Here´s my quick thought on "Atheism & Free Will" and whether an atheist can logically criticise a religious person on the basis of being irrational/stupid/mistaken etc. based on their own world view...it'll be a little confused as I'm thinking about it whilst writing!
Okay, so atheists only believe in the material world that can be studied by science. Humans are part of that material world & consist of cells which are matter. Matter is governed by the laws of physics and reacts in a specific way according to the information going into it (much like if you drop a ball on our planet is can only fall due to gravity acting on it) so too our brain cells can only act in a certain way in any situation. Therefore any "decision" that we make is simply a process of chemical reactions in our brain which, since each reaction is governed by the laws of physics, couldn´t have been any other way. Any notion of "thought", "choice" & "free will" are therefore simply by-products & illusions created by a collection of reactions of each cell which could only have reacted in the way it did.
Okay, so atheists only believe in the material world that can be studied by science. Humans are part of that material world & consist of cells which are matter. Matter is governed by the laws of physics and reacts in a specific way according to the information going into it (much like if you drop a ball on our planet is can only fall due to gravity acting on it) so too our brain cells can only act in a certain way in any situation. Therefore any "decision" that we make is simply a process of chemical reactions in our brain which, since each reaction is governed by the laws of physics, couldn´t have been any other way. Any notion of "thought", "choice" & "free will" are therefore simply by-products & illusions created by a collection of reactions of each cell which could only have reacted in the way it did.
Therefore for an atheist to call any religious person "stupid" or "irrational" for believing in God is actually itself "stupid" and "irrational" as according to their own world view those that believe in God really couldn´t have believed anything else given their cells which are totally governed by physics, and neither could the person who that "rejected" God have done anything else but that. Neither have chosen to follow or reject anything, it´s the only thing that they could have done given the laws of physics acting on the individual cells in their brains. More or less, seeing as there is nothing separating us from our genes, and that those genes are controlled by the laws of nature which can only behave in a certain way, there's no free will and therefore you can't criticise or praise anyone's actions as they are behaving in the only way they can..as a ball falling would.
So if you believe in God, next time you get insulted for believing in God simply say that according to their atheistic world view you really couldn´t have done anything else and any illusion of a choice is simply the by product of reactions in our brains that couldn´t have been any other way and therefore your "decision" to follow God is equally as rational as theirs to reject God and is as rational as a ball falling to the earth when dropped due to the gravity acting on it; it´s the only way things could have been given your cells & the information going into them.
So if you believe in God, next time you get insulted for believing in God simply say that according to their atheistic world view you really couldn´t have done anything else and any illusion of a choice is simply the by product of reactions in our brains that couldn´t have been any other way and therefore your "decision" to follow God is equally as rational as theirs to reject God and is as rational as a ball falling to the earth when dropped due to the gravity acting on it; it´s the only way things could have been given your cells & the information going into them.
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