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- Sep 1, 2019
yeah but what has the japs, chinese and korean buddhisrs doing (some) prayers/chants, and the 8 hells?
im probably wrong but ive met lay people doing the chants in the morning and night. the hell thing is real as well.
Are atheists afraid of hell / punishment for the wicked after death?
- Thread starter StraightShooter2
- Start date
im probably wrong but ive met lay people doing the chants in the morning and night. the hell thing is real as well.
- Joined
- Jan 2, 2016
I think some people just inherently want to do that stuff.
Plus lots of schools interpret the words of the sutras and buddhas differently, different lifestyles, different diets, different outlooks. Buddhism isn't one solitary monolith of a religion like protstantism.
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- Dec 27, 2019
I just realized that you mentioned Dahmer. He was baptized as a born again Christian before being beaten to death in prison. My guess is that he hoped to be forgiven by an impossibly forgiving God.
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- Sep 1, 2019
thats true for every religion, sufi vs wahabi.
protestantism isnt a monolith either, charismatic vs cessationist reformed.
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- Feb 3, 2013
I am atheist and no. When you're dead you just rot in the ground and aren't aware of anything, just like before you were born.
I try to be moral because I have empathy.
I try to be moral because I have empathy.
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- Aug 8, 2020
Nah, bro. Morality is impossible without God. Your lack of faith is why you're such a cum chugging homosexual
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- Mar 8, 2021
You can believe in karma as a natural cycle of the universe without believing in a religion. You might call it spiritualism if you want to but until we know what makes us conscious and how that turns on or off there is room for debate on what happens when we die. If we're organic machines everything turns off and we're done. There's a lot of research into super natural events related to dying and not all of those are religious in nature. If I believe in karma and think high emotions can leave traces on material (Record player theory), what is to say that the consciousness experiencing them isn't reliving those moments over and over as a form of Hell? People have PTSD and their consciousness is dragged back to their abuse completely removing them from reality in some cases. If consciousness lives beyond the body as a recording, it would create a form of eventual torture where your mind is trapped in those bad moments forever.
I don't believe this myself. It's a mixture of different paranormal investigation theories added to a belief in karma as a natural law. There are people out there who do believe in very similar things and there's no way to prove or disprove it until we better understand consciousness and the brain.
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- Aug 22, 2020
You don't seem to quite understand my point. Hell is a punishment IN THE AFTERLIFE due to breaking godly laws. Karma is our actions coming back to us either in our current life, or if you pursue a certain sect of Buddhism and Hinduism then your karmic balance is demonstrated when you reincarnate. Neither of which affects the afterlife.
I am not discounting anything, what I am saying is that atheist's logically don't believe in hell because they don't believe in a god who created the rules to get into hell.
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- Mar 8, 2021
Did you miss my point entirely? God doesn't need to exist for an after life of some form to exist. My example was a portion of your "soul" (consciousness) gets wrote onto a brick which then forces it to re-enact the worst moment of your life over and over. That would be considered a form of Hell and fits within some current atheist paranormal investigator's theories. It's outside of religion entirely unless you consider a belief in ghosts existing to be religious.
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- Dec 23, 2020
Wow, they don't call this place the Autistic Thunderdome for nothing!
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- Dec 18, 2019
I used to be an edgy atheist because I had bad experiences with Christians. My beliefs have since changed but I don't accept most religious dogma. I can sum it up as:
>A single, all powerful creator set all existence into motion then stepped away (Watchmaker analogy)
>Nature is the language of God
>There is no such thing as a soul or an afterlife
>A single, all powerful creator set all existence into motion then stepped away (Watchmaker analogy)
>Nature is the language of God
>There is no such thing as a soul or an afterlife
Quiet Guy
kiwifarms.net
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- Jun 6, 2020
In terms of the supernatural, some of it may just be that we don't know how it works. For example, angels are not omnipotent, because they are not as powerful as God, hence there must be some kinds of laws of nature they cannot violate. Could the plane they usually inhabit contain fields other than the fields that mediate gravity, electromagnetism, and the weak and strong nuclear forces that could potentially enable miracles? Admittedly, I think they might perform miracles by a different method, but I can't entirely discount that possibility, and hopefully you get my point anyway.
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- Jan 29, 2021
The definition of Hell per Christians is actually "a place devoid of God." The fire and brimstone shit doesn't formally come from the bible, so Hell as understood by Christians would actually be impossible to exist for Atheists.
As for like a general concept of punishment after death, I'm sure some have a vague existential fear but I'm not sure I'd classify what they fear as a strict concept like Hell.
As for like a general concept of punishment after death, I'm sure some have a vague existential fear but I'm not sure I'd classify what they fear as a strict concept like Hell.
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- Jun 13, 2020
Pascal's wager is the only objective truth ever written by man, except replace "God" with "basically every sufficiently large religion".
The common theme behind nearly every religion is "be good and you'll be rewarded in some way". I don't necessarily believe in Hinduism or Shinto or any of them really, but I figure there's a non zero chance that one of them got it right, so I might as well do my best to be good and hope that whatever deity weighs my soul against a feather in the afterlife recognizes that.
Worst case scenario I was a good person for no reason.
I think that deep down, even the fedora tippingest atheist recognizes that there's a tiny chance that they're wrong and are sometimes driven to do good because of it. Like I said, there's no downside, so it's the logical thing to do.
The common theme behind nearly every religion is "be good and you'll be rewarded in some way". I don't necessarily believe in Hinduism or Shinto or any of them really, but I figure there's a non zero chance that one of them got it right, so I might as well do my best to be good and hope that whatever deity weighs my soul against a feather in the afterlife recognizes that.
Worst case scenario I was a good person for no reason.
I think that deep down, even the fedora tippingest atheist recognizes that there's a tiny chance that they're wrong and are sometimes driven to do good because of it. Like I said, there's no downside, so it's the logical thing to do.
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- Jan 2, 2016
The idea of "pascal's wager except it's just about being good instead of believing in a specific faith's god" is actually already covered by Buddhism: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rebirth_(Buddhism)#Pragmatic_arguments_and_wager_theories
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- Dec 19, 2019
Why in the fuck would I be afraid of a fictional place?
Scolopendra Dramatica
kiwifarms.net
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- Jan 6, 2021
This is a VERY American question, but I'll bite; for some people, sure, why not, if an overzealous parent lauds Hell over you like the fucking sword of Damocles, why on earth not?
If it's used as a barrier to be brought down every time the kids attempts self expression via naughtiness then no shit they're gonna freak out once they've left and assume ALL religion is a source of control 'cos of that's how it worked fer me lol'.
In some cases it's a simple game of does-it-work-logically? And the answer is no.
In other cases there is no fear after death more of a fear of hell on earth that we create.
In, yet more, cases there's an understanding that there's likely something within these texts that speak to human society and nature (old knowledge) passed on through the most effective means; storytelling.
I would say there's no mystery in atheists and a lot more in the religious; why believe in God and an afterlife without a speck of hard evidence?
There's clearly a human desire and need for some kind of spiritual guidance or we wouldn't see the rise of the mystical gender beliefs or other cult bullshit, but where does that come from? Why is it so necessary?
If it's used as a barrier to be brought down every time the kids attempts self expression via naughtiness then no shit they're gonna freak out once they've left and assume ALL religion is a source of control 'cos of that's how it worked fer me lol'.
In some cases it's a simple game of does-it-work-logically? And the answer is no.
In other cases there is no fear after death more of a fear of hell on earth that we create.
In, yet more, cases there's an understanding that there's likely something within these texts that speak to human society and nature (old knowledge) passed on through the most effective means; storytelling.
I would say there's no mystery in atheists and a lot more in the religious; why believe in God and an afterlife without a speck of hard evidence?
There's clearly a human desire and need for some kind of spiritual guidance or we wouldn't see the rise of the mystical gender beliefs or other cult bullshit, but where does that come from? Why is it so necessary?
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- Mar 18, 2016
It's possible to forge your own larger-than-life beliefs instead of just incorporating an existing one. Just don't turn it into a cult.
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- Apr 30, 2020
I am afraid of the process of dying but I am not afraid of death if that makes sense. Once I'm gone I'm gone, as for the morality side of things I try not to do bad things because I'm not a prick who wasn't brought up properly.