1. If an Atheist smokes that means they are making a choice for their own lives, if it brings them pleasure then so be it. I mean I am sure you know the health risks involved but if you still wanna smoke then it's your own choice.

2. How can it contradict the notion that they only have one life to life? I mean if you smoke while your alive then you are fully understanding that you have one life to live....and if you wanna smoke during that life then it's your choice.

3.No it doesn't contradict the notion that you cherish every moment...you might cherish the fact that you are enjoying a cigarette. I mean true you might not cherish getting lung cancer but it goes back to the first question. It's your choice.

4. I try to live life to the fullest and I cherish the time I have...I do what I want with my life as long as it doesn't hurt other people. I don't smoke ciggs but I do smoke the occasional ...well ya know..but if I am around people who don't like it, I don't do it.

Nope it means that you hate God everyone know that the only reason us atheists do anything. Just to spite God. 

No 

No. Perahps we cherish the sweet rush of nicotine. Besides If the theists would shut the fuck up I'm hopeful that by the time I reach cancer age stem cell research will have yielded a cure.

Yep my lfe is fucking great. I dont really smoke any more but I spend a afir portion of my youth smoking, snorting, dabbing and popping a variety of substances. I counted all of that as part of my life I had some great times.  

Yes I do and when I smoked I did then too. The smoking, along with the rest of my hedonistic youth, was very much part of living life to the full. I can honestly say that my experiances in sweaty techno rave clubs in the mid ninties, chain smoking fags and rushing my tits of on a cocktail of drugs where amonst the "fullest life experiances" I have had. It was fucking great! and, whilst age has taken its toll and means that can no longer hack the pace, I really dont regret a minute of it. 

Hijacking a plane and flying it into a building because you were told in all seriousness that you will be rewarded with virgins in the afterlife.

Armed with no body armor and just an AK-47 you engage in warfare with a mechanized army that has vastly greater technology.  This is done because some bearded guy told you to wage jihad against the invaders.  This despite the fact that the person who told you to do so doesn't seem compelled to put himself in the same danger.

Thinking that scientists have a secret agenda and for some reason actually gain something by lieing and saying that the Earth is much older than 6,000 years and that evolution is true.

Believing that Intelligent Design is a real scientific theory and that it should be taught in school.

Thinking that the Theory of Evolution is "a theory in crisis".  Even though the only people that seem to say evolution is bullshit are fundamentalist christians.

Thinking it plausible that before Adam and Eve sinned Lions and Tigers were vegetarian.

I wish more places would ban smoking in public. Giving other people cancer isn't a right - same as the 2nd ammendment doesn't give you the right to start shooting randomly in a crowded place. And technically, smoking ISNT a right.

If an atheist smokes cigarettes...

Does that mean the atheist is not loving life to the fullest?

I don't see how. A cigarette is an instant pleasure that can lead to negative side effects later on in life. I don't see how that's any different than a great big steak, that might maybe someday lead to a heart attack. A cigarette is a way to live that moment to the fullest, and that moment might just be all you have left.

Does it contradict the notion that they believe they only have one life to live?

I can't find any way to make this conclusion follow from the premise.

Does it contradict the notion that we cherish every moment?

Certainly not. A good smoke is just another way to cherish that particular moment.

Is it something else altogether?

Not for me. Sometimes a cigarette is just a cigarette. (Or a pipe, or a hookah, or...)

Do you even cherish your life? Do you even try to live life to the fullest?

I can't speak for all smokers or all atheists or any cross-section of the two, but I certainly do.

Awww!

Heres the way I see it. It seems like a step towards taking away just a little bit of freedom. I suppose if they got away with this one its only a matter of time before another small thing is taken away. You can see what happens from there. Im trying to spare a rant here on the topic. Its jut really damn annoying. And yes. They will eventually ban all offensive smells.

One day I was listening to a local talk radio dj who was taking call on the subject. Some guy called and said "People should not be able to smoke in any place of business because I do not want to take my kids out in public and have them inhaling smoke."

Give me a fucking break. I want to know what strip club or bar that guy wants to take his kids to. Im all for keeping it out of family establishments. Please let the adults keep there adult activities.

Does that mean the atheist is not loving life to the fullest?

When I became a vegetarian for health reasons I was asked “Then why do you still smoke?” I answered, “Smoking is bad for me. I know it will kill me and I make a choice. Eating meat is not supposed to kill people. I should be able to eat something labeled “food” from the market and be reasonably confident that it won’t kill be. But meat often does kill folks.” Later I took into consideration how my choice to smoke affects others, the burden it puts on the health system if I got cancer, how my getting sick would affect others and the simple fact that it smells bad, your breath your clothes. Funny how when you smoke you don’t notice the smell. I guess this doesn't really anser the question. Oh well, too bad.

Does it contradict the notion that they believe they only have one life to live?

Smoking doesn’t mean somene doesn't understand mortality.

Does it contradict the notion that we cherish every moment?

Not if they’re addicted. Addicts have a hard time quitting what they’re addicted too, (that’s why they’re called “addicts”) no matter how much they love life.

Is it something else altogether?

I dunno, maybe.

Not necesaraly, how a person lives life to the fullest is up to them.

Of course cutting a few years off the end, would make it easier to have it filled.

Just becuase he/she is an atheist doesn't mean that the person believes in a singuler life.

Again, that would be up to the person.

Dunno

Yep.

As well as I can... although many people would say otherwise.

When does it become an issue of addiction instead of choice anymore? Alcoholics make the same arguements for their addictions but in the end how much of it is the addiction speaking instead of the person?

When are you talking to a person, and when are you talking to the drug?

The "enjoyment" of cigarettes for most people could just in fact be them staving off the withdrawl symptoms. Do they enjoy breathing in harsh chemicals when they start? How many people that enjoy it now, had to force themselves to get into the habit?

 Do we let people take cocaine all the time just because they enjoy it? Do we let people shoot up heroin anymore because they enjoy it? Before these drugs were made illegal they were "luxuries" of class as well. 

Where do we draw the line between responsible habits, and habits based on pleasure? As patrons of logic, science and reason any arguement based on the "pleasure" of the substance should be taken with a grain of salt due to the addictive nature of the drug.  

 For example the "living life to the fullest" paradox that seems to arise when smoking comes up. If you live life to the fullest by excercising a "right" to indulge in an addiction, then where is the "fullest" part? How can you speak on behalf of living life to anything when you become ruled by your habits?

To those that are "sick" of this debate maybe what makes you so sick about it is confronting the fact that you are actually addicted to a harmful, disease causing substance. You can dress it up as much as you want, but as atheists i thought we were supposed to be champions of responsible reality, and not wishful reality?

I am addicted to a harmful, disease causing substance. Its a choice I made on my own some years ago. I do not force people that do not want to join me in getting lung cancer to do as I do.I will smoke outside so you dont have to inhale toxic fumes that just might kill you.Maybe...Just maybe some people are sick of this argument because we dont feel it is someone else place to tell others what they should or should not do just becuase it might one day make us ill or even kill us. I obviously cant speak for everyone on that feeling. But I will tell you I am a grown man capable of thinking for myself. I do not need others to try to save me from myself.

This gonna show how nerdy I am, but that was one of the TNG movies. It's the one where Picard and Kirk meet. Yeah... I feel bad for knowing that and pointing it out.

The fact that one is addicted to a substance does not mean that he/she is not making a choice to continue using the substance to which he/she is addicted. Breaking an addiction is difficult, and most people do not enjoy withdrawal symptoms from any substance, but that doesn't preclude a conscious choice to continue using a substance.

Actually, the brain restructures its response to nicotine after a certain period of use to cause the pleasure centers of the brain to be stimulated by nicotine moreso than in those who don't or rarely smoke. This is the general mechanism behind any addiction.

Other than that, smoking may be pleasurable in other ways--personally, it's the physical act of smoking that I enjoy. Others enjoy the stimulant effects. I don't think that anybody "forces" themselves to start smoking. Either you enjoy it or you don't. So, you continue or you don't.

Personally, I support the legalization of drugs for multiple reasons. But as to your point, do we let people drink coffee because they enjoy it? Caffeine is highly addictive. How many coffee drinkers don't want to stop drinking coffee just to stave off withdrawal symptoms? Caffeine has negative side effects and long term consequences as well.

It is clearly rational to do that which gives you pleasure as long as that doesn't involve harming another individual. Why do you have sex? I bet you've done it just because it is pleasurable and not solely for the purposes of procreation.

Nobody here who smokes thinks that it's good for you. We aren't engaging in wishful thinking--we are choosing to do something that we know is damaging despite that fact because we enjoy the activity. Lots of activities are potentially dangerous, and yet people do them.

As far as the "responsible reality" comment, I don't even know what that means. Reality is neither responsible nor irresponsible. It's not my job to make other people's choices for them or be the bastion of "responsibility".

So then we must ask how much of the speaker is the addiction, and how much is the person?

I didn't know that, but it makes sense. Things like this kind of make smoking seem dishonest to me. Again it brings for the question how much of the speaker is the addiction, and how much is the person.

I didn't put that statement forth as some kind of arguementative judgement on smokers, i was just curious because when i started smoking, thats how it happened.

That is a good point, however there is nothing more than increased blood pressure risk involved with too much caffene. With ciggarettes there is direct evidence linking it to lung cancer. As for the legalization of drugs? I have mixed opinions, and thats a totally different discussion.

In the end in the western world it does come down to personal choice, and due to the abilities and freedoms that i personally have, i realize that at this moment in time, i can't have my cake and eat it too. If you wish to shorten your life and limit your chances to do things physically, that essentially is your choice.

There is a difference between: "Known cause for terrible suffering and death" and potential danger.

I meant to say "thinking." I think i was distracted at the end of this post and didn't read it over heh. That being said your statement is a little hypocritical considering your profession of "rationally responding to irrational thinking etc." You raise yourself up as a bastion of rational thinking.

To be honest your post seems to bring across a message of "it's my life i'll do what i choose just because i have the right to. So what i was asking is "Even though we have the "right" to willfully put poison into our bodies and let them manipulate our internal chemistry to further the "pleasure;" knowing the consequences why would you be willing to shorten your life and your ability to live on this world for a 10 dollar high, when there is so much to learn about the world? Wouldn't your rational and intellectual drive to become greater push you beyond the need for a cheap physical gratification at the cost of your own life?

Of course it is your own choice, and feel free to excercise that, but you shouldn't really get angry or upset when people question the validity of your rational and "fullfilling" stance on intellectual clarity and quality of life through atheism when you openly embrace compromising your life for a cheap high.

I think one of the best quotes on this issue that sums up my thoughts on smoking would be this:

"We are going to die, and that makes us the lucky ones. Most people are never going to die because they are never going to be born. The potential people who could have been here in my place but who will in fact never see the light of day outnumber the sand grains of Arabia. Certainly those unborn ghosts include greater poets than Keats, scientists greater than Newton. We know this because the set of possible people allowed by our DNA so massively exceeds the set of actual people. In the teeth of these stupefying odds it is you and I, in our ordinariness, that are here.

Moralists and theologians place great weight upon the moment of conception, seeing it as the instant at which the soul comes into existence. If, like me, you are unmoved by such talk, you still must regard a particular instant, nine months before your birth, as the most decisive event in your personal fortunes. It is the moment at which your consciousness suddenly became trillions of times more foreseeable than it was a split second before. To be sure, the embryonic you that came into existence still had plenty of hurdles to leap. Most conceptuses end in early abortion before their mother even knew they were there, and we are all lucky not to have done so. Also, there is more to personal identity than genes, as identical twins (who separate after the moment of fertilization) show us. Nevertheless, the instant at which a particular spermatozoon penetrated a particular egg was, in your private hindsight, a moment of dizzying singularity. It was then that the odds against your becoming a person dropped from astronomical to single figures."

- Richard Dawkins (excerpt from Chapter I, "The Anaesthetic of Familiarity,"
of his 1998 book Unweaving the Rainbow)

I do not hold anything against those who smoke, I just think it's irrational to give up some of your life for something so materialistic, and then to plug your ears and ram it under the guise of "freedom of choice" when there is a lot of information that points to smoking changing the chemistry of your body to accomadate the pleasurable high that it gives you, while at the same time slowly killing you.

...and now for the last point: "Smoking does no harm to anyone but myself, and that shoudl be the way people look at it." 

 That is just flat out wrong. What about the people who love and care for you? Right now my girlfriend smokes and it breaks my heart that she is addicted to this habit because if she lets it go on too long it will rob her of the chance to experience and live life and enjoy all of it. She is already at a stage where it's brutal coughing and spitting in the morning. She has decreased physical stamina, and has a problem focusing and thinking things through when those infamous "cravings" start. 

 Now you can justify it under freedom of choice etc, but there has to be a line drawn where there is a distinction made between freedom of choice, and being exploited for a dollar. There has to be a line drawn where you are actively choosing to kill yourself, and you are ruled by your addiction.