I’m probably an atheist for the simple reason that I wasn’t raised with any particular religious faith. If I’d been raised a Christian, there’s a good chance I’d be a Christian right now. So right off the bat, I don’t think that I’m an atheist because I’m smarter or better than believers. But faith was never a part of my life as a child, and as an adult, I’ve never felt a need to acquire it. I’m happy with myself as an atheist, and my understanding of how the world works, and how to act in a moral fashion, meshes fine with an atheist understanding of the world.
I certainly don’t begrudge anyone their beliefs. My mother is a practicing Catholic (she was lapsed for most of my childhood, started going again when I was in high school). I’ve dated Christians, Buddhists, Pagans, and atheists. They all found varying degrees of joy, comfort, and wisdom in their beliefs. Why would I want to take that away from them?
That being said, my main problem with most religions is that they all seem to operate on such a human scale. I find it incredible that a being that could create this through an act of will, would really care about this. There are so many infinite variations of life, both here on Earth and, almost certainly, throughout the universe, the idea that the cultural practices of one era for one subset of one species on one planet in the entire fucking universe are of dramatic importance to such a being that he’d devise eternal torments for breaking them is just ridiculous. The mind of a being who could write the fundamental laws of the universe cannot be, in anyway, understandable to beings such as ourselves. Even if you could find a gap in the physical world that could only be filled by God, the idea that any particular human could have a line on what God wanted from us is laughable on its face.
Marley’s OP, not mine, but I’m flattered by the confusion.
Starting with the obvious question: “Why are you an atheist?”
Because I don’t believe that human beings are the point of the universe. That’s always seemed way too egotistical to me. There are plenty of other reasons, but I think that one trumps them all in the end.
“People across all kinds of cultures and throughout histories have religions, and many of them are pretty similar. Doesn’t that suggest they’re on to something?”
No, it suggests that people everywhere are pretty similar, and that lots of people, across all cultures, feel a need for similar comforting fairy stories.
“Did something happen to you to make you an atheist?”
Nothing in particular. I had some religious instruction as a child, but I don’t think I ever actually believed in it. I didn’t consider myself an atheist until fairly recently; I gave religions a chance, but I never found one that seemed at all convincing to me, in comparison to observable reality.
“Are you angry at god?”
No. That’s like asking if I’m angry at the Easter Bunny or Mickey Mouse.
“Do you hate religion?”
I hate dogmatic religion, and dogmatic ideology of all types. I don’t really differentiate between religion and, for example, many political beliefs, and all conspiracy theories - they’re the same thing in my opinion.
“Do you think religion is evil?”
Not inherently, but like a lot of things it can be used for evil purposes.
“Do you think religious people are stupid?”
No. I have some very dear friends who are religious. Lots of people need the comfort of a spiritual belief system, because life can be pretty tough.
“Do you think religion should be stamped out or banned?”
No. Some people need it. I think churches should be very separate from states, though. You’re free to believe in whatever nonsense appeals to you, just don’t try imposing it on anyone else.
(Note that I haven’t read any other replies yet because I didn’t want mine to be influenced.)
I am not an atheist, but this is something that I feel is a step toward a better mutual understanding between atheists and theists and I appreciate the effort. I won’t answer your questions since they don’t really apply to me, but since this was spawned by comments by GEEPERS, I thought it might be helpful to give a perspective that hopefully might help bridge his understanding.
I’m bolding his original comments to keep context
In general, spiritual explanations aren’t going to be examinable by science, so there’s not really any sort of evidence that one can provide to back up any sort of spiritual explanation. The problem is, generally any spiritual explanation supposes that there is some spiritual aspect, so it’s sort of circular logic and it’s just not going to be convincing to someone that doesn’t believe that to be the case. It’s a difficult mindset for someone who believes in God to understand, just as song longterm atheists will have difficulty understanding a theist’s mindset.
I believe that trying to use science in any way to prove spiritual or religious claims is like trying to use science to prove that blue is the best color. It’s ultimately a pointless discussion because they explore different questions.
Honestly, this is a True Scotsman argument, and it’s one that really bothers me when other theists assert it. I believe God reveals himself to everyone, but that revelation isn’t going to be interpretted by everyone the same way. Each of us has a lifetime of experiences and cultural references that determine how we understand the world around us. Yes, the fundamentals of Christianity can be found in the Bible, but so much of modern belief is based upon interpretations, traditions, and history, hence why there’s so many different denominations of Christianity. I imagine that if someone who had never been exposed to Christianity at all suddenly had a very real revelation from God, the resultant impact of that belief probably wouldn’t be like any modern denomination at all, possible not even really discernable as Christianity given whatever his life experiences and cultural context was.
That’s not to say that there isn’t some truth to your statement, as there are some people who are seeking truth, but not so much for the sake of truth. But I don’t think it’s fair to assume that everyone who is an atheist isn’t really looking for the truth with as much, or even more, sincerity as some Theists. But they very well may interpret a lot of those sorts of revelations as something different. Where I may have a very real experience of a revelation from God, an atheist may attribute that sort of epiphany as some deeper level of his consciousness or intuition. There’s simply no way to prove that one of those interpretations is correct over the other, only that each of us had some realization and we really don’t know where it came from.
Here’s the thing. The Bible isn’t there to be proof of the existence of God. Instead, what it is there to do is to teach believers about God and the implications of that. The problem is, when reading it from different perspectives, its easy to come to all sorts of different conclusions about what’s intended. Just take the constitution as an example, it’s a much shorter document written much more recently by individuals thoroughly studied by historians, and there’s still quite a bit of dispute about what a lot of it actually says or was intended to say or whatever.
So yes, there are some atheists out there who will look at it trying to find problems with it and they’ll find tons, but there’s also atheists out there who will appreciate how most Christians interpret it, they just may not necessarily share that interpretation themselves. In my experience, the former type of atheist may be louder, but the latter type is much more common.
And I see it go the other way as well. For instance, I’ve seen an argument against evolutionary science that Darwin said such and such in the Origin of Species and it’s been proven wrong since then, therefore evolution is false science. It’s a bad argument because it misses the context of all the science that’s been done on the subject since then.
If you plan for failure, you’ll always succeed. The purpose of discussing religion isn’t to convince other people, you very seldom will. If that’s your goal, you’ll be very frustrated. Instead, use it to explore the consistency of your own beliefs and just how strongly you believe them. I’ve gained an enormous amount of insight into my own beliefs and the nature of God through discussions with atheists precisely because they asked me difficult questions that theists never would. I only get frustrated when people discuss these sorts of topics not in good faith, like an atheist who just presupposes that all religious people are inherently evil or, just as bad, a religious person who presupposes anyone who doesn’t agree with him is irredeemably deceived and damned.
The only thing that will ultimately convince anyone on this sort of topic, regardless of what your perspective is, is to do the same sort of thing for them. Have a real honest discussion with them, ask hard questions genuinely and respond to them honestly, and then each of you takes time to think about that. You’ll never browbeat anyone into agreeing on this sort of thing.
I have to completely agree with Marley here. Some parts of the Bible are clearly intended to be historical and those parts have often turned out to be pretty accurate in the historical records. Some parts aren’t intended to be historical and they often haven’t turned out well. That some parts have been verified and some parts haven’t doesn’t really mean anything. We have to keep in mind that the Bible isn’t a single book but a collection of books written at different times for different reasons.
For instance, most of the book of Genesis just doesn’t line up with any historical record, that doesn’t invalidate the entire Bible at all. In fact, I very much liken it to a 4-year-old asking his parents where babies come from. Would a parent explain in detail the act of sex, how genetics works, fetal development, and top it all off with a graphic description of the birthing process? I sure as hell hope not. Instead, a parent will realize that the kid can’t even understand that and isn’t even looking for that specific knowledge and will probably give a description that starts with “when a mommy and a dad love eachother very much…” I look at Genesis very much the same way, that there’s no way a primitive people could understand the concepts, muchless the specifics, of evolution, but those concepts weren’t really important anyway, that what was important was that God did it and why he did it.
The reality is that SOME atheists have devoted a lot of time and energy to attack Christianity with an uncanny zeal. Again, this is a case of those being a particularly loud minority, and a number of atheists just not caring. It’s no different than, say, the WBC and their “God Hates Fags” campaign. Anyone who thinks those individuals speak for the majority of Christians is far from the truth.
If nothing else, the fact that Marley opened this thread should be proof enough that at least some atheists are really interested in an honest dialogue about these sorts of topics.
This argument is as bad as atheists who say “well if you’re going to live in eternal paradise, why don’t you just kill yourself now?” Just as the “obvious” conclusion of getting to heaven as fast as possible doesn’t automatically follow from belief in God, it also doesn’t follow from a lack of belief in God that one should live with the purpose of maximizing one’s pleasure before ceasing to exist.
We all decided the meaning of our own lives. A theist is likely to derive some or all of it from his belief in God, but that doesn’t mean that atheists’ lives are inherently meaningless. They just derive their purpose in life from other things. After all, I think even more than wanting pleasure, all of us wants purpose. Seeking nothing but unending pleasure isn’t really much of a purpose for most people, hence why you don’t see a whole lot of atheists pursuing that sort of life.
I don’t think it’s fair to generalize all atheists like that. Certainly some present their perspectives as concrete proof, but many theists will just assert God exists in much the same way, that it’s indisputable and only a fool can’t see it. Further, just as most theists aren’t theologians or Biblical scholars, most atheists aren’t evolutionary biologists or cosmologists. I think plenty on both sides of the discussion could benefit from a more open approach and with greater awareness for how their present their opinions and arguments.
The thing is, the Bible isn’t 100% fact or fiction and any realistic view of it will reveal that some parts of it are historically verifiable and some parts of it aren’t intended to be taken literally. Yet, atheists will deny that any of it has any basis in reality and some theists will deny that any of it isn’t literally true.
The problem is, this is a false dichotomy and it’s really missing the forest for the trees. Whether creation occured literally as described in Genesis or through evolution doesn’t really say anything about why we are here and where we’re going. Whether Jesus’s life occurred exactly as it’s described in the Bible or some parts of it are made up doesn’t tell us anything about the major lessons he taught, specifically related to love and morality.
You’re simply not going to win over anyone who doesn’t believe in God to believe in God by arguing for the truth of the Bible. Here’s a question I’d have you really seriously think about. Assume for a moment that God were somehow proven to absolutely not exist, would you still consider the general teachings of Jesus worth following? If yes, that’s really more the sort of thing that’s worth discussing with someone that doesn’t believe in God. What has continued to help me keep my faith is precisely because I can so much more or less independently verify a lot of what he has taught. If no, why are you following teachings that you only accept on someone else’s authority?
indeed, the whole idea of a christian afterlife never made any real sense to me.
Where’s the fun in it? You don’t eat, sleep, party, have sex, have any hobbies etc
No games, nothing to study or to learn.
All the stuff that makes this life good, you don’t have in heaven.
Then you’re supposed to meet all your deceased loved ones. How about those you didn’t love? Will I meet my ex there? Will we just all love each other? That would mean no real interaction everything would be stagnant. What about my dog?
No animals allowed.
Which brings me to biggest argument for religion, giving Pascal the benefit of tons of doubt, heaven gives this life purpose. We make this life miserable so we can go to heaven. Well, what’s the purpose of heaven?
Christian assuming they know how and why atheists think is just as bad as when atheists do the opposite (see the Pit thread on “I love you unless you’re gay”). I believe that most people, regardless of their beliefs, are honest about what they believe and why. Assigning ulterior motives (especially devious ones) really only reveals uncertainty about one’s own beliefs.
So for example if I think that all athiests secretly believe but are mad at God or are too selfish to obey God, I’m in the same category as atheists who believe that all Christians are simple-minded or secretly hate women and gays.
Because when I looked into it, I realized that there is literally nothing on the religion side but bald assertions. No evidence, no logic, nothing of any real value.
It suggests to me that people are afraid of death and want answers to big questions. Imagining that there is some father-figure in the sky running things is an obvious thing to make up.
I faced my teenage fear over questioning God. It took years before I’d admit that I was too afraid to accept the obvious.
If He existed, I’d work against Him day and night. The remarkably stupid thing about the Abrahamic Religions is that they all pretend the sadistic murderer God depicted in the bible is good. Lex Luthor is a better person than Yahweh as depicted in the bible!
Yes. Not religious people, but religion. One of the worst things about religion, is it can turn a decent, intelligent person into Rick Santorum.
Not necessarily. But it’s delusional by definition.
Stupid people are more likely to be unable to see through religion. But I know many smart religious people. They aren’t stupid, they’re just unable, because of their conditioning, to face that particular slice of reality.
No. But it shouldn’t have any special place above from criticism. We only get one go at a thin slice of consciousness, in the universe. If religion makes you happy you should be allowed to engage in it, but you shouldn’t be able to hurt others because of your delusions.
Geepers is obviously not going to engage on this with any level of fairness, so I’m not going to bother answering his particular questions.
This thread is disappointing, far from a great debate, it’s really a self affirming circle-jerk echo chamber directed at an audience of one who is certainly not interested in reading it.
Wait until a certain poster known only by the color of his shirt chimes in.
Well, I think we’ve done this “why are you an atheist” or “when/how did you become an atheist” thing many times before in this forum, so I don’t feel like repeating myself. Suffice it to say that people can believe whatever they want as far as I’m concerned, as long as they don’t force me to believe it, too. My world view is informed by science, and while religion has generated some nice art and literature, that’s as far as it goes with me.
Please don’t threadshit. Anybody can participate or discuss any of the issues raised here. It was inspired by one person who I would like to read it, but that’s out of my hands. Perhaps other people could find something interesting here anyway.
Because people who did not understand the mechanics of rainfall or gravity are highly unlikely to have understood the mechanics of philosophy or metaphysics. Or, more succinctly, because the only supporting evidence for the existence of a supreme being is the subjective beliefs of other people.
People across all kinds of cultures thought bad smells would make them sick. Clearly, they weren’t on to anything there.
All it suggests is that lots of people made similar guesses when asked to explain things they had no rational answer for.
Not that I can think of. I was raised in a (lax) Hindu household, and I attended Anglican schools. My stepfather was a survivor of the Partition of India, which inculcated a deep seated hatred of religion in him (having watched thousands of people killed in the name of religion), but I was at least a deist before I met him.
No more than at the Terminator or Dracula.
I think it retards people’s mental development. I also think it gives people a forum in which to do good things. If I have a problem with religion, it’s that it invariably leads to entrenched belief systems.
I think they have a greater tendency to avoid actually thinking about things. Most religious people I know are religious because their parents were, and adopt their parents’ beliefs. The mere fact that a person remains in their parents’ faith creates a presumption that they’re either there because it’s politically expedient or because they never thought about it.
If I could recreate the world without religion, I would do so. However, I certainly wouldn’t murder, torture or do other unpleasant things to achieve that end.
I cannot point to a specific moment, but even as a child I began doubting the concept of an omnipotent, omniscient God who made any sense as a deity. As for why I’m an atheist, well, there is no real proof for any ‘supernatural’ realm, at all. Even if there was, there’s no reason to think that Odin isn’t in charge and Yahweh is, or what have you. In any case, the null hypothesis holds sway and even though we cannot know certain things ‘for certain’ in the negative (often because of how they are rhetorically couched), the assumption is still null.
“People across all kinds of cultures and throughout histories have religions, and many of them are pretty similar. Doesn’t that suggest they’re on to something?”
Even ignoring the variation inherent in “pretty similar”, no, it suggests no such thing. There are naturally going to be commonalities among people the world over, including overarching myth structures. The fact that many polytheistic religions had a god in charge of the sun, for example, does not really mean that we must placate Ra so that the sun will crown the vault of heaven tomorrow.
“Did something happen to you to make you an atheist?”
Quite the opposite, I’d say that something happened to make me a theist. As a child I never would have come up with a concept of any specific god on my own, and pretty much grew up with the concept of God that I was taught as a young Reform Jew. But when I started questioning the issue, the whole structure no longer made any real sense to me. I still enjoy religious Jewish life for a number of reasons, but I simply can’t get behind theistic implications at this point in my life
“Are you angry at god?”
That’s like asking if I’m angry at Lord Voldemort or proud of Frodo. The whole point is that I don’t believe in any claims about any gods or the true wishes of any sect’s claims about a God. Since I don’t believe in any God or gods, I can’t be angry at any God or gods. I’d be very surprised to see any self-identified atheist describe him or herself as such.
**
“Do you hate religion?”**
Religion is a collective abstraction, like “food”. And just as there is a difference between gas station hot dogs and grilled ribeyes, there is a different between both the ideology and practice of many religions. And as far as I’m concerned, religions which try to stifle science, oppress minorities, etc… are less ‘good’ than those which dedicate themselves to the improvement of human life.
**
“Do you think religion is evil?”**
See above. It certainly can be. But all things being equal, I’d much prefer to be with Quakers than Aztecs.
“Do you think religious people are stupid?”
Well, yes and no. I think most people are pretty stupid, and religious folks are just a subset of people, we can expect that most religious people are pretty stupid too. I also think that, in part, stupidity is behavioral rather than genetic, and that it can be ‘cured’ if proper critical thinking habits are adopted. There are, of course, plenty of intelligent, religious people with strong critical thinking skills, so obviously the two sets are not mutually exclusive.
“Do you think religion should be stamped out or banned?”
Well, of course not. Whatever doesn’t break my bones or pick my pockets, or what have you. You can do/say/think/chant/whatever any weird thing you want on your own property. Worship Lucky Charms cereal, I don’t care.
In an effort to come at these questions from a fresh perspective, and totally *not *because I’m too lazy to read 30-some-odd posts, I have only read the OP, and very little of that, at best.
Consider me tabula rasa; and away we go:
"Why are you an atheist?"
I couldn’t help it. I was born that way.
"People across all kinds of cultures and throughout histories have religions, and many of them are pretty similar. Doesn’t that suggest they’re on to something?"
Monkey see … monkey do.
"Did something happen to you to make you an atheist?"
No. Nothing happened to me to make me a theist, so … there I was.
"Are you angry at god?"
Considering my position, I find this question ridiculous.
"Do you hate religion?"
No. Honestly, I’m amused by it. When I hear someone, of any religion, talk fervently about supernatural claims, deep down, I’m amazed that actual grown-ups buy into weird shit like that.
"Do you think religion is evil?"
Religion is a tool. Man is evil.
"Do you think religious people are stupid?"
A great many of them. But then, I think a great many of people in general are stupid. And I don’t exclude myself from that shallow pool. I could be dumb as a stump for all I know.
"Do you think religion should be stamped out or banned?"
And what good would that do? You can’t talk stupid people out of being stupid. As long as there people out there willing to say whatever it takes to manipulate other people, there will be religion; whether it’s Christianity, Islam, Shinto, Paganism, or the Holy Church of Batty’s Left Nut … if someone’s buying, then someone’s selling.
Why are you an atheist?
When I was a small child, I was steeped in religion. My family was a very devout bunch of Mennonites, and we had to pray every morning, every evening, before every meal, and whenever we were feeling hurt or confused about something. We had bible study one night a week and two church services on Sunday. For the first ten years of my life or so, I fervently believed in God. I felt I basked in his righteous glow and was saved for eternity, and I felt very sorry for people who did not believe.
As I got older, I started to notice things. At first it was the inconsistencies in the stories I was being taught. Next was the behavior of many of the people in the church, who turned out to be not all that nice when they weren’t communing with God - just like everyone else.
When I asked my parents or ministers about the inconsistencies in the bible or the conflicts with what we know to be science today, rather than decent answers I’d get shocked looks followed by prayers for my soul. Needless to say, that was disappointing.
One day I just realized that I no longer believed. At first, it was a bit scary - that warm glow of being in the presence of God was no longer there. But then it became liberating. I was free to follow my own conscience, follow my own lines of evidence and draw my own conclusions about the world, and develop my own moral code. Science gave answers that religion couldn’t, and that was enough for me.
There are things I still don’t know and that science doesn’t know, and that’s also alright with me - I’m comfortable being just one more autonomous, sentient being in the universe, playing my small part in the grand evolution of the cosmos. I certainly understand that that’s not enough for everyone.
People across all kinds of cultures and throughout histories have religions, and many of them are pretty similar. Doesn’t that suggest they’re on to something?
I think religion is an artifact of two things - a brain that has evolved with the survival trait of wanting to always assign causation to perceived events, and an inability to understand our own mortality.
Our need to assign causation to random or inexplicable events has also led large numbers of people to gamble, to believe in woo like magic and clairvoyance, and it causes baseball players to tap their shoes exactly X times before batting or to wear their lucky amulet during a game. That doesn’t make it real.
Religion has also been called the opiate of the masses - historically, it gave hope to people living under despotic leaders or in backbreaking poverty - hope that so long as they continued to work and to believe, one day it will all be better.
Organized religion has served the ruling classes well. Many of the admonishments in the bible were clearly intended to control the behavior of populations and to maintain social cohesion and public health. It makes sense that pork would be an ‘unclean’ meat - back in the day, it was a dangerous food. Prohibition against adultery and coveting a neighbor’s things is very useful in keeping smaller communities from killing each other.
Giving leaders the imprimatur of God’s right hand is useful in lending authority to their pronouncements. And so it goes. Religion has been very useful to those who would organize and control others - especially in times past. Did something happen to you to make you an atheist?
Yeah. I started reading and thinking for myself. It helped that my own relatives were, in a couple of instances, really nasty people who nonetheless were high level members of the church and therefore given all kinds of latitude for their crappy behavior. That made me cynical. But ultimately, my non-belief came from a study of the evidence and the very unsatisfactory answers the church gave to my inquiries. Are you angry at god?
I’m angry at people who use God as a justification for doing nasty things on Earth, or people who use the fear of God to control others. But I can be no more angry at God than I am angry with Baal, or Zeuss, or Cthulhu.
Do you hate religion?
Nope. It gives a lot of comfort to a lot of people, and in many cases religious organizations do a lot of good. Christian values align pretty well with my own, other than the intolerance to gays and the silly creationist stuff. I believe that most of the 10 commandments are actually pretty good rules for living. When I stopped believing in God, I still followed most of the Christian rules for living.
I do wish that modern religions made more room for science and evolved into a more sophisticated mode of thinking. You can fit the round peg of Christianity into the square hole of science, but you have to be willing to re-interpret it in light of what we now understand about the universe. I do not like those who flat out reject the evidence of thousands of years of study and understanding simply because it contradicts the literal interpretation of their chosen religious text. Do you think religion is evil?
No. Specific religions may be. Any religion that requires you to toss a virgin in a volcano or cut the heart out of an unlucky peasant is pretty evil, y’know? But that’s not a blanket condemnation of religion.
Do you think religious people are stupid?
No. Some of the smartest people in history were very devout. Gregor Mendel was a monk. Isaac Newton was devout. There are great scientists today who are very religious.
I do think it takes intelligence to be able to marry your religion with what is known to be factual about the world, and to do so in a way that is consistent and reasonable. Most people probably don’t even bother trying - they just accept both, and don’t think too hard about the conflicts, because they like being religious and they also like being modern.
Do you think religion should be stamped out or banned?
Absolutely not. People have a right to believe whatever they want. If their religion causes them to interfere with other people, we have a problem. But the same is true of athiesm - an athiest who runs around trying to get government to ‘stamp out’ religion is just as evil as a religious person trying to use government to criminalize behaviour that is contradictory to scripture.
I just can’t believe it. Everything in the universe has an explanation that is, to me, easier to believe than “God did it.” When I look at the gyrations necessary to twist the facts – facts that I can see with my own eyes, or that have been proven time and again – to align with the miracles and religious stories; when I look at the knots tied in logic when believers try to square a benevolent god with all the shitty things that happen in the world; when I look at the unknown and unknowable things that theists take on faith: I see pointless effort devoted to belief for the sake of believing. It’s not for me.
Not all religions require adherents to believe impossible things, of course, but they all require assuming facts not in evidence. Again, not for me.
"People across all kinds of cultures and throughout histories have religions, and many of them are pretty similar. Doesn’t that suggest they’re on to something?"
No. The great majority of people are wrong about many things.
"Did something happen to you to make you an atheist?"
Not really. I was a Christian for a while, in high school, and the first year or two of college, and found it challenging to keep believing. When I moved away from home to go to a better college, and thus moved away from my conveniently located home church, a few months away from the constant reinforcement was all it took. The tortured logic, the hollowness of the promises, and the emptiness of prayer drove me away, once I had some time to think for myself.
"Are you angry at god?"
No. There’s nothing there. I have, at times, thought that if there were a god, he’d have a lot to answer for.
"Do you hate religion?"
No. There are some religious people I don’t care for much, but religion itself is too vast and varied to have a single position on it.
"Do you think religion is evil?"
No. I think some religious people are. I think some believers are tragic, I think others are quite magnificent. I think most people are fearful, greedy, and ignorant: some are held in check by their religion, for which I am grateful, and I think others are enabled by their religion, which can be a horror.
"Do you think religious people are stupid?"
I think most people are stupid, and I think there’s a special kind of stupid that comes with faith, sometimes. But plenty of smart people are religious, and while I think they’re wrong, I can’t prove it.
"Do you think religion should be stamped out or banned?"
No, though I sometimes wish it would just go away. As fascinating a study as it is, I’d rather see it through the lens of history than in the mirror of society.
Here are the responses from my very simplistic atheist viewpoint. I have specifically avoided reading the previous posts to keep from being influenced by them.
"Why are you an atheist?" Because I was born that way, or at least that’s the way it feels. I seem to lack the ability to believe in anything for which I have no objective evidence. I really tried to practice and believe in all of the things I was taught in Methodist Sunday school and church, but even as a small child I recognized that it was only a very nice story. In adulthood, as I read about and discussed other religions, I recognized the same fictions but with different details.
"People across all kinds of cultures and throughout histories have religions, and many of them are pretty similar. Doesn’t that suggest they’re on to something?" No. To me it suggests that they are all trying to answer the same questions or solve the same problems. Since all of them are human and have the same basic needs and fears, it would be surprising if there weren’t some commonalities in the answers they proposed.
"Did something happen to you to make you an atheist?" Not at all. As I said above, I seem to have been born that way. I didn’t come from a very religious family and never felt any kind of religious pressure other than that exerted by American society in general. I had the opportunity to explore different religions throughout my life and never had any interest in them.
"Are you angry at god?" God who? No, I’m not angry at any object, entity or event in regard to religion.
"Do you hate religion?" No. I think the strongest feeling I can muster up is indifference. I tend to be pretty laid back and accepting as a rule, so hatred is just not my thing, I guess.
"Do you think religion is evil?" Sometimes it is. Sometimes it is responsible for great good. Pretty much like people in general.
"Do you think religious people are stupid?" Not all of them. Not even most of them. There are also a hell of a lot of stupid atheists. Unfortunately, the stupid religious people and the stupid atheists are the loudest in their respective groups, so that’s all we hear about.
"Do you think religion should be stamped out or banned?" No, not even if such a thing were possible. I think religion gives great joy and fulfillment to some people and makes their lives better. Some religious people do a lot of things that make the lives of others better. I do think religion needs to be completely absent from our government and our laws, however.
From GEEPERS’ comments as listed in the OP, I’d say he makes a lot of assumptions about atheists in general that are based on very limited interactions with actual atheists. Just based on his assertion that “atheists” all do or think the same way, I doubt he’ll be open to discussion. Marley23 seems to have addressed those comments appropriately.
I’m an atheist the same way that the Archbishop of Canterbury is a lunar afromagist. It’s not an attitude which is significant enough to require a detailed rationale.
Sandwich
Definition: lunar fromagism - the conviction that the moon is made of cheese.
Lunar fromagists must not be considered a homogenous group. The main divisions are the fromagists and formaggists, who follow the French and Roman traditions respectively. In both traditions believers are divided between verdants and others. The verdants insist that the moon is comprised exclusively of green cheese. Internationally, Cheddarism is a widespread legacy of the British empire.
Fromagists claim, with apparent sincerity and lack of irony, that they cannot even comprehend the simple afromagist position. They will insist that afromagism has to be divided into weak afromagism and strong afromagism, and have developed elaborate arguments which prove that both are wrong. Apparently, these hinge on very precise definitions of the meaning of ‘cheese’.
** “Why are you an atheist?”** Because all the evidence supports it. Because all the evidence is against religion. Because religion is blatantly a collection of made up nonsense. Because there’s no rational reason not to be, and atheism is the logical default position.
"People across all kinds of cultures and throughout histories have religions, and many of them are pretty similar. Doesn’t that suggest they’re on to something?" No, it doesn’t. Historically slavery was endemic as well; that didn’t mean the slavers were “on to something”. The belief that women are inferior, belief in magic, torture, genocide, geocentrism, racism; all sorts of evil, irrational or just plain wrong beliefs and practices have been widespread.
"Did something happen to you to make you an atheist?" Not that I can think of.
"Are you angry at god?" No, he’s a fictional character, and one poorly written and characterized enough that it’s hard to get worked up about his villainy. In the abstract he’s a very despicable character, though.
"Do you hate religion?" Yes. It’s evil, cruel and destructive. A mind virus that turns people into tools to spread itself regardless of the cost to them or anyone else. I put it in much the same category as smallpox or AIDS; something innately hostile to humanity, something that preys upon us.
"Do you think religion is evil?" Yes.
"Do you think religious people are stupid?" Some are; most are religious because they are fools or outright irrational, not because they’re stupid. Religion is such obvious nonsense that stupidity is an insufficient explanation for why someone would believe it. Anyone so stupid as to be unable to see through religion because of it would be so stupid as to be barely able to function out of an institution.
"Do you think religion should be stamped out or banned?" Not by force; that has both ethical and practical problem. However yes, ideally it will eventually be driven out of existence as have so many other destructive and irrational practices; or at least be relegated to something followed only by the lunatic fringe.
No, I’m not angry at any object, entity or event in regard to religion.
