"no, I'm actually an athiest"

efb

DOC09UNAM wrote: »

I completely agree with you, it is BS in my eyes, but, I thought it was slightly smuggish to act like you're smarter than them, before even engaging with them, for all you know, they have all read the bible from start to finish, but you just automatically assume they haven't, a tad smug tbh.

That said, I agree with you completely.



Wait, if you are an Atheist, why are you quoting Jesus?

I didn't call you smug, in fact the only thing I said to you was I haven't read the bible, and I am an athiest.

You hadn't advised you hadn't read the bible prior to my posting.

DOC09UNAM

efb wrote: »

Because Jesus son of Joseph and Mary was a great philosopher at worst.

I'm more agnostic than atheist, I don't believe in an afterlife, but I dont discount the existence of a higher being!

I'm confused, I assumed you were an Atheist, when you said you came out, I thought you meant you came out as an Atheist to your Devout mother.

My bad, it is very early.

efb

Apart from
A few dodgy chapters in the first bit, and Paul's letters in the second I'd recommend it as a good read.

A Satanic Verse it certainly ain't...

efb

DOC09UNAM wrote: »

I'm confused, I assumed you were an Atheist, when you said you came out, I thought you meant you came out as an Atheist to your Devout mother.

My bad, it is very early.

No dear, as you preach to others, reading the whole thread is important.

One lies with a man as man would with a woman.

DOC09UNAM

efb wrote: »

No dear, as you preach to others, reading the whole thread is important.

One lies with a man as man would with a woman.

As you may have noticed, I never said anyone should read the whole thread, nor did I preach it.

That said, I did read your post on the first page, I just didn't register the Username when I saw it again today.


Quoting the bible, cool, I haven't read it though, never saw the need.

philologos

Jamiekelly, if you must know, I've read the Bible through once. I'm on my way through it twice. I've read a large proportion of the books in the Bible, considerably more than twice.

efb

Jakkass wrote: »

Jamiekelly, if you must know, I've read the Bible through once. I'm on my way through it twice. I've read a large proportion of the books in the Bible, considerably more than twice.

Jakkass of all the people in here I'd have assumed you had read the bible.

What's your most inspiring part?

Also cudos to DC... for getting my reference was from a book he's never read.

efb

My Fave bible quote:

"There is NOTHING from without a man, that entering into him can defile him"

Jesus in Mark 7

the_syco

PAULWATSON wrote: »

smug little athiest, the same boy would have been a rampant church goer had he been born in the 1930's.

What makes you think he wouldn't have been smashing windows in the 30's?

potterycourse

efb wrote: »

My Fave bible quote:

"There is NOTHING from without a man, that entering into him can defile him"

Jesus in Mark 7

Even carrots? Nice.

Nodin

OutlawPete wrote: »

You'd do well to read the thread a little more throughly and you just might see that I was involved in the debate form the beginning and that that particular user has done nothing but insult and post condescending tripe to almost every poster that has disagreed with him.

188 posts on the thread and not once has he shown respect for someone that has not had the same opinion as himself.

Not that he has been the only on that side of the debate to speak down to other users and so when that happens, you can hardly blame people for replying in kind.

Well, seeing as the first "studs showing" post from yourself occurs way back on page 2, I'd say theres two of yez in it.

AudreyHepburn

Scanlas The 2nd wrote: »

You are deluded if you think you don't have the right to be condescending.

It's delusional to think everyone should be treated with dignity and respect? Erm...right.

Scanlas The 2nd wrote: »

No one is entitled to respect. It is hard to respect people who believe in nonsense. That doen't mean you shouldn't treat them with respect, but when you know the sort of nonsense they actually believe in you lose respect without choice on some level.

I agree with you to a point in that you don't necessarily have to respect a person's belief. But it is a basic human right that every person deserve to be treated with dignity and respect. It really isn't that hard to do tbh, it's more I think that many people on both sides of the debate simply choose not to.

OutlawPete wrote: »

You'd do well to read the thread a little more throughly and you just might see that I was involved in the debate form the beginning and that that particular user has done nothing but insult and post condescending tripe to almost every poster that has disagreed with him.

188 posts on the thread and not once has he shown respect for someone that has not had the same opinion as himself.

Not that he has been the only on that side of the debate to speak down to other users and so when that happens, you can hardly blame people for replying in kind.

I have to back Outlawpete on this.

Not once has this user been anything but patronising, insulting and condescending towards anyone, on both sides, who disagrees with. He/she persists on stating his/her opinions as though their fact and gets stroppy and disrespectful and talks down to other posters when questioned on them.

Sam Vimes

I find that accusations of smugness, condescension and arrogance etc (ie ad hominem attacks) in any discussion are usually the last ditch attempt of someone whose argument has been blown out of the water. Basically those who can argue do so and those who can't accuse their opponents of arrogance.

A perception that someone is being condescending doesn't make make them wrong and if that's the only response you have to someone's argument maybe you should consider the possibility that what you're doing is "shooting the messenger", getting angry at someone because they've exposed the flimsiness of your position instead of listening to them and realising they might have a point.

A good example of this type of thing is when someone says "you can't prove god doesn't exist" and the response is something like "you can't prove the flying spaghetti monster doesn't exist". Cue cries of ridiculing and arrogance and "forcing views on others" when all that has actually happened is that a stupid argument has been shown to be stupid by applying the very same logic to something else. An inability to disprove something is not a reason to believe in it and this is demonstrated by pointing out that one cannot disprove the flying spaghetti monster. If someone says something stupid it's not a failing of somebody else to point it out and they should not have to refrain from doing so lest someone get offended by having the stupidity of their argument exposed. If one doesn't want one's arguments to be ridiculed one should refrain from saying ridiculous things rather than demonising people for pointing out said ridiculousness.

As Jimmy Carr says: "I'm not arrogant, the word you're looking for is correct"

optogirl

PAULWATSON wrote: »

These days, it seems everyone is tearing about the place mouthing off about "being an athiest".

Is this some sort of snobbish "new, new Ireland" thing that has passed me bye?

No bible basher myself, however I don't ever want to be confused with an athiest. I don't pride myself on "the scientific method", or believe in evolution for that matter.

One thing always bothered me about evolution, according to the theory the people around you are the fittest "best of the best" after two million years of dog eat dog. Now looking at this lot, what must the prototype have been like, a right clown I'd say.

(paedo this, paedo that, blah, blah, catholic church, blah, had enough, blah, superstition, blah, we're so educated, blah.)

Are you a smug little athiest?

No - just an atheist. Not because I think it's trendy but because I don't believe in god. Prototype?? You really don't understand evolution do you?

optogirl

OutlawPete wrote: »

Have to agree with the OP here.

People just can't wait to tell you that they are atheists these days.

I really don't care if people are or not.

It's the fact that they titter and sneer at anyone who happens to believe in any kind of spirituality, that I find so contemptible.

Go and masturbate to Dawkins and his ilk as much as you want, I couldn't care less.

Just stop being so obnoxious about it in the process, it's boorish in the extreme to be quite honest.

Talk about stereotyping! 'they titter and sneer' - do they? I am an atheist and I don't titter and sneer and people who believe in god/gods. Not in public anyway.
And I don't particularly like Dawkins - just because neither of us believe in god does not mean I masturbate to his decidedly non-sexy books

optogirl

orourkeda wrote: »

The smell of condescension of that post is making me ill.

And what about OP? Fairly condescending aswell - what would you think of somebody who told you they firmly believe the earth is flat?

Donkey Oaty

And verily I say unto thee, there are now more posts in this thread than there are chapters in the Bible.

Manach

optogirl wrote: »

And what about OP? Fairly condescending aswell - what would you think of somebody who told you they firmly believe the earth is flat?

About the same why if I were told they firmly believe that religions were the primarly cause of all wars.

Shenshen

PAULWATSON wrote: »

These days, it seems everyone is tearing about the place mouthing off about "being an athiest".

Is this some sort of snobbish "new, new Ireland" thing that has passed me bye?

Really? And here I am still getting strange looks by people who seem to assume that everybody of course always goes to church on Sundays....

No bible basher myself, however I don't ever want to be confused with an athiest. I don't pride myself on "the scientific method", or believe in evolution for that matter.

One thing always bothered me about evolution, according to the theory the people around you are the fittest "best of the best" after two million years of dog eat dog. Now looking at this lot, what must the prototype have been like, a right clown I'd say.

It was a string of RNA...
And I can see why you don't pride yourself in the scientific method, you apparently haven't thought it worth while to inform yourself about what it is yet.

Are you a smug little athiest?

No. I just believe in one god less than the majority of people, and I won't lie when asked about it.
You call it smug, I call it honesty.

robindch

AudreyHepburn wrote: »

It's delusional to think everyone should be treated with dignity and respect?

While it's to be expected that everybody should be treated with respect, it is unfortunately a sad fact of life that not everybody does. Because there are some people who start off by showing no respect themselves and in this case, it's reasonable (if unpleasant) to respond in kind.

So, say, when the top Vatican official in the UK says on the radio that atheists are "not fully human" (linky) well, I'm afraid he started off by insulting all atheists and, for this and his thoroughly contemptible and hate-filled comment, frankly, him and his ridiculous views really do deserve to be treated with no respect at all.

Wompa1

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0eKOyI6l03Q

thebigbiffo

PAULWATSON wrote: »

or believe in evolution for that matter.

stopped reading here.

OP should seriously grow up. or get god to create another one of his petri dishes cos his creations are making a serious balls of this place with their 'free will'.

i'm no smug atheist, but i do hate smug religious people

optogirl

Manach wrote: »

About the same why if I were told they firmly believe that religions were the primarly cause of all wars.

huh? If I am interpreting correctly, you are saying that atheists argue that religion causes war?Actually no - although I am fairly anti-religion- I am an atheist because I don't believe in god. Simple

longshanks

If I see two magpies I do the lotto. I've yet to win anything.

AudreyHepburn

robindch wrote: »

While it's to be expected that everybody should be treated with respect, it is unfortunately a sad fact of life that not everybody does. Because there are some people who start off by showing no respect themselves and in this case, it's reasonable (if unpleasant) to respond in kind.

So, say, when the top Vatican official in the UK says on the radio that atheists are "not fully human" (linky) well, I'm afraid he started off by insulting all atheists and, for this and his thoroughly contemptible and hate-filled comment, frankly, him and his ridiculous views really do deserve to be treated with no respect at all.

I completely agree with all of this and this is pretty much what I was getting at myself.

People on both sides of this debate demand respect from eachother which is fine but quite often these same people are the least respectful of the lot.

My name is URL

Sam Vimes wrote: »

I find that accusations of smugness, condescension and arrogance etc (ie ad hominem attacks) in any discussion are usually the last ditch attempt of someone whose argument has been blown out of the water. Basically those who can argue do so and those who can't accuse their opponents of arrogance

Well I don't think that's true for everyone who finds the attitudes of some atheists to be condescending. What about other atheists who find the more vocal anti-theists to be contemptible? I have the same views on evolution and science as those people, and yet I sometimes find them to be almost as unbearable as those unwilling to see reason when taking part in discussions like this

Shenshen

My name is URL wrote: »

Well I don't think that's true for everyone who finds the attitudes of some atheists to be condescending. What about other atheists who find the more vocal anti-theists to be contemptible? I have the same views on evolution and science as those people, and yet I sometimes find them to be almost as unbearable as those unwilling to see reason when taking part in discussions like this

Personally, I start finding them condescending and unbearable when they run out of arguments and turn away from reason just to prove a point....

Sam Vimes

My name is URL wrote: »

Well I don't think that true for everyone who finds the attitudes of some atheists to be condescending. What about other atheists who find the more vocal anti-theists to be contemptible? I have the same views on evolution and science as those people, and yet I sometimes find them to be almost as unbearable as those unwilling to see reason when taking part in discussions like this

So you agree with what they're saying, just not the way they're saying it?

Or do you think they just shouldn't say it at all because you think people will inevitably get offended?

How would you respond to "you can't prove god doesn't exist" in a non-condescending and bearable way?

I'm reminded of a quote from Mohammed Ali: "It's not bragging if you can back it up". Say someone says something like "you clearly don't understand evolution, go and read up on it". That might sound condescending but what if the person actually doesn't understand it? Surely there's only so far you can go trying to explain something to someone who has an ideologically motivated desire not to listen to you, be it with evolution or anything else?

robindch

AudreyHepburn wrote: »

People on both sides of this debate demand respect from each other which is fine but quite often these same people are the least respectful of the lot.

In my experience, there certainly are a few immature atheists who mouth off about theists when it's clear that the world would be a better place if they kept their mouths closed. We get the occasional one over in the Atheists and Agnostics forum, but their career is inevitably fiery and short.

However, I don't recall any people on the leading edge, the intellectual side, of the atheist movement who have issued blanket condemnations of the essential humanity and decency of all theists.

In this, atheists seem to be fundamentally more respectful lot than theists.

philologos

^^ Some atheists are more respectful than some theists, in the same way that some theists are more respectful than some atheists.

How unremarkable?