While all religions are belief systems, not all belief systems are religions. Belief systems that are founded on faith in supernatural entities or processes can fairly be described as religions. But belief systems that are founded on observable reality, rational skepticism, and which accept that one must change one's beliefs when faced with new compelling evidence are emphatically not religions.
While most people suffer from the former, I think we should all strive for the latter, and a society based on the latter would be far more just, sustainable, and productive than our current religiously-dominated one.
And the fact that you "think we should all strive for the latter" essentially moves this potentially useful concept into the realm of your own personal belief system, your mantra if you will, which is at its core no different than a religious belief. Your error in judgement comes when you declare that we should "all" subscribe to some particular notion that you happen to believe in. True atheism rejects groupthink or at least gets its back up when it sees groupthink, even "non-believer" groupthink. It's a little hypocritical for you to denounce religious viewpoints now. See how that works?
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And the fact that you "think we should all strive for the latter" essentially moves this potentially useful concept into the realm of your own personal belief system, your mantra if you will, which is at its core no different than a religious belief.
How is this in any way similar to a religious belief. There is no faith or beliefs regarding supernatural forces or entities involved.
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Your error in judgement comes when you declare that we should "all" subscribe to some particular notion that you happen to believe in.
I have not suggested that everyone should believe the same things, I have suggested that everyone should strive for clarity of thought, eschew the irrational nonsense promulgated by religions, and formulate their own beliefs to the best of their rational abilities. When we encounter subjects regarding which we are not well equipped to reason our way to a well-founded belief, we should avoid forming beliefs; remain open minded and consider the opinions of experts carefully unless and until you can rationally come to your own conclusions.
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True atheism rejects groupthink or at least gets its back up when it sees groupthink, even "non-believer" groupthink.
"True atheism" is rather an outré phrase; atheism is simply the absence of a belief in god(s). There is no dogma or authority that dictates what is or is not "true" atheism. If you don't believe in god(s), you're an atheist. Why an individual is without a belief in gods is going to vary significantly from individual to individual, but it doesn't really pertain to the fact that they're an atheist, or the "truthyness" of their atheism.
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It's a little hypocritical for you to denounce religious viewpoints now. See how that works?
Nope. I feel entirely rational and confident in my denunciation of religious viewpoints. Declaring that I think the world would be a better place if others were more rational and came to similar conclusions on their own has nothing to do with "groupthink" or anything remotely similar to religion.
I don't think I expressed the point very clearly, sorry. I know many religious people who accept the idea that science and religion are "non-overlapping magisteria" (this is what you mean by "NOMA", correct?) and who argue that, because science can only help us understand the way things are, not how we ought to act, we need to turn to religion for guidance on the latter.
I disagree. Religion has demonstrated that it is of no value in discerning what is true about the natural world, but it does not follow that because religion is not useful in understanding nature that it is good for understanding anything else. I contend that religion is not good for anything. (Well, I'll admit that there are side effects of religion that are nice; music, art, literature, architecture, etc. But I see no reason we can't continue to develop these aspects of our culture without the baggage of a bunch of irrational beliefs in the supernatural).
While I agree that science is not a useful tool for developing a moral philosophy, I see religion as even less useful in that it appears to provide guidance, but does so in a consistently twisted and/or inappropriate way that prevents an individual from developing their own rational philosophy to guide their behaviour. Religion is, in my opinion, a deterrent to the development of a healthy and functional moral philosophy, and it therefore does far more harm than good in modern society.
I don't think I expressed the point very clearly, sorry. I know many religious people who accept the idea that science and religion are "non-overlapping magisteria" (this is what you mean by "NOMA", correct?) and who argue that, because science can only help us understand the way things are, not how we ought to act, we need to turn to religion for guidance on the latter. ...
"Guidance" is a different topic, in my opinion. But it is worth addressing. Each society needs moral principle, such as "be honest," "do not harm others," etc.
L.K.
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It is a testimony based on a diary kept between 1946 and 2004 (in the USSR, Poland, France and the USA).
The more people know about proletarian dictatorship the less likely will we experience it.
"Guidance" is a different topic, in my opinion. But it is worth addressing. Each society needs moral principle, such as "be honest," "do not harm others," etc.
I agree, and I think most would. My objection is that many contend that moral principles are the domain of religion. I've had this discussion with many bright people, and often it goes along the lines of "you can't use science to find moral principles, therefore this is the domain of religion." While I agree that science is not going to provide us with moral insights (at least not in the foreseeable future), I emphatically disagree with the conclusion. Just because science can't do something does not mean that religion can.
We have ample evidence that religion can't be used to understand the natural world, but the claim that religion can provide moral guidance is without substantiation. Religion's failure at explaining the natural world is not evidence of it's capacities in any other realm. Indeed, I would argue that religion is an even worse failure as a moral compass than science because it claims to do something it can't.
Not sure why you insist on throwing out the baby with the bath water, Bryan C. Did you have a bad experience with religion growing up? Some dark catalyst that led you to this conclusion? Not only do you not appreciate the value of religion, but you don't want anyone to appreciate its value either. Strikes me as a rather absolute stand for someone who on the surface is preaching tolerance and open-mindedness. Does your world view not permit superstitious beliefs of any sort? Even if these irrational beliefs can make others happy? And for what it's worth, I respect science, but science does not have all the answers, nor does it even pretend to. Take creation, for example: science attempts to explain how organisms can evolve from what state to the next, but has no idea what prompts this evolution or even how life begins in the first place.
And our good friend Albert Einstein claimed that imagination is more important than knowledge.
Not sure why you insist on throwing out the baby with the bath water
Because I'm quite convinced there's no baby; it's just a floating turd.
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Did you have a bad experience with religion growing up?
My personal experiences with religion are not really relevant; history and society's current religiously-founded woes are more than enough evidence that these memetic viruses do us significant harm.
I was fortunate to be spared most of the particularly damaging influences of religion as a child, but I have had the pleasure of playing intellectual midwife to the triumph of reason over faith, fear, and familial indoctrination for several of my friends and colleagues who managed to recover from their religious upbringings. So I can say that while my experiences with religion were rare and only marginally distasteful, many of my friends and colleagues have had much more traumatic histories with religion.
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Some dark catalyst that led you to this conclusion?
I've alway though of reason and evidence as "enlightening" rather than as a "dark catalyst." But I have to admit "dark catalyst" sounds cool... mind if I borrow it?
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Not only do you not appreciate the value of religion, but you don't want anyone to appreciate its value either.
It's not really a question of "want." I see religion as fundamentally inimical to individual and social development. So it's like saying "I don't appreciate the value of herpes, and I don't want anyone else to appreciate it either." I certainly don't see anything wrong with studying and learning about religion (indeed, I think, like other viruses, that's an important approach to eliminating it), but I disagree with people who argue that it is necessary or desirable.
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Does your world view not permit superstitious beliefs of any sort?
Nope. At least not for me. Of course I don't propose we should outlaw any religion or other superstitious nonsense; you can't legislate belief, and oppressing a religion is like trying to put out a fire with gasoline. I just don't think we should be promoting or respecting any of it.
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Even if these irrational beliefs can make others happy?
I admit this is a tough call, and I personally back-off on the religion thing when I'm dealing with someone who I think isn't mentally or emotionally capable of developing a rational philosophy that can adequately replace their religion. This may be somewhat hypocritical of me, but I'm always very uncomfortable about causing unnecessary suffering.
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And for what it's worth, I respect science, but science does not have all the answers, nor does it even pretend to.
Of course not. That's why this is philosophy.
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Take creation, for example: science attempts to explain how organisms can evolve from what state to the next, but has no idea what prompts this evolution or even how life begins in the first place.
Actually, this is a bad example. You're right that evolutionary theory does not deal with the origin of life, and that our understanding of abiogenesis is far less well-developed than our understanding of evolution, but we understand very well how evolution works, and we also have some pretty good ideas about how life got started; this is a thriving sub-feild of biochemistry. We now have several different plausible mechanisms that can give rise to self-replicating polymers that are consistent with what we know of the conditions on the pre-biotic earth. It's just that it's very difficult to formulate falsifiable hypotheses about chemical processes that happened billions of years ago. We can say mechanisms X, Y and Z are known to occur under conditions thought to reflect those on earth around the time of the emergence of self-replicating biochemistry, but we cannot say that some other mechanism we don't know about didn't occur.
So, while we have lots of ideas, we have far less confidence that we understand what actually happened, and we may never be able to unequivocally answer that question.
But it's very important to note that, when we don't know, we admit we don't know; we don't go around making up fairy tales about it.
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And our good friend Albert Einstein claimed that imagination is more important than knowledge.
I certainly agree. But in order for imagination to be useful, one has to be able to distinguish between things that they have imagined and things that they have actually perceived. Just because I can imagine invisible pink unicorns does not mean they exist. As is common for many famous Einstein quotes, the context is important. The point he was trying to make here is that in order to make great discoveries, you have to be able to imagine something that you don't know exists (such as a relationship between mass and energy), use logic and reason to determine the implications (predictions) of your imagined scenario, and then, ideally, make empirical observations to test your predictions (i.e. does perception match the prediction of imagination and rational analysis).
Last edited by bryanc; Jul 2nd, 2012 at 04:43 PM.
Reason: typo
Interesting answers, with which many of I agree. And feel free to use "dark catalyst" if you like—it just came to me out of the blue, like a butterfly angel or a pink unicorn landing softly on my shoulder and whispering in my ear. 👂🐛
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It's not really a question of "want." I see religion as fundamentally inimical to individual and social development. So it's like saying "I don't appreciate the value of herpes, and I don't want anyone else to appreciate it either." I certainly don't see anything wrong with studying and learning about religion (indeed, I think, like other viruses, that's an important approach to eliminating it), but I disagree with people who argue that it is necessary or desirable.
Hate has made you blind not to mention irrational if you can only see herpes when you see religion. Unless herpes has inspired people to build hospitals, cloth the poor, feed the sick, visit the imprisoned, forgive those that have done them wrong, turn from addictions and vices that would have destroyed them etc etc. I've personally known people that would likely be dead today had they not encountered God. They live life and live it to the full. They'd not share your vitriol for the faith that saved them.
Hate has made you blind not to mention irrational if you can only see herpes when you see religion. Unless herpes has inspired people to build hospitals, cloth the poor, feed the sick, visit the imprisoned, forgive those that have done them wrong, turn from addictions and vices that would have destroyed them etc etc. I've personally known people that would likely be dead today had they not encountered God. They live life and live it to the full. They'd not share your vitriol for the faith that saved them.
Cheers
MacGuiver
Wow - who is the blind one here? Generosity is not solely the domain of the religious. As far as your personal observations go, there is no proof that any god was actually encountered; the mind is a powerful thing. An erroneous belief can certainly motivate the behavioral change that actually did 'save them' and lead them to a fuller life. I think they would actually have an even fuller life if religion was left out altogether and they faced their issues directly without the crutch of an irrational belief.
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