The Official God FAQ

[Robert]

it's just another version of the tired old "atheism is a religion" troll.

To start with: that's defenitely true.
We 'religious nutjobs' must however once in a while counter the many atheistic trolls on this board. Just for a pathatic attempt to find at least a little bit of ballance.

But on a more serious side: I actually am really wondering why some people who claim to be that certain about the non-existence of God keep on spending time on that same God. Why did some people create a sceptic annotated bible? That's a huge ammount of work? Why spend that much time on something you consider stupid?

Why do some people get angry that easily when someone says something on the issue of 'God'.
If we are that stupid in their eyes, then why do they keep on paying attention to them? To be honest, I don't pay attention to people I consider to be stupid and retarted (?? too lazy to look the word up)

Why why why why why?

I mean: I certainly don't believe in all those hinduistic gods but I'm really not going to spend only a single minute of my life trying to debunk hinduism.

[Elok]

Originally posted by CyberShy

things are generally more funny when they contain an element of truth in my experience.

I think that there definitely was an element of truth in my FAQ, as a matter of fact.
It's not for nothing that some 'atheists' jumped on me like they were stung by a bee

How much truth there is is obviously open for debate.
Though I think that there's much more truth in there then you may believe. And maybe there's not as much truth in it as I may believe.

The only reason that troll works, AFAIK, is that atheism, being by itself nothing more than the negation of religion, is naturally accompanied by some amount of aversion for all things associated with religion. You'd get a similar reaction if you called Agathon bourgeois or NAACP members exploitative of African-Americans. Such a reaction has aspects similar to religious fervor, but only in the most shallow way; any conviction, be it religious, political, ideological, philosophical, or any other -ical you care to name, can inspire such a reaction if said conviction is only strong enough.

And I believe the reason many atheists are so stridently anti-religion is that they have this hazy mental image of religion as a bogeyman that enters otherwise rational people's brains and possesses them so their heads spin around and they start beating women and throwing rocks at homosexuals or something.

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by CyberShy
Why why why why why?

The reason that some atheists take the issue seriously enough to expend energy on the subject is that it is quite simply a serious subject.

[Whaleboy]

I took Cyber's underlying point to be basically a p!ss-take out of the absurd amounts of time people spend debating these arcane metaphysical abstractions when there are more important things in the world to worry about (Darfur, anyone?).

Don't get me wrong, I am greatly disturbed that in the UK if you're lucky you'll spend ~2 hours out of your entire compulsory education learning about evolution while faith schools are gaining radidly gaining favour. I think it's ridiculous that a 21st century education system still creates a situation where, en masse, people can believe things which have the same logical value as the tooth fairy (praise be to the tooth fairy).

However, I think atheists shouldn't feel threatened by attempts by theists and deists to prove the existence of god. 2+2=3? No. We don't need to prove that god doesn't exist; if this were a court of law where logic ruled the case would have been closed for nearly 200 years.

Surely it makes more sense for us to concentrate our energies on a) educating people in science, particularly evolution (Darwin being the man who truly killed god) and b) using, for want of a better phrase, atheology or natural humanism or whatever you want to call it as a positive constructive force in the world.

Setting up a stupid website to rub it in the face of Christians who you aren't going to convince anyway seems a but puerile to me.

[Elok]

Improving the world through secular humanism. Yeah, good luck inspiring people with a lot of vapid BS platitudes about the potential of the human spirit or whatever crud they're spouting these days.

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by Elok
Improving the world through secular humanism. Yeah, good luck inspiring people with a lot of vapid BS platitudes about the potential of the human spirit or whatever crud they're spouting these days.

Actually, science is pretty inspiring stuff as far as explaining the universe goes.

[Cort Haus]

- and 'universe' includes ourselves and our value-systems, I might add.

[Elok]

But we weren't talking about explaining the universe, were we?

EDIT: Oh, izzat so? My challenge stands: feel free to point me to a naturalistic, internally consistent and self-sufficient system of morals that doesn't logically imply Agathonism.

[Whaleboy]

Improving the world through secular humanism. Yeah, good luck inspiring people with a lot of vapid BS platitudes about the potential of the human spirit or whatever crud they're spouting these days.

I'd say that the world has a better chance of being improved by human beings than vapid BS platitudes about some dude nailed to a tree.

[Lorizael]

Originally posted by Elok
Improving the world through secular humanism. Yeah, good luck inspiring people with a lot of vapid BS platitudes about the potential of the human spirit or whatever crud they're spouting these days.

Well, if you don't believe in a religion of any sort, it would be somewhat disingenuous to use the tenets of one in order to, as you say, inspire people.

Actually, now that I think about it, I wouldn't be surprised if there were non-believing religious leaders who employed similar tactics. My my, I'd hate to think that there might be people who were deceived in such a manner. That would be a terrible shame.

[Whaleboy]

But we weren't talking about explaining the universe, were we?

Were we not? Do you not get a sense of the awe-inspiring majesty of evolution; a giant web of inheritance that connects you to ever other human and life form on this planet? Is that not just as inspirational as "Jesus loves you"?

[Whaleboy]

EDIT: Oh, izzat so? My challenge stands: feel free to point me to a naturalistic, internally consistent and self-sufficient system of morals that doesn't logically imply Agathonism.

Why must a system of morals be internally consistent and self-sufficient?

I don't mean the question in a pejorative sense, I'm interested as to why you think morals need these properties.

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by Elok
But we weren't talking about explaining the universe, were we?

EDIT: Oh, izzat so? My challenge stands: feel free to point me to a naturalistic, internally consistent and self-sufficient system of morals that doesn't logically imply Agathonism.

(I will reply to this once I've finished watching QI)

[Elok]

Originally posted by Whaleboy
Were we not? Do you not get a sense of the awe-inspiring majesty of evolution; a giant web of inheritance that connects you to ever other human and life form on this planet? Is that not just as inspirational as "Jesus loves you"?

Well, if you'd stop masturbating to those old Carl Sagan tapes where he says "billion" over and over in erotically charged tones, you'd discover that evolution is a perfectly amoral process which often (not always, but often) works best through rape, infanticide, theft, deceit, murder, extortion, abuse and pretty much any other bad thing you care to name.

And if you get to simplify my beliefs as "Jesus loves you," then I get to simplify yours as "you're descended from monkeys and have monkey cooties." Not that I'm against evolution.

EDIT: Forgot the Don't wanna sound too vicious. Probably too late now.

[Lorizael]

Originally posted by Elok
Oh, izzat so? My challenge stands: feel free to point me to a naturalistic, internally consistent and self-sufficient system of morals that doesn't logically imply Agathonism.

This shouldn't be what religion is about. Religion should be about actual divine truth. I don't see any reason why it needs to have a system of morals attached to it.