Atheists Unite Here - Page 4

quote Seeker X

There's really nothing stopping you from spirituality or any sort of thing...IN FACT, it's not even stopping you from believing in the supernatural. Like I've pointed out before, atheism is the disbelief in a god or gods and that's it. The other concepts like anti-theism, anti-religion, secularism, naturalism, etc etc, those are concepts that can be correlated but not necessarily exclusive. So yes, I can't see why having an Atheist thread is really that controversial in the first place.

You could have an atheist that is a naturalist (like myself) or an atheist that believes in the afterlife...they are still atheists in the way that they do not believe in a deity.

That's probably the third time I've had to point this out already.

I'm more of an Agnostic rather than an Atheist. For now, it's impossible for us to know whether there is a 'God' or not. I also think the debate is a bit pointless, you'll never convince the other person that what you believe is true. Rather than having useless and never-ending arguments about 'God' (whatever 'God' means) maybe we should focus on the things we can find out, that do exist; by 'things' I mainly mean Science.

Well now, that's my curiosity about what you believed in satisfied.

Oddly enough it also matches up with some weird books my dad has. They're supposedly about Buddhism but seem to mix in some odd sci-fi elements.

The general consensus was that all people everywhere are just puppets of greater beings on higher planes. Used to gain life experience.

It wasn't ONE greater being specifically, but only a few I think.

Oh no. The "puppets" still had free will. It's just that they were each connected to a higher being called a "manu" or some such, which was recording what they did and what they experienced. In order to ascend to an even higher plane, or something like that.

Then again the same books also said that Satan was an alien who came to earth in a flying saucer... so... maybe we shouldn't put too much credence in those.


What I'm curious about is why the "everyone is part of the same soul" theory is preferable to "There is no such thing as a soul." Both are equivalent with regards to morals, worship etc.

But you're right, probably isn't suited for this thread.

Sounds like you believe something similar to Bill Hicks Chiro. Did you come to believe this while on acid?

quote Bill Hicks

Wouldn't you like to see a positive LSD story on the news? To base your decision on information rather than scare tactics and superstition? Perhaps? Wouldn't that be interesting? Just for once?
"Today, a young man on acid realized that all matter is merely energy condensed to a slow vibration – that we are all one consciousness experiencing itself subjectively. There's no such thing as death, life is only a dream, and we're the imagination of ourselves. Here's Tom with the weather."

But seriously it would be interesting to hear what formed your belief and why you think it's true, or are you happy to view it as your own speculation.

MrApples - Being an agnostic doesn't prevent one from being an atheist. Agnosticism is a question of knowledge, so an agnostic would say something like

quote MrApples

For now, it's impossible for us to know whether there is a 'God' or not.

Atheism on the other hand is a question of belief. If you believe god[s] does not exist, you would be an atheist ([strong|positive|explicit] atheist if you wanted to go into detail). If instead you don't believe there is a god, you would be a [weak|negative|implicit] atheist.
Neither is a requirement of agnosticism. I worked with an agnostic theist for several years. He believed it was impossible to find evidence for/against god and to know if god existed, and was thus agnostic. He was also a devout Christian with most beliefs aligning with the Baptist tradition.

Are you an atheist?
I'm a weak agnostic and weak atheist. While I don't find it compelling, I am also open enough to the deist position that I would accept weak deist.
I might be an apistevist as well. I don't believe faith is a path to knowledge, or a way of determining or approaching the truth.

Have you always been? What changed your mind?
Actually I was raised Christian, and went to Christian grammar and middle schools. The schools were different sects than mine, and in many cases their answers made more sense than the apologetics of my own sect. This caused my beliefs to drift away from the official stance of my sect. Eventually I became a non-denominational Christian, and started questioning the accuracy of the canon.
Even that didn't reconcile all the problems I had with the answers of the apologetics. Eventually my dissatisfaction hit the point where I had to examine my core postulates, and without the "god exists" and "god is the Christian god" postulates, stopped being Christian.
I went with deism for a bit, but found it not entirely compelling. Further thought and research reduced that to not compelling. I was still closer to that than strong atheism though, so used deist (or agnostic, which I used improperly) as a label rather than atheist. Later conversations with Neoseekers, ACA members, and others led me to accept the weak atheism position as part of the definition of atheist.

Is there anything you believe in?
Lots of things. Presuming that you are talking about "supernatural" phenomena, there were several things that I experienced during my non-atheistic days that I cannot adequately explain within conventional science. Those things have left me open to the idea that there might be truth behind some "supernatural" claims. Scientific findings there are rarely statistically significant, and other methods recommended produce divergent answers, so while I find it interesting, it's idle speculation.

*sigh*

We aren't allowed to post in the "Christians only" thread, but I've glanced through it all the same.

It seems that at least one member in there is implying that atheists are immoral and choose to be atheists for that reason.

quote someone who shall not be named

Christianity represents moral boundaries. People don't want moral boundaries. They want to have sex with whom ever they please. They want to steal music and videos and not purchase them but "share them". They want to be able to have abortions. They don't want to give 10% of their money to God to help feed the poor or help those in need. (Hell on the money thing Christians going to CHURCH don't want to do that. I think my senior pastor estimated that only about 5-10% of our church even comes close to giving 10%.) When our marriages fail or we have a hard time, and are unhappy, we want divorce, we don't want to be responsible where we should and it goes on and on.

Am I reading this wrong?

Looks to me like that's what's being said. I find this disturbing.


Do people really think that?

I fail to see what atheism has to do with morals.

Granted, atheists aren't mentioned as such, but I think it's implied. It seems to be saying that people would reject religion along with its morals.