Is it even possible to be an atheist?

Question

If human reason, intelligence, and rationality are the guiding lights of atheistic living and what is needed to make humanity better, and history shows that humans who believed they were reasonable, intelligent, and rational have done some of the most idiotic(building New Orleans on a swamp), irrational (creating and promoting cigarettes as healthy and cool), and immoral to humanity(slavery, Japanese prison camps) acts in Earth's history. Isn't the believe in the reason and rationale of humans dispite the piles of evidence to suggestion how poor these things are in humans an act of faith. Isn't faith and act of religion? Isn't religion a quality of a non-atheist? So how can there be a true atheist?

Answer 1

Yes, because acts of faith aren't by definition religious. Ephistomology teaches us that the only thing that can be truely KNOWN without doubt is Renee Descarte's "I think therefor I am" Everythng else, our perceptions, math, the world around us, the existance of others, the past and future existance of ourselves, etc... are believed based on what we can and have perceived, but cannot be PROVEN. Thus belief in ANYTHING other than your own existance is an act of faith. However, we don't have religious faith for all of them. That's a specific KIND of faith. So, unless you're prepared to claim that you have religious faith in a ham sandwitch, you can't deny non-religious faith to atheists.

EDIT

P.S. for all the people who's saying he's not making any sense, he's making perfect sense. He's just wrong. In short, his question is:

Mankind has proven unreliable. Since Atheists rely on man's reasoning to claim there is not God, don't they have to place their faith that in THAT proof, man was not wrong? If they have faith, do they not have a God?

Answer 2

You argument assumes it was atheists who built new orleans, sold cigarettes and invented slavery... Evidence? Anything? Yeah, didn't think so. Don't waste our time.

Edit: Oh, I can't help myself, I have to poke a couple more holes.

"humans who BELIEVED they were reasonable, intelligent, and rational"

Atheists, among all people know the difference between belief and reality. You've shown that you apparently don't.

Also, atheists do NOT worship rationality, intelligence, and morality. They're fine qualities to have, but you're stuck thinking that since atheists don't worship god, they must worship something else. You're wrong. You fail completely.

Amy M: Even if there was a god, there's tons of religions out there, and a lot of them say if you pick the wrong one you anger god. How is that insurance?

Answer 3

You are basing this whole thing on faith=religion=God. So, if an atheist has faith in humankind, then by default they have faith in God, because faith is a religious thing, but it's not.

Faith is not an act of religion, it's an act of hope. Athiests do not believe in a God, but they are still allowed to believe in people. That's eaiser. You can see people, you can physically touch them, they are not invisible. Hope is not religious, hope is a basic trait that is embedded into every human despite what they believe and whether they chose to use it or not.

Basically, yes, it is very possible to be an atheist. In some ways, it is more rational to be atheist because it places the blame on any major tragedy into the hands of mankind, not God.

Answer 4

This is another example of some of the most childish non-logic the gets pushed in the name of religion. How anyone with even an inkling of critical thinking skills can buy this is beyond me, but religion seems to get a free pass when it comes to childish logic.

You're essentially saying that because people sometimes make mistakes in their reasoning, then there must be an invisible man in the sky.

Now, I don't know if the concept of the logical syllogism is beyond you, so I'll instead mention the extreme case of what you seem to be setting as a requirement for a universe in which there is no god. You seem to think everyone in such a universe would have to behave exactly as you dictate, right? You seem to think every brain would somehow be immensely more powerful and robust and capable of perfectly solving every problem imaginable, just so rejection of the invisible man in the sky is even possible.

Golly, I wish logic were taught in schools these days (along with statistics, but that's another story).

Answer 5

Atheist is merely someone who has come to the conclusion that there is no God.

Having faith is independent of having religion - religion implies that there are set moral boundaries that were created by a God and laid at man's feet - man must follow these rules of behavior or suffer some sort of otherworldly punishment, like Hell or reincarnation as something really sucky.

Having faith merely means that you believe it. I have faith that you will not think this is an acceptable answer - that doesn't mean you're a god to me.

Answer 6

You need to get your noodle into a few history books, Bubba, and stop uncritically digesting the tripe that is being spoon fed to you by liars and people with a hidden agenda.

For one thing, the bible was used to JUSTIFY slavery.

http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_slav1.htm

For another thing, Christianity is what dragged humanity into the Dark Ages... a thousand years of church-enforced ignorance, death, torture, disease and depradation. It was only after the Moors (Moslems) conquered Spain, and re-introduced the pagan knowledge that Christianity had destroyed (art, literature, medicine, mathematics, astronomy, engineering, philosophy... to name a few) that sparked the Renaissance, followed by the Age of Enlightenment... a resurgence of SECULAR knowledge that pushed back the evil dark veil of Christianity and dragged humanity OUT OF the Dark Ages.

If it had not been for Christianity, Christopher Columbus would probably have been going into outer space to set up a mining colony in the Asteroid Belt, instead of trying to prove that the world was a sphere and find a shortcut to the orient.

Ignorance such as yours makes me want to vomit, it is so appalling.

Answer 7

I myself think it would take too much faith to be an Athiest, to really have faith that this was all by chance and an accident, but it is certainly possible. As for faith being religious that is not quite true....we all have faith, a belief, that the sun will come up tomorrow but it doesn't mean we all worship the sun. We all have faith that gravity will keep us on the ground but we are not gravity worshippers. There is a difference between faith and religion. Not all people who belong to a religion have faith in it and not all people who have faith belong to a religion.

Answer 8

Yes...but that is why the 'BLIND LEAD THE BLIND'...and that WITH and all round university call-edge education....problem is/was/willbe that all these educated persons never found the source of thier education but simply believed what 'they' were taught...and if these same persons were born of pigmy or another ''backward'' group of persons thier education would be the 'sum' total of that same 'group' ...no more no less...someone else did all the work ( which these students will never use again ..or the greater portion thereof ). and the students marly became 'store-houses' and those that had higher marks were those that could memorize same better than others in the class...

Answer 9

it is all interpretation. human beings do imagine humorous issues, even with the certainty that the reason. Atheists, Christians, different non secular sects, each and every person. the certainty will set you loose. From the seem of this talk board, no longer many human beings are loose yet. Why strive against some different person's opinion. stay your reality, it fairly is the purely actual thanks to stay this existence. faster or later it is going to all be revealed, until eventually then perchance enable human beings their perspectives. supply yours if requested. yet this bashing one yet another might want to be a waste. choose no longer, or you'd be judged. Peace to all and their myriad of perspectives. it truly is what makes the international go round and round and round. maximum folk listed right here are honestly right here because they're bored, or earnings from the "having a go" or have some theory that acquiring "factors" ability some thing interior the scheme of issues. Peace God is Gracious, this i comprehend.

Answer 10

Kmon really that makes no sense at all.

You are talking about how stupid humans are. Do you mean to say all those stupid acts were done by aethists ? It didnt look like you were saying that. If you are, then you are wrong.

Try to make sense. People who talk about things that might make you sound like an intelligent kid, and think that other people wont know that u are not making any sense look pathetic in a group of people when they try to pull that.

So next time try to make sense. It really isnt cool and you wont fool any one into thinking you are a smart guy. Try to make sense.