I'm an atheist, and comfortably so. There's zero solid evidence to support a God's existence, and believing in something just because it hasn't been definitively dispoven is ridiculous. That's just not how it works. If we took that approach to everything we'd all just be a bunch of rambling conspiracy nuts. We'd starve to death in a week because no-one had told us we can't eat air.

But frankly, it's just not worth the time and effort to try and smack theism out of every believers' head. If people want to hold onto their DUMB views and STOOPID practices, go ahead, and do it peacefully. However:

Never.

Never.

Never.

Allow the use of private religous views to actively try to influence or manipulate another person. I want freedom of belief. Any prophets whispering in a person's ear detracts from their ability to make their own decision. Take it too far and people start using the influence for their own ends. Take it even further, and you end up with the horror that is organised religion.

It's amazing that people get so freaked out about the modern hurricane of messages trying to brainwash their children, yet so few try to take on their local place of worship.

Someone's likely to point out that if I don't believe in trying to convert people, that means atheism won't spread either. Call it cockiness on my part, but I expect that if no-one ever pushed religion onto them, most people would come out atheist anyway. A default setting, if you will.

You hear that everyone? BM is the new messiah!

That depends, from a scientific point of view you only have to debunk so much before a story is considered flawed and untrue. That doesn't mean we know what is actually true, but in the past few hundred years I like to think that a large part of the bible has been confirmed to be mostly fiction by eliminating certain elements one by one. There's certainly more evidence pointing at it being fiction than at it being true.

I've actually got a couple of things to disagree with about this post, but not in a disliking way or anything.

Atheism isn't really a belief system. It's a religious belief, yes. But it's just a single statement. "I don't believe in a god." It's not really a system if it's just a single solitary thing. Which means that (going by my definition of a religion, at least,) it isn't a religion. Merely an aspect of religions, in the same way Theism is.

Secondly... Well, shit, I thought I had three disagreements. Oh well.

This is just a semantics thing, but I believe you're thinking of Antitheism. The difference being that Antitheism is the active disbelief in a god (i.e.: "God does not exist,") whereas Atheism is merely the lack of belief (i.e.: "I don't believe in a god.")

It's only a slight difference, and the two terms are practically interchange-able, but still. Just my opinion on the matter.

The bible isn't God.

Just throwing that one out there.

If I don't post, how long before you guys get bored of not having anyone to argue with?

Weird, last year I probably would have still ranted across the topic about God and religion and all that good stuff, I generally don't have the energy to try any more. I suppose that's BM's and WoF's doing more than anyone else...I would like to say this though, we live in a secularly dominated society (at least in Western Europe, I can't speak for the US) in our country religion is rarely mixed with politics and rarer still, forced down peoples throats like a few people here make out, in our neighbour countries like France, public display of religion is banned, and while I think this is a good idea (no crosses, no hijabs no burkhas), it is definitely a form, however subtle, of prejudice. Why therefore, do so many atheists still vehemently, or even violently, attack people of religion, any religion, when our worship does not impact your life in any way shape or form? If you don't like a Christian or a Jew or a Sikh praying or practising their faith, stay the hell away from their places of worship. Is it not that simple?

How often do you see atheists hanging around places of worship?

Atheists attacking religious people is relatively common online, true. However, in real life you won’t find them being nearly so vocal. Militant atheists are probably about as common as extremist theists (Westboro Baptist, anyone?).

The difference is atheism doesn’t have the same history of power as religious bodies do – bear in mind entities such as the Church had (and still have, to an extent) a lot of influence.

I don't see it. It's not a belief so much as it's a non-belief. I don't believe in many things that aren't real. That doesn't mean that I have a belief system of disbelief for every single one of them. It's a negative, not a positive. To say that a person believes in the non-existence of god is saying that they spend enough time after coming to the realization that it's not real to continue caring enough about it to have a belief.....

On second thought, that does sound like most atheists.


I missed the Scrabtrap argument. Here's your answer: It's because you people won't leave us alone. Religious people try to constantly legislate their beliefs so that we all have to live under their flawed , and often rather silly sense of morality. If they weren't constantly spouting off about how their way of life is the only good one, and trying to force that way of life on us I guarantee you we would relax about it. At least, this is true in America.

Perhaps that's just America, doesn't really happen over here. Only time we ever get any grievances with religion is when the Muslims demand the government fund the construction of Mosques, at least that's all I'm aware of, and again, that's a minority percentage.

But then, America has a bit of a backwards sort of mix between secularism and religion.

A lot of people would question whether the physical attacks on religious individuals from atheists is more common than attacks on atheists from religious individuals, or even attacks of religious individuals on other religious individuals. I can't say that I have numbers for that, but I suggest that knowing them would make everything clearer and allow for a more cogent argument.

Religion has found a comfortable place in the UK. It's traditions are part of British culture, and I genuinely feel that, to a certain degree, Britain would be a worse place without those traditions. That said, as soon as religion begins to have ideas about changing school curricular or imposing rules on others who do not follow their belief system, any fondness for the pomp that religion exudes is lost.

In the UK this is certainly not the case (except for perhaps a couple of very private schools in Scotland). However, in America, religion has a frighteningly strong grasp of government. There is talk that the major school textbook providers will need to change the sections involving evolution purely because one of the most wealthiest states (Texas) won't buy them if they don't.

My interest is in the individuals who support this movement; is it simply because they believe it so fervently that they will do anything to facilitate its continued existence even to the possible detriment of their country?


In regards to the "Atheism is a belief" mini-argument: I would suggest that the word belief implies faith, and Atheism isn't based of faith or even a lack of it. Atheism is based of the garnering of evidence and the willingness to interpret such evidence to the full extent possible, even if such an extent leads to places you would rather not go.

The idea of a god is brought forth by religious books like the bible. It's rather backwards to say you believe in god but not the bible. So yeah, bible = god and vice versa.

I'm an atheist, but I think everyone can believe in what they wish to.

As long as they don't force it upon others, such as children, then everything's dandy. People should be free to choose their own path in life.

I also dislike people who bash those who publicly preach. It's comparable to say, someone starting a flamewar on YouTube about a video, when all they have to do is ignore it.

Don't like, don't listen.

I expect people believed in God before the Bible was written, otherwise they wouldn't have written it in the first place.

What Oanst said...

Also


I wish I could express my thoughts in a way that people would understand. But here I'll try.

I'm not atheist because I defined myself as such, but because it would be a term applied to me by others. Because its a common term accepted to mean that you don't believe in god.

But I don't not believe in god to cross religion. It has nothing to do with religion. Religion just isn't part of my heart and mind. When I make decisions, religion plays no part of it, and I am not an atheist because I chose to not believe in religion x_x Jesus... I just have no way of explaining this. Like I'm not like: Haha I choose not to believe in god, therefor I'm an atheist.

But saying that atheism is a religious belief just kinda offends me, because I have no interest in religion in terms of beliefs x__x Its non-existant in that regard.

I do enjoy reading about certain religions though. But it's more of a curious standpoint.

You could turn it around and say that religion is an atheistic belief because they choose to believe in god rather than not.... I dunno.

I'm probly not making any sense to any of you.

I read it as:

"As an atheist, I am supposed to be distanced from religious affairs. I don't appreciate it when people label me as part of an argument I have decided is irrelevant.

I am an atheist because it seems obvious and natural, and have needed no further persuasion to fix my views; Wheras religious people must make a concious decision to protect their beliefs almost every day."

Which seems like a very sensible stance to me.

I ... I think it's something like that xD

I really wish I could organize my thought :p

Why are we restricting ourselves to Christianity here? The Theistic argument is doomed to fail on every single front if it tries to argue for a Judao-Christian God. Unless they think he's insane.

It's far better to try to argue for a metaphysical being that has the attributes of Omnipotence, Omniscience and Omnibenevolence before even attempting to flavour Him with ritual.

I guess that's a chicken and egg situation. I've always assumed that the bible is a mostly a work of fiction, perhaps with many stories of travelers in it, and that it started to take a life of its own when people started to actually believe it. Like those Star Wars nerds who believe The Force is real.

But yeah, I suppose you could turn it around and say it was written as a tribute to god. That's something we'll probably never know.

Most really old books are just standardised oral folklore. I assumed this was the case, with the Old Testament at least.

A lot of the Old Testament is prophecy for the New Testament, and a lot of the New Testament is actually historically accurate, for example we know with relative certainty that Paul did exist and did write to countries across the Mediterranean/ Arabic Seas. There is less proof that Jesus exists but there is still proof, and proof of people existing that knew him furthers the argument. So with this established, you can begin to pick at all the miracles he worked and the sort.

There is no proof of Jesus' existence. None. I've said this before, but even lacking proof there probably was a person named Jesus. There just isn't any proof.

All of the gospels (except Paul, and he never met Jesus) were written at least one generation after the events they were talking about, and were not written by the people who were said to have written them. The Romans had no documents of his execution, and there are no eye witness accounts.

I imagine therefore, you've never heard of Pliny the Younger? Nor Suetonius, Tacitus or Josephus. Before you make yourself out to be a bit of a short sighted arrogant character, do a little background research. There is evidence of the life of Christ, it's pretty hard evidence but a good proportion of it is from around a century after Jesus' time, therefore some historians believe that it may or may not have been lost in translation. However that does not mean there is 'no' evidence. I can quote some if you like.

Edit: Hell, Nero actually burnt Christians in AD 64, just 30-40 years after Jesus' time.

Heard of all of them. None of them are accepted as reliable eye witness accounts.

Let me rephrase, there is no credible evidence that Jesus ever lived.

And I don't think I was being arrogant. Just honest.

Edit: Oh, and none of those people were alive during "the time of Christ".

There's a lot of philosophical discussion here about semantics, I'll just edge my story in this thread amongst all that.

Today I'm an atheist, though was brought up as a baptist, and sure there's a long gripping tale to all that, but I'll try to keep this post short-ish.

I'm quite partial to the philosophy of pantheism, and enjoy the poetic descriptions of science in philosophical Daoist texts, and in a way I find great comfort in just sitting in and experiencing nature, being thankful that such a random assortment of molecules has evolved over time to give birth to sentience. That I can experience a star-lit sky.

Whether a pantheistic approach, with this admiration of Daoist philosophy and that craving for a transcendentalistic romance with nature can be classed as 'religion' is an area I don't care to discuss, though, to me, these encompass something of a spiritualistic experience, and as an atheist I find it upsetting when the fundamentalists come along and call us cold-hearted, emotionless, unhappy people. I find great happiness in the universe around us.



There's another area I'd like to discuss as well, which is the accusations that atheists disregard religious people's texts, for example: many of such accusations come from Christians who after stating their verse and 'opinion' proceed to then label us incapble of understanding for we haven't read the Bible, as if in reading such a text one would become Christian?

Despite now being atheist, I still find religious texts enjoyable reads and have read this Bible of theirs; it's on my bookshelf next to Daoist texts; Ancient Greek, Egyptian and Norse mythologies; Milton's Paradise Lost and Dante's Divine Comedy; as well as my books on Arthurian legend, Wuxia canon and the fictional Old West.

For me the religious texts of the world are fascinating fictional ventures, and these mythologies I enjoy immersing myself within, from a purely fictional point of view. But other than that, I've grown out of believing such things could be fact.
I had the similar crushed feeling when it was revealed to me that Yahweh's magical feats were that of fiction, as I did when I began to realise that the Old West wasn't a mythical land full of gunfighters and chivalry..

I managed to separate the legend from the fact, and left it immortalised in its mythology.

The Old West was totally a mythical land full of gunfighters and chivalry.

Hmm, if you were to pick a religion or pseudo-religious philosophy to live by, whether you are religious or not, what would that be? It's a question that always interested me, I imagine I would pick Buddhism.

I can't rate the Bible as a work of fiction, the writing style is far too dry and the message is all over the place.

Also the vast majority of the characters are one dimensional.

I'd probably scavenge bits and pieces from every religion in the world and mix it together till I have something that fits my own liking. There's no single religion or philosophy that gets everything right.

I have no doubt that a person named Jesus once lived around that time. And people probably worshipped him for the things he said. Does that mean that everything he said and did was real and true? No. For all we know the Jesus they talk about was a huge fraud, getting off on all the attention.

If we sent Uri Geller back in time to that period we'd probably be talking about the word of Geller instead of the word of Christ.

A friend made an interesting argument to me that perhaps he was bipolar. If I wasn't of faith I'd find it plausible perhaps.

I am 18 years old and I'm christian. As a child, I was always taught by my mom of God, the creation of the world, and the christian faith. My dad was always atheist, didn't believe in God, in fact, he made fun of the belief calling those that did believe, "Weak-minded". It was late 2010 that my dad and I found out that my mom had been cheating on him with an imbreed douchebag (who is now my step-dad which I refuse to accept.) So my dad and I left and moved into a trailor house living in poverty. I worked, and he worked, and we made just enough money to support ourselves. During that time, my dad starting reading his bible, and became a serious christian. He read it every night, and became peaceful. He believed in the sabbath, and refused to eat pork and other unclean animals. Three months later, I came home from school to a moving truck in the front yard. My dad said he was leaving, and that I would need to either move in with my mom and that son of a bitch, or move to Mississippi and live with my aunt. He told me he was not abandoning me and said he loved me. Told me to take care of my mom, brother, and sister. He left the next day. I moved in with my mom (who had secretly got married to that family destroyer) for my brother and sister. No one knew where my dad went, no one could find him. I knew he was depressed, but never expected what had happened. On March 13, 2011. He had shot himself...

So I guess, for my dads memory, I take the christian faith to heart. I do all that he would of wanted me to do. I still question why God would do such a thing to a man that dedicated his entire life to him. But I guess that's just not my place to question. My girlfriend is a serious christian aswell, and she helps me through these times, and shows me that there really is a God. Sure the story dwelves much deeper then that, but I'm not gonna go that far.

Man that's a tough story, can't really argue with it. Certainly you must be a pretty powerful believer to stick with God through all that.

I was expecting an argument to arise from this discussion. It makes me wonder whether there will ever be a civil discussion about religion on here. I do think on here there is a very unequal balance of those who are religious and those who aren't, which often triggers an argument. It doesn't help that a lot of people on these forums are heavily opinionated either.

At first, I believed in a god. Then my grandma deepthroated me with all her religious things: prayers, crucifix, church, new testament.... then I threw up, all my beliefs and my breakfast down the toilet and became an Atheist. Thanks to her ^^.

(a long time ago, I prayed to meet sexy girls... I'm 20 now and still virgin T_T)


http://whatitslikeontheinside.com/up...ard-728291.jpg

I removed the stupid part (and kinda expected a "Cool story, bro" ;P)....

Well, that sure was an interesting story.

So is the Bible.

I wish you would stop posting this already, this is at least the third time I’ve seen you try it.

Thank you.



The idea of balance, yin and yang (Taoism?) has always sounded like a neat theory, although I can’t say I know enough to make that kind of decision about it.

Here's a story I remember, I think I was about 8, talking to my mum about the story of Moses. I asked how Moses parted the sea and she said "Well, God helped him do it" and I remember telling her that it sounds ridiculous and that I didn't believe he parted the sea...

I did a little research into it but I just generally love the idea of quiet meditation, a love of all things and the acceptance of all people into one body. I also like the idea that they accept other gods into their belief, I think you can for example believe in the Hindu pantheon but still be accepted into Buddhism.

I just checked OH, and actually, there is no stance on a creator because to try and understand is impossible and pointless, instead they try and reach Nirvana which is ultimate peace. I just love that.

On another note, I think I must have taken a little something from the Hindus; I believe all religions must worship the same God. Certainly the Abrahamic religions, then Zoroastrianism, Jainism, Hinduism etcetera, as long as you follow the path to God, I think we must be all going the same way, we just don't know it. This is why religions should stop fighting with each other in my opinion, especially between sects. (e.g. RC v's CofE)

Do you want a prize for showing critical thought? A little plaque maybe?

No need for sarcasm like that, I was simply sharing a story I think Glitch would be interested in since it relates to my childhood.

Taoism/Daoism it's all phonetics.

Unfortunately the west has misunderstood the concept of yin/yang to an extent. It's presented everywhere as this dark vs light concept, and occasionally that light prevails over darkness. Although this does apply in the sense there exist opposing forces, the yin/yang isn't representative of two absolutes, in Aristotelian views - it's about a golden mean.

For example: Day does not turn to night in an instant, there's always degrees of light in dark, in evil there is potential for good, and even the kindest man has seeds of deceit. Things simply don't alternate wildly from one extreme to another, they evolve gradually.
The balance in the universe, whether it's physics or human morality, from a Daoist perspective, is always in a tangible state of flux, however becoming absolutist essentially will throw the laws of the universe out of sync -- stars explode, corrupt minds murder. Something along those lines.

Daoism is essentially about going with the flow of the universe and preventing excessive tampering with its natural existence, a process known as Wu Wei.

It's all pseudo-scientific business, but for a atheistic philosophy created before 'The Jesus Times', it deserves a degree of credit.

Hope I've helped you understand a little better? :)

If you're interested, then I highly recommend reading Laozi's ''Dao De Ching'' and Zhuangzi's eponymous collection. Laozi and Zhuangzi being the two founders of the philosophy.