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about that Stephen Fry interview and atheism in general...

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kiunchbb said:
You mean atheist believe there are no god or any higher being. "Lack of belief in god" can mean there is a god, but just not believe in it. I think most atheist here argues that God doesn't exist.

I am curious, do atheists think human is the most powerful being, since they don't believe in existent of god or any higher being. What if there are alien powerful enough to be consider a god in our point of view?
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There are atheists that are opposed to abortion, the word only defines one position on one question.

Do you believe in god? Yes, theist. No, atheist.

All other beliefs about powerful entities, aliens, etc... arent relevant.
 
Necromanti said:
Maybe that's what Fry was getting at with his argument. It was less a criticism against a god he doesn't believe in, but rather one aimed at the followers who would be able to respect such a being regardless of its actions (or lack thereof). Perhaps that's where part of the "angry atheist" trope comes from as well; they are people angry with believers who they feel justify atrocities with, from their perspective, a very shaky foundation of reasoning.
"Complexity" is subjective, relative, and isn't limited to just cognition.
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Oh I agree completely. Fry's argument was simply if a God does exist, why the hell would anyone even want to follow someone that could sit by and let the world fall into such a horrible place. He would be a horrible being that isn't worthy of worship or praise.
 
PhantomHound said:
I gave the definition of free will based on our dictionary. What it means to me, would be a little different, and some people would argue that the complete notion of free will is a complete fabrication.
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"Our dictionary." You mean the one that you found from Google and liked what it had to say.
 
RealityExists said:
yes, I get that. From what I've encountered those things serve as the catalyst for the angry atheist to build their case against the idea of a god/gods.
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This doesn't make any sense. You've got the causation backwards. It goes "figure out your religion isn't true" -> "get upset that people lied to you about it being true." Not the other way around.

if the idea of god was such a nonpoint it would seem to me the stances from these angry atheists would be far less "god doesn't exist because A), B) or C) reason" and instead be "of course god doesn't exist, my life is about _____ instead"
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Again, these are people who feel that the people who raised them lied to them. Their reaction is to argue back with the people who told them all these lies. Completely understandable human reaction. Especially since religion still has a substantial impact on our society, culture, and politics.

I suspect to some degree Stephen Fry is very upset about the idea of god otherwise he wouldn't be so impassioned about all the atrocities this creator perpetrated against humanity.
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Yes. He probably is, given the nasty views and beliefs that a lot of people attribute to their idea of God. I get pretty impassioned about fundamentalists trying to deny evolution in science classes, does that mean I secretly believe in God?
 
kiunchbb said:
You mean atheist believe there are no god or any higher being. "Lack of belief in god" can mean there is a god, but just not believe in it. I think most atheist here argues that God doesn't exist.

I am curious, do atheists think human is the most powerful being, since they don't believe in existent of god or any higher being. What if there are alien powerful enough to be consider a god in our point of view?
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These godlike aliens would probably be able to explain themselves, and explain how they're doing these "miraculous" things. Instead of giving us the good book that has absolutely nothing factual of the origins of anything.
 
super-heated plasma said:
Because its the ultimate thing to strive for in this life. And in the next life maybe there are other things to strive for as well just without all the misery.
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So if the whole point is to strive for something then why not just start in heaven if there are still things to strive for?

If there aren't things to strive for then you're back to the original problem.

So either way you have a problem.
 
PhantomHound said:
Merriam Webster dictionary. I actually posted the definition that would agree with my detractors.
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My point was that it's ridiculous to bicker about dictionary definitions as if they are hard facts that cannot be argued. It's better to just explain what *you* meant when using the words you chose to use. Do not defer to dictionaries or bibles and tell people to look things up on their own.
 
karasu said:
That is such a strange barometer for meaning.
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It's really not.

King_moc's post that you quoted was pointing out that there doesn't have to be a divine meaning to life. No god-given reason for each individual human to exist.

You quoted him asking why a nonreligious person would completely lack for meaning.

My post was to illustrate that you were both referring to different "meanings". To demonstrate that each individual human being is not divinely inspired for a singular purpose. We are not born "destined to bear the jeweled crown of Aquilonia upon a troubled brow". Each human life is born with no purpose, no reason, no inherent meaning.

Life has what meaning we give it. Your purpose is what you make it. It's not to say that you can't have meaning, just that you aren't born with one.
 
Why does God give free will, but then create a set of rules and demands for his believers to go to Heaven?

"I'm giving you free will, except for this random list of things over which you have no say if you want eternal life."
 
riskVSreward said:
There are atheists that are opposed to abortion, the word only defines one position on one question.

Do you believe in god? Yes, theist. No, atheist.

All other beliefs about powerful entities, aliens, etc... arent relevant.
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What if bible is a story of super saiyan alien trolling us (I don't think god in bible is from earth). Wouldn't theist be someone that worshipping alien? And god is just a term describing alien with godtier technology. If we consider it this way atheist would just be someone that don't believe in alien.

This is why I think the belief of powerful entities or alien is important.

BTW I really hate this example since I sound like that dude from history channel.

BladeoftheImmortal said:
These godlike aliens would probably be able to explain themselves, and explain how they're doing these "miraculous" things. Instead of giving us the good book that has absolutely nothing factual of the origins of anything.
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We don't explain to ants why we stomp on them. But sometime we like to build an ant farms.
 
Manu said:
Why does God give free will, but then create a set of rules and demands for his believers to go to Heaven?

"I'm giving you free will, except for this random list of things over which you have no say if you want eternal life."
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Because it's not free will and logically makes no sense. I've come to accept the fact that certain people could never be swayed about their religious beliefs because the thought of nothingness after death shakes them to their core.
 
kiunchbb said:
What if bible is a story of super saiyan alien trolling us (I don't think god in bible is from earth). Wouldn't theist be someone that worshipping alien? And god is just a term describing alien with godtier technology. If we consider it this way atheist would just be someone that don't believe in alien.

This is why I think the belief of powerful entities or alien is important.

BTW I really hate this example since I sound like that dude from history channel.
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You're making aliens with god features so either its exactly the same or you could come up with terms like Alienist and AAlienist... I don't know, don't care, and don't see how its relevant to the diacussion. You creating an alien god class just to muddy the term atheist is stupid.

I don't share your belief that believing in powerful entities is important. I only believe in things in which I have EVIDENCE.
 
kiunchbb said:
What if bible is a story of super saiyan alien trolling us (I don't think god in bible is from earth). Wouldn't theist be someone that worshipping alien? And god is just a term describing alien with godtier technology. If we consider it this way atheist would just be someone that don't believe in alien.

This is why I think the belief of powerful entities or alien is important.

BTW I really hate this example since I sound like that dude from history channel.



We don't explain to ants why we stomp on them. But sometime we like to build an ant farms.
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But see, here you're reducing god to something wholly explainable and understandable, which he is by definition not. The "any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic" routine doesn't work as a comparison because the aliens in question do understand how their technology works and presumably could explain it to us if they wanted to. Similarly, regardless of whether or not an ant can understand what a human is, humans neither demand ants worship them, nor do they have any control over an ant's destination in the ant afterlife. On top of that, were an ant capable of reason on that level, humans would be pretty easy to believe in, since we're clearly visible and actively intervening in ants' business on a regular basis for clear and understandable purposes.
 
kiunchbb said:
We don't explain to ants why we stomp on them. But sometime we like to build an ant farms.
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We probably wouldn't stomp on them if we saw them riding around on ant cars with ant air conditioners and ant internet.

But that also begs the question, why would they come here if they don't care about us in the first place?

As for your other argument, you have to prove it's a super alien doing this shit to us. I don't have to go along with the argument and believe into it if there's no evidence to be found.

Edit: I usually say sorry to insects before I kill them, and give a reason for it. Although I try not to kill insects if I can help it. Saw an ant in my house today. I just let it do its business. It wasn't hurting nobody.I certainly didn't give it cancer.
 
PhantomHound said:
By our definition yes.

Free will in the biblical sense would just refer to that god has no action in what we choose to do.
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Going by that definition we have no free will, because we need to follow God's rules in order to go to Heaven.

I mean, you can choose not to follow them, but that would mean willingly disobeying God.
 
Manu said:
Going by that definition we have no free will, because we need to follow God's rules in order to go to Heaven.

I mean, you can choose not to follow them, but that would mean willingly disobeying God.
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Yeah free will :D. You don't have to follow the rules.
 
riskVSreward said:
Yup, not like boring churches and boring god abiding lives. Its just all sex and drugs, so boring!
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You are going to a clearly different atheist temple than the one I go.

Regarding atheism being boring... yeah, we could use some holy wars to spike things up and after the killing we can say that the violent ones weren't true atheists.

*washes hands
 
Manu said:
Why would anyone who believes in God and wants to go to Heaven not follow them though?

Basically, the more you believe and adhere to God's rules, the less free will you have.
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The 10 commandments aint so bad.

I assume they would follow them then.

Not really because you are deciding freely to follow those rules.
 
collige said:
The "problem of evil" as it's commonly referred to is the idea that the Abrahamic God is supposed to be both all-powerful and benevolent, despite the fact that he decided to make things extraordinarily shitty for us humans. Good things happening is consistent with the way God has been described, yet horrible shit happening to good people presents a problem that religious establishments have to reconcile with their worldview.
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God tests good people. The harder your tests are, the more rewards you will get in the after life if you remain diligent.
 
PhantomHound said:
The 10 commandments aint so bad.

I assume they would follow them then.

Not really because you are deciding freely to follow those rules.
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The first 4, and the last one are awful commandments.

And it's not free choice, it's coercion. Do this or you get sent to eternal torture.
 
ibyea said:
The first 4, and the last one are awful commandments.

And it's not free choice, it's coercion. Do this or you get sent to eternal torture.
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Are you talking about the first set of ten commandments or the second? Because much like the bible's genesis accounts, there are some startling inconsistencies.
 
super-heated plasma said:
Because its the ultimate thing to strive for in this life. And in the next life maybe there are other things to strive for as well just without all the misery.
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Soooo by your own metric, you can have something to strive for in paradise. But...

super-heated plasma said:
If everything was a perfect happy paradise, then what would be the point of life? There would be nothing to strive for. Nothing to make us want to better ourselves. Nothing that would make each joyful moment that much more meaningful.
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