Skepticism revised?

So this is the big skeptics-topic of the month/summer/year. It's about Phil Plait's speech at TAM8, which I would dare say both impressed and made some people think. It certainly made me think. The first thing I reacted to was his question about how you lost your previous belief, and I will tell you why:

I have been a believer. I have believed many a thing. I started out as a christian during my early teen-days, which in retrospect was probably just something I did because all my friends did it (monkey see, monkey do). It didn't make me feel like there was anything like a divine spirit or holy spirit making my day more bright, and I were a christian for about three years, at which point it just subsided. I forgot it, plain and simple.

After a few more years, I moved in with my aunt. My aunt is really into spiritism, reiki, aura, regressive hypnotherapy and all that. She made me believe in it too. I was a strong believer for about another 3-4 years, and I believed in reincarnation, I firmly believed in beings from other dimmensions, extraterrestrials, and such. But not in the ordinary way. I believed in them in the way where I thought that if you said a certain "prayer" they would come to your aid. Healing anatomical anomalies one could have had for its entire life. So kind of like gods, if you will, and we could all ascend to that plane by realizing our inner selves or some stuff like that.

I strongly believed this, no matter how reasonable or how nice the people who tried to convince me otherwise were toward me. I was so set in my way, and I believed hard. But I wasnt a fanatic, and I didn't push my beliefs on others, unless you count sharing my deep passion for it with other people. I hope none of them believe it today.

Anyhow, the point I was making. Phil asked about how you lost your faith. I was quite a bit shocked that nobody raised their hands when he asked "did you lose your faith because someone called you an idiot" (not accurate quote, but you get the point).

Am I the only one who realised his stupidity through other telling me how stupid I was? Two persons (along with their top-notch team) saved me from my delusions. Penn & Teller. Thats right. Penn & Tellers show is single handedly responsible for saving me from a fate worse than death. Denial of how life is. The way they said how every person that believed this was an asshole, stupid and using all their verbal might, I finally realized the folly of my ways, and was suddenly free.

And just to let you know that I just didn't happen to "suddenly change my opinion" I also had several friends during my period of belief who actually tried telling me, or making me figure it out by myself. This didn't work, because I had already "figured it out" since I believed in it.

But the power of stupidity is ultimately what saved me. I have always considered myself somewhat of a heavy thinker. I think a lot. Not necessarily about any specific, or anything important. I take pride in my cognitive skills, and having them challenged is something that makes me think more than any other motivation.

Challenging the intellect of people is the most powerful tool I have, as long as I do it correctly, and unfortunately, this tool is far from perfection. I am not the sort of person to state that people are wrong, even if I know it. I merely encourage thought. I try to make other people think, and more specifically think about what they are saying, how they are saying it, and how they ultimately came to the conclusion. I ask questions as if I don't know what they are talking about, and ofcourse I know, but in this way when they say something really silly (like earth is xxxx years old) I can ask them how they know. How do they personally know beyond a shadow of a doubt, and most of the time, if I do this correctly, they will stump themselves and start seeing it from the outside.

and ofcourse, if they say "I just know it" or "you're dumb for not knowing" or anything that isn't telling me the rational or "logical" way for them to believe it, I will simply say "well, it has been interesting, but I tend not to believe in anything people tell me without anything to back it up". This is also an excellent way to make people think, because they might themselves have been caught like this, and if I shower some light on that situation without referring to their own, then they might take the hint.

Phil Plait also said something about a goal. "what is your goal when discussing this". The only goal I have is for people to stop being a walking PR-firm for whatever it is they believe. I dont mind people believing in us being mind-controlled by cats from Phobos since the pharaos went there, or whatever. That is their belief, their problem. What I do not like is people pushing beliefs.
Freedom is just more than the freedom to choose life. Its also freedom to choose to believe whatever you want to believe, however silly it is, as long as you DON'T. HURT. OTHERS!

The ultimate conclusion I have made regarding my life, and religion in general is as follows:

I cannot allow myself to believe in anything written by man, since there is no doubt in my mind that it cannot possibly be godly if it is done by the hand of man. And we all know that the bible has a million versions, all edited by man. That is not a holy book.

Neither can I allow myself to believe in the afterlife, since this might impair my ability to live life to its fullest. I am not saying there is not an afterlife. I am merely saying that the thought of an afterlife might make you enjoy this one a bit less. "there is always the afterlife, in case I screw up this one".

And believing in higher powers is just something I do not waste my time on. If I want a godly entity to worship, I will either do as Carlin and worship the sun, or I will worship black holes. They are far more intriguing than any deity. And the best part is: we can actually see it! we know it is there!

This has been a long post, and I hope it has been a fun read for whoever might read it.