Are you sure you are an Atheist?

[Deathbydefault]

What made you first question? Was it really, "Hey, where's the evidence for this?"

When I learned there were other denominations and religions from the one I was indoctrinated into.
It was fortified by my use of the internet and reading of famous atheists, such as Hitchens.

Well, I don't know that not liking the heavy handed nature of a god is reason to discount his existence. Might be reason enough to switch gods

Switching gods because you don't like the way they act is almost conceding to their existence being fiction.
Fundamentalists are at least honest in one way, they stay with their god belief no matter what type of psycho it is.

Regardless, I don't dismiss god(s) based on my attitude towards their personality.

 

[HonestJoe]

I meant it as in what is that that makes you still sceptical.

Or, if you prefer: what would convince you?

Nothing makes me sceptical. You seem to be working on the basis that theistic beliefs are true by default and any doubt is the outlier. Theistic claims should be treated no different to any other claims. I can't define what would convince me because there are all sorts of different claims but in general terms it's the same for as it is for anything else. In practice it's very casual but in strict technical terms it would require an internally consistent hypothesis, a strong set of supporting evidence and either no conflicting hypothesis (unlikely in this area) or evidence accounting for those conflicts.

 

[Demonslayer]

Their actual useful attributes do exist, but they do not include existence.

I like this statement. Deities do a lot of things, good and bad, but one thing they don't do is exist. Good stuff.

 

[Demonslayer]

Why not?

The question is why don't I consider things like Tao and Zen to be version of "God."

The answer is, I guess I don't know why but "God" has always meant an entity to me. A being of some sort, not a concept or an idea. As I loosely understand it, the idea of Zen is total melding of mind and body into a state of enlightenment through meditation. That not a god to me, it's an idea or a practice or a philosophy.

The wider you spread the definition word God, or any word for that matter, the less meaning I feel it has. I understand what people mean when they say "anything can be a God" meaning things like if money becomes extremely important to someone you can say money is God to that person. But that's a symbolic, figurative idea comparing something that is obviously not "God" to a God due to the importance it has taken on in someone's life.

It's like when people use the word "religiously" to describe things that are obviously not religion. "He plays the guitar religiously" The idea, to me, is a comparison of this person's fervor for guitar playing to the kind of intense passion people tend to have towards their religion. Taking that one step further and saying "guitar is a religion" renders the word religion less important or meaningful. If I like my chair a lot, is a chair religion now? If so, doesn't that take something away from a real religion like Christianity, if we're saying Christianity is the same as a chair I'm fond of?

If everything is religion, nothing is religion. If everything is God, nothing is God. For practical purposes if someone asks me if I believe in God and I say no, and then they turn around and say "well money is God to some people, don't you believe in money?" I mean what purpose does that serve? Is it so when I say "of course I believe in money" they can turn around and say "AH HA, so you DO believe in God!" Is that meaningful? Is that really what you wanted to know when you asked if I believe in God? Whether I believe in money or a chair or a guitar or a form of meditiation?

 

[A Vestigial Mote]

With as much confusion as arises over the use of labels (quite especially on this site) I have come to despise them. I therefore call myself nothing in this realm, officially - though if pressed I do associate with the more generally accepted meaning of the word "atheist".

And my beliefs are, basically:
1. There exists no self-aware/intelligent entity or entities responsible for any part of the creation, maintenance or administration of the universe.
2. To call anything that you admit is not self-aware or intelligent "God" is asinine, and means you're either looking for trouble, or looking to have more in common with or put your belief on more equal footing with other religions who have an entity-based God concept. You know what the term "God" brings to bear - and it isn't clever ("You can't say my God doesn't exist! My God IS the universe, so ha!") or amusing to use the term to describe things that are only going to confuse other people and generally make that label more nebulous.

 

[Demonslayer]

To call anything that you admit is not self-aware or intelligent "God" is asinine, and means you're either looking for trouble, or looking to have more in common with or put your belief on more equal footing with other religions who have an entity-based God concept. You know what the term "God" brings to bear - and it isn't clever ("You can't say my God doesn't exist! My God IS the universe, so ha!") or amusing to use the term to describe things that are only going to confuse other people and generally make that label more nebulous.

Well said

 

[Willamena]

I like this statement. Deities do a lot of things, good and bad, but one thing they don't do is exist. Good stuff.

Well... No one does that. Existence isn't an activity.

 

[Demonslayer]

Well... No one does that. Existence isn't an activity.

Poetic license.

 

[First Baseman]

Hmm.... I'm not sure... So I must NOT be an atheist.

 

[A Vestigial Mote]

Well... No one does that. Existence isn't an activity.

This is not a clever response in any way, shape or form. You knew exactly what was meant, yet you chose to pseudo-refute it, or otherwise look down upon the comment - pretending that the usage of the words was somehow entirely incorrect.

Last time I checked, the word "exist" is a verb. I can "exist" just as I can "jump". I can also not exist or not jump.

Now that we have further mired this in semantics (for no good reason), do you feel any more/less clever, happy, special-snowflake about your response?

I'm tired of people replying with short little "gotchas" on this site. You're entirely free to continue doing so, of course - but be prepared to be called out on it, by me, every time I see you do it. If you don't like me doing this - then stop, or block me. I honestly don't care. Continue, and I'll continue. Simple as that.

 

[Demonslayer]

I can "jump".

Don't jump, life is worth living!

 

[Willamena]

This is not a clever response in any way, shape or form. You knew exactly what was meant, yet you chose to pseudo-refute it, or otherwise look down upon the comment - pretending that the usage of the words was somehow entirely incorrect.

Last time I checked, the word "exist" is a verb. I can "exist" just as I can "jump". I can also not exist or not jump.

That's precisely the category error that I was hoping we'd avert, with my mired semantic interjection. "Jumping" describes a behaviour, "existing" does not.

Oh well.

Now that we have further mired this in semantics (for no good reason), do you feel any more/less clever, happy, special-snowflake about your response?

I'm tired of people replying with short little "gotchas" on this site. You're entirely free to continue doing so, of course - but be prepared to be called out on it, by me, every time I see you do it. If you don't like me doing this - then stop, or block me. I honestly don't care. Continue, and I'll continue. Simple as that.

 

[McBell]

That's precisely the category error that I was hoping we'd avert, with my mired semantic interjection. "Jumping" describes a behaviour, "existing" does not.

Oh well.

moving the semantics game on to the word behavior only reinforces his point, not yours.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

~~~
Just a friendly question to all Atheists:

Is your belief of God’s non-existence based entirely on how God is perceived by all Monotheistic religions (Christianity, Islam, Judaism) and Polytheistic religions (Hinduism, Old religions etc),

or,

it also covers the Pantheistic philosophies of the One, such as Tao, Zen, Pythagorians/Empedoclians, some Gnostic movements, etc?

Thanks for your responces

~~~

It covers all the ones that I've encountered. Some I've dismissed as nonsensical or incoherent rather than evaluated them to be false.

 

[Thanda]

Not in the slightest. Atheism is merely one logical conclusion of being a rational skeptic. No idea, concept, or description of any god(s) I've ever encountered has met even the barest criteria for evidenced existence - similar to ghosts, psychics, big foot, etc. I remain open to all possibilities, but require some type of empirical evidence of something's existence in order to reasonably believe that it actually exists.

Of course, I accept that many other people don't have the same standards for beliefs.

Don't assume that to be the reason why some do believe. Some believe, not because of lessor standards, but because of differing knowledge and experience.

IOW they may actually know just as well as you know what your first thought was when you woke up this morning while being as powerless as you are to prove the fact to someone else empirically.

 

[viole]

~~~
Just a friendly question to all Atheists:

Is your belief of God’s non-existence based entirely on how God is perceived by all Monotheistic religions (Christianity, Islam, Judaism) and Polytheistic religions (Hinduism, Old religions etc),

or,

it also covers the Pantheistic philosophies of the One, such as Tao, Zen, Pythagorians/Empedoclians, some Gnostic movements, etc?

Thanks for your responces

~~~

It covers both.

Ciao

- viole

 

[Marsh]

Not necessarily. Or even preferably.

Alright. I've thought about it. You're correct.

 

[McBell]

Don't assume that to be the reason why some do believe. Some believe, not because of lessor standards, but because of differing knowledge and experience.

IOW they may actually know just as well as you know what your first thought was when you woke up this morning while being as powerless as you are to prove the fact to someone else empirically.

I assume there are as many different reasons to believe as there are believers.

 

[YmirGF]

~~~
Just a friendly question to all Atheists:

Is your belief of God’s non-existence based entirely on how God is perceived by all Monotheistic religions (Christianity, Islam, Judaism) and Polytheistic religions (Hinduism, Old religions etc),

Nope.

it also covers the Pantheistic philosophies of the One, such as Tao, Zen, Pythagorians/Empedoclians, some Gnostic movements, etc?

Um, nope.

Thanks for your responces

~~~

Thank you for asking.

A fuller, frank explanation would likely run several pages and I'm just not into doing that at the moment. Count your lucky stars...

 

[Marsh]

When I learned there were other denominations and religions from the one I was indoctrinated into.
It was fortified by my use of the internet and reading of famous atheists, such as Hitchens.

Thanks for sharing. I'm always curious to learn what causes loss of faith. It's often different for everyone. Learning of other denominations is a theme I've occasionally heard; and it's nice to hear that Hitchens had a positive role to play. At the time I lost my belief in God I was still unaware that there were other atheists. In fact, at the time I didn't even know there was a word for those who didn't believe in God.

Switching gods because you don't like the way they act is almost conceding to their existence being fiction.
Fundamentalists are at least honest in one way, they stay with their god belief no matter what type of psycho it is.

Regardless, I don't dismiss god(s) based on my attitude towards their personality.

I was jesting about switching gods, but I did think you were implying that you found it difficult to believe in certain types of gods. Thanks for clearing that up.