merlinofchaos: (Default)
merlinofchaos ([personal profile] merlinofchaos) wrote2007-03-02 01:23 pm

The last post

My point, by the way, which I was too tired to make is...

In this country (and probably others), it's almost required for politicians to be Christian. For those that truly believe in religious tolerance, it's ok for politicians to be Muslim, Jewish, Buddhist or Hindi.

But atheists? Get out of town. Apparently having some belief is better than having no belief at all.

The problem is, atheism isn't a lack of belief. It is specifically disbelieving in God. And I don't think those are the same thing, not by a long shot. It isn't coming across two paths (or fifty paths) and simply choosing not to pick one. That's agnosticism. That's saying you don't know. Atheism is saying you do know, and you do believe...that God or Gods do not exist.

[identity profile] phoenix-heart.livejournal.com 2007-03-02 10:13 pm (UTC)(link)
I think the (faulty) reasoning of most Americans is that they think no religion=no morality. Since most people derive their moral compass from the Bible, whether they realize it or no, they believe that someone that doesn't believe in the Bible will have no moral compass. Which is absolutely wrong, but hard to argue with...primarily because it involves convincing religious people that one can have moralvalues without a God to decree them. And convincing them of THAT is a much bigger argument than just "atheists are people, too."

The funny thing for me is that most of my atheist friends seem have a stronger commitment to actually living their life by moral values, and a more consistent record of actually acting according to what they say (rather than saying they value one thing and doing another), than most of my Christian religious friends. :)

In my experience, most of my atheist friends would get into Heaven faster than most of my religious friends.
evilmagnus: (Default)

[personal profile] evilmagnus 2007-03-02 10:18 pm (UTC)(link)
Well, I think Dawkin's position is that Atheism isn't /disbelief/ in God - it's belief that there is no evidence to support God's existence. Which is an even subtler distinction. :)

Like I believe in Gravity, because it's a testable theory, and empirically proven.

I don't believe in God, because there's no testable proofs and no empirical evidence. If there was testable proofs and evidence, I'd believe. Just like I believe in gravity.

[identity profile] agrimony.livejournal.com 2007-03-02 10:49 pm (UTC)(link)
I suspect a good portion of that 'belief as requirement' and 'atheism is Right Out' is a hold over from the Cold War and all that propaganda about the dirty, atheist commies.

[identity profile] lurkingowl.livejournal.com 2007-03-02 11:04 pm (UTC)(link)
I wrote up a response ot your previous post, but tossed it, since I didn't want to wander into a semantic debate over religion.

Now that I see why you were trying to put forward the argument, I'll put in part of what I'd said. Namely, that this form of argument is often used to justify banning science in school. Namely, believe in the Big Bang is a religious belief, since it's held to with ardor, and deals with "ultimate reality." And if the Big Bang, or Evolution, are religious beliefs, then the First Amendment says the constitution shouldn't endorse ("establish") one. We have to be very careful about expanding the definition of a word, rather than creating a new word to make the distinction you're trying to make. Namely, it doesn't retroactively change what other people meant when they used that word.

I think what you want to highlight is Atheism != Nihilism. I'd be careful, because Atheism *is* just a lack of belief in God. It's certainly possible to go beyond that to a strong belief (gods are a stupid idea, I actively deny their existence.) Either way, it's not saying you don't believe in being nice to other people, or even that you don't believe in the supernatural (say, you're a Zen Buddhist, or a shinto spirit worshipper.) It's a sticky area, because Atheism isn't a system of beliefs, or even necessarily a positive belief in something, it's an attribute of someone's system of belief.