And I chose to believe in God. In fact, I was never forced to do it.
I chose it for myself. I was never threated that I'd burn in hell for
all eternity if I didn't. I chose it.

But that's the true reaon for the atheism, since you did not

see any quantitative, empirical, proof that God exists, you
decided (chose) not to believe in Him. Not authority at all.

No, liar. There is no choice.

No? Why not?

I could choose to drop my belief in God if I
wanted to, just as you could choose to drop your atheism.

But I would have to _choose_ to do that. Perhaps your
definition of "choice" differs? In which case I would not
be lying, but rather not using the same definitions you do

When one has no reason to believe something, one doesn't believe it.
That's all.
Why do you pretend you don't understand this?

Perhaps I was mistaken that atheism was due to a
rebellious tendency towards authority.

You're either a total retard or lying for effect. Either way the
result is the same. You're an in-your-face jerk.

What, because I made a mistake?

And how can one be a "total retard" if they can see their
error and modify their position accordingly?

Could I? If I decided to? If I _decided_ to believe in Zeus, probably.

How did you come to your belief then if not choice?

You must have a different cocnept of "choice" than I do.

What an idiot.

Thanks for demonstrating your lack of good morals, you

What "lack of good morals", liar?

Lack of good morals, since you insult.

You obviously do not consider insulting a lack of good morals

though I do.

I do not know this lying and derogatory nature. I am trying
to see if any of my conceptions about atheists are right or
wrong.

Atheists supposedly have
more morals and are more responsible than religious people?

In your case we definitely are.

And yet you keep insulting?

What do you define as "more morals", in your view?

Because I cannot see the stupidity you think I have.

I did listen to the answers when you gave real answers.
Maybe atheism itself does not lead to anarchy.

You know we're atheist, so how the ***** can your god have any
authority in the real world, where it is merely "somebody else's
religious belief"?

You may not believe there is any authority.

See, this all comes down to the belief.

Why can't you tolerate a belief different from yours, anyway?

On Apr 17, 4:34 pm, Christopher A.Lee <c...@optonline.net> wrote:

On 17 Apr 2007 15:13:55 -0700, mike3 <mike4...@yahoo.com> wrote:

On Apr 17, 3:25 am, Christopher A.Lee <c...@optonline.net> wrote:

On Tue, 17 Apr 2007 05:21:46 -0400, "Robibnikoff"

<witchy...@broomstick.com> wrote:

"mike3" <mike4...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:1176798873.268563.83290@e65g2000hsc.googlegroups.com...

On Apr 16, 10:11 pm,

In article <1176778162.647597.219...@q75g2000hsh.googlegroups.com>,
mike3<mike4...@yahoo.com> writes:

Hi.

Do a significant propotion of atheists (compared to religious groups)
tend to support anarchy? Atheism goes one step -- no God. Anarchy goes
yet another -- no government. Each one involves a loss of rules or
formulas on which one's life must be held to, and if people yearn for
"freedom" from rules, then it would make sense that people would slip
to atheism or if they already have, then to anarchy (in addition to
atheism), or vice versa.

Are monotheists more anarchic than polytheists?

And why would anyone put gods and governments in the same category?

The idea is that some sort of authority is involved, be that
government or God.
If one chooses not to believe in God, then one has rejected that
authority. See,
it's the authority.

Q. Why does the liar pretend there's any choice, or that it is about
authority?

You _can_ choose whether or not to believe in God. You

Speak for yourself, brainwashed god-bot, instead of lying about us.

You don't like me speaking for you, and yet you speak for me
when claiming my "lying" is "deliberate". Hmph?

chose not to believe in Him. You decided that because there

Liar. There was no choice involved - I simply wasn't brainwashed to
do so as a child, and have zero reason to believe in your religion.

And I chose to believe in God. In fact, I was never forced to do it.
I chose it for myself. I was never threated that I'd burn in hell for
all eternity if I didn't. I chose it. I can know this, you know, since
I
am me.

Which word was too hard for you?

None.

was no quantitative empirical evidence, then you did not

No, liar.

believe in God. That was an actual decision on your part.

No, liar.

People are born initially without any belief, plus or minus
as to wheter or not God exists.

And they have to be taught to believe before they can think for
themselves.

If they weren't taught to believe, they don't grow up believing. It's
as simple as that.

Then later, they may either
declare the issue irrelevant, choose to believe the positive
(deities exist), or choose to believe the negative (deities do
not exist).

Why do you liars pretend it is a choice?

Because I can examine how I came to my own beliefs. I
reflected on it, and I saw I came to them by choice. I could
have chosen not to believe in God. But that still would have
been a choice!

I assume you chose to believe the negative.

No,liar.

Regardless, it was a choice.

No, liar.

But that's the true reaon for the atheism, since you did not

see any quantitative, empirical, proof that God exists, you
decided (chose) not to believe in Him. Not authority at all.

No, liar. There is no choice.

No? Why not? I could choose to drop my belief in God if I
wanted to, just as you could choose to drop your atheism.
But I would have to _choose_ to do that. Perhaps your
definition of "choice" differs? In which case I would not
be lying, but rather not using the same definitions you do,
which you have not apprised me of. If you frame something
that was built on definition Y in definition X, that is a fallacy.

When one has no reason to believe something, one doesn't believe it.
That's all.

Why do you pretend you don't understand this?

Perhaps I was mistaken that atheism was due to a
rebellious tendency towards authority.

You're either a total retard or lying for effect. Either way the
result is the same. You're an in-your-face jerk.

What, because I made a mistake? See, here's where the
"people can err" thing comes in. I do not see it reasonable
to just call someone a "jerk" because they made a mistake.
If there is a "strawman" here, then you'd have to explain
more of what you consider "being a jerk" than making
mistaken assumptions, especially when those mistakes
are conceded...

And how can one be a "total retard" if they can see their
error and modify their position accordingly?

The atheism->
anarchy path does not seem to be holding up anymore
now. But what about the flipside -- anarchy --> atheism?

Only in your bigoted fantasies.

So, no is the answer then. All right, then I've got the
atheism->anarchy/vice-versa thing done with right there.
No to either direction. Finally I got an answer, albeit a
rough and mean answer, but an answer.

Hmm..unintentional lying. What a concept.

In your case, deliberate.

How come then I cannot feel or find any intention in myself
of lying?

A. Because he is a certifiable lunatic with a room temperature IQ.

At this stage it doesn't matter if he really imagines this, or if he
is pretending - the result is the same.

Do you reject the authority of Zeus?

Lemme guess, you just don't believe in him, right?

And that makes the moron an anarchist because the reason he doesn't
believe in Zeus is because he hates authority.

I'd not believe in Zeus because I have chosen not to do so.

The moron has forced himself into a corner here so he lies about this.
But it fools nobody, not even himself.

Then I must be really fooled by it.

Could you honestly, force yourself to believe in Zeus?

Could I? If I decided to? If I _decided_ to believe in Zeus, probably.

Or pixies?

If I decided to do so, yes. One can decide to believe in anything.
But to me only certaion beliefs I would consider worth believing.

"Yesterday I believed pixies existed, ie I forced myself to be certain
they did; tomorrow I'll do the same for Zeus".

Based on my own experience, I chose to believe that
Zeus does not exist,

Liar.

just like how you chose to believe
that no deities at all exist (atheism).

Liar.

How did you come to your belief then if not choice?
You must have a different cocnept of "choice" than I do.

What an idiot.

Thanks for demonstrating your lack of good morals, you

What "lack of good morals", liar?

Lack of good morals, since you insult. You obviously do
not consider insulting a lack of good morals, though I do.

obviously don't mind hurting people's feelings (or at least
trying to do so) with insults.

Pretends the lying hypocrite who knows the loaded and derogatory
nature of his "questions".

I do not know this lying and derogatory nature. I am trying
to see if any of my conceptions about atheists are right or
wrong. Maybe they're all wrong. If so, fine. They're all
conceded.

Atheists supposedly have
more morals and are more responsible than religious people?

In your case we definitely are.

And yet you keep insulting? What do you define as
"more morals", in your view?

I'm not so sure about that. Just because someone may err
in their logic at some point does not mean that their are an
idiot. Especially not when they concede the error. If you

All your complex questions have been based on droolingly nasty
presumptions that don't even apply. Get that beam out of your own eye,
whining hypocrite.

think that people cannot err, then you are wrong. People
are not perfect.

Look up "straw man",moron.

Because I cannot see the stupidity you think I have. I know what
a straw man is, and I cannot see how it applies here.

Think about your next questions and make them honest. Listen to the
answers even if you don't like them.

I did listen to the answers when you gave real answers.
Maybe atheism itself does not lead to anarchy. I was wondering
though if it did.

You know we're atheist, so how the ***** can your god have any
authority in the real world, where it is merely "somebody else's
religious belief"?

You may not believe there is any authority. See, this all comes
down to the belief. Why can't you tolerate a belief different from
yours, anyway?

No? Why not? I could choose to drop my belief in God if I
wanted to, just as you could choose to drop your atheism.

On Apr 18, 2:24 am, Vinnie Venomous <brain_eater...@yahoo.com> wrote:

mike3 schrieb:

You _can_ choose whether or not to believe in God. You
chose not to believe in Him. You decided that because there
was no quantitative empirical evidence, then you did not
believe in God. That was an actual decision on your part.

one can hardly call it a choice when an opinion is based on evidence -
or lack thereof. if one touches an oven and burns one's fingers, does
one have a choice of assuming this oven is hot?
a choice is a matter of preference (coke or fanta) and does not involve
validity. (one cannot choose between a correct and a false opinion)

But I do not see the empirical, scientific evidence that God does not
exist. You claim that empirical, scientific evidence is the way to go.
But, according to empirical science, we do not know if God does or
does not exist, since empirical science does not provide any evidence
*either* way. If one goes with empirical science, then one *does not
know*!

That is not a choice. However when I talk about "atheism", I am
talking
about believing that God does not exist, not simply not knowing if
God does or does not exist. With no evidence presented either way,
one simply does not know. So if one only admits empirical, scientific
evidence, one would not know. To believe God does not exist then,
in this atmosphere of pure empiricism, would then require a choice,
just as it would take one to believe that He does exist. Does that
make
sense?

atheists in the western world examined the biblical accounts and
followed discussions about philosophy and came to the conclusion that
the existence of the judeo-christian god is highly unlikely or even
impossible. one can not choose to abandon belief in anything that is
impossible to exist - or the other way round: one can not believe in
anything that one regards as inexistant.

Ah, so you have decided to admit additional evidence into the debate.
Now you have decided to talk about _one conception_ of God, namely
that of fundamentalist Christianity. I do not accept this concept
either.

I'd not believe in Zeus because I have chosen not to do so.
Based on my own experience, I chose to believe that
Zeus does not exist, just like how you chose to believe
that no deities at all exist (atheism).

to be frank, i don't assume you ever had a true choice in that aspect.
since you were told from the very first day that only the god yahwe
existed while all other deities were "false" ones you were probably
biased when looking at other religions. (even though i'm coming from a
secular country, i pretty much saw the same procedure here.)
whenever you were told about those religions it was done with a certain
distance in it. while the stories from the bible were presented to you
as if they were the news headlines, the myths of other religions were
often ridiculed or clearly marked as mere stories. "the ancient greek
believed...", "the egyptians believed..." and so on.

The stories from the Bible were given as news headlines? I don't
think so. In fact, I was taught much the opposite -- that a lot of the
Bible is full of metaphor, and not literalism. I even went to try and
investigate the literalist position, and I did not see it as logical.

so it is very likely that you had no choice, either. when something is
presented to you as a fact, you will accept it as a fact. when something
is presented to you as fiction, you will call it fiction, too.

Actually, I was given a choice. I could accept or reject the stuff.
That may seem strange to you, though, since most religions don't
do that and instead try to instill fear... I still haven't committed
to
the religion, though, but still hold some of the beliefs, out of
choice,
since I could see the rightness. I even tried from a neutral
perspective too.

so you are an atheist in regard to any other religion. nice idea, ne?

But not a true atheist, since true atheism in my mind means not
believing
in any God at all.

just replace zeus (or any other deity you don't believe in) with your
god in your sentence "I'd not believe in Zeus because..." and you got
the point of view of any western atheist.

I could choose to renounce the religious belief, but I have chosen not
to do so. There is still a choice, right there. You know there are
atheists
who started out religious -- they got to atheism since they decided
for
themselves that God does not exist based on <insert argument here>,
and then proceeded to renounce the belief. I've also heard of
religious
people who started out atheist. You may have been "brought up" with
atheism, but there is still at least some degree of choice in that you
decided not to convert to any other system of belief afterwards.

But really, this choice of religious belief thing isn't too relevant
to the
atheism->anarchy/anarchy->atheism thing. Now that I went back over
the discussion where this "religion choice" thing came in I think I
discovered something.

The "choice" thing comes in here:

"

The idea is that some sort of authority is involved, be that
government or God.
If one chooses not to believe in God, then one has rejected that
authority. See,
it's the authority.

"

In one part, yes, I may concede a mistake, if the person was brought
up with atheism, then maybe they didn't have a choice (in regards
to the atheism.), and that this whole thing wasn't clear and was
hasty. In another sense, though, what if we are talking about a
_religious_ person who later sees that anarchy may be good, so
then we get to anarchy->atheism. Then the person does have
more of a choice. I'm just wondering if starting out with one tends
to lead to choosing the other. Or if one starts out religious, and
then decides to go to atheism, then might they also go to anarchy?

So it's sometimes choice, sometimes not. But I guess the answer
is no, anyway, since the reasons they go to atheism need not be
related to the reasons they go to anarchy. Atheism need not be
taken because one hates authority or government. And same for
anarchy -> atheism. The reasons for adopting anarchy may not
apply to adopting atheism (if the person was not raised with
atheism in the first place.). But now that those questions were
answered, and the holes in my assumptions discovered, I guess
I'm finished with this discussion now. I got what I was looking for:
answers!

(if this post seems to be a little contradictory in terms of my
assumptions about choice of religion, it is that as I was writing it
the assumptions changed somewhat as I thought this stuff
through. There is some choice, but it's not _nothing but_ choice.)

And I am most happy that I finally got a response from someone
who wasn't just interested in beating me up with insults. This not
only made it easier to examine the reasoning, but also to help
correct my ideas that all these atheists are somehow immoral.

Thanks a lot for answers, everyone, and have a nice day!

Goodbye!

On Apr 18, 2:24 am, Vinnie Venomous <brain_eater...@yahoo.com> wrote:

mike3 schrieb:

You _can_ choose whether or not to believe in God. You
chose not to believe in Him. You decided that because there
was no quantitative empirical evidence, then you did not
believe in God. That was an actual decision on your part.

one can hardly call it a choice when an opinion is based on evidence -
or lack thereof. if one touches an oven and burns one's fingers, does
one have a choice of assuming this oven is hot?
a choice is a matter of preference (coke or fanta) and does not involve
validity. (one cannot choose between a correct and a false opinion)

But I do not see the empirical, scientific evidence that God does not
exist.

You claim that empirical, scientific evidence is the way to go.
But, according to empirical science, we do not know if God does or
does not exist

If one goes with empirical science, then one *does not know*!

That is not a choice. However when I talk about "atheism", I am
talking about believing that God does not exist

With no evidence presented either way, one simply does not know.

Does that make sense?

atheists in the western world examined the biblical accounts and
followed discussions about philosophy and came to the conclusion that
the existence of the judeo-christian god is highly unlikely or even
impossible. one can not choose to abandon belief in anything that is
impossible to exist - or the other way round: one can not believe in
anything that one regards as inexistant.

Ah, so you have decided to admit additional evidence into the debate.
Now you have decided to talk about _one conception_ of God, namely
that of fundamentalist Christianity. I do not accept this concept
either.

The stories from the Bible were given as news headlines? I don't
think so. In fact, I was taught much the opposite -- that a lot of the
Bible is full of metaphor, and not literalism.

so you are an atheist in regard to any other religion. nice idea, ne?

But not a true atheist

since true atheism in my mind means not believing
in any God at all.

just replace zeus (or any other deity you don't believe in) with your
god in your sentence "I'd not believe in Zeus because..." and you got
the point of view of any western atheist.

I could choose to renounce the religious belief, but I have chosen not
to do so.

You know there are atheists
who started out religious -- they got to atheism since they decided
for themselves that God does not exist

based on <insert argument here>,

I've also heard of religious people who started out atheist.

You may have been "brought up" with atheism

but there is still at least some degree of choice in that you
decided not to convert to any other system of belief afterwards.

The "choice" thing comes in here:

The idea is that some sort of authority is involved, be that
government or God.
If one chooses not to believe in God, then one has rejected that
authority. See,
it's the authority.

"

In one part, yes, I may concede a mistake, if the person was brought
up with atheism, then maybe they didn't have a choice (in regards
to the atheism.)

In another sense, though, what if we are talking about a
_religious_ person who later sees that anarchy may be good, so
then we get to anarchy->atheism.

I'm just wondering if starting out with one tends
to lead to choosing the other. Or if one starts out religious, and
then decides to go to atheism, then might they also go to anarchy?

So it's sometimes choice

But I do not see the empirical, scientific evidence that God does not
exist. You claim that empirical, scientific evidence is the way to go.
But, according to empirical science, we do not know if God does or
does not exist, since empirical science does not provide any evidence
*either* way. If one goes with empirical science, then one *does not
know*!