I would first like to say hello to everyone on this net work and how great it feels to feel like I belong for the first time. Thank you rational response squad I have not done my research so I do not know how long you have been around, and who all you are connected to; what I do know is you did a nightline debate that helped me find you. From what I have heard on myspace, and the debate I am a very devoted follower and firm believer in mostly everything you have said, may all atheist quote Mr. Spock "Live long and prosper."

Please feel free to contact me for any reason I am not sure how often I will be on here but I will reply to any reasonable, question, comment, or critique.

Hello to anyone who is reading this! I'm Nikki, a pretty much life-long atheist living down in sunny (and often irrational) Florida. A little about me: I'm 20, I have a BA (it's only three weeks old so it is still a big deal to me . I majored in English and Political Science and minored in African Studies. I'm currently taking a year off before I start my graduate work with the goal of getting a PhD in English. I want to be a novelist and English prof., but I am also passionate about several social issues. Namely, I work to dispell negative stereotypes of Africa and to promote eating disorder / poor body image awareness and recovery (I'm a recovering anorexic). On that note, I have a YouTube series about ED recovery under the username bordersofmylife.

Seriously, WHAT is this??? Is this guy just a common troll, or is he really that insane?

I notice there are whole some theists that lie about atheists, what it means to be an atheist, what atheists believe in, etc...

And of course they will jump through hoops to justify their lies (Bodhiharta comes to mind. Bodhiharta will lie about about anything, so it's not surprising), Or just ignore any retort (Nonbobblehead).

It always bugged me as to why would these people be so dishonest to others.
Then (The afformentioned) bodhiharta (Hence known as "bod") said:

Guilt is not good for survival.

That's it! They don't want to feel guilty.
"aww gee, it would be horrible for this guy to burn in hell forever, but he's an atheist, and atheists are god-hating-baby-raping-idiots"

for people new to samkhya school of thought

they can refer ::

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samkhya

the science and other developments in recent time has forced learned indian people(hindu) to once again samkhya system of hindu thought !

its a nice link to american atheist here!
i think it will offer a new source of knowledge as susan asked for!

So I was thinking about how theists love to fallback on their "faith" once logic and reason has obliterated their weak arguments in a debate setting. You know what I'm talking about, it goes something like: "Well Mr. Atheist, while you have a good point logically, it's really quite irrelevent. My strong FAITH in (insert imaginary friend here) is all I need."

It dawned on me that this situation is no different than that of an adult asking a child "Why did you do that?", and the child's obstinate reply of "Because!"

"Because why?"

"Just because!"

ad infinitum

Because. That's what it boils down to. Because. Obstacles to medical progress, religiously motivated war, "honor killing", unneccesary guilt, oppression, sexual repression, women treated like dogs.

I just got a copy of The God Delusion. I'm on Chapter 4 and have been enjoying it very much. I don't really agree on how Dawkins thinks we should handle religion. We should argue vehemently against it, yes, but not with the vigour he is advocating.

I'm afraid that if atheists start berating the religious, there will be a collective backlash. Perhaps that is unfounded worry.

After reading The God Delusion, I'm planning on reading Stephen Hawking's A Brief History of Time. So, I have a lot to look forward to.

Does anyone have any reading suggestions? Anyone? Anyone?

As I do more and more research, critical thinking, contemplative and reflective thought and I come to my ultimate conclusions, my hope for a God existing dims more and more. I claim to be Atheist, and I claimed to not believe in God. But… not until recently, I don't think that I actually realized what that meant. I claim that I don't believe in God, but what exactly does that entail? I was confident in my proclamations because, deep down I remained comfortable in the fact that maybe, I could be wrong. That maybe, in the end there is a God, and in the end, Death won't be the absolute end. However, I realize now that that is just wishful thinking.

If I were asked how I would define a religion, I would probably say one of two things:
1) Religion is what is used to explain the origin, purpose, and destiny of humanity.
2) Religion is faith in that which cannot be proven, but is believed to be true anyway.

Since I am certainly not the authoratative standard of word definitions, I offer dictionary.com's definions of the word "religion" too:

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/religion re·li·gion /rɪˈlɪdʒən/ –noun 1. a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, esp. when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs.

Everone is born an Athiest, I believe that God was created in the image of man and hense is a myth. I wasn't always an Athiest I served as a devote servant in a baptist church for 16 years (after my mother and father beat me repeatedly with a long wooden spoon and a slipper to become religious) and met a lot of good people there. I realised something though, as I was worshiping thin air and trying hard not to feel guilty about masterbating the previous day I realised that (through a complicated prosses) that religion is for wankers. Shortly after that I stopped masterbating or feeling guilty.