The Life of an Atheist and Agnostic (page 4)

Golf

Hmmmmmmm, more interesting responses. Cognitive_Dissident gave me something to think about, and that is, do the teachings of the jw's actually make you believe in a God or does it turn you away from believing in a God?

Cognitive said,"The most detrimental affects of being a witness for me was...I in fact had very little or no hope at all in my day to day life." This suggest a void in a belief system resulting in disbelief.

MKR, let me reassue you, its' an innocent question. Do you always question people's motives? Do you trust or have a measure of faith in people? Do you give people the benefit of the doubt? Why do you read into things? The fact that you said, "...but I still say it's not worded like an innocent question" suggests you don't.

Maybe you need to walk with me on steel beams a few floors above street level to get you to believe that my question is innocent. I'll guarantee to you you'll have second thoughts.

Golf

Mysterious

What do you base your hopes,dreams,aspirations and your eventuality on?

My aspirations are based on bettering myself and the world I live in. I am motivated by love of the things important in my life: my bf, my cat and my hobbies. I know that when I go through hard times a real person will be there with their arms around me, not an imaginary and distant deity.

Golf

Mysterious, my wife and I were watching a segment of yesterday's news and it dealt on 'happiness.' People in the Montreal region were aked, what was more important to them, work or happiness, happiness won out.

Golf

zen nudist

in reading all these responses it occurs to me that I think I know where this question originates....

while I was still a JW and contemplating leaving.... I kept thinking that life would be meaningless if it just ends and there is nothing

more afterwards.... all my efforts, dreams, goals and desires would end up in the ash heap of history and what did it matter what I did?

but

after I finally could not take the self deceptions and did actually find myself godless and hopeless, I still found meaning in living and was puzzled and searched myself for the reason.... and found this:

there is no meaning of life from the outside....no value in judging ones own life from any external standard...which is how JWs and any one else who compares you to some ideal fantasy, gets you to see yourself.... its a sham with the goal of making you feel inadequate and helps enslave you to their distorted view of what is going on.... in reality you find meaning because you CARE about your current state of being and the impact your next move will have on it.... plain and simple, the meaning of life does not exist but for the meaning found by the living.

JT

Never in my life as a Witness was I able to envision or look forward to life beyond a few months out

############

this has got to be the deepest post i have read in a long time and it is so true

due to the fact that we couldnever see more than a few months out we saw no need to plan for our future

no saving /retirement plans, such conversations could not take place among jw, while it is true some did, but as a collective group for a jw to say

Hey take alook at this info on retiring int 1998,while livnng in 1978, was unthinkable

so we just lived for the day hoping that the end would save us from the future

how sad

mkr32208

Do you always question people's motives?

Yes...

What does walking on steel beams a few feet off the ground have to do with anything? I was a competitive climber and skier in NY I've had plenty of near death experiences and waking up in hospitals if that's what your referring to!

Mark of the ~ atheist in a foxhole class

hooberus

What do you base your hopes,dreams,aspirations and your eventuality on?

Golf

Though I am not an atheist I think that the correct answer would be (from the prespective of a materialist) that the above things are all predetermined simply by the sequences of atoms in the DNA molecules in conjunction with influences in the environment:

"Let me summarize my views on what modern evolutionary biology tells us loud and clear … There are no gods, no purposes, no goal-directed forces of any kind. There is no life after death. When I die, I am absolutely certain that I am going to be dead. That’s the end for me. There is no ultimate foundation for ethics, no ultimate meaning to life, and no free will for humans, either." William Provine Biological Sciences Professor Cornell University 1994

Abaddon

hooberus

I get the idea of you expecting people to suck their teeth and gasp at each revelation of what you obviously have a negative view of

There is no ultimate foundation for ethics,

Yup, no god, but being nice just because being nice is nice is nicer than being nice because if you don;t god will smack your bottom.

no ultimate meaning to life,

Yup, no god, but one can give ones life meaning, as explained.

and no free will for humans, either."

Heh... the Biblical definiton of free will, the legal one, the logical one and the scientific one all differ.

The Biblical definition is 'do what you want but if you don't do what I want I will do you'.

The legal one is 'not under any duress or complusion'.

The logical and scientific ones go together - total free will is not possible. The more you play with the idea the more obvious this is. I could kill the person sat next to me now, but there are many things infringing this expression of free will, from nature through nurture to not wanting to go to jail and much much more.

greendawn

I don't mind wishing the atheists the best in this life, but nothing can beat the belief in a God and an afterlife as a life quality booster. The atheists put themselves in a corner by having accepted that after death there is eternal non existence. It sounds brave to fully accept such a disagreeable idea but....

googlemagoogle

nothing can beat the belief in a God and an afterlife as a life quality booster.

it's just the other way around. without believing in magic, i live my life for myself and for the people who are important to me. i don't live it for a god.

The Life of an Atheist and Agnostic

Share this