Atheists life motive

[Mudhammam]

My goal is to enjoy it, which for me entails waking up each day and learning new wonderful facts about this great Universe, and sharing it's beauty with others.

[Rampant.A.I.]

Never a Theist here. Some time between 3ird and 5h grade I felt peer pressure to go to church, and asked my mom if I could go. She took me twice and I hated it. I found out my sister was Pagan after that, and tried to figure out what that was all about. Nothing stuck. By the time highschool rolled around I realized I was an Atheist. I never had a god to kill off, and the only time I struggled spiritualy was when I thought there was something wrong with me for not believing in such things.

Almost the same here, except I attended a number of different religious services (not just Christian) before coming to terms with "none of this seems believable to me."

My sister is some sort of evangelized generic Christian who can't properly define her own beliefs.

[Ravenshire]

Being FREE is a really fucking scary thing.

Maybe so, but it gets better, and better, and better...

The only true meaning you will ever find in this life is what you give it. Even the meaning people find in religion and credit to gawd(s) is meaning put there themselves. As someone who once wasted a lot of time trying to believe in gawd, this realization was most profound.

[Whateverist]

Though you make a lot of stereotypical assumptions about atheism at least you check them out by asking and stick around to hear the answers. That is a point in your favor.

I don't think there are any gods 'out there' but I'm sure plenty of people carry on a relationship with one or another 'inside'. I believe the nature of the mind/self is such as to accommodate a wide range of perspectives and beliefs. I have no objection with people who like that relationship and carry it on their whole life. I don't believe it is inherently better to 'kill your god' as you put it. But I can't imagine doing that myself - carrying on a relationship with god that is. It just wouldn't work. When you see through something, that's it. Like it or lump it, it's gone. God didn't cry when I moved on. The psychic energy invested in running that relationship just returned to ground. Nothing created or destroyed.

I also believe it is possible to achieve a great deal of insight and an intelligent grasp of the world around you even if you do maintain that relationship. The trick is not to ground the relationship in an authoritative dogma such as the bible. So long as the relationship nourishes curiosity, reflection and humility there is no handicap. Perhaps it is even advantageous for some individuals.

As an atheist I don't think I have all the answers. Nor do I think science is on its way to getting them all for me. When it comes to the mind and the nature of the self, there really is a lot to wonder at. I find the same sense of adventure in going out to discover what I think and feel, as I ever did as a xtian. Finding equilibrium as either a theist or atheist isn't easy, but either will do if you maintain balance.

[psychoslice]

I feel sorry for anyone who needs a god to enjoy life, life itself is enough, stop being greedy and wanting more and enjoy what you have, if you don't you'll miss out on what you have, there is no afterlife, get that silly idea out of your head and start living.

[Freedom of thought]

There was a quite interesting "pro God" argument from Craig, which I will start as a new topic about, since I would love to hear your opinions about this.

If it was Kalam, be prepared to hear a lot of angry voices, because that argument is balls.

Jesus fucking Christ (sorry for taking your favorite person's name in vein WLC), not the kalam argument! It's outdated pseudo-logic dressed as if it's "unquestionable metaphysically true". I love when WLC staw mans opponents that deny that things coming into existence requires causes, by saying "well, why don't things like Beethoven just pop into existence from nothing then?". On one hand he says "the quantum vacuum is not nothing!" then on the other hand he says "why aren't things popping into existence from nothing all the time then?" completely forgetting he previously pointed out there isn't 'nothing' in the universe. We do have evidence of things coming into existence uncaused, if that's nothing is up for debate. Regardless if he accepts this or not, we have that evidence for this and thus are free to accept things can come into existence uncaused through quantum events. The reason why Beethoven doesn't pop into existence uncaused is because that is highly improbable through a quantum event, it's far more probable based of the scientific models that universes can exist uncaused (both coming into existence and existing eternally in the past). Beethoven or Boltzmann brains are both almost impossible to occur on these models. If you want to get WLC destroyed on these points, watch the debate with Sean Carroll. Carroll destroys his layman interpretation of the BGV theorem, which doesn't prove a beginning, only our current theories of space time breaks down at a certain point. And WLC grasps at straws on Carrol's diagram of an eternal universe, saying that in the middle it had a beginning, but that was false. I think this was the last intellectual gasp of theism to be honest.