Theists... ?

Question

If you already know about religion, then why are YOU here?

Just a dumb question to address an even dumber one.

Would anyone care to list a few of the very good reasons why atheists are here for the millionth time... so the person (currently the last person) that answered my question can perhaps continue to ignore them even though she knows better...?

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=AvzKBjknXHgd0p3C6eOiGX_zy6IX?qid=20061015191024AAYkfrW

Answer 1

1. Atheists can be spritual being, this the religion and spirituality section
2. Society, specially American society is drenched in a bucket filled with God, so anybosy should have an opinion about religions to survive in a society like that
3. In a society where I wanna put my kids through school, I don't want them to get indocterinated with all sorts of fundamentalistic religious BS in those same schools
4. We all suffer from religious fundamentalists all over the planet.
5. Atheists are also simply here, because they have a right to be here.
6. the main reason that atheists are here, is out of friendlyness. There must be people to answer all the questions that start with "Atheists, why are you here?"

Answer 2

I don't really want to get into someone's feud, but...
There are really not many places where you could find people of every different religion along with people without religion having an open discussion about spirituality, especially a place like Yahoo! where everyone's opinion is treated pretty much equally. It is a rare opportunity to examine some of our core beliefs and why we have those beliefs. In the best case, it could generate more understanding among people, but in reality it's mostly a lot of arguing.
The arguments are loud and nasty and long-winded and they often degenerate into name-calling and really bad logic. The arguments are so loud that the person who looks at questions and answers and learns to be a little more tolerant a little at a time goes unnoticed. But they- I should say "we"- are there all the same.
Many religious people see their religions answering complex questions for them. I am not going to comment on the quality of those answers- they are matters of faith. People who don't follow a religious path also need answers to spiritual questions and- again without commenting on quality- in the absence of a ready-made religious answer, non-religious people have to answer science questions by using science, relationship questions by knowledge about relationships, psychology questions by understanding how a mind works and so on. In terms of people who are actually looking for actual answers, non-religious people probably get more from a discussion group than religious people do. If your answers are already in the scriptures, there is no need to look for them here. There must be another reason for a person who already has all the answers to be here asking questions. Sometimes- okay MOST of the time- it's people asking rhetorical questions, but once in a while, it's someone trying to understand other people.
So does anyone care about whether people understand each other or not? Yes. I do. I'm tired of fights. I'm tired of people starting fights and then other people taking revenge because they got hurt. It just goes on and on. Have you ever listened to a person from Israel/ Palestine? On both sides, they only talk about revenge; about having to get back at someone who did something because that person was getting back at someone who was getting back at someone else. It never stops. Unless you make it stop. That would start with people seeing each other as people. And here we are.
Welcome!

Answer 3

Just because you may be an atheist, does not necessarily mean that you are not spiritual.

Answer 4

I don't care to list them, tyvm. I think you should.