How do you become an Atheist?

[Anomalocaris]

Where's the question in that post?

Check post #36

[Cando]

Where's the question in that post?

Check post #36

My answer to the question is also in post 36.

[Strongbad]

For me, there is no “one” reason that made me decide I was an atheist. I was raised in a Catholic family, went to Catholic schools, was an alter boy, etc. I remember thinking about religious teachings, even as a little kid, “this seems like the stories I read in my comic books”. I also remembered something that we were all taught as children – “if something sounds too good to be true, it probably is”. As I entered in my teens, I began to doubt even more that what I was being told was true. At about age 15, I finally thought to my self, “this can’t be true, and I don’t believe it”. Although I probably hadn’t even heard the term “atheist”, I officially was one.

From then on, I never really gave religion much thought at all. I really only became aware that there were other people that shared my thinking with the advent of the internet (I’m 51, and I vividly recall the pre-internet world). Atheist forums such as this one have corroborated my beliefs (or lack of beliefs), as I realized that there are people far more intelligent than me, that think way deeper than I do, that have learned a lot more about science and history than me, but arrived at the same conclusion as me – a “god” is not believable.

I think that most atheists became atheists over a long period of deep thinking, not all-of-a-sudden or based on some single proof or event. Evidently, a science education also leads to atheism, as the vast majority of all scientists share atheist viewpoints.

I’d like to turn this question back on you – why are you a Christian? Why do you believe that the bible is the word of god? Why don’t you believe that the Quran is the word of god?

I’ll defer the philosophy questions to the philosophers.

[Cando]

I'm sure many believe that they both are.

[theVOID]

Non-contingent things are even further removed from neuroscience, you can't establish truth that is by definition independent of minds and/or physical things by measuring minds and physics. You can't neurologically prove that a =/= not a, only whether or not we are accurate in our application of these concepts.

Not with a notional non-contingent truth. However, no truth actually taken to be non-contingent is fundamentally non-contigent upon the mind and/or physical things because:

1. It is only conceived of by the mind.

That is a misunderstanding, the concepts of the non-contingent are contingent upon minds, but the non-contingent things that they relate to are not. The concept of the law of non-contradiction is contingent upon minds, but the law of non-contradiction exists without minds or physical things.

[Strongbad]

I'm sure many believe that they both are.

Are you implying that many people believe that both the bible and the quran are the word of god? Do you personally know any Islamic Christians, or are you just guessing that there are plenty of them around?

[Cando]

I'm sure many believe that they both are.

Are you implying that many people believe that both the bible and the quran are the word of god? Do you personally know any Islamic Christians, or are you just guessing that there are plenty of them around?

Of course I'm implying that there are many people who believe they both are. That's why I said it. Go to a mosque, ask a muslim f they believe in the bible, and they will say "yes, and islam is the next and final step in god's revelation". They will also tell you that in islam, there are 144,000 prophets. The first is Adam, the penultimate (second from last) is Jesus, and the last is Muhammad. It is a myth that islam and christianity are worlds apart. A fact that is clearly unknown to you.

[Anomalocaris]

Non-contingent things are even further removed from neuroscience, you can't establish truth that is by definition independent of minds and/or physical things by measuring minds and physics. You can't neurologically prove that a =/= not a, only whether or not we are accurate in our application of these concepts.

Not with a notional non-contingent truth. However, no truth actually taken to be non-contingent is fundamentally non-contigent upon the mind and/or physical things because:

1. It is only conceived of by the mind.

That is a misunderstanding, the concepts of the non-contingent are contingent upon minds, but the non-contingent things that they relate to are not. The concept of the law of non-contradiction is contingent upon minds, but the law of non-contradiction exists without minds or physical things.

Would that interpretation of non-contingent truth be analogous to "red light means stop" whether there is anything to stop, or any meaningful definition of stop? If so, then non-contingent truth must be contingent upon the mind because the very notion of its non-contingency exists only as a concept in the mind.

[Strongbad]

I'm sure many believe that they both are.

Are you implying that many people believe that both the bible and the quran are the word of god? Do you personally know any Islamic Christians, or are you just guessing that there are plenty of them around?

Of course I'm implying that there are many people who believe they both are. That's why I said it. Go to a mosque, ask a muslim f they believe in the bible, and they will say "yes, and islam is the next and final step in god's revelation". They will also tell you that in islam, there are 144,000 prophets. The first is Adam, the penultimate (second from last) is Jesus, and the last is Muhammad. It is a myth that islam and christianity are worlds apart. A fact that is clearly unknown to you.

I see. If I ask a Muslim if they believe in the bible, specifically, if they believe that Jesus was the son of god and that he died for their sins and that the only way to get into heaven is to accept Jesus as their savior – they will say “yes, this is what I believe – it is a myth that Islam and Christianity are worlds apart”. I guess another fact that is also unknown to me is that Muslims and Christians have been killing each other, because of their respective religious beliefs, for centuries.

[coffeeveritas]

I saw a lot of people quoting people who were quoting other people who were quoting themselves who were quoting another person. It's very "meta" but I lost track of what was going on. At this point we should probably just see how many quotes within quotes we can get before the system crashes.

I think that most atheists became atheists over a long period of deep thinking, not all-of-a-sudden or based on some single proof or event. Evidently, a science education also leads to atheism, as the vast majority of all scientists share atheist viewpoints.

I’d like to turn this question back on you – why are you a Christian? Why do you believe that the bible is the word of god? Why don’t you believe that the Quran is the word of god?

I’ll defer the philosophy questions to the philosophers.

Why am I a Christian? Let me see, that's a big story. Actually I started off really legalistic Christian, but it never made a lot of sense to me, and it seemed like the Bible constantly contradicted itself. Also, God seemed like kind of jerk, and going to church was like being shot in the leg in slow motion, over and over. So I deconverted, to being a Christian Disciple (by which I mean just reading the Gospels, and doing what Jesus says to do). To me Christian Discipleship did the best job out of any worldview in making sense out of the world and how to live in it. For me for something to be true it has to hang together on many levels: it has to be logically true, internally consistent, it cannot contradict science, it has to be true on a personal/subjective level, it has to be evident in human history and in my community, and it has to reveal a clear way to live and act accordingly. Now it's true that the legalist/fundamentalist worldview didn't pass these criteria, but finding Christian Discipleship was like suddenly tying together all the loose strands in the world that never made sense to me before. It was consistent with every method I had of perceiving truth and reality, I couldn't deny it. It wasn't just that it made sense either, Discipleship gave my life meaning and helped me overcome many personal struggles. For me Discipleship does nothing but good for the world, and it actually tells us that our mission in life is to make like a superhero and save the world. Well, there's a lot to it, but basically I believe it because it's just true on every level.