powerclown

Are you saying that atheism didn't exist over 100 years ago? Not sure about that one.

Willravel

If I were born in the US or Europe 100 years ago, odds are I would not have been exposed to atheism at all. While it has existed for a long time, it has not been prevelant until recently.

powerclown

I'm curious: why do you think one wouldn't have been exposed to atheism in, say, 1901?

Are we talking in absolutes here ("there was no atheism in the early 20th century) or are we talking in relativity? ("atheism wasn't as prevalent in the early 20th century as it was in other times before and after.")

Willravel

The second one.

powerclown

Right...atheism is thousands of years old of course. Perhaps you're referring to an atypically forceful period of theologial indoctrination that just so happened to be occurring in the 1980's and 90's.

I disagree with your characterization of theism as intellectual laziness and a copout. Theism doesn't necessarily mean Zeus riding his white horse across the sky hurling thunderbolts, or some old fart with a cane raising up the ocean. It can also mean, dare I say, a certain form of quiet introspection. It could mean a form of spiritual comfort and solace based on the realization that 'the way things are' has nothing to do with the behavior of human beings, but the way of something 'greater' or something 'universal' such as mathematics and physics. It could be something for the self-proclaimed 'most modest person ever' to allow even himself to consider.

If memory serves, isn't you're father a pastor? Could atheism, for you, be a form of rebellion from a direct and painful exposure to certain forms of religious piety and/or punishment? For example, my father was an accountant, and to this day I have an aversion to order, methodology, numbers, etc.

Willravel

Yes, my father is a pastor, so leave us say I am somewhat familiar with the interworkings of spirituality. At first it was a reality, as real as the sky or the smile on my face. It was simple and I was unquestioning. Then it moved into a more cerebral area, where I contemplated the meaning of the teachings of Jesus, and eventually I moved on to the teachings of other spiritual leaders like Muhammed and Buddha. I was in search of the whole of truth, because it felt like that was the direction I was supposed to be headed in. I kept hitting snags, though. Some theological teachings are pure and joyus, teaching peace, understanding, and hope. Others, though, teach hatred, intolerance, and the fear of an eternal punishment after death for those who resisted the faith. Even the most enlightened of my friends, a muslim, was clear on how those who did not believe are less than human and will be damned. Had this been a simple interpretation of the Qu'ran, I would have been cool, but it's written clearly. Similar passages appear in the Torah and New Testimant. They are clear: if you don't believe, you will be severly punished. The peace and unerstanding are suddenly replaced by vengence and hatred. It is in this message that I finally understood the true meaning of god: control. It's clear to me that mythos has different meanings for different people, for some it is a staple of understanding others, for some it helps them understand themselves, for some it is a tool of control, and for others still it is a tool to be used for control. Ultimately, it controls the believer. It acts as a prison from which one can see the world, but is limited. While that prison can offer some things, such as safety and a sense of belonging with the other prisoners, it is a prison none the less.

The funny thing is, I thought I was happy being a Christian. I was somewhat torn when I was learning about evolution (and I have to make an apology to my first bio teacher, I was wrong to bring a bible to class, and you were right). I was somewhat torn when I learned of viable theories of the beginning of our unvierse like the big bang. Part of me resisted even learning them. All along, though, I was happily ignorant. I was in the worst kind of prison: a prison that you cannot touch, see, or taste. I imagine there is a Matrix metephore for it, but I'll leave that for Tilted Entertainment. This prison was able to disable my reasoning abilities enough to convince me that there exists a supreme being that actually cares about me, what a wonderful idea. My escape only came from a fundamental paradigm shift in my own mind. That shift was from unhealthy dependancy to self sufficience and peace.

Ourcrazymodern?

Atheism doesn't require being exposed to it. OMG, what is that guy in the trenchcoat doing? Thinking persons have tended this direction, IMO.

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ASU2003

While it is fine if he is only making these speeches for people who are atheist already, it doesn't help when you are trying to convince people that their faith is wrong. And the alternative atheist lifestyle isn't always attractive, even if these people don't really believe.

I do agree with him that I don't like the religious indoctrination that preys on kids either. I think it should be up to teens to look at the religions and understand why they want to be a member or not be a member. And they shouldn't be forced into the religion because of shame or fear.

powerclown

For me, believing in god was never a matter of mind control or whatnot. I didn't come from an overly religious family, and religion was only ever observed in a friendly and social way, consisting of family getogethers, dinners, games, stories, watching tv, gossiping, farting, wrestling, shooting hoops, swimming, etc. We would say prayers and lightly observe the customs of the holidays of our religion (more for ceremony that anything else), but the actual messages of the bible were always far, far secondary to simply being together as a family.

It's obvious that much suffering has been carried out in the name of religion, but many times the reasons, to my mind, can just as well be pathological as religious, religion acting merely as a catalyst for aggression. In other words, people naturally have more aggressive tendencies than intellectual ones. Religion has been the match lighting the tinder, but it isn't the actual fire. Understanding this, for me, has cast religion in a different light than how it is used in certain social, religious and political contexts for example.

Another catch for me lies in the fact that we as humans think we are capable of comprehending god, as if he/she/it were to walk past us on the sidewalk. Just because visible light waves are the only electromagnetic waves we can see, doesn't mean they are the only lightwaves in existence. Same with frequency and sound waves.

I'm not saying that how you feel is wrong, but I would question the absolute objectivity of some of the things you posted in this thread. I would also take issue with Richard Dawkins characterization of faith as 'a process of non-thinking'. I've never been one to interpret the bible literally.

Willravel

What drove me away from religion was an extreme discomfort with being controled.

What keeps you teathered to psuedo-faith (you obviously aren't devout) is the fact that in your mind family and faith in god are fundamentally linked. Had that been the case for me, I would have found it difficult to pull away.

powerclown

Obviously. You words here bear that out quite clearly.
What I'm saying is that the experience of religion needn't be one of control.
In the same way that the experience of sex needn't be one of rape.
My earliest experiences with faith were symbolic, not religious.
My earliest experiences with religion were those of love and being loved by family.
While we partook of religion only ceremoniously, our faith wasn't in religion.
Family was our religion.

Willravel

The thing is set up to control, though. Many Christians upon hearing that you only go to church on holidays and really only observe things like prayer before eating would say that you're going to hell for not being a real Christian. They are being controled.

Maybe I should clarify. Going back to the Matrix analogy, the devout are in the matrix, and the agnostics or those who really only do religon when it's convenient are like Sypher. You know the whole thing isn't right, but you go along anyway.
Wouldn't that make anyone who brings a child to church a pedophile?
So I say again, religion is fundamentally linked with your family. May I ask if you believe that Jesus Christ died for your sins on the cross and was raised by god again, so that he would ascent into heaven? A yes or no answer would be fine.

powerclown

That's their problem, not mine. Them telling me I'm going to hell for living how I do means nothing to me. I don't hold it against them for feeling compelled to pass such a judgement.
Could you elaborate?

Religion is linked with my family in the same way that golf is linked with my family. We are secular, but not non-religious.
I believe that a guy named Jesus was killed by some romans, and then was buried. End of story. Answer: no.

I have a question: Do you believe that god has a body, and concerns himself with humanity?

Willravel

You're not Christian, then. Youre a secularist that follows the positive morality of the bible, something I have no problem with.
God may exist, but because I see no proof as such I am lead to believe his existence is extremely unlikely. If god does exist, then his nature is a mystery to me so I can't really answer your questions. If I had to guess, I'd say that god doesn't exist, but I can't say that with absolute certianty (just like I can't say with absolute certianty that taking a picture of someone doesn't steal their soul).

powerclown

You describe the ancient dilemna of Faith.
Sooner or later, we all take the leap, this way or that.
Plus, you have an insurance policy in case of emergency: "Born Again"

Bill O'Rights

Why does he (Dawkins), or anyone else for that matter, feel the inherant need to convince others that they are wrong for what they believe, or don't believe? It's simple, really...keep your faith out of my face, and I'll keep my lack of faith out of yours. Why is that so hard for some people? I'm secure enough, in my thinking, that I do not have this overwhelming drive to attract others to my views, as a form of self-validation. As an atheist, I see no compelling reason to "convert" the righteous, or the self-righteous, over to my way of thinking. In fact, the more God fearing, church going, Christians there are...the better tee times I can get at the golf course on Sunday morning.

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Willravel

The only way I'll be born again is if I am presentd with real evidence of the existence of god, which I don't really expect will happen.

Ourcrazymodern?

The "evidence", for those willing to perceive it as such, is all around us and within us. I'm as much an atheist as you are, will, but I'm thinking less conflicted about it? Maybe "infinite grace" has its drawbacks, as ideas go...

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Ch'i

As a debate, Atheism will always win over religion until tangible proof of God's existence is placed on the table.

Kalnaur

That's Agnosticism.

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HK-47: I'm 98% percent sure this miniature organic meatbag wants you to help find his fellow miniature organic meatbags.
PC: And the other 2 percent?
HK-47: The other 2 percent is that he is just looking for trouble and needs to be blasted, but that might be wishful thinking on my part.

KnifeMissile

Maybe he feels this need because the church won't keep its faith out of our "faces?" More and more laws and public policy is being enacted based on "faith" and that's simply ludicrous and deserves a lively debate. It would also be nice if people didn't indoctrinate their children and, instead, let them make an informed choice when they're older...

I used to think so too, Kalnaur, but that's really not a useful definition. As willravel has said, that would mean that most self proclaimed atheists are really agnostics and that there are almost no atheists in the world.

A more useful definition of agnosticism would be if they took the possibility of the existence of god seriously while not totally committing to the idea. For instance, they should think that the possibility of God's existence is more likely than the tooth fairy's existence...

Ch'i

I am a bit puzzled. Every definition of Atheism is something along the lines of "denial of God's existence." Though nearly all of the atheists on this thread are open to the possibility of there being a god. Is this a misunderstanding between those who define Atheism and those who define themselves as Atheists, or is Atheism just a more specific sect of Agnosticism?

roachboy

hey...another excuse to copy stuff from the oed.
yay!

agnostic:

atheist:

so bascially, ch'i, you're right.
the distinction is in the kind of claims made either by (or often about) agnostics or atheists.
it seems to me that many christian types (well believers in general, but i have more experience with xtians in number terms) can't tell the difference.

because there is also this meaning:

from which you can see how the term can be tossed about by christian types to basically mean "not one of us, not one of us" (in the mode of that classic film "freaks")...and this explains a little of why xtians tend to find atheists a threat: because they collapse ethics into morality, and then claim that they monopolze morality because they have this god character running around who functions as the anchor for "morality"---and on this, again, there is really nothing to say that nietzsche didnt say better.

anyway, it is because of the order of claims (of an agnostic rather than an atheist) that i think atheists are often little more than inverted christians. because they make the same kind of claims and run into the same problems.

like i said before, personally i think god is just a word.
but i wouldn't claim that i am certain, simply because it gets to a kind of goofy paradox, something on the order of:

"nothing is certain."

which is a problematic sentence.

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spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

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KnifeMissile

I honestly think you're trying to create ambiguity where there is none...

I know I've flogged this analogy to death but as long as people don't get it, I'm going to keep flogging... Atheists are "open to the possibility of there being a god" just as they are open to the possibility of there being Santa Clause. Does that mean that they don't deny Santa Clause's existence? I think it's fair to say that they do deny his existence...

Willravel

No, agnostics believe there is a god, but they can't define him or fall into religion.

roachboy

no, will.
when it comes to this god character, not knowing is not knowing.
it implies no belief overt or covert.
it is what it is.
i dont call myself an atheist because i dont think the claims you can make for that position hold up logically.
but insofar as matters to do with religion are concerned (a notion that is itself a reflection of a christian dominated world, one in which all types of belief are necessarily modelled on xtianity) i dont believe any of it. i am probably a harder critic of it that you are----but not because i am certain.

i am not certain of much of anything: are you?

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

Willravel

There are degrees of belief, you have to admit. My degree is that it's so unlikely that god exists, I won't waste my time even considering it. That's atheism as much as the vehemind denial of the existence of god is. Agnostics de believe that god exists, but they aren't sure about the true nature of god. It's all in the shades of gray. There has to be a point where you draw the line.

Ourcrazymodern?

Will, quickly google agnostic.

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roachboy

like i said, i think god is just a word.
i believe that the word exists: what it refers to is an empty space that people fill in with projections.
i dont think that there is any pre-ordained order to the world. there is order, but it doesn't originate with any god.
i think religions hamfisted institutions geared around defending the existing order: reactionary backward foul institutions.
but i wouldn't call myself an atheist for the reasons i outlined above. the arguments are internally inconsistent. they are unnecessary. besides, if you look at the etymology (i love etymologies) i bit above, you can see that the word comes from an inversion of theism. it is the reverse image of what it opposes.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

Willravel

Ourcrazy, I don't believe in god. That makes me atheist.

RB, I'm not sure what you mean. It's clear that you're agnostic, but you seem to think that I would classify you as atheist. Don't worry, I get it.

Ch'i

From what I understand, agnostics believe that nothing can be known of the nature of god, or whether he/she/it even exists. They don't believe in God, but they also do not deny the possibility.

Is this wrong?

KnifeMissile

Even Richard Dawkins doesn't deny the possibility. Does that mean he isn't really an atheist?

Did you not read my previous post?

rlbond86

dunno if it's been posted, but here's Dawkins refuting the claims of students at Liberty University: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qR_z85O0P2M

ryborg

I have to admit that Richard Dawkins just makes perfect sense to me. I couldn't say for certain if I'm an Atheist or an Agnostic, but I really do click with the message he is trying to get out there. In fact, I think it was particularly interesting to see how the discussion ended.

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Infinite_Loser

I'm not sure how one can make an absolute statement with inconclusive evidence. The stance "God doesn't exist because I can't prove it" just isn't scientifically sound. As Dawkins points out, there are many things science can't prove but it doesn't say that these things don't exist, but rather that they might exist.

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Infinite_Loser

*Stupid double post*

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KnifeMissile

It's not only scientifically sound, it's science.

All these ludicrous claims, from God to the tooth fairy, might exist but it is highly improbable. So much so that it's considered extremely safe to do so. That's science.

For instance, there's nothing that proves the non-existence of the aether under the Lorentz–FitzGerald contraction hypothesis, yet such a theory has been discarded by science. It is, both, scientific and reasonable.

We can't prove that there is a god. We can't prove that there isn't a god. By your reasoning, we should believe both theories!

No, it's much more reasonable to simply disbelieve all that can't be proven and wait for actual evidence before changing our opinion...

Yakk

Yes. And saying there is an invisible pink unicorn behind my head is also a leap of faith -- because you are saying something that cannot be proved.

It can describe things that tend to be true. It can also provide a means to determine if a statement is meaningless blather.

Science is simply the practice of figuring things out that actually works. It includes means to detect stupid questions (What if there are invisible pink unicorns pushing the rocks around? It would look just like the experiment!) as well as means to determine if a question has been sufficiently answered (statistics, reproducibility, etc).

You can say "there is no evidence of a black swan". If someone says "I had a dream, and in it there was a swan that was black -- so there must be a black swan", you say "can you show me the black swan?"

If they can't produce one, then "I have no belief in the existance of a black swan" is a belief.

If someone showed up with a black swan, or even if someone did genetic analysis on the swans and demonstrated that 1 in 10000 swans will be black, this might change one's beliefs.

Every single known society has many wrong beliefs. Belief in the supernatural can be explained simply, as application of human's social intelligence to non-social parts of the world.

That isn't that hard an explaination. It is plausible. It makes predictions about the kinds of supernatural beliefs people will have. It even makes predictions about what parts of the brain religious thought will invoke.

In other words, it is a meaningful statement.

Belief in the supernatural cannot be disproven. The invisible pink unicorns could simply play with any tests so they look like there are no invisible pink unicorns. So "something supernatural exists" is a statement that has no consequences (it implies nothing) if it is true -- ie, it is a meaningless statement. If it had consequences, you could simply test to see if the consequences happen, and you would be able to confirm the existance of the supernatural. But with the IPU's hanging around, you can't do that test!

There is no need for the God hypothesis. If God created "the universe", what created God? If God created God, why not say "the universe created the universe" and do away with the God hypothesis?

Basically, saying "X created the universe" doesn't do anything to solve the problem of "what stared stuff".

There are lots of theories how the universe came into being. Many of them make testable predictions, and they are being poked at.

As an example, there are "virtual particles" which pop into existance all over space-time. They come from nothing, and their duration of existance is purportional to their energy balance, afterwhich they go away into nothing.

One theory is that the universe is just a large collection of "virtual particles", and that the sum energy of the universe is actually close to zero.

Of course, that leads to the problem of "where did spacetime come from". But we continue to learn new things, and we continue to push back the edge.

Meanwhile, there is a constant pattern of "God does X" being pushed out of reasonableness. The "God does X" predictions made in the past have failed time and time again, and what is left at the core is a statement that is without meaning.


If someone told you "things fall up -- just let go of something, and you will see!", or "tin foil hats save me from the hampster chicken overlords.", would you feel justified in saying "you are 100% wrong, and you really aren't worth arguing with"?

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Last edited by JHVH : 10-29-4004 BC at 09:00 PM. Reason: Time for a rest.

filtherton

Will, i still respect you too.

The crux of my position is that while it may be irrational from a scientific perspective to believe in things without objectively verifiable proof, this kind of irrationality isn't necessarily that important when concerning questions whose answers are fundamentally impossible to prove.

Furthermore, while a belief system based on a commitment to rational decision making does not in and of itself require any faith, the decision to embrace that belief system does. There is no reason to believe that an unwavering commitment to only rationally explainable ideas and endeavors will make you, or society in general, better off in the long run. Unless of course, you define "better off" as being more rational.

I was just pointing out that atheists do fucked up things, too. Also, that attempts to discredit all of christianity based on the actions of only a portion of christians are lazy.

Also, you should be aware that christianity doesn't necessarily dictate a doctrine either, beyond a commitment to acknowledging the importance of christ.

Seems like a faith-based position to me. People don't need religion to be fooled, and they can do so quite spectacularly without it. You should try to see religion as more of a symptom than a cause.

Yeah, i'm saying that dawkins misses the point, that any system of morals or ethics necessarily is based, at some level, on completely subjective judgements which may as well be based on fairy tales.

Tell me why being strictly rational all of the time will make the world a better place. First, though, you ought to be able to define "better" in a way that is strictly rational. Good luck.

I would probably breathe a sigh of relief, get angry at myself for doing something stupid, decide whether maybe the "stupid" thing to do might actually be the "smart" thing to do and then be thankful that it all worked out.

I may be wrong here, but you seem to think that there is always a rational solution, and that that rational solution is always the one that should be pursued.

What do you do when you don't have a rational solution to pursue or you don't have time to come up with one? How can you be sure, in any given situation, that you have enough information to actually make a rational decision? In short, how can you have so much faith in rationality?

You're right, the rest of the world, the parts without humans, are pretty rational (electrons aside). I don't know where you live that you can so casually dismiss the human element's relevance in shaping the world around you. Where i live i have to constantly deal with the actions of people who aren't doing the things that i might expect them to.

Actually, at least in the u.s., fewer and fewer laws and public policy are being enacted based on faith. We are an increasingly secular country, despite what dawkins might have you believe.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schrodinger%27s_cat

Ourcrazymodern?

As stories go, the Christ one was excellent. Wasn't it a Roman who made him a god, hundreds of years later? Crucifiction sucked, but there were a lot of men (!) who suffered it and died. Is it fiction which carries us onwards?

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