Questions For Atheists

Sigh. Yet another freakazoid making false presumptions.  PZ Myers responds:

I don’t think he understands atheism at all. It doesn’t mean that existence is random, since the universe actually has physical laws that allow some predictability; if I mix hydrogen and oxygen gas, and apply a spark, I’m going to get the release of a lot of energy fairly quickly, and water. I won’t get bunny rabbits, or marzipan, or a sheet of cellophane. That there is no ultimate meaning to life means I am free to set my own goals, and I don’t have to worry about, for instance, getting enslaved in a celestial choir after I die.  

We can establish an objective morality, based on human needs and desires, which is far superior to a morality built on the arbitrary caprice of an imaginary deity (or, more accurately, the self-serving demands of the imaginary deity’s priests). Death is just an end, and while endings are to be avoided, they are a part of our existence. That believers think they will be reunited with loved ones after death does not mean that they will. Finally, I’d rather see justice in this life, where it counts. I also do not consider the Abrahamic idea of justice at all just — murderers are to be tortured with endless misery for all of eternity? Really? You consider that justice?

SNIP

I don’t expect my answers to please Prager. He has intentionally composed a pair of questions for which he has his pat answers, and he’s not asking out of honest curiosity to find out how atheists think — he’s just looking for excuses to reject atheism. It’s as if he asked the question, “What is 1 + 1?”, so that he could sneer at all the ignorant materialists who answer “2”, by informing them that obviously the answer is “3”, gosh aren’t atheists dumb?

But then, this is the kind of thing I’ve come to expect of dishonest religious apologists.