When atheists have doubts!

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Re: When atheists have doubts!

Post by Gawdzilla Sama » Fri Sep 24, 2010 12:36 pm

Twoflower wrote:
Gawdzilla wrote:I doubt we're going to agree on anything.
Do we ever?

I never had doubts, I alway knew god was a fairy tale.
I reserve 0.000001% doubt.
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Re: When atheists have doubts!

Post by Xamonas Chegwé » Fri Sep 24, 2010 3:15 pm

Twoflower wrote:
Gawdzilla wrote:I doubt we're going to agree on anything.
Do we ever?

I never had doubts, I alway knew god was a fairy tale.
I doubt that. :tea:
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Re: When atheists have doubts!

Post by RandomGuyOnCouch » Fri Sep 24, 2010 3:45 pm

Robert_S wrote:
RandomGuyOnCouch wrote:
Robert_S wrote:Ever so slightly irrational it may be; my 100% disbelief in the Life Everlasting, the Keebler elves and the 6 day creations; but not enough to justify a an equivalence with believers.
I fail to see the usefulness in establishing degrees of irrationality, particularly when one could simply be rational by acknowledging a chance for error.
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What I'm really on about is not the half a quarks worth of doubt I neglect to have about the sentence above, it is the equivocation with the wildly improbable and firmly held religious beliefs and the misleading use of the word "fundamentaist".

The fundamentals of science > the fundamentals of revelation.
Subjective assertion, although one I agree with. However, I used the phrases "fundamentalist atheism" and "fundamentalist theism" and then further defined "fundamentalist" as "absolute faith". The terms "atheism" (a philosophical position) and "science" (a discipline of learning based on systematic and measurable principles) are not simply interchangeable, as you seem wont to do, regardless of how much one seems to imply the other.

Hell, even judged by the fundamentals of science, your position seems even more irrational simply because scientific thinking advocates doubt.
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Re: When atheists have doubts!

Post by A Monkey Shaved » Sat Sep 25, 2010 4:22 am

It is only when one broadens the definition of God to what the Scientific Pantheists believe in such as what Carl Sagon, Spinoza or Einstein subscribe to I have doubts but that is just playing semantics with the word.
Just because more people believe Jesus is the son of God and not the son of Satan does not make it any truer.

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Re: When atheists have doubts!

Post by Hermit » Sat Sep 25, 2010 4:52 am

Rum wrote:It just occurred to me that people of religion who go through periods of doubting their faith often go through a great deal of anxiety. To my knowledge this isn't a phenomenon atheists ever experience if they find themselves wondering if maybe there is a supernatural creator after all!
I am not totally certain of anything (until further notice) because absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. No matter how many times you fail to see black swans, it does not mean none exist, but if there was a creator of life, the universe and everything, he / she / it couldn't be anything as cruel, punitive and generally bloody-minded as those god thingies portrayed in the various 'holy' books. They are simply too anthropomorphic, which is typical of writings that originated in the bronze age. At most there might be some sort of 'divine' watchmaker who designed everything to begin with and then sat back and watched it ticking away without ever intervening in anything. This view doesn't even require an 'afterlife'. The possibility of the existence of a divine being is no cause for anxiety to me.
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Re: When atheists have doubts!

Post by Robert_S » Sat Sep 25, 2010 10:07 am

RandomGuyOnCouch wrote: Subjective assertion, although one I agree with. However, I used the phrases "fundamentalist atheism" and "fundamentalist theism" and then further defined "fundamentalist" as "absolute faith". The terms "atheism" (a philosophical position) and "science" (a discipline of learning based on systematic and measurable principles) are not simply interchangeable, as you seem wont to do, regardless of how much one seems to imply the other.

Hell, even judged by the fundamentals of science, your position seems even more irrational simply because scientific thinking advocates doubt.
OK, I would still like people to consider not using the word fundamentalist in place of extreme hard headedness. For one, it doesn't really describe very well. It has gone from describing a set of beliefs that some people try to maintain to a mere epithet. Also, I think there is some virtue in trying to be consistent and honest.

At this point, I do not really bother with any doubts about the more literal interpretations of scriptures. In principle, I know there should be a wee bit. But life's too fucking short so I consider the matter settled until something really really super unexpected and extraordinary happens.
What I've found with a few discussions I've had lately is this self-satisfaction that people express with their proffessed open mindedness. In realty it ammounts to wilful ignorance and intellectual cowardice as they are choosing to not form any sort of opinion on a particular topic. Basically "I don't know and I'm not going to look at any evidence because I'm quite happy on this fence."
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Re: When atheists have doubts!

Post by Trolldor » Sat Sep 25, 2010 10:35 am

Charlou wrote:
The Mad Hatter wrote:The Universe is too big for a god.
I like this.
I was having an argument in class, and after going through the list of natural cosmic phenomena (Nebulae, Planets, Stars, Black Holes, Voids etc.) al I got was a reply of "So what?"
In a fit of RAAAAAAGE I simply responded "So what? The universe is too fucking big for your god is what."
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Re: When atheists have doubts!

Post by Ronja » Sat Sep 25, 2010 10:37 am

The Mad Hatter wrote:
Charlou wrote:
The Mad Hatter wrote:The Universe is too big for a god.
I like this.
I was having an argument in class, and after going through the list of natural cosmic phenomena (Nebulae, Planets, Stars, Black Holes, Voids etc.) al I got was a reply of "So what?"
In a fit of RAAAAAAGE I simply responded "So what? The universe is too fucking big for your god is what."
:this: :clap: :tup:
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Re: When atheists have doubts!

Post by Pappa » Sat Sep 25, 2010 11:57 am

Ronja wrote:
The Mad Hatter wrote:
Charlou wrote:
The Mad Hatter wrote:The Universe is too big for a god.
I like this.
I was having an argument in class, and after going through the list of natural cosmic phenomena (Nebulae, Planets, Stars, Black Holes, Voids etc.) al I got was a reply of "So what?"
In a fit of RAAAAAAGE I simply responded "So what? The universe is too fucking big for your god is what."
:this: :clap: :tup:
But surely a perfect deity who designed and orchestrated a universe of such complex and magnificent beauty would be interested in the petty squables of some Bronze Age goat herders, right? :what:

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Re: When atheists have doubts!

Post by Tigger » Sat Sep 25, 2010 3:48 pm

I constantly take great pleasure reminding myself that were it not for religion, I wouldn't have met and made friends with so many people here. Otherwise the thought of it would drive me apoplectically loopy.
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Re: When atheists have doubts!

Post by Joe Bloe » Wed Sep 29, 2010 9:31 pm

The chance that I might wonder if god really exists is about the same as the chance that a christian may wonder if the Tooth Fairy really exists.
Believe nothing you hear and only half what you see.

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