Is it possible that some believers can not even wrap their minds around the idea that atheists really, truly, do not believe in God?

~ I am what I am not. I believe that the Christian God controls my Astral traveling, but I don’t believe in religion.

Yes.
To be fair, quite a few atheists have trouble accepting that theists actually believe all these myths.

@talljasperman I wasn’t asking what you believed. Do you understand that, as an agnostic, I don’t believe there is a God any more than you believe Zeus is real?

@Dutchess_III: “Is it possible that when folks ask this question it’s because they can’t even fathom not believing in God?”

Actually, I suppose it’s possible that they could understand the concept if it weren’t for apologetic tactics that redefine atheism and teach that there is no such thing as not believing in god. Atheists have turned away from god, etc. It takes some aggressive re-defining and propaganda to be able to pull this off, but from what I have heard/read, this is fairly common.

@ragingloli – I’m glad I haven’t met any atheists that claim to be mind-readers and question someone’s beliefs. I tend to take people on their word.

@ragingloli Not all theists blindly believed. I didn’t. But I guess some do. Which I could never understand, not even as a Christian.

GA @hominid.

Some religions teach that knowledge of the existence of god is innate, and any deviation from that state is the result of personal choice or demonic influence.

To them, saying one doesn’t believe in god would be akin to saying one doesn’t believe in blue.

Yes, some people can’t wrap their heads around it. They don’t understand that an atheist does not hold the belief that God exists and they choose not to worship/reject God, but that they think the whole thing is fictional, like the tooth fairy.

Of course, not any different than me having a hard time wrapping my mind around how someone, could possibly believe in a magical almighty creator of the heavens and earth in the face of science and rational thought.
Or…if this is true why they will not admit that IF there is a “god” he/she it is really an alien, extraterrestrial being not a man.
I always think how funny it would be if “God” turned out to be some wobbling giant caterpillar thing with 12 eyes or another, less than, made in the image of man creature. haha

I’ve heard we also have mental problems if we don’t believe in God. We are insane.

@gorillapaws If I ask one if they believe that Zeus is real, and they say “Of course not,” and I say, “Then that’s exactly how I feel about God.” Why can’t they see it then?

People who believe in God…

And you really look for a meaningful conversation with them, on that topic?

@Dutchess_III Well they can see how you can believe in a different God (like Zeus), but the idea that the universe has SOME KIND OF CREATOR is such a fundamental belief in their view of the nature of reality that I think they have a hard time mentally wrapping their head around how someone could believe that the universe works in a radically different way. They may have never considered the implications of this.

So just to clarify, when they say they don’t believe in a particular God (e.g. Zeus) there isn’t a huge mental leap on their part. When you say that there are no Gods and the universe works in a radically different way, than they understand it, they really struggle to process that. Hopefully that was understandable; I fear I haven’t articulated my point very well.

I think some of it is fear.

I don’t really understand people who want to convert you to their beliefs. Is it because they are insecure with their beliefs themselves?

Christianity has a specific conversion edict. It had little to do with the believer’s comfort in their own beliefs.

An insecure Christian is less annoying than an arrogant one. Trust me.

In the case of Christianity, it’s because they are told that converting others is part of the deal. I guess you get brownie points for it.

I took a religion class in college once. The teacher said that Christianity is the only religion that actively goes out and recruits. Of course, that’s a very good deal for governments, which I suspect is at the root of that whole concept.

Yes. My mom could never grasp it. My cousins think I have mental problems.

If you admit and accept that one does not believe in any god it makes believing a choice and the idea of choice means that one can actually question the very idea of the existence of any god(s). That’s too close to choosing to believe there IS a god(s). Cognitive Dissonance. Most people can’t handle it.

Yes. It is also possible that this scenario exists in reverse. In fact, they both do. What have we learned?

I suspect that questions like this don’t come from an inability to fathom a lack of belief in God. To a believer trying to proselytize, it’s easier to work with someone who harbors some modicum of belief in God, even if that belief is so damaged that they no longer profess a belief. To the proselytizer, there’s something to work with there. It’s a repair job: correct their misconceptions about God and they’re back in the fold. If someone really doesn’t believe in God, then that’s the end of the discussion.

Some people can’t wrap the heads around anything that goes against anything they believe in or were taught to believe in.
That goes for God, politics, traditions, and so on.

Lol, I have trouble believing people actually believe in god. Well, not god, but Jesus and all the fairy tale stuff.

@Apparently_Im_The_Grumpy_One

I think, really, that the only thing that is learned is that nobody knows anything for certain. The revolving door just keeps revolving.
The hardest 3 words to be spoken are “I don’t know.”

Could you expound on that a bit more? Why do you feel “I don’t know” are the hardest 3 words to be spoken?

@ragingloli Well I guess I’m one of those. I spoke with these Jehova Witnesses before, and it seemed so odd and confusing that grown, mature and intelligent people would be telling me about lions learning how to eat grass and how Satan invented money.
It’s like they have to have some kind of secret hidden agenda or something because I just don’t understand how people would believe in those kinds of things, and tell them to me with a straight face.

I don’t know how to answer your question. I will apologize and move on. Sorry.

@talljasperman do you think it is possible for someone to literally not believe that there is a God?

@Dutchess_lll Yes. I’ve not believed in G (g)od for a couple of years. I believe that the government runs my life and not (G)god.

@Coloma I have a different opinion on “I don’t know”. I think those three words unlock an entirely new world. If I stop and admit I don’t know, then I can go forward and uncover new truths or new info and that expands my horizons a bunch. It’s learning all the time that opens my eyes.

Yes, I have that same feeling about a lot of Theists. Some even think that since Atheists don’t believe in “God,” that they are devil worshippers instead.

Possibly. The assumption of the existence of a supernatural deity is not a conclusion. It is a capricious “belief”, since anything that is “supernatural” can not be knowable by natural creatures like ourselves.

He or she who makes an assertion of existence of something, bears the onus to give evidence of existence. No different than if you make an accusation of murder, you must show evidence of murder to expect justice.

No such evidence is forthcoming regarding the existence of God, other than the Ancients believed it. If a comfy “belief” it is not sufficient evidence to convict you of murder, it is certainly not sufficient evidence to conclude that God exists.

Thus atheists simply draw a rational conclusion. Since there is no concrete evidence of God, there is no God. (If it turns out that God is in fact an expression of the “natural” world, and thus becomes knowable to humans, then many attitudes will change).

But, people who hold “beliefs” are not comfortable with reasoned conclusions. The demand for such would threaten to invalidate their capricious beliefs.

So they imagine that rational people are equally capricious and therefore arbitrarily reject the temptation to believe. It is a more comfortable paradigm than to have to consider the reasoning behind atheism.

This conflict expresses itself many ways beyond religion, by the way. Some people believe that the way to salvation is the establishment of an authoritarian government that steals from the bourgeoisie and gives to the proletariat. No evidence that this is true, but they “believe” it never the less. Equally capricious.

@Dutchess_III Being able for either an atheist or a believer to say ” I don;t know” usually doesn’t come easy. I think it is easier for the non-beleiver to say they don’t know than the firmly faith based.

@Adirondackwannabe Agreed, but in the case of most atheists and religious people neither want to entertain the others side. In this case I think it the opposite of what I said above, the non-believer doesn’t want to listen to a bunch of cryptic scripture quoting.

@Symbeline Haha..I hear ya. I used to live in the middle of a JW zone. They just seemed to materialize out of the woods, the stealth sect I think. Once I was asked if I wanted ” to live in paradise”, I replied “I already do.” ( Living on 5 secluded acres in the hills.)

Then of course, there is Marwyn my goose, I know I have mentioned before that he is the distinguished “Witness Protection” goose.
Aaah, my darling Marwyn, he has single beakedly driven off scores of witnesses leaving their Watchtower pamphlets fluttering in the weeds. The goose will not lie down with the witness. lol

I can imagine that, yes. Someone who has grown up with theists, never having had their beliefs questioned or even the possibility of other beliefs presented…absolutely.

There are many things I believe in without questioning them much. Gravity comes to mind, as well as evolution. I believe in the ideas of certain people I admire, I believe in climate change and I believe the Holocaust really happened.

I don’t pretend to understand gravity or evolution in their entirety. I can grasp the basic concepts, but there is definitely a bit of believing involved. If someone told me they did not believe in gravity, I’d have a hard time accepting that. I would probably drop apples or pens to convince them for quite a while, because I’d be concerned for them and astonished at how different their wold must be. I can imagine theists thinking the same about my lack of belief in God.

I do think a lot of theists can’t wrap their minds around the idea that atheists don’t believe in God. It’s partly why I am sure to call myself an atheist and not an agnostic, because using agnostic defnitely gives thests the fuel to believe I must sometimes consider God in my life.

I recently saw a show on atheists. It was an hour long show trying to explain how atheists think. I was pretty disappoiinted that the majority of the show was people who had left religion, or atheists who preached their atheism like the very religious people do. Literally, some of them were preachers of atheism holding services about it or going to college campuses and talking to students about it.

One man was a Christian Minister who felt badly that he had become an atheist many years ago, because he was basically lying to his congregration, but he still worked as a Minister, because that is his vocation. He partcipates in a website that gives atheist clergy an outlet.

I had hoped the show would be full of people who were raised atheists and are atheists and how life is for us. I was barely aware of God at all growing up. He was mentioned in books at holidays and I heard other people talk about God sometimes. I saw the movie Oh God with George Burns as a kid, it was very funny and cute. I ready Dear God It’s Me Margaret in my tweens. None of it registered with me that there really was a God, or that so much of the world believed in God.

Anyway, back to your Q, I just think that if you feel God is in everything you see and do, it’s incomprehensible to those people that atheists can even move out of bed without believing. For them it would be like all the oxygen being sucked out of the air. That’s how it seems to me. We don’t see oxygen, but of course it is there.

There are plenty of theists who can understand it though. I would say most people in my circle of friends don’t overanalyze it in any way. Some of us believe, some of us don’t, and it is completely a personal matter and does not affect much of anything when we interact.

It doesn’t affect much of anything for me either. It’s not like “OMG! This has changed my life!” Not at all.

Not only do I not believe in “God”, I’m not even sure what the word means. (Yes, I can read a dictionary, but that doesn’t seem to help, because none of the definitions make any sense to me. For example, if “God” is omnipotent [all-powerful] and “he” can do anything, how would that work exactly? Is it like magic? Or does “he” have some kind of cosmic computer [and we are all lines of code]?)
So I suppose it works the other way around also: not only can theists not imagine themselves not believing in “God”, they can’t even imagine anyone not believing in “him”.
(Too many negatives in that paragraph? Sorry….)

Sass that, @LurgidVogon. I take the same approach to for knockers and religious family members. They get quite annoyed when you so their spiel to ask them to define the word “god” before you’ll agree to discuss whether it exists or if it cares which roof I spend my Sunday mornings under.

You sound like a frood who knows where his towel is.

@Uasal:
Yep, it makes just as much sense to believe in the Muad’Dib or the Flying Spaghetti Monster as it does to believe in Jesus or “God”, in my humble opinion.

HEY NOW.

I have a shelf FULL of books that say Paul Muad’dib known as Usul of the house of Atreides IS the Kwisatz-Haderach, and he WILL bring rain to Arrakis.

<A Christian

@Dutchess_III I’ve never met anyone who’s said such a thing, but there are clueless people in every walk of life and every belief system. I know that may not be comforting to you, but it helps to keep perspective.

What such things are you referring to @snowberry?

Dutchess_III You said you’re on a website where people often ask questions along the lines of “Do atheists think God has let them down?”

It seems to me that either they’re clueless or perhaps they’re assuming that many athiests started out believing in God and stopped because they were disappointed in how life turned out for them (he let them down).

I’ve noticed that not all, but a lot of atheists, especially the more vocal and angry ones have had horrible experiences with people who believe in God, especially if they were raised by abusive Christians. So for them perhaps not believing in God is a reaction against those experiences.

But to ask a question like that without qualifying it, I think would have potential to insult many atheists.

‘Cause if we’re vocal we must be angry, and if we’re angry it’s because we were abused, and if we don’t believe it’s in retaliation for that abuse. Way to be dismissive.

Not worshipping can definitely be in retaliation. Not believing is a reasoned response.

@Uasal I didn’t say that’s how EVERYONE thinks, but it’s definitely how SOME (NOT ALL) atheists work. And I’ve seen it over and over right here. Just sayin’.

I just simply do not believe in some magical deity that is responsible for all of this. I’m a science girl.
Now they are saying that they have proven that modern man was responsible for wiping out Neanderthal man in Europe way back when. That both human offshoots exisited at the same time.
Now HOW is it that “God” that supposedly created us in his image decided to create two species of man? You think he’d of gotten it right the first time, after all, he didn’t screw up and reinvent serpents and apple trees. lol

Sharks and Crocodiles were good enough the first time but the human prototype was not?

I’m 2.7% Neanderthal. Had my DNA tested.

@Uasal I’m 0% gorilla, but 100% primate!

Me Jane.

I believe the problem comes from former devote religious people whom say they are atheist but maybe left for different silly reasons.

My daughter dated a guy that said he was atheist and then he said he was a buddist. He was raised Catholic but he got angry he says with God when his grandmother died.
That is when he broke ties. The fact that he got angry with God means he believes there is a God.

Many people often break from faith when something happens to make it happen. Saying you are an atheist makes a person no more than an atheist than saying you are a Christian and showing behavior that you are anything but.

But I believe there are people who truly are atheist and people of many faiths that say they are one thing, while believing deep down in something else.

People don’t always truly know what they believe. They often choose to say they are one thing or another because its easier to associate with a group while they are figuring things out, than to feel alone.

Sure, I think that there are those believers out there who cannot fathom the idea that someone cannot believe in some sort of supreme being. They have spent their whole life, pressed onward by their faith, believing and it is inconceivable to them that someone could not.

I saw a post from a face book friend confessing sins. Several months ago she had come to the conclusion that there was no god, and became an atheist. Well, I guess that didn’t work out to well. One of the reasons she cited was that she had a panic attack while looking through religious card selections for a Mums Day card for her mother. I guess she attributed the “panic attack” to Satan.
Anyway, she recanted her disbelief and now she’s at peace again.
I kind of wish I could just do that.

It’s possible. It’s also possible that (some at least) believe Atheists will burn in hell if they don’t believe.