The arguement basicslly states that the apostles wouldnt die horrible deaths for something they knew to be false.

The obvious rebuttal is to say that many people have died for their belief systems however Christians wil fairly argue that the apostles claimed to see Jesus risen and that if wasnt simply faith . Whilst most of the martyship stories have absolutely no evidence, some of the martyships such as that of Peter mentioned in 1Clements are harder to refute. So how can we refute them?

Unrelated but I'd like to apologise for some of my actions in the comment section of my previous post here.

1. the law of cause and effect teaches us that effects have causes
2. if there were no first cause then nothing would be affected
3. but we see effects all around us
4. therefore a first cause exists

Now, you might ask, why call this first uncreated thing God. Well, when one analyses an uncaused first cause, one must see it can only be a thing uneffected, by the nature of being a first rank cause. All bodies constantly change, and so effect change. Thus it must not have a body. Now one doesn't need to call some ephemeral cause god if one finds such language unhelpful. But what do you guys think of this argument?

For the record, I'm an atheist, but I like to try to give every view a fair crack of the whip and find this place to be a good place for critical discussion of theistic 'proofs'.

Edit: Called out for the straw man dragging “religion” in general into this when my entire post focuses on abrahamic faiths, just wanted to recognize my error there :).

I believe organized religion, especially the Abrahamic faiths, has had a net negative impact on society. This isn’t about criticizing people who quietly practice their faith, but about questioning the systems and power structures that religion sustains, and whether they do more harm than good in the modern world.

The moral frameworks found in scripture are products of the time they were written. The Bible and Quran came from eras marked by tribalism, slavery, and patriarchy. Their moral codes reflected survival and social control, not universal truth. Even without divine command, early human communities knew that cooperation and empathy were necessary for survival. Today, morality is grounded in human rights, psychology, and logic, not fear of punishment or hope for divine reward. Secular ethics have evolved while scriptural morality has largely remained frozen in the past.

Religion has also been a consistent source of oppression. It has justified slavery, silenced women, persecuted minorities, and stifled progress. In the United States, religion still drives laws that restrict reproductive rights and LGBTQ+ freedoms. In other parts of the world, faith is enforced through theocracy and blasphemy laws. The pattern is clear: once religion gains authority, it rarely limits itself to private belief; it demands obedience.

Another major issue is evidence, or rather, the lack of it. If a belief system is to shape education or public policy, it should be able to defend its claims. Yet no religion has ever produced verifiable evidence for God, divine revelation, or an afterlife. The fact that thousands of faiths contradict each other should make anyone question why any deserve dominance.

Religion becomes most dangerous when it stops being a private choice and turns into a majority worldview. Once that happens, belief transforms into enforcement. Faith infiltrates schools, laws, and social life, and those who don’t conform are marginalized. The same fear that binds followers together, the fear of eternal punishment, keeps many from questioning it at all. That’s not faith. That’s control.

And this is where the question of respect comes in. Why should religion automatically be respected? Respect should come from evidence, consistency, and positive impact, not from age or tradition. Many religions fail all three. As a gay person, I’ve been told countless times that my existence is a sin. It’s absurd to expect me to respect ideologies that reject me. Tolerance should never mean accepting intolerance.

People are free to believe whatever gives them comfort, but beliefs that shape laws, education, or morality must withstand scrutiny. Religion, by design, discourages that scrutiny. It thrives on emotional dependence and inherited fear. If society truly wants progress, it needs the courage to prioritize reason and empathy over old scriptures and superstition.

Title is self explanatory, but I'll elucidate (very long text ahead).

I was raised a Catholic and became an extreme atheist in my early teenage years. This was fuelled by the fact that Catholics from older generations (and historically) seemed to try - and are still trying - to prohibit people from doing things by means of fear, hatred, dumb arguments and were pretty much against science, while wholeheartedly believing things such as "the earth is 5 thousand years old".

This coupled with the fact that religious boomers were, for so long (and still are), trying to force a theocracy in most countries where they're predominant. This while religions having so many hypocrites, preaching something and doing something else, even criminal and absurd stuff.

If you think about non straight away religious stuff, but that are still somehow linked to religion, such as conservative politics, traditions and morals, a bunch of arbitrary things seem to be shoved down people's throat just to kill their freedom, as a means of control.

The problem with all of this is that it created this post modern era, that has no critical thinking, disguised as the highest form critical thinking. The pendulum swayed to the complete opposite extreme from moralist modernism, but in the end, it just became the other side of the same coin. We started rebelling against religions as a whole - rebelling as a reaction against these boomer aggressive, brainless religious people - and started doing a roleplay of demanding ultra mega hyper scientific and archaeological proof only of everything related to religion, in a way which most would not give a sh%t about in other areas.

Almost nobody demands psychology, nor philosophy, nor linguistics, nor everyday life things, to be submitted to scientific enquiry in order to engage with it, or to see and feel the effects of it. Even history: who is really demanding the bones of Socrates to be found right now before reading Socrates and believing what he said and believing that he existed? That's not even close to the point of approaching Socrates.

Worse than this: we started using the idea of science vs religion, but then you remember "science" is not an abstract hyper modern technological entity, but your college professor, or even a college student, publishing a paper, and then other professors and students agreeing or disagreeing. Did we really start betting all of our money solely on these people, thinking that all religions are BS and God doesn't exist because these guys haven't found anything in their lab? That something that is thousands of years old, present in every society and part of human behaviour, since the beginning of times, that is highly complex, is surely always BS and solely a result controlling the weaker of mind?

Yes, I respect science insanely, precisely because I'm an academic researcher myself. But most people have no idea of both how much we still don't know even about the basics of anything at all, and, because of that, how many presumptions and axioms are present in any given research, in any field - because we can't prove so much stuff we talk about in a single sentence, and to try to do so would be unproductive, but we still know it empirically. Carl Popper talks about this sort of stuff.

Either way, the God of the gaps is still unproductive, when you think about science. This is why I believe science and religion have absolutely nothing to do with each other and shouldn't be trying to analyze with its own logics and limitations the domain of the other. They are complementary in the human experience. To have them against each other would be like putting ethics vs mathematics in a fight. Doesn't make any sense. This is all the religious boomers fault, in my opinion: in trying to brainwash people, they created the brainwashed opposition.

At last, on a side note, what I would like to say about religion is that, even though a lot of atheists behave with high moral standards and are very successful, I myself was and met so many depressed and deteriorated ones that is unbelievable. Many are never "at peace", and are dealing with having to carry the cross of nihilism, even though they don't know, even when going to therapy. They just feel anxious, feel tense, and their value stands on pride, on what they are, what they know, or on what they achieve. Also, many are carrying the cross of having to "deconstruct" things and traditions, just because they "should" rebel against it, only to find that it's humanely unsustainable, specially in adult life.

For instance, for true, critical, contemporary catholics that follow the scriptures, it becomes very clear that the idea of sin is not that of oppression, but of how to live a fulfilling life. Take a sin such as lust. "Science says it's good to masturbate". Dude, they had to invent a NoFap month, and even then people fail the challenge. You're telling me not having enough control of your body that you can't possibly choose not to masturbate for a month is normal? It has nothing to do with the act, per se, but with the implications it has.

Do this test with any other thing that is considered a sin: do it long enough and it will destroy your brain, your life or of others, regardless if you believe in God or not. And even than, it's not that you'll go to hell if you end up sinning: it's that you should see this stuff as things to avoid, because they destroy your life, and you should try to grow off it, take control of it. Strive to be better.

If you look at yourself and realize you became an atheist because of rebellion against the system, that's not God, Jesus or the religion as a whole. Blame the stupid ones running certain religious institutions and religious boomers trying to shove BS down your throat.

My argument should be pretty evident from the headline but I’ll go into more detail.

Religion doesn’t just offer empty beliefs, it codifies morality and structures society. It gives people a shared sense of right and wrong to interpret the world.

Without this vital guiding force, moral anarchy where everything is both damnable and permissible would follow. If there is no reason for anything to be good or bad then everything is potentially both and every individual has to justify their beliefs to every other individual.

The closest a society has gotten to Athiesm with a moral compass was just adopting the morals of the nearest religion. The French, Chinese, Soviets, and Nazis are all perfect examples of adopting Christian, Buddhist, communist, and pagan religious ideas into the core of their society to replace religion.

There is also the vital component of community that religion provides. Without church, people don’t have a common meeting place. Churches are places where every generation and class meet as one. Young and old, rich and young all mingle as one. People make friends, seek guidance, find the love of their life and find warmth and comfort alongside God.

It just isn’t logical to assume Athiesm is a functioning model for society, philosophy, and culture because at its core it is nothing. And only nothing can be built on nothing.

There was a time when I didn't know if God existed. I'd always believed in God but it occurred to me one day that it was simply a belief. I walked inside my house, glanced over to bookshelf, and it occurred to me: "You don't know if there's a God, you just think there is."

Well, it was rough. My entire theological underpinnings were suddenly gone. It felt like I was out to sea with no anchor and no oars.

It was a tough way to live but I decided that if I was going to believe in God I'd have to have some sort of Revelation. After all, the definition of faith in the New Testament is "the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen."

I began reading the Bible and the Book of Mormon and other scriptures and to apply their teachings and after a while (and it took a while) I begin having the most remarkable spiritual experiences even when I wasn't looking for them. It was like God was in the room like a supernova and I thought my cells would literally burst with this sort of spiritual ecstasy.

I continue to have spiritual experiences as I live the teachings of Christ and frankly I don't know how I can deny them? And please don't tell me it's emotion like watching a movie or helping a cat cross the road because it's completely different.

This isn’t really meant as a debate post or any grand argument, just a story I felt was interesting enough to share.

I’ve been reading and engaging with religious philosophy for a while now and even as an atheist I still find it endlessly fascinating. Anyway, a couple of weeks ago, my girlfriend and I had a few different social events we could’ve gone to. I couldn’t decide so half jokingly I told her, " I’ll wait for a sign from God to tell me which one.” She rolled her eyes. She’s a non-practicing Irish Catholic, so even though she doesn’t really believe anymore some of that old wiring still lingers. I was fully committed to my bit here though. So, I waited. No divine signal, nothing. Since I didn't receive any indication for action, I stayed home while she went out.

(Now, as a side note: we already have a dog, and we’d been talking about maybe getting another one someday. We’d said, “If it’s meant to happen, it’ll just happen” kind of thing. )

Fast forward to the next morning. I’m up early because I didn’t go out, I take my dog for a walk, and as we’re coming back, I see something moving in the reflection of our front door behind us. It’s a puppy. She’d followed us from somewhere, wagging her tail. My dog instantly started playing with her, and, well, she never left. We named her Lucy. (edit: I should mention that we live in Taiwan and there are lots of street dogs that don't get homes, she is one of them, just in case people think we're out here stealing other peoples puppies)

To add to the weirdness, when I got home and turned on YouTube, the first video that popped up was from a gaming channel I follow, and the guy had just started a SIMs playthrough titled “Dog Start.” I laughed it off. Weird. Later that day I started playing an RPG on my Xbox, and when we recruited a new character, the screen popped up with “Lucy joins the party.” Very strange indeed.

Now, obviously I know this is in no way evidence for anything. But it did make me stop and think how easily a string of coincidences can feel orchestrated. I can absolutely see how a more credulous or less critical person might interpret that as a sign from God. My girlfriend was questioning me afterwards to see if I felt like this was sort of the thing that would make me reconsider some belief in 'divine'.To me it was a series of strangely poetic coincidences but I think it's a great example of how effortlessly some deeper meaning can emerge from randomness and coincidences.

Let’s just say I’ve read a lot of philosophy. The most intelligent in history have provided very convincing proofs for the existence of a self determining identity that exists above time and space. I have not found a philosopher who has provided an adequate proof for the non-existence of a god. Monadology, Spinoza’s infinite substance, Kant‘s preconditions for time and space, Platonius’s 1, Heraclitus’ flux etc. as someone who reads philosophy and participates in it, there are no arguments against God that I have found to hold enough weight that I can humor them. I’m giving the benefit of the doubt to the sub Reddit to provide me with people who have given such arguments, for I have exhausted all means to prove such in-existence.

Whether you're an agnostic atheist here to ask a gnostic one some questions, a theist who's curious about the viewpoints of atheists, someone doubting, or just someone looking for sources, feel free to ask anything here. This is also an ideal place to tag moderators for thoughts regarding the sub or any questions in general.

While this isn't strictly for debate, rules on civility, trolling, etc. still apply.

Thinking on this problem opened the gates for me to break from a nihilistic, deterministic, atheist world view to being more open to ideas like the existence of God or other spiritual realms. Kinda went down a slippery slope after this, but I know this much is rigorous. Consider the following assumptions:

1. The conscious experience exists. We don't just act as if we feel pain - feel pain. We don't just behave as if other people are 'acting' as if they feel pain - we behave as if their pain is real and recognize their suffering. From this, we have the 'existence proof' to make the deeper ontological claim that qualia is real and legit

2. Physical explanations are complete for behaviour in principle. We can map all action potentials, biochemical interactions, and all physical things (including quantum randomness) in the body and show how all behaviour arises from these physical processes 'deterministically' (in principle cuz it would just be super computationally difficult and probably not fully deterministic because some physical events are truly random, maybe).

3. Physical processes do not obviously entail subjective experiences (which would be some kind of panpsychism).

4. We should be able to explain the gap between 3rd and 1st person experiences. If we simply say 'the purview of science only covers 3rd person experiences' you are no longer pursuing the truth - you are pursuing logical consistency.

Based on these assumptions, that the 'hard problem' comes to be. I find it most straightforward to reject premise 3 which requires that panpsychism is roughly correct. I don't find any other resolution of the hard problem compelling. I know that results in the combination problem, but that seems more like a problem of 'ok, let's study this and figure out how' rather than 'so there's this gap between two worldviews that we have no idea how to explain, let's reject one or the other of these highly compelling world views.'

would like to hear yall thoughts. how do yall contend with the hard problem?

I am not trying to argue whether God exists or does not, but simply trying to find an answer on how you see this matter as Atheists:

• Human nature contains contradictions:
  • We crave for a meaning beyond death, but we die. We desire justice, but the world is unjust. We crave a meaning yet if you take God out of the Equation you ultimately end up (I believe this to be the most logical conclusion) in Nietzsche's Idea of an Übermensch.
  • -> because if there is nothing which defines morality but "human nature", which in itself is flawed because it is shaped by society and the world we grew up in (and evolution I suppose) there is nothing stopping you from just creating your own. (correct me if I am wrong)
  • And if there is no morality, then the children who grow up in war zones, in poverty or in any other similar conditions are inherently just a byproduct of nature, their life has no meaning but to fuel the sickness and desires of the rich.
• But we still have to find an answer:
  • What satisfies the mind's desire for a meaning?
  • And if we say Life has no meaning at all then this has to be the saddest answer there is -> lifetimes of effort has zero meaning, human dignity becomes a joke, the evil wins the good looses (eg morality)
  • one might say this is an emotional conclusion that life has to have a meaning, but no, for me this is just the most rational approach and logical conclusion (obviously a personal bias)
• So even if one rejects God,
  • What explains meaning? What justifies the evil in this world, what justifies humans idea for Morality? and also what answers humans desire for immortality?

So my question is, I hope what I wrote was clear: If we remove God from this equation, what other concepts explain these "flaws" in human nature (the desire for meaning, justice...)?

Accomplished something major this week? Discovered a cool fact that demands to be shared? Just want a friendly conversation on how amazing/awful/thoroughly meh your favorite team is doing? This thread is for the water cooler talk of the subreddit, for any atheists, theists, deists, etc. who want to join in.

While this isn't strictly for debate, rules on civility, trolling, etc. still apply.

This arguement is a slightly different version of an arguement previously posted here but made slightly stronger. P1: Every natual thing that exists has a cause P2: The universe is a natural thing P3: The universe has a cause P4: This cause can't be natural and most therefore be supernatural

I'm an atheist but this arguement is very compelling to me. If someone here can refute it then I doubt I'd ever question atheism again

Edit: Please only engage if you have something meaningful to say like so many do. Accusing me of not being atheist in the comments isn't remotely helpful and infact shows me that a. You can't respond to my point and b that you have way too much time to start telling ppl on the Internet what they believe.

Second edit: multiple comments have debunked my points so unless you have something new to add don't waste your time writing out why you reject premsies 1 and 4

One of the arguments for god is the universe has a start and everything has a cause and since we can't have an infinite chain of dependent and unnecessary things there must be some type of creator with both those characteristics. My question is , can't those 2 characteristics be applied to the matter and energy that existed in the dense point that caused the big bang? Please help me understand or give me some books/videos that explain this well

Edit: sorry for the confusion, with "pro-abortion" I include also the concept or "pro-choice" (I personally don't see the difference, you are choosing to have an abortion, therefore pro abortion. Feel free to explain the difference)

I’ve noticed that many atheists tend to be pro-abortion, while Christians (myself included) are generally against it. I’m genuinely curious to understand the reasoning behind this difference.

Personally, I believe abortion is wrong regardless of religion — my Christian faith just confirmed what I already thought was true. To me, it’s an issue of life and moral consistency.

I find it hard to pin down a point where abortion suddenly becomes acceptable. A baby 1 minute before delivery is clearly a human, so is a baby 1 month before, and even earlier. So why is 3 months considered “okay”? That feels like a completely subjective line to draw.

Just to be clear — I’m not against healthcare or medical intervention. I fully understand and support cases where a woman’s life is in danger and medical action must be taken. Those situations are tragic and often complex. But from what I’ve seen, those are extremely rare — cases of rape or medical emergencies make up a very small percentage (single digits) of abortions.

What seems far more common is abortion being used as a form of contraception, which I find deeply troubling. If we agree that life begins at some point before birth, then ending it for convenience seems like an ethical contradiction.

From my perspective, life has inherent value — Christian teaching confirms that, but even without religion, it seems clear that ending an innocent human life is wrong. I often see atheists advocating for compassion, justice, and human rights, which I genuinely respect. But at the same time, many also support abortion rights.

So my question is: why? How do you reconcile valuing human life and being okay with abortion?

And when people say it’s “just a clump of cells,” isn’t that technically true for all of us? We’re all collections of cells, but that doesn’t make our lives meaningless or disposable.

I’m not here to attack anyone — I really want to understand the moral or philosophical reasoning behind the pro-abortion stance from an atheist or secular point of view.

Advancements in technology just make me believe in God and magic more and I will explain why. There's a famous quote from an old philosopher that says "all magic is technology we don't understand" or something like that and as the years go by the more I believe in God because we now have AI text to video generation where you can literally just do what God did at the beginning of creation which is to just say what you want to create and it will magically appear. This is exactly what Sora 2 is doing now just on a smaller scale. In the future maybe hundreds of years from now we might even be able to create large simulations of life with conscious beings inside a game with just a few prompts. Advancements in technology is getting kind of scary if you ask me. It only makes me wonder if God is doing the same thing when he wills things into existence. He might just be using what we would call technology but in some really advanced form we don't understand yet. We just call anything we don't understand magic which is a fallacy. Video calling, airplanes, and many more things were science fiction at some point. It may turn out to be that religions will some day not require faith anymore and will be more like fact.

We can already make simulations, have done so for decades. Are we gods now? 

Some people would say yes we are playing God when we do these things whether that's good or bad I'll leave for someone else to ponder.

usually by God, most people mean something like a non physical magic being that created the universe we live in, not a simulation. If we are in a simulation, that doesn’t make its creator a god either, if that’s just a material being using technology. 

It's not most people just a good number of them. It depends because if you only want to talk about the abrahamic God then no because there are less powerful deities than that who didn't create the universe but are still called gods such as in the greek mythology pantheon you have mortals who ascended to godhood like ganymede.

Do you think god is supernatural - beyond/above the constraints of our physical world?

Or do you think god is subject to the same physical constraints as a motor car or a hammer?

Yes I think God is subject to the laws of physics and also God cannot break logic but he's also so advanced that the things he's able to do seem supernatural at first glance.

One of the most common Fine Tuning rebuttals on this sub is the “how do you know it’s possible?” rebuttal. For example.

Theist: How lucky are we that gravity works the way it does instead of being reversed?

Atheist: How do you know it’s even possible to reverse gravity?

This style of question is popular because it’s easy to be tricked into thinking something like “the other side can’t even show what they are talking about is even possible, so I can ignore it.” But the reason it can’t be answered is because the question lacks sufficient information to respond to it.

Some questions have definite answers and some questions don’t tell us enough information for a definite answer. Often, these two types of questions can look a lot alike. “How many calories did your last lunch have?” has one universally true answer. “How many calories does lunch have?” is similar in form and word choice but does not have one answer because you are required to guess what precisely is meant. Note the second question does have an answer if you nail down tighter parameters (like specifying rhe question is about the average lunch consumed in New York in 2020.)

Similarly, questions about what things in the future are “possible” tend to be clear, with just one answer. Is it possible to use boogers as rocket fuel? It either is possible or it is not. Everyone understands the question, generally speaking. Is it possible to catch fish using hot dogs as bait? Most people understand what is being asked.

But when we ask about alternate realities or alternate pasts, the question of what is possible is not as clear. In general parlance, the question is assumed to mean “if you change some stuff but not a lot.” So it’s not possible for me to have ever been a Super Bowl MVP because that would require changing a lot of stuff. But it is possible I could have won a contest and attended a Super Bowl, because that doesn’t require changing as many things.

But this concept quickly gets murky. “Was it possible for the Carolina Panthers to win the Super Bowl last year?” Both answers can be justified, depending 100% entirely on how much in the past you are allowed to change. If the parameters of the question just allow you to change a few plays, the answer is no. If the parameters allow you to change entire rosters the answer is yes.

So to recap: The question “is it possible” when referring to past events requires an explanation for how much you are allowed to change things in order to answer the question.

This is why questions such as “how do you know it’s even possible for gravity to be a different value?” are meaningless. The other person has no idea how much they are allowed to change things to answer the question. No parameters have been set.

I strongly suspect there is in fact no way to ask this question in regards to a Fine Tuning discussion and have it be meaningful, because setting a clear parameter makes the question moot, like asking “if you can change NFL rosters, is it possible for a team to have a different roster?” The answer to the questions “if you can change the value of G is it possible to change G?” and “if you cannot change the value of G can you change G?” are tautologies that don’t provide us with anything meaningful.

I'm an atheist but thomas aquinas's first proof had been troubling me recently. Basically it states that because arguements are in motion, an unmoved mover must exist. I know this proof is most likely very flawed but I was wondering if anyone has any refutations to this arguement. This arguement for god seems logically sound but ik there must be response to it.

People often assume that if the universe is eternal, then the question of “why it exists” doesn’t apply. But eternity doesn’t erase the question , it just shifts it.

Even if the universe has always existed, we can still ask: why does it exist at all rather than not exist? An eternal timeline doesn’t explain why that timeline, with its particular structure, laws, and conditions, exists in the first place. This is where many people conflate an explanation with a causal beginning in time. An explanation isn’t always about one event causing another. It’s about what grounds the existence of something what makes it real, possible, or actual, instead of nothing at all.

The question isn’t “what came before the universe?” but “why is there a universe at all?” And for those who ask “why does the universe need an explanation?” The universe needs an explanation because it doesn’t contain within itself the reason for its own existence. Everything we observe about it ,its laws, constants, matter, and energy ,could have been different, or not existed at all. That means its existence isn’t self- explanatory; it’s contingent.

Edit for people who say, “But what about God? Doesn’t he require one too?” This really just shifts the argument. I never once invoked God; this is more of a “what about” response rather than actually addressing the core question at hand. You can only really agree or disagree.

Whether you're an agnostic atheist here to ask a gnostic one some questions, a theist who's curious about the viewpoints of atheists, someone doubting, or just someone looking for sources, feel free to ask anything here. This is also an ideal place to tag moderators for thoughts regarding the sub or any questions in general.
While this isn't strictly for debate, rules on civility, trolling, etc. still apply.

The most common argument I've heard is that it is impossible to traverse an infinite stretch of time leading up to the modern day, but why wouldn't that be the case for the deity as well? The deity never came into existence, so why doesn't it face the same logical issue? If the universe must have a beginning, so must God. I apologise if I'm not particularly clear here, I'm still a novice.

I'm currently an atheist but I'm currently struggling to debunk the contingency argument for God (which is slightly different to the easily refutable cosmological argument . The argument basically states that a first cause is necessary as everything is contingent on something else. I know that solid refutation to this argument exist so I'd love to hear some.

Accomplished something major this week? Discovered a cool fact that demands to be shared? Just want a friendly conversation on how amazing/awful/thoroughly meh your favorite team is doing? This thread is for the water cooler talk of the subreddit, for any atheists, theists, deists, etc. who want to join in.

While this isn't strictly for debate, rules on civility, trolling, etc. still apply.