First things first, you are talking to a former atheist here. The only reason i believe in a god is because of an inexplicable experience i had. I’ll spare you the story since i do not expect you to believe and because no matter what you may never believe it. But the questions you ask are shockingly respectful as well as being some of my favorite things to ponder. Please don’t view this as an attempt to convert you. If it is one thing i admire about atheism it is the constant asking of questions.

Yes it is related because the image is a blanket statement so i made a blanket statement in return. I do not honestly think that atheism means a meaningless existence. In atheism as well as religion your life is what you make of it. Every decision you make defines your existence be it for the name of god or not. But to get to what you said..

The point Dawkins is making is a very good one: religion fills gaps in our knowledge with rubbish, while science urges us to recognise gaps and find the truth.

Religion says “I don’t know… God did it!”

Science says, “I don’t know, but I want to find out.”

Dawkins is right in the sense that people do use religion to remain ignorant, but beyond that it is nothing more than a blanket statement that is only backed up by a partial truth. But what dawkins isn’t telling you is that there are thousands of people, scientists and civilians alike who believe in god but also believe that god is not the only answer. Statements like the one Dawkins made rely on stereotypes in order to get their point across. Again it is nothing more than a tactic to get people polarized into one camp of thought. Religious factions do the same exact thing. ” if you do not believe in god then you are going to hell” “People who don’t believe in god lead meaningless or immoral lives” Yes there are atheists who do exactly that, but does that account for all atheists? No, it does not. There are plenty of atheists who are open to the concept of a god of some sort and there are plenty who lead lives that agree with christian morals and values. Those statements only account for a certain part of the atheist or theist populations as a whole. They are bullshit brainwashing tactics. I mean if you see a black person buying fried chicken do you automatically assume that all black people eat fried chicken? Do you assume that every nazi germany politician or citizen believe that the jews really were the source of the worlds problems and needed to be erradicated?

Have you ever thought that being religious does not necessarily relegate you to one possibility? I’m willing to bet a lot of money that you have been told by atheists and theists alike that there can only be one answer. But if it is one thing science has taught us there is always the possibility of a second answer, we just may have not found it yet. Now that isn’t to say people don’t use religion as an excuse to remain ignorant be it in spirituality or science. I mean think of what that one atheist said ” i contend we are both atheists because you refute other religions” That statement fundamentally isn’t true because atheism is not supposed to be like a religion, but it is true because the religious person is denying the possibility of other deities. But why is that bad? Moral reasons? What are those morals that it violates? Arbitrary rules that eventually lead to us agreeing on things like “killing is bad”.Or is it the result of some grand comsic energy ( or god as a religious person would call it) manipulating us from beyond our observable realms? I do not think there is ever certainty. I believe that Even in a universe engineered by an all powerful being there is no certainty. I mean to me objectivity is only as real as we tell ourselves. Maybe god is only real for the same reasons? Who knows. Do you TRULY know? I am a religious person and i will openly admit i do not truly know.

Where are you getting this notion that being religion means ignoring scientific explanations? If you actually understood religion beyond the whole “god did it” box you would realize that an educated religious person says ” god MAY HAVE done it and i want to find out how he did it and what allowed him to do it”

When i turn on my computer i don’t say “GOD DID IT” it’s because a multitude of insurmountable factors did it, and god may be part of the equation. I do not know, the ultimate answer may be beyond our comprehension, so much so that the best we can do is articulate the idea that we may never understand it. Part of any religion is trying to understand why god does what he ( or it ) seemingly does. Does god operate because of physics and chemistry or is it the obverse? Is god a product of the universe or is the universe a product of god? We don’t know. The bible says that god created the universe but who created god? But lets say there really is no god, that there is a multitude of evidence that says NO. What does it matter? I am still just as fascinated by the concept of a graphene processor or the lattice work of a diamond.

My favorite bible verse is this: “Ye Are Gods” John 10:34 –

Think about that, think about that beyond it’s biblical meaning, think of it in a secular manner. What has science given us? We have the ability to manipulate our universe on the most basic of scales. Sure our most powerful super collider is no match for a Quasar or black hole but still, We are the gods of our world. At any moment we could unleash a nuclear holocaust upon the whole planet wiping out life. And theoretically we could build life from scratch, from random pieces of carbon and glucose. You don’t find that awfully convenient?

“Imagine that the end of your life will be the utter end of your existence. Are you willing to bet that, despite the total lack of proof that some other form of life will follow this one, you are not wasting your single chance to live the best life you can, before you one day cease to exist entirely?”

That argument makes no sense. What does it matter if there is a god or not then? I enjoy my life already, i enjoyed without religion and i enjoy it with religion. I mean why should i worry about the fact that i spent my life dedicated to what could be a non-existent god? I mean if we want to go with popular definitions of a secular morality then what does it matter? As long as i am not harming others and impeding things that may benefit society as a whole then what harm am i doing? I don’t advocate faith based initiatives because they do not represent the worlds population as a whole. I don’t admonish people for not believing in gods of any sort. I just really do not care if my life is a grand cosmic mishap or an intricate plan

By many flukes of evolution, we have ended up with intelligence, emotion, and self-awareness. We can recognise where these things came from, accept that they evolved for a purpose, and work to increase our happiness and the happiness of others.

What makes you so sure that it has a purpose? If our universe is made up of flukes then wouldn’t that mean there is no purpose? Couldn’t it be that The only reason it has purpose is because we think there is a purpose? I think you inadvertently just proved a case for a god. Why do our particular sets of atoms get to do this while others don’t? The raw materials are there for the taking. Random Abiogenesis has seemingly proved that all is needed for matter to act the way we act is by an input of some sort, be it purposeful or not. But why is it that way? Why out of all the other elements does our particular set allow this behavior? We can keep reducing everything as much as we want but we still come to that nasty little ” but why?” question.

“It took a lot of hard work and deprogramming to accept that I will one day entirely cease to be. It’s a terrifying thought – no eternity, no reward or punishment, not even darkness… total oblivion… I want to fit in all the living I can before that moment of eternal nothingness arrives.”

What makes you so sure you will cease to be? And even if there is no god you don’t truly dissappear, your atoms just get rearranged. Because eventually your body will return to its’ elemental state? If the universe is as you say it is then eventually at some point you will reassemble. The idea of eternal nothingness fascinates me because maybe i will reassemble one day and i will still be the same person that i am only in a different place and time. Or maybe my ethereal self will continue again only on a different plain of existence. One atheist guy i spoke to had a really cool idea, Because of how unique every humans atomical structure is then there may be no such thing as dying.The idea being that once our atoms rearrange it may seem like nothing ever happened. That aside There are a multitude of answers to that scenario, more than i may ever know in what we have determined is the time we “exist”.

“If your very existence is a roll of cosmic dice, and the particular set of circumstances that make you who you are will never occur in that precise pattern ever again, don’t you owe it to yourself to fill your life with the greatest amount of love, peace, happiness, and experience that you possibly can?”

What gives you the right to say i am not living my life the very best i can? Because i am religious? Because i do not adhere to your chosen beliefs? Seriously you are going to have to come up with something better than that if you have any hopes of polarizing my mind.
I’m not going to lie. That statement kind of pissed me off, i mean who are you to say that i am not living my life to its fullest? I don’t assume because you are atheist or agnostic that you lead an unfullfilling or unhappy life. At any given moment i could stop believing in a god. I just see no reason not to. Science doesn’t explain everything, just like how the bible doesn’t always explain gods supposed reasoning. “Why did god create creatures that could actively defy him?” for example.

Well that is what makes life beautiful isn’t it? God or not at the end of the day our very existence is beautifully unique in that we know not of any other collection of matter that acts in such a way. You don’t have to be a scientist or an atheist in order to see that.
I mean look at this conversation we are having? Isn’t it beautiful that we are able to even have it?

I’m sorry but It just sounds like you are trying to get me to say “there is no god” even though i have considered that as a possibility. Is that 100% your fault that you have acted in such a way? Maybe it is since you haven’t stopped to consider that there are religious people such as me who have a panoptimist view. But personally i would like to think that it isn’t your fault. You don’t know me personally, you are not me and you do not have the means to access my mind and see the world the way i see it just like how i may never truly understand your position. So howabout this: Instead of making blanket assumptions about each other till the point we argue in circles howabout we respectfully disagree and work together in order to better eachother? I am sure there are some things you could teach me and i am sure there are things i could teach you. But in order to do that you are going to have to consider more than one possibility. Is that something you are capable of? I’ll openly admit that at times i am not capable of it, but at least i am able to recognize that i am incapable so perhaps that counts for something. Are you convincing yourself that there is no god because you are afraid of being accountable to something other than yourself and other people? Are you afraid that life really does have no meaning and that you should try to give it meaning in accordance to your world views? Are you afraid that there may be something that has the power to say whether or not your particular set of matter gets to come into being again? I am, and i am big enough of a person to admit that.But maybe that is the only reason i believe right? So therefore my belief in a god is only because i am afraid of a god correct? Does that make me a weak or unintelligent person? Because i do not want to upset that which can willingly destroy me? As incomprehensibly huge and amazing our existence is do you honestly think that you are in any position of authority to say that it is one way or the other?

I am in no position to tell you that a god does or does not exist. All i can do is tell you how i have come to understand god. If god does exist then i am in no position to tell you what he does and doesn’t do or what he thinks and doesn’t think. Who am i to speak for that which i do not have the ability to understand? Nobody can tell you the truth about god, because we do not know the ultimate truth about god. The only person who knows that is god himself and those who may have truly interacted with him. Until then we are all just bystanders to a grand cosmic circus.