does Atheism exist.......

[skitzee2k]

Why is it that with information becoming increasingly readily and easily available, and more and more acts of violence/terrorism/wars being reported with a religious undercurrent, more and more people who have access to this data are coming to the conclusion that maybe there isn't a god at all? On the other hand, I suppose that this observation is biased based on personal experiences (I work in an 11-18 CE school )

Are you sure you mean that Dex?.... isn't the war on terror (aka islam) bolstering the muslim ideal? The people you're referring to, surely, are middle class white people who were, by default 'christian', but never really prayed or anything, and then heard about Richard Dawkings !! and realised that their focus was money, Ikea and reality TV?

A valid point, up to a point. Not sure that Dawkins said that, but then again only got halfway through his god delusion book before knocking it on the head.

I'd recommend "Greatest Show on Earth"

 

[dextrous]

Also it is lifted from a Pagan holiday. They didn't know when he died or was born so they put one on the festival of lights and the other on the pagan holiday at the equinox....even the name itself comes from "Ēostre" a pagan goddess...
...i.e. the easiest way to convert someone from their old religion to a new one is to make a hybrid.

As you are well aware, it's the representation that matters, not the fact. Unless on a slightly different track, one really does beleive in transubstantiation, in which case it's all to be taken literally.

There is a growing school of belief that Jesus didn't exist at all...

There is also a school of thought that the holocaust didn't happen either. We await evidence (of the former - I'm not of the latter train of thought ), although it will be interesting to see how anyone can find evidence that someone didn't exist

 

[dextrous]

I'd recommend "Greatest Show on Earth"

Circus movie with Charlton Heston What was the subliminal message

 

[imamartian]

Why is it that with information becoming increasingly readily and easily available, and more and more acts of violence/terrorism/wars being reported with a religious undercurrent, more and more people who have access to this data are coming to the conclusion that maybe there isn't a god at all? On the other hand, I suppose that this observation is biased based on personal experiences (I work in an 11-18 CE school )

Are you sure you mean that Dex?.... isn't the war on terror (aka islam) bolstering the muslim ideal? The people you're referring to, surely, are middle class white people who were, by default 'christian', but never really prayed or anything, and then heard about Richard Dawkings !! and realised that their focus was money, Ikea and reality TV?

A valid point, up to a point. Not sure that Dawkins said that, but then again only got halfway through his god delusion book before knocking it on the head.

Dex, i don't believe that i said RD had said anything in my post? but anyway... i read The God Delusion, and realised that i was no longer an atheist as i believe that some way down the line, a bizarre mad scientist created all that we know in a laboratory, in a different dimension... and so therefore, that scientist is my God.... so i can't be an atheist. But what i don't believe in, is praying to some overseer, who will help my Gran pull through pneumonia, or will tell me next Saturday's lottery numbers... or will condone throwing housebricks at a woman until she is dead for sleeping with someone other than her husband !!!!

 

[skitzee2k]

There is a growing school of belief that Jesus didn't exist at all...

There is also a school of thought that the holocaust didn't happen either. We await evidence (of the former - I'm not of the latter train of thought ), although it will be interesting to see how anyone can find evidence that someone didn't exist

Two very different types of belief.
One is denying hard evidence, the people saying Jesus probably didn't exist are pointing out that for a man that was supposedly the son of god, he wasn't mentioned by anyone alive at the time....even the people that were writing about EVERYTHING ...including the bread levels in the stores of Jerusalem...

Also...God made human, born of a virgin, had twelve disciples,was betrayed by one, raised people from the dead, died on a cross, came back three days later...is a story that was well documented before 'Jesus' was supposedly born....it goes back to the myth of Osiris which was found in scriptures thousands of years before 'Jesus'..
...bit of a coincidence don't you think?

...and normally we require proof to think someone DID exist...if there isn't any...maybe we shouldn't be so sure

 

[imamartian]

...what a load of crap...Islam isn't the fastest growing religious stance....Atheism is, soon there will be no religion...and we'll have to find something else to kill each other about...

I am getting in early and declaring war on all Gingers

You're wrong... Islam is growing in an unprecented fashion with respect to the rest of the planet...

But let's 'play' with your idea a little, that atheism is winning the race.... that's a but like saying "countries without nuclear arms far outweigh those countries with nuclear capabilities!" now who's gonna win that war i wonder !!!!!

That analogy doesn't make any sense. Religion doesn't do you any favours or give you any advantage..but interestingly, as you mentioned Nuclear Weapons, if it wasn't for the racial and religious hatred Hitler showed, he would have had a gentleman called Albert Einstein working for him...whos research and tech made the atom bomb possible.

In other words, if Hitler wasn't so into his religious war, he would of had the ability to take over the world.

Skitz, the point i'm making is that in the religious 'arms race', the atheists are the hippies without any arms (or beliefs), and therefore much less radical, much less potent, and much much less unified.... plus there really are so many fewer atheists, that there are believers....

 

[skitzee2k]

Dex, i don't believe that i said RD had said anything in my post? but anyway... i read The God Delusion, and realised that i was no longer an atheist as i believe that some way down the line, a bizarre mad scientist created all that we know in a laboratory, in a different dimension... and so therefore, that scientist is my God.... so i can't be an atheist. But what i don't believe in, is praying to some overseer, who will help my Gran pull through pneumonia, or will tell me next Saturday's lottery numbers... or will condone throwing housebricks at a woman until she is dead for sleeping with someone other than her husband !!!!

SO your a kind of deist.

 

[skitzee2k]

...what a load of crap...Islam isn't the fastest growing religious stance....Atheism is, soon there will be no religion...and we'll have to find something else to kill each other about...

I am getting in early and declaring war on all Gingers

You're wrong... Islam is growing in an unprecented fashion with respect to the rest of the planet...

But let's 'play' with your idea a little, that atheism is winning the race.... that's a but like saying "countries without nuclear arms far outweigh those countries with nuclear capabilities!" now who's gonna win that war i wonder !!!!!

That analogy doesn't make any sense. Religion doesn't do you any favours or give you any advantage..but interestingly, as you mentioned Nuclear Weapons, if it wasn't for the racial and religious hatred Hitler showed, he would have had a gentleman called Albert Einstein working for him...whos research and tech made the atom bomb possible.

In other words, if Hitler wasn't so into his religious war, he would of had the ability to take over the world.

Skitz, the point i'm making is that in the religious 'arms race', the atheists are the hippies without any arms (or beliefs), and therefore much less radical, much less potent, and much much less unified.... plus there really are so many fewer atheists, that there are believers....

China...USSR....The hippies ladies and gentlemen.

 

[skitzee2k]

I'd recommend "Greatest Show on Earth"

Circus movie with Charlton Heston What was the subliminal message

Triple post

It is a Evolution book, a biology book basically. Very interesting and will keep your brain ticking over.

 

[dextrous]

Dex, i don't believe that i said RD had said anything in my post?

it was when you jumped from dawkins to money etc - I thought that maybe he had said something about materialism being our deity, which came up later in his book or elsewhere

but anyway... i read The God Delusion,

no mean feat

and realised that i was no longer an atheist as i believe that some way down the line, a bizarre mad scientist created all that we know in a laboratory, in a different dimension... and so therefore, that scientist is my God.... so i can't be an atheist.

You took men in black too literally

But what i don't believe in, is praying to some overseer, who will help my Gran pull through pneumonia, or will tell me next Saturday's lottery numbers... or will condone throwing housebricks at a woman until she is dead for sleeping with someone other than her husband !!!!

Agree. Although it would be so much easier if God were like this.

As far as I can make out, god is of little to no value to anyone - if he did indeed create us, he seems quite happy to leave us in the sh*t. Discarded pets are taken into care and treated better than that. So, if he does exist, he can just f*ck off as he's a waste of time and space

 

[skitzee2k]

Dex, the God Delusion wasn't that hard to read..was quite enjoyable..he did dumb a few things down a little, but that is his job I guess.

His other books are equally good.

Any type of God just doesn't seem probable at all.

 

[dextrous]

Dex, the God Delusion wasn't that hard to read..was quite enjoyable..he did dumb a few things down a little, but that is his job I guess.

I found it not difficult but increasingly repetitive. After a while one gets the gist and it seemed as though he had pages to fill more than anything new to fill them with. Bit like Stephen King novels

Did it get any better towards the end?

 

[imamartian]

Dex, the God Delusion wasn't that hard to read..was quite enjoyable..he did dumb a few things down a little, but that is his job I guess.

I found it not difficult but increasingly repetitive. After a while one gets the gist and it seemed as though he had pages to fill more than anything new to fill them with. Bit like Stephen King novels

Did it get any better towards the end?

in the end???? God killed everyone!!!!

 

[dextrous]

in the end???? God killed everyone!!!!

And so it came to pass.....

 

[Karinska]

Dex, the God Delusion wasn't that hard to read..was quite enjoyable..he did dumb a few things down a little, but that is his job I guess.

I found it not difficult but increasingly repetitive. After a while one gets the gist and it seemed as though he had pages to fill more than anything new to fill them with. Bit like Stephen King novels

Did it get any better towards the end?

in the end???? God killed everyone!!!!

No change there then