HACKER Q&A
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Why are we all atheists


Why we see beauty in the works of "sick minds", but we are afraid of psychiatric illness. Why we can't see beauty and elegance in TempleOS. Why are we so quick to classify it as a work of a mad genius and not of a rational, troubled mind.

I fuck this road. I can write on HN and I will, but I will get back to work and have fullfilling life. Society, you are the problem and I can manover you to have happy life. So get your shit together for your own sake. Make Bill Gates talk to the religious leaders. Talk to your local priest. Just let me live a happy life in a happy society. I will go out of hospital soon and get back to work. For now I can write on HN.

  👤 bobkrusty Accepted Answer ✓
I believe in god/creators but not religions.

And I think it's unnecessary to debate about god or its existence

Societal problems are more important

👤 arkj
It depends on where you are. These are just observations from personal experience so I take it with spoon of salt; A significant (more than 7 out of 10) percentage of my Indian friends are theists. Where as the percentages are reversed among my European friends. It is a personal hobby of mine to ask my friends if they believe in God or not as the responses fascinates me. I see the inclination towards atheism is more among my christian friends than my Hindu or Muslim friends. I only have one Chinese friend so no insights there but I believe communism has an influence on the worldview of our friends there.

I see friends from business background to be more religions than the ones from science streams. And withing the sciences biologist to be the most vehement defenders of atheism followed by computer science folks. Mathematicians tend to be be in the middle these days. Maybe there is an influence by Gödel theorem of incompleteness. Maybe the unexpected long duration in proving all of Hilbert's problem also has an influence in the belief.

Christians by far has turned to atheism among my friends, I am inclined to agree with Girard, that after Christianity closes the option of returning to any myth so maybe atheism is the only rational choice left.

Increase in wealth seems to be common factor among the majority of those who changed from some theistic beliefs to atheism. Maybe wealth brings more choice and religions commitments puts a leash on the desires of the mind.

Among those who where atheists and who turned to theism (less than 10 people I know personally) the most common reason was a miraculous escape from death.

I have met only one person who left atheism to Christianity citing the works of Thomas Aquinas.

In my ever changing view, for the majority of the people I have observed, for the majority theism/atheism is psychological response than a rational/philosophical one.