To imagine that God wants prayers and hymns of praise is to make him out to a sort of oriental potentate; while praying for favours is an attempt to get him to change his allegedly all-wise mind.
BARBARA SMOKERWhy am I an atheist? The short answer is that I cannot accept any of the alternatives. I simply don’t find them believable.
More Barbara Smoker Quotes
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Why am I an atheist? The short answer is that I cannot accept any of the alternatives. I simply don’t find them believable.
BARBARA SMOKER -
People who believe in a divine creator, trying to live their lives in obedience to his supposed wishes and in expectation of a supposed eternal reward, are victims of the greatest confidence trick of all time.
BARBARA SMOKER -
To imagine that “God moves in mysterious ways” is to put up a smokescreen of mystery behind which fantasy may survive in spite of all the facts.
BARBARA SMOKER -
As for the accusation of intellectual pride, surely the boot is on the other foot. Atheists don’t claim to know anything with certainty — it’s the believers who know it all.
BARBARA SMOKER -
The one function that most gods seem to have in common is to give human existence some ultimate purpose – and, while it is not possible to disprove an ultimate purpose, there does not seem to be any evidence for it.
BARBARA SMOKER -
As for an eternity in heaven – that would be hell!
BARBARA SMOKER -
This is not to say, of course, that there is no purpose in life at all: we all make our own purposes as we go through life. And life does not lose its value simply because it it not going to last forever.
BARBARA SMOKER