I don’t understand why we are all so naive and confident as to assume that we must and do know everything right here, right now. You all have nice long rants about “Why we are” and “Scientists cannot replicate”: How “evolution fails” and “right from wrong”. Does anyone else (except myself, obviously) believe that we are all, in fact, ignorant? That evolution does not provide answers, but rather provides a question? That the idea of religion is close minded and stagnant, and the only refutation of evolution they provide is that it is changeable? And the evidence for evolution! Atheists shove “facts” into everyone’s faces, attempting time after time to disprove all Christianity in one final swoop, contradicting the very basis of itself, in that facts are never actually facts, and may never actually be facts, but are merely ideas that place hold for the next fact.

I’m an atheist, i agree with much of what some of you are saying. i still think you’re ignorant.

So far as your point is concerned, I think the big difference between religious people and atheists is that far more atheists will admit that they are ignorant. At least this has been my experience.

I would agree that there are far more questions in the universe than there are answers. That said, I think that science can help us march toward the truth in a way that faith cannot. While evolution does indeed seem to lead to more and more questions, those questions are part of a refining process of knowledge, not a sign of increasing ignorance (as you seem to be implying).

I agree that atheists who attempt to disprove Christianity by “shoving facts into everyone’s faces” may be misguided (and are, at lest, rude), but in those cases where Christians are making specific claims that can be tested, I do think that progress toward truth can be made by testing those claims.

As an agnostic, I find your site to be in bad taste and to be offensive.

That’s pretty harsh. Can you be more specific?

I appreciate your site. As a fellow atheist, I’m always glad to see people banding together in the name of reason. But I’m a little worried at the sarcastic nature of the site. For now at least, I feel that we should be using logic and reasoning to dissolve the idea of god instead of sarcasm. In my opinion i feel that it just give a theist a reason not to give up their beliefs.

The non-blog portion of the site is indeed a bit (okay, a lot) sarcastic. I agree that this is not a great way to “battle” religion, but it was meant more as an entertainment for atheists than a serious counter to religion.

While we’re on the subject, I also don’t feel a great need to battle against religion (and this puts me at odds with many of the “new atheists”). I feel that encouraging rigorous thinking and morality is a much higher priority at this time. I also think that, if we concentrate on critical thinking, much of religious thought will naturally fall by the wayside.

I don’t think many of your rights and responsibilities for atheists are reasonable.

Well, they’re not meant to be taken seriously, but I’d be interested to know which ones you don’t find reasonable.

As an Atheist, I found the “Argument Against” section to be rather childish and a tad bit intellectually insulting. Maybe I missed the point, and the purpose of the site is all about sarcastic humor, but even then it would still be pretty much without merit. While reading the mentioned section, I pictured someone actually using the provided responses and all I could envision was a person arguing with just as much fallacy as a bible thumper. I understand that you in no way set out to seem like some Atheist role model, but if someone who knew nothing of Atheists were to come across your site they might think us all idiots.

Peace out

Yep, it’s childish and intellectually insulting (as is the rest of the non-blog portion of the site). And, yes, it’s answering stupidity with stupidity. Personally, I think it’s funny.

I am an Australian Aborigine. I think if athiest means non-Christian or non any organized religion, then fine. Go for it. But please don’t denigrate God if you do not understand what spirituality is. The scientists, who have been pushing the philosophy of the power of individual logic and reason, got it wrong too. At least, it’s not the complete picture. Still, I enjoy your thinking and support your mission because of the terrible things that have been done in the name of God.

An atheist doesn’t believe in deities of any sort — whether part of an organized religion or not. In any case, as an atheist I don’t set out to denigrate God or spirituality. Rather, I’m just not convinced that God exists. Atheism is a statement about my beliefs, not an attack on yours.

Thanks for writing.

An honest question: how can you be so sure?

(Also, a pet peeve- your rights and responsibilities page. I didn’t get the memo that not believing in a god signed me up for a whole new other club. It’s a personal choice, belief, whatever; it’s not a church without a centre and it hasn’t got a specific creed. Grr.)

An honest answer: About what?

Not believing in God doesn’t “sign you up for a whole new other club.” But there are certain rights and responsibilities people have even without religion. So, in that sense, these rights and responsibilities are atheistic.

(Besides, that page is a satirical jab at intolerant theists — it’s not intended as a set of rules embedded in atheism.)

I noticed in your atheist rights and responsibilities, you list “Don’t be greedy”. I would argue that being greedy is not morally incorrect. In fact, I would argue that greed is a natural and society improving human process.

Laissez-faire capitalism is a system in which individuals produce goods and services that they trade with one another based on mutual consent, not on the use of force or fraud.

Ayn Rand emphasized that businessmen at their best will first and foremost love their work and the challenge of creating products and services that earn them profits. If that’s greed, it s to be praised! Rand also singled out for condemnation businessmen who seek money by any means, including fraud, or government handouts and special favors. If that s greed, it’s to be damned!

This passage (to me) clearly states why greed is good. There is both a moral and immoral way to use greed to be “successfully” in life.

One may be greedy and wish to have as much money as possible. In achieving this, he creates a life saving device which will never break, wear out and costs only a few dollars. Everyone buys one and the man reaches his goal.

Conversely, another man may be greedy and wish to have as much money as possible. In achieving this, he defrauds his customers into giving their bank account information and steals as much money as possible. He achieves his goal as well.

While achieving the same outcome, the means by which they were achieved is vastly different. Most people would call the first man a hero and the second, a crook, though both were greedy.

My point is that if we all lived morally (who’s morals is another argument) greed could be seen as a natural and society improving human process. An atheistic society does not have to reject greed as evil (Rands philosophy is clearly atheistic while honoring greed), but, more simply, it should reject the moral systems in which greed is used immorally.

**For simplicities sake (it is now 4:30am), portions of my passage where copy/pasted from [freerepublic.com URL]

In the context of my Rights and Responsibilities page, I consider greed to be striving for personal gain without consideration of moral consequences. Running a rival out of business by selling a better product is fine. Running a rival out of business by spreading malicious rumors is not.

By the way, I’m posting your note to my blog with a bit of hesitation. As a great believer in copyright preservation, it worries me that parts of your message might have been copied from a source to which you do not have rights. However, I can’t tell where your text ends and the copied text begins and I consider your message worth sharing, so I’m going ahead and putting it up. (But, to those readers whose notes I’ve skipped because they were not original, don’t take this as setting a precedent).

Even though I’m an atheist, i find the IAmAnAtheist.com website a bit offensive. I mean, no one should have the right to say to anyone whether or not he/she is an atheist, or a christian, or a pastafarian. I know it’s supposed to be funny but still, it struck a minor chord (ha ha lol, geddit? minor chord?? lol). Also, I disagree with your second atheistic right / responsibility. The word “worship” has more than one meaning, one of which is “To regard with ardent or adoring esteem or devotion” (from thefreedictionary.com – a very good site). So perhaps a little rewording would be nice, yes?

I also want to say, W00t ATHEISM! GO ATHEISTS! ATHEISTS ROCK! I AM AN ATHEIST! Atheism gives me all kinds of perks! Like … Working on Sundays, and the Ability to Learn EVERYTHING through Experience! MOre FREEDOM! YEEEAAH!!! w00t w00t … YeeaahH!! And, if I was a weak atheist, I could go closer to ‘God” as I experience life and the nature of things. Yup .. I Love being an atheist. I am PROUD to be an atheist! I feel that I even have a special bond with the true nature of things. Whenever I think of myself as an atheist, I smile with satisfaction! And I just wanted to say that because I’ve never done so before. ^_^

I agree that the site might be minorly offensive if one took it too seriously. However, I feel it’s clear enough that it’s a joke.

The wording of Right and Responsibility #2 is meant to parallel the second of the 10 Commandments, so I feel I’m kind of stuck with it. I feel that, in context, it’s meaning is reasonably clear.

Regarding your final paragraph — please set it to music and send us an MP3. Thanks!

I “stumbled” into this page using stumbleupon and was rather amused by the contents despite my Christian beliefs. I appreciate your attempt to knock down Christianity as far as possible, but would like to request that you understand it before commenting upon it. Christianity IS inherently exclusive – nobody is going to argue that with you and no amount of smart-aleck responses on your web page will stop that fact. The nice thing is that it is exclusive to everyone who chooses to be exclusive to it. There are no requirements except existence – all one has to do is join. Christians do not believe that Atheism is wrong for any reason other than that they believe that Christianity is correct. If you wish to debate that, by all means go for it, but I sincerely hope you’ve read enough books to make a case. You have my e-mail: I wish you the best of luck in evading ignorance. If you know something I don’t know I would be glad to discuss it with you.

I’m not attempting to knock down Christianity. Rather, I’m attempting to knock down a certain group of particularly annoying (and, often, willfully ignorant) Christians.

When you say that “Christians do not believe that Atheism is wrong for any reason other than that they believe that Christianity is correct,” I think you may be speaking over-broadly. There are many Christians who believe that being a non-Christian theist is better than being an atheist, or who think that atheists can’t have morality because they are godless.

You are right that Christianity has an “inclusive exclusive” thing going for it, and some brands of Christianity believe you can get to Heaven even if you are not Christian.

As for having done research, I was brought up Catholic, I’ve read various translations of the Bible, and I have 100+ books on the Bible and religion in my home library. I’m no expert in religion, but for an atheist I think I know my way around pretty well.