A Question For Atheists.

[DioneTheDiabolist]

When and how did you decide that you didn't believe in god?

I wasn't sitting, I was walking in from the kitchen. It really couldn't have been more mundane.

Before the age of 13. though I tried really hard when I was about 15, however, it just didn't happen. But I did learn a lot more about myself, and realized that there is more in this world than my philosophy can imagine.

I was brought up a fairly strict religion (methodist) and I really want to believe, but I guess I never have because none of it actually makes sense. I think I struggled with 'God' even back in Sunday School.

I realise that any comfort of religion I might look for these days is simply the comfort of childhood memories.

On the whole, Dawkins is right.

"I think the irritation that you feel when believers question your morality is the same as the irritation they feel when some atheists question their intelligence. Neither"

They might be just as irritated but injustifiably so.

Wishing to be a good person and not wanting to kill people are completely unrelated to the question of whether an intelligent being created the universe.

On the other hand, completely believing in stuff for which there is no proof does appear to be a sign of intellectual shortcomings.

(Having said that, I know several intelligent people with unshakeable faith. In their case, the faith has been indoctrinated into them at a very early age, before they developed critical faculties)

Unjustifiably, even.

The very religious in my family are all highly intelligent and all had their moment of 'enlightenment' as adults (all at university I believe).

Although to me their deep faith is inexplicable I don't doubt their intelligence, and as none of them have ever commented negatively on my morality I've no problem there. Although the 'no faith' position to me is an intelligent one, I don't conflate the two as I don't think that atheists are necessarily more intelligent than the religious.

Faith is a conviction not a rational choice, and using rational tools to try and understand it doesn't work terribly well (excluding interesting thinking about why humans have faith, or what is going on in the brain during religious experiences).

It's perhaps wrong to assign a lack of intelligence to religion, and in fact the first response every time it's implied is "I know religious people who are very intelligent". But you can definitely assign a lack of rational thinking, the two aren't necessarily linked. You could have a stoutly religious person kick your arse at Trivial Pursuit but that doesn't mean they can't also believe in their imaginary friend without evidence for its existence.

I think I have always been an atheist, although had a brief wobble while working at a Catholic school (I think because I was a bit unhappy at the time and was sort of fascinated by the trappings of Catholicism, which I hadn't really encountered much before).
I have become more strongly atheist in recent years, and can understand the tendency for atheists to feel like questioning the intelligence of believers. But the thing is, there are certainly believers who absolutely are very intelligent. And if you go back a century or more, then most intelligent people were believers.

I was in primary school, probably about 10 yrs old. It didn't just happen overnight, but the idea of God existing just sounded more ridiculous to me every day and then finally I decided there wasn't any part of me that could believe in any of it. 15 years later I'm still firmly an athiest.

Cote, are you saying that you think the effects of religion on the reasoning ability of your friends was negated because religious indoctrination occurred in very early life?

It can be quite hard to shake off the irrational prejudices we aquire in early life. If we were brought up by racists, no matter how well educated we later become, it can take a long while to shake off completely the residual unease we might feel around members of an ethnic group we were brought up to believe are alien/dangerous/untrustworthy. We generally learn to keep such little niggles to ourselves and to behave like decent, polite, sensible people in company, though. It could be the same with those indoctrinated about imaginary friends: knowing and seeing that it's a crock of shit might not always get rid of lurking fears and/or comforting habits.

Equally, those brought up as non-religious might find it hard to let go of the idea of believers being foolish or stupid, even though they have probably met many believers who aren't.

I've met a great many believers who are very intelligent. And I know full well that the last Archbishop of Canterbury spoke goodness knows how many languages, just to give one example. But it is possible to be highly intelligent and still have a completely irrational belief in stuff. I'm sure there are very clever people with PhDs and so on who believe in alien abduction, to choose just one example...

Yes exactly. So however deluded I find belief in a deity, I don't think it is ok to imply that someone has a reduced IQ just because they believe in a god. People can have all sorts of reasons for believing in all sorts of things. It doesn't necessarily have anything to do with intelligence.

I am genuinely very surprised that people who are atheists think that people of faith are less intelligent than them? Is this because we believe in something we cannot prove beyond all reasonable doubt? What exactly can you really prove? Is this because our faith does not make sense? What exactly makes sense in this world. The things most of us would say we can really prove are things like our love for our kids or spouses etc (I am guessing, more so than the more basic stuff like my back door leads into my garden) and the things that make most sense to many of us (I am guessing - well to me at least) are the love of family and friends. Again, not sure how exactly we can prove all that.

Being a Christian makes you more positive and more healthy ...(I also think it is true) and I don't want to be argumentative at all, I am just really surprised that anyone thinks because someone had a capacity for spiritual faith it diminishes their mental intellect.

curiouspresbyterian.wordpress.com/2011/04/28/yet-another-scientific-study-finds-empirical-evidence-that-religious-faith-is-good-for-your-health/

One of the most intelligent people I know, who has a degree in genetics, is also a Methodist minister.

Sorry that should say PhD

I suppose one reason that atheists might suspect Christians as being less intelligent is that the Bible is obviously a bit dodgy, yet is taken as a valid historical record of events that quite frankly require better evidence than that presented before being remotely believable.

If you haven't had some sort of revelatory experience filling you with faith and the Bible is what you've got to go on, it's really not very convincing. Or a nice book, even.

noblegiraffe that is a good point.

IMHO I think it depends how literally people are taking the Bible.

The Bible is history, poetry, song, revelation and dreams.

noblegiraffe you say it is not very nice and I expect you are thinking of bits that are full of violence etc. And that is true there are some bits that are shocking, and I would not say as a Christian I was advocating doing violence! In fact I know some Christian pacifists.

But there are also some beautiful bits in the Bible, about love and care and justice.

I take your point though, I guess it needs skill to interpret the Bible or any book like that and that is where the disagreements come in. The experience that individuals have of God can help them to interpret it.

I take your point though, I guess it needs skill to interpret the Bible or any book like that and that is where the disagreements come in.

I don't think that was noblegiraffes point at all.

Maybe you are right LuisGarcia. - noblegiraffe said "If you haven't had some sort of revelatory experience filling you with faith and the Bible is what you've got to go on, it's really not very convincing. Or a nice book, even. "

I said "I take your point though, I guess it needs skill to interpret the Bible or any book like that and that is where the disagreements come in. The experience that individuals have of God can help them to interpret it. "

I thought Noblegiraffe meant if you have just a book and no experience then it is just a book and I said about having experience as a way of interpritting it. But I do see your point. Maybe I got that wrong.

Sorry Noblegirrafe if I misinterpreted or misrepresented you.

Most Christians pick and choose very carefully what they select from the Bible as guidance. And they really need to as some parts of the Old Testament are quite horrific. Not just because they are violent but because they advocate actions that most would consider completely 'unchristian' in particular a large amount of rape and enslavement in the 'historical' part, but also some really quite unpleasant commands.

I was very surprised when we were planning readings for my father's funeral and the priest spoke very openly about readings with sections omitted because they jarred with modern sensibilities.

It has always surprised me that when the early church decided on canon they left in so much of the Old Testament as it fits so poorly with the 'love thy neighbour as thyself' or 'suffer the little children to come unto me' type ethos of the New Testament. The Old Testament god is really quite deeply scary. Or as Richard Dwarkins apparently has said:

'The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully.'

I decided when I was about 18 and started feminist studies and started to question....
Why is god a man?
Why do people refer to a him?
Why do people hold up the fact that the only prominent female is a virgin in the bible?

And then other religions....
Why are religions so exclusive? Why do they use language and activities that exclude others?
Why are values not as important? Surely being kind is more important than believing in a religion?
Why do people hide behind religion as a justification for violence, hatred and aggression?

I just started to question and the answers weren't very appealing

I take your point though, I guess it needs skill to interpret the Bible or any book like that and that is where the disagreements come in. The experience that individuals have of God can help them to interpret it.

It certainly takes a vivid imagination to interpret the Bible. That fact that it's almost impossible to find two people in the world who interpret it in the same way should really tell you something.

The amount of actual historical fact in the Bible is dubious, but that which there is tends to refer to places rather than people. But there is no clear way to determine which parts should be taken as literal and which as merely 'guidance' or whatever you wish to call it. Because of this, it is impossible to argue against a Bible-ist because when you question a chapter or verse you always get back "it's not supposed to be taken literally". Well for the record, there are several verses which I've heard different people tell me are both literal and not literal, so forgive me if my conclusion is that the whole thing is a load of bollocks.

Telling me that you have to also have an experience to really understand the book is even worse. I'd rather stick with the books that actually convey their message without relying on me having to hallucinate to understand them. I wonder how many people who have never heard of the bible (or any other religious text) have had a strange experience and then said, "Hey, I met this God fella and he told me to read his book". No, people think that they have 'religious' experiences because they want to believe and they want to feel like God has touched them in some way. I'm not saying these people didn't have strange experiences, or vivid dreams, or thought they felt something or saw something, who hasn't had things like that happen, but to just jump to the conclusion that it must be Jesus reaching out is ludicrous. So whilst I don't want to say that this demonstrates a lack of intelligence, it certainly demonstrates a lack of rational thought.

Religionists seem to think it is intelligence that is questioned by atheists. It isn't, it's rationale.

nooka Exactly why the books that are in the Bible are in, is something I can't really explain except that God guided those people to put together the canon and I suppose my answer would have to be, if you would like an answer which maybe not, that they aren't meant to be taken literally, but they have something to tell us about human history and I know that some of it is history, but I agree some is not, it is poetry, dreams, songs etc. I can certainly understand why many of the things that are written can be seen as offensive.

OneLieIn I am not trying to convince you of anything but just for the record I am a feminist and a Christian. I don't think God is a man. I know that we use the term 'he' but that (for me at least) is to be distinct for 'it' not to be distinct form 'she'. There are lots of women in the Bible but you are right there are more men. The Bible was written down by people so I believe it has been influenced by people, I do not believe it was dictated word for word from God to people, if you see what I mean.

I guess Pedro that that is why I speak about experience, I really don't want to upset or rattle anyone's cage, it is very hard to explain something personal, like explaining why I love my husband or like eating Chinese red bean cake when no one I know does! I have had an experience of God, and a relationship with Jesus for 30 years; I look at the Bible in the light of that experience. Just as I would read a love letter from my husband (when I used to get them and that was a long time ago!) in the light of the relationship I have with my husband. And when I see a red bean cake I think yum because I like to eat them. I know it is not a perfect analogy at all; I am just trying to explain.

In some ways it seems pointless to do so because I can see how much many people feel my view on life is wrong and part of me doesn't feel that anything I can say will make much sense, but I guess I did not want to appear cowardly and just post and then disappear.

You have been very helpful in explaining to me why some atheists are very hostile to religion and God etc and to Christians. I mean that genuinely I did not understand why people felt so strongly. I can totally understand people not believing in God. I also feel in some ways that this type of discussion where one person posts, then another then someone else and someone takes offence and someone else mentions something etc etc makes it very hard to really understand what is behind people's thoughts and to connect with people. I feel if we were having this chat over a coffee or a glass of wine we would all feel much open to the discussion and connecting more on a personal level. I'm not explaining that well I guess it feels quite hostile, like I am lobbing my views like custard pies out of a trench and then retreating! It is only my desire to learn what makes others tick and to share what makes me tick. I am going away now for Easter and so may not get a chance to post for a day or two, if i do not may I wish you the peace of this Friday, not Good Friday, just any old Friday.