Well, to a certain extent, think that you may have answered your own question.

You observe that religions are made by men. Fine. And since men are not perfect, neither can religion be. However, take a few steps farther down that road. Men made religion. They did not get it handed to them from “somewhere else”. So why would one assume that any religion contains a god or gods that are really a description of how the world must operate in fact?

Now, as to the idea that there are stranger things out there than we have imagined, sure there are. If you try to explain modern science to some bronze age goat herder, well, don't expect to make too much progress. They have probably already made up their mind on how the world works and there is just no room for chemistry or physics.

As it happens, do I need to “see” protons in a jar somewhere to know that they are a necessary part of the single most powerful explanatory system ever devised by man? Um, not really. Nor does it matter that as far as we can determine, protons are not tiny little balls like the pictures in grade school text books. They appear to be triplets of quarks attached to each other by strings of gluons. And who knows if that is even the end of the explanation? It could well turn out that there is something even more subtle than that but we just have not got to that point in our inquiries as yet.

Shall I insert some other type of conscious being into the equation? Even if that being does not fit any of the existing standards for what a god or a demon or whatever may be? Well, I don't see where to do that insertion nor do I see a clear reason for doing so. Might as well just go with leprechauns in that case.

I am sure that many atheists have never "converted" from other religion, but they have never believed in first place.  I am one of such people.  It must take a quite serious effort for me to start believing in something, it's much easier not to believe.  I do not deny gods, I just did not care .... until I arrived to the U.S.  I have never heard of shabbat before I moved to Boston from Germany and Russia. 

Think of an experiment.  All children are not allowed to go to church or Sunday school or whatever is used to indoctrinate kids into religions; children books promoting particular religions are prohibited.  Religion is only allowed starting at age 21 ... pretty much like alcohol.   How many people do you expect will be believers?

There is no need for an atheist to argue that god does not exist.  I do not really care.  If someone believed in god so much that he wants to deny some of my human rights, then it is his responsibility to bring a nice loving alive god in the courtroom.  One god would be enough for me to say: ok, here is one, now I know that he exists, so let's ask him how many people he killed, maybe he should go to prison for live.

Hello

I don't agree with this reasoning. The reason I disagree is because there are an infinite number of things for which it is impossible to disprove the existence of.  It is unreasonable to expect people to believe in all of these things just because it isn't possible to disapprove there existence.  For instance I can't disprove the existence of immaterial invisible pink flying unicorns.  I don't think anyone would be justified in asking me to disprove the existence of immaterial invisible pink flying unicorns in order for me not to believe in it.  This is why I believe that people making a claim that something exists are the ones that provide the evidence of that things existence.  Otherwise we should all logically  believe all kinds of crazy stuff such as the pink immaterial invisible flying unicorns.  

I am willing to bet that there any many things in existence which exist outside of what human being currently fathom.  It is even possible that their are things that exist that human being are unable to fathom.  How does the existence of things you can not fathom lead you to a belief in god?  Those thing we can't fathom could be anything.  I see no reason to assume that those things contain something that can be termed a god or gods.   This is an actual question.  Please  tell me how the existence of things that you can't understand leads you to the belief in god?

I am an Atheist because nothing in the acumen of my life's experience leads me to believe that there is even the slightests possibility of this thing called "god" beyond man's conceptualization... I didn't set out to be an Atheist... I try to be rational, and Base my world perspective on facts, rather than wishes and the dictates of my passions....

To be honest, though I appreciate your response, but I do think you made much effort to scrutinise my every word, and have taken everything too literally when all I did was write up something in a more general and open-to-interpretation manner in the middle of the night whilst laying in bed and feeling the need to express myself.

I didn't write anything to try and spark up a scientific, all-logical debate - I was simply curious to see responses because in the past week I have been speaking with many people who call themselves atheists and when I ask them why, they straight away bag out religions and point out all the flaws of religions.

Like I said, I don't believe in a deity or anything so I can understand you continously mentioning the lack of logic behind believing in things that can not be empirically tested or actually "proven". But I really was not trying to be so technical or literal when using terms such as "power" etc etc, I was simply trying to gather a pool of thoughts. I can see that you are over-analysing everything I have written in a patronising manner where you quite clearly believe everything in life must be literal and make perfect and utter sence, or not be stated at all. I am not writing up a thesis, nor am I trying to make an argument to prove a point, therefore I do not understand why, when asking a question which was intended to receive a broad range of responses and was intended  to be open to interpretation and not so literal, would I have to define every term I use before making a statement?

I do think that generally people should write up questions or make statements to provide insight or spark up a nice healthy debate, but this was not an attempt at one of those, it was something intended to be very casual.

But thank you I do appreciate your time anyway as it was insightful.

Firstly thank you for your response. I definitely agree with you that just because we cant prove something that imaginary to be just that, does not make it real.

Might I just clear it up that, I myself do not believe that just because we can not disprove the tooth fairy it does not mean that it exists. I completely agree with you. 

But I just also understand why they feel justified in asking us the same question because to their knowledge, the fact that a baby can be born is proof of God's work, and to them this is SOLID proof. To us, it is nonsense.

As for your question, I do not think that existence of things such as energy etc should lead to a belief in a god. Nor do I believe in a god. I don't know if you wanted me to justify how others can come to that conclusion, or if you thought I believe in a god and wanted me to answer for myself.

If you're asking me to explain to you if there is logic behind people reaching the conclusion of a god because of the existence of things we can not fathom, my response would be that it is a human need. Such a belief provides them with security and hope.

It is not easy to accept - especially if you come from a background which imposes the belief that a god exists from the time you are born - that god does not exist, and that we are alone in the sense that there is no one watching over us, therefore if something happens that is out of our hands we just have to accept the result. But scientific studies have even shown that religious coping is healthy, and that people who use positive religious coping tend to be more psychologically healthy. I would cite this, except I really do not know where my book is in which I read the study conducted that suggested this.

So I can definitely understand how people can create a figure that is watching over them and has something better planned for them out of need to get through their days.

YOu are right, the word supernatural would not be accurate to describe such things.  I was unsure of what word to use though.

As for the extra dimensions, are there are books or documentaries that you could recomment to me as I would LOVE to learn more about them. It would be highly appreciated!

Thank you for your response.

At first I thought that maybe you were making some kind of argument for the existence of a god, or some kind of god like being.  I thought this because sometimes people believe in god but hate organized religion.  Those people will often badmouth the institution of religion while at the same time making arguments for gods existence.  I thought that maybe that was what you were doing, but I was wrong.  

I personally don't believe in god for a variety of reasons.  When I first stopped believing in god it was because of the nature of the god that I had been taught about.  I was unable to accept the idea of an all loving all powerful god that would torture people forever in a lake of fire.  Latter on in life as I learned more about a variety of different things my reasons for rejecting the idea of god became more about the lack of evidence.  I don't believe in god because I don't feel that there is any valid evidence for god's existence.  

I understand why people would want to believe in god, or any number of other unlikely things.  I suppose that maybe I would be happier if I believed in certain things.  For instance it might be nice to believe in some kind of happy after life.  One were everyone will benefit, and not just the chosen few.  Also the idea of reincarnation seems kind of fun.  It would be kind of nice to think that there was a reason why things happened they way they do, or that some kind of 'being' was looking out for me.  After becoming more familiar with the kind of arguments that people make for the existence of these types of things I started to view this kind of stuff as wishful thinking.  

Well D3ry11,

It would be kind of nice if you would attach the name of each person whom you were responding to, so that each of us would know what was intended “for them”.

Even so, if I am following you, you seem to have had some discussions with other atheists who bagged religion. Only I am not clear on one thing: Were they bagging specific religions or religion in general?

It is an interesting distinction that I believe to be worth exploring.

There are people who came to atheism from a rejection of a certain religion. There are other people who came to atheism because they were brought up in an atheist (or at least agnostic) family. Among the former, I think that you are somewhat more likely to find people exploring the faults of one specific religion.

To be fair, that cannot be absolute as there are certainly times when any of us may have a specific point to raise that can be well illustrated by looking at one specific religion. For example, if the question at hand was about the Genesis account of creation, one may want to look specifically at that and show internal contradictions (and just who was Cain married to again?).

Now, as far as what is fathomable, perhaps it is relevant to discuss what the term really means.

Originally, a fathom appears to have been the distance between the fingertips of one's outstretched arms. In that sense, it referred to that largest thing that one could embrace or wrap one's self around. In more recent times, it has been used a a measure of depth for the water under your boat. As a verb, it meant to drop a weighted line off the bow and see how much string you had to pay out before you hit bottom. Literally, it means “to plumb the depth of” or “to get to the bottom of” the water.

In the sense that tends to get thrown about today, it refers best to that which may be understood in a non-trivial sense. One does not have to fathom that fire is hot or that moving buses suck to stand in front of.

However, to call a thing unfathomable, one is saying that it is beyond any reasonable ability to understand. Pardon me but does that mean anything when trivially dropped into a conversation?

Today, we know a great many things that people of the past could not have followed because they lacked the background that was needed to get the general idea. Could Isaac Newton have understood radio waves? Well, if he had had Maxwell's equations, then sure. Of course Maxwell needed calculus to derive them.

Then too much of Newton's work would have been dead in the water without calculus. As it happens, calculus did not exist at the beginning of Newton's life. Newton needed calculus to do some of his work, so he invented it. Today, most students struggle with calculus for a good bit longer than it took Newton to develop it in the first place.

As someone also living in Australia, hello.

Also, I am impressed that you have come out as an atheist despite being from an Islamic background.

I was hoping that some day an Islamic atheist would turn up on this site.

Good on ya!