Open to explore possibility

[Rahn127]

Do these questions occupy as much of your time ?

What is circumference of Jupiter ?
How many chickens are there in the world ?
How many children starve to death each year ?
How deep can a nuclear submarine go before the pressure crushes it like a tin can ?

I don't know the answer to any of these and most of them don't bother me in the least for not knowing.

The question about starving children concerns me more because I care about the well being of my fellow humans.

As a lifelong atheist, I don't give any thought to what any religion believes or doesn't believe.

I make every attempt to stay alive for as long as I can. I know that people die and they don't come back to life.

I cherish the time I spend with family because I know that this is the only life I'm guaranteed to have. I don't have any reason to believe anything else.

Not knowing something is one of life's joys.

[The Grand Nudger]

Testament to the lasting power of parental and societal conditioning. We may find ourselves, as adults, no longer believing the things that our parents or our society tells us - but that in and of itself doesn't erase the fear or shame or worry or uncertainty which was used to reinforce those abandoned beliefs.

I liken it to convincing someone that their name is bob. Now, they may know that their name is phil, and they may understand that no expression of uncertainty with regards to their name is a genuine reflection of the state of their beliefs about their name - but they may still be compelled by any number of things to state that they just can't know that their name is phil..that they just can't rule out that their true name is bob.

It looks ridiculous from the outside, which is to say coming from people who were not indoctrinated into those beliefs, beliefs which include the impossibility of knowledge as an ideological defense of a knowledge claim - but it's a critical and self aware kind of ridiculousness. Win some lose some, I suppose.

---

-and before anyone goes apeshit, lol - it should be manifestly apparent that I'm just as much a product of the same thing, with all the usual doubts about things that were central to my own indoctrination as a member of a family with a worldview, and a society with expectations.

Same shit, different stuff.

[Angrboda]

Testament to the lasting power of parental and societal conditioning.  We may find ourselves, as adults, no longer believing the things that our parents or our society tells us - but that in and of itself doesn't erase the fear or shame or worry or uncertainty which was used to reinforce those abandoned beliefs.  

It's the engrams.

[The Grand Nudger]

We're stuck with dirty info long past it's use by date. Seems like an oversight, what with the possibility of gods and all.

[possibletarian]

“But you can’t be a scientist if you’re uncomfortable with ignorance, because scientists live at the boundary between what is known and unknown in the cosmos. This is very different from the way journalists portray us. So many articles begin, “Scientists now have to go back to the drawing board.” It’s as though we’re sitting in our offices, feet up on our desks—masters of the universe—and suddenly say, “Oops, somebody discovered something!”

No. We’re always at the drawing board. If you’re not at the drawing board, you’re not making discoveries. You’re not a scientist; you’re something else. The public, on the other hand, seems to demand conclusive explanations as they leap without hesitation from statements of abject ignorance to statements of absolute certainty.”

― Neil deGrasse Tyson, Space Chronicles: Facing the Ultimate Frontier

[pocaracas]

One thing that is still a bit scary to me as a fairy new atheist, is accepting "I don't know" and leaving myself open to new arguments, new evidence, etc. I think as a Christian, I was lazy about my religion and took a lot of things for granted. I didn't push or dig, or experiment, I just believed because that was what I was told was true.

What flavour of christian were you raised to be?
What's wrong with accepting "I don't know" as an answer when you really don't know?

Young earth argument >> "The truth of the matter is that the moon is receding from the earth. The recession of the moon is caused by the tidal breaking that takes place between the earth and the moon. Tidal breaking causes the moon to accelerate in its orbit and therefore expand the orbit. Based upon measurable data, scientists have calculated that the moon is receding at a rate of 3.8cm/year (Pogge 2005). These measurements are taken by beaming laser rays at reflector arrays that have been positioned on the moon (Pogge 2005). At this rate, some young-earth scientists claim that the moon would have been so close a mere million years ago that the tides would have drowned the creatures on earth. It is said that based upon the rate of the moon's recession that it cannot be older than 10,000 years."
Knowing from various other sources that the Earth is indeed older than 10,000 years, something is wrong in the reasoning above. You may not know what's wrong, but you know something is wrong.

I mean, I had my own experiences and I studied the scriptures and doctrine, but lazy in the sense that I never questioned or followed my doubts. I never fully researched or tested a belief in a God.

Lazy and yet studying... hehe...

So, for about 30 years of my life, I've been operating on this system of accepting "this is the truth about the world and existence" and moving on with my day. In some ways, I'm still trying to get there, to find something solid to accept so that I can move on with my day and not think about it. But that's not the way I want to live. I don't want to feel secure in something and ever get the rug swept out from under me ever again, simply because I was ignorant or wasn't paying close enough attention.

Don't ever become a scientist.  

However, even though this is still something I've only explored for about 4 or 5 months, I do find myself occasionally consumed by the pursuit of arguments and questions. Probably 80% of my waking hours are involved with thoughts about the weight of reality and the flaws in Biblical morality, the nature of God(exploring a "if it were true" thought process), the flaws in the history or literal aspects of the Bible, etc. I can feel myself trying to hammer it all down to make sure the world makes definitive sense.

Ah... 4 or 5 months after waking up... if only real life was as easy as the Matrix.
I'd advise you not to worry so much about it.
Religion has a number of laudable moral instructions... but they're made for the wrong reason. Take the divine out of the equation, insert society, social interaction, social wellbeing, social evolution and the annoying requirement that people need other people to actually survive, so they all better behave in such a way that suits everyone else. The trouble is that, as the populations increase, it becomes unlikely that any individual you meet outside will ever provide any input to your wellbeing. Still, on the chance that they will, you better behave properly towards everyone.

Have you guys also struggled with "I don't know"? Was it ever scary or painful to reach that place? I recognize it's still new for me and the likelihood that healing from religious trauma will eventually happen.

If you ever need to know anything, google it. You'll find answers for most things. For some things you'll find all sorts of answers, ranging from the scientific to the conspiracist to the religious.
Or you can just ask.
Good luck!

[possibletarian]

I think if I had to describe my passage from devout believer to athiest in a single sentence it would have to be..

'I ran out of excuses as to why god appeared exactly the same as no god'

[Nogba]

I think if God is evil he will punish anyway, but if he isn't, he shouldn't punish someone who doesn't know.

---

Whoever chooses to be guided,
it is only for their own good.
And whoever chooses to stray,
it is only to their own loss.
No soul burdened with sin will bear the burden of another.
And We would never punish ˹a people˺ until We have sent a messenger ˹to warn them˺.
Dr. Mustafa Khattab, the Clear Quran, Chapter 17 verse 15.

[zwanzig]

I've never lived my life with uncertainty like this before. I was conditioned to believe that there was always this someone out there, who knew everything, who was always watching me, who knew the future and had a plan for me. I was abused by a cult to hold every thought accountable because this being who knew what was best for me had access to my thoughts, to the point where 80% of the personal prayers I gave were said inside my head.

And now, suddenly, after 32 years, I'm alone. There's nothing. I have no one to go to check my decisions and information. I have to trust me. Not only that...but it has always been this way. The only thing that has actually changed is my perception. So, yes, it is scary and painful.

Because religion stole from me this connection with myself. All this time, "the spirit" I felt and confided in was me, yet I don't recognize it.

Sorry to be a downer. I'm just realizing the real emotions and thoughts behind my making this thread. It probably should have stayed as a journal.

[The Grand Nudger]

It shouldn't be impossible for you to maintain that connection to yourself, or recreate the experience of that spirit. Many people who do not believe in gods do this. Lean the other way, perhaps...and realize that the advice and comfort which you thought was the sort of stuff coming from a god was...you. You're that soothing thing. You're that certainty. As you mentioned, it's always been that way. It's always been you. It's been you for better and for worse, not just for worse.