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By Jim Downard
Okay, so I do not believe in the existence of “God.” I cannot see him, feel him (physically or his “being” as some believers say), hear him or smell him. I don’t believe in hell or Satan either. I identify as atheist.
Today I was having an argument with my family about atheism and my mother believes that you have to sign a legal document to actually identify as an atheist. I think that’s BS. You can identify as whatever you want and believe in, just like your gender. My brother says that atheists believe that they will be reincarnated as a part of nature when they die. I also think that’s BS. Atheism is nothing like Buddhism or Hinduism, and I know those two religions believe in some form of life after death. Atheists don’t believe in religion.
What I know about atheism is that they don’t believe in the existence of God or Satan or heaven or hell. It’s simple, but they’re trying to get me to believe that.
So the questions I want to ask are: Do atheists believe in reincarnation like Buddhism? Do atheists believe in other religions or gods? Do you have to sign a legal document to identify as an atheist? And if I’m wrong about atheism, what is it? And since I don’t believe in God or reincarnation, what am I?
Thank you for taking the time to answer my many questions, it will be extremely helpful with my next argument with my family about religion.
Alas, your family is astonishingly ill-informed on what atheism consists of. My condolences. First, I can’t recall any atheist who believes in reincarnation (which is a notion Buddhism adopted from Hinduism, and hence knee deep in religious assumptions about souls and what happens to them after death). There may be some, though they would have to have a notion of an extra-physical surviving spirit or mind that is also a concept not many atheists believe to be true.
1 There is no God.
2 Morality is antiquated
3 We are but animals
4 White culture is responsible for every modern advancement
5 The other races haven’t caught up yet in their evolution, although Asians are close.
6 We are animals, life has no purpose, no meaning, so live it however you wish, there is no good no evil, no true right or wrong.Society may punish you if you get caught, but that’s the key.
7 There is no truth, only perception
8 There is only instinct,do what you like, but get an education so you can be the fittest in whatever you do, those that do not are weak, and irrational.
9 Do not feel guilty about anything, guilt is a form of false religious indoctrination that still permeates society.It doesn’t matter what you do, just because you are smarter than a cockroach, does not make life any more valuable. The world is overpopulated, the herd needs culling anyway.
10 The only politics that should be engaged in are those that further evolutionary causes, and abortion. Try to find gun supporters, however as we need them.Try for lowered sentences under the law as animals are meant to run free, not be locked up.
Proof of thesis is not needed, we have it in science, minorities are prone to violence, that is good as they are less educated, haven’t evolved to our level yet, so let them keep killing themselves off , and aborting their young. Keeping them on welfare is costly, but worth it in the short term.Once the system goes bankrupt, they will starve out anyway from lack of desire to work, and without a free ride, they won’t survive. It’s simply nature weeding out the weak and lazy, that’s all.
Encourage the provocation and continued eradication of religions and their fake gods meant to keep you in line, not doing whatever you wish.Society will change, and once morality is eliminated, then further the goals towards acceptance of every lifestyle, because following instinct is natural.limiting yourself from following you natural instincts based on another trying to control you is not natural.
The strong will dominate, the weak will submit or die, that is the natural order.
It is time to get fully educated, and follow natural law.Governments and Religions are simply control mechanisms that are outdated.
That’s an (almost) adequate, if a bit over-the-top, account of objectivism (the philosophy advanced by the infamous sociopath Ayn Rand) and at least one school of Satanism (as explained to me by a self-avowed practicioner), but even of those extreme cases, this is a caricature. If it’s meant to apply to atheism, it misses the mark widely.
It is the simple truth 2 absolutes, you live, you die, anything else is opinion. I believe only what science can prove, morality , anything else is subject to opinion, thus not believable. FSM, Easter Bunny, Religion, Morals, all the same.
What do you make of Sam Harris’ argument in “The Moral Landscape” that neuroscience provides a valid and universal basis for objective morality?
I don’t even fully accept evolution yet.They haven’t proven it yet. I do not consider any of the circular reasoning promoted by any theory.
It may be the most logical, but I still do not accept it till science has the proper evidence.I am sufficient enough to answer I do not know.To promote a flawed model and proclaim it as if it is factual, only gives crackpots ammunition against it to continue their nonsense.
Until there is solid unquestionable evidence, I will not believe anything.Having a theory is fine.Proclaiming it as factual is the similar to claiming a deity.
As far as any philosophy it is conjecture. Neuroscience as a basis for morality, I think not.There is no morality, who decides what morality is? Some are born with tendencies and instincts that are different from others.Others find enjoyment in activities that others find distasteful, it doesn’t matter.As animals , it doesn’t matter in nature what actions are taken.
There is no reason to care what happens to anyone , your opinion may be different, but factually it does not matter.Life goes on, but who knows for how much longer.
There are too many humans, and the population is growing exponentially. The earth cannot continue to support this growth. Humans have over infested the planet, it is time to restore balance.
Wow. Cynicism is a cheap substitute for wisdom, and invincible ignorance is not a worldview. If you were as skeptical as you claim to be, you wouldn’t be engaging in this discussion in the first place. I can only assume you’re either acting in bad faith or being facetious at this point.
Believe what you wish, it matters not to me.Truth is only in the eyes of the beholder.I do not deny anything, I do not need to. I do not deny that humans are delusional in their value, religion claims to value life , yet they kill for it.It is hypocracy.
It doesnt matter that they kill, their actions are beneficial to the planet.It matters they deny science and nature ,spreading like a plague and will set science back 500 years.Religion set us back 1500 years by burning the library of Alexandria.
Morality is killing this planet, and then there will be no life at all to worry about.It is even more genocidal than culling the herd of the sickly, and weak, the lazy.
Don’t bother asking me about any situational ethics, there are none.
Ask if any action of cruelty is wrong, the answer will be no. Ask if I would like someone to be cruel to me, I would say no. Ask if it matters if anyone were cruel to me, the answer is still no. Ask if they should be cruel to me if they wished to do so and could, yes.Would I try to stop them yes.
And yet if it did not matter, you wouldn’t be pushing this incoherent nonsense as hard as you are; your words and deeds are very much those of someone who feels the need to convince others. You’re either lying to yourself or to us. Or, more likely, both.
Hey JBsheppard, How’s it going? I understand, and can kinda appreciate where you are coming from on some points. I just want to make sure I’m hearing you (reading) correctly. You do not believe or adhere to any explanation of the inexplicable. I agree that we are all equally ignorant in many inexplicable areas of existence, so I refrain from choosing one belief or ideology at the exclusion of all of the others. However, I do have my own moral (lack of better word) compass that I follow based around my definitions and beliefs of love and respect.
Am I wrong in thinking you’re coming from a position closely akin to nihilism or the thoughts of Nietzsche? Thanks in advance for answering my question.
If those are your instincts, follow them.
I know of nihilism, I haven’t read any books on it, I do not care for philosophy whatsoever.
Both instinctual kindness and revenge, the need to maintain order would weed out the psychopathic behaviors and eliminate it from society.
If someone were to steal from me , I would react accordingly, they would no longer be stealing from anyone.If a rapist were to try and harm anyone in my family, they would pay the price, as we are never alone, we are armed.The same thing with my nieghbors.
Self preservation.You do not need morality to understand that following instinct over fictional morality is anything other than natural law.A leads to B and the consequences would be C.
Look at what tolerance and morality has led to. Prisons full and bankrupting the states. Inner cities filled with violence, rioting, gangs and drugs.If society doesn’t like such behaviors, kill it off to maintain order.
No one in my neighborhood would do such things.Anyone that started would be shot.Its not about morality whatsoever.
It is like putting down a rabid dog.Violence is a great tool of order as well as chaos.
It’s survival of the fittest and selection, culling of the herd.Actions are not immoral, but have consequences,when there are no consequences it becomes detrimental to natural order.Imprisonment is not part of natural order.
Okey Dokey, then. Thanks for answering my question. I’m out…
Atheism is the known fact there is no deity. Man is an animal, beyond life and death, everything else is opinion and philosophy, neither of which is valid.
I deal only in factual absolutes, I choose what to do based on my own instinct nothing more.
There is nothing to judge anybody on other than irrational beliefs in stupidity, and to follow opinions , which has led us to overpopulation, and a polluted planet. We could advance technology so much faster without the irrational ideals that have led to wasted money on prisons, care for diseases that do not spread, feeding the weak and lazy. We abort the unborn, the population also needs many abortions.
Deceived by motions of grandeur, and religious structuring has left mankind thinking we are some noble creature. We are simply animals, just accept it , individuals mean nothing to nature.The only way to restore balance is to let it happen.If people can’t feed themselves, too bad, if they are too lazy to work, or can’t get a job, too bad, go somewhere else and get one, or starve.
Time to let nature run its course.
If we dont, we end up killing the planet and dying anyway.why put it off for a few extra years of suffering , pain, and expensive treatments.When a horse suffers, kill it, put it out of misery, we do the same with dogs, it should be the same with humans.
Wait, why is JB’s atheism definition racist? Why is white culture included?
Honestly, he seems just to be posting offensive things for the sake of being offensive. I’ve tried repeatedly to engage him in honest discussion, but he flees from it like a shadow flees the sunlight, and (I suspect) for much the same reason. That said, I encourage you to try. You may well have better luck than I.
Apart from an adjustment to number one (to read “there appear ti be no god(s)” as using the capitalized “God” presupposes an unwarranted restriction of concepts to one particular version of supernatural entities) I would disagree with the other 9 statements as being factually and philosophically questionable.
We are “but animals” who happen to have brain systems that actively make moral judgments as naturally as we burp, and sloughing off that side of us is of negligible utility. Issues of good or bad action make morality no more “antiquated” than justice or kindness. The meaninglessness of “no truth, only perception” is certainly illustrated by the sciences, where saying we “perceive” that apples fall is just another way of saying that our perceptions reflect something that is objectively true underlying those perceptions. (btw there are some people whose neurobiology does not allow them to perceive motion visually, does that mean things have stopped moving for them? I would suggest not, because there is in fact a true reality out there that does not change based on our perceptions or lack of them.)
Thus I must get off the glib positivism bus represented here, with my head shaking in a sigh over that “white culture” trope that suggests a less then broad understanding of how we have come to make progress and what parts diverse peoples have played in getting to that point.
Again opinion, but you are correct on one point I should have stated it as deities.Morals are opinions, it is the same as a religious standard. Each person has an opinion on it, just like there are many religions, even amongst themselves they argue about right and wrong.
There is no right or wrong.It cannot be proven.What is real is nature.Live by your nature. Nobody can make you feel guilty for following your nature, guilt is another relative term.
You might be killed for it, but that’s the way it should be.You harm another, if they are stronger, you die, if you are stronger you live. That’s it.No reason to worry about it, you will die anyway,rather than living to expectations , be true to your nature, enjoy what you have, do as you please.In the end nothing else matters.