Atheism

I'm sure I could find a way to connect it up to atheism pan if I put my mind to it but alas it is my time for snuggling down in my Christian, electric-blanketed, fester-pit.

fairies under your pillow caveman

LOL you are going to need to turn that blanket off as it was made possible by a non-believer by the name of Edison!

Thomas, not sure what your point is.

Spendi - your last few comments make me want to vomit.

Now that I think of it, neither am I. At the time I said that, there seemed to be a nice parallel between your post and the allegation, frequently made by defenders of religion, that atheists are shrill, always arguing, and looking for a fight. So I made a sarcastic quip about it. On second thought, maybe I was just over-eager to see a nice parallel where none existed, and to make a sarcastic quip where none was warranted. It happens to me sometimes.

you're a good man Thomas. On the Atheists Your Life Is Pointless thread, Pookie told me she respected you more than any other poster.

First, no one claims this is "a little club house for atheists," nor that anyone who does not agree is excluded. The point, which you probably miss because you're just jumping into the thread now without having actually read it, is a discussion of the experience of being an atheist. The objection to Spurious and his bullshit is that the stupid arguments about the value of christianity have been exhausted in one inane thread after another, and there's no reason to discuss this discussion of the experience of being an atheist with arguments going on in many other parts of the site. In the particular case of Spurious, he attempts to introduce such stupid arguments into threads which are not about atheism at all, such as the intelligent design thread and the Wandel's thread on the latest developments on the attempt to introduce intelligent design into schools.

Second, there are any number of threads about Christianity and Islam at this site (or once were) in which the participants just **** their pants when anyone who disagrees with them comments.

Third, "taking on" Spurious is just what he wants, and simply provides him even more opportunities to post one idiotic diatribe after the other. If you watch him for any length of time, you'll see that he'll post on, two, three or more posts in a row, even commenting on people who have been ignoring him. To respond to him is just to increase both his shrillness and his frequency of posting, which trashes the thread further.

Finally, Spurious is not a "born-again," and i suspect he's not even a practicing Christian. He's just a turd-stirrer and a contrarian, who wants to make every thread in which he appears about him, and not about the titular topic.

Bottom line: just as in real life, any of us have a right to complain about some jerk who pushes his way in and stomps all over the conversation. Lots of people here have interesting things to say about atheism--Lil Kay, EB . . . hell, if Neologist showed up to tell of his experiences as an atheist, before he turned to the JWs, that would be welcome. The drivel that Spurious posts, however, is not about the topic, and adds nothing worthwhile to the conversation.

Pity you can't see that.

And you do not know how to used the ignore function?

My life had been greatly improve since I am only reading one out of every ten posts of yours for example.

I don't need electronic assistance to ignore someone, and i know that Spurious is trashing this thread without reading the drivel he posts. Apparently, it doesn't do you much good, or you wouldn't have read my post. You're as much a part of the problem here as he is, because you go into every thread remotely about religion, including this thread about the irreligious, to clutter up the thread with your inane rants against superstiion, and your ill-informed comments about how evil christianity is. You're not even very good at the latter, because you are so typically ill-informed.

If the ignore function is such a boon, use it properly and don't read my posts. While you're at it, put Spurious on ignore, and stop trashing this thread.

After that ridiculous post it looks as if my posts are the topic. In actual fact they are not the topic and therefore Setanta's sulky diatribe is off topic.

Of course, taking me on is what I want. What else are debates about? Who wants to contribute to the thread and nobody take them on? Isn't Kay trying to provoke me by saying that my post about the benefits to ladies of always providing them with some nagging opportunities makes her vomit. Which I don't believe actually.

I think a post I wrote yesterday amply justifies my posting two, three or more posts in a row. I'm the only one questioning militant atheism. Without me the thread would soon fade out. There's not much energy in agreement. Then advertisers would desert A2K and Bob would suffer cash flow problems which might lead to A2K going into administration and that would be a minor disaster for us all. The atheists have posted many efforts attacking Christianity. Often two, three, four,five and six or more in a row and they all say the same thing, more or less, and thus, for intellectual purposes, may be thought of as a many-headed monster. Setanta must wish them to go onto the record unchallenged which is to say censored at his behest.

I gave examples from past experience of how the atheists I have known behaved. In doing so I distinguished between atheists and atheists preaching. Most atheists don't preach their atheism. Many, probably most, obfusticate it and even pay lip service to Christian rituals. Going to midnight Mass at Christmas, having their children baptised and taking them when they are older to view the manger scene and behaving properly at Christian ceremonies to which they are invited or feel a duty to attend. I have seen atheists bow their heads at funerals as the priest intones the ritual words by which the deceased is felt to be being ushered into a better life. They do not shout "bullshit" and start waving their arms about in protest. Never once have I heard them deprecating the waste of good protein which could be ground up and put into pet foods or suggesting that the bones could be made into piano keys, knick-knacks, stays or table lamps which are all perfectly valid economic usages for cadavers from a strictly materialist point of view. There are about 2.5 million deaths in the USA per year. If it is assumed that the average cadaver weighs 180 pounds, which seems reasonable judging by the scenes on the News where US street scenes are depicted, then there is 450 million pounds, or 200,000 tons, roughly, of useful organic substances some of which, when rendered down, are probably quite valuable. There are possibly chemicals which cannot be found elsewhere in the universe which may lead to new treatments which could alleviate the symptoms of lumbago or dandruff or erectile dysfunction, assuming anybody is daft enough to want to cure that most advantageous condition.

But Setanta has me on Ignore, or so he claims, so he would not have seen the post concerning my observation of atheists. I even decribed how a pal of mine became a lifelong atheist. He can't have seen that either. So not having seen my posts he then makes an argument that I have not contributed anything about the "experience of being an atheist" and he has nothing to say about posts he has seen which have nothing to say about that experience. Such as Lil Kay's last one. And those of others who he needs to keep in tight with so he can more easily hypnotise them into ganging up on me.

All he can do is rant in a repetitive and circular fashion. Anybody who disagrees with him on this issue, and most others, is automatically deemed "idiotic" so "bullshit", "stupid" & Co follow like defecation follows digestion and digestion follows swallowing and swallowing follows mastication and mastication follows shoving grub in the gob.

Setanta's post is just variations on a theme about me being an idiot and me being an idiot is only an assertion based on my opposition to his preaching atheism which, if I may be so bold, I do for his own good because in a society of 91--97% non-atheists (see fresco's survey figures) he is bound to be generally unpopular if he goes around talking as he has above and can only find social solace with other atheists who are notorious for being boring, cynical and illiterate and unable, by their own principles, to do anything other than be looking out for themselves the whole time, and I feel I should help him to overcome such disadvantages so that he may, with a little practice, become a normal member of a society which is 91--97% non-atheist.

Setanta is so bereft of ideas with which to pad out his intemperate spiel that he has to bring other threads into this one and make assertions about what goes on on them in the knowledge that most of the others here haven't read those threads and so he can say anything he likes about them anticipating that he will be believed.

And then he pulls the dirtiest stroke of all. Faint praise of "Lil Kay" and "EB", who must feel they are being used as stage props, and reference to Neologist who is then admitted to have jacked in atheism in favour of becoming a JW which I presume means a Jehovah Witness. In view of the padding about the other threads it seems incoherent to be using abbreviations.

What Setanta says about Bob Dylan tells me all I need to know. Bob must be one of America's top foreign exchange earners if not actually No 1.

farmerman is another who deprecates America's greatest artist. The atheist's artistic appreciation can only be zero. An atheist cannot have what Freud called the "oceanic feeling". The Naked Lunch is all he has.

I think it unreasonable to attack Bill in that manner. He did a very nice post about contemplating the universe from a hammock. I identified with that because I have contemplated the universe myself from various positions. Grassy banks, bed with the curtains drawn. Once, after a particulary happy night in the pub, the universe took me completely by surprise when I went outside.

And, if my antennae are picking up the correct messages, Bill is not only young but may also be writing in a second language. In which case, saving him from becoming another Setanta seems a charitable thing to attempt.

Nice try, but none of that speaks to your experience of being an atheist which is the subject of this thread. My experience has been much like what has gone on on this thread. Interruptions, mis-informed historical references, pleas for understanding and respect for faith in fantasy and then, when those are answered, cogently and in the spirit of camaraderie, either no equally cogent response or anther long tangential spew. One can only reply to so many yah-buts before it begins to feel as if one is addressing a child who knows they can delay bedtime by just asking one more question.

So, if you have any personal experience with living as an atheist yourself, I'd like to hear it. Otherwise, try listening for awhile.

Joe(I'm sure there will be no surprises.)Nation

Neologist told me that he had been raised a Cat-lick, had drifted away from the faith, became an atheist, and then found the guiding light of the Jehovah's Witnesses. I hope he won't mind my having outed him. He doesn't deny it, but he doesn't advertise it, either. One of the reasons it would be interesting is that i have seen more vicious attacks here against him for his confession than i've ever seen launched against atheists.

Which I presume is addressed to me. This is the first post on the thread Joe--



It even mentions friends. So I think it is you who ought to study what the subject of the thread is instead of asserting what it isn't.

And you must admit that designating me a child trying to delay bedtime and scolding me for it does rather put you into the role of a Mom who has had the effrontery to shove someone into this pile of shite either because she didn't time the back-shift correctly or was angling for a present and now wants it out of her sight.

As for being an atheist--it is a temporary condition as sleep proves and events such as getting out of heavy protective clothing when a sudden peristalsis in the bowel takes place on an artic expedition.

Generally speaking though I think the atheist experience is best appreciated when it becomes advantageous to set aside Christian morality. But the intellectual problem with that, as many philosophers have pointed out, is that in the act of setting aside Christian morality one is necessarily recognising it.

The person who says "excuse me" when he farts is in the same position in that he is recognising the rules of etiquette and at the same time setting them aside. Which is why he asks forgiveness.

Thus, one might argue, assuming that there is nothing of interest to listen to and the conversation might flag otherwise, that a real atheist never has a thought for his atheism and that state procludes him saying anything about it. I have witnessed an atheist who regularly farted without making the slightest sign that he had done so.

When I have been in that mental state where Christian morality is liquidated from the mind, which I am ashamed to say I have been on more occasions that I really ought to have been judging from the po-faces on the front row at the Tiger Woods base denigrations of evolutionary masculinity, my behaviour was not something which I would care to describe and place on the record of a family oriented forum. I feel that to do so would cause many A2Kers to lose their respect for me despite my having long ago repented of such things and received absolution.

We cannot allow this thread, Sir, to degenerate into the shambles Setanta wanted the evolution threads to get into where discussing the teaching of evolution takes the place of actually teaching evolution and thus paving the way for him to insult anyone who has the temerity to disagree with anything he has said.

So let us have some atheistic experiences described by all means rather than just abstractly discussing atheism as if it was a flying spaghetti monster having no connection with anything of the earth. The whole matter is pointless when it is tip-toeing around as if atheism has no connection with our actions.

Setanta's lack of respect for others can be easily seen from his distortion of my username and his inability to stop himself from referring to Catholics as Cat-licks. He has also "outed" a member whilst expressing the hope that the member concerned will not mind.

His sarcasm "guiding light" , which is unneccessary to the point he is making, is another instance of his disrespect. I trust you all sniggered at it.

I think it is the height of bad manners.

spendius said:



(that was funny)!

I think your antenna is off on Bill though. I think he's retired and married again to a woman who has grown daughters so unless he's actually NOT retired and doing the cougar thing - he's not a young guy.

I'll bear that in mind Rebecca. Maybe Bill will inform us but I wouldn't dream of asking.

I think Setanta did treat him with disrespect although, like me, he doesn't mind.

I didn't ask him - he just told me on one thread or another.

I also remember him telling me that English is his first language. He made reference to a difficulty he happens to have with written language that is not indicative of a lack of overall intelligence. He's a numbers guy apparently.

I have to say that it does bug me when people disrespect others and make assumptions about their intelligence based on spelling mistakes or problems they have with written language while they ignore pretty convincing evidence that they're smart (at least in some ways) when one actually listens to WHAT they're trying to say.
I guess that's just one of my own pet peeves because of the population of people I work with. I've witnessed their frustration and find it hard to watch people judge them, find them lacking and exacerbate their feelings of inadequacy in that department.

Oh well - if Bill can handle it - good for him. I like strong people.

.

Thanks for your kind words and for your information I can not take a great deal of credit for the ease I handle such personal attacks.

Beside the “wiring problem” with my brain that show up with my written language here it also had shown up in the form of a speak impediment during my childhood.

I am sure that if I did not also find myself in the situation of being an only child with loving parents and one set of loving grandparents on the same property the numbers the other children and for example the so call adults here had try to do on my self esteem would had been deadly.

As it is I always knew that I am far superior to my attackers in most ways including basic intellect and all they could and can do is amuse me.

I do however feel sorry for those adults/children who had my problems without the kind of wonderful family I was born into to shield me from idiots looking for victims.

Bill - You're welcome. I always enjoy reading what you write- it's never predictable and often very insightful (even if you ARE an atheist). - that's a joke - some of my best friends are atheists..(that's not a joke - that's the truth).

Anyway- and I'm not being condescending - you can believe that - I've read you enough that I know you could blow me out of the water when it comes to physics and numbers. Although I did check your facts on Thomas Edison - and what I read pegs him more of a deist than an atheist.
See - you always make me learn something.