Atheists/agnostics: Please share about your sense of higher awareness and intelligence.?

Question

Having been agnostic and atheist, I recall a certain self-awareness that I was smarter than people still naïve and deluded enough to believe religious claims. I see a lot of that here at R&S. I am interested in how people experience this sensation and to what extent it informs the current Zeitgeist. Anything you’re willing to share would be greatly appreciated. The questions:

Do you feel this way about yourself? Have you ever doubted this about yourself?

How has it affected your life?

Do your friends feel this way about themselves?

Does it feel liberating? Or does it feel more like a burden?

MrNiceGuy indeed!

I'm impressed by how many people answering have shunned feeling arrogant and superior, despite their feeling like they are less deluded. I have not thus far seen a lot of that attitude among critics of religion here at R&S.

Answer 1

Intelligence doesn't correlate to your belief system and it certainly does not vary if you change your belief system. What is correlated is the cognitive abilities as generally believers tend to not develop various cognitive skills as much.

So no, I do not feel more or less intelligent than others, believers or not, but I do think that I'm more objective, skeptical and analytical than some believers. Generally though I try not to assume this as each person is an individual and should not be treated in a stereotypical fashion until they demonstrate that they should be.

Edit:
As I look back on what I know about the Bible (a reasonable amount, after being steeped in it for 35 some odd years), being more objective about it certainly keeps me from doing mental gymnastics to rationalize it, and makes it much easier to understand.

Answer 2

I do feel I have a higher sense of awareness, yes. I've been in their shoes, having been raised Lutheran and taught to believe in god. My mom reads A LOT about religion, but only HER religion seriously. She does read propaganda put out by her religion about others and it is FILLED with inaccuracies and downright lies, but that's to be expected. They don't want to lose her as a believer.

I, on the other hand, read the texts of the other religions and decided for myself that they are ALL hoaxes designed to coerce the masses into believing using fear... fear of the unknown, fear of death, fear of not belonging.

This has affected my life in both good and bad ways. I don't think I'm more intelligent, per se... just that I feel that the blinders have fallen away and I know life as it really is, not as the religions would have me believe it is. This is both sobering and joyful... I can be happy on a daily basis, enjoy life and not be so focused on what happens later because I'm sure there is nothing after death, so I MUST enjoy life now. However, it's sobering because it's tremendously lonely. But I refuse to be a believer just to have friends. I'd rather be a lonely non-believer than a busy believer.

The majority of my friends are believers and the few non-believers I know are 'closeted.' They don't want to face what might happen in their lives were they to 'come out' as atheists/agnostics. Two are teachers and it would complicate their lives (it SHOULDN'T but it would) and the other is just more private than I am.

It is liberating and burdensome... but religion to me is stifling and filled with lies and untruths, repressive. I'd rather be living life like I do now, filled with facts and happiness than the lies and fear of religion.

Answer 3

I am an atheist and I do not consider myself any smarter or better than anyone else. I have never believed, even when I was very young. I don't look at Christians and say "poor deluded fools" like so many of us do. I kind of envy them because they believe in something and religion really helps people through some tough times. It just isn't for me, never can be and never will be.

Answer 4

Atheists aren't smarter than christians because of religious belief, it's how we go about finding answers. Christians look it up in a book that has all the answers. Atheists have to look at many different sources. The reason we're usually more "enlightened" to the natural world is that in our process, you'd be suprised how much we find along the way.

(that is, putting at what would be considered the same intelectual levels, the case is usally true, but there are definite exceptions)

Answer 5

You do not have to be stupid to be fooled. And you do not have to be clever to be enlightened.

Which is good. Because it means anyone can rationally see that there is no evidence of a god, and that life can be better lived and human rights better served by assuming that there is not one rather than living under a delusion.

The virtue of this is not of being brighter than other people, but of having had the courage to resist enormous societal pressure to conform to a culture that historically has had a repressive religion at its heart.

Answer 6

i think of if somebody unearths bigger information straightforward, that's because of the undeniable fact that they were meditating in previous lives. if that they were on yet another airplane, they get reestablished on yet another airplane and proceed to meditate.To get completely common on a greater physically powerful airplane i think of desires many lifetimes of meditation, and then, because of the fact transversing the ego is so perplexing, once you get to the front gates of yet another airplane, a non secular instructor or possibly even a ideal grasp will come to assist you. it is not a great open direction, that's greater like strolling a good rope. while you're actually not a gifted tight rope walker, the opportunity of falling is often inevitable. that's the reason a handbook will come to assist you, because of the fact which you won't be in a place to do it your self.

Answer 7

I'm no more or less intelligent than the next reasonably intelligent person, and I don't think I'm better than anyone else. I just "get" something that it took me a long time to understand. One of the things I like about myself if that I found enough self awareness and confidence to attack the world with my own heart, mind, and spirit being enough to guide me.

Answer 8

People can believe any fool thing they want. What I believe doesn't make me any better than anyone else. A lot of my beliefs may be wrong, I dunno, that's just what I believe. Looking down on people for their beliefs is self defeating and will only lead to isolation or a group mentality. I am open to others ideas and beliefs cause even if I disagree with them there is still wisdom in how they drew their conclusions just as I drew my own. Thinking someone else is foolish for spiritual or philosophical reasons is foolish itself cause none of any of it can be definitively proven.

Answer 9

when we leave the oppressive religious mentality.... we begin to heal spiritually... something that never occurs in religions... so when we do heal we become reconected with nature... when become truly connected and aware of our environment.... In religion we are limited to the religion... and we all know that nothing new comes from that attachment.

Answer 10

Honesty is always liberating. The only difference between atheists and non-atheists is that the atheists are no longer pretending to believe in God or pretending to know what the future has in store for them. They face reality, no matter how fearsome it may be.