Posted by Jim Henderson on: 03.16.2006 /
From Comment# 9 Monstrous Certainty
“I’m curious to know if an Atheist ever doubts anything about his/her position? I don’t see that kind of processing going on much in this blog”
Here are some responses
# 19 “The entire basis of the atheist viewpoint is doubt! We just prefer to call it skepticism and incredulity. I think part of the problem is that to show doubt is to show weakness. In a discussion with someone holding an opposing view showing doubt is like rolling over to expose your soft bits. Normally in this type of discussion my opposite number would latch onto any doubt I show and use it against me. So… to expose myself… what makes me doubt atheism? Quantum mechanics. I’ll admit that I have a VERY layman’s understanding of this topic, but one of the things I understand it to say is that certain events, at the quantum level, cannot be predicted, because…
# 31 My ability to doubt and be a skeptic is exactly what led me to become an atheist, from being a hardlined christian who even to this day, is surrounded by christianity. And personally, I do not know a single atheist who was raised “atheist.” Most who are in this camp, like kirk cameron for instance, were merely raised non religious, and weren’t raised with critical thinking skills…
Comment by: Siamang
1Three word answer: All…The…Time!
If I didn’t doubt myself, I wouldn’t ever think about atheism. There would be no point. I could just put it all on a dusty shelf and get back to other things.
What makes me doubt? Well, what makes everyone doubt? The possiblity you’re missing out on something else. A better, richer understanding of something.
I don’t currently think that God, as understood by my fellow humans, holds that missing puzzle piece for me. Perhaps the puzzle will remain unfinished when I die.
I can’t tell, from my vantage point, if other people have found a piece there that really fits, or if they’ve fashioned a shape themselves with cardboard and a pair of scissors. That’s a personal discovery.
Comment by: TXatheist
2I know I do. I said about 4 hours on hemant’s blog I like to be corrected. It was about the industrial revolution and I was wrong, thanks to Siamang and Texan I won’t do it again:) I also hope xians answer this question. When I first said something skeptical it went like this to a xian friend “I think there is a 1% chance there is no god”. I’ve been moving toward atheism more and more from that point about a decade ago.
Comment by: Tom in Sacramento
3For any of the atheistic persuasion, a question of curiousity. Working as an analyst in a university, I am paid to be skeptical and analytical. My wife would say that I never take that hat off. Rick probably would agree. ;-) But I look at the evidence and find it sufficient, especially so if what the Bible says is true.
My curiousity is, at what point or points do you find it wanting? (Don’t want to argue points, just want to understand the difference in our responses to more or less similar sets of data.)
Tom in Sacramento
Comment by: TXatheist
4What evidence? Please, that word is stickler so I don’t get it when people use it when refering to religion/god.
Comment by: Jim Henderson
5Siamang - I love the simple elegance of your language
TX - I think Christians have been pretty forth coming about their doubts but as always we are always open to more
Comment by: Jim Henderson
6Tom and TX (or anyone) If you find yourselves needing to have a longer conversation there is plenty of room at the bottom of The Post Atheist Becomes Christian Sort of
Sorry for the detour - We will get a longer discussion oriented thread going pretty soon that connects to this blog so people can participate in and FIND the conversations they are most interested in sticking with
Comment by: Denigma
7I too would say I’ve had my moments of doubt. Not so much in terms of religion, such as “What if I’m wrong and Christianity/Islam/Hinduism/etc. is right and I’ll be heading to hell if i don’t accept this or that prophet and follow this or that tome.” But more like “right now I don’t believe in any greater being or sentient all-powerful/knowing entity, but what if there is one?” It’s not really something that i’ll lose sleep over, but rather something that is interesting to ponder and think about.
Ironically, it was when I went to college and began studyin science that gave me these pauses. For the record, I absolutely believe in the formation of the universe 13-14 billion years ago, that life evolved from single cell organisms, and so forth. But after REALLY learning about how complex and beautiful life is, I sometimes wonder about the BEFORE. Did the first cells aggregate from the rich soup of ions and nutrients and proteins that existed on Earth back then? Did they fuse together in the busy colonies of particles in space and crash into our planet? Or did they have a helping hand? And yes, quantum mechanics, physical and organic chemistry…it is not hard to stop for a second and think “Maybe something out there had a hand in how all this started.”
Comment by: TXatheist
8Jim, will do on the Tom/TX conversation but I have yet to see where a xian says something like “I now question if Jesus existed at all”. That level of doubt is what I’m talking about. Forgive me if I’m wrong but I don’t recall seeing that.
Comment by: Jim Henderson
9TX- Got it
When you guest host this blog you can ask that question - how about that?
Comment by: TXatheist
10Thanks Jim.
Comment by: Ir
11I have lots of doubts - but I’m not sure whether I’m a real atheist (I guess that’s one of my doubts).
Comment by: Stephan
12Ir, the term LOL is used far too often in blog-dom. In this case, I can sincerely say I laughed out loud.
I’m sure you’ve heard the one about the agnostic insomniac dyslexic. They laid awake all night wondering if there really was a dog.
Comment by: Eliza
13“Question skepticism” - my favorite bumper sticker! Everything is, for me, grist for skeptical inquiry - how do we know? how do we know that we know? who says so, and on what basis, and what do they have to gain? and so on. Tom, you said:
I look at (read) the Bible and find it insufficient as evidence for the existence of any divine entity, in fact inadmissible as evidence because of its internal contradictions and - imho - the overt stamp of humans on its content. “What point or points” = too many to list here. I would love to participate in a Bible study group of Christians and skeptics - would love to find out how it is that others see incontrovertible evidence where I see holes, gaps, and a story that just doesn’t hang together.
Comment by: Eliza
14On the question, Do atheists ever doubt? Well, I’m comfortably secure in my own belief that the Christian God/Trinity doesn’t exist. I think there might be a force or forces much greater than ourselves that had a hand in forming the universe as we know it, but also that such force(s)/god(s) would not have or seek interactions with us at any level that we can recognize/understand, thus we cannot know (a-gnosis). As if we were nematodes in the dirt, trying to understand the gardener, who has heard about us but doesn’t consider us in his/her actions.
Comment by: cautious
15As a (wannabe) scientist, I have doubts where our observations of the natural world cannot take us: before the Big Bang and outside the Universe. These times and spaces, if they exist, are, quite literally, supernatural, and thus may be where all sorts of beings beyond belief occur.
But I don’t really have doubt in the mainstay of my beliefs: that no one is here to hold our hand and help us achieve a thing. The Universe did a splendid job of being around for a long time without our input. Our search for a benevolent being out there is a reaction to our collective inability to find one down here.
…which means we should do a better job of being nice people. The New Testament wouldn’t sell like hotcakes if its message was bad.
Comment by: David S
16When I was initially deconverting from Christianity and for a while as an agnostic I was a ball of doubt and fear about everything. Now I’m comfortable and confident as an atheist–but it’s a confidence in that I don’t know (and you likely don’t know either). That’s an entirely different sort of confidence than what theists have.
And to be honest as I’ve looked into some issues longer I get more confident about certain definitions of gods not existing… such as the god-of-the-perfect-error-free bible, or the god-that-creates-people-just-to-throw-them-into-hell. Those definitions of god are so full of holes or so absurd I have very little doubt of my position that they are highly unlikely to exist.
Comment by: S
17I have doubts sometimes too - especially when I think all the way back to the beginning and wonder where that infinitely dense ball of matter came from. But I don’t worry too much about it. I figure, if I lead my life the best way I can and with integrity, and love and care about people, then if God does exist and judgement day rolls around, He will see that. If He doesn’t, then I don’t want to worship a God who cares more about whether a speck of dust like me believed in him than about what I actually did with my life. I like to think that if God does exist, He would understand why it’s so hard to believe in Him.
Comment by: Annie
18I am a progressive Christian and I am fairly skeptical that we can take any of the Biblical stories about Jesus as much more reliable than other ancient stories about heroes and such. But he is mentioned in texts of Josephus, although they have been rewritten and changed, so I think there was probably a guy, named Jesus, involved in some new version of Judaism, of which there were many at that time.
Why am I a Christian then? Some would say I’m not. Progressive Christianity says that I am. I think the Jesus story is part of a larger system of myth (not in the negative sense) that is a story that speaks to me. Particularly the angle of the “radicality of God vs. the normalcy of civilization” to paraphrase John Dominic Crossan. For better understanding of where I am coming from, check out Joseph Campbell, John Shelby Spong, Marcus Borg.
(If you want to get back to why I believe in God, I’m fairly well a mystic, and after some transcendental experiences in nature, I feel something big connecting everything. I call it God, but see it in the intricacies of chaos theory, the mysteries of quantum physics, and the beauty of cell construction. Can’t prove it, just feel it.)
Caveat: These beliefs are my path, and I would never think of imposing them on anyone other than myself, so don’t feel the need to prove them beyond a reasonable doubt. They work for me and make me a better person. So don’t engage me in proofs, I am also a philosopher, and have come to the conclusion that logical proofs are useless in speaking to feelings such as love and religion.