# What’s the worst thing about being an atheist? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [April 25, 2023, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-worst-thing-about-being-an-atheist/983166 "2023-04-25T13:18:23Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 14
**Author:** ![crowmanyclouds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crowmanyclouds/32/19884_2.png) [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2023, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-worst-thing-about-being-an-atheist/983166/261 "2023-04-29T21:55:27Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > One of the dumber things I’ve heard apologists say (and more than one of them) is that it was okay to commit genocide on these tribes because they did child sacrifice. I’ve heard that all those children went to Heaven . . . despite the claim that their slaughter was justified because God knew they would grow up and be child sacrificers. Of course they were all children of the Nephilim so… Also, of course, why God made it possible for fallen angels to impregnate humans and create the Nephilim is a question that will not be entertained. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2023, 9:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-worst-thing-about-being-an-atheist/983166/262 "2023-04-29T21:58:06Z")
> [@eschereal](#): > > > [@thorny\_locust](#): > > > > > [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > > > > > I think it would be more valuable to explore the genesis of religion than religion _in situ_. > > > > It would be fascinating. But how? > > > > The genesis of religion has to be so far back that we’re talking anthropology, not history or even what’s generally called pre-history. How do we tell, that far back, what was and what wasn’t religion? Even now the definitions are blurry – look how blurry they are even just in this thread. > > What I meant by that was not to go back into history to find out how and where it all got started but to study the human animal to figure out what in our makeup causes religion to develop and what about us facilitates its spread. Obviously we can examine L. Ron Hubbard, and to a lesser extent, Mary Baker Eddy and Joseph Smith, and perhaps even Mohammed the rug merchant. Look at the growth dynamics of various situations and try to figure out what is going on in the heads of the humans that make these things happen and make them endure. > > _you were quoting me, not **Sam** _ _The Varieties of Religious Experience_ is a good read if you are interested in that sort of thing (direct religious experience, as opposed to religious institutions). I have had someone describe such a mystical experience to me, though in that case the person did not connect it with religion. Still, it may not be so uncommon. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2023, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-worst-thing-about-being-an-atheist/983166/263 "2023-04-29T22:29:35Z")
> [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > If you don’t believe there were Ba’al worshippers who did that, just substitute the Aztecs, Incas, Mayans, Phoenicia, or Carthage. They share the common trait that they are all now extinct. So are lots of other cultures; including all the early Christian ones. Oh yes, and the Mayans, Aztecs, and Incas are still around; including quite significant chunks of their cultures. Both Judaism and Christianity have stories about growing out of a child-sacrifice stage – I think Islam keeps at least one of those stories. > [@DPRK](#): > > _The Varieties of Religious Experience_ is a good read if you are interested in that sort of thing (direct religious experience, as opposed to religious institutions). By William James, approximately 1902? That’s in my library system, though not in either of the libraries I generally get to. I could order it in, though; although winter might be a better time to do that. Thanks for the recommendation. > [@DPRK](#): > > I have had someone describe such a mystical experience to me, though in that case the person did not connect it with religion. Still, it may not be so uncommon. I think it may be quite common. I’ve had some myself. Still an atheist at least about what most people seem to mean by God, though. And I suspect what I may be doing is making connections within my own head; though that’s not what it feels like. – the rest of this post deleted before posting, as it turned into a scrambled attempt to sort out into words something that doesn’t want to go into words right. I’ll just say that how that experience turns into the sort of thing that human religions often seem to turn into seems to me to be quite a mystery on its own. ---
**Author:** ![Biffster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/biffster/32/339_2.png) [@Biffster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffster)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2023, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-worst-thing-about-being-an-atheist/983166/264 "2023-04-29T22:37:14Z")
> [@Tibby](#): > > So, perhaps it’s best to take Pascal’s wager in secular terms. That’s better than taking it in religious terms, because there would be no down side if you lose. If there is a secular god, and you believe it, you can rest assure that there is meaning to the universe and that should make you happy. If you believe there’s a secular god, but there’s not, well when you die it really won’t matter to you any more, but it made you happy to believe while you were alive. If you don’t believe there’s a secular god, but there is, you’re not going to Hell for not believing. Win/win. You might appreciate this: Mr Deity and the Skeptic (with Michael Schirmer). [https://youtu.be/6gnQz32c5EA](https://youtu.be/6gnQz32c5EA) ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2023, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-worst-thing-about-being-an-atheist/983166/265 "2023-04-29T22:44:26Z")
> [@Dung\_Beetle](#): > > > [@Velocity](#): > > > > But if you were raised highly religious, **then** become atheist, it’s terrifying. You’re having your safety net ripped away from you. It’s almost like jumping out of a plane but finding out mid-fall that you didn’t actually have a parachute after all. > > I thought it was like falling out of a plane without a parachute, certain to hit the ground…and then finding out you _did_ have a parachute. 🙂 I suppose it depends on if you are willing to put your faith in God to make sure your parachute opens safely or are you asking him to prevent you from falling to your death? ---
**Author:** ![Dung\_Beetle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dung_beetle/32/7945_2.png) [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2023, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-worst-thing-about-being-an-atheist/983166/266 "2023-04-29T22:46:20Z")
I thought I was certainly going to hell, but then realized I wasn’t. 🕶 ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2023, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-worst-thing-about-being-an-atheist/983166/267 "2023-04-29T22:59:43Z")
> [@DPRK](#): > > _The Varieties of Religious Experience_ is a good read if you are interested in that sort of thing (direct religious experience, as opposed to religious institutions). Yeah, not really. As not-a-believer, my interest in the genesis religion is primarily sociological. The social structures that are built from/around it. The mystical experience is entirely another matter, though how we cope with things that seem to violate the current order is kind of interesting and maybe useful. ---
**Author:** ![vbob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/vbob/32/4439_2.png) [@vbob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vbob)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2023, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-worst-thing-about-being-an-atheist/983166/268 "2023-04-29T23:17:08Z")
I well and truly believe that no gods exist, but I certainly cannot prove it. It must therefore remain a matter of faith. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2023, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-worst-thing-about-being-an-atheist/983166/269 "2023-04-29T23:46:22Z")
> [@Tibby](#): > > perhaps it’s best to take Pascal’s wager in secular terms. That’s better than taking it in religious terms, because there would be no down side if you lose. If there is a secular god, and you believe it, you can rest assure that there is meaning to the universe and that should make you happy. If you believe there’s a secular god, but there’s not, well when you die it really won’t matter to you any more, but it made you happy to believe while you were alive. If you don’t believe there’s a secular god, but there is, you’re not going to Hell for not believing. Except a) I can’t just make myself believe it b) you’re not supposed to just believe it, you’re supposed to change your life so as to follow the laws that particular deity is supposed to have set up c) there are still hundreds if not thousands of different specific beliefs that one person or another will tell you that you’ll go to hell if you do take up, so whichever one you picked, and even if you somehow made yourself believe, and even if you then followed that version’s laws precisely (quite possibly screwing your actual life up seriously in the process): if some one of those gods is real, you’ve still got by hundreds of times a better chance of winding up in hell for picking the wrong one than you do of escaping hell by guessing right. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2023, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-worst-thing-about-being-an-atheist/983166/270 "2023-04-29T23:49:47Z")
> [@eschereal](#): > > As not-a-believer, my interest in the genesis religion is primarily sociological. The social structures that are built from/around it. The mystical experience is entirely another matter, though how we cope with things that seem to violate the current order is kind of interesting and maybe useful. They’re connected, though, I think; although, as I said or tried to say above, how the mystical experience turns into, or is connected with, the social structures is itself mysterious; and I’m also interested in that. – maybe the mystical experience doesn’t turn into the social structures. Maybe the social structures co-opt it – the experience itself seems to be at least sometimes disruptive of such structures. But they do seem to get tangled up together. ---
**Author:** ![Thing.Fish](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thing.fish/32/9168_2.png) [@Thing.Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thing.Fish)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2023, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-worst-thing-about-being-an-atheist/983166/271 "2023-04-30T00:18:31Z")
I would say that the social structures represent an attempt to institutionalize the mystical experience by creating settings where people may have such experiences, and/or by acting in accord with the mystical insights of their spiritual leaders. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2023, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-worst-thing-about-being-an-atheist/983166/272 "2023-04-30T00:43:28Z")
> [@Baker](#): > > Mormons use part of Christian imagery but are not Christian. I suppose many Christians say that, but then many Christians say Catholics aren’t Christian. From my perspective, Mormons believe in the Hebrew god and the divinity of Christ, so they’re Christians. > [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > I’m guessing that about five minutes after people decided some super-being must have created them, someone announced that he had a special line to that being and was given rules that must be followed. I’m guessing that religious worship almost always started (likely more than once) as worship of powerful elements of the natural world, like the sun. Once your lore has attributed deific characteristics to the sun, or rain or what have you, you’re going to want to try a song or a dance or some other demonstration to try to convince them to help you out. Once you start doing that, someone is going to say they know the right way to sing/dance/what have you, and it goes from there. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2023, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-worst-thing-about-being-an-atheist/983166/273 "2023-04-30T01:00:47Z")
What someone you care about suffers a terrible tragedy, the most comforting thing you can come up with is “That sucks, bro.” ---
**Author:** ![F.U.Shakespeare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aca169/32.png) [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2023, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-worst-thing-about-being-an-atheist/983166/274 "2023-04-30T01:13:54Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > I suppose many Christians say that, but then many Christians say Catholics aren’t Christian. I wonder whether that may be because Mormons have claimed that _they_ are the only true Christian faith. (I can’t claim to know what the current doctrine is, but I remember reading in the newspaper that Gordon Hinkley said this at a press conference). > [@](#): > > From my perspective, Mormons believe in the Hebrew god and the divinity of Christ, so they’re Christians. Agreed. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2023, 1:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-worst-thing-about-being-an-atheist/983166/275 "2023-04-30T01:35:12Z")
If this is supposed to be a joke, it isn’t funny at all. ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2023, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-worst-thing-about-being-an-atheist/983166/276 "2023-04-30T02:14:12Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > What someone you care about suffers a terrible tragedy, the most comforting thing you can come up with is “That sucks, bro.” As opposed to, “_Let me make a call to my ISF to see if he can help you out (because I sure fuck don’t have the time or inclination)_.” \*Invisible Sky Fairy ---
**Author:** ![Spice\_Weasel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spice_weasel/32/5435_2.png) [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2023, 12:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-worst-thing-about-being-an-atheist/983166/277 "2023-04-30T12:32:57Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > What someone you care about suffers a terrible tragedy, the most comforting thing you can come up with is “That sucks, bro.” Yeah, that one stumps me too. “You’ll be in my heart.” “I’m holding space for you.” Sometimes just, “I love you.” I don’t know. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2023, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-worst-thing-about-being-an-atheist/983166/278 "2023-04-30T13:18:12Z")
Me too. I just struggle to come up with words that have the emotional impact I’d like. ---
**Author:** ![alovem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b38774/32.png) [@alovem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alovem)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2023, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-worst-thing-about-being-an-atheist/983166/279 "2023-04-30T17:09:00Z")
> What’s the worst thing about being an atheist? No disadvantages, as far as I know. I guess you have to keep your ideas to yourself, just to avoid offending others, but I think the world would be a better place if everyone kept their ideas of religion to/among themselves. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2023, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-worst-thing-about-being-an-atheist/983166/280 "2023-04-30T17:14:15Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > If this is supposed to be a joke, it isn’t funny at all. Oh. Well that sucks, bro. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-worst-thing-about-being-an-atheist/983166.md?page=13) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-worst-thing-about-being-an-atheist/983166.md?page=15)