Camaban

Does it bother me? not for a moment.

nogods4me

Does it bother you that there is no evidence whatsoever that there is a "scheme" of things. No plan, no goal, no designer.

excreationist

So there is equality.

Christians on the other hand believe that they are infinitely inferior to God - they are doomed to spend an eternity serving him and acknowledging God's infinite superiority. And in the world-view of many Christians, most humans will live for a few decades on a cursed earth and then suffer for ever and ever and ever in the lake of fire. That is probably a worse fate than viral life. I mean in the case of pets we "put them down" if they are suffering too much.

Oolon Colluphid

Some answers:

Does it bother you that to think humans are special, despite all the contrary evidence, is amazingly arrogant?

Does it bother you that there is no evidence whatsoever for this designer of yours?

Does it bother you that, if you try to use the living world as evidence for a designer, then said designer is clearly an incompetent designer, and a malicious sadist to boot?

Do you wonder why atheists, when faced with people who spout this stuff, perceive them as both arrogant and ignorant?

TTFN, Oolon

excreationist

I think there is some evidence... even though it might be "God of the gaps" style evidence. I think GeoTheo's belief that the world is about 6000 years old is more questionable.

GeoTheo

I find it questionable that your change of belief about the age of the Earth is why you gave up Christianity. Life is more complex than that.
That's like someone saying they became a Christian when piltdown man was proved a fraud.

lpetrich

What's your point, O GeoTheo? Why is our species supposed to be cosmically important? Would you commit suicide unless you managed to convince yourself that all of the Universe had been created for our benefit?

And how is the doctrine of Original Sin supposed to be an improvement on a Universe that exists without any concern for us?

And as to arrogance, I'm sure that some flat-earthers have perceived round-earthers as arrogant.

WinAce

If you're referring to my change of belief, it had much more weight behind it than merely disagreeing with YEC beliefs. I had always valued skepticism previously, but I had avoided applying it to my deepest beliefs for who-knows what reason (social pressure? the fear of changing them?)

Once I did, however, I recognized that the 'evidence' used by all religions is simply uncompelling, subjective and ultimately useless. Moreover, the arguments found in freethinker books simply blew away the mind-bending apologetics by C.S. Lewis and company. The universe is complex, but it most certainly doesn't appear to be the guided effort of anything completely benevolent, completely evil, highly intelligent or even entirely competent.

The only reason remaining for believing in the supernatural in the face of all reason could have been the somewhat comforting belief in a Unitarian-style afterlife (not the horrible heaven/hell thing, which is quite frankly worse than just having everyone die).

I personally value truth over comforting but ultimately futile beliefs, however, I understand those are important for a great many people, and they might know something I don't, so I generally won't debate unless they:

(1) Claim religion is correct, but everyone else is mistaken
(2) Make empirically testable claims that are completely blown away by the data, then resort to invoking miracles or ludicrous ad hoc hypotheses to explain said data

Do you belong to any of these two categories, GeoTheo? If so, why? You're obviously intelligent enough to see through the scientific illegitimacy of some valued beliefs like alien abductions, but you have to want to find the truth first (and I won't say what that truth ultimately is, just that it obviously isn't the set of YEC hypotheses).

Oolon Colluphid

That isn't evidence for anything. Or against anything. There's no such thing as god-of-the-gaps style evidence. All a gap means is "don't know".

If I ask you whether my wife can drive a car, is your response -- "don't know" -- evidence one way or another?

If I ask you about fossil precursors of bats, how does "there's no information on it" mean they were created?

But I'm sure you knew that already

Oolon

excreationist

I you're talking about me see <a href="http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs/1316.asp" target="_blank">AiG's "The Necessity for believing in six literal days"</a>.
Basically, if the days in Genesis weren't literal days then there is death before Adam, undermining the gospel message and also it brings into question how literal other parts of the Bible, such as the gospels, are.