View Single Post
Old 12-05-2007, 04:22 PM   #34 (permalink)
Katczinsky
Senator
 
Katczinsky's Avatar
Join Date: Jan 2006
Location: Columbus, OH
Gender: Male
Posts: 3,758
Country:
Points: 15,236, Level: 79
Points: 15,236, Level: 79 Points: 15,236, Level: 79 Points: 15,236, Level: 79
Level up: 78%, 114 Points needed
Level up: 78% Level up: 78% Level up: 78%
Activity: 1%
Activity: 1% Activity: 1% Activity: 1%
Send a message via AIM to Katczinsky
Katczinsky is offline
Reply With Quote
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by OhDear View Post
Kat stated:

Whilst that may be factual and come with stats to prove it...I would say that those who are turning to atheism were already NOT believing. Fencesitters, agnostics and those who were not already giving much thought to a belief system at all were the most impacted.
My personal experience contends that, and most of the atheists I currently know. No, actually all of them were at one point religious. I don't know anyone that grew up in an atheist household, but I don't seem to have any trouble coming across people who have, upon their own investigations, rejected their religion and the notion of faith in favor of reason.

Quote:
But you won't find so many converts in fundamental religions simply because of some of the media attention to atheism provided by Dawkins, Harris, etc. In fact, within their ranks, hardly any would have dared to even read any of the literature provided by the aforementioned infidels.

OhDear
I know I don't speak on his behalf, but from what I remember from my brother, he could have been considered a fundamentalist Christian. Walk up to his desk now and you're likely to see a copy of "God is Not Great" by Christopher Hitchens or perhaps "The God Delusion" by Richard Dawkins. I have known others who came to same conclusions, and I doubt those authors explaining atheism had no part in ridding misconceptions behind atheism.

Michael Shermer, for example, well-known advocate for skepticism (Skeptic Magazine) and atheism, was once a Christian fundamentalist.

Actually, it's my contention that the ruthlessness of fundamentalism (an expression, not a perversion, of a particular faith) drives people with a conscience to question their faith, which leads them to the many philosophers of atheism and religious skepticism from the classics such as Empiricus, Democritus, Lucretius, to David Hume, Darwin, Mark Twain, to today's Albert Einstein, Carl Sagan, Richard Dawkins, and the like.
"If you want to achieve peace of mind and happiness, then have faith; if you want to be a disciple of truth, then search" -- Friedrich Nietzsche

Economic Left/Right: -9.50
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -6.72