“Pretty much anything we do we get assistance with if we ask and we have faith in God, even though we cannot see that assistance.”
So you claim.
So I believe, but I cannot claim it because I cannot prove it.
“No, not at all, because being a good person is still possible even if we do not get assistance from God.”
Which literally means that gods or belief in gods, is not at all a requirement to be and act good. The point exactly.
They are not always a requirement but even when they are not required, they do help. It is not the belief that helps; it is the actual teachings of the religion because they act as a guide to right living.
“There are some things an atheist can do that are perceived as bad, because an atheist has no fear of God.”
If you don't do certain things out of fear of punishment, then you are not acting morally.
That's what I call a corrupt motivation.
I did not say fear of punishment, I said fear of God. There is no way to know what God might do to us, but God is omnipotent, so God is an Entity to be fearful of. With no God belief, there is nothing to be afraid of, nobody higher than yourself.
Moreover, anything goes as long as you consider it moral, so there are no moral guidelines, only what YOU consider good behavior.
“You are correct, if the only reason we are good is because we fear God that does not say much about our morals.”
Right. So why are you even mentioning it?
That we fear God should not be the only reason we are good, but it can be a legitimate reason.
“That does not compute. If one is religious and fears God, it is more difficult to be bad because there are consequences for one’s actions.”
You JUST agreed that having that as a motivation to not do bad, has nothing to with morality.
No, I did not admit that. Morality and fear of God are not mutually exclusive. In other words, one can do God because they fear God but
also because it is the moral thing to do.
“Conversely, if one is not religious and has no fear of God, it is easier to be bad because there are no consequences for one’s actions.”
Actually, there ARE consequences. And they are infinitly more real. Like jail time etc.
You fear imaginary after-life punishments. The boogey man under the bed.
But these same consequences of jail time accrue to religious believers,
in addition to what they might fear in the afterlife.
Take a baseball bat, go out and start smashing random people's face in. See what happens.
I guarantee you there will be consequences for you. And I guarantee you that your god won't have anything to do with them.
That is true when behavior hurts other people, but if you just hurt yourself nobody is going to care and there will be no consequences if you are not a God believer.
“My point was that “some people” do not need the fear of God to be good and that is why belief is not necessary (for everyone) in order to be a good person.”
And those people, I will call moral.
Those who don't do bad because they fear big brother is watching, is what I call immoral people.
But that does not mean that believers are immoral just because they fear God because there can be
other reasons they are moral, because it is the right thing to do.
“But belief is necessary for “most people” to be good people.”
Is it?
Reality seems to disagree with that.
For example, why is that atheists are so completely underrepresented in prison, compared to the "free" population?
If your statement was correct, I'd expect to see a disproportional HIGH number of atheists in prison. But the reverse is true.....
There is an easy explanation for that. Most people are believers since atheists constitute only about 7% of the world population, so you won’t see many atheists in prison. Also, those who are in prison might say they belong to a religion, but in name only. If they really believed in God, they would not commit crimes because they would fear God’s punishment. One exception to this might be if they were a Christian who belief that they are saved and forgiven regardless of their behavior.
“because fear of God is the only thing that will keep them in line.”
So most people are psychopaths who are utterly incapable of moral reasoning and who require an authority to fear and who's commandments must be followed?
Seriously?
I did not say most people are psychopaths, as psychopaths are not a very high percentage of the general population. But most people do require a belief in God to live a moral life. That does not prove that atheists are immoral, it just shows that belief in God is keeping the believers on the straight and narrow.
There is no way to prove what would happen if there was no religion, but I do not think it would be pretty. If you think it is bad now with all these competing religions just take religion away and it would be chaos. Sure, it works okay for a small percentage of people to be atheists, but that percentage is not running the world. Those who are in positions of power are believers.