church of atheism

@failures art,

failures art wrote:

Also, we don't do negative proofs. Atheists have no imperative to disprove what has never been proven. Similarly, if I claimed Napoleon was a red head, it wouldn't be your job to prove he wasn't. The claim belongs to me, and the burden falls on me to support my claims. Now, if I don't put any effort into supporting that he had red hair, does that mean a controversy exists? How is it intellectually superior to assume the agnostic middle ground (metaphorically) that we simply don't know? It is a false stalemate.

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Normally Id discuss a bit here, but I tend to relativize eveything into uselessness...

For example, except for "I think therefore i am" and etc, we can never know anything 100%. But still we say that we know things. Where should the boundary be between knowing and not knowing, that is, how much certainty must you have of something to say that you know it?

I mean, for example, we know that the chances of any religion being correct are very, very small. So we (atheists and agnostics) usually simply say that we know that all religions are wrong. But oftenly this "we know" is contested, since we arent 100% sure.

I feel as though discussions regarding god are ultimately held back by language. We dont have enough words to represent these matters, and the words we do have arent well-defined enough.

failures art wrote:

I'm not willing to commit to saying that they don't exist.

The next time I gain god-like powers, I will be sure to create the Flying Spaghetti Monster and command it to go to the 21 century Vatican just for the sake of it =)

reasoning logic wrote:

Very good now you need to become a preacher and get the church to understand this and if you are able to, we will see a advancement in mankind that puts the computer advancements to shame. lol

If god took his holy pencil of flames and wrote "CHRISTIANISM IS FUC**** WRONG" in the sky, the church would say it was the devil and keep on believing =)

No, really, thats how faith is. That is why trying to "convert" people away from religiousness is so frustrating.

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@manored,

manored wrote:

Where should the boundary be between knowing and not knowing, that is, how much certainty must you have of something to say that you know it?

It's a fair question, and I won't speculate on some special tipping point. I think convergence is a hard thing to predict, but it's pretty obvious once it is found.

How many pieces of a 500 piece Mickey Mouse jigsaw puzzle would have to be in place before you definitively say that the picture is Mickey? That's hard to say. What is not hard to say is that the image is not converging on an image of the Titanic... or of Pacman... or of Elmo... The puzzle might be missing pieces, but the people that believe the picture is of Popeye aren't being intellectually honest to say that until we have every piece we can't rule out the picture being of our favorite spinach eating sailor man.

How much certainty? It's hard to quantify, and yes, language limits us here.

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@manored,

manored wrote:

No, really, thats how faith is. That is why trying to "convert" people away from religiousness is so frustrating.

That's why undermining anyone's beliefs is a waste of time, religious or not. But what's the motivation for changing other people? Do you treat them the way you'd like them to treat you? Or would you only be happy if they were exactly like you?

Instead of aiming at creating a void, what about building up something? What's your angle on reality? What excites you about it? What does it facilitate? What vision is at the heart of it?

I mean, do you want your identity to be defined as the negative of somebody who frustrates you? That leaves you bound to them, because without them... you'd be what?

On the other hand... are you sure you really understood them?

1 Reply

in this church of atheism what then does atheism believe in then ?

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@Arjuna,

Arjuna wrote:

manored wrote:

No, really, thats how faith is. That is why trying to "convert" people away from religiousness is so frustrating.

That's why undermining anyone's beliefs is a waste of time, religious or not. But what's the motivation for changing other people? Do you treat them the way you'd like them to treat you? Or would you only be happy if they were exactly like you?

Other people interfere with my life as well as the progress of humanity. If most people believe something different from me, then humanity goes down a path I dont want it to go. Taking a real example, experimentation with embryos is forbidden in many countries due to christian or christianity influenced morality. I do not hold this same system of morality, so I see it as a stone in the way of scientific advancement. Another real example: In my country there is a religion that says its members should go from door to door trying to convince people to join then, and they do. Its really bothersome, but their religion says they should do it, so there is no way to contest that without contesting their religion.

I wish things were as simple as ignoring other beliefs, but they arent. Off course, sometimes ignoring is possible, but it isnt always. We live in a democracy and so other beliefs will influence my life even if I dont want to have anything to do with then.

There is also a factor of wanting to help others evolve. Now, I know that this sounds arrogant, but I personally find the position of theist intellectually inferior to the position of atheist or agnostic. Its just because I was raised a theist but evolved out if it naturally as I realized it didnt made sense and held me back in several levels. But, off course, I understand that people who are in a "lower stage" wont see it that way, in the same way that if I myself im in a "lower stage" in relation to someone else, I wont see it, probaly even if they try to show me. I dont bother people for this reason, I only give a light nudge and see if they roll along. But then they start interfering in my life I have to do something about it.

1 Reply

@manored,

manored wrote:

Arjuna wrote:

manored wrote:

No, really, thats how faith is. That is why trying to "convert" people away from religiousness is so frustrating.

That's why undermining anyone's beliefs is a waste of time, religious or not. But what's the motivation for changing other people? Do you treat them the way you'd like them to treat you? Or would you only be happy if they were exactly like you?
Other people interfere with my life as well as the progress of humanity. If most people believe something different from me, then humanity goes down a path I dont want it to go. Taking a real example, experimentation with embryos is forbidden in many countries due to christian or christianity influenced morality. I do not hold this same system of morality, so I see it as a stone in the way of scientific advancement. Another real example: In my country there is a religion that says its members should go from door to door trying to convince people to join then, and they do. Its really bothersome, but their religion says they should do it, so there is no way to contest that without contesting their religion.

I wish things were as simple as ignoring other beliefs, but they arent. Off course, sometimes ignoring is possible, but it isnt always. We live in a democracy and so other beliefs will influence my life even if I dont want to have anything to do with then.

There is also a factor of wanting to help others evolve. Now, I know that this sounds arrogant, but I personally find the position of theist intellectually inferior to the position of atheist or agnostic. Its just because I was raised a theist but evolved out if it naturally as I realized it didnt made sense and held me back in several levels. But, off course, I understand that people who are in a "lower stage" wont see it that way, in the same way that if I myself im in a "lower stage" in relation to someone else, I wont see it, probaly even if they try to show me. I dont bother people for this reason, I only give a light nudge and see if they roll along. But then they start interfering in my life I have to do something about it.

continue the light nudge , perhaps they will grow we shall see

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Lets make it a religion!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I92vQ0Nj4LA

1 Reply

@reasoning logic,

reasoning logic wrote:

Lets make it a religion!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I92vQ0Nj4LA

Being a religion does give an organization some nice governamental bonuses... =)

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I'm surprised that I never saw this thread until today. Everyone sparkled; it was fun. My only belated addition is that my atheism is no more than the absence of a particular kind of belief, not the presence of any kind of doctrine. I do not believe in a No-God and worship Him in some kind of Church, substantial or metaphorical.

1 Reply

@JLNobody,

Amen JLNobody! Smile

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