are you an atheist?

Oh well if you're talking about all-time, religion is hugely important to the organising of society as well as a cultural inspiration.

I think those roles - in the positive sense, at least - are somewhat diminished these days. Psychological reassurance is still very important.

I think religion is pretty awesome in a lot of ways on an individual level, and more often than not I find myself actively wishing that I was a (liberal, non-dogmatic) religious person. But I can't be, because I just don't think/feel/believe/whatever that there is any sort of supernatural anything. It's weird to me when believers try to act like it's this choice I've made in defiance of everything in order to be "right". I honestly think I'd probably be a happier person if I could be religious, but I didn't pick a team here, it's just how I see the world.

otm. i miss being young and having that kind of comfort (though I don't miss the fear of damnation). I'm just not capable of it anymore. And I'm glad I'm not, all in all.

en eye see kay, try Buddhism on for size. It is much easier to eliminate the supernatural from it and still have many excellent traditions to choose from (e.g. Zen). Just be aware that the Zen idea of 'nature' may look 'supernatural' to you, until you get what they're driving at (via satori).

Can you say more about the Zen idea of nature, Aimless? I'm interested.

Afaics, a zen buddhist's idea of nature is completely compatible with that of particle physics, except for the particles maybe. (joeks)

It is hard to be clear about this stuff in words and talking around it just makes most people dizzy. Zen seeks a direct experience of nature and meditation is a sort of training for this, although satori is always possible to everyone at all times, with or without meditation. A good portal into this stuff is the Tao Teh Ching.

fwiw, this is my bag and is on a totally different wavelength from supernatural explanations of divinity: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panentheism#Judaism

the next section also that discusses gnosticism (where my gnostics at???)

Fuck the demiurge. Hail Sophia.

Psychological benefits of a religious person thinking they know The Truth about reality and psychological benefits of an atheist thinking they know The Truth about reality.

I think there's something in a more mystical approach to spirituality that sort of bridges the gap. However, it's a pretty abstract bridge.

Robin Hanson isn't suggesting that the benefits of being religious are from thinking you know The Truth about reality. His example is that by wanting to associate w/ the highest status friend (GOD) you can change your behavior to more closely represent what you want (by thinking, I guess, GOD would really love me more if I did X, Y, Z). If you're an atheist you also think you know The Truth about reality but that truth is that there is no higher status friend to motivate you.

You could say that some metaphysic ideal or ethical system compels your behavior, but it's hard to place them outside yourself in a tangible way bc they're more idk intellectual.

i follow the bro code

imo (& iirc) the 'higher status friend' as motivating factor doesn't even compete with the 'omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent judgemental supervisor'- losing belief in this dude did nothing for my grades let me tell u

There's plenty of religious people that don't have that kind of reductive concept of God. It sounds less like a spiritual truth and more like a self-esteem or ego problem.

Religion doesn't really have that great a hold on how people behave, though they will say otherwise, oftentimes very loudly. Catholics and Baptists seem to have similar ethical systems, so do Christians and Atheists. Stealing is bad, killing is bad, don't lie, etc. are all lessons that everyone who grows up in modern society pretty much believes in, no matter what they label themselves as.

Many years ago I knew an English academic called D@n H3dl3y, who was a Victorianist (at least that’s what his PhD was in), and he was the biggest bag of contradictions, and one of the most fascinating conversationalists, I ever met. You used to see him walking around the town with his iPod (he was the first person I knew with one, must’ve been back in 2002) very audibly blasting Public Enemy. He left academia to go to London and work in advertising because he decided he wanted to make lots of money, which somehow seemed both at odds with his personality and utterly inline with it.

Anyway, amongst his weirdest foibles, and biggest contradictions, was his religious life. D@n was a practicising Catholic, yet professed to not really believe in God on any kind of spiritual level (as I recall; the conversation was a decade ago, long, involved, and very confusing for me and Billy, who were on the other side of it, questioning D@n about his beliefs).

I’m pretty sure he hadn’t been raised a Catholic, at least not in any devout, fire-and-brimstone, confession-once-a-week way. His Catholicism was, as far as we could understand from his very long, very strange explanation, a pragmatic decision based on the fact that he thought people as individuals and society as a whole functioned better when it was galvanised by religious belief of some kind. With this belief in mind (but, seemingly, no love for, of even sense of, God in his soul), he decided on Catholicism, which seemed to fit in the centre of some venn diagram of morality, convenience, amusement, spectacle, routine and ritual. And so he wore a crucifix around his neck, went to church once a week, and assumed the role of God-fearing disciple, all the while not actually believing in God. Billy and I, both convinced, sceptical atheists, found this absolutely fascinating.

i'm not knocking the supervisory god, i'd love one tbh. he p much *is* the irish catholic god, tho, and in living memory religion (and the apparatus of same) very much dictated how people behaved here.

<I>If you're an atheist you also think you know The Truth about reality but that truth is that there is no higher status friend to motivate you.</I>

That's why we all worship Richard Dawkins and Bertrand Russell duh

couldn't figure out if this would be best here or in the vice thread but this is the one of the two i had bookmarked:

http://www.vice.com/read/hey-atheists-just-shut-up-please

Said it many times around here but my personal position isn't that we need more atheism, necessarily, but a deeper more reflective thinking about religion. In just a pragmatic sense, "attacking" religious beliefs plays into fundamentalism's essential logic.

Looking forward in this thread to being a dick about people being dicks about people being dicks about religion.

and anyone who does think they know, whether they be a christian fundie or militant atheist, irritates the snot out of me.

haha You must be my husband. This is one of the very few things we fight about. This is one of'em. I am a radical atheist. That said, I could care less what others think. So what is our fight about? The fact I take a radical stance. He says there's no way you can that.

deeper more reflective thinking about religion
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/61FzRzoLjrL._BO2,204,203,200_PIsitb-sticker-arrow-click,TopRight,35,-76_AA300_SH20_OU01_.jpg

I heard about Alain de Botton and his School of Life (a secular church alternative in London) via the APR program On Being
The SoL's Secular Sermons are worth perusing.

The David Bodanis sermon on the Ten Commandments is interesting less for the subject than a glimpse at what may be the most highly-strung person on the planet.

we need a companion thread to this one called are you a believer?

after I saw her face, yes

we need a companion thread to this one called are you a believer?

― Mordy, Monday, September 24, 2012 9:12 AM (34 minutes ago)

I'd follow that with interest, and wouldn't troll it.

Reddit Atheism isn’t about philosophy or even adult conversation;

shocking

Reddit is too popular to not be drowned out by assholes.

But then he says this:

...unless you end up making a career out of “debating” religious people, a la Christopher Hitchens or Richard Dawkins. (By the way, what is more arrogant than assuming someone can be reasoned into abandoning their faith?)

Does this mean that even in the context of adult debate it's arrogant to assume that a person's beliefs are receptive to reasons? That's actually the opposite of arrogance. It's attributing rationality and open-mindedness to your opponent.

it's making a category mistake about what "faith" is

i'm an atheist, but i don't blame people for being religious. the fact that we're inevitably going to fall into non-existence in a handful of decades is still a little freaky. reddit-style richard dawkins atheists never seem to brush on things like that, or say like "we're going to be atoms one day - yeah!" which really means jack shit imo since you can't perceive squat when you don't exist.

from this standpoint, on a personal level it doesn't matter what anyone believes, and being evangelical on one end or the other is utterly pointless. socially, people are going to do fucked up shit whether through religion or not since religion in that sense is just a means to an end, and it's not like the end's gonna change by switching up the tools.

I speak of a subtype of militant atheists who I’ll call the “Reddit Atheists.” These are the folks who have, ironically, adopted the attitudes of hardcore evangelicals who try to convert strangers on subway platforms

I bet there's a nontrivial difference between these two groups of people that even the writer can figure out if given ample time. I'll start the clock.

As an atheist, my only real opposition to religion and spiritual belief existing at all is I feel that the human race collectively would be more open to the search for new information, and ignorance without religious ideology wouldn't have a reason to slow that down.

people are going to do fucked up shit whether through religion or not since religion in that sense is just a means to an end

for sure. the question is whether a lack of religion would decrease the degree and frequency of people doing fucked up shit. thinking there's no chance it wouldn't reflects a cynical view on humanity that doesn't do anyone any good imo.

reddit-style richard dawkins atheists never seem to brush on things like that, or say like "we're going to be atoms one day - yeah!" which really means jack shit imo since you can't perceive squat when you don't exist.

Perception (at least the 3D 'Real World' phenomenon we take that to mean) is overrated imo. It's rather unfortunate and ironic that many who describe themselves as atheists or strict materialists still place immense importance on personal perception.

Thomas Nagel reviews Alvin Plantinga, a philosophical defender of religious belief:

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2012/sep/27/philosopher-defends-religion/

So what is our fight about? The fact I take a radical stance. He says there's no way you can do that.

My wife and I differ in our beliefs. But we know better than to fight about it (actually I'm not sure why we don't, but we don't). Instead, we emphasize common ground, of which there is a surprisingly large area, and I mainly concern myself with whether her beliefs are likely to lead to actions that do any kind of harm to herself or others. If they pass that test, I just listen and nod my head and let her think what pleases her.

reddit-style richard dawkins atheists never seem to brush on things like that, or say like "we're going to be atoms one day - yeah!" which really means jack shit imo since you can't perceive squat when you don't exist.

Perception (at least the 3D 'Real World' phenomenon we take that to mean) is overrated imo. It's rather unfortunate and ironic that many who describe themselves as atheists or strict materialists still place immense importance on personal perception.

― Emperor Cos Dashit (Adam Bruneau), Monday, September 24, 2012 11:38 AM (1 minute ago)

Agreed, but I'm curious where you've seen examples of atheists do this. Not a challenge just would like to see.

"people are going to do fucked up shit whether through religion or not"

the kind of fucked up shit people do outside of religion is going to be limited to putting sardines on pizza, or putting human clothing on animals and taking pictures of them. it's very hard to think of egregious examples that don't have at least some religious flavor to them. it's almost tautological that really fucked up shit is going to involve religion, even if it's a religion of one.

Oh, boy, that book review o. nate linked to. "Evangelical Protestant believes theists are rubber, atheists are glue, and that the latter have something broken in their brains. Also, lots of special pleading! Film at 11."

for sure. the question is whether a lack of religion would decrease the degree and frequency of people doing fucked up shit. thinking there's no chance it wouldn't reflects a cynical view on humanity that doesn't do anyone any good imo.

Some social ills would be eliminated w/o religion, but secular society isn't some grand fantasy land of lovely pro-human rationalism. We still have consumerism, wage slavery, paranoia, fear, xenophobia, nationalism, ideology and politics, etc. In the US we utterly destroyed a nation and peaced out for what? Profit, fear, and the inherent flaws in human thinking. We're never not going to be flawed, religion or not. We can't scapegoat religion for our own shortcomings as a species.

Perception (at least the 3D 'Real World' phenomenon we take that to mean) is overrated imo. It's rather unfortunate and ironic that many who describe themselves as atheists or strict materialists still place immense importance on personal perception.

Just meant this in a way where a story is told to comfort us in the present when it has no bearing on the likely ultimate reality of returning to non-existence. It's a salve like religion... the reality of our lives is utterly maddening since it's some strange after effect that we're conscious anyway, so it doensn't matter what cure you pick ... atoms, after life, living on through the people whose lives you nuture. I'd rather pick the third option anyway.

the kind of fucked up shit people do outside of religion is going to be limited to putting sardines on pizza, or putting human clothing on animals and taking pictures of them. it's very hard to think of egregious examples that don't have at least some religious flavor to them.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ed_Gein

I guess this could be seen as a variation of putting human clothing on animals, so to speak

"consumerism, wage slavery, paranoia, fear, xenophobia, nationalism, ideology and politics"

i don't think you can magically whisk away religion, but if you could, these things would generally disappear as well.

re: ed gein, death cults count as religions, too

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeffrey_Dahmer

not sure how this matches up to putting sardines on a pizza

it's almost tautological that really fucked up shit is going to involve religion

I beg to differ.

Wars are about as fucked up as any shit any human ever does and although they are sometimes started over religious differences, far more often they're started out of greed, pride, or fear. When a nation goes to war, it is normal for them to make passionate declarations about the need for doing it and the causes that justify it, and religion is often invoked in this context, but merely as a smokescreen for greed, pride or fear.

it's very hard to think of egregious examples that don't have at least some religious flavor to them.

This is hugely different from saying that these egregious examples are somehow sanctioned within or motivated by religion. People are enormously capable of rationalizing their motives. Just because their rationalizations drag religion into the conversation does not mean it had any fundamental culpability for them doing what they wanted badly to do and would no doubt have done in any event.

"consumerism, wage slavery, paranoia, fear, xenophobia, nationalism, ideology and politics"

i don't think you can magically whisk away religion, but if you could, these things would generally disappear as well.

??? C'mon.

As a confirmed atheist and materialist, I am not confident that, if religion were swept away tomorrow, that I could convince people who can't even use turn signals to do away with nationalism and consumerism.

Spectrum, what about truth for its own sake? Having fewer false beliefs is intrinsically good, even if it won't help us to avoid death. We can at least try to understand what sort of universe it is that's killing us.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_bundy

I suppose being socipathically crazy also counts as a religion

Religion's role in war is overwhelmingly just the tool those at the top use to further their own economical gain, historically.

And as far as what would or wouldn't exist if religion was suddenly whisked away, in my opinion, it would be the endless opposition to scientific discovery, and the collective openness to these discoveries. Without religion, I believe that even the most ignorant people would be less inclined to hold on to ideology regardless, and as a race we would have been much farther along.