why are you an atheist?

Originally posted by HiddenPotential
Gregory, it seems to me that your religion is evolution.
In your opinion, how did we humans evolve, start at the beginning

My "religion" is evolution? Reread the thread, my friend. I've only even mentioned evolution twice--both times as a direct response to other people's questions. You're the one who keeps bringing it up. As for my opinion of how humans evolved, I'm not sure what you mean. Do you want a family tree? An explanation of the mechanism of evolution? I could probably dig up either of them (I already more or less know the second one), but I'm not an evolutionary scientist; I'm a math student. Why are you asking me?

he could be asking to stray away from the point, which is what it looks like to me.

Zelda Lestat
We have been given free will, to do as we please.
If god did stop everyone from doing all evil then we would not know the difference between good and bad and life would be meaningless.

you completely misunderstood what I was saying. When I was referring to WWII I wsa asking why he ddint save them.Why wuld he hvae let thousands of the innocent that worshipped him die and be tortured like they did.

If most parents were like god apparently is, they'd watch their five-year-old children put their hands on red-hot stove units and not do jack to stop them. Because, you know, free will and all that.

lol.thank you gregory.

What the hell does free will have to do with God, anyway? That's a crap excuse to explain why bad things still happen...

Good point, Gregory 👆

i dont know. it seems to me that HP here is trying to steer away from the fact that nothing he's saying is credible.

Yeah really...people tend to do that when they can't back up anything they say.

Originally posted by Gregory
If most parents were like god apparently is, they'd watch their five-year-old children put their hands on red-hot stove units and not do jack to stop them. Because, you know, free will and all that.

Well, I guess you like being spoon-fed, manipulated and controlled.

I don't know abut the rest of you, but I am an atheist because too much is taken forgranted over matters of religion.Wars are started and millions of innocent people are killed because they believe in this so called God.Percfect example-WWII.So, I choose to believe in nothing.Besides, if there truly was a god, why would he allow things like that to happen?Also I dont agree with alot of the things the bible suggest even.

Misunderstood? Lets see-
"if there truly was a god, why would he allow things like that to happen?"

Gregory,
Yes exactly, He said dont eat of the tree in the garden or eden, but what did they do.

they did the exact same thing, all of us do, its in our nature.

By the way, humans created the stove, you cant use todays society as an example of how god originated law.

Originally posted by HiddenPotential
white eagle, I see where you are coming from but you are focusing on inevitable negative things that could happen.

The things that have happened though that I find positive and imperative to life on this planet are-

-Perfect atmosphere, if it wasnt as thick as it is we would be crushed by the millions of pieces of cosmic debris, and meteorites that continually fall on this planet
-Perfect distance from the sun creating perfect heat absorption
-Perfect axis
-Perfect moon that pulles the tides, without it we couldnt live on this planet.
-Without the tides created by the moon, all our harbors and shore would become one stench pool of garbage, and it would be impossible to live anywhere near them.
-The tides aerate the ocean providing oxegen for the plankton, which is the very foundation of the food-chain of our world.
-Without the plankton there would not be oxygen, and man would not exist in this world.
-the moon is also perfectly sized and distanced from the sun, to perform these and numerous other functions.
-The amazing nitrogen cycle thats needed for plants. It get out of the air and into the soil through lightning, 100,000 lightning bolts strike this planet daily, creating a hundred million tons of usable plant food in the soil each year.
-Perfect ozone. Eight killer rays fall upon the earth continually from the sun, without the ozone we would be burned blinded and broiled by them.
If compressed the ozone would only be a quarter of an inch thick.
-Perfect clouds, covering 50 percent of the earth at any one time.
-Perfect water, I could go on and on about the cycle, but instead tell about something maybe you dont know. Bizmuth is the only other liquid that is heavier at 4 degrees celcius than it is at freezing. Meaning when its frozen its lighter and rises. If this were not so the lakes would freeze from the bottom up and kill all fish. The algae would be destroyed,

You're making the typical stupid creationist mistake, which is saying that these things are true because of us. This is totally untrue. Rather, it is quite the opposite--we exist because of these things. Yeah, if there were no plankton, there would be no humans, so what? What does that prove? Yeah, everything has a place in the world, but that place is not to help us live. If cows didn't exist we wouldn't eat beef. If plankton didn't exist we would either function differently or not at all. This in no way proves the existence of a God. Plants evolved to fit the conditions of the soil and the atmosphere--it's not like there's only one possible way they can function and by some miracle these exact conditions exist here.

And for the last time, life on earth is very far from perfect. Complex beyond comprehension, yes, but certainly not perfect. I already told you the example of the locusts, and you've given me no explanation for that. Another example of an imperfection in life is male "plumbing". Any intelligent being could have designed that better. Yet another is the existence of the "wolf tooth" in domestic horses. It is a relatively small, canine-type tooth which is in the approximate center of the gap between the horse's molars and incisors. They are typically removed once the horse is mature, as they cause a lot of problems--even if the horse is never ridden or worked.

Certainly I like being controlled. If people aren't controlled there's anarchy; people murdering each other in the street, looting, turning over cars. So the laws control us--but we still have freedom as long as we're not hurting others with our freedom. All I want God to do is take on the role of law-enforcement and keep us from ****ing each other up. Sure, I'd lose the "freedom" to steal and murder and rape; but you know what? Those freedoms aren't important to me.

Good point, but I have to say If God tried to interfere in the way we live our lives there would be a major insurrection. People obey laws out of fear not dissimilar to Christianity, which you just said you wished do to. So what's the use of being an athiest if you want an authorative figure who instructs you? Athiesm is more archaic because it absconds the idea of any supreme ruler or 'law enforcer". And don't forget Gregory not all freedoms that are legal are morally acceptable.

Posted by Darth Revan

"We didn't evolve "from" apes as you describe it. In fact, rarely ever do species evolve entirely into another species. Rather, some of them "break off" of the rest of the population, and each new species goes their separate way. Sometimes one of the two becomes extinct, sometimes they don't. We are far from perfect, as are all other organisms on this planet. "Functioning" and "perfect" are not synonyms, after all. There is a kind of locust which has a set of nerves that starts at the head, goes down to the end of the animal's abdomen, and then loops back up to its wings. There is no longer any need for these extra nerves, they merely take up space and use up valuable resources.

Our ecosystem is balanced because that's the way it evolved. If we were too close to the sun, or too far away, we would not exist at all. If there were a different mixture of gasses in the atmosphere, everything would work very differently, but rest assured that it would still work."

If anyone was to read this post, they would notice how you say we didnt evolve and then we did evolve. Its a very interesting mistake for someone who's so wise.

Good point, but I have to say If God tried to interfere in the way we live our lives there would be a major insurrection. People obey laws out of fear not dissimilar to Christianity, which you just said you wished do to. So what's the use of being an athiest if you want an authorative figure who instructs you? Athiesm is more archaic because it absconds the idea of any supreme ruler or 'law enforcer". And don't forget Gregory not all freedoms that are legal are morally acceptable.

I wasn't thinking about obeying laws through fear; I was thinking of God making it so that it simply wouldn't occur to us to behave baddly to each other.

You have to make a distinction between what you want and what is. I might like it if there was some divine figure I could turn to in times of moral turmoil, so that I could always be sure of doing the right thing. Certainly, I wouldn't turn my nose up at immortal life. But I simply don't see any evidence that such a being exists. I do not want atheism to be correct; I simply think that it is (this isn't to say that I want Christianity to be true; I strongly disagree with Christianity on some moral points).

Originally posted by HiddenPotential
Posted by Darth Revan

"We didn't evolve "from" apes as you describe it. In fact, rarely ever do species evolve entirely into another species. Rather, some of them "break off" of the rest of the population, and each new species goes their separate way. Sometimes one of the two becomes extinct, sometimes they don't. We are far from perfect, as are all other organisms on this planet. "Functioning" and "perfect" are not synonyms, after all. There is a kind of locust which has a set of nerves that starts at the head, goes down to the end of the animal's abdomen, and then loops back up to its wings. There is no longer any need for these extra nerves, they merely take up space and use up valuable resources.

Our ecosystem is balanced because that's the way it evolved. If we were too close to the sun, or too far away, we would not exist at all. If there were a different mixture of gasses in the atmosphere, everything would work very differently, but rest assured that it would still work."

If anyone was to read this post, they would notice how you say we didnt evolve and then we did evolve. Its a very interesting mistake for someone who's so wise.

No, you're just mis-reading his post. What he's saying is that apes didn't directly evolve into humans, like so many people (mistakenly) believe. If this were so, there would be no apes on Earth. Instead, a group was broken off from the rest of the population, and this group, over time, evolved into the first humans.

Originally posted by Gregory
I wasn't thinking about obeying laws throught fear; I was thinking of God making it so that it simply wouldn't occur to us to behave baddly to each other.

You have to make a distinction between what you want and what is. I might like it if there was some divine figure I could turn to in times of moral turmoil, so that I could always be sure of doing the right thing. Certainly, I wouldn't turn my nose up at immortal life. But I simply don't see any evidence that such a being exists. I do not want atheism to be correct; I simply think that it is (this isn't to say that I want Christianity to be true; I strongly disagree with Christianity on some moral points).

Well you should have clarified the kind of freedom of you mentioned in the first place.

Originally posted by Silver Stardust
No, you're just mis-reading his post. What he's saying is that apes didn't directly evolve into humans, like so many people (mistakenly) believe. If this were so, there would be no apes on Earth. Instead, a group was broken off from the rest of the population, and this group, over time, evolved into the first humans.

Exactly 🙂

And I never claimed I was wise. I don't know where you get that idea. Is it because I use big words and don't make very many typos/gramatical errors? cuz i can talk liket his if u want me 2.

Gregory,
what moral points do you dissagree with?