ILX Religiosity and Spirituality and Agnosticity and Atheicity Poll

yeah i guess when the full spectrum of human behavior is present among believers and nonbelievers i'm like "so what does this actually do?"

xp only if you didn't score a sweet gig in the vatican somewhere tbh

Most of which are exacerbated by the actions of various churches around the world.

Sure. But I tend to be of the opinion that the the form of the relationship is capitalism shaping churches, rather than churches altering the drive of capitalism (after all, if the machinations of such navel-gazing institutions as churches has any serious impact on economic structure then capitalism would have died out a long time ago. But churches, while occupying a peculiar relation to production, are as much controlled by these forces as any other institution, and any dogma finding itself incompatible with capitalism would be sidelined or eliminated. Though depending on your political views that may not apply)

I'd be shocked if the members of these awful churches would concede that the bible was just a bunch of stories, actually.

xp

In the same way that fundamentalism has a recognizable profile built around acceptance of the Bible as the inerrant word of god, the standard profile of atheism, when espoused as a philosophy, is also recognizable and Dawkins provides a fairly good example.

It may be that the actual "standard issue atheist", as determined by sheer numbers, is simply someone who has a profound disinterest in anything remotely like religion, thinks of it rarely, if at all, and could not say more than five sentences on the subject without resorting to repetition.

Neither the Dawkins-type of militant, engaged, anti-religious atheist, nor the unengaged, apathetic atheist is likely to have much interest in or understanding of mysticism. The Dawkins type has almost nothing to say on the matter, other than to dismiss it as a chemical abberation in the brain.

all of your atheists are pretty unpleasant on the subject of religion in general tbh

So, now that we've moved from "spirituality" to "mysticism," can someone explain exactly just a) what these two things are, and b) what the difference is between them? And what their interaction with "religion" is? Because we've got an awful lot of nonspecific terms being tossed about here in the process of deriding us poor, lonely, intellectual incurious and unwise atheists, who are yet somehow also disproportionately powerful and angry-making.

Certainly it says that "belief in god" is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for acting like a decent human being.

Fully agreed. A "belief in god" is a cipher, upon which almost any image may be cast by the believer. I, myself, do not believe in god, but rather in compassion and spiritual enlightenment. God, whatever it may or may not be, is of little interest to me. Clearly, if god exists, he's doing fine all on his own. My worship of god is as unnecessary as my fear of god.

wk, yeah lots of churches are fucked up. Which says nothing about the validity of a belief in god.

I didn't say that it did, and I have a hard time believing that's what Dawkins was saying to dowd. Atheists don't believe in god because they see no reasonable evidence that god exists. They might also condemn various religious institutions for their actions, but that's not why they don't believe in god. It's just that the conversation tends to end up there when the religious say "all genocides are the result of atheism, and religion is nothing but a force for good in the world, etc".

fwiw there may be some overlap in that one can use the actions of the religious as evidence for the nonexistence of god.

the conversation tends to end up there when the religious say "all genocides are the result of atheism, and religion is nothing but a force for good in the world, etc".

I understand how this works. Seen many thousand times on the internet. You were refuting the argument you anticipated, rather than the arguments that were made. I'm pretty sure the absolute goodness of religion or evil of atheism has not been claimed by anyone in this thread.

God knows, I do this, too.

There was a recent? book out by a convert where the dude basically couldn't reconcile an omnipotent, interventionist God with the suffering he saw in the world, so his backsliding was doctrinally based, rather than pure evidence.

I have a hard time believing that's what Dawkins was saying to dowd

Oh, it wasn't. They were just general kind of chats, the kind you have after lectures - this was late 90s, he wasn't quite the boogeyman he is now. He just seemed to be arguing against strawmen, possibly because he's not a philosopher by trade - retreading the ontological argument etc.

As for mysticism, generally it refers to a claim of direct knowledge or experience of the divine. Fairly influential in Christianity - John of the Cross or St Theresa for example. Anyway, it usually includes a kind of self-justification, an internal necessity of truth, and it is usually considered beyond communication (as in trying to explain 'yellow' to a blind man). If you want to be cynical, this is all very convenient, and the similarity between accounts of 'godhead' and experiences during siezures has not gone without notice.

xp

There are probably many excellent definitions of mysticism out there, but i can't be arsed to hunt them down. I would contend that mysticism is based on personal experience which the believer comprehends as numinous. It is directly experienced, not derived from any philosophy, and by nature uncommunicable.

Mystical traditions tend to center around accumulating empirical techniques that increase the chance that the seeker will reproduce the same or similar numinous experiences. They also specialize in gnomic sayings, since the experience cannot be explained or transmitted, but only hinted at.

The major religions all have mystical offshoots, which are only barely respectable, since the mystics often deride the mainstream as misguided, polluted and ineffectual.

You were refuting the argument you anticipated, rather than the arguments that were made.

Nonsense. I was responding to a specific point made by dowd.

I mean, the general thrust of this thread is that anyone who doesn't believe that gods exist is a "hardcore atheist", as stated in the poll wording. The consensus seems to be that Richard Dawkins is the representative of this entire group of people, labeled by you as "standard issue atheists". Or rather I guess you gave us a choice where atheists can either be "militant" or "unengaged and apathetic."

So apparently these people aren't supposed to point out real world examples of religion's wrongdoing, because that bothers people like dowd, as seen in the Dawkins anecdote. But then dowd goes on to say that "frankly, I find myself much more concerned by poverty levels, preventable disease, the need for democratization of our socio-economic system, climate change etc. than whether or not one guy gets pissed off by someone preaching in the streets". So an atheist can't voice his concern about the actions of the church as they relate to those issues, because it offends the faithful, who are too busy worrying about those same problems, and anyway, it's not my church, I'm a good christian, etc.

Sorry, I think I must have been expressing myself badly last night (which is highly likely, I was kind of drunk). My point about real world concerns was not that this was the domain of religion, but rather that the debate between theists and atheists is a distraction from real problems. And yes, religious groups are part of this problem, and have a lot to answer for in these areas, and should be held to account whenever possible. And there are plenty of strong or hard-line atheists who are a powerful force for good in the world, and have a positive and inspiring vision for a world without religion which is to be applauded. I just happen to think that they're wrong about God, which is no big deal really, is it?

I guess all I was feebly trying to express is that atheism/theism is an argument about a philosophical position, and shouldn't be used as the defining category for mankind, as many people (especially religious people, splitting the world into a war between the faithful and the unfaithful). Criticism of the actions of religions is a necessary part of any struggle for a better world (as is criticising the actions of governments, aid programs, commercial companies etc.) and I would never expect someone to hold their tongue for fear of causing offense. But historical and political examples of religious malpractice are clearly not arguments against the existence of gods.

So, to (try to) clarify - I'm not anti-atheist; I think it's unfortunate that Dawkins has (perhaps against his will) become the spokesman for atheism, mostly because I think he's not very good as it; and I'm sorry if I was confused about what I was trying to say.

Pretty much the least of my worries is 'offending the faithful' but my atheism is underpinned by being reasonably well-informed about other people's belief systems. My reply to offended parties, probably since I was about 11, has always been along the lines of 'I am quite sure your imaginary friend can take a bit of disinterested criticism, see also turning of the other cheek.'

I have more fights on whether I'm right or wrong with my mom, who believes in God but not in any form of organized religion (because denominations are all about making a fast buck), and most of the scientists I've known identify as agnostic - my best friend's dad (major scientist) was always saying that 'not knowing' was the only rational choice for anyone who worked proving things or not for a living.

Nunez was all downhill after the juggaloes comment, which was both perfect and wrong in the way that Jesus was both God and man.

xp that's a philosophical not a scientific opinion tho, and easily arguable.

My own thoughts on this are difficult to put into a message board post, but I do think that God vs. organized religion is the wrong argument, and "God exists" vs. "God does not exist" is also the wrong argument -- probably the more wrong one. Most of this thread seems to hang on the assumption that God is one thing, no matter how incorporeal or widely dispersed. Monotheism has messed with us hard for 6000 years. God didn't used to be like this.

God was awesome until he signed to major label

The Jews totally sold him out.

Most of this thread seems to hang on the assumption that God is one thing, no matter how incorporeal or widely dispersed

most of the world seems to hang on this assumption?

I KNOW

It frustrates me

I voted for "poetry of the ocean at night, man" and thanks for the mockery.

(from the thread starter, I mean)

God is what is beyond you, I believe by definition. Trying to form a concept of something that you can't possibly form a concept of is a useful exercise. Every religion knows this, and is built from that idea. Something you can almost wrap your head around, but simply cannot -- that's where there's God. I don't mean a "God of the gaps" argument -- it's not about intelligence or knowledge. Philosophers and theologians have been running against the same edges of the same kinds of brains for thousands of years, but they have all agreed that there is something that they can't quite get at. But that's just it -- God is a lesson, not a being. He's a lesson so big that he probably deserves a name all by himself, but let's be careful how we talk about him, because if you're not careful, before you know it there's a man in the sky that you can ask for favors. Monotheism brought God one un-useful step closer to being more like ourselves -- if God made us in his image, then we have a more concrete concept of what he is, and that's a jack that we can crank until we're nearly at his level. This defeats the purpose of his being there altogether, and misses the point. God has no ego, he has no identity, he's as inconceivable as the idea of Nothingness. Nothingness is not empty space; it's nothing. God is not a thing; it's God.

Dowd is the most consistently OTM person here.

Dowd's been making sense all along to me, and Aimless's piece on mysticism was very interesting to read (apart from his hating atheists :))

Kenan, I have no grasp of your concept of what God is or may be. That's not a criticism or anything though.

I have no grasp of your concept of what God is or may be

Exactly what I just said.

I mean that sentence, which you just said, is also what I just said.

omg we have a church hi 5

Let's burn a Koran to celebrate

xp God rotisserie

Am doubtful of yr notion that personification is a later development of our idea of god, and not the earliest idea of all.

You may be right. There's no way to know for certain, I don't think.

It seems to me that a pagan world view disperses the concept of evil more efficiently, though. "Why do bad things happen to good people?" "Because they pissed off the wrong deity."

It makes sense that the oldest One God is also a very cranky one.

Part of what is frustrating about the new fundamentalism in the US is their assumption that this is what Christians have always been like. It's probably impossible for us to understand how, say, 10th century Christians understood their faith (finally got around to reading Veyne's 'Did the Greeks Believe in their Myths', which was awesome, though mostly for it's questions rather than it's answers).

I believe in the book of Job, I think. The world is wonderful, and then it's awful, and it all seems meaningless much of the time, but if you ask God why, his answer is going to be, "You don't get to ask that question, little one." God seems like a bit of an egotist as he explains to Job that he made everything, and Job is very small by comparison, but that's not what the writer is getting at. Imagine Job as a stand-in for all the writer's questions, and God as a stand-in not for a supreme supernatural being but instead for everything the writer is awed and cowed by, and God's speech makes perfect sense. "You do not get to ask."

Thik you're confusing 'Book of Job' with 'ILX FAQ' there

Shh! I'm trying to be all deep and shit.

I love Job - and it's interesting in that it has pretty much always (from early Judaism through the Church fathers on up) been considered an allegory, and Job not a historical figure. It's only recently that biblical literalism got a hold of some groups that this changed.

xp yeah sorry, that was a good post. Think underrated aerosmith and others have stanned hard for 'Book of Job' before too.

iirc the acceptance of the creation story in Genesis as literal started with Martin Luther, and remains primarily a feature of protestantism?

boy that guy really liked to stir it up huh

tho not having entered a discussion on theology with a priest since i was maybe 11, i couldn't give you an irish catholic perspective for certain- but i think that if asked officially they have to declare as literalists as well so not sure about it being 'mainly protestant'

I've kind of lost track of what is happening in this thread any more (I now understand that the things I was objecting to in Phil N's posts are basically some wacky misreading of atheism that not even the atheists on this thread agree with.)

Dowd has been talking a lot of sense, especially:

the debate between theists and atheists is a distraction from real problems.

Yeah, this has been my experience again and again, that it tends to divide people (who might otherwise work together on solving those problems).

I think it's quite easy for Atheists to fall into the trap of saying "religion is the cause of 90% of the world's problems!" when actually it's something more like "humanity is the cause of 90% of the world's problems" and "90% of the world's humans are the cause of the world's religions." B and C may be true, but that doesn't mean that A follows.

(And this is probably the atheist equivalent of the "how can you be moral without god?" fallacy.)

xp Martin Luther presented the creation story as being literal because he didn't think the unwashed masses understood the concept of allegory. Or, even more cynically, he understood that "it's just a story" was no way to start a revolution.