Aswad
Posts: 6908
Joined: 4/4/2007
Status: offline
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Hi, Stella.
I'm not looking to poison anyone's oatmeal, atheist or not.
And it's only a low blow if he doesn't respond.
That said, I agree with what you said, pretty much. I have no problem with people who do not believe in anything. I have a problem with people who believe in nothing. You see the difference, I hope. Absence of faith is fine with me, on every level. Presence of a faith in the lack of validity of faith, however, is as pure as hypocrisy gets: it's a clear contradiction.
Do I have a faith? Yeah, I do. But I keep my eyes open. When someone is bleeding to death, I don't stand around and say "he'll survive if G*d wills it", I do something about it instead. If G*d wants him dead, he'd better let me know in no uncertain terms, or kill the guy himself, or I will go by my own understanding of things. I believe we have been given free will and a causually organized universe for a reason, and that we are meant to relate to the world around us for ourselves. G*d is mostly pointing the way.
Do I use science and rational thinking? Yes, most certainly. But I quite understand the epistemology and philosophy. A lot of atheists are choosing to believe in their prejudice, not science. Science is not applicable beyond its problem domain. It is an antinomy. To scientifically disprove the existance of anything beyond our physical world requires the ability to observe the outcome of falsifiable experiments outside the physical world. It is a contradiction.
While more of a rhetorical argument, we will be able to simulate intelligent life in time. If we do that, there will be a point in time when the beings in the simulation are going to start wondering if there is anything outside their universe, what created their universe, and why they exist. In short, they will be looking for us, regardless of whether we have interfered in their world or not.
Similarly, for all I know, G*d could be asking the same questions, and whether we are a high-school science project, a cluster of pets, entertainment, an attempt at answering the questions via recursion, or something else entirely, is not something I could even begin to speculate about.
I have my own beliefs about what things are like, but I recognize them for what they are: beliefs. A lot of those who believe in nothing fail to recognize that as a belief in itself. That makes it hard for me to peg them down as rational people. I peg them as closed minds that believe in their own prejudices. Simple as that.
Those who are without beliefs, however, I consider rational.
Whether someone has a faith that differs from mine doesn't matter to me, as long as they can respect my right to mine, and leave it at that. If they can do that, we can drink beer (though I prefer cider; beer actually does taste a lot like piss) or shoot some pool or whatever. Hell, I'm basically something along the lines of a Christian, and I've had friends who were Satanists, no problem. Dating a pagan? No problem.
So I agree that it's really that simple.
_____________________________
"If God saw what any of us did that night, he didn't seem to mind.
From then on I knew: God doesn't make the world this way.
We do." -- Rorschack, Watchmen.
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RE: How much does religion matter to you? - 
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