I am an Atheist and always have been.

officerripley said:
Unfortunately, I was mostly raised by a crazy old grandmother who was exactly that. As she put it, "It's so distressing for me to have to be around a nonbeliever since I can't help but picture what they're going to look and sound like burning in the flames of Hell. Just so distressing." And that is indeed distressing, you might well say? But if you had seen the relish with which she said that? She really did enjoy that, I think.
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I'm sorry to hear you had to endure being raised by someone who was mentally impaired.
 
officerripley said:
Unfortunately, I was mostly raised by a crazy old grandmother who was exactly that. As she put it, "It's so distressing for me to have to be around a nonbeliever since I can't help but picture what they're going to look and sound like burning in the flames of Hell. Just so distressing." And that is indeed distressing, you might well say? But if you had seen the relish with which she said that? She really did enjoy that, I think.
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That was my grandmother too. She raised my father who bought into the "Vengeance is mine, sayeth..." Religion. My mother was also a Christian, but not a vindictive one, and when it came to introduce me to church, my mother put her foot down and said, "Not that church for my kids." My father had to give in on that one, and accepted a more moderate Christianity, at least until my Mother died, and then returned to the "Wages of Sin" Let the Damned be Damned Church of the Living Fire. By that time, I had written the whole thing off as nonsense. No matter how I tried to define my own god, I could still provide no evidence for such a being.
 
What is the point of this thread? Should anyone one of us care who is an atheist or a believer in God? I've been reading these comments and shaking my head. It's like who is the most atheistic of us all? Is this a contest, or what?

Frankly, it is a given that we all have free will and you can believe what you wish. No big deal.
 
robordon said:
If there is no higher being, ok. What if there is, what if they're right? I err on the side of caution, if there's nothing else, no harm no foul. Take your beliefs to the grave, if there's nothing you'll never know it, if there is you will.
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Scott Adams from Dilbert: Shortly before his death, Adams announced his intention to convert to Christianity, despite continuing to identify as a nonbeliever. He viewed the decision in pragmatic, cost-to-benefit terms, concluding the potential benefit of eternal salvation to outweigh any downside if the belief proved to be false.
 
Lewkat said:
What is the point of this thread? Should anyone one of us care who is an atheist or a believer in God? I've been reading these comments and shaking my head. It's like who is the most atheistic of us all? Is this a contest, or what?

Frankly, it is a given that we all have free will and you can believe what you wish. No big deal.
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The point of this thread is to engender discussion amongst members.
Is that not the point of all threads on social network sites?
 
Messy said:
Scott Adams from Dilbert: Shortly before his death, Adams announced his intention to convert to Christianity, despite continuing to identify as a nonbeliever. He viewed the decision in pragmatic, cost-to-benefit terms, concluding the potential benefit of eternal salvation to outweigh any downside if the belief proved to be false.
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My grandmother would have said no one can be saved by pretending faith, and those who try to get in under false pretenses should be double damned.

Edit: Honestly, her exacter words were, "You cannot doubt God. If you do you go to Hell."
 
David777 said:
Adequately answering @Knight 's Young Earth Creationist (YEC) religious questions would greatly expand the thread from the OP's original atheist statement. One can of course, just web search to read volumes of content, criticizing those dated ideas from any serious science based discussion. And whole very manipulative nonsense books have been published specifically to keep their faithful there.

YEC criticisms that won't change opinions of any more non-science persons still with those faith based ideas. A science based person cannot reasonably argue with science ignorant persons on most any subject because of the disconnect in understanding. Just as we see with the Global Warming debates today.

Much of the criticism can be placed against the self-serving dogma of Bible inerrancy and that the Holy Spirit inspired the whole OT and NT authors. Also, all the Omniscience, Omnipresent, Omnipotent (OOO) non-Bible based ideas that rose in the Middle Ages as philosophers argued qualities of what a perfect god needed to have. If God cannot do anything one can imagine... then He isn't a god!!!

Just nonsense to any honest scholars over centuries that have studied those matters. And why? Well after the Reformation, especially during the 17th century, numbers of religious leaders were afraid given the rise of science that people would increasingly stop believing them, leave their churches, and turn to scientists. Discussions actually documented in supposedly closed discussions of religious elites now readable on the Internet. Oh, how they HATED Darwin! As science into the 21st century has vastly expanded, such has become true with myriad younger educated people moving away from YEC dogma.

Unfortunately, between the dominant dogma of an OOO level god, and anything less, there is very little middle ground so ordinary persons tend to go from being religious when young, to not believing at all. But there is a middle ground for a non-OOO god that does not have magical, actions without forces, powers but is still worth following. And the Bible itself has much scripture that has always pointed in that direction. Much of the criticism like "Why does God allow all the Worlds evils" is misplaced as that is NOT his responsibility in a vast universe, vastly older than even our primitive multicellular Earth life, where we nascent warmongering Earth monkeys are but recent risen intelligent entities with considerable primitive social, political, economic, self caused problems.
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I only studied one year physical geography and just assumed that what they said was true. Soil layers, billions of years old, geology, all that stuff. I didn't really care. Okay. Maybe 6 days are 6 periods of millions or billions of years. What does it matter. And later I saw GAP theory. Then dino's were still old, but God recreated. Okay. Sounds plausible. And then they found soft tissue in a dinosaur and I didn't believe that it was so old anymore.

This guy was not dumb:

 
Heck, I can't believe I just now remembered this. Dante's Inferno by Dante Alighieri, the big woo woo of medieval literature was just full of souls being tormented because of the p0litics in Italy at the time, and the effect it had on his writing; some of that book seemed like the punishment was viewed gleefully ("It's only what they deserve!). So unfortunately, I think the pleasure in others being punished (especially for all eternity) is common, even among the non-religious.
 
JustDave said:
Honestly, her exacter words were, "You cannot doubt God. If you do you go to Hell."
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I don't agree with her.

I entered her "exact words" into my search bar to see what AI would say about it.

Here's the exact answer I got, which I do agree with:

"Many theological perspectives distinguish between passing doubts and intentional, lasting unbelief, arguing that honest questions do not inevitably lead to hell. While some interpretations emphasize strict obedience, many traditions, including Catholic, view doubt as a natural struggle or a prompt to deeper faith rather than a mortal sin. "
 
As children, many of us experienced having to attend the church of our parents choice. However, as an adult, we can then re-evaluate and choose what best fits us. It really doesn’t matter to me what an individual’s beliefs are – whether you are an atheist or a member of an organized religion – that’s entirely your choice. What I have an issue with is people who try to alter a person’s ideals and manipulate them into believing what they believe in.
 
TeePee said:
When my mother was 10 yrs old, she had polio and couldn't walk without crutches. She said one day out out of the clear blue sky that God had healed her. She dropped her crutches and walked without them ever since. When she was probably in her late 30's, the doctor opened her up and discovered cancer. I forget where they said it was. A few days later, he opened her up to remove the cancer and the cancer was no where to be found. I remember that incident years ago. Did my mom have cancer or was she misdiagnosed with cancer? We'll never know. All I know is my mom had a lot of faith.
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I've heard many similar stories like that all my life. But I've never experianced anything in my life that didn't have a logical scientific explanation. Therefore I remain unconvinced.
 
MACKTEXAS said:
I don't agree with her.

I entered her "exact words" into my search bar to see what AI would say about it.

Here's the exact answer I got, which I do agree with:

"Many theological perspectives distinguish between passing doubts and intentional, lasting unbelief, arguing that honest questions do not inevitably lead to hell. While some interpretations emphasize strict obedience, many traditions, including Catholic, view doubt as a natural struggle or a prompt to deeper faith rather than a mortal sin. "
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She also said the exact words, "If you become a Catholic, you will go to Hell."I asked her that when I was a little older and many of my Catholic playmates were getting extra days off from school.
 
Messy said:
My colleague's girlfriend's dad had cancer. One day with a meeting he looked very depressed. What's up? His FIL would get euthanasia next week. What? My goodness. That colleague was atheist. I said: Is your FIL a bit open to the Gospel? Can you tell him? No not at all. He wants nothing to do with it.
I just panicked. Normally I wouldnt ask an atheist to tell someone the Gospel lol. He stayed very kind.

My God. Total panic the whole week. I refused to eat. My ex thought I had gone nuts. Prayed hours a day non stop when I came home from work. A week long every day.

After he said he was cremated I stopped trying to raise him from the dead. I got a dream. There was a bird and a fox and I kept shooting that fox who went after the bird but I couldn't hit him and I kept trying and then BAM a shot from heaven and the fox was dead and the bird flew to heaven.

I saw him in another dream with his eyes wide open. I believe he got saved. But it was a lot of stress. Would have been easier for me if he had just said: Sure. I'll convert.

Ian Mc Cormack died from a box jelly fish. His mom at the other end of the world, who didn't know where he was or what was going on, had to pray. He came back after 45 mins. He was an atheist. Just before he died he said: If there is a god help me to pray and he saw texts from the our Father and prayed that and forgave people and then died, saw Jesus and heaven. Since I saw that I just pray for everyone and believe God can show them.
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My old man dies when I was nine and my mom when I was 20. For several years afterwards I had dreams in which they were alive. There's a psychological explanation for that. It doesn't mean that they came back in anything other than my sub consious mind.
 
TeePee said:
I think it all boils down to faith.
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To which Trade responded:
Trade said:
To me that means being gullible enough to believe something in spite of there being no evidence to back it up.
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I agree with TeePee myself because of information we have regarding the placebo effect and self fulfilling prophesies. We have found that human belief is able to generate results without any known cause. So whether or not god exists belief in that god and what the god can do can be enough to provide results for the believer.
 
asp3 said:
To which Trade responded:


I agree with TeePee myself because of information we have regarding the placebo effect and self fulfilling prophesies. We have found that human belief is able to generate results without any known cause. So whether or not god exists belief in that god and what the god can do can be enough to provide results for the believer.
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Human belief in religion seems to be best at generating wars which is why I had to pay $3.75 a gallon for gas this morning when it was $2.50 a gallon just 5 weeks ago. :mad:
 
Trade said:
Human belief in religion seems to be best at generating wars which is why I had to pay $3.75 a gallon for gas this morning when it was $2.50 a gallon just 5 weeks ago. :mad:
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I'm not a fan of organized religion either. I was talking about personal belief in a god, not the social constructs built around people who share beliefs and the various differences in flavor and texture within those beliefs.
 
This is in regard to post #90 and post #91, and to all who accept scientific "evidence" as the proven basis for their beliefs:

In the history of evolutionary biology, there have been many major beliefs once held as supported by scientific proof that have since been proven wrong or incomplete.

Before Darwin, Jean-Baptiste Lamarck proposed that organisms could pass on traits they acquired during their lifetime to their offspring. This was disproven by the discovery of genetics. We now know that DNA is what determines inherited traits, and the once widely held "Lamarckism" is now considered incorrect.

Ernst Haeckel proposed that an embryo passed through a "fish stage," then a "reptile stage"before becoming human. He even presented his famous "Haeckel" drawings, since found to be highly exaggerated and inaccurate . . . or worse - since modern scientists - such as Michael Richardson in the 1990s - declared them to be outright "fakes."

Scientists once listed dozens of human organs, like the appendix and tonsils, as useless remnants of our evolutionary past, stating those organs served no purpose in modern humans. We now know many of these organs have specific functions - for example, the appendix provides beneficial gut bacteria, allowing the body to repopulate the gut after illnesses.

Scientists once believed that whales evolved from a group of extinct carnivorous land mammals, but in the early 2000s, new fossil finds provided DNA evidence proving that whales are actually more closely related to hippos and camels.

And so, some of the "proof" wasn't proof after all, and much of what has been kept as "proof" will continue to change, and some may be totally discredited, just as it has been in the past.
 
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