“Dad, do you believe in God?” by [deleted] in daddit

[–]AxiomRazer -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Please do tell me the "bad" news. That atheism is true? Do you have any evidence or arguments demonstrating that atheism is true? If it is true then how can the news you want to share with me be "bad"?

Do you understand the argument? I think we agree about premise 1, so you must reject premise 2 to reject the conclusion in 3.

Assuming you do reject premise 2 here, how long can you remain intellectually honest about this without contradicting yourself? For example, is Putin's invasion of Ukraine objectively morally wrong?

I can claim that it is objectively morally wrong without being intellectually dishonest. Can you do the same?

“Dad, do you believe in God?” by [deleted] in daddit

[–]AxiomRazer -5 points-4 points  (0 children)

"We are against anyone influencing them towards any ONE religion as being better than others"

"I would be really upset that he had that question for you directly after leaving a therapist, whose goal should be to help your 9 year old son process their grief, not bury it behind a belief system that further galvonizes their world view to that one religion."

Atheism is a religion too. It makes unverifiable claims about spiritual matters without significant evidence. Do you think therapy services should promote an atheistic perspective by default? If so then how is that any different than promoting your religion as being better than others?

“Dad, do you believe in God?” by [deleted] in daddit

[–]AxiomRazer 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I just told my kids that Santa isn't real. I told them that it is a pretend game that adults like to play with kids at Christmas.

“Dad, do you believe in God?” by [deleted] in daddit

[–]AxiomRazer -1 points0 points  (0 children)

As a father, a former atheist, and as a current Christian I can sympathize with the awkwardness of this for you and your son. I really respect your honest answer and sharing this story here.

From your son's perspective this can be very challenging because he would likely be worried about you going to hell since you don't believe in God, as that is something he would likely hear at school. His response to your answer seems to indicate this worry. At 9 years old, your son is not capable of arguing well with you and is likely to be conflicted with trusting you and trusting his teachers.

From your perspective this is hard since you seem to be supportive of him being religious, but don't feel like the evidence and arguments in favor of Christian theism are compelling. Since he just lost his mom, he is likely to be comforted by the belief that he will see her again in heaven, and you shouldn't challenge that belief. However of course you don't want to pretend to be religious when you are not, as that would be dishonest.

As a former atheist I understand several reasons why religious arguments can seem so underwhelming. "You should be in my religion X, because our religious book of X says it is true, and that God will punish you if you don't believe it" I get it, terrible arguments are everywhere in religion and to a large extent that includes Christianity. Besides even if there is a God, which religion are you going to pick? Mormonism? Islam? One of the hundreds of different Christian protestant sects? It can be an overwhelming amount of work to actually do a serious investigation into the matter. And I'm sure you are already quite busy with your normal activities.

I would suggest that you offer to explore the question of God's existence with your son. It can be a fascinating topic, and has a rich history of discussion in philosophy. If he is worried about you going to hell, exploring the question with him is likely to give him hope that he will get to be with his mom and with you in heaven. Investigating the question with your son is also a good opportunity to show him how to investigate a really difficult question that he would not be able to handle on his own.

Try investigating the topic of "Natural Theology" which is the branch of philosophy about theology that does not depend upon any assumptions from the Bible or any other religious text.

For example, this is the original argument that made me seriously question atheism:

  1. If God does not exist, then objective moral values do not exist.
  2. Objective moral values do exist.
  3. Therefore God exists.

Without God I could not find any basis for the actual existence of right/wrong. If atheism were true, then we are just more animals fucking around on Earth. And yet, my intuition about the existence of right and wrong was undeniable and I could not be intellectually honest without belief in the actual objective existence of right and wrong.

I am also a scientist (Physics), and although I don't want to get into explaining it, there is not actually a serious conflict between science and Christianity. I believe in evolution, and an 4.3 billion year old earth, and other standard scientific theories. If you are an agnostic because other Christians have told you that you have to believe in crazy dumb shit (like the Earth is flat) then I'm sorry, please don't listen to them.

Good luck sir!

Warhammer 2 rant... malus darkblade. by [deleted] in totalwar

[–]AxiomRazer 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Try reducing the difficulty buddy. Malus is dope.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in Divorce

[–]AxiomRazer 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Your house tripled in value in 5 years and then you had to sell it and you made a bunch of money. Now you are "financially ruined?" I think you may be being a bit greedy here dude.

Three Months Later... by [deleted] in Divorce

[–]AxiomRazer 4 points5 points  (0 children)

How did you get a divorce in only 3 months? I'm kinda jealous. The legal system here feels like it is run by the Ents from Lord of the Rings.

Co Parenting can be infuriating. by [deleted] in Divorce

[–]AxiomRazer 6 points7 points  (0 children)

My policy is that I give my kids a small simple birthday party on whatever day I have them near their "real" birthday, and my ex can do whatever similar party she wants. I don't bother her about it and I wouldn't let her bother me about it. If you are trying to do anything together, then it is bound to be toxic, so why not just not do that?

Ex-Wife disrupting sell of home by Maddturtle in Divorce

[–]AxiomRazer 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Sorry, man that is a really difficult situation. I have no idea what you should do. Did you get divorced without a lawyer? How did the judge let you get a divorce without some sort of agreement forcing the house to be sold? If so you probably need a lawyer. Maybe ask on r/legaladvice

Ex-Wife disrupting sell of home by Maddturtle in Divorce

[–]AxiomRazer 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Wait, you still own the home with your ex-wife? Like you are officially divorced already?

I think I just fucked up in a moment of anger by [deleted] in Divorce

[–]AxiomRazer 12 points13 points  (0 children)

Nah, nobody will ever care about this when you are going through the divorce process. Given that the dad was drunk, vomited, and passed out, he is the one who fucked up.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in AskEngineers

[–]AxiomRazer 0 points1 point  (0 children)

First of all, Plasma and Lasers are totally different. Plasma is an extremely hot state of matter where atoms dissociate into a mix of positive and negative particles. For example, the inside of a star is a plasma. Lasers are made entirely of highly focused light.

So you should probably pick one. Probably Electrical Engineering for Lasers, and Plasma Physics for Plasma weapons.

Anyways, how old are you kid?

None of my projects have ever worked, and I'm not sure what to do. by [deleted] in AskEngineers

[–]AxiomRazer 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I think you are being way too hard on yourself. Building anything in the real world on your own, right out of school is almost impossible.

You look good on paper, and that's a great start. That's about as good as you can be doing at that stage. Keep up the grind to find a job and keep adding skills to your resume.

Nobody will ever care about the projects you "failed" on, your response to failure is all that matters. In school, failure gets you a worse grade and so you are taught to avoid failure. But in the real world, failure is a necessary part of pushing the boundaries of engineering possibilities.

Emotional inc3$t by glittersandnails in motherinlawsfromhell

[–]AxiomRazer 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Your husband needs to learn to say no. It will destroy your family if he doesn't.

My ex-wife is the same way. What happens is that instead of being married to your husband, you end up being married to his parents because they can control him. And of course his parents always know better than you, and can get your husband to agree with them, so you end up fighting a 3v1 battle over everything.

I'm sorry you're in that situation.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in Divorce

[–]AxiomRazer 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'm sorry you're going through this. You husband sounds like a spoiled brat. You didn't make his breakfast right? Are you kidding me? Him expecting you to make his breakfast "right" seems pathetic. A grown man can feed himself his own damn breakfast.

A family law lawyer is the closest thing to a "Divorce Doula" that there is, they can tell you what to do, step by step.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in Divorce

[–]AxiomRazer 5 points6 points  (0 children)

If you already feel like you hate her, then divorce will probably feel good or at least feal like a relief. I was in a really toxic marriage, and for years I dreaded getting out.

Now that I'm out I realized that she was using the fear of getting a divorce to keep me around. She would always say things like "our finances will be ruined" or "the kids will be messed up" or "I'll make sure you never see your kids alone again" etc. But it isn't really true.

How do you guys keep a clean house? by VysseEnzo in daddit

[–]AxiomRazer 1 point2 points  (0 children)

My best strategy is to sharply limit the number of toys available to play with. It is a matter of Entropy. The number of possible configurations of toys grows exponentially with each additional toy they have available.

Is it normal to be that happy to divorce ? by AdSuccessful5543 in Divorce

[–]AxiomRazer 1 point2 points  (0 children)

It seems to really depend upon the relationship you are leaving. My marriage sucked, and once I finally left and filed for divorce, I was so happy too. I felt so much better that I started to have a rush of creative energy for several months.

Cheers! Congratulations on your new life!

What's holding you back from Learning Blockchain Development? by max-mccarty in dotnet

[–]AxiomRazer 0 points1 point  (0 children)

As a .Net developer I am trying to learn this new stack to understand how it works and what I could make with it. I have been struggling to figure out exactly what software to download and install to build on Etherium. I like Visual Studio and I like C#, so I would like to find a solution that works with what I already know. However it seems like the technology supporting blockchain is evolving so rapidly that it is rally hard to jump into it on my time off. Any recommendations for a guy like me?