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Hello. :(

Started by Marc, January 07, 2017, 06:47:55 PM

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Journey_To_Mars

I am a fellow 15 year old. I started my journey in atheism when I was 13 for the same reasons that you are now considering for yourself. My process went almost exactly like yours right now going for a Protestant Christian to an agnostic theist, and then I realized that I was lying to myself and jumped to atheism. I feel personally that the best ways to really get a good look at Christianity is to read the Bible as any other literary work and then read an atheistic perspective on it. Another good thing is to look at other religious text's and ways of thinking to see similarities. Listening to debates can help too but it's all really just a preference on which direction you want to take.

The life of being an atheist does differ a lot from when I was an atheist. For instance, I once wanted to be a musical artist but as I became more skeptical I started to get more into physics and maths as a career choice. One thing that I didn't really like is that I would attack people who were religious for about the first of being a year of being an atheist, but I have since realized that I should be a little more respectful and teach other's what being an atheist means rather than trying to de-convert them.
"It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets." - Voltaire

Maths is a game where you make the rules and play around within them.

fencerider

theist always have a good excuse to get the missing person (god) out of the room.

This was posted by somebody else a few weeks ago. It was "1391 reasons Christianity is false" when I first saw it now I think it is 1408. If you like to read, read this

www.kyroot.com

lot of info I would have never found on my own
"Do you believe in god?", is not a proper English sentence. Unless you believe that, "Do you believe in apple?", is a proper English sentence.

SGOS

#32
Even as a very young Christian, I never understood all the flap about Jesus.  You have to believe in Jesus as the son of God, who is the same as God and part of a trinity, which includes the Holy Spirit, which is the same as Jesus and God.  Well, OK, that's how Christianity differs from Islam and Judaism.  Set aside the absurdity of the Trinity with its issues of split personalities, and a wispy spirit thrown in for good measure, and the real question still remains.  As I asked earlier, "Is there a god?"

Christians, Muslims, Hindus, and Jews, blithely jump over this elementary question, so that they can jump straight into formulating stories, finding hidden meanings, and busying themselves with theological dissections, about the very thing they never bothered to come to grips with in the first place.  Is there a god?

I find that when I'm working on a logical analysis or trying to understand myself, it helps if I write my thoughts down in the form of a logical progression.  If I just limit myself to thinking without writing, I find myself making occasional leaps of thought that conveniently bypass troublesome concerns.  These are things that are critical links in the chain that lead to logical conclusions.  When I write it down, those weak links tend to glare at me.  If I just think without writing, it's too easy to blithely ignore the links that would make any conclusions illogical.

This is the mistake that theists make, and they do it right out of the gate.  They don't question whether God even exists before they start making shit up about him.  Well, OK, sometimes they ask the essential question, but they conveniently ignore the links that provide a logical answer regarding the existence of a god.  It seems to them they are being entirely logical.  It's part of the human condition, most people assume they are being logical, but they do so for illogical reasons.  Maybe like they assume they are logical because they have good intentions.  I dunno, but they just don't seem to see how lost they are in their reasoning.

Mike Cl

Quote from: Journey_To_Mars on January 08, 2017, 11:55:46 PM
I am a fellow 15 year old. I started my journey in atheism when I was 13 for the same reasons that you are now considering for yourself. My process went almost exactly like yours right now going for a Protestant Christian to an agnostic theist, and then I realized that I was lying to myself and jumped to atheism. I feel personally that the best ways to really get a good look at Christianity is to read the Bible as any other literary work and then read an atheistic perspective on it. Another good thing is to look at other religious text's and ways of thinking to see similarities. Listening to debates can help too but it's all really just a preference on which direction you want to take.

The life of being an atheist does differ a lot from when I was an atheist. For instance, I once wanted to be a musical artist but as I became more skeptical I started to get more into physics and maths as a career choice. One thing that I didn't really like is that I would attack people who were religious for about the first of being a year of being an atheist, but I have since realized that I should be a little more respectful and teach other's what being an atheist means rather than trying to de-convert them.
I would suggest to you that your interest in music may hold you in good stead with your study of math--I think most see a connection between the two with each enhancing the other.  Or so I've been told--my musical talent is simply in the listening. 
Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able?<br />Then he is not omnipotent,<br />Is he able but not willing?<br />Then whence cometh evil?<br />Is he neither able or willing?<br />Then why call him god?

Blackleaf

Quote from: Mike Cl on January 09, 2017, 10:20:16 AM
I would suggest to you that your interest in music may hold you in good stead with your study of math--I think most see a connection between the two with each enhancing the other.  Or so I've been told--my musical talent is simply in the listening.

Math ability and musical talent stimulate the same brain region. Because the brain is a muscle, using it makes it better. So when a person practices music, they also improve their mental ability to perform in math.
"Oh, wearisome condition of humanity,
Born under one law, to another bound;
Vainly begot, and yet forbidden vanity,
Created sick, commanded to be sound."
--Fulke Greville--

Mike Cl

Quote from: Blackleaf on January 09, 2017, 10:24:17 AM
Math ability and musical talent stimulate the same brain region. Because the brain is a muscle, using it makes it better. So when a person practices music, they also improve their mental ability to perform in math.
Well, there ya go Journey. 
Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able?<br />Then he is not omnipotent,<br />Is he able but not willing?<br />Then whence cometh evil?<br />Is he neither able or willing?<br />Then why call him god?

widdershins

In my experience people don't choose to be an atheist.  But I suppose they do stop choosing to be Christian.  Christianity is a choice.  You have to choose to remain ignorant to the facts.  Some religious faiths require more willful ignorance than others.  I would imagine it takes a whole lot of willful ignorance to be a Scientologist or a Mormon, for instance.  Or any of the "Bible literalist" faiths.  You have to actively work to keep your faith, or at least just not think about it.

Atheism, on the other hand, is just a lack of beliefs.  You don't choose not to have something so much as you choose to discard that thing, I suppose.  But for me, atheism wasn't something I particularly wanted.  It was a realization I came to.  I realized that I had chosen wrong the first time when I chose the religion of my parents.  I realized that the things they said and did and believed didn't match with what the Bible said.  They believed that certain things were in the Bible which just weren't there.  They taught a rejection of science, which I found ignorant.  I realized they were wrong.  I never chose to be an atheist.  It happened while I was looking into Christianity to see if I could find "the one true religion".  And after talking to a few people about it I simply came to the conclusion that all religions were the same.  They all chose which parts of the Bible to follow and which parts to ignore.  What's more, a dozen people could read the same passage in the Bible and make a dozen different arguments for a dozen different meanings.

So I would say, be what makes you happy.  And if you were in a fundamentalist religion, one of the "holy roller" religions, one of the religions that separates you from anyone outside of the church, I would gets some counseling.  It took me about a decade to get over the shit my religion had done to me.  I didn't even realize that I was messed up, but it left me with extreme feelings of self-loathing and depression.  They did teach me, after all, that I was worthless, that only God gave me value.  So without God everything which gave me value was gone.  I was angry and depressed and just generally messed up.  If I had known then what I know now I would not have had to go through a decade of self-discovery to fix the issues myself.  I would have had professional help.  But at the time I didn't even know there was a problem.
This sentence is a lie...

Journey_To_Mars

Quote from: Blackleaf on January 09, 2017, 10:24:17 AM
Math ability and musical talent stimulate the same brain region. Because the brain is a muscle, using it makes it better. So when a person practices music, they also improve their mental ability to perform in math.

Thanks for that. I've heard of something like this before, I just kind of threw it out though.
"It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets." - Voltaire

Maths is a game where you make the rules and play around within them.

Marc

Quote from: Journey_To_Mars on January 08, 2017, 11:55:46 PM
I am a fellow 15 year old. I started my journey in atheism when I was 13 for the same reasons that you are now considering for yourself. My process went almost exactly like yours right now going for a Protestant Christian to an agnostic theist, and then I realized that I was lying to myself and jumped to atheism. I feel personally that the best ways to really get a good look at Christianity is to read the Bible as any other literary work and then read an atheistic perspective on it. Another good thing is to look at other religious text's and ways of thinking to see similarities. Listening to debates can help too but it's all really just a preference on which direction you want to take.

The life of being an atheist does differ a lot from when I was an atheist. For instance, I once wanted to be a musical artist but as I became more skeptical I started to get more into physics and maths as a career choice. One thing that I didn't really like is that I would attack people who were religious for about the first of being a year of being an atheist, but I have since realized that I should be a little more respectful and teach other's what being an atheist means rather than trying to de-convert them.

Wow, I am in love with science and love everything about it. Thanks for sharing your experience :)

Journey_To_Mars

You're welcome Marc, I'm happy to share.
"It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets." - Voltaire

Maths is a game where you make the rules and play around within them.

Marc

Quote from: Journey_To_Mars on January 09, 2017, 06:51:24 PM
You're welcome Marc, I'm happy to share.

Oh my gosh, he sent videos of atheist reading he bible and proves to me how stupid what they were reading the Bible and I'm convinced the Bible is shit. Oh my god, how stupid I was in believing in this.

Journey_To_Mars

I think I'm doing good things
"It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets." - Voltaire

Maths is a game where you make the rules and play around within them.

Hydra009

Quote from: Marc on January 10, 2017, 12:01:36 AMOh my gosh, he sent videos of atheist reading he bible and proves to me how stupid what they were reading the Bible and I'm convinced the Bible is shit. Oh my god, how stupid I was in believing in this.
It's what people were raised to believe, so don't be too hard on them or yourself.  Hell, I wish I figured it out in my teens.  I had to wait until the mid-20s for that revelation.  Apparently, it took a while for me to pick up on biblical contradictions and inaccuracies.

With in mind, watch the arguments theists use to defend their holy book.  It usually doesn't go well for the defender.

Munch

I think the best argument you can have against Christianity is, no matter if you believe in the stories of the bible or not, it takes an extreme level of denialism to read the bible, and deny the twisted and fucked up things god brought down on people. from flooding the world, to turning people into salt, to opening the earth and killing thousands of people.

QuoteIn Genesis 7:21-23, God drowns the entire population of the earth: men, women, children, fetuses, and animals.
In Exodus 12:29, God the baby-killer slaughters all Egyptian firstborn children and cattle because their king was stubborn.
In Numbers 16:41-49, the Israelites complain that God is killing too many of them. So, God sends a plague that kills 14,000 more of them.
In 1 Samuel 6:19, God kills 50,000 men for peeking into the ark of the covenant.
In Numbers 31:7-18, the Israelites kill all the Midianites except for the virgins, whom they are allowed to rape as spoils of war.
In 2 Kings 2:23-24, some kids tease the prophet Elisha, and God sends bears to dismember them.

And yet, Christians want to call out their god as 'good'. Usually using the phrase of 'well god works in mysterious way'. You know who else worked in mysterious way? Ed Gein.
'Political correctness is fascism pretending to be manners' - George Carlin

Hydra009

Quote from: Munch on January 10, 2017, 12:11:02 PMI think the best argument you can have against Christianity is, no matter if you believe in the stories of the bible or not, it takes an extreme level of denialism to read the bible, and deny the twisted and fucked up things god brought down on people. from flooding the world, to turning people into salt, to opening the earth and killing thousands of people.
Noah's flood is twisted and fucked up?  You mean the most moral story ever told?  Surely you jest!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3lmi4YJo1tU