Ask an atheist anything! (seriously, anything)

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SomeGuyWithQuestions

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Edit: Apparently there’s a maximum number of replies that I can give in the first 24 hours of creating an account. My apologies to those who haven’t been replied to; I will do my best to reply to everyone that I couldn’t get to after the timer is up!

Atheist here. A little background info on me: I’m currently enrolled in a Catholic school and have been my whole life. My family is Catholic and up until recently, I have gone to church my whole life. Pretty much my entire life I’ve had questions about God and all that sort of stuff. About 4 years ago, those doubts grew stronger. Rather than ignoring them and pretending that it wasn’t there, I researched the topic. I looked at both Catholic arguments (which I initially agreed with) and atheist arguments (which I found myself agreeing with more and more.) For the past three years or so, I have identified as an atheist. In the technical sense, I am agnostic, but in the words of Richard Dawkins, “I am agnostic about God in the same way that you are agnostic about unicorns or the tooth fairy.” Today, I made my way to this forum in search of further knowledge. I figured that I’d start by allowing others to ask questions of me, and then maybe I can ask some questions myself, too. So, what have you got?

Edit 2: posting my first edit at the beginning of my wall of text instead
 
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I don’t have any questions about atheism.

I’ll pray for you conversion back to faith. I was agnostic for a short period of my life. It turned out to be one of the darkest moments in my life.
 
Sorry, Atheism never ever made any sense for me. So I have no questions… But like the poster above said, get ready for polemics 😉
 
It was definitely depressing at first, but I’ve gotten over it. I have a different view on life now. I feel like I treasure it even more because my personal belief is that when you’re dead, that’s it. You don’t keep going. I’ve come to terms with the concept of not existing after death. You can’t care about not existing if you don’t exist, haha.

Edit: not sure how to reply to a comment. If someone could show me I’d be glad. I’m replying to mrsdizzyd
 
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If you believe that we are just organisms powered by electrical impulses that just switch off one day and cease to exist, why do atheists choose to have children? How do you look at your children and just see a machine/collection of DNA? Why bother if it’s all pointless.
 
halogirl said:
If you believe that we are just organisms powered by electrical impulses that just switch off one day and cease to exist, why do atheists choose to have children? How do you look at your children and just see a machine/collection of DNA? Why bother if it’s all pointless.
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Atheists don’t think there’s no value in life. They just don’t believe in gods is all.

I was going to say to Someguy that it might be better to pick a few topics and start conversing. You won’t likely get any questions that haven’t been answered already. Well, except for ‘how come everyone you love you see just as matter and energy’ etc. Which has been answered more times than I care to count. Doesn’t stop it coming up though…
 
SomeGuyWithQuestions said:
I am agnostic, but in the words of Richard Dawkins, “I am agnostic about God in the same way that you are agnostic about unicorns or the tooth fairy.”
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Dawkins isn’t exactly a strong philosopher. 😉
Today, I made my way to this forum in search of further knowledge. I figured that I’d start by allowing others to ask questions of me, and then maybe I can ask some questions myself, too. So, what have you got?
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I’ve no questions right now, but welcome to the boards. Pursuit of further knowledge is a great thing.
 
Surely to see value in life there has to be some meaning ? The fact you see value at all means you aren’t just a creature like all the others on earth? To see value In life seems incompatible with the atheists idea that life is just a product of evolution, to me.
 
Welcome to the forums !
SomeGuyWithQuestions said:
Today, I made my way to this forum in search of further knowledge. I figured that I’d start by allowing others to ask questions of me, and then maybe I can ask some questions myself, too.
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I don’t have questions for you, but I hope you will find what you are looking for.
 
Here’s the way I see it (this isn’t for every atheist.) You are correct that I believe that we are just organisms powered by electrical impulses that just switch off one day. I also believe that any children that I have would be the same way. That doesn’t mean that I wouldn’t care, though. Although I do not believe that we have a soul or anything like that, I do believe that each human has experiences, and wants and needs and things that they care about. I am human, and even though at times life can be depressing, being alive is an amazing thing. I enjoy being alive. Others do, as well. If I had children, I would care about them just as much as I care about myself and others. We all have consciousness and we should all be treated that way.
 
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I believe that you would be correct about Dawkins, haha. I personally think that he is just extremely good at making points and making them humorous. He’s good at what he does, but certainly not an expert philosopher. Thanks for the warm welcome! I’m enjoying it here more than I thought I would.
 
I’m not questioning the fact you would care about future kids and do enjoy being alive. Fantastic! 🙂 But why would you CHOOSE to have them if you thought they would just switch off one day? I couldn’t honestly bring someone into this world if I felt they were one day going to suffer and die for no reason. For me, either we are like all the other creatures on this earth or we are not. And if not, why aren’t we?
 
Specifying what I’d like to talk about would probably have been a good idea. I just kind of wanted to get an initial feel for this community.
 
For Catholics life without God is meaningless, is all. For myself, the idea that you or anyone find meaning in life is a sign to me that you are made by God
 
I see what you mean. It’s a bit of an interesting topic. Think about it like this. Did you feel bad before you were born? Did you wish that you existed? My answer to these questions is, “of course not, I didn’t exist, I couldn’t have cared!” Everyone dies. That’s not a reason to not have kids. If I knew that my kids were going to suffer their whole lives though, I would not want to put them through that. Is it really my decision to make though? Sorry if this reply was sort of a stream of consciousness, it’s just a bit of a complicated topic, lol.
 
Welcome to CAF!

My question (as an agnostic) is - do your family know about your beliefs? If they do, how did they react when you told them?

I have never had any religion and neither has my family. So I’m interested to hear how agnostics with religious families talk about losing faith 🙂
 
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