FF, if that kind of question had an answer that was clear, universal and unambiguous, 'discussions' like this one would have been over about 200+ years ago.

Please don't assume we're all evil because we don't agree with you. Rand had very little use for or support of Religion, and while there are many 'believers' in this group, many Objectivists (let alone atheists) have some pretty 'strongly held opinions' on the subject and many will appear to be strongly In Disagreement with some of the positions you've taken.

How many books have been written in the past century or two to try to answer the kind of question you're posing?

If the answer is obvious, where's the consensus? There isn't any because 'consensus' of 'agreement' is NOT "proof." It's just a group of folks who agree with each other on some topic.

And in many similar situations, one person's interpretation of What The Founding Fathers Really Meant may not hold any water for the next person in line.

Personally, I espouse the Socratic Method of asking questions in the search for Root Cause of an issue or problem. Believers don't tend to stick around for discussions like that, in my many years of experience.

I would venture that there Just Might be something they're Afraid Of. I wish they'd stick around long enough to keep peeling the layers off that onion.

Cheers!
https://www.plusaf.com/

If you do not know that you should get an education. But I will give you a hint, it is not the irrationalism of christianity

I have a soft spot for Ben Carson. While this is not the same as support, I was cheered by this put-down of a critic:

Question: How did Ben Carson ever get to be a brain surgeon?
..Piers Morgan, British progressivista.
Answer: By graduating Yale, U Michigan Medical School, and a residency in neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins.
Hope that helps, unemployed TV guy.
..David Burge

http://blogs.news.com.au/dailytelegra...

thanks for your comments and description of your experience.

I'm not schizophrenic either, and I've never had any such similar experience. I like proofs and replication of experiments, but have never seen any reasonable data to show me a reason to not be an atheist.

And, unlike many Theists of all flavors, I can be a kind, ethical, generous, loving person AND be an atheist at the same time. And I don't believe that I'm all that unusual... :)

I appreciate your Objectivist response instead of the emotional tirades like some others' responses. Thank you and +1. Documenting or making facts reproducible to prove the existence of God is a tough one, but it is done daily by many. It is possible to talk to God and it does, in fact, happen. God is not some unknowable phantom. You will call me crazy, I know, but I have heard his voice in that part of my brain that is rarely used. It was very clear what he said to me and it is now an experience that is part of me and has taken me beyond just faith. I am not schizophrenic. I am an Objectivist and the belief in God is not emotional or mystical. I am an individual, with my own mind, my own research, and I am on my own journey and search for truth.

W, implying that Rand might have 'changed her mind After She Died" is about as NOT A=A as one can be.
It's a belief, unprovable at all, and about as weak a proof or justification for your continuing 'belief' as pretty much anything you could say!

Until She Died has all the implications in it of a "I'm right, but we all have to die in order to see that I am/was Right." Poppycock!

That's the core of Belief... A strongly-held opinion in the absence of any tangible proof.

As long as A=A, anything resembling 'after-death experiences, revelations or 'truths' ' absolutely should have no traction here!

After All (so to speak), if there IS a 'heaven', why doesn't everyone's 'near-death experiences' tend to have anything in common???.... sure, they see their dear, departed relatives and all that, but shouldn't they all see the same surrounding environments? Same trees, lakes, clouds? Or are there lots of different 'heavens' where you will go, depending on ... what?!

Trying to answers to questions like those suck one down a rabbit-hole of fantasy in which only "Believers" can Find Common Truth. And even That is 'uncommon.'

Yep, and I CAN wrap MY mind around That! :)

... "Some of us on this forum have had physical, real, factual events occur in their life that proves the existence of God that goes beyond faith"...

and what some of us have trouble 'wrapping our minds around' is that Those Events and Experiences just never seem to be documented, accurately reported, proven Or Replicable in Any Way, Shape Or Form!

Sorry, it's the 'scientist in me' that really likes to see reproducability, evidentiary documentation and proof and 'shit like that' Before I can agree with what People Believe.

There are tons of things "we can't prove or understand" but unless that phrase is followed immediately by the word "YET", someone is heading in the direction of Faith and Belief on you and suddenly Proof will be irrelevant to the alleged 'discussion.'

Well, FF, I think one might be able to have the belief that there Was A Creator and maybe that there Is A God, but when the chips are down nowadays, people who claim we're based on "Judeo-Christian morality" somehow seem to always gravitate back to Jesus Is My Saviour, Belief In Christ is The Only True Way, and so on.

That's one reason I can't see the 'logic' in your 'arguments.' It still keeps walking and quacking like a duck! A Christian Fundamentalist Evangelical Duck.

Yeah, like so many religious protesters we keep seeing on TV, right? Westboro Baptist Church ring a chime with you?

Sikhs, maybe... most Buddhists... but darned near Every Other Religion seems to have their aggressive factions. Look around.

And in the same vein, blarman, you keep leaving me with the impression that You Hate People Who ARE Atheists...

My browser won't let me vote for my own posts OR vote more than once for anyone else's...

Does your system work differently?

Maybe the Galt's Gulch site programmers should look into copying a technique from FaceBook... if you Like a page or a comment, names are displayed in alt-text if you hover the votes.

Would That be a solution for you?

... and that's one thing that really bothers me about Conservatives who identify themselves as Objectivists or Libertarians...

If you think you have the right, power or wisdom to make decisions for Other People, you should not identify yourself with either of those labels.

Supporting Capital Punishment and opposing Gay Rights or Abortion Choice are two prime examples, even if you say you like lower taxes and 'smaller government.'

Those are NOT examples of 'lower government intrusion into individuals' lives.'

db, if you mean to say he never used Exactly Those Words, I could easily grant you that, but from my years of observing Obama and hearing his speeches, much like Carson in an opposite way, "it walks, talks and smells like a duck," so I'm not having a lot of trouble identifying it as a Duck.

Difficult indeed. I just need a couple good years to prepare for it. I guess that puts me in the "anybody but hillary" group at this point.

For the time being, I hang on to the slim chance of a peaceful return, Kevin.

To me, the election of Clinton, or Trump, will signal the official end of the "rule of law" that attempts to protect our individual rights. The confusing anarchy that follows will be a difficult time.

I'll pass...on acceptance of that version of 'integrity'.

The only one who has posted any hostile remarks on this post is you, ewv. Many times. You unjustly accuse others of doing this when they disagree with you.

Blarman, you can count on the fact that when you start pushing religion and ignoring historical facts I will vote you down.

Are you still on that? I've shaken the dust of my feet on that subject. No one is promoting religion. You've interpreted it as a promotion of religion. Nevertheless, you win, I'm out on this subject. I'll believe I'll meet my maker when I die, if you don't mind, and accept your belief that you your consciousness will blink out like a light bulb instead, which I don't mind. Ayn Rand was an atheist, I believe she would loved to have had this discussion presenting her point of view as only she could. However, you call people arrogant because you disagree, reject any discussion and would like to shut down the discussion you disagree with. Today the news is replete with anti-first amendment right in the institutions of higher learning. What a twist. I am certain Ms. Rand would have joined the discussion in favor of the first amendment. Well you have good luck with that too.

blarman- How would evw know who is giving points?
Anyway, one of the secret up-pointers of some of ewv's posts is me, as I have for some of yours.
Comment on 'there is more out there'. This argument for obscurantism has been demolished both by Bertrand Russell and Richard Dawkins.

Typical of utilitarians