“There’s probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.”

Are you suggesting that atheists don’t worry about death and losing their ego identity but only religious people do?

“Charles Darwin may have gone to a very Christian school but it didn’t prevent him from coming up with the “best idea in the world”.”

I think the Christians may debate on that statement as they may feel that their Jesus might have taught the best idea in the world. I do commend you for stating there probably is no god. You left a crack in the door with the word probably. The very word god has so much big daddy in the sky baggage it depends on what one means by god.

Now you speak of indoctrination as if it is limited to just religious studies. Children can be indoctrinated in many ways such as nationalism, patriotism, capitalism, communism, socialism, and yes; even scientism. With scientism matter creates consciousness and life started by a chance occurrence. The interesting one is that all the matter in the universe was contained before the big bang in the size of a needlepoint because the mathematics cannot go beyond that.

How much suffering has been occurred in the world with nationalism, with patriotism, with capitalism, with communism etc.

The Catholics have a saying “give us a child until they are seven and we will have them for life”. Well almost true because the Catholics create more atheists than schools ever could. The problem with atheism it is based in materialism and that it can become a religion also. Paradigm paralysis knows no boundaries in can show up in patriotism, nationalism (i.e. America is the greatest nation on earth mentality) and of course there is scientism.

That paradigm paralysis can be so powerful that most Americans think they have the greatest medical care in the world even though we are ranked last (37th) by the world health organization. That is the power of paradigms we see them in others but not in ourselves. Myself included.

And what group of people tend to be against taxpayer health insurance for all-Americans. Why it is the fundamentalists Christians. For them Christianity died on the cross; capitalism rules supreme as if Jesus taught capitalism. Religions do tremendous harm in the world but they are needed or they would not be supported ($$$$$$) by the masses.

Now a good study would be why does Sweden have a desire to teach religious beliefs in their schools. There is much to learn about the human mind (and indeed the soul?) if one goes deeply into that research with a bit of an open mind. We teach materialism in schools and economic ideologies like capitalism why not the history of religion.

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researcher,

I have always felt that religious education could be a good thing if it is non-compulsory, and uses a text like Huston Smith’s “The World’s Religions”.  I had such a course.  It presented the competing claims of multiple religions to exclusive truth, which is of course a contradiction.  Many students began to look at their own faith in a different light - as an “instance” of a religion instead of the only one.  If people start thinking, that is half the battle.  Some of them had turned away from religion by the end of the class. 

Also, thanks for pointing out the alliance of fundamentalists and capitalists.  In my opinion, fundamentalists are a fantastic target for political mobilization.  As the most prejudiced, hateful, and fearful people in America, they are easily demagogued and fearmongered in the right-wing media, especially FoxNews.  And who does the fearmongering?  Those who have the most to lose from reform, and the most to gain from the infinite extension of the status quo.  The bigs.  Big oil, big banks, big insurance, mining, wall street, etc.  They have raised sacred propaganda to a high art.  That’s the media world we live in. 

Roughly, the formula is that “since (jesus == capitalism) and (atheism/secular humanism == communism), and (they hate your freedoms, will steal your guns, and rape your sons), then (leave us the <splat> alone and give us massive additional tax breaks).” 

I don’t like msnbc or other left-leaning talk outlets much either, by the way.  They are fruits of the same poison tree, engaging in the same sort of tactics.  But I am glad that they are there to provide a counter to the right, which would otherwise go unanswered.

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We live in a nation that has laws as to when a person is of drinking age, voting age, able to legally drive a car and have consentual sex. All with the understanding that these laws are to protect the young and impressionable. But because of “religious freedom” parents are allowed to fill young peoples minds with a dogma that has proven over the centuries to unjustly kill, jail, silence and oppress those who think and live their lives differently.
Where is the law when it comes to parents choosing not to seek medical attention for their sick child?  Why aren’t parents held responsible for crimes committed by their children who do so based on the beliefs held by their parents and other adults who are allowed to indocrinate them at an early age?
And where are our nations leaders when it comes to protecting our youth when these and many other atrocities continue? 
We have religious freedom but where is religious responsibility?

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Maybe schools should indoctrinate pupils in all the major religions equally and when they turn eighteen they must declare a faith or become an independent.

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esnyder

Thanks for the fair and reasonable response to my comments. I agree a good class about the history of religions would be I think very beneficial to any student. But this is not going to happen at a grade school or high school level. I suspect there are tons of hidden agendas at work here to convert young minds. The desire to convert others to our beliefs is not based in certainty but doubt.

I did my own research into the history of three religions Christianity, Buddhism, and Hinduism especially the so-called enlightened Hindus. I found the research fascinating; there are so many followers of these religions that are unaware of how many of their beliefs came from followers not the original teacher. I.e. original sin is an example. Many just rely on their preachers to give them the religion they need. Their preachers of course cherry pick what they want to preach on.

One must do their own study and research and not rely on any authority for these truths into the mysteries of life. Neither science nor religion can be completely trusted. Both have their agendas. Scientists as a whole have been known to reject most new discoveries that are outside their existing paradigms. Religion is still rejecting most of science.

An example of this when William Crookes was doing work with a medium named Cook at her mother’s request and he invited his peers to come and witness the events taking place most refused to travel the few miles to investigate for themselves. They already knew from their materialistic beliefs the paranormal was not valid. That is the power of a paradigm. Many on this website have expressed the same type of response to the paranormal.

As mark twain stated: god made man in his image then man returned the favor. Of course using the word “his” meaning god, mark twain made the same error. If one looks close the god that the religious claim to worship has been made in their image. I.e. ego thing.

“To put it bluntly science no longer contains absolutes truths……the old distinction between the natural and the supernatural has become spurious.”
Yale physicist Henry Margenau

“The greatest skeptic concerning paranormal phenomena is invariably the man who knows the least about them.” H.H. Price

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“Maybe schools should indoctrinate pupils in all the major religions equally and when they turn eighteen they must declare a faith or become an independent.”

I don’t perceive anytime in the future this will even be considered. Our religion is thee religion. There are some Muslim countries if you convert to Christianity you get your head chopped off. Literally chopped off.

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“I don’t perceive anytime in the future this will even be considered. Our religion is thee religion. There are some Muslim countries if you convert to Christianity you get your head chopped off. Literally chopped off.”

Seriously, it would never be considered by any religion because it’s not really indoctrination if you give pupils different points of view.
If it were to happen “A head is a terrible thing to waste” just might be an appropriate slogan.

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esnyder, you forgot to mention the other “big”, BIG GOVT.  At least with big oil, big walmart, big autos, etc.  there is competition,  Lots of it.
With monopoly BIG GOVT.,  there isn’t!  Unless you emigrate to a freer country like we did.

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This is a good dialogue. I will be up front here and tell you that I am a HS biology teacher and consider myself an Agnostic Buddhist, so my perspective may be a bit biased, although I make a conscious effort to be objective.

Researcher, you are correct about your thoughts on indoctrination in schools with regard to nationalism, etc. Remember, schools are ultimately set up to carry/pass on the beliefs and values of a particular society. For a very long time, those beliefs and values were rooted in Christianity. And, while the mindset of many Americans is changing, (the very existence of the Reason Project is evidence of that) schools are usually the last to make substantial changes to reflect societal ideology. It takes only a few loud voices to restrict (sometimes much needed) change in public school policy. Great progress was made when religion was removed from public schools. However, the underlying Christian values and beliefs are still omnipresent in every public school in America. I actually had a student tell me they spent half an hour praying that they would do well on an exam. My reply was, “Don’t you think you would have done better if you used that time to study?” The student acted like I was the Antichrist for implying that their choice of actions was more powerful than the power of God. This is why religion is dangerous. People tend to rely on divine intervention rather than make rational, well thought out decisions. It is time to truly separate religion from policy, on all levels. Separation of Church and State is currently little more than words on paper. We need to start promoting critical thinking skills, and make real progress for humanity.
I am not suggesting that the history of religion be extinguished from education. However, as previously suggested, religion should be taught/learned from a historical, all-inclusive, and broad perspective. 

In short, the mission statement of The Reason Project says it all.

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“I will be up front here and tell you that I am a HS biology teacher and consider myself an Agnostic Buddhist, so my perspective may be a bit biased, although I make a conscious effort to be objective.”

As you are a practicing Buddhist I am always interested in how others perceive the Buddha’s realization about the origin of suffering. If someone asked you what did the Buddha realize about the origin of suffering, how would you respond to that question?

When it comes to insights into Mind and consciousness I think Buddhism is a very profound and worthwhile religion to study and practice. At one time I thought of being a Buddhist but there were a couple of teachings they have that my research did not validate.

Also my consulting career had taught me the pitfalls of how beliefs and even joining any organization or religion can bias the mind. It is good you stated you might be biased in your response. This is a rare statement indeed. Politics and religion are two prime examples of this phenomenon of bias in action.

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We’re all for saving millions of lives! As long as . . .

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modern religions should receive the same treatment, in schools, given to the religion of the romans and greeks. greek and roman mythology are treated as historical events and so should “christian mythology”, “muslim mythology”, and whatever other superstitions fill peoples’ minds.

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… Religion is a “fable invented by the ancients,” worthless
except for those who exploit the credulous masses.
(Ibn Warraq, “Why I am not a Muslim,” p. 283)

The day that we will teach children that there was once a time when man believed in religions and all kinds of irrational utopianisms should come soon.  The sooner the better.
As for now, American Constitution permits (legalizes) all kinds of freedom including the freedom to deceive people or the freedom to kill freedom and reason. 

I define religions as any irrational utopianism.  We have all kinds of problematic religions.  But I think the most urgent problem is the Equality Religion led by Obama.

Obama is determined to destroy America by the socialist-communist dream of “Equal Society by means of Strong Government.”  Obama is more dangerous and detrimental to America than bin Laden.  Bin Laden destroyed two buildings and 3000 people. But Obama’s target is whole America. Many Americans do not know that number #1 enemy is in Washington. 

How far can people be equal? 
Men come in all kinds of different abilities or qualities that cannot be equalized by any means.  Without making the various natures or qualities of individuals, the idea that we can make all people equally happy is not only a naive daydream but also a serious crime because that kinds of daydream kills or devastates millions and millions of people.  We have learned that in the 20th Century.  Still the irrational concept of equality is worshipped by many ambitious politicians and naïve sentimental masses who never learn from history. (American leaders have boasted about freedom only and not taught people the history of irrational utopianism—religions.)

Socialistic or communistic principle works only within a family unit.  Each family member contributes his/her best and is given as he/she needs.  Unconditional sacrifice, contribution, love, forgiveness, reconciliation, concession, etc. are possible within a family.

But when more than two families form a communal society, there occurs problems.  That is because humans are basically egoistic animals.  Socialistic or communistic sacrifice does not work in a society unit regardless of the size of the society—whether that be a small town or a big country.

I know a South Korean pastor (Kim J H) who experimented with a utopian equal communal society (based on Jesus’ teachings) for 15 years with all his might, and at last he bankrupted and he gave up.  Israel Kibbutz experiences give us the same lesson.  Red revolutions in Russia, China, Cuba, and many other countries taught humanity that equal society is a satanic daydream. 

Socialist way of economy fails invariably. Government-owned economy never fails to fail.  The pain of failure is too severe and great to taste actually. Why many Americans do not learn from history?  For Americans, the Equality Religion led by Obama is more urgent problem than Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Buddhism.

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“Socialist way of economy fails invariably. Government-owned economy never fails to fail.”

The mentality of dualism states there is either a pure capitalist or a pure socialist economic system. Neither works we are living proof that capitalism is failing at a rapid rate. Communism has already self destructed by its own ideological faults. We borrow from communists, social democracies, and kings and are printing massive amounts of money to keep our capitalism afloat for the interim.

There may be a middle path between socialism and capitalism.  Maybe some type of social democracy or maybe not. Capitalism will create a society of haves and have nots. In the end that society self-destructs in violent revolution between a large lower class and a very small upper class with a large authoritarian military to protect their assets.

In the last thirty years of free market capitalism (Reagan economics) has seen the greatest concentration of wealth to the smallest number of people in the last one hundred years and the country is suffering and the middle class will continue to decline. Without a middle class a country becomes unstable.

Of course Americans are being told that we are just in a difficult recession and if you believe that; Palin and I have a bridge to nowhere to sale cheap.

Referring to humans as egotistical animals is the great danger of atheism where life has no meaning other than material life. The same danger applies to religion where they call humans that don’t agree with their beliefs evil or evil empires. Both egotistical animals and evil people are easy targets to eliminate by any means.

After all they are either animals or evil and both may deserve to be eliminated by any means necessary if they interfere with someone’s or some governments wealth generation. Atheism and religion are two sides of the same coin and your comments show this aspect of both beliefs the very best. Better than anything I could possibly write.

The Christian evangelicals would agree with most of your article on most of the points that you have made in your comments. Surely that should give you cause for concern.

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Is there a way to have a social revolution without violence? I am not sure how the Gandhi experiment worked out, but I don’t see a taking from the rich to improve the poor, working out in India, most of their gains have been thru the out sourcing of jobs i.e. cheap labor for corporations in capitalistic societies. I see the same model of wealth creation or monopoly repeating itself in what we in the west like to call third world counties. Poor is poor anywhere in the world and rich is rich even in China. I would like to see a faith based on improving all people’s living standards so that we can get on with the task of exploring the universe.

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“I am not sure how the Gandhi experiment worked out”

The Gandhi experiment of nonviolence is a form of violence. It is resistance and resistance can be form of violence or at least it creates greater resistance and then here comes the violence. But I think nonviolence is not as violent in severity as a violent over throw of a repressive government. Often those that violently overthrow a government are worst than the government they overthrew.

Now Jefferson did state he felt about every 200 years governments need to be changed. In a republic one hopes this can be done through the voting booth. Time will tell.

As far as India that revolution split their country into two counties. One being Muslim and India remaining with some Muslims and a majority of Indians. Many people died when England left their country and the two sides are still fighting over land.

We humans have not invented an economic system yet that is capable of sustaining a country indefinitely. Pure capitalism does not work as it creates a country of have and have nots with a very small middle class. Reagan economics put our existing form of regulated capitalism on steroids and now we pay the price for that in our decline of wealth and economic failures.

Our economic failures are systemic yet we blame people. Lots of people everyone from CEO’s to unions to religion to educational systems the list is almost endless.

Pure communism does not work as it has been proved not to work and it fails to work for a variety of reasons and to involved to go into here. Maybe there is a middle ground as the Buddha suggested. A social democracy free enterprise regulated system of some type. Finding the right amount of gov regulation is no easy task.

I did well in our capitalistic system but many do not. There are many variables involved in doing well in a system based on materialism and competition. To say that free market capitalism is just and fair to all is profound ignorance of the free market system.

With communism man exploits man with capitalism it is the other way around.

One only has to study the history of America to see how capitalism has tried to exploit and often successful at exploiting workers even children and the own well being of its nation. But then again the struggle appears to be the right vehicle for the development of consciousness.

Capitalism left unchecked by its very nature will lead to some form of imperialism. History tells us that.

We learn though experiences what most Americans see as a recession I see as a cause and effect relationship between capitalism and the decline of wealth of a nation.  Unfortunately many Americans see a dualistic socialism or capitalism choice. I see a choice that finds a middle path between gov and free enterprise.

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“I would like to see a faith based on improving all people’s living standards so that we can get on with the task of exploring the universe.”

The greatest potential for growth may be within our own minds. Someone once stated it is easier to conquer a country than to conquer one’s own mind. Bush jr proved that axiom to be correct.

Not sure what you mean by faith based?

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@ Researcher
Researcher writes, “We borrow from communists, social democracies, and kings and are printing massive amounts of money to keep our capitalism afloat for the interim.
There may be a middle path between socialism and capitalism.”

It seems that researcher see the reality in complete upside-down mode. The cause of the economical setback of America is not due to capitalism.  The real cause was that America has heavily borrowed or mimicked the principle of socialism for the past several decades. 

Banks and mortgage companies, believing in the support from federal government, have lent too much money to those who do not have the ability to pay off.  No ordinary bank or mortgage company in capitalist country would do this kind of stupid thing. This is socialism, not capitalism because the big federal government intervened in providing people with houses. 

Governmental support cannot make incapable citizens capable enough to pay off their houses.  Seeing this have failed, Obama thinks that the Government might pay off the debt of the poor.  This is a full-blown socialism—redistribution of wealth. This is the promise Obama made in his campaign.

The idea that governmental intervention can solve the problem of inequality is a naïve and very dangerous thought. The reason why some possess house and others do not is not simply that the former were given favorable opportunities with enough initial money and the latter were not.  It seems that the ability to achieve certain level of economic achievement (as well as the achievement in other fields) is given to as a talent.  (It is not that successful pop singers succeed because they meet favorable opportunity and good sponsor. The key is a talent and wise management.) 

Some people succeed again even after thorough failures while others do not even if third parties (parents or state) give lot of support.  Dambisa Moyo writes in her recent book the Dead Aid that lot of aid for African nations from the West only aggravates the African nations’ economic dependency on West.  Third party’s support is the idea of socialism and it spoils the economic sense of people.  Money is basically not given free. When people begin to believe in free money, they become irresponsible. 

When it comes to American car companies, they run company not in the principle of competitive system but in “wealth-distribution system.”  So unions grew their greed without bound and incompetent CEOs let the tails (unions) wag the dogs.  This is not capitalism. 
Obama has printed lot of bailout money.  This kind of economy is for socialism.  I read a comment from a Chinese CEO who says that he is very surprised to see that there are so many socialists in America.  This tells some important truth Americans should ponder. 

The true problem of America now is not that we are in economical setback.  The real and serious problem is that so many American leaders and common people are indoctrinated by the socialist spell that “capitalism makes the rich richer and the poor the poorer, and finally the society becomes divided in two (the haves and the have-nots) and there would come a disastrous class struggle.”  This is a complete Marxist preach.  Researcher is a very dangerous person as most other Americans are. 

There are too many false cooks in America.  They are really ready to spoil the broth.  They see the reality in upside-down vision.  I think researcher does not know what capitalism is and what socialism is.  I recommend that researcher reads a lot about the socialism in the West or he lives in the West at least one or more years.  He would find that American is still a blessed country (due to capitalism) if he still maintain some reason.  Once people are indoctrinated by socialism, they seldom see the reality in rational point of view. Its a kind of religion.
Many people identify Christian religion with capitalism.  Jesus was a radical socialist-communist revolutionist. (The Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles prove this.)

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“Researcher is a very dangerous person as most other Americans are.”

Well I am gaining quite a following. From hateful to dangerous to why don’t I leave the country. When someone challenges someone’s cherished beliefs here comes the name-calling.  Read the last part of that sentence “as most other Americans are”. Except those that are capitalists. Nothing bias there. Capitalism in its purest form is a survival of the fittest mentality, which is completely misunderstood as individualism rather than survival of the species.

This is the great debate going on in this country now between the individualists and those that want or desire a social democracy. As I have stated many times atheism/materialism and religion are two sides of the same coin. Both sides think they have discovered truths. The human species is so far away from discovering most truths. We have not even touched the surface of truths.

“Many people identify Christian religion with capitalism.  Jesus was a radical socialist-communist revolutionist. (The Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles prove this.)”

Wow what ignorance about Jesus. Jesus cared less about communism, socialism, capitalism or any ism. Guess you did not read the part about give unto Rome’s what is Rome’s. And these are the type of people that make fun of religion and the bible.

“The real cause was that America has heavily borrowed or mimicked the principle of socialism for the past several decades.”

Again complete unawareness when this heavily borrowing began. If you are able to read history you will discover that this heavy borrowing began during the Reagan years of tax cuts for the rich and massive spending on the industrial military complex and free trade capitalism and the trickle down theory.

Any country that spends over a trillion dollars a year on its war machine will soon have debt problems and social problems.

I am not a fan of obama’s but he inherited two unwinable wars and an economic meltdown. From my point of view he is making the same mistakes as LBJ with both the Iraq war and afghan war. The jr senator is acting more like a senator than a president. He will pay a heavy price for that unawareness. As a former keynote speaker I have great respect for obama’s ability to give emotional speeches. That is an art and a science.

I am amazed how what the liberals call right wing wing nuts can get the facts so wrong. I suspect this person is a real fan of glen beck and russ. Oh forgot palin the patriot and quitter.

“He would find that American is still a blessed country (due to capitalism) if he still maintain some reason.”

Highly regulated capitalism after the 29 meltdown and the only country that was not bombed out after World War II was the greatest cause of our wealth not pure deregulated capitalism. In spite of the evidence the right-wing free traders want more of the same. Paradigm paralysis par excellence. Classic example of it.

This is not a recommendation to become a democratic. Far from it. They believe they can create a social utopia if they spend enough money like on welfare or busing. Also materialists that don’t understand these universal laws.

Blessed is a spiritual or religious term and it is not intended to be a materialistic term but it has become that as wealth can create a very materialistic society. Wealth can be as harsh of a teacher as poverty maybe more so. But a materialistic society soon succumbs to greed and arrogance both abundant in America. The cry by most Americans we are the greatest country in the world in everything in spite of the evidence. The path to understanding and blessedness is humility not arrogance.

My interest is not primary in political ideologies but the human mind and its evolutionary process. Such as how groups of people lack anything that even resembles compassion or fairness. There are universal principles that apply to all aspect of lives and indeed the universe and until we align our ideologies with those principles problems will arise.

It will be many centuries before this comes about, as the human mind is slow to move from individualism to systemic thinking. Ain’t politics great it brings out the best in us.

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sorry typo, meant to say atheism is NOT a philosophical position

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“sorry typo, meant to say atheism is NOT a philosophical position”

If one is able to stand outside of atheism or religion one can see clearly that atheism can be as much of a religion as religious fundamentalism. Atheism can become very steeped in beliefs, creeds, faith, and science conviction or scientism. Now it is almost impossible for an atheist to see this reality of their beliefs just as it is almost impossible for the religious to see the reality of their beliefs. When one stands in the forest one has limited vision.

One synonym for philosophical is truth-seeking. How interesting for one to say that atheism is not a philosophical position.  Also it is impossible for consciousness to not have beliefs. Impossible. An open mind is an oxymoron kind of like military intelligence. Sorry inside joke from my friends in military intelligence.

This is why when I started this research into the mysteries of life I joined no organization as I had seen in my business seminars the power of beliefs to overwhelm new incoming information. The paradigm effect.

Now the good news; it is almost but not impossible to see how one’s beliefs have constricted their view of the world. As we have atheists that do awaken to the limitations of their views as we have the religious awaken to their limited view of realty.

Now the atheist will snap back and state where do we worship at like the religious do. Atheists worship first and foremost their intellect, but intellect is not intelligence, world of difference. They never hesitate to tell everyone how much better they are in their reasoning and rational abilities. The religious worship a deity that is made in their image.

The very name of this website is the reasoning project. Need more be said? Now I will take some heavy hits and name calling and put downs and personal attacks and I deserve them but as a former almost atheist I see more clearly now but by no means with perfect clarity. Few if any do in the world.

Please do not get upset and not post or ban this post as introspection of ones self can be very helpful when doing research into these mysteries. Even if you believe that matter creates consciousness.

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“atheism can be as much of a religion as religious fundamentalism”
I suppose you were in a dreaming phase when you wrote this.

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“the only country that was not bombed out after World War II”

....  How quick Americans can be to completely forget about their little northern neighbor.  Canada was far from being “bombed out.”

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“atheism can be as much of a religion as religious fundamentalism”
”I suppose you were in a dreaming phase when you wrote this.”

These types of remarks are called denial. We all have them. They are also a form of attack coming from a threatened ego. I don’t believe it was a dreaming phase although some believe all life is a dreaming phase. But again you proved my point with your remarks.

Here is how: If I was to point out to a religious fundamentalist about the rigidity of their beliefs and compare their beliefs to atheist beliefs they would respond in a similar way. Probably call me a heretic or evil or worst. I suspect many would just state they feel sorry for me because I do not see what they see or feel and therefore have sympathy for me.

What we humans succumb to is the thinking that our beliefs are thee beliefs based in truths. Worst, some humans don’t even realize they have beliefs. Any human that believes they don’t have beliefs has not lived an examined life.  They are at the very beginning stages of their consciousness “awaking”.

Most atheists and most of those that call themselves religious do not accept my writings. Why is that?  When we are outside of atheism, materialism, and religious beliefs, we can see that the phase above about atheism and religious fundamentalism has some validity. Now I do not claim to be completely outside of materialism. This appears to be a very difficult thing to do while living in the physical world of materialism.

Now I fully admit that phase quoted above is very harsh and I must seek deeply into my own mind to seek better understanding why I even have made such a statement knowing full well from past experience what the outcome would be. For the most part to date this website has not been as hostile as others like this one I have visited. That is a good sign. Harris on bill’s show left me with the impression that he is not completely fixed in his materialistic beliefs.

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@ Researcher,

Christians believe that Jesus is God or son of Go. Atheists think that Jesus was neither God nor son of God.”  Researcher thinks these two groups (theists and atheists) are equally misled.  I cannot agree with Researcher. 

Religionists’ God or gods are man made idols. This is knowledge, not a belief.  Religionists’ belief is a “wishful thinking (without rational evidence).”  Everybody has his/her own opinion or outlook on the world though such opinion is not always right or correct.  I would say that all humans are philosophers—thinkers.  Philosophers are not all right or bright.  Most of their thoughts are merely personal opinions so they are opinion-tellers. So all men are philosophers. But I would not say that all men are believers. (The term belief we are talking about is religious belief.) 

The opinion that religionists’ God is man-made idol is either true or false.  Therefore, for the impartial third parties, either theists or atheists are wrong. Both (theists and atheists) cannot be wrong to the same degree when it comes to the argument about the existence of religionists’ God.  Researcher seems to be lost in the middle.

As Sam has articulated, the term atheism is actually not a definite thought system. It includes all kinds of philosophers such as communists, anarchists, socialists, tree-huggers, In-yang believers, Buddhists, astrologers, good-vibration believers, etc.  In this point, atheism cannot be an alternative to religions.  I use the term rationalist or rationalism instead.

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“Researcher thinks these two groups (theists and atheists) are equally misled.  I cannot agree with Researcher”

I never said both are equally mislead. Where did I say that? Look around the world we have suicide bombers thinking they are going to heaven and have 72 virgins. I don’t see any atheists doing that.

We have millions of Christians lining up to drink symbolic blood and flesh don’t see any atheists doing that. We have Christians reading a bible that tells them their god has chosen people and that god of love gave the Jews the permission to kill thousands of people to have their own homeland.  Well that one might be debatable as far as atheists advocating killing others to gain land or resources.

Nothing is equally anything, average is a mathematical calculation not an indicator of reality. This has not been my point. My point is not about being mislead but how the human mind can mislead itself, deceive itself into thinking it knows when it does not know.

“There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn’t true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true.” -  Søren Kierkegaard, Danish philosopher

Change the word fooled to mislead maybe that helps.

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researcher,

Atheism is not rooted in materialism and it is not a religion with dogmatic beliefs. It is the lack of belief in the existence of a deity.

And no, I am, in fact, not the least bit concerned with what happens to me when I die. When I was still a christian, I was terrified of death. There are probably some christians who are not afraid to die, and probably some atheists that are; however, that’s not even the point of the statement you are criticizing.

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“Atheism is not rooted in materialism and it is not a religion with dogmatic beliefs. It is the lack of belief in the existence of a deity.”

Carl how would you explain paranormal phenomena, consciousness, and the origin of love, compassion, creativity, intelligence, and what caused the big bang.

My research and communicating with atheists on blogs has revealed to me that indeed atheists are rooted in materialism and/or intellectualism, which we all are to some degree. After all it is materialism and intellectualism that has caused Christians to make their God in their image.

“And no, I am, in fact, not the least bit concerned with what happens to me when I die”

Sorry Carl but I don’t believe people when they make these kind of statements.  They are the “in thing” to state. Some kind of macho or courageous statement of course you could be the exception.

As a Christian you may have been told as a child you might burn in hell for eternity; that would scare anyone to death so to speak.

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Why don’t you explain those things to me? Why do people like you look to atheists to answer all the questions that they can’t? No sane atheist claims to be omniscient. I don’t have to explain those things to experience them, and god is unnecessary to experience them. The fact that god is invoked by religious types to explain anything that confuses them does not mean he is the source.

Believe me or not, I have nothing to prove to you, and no reason to lie. From your statement I infer that you are afraid of death. You are merely projecting your fear onto me. It is a common fallacy of reasoning. Yes, I was scared of hell when I was a christian. I had an ever present fear that when judgement day came, I would not be worthy of heaven. When I came out as an atheist, someone asked me “aren’t you afraid of hell?” I laughed at him. “In thing” or not, there is nothing macho about having no fear of something that you don’t think exists.

There is no evidence that we have any control over what happens after our deaths. Why should we worry about it? It is a certainty, however, that your time here is limited. Make the most of it.

You said one thing that I agree with. My lack of unsubstantiated belief is rooted in intellectualism, logic, and reason - quite separate from materialism, and I would say that Yahweh was crafted in the image of man because of human ego and a lack of imagination.

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Slightly off-topic I know, but this Swedish effort at the bus campaign leads me to ask the following: it is quite clear that many great and creative minds are supporting the atheistic cause, so why is it that all of our public promotion and marketing attempts are so unbelievably ineffective and silly? From the ‘brights’ to Dawkins’ Out Campaign to these bus adverts, it’s all questionable at best and damaging to the cause and our credibility at worst…

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“Yes, I was scared of hell when I was a christian. I had an ever present fear that when judgement day came, I would not be worthy of heaven.”

“As a Christian you may have been told as a child you might burn in hell for eternity; that would scare anyone to death so to speak.” This was my response to your quote above. Sounds to me that is exactly what happen. I find most atheists become atheists as a stance against religious beliefs. It is kind of like I was conned once but never again.

That is a tragedy that we do that to young children. I wonder if much of our drug problems are not due to religious beliefs that put such fear into young minds that show up later in life as neurotic behaviors. Drugs become an escape from reality.

“There is no evidence that we have any control over what happens after our deaths. Why should we worry about it? It is a certainty, however, that your time here is limited. Make the most of it.”

Making the most out of life could have some very interesting and even for some destructive outcomes.

Tons of evidence about having control over our lives after death but one has to look long and hard for it and not go into the research with strong beliefs of life after death or there is no evidence for life after death. The research findings will either succumb to wishful thinking or denial of the evidence. I.e. the paradigm effect.

If a person has a strong belief in materialism then save your time and effort it will do no good to do the research. The only thing that will cause such a person to question their beliefs is a significant emotional experience such as a NDE or OBE. Now significant emotional events can come in many forms of experiences too numerous to mention.

Here is a physicist that had several out of body experiences and these experiences caused him to write several books on his idea of the theory of everything (toe). This is not a validation or recommendation on my part of his books just an example of a significant emotion event changing a person’s perspective of reality.

http://sites.google.com/site/iscatus/review-of-my-big-t

You may want to give it a read after all Einstein worked almost his entire adult life on the theory of everything and was unsuccessful.

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