I'm going to go ahead and say me too. Although I'm not well educated in the sciences, I think the subjects are amazing. Even though I've always considered myself an atheist, I used to, as a late teen, dabble in "cool things" (I think much like some of you with your science fiction) within the realm of belief, such as paganism or pantheism, maybe a little common astrology, such things based on nature, an anthropomorphic version of it, without really considering it at odds with the lack of god. I think you could call it an interest in fantasy.
I was not raised with the phrase "because I said so!"; my mother always gave a reason, at least it was her reason, if not universally applicable: because cars go too fast on that road, or because I don't want everyone to think we're too poor to buy you jeans with no holes in them, etc. I think what people object to with empiricism is this "hard truth" of life. My mother considers herself practical and realistic and I think this is her coping mechanism, to be extra cautious and keep this hard truth from pushing her down the stairs if she's looking the other way. She escapes in the tv a lot more than I remember her doing when I was a kid, and I feel my upbringing was pretty cold most of the time, and maybe this is what people think of when they say empiricism is too bare and empty. My mother never goes out on the porch and looks at the stars. She gardens to make her house appealing to neighbors rather than to feel the earth and enjoy plants and flowers that grow.
Anyway, as far as "spirituality" or whatever, I do look at stars whenever I think of it. I pretty much dislike people, but I love very hard and sincerely the few people I let in. Life is but a dream sometimes. I am a drop of water in an ocean. I still sometimes look at an old tree and wish it had a voice and a way to tell me all the things it has seen. It doesn't get to walk around, it has had visitors for decades, endures the seasons changing, and doesn't care about this internet nonsense. When I think about where I want to live the rest of my life, I'm sure I need seasons. The revolution of the earth around the sun in observable parts with their own essence of life and death and cycles is a big part of my ... what you call, spirit, I don't know what you would call it. Marking time with new displays of nature every couple months feels like a vital part of my human experience. I'm not in control of everything. I suppose I could control the weather by moving. That doesn't really give me joy and life the way seasons do. My mother calls me a dreamer because I think about this stuff, but I don't know why she deprives herself.
I think anyone who regards empiricism as boring or stark and without luster is probably accounting for the enjoyment of nature as god's wonderful creation, and that atheists are incapable of looking at it without trying to quantify it into numbers or write it in flat terms in a book with no pictures or stories with a plot, or look at clouds and think "ugh, rain!" and stick their nose back in their book. I don't know who thinks that or why.
