An Atheist and Happy

Dades

PDN wrote:

Reading these stories, I was struck by the similarity to many stories that I hear from Christians as to how they came to believe.

Personally I think the 'conversion' process works in different ways. As in there are completely different catalysts for conversion from atheism to Christianity, say, than the other way around.

The only reason someone might begin with a "gut" feeling that there may not be a god, is because they've probably been told there is one for their whole life and you have to fight against the tide. There is no one-thing that will make you suddenly realise - it's more of a realisation.

I am open to other opinions, but I would imagine most conversions from atheism to Christianity are preceded by life-changing events.

Rev Hellfire

The Atheist wrote:

Personally I think the 'conversion' process works in different ways. As in there are completely different catalysts for conversion from atheism to Christianity, say, than the other way around.

The only reason someone might begin with a "gut" feeling that there may not be a god, is because they've probably been told there is one for their whole life and you have to fight against the tide. There is no one-thing that will make you suddenly realise - it's more of a realisation.

I am open to other opinions, but I would imagine most conversions from atheism to Christianity are preceded by life-changing events.

I would imagine that in this day and age the tide is very much in the opposite direction ie. moving away from religion. Most people assuming they even bother to give it thought would (IMHO) default to no god, saying you believe would (for the younger generation and by younger I mean anyone less that 30) put you in opposition to default view of your peers.

Zombrex

PDN wrote:

It seems like we all tend to make decisions either on quite subjective grounds (gut feelings, something just 'felt right' or 'made sense') or when we are still very young and not really that well-informed as to the logic or implications of our decisions.

To be honest I think you have it the other way around

As children we are far more likely to accept supernatural explanations for why things are the way they are ("gut feelings") without really thinking about the logical nature of these.

This is simply the way our brains are set up, to view the world in terms of agency, even inanimate objects. This for a long period of our early lives over rules more materialist models of our universe, because supernatural models can be for more comforting or exiting or satisfying. This will natural appeal to children more than adults.

I remember about 10 being very convinced that ESP was possible, and spending hours with my friends trying to demonstrate that it worked to each other. We took every little sign as proof that it was working. We were even convinced that one of us had moved a car.

But as people get old some tend to come crashing back to reality.

You slowly realise that it isn't ESP, that there are other explanations for things that are not supernatural in nature. Despite the fact that it would be really cool for ESP to be real, despite the fact that we really wanted ESP to be happening, it wasn't. This of course will be effected by the ideas we are exposed to in areas of education.

I think it is this realization that reality is not simply there for us is possibly the most important and profound one that a child will experience. "Life changing" is the word.

It causes a lot of people, in their teenage years or earlier, to reject not just God, but the supernatural explanations in general. Reality exists independently of us, not for our benefit. We may want certain things to be true, we may want reality to work a certain way. But it doesn't, it works the way it works.

But for some this fact just doesn't "click" throughout their early life, and they carry on the idea that there can be supernatural things that exist for our benefit in later life. They are still in the mind set they were as a child, where supernatural explanations for events were as logical as materialist ones because reality can be what we want it to be.

This will lead to everything from religion to UFO watching

DinoBot

Well I was raised with quite alot of exposure to many different faiths. Mother was christian, father was pagan but was previously very stong christian and has very good knowledge of the bible. So growing up I always wanted to understand where peoples belief came from. If someone said "I believe X" I would need to know why, which book was that from which prophet etc.
So I started off by reading the bible because most discussions in school would be centred around that faith and then branched off to Bahi and Islam.

My Conclusion: All faiths think they are the one true source of truth. They all feel that others "may" contain bits of truth. There is no way to really tell if one is any more true than the other.
So it has lead me to an atheist worldview.

Most people I meet think an atheist is someone who doesnt bother about the issues of faith and religion but in my experience its the complete opposite.

Crucifix

PDN wrote:

Note: This is intended as a friendly post and in no way to hijack the thread. If the mods think it is out of line please delete. PDN

Reading these stories, I was struck by the similarity to many stories that I hear from Christians as to how they came to believe. It seems like we all tend to make decisions either on quite subjective grounds (gut feelings, something just 'felt right' or 'made sense') or when we are still very young and not really that well-informed as to the logic or implications of our decisions. Then, as we get older, we build a logical framework for our belief/unbelief that makes sense to us and is coherent and consistent, but is initially founded on a hunch, the influence of another person, or a step of faith (or even a step of unbelief).

Maybe we are more like each other than we care to admit? That is a friendly observation, not a criticism.

It's a very interesting point. I was a very curious child, and used to drive my parents and others crazy with incessent questioning. I would say that this questioning nature lead me to always be somewhat agnostic about religion, but then in my teens I thought about it and settled into a sort atheist/agnostic hybrid.
Certainly I have thought long and hard about it (and continue to do so), as most theists and non theists who bother to post in the religious fora probably have, but that youthful skeptic nature catalyst was probably far more important than the later logic.
I don't think anyone could (or at least should) construe it as criticism, as really it's about human nature. You can often see similar believed justification of something that has much simpler motivation in other areas; in ethics and morals people will often go to great lengths to justify things (good or bad) that could seen as "in their nature", or an example from a recent after hours thread, Stormfront trying to use culture and history to justify their racism and bigotry.

Sangre

DinoBot wrote:

Most people I meet think an atheist is someone who doesnt bother about the issues of faith and religion but in my experience its the complete opposite.

Yeah, I remember someone asked me about baptism of kids and I said that I'd rather not do it but I may have to depending on the schools in the locality. This discussion went on and I remarked I'd prefer the same for no chruch wedding but would if the missus was gagging for it. Then they made a flippant remark about hows 'its only because i'm lazy about it''. I kind of lost the rag at that ignorance and started mouthing off that 'at least I have a strong belief, you on the other hand go to Church twice a year so don't you dare call me lazy'.

They just couldn't understand how I could be sensitive about an 'únbelief'.

pfft.

Zombrex

Sangre wrote:

They just couldn't understand how I could be sensitive about an 'únbelief'.

pfft.

I imagine it was more the idea of being called lazy

Its simply a rationalisation that there can't be something wrong with my belief in Christianity/Islam/Scientology etc, there must be something wrong with the person who rejects my belief, they are lazy, they turn away from morality, they are selfish etc etc

DinoBot

Sangre wrote:

........so don't you dare call me lazy'.

.

Yeah, been there

Being atheist requires you to be active, while going along with the crowd is much more passive. It requires you to choose different schools, different type of wedding, funeral, baby naming party etc. Plus, for me anyway, it forces you at activily question which holiday and festiful to take part in and celibrate.

Lazy, it isnt

Scofflaw

The Atheist wrote:

Personally I think the 'conversion' process works in different ways. As in there are completely different catalysts for conversion from atheism to Christianity, say, than the other way around.

The only reason someone might begin with a "gut" feeling that there may not be a god, is because they've probably been told there is one for their whole life and you have to fight against the tide. There is no one-thing that will make you suddenly realise - it's more of a realisation.

I am open to other opinions, but I would imagine most conversions from atheism to Christianity are preceded by life-changing events.

Strikingly similar to falling in love (theist), and falling out of love (atheist) - indeed, there are rather more similarities than that...people badmouthing their ex, for example.


cordially,
Scofflaw

Tim Robbins

Scofflaw wrote:

Strikingly similar to falling in love (theist), and falling out of love (atheist) - indeed, there are rather more similarities than that...people badmouthing their ex, for example.


cordially,
Scofflaw

Or if one is a conformist (theist) or contrarian (atheist)

Scofflaw

Tim Robbins wrote:

Or if one is a conformist (theist) or contrarian (atheist)

If one is an atheist because one is a contrarian, one is not an atheist, but a contrarian - because in an atheist milieu, the contrarian would be a theist.

Same for the conformist, of course, in reverse.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Tim Robbins

Scofflaw wrote:

If one is an atheist because one is a contrarian, one is not an atheist, but a contrarian - because in an atheist milieu, the contrarian would be a theist.

Same for the conformist, of course, in reverse.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Agree, but most (not all) atheists are contrarian and most theists (not all) tend to be conformists.
Far more of a correlation than those that are in and out love, anyway.

Scofflaw

Tim Robbins wrote:

Agree, but most (not all) atheists are contrarian and most theists (not all) tend to be conformists.
Far more of a correlation than those that are in and out love, anyway.

Well, yes - that would be because it was an analogy, rather than a correlation.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Fallen Seraph

Tim Robbins wrote:

Agree, but most (not all) atheists are contrarian and most theists (not all) tend to be conformists.

There are a lot of circles where being a theist is an extremely untrendy thing, and vice-versa. In irish society, imo, the norm is apathy; not belief or disbelief. I think your statement is rather wrong... As scofflaw pointed out; the punk rocker isn't necessarily being contrarian...

Tim Robbins

Scofflaw wrote:

Well, yes - that would be because it was an analogy, rather than a correlation.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Damn those analogies!

Tim Robbins

Fallen Seraph wrote:

There are a lot of circles where being a theist is an extremely untrendy thing, and vice-versa. In irish society, imo, the norm is apathy; not belief or disbelief.

Agree completly it's irrelevant question for most people especially in a consumer driven celtic tiger.

I think your statement is rather wrong... As scofflaw pointed out; the punk rocker isn't necessarily being contrarian...

Would agree the statment is wrong if atheists were in millieu but judging by the census they certainly are not.