Why give them doubt? (how many times will this be asked)
Posted on: September 6, 2006 - 11:43am
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Why give them doubt? (how many times will this be asked)
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----------------- Original Message -----------------
From: **T*C**
Date: Sep 6, 2006 11:04 AM
why does it matter?
wht do you atheist want to prove everyone wrong?
and why do the Christians what to prove themselves right?
at least they say they do it out of love. they say if you believe ____ then you get to go to happy place with me. 
what happens when doubt is put into people that aren't ready? depression which can lead to death. and you say that death is the end.
just wondering why you are useing the only life you have to spread doubt?
forever why,
-TC-
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We want people to believe what is true, not bullshit. I would rather believe in the truth than nonsense.
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If they'd stay out of my government and my face and "pray in the closet", I would. They won't. So here we come.
These type of questions are frustrating, not because they're difficult to answer but because the feeling behind them is completely disengenuous.
Let's make something clear, it is precisely the Christian who is askign people to doubt everything. Think about it. For their beliefs to be right, all sense perception, thought and the world as we intuitively know it, is in doubt for there is another world acting upon this one in ways that are impossible to comprehend. Whereas for the atheist, the only thing being asked to doubt is one's thinking of being right all the time, a fact that most (other than when it comes to their religious beliefs) have no problem being in support of.
But this isn't where being disenguous comes in. Where it does is in the notion that believers do it out of love or some grand commitment to truth or humanity. It simply isn't accurate. With fear and trembling, knowing the terror of the Lord, do believers engage in proselytization. It isn't about love of humanity, but out of fear and obedience to God that is the inspiration.
All of this boils down to, in the end, morality. As Sam Harris eloquently points out, beliefs are not private, for action is predicated upon them and action affects society. I would no sooner have a doctor believe he can do surgery with his toes than someone believe they have sole access to an invisible god.
Every one of your relationships to man and to nature must be a definite expression of your real, individual life corresponding to the object of your will. -Erich Fromm
It matters to us because we care about people. We cannot idly sit by while religion, superstition and pseudoscience are causing an inordinate amount of needless suffering and death.
We do not. However, when people hold beliefs that are both harmful and false, we ask them to examine the evidence for and against those beliefs.
Doubt is good. It is certainty in spite of evidence that is truly dangerous.
We do much more. We study, we work, we play, we love. And sometimes we feel like sharing with others the good news that we are free men and women, not the puppets of some jealous god in the sky.
my sentiments exactly.