what do YOU say when questioned about your atheist/agnostic point of view?

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Originally Posted by Alextanium

I used to think like that too, until I discovered an entire church of these batshit insane people right around the corner in my hometown in Australia.

The rest of the world is definitely not immune to this kind of stupidity.

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Originally Posted by xdcx

you're exactly right. i guess what i meant was since atheists are able to defy public beliefs and overcome, for the most part, the onslaught of conversion attempts by other faiths by being able to THINK coherently for themselves as opposed to following common view and religious belief, does this make atheists smarter? to answer my own question - i guess to a certain level and extent yes it does, but not so to be over-generalized.

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Of course in general atheists are smarter. It's been shown a couple of studies, as well as that you have to be really damn stupid, or indoctrinated, to believe the shit most religions spout.

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Originally Posted by Omicron

Of course in general atheists are smarter. It's been shown a couple of studies, as well as that you have to be really damn stupid, or indoctrinated, to believe the shit most religions spout.

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I wouldn't use the word 'smarter'. I'd phrase it more like this:

"Studies have shown that the higher the level of education one has reached, the more likely they do not hold any religious beliefs. People who study biology have the lowest rates of religiously held beliefs across all the sciences".

Give them enough rope and they'll hang themselves with it. You don't have to do it for them.

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Originally Posted by Omicron

Of course in general atheists are smarter. It's been shown a couple of studies, as well as that you have to be really damn stupid, or indoctrinated, to believe the shit most religions spout.

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Not that I'm a theist, but where are these studies?

What if people just want to have something to believe in as opposed to the thought of rotting in the ground? I don't see anything wrong with that. Sure, there's potential of that happening but it's the thought that counts.

After 30 seconds of googling I didn't find the study itself, but:

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Originally Posted by Richard Dawkins

"As for citing the evidence, a number of studies have been done. The one meta-analysis of this that I know of was published in Mensa Magazine. It looked at 43 studies on the relationship between educational level or IQ and religion. And in 39 out of 43 -- that's all but four -- there is a correlation between IQ/education and atheism. The more educated you are, the more likely you are to be an atheist. Or the more intelligent you are, the more likely you are to be an atheist."

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And on the matter of "belief is OK if it's comforting":

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Originally Posted by Carl Sagan

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

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a.k.a: the truth hurts, but that doesn't make it less true.


Also: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_atheism

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Originally Posted by CoLd BlooDed

Not that I'm a theist, but where are these studies?

What if people just want to have something to believe in as opposed to the thought of rotting in the ground? I don't see anything wrong with that. Sure, there's potential of that happening but it's the thought that counts.

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The problem with that is that it doesn't give us a clear-cut attacking point for extremist and other batshit insane fucktards. We can't say "Well, your book is wrong" or "you have no evidence", because then we'd have to say the same to otherwise friendly people. So instead we just bomb the shit outta them, even though it says right there in the Bible and Quran that killing people is definitely the way to go and it might be a good idea to just question the book itself for a minute, on a larger scale.

A Christian simply does not have an argument against a fundamentalist terrorist because he commits the same sorts of fallacies and it is impossible for him to question the world view of the terrorist without questioning his own. He's caught in the predicament of considering something wrong that is clearly condoned by the book that he himself relies on.

Then we have theists discussing their interpretations of books, instead of first checking whether the books are actually relevant. There was this TV show where they had the Westboro Baptist Church on and some preacher dude and it was just a complete brainrape, because the preacher kept saying "Well, my God is a compassionate and benevolent one." Then a gay guy in the audience said he's pretty sure that God has no problem with his homosexuality. Now the only problem with that is that the Westboro Baptist Church is entirely correct in their interpretation of the bible which makes these kind of attempts to declassify them just ridiculous. God does hate homosexuals and these people that claim otherwise haven't read the bible. God isn't compassionate, he's a big asshole, according to the bible. But there's really no level ground to argue with that as long as we take the bible as a reference instead of criticizing the whole thing.

Actually, he (the Christian) does have an argument - "We live in the modern world where extreme adherence to laws laid down in biblical times isn't acceptable."

As a side note, Christain and Muslim (for instance) extremists just take what they want from these rules and ignore other rules in an attempt to justify their immoral actions.

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Originally Posted by CoLd BlooDed

Not that I'm a theist, but where are these studies?

What if people just want to have something to believe in as opposed to the thought of rotting in the ground? I don't see anything wrong with that. Sure, there's potential of that happening but it's the thought that counts.

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Mmm. I have no problem with moderate liberal religious people, but the problem comes is in that it accomadates for more extremist views, and where do you draw the line?


anyway, google gives me these:



this one is from the magazine "Scientific American":

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Originally Posted by Scientific American, September 1999

"Scientists and Religion in America"

"Whereas 90% of the general population has a distinct belief in a personal god and a life after death, only 40% of scientists on the B.S. level favor this belief in religion and merely 10 % of those who are considered 'eminent' scientists believe in a personal god or in an afterlife."


Contrary to the notion fostered by so-called 'creation-scientists', Albert Einstein did not believe in a personal god.

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Originally Posted by 'Nature' magazine

"Leading Scientists Still Reject God"

A recent survey of members of the National Academy of Sciences showed that 72% are outright atheists, 21% are agnostic and only 7% admit to belief in a personal God.

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Originally Posted by wikipedia

In 2006, a self-published non-peer review study was undertaken[3] to investigate, on a country-by-country level, the possibility of a link between the importance of religion to citizens and their average IQ. The study found that the strength of religious belief in countries was inversely related to their average IQ. The countries with higher IQs on average had significantly lower levels of religious belief than those with lower average IQs. The study has subsequently drawn criticism for neglecting the influence of several critical confounding factors, such as the work of religious institutions in deliberately focusing missionary work in third world countries where educational opportunities are concurrently poor.

In 2007, Danish newspapers reported that a study conducted by controversial intelligence researcher Helmuth Nyborg estimated that atheists' IQs were on average nearly 6 points higher than believers'.[4] The study is based on data from the National Longitudinal Study of Youth, which includes intelligence tests on a representative selection of American youth, where they have also replied to questions about religious belief. " I'm not saying that believing in God makes you dumber. My hypothesis is that people with a low intelligence are more easily drawn toward religions, which give answers that are certain, while people with a high intelligence are more skeptical," says the former professor.

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Originally Posted by more official trustworthy wikipedianess

In the US, according to raw data from the 2004 General Social Survey, those with graduate degrees were the least likely to believe in the afterlife or the Bible as the word of God, suggesting a link between religious belief and lower educational attainment.

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Originally Posted by The Fishy

Actually, he (the Christian) does have an argument - "We live in the modern world where extreme adherence to laws laid down in biblical times isn't acceptable."

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That's not an argument. Every Christian is a fundamentalist in terms of believing that Jesus is the son of god. Once you believe anything in the bible without evidence, this makes you a fundamentalist in regards to those parts of it. They just pick and chose, based on the culture they live in, not based on the actual scripture.

The reason it's not OK to adhere to biblical laws is not that it's generally a bad idea to follow laws but because most to all of the biblical laws are complete turdness.

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As a side note, Christain and Muslim (for instance) extremists just take what they want from these rules and ignore other rules in an attempt to justify their immoral actions.

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That's what every religious person does, not only extremists.
It's impossible not to do it, because all major religions are inherently contradictory and require massive hypocrisy on part of the believer.

Well, that last part's a given. :D

Fair enough, although I think that following social rules laid down by a 7th century prophet (for instance) today is sheer insanity regardless of how turdy the law is. But fair enough.

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Originally Posted by The Fishy

Fair enough, although I think that following social rules laid down by a 7th century prophet (for instance) today is sheer insanity regardless of how turdy the law is. But fair enough.

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Ya I think that's what I wanted to say but failed to accurately put into words.

Wow you guys are all really lucky. I for the most part just try to avoid the question at all costs. It is not completely frowned upon to be an athiest at my school, but it definetly makes things a little awkward. I usually tell people I am a scientologist just to mess with them.

I just say "Step off!"

I wear my atheism on my sleeve. That was how I wanted to be known at my new store I transferred to (I work at a grocery store while finishing up my B.S.) simply because I am in hick town Virginia (US) and the people around here are practically in awe of it. Or scared of it; two coworkers thought I worshiped Satan until I explained to them what atheism was, lol.

One lady is pissed off at me because she said I have "converted" a couple of the 17-year-olds to atheism. This reminded me of a great Dawkins quote which I will paraphrase: "Many people have never believed in the religion they were brought up in but simply didn't know there was an alternative to it". This is what I've found in hick-town. These young adults aren't stupid; they say they believe in it as to not incur the wrath of their parents and they leave it at that until I come along and show that someone can be openly atheist and not evil. As soon as that happened they realized they were atheists (or agnostics once I explained what that was) as well, they just didn't know it. Counting me there are now 4 atheists and 1 agnostic at my work; when I had started there, there was only me. One I will admit I probably converted (or deconverted depending on how you look at it) which is my boss; the others just needed to realize they didn't have to pretend anymore.

So yeah, the one fundie Christian there has talked to my boss about me not ruining the kids' minds (17-years-old is not a kid in my opinion) and sending them on the path to hell, but my boss blew her off.

Another quote that I am reminded of is by Hitchens where he says that America is not nearly as religious as the polls would suggest. He's damn right.

Heheh, Christopher Hitchens is awesome. I like him a lot more than Dawkins or Harris. They're too polite and aloof.

I'm pretty sure I broke my grandma's heart when she found out I took the cross off of the gold chain my grandfather gave to me, but she's in the first stages of dementia these days so she won't remember it for much longer, then I'm off the hook.

(I'm not a monster, humor is how I deal with reality :))

^ Good to know (about not being a monster).

I agree, loads of people just get born into it and stay that way because their parents lead them into thinking it's the only "true" religion. I find it sickening - I would NEVER do that to my child, no matter how strongly I believed in something. Maybe I would his him/her in my faith, but I would always encourage my children to be open-minded about religion.