7 Points of a Godless Life

[Angrboda]

[cosmowanderer]

The OP gives us a good example of atheist wishful thinking. If there is no god you can do as you please to serve yourself without having to worry about trivialities like justice or truth. You live, you die, the end. How comforting it must feel not having to worry about the ultimate consequences of your life and never being held into account. I can see the appeal of atheism for people with no sense of responsibility beyond themselves.

On the contrary, our sense of responsibility comes from the self. We needn't the threat of eternal punishment to do good deeds and live a positive existence. In fact, because this life is the only life, atheists tend to have more of a sense of responsibility because we know that we are accountable to ourselves and don't have a mythological figure to forgive us when we do wrong—we must take it upon ourselves to make it right.

I was deeply Christian and still have many friends and family who are such, and I have many atheist friends as well. By far, atheists have always had a deeper sense of responsibility and drive to do what's right. Probably because our sense of morality comes from a true desire to be morale, rather than a desire to avoid punishment. (Not to say there aren't believers who don't have a genuine sense of morality, but it's always been my experience that atheists act more morale on the whole—even statistically, areas with higher populations of atheist/non-believers have lower crime rates; I feel these are both tied in with better education.)

Being a believer or non-believer has little to no affect on one's actual morales; religion is often used to justify one's personal beliefs, not to dictate them. Hence why so many Christians support gay marriage and so many others don't, for example. Without religion, those same people would still support or oppose it, respectively, but would find other means to justify their beliefs.

[Esquilax]

The OP gives us a good example of atheist wishful thinking. If there is no god you can do as you please to serve yourself without having to worry about trivialities like justice or truth. You live, you die, the end. How comforting it must feel not having to worry about the ultimate consequences of your life and never being held into account. I can see the appeal of atheism for people with no sense of responsibility beyond themselves.

The difference between atheists and theists, it seems, based on the fact that this argument is such a common theme among religious blowhards that can't leave well enough alone, is that atheists don't share in the theist's desire to commit actions that would require accountability of a negative sort after death. Isn't it interesting, Chad, that you seem to believe that your actions in this life will require some retributive justice in the next, whereas I do not? My actions in life don't require some grand, dramatic court martial to balance the books punitively before I go on to my rest, and frankly, it's a testament to how bad you have been not only that you think your actions do require that, but that you literally can't imagine a person who might just be decent their whole lives, make up for their errors in this life, and die without this clawing fear of ultimate justice round the corner. As usual, your projection says far more about you, than it does about that which you disdain.

Incidentally, who, exactly, is attempting to escape accountability here? The atheist, who does their best to make up for their bad actions in the here and now, or the christian, who has shopped off any need to do that on the suffering of a third party they've agreed to be innocent? You want to talk about escaping accountability? You think you're going to heaven regardless of your sins because of a Christ shaped loophole, something that we atheists have no assurance of at all, and you're accusing the people who aren't using the loophole of trying to avoid accountability?

[The Valkyrie]

The OP gives us a good example of atheist wishful thinking. If there is no god you can do as you please to serve yourself without having to worry about trivialities like justice or truth. You live, you die, the end. How comforting it must feel not having to worry about the ultimate consequences of your life and never being held into account. I can see the appeal of atheism for people with no sense of responsibility beyond themselves.

Which is why we have secular laws.

And I have encountered very few atheists who say, "I don't believe in a deity.  I'm off to rape, pillage and hurt others!".

I HAVE heard theists say that if they didn't believe in a deity they'd be out doing just that because they wouldn't have anyone to answer to.  I've also heard many say that if they thought their god told them to go out and do those things, they'd go out and do it.

Some, of course state, "my god wouldn't tell me to do that" while apparently ignoring all the passages from the bible where he tells them to do just that.

This, to me, is an indication of the mindsets of some believers.

[Cecelia]

The OP gives us a good example of atheist wishful thinking. If there is no god you can do as you please to serve yourself without having to worry about trivialities like justice or truth. You live, you die, the end. How comforting it must feel not having to worry about the ultimate consequences of your life and never being held into account. I can see the appeal of atheism for people with no sense of responsibility beyond themselves.

On the contrary.  If there is no afterlife, it means that we must make the most of every day because it is all we have.  In order to live on, we must make a mark on the world.  If we fail to make our mark, then when we die we will be long forgotten, having never done anything to affect the world at large.  If Atheists only sought to please themselves, I wouldn't have become a teacher.  Not at that salary.  I'd have taken any number of better paying jobs to serve myself. 

When we give to Charitable causes, we do it to make a difference.  Not to please god, who will reward us for being charitable as many Christians do.  When we see our fellow man suffering, our empathy gives us cause to help them. 

Whereas Christians worry about the ultimate consequences of their lives and the lives of others, that we don't believe in an afterlife allows us to treat the people Christians see as sinners such as gays, lesbians, and transgenders with the respect they deserve as people.  We don't have some religious text that inspires bigotry.  There are many religious people who don't use their religious texts to inspire bigotry, but it is certainly not a message most Christians get.  Ironically perhaps, the idea that we should not judge (which is a concept Christianity accepts) is an easy concept for Atheists because we have to judge on the standards of our own empathy, rather than that of a book that was written so long ago that was allegedly inspired by god.  

We are ultimately held accountable.  Not to god, but to the human race, and what we do to further it.  We just aren't held accountable for the small things.  The 'sins' that hurt no one except allegedly ourselves.

[Whateverist]

I too found that it satisfied an important need to do something for the general good. But I have to say that same urge no longer moves me. Now I just want to experience and understand all that I can. If there were no causes, what would I do? Doesn't mean I don't understand that there are causes, I just won't lose myself in any of them. Actually, I don't think I ever did.

[The Valkyrie]

I too found that it satisfied an important need to do something for the general good.  But I have to say that same urge no longer moves me.  Now I just want to experience and understand all that I can.  If there were no causes, what would I do?  Doesn't mean I don't understand that there are causes, I just won't lose myself in any of them.  Actually, I don't think I ever did.

I still remember the arrogant comments I received from a certain theist on these very boards when responding to my time in Sierra Leona with MSF, "It was likely you heard god's voice in your mind stirring you to help... (paraphrased).

So, once again, we see that "god" gets the credit for anything good that we do (apparently atheists as well), but anything bad we do is because of our own rebelliousness.

Let me just reiterate now, what I said then: Fucking idiot!

[Cecelia]

You know, the voice of God told Andrea Yates to kill her children, but everyone says she was just crazy... Same with several other women.

[robvalue]

I am sick of black and white religious thinking. "If you're not directly accountable to God, there is complete anarchy and no consequences to anything!"

Bull. Shit. Obviously there are consequences in the form of laws. We especially need laws in order to overrule God when religious people feel they have the right to do whatever the fuck they want to people. But also, we have a conscience (most people do, anyway). I'm accountable to me, and I'm my own harshest critic.

Theists touting this nonsense either have no conscience (possible, it does happen) or else are mistaking their conscience for some magical property. They are justifying to themselves why they don't do certain things by pretending it's to please some celestial father figure. But ultimately, you're not doing bad things because you don't want to do bad things, and this is very easily explained scientifically.

Time to grow up and take responsibility. It's like adults who are still children, who can't think or function without someone telling them what to do, think and say. I see the journey from religion to atheism (or even just deism) as a metaphor for growing up. It is unfair that indoctrination requires you to "grow up twice", when once is hard enough. I didn't have to do this second growing up for religion, but I did in a different way, thanks to another kind of "indoctrination".

[Rhondazvous]

You see, Chad, you’ve painted yourself into a corner by saying we need god to be moral. The truth of your statement must be manifest in the lives of every Christian, which it clearly is not. Me, I’m free because if every atheist on this planet were to go out and start killing people that still would not prove the existence of god.