Without God(s), what is the point?!

[Sheldon]

(1) Believers don’t go to hell

No matter what deity they imagine is real?

(2) hell has punishments including burning from flame but a believer fear losing their faith and going to hell out of fear of intense pains while the idea of being far from God in hell is their biggest fear about hell

Hell is a fictional unevidenced posthumous torture chamber.

(3) disbelievers concern of hell is not that they are far from God.

Well duh, how could anyone rationally fear being far away from something they don't believe exists?

If they care about that at all with the punishments awaiting them their prayer might have meaning and probably would save them from hell at that moment.

I don't atheist means what you think it means?

But they won’t pray for that reason and will even per Quran want to ransom their family friends and all of humanity if it can save them from the pain. Their prayers will only be in error at this point and won’t have meaning.

Do you pray to deities you don't believe exist, like Thor or Zeus? This is asinine reasoning.

 

[Sheldon]

If I bragged about my self sacrifice that would not be humble would it?

Lol, my ideology literally is self sacrifice, so what are you talking about?!

 

[Wildswanderer]

Having an ideology is not bragging about it.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

That's because you can't allow yourself to believe evil and good really exist.

Even if that were through, it's not an answer to the points raised in the post you are quoting.

Those points being:
1. humility is not exclusive to christianity
2. the idea of original sin is part of christian belief and therefor meaningless to non-christians


Neither has anything to do with being able to make sound moral judgements.

 

[KWED]

Definitely for you. You can't be given a gift you throw away, however. It's still being offered.

If you say you have bought me a new pair of shoes, but the box is empty, there is nothing to throw away. If you keep offering the empty box saying "But look at the lovely shoes!", I will start to question your sanity.

 

[KWED]

Thinking you are better than others because you do good work is not the right pride.

If your work is better than someone else's, then you are better than them at that job. It's kinda the basis of how business, industry, education, sport, etc work.

If finding out who is "better" is so bad, why does god "test" us?

 

[KWED]

You have understanding issues, so... that is nothing new. You would do good to slit the unruly tongue and listen more, and more questions geared to understanding instead of bickering and arguing.

Look, we have long established that much of what you post is incoherent, although I'm sure it makes sense to you when you think it. There appear to be various reasons for that, but the end result is clear.

 

[KWED]

Who knows why you'd pick an example that destroys your argument though.

It has become abundantly clear that because of their blind adherence to dogma, confirmation bias, DK, delusions, or even just being a bit dim, etc, some apologists on here are simply incapable of presenting cogent arguments or holding coherent positions. I am beginning to lose patience as the majority of exchanges seem to be with this type of apologist. I may have to look for a better forum.

 

[KWED]

So is human morality, a cursory read of the bible can demonstrate how much morals have evolved. I don't know what "better than dogs means"? Lets try an example, perhaps you can explain how Hitler was "better" than a dog?

If Hitler accepted Jesus before the end, he is enjoying an eternity of paradise, whilst the child raised as a believing Hindu and died of cancer is suffering the torments of hell.
Gotta love their "morality".

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

That so called compass is completely relative, as other atheist here have already confirmed.

It's the exact same compass as you have. Because we are both human.
And it's not that relative.

It's, at bottom, driven by empathy and, on top, influenced by culture.
More importantly, moral judgements are like logical arguments.
You have a few premises and a conclusion follows.
But like with any argument, your conclusion is only as good as your premises.

So knowledge informs morality.
Deeper and better understanding of human nature, human biology, etc informed us that the practice of slavery was morally indefensible. Today it's illegal in most of the world except a few hellholes
Deeper and better understanding about animal well being informed us that torturing them (in experiments, in games, whatever) is morally indefensible. Today we have things like animal rights.
So this is how morality develops. It's also how it differs from culture to culture.

For example, a culture that imposes premises like "god thinks homosexuality is evil", those people will be concluding that it's evil.
The problem is not the logic of the argument. The problem is the premise. It's unsupported nonsense.

When you only use supportable premises, you actually can't come to the conclusion that it is evil.



It's also situational.
What is bad in one context may be the right thing to do in another context.


To me, morality is pretty objective.
I am of the opinion that there is such a thing as objective morality.
Morality ultimately pertains to well-being.
So, ultimately, whenever we make moral judgements, what we actually look for to determine the "severity" of the act, we look at what the impact of the act was on general well-being.
The greater the cost to well-being (in all its aspects) the more "horrific" the act will be and thus the more "evil".

This means that on principle, the well-being cost of any act can be objectively determined.



Ironically, this entire exercise ceases to be objective, once we throw out the rule that premises must be supported by objective evidence.
If one is going to inject premises from some faith based religious beliefs....Obviously we are no longer being objective.

 

[KWED]

Having an ideology is not bragging about it.

You just trumpeted that you are all about self-sacrifice - although you still haven't told us what "sacrifice" you have made that is so special.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

But why try to prolong that meaningless life?

Why do you think it's meaningless?

This is why most atheist are pro abortion and pro genocide IMO.

Obviously that's not the only thing you are wrong about.
Is there any atheist on this forum, for example, who agrees with you that life is meaningless and that he/she wouldn't care to drop dead this instant?

I personally don't know anybody that thinks / believes that.
So I wonder who you talk about.

My guess is: nobody, and this is just typical atheist bashing.

Life isn't really sacred to them in any sense.

Nothing in the universe is "sacred" in the religious sense to atheists. Because they aren't religious.
That's like saying that bachelors aren't married. Pretty obvious.

That doesn't mean that atheists don't think anything is important.
I'll use the term "sacred" sometimes in the metaphorical sense. What I mean then is that the thing is very important to me.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

No... because we have no reason to lie when we are dying.

Many people are very concerned with their legacy.

You have a very very narrow view of humans and humanity.
The world is a lot bigger then the small bubble you live in.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

And an atheist cannot point others to eternal life

Atheists don't believe such a thing is real.
So this is again a meaningless statement.

I'll also point out that merely claiming to being able to point people to "eternal life" doesn't mean that you actually can.

As an atheist, I don't believe that you can and you, and others like you, completely fail time and again to demonstrate otherwise.

From my perspective, you may just as well be claiming that you are able to point us to a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. That claim has the exact same merit as the "eternal life" one. It's your religious belief. And I don't share that belief, because I have not been given sufficient reason to do so.

Heaven is not merited by doing good. It's a gift for all those who truly believe.

I consider that an evil, unjust system.
Behavior is irrelevant, gullibility is rewarded and rational reasoning is punished.

There's nothing just or moral about that. Au contraire. It's unjust and evil.

 

[joelr]

I'm struggling to understand the purpose of life without God. Atheists, do you simply chase happiness and contentment with your days? Is that all there is without God?
When I was a Christian , I served a higher power and had a purpose. My actions and thoughts affected the metaphysical world. My purpose was to serve Jesus Christ and help reclaim the world for Him. Even after letting go of Christianity, still retaining some belief in God and karma, I served a higher purpose. The reclamation of this world for the benevolent yet not omnipotent God.
Now as I question my belief in God altogether, I am left wondering what my purpose would be without serving a god. My whole life revolved around my spiritual practice, and I am losing it. I don't see the point in life without a god. So perhaps I will be intellectually dishonest to myself and return to Christianity. Or perhaps many other things. Can become a polytheist or animist. Those would give me purpose too I think.
But if I were atheist, I fail to see how I would carry on. God has been my crutch since forever. Knowing that sky daddy is watching over me and taking care of me and has a plan for me is a powerful, motivating belief. Why do you think so many fail to ever let the God belief go?
Debate point: there is no point in life without God.
Someone told me that the point is to leave the world better than you left it for future generations. Perhaps that's true. But you're dead and unconscious, so so what. I'm just negative maybe.

The preacher of Ecclesiastes questioned the point of life. I resonate with him.
Maybe I just need to accept that I can live a simple life. No need for a higher grand purpose. Maybe finding contentment in simplicity is the point of life.

You may need philosophy.
Arthur Schopenhauer deals with reasons for living despite a very pessimistic viewpoint.
Greek philosophy is the place to start.

Nietzsche and others talk a lot about existentialism which deals with your issue -


"
In Kierkegaard, the singularity of existence comes to light at the moment of conflict between ethics and religious faith. Suppose it is my sense of doing God’s will that makes my life meaningful. How does philosophy conceive this meaning? Drawing here on Hegel as emblematic of the entire tradition, Kierkegaard, in his book Fear and Trembling, argues that for philosophy my life becomes meaningful when I “raise myself to the universal” by bringing my immediate (natural) desires and inclinations under the moral law, which represents my “telos” or what I ought to be. In doing so I lose my singularity (since the law holds for all) but my actions become meaningful in the sense of understandable, governed by a norm. Now a person whose sense of doing God’s will is what gives her life meaning will be intelligible just to the extent that her action conforms to the universal dictates of ethics. But what if, as in case of Abraham’s sacrifice of his son, the action contradicts what ethics demands? Kierkegaard[5] believes both that Abraham’s life is supremely meaningful (it is not simply a matter of some immediate desire or meaningless tic that overcomes Abraham’s ethical consciousness; on the contrary, doing the moral thing is itself in this case his tempting inclination) and that philosophy cannot understand it, thus condemning it in the name of ethics. God’s command here cannot be seen as a law that would pertain to all; it addresses Abraham in his singularity. If Abraham’s life is meaningful, it represents, from a philosophical point of view, the “paradox” that through faith the “single individual is higher than the universal.” Existence as a philosophical problem appears at this point: if there is a dimension to my being that is both meaningful and yet not governed by the rational standard of morality, by what standard is it governed? For unless there is some standard, it is idle to speak of “meaning.”

Existentialism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)

 

[Wildswanderer]

If you say you have bought me a new pair of shoes, but the box is empty, there is nothing to throw away. If you keep offering the empty box saying "But look at the lovely shoes!", I will start to question your sanity.

Your analogy doesn't relate to the situation. You are being offered a awesome pair of shoes but you refuse to take them.

 

[Wildswanderer]

Atheists don't believe such a thing is real.
So this is again a meaningless statement.

I'll also point out that merely claiming to being able to point people to "eternal life" doesn't mean that you actually can.

As an atheist, I don't believe that you can and you, and others like you, completely fail time and again to demonstrate otherwise.

From my perspective, you may just as well be claiming that you are able to point us to a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. That claim has the exact same merit as the "eternal life" one. It's your religious belief. And I don't share that belief, because I have not been given sufficient reason to do so.




I consider that an evil, unjust system.
Behavior is irrelevant, gullibility is rewarded and rational reasoning is punished.

There's nothing just or moral about that. Au contraire. It's unjust and evil.

That is because you want to earn your way. You think there's something inherently good in you. Humility accepts that to be a falsehood.

 

[Wildswanderer]

Why do you think it's meaningless?

Because atheists here have agreed that it ultimately is meaningless.

 

[Wildswanderer]

You just trumpeted that you are all about self-sacrifice - although you still haven't told us what "sacrifice" you have made that is so special.

No, I said my ideology is self sacrifice. So you proceeded to ask what my sacrifice was. I'm not special. I never claimed to live up to what I believe. You are the one asking me to brag ..so here's me bragging: I have an awesome God. Me? I'm nothing.

 

[Wildswanderer]

If your work is better than someone else's, then you are better than them at that job. It's kinda the basis of how business, industry, education, sport, etc work.

If finding out who is "better" is so bad, why does god "test" us?

Being better with my hands doesn't make me a better person. It just makes me more coordinated, and that's usually an inborn thing we don't really have any control of. A paralyzed man is just as valuable as me. Value doesn't come from doing.