Playing devil’s advocate (o wayte, this thred 4 atheism, no devil hurr hurr), atheism has a lot of loose ends that have yet to be proven. Not that they can’t be proven, but that they haven’t. Atheists seem to put as much faith in modern science as religous folk put in god.
I’ll take this as a question.
There are loose ends, but they are simply parts of the puzzle that have yet to be finished, not gaping wholes in the logic of science. We aren’t putting faith in science, because faith is blind trust, and our trust is based of logic and reason, so our trust isn’t blind.
What is your most sincere and honest opinion on all religion, I don’t care how offensive it is I just want to know.
Mass hysteria. But I don’t blame or hate religious people (unless they are ridiculously ignorant) I mostly find fault and blame in their religions.
Q: In your honest opinion do you think that everything would be better if you took away all belief systems?
Q: Do you think that it would even be possible?
Q: Do you believe that there is no chance any of the other religions are correct?
Q: isn’t “rounding up” you putting faith?
I am a philosophy student, along with that I study religion and I am an atheist. I do not practice any religion. However, I have no problems whatsoever with religion or religious people.
The fact of the matter is that all religions try to make sense of daily life, and through that set a sort of guideline for how a person should lead their life. Whether it is striving to do good deeds and go to heaven (Judaism, Christianity, Islam), break the cycle of Samsara and reach Moksha (Hinduism. Also from practicing certain aspects of life), breaking free from your body and reaching liberation (Buddhism) or the Chinese religions, Confucianism and Daoism, where there is no goal or afterlife and it literally is guidelines for daily interactions and ritual propriety.
I feel that when people make sweeping statements e.g. “all religion is bad” or “religion is the cause of all the worlds problems” they are very ignorant, because in reality they are talking only about one group of religions, the Abrahamic religions, but they are also talking only about a very small vocal minority within those religions.
Even if it is obvious to anybody with an amount of higher education that the scientific method is well proven, does it really matter if someone wants to believe that evolution doesn’t exist? Does it really matter if they think you are going to hell? (By the way, who put them in charge of admissions?)
The only time I will actively confront and attack people on religion is when they are attempting to legislate their morality or view on the world so as to force it on the rest of us. It shouldn’t be in law, and it shouldn’t be in schools.
Where there are many people in different religions throughout the world, there are scientists and philosophers from every religion. That is why science should be relied upon. Science is universal, and the scientific method has proven to work.
Too bad that will never stop happening.
Religion is a subject very close to some people’s hearts and of course it’s going to take part in some of their decisions so you can never stop that.
What is so wrong with just admitting “I don’t know” to questions on the afterlife, God, etc.?
Why do we have to have all of these fantastical opinions created by religions on what actually happens, instead of not knowing but striving towards knowing MORE, instead of just assuming we do?
I’ve never said I know what happens after death, I’ll find out when I die and I welcome all possibilities openly. I put it all on the same field, whether it be a giant spaghetti monster, aliens, or some big man with a bushy beard.
Question wasn’t really directed at you personally, rather directed towards your take and others on it.
Somebody mentioned “proving/disproving that religion exists”… That’s dumb. You don’t need to prove/disprove it. It exists. Should it exist in an enlightened (mostly) society? Prolly not. Even the historical value of most modern religious texts is distorted beyond usefulness. With the churches rejection and destruction of the Books of Jesus and Magdalene, they removed the only two books that were written by their namesake.
I don’t believe in a god, but I do see how it could help make ones self feel like they have a place in life, but for humanity to move forward unhindered, I see it important that this NEED for self-affirmation from figments of collective imaginations has to diminish. Religion, all to often, stands in the way of science, which has to stop. What saves more people? Miracles or Antibiotics?
As to atheists not believing in supernatural/extraterrestrial things, that’s not a requirement of being an atheist. I am skeptical of supernatural events, strongly question the existence of such anachronistic beings such as bigfoot and the likes, but wholeheartedly believe in the existence of life not on earth. Mathematics statistics make it as improbable that we are the only life in the universe as it is that there ARE others. I don’t, however, believe the majority of abduction stories.
So I should be killed for doing work today?
Yep. The local christian death squad is probably on their way now. Nice knowin ya.
How do you feel about Gödels Theorem? Or the duality of light being a particle and a wave at the same time? Or the principle of uncertainty in quantum physics?
Now, as a scientist, I believe that each and any system of belief in divine beings and a supernatural order (or lack thereof) is equally as probable. That’s what my brain tells me. My gut tells me, that there is a God. I manage to reconcile my gut and my brains on that matter for the most part and I feel pity for those hard headed fools who cling on to a black and white view where there is only a world of pure science or a world solely ruled by their religious ideas.
Aaand another edit having read something on this page:
Look up Gödels Theorem. Really.
As a scientist you should also know that your gut is for digestion, and your brain for thinking.
I’m assuming you are relating to the fact that science cannot explain a lot of the things it discovers. My answer is, it’s not that they’re unexplainable by science and there’s some deity causing it, but simply we don’t yet have the knowledge and technology to explain such things.
wat?
No, disbelief in the supernatural isn’t a requirement of atheism, but if you are truly atheist you will discover that said things are absurd. IMO, to be a true atheist (I know this isn’t the exact meaning of the word, but I take atheism to mean someone who replaces god with science) you must believe solely in logic and reason, and logic and reason contradict the supernatural. Also, I believe in aliens wholeheartedly. Not to is ignorant. I just don’t believe in tall grey people abducting people in their sleep and stealing human fetuses.
No. Faith is when you believe in something entirely without reason. The reason I “round up” is because science is right so often and religion is so wrong, there is no need to dwell on the .01% chance of me being wrong.
Edit: I looked at godels theorom, and as technical as wikipedia is, I think I understand what it is saying. This theorom applies to mathematics, not science.
This is directed primarily at mattemuse, since he’s asked about this more than once.
I’ll try to explain what I understood and remembered from the video about the biological, evolutionary and psychological origins of religion.
As humans evolved, they adapted a strong social structure. This included the ability to think of people who aren’t present, as it were.
For example, I can talk and think about my aunt, even though she may be in another country. I can talk and think about my grandfather, even though he’s dead.
The concept of a god, or a higher power, or whatever you want to call it, is essentially the same.
As a child, or even as an adult (though in that case the concept of god is usually already imprinted into you anyway), you are introduced to this character, and you develop a “relationship” with him, the same way you would develop a relation with your father who died before you were born, for example.
This character has a set of defined attributes, just like a person.
Children are a prime example of how this works.
There’s a good example.
When there’s a cartoon with a mouse that is eaten by a crocodile, and you ask a child if the mouse can still eat or breathe, the child will say no. If you ask the child if it can still dream, or hope, or think, the child will say yes.
Children having imaginary friends is also part of this.
The video goes on to say that it is intellectually more difficult to stop believing in god (as it’s essentially denying the existence of someone you know), than to start believing in god (as it’s essentially being introduced to a new person).
That is why religious people rarely relinquish their beliefs, and it is more common for non-believers to become religious.
That’s pretty much the essence of that video. I haven’t explained it very well, and there are many more arguments and reasons for all of this, and many more results and conclusions, but I suggest you watch the video.
When I was a child I wasn’t sure whether to believe or not, and later I was agnostic. The idea that the concept of religion pretty much arbitrarily came into existence, and the only reason current religions are believed in is because of indoctrination and tradition, combined with the fact that there are and have been so many religions with so many fundamental differences, and that many of those have been completely forgotten is what made me an atheist.