To all ATHEISTS out there.

a reply to: St0rD

Do you have regular interaction with many atheists? Why would you find it difficult to get along with them? A person's spiritual or religious belief...or lack thereof...only represents part of who that person is. Why not simply accept that they are human beings who have a different view than you do and find other things to talk about?

I believe that everyone has the inherent right to make their own decisions about what they believe, without persecution, judgement or ridicule...and without other people trying to affect their free will by shoving their own beliefs down their throats.

Of course, it is a rant, so there's that...but really, why does it vex you so that others do not believe in a creator deity? If they're wrong and some omnipotent being chooses to smite them, at least they know the choice was theirs and no one else's.

Hell, even Jesus said it. Dust off your feet and keep walking toward people who are willing to listen. Paraphrasing, of course, but the man had a really good point.

I hope you don't spend your life wasting too much of your energy on pointless things like this. I say pointless, because you're not going to change someone's mind this way. And really, why would you want to? Live and let live, man.

Dude, I think if I (an atheist) can live 3 doors down from a Catholic church & have a good first-name-basis friendship with the CRC pastor at the one the next block over, you can pull your head out of your ass & quit sulking like a toddler.
I can certainly debate & criticize the concept of religion like anyone else, but it does NOT get in the way of living side-by-side or forming meaningful friendships.

Methinks you're your own root problem, not others.

a reply to: Nyiah

How dare you just let those fanatics just...be!

And those Catholics, they allow you to live in their worshipping vicinity?

You clearly are what's wrong with this world.

a reply to: JinMI

Not only do they allow a dirty atheist like me to live within their worshiping vicinity, they allow a METHODIST church across the street from them! And the CRC church doesn't even require you be a parishioner, or religious at all, to partake in their knitting group or kids' art days! THE NERVE. This is why the world is burning, too much welcoming acceptance 'round these parts.

a reply to: Nyiah

Not only do they allow a dirty atheist like me to live within their worshiping vicinity, they allow a METHODIST church across the street from them!

As an agnostic, I'm not sure I shouldn't even be responding to you. If anyone knew that I shared my bed with a witch also...well, lets just say it would get mighty hot around here.

originally posted by: Lysergic
a reply to: St0rD

science is a method of testing hypothesis. ...

not a belief system.

The hypothesis that there is no creator is a hypothesis that cannot be proven.
The hypothesis that there is no other life in the universe is a hypothesis that cannot be proven.

But wait.....a scientist can go try to see if there is a creator or other life in the universe, but they find none. Yet they insist there is life out there but no creator.

The hypothesis that there is a creator cannot be proven.
The hypothesis that there is life out there cannot be proven.
Yet they insist one is silly and one is not.

If they do find life, they will have found proof there is a creator. If there is only life on Earth in the whole universe ever, than that is more likely to be a statistical anomaly of chance for life happening than finding life in multiple places and times.

They cannot win for trying but their so called hypotheses are in fact beliefs, which is in itself a hypothesis that is proven by their favorite choices in unproven hypotheses.

a reply to: TinfoilTP

tldr

originally posted by: Lysergic
a reply to: TinfoilTP

tldr

You had momentary bias overload, understandable.

a reply to: St0rD

I am an atheist. What that means is I simply deny the God claim made by theists due to lack of compelling evidence. Since you are claiming a God you must produce the evidence that one exists. I wont even ask if you have any because I know you dont. As an athiest I do not "have faith" in science, although time and again science has proven to be a fairly reliable model = though not perfect.

originally posted by: St0rD

To all atheists out there I must be honest, the more I go through life the more I find it hard to go along with you guys. A lot claim to be more wise and more intelligent than those who believe and rely on an ''imaginary being''. Well let me tell you something - you #ing rely on something. Something that is called science.
You believe only science can get us out of this #ing mess. Well here is something that science is already telling you.. even though it has not even discovered 10% of the universe:

All of creation is perfectly created. All of creation is intelligently designed. Nothing is left unchecked and everything lives in symbiosis (except for humans, ironically). We all know about the big bang. It claims that from nothing appeared everything. So, consciousness and intelligence spawned out of... #ing nowhere?

'' Nothing is destroyed, nothing is created, everything is transformed''

That's basic science ffs. And yet you guys still look up on believers? Everywhere you look can see hints and proofs of an ultimate intelligent being. Yet, you still deny that to have such a marvelous and gigantic universe you have got to have a #ing OVERWHELMING power somewhere behind all of it.

I find it disturbing to see how such small human beings permit themselves to jugde such a tremendous work of creation and put man above all. Above nature, above animals and even above God. Just as I speak scientists are actively working to 'perfect creation' through DNA engineering and other #ed up stuff.

We are babies learning to walk in the cosmos and yet we think we can still manipulate reality just as we please.
THAT is insanity, wake up ffs!


P.S: Little proof of total infiniteness.

It's a bit difficult to know where to start with this one. I'll pick out this one teeny .... You say, quite clearly.....

"All of creation is perfectly created." Well I can name a few design flaws - why don't humans and goats not manufacture Vitamin C in their bodies as do most animals in response to stress?

Then ...

"'' Nothing is destroyed, nothing is created, everything is transformed''" So you don't believe in a creator - a creator has to initially be outside of 'the creation' .....

Then ....

Everybody does 'rely' (trust, have faith) in something. Most Eastern religions are athestic. Science isn't the only thing people can believe in. In fact, in the West, "Money" and "Self" are the two top 'Idols'.

Why does someone's else's belief trigger such rancour in you? Science is reproducible, by definition, by all manner of people and as close to objective as we can accomplish. But religious, political, cultural beliefs are all very subjective and not reproducible by others. That is why science need to be attended to.

Best Wishes.

Are atheists the only ones who believe science?

Simply put as an Atheist... i'm actually agnostic as is everyone else as no-one knows. Atheism I just choosing not to believe in something because someone else told you to.

"There are about 3,000 Gods to choose from. Basically, you deny one less God than I do.
You don’t believe in 2,999 Gods. And I don’t believe in just one more."

a reply to: Nyiah

Hey, my Catholic neighbors seem to be pretty tolerant of having a filthy heathen Witch right in their midst too...which is great, since I'm surrounded on all sides by them, and within throwing distance of two big churches. Not the first time I've been the minority, but at least if I'm outside doing witchy things these people don't start walking the opposite direction as if I'm going to turn them into toads or something. Nobody seems to think anyone else is better or worse than they are. Very refreshing, I must say. Peacefully coexisting...what a concept!

a reply to: St0rD

So if you see a closed door that you cannot open yet..

Surely god must be standing on the other side ?

a reply to: St0rD

I am a man of faith.

BUT... I have experienced more good will, kinship and evenhanded treatment, from atheists and worshipers of the Earth itself, than I have from other Christians. It is strange to say baldly, but some of the most Christian people I know, have no time for the Bible, or for any of the matters of my faith. But that should not be a surprise. Organised religion is toxic to the soul, and anathema to the spirit. Flawed people, being lead in prayer by a flawed person, dressed in holy robes as if to lift him or her above others, when all they are is yet another damaged vessel with corrupt contents.

I denounce the hierarchy which exists in all organised religion, because Jesus never mentioned an army of robe wearing sycophants, tyrants, kiddy fiddlers and conservative hatemongers. He said that none come to the Father, but through Him. There is no one between me and Christ. I can well understand atheists issues with the way religion works, when all it really seems to be from the outside, is a method by which corrupt, evil people, can corrupt others to their will.

Basically, if you want to know what atheists problem really is, look at the oxymoronic Christian Conservative movement, and the horrendous, disgusting, hateful thing that it is. A group of people so deluded, they believe they can achieve through hate, what Christ recommended be done through love and compassion. Look upon these things and more, and tell me you do not understand the unwillingness of reasonable people, to involve themselves with it.

I have an advantage, in that I knew Christ from a young age, and escaped the Church before my mind was ruined by it. I kept Christ, and abandoned the evil structures which have been erected in his name, abandoned congregational religion entirely, and worshiped Christ, the way he and his followers worshiped God, in the home, and in my deeds as a man in the world. If I, a man who loves Jesus, who loves God, can say without a shred of doubt, that the Church is a terrible, dangerous and corrupt entity, then what reason would a questioning person, absent a relationship with Christ, have to involve him or herself with it?

You wonder at atheists? First, look within your own community, and see it honestly. There is more than enough to turn a person away from faith, within the communities and hierarchies created to support it. People rarely announce their atheism having had no experience of, or contact with, the church or its tendrils. There is not a more effective way to dissuade a person from a relationship with Christ, than to operate an organisation in his name.

a reply to: St0rD

You know why atheists (well intelligent people in general that is not just atheists) trust to science? Because science only speaks to what it can prove or rationalize unlike religion which makes proclamations then proceeds to defend them at all costs. Humans are notoriously bad guessers and minimizing the guesswork goes a long way to discovering the true reality of the universe.

For instance, there is this proclamation you made that you clearly never bothered to actually look up and confirm is true. You just regurgitated stuff you think is true and proceed to declare it as so. That is religion, not science.

All of creation is perfectly created. All of creation is intelligently designed. Nothing is left unchecked and everything lives in symbiosis (except for humans, ironically). We all know about the big bang. It claims that from nothing appeared everything. So, consciousness and intelligence spawned out of... #ing nowhere?

That is a HUGE misunderstanding about the Big Bang (it NEVER says that everything appeared from nothing) and creation isn't "perfectly" created. Whatever that is supposed to mean. Go out and find a perfect circle or sphere in the universe. They don't exist.

I find it disturbing to see how such small human beings permit themselves to jugde such a tremendous work of creation and put man above all. Above nature, above animals and even above God. Just as I speak scientists are actively working to 'perfect creation' through DNA engineering and other #ed up stuff.

You are projecting religion's intentions onto science. It is religion that declared the earth at the center of the universe. It is religion that declared man to be above all animals. It is religion that models its gods after human behavior (while simultaneously saying they are above it). It is religion that maintains the Earth is 6000 years old. It is religion that maintains that humans and the planet they live on are somehow the most important thing in the vast universe.

Science changed the thinking on ALL of those beliefs and is constantly working to put more perspective in human imagination by trying to show humanity's insignificance to the grand universe. Just because humans work to master and understand physics and the way the universe works doesn't mean we are putting humans above anything.

originally posted by: TinfoilTP
If they do find life, they will have found proof there is a creator. If there is only life on Earth in the whole universe ever, than that is more likely to be a statistical anomaly of chance for life happening than finding life in multiple places and times.

This is a gross misunderstanding of what science is saying on both matters. Life elsewhere in the universe becomes a statistical inevitability the greater the size of the universe and the longer it has been in existence in its current form. Since both of those measurements are vast (one of which we cannot even measure yet) science maintains that life is likely to exist elsewhere in the universe in some form even though it hasn't been discovered. Due to the vastness of these two sizes it is more statistically unlikely that life ONLY exists on Earth which would go more to proving a creator than finding life elsewhere in the universe would. Though neither discovery would ACTUALLY prove or disprove a creator.

originally posted by: Krazysh0t
a reply to: St0rD

You know why atheists (well intelligent people in general that is not just atheists) trust to science? Because science only speaks to what it can prove or rationalize unlike religion which makes proclamations then proceeds to defend them at all costs. Humans are notoriously bad guessers and minimizing the guesswork goes a long way to discovering the true reality of the universe.

For instance, there is this proclamation you made that you clearly never bothered to actually look up and confirm is true. You just regurgitated stuff you think is true and proceed to declare it as so. That is religion, not science.

All of creation is perfectly created. All of creation is intelligently designed. Nothing is left unchecked and everything lives in symbiosis (except for humans, ironically). We all know about the big bang. It claims that from nothing appeared everything. So, consciousness and intelligence spawned out of... #ing nowhere?

That is a HUGE misunderstanding about the Big Bang (it NEVER says that everything appeared from nothing) and creation isn't "perfectly" created. Whatever that is supposed to mean. Go out and find a perfect circle or sphere in the universe. They don't exist.

I find it disturbing to see how such small human beings permit themselves to jugde such a tremendous work of creation and put man above all. Above nature, above animals and even above God. Just as I speak scientists are actively working to 'perfect creation' through DNA engineering and other #ed up stuff.

You are projecting religion's intentions onto science. It is religion that declared the earth at the center of the universe. It is religion that declared man to be above all animals. It is religion that models its gods after human behavior (while simultaneously saying they are above it). It is religion that maintains the Earth is 6000 years old. It is religion that maintains that humans and the planet they live on are somehow the most important thing in the vast universe.

Science changed the thinking on ALL of those beliefs and is constantly working to put more perspective in human imagination by trying to show humanity's insignificance to the grand universe. Just because humans work to master and understand physics and the way the universe works doesn't mean we are putting humans above anything.

.


This reply deserves praise. Well said!

I like religion and it's penchant for adaptability depending on your psychological profile.

Currently I'm focusing on idolatry. Yes, that's right a graven image of this guy...



Praise Bob!

Question.. I keep seeing it here. Why do so many of you interlink atheism and agnosticism as one in the same? They're not.

originally posted by: SpeakerofTruth
Question.. I keep seeing it here. Why do so many of you interlink atheism and agnosticism as one in the same? They're not.

Because most atheists are agnostics and vice-versa. So it is easier for people to just assume they are synonyms, but that just shows they are lazy critical thinkers instead.