Main Reason For Atheism

[TTM]

AnAtheist:

No, that is not a good point. A great deal of people die for nothing or a lie or whatever. Take Muslim suicide bombers for example.

That’s true, but I was referring to this passage here:
Chris W:

There is the question of why the followers of Jesus would engage in the fraud when the only thing to gain was persecution and death.

So the point is still “good”

Blessings!
TTM

 

[Monarchy]

Chris W:

Ah. But there is no proof that He doesn’t exist either, if you rely only on science, (since science doesn’t adress the issue) so why would you need to abandon reason? I didn’t ask you why you don’t believe in God, I asked you why you feel you would need to abandon reason to believe in God. You haven’t answered the question.

You can’t physically prove something doesn’t exist. This goes for any claim of existance, God, Santa Claus, Unicorns, Faries, Big Foot,etc… I feel it would be an abondonment of reason because you are asking me to take something as true which has many logical holes in it. For Example: The Bible is the Word of God, God is Perfect. If God wrote the bible it would be perfect, without a flaw. This is plainly not true. There are many inconsitoncies in the 4 gospels alone that would make me abondon reason to be a theist.

That’s because absolute truth is unchanging Shall I conclude form your answer that you do **not **see a conflict between the two (I asked you what the conflict is)?

There is not a conflict between science and religion. See below.

This again raises the question: Why would you feel you need to choose between the two unless they contradict each other? Lets confine this to science and “theism”, not “religion”, k? There are numerous kinds of religions, but the topic at hand is atheism, not the rejection of a specific religion.

What I was talking about was if a person came along, put a gun to my head and stated I needed to choose between religion (which is what I said in the first place) and science. Given a choice between them I would choose science. However I do not see them as contradictory, as long as they stay within the confines of their area of expertise. This means Science doesn’t try to explain the meaning of life, and Religion doesn’t try to explain how things happen.

If you believe they contradict each other (science and theism), please explain how.

I don’t.

 

[Chris_W]

AnAtheist:

No, that is not a good point. A great deal of people die for nothing or a lie or whatever. Take Muslim suicide bombers for example.
If you have nothing worldly to loose but everything heavenly to win, you are willing to die. If you furthermore believe, the end of the world is near anyway, even better.

There is a big difference between the early Christians and the Muslim bombers or the followers of David Karesh (for example). Both of these latter groups believe/d in their cause, and are/were willing to die for it. But what you are suggesting is that the followers of Jesus knew He did not perform miracles, did not rise from the dead, and was not God (as He claimed to be) and yet they chose to fabricate stories to glorify Him, travel the known world to convince others of the Good News, and then suffered and died for that cause. That is very different and very difficult to believe.

To say the Muslim bombers are willing to die for believing in something untrue is one thing. To say the followers of Jesus did not believe in Him and yet chose to die gruesome deaths rather that give up the lie, is quite different. (They died for what they did not believe in?).

The Muslim bombers may believe they have “everything to gain” because of the promise of heaven that they believe. The followers of Jesus would not have had this to gain, because if your theory is correct, they knew Jesus was just a man. What was their motive?

They sought to convince the world that they should love their neighbors as themselves, they should not steal, they should remain married to their spouses for life, that they should be honest, and choose right over wrong in all daily activities. They refused to accept pay for their work. They lived in hiding many times. They did not have a home per se. They left family and loved ones for this mission. Where is their motive, An Atheist?

Something so significant had happened to them (through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus) that they (not just the 12 Apostles, but large multitudes of people…including Jews…even Jews assigned with the mission of destroying Christianity) became convinced unto death that He was who He claimed to be…God. And these were Jesus’ contemporaries who had the ability to look into the claims first hand.

By itself, this topic may not be convincing to you. I expect it may not be. But as I said earlier, it is merely one in a long list of evidences to be considered. My intent is here is merely to respond to your statement that this is just like any other fanatic who will die for their faith. It clearly is not the same thing.

 

[Chris_W]

Monarchy:

You can’t physically prove something doesn’t exist. This goes for any claim of existance, God, Santa Claus, Unicorns, Faries, Big Foot,etc… I feel it would be an abondonment of reason because you are asking me to take something as true which has many logical holes in it. For Example: The Bible is the Word of God, God is Perfect. If God wrote the bible it would be perfect, without a flaw. This is plainly not true. There are many inconsitoncies in the 4 gospels alone that would make me abondon reason to be a theist.

I see two possibilities, Monarchy. Either supernatural causes could possibly exist, or there must necessarily exist natural causes for the observable universe. I do not see a third possibility.

A person must choose between those two possibilities, or else remain ever in a state of uncertainty. If you will not choose between the two than the most you could ever say about God is “I do not know”. If however, you would make the statement “there is no God” (which I understand to be your position) then you have chosen the latter of the two possibilities, and this choice is a decision of faith…a faith for which there is no demonstrable proof.

Now then, getting back to your initial statement, why would you feel you need to abandon reason to believe in God (for which you see a lack of conclusive evidence) yet you can accept the alternative faith (for which there also is a lack of conclusive evidence)?

You mentioned the Bible. I think were getting ahead of ourselves here because we are merely talking about the possibility of God (not necessarily the God of Christianity). However, the short answer to your question about inconsistencies is that from a ciritical analysis perspective, the minor inconsistencies so often pointed out, actually help the cause of Bible proponents. If for exampe, An Atheist’s theory is correct, and the miracles attributed to Jesus were merely a concocted set of stories, we would expect to see consistency, not inconsistency.

For example, in a court of law, if every witness gave the exact same testimony, it would actually cause more reason for doubt than if there were minor inconsistencies. Exact duplicate testimonies give reason to believe the testimony was contrived and agreed upon in advance. In reality, we know from daily experince that if 15 people witness an event, there will be 15 stories of what happened, each agreeing upon the primary events, but with minor inconsistencies in the details.

Your argument actually provides more reason to give credence to the Biblical accounts. The reason we believe the Bible is perfect is not because of the concise historical accounts, but because the Bible is perfect in consistency of belief. It perfectly teaches what is was intended to teach. Any Christian (well, most Christians ) will agree it is not a science book, and it is not a concise chronological history. It helps us understand the faith. It was written by our Perfect God, but through flawed humans.

Monarchy:

What I was talking about was if a person came along, put a gun to my head and stated I needed to choose between religion (which is what I said in the first place) and science. Given a choice between them I would choose science. However I do not see them as contradictory, as long as they stay within the confines of their area of expertise. This means Science doesn’t try to explain the meaning of life, and Religion doesn’t try to explain how things happen.

Good thing nobody is holding a gun to your head forcing you to decide between the two You are therefore free to accept both.

Your last two sentences are interesting. It is true that science is limited to the observable by definition. I am wondering why you feel that religion is limited such that it should not “try to explain how things happen?” So long as science does not disprove the claims of a religion, why shouldn’t it be free to explain how or why things yet unanswered through science have happened? If science does disprove a claim then you have reason to reject it, but if not, you would still not need to abandon reason to accept it.

Peace,
Chris W

 

[Gilbert_Keith]

AnAtheist

*In 6AD a man was born, who later became a great preacher and teacher. After his death his followers glorified him, and based a a power- and successful relgion on him. That is a reasonable claim.

That he was born by a virgin, walked on water, rose from the dead, went to hell and came back - that is another story.*

But no less another story than the claim made by certain atheists that it is plausible to believe in a universe that spawned our own universe … thereby sidestepping the problem of the Big Bang and the inference of a universe created from Nothing.

If one is another story, why isn’t the other another story? Yet I could find you any number of atheists willing to believe anything implausible to be possible rather than have to confront the possibility of God.

We believe what we want to believe. I want to believe. You do not want to believe. Our logic follows accordingly. I believe in the choice between heaven or hell. You believe everyone is finally doomed. We both believe what we want to believe.

Why do you want to believe we are all finally doomed?

 

[AnAtheist]

Gilbert Keith:

Why do you want to believe we are all finally doomed?

That is a wrong question. On many levels.

1. The question of an afterlife is independed of whether there is a god or a supernatural cause of the universe. (There might be an afterlife, but no god. There might be a god, but no afterlife. There may be different kinds of afterlifes. Or any other combination. Or reincarnation.)
2. Reality does not depend on our wishes. There is even less proof for an afterlife than for a god of some kind.
   Most people do not wish to die, i.e. want their existence exterminated. Therefore the idea of an afterlife came up. Understandable, but not rational.
3. Actually, I don’t want to be doomed. To be honest I’d very much like to live as long as I wish or to reach other levels of existence. I also wish I could fly (preferably to other planets) or have other superpowers.

In short, the question is like “Why do you want stones to fall down instead of flying upwards?”

 

[TTM]

For all the atheists in the thread,

I have a couple of request to make of you. First is, can you earnestly keep searching for the truth? Second is, can you keep turning away from any moral evil that you can perceive, and seek to love those around you?

The thing is, if there’s such thing as Hell, we don’t want anyone to go there. Sometimes people use their non-belief in God as an excuse to do whatever pleases them, even when they know in their heart that those actions may be “sinful”. We don’t want you to risk being one of them.

Bless you all,
TTM

 

[AnAtheist]

TTM:

The thing is, if there’s such thing as Hell, we don’t want anyone to go there. Sometimes people use their non-belief in God as an excuse to do whatever pleases them, even when they know in their heart that those actions may be “sinful”. We don’t want you to risk being one of them.

That is very nice of you. :tiphat:

 

[john_doran]

AnAtheist:

Time cannot be separated from space, that is fact.

not true. the unification of time and space into a 4-dimensional geometry was an illustrative device innovated by minkowski; the secondary step he made to reify the mathematical model was gratuitous - in doing so, what he did was philosophy (specifically, ontology), and not science.

this is, of course, not to say that time and space do not compose a 4 dimensional manifold - just that whether or not they do is underdetermined by the evidence and certainly not what you’re calling a “fact”.

 

[Gilbert_Keith]

AnAtheist

There might be an afterlife, but no god. There might be a god, but no afterlife.

To an atheist, the afterlife should be as meaningless and unlikely as the existence of God since there is no more proof for afterlife than there is for God (at least the kind of proof the atheist demands.)

*Reality does not depend on our wishes. *

Yes, I have always believed that. You are so right! Then if you are an atheist because you want to be, that has nothing to do with whether or not God truly exists. God might exist, even when you do not want Him to exist, because “reality does not depend on our wishes.”

Actually, I don’t want to be doomed.

But you seem to have embraced your ultimate doom as a necessary reality. It’s hard not to suspect that all atheists are not really whistlers in the dark. This is why we often hear atheists talk about the need to be positive and even cheerful about their doom. As if this would help deflect the pain of knowing that the universe itself, never mind one’s own life, is meaningless.

Having been there, I don’t buy it.

 

[Chris_W]

AnAtheist:

Most people do not wish to die, i.e. want their existence exterminated. Therefore the idea of an afterlife came up. Understandable, but not rational.

The potential for people to have come up with the idea of an afterlife as a consolation of sorts is possible. The same argument is frequently made about belief in God. But the same argument can also be made about the wish of some that there was no God and no afterlife for the various perceived benefits of that belief too.

Both are understandable (conceivable possibilities), but why would either be irrational? It seems to me belief in God and/or an afterlife would only be irrational if evidence exists that disproves the “idea”.

This is kind of like the discussion between myself and Monarchy, who stated early on that he qould have to abandon reason to believe in God. You may feel there is inadequate reason to believe, but why does that render the belief irrational?

I see no reason not to believe in God or an afterlife. I see many challenges to many specific aspects of theism by atheists, but seldom do I see positive arguments supporting belief in “no-God” or “no-afterlife” (that there must necessarily exist natural causes for the observable universe). Without such arguments, why should we not believe in an afterlife and God…or perhaps the better question…why would those beliefs be irrational?

 

[Gilbert_Keith]

AnAtheist

Most people do not wish to die, i.e. want their existence exterminated. Therefore the idea of an afterlife came up. Understandable, but not rational.

but not rational?

Then is it not rational to want to extend our lives on earth indefinitely? And is it not rational to devise medical stratagems for doing that?

The idea of immortality is one that transcends this earthbound life. If you came to believe in the existence of the soul, there would be nothing irrational about supposing that the soul is not heir to the same process of decay and corruption as the mind and the body.

But you would take it that the idea of a soul is also irrational? As irrational as the idea of God? Why is either irrational when both have been believed by the bulk of mankind since the dawn of civilization?

I am not arguing that a thing is truthful because of the number of people who believe it. But as Thomas Jefferson himself said, when we disagree with the mass of mankind, we ought to look to our own motives to find out why.

And that is the subject of this thread, isn’t it?

Are you absolutely sure that atheists reject God and the *soul *because they are irrational concepts? Could there be another reason? It’s clear this is your rationale … but you have yet to prove that God and the soul are irrational concepts. You have only maintained that they are not subject to rational demonstration, which is another creature altogether.

 

[paulito]

TTM:

Sometimes people use their non-belief in God as an excuse to do whatever pleases them, even when they know in their heart that those actions may be “sinful”. We don’t want you to risk being one of them.

Bless you all,
TTM

I think there is more truth to this than many would admit.

God has rules: Thou shalt…
Thou shalt not…

Those rules are totally out of sync with what current culture deems to be of value.

Resoning process that some seem to have:

1. I don’t like God’s rules
2. Therefore the Bible is just another book.
3. There is no God. Everything is meaningless, so I might just as well find the good life and enjoy it.

Some answers to above “logic” -

1. To believe (and this does take faith) that all of life and everything we see came into being without God is taking a big chance…suppose He is real and there is a heaven and hell?
2. It takes another leap of faith to think that maybe He did create it all, but did not bother to speak clearly to us so that we could both know Him and know how He expects us to live.

Comments on faith :  in everyday usage, faith is not blind.

In making a business transaction, I consider the reputation of the company with which I am doing business, and trust them according to what I know about them.

In making a donation to help disaster victims, I choose an organization with a proven track record, and look for their membership in a financial accountability organiztion, and then trust them to take my money and use it honestly and wisely.

**In choosing upon what will I build my life, I consider the outcome in the lives of persons who have chosen against Christianity, as well in the lives of those who have chosen to follow Christ.  Based on both the objective and subjective reality which I see in the lives of Christians, as well as the differences in the Bible vs. other philosophies, I have chosen Christ.  I first did this as a young child, without a lot of knowledge.  At age 64, I have only grown to love Jesus more the more I learn about Him.**

 

[TTM]

AnAtheist:

That is very nice of you. :tiphat:

In the end, that’s what it’s all about for us. We want people going to heaven in droves.

God bless!
TTM

 

[TTM]

paulito:

Resoning process that some seem to have:

1. I don’t like God’s rules
2. Therefore the Bible is just another book

I think what people need to know also is that obeying God’s will is a process - none of us are perfect, and many Catholics and Christians are just as sinful as other people. People need to know that the God of justice (and therefore laws/rules) is also a God of mercy (and therefore forgiveness and encouragement - praise God!), and that the rules are there for our own good.

Comments on faith : in everyday usage, faith is not blind.

Good point, that. I think a lot of Christians and Catholics could do well to know that faith and reason do not conflict with, but do compliment each other. We shouldn’t be afraid of asking tough questions, when we’re trusting of God’s goodness.

For me, as a former agnostic, I know that faith is about trusting a person: Christ. I marvel at my life now, really almost every day, as I see God’s hand directing me to greater holiness and increasing my love both for God and for people. Really, I was a broken wreck compared to who I am now - I wasn’t really capable of loving anyone; I couldn’t care less! Now, I find myself loving my enemies and praying for them. I thank and praise God for that.

God bless y’all!
TTM

 

[Gilbert_Keith]

Here is my final list of a dozen reasons why people are raised atheist or turn atheist at some point in their lives.

---

They insist that no God would create a world with so much evil in it.

They find the idea of God intellectually unsupportable (“Ockham’s Obstacle”).

They rebel against God as an authority figure. “I will not serve!”.

They find the Christian God an obstacle to charting their own moral code.

They conform to the “in” philosophy inherited from Darwin, Nietzsche, Bertrand Russell, et. al… in order to “fit in” with their peers who have also succumbed to the “in” philosophy.

They have inherited atheism from their parents.

They have inherited atheism from the combined influence of the media and/or academia.

They fear an Ego bigger than their own … the great Unknown.

They’ve had a bad experience with a “religious” person.

They choose not to engage with God from inertia or laziness.

They are lacking in faith because of a narrow vision of what is knowable.

They are looking for attention … which they usually get.

Some of these reasons will overlap with the same reasons people are religious; for examples:

They have had a bad experience with atheism.

They have inherited religion from their parents.

They conform to the religious values of their peers.

The give and take at this thread has been most generous on all sides. Thanks to all for your vigorous participation.

God bless,
Gilbert

 

[SamCA]

paulito:

1. To believe (and this does take faith) that all of life and everything we see came into being without God is taking a big chance…suppose He is real and there is a heaven and hell?

Yeah, but suppose the Gnostics were right, the God you worship is just a Demiurge, and by failing to embrace the true path you doom yourself to eternal imprisonment in this material Hell?

Or what if you die and Zeus is rather pissed at you for being part of the religion that wiped out the one, true faith?

The “What if you die and God is mad at you for picking the wrong religion?” argument doesn’t carry much weight for me, as mankind has believed in and worshipped somewhere in the neighborhood of 2500 different gods that we know about, and the argument applies equally well to all of them.

 

[Gilbert_Keith]

The “What if you die and God is mad at you for picking the wrong religion?” argument doesn’t carry much weight for me

Wouldn’t carry much weight with me either if the person chose the wrong religion through a misguided sense of it being the right religion. God judges the person’s heart for best intentions.

What would concern me, as it does Paulito, is that one would deliberately thumb one’s nose at God when God had invited him to the table.

It does no good to say that such atheists are misguided. They have misguided themselves. They are fools (people who deliberately deceive themselves).

“The fool in his heart says there is no God.” Psalms 14:1

 

[Chris_W]

SamCA:

The “What if you die and God is mad at you for picking the wrong religion?” argument doesn’t carry much weight for me…

Out of curiosity, what arguments pertaining to the existence or non-existence of God do carry weight with you? (remembering that science doesn’t address the issue).

 

[seetiger33]

I like the fact they exist so i can witness to them. Its a opportunity.