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The reason I hate online atheists is because they just make it a personality trait to think that everyone who follows a religion is stupid and that all religion and religious books are bad.
Obviously people don’t read the bible and do everything instructed in it. Christians don’t follow the old testament even though it says not to eat pigs and is a book in their religion.
Recently on this subreddit someone told me that he knew of a very smart scientist who believed in God and then told me that his beliefs are just outside his area of expertise. Later that same person told me that a degree in Theology is a degree in useless make believe or something along those lines. Then what exactly makes someone an expert on religious beliefs. Because according to this person it’s not a theologist and it’s not someone who follows a religion. So from what I can tell, this athiesm poster meant that to be an expert on religion and knowing who or what God may or may not be, is to believe exactly as they believe.
Hypocrisy at it’s finest. Online atheists may have logically sound arguments, a lot of the times their arguments are flawed. I just want to emphasise to anyone who may be reading this, that atheism is a belief like any other, it is not fact, and it is not science, it is a belief. So do not try to force your belief on others or give them an essay on why they are stupid for believing in a god. It just makes you an asshole.
that atheism is a belief like any other, it is not fact, and it is not science, it is a belief.
For me, personally, I have not found or been presented with sufficient evidence to believe in the existence of any sort of deity. I don't consider it a belief so much as a lack of belief until sufficient evidence is provided. Which is a perfectly sensible default position towards any claim, really. My reason for deconverting was due to adopting much more stringent requirements for believing religious claims.
Only science is science. One's thinking and epistemology could be scientific or non-scientific, though. Science depends on using good quality evidence to inform our theories.
Exactly. Calling atheism a belief just like religion is absurd. That's like if I were to say underground lizard people control the government, then branding you a non-lizard-eist for not believing me. It's not a belief system, it's just the logical default when no evidence is presented.
The "atheism is just another belief" talking point is popular in religious circles because it's a little mental game they can play to try and make their lack of evidence equal to someone saying they lack evidence. They frame atheism as an assertion that no gods exist, which is therefore equal to a religious person making the assertion that their god does exist. We know that in reality, lack of belief in something (anything) is passive and the default (I'm not gonna believe that lizard people live in the sewers unless you prove it to me), but they try to frame it as an active claim because then it's just a bunch of people claiming different things.
It's just another form of deceit they wrap around themselves to hide from the fact that they have no actual evidence of the divine existing.
Isn't that the whole nuance between atheism and agnostism?
Agnosticism is not some sort of 'weak atheism', it is a completely independent thing, you can have gnostic theists, gnostic atheists, agnostic theists and agnostic atheists. It just means that you believe something can be known about the existence of god vs. you believe nothing can be known about it.
Thanks for the precision, I'm definitely not an expert in the topic, grew up completely religion-free.
You raise a good point. I feel like my personal issue is with gnostic atheists, who proudly trumpet that since human beings cannot prove that God exists then he must not exist and any attempt to think or act otherwise is just foolishness.
I'm much more conversationally compatible with the agnostic atheists who say we can't know that God exists so most likely he does not.
To be fair, there are assholes in all four quadrants, and my actual beef is with the assholes who feel like they need to force their belief or their lack thereof on me.
I would feel the same way about a militant zoroastrian who expects me to convert to their religion as I would against a militant Gnostic atheist who expects me to abandon my own.
And I also understand that many atheists have been antagonized by militant Christians for not believing and so therefore they are primed to defend themselves against anyone that identifies with their former enemies.
Realistically gnostic atheists and gnostic theists are just different flavors of the same type of stupid. Obviously we can argue one is more likely to be correct and how we should operate because of that, but that's covered by the atheist/theist part of the title. Anyone claiming to know something that's inherently unprovable is either stupid or intellectually lazy
This is a very good point that I completely missed, lack of belief is really a default which is what atheism is, or what agnostic athiesm is.
The chances of any religion on earth being close to correct are unbelievably small if at all. So to follow a religion at all will almost certainly not be following the most truest of truths. My problem is with people who take this fair and reasonable viewpoint, and morph it into hatred for people who do choose to believe in a religion. Sometimes it’s nice to believe in what probably isn’t true, that doesn’t make that person stupid or oblivious.
I really chose a bad term ‘online athiest’, I meant it more like who the term ‘average redditor’ describes vs who the factual average redditor would be. It may be misleading, but I’m not very good at coming up with names for things.
Ultimately my comment was directed at the author of this post, which says to take a book, that is over a thousand years old and do whatever is in it. The author of the post is what I’d call an ‘online athiest’ because they use the guise of athiesm to just post stupid drivel about a book I’m sure they have never read.
I appreciate the well thought out reply. I agree that choosing to believe in a thing does bring comfort in difficult times I know all too well. And I know the type to whom you directed your comment--the edgy atheist that is just rude and shits on anyone religious.
In an echo of your good faith... (And sorry for the lengthy post here). In case it is helpful to hear my perspective as it was for me to hear yours...
I admit that I have been less than kind about religion and have been the edgy atheist at times. That was wrong of me.
Your comment has given me cause to reflect.
I know my anger shouldn't be directed at all religious prople. It should be directed at the religious right who display bigotry and judgement, and also to the religious leaders who abuse their power. I let my anger, bitterness, and personal hurt get the better of me and I have lashed out too widely sometimes. Not ok. And I am sorry for the times I've done that.
Relevant backstory: I was religious for most of my life, over 40 years. My experience toward the end of that felt like utter betrayal.
I had gotten caught up in an evangelical church. Most people I interacted with were quick to judge, lecture, and preach though I had considered them friends. It was hurtful to discover most were interacting with me out of obligation, not authenticity. They weren't there to support me or be a friend, but just to police my actions.
(And while I get the biblical basis for what they did, they failed to act on 1 Cor 13 -- doing everything out of love, the kind that requires commitment, genuine connection, a relationship with authenticity and vulnerability, not just calling people out without having any real investment in their life).
I left that church. It took some years after that before I deconverted.
I realize I have anger and resentment towards those specific people and too often let it bleed over to more than just them.
I have always felt frustration and anger towards people who use religion as a cover for hatred and bigotry. As I am sure is true for you. Nothing wrong there except directing that anger more broadly.
I am also angry at myself for being sucked into that church and for putting my trust in untrustworthy people. I'm angry for letting my religious belief hurt others and myself over the years.
And I sometimes allow myself to be angry and disdainful of all religious people and that's simply not right or ok.
So I will do better. I will recognize my anger and deal with it more appropriately before commenting on religion or the religious.
Again thanks for the reply.
I myself am guilty of having been an ‘online athiest’, everyone does it, and we do let our personal biases get in the way of that. All I want, and I’m sure all anybody wants is for people to just respect each other and be kind, and it isn’t always easy, especially when no matter how hard you try there will be people who won’t reflect on themselves.
But for someone to see error in the ways of their past and try to change, no matter how successful they are, that’s all that matters. If everyone tried to be kind and understanding we’d all be better off for it.
Thanks for your comment, it’s great to hear your story :)
Have a good day my friend.
My parents would quote the old testament when it was convenient for threatening me as a child.
I’m sorry to hear that your parents would threaten you when you were a child.
Not disagreeing with the thrust that atheists can tend to push their views a bit but technically everyone is a bit of an atheist.
There are maybe 5000 gods currently being believed-in across the globe. A Christian doesn't believe in 4999 of them, an atheist doesn't believe in just one more.
Good comment, maybe it depends how you define pushing views, most religious people I’ve met have maybe spoke about how their personal views affect them but I’ve never met anyone who tried to push their views on me. Maybe I’ve just not met enough people.
Atheist may bother you online, but Theist literally bother you by knocking on your door on a Sunday.
Also most Atheists are Agnostic Atheists.
Sometimes a Jehovahs Witness will knock on your door, and you can just tell them you aren’t interested thanks.
Obviously what they believe isn’t true, but that doesn’t make them assholes. If someone genuinely believes that them knocking on your door and talking to you could actually save your soul in the afterlife, I won’t ever count that as bothering me. It can be annoying sometimes, but that’s usually because I’m already in a bad mood and not the fault of the door knocker.
If someone genuinely believes that them knocking on your door and talking to you could actually save your soul in the afterlife
The act of knocking on one's door is annoying but ultimately innocuous, true, but that ideology is a slippery slope. How better to write yourself a blank check that absolves you off your heinously cruel actions than to delude yourself with the belief that you're acting on some holy mandate from sky daddy? The Salem witch trials and the crusades jump to mind as stark examples of religion carried to its inevitable endgame.
Good point, to act on others in a way that most would deem unethical and unkind and use the excuse of religion to do these actions is terrible. Although I’m sure those who did these things you have given as examples didn’t end up in the good afterlife if there is one.
I’m not sure what a solution for this problem would be.
Whether these perpetrators received the afterlife they expected, or whether such a thing exists (if it does, it certainly has nothing to do with any manmade religious doctrine), is largely irrelevant. The salient point is that they believe it exists, and that whatever they do is ultimately justified because, as the Bible so keenly reinforces, it's okay to do objectively monstrous things (e.g. slaughtering an entire city's worth of men, women and children) as long as you're doing it in service of your god.
As long as people cling to these fairytales and fables as the inspired word of the creator of the universe, valuing their god more highly than other people, I don't see how it can change. The solution would be to deconstruct and demystify the fairytales, revealing them for what they are, but when someone has bought into the delusion as hard as religious zealots tend to do, they're much more likely to lash out than listen to reason.
You hate "online atheists" for throwing all religious people into one group, yet in your opening sentence you do the exact same thing with online atheists.
You then use the example of your interactions with one person online, an environment known to not bring out the best in people, and apply that to an entire group.
And then you call every online atheist a hypocrite... That's kind of hypocritical, don't you think? Very ironic, too.
And I don't even disagree fully with you that some atheist can be an absolute pain, and treat their atheism with the same group mentality as any religion. But being an asshole isn't tied to any religion. That's just a people problem.
Atheism is, however, absolutely not a belief. It is the absence of it. It's the lack of belief, because there is no proof. The same as not believing in fairy tales or Santa. Coming to a conclusion based on evidence, or lack there of, is science, however way you like to spin it. Hell, you can be a spiritual person and still be atheist.
And religion is responsible for some horrible shit too. Let people make a bit fun of it, at least.
An online athiest in my eyes, is no ordinary athiest, but someone who goes online to forums and “discusses athiesm” but in reality just makes fun of people who follow a religion. You can be someone who goes online and is an athiest, that doesn’t make someone an online athiest, you can even go on forums and discuss athiesm if you so please, you are still not an online athiest. An ‘online athiest’ is someone who specifically goes online to poke fun at people who don’t think how they think. It’s not kind and I won’t stand for it.
Your last paragraph really describes what makes an ‘online athiest’ as I call them, I can’t really think of a better word. It’s basically someone who is an asshole and uses athiesm as an excuse for their assholery.
Atheism is not science? I don’t think you truly understand what science is.
If you can successfully explain why Atheism is science I will declare you the most profoundly intelligent person to have ever existed.
Easy.
First we’ll define science (from the Oxford dictionary):
the systematic study of the structure and behavior of the physical and natural world through observation, experimentation, and the testing of theories against the evidence obtained.
Now we’ll define atheism (from Wikipedia):
Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there are no deities.
The absence of evidence for any deity or supernatural power is the natural result you get when applying the scientific method to religion.
The key concept here is that science requires reproducible experiments. So let us assume that a deity or other supernatural entity exists. What consistently reproducible experiment can people perform which provides evidence for that hypothesis? There is none. (Though if you have one, I’m sure there would be a Nobel Prize with your name on it. Simply publish your results. You’ll be famous immediately.)
So what does science do when a proposed model does not yield experimental results? It rejects the model completely. A few examples of this include the luminiferous aether (a mechanism for light to travel through vacuum), phlogiston theory (an explanation for fire), or spontaneous generation (a theory for where life comes from).
Personal opinions or beliefs do not matter to science. Only reproducible experiments do.
Tl;dr - Atheism is science because there does not (and likely cannot) exist an experiment which supports the existence of God.
Atheism still isn't science, it's just supported by science.
Sure, it’s more appropriate to say that atheism is the logical conclusion you arrive to when applying the scientific method to religion.
Of course Atheism isn't science, they are 2 different labels with different names to point to different things.
A hexagon also isn't a square, yet they do have similarities and are connected.
There is not, and likely cannot, be an experiment which proves the speed of light to be the fastest anything can travel in the universe. Yet scientists don’t take it to mean that the previous statement can’t possibly be true.
There are many things in science which cannot be proven to be true, that doesn’t make those things automatically false.
Religion aside, the topic about the speed of light is actually really fascinating, actually. I didn't quite grok what it was all about until recently watching a particular video which I'll link at the end.
The going theory (and here theory means our best model for how a thing works) is that the speed of light is constant in a vacuum. You may be familiar with the toss-a-ball-on-a-train (🚂) thought experiment?
If I'm traveling on a train traveling forwaes at 20mph and standing still relative to the car I'm in, and toss a ball at 10mph in the direction of the train's travel (toward the front), an observer outside the train could see and measure the speed of the ball they would find it is traveling 30mph relative to the ground (20+10) in the direction of the train's motion.
If I had thrown the ball in the opposite direction, toward the back of the train, the ball would be traveling at 10mph towards the front of the train (20-10)
Speed is measured relative to a frame of reference, ground or train, say.
Now if I were to instead use a flashlight, how fast would the photons travel if I were pointing the flashlight towards the front? The back? (And let's assume everything is in a vacuum to illustrate the point)
They wouldn't be 20mph + c forward or c - 20mph toward the back. The photons would travel at c.
Experiments have proven that c is constant-- that photons don't go faster when being emitted from a source already traveling at a given speed (see: Michaelson-Morley experiment among others). (A number of experiments demonstrate the general theory of relativity holds up at large scale, too).
But anyway, how can light possibly be constant regardless of the motion of the emitter?? It's a paradox right? It is because spacetime isn't "constant". That's where the video comes in...
https://youtu.be/Rh0pYtQG5wI?si=d1FG5jpGi6cghY5t
It may be more accurate to think of the process of science as: developing, verifying, and updating models based on the results of high quality evidence gathered from experiments that follow the scientific method.
That is to say that if sufficient, good evidence is gathered contradicts a model, the model is wrong, at least for the specific conditions of the experiments in question. In that case the part of the model addressing those conditions has to be updated. (In some cases the conditions are "all" essentially and so the whole model has to be tossed...like the aether theory).
Good comment, always interesting to hear about physics. And I agree with your definition of science. I think my comment was a rather weak argument to begin with.
Physics is so fascinating, right? I'm too dumb to be a physicist 😆 but videos like this are great. This channel is good. I also really enjoy and recommend PBS Spacetime videos to anyone interested. Another topic that is fascinating is how relativity and gravity relate. It's kind of wild.
Your example just serves to further strengthen my argument. The lack of experimental evidence for FTL travel is an astonishingly good argument that it doesn’t exist.
You should research the logical fallacy “argument from ignorance” which implies that a thing is true simply because it hasn’t been disproven to be true. That kind of argument is a feeble attempt to shift the burden of proof to the other party, when instead the maker of the claim is responsible to provide evidence for that claim.
Interesting, I agree with you, my comment was a particularly weak argument. I think the problem with disproving or proving that a god exists, lies with the fact that they/it would presumably lie outside of our universe. And from what we think now we won’t ever be able to escape our universe. Everything that Science says should exist or does exist, lies within our Universe, and we can’t say what lies outside it, and we won’t ever be able to. Which makes the topic of a creator especially difficult to prove/disprove. Following that, I personally still believe that someone who asserts that there is no creator holds it as a belief rather than a fact, although someone else pointed out to me earlier that absence of belief could be called the default. I personally believe that we can’t ever know whether there exists a creator or not, it’s my belief. In my eyes, everything regarding a creator is a belief, because again, I don’t think it’s a thing that is possible to prove or disprove.
Sorry for the hostility of my earlier comments, I just got carried away, I hope you can understand how that is.
Right, if a hypothetical deity exists outside of the universe and does not affect it in any way, that entity would be impossible to detect, by definition. (That entity would also be irrelevant to humans.)
You might also be interested in the term agnostic:
a person who believes that nothing is known or can be known of the existence or nature of God or of anything beyond material phenomena
Some agnostics believe in a god and some don’t, what they agree on is that the truth of it cannot be known.
Agnosticism is also scientific in nature, because it acknowledges that there are no experimental ways to test the existence of a god.
And no worries, I didn’t read any hostility in your comments. I enjoy talking about this since I’ve spent multiple decades going over the topic myself.
Yes, I think that everyone must be at least somewhat agnostic, because I think it is human nature to question the logic in what they are told, provided they have the mental capacity to question things (by this I mean as ling as they aren’t a child or mentally developmentally challenged).
Thank you
Since god can not be measured, it does not exist in science
I can’t measure the coastline of the UK, hence the UK scientifically does not exist. Brilliant news!