Any Atheists here?

[mribas1981]

I am an outed Atheist. I respect all other's beliefs and am always down for discussion.

any other Atheists here? Do you face a lot of persecution and hatred here or in other places in your life?

I generally approach the topic pretty respectfully, so I generally don't save for a few instances (the extremists).

Just curious

 

[ebola?]

outed Atheist

What? Does this really carry social stigma analogous to that which comes with being of an alternative sexual or gender orientation and "out"?

ebola

 

[RobotRipping]

yeah i'd say it does because you are going to take shit from theists and agnostics

how could you possibly know there is no God or deity/ies or whatever?

if you're down for some discussion, what arguments do you have that there is no God or deity or DMT elves or whatever?

I personally find atheism to be an extreme, it is just as absurd as saying there is a God/many Gods. At least i've experienced/seen/spoke to entities on DMT, that's gotta count for something.

 

[Mysterie]

i think most peoples concepts of Gods seemed to be kind of based on themselves (huge egos etc)

im more of an esoteric thinker really so i dont believe there is some external force which is god controlling anything

although if you categorize god as being love, then i would be a theist

 

[ebola?]

The only hesitation I have toward taking an explicitly atheist position is that no one seems to be able to describe what the concept "god" might point toward, so I'm not sure what's even being rejected.

ebola

 

[RobotRipping]

^ "When I picture god I picture the cloud sweeper from the Care Bears."
-Amy Schumer

Athiests are a varied group with a vast array of beliefs, they can't really be pigeon holed into a category, I guess you can say the same for theists.

concepts of God vary but i most prefer the idea that God is the universe (or all universes, multiverse whatever)

I'm still working on an argument for the existence of a pantheistic god based on probabilities. Given the improbable formation of a universe that could support life, my argument lies somewhere in that idea but can't quite flesh it out. Basically my conclusion is that God has a positively infinite probability of existing or a probability of 1 (approaching 1, like .999 repeating infinitely); the converse of this idea is that our universe supports life with a probability approaching negative infinity or 0, but the premises i can't come up with, the idea occurred to me while on a huge dose 2c-e

i've read so many arguments back and forth on the subject and the ones involving probabilities (not pascal's wager tho) and ideas that 'the game is rigged' always seemed the most intriguing. If an Athiest pulls out the old 'how can evil exist' or other bullshit i just give up right away but i'd be interested to hear some compelling arguments that there is absolutely no God/s, especially arguments against a pantheistic concept of God.

Carl Sagan argued that the doctrine of a Creator of the Universe was difficult to prove or disprove and that the only conceivable scientific discovery that could disprove the existence of a Creator would be the discovery that the universe is infinitely old

source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God#Non-theistic_views_of_God

That's an interesting idea but our concept of time is not whole, so how can something be infinitely old? wouldn't it just have always existed? outside of time? the big bang created time in our universe, so there was never a time before it and there will be no time after it.

this is my preferred idea http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ekpyrotic_universe if a cyclic model is employed then there's no conceivable scientific discovery that could disprove the existence of a Creator, which in my eyes increases the probability that there is a creator or that the creator is everything. Intuitively that feels right but makes no fucking sense when i think about it.

the science and philosophy of these ideas start to cross over and my brain shuts down at this point.

 

[Foreigner]

Athiests are a varied group with a vast array of beliefs, they can't really be pigeon holed into a category, I guess you can say the same for theists.

I thought atheism was an absence of a belief, hence the "a-" part.

 

[pk.]

I'm not sure how Atheist ideas have evolved since, but I think the first distinction we can make is between empiricism and rationalism. Rationalism supports the Atheistic view as it acknowledges that there are certain truths which can be ascertained without sense perception (innate). Empiricism maintains that experience and evidence are required to support truths so the concept of God stays intact as it cannot be proven otherwise. However now that Christianity has almost become obsolete, the modern empiricist would probably deny the existence of God also and so would join the Atheistic camp.

 

[RobotRipping]

I thought atheism was an absence of a belief, hence the "a-" part.

theism is the belief in a deity, atheism is then the rejection of a belief in a deity or deities. However, that's general, i was making the assumption that most atheists who proudly claim to be atheist reject the idea that there is a God/deity/whatever at all. I don't see a huge distinction in rejecting a belief vs rejecting the very idea of that belief.

an agnostic also rejects the belief in a deity but not in the same way as an atheist or for the same reasons. I don't know, the distinctions are a bit blurry.

^i agree there

there must be a distinction between atheists who reject the belief of a deity and those that reject the deity itself, though i'm not sure what difference that makes other than just semantics.

 

[pk.]

God is belief itself, so rejection of the belief means the rejection of God.

Belief cannot be rationalised, therefore God cannot be rationalised.

If something cannot be rationalised, it cannot exist.

If God is absolute truth (like religion espouses) and faith is the means of obtaining that truth, then truth must not be able to be rationalised.

So essentially if you are to believe in God, you are to admit that you know nothing and that nothing is everything.

 

[ParappaTheRapper]

Yes. I am now. and before going through a spiritual phase. I had a handful of terrifying/soul crushing experiences like this

This is why I believe in meditation. Prey enough, or go with the flow enough, and your honestly just talking to yourself. Which is not bad at all.

Someone who is a strict catholic for example, may be extremely self actualized, after spending a great deal of time thinking to themselves and reflecting on their problems. Accepting them. Identifying with their decisions. Looking for solutions.

Its all just different filters to me. A lens. Like a language. An hola or a wats good or a pig grunt really all mean the same thing.

And beliefs are all just different mediums to existing. Prey. Put your hands inbetween your eyes. Breakthrough at a shpongle concert, let your third eye guide you. Be athesist, sit around with a cup of coffee and stress about life.

Just my opinion anyway.

On the other hand. If you take somebody who's hyper religious and has strict rituals. Well. you might say this persons delusional. You take 1200 people, put them in a stained glass building with donation funding, and its totally normal. Take somebody 'normal,' feed em the right drugs, and they are on a spirit quest to the marahishi.

I think a good way to put it is Matisyahu. If you scope him on youtube for example, he used to be a suburban kid who dropped acid and smoked pot. he got carried away at a certain point. If you listen to any of his thoughts now, he regrets most of that. He equates his level of devotion to judaism at the time to insanity. He still digs it though. Jus sayn.

I think a better question than are atheists persecuted, is why are some others persecuted at all? Put a hecidic jew on an airplane doing an outlandish prayer, its fine. Take an "atheist" and have them deny god outloud on an airplane they'll get fined when it lands. Have a muslim pray on plane, get tackled by an air marshall.

 

[panic in paradise]

God is belief itself, so rejection of the belief means the rejection of God.

Belief cannot be rationalised, therefore God cannot be rationalised.

If something cannot be rationalised, it cannot exist.

If God is absolute truth (like religion espouses) and faith is the means of obtaining that truth, then truth must not be able to be rationalised.

So essentially if you are to believe in God, you are to admit that you know nothing and that nothing is everything.

The belief becomes rationalized through the results of practice.

... much of what is believed to be true, is not allowed to be unlearned and seen as false, due to the ego wanting to retain a sense of feeling right.
_________
Atheism is the rejection of God and any spiritual aspect being a reality in life.

Agnosticism is belief in spiritual aspects being a part of life, but having no personal or shared/subscribed theory or belief as to the existence of God.

 

[jpgrdnr]

I find New Atheism to be just another form of religion. As much as I like Hitchens to intellectually beat up people and talk about things I find him somewhat offensive and vulgar at times. I see its more of a political end to evolve towards a global non-religion, which I think is a bit pre-mature in thought currently.

I don't know if I'm a dyed in the wool atheist persay. I reject organized religion personally, and any sort of concept of God, gods. I think the idea of God is flawed and is a fallacy. I still have some spiritual beliefs. Although I'm not terribly spiritual.

Atheism really is a sort of private thing, depending on who you are with. I reject Christmas as holiday, Easter - its fine with the anti-christian crowd but it makes funerals, weddings, family stuff weird. It really is a problem in mixed company. I automatically have issues with Christians and have to keep up this false image of either being Christian, younger people are more accepting of it or tolerating it. Some friends and I have Atheist grudge hut sitdowns that are pretty funny.

 

[RobotRipping]

God is belief itself, so rejection of the belief means the rejection of God.

Belief cannot be rationalised, therefore God cannot be rationalised.

If something cannot be rationalised, it cannot exist.

If God is absolute truth (like religion espouses) and faith is the means of obtaining that truth, then truth must not be able to be rationalised.

So essentially if you are to believe in God, you are to admit that you know nothing and that nothing is everything.

Okay well there's an argument there at least.

Regarding the premises; God is belief itself and If something cannot be rationalised, it cannot exist. I think there are some faults there. How is God belief itself? isn't that a circular argument ie. if belief itself is not rational, then belief in anything is not rational then belief in God is not rational? How can you back up that belief is God in the first place though, isn't that a belief itself?

and 'If something cannot be rationalized, it cannot exist' what do you mean by rationalized? We have concepts of infinity like +1 or -1 of a number, that isn't really rational, i get the concept but can never grasp it fully. Could it not be the case that then God = infinity? There are plenty of empirical examples of things we could not rationalize like say black holes 100 years ago, but they still exist.

and are you saying if something cannot be rationalized that it absolutely, universally, in all possible words, logically cannot exist? doesn't that presume a purely subjective view of the nature of reality? If we can't perceive it, it doesn't exist? is that analagous? because we can't see gamma rays or ultraviolet rays but they do indeed exist.

and for the sake of argument let's say god is not absolute truth or anything. Let's say God is everything all at once, whatever that may be. I see most atheists just reject the God's described by organized religion but that's a senseless argument, without diving into theology, we should just set that kind of God aside and argue for/against a pantheistic type God, where God is the universe(s). The Christian God and Jewish God (or any other organized religion) i think can be completely dismissed but there's no need to get into that

 

[pk.]

How is God belief itself?

Well God cannot be observed or rationalised. God can only exists if you 'believe' in it's existence.

Hebrews 11:1

Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.



and 'If something cannot be rationalized, it cannot exist' what do you mean by rationalized?

I mean that the something must be observable and that it can be understood logically and quantifiable.



and are you saying if something cannot be rationalized that it absolutely, universally, in all possible words, logically cannot exist?

something only exists when we are aware of it within human reason and perception.


and for the sake of argument let's say god is not absolute truth or anything. Let's say God is everything all at once, whatever that may be.

How can a finite being understand an infinite entity? He simply cannot.



(I apologise for my poor argumentative style, I've only recently started adopting these views [I used to be religious])

 

[ebola?]

As a rough marker, the social stigma borne by atheists would be analogous to that borne by those with alternative sexual and/or gender orientations if the insult, "heathen", were to be as commonly circulated as "fag". As it stands, I think that socialization (particularly male socialization) into homophobia runs more socially deeply than socialization into fearing the godless.

ebola

 

[jpgrdnr]

^^ Sure, I don't disagree. But the complexity of straight males and gay men outside of, say high-school, is a bit different than say Muslim and Christian interaction. Hitchens violently attacks Christians in debate that really isn't socially acceptable. The trouble of raising Religion in casual conversation.

I think with "fag," its a complex put down of a straight male who is unsuccessful or weak. Or isn't having sex. In polite circles if I called a gay man a "fag" I'd be deemed an asshole. If I did that at work I'd get fired, or at the very least formally warned and socially shunned. Straight men like to flirt with the idea of gayness, or gay acts as a joke. Sports, slapping the ass - to the military where its borderline accepted, just dont be a rat.

I mean if I were a hardcore Atheist I should almost be politically active to the point of protest or putting down people socially who believed otherwise. I mean really the amount of hate is virtually the same, to point of fag/Christian being interchangeable.
I'm not that hardline, but I know people that are - freedom of religion is paramount to a civil society.

I think its strange that New Atheism attacks Religion in such a jockular way, as blatant ignorance. Its like Religion is wrong. As well as in certain circles I'm sure in the Bible belt of the South, Iran, Rome, India, the military, Conservative Canada ~ that being against the idea of God, or a god(s) could be bad for your health, and at the very least not great socially. There's a historical connection to heathen that's still prominent. It depends on where you are, really.

 

[paranoid android]

I am a hardcore atheist as i think that believing in some mythical deity with absolutely no evidence is rather silly. Pretty much like how people where i come from believed in fairies, Banshees and will-o'-the-wisp's years ago. ranted back then they atleast had the excuse of knowing no better. That has all been labelled as folklore so why not god? Man created god in his own image not the other way around

As for anyone insulting my atheist beliefs or lack of beliefs i have never experienced this in real life as people here are not exactly the religious types anymore. We don't get Christian fundamentalists out here though we do get some 7th day Adventists here especially at the university (for some odd fucking reason) who sucker in poor foreign students from Africa to joining their religion. Unlike the Irish Catholics here they actually give a shit about religion and annoy the fuck out of good Catholic atheists like myself.

On the internet i have had a few fundies go off their head at me but i could care less about them cause they only look foolish.

 

[L2R]

i think it is silly how much emphasis is put on the choice between belief and disbelief on all sides. it's portrayed as the most important thing, but in actuality, it is the absolute least important thing to be concerned about. there is nothing less important to our lives that the existence or non-existence of a deity or more.

a magical "n" falls from the sky confirming the case either way, and life will not change one iota.

all that matters is whichever choice each individual makes which makes their finite lifespan on this speck of dust the least bit unpleasant. it doesn't matter which, just the experience to each of us.

 

[Lightning-Nl]

Ya know it's funny...

I tried being an atheist once, but then I realized that I do believe in god and these he/she/it is a big part of my life.....as weird as that sounds. I can't even explain it! I just feel like...god is with me. It sounds lame I know, but that's just how I feel...