For fun, I'd like to do a little meme this morning which I saw here and here.
Q1. How would you define “atheism”?
Absence of belief in the existence of god(s).
Q2. Was your upbringing religious? If so, what tradition?
This is a tough one, but I'm going to go with Mormon.
Q3. How would you describe “Intelligent Design”, using only one word?
Newspeak
Q4. What scientific endeavour really excites you?
Naturalism, especially observing amphibians in the wild. My little Nico loves Biology. This morning he tore me away from my Internet habit to show me a series of fossil crustaceans -- screenshots he'd taken from his current favorite David Attenborough D.V.D.
Q5. If you could change one thing about the “atheist community”, what would it be and why?
I'd like to see more emphasis on charity and volunteer work. Belief in God makes it easier to say "I have no choice but to donate 10% of my income," but if you know that you have to rely on yourself, you often say "I have to be sure I'm providing for my family's future first, and we'll see what's left..." But we have to make it a priority to think about humanity's future.
Q6. If your child came up to you and said “I’m joining the clergy”, what would be your first response?
What? Whatever happened to becoming a Biologist???
Q7. What’s your favourite theistic argument, and how do you usually refute it?
That atheism is a ("fundamentalist") "religion" which requires just as much "faith" as belief in God. If you have to call atheism a religion in order to discredit it, then religion has already lost. (See It takes a lot of faith to believe that!!!)
Q8. What’s your most “controversial” (as far as general attitudes amongst other atheists goes) viewpoint?
I don't think my views are terribly controversial within the atheist community. However, the one topic that consistently generates controversy and disputes when I post about it is this one.
Q9. Of the “Four Horsemen” (Dawkins, Dennett, Hitchens and Harris) who is your favourite, and why?
P. Z. Myers. Yeah, I know he's not on the list, but he's my favorite of the scary "new atheists". Of course Dawkins scored some points with me when he performed that hilarious rap video...
Q10. If you could convince just one theistic person to abandon their beliefs, who would it be?
I'm not really interested in deconverting people. I'd just like to encourage critical thinking in general.
Now name three other atheist blogs that you’d like to see take up the Atheist Thirteen gauntlet
I don't feel like tagging anyone. Anyone else who'd like to do this meme (or has done it), please feel free to link to your post in the comments. :D
The Adventures of a Friendly French-American ExMormon Atheist Mom Living in Switzerland!!!
Showing posts with label atheist. Show all posts
Showing posts with label atheist. Show all posts
Friday, June 13, 2008
Wednesday, May 30, 2007
How I became an atheist
I've told the story of my deconversion from Mormonism here, here, and here, but I haven't quite explained yet how I got from there to atheism.
Before my deconversion, I'd already identified atheism as the main alternate possibility (as explained here: If the church weren't true I'd be an atheist, and other things I learned in seminary). Either the church is true or it isn't. Either the spiritual witness is right or it isn't. Since -- if we wipe away what we learned from the spirit -- what's left?
But I was plagued by self-doubt.
Mormonism had convinced me that spiritual witness was valid as evidence for deciding questions about the way the real-world universe functions. So I put a massive amount of heart and effort and prayer into trying to receive that spiritual witness. And several times I managed to generate an emotional/spiritual experience that I hoped was God talking to me.
But "the spirit" always felt sickly and off. Despite what I wrote in my journal about it, I never fully convinced myself that my spiritual experiences weren't wishful thinking and all in my head. That was why I continued to pray fervently for the "testimony" I didn't have, right up to the day of my deconversion epiphany.
But my doubts about my own spiritual experiences didn't extend to doubts about the reality of other people's spiritual experiences. I though my own were possibly just in my head, but I assumed that it was just because I was unworthy to have real spiritual experiences. I believed that other (more righteous) people were receiving actual communication from God.
That was why it threw me for such a loop when I heard from some faithful Mormons say that people in other religions had spiritual experiences similar to those Mormons have (see my deconversion, part 3). My belief in God was ultimately built on the bedrock of believing trusted friends and family when they said they'd talked to Him. When the same trusted individuals admitted that Mormons didn't necessarily have a monopoly on spiritual witness, I hardly knew what to think.
Then, when I had my grand epiphany that the claims of Mormonism are false, I didn't entirely stop believing in other people's spiritual claims. I merely determined that spiritual witness couldn't be used to answer real-world questions or questions about the nature of God. I immediately saw the parallels among all of the myths and miracles claimed by all of mankind's religions, and concluded that all of these details were inventions by people wishing to explain their experiences with the divine.
Thus I became a Deist. I believed that God or gods exist and created the universe and care about people (enough to commune with them), but that the divine powers don't actually intervene or explain anything specific to anyone. That's where I was at when I entered BYU as a freshman.
Sometime during my first year at BYU, I attended a devotional. My ward had invited one of the BYU religion professors to tell us the story of his conversion to Mormonism. He told an amazingly moving story that -- as far as I could tell -- touched everyone in the room, including me. That was the spirit for sure. Since I'd participated in the same spiritual experience with others whose spirituality wasn't in question, I concluded that that must be the real thing, if anything is. I took the experience as evidence of God's love and of the fact that God can communicate through Mormonism just as through any other religion.
But weirdly it was the beginning of the end. As long as I wasn't sure I'd ever received any spiritual witness, I didn't feel qualified to criticize that type of evidence. But once I had some spiritual evidence of my own, I had something concrete to question. And as soon as I started putting some weight on my evidence -- to rely on it for my belief -- the doubts started to squeeze out. That guy is a talented speaker. He's probably given that same devotional hundreds of times. He knows how to tell his story in such a way that it generates an emotional response in his audience. No supernatural explanation required...
Around the same time, someone had posted a cartoon on a door leading to some offices inside the BYU library. I passed the cartoon all the time because the door was along one of the main stairways leading to some of the lower floors of the library. The cartoon was of a stern-looking man (dressed as a scholar) walking down a staircase. I don't remember exactly what was written on the upper few steps -- I think it was a series of things like questioning the literal inerrancy of the Bible -- but I remember what was written on the last three steps: Deism, Agnosticism, Atheism.
I was annoyed by this cartoon because I felt like it was just an attempt to scare people away from doubting or interpreting the slightest thing for themselves. It looked like an obvious swipe against the "liberal" and "Sunstone" Mormons (today's "middle way" people). I thought "Oh, please!! Just because you don't buy the whole enchilada doesn't mean you're on the road to **shudder** atheism."
But the more I passed that cartoon -- and the more I thought about it -- the more I thought, "Well, actually... Maybe this path does lead to atheism..."
I didn't really have a moment of epiphany the way I did with my deconversion from Mormonism. I just gradually started calling myself an agnostic when I wasn't sure anymore. Meanwhile, the evidence for God's existence started looking weaker and weaker.
Then one day I was explaining to an atheist friend (probably my brother) about how I'm an agnostic because I don't claim to have a proof that God doesn't exist.
He then asked me "But which do you think it is? God exists or God doesn't exist?"
Without hesitation I said "I think God doesn't exist."
He laughed and said, "Then you're an atheist! Admit it!"
I thought about it a second and said, "You're right, I'm an atheist."
And I've been an atheist ever since.
Before my deconversion, I'd already identified atheism as the main alternate possibility (as explained here: If the church weren't true I'd be an atheist, and other things I learned in seminary). Either the church is true or it isn't. Either the spiritual witness is right or it isn't. Since -- if we wipe away what we learned from the spirit -- what's left?
But I was plagued by self-doubt.
Mormonism had convinced me that spiritual witness was valid as evidence for deciding questions about the way the real-world universe functions. So I put a massive amount of heart and effort and prayer into trying to receive that spiritual witness. And several times I managed to generate an emotional/spiritual experience that I hoped was God talking to me.
But "the spirit" always felt sickly and off. Despite what I wrote in my journal about it, I never fully convinced myself that my spiritual experiences weren't wishful thinking and all in my head. That was why I continued to pray fervently for the "testimony" I didn't have, right up to the day of my deconversion epiphany.
But my doubts about my own spiritual experiences didn't extend to doubts about the reality of other people's spiritual experiences. I though my own were possibly just in my head, but I assumed that it was just because I was unworthy to have real spiritual experiences. I believed that other (more righteous) people were receiving actual communication from God.
That was why it threw me for such a loop when I heard from some faithful Mormons say that people in other religions had spiritual experiences similar to those Mormons have (see my deconversion, part 3). My belief in God was ultimately built on the bedrock of believing trusted friends and family when they said they'd talked to Him. When the same trusted individuals admitted that Mormons didn't necessarily have a monopoly on spiritual witness, I hardly knew what to think.
Then, when I had my grand epiphany that the claims of Mormonism are false, I didn't entirely stop believing in other people's spiritual claims. I merely determined that spiritual witness couldn't be used to answer real-world questions or questions about the nature of God. I immediately saw the parallels among all of the myths and miracles claimed by all of mankind's religions, and concluded that all of these details were inventions by people wishing to explain their experiences with the divine.
Thus I became a Deist. I believed that God or gods exist and created the universe and care about people (enough to commune with them), but that the divine powers don't actually intervene or explain anything specific to anyone. That's where I was at when I entered BYU as a freshman.
Sometime during my first year at BYU, I attended a devotional. My ward had invited one of the BYU religion professors to tell us the story of his conversion to Mormonism. He told an amazingly moving story that -- as far as I could tell -- touched everyone in the room, including me. That was the spirit for sure. Since I'd participated in the same spiritual experience with others whose spirituality wasn't in question, I concluded that that must be the real thing, if anything is. I took the experience as evidence of God's love and of the fact that God can communicate through Mormonism just as through any other religion.
But weirdly it was the beginning of the end. As long as I wasn't sure I'd ever received any spiritual witness, I didn't feel qualified to criticize that type of evidence. But once I had some spiritual evidence of my own, I had something concrete to question. And as soon as I started putting some weight on my evidence -- to rely on it for my belief -- the doubts started to squeeze out. That guy is a talented speaker. He's probably given that same devotional hundreds of times. He knows how to tell his story in such a way that it generates an emotional response in his audience. No supernatural explanation required...
Around the same time, someone had posted a cartoon on a door leading to some offices inside the BYU library. I passed the cartoon all the time because the door was along one of the main stairways leading to some of the lower floors of the library. The cartoon was of a stern-looking man (dressed as a scholar) walking down a staircase. I don't remember exactly what was written on the upper few steps -- I think it was a series of things like questioning the literal inerrancy of the Bible -- but I remember what was written on the last three steps: Deism, Agnosticism, Atheism.
I was annoyed by this cartoon because I felt like it was just an attempt to scare people away from doubting or interpreting the slightest thing for themselves. It looked like an obvious swipe against the "liberal" and "Sunstone" Mormons (today's "middle way" people). I thought "Oh, please!! Just because you don't buy the whole enchilada doesn't mean you're on the road to **shudder** atheism."
But the more I passed that cartoon -- and the more I thought about it -- the more I thought, "Well, actually... Maybe this path does lead to atheism..."
I didn't really have a moment of epiphany the way I did with my deconversion from Mormonism. I just gradually started calling myself an agnostic when I wasn't sure anymore. Meanwhile, the evidence for God's existence started looking weaker and weaker.
Then one day I was explaining to an atheist friend (probably my brother) about how I'm an agnostic because I don't claim to have a proof that God doesn't exist.
He then asked me "But which do you think it is? God exists or God doesn't exist?"
Without hesitation I said "I think God doesn't exist."
He laughed and said, "Then you're an atheist! Admit it!"
I thought about it a second and said, "You're right, I'm an atheist."
And I've been an atheist ever since.
Saturday, May 26, 2007
Carnival of the Godless #67!!!
It's carnival time again!!! And a fantastic batch of godless thoughts have arrived in my inbox this past fortnight, so let's jump right in!!!On being an atheist
Twice tells a lovely deconversion story of how understanding a past religion led to new insight about religion in general. VJack follows with a letter to a new atheist. Riversider discusses atheist networking through "Internetionalism" and the symbolism of the circle.
Philosophy
No More Mr. Nice Guy gives us Footsteps: an atheist parable.
The skeptical alchemist gives a good discussion and explanation of framing atheism.
A couple of bloggers write to us about their experiences working things out in that strange space between religion and unbelief: Zen Atheist Cat's Got My Tongue and Questions of God.
And we have three posts covering different facets of the question of how religion and atheism relate to morals: Materialism's Foundation for Moral Agency, The Best Arguments for God’s Existence…and Why They Fail: The Argument from Morality, Some comments on religion.
Ethics + Behavoir
Aaron Ross Powell discusses how atheists should act with respect to religion, and on a related note, Stephen Littau is critical of atheists celebrating Fallwell's death, and how that affects public perception of atheists. The atheist ethicist in particular doesn't care for the fact that it's common in public discourse to slam atheists for the (supposed) good atheists would not do.
Speaking of how atheists should behave, Mojoey talks about small lies (including contempt of court).
And the behavoir of the religious? Misanthropic Bastard discusses How Religion Hurts The World: Division.
Religion + Politics
CapeTownDissentator gives an interesting overview (with statistics) of religion and politics in America.
Freedom of religion for other religious minorities affects freedom of/from religion for atheists. So let's have a look at some cases of less-favored religions seeking the same treatment as Christians: Damned Witches! and NC believes in magic....
We have some interesting new analysis of the religious right's favorite issues: abortion (If humans were marsupials) and gay marriage (Mitt Romney: Gay Marriage Makes Baby Jesus Cry). Then speaking of Mitt and Mormon political influence, Æsahættr tells us about religious political influence: Mormon style.
In other news, the Pope decries the evils of both capitalism and communism. Exmoron wonders what he's hoping to replace them with, and Advice Goddess suggests maybe religion should be on the list as well.
Religion + Culture
Mutant Cat translates Christian t-shirts, and in other Christian pop-culture fun Jul brings us some funny photos of signs you may be in the Bible Belt.
On the less-amusing side of Christian culture, the Voltage Gate describes "Quiverfull" as seen on TLC.
Creation Science
If creation is a science, then it should have a museum, right? Complete with dinosaurs!!! Well, it does, and we've got a couple of fun posts about it: Creatin' Science and Adam and Eve In The Land Of the Dinosaurs.
And who can forget everyone's favorite creationist media personalities, Cameron and Comfort? Axis of Jared offers $10k to anyone that can prove Ray Comfort isn't an idiot, and Unashamedly Atheist is kind enough to carefully explain the problems with Comfort's argument, in terms of an understanding of the mechanism by which something is made.
Miracles
Some people still believe in miracles though, and when they do, the skeptics are right there to say "You've got to be kidding...." The prize goes to finding Jesus in a plop of bird poop (is it even possible that's not a joke?). Then a skeptic visits a healing crusade and doesn't mince words about what a shameless scam it is, profiting from people's desperate hopes. Then Action Skeptics deconstruct another moneymaking miracle, The Seed Principle.
Reviews
We've got a batch of reviews for your reading pleasure: Aardvarchaeology reviews God, the Failed Hypothesis, Generative Transformation reviews The Albigen Papers, and The Uncredible Hallq reviews all of J.P. Holding's scholarship.
Stories
Saving the best for last, we have our stories. Rickey Henderson recounts his weekend of doom attending a Bat-Mizvah.
Then who could forget the most fabulous atheist-interest coming of age novel ever written? It's got all of the misadventures of youth through the eyes of Mormon teens and atheist young adults!!! Our heros are currently attending Youth Conference where we've seen Let the Manhunt Begin!, Doomed Unrequited Love, and Sexual Purity, with the conclusion Another Great Year at Youth Conference coming up soon!!!
That's it for this carnival -- the next one will be held June 10th at Action Skeptics!!!
Submit your post here to be included in the next Carnival of the Godless!!! (Or if it's more about Humanism, consider The Humanist Symposium.)
Sunday, May 13, 2007
Carnival Time!!!
The 66th edition of Carnival of the Godless is now avaliable for your reading pleasure at the Atheist Experience!!!
The next one, #67 on May 27, will be hosted by yours truly right here at Letters from a Broad!!!
I've never hosted a carnival before, so this should be a fun new experience. I've already started receiving submissions, and it looks like it's going to be a good one!!! (To submit a post, use the standard carnival form I linked to above, or email me directly: chanson dot exmormon at gmail dot com.)
I especially hope the atheists of Outer Blogness will make a good showing by submitting some of their best work. It seems like there's been an upsurge in posts tackling philosophical questions all over Outer Blogness (if you're wondering whether I'm talking about you, then yes, I'm talking about you), and some of the submissions I've already received are on the philosophical side as well, so it might be fun to try to have a philosophy sub-theme to the next Carnival. That way we can be sure the philosophers of blogspace are aware of one another and get some good idea-flow going.
Then to balance out the deep-n-heavy, I should probably request that people send in humor pieces as well. ;^) The Exterminator of No More Hornets says we atheists take ourselves way too seriously. I don't think so, but I agree it's a fine excuse to start a collection of atheist jokes, and Friendly Atheist has answered the call with two threads of atheist stand-up comedy here and here. (My personal favorite religion/comedy video series is Mr. Diety.)
Also, please don't forget about the tri-weekly Humanist Symposium. If you think your special post is more "humanist" than "atheist" send it to them, otherwise send it to me. :D
The next one, #67 on May 27, will be hosted by yours truly right here at Letters from a Broad!!!
I've never hosted a carnival before, so this should be a fun new experience. I've already started receiving submissions, and it looks like it's going to be a good one!!! (To submit a post, use the standard carnival form I linked to above, or email me directly: chanson dot exmormon at gmail dot com.)
I especially hope the atheists of Outer Blogness will make a good showing by submitting some of their best work. It seems like there's been an upsurge in posts tackling philosophical questions all over Outer Blogness (if you're wondering whether I'm talking about you, then yes, I'm talking about you), and some of the submissions I've already received are on the philosophical side as well, so it might be fun to try to have a philosophy sub-theme to the next Carnival. That way we can be sure the philosophers of blogspace are aware of one another and get some good idea-flow going.
Then to balance out the deep-n-heavy, I should probably request that people send in humor pieces as well. ;^) The Exterminator of No More Hornets says we atheists take ourselves way too seriously. I don't think so, but I agree it's a fine excuse to start a collection of atheist jokes, and Friendly Atheist has answered the call with two threads of atheist stand-up comedy here and here. (My personal favorite religion/comedy video series is Mr. Diety.)
Also, please don't forget about the tri-weekly Humanist Symposium. If you think your special post is more "humanist" than "atheist" send it to them, otherwise send it to me. :D
Monday, April 30, 2007
More good news about atheists!!!
There's a new carnival in town for atheists: The Humanist Symposium!!! Their inaugural edition includes not only a post by yours truly but also one by Outer Blogness's own from the ashes!!!
This is a fun carnival because the idea is to highlight positive aspects of being an atheist and a humanist. The term "atheist" describes an absence of something, namely absence of belief in God or gods. However, (like the term exmormon ;^) ), being defined by this negative can actually mean a whole lot of positive things in your life. So it's cool to have a blog carnival to focus on all of the good stuff!!! :D I hope it will be a big success!!!
I have a hard time seeing how people could view atheism (or humanism) as bad -- except possibly fear of the unknown and unfamiliar. As much as I don't proselytize for atheism myself, I have to admit I feel a lot of hope for the future when pondering quotes like this one I saw on the Secular Earth site:
I don't know much about the "Secular Earth" community except that they left a comment on my blog, and I have no idea who Ludwig Feuerbach is, but they've got at least one good quote going for them, so maybe there's more where that came from. ;^)
This is a fun carnival because the idea is to highlight positive aspects of being an atheist and a humanist. The term "atheist" describes an absence of something, namely absence of belief in God or gods. However, (like the term exmormon ;^) ), being defined by this negative can actually mean a whole lot of positive things in your life. So it's cool to have a blog carnival to focus on all of the good stuff!!! :D I hope it will be a big success!!!
I have a hard time seeing how people could view atheism (or humanism) as bad -- except possibly fear of the unknown and unfamiliar. As much as I don't proselytize for atheism myself, I have to admit I feel a lot of hope for the future when pondering quotes like this one I saw on the Secular Earth site:
My only wish is ... to transform friends of God into friends of man, believers into thinkers, devotees of prayer into devotees of work, candidates for the hereafter into students of the world, Christians, who by their own admission, are 'half animal, half angel' into persons, into whole persons.- Ludwig Feuerbach
I don't know much about the "Secular Earth" community except that they left a comment on my blog, and I have no idea who Ludwig Feuerbach is, but they've got at least one good quote going for them, so maybe there's more where that came from. ;^)
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