The origins of atheism

[GoldenBoy89]

Atheism is choosing to not believe in God. A baby does not believe or disbelieve in ANYTHING! The term atheism only makes sense if reference to theism (belief in God). The word "a-theism" literally means against God, but we now understand it as disbelief in God or gods. An inability to believe in anything (like babies and animals) does not equate to atheism.

I can agree with this. It is analogous to someone saying babies are Republicans and then someone else makes the claim that they are actually Democrats only to then have someone come along and say babies are actually Independents because they don't claim any political affiliation. When in reality, babies are just babies and have no political beliefs. Just like they have no religious beliefs and thus, no belief on whether gods exist or not. They are not atheist, nor theist.

 

[GoldenBoy89]

i completely understand what your saying

Thank you! It's always nice to meet someone who hears what you're saying.

 

[AV1611VET]

Oh I see, small g big G God. I constantly encounter Christians who think Satan is a living being today who big G God keeps on a short leash to do evil things. That Satan also has a bunch of demons on the payroll. I'm often told I have demonic goblins and such corrupting me......usually when I make a point that people can't conceade.

Yet once again, Colter.

Feel free to answer it.

 

[aus22]

Belk If you broaden the definition of religious to include Atheists than your wife is religious. But what does she do to be religious. Also why is she an Atheists. Did someone tell her. Would she sacrifice anything for her religion.
I belive that God communicated with people from te creation of the first humans. That is why there are so many religions and Gos. I do not thik these were all wrong but a misinterpretation of God message. I am concen only with the God that communicated to me but I do not think other religion or Gods are evil.

 

[Dr Bruce Atkinson]

That one word (bolded) says it all. Being told to submit comes off as a power play by a con artist.

Guess what? NO!

That shows that you have the 'normal' human default position in your inner being. It defines us. It is called 'original sin' and we were all born with it. You cannot trust an omnipotent being so you choose to disbelieve one exists (denial is easier than rebellion).
RE: submission: There is only one way human beings willingly submit to anyone (God or not) and that is if we truly trust that person with our best welfare. We see little glimpses of such trust when we submit to the surgeon's or pilots's competence sufficiently enough to go under the knife or ride in the plane. Expand that example to include your entire existence, even after you die, and you have some idea of what faith in God is all about. Of course no one is going to submit to a God they don't trust or don't even believe exists. Nor will you submit to a drunk surgeon or an infant pilot. That would be stupid.

But in this case, there IS a God who is all powerful, all knowing, and loves humanity enough to become human and experience even rejection and death in order to save us from ourselves. Trusting (and thus submitting to) Him is not stupid at all but is the wisest thing a human being can do.

 

[Dr Bruce Atkinson]

No, they don't.

You all sound like five year olds on the playground.

 

[AV1611VET]

You all sound like five year olds on the playground.

He started it!

 

[Archaeopteryx]

It seems clear you don't have the answers to the toughest questions in life and that's fine, you'll figure it out eventually.

Should he emulate you and pretend to have all the answers?

 

[LynnC]

Oh I see, small g big G God. I constantly encounter Christians who think Satan is a living being today who big G God keeps on a short leash to do evil things. That Satan also has a bunch of demons on the payroll. I'm often told I have demonic goblins and such corrupting me......usually when I make a point that people can't conceade.

Hi Colter,
Think about this...
there is no way you can tell me that what ISIS is doing is not demonic, and demon inspired.

and what about people that think it's ok to harvest baby parts?
Remember the ancient pagan practices where babies used to be sacrificed on altars? This is nothing but a new form of that... demon inspired.

 

[LynnC]

He started it!

hahahaha - I need a good laugh every day.

 

[Archaeopteryx]

I am honestly baffled by how, and why, people claim not to believe in a Creator of all.

There's no need to be baffled. Simply ask us.

I can't imagine why they think they exist, or what they think when it comes to their purpose... the purpose of life....

Some people believe that life is either imbued with theological significance or else it has no significance at all; it is meaningless. I don't subscribe to this nihilistic philosophy.

Honestly I agree with what is written in the Bible, that
we are all born with a 'knowing' that something greater than ourselves must exist, even though we can not understand it, or how...

Even if true, this doesn't necessarily imply theism. An atheist can acknowledge that there are many things greater than herself, without committing to the doctrines of any particular religion.

Honestly I think atheists are what they are merely because they don't like the idea of rules, and they view religion as a set of rules, rather than as a blessing, the Word, from the One that created us and wants to guide us into blessings. Every designer knows best the way to implement his designs.

Most atheists don't have an aversion to rules per se, but the rules of religion in particular are mostly superstitious and in some cases may even be harmful.

Honestly I think atheists are self-deceived in order to pursue life the way they want to pursue it... making themselves their own gods.

That would make them theists, wouldn't it?

 

[AirPo]

You all sound like five year olds on the playground.

We have a history and it's not embedded!

 

[Archaeopteryx]

Biblicallly speaking, the "heart" is associated with our deepest desires. The fool does not want to believe in God, so he/she finds 'rational' reasons for not doing so. People can rationalize about anything that they want to believe or do. If, by God's grace and spiritual power, our hearts are changed, then we come to want relationship with God. If our hearts are not changed, then it is natural (original sin) to not want to believe in God.

Why are you assuming that I don't want to know the truth? If there is a god, I want to know about it. Unfortunately, however, religion has been been terribly unsuccessful in advancing a compelling case for theism, so I remain unconvinced.

 

[David Colin Gould]

Life has no meaning. Life has no purpose.

But things that are alive can create meaning and take purposeful actions.

 

[ecco]

...
What is new is that some political regimes have claim to be atheists like Communists or Nazi

Just for the record, Nazi Germany never claimed to be atheist. American propaganda claimed Nazi's were atheists so they could get German Americans to fight against Germany.

German officers had "Gott Mitt Uns" (God is with us) inscribed on their belt buckles.

Hitler used the teachings of Luther to inflame Christian Germans against Jews.

Martin Luther
'On the Jews and their Lies'
Chapter 15

First to set fire to their synagogues or schools and to bury and cover with dirt whatever will not burn, so that no man will ever again see a stone or cinder of them. This is to be done in honor of our Lord and of Christendom, so that God might see that we are Christians, and do not condone or knowingly tolerate such public lying, cursing, and blaspheming of his Son and of his Christians. ​

 

[LynnC]

There's no need to be baffled. Simply ask us.

Some people believe that life is either imbued with theological significance or else it has no significance at all; it is meaningless. I don't subscribe to this nihilistic philosophy.

Even if true, this doesn't necessarily imply theism. An atheist can acknowledge that there are many things greater than herself, without committing to the doctrines of any particular religion.

Most atheists don't have an aversion to rules per se, but the rules of religion in particular are mostly superstitious and in some cases may even be harmful.

That would make them theists, wouldn't it?

Hi Arch, (hope it's ok if I shorten your name?)
Let me start with that last, by saying;
exactly, we all believe in a god, one way or another. When we don't believe in an authority higher than ourselves we make ourselves our own god.

You mention, 'without committing to the doctrines of a particular religion'
There is a difference between rejecting religion,
and rejecting belief in a Creator. It seems to me that what you reject is religion which tells us what that higher authority expects.
To be an a-theist means you do not believe in a higher power at all... that none exists... and that there is no explanation or purpose for our existence. It is this that baffles me... how anyone can deny that somehow, something greater than ourselves created everything... otherwise it would not exist... consciousness would not even exist... we would be as nothing, because we came from nothing. There has to be a purpose behind everything, even if we do not yet understand it.

One of my favorite verses from 'God', or the Creator if you prefer...
'for now we see only as in a glass darkly,
but then (when we die and meet our Maker) we will know in full'
I look forward to that day.

Peace and blessings to you.

 

[Dmitri Martila]

Atheists are interested in the philosophical truths that theism provides, just not interested in the source of the truths. Atheism provides a way to deny the source of all philosophical truths.

River without source is not the river. Indeed, as the Hawking wrote on atheists (no other kind of people he sees around): "we are just robots."

 

[Archaeopteryx]

Hi Arch, (hope it's ok if I shorten your name?)
Let me start with that last, by saying;
exactly, we all believe in a god, one way or another. When we don't believe in an authority higher than ourselves we make ourselves our own god.

How are you using the word "god" here?

You mention, 'without committing to the doctrines of a particular religion'
There is a difference between rejecting religion,
and rejecting belief in a Creator. It seems to me that what you reject is religion which tells us what that higher authority expects.
To be an a-theist means you do not believe in a higher power at all... that none exists... and that there is no explanation or purpose for our existence.

That's incorrect. To be an atheist simply means that you do not believe in gods. That's all.

It is this that baffles me... how anyone can deny that somehow, something greater than ourselves created everything... otherwise it would not exist... consciousness would not even exist... we would be as nothing, because we came from nothing. There has to be a purpose behind everything, even if we do not yet understand it.

This sounds similar to an argument from ignorance.

 

[withwonderingawe]

Hello there everyone. I am sure this has been discussed before but I would like to start a new discussion on this. I want to hear your opinions on why do you think atheism exists and its cause. I will tell mine only after I see yours.

MMMmmmmm what I’m going to say will probably get me thrown off this discussion board.

1, Wrytui you quote Saint John of Damacus

“I believe in one God, the source of all things, without beginning, uncreated, immortal and unassailable, eternal, everlasting, incomprehensible, bodiless, invisible, uncircumscribed, without form. I believe in one superessential Being, one Godhead greater than our conception of divinity, in three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and I adore Him alone. I worship one God, one Godhead, but I adore three persons: God the Father, God the Son made flesh, and God the Holy Spirit, one God”

If that’s the way God was explained to me I would be an atheist too!

Incomprehensible?

“And this is life eternal to know thee the only true God and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent” John 17

2, Another point where I believe Christianity has fail is to sufficiently explain suffering, how can a God of love allow all the suffering in the world. Every atheist I ever spoke to wants a rational explanation of why God created in the first place and then why must we suffer.

3, I believe many people become disillusioned with the way fundamentalist have taught the Bible, I mean the insistence of God creating in six twenty four hours days, the earth is 6000 years old, ex nihilo or something from nothing, the flood, Jonah and the whale etc. They are taught all of this growing up and then they go off to collage and in a short time it’s all destroyed by the secular world.

4,We need to better understand evolution and abiogenesis. It really is a hoax. There is an article here; http://wasdarwinwrong.com/korthof98.htm

"The probability of the spontaneous origin of this is: P < 10-1018. The spontaneous origin of 1,800 nucleotides is the Koonin-threshold for the origin of life and evolution. No Origin of Life (OOL) researcher put it more clearly and dramatically than Koonin. Please note 1,800 nucleotides is a minimum. Every OOL researcher that skips over the Koonin threshold makes a serious scientific oversight."

That probability of less than 10 to the 1018 power represents more years than this earth has been around. We need to educate our atheist friends more on this issue, I don't think most of them have any idea how flimsy their faith in evolution is.

 

[Foxhole87]

romans 1:20 - For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse

This statement is the only "right" statement you've made, in that scripture does say that.

There are other verses i cant seem to place... but my belief is that the existence of a god is self evident. God's fingerprint is over everything in this world, and i can clearly see it as his handiwork.

"Self-evident" is a demonstration of special pleading. You don't get to assert your "truth" and when asked to support it, respond with "well it is self-evident".
I find it obvious that X exists.
Therefore, X exists.
This is not a cogent argument.

We both see the same thing, but the athiest attributes it to .. randomness, or science or what have you, but the follower of God attributes it to God.

Lightning bolts and sickness are two examples of things that I'm sure we can agree the scientific explanation has exhaustively been more useful than "God made it" or "evil spirits did it". I also don't see how you can attribute a phenomenon to "science", that's like saying my glass holds 12 ounces of beverage because of "arithmetic".

Atheists exist just like blind people exist. and for the same reason, because somethings frigged up with them.

So atheists are broken people, and the omnipotent, benevolent God does not cure the broken people and instead condemns them to a bad afterlife for all of eternity because of a defect? I think you'll be hard pressed to find another person here to agree with your sentiment, let alone any serious or otherwise significant theological argument favoring it.

I have considered all that I know about this universe, and passed through countless scenerios in my mind. To me, it seems that evolution(speciation), if true, and if there is no god, would create a "god". So God is more of a question of when, than if.

What is your credibility on any of these subjects?
Also, you're at odds with scripture if you suggest that God is simply the result of evolution; I'm shocked AV1611VET hasn't jumped at the opportunity to refute this.

what does evolution create when you have infinite time, and limitless space? A God. obviously. us in the past generation alone, have made it to where us being a god is conceivable. remember, you dont have to be a god to youreself.... just to a lower being. I could be "god" of some computerized germ city, probably within my lifetime. God is so [bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse]in possible its ridiculous.

Nope, evolution does not work that way, it doesn't have a ladder that organisms climb up to omnipotence. It gears with survival and fitness. The "perfect" organism is the one that currently survives. That's it.