I’m pretty sure that most knowledgeable people know that someone who claims to be an atheist is just making an overstatement about his/her own beliefs. As most knowledgeable people who claim to be atheist probably know that even the most recognizable faces of atheistic propaganda, such as Richard Dawkins, admitted publicly that they are less than 100% certain that God/gods don’t exist.
My question is: Why would anyone who calls himself an atheist make a statement like that?
Meh. I’d rather go to a good movie.
I guess that has been the case, especially prior to the arrival of the scientific age. But my point that Keiths misunderstands so eloquently is that there is absolutely no point in arguing over fact-free issues, for instance whether anything or what might exist outside the past and future light cone of the Earth (or within it, presumably, in the case of gods). I’m content with my view that it’s mostly more of the same and I’m not at all interested in convincing anyone else. In any case, my position is both irrefutably unassailable and utterly unsupportable, so not much basis for an argument.
I also have the luxury of not living in some state under Sharia law, where my blasphemous views could get me executed so I’m a little more relaxed than, say, Patrick over the dangers of Christian fundamentalism.
My hope lies in the direction of secularism. Proper separation of church and state should guarantee religious freedom as well as freedom from religion. Giving everyone the space to think for themselves is the only route to true civilisation, which, as Ghandi pointed out (or maybe didn’t), would be a good idea.
It’s a problem when it comes to young people. There’s an age when we allow them to make their own decisions on sexual activity, on alcohol, on voting. Allowing kids to develop their own ideas on religion and belief? Is there an age of consent for that?
My hope lies in the internet as the universal enzyme that digests rubbish ideas.
Unfortunately, it also seems to promote the growth of weeds.
Rather than promoting the growth of secular tolerance, we have secular tribes that behave pretty much the way religious tribes behave.
The internet gives us O’Leary, Arrington, and BA77.
A useful, but rather imperfect, tool.
Glen Davidson
Flint,
That’s just dumb, Flint. I not only understand religious faith; I used to have religious faith. I’m familiar with it from the inside.
But feel free to demonstrate that my understanding of faith is “an absurd caricature”.
Yes, I fear you’re right. By its nature, extremism seems to drown out tolerance.
/grumpy old fart fearing for future
Flint,
Exactly. That’s why I don’t believe in the supernatural, and it’s why I won’t believe in the supernatural until someone provides sufficient evidence. I’m a skeptic, after all.
I’m open to being shown that I’m wrong and that the supernatural really exists, though I’ll be surprised if that happens. Supernatural hypotheses are batting zero so far.
You, for some reason, aren’t content to let the question be decided by the evidence:
Whence the closed-mindedness? What purpose does it serve?
Flint,
How would you know?
This appears to be more projection on your part.
Flint,
No, Alan actually tries to define the supernatural out of existence. Same for the immaterial. From the thread I linked to above:
Alan:
keiths:
Alan confirmed his intention:
keiths:
Alan:
It’s a similar kind of closed-mindedness to yours. No need to look at the evidence, because Alan has already defined the supernatural and the immaterial as nonexistent.
Flint,
You think the mere act of investigating something means “automatically rejecting the religious view”? Where did you get that idea?
And you. Don’t forget yourself.
My personal unsupportable theory is that religious extremism is a direct reaction to the revolution in communications. (There’s the old aphorism, How can you keep them down on the farm when they’ve see Paris). The internet lets everyone see Paris. And all the ideas ever thought and written.
Extreme orthodoxy, including heresy laws and apostasy laws, are an attempt to prevent apostasy and reformation.
And terrorism — whether consciously or unconsciously — isolates members of a faith from the wider world by making them feared and hated. It blocks assimilation. That seems to be the payoff.
keiths,
If I were to make the claim that you are supernatural, how would you refute my claim?
walto,
Being open-minded is not the same thing as being gullible. It just means that you’re willing to consider evidence even when it goes against your own beliefs.
colewd:
You mean the claim that I am a supernatural soul?
keiths,
Leave that aside for now. Just your ability to walk, talk, reason, show empathy, and plan. Can we explain this with in the context of the natural world or do we have to go outside the natural world to explain your existence?
None of that requires the supernatural, as far as I can see. Do you have any evidence that it does?
Well, maybe, but Islam went more anti-science and otherworldly around the time of the Mongol invasions, likely because the worldly and “material” wasn’t very dependable and the eternal was supposed to be the opposite. Which also seemed to occur in Athens after Sparta won and Socrates decided that death wasn’t the end of meaningful existence (not the dull, unthinking “afterlife” depicted by Homer). To be sure, Islam might have been fated for fundamentalist viewpoints anyhow, since it’s not as problematic as Christianity (IMO) with its contradictory Bible. Although, Islam has probably been defensively reactionary in order to preserve Muslim identity through the Mongol invasions, colonialism, and to hold out against modernity.
There are many causes, and it does seem that the Arab Spring was driven at least in part by the desire for more openness and democracy, as well as by reactionary forces, although the latter pretty much got the upper hand.
But these aren’t very new.
Religiously-inspired terrorism is aimed at least as much against the “accommodationists” among them as against the “infidels.” Arguably, more so
Glen Davidson
I’d like to see an explanation come from “outside the natural world.” No, not something that satisfies you, a real explanation, like kinetics, or the biologic order being caused by evolutionary processes.
Glen Davidson
Well, one can look at a country like Iran, which was in the process of being westernized when the Shah was overthrown. I’m far from being an expert, but it appears superficially that the one thing that cannot be tolerated in Muslim dominate governments is equal rights for women.
I suspect the reformation is inevitable, but will be delayed a generation or two, and continue being bloody. It wasn’t all roses for Christians either. So to speak.
There’s a limit. For example, I’m not interested in considering evidence that the world is really made of bubble gum. Some hypotheses are too stupid to consider–even if a ton of people believe them.
walto,
Some hypotheses are more easily dismissed than others, but a good skeptic will base the dismissal on reason and evidence, not personal prejudice or an unwillingness to consider things that run counter to his or her own beliefs.
Again, open-mindedness is not gullibility. It’s fine to reject logically inconsistent hypotheses or those not supported by the evidence. I encourage it wholeheartedly! But you have to be open to considering the hypothesis, if only for a moment, in order to identify the problems in the first place.
I just realized that I totally forgot to link the Dawkins video…
Here it Dawkins admitting to be agnostic… hmmmm like this is going to change anybody who resist info they don’t like..
Don’t ask me why…
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/religion/9102740/Richard-Dawkins-I-cant-be-sure-God-does-not-exist.html
keiths,
Lets define supernatural or at least agree to a definition. I do think that the origin of a human(first article, before reproduction) is well beyond our current understanding and very likely required assistance outside nature. Where did the original process to go from a zygote to a human come from?
I find your position on this matter as silly as your position on evil demons. IMO, there are hypotheses that are not worthy of consideration–partly because there is nothing that could confirm or disconfirm them. No walking on water or turning seas to blood could do it–nor could any inability to perform those feats prove these hypotheses false. (Especially not to you, who could be dreaming right now.)
You and I obviously have entirely different views about both initial credibility, and our ‘obligations’ once a level has been set.
That’s why we won’t agree on this. That difference will irk you, of course, and no doubt we can expect you to link to your prior ‘explanations’ on this matter. Fwiw, I won’t read them again. My assessment of their worth cannot be changed by your repetitions.
J-Mac,
What’s amusing to me is your assumption that any of us here even care what Dawkins thinks. Dawkins does not speak for me.
walto,
If you don’t at least consider them, you can’t decide that they have no entailments.
colewd,
That’s pretty garbled, so let me focus on the question in the last sentence. The “original process to go from a zygote to a human” came from the ancestors of the first humans. Why do you think that supernatural intervention was required?
Yes, the same here. In fact Dawkins is one of the main reasons that I prefer not to call myself an atheist.
keiths,
The origin of the first human(s() requires a unique DNA sequence that brings a zygote to a human. The origin of this sequence in not very likely to occur in our universe. So I am defining supernatural as an event requiring resources out side our universe.
Ha! That’s quite understandable!
I like to bear in mind that Dawkins was not the first atheist (Leucippus), nor the most important (Spinoza), nor even the person who saw what atheism required in politics (Marx, Bakunin, Goldman), in epistemology (Dewey, Sellars) or in existential orientation (Nietzsche). Dawkins didn’t invent atheism and he doesn’t own it.
What resources are outside our universe, and what is the evidence for these?
Oh right, you just use made up claims and don’t care about evidence involving your presumptions.
It’s fine if you want to believe in fantasy, but don’t try to make us agree that your fantasies matter.
Glen Davidson
FWIW, I don’t think of Spinoza as an atheist.
Oh, really? Never heard or thought of that!
I think of him as a small dog.
I admit that it may not be the best description of him, but one more cuddly than his writings make him out to be.
Glen Davidson
walto:
Glen:
It’s actually quite accurate. Eva Feder Kittay’s dog Spinoza on the right, plus some obscure philosopher named Spinoza on the left:
colewd,
You don’t think that humans were somehow a target of evolution, do you?
Oh, I had one just like that.
Then I got a different philosopher.
Glen Davidson
I have no idea what that means, or what conceivable connection it has to my post. There seems to be a mistaken impression among many people, particularly the religious and the confused, that lack of belief is somehow focused on the thing THEY believe. I have talked to many religious people, and I used to be one of them, who simply cannot understand that *not believing* isn’t a thing. It doesn’t occupy any of my attention at all. It’s not something that requires constant maintenance. It’s not a model.
The believer’s life revolves around their belief. Many or most of them really and truly cannot understand that the unbeliever’s life doesn’t revolve around not believing in the particular thing that they have gotten hung up on. It’s like an addict trying to imagine what it’s like not getting a fix. It’s not like anything. It’s just normal life. I suspect it’s an out of control ego thing, imagining that it’s somehow an engaging activity to not be like them.
keiths,
I don’t think we have an explanation for the origin of human DNA. This design requirement is beyond any known resources available in our universe.
It’s that ego thing I mentioned.
Are you aware of anyone who does think that? Or does it just irk you that all the pompous, chin-stroking obfuscation of people who know who the fuck Kant is can be trashed in simple language?
Stormfield, by the way, is a man. As any reader of American literature should know. I have chosen to drop the honorific “Captain”, since I ain’t one.
Stormfield, to KN:
KN, who doesn’t have the evenest of keels to begin with, absolutely flips out when the topic is the New Atheists.
Prime example:
keiths:
KN:
KN was serious.
If it angers you that there’s stuff I know that you don’t know, then I’m sorry, but that only means you’re just one more anti-intellectual I can safely ignore from now on.
KN,
That doesn’t appear to be what Stormfield was saying. 🙂
colewd,
That’s an assertion. You forgot to include the argument.
I can’t help but notice that you ignored the actual question about your pointless name dropping. Would this be a bad time to point out the absurdity of identifying a particular individual as the “first atheist”? You do know that there was, at that time, a rest of the world, largely uninfluenced by the philosophers of the Mediterranean rim, right? And you understand that even in superstition soaked societies (think contemporary U.S.A., for example) there is always a segment of the society that reject the superstitions of those around them?
So what could the phrase “first atheist” conceivably mean? Would you like to stroke your chin whiskers and obfuscate some more? Or have you actually embraced the mind-set of the fundies and started to imagine that lack of belief is a sort of claim that needs to be described by a priestly class before it exists? You appear to have fallen into the same trap as J-Mac: Imagining that an individual who lacks belief requires a subscription to, or is responsible for, any of the many bags of hot wind that have pontificated on the subject.
” If it angers you that there’s stuff I know that you don’t know…” Objection, your honor, assumes facts not in evidence. Do please learn to read. I can try to be less subtle if you need.
The red horns and tail are a dead giveaway.
That’s actually what I did. In my neediest days, he was my guy. Did my thesis on him. But when I finally realized I couldn’t make a single argument in The Ethics work, I gave him up. Maybe that’s similar to the “losses of faith” that other people around here have said they went through at some point in their lives?
I think I must enjoy the hero-worship aspect, though, since I did land on another philosopher. That’s childish too, I guess, but everybody’s gotta have something. I mean, even John had Yoko.
That’s just another of your arguments from ignorance, btw. Even if it should be true that the resources aren’t “known”–that’s no reason to go universe shopping.