Pseudo-Atheism, this one is for you...
July 29, 2014 at 1:42 pm
(This post was last modified: July 29, 2014 at 3:09 pm by Bibliofagus.)
I'm not offended. Not to worry. I do think you are a bit off the mark though.
Consider this: I was raised atheist. I genuinly don't have a clue what people are even talking about when they mention god. As I said, I can be pretty dense as well.
Now some theist crosses my path and claims I'm immoral, because I don't believe in his god. This happens a lot more often than me going out telling them they are assholes.
So... I want to respond. I'm not able to phrase a perfect argument. I'm not allowed to 'invoke' hitchens.
What do I do?
The thing is, you appear to want all atheists to be perfect advocates of atheism. I'm not. And I'm human to boot. I do get annoyed when people, who often don't know me at all, tell me I'm an asshole for not believing their god, or for letting my wife out of the house without a scarf or whatever. And I respond. I respond for my own satisfaction. I don't expect a deconversion. I don't expect anyone to change his mind. And I sure as hell don't care if some other atheist feels I'm misrepresenting him. I'm not representing you. I'm representing me.
Another thing is that I never met a theist that truly was convinced to believe because of lets say Kalam's cosmological argument. Or the argument from design. Belief is often not rational at all. You may want to ask yourself what reasons for engaging a theist might exist. Is a perfect argument really a good way to convince someone theism is bullshit? Could it be even stupid atheists feel the need to tell off some theist, just because he lives in a society saturated with it, or is confronted with a claim as in my example?
Or is it all about something else?
Consider this: I was raised atheist. I genuinly don't have a clue what people are even talking about when they mention god. As I said, I can be pretty dense as well.
Now some theist crosses my path and claims I'm immoral, because I don't believe in his god. This happens a lot more often than me going out telling them they are assholes.
So... I want to respond. I'm not able to phrase a perfect argument. I'm not allowed to 'invoke' hitchens.
What do I do?
The thing is, you appear to want all atheists to be perfect advocates of atheism. I'm not. And I'm human to boot. I do get annoyed when people, who often don't know me at all, tell me I'm an asshole for not believing their god, or for letting my wife out of the house without a scarf or whatever. And I respond. I respond for my own satisfaction. I don't expect a deconversion. I don't expect anyone to change his mind. And I sure as hell don't care if some other atheist feels I'm misrepresenting him. I'm not representing you. I'm representing me.
Another thing is that I never met a theist that truly was convinced to believe because of lets say Kalam's cosmological argument. Or the argument from design. Belief is often not rational at all. You may want to ask yourself what reasons for engaging a theist might exist. Is a perfect argument really a good way to convince someone theism is bullshit? Could it be even stupid atheists feel the need to tell off some theist, just because he lives in a society saturated with it, or is confronted with a claim as in my example?
Or is it all about something else?
