# Does atheism make sense?



## ljubo

I really dont think it does. I will let this pictures explain it.





































How can anybody still be atheist after this thread?


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## alenclaud

I think it is just a semantic issue. When someone says they are atheist, they do not usually mean that they know for sure that a god or gods don´t exist. They just do not believe in the existence of any god in the same way as they do not believe in the existence of the tooth fairy or a big monster hiding under your bed. Of course, they cannot be 100% certain that the tooth fairy doesn´t exist. But they can be pretty damn sure it doesn't, due to lack of evidence. Same applies to the Gods.
I think agnostic would be a better term.


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## Typhoid Mary

Yeah, and that first one about all atheist being hipsters and drunks is about as ignorant as thinking all Muslims are terrorists, or all Christians are extremists.

I'm an atheist, and one thing I never do is look down on another person's belief. I always respect other's religion and never mock them. Everyone is free to believe what they will without the threat of someone ridiculing them for it.


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## coldsorehighlighter

Any credible scientist will tell you they don't know how the universe was created, or why. Those questions haven't been answered yet, because there is no evidence. They can theorize how or why the universe came to be but you'd never hear them say they know.

And that's what makes science superior to any religion.

And I'm not an atheist.


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## ljubo

the cheat said:


> Any credible scientist will tell you they don't know how the universe was created, or why. Those questions haven't been answered yet, because there is no evidence. They can theorize how or why the universe came to be but you'd never hear them say they know.
> 
> And that's what makes science superior to any religion.
> 
> And I'm not an atheist.


When did you convert to Islam?


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## Tetragammon

Actually atheism is the only view that makes sense. But you can only understand that if you're able to overcome the decades of indoctrination and social conditioning that made you a theist in the first place. And most people can't. I feel sorry for you and all the other zealots. You're wasting your entire life on a fairy tale.


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## A Void Ant

I don't label myself as an atheist but it's possible I meet the criteria of one, since I tend to believe in science. Here are my responses to the 4 pictures posted.

Picture 1: 
The universe_ did_ create itself from nothing. Actually, they don't know what caused the big bang, but one theory is that one membrane collided with another in a multiverse of floating membranes. The question then would be, what caused the multiverse?

Picture 2: 
The sandcastle was crafted by a human who manipulated the granules of sand into a piece of art. The human mind is creative and artistic. It is the culmination of billions of years of evolution.

Picture 3: 
This one is actually pretty accurate, apart from the fact it's trying to be sarcastic and uses the word "magical". All the energy & matter in the universe was compressed in one tiny dot and it blew up and particles dispersed unevenly. The unevenness caused matter to concentrate in certain areas and form gas clouds, which further compressed from gravity into stars, which when created blow up and disperse heavy elements, which then accrete into balls like planets, which pull the hottest elements to the core, which promote pressure build ups, which promote volcanoes, which birth atmospheres and condensation, which gives water and if lucky enough, a single cell organism, which can go on to evolve over billions of yrs.

Picture 4:
This pic contains 4 in 1: The first 3 are inventions of the human mind, again, the culmination of evolution to-date. The last pic is our natural environment, all of which have explanations: clouds are water droplets condensing on to particles in the air, rainbows are visible light spectrum due to moisture acting like a prism on the path to your eye, the mountain is formed from the push of tectonic plates over millions of yrs, the waterfall is just the path of least resistance the rainwater/melting snow is taking as it drains from the mountain.


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## coldsorehighlighter

ljubo said:


> When did you convert to Islam?


Lol...what? Why would I do something so stupid?


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## softly

We don't live in a binary world, where there is only right and wrong. There is a lot of stuff in between stuff. However, I will uphold my belief in atheism, but I'd like to emphasize the fact that I do not think anyone else is wrong for not doing the same. I support the worship of other religions, as long as it is for purely good intentions and no one is getting hurt by those who believe in it. That being said, here is my argument:

I often find myself thinking about this, and what the fuss is between atheists and theists. I feel religion to be a form of institutionalized deception. It's non-progressive. People are told that this is the way things are, without much questioning as to exactly why it is that things have to be a certain way. I think in order to have a functional society, we need to understand the limits of our knowledge and work towards learning the unlearned. We need to reach a common ground in our understanding, and progress from there. And this is where science comes to play. Science is a land where controversial statements are rejected or accepted based on universal concepts of numbers and facts proved by the infamous scientific method. With science, _things can be proved_. I feel religion to stifle the proper examination of things and hinders intellectual and emotional curiosity. People are just told to accept that this is what is wanted of them, and they are to oblige, or else it is *wrong*. It keeps us from reaching a common truth. Thus, my previous argument of religion being unprogressive.

Atheism also helps us understand the value of our very short lives and puts life into perspective. It makes one understand the real world and its limits.

It really breaks my heart when basic civil rights are taken away when people are "brainwashed" by the demands of one's religion. When people are blinded by their beliefs and cannot realize basic humanity. That is when my issue with religion starts.

Nonetheless,
Atheism is accepting to change and learning, and in my opinion, that is the only sensible thing in the world.

Let me know what you think. I'm glad this thread exists, as it is important to discuss both sides to a controversial issue.

Also, two words: *Peer*. *Review*.


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## 2Milk

Currently, there is no right answer to the god question. It's really up to you what you want to believe. Most atheists base their beliefs on the natural laws that we can understand. It's like reverse engineering an answer. I'll put my money on atheism 10/10 times, because unlike religion the laws of nature and what we think we know about them are constantly being tested, proven false, updated, and retested. Religious people just assume that the laws written out in their books are right and anything else that contradicts them is wrong. They never dare question anything.


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## regimes

atheism doesn't really have to make sense. as its most basic purpose, it's just an abstention from religion. 

also the graphics have a really poor understanding of physics.


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## eukz

ljubo said:


>


How are three people representing atheism as a whole, precisely?



>


False equivalence fallacy. Dreadful.



>


Except dinosaurs are real, evolution is a perfectly observable phenomenon, and the holy books are mostly laughable. The rest is just a strawman argument.



> How can anybody still be atheist after this thread?


So I see nothing has changed in the past few weeks.....


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## ManInAShed




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## Dissonance

Looks like someone wants to take the piss on people and not actually read anyone who responds to them.


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## A Void Ant

2Milk said:


> Currently, there is no right answer to the god question. It's really up to you what you want to believe. Most atheists base their beliefs on the natural laws that we can understand. It's like reverse engineering an answer. I'll put my money on atheism 10/10 times, because unlike religion the laws of nature and what we think we know about them are constantly being tested, proven false, updated, and retested. Religious people just assume that the laws written out in their books are right and anything else that contradicts them is wrong. They never dare question anything.


I agree, all religion has is old books with stories of unverifiable sources that can be interpreted millions of ways and it has amassed billions of followers over the millennia. The smart people of course know the truth. That is, that even in it's most primitive form, the purpose of religion was to get money from gullible peasants. It's a rich man;s game, always was. As Carlin put it,_ the biggest bull**** story of all time.
_


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## lackofflife

does it make sense when a guy goes up to the sky with a flying donkey?


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## WinterDave




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## iAmCodeMonkey

Atheists do not believe in any god or gods. For me, that is all it is, and if someone wants to follow a religion, they should be allowed to do so.


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## hoddesdon

A Void Ant said:


> I don't label myself as an atheist but it's possible I meet the criteria of one, since I tend to believe in science. Here are my responses to the 4 pictures posted.
> 
> Picture 1:
> The universe_ did_ create itself from nothing. Actually, they don't know what caused the big bang, but one theory is that one membrane collided with another in a multiverse of floating membranes. The question then would be, what caused the multiverse?


You can not know that the universe created *itself *from nothing, but scientists do agree that it came into existence out of nothing, which is fantastically extraordinary in itself. Why does anything exist? Scientists can not come up with a *scientific* model to explain how it appeared from nothing. If scientists can not come up with such a model it is certainly not possible to say it created itself.

By the way, until relatively recently the scientific viewpoint was that the universe had always existed, which solved the problem mentioned above. The only mention at that time that the universe once did not exist is in Genesis.

Yes, there is no evidence whatsoever for the multiuniverse. The provenance of that theory makes it suspect i.e. speculation to explain how the universe appeared out of nothing (when the explanation already exists in Genesis).


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## naes

alenclaud said:


> I think it is just a semantic issue. When someone says they are atheist, they do not usually mean that they know for sure that a god or gods don´t exist. They just do not believe in the existence of any god in the same way as they do not believe in the existence of the tooth fairy or a big monster hiding under your bed. Of course, they cannot be 100% certain that the tooth fairy doesn´t exist. But they can be pretty damn sure it doesn't, due to lack of evidence. Same applies to the Gods.
> I think agnostic would be a better term.


+1

If every1 were honest then we would all be agnostic.


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## Milco

hoddesdon said:


> Scientists can not come up with a *scientific* model to explain how it appeared from nothing. If scientists can not come up with such a model it is certainly not possible to say it created itself.


If you cannot give a detalied explanation for how the ancient Egyptians built the pyramids using the primitive technology they had at the time, then aliens built them and you certainly cannot possibly say they didn't!
..It's just not a good argument whatesoever.



alenclaud said:


> I think agnostic would be a better term.





naes said:


> If every1 were honest then we would all be agnostic.


Most atheists are agnostic - as are many religious people (thankfully).
But agnosticism doesn't mean we should entertain the notion of there a god/gods, let alone any particular god/gods.
There are infinitely many things we cannot ultimately know, so speculating about any them is meaningless (why prefer one to another?) and religious people claiming knowledge about the unknowables are obviously not being truthful.

Also really, we have to be agnostic about our agnosticism. How can we know that we cannot know? But just as people don't say they're agnostic agnostic, many just leave it out and say they're atheist instead of agnostic atheist.


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## Maslow

Science makes a hell of a lot more sense than a magic man in the sky! :lol


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## hoddesdon

Milco said:


> Most atheists are agnostic - as are many religious people (thankfully).


I am not agnostic. There are some people involved with the church who do not truly believe, but they are not really religious in the first place.


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## hoddesdon

Milco said:


> If you cannot give a detalied explanation for how the ancient Egyptians built the pyramids using the primitive technology they had at the time, then aliens built them and you certainly cannot possibly say they didn't!
> ..It's just not a good argument whatesoever.


That only means that the technology has been lost. Technology exists today that would have been deemed impossible in the past e.g. mobile phones. Applying that in reverse chronologically, today it is not known how it was done but it is conceivable that there is a way, and it is unreasonable to say it is impossible. However, scientists can not even start on an explanation of how the universe came into existence out of nothing - not even the first step is known and there is no precedent.


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## IceCool

Science doesn't provide a complete explanation of how the universe came to be. To say that we just don't know yet, is an expectation for us to believe something based on faith; something illogical: the creation of something out of nothing.

Organized religion tries to provide a complete explanation, but it's stories are fantastical, and expect us accept everything based on faith.

I like the parts that science can explain, but I think it's essential for theorists, and atheists who don't want to appear dogmatic, to have the humility to accept that science doesn't preclude the belief in God. Believe what you will, you certainly don't need to believe in God, but your account does not disprove God. There is a place for both science and God, even if it isn't the God that any one organized religion proposes.


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## hoddesdon

Milco said:


> There are infinitely many things we cannot ultimately know, so speculating about any them is meaningless (why prefer one to another?) and religious people claiming knowledge about the unknowables are obviously not being truthful.


I resent this. From a purely scientific standpoint, you can not read minds. You are making assumptions about what is unknowable. There is biblical authority to say that those who endorse the Law of God do have the existence of the spiritual realm revealed to them - God drags them to Himself or calls them.


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## forgetmylife

does to me

makes more sense than making **** up, especially if that **** compels you to believe or else bad things are in for you

religion can make people do good things and it can also make people do horrible things, but that doesnt mean the storyline is true or valid

it's all psychological imo


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## Erroll

Not just humanity, but the whole universe is evolving and becoming. Maybe some parts of the universe have evolved further than others. Maybe we would consider one of these more highly evolved beings a god. Maybe humanity is evolving towards godhood. Or maybe when we doff our mortal shells, we will not longer feel separate and alone and socially anxious, but we will all be one together, in the mind of a god-consciousness. I'm agnostic, because I can think of lots of possibilities, but no proofs


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## SparklingWater

There's actually a designation in the SAS drop down menu for religion called non religious. I prefer that term to athiest or agnostic. Shoot maybe even spiritual works. Athiesm always feels like I'm against God when i'm not against anything, just don't believe in God or practice. It's like do I believe, idk, that everyone is secretly a bee or a whale lol. Just don't think of it and never affects my life. Not even a consideration ya know? Just kinda feels like something akin to a fairy tale if not born into it outside of all the extra chatter about it in society.


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## Milco

hoddesdon said:


> I am not agnostic. There are some people involved with the church who do not truly believe, but they are not really religious in the first place.


Only fundamentalists _know_ that god exists. Doubt is a big part of normal, mainstream christianity.



hoddesdon said:


> I resent this. From a purely scientific standpoint, you can not read minds. You are making assumptions about what is unknowable. There is biblical authority to say that those who endorse the Law of God do have the existence of the spiritual realm revealed to them - God drags them to Himself or calls them.


The alien also left accounts of what they did in various books and reveal themselves to people who believe in them.


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## charlietart886

I think if a person has looked at the evidence and the arguments from both sides, Atheism always comes out as the clear winner. It's not even a fair fight. There is just no way to describe attributes about something that doesn't manifest in reality in any sort of meaningful way. Well there is a way, and that's called making stuff up. There are many things that could explain why we started to develop religions from brain sizes, tool use, morality and group living, ect.. All of which are a better explanation than the supernatural (occam's razor).


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## hoddesdon

Milco said:


> Only fundamentalists _know_ that god exists. Doubt is a big part of normal, mainstream christianity.


That is not true. So you are the one who is untruthful.



Milco said:


> The alien also left accounts of what they did in various books and reveal themselves to people who believe in them.


What is this book?


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## ljubo

Maslow said:


> Science makes a hell of a lot more sense than a magic man in the sky! :lol


Magic man is not god. God is spirit, a force.


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## ljubo

Watch this.




__ https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=1082904598522968


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## Post_Punk_Proclivity

Does fundamentalism make sense?


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## Persephone The Dread

I don't think the other two are in the same 'crowd' as Dawkins.






Christopher Hitchens died in 2011.


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## ThatGuy11200

ljubo said:


> Magic man is not god. God is spirit, *a force*.


So he's created by magic bacteria that live in our cells?


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## AussiePea

Oh man, the dumb is too much.


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## sad1231234

Religion:

The belief that there was nothing and nothing happened to that nothing which turned nothing into some giant man in the sky, and this giant man in the sky created our universe out of nothing.


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## sad1231234

hoddesdon said:


> scientists can not even start on an explanation of how the universe came into existence out of nothing


Good point. Maybe the scientists have come even further with explaining how God came into existence out of nothing?


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## RyanIsNerdy

ljubo said:


> How can anybody still be atheist after this thread?


I'm just stubborn. I hate being proven wrong by strangers on the internet, and more specifically memes/comic strips. It's infuriating. So I'll just stay an atheist to spite you.


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## ljubo

sad1231234 said:


> Religion:
> 
> The belief that there was nothing and nothing happened to that nothing which turned nothing into some giant man in the sky, and this giant man in the sky created our universe out of nothing.


We never said this.

We say god always existed. God never was born, god exist before time, space and matter. God is what caused big bang. God is the "force" in universe.


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## eukz

ljubo said:


> We never said this.
> 
> We say god always existed. God never was born, god exist before time, space and matter. God is what caused big bang. God is the "force" in universe.


He caused the Big Bang and then the observable universe? Like he built a whole mansion for a bacterium?


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## ljubo

eukz said:


> He caused the Big Bang and then the observable universe? Like he built a whole mansion for a bacterium?


Yes, "he" made big bang and universe.


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## eukz

ljubo said:


> Yes, "he" made big bang and universe.


So, did he cause the existence of extraterrestrial life as well? Or the "mansion" only belongs to us?


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## ljubo

eukz said:


> So, did he cause the existence of extraterrestrial life as well?


yes.


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## eukz

ljubo said:


> yes.


He must have a very tight schedule if you ask me, supervising all these living beings across the universe. I guess his senses must warp space and time in order to carry it out, and his books are total sh!t for omiting all this.


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## sad1231234

ljubo said:


> We never said this.
> 
> We say god always existed. God never was born, god exist before time, space and matter. God is what caused big bang. God is the "force" in universe.


And how is this suppose to be of any support in the argument against evolution? Essentially, both the theory of evolution and the theory of God/Allah are based on no empirical evidence. Although we do have some evidence(cosmic rays, entropy, etc) which seems to indicate that the universe began with some kind of explosion. The chances of that explosion being caused by God/Allah are no more probable than the chances of that explosion being caused by hyper dimensionally vibrating cosmic superstrings(lol they have a pretty long name). Basically these are theorized things which supposedly create every possiblity, one of those possibilities being our universe. Meanwhile we have no evidence to even suggest God/Allah's existence aside from the argument of intelligent design, but evolution and/or multiverse theory can probably negate that argument.


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## sad1231234

eukz said:


> He must have a very tight schedule if you ask me, supervising all these living beings across the universe. I guess his senses must warp space and time in order to carry it out, and his books are total sh!t for omiting all this.


Allah works in mysterious ways...


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## ThatGuy11200

sad1231234 said:


> And how is this suppose to be of any support in the argument against evolution? Essentially, *both the theory of evolution and the theory of God/Allah are based on no empirical evidence. *Although we do have some evidence(cosmic rays, entropy, etc) which seems to indicate that the universe began with some kind of explosion. The chances of that explosion being caused by God/Allah are no more probable than the chances of that explosion being caused by hyper dimensionally vibrating cosmic superstrings(lol they have a pretty long name). Basically these are theorized things which supposedly create every possiblity, one of those possibilities being our universe. Meanwhile we have no evidence to even suggest God/Allah's existence aside from the argument of intelligent design, but evolution and/or multiverse theory can probably negate that argument.


I'd suggest this book to cure you of your ignorance of the evidence supporting the theory of evolution:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Evolution-...r=8-1-spell&keywords=evolution+douglas+futyma

It's only 600 pages, but it's a good start.


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## sad1231234

ThatGuy11200 said:


> I'd suggest this book to cure you of your ignorance of the evidence supporting the theory of evolution:
> 
> https://www.amazon.co.uk/Evolution-...r=8-1-spell&keywords=evolution+douglas+futyma
> 
> It's only 600 pages, but it's a good start.


Lol i was raised as a Christian(i've been agnostic for a while now) so i dont know my evolution that well, but i know that evolution does have a lot of indications as we can see in fossil records, studying living organisms, etc. But i guess i used the wrong word when i said "empirical", i meant to say that we have no absolute evidence. Yes we can see that the world may have very likely formed the way it is because of evolution. But since it supposedly happened on Earth 4.5 billion years ago, we cant quite tell for certain. But thats not to say that everything doesnt seem to be pointing towards evolution.


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## ThatGuy11200

sad1231234 said:


> Lol i was raised as a Christian(i've been agnostic for a while now) so i dont know my evolution that well, but i know that evolution does have a lot of indications as we can see in fossil records, studying living organisms, etc. But i guess i used the wrong word when i said "empirical", i meant to say that we have no absolute evidence. Yes we can see that the world may have very likely formed the way it is because of evolution.* But since it supposedly happened on Earth 4.5 billion years ago, we cant quite tell for certain.* But thats not to say that everything doesnt seem to be pointing towards evolution.


Ah, it seems you're talking about the origin of life, which isn't evolution exactly. Though it probably played a role.

Evolution is (very) simply a change in populations over time, there's plenty of direct evidence for that. Bacterial resistance to antibiotics for example. Even from hundreds of millions of years ago, there are some lineages of micro-organisms that can be seen evolving, down to a resolution of years. Look at a chalk cliff and you're looking at the fossilised plates of trillions of generations of plankton called coccolithophores. Look at the chalk under a microscope and you can see them changing over time (although the weathered face of a cliff wouldn't be a good source for that).


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## lackofflife

i would call this meme jihad! @ljubo


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## 1ShyKid

Typhoid Mary said:


> Yeah, and that first one about all atheist being hipsters and drunks is about as ignorant as thinking all Muslims are terrorists, or all Christians are extremists.
> 
> I'm an atheist, and one thing I never do is look down on another person's belief. I always respect other's religion and never mock them. Everyone is free to believe what they will without the threat of someone ridiculing them for it.


:agree Well said


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## blue2

What ? Atheist pastors lead drunk hipsters ...ok ...I don't know any pastors :no ....Doe's atheism make sense ? Of course...believing in nothing is more rational that believing in an imaginary all powerful being living in the sky : / ...but being rational is only a state of mind, better to favour an open mind rather than rational, but also don't dismiss rational.....


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## sad1231234

ThatGuy11200 said:


> Ah, it seems you're talking about the origin of life, which isn't evolution exactly. Though it probably played a role.
> 
> Evolution is (very) simply a change in populations over time, there's plenty of direct evidence for that. Bacterial resistance to antibiotics for example. Even from hundreds of millions of years ago, there are some lineages of micro-organisms that can be seen evolving, down to a resolution of years. Look at a chalk cliff and you're looking at the fossilised plates of trillions of generations of plankton called coccolithophores. Look at the chalk under a microscope and you can see them changing over time (although the weathered face of a cliff wouldn't be a good source for that).


Well i'll have to give it to you for knowing your biology haha. I guess the word evolution generally refers to the transitioning of simple to complex organisms. Yeah we can observe micro-evolution in almost all species but as far as i know, we dont have any evidence of taxonomic changes other than in fossils. And as advanced as our technology is, and we can figure out a lot about a fossil, it still doesnt seem like evidence that would convince me to believe in evolution with certainty.


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## ThatGuy11200

sad1231234 said:


> Well i'll have to give it to you for knowing your biology haha. I guess the word evolution generally refers to the transitioning of simple to complex organisms. Yeah we can observe micro-evolution in almost all species but as far as i know, we dont have any evidence of taxonomic changes other than in fossils. And as advanced as our technology is, and we can figure out a lot about a fossil, *it still doesnt seem like evidence that would convince me to believe in evolution with certainty.*


What evidence would you need to convince you?


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## sad1231234

ThatGuy11200 said:


> What evidence would you need to convince you?


Well, we cant know for full certainty what happened before we started recording our history. A lot of evidence for evolution is based on incomplete fossils or is dated inaccurately for some reason or another. Carbon dating for example, has been proven before to be inaccurate.


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## sad1231234

Sheska said:


> Yes, but what evidence would you need to convince you? I'm also curious to know the answer.


No evidence could convince me with full certainty. Because anything i percieve can not be verified, the only thing i can verify about the world as i experience it is the fact that i can percieve things at all. But if you are talking about just physical evidence, then i reckon a fully complete record of the most important evolutionary transitions(from unorganic matter to humans, for instance) would convince me. But even then i would always have some part of me believing, if not hoping, that there could be some higher power out there.


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