Anecdotal evidence for atheism (page 3)

Tuesday

But of course, I prayed for the same thing since I was five till I was twenty. My conclusion is there's either no God or he doesn't care about me in the slightest. Either way it's not something that I should worship.

slimboyfat

That's why your belief has not proven to be evolutionarily successful, as it has little power of motivation. :-))

Survival of the fittest meme, baby.

Randy

However I can see no reason why there should be a correlation between the survival value of a worldview and its truthfulness. Yeah my kind, who are prone to see meaninglessness everywhere may end up extinct, but at least we may have been right in our pessimistic view of the universe's ability to provide us with meaning. And who would want to perpetuate yet more existence in a meaningless world anyway? That seems cruel. I doubt I will have children for that reason. I will just live it out and my dour flame dies with me.

parakeet

sbf: "And who would want to perpetuate yet more existence in a meaningless world anyway? That seems cruel. I doubt I will have children for that reason. I will just live it out and my dour flame dies with me. "

Your "dour flame"? Sounds like someone is having a self-pity party. Get up from your computer chair and start taking charge of your life. If you're unable to do that, go to a doctor and get some medication for depression.

slimboyfat

I am honestly not depressed. I had a period of mild depression (not treated medically or anything, but still unsettling) in my early teens (before I joined the Witnesses actually) so I know what depression is like. I am not depressed. I think I am just realistic. And I do try to make the most of life. I have a serious illness that holds me back, and I have a lot of pain, but I think I do quite well all things considered. I try to make the best of things. That doesn't mean I would be prepared to inflict the burden of existence needlessly on an unsuspecting unborn potential life however. Having said that my wife may have other ideas and I might have to compromise on that. We'll see how it goes. And you never know I might change my mind in the future about God, babies and existience - it happened before. I am just telling it as I see it now.

SacrificialLoon

I can't really point to one event that afterwards I knew I was atheist whereas before that event I was theist. Maybe the first seeds were planted when I was allowed to stay up and watch Cosmos on PBS all those years ago. :)

I can't say for 100% sure that a god or gods doesn't/don't exist, but neither can I say that I know for a fact that a planet full of man eating pink unicorns doesn't exist somewhere in the universe.

IP_SEC

Im kinda weird. I've had subjective 'spiritual' experiences. Alas' I am still an atheist. Ive has similar experiences on mind altering substance and in meditation. Just proves that the brain can do some wild shit. I got an open mind that there might be something out there extra-physical, mostly cause it would be cool if it were true. Still I dont believe.

There is no anecdotal evidence for atheism. Ancedotal or otherwise evidence is incompatible with something that cannot be proved or disproved. Evidence is incompatible with a philosophy that cannot be proved or disproved.

John Doe

Evidence is incompatible with a philosophy that cannot be proved or disproved.

I wouldn't go quite that far. Evidence can narrow possible circumstances without proving a specific circumstance. But, I agree with the gist of your post.

hamilcarr

How come my world became utterly meaningless from that time on and I have been drifting, I know not where, ever since? I don't think God was a word to me, he was the lens through which the whole world, consisting of words, could be understood and acted upon.

But doesn't that lens narrow the view?

What do you think about this quote:

I have no objection to worshiping this God Jehovah, far from it. But I mean we ought to consider everything sacred, the entire world, not merely the artificially separated half! Thus alongside the divine service we should also have a service for the devil.

glenster

The video above refutes certain conservative views of the God concept and
creation, which have long been disagreed about between conservative and liberal,
not necessarily belief or non-belief points.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augustine_of_Hippo#Natural_knowledge_and_biblical_interpretation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegorical_interpretations_of_Genesis

It ends with a refutation of the idea of an an all-beneficent God, not the God
of the Bible. In order to be credible, the God concept has to be reconciled
with the same world with its tragedies as everyone else has. It leads to ideas
that might come up in a discussion of God's prerogative, not necessarily whether
you believe in God or not let alone decisive for not believing.

The idea of belief in a God that isn't all-beneficent is illustrated in one of
the oldest books of the OT--the book of Job. in Job, the devil wants Job to for-
get God because of them, but Job maintains his faith. An easy way to understand
how Job could do that in a secular way is to remove God from the account--some
might say life stinks due to those tragedies, yet another might say they recog-
nize the same tragedies but they're glad for the good they found in life and the
opportunity they got to find some for themelf. Just substitute ability to be-
lieve in God for ability to believe in life, and it's basically the same thing.
Job knows God isn't all-beneficent (like life isn't all-heavenly), but is glad
for the good he believes God provided anyway. My point is just that the trage-
dies don't create the make or break point for non-belief the video condescend-
ingly intends.

In my ideal on the matter, it can be simplified to seeing that both the
believer and the non-believer can know the same see-able, touchable stuff. The
believer wants to have a hope commitment for something beyond that the other
doesn't want. Arguments about what the see-able touchable stuff is as intending
to decide which you pick probably went wrong somewhere, and are probably better
understood as matters of how you look at each and not decisive for which you
should take.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Existence_of_God
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relationship_between_religion_and_science

Also see the book by Mortimer Adler, "How to Think About God," for an empiri-
cal philosophical analysis that concludes that the basic God concept--of a
neccesary, eternal (in the sense of transcendant of time, not in existing for-
ever in time as we exist in it), creative cause for the cosmos--that the unnec-
cesary cosmos could become necessary there--is a compelling, not arbitrary, pos-
sibility.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmological_argument#The_argument_from_contingency

Beyond that, it's a personal choice whether or not to have the hope commitment
about it, not a matter of how intelligent you are. Any two big groups, such as
believers and non-believers, probably have about the same average IQ.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Christian_thinkers_in_science

Be careful of surveys meant to show lower intelligence or higher crime rates,
etc., among believers--see the refutation of the article at the next link:
http://bluegrassroots.org/showDiary.do?diaryId=2469

Someone can try to rationalize a 'centric view by taking one aspect--race,
sex, or belief choice--of another group and try to connect it to bad social
trends. They leave out it's really due to other things. For instance, about
every ethnic group that's come to the USA initially had a higher unemployment
and crime rate which dissipated as the group assimilated, yet a bigoted group
like the KKK might try to take such findings out of context in an attempt to
show that the group they attack is inherently prone to crime, etc.

Besides, the Christian faith involves the book of James and "show me your
faith by your works." An habitually bad-behaving unrepentant alleged Christian
is a non-believer, not a bad Christian.

slimboyfat

But doesn't that lens narrow the view?

What do you think about this quote:

Belief in God/non-belief in God are both lenses I suppose. Whether one is better/worse, wider/narrower I wouldn't know how to judge. I only know where I find myself and where I have been.

Are you quoting Nathaniel Merrit - or yourself perhaps? It sounds a bit New Age for me.

Anecdotal evidence for atheism

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