PP: God - fordsfords/fordsfords.github.io GitHub Wiki

I do not believe in God. I do not believe there ever was a God, nor ever will be.

I cannot prove this. Nobody can. Neither can anybody prove there is/was one.

This is not a new debate, and I certainly don't have any new and creative insight to add to the discussion. I'm not going to go through the countless arguments made for and against God. I instead will give my personal reasons for my lack of belief.

In the order of influence:

  1. My parents were not particularly religious. I think the most common reason for a person to believe in God is that they were taught to do so. I was not. My father claimed to be an atheist, but I'm not sure he really was. He believed in pre-determined fate (at least he said he did), which is just a different flavor of God. I'm pretty sure my mother believed in God, but she never made any effort (that I can remember) to transfer that belief to me. I was not sent to religious school, nor did I ever go to church. The closest thing to praying we ever did was saying, "God is great, God is good, thank you for the food we eat. Amen" every Thanksgiving, and we even stopped that at some point. And we exchanged presents on Christmas, but never talked about it in any religious way.

  2. I was taught to value (secular) education, especially STEM. This didn't actually encourage atheism, but it set the stage for what came next.

  3. I discovered Issac Asimov. Initially, I only knew him by his science fact articles that he wrote for the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, and which were collected into books. I didn't know anything about the magazine, but I loved the books. Each chapter was a self-contained essay about science, written by one of the great science communicators. Not a dry text book, but a lively, interesting, and accessible explanation, with a sense of humor no less. I devoured these books. It was a long time before I found out that he is better known for his science fiction. I think I was in high school when I read that he was unapologetically an atheist. I had been thinking about atheism before that, and discovering that a well-known person who I idolized was one sealed the deal. I think he sort of gave me permission to be one.

  4. And in fourth place -- a distant fourth at that -- are the logical reasons for not believing in God. And there are many. These are the reasons I've spent the most time thinking about (when I think about God at all). These are the reasons that I, in many ways, value the most. Ironic since they aren't the reason for my lack of belief. I fear they are post hoc justification and rationalization. If I had religious parents, I suspect I would now consider myself a mostly secular agnostic. Or maybe not. Who can say?

All that said, the most compelling logical reason for my not believing in God is that there are just too many Gods to choose from, and most of those Gods don't believe in the others.

  • This was more true in history - one flavor of Muslim believed that another flavor of Muslim would burn in hell. One flavor of Christian believed that another flavor of Christian would burn in hell. And all four flavors believe that Jews would burn in hell. Not to mention the Hindus and Buddhists. Wars, large and small, were fought over competing God concepts.
    • I've heard the argument that this is not God's fault. It was humans who chose to abuse religious fervor to achieve secular political ends. And that is probably true. But the fact that they got away with it certainly doesn't bode well for believing in God, at least an activist God.
  • Nowadays, different religions get along much better, officially at least. But I don't think it's because the religious leaders suddenly discovered the true meaning of Christmas. The social cost of religious intolerance became too high. Warfare became more effective at killing people. Especially with the advent of nuclear weapons, religious leaders really had no choice but to (mostly) tell their followers to just get along.
  • So, since I wasn't raised to believe in a particular God concept, which one should I choose? Whichever one I select, over half the planet will believe I will burn in hell. So, whereas Pascal's Wager was originally intended to support belief, the continued growth of religions he dismissed has made the wager an argument against belief. No matter what you choose, you are guaranteed to go to Hell. The only way to win is not to play.
    • And yes, I know that is not a logically valid argument. But I like the twist so I'm keeping it.

So, why did I become Jewish?

Well, first of all, secular Judaism is a real thing. There are plenty of Jewish atheists. But there I go again, with the rationalizations. The real reason I became Jewish was to make my first marriage easier and to gain acceptance by my in-laws. The fact that Judaism is a lot more "this world" oriented than many other religions simply made it easier for me to convert without lying about my beliefs.

Secondly, who says I'm Jewish? I say so. The rabbi who converted me says so. But no Israeli rabbi would accept my conversion. In fact, a US Conservative rabbi wouldn't, never mind a US Orthodox rabbi. And you get back to the same old argument - when you really look closely, there are so many Judaisms, with each more traditional considering all the less-traditional groups to be not good Jews. To be fair, even the most ultra-Orthodox don't think the Reform Jews are going to hell, they'll just have to endure some stern lectures from God.

So, am I Jewish? Probably less so now than I was 40 years ago. Or even one year ago; the recent OP: War in Gaza is making me re-think my opinion of Israel, and even Jews in general. But yeah, I'm Jewish enough for me.

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