The Folly of Atheism

Again, full credit to Dawkins (and his atheist chums) for using the word 'probably' on the buses instead of saying flat out "there's no God", but where does the "worrying" bit come in?
Who exactly is worrying, and about what?

 

And how does one calculate the probability for a belief? What numbers or statistics do you base those on? IMO, his was merely a statement of belief, about the universe. Masking it in mathematical or scientific terms is a pretense of validity.

 

Many atheists would say there is no God, but would refrain from saying there is no god.

Those who worry are the people who try to impose their views, based on a probably non existent god on themselves or worse others.

 

Maybe so, however that is one Atheists world view, it does not represent others. The only thing you learn from the statement "I am an atheist" is they lack a belief in god. That is what you cannot appear to grasp.

 

Depends what religion you're talking about mate. For example I don't think i've ever met a christian who worries. What have they got to worry about?
PS- on second thoughts I see you're in Cornwall where I hear they build wicker men to burn christians in so I think christians would want to steer clear of there.
(Mind you Edward Woodward deserved it for his bad acting, and in the remake Nic Cage deserved it too for squashing a wasp on the pub bar. But bunging innocent animals in there with them was a bit much)

 

Really, many Christians seem worried about abortions and gay marriage.

By the way the Wicker man was not set in Cornwall, try to drop your silly bs or at least get your facts right. Sleep safe, it was in Scotland many miles away from Union Street, you can cruise in safety.

 

It seems we are having difficulty in having a rational discussion. Your responses are becoming increasingly irrational & laced with ad hominem. Perhaps we should just let this go for now.

 

No it is quite simple, you appear not to be able to grasp the simple fact that all you learn from the statement " I am an atheist" is "I lack a belief in god" If you want to let it go at that fine.

PS if you think I am making ad hominem attacks please inform the mods and allow them to make an unbiased view.

 

If a woman has to abort for health reasons most christians have no beef with that!
As for gay marriage, it's sweet that they want God to bless it..
As for wicker men, paganism is all over Britain including Cornwall, I've seen vids of pagan women tying ribbons to maypoles and prancing naked around them by moonlight. If I was to bring my maypole they can tie ribbons to it and prance round it as much as they like.
As for Union St, it's too brightly lit and thick with coppers nowadays, so your best bet is to branch off down one of the side roads where the shadows are..

 

And if health reasons are not involved they worry about it.

Edward Woodward was not all over Britian and you did refer to a specific, but that's ok, I am used to stupidity. Thanks for letting me know where you are. Post reported by the way, stay on subject.

 

Two can play the "post reported game" mate, so as a reprisal I've just reported your post that implies I cruise Union St looking for prostitutes..
PS- you've got the Welsh flag and the Cornwall flag at the top of your posts, don't you know what your nationality is? You surely can't be Welsh because they're a tough strong people, I seen what they did to them Zulus..

 

Good man, I was actually referring to God TV on Union Street, still I guess we all know it for different reasons!

 

Shouldn't you be less concerned with proving atheists wrong and more concerned with proving you right.

After all, if you prove you right, they will be wrong by definition.

 

The problem for Theists I don't need certainty just is it more likely than not using the available evidence that there are unlikely any deities or a deity. Look at it from my perspective in Hinduism there are thousands of deities so if true wouldn't there be many examples of divine evidence that faith is true as one example and see this objectively not subjectively. I just need enough evidence to demonstrate one deity exists and there are how many in human history and in the current global society? Seriously how hard is that to do?

Until then I'll deny deity claims its not hard to understand.

 

Given that matter/energy can be neither created nor destroyed and given that in nature we see cycles of transformation and not definitive origins, the only logical answer is that the universe did not have an origin and that instead it has always existed in one form or another, transitioning between them using natural forces.

 

Fair question. I leave that up to the theists.

 

Someone else that gets it.

 

Well the people who keep pushing the god myth seem to be worried about something. Otherwise they would just enjoy their delusions and stop worrying about those with alternative realities.

 

Religions, though generally purporting to adhere to a "golden rule," have inspired wars: Within them: Catholicism vs Protestantism, Shiite vs. Suni. Between them: Crusades, Jihad. Persian Gulf wars. Wars between Hindu and Islam. But Blake (admirably, in poems "The Four Zoas" and "Jerusalem" also warned (futilely) against making a god out of Science, whose handmaiden is business, which is the despot making wage slaves of the masses these days. Yet Science has proven religious takes on cosmology, anatomy, history, etc. to be so much superstitious hogwash. But I still believe it is possible to acknowledge the truth of Science and at the same time be a moral person.

 

What religious belief does a person start life with?

Since scientists with the tools for critical thinking and inquiry are far more likely to be atheist than the general population, your claim that atheists do not know the scientific basis for their lack of belief would be wrong.

 

Indoctrination
Naturalism has become the state religion. It is promoted in national parks, public media shows, entertainment, schools, universities, & driven into impressionable children from infancy. Movies are filled with sci-fi imaginings of evolution. The media, entertainers, celebrities, govt leaders... everyone of influence & status present a unified, constant drumbeat of naturalistic origins. Even if it is blended with some nostalgic references to a deity, there is NEVER any question of the science presented, the narrative, or the ideology.

Historical timeline
To show the progression of this belief system, & how it has become the official state religion, one only need to follow the court's rulings on evolution. Since evolution is the keystone for the belief in naturalism, & the cornerstone for atheism, it follows that it needs to have a voice, if the atheistic worldview is to gain traction.Creation was the indoctrinated belief system for origins, for most of American history. When Darwin's theory began to spread among the intelligentsia & academic elite, a naturalistic view evolved that was much superior to the old one.. that of spontaneous generation. Pasteur's experiments, and other scientific discoveries, were putting too many holes in the pop belief of the day for naturalism. But the Theory of evolution (ToE), had no such experimental flaws. It was a belief, shrouded in scientific jargon, that could not be falsified in the traditional scientific sense. There were no proofs FOR the theory, but neither could it be disproved, as the times claimed made that impossible.

In 1925, during the early years of progressive ideology, the Scopes Monkey Trial, as it was called, brought the ToE to the limelight. Politicians & elite academians had been singing the praises of the ToE for years, but most of the rank & file citizens did not. Engineers, doctors, & the applied sciences were concerned with practical science, not the theorizing & speculations of philosophical beliefs. This trial was from a lawsuit in Tennessee, where a state law had forbade the teaching of evolution. After much grandstanding by the lawyers, it was eventually held up by the court. The states were allowed to decide the curriculum on origins. The advent of WW2 put the promotion of evolution on the back burner.. especially since the 'godless commies', & the Nazis used evolution as an integral part of their ideology. Americans were in the midst of a mini religious awakening, & faith in God took center stage in this struggle against despotic aggression. 'Under God', was added to the pledge of allegiance, in 1954, under Eisenhower. 'In God we Trust' was mandated to be put on all money in 1956. 'Godless Commies' were pursued by McCarthy, in an effort to rid the nation of anti-American influences. Marxist ideology was very popular in the entertainment industry, the universities, & the intelligentsia, but they slunk in the shadows, unwilling to openly proclaim their beliefs.

But by the 1960s, this began to change. The Scopes ruling was overturned, & the ToE was allowed to be taught, alongside a supernatural view. In 1967, the state of Tennessee repealed the act that forbade the teaching of evolution. Slowly, a series of court cases have brought us to where we are today, where the ToE is the ONLY allowed belief system of origins. No criticism or questioning of the science is allowed, but mandated belief & conformity in what is presented as Absolute Truth, regarding origins. Most students now graduate from school well versed in the doctrines of evolution, & believe it to be 'settled science'. Ironically, it was not scientists that made this social change, but lawyers, imposing their indoctrinated beliefs on everyone else.

Since the ToE is the cornerstone of the naturalistic world view, & since every atheist i have ever known has professed a belief in this theory, it is not hard to correlate the expansion of atheism with the promotion & eventual monopoly of this belief system on origins.

Note this recent study on atheism in the US:


Atheists, in general, are more likely to be male and younger than the overall population; 68% are men, and the median age of atheist adults in the U.S. is 34 (compared with 46 for all U.S. adults). Atheists also are more likely to be white (78% are Caucasian vs. 66% for the general public) and highly educated: About four-in-ten atheists (43%) have a college degree, compared with 27% of the general public.

Self-identified atheists tend to be aligned with the Democratic Party and with political liberalism. About two-thirds of atheists (69%) identify as Democrats (or lean in that direction), and a majority (56%) call themselves political liberals(compared with just one-in-ten who say they are conservatives). Atheists overwhelmingly favor same-sex marriage (92%) and legal abortion (87%). source

The timeline & correlation of the subjects of indoctrination are impossible to miss. Atheists just happen to be mostly progressive, in their political views, & fall in line with most of the progressive talking points. Even the few that do not, mostly older atheists, have the same indoctrination about the ToE. They believe it to be Proven Scientific Fact, & allow no questioning or examination of the science behind it. And, when you add the progressive doctrines of global warming, sexual identity, abortion, social justice, & other neo marxist/darwinist agendas, the evidence of it being a politically indoctrinated worldview is overwhelming.

Atheists are made, not born. They are the result of a series of indoctrinating processes, put together in unison by a manipulative philosophical belief system. Progressive ideology is at the root of this indoctrination, & it controls every institution in America. The few dissenting voices are shut down, attacked with jihadist zeal, & ridiculed with disdain.

But it is not enough to merely indoctrinate at a young age. They keep up the narrative with a constant barrage of religious programming. PBS uses tax dollars to fund a constant stream of indoctrination to prop up the beliefs inculcated since childhood. The entertainment industry produces movie after movie, tv show after tv show, dedicated to the naturalistic narrative. The heroes & protagonists in movies are almost always portrayed as naturalist/atheists, while the antagonists are usually portrayed as evil, bigoted, theists. This is all part of the unified indoctrination process for promoting the naturalistic world view, & the results are proof of the effectiveness of indoctrination. Many, if not all of the atheists i know spend a great amount of their free time watching PBS nature shows, where the reinforcement of their earlier indoctrination can continue. They do not seek alternate views, or question the science presented, but eagerly devour what can only be called propaganda from a politically driven source with a political agenda.

 

In the early 1960's kids at school were walking round in shock and awe telling us "Wow, a sensational new group called the Beatles were on TV last night, you GOTTA check 'em out!"
Same with Jesus, a lot of people have got the wrong idea about him, so Christians want to tell them how kool he really is..
For example hey kids, you know how you sometimes get hassled by your parents and teachers always telling you what to do, and sometimes feel as if they hate you?
Relax, JC went through the same thing and has got this message for you..-

 

What is "fundamentally flawed on many levels" is your knowledge and your conclusions behind the "driving factors for becoming atheistic".

Some years ago I was a member of a skeptics forum. Many atheists posted their deconversion stories. I do not remember anyone writing that they became atheists because of science. They became atheists because they recognized the flaws in their religions. They recognized the utter nonsense portrayed in the Genesis story. They began to question other things in the bible. They recognized that the answers and explanations being given were nothing more than religious dogmatism.

It was only after the realization that religion was wrong that they turned to science. "They" includes me.

 

So, would you like to offer a rebuttal to my points, instead of anecdotal evidence? I have 3 main points up to now, with many arguments & evidence to support each one. Would you like to take a shot at refuting my points, or just dismiss them & smear me, personally?

I thought atheists were supposed to be rational, evidentiary based beings. Why so emotional & hysterical in the responses? Where is the evidence & reason for these alleged 'scientific' bases?

IMO, these kinds of responses only show the effectiveness of the state indoctrination, pushing everyone into a naturalistic world view.

 

Theists are made, not born. They are the result of a series of indoctrinating processes that begins when their parents take them to church from before they can walk. But it is not enough to merely indoctrinate at a young age. They keep up the narrative with a constant barrage of religious programming from channels like Christian Television Network and Trinity Broadcasting Network. This is coupled with sending 4 and 5 year olds to Sunday School and Bible Study classes.

It is the young children of theistic parents that are forced to devour religious propaganda. Children are exposed to religion long before they are exposed to science.

Young children are told by parents and aunts and uncles and grandparents god is real. Young children are brought to churches long before they are brought to schools teaching watered down versions of evolution. Young children are brought to places like the The Creation Museum which is operated by the Christian Creation apologetics organization Answers in Genesis. There they are shown how god created man and dinosaurs to live together.

This is religious indoctrination. Religious indoctrination has been practiced long before there was a TOE, long before there was a PBS. It is the reason that most people believe in the same god their parents believe in. It is the reason that most people are of the same religious denomination that their parents are. It is the reason that most people practice their religion the way their parents do.

Up until recently Catholics had to promise to raise their children in the Catholic faith if they wanted to get married.