Atheism and the 'religious' feeling

I call it the 'religious' feeling because it seems to have been hijacked by the religious majority. When religious people tell me that I "just wouldn't understand" or that "you have to experience it to believe", I just get frustrated. Not only did I used to believe in the Catholic god, but I understand their 'experience' all too well as an atheist. It is the feeling almost anyone has... at least people who deeply think about philisophical, religious or scientific issues. Einstein spoke about the 'religious feeling', and as a fellow non-believer in god, I understand exactly what he was getting at.

People who speak about their 'experience' as proof of god, share the same feeling as those who have no such belief, yet this feeling does not motivate atheists towards believing in this created delusion.

People are more likely to create something as a cause of this feeling, and then attribute this feeling to their created delusion (such as god). This could come in any form of wishful superstition - most people I would suggest use pseudoscience such as astrology and reincarnated loved ones coming back as a butterfly on their front porch. But in general, any self-fulfilling delusions generally consist of people telling themselves that there is an external meaning to life, that life is not all that we have, that we are not surrounded by a sea of 'dull' matter...

People could argue that I, as an atheist, have invented a pinpoint for this feeling too, but I pinpoint this feeling to something I know exists and is a reasonable interpretation of reality. Nothing cares about our existence, our feelings and our well being. The Earth will not even go around the Sun 100 times before I, and everyone reading this, will no longer exist. We will in effect return to what it was like before we were born, and it will stay that way.

But should refusal to believe in any supernatural delusions be pessimistic or depressing? Well if you think that, then I suggest you seriously think about the universe and life existing without your created delusion. Think about it a bit more, and I suspect that gradually, you will get used to it. Just like the cancer patients who find a new lease of life and make the most of everything while they still have life in them.

 

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Atheists=cancer patients?

I hope you're not in charge of recruitment

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Basically, yes! People can find a new lease of life when suddenly harsh reality is thrusted upon them.

 

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Your remark just proved that you should be first in line

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Deflecting the issue is a perfect example of what he's talking about. Instead of finding an excuse to change the subject you just did what most, should I say religiously delusional people do when confronted with a faith testing alternative, by finding or creating something totally bogus, witty or charmingly insulting about an opinion contrary to your own.

It indicates to me that you see logic and reason within Kenny JC's words but for some inhibiting reason you can't even begin to accept it. What is the inhibitor? What prevents the indoctrinated from venturing off the path to confront the reality of this life, universe, world, etc.?

 

Hey now, not all atheists are boring. Just the ones who have read Dawkwins.

 

I stand corrected.

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Limited breadth of thinking? I am quite capable of writing at length how life would change if I worked under the assumption there was a god. I never see theists do the same working under the assumption that their superstition is untrue... even when I invite them to do so.

 

Remember what I said about cracking back as an issue deflector, well....You're doing it again. But oh well, aside from your personal opinion of Kenny there are many atheists such as myself who accept the fact the other side, if you will, may think of me as being delusional. I have no problem with that. In fact I have no idea what makes me an atheist. I've never read any book on atheism, watched any tv shows on the subject or visited any atheist internet forums. Call it the 'atheist feeling' if you want but it makes no difference to me because my feeling is what it is. I never converted to atheism, I just am. I've been an atheist since day one, just that now I'm an adult. I never thought of it much more than a natural progression. I see no reason or logic in religious ideology, never have, never will....possibly because there are so many, who knows?

 

Hmm it's actually of no interest to me why you are an atheist, so why would you even explain it. I grew up in a multi-religious society with different grades of belief and disbelief and atheists are also part of the continuum.

And it wasn't a distraction, I've pontificated on my beliefs ad nauseum on this forum before coming to the conclusion that most atheists on this forum are as blind to the socio-political realities and as influenced by religious propaganda as religious extremists. They are certain that the internet and the media are absolute reflections of reality, since this to them constitutes "evidence" in support of their disbelief. They seem too inhibited by their own disbeliefs to explore the issues objectively for themselves and appear to fall into fallacious reasoning by virtue of their limited outlook.

That is merely my opinion, of course.

 

That is an excellent point. Assumption is a weird word for it.

 

The feeling's mutual.

You had a religious homelife and I didn't. That in itself probably explains a lot. Maybe we're both fucked up and there is another alternative no one's even thought of yet.

 

This is what I mean about assumptions.
No I did not have a religious homelife. I'm probably the most religious person in my house.

And I see no contradiction in having many religious ideologies.

Religion is not science. That there should be many interpretations is an obvious result of human beings having differences in comprehension and thought processes. To lump all humanity from the beginning until now into round and square pegs is, in my opinion, a failure to comprehend the magnitude of our minds as well as a rejection of all the thinking by a wide variety of humans to date.

 

Ok, we're both right. Although I have a feeling the atheistic minority hasn't had the same luxury of reporting that the religious have had thru history. Besides what is wrong in thinking the wide variety of humans to date are (gulp!) mistaken?

 

More assumptions.

There is a wide variety of atheist literature available, dating back almost 5000 years.

But the New Atheists like to think that they invented godlessness.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carvaka

 

This is all very nice but nobody has discussed my point that the 'religious feeling' is in fact not very religious at all. Meaning of course theists can not use the 'you need to experience it to understand' copout.

 

How would you know?

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Because if my feelings where completely the same, with the exception that I believed in god, I would use those same feelings as a copout to judge that I have experienced god.

 

Sort of like being in love with love.

 

Mmmyeah, I'm going to say that a feeling of God's presence would be indirect evidence -- thought perhaps not conclusive evidence -- of God's existence. It is at least a reason to suspect that he might exist.

 

Hardly.