atheism and what it means to be spiritual.

Philosophy Forums Religion and Spirituality
1

okay…

either atheism is a religion and belongs in the religious thread…

Or atheism is a philosophy and belongs in that thread.

So which is it atheists?

Atheists remind me of something I read from Plato.

Would you ask a pilot to teach you how to fish?

Would you have the politician teach you how to be moral?

How then can we trust your opinion of god and spirituality, when you know nothing about them? You are like someone who’s always lived in the state of Kansas and has never seen the ocean. Other people tell you of the ocean, tell you they dream of the ocean. But you don’t. You’ve never seen it, and you decide one day that because you’ve never seen the ocean, the ocean is just a myth.

It goes beyond that as well… you then (some of you) say that those who believe in the ocean are evil, and dangerous. Those who speak of the wonderful sound of crashing waves, are the most dangerous. You seek out to prostelyze your view point, thinking that because you’ve never seen the ocean, it must not exist.

So you go out and start your religion of anti-oceanists. You speak with your hero dawkins and preach to the oceanists the dangers of faith in the ocean, and the unseen.

You are elite. You have ultimate faith in man, and what can be seen. But … everything that you see is a manifestation of what you believe. You are no more right in your view of the world, than a theist who believes god killed his son is. You place yourself in the desert of faith, so that you can reject any (no matter how small) proof of something beyond your narrow minded belief in the world.

For awhile I didn’t understand this POV, but now I do. Atheists are elitists and desire to be in control. Giving creation power to something greater than themselves is demeaning. Giving moral power to something greater than themselves is impossible. What is morality but the declination of suffering and increasing enjoyment?

Is it any wonder you are in the desert of faith and spirit? You purposely ignore challenging your base instincts and acting out of compassion and responsibility, instead of your new age morality that is doomed to failure. (or disease.)

most of all, what gives you the authority to call religion evil… when everything is relative?

2

Who has ever seen the ocean, scythe?

edit: I hate Dawkins. He is a plant.

3

It’s neither. As I’ve previously stated, when I became atheist (from agnostic, when I thought every possibility had an equal probability), the only thing that changed was my belief in God. Nothing else in my life majorly changed, to my surprise.

I absolutely agree on this, but I don’t think it’s a valid argument in this case. If you want to learn something, learn it from an expert. I’ve learned from people who believe in God why they believe in God. It still doesn’t make sense.

I’m not sure exactly what you mean here. It is almost as if you are implying that atheists don’t know anything of spirituality, or Christianity, etc. I’d assume a majority of atheists becamse that way. I used to be a very devout Christian. Every word out of a Christian’s mouth, I can relate to. I read the Bible quite extensively back in the day.

I don’t constitue something as “proof” unless it can be proven. God, unfortunately, cannot, or we’d obviously all be believers. Unless your proof is faith. For that I have no counter.

But out of curiosity, how is it any more narrow minded to believe in a world with no God than it is to believe in a world with God? Narrow minded is to exclude possibilities. Once again, atheists don’t exclude the possibility of God, but admit the chances of God existing are extremely low.

Theists, however, most often believe there is no chance of God not existing. This seems a bit more narrow-minded than the aforementioned.

You might certainly understand some atheists point of view (not quire sure which ones), but you definitely do not understand mind, or you would not be using any of the previous arguments in this post.

Morality and theism have no relation, sadly. I know theists who are much less compassionate than I, much more violent than I, or much less moral than I. But Christ already died for their sins, what do they have to lose?

Evil is a sloppy word. I would say religion has slowed the progression of mankind morally, socially and technologically.

I often wonder why so many Christians don’t heed the words of Luke 6:37 (New International Version)
New International Version (NIV)

Or Matthew 7:1-5:

4

Atheism can certainly be considered a faith much like anything else. Religion

This is a rather assumptive statement in that some atheists know more about religion than any others. Now one key factor you continually neglect to put forth is the idea that many religions are atheistic in nature.

You of all people should be wary of throwing around the elitist statements my friend. Your anti-Islamic stance along with your homophobic nature creates the label floating so visibly above you. Also, who are you to make these statements?

Funny this statement here. So basically you believe that atheism promotes immoral behavior? And that they don’t have a heart? Or no notion of compassion? I will once again remind you of Buddhism being an atheistic nature. Now you mock the “new age” morality but let us examine the “old age”. Let us go to a place where this “old age” morality destroyed; Africa. The spread of Christianity by Frances Xavier is perhaps the worst thing that ever happened to the continent besides AIDS. Chock that up with the “Old Age” mentality that African’s were inferior hell Afrik means “without order” so the “old agers” thought well who gives a fuck about them? And raped the land, stole them from their homelands, and oppressed them. Then they were like “OK we are done” they pull out and leave Africa MANY times worse than it was ever. This “Old Age” morality also allowed the Inquisition.

When ALL theistic religions act with proper morals perhaps one day you can speak so ill of atheism. You and I both know that this will never happen so maybe you should cease and desist your vehement words. Because your desire for elitism is shining through and you are simply mulling along like one of the many believing all that you believe is true.

5

I really admire Buddhism- of all mans religious delusions, this one is the most appealing to me. Sometimes I wish I was a Buddhist, but ultimately I just can’t make myself drink the KoolAid.

For my own part, I’d say atheism is neither a religion nor a philosopy. It will continue to be thought of as one, mostly by theists, and theists will keep bringing up in the Religion forum. And since a lack of belief in gods would have no meaning if there weren’t some who believed in gods, it seems natural that those discussions would crop up there. Since atheism affects one’s world view, it’s not out of place in the philosophy forum, either.

I dunno- is that supposed to be a ‘gotcha’ of some type?

6

there is a difference between knowing about religion and knowing about spirituality and god. Look at how quickly dorkydood busted out the bible quotes, but when they are used against him he quickly de-riles them as “oh great now you’re pulling out the bible”

dorkydood, many of the statements you make are more agnostic than atheistic:

Atheists key belief is that god does not exist, and there is no possibility for his existence.

See chapter 2 of my book on throwing the baby out with the bath water.

see chapter 3 of my aforementioned book.

See chapter 1 of history 101.

Probably only astronauts, we only see bits of it, and we have to have faith of it’s larger scale existence.

Conifer or deciduous?

I agree Phaedrus… there are aspects of christianity and judaism I admire… especially the strong community bond. It’s why I’ve repeatedly stated that I’d rather raise my kid christian than atheistic/agnostic. When he’s older he can make the decision for himself, but being christian does by and large lead to a more moral and responsible population. Are there still creeps and assholes? of course, but that is covered in my book, throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

I myself cannot partake of the Kool-Aid. I like the wisdom of buddhism, and the wisdom of christ… but I cannot accept the god of christ, judaism, buddhism. I cannot accept that suffering is bad… much is learned from mistakes, and much is learned from suffering.

People define who they are by what they believe… politically and theistically. Some people ride the middle of the fence on both, others have chosen one side or the other. As far as atheism is concerned, I think it is not a philosophy as it fails Voltaire’s requirement for such. Atheism is no more truthful than any theism. The philosophers job is to spread the moral truth, and we debate what is moral and true for the rest of man…

Not that they listen… Plato’s Republic perfectly describes our democrats and republicans, but they will continue to be voted for.

7

Scythe, your post didn’t seem to address very many of the points I brought up, and the majority were addressed with references to your “book.” I would like to discuss the issue, but I do ask you address my arguments.

You’re correct, by the definition of atheism according to dictionary.com:

But I think this covers the basics, not the details. Phaedrus addressed this well when discussing the differences between agnosticism, in which things are equiprobable, and atheism, in which probability plays a vital role.

Most people, including yourself, are atheists. You don’t believe in Zeus, Apollo, Aphrodite, etc. “Some of us just go one god further.”

8

In the since of the word religion, atheism is a religion, it is the belief of no belief! Even if you don’t make a choice, you have made a choice not to choose!

9

It is not a choice to not believe but rather that of which to believe in.

10

Obviously, my dry sense of humor was too much for you…

If I’m correct why quote dictionary.com?

So you’re admitting that atheism is more than just a dis-avowing of all gods?

not every atheist avows such a belief about the universe. Therefore, there are sects within atheism.

Wow… if I had a penny for every time I heard that, I’d have billions of dollars.

OR…

Maybe it’s possible, JUST possible that all of those ideas were describing the same entitity?

wavicle:

it is the belief of disavowing god, and spirituality. I liken it to someone who constantly complains about how the world is beating them down, nothing good ever happens, etc etc.

The issue isn’t that those things aren’t happening, their mind is intentionally ignoring them to keep up the defensive dogma against god and spirituality. Remember how I stated that “reality” is influenced by how you see the world and what you believe? There are several sects of atheism, the determinists, the chaosist, etc… the determinist IMO, is a fatalistic world view. The chaosist, is a hopeless world view. Neither is an attractive viewpoint to me. So even if I don’t believe that the bread and the water represent the blood and the body of christ, I’d rather swallow that pill than the pill of atheism.

The relativists among the atheists will then tell you that “evangelical christianity is just as dangerous as Islamic fascism!” To further prove that they have NO CLUE about spirituality and belief in god.

The book I’m reading (searching for darwins god), covers this in the prologue. That atheists tell us that science can tell us the meaning of life. And that meaning is that life is pointless. Is that a misunderstanding of atheism? Even in the atheistic threads where i challenged them to come up with an alternative attractive meaning to life, they cannot.

11

No, not possible. Study Greek mythology. Study Roman mythology. Different gods didn’t describe the same thing. I’m not sure where you’d even come up with such an idea.

Sounds like the book your reading is incorrect, but I’m glad they’re making false assumptions about what atheists believe. Yes, it is a misunderstanding. Of course I don’t think life is pointless. Then again, I’m not as hopeless as the masses, who have no faith in themselves, who only live life in the hope there is something afterwards, because they’re so disappointed with what they have in the here and now.

Maybe living for yourself isn’t attractive to you, but it is to me. I like helping my fellow man. I love playing my guitar, working as a stock broker, and being on a professional online gaming team. I love being with my girlfriend, my best friend, and my two kittens. I love my family, and look forward to my future, knowing I can do anything I put my mind to, and have many goals to accomplish.

If you have no reason to live, I’m sorry. I’m sorry if some can only be happy living for an entity upstairs, unable to find joy without one. I’ve never had such a problem, which very well might be why I’m atheist in the first place.

12

I have… they all describe the same thing. Read Campbell. Your rejection of the soul is ridiculous dorkydood. It’s not like atheism is some holy thing that would be less violent than other religions if it was a majority. You’d still be warring, you’d still be killing.

I think, that our soft, easy life leads many many people down the road of relativism and atheism. Without challenges, you never truly find out your inner character.

13

I may be out of line with this but All points are valid regardless of your own disposition,

Choosing to not beleive in an ocean is valid because you yourself have never seen one.

Choosing to beleive in on even though you haven’t seen one is also valid when many others have, Concept: how could they all be wrong?

Deciding not to beleive or disbeleive is also valid since you would rather know than guess anyways.

from what I have seen athiests don’t hate those who beleive in god, But they greatly dislike those who say they are stupid for not beleiving in god. Who can blame them though, that point of view is condecending and unjustafied, just something to consider.

14

I think some do… You don’t call something “evil” without a certain amount of hatred behind your words. You don’t call for the eradication of something, without a certain amount of hatred behind the words. Atheists here, in the vein of Dawkins and Harris have done that.

15

there are people like that within all spiritual groups, regardless of set, cristians called witches, muslims, and Jwes evil and attempted erraticate them.

But not all of christianity felt this way, it just so happens that those who did held major influance at the time.

I will not say their aren’t those who hate beleivers, but many of them do not, and would simply like to beleive or disbeleive in peace without being insulted for it.

I would like to know, if the majority of people were athiest, and each time you talked about your beliefs you were seen as stupid, how would you feel. If you look at it this way much dislike and even hatred can be both expected and explained.

Unfortunatly, as long as you argue and fight oves such minor things, you only continue to perpetuate such views of harted, and so you will find yourself fighting regardless of if you want to.

Currious, isn’t it?

16

“So called” religious people know just as much about god than atheists. No one’s idea of god is more right than anybody elses. The idea of god is completley subjective and to be compeltely honest there is no point in arguing over it. It’s all just a waste of time because no one will ever proove anything. Going along that philosophy, someone that says god does not exist has just as much proof and credibility than someone who says he/she/it does exist.

One does not need to belong to a religion, or even believe in god for that matter, to be spiritual. I would argue that there are alot of people that don’t belong to a religion that are more spiritual than those who do belong to one. Spirituality and religion do not go hand in hand. They are two completely different subjects that can help one be better at the other. Just because someone is religious doesn’t mean they are spiritual and vice versa.

The same authority you have to discredit an atheist’s opinion of spirituality, religion, and god.

17

Yeah, I certainly don’t hate theists. My girlfriend is one. I just think it’s a degrading belief often times.

I can state why life is not pointless for me. How could I do that for somebody else? I don’t live in anybody else’s shoes. Some people find their passion in music, some in dance, some in theatre, some in the stock market, some in science, some in philosophy. I think it’s up to the individual to fulfill themselves, and life is the process of self discovery IMO.

18

Ok…Enough!

                                       ATHIESTS

  1. Some of you are saying atheism does not believe in God…It’s doctrine say’s nothing about not believing in the Metiphysical and most athiest do from a scientific standpoint…Which is= Spirit’s, godform’s relative being’s, science and energy, A combination of everything.

  2. God is a…What? Spirit…??? Entity? Essance? Conciousness? Athiest believe in all of these thing’s. If you wanted to go by Definition Athiest do not believe in “THE” “GOD” Creator of everything or the Christian Viewpoint. They Do however believe in the Metiphysical.(Again this varies with the athiest but 90% do)

  3. Athiest Believe in whatever they can reason or can prove through science or personal experiance and varies depending on the athiest in mind or discussion.

  4. Your Science (if your species survives long enough without killing itself) will eventualy understand the Metiphysical in graphic detail and scientific standpoint, Hence= What you now consider to be God’s,god’s, Will merley turn into entities or other beings classified just like your animals, diferent species, and races of people are now. Sort of like: African americans Cocasions, mexican, ETC.

                                     THEISTS

  5. Believe in some God, or god’s (Usualy this word refers to the Christian or Catholic faith’s).

  6. See everything in Black and white No grey area. (You are either for God or against God) No neutral parties. (this in itself shows a severe lack of understanding of the metaphysical and GOD in general, especialy when god himself is porttrayed as Chaotic in nature by the bible)

  7. Completely illogical. (Which is a good step as the Universe canot be explained by logic)

  8. Hypocracy is, well a large unintentional part of their belief’s. (Action speak louder than word’s, Dont tell me your not hypocritical show me…)

  9. Sheer belief (Faith) in the face of overwhelming Odds as far as fact and History that debunks their belief. (Not belief in God persay but belief in the bible as the word of God)

  10. Many denomination’s which cant seam to figure out which one is more Correct or more true. (When None of them would know Jesus if he walked up to them, as a matter of fact if he was a desease ridden begger and came up to them they would probably kick him in the gutter or drive off really fast, Or pretend he didnt exist…)

                                   Families of both

Athiest:

  1. Tend to be well grounded on what is believed to be reality based on fact’s and what can be reasoned or proved.

  2. Children tend to be excelent student’s (As far as academics are concerned)

  3. Prejudice due to belief is not present.

  4. Tend to be kinder to everyone and more understanding of idea’s (Tend to be more open minded)

  5. tend to be more emotionaly withdrawn (lean tword sociopathic scientific points of view)

  6. Moral’s as far as society is concerned depending on the Region and environment which the family is located.

                                         Theists

  7. Families tend to have a more closenit relationship.

  8. Morals are usualy very strong.

  9. Children tend to be encouraged about prejudice due to religious belief’s and oppinion’s.

  10. Student’s are more prone to make poor grade’s depending on the social structure of the environment due to religiouse belief’s.

  11. More likely to get expelled for fighting over stated religiouse belief’s as most seam unable to discus there belief without defending their entire family and God. (Prejudice agianst other belief’s, everything not viewed as or for God is satanic or evil, telling other’s they will go to hell, trying to convert others to there own belief, Etc)

  12. If the child decides to have an oppinion of there own about religion most families will try to “Force” God onto the child especialy young questioning one’s, Damaging mental and psychological aspect’s of the child. (Brainwashing) Go to a church and watch the childrens service listen to exactly what is said and the example’s. These children are no where near old enough to comprehend anything haveing to do with such aspects as metiphysical, Yet they are told that God is there creator he loves them that if they do not worship him they will go to hell…Etc.

  13. If it were not that Religion was an excepted practice in today’s society this would be lables as psychological trauma and child abuse. Would you tell your child that if he/she didnt do as you told him that you would set her/his skin on fire and let them burn in everlasting pain? That is exactly what the church tells them God will do if they do not worship him…Only in a much sweeter voice…

Me:

I am neither of these. And do not take my word, look at these examples than look at the society that souround’s you Go to a church if you are an Athiest and listen to the service’s, If your a thiest try looking at your world through non Thiestic eye’s.

Decide for yourself, They both have there ups and down’s but all that really matters is that YOU are Happy by what you believe in and that it fills that gapping void inside you which yerns for somthing you have yet to find.

There are many many more options besides these two or three. Infinite option’s really. Mix and match if you like make your own even, It is after all your existance…So do with it what you please, Just make sure you enjoy doing it and find peace and comfort within you and The Universe it’self.

Your purpose here is to lern…So get to it.

19

The error in your argument here is making the words religion and belief equivocally interchangable synonyms which they are not. Where a square is a type of rectangle but not vice-versa, so too religion is a type of belief but also not vice-versa. When you go from belief to religion is when you have an elaborate ritualistic tradition to observe in expressing and exercising your belief. Atheism is a belief-system, yes, but should never be confused with religion, b/c there is no atheists’ bible from which atheists indoctrinate one another with and atheists do not meet together regularly on a doctrine-established day of the week to discuss their absense of faith and how to convert believers to the ways of the non-believer – there is no evangelical spirit in the atheist. Atheism simply means the absense of religion [really God] --it contains the word atheism because it is preceded by the prefix “a-” which denotes a state of negation comparative to the rootword upon which it is attached-- and atheists merely live secure in the knowledge that there is no god(s) and conduct their lives as all other people do whether for better or worse or all the gray in-betweens. I know plenty of atheists who are quite moral and compassionate people and, conversely, religious people who are some of the most immoral, unethical and compassionless people I know. Your morality-immorality has nothing to do with whether you believe in God(-ess) or not.

lhw – AKA: The Straight-faced Clown AKA: M.C. Tape-HIss

20

Dorkyd00d’s experience as a devout christian is of no surprise to me.

Now he just gets his beliefs from a more credible source.

Dorkyd00d, can you explain your reasons for moving from agnoticism to atheism (bitterness towards the religious, bringing out in you the need to repeatedly prove to yourself your superiority over them, doesn’t qualify. Athiests argue with the same desperate, passion-fueled intensity as the fanatical christian. The athiest just feels more comfortable because he can source “science.” I am guessign the level-headed rationality of an agnostic did not suit your needs)?