Speaking as an atheist, my main beef with atheism is that it implies that when we die we stay dead and won’t live in some paradise or be able to meet up with old friends and family members who have died before us and we won’t be able to what happens to the people who are still alive.
However the main of the thread isn’t mainly the beef with atheism so much as the beef with atheists.
So my main beef with atheists is that too often when debating with theists, we are more interested in putting down the theist than we are with winning the theist over to the idea that our view of the world makes more sense. In other words we are lousy at public relations.
“I believe God does not exist” is an assertion that there is nothing to have a belief in, “I do not believe God exists” is an assertion that you do not beleive in a deity. I could say both fit my point of view as an atheist.
That does not take away the sting. When you send your children to church they are supposed to be safe. Religious leaders are held to a higher level. I would not be satisfied that church molesters simply being the same ratio of average citizens. For me that is not nearly good enough.
Not so much a beef with atheism per se, but with a certain subset of straightdope atheists. A dozen of them will pile on you insisting that there is no herd behavior amongst atheists.
Atheists hold back too much from fear of being piled on by godists. The vast majority on this board is godists and they answer in mass to any possible affront to their well trained religious stances. (in mass is trying to be cute ,no need for correction)
Can I see a cite that the vast majority is Godists? In my experience the majority is atheists, at least the majority that enter into the atheist/theist debates. How would one reliably measure such a thing?
Are you saying that sex only occurs when it results in insemination, or when there’s a possibility of insemination? Is it impossible for infertile people to have sex, under your definition? What do you call what I did with my boyfriend? And why is it necessary to differentiate between what I did with my boyfriend, or what Kimstu does using contraceptives, and what you consider to be “real” sex?
Cite?
No, it’s not.
And the relevance of this to the definition of sex is?
Take the rant somewhere else. I made no defense of the situation as it has occurred. A particular statement was made that eliminating the reqirement for a celibate male clergy could possibly reduce the incidence of pedophilia and I presented information challenging that specific statement.
Anyone who thinks that these threads are distorted because people on one side or the other appear to be afraid to respond has not had to wade through these threads. I do not know which “side” has more members, (a number that probably changes from week to week, both in terms of absolute membership and in terms of posters willing to wade into this swamp), but I am pretty sure that neither side has anything resembling a supermajority.
The last time someone tried to find out the believer/non-believer representation on the SDMB was, I think, the thread SDMBer religion from a year and a half back. (There may be one more recent, but I do not recall it–and, of course, the poll is hardly scientific, as it is based on who bothers to read IMHO, who had an intrerest in reading that thread, and who had an interest in self-reporting their belief status.
I know just how you feel. I chalked that up to having been raised Christian, and constantly having to thank God for everything I’d worked my ass off to earn. But there are times when you just want to acknowledge that thing have gone swimmingly well – or at least aren’t as bad as some other poor bastard has it.
I also missed the human-to-human communion, the really deep spiritual exchange of we’re-all-in-this-together-ness that church offered. I tried going to some meetings in Fort Collins, over 100 miles and two hours away, but was never really part of “the group.” I think people need that … well, communion, for lack of a better word.
Yeah, the SDMB is one of the more ideologically balanced places I’ve been. Though I might argue that liberals outnumber conservatives here. I could be wrong on that one though. Again, my point in this debate isn’t that there is a supermajority, only that atheists are as subject to group dynamics as theists.
Right. It’s hard to tell. From a cursory scan of the thread I see no attempts to tabulate the results.
It was incredibly common in Buddhist monastaries in medieval Japan. It was pretty much taken for granted that the monks would sleep with young acolytes.
I think this is a subtle difference, but one that definitely exists.
You’ve misinterpreted the first statement. “I believe God does not exist.” =/= “There isn’t a God for me to believe in.”
It’s like the difference between saying, “I don’t agree with your viewpoint because I find your lack of evidence disturbing,” and, “I don’t agree with your viewpoint because I have evidence to the contrary.” Both statements reflect a common underlying point (that is, you don’t agree with their viewpoint), but for two completely different reasons.
Don’t you mean, “I believe that inane semantics are not a substitute for discourse”?
LilShieste
“I believe God does not exist” asserts that you have a belief. “I do not believe God exists” asserts that you do not have a belief… as “inane semantics”.
It’s the same semantics as “you agree with me” versus “you do not agree with me”. Since there’s no difference between them as far as you’re concerned, why are you even debating? Based on your quip, I wouldn’t be surprised to hear you say that a number having two square roots is nitpicky, there being no significant difference between +X and -X. “I believe” — “I don’t believe”. They are what we nitpickers call “opposites”.
If I believe that God doesn’t exist, then what God does that leave for me to believe in, if you see what I mean?
In any case, how does it make two sorts of atheism, hard and soft. Atheist is a word to describe someone who doesn’t believe in any sort of god at all. If that’s because someone just doesn’t want to believe, someone doesn’t see evidence for it and someone else sees evidence against, does it really change that?
What you’re saying makes sense - the logic completely follows. (On re-reading my post, I can see how it was confusing.)
It doesn’t change the underlying point of view at all, IMO. (I’m not necessarily trying to argue for or against the idea of hard/soft atheism - I hadn’t really thought of things like that before reading this thread.) The point Liberal was trying to make in post #81 was that there is a difference (albeit a subtle one) between the two statements, “I believe there is no god.” and “I don’t believe in god.”
Normally, these types of semantics wouldn’t be a very big deal - but one of the reasons that atheists generally give for not being a Christian, or a follower of any other particular religion, is that there is no reason for them to believe that a god exists. (“I do not believe in god.”) The other statement (“I believe there is no god.”) suggests that the person has some kind of evidence that has lead them to that particular conclusion.
IMO, it’s kind of like when you hear someone say, “I don’t believe God exists; I know He does.” A lot of times, this type of statement will draw a lot of criticism from atheists (and even some Christians, like myself), even though it’s really just a matter of semantics. The problem with it is namely that a statement of fact is trying to be argued, without having any evidence to back it up.
LilShieste
