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Comment by silverquiet | Hacker News Reader

> you start spending a lot of time around sincerely religious people who you like, you’ll end up believing sincerely yourself

Interestingly, this is what turned me into an atheist at a rather young age. A friend invited me to a childrens' religious/social group wherein they explained that most science is actually incorrect; the earth is only 6000 years old, evolution is a lie created by the evil Darwin... that sort of thing. In my head, their version of Christianity fell apart and the rest quickly followed.

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Yeah, you thought they were idiots and formed antibodies against their belief system. But there are sophisticated religious people. And IMO sophisticated religious people are much more likely to have pondered deeply the ineffability of existence and accepted that it is incomprehensible except by faith. Whereas atheists just want to point out that it can’t be turtles all the way down and then become suddenly disinterested in the question beyond that.

Oh, I got the academic, Jesuit-style teaching from my Catholic church and the decade or so of CCD I was compelled to attend as well. I actually spent years thinking rather deeply about it, but that doesn't mean it stuck - I suppose some of us just aren't capable of believing.

You do remind me of one of my favorite Douglas Adams quotes though:

> “Let's think the unthinkable, let's do the undoable. Let us prepare to grapple with the ineffable itself, and see if we may not eff it after all.”

I'm imagining a dialog in which I ask, "So why does it all exist then?" And you reply, "Well, I'm not sure, no-one is. But it's not God." To which I respond, "My brother in faith!" and embrace you. After that we ponder the ineffable over a few pints.

“suppose some of us just aren't capable of believing.”

That’s such an obvious fallacy, you should do yourself a favor and introspect how such an absurd idea came into your head. Who put it there?

To see it’s absurd, consider, have you ever changed your mind about something? If yes, then it’s obviously possible and maybe even likely that you can and will one day change your views on divinity? If course it’s possible, and actually quite common. And yes, it comes as a surprise.

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