Help Me Out
Posted on: December 11, 2008 - 9:50am
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Help Me Out
I've been wondering this for a long time, and I've never gotten a good answer from my atheist friends.
In no way do I intend to offend anyone or start a flame war here. I just want calm, rational answers and not dismemberment. So, with that said.... How is atheism not a religion? Like "theists," as you call them, you believe that you have a definite answer about a higher power. Like theists, you have no tangible way to prove what you believe. Instead, you unfairly place all the burden of proof on the other side. You are also making an absolute claim (there is no god). So, making that claim, you place a burden of proof on yourself. To say something is true because someone else cannot prove the opposite is true is a logical fallacy. Like theists, you have an enormous hostility toward opposing viewpoints (this is a conclusion drawn from poking around this site and from personal experience). Like theists, you claim persecution. Like theists, you have support groups (like this site). Like theists, you actively try to "convert" people to your way of thinking. You get the point. It seems to me that atheism is as much a religion as any other, though a little different in that you don't believe in a higher power. But still, the existence of a belief structure argues for atheism being a religion. It seems to me that being truly rational is admitting you don't know the answer to something when something cannot be proven or disproven empirically. Therefore it seems to me that agnosticism is the truly rational position. Why do you have to have a definite answer if you don't believe in an afterlife or an overseer God? I understand the need to keep religion out of government, and atheist groups can be decent watchdogs to that end, but what is to be gained from destroying Christianity? Some other religion will only take its place. Did you see that South Park episode where atheism became the dominant religion in the future, but there was still a holy war between different factions of atheism? I think it's just sadly human nature to find something to fight about, so you can't really blame religion for all the world's problems. You can blame evolution until someday, assuming we don't destroy ourselves, we do evolve beyond the need for war. The only decent answer I've ever gotten to this is my very smart friend who I still don't agree with. He said that it's silly to even entertain the notion of a God when a notion of God can't even be defined. Basically he said that since there is no standard for a definition of God, then it's impossible to really believe in a God. My problem is that argument still seems to argue for agnosticism. There doesn't have to be a set concept of something in the human consciousnesss in order for it to exist. People used to think the Earth was flat until we learned otherwise. The concept of an outer space beyond the Earth was foreign to people hundreds of years ago. Even if all our notions of God are wrong, the possibility of God existing is still there, and that possibility refutes atheism. I would appreciate some thoughtful discussion on this topic. Once again, no hostility here. I'm not a "theist." I'm at least half on your side.
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Remarkable. Two ad ignorantium fallacies in two hours. You need to understand and never again conflate two distinct definitions of the term. I imagine that for many atheists, it (their atheism)is simply a rejection of a priori and a posteriori arguments for God as being unsound, so there is no sound reason to believe in God. This is just a form of weak atheism and is as epistemologically sound as the denial of any other evidence free concept. For me, however, I think the problem runs deeper than lack of evidence. "God" is a arguably a broken and ultimately meaningless concept. What we are essentially discussing is some sort of omnipotent entity with no recognizable form, constitution or structure that somehow has limitless mental capacity and is some sort of meta-entity existing in a void independant of everything else and is responsible for the maintanence of reality. This is clearly absurdity of the highest order. The problem is that, on the one hand, we are saying that this entity has perfectly recognizable properties. It is a conscious being with mental capacity which has the ability to causally exert its influence on the material world, and at the same time, we are denying that this being has any meaningful material existence. So to talk about such a being requires committing a stolen concept fallacy, sort of like saying that property is theft. It is meaningless, for example, to speak of a conscious being with the ability to think thoughts, without some sort of world for it to experience. But since we are denying that God requires anything to exist, then we must deny it the property of mental capacity. When we talk about a God, what we are basically saying is "it is possible for a conscious mind to exist in the void". This is preposterous
I need a drink.
This is the most blatant goalpost shifting fallacy I have ever encountered. A discussion of this principle has shown to the point of total exhaustion that this does lead to strong atheism and since I was one of the primary contributors to that discussion, I shall leave with with a link to it:
Does incoherence/meaningless lead to strong atheism, or non-cognitivism?
Secondly, what you seem to be saying here is that there may or not be something which we cannot yet define or conceptualize that may or may not exist. This strikes me as the very definition of useless. However, it is also a shifting the goalpost fallacy because atheism is defined with respect to what theists believe. So, if you were to play with the word and decide that it meant something else (as of yet unconceptualized) you would be shifting the goalposts (in addition to forming a mystery of your own devising, which is a complete waste of time). THe definition I employed above is most common. Let us not kid ourselves by trying to outmanuever our way out of this fallacy by deferring "God" to be some sort of thing that we may or may not be able to conceive of. This certainly would not "refute" atheism. It would serve only to indicate that the word "God" is useless and should just be scrapped. By that, you could have it mean whatever the bloody hell you wanted to.
"Physical reality” isn’t some arbitrary demarcation. It is defined in terms of what we can systematically investigate, directly or not, by means of our senses. It is preposterous to assert that the process of systematic scientific reasoning arbitrarily excludes “non-physical explanations” because the very notion of “non-physical explanation” is contradictory.
-Me
Books about atheism
No it is not. And it is quite clear that you have not read my whole post. (Actually, this is because I was editing it as you were reading it. Read it now). A weak atheist would simply deny that a priori and a posteriori arguments for God are valid. This is not a valid reason to deny the existence of such an entity. That is the domain of strong atheism. Strong atheists will generally hold that there are deductive arguments against God.
The reason I am angry is because I've been through this fifty times.
Did you seriously think this was new to us? Do you not realize that everyone here has heard "you can't disprove God so you are no better than the religious" countless hundreds of times? Everyone here is familiar with the distinction between weak and strong atheism.
EDIT: Why is the text in your post gone?
"Physical reality” isn’t some arbitrary demarcation. It is defined in terms of what we can systematically investigate, directly or not, by means of our senses. It is preposterous to assert that the process of systematic scientific reasoning arbitrarily excludes “non-physical explanations” because the very notion of “non-physical explanation” is contradictory.
-Me
Books about atheism
Welcome to the boards. Wonder away.
Well, we don't have any specific rules, we don't hold regular meetings (although I suppose some do) and we don't believe that a higher supernatural something-or-other governs our lives. It's pretty simple.
Nope. I, for example, believe there is no higher power because I think the odds are so incredibly small. And I do mean incredibly small. Moreso when you get into it.
Not true. I believe firmly in the physical world, which is supported by a great body of evidence.
That's not "unfair": the physical world has a great deal of evidence to support it, but the supernatural does not. That's why we (generously) call it the supernatural.
Support groups are also available for eating disorders. I don't know if I'd call an eating disorder a religion (although ...)
There's part of the problem. Nothing can be proven empirically. Things can be disproven handily, though. I think the light won't turn on when I flip the switch. Flip. Oh, I guess I was wrong. Things can be supported empirically, but there's always that little margin of error. Sometimes the margin of error is very, very small, like in the case of the physical sciences.
But pragmatically, it's so improbable that a specific interpretation of an invisible creature exists that it's easy to dismiss outright.
No it doesn't. Atheism is a belief. If I think there's only the remotest possibility that there's a "God", then I'm still an atheist. And I'm probably right.
Saint Will: no gyration without funkstification.
fabulae! nil satis firmi video quam ob rem accipere hunc mi expediat metum. - Terence
Bah, foolish atheists! Why won't you just admit that not collecting invisible pink unicorns is just as much of a hobby as collecting them is? We all know that invisible pink unicorns exist, otherwise people couldn't collect them! Your denial of my collection proves that you acknowledge the existence of my collection. All you have to do now is admit that you deny my collection with as much religious faith as I defend my collection. It takes more faith to deny invisible pink unicorns than it does to accept them. Since you have failed to disprove invisible pink unicorns, you must abandon your denial and at very least admit that you are agnostic of them. Straddling the fence is the only sane choice, because it allows you to pet the invisible pink unicorns while not looking like the fanatical extremists on either side of the fence, because we all know that atheists practice their atheism ( wicked smile toward Hambydammit ) religiously, therefore making them as much a religion as bomb throwing religious terrorists.
It takes a village to raise an idiot.
Save a tree, eat a vegetarian.
Sometimes " The Majority " only means that all the fools are on the same side.
I realized you weren't finished with your post after I replied, so I tried to erase it before you read it so you could read my revised comment. Obviously, it didn't work. Anyway, I see what you're saying. I understand the need for pragmatism with respect to arguments against God. I guess my friend was arguing a weak atheism position, and you've helped me understand that a bit more. I guess I still don't really get strong atheism, but that can be a different discussion. This was what I was trying to avoid. I didn't really mean to get into an argument about whether atheism is true/false. I was merely pointing out the similarities between religion and atheism and posing the question of whether atheism could be considered a religion. I'm not sure what I said qualifies as a moving goal post fallacy because I wasn't necessarily saying that greater evidence was required to prove the atheist point. I was only trying to say that the lack of scientific evidence leads me to believe that agnosticism is the better fit for rational people. But forgive me for only taking one philosophy class in college.
No one forced you to reply to this post, so no reason to angry at me.
I know you've probably heard all this before. Any person with a belief is going to be forced to defend that belief. I don't know what I believe, so that makes me agnostic, and I think there's nothing wrong with that. This was for my benefit. I'm not trying to convert anybody. I don't really care about your personal beliefs, another trait of the agnostic I guess.
This is what I was looking for....thank you for your smug-free answers.
You make some very good points, and I recognize that atheism has taken on some nuance. But I still have a hard time reconciling how, if you do believe there is a remote possibility of a god, then why be an atheist? This is the point I'm trying to make. What good does it do to identify yourself as an atheist when very few people are pure atheists? You obviously don't believe in any consequences for not believing what you believe, so why the belief system? That reeks of religion to me. That's all I'm trying to say here.
Read THIS
Okay, okay. I see my mistake now. I wasn't using the approved terminology. I guess I should amend my statements to say, "Is STRONG Atheism a religion?" I was just using agnostic in its accepted form. Whatever, I'm a weak atheist/agnostic/whatever. Labels aren't really that important to me.
This is a linguistic hangup. The a prefix indicates negation. An atheist is someone who doesn't believe in God. This is very simple. Let us suppose here I asked you to make up some sort of creature in your head. If I asked you if such an entity actually existed, you would probably say no. Technically, you cannot say this but (and this is a very important difference so pay attention) if I asked you if you believed in such a thing and you said no there would be nothing wrong with saying that from an epistemological standpoint. Of course, we don't have to invent words to deliniate people on the basis of whether or not they believe in the imaginary creature you made up in your head but the only reason this is the case is because of strength in numbers. If there were no concept of God, the word atheist would vanish. The only reason the word "atheist" exists and it describes a distinct group is because there are lots of religious people who believe in this idea. What a weak atheist will emphasize the fact is that although this is the case, from an epistemic standpoint there is no important difference between the situation I just described and the situation with people believing in God. And that is why they get irritated when people say "you can't disprove God". Because they are never seeking to do that. There is no need to do that. Frankly, most of them don't really like the title "atheist" because we shouldn't really need a word to describe people who don't believe in something which is completely ridiculous but the concept is prevalant and so the word is there.
"Physical reality” isn’t some arbitrary demarcation. It is defined in terms of what we can systematically investigate, directly or not, by means of our senses. It is preposterous to assert that the process of systematic scientific reasoning arbitrarily excludes “non-physical explanations” because the very notion of “non-physical explanation” is contradictory.
-Me
Books about atheism
There aren't very many strong atheists, but since I happen to be one, I can say it is not. The first and most important thing to say is that a strong atheist does not hold "I am certain there is no God". It would be a fallacy of false dichotomy to claim that strong atheists believe this. What a strong atheist holds is that there are certain holes in the concept of God that make the statement "God exists" problematic, not just unsubstantiated (this is in fact the definition of strong atheism). The only statements that anyone can really be certain of are formal statements (in other words, mathematics). The second thing to say is that a "religion" usually revolves around customs, rituals and so forth pertaining to the belief system, and I don't possess any of those ("arguing" is not a ritual). The third thing to say is that bona fide religious people, unfortunately, are completely certain of their beliefs, whereas I just admitted to you that we can't really be "certain" of anything (except formal statements).
"Physical reality” isn’t some arbitrary demarcation. It is defined in terms of what we can systematically investigate, directly or not, by means of our senses. It is preposterous to assert that the process of systematic scientific reasoning arbitrarily excludes “non-physical explanations” because the very notion of “non-physical explanation” is contradictory.
-Me
Books about atheism
Okay, I sort of understand what you're saying now. Thank you for clearing that up. I still don't really see how it's that much different from weak atheism, but I have to go now, so thanks for the discussion. Didn't mean to piss you off.
Consider me more educated on the complexities of atheism, though. I was never really taught all the details of the word's meanings and all that. So this was more constructive than I thought it would be. I was just expecting to be disemboweled. Plus, that banner ad on the side there made me put The God Who Wasn't There on my Netflix list.
It's part of the claim. A weak atheist will just shrug their shoulders and say "this [idea of God] is no more substantiated than any other arbitrary thing we could conjure up in our head. End of story". Of course, for any arbitrary thing we could make up in our heads, there is no reason to suppose that there would be people actively doubting the concept. Why would they care? Nobody goes around trying to poke conceptual holes in the notion of unicorns. Unfortunately, it so happens that many, many, many people believe in God, hence atheism as a deliniating term exists and so some strong atheists will tend to exist. They agree with weak atheists but go further. "Yes, this is no more substantiated than any other arbitrary concept we could make up in our head AND as luck would have it, there is a problem with the concept which makes it either extremely unlikely or internally contradictory". (strong atheists differ on their view on that matter)
What makes strong atheism quite powerful is the fact that religious people have this corrosive thing called "faith" and are therefore often not fazed when a weak atheist points out the unsubstantiated nature of their claim. Unfortunately, a successful argument against the concept cannot be ignored in that way.
"Physical reality” isn’t some arbitrary demarcation. It is defined in terms of what we can systematically investigate, directly or not, by means of our senses. It is preposterous to assert that the process of systematic scientific reasoning arbitrarily excludes “non-physical explanations” because the very notion of “non-physical explanation” is contradictory.
-Me
Books about atheism
To pose the reverse of your question, as theists sometimes have doubts about their faith, therefore acknowledging the possibility that there is no god, why do they identify as theists? People have believed in a lot of things, and have often been proven wrong in their belief. Flat earthers believed falsely, but the falsity of their belief did not mean that they didn't believe. Others have not believed in something only to be proven that their lack of belief was incorrect. Lack of belief in an actual city of Troy comes to mind here. Troy existed, but until this was established, the non believers were justified in reserving their belief. We can be wrong. Most of us will quickly admit this. But until we are presented with good reason to reject disbelief, we retain it.
Your second question requires one to define atheism a bit differently than most modern atheists do. Atheism is a lack of belief. If you point to a bag laying flat on the ground and tell me in complete honesty that it is full of baseballs, then you hold a belief that the bag is full of baeballs. Looking at the flat bag for myself, I conclude that there are no baseballs in the bag. I lack your belief in the bag full of baseballs. I do not ( negative ) believe this. This a rejection of belief, not a belief in itself.
As for question three, what belief system? I do not believe in a god or gods. How does lack of something equal belief in something? Like your second question, how does my lack of belief in a bag full of baseballs equate to a belief? How can this possibly " reek of religion "? Is there a church of disbelief? A doctrine? Organized ritual observances? This implies that you equate all beliefs with religion. If I believe that bowling balls can be found in sports shops, is this a religion? If I believe that cars are found on interstates, does this place me in the cult of cars? Are Red Sox fans a religious cult? Is there a Deadhead church? Are people that reject the belief in a Scottish lake monster tithe paying members of the Holy Order of Anti-Nessie?
Sorry my friend, but belief in most things does not constitute a religion, and lack of belief in something certainly doesn't.
It takes a village to raise an idiot.
Save a tree, eat a vegetarian.
Sometimes " The Majority " only means that all the fools are on the same side.