A timeline of some key memories around my personal experience of religion, running from my earliest memories to my emergence into atheism.
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opening quote:
We know that the only way to avoid error is to detect it and that the only way to detect it is to be free to inquire.
— J. Robert Oppenheimer
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subtitles
Arabic: [anonymous]
Brazilian Portuguese: Aymar Pescador Jr
Bulgarian: Djeitko
French: Pierre Morot
Indonesian: Azzedine Al-Razi
Polish: Karol Chrząstek
Russian: Sergey Savelyev
Slovak: Peter Ščigulinský
Spanish: Spanish Subs, Mau Jo
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Note regarding the fallacious accusation that I distort Christianity in my videos.
There's great irony in the constant accusations I've had over the years that my critiques distort or 'strawman' Christianity. They don't. I convey what was explicitly conveyed to me by other Christians — messages I've queried with them, often in depth. I don't give my own interpretations — just the ones Christians give me. So when a Christian says I'm distorting Christianity, they're in fact accusing other Christians of distorting Christianity. By the way, the critiques in the video are specific to my childhood — I've of course countered other interpretations since then.
I won't accuse these Christians of shifting the goalposts — like strawmanning, an accusation of goalpost shifting is only valid if it's being done between the specific parties making the arguments. If one Christian puts forward one interpretation, a second Christian isn't goalpost shifting by presenting another different view — two different views are being presented by separate agents. By the same principle, if a Christian presents a view and I misrepresent that view back to that individual, I'm strawmanning. But if I accurately present that view, then other Christians come along and disagree with it, I haven't strawmanned them because I wasn't responding to them but to the first Christian. If I ever said 'All Christians believe X' and they didn't all believe X, then I could possibly be accused of strawmanning — but I don't use that language because I'm aware of the vast conflicting diversity of Christian beliefs. And that awareness originates from my experience as a Christian myself.
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Note regarding the false accusation that I’ve lied about my own thoughts/experiences.
1) Some theists have stated Christians don’t act in the hateful ways depicted. This seems to be based on 'no Christian I've ever met' reasoning. First, to suggest the tiny sample you've met represents every Christian is an obvious hasty generalisation fallacy. Second, even regarding the Christians you've met, you don't know what goes on behind closed doors. Third, try pretending to be an atheist sometime — it might be an eye-opener. If you want to be taken seriously, don't deny plainly evident realities. I can freely admit that some atheists abuse theists. It’s plainly evident reality. I’m not obliged to deny or defend them just because I'm an atheist.
2) Some theists claim my questions about Noah and the ark around age six were lies — I was too young. Wrong.
My brother and I were lumbered with a bizarre myth when we were born. Doctors told our parents that being identical twins we’d always lag behind other children — twice the brains meant half the intelligence. In fact, we showed the opposite pattern. Our father recalled a hilarious moment when a doctor gave us some puzzles and said it would be years before we could solve them — then turned to see we already had.
We scored consistently ahead of our age in reading and vocabulary. A head teacher once chastised our parents for helping with our work — she didn’t believe we knew the words we used. She then had to eat her own. In our 11+ exams, we both got 99% and were accused of copying each other. We were cleared when it was discovered we got different answers wrong — oh, and took the exams in different rooms. I could go on. Have a think what it’s like for naturally bright children to be repeatedly suspected and accused instead of encouraged. No surprise I later learned to coast in school — performing to an average level to blend in.
The water cycle wasn’t part of the formal curriculum until around age 8. But my interest in clouds led me to find out about it sooner. I know — unbelievable isn’t it. I was given a poster by a teacher showing all the processes. Noah and the ark was part of a school performance when I was around six, in which I sang a song called ‘40 days and nights’. The play and the poster led to my question about where the water went.
It’s ironic that theists who’ve accused me of lying expect atheists to believe their claims of gods’ existence for which they provide no commensurate evidence — but refuse to believe in the existence of bright children. They're headed for a real shock when they discover distribution curves.
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music © theramintrees
