Why so important right now for Athiests?

I see Christmas as more of an over-commercialized month long celebration than a religious holiday. As someone who doesn't celebrate Christmas, the religious part doesn't annoy me, the only thing that really annoys me is the Christmas music everywhere and on every radio station. If it were one day, fine, but Christmas is shoved down our throats for an entire month. Call me Mr. Grinch, but I like normalcy, and it doesn't exist for like the entire month of December.

 

It makes a lot of Christians gag, too! The Christmas merchandise started showing up around Labor Day in places like Costco, Sam's Club, and Walmart. The whole "holiday season" thing has been marble-caked into a great big, indistinguishable blob of sales events. Who can enjoy anything when Halloween is staged at the same point as Christmas, and Thanksgiving? Thanksgiving, a uniquely American "holiday" is completely crushed and run over by the big Christmas sales events, including "Black Friday" sales extravaganzas that start right after Halloween!

The music? Most of what you hear anymore is just more of the same secular *pop* crap that came out after World War II. I'm especially sick to death of "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree" and "Have a Holly Jolly Christmas". Except for a few classical music stations, you never hear any of real Christmas carols anymore. The whole thing has just turned into a meaningless, exhausting, expensive pile of ****....

 

Yes and in the field of medicine how well has it served us versus the religious method?

I think Jonas covered them well enough.

So tell me since electricity is ONLY a theory how come it powers you stuff?
If gravity is ONLY a theory how come you stick to the earth?
If nuclear power is ONLY a theory how come we have lots of subs under the water running on it?

And how did that the earth is the center of universe and the universe revolves around the earth religious dogma hold up? In fact can you give me any instances where religious dogma proved scientific theory wrong and is now excepted fact used in everyday practical purposes? Like if you got real sick tomorrow would you go to your minister and just have him pray over you or would you seek scientific medical aid?

 

Physical measurements of the universe are not in dispute. So far there isn't even a remotely credible alternative scientific theory to the big bang.

As to theories, very few people in history have formulated scientific theories.
Yes, everyone can and does have a host of theories, but not scientific ones.

As a matter of fact, my "evidence-starved" expression of prevailing scientific theory is based on accumulated evidence.
For a scientific theory to be valid, it must be supported by continual observation and discovery, while also predicting such observations and discoveries.

Perhaps a more appropriate approach would be for me to demand evidence that these prevailing theories are nonsense, since so far all evidence points to their validity.

How wonderfully ironic that you would accuse atheists of being stupid and wearisome because they do not believe the universe was the product of a supernatural entity's creative talents.

I personally am agnostic. I don't know for sure if there is a creator or god, but in the absence of any evidence to support such a supernatural claim, I choose not to believe in superstition, nor rely on a fallacious "god of the gaps" argument.

I suppose both theists and atheists suffer from the same human conceit differing only in its expression.

theists conceit manifests itself in "god created man in his own image".
Atheists conceit manifests itself in "what can't be seen, touched, measured, reproduced or reasoned, does not exist".

 

"Jonas" didn't cover them at all. How could he? No one who has ever lived has been able to conclusively answer those questions, as we all know very well.

You and "Jonas" have misunderstood me, obviously. Nothing in anybody's religion (that I'm familiar with) tells us in 2014 that the Earth is the center of the universe, that gravity does not make you "stick" to the ground, or that you should rely exclusively on prayer to deal with medical problems. It seems to me (my theory) that "god" has intended human existence to be a series of learning experiences, and may very well encompass reincarnation as part of the overall process (again, a theory). Thus, we can learn that humans did evolve from lower forms of animal life, that the Earth and everything else was pershaps created billions of "years" ago, and not the rigid October 23, 4004 B. C. stipulated by Bishop James Ussher. And it may also teach us, even after all our "improvement" that "the stars are not for man" after all.... Did you ever read "Childhood's End"?

Let me ask you this, since we're talking about "theories"... is it possible that a "Creator" may have provided mankind with all the material and mentality to discover many thousands of things about ourselves and the universe, and encouraged pursuit of them? Is it possible that a "Creator" has a mission for human (or beyond) life-forms that involves development/refinement/improvement of physical vehicles for spiritual life? It's a theory, I know, but it does seem to be consistent with what we've seen throughout history, and before.

But atheism (differentiated here from agnosticism) denies even the possibility of everything except the rather senseless dogmatic conclusion that the universe was not created by anything or anyone. It just sort of *popped* into existence -- and it CANNOT be any other way! If you think it's silly and futile to pray to God when you're sick, what can you possibly think of an opinion like the one that results in atheism?!

The agnostic says, "I don't know for certain." The atheist says, "I KNOW! Moreover, I'm CERTAIN that there cannot possibly be a creator of the universe...." What uninquiring minds....

 

No he covered it quite well.

Not at all in fact I at least understood quite well you were trying to dismiss his response out of hand based on your misunderstanding of scientific theory.

Really in spite of what the book or your religion teaches? Now why is that, because of new religious discoveries, perhaps that god wasn't telling the truth or something or because scientific investigation proved otherwise, you know that scientific method that leads to scientific theory?

Which is trumping which here?

That is not theory, that is supposition.

Why when he could have simply created these already more highly developed life forms? Again you deal in suppositions instead of scientific theroy, that is superstition or science, I don't.

No it was created when all the mass that existed collapsed on itself and exploded back outward.

Now tell me who created your god, what was here before your god.

 

The only time I get upset around the holidays is when Christians act like i'm being as (*)(*)(*)(*)(*)(*)(*) for not taking part in their BS. I got yelled at by some old for sayi happy holidays instead of merry christmas. When i told her i wasn't christian, she said she hoped I burned in hell for my evil heathen ways. To which I replied that christmas is actually a pagen holiday worshipping the Roman god Saturn, called her a hyprocrite and left.

 

Again, you have misunderstood me. I'm NOT trying to "convert" you to any point of view, and I can tell you that other Christians consider many of my beliefs to be heretical and chock-full of error. Religion -- whether mine or any other, is taken on the basis of FAITH, but it does not mean that we cannot embrace and integrate new discoveries about the nature of the universe as they are discovered.

You ask why God didn't just cut-to-the-chase and create perfect beings in the first place? Very honestly, I do not know. But that depends on what we, as the created beings perceive as "perfection", doesn't it? Oooh... subjectivity! I can only look around me and see what is so obvious to my human perceptions and understandings, and those form suppositions, hypotheses, and theories. If enough people share these ideas in common long enough, they become tenets and axioms -- the great "eternal truths", many of which are overturned or simply superseded with the passing of more time, and after subsequent discoveries.

Again, and for the last time, I put forth my basic observation -- that anyone who can stand in the middle of all THIS, in all its variety, complexity, and vastness, and state flatly that nothing and no one created it has committed his mind to a state of sealed stupidity. The agnostic says, "I don't know", but the atheist says "I am SURE I know, but can't tell you anything else...."

 

Well, celebrate the Nativity then. Take down the tree, the lights, cancel the Macy's card, and go to church. I ain't anti-Nativity.

 

Do we know each other?.... or maybe you are generalizing too much!

 

To me atheists are just as closed minded as very religious people are.

 

of course, the fanatically Atheists can be are just as fanatical as fanatical Christians, no doubt about that, I have been attacked by both Christians and Atheists because I celebrate a secular Christmas

 

I've got one question on that; how many atheists do you think you need to know personally in order to make that determination about all atheists?

 

...or all Christians?

 

Several form this forum and the ones I know at college. The very definition of being an atheist also states that they are close minded. Athiests are 100% certain there is no higher intelligence, religious people are 100% certain their god is the one true god and anything else is make-believe. Neither position is defensible at even the most basic level of critical analysis. The entire argument of atheism is "I don't believe in God because he never introduced himself to me" With religious people its "I believe in God despite the fact that he has never introduced himself to me."

Regarding their behavior the vast majority of atheists are as benign as the vast majority of religious people. The problem is that there are so few atheists compared to religious people that they overcompensate by being overly obnoxious. When is the last time you heard a Jewish person complain about nativity scenes or having someone say Merry Christmas to them. I don't even recall any Muslims complaining about Nativity scenes and Islam deosn't believe Jesus is the son of God. We just had some angry atheist kicked off a plane last week because he didn't like all the Merry Christmas greetings from the staff.

 

Your definition of "atheist" is closed minded. There is absolutely nothing about the term which automatically implies 100% certainty. It describes some who doesn't believe in any gods. Anything beyond that is outside the scope of the definition of the word.

I don't see what is logically wrong with not believing in the existence of something presented with no evidence (or evidence you don't feel is strong enough). Is it equally irrational to not believe in ghosts, Big Foot or little green men?

Some people are obnoxious. Some people are atheists. Where is your evidence that the two coincide any more than coincidence would suggest? Some people are obnoxious on message boards but that doesn't mean the rest of us are.

It happens occasionally, just as sometimes Christians will make a big scene about something minor that they object to. That's a people problem, not an atheism (or theism) one.

I hope you had a Merry Christmas.

 

Christmas isn't a Christian holiday, it was originally a pagan holiday adopted by the Christians. The number of pagan practices should be fairly obvious to anyone.

If pointing out facts is (*)(*)(*)(*)(*)(*) baggery, I don't know what to tell ya.

 

Yes I have had Christians upon learning I am not look at me and say "OH I'll have to work on you" as if I needed any work. I slough it off even though I could come back with something smartarse.

And the fact remains I probably celebrate the holidays more than lots of Chrisians.

 

Nope.

Can you point to an atheist who is absolutely sure there is not a higher power? Even the likes of Dawkins and Harris openly admit they are not absolutely certain there is not a higher power, they simply accept there is no evidence for a higher power. The premise of argument of god is unfalsifiable and subject to goal post movement with the advancement of science (God of the Gaps). Which each advancement in science and understanding the space of "well, science can't explain this, so god did it" gets that much smaller. The Bible and other holy texts are easily demonstrated as false and inaccurate, however a person can adopt any other model of god that does not contradict what is known to be true and sit in the fortress of Russel's Teapot.

Given the complete unfalsifiability of the god claim, anyone who claims to be absolutely certain there is not a god is as unreasonable as their theistic counterparts.

 

I think you misunderstand, I don't think you are nor could.

 

Common knowledge for many (include me!) ...thanks for pointing that out (I guess)

 

Why do you care? Atheists are a tiny minority in this country. Christians are a dominant majority, why do they whine so much about atheists?

 

Because your religious holiday is taken for granted as something that is true by society, is promoted massively across the country and I'm criticized as some kind of Scrooge if I go around saying it's based on horse(*)(*)(*)(*), which it is.

 

Point made - Christmas is over now! Time for you to crawl back in your hole and plan your next attack!