but you were right, for the Islam, Christianity and Buddhism parts. that IS exactly what we are taught..

@ Pielouka-Why? What is your proof for that? Is not the birth of a child a miracle? Is not the growing of a tree a miracle? Is not the fact that this world exists a miracle?  

It’s science.
The things you have mentioned are wonderful and support us as humans.

And if Earth is knocked out its current tracked orbit by a very large meteor and all existing life ceases….is that a miracle also?

You claim to be a freethinker, open minded etc, but I think in this post your bias is starting to show quite blatantly. Funny how each religion is named and described very specifically, yet you lump your own beliefs with “unbelief”. Now that is an incredibly vague category. That could be someone who’s never even thought about God, or who couldn’t care less about whether he existed or not, or is an agnostic or gnostic atheist. And I think you know full well that many atheists- though certainly not all- do actually have a belief that God does not exist.

And I think that that can be shown by asking them the question, “Does God exist?” Now of couse if they simply had a non-belief about God, they would say “I don’t have a belief”, whereas most atheists would give actively negative answer, “No.” Which is fair enough, but its not a non-belief.

And so with that in mind, you could have described the atheist worldview something like this,”Atheism- the belief that there was nothing and then nothing happened to nothing and then nothing magically exploded for no reason, creating everything. Then for no reason some things on earth magically made themselves to start living, which then accidently made themselves into unbelievably complex animals for no reason.” “You cretin, you clearly have no capacity in your puny little half-evolved brain to understand atheism AT ALL!!”, I hear you say! And I agree that this is not a fair representation of atheism, but this is just the same kind of representation that Luke has given these other worldviews here. Either reject them all as inadequate representations, or accept them all- including the one for atheism.

I’ve got to say, though, putting in scientology and not Judaism is strange. We might be small, but we definitely have more people than scientology, and certainly have more influence in Hollywood. Not to mention there are enough qualitative differences between us and Christianity or Islam to deserve your scorn on our own. The Christian god wanted everyone to turn their frikken cheeks. It was Yaweh, our badass psychotic adonai that flooded the earth because he was… ummmm….. jealous? Don’t get me started on the book of Job.

I mean, don’t the funny sideburns and hats deserve some mention?

… and Annon…. I really don’t know why you “have the feeling you laughed at all cracks on the religions you don’t believe in, and are only upset because Christianity was thrown into the same group as them?”

I’ve already stated that I’m agnostic, and just fyi I was raised muslim but everybody else here is christian or atheist.

0 evidence = nonexistence until proven otherwise (or at least until there’s SOMETHING like evidence, something that makes the possibility stand out). I would think that would be an obvious logical point.

Now, people can believe whatever makes them happy. I don’t care. I have a friend who’s a creationist. But he doesn’t try to defend it logically, he just says that’s what makes him happy. (to quote him, “I know my entire philosophy sounds like the fantasy trope of ‘wizard did it’”). I start caring when people try to make themselves sound logical or rational when they are not.

Oh, and I would argue that atheism is often a faith. Not for everyone; some people are just taking their agnosticism very far towards the direction of non-belief, and I don’t blame them (Again, it is the more logical conclusion to conclude that there is no god than that there is one, so the strength of that conviction is a matter of choice), but when an atheist refuses to allow for the possibility of god, then he steps into the same territory of the religious. (I’m not saying Anon, or anyone else here is doing that, merely pointing out that it occurs).

After all, a god similar to the one of the hebrews COULD exist, if you remove the logical inconsistencies and factual inaccuracies. Could have come down and told them to mutilate the genitals of all little boys. Heck, could be the same god that went to Mohammed, who was a pedophile (his 9 year old wife, Aisha, whom he supposedly consummated the marriage with, because I’m sure I’ll get attacked for mentioning it). And that strange, evil god COULD have created us. I wouldn’t serve him, even if he did, but it is not outside the realm of possibility. But without SOME KIND OF EVIDENCE, I’m not goign to belive, because htere’s no reason to believe. To believe is an affirmative, an affirmative needs a basis.

Maven: lukeprog,I must admit the fact that you elicited a laugh or two when I read this post, but in one of your comments you said that you use varied strategies to “wake people up.”This question is not a jab but rather serious intrigue as to your reasoning: what gives you the right? I think we all agree that the Jehovah’s Witness on one’s doorstep is a burden, and should not have plagued the world by ringing our doorbell.Similarly, (I assume, possibly faslely) that you have decided that your faith is truth and that all other belief systems are false, you have made this decision publicly known, and you have then made the attempt to force your beliefs on others with various “strategies to ‘wake people up.’”If ignorance truly is bliss, and the 4.8995 billion people in that set of statistics are happy with their delusion, why does it matter if they dont understand the world like you do?If you could help me understand, that would be great.The way I see it, if there is no afterlife and this is it, if when I die all that will come about is decay and grief, and if there truly is no purpose to it all, then I have nothing to live for, because in the end all my endeavors result in nothing. I live without meaning, while the blind follower lives knowing that he will soon be met with rainbows and puppies. As much as it pains me to say it, I think he is the more happy man.Or, is happiness a dellusion too?  

Why do I have the feeling you laughed at all cracks on the religions you don’t believe in, and are only upset because Christianity was thrown into the same group as them?

I have a very christian background. Born into a christian family I was completely brainwashed until about 16 I was christian but thought it all sounded a bit silly. 17-24 I was agnostic, and after 24 atheist, mostly because of having access to so much information and articles like this helped put into perspective how silly religion is and give me a better understanding of why scientist theories are what they are. It was such a relief to be free of what I now view as a mental virus. I remember in sitting in classes up through high school and any time something came up that contradicted what I was taught I’d think “this is bullshit, they dont know what they’re talking about” and “lol plate tectonics my ass”. Things like carbon dating, evolution, genetics, I remember learning all these things and discounting them at the same time. It’s so easy to believe something that’s off the wall when that’s all you’re exposed to.

You ask what gives him the right to “wake people up”… yet the christian faith tells you to be “fishers of men”. It’s not just Jehovah’s witnesses that go door to door, and I’m sure at one time you’ve attended a church that’s funded or sent missionaries. All lukeprog did was write this and put on on an ATHEIST website. FFS

Atheism is not a faith. No matter how much you say it is, no matter how much you want it to be, no matter what you’ve heard misguided christian leaders say, it’s not a faith. I’m starting to wonder if I’m getting trolled.

What’s wrong with someone believing something as long as it makes them happy? So the more ignorant you are the more happy you are? And on being misguided, doesn’t it bother you to know you’re living in a false dream world? and the fact that you can say that thinking of life without an afterlife/god wouldn’t be worth living says a lot of why people believe these ludicrous beliefs in the first place. “Religion. A really complicated and illogical way of saying ‘I’m scared of death’”\

Side note, I saw the invention of lying and loved it.

You spent all that time saying that “We have no proof of there being a god, and no proof of there not being one”, then you say “I will pick the most likely, and as there is 0 evidence of god, then, like with anything else there is 0 evidence of, I will assume it does not exist until something comes along to shake that fact.”

Care to explain why the zero evidence against god is better than the zero evidence for it?

To use a famous example, Russel’s Teapot, there COULD be a teapot orbiting Jupiter. It’s too small to see, and Jupiter’s a huge surface for me to be looking at, so therefore, although I really don’t believe there is one, if someone tells me there is, I must at least admit the possibility of such.

That being said, every religion that I’ve ever heard of is provably false. The bible, after all, defines pi as 3. As such, if one precept is falsified, the whole thing becomes questionable. The bible also defines god (and someone else mentioned this) as all knowing, all powerful, and all loving. That is retarded. Anything with the ‘omniscience’ tag belies free will; knowing what someone will do means they have no choice in the matter. And omnipotence means free will. Though you may quibble with the specifics I have here, the point is that every actual religion makes claims. Once you make a claim, then your theory can be falsified. And every religion I know of has falsified claims (usually relating to prayer), and as such has invalidated itself as a theory.

And example, in science, would be ‘the aether’, which was an idea proposed to negate the idea of a real vacuum, with the thought that light waves couldn’t propogate in a vacuum (I’m vastly oversimplifying). It was invalidated as a theory as soon as its claims were looked at seriously, and we realized that it was not true. This doesn’t mean there isn’t something we don’t know about, only that the aether, as described, doesn’t exist. I would say the same about every religion. God, as THEY DESCRIBE, does not exist. God as a concept, however, is a different matter.

God alone, existence versus non, is like String Theory. Makes things prettier in your head, but makes no predictions and no specific claims that can be refuted. The religious frequently fall back on “you can’t prove he doesn’t exist” claims. And they are right. The problem is they usually try to parlay that into their own specific religion, which as I’ve said, then starts to make claims, which then invariably are falsified. The less claims a religion makes, the closer to the simple idea of god’s existence, the more difficult it is to falsify. I mean, perhaps god just doesn’t like us, and that’s why he’s hidden himself from us. Perhaps he’s ‘just fucking with us’ with dinosaur bones and the appearance of age. I always make room for that possibility.

But on a day to day basis, I must have a working theory. Just as I assume there are no invisible unicorns in my underwear drawer, despite the fact that, like with the idea of god, I can’t rove there aren’t, I assume there is no god. But again, this doesn’t mean I say for sure he doesn’t exist, only that there are an infinity of things that are possible, and I cannot believe them all, nor can I live a day to day life making room for them all. After all, perhaps god needs me to walk backwards or I’ll go to hell, or perhaps sideways or I’ll go hell, thus ensuring that no matter what, I might be going to hell. I cannot work with conflicting theories like that, and so have to pick one. I will pick the most likely, and as there is 0 evidence of god, then, like with anything else there is 0 evidence of, I will assume it does not exist until something comes along to shake that fact.

You can choose to believe what you want, but if you believe in god, then you are, by definition, being irrational. There is no need to gather ‘evidence’ to back that claim up, the only thing necessary is an analysis of the position, to see how it is logically incoherent, and thus irrational, and thus, if you care clearly being irrational, then idea that you ‘cannot rationally think for yourself’ is a fair one to put forward. I’m sorry you don’t LIKE that; unfortunately, reality doesn’t bend to our wills. To quote Philip K. Dick, “Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn’t go away.”

And in response to the idea that “just you” being born is a miracle, because you could just as easily not be, that is a ridiculous argument. The same argument would have you call every coin flip, REGARDLESS OF OUTCOME, a miracle, thus making the term meaningless. (“My god it’s heads, I can’t believe it’s heads. And this time it’s tails! Wow!”) It’s just statistics. If the conditions are right for pregnancy, it will occur. That is biology. If pregnancy is going to occur, only one sperm can get in (normally, I believe there are exceptions but they are irrelevant to the dicussion at hand), this is also biology. If only one can get in, and there are millions, then yes, you are a one in a million chance. But to refer back a bit to a previous person’s idea of a religion lottery, if you have a set defined set of numbers (let’s say you’ve numbered each sperm), and you know one will be ‘chosen’, then there is absolutely nothing to the fact that any specific one was chosen. This takes into account equality of likelihood. Now, it has been noted that some sperm are more fit than others. This follows its own causal chain: a leads to be leads to c leads to a sluggish individual sperm. To say this is a miracle is to say that literally everything that happens, literally all the time, is a miracle. Thus miracle would lose all meaning, and THAT’S why some took issue with your use of it in that way. It is a known logical fallacy to look at a statistically unlikely outcome and infer meaning to it, when in fact AN outcome is certain, and the purpose of statistics is to quantify how often any particular outcome is likely to come up, and so therefore that often that outcome WILL come up. After all, in the marathon example, SOMEONE WILL WIN. We can analyze WHY whoever won, won, but SOMEONE would. We can’t say that therefore it’s a miracle someone specific won… it had to be somebody. (Also, as in an earlier example, with the 99.7 percent effectiveness leading to a .3 percent chance of pregnancy despite. Therefore, if 1000 people are on it, 3 WILL get pregnant, and it is foolishness to infer anything beyond that, since we already knew it was going to happen…it would be like saying “whoa, I stubbed my toe, then felt pain! What a miracle! … I took that pill, and 997 people who also took it didn’t get pregnant, but me and two others did get pregnant, what a miracle!)

I guess the final thought about that would be, that you’re saying I’m here is a miracle…but you’d also say that if a different sperm had fertilized and a different ‘me’ was here. Or if I wasn’t here at al, and someone else’s kid was in my place. so how is it a miracle?

Sorry to be so verbose. To end on another quote, just for fun, I’ll leave you with Mark Twain: “Faith is believing what you know ain’t so.”

I myself am a true believer in God (although many of the details are sketchy to me still). I am here, enjoyed the article, and in no way want to “save anyone’s soul.” Not because people here don’t deserve it, but because I don’t have any right to. I’m tired of many of the masses being afraid to talk to and being aggressive to Christians because of those who feel the need to convert others.

I think that before you put all of us believers into a category saying that none of us can rationally think for ourselves, you need to get more evidence that backs up your comment. Because I’ve known many Theists that have a good backbone when it comes to knowledge, facts, and individualism. It’s just the crazy people who follow “Christ” or people who claim to be “Christ’s followers” blindly that are dangerous and annoying.

As I read somewhere else, “If you could reason with theists, there wouldn’t be any theists.” That makes sense to be because the first thing a theist must do is reject all semblance of reality. Then goes logic, facts, and rational thinking for oneself.

So keep up the good work of entertaining rationalists.

I laughed when I read your analogy to the board game because I completely agree. I suppose my point was to propose that perhaps the reason we cannot “prove” any philosophical idea is not only a variance in perspective creating a seemingly impossible “overall truth”, but also because of something greater. I would also like to reiterate that Christianity was not the purpose of my post, merely the angle chosen.

And in regards to your question, I am seventeen. :)

I went back and read what I wrote, and I can see how I could have come off as aggressive and I apologize. As for whether Shay is an atheist or an agnostic… she is an atheist.

“Judeo-Christians are atheists as well, I just believe in one less God than them.”

The way I see it, Atheists are agnostics as well, I just believe in one less nongod then them.