The Atheist Blogger

As I noted in a previous post, The Atheist Spot are currently interviewing atheist bloggers with a variety of questions. The latest interview posted is with none other than myself, so go read it! I’ve never really answered many questions about atheism in relation to England, so hopefully a few people might come up with a few more.

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

Angelpuriran recently posted a few questions in a comment to an old post about Questions for God.

Why you decided to become an atheist..? WHAT gives you benefits to become an atheist? does it makes sense? what if you died and you proved that there is hell, eternal death in hell and the only way to go to heaven is to believe to Jesus, what would you do? will you repent?

I don’t know if “decided” is the correct word to use. I would have said it was more that I “realised” I was an atheist. I did so because I saw that whilst I had believed in God and Jesus for many years, I didn’t have a valid reason for believing in them. There was no evidence for God existing apart from in a book which is claimed to have been inspired by him. Such circular evidence went against how I came to know reason. I also saw problems with the whole form of a God that created the universe, because it doesn’t answer the questions about what created God. Why did something so natural like the universe have to be created by a non-natural phenomenon, especially when there have never been any recorded supernatural phenominon in science.

I guess the major benefit to being an atheist is the freedom from the constant worries about death. I believe that when I die, that will be it. My mind will cease to function and I will become a non-concious entity. This is actually one of the hardest things to wrap your mind around, and I think it might be why some people have problems with atheism. Trying to imagine no life after death is akin to trying to think what “not thinking” would be like. It is a mental impossiblity to do because such an action is a contradiction of itself.

Read the rest of this entry »

It seems that a lot of talk has been going on about Patrick Greene, especially since Ray Comfort mocked him on his blog, and he started emailing (and phoned into) The Atheist Experience. In case any of you have not been following the story, Patrick is attempting to sue Ray’s evangelical company “Living Waters” for selling an offensive bumper sticker.

The sticker in question says “National Atheist’s Day” in large red letters, then “April 1″, and the quotes the Bible “The FOOL has said in his heart, There is no God” (Psalm 14:1). Here is a small thumbnail to help you visualize it:

Now, there are many reasons I believe people can get offended by certain beliefs. I’ve written how I am offended when people tell me I’m going to Hell, not because to them it is “fact” (as Patrick Greene argues), but because they believe that such a punishment is justified, and they are willing to compare me as equal to murderers and rapists. I am offended by the threat of Hell for the same reasons I am offended when someone calls me a bastard. It is a personal attack, aimed and directed quite thoroughly.

Read the rest of this entry »

I got some negative feedback after I jokingly filled in the atheist thirteen meme as if written by a fundamentalist Christian. People said I was taking the easy way out, and that it wouldn’t have cost me anything to ask a fundie to do the thing for me. I took the criticism, responding only that I had once been a Christian and so I knew what it was like to believe etc. However, I’ve recently been reading the blog “Debunking Atheists” for amusement, and decided to ask the main contributor “Dan” if he would answer the meme for me. I modified a few questions to better suit a theist answering them.

Here is his response.

Q1. How would you define “atheism”? A branch or another name of the religion, Secular Humanism.

Q2. Was your upbringing religious? If so, what tradition? I was raised in an atheist’s/atheistic home.

Q3. How would you describe “Intelligent Design”, using only one word? “vague”, I prefer ‘Biblical Creation’

Q4. What scientific [endeavor] really excites you? Discovery of any kind, without the subjectivity of scientists that are atheists.

Q5. If you could change one thing about the “atheist community”, what would it be and why? Their belief of no God. Why, because of the end result on Judgment Day.

Q6. If your child came up to you and said “I’m joining the clergy”, what would be your first response? I would ask to be more specific. A bishop or minister? If his soul couldn’t live without anything else then he would have my blessings. If he means priesthood in the RCC (Roman Catholic), I would ask why he would want to be a part of the largest pedophilia group/society in the world. I would ask why does he wants to help people into hell. I would rather him be an atheist.

Q7. What’s your favorite theistic argument? Anything Jesus said, like the sermon on the mount. He is the pro!

Q8. What’s your most “controversial” viewpoint? That a building or Church isn’t necessary for Salvation and/or denominations are man made.

Q9. Of the “Four Horsemen” (Dawkins, Dennett, Hitchens and Harris) who is your favorite, and why? Dawkins, putting his foot in his mouth in Expelled. The Movie was hilarious. Why, because Dick makes me laugh.

Q10. If you could convince just one atheistic person to abandon their beliefs, who would it be? My Dad

Read the rest of this entry »

A the title suggests, I would like to know which state (or area) of the USA is considered the most secular / non-believing. Since I live in the UK I am putting this question out to all my American readers in hope that they can throw back some figures for me.

Why do I want to know? Well, I’m currently going into my second year of university studying Computer Science with Information Security (which is way more interesting to me that it sounds to you). It’s a three year course, and at the end I will weigh up my options before deciding whether to do a PhD in it. Whenever I actually leave university, I have always had plans to emigrate to America. Truth be told, there are far more jobs in the computer industry over there, especially in the areas I want to go into (Gaming and/or Web Technology).

I don’t want to end up in a Bible Belt area for obvious reasons, so I’d like a place where I could feel at ease with my beliefs, and find other secular people to hang out with. California’s “Silicon Valley” is a good place to start, since it has the technology and I know of at least one secular/atheist group for workers there. Amiable Atheist recently made me aware of Arizona which has an increasing number of non-believers.

So, which state do you consider the most secular / atheist? Do you have any figures to show this result? What other aspects of this area would make it desirable for a liberal atheist technology geek like myself?

I await your answers!