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Atheists - Any personal experiences you can't explain?

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Well, I honestly thought that's how most atheists would define themselves. Believe me, I'm glad to be wrong.

Well it's about time to realize this, because apart from fundamentalists I don't know of any other types who can believe the whole "atheists have no sense of morals, true value" and that kind of crap.

I'd be curious to know what exactly you mean by "higher spiritual truths and principles and meaning". Like, concrete examples.
 
Fair enough. I just think getting older and approaching death, no matter how good your life was, would have to be pretty depressing if you're a full on atheist who believes this one life on planet of the apes is all you're ever going to experience. I'd probably start to fear the inescapable void somewhat.

Yes this thought sucks and makes me wish we could live longer than 70-80-90 years, but i'm not going to force myself to believe into god(s) or heaven or living after death as a ghost or starting a new life again in another body with my old memory wiped (something that my father keep telling me, even if im not sure if he even believes in that himself) just to make me feel better.

If something after death does exist, great! But books alone aren't proof enough.
 
Well, I disagree, I think we transcend the physical paint at a fundamental level, but I do agree that it doesn't really require explanation.

I enjoy the search for some kind of answer, though. And my personal experiences have led me to believe there is more to the physical world than meets the eye.

And all I'm saying is that meaning doesn't have to be extrinsically defined. Meaning doesn't have to come from somewhere, it can arise emergently. There is nothing about rationalism and the regard of human thought as purely physical that makes the meanings people perceive any less real.
 
In the grand scheme of things, yes, it might well all be pointless. It doesn't make our individual lives and feelings and experiences meaningless, though. If you gave it a chance, you might actually see that.

Ultimately, you're not really much different from most any other religious person in that you believe what is comforting, not what is more rational. Its the old "There HAS to be more to it all" notion that really just seems to come from fear rather than any logical conclusion.

I think you might also have to accept that just maybe those that hold a different view aren't necessarily abandoning logic and rationality or just looking for comfort.

I consider myself a fairly lucid, reasonable person. But life sometimes has its own ideas of where it's going to take you. I didn't go out looking for this stuff. It found me, and I wasn't at all concerned with death or God at the time.
 
Fair enough. I just think getting older and approaching death, no matter how good your life was, would have to be pretty depressing if you're a full on atheist who believes this one life on planet of the apes is all you're ever going to experience. I'd probably start to fear the inescapable void somewhat.

And considering life had no real meaning or purpose would strike me as incredibly senseless. Why then do I have this consciousness that seems to rally against the notion so strongly. Why give me the power to imagine, laugh, love? Just functions of my swirling chemicals? Pointless, all of it. It would make me fairly nihilistic.

It doesn't make others nihilistic.

/end discussion
 
I think you might also have to accept that just maybe those that hold a different view aren't necessarily abandoning logic and rationality or just looking for comfort.

I consider myself a fairly lucid, reasonable person. But life sometimes has its own ideas of where it's going to take you. I didn't go out looking for this stuff. It found me, and I wasn't at all concerned with death or God at the time.
You may not have gone out looking for it, but along the way, you definitely seem to have dismissed a perfectly rational stance based on it not being comforting so it is essentially the same thing.
 
I think you might also have to accept that just maybe those that hold a different view aren't necessarily abandoning logic and rationality or just looking for comfort.

I consider myself a fairly lucid, reasonable person. But life sometimes has its own ideas of where it's going to take you. I didn't go out looking for this stuff. It found me, and I wasn't at all concerned with death or God at the time.

It's completely possible for intelligent, rational people to hold very irrational beliefs. Happens all the time.

Believing in anything without good evidence to support it, seems quite irrational to me. There is no good evidence, or even somewhat believable evidence that any supernatural god exists.
 
my old house in matteson,illinois 60443 was haunted as shit.

1) I will never forget the date of march 6,1998, around midnight or later in my basement/room, the furnace and the washer and dryer starting turning off and on and shaking violently. my brother room door opening and closing, also violently. wooden stairs sounded like boots running up and down constantly. the futon mattress i was sleeping on was shaking and pulsing just like a heart beat. cockroaches coming from cracks when not having any known pests and bugs. I started screaming like a little bitch and crying because i already knew what this shit was.

At first I thought it was an earthquake, but i just knew it wasn't, it felt like watching a vicious dog growl at you. that fear was just so surreal. no one else felt anything or heard anything later the next day, so that confirms not having an earthquake that night.....It was too real for any dream, and i couldn't go back to sleep for shit later that night because i was petrified for obvious reasons. no cockroaches, no evidence to show people...just that haunted damn memory. :(

Funny though, march 6 was the same day my mom had the house blessed with her pastor...........yea. take that as you will.

2) Another night, I'm pretty sure my sister had closed and locked the front door because it was pretty routine. the next morning, my dad starting yelling because the door was wide open. He said "why the fuck are you guys leaving the door open? You're letting spirits in". I don't know why, but that felt creepy as shit. Anyway, this continue for 4 days straight though out the day from various times. my pops got tired of us being careless ( I swear to god that i and my sister never left that door open, I'm 100% positive.) until my dad installed a beeping door alarm and automatic locking system with bolt locks for the front and back doors. A week later or so from that happening, my dad cleaned out the garage and parked his truck in there. A down the street neighbor was spotted entering our lawn by my pops. He was creeping up along the side of the house and my dad woke me up from the living room couch. My dad wanted to beat the shit out of him so he went to the alarm control panel to release the locks, the lights went red meaning error or something and the dead bolts wouldn't release. so my dad just pushed the police officer button. The guy was wiggling the door knob...i was pretty scared but my dad was ready for this motherfucker. we can see him through the front window, and as soon as my dad turned around, there was another guy in the backyard looking around. The cops rolled upped and sound their alarms, both guys and a car of 3 guys were arrested. Both men at the house was armed with guns, duplicated house keys for the front door and screen door, 3 pillow cases, 2 way radios and dressed in all black. The other guys in the car was also dressed in all black and one had a gun. On the neighbors statement, he wrote that he didn't think any one was home and had no intent on using the guns, he also knew that we didn't had a security system because he tried the keys a couple of weeks before at our yard sale(2 days before the front door starting opening mysteriously by itself)

Senica(the robber) said in court that he never went back to try and test the keys in between the first time and during the attempted robbery. All guys served jail time and was part of the folks (chicago gang).

I am pretty sure that alarm system malfunction and opening of the front door saved my dads life. Also, the door never opened by itself ever again after that even without the dead bolts on. :/

3) When i was in the navy, I was stationed in meridian mississippi for A school. On my last weekend after i got my hard copy orders, i started binge drinking and partying heavily. Someone by the name of SH2 rodgers, called my parents saying that i have attempted suicide on friday, october 10th 2008. I have misplaced my first gen iphone the day before when i set up shop on at the local motel 7 thursday night. i haven't call anyone since i found the phone on sunday october 12th. I have seen the voicemail messages from my parents,sister and cousins. I have listened to all of the voicemails and i was furious and at the same time embarrassed because I can't believe that someone told my parents that i have tried to kill my self, i would never try to do something like that. I called them back and they were so relieved that i was alright. My friends knocked on my door and was heading out to a local restaurant called garfields where all the local military personal head to at the local mall. We was all drinking heavily and the place is only down the street. I didn't want to go because i felt awful about this and was talking to my parents.

Jamar Clayton, My friend that was going on leave with me back home in chicago, crashed his rented car near the mall, killing a pedestrian, along with him and both of my other friends that was passengers. I would've been in that car if i have never found that iphone and talked with my loved ones. I live with this everyday of my life, and i just can't fall this under coincidence.

The navy have apologize on behalf of Meridian air base to my family about the mistake. SH2 rodgers have only been notified bits and pieces by the local police department saturday morning, that a Navy personal, Seamen Guidry, attempted suicide because his family members have died in a car crash killing all three of his love ones in upstate new york. I am also a seamen Guidry, But my name was Nathan Guidry, and he is Lorenzo Guidry. She assumed it was me because i was also a SH. So she was worried and jumped the gun and notified my parents, at the same time calling my phone.

I have so much other shit that had happen to me to not be a believer to some degree. I do not believe in church...i don't believe in an utopia of some sorts after death..but i believe in the concept of god. I believe that there is something that is more then mere coincidence. :/

Call me crazy, I wont mind, but after watching Twin Peaks, I remembered that when growing up, I had encountered several times situations where the very fabric of reality seemed to want to break down, if even for mere seconds or minutes. Ever since then, I have asked around my friends and all my relatives about their experiences (if they had one) - and my question always way: "Do you remember a time in your childhood, when you have a very clear memory of something so scary happening that you could not even believe the intensity of it, then later on it disappearing for some reason?"

And I have gotten very scary stories out of it - and unless everyone I know is crazy around me, including me, we DID have things that really could have been in a random Twin Peaks episode, and it always is regarding driving one into a state of intense fear, opening the consciousness up to experiences that are simply not possible with many people around. "Simple" as that.
As for the second story: damn, that is one rough lesson to live through.
 
So, my flippant response to the question is: There's a lot of shit that I can't explain. That doesn't mean someone else can't explain it.

My more serious response to the question is: I get a lot of the vus. Specifically, déjà vu, presque vu, déjà entendu and reja vu. A lot of times I feel like I have dreamed of doing something that I'm currently in the act of doing... and it's usually mundane, like walking down a hall, or having a normal conversation. I'll suddenly just kind of pause and say, "hey, I remember this one"... and then I'll say, "uhhhh no you don't, dumbass". I'm convinced it's either my meds or my head conditions kicking in and fucking with me, but it was something that would happen even when I was young, so it predates the PTSD.

I was visited by this guy while I tried taking a nap in the afternoon when I was a young kid.

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Where on the doll did he touch you?
 
So, my flippant response to the question is: There's a lot of shit that I can't explain. That doesn't mean someone else can't explain it.

My more serious response to the question is: I get a lot of the vus. Specifically, déjà vu, presque vu, déjà entendu and reja vu. A lot of times I feel like I have dreamed of doing something that I'm currently in the act of doing... and it's usually mundane, like walking down a hall, or having a normal conversation. I'll suddenly just kind of pause and say, "hey, I remember this one"... and then I'll say, "uhhhh no you don't, dumbass". I'm convinced it's either my meds or my head conditions kicking in and fucking with me, but it was something that would happen even when I was young, so it predates the PTSD.

I too get the feeling of deja vu a lot of times, personally I chalk it up to my shoddy memory.
 
Fair enough. I just think getting older and approaching death, no matter how good your life was, would have to be pretty depressing if you're a full on atheist who believes this one life on planet of the apes is all you're ever going to experience. I'd probably start to fear the inescapable void somewhat.

And considering life had no real meaning or purpose would strike me as incredibly senseless. Why then do I have this consciousness that seems to rally against the notion so strongly. Why give me the power to imagine, laugh, love? Just functions of my swirling chemicals? Pointless, all of it. It would make me fairly nihilistic.

But I accept now that that may not be true for everyone. This thread has actually changed my opinion as far as that is concerned, somewhat. Those are just my views, doesn't mean others will share it.

Nihilism is the rescue from despair.

Existentialism is the rescue from nihilism.

i.e. Despair because life is without meaning should it not persist.

Nihilism means - life will end for all, and it will end in the same way for all irrespective of what they've accomplished or not accomplished in life. Ergo, there is no meaning to living.

Existentialism - But irrespective of the meaningless of life, one desires survival. Our will to live overrides the logic of nihilistic meaningless. And while I should live, because I want to live, I shall take part of life to the fullest measure that I can, enjoying both the here and the now, and the future that I hope to be part of, if only for a fleeting moment.

the clue is in the name of existentialism - to embrace existence.

Essentially... life is precious. Life is beautiful. Enjoy it while you can, while it lasts. When death comes, you'll no longer need to be around to despair of it.
 
My dad is an extremist conservatve atheist, yet he has seen ghosts, and he can't explain it, he sometimes think he as just delusional or had a very active imagination, but his experiences were very real.

I on the other hand I had never experience stuff like that, except some premonitory dreams, and when reading tarot for fun I get everything right, however I do think is just my awesome intelligent subconscious that figures out things before I even get conscious about them.
 
Long time ago, when I was only a small kid, my friend told me that he had prayed for the particular RC Car model for Christmas and he had never told anyone what that was. He got that very same Car model as a Present. According to him, God listened and helped him.
 
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