The religious freedom we have today allows us to make our own choices. We are free to have the beliefs we want to have. No one has the right to impose their point of view on us, force us into churches, celebrate church holidays, or observe religious customs. However, the number of believers is still large. Scientists believe that faith in God is convenient for both rulers and the people themselves.
The former receive a tool that allows them to manipulate the consciousness of the electorate, and the latter receive faith in a bright afterlife from long-suffering. However, sometimes during their lives some believers become agnostics or even join the camp of atheists. Let's consider what happens to the mind of a person who has abandoned his previous beliefs.
Getting rid of addiction
Science claims that belief in God is a form of psychological addiction. Religion offers us well-being and reward for suffering. Therefore, it is quite difficult for a person to give up his faith. It’s another matter if he was originally raised in a family of atheists.
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How I stopped believing in God. Part 2: belief, attitude towards believers and discrimination against atheists.
I continue the topic of my loss of faith in God. The first part is here.
Belief
One of the most harmful acts of religion is to promote the idea that the renunciation of knowledge is a virtue.
Richard Dawkins
In fact, the first, albeit absolutely insignificant, thing that gave me a shred of doubt was George Carlin's stand-up performance. I found his monologue about religion funny, but it was not enough to shake my years of faith in God.
Due to the fact that I was a terrible nerd, I studied the facts, but rarely compared them with each other. I believed that God existed, although I was a confident adherent of the theory of evolution. I revered Islam and Christianity, although I knew that the Universe was at least 13.7 billion years old. I knew that indulgences were sold, innocent people were burned, crusades were carried out, people killed themselves and others for the glory of God, and I still believed in God and that he loves us all. However, when my formal analytical and critical thinking developed sufficiently, all the facts in my brain began to line up: religion seemed to me a farce, and God - just another fiction. The same as Zeus or Thor, who were responsible for thunder and lightning.
If I have a completely positive attitude towards pantheism, then I do not share these feelings towards religious fanaticism. While relying on freedom of speech in Kazakhstan and mentioning that this is my personal opinion based on the opinions of other people and facts, I will say this: I believe that religion is a relic of the past. Religion was created to control people by people themselves, maybe not even with particularly bad intentions. After reading the beginning of the Old Testament, and even the Koran itself, you can simply die of fear before doubting what is written. It is not surprising that in the name of religion and God, under whatever name, all kinds of violence were committed.
I find most arguments for the existence of God simply ridiculous. If you are too lazy to read scientific and popular science works, then start with stand-up comedy (by the way, it was humor that played an important role in my case) and an article on Wikipedia. If seriousness is your middle name, then if you wish, you can read the lecture “Why I am not a Christian” by Bertrand Russell. Why I Am Not a Muslim by Ibn Warraq is available in English, and The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins is also available online.
Many believers defend themselves by saying that Einstein and other physicists allegedly believe in God. However, they forget that most of these scientists do not believe in an anthropomorphic god. They believe in Spinoza's God, who is far from our “image and likeness.” Their faith is close to pantheism, although Dawkins believes, for example, that this is just embellished atheism.
One of my favorite arguments in favor of the existence of God was “Science has not proven many things.” Yes, there are blind spots in science: if they exist, this does not mean that sooner or later they will not be explained. More than 100 years ago there were no airplanes that were created (moment-moment) by people. Does the unknown really make life uninteresting to know by locking itself into one belief system? For me, it's the other way around.
I am not an expert in theology, not an expert in many other things, my path was long and thorny to my current view: yes, I do not believe in God. As the same Dawkins said: “Do you need to understand leprechaunology in order to stop believing in leprechauns?”
The concept of God does exist, of course, and it was invented by humans. And people also believe in this concept.
How do I feel about believers?
We must respect our neighbor's religion, but only in the same way and to the same extent as we respect his opinion that his wife is a beauty and his children are prodigies.
G. L. Mencken
Although at first I was sure that by eradicating religion, you can get rid of almost all problems, now I agree that “religion is not the root of all evil, because nothing can be the root of all evil.” Due to my upbringing and acquired professional skills in real and online life, I will never stoop to insulting a person, especially on religious grounds. This person has his own reasons to believe. However, I reserve the right to mock certain aspects of religion to myself and all atheists on this planet. For “you have the right to believe in whatever you want, but you do not have the right to force any of your opinions to be respected” (R. Gervais).
I have many believing friends, believing relatives and acquaintances. Therefore, one of my main beliefs is that it doesn’t matter where a person comes from or what he believes in, as long as he is generally good.
What do I expect in return from other people? Accepting the fact that I have the right not to believe in God and have the right to talk about it. I rarely discuss this topic with friends and relatives, unless they themselves do not want it or unless the discussion begins to smack of a quarrel.
I'm not asking you to stop believing in God. I ask you to understand our position. I ask you to understand why and how you can question what has been drilled into us since childhood.
Several studies have shown that you don't have to believe in God to be a good person and do good deeds (to be fair, some of the studies are in favor of atheists). The kindness of people and their actions is not the merit of God. This is the merit of the people. People are capable of good deeds because they themselves are inclined to altruism and good deeds. Although I don't believe in God, I do believe in the good in most people. I believe that people are capable of generosity, kindness, and responsiveness, not because they are afraid of going to hell and strive to please an incomprehensible creature in heaven, but because they are like that themselves.
Due to human nature, naturally, there are different atheists. However, most of the people I know say one thing: “People are better than the god they believe in.”
“Would you stop someone from raping a child if you could? If yes, then you are better/more moral than your god.”
Discrimination against atheists
...Similarly, the main postulate of religious faith, its strength and greater glory is that it does not require rational justification. The rest of us have to defend our beliefs. But ask a believer to justify his faith, and you will be accused of encroaching on “freedom of conscience.”
Richard Dawkins
Let's start with the fact that on Google, when I asked for “discrimination against atheists,” the first site that came up was: “Is your child an atheist? We will tell you what to do” and a video with some Christian figure.
Someone will start laughing like: “Lord, how are you being discriminated against?” because for some reason it is fashionable in our country to laugh at the struggle for equal rights. I’ll quote from Wikipedia (surprised that my last post was not deleted, but not surprised that it was not put on the main page):
According to Daniyar Nauryz, in terms of information, a ban has actually been imposed on the topic of atheism. Alexander Kharlamov was also arrested for inciting interreligious hatred. He is accused of promoting atheism in his publications about Christianity and various religious movements, thereby offending the feelings of believers.
Judging by this article dated February 3 of this year, they want/wanted to prosecute him again. Despite the fact that, in my opinion, some of his ideas do not correspond to general scientific terms and theories, I find the judicial accusation against him unnecessary, if not absurd.
This phenomenon exists in almost every country, because there are more religious people. And if there are more people, then for some reason they think that they are right because of the quantitative attribute. Do we need to explain to them that this is not so, taking at least the example of Copernicus (more precisely, Aristarchus of Samos), for whose theory many innocent people were once burned? (You don’t have to tell me anything at all about the flat earth, which they still believe in: I simply have no words on this matter).
I myself have encountered the beginnings of discrimination many times, from the belief that I have no right not to believe in God (read: I have no right to think), ending with the fact that I am a carrier of STDs because I am an atheist. Read the second sura of the Koran and you will understand what I am talking about: as soon as some religious people find out that I am an atheist, they equate me, at a minimum, with an enemy of the people. Not knowing what I have done and not done in my entire life, not knowing what I will do in the future, the majority are ready to lump me, and all atheists, into the dirt and stop communicating with them because they dared to doubt. This sura contains as much hatred as I had towards Joffrey from Game of Thrones. And this is only one surah. By comparison, my hatred of Joffrey lasted two years, and I have never hated anyone as much as I hated him.
On the one hand, I completely understand them: for example, I also took many of Shpak’s comments about the history of Kazakhstan with hostility. Having one day questioned the views of my inner nationalist, nurtured by our education system for almost 11 years, I discovered something new for myself.
We are not taught to think critically, we are not taught to ask questions and look for answers, we are not taught to learn something new out of interest, and not under pressure. Remember the words of Hitler: “How lucky the authorities are that people never think.” Our society almost encourages this.
In response to this discrimination and the special rights of religious people and organizations, the coolest religion on this planet was created - Pastafarianism. This is such a magnificent irony over other religions that so far not a single stand-up comedian has surpassed them.
However, from happy to sad. Look at what they do to ex-Muslims in some countries (including “secular” and “moderate”): according to Sharia, they must die, and they are executed. Somehow after this you involuntarily doubt the merciful Allah and the fact that “Islam is a religion of peace.” It is quite possible that today there are plenty of such examples in other religions.
While I was reading books on this topic and searching for information, I came across something that I still can’t believe. Therefore, if anyone understands this issue, then please clarify for me. According to Wikipedia:
In 1990, the Organization of the Islamic Conference published a separate Cairo Declaration on Human Rights in Islam, consistent with Sharia law.[145] While the declaration guarantees many of the rights set out in the UN declaration, it does not give Muslims the right to convert to another religion and limits freedom of speech to speech that is contrary to Islamic law.
As far as I know, Kazakhstan is part of this organization. Those. The Constitution allows me to profess any religion (due to being born in a Muslim family, I am supposedly a Muslim), but because of the Cairo Declaration I cannot convert to another? And if I renounced religion altogether, will I still be judged based on this declaration? If so, is there any doubt that in our great country there are LAWS that discriminate against atheists?
How to live without believing in God?
It took 1.5-2 years before I 100% stopped believing in God. As stated, it has been a long journey. However, he was aware. Yes, at first I was disappointed and to some extent lost the meaning of life. After some time, I finally realized how wonderful life is. I realized for myself that you need to live not to go to heaven, but to simply live it: to feel every moment, see and know everything you want. To be good not because someone who perhaps never existed preached so, but because you yourself enjoy doing good. Understand that you cannot be good to everyone, because everyone has different ideas about this characteristic. And that, thank all, you won’t burn in hell if someone didn’t like you.
Everyone can find their own meaning in life, despite belief or disbelief in God.
Being an atheist, I stopped, with a bit of hypocrisy, sympathizing with the troubles of others with the caption “pray for (insert as appropriate).” Prayers will NOT help! Either we need to do something for a better life, or finally admit that many of these sympathizers really don’t give a damn, and they either simply follow the general wave, or collect points for karma. You would think that at least some of those who survived/are experiencing a war/terrorist attack read that someone is praying for them, and this makes them feel much better?! Their houses were immediately rebuilt, their disabilities disappeared, and those they loved were resurrected?! No matter how much you want, prayers help with the same degree of probability as almost everything in this world works.
Many other people said better than me about life without faith in God, but here is my favorite passage:
I think that when I die, I will rot and nothing of my “I” will remain. I'm not young anymore and I love life. But I would consider it beneath my dignity to tremble with fear at the thought of death. Happiness does not cease to be happiness because it is transitory, and thoughts and love are not deprived of value because of their transience. Many people held themselves with dignity on the scaffold; such pride should teach us to see man's true place in the world. Even if the wind rushing through the windows opened by science makes us, accustomed to the cozy warmth of traditional “ennobling” myths, tremble at first, in the end, fresh air brings cheerfulness and strength, and the vast spaces opening before us have their own unique splendor.
Bertrand Russell
That's all.
Thank you for your attention! I will be glad to comments =)
Great weekend to everyone!
Craving towards rationalism
The more people turn away from the religious idea of creation, the more rational their thoughts become. Now they will not trust in the Savior, but will rely on their own strength. Any difficult situation will not be accompanied by questions: “Why am I doing this?”, but will force you to act.
On the other hand, rational thinking also has its drawbacks. It cannot provide the feeling of security and happiness that irrational thinking has.
