Delightful Quotes
Kill a man, and you are an assassin. Kill millions of men, and you are a conqueror. Kill everyone, and you are a god.
~ Jean Rostand
I contend that we are both atheists. I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours.
~ Stephen Roberts
Man is certainly stark mad: he cannot make a worm, yet he will make gods by the dozen.
~ Michel de Montaigne
Which is it, is man one of God’s blunders or is God one of man’s?
~ Nietzsche
We, on our side, are praying to Him to give us victory, because we believe we are right; but those on the other side pray to Him, too, for victory, believing they are right. What must He think of us?
~ Abraham Lincoln
Invisible Pink Unicorns are beings of awesome mystical power. We know this because they manage to be invisible and pink at the same time. Like all religions, the Faith of the Invisible Pink Unicorns is based upon both logic and faith. We have faith that they are pink; we logically know that they are invisible because we can’t see them.
~ Steve Eley
All great truths begin as blasphemies.
~ George Bernard Shaw
Religion, comprises a system of wishful illusions together with a disavowal of reality, such as we find in an isolated form nowhere else but in amentia, in a state of blissful hallucinatory confusion.
~ Sigmund Freud
The philosopher has never killed any priests, whereas the priest has killed a great many philosophers.
~ Denis Diderot
The Bible is not my book, and Christianity is not my religion. I could never give assent to the long, complicated statements of Christian dogma.
~ Abraham Lincoln
A man’s ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties and needs; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death.
~ Albert Einstein
If you talk to God, you are praying. If God talks to you, you have schizophrenia.
~ Thomas Szasz
Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich.
~ Napoleon
It was, of course, a lie what you read about my religious convictions, a lie which is being systematically repeated. I do not believe in a personal god and I have never denied this but have expressed it clearly. If something is in me which can be called religious, then it is the unbounded admiration for the structure of the world so far as our science can reveal it.
~ Albert Einstein
I distrust those people who know so well what God wants them to do because I notice it always coincides with their own desires.
~ Susan B. Anthony
One man’s magic is another man’s engineering. Supernatural is a null word.
~ Robert Heinlein
We must question the story logic of having an all-knowing all-powerful God, who creates faulty humans, and then blames them for his own mistakes.
~ Gene Roddenberry
As with the Christian religion, the worst advertisement for Socialism is its adherents.
~ George Orwell
If child molestation is actually your concern, how come we don’t see Bradley tanks knocking down Catholic churches?
~ Bill Hicks
Secular schools can never be tolerated because such schools have no religious instruction, and a general moral instruction without a religious foundation is built on air; consequently, all character training and religion must be derived from faith … we need believing people.
~ Adolf Hitler
I like your Christ; I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.
~ Mohandas Gandhi
If god created us in his image we have certainly returned the compliment.
~ Voltaire
The most detestable wickedness, the most horrid cruelties, and the greatest miseries that have afflicted the human race have had their origin in this thing called revelation, or revealed religion.
~ Thomas Paine
I have seldom met an intelligent person whose views were not narrowed and distorted by religion.
~ James Buchanan
When did I realize I was God? Well, I was praying and I suddenly realized I was talking to myself.
~ Jack Gurney – “The Ruling Class”
Could a being create the fifty billion galaxies, each with two hundred billion stars, then rejoice in the smell of burning goat flesh?
~ Ron Patterson
Science has done more for the development of western civilization in one hundred years than Christianity did in eighteen hundred years.
~ Jeff Burroughs
I read about an Eskimo hunter who asked the local missionary priest, ‘If I did not know about God and sin, would I go to hell?’ ‘No,’ said the priest, ‘not if you did not know.’ ‘Then why,’ asked the Eskimo earnestly, ‘did you tell me?’
~ Annie Dillard
I am convinced that I am acting as the agent of our Creator. By fighting off the Jews, I am doing the Lord’s work.
~ Adolf Hitler
The most heinous and the cruelest crimes of which history has record have been committed under the cover of religion or equally noble motives.
~ Mohandas Gandhi
Isn’t it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?
~ Douglas Adams
It does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no God. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.
~ Thomas Jefferson
All Bibles are man-made.
~ Thomas Edison
I cannot imagine a God who rewards and punishes the objects of his creation, whose purposes are modeled after our own; a God, in short, who is but a reflection of human frailty. Neither can I believe that the individual survives the death of his body, although feeble souls harbor such thoughts through fear or ridiculous egotisms…
~ Albert Einstein
In every country and every age, the priest has been hostile to liberty.
~ Thomas Jefferson
A celibate clergy is an especially good idea, because it tends to suppress any hereditary propensity toward fanaticism.
~ Carl Sagan
When you call yourself an Indian or a Muslim or a Christian or a European, or anything else, you are being violent. Do you see why it is violent? It is because you are separating yourself from the rest of mankind. When you separate yourself by belief, by nationality, by tradition, it breeds violence. So a man who is seeking to understand violence does not belong to any country, to any religion, to any political party or partial system; he is concerned with the total understanding of mankind.
~ J. Krishnamurthi
Man is the religious animal. He is the only religious animal. He is the only animal that has the True Religion, several of them. He is the only animal that loves his neighbor as himself and cuts his throat, if his theology isn’t straight. He has made a graveyard of the globe in trying his honest best to smooth his brother’s path to happiness and heaven.
~ Mark Twain
I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use.
~ Galileo Galilei
So far as I can remember, there is not one word in the Gospels in praise of intelligence.
~ Bertrand Russel
I have examined all of the known superstitions of the world and I do not find in our superstitions of Christianity one redeeming feature. They are all founded on fables and mythology. Christianity has made one-half the world fools and the other half hypocrites.
~ Thomas Jefferson
If you believe in the existence of fairies at the bottom of the garden you are deemed fit for the bin. If you believe in parthenogenesis, ascension, transubstantiation and all the rest of it, you are deemed fit to govern the country.
~ Jonathan Meades
I know of no crime that has not been defended by the church, in one form or other. The church is not a pioneer; it accepts a new truth, last of all, and only when denial has become useless.
~ Robert G. Ingersoll
The good Christian should beware of mathematicians and all those who make empty prophecies. The danger already exists that mathematicians have made a covenant with the devil to darken the spirit and confine man in the bonds of Hell.
~Saint Augustine
Theology is never any help; it is searching in a dark cellar at midnight for a black cat that isn’t there. Theologians can persuade themselves of anything.
~ Robert Heinlein
There was a time when I believed in the story and the scheme of salvation, so far as I could understand it, just as I believed there was a Devil. Suddenly the light broke through to me and I saw a silly story, and each generation nowadays swallows it with greater difficulty. Why do people go on pretending about this Christianity?
~ H. G. Wells
The state has not the right to leave every man free to profess and embrace whatever religion he may desire.
~ Pope Pius IX
To date, despite the efforts of millions of true believers to support this myth, there is no more evidence for the Judeo-Christian god than any of the gods on Mount Olympus.
~ Joseph Daleiden
You find as you look around the world that every single bit of progress in humane feeling, every improvement in the criminal law, every step toward the diminution of war, every step toward better treatment of the colored races, or every mitigation of slavery, every moral progress that there has been in the world, has been consistently opposed by the organized churches of the world. I say quite deliberately that the Christian religion, as organized in its churches, has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world.
~ Bertrand Russell
Either God wants to abolish evil, and cannot; or he can, but does not want to. If he wants to, but cannot, he is impotent. If he can, but does not want to, he is wicked. If, as they say, God can abolish evil, and God really wants to do it, why is there evil in the world?
~ Epicurus
To use the term blind faith, is to use an adjective needlessly.
~ Julian Ruck
The establishment of Christianity arrested the normal development of the physical sciences for over fifteen hundred years.
~ Andrew Dickson White
The minority, the ruling class at present, has the schools and press, usually the Church as well under its thumb. This enables it to organize and sway the emotions of the masses, and make its tool of them.
~ Albert Einstein
Anyone who has two shirts when someone has none is not a Christian.
~ Lenny Bruce
The church tries to save sinners, but science seeks to stop their manufacture.
~ Elbert Hubbard
I can’t embrace a male god who has persecuted female sexuality throughout the ages; and that persecution still goes on today, all over the world.
~ Amanda Donohoe
If a man would follow, today, the teachings of the Old Testament, he would be a criminal. If he would follow strictly the teachings of the New, he would be insane.
~ Robert G. Ingersoll
If you pray for rain long enough, it eventually does fall. If you pray for floodwaters to abate, they eventually do. The same happens in the absence of prayers.
~ Steve Allen
Acceptance without proof is the fundamental characteristic of Western religion, rejection without proof is the fundamental characteristic of Western science.
~ Gary Zukav
Religion is the end of love and honesty, the beginning of confusion; faith is a colorful hope or fear, the origin of folly.
~ Tao Te Ching
The more I study religions the more I am convinced that man never worshipped anything but himself.
~ Sir R. F. Burton
All natural institutions of churches, whether Jewish, Christian, or Turkish, appear to me no other than human inventions, set up to terrify and enslave mankind, and monopolize power and profit.
~ Thomas Paine
The religion of the future will be a cosmic religion, the religion which based on experience, which refuses dogma.
~ Albert Einstein
I do not believe that any type of religion should ever be introduced into the public schools of the United States.
~ Thomas Edison
If one were to take the bible seriously one would go mad. But to take the bible seriously, one must be already mad.
~ Aleister Crowley
Religion is an insult to human dignity. With or without it, you’d have good people doing good things and evil people doing bad things, but for good people to do bad things, it takes religion.
~ Steven Weinberg
Mythology is what we call someone else’s religion.
~ Joseph Campbell
Beware the man of one book.
~ Saint Thomas Aquinas
Nice collection.
you_are_my_hero.
dude, these quotes are wicked awesome!
Cool quotes, all true which saddens me.
Cool quotes, but the whole Hitler quotes were unneccessary and seem Godwin fodder to me. There are better quotes to illustrate the use of religion to manipulate (I like “Religion is seem by the masses as true, by the wise as false and by the rulers as useful”) personally.
This post (c) Kingreaper: Doesn’t like the idea of Guilt by Association
Those quotes were to point out the flaws in claims that Hitler was an Atheist. While him saying he likes religion doesn’t make him religious, it does highlight the fact that religion requires unquestioning faith and obedience, neither of which is a positive quality.
Hitler was a devout Christian right to the end. In fact he thought it was useful and references in his speeches are many and clear. He stated he was doing God’s work. That he was an atheist is patently false and spread by the fundies to advance their crusade by hook or crook
Much like George Bush and his cartel of amoral bastards.
That’s immoral. :x
why would an all knowing, all loving, all seeing deity NEED to create little FLAWED human beings to worhip it??? and if those FLAWED beings, made so by the creator, succumb to those FLAWS or fails to worship in exactly the way some fat hick preacher with a bad hairdoo or some child molesting priestophile says they should…. then….. that deity would BURN the human beings FOREVER??? essentially punishing them for ITS MISTAKE of not making them perfect in the first place???
this is no deity that deserves worship… its more like a psychotic, posessive, control freak, stalker, torturer god…WE PUT PEOPLE IN JAIL FOR ACTING LIKE THAT…..
i want no part of that deity or the superstitious monkeys (with car keys) that cringe in fear at its feet. ~ Kevin Walsh
I’m guessing all these comments are against organized religion. Because my spirituality definitely does not permit “priestophiles.” I dont believe God NEEDED to create little FLAWED creatures. He thought it would be nice to create a beautiful world for us to enjoy. He KNEW (hence “all-knowing”) that we would end up flawed, because we rather use our free will for sin. it’s our choice to be flawed. i definitely choose to be an ass to someone, and i’m sure you do too. and the fact that you don’t want to be part of a deity because fat hick preachers and priestophiles are threatening that a God will burn you for being flawed, well you are just very closed-minded. I don’t follow everything by the book, but I am open to what sounds like a logical, reasonable guideline… like honoring my father and mother or not killing someone. even the commandment of having God above all other idols is reasonable. Ever notice someone who is obsessed with food or sex or money? they are disillusioned and usually secretly unhappy. but i’ve met many content spiritual people. so if you don’t like the deity that, by the sounds of it, are taught by christians, then go soul searching or religion searching or spiritual searching and find a logical God that suits your preference. Either way, what I believe is that my deity is all forgiving and understands that because we are flawed and ignorant (like you), he can give us a break and forgive that we are curious little things that dont have the brain capacity to imagine something that our cocky little species can’t discover or prove.
As hard as you tried with this post, you’ve failed to impress.
It’s always easy to be cynical
Was humanity’s flaw foreseen by Yahweh or was he not expecting it to happen? Answer this for me, please, and tell me why you continue to believe that he is infinitely intelligent and infinitely loving.
This is a very typical and overused question as to why God does not exist btw. Logically speaking there are one of three possibilities for this:
1. God is psychotic and he made us fall on purpose.
2. God has nothing to do with the creation of us, either being completely outside of our universe or non existent.
3. In order to maintain his status as “God”, his creations would have to be beneath him and NOT perfect like he is.
I’m sorry that there are people as narrowminded as you Erika. Please keep in mind that “ignorant” people may not be as “ignorant” as they seem. Getting worked up over other’s views is definately not a healthy way to stand up for the “infinitely intelligent and infinitely loving” god that you worship. Afterall, is it not to be a religion filled with understanding? It is… until you realize perhaps you are leading your life wrong and then what, the eyes turn red and you plummet, the god will not care, no remorse for those cast out. Therefore, not infinately loving. You believe it so hard because of your family raising you to believe it. Either that is why or some amazing turn of events. Perhaps it is the power in oneself not the power of a god. Praying only works because you believe there is someone listening to you; you believe they will fix it. It is not that they can hear you, or care… it is because you believed strong enough it would be true.
All I ask is that you please open your mind to more thoughts, and then fight your battle if you still believe in it. Peace be with you and knowledge come to you.
Are you suggesting that the human mind is in itself its own God; because it “believes” hard enough that it will be so? Hmm… acknowledging that we as humans are limited in what we can understand and do is a bit more humble approach to the problem, wouldn’t you say?
Not so much as, anything you want can come to pass. Just that there are a lot of things that man is in control over. That believing in yourself is moreso god, than a prayer. =)
and the sad thing is u actually belive all your god loveing spill.
who bad u r,u really do need savin,from yourself,
Please blue, your poorly articulated response does not further the discussion and should be kept to yourself.
That says a lot about you if you couldn’t have come up with the guideline of not killing people without reading it in a book.
lol. I like you, larry.
I keep saying this and nobody ever listens.
Who really is the ignorant one? The people who know enough about religion to make a logical choice based on their knowledge, or the person who cant take a step back and think what if god really didnt exist/(why?)
There are many people who know vasts amounts of religion and are heavily devout to the Creator- including some who were brought up in an atheist environment and broke free from that.
Broke free from athiesm? Wow, you make it sound like being an athiest is like being a prisoner. I would argue that it is in fact the complete opposite. Coming from a religious background, I can see in hindsight what a prisoner I really was when I followed the faith. Becoming an non-believer has done far more for me in terms of openness and freedom to explore and learn than religion ever did. All religion did was force on me a belief that I was born bad (into sin) and as a result have to toil and live with a low self esteem my whole life to become a perfect worshiper for an egotistical, jealous, viscous and most importantly, fictional deity. Screw that! As far as I know, I only get to live once. I want to make the most of it while I’m here.
“logical God”? Can you say “oxymoron”?
Accusing rational people who have outgrown the need to be coddled/controlled by a religion of not having the imagination to discover or prove various aspects of our universe? Did you even read those quotes? Are you not aware of the repression that Christianity has subjected scientific discovery to?
I’m sorry, as soon as anyone opens their mouth to proclaim their belief in an invisible guy who lives in the clouds, I quit listening.
“guy who lives in the clouds”?? wrong. God is everywhere and He is actually not a guy. He is referred to as a “He” only because there is no pronoun to use in place of God. He is neither woman nor man. He is an omnipotent being. by the way, any scientific discovery is OWNED by God. He created everything.
For a being who is “neither woman nor man,” he sure didn’t have a problem with putting women on the lowest rung of the totem pole.
Also, “any scientific discovery is OWNED by God”? So now we’re going to give God the credit for literally everything ever? It was God who created the light blub, not Edison? Okaaaay, than.
Ever notice someone who is obsessed with becoming something they are not, namely a perfect “Christlike” being, and condemns others for not being the same way? they are disillusioned and usually secretly unhappy.
I say each to their own…
Many of these quotes are not condemning you for your beliefs (although some are), they are merely pointing out other ways of thinking. Most of the condemnation is directed towards the organised religion, which has bred ignorance, hate, and intolerance for a very long time.
The only thing that actually angers me is when religious people try to force others to their particular view without any putting forth any effort to try to understand the opposing views.
Open your mind and give every idea a fair chance.
“Either way, what I believe is that my deity is all forgiving and understands that because we are flawed and ignorant (like you), he can give us a break and forgive that we are curious little things that dont have the brain capacity to imagine something that our cocky little species can’t discover or prove”- Erika,(or any other believer) Would love to hear what your god has to say about children with cancer or kids with incurable disabilities.Please dont use logic because you can either be logical or a believer.
people are so lazy and spoiled and want everything handed to them on a gold platter. you want to get to heaven? you have to work for it. just like anything else. so God created us as animals who can reason and have free will to choose as we want. its hard to resist sinning, but the incentive- your spirit will live in eternal happiness when its capsule (the human body) passes away. life is a test.
Ben i believe the same “to each their own”…it all narrows down to being a good person…although perspectives on what constitutes a “good person” is a whole other conversation.
right on.
I have a quote for you:
If we evolved through natural selection, each of us is a living miracle. If we were created, it was a botched up job.
Dr John Cocker
Ah, I like that quote, John. And I think all of these quotes are great in their own way.
I hope this site stays up for a long time.
Would be nice to have an RSS feed, though. Oh well.
err.. you mean like this? https://irreligion.org/feed/atom/
Guess I overlooked it. Thanks, Ian.
I like your Christ; I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.
~ Mohandas Gandhi
Beautiful.
Very true, and very sad. Is it not?
great collection. i can longer tolerate their ignorance. They say i need another eye and ear to perceive god. when am i gonna grow them?
“I swear by my life and my love of it that I will never live for the sake of another man nor ask another man to live for mine!”
Ayn Rand in Atlas Shrugged
“Truth is treason in a world of lies.”
Ron Paul in The Revolution: A Manifesto
I like this. Very nice Galtgulch
A Christian friend of mine said that people needed God to guide them in ethical living. I asked him “Which God; the one in the New Testament who taught that we should turn the other cheek when smitten, or the one in the Old Testament who exulted in the dashing out of the brains of infants? According to your theology, they are one and the same, and eternally unchanging, but I can’t seem to reconcile the two.”
Man made God while other men were looking.
I like this one. :)
Atheism: A non-prophet organization.
George Carlin
….LOL
kool as hell
“I was catholic…until I reached the age of reason.” -George Carlin
“‘Sanctity of life,’ makes you feel special, doesn’t it? To believe that, somehow, life is sacred. But look at what we kill. Flies and mosquitoes? Because they’re pests! Chickens and pigs. Because we’re hungry. Lions and tigers? Because it’s fun! And people! We kill people! Why? Because they’re pests! And, it’s fun! We get to *choose* which forms of life we feel are sacred, and we get to kill the rest.” -George Carlin
Also I was happy to see the quote that retard Sarah Palin misquoted of Abe Lincoln’s. She was like ‘Abe Lincoln told us to pray to god for us to win the war’ and I was like ‘NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO he said ‘why pray, the other side is praying too, what would god think?’
It’s like back when the Phillies were playin’ the Giants for the NL Pennant and they were down 3 games to 1, some phan on the Phillies Facebook page was like ‘wooo bring them back to philly, and the rest of us: pray pray pray’ and i was like, ‘you can pray to your imaginary god if you want, but what would god think, both teams’ fans praying for their own team to win…it’s a f*cking game, you think god is gonna take sides?”
Of course god takes sides in baseball… but only the side of the redsox… they are the chosen ones, very similar to the jews in the bible. he let them wander in the desert (losing streak) for 86 years (46 more than the jews) until they were led to the promised land. lol.
People, people, people – you confuse God with religion. Be still and you will know. THe truth is in you
This is true, To earn the title of “God” you must kill many. To earn the title of “religion” you must have 5,000 followers. Yes, let that sink in… anything can be a religion… with 5,000 followers. (silly logic yes??)
by that logic, just about every celebrity in holywood (oops, hollywood) is a religion in and of themselves.
“If I were to drop to my knees in public, praising god and all of his supposed grandeur aloud, I would be looked at by most as a individual that possesses a profound relationship with my god. If I were to do the same, but merely replace the title of god with any name not associated with any religion, ex. (Platypus King); The mumbles, whispers, and the shouting from passerbys would begin, questioning my sanity all while my continued ranting would only incite their rage. Eventually, I would be ambushed by local authorities for creating a public disturbance. I would then be given a mental evaluation and confined to a room with padded walls, (me).”
A good feeling came from this one. I am happy to have stumbled across this beautiful compilation.
This is the one i like the best.
The World is divided into armed camps ready to commit genocide just because we can’t agree on whose fairy tales to believe.
In the end, Religion will kill us all.
– Ed Krebs
“What can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence” – Christopher Hitchens. Legend.
“Gods are children’s blankets that get carried over into adulthood.” – James Randi
i could only wish that everyone would read these… sadly i have the feeling that the people who need to read them will stop after reading after 2 or 3 of them. ignorance is bliss i guess.
Its ok, you can all stop now ,,
I like your Christ; I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.
~ Mohandas Gandhi
Whatever Gandhi this is, I likes it.
I AM IN LOVE WITH THE INVISIBLE PINK UNICORN!!!
Faith is willful ignorance for personal reward. Those who are willing their own ignorance are not willing to read secular quotes and think them through, because they fear for that reward they’ve been coveting for so long.
Those who can make you believe in absurdities can make you commit atrocities. – Voltaire
There will be two dates on your tombstone. And anyone you might have known will read ‘em. But all that’s gunna matter is the little-dash between ‘em
Life is short, art long, opportunity fleeting, experience treacherous, judgment difficult.
amazing. simple amazing
Loved the one by Gandhi. Have been saying for years that more harm has been done in the name of religion than anything else I can think of. And if you have any doubt, look back in history … the crusades, the reformation, Salem witch trials, the holocaust, 9-11 … damn, the bible is an adventure in violence, full of murder stories.
God made religion, and we made god.
Religion was formed as a need to social structure. Rules are simply guidelines for what is fair or just. It is the way those among us whom are educated enough to place restrictions on those who no no better. However once you are able to distinguish between right and wrong the rules no longer apply. Judgement and wisdom come inevitably to those unworthy and unprepared but this is the worth we live in. Likewise those who have been enlightened to this truth are subsequently suppressed by the masses misguidance and misfortune. To be able to judge from right and wrong is the true purpose of religion.
Gods however have existed long before the creation of organised religion. Before we consciously thought of ourselves as humans we have believed that their was/were god(s). Subconsciously we have the need to be able to look up to something. We are unable to see the pinnacle of life so we place something there. Little did we realize that we were the top of the food chain, the highest of beings. Nowhere in the world was the surreal not imagined. Why? Ideas are constantly flowing and we share our personal epiphanies with others, much like how I am currently typing to you, reader. The more intriguing the idea the more likely it is to spread. The fact that you have all likely succumbed to the thought that possibly their is a god or pantheon of gods overseeing us is proof. We created divine beings out of the need not to solely rely on ourselves.
Religion has simply been a mask to hide our goals and desires. Whether it is Shi’a fighting Sunni Muslims or the Crusades we have all justified our wars and battles from either greed, religion or spite. Countless battles, both civil and between empires and countries have been fought for these reasons
I just want to clarify a couple of your points…
It’se more accurate to say that MANKIND made religion and MANKIND thought up the gods.
Gods did not exist before religion, the CONCEPT of gods existed. Just like unicorns, vampires and werewolves existed conceptually in literature and fiction, but not in actual history or reality.
I’m sure you know this but others reading your comment may interpret it differently.
Great stuff much more of this is needed, to -day
OMG NOOOO he speaks O_O! >.<''' ha ha ha good one =P
If you could reason with religious persons, there would be no religious persons.
Here is a ringer, (old saying) I (we) old autistic grew up in a different world, we inadverently learned a different ,long hand version of human thought. Once we learn this and short cut our thoughts we do normal thought just like you do. While we were in special education and just plain odd strange kids /we finally came out as Einstein.
Our picture based thought system seems to be the core of the human mind and indeed the long hand thought that makes us (humans) work. Our autistic minds have never been in a text book before and they offer the insight to the next 1000 chapters in psychology. Sadly they also make the point man is not all that “smart”. Via our Picture thought (and yours, you don’t know you have it) every answer of makind and his mind and his need for religions are all exposed. We are not that far removed from the cave person.
Rich Shull- Inventor of the Turing Motor a Green triple hybird car motor with no up and down moving parts that runs on compressed air ,electric and gas.
PS Autism Old working Autism is not the “I have fallen and get up stuff of today”, It was indeed Einstein and Computers ,our Alan Turing (1912-1954) was father of the computer and like the rest of us he started out as a super geek.
wow. i really enjoyed this. religion is the beign of our existence
Did you mean, “bane”?
I like, but I can’t quote it exactly so please forgive me, “an invisible man that lives in the sky that loves you but if you don’t follow his impossible rules he ll send you to q lake of fire for an eternity oh and he need money too.”
My mother and sister derive incredible strength and comfort from God/Jesus/Christianity. An atheist myself, and one who certainly enjoys a heated theological debate from time to time, I can’t bring myself to argue (discussions inevitably turn to arguments) theology with my family. “What am I hoping to achieve here?” I ask myself. Both of them are wonderful, caring and charitable people and I’d be taking their greatest comfort away from them, for what?
A sentiment from the film “Religulous” struck a chord with me, that of religion actively harming humanity. From that viewpoint it seems obvious that us atheists should go on a !crusade! to enlighten all the believers as to the folly of their ways. But would that not be remarkably similar to what was done by the earliest proponents of religion, truly believing they were doing right?
Yes, many terrible things have been done, and continue to be done, in the name of religion. But the followers, or faithful, were led and indoctrinated by a handful of inherently evil “leaders”. It is not difficult to imagine these “leaders” using any and all means available to them to further their own agendas, religion just happened to the best one available.
Reading the posts above I definitely sense an aggressive tone in the replies to a post from someone who is a believer. My feeling is that people be allowed to formulate their own beliefs. The time of “converting” people is over. All the information you could possibly want on the matter is available to everyone, perhaps just an encouragement to look at the argument from both sides is all that is required, for atheists and believers alike.
“If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him.” – Voltaire
“Some people say there is a God. Others say there is no God. The truth probably lies somewhere in-between.” – W.B. Yeats
“The easy confidence with which I know another man’s religion is folly teaches me to suspect that my own is also.” – Mark Twain
Once my friend told me that he had found Jesus. I thought to myself, “Woohoo, we’re rich!” It turns out he meant something different. – Emo Philips
How about:
‘”God” is “Dog” spelled backwards.’ — Brian Grover
I have a couple questions. I love science, but I would like to know why it is that people believe that religion is less logical than science? At this point in time it is believed that evolution is the way in which this world was created, that the universe has bounds, and there is a super-massive black hole in the center of the galaxy that will swallow us up in a couple trillion years. Many would answer, it is because there is physical evidence, scientists have done countless studies and there is no way any of these claims could be false. Well, not too long ago science “proved” that spontaneous regeneration was the method that some animals used for reproduction and the Earth was flat. Why is it that the ideas perpetuated by scientific reasoning can be disproved so often, and people still follow it blindly based on faith (the word many of the people in earlier arguments seem to equate with idiocy) in scientists and their research. Why are people being branded as being crazy or undereducated for believing in religion? Why is it so much easier for people to believe that in ideas proven by science. For example, the universe has boundaries, you haven’t seen them, but u take it on faith. Just as religious people base their beliefs in a God on faith; for them there is evidence that He exists. In many ways science seems to be just as flawed as some claim religion is.
We need to stop branding each other as “closed minded” or “fundamentalist”; to use these terms you yourself would have to be closed minded. We should all be open to the idea that maybe our own ideas are wrong, maybe a greater power does exist, maybe it doesn’t. The only reason religion is flawed, in my opinion, is that humans are essentially flawed. The basic ideas and laws behind many religions are essentially the same. The basic ideas that are perpetuated by many religions, love your neighbor, love yourself, cherish the gift of the earth, are all beautiful. Religion became flawed when it was interpreted by humans and their limitations. Religion becomes more flawed when people and their flaws take ideas, warp them, and force them on others. This is not loving your neighbor and is frowned upon by religious and non-religious alike.
I think that it was Confucius that said, “the answer is always in the mean”. My concluding questions are, why can’t religion and science coincide? Why can’t science be God’s method? We all need to realize that we are all brothers and sisters whether you believe in science (evolution, we all have the same ancestors) or religion (it says it in the book) and we need to respect each other and their ideas as such, no matter how ridiculous they might seem.
“When you call yourself an Indian or a Muslim or a Christian or a European, or anything else, you are being violent. Do you see why it is violent? It is because you are separating yourself from the rest of mankind. When you separate yourself by belief, by nationality, by tradition, it breeds violence. So a man who is seeking to understand violence does not belong to any country, to any religion, to any political party or partial system; he is concerned with the total understanding of mankind.”
~ J. Krishnamurthi
P.S. Just so there’s no confusion, I am not bashing atheists, I’m just trying to understand their ideas better.
It’s incredibly rare for a widely accepted scientific theory to be invalidated. Instead they are frequently improved.
Newtonian theory is a great example. Newtonian mechanics work great for almost everything you’ll deal with on a day to day basis, but if you start working with objects moving at near light speeds, the theory stops working. What is then needed is General relativity. It’s not that newton was “wrong”, it’s that he had not tested all possible scenarios.
Evolution is an observable phenomena, we see it happen, we know it happens, it does happen. It is so unlikely that evolution will ever be proven complete wrong, or even slightly wrong, that it would be statistically insignificant, and not worth thinking about. Evolution is as close to fact as you can bring a theory (yes, it’s a theory because we’re not talking about math, only math can ‘prove’ something to be the case).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newtonian_mechanics#Limits_of_validity
>Why are people being branded as being crazy or undereducated for believing in religion?
Because there is NO evidence to back up *anything* religion claims. Zero. Religion isn’t even a theory, since there’s nothing to test, nothing that can possibly be verified (and the things that can be verified, have been proven false). Religion is misinformation. Religion is a lie.
>Why is it so much easier for people to believe that in ideas proven by science.
For the same reason its easy to believe that the earth is round. There is evidence to back it up. Science is NOT a belief system. Science is an extension of rationality and logic. Religion is essentially the opposite of logic.
>For example, the universe has boundaries, you haven’t seen them, but u take it on faith.
Prove it.
>Just as religious people base their beliefs in a God on faith; for them there is evidence that He exists.
No there isn’t. A belief is not a proof. Just because you really want god to exist, does not make him exist.
>We need to stop branding each other as “closed minded” or “fundamentalist”; to use these terms you yourself would have to be closed minded.
How about no.
>We should all be open to the idea that maybe our own ideas are wrong, maybe a greater power does exist, maybe it doesn’t.
No, gods don’t exist. Until I see a single shred of evidence, I will not waste any time postulating the plausibility of gods, ghosts, goblins or any other fairy tales.
>The basic ideas and laws behind many religions are essentially the same.
No, they really aren’t. You really need to study world religions if you think they all believe the same things…
Unless you mean they’re all equally stupid, in which case, you’re right.
>The basic ideas that are perpetuated by many religions, love your neighbor, love yourself, cherish the gift of the earth, are all beautiful.
… and kill those who do not follow your religion… and believe in my god or you will suffer for eternity in hell…
>Religion became flawed when it was interpreted by humans and their limitations.
Who’s fault is man’s limitations? If god existed, I would blame him, since we’re supposedly made in his image.. by him.
>Religion becomes more flawed when people and their flaws take ideas, warp them, and force them on others.
Which is probably the most standard feature of a religion.
Thank you for your response. You had a lot of good points that I have to consider but I just want to pick your brain for a few more things. I have studied world religions and from what I understand for the most part they all believe in a higher power, they set guidelines for how to live, and most in the purest sense are peaceful. For example, most basic belief in Hinduism is that all life is sacred, so killing someone in the name of their religion would go against everything they believe. Also it is an unfair generalization that religious people kill those who don’t believe in the same God as theirs. I have friends that practice Buddhism, Islam, Judaism, Catholicism, various forms of Protestantism, and people that live by the Atheist philosophy and I have never felt the need to kill/convert them. I also feel that when they die they all will go to heaven if they are good to others and themselves. I simply can’t believe in a God that goes around damning people. It seems that you are basing most of your opinion of religion on the human history associated with it. Religion teaches us to sacrifice ourselves for the greater good, not to kill each other. It’s the radicals that kill but not just when religion is involved, it’s in every group.
Yes in general religions believe in one or more higher power and set moral guidelines; that’s within the definition of religion. But by no means is Christianity peaceful. There is plenty of quotes in the bible that command people to be put to death – for not putting their god first, for working on Sabbath, for adultery and many other reasons. He tells us not to commit murder but this does not include putting women and children to death in punishment. “I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God. I punish the children for the sins of their parents. I punish the grandchildren and great-grandchildren of those who hate me” Exodus 20:5. And sure, I’ve seen plenty of radical athiests on murderous rampages
This has been very good for me.
I like your Christ; I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.
~ Mohandas Gandhi
I believe not because i was good enough or was looking for God or anything like that. The Bible talks about all of these issues beautifully and from a perspective of perfection, that would look very different from how we see it. The truth, we are all close minded. Lets not run from it lets face it. So i ask what is the root of close-mindedness? Pride in ourselves. Now that is a touchy subject, is pride good or bad. Pride blinds because we give pride to our selves and so it is unjustly given. The old saying “you cant be a judge in your own court” i believe to be full of wisdom. Pride-fullness aka our egos. The church is history’s biggest offender but this church is nor what Christ wanted the church of acts was his church. Pride blinds us. Our egos blind us and we refuse to humble our selves and see what the root of the problem is, ourselves. This is one of the major points of the Bible, its world changing.I changed a while back but I’m not perfect and i have not given everything i own to become as such so I’m flawed and its my choice. Love, people its the only way even to the point of loving ones enemy’s no especially ones enemy’s.Brake the spiral inside ourselves……Then we might just find God there all along. And so I’ll end with two of mt favorite quotes.
-”The first step in wisdom is the admittance that i don’t know”.
-”Its not what the world has in store for you its what you have in store for the world”
Religion is the ultimate expression of selfishness.
Religion is the blind belief in things one would like to be true.
Faith is the unquestioning acceptance of beliefs in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary.
If a ‘god’ created this universe, where was he before doing so? And, why did ‘god’ wait since the beginning of time until 13,7 billion years ago to create it?
‘God’ created man as imperfect and then punishes man for being imperfect. That makes ‘god’ a sadist.
Faith is the attitude that anyone who does not think like me deserves to be tortured for all eternity.
>Well, not too long ago science “proved” that spontaneous regeneration was the method that some animals used for reproduction and the Earth was flat.
The difference between “Science” saying the earth is flat, and the “Bible” saying the earth is flat, is that the Bible still says it is.
great point.
Another point of note: Pythagoras proposed a spherical earth… 600 years before Jesus.
And it took us 2000 years for a radical to go against the Church and…
Prove the triangle guy right! Way to go, religion. Stepping on the little guys foot since God-knows-when.
That’s funny, because it may or may not be true.
There are millions of quotes stating for and against religion. Saying that religion is the basis of morals is in my opinion wrong. I don’t believe in god, gods or invisible pink unicorns and yet I don’t feel the need to steal, kill, maim or whatever to anyone. I’m always quite happy to engage in theological discussions with people because they each offer their own view into the shared delusion I guess. I spoke to one person who volunteered in Poland and a little boy broke his leg so she prayed and it healed itself miraculously. I politely informed her that was not the work of god but of the human body and evolution. I usually end up quoting Bertrand Russells flying teapot idea or just point out that it’s not up to me to prove something to be false but for them to prove it’s real. So far I’ve not seen any proof that god exists but plenty that he doesn’t.
When you read quotes from men like Jefferson, Adams, Franlin, and Lincoln. You come to realize that America is a country that was not founded on religious dogma, but reason. We stand at a point in history now, where all the churches have battled their way into our government and blinded the majority of American society to this reason. And these dogmas being pressed into the minds of the people have been so successful, that the average American doesn’t even know the real reason that our founding fathers incited a revolution in the first place.
I can’t believe there are people on here arguing the existence or non-existence of a god. Do any of you people know the meaning of irreligion? It’s indifference towards religion, not being so presumptuous to assume that we as humans have the knowledge of the existence or non-existence of any higher power. We do not have the knowledge to PROVE or DISPROVE any such existence, so therefore we cannot say whether there is or is not a god. We could be the dreams of a sleeping dog and not know the difference. Atheism is just as arrogant and empty as an theism, and it is one never ending circular argument. No matter what amount of disdain in your voice or smug jokes you crack on one another is going to change anyone’s belief. Every one of you is showing bad character talking down to someone for their religious (or irreligious) views, no matter how right you think you are. Just bad character, and mean people.
there’s actually a difference.
Atheists never spent their spare time killing people who (dis)believe differently.
there’s been cases of church shootings done by atheists, many also who hate god and christians so much that they carry out all the anger and rage on them. and also stalin was an atheist and wanted to rid religion.
>there’s been cases of church shootings done by atheists
Lol, cite that claim please.
>many also who hate god and christians so much that they carry out all the anger and rage on them.
Woah, people hating another group and “raging” at them?! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!
Also, stalin might not have been specifically religious, but that had nothing to do with his actions. “Not believing in god” is not a reason to do something and more than your lack of belief in Thor makes you do anything.
http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=3982722&page=1
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jared_Lee_Loughner
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SuccessTech_Academy_shooting
sure, because when a pro lifer kills an abortionist doctor it’s christianity that needs to be blamed, not his actions. because when a woman drowns her children it’s christianity that needs to be blamed, not her actions. and lol @ you for trying to use the “not beliving in god is not a reason…” excuse. many suicidal people have inflicted harm on others and/or went on a crime/shooting spree because of their absence of faith in god. but of course they “didn’t” do these things in the name of atheism… any less than a pro lifer kills an abortion doctor or a woman drowns her children or an old hag kills a dog because it was chewing the bible in the name of god. it’s the sick twisted people to blame, not god.
If your god existed then he would be the biggest killer of us all.
And on that note, you can’t say “there is no god” and simultaneously capitalize the word god! Capitalization is a sign of respect, come on people!
It’s ok to be respectful to people you disagree with.
I usually reserve my disrespect for people who knowingly mislead or lie..
Side note, irreligion *can* mean indifference, but it can also mean ‘active hostility towards religion’…
I’m irreligious and have a real problem with religion… :)
I really wish I never started thinking about this. Religion may be, ignorance, but ignorance is bliss. I was perfectly fine thinking I would exist forever for the first 18 years of my life. The more I read, the more I think, the less I believe. The only thing that scares me more than the concept of hell did for my entire life leading up to this point is the concept that I will not exist anymore after I die.
Okay, maybe I should be more upset that people told me about catholicism to begin with, but still.
1) I wish nobody ever told me about religion.
2) Given that this already occurred, I wish nobody ever told me that it was all a lie.
Okay, atheists, given that religion is BS, please tell me, what do you live for? And what do you think will happen after? I know this will sound absolutely pathetic, but please do not flame me or anything like that. I am still entirely uncomfortable with not believing, but I cannot do anything else now.
Everyone dies, but not everyone really lives.
Thinking you will live forever just means you’re more likely to put things off and not enjoy the life you have. If you ever think about “what it would be like not to exist anymore”, just think about what it was like before you were born. Was it painful? Was it bad? Was it good?
Dying is not the worst thing that will happen to you, wasting your life being unhappy or afraid is.
Don’t focus on all the bad things, instead work on being happy and enjoying what life has to offer.
Very good response. Thank you.
This. Fucking this.
Anyway, I understand your situation very well. Don’t be afraid of life and death, for everyone is going to die one day. When will that happen? I don’t know, but I wouldn’t worry about it. Even without religion, your life can still have a meaning. In fact, you’re most likely to have a greater lifespan than when you had religion, since you’ll be forced to define your life’s meaning by thinking for yourself (only YOU can define it… not religion, not your friends, etc.).
You’re still anxious about all this religion stuff, so if I may I would like to show you a good site for former/deconverting Christians to gather around and discuss their life stories. Check out http://www.exchristian.net, where you can read testimonials posted every 1-2 days.
Also check this site out if you’re not certain how to live your life post-religion: http://www.decidingtobebetter.com/
Trust me, you’re not alone.
The following quotation is a chapter heading in Arthur Koestler’s book ‘Darkness at noon’ published by Penguin Books.
‘When the existence of the church is threatened, she is released from the commandments of morality. With unity as the end, the use of every means is sanctified, even cunning, treachery, violence, simony, prison, death. For all order is for the sake of the community, and the individual must be sacrificed to the common good.
DEITRICH VON NIEHEIM,
BISHOP OF VERDEN:
De schismate libri 111, A.D. 1411.
Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing?
Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing?
Then why call him God?
~Epicurus
its really infallible and simple logic… whether there IS a god or ISNT a god is not the question…. the real question is, is he worthy of our worship?
The philosopher has never killed any priests, whereas the priest has killed a great many philosophers.
~ Denis Diderot
Though Im sure at least one philosopher has gone the route of violence in history, the truth in this quote is unmistakable, reasonable people dont boil others in oil for the words and noises that come from a persons mouth. Rationality + Proof > Faith.
“Man Will Never Be Free Until The Last King Is Strangled With The Entrails Of The Last Priest.”
I’m not sure who said that one, and I dont feel like googling it, but that is the epitome of freedom, strive for it, and be a human of the human race, not a slave of your devine overlords….. mutiny i say!! ;)
Best quotes I’ve ever seen, period.
Nothing beats these quotes, all said by men who actually made a difference in the world, as one quote you left reads:
“two hands working can do more than a thousand clasped in prayer”