RE: Interview an Atheist
December 1, 2016 at 10:16 pm
(This post was last modified: December 1, 2016 at 10:17 pm by SteelCurtain.)
Origin:where's do we come from?
This question begs several follow up questions. Do you mean where does all matter come from? Where did intelligent life come from? Where did organic molecules come from?
I think you probably mean the first one, and the answer is we don't know for sure. There are some pretty compelling theories with good evidence, but in the end all we will really ever be able to say for sure is that there are certain physical constraints that must have always been the way they are, and a result of those laws is life--whether it be abundantly common or extremely rare.
We are able to see far back into the past via our most advanced technology, and we know that this universe is very old, and was once very dense and compact. We know that every atom that makes up you and me came from the furnace of a long dead star. We don't know how that became life. It's okay not to know, because claiming to have the answer when you don't is what makes it okay not to search any more.
Morality: how do you determine right from wrong good from bad?
I would say that I likely determine what is right and wrong and good from bad in the very same way you do. And that's not from a 2000 year old book that condones slavery, the murder of infants, sleeping with your own father, the genocide of the entire human race save for 8 and the repopulation of the earth from those 8 people in the what would be the world's worst inbreeding fiasco, the sale and subjugation of women, blood sacrifice, etc.
We get our morality from the culture we live in, and the micro-society we choose. We get our morality from our sense of empathy, and how far our sense of altruism reaches. Evolutionarily, we are a social species, and the propagation of our genes depended heavily on group cohesion. This still resonates today.
Purpose: What is our purpose in life?
Is there are purpose? I think you must demonstrate that such a thing must exist before asking a loaded question.
Destiny: What happens once we die?
The same thing that happened before you were born.
This question begs several follow up questions. Do you mean where does all matter come from? Where did intelligent life come from? Where did organic molecules come from?
I think you probably mean the first one, and the answer is we don't know for sure. There are some pretty compelling theories with good evidence, but in the end all we will really ever be able to say for sure is that there are certain physical constraints that must have always been the way they are, and a result of those laws is life--whether it be abundantly common or extremely rare.
We are able to see far back into the past via our most advanced technology, and we know that this universe is very old, and was once very dense and compact. We know that every atom that makes up you and me came from the furnace of a long dead star. We don't know how that became life. It's okay not to know, because claiming to have the answer when you don't is what makes it okay not to search any more.
Morality: how do you determine right from wrong good from bad?
I would say that I likely determine what is right and wrong and good from bad in the very same way you do. And that's not from a 2000 year old book that condones slavery, the murder of infants, sleeping with your own father, the genocide of the entire human race save for 8 and the repopulation of the earth from those 8 people in the what would be the world's worst inbreeding fiasco, the sale and subjugation of women, blood sacrifice, etc.
We get our morality from the culture we live in, and the micro-society we choose. We get our morality from our sense of empathy, and how far our sense of altruism reaches. Evolutionarily, we are a social species, and the propagation of our genes depended heavily on group cohesion. This still resonates today.
Purpose: What is our purpose in life?
Is there are purpose? I think you must demonstrate that such a thing must exist before asking a loaded question.
Destiny: What happens once we die?
The same thing that happened before you were born.
"There remain four irreducible objections to religious faith: that it wholly misrepresents the origins of man and the cosmos, that because of this original error it manages to combine the maximum servility with the maximum of solipsism, that it is both the result and the cause of dangerous sexual repression, and that it is ultimately grounded on wish-thinking." ~Christopher Hitchens, god is not Great
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