Win Prizes Ask an Atheist II

[Gethelred]

Welcome to the Ask an Atheist thread II.

Previous part:

Win Prizes - Ask an Atheist - Shoe's on the other foot now!

Alright, we're going to have a change of tack. As I'm sure you can see, the thread title has been changed to Ask an Atheist. People who have a question to ask of the atheists who populate this thread - more than the christians do - should feel free to ask questions of them. If you've still got...

www.bigfooty.com

Standard board rules apply.

 

[ManInTheArena]

In our legal system every day.

Along with every other group who has an identity and ideology.

This is just pointing out the obvious but singling one group out and making it about them.

 

[Roylion]

I don't.

I originally asked a question "to an atheist" asking if there was any such thing as an atheist out of interest.

I’ve given you a definition. It seems pretty clear.

Just admit you get enjoyment of the atheist identity and it's why you're really here.

I don’t identify as an atheist. You’ve just made that assumption.

I’ve made it quite clear why I post in this discussion forum.

 

[ManInTheArena]

I’ve given you a definition. It seems pretty clear.

Nah, because the point is that it's a man-made definition of something highly conceptual which doesn't actually exist outside of our shared collective delusion.

I don’t identify as an atheist. You’ve just made that assumption.

Why define it only to say you don't identify with it?

You're just identifying everyone else but "not me"?

I find this a cop out from atheists. "We're not a group, we're just people who reject supernatural claims", then you hang out in groups baiting theists and other supernatural believers into discussions so you can tell them how their claims are bulls*.

If you were for real that you don't identify as an atheist you wouldn't live as if you were, because when you live without that identity you would hardly encounter any situation in your life in which you need to debunk theist or supernatural beliefs.

Just be honest with yourself and admit you like to seek it out. You like debunking beliefs and you put yourself in situations so you get to do it, like this forum.

I’ve made it quite clear why I post in this discussion forum.

I'm skeptical about whether you're being really honest with yourself as above.

 

[Roylion]

Why define it only to say you don't identify with it?

Because you asked what an 'atheist' was. I can define terms without necessarily having to identify with them.

You're just identifying everyone else but "not me"?

I'm not identifying anyone as anything specific. I said I don't identify myself as an 'atheist'.

"We're not a group, we're just people who reject supernatural claims",

Yeah. Some people like to categorise people with similar beliefs under a particular term.

then you hang out in groups baiting theists and other supernatural believers into discussions so you can tell them how their claims are bulls*.

Yeah. Asking for robust supporting evidence, in support of the claims they assert as actual 'truth' to the rest of us, is a reasonable request in what is, after all, a discussion forum.

If you were for real that you don't identify as an atheist you wouldn't live as if you were, because when you live without that identity you would hardly encounter any situation in your life in which you need to debunk theist or supernatural beliefs.

I ask for robust supporting evidence in support of the claims asserted as actual 'truth'. This is after all a discussion forum. If people assert their beliefs as truth on a discussion board, then they should expect those asserted truths to be challenged.

Just be honest with yourself and admit you like to seek it out. You like debunking beliefs and you put yourself in situations so you get to do it, like this forum.

I do like challenging assertions of truth that are made without any robust supporting evidence on a public discussion board.

I'm skeptical about whether you're being really honest with yourself as above.

You can be as skeptical as you like. I've told you why I post in this discussion forum. Whether you reject that reason or not makes absolutely no difference to me. I'll post where, when and how I please, whether you like it or not.

 

[Chief]

then you hang out in groups baiting theists and other supernatural believers into discussions so you can tell them how their claims are bulls*.

Where? In here?

 

[Chief]

Along with every other group who has an identity and ideology.

We all encounter legal limits based on religious values. This is a proud boast of many Christians - "this is a Christian country!"

That Christianity is expressed in the culture, law, economy, personal freedoms, all that.

This is just pointing out the obvious but singling one group out and making it about them.

Which other group has that much influence?

 

[Vdubs]

Yeah experts are those who are 'evangelicals' . Just listening to one side of the argument must be fun. I mean they are already Christians, what you expect them to say? "Oh i am sorry, i am wrong, the evidence says otherwise"?

No the point is, anybody who is an expert would not bother coming here. I don't read any posts from Christians professing to be experts, BUT you and several others come across as if you know more about God, Jesus, the Bible than practicing Christians, and indeed, more than many scholars whose daily lives are all around Biblical studies.
The way your points are made says more about you than your knowledge.

 

[ManInTheArena]

We all encounter legal limits based on religious values. This is a proud boast of many Christians - "this is a Christian country!"

That Christianity is expressed in the culture, law, economy, personal freedoms, all that.

Yeah and so it should have been considering they were the majority for a long time and determined what was right or wrong.

Self proclaimed atheists can't have it both ways saying there's no objective morality (which is true) and then say we shouldn't have these laws and rules when the majority made them up like they have been for the last 200,000 years.

Which other group has that much influence?

I think they have f* all influence in this day and age. They try but mostly I think it's a secular society and unions, media, and big business have far more influence.

 

[Chief]

Yeah and so it should have been considering they were the majority for a long time and determined what was right or wrong.

Yeah. And their values and laws never fully reflected the source texts, so it was made up by people but used a non-existent magic being as justification.

Self proclaimed atheists can't have it both ways saying there's no objective morality (which is true) and then say we shouldn't have these laws and rules when the majority made them up like they have been for the last 200,000 years.

Some of the laws are objectively harmful and exclusionary for no reason than religious control.

I think they have f* all influence in this day and age. They try but mostly I think it's a secular society and unions, media, and big business have far more influence.

Maybe, but the cult still persists in political life https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opus_Dei

Clergy being protected by media (Andrew Blot), politicians and police and so on.

Religious schools subsidised by the government.

Parliament opening prayers.

Head of state is the head of the church of England.

 

[Vdubs]

Because you asked what an 'atheist' was. I can define terms without necessarily having to identify with them.


I'm not identifying anyone as anything specific. I said I don't identify myself as an 'atheist'.


Yeah. Some people like to categorise people with similar beliefs under a particular term.


Yeah. Asking for robust supporting evidence, in support of the claims they assert as actual 'truth' to the rest of us, is a reasonable request in what is, after all, a discussion forum.


I ask for robust suporting evidence in support of the claims asserted as actual 'truth'. This is after all a discussion forum. If people assert their beliefs as truth on a discussion board, then they should expect those asserted truths to be challenged.


I do like challenging assertions of truth that are made without any robust supporting evidence on a public discussion board.


You can be as skeptical as you like. I've told you why I post in this discussion forum. Whether you reject that reason or not makes absolutely no difference to me. I'll post where, when and how I please, whether you like it or not.

He has a good point though, and you squirm every time. We don't see you asking atheists any questions at all, agreeing with most of their assertions, but you don't identify as one? Yet any and every point that a Christian makes has got you copying and pasting to your heart's content

 

[SBD Gonzalez]

As soon as you self identify, define, and categorise yourself, you limit yourself

If you say "I'm an atheist and I elevate fact and reason", then those are now your boundaries you are contained in. That's your box.

You're now stuck only considering the world within your own headset. The headset put on you by evolution, not realising on a moment to moment basis that none of what you experience is reality and therefore not fact. On top of that you're not even a speck in this whole arrangement and we don't even know what the arrangement is. There's 200 billion stars just in our galaxy and up to 2 trillion galaxies just in the observable universe. Where the hell are you, and by "you" what do you even mean? Your thoughts about yourself? What are thoughts? They probably only evolved so we could organise ourselves in a small-scale social society yet we cling to them like they're reality. Like our "reasoning" is important. Like we're important.

There's no meaning to you, no importance to you, and no meaning or importance to the theist, we are just "here" but can't even say where here is let alone cling to our "facts" made up with our "thoughts" to get some certainly of the "reality" we can only perceive through our little brains and five senses which evolved for us to pass on our genes, not so we could objectively and rationally understand reality. We don't experience s**t of reality. Daily we're walking around in an evolutionary made delusion thinking what we experience is reality.

All science can do is measure "that reality" and we're clever little f*ers for doing it and it's helped us pass on our genes (and is very useful), but it boxes us into our headset not what might be beyond it. I'm not talking about theism and gods made up with our thoughts either, that would be a regression, I'm talking about the fact that maybe we can't understand true reality with this limited brain. And it is severely limited. We're not much better than monkeys in the scheme of things yet we call ourselves intelligent and act intelligent like we're the centre of the universe when we're nothing, we're no "thing", because the "thing" we think we are is simply made up by our own brain and it's incessant evolutionary need to define everything, but at the same time without those limited brain made up definitions we are everything. We are the big bang, if the big bang can even be agreed as a "fact" or maybe someone will change it later. But whatever, we're made of the same s*t as everything else and our boundary is defined by ourselves and our sense of self which probably only evolved when we needed to move towards safety and away from danger. You can't avoid getting eaten by a predator if you don't know where "you" are. Worse still are the definitions within that "you", "I'm an atheist" being one of them but there are hundreds of others.

I could go on for a long time here but what I'm suggesting is that maybe defining yourself is limiting yourself if you look at what you're actually doing in the grand scheme of things with an understanding of what reality isn't (because we sure as hell don't know what it "is"). Bonus is that we wouldn't have a bunch of c*s walking around treating each other like s*t, and worst case starting wars, because they define themselves differently with their primitive little evolutionary constrained brains.

Well, you could say that, yes.

 

[SBD Gonzalez]

I don’t believe in god. By the definition of the word “atheist”, that means I am one. But it’s not a core part of my identity. I don’t go around all day thinking “I am an atheist” and picking fights with those who believe in god.

Occasional participation in this thread forms the majority of my direct engagement on the topic. It’s not something that comes up in my daily interaction with people.

My personal values are based around treating others fairly and with respect. By being friendly where appropriate and courteous otherwise. I treat others as I would like to be treated myself.

The only time my personal non-belief in god comes to the fore is when others try to impose their god-based moral code on society. Then I get irritated.

My sentiments exactly. I'm "an atheist" when someone asks me about religious beliefs or lack thereof, and I tell them about the conclusions I've reached - wrong or right, who knows - after many decades of life.

Other than that, I'm a living person, end of story.

 

[SBD Gonzalez]

By human definition, which is a delusion.

By that definition you're wasting your time pressing keys on a keyboard to construct that sentence. Constructing that sentence and conveying its intent to humans bound by human delusion is a human delusion.

 

[ManInTheArena]

Yeah. And their values and laws never fully reflected the source texts, so it was made up by people but used a non-existent magic being as justification.

And people are still doing that.

Groups get what they want through politics if they have enough influence. Again that's just how it works and we can't hardly complain about that when you'd probably do the same with your ideologies (e.g. getting rid of all religious influence on laws) if you had the influence.

Some of the laws are objectively harmful and exclusionary for no reason than religious control.


Maybe, but the cult still persists in political life https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opus_Dei

Clergy being protected by media (Andrew Blot), politicians and police and so on.

Religious schools subsidised by the government.

Parliament opening prayers.

Head of state is the head of the church of England.

So?

Relics from the past when they held more power is not what I'd call beliefs being forced upon you. It will take time to disappear from law and I'd estimate that to be when the baby boomers die considering they have significant voting power.

There are religious factions in the membership of both major political parties but (having some experience with inner politics) I think you'd be surprised how those are dying as well.

Again this is all just reflective of how humans work to make up societal values and rules, it's not specific to Christians. They just once had the most influence.

The original point was that I don't believe in anything and I don't encounter dogma being forced on me. Therefore it doesn't necessitate any identity. If it comes to a law I disagree with then I use my voting power like everyone else and I don't think Christians have much power left. Definitely not as much as other groups now.

The original question was is there any such thing as an atheist? If there were no theists then you don't exist, and I'd argue for that reason you don't exist anyway. You're just waiting for someone to walk by who believes something so you can ridicule them and justify your own identity, otherwise there's no identity to be found.

Not withstanding the fact all identities are fabrications of evolution anyway which I went on a big rant about. There's no "Christian" either in true reality.

 

[SBD Gonzalez]

I find this a cop out from atheists. "We're not a group, we're just people who reject supernatural claims", then you hang out in groups baiting theists and other supernatural believers into discussions so you can tell them how their claims are bulls*.

If you were for real that you don't identify as an atheist you wouldn't live as if you were, because when you live without that identity you would hardly encounter any situation in your life in which you need to debunk theist or supernatural beliefs.

Just be honest with yourself and admit you like to seek it out. You like debunking beliefs and you put yourself in situations so you get to do it, like this forum.

Yeah, those atheists wearing their atheist necklaces and atheist earrings and building gigantic atheist monuments in the centre of cities and congregating in them to sing and yell out loudly how much they love atheism and going around the world to different countries to tell people they should be atheists (often forcibly so) and making sculptures and paintings of the first atheist and congregating on street corners or knocking on the doors of private houses to tell people how much they love atheism and how those people should love atheism too.

Relentless, those atheists.

 

[ManInTheArena]

By that definition you're wasting your time pressing keys on a keyboard to construct that sentence. Constructing that sentence and conveying its intent to humans bound by human delusion is a human delusion.

Yes, which is why I'll disappear from here once I've understood more.

I have no identity to belong here for any other reason.

 

[Roylion]

He has a good point though, and you squirm every time.

Squirm over what?

We don't see you asking atheists any questions at all, agreeing with most of their assertions, but you don't identify as one?

As I said, I challenge the assertions to truth you make without providing absolutely no supporting evidence for the truth of those claims whatsoever. Much of what you provide in response is quoting scripture. Which means nothing.

Yet any and every point that a Christian makes has got you copying and pasting to your heart's content

I often cut and paste my own material, sometimes made years ago in response to the same unsubstantiated claims that you (and others) make over and over again. I also quote scholars depending on what is discussed. For example, recently I asked you whether engaging in polygamy is adultery (after you claimed that adultery is 'sin' and everyone 'sins') and then gave examples of where several biblical figures were described as engaging in polygamy. You never answered that question.

 

[ManInTheArena]

Yeah, those atheists wearing their atheist necklaces and atheist earrings and building gigantic atheist monuments in the centre of cities and congregating in them to sing and yell out loudly how much they love atheism and going around the world to different countries to tell people they should be atheists (often forcibly so) and making sculptures and paintings of the first atheist and congregating on street corners or knocking on the doors of private houses to tell people how much they love atheism and how those people should love atheism too.

Relentless, those atheists.

You're confusing ritual and religiosity with identity, either as a strawman, or by accident.

 

[Gough]

I've always had a grudging respect for fundamentalist Islam because they don't pick and choose which bits of their holy book they follow and offer up timid excuses why god didn't really mean that when she said it. Religion is primitive however much you try and reinvent it.

 

[SBD Gonzalez]

You're confusing ritual and religiosity with identity, either as a strawman, or by accident.

Proselytism is hardly ritual or mere religiosity. Nor is taking centuries to build huge cathedrals. Or setting up organisations to send proselytising agents to the corners of the earth.

 

[Total Power]

No the point is, anybody who is an expert would not bother coming here. I don't read any posts from Christians professing to be experts, BUT you and several others come across as if you know more about God, Jesus, the Bible than practicing Christians, and indeed, more than many scholars whose daily lives are all around Biblical studies.
The way your points are made says more about you than your knowledge.

Where have i made it about me? i tried to stick to the Bible, you are making it about me. You never answer any questions and you make it all about me everytime. A bit rich coming from you.

Where have i said i am an 'expert' here anyway? Bart Ehrman is an expert, i am not. I have read the Bible/context/history from cover to cover and i am here to have a discussion. Yet it seems difficult to have it with you cause you are going to throw the toys out of the cot the moment your position is questioned and 90% of the time you have no answers anyway.

Then you point to the scholars. I posted a wiki link about authenticity of the Gospels anyway, go have a read if you wish to know what scholars think about it. But don't wanna spoil your party.

 

[Total Power]

He has a good point though, and you squirm every time. We don't see you asking atheists any questions at all, agreeing with most of their assertions, but you don't identify as one? Yet any and every point that a Christian makes has got you copying and pasting to your heart's content

Yet again you attack the man and his posting style and then say 'you make it all about you'. If you are not interested in this thread why post here? Christianity is going to be ripped apart in this thread, if you don't like it..leave and stick to your sunday morning echo chambers.

 

[Total Power]

That's what I believe, and last I checked, it's my human right to believe that.

Because it's true, and because truth is one, error multiple, why would I care for errors.

You are talking out of your arse yet again. Nothing in Christianity is original, including the story in Genesis which was written hundreds of years before as a Babylonian myth. Again it's a circular argument, i have made long posts about this, how Confucius and Buddhas words appear in NT..learn how mythologies work, lightweight.

 

[Total Power]

Squirm over what?


As I said, I challenge the assertions to truth you make without providing absolutely no supporting evidence for the truth of those claims whatsoever. Much of what you provide in response is quoting scripture. Which means nothing.


I often cut and paste my own material, sometimes made years ago in response to the same unsubstantiated claims that you (and others) make over and over again. I also quote scholars depending on what is discussed. For example, recently I asked you whether engaging in polygamy is adultery (after you claimed that adultery is 'sin' and everyone 'sins') and then gave examples of where several biblical figures were described as engaging in polygamy. You never answered that question.

How dare you ask them to post evidence, that's blasphemy. I don't even think VD has the word evidence in his vocabulary. He is looking it up now as i speak.

Funny that's how most religions work...not just Christianity.

 

[Boston tiger]

I've always had a grudging respect for fundamentalist Islam because they don't pick and choose which bits of their holy book they follow and offer up timid excuses why god didn't really mean that when she said it. Religion is primitive however much you try and reinvent it.

Atheism is as primitive as pond slime .