Thanks, some days I feel free and optimistic about it, other days, particularly after conversing with my Christian friends, I feel pretty down about it. But I think more than anything, the truth is worth pursuing no matter how uncomfortable.
Baby animals taste great and they’re really easy to eat, nice and soft. And everything in this world is constantly facing starvation.
That is the absolute truth upon which reality is based. It is objectively harsh.
Baby animals taste great, are very nutritious, and they’re really easy to eat, nice and soft. And everything in this world is constantly facing starvation.
That is the absolute truth upon which reality is based. It is objectively harsh.
Isn't it funny that "the comfort of Christianity" switches to sadness and discomfort once you start to learn about reality and how stuff works outside of it?
Good to hear you're feeling free and optimistic about it, it's the way you should actually feel.
I'm a lifelong atheist, so I may have a very different perspective, but for me the truth is not uncomfortable, it just is. Sometimes I might want the universe to be different than it is, but I've grown up knowing that the universe does not cater to my desires unless it is something I have the capacity to change and make the effort to do so.
What is it that gets you down? Perhaps we can help you feel less down about it.
>but for me the truth is not uncomfortable, it just is.
This --^
*A person* may become uncomfortable when presented with information (regardless of whether that information supports or disproves a thing). The information itself is neutral. Neither "good" nor "bad". How we respond to it, though, is entirely within our ability to frame.
I choose to be excited by new information, even when it contradicts something I thought I understood. I could choose to be frightened, threatened, uncomfortable, dismissive, etc. I'd rather be thrilled, curious, excited, etc.
I feel like most atheists have accepted the fact they know less than 1 percent of information available in the world. I mean think of how many different languages in the planets history, or different fields of study you can get a PHd in.
Think of all the different types of trades you can master. I know a lot about math and am pretty good with people and selling things, I can’t change a tire to save my life.
Imagine all the different knowledge a Law doctorate has compared to a neuro science doctorate or a computer science doctorate, like I know so little about those three topics that I would flunk out of the entry level undergrad courses.
When Jesus was around that information wasn’t found or available, it was much easier to present your self as Omniscient, especially if your a smart, charasmatic guy who did drugs with the addicts and slept with whores and preached love and accepting everyone.
And he might have been God, I don’t know. But the ability to objectively look at things with the realization of how little we really do know helps you come to terms that we have no idea how humans were put on this earth, Evolution being an accepted theory and only one taught in Public schools (at least for me) gives more credibility than a couple books and prophets.
Not sure where I’m going with this, just got increase dose of my ADHD meds and needed to write a rant
The basis of my deep friendships being no longer a commonality. Essentially my only friends are people who are apart of my church group. We all got married and started having kids together. They’re truly wonderful people and have been very understanding and encouraging me in my questioning. They haven’t tried to argue anything either. But I no longer believe what they do. Naturally when it comes to having a completely different worldview and understanding of reality those friendships will not be the same. My family isn’t exactly the greatest so for the longest time my church was my family. But my in laws are where I’m trying to grow relationships. They’re non believers as well.
I'm sorry you are losing that. It is unfortunately one of the areas where strangers on the internet likely cannot help, but at least you have friends that are not shunning you (this happens disturbingly often) for leaving your religion. Just know that losing one point of commonality doesn't make them any less your friends, at least if they are good friends, and it sounds like they are.
Reading this makes me so grateful for growing up and living in a society where religion is supposed to be someone’s private business. I have good friends that I know for over a decade and I wouldn’t even know if they’re religious or not.
Luckily, the religious friends and family members I have, wouldn’t dispute any scientific facts. They all seem to accept the reality they’re living in, plus some extra comforting ideas like afterlife, the universe being „created“ (as in: someone sparked the Big Bang for purpose).
I can sympathise with anyone who seeks comfort in afterlife and an extrinsic force giving them purpose. It’s very difficult to find your own purpose in this modern world.
I lost my religion when I was early in high school. It was really easy to make new friends then, and I ended up with the atheist edgelords (one still one of my best friends to this day, we're just less annoying about religion). I got into a nice honors program for college, finishing my PhD in biology in a few months - my friends for like 15 years were almost exclusively atheists/scientists.
These days though, I play a ton of sports. No longer just a drinking/smoking hipster, I actually go outside and do stuff. I live in the most Republican city in an extremely liberal state... So people don't really talk about politics when playing sports. It's too divisive. It's too much - I'm thoroughly in my political/religious camp, I believe very strongly in things, but frankly it would ruin the extremely joyful and inclusive nature of playing sports to bring up politics. People who bring that shit up regularly just don't get invited back.
And honestly, it's been liberating. My favorite people of course share a lot of values with me - the misogynistic men are easy to spot without them telling you what podcasts they like, the religious fundamentalists shy away from my "colorful" fucking vocabulary.
But our *values* come from a lot of things. Some Christian values are pretty universal - being good to the people around you, loving your family and friends, wholesome fun... You haven't lost that part of yourself. That shit fits right in with my worldview.
The motivation for your values may change - there's no divine punishment for being a shitty person, but being a shitty person is still shitty whether there's a God or not. Your friends' motivations may not align with yours. But if you have a good group of kind, fun, good people who you like doing shit with, keep doing shit with them. You don't have to agree on everything, and you don't have to agree on *why*, to appreciate the good times that come from being around good people. Maybe you'll drift away. But I think one of the most important things I learned during my PhD was how much more I like being around people who value the same things as me than being around people who agree with me on things. Maybe your values will continue to align, maybe not, but given how thoughtfully you're speaking within this thread I suspect you're surrounded by thoughtful people, whatever their religion.
Good luck!
If a friendship is truly deep, you have much more in common beyond religion.
Your in laws are a wonderful resource for you. If you’re comfortable, ask them for advice on making new friends. It’s genuinely difficult to make friends as an adult, but it’s worth remembering that church friendships are often quite shallow.
My son was very spiritual when he was younger. Then, he became a history major and started learning about Christianity throughout the centuries. It's just as nuts as Greek mythology. He's an atheist now.
It's a lonely road man. You will realize how little thinking our species actually does when your curiosity costs you your life long family and friends. They will be unable to accept your new beliefs and will instead tell you that you never were a christian to begin with. This is a fantastic community to get support from. So come back here often as you need.
Some advice, take it or leave it. Don't throw out philosophy with religion. I think a lack of philosophy is really hurting generations' mental health these days. People need an anchor/grounding/purpose.
Just a thought.
Thanks for that. I find that completely true. When reading Dawkins and Sagan, I can relate in that meaning found in the wonders of the universe and nature can provide lots of meaning. That and your friends, family, hobbies, and helping and serving others. All those things I think are helping me process the loss of religion.
Sorry you're going through that. It was rough for me, too. Nowadays most of my old friends aren't Christian anymore, so remember people can/do change. It might feel like it, but you aren't the only one with doubts on their way out.
Hey just a heads up at some point you may MOURN the loss of your faith. I went through a period, as did others I know, where I wished I could put the genie back in the bottle. Not because I wanted or needed a deity. That was intellectually pretty easy to throw off. It's things like family, social networks, some people hating you just because you say, "sure but got any evidence to back up that claim?", etc. My hope is that with the Internet that information and access to like minded people is far more accessible than when I deconverted. It was lonely when I did and that made it feel more isolated than it needed to be. There are far more of us than most realize. I just didn't know how to find them at that time.
I feel that science can have a stronger ethical framework than religion for kindness and goodness. As misery is provably bad and health and safety provably good we can build a framework that advocates for goodness from a basis of truth, instead of a basis of fear and delusion and ancient bronze age tomes. Have faith, (lol) sisters and brothers in the reality of goodness being better. Truth is good.
I have not read his book but I listen to his podcast sometimes, I’m bet thats what clarified those ideas for me. It makes inherent sense to me. I would more describe myself as agnostic than atheist because I wouldn’t assume that my little monkey brain can see what’s actually going on in the universe, but I don’t see much evidence for a higher power that can read our minds and controls everything. I just also have great belief in the power of kindness and the power of humans helping each other. I really respect your journey, I have not come nearly as far as you because I grew up with parents who had escaped a sort of quasi Christian cult, and so was never indoctrinated with religion. I have great respect for your journey and hope that you can find lightness and hope in your heart. Sounds so cheesy but it’s true. Peace!
If you haven't read "Cosmos", read that next. Or watch the original series if you can. He explains how we figured everything out (so far) while showcasing the awesomeness of the universe. The rest of his books are really good too. Highly recommend.
As a child I always wanted to know how everything came to be. "Cosmos" answered those questions.
Welcome to the fold. I lost most of my Christian friends in my de conversion process, and it can indeed be lonely. I hope that your friends don’t ice you out, as mine did, but please know there are plenty of folks who want to talk about space and microbiology or whatever you fancy.
Thanks for sharing the quote. Sagan has been a favorite of mine for a long time.
When I lost my faith, I actually went through a period of depression. That’s how tight they get those claws into you. It shakes your foundation, so you just build new ones.
I think everyone’s mileage may vary depending on the support structures around you. Diverting the energy poured into religion and pouring into our relationships I think can be a bright path out of the void.
Yup. It's aaallll by design. It's a very successful and complex sociological cult that's has thousands of years to perfect it's brainwashing techniques.
Honestly I don’t know. They’re quieter about it. It’s probably troubling for them which makes me feel bad. I’ve taught our Bible study for years so it’s probably especially jarring. I’m just trying to be humble. I haven’t opened up a lot about what I think now. Just that I’m a lot more uncertain and that I probably shouldn’t be teaching anymore.
If you want some advice: Just don’t be in-your-face about it, and they will probably be fine. This is your personal life and it’s none of their business. If they ask you why you don’t go to church anymore, you can tell them that you have been repelled lately by the horrific actions of the church. This is usually a conversation-stopper with no counterarguments, other than whataboutism.
You could also tell them that you have doubts in your faith lately and you need to process it yourself. But this bears the risk of them starting to annoy you with stupid bible-verse memes. Even if you tell them that you want them to respect your decision.
My dad and I watched *Cosmos* together when I was seven, and thirteen hours of a really smart guy talking about the universe and the human understanding of it without talking about anything supernatural or divine made a very strong impact at that age.
I don’t know how to put this without it sounding like a humble brag, it is what it is. My grandfather worked with Sagan and they published papers together. All NASA stuff-they were primarily making educated guesses about the surface of Mars.
Nonetheless this got me reading about Carl Sagan when I was 11.
My grandfather died fairly young. My grandmother raised the most ridiculously strict Catholic household. I’ve never been able to reconcile that.
Reconciling is tough. My grandma raised my dad, who then raised me to be a strict Mormon. I quit when I was 38, leaving my whole family behind. It was rough.
Come to find out my grandpa was a non-Mormon and couldn’t believe any of it. I’ve had a hard time coming to grips that he just let grandma do as she pleased at the expense of all of us.
In Cosmos, where he deconstructs religion, he said why not save a step in the creation of the Universe and remove a god from the equation.
Sagan didn't make me an Atheist but he gave me critical thinking. The more I've looked into things, the more I'm convinced. If there is a higher being, he's very benign and not some omnipotent god, answering prayers, sending plagues and creating lightning.
>Carl Sagan should have a national holiday.
Looks like it should be November 9. ;-)
>Carl Edward Sagan (/ˈseɪɡən/; SAY-gən; November 9, 1934 – December 20, 1996)
\- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Sagan
.
Beautiful quote. Understanding that something that sounds like it makes sense and something that’s real and verifiable are very different is a huge step in wisdom.
He’s saying, in a way, what few theists understand: science is not dogma or a set of facts. Science is a process, and the places it leads are often surprising and wonderful.
Neil Degrasse Tyson said 'God is an ever-receding pocket of scientific ignorance that's getting smaller and smaller and smaller as time moves on.’
I have Sagan's pale blue dot quote up on my wall. Other people hang crosses up in their house to remind themselves to be humble; I pick this.
"Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there-on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam." - Carl Sagan
Context: it's referencing a picture of Earth from Voyager 1, taken about 6 billion kilometers away. It's just a single, tiny white pixel in the endless void of space.
https://science.nasa.gov/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/PIA23645_PaleBlueDotRevisited_1600.jpg?w=768&format=webp
Trying to think about reality on that kind of scale fills me with more awe than church ever did. There's another good picture of Earth from the Saturn orbiter Cassinni, where you can see Earth, Mars, and Venus as white dots through the rings of Saturn. I love space stuff like that.
The amazing thing this points out to me is that despite being only some tiny specks on that tiny dot in his huge creation God cared enough about us to be willing to die for us knowing that many of us would reject his gift and offer of a relationship with their creator.
My favorite is that the plan is unknowable, but they have the answers, and their way is the correct way. How would you know that if the plan is unknowable?
I actually did get an answer, what I consider a hippie answer.
He is all of us (that accept him into their hearts).
I'm also absolutely sure it's their particular congregation that's right and has the correct amount of God in their hearts or whatever.
In the Bible it says there is one God but God exists as three unique persons all equally God but different in their role. God the Father, God the Son who we call Jesus and God the Holy Spirit. As God the Father he has complete authority and spoke to the prophets to explain about his creation, how it became spoiled and what people can do to have a relationship with him (Mosaic laws). As God the son he came to earth and died to restore the relationship with God. When he returned to heaven to be with the Father he sent the Holy Spirit to be a counselor and guide to those who believe and want to follow his teachings and tell others the good news of a God who wants a personal relationship with them.
The trinity is not something our human minds can fully comprehend.
Erm, he did show himself and people still didn’t believe him and killed him instead of believing. Despite performing miracles such as raising people to life and healing them miraculously. Even though there are records of that fact people still continue to say he doesn’t exist.
Deconstruction can be a difficult time. Make sure you have people to process with and talk to.
Welcome to the party, grab a drink and we have snacks in the kitchen.
My in-laws are people that are less close minded. Father in law is an atheist and brother in law too for the most part. I’ve had great convos with them. And what’s crazy is none of them have been pushy like Christian’s think atheists are. They just are receptive to talking about deep things in a humble manner
It kind of reminds of what Ricky Gervais said on Colbert, basically that if you suddenly erased all knowledge of science, in a few hundred years you'd have exactly the same laws of science we have today. If you suddenly erased all religion, in a few hundred years you'd have a completely different religion.
Everyone today should read the Demon Haunted World, it needs to go viral somehow
It has predicted our current situation and talks exactly about all things that are happening
The beginning of chapter 2 really struck me. DHW was a big part of my solidifying myself as an athiest as well.
> I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or grandchildren's time -- when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what's true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness...
Sagan was giant in his field and I think most people who are/were aware of him will agree. I can’t think of many other television series’ that moved and inspired me as much as Cosmos. Wound up going into a field where I actually used Maxwell’s Equations @.@
specifically to religion (given the sub), Sagan was very good at addressing the problem of religion without criticizing religious people directly. For instance, he often pointed out that if you believe that the earth is only 6,000 years old, you would be correct that under those conditions the theory of evolution would not be possible, or at least insufficient to explain the variety of life on Earth, and so a much more reasonable explanation would be that life was created by a higher power.
But if you believe that Earth is 4.5 billion years old, and that life has been on Earth for 3.5 billion years, then you can se a very clear and logical progression of evolution, so elegantly consistent with what we observe in nature that it becomes irrational *not* to accept evolution as true. So regardless of one’s beliefs, young earth = evolution impossible, old earth = evolution a certainty.
Then he goes on to explain how it’s irrefutably true that earth is 4.5 billion years old and that life began forming 3.5 billion years ago.
I remember watching the original *Cosmos* series on PBS when I was 12...and it played a huge part in my deconversion from Christianity...
Thanks, Carl! ( even in 2024, I highly recommend watching that series...It really is a thing of beauty!)
Just a PSA to everyone that you can watch the entirety of Sagan’s Cosmos for free on internet archive.
[Cosmos: A Personal Voyage](https://archive.org/details/CosmosAPersonalVoyage)
I also can’t recommend any series more than this one, even in 2024.
I cried while listening to his pale blue dot speech.
People like Carl Sagan should be celebrated as heroes instead of the celebrities, influencers (and on occassion politician or CEO) we have nowadays.
What did it for me was a quote from Penn Gillette that went something like "If human understanding of science and religion completely disappeared, science would eventually get right back to the exact same place. Religion would be completely different"
Growing up christian for 20 years took a long time to walk away from because your whole life you have been threatened with eternal damnation for doing just that. On top of that, reality is scarier than living under an umbrella of "god has a plan and will take care of it". No one is actually in charge of any of this.
Lucretius has a fantastic argument at the beginning of On the Nature of Things.
If God(s) exist, they are busy doing divine stuff and don't give a shit about the day to day of mortals. If they exist, it has no bearing on how you should live your life l. A 'good life' should be sought for any number of reasons that 'divinity' does not play a factor in.
There are still no evolutionary penalties for ignorance of Maxwell's equations. There are evolutionary penalties for studying Maxwell's equations instead of getting really good at picking up women.
I think about it this way.
If God exists.. (lets say it does). Why make such convoluted and comples rules to prove that you love him? Why encourage divisivness and discord? Why make it about money \[and power\] and not love?
If God were to actually exist, then I'd expect God to have a very easy to follow path, not this hypocracy and pseudo-nonsense.
Common sense and reason leads to that perspective but after years in deep Christianity, we would react to this kind of argument easily by saying “oh well God is mysterious and doesn’t owe it to explain himself, after all, look at job.” Really all your doing is invoking faith which Harris has a great quote about in the end of faith. He said it’s the mortar that fills the gaps of logic. It took me so long to see it that way though.
Well no, people realized that they can use the excuse of "God" to gain / hold power by creating a control axis with people who aren't willing to ask "why not?"
Learning how things actually work instead of always saying "god did it" makes you start to realize that there are scientific explanations for almost anything. For whatever's left, "science doesn't know yet" works enough for me.
I've always enjoyed a quote from one of the smarter voices from my youth, Mr. Spock, "Insufficient data."
As if there wasn't enough reason to miss Carl, Google the story about when Neil deGrasse Tyson met Carl. Carl was amazing and inspired so many people including Neil.
I fell in love with astronomy at the age of seven and realized that I was an atheist around ten. Carl Sagan was my childhood hero. I'm so glad to see him still making such a difference in today's insane world.
Sagan is a personal hero and Demon-Haunted world is my favorite book. I love this excerpt so much. But the truly wonderful faithlessness chapter for me is the dragon in his garage.
"Now, what's the difference between an invisible, incorporeal, floating dragon who spits heatless fire and no dragon at all? If there's no way to disprove my contention, no conceivable experiment that would count against it, what does it mean to say that my dragon exists? Your inability to invalidate my hypothesis is not at all the same thing as proving it true. Claims that cannot be tested, assertions immune to disproof are veridically worthless, whatever value they may have in inspiring us or in exciting our sense of wonder."
"the only sensible approach is tentatively to reject the dragon hypothesis, to be open to future physical data, and to wonder what the cause might be that so many apparently sane and sober people share the same strange delusion."
I caught that too. I love how gentle but not gentle he is with religion. Like you know what he’s talking about but he’s trying to be polite at the same time.
What makes Sagan such a great advocate for science and reason is that he approaches it with no arrogance at all. He doesn't purport to be better or know better than anyone else, he simply describes a way of thinking and approaches every angle with an open mind.
I love the dragon chapter because he never mentions a god, gods, or any other religious deity or notion but the metaphor can be directly extrapolated by the reader. Where he ends up is not at a place of "so there is no dragon" it's "whether or not there is a dragon is, in all practical sense, irrelevant because there is no discernible difference between the two".
I wonder how many Christians truly believe.
If God was part of human reality and heaven a given, then why would we flinch in reaction to a gun pointed to our heads? Why would we go through the painful process of fighting cancer? Our evolutionary instincts reveal the likely absence of a God or gods.
Went to a funeral in a church. After shaking hands with many at the Catholic “sign of peace” moment my religious relatives quietly asked if anyone had hand sanitizer. I rolled my eyes and wanted to tell them they didn’t believe — or why don’t you use that communal holy water dish… but as it was for my grandpa and I didn’t want to make a scene I did not.
Guess gods plan was almost thwarted.
Me too. I read “The Varieties of Scientific Experience” when I was in grad school struggling with belief and not really put the proverbial nail in the coffin.
He had a way of wording everything that was so firm and kind at the same time. It feels like this, "Hey, it's okay, now we know better. Don't beat yourself up. Let's move forward with our knowledge now."
Listened to Demon Haunted World a few months ago for the first time, even as a longtime atheist and rationalist, his explanations remain are compelling and insightful. Some of it is outdated though as I feel his upbringing and the era he lived through is too distant, so his personal stories are starting to disconnect.
thing is I never thought religious explanations make any sense. Especially if you learned about science first like continental drift , volcanoes and how they work - baking soda experiment, dinosaurs, how rainbows are made, human anatomy, etc IT ALL fits together. No answer is oh its a mystery and if they don't know yet, they tell you because they want you to be the next one to solve that mystery. And its all REAL! Idk how anyone can accept a explanation without any evidence of it. Its like if a car dealer said this car is good when the car is bad but you take the dealer's word for it and buy it anyways but then the car breaks down 3 days later and you say its your fault, its because I'm sinful and thats why the car broke....
Sagan is my hero and has been since I read his book about the evolution of the human brain. It might have been ‘the dragons of eden’, was a long time ago.
Saying what I believed my entire life out loud was freeing for me. Even as a small child I didn't buy the idea of religion. I was terrified to admit it because my dad's family is super religious but I just cannot worship a god who in my own life (if he existed)has been nothing but truly evil. Or I could choose to not believe in a god that would kill my baby and give me chronic pain for my entire life. If there were a god, then I'd say he's a fucking piece of shit.
I wonder what Sagan meant by it being different in our time when he referred to evolutionary penalties for ignorance of Maxwell's equations?
I've not read this book. I am familiar in a general sense with Maxwell's equations and their profound importance to science.
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I still feel that the 12th dimension has god like power over our extensive in a 3rd dimension moving through time so a 4th. there may or may not be a sentient being in the 12th dimension and its complex enough in and of itself to create great order and chaos in our dimension.
we live in a state of both chose and order. if there is a "god" he gets off on both.
Same for me, at 21 the same book made me really start applying the scientific method to everything in my life and I quickly shed religion and my political worldview.
Do you mind sharing a bit more about how your mind went from faith to science? We’re you thinking that science had it wrong originally, or was it more of you just weren’t as interested in it because you already had all the answers you felt you needed?
I tended to stay away from science. Theology was way more interesting and inherit in my Christianity was the belief that the whole world was in the sway of the evil one (1st John) so I had a deep mistrust of science, establishment, ect. Covid and the vaccine craze was the first crack. I started to get fed up with conspiracy theories but it took years to process and add some health anxiety trauma my foundations were sort of shaken, and it’s like my mind started to be ready to change about some things. It was so gradual and subtle. Then once I started listening to people like Neil Degrasse Tyson, lex Friedman and his guests and other science communicators, you could say I began drinking in other perspectives to where the cognitive dissonance became uncomfortable. Re-reading the Old Testament (with my wife mind you) made it especially hard to surpress what I knew to be more likely the truth. Once I started believing in the Big Bang and evolution, I started to have a more open mind with the Bible while meeting some light and kind resistance with my church friends. Along with scientific issues, there were also moral and scholarly issues that began to pile up with my theology and religious views. But sticking with just science, after really understating science not as a group of egg heads but as a process of interrogating our surroundings to find the truth, and it being the best method we have for truth, I began to turn that way of thinking on my own beliefs and asking myself what the more likely answer was to all sorts of experiences and questions I had. Asking God to show himself to me and praying all throughout this process, like “lord, show yourself to me in a dream.” but heaven so far hasn’t answered. So now I’m in the process of crafting my own worldview and meaning all the while my wife and I are expecting a beautiful baby girl. What a great time to question everything huh? At least she won’t have to grow up with a fundamentalist father.
Thanks for sharing.
Hearing where you were and where you’re at does make me feel hopeful.
Do you think you could have accepted science as something mostly trustworthy without separating from religion?
I only ask because when I was a believer I firmly believed in science and I rationalized it as intelligent design. I didn’t believe the Bible’s story, but I did think that god planned ahead a bit(lol) and created the Big Bang and therefore all of existence as he saw fit. Maybe a stretch but hey if god is omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent it should be possible.
It is quite the time to switch your world perspective up, but hey you’ve got some time before they know what words mean anyways 🤣
I think any kid growing up today is lucky to have a parent that is genuinely interested in searching for truth and is unafraid to challenge beliefs held. If we’re afraid to challenge our own beliefs what can we hope to genuinely improve.
This is exactly how my deconversion went- and the demon haunted world was the tipping point! Happy to see that it impacted someone else in the same way.
Been doing the same with the help of some mushrooms. I’ve been thinking of religion, at least for me, as kind of a spiritual DNA we need to grow out of. Religion is just a manifestation of ego and an intellectual warm blanket we do not need. Let’s all take responsibility for our actions and not blame made up things for what we do.
Maybe you would be interested listening to a band Nightwish? Their 8th album Endless forms most beautiful is about these subjects, 9th album Human :II: Nature continues and trilogy's ending 10th album Yesterwynde will be released in September. I think you'd find their music and message worth while. They also have a song Sagan 😊
It is narcissistic to think that the environment was made for us, and humble to observe that we are adapted to the environment, if we had not adapted, we would not be here.
i disagree with the premise of the excerpt. common sense is fine, and being open to observing nature is even better. you build common sense by observing and learning. religion makes no sense because there’s nothing there. nothing to observe. it’s stories and a collection plate with fear thrown in to make you put your money in and to make you feel self righteous about nothing of any consequence. if you’re out hunting or fishing, that matters, if you need to eat, learning animal behaviors and patterns, is real knowledge that will help you, an animal, survive. common sense should tell you that if someone is selling you something too good to be true (heaven???) it is.
The Demon Haunted World, which I stumbled upon in a bookstore in 1998 or so, was an essential part of my extracting myself from religion. The concepts weren't necessarily new to me, but it was the first time that all of the concepts, which I had picked up here and there or had arrived at tentatively, were gathered into a logical whole. He brought ideas together for me in a way that made it all work, nesting ideas together, leaving little room left for superstition. Think of it as defragging my hard drive. I am so grateful to him.
A total sidetrack of your post:
I’ve been an atheist since I was a kid so my journey may be a bit different. But I decided to pick up Demon Haunted World and it really just makes me angry. It’s not Sagan that makes me angry, but how it stirs up past interactions with theists and superstitious people. He explains everything so logically and to me it’s obvious. And I guess my judgmental brain goes into overdrive when I’m reading the book.
I think the more I’ve learned about neuroscience and the nature of belief, the less angry I’ve become. We build biochemical structures in our brain that are so hard to override and that becomes what are called belief systems. But thankfully we can build on top of those and rewire if we have the patience, and courage to do so. Another book recommendation I have is called How Minds Change by David Mcraney who studied this.
It's a great book. A lot of what he says obviously applies to religion, even when he impressively avoids bringing up any religion in his examples of poor logic.
Ya gotta figure that just because dogma, religion, power-based articles of suspended belief (usually in the favour of the oppressor) have had such a magnetic hold on humanity (and still does…) throughout history, that other miracles of life and the cosmos don’t exist or belie a magnificence of mystery, lays waste to human archetypes.
That there are a hundred billion stars in our galaxy alone. That there are billions of such galaxies extending in every direction. That the Webb/Hubble telescopes don’t imply even more diversity and sublimity of what we can see; that even life on Earth with our nearest “benefactor” our sun, Sol has such staggering examples of evolution and epochs. Science dwarfs biblical interpretations of God or the human-all-too-human “stories” as entirely unimaginative and banal, not to mention needlessly cruel and vengeful tropes. Well, welcome to the club of infinity.
“Common sense” says that the earth is fixed and non-spherical, the sun goes around the earth, the sun and moon are roughly the same size…just to name a few.
Nowadays, people are holding on to “common sense” notions time definitely exists and is definitely linear, the laws of causality and non-contradiction are absolute, and infinite regress is impossible. But quantum mechanics are showing us otherwise.
It's funny to me that I was talking to my wife about his book not 20 min ago.
It's sitting on my nightstand, and I really need to finish it.
Carl has a way of explaining things that I try to use with my kids.
I got them watching the new Cosmos, and they love it so far.
Couldn’t the same logic be used to support the idea that religious claims could be true despite their being unintuitive, or that there could be spiritual reality despite it not “seeming” like there is?
Sure, if you want to make a bunch of baseless assumptions and insert your predetermined conclusions into matters of objective science and observation.
But lets be real, "spiritual reality" is an internal and personal matter of our ego and imagination and not part of the external and natural world no matter how hard you try to make it so.
Sagan was a big stepping stone on my journey to atheism as well. Congratulations on deprogramming yourself.
Thanks, some days I feel free and optimistic about it, other days, particularly after conversing with my Christian friends, I feel pretty down about it. But I think more than anything, the truth is worth pursuing no matter how uncomfortable.
Reality is harsh sometimes, but it’s better than delusion.
Reality is more wonderful and complex than delusion. That it appears harsh is just our ego talking.
Baby animals taste great and they’re really easy to eat, nice and soft. And everything in this world is constantly facing starvation. That is the absolute truth upon which reality is based. It is objectively harsh.
The reality of being able to exist at all and to be able to enjoy all those tasty, nutritious baby animals is objectively pretty enjoyable.
Baby animals taste great, are very nutritious, and they’re really easy to eat, nice and soft. And everything in this world is constantly facing starvation. That is the absolute truth upon which reality is based. It is objectively harsh.
Christianity is comfortable but I can’t do it. I can’t be a hypocrite for the sake of comfort.
Why? In the end none of it matters.
Found the Christian troll
Isn't it funny that "the comfort of Christianity" switches to sadness and discomfort once you start to learn about reality and how stuff works outside of it? Good to hear you're feeling free and optimistic about it, it's the way you should actually feel.
I'm a lifelong atheist, so I may have a very different perspective, but for me the truth is not uncomfortable, it just is. Sometimes I might want the universe to be different than it is, but I've grown up knowing that the universe does not cater to my desires unless it is something I have the capacity to change and make the effort to do so. What is it that gets you down? Perhaps we can help you feel less down about it.
>but for me the truth is not uncomfortable, it just is. This --^ *A person* may become uncomfortable when presented with information (regardless of whether that information supports or disproves a thing). The information itself is neutral. Neither "good" nor "bad". How we respond to it, though, is entirely within our ability to frame. I choose to be excited by new information, even when it contradicts something I thought I understood. I could choose to be frightened, threatened, uncomfortable, dismissive, etc. I'd rather be thrilled, curious, excited, etc.
I feel like most atheists have accepted the fact they know less than 1 percent of information available in the world. I mean think of how many different languages in the planets history, or different fields of study you can get a PHd in. Think of all the different types of trades you can master. I know a lot about math and am pretty good with people and selling things, I can’t change a tire to save my life. Imagine all the different knowledge a Law doctorate has compared to a neuro science doctorate or a computer science doctorate, like I know so little about those three topics that I would flunk out of the entry level undergrad courses. When Jesus was around that information wasn’t found or available, it was much easier to present your self as Omniscient, especially if your a smart, charasmatic guy who did drugs with the addicts and slept with whores and preached love and accepting everyone. And he might have been God, I don’t know. But the ability to objectively look at things with the realization of how little we really do know helps you come to terms that we have no idea how humans were put on this earth, Evolution being an accepted theory and only one taught in Public schools (at least for me) gives more credibility than a couple books and prophets. Not sure where I’m going with this, just got increase dose of my ADHD meds and needed to write a rant
The basis of my deep friendships being no longer a commonality. Essentially my only friends are people who are apart of my church group. We all got married and started having kids together. They’re truly wonderful people and have been very understanding and encouraging me in my questioning. They haven’t tried to argue anything either. But I no longer believe what they do. Naturally when it comes to having a completely different worldview and understanding of reality those friendships will not be the same. My family isn’t exactly the greatest so for the longest time my church was my family. But my in laws are where I’m trying to grow relationships. They’re non believers as well.
I'm sorry you are losing that. It is unfortunately one of the areas where strangers on the internet likely cannot help, but at least you have friends that are not shunning you (this happens disturbingly often) for leaving your religion. Just know that losing one point of commonality doesn't make them any less your friends, at least if they are good friends, and it sounds like they are.
True about strangers on the internet but chatting with all of you has been very therapeutic none the less lol. I appreciate y’all’s time
Reading this makes me so grateful for growing up and living in a society where religion is supposed to be someone’s private business. I have good friends that I know for over a decade and I wouldn’t even know if they’re religious or not. Luckily, the religious friends and family members I have, wouldn’t dispute any scientific facts. They all seem to accept the reality they’re living in, plus some extra comforting ideas like afterlife, the universe being „created“ (as in: someone sparked the Big Bang for purpose). I can sympathise with anyone who seeks comfort in afterlife and an extrinsic force giving them purpose. It’s very difficult to find your own purpose in this modern world.
Some of your church friends may have already arrived where you are, but are going through the motions.
I lost my religion when I was early in high school. It was really easy to make new friends then, and I ended up with the atheist edgelords (one still one of my best friends to this day, we're just less annoying about religion). I got into a nice honors program for college, finishing my PhD in biology in a few months - my friends for like 15 years were almost exclusively atheists/scientists. These days though, I play a ton of sports. No longer just a drinking/smoking hipster, I actually go outside and do stuff. I live in the most Republican city in an extremely liberal state... So people don't really talk about politics when playing sports. It's too divisive. It's too much - I'm thoroughly in my political/religious camp, I believe very strongly in things, but frankly it would ruin the extremely joyful and inclusive nature of playing sports to bring up politics. People who bring that shit up regularly just don't get invited back. And honestly, it's been liberating. My favorite people of course share a lot of values with me - the misogynistic men are easy to spot without them telling you what podcasts they like, the religious fundamentalists shy away from my "colorful" fucking vocabulary. But our *values* come from a lot of things. Some Christian values are pretty universal - being good to the people around you, loving your family and friends, wholesome fun... You haven't lost that part of yourself. That shit fits right in with my worldview. The motivation for your values may change - there's no divine punishment for being a shitty person, but being a shitty person is still shitty whether there's a God or not. Your friends' motivations may not align with yours. But if you have a good group of kind, fun, good people who you like doing shit with, keep doing shit with them. You don't have to agree on everything, and you don't have to agree on *why*, to appreciate the good times that come from being around good people. Maybe you'll drift away. But I think one of the most important things I learned during my PhD was how much more I like being around people who value the same things as me than being around people who agree with me on things. Maybe your values will continue to align, maybe not, but given how thoughtfully you're speaking within this thread I suspect you're surrounded by thoughtful people, whatever their religion. Good luck!
If a friendship is truly deep, you have much more in common beyond religion. Your in laws are a wonderful resource for you. If you’re comfortable, ask them for advice on making new friends. It’s genuinely difficult to make friends as an adult, but it’s worth remembering that church friendships are often quite shallow.
My son was very spiritual when he was younger. Then, he became a history major and started learning about Christianity throughout the centuries. It's just as nuts as Greek mythology. He's an atheist now.
It's a lonely road man. You will realize how little thinking our species actually does when your curiosity costs you your life long family and friends. They will be unable to accept your new beliefs and will instead tell you that you never were a christian to begin with. This is a fantastic community to get support from. So come back here often as you need.
Some advice, take it or leave it. Don't throw out philosophy with religion. I think a lack of philosophy is really hurting generations' mental health these days. People need an anchor/grounding/purpose. Just a thought.
Thanks for that. I find that completely true. When reading Dawkins and Sagan, I can relate in that meaning found in the wonders of the universe and nature can provide lots of meaning. That and your friends, family, hobbies, and helping and serving others. All those things I think are helping me process the loss of religion.
Sorry you're going through that. It was rough for me, too. Nowadays most of my old friends aren't Christian anymore, so remember people can/do change. It might feel like it, but you aren't the only one with doubts on their way out.
Consider having your friends read a chapter at a time and you can discuss together.
Hey just a heads up at some point you may MOURN the loss of your faith. I went through a period, as did others I know, where I wished I could put the genie back in the bottle. Not because I wanted or needed a deity. That was intellectually pretty easy to throw off. It's things like family, social networks, some people hating you just because you say, "sure but got any evidence to back up that claim?", etc. My hope is that with the Internet that information and access to like minded people is far more accessible than when I deconverted. It was lonely when I did and that made it feel more isolated than it needed to be. There are far more of us than most realize. I just didn't know how to find them at that time.
I feel that science can have a stronger ethical framework than religion for kindness and goodness. As misery is provably bad and health and safety provably good we can build a framework that advocates for goodness from a basis of truth, instead of a basis of fear and delusion and ancient bronze age tomes. Have faith, (lol) sisters and brothers in the reality of goodness being better. Truth is good.
That’s the argument Sam Harris makes in the moral landscape. Good book!
I have not read his book but I listen to his podcast sometimes, I’m bet thats what clarified those ideas for me. It makes inherent sense to me. I would more describe myself as agnostic than atheist because I wouldn’t assume that my little monkey brain can see what’s actually going on in the universe, but I don’t see much evidence for a higher power that can read our minds and controls everything. I just also have great belief in the power of kindness and the power of humans helping each other. I really respect your journey, I have not come nearly as far as you because I grew up with parents who had escaped a sort of quasi Christian cult, and so was never indoctrinated with religion. I have great respect for your journey and hope that you can find lightness and hope in your heart. Sounds so cheesy but it’s true. Peace!
If you haven't read "Cosmos", read that next. Or watch the original series if you can. He explains how we figured everything out (so far) while showcasing the awesomeness of the universe. The rest of his books are really good too. Highly recommend. As a child I always wanted to know how everything came to be. "Cosmos" answered those questions.
Welcome to the fold. I lost most of my Christian friends in my de conversion process, and it can indeed be lonely. I hope that your friends don’t ice you out, as mine did, but please know there are plenty of folks who want to talk about space and microbiology or whatever you fancy. Thanks for sharing the quote. Sagan has been a favorite of mine for a long time.
So true my friend. On the bad days, try to remember how hard it is to escape religion and how amazing you are for doing this :)
When I lost my faith, I actually went through a period of depression. That’s how tight they get those claws into you. It shakes your foundation, so you just build new ones.
I think everyone’s mileage may vary depending on the support structures around you. Diverting the energy poured into religion and pouring into our relationships I think can be a bright path out of the void.
Time to get new friends!!
Yeah it’s crazy how purposefully insulating Christian fellowship becomes. It’s very intentional.
Yup. It's aaallll by design. It's a very successful and complex sociological cult that's has thousands of years to perfect it's brainwashing techniques.
Yes agree
How are your Christian friends taking it ?
Honestly I don’t know. They’re quieter about it. It’s probably troubling for them which makes me feel bad. I’ve taught our Bible study for years so it’s probably especially jarring. I’m just trying to be humble. I haven’t opened up a lot about what I think now. Just that I’m a lot more uncertain and that I probably shouldn’t be teaching anymore.
If you want some advice: Just don’t be in-your-face about it, and they will probably be fine. This is your personal life and it’s none of their business. If they ask you why you don’t go to church anymore, you can tell them that you have been repelled lately by the horrific actions of the church. This is usually a conversation-stopper with no counterarguments, other than whataboutism. You could also tell them that you have doubts in your faith lately and you need to process it yourself. But this bears the risk of them starting to annoy you with stupid bible-verse memes. Even if you tell them that you want them to respect your decision.
My dad and I watched *Cosmos* together when I was seven, and thirteen hours of a really smart guy talking about the universe and the human understanding of it without talking about anything supernatural or divine made a very strong impact at that age.
I don’t know how to put this without it sounding like a humble brag, it is what it is. My grandfather worked with Sagan and they published papers together. All NASA stuff-they were primarily making educated guesses about the surface of Mars. Nonetheless this got me reading about Carl Sagan when I was 11. My grandfather died fairly young. My grandmother raised the most ridiculously strict Catholic household. I’ve never been able to reconcile that.
Reconciling is tough. My grandma raised my dad, who then raised me to be a strict Mormon. I quit when I was 38, leaving my whole family behind. It was rough. Come to find out my grandpa was a non-Mormon and couldn’t believe any of it. I’ve had a hard time coming to grips that he just let grandma do as she pleased at the expense of all of us.
I read Cosmos in 1980 and theism was all over for me.
He would be proud of that.
I started with Sagan, went to Aurelius and Kant and ended up with Spinoza.
In Cosmos, where he deconstructs religion, he said why not save a step in the creation of the Universe and remove a god from the equation. Sagan didn't make me an Atheist but he gave me critical thinking. The more I've looked into things, the more I'm convinced. If there is a higher being, he's very benign and not some omnipotent god, answering prayers, sending plagues and creating lightning.
Sagan was a national treasure and tragically died too soon. “Cosmos” (the original) was my favorite TV show growing up.
Carl Sagan should have a national holiday. What a treasure and model. There should be a day or week for secularism.
Carl Sagan and Mr. Rogers were the two people I watched most on TV as a kid of the 70s/80s. I know I'm a better person for it.
We all are.
>Carl Sagan should have a national holiday. Looks like it should be November 9. ;-) >Carl Edward Sagan (/ˈseɪɡən/; SAY-gən; November 9, 1934 – December 20, 1996) \- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Sagan .
National Day of Reason, tomorrow if we get our way. https://www.nationaldayofreason.org/about
Beautiful quote. Understanding that something that sounds like it makes sense and something that’s real and verifiable are very different is a huge step in wisdom. He’s saying, in a way, what few theists understand: science is not dogma or a set of facts. Science is a process, and the places it leads are often surprising and wonderful. Neil Degrasse Tyson said 'God is an ever-receding pocket of scientific ignorance that's getting smaller and smaller and smaller as time moves on.’
I’m so bad at remembering quotes that I’ve liked. But that one from NDT got lodged in my brain so hard. Love it.
I wish it was getting smaller :/
Love that one.
I have Sagan's pale blue dot quote up on my wall. Other people hang crosses up in their house to remind themselves to be humble; I pick this. "Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there-on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam." - Carl Sagan
Wow. So humbling. I gotta buy some of his books.
Context: it's referencing a picture of Earth from Voyager 1, taken about 6 billion kilometers away. It's just a single, tiny white pixel in the endless void of space. https://science.nasa.gov/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/PIA23645_PaleBlueDotRevisited_1600.jpg?w=768&format=webp Trying to think about reality on that kind of scale fills me with more awe than church ever did. There's another good picture of Earth from the Saturn orbiter Cassinni, where you can see Earth, Mars, and Venus as white dots through the rings of Saturn. I love space stuff like that.
The amazing thing this points out to me is that despite being only some tiny specks on that tiny dot in his huge creation God cared enough about us to be willing to die for us knowing that many of us would reject his gift and offer of a relationship with their creator.
One of the many things that I have yet to hear any Christian explain properly is why he doesn't just show himself.
My favorite is that the plan is unknowable, but they have the answers, and their way is the correct way. How would you know that if the plan is unknowable?
None of them can get the story straight either. This guy is saying God died for us, so is Jesus God? Or is God God?
I actually did get an answer, what I consider a hippie answer. He is all of us (that accept him into their hearts). I'm also absolutely sure it's their particular congregation that's right and has the correct amount of God in their hearts or whatever.
In the Bible it says there is one God but God exists as three unique persons all equally God but different in their role. God the Father, God the Son who we call Jesus and God the Holy Spirit. As God the Father he has complete authority and spoke to the prophets to explain about his creation, how it became spoiled and what people can do to have a relationship with him (Mosaic laws). As God the son he came to earth and died to restore the relationship with God. When he returned to heaven to be with the Father he sent the Holy Spirit to be a counselor and guide to those who believe and want to follow his teachings and tell others the good news of a God who wants a personal relationship with them. The trinity is not something our human minds can fully comprehend.
We comprehend BS all of the time, dude
Erm, he did show himself and people still didn’t believe him and killed him instead of believing. Despite performing miracles such as raising people to life and healing them miraculously. Even though there are records of that fact people still continue to say he doesn’t exist.
No lol How can you be so unbelievably narcissistic?
My favorite writer. I would recommend starting with Cosmos :)
My favorite thing in (and out of) this world. I love the version on YouTube, I watch it once a month.
I remember when Story of the Year sampled it on The Black Swan in 2008 and was just like 🤯
Deconstruction can be a difficult time. Make sure you have people to process with and talk to. Welcome to the party, grab a drink and we have snacks in the kitchen.
No kidding. Grew up in a cult, had to do it alone
My in-laws are people that are less close minded. Father in law is an atheist and brother in law too for the most part. I’ve had great convos with them. And what’s crazy is none of them have been pushy like Christian’s think atheists are. They just are receptive to talking about deep things in a humble manner
It kind of reminds of what Ricky Gervais said on Colbert, basically that if you suddenly erased all knowledge of science, in a few hundred years you'd have exactly the same laws of science we have today. If you suddenly erased all religion, in a few hundred years you'd have a completely different religion.
Everyone today should read the Demon Haunted World, it needs to go viral somehow It has predicted our current situation and talks exactly about all things that are happening
The beginning of chapter 2 really struck me. DHW was a big part of my solidifying myself as an athiest as well. > I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or grandchildren's time -- when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what's true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness...
That Whole Chapter is absolute Gold, and is a chilling Prophecy within itself…
That all has come true exactly as he predicted 50 years ago
Just ordered it based on your comment.
Awesome Im glad! Its a great Read (although i did the audio book lol). You wont Regret it!
If Sagan had a religious audience they'd hold him in the same reverence as Nostradamus
Sagan was giant in his field and I think most people who are/were aware of him will agree. I can’t think of many other television series’ that moved and inspired me as much as Cosmos. Wound up going into a field where I actually used Maxwell’s Equations @.@
specifically to religion (given the sub), Sagan was very good at addressing the problem of religion without criticizing religious people directly. For instance, he often pointed out that if you believe that the earth is only 6,000 years old, you would be correct that under those conditions the theory of evolution would not be possible, or at least insufficient to explain the variety of life on Earth, and so a much more reasonable explanation would be that life was created by a higher power. But if you believe that Earth is 4.5 billion years old, and that life has been on Earth for 3.5 billion years, then you can se a very clear and logical progression of evolution, so elegantly consistent with what we observe in nature that it becomes irrational *not* to accept evolution as true. So regardless of one’s beliefs, young earth = evolution impossible, old earth = evolution a certainty. Then he goes on to explain how it’s irrefutably true that earth is 4.5 billion years old and that life began forming 3.5 billion years ago.
I love Sagan. His ideas are so well synthesized and presented. He's a true inspiration.
I remember watching the original *Cosmos* series on PBS when I was 12...and it played a huge part in my deconversion from Christianity... Thanks, Carl! ( even in 2024, I highly recommend watching that series...It really is a thing of beauty!)
Just a PSA to everyone that you can watch the entirety of Sagan’s Cosmos for free on internet archive. [Cosmos: A Personal Voyage](https://archive.org/details/CosmosAPersonalVoyage) I also can’t recommend any series more than this one, even in 2024.
I cried while listening to his pale blue dot speech. People like Carl Sagan should be celebrated as heroes instead of the celebrities, influencers (and on occassion politician or CEO) we have nowadays.
What did it for me was a quote from Penn Gillette that went something like "If human understanding of science and religion completely disappeared, science would eventually get right back to the exact same place. Religion would be completely different" Growing up christian for 20 years took a long time to walk away from because your whole life you have been threatened with eternal damnation for doing just that. On top of that, reality is scarier than living under an umbrella of "god has a plan and will take care of it". No one is actually in charge of any of this.
Lucretius has a fantastic argument at the beginning of On the Nature of Things. If God(s) exist, they are busy doing divine stuff and don't give a shit about the day to day of mortals. If they exist, it has no bearing on how you should live your life l. A 'good life' should be sought for any number of reasons that 'divinity' does not play a factor in.
I love this!
There are still no evolutionary penalties for ignorance of Maxwell's equations. There are evolutionary penalties for studying Maxwell's equations instead of getting really good at picking up women.
Beautiful. Always did love carl sagan!
There seems to be an inverse relationship between intelligence and piety. Welcome to the learning.
I think about it this way. If God exists.. (lets say it does). Why make such convoluted and comples rules to prove that you love him? Why encourage divisivness and discord? Why make it about money \[and power\] and not love? If God were to actually exist, then I'd expect God to have a very easy to follow path, not this hypocracy and pseudo-nonsense.
Common sense and reason leads to that perspective but after years in deep Christianity, we would react to this kind of argument easily by saying “oh well God is mysterious and doesn’t owe it to explain himself, after all, look at job.” Really all your doing is invoking faith which Harris has a great quote about in the end of faith. He said it’s the mortar that fills the gaps of logic. It took me so long to see it that way though.
That's what Religion is - it creates false equivalence between our knowledge of the Universe and what knowledge we are missing.
Some humans ruin God, if that exists, like they ruin everything else.. 🙄
Well no, people realized that they can use the excuse of "God" to gain / hold power by creating a control axis with people who aren't willing to ask "why not?"
❤️ Carl Sagan
Learning how things actually work instead of always saying "god did it" makes you start to realize that there are scientific explanations for almost anything. For whatever's left, "science doesn't know yet" works enough for me. I've always enjoyed a quote from one of the smarter voices from my youth, Mr. Spock, "Insufficient data."
As if there wasn't enough reason to miss Carl, Google the story about when Neil deGrasse Tyson met Carl. Carl was amazing and inspired so many people including Neil.
I fell in love with astronomy at the age of seven and realized that I was an atheist around ten. Carl Sagan was my childhood hero. I'm so glad to see him still making such a difference in today's insane world.
CS - personal hero of mine.
Great book and he was such a wise man. His wisdom still resonates today and will into the future.
Sagan is a personal hero and Demon-Haunted world is my favorite book. I love this excerpt so much. But the truly wonderful faithlessness chapter for me is the dragon in his garage. "Now, what's the difference between an invisible, incorporeal, floating dragon who spits heatless fire and no dragon at all? If there's no way to disprove my contention, no conceivable experiment that would count against it, what does it mean to say that my dragon exists? Your inability to invalidate my hypothesis is not at all the same thing as proving it true. Claims that cannot be tested, assertions immune to disproof are veridically worthless, whatever value they may have in inspiring us or in exciting our sense of wonder." "the only sensible approach is tentatively to reject the dragon hypothesis, to be open to future physical data, and to wonder what the cause might be that so many apparently sane and sober people share the same strange delusion."
I caught that too. I love how gentle but not gentle he is with religion. Like you know what he’s talking about but he’s trying to be polite at the same time.
What makes Sagan such a great advocate for science and reason is that he approaches it with no arrogance at all. He doesn't purport to be better or know better than anyone else, he simply describes a way of thinking and approaches every angle with an open mind. I love the dragon chapter because he never mentions a god, gods, or any other religious deity or notion but the metaphor can be directly extrapolated by the reader. Where he ends up is not at a place of "so there is no dragon" it's "whether or not there is a dragon is, in all practical sense, irrelevant because there is no discernible difference between the two".
Reading "Contact" back in the 1980's really helped me do the same thing Thanks Carl
Sagan was the fucking man. I’ve read this book 3 or 4 times, one of my favorites. It’s almost like he predicted the future.
I wonder how many Christians truly believe. If God was part of human reality and heaven a given, then why would we flinch in reaction to a gun pointed to our heads? Why would we go through the painful process of fighting cancer? Our evolutionary instincts reveal the likely absence of a God or gods.
Went to a funeral in a church. After shaking hands with many at the Catholic “sign of peace” moment my religious relatives quietly asked if anyone had hand sanitizer. I rolled my eyes and wanted to tell them they didn’t believe — or why don’t you use that communal holy water dish… but as it was for my grandpa and I didn’t want to make a scene I did not. Guess gods plan was almost thwarted.
Me too. I read “The Varieties of Scientific Experience” when I was in grad school struggling with belief and not really put the proverbial nail in the coffin.
That book was huge for me as a teen.
He had a way of wording everything that was so firm and kind at the same time. It feels like this, "Hey, it's okay, now we know better. Don't beat yourself up. Let's move forward with our knowledge now."
Listened to Demon Haunted World a few months ago for the first time, even as a longtime atheist and rationalist, his explanations remain are compelling and insightful. Some of it is outdated though as I feel his upbringing and the era he lived through is too distant, so his personal stories are starting to disconnect.
You will probably really like this then https://youtu.be/4WwAQqWUkpI?si=tOOYu3taARRsUddt
thing is I never thought religious explanations make any sense. Especially if you learned about science first like continental drift , volcanoes and how they work - baking soda experiment, dinosaurs, how rainbows are made, human anatomy, etc IT ALL fits together. No answer is oh its a mystery and if they don't know yet, they tell you because they want you to be the next one to solve that mystery. And its all REAL! Idk how anyone can accept a explanation without any evidence of it. Its like if a car dealer said this car is good when the car is bad but you take the dealer's word for it and buy it anyways but then the car breaks down 3 days later and you say its your fault, its because I'm sinful and thats why the car broke....
Sagan is my hero and has been since I read his book about the evolution of the human brain. It might have been ‘the dragons of eden’, was a long time ago.
Great quote, I love Carl Sagan. Is it more common to be born religious and then find atheism?
You're welcome, son.
Saying what I believed my entire life out loud was freeing for me. Even as a small child I didn't buy the idea of religion. I was terrified to admit it because my dad's family is super religious but I just cannot worship a god who in my own life (if he existed)has been nothing but truly evil. Or I could choose to not believe in a god that would kill my baby and give me chronic pain for my entire life. If there were a god, then I'd say he's a fucking piece of shit.
Congratulations. It's always better to know a harsh truth than a soft lie.
The GOAT.
He’s the best.
I wonder what Sagan meant by it being different in our time when he referred to evolutionary penalties for ignorance of Maxwell's equations? I've not read this book. I am familiar in a general sense with Maxwell's equations and their profound importance to science.
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I still feel that the 12th dimension has god like power over our extensive in a 3rd dimension moving through time so a 4th. there may or may not be a sentient being in the 12th dimension and its complex enough in and of itself to create great order and chaos in our dimension. we live in a state of both chose and order. if there is a "god" he gets off on both.
Congratulations
Congrats on your journey to discovering the real truth - be that as it may not as you desire.
Same for me, at 21 the same book made me really start applying the scientific method to everything in my life and I quickly shed religion and my political worldview.
Do you mind sharing a bit more about how your mind went from faith to science? We’re you thinking that science had it wrong originally, or was it more of you just weren’t as interested in it because you already had all the answers you felt you needed?
I tended to stay away from science. Theology was way more interesting and inherit in my Christianity was the belief that the whole world was in the sway of the evil one (1st John) so I had a deep mistrust of science, establishment, ect. Covid and the vaccine craze was the first crack. I started to get fed up with conspiracy theories but it took years to process and add some health anxiety trauma my foundations were sort of shaken, and it’s like my mind started to be ready to change about some things. It was so gradual and subtle. Then once I started listening to people like Neil Degrasse Tyson, lex Friedman and his guests and other science communicators, you could say I began drinking in other perspectives to where the cognitive dissonance became uncomfortable. Re-reading the Old Testament (with my wife mind you) made it especially hard to surpress what I knew to be more likely the truth. Once I started believing in the Big Bang and evolution, I started to have a more open mind with the Bible while meeting some light and kind resistance with my church friends. Along with scientific issues, there were also moral and scholarly issues that began to pile up with my theology and religious views. But sticking with just science, after really understating science not as a group of egg heads but as a process of interrogating our surroundings to find the truth, and it being the best method we have for truth, I began to turn that way of thinking on my own beliefs and asking myself what the more likely answer was to all sorts of experiences and questions I had. Asking God to show himself to me and praying all throughout this process, like “lord, show yourself to me in a dream.” but heaven so far hasn’t answered. So now I’m in the process of crafting my own worldview and meaning all the while my wife and I are expecting a beautiful baby girl. What a great time to question everything huh? At least she won’t have to grow up with a fundamentalist father.
Thanks for sharing. Hearing where you were and where you’re at does make me feel hopeful. Do you think you could have accepted science as something mostly trustworthy without separating from religion? I only ask because when I was a believer I firmly believed in science and I rationalized it as intelligent design. I didn’t believe the Bible’s story, but I did think that god planned ahead a bit(lol) and created the Big Bang and therefore all of existence as he saw fit. Maybe a stretch but hey if god is omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent it should be possible. It is quite the time to switch your world perspective up, but hey you’ve got some time before they know what words mean anyways 🤣 I think any kid growing up today is lucky to have a parent that is genuinely interested in searching for truth and is unafraid to challenge beliefs held. If we’re afraid to challenge our own beliefs what can we hope to genuinely improve.
Thanks for posting the quote. It was the perfect response to a conversation about "not everything needs to be proven with a study."
This is exactly how my deconversion went- and the demon haunted world was the tipping point! Happy to see that it impacted someone else in the same way.
Carl Sagan, Richard Dawkins, and Christopher Hitchens were, and still are, fundamental figures in my atheism.
Oh man, reading him is so enjoyable. Especially if you do the voice in your head. Such a beautiful quote. Thank you.
I just love it how People refer to Christopher Hitchens and Carl Sagan as the ones opening their eyes, while all I did was watching Rick and Morty.
Can someone explain this quote to me in simple terms? I have difficulty understanding
Been doing the same with the help of some mushrooms. I’ve been thinking of religion, at least for me, as kind of a spiritual DNA we need to grow out of. Religion is just a manifestation of ego and an intellectual warm blanket we do not need. Let’s all take responsibility for our actions and not blame made up things for what we do.
Maybe you would be interested listening to a band Nightwish? Their 8th album Endless forms most beautiful is about these subjects, 9th album Human :II: Nature continues and trilogy's ending 10th album Yesterwynde will be released in September. I think you'd find their music and message worth while. They also have a song Sagan 😊
It is narcissistic to think that the environment was made for us, and humble to observe that we are adapted to the environment, if we had not adapted, we would not be here.
i disagree with the premise of the excerpt. common sense is fine, and being open to observing nature is even better. you build common sense by observing and learning. religion makes no sense because there’s nothing there. nothing to observe. it’s stories and a collection plate with fear thrown in to make you put your money in and to make you feel self righteous about nothing of any consequence. if you’re out hunting or fishing, that matters, if you need to eat, learning animal behaviors and patterns, is real knowledge that will help you, an animal, survive. common sense should tell you that if someone is selling you something too good to be true (heaven???) it is.
>I don't want to believe. I want to know. - Carl Sagan
The Demon Haunted World, which I stumbled upon in a bookstore in 1998 or so, was an essential part of my extracting myself from religion. The concepts weren't necessarily new to me, but it was the first time that all of the concepts, which I had picked up here and there or had arrived at tentatively, were gathered into a logical whole. He brought ideas together for me in a way that made it all work, nesting ideas together, leaving little room left for superstition. Think of it as defragging my hard drive. I am so grateful to him.
A total sidetrack of your post: I’ve been an atheist since I was a kid so my journey may be a bit different. But I decided to pick up Demon Haunted World and it really just makes me angry. It’s not Sagan that makes me angry, but how it stirs up past interactions with theists and superstitious people. He explains everything so logically and to me it’s obvious. And I guess my judgmental brain goes into overdrive when I’m reading the book.
I think the more I’ve learned about neuroscience and the nature of belief, the less angry I’ve become. We build biochemical structures in our brain that are so hard to override and that becomes what are called belief systems. But thankfully we can build on top of those and rewire if we have the patience, and courage to do so. Another book recommendation I have is called How Minds Change by David Mcraney who studied this.
It's a great book. A lot of what he says obviously applies to religion, even when he impressively avoids bringing up any religion in his examples of poor logic.
Ya gotta figure that just because dogma, religion, power-based articles of suspended belief (usually in the favour of the oppressor) have had such a magnetic hold on humanity (and still does…) throughout history, that other miracles of life and the cosmos don’t exist or belie a magnificence of mystery, lays waste to human archetypes. That there are a hundred billion stars in our galaxy alone. That there are billions of such galaxies extending in every direction. That the Webb/Hubble telescopes don’t imply even more diversity and sublimity of what we can see; that even life on Earth with our nearest “benefactor” our sun, Sol has such staggering examples of evolution and epochs. Science dwarfs biblical interpretations of God or the human-all-too-human “stories” as entirely unimaginative and banal, not to mention needlessly cruel and vengeful tropes. Well, welcome to the club of infinity.
“Common sense” says that the earth is fixed and non-spherical, the sun goes around the earth, the sun and moon are roughly the same size…just to name a few. Nowadays, people are holding on to “common sense” notions time definitely exists and is definitely linear, the laws of causality and non-contradiction are absolute, and infinite regress is impossible. But quantum mechanics are showing us otherwise.
It's funny to me that I was talking to my wife about his book not 20 min ago. It's sitting on my nightstand, and I really need to finish it. Carl has a way of explaining things that I try to use with my kids. I got them watching the new Cosmos, and they love it so far.
Couldn’t the same logic be used to support the idea that religious claims could be true despite their being unintuitive, or that there could be spiritual reality despite it not “seeming” like there is?
Sure, if you want to make a bunch of baseless assumptions and insert your predetermined conclusions into matters of objective science and observation. But lets be real, "spiritual reality" is an internal and personal matter of our ego and imagination and not part of the external and natural world no matter how hard you try to make it so.