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DoomUK

A question for atheists

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The orginial question was about what happens after death, I believe.

Well, my belief is that nothing happens. That's it, game over. Does make me wonder if thats what my nan is (not) experiencing after passing away yesterday morning. Whatever is going on, it must be better than suffering cancer any longer.

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I believe that maybe when we die we just start another life as another person without any memory of previous lives. Is that a religion? I hope not...

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HumanBones said:

I am sure that they were curious about the lives they were living and why they were living them that way. It's possible that people were not thinking about me or you, and were only concerned with themselves. If they decided that whatever they were doing was meaningless...well, cause and effect.

What I mean is the part of our evolutionary history before we had developed enough brains to think about whether what they did "mattered". Back when they were as "curious about the lives they were living" as an amoeba.

DoomUK said:

If sex is so fundamental and hard-coded, why are we choosy about our partners?

Because the people who tried to impregnate rocks died off long ago.

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Oohh.. my favorite topic. Because nihilism sucks and enjoying life doesn't.

Actually, I'm not athiest. I guess you could say I fall into what Bank said:

Anybody claiming to be sure about what happens after we die or how we came about in the first place is nuts.

and Khorus:

Because I live for the now.

and Reckonmajor's misunderstood by Liam's post:

> realize existence is meaningless
> eat a box of donuts
> get a tummyache
> realize eating a box of donuts is a bad idea
> everything's back to normal

Jodwin said:

What if the world simply doesn't exist? What if it's all simply a hallucination that I'm experiencing and none of you really exist in any concrete form? As soon as I'll die, the whole world just disappears.

...yeah.

I ate a brownie and came to this conclusion. It was so compelling I spent a year in intermitten despair that this was really the case. It doesn't upset me as much as it did closer to having eaten the brownie, but it's not a pleasant thought for me. Mark Twain wrote on it very eloquently and I quoted him in another one of my posts on this topic buried somewhere in my blogs I believe (but maybe in EE).

40oz said:

This thread reminds me of a document I wrote one time after coming down from a serious DXM drug trip.

As I was coming down from the trip I started to feel more and more depressed and paranoid as I was sobering into reality. Thinking some pretty awful suicidal thoughts and developing a "logical" reason why I needed to kill myself.

See above. This has happened to me on numerous occasions from marijuana.

I'm surprised more people on here don't entertain the more new-agey spiritualism that is anti-religion but pro 'life has a purpose, this life is just part of a larger journey/plan' but I have to run right now, so I can't elaborate on that atm. This does seem to be the most popular form of spirituality going right now (outside the bible belt, but why am I being American-centric?)

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Technician said:

Manly reply, bro. Super not gay!


I know I almost didn't post it, I don't wanna be accused of trolling but I guess it was a way of contributing without getting into this subject as it seems every corner has been covered.

And actually I take it back I don't worship them.. They worship me!

Oh and after watching a new (to the UK) Family Guy Episode, it turns out Stewie Griffin created the Universe, discussion over!

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"'god did it' is an entirely self contradictory concept.. its a square circle.. its 2+2=5, even worse, like 2+2 is green" lol

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Yeah, God-did-it is the most generic, base answer any human can give. For some reason we're still stuck on that answer as a society.

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40oz said:

This thread reminds me of a document I wrote one time after coming down from a serious DXM drug trip.


I missed this before, but shouldn't you be advocating we throw you in jail for breaking the law or something? Or do you consider your depressing "insights" to be a prison?

There seems to be a funny correlation around here between people doing drugs and then fielding unfalsifiable ideas as though they are worth believing.

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I say the scientific method is like building a house upon a foundation. Any theories or hypotheses must rest upon that foundation, and the foundation must be strong. (Not a mind-blowing simile, but hey.) However, saying "God did it" and shoehorning all of your experience into that idea is like suspending a TV in midair, then trying to build a house around it.

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I'm Christian. It kind of bothers me that some people claim I "Waste" my life. I don't object to people believing in any thing but the thing that troubles me if there was no God, how do you tell Right from Wrong?

I know the majority believe it's wrong to murder and it's wrong to rape, but there are people who believe it's the right thing to do. Who gets to ultimately decide what is Right and what is Wrong if there is no God? Should Adolf Hitler decide? Should George W. Bush decide?

I know every one hates religion and that the majority of people believe that Christians or insane bastards. And I know I probably don't look good saying this because of the extremists that I have nothing to do with and the majority of Christians have nothing to do with, but the way I see it, a lot of the world's terror has been caused by this problem : How do you tell Right from Wrong?

There was a school shooting, not as famous as the Columbine Shooting. What happened there was this kid named Kip Kingle (I think that was his name) went into his with an assault rifle and killed a bunch of kids. When he was arrested he was quoted of saying "If there was a God he wouldn't let me feel the way I do, there is no God only hate." . Well maybe he felt like that because he wouldn't believe in a God and realize, he loves me and every one in existence.

The thing that bothers me is that these Christian extremists go around killing people and what not and everyone thinks "Well 2% of Christians have killed people, that must mean all Christians in the world are murderers and heartless".

Any way, I'm rambling. If people think I'm "Wasting" my life, I'd say, fine, but the after life to spend eternity with God and his love and glory is well worth "Wasting" my life.

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888mikem888 said:

Who gets to ultimately decide what is Right and what is Wrong if there is no God? Should Adolf Hitler decide? Should George W. Bush decide?


How about you decide? Do you want someone to murder or rape you, or someone you care about? No? Wow, that was hard.

888mikem888 said:

The thing that bothers me is that these Christian extremists go around killing people and what not and everyone thinks "Well 2% of Christians have killed people, that must mean all Christians in the world are murderers and heartless".


As part of "everyone", no I don't think that. That would be association by guilt, probably one of the most used logical fallacies. Although it helps to know that and I really wish schools would teach basic logic.

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Scet said:

How about you decide? Do you want someone to murder or rape you, or someone you care about? No? Wow, that was hard.


Ok, so what if I decide it's alright to come to your house and kill you? You might decide it's not right for me to kill you, but according to what you said, it's alright for me to kill you because I decide it is.

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888mikem888 said:

Ok, so what if I decide it's alright to come to your house and kill you? You might decide it's not right for me to kill you, but according to what you said, it's alright for me to kill you because I decide it is.


Well we could either kill each other, or agree not to kill anyone. I'm pretty sure the idea of being part of society and how its laws where chosen is in an earlier part of the thread.

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Scet said:

Well we could either kill each other, or agree not to kill anyone. I'm pretty sure the idea of being part of society and how its laws where chosen is in an earlier part of the thread.


You failed to see my point. You said, "You decide whats Right and whats Wrong" and most people will say "It's wrong to kill someone" And I agree to that. BUT, there are people who believe it's right to kill some one. Laws are nothing but words written on paper created by humans who believe it WRONG or RIGHT to do this or that. And I agree, we should obey these laws.

But there are people like Hitler who believed it was right to kill millions of Jews. HE wrote the laws for Germany in his time.

Do you get what I'm saying?

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888mikem888 said:

You failed to see my point. You said, "You decide whats Right and whats Wrong" and most people will say "It's wrong to kill someone" And I agree to that. BUT, there are people who believe it's right to kill some one. Laws are nothing but words written on paper created by humans who believe it WRONG or RIGHT to do this or that. And I agree, we should obey these laws.

Yeah you're right, the laws are just words. I can't see any persuasion they could possibly have on people.

888mikem888 said:

I know the majority believe it's wrong to murder and it's wrong to rape, but there are people who believe it's the right thing to do. Who gets to ultimately decide what is Right and what is Wrong if there is no God? Should Adolf Hitler decide? Should George W. Bush decide?

Both Christian men, both with senseless blood on their hands.

888mikem888 said:

But there are people like Hitler who believed it was right to kill millions of Jews. HE wrote the laws for Germany in his time.

Adolf Hitler said:

My feelings as a Christian points me to my Lord and Savior as a fighter. It points me to the man who once in loneliness, surrounded by a few followers, recognized these Jews for what they were and summoned men to fight against them and who, God's truth! was greatest not as a sufferer but as a fighter. In boundless love as a Christian and as a man I read through the passage which tells us how the Lord at last rose in His might and seized the scourge to drive out of the Temple the brood of vipers and adders. How terrific was His fight for the world against the Jewish poison. To-day, after two thousand years, with deepest emotion I recognize more profoundly than ever before the fact that it was for this that He had to shed His blood upon the Cross. As a Christian I have no duty to allow myself to be cheated, but I have the duty to be a fighter for truth and justice... And if there is anything which could demonstrate that we are acting rightly it is the distress that daily grows. For as a Christian I have also a duty to my own people.

-12 April 1922 [Baynes]

Because God, by default, can influence what's right or wrong.

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Technician said:

both with senseless blood on their hands


Hitler was pretty bad too iirc so all three of them really.

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@Technician : You didn't get my point either. I'm not talking about only non-Christians. Like I said before, there exist Christian extremists who kill people. Adolf Hitler wasn't Christian. He tricked people into believing he was but he's not. He use the Christian belief for propaganda to make himself look more likable, he wasn't influenced by God at all, only power. Same goes for George W. Bush.

The majority of Christians (ones who actually read the Bible) go by the Ten Commandments. The Ten Commandments were revealed to Moses by God. One of the Commandments is "Thou shall not murder". It's understandable why it's bad to murder people. But people who don't believe in God obviously don't believe that God gave Moses the Ten Commandments so no one ever told any one about moralities to begin with! So that being said, IF there was no God, how would we REALLY know what is right and wrong? Some people will give the argument it's right to murder some one if their standard of living isn't high enough. Who's to say some one wouldn't push to make a law where it would be legal to kill some one disabled on the spot? What if that went all the way through? What would happen years later? People would believe it's right to kill some one if their disabled.

Am I making any more sense? Because I don't think any one is actually getting my point.

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888mikem888 said:

the thing that troubles me if there was no God, how do you tell Right from Wrong? {...} Who gets to ultimately decide what is Right and what is Wrong if there is no God? Should Adolf Hitler decide? Should George W. Bush decide?

Society decides through concensus after steady, incremental developments in the fields of anthropology, science and philosophy etc. have been made, when mankind has shifted onto unfamiliar grounds presenting moral questions that before would have held little meaning or cause. The abolition of slavery was one such development. An inate sense of morality coupled with environental exposure will shape an individual's sense of what is right and what is wrong, and those who do not adhere to the standards outlined by society can in most cases be deemed socio or physchopathic. Or, at least when concerned with actions that to this day all known societies have considered repulisive: Murder, adultery, theft etc.

Of course, what you're really chatting about it moral objectivism. While I don't think one actually needs a set of moral principles to refer to once evolution and societal constructs have been cited, you can always take a look at the Golden Rule, which, although not at all perfect, is a damn stretch more convincing than a celestial mandate that bundles in women with asses and oxen.

The thing that bothers me is that these Christian extremists go around killing people and what not and everyone thinks "Well 2% of Christians have killed people, that must mean all Christians in the world are murderers and heartless".

Well those people deserve to have their heads bashed in. I don't sight 4 purple swans then write off the whole species as physchedelic bread peckers!

I would like to own a purple swan, though. Not that I could in the UK as they're all owned by the Queen, which is a stupid rule and one which should be overthrown, might I add. I mean, like she needs'em or something. What a crock!

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I think you can objectively define wrong/evil as intentionally causing pain to beings capable of feeling pain (its more complex than that because the hypothetical situation where if you push someone onto railroad tracks to somehow save all the passengers, that would be a choice of lesser total overall pain caused. Plus you have to factor in preventing pleasure/happiness, and the varying degrees of pain that can be felt by varying degrees of consciousness (ant vs human).

So is it wrong to randomly stab someone. If you use the definition above, then yes (by definition). You can TRICK your mind into a moral path like 'the flying spaghetti monster will send me to heaven if I'm good' or any nearly infinite number of made up things, but whether or not that affects your behavior has no affect on its truth. Being true and (supposedly) causing moral behavior are independent of eachother.

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Arrgh! No one is even reading what I'm saying!

Ok, so I'll repeat my last example but try to word it better.

There are these group of scientists who will test you and see how high your living standards are. Living standards are how useful you are in society, ex. how smart you are, how strong you are, if you have any mental/physical disabilities or not. They were pushing into the courts that if one's living standards aren't high enough, they should be allowed to kill them.

Now say that it actually went through the courts and it became legal to kill some one who doesn't have high enough living standards. Would you think that is wrong? I would.

But now that it became a law, it would become LEGALLY right to kill a disabled person. People would start to think "Well there's a reason it became a law, so it must be alright" the what will happen? Millions of people will be killed because of this law.

Most people on this forum might think it's wrong to kill a disabled person. But what? Because a small group of people made it a law it's now morally right?

I'm not saying this is going to happen but I'm just trying to create an example. Does any one get what I'm saying now?

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st.alfonzo said:

I would like to own a purple swan, though. Not that I could in the UK as they're all owned by the Queen, which is a stupid rule and one which should be overthrown, might I add. I mean, like she needs'em or something. What a crock!


Write up a petition, man. Get your Swan.

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888mikem888 said:

Does any one get what I'm saying now?


No. Incase you are trying to somehow prove that someone's and/or their god's morality or whatever is "more moral" than everyone elses, then that's just like your opinion, dude.

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888mikem888 said:

Adolf Hitler wasn't Christian.

There are people who take Christianity a lot less seriously than Hitler has. Hell, most evangelical Christians haven't read the Bible, Hitler had. Do you know your Bible, not just the few tidbits we hear daily? Be honest.

888mikem888 said:

He tricked people into believing he was but he's not. He use the Christian belief for propaganda to make himself look more likable, he wasn't influenced by God at all, only power. Same goes for George W. Bush.

How do you know the man wasn't Christian? That's a big assumption."The man only used his Volkswagon to trick people into buying Domestic. He wasn't really as VW owner." Why do you get to choose his beliefs? Because he doesn't represent your religion at it's best? Bullshit. That's the beauty, you can pretty much make what you want of Christian doctrine, good and bad. Who gets to choose what's right and wrong?

888mikem888 said:

The majority of Christians (ones who actually read the Bible) go by the Ten Commandments.

Yeah, this is why priests molest children. Hey, it's not written.

888mikem888 said:

Thou shall not murder". It's understandable why it's bad to murder people. But people who don't believe in God obviously don't believe that God gave Moses the Ten Commandments so no one ever told any one about moralities to begin with!

Jesus, if that's not circular logic, I don't know what is. Insinuating humanity was a festering, filthy, evil mud hole before God killed all the first born and finally got around to telling Moses it's wrong to kill, and than went on to kill many tribes.

888mikem888 said:

So that being said, IF there was no God, how would we REALLY know what is right and wrong?

Hey, I'm doing pretty good. I haven't raped or killed yet. Maybe my evil genes that our god of atheism, Evolution, hasn't kicked in yet.

888mikem888 said:

Some people will give the argument it's right to murder some one if their standard of living isn't high enough. Who's to say some one wouldn't push to make a law where it would be legal to kill some one disabled on the spot? What if that went all the way through? What would happen years later? People would believe it's right to kill some one if their disabled.

So this is why Japan and Sweden has made it mandatory to kill all autistics.

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Ok then, we have our own opinions. I was just trying to share mine. Obviously my opinion is not liked so there's no point in repeating my self.

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Technician said:

There are people who take Christianity a lot less seriously than Hitler has. Hell, most evangelical Christians haven't read the Bible, Hitler had. Do you know your Bible, not just the few tidbits we hear daily? Be honest.


Believe it or not I do read the Bible, and I don't recall the Bible saying any thing about killing off Jews.


But I'm done now. I don't want to end up having some one burn my house down.

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No, it's because you only believe people who invest only in the ten commandments know true right and wrong. Heck, the commandments aren't even complete. It says nothing about rape.

Many civilizations has had similar rules to the ten commandments. Many civilizations today that are not particularly secular (Sweden and Japan for example) make or nation (founded on Christian beliefs, apparently) crime rate look savage. Oh whoops, I forgot about those damn heathen foreigners.

The Bible has many contradictions where whole cities of people were killed and used as slaves. Why is that right? Because they weren't God's chosen people?

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Technician, You didn't get my point AT ALL. I put way too much effort in bothering to get my point across. It's not that difficult of a question to understand, How do you REALLY know what is right and what is wrong? No body obviously gets what I'm talking about, you and every else can continue your lives with the belief that you really showed me, but I really can't get get my point across clearly. I don't want to bother talking about this, this conversation is going no where. If that means that your a genius and I'm just a dumb crazy Christian, fine.

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888mikem888 said:

Believe it or not I do read the Bible, and I don't recall the Bible saying any thing about killing off Jews.

Actually I was talking about the genocide of the Canaanites, the Midianite, and the Sihon, but if you want some God on Jew killings read Numbers 16 1-50 -killing of fourteen thousand and seven hundred.

But I'm done now. I don't want to end up having some one burn my house down.

Ah, self victimization, the last resort of the theist. But your right, I wouldn't trust an atheist, they may kill you babies. Bawhahaha!

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