Expressing Atheism

[Nacho]

Which was your part in that discussion, Snake (or which would be your side if you didn' t participate directly on it)?

I don' t really get it, because seems that the "Atheistic" said the last sentence and apparently it is a "pro-atheism" text... But the Atheistic has expressed his feelings even when gently told not to, being rude and unpolite. I don' t think this person is really "helping the cause". My sympathies for the other two guys, though.

[space boy]

A discussion i just had with a christian:

christian: why do you think there is no god?
me: why do innocent children have to suffer for years and die eventually of starvation and sickness?
christian: god wants to have them with him in heaven.
me: so why does he make them suffer on earth in the first place?
christian: jesus suffered for us on the cross. why can't we suffer a bit for him?

bottom line: the following is no big deal

[MrColossal]

On that subject, Space Boy, I recommend listening to Julia Sweeney's "Letting Go of God" [I haven't heard it all yet, just excerpts on This American Life] and in it she says that watching her brother die of cancer for years, chapped lips, reduced body weight, hair falling out, bleeding, chemo, pain, sleeplessness, morphine shots and all that... She concludes that compared to her brother "Jesus had a really bad weekend for your sins"

[LimpingFish]

Organized Religion has nothing to do with the existence of God, the salvation of humanity, or the unity of man.

It teaches us nothing but to how to divide, scorn, and condemn.

It tells us that we are we are born into sin regardless. That it's our fault that mankind is denied it's glory in fields of elysium.

It tells us that punishment awaits if we embrace the very things that make us human.

Mankind's greatest spoiling is Organized Religion.

[jetxl]

Douglas Adams.
http://nl.youtube.com/watch?v=DUfDWwWKXqQ&mode=related&search=

For a sci-fi writer, he makes remarkebly a lot of sense.

[space boy]

Thanks eric. I've heard of julia sweeney and "letting go of god" but havent taken a look at it yet.

jetxl: thanks for that vid. it's incredibly satisfying to listen to words that make sense, as opposed to the stuff you have to endure from believers. just some more examples of what ive been told by christians yesterday and today:

- the flood in new orleans was gods punishment for the debauchery that was going on there
- satan is responsible for the holocaust
- the reason why jesus' suffering is more important than the suffering of people in concentration camps is faith and purpose(sic)... if someone knows what that means please tell me.

and just to be fair i actually talked to a christian who said that she didnt know what "jesus died for our sins" means, since people still sin(and can go to hell for it) despite jesus dying on the cross. also she said that the suffering of many people over years is worth more than the suffering of one person over days(with an aditional resurection and eternity in paradise). so yeah, a believer who questions parts of her own belief. a geniune rarity.

[Monsieur OUXX]

I wonder why everyone seems to act like missionary, why not just let them believe what they want

Because religion is bad for health (both spiritual AND physical health, considering of the current world-conjecture)
(short and exaggeratedly aggressive post.  For further comprehension, read Platoon, Pascal, Descartes, Marx, etc.  )

[Misj']

(short and exaggeratedly aggressive post.  For further comprehension, read Platoon, Pascal, Descartes, Marx, etc.  )

(with the exception of Blaise Pascal of course...or Descartes. But hay, they lived a long time ago, so just stick to more modern people...like those in this forum-subject.   : )

[Tuomas]

Earlier I would have been all over the place telling how bad religion is for you. But in the end, I don't really care. I would never believe in God, never did, and never will, and I don't care if people believe in something I think is utter bullsh*t, as long as they don't come preaching to me. I don't consider myself as atheist, I don't like the idea of including myself in a group of enthusiasts, one way or another. So having said this, I'll just restrain.

[evenwolf]

Sunday I visited a church for the first time in years.   How ironic!!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TQpwF-oq1_Q


I was filming a short documentary piece on a local boxer.

[space boy]

Earlier I would have been all over the place telling how bad religion is for you. But in the end, I don't really care. I would never believe in God, never did, and never will, and I don't care if people believe in something I think is utter bullsh*t, as long as they don't come preaching to me. I don't consider myself as atheist, I don't like the idea of including myself in a group of enthusiasts, one way or another. So having said this, I'll just restrain.

It seems to be a popular opinion that calling yourself an atheist means counting yourself to a radical movement of people who "share a goal" or something(about the enthusiasm part. enthusiasm varies. saying that all atheists are equally enthusiastic about their views is not really true). Atheism is not a movement or ideology. It's an opinion. "I don't believe in god" = atheism, and that's all there is to it. Everything else atheism is sometimes associated with(materialism, anarchism, nihilism) is artificially tacked on and distorts the essential meaning of "atheism". Because of all the negative associations and misunderstandings in some areas people, who are actually atheists, refuse to call themselves atheist. So, saying that you don't believe in god but don't want to be called an atheist is a contradiction and further enforces the view that it's "not good" to call yourself that, even for people who lack belief in a god.

[voh]

I was filming a short documentary piece on a local boxer.

The funny thing is that the answer to his question of "If evolution is a continual process, why did we stop at being human?" is so simple it's painful.

Evolution is the process of adapting to one's surroundings to ensure the species lives on. The moment we picked up tools we started the process of evolution stopping, since we don't HAVE to adapt to anything anymore. We adapt the world to suit US.

That's why evolution seems to have stopped.

But it hasn't - evolution just switched from being mostly physical to being mostly psychological and intellectual. We're getting smarter and smarter, but our bodies aren't changing much.

Makes perfect sense to me

[Redwall]

And aside from the fact of cultural evolution physical evolution takes a heck of a lot longer than a few thousand years to demonstrate the kind of results they seem to expect.

[Andail]

Evolution only occurs if individuals less fit for survival are somehow less likely to reproduce, as with most animals. However, humans typically get children no matter how physically or mentally weak they are (since we have a "civilization" that cares for the weak. On the contrary, people who are really stupid tend to get more children than others.

So therefore, no, humans don't get smarter and smarter genetically. We are practically standing still evolutionary, and all changes are due to external circumstances that start to take effect after we're born.

[Tuomas]

It seems to be a popular opinion that calling yourself an atheist means counting yourself to a radical movement of people who "share a goal" or something(about the enthusiasm part. enthusiasm varies. saying that all atheists are equally enthusiastic about their views is not really true). Atheism is not a movement or ideology. It's an opinion. "I don't believe in god" = atheism, and that's all there is to it. Everything else atheism is sometimes associated with(materialism, anarchism, nihilism) is artificially tacked on and distorts the essential meaning of "atheism". Because of all the negative associations and misunderstandings in some areas people, who are actually atheists, refuse to call themselves atheist. So, saying that you don't believe in god but don't want to be called an atheist is a contradiction and further enforces the view that it's "not good" to call yourself that, even for people who lack belief in a god.

This is where I usually bring in the difference between stating ones believes/unbelieves and not doing so, or perhaps doing so, but not making a point out of it. I'm basically arguing about atheism as it exists both as a word and then as an idea. Whereas I do find myself as an atheist by my ideology, I do not feel comfortable including myself within the boundaries the word sets. It pretty much depends how you define it in your own mind. If it's strictly lingual, you're basically saying, that you don't believe in God. Then if you think of it as promoting your non-believes, that's completely different. I don't see anything worth expressing in my view, that would be like promoting nothing. Whereas if you take the road of spreading atheism, you're promoting or expressing something that means something to you. And I believe that these two things are completely different in their deepest meanings. So my point is, how you feel about not believing. Should you consider it not believing, or just being as it is. And then how you feel about being an atheist. Do you feel like an atheist, or do you just not feel and be like me. I like the way Hannah Arendt puts it. As in, if there is a belief, there must be something opposite to it. Just as the only thing to define the colour blue is the other colour one uses to tell it from. So there must be something that's opposite to believing, and that, in my opinion would be atheism. But as I don't believe in religions, I can't see myself believing in atheism either.

[Nacho]

A bit out of topic, but I have been thinking in that lately, and I think that maybe the human evolution is slowing down.

For example, we are taller each day (well, not me) so, it' s true that we are still changing (who says we aren' t in defense of religion is making a mistake, IMHO) BUT:

[reduction to absurd]Imagine the noses, the lips and the tits... In a world without plastic surgery, girls without big tits, lips and with big noses would have less success with boys than the girls who have those atributes, and with million of years, all the girls would have big tits, big lips and small noses. Now, with plastic surgery, girls without those atributes have children and their DNA is transmitted.

(Girls, you can imagine an example with boys, I don' t care, the example is bad, but I just want to tell a theory)[/reduction to absurd]

Same happens with disabled, or dwarfs, or retarded... Some millions ago people with those attributes would die of starving, but not now (fortunately)... But I wonder that in million of years the nowadays social care politics (I thankgive everyday for them, don' t missunderstand me) would make a weaker human being.

I am reading my post, and sounds terrible similar to some of the Nazi racial/Darwinist theories  :'(... I am ashamed of that, but I just want to discuss from the SCIENCE point of view a theory (I am not telling that I believe my theory, I am just saying that I am curious to receive a scientific/non-political oriented reply)

[space boy]

This is where I usually bring in the difference between stating ones believes/unbelieves and not doing so, or perhaps doing so, but not making a point out of it. I'm basically arguing about atheism as it exists both as a word and then as an idea. Whereas I do find myself as an atheist by my ideology, I do not feel comfortable including myself within the boundaries the word sets. It pretty much depends how you define it in your own mind. If it's strictly lingual, you're basically saying, that you don't believe in God. Then if you think of it as promoting your non-believes, that's completely different. I don't see anything worth expressing in my view, that would be like promoting nothing. Whereas if you take the road of spreading atheism, you're promoting or expressing something that means something to you. And I believe that these two things are completely different in their deepest meanings. So my point is, how you feel about not believing. Should you consider it not believing, or just being as it is. And then how you feel about being an atheist. Do you feel like an atheist, or do you just not feel and be like me. I like the way Hannah Arendt puts it. As in, if there is a belief, there must be something opposite to it. Just as the only thing to define the colour blue is the other colour one uses to tell it from. So there must be something that's opposite to believing, and that, in my opinion would be atheism. But as I don't believe in religions, I can't see myself believing in atheism either.

I get what you mean. We can only define an idea if we have an opposite to compare it to. If there was no concept as "religion" there would be no concept as "secular". The thing is, religion is real and it does influence our lives in one way or the other. I would probably not care if religion was that pesky little thing that annoys you sometimes but otherwise does no harm. Then i would see no point in explicitly stating that I'm an atheist. But religion does do harm. From "why give a shit, god will sort out everything"(refer to my post with the starving child) to "you drew a picture! i must burn a building!". I see absolutely no benefits in religion, except the "personal comfort" bullshit. but if you have to draw comfort from a delusion then something is seriously wrong. There are so many real and natural things that give you mental and emotional comfort, you don't have to make up stuff. So that's not really an excuse for me. All the other things religion is good for are basically of political or commercial nature. The more i debate with believers and the more i look whats going on in the world the more i become anti-religious rather than just "neutral". Considering what religion does to people you just cant be neutral towards it. So yeah, call me a militant atheist but i get seriously pissed off at people who say that the flood in new orleans is gods punishment for sinners. If someone said that right in front of me they would earn a good smack in the face.

[Nikolas]

Yes, Farl

It does make sense that human "evolution" in science, and advancement has managed to break the very reasons of evolution.

You know what though?

When it comes time that my kids will ask me about humans, and stuff like that (where are we, where are we coming from, where are we going, etc), which might be in a few years time, I will have two options, both acceptable:

1. The religion option. God made us, we are here to serve God, blah blah
2. The scientific view. We evolved from the apes, we are here to reproduce (or something), blah blah

Both, at the age of my children, will sound like fairy tales to them. Now considering to what fairy tales I've heard in my youth, a loooooong time ago, I had a mixture of Christian tales (Christ, Xmas, Easter, etc), Ancient Greek mythology (Hercules, Theseas, Ulesses, etc), scientific tales (the little blood cell and his stories in the human body), and other weird stuff. All coming from my own father, who is a doctor (thus a scientific mind, first and foremost). I've heard everything with interest, and I had favourites from all "genres". I also learned how to think "properly" from him, and the scientific methods of experiment, and proof (since he was in the university and he had once a week experiments, a cardiologist).

In the end, all I can say of the above tales, is that they all have benefited me to the maximum. My scientific views and mind, goes along with my imagination mind, and all work nice and cuddly in my brain...




Now,

I've been following this thread for quite some time now, remaining a lurker here, but I do have to comment on this:

Why on earth can both sides stop?

I find that the religion/non religion part of ones life, is personal. I have no need to express to anyone if I believe in a God, two Gods, or 12 Gods, or no God at all. I don't want anyone coming in my faces and telling me what they believe, and this involves, both religous and non religious zealots!

This passion to make people believe what you believe, is somewhat too much. I know that the States are going through some rough times with the evolutionists and creationists and so on, and I've never seen anyone here even talk about it. They just mind their own business. Of course, last night there was a program in the BBC, about some guy and the enemies of reason and so on.

We are all so happy and fast to proclaim "I believe in this, and evolution is that, and God is that". Why? I do see that zealots from both sides would like to "save" the others from doom, because this is what it's about from both sides, no matter what people claim. "enemies of reason", BBC1! Religious people are enemies, bad people, bad bad bad bad! They mean harm! And they are enemies of reason (=science). Don't you think for a sec, that aetheists, or religious people are any different.



Other than that re: "expressing Atheism", I can see one wanting to express it, but also they should keep in mind that it is one of the most dangerous subjects around, so it's bound to get some notice.

[evenwolf]

In response to humans breaking the chain of evolution:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13NPZ5Nv_fc

Richard Dawkin's wonderful program "The Big Question:  Why Are We Here?"

But I'm not certain I agree that humans have stopped evolving.  Perhaps "paused" is a better word.   One major catastrophe would start the process back again.   Imagine for instance, that a group of humans get stranded and one guy with a clubbed foot becomes better suited than the others.  Or a woman with thicker skin.    Try to read Vonnegut's "Galapagos" which has a similar concept.

[space boy]

The principle of evolution doesnt change. The criteria for survival do.