any other Dopers sometimes have the same beliefs as me or am I just thinking too much about it? [/QUOTE] Dimly lit room. _Dark Side of the Moon_. Ride it out. Seriously, I suspect everyone has pondered the nature of existence and/or God at some point. There are libraries full of books on the subject. Aristotle to Timothy Leary. Ya pays your money and ya takes your chances. I don’t think it particularly matters what you believe. The important thing is what you do. Maybe you’ll have to answer for it someday, maybe not. Either way, ya still gotta look at the man in the mirror while you shave. ---
**Author:** ![aclubs](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e68b1a/32.png) [@aclubs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aclubs)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2006, 9:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-about-my-atheism/385204/5 "2006-12-22T09:34:41Z")
Perhaps men are the dreams of gods. Perhaps gods are the dreams of men. ---
**Author:** ![Li\_l\_Pluck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ee59a6/32.png) [@Li\_l\_Pluck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Li_l_Pluck)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2006, 10:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-about-my-atheism/385204/6 "2006-12-22T10:37:05Z")
I’m much like you, Zerc. I don’t know how the Universe (and all that that includes) came into being (and I actually don’t care to the extent that it keeps me up at night), but I \*can \* allow that some creator or creators \*may be \* responsible. Like I said, though, I really don’t need to have something like that determined definitively in order for me to get through the life that I have. (Gee, I hope this doesn’t make it seem as if I’m living in happy, ignorant bliss, but perhaps I am.) Given this, I consider myself to be an atheist (albeit a practicing Jew, but a godless atheist Jew, nonetheless), because while I can allow for the \*possibility \* of a creator/whatever, I don’t believe, and it makes no \*\*logical \*\* sense to me, that such a creator or creators (a) require human adulation and worship for their ego boost, (b) demand human worshp because, well, they damn well can, or © are active in human or world affairs, i.e., can’t stop planes from crashing, can’t cure illnesses, etc. IOW, \*if \* they exist, they don’t give a holy fuck what we do or what happens to us. (And that, IMHO, has been proved time and time and time again.) As you might imagine, then, I don’t believe in heaven, hell, or any kind of afterlife (other than how one is remembered by those one leaves behind), and I’m actually quite comfortable with the idea that when I die…well, I die. IOW, the idea that I will, one day, cease to exist in any form doesn’t bother me, espeically considering that there was a time before I was born that I didn’t exist. True, this can be a difficult concept to wrap one’s brain around, and undestandably so, but I believe that this is pretty much what happens in death. And I agree with **Oakminster**. To me, you can have all of the religion in the world that you want, but in the end, what \*really \* matters is the kind of person you are during the life that you \*\*KNOW \*\* you have. Other than that? Feh. ---
**Author:** ![Li\_l\_Pluck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ee59a6/32.png) [@Li\_l\_Pluck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Li_l_Pluck)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2006, 10:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-about-my-atheism/385204/7 "2006-12-22T10:38:30Z")
Sorry, **Zerc** , I meant to boldface your name in my previous post, so…here ya go: **Zerc**. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Li\_l\_Pluck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ee59a6/32.png) [@Li\_l\_Pluck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Li_l_Pluck)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2006, 10:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-about-my-atheism/385204/8 "2006-12-22T10:54:11Z")
Shit! In case it’s not clear, I just wanted to clarify that I have \*\*no problem \*\* with science and the like–in fact, I rather \*\*agree \*\* with science, the notion of evolution, etc. (Makes much more sense to me than making up names for shit that we don’t understand and ascribing anthropomorphic qualities to things that we can’t see/touch/taste/smell/interact with, that’s for sure.) I just meant that I could leave room for the possibility that evolution didn’t come from, well, nothing, whatever the opposite of that nothing might ultimately be (and I don’t care what that might ultimately be). Got me? Good. ---
**Author:** ![Zerc](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/82dd89/32.png) [@Zerc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zerc)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2006, 10:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-about-my-atheism/385204/9 "2006-12-22T10:57:25Z")
[QUOTE=Li’l Pluck] Sorry, **Zerc** , I meant to boldface your name in my previous post, so…here ya go: **Zerc**. 🙂 [/QUOTE] Don’t worry about it Li’l Pluck. Oops, I meant **Li’l Pluck** 😉 I like what you said in your previous post. I must say that somehow I have a difficulty in believing that one day I’ll die and be no more. Logically I know that I will cease to exist but emotionally I can’t get my head around the fact that I won’t exist and that I won’t even know that I don’t exist. I suppose that when I die it will be same as when I had an anaesthetic and after I woke up I had no sense of time passing except that I won’t wake up. I didn’t really like the feeling but there’s no point in agonising over it though. ---
**Author:** ![Canadjun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/76d3ee/32.png) [@Canadjun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Canadjun)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2006, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-about-my-atheism/385204/10 "2006-12-22T12:39:21Z")
[QUOTE=Zerc] I don’t believe in a god(s) so I guess I’m an atheist. At the same time, however, I am open to the idea there may be a being that created the universe from their own dimension/bigger universe/some other place. If there is such a being I don’t believe that they have any interest in us and if they did that interest is of the same level as a scientist being interested in the bacteria in his petri dish. [/quote] Sounds like you’re a [deist](http://www.answers.com/topic/deism). [QUOTE=Zerc] As an offshoot of my beliefs I sometimes wonder if I may be living in a simulation. If I am living in a simulation then I’m not sure if anyone else exists although it is entirely possible that everybody else is sharing the simulation with me. [/QUOTE] Sounds a little bit like Descartes and his [cogito ergo sum](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cogito_ergo_sum) statement. ---
**Author:** ![Sapo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ec9cab/32.png) [@Sapo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sapo)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2006, 1:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-about-my-atheism/385204/11 "2006-12-22T13:34:07Z")
IF there is a God, a true God should be: Unfalsifiable. A creator of the universe should be outside the universe and therefore not discernible to our science. Uninvolved in the daily workings of our lives. A perfect God would have made a perfect universe on its first try. No need to come here and push stuff around every once in a while. Anything other than that, we are not talking about God but some super powerful alien, force of the universe or what-have-you. So the existence of God doesn’t really impact my intellectual life. It is not a phenomenom to study. I do believe in God. A real kick arse God, not the joke in the OT or any other primitive religion out there (that I know of). My belief in God affects my moral decisions in ways that I could probably rationalize with philosophy but don’t care to. I do them because I have faith that they are the correct choices, not because doing them is the smart thing to do. ---
**Author:** ![According\_to\_Pliny](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8e7dd6/32.png) [@According\_to\_Pliny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/According_to_Pliny)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2006, 1:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-about-my-atheism/385204/12 "2006-12-22T13:35:37Z")
I think you are a deist, certainly not an atheist. ---
**Author:** ![Zerc](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/82dd89/32.png) [@Zerc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zerc)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2006, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-about-my-atheism/385204/13 "2006-12-22T13:37:40Z")
[QUOTE=Canadjun] Sounds like you’re a [deist](http://www.answers.com/topic/deism). According to the site listed above - “Deists hold that correct religious beliefs must be founded on human reason and observed features of the natural world, and that these sources reveal the existence of one God or supreme being”. The way I understand this it means that a Deist believes in a god or supreme being. I am much more undecided and doubt that such a being exists although I don’t completely reject it. So I doubt that I’m a Deist. Most of the time I don’t really think about religion anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2006, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-about-my-atheism/385204/14 "2006-12-22T18:04:56Z")
[QUOTE=aclubs] Perhaps men are the dreams of gods. Perhaps gods are the dreams of men. [/QUOTE] Shh. You’ll wake the Red King. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2006, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-about-my-atheism/385204/15 "2006-12-22T19:26:39Z")
If you think the creator is an imperfect scientist (or grad student - my guess) then you’re an atheist still, not a deist. Deists believe in god, but a god who does not get involved. You’re not alone in wondering if the universe is a simulation. Ed Fredkin, former head of Project MAC at MIT, thought this. He’s written up in a book called _Three Scientists and Their Gods_. When he talked to our class in 1973, he said that Planck time was the simulation time increment, and “miracles” might be bugs. Of course he’s a dreamer - he also told that memory someday might be as cheap as a penny a bit, so I wouldn’t trust someone with such wild predictions. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![AskNott](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asknott/32/5790_2.png) [@AskNott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AskNott)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2006, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-about-my-atheism/385204/16 "2006-12-22T19:33:15Z")
A person who is mostly in one camp, but leans toward a tenet of another camp, is a tweener. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2006, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-about-my-atheism/385204/17 "2006-12-22T19:40:44Z")
[QUOTE=Voyager] If you think the creator is an imperfect scientist (or grad student - my guess) then you’re an atheist still, not a deist. [/QUOTE] How? He’s not a deist, but if he believes in a god, he’s not an atheist. That’s the only requirement we have. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Sapo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ec9cab/32.png) [@Sapo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sapo)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2006, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-about-my-atheism/385204/18 "2006-12-22T19:46:07Z")
[QUOTE=Voyager] …he said that Planck time was the simulation time increment, and “miracles” might be bugs. [/QUOTE] unless you are religious, then it is not a bug, it is a feature. ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2006, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-about-my-atheism/385204/19 "2006-12-22T20:21:04Z")
I don’t think that “living in a simulation” matters, one way or the other. ---
**Author:** ![Napier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ce73a5/32.png) [@Napier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Napier)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2006, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-about-my-atheism/385204/20 "2006-12-22T22:05:31Z")
Zerc, I think I’m a devout athiest, but don’t exactly disagree with any of your ideas, so I think you’re legit as an athiest. I think all the religions got it wrong, and there’s nothing like the gods they describe and worship. I also think there’s an endless continuum of amazing and complicated stuff in the universe and as Clark said any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishible from magic. I doubt anybody is intentionally fooling around with us, just because the universe is so big and empty, but our core understanding of physics has changed enough in the last half a millenium that I feel unconfident about stating limits on what the next ten millenia may turn up. Can’t there be a working definition of “athiest” that says you are sure enough there aren’t any gods in the classic sense that you are going to deny them in practice? I mean, in some logical sense you can never be sure, but if you’re willing to gamble eternity in hell then you seem pretty close to sure. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-about-my-atheism/385204.md?page=2)