Grad student seeking atheist to interview

[brewer]

Cherry picking which is story and which is factual or the 'word of god' is just the best.

[Rahn127]

For me believing that a god exists was akin to believing that a small town had an invisible, intangible fire department and every time a house caught fire, people stood around and prayed for this invisible, intangible fire department to arrive.

The end result every single time was that the house would burn down and people would make excuses or try to rationalize why the invisible, intangible fire department didn't show up.

I knew why it didn't show up.
It wasn't fucking real.
It didn't exist.

There is no compelling evidence for any god.

It's just us on this planet. We have to take responsibility for everything. If something is going to happen, we are the ones that have to do it. There is no magical sky daddy.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

For me believing that a god exists was akin to believing that a small town had an invisible, intangible fire department and every time a house caught fire, people stood around and prayed for this invisible, intangible fire department to arrive.

The end result every single time was that the house would burn down and people would make excuses or try to rationalize why the invisible, intangible fire department didn't show up.

I knew why it didn't show up.
It wasn't fucking real.
It didn't exist.

There is no compelling evidence for any god.

It's just us on this planet. We have to take responsibility for everything. If something is going to happen, we are the ones that have to do it. There is no magical sky daddy.

The only reason the invisible, intangible fire department didn’t show up was lack of faith on the part of the penitents.

Invisible, intangible fire departments are a sacred and holy mystery, and are not to be questioned by the likes of YOU, pally.

Boru

[brewer]

Heard this two step?

1. We all prayed and he lived.

2. We all prayed but god needed to take him home.

Always winning!

[possibletarian]

HappySkeptic - I don't believe in a "young Earth" either. I believe the scientific record on age of the earth, universe, etc. Do you think Genesis teaches a literal 6 day creation? I am curious if any of you have found Genesis to be a cause for unbelief because the scientific record seems to contradict what is taught in Genesis?

Welcome back, Brooke! I think it's odd for the six days of creation to be described as having mornings if they weren't meant to be taken as literal days. The only reason not to take it literally is overwhelming evidence that the events described took millions of years altogether. I certainly understand making the compromise of saying they were 'symbolic days' though, it's the only way to keep the book without denying the evidence from the one thing a capital c Creator must be the author of: the world we find ourselves in.

When I first read Genesis I believed it and took it literally. It was the barbarity of the Bible sanctioned by the God it describes that convinced me it wasn't an authentic representation of a perfect and omniscient being. Reading the Bible cover-to-cover didn't make me an atheist, but it did make me an agnostic theist. I believed in a Creator, but not that one, so I was in the position of still believing and being aware I couldn't know. I think it took me about 20 more years to get to atheist.

And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. 4 God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light “day,” and the darkness he called “night.” And there was evening, and there was morning—the first day.

*Bold and italics mine

That's how every day ends, and starts it is almost impossible for any reader to come away with anything BUT literal days. Clearly the stretching of the creation days to millions of years is an afterthought, forced upon the religious by evidence. No plain reading of the text can possibly give you anything but 24hour periods, Or a earth made at the centre with the stars to serve it, which knowing what we do about the universe is ridiculous.

The Christian ability to decide at whim what is literal and what is not always amazes me, truth is it's not decided by biblical or so called spiritual wisdom but by science knocking down its doors. There is a theological answer for almost everything, but is sounding stretched at best, downright delusional at worse.

That is what you get when you define a god as none material, timeless, space less etc. The to add to the confusion you make anything we can't understand as this creatures 'wisdom and knowledge which our puny minds cannot understand... In other words a magical being. The fact that the Christian god can't be distinguished from stuff we can make up says it all.

[Anomalocaris]

For me believing that a god exists was akin to believing that a small town had an invisible, intangible fire department and every time a house caught fire, people stood around and prayed for this invisible, intangible fire department to arrive.

The end result every single time was that the house would burn down and people would make excuses or try to rationalize why the invisible, intangible fire department didn't show up.

I knew why it didn't show up.
It wasn't fucking real.
It didn't exist.

There is no compelling evidence for any god.

It's just us on this planet. We have to take responsibility for everything. If something is going to happen, we are the ones that have to do it. There is no magical sky daddy.

The only reason the invisible, intangible fire department didn’t show up was lack of faith on the part of the penitents.

Invisible, intangible fire departments are a sacred and holy mystery, and are not to be questioned by the likes of YOU, pally.

Boru

If you faith is strong enough to retain conviction of the reality of the invisible fire department while you are being burned alive,  you will be rewarded with an eternity of sliding up and down the invisible firemen’s pole, which absolutely is the greatest and most everlasting joy there could be.

[Silver]

When I first read Genesis I believed it and took it literally.

When I believed, it was merely on the basis that others believed.

When I first started reading the bible, it became apparent what a fairy tale it is.

[Ferrocyanide]

Someone implied I was not rational for being a Christian and I brought up the eyewitnesses to the resurrection of Jesus. I said this to give an example of how it is rational to be a Christian because there are logical reasons to believe it - not just emotional reasons. I wasn't making this comment to evangelize or try to evangelize.

Since I'm not here to evangelize, I'm not going to get into apologetics - or not on this thread anyway because I know it's not the place.

HappySkeptic - I don't believe in a "young Earth" either. I believe the scientific record on age of the earth, universe, etc. Do you think Genesis teaches a literal 6 day creation? I am curious if any of you have found Genesis to be a cause for unbelief because the scientific record seems to contradict what is taught in Genesis?

There is no need for witnesses. There is no need for a god to put himself inside a human cell and to spend 9 months in a woman's uterus. There is no need for him to spend years as a baby, as an infant, as a child, as a teenager. All that is a big waste of time.

If you are the jewish god and If you don't want to harm people and you love people, then don't create a hell.
If you want to save people from death, then don't create death.
In fact, why would a god need to make stuff out of atoms?
Is he made of atoms?

I think there were eyewitnesses as well except that I think they didn't see any resurrection or anything magical.
Once in a while, a new cult leader pops up and gets himself an audience. Most people are wise enough to not follow the cult leader but there are some who have an emotional need to follow someone, or they want to be closer to god, or they want a teacher .... I don't know. Humans vary a lot.


Have you looked into cults? Most cults eventually disappear but once in a while, one of them becomes successful. Look at Islam. How did it succeed? I hear that Mohamed didn't do any magic yet he managed to get a large following and it grew. Eventually, it was claimed that he didn't die. He climbed on a white horse with wings and flew into space-heaven.


Have you looked at mormonism? The guy didn't even show the "golden book" to anybody and he managed to convince 2 followers that they saw it, then he managed to convince his family, his entourage. It grew from that to a 10 million to 16 million personnel.
Now that is a huge business. Much bigger than Microsoft, GM, Ford, Intel, Reybolds.

Yes, I do think that the ancients jews believed in a 6 day creation event and this went on until science began addressing these questions. Over time, the scientific endeavor grew and built itself up into a reputable corporation.
Science never bends itself to religion and it should not.
On the contrary, once a logical explanation becomes available, the old superstition is thrown away. For example, how to you explain earthquakes? How do you explain disease?
The reverse never happens. We don't throw away the logical or scientific explanation and replace it with superstition.


Also, the ancient jews were flat earthers.