Anti-theist

I would agree. For me personally, a belief based approach challenges those of you who favor evidence based approaches.

All that I am trying to get you to accept is that belief is possible. It need not be categorized as fantasy. I feel that I have had enough experience to accept this premise, at any rate.

In addition, the reason that I never get anywhere with jar is that he wants me to throw away what I think is evidence (experiences and observations) and see God as a mere human created character in a book.
It is for this reason that I discount his claim to being a believer...all that he apparently believes in is his own mind and conclusions and biases.

Of course, to be honest, I can claim no better.

My belief is no mere superstition.

You are right. Your religious beliefs are not mere superstition. They are evil superstitions of violent inhumane hatred.

You are of the book, Phat, so you own the book ... all of it. You accept the blood and extreme barbarity of your book because it was done by or was commanded by your god.

With that base of evil in your soul, despite protestations to the contrary, you are primed to make war on humanity if so ordered by your god as revealed by your favored priests. The only thing that keeps you and yours from continuing to perpetrate this holy evil against humanity is the even greater power of a liberal secular society that will kill you right back.

Your religion, Phat, is a superstitious fantasy of evil, blood, suffering and death. Your very humanity should be ashamed.

I fail to see why atheists have their panties in such a wad over teaching about religions in school.

They don't want to "teach religions". They want to kill science with their superstitious BS and proselytize young minds to only the one creed. They want to rule the classroom as a way to regain their lost control of the government.

Of course you can't see it. You're one of them.

Panties in a very tight bloody knot, for sure.

I certainly wouldn't force my beliefs...I would get their permission first.

Yes, you most certainly would force you beliefs on the rest of humanity given the chance. History has proven so in every society the world over.

And btw ... permission denied.

Phat writes: My belief is no mere superstition.

You believe in primitive iron-age myths of ghosts and miracles. Of course it's a superstition. But it's laced with politics and power and the all very human manipulation of others.

If I catch your "kid" in a dark alley I shall freely and boldly share my faith and you and an army of liberal activists wont stop me.

And there you have it.

When I was younger, in my very early 20s and single, I was taking a ride on the tube in London. As you’ll know, it’s very rare for anyone to strike up a conversation with you on the tube, but this incredibly attractive young woman sat down opposite me and struck up a very pleasant conversation. I was amazed (Ryan Reynolds has nothing to fear from me in the looks department), but I happily went along with it, not quite believing my luck.

Until, after 5 minutes, she asked me if I’d read the bible.

On one level, it was a disappointment - I thought that I’d inadvertently stumbled onto the mother lode - she was utterly stunning. But on the other hand, at least I was able to politely disengage from the conversation and avoid being treated as someone who needed to be in her club, in order to have a valid life.

(I will confess to a continuing mild regret that she wasn’t attracted to me though - there might have been some pleasant memories to reminisce over with a smile in my old age)...

AZPaul3 writes: Your religious beliefs are not mere superstition. They are evil superstitions of violent inhumane hatred.

Nonsense. Quit listening to the ideas in your head that you should hate GOD or Jesus. Jesus IS God. Period. Any relativistic ideas to the contrary are simply wrong. You likely will never understand this, though since you think that you actually understand what it is that you DO believe. Perhaps next time that you smoke a joint, you can lecture me on the Tao of the universe and karma and how I really hate people and you really don't. I was poking fun at your seriousness regarding indoctrinating your kid...or a younger vimesey on the tube, (he likely would have preferred thee woman) But I think that I would NEVER try and discus a subject such as the Bible with someone I had just met or had known for less than 6 months or so.

Your religion, Phat, is a superstitious fantasy of evil, blood, suffering and death. Your very humanity should be ashamed.

Nonsense. If more people believed and followed the precepts of what Jesus taught, much would improve in this world. They certainly poison themselves and society when they believe some of the modern lies such as Cancel Culture

It seems that many of you are incapable of seeing God as anything more than a character in a book. The demons which plague you have blinded you to this reality and some day the veil will be lifted and the blinders will come off of peoples minds and eyes. The supernatural realm will become virtually undeniable. At this time, I think...people will either become even more violently opposed to GOD or they will surrender joyfully to His beckoning call.

With that base of evil in your soul, despite protestations to the contrary, you are primed to make war on humanity if so ordered by your god as revealed by your favored priests. The only thing that keeps you and yours from continuing to perpetrate this holy evil against humanity is the even greater power of a liberal secular society that will kill you right back.

Not quite. We are primed to make war against the demons which control your thoughts and minds. We have nothing against you personally.(At least I don't.) And there will be no killing except binding the evil spirits. They tried and failed to kill Jesus the first time and they wont be able to do that again.

Demons and a belief in demons is just plain silly.

Did you ever stop to consider that you might have misinterpreted her intentions? Maybe she was just checking to make sure you weren’t some celibate Jesus freak who she shouldn’t waist her time on! Put that in your memory bank.

My older brother was agnostic and very concerned whether there might actually be supernatural forces and a heaven and possibly hell. After he died a few years ago he told me that there is no afterlife.

after he died?

Phat writes: after he died?

Of course! When else would he know for sure?

Quit listening to the ideas in your head that you should hate GOD or Jesus.

The ideas in my head were put there by your bible. Have you ever read that horror story?

To say nothing of your religion's swath of blood as it ate through the heart of humanity these last 2000 years. Your creed's history leaves a lot of hate in its demented bloodthirsty wake, Phat.

Your religion, Phat, is a superstitious fantasy of evil, blood, suffering and death. Your very humanity should be ashamed. Nonsense. If more people believed and followed the precepts of what Jesus taught, much would improve in this world. They certainly poison themselves and society when they believe some of the modern lies such as Cancel Culture.

Phat, your creed is the poster child for cancel culture. Except instead of ignoring us on social media your adherents torture us and kill us dead.

That was the dumbest crap you've put out here in quite a while, Phat.

We are primed to make war against the demons which control your thoughts and minds.

Save my soul by burning me at the stake. Hanged, drawn, and quartered. Crushed beneath a bed of stone. Boiled alive. Immured. Shoot the abortion doctor. Throw gays off of buildings.

Yes. We're familiar with your religion's war against human thoughts and minds and your response here is more evidence of its evil.

Your religion, Phat, is a superstitious fantasy of evil, blood, suffering and death and every time you try to defend it you just prove my point again.

Due to the engagement of my limited neuronic abilities with the superbowl there was not enough capacity left to compose the usual Sunday sermon.

I have opted for the easy way to address this deficiency with today's listing of observations and opinions from some of my long time friends.

Surely the ass who invented the first religion ought to be the first ass damned. -- Mark Twain

The hands that help are better far than lips that pray. -- Robert G. Ingersoll

Nothing could be more idiotic and absurd than the doctrine of the trinity. -- Robert G. Ingersoll

All thinking men are atheists. -- Ernest Hemmingway

I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ. -- Mohandas Gandhi

Born again?! No, I'm not. Excuse me for getting it right the first time. -- Dennis Miller

Eskimo: If I did not know about God and sin, would I go to hell?
Priest: No, not if you did not know.
Eskimo: Then why did you tell me?
-- Annie Dillard:

Religion is the most malevolent of all mind viruses. -- Arthur C. Clarke

Without religion, we'd have good people doing good things, and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion. -- Stephen Weinburg

Shake off all the fears of servile prejudices, under which weak minds are servilely crouched. Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call on her tribunal for every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason than that of blindfolded fear. -- Thomas Jefferson

Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legislative powers of government reach actions only, and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should 'make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,' thus building a wall of separation between church and State. -- Thomas Jefferson

To talk of immaterial existences is to talk of nothings. To say that the human soul, angels, god, are immaterial, is to say they are nothings, or that there is no god, no angels, no soul. I cannot reason otherwise: but I believe I am supported in my creed of materialism by Locke, Tracy, and Stewart. At what age of the Christian church this heresy of immaterialism, this masked atheism, crept in, I do not know. But heresy it certainly is. -- Thomas Jefferson

And the day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the supreme being as his father in the womb of a virgin will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerve in the brain of Jupiter. -- Thomas Jefferson

In Christianity neither morality nor religion come into contact with reality at any point. -- Friederich Nietzsche

The Christian resolution to find the world ugly and bad has made the world ugly and bad. -- Friederich Nietzsche

There is not enough love and kindness in the world to give any of it away to imaginary beings. -- Friederich Nietzsche

It is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring. -- Carl Sagan

This would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion in it. -- John Adams

The world holds two classes of men - intelligent men without religion, and religious men without intelligence. -- Abu Ala Al-Maari

Creationists make it sound like a 'theory' is something you dreamt up after being drunk all night. -- Isaac Asimov

So far as religion of the day is concerned, it is a damned fake. Religion is all bunk. -- Thomas Edison

I am myself a dissenter from all known religions, and I hope that every kind of religious belief will die out. -- Bertrand Russell

I do not believe any type of religion should ever be introduced into the public schools of the United States. – Thomas Edison

Tell me there is a God in the serene heavens that will damn his children for the expression of an honest belief! More men have died of their sins, judged by your orthodox creeds, than there are leaves in all the forests in the wide world ten thousand times over. Tell me these men are in Hell; that these men are in torment; that these children are in eternal pain, and that they are to be punished forever and forever! I denounce this doctrine as the most infamous of lies. --Robert G. Ingersoll

The Christian god can easily be pictured as virtually the same god as the many ancient gods of past civilizations. The Christian god is a three headed monster; cruel, vengeful and capricious. If one wishes to know more of this raging, three headed beast-like god, one only needs to look at the caliber of people who say they serve him. They are always of two classes: fools and hypocrites. -- Thomas Jefferson

Religion is so absurd that it comes close to imbecility. -- H. L. Mencken

Religion is fundamentally opposed to everything I hold in veneration--courage, clear thinking, honesty, fairness, and, above all, love of the truth. -- H. L. Mencken

Religions vary in their degree of idiocy, but I reject them all. For most people, religion is nothing more than a substitute for a malfunctioning brain. -- Gene Roddenberry

It is easier to suppose that the universe has existed for all eternity than to conceive a being beyond its limits capable of creating it. -- Percy Shelley

Christianity is the most ridiculous, the most absurd and bloody religion that has ever infected the world. -- Voltaire

Reality is what it is, not what you want it to be. -- Frank Zappa

To sit alone with my conscience will be judgment enough for me. -- Charles William Stubbs

For there is nothing either good or bad, thinking makes it so. -- William Shakespeare, Hamlet, II.ii

Faith: not wanting to know what is true. -- Friedrich Nietzsche

The being we call god is merely a pawn working for a powerful and rational force in some far-off galaxy. This force is trying to weed out people who are irrational by seeing who would be stupid enough to believe in his god illusion so easily. Those that believe in this illusion, he will send to eternal damnation and he will deliver the rational beings, those who stoically refused to believe in a god, to heaven. -- Nicholas Yee

God for you is where you sweep away all the mysteries of the world, all the challenges to our intelligence. You simply turn your mind off and say God did it. -- Carl Sagan, Contact

Religions are all alike - founded upon fables and mythologies. -- Thomas Jefferson

It's fair to say that the Bible contains equal amounts of fact, history, and pizza. -- Penn Jillette

I don't see any god up here. -- Yuri Gagarin

God is a concept by which we measure our pain. -- John Lennon

We need more understanding of human nature, because the only real danger that exists is man himself. -- Carl Gustav Jung

I distrust those people who know so well what God wants them to do because I notice it always coincides with their own desires. -- Susan B. Anthony

If the gods listened to the prayers of men, all humankind would quickly perish since they constantly pray for many evils to befall one another. -- Epicurus

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able?
Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing?
Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing?
Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing?
Then why call him God?
-- Epicurus

I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use. – Galileo

Religion: A daughter of Hope and Fear, explaining to Ignorance the nature of the Unknowable. -- Ambrose Bierce

Amen.

Edited by AZPaul3, : No reason given.

SIX ARGUMENTS AGAINST RELIGION

Found this treatise and thought it well formed, so I share.

1. Historical: History shows us that religious thinking is dangerous.

2. Geographical: People adhere to the dominant religion of their country. This argument demonstrates the absurdity of religion-specific dogmas that contradict the dogmas of other religions.

3. Legal: Constitutions and laws all over the world were framed to establish the separation of Church from State because religion is irrational, thus absolute theocracies are irrational forms of government that would lead to tyranny if these provisions were not made.

4. Cognitive / Educational: Religious faith requires the suspension of the critical and reasoning faculties.

5. Scientific: Science has debunked religious dogmas that were held as unquestionable truth in the past.

6. Humanistic: People do not need religion or faith in God in order to be moral.

7. General (added): Because its fuckin' stupid.

quote:

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In conclusion, it is my hope that these six arguments have persuaded you to see that religion and religious thinking are harmful to society. While I am against finding meaningful patterns where there is none, I have to mention that I am glad to have come up with six arguments since such a number is feared in the Christian myth. However, our objective should not be to attack but to persuade and educate using reason and evidence. -- Francisco Padilla García, author

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I'll take exception to his last sentence. Religion is too dangerous to our species to not attack, with vigor.

Edited by AZPaul3, : No reason given.

More than a decade ago I stumbled upon a British atheist site which had a rather good allegory. Needless to say, I have no idea how to find it again.

So from memory, the story is of a traveling Christian missionary happening upon two men on the road who had never before heard of religion at all, let alone Christianity. So he started his proselytizing spiel on them, the same one that we have all heard far too many times. The two men listened eagerly and intently to what the missionary was telling them, since it was all brand new to them and he had said that it was very important. However, none of it made any sense to them, so they asked him many questions seeking clarification. The actual dialogue, which I cannot remember completely, showed the problems they were having (eg, the need for salvation from being punished for eternity by a God who's doing it out of love, why this "loving" God committed such atrocities, etc).

The missionary was trying his best, but he was unable to answer their questions. Despite that, he agreed to accompany them to their village nearby to deliver his message to their neighbors who had also never heard about such things before. The entire village crowded around the missionary and listened to him even more eagerly and intently than the two on the road. And what he was telling them made even less sense to them so they had many more questions for him.

Finally the missionary ran out of and away from that village as fast as he could despite the people's pleas that he remain and explain his teachings to them.

Obviously, I could not do that story justice.

Tsk, Tsk AZPaul3! For every little gem that you produce in your anti religious temper tantrums, I can refute and do so logically. I will defend some of your ideas,(and those of your "friends") however, if they have logical merit and anything more than a willful disdain for Jesus Christ.

So to begin:

AZPaul3 writes: Due to the engagement of my limited neuronic abilities with the superbowl there was not enough capacity left to compose the usual Sunday sermon. I have opted for the easy way to address this deficiency with today's listing of observations and opinions from some of my long time friends.

OK lets examine each of your so-called friends. To me, they simply look as if they are people whom you agree with (in order to prove your biased point)

Mark Twain-- Twain was a humorist and saw the folly and hypocrasy generated by organized religion. I admired his wit and, in fact have one of his quotes in my signiture.

Robert Ingersoll--

quote:

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The Madison trial occurred when young Robert was nine years old, and it was the unjust and bigoted treatment his father received which made him the enemy, first of Calvinism, and later of Christianity in its other forms.

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Many of the most vocal atheists/agnostics have had personal negative experiences connected with religious beliefs.

quote:

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In a lecture entitled "The Great Infidels", he attacked the doctrine of Hell: "All the meanness, all the revenge, all the selfishness, all the cruelty, all the hatred, all the infamy of which the heart of man is capable, grew blossomed, and bore fruit in this one word – Hell."

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Ingersoll, a logical man, found little reason to trust Jesus Christ. Whether or not that was a mistake in his judgement is unknown objectively nat this time.

AZPaul3 writes: The ideas in my head were put there by your bible. Have you ever read that horror story? To say nothing of your religion's swath of blood as it ate through the heart of humanity these last 2000 years. Your creed's history leaves a lot of hate in its demented bloodthirsty wake, Phat.

A Bible cannot "put ideas" in your head unless you choose to accept them and focus on them. To one, a glass is half empty. To another it is half full.
William Lane Craig did a masterful response (addressing Christopher Hitchens) regarding the problem of evil argument.

transcript of debate writes: I think it's important to distinguish between the intellectual problem of suffering and the emotional problem of suffering (134:48) because these are quite different from each other. In terms of the intellectual problem of suffering, I think that there you need to ask yourself is the atheist claiming, as Epicurus did, that the existence of God is logically incompatible with the evil and suffering in the world? If that's what the atheist is claiming then he's got to be presupposing some kind of hidden assumptions that would bring out that contradiction and make it explicit because these statements are not explicitly contradictory. The problem is no philosopher in the history of the world has ever been able to identify what those hidden assumptions would be that would bring out the contradiction and make it explicit. On the contrary, you can actually prove that these are logically compatible with each other by adding a third proposition, namely, that God has morally sufficient reasons for permitting the evil in the world. As long as that statement is even possibly true, it proves that there's no logical incompatibility between God and the suffering in the world. So the atheist would have to show that it is logically impossible for God to have morally sufficient reasons for permitting the evil and suffering in the world and no atheist has ever been able to do that. So, that the logical version of this problem, I think, is widely recognized to have failed. Those atheists who still press the problem therefore press it as a probabilistic argument. They try to say that, given the evil in the world, it's improbable that God exists, not impossible but improbable. Well, again, the difficulty there is that the atheist has to claim that if God did exist then it is improbable that he would permit the evil and suffering in the world. And how could the atheist possibly know that? How could the atheist know that God would not, if He existed, permit the evil and suffering in the world. Maybe He's got good reasons for it. Maybe, like in Christian theism, God's purpose for human history is to bring the maximum number of people freely into his kingdom to find salvation and eternal life and how do we know that that wouldn't require a world that is simply suffused with natural and moral suffering. It might be that only in a world like that (that)the maximum number of people would freely come to know God and find salvation. So the atheist would have to show that there is a possible world that's feasible for God which God could've created that would have just as much salvation and eternal life and knowledge of God as the actual world but with less suffering. And how could the atheist prove such a thing? It's sheer speculation. So the problem is that, as an argument, the Problem of Evil makes probability judgements which are very, very ambitious and which we are simply not in a position to make with any kind of confidence. Now, I recognize that that philosophical response to the question doesn't deal with the emotional problem of evil and I think that for most people, this isn't really a philosophical problem,...

Your religion, Phat, is a superstitious fantasy of evil, blood, suffering and death. Your very humanity should be ashamed.

Many humans have behaved and acted badly...both theists and atheists. Anti theists are simply loud and proud of their freedom from God. It shall be short lived.

AZPaul3 writes: Phat, your creed is the poster child for cancel culture. Except instead of ignoring us on social media your adherents torture us and kill us dead.

The demons have every reason to be afraid. They will be rounded up and controlled. We seek not to do this against our fellow humans, but your stubbornness may lead to collateral damage. Best just surrender to God.

And no, you will never imprison or shut us up either. Best just drop this whole assault on reality.

Edited by Phat, : No reason given.

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"A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes." ~Mark Twain "
***
“…far from science having buried God, not only do the results of science point towards his existence, but the scientific enterprise itself is validated by his existence.”- Dr.John Lennox

“The whole war between the atheist and the theist comes down to this: the atheist believes a 'what' created the universe; the theist believes a 'who' created the universe.”
- Criss Jami, Killo

“The most difficult subjects can be explained to the most slow-witted man if he has not formed any idea of them already; but the simplest thing cannot be made clear to the most intelligent man if he is firmly persuaded that he knows already, without a shadow of a doubt, what is laid before him.” — Leo Tolstoy, The Kingdom of God is Within You
(1894).