What should I ask an Atheist?

Where do they get their ‘moral compass’?
Why are they atheist?
What is an atheist?

I suggest you ask him how he knows what’s right or wrong without having scripture for guidance. A lot of Christians seem to have the belief that atheism = immoral, so in the interest of mutual respect and understanding, I’d give him the opportunity to explain how not believing in God does not mean that he doesn’t believe in love, compassion, forgiveness, charity, etc.

The fact that the term “atheist” is no more meaningful than the terms “monotheist” or “polytheist”.

in my opinion, ask him exactly what you just asked us, i.e. “Is there anything you wish Christians would ask you to explain to them about atheism, and what is it that you would most want us to know?”

in my case, it would be that while i have no need for religion – i also don’t begrudge someone who finds something of value in it. and just as i wouldn’t push my beliefs on others, why do others (Christians specifically) seem to want and feel the need to make me live the way they choose to live.

“How can we work together?”

Perhaps better for a start of a dialogue than as a one-off question, but I’ve found that oftentimes collaboration between atheists and theists on social projects that ought to have absolutely nothing to do with faith nonetheless get sidetracked, and that’s really unfortunate when it happens.

oo You should try to get Matt Dillahunty.

I don’t understand the point of this program. By exploring alternative points you create two possible outcomes. (1) By being open-minded and carefully considering alternate perspectives on a personal level you mitigate your value for your own point of view. (2) By studying alternate perspectives on a clinical level you promote a condescending know-thy-enemy side show.

I would want such a group to ask me: Why isn’t faith good enough (for me)?

How do you find comfort living in a world where you have no belief in a god?

How do you deal with the death of a loved one when you have no belief in god?

How do you feel about your own death if you have no belief in god?

What gives you strength to carry on when things turn gloomy in your life when you have no belief in a god?

… I pose these questions because I think a lot of people are religious for comfort reasons. So, I’d like the atheist to be able to talk about how someone without god can find comfort and happiness in this world, even on his or her worst days.

When did you become an atheist?
Was there a particular impetus?
Were you brought up religious?

To what extent does atheism define your life?
Do you feel like a minority?

How open are you about your atheism?
Does your boss/family/friends know? Why or why not?
Who do you hide your atheism from?

Do you experience spiritual (“religious-like”) moments?

It is great that you are doing this and shows a high level of trust in your audience/members/congregation but, just like one Christian can not be expected to represent all of Christianity it should be clear that one Atheist can not do that for all of Atheism either. Even though it seems like an obvious point it bears repeating.
For me personally believing is not a possibility without some very solid evidence to change my mind. Other than that I would say that all of your guests as well as your congregation would be likely to find we have more in common than our labels would show.
Lastly, I tend to categorize behavior and arguments as helping or not helping. This definitely fits under the helping category.

I think that a great question to ask an atheist is about that person’s perception of Christians, especially if it is a question to a person who has deconverted.

You would get several different answers, because not all of our experiences are the same.

There’s the basic question that I think will come up anyway: Why are you an atheist? Why don’t you believe in God?

Maybe a better suggestion is “How do you cope with death/mortality?” It’s a bit of a personal question, and there’s no particular “atheist answer”, but I do think it elucidates a common fear people have regarding atheism.

I’d love to hear how this goes. We’ll probably get the ACA rep’s side of things at some point, but I’d like to hear reactions from some of the Christians as well.

As an atheist, why do you find it necessary to be so hyper-sensitive about religion in the political sphere?
Do you really expect a religious politician not to introduce and support legislation based on his religious convictions?
Wouldn’t it be hypocritical of him not to?

Mike, I just read through your church’s website and I am quite impressed. I like your ideas about interpreting the bible and this part really stood out to me:

We don’t emphasize “right belief” as much as we emphasize being loving, forgiving, trusting God, believing in and following Jesus.

The next time I’m in Austin, I may check it out. I could use a reminder that there are indeed a lot of good Christians in the US.

As far as what you should ask, I second (or third) Dan’s questions, especially:

How do you find comfort living in a world where you have no belief in a god?

This is a very important part of my non-belief. When I was a devout Catholic, I had daily stress, including vivid nightmares several times a week. I could never live with an all-powerful and supposedly loving god who allows bad things to happen to good people.

I take solace in an indifferent universe that has nothing to do with how humanity behaves. I suspect I’m not alone.

Hi Mike!!

A couple of questions.

My first question could be equally for atheists and believers alike: is belief something that a person has control over? I once read an atheist who complained that “belief” isn’t something we can just put on like a sweater. I liked that analogy… if someone asks you to put on a sweater, even if you aren’t cold, you can still do it to oblige them.

But belief in a thing isn’t (to me) something you can do that with. Other people might have differing opinions. Maybe you could ask atheists if you think that believers can just take off that sweater because you convinced them that YOU don’t need one. I think it’s a good question for everyone… just to think about what “belief” is and how much control we even have over such a thing.

Anyway, that’s one question.

My question to you (prolly off topic) is this… Okay, so my daughter is seven now. I’m getting to the point where soon we’ll have to start dealing with her learning about people who are unpleasantly religious. (So far, it’s just been nice people who are religious.. grandma and grandpa, etc).

But we’re trying hard to raise her with the notion that mommy and daddy don’t believe in a god, but other people do…

But here’s the deal… Partly out of protectiveness, but mostly out of wanting to teach her respect for others… we’ve been really kind of not teaching her about the parts of religion we really don’t like.

It’s REALLY hard to express to her why some people don’t want to let her gay grandmothers get married… and it’s because of their religion… without really trashing religion. Without telling her the problems that religion can cause… because of course we don’t want her telling her friends at school that their religion is wrong.

Anyway… so we’re kind of not addressing the subject. So pretty soon now (by my watch) some kid on a playyard’s gonna tell her that her parents are going to go to hell and she will too unless they kneel right there and pray the sinner’s prayer…

Anyway… that’s my fear because that kind of stuff happened to me when i was a kid and I was unprepared. And here I am unpreparing my daughter because i’m afraid of loading her down with my dislikes for religion. She doesn’t even know about hell, and I don’t want to be the person who tells her that people believe in such a thing.
What child needs that horror show in her mind? What a perfect innocent person… why should she have to endure the horrors of dark imagination that kept me awake nights?

Of course, it’s even worse if someone else tells her, because they can make it scarier.

How do I teach her to treat with respect the beliefs of others, when their beliefs contain thoughts that are to me absolute madness, like the doctrine of hell?

Anyway… slight derail.

The most obvious questions: What does atheism mean? Why are you atheist? What positive things do you advocate? How do you feel about efforts to change people’s beliefs? What causes might you have in common with the emergent church?

Other possible questions:
What’s the difference between an atheist and an agnostic?
What problems do atheists face in their personal lives for being in a minority group?
Do you believe there are “two kinds” of atheists, the nice ones and the mean ones?
Also, any question that leads to any of the points here is a good one.

Jon Moles wrote:

If your guest is Matt Dillahunty, you won’t need to ask him anything, just let him speak. I’d say that goes for just about anyone who hosts/co-hosts The Atheist Experience show.

I’m a Matt fan as well, but for my money, Tracie Harris is the best representative for the show (especially when it comes to reducing arguments/issues to their essence). She simply never comes across badly….which isn’t true for every host of the show.

I’m having a great day. Every time a Christian tries this on me, it always goes sour, thanks to them.

I did a phone interview with a Christian reporter the other day, and she was real nice and receptive on the phone, and gave me plenty of chance to explain our position on a lot of issues.

Then she lied about what I said, and made me look like I missed religion because I’m angry at God. lol!

I laugh, but I also remember. She was not the first, and won’t be the last. Christianity relies on dishonesty, and that’s not going to change anytime soon. Fool me once…

Is there any positive moral thing you’ve done that you could not have done if you were a believer? Is there any moral action a believer could do which you would be incapable or even more hesitant to do?

Make it tough on them. If they’re anything like me, they hate softball questions.

Have them ask “what’s the hardest part about being an atheist?”

I think that’s a pretty open-ended question that will allow the person to address a lot of misconceptions and difficulties that an atheist might face.

“What is the point of your existence without the promise of a life after this one, and where does your morality come from without the promise of reward or threat of punishment?”

That, for me anyway, covers the most annoying and patronising accusation levelled against atheists, namely that we’re immoral, directionless and deeply unhappy. High five to the commenter who suggested “What do babies taste like?” though, was gonna go for that too 🙂

Interesting thing about whether atheism is a choice. My guess is that yes for some, no for others. A related question would be “Is theism a choice?“. It obviously is in the sense that it’s not something you are born with and it’s not biologically determined. On the other hand, to what degree some people are given a choice in the matter is questionable. If you are brought up by fundamentalists of any stripe and you share their beliefs, can it be really said you had a choice? Sure, some people, even some people brought up by fundamentalists, never buy it, but I don’t know for certain that those that do are really free to choose.

Joe,

I read the article in question and I fully agree that you were taken out of context and misrepresented here. However, no matter how many Christians seem to fulfill their stereotypes, I think we have to be careful not to tar them all with the same brush. Just as while we may vigorously disagree with Islam, we can recognize that not all Muslims are terrorists, we can have fundamental disagreements with Christianity while recognizing that not all Christians are arrogant, self-serving hypocrites.

Now, incidentally, Mike happens to be a family friend and I will grant that this could be skewing my perception a bit, but due to my interaction with him I have a very hard time believing he has any ulterior motive here and that he is truly interested in building bridges.

Trust me, I really do get your reaction here. Since I (and many of us here) feel strongly that atheism is the only really rational hypothesis in the face of all current evidence, and since we are frequently told by well-meaning believers that we are infringing on their religious freedoms by existing, even if we don’t actively evangelize this position, it’s a struggle not to regard believers of all stripes with some form of mild to severe intellectual contempt, or consider any attempt to improve channels of communication between us an act of condescension.

I freely admit this is a character flaw on my part, one that I exhibited just as strongly toward the other side when I was a Christian. Last week I (and many of us) came down pretty hard on Brad White for doing something similar, and while I feel I made a few perfectly valid points, it’s also clear that he was earnestly attempting to reach out and that should probably have tempered the tone of some of my replies.

Many atheists believe that pure, unbiased critical thinking should only lead to atheism, but remember that many Christians believe that pure, unbiased critical thinking should only lead to Christianity (I suppose then that most people who believe that pure, unbiased critical thinking can lead either way would call themselves “agnostic”). I think that most of the vitriolic debates we find ourselves embroiled in stem from this very basic impedance mismatch, and I don’t think it’s going to change as long as either side places such a high degree of importance on being right all the time.

You’ll have to forgive my roundabout long-windedness (I had a 5-hour energy for the first time this morning so I’m a tad hyper :D) but I guess the point I’m trying to make is that if Mike were in the business of twisting atheists’ words to protect a Christian audience, he wouldn’t be bringing them front and center and letting them speak for themselves.

Besides, if an atheist is able to successfully convey to a group of Christians that we are not trying to take their rights away, that we really are a marginalized segment of society, and that we can be good people too, then that is a success for us that Mike has helped organize. Being viewed as human beings, and not spawn of Satan, can only help us when it comes to getting across our position on “hot-button” issues, such as the teaching of evolution in public school, gay marriage, abortion rights, first amendment violations, and so on. It’s always easier to debate with a friend than it is to debate with a random stranger on the internet.

On that note, Mike, the questions I’d like to see asked:

“It’s frequently claimed that the most influential atheists are working to curtail the civil liberties of Christians in the US. Do you agree? Why or why not?”

“Would you agree that the US is a predominantly Christian nation? If so, how does that affect you personally on a day-to-day basis?”

“Many Christians believe that their faith empowers them to be better people. What empowers you to be a better person?”

For most of the religious, religion and religious beliefs form a decent sized chunk of personal identity. To what extent is that true or not for atheists?

I bring up this question because I think the degree that religion is tied up with identity is the reason so many religious are ‘offended’ by even talk of atheism. That is, if you decry a person’s religion it is often perceived as a personal attack rather than a criticism of ideas. If there were one thing I wish the religious would take away understanding about atheism (and especially ‘new’ atheism) is that the critical consideration of religious ideas are not personal attacks and should be responded to on their merits. Debate on religious ideas should be robust and getting the religious to see that would help a lot with any dialogue or understanding.

My 2 cents.

As an atheist, why do you find it necessary to be so hyper-sensitive about religion in the political sphere?

Because of the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, and because I would honestly rather not be hanged for apostasy by the thugs of a theocratic dictator. (DishonestNice framing, by the way.)

Do you really expect a religious politician not to introduce and support legislation based on his religious convictions?

Happens all the time. The “Tax cuts for the rich, a knife in the eye of the poor” bill passes every year with overwhelming support. Nearly all of those legislators believe in the one who called his followers to sell all they have and give the proceeds to the poor.

Wouldn’t it be hypocritical of him not to?

When has that ever stopped any politician?

Jeff P wrote:

Is atheism a choice?

I would predict that the ensuing discussion would be both interesting and informative. You would probably get various answers even from atheists. For me, I don’t view my atheism as a choice. It is just the way my brain is wired.

My response to that question is basically:

do we choose the conclusions we come to? Because that’s basically what atheism is ~ a conclusion one arrives at.

Are there any atheists here who feel that their atheism was a ‘choice’? If so, I’d love to hear their response(s) to my question above.

Ask anything as long as you genuinely wish to know the answer.

Just remember one thing – religion and the people that follow a religion are two separate entities. Any view against religion is never meant to be an attack on you.

Ask him, “Why are we here?”

Mike Clawson…

I’m curious which ACA representative is speaking. I dug through my e-mail and can’t find anything. (I’m mostly checking to make sure I didn’t miss/forget to add something to my calendar)

Matt Dillahunty
President, Atheist Community of Austin

Mike, which member of the Atheist Community of Austin volunteered? Some of us are not sure who is supposed to go.

The most obvious question I think would be “Where do they get their ‘moral compass’?” This assumes that morality can only be from religion. I think I can tie this into my other persona – that of being a vegan. A study last year revealed that people who are vegan are neurologically different from others. The part of the brain that has the ability for empathy is more pronounced in vegans. Ah ha! Empathy for others is what governs our morality – not religion!!

This might be a boring or obvious, but I think the most useful question is “how did you become an atheist?”

Siamang (hey we saw some of those at the Zoo yesterday!): Parenting Without Belief has a workbook out now. I haven’t read it so can’t say that it is more grounded, but you might want to check it out. I have similar concerns for my daughter who is soon-to-be 5 and asking questions about death, and will go to a public school next year with all types of people. Diversity is good – trying to convince her to believe in Jesus is not IMO. I want to give her a strong grounding in our beliefs about what is important (mainly how you treat other people) and hope that she comes to me with anything she hears that does not jive with our beliefs. We don’t believe in a supernatural deity but we believe in the inherent goodness of most people. I am still working these issues out as well as you can see. Parenting is a work in progress and we hope we just dont screw them up too much along the way. LOL

Mike,

It’s all cleared up now. We’ll make a change so that “lecture coordinator” is a bit more clear. We host a monthly lecture series and there’s one board member who handles all that traffic. It was never intended (to my knowledge) to be used for contacting us about having someone speak, though I certainly see how one could assume that.

Thanks for e-mailing. I hope you enjoy the talk. 🙂

It has been mentioned, but I feel it is important enough to be repeated, repeatedly. Atheist means only “without a belief in a god or gods.” This defines us specifically based upon something we do not have or possess, which does not serve to define us in any purposeful manor. A very good question would then be “What do you believe?”

That said, I think another good series of questions would be along these lines:
“Are there any questions you often receive that you find frustrating? What are they and why do you find them so?”

But if you are looking for… sympathy… or perhaps a common ground, might I also suggest you ask questions that involve getting to know the person for who they are, rather than based upon their Atheism which as mentioned does not serve to define them meaningfully.
“What kind of music do you like?” “Favorite movie?” “Read any good books lately?” Helping your congregants to see us as people, rather than as atheists first would probably do more good than focusing upon religious views that we don’t share.

Why would an atheist attend a church – in Austin or anywhere else? What do they get out of it?

That’s a great question Michael. I know what my friend has told me about it, but I probably shouldn’t presume to speak for him in a public forum. I’ll let him know you asked and see whether he wants to answer it himself.

Thanks to everyone for all the great questions. They were very helpful. My interview with him actually got bumped up a week, so I’ll be doing it tomorrow morning. (9:30am at Journey Imperfect Faith Community, if any Austinites reading want to come). I’ll let you all know how it goes.