dahn batchelor's opinions: Is there a god? (Part 2)

Is there a god? (Part 2)

In the previous article, I submitted the opinions of people who stated in their submissions to the National Post that they believe in the existence of a god. I also submitted my own thoughts on each of their opinions and did so as an atheist.

In this article I am submitting the opinions of those persons who stated in their own submissions to the National Post that they don’t believe in the existence of a god.

Since I am an atheist, I don’t feel that there is anything that I can add to their statements as they have more or less expressed the same thoughts that I have on this subject.

Statements of those who don’t believe that a god exists

In answer to your question, no, I don’t believe in a higher power. I suggest reading Atheism: The Case Against God, by George H. Smith.

I am an 86-year-old reasoning woman. I am a free-thinking atheist, and with all my common sense and brain power, I will never understand the fairy story of heaven….such a waste. I will never get on a pulpit to voice what I consider a tragedy to humanity.

I don’t believe in the Christian God, nor in any other god — they’re all manifestly human inventions. Just think of the ways different religions contradict each other. Islam teaches that Jesus is not the son of God, which if true undermines the whole basis of Christianity. If the Christian God exists, surely he realizes he has a problem here.

When I was little, I used to believe in a god (lower case, please) — then I grew up. I started thinking, Bible stories were made up, the Great Pumpkin (deserves capitals) never came, and Santa turned out to be my Dad (also capitals). We live; we die; we rot. Ghosts, gods and goblins are for kids and movies. So please sign your organ donation cards (sorry about my liver) and burn me to a crisp for being a heretic.

God of the Old Testament was angry and often ruthless. The Son in the New Testament did some PR for his Father’s image. Then we have the gods of the tribal communities, and of Egypt, Greece and India who are good and bad, and beautiful and not so beautiful. In fact, we have man making these Gods in his own image. This is either the longest running fiction or a childish interpretation of the complex phenomenon, the Life Force.

There is no evidence for a god, or even for dualism. Some people talk about angels and demons as if their existence is unquestionable. Science provides a much better explanation of the world in which we live. Science reveals a world that is more beautifully interesting than any of our mythologies have offered up to this point.

Big beliefs require big evidence. The onus of proof is on the holder of the belief. I don’t have anything to prove as I don’t hold beliefs on religion that are not based on evidence. Therefore I am not anxious and hostile. Religion is like smoking, do it if you want to but not around me and certainly not around my kids.

I was a believer most of my life until I realized it is all a con job foisted upon us even before Moses refined it. As that great 23-century philosopher Mr. Spock would say, “It’s illogical.” That’s the magic word — logic. Once you apply it, God and its minions disappear, they no longer exist, ergo, God does not exist and because God does not exist neither does religion.

While I used to be a Christian, the comical nature of the biblical stories and my years as a registered nurse (watching pointless death and suffering) have forever marked me an atheist. After studying the Bible and the realities of human behaviour, it’s clear to me that there is no evidence of god and religion. All religion is a myth to placate emotions and the masses.

I do not see how anyone can reconcile a God that is omniscient, omnipotent and benevolent with the evil that is in this world. A child dies of cancer, then her mother in a span of a year. Both were good people. God did not help them. There is no God.

Man created God in his own image. It’s that simple.

Imagine! The Post giving readers an opportunity to talk about God. As a theologian (Boston University, 1955), my answer in a word is, no! However, I am not an atheist. In harmony with the great psychologist, Carl Jung, I prefer saying: I have no need to believe in a god; I know and experience G-O-D, in and through all things, seen and unseen, including people.

Theologically, I am a certain-uncertain; uncertain as to whether God exists; certain that, if so, I want nothing to do with the insufferably self-righteous, punishing, abusive Judeo-Christian God who demands adult substitution of reason and integrity by childlike dependence and faith for the “free” gift of eternal life. Each day “I wish that today my life serve transcendent good, beyond my narrow self-interests.” God, for me, is that “transcendent good.”

If I am right, in life, my last word is No! In death, if wrong, my next word will be Doh!

The debate about belief or not in God would not arise if we avoid the use of the word “God” and refrain from ascribing all sorts of forms, names and non-proven presumptions that world religions have heaped on that word. We neither know where we came from nor where we are going. The only certainty is that we are born here and we will die here.

Most days I am not sure that there is a God, but if there is a God, I am pretty confident that he/she doesn’t have a favourite football team nor a favourite religion.

My caveman brain has trouble with a notion that the universe just does its thing willy-nilly. But I do not believe in the “Big Man in the Sky”/ rewarder-punisher/head honcho invention. God does not need to be worshipped: he/it’s way beyond that. However, if one wants to believe otherwise — and no one gets hurt in the process, go for it.

As a teacher of reincarnation, people ask me what religion I am. I say, “I’m the same religion as God. In a garden, surrounded by the beauty of the art of God, I believe that God had a hand in it. During a basic Botany and Zoology class, one day I asked myself, “Wow, what mind thought up all these interdependent systems?” My first spiritual question. Just this morning I marveled at the love my large cat continually shows toward our feisty dog who elbows her out of the way if she’s in it. And where did the instinct of loyalty and patience come from that our dog displays every day?

No, because people have very different beliefs, and follow different religions in large part on where they were born and who raised them. A universal truth would be the same and apparent the world over. One god is not a universal truth. Religions contradict each other; however religion provides no way to decide what the truth is. Each asks for belief, but for someone starting out, how do you decide which to believe in.

Simply put, my beliefs inform my actions, so I care very strongly if what I believe is true. It is with that in mind that I approach all claims skeptically, and I rely heavily on evidence (not all empirical, but most) to inform my beliefs. That means I do not have any reason to believe in Santa Claus, the tooth fairy, Sasquatch, the Lochness Monster, Chi, Karma, or any gods. Further, I find most current iterations of god to be damaging to our society, our lives, and our progress in understanding the world around us.

God of the Old Testament was angry and often ruthless. The Son in the New Testament did some PR for his Father’s image. Then we have the gods of the tribal communities and of Egypt, Greece and India who are good and bad, and beautiful and not so beautiful. In fact, we have man making these Gods in his own image. This is either the longest running fiction or a childish interpretation of the complex phenomenon, the Life Force.

As a theologian (Boston University, 1955), my answer in a word is, no! However, I am not an atheist. In harmony with the great psychologist, Carl Jung, I prefer saying: I have no need to believe in a god; I know and experience G-O-D, in and through all things, seen and unseen, including people.

If I am right, in life, my last word is No!/In death, if wrong, my next word will be Doh!

Most days I am not sure that there is a God, but if there is a God, I am pretty confident that he/she doesn’t have a favourite football team nor a favourite religion.

The universe was created by a spiritual power (male naturally) solely for the benefit of human beings on this tiny planet. There is no “plan” for each of us. We’re just not that important. God did not create us. We created God. It was done to control human behaviour and give our lives more “meaning.” It’s the 21st century. Time to lose these superstitions.

No. Trying to explain the complexity of the universe and the life within by positing an even more infinitely complex god figure is not a useful idea, nor is it a logical one. Faith is a philosophy of ignorance, and science is a philosophy of discovery.

I am swayed by the thoughtful words of the late Christopher Hitchens in answering this question. If in fact there were a higher power, it would be so remarkably unkind and capricious that not one person should be content to be under his control. In fact, considering the historically deviant role of religion, to consent to a higher power is to pledge your life to an almighty dictator who arbitrates your life according to their treacherously immoral conventions, and, to unnecessarily limit human kind’s innate potential in answering the truly inspiring questions about life with reason and evidence.

No, I don’t believe in God because I have not seen evidence of “his” existence as it relates to the story of creationism. This notion came from societies who did not understand the natural world around us. So they created stories to explain different phenomenons. Really – is any reason in this enlightened age to continue to follow ancient belief systems? How could a spirit have created this complex system of universes, stars, planets, and life forms, etc. The idea that there is a “Being” watching, judging, punishing, and rewarding us with the promise of a fantasy trip to “heaven” is absurd.

Mankind originally created the gods to explain the unexplained and to comfort him in death. Since then, the horizon of the unexplained has been pushed to new frontiers and, as a result, the definition of ‘god’ continues to be redefined. If there really were a supreme, all-knowing creator, wouldn’t he remain constant in his definition? Instead he is continually being re-engineered to represent the closest version to himself that current mankind can accept.

I don’t believe there is a ‘God’. If there were a god as described, why only one ‘visit’ to ‘one’ tribe in the million+ year history of mankind’s hundreds of cultures and multi-billions of people? Why such a simplistic set of 10 rules? If ‘s/he’ were so omniscient and omnipotent, why would s/he create such defective beings? Heaven? We are electromagnetic beings and when the EM energy of our brain/spinal cord dissipates, so does our consciousness and awareness of existence.

Children are, from an early age, submitted to family religious and cultural indoctrination. After baptism and confirmation in the United Church, I took a Religious Knowledge course in university, only to discover that each religious sect has a different interpretation, unusual dietary prohibitions, and often exclusionary beliefs that all others are damned! There is no evidence that there is a God. Where could Heaven or Hell exist in this explored cosmos? A realist can live a moral and contented life without an antiquated belief in a higher power.

I don’t believe in the god of any religion. I’m an Atheist Unitarian Universalist. Once we had a service put on by a family – the name of the service was “We are Stardust”. That is what I believe connects everything in the universe & beyond. I think some form of god(s) was invented by all cultures in an attempt to understand and explain the world around them. The scientific method explains a lot of it now, and what we still don’t understand will be explained by scientists in the future, as long as the right wing idiots don’t destroy the earth before they can. I don’t hold out much hope for mankind, as long as politicians are fighting about science versus religion, but I do what I can in terms of the environment and social justice work.

I do not believe in a higher power, because no real solution has ever come from doing so. Even if there were a god, its only desire would be for us to believe in ourselves. We are not born only to be judged. Religion and spirituality separate mankind from our own existence. It is dangerous to live in the fantasy of other worlds, when really what matters is here and now. This is our canvas.

The reasons for my lack of a belief in god are twofold. Firstly, and more importantly, is the lack of evidence for any sort of supreme being as well as the vast amounts of evidence that contradict points made in any holy texts. My second point is emotionally driven and has to do with the bile that you can find in most, if not all, holy books.

Believe in a god? Let me see. There are gods with funny hats or ties or flowing robes and GOD knows lots of other gods from space ships to chicken bones. Which one should I choose? A Bubby on a cloud eating cream cheese? One with wine and virgins?

One with snakes? I don’t know. What do they charge? How does the god thing go?

To the extent that a god or higher power exists, it exists solely in the mind of a person or other animal. It is the answer to questions that cannot otherwise be answered. The only consistent attribute of god is that it exists just past the boundary of our comprehension. As our comprehension grows, so god shifts, as do heaven and hell.

Why should I believe in the absolute truth of such a relative construct?

I do not believe in any gods. My reason for not having belief in the Christian god is the same reason I don’t believe in Zeus or Ganesh or Ra — it has not been demonstrated that any of them are true.

As a child, I was comforted by the acceptance of my faith community. But with age, education, and experience, I left belief behind. University science showed me the value of observation, evidence and critical thinking in making sense of reality, and I realized that morality simply involves consideration of how our actions impact the well-being of fellow conscious creatures. Faith in gods is unnecessary and is not a path to truth.

I don’t believe in God nor understand the rigorous followers of Him or Her. Religions are and have been the cause of division, violence and hatred in the world. I have nothing good to say about them.

There is no tangible proof HE exists. Lots of proof he does not exist. The story of his existence makes sense in the history of humans but we have more knowledge now. Science explains many of the mysteries. The world makes more sense to me without a God. Love, nature humanity and family are my belief system. That is all I need.

When I reached an age where I was able to reason for myself, I listed the evidence for and against there being a higher power. I found that the ‘’for’’ column remained blank. And after the tremendous advances in cosmology over the last few decades the ‘’for’’ column remains blanker than ever.

Not only do I not believe in any one of the thousands of Gods that humanity has invented, but I find those who do to be of shallow thought, blindly following the superstitions of human kind’s infancy. Every aspect of religion has been replaced by better information, and it’s time to let go of mysticism in all of its forms.

The surest way to guide our lives is to hold fast to what we can prove is true. I do not believe in a God because the evidence for evolution is evidence against a creator God, and our understanding of the brain provides an argument against the soul. It takes great courage to be an atheist, because the world is a hard place, and its truths are often hard to accept.

No, I do not believe in God. I believe that God is a man-made creation so humans can feel protected. This, is somewhat along the lines of Sigmund Freud’s theory of God being a projection of the unconscious mind that looks for a father figure for security and forgiveness. However, I believe in the material world. We are the controllers of our own live, not a almighty being that cannot be seen or heard.

No, despite Christian upbringing. No credible evidence exists for God. I have read Julian Jaynes’ The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind, the most important work since Darwin, and a thoughtful reading of that book puts paid to any belief in God.

You ask me, a quiet atheist, “Do you believe in a God?” Between the Bible, the Koran and the Talmud as examples, which of the many different items of religious fiction in the world should be the source of such belief?

There is no god. At the earliest dawning of man’s consciousness, existentialists knew our psyche was too fragile to handle the enormity of the human condition. For the ultimate spiritual good of our rational but delicate species, religion was invented as balm for our conscience, solace for our soul, and direction for communal inspiration. The fact different religions exist speaks volumes about this universality in man’s thinking. If you believe in God, god is you.

In conclusion

As an Atheist, I am compelled to agree with the thoughts of those who made their aforementioned views known. There are millions upon millions of Atheists around the world. However, the demographics of atheism are difficult to quantify. Different people interpret atheism and related terms differently, and it can be hard to draw boundaries between atheism, nonreligious beliefs, and nontheistic religious and spiritual beliefs. Furthermore, atheists may not report themselves as such, to prevent suffering from social stigma, discrimination, and persecution in some countries.

A majority (53%) of Canadians believe in God. That means that 47% do not believe in God. Several studies have found Sweden to be one of the most atheist countries in the world. 23% of Swedish citizens responded that "they believe there is a God", whereas 53% answered that "they believe there is some sort of spirit or life force" and 23% that "they do not believe there is any sort of spirit, God, or life force". A 2006 survey in the Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten (on February 17), saw 1,006 inhabitants of Norway answering the question “What do you believe in?” 29% answered; "I believe in a god or deity", 23% answered; "I believe in a higher power without being certain of what", 26% answered; "I don't believe in God or higher powers" and 22% answered; “I am in doubt.” A poll in 2004 by the BBC put the number of people in the United Kingdom who do not believe in a God at 39%. A 2004 BBC poll showed the number of people in the US who don't believe in a god to be about 9%

Many Atheists believe in much of the teachings in the Christian Bible. I am one of them. For the most part, I consider the Bible as a great historical document. Further, the teachings of Jesus and others in the Bible in both the Old and New Testaments are teachings that we should take to heart. This goes for the teachings of other writers in other holy books. But this does not mean that I would be willing to accept everything that has been written in these holy books. And I certainly don’t believe that there is a god somewhere who or that is a loving god that dwells in all of us.

However I feel that if people want to believe in the existence of a god in their lives, that is their right and if it makes them feel good about it, then I am pleased for them.

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Tuesday 24 April 2012

Is there a god? (Part 2)

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