MetaFilter posts tagged with athiest

Youtube logician explains why God must exist

stupidsexyFlanders — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 08:31:50 -0800

Apparently there's at least a 51% chance of God's existence. It starts out 50/50, like with pets. You have, say, either a dog or a cat. It's a 50/50 chance that it's one or the other, just like it's 50/50 that there's a God or not. Well, we exist. You exist. The earth exists. That nudges it up to 51%. If I understand this youtube gentleman. Hilarious exercise in smug delivery of ironclad logic.

Battleground God

PenDevil — Mon, 30 Jun 2003 03:40:54 -0800

Are you hypocritical about God? And don't cheat.

MiguelCardoso — Tue, 29 Oct 2002 12:32:59 -0800

Religion! What Is It Good For? Absolutely nothing? Perhaps not. Michael Prowse, a lifelong atheist (and Financial Times columnist even!) had this to say in an article for Prospect:
"Having accepted that meanings are always contestable, I have found myself more able to focus on what religious people do, and less on what they say. Are they "better" people than the irreligious? Of course not. Are they better people than they would be were they not religious? Probably, and this is what counts for me.".
Meanwhile, another atheist, Jared Diamond, writing (brilliantly, as the author of Guns, Germs and Steel always does) in the current New York Review of Books, addresses religion in a (let us say) more scientific way and, though more sceptical, leaves a similar question mark hanging. So, in a nutshell: can there be something in (or about) religion for atheists too?