About Belief, Religion and God

[Meatros]

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]orion wrote:
Therefore they did not kill in the name of atheism, but of communism.

[/quote]

Well, except that they did.

[/quote]

Is the limit to your evidence based on the amount that you assert this?

How do you ‘kill in the name of atheism’? What does that look like?

If God doesn’t exist, then we should slaughter people.
God doesn’t exist
.: we should slaughter people

If this is your argument for their motives, then it’s clearly a nonsequitur. If it’s not your argument for their motives, then what is? Please put it plainly.

[pat]

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]orion wrote:
Therefore they did not kill in the name of atheism, but of communism.

[/quote]

Well, except that they did.

[/quote]
I love historical rewrites…They are so convenient.

[Meatros]

[quote]pat wrote:
You must be confused. Where is it written that being communist necessitates the mass destruction of human life? [/quote]

You make my point for me, unwittingly, apparently. Let me illustrate:

“Where is it written that being an atheist necessitates the mass destruction of human life?”

[quote]pat wrote:
Further, it is a matter of historical fact that people who where atheist, bent on seeking the destruction of religion, have committed the greatest mass atrocities the world has ever known, period. These are indisputable facts. [/quote]

It’s a matter of historical fact that the people also accepted heliocentricism - should we blame that as well as atheism?

You are committing non sequiturs - that is an indisputable fact.

[quote]pat wrote:
Does one being atheist automatically mean that they support murder and violence? No. [/quote]

Then referencing their atheism is a red herring.

[quote]pat wrote:
Neither is it true that religions or people of religious belief are automatically murderers, tortures or child molesters. [/quote]

I completely agree with this and wouldn’t argue otherwise.

[quote]pat wrote:
That’s the point of this exercise. People are asserting that religion leads to horrible behavior where it is clear that if that is true, then a lack there of leads to behavior that is as bad or worse.[/quote]

Good for ‘people’. That is not a point that I have made, however. My point, as far as this goes, is that abrahamists actually have justified atrocities by appealing to God - in their holy books. That is a significant difference, don’t you think?

[quote]pat wrote:
It is your history that is poorly known. The ideology that there is no God and that all other philosophies should be stomped out was the justifications for these crimes against humanity. [/quote]

There is no ideology that there is no god. Communism is not atheism. Atheism can be, but is not necessary, a component of communism. Your link does not justify your assertions here.

[quote]pat wrote:
The point is this, there is no causal relationship between being religious and behaving badly, nor does correlation support such assertions.[/quote]

Then why are you attempting to construct such a point? I certainly am not.

[quote]pat wrote:
Yes, religious people have done bad things, non-religious have done worse. [/quote]

And in most cases the religion/non religion was not the reason behind those bad things.

[quote]pat wrote:
Neither assertions are causal, but athiests always feel compelled to bring up bad things religious people have done in attempt to make the point that religion causes this behavior. In as much as atheism does not cause the atheist to be evil, neither does the theism cause the theist to behave in an evil way.[/quote]

I cannot speak to those elusive ‘athiests’ you are referring to, unfortunately, as I never made those claims.

pat wrote:If you bring it up, I will retort as the facts are the as bad as religious people have behaved in history, atheists have behaved even worse.

Good to know - did you forget that I didn’t bring that up? In fact, I specifically attempted to distance myself from the claim that religion caused the Crusades? Please keep me out of your atheist strawmen.

[quote]pat wrote:
Neither ideology is responsible for the behavior. But it is time to move past this point as it is just a red herring and is irrelevant to the argument that God does or does not exist. No matter what ideology people follow, you will always have assholes.[/quote]

Atheism is not an ideology. I agree with you that it is irrelevant to the argument that God does or does not exist. You, however, seem to be content with putting stuff in my metaphorical mouth though.

[pat]

[quote]Meatros wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:
You must be confused. Where is it written that being communist necessitates the mass destruction of human life?

You make my point for me, unwittingly, apparently. Let me illustrate:

“Where is it written that being an atheist necessitates the mass destruction of human life?”
[/quote]

The historical reference that for instance, the Soviet Union was an atheist state. The soviets sought to destroy religion by killing religious peoples. Further, the communists were also athiests…Whether or not they did it in the name of communism or atheism is irrelevant as they were both. They were atheists and they murdered millions. Are you disputing this concrete fact?

[quote]pat wrote:
Further, it is a matter of historical fact that people who where atheist, bent on seeking the destruction of religion, have committed the greatest mass atrocities the world has ever known, period. These are indisputable facts. [/quote]

It’s a matter of historical fact that the people also accepted heliocentricism - should we blame that as well as atheism?

You are committing non sequiturs - that is an indisputable fact.
[/quote]

Do you know what a non-sequitur is? This is a matter of fact that people who were athiests committed the worst atrocities ever know to man. Where do you see a premise not supporting a conclusion here?

[quote]pat wrote:
Does one being atheist automatically mean that they support murder and violence? No.

Then referencing their atheism is a red herring.
[/quote]

You should read the whole thing rather than pick it apart line by line…Addressed later.

[quote]pat wrote:
Neither is it true that religions or people of religious belief are automatically murderers, tortures or child molesters. [/quote]

I completely agree with this and wouldn’t argue otherwise.

[quote]pat wrote:
That’s the point of this exercise. People are asserting that religion leads to horrible behavior where it is clear that if that is true, then a lack there of leads to behavior that is as bad or worse.

Good for ‘people’. That is not a point that I have made, however. My point, as far as this goes, is that abrahamists actually have justified atrocities by appealing to God - in their holy books. That is a significant difference, don’t you think?
[/quote]

No, not really. People referencing things to justify their actions does not have any barring as to the significance of said text.
That’s like saying “The Catcher and the Rye” was responsible for the death of John Lennon or that Marlyn Manson was responsible for the Columbine Massacre.

[quote]pat wrote:
It is your history that is poorly known. The ideology that there is no God and that all other philosophies should be stomped out was the justifications for these crimes against humanity. [/quote]

There is no ideology that there is no god. Communism is not atheism. Atheism can be, but is not necessary, a component of communism. Your link does not justify your assertions here.

[quote]pat wrote:
The point is this, there is no causal relationship between being religious and behaving badly, nor does correlation support such assertions.[/quote]

Then why are you attempting to construct such a point? I certainly am not.

[quote]pat wrote:
Yes, religious people have done bad things, non-religious have done worse. [/quote]

And in most cases the religion/non religion was not the reason behind those bad things.

[quote]pat wrote:
Neither assertions are causal, but athiests always feel compelled to bring up bad things religious people have done in attempt to make the point that religion causes this behavior. In as much as atheism does not cause the atheist to be evil, neither does the theism cause the theist to behave in an evil way.[/quote]

I cannot speak to those elusive ‘athiests’ you are referring to, unfortunately, as I never made those claims.
[/quote]

That’s what you get for jumping in to an argument late.

[quote]pat wrote:If you bring it up, I will retort as the facts are the as bad as religious people have behaved in history, atheists have behaved even worse.

Good to know - did you forget that I didn’t bring that up? In fact, I specifically attempted to distance myself from the claim that religion caused the Crusades? Please keep me out of your atheist strawmen.
[/quote]

Then don’t respond to my retorts to another. If you take up their fight, I have no choice but to assume you are defending and sharing their point of view.

[quote]pat wrote:
Neither ideology is responsible for the behavior. But it is time to move past this point as it is just a red herring and is irrelevant to the argument that God does or does not exist. No matter what ideology people follow, you will always have assholes.[/quote]

Atheism is not an ideology. I agree with you that it is irrelevant to the argument that God does or does not exist. You, however, seem to be content with putting stuff in my metaphorical mouth though.[/quote]
It is the doctine of belief that their is no God. Theism is the belief that there is a God. So in as much as one is an ideology so is the other.

[pat]

Repeat question for Athiests. This is to stay on topic to the original post. The guy in the video makes refernce to morality, good and evil.

What does “good” mean?

What does “evil” mean?

What makes a behavior a good one?

What makes a behavior an evil one?

[Meatros]

[quote]pat wrote:
Do you know what a non-sequitur is? [/quote]

Yes, I do, which is why I used the term. Is your tactic here to simply continue to insult my intelligence?

[quote]pat wrote:
This is a matter of fact that people who were athiests committed the worst atrocities ever know to man. Where do you see a premise not supporting a conclusion here?
[/quote]

The premise ‘they are atheists’ does not support the conclusion that atheism was in any way responsible for the atrocities. This is why I brought up heliocentricism. Frankly speaking, if memory serves, I believe the motive for most of the murders was financial.

[quote]pat wrote:
You should read the whole thing rather than pick it apart line by line…Addressed later. [/quote]

You should take your own advice, as you are painting me with a broad brush here.

[quote]pat wrote:
No, not really. People referencing things to justify their actions does not have any barring as to the significance of said text.[/quote]

I’m not sure what you are referring to - I am referring to the conquest of Joshua, where God specifically calls for, and participates in, atrocities. So, in that sense - the sense I am speaking, ‘yes, yes really’.

Now, should Christians, Jews, or Muslims believe those texts? I’m not the one to say, but it’s in there.

[quote]pat wrote:
That’s like saying “The Catcher and the Rye” was responsible for the death of John Lennon or that Marlyn Manson was responsible for the Columbine Massacre.[/quote]

This is not a fair analogy. I am not trying to use the bible to justify any sort of atrocity outside the events in the bible.

[quote]pat wrote:
That’s what you get for jumping in to an argument late. [/quote]

I get you quoting me and then putting strawmen in my mouth?

[quote]pat wrote:
Then don’t respond to my retorts to another. If you take up their fight, I have no choice but to assume you are defending and sharing their point of view.[/quote]

How am I responsible for your misunderstanding of my position. If someone responds to something, that doesn’t mean that they agree 100 % with what that person said. To accept such a thing is simply silly. Especially when I specifically state that I do not agree with blaming religion for X. I suppose this goes back to you taking your own advice.

[quote]pat wrote:
It is the doctine of belief that their is no God. Theism is the belief that there is a God. So in as much as one is an ideology so is the other.[/quote]

No, actually it’s not a doctrine and it’s certainly not exclusively a doctrine that there is no god. Atheism is a position on the belief in God - not on the certainty of whether one exists or not. Agnosticism is the position on whether you think it’s possible to know whether god exists or not. One can be an agnostic atheist (someone who isn’t sure whether god exists or not, but doesn’t believe in any gods), a gnostic atheist (one who is certain no gods exist), an agnostic theist (a fideist), or a gnostic theist (one who is certain that gods exist).

Theism is not an ideology either. It is a position on the belief in God.

[Meatros]

[quote]pat wrote:
Repeat question for Athiests. This is to stay on topic to the original post. The guy in the video makes refernce to morality, good and evil.
[/quote]

Morality, good, and evil are necessary components of worldviews, not atheism per say, as atheists will have varied answers to the question.

[Sloth]

[quote]Meatros wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]orion wrote:
Therefore they did not kill in the name of atheism, but of communism.

[/quote]

Well, except that they did.

[/quote]

Is the limit to your evidence based on the amount that you assert this?

How do you ‘kill in the name of atheism’? What does that look like?

.[/quote]

Well, you take an atheist person or persons, ok? Call them the something like the “League of the Militant Godless.” Then either put rifles in their hands, or carry the rifles on their behalf. Then persecute the religious. They don’t neccessarily need to be exterminated all in one go, mind you. They simply need to be controlled and subjugated.

[orion]

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]Meatros wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]orion wrote:
Therefore they did not kill in the name of atheism, but of communism.

[/quote]

Well, except that they did.

[/quote]

Is the limit to your evidence based on the amount that you assert this?

How do you ‘kill in the name of atheism’? What does that look like?

.[/quote]

Well, you take an atheist person or persons, ok? Call them the something like the “League of the Militant Godless.” Then either put rifles in their hands, or carry the rifles on their behalf. Then persecute the religious. They don’t neccessarily need to be exterminated all in one go, mind you. They simply need to be controlled and subjugated.
[/quote]

And where was there ever stand alone militant atheism?

[Sloth]

[quote]orion wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]Meatros wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]orion wrote:
Therefore they did not kill in the name of atheism, but of communism.

[/quote]

Well, except that they did.

[/quote]

Is the limit to your evidence based on the amount that you assert this?

How do you ‘kill in the name of atheism’? What does that look like?

.[/quote]

Well, you take an atheist person or persons, ok? Call them the something like the “League of the Militant Godless.” Then either put rifles in their hands, or carry the rifles on their behalf. Then persecute the religious. They don’t neccessarily need to be exterminated all in one go, mind you. They simply need to be controlled and subjugated.
[/quote]

And where was there ever stand alone militant atheism?

[/quote]

Stand alone?

[pat]

[quote]Meatros wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:
Do you know what a non-sequitur is? [/quote]

Yes, I do, which is why I used the term. Is your tactic here to simply continue to insult my intelligence?

non sequitur (“it does not follow”) – A statement that does not logically follow from what preceded it; a conclusion that does not follow from the premises.

I made a statement fact not an argument.

[quote]pat wrote:
This is a matter of fact that people who were athiests committed the worst atrocities ever know to man. Where do you see a premise not supporting a conclusion here?
[/quote]

The premise ‘they are atheists’ does not support the conclusion that atheism was in any way responsible for the atrocities. This is why I brought up heliocentricism. Frankly speaking, if memory serves, I believe the motive for most of the murders was financial.
[/quote]

My point as I stated before, that the whole ‘religious people do bad things’ because they are religious is a red herring. I was addressing the diversionary tactic head on, to dispel the myth religious people are inherently evil because of their religion.

I’m not sure what you are referring to - I am referring to the conquest of Joshua, where God specifically calls for, and participates in, atrocities. So, in that sense - the sense I am speaking, ‘yes, yes really’.

Now, should Christians, Jews, or Muslims believe those texts? I’m not the one to say, but it’s in there.

Well gee, you did fail to mention that you were scripture mining and referencing a specific text in the bible. To which I will say, what the hell does that have to do with the existence of God. That is a strawman.
Whether or not people should believe their religious texts is a separate topic.

[quote]pat wrote:
That’s like saying “The Catcher and the Rye” was responsible for the death of John Lennon or that Marlyn Manson was responsible for the Columbine Massacre.

This is not a fair analogy. I am not trying to use the bible to justify any sort of atrocity outside the events in the bible.
[/quote]

A topic change you failed to bring to light until just now.

[quote]pat wrote:
That’s what you get for jumping in to an argument late.

I get you quoting me and then putting strawmen in my mouth?
[/quote]

[quote]pat wrote:
Then don’t respond to my retorts to another. If you take up their fight, I have no choice but to assume you are defending and sharing their point of view.

How am I responsible for your misunderstanding of my position. If someone responds to something, that doesn’t mean that they agree 100 % with what that person said. To accept such a thing is simply silly. Especially when I specifically state that I do not agree with blaming religion for X. I suppose this goes back to you taking your own advice.
[/quote]

Huh? You argued on behalf of the atheist’s argument that being religious belief necessitates evil behavior, yet then you say that’s not what you are arguing? Forgive me for getting confused.

[quote]pat wrote:
It is the doctine of belief that their is no God. Theism is the belief that there is a God. So in as much as one is an ideology so is the other.[/quote]

No, actually it’s not a doctrine and it’s certainly not exclusively a doctrine that there is no god. Atheism is a position on the belief in God - not on the certainty of whether one exists or not. Agnosticism is the position on whether you think it’s possible to know whether god exists or not. One can be an agnostic atheist (someone who isn’t sure whether god exists or not, but doesn’t believe in any gods), a gnostic atheist (one who is certain no gods exist), an agnostic theist (a fideist), or a gnostic theist (one who is certain that gods exist).

Theism is not an ideology either. It is a position on the belief in God.
[/quote]

aâ??theâ??ismâ??â??/Ë?eɪθiË?ɪzÉ?m/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [ey-thee-iz-uhm] Show IPA
Use atheism in a Sentence
See web results for atheism
See images of atheism
â??noun 1. the doctrine or belief that there is no God.
2. disbelief in the existence of a supreme being or beings.

Dictionary.com | Meanings & Definitions of English Words

ag·nos·ti·cism (Ä?g-nÅ?s’tÄ­-sÄ­z’É?m)
n.
The doctrine that certainty about first principles or absolute truth is unattainable and that only perceptual phenomena are objects of exact knowledge.

The belief that there can be no proof either that God exists or that God does not exist.

Dictionary.com | Meanings & Definitions of English Words

[Meatros]

[quote]Sloth wrote:
Well, you take an atheist person or persons, ok? Call them the something like the “League of the Militant Godless.” Then either put rifles in their hands, or carry the rifles on their behalf. Then persecute the religious. They don’t neccessarily need to be exterminated all in one go, mind you. They simply need to be controlled and subjugated.[/quote]

And you actually believe this is what happened?

Again, how is this actually using ‘atheism’ to justify the atrocities? Replace ‘atheist’ with a person who believes the earth is flat and, one would hope, you will see the error in your argument.

[pat]

[quote]Meatros wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:
Repeat question for Athiests. This is to stay on topic to the original post. The guy in the video makes refernce to morality, good and evil.
[/quote]

Morality, good, and evil are necessary components of worldviews, not atheism per say, as atheists will have varied answers to the question.
[/quote]

I am not asking the general answer on behalf of atheism, I am asking atheists what good, evil and morality mean. What is it based on, and why.

Simple questions. Seeking simple answers, I don’t care if they vary, I want to know what atheists see good and evil as, and what constitutes a good or evil act.

[Meatros]

[quote]pat wrote:
My point as I stated before, that the whole ‘religious people do bad things’ because they are religious is a red herring. I was addressing the diversionary tactic head on, to dispel the myth religious people are inherently evil because of their religion.[/quote]

Fair enough - then we don’t actually disagree with much in this regard.

[quote]pat wrote:
Well gee, you did fail to mention that you were scripture mining and referencing a specific text in the bible. To which I will say, what the hell does that have to do with the existence of God. That is a strawman.
Whether or not people should believe their religious texts is a separate topic. [/quote]

No, I did not fail to mention that I was referencing a text in the bible. I specifically mentioned it in several places. I even made a reference to the Joshua Challenge. You are ignoring important bits in my posts to construct a strawman.

I referenced Joshua not as an argument for or against God’s existence, as a clear reading of my posts would indicate, but as a reference for a (supposed) time when religion was to blame for an atrocity.

[quote]pat wrote:
A topic change you failed to bring to light until just now. [/quote]

Not at all - it just seems that you pick and choose what posts of mine you care to read.

Take a look at the post I made at 850 this morning:

"Personally I’m not sure how much of Christian dogma was responsible for the Crusades and some other atrocities. It might have been the go-to patsy for the authorities to point to, in order to rile up the public, but I think that the Crusades were largely a result of land acquisition and greed. I’m not a student of history though, so I could very well be wrong.

With that said, there certainly are wars and atrocities that Abrahamists committed (or *said they committed) in the name of God - and they are in their holy book. Joshua, for instance, went on a rampant slaughter of the amalikites (sp?). God, at one point, even took part.

Are any of the Christians here familiar with the Joshua Challenge? If so, what is your response?"

Keep in mind that this was before the main thrust of our arguments - and yet you are accusing me of just bringing this up now?

[quote]pat wrote:
Huh? You argued on behalf of the atheist’s argument that being religious belief necessitates evil behavior, yet then you say that’s not what you are arguing? Forgive me for getting confused.[/quote]

sigh, no, I did not argue on behalf of an atheist argument that religious belief necessitates evil behavior - please actually point out where I did so.

At best I argued that atrocities were justified in the biblical text.

[quote]pat wrote:
aâ??theâ??ismâ??â??/�?e�ª�¸i�?�ªz�?m/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [ey-thee-iz-uhm] Show IPA
Use atheism in a Sentence
See web results for atheism
See images of atheism
â??noun 1. the doctrine or belief that there is no God.
2. disbelief in the existence of a supreme being or beings. [/quote]

So what’s the ‘doctrine’?

A doctrine is more then one belief, you know?

As to “2”, this is what I was referring to.

[quote]pat wrote:
The doctrine that certainty about first principles or absolute truth is unattainable and that only perceptual phenomena are objects of exact knowledge.

The belief that there can be no proof either that God exists or that God does not exist. [/quote]

Thanks for providing a link supporting what I said.

[Meatros]

[quote]pat wrote:
I am not asking the general answer on behalf of atheism, I am asking atheists what good, evil and morality mean. What is it based on, and why.[/quote]

So why are you singling out atheists then?

[quote]pat wrote:
Simple questions. Seeking simple answers, I don’t care if they vary, I want to know what atheists see good and evil as, and what constitutes a good or evil act.[/quote]

This is untrue, these are not ‘simple questions’ and they are derivatives of complex worldviews. Which is why I am suspicious of your singling out atheists.

Let’s suppose that atheists don’t have an answer - ie, they don’t know where morality comes from. What then? Do we assume god did it?

Or how about we suppose that moral questions do not actually express factual claims?

What about if we assume that morality is relative? Or that objective morality is simply a feature of the universe?

None of those various opinions has anything to do with whether God exists or not, unless you are going to try to construct an appeal to ignorance wherein God becomes the enigmatic answer to a genuine question.

[Sloth]

[quote]Meatros wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:
Well, you take an atheist person or persons, ok? Call them the something like the “League of the Militant Godless.” Then either put rifles in their hands, or carry the rifles on their behalf. Then persecute the religious. They don’t neccessarily need to be exterminated all in one go, mind you. They simply need to be controlled and subjugated.[/quote]

And you actually believe this is what happened?

Again, how is this actually using ‘atheism’ to justify the atrocities? Replace ‘atheist’ with a person who believes the earth is flat and, one would hope, you will see the error in your argument.
[/quote]

Yes…this is what happened. The League of the Militant Godless (just one example) isn’t fictional. How can you ask me how they used to atheism to justify what they did, when it was an overwhelming feature of their identity? Look at the name of the group I used as an example.

But I ask again, aren’t you guys turning atheism into an organized belief system? Outside of being non-theists (obviously), you guys are trying adding other stipulations. Doctrines, actually. “No! They aren’t atheists! Those are excommunicated heretics of the one true no-religion!”

[Meatros]

[quote]Sloth wrote:

Yes…this is what happened. The League of the Militant Godless (just one example) isn’t fictional. How can you ask me how they used to atheism to justify what they did, when it was an overwhelming feature of their identity? Look at the name of the group I used as an example. [/quote]

Ah, okay, so you believe it because you believe it. I’m sorry, your dogmaticism is just not convincing.

Sloth wrote:But I ask again, aren’t you guys turning atheism into an organized belief system? Outside of being non-theists (obviously), you guys are inserting other stipulations. Doctrines, actually. “No! They aren’t atheists! Those are excommunicated heretics of the one true no-religion!”

“you guys”?

I have no idea who you are attempting to lump into your demonization. Is this similar to the idea that all homosexuals are effiment, that african americans are less then human, etc?

[Sloth]

[quote]Meatros wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

Yes…this is what happened. The League of the Militant Godless (just one example) isn’t fictional. How can you ask me how they used to atheism to justify what they did, when it was an overwhelming feature of their identity? Look at the name of the group I used as an example. [/quote]

Ah, okay, so you believe it because you believe it. I’m sorry, your dogmaticism is just not convincing.

Sloth wrote:But I ask again, aren’t you guys turning atheism into an organized belief system? Outside of being non-theists (obviously), you guys are inserting other stipulations. Doctrines, actually. “No! They aren’t atheists! Those are excommunicated heretics of the one true no-religion!”

“you guys”?

I have no idea who you are attempting to lump into your demonization. Is this similar to the idea that all homosexuals are effiment, that african americans are less then human, etc?
[/quote]

Did you jump into this thread at the middle, or something?

[pat]

[quote]Meatros wrote:

With that said, there certainly are wars and atrocities that Abrahamists committed (or *said they committed) in the name of God - and they are in their holy book. Joshua, for instance, went on a rampant slaughter of the amalikites (sp?). God, at one point, even took part.

Are any of the Christians here familiar with the Joshua Challenge? If so, what is your response?"
[/quote]
Don’t fuck with the Jews, or it’s your ass.

[pat]

[quote]Meatros wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:
I am not asking the general answer on behalf of atheism, I am asking atheists what good, evil and morality mean. What is it based on, and why.[/quote]

So why are you singling out atheists then?

[quote]pat wrote:
Simple questions. Seeking simple answers, I don’t care if they vary, I want to know what atheists see good and evil as, and what constitutes a good or evil act.[/quote]

This is untrue, these are not ‘simple questions’ and they are derivatives of complex worldviews. Which is why I am suspicious of your singling out atheists.

Let’s suppose that atheists don’t have an answer - ie, they don’t know where morality comes from. What then? Do we assume god did it?

Or how about we suppose that moral questions do not actually express factual claims?

What about if we assume that morality is relative? Or that objective morality is simply a feature of the universe?

None of those various opinions has anything to do with whether God exists or not, unless you are going to try to construct an appeal to ignorance wherein God becomes the enigmatic answer to a genuine question.[/quote]

Either answer the questions or don’t answer at all. Dodging the answers serves nobody.
Can you answer them or not? If not, please don’t bother and let someone else have a try.