Reggie Miller
Well-Known Member
Just curious as to why atheists do not believe in any deity. Please post why you don't.
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Why are you an atheist?
- Thread starter Reggie Miller
- Start date
Ive never encountered an argument, situation or experience compelling enough to be convinced of the existence of a god or gods.
I don't know that there is a reason as such.
It just turned out that the conceptions of deity that I was taught were not useful for my personal journey.
I might easily have become a Hindu, perhaps specifically a Shakta, had I been raised in such a social environment. Or a Shintoist. I might even adopt one or various practice deities if the mood struck me, which I guess it does to an extent.
But to take god-beliefs so seriously as to make the belief itself a significant part of my existence? That is just not in me. I have little idea of why, other than that I could hardly be convinced by the preaching extended to me at an early age and was in fact somewhat shocked to find out that there were people to took this god-idea so seriously.
I always sort of assumed it was all a very popular fable or something. To find out that people actually believed in God was not unlike learning that people believe in the bad wolf, the three little pigs and little red riding hood. It just seemed so exotic, so pointless.
It just turned out that the conceptions of deity that I was taught were not useful for my personal journey.
I might easily have become a Hindu, perhaps specifically a Shakta, had I been raised in such a social environment. Or a Shintoist. I might even adopt one or various practice deities if the mood struck me, which I guess it does to an extent.
But to take god-beliefs so seriously as to make the belief itself a significant part of my existence? That is just not in me. I have little idea of why, other than that I could hardly be convinced by the preaching extended to me at an early age and was in fact somewhat shocked to find out that there were people to took this god-idea so seriously.
I always sort of assumed it was all a very popular fable or something. To find out that people actually believed in God was not unlike learning that people believe in the bad wolf, the three little pigs and little red riding hood. It just seemed so exotic, so pointless.
Because it's lazy thinking.
It takes a bit of work, curiosity, study, understanding things spiritual, to believe
in a Power great than mankind.
Anyone and say "poooie, ain't no such thing. Prove there is!"
To which I respond: Prove there isn't.
If an atheist doesn't believe in a deity then that atheist has never
been in a fox hole, shot at, been attacked with a knife with murderous intent,
held a child while it died, escaped certain death, or.....................................
Just my usual bigoted opinion.
It takes a bit of work, curiosity, study, understanding things spiritual, to believe
in a Power great than mankind.
Anyone and say "poooie, ain't no such thing. Prove there is!"
To which I respond: Prove there isn't.
If an atheist doesn't believe in a deity then that atheist has never
been in a fox hole, shot at, been attacked with a knife with murderous intent,
held a child while it died, escaped certain death, or.....................................
Just my usual bigoted opinion.
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@jeager106 , you are both seriously mistaken and posting in a DIR not your own...
Oh noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo..
I am so sorry. Mia cupla.
It happens.
But it is too bad. I was just about to teach the secret handshake and give you the discount coupons for the pizzas.
But it is too bad. I was just about to teach the secret handshake and give you the discount coupons for the pizzas.
Born not believing.
See no reason to change.
See no reason to change.
Kilgore Trout
Misanthropic Humanist
Mostly because I understand people, and why they believe in things that have no rational or empirically-supportable basis.
Also because I've never seen any convincing or compelling reasoning or evidence to adopt any belief in such a thing.
I'm an atheist for the same reason I don't believe in astrology, psychics, reincarnation, teleportation, numerology, or Big Foot: I don't have the personality or capacity for fantasy-prone thought or belief.
Prove there isn't is a silly argument. Prove there isn't a flying teapot or a flying spaghetti monster or a purple skull juggling walrus. We don't keep encyclopedias of things that can't be disproven and regard them as true until proven otherwise. That's why the burden of proof is the onus of the believer, not the disbeliever.Because it's lazy thinking.
It takes a bit of work, curiosity, study, understanding things spiritual, to believe
in a Power great than mankind.
Anyone and say "poooie, ain't no such thing. Prove there is!"
To which I respond: Prove there isn't.
If an atheist doesn't believe in a deity then that atheist has never
been in a fox hole, shot at, attacked with a knife with murderous intent,
help a child while it died, escaped certain death, or.....................................
Just my usual bigoted opinion.
By the way, not only are there plenty of atheists in foxholes and we should really stop disrespecting atheist veterans with that untrue metaphor, Military Association of Atheists & Freethinkers
But it also says more about the person using the statement that it does the atheist. That tells me they're not an atheist because of fear for their mortality. Not love, not reverence for a god, but because they can't handle the idea of their own demise. Which makes me think that the atheists in foxholes are a whole lot braver than those who think they shouldn't be.
Edit: Oops, this is DIR and I shouldn't perpetuate argument. You can note me if you want to continue.
I've found every sort of theism I've ever encountered to be unconvincing.
Father Heathen
Veteran Member
I imagine that most don't believe simply due to a lack of adequate evidence to convince them otherwise.
Unveiled Artist
Veteran Member
It is honestly not in my mental programing of reality to assume a deity exists base off what I know of myself, people, and my environment. It isnt a "common sense" feeling or something point blank that needs no explanation for it to exist.
If something exists its either independent of ourselves or dependent on ourselves. Most christians I know, which are a lot, say god exists even if they do not. Given the above, god to me cannot exist without a person to describe it.
God is part of the human psyche. Its the nature of man. His inate emotions or soul if you will that helps you appreciate life. Culture, history, and tradition help shape this for external confirmation of its validity but it doesnt change that god is you.
But outside the human needs and wants, there is nothing I have heard about god that is unique to him. Even calling him, him says how he is a reflection of human thought.
No christian and other believers have challenged me on this. I guess they like the same ol' answers: "there is no proof; we cant see him; he is consciousness".
Nothing wrong with staying in ones confort zone. God cant say no. If he did, who would hear it without their interpretation added to it.
Father Heathen
Veteran Member
I wouldn't consider building belief on something more substantial than unsupported presumptions and empty speculation to be "lazy thinking".
Anyone and say "poooie, ain't no such thing. Prove there is!"
To which I respond: Prove there isn't.
Not how it works, son: Philosophical burden of proof - Wikipedia
There have been plenty of atheists in life threatening situations, including fire fighters, law enforcement officers, and service personnel. It's beyond ignorant and insulting to assume otherwise.
Why I Am an Atheist (Part 1)
“But how can you be an atheist?” That's the question I am most often asked when I'm discussing my nonreligious views with religious acquaintances. This is usually followed up with some variation on, “how do you know right from wrong if you don't believe in god?” Another frequent question is, “where do you go for help when it's all too much?”
And yet, to answer the question, “why am I an atheist,” seems to presuppose that I had some choice in the matter. That, for the record, is simply not true. William James and Pascal's Wager aside, one cannot really will oneself to believe. One either does or one does not. Certainly one can pretend (lots of churchgoers do that), but at the core of one's being, what one believes about god does not feel as if it's a matter dependent upon the will. Not if one is honest.
So the real answer, the only one that actually answers the question “why am I an atheist,” seems to be, “because that's the way I'm made.” This is hardly a satisfying answer, of course, and doesn't seem to answer the question that is so often asked. The intent of that question, if I understand it correctly, is rather more “how is it possible you gave up god?”
I Did Not Give Up God
I cannot recall a time, ever in my life, when I believed in a god, a soul that survived my body, or a “spirit realm” called either heaven or hell. I was certainly told about all of those things, of course - along with Santa and the Tooth Fairy - but I simply and quite honestly thought it all equally silly nonsense for kids. The Tooth Fairy and Santa didn't take long to dispense with, as I'm sure it doesn't for most kids, but it seems as if, somehow, I just applied the same kind of thinking to god.
I went to Sunday school and heard the Bible stories specially prepared for children. I was told that “Jesus loves me,” though nobody else at the time seemed to, and that “God sees the little sparrow fall.” I noticed, though, that god didn't hold out a single deified digit to prevent that fall. Then I checked out those Sunday school stories - I read the book (yes, that book, the Bible), from beginning to end, before I was 11 years old.
What horrors I found there! And what nonsense!
Now, as it happens, I was also a big fan of National Geographic (the only place I could see naked bodies back then), and everything I could find on dinosaurs and as much science as I could understand. Even as a little kid, I was happier with books and quiet time than on the playing fields. Peaceful walks in natural surroundings, hours with a magnifying glass (and later microscope) examining the wonders of the pond, under rocks, around the roots of trees - these were the things that occupied my mind.
The Bible didn't come close to being as believable as any of my other reading material. The god I found there was not, most assuredly not, the god I heard about in Sunday school.
What Did Other People Believe
And then, I discovered (perhaps I should say intuited) quite early on that most of the people around me who thought of themselves as believers - and who were supposed to be my role models in religious belief - didn't seem believe much either. Or rather, I should say that they may (I couldn't tell) have held some belief about the existence of god, but they most assuredly did not give much evidence of believing any of the Christian dogma that I was learning about.
“What an astonishing statement,” I hear you say. “How can you possibly know what somebody believes or doesn't believe?''
Well, I know that people “believe in” gravity when I see them step back from the edge of the precipice, or that fire bums as they quickly draw their hand back from the little explosion in the fireplace. Their actions give them away. I know that people believe that they actually have a chance at winning the lottery, else they wouldn't buy a ticket, which given the actual odds is pretty much exactly like tossing your two dollars over that precipice. Beliefs inform actions. Where the action is inconsistent with a stated belief, I must assume that the action is informed by some other belief, unknown to me and perhaps even to the person performing the action. But what I do know is that the claimed belief cannot be strongly held internally, or it would prevent the action that is inconsistent with it.
Let me provide a couple of examples.
There is wildly inconsistent use of Bible texts. Leviticus is used to label gay people as sinners worthy of death (or at least hell, perhaps), but seems remarkably ineffective in getting its message about the evils of pork chops, bacon and shrimp out to the masses. I for one (and I knew I was gay before I was ten) couldn't see why one verse was dutifully adhered to, to my cost, while others right around it were studiously ignored. That seemed to have a whole lot less to do with believing anything at all about god, and was more reflective of personal tastes. In other words, hypocrisy.
And I was told that faith, not good works, was needed to please god. Except, of course, when it was good works, not faith. I decided early on that good works couldn't be what people believed guaranteed entry into heaven, because those works were in remarkably short supply. And, of course, it doesn't take much actual observation of people to see how routinely the commandments are broken. I saw a graven image in practically every church I was in, but if you're going to flout a commandment, I suppose church is the place to do it.
Every believer seems more concerned about his own soul, its disposition after death, then about the condition of his fellow humans who are still alive. The Bible is chock-a-block with prohibitions and “though-shalt-nots,” but how much better than “don't get your hands dirty” might be the enjoinder to soil them dreadfully helping those in need?
And sex! Don't even get me started on the religious view (at least the Christian one I grew up with) of sex. (Yet, as a science reader I knew that sexual reproduction was only one of the options god had open to him. Nature, however, needed sexual reproduction as the surest route to evolution and the continuation of life through changing conditions.)
“But how can you be an atheist?” That's the question I am most often asked when I'm discussing my nonreligious views with religious acquaintances. This is usually followed up with some variation on, “how do you know right from wrong if you don't believe in god?” Another frequent question is, “where do you go for help when it's all too much?”
And yet, to answer the question, “why am I an atheist,” seems to presuppose that I had some choice in the matter. That, for the record, is simply not true. William James and Pascal's Wager aside, one cannot really will oneself to believe. One either does or one does not. Certainly one can pretend (lots of churchgoers do that), but at the core of one's being, what one believes about god does not feel as if it's a matter dependent upon the will. Not if one is honest.
So the real answer, the only one that actually answers the question “why am I an atheist,” seems to be, “because that's the way I'm made.” This is hardly a satisfying answer, of course, and doesn't seem to answer the question that is so often asked. The intent of that question, if I understand it correctly, is rather more “how is it possible you gave up god?”
I Did Not Give Up God
I cannot recall a time, ever in my life, when I believed in a god, a soul that survived my body, or a “spirit realm” called either heaven or hell. I was certainly told about all of those things, of course - along with Santa and the Tooth Fairy - but I simply and quite honestly thought it all equally silly nonsense for kids. The Tooth Fairy and Santa didn't take long to dispense with, as I'm sure it doesn't for most kids, but it seems as if, somehow, I just applied the same kind of thinking to god.
I went to Sunday school and heard the Bible stories specially prepared for children. I was told that “Jesus loves me,” though nobody else at the time seemed to, and that “God sees the little sparrow fall.” I noticed, though, that god didn't hold out a single deified digit to prevent that fall. Then I checked out those Sunday school stories - I read the book (yes, that book, the Bible), from beginning to end, before I was 11 years old.
What horrors I found there! And what nonsense!
Now, as it happens, I was also a big fan of National Geographic (the only place I could see naked bodies back then), and everything I could find on dinosaurs and as much science as I could understand. Even as a little kid, I was happier with books and quiet time than on the playing fields. Peaceful walks in natural surroundings, hours with a magnifying glass (and later microscope) examining the wonders of the pond, under rocks, around the roots of trees - these were the things that occupied my mind.
The Bible didn't come close to being as believable as any of my other reading material. The god I found there was not, most assuredly not, the god I heard about in Sunday school.
What Did Other People Believe
And then, I discovered (perhaps I should say intuited) quite early on that most of the people around me who thought of themselves as believers - and who were supposed to be my role models in religious belief - didn't seem believe much either. Or rather, I should say that they may (I couldn't tell) have held some belief about the existence of god, but they most assuredly did not give much evidence of believing any of the Christian dogma that I was learning about.
“What an astonishing statement,” I hear you say. “How can you possibly know what somebody believes or doesn't believe?''
Well, I know that people “believe in” gravity when I see them step back from the edge of the precipice, or that fire bums as they quickly draw their hand back from the little explosion in the fireplace. Their actions give them away. I know that people believe that they actually have a chance at winning the lottery, else they wouldn't buy a ticket, which given the actual odds is pretty much exactly like tossing your two dollars over that precipice. Beliefs inform actions. Where the action is inconsistent with a stated belief, I must assume that the action is informed by some other belief, unknown to me and perhaps even to the person performing the action. But what I do know is that the claimed belief cannot be strongly held internally, or it would prevent the action that is inconsistent with it.
Let me provide a couple of examples.
There is wildly inconsistent use of Bible texts. Leviticus is used to label gay people as sinners worthy of death (or at least hell, perhaps), but seems remarkably ineffective in getting its message about the evils of pork chops, bacon and shrimp out to the masses. I for one (and I knew I was gay before I was ten) couldn't see why one verse was dutifully adhered to, to my cost, while others right around it were studiously ignored. That seemed to have a whole lot less to do with believing anything at all about god, and was more reflective of personal tastes. In other words, hypocrisy.
And I was told that faith, not good works, was needed to please god. Except, of course, when it was good works, not faith. I decided early on that good works couldn't be what people believed guaranteed entry into heaven, because those works were in remarkably short supply. And, of course, it doesn't take much actual observation of people to see how routinely the commandments are broken. I saw a graven image in practically every church I was in, but if you're going to flout a commandment, I suppose church is the place to do it.
Every believer seems more concerned about his own soul, its disposition after death, then about the condition of his fellow humans who are still alive. The Bible is chock-a-block with prohibitions and “though-shalt-nots,” but how much better than “don't get your hands dirty” might be the enjoinder to soil them dreadfully helping those in need?
And sex! Don't even get me started on the religious view (at least the Christian one I grew up with) of sex. (Yet, as a science reader I knew that sexual reproduction was only one of the options god had open to him. Nature, however, needed sexual reproduction as the surest route to evolution and the continuation of life through changing conditions.)
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Why I Am An Atheist (Part 2)
It Started with My Upbringing
I was a battered child. Through all the torture of my growing up, I bore the pain and scars. Those who inflicted them went scot-free. I paraphrase David Hume in saying, if god could have prevented my pain but didn't, then he shares the blame. If he wanted to help me, but couldn't, then he was weaker than those who were hurting me, so I'd be better off bowing down before them than god. It was ce1iainly clear to me that god was not simultaneously interested in and capable of my protection, or else I would not have been so horribly hurt.
And nothing I found, either in the Bible or in church, answered my questions about why that should be so. and then I began to see that the world - supposedly the work and pride and joy of a loving god – while often beautiful, awe-inspiring, grand and mysterious, was also a world of unspeakable horror, visited without rhyme or reason upon the just and unjust alike, as were all its many pleasures. And I wondered how it was possible to lay all of the beauty - yet none of the horror - to god's account. And there were no answers.
Ah, but then I was told about Satan! The Devil, eager to cart everybody's soul off to Hell, which would be pem1itted for eternity for quite finite (often mild) indiscretions. Poppycock! Balderdash! Rubbish! If god is omnipotent, then Satan must be nothing by comparison. Infinity is infinitely greater than anything finite. Therefore, Satan could hold no sway - there cannot be two omnipotent entities in a single universe - by definition - since both would be unable to best the other - a clear failure in the definition of omnipotence. Thus, if god exists and moves in the world, then he's responsible for it all, including how ludicrously unfair it is.
Such a god, when I thought about it, was completely unacceptable to me.
Answering My Objections
No theist has ever actually answered my objections, although I answer all of theirs. Instead, when I raise what I consider to be a killer argument against god, they simply move on to another statement, usually unrelated. I've observed this many, many times in debates, for example between Richard Dawkins and Francis Collins. Dawkins gives direct answers to Collins's points, while Collins frequently rebuts with discourses on “god's purpose,” and similar arguments which are irrefutable.
But the truth is, the counter-argument to “red and green make purple,” is not “yellow and blue make green,” no matter how true the latter statement might be.
No Answers From Scripture(s)
Answers from Judeo-Christian scripture are no better to me than answers from other scriptures, or from Shakespeare or any other fiction. In fact, every answer from scripture is easily refuted, and almost always by a different selection from the same book. If this were not so, there would be no need for the very busy apologetics industry.
Religion, it seems to me, teaches that we should be satisfied without bothering to try and understand, to accept without questioning. All I ever have is questions, and magisterial answers, fully dependent on authority and nothing else, leave me completely unsatisfied.
God's Greatest Creation
I've seen the human race at work. God's greatest creation is responsible for a list of horrors too long for recitation here.
But it's not just the evil that men do. It's the sheer bloody stupidity of so much of the race. Watch the football hooligans in the stands, or in the streets after the game. See this creature, a little lower than the angels, this “piece of work ... so infinite in faculty,” as it watches endless hours of “reality television.”
I've heard Joel Osteen, a “good Christian,” describe gays and lesbians as “not god's best work” on Larry King Live on CNN. Yet Osteen seems unable, at least in this particular case, to follow the one thing that Christ is said to have really insisted upon - to love his fellow man without judging. Having failed at this single Christian duty, he still considers himself to be, one must assume, among “god's best work,” and therefore competent to judge the “sins” of others.
Guessing Game
A universe with god, well actually, with all the gods that humanity has created, is an endless guessing game, with poorer odds of being right than the lottery. What does god want? You'll never figure it out by observing and trying to make sense out of who suffers and who enjoys happiness. If we can't tell here on earth, what hope have we of understanding the rules by which one merits “heaven?”
Confusion
No god worthy of the position could possibly have arranged to be so variously, and badly, misunderstood. One hundred thousand religions later, and still no agreement on who or what god is, and what He/It wants.
Spirituality Needs Art, Not god
Spirituality is not aided by unwarranted fear nor unjustified hope, but rather by deeper understanding of ourselves and our universe. For true spirituality, put aside your scripture and turn instead to art - any art. And having done so, recognize that scripture is likewise art, able to provide us with new perspectives on ourselves and our world, worthy of similar (but not greater) respect.
Too Many Beliefs, Too Little Reason
I do not believe in god for the same reason that I do not believe in ghosts, the Yeti, Sasquatch, Loch Ness Monster, The Flying Spaghetti Monster, the Invisible Pink Unicorn, fai1ies, gnomes, ogres, gremlins, banshees, naiads, dryads, djinn, fairy god-mothers or spontaneous human combustion, among a rather longish list of other nonsense routinely held to be reasonable by far too many people.
Throughout my entire atheist existence, I've managed to behave both more morally and more ethically, with more concern for my fellow man of whatever condition, than many of the religious people that I've known. I am in myself proof that morality needs no god - Torquemada, for example, is proof that believing in god does not guarantee moral behaviour.
What a tragic notion must be held by the faithful that if, by some calamity, they lost their faith in god, they would suddenly be unable to restrain themselves from theft and murder. The atheist is in no doubt at all that - should he suddenly believe in god - he should continue to behave as morally as he did before. The problem with morality guided by religion is that religion (at least the human ones that I'm familiar with) is manifestly unintelligible. If this were not so, there would not, could not, have arisen about 100,000 of them in the course of human history.
God's Infinite Mercy
I could never believe in both Hell and a merciful god. Mercy is not needed at all except by those who are not wo1ihy of it. It is completely wasted on those who don't need it.
Religion Gone Bad
I have seen human nature - that good people do good things and bad people do bad things. But to get a whole church or mosque panting for the deaths of the homosexuals, the idolaters, the “sinners” of every sort - yes, that takes religion.
Original Sin
Few things offend me as much as the idea of “original sin” - that 1 (the child abused by those most accountable for my security) inherit guilt along with their genes. The Bishop of Hippo would excuse god for deformed and still-born children on such a vile supposition, but I will not.
Conclusion, My Purpose, Not God's
Mostly, I am an atheist because I think, and none of my thinking led me to any notion of god. Nothing led me to understand that there was any other purpose to my existence than what I chose to make of it. My parents gave me life, but it is mine to live, not theirs. They can hope anything they like for me, but I will go my own way.
I am not interested in being the object of “god's purpose,” whatever that might be (and I challenge anyone to tell me what it is). I'm the object of enough other purposes over which I have little control. Regarding a meaning or a purpose for my life, I prefer my own. And at least I have some hope of knowing what it IS.
Post Scriptum
I was mentioning this the other day to a friend, who said to me my analogy of winning the lottery and belief is flawed with respect to belief. She said, “I play the lottery because I hope to win, not because I believe I will win.”
Point taken. And it is true that I, too, play the lotteries. I also hope to win. But you know, if I believed that I could not win, I would not play. So, what does that suggest about my beliefs (even though l actually do know the odds)? Beliefs can, in fact, be much stronger than knowledge, for reasons that are so completely human. It's funny, but it's also a bit endearing sometimes-- as long as it doesn't get destructive!
Another point about my original post. I said “I am an atheist because I think.” Someone I know told me that was pretty arrogant, and that many intelligent, thinking people believe in a deity.
For my comment, then, I must apologize, because of course there are intelligent people on this forum who also believe in a deity. My thought perhaps didn't read as well as it could, and I can see how it looks.
Ah, well, this is a work in progress, and I'm open to change. Still, I did not mean that believers don't think and atheists do. I meant that I have always spent a lot of time thinking, and every avenue of thought that I traversed led me to a different conclusion than the vast majority of other people.
Still, I wonder sometimes if it isn't true that most people don't really spend a lot of time and effort really thinking about the things that they take for granted, and if they actually did stop and examine more closely, they might arrive at different conclusions. This might be especially true, not so much for belief in god, but for rigid adherence to the particular dogmas of most formal religions. It would still be possible, I think, to believe in god and the message of Christ without believing that Mary was a virgin, that water turned into wine, or that the dead got out of their graves and wandered around town, and nobody thought to actually write a memo about it. Or that Jesus actually and literally died for our sins.
It Started with My Upbringing
I was a battered child. Through all the torture of my growing up, I bore the pain and scars. Those who inflicted them went scot-free. I paraphrase David Hume in saying, if god could have prevented my pain but didn't, then he shares the blame. If he wanted to help me, but couldn't, then he was weaker than those who were hurting me, so I'd be better off bowing down before them than god. It was ce1iainly clear to me that god was not simultaneously interested in and capable of my protection, or else I would not have been so horribly hurt.
And nothing I found, either in the Bible or in church, answered my questions about why that should be so. and then I began to see that the world - supposedly the work and pride and joy of a loving god – while often beautiful, awe-inspiring, grand and mysterious, was also a world of unspeakable horror, visited without rhyme or reason upon the just and unjust alike, as were all its many pleasures. And I wondered how it was possible to lay all of the beauty - yet none of the horror - to god's account. And there were no answers.
Ah, but then I was told about Satan! The Devil, eager to cart everybody's soul off to Hell, which would be pem1itted for eternity for quite finite (often mild) indiscretions. Poppycock! Balderdash! Rubbish! If god is omnipotent, then Satan must be nothing by comparison. Infinity is infinitely greater than anything finite. Therefore, Satan could hold no sway - there cannot be two omnipotent entities in a single universe - by definition - since both would be unable to best the other - a clear failure in the definition of omnipotence. Thus, if god exists and moves in the world, then he's responsible for it all, including how ludicrously unfair it is.
Such a god, when I thought about it, was completely unacceptable to me.
Answering My Objections
No theist has ever actually answered my objections, although I answer all of theirs. Instead, when I raise what I consider to be a killer argument against god, they simply move on to another statement, usually unrelated. I've observed this many, many times in debates, for example between Richard Dawkins and Francis Collins. Dawkins gives direct answers to Collins's points, while Collins frequently rebuts with discourses on “god's purpose,” and similar arguments which are irrefutable.
But the truth is, the counter-argument to “red and green make purple,” is not “yellow and blue make green,” no matter how true the latter statement might be.
No Answers From Scripture(s)
Answers from Judeo-Christian scripture are no better to me than answers from other scriptures, or from Shakespeare or any other fiction. In fact, every answer from scripture is easily refuted, and almost always by a different selection from the same book. If this were not so, there would be no need for the very busy apologetics industry.
Religion, it seems to me, teaches that we should be satisfied without bothering to try and understand, to accept without questioning. All I ever have is questions, and magisterial answers, fully dependent on authority and nothing else, leave me completely unsatisfied.
God's Greatest Creation
I've seen the human race at work. God's greatest creation is responsible for a list of horrors too long for recitation here.
But it's not just the evil that men do. It's the sheer bloody stupidity of so much of the race. Watch the football hooligans in the stands, or in the streets after the game. See this creature, a little lower than the angels, this “piece of work ... so infinite in faculty,” as it watches endless hours of “reality television.”
I've heard Joel Osteen, a “good Christian,” describe gays and lesbians as “not god's best work” on Larry King Live on CNN. Yet Osteen seems unable, at least in this particular case, to follow the one thing that Christ is said to have really insisted upon - to love his fellow man without judging. Having failed at this single Christian duty, he still considers himself to be, one must assume, among “god's best work,” and therefore competent to judge the “sins” of others.
Guessing Game
A universe with god, well actually, with all the gods that humanity has created, is an endless guessing game, with poorer odds of being right than the lottery. What does god want? You'll never figure it out by observing and trying to make sense out of who suffers and who enjoys happiness. If we can't tell here on earth, what hope have we of understanding the rules by which one merits “heaven?”
Confusion
No god worthy of the position could possibly have arranged to be so variously, and badly, misunderstood. One hundred thousand religions later, and still no agreement on who or what god is, and what He/It wants.
Spirituality Needs Art, Not god
Spirituality is not aided by unwarranted fear nor unjustified hope, but rather by deeper understanding of ourselves and our universe. For true spirituality, put aside your scripture and turn instead to art - any art. And having done so, recognize that scripture is likewise art, able to provide us with new perspectives on ourselves and our world, worthy of similar (but not greater) respect.
Too Many Beliefs, Too Little Reason
I do not believe in god for the same reason that I do not believe in ghosts, the Yeti, Sasquatch, Loch Ness Monster, The Flying Spaghetti Monster, the Invisible Pink Unicorn, fai1ies, gnomes, ogres, gremlins, banshees, naiads, dryads, djinn, fairy god-mothers or spontaneous human combustion, among a rather longish list of other nonsense routinely held to be reasonable by far too many people.
- Every “fact” of science can be demonstrated again and again in controlled experiments. Every theory makes predictions which can be tested for. Not a single “fact” of such pseudoscientific or religious nonsense ever has been, nor ever can be, tested, and none makes predictions that I'm aware of (or when they do, as is sometimes said of astrology, they are either to general to be useful, or turn out to be wrong a statistically correct number of times).
- When a theory of science is finally shown not to fulfill some crite1ion or other implicit in itself, then the theory is either corrected or discarded. Pseudo-science and religion are immune to that sort of self-correction, since there is never going to be any evidence to “disprove” their assertions anyway.
- If anything must exist, it might as well be the universe as god. Is a naked singularity so much less likely than a consciousness without any other sort of existence, (or means to support itself)? Why propose a middle-man, which only complicates matters?
Throughout my entire atheist existence, I've managed to behave both more morally and more ethically, with more concern for my fellow man of whatever condition, than many of the religious people that I've known. I am in myself proof that morality needs no god - Torquemada, for example, is proof that believing in god does not guarantee moral behaviour.
What a tragic notion must be held by the faithful that if, by some calamity, they lost their faith in god, they would suddenly be unable to restrain themselves from theft and murder. The atheist is in no doubt at all that - should he suddenly believe in god - he should continue to behave as morally as he did before. The problem with morality guided by religion is that religion (at least the human ones that I'm familiar with) is manifestly unintelligible. If this were not so, there would not, could not, have arisen about 100,000 of them in the course of human history.
God's Infinite Mercy
I could never believe in both Hell and a merciful god. Mercy is not needed at all except by those who are not wo1ihy of it. It is completely wasted on those who don't need it.
Religion Gone Bad
I have seen human nature - that good people do good things and bad people do bad things. But to get a whole church or mosque panting for the deaths of the homosexuals, the idolaters, the “sinners” of every sort - yes, that takes religion.
Original Sin
Few things offend me as much as the idea of “original sin” - that 1 (the child abused by those most accountable for my security) inherit guilt along with their genes. The Bishop of Hippo would excuse god for deformed and still-born children on such a vile supposition, but I will not.
Conclusion, My Purpose, Not God's
Mostly, I am an atheist because I think, and none of my thinking led me to any notion of god. Nothing led me to understand that there was any other purpose to my existence than what I chose to make of it. My parents gave me life, but it is mine to live, not theirs. They can hope anything they like for me, but I will go my own way.
I am not interested in being the object of “god's purpose,” whatever that might be (and I challenge anyone to tell me what it is). I'm the object of enough other purposes over which I have little control. Regarding a meaning or a purpose for my life, I prefer my own. And at least I have some hope of knowing what it IS.
Post Scriptum
I was mentioning this the other day to a friend, who said to me my analogy of winning the lottery and belief is flawed with respect to belief. She said, “I play the lottery because I hope to win, not because I believe I will win.”
Point taken. And it is true that I, too, play the lotteries. I also hope to win. But you know, if I believed that I could not win, I would not play. So, what does that suggest about my beliefs (even though l actually do know the odds)? Beliefs can, in fact, be much stronger than knowledge, for reasons that are so completely human. It's funny, but it's also a bit endearing sometimes-- as long as it doesn't get destructive!
Another point about my original post. I said “I am an atheist because I think.” Someone I know told me that was pretty arrogant, and that many intelligent, thinking people believe in a deity.
For my comment, then, I must apologize, because of course there are intelligent people on this forum who also believe in a deity. My thought perhaps didn't read as well as it could, and I can see how it looks.
Ah, well, this is a work in progress, and I'm open to change. Still, I did not mean that believers don't think and atheists do. I meant that I have always spent a lot of time thinking, and every avenue of thought that I traversed led me to a different conclusion than the vast majority of other people.
Still, I wonder sometimes if it isn't true that most people don't really spend a lot of time and effort really thinking about the things that they take for granted, and if they actually did stop and examine more closely, they might arrive at different conclusions. This might be especially true, not so much for belief in god, but for rigid adherence to the particular dogmas of most formal religions. It would still be possible, I think, to believe in god and the message of Christ without believing that Mary was a virgin, that water turned into wine, or that the dead got out of their graves and wandered around town, and nobody thought to actually write a memo about it. Or that Jesus actually and literally died for our sins.
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