for atheists/agnostics

BlackSwan of Memphis

How did you get to the point where you are at now?

Was it primarily new information that made you rethink religion and God?

I.e. learning about the Ice Age, the Universe, the fossils out there?

Or was it the basic philosophy that turned you off?

You know, God is going to murder and smote non believers including children.

God doesn't answer prayers, or he hasn't mine anyway, or the prayers of people starving to death etc etc?

Genuinely curious.

If you can share I would really appreciate your thoughts.
edited to add:
I really, really, really want to keep this friendly, please!!!!

thx

BSoM

Fleur

Hi BSoM!

I can tell you that personally, it's the whole mankind trying to annihalate each other thing. The cruetly in this world especially toward children.

Any loving "parent" wouldn't stand idly by while two of their children killed each other, especially not over something as stupid as the issue of which child the parent loved best.

If there were a god, in my view, he/she/it should have DONE something by now to tell makind to quit it already.

That is why I am where I am. Which is agnostic leaning heavily toward athiesm.

hugs

essie

Gopher

Belief in God is based on faith. People of faith often tell you that you have to "experience" faith to understand it, and that it really cannot be explained. That may work for some people, but not for everyone.

If there is a God, he/she/it has left us floundering. Sure, in holy books purported to be written/inspired by said God, there is hope at some unspecified future point or after we die.

I think the intellectually honest approach is to just admit we cannot know for sure whether there is a God with a purpose for us. Hence, agnosticism.

Lack of belief in God is not a license for bad behavior without accountability. What it means is that you do your best for the people around you, not out of fear of an unseen God, but because you care about people and want them to care about you.

BlackSwan of Memphis

Thx Essie for sharing!
I can honestly say I hadn't even thought of it like that.
I have thought...
What's the hold up here?
When looking at stuff going on in the world.

hugs back at ya
BSoM

done4good

Black Swan,

It, (my Atheism), really came from examining religion openly after leaving the WTBTS. I tried very hard to "accept" the bible, and attempted to reason for it, but the more I researched, the more questions I found had no answer. It became apparent to me that religion was merely the product of man, attempting to explain the unexplainable. I no longer concern myself with things I cannot "know", such as whether god exists or not, and prefer to focus on things I can better myself, and others with.

j

Swan

If there were a god, in my view, he/she/it should have DONE something by now to tell makind to quit it already.

Yep, that was pretty much the way it was for me too. The mounting scientific evidence against the Bible's creation account made doubt more and more. However, it was man's inhumanity to man, and also God, who we are supposed to be made in the image of, not doing a damn thing about it, that cinched it for me. Hey, if you're going to be a god and create a universe, at least take some responsibility for taking care of things instead of just phoning it in.

Supposedly for the first 4000 years of human history, He performs amazing miracles, punishes His followers when they make mistakes, holds grudges against people for generations, destroys evildoers, involves himself in the political affairs of the world, interferes every chance he gets, demands regular doses of smoking meat and fat on his altar, micro manages humans to no end... and then...

...nothing. Not a peep. 2000 years and he hasn't said boo.

It makes no sense to me unless God is just some collection of superstitious myths by ancient peoples too ignorant of science to understand life, death, and the world around them.

Tammy

Madame Quixote

Emotional and philosophical issues like all of the above-mentioned got me to leave the bOrg at age 15. Intellect and education keeps me away from it. For a while in my young adulthood, I was fascinated with metaphysics and researched it a bit; came to the same conclusion as other atheists: man made god in his/her own image, not the reverse. I am a die-hard atheist now.

Fleur

I no longer concern myself with things I cannot "know", such as whether god exists or not, and prefer to focus on things I can better myself, and others with.

I really appreciate this, it's kind of like what I tell my child about evolution etc...I just posted about it in Dansk's Evolution thread. In the end nobody can know. That to me is the mark of humility in a human being, knowing that they do not know the answers.

Even if people do profess faith in something, it seems to me that where they go wrong with it is to say that they know all the answers. I mean, isn't there something that they have to 'take on faith?" so to speak? and if that is so, can't they just admit it?

I don't begrudge anyone their faith, if they have it. I believed for years, and I was absolutely sincere in doing so. Most of my friends believe in something, either they're Christian or Pagan or something. But they know that when it comes to religion I am like a person sunburned; that if they "share" with me what they think is a gentle pat on the back so to speak trying to sway me to their view, that to me it's like a hard smack on very sensitive skin. They just accept it about me, and we go on to other things and topics.

I find that the song "closer to fine" means a lot more to me as I get older. The less I spend my time worrying about why and how and Who got us here and just do the best I can to live a good life and help others when I can, the less any of those existential questions bother me in the least.

I don't know, and that's just fine with me :) Enjoy the journey!

hugs

essie

jstalin

I think the one event that jolted me most toward the parth of atheism was reading Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged. The speech by the main character, John Gault, contains a phrase that brought it home for me: "A is A." His point is that there is an objective reality, and in reality, the A is A. In a world with a interfering god, A is not necessarily A and objective reality cannot be determined. A can be anything god wants it to be. God can make A the same as B, if he wants. Therefore, if we are to believe there is a world around us, there can't be a god.

I'm not sure if this is making sense. I can't put it as well as Rand.

HadEnuf

I guess I'm agnostic because I just don't know. What I do know is that ANY religion is not for me. I also have a bit of a problem with a god that allows such things as crusades, holocausts, unending terrorism, etc. So if I have to have a label applied...I would have to say agnostic. Yeah. Agnostic. There may be a god around. Where he/she is at is another thing. But I too am an inch away from atheism.

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