Atheists/agnostics, why did you become atheist/agnostic

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:For those of you, what do you think happens when you die?

I will to the same place the dinosaurs went. Reunited at last.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For those of you, what do you think happens when you die?

I will to the same place the dinosaurs went. Reunited at last.

What do any of you think happens at death- not just you, but animals or plants? No one seems to have an issue with the end of life to eat a hamburger or a geranium at the end of its season, but the hubris evolves around our death. Maybe death is just death. The idea that we somehow prevail later in soul or afterlife is the chemicals that keep us surviving in life. Yet, it appears that we just die like all human things.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For those of you, what do you think happens when you die?

I will to the same place the dinosaurs went. Reunited at last.

What do any of you think happens at death- not just you, but animals or plants? No one seems to have an issue with the end of life to eat a hamburger or a geranium at the end of its season, but the hubris evolves around our death. Maybe death is just death. The idea that we somehow prevail later in soul or afterlife is the chemicals that keep us surviving in life. Yet, it appears that we just die like all human things.

Probably so. After all, we can accept that all other living things just die, but not us.

Still, hope springs eternal and there's a whole religious business model based on this hope to live forever.

If you read through this thread, you'll see that there are people who were never religious, who find death very easy to accept. Others, who accepted religious teachings about the afterlife, want to keep believing that it's real.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For those of you, what do you think happens when you die?

I will to the same place the dinosaurs went. Reunited at last.

What do any of you think happens at death- not just you, but animals or plants? No one seems to have an issue with the end of life to eat a hamburger or a geranium at the end of its season, but the hubris evolves around our death. Maybe death is just death. The idea that we somehow prevail later in soul or afterlife is the chemicals that keep us surviving in life. Yet, it appears that we just die like all human things.

Probably so. After all, we can accept that all other living things just die, but not us.

Still, hope springs eternal and there's a whole religious business model based on this hope to live forever.

If you read through this thread, you'll see that there are people who were never religious, who find death very easy to accept. Others, who accepted religious teachings about the afterlife, want to keep believing that it's real.

But some people get very nervous about their dogs. They want to meet their dogs in heaven. They don't think about all the cows that were slaughtered so they could have a nice steak and they have no interest in seeing a bunch of cows on the streets of heaven. But their dogs are another story.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I realized that religion is completely manmade.

I mean really when you think about it, what on earth makes Islam, Christianity, Judaism (etc) more plausible than Greek gods and mythology, or ancient Egyptian? Or why is monotheism any more plausible than polytheism?

The stories, the concepts of an afterlife, and so on are not any more believable (and in many cases, obviously borrowed and built upon).

People create and tell stories to have a sense of order. To structure what they feel is chaotic in the universe. Which is fine... but it's just a story in the absence of (or before) scientific understanding. Or to give comfort. But it's all completely manmade.

+1 this

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I realized that religion is completely manmade.

I mean really when you think about it, what on earth makes Islam, Christianity, Judaism (etc) more plausible than Greek gods and mythology, or ancient Egyptian? Or why is monotheism any more plausible than polytheism?

The stories, the concepts of an afterlife, and so on are not any more believable (and in many cases, obviously borrowed and built upon).

People create and tell stories to have a sense of order. To structure what they feel is chaotic in the universe. Which is fine... but it's just a story in the absence of (or before) scientific understanding. Or to give comfort. But it's all completely manmade.

+1 this

"it's all completely manmade" doesn't seem like a strong reason to discount something. While scientific principles always existed, the study and understanding of science is "all completely manmade" as well. Shoud we ignore that, as well?

[Anonymous]

Life is more complicated than “you’ll be rewarded if you’re good and punished if you’re bad”. All religions basically boil down to this and definition of good and bad depends on who is in power and who they want to control. Be good for goodness sake.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I realized that religion is completely manmade.

I mean really when you think about it, what on earth makes Islam, Christianity, Judaism (etc) more plausible than Greek gods and mythology, or ancient Egyptian? Or why is monotheism any more plausible than polytheism?

The stories, the concepts of an afterlife, and so on are not any more believable (and in many cases, obviously borrowed and built upon).

People create and tell stories to have a sense of order. To structure what they feel is chaotic in the universe. Which is fine... but it's just a story in the absence of (or before) scientific understanding. Or to give comfort. But it's all completely manmade.

+1 this

"it's all completely manmade" doesn't seem like a strong reason to discount something. While scientific principles always existed, the study and understanding of science is "all completely manmade" as well. Shoud we ignore that, as well?

I guess the difference is that religion purports to be sent by God. But of course there's no proof of that. You just have to believe it.

[Anonymous]

We're animals. The only difference between us and a dog or a cow is thumbs obviously but also the ability to worry about the future.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We're animals. The only difference between us and a dog or a cow is thumbs obviously but also the ability to worry about the future.

and to dream up everlasting life, or everlasting punishment

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We're animals. The only difference between us and a dog or a cow is thumbs obviously but also the ability to worry about the future.

and to dream up everlasting life, or everlasting punishment

Yup.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We're animals. The only difference between us and a dog or a cow is thumbs obviously but also the ability to worry about the future.

and to dream up everlasting life, or everlasting punishment

Yup.

Humans also have high intelligence and creativity. We can use these traits to understand science and to make up stories. From the beginning, we've made up stories about creation and relatively recently, we've been able to use our intelligence to understand the science of creation.

The stories persist among some people, even when thy clash with the science.

The stories may evolve, and there may be new stories, but there's no lack of stories. People who want to believe them, will believe them - and in some cases try to impose their stories on others.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We're animals. The only difference between us and a dog or a cow is thumbs obviously but also the ability to worry about the future.

and to dream up everlasting life, or everlasting punishment

And to insist that everyone should believe in it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We're animals. The only difference between us and a dog or a cow is thumbs obviously but also the ability to worry about the future.

and to dream up everlasting life, or everlasting punishment

And to insist that everyone should believe in it.

And then to shun those who don’t. Because that somehow makes people feel good.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I believe I am ‘losing my religion’ as we speak.
I have been an active Methodist all of my life; I married a Catholic guy who goes through all the motions but doesn’t actually have deep faith. I realized we keep up the pretense for our children (kind of like the Santa analogy above) because my Methodist church provides a convenient way to help us reaffirm the values we want to instill in our children.

I want to live like Jesus... I just don’t think any religion has any (provable) truth deeper than old earthly creation stories that morphed into stories of divinity.
This has been a mix of influence of my anthropological education background / having children / burying loved ones / not feeling stronger faith as I age, but the opposite. Shouldn’t faith strengthen as we invest in it? I’ve given it 42 years.

I am struggling with this, though. It’s tough to let go or something after a lifetime of trying.

I hear you. It can be tough to make the transition to non-belief. "Letting go" doesn't need to be as complete as cutting a bad ex out of photographs if you don't want it to be. It's still okay to want to live like Jesus. In the same sense that it's okay to want to live like Atticus Finch or Robin Hood or Tom Sawyer.

Personally, as a committed atheist, I'm actually really impressed by the bible. I think it's kind of cool and interesting that humans' desire to understand -- to understand the world, to make sense of creation, to explain what they didn't have the science to explain -- resulted in the creation and codification of these stories. Not that it's necessarily great literature, and a lot of it is simply not well written even in a good translation, but there's a lot there. So feel free to interpret the New Testament Jesus stories as a reasonably-decent guide for how to live. You don't have to give that up as you move away from really "believing."

Interesting point of view -- thanks for expressing it. Sounds like, having removed or discounted the Bible's power as a must-follow book of rules, you are able to recognize its value as ancient literature.

This is a view that can be difficult for formerly religious people who became atheist because they were taught to "believe" the Bible as the word of God, and then found it to be a sham.

Jefferson had similar issues with the Bible. He took the New Testament and used a razor to physically cut out all supposed miracles by Jesus and most mentions of the supernatural - i.e., the Resurrection, miracles, etc. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jefferson_Bible