Every now and then I find an honest atheist.
It is a rare occurrence.
On atheism, honesty doesn’t serve a purpose.
And honesty is catastrophic for the appeal of pagan worldviews.
Godlessness is an ugly thing in the stark, white light of truth.
But don’t take it from me.
Take it from an honest atheist.
“[To] all my Atheist friends.
Let us stop sugar coating it. I know, it’s hard to come out and be blunt with the friendly Theists who frequent sites like this. However in your efforts to “play nice” and “be civil” you actually do them a great disservice.
We are Atheists. We believe that the Universe is a great uncaused, random accident. All life in the Universe past and future are the results of random chance acting on itself. While we acknowledge concepts like morality, politeness, civility seem to exist, we know they do not. Our highly evolved brains imagine that these things have a cause or a use, and they have in the past, they’ve allowed life to continue on this planet for a short blip of time. But make no mistake: all our dreams, loves, opinions, and desires are figments of our primordial imagination. They are fleeting electrical signals that fire across our synapses for a moment in time. They served some purpose in the past. They got us here. That’s it. All human achievement and plans for the future are the result of some ancient, evolved brain and accompanying chemical reactions that once served a survival purpose. Ex: I’ll marry and nurture children because my genes demand reproduction, I’ll create because creativity served a survival advantage to my ancient ape ancestors, I’ll build cities and laws because this allowed my ape grandfather time and peace to reproduce and protect his genes. My only directive is to obey my genes. Eat, sleep, reproduce, die. That is our bible.
We deride the Theists for having created myths and holy books. We imagine ourselves superior. But we too imagine there are reasons to obey laws, be polite, protect the weak etc. Rubbish. We are nurturing a new religion, one where we imagine that such conventions have any basis in reality. Have they allowed life to exist? Absolutely. But who cares? Outside of my greedy little gene’s need to reproduce, there is nothing in my world that stops me from killing you and reproducing with your wife. Only the fear that I might be incarcerated and thus be deprived of the opportunity to do the same with the next guy’s wife stops me. Some of my Atheist friends have fooled themselves into acting like the general population. They live in suburban homes, drive Toyota Camrys, attend school plays. But underneath they know the truth. They are a bag of DNA whose only purpose is to make more of themselves. So be nice if you want. Be involved, have polite conversations, be a model citizen. Just be aware that while technically an Atheist, you are an inferior one. You’re just a little bit less evolved, that’s all. When you are ready to join me, let me know, I’ll be reproducing with your wife.
I know it’s not PC to speak so bluntly about the ramifications of our beliefs, but in our discussions with Theists we sometimes tip toe around what we really know to be factual. Maybe it’s time we Atheists were a little more truthful and let the chips fall where they may. At least that’s what my genes are telling me to say.”
I’ve been trying to tell atheists what they necessarily believe for a long time.
Maybe it’ll finally sink-in when it comes from one of their own.
(**Prediction: Godless responses (if there are any) will be to dismiss this as theistic propaganda. There will be no rebuttal raised.)
33 Responses
Oh my guns and roses, I love the way life imitates art and atheists never fail to come through.
JB: “Prediction: Godless responses (if there are any) will be to dismiss this as theistic propaganda. There will be no rebuttal raised.”
VERY FIRST ATHEIST REPLY: “I Demand the reference! This is Fiction!” (Offers no rebuttal of ANY kind.)
If someone was going to doubt the validity of anything around here, its that the atheists who call you a liar in the comments section are REALLY atheists and not bad comedians. I mean- in all seriousness- if you were to write a fictional dialogue between a Christian and atheist that went the way these comments from atheists go, they would call you a liar building a straw man version of atheists, but when given the chance to actually SAY these inane and even blatantly predicted things, they come through!
Where are the skeptical atheists who SHOULD be insisting that KIA here is a theist troll PRETENDING to be an atheist? He’s LITERALLY DONE EXACTLY as you predicted the twit atheists would do. Why should they accept him as a real atheist when he’s making them look so stupid? He MUST be doing it on purpose, right?
Keep up the good work JB.
I’ve worried before that people would think we’ve invented JZ or KIA or Ark…
Nope…
:/
The question I have is, what do these people actually believe? I hear about what they do not believe in all the time, but I have never had any atheist articulate what they think is true (if truth exists that is). I have told an atheist that they think there was nothing, and that nothing exploded for no reason and from the chaos came order by unguided, non-directed natural processes. Then non-life spontaneously became life and gradually evolved (except the Cambrian explosion where evolution happened rapidly). I was told that is not what they believed and then refused further clarification. The closest I’ve heard to an explanation is the parallel universe hypothesis that, according to the uber smart people, will never and can never be proven because any other universe would operate on different laws of physics, so by nature can never be proven by our means of exploration. Until the atheist can articulate what they believe, I’ll just keep believing that Jesus was God and proved it by rising from the dead-because sadly, I don’t have enough faith to be an atheist.
Excellent post, Rob.
I’ve met a number of atheists, and many seem to be on a spectrum of belief. Many of the mid-spectrum are Pantheists, but don’t realize it (C.S.Lewis originally came from those ranks. He writes about this in “Mere Christianity”.)
It’s interesting how Christians know they are sinners, and not good – but we follow The One Who is Sinless and Good.
Atheists believe they are good and don’t sin.
I think Pride is the major sin, here. They’re following the fallen one (I hate his name), even though they don’t know, realize it or want to see it. It’s very painful going from being your own self-determining god (atheist) and discovering just how filthy and minuscule you really are. (It’s why I can’t understand how atheists can look up at the stars, or any bit of God’s creation, and not understand how tiny they are yet how deeply loved they are by the One Who created them.)
I read an amazing book by, I believe it was Lt. Col. David Grossman. He was talking about what things he had learned about how some of the most horrific criminals think and believe about themselves. Every single one, no matter how heinous the crime, was a hero in his/her own eyes!
That stunned me! Yet, how easy it is for us Christians to slip into the same – and become little hidden Pharisees. It’s everywhere within the Church when we don’t grab our ego and wrestle it to the ground on a regular basis. Ego hurts when we do that! I think all atheists would rather live life on their terms than go through that, yet end up in eternal loss and separation from the Source of all Good, Love, Joy, Peace.
(I apologize. I have been sitting on my hands, not wanting to write – because there is an ocean torrent inside with love for God Who rescued me. Jeremiah: His Words burn within my breast. I apologize- this quiet stone had to burst out. I feel so bad that not everyone wants to run like a child into Abba’s arms, that they choose to turn away. 😢💔)
Thank you, John, and all sweet brethren, who write here.
The article at Wintery Knight adds a few more honest Atheists to the list: Richard Dawkins, William Provine, and Michael Ruse.
(I would also add Alexander Rosenburg, who wrote “The Atheist’s Guide to Reality.”)
Hopefully one of those guys is using a pseudoname, so the Atheists can tell themselves their quotes are irrelavant! 🙂 Wouldn’t want them to actually THINK about what’s being said!
https://winteryknight.com/2015/10/02/an-atheist-explains-the-real-consequences-of-adopting-an-atheistic-worldview-3/
If Atheist’s were consistent, they would say, “Our belief that rape is wrong is just as arbitrary as the fact that we’ve evolved five fingers instead of six.”
They wouldn’t send Stephen Hawking off with hopes that he “enjoy the stars” either. They can’t stand the repercussions of their own beliefs. I wonder why they hold them so tightly?
Does it scare them that once they die they will no longer be atheists?
They don’t think about it…
And they have amazing ways of plugging their ears when someone else speaks who has thought about it.
The nitwit comments from KIA’s link are in essence, “This guy isn’t an atheist!” I don’t care where the comment came from.
THIS is how an honest/consistent Atheist would answer the following questions:
“Is there a God? No.
What is the nature of reality? What physics says it is.
What is the purpose of the universe? There is none.
What is the meaning of life? Ditto.
Why am I here? Just dumb luck.
Does prayer work? Of course not.
Is there a soul? Is it immortal? Are you kidding?
Is there free will? Not a chance!
What is the difference between right and wrong, good and bad? There is no moral difference between them.
Why should I be moral? Because it makes you feel better than being immoral.
Is abortion, euthanasia, suicide, paying taxes, foreign aid, or anything else you don’t like forbidden, permissible, or sometimes obligatory? Anything goes.”
You can’t say that. You’re a Christian.
I have to be careful about what I write, trying to sin not while feeling angry beyond what I can decently say.
The premise from the “honest atheist” that he could kill my husband and casually rape me steps far beyond a line most atheists would ever cross.
It’s because of monsters like this that I have had to learn self-defense. It would be to my, and other peoples’, descendants advantage for him to die before he could procreate. In evolutionary terms his brain is functioning at the level of a bacterium.
In a universe of blind physical forces and genetic replication, some people are going to get hurt, other people are going to get lucky, and you won’t find any rhyme or reason in it, or any justice. The universe that we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference… DNA neither knows nor cares. DNA just is. And we dance to its music. (Richard Dawkins, River Out of Eden: A Darwinian View of Life (1995))How is this any different from what was written in the article? So if your DNA cares why?
https://www.reddit.com/user/andyet
Wonderful! I am wiser for knowing the truth.
You have done a noble thing defending atheism given that you are not an atheist.
So tell me jb, why do Christians have to lie for the Truth?
That question is incoherent.
Why do you feel the need to defend a worldview that you don’t believe yourself?
I’m not defending a worldview. I’m pointing out that your post is based on a lie. Do you care?
No. The post is not based on a lie.
As I predicted, you have not offered a rebuttal to the comment. The origins of the comment don’t matter.
The origin of the comment doesn’t matter? Doesn’t matter that it wasn’t an atheist being honest, but an evangelical Christian being dishonest?
Amazing
Welcome to the world of critical thought! This is where ideas matter more than the people who said them!
You game to keep discussing or is your incredulity going to send you scurrying back to safety?
Redditer andyet where the quote comes from on that Reddit comments from Jan 2014 while discussing Frank’s character from House of cards… Andyet is an evangelical christian. His comment from whence this ‘honest’ ost and others from dishonest apologists is a sham. It’s what he wishes to put into the mouths of atheists. But of course… It’s a strawman lie.
The comment nicely sums up the atheist position. It is more honest than anything I read from most atheists.
You are welcome to explain what part of the comment you find problematic.
It seems to be a common repeated trope from apologists (plural) from years ago. 2014. See this link http://www.mybrainblinks.com/2014/04/09/when-an-atheist-is-brutally-honest/
It may have even originated from a Reddit comment on the character Frank in House of Cards… a tv show… from that year. Google is your friend. But regardless, Wallace is the one who isn’t being “honest” about it being a ‘john’ commenting on his blog.
The redditer is probably a strawman, then the Christian apologists run with it, claiming it was a comment on ‘their’ blog. B.S.. Google the phrases and find the original sources. Honest? Hardly JB. Hardly. And all it would have taken for you would have been a simply Google search. But you didn’t even think to do that. Dishonest.
-kia
(**Prediction: Godless responses (if there are any) will be to dismiss this as theistic propaganda…)
Thank you!
Please share the results of your simple Google search. Your honest commentary is refreshing, Pastor Mike.
Well, at least whoever wrote that excerpt is consistent. I can’t say the same for the rest of the crew.
Atheists don’t know what they believe.
Why would they? Random electrical impulses have no beliefs.
“We believe that the Universe is a great uncaused, random accident.”
Ha, Ha, Ha, this is as far as I needed to read, good comedy. This is not an atheist writer, but a story made up by theists, these stories strengthen theist faith while also trying to dispel their own doubts.
You’re probably right about it not being an atheist writer. Atheists are rarely honest.
Please give the link to the direct comment the apologist was quoting or this is created fiction. I went tonnthe link you gave to his article with the quote, but he gives a fictional name of John and no direct link to the comment he’s quoting. It’s a fictional and wholly contrived commen otherwise.