Atheism

I am not joking... You seem to have an issue with sex. Why not discuss it?

Of course, men do as their women wishes... but that's sometimes a sweet sweet surrender.

I don't have any issue with sex. It is this thread that has an issue with sex.

That it is not admitted doesn't alter that.

I am discussing the matter. I have been for ten years.



If you read on after the Virgil passage I provided you will see that Vulcan is ashamed of granting Venus her wish and admonished her for stooping to such tricks which only vowed celibates can resist.

It sounds as if you are ready the climb up onto the cross. Beware of ladies sporting crucifixes. They are not all Christians.

For Vulcan, post coitum anima triste.

I climbed on that marital cross a long time ago. It's been quite a ride to maintain my capacity for individual choices.

What a very, very nice man Mr de Botton seems to be. What an array of virtues he obviously sports.

Alain de Boton is one of Britain's biggest Proust fan; he even wrote a "how to" book based on Proustian psychology... (i.e. what does Proust tell us about love, friendship, etc). Decent stuff.

His list of atheist virtues seems ok to me. IMO, it's not so difficult to see where they come from: not Christianity, but the old Roman virtues.

Auctoritas
"Spiritual Authority" The sense of one's social standing, built up through experience, Pietas, and Industria.
Comitas
"Humour" Ease of manner, courtesy, openness, and friendliness.
Clementia
"Mercy" Mildness and gentleness.
Dignitas
"Dignity" A sense of self-worth, personal pride.
Firmitas
"Tenacity" Strength of mind, the ability to stick to one's purpose.
Frugalitas
"Frugalness" Economy and simplicity of style, without being miserly.
Gravitas
"Gravity" A sense of the importance of the matter at hand, responsibility and earnestness.
Honestas
"Respectibility" The image that one presents as a respectable member of society.
Humanitas
"Humanity" Refinement, civilization, learning, and being cultured.
Industria
"Industriousness" Hard work.
Pietas
"Dutifulness" More than religious piety; a respect for the natural order socially, politically, and religiously. Includes the ideas of patriotism and devotion to others.
Prudentia
"Prudence" Foresight, wisdom, and personal discretion.
Salubritas
"Wholesomeness" Health and cleanliness.
Severitas
"Sternness" Gravity, self-control.
Veritas
"Truthfulness" Honesty in dealing with others.

I recognise in these Roman virtues (the list varies) the values my folks taught me as a child, though of course nobody could tell where these values came from. They have little to see with Christian values, but are very similar and probably share the same origin as the Norse pagan virtues (see Nine Noble Virtues).

Therefore, coming up with a non-christian value system is not really difficult: our "western" value system was never that strongly influenced by Christianity to start with. It was always much more strongly rooted in Indo-European "virtues".

Have you read anything about life in the Pagan era Oliver?

Values need structure. They can get a bit mushy without one. They are getting a bit mushy these days it strikes me. "The Honourable Member for Expenses Fiddling" for example.

No doubt such a list was compiled by those with dignitas, gravitas and extensive lands comprising many small farms and a mansion in the city decorated with loot. And with an odd sense of humour. It had to be odd because anybody who doesn't find dignity and gravity funny hasn't got a proper sense of humour. Courtiers who did soon found themselves leading the troops on the far distant frontiers.

It is my view that without the structure the simple folks like ourselves would never have heard of such high-falutin rhetoric. Such language would still, in the Year of The Bubbling Stream, (2014 being a Christian calculator accepted right round the rolling stone and, as such out of place here), be confined to what is facetiously known as the Upper Crust.

Mr de Botton has credible pretentions to belong to that august body but I'm afraid I don't. The list makes me titter. As it would have Thersites and Proust his very self. There are not many stones Proust didn't turnover.

Proust needs to be read in a manner which gets as close as it can to getting the story told by the man from one bar stool to another in the small hours at The Ritz. So that one senses a shift of an eyebrow and when you're being looked straight in the eye.

I have read about life in the pagan era, quite a lot actually. Including from authors who had very little respect for the Christians and a lot of respect for the Pagans. And structures existed too back then, such as family.

I don't want to be too moralistic, and agree with your critique of the Roman values "in practice"... But values are important nevertheless, over and beyond the lies they sometimes say: they set the tone, they define expectation for behavior.

You were the one who brought up the need for an atheist ethos. Don't pull back now.

I'm not pulling back. It is the sexual virtues of the masses which are important.

Other cultures have and had sexual virtues. Many of them very strict. Some are said by anthropologists to be not only strict but beyond human comprehension.

Take their wine as a paradigm case. It was really alcohol. Meths. It was not like our wine. It got them pissed. Sure--ours gets us pissed but it does something else. It creates moods.

Values might require close attention to the details of their fermentation in various conditions and circumstances if lasting success is to be achieved.

It is the structure that provides that attention. It is imperfect because humans are, as yet, imperfect.

Most atheists are content to rely on the past imperfections. Unless some bloke has faked his way into the structure in order to carry out evil acts. Other than that, cases which Media brings into focus, it is past imperfections that are relied upon. And there is plenty to go at.

One might just as well criticise the food industry for the past imperfections of the food supply. Obviously ridiculous.

My atheist ethos is only at the stage which alcohol use was at when some rotting fruit was found to make you feel better than you have done in years. I haven't thought it through yet.

I can't decide whether to have alphas, betas, gammas, and epsilons or have everybody take their turn in each social station like the Lancashire Mill owner who insists his son does.

Mark Levin Goes nuts on an atheist.

I love the young turks...

Re the list of "Virtues" posted earlier, it's interesting to note some are diametrically opposite to Christianity, for example to name three-
"Respectibility" The image that one presents as a respectable member of society.
"Industriousness" Hard work.
"Wholesomeness" Health and cleanliness.

Fact is, Jesus's young cousin John had no interest in becoming a "respectable clean and healthy hardworking member of society"!
He had no job, preferring to live rough in the wilderness dressed in near-rags, sometimes going in town to yell insults at the snooty priests and corrupt rulers. Jesus's verdict on him?-
"John is the greatest man ever to be born!" (Matt 11:11)

John in action against Herod and Salome-


"In the wilderness of Judea...John’s clothes were made of camel’s hair, and he had a leather belt around his waist. His food was locusts and wild honey" (Matt 3:1-4)

Nathan Phelps, son of Westboro Baptist Church leader Fred Phelps issues a powerful statement about his dad passing away:

“Fred Phelps is now the past.
The present and the future are for the living.

Unfortunately, Fred’s ideas have not died with him, but live on, not just among the members of Westboro Baptist Church, but among the many communities and small minds that refuse to recognize the equality and humanity of our brothers and sisters on this small planet we share.

I will mourn his passing, not for the man he was, but for the man he could have been. I deeply mourn the grief and pain felt by my family members denied their right to visit him in his final days. They deserved the right to finally have closure to decades of rejection, and that was stolen from them.

Even more, I mourn the ongoing injustices against the LGBT community, the unfortunate target of his 23 year campaign of hate.
His life impacted many outside the walls of the WBC compound, uniting us across all spectrums of orientation and belief as we realized our strength lies in our commonalities, and not our differences.
How many times have communities risen up together in a united wall against the harassment of my family? Differences have been set aside for that cause, tremendous and loving joint efforts mobilized within hours…and because of that, I ask this of everyone – let his death mean something. Let every mention of his name and of his church be a constant reminder of the tremendous good we are all capable of doing in our communities.

The lessons of my father were not unique to him, nor will this be the last we hear of his words, which are echoed from pulpits as close as other churches in Topeka, Kansas, where WBC headquarters remain, and as far away as Uganda. Let’s end the support of hateful and divisive teachings describing the LGBT community as “less than,” “sinful,” or “abnormal.”

Embrace the LGBT community as our equals, our true brothers and sisters, by promoting equal rights for everyone, without exception. My father was a man of action, and I implore us all to embrace that small portion of his faulty legacy by doing the same.”

I don't see why the virtues of the elite would not matter, nor why virtues related to other things than sex would be worthless: the prohibition of murder and theft, the values of hard work and hospitality have little to do with sex but are massively important for a group's survival...

My point is that Christian values have not had much impact on the "dominant western value system" (assuming one can generalise so much, "main western values systems" if one cannot). The Nietzschean project to remove supposedly deleterious Christian values from the European culture was rather wrong-footed IMO, because rare are the features of the message of Jesus that were adopted as fundamental tenets by European societies. Love your enemy? Share all your riches with the poor? Don't work because God will provide?... errr.... Who, when during the centuries of war and profit?

There is another thread about how much of Christianity is of pagan origin. The correct answer to that is of course 100% (Judaism itself has pagan origins). This has relevance to our values systems: the real values that shaped European societies from the get-go have been pagan, with a light sprinkling of Jesus' message. These values are about hard work, bravery at war, honor and other ridiculous and macho things like that; you find an echo of them in the various lists of pagan virtues from the Roman virtues to the Norse and to the Prussian ones and in the "protestant ethic of capitalism" too. They lead Europe to expansionist, industrious and capitalist societies. They led to our brightest successes and our darkest catastrophes. They never were static though. They were at all times being rethought, recast and re-written, with greater emphasis placed here or there, and our times will be no exception.

We need a modern set of virtues for a modern world. There is no way around it. And sexual rights and duties are certainly part of it but only a part of it.

Apparently the Westboro baptists had announced they would be protesting at Lorde's Kansas City concert. Forewarned, local residents prepared this.



Love it when atheists are more Christian than Christians. Ie most of the time

Indeed.

Thank you for taking the discussion seriously Oliver.

That cannot be said for the posts surrounding it which are based on the sheer cultural irrelevance of one report about one man whose lust for publicity knew no bounds of decency and whose "church" seems to have consisted of the members of his extended family located in one small district of one small town.

One has to wonder about the defensiveness and obvious insecurity of those who have clutched at such a fragment of straw. That they think some relevant point is being made is a fair measure of how far their underestimation of the intelligence of others has progressed to. It is as bad as the case when an allegation that one teacher had burnt a cross on a student's arm with a Tesla device was latched onto to prove that evolution should be taught in public schools.

When such arguments are brought forth it is clear that nothing but a personal mission is under consideration and that those who do so are no different from those Islamic fundamentalists who tried to paint over 300 million Americans in the colours of one nutcase who sought to burn a Koran for the TV cameras.

Your post raises issues of consequence. Unfortunately I cannot properly address it because I would need to say things which are not to be said to an audience such as there is here. I will say that the Emperor Augustus attempted and failed to produce an "expansionist" Roman citizenry capable of dealing with threats from outside: mainly from the east. Thus the Empire was forced to recruit people of many religions and allegiances which explains its toleration of those religions and possibly also its decline.

Now that technology has, more or less, replaced weight of numbers, which might be seen as a disadvantage, a rethink of the theology is in order and, indeed, such a rethink is taking place. There was no Phelpsianism in the Pope's recent gestures towards the homosexual community, if there is such a thing as a single homosexual community, nor in many judicial decisions, which rather makes the continual bleating redundant. There will be no retreat on abortion though.

The "people" are not wrong, imo, to reject atheism. The very idea of 300 odd million being like me is impossible to contemplate. These wuss atheists on this thread, and in the pubs, think that nothing much would change if the population accepted their arguments and were content to rely on nothing but carrots and sticks, some rattling in a bucket, and deployed even in the bedroom. Which I can easily think up practical methods of doing so.

Sex for running faster as even the Zulus practiced in a crude fashion. As do we in a somewhat discreet manner. You have lightly alluded to your position on the cross. Even your eagerness for it.

As a bloke I'm against all that sort of ****. And I have a plan, using genetic modification techniques, mass hypnosis and industrialised sex selection to avoid the blokes of the future having to deal with it.



When it comes to straw men that's Top of the Pops.

Doesn't Benjamin Braddock end up crucified at the end of The Graduate? Symbolically I mean.

Huh, scientists can't even agree whether global warming is a natural thing or caused by human pollution..