Atheism-o-Phobia

Off Topic Politics & World Issues
421

[quote]JoabSonOfZeruiah wrote:

[quote]MikeTheBear wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]MikeTheBear wrote:

[quote]BackInAction wrote:

[quote]JoabSonOfZeruiah wrote:
Me having a child is not creating him in the sense that God has created us. The best analogy I can come up with us humans is if we were capable of creating a robot with consciousness/artificial intelligence; the creator of said robot is entirely in his right to do what he wills to the robot whether to end its consciousness and dismantle it or give it a hardware/software upgrade.[/quote]

I knew you were going to say that which is why I wrote about that :slight_smile:

But for your analogy, no, the creator of the AI does NOT have that right either if the AI is self aware[/quote]

Been away for a bit catching up on work. BackInAction is right. Once the robot (are we talking about Mr. Data?) has consciousness, the rules change. Perhaps I have the “right” to dismantle Mr. Data, but if I exercise that right, then I would be evil. Yeah, I bring up Mr. Data because I think there was a Star Trek episode on this. A character from a hologram game program gained “consciousness” and there was a real issue whether the program could be “shut down” ethically.

[/quote]

Technically, you cannot kill consciousness…Just sayin’[/quote]

For me, consciousness is the opposite of the problem of evil. On one hand, the fact that evil exists tends to disprove the existence of God. Consciousness does the opposite. There have been attempts to explain consciousness as an emergent property of the brain. Is that a satisfactory explanation? I’m not sure. If it is linked to the physical brain, then it can be killed. But that brings up a whole 'nother issue that I won’t go into for fear of being called insane.
[/quote]
Concerning the problem of evil, did you see the axiological argument video I posted?[/quote]

I saw the first 15 minutes of it because that’s all I had time for. From what I watched he seemed to be making an argument from design or “first cause” argument applied to morals. Just like laws required a law giver, so too did morality require a giver of morality. He stated that evolution could not explain morality because evolution is only concerned with what’s best for the individual. This is not correct - evolution is concerned with what’s best for the survival of the entire species. Given this adjustment in the way evolution works, evolution can, in fact, explain morality. As I wrote earlier in this thread, humans as a species survive better when we form cooperative groups, i.e., societies. This is seen in other animals as well. It makes sense, then, that humans would develop personality traits that lead to strong, well-ordered societies. These traits are then hard-wired into our brains and passed on by genes. This explains why, to use his example, running over someone with car for fun is wrong, and that this is wrong is self-evident. It is in our self-interest not to kill one another because killing indiscriminately will rob society of useful members and ultimately destroy the group. Since we do better in groups, it is to our advantage to preserve and strengthen such groups.

422

[quote]ephrem wrote:

[quote]MikeTheBear wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

Technically, you cannot kill consciousness…Just sayin’[/quote]

For me, consciousness is the opposite of the problem of evil. On one hand, the fact that evil exists tends to disprove the existence of God. Consciousness does the opposite. There have been attempts to explain consciousness as an emergent property of the brain. Is that a satisfactory explanation? I’m not sure. If it is linked to the physical brain, then it can be killed. But that brings up a whole 'nother issue that I won’t go into for fear of being called insane.[/quote]

…this is a free Psychology 101 course from Yale, and altough it’s cursory it did give me an idea of how science relates consciousness to the brain: Online College Courses & Accredited Degree Programs - Academic Earth It’s also pretty interesting (:[/quote]

Damn you, Ephrem! I could spend hours on that site going through all of the courses. I noticed one on “Brain-computer Interface.”

423

[quote]MikeTheBear wrote:

[quote]ephrem wrote:

[quote]MikeTheBear wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

Technically, you cannot kill consciousness…Just sayin’[/quote]

For me, consciousness is the opposite of the problem of evil. On one hand, the fact that evil exists tends to disprove the existence of God. Consciousness does the opposite. There have been attempts to explain consciousness as an emergent property of the brain. Is that a satisfactory explanation? I’m not sure. If it is linked to the physical brain, then it can be killed. But that brings up a whole 'nother issue that I won’t go into for fear of being called insane.[/quote]

…this is a free Psychology 101 course from Yale, and altough it’s cursory it did give me an idea of how science relates consciousness to the brain: Online College Courses & Accredited Degree Programs - Academic Earth It’s also pretty interesting (:[/quote]

Damn you, Ephrem! I could spend hours on that site going through all of the courses. I noticed one on “Brain-computer Interface.”[/quote]

BTW, Matt Dillahunty analogized the emergent property of consciousness to wetness. If you have one water molecule, it won’t feel very wet. Two won’t give you much wetness, either. What about 1 billion water molecules? Get enough water molecules together and you get wetness. So, too, in the brain - one neuron can’t do much, but develop enough connections between billions of neurons and consciousness emerges. I’ve also read a similar explanation for intelligence - brain cells that store information and memories connect together and can not only share this information but create analogies to other problems. This is why adults are more intelligent than children (generally speaking, of course, since I’ve met some stupid adults): adults simply have more information and more memories stored in their brains to draw upon when solving a problem. This is why it’s good to learn new things about a variety of subjects, even if the subject (such as cosmology) may have no practical relevance in your everyday life (while the origins of the universe fascinate me, who or what created the universe makes no difference to my job performance).

424

[quote]MikeTheBear wrote:
He stated that evolution could not explain morality because evolution is only concerned with what’s best for the individual. This is not correct - evolution is concerned with what’s best for the survival of the entire species…[/quote]

Evolution isn’t concerned with what’s “best” for anything. It isn’t concerned at all. If anything it’s powered by an editing process that devours the ill-suited. If a population or species survives a potentially devasting change in enviroment, then it just happened to have individuals with some advantagous heritable trait. Those of the population without that trait, could go the way of the dinosaur for all evolution cares. If the entire population, or even species, or the entire biosphere for that matter, lack survivable adaptions to some event, evolution isn’t stepping in to do what’s best at any hiearchy of life.

What followed the above was an explaination of survival technique, not morality. And frankly, if anything, when viewing neighborhoods full of feral children and young men, evolution best explains ‘immorality.’ Screw, fight, screw. Doesn’t matter if you die fighting, as long as you have lots of kiddies running around to pass on that DNA.

Morality is a thin veneer that takes generation upon generation to build up over the fissures of society. If evolution did explain ‘morality’ (written upon our DNA) it’d also explain ‘immorality.’ So, both are natural and contrasting adaptions. But perhaps the ‘immoral’ call their own adaption moral, and yours immoral. After all, their own adaption would naturally seem right to them. So now instead of mere opinion, it’s in the genes you’ve lucked out with. So now ‘morality,’ without God, again has no foundation.

425

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]wfifer wrote:

[quote]Sweet Revenge wrote:
hello kamui

Personally, I don’t think you’re an atheist.

Perhaps you’re not religious – and considering all the circular arguing that goes on about religion, that’s a good thing.

It’s more important to live It, see It, hear It. Call ‘It’ whatever you want – Life, Creation, God, Love, Force, Mind, Christ, Brahma, Light, Potentiality, Divine Matrix…

I love mystic and earlier new thought works and have a nice collection. I’ll hit them over and over…like a fine bottle of wine or scotch. A little will go a long way. If you don’t mind my asking, what are your favorites?
[/quote]

I don’t necessarily agree. There’s nothing saying I can’t be atheist, agnostic and “spiritual.” This just goes along with the stigma of atheism; everyone jumps at the chance to deny it. Sorry, no, I don’t believe that the universe was created by a conscious entity. That’s all atheism says. I’m also aware that I can’t know for sure one way or the other. That just frees me to live my life without external cues. I get to decide what my life means.

The way I see it, the beauty of the universe and everything therein is only meaningful because we’re here to appreciate it. You can paint it as spiritual or existential or whatever, but that’s how I choose to give my life meaning. [/quote]

It’s not about stigma, that what you described is not a strict definition of atheism. [/quote]

That was a strict definition. A god is defined as a supreme being. Atheism is defined as the lack of belief in any god or gods. When you start bending what the word “god” means for the sake of not labeling us as atheists, you’re not really playing by the rules.

You can believe we’re all connected by energy and be an atheist. You can believe in some form of a soul or spirit and be an atheist. You can believe in magic and unicorns and be an atheist.

426

[quote]wfifer wrote:
You can believe we’re all connected by energy and be an atheist. You can believe in some form of a soul or spirit and be an atheist. [/quote]

Yeah, but you kind of lose the entire reasoning behind choosing to be an atheist.

427

[quote]Sloth wrote:
What followed the above was an explaination of survival technique, not morality. And frankly, if anything, when viewing neighborhoods full of feral children and young men, evolution best explains ‘immorality.’ Screw, fight, screw. Doesn’t matter if you die fighting, as long as you have lots of kiddies running around to pass on that DNA.

Morality is a thin veneer that takes generation upon generation to build up over the fissures of society. If evolution did explain ‘morality’ (written upon our DNA) it’d also explain ‘immorality.’ So, both are natural and contrasting adaptions. But perhaps the ‘immoral’ call their own adaption moral, and yours immoral. After all, their own adaption would naturally seem right to them. So now instead of mere opinion, it’s in the genes you’ve lucked out with. So now ‘morality,’ without God, again has no foundation. [/quote]

I can’t agree because societies that lack moral fiber have gone the way of the dinosaur. Take the Aztecs for example. Yeah, the Spanish wiped them out with disease, but they were having problems long before them. They were starting wars for the sole purpose of gathering human sacrifices to appease their gods. They did this because they hit hard times with famine and other issues and though that more human sacrifices would bring them mercy from their gods.

Now have you ever seen a successful society that encourages human sacrifice on a grand scale? No. Because doing so is counter-productive to continuing a society.

428

[quote]

Now have you ever seen a successful society that encourages human sacrifice on a grand scale? No. Because doing so is counter-productive to continuing a society.[/quote]

As you said, the Aztecs had a society. And according to some, modern warfare has only carried on the practice of human sacrifice. But now, for the blessings of Democracy, capitalism, socialism, or whatever -ism.

429

And many would say that if we continue to spread our resources too thin, we’ll either have to downsize at some point (like the British or worse like the Soviets to Russia) or disappear as a society (like the Mongols).

430

I’m pretty sure i’m not him. My religion forbid me to teach in summer classes.^^

My primary concerns were environmental ethics, (post)structuralist epistemology, the concept of Nature/culture in traditionnal societies.

I will admit that my atheism bear some ressemblances with apophatic theologies or the Via Negativa.
But there’s still a difference.

Saying “God is an ineffable Being” is different than saying “the Universe itself is sacred, and there’s no (need to believe in a) Divine Being”.

it’s not exactly the same ethos / the same relationship.
The Sacred is something you have to protect and respect (the latin meaning of the word “Sacer” is 'do not touch/disturb"). The Divine is someone you should obey, love, fear, adore, etc

[quote]
It simply sounds like you reject religion…The way religious people, or people who claim to be religious behave, it’s hard to blame you…[/quote]
in fact, i do not “reject” anything. I spend one of the most peaceful and meaningful year of my existence living in a presbytery (my Godfather is a Catholic Priest, and a bioethics expert) and lurking in a dominican library. I just happen to not believe what they believe. But I still respect it.

I will confess it : I find the old philosophical daoism and some schools of Buddhism pretty interresting.

[quote]
If I may ask your opinion on the matter, what properties must a prime mover, an uncaused-cause necessarily have? [/quote]
I’m not sure a prime mover or an uncaused-cause is a relevant concept. But i 'm inclined to think that all metaphysics should start and end with the old heraclitean sentence
“There’s nothing permanent, except change”
I would like to express that more clearly, but since English isn’t my mother language, it would be quite an exercise.

431

[quote]Sloth wrote:

Morality is a thin veneer that takes generation upon generation to build up over the fissures of society. If evolution did explain ‘morality’ (written upon our DNA) it’d also explain ‘immorality.’ So, both are natural and contrasting adaptions. But perhaps the ‘immoral’ call their own adaption moral, and yours immoral. After all, their own adaption would naturally seem right to them. [/quote]

Yes, we evolved with both the ability to love and hate, make war and be peaceful. Which emotion is right depends on the situation and, to a large extent, the size of your tribe. Let’s say you have two tribes: the Unga-Bunga Tribe and the Wiki-Wiki Tribe. Both tribes experienced a tough growing season with severe drought but the Unga-Bungas managed to produce a harvest to feed their people. The Wiki-Wikis were not so lucky, and now, livestock and tribe members are beginning to die of hunger. They approach the Unga-Bungas and ask them for food in exchange for a promise to share their own harvest in the future. The Unga-Bungas refuse. The Wiki-Wikis, fearing that more of their people will die, decide to wage war on the Unga-Bungas to get some of their food.

Which tribe acted morally and which tribe acted immorally? I could argue that both and neither acted morally. It’s easy to create Kantian moral imperatives when you have time to sit and think in an ivory tower. Things are different in real life.

Well, as Fletch mentioned, if you have a society that’s into killing their own for fun, lying, cheating, and not cooperating with each other, that society will not last long. Everyone will kill themselves off and those genes will not be passed on.

I agree with you almost 100%. The world would be so much better if there were a Supreme Being who would law down a moral code and enforce it, or at least help enforce. I would very much like such a thing. But just because life with a god would be better does not mean one exists.

432

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]wfifer wrote:
You can believe we’re all connected by energy and be an atheist. You can believe in some form of a soul or spirit and be an atheist. [/quote]

Yeah, but you kind of lose the entire reasoning behind choosing to be an atheist. [/quote]

I guess it really depends on how you define soul or spirit. If you consider the soul to be just pure energy, string theory might work it’s way in there. But who knows.

433

the soul is what make a good wine different of a bad one.

you could probably explain that at a molecular level, but you can just drink it as well.

434

[quote]kamui wrote:
the soul is what make a good wine different of a bad one.

you could probably explain that at a molecular level, but you can just drink it as well.[/quote]

I think this is one of the best quotes I’ve read here. This belongs on a T-shirt or something. I would make it say something like this:

“The soul is like the the taste of a fine wine. You can try to explain it on a molecular level. Or just drink it and enjoy.”

That’s gold, right there.

435

[quote]BackInAction wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]wfifer wrote:
You can believe we’re all connected by energy and be an atheist. You can believe in some form of a soul or spirit and be an atheist. [/quote]

Yeah, but you kind of lose the entire reasoning behind choosing to be an atheist. [/quote]

I guess it really depends on how you define soul or spirit. If you consider the soul to be just pure energy, string theory might work it’s way in there. But who knows.
[/quote]

Energy is the capacity to do work. We don’t call energy a soul. Even if we started calling energy ‘soul,’ what would be the point? It’s like wondering if an onion bagel comes into existence at each death of a human being. The ability to think, self-awareness, is an emergent property stemming from function of an organic mechanism, which in turn owes it’s properties to it’s constituents. So even if energy vacates the mortal shell upon death, it’s just dumb, blind, unknowing energy (bagel). Unless you mean a supernatural ‘energy.’ But then, again, atheistic reasoning goes out the window.

436

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]wfifer wrote:
You can believe we’re all connected by energy and be an atheist. You can believe in some form of a soul or spirit and be an atheist. [/quote]

Yeah, but you kind of lose the entire reasoning behind choosing to be an atheist. [/quote]

Well technically he’s right, but it’s stretchy for sure. It’s my fault, he just called me out on what I said.

437

[quote]kamui wrote:

I will admit that my atheism bear some ressemblances with apophatic theologies or the Via Negativa.
But there’s still a difference.

Saying “God is an ineffable Being” is different than saying “the Universe itself is sacred, and there’s no (need to believe in a) Divine Being”.

it’s not exactly the same ethos / the same relationship.
The Sacred is something you have to protect and respect (the latin meaning of the word “Sacer” is 'do not touch/disturb"). The Divine is someone you should obey, love, fear, adore, etc[/quote]

Yeah, that’s a real stretched definition of atheism as most atheists do not hold fast to anything outside of empiricism. I don’t define God as merely an infallible being. I define him as the creator. However, being a creator, any interaction to the creation actually infallible.

Using words like ‘Sacred’ intimate a high level relationship than just object-human. You’re definitely tying in at a metaphysical level, which means you understand it at the metaphysical level.
I argue that the universe or existence in general is a manifestation of God. Necessarily that mean he is part of it and it is part of him. You cannot relate to inanimate objects, you can relate to what they mean, there majesty , beauty, etc, but not it specifically.

[quote]
If I may ask your opinion on the matter, what properties must a prime mover, an uncaused-cause necessarily have? [/quote]
I’m not sure a prime mover or an uncaused-cause is a relevant concept. But i 'm inclined to think that all metaphysics should start and end with the old heraclitean sentence
“There’s nothing permanent, except change”
I would like to express that more clearly, but since English isn’t my mother language, it would be quite an exercise.[/quote]

Actually I am not much of a fan of the eastern disciplines I don’t have enough patience for it. Second, eastern philosophers seem to be content not to ask and seek answers to the big questions, but I am not. I prefer the argument laid out concisely rather than ‘here’s a truth, now figure out why it’s true’.
For instance, I would take the above quote and say “How do you know there is nothing permanent?” “How do you know change is permanent?”…I am not asking literally, just illustrating what I mean.
As far as all metaphysics starting and ending with your stated sentence, I must respectfully disagree. Metaphysics deals with all non-physical entities. Any object of metaphysics is a starting point. “Change” is just a broader term for causal relationships. To say it happens, because it happens is circular reasoning which I feel compelled to reject. Why does change happen? Where does it come from? Why does it only apply to physical objects?

Your English and even your grammar and expression is quite excellent, actually.

438

I give up on these damn [quote] tags! I just reply at the bottom of posts from now on…

439

I think atheists can be very moral. Your religious preferences don’t determine how moral of a person you are although if you consider yourself religious then it should. I don’t know of any religion that preaches immorality, but I’m sure there are a few.

The question of morals in atheists though raises another question. Where do atheists get their morals? Christians, Muslims, etc. say their morals come from God therefore there is a a clear cut right and wrong. An atheist who says there is no God and people are just the process of evolution is left to decide if there is a right or wrong. If so, then where does it come from?

I would never vote for a person based on their religious beliefs. Afterall, I would bet the majority of the “Christian” leaders of the nation are just nominally Christian.

440

[quote]BBriere wrote:
I think atheists can be very moral. Your religious preferences don’t determine how moral of a person you are although if you consider yourself religious then it should. I don’t know of any religion that preaches immorality, but I’m sure there are a few.

The question of morals in atheists though raises another question. Where do atheists get their morals? Christians, Muslims, etc. say their morals come from God therefore there is a a clear cut right and wrong. An atheist who says there is no God and people are just the process of evolution is left to decide if there is a right or wrong. If so, then where does it come from?

I would never vote for a person based on their religious beliefs. Afterall, I would bet the majority of the “Christian” leaders of the nation are just nominally Christian. [/quote]

I’ll answer this one. My morals come from my own experiences and the experiences of interacting and observing those around me. If I see that something causes suffering to another, I will see this and note that this is an incorrect action.

And yes, I do think Atheists can be very moral people. I do a lot of things I consider good: trying to become vegetarian, volunteer at old peoples homes, try to give advice and help when asked, help animals that are injured, put worms in the grass (ones on pavement) after a rain storm, etc.