Absence of Belief

Craig's Cosmological Argument From Contingency

2014-12-31T21:41:00.000-08:00

Before I Begin

I don’t want to rehash what has already been accomplished around the web, and which has already been covered far more thoroughly than I desire to do. Besides, that is too much for me to take on, and far too much to ask any reader to read or to not get overwhelmed with. Additionally, I’m not really trying to talk to the people who are already well within the realm of theological debate, but rather those who have had limited to no exposure or interest in the subject, and I do not wish to be anything more than a quick crash course into the subject.

I fully encourage you to do further research around the web to delve deeper into these arguments, as you will undoubtedly find that the arguments go far deeper than I am willing to go here. However, I must warn you that you will likely lose interest before you ever find the bottom of the barrel of even the first argument you come across. This doesn't make doing the research pointless though, because ultimately it gives us deeper understanding.

Since I want to keep any reader's interest to the end of the post, and desire for you to be done reading my thoughts on any given argument within five minutes or so, and not be overwhelmed by a wall of text or appearance of complexity, I will only skim the surface and get your feet wet. Those opposed to my position will likely see this as a deliberate attempt to gloss over important details in order to deceive you, which is why I encourage you to dig deeper elsewhere around the web.

Also, full disclosure, I'm no expert or anything like that. I'm just going to apply my thought process to these arguments and offer it for your consideration.

The "Best" Arguments For God: Part I of a series

With that, I will begin my evaluation of the “best” arguments for God that I could find. I will let the apologists and other theists name their own best arguments instead of attempting to choose their best arguments for them.

So I will start with William Lane Craig, perhaps one of the most respected apologists for the existence of God in the Christian community that I know of. Craig has named five arguments that he considers to be the best arguments for God’s existence. Let’s look at the first one.

The Cosmological Argument From Contingency

There are many variations of this argument, with slightly different phrasing. This is just Craig’s particular version of the argument.

Everything that exists has an explanation of its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause.
If the universe has an explanation of its existence, that explanation is God.
The universe exists.
Therefore, the universe has an explanation of its existence (from 1, 3).
Therefore, the explanation of the universe's existence is God (from 2, 4).

What do you think? Convinced?

My first complaint is the order of the premises. Generally, the order of the premises shouldn't matter, but the flow is all wrong.

Notice in the second premise, the existence of the universe is assumed, and then we get to the third premise where the existence of the universe shows up as a premise. It messes up the flow. Also, it would flow better if the two conclusions were more separate. I’m going to fix that, just do some rearranging, and I don’t think this changes the intention of the original argument by doing so, but again I am more than willing to be corrected on that. I think this just does a better job at highlighting the flow of the logic being represented here:

Everything that exists has an explanation of its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause.
The universe exists.
The universe has an explanation of its existence (from 1,2).
If the universe has an explanation of its existence, that explanation is God.
Therefore, the explanation of the universe's existence is God (from 3, 4).

I have not yet addressed whether any of these premises are true or not. I am simply trying to make the logic flow more .... well, logically. The first conclusion isn't quite specific enough, it should be more explicitly stated to have it follow from premise one:

Everything that exists has an explanation of its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause.
The universe exists.
The universe has an explanation of its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause. (from 1,2).
If the universe has an explanation of its existence, that explanation is God.
Therefore, the explanation of the universe's existence is God (from 3, 4).

Now, one through three flows like a syllogism. Let’s split this up, because the rest is like a separate argument that builds upon this first conclusion:

Major premise: Everything that exists has an explanation of its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause.
Minor premise: The universe exists.
Conclusion: Therefore, the universe has an explanation for its existence, and that explanation for the universe is either an external cause or in the necessity of its own nature.

I think this flows much better. I could nitpick this syllogism a bit more, mostly just on phrasing, but I don’t see that it is necessary. Because that is the ultimate question, isn't it? Or at least one of them? That the universe either exists necessarily or is contingent? We know that already.

What is relevant here is the rest of the argument. So what’s left?

Major premise: If the universe has an explanation of its existence, that explanation is God.
Minor premise: The universe has an explanation of its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause. (from previous)
Conclusion: Therefore, the explanation of the universe's existence is God.

I reject the major premise. Done.

Now, Craig has a habit of putting together these logical arguments with premises that, left on their own, are bare assertions, like the major premise here, but then goes on to argue in defense of those premises outside of the argument in conversation format.

I find that to be a foul. Your argument should include your supporting arguments as part of the argument if the premise requires further justification, so that it can be dealt with properly. But Craig isn't in the habit of doing that.

But, since I’m a nice guy, I’ll bring in his justification for why God is the explanation of the universe, that only exists outside of his argument, so that we may evaluate it.

Evaluating Craig's Supporting Argumentation

According to Craig, “the atheist almost always say[s] in response to the contingency argument”:

If atheism is true, the universe has no explanation of its existence.

He then points out that the contrapositive to that statement is this:

If the universe has an explanation of its existence,

atheism is not true.

He then says that atheists are essentially unknowingly affirming his second premise to be true, which is why he wrote it in the way that he did.

Where to begin... let me just run down a list here.

No atheist I know would ever use the phrase “If atheism is true”. Why? Because of my next point.
Atheism can’t be “true”, because it is not making a claim, it is the rejection of theistic claims. What he means to say is “If no gods exist”, which is not the same thing as “if atheism is true”, which is just a nonsensical statement to begin with. He could say, however, “If strong atheism is true”, perhaps. But honestly, who says that? Just say, “If no gods exist” instead if that is what you are trying to communicate. It is far more clear of what you are talking about that way.
Just because someone says it doesn't make it true.
Just because a lot of people are saying the same thing doesn't make it true.
I challenge the claim that atheists almost always say this. In my experience, what I "almost always" hear is “I don’t know” in regards to the universe. Because it’s true, we don’t. And by we, I don't mean atheists, I mean humans.
There is a misunderstanding going on here. Craig is interpreting this statement to mean that atheism is dependent upon a universe in which its existence is explanation-less, as opposed to its explanation of existence being the necessity of its own nature. Even if someone were to say that the universe “had no explanation for its existence”, they most likely were trying to communicate that it exists necessarily rather than contingently, and not that it exists explanation-less. This would just be their opinion though. Which leads to my last point...
Atheism does not depend upon a contingent universe, nor a necessary universe, nor an explanation-less universe. Just a godless one.

So let’s look at that again, this statement that atheists “almost always” say:

If atheism is true,

the universe has no explanation of its existence.

To me it sounds like something theists think must be a position all atheists have, rather than something atheists actually say. I’m an atheist, and that’s not something I would say at all. But anyway, he is taking this to mean:

If there are no gods,

the universe is explanation-less in regards to its existence.

rather than...

If there are no gods, the universe has an explanation of its existence--it exists by the necessity of its own nature.

I don't even agree with that, despite the clarification.
Here is what I would say:

If there are no gods,

then the universe is not explained by a god.

That's where I would stop. It has not been shown to be necessary for the universe to be contingent, necessary, nor explanation-less in order for no gods to exist.

So let's string all of this back together, and weave Craig's supporting argument into his original argument, so as to show the entire line of reasoning. This is now several arguments, so I will structure it as such. I am attempting to be as fair as possible here, but let me know if I am representing unfairly.

Side Note

In Craig's paragraph-format support of his original premise 2 of God being the explanation for the universe, he briefly attempts to make the case for God actually being the explanation and not just for God existing. He does this by way of what appears to be a quick and dirty first cause argument. To avoid derailing this post, I'll save the first cause argument for another time. But as we'll see in a second, it won't matter, since he can't even make the case for a god even existing with this argument anyway.

Argument 1

P-1.1: Everything that exists has an explanation of its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause.

P-1.2: The universe exists.

C-1.1: The universe has an explanation for its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause.

Now we can clearly see that the conclusion follows from the premises, thus the argument is valid, and we can evaluate the argument for soundness.

I actually have no qualms with P-1.1. I think P-1.1 is likely true. Although whether I think it is likely true or not is not the point. Typically, you want your premises to come from knowledge already available to you, and come to new knowledge as a result of the argument. P-1.1, while it seems to me that it is likely to be true, it is really more of an assumption than knowledge, and that is potentially a problem for this argument.

I do have a bit of a problem with P-1.2 as well. It's not that I think the universe doesn't exist, that's absurd. But the universe is arguably not something that exists, but is rather a set of things that exist. As a result, this argument may contain a fallacy of composition.

Nonetheless, I personally think the conclusion is likely a true statement. I have no objection to the idea that the universe is either contingent or necessary. I personally doubt that it exists explanation-less.

As for the argument being sound, I don't know, since I can't confirm P-1.1 to be true. I can't confirm that the argument is sound, but I just don't have any particular objection to its conclusion.

Argument 2

P-2.1: Atheists almost always assert that in order for no gods to exist, the universe must exist explanation-less.

P-2.2: From logic, a conditional statement is logically equivalent to its contrapositive.

C-2.1: Atheists almost always (unknowingly) assert that if the universe has an explanation for its existence, at least one god exists.

Now we can clearly see that the conclusion follows from the premises, thus the argument is valid, and we can evaluate the argument for soundness.

I challenge P-2.1. As I said before, what I hear most often is "I don't know". We atheists take skepticism to be a virtue, and because little is known about the origins of the universe, the proper answer is "I don't know".

Hell, even physicist Lawrence Krauss wrote a book called A Universe From Nothing, which is nothing if not an attempt to offer an explanation for the existence of the universe, and he is an atheist. The book is also very popular among atheists. Why would atheists read or much less write a book that offers an explanation for the existence of the universe if atheists are of the position that it must be explanation-less?

I determine argument two to not be sound.

Argument 3

P-3.1: From C-2.1, atheists almost always (unknowingly) assert that if the universe has an explanation for its existence, at least one god exists.

P-3.2: (While not explicitly stated, there is an implied premise here. Upon consideration, I believe the implied premise is this...) Anything that atheists unknowingly report to be true is true.

C-3.3: If the universe has an explanation for its existence, at least one god exists.

Now we can clearly see that the conclusion follows from the premises, thus the argument is valid, and we can evaluate the argument for soundness.

P-3.1, obviously same complaint from P-2.1

P-3.2, which is admittedly an implied premise, is just silly and bad reasoning. Whether this was the intended implied premise or not, I don't see any better valid reasoning offered from going from P-3.1 to C-3.1. It's either the implied premise I offered, some other even less convincing implied premise, or there is no implied premise and it is just a non sequitur. I feel I'm being too generous to Craig.

I determine argument three to not be sound.

Argument 4

P-4.1: From C-1.1, the universe has an explanation for its existence, and that explanation for the universe is either an external cause or in the necessity of its own nature.

P-4.2: From C-3.1, if the universe has an explanation for its existence, at least one god exists.

C-4.1: At least one god exists.

Now we can clearly see that the conclusion follows from the premises, thus the argument is valid, and we can evaluate the argument for soundness.

The soundness of argument four depends entirely on the soundness of arguments one through three. I've determined arguments two and three to not be sound, thus neither is argument four.

In Conclusion

The cosmological argument from contingency, or at the very least Craig's version of it, does not stand up to scrutiny. It was actually quite terrible. But perhaps another argument will be more convincing.

You think?

The Burden of Proof

2014-12-26T09:18:00.000-08:00

When a claim is made about what is true, a burden of proof is adopted.

Referring back to the jar of pennies example, if I were to say:

"the number of pennies in the jar is even"

I have adopted a burden of proof to show that I am correct. If I cannot show that I am correct, then you have no reason to accept my claim. This does not mean that you believe that the number of pennies in the jar is odd, just that you don't accept that it is even. If you don't understand that, refer back to the default position for more clarification.

Similarly, if I were to say:

"the number of pennies in the jar is odd"

I have once again adopted a burden of proof to show that I am correct. And again, if I cannot show that I am correct, then you have no reason to accept my claim here either.

If I make both claims, and I present no evidence in support of either one, you can reject both, and return to the default position of not accepting either claim as true, even though you know and understand that one of them must be true.

Even though you know that one of those must be true, you have no evidence to support either position. Perhaps I offered you what I called "evidence", but you found what I presented to be fallacious in some way.

For example, perhaps I offered as evidence for an even number of pennies that "I have a hunch". You probably don't see that as supporting evidence for even, so you have no reason to accept either position of even or odd. You know that it must be either even or odd, but you are left in a position of having no reason to be convinced in any direction.

As a result, your beliefs are consistent with the available evidence.

Applying This Understanding To God Claims

Most people seem to understand that there can never be 100% solid proof either way about whether a god exists. Most people seem to understand that while you can't prove that a god exists, you also can't prove the negative, that no gods exist. Especially not with 100% certainty.

The problem is, people seem to go straight from this to "well, I guess it all falls back on what you believe, then", and that it all ends up just being opinion versus opinion, and no one is right or wrong, it is all just what we believe.

I find that conclusion to be very fallacious. If you don't find either side convincing, you can reject both sides and believe neither.

From the default position post, we know that only two possibilities exist as a matter of fact. Either:

At least one god exists.
No gods exist.

There are no other possibilities. Notice, also, that both cannot be true at the same time. One of those is necessarily and actually true, and the other is necessarily and actually false. We know that from basic logic.

However, what you believe falls into three categories, as we learned from the default position post:

You believe at least one god exists.
You believe no gods exist.
You have no belief either way.

So before any evidence whatsoever is presented, we start from the position of no belief either way.

When someone argues for the existence of at least one god, we either find that evidence compelling and adopt belief (that is, become convinced that it is the case), or we remain without belief either way.

Similarly, if someone argues that no gods exist, we either find that evidence compelling and adopt belief, meaning we become convinced that it is the case that there are no gods, or we remain without belief either way.

But it is up to the person making the claim to make their case. This is the essence of the burden of proof.

The important thing to understand here is that: if someone adopts the burden of proof for one position, say, that the number of pennies in the jar is even, it is not up to you to prove that the number of pennies in the jar is odd. You have no burden of proof because you have not made a claim. It is entirely up to them to make their case for their claim. If they cannot make their case, you have no reason to accept their claim. That's all.

Similarly, if someone argues for the existence of god, it is not up to you to prove that no gods exist. You only adopt a burden of proof when you make a claim. It is up to the person making a claim to make their case, and if they cannot, then there is no reason to accept their claim as true.

Remember that in all instances. When allowing yourself to question that some claim is true, remember that it is different from adopting the claim and burden of proof of the opposite position. People will usually quickly pin you to the opposite claim merely by you questioning the acceptance of the original claim, which is completely unfounded.

It is perfectly acceptable to question a claim being made without adopting the burden of proof of the opposite claim, as long as you aren't claiming that the opposite is in fact the case.

Conclusion

Atheists who aren't making the claim that there are no gods have no burden of proof to show that there are no gods. A lot of atheists don't even accept that claim as true in the first place. Most simply don't see the evidence to support the position that any gods do exist. It is up to the person claiming that a god does exist to make their case.

Now, there are many, virtually countless arguments for a god's existence. I personally find all I've seen to be flawed in one way or another, and I don't think argument number 83,692 will be the one that convinces me. I'll just be left wondering, why didn't you lead with that argument?

But what I'm getting at is, once evidence is presented, we aren't able to take a position of "...meh... I don't like your evidence", or, "I don't like what you're arguing for", and just dismiss it and return to our default position and feel like we're superior. There must be reasons why the arguments fail or why the evidence fails if we are to dismiss it.

From here, I plan to either go over how to spot logical fallacies in arguments in general, or, perhaps go through what apologists consider to be the best arguments for a god and show why they are fallacious. Perhaps both.

Further Understanding

Here are some additional links on the burden of proof from around the internet that you might find useful.

The burden of proof, by YouTube user QualiaSoup
Russell's teapot on Wikipedia
Burden of proof on YourLogicalFallacyIs
Burden of proof on RationalWiki

The Default Position

2014-12-02T19:05:00.001-08:00

I'm not going to give a deep dive into this. I just want to explain the concept well enough that it can be understood. It is, after all, a rather simple concept, and once you have an understanding of it, you won't easily forget it.

Imagine, if you will, a jar full of pennies.

Got it? .... Good.

For a jar full of pennies, you wouldn't be able to immediately discern how many pennies are in the jar. This is what you are picturing, correct? .... Good.

Okay. The next statement is a true statement.

The number of pennies in the jar is either: even or odd.

Correct? If it is not even, it is odd. If it is not odd, it is even.

Those are the only two possibilities, correct?

No other possibilities exist, correct?

... Right.

So, let's evaluate a claim.

Claim: "The number of pennies in the jar is even."

Do you believe this claim?

I expect that you do not.

But wait... are you saying you believe it is odd, then?

No?

So you don't accept the claim that it is even, meaning you don't believe that it is even, and simultaneously, you don't believe it is odd, either?

But there are only two possibilities. So which do you believe?

Do you believe it is even or do you believe it is odd?

....You know one is the case, but you currently don't believe either way?

Welcome to the default position

You have no reason to accept either claim, as no evidence for either position has been presented for you to accept either claim.

The interesting thing about this is this:

While there remains only two possibilities in fact, there are three possibilities about what you believe about it.

The possibilities are:

It is even.
It is odd.

The possibilities of what you believe are:

You believe it is even.
You believe it is odd.
You have no belief either way.

What about God?

When you apply this to a god or gods, there are two possibilities:

At least one god exists.
No gods exist.

What you believe about it has three possibilities:

You believe that at least one god exists.
You believe no gods exist.
You have no belief either way about the existence of gods.

There's a word for having no belief either way about the existence of gods. That word is atheism.

More specifically, it is what is called weak atheism, which is a subset of atheism. But it is often shortened to simply "atheism", because most self-identified atheists seem to be weak atheists. I happen to be a strong atheist, meaning I do happen to believe that no gods exist, but many, if not most atheists do not hold this position.

Notice, also, that this has not discussed what one claims to "know", that is a whole other discussion, but rather only what one believes about a claim.

In summary, when we talk about the default position, we aren't trying to establish a "default belief", but rather a default rejection of belief of any claim before evidence is presented.

This bleeds over into the burden of proof, which I plan to be my next post.

Thanks to Matt Dillahunty for this analogy for understanding the default position.

What Is Skepticism?

2014-07-10T17:14:00.002-07:00

"A lot of people believe humans have had an affect on climate change, but I'm a skeptic."

"Most people accept evolution as fact, but I'm a skeptic."

"They say vaccines are safe and don't cause autism, but I'm a skeptic."

"You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."

~Inigo Montoya, The Princess Bride

It's as if people think the word simply means "a dissenting opinion." No. Not even close.

There are a number of qualities that go along with being considered a skeptic, or someone who practices skepticism.

A skeptic is one who holds no claim above questioning. If skepticism had a slogan, it would likely be "Question Everything".
A skeptic is one who holds no emotional attachment to a belief or set of beliefs.
A skeptic proportions degree of belief of a claim to the amount of evidence to support it.
A skeptic values evidence that supports the truth of a claim, as opposed to how good a claim makes the individual feel.
A skeptic is not interested in believing claims simply because they are comforting or make the individual feel good.
A skeptic is one who, and I must give credit to the author of this expression, Matt Dillahunty, wants to believe as many true things as possible and as few false things as possible.
A skeptic values evidently true beliefs over comforting beliefs.
A skeptic rejects claims that don't have sufficient evidence to support them.
A skeptic rejects the concept of absolute certainty wholesale.
A skeptic is one who does not hesitate to call into question any belief that they hold.
A skeptic is one who recognizes that any belief they hold they have any kind of emotional attachment to must be questioned most critically.
A skeptic strives to not hold any emotional attachment towards any belief that they hold.
A skeptic is always willing to listen to new evidence to the contrary of what they believe.
A skeptic will often seek out arguments against their own beliefs to evaluate them.
A skeptic strives to remove as many presuppositions as possible.
A skeptic, above all else, strives to know what is actually true.
As a result, a skeptic, above all else, must be very skilled in filtering out as much falsehoods as possible.

I don't know how you can confuse that with simply someone who has a dissenting opinion. There is nothing in there about denying a claim when there is overwhelming evidence in support of it.

There is overwhelmingly supporting evidence that climate change is happening, and that humans had a lot to do with it. There is overwhelmingly supporting evidence for evolution by natural selection, for "macroevolution", and for humans being part of the evolutionary tree. There is overwhelming evidence that vaccines are safe and no evidence to support the claim that vaccines cause autism. And if you want to be a skeptic, don't take my word for it! We have the internet! You can research this for yourself!

There is another misuse of this word that bothers me. And that is when it is used by someone to describe their degree of belief in a god.

"No, I'm not an atheist, but I'm a skeptic."

We have a very different understanding of both of those words... First of all, when that is said, it sounds an awful lot like you understand the word "atheist" to mean "someone who claims 100% certainty that god does not exist and won't call that belief into question", but that is for another post.

Secondly, what you're saying is probably not what I'm hearing. Because I just explained what skeptic means to me, and what I would say what it should or does mean.

But what you seem to be saying is simply:

"I'm not certain that God does not exist, but I'm examining my faith."

No, sorry, those two things are not the same, and expressing that using the words "atheist" and "skeptic" are just adding confusion.

If you're not an atheist and you are a skeptic, that to me would mean that you are convinced that there is a god, meaning you are a theist, and that you have sufficient evidence that can be shown to anyone that would compel them, if they are also skeptics, to be convinced as well. But that is never the case when this is said.

Another thing that really bothers me is when skepticism is portrayed as something that is bad or something to be feared. Sometimes in the context it is used it sounds like it is meant to simply mean "questioning the existence of God", and as if this is something bad. If you agree with that, then you are not a skeptic; see the list I made above if you don't understand why.

Skepticism is a very good thing. Possibly the best thing. I value skepticism more than my atheism. If I had to choose between the two, I would choose my skepticism. If there was sufficient evidence for a god, I would believe it existed, but as a skeptic, I would not hold any emotional attachment to that belief; it would simply be as a result of the evidence. If there was evidence to support the claim that humans had no involvement in climate change, I would believe that claim. But there isn't. If the evidence led to the conclusion that we have not evolved, then I would believe that, but that is simply not the case. If the evidence supported the claim that vaccines are unsafe, I would believe that, but that is not the case. If the evidence supported the claim that vaccines cause autism, I would believe that, but that is not the case. I'd rather be a skeptic and not an atheist than an atheist and not a skeptic.

Skepticism is awesome. Skepticism leads to the greatest number of true beliefs and the fewest number of false beliefs as possible.

When will you decide that finding truth matters more to you than continuing to hold even your most cherished beliefs?

The Non-experience of Sleep

2014-07-09T21:50:00.000-07:00

Ever since this thought occurred to me, I remember it every time I lay down to go to bed. For the sake of this discussion, I'm not really concerned with dreams that you happen to remember when you wake up.

I realized -- there is no subjective experience to speak of when you are asleep. Think about that. I've written on this topic somewhat before, but when you are asleep, you aren't aware of ... anything, really. You aren't aware of the room you are in, you aren't aware of how you are laying or if your arm is losing circulation. You aren't even aware of the time passing. You aren't even having a personal subjective experience. You aren't even aware of the fact that you exist while you are asleep.

Which raises the question... when you are asleep, can "you" be said to exist at all in any sense that matters? Sure, your body still objectively exists in the natural world. Your brain still has activity going on. Your senses are still in fact working. But "you" are not working. In what sense can you even tangibly say that you exist when you are asleep?

Each night, between the time I go to bed and the time I am up and about, I have a last memory and a first memory, as I imagine you do as well, with absolutely nothing in between. There is a last subjective experience and a first one. I don't even feel like several hours have passed. If I had to describe that phenomenon to someone who hypothetically has never experienced it, I would describe it as a gap in existence.

However you choose to describe it, this is something that virtually everyone experiences--or perhaps I should say doesn't experience--every single night.

Do you disagree? I don't know how anyone could argue the opposite point. What did you do while you were asleep? Did you think to yourself "I should really reorganize that closet...", or did you run down the list of things you have to do in the upcoming day? Did you internally sing songs to pass the time while you were asleep? Or were you just bored waiting the several hours until you woke up? It seems ridiculous to argue that anyone has a continued subjective experience while they are asleep.

This to me seems to be an issue for the idea of a soul. For many, the soul is whatever it is that allows us to have a personal subjective experience; it is what makes you "you", or the "real" you that inhabits the natural body (that I guess is not the real you), according to most soul believing people.

For those that believe that, the phenomenon of being asleep should trouble you. If "you" are the soul, why aren't you still experiencing anything? Does the soul need "sleep" also? Why? Does the soul sleep at the exact moments the body does? I can't think of any other excuse that might be given.

But that's not ultimately what I wanted to get at. This phenomenon, which we all experience every single night--er, excuse me--we all don't experience every single night, this gives us a strong idea of what it will be like to not be alive.

To not be alive will, quite obviously, be very much like being asleep, minus the waking up part. It is intuitively obvious that whatever being dead will be like, we would experience less than we do while we are alive but asleep. Which is to say, not much at all. So let's add up the characteristics here:

no experience of the passage of time
no personal, subjective experience
no ... hmm... there's nothing really left, is there?

Here is another clue as to what it will be like to not be alive anymore. Do you recall what it was like to not be alive before you were born? What were you doing when the Titanic sank? What were you doing when the dinosaurs went extinct? What were you doing during the Permian-Triassic extinction event? What were you doing when the pyramids were being built?

If you believe you will have some kind of afterlife, that necessarily means that you also believe that everything that makes you "you" is ultimately completely independent of the brain. What is it do you think the brain does exactly?

We know that the brain is used for short term memory, and some of those short term memories get stored as long term memories. You won't have any of those. You won't have any memories, because you will not have your brain.

We know that the brain is used for conscious thought. You won't have conscious thought, because you will not have your brain.

We know that the brain is what causes us to experience emotions like love and fear. You won't be experiencing any of that, because you won't have your brain.

And it goes without saying that you won't have your eyes or your ears or any of your other senses, but what would it help you anyway, because you won't have the brain to process that sensory information.

But you believe you will have your soul. What function does the soul have, anyway? There doesn't seem to be anything useful left to attribute to it. What does a human body need with a soul? Suppose there was a living human body without a soul occupying it. What would be different exactly?

To summarize, if you were to ask the question, "What is it like to be asleep?", I would have to first point out that the question is malformed. Being asleep isn't "like" anything. You simply don't experience being asleep.

Similarly, the question that many ask themselves throughout their lives, "What will it be like after I'm dead?" is a malformed question as well. It won't be "like" anything. You simply won't experience it because what allowed you to experience anything at all has irreversibly ceased functioning.

The answer to what happens after death has been staring us in the face for as long as we've been around. Even without knowledge of the brain, we should have been able to deduce what death will be like from our daily encounter of being asleep. It's a bit like that, minus the waking up part.

Pastor Killed By Rattlesnake

2014-02-19T19:14:00.000-08:00

I'm pissed. I'm fucking livid.
This is exactly why I blog. This is why.
You know the story, it's been in the news lately. This is about Jamie Coots.

Here's the rundown:
- Snake-handling pastor was bitten by rattlesnake
- Pastor refused treatment
- Pastor died from untreated rattlesnake bite
- Fun fact: more snake-handling next week! Same snake!

So let's get the obvious out of the way:
Why was he playing with deadly snakes?!?!
Well, as a demonstration of faith, of course.
What led to this practice? It's in the bible, of course.

“And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.”

(Mark 16.17-18, KJV)

Put simply:
Because of his devout faith, he handled deadly snakes.
Because of his faith, he refused treatment when he was bit.
Because of his faith, he died.

The worst part?
Mark 16:9-20 isn't even in our earliest copies of Mark. It was clearly added later. In the end, he died for nothing. Absolutely nothing.

The thing to note here is that even the deadly venom from the rattlesnake could have been treated. His faith, unfortunately, could not be.

Evidently, faith is more deadly and toxic than rattlesnake venom.

When the hell are we going to wake up.

Your Place In Time

2014-02-15T12:53:00.000-08:00

"Your place in time" by Brian Parsons, is licensed under CC BY 2.0

So much time has passed, that it is simply beyond our comprehension to visualize exactly how much time it really is. This graphic is an attempt to aid in that visualization.

I was originally going to expand on this graphic and go into sources and how we know this information, but the graphic took so much work that I'm kind of disinterested in that now for the moment. Maybe I'll go into that in a later post and come back to update this one.

You should try looking at the graphic from bottom-up. See where your life is first, then work backwards.

Some interesting things to look at:

the young earth creationist's idea of when the earth "began", and presumably everything else, is towards the very end of the Homo Sapien timeline, third from bottom.
both world wars occur on the last timeline.
Anything that we would recognize as a "computer" exists only on the last timeline.
Almost all phone calls occur on the last timeline; the first phone call was in 1876.
Almost all motorized automobiles fit on the last timeline; the first one being in 1886.

See what else you can identify. It is mind-blowing.

A few things:

These dates are approximates. No one is suggesting any of these have been nailed down to within one year, or one day, or one minute, or one second.
I abstracted away date ranges and margins of error for the sake of having a spot to zoom in on.
Yes, I skipped a lot of other significant events. There were many other events I could have chosen to highlight. Ultimately, I used those events that most people are most familiar with.
If you find that any of this information is flatly wrong, please let me know. I will need some sources, of course. Once I've verified the mistake, I'll begin working on getting it fixed.

Enjoy the graphic.

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The God-Shaped Hole

2014-02-01T21:15:00.000-08:00

Haven't you heard ?!

You have a hole in your heart that you have an innate desire to fill. This hole is God-shaped, and only God can fill this hole. If you ignore this and attempt to fill it with other things like hobbies, TV shows, movies and so forth, you will inevitably feel unfulfilled and unsatisfied, and you will have left no room for God!

Aren't you alarmed ?!

You've probably heard this before, it's rather common.

Okay, well, let's get the obvious out of the way.

The Incredibly Obvious

"Human Heart" by Mikael Häggström, MD,
released to public domain

This is a human heart. From the wiki (emphasis added):

The heart is a hollow muscular organ that pumps blood throughout the blood vessels to various parts of the body by repeated, rhythmic contractions. It is found in all animals with a circulatory system, which includes the vertebrates.

Should I call my doctor?

How is it that I'm not dead right now?

Where is this hole?

What shape is "God-shaped"?

Am I looking for a cross-shape?

How does one fill this hole without heart surgery?

Obviously, this defense of Christianity is not to be taken literally. But then why use such wording? Why not just say what you mean and mean what you say? If this isn't exactly what you mean, then perhaps you'd be better off finding better wording.

Digging Deeper

Clearly, this is not to be taken literally, that is pretty self-evident.

Often this argument will be attributed to Blaise Pascal in his work The Pensées, and you will probably see him quoted as saying:

There is a God-shaped vacuum in the heart of every person, and it can never be filled by any created thing. It can only be filled by God, made known through Jesus Christ.

However, Pascal never says this anywhere in The Pensées. This is really no secret. Although, he does say something very similar:

What is it then that this desire and this inability proclaim to us, but that there was once in man a true happiness of which there now remain to him only the mark and empty trace, which he in vain tries to fill from all his surroundings, seeking from things absent the help he does not obtain in things present? But these are all inadequate, because the infinite abyss can only be filled by an infinite and immutable object, that is to say, only by God Himself.

Pascal, The Pensées #425

From this concept, I derive quite a few claims:

Everyone, by default, feels like something important is missing from their lives.
People desperately try to identify what this important something is and include it in their lives.
Those who do not become Christians never succeed in alleviating this feeling that something important is missing, and ultimately live unsatisfying lives as a result.
Those who do become Christians succeed in finding exactly what alleviates the feeling that something is missing, and ultimately live satisfying lives as a result.

"Pinocchio 3ak" by André Koehne, is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0

This argument has taken many forms:

Secular Pursuits of Happiness Are Fruitless
The other ways people find happiness through things that legitimately make people happy, like family, goals, and hobbies are insufficient. In other words, they paint a picture that these people always still feel that something is still missing from their lives.
Secular Pursuits of Happiness Are Dangerous
When people don't "fill this hole" with Christianity, they turn to drugs, alcohol, greed, etc in their attempts to "fill it". In other words, they paint a picture of an immoral or depressed person.
Backsliding Christians Are In Danger
Christians who aren't making God a priority in their lives are "filling this hole" with other things and "don't leave room" for God, and thus, they need to prioritize God in their lives, or else their lives will start to fall apart.

A Dose of Reality

It doesn't take much to show that this is false. A single example of a non-Christian or godless person who is happy and satisfied by any reasonable definition is enough to show that this argument is complete bullshit.

The fact is that there are plenty of people who are not only not Christians, but completely godless, and are perfectly satisfied with their lives, so this argument makes no sense.

I am one of them, myself. I don't feel as if I am missing something I need. I feel like I have everything I need to live a happy, fulfilling life, and more. No one knows how I feel better than I do.

Pascal may have originally directed this towards skeptics and other non-Christians, but that doesn't appear to me to be who it is directed at today. The primary place I keep finding this argument is in sermons.

This is Christians telling other Christians about the dangers of not being Christian, or in some cases, not being Christian enough.

It was originally a terrible argument by Pascal, but now, it's only purpose seems to be to instill fear in Christians as to what their lives might be like without God. But since they are already Christian, instead of fear, they feel immense gratitude for having found the cure for this disease. They just must remember to stick with it... or else!

This clearly isn't an attempt by Christians to stop the depression epidemic that exists only outside of Christianity.

This is about manipulation. This is about control. Nothing more.

This is a derivative work of two public domain images:
"Human Brain", PD-US, modified color, lighting, contrast
"barbed wire page clip art", public domain, rearranged barb wire

Please, think for yourself.

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Virgin Birth

2013-12-20T21:50:00.000-08:00

Was Jesus born of a virgin?

Remember these from ninth grade Biology? Punnett squares?

	X	X
X	XX	XX
Y	XY	XY

They help determine the probability of the genetics of the offspring. In this case, gender.

With a human mother and a human father, we have two X chromosomes from the mother, and an X chromosome and a Y chromosome from the father. The possible outcomes are two for XX and two for XY. So the probability of a boy is 50% and the probability of a girl is 50%.

However, what happens when we only have a human mother, and no human father?

	X	X
n/a	X	X
n/a	X	X

Not only can you not get pregnant without a human partner, but further, in order to make a boy, you need a human father to pass on a Y chromosome.

Oh wait, I'm forgetting all about magic.

Yes, well, that certainly explains it then, doesn't it.

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Women's Hair

2013-12-02T22:45:00.000-08:00

I went looking for inspiration for a post, and stopped by a Christian website that frequently gets linked on Facebook. They have an "Answers" section where Christians can ask questions and get answers from other Christians.

One question posted was about short hair on woman, asking if it was "biblical". It's not clear that the person asking is a woman wanting to cut her hair short, but let's assume that is the case. A woman wants to have short hair, but essentially she wants to make sure that she has the bible's blessing to do so.

[disgonbegood.gif] (removed)

Now from my perspective, I don't give a damn what the bible says about it. However, I am interested in what people are going to tell this woman about what she should or should not do with her hair.

The first person to reply references 1 Corinthians 11 and essentially says to her that the reason women have long hair is because it is a natural covering and a symbol of submission to men. They go on to say that to shave it off would demonstrate a woman's unwillingness to submit to male authority.

[gofuckyourself.gif] (removed)

If I were a woman, and didn't already have a buzzed head, my very next move would be to shave my head. Not that I think women need to do that, that's just how I would react personally. A woman with long hair is not a sign of submission, it's not a sign of anything other than that is the hairstyle she chooses to have.

Second person to reply? More of the same. They said that a lady is to wear a covering if her head is shaved.

[throwcomputer.gif] (removed)

Seriously, what is wrong with people.

They are right, though. It certainly isn't "biblical", but how did no one think to say....

It's your hair, do whatever you want with it!

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Crucial Moments

2013-11-25T18:22:00.000-08:00

One day, it is likely that every one of us will find ourselves in a crucial moment, where every action we take matters, and every mistake or delay comes at a great cost. In these crucial moments, it is essential that we take immediate action, and that the actions chosen are the ones most likely to bring a positive outcome to the crisis.

I was listening to a debate with a preacher and an atheist. The preacher cited many personal experiences where she had put her hand on the sick and the wounded, and called out to Jesus, and (allegedly) they were healed. Old ankle injuries from years ago were no longer painful. Migraines were instantly gone. Just because the preacher put her hand on them and called out to God to heal them.

The atheist had some good responses to this, but this post isn't about debunking these kinds of claims. Instead, I want to focus on the effects of people continuing this behavior.

There is no doubt in my mind that the person who is being healed certainly feels some kind of relief of pain. The cause of the relief is for another discussion at another time. This undoubtedly makes the person feel happy, and grateful, among many other positive emotions.

For the preacher, witnessing this, would also feel a great sense of joy, happiness, and gratitude. I have no doubt that both persons involved and including onlookers have tears of joy in their eyes and many positive emotions are stirred up.

However, the preacher and everyone involved is further convinced of at least one of two things, if not both: one, that the preacher has some special connection to God that allows them to heal people, or two, that prayer is effective.

So my concern here is what happens when that crucial moment comes. You are sitting in your house with your loved one. Other than the two of you, you are alone. Suddenly, your loved one grabs their chest and collapses to the ground, and becomes unresponsive to your calls.

In an instant, every split second matters. The life of your loved one is slipping away, and you need to take immediate action. But not just any action, you need to take the action that will give your loved one the best chance to make it through this crisis. Any wasted time could mean life or death.

What do you do?

If you are a person who honestly believes that by putting your hand on someone and calling out to Jesus to heal them will actually heal them, then you will act on those beliefs. But your loved one doesn't need prayer, they need emergency services, and they need it now. In this scenario, your beliefs could come at the cost of the life of your loved one. Your loved one could lose their life at the cost of you holding on to false beliefs about reality.

This is why it is important to be skeptical, and to make sure that your beliefs are based upon the reality that we live in. I want to make sure that when I find myself in those crucial moments, that my loved ones are in good hands, that I will take immediate action, and the appropriate action. The action that has the best chance of helping them survive this crisis. I would not waste one single solitary microsecond thinking about trying to heal them with prayer. Hopefully, neither would you.

Honestly, even this preacher who claimed to have healed the sick and the wounded, even I don't think she would have tried to heal their loved one with prayer either. I honestly believe that the preacher's first reaction would be to grab the phone and call emergency services.

Now tell me, should we despair in the preacher's apparent lack of faith in healing powers when it's all on the line? And what will the preacher think the next time someone from her church approaches her and asks to be healed?

Everyone likes to say "oh, let people believe what they want", and I wholeheartedly agree that people have the freedom to believe whatever they want. I would never try to take away someone's freedom to believe whatever they choose to believe.

But I would stress the importance that everyone's beliefs about reality are as close to actual reality as possible, because as I've shown here, the lives of your loved ones could ultimately depend on your beliefs about reality. I stress this because I don't want to see anyone else die because of superstitious beliefs.

Have you put yourself in that situation yet? If it was you caught in this dilemma, where every second matters, where life and death is on the line, then what would you choose? Would you call out to God for healing? Or would you pick up that phone and call emergency services?

Whatever you chose to do, why was that your choice?

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Guest Post! My Humanist Rant

2013-11-23T23:47:00.000-08:00

This is the first guest post I've had on this blog. Currently it is unknown if there will be more guest posts in the future, but I'm hoping that this becomes a somewhat recurring feature.

The author of this post is a good friend of mine who shares my frustration with the harm religion has caused and continues to cause, particularly when it comes to something so incredibly obvious as equality.

My Humanist Rant

I honestly believe that in our societies, in our species, the very fact that the issue of “gay rights” or “women’s rights” or “black rights” or “insert subset of the human species here rights” is even discussed is indicative of a fundamental flaw in the way humans are viewed.

This reflects a bigoted world view. This view does nothing to serve humanity. If we even entertain the idea that any human being should not have the same basic rights as another, then something is wrong. Of course, there are many times that legal rights and human rights may seem to conflict. This should also never happen. This is wrong.

I believe that any law that governs the rights of a human should: only ever seek to enforce and preserve human rights, apply to all humans without bias, be clearly defined, never ambiguous, made available freely and publicly, be based on factual data that can be reviewed and tested, be agreed upon by all that it governs, and be always enforced in full and without loopholes or exceptions.

Legal rights may be lost in order to prevent the violations of another’s human rights. This is necessary as there will likely never cease to be acts committed by our species that violate the human rights of others. The consequences for these acts though, should NEVER be a loss of human rights. Legal rights should never be able to remove, restrict, or hinder human rights in any way. This means that in no way should a law ever prevent someone from exercising their human rights, but I would argue that it also means that no law should ever limit any legal rights of a group, class, race, culture, gender, etc. unless it is to directly protect the human rights of another.

What does this mean in practice? If you are a law abiding human being, not infringing on the human rights of anyone else, then you should be entitled to all legal rights afforded to any other human. No more, no less. If any (consenting adult) human is allowed to be married to another consenting adult) human, every (consenting adult) human should be allowed to be married to any other (consenting adult) human. If any human is allowed to choose what they want to subject their body to, then ALL humans must be given this same right. The ONLY exception to this is that no human should be able to violate the human rights of any other human. If there are objections made to a certain law, or right afforded to humans, it should be based on testable, observable, reviewable facts only. These objections should be agreed upon by everyone that they apply to, which should be EVERYONE. Opinions and emotions have no place governing the rights of our species.

While this is not necessarily an exhaustive list, some of the human rights that I believe are shared by all of humanity include: life, freedom from injustice, freedom from slavery, freedom of beliefs, freedom of thought, freedom of speech, freedom of religion (and obviously lack thereof), freedom to pursue improvements to one’s life, freedom to access basic elements needed to continue life (i.e. food, water, shelter, clothing), freedom of personal expression and control of one’s own body, free access to knowledge, freedom of enterprise, freedom of self-preservation, and freedom from the rejection of human rights for any reason.

I am livid at the idea that anyone could suggest that any other human is not entitled to the basic human rights that they so gluttonously enjoy. Nothing makes you so special. There is no excuse for bigotry. I hope that someday, in my lifetime, there will no longer be a need for the discussion of rights for any group of humans, because we will all share the same rights. I hope that one day our laws focus instead on preserving the rights that all humans are entitled to. And I hope that our laws, not just in this country but across this planet, begin to prohibit anything that might try to discriminate against our rights as a species. As human beings.

- Lee

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Explaining Away Atheists

2013-11-13T10:41:00.001-08:00

I often try to make a more-than-negligible effort to gain some perspective on how Christians and other believers view everything, such as how they view atheists and the things they say, in order to gain some understanding of what needs to be talked about. I also spend a lot of time trying to remember how I would have reacted to these same things when I was a Christian. How would I have dealt with an atheist had I met one as a Christian? What would I have concluded about how to explain why they claim to not believe in God?

As a result, I feel I need to visit a topic that I didn't initially think needed visiting, because it is as if we are not speaking the same language. I'm sure it happens both ways, but from my side, it seems like what an atheist says is heard, goes through a filter, and how it is interpreted or ultimately explained is so distant from the intent of what was trying to be communicated. In other words, it seems that "what we've got here.... is a failure... to communicate."

For Example.

Had I met an atheist as a Christian, and asked them to explain their beliefs, and they respond with that they don't believe a god exists because they see no evidence for a god, and they don't see the biblical god as any more real than say Zeus or Thor, my first reaction would have been pity. I would have pitied their situation.

"Oh my, they have a long spiritual road to travel. I hope one day they are able to find God, and to know Him."

Another reaction I would have had would have been an unfounded assumption.

"Their life must be such a mess. It must be struggle for them, day in and day out. To live without God in their lives... well, what's the point?"

Ironically, it's not so much that I would have been concerned about where they will spend eternity at, I would have been more concerned for them not having God in their lives on this planet.

This gives me some understanding when a Christian responds with:

"Oh, I'm sorry, I'll pray for you."

Then, I would have had to deal with explaining why God doesn't just reveal himself to them. From a believer's stand point, God is never not trying to bring you to him. God is always trying to reach out to you. So, a believer can only conclude that the reason a person is an atheist is a willful attempt to ignore God.

Taking this rationalization to the next step, the believer might also conclude that the atheist really does actually know that God exists, but is making an attempt to keep God out of their life, to the point that they are lying to themselves about his existence.

With that in mind, then the believer will start to wonder about what horrible or tragic event might happened in this atheist's life that would make them turn their back on God. Surely something awful has happened to them. Were they abused as a child? Did there parents die simultaneously in a car crash? Did their child die far too young? Surely something awful has happened to them to make them turn their back on God.

Or perhaps there are personal reasons. Maybe they don't want to be accountable for things they have done in the past, so they can continue to live an "immoral" lifestyle.

Just Wrong.

If this is anywhere along the lines of how you view atheists, then you greatly misunderstand the majority of atheists out there. Most atheists reach atheism by means of skepticism, meaning they researched into their beliefs and saw that no evidence supported them, and as a result could no longer believe something that had no evidence for it.

This process almost universally starts at an attempt to come closer to God. An attempt to know God better. An attempt to be the Christian that they believed God wants us to be. But, we got so close, that we see he isn't there at all (not mine).

It has absolutely nothing to do with a tragic event. It has nothing to do with not wanting to be accountable for actions. All it has to do with is insufficient evidence.

I can't prove this to you, I can only reiterate it, although it is just going to go through that filter again and be interpreted however you want to interpret it, but I ask you, for the sake of communication, please interpret this completely literally: an atheist does not believe a god exists. If you draw a circle around all the things an atheist believes exists, such as trees, planets, stars, people, dogs, cats, etc, a god would not be included in that circle. If you draw a circle around the things an atheist does not believe exists, such as unicorns, leprechauns, fairies, elves, witches, vampires, werewolves, all the proposed ideas of gods would be included in that circle.

If you understand that, please understand the number one reason an atheist does not believe any proposed idea of a god exists: simply a lack of evidence of a god's existence. It has nothing to do with tragic events or not wanting to be accountable. Stop trying to rationalize us away.

From the atheist perspective, a large portion of atheists look at believers and feel pity for them as well. I know that I do. I see believers as a victim of their culture during the time and place they were born. How many Christians come out of Muslim families inside of Muslim countries? How many Muslims come out of Christian homes in America? How many Jews come out of a Hindu family in India? Does it happen? Sure, probably. But it is surely a rare case indeed. It is simply an observable fact that a person's religion is often the religion of their family or their culture or both.

I see believers as victims of indoctrination, taught what to believe from the onset. When I meet a Christian in America, I am not surprised. They grew up in a very Christian culture. If they grew up in India, they'd probably be Hindu. If they grew up in Pakistan, they'd be a Muslim. There is no particular reason to think that what they believe in is true, their beliefs are merely a product of their culture.

I want to help them escape this dogmatic thought that gets passed from one generation to the next. I want to help them see that their beliefs have no more or less merit than the rest of these religions.

I want to communicate.

My target audience is not other atheists, but believers. I want to open the lines of communication between us, but more than that, I want us to understand each other.

Too often believers and atheists get in heated arguments without actually "hearing" what the other person is actually trying to communicate. How is this helpful to anyone? I understand it can be very frustrating when you are trying to communicate a train of thought, and the other person is just not getting it. I've been there.

We see and think about things very differently, and when either of us speak, the other person often doesn't actually "hear" what the other person is trying to say. I believe it is important for us to understand what we are trying to say to one another, and I want you to know that I spend time daily thinking not just about the words that were said to me by a believer, but what the meaning was behind it. Where are they coming from? What are they communicating to me? How can I communicate back to them from where they are coming from? This is a daily struggle, because we are so incredibly different.

I believe it is also important for the believer to make this attempt to try to understand the atheist perspective as well. Stop putting us through your filter, and try instead to understand what we are actually communicating and where we are coming from.

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Deconversion: Part V

2013-11-05T19:51:00.001-08:00

Continued from Part IV

And now, we come to the conclusion of my deconversion story, which will wrap up fairly quickly.

Three years have passed, and I have been pretty content with being non-religious and secular. Although I could not for the life of me find an appropriate identifier to appropriately identify myself. This was frustrating for me, because how previously I always had the identifier of "Christian", I no longer had that when it came to religion. This is mostly because I was still harboring some strange and unique beliefs about an afterlife that had no appropriate identifier.

Then I finally sat down one day and decided to watch a movie on Netflix that I have been meaning to get around to watching for about a year. A movie called Religulous. And then, as I remember it, I almost immediately went to my computer after the movie was over, and for the first time, I searched on YouTube simply the word "atheist". I thought maybe I had finally found an identifier that suited me.

I'm not exactly sure what I wanted to find, maybe just a video explaining what an atheist was, but what I found was much, much better. The first thing that came up, as I remember it, was what appeared to be a call-in show where atheists would talk to people of faith and discuss openly. I thought "oh please, let this be what it looks like", and it absolutely was. It was exactly what it looked like. It was called The Atheist Experience. I thought "finally, a show where there is an open discussion about faith, and people are free to be critical of it, and we can all be adults about it."

I was immediately in love with this show. The show had been on for years. Over a decade, even. Videos of it were all over YouTube, and somehow, I had never came across it. I was immediately hooked. I watched every video I could find. Every spare moment I had, I was watching this show.

I learned a lot on the show. Not just about atheism. I learned about Christianity. I learned about agnosticism. I learned about Mormons, about Islam, about Jehovah's Witnesses, about Judaism, about the history of the bible, about it's reliability, about logical fallacies, about all the arguments for god and the counter-arguments, about evolution, about intelligent design, about irreducible complexity, about knowledge vs belief, epistemology, paleontology, biology, cosmology, philosophy, the list goes on and on. It's insane how much knowledge I gained as a result of watching this show.

Inside a month, I was calling myself an atheist. Shortly after, a naturalist, meaning that I had no belief in anything supernatural at all. Although I still prefer the term atheist, generally.

I didn't just become a hardened skeptic and atheist, I also began to care about issues I had never cared about before. Science in the science classroom. Separation of church and state. LGBTQ rights. Women's rights. Suddenly it was very clear the harm that religion has done (and continues to do) to this entire planet for thousands of years.

I wasn't just an atheist and a skeptic. I became an anti-theist. I adopted the term humanist. Rationalist. Freethinker. Naturalist.

I felt like I had come across information that I had been looking to find my entire life. I was practically livid to discover that I had reached the age of 28 and had only now found all of this information. Why was this information not more widespread? Why are these open conversations about religious faith so difficult to find?

I also immediately wanted to immerse myself in this small but very much alive community of atheists. I branched out and found other communities. I found The Thinking Atheist podcast, and The Dogma Debate. I found Aron Ra. I immediately wanted to go to every meetup and convention I could possibly afford to attend. And I did.

Another reaction I had was to figure out how I can possibly contribute to this atheist movement that is ongoing, and seemed to be stronger than it has ever been.

The result was this blog. This blog is directed at those who are searching for answers to questions that no one seems to want to talk about.

I suppose the blog carries where the story goes from there, so I guess my deconversion story-time is over.

I don't know a much better way to wrap up this story than to thank those who helped me on this journey, even though most of them will likely never see this.

Ironically, I ought to first thank my fundamentalist friend "Bob" for getting me motivated to get serious about my religious beliefs again, which kicked off this whole skepticism process...

Secondly, I'd like to think my brain for being skeptical. The rest are in no particular order, but then again maybe they are.

Following that, I'd like to thank Matt Dillahunty for teaching me how to think (like a skeptic). This is a skill I've collected from many, but primarily I have Matt to thank for this. So thank you, Matt.

Equally, I'd like to thank Tracie Harris, who I generally credit for my naturalism, almost immediately upon after watching her Fallacy Model for the first time.

Following that, I'd like to thank Aron Ra, for being a living, breathing encyclopedia on evolution that taught me so much more than I ever learned through public education about it.

I'd like to thank Matt Dillahunty again for redefining my understanding of where morality comes from. Additionally, I have Sam Harris to thank for furthering my understanding of morality.

I'd like to thank YouTube users QualiaSoup, NonStampCollector, DarkMatter2525, The Thinking Atheist, who were critical during my deconversion time frame. Thank you so very much. You all had different focuses, different tactics to inspire critical thought, and each one was important and effective towards me.

I'd like to thank the maker of the The Thinking Atheist podcast, Seth Andrews, for being the most lovable atheist that I know of. You're podcast is such a pleasure to listen to, and very therapeutic for those recovering from religion and religious thinking.

I'd also like to thank David Smalley and the others from the The Dogma Debate, which regrettably I have not listened to enough, but has been helpful to a very significant degree in my deconversion.

I'd also like to thank Sam Harris for disposing me of the belief of free will, particularly in thanks to your book "Free Will". Thank you so, so much, and please write more books. Also, you have excellent arguments against gods in general, which are amazing and convincing. Thank you for being such a great skeptic.

Thank you, Richard Dawkins, for being such a large public figure for atheism. I finally got around to getting through your book "The God Delusion", which I was only able to get through thanks to Audible, and it was amazing. Thank you. I look forward to sitting through more of your books.

And how could I have put this off so far down, thank you to the atheist community in general that help make conventions happen; they are (again) very therapeutic to myself and others recovering from religion and almost feel "needed", and I long look forward to the conventions taking place.

Lastly, but definitely not least, I'd like to thank Shelley Segal for putting out an album devoted entirely to atheism, which her music sounds entirely deserving of the word "awesome" in my opinion. If there's one thing I want to see more of, it's mainstream atheist music albums. We have gospel music in stores, why not atheist music? I really need more of this.

Although I have probably missed some, and I regret that, these are those who I have to thank for the person that I am today. These people literally changed my life in a very significant way. I am so grateful to be the person I am today. Not a day goes by that I don't look around at the world and say to myself....

"Thank GOD I'm an an atheist!"

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What Would It Take For You To Believe?

2013-11-05T18:42:00.002-08:00

Theists will sometimes ask atheists "What would it take to convince you that God is real? How much evidence would you need?"

Then they will say that it sure seems like no amount of evidence will convince an atheist. Then they conclude that atheists are close-minded people.

Well, here is my response to this question.

First of all, it's different for every atheist. For some, it will take less. Others, more.

Second of all, it depends on which god or which concept of god you are talking about. I will be focusing on the concept of god that is a personal god that answers prayers and is all-loving, all-knowing, all-powerful, etc. This seems to be the god most commonly believed in. I'm going to use the male pronouns for simplicity.

In short, I would need to live in a reality that is entirely unlike the one we live in.

Here's what I mean. Here is how I would expect reality to be if this concept of a god actually existed...

1. There would be no atheists.

This god would make his existence known to every human that exists. No one of rational mind could seriously doubt his existence. Many of those reasons why you couldn't seriously doubt his existence I am about to list.

2. There would only be one sect of one religion.

This god would make his existence, his morality, and his commands absolutely crystal clear to every human being. No one of rational mind could seriously interpret it any other way.

3. The personal god would be personal.

With this god, you could make god appear and manifest in reality at will. Then, you could talk to god, and ask him questions. You would get clear, direct answers. This god would be involved in every detail of your life more than your best friend, significant other, parents, and siblings combined.

4. There would be no disagreements about god's position on issues.

Homosexuality. Gay marriage. Abortion. Condoms. Sex before marriage. Birth control. No one would be divided on these issues, because everyone would be told god's position on them from god himself. And more to the point, god would give everyone the same answer. He would be consistent with his answers to these issues.

5. The universe would be a lot smaller.

This god would not bother to make billions of galaxies, each containing billions of stars, all for the sake of one land-dwelling species on a single planet of primarily water. This is not what one should expect to find. If the universe was built with humans in mind, then why wouldn't reality contain only what was needed for that goal? Adding billions of useless and lifeless galaxies is far from a perfect design by a perfect being.

6. The universe would be a lot younger.

This god would not bother with 13 billion years of existence without humans in it if that was the whole point of it. It would seem that if a god created existence for humans, humans would begin quite near the beginning of existence.

7. God would not condemn people to eternal torment.

There is nothing you can do that is so horrific to justify torturing a person for an eternity. Such a god would not be all-loving. They would be far from it.

8. There would be one written language and one spoken language.

A god who created humans and creates holy scripture for them to teach them how to live would not risk losing the message due to language barriers.

9. A god who has holy scripture would author it.

Your copy of this god's holy scripture would not be manufactured in a factory made by humans. It would not have been originally written down by humans thousands of years ago, divinely inspired by god. In this reality that I am describing, this god would simply manifest one for you right in front of you, and hand it to you and say "Here is your copy". If you ever lost it, this god would just recover it for you. If it got damaged, this god would restore it for you. Your copy of holy scripture would come right from the god who authored it himself.

10. A god's holy scripture would not contradict itself.

A god who wants to explain to his creation how they should live their lives would be very clear and very consistent. It most certainly wouldn't say one thing, and then in another place say the exact opposite of that.

11. Things that would not exist if this
all-loving, personal god did:

Stillborns. Birth defects. Cancer. Alzheimers. Tornadoes. Earthquakes. Hurricanes. Tsunamis. Floods. Droughts. Famine. Bubonic plague. Influenza. Diabetes. Smallpox. Malaria. Polio. AIDS. Mental disorders. Mental retardation. Moving on.

12. There would be no scientific discoveries, only scientific confirmations.

Anyone could ask this god how something worked. Say a scientist asks this god what causes X to occur. Then this god explains it. Then we run a scientific test and confirm that it is the case.

Etc etc etc

This list can go on and on, but you get the gist.

Already, you can see that the reality I would expect to be living in if such a god existed would be vastly different than the reality that we do live in. Further, the reality that we do live in suggests that such a god does not exist.

I would need to live in an entirely different reality, something like the one I described, for the evidence to be sufficient.

However, my question to you, Christian, is that how can you believe in a personal god, given the world that we do live in?

A world where a growing community of people exists that see no evidence for any kind of god or supernatural anything whatsoever. Why won't this god show himself?

A world where there are so many different religions, and so many different sects of each religion, and so many splinter groups within those sects of those religions. Why won't this god straighten everyone out?

A world where the personal god is so impersonal that his very existence can't even be confirmed and is constantly debated. Why doesn't he just verify his existence already?

A world where believers can't agree on this god's position on some very important issues, and vary wildly. Why won't he just clarify these issues for everyone so the believers can stop disagreeing with each other?

A world where the universe seems to be largely indifferent to our existence, even our planet's existence, even our galaxy's existence. Why didn't this god build a universe that isn't hazardous to our existence?

A universe where humans didn't even show up until extremely and ridiculously recently, and was moving just fine without us for billions of years. Why didn't this god create us closer to the beginning if we were created?

A world with so many different languages you couldn't possibly learn them all. Why would this god even allow for the possibility of multiple languages? To add to the confusion?

A world where your only physical connection to your god (if he exists at all) is a book that was originally written by people, not by the god himself, and then transcribed and translated over thousands of years and eventually ended up in your hands where it was printed in a factory somewhere. Why is this personal god so incredibly distant?

A world where the book that is supposedly inspired by this all loving god is riddled with contradictions and disgusting acts of immorality. Why is this god's one connection to us so incredibly flawed?

A world where plagues, natural disasters, and the uncaring wrath of nature are a reality. Again, why didn't this god build a universe that isn't hazardous to our existence?

A world where the best method we have of gaining knowledge, i.e. the scientific method, has led us to findings that contradict a fundamentalist interpretation of the bible at almost every turn. Why didn't this god provide us with scientific truths about our reality?

How can you still believe it? It's astonishing really.

But not admirable. It's disheartening and depressing, really, that anyone can be so committed to an idea, that even after looking at all of these evidences, can still convince themselves that there is a personal god up there.

My response is: Well, what would it take for you to finally stop believing in such nonsense?

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Weak Atheism: No Belief Either Way

2013-08-08T21:19:00.004-07:00

You've probably heard an atheist say before: "I never said that I believe that a god doesn't exist; what I said was that I don't believe that a god does exist."

And you are probably asking yourself, "What exactly is the difference? If you don't believe a god does exist, then doesn't it logically follow that you do believe that a god doesn't exist?"

In a word, no.

To explain this, I'm going to use the even-or-odd analogy which I attribute to Matt Dillahunty. It's a bit simpler to understand than the courtroom analogy.

Say we have a jar filled with an unknown amount of pennies.

It is a fact that the number of pennies is either even or odd.

I say "The number of pennies in the jar is even."

Do you believe the number of pennies is even because I said it was?

No.

Since you don't believe the number of pennies is even, doesn't that mean you do believe the number of pennies is odd?

Again, no.

You do not have a positive belief either way.

Despite the fact that you know that it is either even or odd, you don't believe the number of pennies is even, and you don't believe the number of pennies is odd either.

This is the very definition of weak atheism.

A weak atheist knows that a god either does or doesn't exist, but doesn't believe the claim that a god exists, and also doesn't believe the claim that no god exists. A weak atheist is not convinced either way.

Most people who identify as simply "atheist" are weak atheists.

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Deconversion: Part IV

2013-08-07T20:28:00.000-07:00

Continued from Deconversion: Part III

I began to question.

I believed different parts of Christian doctrine to different degrees.

Jesus is God and died on the cross for my sins? I believe this very strongly.

Adam and Eve in the garden? Well... probably some kind of metaphor.

Noah's arc? Probably just a story with a point about morality or something.

I hadn't thought about all of it that much.

The only thing that had been drilled into me was:

I was a sinner.
I was born sinful, I am prone to sin, I continue to sin.
"Sin" is anything God doesn't like.
You can't get into Heaven with sin on you.
Sins must be dealt with. In other words, death.
Jesus is Lord.
Jesus is without sin.
Jesus died on the cross for our sins.
I am saved.
By being saved, my sins have been forgiven.
My sins, past, present, and future, are forgiven.
But for some reason, I need to go to church, read the bible, etc.
Why? To please God. To get right with God.
That's pretty much it.

But then I started to think about those beliefs.

"Okay, let's start with the thing I am most certain about...

Jesus died on the cross for my sins.

Sin.

Sin exists.

Where did sin come from?

According to the bible, Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden.

That is the origin of sin. Disobeying God.

But I don't believe in a literal Adam and Eve, that seems ridiculous.

Okay what else is a basic belief?

By being saved, I will go to heaven, instead of hell.

Hell.

Hell exists.

Which means Satan exists.

Where did Satan come from?

As I've heard before, Satan is some kind of fallen angel.

Angels.

Angels exist.

Angels exist?

Then Satan turned against God, and God abolished him from heaven, and created hell for him to be there.

When did this happen? Before Adam and Eve or after?

Compared to my belief in Jesus as my saviour, this sounds totally bogus.

Satan is in hell.

Supposedly, because he is banished from Heaven.

So why does Satan want our souls?

Souls.

Souls exist.

He wants our souls to wage a war on the kingdom of heaven, so I've been told.

To overthrow God in his kingdom of heaven, so I've been told.

Wow, that sounds ludicrous.

But the bible tells us about the second coming of Jesus.

Jesus is going to return. Seriously?

Would I believe any person in today's world who claims to be Jesus?

Wouldn't I just conclude that they were crazy?

What if I'm left behind?

Left behind.

That's a thing, too.

So the apocalypse is coming, Jesus is going to return, and all the Christians are going to vanish.

Will I just vanish with the rest of them?

All of this sounds insane.

But... I believe Jesus is my saviour, and if that's true, then it would seem... so is all of this."

Essentially what happened is I could no longer maintain the cognitive dissonance.

I said to myself "Enough is enough!"

I've been relying on other people's information for far too long.
Yes, the God question has been going on for millenia.
But I need to stop relying on just what other people are telling me.
I need to investigate this for myself, and evaluate the evidence.
Sure, of course I can already see that there is no definite answer,
but I need to research this for myself, for once.
I'm tired of being told what is and what isn't.
I need to go see the evidence for myself.
This way, I'll be confident in whatever my beliefs are,
because I personally researched them,
not just because people told me them.

At this moment, I decided to take a hiatus from attending church.

I decided I would set aside my personal free time, and investigate this ultimate question. But if I was going to be successful in my research, I needed to set some ground rules. First of all, I need to accept whatever the evidence seems to suggest.

If the evidence points to Christian doctrine, then that is the life I will live. If not... then... at this point in time, I wasn't sure what that would mean.

That was kind of a terrifying realization:
At the end of this, I'm either going to be a devout Christian, or...
someone who doesn't even believe God exists.
Is there a word for that? I didn't know.

More ground rules. I need to investigate both sides of the argument, of course.
I remember googling "arguments for god" and "arguments against god" in two tabs.

I think this went on for a couple weeks.

My friend Bob became concerned, and messaged me at one point.

"Haven't seen you at church lately. Everything okay?"

"Yea, I just, I don't know, I need to figure some stuff out.."

"Oh, okay. Well, let me know if you need anything."

"Sure, thanks, will do."

I don't remember much about the information I looked up then, but strangely, I don't think I came across:

the traditional arguments for god (cosmological, teleological, etc)

I think because at the time, if I did find them, they were over my head probably.

definition of atheism

pretty sure I came out of this not knowing what atheism was at all

The only thing I truly remember from these few weeks was a video.

Not a single, particular video; but a certain type of video.

A video that I could not stop watching. Over and over and over.

For everything I had previously believed, it seemed to destroy all of it.

Of all the arguments against god's existence,

I feel this is probably now the weakest from a logic standpoint.

Although, at the time, the argument was pretty damning.

It wasn't an argument, exactly. Didn't even have anything to do with a god.

It was more just a demonstration.

A demonstration of the size of the universe.

I couldn't stop watching videos like this. It kept boggling my mind.

Why would God create all of this... just for humans?

One word came to mind upon reflection of these videos,

and the idea that it is all for us: arrogance.

This enormous universe, and it's all for us?

We are so arrogant to think that. And so ignorant.

Towards the end of this research, I was essentially an atheist.

I didn't know it yet, as I wasn't even aware of the term.

But my belief in a god had faded. I skipped right over deism as well.

I felt that, either Christianity is true, or there is no god at all.

I can spot quite a few flaws in my logic back then, but that is where my head was at.

If the religion I was born into wasn't true, then none of them were.

So I no longer believed in a god.

But I would argue that I wasn't quite there yet.

I was still susceptible to religious persuasion, I'd say. My critical thinking skills weren't hardened enough to prevent me from falling back into religious belief due to a traumatic event or whatever else might happen to me.

I also maintained some other spiritual beliefs. I had this weird idea that maybe we'd all be reincarnated. Maybe we would all eventually live each other's lives.

But I had no rational reason to think this. I thought I did, but my logic was fundamentally flawed.

My critical thinking skills still needed some hardening.

The good news though is that I was now valuing evidence, logic, and reason. Not just what I wanted to be true or what I thought sounded nice.

These values put me well on the path to calling myself an atheist. Even though I technically already was one, I didn't know it yet. I didn't know how to identify myself for years.

But, once I was satisfied with my answer to the god question, I returned, once again, to my largely secular lifestyle. I put away theology, as I never really wanted to know more than I had to about it, and simply lived my life.

I wouldn't call myself an atheist for another three years...

Continued in Part V...

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Are You Absolutely Certain?

2013-08-03T09:59:00.000-07:00

I have talked about being absolutely certain before, but it has been on my mind lately and I feel it is time to talk about it again. Because this is one of my pet peeves. People still like to question whether the opposition is absolutely certain, as if not being absolutely certain of something somehow makes you wrong.

I think this is the main difference between theists and atheists. Theists seem to tend to value conviction. A theist will value the opinion of someone who believes their position most strongly. Atheists tend to never care about conviction. How strongly someone believes something is irrelevant; only the evidence matters.

What does it mean when someone says that they are "absolutely certain" of their beliefs?

The hidden message that is embedded in there is "my beliefs are true." Because you are essentially saying "I know that I'm right" and "I cannot be wrong."

Therefore, when you say you are "absolutely certain," you are just making a claim. But rarely if ever is this claim followed by evidence to support it. It is merely stated, but never supported.

Let's look at this some more.

To be absolutely certain means that you will never change your position. It means even if the evidence changes, or even your evaluation of the evidence changes, your position will not, because you are absolutely certain. In other words, it means you don't care about the evidence.

It means that even if you recognize that if any and all evidence that you once thought supported your position has been refuted, and even if you recognize that the opposition has tons of supporting evidence, your position will remain unchanged, because you are absolutely certain of your position.

To be absolutely certain of your position is to not care about the evidence.

So, when a theist points out that an atheist can't be absolutely certain that there is no god, generally the first reaction is:

"First of all, I never said I was. Second of all, so what? Why would I want to be absolutely certain?"

Similarly, when a theist says that they are absolutely certain that there is a god, what an atheist hears is:
"I don't care about the evidence."

*facepalm*

If you still think it hurts the atheist's position to admit that they are not "absolutely certain", here is a list of things that atheists will freely admit that they are also not "absolutely certain" about:

The nonexistence of Big Foot
The nonexistence of Santa Claus
The nonexistence of the Tooth Fairy
The nonexistence of the Easter Bunny
The nonexistence of Bertrand Russell's teapot
The nonexistence of the Lochness Monster
The nonexistence of ghosts
The nonexistence of vampires
The nonexistence of werewolves
The nonexistence of leprechauns
The nonexistence of elves
The nonexistence of fairies
The nonexistence of wizards
The nonexistence of witches

Does it somehow increase the likelihood of any of these things existing by admitting that I am not absolutely certain that they don't?

Of course not.

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Deconversion: Part III

2013-07-22T22:19:00.000-07:00

Continued from Deconversion: Part II

I never held fundamentalist beliefs. As a Christian who grew up primarily outside of the church, my religious beliefs didn't exactly follow doctrine.

I was a "compatabilist" Christian, for lack of a better term. In other words, I was of the opinion that science and Christianity were completely compatible. For example, when the bible talked about a six day creation, surely "day" could mean billions of years. When it talked about the creation of all the species of life, surely they were referring to how God had a "guiding hand" in the process of evolution by natural selection.

I reasoned that if God was to write a book for the whole world to read and understand, then the story of creation had to be told in such a simplistic manner so that the simplest of us could understand it.

At the time, I wasn't heavy into science or its findings, but I had respect for it, because on some level I understood that the goal of science was to distinguish what's true about reality from what's not, by the best methods we have available to us to acquire knowledge. How could you not have respect for that?

Nonetheless, I was still a Christian, but one who had avoided God, prayer, and religion for several years at this point. I was afraid that any attempt to embrace it would backfire as it did before. This fear was resulting from still not having understood what caused the backfire to begin with.

At about 25 years old enters my new best friend, whom we shall call Bob to protect his true identity; I'm not trying to give away other people's information.

It was no secret that he was Christian. He was pretty open about his faith. Occasionally, I would spark a discussion about religion.

I remember having a discussion about "source of truth". In other words, when science and religion conflict, what do you do? My resolution to this problem was to interpret the bible in the framework of scientific findings. This was not Bob's solution. Bob said, "when those two conflict, I go with the bible, because the bible is my fundamental source of truth, not science". (My use of quotations there is a paraphrasing. That conversation was years ago, but that was the gist of what was said).

Ultimately, what he was saying was that when the bible talks about a six day creation, and science tells us that the earth is 4.5byo and the universe is 13.7byo, he just concludes that science must be wrong and that the six day creation is correct, simply because it was in the bible.

I was dumbfounded. I had never even considered anyone even being capable of doing this. What really blows my mind though is that my reaction to this at the time was: "that is admirable... I wish I could have faith like that."

I would question him about what church he goes to and what it was like there. I felt that God had introduced Bob into my life because God felt that I was ready to come back to a religious lifestyle. It wasn't long before I decided to "get back up on that horse" and decided to try to start going to church again, and bring God back into my life.

I still had this insidious idea in my head that:

If you aren't a church-going Christian, you're a failure, essentially. Your life is a mess.
Church-going Christians are role models for society who have their lives in order and are successful.

Where did I get these ideas from anyway?!

I took time making this decision to return to God, church, and religion. I was a bit afraid, because I didn't want another backfire like in college. I thought another backfire might make me abandon God entirely. I decided what I had to do was jump in head first. Completely dedicate myself to it. Do everything right, and stick with it. Then surely I would avoid another backfire.

Of course, I was also concerned that the harder I jump in it, the harder the backfire would be. But ultimately, I took the risk, because I had felt that God had orchestrated the circumstances for me to take advantage of it.

I remember that first day back in church. I hadn't been in church in about 7 years since basic military training. But I had the same feeling I did back then.. completely overcome with emotion. Crying and completely unable to hide it. The music was too powerful and too moving.

Of course, I felt it was God taking all the weight off my shoulders of all the stress I had been hauling around for the past several years. I constantly had shivers running up and down my back which I attributed to God literally flowing through me, which I assumed must be relieving my stress and providing calmness, bliss and happiness.

Obviously, I went back to church the following week. I wanted to feel that feeling again. Which I did, but not as much the second time. Half as much the third time. Barely at all the fourth. Eventually I couldn't bring about that feeling again at all.

In the mean time, I was doing bible study on my own. I recall reading various parts of the bible and despite some of the more absurd notions in it, telling myself "this... is true...", trying to convince myself of it's truth.

I think that even though I interpreted Genesis and the like to fit my understanding of scientific findings, I still ultimately believed on some level that a literal interpretation was God's intention; and therefore, my non-literal interpretation was a sign of a lack of faith.

I was attempting to gain as much faith as my friend Bob had. I felt that God gives everyone a challenge to overcome, and that mine was faith.

I remember reading Genesis specifically, one chapter at a time, and then stopping to reflect on what I had just read, and despite how absurd it sounded to me, telling myself once again "this... actually happened...", trying to swallow that pill.

In short, I was making an attempt to indoctrinate myself.

While all of this was going on, I was relieved that there was no backfire this time. I felt no anger with God, or frustration, like I did before. This is probably because I wasn't spending every waking moment in the church.

But something else happened instead.

Perhaps it was the result of those self-paced bible studies at an attempt to force myself to have more faith. Perhaps it was just having God and the stories of the bible at the forefront of my consciousness all the time, which was a fairly new thing.

But something happened. It was small at first, only mildly annoying. A minor distraction. I tried to simply ignore it.

But I couldn't. It was there, and it wasn't going away. If anything, it demanded more and more attention. Before long, I couldn't ignore it any longer, and had to address it.

I began to question.

To be continued in Part IV...

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Deconversion: Part II

2013-07-11T22:04:00.000-07:00

Continued from Deconversion: Part I

When I left home for college, I had been living largely secular as a Christian for five years, and would occasionally feel guilty for not involving God in my life. I just kept thinking one of these days I'm going to get back up on that horse and make things right.

I was in a new place, and I had to make some friends. I became friends with someone on campus, and he was very involved with his church.

I remember very little about this time period. But my educated guess is that, remembering where my head was at the time as best I can, I must have expressed interest into getting involved with his church as well.

I felt it was time to get my life back together. Remember, I had this insidious idea in my head that going regularly to church and piousness was somehow tied to being successful, or having things figured out, and organized. Similarly, not going to church regularly and not involving God in your life was somehow tied to someone who had lots of problems. You are a disappointment in that instance.

So, I felt it was time to correct my largely secular lifestyle. I began going to this church. There, I met my friend's friends, who quickly befriended me as well. Suddenly, I had a handful of friends. Probably more than I had ever actually had at any one time.

It was the liveliest church I think I have been to to date. They liked to sing, and the songs were good and catchy. At times, it was almost fun.

There was also lots of Bible study. And a lot of praying.

One memory that stuck with me is one night we went to the track and walked around it several times as we took turns praying. I remember thinking they were "experienced" at praying. I thought their prayers were good and flowed naturally. What was strange though was that they all prayed the same way. All of them would repeatedly mention God as they were praying.

"And I just pray, God, that you give us strength, God, and always watch out for us, God", etc, etc.

As I would listen to them pray, I would take mental notes on how to pray.

Now, I am extremely introverted. They were not; they were extremely extroverted. I knew after they were done (each prayed like 15 minutes) they would call on me to pray as well. I felt that I had to perform well. I didn't want to disappoint. I was very nervous about praying out loud in a group. I was always very private about religion and prayer.

But, so I prayed, and mimicked them as best I could, essentially. I even surprised myself a bit how well I was able emulate it. I felt that I was pleasing them, and pleasing God, by praying more in the way that God wanted me to.

After a while with my new friends, I began to get exhausted. We were in church ALL the time. If it was Sunday, we were there from morning to night. Other nights of the week, we were there some more. I began to enjoy it less and less, until before long, it felt more like obligation.

Something was building up inside me, and I didn't understand it, but I knew I had to cut ties with these people as quickly as I could. I couldn't do this anymore.

I cut ties with them, and it wasn't easy. I generally avoid confrontation like the plague, and they didn't back down easy. I think I even took new paths around campus just to avoid running into my old friend again. But eventually, they were history.

It wasn't just them I had to break away from though. It wasn't them so much that I was frustrated with. It was God. It was Christianity. I cut ties with that as well. I cut ties with church, with God, all of it.

I didn't understand why at the time, but I didn't even want to think about God anymore. This scared me, because I still believed at the time. I just wanted nothing to do with it. At least, not for a very long time.

So what happened? Well, it took me virtually a decade to understand my actions and the emotions I was feeling, but my assessment is this... I was frustrated with God for giving me a life to live, but then being asked to surrender far too much of it for the sake of praise and worship. Living the life God wanted me to live (i.e., regular church attendance, constant prayer, etc) was too much to ask of me. I wanted my life back that I was living before I had met these people.

It was the first time I had experienced anger with God. It terrified me, because I felt like if I didn't end up as that person that I was trying to become and loving it, then I am a disappointment to God and more concerning that I would burn for eternity.

I found a book called "When Bad Things Happen To Good People" while walking around a store shortly after and, at the time, I felt that I was meant to buy it. I felt that since God knew that I wouldn't go near a Bible at that time, that God was trying to bring me back to him via directing me to this book.

I don't know why I thought that. Nothing particularly bad happened to me, so I don't know why I thought I could relate to the book. Nonetheless, I thought I was meant to read it, so I bought it and read it.

I don't remember much about what was in the book, but when I was done with it, most of my anger was gone. It took a few months for that anger to subside. But, I still wasn't ready to try to get back on the horse again.

As I said, I was terrified by my own reaction and the feelings I had felt and didn't understand at the time. I tried to become a good Christian, and it completely backfired, and I felt like I nearly lost my faith entirely. I felt that I needed to be extremely careful if I wanted to be successful at making myself devout.

So, I approached with extreme caution. Which is to say, not at all. While still considering myself as some kind of Christian, I, yet again, returned to a largely secular lifestyle for several more years.

I had a brief surge of piousness during the few short weeks of basic military training, which immediately faded as soon as it was done.

But I wouldn't realistically make another attempt at my goal of becoming devoutly religious again until I was around 25.

It was at this time that I met my new best friend, who just happened to be a young earth creationist...

To be continued in Part III...

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Deconversion: Part I

2013-07-07T00:18:00.000-07:00

Personally, based on all the deconversion stories I have heard told, I feel my journey to atheism is a unique one. So, I will tell my story.

Right around the time I began calling myself an atheist (I can't pinpoint a day, and couldn't), I immediately began analyzing "How did I get here, of all possible outcomes?" I began analyzing my religious path up to that point and began trying to make sense of it. It doesn't have the same history of deconversion stories that I usually hear.

Honestly, given the lack of significant indoctrination I was subjected to over the years, it's surprising that I wasn't an atheist much, much sooner.

What makes my story unique is that the way I often view it is that most of my indoctrination was self-applied. In other words, I can't say that I've ever felt like I was having Christianity force-fed to me; instead, I look back on it as though I was the one seeking it out.

Before I begin, I just want to say that I do not put any blame on anyone who tried to bring me to any kind of religion, nor do I feel any resentment towards them. Had I been in their shoes, I would have done the same and would have felt that I was doing the right thing, as I'm sure they felt they were doing the right thing as well. I am glad that I was ultimately able to escape it, but I hold no negative feelings for the individuals who might have had an impact on me being a Christian or religious at all.

With that, I think I will begin.

I suppose it all starts with growing up as a child in my family. Although I always thought of us as Christians, and, if asked, I suspect my parents would have said as much at the time, my immediate family was a very secular one from my perspective. I rarely recall God ever coming up in conversation. We were not church goers; we didn't even go on Christmas or Easter. I think maybe once we did. We never started meals with a prayer. There were never Bible studies or encouraged prayer of any kind. For this, I am now very grateful.

I do recall watching "The Ten Commandments" movie at one point. It probably just happened to be on TV and we watched it. That was pretty much the extent of religious involvement in my immediate family.

However, I somehow did manage to pick up Christian ideas as a result of society in general and the local community. I had some idea of heaven of hell. Before say the age of 12, all I understood was that God existed, the devil existed, and good people went to heaven, and bad people went to hell. I was under the impression that I was a good person, and that I would go to heaven. That was the extent of what I understood happens after death. I probably got this idea from movies and TV. Like the movie Ghost comes to mind.

Before I go into this next part, I want to mention that I had this idea in my head. This idea that going to church every Sunday was somehow related to having "everything altogether". You know, you wash your car, you pay all your bills all time, and you go to church every Sunday. Church went along with all of those other things in my mind. If you didn't go to church every Sunday, you were unorganized, or chaotic, or lost, or just a person with problems in general. This was an idea I held all the way up until I became an atheist, and I'm not quite sure where I got it from, but I blame society for that.

I mentioned that because that idea was a big motivator for me throughout my entire story, so I want you to know that this idea was in my head from the outset.

Moving on. So I believed good people went to heaven, bad people went to hell -- end of story.

All of that changed when I began hanging out with my cousin. We were better classified as friends than cousins, I suppose. We hung out a lot when family gatherings would happen. However, his family was religiously active. It might even be accurate to say very active. They went to church on Sunday, said prayers before meals, and God and Jesus was very much a part of their lives. Before I started spending much time with them, I'm not sure I even had any idea who Jesus was.

It wasn't long before we had a discussion about religion. I was very curious about it, since I hadn't had much exposure to it. I wanted to know why they went to church and my family didn't. I was roughly 13 at this time. I distinctly remember saying something like:

"I thought if you were a good person, you went to heaven, and bad people went to hell?"

The response: No, no, no, no! Only those who are saved go to heaven!

This was the first time I had been introduced to the concept of being "saved". "Saved from what?", I thought. I didn't really understand, but there were many emotions that this stirred up.

I was scared at the idea that I was bound for eternal torment and not even aware of it all this time, and despite thinking that I was a good person. I wondered, "How can I ever really be certain that I won't go to hell?"
I was upset with my parents for not teaching me this important information, and thus risking me burning in fire for eternity. I thought "Why didn't they warn me about this?"
I was disappointed with my parents for not raising me to go to church on Sundays. (Can you imagine?? A kid, feeling that way?? Now, I am glad. I am so glad they didn't do that.)
I was also worried for the fate of my immediate family. Were my parents saved? Were my sisters? I doubted they were. I felt responsible for warning them and for protecting them from eternal torment, although I don't think I ever acted on that, out of avoiding awkward conversations.

So where is my skepticism at this age? I feel pretty comfortable in saying that I've always been an analytic kind of person, and I want to say that I've always been a skeptical person as well. It is undoubtedly these attributes that ultimately led to my atheism. However, my critical thinking skills were weak at this point. My reasoning was:

I know nothing about this topic, all of it is new to me.
They are family, so what they say carries more weight.
They go to church every Sunday and study this stuff.
Also, they are older and more experienced.
I, however, am a kid, and inexperienced.
Therefore, they are the experts.
They seem pretty certain about what they are telling me.
Conclusion: I should accept all of this as fact.

I began attending church with them. I recall wanting to go. As a result of this news, I was curious about what else I didn't know. I was curious about religion. About Christianity. About Jesus. About being saved. About how I should live my life. All of it was pretty much new to me.

Of course, in church, they provided ample opportunity to say the sinner's prayer. It was a pretty thick guilt trip. Choosing to ignore their pleas to say the sinner's prayer and be saved was like choosing to ignore those commercials that urge you to give just 5 cents a day to a starving child. The guilt trip is that thick.

So, it wasn't long before I was "saved".

Thirteen years old, and I've already accepted Jesus's blood sacrifice on the cross for the sins I commit, because I was born a sinner, and deserved eternal punishment, as a result of Adam and Eve biting an apple from the tree of knowledge, and God told them not to do it. And since the wages of sin is death, the punishment had to be carried out, so God reasoned that it was sufficient to pin the sins of everyone on the blood of Himself, because He loves us so much.

I guess it made more sense when I didn't think about it too much.

At this point in time, my idea was that all of my sins up to that point were forgiven, but not future ones. Furthermore, my understanding was that you can only get saved once.

Because, I reasoned, if all my sins are forgiven, past, present, and future, then what's to stop me from abusing the system? Now I can go on a killing spree and still get into heaven! No, no, it must be that they are only forgiven up to that moment.

...In retrospect, I see those doubts were already creeping in.

So basically, my understanding was that every sin after that had to be prayed about and forgiven. I thought I had to stick with God for the rest of my life.

I thought I had to live the life God wanted me to live for the rest of my life, or I would go to Hell. These were the options that I understood.

Of course, it wasn't long before I stopped going to church.

It wasn't long before I stopped reading the bible.

It wasn't long before I stopped praying.

And it wasn't long before I stopped thinking about God at all for a number of years.

I would from time to time stop to think about what a terrible Christian I was being by returning to my secular life, but I had a real life to worry about. I was too busy trying to do my homework, get an education, make friends, make people think that I was cool, date girls, all the usual kid stuff.

Although I returned to living a secular life, I held on to my Christian beliefs throughout those years. There was nothing really challenging them, so the beliefs remained intact.

I still considered myself a Christian, of course; but I wouldn't make the decision to revisit an active Christian lifestyle again until I went off to college.

Continued in Part II...

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God Forgives Your Sins

2013-06-05T21:36:00.000-07:00

God forgives you.

You don't think so?

You think your sins are too big for God to forgive?

No. There is no sin too big for God.

Sources:
http://www.gotquestions.org/God-forgive-big-sins.html
http://www.gotquestions.org/sin-God-not-forgive.html

I know I've heard it before. You know you've heard it before:

God forgives your sins.
Do not think your sin is too big for God.
When Jesus died on the cross, all sins were forgiven.

Not some sins. Not most. Not just the minor ones.

But ALL sins were forgiven.

According to Christian doctrine, as it is often described to me (and you, I imagine), there is no concept of "small sins" and "big sins". There are only "sins".

So no, when you hid the fact that you maxed out a credit card from your spouse, God forgives you. When you lied about it directly, God forgives you.

You may have trouble forgiving yourself, but know that God forgives you.

This instills a good feeling, doesn't it? Even though you are having trouble forgiving yourself, it makes your guilt a little more bearable hearing that some other being, particularly one playing a parental role, forgives you. No matter what it is...

Even if you cheated on your spouse, God forgives you.

Even if you cheated multiple times with multiple people, God forgives you.

Even if you stole food or clothing, God forgives you.

Let's not stop here, even if you kill someone, God forgives you.

Even if you kill your spouse, God forgives you.

Even if you kill your spouse and all your children, God forgives you.

Even if you rape and murder your entire family, God still forgives you.

Might as well keep going.

Even if you rape and murder 1,000,000 children, God forgives you.

Even if you drop a nuke on a metropolis populated by millions of people and kill them all, God forgives you.

Even if you engineer and intentionally let loose a deadly virus that spreads and kills 90% of the human race, God forgives you.

That's right. There is no sin too big for God. There are no "big sins" or "small sins". There are only "sins".

That's right; lusting over someone's body is equivalent to genocide in God's eyes.

But you needn't worry. Because God has forgiven all of your sins.

All you need to do is give your heart to Jesus Christ and accept Him as your Lord and Savior.

...

What? You don't believe Jesus is Lord?

You don't believe there is a Lord God at all?

You think that even if He did exist, that God would not be worthy of worship?

You say that He is immoral ?!

Blasphemy!

Oh, I forgot to mention there is one sin that God cannot and will not forgive, and that is blasphemy!

Source:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_sin

If you don't believe there is a God, then you are going to Hell.

And don't even say that God is sending you there -- it's your own fault.

You are sending yourself there by not believing in Him.

I don't want to hear about what a moral life you've lived, and neither does God.

Your contributions to charity don't matter.

Your efforts to help the homeless don't matter.

It doesn't matter how moral you are -- you don't believe in God and therefore you are sending yourself to Hell.

Where you will be tortured. For eternity.

Because that's what we all deserve.

Good riddance.

Your sins are NOT forgiven.

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FFRF's "Out of the Closet" Campaign

2013-04-02T19:04:00.000-07:00

I just discovered this last night.

The Freedom From Religion Foundation has started an "Out of the Closet" Campaign, encouraging nonbelievers to publicly state their non-belief. It looks like this was started back in 2011, but I just found it and it is still going on, so why not, right?

The Campaign allows you to build your own virtual billboard from a template, where you can add your photo and a quote and your name and your preferred identifier.

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Believe Picture Frame

2013-03-24T09:05:00.000-07:00

I saw this in a store. I was dumbfounded. How is this a positive message at all?

Not only is it promoting believing something when there is no reason to, it also seems to imply that this is the only time that you should believe, or perhaps that is especially when you should believe.

Incorrect. Wrong, wrong, wrong.

Belief is only justified when there is sufficient reason to.

When those reasons are found to be in error, the belief is no longer justified.

This picture frame needs a big DO NOT in front of it.

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I'm A Card-Carrying Atheist

2013-03-23T20:42:00.000-07:00

BAM!

So this came in the mail today. I joined for the first time about a month ago... it's been a long month of checking the mail every day looking for this. Finally!

Over the last several months, I've become familiar with what American Atheists' goals are, what battles they are fighting today, what battles they have fought and won in the past, and I wanted to be part of it in some way.

I'm not sure where to go from here, or what membership even really means, but I am just taking it one step at a time and I will see where I end up. For the moment, I just wanted to be a member and be in the mix.

On a Related Note

I recently registered for American Atheists' 50th Anniversary Convention! I won't be there for the entire event, but I am able to make it on Sunday the 31st, otherwise known as Easter Sunday.

How funny is that?

"What'd you do for Easter weekend?"

"Oh, I had fun! I drove up to the American Atheists Convention."

Who would have thought?

Anyway, I'll be hearing a lot of great people talk. I will definitely be taking lots of notes and posting about it in the days after. I'm a little sad that I can't be there for the whole event, but at least I won't miss it entirely.

UPDATE: I ended up being in full swing of a cold, but I insisted on going since the tickets were paid for. I took so much medication to be able to function that most of it was a blur. I didn't take any notes due to my condition, but I had a good time, overall.

Disclaimer
I don't speak legalese, but here we go. Anything posted on this site isn't necessarily the views or opinions of American Atheists. My membership with them is separate from this blog. I am not sponsored by them or anything like that. Hooray for no legalese!

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