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Having seen this flowchart neatly decide that me being an atheist will eventually lead to the extinction of my species, I paused for a little while to consider the validity of the claim (which every good scientist should do), THEN promptly dismissed it as utter bollocks (bullshit).

Right from the get-go you can see the perspective of the person writing it. “Disbelief in God”. Not only is that compartmentalizing my entire mindset by contrasting it to the warped fantasyland that religious people live in; but it’s clearly talking about the Judeo-Christian god, with all the trimmings (bible, traditions etc.) and not hitting the issue of ‘any supernatural being’. Secondly, it’s clearly being written from the perspective of a person who’s just frustrated because there are people out there not doing things exactly the way HE does things.

This entire flowchart is the equivalent of two boys playing with action-figures, one turns to the other and says “you shouldn’t play with Boba Fett, you should play with my Lando Calrissian”, the other turns and says “Lando’s gay, I’m sticking with Boba Fett”; to which the other one says, “You’re wrong! And because you’re wrong the entire human race is going to be wiped out” *makes bang, boom, pow noises” It really is that childish. (Notice I made Boba Fett represent Atheism. You can thank me later)

So, ignoring the fact this is COMPLETE nonsense from the outset, let’s continue. “Disrespect of Religious Morality” and “Religious Ignorance in Children”. Fuck yeah! That’s EXACTLY what I want! Thanks, crazy Christian nutjob! Just because I don’t think I’m going to get burnt and poked with sharp sticks for all eternity, doesn’t mean I’m going to go around stabbing people! Basic humanistic morals should get me by just fine without destroying the human race. I would PREFER that my children were ignorant of religion. Only after their brains had developed to a level when they can successfully differentiate between reality and fantasy would I allow them to learn about religions. In this way, if they choose to hold a belief it will be because they have thought about it logically beforehand. Of course, if they DID they’d receive no end of ridicule from ME.

“Disrespect of Human Life” See the previous. If anything, without the belief in a god I find the human race to be far more fascinating. If somebody just went POOF and suddenly humans were around, there’d be none of the wonderous happenstance that our evolution over thousands of years indicates. The astronomical chances of the various contributing factors which made up the road we travelled to get to where we are today would be rendered null and void.

The list goes on as you can see for yourselves, but it’s the last few bits that really intrigue me. Notice that the legalization of genocide comes before a unification of governments. That’s upsetting isn’t it? There’s me thinking our peacemaking efforts between nations might actually pay off one day. It also ASSUMES that our unified government would break down into civil war, which I assume is the logical conclusion based on historical evidence; but if you’re solely looking at historical evidence, you’d do well to observe that there has NEVER been an atheist government. Therefore, all these governments that break down into civil wars killing hundreds and thousands of people have all been due to religion!

Thus, the points on the chart after that point all lead to the following conclusion:

RELIGIOUS PEOPLE WILL CAUSE THE EXTINCTION OF THE HUMAN RACE

Staks’ post is a very good one, I advise you all to read it before you read what I say below(link)

That’s a really well written, well thought-out post, Staks. Obviously you can’t help it, and in no way is it a bad thing, but you ARE writing from a very American standpoint; a country where religion really is a thorn in the side of everyday life and the lives of logical people like you and I. However, in the broad scheme of things, for an atheist to give one moment of their day to allow even the most minute portion of brainspace to religion is utter lunacy.

I wish I could remember the name of the professor that said it, but he put it brilliantly when he says “to call me an atheist is to label me against something I completely discount. You might as well call me an a-goblin-ist, or an a-pixie-ist” and so on.

In the grand scheme of atheism (which for the sake of this post I shall continue to refer to as agoblinism to try and establish the point that I’m talking about the group of people who discount all nonsensical, imaginary and unscientifically proven things’ existence) it’s so utterly degrading to have to keep on referring to the beliefs and practises of people we regard as entirely wrong, wrong beyond all possible description. People who pride themselves on the fact that the utter bollocks (British English for ‘bullshit’) that pours from their mouths cannot be proven, and that their ‘faith’ makes them better than you or I.

I’m not naiive. I know that these people have got their fingers firmly planted in all the world’s pies, and that if somebody doesn’t say anything or do anything to counter it; eventually the lives of agoblinists will be governed by their closed-minded, ignorant nonsense. The only point I’m trying to make is that I don’t like angry atheists. I hope deep down that angry atheists don’t even like angry atheists. But I do acknowledge that they’re kind of like the defensive front line of the agoblinist population of the world.

Do you share my (all-be-it baselessly optimistic) principle that agoblinists should be able to sit completely aside while all the metaphorical children play with their imaginary friends in the world’s playpen; free to pursue our own endeavors based on principles of truth and scientific evidence?

A very, very complex question. While it’s obvious that Islam didn’t attack the United States, rather a small group of radicals operating on their idea of Islam; it still seems to me to be a bit of a risqué move to build a mosque on the site of the nation’s greatest tragedy, committed in the name of that particular faith.

The BBC have posted a video of some of the reactions people had when the announcement was made. One woman holding a sign up that read “Islam builds mosques at the sites of its conquests and victories”. Well, historically she’s quite accurate; but then again every conquering race up to and including the United States (who, let’s face it, are steadily becoming the modern-day British Empire) built structures to mark their victories. However, to assume that the events of 9/11 were a ‘victory for Islam’, I feel, is a little bit ignorant.

That being said, can you think of an instance where the building of a religious structure so close to the event of a radicalist faction’s attack would be welcomed? After the fall of the Spanish Inquisition throughout Europe, it took decades for anyone to feel comfortable about Catholic structures being built, especially if they were going to be built and the sites of burnings and tortures.

Although I perfectly understand that the radicals don’t directly represent the principles of the overall faith; does it not seem like stirring up trouble for trouble’s sake to built a monument to something which the insular and culturally ignorant (no offence intended) society of the USA would regard as the body of people that attacked their homeland? This is, of course, operating on the semi-justified stereotype that Americans don’t really know much about the world outside their borders and lump groups of people they don’t understand together to better focus their aggression towards them.

The Mayor of New York, Michael Bloomberg, said he hoped the mosque would “bring our city even closer together”; said in the most true and noble sentiment, worthy of the constitution upon which the ‘land of the free’ was founded. Unfortunately for Mike, the ‘home of the brave’ is now firmly the ‘home of the scared and vengeful’, and like any man or beast that’s backed into a corner and feels out of its depth, it’s going to respond with unthinking violence.

I honestly hope everything turns out for the best, but I can’t help but think this is a terrible idea.

In the Nature vs Nurture argument, I feel neither one can totally answer the question; but that the Nurture element plays a vastly superior role in the process.

A person can be born with the predisposition for creativity, intelligence and charisma; but without the environment in which to use and develop them, these facets are rendered superfluous and are degraded, sometimes even lost.

I’ll be clear in my answer that a person’s skills have absolutely no bearing on their personality; it may just transpire that their personality puts them in a position where their skills become apparent or operable.

A person’s ‘personality’ only even develops when contact with another person/entity is made. Take the classic example of Genie, the girl who for 16 years of her life lived with feral dogs in Ukraine; eating the raw meat of animals she killed, running in packs etc. She had absolutely no ‘personality’ to speak of, her every instinct was that of a dog. Her vocal chords were able to produce dog sounds that a social human would find near impossible, our interactions and practised speech preventing us from doing so. After many years of work with Genie, psychologists were able to raise her to the social level of a young child with learning difficulties, but no other progress was possible.

Were ‘personality’ an innate quality, Genie’s upbringing by the dogs would have little no no bearing on her ability to interact with humans; but unfortunately for her this wasn’t the case.