Richard Dawkins - The God Delusion

On Human Frailty

     The early people -- the poeple where religion originated -- lacked the evidences needed to answer the primitive questions; they lacked not just in technological advancement, but also in the scientific advancement, this in turn led them to the belief that a magic is governing the world, it is their only hope in answering the questions that haunt them. This I can tolerate, as frail humans as we are, we fear something that we don't know of.

      After years of scientific and technological advancements, we have learned about the big-bang, about our very old ancestral prokaryotes and how they came to be, about bacteria that causes illness, about the solar system and the stars, and about the evolution of species including us humans, we are at the pinnacle of evolution and the evidences and ideas that we have gathered are adequate enough for us to answer these primitive questions that seemed astronomical before. Why, still, do we have to hold on the a fatherly figure? Why must we not try to move on and, just like what evolution does and told us, remove the useless stuff that'll slow us down? Why must man not try to rely on himself and his logic or reason, given that we have advanced brain capable of reasoning.

     I have met many a friend that I've helped open his mind to the world of freethinking -- and it had wondrous effects, but I noticed, after a terrible experience or two, they suddenly morph back to their old religious status, and worship god again, seeking for his divine intervention -- which never comes. I pity those who can't stand for their own, those who still hold on to a heavenly figure, and to worsen that, they dare not question that belief for the fear of eternal punishment.

"Why must learned man believe the uneducated?"

     We need to let go of the supernatural explanation on how we humans came to be, the evolution of man is there to explain this; and where humans came from? The early prokaryotes - who, mind you, can come out from inorganic materials that existed in the early earth, even until now. Why still trust the bible, who's written by illogical men who don't even understand what evolution is? Why say that god created the universe? Are you afraid to say that "science hasn't fully answered that yet? (but honestly, Lawrence Krauss pawned this topic, search for it in google- youtube, "a universe from nothing".)" Must there be an answer to everything? Can't we not wait for hard evidences before concluding something superficial as god? Must men resort to illogical arguments, just to assure him that something, someone out there has some sort of plan for us?

I ask you, then, what if one day, god disappears? Will you lose your sanity?

All I ask of you is to, for once, think.

 I am one of those atheists who love to go to chat rooms and try to have a decent debate with religious people. What frustrates me is that: every time I try to open up a conversation on the said topic, all those religious fundies do is dodge the question or arguments that I throw and shove their religion to my throat, and to add the cherry on the stupid icing, all they say are logical nonsense.

                Have you heard a theist on their argument why god may be real? Most of the time, they don’t bother to, or if they do, it’s just the simple ‘because the bible this and that’. Don’t they know that quoting the bible as grounds for your argument is a fallacy? Firstly, the bible may not be authentic; sure, it claims that it is legitimate but that doesn’t prove anything. Secondly, bible-god-bible argument is a fallacy (almost) all theists commit. The fallacy is so common that it even has a name! It’s called the argument in circles fallacy: which is a fallacy that happens if a premise is said to be true because it is backed up by another premise – even though that supporting premise isn’t even proven true. Bible said that god is real; god wrote the bible who says he is real.

                Have you had a theist who questions you about your moral system, something like, “where do you get your morals from?” This is a signal, and it’s telling us atheists that the Christian has no other arguments up his sleeve. I’d like to school theists about the human morality. Unlike Christians, who get their morals from 10 laws, atheists’ are based on logic, a dose of pity, a touch of personal biases, the society and our being human. Society has told us what god from bad is, therefore, whether you like it or not, man is imbued by set of moral values which he acquired from society. Psychologists say that we got our morals from painful experiences ad that we don’t want that to happen to others, sorry to say, but, if one day, god is really disproven, theists lose their moral foundations and may turn to the worst of people, or simply lose their sanity. It’s a double edged sword.

                On some occasions, I challenge those theists, I tell them my argument that god-bible is a fallacy, and I usually get two answers. Let’s talk about the first one: my apologies, but I think I made a mistake in labeling this as an “answer”, the truth is, and they don’t. Theists dodge my argument so well, that if they are as good in doing so with a bullet, they wouldn’t die in a battlefield. Anyhow, the worst part of this is that, after those theists stupidly and unartfully dodges; they come back at you, disregard your arguments, and once again, shove their religion at you.

                The second answer is the use of another fallacy: appeal to emotions, or red herring. Let me further break this apart. The first segment is the part where those theists answer something like this: “it is about the feelings of the people, we felt god, that’s why we believe that he is real”. Emotions do not prove anything; I did not feel god in any way possible, does that prove his inexistence? As a teenager, have you heard the line: “he’s the one”? Usually, he isn’t. Ha ha. The other segment is that, they tell you that god is real backed up by useless arguments packed with fallacies so obvious that only a monkey can’t see – that’s what they are, by the way. The other version for this is that, they use a tactic called burden of proof; this is where those fundies challenge you to disprove god. This isn’t an obvious fallacy but it doesn’t mean that it isn’t; it is a fallacy in a sense that, they are the ones who should give the proof because they are on the affirmative side. You guys can do research about this one.

The next subtopic that I’m going to talk is confirmation bias. This is the part where those real-life-which-is-supposedly-true miracles happen; where cancers are cured, successful operations happen, crying statues and holey marks on trees exist. Let’s just focus on the cured cancer part; I do think that this would suffice. Have you heard a theist tell you about a person who has been cured because they prayed? I ask you this, then, how many people are there in the world that has cancer, and among these individuals, how many have a theist family who sought for God’s holey miracles, and to sort them further, how many did die? After answering those questions, you’ll hopefully understand something that there are a lot of deaths due to cancer that were neglected and only the one who survived is given focus, and to worsten this, they call this the miracle of god! What makes that one person different from the other? What makes that one guy so special? None! Everything happened by chance and chance alone! If that guy is special, your god then is as biased as you are.

“It is not our duty to question God, as mortals.” Who said so; if we don’t our brain will become that of a dog’s. If you Christians think this way, then by all means do so, but don’t think that, your stupidity will be respected in the atheist community.

All we ask of you is to, just for once, think, and to not act as to what a dog would.

A Letter from an Atheist: Decoded

Remember my post about a letter from an atheist? There's a secret meaning behind it, just like what I said, here it is.

There are many kind hearted people, some are educated some aren’t, or they do not care they are living with rational people. Belief in a great many mysteries and things is good but now that I try to think about it, oftentimes I feel most enlightened overall. Of course to them (rationalists) I become foolish and irrational for believing and for being defensive of religion. When I began it (faith), it comes as revelations to me in matters of hopes concerning the true religion. We ask why believe it? Must you ask religion to not be at all special? Of course one must be very polite to likely impart a reason since, this is faith. Perhaps because non-believers think most believing people, of course including us Bible readers, were not well taught in logic, and that we indoctrinated and convinced as many innocent children we’d found. To believe and not ask any question about the matters of God, of our heavenly faith. You and I are brothers. Can’t religion triumph? Prevent it not. Myself included, we’re from this moment questioning not faith, my personal revelations, beliefs, nor God. Every moment is time well spent, I think, to reflect on God, on his mercy. My skepticism’s now past. Returning to religious status, my convictions have changed. I now solemnly arrive to serve at God’s feet. The one true conclusion is such that of mine. A loving, forgiving, personal, and merciful God the almighty, is certainly not absurd.

Why need god?

     I have been an atheist since I was 14 years old, 4 years ago; since then, I learned how to stand on my own, be strong, and to not rely o any magical being... everything was, and still is, fine, I did not experience any superficial sufferings nor punishments and I lived my life in a very logical and moral way with no experiences of religious irrelevance. So I asked, what is there in god that man can't let go? If a life without god is just as contenting, less the time-consuming religious acts, why the need for an omnipotent being then? If man can still live his life in a moral way without the guidance of the 10 commandments, why still hold onto the notion that god exists?

     A few months ago, fate jokingly answered me. I suffered a vast amount of metaphysical pain, which I can't overcome easily, and to top that, I can't contact any of my friends whom I feel comfortable with in sharing my problems. After this, I realized that: if I were a religious guy, I would've had a fatherly figure who I can console my problems to.

     After that incident, I finally got my answer. People need god in order for them to have a meaning in their lives, so that they won't be haunted by the grim reality of the cosmos -- that we came from nothing, and we don't know where we are headed to or what we're here for, and that our mere existence came from pure chance, no reason, no mission in life, no destination. That we are all going to die and who-knows-where we're going to and we don't know what will happen then. That all our efforts will just go to waste, as if nothing really happened.

"We live to live."

An open letter to religious people: you are idiots and I hate you.

***Note: I got this from a comic strip, don't shoot me for this, but I second this, honestly.

Before you go and get the wrong idea, this is NOT about why religion is bad, or why it is wrong. Of course religion is bad, and of course religion is wrong. But this is so blindingly obvious that it no longer needs to be said.
Instead, this is a direct attack on you, the religious person. The argument? That your failure to reject religion indicates that you are colossally irredeemably stupid.

Religion is fundamentally flawed in a staggering variety of ways, to the point that a curious child can bring down the entire framework of baloney with an innocent question.
Such questions include

*Why is there evil?

*Who made god?

*Why should I trust you after that santa claus thing?

But you didn't ask those questions, did you? Or if you did, you accepted the pathetic rationalizations that where offered without further contemplation.
perhaps you where even afraid to ask, or even to think about it.
Your comforting little worldview matter more to you then the truth.

But can this critical failure really be blamed on fear of the consequences of religion being wrong? Is a godless world that terrible to contemplate?
The idea that santa claus isn't real is also unpleasant, and this proves a deterrent to disbelief. But not a significant one.

God doesn't even bring people presents. In fact, in most religions he is actually a real jerk. Plagues and laws and smiting and eternal torture. Is this really a so attractive an idea that people can't let it go?

Perhaps disinterest is the only real problem. After all, if a man can't read greek, that doesn't make him stupid. It simply means he doesn't care to learn greek.
But can really a disinterest in the fundamental nature of reality really be justified in such a way? maybe so. After all, it makes little difference in day to day living if god is really up there or not.

And yet, should not the fact that god's existence has no major consequence itself raise a red flag?

The idea that a being with immense powers exist, but never tampers with the world in a noticeable way is an absurdly childish hypothetical scenario. it's "I'm not touching you" on a cosmic scale.

Granted, we used to see a lot more evidence of god's tampering then we do today. Lightning, disease, floods, butterflies and the sun.
But even then, a bunch of inexplicable things hardly adds up to a magical being who you can't see.
And of course all this "evidence" wilted and died with sufficient rational inquiry. The sun and stars turned out to be big nuclear furnaces, diseases and butterflies are now well understood, and lightning is just an electrical discharge.

Indeed, from a leopards spots to pregnancy to the shape of the earth, religions has been proved wrong, wrong, wrong.
It would take an IDIOT not to see a pattern in this. And that's exactly what you are.

The icing on this pathetic cake is that you realize that all OTHER religions are wrong, you just have a blind spot towards your own.
Perhaps you have a vague awareness that religion is retarded, but you never really give it up because your thoughts are to disorganized to deal with it.
If this is the case, and your mind is a dusty closet full of odds and ends, motivational phrases and vacation photos, I have nothing but contempt for you.

I refuse to respect religious beliefs, and I refuse to respect the people who hold them. Your willfull ignorance is inexcusable and it disgust me.

:) Enjoy flaming, christians.

A Letter from an Atheist

Here is a letter that a colleague wrote:

There are many kind hearted people, some are educated some aren’t, or they do not care they are living with rational people. Belief in a great many mysteries and things is good but now that I try to think about it, oftentimes I feel most enlightened overall. Of course to them (rationalists) I become foolish and irrational for believing and for being defensive of religion. When I began it (faith), it comes as revelations to me in matters of hopes concerning the true religion. We ask why believe it? Must you ask religion to not be at all special? Of course one must be very polite to likely impart a reason since, this is faith. Perhaps because non-believers think most believing people, of course including us Bible readers, were not well taught in logic, and that we indoctrinated and convinced as many innocent children we’d found. To believe and not ask any question about the matters of God, of our heavenly faith. You and I are brothers. Can’t religion triumph? Prevent it not. Myself included, we’re from this moment questioning not faith, my personal revelations, beliefs, nor God. Every moment is time well spent, I think, to reflect on God, on his mercy. My skepticism’s now past. Returning to religious status, my convictions have changed. I now solemnly arrive to serve at God’s feet. The one true conclusion is such that of mine. A loving, forgiving, personal, and merciful God the almighty, is certainly not absurd.

I hope you guys can find the hidden meaning behind that letter, it's written masterfully.

If you can't figure it out, send me an email: paulotaku@gmail.com -- and please, don't assume. :)

God is a Fallacy

  Christians and even us atheists on our christian days, found out about the possible existence of God through our parents; they were the first people who taught us about God, and they used a book as a guide, or tool, in telling us who God is - that book is the bible. What happens if the very book, that is the foundation of the possible-existence of God, is nothing but a lie. If so, we can say goodbye to christianity.

    The bible said that god is real, we know; and we do know that the author of the bible are mere humans which are said to be instructed by god. This argument is a type of fallacy called 'argument in circles'. I was confused after realizing this, so I told some christians about this, and its either they dodge the question skillfully or shove their religion in my throat - fundies.

Anyhow, I was startled by this one answer that I got from my cousin, she told me that the feelings that were felt by us humans are the reason why they can tell that God is real; this is red herring, an appeal to ones feelings or emotions. Feelings doesn't prove God's existence. Honestly, christians, you equate everything that happens to your life into a 'miracle-of-God' or work-of-God'.