Opinion peice on Athiests

by SickofLies 203 Replies latest jw friends

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  BurnTheShips

  Hi Nvrgnbk

  Burn the ships , if you're promoting some sort of spirituality, not to be confused with a belief in the supernatural, many atheists are already there.

  I am not promoting that.

  Burn
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  serotonin_wraith

  There's no 'atheist hospitals' for the same reason Stalin didn't do what he did in the name of atheism. There's plenty of non religious hospitals though.

  On the 'because they were atheist' thing - stating what someone doesn't believe in says nothing about what they do believe in. There are atheists who see religion as a good thing for society, there are theists who believe in God, but who think man made religions are a bad idea. And there's this example, which is very fitting for this board - JWs want religion to be outlawed, or turned upon. Not because of what they DON'T believe, but because they DO believe that would fulfill Bible prophecy. Even with the 'new atheist' movement, we don't do this because we are atheist, we do it because we see the danger in religion. I don't believe in Santa, but I don't get vocal about Santa belief. However, if Santa belief ever brought the same kind of danger as religion, I would. It would be about what I believed, not what I did not.
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  hillary_step

  Burn the Ships,

  The fact is the men are blind. They have felt the elephant, but can not see him.

  And the fact is that science has eyes. Which suggests that more weight should be put in science than in the "blind" do you not agree?

  If so, might I ask what motivates a person or group to attempt to make these definitions? Is it based on some sort of evidence, or a visceral reaction? Or what?

  Both.

  Either or.

  And neither.

  Depends on the specific instance.

  I am not sure if you are being deliberately obtuse, but on the premise that you are not I would like to flesh out the only element of your statement that has any value and that is the one that specifically deals with the "evidence" that you suggest motivates the religious mind.

  What exactly is it?

  Funky Derek has already put to bed the notion that all "religions" are equal at least in embryonic motivation, by correctly positing that if you are correct, then equal weight should be put into the existence of Santa Claus. BA tried to circumvent the logic of this position by stating that, yes, all these are "gods" of a sort, but there is only one Almighty God. An obvious logical fallacy. As there is no evidence to support the existence of Vishnu, Santa Claus, or the Bible God, so giving one more credence than the other is a matter of faith, and an arbitary one at that.

  Let me ask you. What exactly is your own position on this issue? Do you actually have one?

  HS
• 

  BurnTheShips

  There's no 'atheist hospitals' for the same reason Stalin didn't do what he did in the name of atheism.

  I did not bring up Stalin-but since you are....

  Stalin DID do what he did in the name of atheism. Stalin claimed his policies were based on Marxism-Leninism. Marxism is an explicitly atheistic ideology. Here are some quotes.

  Religion is the impotence of the human mind to deal with occurrences it cannot understand.
  Karl Marx
  
  Religion is the opium of the masses.
  Karl Marx
  
  Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.
  Karl Marx

  The first requisite for the happiness of the people is the abolition of religion.
  Karl Marx

  Works of Karl Marx, 1855, Anti-Church Movement,Demonstration in Hyde Park

  Atheism is the core of the whole Soviet system —Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn, The Oak and the Calf

  [Religion] in its very essence is the mortal enemy of Communism. —Leon Trotskii, Pravda, June 24, 1923

  http://uncpress.unc.edu/chapters/miner_stalins.html

  A fundamental conceit of the Communists had been their moral certainty that their new faith in "scientific atheism" would supplant what they believed to be mystical religious "mythologies," relics inherited from a bygone era of superstitions before Darwin, Marx, and electrification. Instead, despite the Communists' best efforts, religion outlasted the Communist era. In Russia itself, public opinion polls conducted after the fall of the Soviet state revealed that the institution most trusted by the average citizen was the Russian Orthodox Church.

  So much for 80 years of "enlightened" scientific atheism!!!!!

  Burn
• 

  nvrgnbk

  , public opinion polls conducted after the fall of the Soviet state revealed that the institution most trusted by the average citizen was the Russian Orthodox Church.

  So Russian Orthodox is the way to go?

  LOL!

  Wednesday, June 13, 2007

  Post-colonialism and Post-theism

  (Hat tip to Atheist Hussy for grooving me onto the interview with Christopher Hitchens.)
  
  Truthdig.com just did an interview with Christopher Hitchens concerning his new book God is Not Great. It is the latest in a series of best-sellers whose success motivates me to write Simon Peter faster so I can point to all the recent books directed at atheists that have sold a million copies. Beyond that, and the proximate reason for this post, is that Hitchens said something clever:
  
  

  Wiener: The final killer argument of your critics is that Hitler and Stalin were not religious. The worst crimes of the 20th century did not have a religious basis. They came from political ideology.
  
  Hitchens: That’s easy. Hitler never abandoned Christianity and recommends Catholicism quite highly in “Mein Kampf.” Fascism, as distinct from National Socialism, was in effect a Catholic movement.
  
  Wiener: What about Stalin? He wasn’t religious.
  
  Hitchens: Stalin—easier still. For hundreds of years, millions of Russians had been told the head of state should be a man close to God, the czar, who was head of the Russian Orthodox Church as well as absolute despot. If you’re Stalin, you shouldn’t be in the dictatorship business if you can’t exploit the pool of servility and docility that’s ready-made for you. The task of atheists is to raise people above that level of servility and credulity. No society has gone the way of gulags or concentration camps by following the path of Spinoza and Einstein and Jefferson and Thomas Paine.

  
  
  This put me in mind of post-colonialism. For those not in the know, post-colonialism grapples with the legacy of colonial rule. Stuff like why is that Haiti is the amongst poorest nations on earth despite being one of the first modern democracies and despite having a massively profitable export product? Post-colonialism argues that it is the legacy of dependence created by the colonial system that keeps places like Haiti poor - that even after Haiti was technically independent of France's rule, most of the property in Haiti was still owned by people who had deep ties to France and who served the interests, largely, of France. Not to mention the brutality of slavery, the trained obedience to white prestige and privilege, things of that nature. The same is true in most former colonies. This ongoing legacy needs to be dealt with before a country can come into it's own. Haiti, having been particularly brutally colonized, is having a particularly hard time coming out of it's post-colonial period. Whereas China, which was far less colonized than Haiti, for less time, and with a far more robust culture than Haiti, has almost entirely put its post-colonial legacy behind it. And it is then unsurprising that the first Asian nation to come into it's own on the world stage was Japan - a country that had never suffered colonization by European powers.
  
  So, when Hitchens said Stalin was able to take advantage of centuries of servility and docility that had been hammered into the Russian people by the Russian Orthodox Church, my mind made the connection between the legacy of religion and post-colonialism. It made me think that we're living in a post-theist society. God is dead, but as Nietzsche noted the shadow of god will continue to trouble our days for centuries to come. So, while Stalin was certainly an atheist, and a madman, the groundwork for his atrocities were laid by brutal theism of the Russian Orthodox Church in the same way that the brutality of Papa Doc Duvalier were laid by the colonial horrors of the French. The brutality of Stalin was not contextless. It was able to happen for a reason and part of that reason certainly was the habits indoctrinated into them by the Russian Orthodox Church and the Czar.
  Some other examples of post-theism might be found in, say, Great Britain where the Church of England still has seats in the House of Lords. Despite the overwhelming majority of the British being a-religious, British laws are still in part shaped by the Church of England. It's absurd, but it's true. And in the United States, it is de rigeur for virtually all political candidates to publicly repeat ad nauseum their "born again" status - even though, on paper, the US is one of the least religious countries in the world. We don't have an official religion. We never have had an official religion. But so powerful is the lingering influence of theism that candidates must nevertheless acknowledge some silly born again state in order to get elected into office. A third example might be found in the Vatican City. Why on earth is a couple of blocks in Rome a separate nation? It's preposterous, but there it is, not to mention the absurd level of influence this decadent and dying religion continues to have on the modern Italian state.
  
  Most of the world is in a post-theist phase - there is no enforcement of a state cult in most countries and religious leaders have little formal authority in most places. Yet, I think that it is important to realize that just because a society might not be religious doesn't mean the effects of religion mystically vanish from that society. After literally centuries of basing one's laws and culture off of various religious authorities these cultural habits remain ingrained into our society and person even if we have rejected the religion. Much of who we are, culturally, socially, is so deeply entwined with religion it will be a very long time before we're free of the malady of religion. Religion is a fever that has broken, but we are still a long way of having our full strength.
  But we will. Skepticism is the fastest growing belief about religion in the world today. I don't figure this will change.

  Posted by Chris Bradley at 11:59 AM

  Labels: atheism, christianity, church of england , history, hitchens, nietzsche, philosophy, post-colonialism, post-theism, religion, russian orthodox church
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  serotonin_wraith

  *sob* I just did all that with Bro Apostate.

  They didn't like religion. Okay, but it's not 'atheist ideology' to hate religion, is it? It just means you don't believe in a god.

  As I just put-

  There are atheists who see religion as a good thing for society, there are theists who believe in God, but who think man made religions are a bad idea.

  So it's not about whether they were atheist or not, it was about their views of religion. Which isn't the same thing.
• 

  BurnTheShips

  And the fact is that science has eyes. Which suggests that more weight should be put in science than in the "blind" do you not agree?

  Science deals with the natural. It is "blind" when it comes to the supernatural. This dovetails with the poem posted above.

  .....if you are correct, then equal weight should be put into the existence of Santa Claus. BA tried to circumvent the logic of this position by stating that, yes, all these are "gods" of a sort, but there is only one Almighty God. An obvious logical fallacy......

  It is not a logical fallacy. Comparing the infinite God to finite Greek, Roman, or pagan gods like Zeus, Apollo, or Thor or conjured up characters like Santa Claus etc is comparing apples and oranges. They are not the same thing. You can not construct an ontological argument for a finite lower-case god like Thor as you would for God (call Him/Her/It what you will, in the end we are speaking of the same thing).

  Burn
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  BurnTheShips

  So Russian Orthodox is the way to go?
• 

  BurnTheShips

  Okay, but it's not 'atheist ideology' to hate religion, is it?

  Ideology:

  2 a : a systematic body of concepts especially about human life or culture b : a manner or the content of thinking characteristic of an individual, group, or culture c : the integrated assertions, theories and aims that constitute a sociopolitical program

  "Hating religion" as an ideology has been, and it is presently among many. It is not the only atheist ideology but it is an atheist ideology.

  Nvrgnbk:

  The brutality of Stalin was not contextless. It was able to happen for a reason and part of that reason certainly was the habits indoctrinated into them by the Russian Orthodox Church and the Czar.
  

  Atheists being brutal.........but it is because of the "context" indoctrinated by a Christian religion?

  Classic!
• 

  kwintestal

  Even secular charities benefit more from donors who have a religious faith than they do from secular donors. Religious people are 10 percent more likely to give to secular causes than secular people, he said.

  A couple things I wanted to point out about this is that I didn't get this from reading the study. I obviously didn't anylize all the data, however I didn't see it stated throughout, and I also didn't see it in the conclusion. The study also didn't mention the margin for error.

  The other thing was this study was sponsored by the Fetzer Institute, a religious institute which makes me question the study's possible bias. The way questions are worded and candidates selected can often times create a biased poll. Do you know any other studies?

  Kwin