Question for social experts or atheists (if honest)?

It is you who appears to be the idiot for not understanding the atheist stance. The religious start off with the answer to the ultimate question then work back to try to find supporting evidence. That is about as closed-minded as you can get - they think they already know the answer.

Science simply forms hypotheses from observation - no matter what those observations may show. If an observation led to the inescapable conclusion that there was a god - fine. Science would accept that. But to date not one scrap of such evidence has been observed.

So when you say "Why is it, more often than not, on the internet or in real life I hear atheists being closed minded about things" - what you appear to mean is why aren't atheists "open-minded" enough to agree with me?

Well, I am sorry but if you are mistaken in your understanding I will not agree with you.

Its true that in most atheist/believer conversations there is an unending need to explain ALL this in order to get to that. However, I make a distinction between people are complacent and only rest upon the 'facts of the time' and people who are a bit more willing to be intrigued by the unknown. Children constantly claim 'it could happen' about ridiculous things and these things surely could...but will they? Do we have evidence or even a theory about ftl? Given all the needs to prove quantum entanglement would we even know how to go about it? Some people are reasonably unconcerned with such longterm whatifs and others are consumed by them. The idea that not agreeing on a whatif makes someone closeminded is useless as me trying to explain why.

Quantum entanglement is an established part of quantum mechanics and has strong experimental evidence to back it up, no belief required.

As far as faster than light particles go, I don't believe they exist because I have no reason to, wanting them to isn't a good enough reason for belief. If some are discovered, I'd happily go along with it, I'm not emotionally against their existence.

Science isn't normally advanced by people wishing that something existed, normally its far more mundane than that. Most advances are done by people examining something else, and discover something by accident.

I don't like the phrase open minded, it normally is touted about by religious dogmatists and UFO enthusiasts when they have nothing to back up what they are saying.

I've already assumed that you are an idiot!

I have always maintained an open mind, that is part of the reason why I could never accept Christianity as a way of living. It is both illogical and evil. It causes individuals to be in constant conflict with their own human nature. It allows and even encourages ignorance. It suggests that one can be as horrible a person as he/she pleases and all they have to do is periodically admit that fact, to be "saved".

It offers a completely idiotic view of the world.

Taoist/Atheist (won't play your silly game)

It is ok to believe in possibilities outside the textbook. If you have evidence. When you have evidence that there might be more to know than is written in the textbook.

If you believe in possibilities that contradict the textbook you lose your grip on reality. You lose your ability to distinguish between imagination and reality. This is ok only when everybody knows that the topic now is (science) fiction. Otherwise you could just start to believe that you won the lottery last weekend. Or you could waste your life researching perpetuum mobiles.

You need to be aware of the difference between open-mindedness and gullibility.

An open-minded person tends not to dismiss claims unless they gave them a thought, or even a thorough analysis. That way they leave the door open to be convinced.

A gullible person is likely to accept something because it comes from authority or otherwise "trustworthy" persons, maybe even from the random person if they seem legit..

Means they rely pretty much on their gut feeling alone, without performing reality checks and giving things a proper logical scrutiny.

If you tend to believe things without giving them a proper thought, you are more likely than not to believe loads of crap, inevitably.

"I'm not generalising about atheists"

" I hear atheists being closed minded"

" it will be more often than an atheist"

"I will automatically assume that they're idiots".

Do you really think that anyone cares what you assume and that your fatuous opinions have any value.

I agree with Morbo (above).

He spelled 'favour' wrong though.

so your using bogus examples to prove something now that is just wrong so you have no case