There are no atheists in foxholes!

[zorkan]

What do you reply to this irritating question?
My reply:
If you mean this in the military sense, you are probably right.
Atheists don't go to war.

[Tank]

Of course we do. We are ordered to and we may have to do it out of necessity at Islam collapses.

[Recusant]

In the figurative sense of facing imminent death, this site has unfortunately seen several atheists who were in that position. None of them found Jesus in their final days, going by what they posted here.

[Asmodean]

As pointed out in the responses before mine, "no Atheists in foxholes" is simply not a true statement.

I, for one, went from pacifist to, I suppose, realist when it comes to the necessity of war while remaining atheist. I'd rather not go to one, but there are certainly reasons why I would.

Taken metaphorically, it would not occur to someone like me to turn to a god for comfort when faced with death. Again, personal perspective, but I don't mind ending one day. My capacity to care will be gone, so what's the problem? Oh, sure, I'd rather avoid certain processes of dying, but that's a completely different set of fears and to those, I would seek a resolution - not empty comfort of faith.

Looking at it from a different angle, say, that of loss, there are still atheists in them foxholes. Someone dear to you is gone forever and no longer exists as a person. That does not necessitate nor imply life after death or divine whatnots. You mourn and then... Move on.

Granted, it needs not be quite as stark as I present it, but any honest conclusion would have to be that atheism may be a variable in whether or not you find yourself in a particular foxhole - it may even be the variable - and it may play either way, or not at all.

[Icarus]

Deeply religious people are incapable of imagining that one could face death without any reason to pray, or ask favor, from some god that they do not believe exists. 

 

[Asmodean]

If "all" Bob ever did was turn to gods, he may quite simply not know anything else. Conversely, if Dave has not once turned to gods, it is unlikely to even occur to him to do so in the circumstances where it wouldn't occur to Bob not to.

The Asmo complicateth because The Asmo can... th.

...A other interesting observation is that people tend to plead with their gods for this and that, but I notice that they rarely-to-never offer a price that would be "logically" sufficient to entice an entity of that scope to lift whatever multi-tentacled appendage it may or may not have.  Makes an person have at least a tiny speck of respect for those trying to sell their soul to the devil in stead - at least they offer him something.

Roleplay time.

The petitioner The Asmo: Oh, pwease, Lord, take MY life in stead of that there The Asmo over yonder, I begs you!
The Divine The Asmo: Bitch, what would I even want with your corpse, go away! Divine-we is busy watching Divine Netflix.
The jumped-out-of-airplane-with-no-parachute The Asmo, for which the petitioner The Asmo is praying: SPLAT!
The... End..?

[zorkan]

Don't know anybody that's theistic to all gods.
Trip Christians up with this one.

Are you atheist to Brahma?
Most likely they will reply they are.

But what happens when you move the trailing 'a' to the front?
Abrahm.

Abraham, also your one god.

[billy rubin]

the hindus would be be okay with some varieties of that

[Asmodean]

But what happens when you move the trailing 'a' to the front?

Getting flashbacks to that... I think it was an episode of Penn and Teller, actually, where some fool was turning Mabus into George W. Bush by turning an M upside-down and dropping an a here and there. Why? "Because that is something that we can do." A direct quote - or as close as.

The Asmo can do something even more profound. If you turn P in Peter upside-down and insert a a, because we can do that, then it becomes beater! So how can there be any doubt as to who instigated the bar fight?! See, even bar starts with a upside-down P!

[zorkan]

Another irritating question.
Why is there something rather than nothing?
They probably want to lure you into the big bang theory which they think they can discredit.

But let no atheist be back-footed by this, because the the answer is simple even if the full description is complex.

You do get something for nothing from quantum physics, and we live in a quantum universe.
Repeated doublings, symmetry breaking, curved apace, thermodynamics and the universe is just like you'd expect it to be.
 

[Asmodean]

Why is a rather than b may not be a valid question in that particular scope.

Everything is. How did it come to be? How will it end? Is "nothing" just another part of "our" everything? If so, what's "beyond" nothing?

Point is, there may not be a "why."

Edit: this may deserve an example. Let us assume a multiverse. A number of universes, each with its own space and time. What is that space of spaces? Is it space, or something else entirely? Does it have a component of time - a time of times, if you will? The interesting questions, they tend to be the hows and the whats. The whys... On that scale, do they not boil down to "because here you sit, asking 'why?'"

[zorkan]

The only thing that I feel sure exists is consciousness,
Materially we are made of atoms which allow for molecules and cells.
Yet, nearly all of us is empty space.
It's only the forces of nature that prevent us from falling straight through the earth.
I don't assume a multiverse, just like I don't assume time or motion.

The Greeks knew that if you fired an arrow it could never reach its target if maths is correct.
But what if the arrow that left the bow is not the same arrow that hits the target?
That implies parallel worlds.

Space isn't quite empty. Virtual particles pop in and out of existence.
Space is expanding, not the galaxies.
Have to accept that science is never fixed and always work in progress.

So when a theist proudly declares "Evolution is just a theory" you remind them that their creationism is not even that.
It's a myth, laced with a bit of fable.