Atheism
I'm an uneducated person, so kindly don't judge my posts too harshly.
I'm neither religious, nor atheist.
My understanding of the term atheist is the point of view that nothing supernatural exists, most particularly a deity, and this is expressed as an absolute.
My understanding of a religious point of view is that the supernatural does exist, most especially a deity, and this is expressed as an absolute.
My perspective is that both points of view are asinine, as neither can be proved. The fact that you have not found evidence of the supernatural isn't conclusive proof that it does not exist.
If feelings are a valid tool to perceive factual reality, and you FEEL that the supernatural exists, then it would be equally true that it does NOT exist, because someone else FEELS that it does not.
I'm neither religious, nor atheist.
My understanding of the term atheist is the point of view that nothing supernatural exists, most particularly a deity, and this is expressed as an absolute.
My understanding of a religious point of view is that the supernatural does exist, most especially a deity, and this is expressed as an absolute.
My perspective is that both points of view are asinine, as neither can be proved. The fact that you have not found evidence of the supernatural isn't conclusive proof that it does not exist.
If feelings are a valid tool to perceive factual reality, and you FEEL that the supernatural exists, then it would be equally true that it does NOT exist, because someone else FEELS that it does not.
Comments (219)
The ‘supernatural’ cannot be proven as it falls outside of natural sciences.
Atheist is a term coined by religious folk. Atheist movements have happened to better education and healthcare.
This misunderstanding – caricature – is "assinine". :roll:
Strawman.
"Feelings" are not sufficient. (Moot.)
Quoting Elric
The definition of "atheism" varies depending on what one is trying to convey. Some use a labeling system wherein "atheism" is the affirmative denial of gods, "theism" is the affirmation of at least one god, and "agnosticism" is no affirmation whatsoever. Others use a two-dimensional labeling system wherein one is plotted on a graph, so to speak, in relation to an axis representing "agnosticism/gnosticism" and the other axis representing "atheism/theism": this typically separates more clearly the claims of "knowledge" from those of "belief". In the former labeling system, you would be more or less correct: an atheism would be affirming there are no gods and not merely lacking a belief. However, if the latter labeling system is being utilized then you would be incorrect: an "agnostic atheist" does not affirm there are no gods, they simply lack a belief in any gods.
Some will claim that every person is an atheist in their own regards, to some particular subset of gods, to more clearly explicate the difference between "lacking a belief" and "believing".
To be quite frank, this is a hot topic, eternal semantical feud, amongst many out there in the community. For me, I worry more about the underlying meaning the person I am conversing with is trying to convey. For me, I would fit more with the "agnostic atheist" label than "atheist" (in regard to its one-dimensional usage). But if one were to insist that, semantically, "atheism" is the expression of the affirmation of no gods, then I simply am "agnostic".
I would also like to emphasize that, even if one is expressing the affirmation of no gods, they are not necessarily positing it as an absolute. Not all epistemologies allow for "absolutes" and, therefore, they may be claiming to "know" there are no gods while retaining that it is not an absolute judgment.
Moreover, "atheism" does not entail the denial of the "supernatural" nor "metaphysical", it is simply either the affirmative denial of gods or the lack of belief in all gods or the lack of belief in a particular subset of gods (again, depends on whom you are speaking to).
I think that the views you are attacking are "gnostic" absolute claims either way: which are not the only two options. I think that we tend to default to something "does not exist" until we have proof that it does. So, although, yes, simply lacking any evidence whatsoever does not necessitate that supernaturalism is false, it would entail that we shouldn't belief it is true.
I think I would need further elaboration on what you mean here. What are "feelings"? Sensations? It seems as though you are trying to convey that "feeling" either way is not proof (either way), which I would agree with. I think the problem is that one cannot be in a middle space between holding a "belief" and "not believing". Sure, we could distinguish "disbelief" as the negative affirmation and "not believing" as merely the lack thereof, but nevertheless there is no truly neutral space here: either you belief something, or you don't.
We could make this argument for any imagined thing, including elves, leprechauns, and dragons.
It is incumbent upon the claimant to both define and show evidence for (based upon the definition) the state-of-affairs that is being asserted. If you want to assert that "supernatural" or "gods" exists, then it is incumbent upon you to define "supernatural" or "god" and then provide some evidence that it exists. Until you do that, then what am I suppose to do with your claim? How would it be useful to me to believe it?
Because I haven't found any use in believing that the supernatural or gods exist, then I don't.
These are no gods though. Dragons could in principle be found in the Earthly domain. God(s) exist outside of this domain, so their existence can't be proved. Dawkins's claim that he's 99.9% sure that god(s) don't exist is a ridiculous, if not ludicrous claim. You can't assign a probability to the existence of god(s) if they exist.
Anything might be possible. We don’t seem to know and work with the tiny window we have and that window is ‘existence’.
A percentage does not mean probability. He was just making clear that he is not all knowing just like they say bleach kills 99.9% of bacteria dead - because they cannot possibly test it on ALL bacteria but in reality it almost certainly does kill literally 100% of bacteria.
The point is that many people think there is an extramundane realm. And that realm can give meaning to our existence, which without that outerwordly region, called heaven, and God in it, would be meaningless and empty. We would be what science describes only. Like Dawkins puts it: "vessels of selfish genes or memes, programmed to pass them on", or, like I read once, products of chance events, evolving into ensembles or configurations of dead particles. A rather depressing view. I think Dawkins and other new atheists, can't really understand the meaning God can give to life.
What could be the use, apart from moral or closing gaps? Do you understand why people believe?
Quoting Elric
What are the two points of view? I only see one here ...
Quoting Elric
You cannot feel something that does not exist neither you can feel that something does not exist. For example, you cannot feel a wind that isn't blowing.
As for poofs, you are right, you cannot prove either that God exists or that God doesn't exist, esp. the second. How can I prove that God does not exist if it does not exist (for me)? That would be totally absurd.
You can only experience God, but this is personal. Even if there are millions of people with such an experience, that could be called a common experience, but it would be different for each person, i.e. personal.
Outside what domain, and "outside" in what way? It certainly can't be outside causality because events outside this domain affect what is in this domain and vice versa, so we should be able to prove their existence just like we can prove the identity of a criminal given the effects they leave at the crime scene (fingerprints, DNA, etc). It doesn't make any sense to say that it is outside this domain while at the same time asserting that there is a causal relationship between the outside and inside yet the outside can't be proven.
Quoting Haglund
Sure. I was once a believer. When I question my former fellow believers most ask, "well what happens after we die?", so it seems like believing is more of a delusion to aleviate the suffering of knowing you will die and that your friends and family no longer exist for you to meet after death.
Being outside the secular domain by definition means a domain with no causal contact, unless they can influence the chances of quantum mechanics. That's the only acausal way to interfere.
People make believe – tell themselves consoling stories (myths) – when they do not know; it is cognitively easier to pretend to know (à la placebo-effect) than to accept the unknown (or unknowable). In other words, "belief" seems a developmental and atavistic vestige of childhood magical thinking in adults. People also believe because they are socialized to believe that "belief" is more "socially acceptable" and more "moral" than to not believe. Raised and educated Roman Catholic, this is how I understand (in a nutshell) "why people believe" after four-plus decades as an unbeliever, freethinker and reader of comparative religion.
You think an afterlife is the reason for believing? Then you don't understand the reason at all.
You don't understand the reason for believing. The why is not what you mention.
It is claimed that god created the universe and that our actions influence his final judgement. Those are causal relationships. As such, there should be evidence that was left for use to be able to show that god exists and created the universe. Where is that evidence?
Quoting Haglund
You asked if I understand why people believe. I told you that I once was a believer and that I have spoken to other believers and what they have said. Are you then saying that none of us are, or were, actually believers - as in only you have true sight into what god wants us to believe?
I'm still waiting on you to define "god".
Why should they judge in the first place? They might frown when they us toiling along maybe...
Quoting Harry Hindu
No. I just said you were believing for the wrong reasons. Afterlife, morals, or gods of gaps.
Atheism is often described as the position that there is insufficient evidence for justifying belief in gods.
I am also 99.9% convinced that no gods exist but if I said I was 100% convinced then I would be as dogmatic as the pope. The 0.1% difference of conviction between Dawkins and the pope makes Dawkins the better thinker in my opinion.
Although in truth, I have no idea how many individual popes did or do 100% believe in the christian/catholic god.
Forgot that one! Gods are the entities that, for whatever reason, created the universe in which life develops.
You call the universe insufficient proof?
Yes.
What better proof is there? They won't show themselves. Yet...
What causal relation?
Sorry, I didn't mean to say you were wrong, but the reasons you gave are just not my reasons. I just don't think science alone offers meaning or reason for life.
Your understanding. Good observation. But people like you don't (can't) really understand because your thinking obeys the imperative.
That is a pretty good explanation. People think being good means being religious.
That is probably because they don't exist. The only eternal here is your eternal 'yet.'
The eternal yet... Sounds great. Like a never ending now.
Quoting universeness
Which is the question.
I feel sometimes that humans are Peter Pans (re neoteny as seen in salamanders). We never achieve maturity. I suppose we did get our wish, even Tithonus, for eternal youth. I wonder what an adult h. sapiens actually looks like: we should be hairier I suppose, but beyond that, your guess is as good as mine.
I recall reading an article about a paleontologist who said something to the effect that other paleontologists had made the quite silly mistake of misidentifying the fossils of juvenile dinosaurs as a different species altogther. So, in a way, velociraptors could actually be young T. Rexes. :chin:
Quoting Haglund
Gods would be the cause of a universe in which life develops.
Quoting Haglund
Quoting Haglund
You didn't make a distinction between your reasons and the reasons. Now that you have you are basically admitting that the reasons are subjective, therefore no one can ever be wrong about the reason for which they believe.
Quoting Haglund
The observation of the universe is simply evidence that the universe exists, not what caused it to exist. What caused it to exist and where would we find the evidence of its cause? What would the evidence look like?
Yes. But not in the scientific cause and effect sense. It's a teleological cause. A "theleo"logical cause.
Quoting Harry Hindu
My reasons are the reasons.
Quoting Harry Hindu
The existence of the universe is the evidence.
How is it different?
Quoting Haglund
Then you are claiming to know the mind of god? You seem to be afflicted by delusions of grandeur.
Quoting Haglund
Is the universe a teleological effect or a scientific effect of this teleological cause?
Gods can create a universe out of nothing. They are like magicians pulling things out of a hat. For real, that is. There is no material cause preceding it (the universe). They could have done this an infinite time in the past.
Quoting Harry Hindu
Yes. Though I wouldn't call it grandeur. More a sense of reality.
Quoting Harry Hindu
An effect of their thoughts, efforts, and creation power.
But there wasn't ever nothing. There was a god, if you claim that one of these properties of god is being eternal, but if not then how did god come from nothing? How does something come from nothing? You see, this is what happens every time I engage with the religious. Nothing but mental gymnastics that end up collapsing in on themselves without having said anything constructive, reasonable or understandable.
Quoting Haglund
Quoting Haglund
What I'm looking for is how exactly does a teleological cause (god) form a relationship with a scientific effect (universe)? What would that relationship look like? How does something form a relationship with something else that does not share something in common? And please don't use "god" as the answer as that would just prove my assumptions about your intellectual capacity and honesty.
Quoting Haglund
I'm sorry to be the one to inform you of this, but your "reality" is a bubble of your own making.
There never was nothing. The gods are eternal. But they created the universe outa nothing. It wasn't there and the next moment it was there. The spoke the word, the logos, so to speak. "Let the be particles and spacetime!", and there it was. So its all there for a reason and not because of some scientific theory, though that does a good job in describing.
I can tell you exactly what happened before the big bang and before that one, and after the current one, and offer mechanisms, but the very existence of these mechanisms can't be explained by a mechanism. Call it the Gödel theorem for physical laws. Only gods can complete it.
For what?
Except for closure of everything and give meaning and reason to anything, which science alone can't provide.
Science has shown me only descriptions of reality. Not meaning or reason. Unless you wanna give meaning to describing reality. For me that's not giving meaning to life. Though I admit science is a nice form of art! You can even make money with it!
What is the meaning of life? In your own words or less.
The meaning, the reason, for all life, in my humble opinion, is that the universe, or at least the particles making it up, were created by gods, so, for whatever reasons they had for it, so we and all creatures developed as a copy of heaven, so they can watch us. In which case every scientific explanation, reason, or meaning, ceases to be valid. Are the gods atheists? Maybe they didn't believe in themselves anymore. So they used their creation power. So let's not disappoint them and give them some spectacle!
And now that we settled that, I'll ask you, what end does that meaning serve you with?
What is the medium in which this god existed and that divides the god from what it creates. If god and universe are not the same things (as it is in some other religions), then what is the medium that divides them. That must also exist, no?
good luck in getting a straight answer. :smile:
Sounds like scientists performing an experiment.
I don't want this to go to the wayside. Please respond, Haglund. I wish for an answer, because I wish to prove to you that the concept "meaning of life" is basically a futile, meaningless concept, but you can only internalize that truth by answering my questions truthfully and honestly.
So please do answer my questions, otherwise face the fact that your opinion is undefended, and therefore false.
I asked a straight question, to which you answered (as far as I can see) that the meaning for your life is that the gods can watch us.
For me that is not a meaning, but a view. What meaning do you see there?
And if you don't see any meaning in "so that the gods can watch us" either, I'll ask you, to please tell us at least, what end does that non-meaning serve you with? The gods watch us. So what? What is your opinion on the gods watching us?
The only meaning it serves for me is that science can't provide the reason. It gives meaning to my being. A reason for me being there. Which science can't provide. That's all. So every time science says I'm a product of evolution or particles bouncing around I can say, that's a description only. No reason.
In short, all creatures are copying the gods.
Well, they know what they watch. Themselves in better times.
The medium is heaven. Outside of the universe. Maybe somewhere in a higher dimensional space. I dunno. Maybe they are not casually connected. Maybe they can interfere somehow. Quantum mechanics offers possibilities. But I think there was no need to interfere. What for? To teach morals? Don't think so.
You asked me the meaning of life. The meaning of our lives, of all life, I might add in joyful honesty, stems indeed from a rather selfish reason the gods had. They made all life to watch it. Not to judge it. So we better give them a good time. Or do exactly the opposite. Just bother them...
The reason for being here, as you put it, is for someone else's entertainment. Being here for the pleasure of their watching. Well... a reason for existence is to entertain some higher beings. How and why should that provide you with comfort? It is more of a Cause than a Reason. You are here because someone created you for his or her own amusement. I can see that as a causational process, but not as a status of reason.
Quoting Haglund
Well, I could see your point that science can't provide a reason for you being here. It can provide a complete chain of causation from the big bang, but it can't tell you why you are here.
Why you are here is answered by "because some higher beings enjoy watching you." Is that something to be proud of, or something that settles your mind? It has been shown that a being created just to be watched is more of a causational process than a state of reasonable existence. So... then... causational process here, causational process there... be it science or faith in the supernatural.
If you can accept a causational process for your existence in the supernatural, I think it ought not take too much effort to accept your existence in the natural as the reason to be. Because being the show-puppet for some higher being is not the reason to be for the puppet, but a caused existence.
It's the reason for existence. They had good reason to let universal life continue their mad plays in heaven.
This knowledge gives me more comfort than the story atheists like Dawkins and Harris throw around, hitting themselves on the chest. All scientific knowledge, and as a physicist I can play the game along, is just a description from a distance. Knowing the gods made the universe evolving gets you actually involved in life without anyone being scientifically able to explain me.
We use reasons as the causes of our behaviors. Reasons, intentions and motives are just particular types of causes. "God created the universe" is also a description from a distance - just a different type of description - one that has no evidence. It's really no different, and has no more evidence for, the description that extra-dimensional aliens genetically engineered humans and are watching them.
"Knowing" gods created the universe does nothing to comfort someone when you don't know the motives behind them creating the universe.
Aliens are just a part of the universe. They are created by gods too. And life can't be created by creatures of the gods. Who says the reasons of the gods are unknown? That's what you presume, assume, hypothesize. Science just can't explain the reason or meaning of life. I, on the other hand, can, and dance happy through life, without science able to explain me.
How can you speak for @Haglund? If you tell me that you are not comforted by knowing there was a motive for creating the universe when you cannot know what the motive was, I can only believe you. By the same token, I'm not sure how you can tell someone else they are not comforted when they've told you they are.
I guess your argument is that it does not logically follow that he be comforted, which only means he fails logically to explain why his belief is comforting, but it doesn't mean that he's not. The best you can argue is that he's found comfort where he should not have and his response would be that comfort is comfort regardless of whether logically it should be.
It's you having the delusion of grandeur. You can't stand it not being able to explain me. The thought of being able to explain me is exactly your illusion of grandeur! The gods laugh about you! :lol:
I'm not interested in Haglund's feelings. I'm interested in the truth.
:up:
Asking questions are not the symptoms of delusions of grandeur. Asserting that you know more than others while at the same time giving no evidence is a symptom of delusions of grandeur. I can point to observations and reason as evidence for our existence. You cannot. When you can I am willing to change my mind. I have in the past, as I said I was a believer, but now I am not - based on observable evidence and logic. I am the one here that has made a complete 180 on my beliefs based on the evidence. I am the one with an open-mind and having an open mind means that you are willing to accept that you are wrong and willing to listen to others, but also having the right to ask questions when what is being said isn't clear or reasonable.
I consider the existence of the universe as proof of the gods. I can give you a description of the singularity the universes inflating from it into existence periodically, etc. but that doesn't explain the universe. For me it's the opposite. I believed in god when a kid, university took that away (I even had to sign I was a Christian...), and now I can only conclude there are gods. So from theist to atheist (always arguing with Jehova witnessnes who always know to find me) back to theist.
The evidence for our existence is not hard to give. But that's no reason for existence. The big bang is not the reason for existence.
Just look at CERN.
It's obvious that our personal comfort in believing something has no bearing on the truth of it. To the extent one can choose to believe or not when there's a lack of evidence of something, that would be a nod towards pragmatism. That is, if I choose to believe in a fantastical claim that in no way interferes with my daily existence, but it does offer me comfort, then that would be a basis to believe in it, while admittedly not making the belief true. I choose to believe for the positive effects, not because of a delusion that I have arrived at empirical evidence or that my position is logically entailed.
Quoting Harry Hindu
There might be some degree of cognitive dissonance in maintaining a belief in God that you should know is not valid, but I wouldn't describe that as having special access to the divine that would amount to a delusion of grandeur. The typical theist claims that knowledge of the divine is available to anyone who seeks it, so I don't agree with your psychological assessment.
My point here is simply that decisions of how one wishes to live one's life, including what foundational truths one wishes to adopt, need not be based upon upon empirical evidence or logical dictates, but it could just be a matter of personal preference. If, at the end of one's life, one has lived a life they found complete and meaningful, what difference does it make that the person might have lived a life filled with unprovable and even false beliefs?
I find the objection that one must accept atheism as true because it is true, even if it means a life a despair, to be ironically antithetical to the ideology of secular humanism. That is, if all there is to this great big universe in terms of meaning is what we humans give it, then why deprive it of sacred meaning if that will elevate the lives of humanity?
I'm submitting that we should hold to beliefs that make life meaningful as opposed to insisting we live with the cold reality of meaningless if meaningless is what there really is behind the curtain.
And before you say that atheism is what gives your life meaning, however that might be, please recall my prior comment, which is that simply because you've found the fountain of meaning in your atheism, that doesn't mean you need to proselytize it to others because it is likely some are not constructed as you are and they do find meaning in what you think to be delusions.
I couldn't have said it better. :smile:
Does "religion" make the believer's life "meaningful"? No more, it seems to me, than alcohol makes the alcoholic's life "meaningful". Like other forms of intoxication, religious faith exchanges sobriety for "comfort" (often to the point of delusion (e.g. Haglund)).
Quoting Haglund
:roll: First, prove the universe exists ...
Divine reality (i.e., the ineluctable limits of the gods, their facticity) is independent of scientific faith.
Truth (the gods plus their creation) is independent of anti-religious feelings.
A "meaningful life" (i.e. optimal agency), besides the minimum, i.e., striving daily to overcome habits of maladaptive scientific judgment, means acknowledging faith-dependent expectations of reality (biases, superstitions, delusions) and maladaptive conduct (e.g. feelings-dependent motives) as the only viable grounds of for reason and meaning. It acknowledges scientific reality as contingent and fun, being part of the larger meaning of life in a universe resembling heaven, where life is still the miracle it ought to be.
I trust you in your statement that you would not find any value to holding to religious faith and that it would not enhance your life in any way. I find your assessment that I would have as meaningful of a life without faith as pretty non-sensical, as if you know better than me what I'm actually experiencing. That is, I'm not in a position to assess your subjective state and you're not in a position to assess mine. We're just left having to trust one another when we tell each other what affords our respective lives meaning.
As I've also said:
Quoting Hanover
In order to make your analogy apt, that religion is akin to alcohol and other toxins, you will need to demonstrate that like the alcoholic whose life often ends in broken relationships, destroyed families, financial ruin, desperation, legal troubles, and general instability, so goes the person of faith.
Does that describe the typical life of the devout Jew, Muslim, or Christian?
And it's an odd twist here, with the atheist knocking at my door and handing me his literature so that I can see his Way. If you find atheism the way to a meaningful or productive life (or whatever your objective might be), then do that. Even if I had positive proof that God existed, if you have found happiness in your belief he didn't exist, why would I impose?
If I were trying "to assess your subjective state ... actually experiencing", I would agree with you, sir, but I have not claimed or implied any such thing. Your non sequitur is what's "non-sensical". Faith-based rationalizations (and delusions) abound.
Quoting 180 Proof
You have offered an opinion as to what "seems to you," which is how you think things must seem to me, namely that I derive the same sort of benefit an alcoholic receives from his drink. I'm telling you that I don't. It's different. My faith doesn't cause me to wreck my car, divorce my wife, lose my job, and destroy my liver. In fact, it causes me no internal strife. So how do you assess what my faith does to me from your vantage point at your keyboard?
Your final sentence ("Faith-based rationalizations (and delusions) abound") attempts to wedge in what you want desperately to argue, which is that my beliefs are factually wrong. I've, at best, argued from pragmatism. I'm not asserting what reality is, but just how best to live my life. "My" is in bold because I trust you when you say that what I say works for me doesn't work for you.
This is about Hanover being Hanover, accepting whatever abuse you wish to throw my way in terms of my believing in complete and utter bullshit. I do accept those criticisms smugly, to be sure, because I have lived it both ways, and I know personally what offers my life meaning and direction and what does not.
And the point of all of this is to offer elbow room in this crowded world of ideas for religion, which does have a role, and for which I think is the primary motivation behind your objections, although correct me if I'm wrong.
technically Atheism is a view that God does not exists rather than nothing supernatural exists.
There are many supernatural phenomena that have nothing to do with God or religious point of view.
Knowing that it's also worth knowing there are 2 kinds of Atheism existing today:
1. Atheism which claims God doesn't exist and it doesn't care about God, something not worth discussing any further by such people (true atheism)
2. Atheism which claims God doesn't exist but with firm belief it's so and desire to spread the word about God nonexistence. (this is a form of religion, strong belief there is no God and desire to get followers)
Then also God and deity are 2 very different things, I think you may want to know this.
I don't think either of mentioned points of views are asinine because lack of knowledge is what makes these points of view foolish, I would say that these points of view are contradictory rather than asinine.
What's your obsession with proof? Why should I proof what's obvious? You are like a teacher opening a model skull and taking a model brain out to proof the 7- or 8-year old they have a mind...
Elric who wrote the OP was banned a week ago.
Some tweaks to your ideas.
Firstly there is no 'true atheism' - this is as erroneous as claiming there is one true Christianity, or one true American.
Many atheists these days simply argue that they don't accept the claim that god/s exist. The evidence is unconvincing. They do not say there is no god. In the same way we might say we don't accept the claim Bigfoot exists, but we don't need to say it does not exist. Ditto the Loch Ness Monster.
Atheism is simply any view that holds that god claims are worthless. But an atheist could be a secular humanist or believe in ghosts and astrology. It's only about a god claim, nothing more.
Some atheists think that religions cause harm - Hinduism, Islam, Christianity - faiths all try to change the world via laws and social policy. Many atheists think this is harmful. This is why they sometimes work to educate the community about god claims. Is it about gaining followers? The word follower is wrong because atheism doesn't follow any teaching. It is an 'unteaching'.
This is a good point, and there seems (to me) to be tension around whether the definition of athiesm is a denial of the existence of gods or an assertion that God/gods do not exist.
However I do want to point out that and (perhap the antitheist claim)
seem contradictory to me. Maybe you can assert that atheism is the view that god claims are meaningless (in a similar way to how moral non-cognitivists assert that ethical claims have no truth value). But if you assert that religions cause harm, then religious claims (and thus claims about God or gods) has the capacity to hold (in this case) negative worth.
And while atheism may not follow any teaching, there are followers of prominent atheist figures such as Dawkins, Dennett, JL Mackie, Russell, etc. In a sense, the evangelical nature of the new athiests (which to me are more antitheists than atheists) are a very interesting parallel to evangelical religions. Both host talks, publish books, give awards etc.
I think people often point this out. But for me their work is better understood as activism. Which could be about race or poverty, or in their case theisms.
I generally see the work of Dawkins and co as fundamentalist busting - be they Christian or Islamic fundie views.
Quoting Paulm12
The ideas are not contradictory but are interrelated. God claims are meaningless is one idea. Religions founded on meaningless claims (which cannot be substantiated) hold views and influence social policy in a manner which many consider to be harmful - views on women, gays, abortion, education, etc. Note the strong Evangelical support of Trump... So we have the situation wherein lives are being influenced (often in negative ways) by ideas which are supported by appeals to god (and are often antithetical to other Christian believers).
The more you make the topic under discussion all about you, Hanover, the more you merely rationalize your "faith" (i.e. cosmic lollipop) rather than reason against my stated position in what I propose a meaningful life (which is the Socratic "examined life" translated into a more Peircean-Deweyan milieu) consists. :death: :flower:
In this case, would you also hold that religious fundamentalists who believe that those they are preaching to could spend eternity in hell are also activists in a similar sense? Perhaps "after-life activists"? Furthermore, what about any activism based on such beliefs (i.e. pro-life stances)?
Yeah that's the way I see it too. Unfortunately, I think they take it too far and become alienating. This has been especially apparent in recent years as we see their work as a knee-jerk response to 9/11. Especially because Dawkins is like Trump on twitter “All the world’s Muslims have fewer Nobel Prizes than Trinity College, Cambridge.” To the point that I don't even know if they're intentionally trying to imitate fundamentalist claims or have merged with the far right themselves. And I apologize that this article reads (and basically is) a tabloid.
I think I understand the point that you're trying to make. With that being said, the theist can counter by saying their religious claims are substantiated from their religious experience(s). But I don't think the particular issue is the fact that the claims are unsubstantiated. The issue is that the behaviors themselves are harmful (and like you point out, both plenty of other religious people and nonreligious people speak out about this).
I say this because I tend to fall onto the side of having difficulty substantiating any (objective) moral claims. Yes I do believe they exist, but I don't think I'd really be able to provide evidence as to why they exist or why someone should adopt them.
Sure, if you count religious activity as activism. But they would say the were doing apologetics, activism generally being secular.
Quoting Paulm12
I hear you - lots of direction one could go with these points. I would hold that there are no good reasons to accept the premise god/s exist. And even fewer to establish that you know what god/s want - their will and views on morality.
So any claims made to be following god's will are based on three layers of dubiousness - that we accept the existence of god; that we accept the existence of a particular god; and that we know the views of that particular god. I think this is unreasonable.
I don't think we can demonstrate that moral claims are objective. They are intersubjective agreements held by communities (with outliers and dissenters) based on empathy and cooperation and they serve to support the preferred social order. That does not make them pointless. Traffic lights do not convey truth, but they provide a valuable tool to make roads predictable and much safer.
Quoting Paulm12
Not a great counter argument, however, since this is hardly a reliable tool for justification or reliability and it could readily be argued the conflicting 'experiences' of other believers cancel each other out. One person's Jesus tell us her 'fags' are to be condemned. Another person's Jesus holds up a rainbow flag...
My only objection is that it's a two-way street. Much like we, atheists, can't tell @Haglund to not feel comfort based on religious considerations, @Haglund also makes a mistake by categorically stating that atheists can't feel comfort, because they lack religious considerations.
I say @Haglund has a feeling of comfort from believing he has found a meaning for his life via religion, but I contest that it is via religion that he found a meaning for life; in fact, he found no meaning for life; this still does not take away from the facts that 1. He feels comforted and 2. He feels comforted because he mistakenly believes he's found a meaning for his life via religion.
But where do you arrive at the idea that the examined life (as translated by modern sensibilities) is a virtuous raison d'etre other than your subjective assessment? If my life suffers in all objective measure as the result of my rejection of faith, is such just my unfortunate fate even though there was a way to have avoided it? Why must I worship at your alter? Because it is the path to Truth? But we're right back in our circle - I must accept that the rational pursuit of truth is a valid reason to exist in order to be persuaded by rationality alone.
How aren't you similar to the evangelical at my door telling me to follow his path to truth so that I can experience true joy? Is it impossible to believe my beliefs do accomplish exactly as I say they do?
The point here is that the way of Athens is not the only way to a meaningful life. The way of Jerusalem works just as well. Either path is a choice
But that is my point as well.
I think you and I are in agreement with each other then, not in contention. I just did not read your post all the way to the end, I suppose. BTW, the post that made me think was not the last one, and not the second last one in this thread, either.
Quoting 180 Proof
This is the newest. I got this same from @Banno (Quoting Banno) and a number of us got this same from @StreetlightX(Quoting StreetlightX)
So the newest is: "This is about you, ain't it."
Shit.
Such is our point of contention. You deny the significance of the subjective commitment to faith and I hold it primary. The basis for my position is that it imbues my life with meaning. I can see no reason to substitute your objective (i.e. to live the examined life) for mine.
You need to explain why I should seek empirical and rational truth for its own sake. Why is that the universal good? I recognize the hedonistic value of intellectual pursuits, but if that's all there is, I quickly reach an existential problem centering around why am I wasting my time learning the intricacies of our randomly created world?
Philosophical hold nearly as profound a meaningfulness as spiritual pursuits. Dispelling a fatal confusion is a profoundly meaningful achievement - and borders on salvation. It is indeed at times far more spiritually transfiguring than - typically lukewarm* - dreams of salvation.
*Spiritual fire, of course, is something different. In terms of life-meaning, philosophy can't hold a candle to it.
Quoting ZzzoneiroCosm
If that's your belief, then the altar of philosophy is where you should kneel. Like I said, I'm not an evangelical. You do you.
My point is simply that if the quest is for meaning, then the quest for knowledge will only get you closer to meaning to the extent you equate meaning with knowledge. That's a personal preference. If knowing the ins and outs of our world leads you to have a subjectively meaningful life, then do that.
I do believe I view intellectual masturbation more pleasurable than most. That's why I'm here in this forum. Doing this right here is not the meaning of life though. Not mine at least. But if yours, wow, but ok.
Of course not. Life-meaning comes from all kinds of places and all kinds of life-meaning can be integrated and synergized.
But without philosophy I would be so confused it would be difficult, in this age, to pursue a spiritual objective in any clear-sighted sort of way. We're born so confused.
The faith of John the Revelator - the fire of his Revelation - that incomparable poetic energy of the prophet - is hardly available to the typical twenty-first-century Seeker. Some folks need philosophy to clear a path to it. First clear away your native or inherited confusion* - then seek His Holy Fire.
*Far from masturbation.
It makes me feel my life has meaning. Scientific meaning, which is the alternative you suggest, gives me an uneasy feeling. I am no product of randomly started particles or genes and memes directing life for the sake of replication. You can describe life like that, I mean, there are genes, memes, particles and time appearing by inflation from virtuality at a central 4D wormhole singularity if two previous 3D universes have inflated away from each other, etc. It's nice to know. But that's not the reason it's all happening. It must have been made by gods. They made a copy of heaven and the only moral we should conform to is not to fuck up what they created. But science is doing exactly that. So no moral how we should be, what we should be, or about stealing and murdering..The gods in heaven steal and murder too. Are good and bad, fair and unfair. And the human gods in heaven aren't given a chance to fuck up heaven and kill parts of heaven in the name of some heavenly science, as the matter they made the universe with was not present yet, letmetellya! They were involved too in the creation of the universe. But no other gods payed attention to them in the preamble to creation... They should have.
Where did I say that? If you feel good without them, that's fine by me. I only explained why it feels good for me. Damned, these Jehova witnesses were right all the time! Though their god is very different from my gods!
Quoting Hanover
No, I do not.
Since time "wastes" all things and us too, gaining some understanding for its own sake seems like a more enriching way of "wasting" this interval between the two oblivions rather than making believe 'shit made up just to flatter and console ourselves' in anxious denial of the existential mediocrity principle (i.e. boredom). "One must imagine Sisyphus happy" (Camus) if one's happiness is defiant (lucid, active) not merely sheepish (nostalgic, passive). Amor intrllectualis dei. The end of a song is not it's goal. The journey is the destination. Ja-sagen: "be here now!". Amor fati :fire:
:death: :flower:
:fire: :hearts: :fire:
Yet you do explain:
Quoting 180 Proof
And I accept your reason for you. There's no basis here except that "it seems" an enriching way to live your life. This really isn't about you, so I'm not sure why you're telling me what you like to do. Why devolve into the subjectivity you previously criticized?
The similarity is in your dependence. You say yourself that it gives your life meaning. If that’s the case then you’re dependent on it. Without if you would feeling the sting of nihilism (analogous to delirium tremens).
Quoting Hanover
Not all drinkers drink the Kool-Aid to excess, but for the ones who do there are countless horror stories (think Jim Jones).
Quoting Hanover
This is a false equivalency, as though you’re saying that it’s impossible to feel pleasure (or whatever benefit alcohol offers) without drinking.
The critical distinction between your analogizing faith to alcoholism is that alcohol is being used in the analogy as an intoxicant, making it definitionally a toxin and an evil. As I previously mentioned and what wasn't addressed was that you would need to show the devastating implications of faith as you see in alcoholism.
That is, my question was whether ruined lives are characteristics of Jews, Christians, and Muslims as we see in the alcoholic.
If, as you're implying here, you're using alcohol as a benign example of a way to bring about bliss without the negative implications, as if it might offer a euphoria that includes leaving the user with a state of long term meaning and contentment, then it would be analogous, but that's not what alcohol is. If it were, and it did not have its negative effects, I suppose I would be advocating its usage. I just don't think the meaning of life has ever been found at the bottom of a bottle, although many have looked there.
The Westboro Baptist Church?*
Faith is as perilous a path as reason. It can devolve to a neurotic, narcissistic pursuit of glory (see Karen Horney's Neurosis and Human Growth).
Faith has its ego-apotheosic pitfalls, its mad, mad crusades. Faith that one has the Holy Truth in hand, and the blessing of the Almighty - that's why Christians hate and ostracize homosexuals and Muslims hate and bomb infidels.
A meek and mild faith is a different story.
* Amazingly, their url is: godhatesfags.com
This is a strange statement for me because I don’t consider intoxication or toxins “evil.” I can only assume that’s a faith based moralization on your part. Chemo therapy, for example, is highly toxic but can be beneficial nevertheless and for that reason can be considered good. Plants and animals produce toxins as defense mechanisms or survival strategies. That’s not evil, in my opinion. We bombard the planet with poisons to kill pests. Is that evil? I might agree that it is in that case.
Perhaps you consider intoxication evil. If so, why? Is it because it influences our thinking, judgment, inhibitions, reflexes, etc.? If a religion doesn’t have any influential power, if no one drinks the Kool-Aid, then it’s probably about as meaningful as a Seinfeld rerun, amusing in the moment but quickly forgotten. If religion does have influential power, if we can be ‘under the influence’ of religion, then by your own definition it is evil.
That I agree with. I would place the evil on the actions, not the intent, so it's not the faith that is doing the harm, but the attempted imposition of one's values upon another.
And that really is what my objection has been here, which is the suggestion that another person's discovery of the meaning of life need be imposed on those who have rejected it. If someone has found the meaning of life deciphering analytic syllogisms, good for them. I don't know how they can claim their discovery superior to mine if mine subjectively works for me in terms of providing me meaning.
Quoting praxis
:up:
Quoting praxis
:up:
Sure, but can't you say the same about any human activity at all? Almost any thought system, activity or profession has its share of toxic, dictatorial narcissists.
If the question is "Does alcohol give you cirrhosis?," the answer is yes no matter what you believe. If the question is "Does alcohol give your life meaning?," that depends. Me, no, but if you say otherwise for you, then yes for you.
You're going to have to go back and re-contextualize this whole alcohol discussion. I have no personal opposition to drinking alcohol and your pointing out there is no decontextualized meaning of the word "toxin" is obvious.
This began as a comparison of alcohol to faith as in either could offer meaning. I countered in two ways: (1) I have seen lives destroyed by alcohol, but not so much by faith, and (2) if you insist you have found the fountain of meaning in the bottle, then drink up.
That is to say, I don't think that faith and alcohol consumption are similar enough experiences for meaningful comparison, but if you insist they are, then have at it and enjoy your meaning on the rocks.
I was simply trying to determine your meaning about alcohol being toxic, which is still not obvious to me.
Quoting Hanover
I can’t tell if you’re kidding.
Quoting 180 Proof
No. It's a nod towards favoritism. There are many ideas that have no evidence. So why choose to believe in one idea with no evidence over another if not for some emotional attachment?
That's all well and good if some idea makes you feel good. The problem is that when you participate in a discussion about the true nature of the universe and it's causes, your emotional attachments to some explanation isn't useful. In a discussion about what is true, it is a category error, or at least off-topic, to inject your feelings into it.
Hmmm, well now, seems I’ve gotten myself into quite the pickle. :brow:
Perhaps @180 Proof can rescue my dignity.
:clap: :fire:
Quoting 180 Proof
Strawman. Non-sequitur. :roll:
In sincere humbleness I can do no other than agree. If we truly love the human being and want to fully explore our humanity we have to admit that all objective truths, and I mean all of them, are basically subjective stories. Which doesn't mean denying the absolute truth as independent of us, an idea initiated in ancient Greece (Xenophanes) which propagated in history to find a climax in the world of science, trying to land on this independent true reality but without actually touching it. An idea embraced by oldies like Plato (the mathematical realm, approximated by mathematical expressions) or youngsters like Sir Karl PimplePopper, claiming indeed we never will actually touch upon reality as we should always nervously try to falsify.
No. We don't have to deny that idea. But what we do have to deny, is that, self-contradictory (paradoxically) as it might sound, the uniqueness of that absolute objective reality. It depends on who, or which cultural ensemble, or even which creature existing besides of us (which are created by the gods just as us) it's asked. They all have their objective stories. None of these stories should be given an advantage over the others. If we want to be truly human we have to admit that and let them all be part of humanity. For the benefit of all.
It's the subjective truth!
So, while I think gods exists independently of us, for all people and creatures, the atheist's objective reality is one of matter only. Or whatever other image. A tesseract reality maybe. Or a mathematical. Or a dreamtime reality. Take your pick. Why is so hard to concede? Because of that old Greek initiative still echoing today? And pretty strongly, I might add...
Empiricism is something. I am more inclined to lean towards empiricism I would say. What does what it does, does what it does. If it makes no logical sense to me it still does what it does.
Well, this is what got me thinking about all this;
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concluding_Unscientific_Postscript_to_Philosophical_Fragments
And theists don't? Maybe it's a different kind though.
Religion can make good people believe bad things, like that God can order slayings of any person at anytime.
It's always people who do the slayings, whether in the name of God or, more topically, Putin. At least we can define God as the good and deny unholy acts are decreed by him, but only falsely in his name. The same cannot be said of Putin. He is not an ideal or representation of the good.
Didn't God flood the world?
No.
The Bible lied?
Must we really start this discussion from the simplistic strawmen or can we fast forward to a place of higher sophistication? Modern fundamentalist readings are absurd. There weren't polar bears and camels on an ark bouncing around in a violent storm for 40 days and nights.
I also don't recall remotely suggesting the Bible was the work of God.
But to your question, a work of fiction doesn't lie. Winnie the Pooh isn't a lie. It's a tale of talking bears and donkeys, but I don't think you'd read it thinking it were non-fiction. By the same token, that it is fiction doesn’t mean it can't contain truths.
The Bible is fiction, but fiction doesn't mean it can't contain truths. That a fictional book speaks of God (or trees) doesn't mean God (or trees) don't exist. I assume that's the drift of your question.
No, Gilgamesh lied. By the time the Bible hit it was misinformation.
The God of the Hebrew Bible cannot be defined as good without ignoring all the bad things attributed to him. The stories may be myth but as you say:
Quoting Hanover
So what is the truth about God as depicted in the stories of wrath and destruction? Do you think the depictions are false because they do not conform to God as you define him? One might just as well say that God as you define him is a fiction. It seems far more simplistic and lacking in sophistication.
You submit a strawman that certainly no significant group adheres to, which is that the Hebrew Bible is to be read literally and in isolation. No one does that. If they did, adherents would be stoning little girls. That they don't should give you pause as to what they must be looking at to decide how to act.
So, unless you really want to study the theology of religious groups that hold the Bible sacred, and you think that somehow this bears on the question of whether God is evil (which is the impetus of this recent turn in discussion), we can do that.
That discussion will in itself be a response to a strawman because I've never stated that God's definition is to be found in the Bible, but the conversation would be instructive to the fact that your own understanding of how the Hebrew Bible is interpreted and applied is incorrect.
Indeed. Do you know have a view why it is that Jewish fundamentalism hasn't gone down this path, given that Islamic fundamentalism (by contrast) seems quite ready to kill women, children and apostates in the name of Koranic fidelity?
I tend to draw very blurred lines between theology and politics, meaning why a civilization behaves as it does might be related to underlying worldviews and religious views, but also to wars, leadership, and all sorts of political forces. I also don't subscribe to the belief that religious beliefs are immutable, as they change with demographic changes, economic issues, and all things political as well.
So why are Muslims where they are right now? Maybe look at the Koran in part, but look at the whole picture. A single invasion, for instance, can change history more quickly than theological shift.
As to what I was getting at about the use of the Hebrew Bible for the Orthodox views, the Talmud (the supposed oral tradition) and the rabbinic law arising from that, dramatically altered the religion. The Torah does not have priority over the Talmud. See, generally, https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oral_Torah
I can only repeat what I've said, which is that the fictionality of the Bible neither affirms nor negates its literal statements. I mean could there have been a Tiny Tim and Ebenezer Scrooge? I guess, but who cares? The story's literal truth doesn't impact its meaning.
Nah, you're trying to make the fact that it's fictional mean that every fact contained in it is false. To be fictional simply means the factual claims in the book need not be true for the relevance of the story, but it doesn't require they be false.
If you are saying the Bible is fictional the same way Shakespeare's Hamlet is fictional then I would agree.
The OP, by a contributor who was banned almost as soon as joining, asserts that belief in the supernatural is 'asinine' on the basis that it cannot be 'proven' - meaning, I presume, that it cannot be made subject to empirical validation. But this is basically just junior-school positivism so I don't think warrants consideration.
The point I want to get at is broader. What, after all, is the meaning of the idea of revelation, from an anthropological viewpoint? Are there states of spiritual illumination? These kinds of insights arise, I think, from what us moderns would deem 'non-ordinary states' - this article posits trance states which have been culturally valued since pre-historic times. (Worth noting that 'ecstacy' means literally 'outside stasis' where 'stasis' is normal day-to-day consciousness.) Or again in Buddhism, in which 'there is a whole set of teachings pertaining to the topics of realisation and the aspect of lokuttara, (a ‘transcendent’ dimension). These teachings emphatically insist on the possibility of an embodied, subjective and numinous experience through the practice of meditation' (source).
So - does atheism sweep all of this off the table? It seems to me that it must, lest 'the divine foot is let in the door', as Richard Lewontin once put it. Or can it more limited, and so more nuanced, than that?
Forget 'the holy', according to Nietzsche, if you believe in grammar, you're a theist. Is intelligibility a matter of transcendence? If it is, we are all participating in the sacred whether we know it or not, right?
'The sacred' is not a clear idea. Sacred tends to be held in relation to something. Lenin's embalmed corpse was sacred to the Communist party. I imagine that many atheists, who are also secular humanists, would hold human rights as sacred. If you take as a presupposition that human suffering is wrong and wellbeing is good, then this makes sense, but it lacks aesthetic charm and a transcendental guarantor. The Western cannon would be held as sacred by many secular folk too - Dawkins has made this point often.
I generally hold that belief in god/s or higher consciousness is an aesthetic response. And, as I have said to you before, I think the way you express your positions often suggests (to me) that transcendent significance (via idealism, reincarnation, meditation) is aesthetically superior to a world of Weberian disenchantment (the products of stultifying Darwinism, scientism, scepticism, rationalism).
What do you understand by 'the sacred' can it be a secular notion?
Quoting Tom Storm
Absolutely not:
The sacred is religious rather than secular.
Definitionally yes, usage... who knows?
colloquially the word "sacred" is often borrowed, ex:
My country is sacred (but nobody is worshiping my land)
President's office is sacred (but nobody is worshiping his office)
holly war (but nobody is worshiping a war)
Not in the context of post-Enlightenment western culture, because secular culture was explicitly defined against religious culture. The word itself goes back to the secular calendar, distinguished from the sacramental calendar (and its holy days), the secular calendar being concerned with the day-to-day affairs. But in a philosophical sense the division is not so clear cut. Einstein held to his ‘cosmic religious views’ expressed in many of his later-in-life writings, even though he reviled organisational religion as childish and immature. As discussed in the ‘concept of religion’ thread a few weeks back, it’s really impossible to arrive at a simple definition of religion (outside the stereotypical post-Enlightenment attitude, which makes it dead easy.)
Marxism is to all intents a secular religion. Heck, Darwinism is too, to some people. Richard Dawkins used to hold school camps to imbue children with a satisfactorily scientific-rationalist mindset.
What’s that satirical verse I sometimes quote….
(I believe that is paraphrased from The Book of the Tarot.)
But then, on the other hand, the Buddha was,relative to the culture of his day, a secular philosopher, as he rejected the authority of the Vedas and taught a method that was arguably more like that of the ancient sceptics and stoics than the early Christians. As far as the Brahmins were concerned he was a nihilist. But ultimately, his aim was to transcend the eternal cycle of birth and death, and that can’t be fit comfortably into a secular framework (notwithstanding the earnest efforts of secular Buddhism.) But then, the Buddhist conception of dharma cuts across the Western divisions of sacred and secular, in that it emphasises ‘seeing for oneself’ and acquiring insight through disciplined meditation, which is like neither what we think of as religious dogma, nor empirical science.
The problem/catch is that sacrednsss is used as an excuse/reason to stifle free thought, the classic example being, at the moment, Islam - it doesn't take much to elicit a fatwa from the grand Ayatollah of Iran if you catch my drift.
It'a a tightrope walk - on one side fatwas and on the other side orgiastic decadence. Tough call!
Of course that is true. Religions can be a source of oppression, no doubt about that, but they’re not only that.
How do we tell when things are going south? Slippery slope fallacy notwithstanding, always being on guard is a headache, oui?
But this covers an immense amount of territory. So why postulate something beyond "the natural", if we don't know just how big it is?
It would be a different story if we somehow knew that the natural only covers, say, non-conscious things. Then we would be forced to say that everything mental is supernatural.
But then we are merely stipulating definitions and not discussing the content of these terms.
By extension then man made fibers are natural too. Cheers for nylon!
Can you name an example of anything we know of which is non-natural?
What is free thought? Don't you think your thoughts have been formed by science, on school? You were forced by law to follow the brainwash. Or braintaint maybe. Isn't science stifeling too? There are a lot of science ayattolah's. Threatening with punishment if you don't adapt.
Surely, not everything natural is good. Earthquakes are natural, but suck for people. Hemlock too if used in certain ways, so it's not as if natural is somehow sacred or benign.
There are things called "supernatural", stuff like ghosts, auras and the like. I think these things are based on faulty judgement of perceptions and evidence for these things is shaky at best.
Even if suddenly there is good evidence for these phenomena, why call them supernatural? I mean, we can't find 95% of the universe, but we don't call that "supernatural".
Everybody knows what free thought is. Look it up.
I said nothing about science. Nevertheless, you would be going against the spirit of science if you ever adopt a dogmatic stance as a scientist. With religion, dogmatism (so-called orthodoxy) is a defining feature.
From our friend Wiki:
[b] for an encyclopedic entry. (November 2020)
Freethought (sometimes spelled free thought) is an epistemological viewpoint which holds that beliefs should not be formed on the basis of authority, tradition, revelation, or dogma, and that beliefs should instead be reached by other methods such as logic, reason, and empirical observation. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, a freethinker is "a person who forms their own ideas and opinions rather than accepting those of other people, especially in religious teaching." In some contemporary thought in particular, free thought is strongly tied with rejection of traditional social or religious belief systems. The cognitive application of free thought is known as "freethinking", and practitioners of free thought are known as "freethinkers". Modern freethinkers consider free thought to be a natural freedom from all negative and illusive thoughts acquired from society [/b]
"not be formed on the basis of authority, tradition, revelation, or dogma"
Ain't school learning you what authorities say you must? Fir example there is the dogma of molecular biology. And many more.
The only strawman here is the one you made. It is not a matter of reading the myths literally. How do you understand the following:
The term translated as evil is ra'. It means bad, trouble, adversity, calamity.
Quoting Hanover
I raised this problem before, but you ignored it. By what light do we read such passages from Deuteronomy? I think it obvious that we read them in light of beliefs and values which are not fixed and eternal, but relative to time and place. Those who wrote and those who first heard the Law did not think that it was not to be taken literally.
The experience of the sacred is clear; there is nothing clearer. Clarity par excellence.
There is a reason why scientific theories adapt and change over time and The Bible and Koran remain exactly the same - one is Dogma and the other is constantly changing.
The intellectual approach is misguided here. Either one has had the experience of the sacred or one has not.
As to a definition: It's like porn. You know it when you see it.
Indeed. But a lot of unproven dogma is used. And the same holds for religion. There are some pretty dogmatic people in the world of religion and science.
There is more than the bible or koran. The books of classical mechanics don't change ever. They form a dogma. And that dogma, by authorities and law is forced upon the upgrowing people.
There are two ways to read the Bible: (1) from a traditional view of a believer or (2) from the view of biblical scholarship. If you want an answer under #1, you will need to look at the tradition you are referencing and we can look at all the theology and additional texts used by that group. An Orthodox Jew would read it differently than a Reform Jew and differently than a Christian, and there are variations among Christian denominations.
Your last sentence quoted above is simply not correct and it conflates the views of #1 and #2. If you want to stand in the position of a believer, you are correct in asserting that Moses received the law from Mount Sinai and he accepted it as the word of God, but you also (depending upon your religious viewpoint) might be accepting that an oral law was also handed down that day that dramatically added to and altered the written word. That is, if you're a believer, tell me what you believe, and I'll believe you, but the views you're expressing of believers do not describe any real group of believers.
If you take the position of #2 (a modern biblical scholar), you will not say such things as "those who first heard the law" because that assumes a sudden handing down of law as opposed to hundreds of years of the Bible being written, it being edited, and it being combined by an editor into a single scroll. It also assumes a single march step through time of how the Bible was used and accepted, ignoring the fact that rabbinical Judaism is not at all similar to the Jewish practice during the times described prior to the destruction of the Temple.
What you are describing in your post is a modern fundamentalism that asserts a simple literalism to the Bible that isn't historically something biblical adherents held to, and it's certainly not something I adhere to. For that reason, it's a strawman.
As to your comment that biblical interpretations by adherents have varied through history and that fact is obvious, I agree. The insertion of biblical interpretation into this conversation only arose in this conversation when someone asked me about the historical accuracy of the flood (which I denied), but I never suggested the question of who God was best answered by referinng to the Bible.
Quoting Fooloso4
You would be interested in my interpretation of biblical text? Why? I think we could spend weeks on Job alone, considering that does present a very complicated discussion of theodicy.
Just because scientists can be ‘dogmatic’ it does not mean that science contains dogma … that is just plain wrong. Religious texts on the other hand are the very definition of dogma by claiming to be irrefutable truths.
English is a messy language, but it bothers me that people choose their own meanings and uses for words to suit their weird ideological views.
These are not mutually exclusive, many but not all scholars are believers.
Quoting Hanover
Are you claiming that stoning was never taken literally? If it conflates your dubious distinction it does so for good reason. The rabbis who interpret the Law, both then and now, were both believers and biblical scholars.
Quoting Hanover
There are many believers who doubt the historical veracity of this.
Quoting Hanover
You shifted from biblical scholarship to modern biblical scholarship. The inclusion of the perspective of time is significant.
Quoting Hanover
At some point it was said that certain infractions were punishable by death by stoning. Are you claiming that it was not understood literally then? At some point it was written down, are you claiming that it was not understood literally then? Eventually, however, there was no longer compliance. Such things were no longer regarded as morally acceptable. It is just this change that I am pointing to.
Quoting Hanover
Again, what I am describing is changes in beliefs and values.
Quoting Hanover
How do you reconcile such changes with your claim that there is an objective morality?
Quoting Hanover
So what would you suggest is the best way to answer the question?
Quoting Hanover
That is certainly true. Are you suggesting that we should not take your claim that:
Quoting Hanover
seriously? Or are you saying that you are not prepared to back up your claim? When you say "we" who are you referring to?
Same for, say, religion.
There is no dogma in science. There is dogma in religions.
There are dogmatic and non-dogmatic people in both.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that there's nothing amiss about putting rationality on a pedestal like philosophers, scientist, and freethinkers do. No authority, even one inanimate like logic must be allowed to hold such sway over our lives. However, as you would've guessed, I'm merely running around in circles here - it's rationality that cautions against rationality!
A dogma is an unproven conjecture. And there are lots of them in science.
You are, by law, directed towards the institutions of knowledge. In my humbly humbleness I can't help calling that authorative... :grin:
Sounds rational!
Radical skepticism is in order. We must put logic in the dock, interrogate it! How did it come to be this powerful? What vile trickery did it put to its service? Who were/are its accomplices? :chin:
And what definition is that?
Once upon a time, in a country far far away, called Greece....
The Indians too were very good logicians. The Chinese, however, are a different story. Taoism seems to be a slap in the face of logic!
From Wiki:
Dogma is a belief or set of beliefs that is accepted by the members of a group without being questioned or doubted.
They had to be, in meeting up the western invaders... :grin:
“A 'dogma' is defined as a principle or set of principles laid down by an authority and held to be incontrovertibly true.”
Truth is not directly what science is about. Science is concerned with how things work by refining proposed rules and laws and making observations.
Dogmatic attitudes have existed amongst science-based persons. Yet when evidence is brought forward they DO NOT deny the evidence. Evidence is taken into account and minds are changed. There is no ‘god’s word’ or ‘scripture’ that cannot be changed.
This is basic stuff.
Note: I am NOT saying that all religious people are aligned with such dogma but enough are to cause problems.
I'm not sure if I'm right about this, but in physics, especially quantum physics, there seems to be an inclination towards eastern philosophies. Especially the relation between the parts and wholes, and the holism (lacking in the "hard" reductionist sciences) inherent in eastern philosophy, seems attractive. So maybe "the whole" is holey ("wholey"!).
That's exactly what is done in the scientific world. And I have encountered it directly. I have questioned the standard model with a preon model. Quarks and leptons being made if three other particles, preons. The model offers only advantages, but the dogma is that quarks and leptons are fundamental and point-like (string theory offers string and brains but they are supersymmetric in orinciple, contrary to observations). When I offered the midel as an alternative, the dogma defenses were activated.
Bye bye (that means you get a response from me for around a month).
Have fun :)
"Model"? Ain't the standard model a model?
True.Quoting Fooloso4
There is no historical evidence of the stonings taking place and extremely few death penalties being carrier out in the rabbinical era beginning in the 1st century CE. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_in_Judaism ( "The Mishnah states that a Sanhedrin that executes one person in seven years — or seventy years, according to Eleazar ben Azariah — is considered bloodthirsty.")
This is to say that that biblically imposed death penalties occurred in antiquity far less often than secular based death penalties in modernity. Quoting Fooloso4
Because I have never suggested, hinted, or intimated that the Bible is the source of morality. I hold to moral realism, a claim that there is a true right or wrong, regardless of what the current population might hold.Quoting Fooloso4
Through personal experience, introspection, and a need for there to be an anchor for meaning and purpose.Quoting Fooloso4
What is significant isn't when it occurred as much as who is doing the scholarship. It's a distinction between believers and those not committed to interpreting it from a perspective of belief. Quoting Fooloso4
I'm saying that I'm not committing to your strawmen and am asserting what I take to be a more proper conception of God.
I'm using "we" in the third person objective, synonymous with "one." It expresses an ideal, or what a reasonable person should do.
Do you mean no historical evidence taking place or no historical evidence of them taking place in the rabbinical era?
[Edit]
Quoting Hanover
In other words, your definition of God is subjective and based on the presupposition that there must be a meaning and purpose that is not subjective.
Quoting Hanover
To be clear, are you claiming that the quotes from Isaiah and Job are false? And that they are false because they do not conform to your definition of God as good? A definition that "we" or "one" should accept because that is what a reasonable person should do?
[Added: Does this mean that those of us who do not accept what a reasonable person does is not reasonable, at least to the extent they do not accept your definition of God?
I don't accept the historicity of the Bible, so I'm not using that as a source of proof. Whether there were stonings in the Near East in the Bronze and Iron ages, I don't know as the historical record is pretty much lacking unless there's an archeological record. What I can say is that the institutional religious records written by the rabbis do not reflect stonings occurring, with that era beginning in the first century CE.
I'm also not committed to referring to the ancient Hebrews as Jews until much later in the biblical history, considering the religion of sacrifice centering around the Temple is a much different religion that what is practiced today.Quoting Fooloso4
None might be an overstatement, but to the extent there is a dispute between a Judaic concept and my personal belief, my personal belief trumps.Quoting Fooloso4
Maybe as a broad sketch I might agree with this. I'd have to think on it. I do believe in the subjectivity of faith in a Kierkegaardian sort of way. I'm trying to make sense of it honestly.Quoting Fooloso4
I'm in disagreement with any statement that represents God as not being the source of the good or morality, whether that be Isiah, the Koran, or whoever says something contrary to what I think.
My take on the Bible is that it is an ancient source of wisdom, in particular how it has been interpreted, meaning our wisest ancestors used it as the vehicle to describe good from evil and to take a stab out of describing God. I think they did a far better job with the Bible, than say the Scientologists have done with Dianetics.
Right. This supports the claim of moral relativism, that even under the pretext of what is unchanging and absolute the beliefs and values of human beings are not invariant. Now you may think that this is progress, that we are moving toward the realization of moral objectivity, but I think that it is instead a matter of trying to figure out what is best in the absence of knowledge of what is best. In the absence of such knowledge perhaps what is best is to accept that certain moral problems do not yield clear solutions, that the recognition of uncertainty leads to toleration of differences.
Quoting Hanover
What I am suggesting is that our wise ancestors did not make such a clear distinction. The tree of knowledge is of both good and evil. One tree, so to speak, that bears fruit that is both good and evil, just as experience shows. (Koholeth) eschews the pollyannic view and squarely faces the fact that the wicked may prosper and the righteous get what the wicked deserve.
.
I have never experienced it. So it is not clear. Only clear to those who make such claims, eh?
Why not consider life itself "numinous" "sacred" "spiritual" "supernatural" "miraculous" "a mystery", instead as "highly-qualified, or overly-interpreted, 'experiences' of limit-situations (Jaspers)" (who ever that might be), as secular knowledge tends to turn it into?
Do you know Tao of Physics? That was published in the early 1970s. Of course it has its critics but Heisenberg was interviewed by the author and he approved it. Carlos Rovelli's RQM model makes explicit reference to the Buddhist philosophy of N?g?rjuna. There are many such parallels. Have a read of Schrodinger and Indian Philosophy, Michel Bitbol.
Quoting ZzzoneiroCosm
Agree, even if glimpsed from afar.
Variations in moral beliefs over time and among cultures is an obvious empirical fact, and if that proved relativism, the debate over moral realism would have ended long ago. The problem is that epistemological uncertainty has no bearing on ontological reality. Whether we know what is right doesn't affect what is right
Quoting Fooloso4
Why would someone advocate otherwise, as if to insist someone behave in a certain way when we ourselves aren't certain of what is the right way to behave? This has no bearing on moral relativism or absolutism, but is just pragmatics. I'm going to insist though that others not rape. Moral quandaries exist, but sometimes not Quoting Fooloso4
By using a biblical analogy to make your point, do you not invoke the wisdom of the Bible?
How do you account for those, like me, who do not see/experience the sacred? Are we insensitive, blind to it, suppressing it, immune to it, not looking carefully...
As I've said many times on this forum, it's why I studied comparative religion (for which I've recently been severely criticized as it's apparently a totally bogus discipline.) But I was trying to understand what enlightenment or illumination meant. At the time I started out on that, I had no sense that it was connected to what I had been taught as 'religion' at all. But over the years, and through books like William James Varieties of Religious Experience and Alduous Huxley's The Perennial Philosophy, I began to see the connections. I had also had 'peak experiences' under the influence of enthoegens which conveyed a strong sense of the numinosity of nature. Impossible to convey in words, of course. And some encounters with charismatic teachers - likewise.
But overall, I do see atheism, in the sense of Dawkins-Dennett style of materialism, as a lack, something not seen, a missing dimension, and that's just going to remain an irreconcilable difference I'm afraid.
I have one Capra book. Not sure if it's the Tao. It's got a blue cover with a stone wall and a white wave. He says interesting stuff about economy but I haven't read more. The connection between life and QM, the part and the whole, not seems clear to me. Of course the non-locality of QM is interesting, and the QM phenomena are dependent on circumstance (close one slit and the pattern changes, which also happens in an experiment with two waterwaves, indicating that the wavefunction is, well, just a wave, which is nothing special per se; so why not associate waterwaves with eastern philosophy? Waterwaves have beautifull non local features, i.e., one part of a wave is no causaly connected with the other parts, all parts exercising the collective motion), but hey, there is more physics than QM. QM is nothing special, and I can't see the connection with consciousness. Quantum matter ain't different from normal matter.
"Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" lay around somewhere too. Penrose, Rovelli, all nice but not particularly enlightening. David Bohm is great. The hologram universe.
Without epistemological certainty there can be no certainty of ontological reality. Moral realism remains an assertion.
Quoting Hanover
If we do not know what is right we do not know if anything is right beyond whatever it is we assert to be right.
quote="Hanover;686309"]Why would someone advocate otherwise, as if to insist someone behave in a certain way when we ourselves aren't certain of what is the right way to behave?[/quote]
This happens all the time. Although those who want to make abortion a criminal offense may be certain that they are right, it certainly is not certain that they are.
Quoting Hanover
Of course it does. Those who are convinced of their own moral certainty are now the majority of the Supreme Court and a large and powerful enough faction of the Legislator to determine what significant portions of our lives will be.
Quoting Hanover
The point is, what is regarded as the wisdom of the Bible does not conform to what you want it to. Where it does you call it wisdom, where it doesn't you reject it. I do think there is wisdom to be found but do not think it matches up with what you find.
.
Works for me – deus, sive natura naturans.
Quoting Wayfarer
Naturalism, or supernaturalism sans "super" (i.e. the imaginary :sparkle:)
I don't agree with this assertion. Regardless, I am certain there is a moral reality. Certainty is a special class of knowledge in any event. Quoting Fooloso4
And you comment is non-responsive to mine. Quoting Fooloso4
I don't know their level of certitude regarding moral issues and neither do you Quoting Fooloso4
You have no idea what I derive from the Bible, Hamlet, or Winnie the Pooh.
I thought I'd step in and say I don't think I know any Christian or Jewish believers who literally think the Bible fell out of the sky, literally translated (in English). Pretty much everyone I've talked to has explained that Paul wrote the letters Corinthians, Ephesians, etc; different books, different authors, and of course, different historical contexts, which needs to be taken into account. I think it is all too easy for us, in a post scientific-revolution context, to expect early writers and those passing on oral history to preserve every small detail of the story as if it was some process to be able to replicate. This is not how history was told; for instance, battle records often exaggerated the number of troops on the enemy side. Historians know (and expect) this. Does this mean the battle didn't happen? No, simply that there may not have been a way to keep an accurate count, or that the exaggeration served a different purpose.
As Conrad Hyers said,
The sad thing is, this seems to be what is going on here, which frankly does not belong on a forum dedicated to philosophy.
Well, that's not all, is it? It's not so much about some details being lost in translation - its entire mythologies being recorded that did not happen. Moses not being a real person and not writing those books is but one issue. There are also no eyewitness records of the figure known as Jesus, with the gospels being written anonymously, decades after the supposed events. This is significant given the belief systems and philosophical positions people held and hold based on those stories.
Quoting Paulm12
One of the fastest growing expressions of Christianity in the world is Bible believing Pentecostals. They played a huge role in Trump's support and in helping to stack the Supreme Court and in advocating for education and laws to be changed to reflect a supposed Christian worldview. Interesting book on this by Kristin Kobes Du Mez, a Christian writer, called Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation. It's quite a big deal and can't be minimised as just being a few harmless stragglers. They even show up here regularly proffering ontological and cosmological arguments and sometimes anti-evolution beliefs, so there's that too.
Sine diis mortua est natura
Nulla natura
Deos faciunt naturam chorus
Non fun sine diis
Fucking inutilem
Scientia non scit stercore...
Yeah, and I didn’t mean to imply that there aren’t Christian biblical literalists out there (as there certainly are). It is more that the version of Christianity that I often see attacked by antitheists is a version of textual literalism that is held by a minority (of a minority) of Christians. For instance, many of those who argue for biblical inerrancy claim inerrancy only applies to autographical texts (Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy).
If someone is arguing against biblical literalism they are in agreement with a majority of Christians on this point. There have been almost 2,000 years of Christian, Jewish, Islamic scholarship on the matter (Origen, Hippo come to mind) on how figuratively/literally to interpret different parts of the Bible which unfortunately seems to get ignored in online conversations.
All too often certainty can be a special class of delusion.
Quoting Hanover
It is. Only you don't see it because you assume the existence of the very thing in question.
Quoting Hanover
Do you think that anti-abortion advocates doubt their own convictions?
Quoting Hanover
I do know how you define God. And I do know that there are several examples in the Bible that do not conform to your definition. So:
Quoting Fooloso4