Why should I love one who lived eventually 2000 years ago and told the people, that they should be glad if they are beaten by someone and beg for more?
Why should I have another feeling than quiet resentment, who drags in front of his death the ross with his last power upwards? Did he fear, to be killed fast, if he don't so?
Overthis is there no evidence for the existence of Jesus. He may be created by Constantine the Great, while he didn't know how to handle the mourning people, he ruled that everybody has to be a Christian under penalty of death. And to follow those laws of suppression. To be happy if your lord is beating you and even if the life is beyond alll bearing, it's a sin to ste...

Why should I love one who lived eventually 2000 years ago and told the people, that they should be glad if they are beaten by someone and beg for more?
Why should I have another feeling than quiet resentment, who drags in front of his death the ross with his last power upwards? Did he fear, to be killed fast, if he don't so?
Overthis is there no evidence for the existence of Jesus. He may be created by Constantine the Great, while he didn't know how to handle the mourning people, he ruled that everybody has to be a Christian under penalty of death. And to follow those laws of suppression. To be happy if your lord is beating you and even if the life is beyond alll bearing, it's a sin to steal your lord your working power by suicide. The more life sucks, the better will be your afterlife!
Give god and the king the tith, even if your children die by suffering. And stay at your place. Don't leave the country. If your family stay hungry and your children die, thank the lord for this! He gave them his great mercy.
This are rules for slaves!
And the kind, how they are brought to the people dont seem like a challenge of love!
The Christians drowned the earth 1500 years in the blood of the nations to rule the world in the name of their god, who is a horridly sadist, how you can read in the bible from the first until the last side. And as the Christians are created in his own kind, it's no surprise, that they are doing the same. Read Josua, it seems for me, you never looked in this book, that christians call the truth and the rule for life.
You are hating atheists, although they are peaceful.
I don't hate you!
I am sorry for you!
You must love those who treat you bad, and if you are beaten, you have to turn the other chick.
But who wants to live in peace and don't harm you anyway, you must hate.
Explicable.
Pure envy!

And overthis you did you breake your laws !
Envy is a sin.
Hate is a sin.

"Make them stupid!" - said the king to the bishop.
"I will mak

Atheists don't preach, we respond to the insipid preaching of the believers. In fact, we are only labeled 'atheists' because believers cannot stand to see people who do not drink them koolaid go unlabeled. It makes it very difficult to wag a finger at someone if you don't isolate them and give them a label to call bad.

Atheism is about much as a religion as bald is a hair color. Christianity is a religion. Islam is a religion. Judaism is a religion. They preach their gospels and try to convince people their mythology is actually real. Atheist simply point out how ridiculous their claims are and point out the glaring faults of their claims. That is not a religion. It's why its called ATHEISM...

Atheists don't preach, we respond to the insipid preaching of the believers. In fact, we are only labeled 'atheists' because believers cannot stand to see people who do not drink them koolaid go unlabeled. It makes it very difficult to wag a finger at someone if you don't isolate them and give them a label to call bad.

Atheism is about much as a religion as bald is a hair color. Christianity is a religion. Islam is a religion. Judaism is a religion. They preach their gospels and try to convince people their mythology is actually real. Atheist simply point out how ridiculous their claims are and point out the glaring faults of their claims. That is not a religion. It's why its called ATHEISM. It is without ('a') religion or belief ("theism").

Believers try to make the claim that atheism is a religion as a distracting tactic. They know the claim is bs, but its not like they don't push other bs claims without the least bit of integrity or truth.

If atheists are gambling with eternity, the believers do the same with Oden, Ra, Shiva, or a host of hundreds of thousands of other man made gods right along side Yahweh. One only wishes that people like jay8h would turn is critical thinking skills upon his own mythology and see that there is no difference between that and Mithra, Buddha, or any other religions that were built on the same principals.

Thank you, iquanyin, for the compliment. Some here might say I'm something of a troublemaker as I tend to clip the things I see and speak my mind about them; clearly without regard to whose toes I may step on. I'm just being me.

Enjoy the Clipmarks experience to the fullest. It is one of the best places I have found on the whole of the Internet to both learn and share with a widely diverse group of widely divergent topical interests.

Oort and WT are bringing interesting points to the table. My take on the point would be that anything an atheist might do which might be construed as being "in the name of atheism" is almost always as a push-back against the intrusion of religion into the...

Thank you, iquanyin, for the compliment. Some here might say I'm something of a troublemaker as I tend to clip the things I see and speak my mind about them; clearly without regard to whose toes I may step on. I'm just being me.

Enjoy the Clipmarks experience to the fullest. It is one of the best places I have found on the whole of the Internet to both learn and share with a widely diverse group of widely divergent topical interests.

Oort and WT are bringing interesting points to the table. My take on the point would be that anything an atheist might do which might be construed as being "in the name of atheism" is almost always as a push-back against the intrusion of religion into the life of the atheist. I think most atheists couldn't give a hoot about the incantations the witch-doctor down the street performs by the light of full-moon, at least until the dead chicken is left on his doorstep.

Ah, I see. But I'd have to further clarify that the only reason an atheist would hate a believer is because the believer has done something to interfere with an atheists life - like oppress them for their lack of belief, creating laws to force acceptance of their dogma, etc.

On further reflection, I still don't quite agree with what you say on no one claiming a pure past. Atheists have never risen as a group and developed a set of policies, beliefs, dogma's or rituals in which to enforce on other people. At BEST you could argue that they have fought against those that imposed their beliefs upon them, but never have they simply went on a bloody run to impose their lack of beliefs on other pe...

Ah, I see. But I'd have to further clarify that the only reason an atheist would hate a believer is because the believer has done something to interfere with an atheists life - like oppress them for their lack of belief, creating laws to force acceptance of their dogma, etc.

On further reflection, I still don't quite agree with what you say on no one claiming a pure past. Atheists have never risen as a group and developed a set of policies, beliefs, dogma's or rituals in which to enforce on other people. At BEST you could argue that they have fought against those that imposed their beliefs upon them, but never have they simply went on a bloody run to impose their lack of beliefs on other people as a means of spreading their atheism.

I don't think it fair or accurate to say that because someone was an atheist and committed a crime or brutality that their atheism was the core reason behind the action. Christians/Jews/Muslims/etc have literally wiped out entire cultures in the name of their god for the specific reason of spreading their beliefs and eliminating those that differed. Atheists simply do not match those "qualifications".

Bear nailed it. Atheists don't care what you do until you start trying to foist your beliefs on them or use your beliefs to cause actions against them.

I am enjoying this post and the thoughtful comments.
I do disagree however on one point

Atheism is not a religion or belief system.

I believe that atheism is clearly a belief system.
There is one trait that atheists and the religious have in common.
They both "know." The atheist knows that there is no God. The religious knows that there is a God.


If you "know" what you think is correct you have a belief system.The fact that you believe in the non existence of God doesn't make it a non-belief.

I am an agnostic. I don't believe in any religion.I think that there is no God. But I don't know for sure.I think that whether on not God exists is beyond the scope of m...

I am enjoying this post and the thoughtful comments.
I do disagree however on one point

Atheism is not a religion or belief system.

I believe that atheism is clearly a belief system.
There is one trait that atheists and the religious have in common.
They both "know." The atheist knows that there is no God. The religious knows that there is a God.


If you "know" what you think is correct you have a belief system.The fact that you believe in the non existence of God doesn't make it a non-belief.

I am an agnostic. I don't believe in any religion.I think that there is no God. But I don't know for sure.I think that whether on not God exists is beyond the scope of man's knowledge.

So since both atheists and theists both have faith (they know) in their beliefs they both are belief systems.

As for whether or not a belief system is a religion that is another question.

T2B, I think the potential failure of your perspective is that the determination of a belief system would, in the end, produce dogma upon which one would act to satisfy the logical outcome of the belief which produced it. That would be the "system" part of the structure. Religion is a system based upon a root belief is the support of that belief.

There is no such dogma produced by the belief that there is no god; there is no action predicated by acceptance of that belief. Atheism is a singular belief, but not a belief system. The acceptance of that sole thought does not predicate other thoughts which must be adhered to to satisfy it. An atheist could just as easily be a flat-earth believer ...

T2B, I think the potential failure of your perspective is that the determination of a belief system would, in the end, produce dogma upon which one would act to satisfy the logical outcome of the belief which produced it. That would be the "system" part of the structure. Religion is a system based upon a root belief is the support of that belief.

There is no such dogma produced by the belief that there is no god; there is no action predicated by acceptance of that belief. Atheism is a singular belief, but not a belief system. The acceptance of that sole thought does not predicate other thoughts which must be adhered to to satisfy it. An atheist could just as easily be a flat-earth believer as a cosmologist, but neither would have to be the logical outcome in support of the lack of belief in a god being.

A very common if not universal upshot of a religious belief system is that of moral action; the belief that certain actions are taboo with dire outcomes if they are actually enacted based upon the judgement of the god being at the root of the religious system. Atheists, not sharing that belief, are often accused of being amoral, which is of course a fallacy, given that there are many confessed and avowed athiests active in our everyday lives, even here on Clipmarks, who are free and productive members of our society. An individual who genuinely believed in no god and thus no morals acting upon that belief systematically would ultimately be be exposed as a sociopath, for it is almost a certainty that he would ultimately act in an extremely anti-social manner against the rules not of the the atheistic belief, but of society, which is an areligious construct, at least here in the US (theoretically - but the battle to keep it such is ongoing in the face of religious dogma).

T2B, would you say that you are actively participating in the religion of anti-Ra? Anti-Shiva? Anti-Mithra? Certainly you make no claim to religion as being an anti-Zeus. Atheism is a lack of belief. It is the default position of everyone. We are all born atheist. No one is born with knowledge of a creator of any sort. It is only after a person is indoctrinated with religion that they even become aware of a specific belief system.

Saying that atheism is a religion is like saying "off" is a television channel. An atheist doesn't "know" that there is no god, they simply see no reason to accept the claims that there is a god. It is a non acceptance of the claim for a variety of reasons usuall...

T2B, would you say that you are actively participating in the religion of anti-Ra? Anti-Shiva? Anti-Mithra? Certainly you make no claim to religion as being an anti-Zeus. Atheism is a lack of belief. It is the default position of everyone. We are all born atheist. No one is born with knowledge of a creator of any sort. It is only after a person is indoctrinated with religion that they even become aware of a specific belief system.

Saying that atheism is a religion is like saying "off" is a television channel. An atheist doesn't "know" that there is no god, they simply see no reason to accept the claims that there is a god. It is a non acceptance of the claim for a variety of reasons usually centering around the failure of the claim to be proven.

You don't have to have faith that there is no elephant in the trunk of your car, you simply see no reason to believe that it is possible given the size of the trunk space vs the size of your average elephant. It's simple rationality.

Atheists don't reject the belief in god because they don't want there to be a god or because they refuse to believe, its really a matter that there is no reason to accept it.

The resistance that atheists hold toward religion has nothing to do with trying to spread the atheistic perspective. Its about theists attempting to force their religion, in various ways, upon those that don't share their belief. When a theists says things must be a certain way and the basis of that command is dependent on their belief system then it is not a matter of atheists trying propagate anything they believe when they stand against it so much as pointing out the falsity of a claim trying to be forced upon them.

We are all born atheist. No one is born with knowledge of a creator of any sort.

While we are all born without knowledge of a creator that does not make everyone born an atheist. An atheist is not properly defined as a person with no concept of the existence of god.

An atheist doesn't "know" that there is no god, they simply see no reason to accept the claims that there is a god.

I also see no reason to accept the claims that there is a god.
But to me if an "atheist" claims they don't "know" whether or not there is a god then they are actually taking an agnostic approach

You don't have to have faith that there is no elephant in the trunk of
your ca...

read more»

We are all born atheist. No one is born with knowledge of a creator of any sort.

While we are all born without knowledge of a creator that does not make everyone born an atheist. An atheist is not properly defined as a person with no concept of the existence of god.

An atheist doesn't "know" that there is no god, they simply see no reason to accept the claims that there is a god.

I also see no reason to accept the claims that there is a god.
But to me if an "atheist" claims they don't "know" whether or not there is a god then they are actually taking an agnostic approach

You don't have to have faith that there is no elephant in the trunk of
your car, you simply see no reason to believe that it is possible given
the size of the trunk space vs the size of your average elephant. It's
simple rationality.

Agreed. But can you apply that to a series of questions regarding (for example) the existence of souls, the fate of souls, the afterlife (or lack there of) and get answers to the same level of certainty as to your elephant in the trunk analogy?
I don't think you can. That's why I'm am agnostic.
I do agree with both yourself and bartending bear regarding the fact that atheists are reacting to religious intrusions rather than trying to "spread" atheism

Bartending Bear said-

that the determination of a belief system would, in the end, produce
dogma upon which one would act to satisfy the logical outcome of the
belief which produced it.

There is no such dogma produced by the belief that there is no god; there is no action predicated by acceptance of that belief.

I must disagree. Our course what you consider dogma may differ from me.Consider the following- As an atheist you are aware that there are theists who will try to convert the innocent into following a false belief system that is likely to cause them more harm than good. I would think that warning your friends and loved ones about the dangers of gettin...

Bartending Bear said-

that the determination of a belief system would, in the end, produce
dogma upon which one would act to satisfy the logical outcome of the
belief which produced it.

There is no such dogma produced by the belief that there is no god; there is no action predicated by acceptance of that belief.

I must disagree. Our course what you consider dogma may differ from me.Consider the following- As an atheist you are aware that there are theists who will try to convert the innocent into following a false belief system that is likely to cause them more harm than good. I would think that warning your friends and loved ones about the dangers of getting involved with religion would be a very reasonable action. But it is still a mild form of dogma. And it's hardly at all different from the religious family warning their loved ones about the non-believers.

A very common if not universal upshot of a religious belief system is
that of moral action; the belief that certain actions are taboo with
dire outcomes if they are actually enacted based upon the judgement of
the god being at the root of the religious system. Atheists, not
sharing that belief, are often accused of being amoral, which is of
course a fallacy,

On this and most of the rest I agree. I would only clarify the above with I'd agree with very common over universal

An atheist is not properly defined as a person with no concept of the existence of god

An atheist is one who lacks belief; be it through a judgment of the failure of the god claim or because they've never heard of it. They have no reason to believe.

"A person who does not believe that deities exist; one who lacks belief in gods. "

It doesn't matter how one arrives at the state of atheism, only that they are there, lacking belief.

But can you apply that to a series of questions regarding (for example) the existence of souls, the fate of souls, the afterlife (or lack there of) and get answers to the same level of ...

read more»

An atheist is not properly defined as a person with no concept of the existence of god

An atheist is one who lacks belief; be it through a judgment of the failure of the god claim or because they've never heard of it. They have no reason to believe.

"A person who does not believe that deities exist; one who lacks belief in gods. "

It doesn't matter how one arrives at the state of atheism, only that they are there, lacking belief.

But can you apply that to a series of questions regarding (for example) the existence of souls, the fate of souls, the afterlife (or lack there of) and get answers to the same level of certainty as to your elephant in the trunk analogy?

Show me the proof that they are real. I'd like to think that there is something after we die, but there is absolutely nothing to support that. We do have evidence that suggests we know what comes after death and that is what we recall before birth ... nothing.

Souls are really nothing more than people wanting to create a material thing our of who we are. Again, prove that souls are real beyond the desire of people that want them to be real. I'd like to think we have souls, but there is nothing to suggest there is any such thing.

I can come up with a half dozen different constructs suggesting afterlifes, life purposes, soul like remains, etc - but no matter how good or likely they sound, without substantiating proof they are no more real than the descriptions of souls that various religions create. Little more than hopeful fantasies.

Honestly, i think the idea of souls were created to control people. Do this or do that or your soul will be judged and after you die you will suffer for eternity! They are just another construct of religion.

We do have evidence that suggests we know what comes after death and that is what we recall before birth ... nothing.

The fact that there is some evidence that there is nothing after death is not sufficient to me to declare without doubt what happens after death. You may be absolutely confident as to what happens upon death. I am not so convinced.

Honestly, i think the idea of souls were created to control people. Do
this or do that or your soul will be judged and after you die you will
suffer for eternity! They are just another construct of religion.

You are probably correct regarding them being an invention to control people.

But I am certainly not as confide...

We do have evidence that suggests we know what comes after death and that is what we recall before birth ... nothing.

The fact that there is some evidence that there is nothing after death is not sufficient to me to declare without doubt what happens after death. You may be absolutely confident as to what happens upon death. I am not so convinced.

Honestly, i think the idea of souls were created to control people. Do
this or do that or your soul will be judged and after you die you will
suffer for eternity! They are just another construct of religion.

You are probably correct regarding them being an invention to control people.

But I am certainly not as confident in my doubts regarding the existence of souls as you are. I have questions regarding death, as well as whether or not there is a force in the universe that exists outside of myself that might meet a definition of God.I doubt it. But I don't know.

Is that not the major difference between us? I don't know the answers. You do. (not the best way to wrap up my argument.)
Thus you as an atheist know there is no god and I as an agnostic have similiar feelings but in the end do not know if there is a god or not.