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CeaselessMedik
Guest
I don’t believe in gods. Is there reason to believe life is sacred (in a figurative sense)?
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josh987654321
Guest
If we are all physical accidents, just a complex make up of atoms, not only are we incapable of free will, since every thought and action is reduced to simply chemical reactions in the brain, but there is also no inherent value, only subjective value, and this value is simply pre-determined due to the chemical reactions in ones brain as is everything else.
If there is no God, then you were not even free to decide that there is no God, it was just a pre-determined chemical reaction in your brain which produced this, as is my response. There is no ‘you’ no consciousness, no free will, no thinking, your essentially just a machine, a machine that is under the illusion of being ‘free’ ‘thinking’ and ‘conscious’.
I don’t believe this, I believe the human person has a soul, that we are more then a make up of atoms and I believe because we have an immortal soul, all human life has inherent value.
I hope this has helped
God Bless
Thank you for reading
Josh
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heidi_storage
Guest
The concept of “sacred” doesn’t really exist without God. You could certainly say that society in general tends to run better when life is highly valued, and that decreasing suffering by preseving and improving life is a worthy goal. You could celebrate the complexity of human thought, and consider that it makes the world richer and more interesting. Many atheists do good on these premises. But I don’t think you can hold human life sacred without believing in the sacred Divine.
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PJH_74
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As a simple backup to any religion, a planet like ours is very special. Science is telling us that the number of planets that can support life, as we know it, are extremely rare. Life as we know it could likely be the only way due to the near unique ability of carbon to create the long strings of molecules that life seems to require.
So yes, life may sacred for the near reason above. In addition, there are people that love you and likely rely on you. I just find it hard to not assume there is not some reason behind us being. That someone or something made the Universe is almost a given. But we will never know since we will never be able to detect why.
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undead_rat
Guest
This is a really good question. I believe that Catholics hold that human life is sacred, and I think that this is in their Catechism. I must respectfully disagree on the grounds that only YHWH, our Creator, is sacred.
To say that a human being is sacred would violate the first commandment that only YHWH is sacred. I have read through the Scriptures many times and have found nothing that would lead me to believe otherwise.
So, with apologies to my Catholic friends, I must conclude that human life is not sacred.
YHWH said, "My spirit must not forever be disgraced in man, for he is but flesh; his life shall last no more than a hundred and twenty years."
Genesis 6:3
To say that a human being is sacred would violate the first commandment that only YHWH is sacred. I have read through the Scriptures many times and have found nothing that would lead me to believe otherwise.
So, with apologies to my Catholic friends, I must conclude that human life is not sacred.
YHWH said, "My spirit must not forever be disgraced in man, for he is but flesh; his life shall last no more than a hundred and twenty years."
Genesis 6:3
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Crusaderbear
Guest
Since we have not found life anywhere but earth so far, it should indicate it is at least special and needs to be protected, which would be a secular way of saying it is sanctified.
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Tim_D
Guest
If you do not believe in objective morality, then no, life is not sacred. But an absence of objective morality is illogical when one considers the necessity of God. There must be a first cause to everything. Knowing that the universe, material existence itself, is finite and must have had a beginning, it is a logical necessity that some “thing” pre-existed it and that this same being must, by logic and reason, be eternal. God is the great measuring stick of morality. Without Him, man has no dignity and theft, violence, rape and murder - including the purposeful intent to exterminate an entire race of people by the millions - is no more significant than wiping the mud off of your shoes before you go inside the house. If the horror and abomination of modern-day abortion can exist when the vast, vast majority believe in God’s existence, then what would happen if no one believed at all?
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reggieM
Guest
As others have said - no. Figurative or literal. If there is no God, nothing can be sacred for what it is.
Atheists can make things sacred for themselves. But it would be their own decision to think something is sacred or not. But in itself, life would just be a physical output.
Perhaps someone could say that “we have to try to preserve the human species because that is what evolution does”. That’s ok, but evolution does not care about human life, and if life is just the movement of molecules, then no individual person is sacred at all…
It’s only God, as our Father and Creator, that teaches us that life is sacred. Because He, who is all Good, created it through love. He loves us - and He loves everything He made. Thus, we also treat His creation as sacred (with human life as the most important).
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BlueEyedLady
Guest
I’m personally very confused by this question. I couldn’t begin to guess how any individual fellow atheist I know feels about the concept of life, much less how a stranger on the internet might feel. My hunch is you could ask 30 non believers and get 20 or so unique responses. Maybe more if you stayed away from college kids.
These questions are ones we all have to work out for ourselves, and that goes for everyone if any faith or not faith. I hope you find whatever peace you’re looking for.
These questions are ones we all have to work out for ourselves, and that goes for everyone if any faith or not faith. I hope you find whatever peace you’re looking for.
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Sarcelle
Guest
Not all atheists are materialists.
Materialists believe that the material world is all there is.
There are some atheists that believe in a universe that can encompass more than just the material world and may even allow for some supernatural activity.
They just don’t believe in an all-powerful, omnicient God.
Atheists may believe in different things.
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Michael_Mayo
Guest
Life in general or just human life?
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Sarcelle
Guest
I was raised atheist and have several close family members who are and still are atheists.
They are the most principled and moral people I know.
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CeaselessMedik
Guest
I like that whole post, but it’s very long and I didn’t want to quote the whole thing.
Thanks and rock on! \m//
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HerCrazierHalf
Guest
And it’s finite nature…
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John_Lazarus
Guest
That seems to depend on a pretty tight definition of “sacred”.
If you mean “sacred = deserving of worship” you would be correct. But even the Bible holds that objects and places can be sacred.
The word “consecrate” means “to make sacred”. Does not the Anglican church consecrate its bishops?
And only YHVH is sacred? What about His Son? And the Holy Spirit?
What exactly do you mean by the word “sacred”? Do you differentiate the word from “holy”, “hallowed”, “divine”?
No, human life is not divine. It is to some extent inviolable (“Thou shalt not kill”), and to be respected due to its origin ("Genesis 1:26 And God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness…*)
*Unless you interpret this to mean with eyes, nose, belly button, etc.
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Russell_SA
Guest
How is this entire post not a big, I don’t like how reality presents itself so I’m going to invent something that makes me feel better about it. What you prefer reality to be has no bearing on the truth about reality.
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Russell_SA
Guest
Could you define how you use the word “sacred”? I find that theists and atheists use this word the same just each group references it to something different. Sacred to god and sacred to people.
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Russell_SA
Guest
Could you define what you mean by sacred.
We are the products of evolution and the groups that worked well with others and valued life succeeded over the groups that did not. Also, since we are social creatures interacting in reality with each other, we have to rely on inferring that other people around us value life as much as we do for our society to work. Your actions have a direct influence on my quality of life and vice versa. So people that do not value life for itself, we lock away so that we don’t have that error in our code for day to day living.
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Russell_SA
Guest
How can something pre-exist, cause and effect, A before B work in an environment where time does not exist? Time is, by definition linear, so in a realm without time there is no linear cause and effect correct? Sounds like you are using the label god for the event that started off this universe. Ok, I’ll call it X. X because we don’t know how universes are started.
Morality referencing a deity is pointless because we can not have a conversation and an interaction with this deity. It’s like trying to learn morality from your parents that dropped you off in the orphanage and never interact with you since. You can learn morality from the people within your environment, such as your friends, yourself, your enemies, etc. but not from someone that is not presenting themselves in your environment. I can’t learn what is good and bad from Lin Sho in China without actually caring on a conversational relationship with him, even though Sho actually exists there.
Funny how all these atheists are going around performing all this rape and murder as much as they want, which is a big fat 0. They’re not psychotic, unlike your assumption to the religious side where you imply that they all want to rape and murder, just their religion is stopping them from doing this.
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