Your reason for atheism

ianobrien

For me, growing up it never made sense. I was sitting there listening to the words being spoken and the concepts of heaven and hell, all watching God, etc just didn't match what I was reading about the universe with the planets, Sun, etc). It also sounded more far fetched than a lot of Fairy tales. Then, at about 10 or 12, I started learning about evolution and it made more sense as to where we came from. (We are intelligent animals after all).

As I got more and more into science, I came to the opinion that religion evolved as a concept to explain what we couldn't understand before science developed theories to explain (eg rising sun, diseases, etc). People try to understand their world and an all powerful God(s) gives comfort to explain what they don't understand.

The kick is that the priests/rabbis/shamans/etc cottoned on that religion could be used to control people and as a political weapon. Hence the political wars (simple land grabs to full-on exterminations) dressed up as religious wars under the guidance of their "God"

Edit, I was lucky in that everyone at home really stopped going to Mass when I was 10 to 12

learn_more

Originally Posted by learn_more
Particularly flowers/plants, they don't make themselves look nice for humans enjoyment, they are designed to make themselves alluring to birds so they spread their pollen.

StupidLikeAFox wrote: »

I laughed at the irony of this sentence :pac:

Ha, yes. I should have used the word evolved not designed. Well spotted

learn_more

Swanner wrote: »

Interesting topic...
OP - Maybe i'm not getting it but i don't see how relating us to animals disproves the existence of a god. I'm not disagreeing with you in that we are indeed driven by the same desire to survive and procreate. I just don't get the link between that and atheism.

Absolutly @Swanner, It absolutely doesn't prove the non-existence of God and wasn't putting forward that similarity as a proof.

I'd say most believers would never be able to put forward logic academic arguments for gods existence or otherwise. I'm certainly not a academic myself in this area but I've heard of things like the Kalam Cosmological argument. I know a little bit about inductive reasoning that I became aware of while studying Computer Science at uni.

But in the absence of being aware of the Kalam Cosmological argument, people believe in God for other reasons. I guess based on life-experience, personal experiences. Ditto for atheists. And I'm just interested in what those reasons might be, especially your primary reason.

Going back to my reason, I think if aliens were to come to this planet and plant cameras to document and analyse our lives without us knowing it, it wouldn't look to dissimilar to any of our own nature documentaries. You would find they would show our mating rituals (dating), our farming techniques, our recreational habits, and all the challenges we face to basically stay alive, all in an effort to continue to exist on this harsh plant.

Some responders have said so far well it was all the bull they heard at mass. Or the multitude of different religions that exist. Or the pain and suffering that especially some kids have to suffer. None of these things disprove god or a creator. But these things do matter when it comes to belief in god or not. It's the It's doesn't ring true factor for me, rather than academic arguments.

Speedwell

learn_more wrote: »

Some responders have said so far well it was all the bull they heard at mass. Or the multitude of different religions that exist. Or the pain and suffering that especially some kids have to suffer. None of these things disprove god or a creator. But these things do matter when it comes to belief in god or not. It's the It's doesn't ring true factor for me, rather than academic arguments, that mean that I remain an atheist.

Interesting that you put it that way. I'm a nerd princess through and through, and for me the "academic" argument is the most compelling one. I admit my deconversion "moment" came when I was reading the Bible one Easter morning to try to figure out how we got the God of popular mythology out of the actual words of the Bible, and the more I read, the more it fell apart like cheap chewing gum in the mouth. I didn't go directly from "the God of the Church can't be found in the inconsistent, laughable, deplorable crap that makes up the Bible" to "no religion makes the grade" in one day, though.

As for proof and disproof, I certainly do not accept in any way the burden of disproof when I am not the one making the claim; it is, however, possible to point out that the most common claims about the Christian God result in illogical nonsense. One common argument among religious debaters on both sides is that you can't prove/disprove a negative. But you can, trivially; if you make the claim that all the students have gone in from recess (= "it is not the case that there are students on the playground"), I can obviously point out the presence of Johnnie and Susie as refutation. If you claim "these shoes don't fit", it is quite possible for us to come up with appropriate definitions of "shoes" and "fit" that prove that yes, you are right, the shoes don't fit. It is not necessary to ask, "have you personally examined every student and every square inch of the playground at every point in time to make sure you're right", or "have you tried every possible style and size of shoes on every pair of human feet at every stage of development". However, I've had many, many Christians say, "You cannot deny the existence of the Christian God without addressing every possible definition of God that can ever be proposed". The argument is typically phrased as repeated iterations of "Well, some people believe God is like THIS...", and when I have to leave the chat to, you know, go to the loo, or sleep, I am accused of running away from the debate. No, sir. I am refusing to buy a pair of shoes because they don't fit; I am not obliged to try on every pair in the shop, and then pretend all the gloves are shoes and try them on my feet as well just because the German for glove is Handschuh ("hand shoe"), and then wait for every delivery truck in the factory to arrive with the new season's styles that have not been designed yet. And if you attempt to tell me that the shoes fit you, therefore they should fit me, I will give you that look.

learn_more

Speedwell wrote: »

Interesting that you put it that way. I'm a nerd princess through and through, and for me the "academic" argument is the most compelling one. I admit my deconversion "moment" came when I was reading the Bible one Easter morning to try to figure out how we got the God of popular mythology out of the actual words of the Bible, and the more I read, the more it fell apart like cheap chewing gum in the mouth. I didn't go directly from "the God of the Church can't be found in the inconsistent, laughable, deplorable crap that makes up the Bible" to "no religion makes the grade" in one day, though.

I like that answer. That's you personal reason and I'm just interested in what peoples personal reasons are. It's not like every atheist will give the same answer. The brutal logic one doesn't work for me which is why I don't buy the Kalam Cosmological argument.

But not everyone is a nurd princess as you describe yourself : ) How do non-nurds make their decision? Going to an extreme how would someone with learning difficulties decide. Just wondering : )

Speedwell

learn_more wrote: »

I like that answer. That's you personal reason and I'm just interested in what peoples personal reasons are. It's not like every atheist will give the same answer. The brutal logic one doesn't work for me which is why I don't buy the Kalam Cosmological argument.

But not everyone is a nurd princess as you describe yourself : ) How do non-nurds make their decision? Going to an extreme how would someone with learning difficulties decide. Just wondering : )

Heh. Well, I can make a stab at your question, but that's asking a lot from am INTJ with Asperger's. If you're interested in astrology of various sorts, I'm a Virgo with Leo moon and Aries rising in the conventional Western system, Scorpio with Anuradha nakshatra in the Vedic system, born in the Fire Horse year in the Chinese system, and a 9 Serpent in the Mayan system, all of which add up to "I can't so much as take a deep breath without being a nerd", lol. The fact that I collected all of those things without giving astrology the least bit of credence says much as well, I think. Probably that it's late and I need to go to bed soon. :P

Religious "salespeople" have never pitched their arguments to nerds and other overanalytical, inquisitive sorts of people, though. Their arguments are meant, like much of marketing, to create and sell a solution to an invented need. They do this by overcoming something called "sales resistance", which can be usefully defined as "exercising critical thinking". The typical way of doing this is to work on the emotions. If you look at old ad campaigns from eighty to a hundred years ago, it will strike you how many appeal to reason ("our product is fifty percent more durable than the competition's product", for example). More sophisticated modern marketers use what in any other context would be considered "psychological warfare" to induce potential customers to buy the product.

In the case of Christianity, the sales pitch begins, "All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God". You can see the commercial taking shape in your mind, if you wish. The beleagured, fallible human in a world too big and chaotic for them to cope with, like a tired, stressed-out housewife coping with a dirty house and a family that adds to her burdens by tracking mud through the kitchen and staining their laundry with mustard and underarm sweat. Disapproval from God, like a next-door neighbor pointing out to the entire neighborhood how much of a failure you are at keeping house. Salvation in the form of the intervention of Jesus with God and membership in the Church, like an Amway diamond executive promising you both washing powder in bulk and a way out of your troubles if you only agree to join his downline and sell it. You get the drift.

People with limited capacity for analysis (for whatever reason) are easily swayed by such appeals to emotion. It's said that a person who has not reasoned their way into something can't be reasoned out of it, and while that's mostly true, it is possible for someone to change from being uncritical and gullible by merely paying attention and realising that what they're told doesn't add up, or by noticing that they're being gulled for someone else's benefit. It's not uncommon, these days, for emotional reasons to play a large part in deconversion, too; just look at the disgust of many good Catholics, people who I'm sure would be good even if they weren't religious at all, at the child abuse scandals within the Church that have been coming to light, or the Protestant fanaticism that has been making the American political scene a worldwide laughingstock (nervous laughter, to be sure). Any of these things can act as the spark that lights the fire of personal discovery and sets the former Christian on the road out of Damascus.

Atheists don't seek to convert, exactly; that would make the whole exercise pointless. If religion still makes sense to someone and they need it, then atheists like me respect that. But we don't accept their religion's judgment on us when its judgment has been shown to be wrong, and maliciously wrong at that, in so many other ways. And we'd really like to not have to do the humanitarian work of picking up the pieces after they find that their religion has failed them; we'd rather prevent that sort of heartbreak, and people like me who are inclined to be overanalytical and overpractical are not always the best at nurturing those who religion has harmed.

realdanbreen

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

Where fid you get that? I was answering the question 'why don't you believe in any of the gods'?

If you're asking what I think then I could speculate but the ultimate answer is that I don't know because there isn't really any evidence of 'why were here'.

Do you have evidence of why were here?

Well I have always liked to keep it simple.
You and me and shep the dog and Daisy the cow exist today and live our lives-fact.
Somewhere at sometime something was created to get you, me, shep & daisy to this point-fact. I believe there must have been a creator while others like yourself don't believe that .

Speedwell

realdanbreen wrote: »

Well I have always liked to keep it simple.
You and me and shep the dog and Daisy the cow exist today and live our lives-fact.
Somewhere at sometime something was created to get you, me, shep & daisy to this point-fact. I believe there must have been a creator while others like yourself don't believe that .

Heh, how do you get from "nothing" to "Creator"... simply? I would have thought that something like a Creator of the Universe would be the very opposite of "simple". Looking forward to hearing your thoughts on what a simple Creator would be like.

realdanbreen

Speedwell wrote: »

Heh, how do you get from "nothing" to "Creator"... simply? I would have thought that something like a Creator of the Universe would be the very opposite of "simple". Looking forward to hearing your thoughts on what a simple Creator would be like.

You need to concentrate a bit more when reading my posts. I never said the creator was simple. Anyway I have laid out my stall for believing in a creator, what's your explanation for being in existance today? BTW and it's me not you, but I rarely read a post that rambles on for more than 10 or 15 lines.

Speedwell

realdanbreen wrote: »

You need to concentrate a bit more when reading my posts. I never said the creator was simple. Anyway I have laid out my stall for believing in a creator, what's your explanation for being in existance today? BTW and it's me not you, but I rarely read a post that rambles on for more than 10 or 15 lines.

Yes, you want everything simple. A simple man you are. Divine simplicity, that's your bag. If you can't say it while standing on one leg before you put your foot down, it's not for Danny. Thinking is just too much work for you, and you don't want other people to be all in-your-face about it either. Got it, lazy.

I got news for you. This subject isn't simple, and the burden of proof is on the person making the claim. The mere fact that you think you can explain your worldview in "10-15 lines" makes it reductionist and simplistic and not very useful, and insults everyone from the writers of Genesis to the modern Jesus study academics. Wake me when you've put in the effort.

realdanbreen

Speedwell wrote: »

Yes, you want everything simple. A simple man you are. Divine simplicity, that's your bag. If you can't say it while standing on one leg before you put your foot down, it's not for Danny. Thinking is just too much work for you, and you don't want other people to be all in-your-face about it either. Got it, lazy.

I got news for you. This subject isn't simple, and the burden of proof is on the person making the claim. The mere fact that you think you can explain your worldview in "10-15 lines" makes it reductionist and simplistic and not very useful, and insults everyone from the writers of Genesis to the modern Jesus study academics. Wake me when you've put in the effort.

Just as I figured, apart from attempted put downs you haven't anything to offer. You're just another one of those' It's all too complicated for a 5/8 like me' to comprehend.

Speedwell

realdanbreen wrote: »

Just as I figured, apart from attempted put downs you haven't anything to offer. You're just another one of those' It's all too complicated for a 5/8 like me' to comprehend.

Well, if you refuse to bother your pretty head reading long posts, you have probably missed everything I have to offer, you darling anti-intellectual, you. Toodles.

robindch

^^^ Folks and folkesses, please chill and avoid responding to juvenile quipping. For the avoidance of doubt, that mainly means you realdanbreen.

Thanking youze.

realdanbreen

Speedwell wrote: »

Well, if you refuse to bother your pretty head reading long posts, you have probably missed everything I have to offer, you darling anti-intellectual, you. Toodles.

No, unfortunately I haven't missed 'everything' you have to offer. Not surprising that you also belive yourself to be an intellectual(so intelligent that you haven't a better notion than poor old simple me about why you exist). Any advance on the tooth fairy being the reason?

Pherekydes

realdanbreen wrote: »

Any advance on the tooth fairy being the reason?

The tooth fairy for adults? AKA God.

uck51js9zml2yt

Speedwell wrote: »

Because religious people spend so much time trying to force society to conform to their beliefs.

Do you wouldn't have wanted to see the end to slavery and chimney boys. Both of which were championed by "religious" people ( whatever they are!) and abolished. It was the "non religious who opposed their abolition.

Speedwell

Ares Magnificent Kale wrote: »

Do you wouldn't have wanted to see the end to slavery and chimney boys. Both of which were championed by "religious" people ( whatever they are!) and abolished. It was the "non religious who opposed their abolition.

Sorry, please back up and try again, I didn't understand what you are asking me here.

intheclouds

realdanbreen wrote: »

Well I have always liked to keep it simple.
You and me and shep the dog and Daisy the cow exist today and live our lives-fact.
Somewhere at sometime something was created to get you, me, shep & daisy to this point-fact. I believe there must have been a creator while others like yourself don't believe that .

Why does there have to have been a creator and not just a natural process?

El_Duderino 09

realdanbreen wrote:

Well I have always liked to keep it simple. You and me and shep the dog and Daisy the cow exist today and live our lives-fact. Somewhere at sometime something was created to get you, me, shep & daisy to this point-fact. I believe there must have been a creator while others like yourself don't believe that .

Is there any evidence for a creator? Or an argument for a creator that isn't dizzyingly circular?

El_Duderino 09

realdanbreen wrote:

Any advance on the tooth fairy being the reason?

'The tooth fairy did it, how else could the tooth be replaced by money's is the religious answer.

'i don't know do I'll wait until I have more information' is the skeptic's answer

Speedwell

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

'The tooth fairy did it, how else could the tooth be replaced by money's is the religious answer.

'i don't know do I'll wait until I have more information' is the skeptic's answer

"I know it can't be the tooth fairy because fairies are made-up stories, and every time anyone has observed money placed under a pillow in exchange for a tooth, it is done by the tooth-losing child's adult family members" is the rationalist's answer.

El_Duderino 09

Speedwell wrote:

"I know it can't be the tooth fairy because fairies are made-up stories, and every time anyone has observed money placed under a pillow in exchange for a tooth, it is done by the tooth-losing child's adult family members" is the rationalist's answer.

Nice attempt but too many lines for my attention span

Mark Hamill

realdanbreen wrote: »

I never said the creator was simple.

Is your "creator" more or less simple than the scientific explanation (Big Bang, Abiogenesis, Evolution etc.)?

Speedwell

Mark Hamill wrote: »

Is your "creator" more or less simple than the scientific explanation (Big Bang, Abiogenesis, Evolution etc.)?

Any explanation that involves a Divine Being of the usual sort will be required to explain how that Divine Being came about. No "it just happened" just-so stories, you know.

Sam Kade

Speedwell wrote: »

Because religious people spend so much time trying to force society to conform to their beliefs.

Religious people in general do no such thing.

Speedwell

Sam Kade wrote: »

Religious people in general do no such thing.

Sam, everyone wants their world to conform to their worldview as they think it should be, and does their best to make that happen. Every religious person wants the world to be the way their religion says it should be, and they inevitably express that in everything they do and say, whether they know it or not. That's why religious people claim a monopoly on "truth", and why my New Age mystical friends pretend the Universe will give them what they want if they wish hard enough. Religious people vote with their worldview, talk with their worldview, expect other people to follow their script and get upset when they don't, and so forth. They can't really help it; they've bought into a worldview that purports to have figured out the truth about everything, even when it's demonstrably wrong.

Many seculars like me value reality for its own sake and are prepared to change our worldview when presented with evidence of sufficient quality. This was something I personally had to learn, starting with "don't run in roller skates unless you can change the laws of physics", lol. Reality is good stuff. It sticks around even when you don't believe in it. It doesn't have an agenda. It can stick up for itself.

PopePalpatine

Sam Kade wrote: »

Religious people in general do no such thing.

Let's see...first of all you have all the totalitarian Muslim countries like Saudi Arabia (where women can't even drive, and the king has a divine mandate), the likes of the Taliban and Da'esh/ISIS/Goat Rapists International, the Republicans in the USA whose party platform endorses state funding of abstinence-only sex education, conversion therapy for LGBT people, total bans on abortion and creationism in state curriculums thanks to their courting of the evangelical "Moral Majority", the various pro-life/anti-choice campaign groups across the world like the Legatus Lackeys (the Iona Institute, Youth Defence, the Pro-Life Campaign, SPUC etc.)...need I go on?

El_Duderino 09

Sam Kade wrote:

Religious people in general do no such thing.

Religious people in Ireland are massively confused about what their beliefs are. The religious institutions are the ones the poster us referring to.

uck51js9zml2yt

Speedwell wrote: »

Sorry, please back up and try again, I didn't understand what you are asking me here.

You said religious people conform society. I said, it was religious people who forced the abolition of slavery and the use as young boys as chimney sweeps. Both agaisnt the wishes of the non religious people.
Would you have preferred if the "religious people" did nothing and these 2 practices continued. After all, they conformed society to their wishes, some you obviously object to!

ReefBreak

I haven't actually read the previous 6 pages, but to answer the original question: my reason for atheism?

The size (f*cking BIG) and age (14,000,000,000 years old) of the universe makes the idea of a magical man living in the sky seem a small bit silly.

i.e. astronomy.

Speedwell

Ares Magnificent Kale wrote: »

You said religious people conform society. I said, it was religious people who forced the abolition of slavery and the use as young boys as chimney sweeps. Both agaisnt the wishes of the non religious people.
Would you have preferred if the "religious people" did nothing and these 2 practices continued. After all, they conformed society to their wishes, some you obviously object to!

Are you OK? I mean, I've seen you post a lot and you normally think much better than that.

There is nothing in the Bible against slavery. Slavery exists today. Where slavery has been abolished, Christians differed with each other, sometimes violently, about its abolition, and the abolitionists were in the minority. The vast majority of slaveowners were, and are, religious people. Today, the advocates of slavery in its many forms, from forced labor to forced pregnancy, are overwhelmingly religious. As for the use of children as chimney sweeps, I don't know a lot of about that, but I am sure the practice would have been abolished long before the late 1800s had not "good Christian people" made use of their services. I've seen the argument made convincingly that the abolition of the use of children as chimney sweeps was due to the increase in household cooking and heating technology, as well as in chimney cleaning technology that made the use of children to sweep obsolete.

I looked for a while at some mainstream resources about both issues and I was unable to find evidence of any concerted effort by atheist activists to preserve slavery or child labor. Do you have links?

realdanbreen

intheclouds wrote: »

Why does there have to have been a creator and not just a natural process?

You may be correct, it may have been a natural process. Thing is I have yet to hear or see a clearly expressed explanation of that process. Most theories that are put forward are ill defined, ambiguous and lack clarity.

meeeeh

I'was never spiritual person and that might be understatement. As a child I was sent to school psychologist because of basically stage fright (exam anxiety and so on) and she was trying to teach me different breathing or relaxing techniques. I didn't even believe those work. Years later I started buying some herbal pastils that I am now sure were just a placebo but at least they were tangible. It's very hard for me to believe into anything I can't see actual proof of or get some clear results. I despise alternative medicine, I am seriously sceptical about claims of cosmetic industry and so on... Spirituality of any kind bores me, I don't even do poetry. Similarly I always found philosophy too abstract but I find sociology and anthropology fascinating as a was of explaining how the society works because they at least pretend t g ere is method to their findings.

I just don't think I am wired to be religious and despite plenty of religious influences around me it never stuck.

Speedwell

realdanbreen wrote: »

You may be correct, it may have been a natural process. Thing is I have yet to hear or see a clearly expressed explanation of that process. Most theories that are put forward are ill defined, ambiguous and lack clarity.

Awesome, that is exactly how we feel about religious creation myths. (The ones that aren't clearly refuted by what we now know about how the Universe actually works, that is.)

realdanbreen

Speedwell wrote: »

Awesome, that is exactly how we feel about religious creation myths. (The ones that aren't clearly refuted by what we now know about how the Universe actually works, that is.)

Right so apart from any more red herrings you will have no problem posting what you now know about how the universe was formed.

Speedwell

realdanbreen wrote: »

Right so apart from any more red herrings you will have no problem posting what you now know about how the universe was formed.

You're the one serving red herrings, Dan. I don't have to disprove your claim by stating how the universe was formed. It could have been any of a million ways, I suppose, none of which involve the Christian God as their creator. Suppose I told you I believed it was a computer simulation (some people actually believe this because it is not inconsistent with observed facts and calculations; I do not happen to believe this because I haven't been convinced by sufficient evidence for it yet). You would still have to prove there was such a thing as that Christian Creator God in which you believe. You are far from off the hook, and your argument is not the "gotcha" that your books about "how to debate an atheist" may have led you to think.

realdanbreen

Speedwell wrote: »

You're the one serving red herrings, Dan. I don't have to disprove your claim by stating how the universe was formed. It could have been any of a million ways, I suppose, none of which involve the Christian God as their creator. Suppose I told you I believed it was a computer simulation (some people actually believe this because it is not inconsistent with observed facts and calculations; I do not happen to believe this because I haven't been convinced by sufficient evidence for it yet). You would still have to prove there was such a thing as that Christian Creator God in which you believe. You are far from off the hook, and your argument is not the "gotcha" that your books about "how to debate an atheist" may have led you to think.

That's fair enough. Basicly your theory is that the universe could have been formed in any one of a million ways. Or you also think that the universe might have been formed as a result of a computer simulation.

Speedwell

realdanbreen wrote: »

That's fair enough. Basicly your theory is that the universe could have been formed in any one of a million ways. Or you also think that the universe might have been formed as a result of a computer simulation.

No, at the moment the theory I find most convincing is one based on certain principles of quantum mechanics and probability, something that I could use the phrase "constrained random chance" to describe. But it's utterly irrelevant to and separate from the question of whether a God exists... it just makes it a little more difficult for an intelligent and educated person to believe in one. (This is not dissimilar from when the theory of evolution gained currency. That theory didn't disprove God either, it just made it impossible for Christian people to say that Genesis was a blow-by-blow factual account of how things came to be.)

I should probably explain what I mean by "constrained" random chance. Putting constraints on randomness doesn't make it less random, surprisingly. Saying "pick any number in which the digits 0 through 9 appear" is no more or less random than saying "pick any sequence of letters in which the letters A through Z appear" or "pick any number by taking digits in the fractional part of the decimal representation of pi" or even "pick any number in which the digits 1 and 0 exclusively appear". But knowing something about what the constraints are can give us hints to how chance gave rise to what we now observe.

ScumLord

realdanbreen wrote: »

You need to concentrate a bit more when reading my posts. I never said the creator was simple. Anyway I have laid out my stall for believing in a creator, what's your explanation for being in existance today?

The only part science really can't explain is how the universe started. We have a theory of the big bang that probably makes mathematical sense, but that's beyond me, I accept that the smart people know what they're doing. Our own solar system however we know a lot about. We know how it formed, through a natural process, we have a number of theories on how life took off that we probably won't be able to test properly until we find life somewhere else.

So even if some creator started the universe off knowing full well it would lead to life and a good possibility that there would be sentient life in it at some point. That doesn't mean the creator created us. We're the byproduct of a changing environment, we're the byproduct of millions of years of random events. I guess it could be argued god started it knowing how every atom would interact with every other atom over the course of billions of years, but it makes the whole process a bit redundant, if the god is all powerful and can do what he likes why spend billions of years making a universe to make a particular animal? Why not just make the animal. What does he want that animal for in the first place?

Ares Magnificent Kale wrote: »

You said religious people conform society. I said, it was religious people who forced the abolition of slavery and the use as young boys as chimney sweeps. Both agaisnt the wishes of the non religious people.
Would you have preferred if the "religious people" did nothing and these 2 practices continued. After all, they conformed society to their wishes, some you obviously object to!

Who were the non religious people that the Christians convinced to stop keeping slaves. If this happened in Europe most people that owned slaves would have also been Christian. The humanist movement among elites probably did as much to brings rights to commoners than religious dogma which had been around for thousands of years.

intheclouds

realdanbreen wrote: »

You may be correct, it may have been a natural process. Thing is I have yet to hear or see a clearly expressed explanation of that process. Most theories that are put forward are ill defined, ambiguous and lack clarity.

Im not sure here if you are talking about the creation of the universe as a whole or just the creation of "You and me and shep the dog and Daisy the cow" (ie, life).

The processes for both are well described in scientific literature, although the actual creation of the universe has a few competing theories going for it.

Is there any particular aspect of the current scientific thinking on either of the above that you feel renders it completely unbelievable and would make the idea of a God a more believable idea?

realdanbreen

ScumLord wrote: »

The only part science really can't explain is how the universe started. .

That's kinda the only part that I'm interested in hearing an explanation for.

realdanbreen

intheclouds wrote: »

Im not sure here if you are talking about the creation of the universe as a whole or just the creation of "You and me and shep the dog and Daisy the cow" (ie, life).

Either or. But lets keep it simple, why not start with the creation of life?

El_Duderino 09

realdanbreen wrote:

That's kinda the only part that I'm interested in hearing an explanation for.

realdanbreen wrote:

Either or. But lets keep it simple, why not start with the creation of life?

I don't know the answer to either of those questions. Do you?

realdanbreen

Well I believe that something/someone created them.

ScumLord

realdanbreen wrote: »

That's kinda the only part that I'm interested in hearing an explanation for.

Why, because people have just stated that we don't have a definitive answer?

It's not really a question we can fully answer from this planet. We can't even see the majority of the universe from here. All we have is our observations of what we can see, our scientific research and mathematical models.

You could probably learn enough physics to satisfy your curiosity, just because we can't see the whole universe doesn't mean what we can see is some sort of bizarre anomaly, the rest of the universe more than likely works exactly the same way. So the maths should be the same.

Trying to convince people that the entire journey is worthless because we haven't gotten over the hill in front of us yet isn't going to do much good. The fact we don't know how the universe started with certainty doesn't do anything to help the god theory. There's still everything else we know showing the god theory is just a story made up by primitive people trying to explain the mysteries of life.

El_Duderino 09

realdanbreen wrote:

Well I believe that something/someone created them.

Based on?

Moo Moo Land

My reason for atheism: I started to think for myself.

realdanbreen

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

Based on?

Based on the fact that if something exists as I do and you do then something or someone created or formed or developed( or whatever wording you want to use) us. Maybe God or a creator is the wrong title but something started the ball rolling surely.

El_Duderino 09

realdanbreen wrote:

Based on the fact that if something exists as I do and you do then something or someone created or formed or developed( or whatever wording you want to use) us. Maybe God or a creator is the wrong title but something started the ball rolling surely.

Have you thought about the possibility of a natural process causing things to be the way they are?

Mark Hamill

Speedwell wrote: »

Any explanation that involves a Divine Being of the usual sort will be required to explain how that Divine Being came about. No "it just happened" just-so stories, you know.

Presumably why realdanbreen has ignored my question then.