Atheists delusional?

[Russell_SA]

“Well if the objective truth states 2+2=4 can i subjectively state that 2+2=5, no that would be irrational and that’s exactly what the atheist does by trying to impose their subjective truth over an objective truth.”
It is irrational to state that 2+2=5 since the problem you are trying to deal with is the best way to communicate the logical process of mathematics through symbolic language of numbers and operators. You defined the problem you are trying to address. So within that problem you can have objective bad and objective good it seems. But we have to look at the problem you are trying to solve to see if there actually is an objective good and bad in reference to that problem. For example, is it objective good or bad to wear red running shoes? That frame of question is not actually in the realm of morality, so it’s a badly framed question to begin with and it also indicates a presupposition that there should be a link between morality and footwear that may need to be hashed out first.

“Now if God does exist and the universe does have an objective purpose, meaning and value intended by it’s creator then the christian is being consistent with the objective truth and is quite rational.”
Only if the deity and the christian are in agreement of what is the objective purpose. If you have not been convinced that this deity’s purpose for it’s creation is valid, then it is not rational to take this position. And you need to address the point put previously of why a deity’s objective purpose for its creation should be the objective purpose for anyone else.

“The atheist is no longer in complete delusion but merely partially because they live their life in consistency with the objective truth that life has meaning, purpose and value, how ironic.”
This implies that we can find purpose for ourselves and if it aligns with a deity’s purpose, is irrelevant to a non-theist. It’s like finding out that someone on the other side of the world agrees with your meaning for your new book. Nice to know but other than that, irrelevant. If there is conflict for each person’s meaning of the book, then we can have a discussion about that. The meaning of a creation by it’s creator is irrelevant to the meaning of a creation by the users other than giving a different perspective of the meaning of the item. Just like I can be given a book and not find it all that interesting but when the author tells me it’s a story about their grief of loosing a loved one, it takes on a different perspective. Still don’t find the story, itself that interesting, but that connection to the author makes it more interesting.

“In actual fact they would still think that the universe and everything in it has no objective meaning, purpose and value.”
Ultimate meaning and purpose to this non-theists is irrelevant to me it seems.

"Now if a Naturalist recognizes the objective truth that there is no purpose, meaning and value and lives consistently with that then they are only delusional if God exists. "
You seem to be using “objective truth” interchangeably with “ultimate meaning”. They are separate to me.

 

[Russell_SA]

“If God does not exist they are the rational ones and Christians the delusional ones”
No this is an unfalsifiable point to know if a deity exists or not. Since this is currently the case, the religious are justified to them for their reasons and the atheist is justified to them for their reasons. Religious have the term “faith” and the non-theists do not since the religious seem to use the term faith as the reason for the unreasonable while the non-theist state the unreasonable is just that, unreasonable to hold. You can literally hold any position on an idea based on faith.

“My point however is you’ll always get the Atheist who says there is no meaning to life and purpose, we give it meaning and value ourselves, in other words the objective truth is too hard to bear so i’m going to live in ignorance of it.” - Just poisoning the well here. Nice bias position. Please don’t be on a jury if you have this mind set. You don’t seem to come across as responding to what the defense would say instead you respond to what you presuppose about them with statements like this.

“If i’m in error here please point it out…”
Yes you are in a couple of points here.

 

[IWantGod]

The theist claims that there is an even number of marbles and in-fact there are 72 marbles. The atheist does not believe the theist is justified in that conclusion so does not believe that there is an even number of marbles. Does this mean they believe there is an odd number of marbles? No, No it does not.

I think that the idea of God not existing has serious existential consequences. I think what bothers some theists, including my self, is that its all taken so very lightly, like not believing there is an odd number of marbles. And yet they accept so many other things that cannot be rationally justified by the metaphysical consequences of their disbelief like freewill.

If theism was just about believing whether or not dragons exist i could understand people like Richard Dawkins. But it really isn’t that game.

 

[Russell_SA]

This opens up a huge rabbit hole now:
1: The seriousness of the consequences are not in level with the evidence people need to make an informed decision.
1a: Implicates this deity for not being morally serious by not educating everyone about the truth of the situation since it’s coming across to a lot of people as not there at all or a completely different deity.
2: Might makes right: Is the punishment in weight with the crime?
2a: Divine command theory is a dictation, not a process for how to teach people moral assessment of issues.
3: Is it really a crime to begin with?

 

[Russell_SA]

Freewill problem remains a problem to continue to solve, but we are only allowed to use solutions that are apart of reality that everyone has access to. Since this deity can not be investigated in anyway independent of it revealing itself to us and that it appears to be revealing itself in a way that can be dismissed as god of the gaps and hearsay, it is not allowed to be a solution to the freewill problem and it just remains just that; a problem we are still attempting to address. Just like if aliens are revealing themselves to certain farmers and not to everyone else, if the farmers are using aliens as a reference to solve their freewill problem, well that’s fine for them since they have access to information I can not have. We have to use solutions that everyone has access to. These deity messengers are indistinguishable from charlatans and we have to have a way to distinguish between the two. This deity can clear this up but is still not doing this.

 

[Glark]

If there is no God and no after-life? … I want to die - asap.

Interesting take on it… why would you want to die?

I know I want to enjoy my life while it lasts and I hope it lasts for a long long time with minimal health related problems.

“Man cannot live on bread alone”. Without God, life has no meaning and I couldn’t be bothered living a meaningless life. If God offered just a temporary life, I would also consider that meaningless - only eternal life gives any life meaning.

 

[pocaracas]

“Man cannot live on bread alone”. Without God, life has no meaning and I couldn’t be bothered living a meaningless life. If God offered just a temporary life, I would also consider that meaningless - only eternal life gives any life meaning.

Yikes!.. well then, you better go on believing that there is such a thing as eternal life.

 

[Mike_from_NJ]

only eternal life gives any life meaning.

“The meaning of life is that it stops.” – Franz Kafka

 

[IWantGod]

“The meaning of life is that it stops.” – Franz Kafka

That’s no meaning at all. It would only be proof that life is meaningless, pointless, and absurd, and the only reason we keep making more of it, despite it’s absurdity, is because we are slaves to our passions, emotions, and genes.

I can’t wait for an evolutionary psychologist to come along and say that the only reason our desires appear reasonable to us is because our genes make it appear that way so that we can generate more genes and not go insane in the process!

 

[sonofbarry]

I don’t think you’ve established that life, objectively, has no meaning, purpose and value. Atheists usually live completely fulfilling lives, with meaning, purpose and value. These are concepts drawn from within (yes, subjective), but you’re a long way from proving the ‘objective truth’ here. Can there even be an absolute ‘objective truth’, given that we all see life subjectively?

 

[KindredSoul]

I can’t wait for an evolutionary psychologist to come along and say that the only reason our desires appear reasonable to us is because our genes make it appear that way so that we can generate more genes and not go insane in the process!

Well, that’s already rather plausible, if one believes the material world is all that exists. That’s why, as I said in an earlier post of the thread, even if I think right and wrong, and objective meaning, are “obvious” and even if all humanity agreed, it wouldn’t “prove” it’s really there, because in theory that could (quite sensibly) be argued to just be an evolutionary trait to make us better at survival, which isn’t in itself proof that survival is (objectively) right or better.

At the end of the day, in order to believe in any true and objective meaning or value, it just does take faith, at least to some extent. I don’t think it will be like that in eternity, where I think our intellect will be expanded, but for right now, it takes faith to just trust (and take for granted) that things really do matter in a more objective way than just somebody’s opinion or desires.

 

[IWantGod]

Well, that’s already rather plausible, if one believes the material world is all that exists.

There is no purpose in a purely physical reality. If metaphysical naturalism is true then one cannot say that physical reality is designed or caused into being in-order to act for a teleological or meaningful end. So you cannot say that it’s plausible. It does not act for any purpose; it’s just doing things.

 

[KindredSoul]

There is no purpose in a purely physical reality. If metaphysical naturalism is true then one cannot say that physical reality is designed or caused into being in-order to act for teleological or meaningful end. So you cannot say that it’s plausible. It does not act for any purpose; it’s just doing things.

You may misunderstand me: I was saying it would be plausible that, as you said, a biologist could posit that the sense of meaning was just an illusion to make us better at replicating DNA and preserving our species.

I agree that true meaning itself would have to be immaterial, intangible, transcendent. Even if everything else in the universe was material, if there was objective meaning, at the very least the objective meaning in itself would have to be non-material, transcendent. So yes, to say objective meaning could exist in a strictly materialist universe is an oxymoron, because objective meaning/value in itself would have to (even if, in theory, it was the one and only thing) be something that wasn’t material. And since most people I hear from who insist there is no God also reject realities intangible, transcendent realities that cannot be seen nor empirically verified, it would indeed be a double standard IF they believed that this one thing (objective meaning/value) was an exception. Most atheists in this thread don’t seem to be arguing that there IS objective value/meaning, so this doesn’t apply to them, and maybe is rare. The belief there is no objective value, etc, would depress me, personally, but it’s consistent, I’ll grant, with the other claims of most materialists.

 

[IWantGod]

You may misunderstand me: I was saying it would be plausible that, as you said, a biologist could posit that the sense of meaning wasjust an illusion to make us better at replicating DNA and preserving our species.

But there is clearly a teleological relationship involved in that statement. In other-words we are sane for the purpose of preserving our genes! That’s goal-direction, you know, the kind of thing we do with our minds to create statements like this. That is clearly not consistent with a reality that has no objective purpose, no meaning, and no true moral value.

There can only be an illusion of something if there is an element of reality to it. Hence motion pictures. There is an illusion of motion, but that’s only possible with actual motion.

The qeustion is, why should i think that my experience of guilt and it’s relationship with objective reality is just an illusion? There is clearly a teleological relationship involved and i think that might be undesirable to some. But that’s not a good reason to ignore our experiences. Why should one think that ones experience of the good is just an illusion? You have to have a good reason to think that in the first place. You cannot just say it’s an illusion because such and such would counter my personal preference. Of course, if my agenda is agnosticism of that which brings undesirable results then we can even entertain that the universe is an illusion if we so wish. But that’s not reasonable is it.

 

[KindredSoul]

The qeustion is, why should i think that my experience of guilt and it’s relationship with objective reality is just an illusion?

Well, rationally speaking, there is no compelling, certainly not irrefutable, deductive argument for why you should or shouldn’t, so I can’t answer your question. I agree that it’s not just an illusion, but it’s because I’m willing to just trust it, and to trust God, as well as my own senses (i.e., I’m not crazy, delusional, etc. all of which really DO happen to people and thus, in theory, could be true of any one of us–which would answer your “Why entertain the notion?” question, namely because there ARE examples of seriously deluded people, psychologically verified to be out of touch with reality, and by definition a truly deluded person wouldn’t realize it, would think their own logic and reason was flawless, etc, meaning it’s always hypothetically possible to BE deluded without realizing it) and to take that leap of faith and just trust.

At any rate, we agree on what reality is–there is God, there is objective value, etc–so any disagreement we may be having (and I’m still not precisely sure we are) is purely academic and hypothetical. It’s not that there IS no disagreement, necessarily, but that disagreement only matters if we were both Atheists. Neither of us are, so the disagreement is immaterial…er, no pun intended.

 

[IWantGod]

At any rate, we agree on what reality is–there is God, there is objective value, etc–so any disagreement we may be having (and I’m still not precisely sure we are) is purely academic and hypothetical. It’s not that there IS no disagreement, necessarily, but that disagreement only matters if we were both Atheists. Neither of us are, so the disagreement is immaterial…er, no pun intended.

Even if there is no way to get an ought from an is through logic, We all trust our experiences. We could all be delusional regardless of whether one is a theist or an atheist. But since we all rely on our experience then why the sudden prejudice toward seemly intangible things? I experience the good, and i have no good enough reason to doubt it; it is irrelevant if it means intangible things exist. I cannot reasonably doubt that throwing an axe into a babies head is truly wrong. The experience itself tells us that there is something wrong happening.
So there certainly seems to be a preference for ideologies rather than an acceptance of human experience, and that preference runs so deeply that some people are prepared to be nihilists. And i argue that if and when a person does accept nihilism they are doing so without evidence, and rather they are doing it merely because it is consistent with their materialistic-atheism… .

So who is more likely to be delusional if not dishonest?

 

[KindredSoul]

I think a big part of it is that our currently living generations are hurtling toward the slow-release natural conclusion of “Enlightenment” thinking, which in essence made a god out of deductive reasoning, making it the sole acceptable means to make assertions which people had any political or ethical obligation to heed. It was an attempt to divest religion of any political and social power, since the most important religious claims by definition are transcendent to deductive verification. The Enlightenment philosophers seem to have believed demanding deductive verification for everything would create a society without religion. But I believe they didn’t (at least not all) foresee that the ultimate conclusion of that IS nihilism. Since deductive reasoning can only go so far, and can never, ever apply (at least not conclusively) to establishing the existence of the immaterial (objective morals, transcendent philosophy, etc), even though it can apply to sorting their implications out once one has already accepted them via other thought processes outside of the narrow deductive scope.

 

[Paddy1989]

I haven’t checked this topic in a while and i’m impressed with the debate that has went on here. Your point on religious people having faith to believe in the unreasonable is arrogance. It is as arrogant as Theists claiming all atheists only think the way they do to justify the way they live which is true in some cases but certainly a harsh and false generalization. Faith comes after reason, you use faith everyday, one being that you have faith in your senses to perceive reality

 

[Paddy1989]

I don’t think you’ve established that life, objectively, has no meaning, purpose and value. Atheists usually live completely fulfilling lives, with meaning, purpose and value. These are concepts drawn from within (yes, subjective), but you’re a long way from proving the ‘objective truth’ here. Can there even be an absolute ‘objective truth’, given that we all see life subjectively?

Objective truth is something that is true not matter how we subjectively perceive reality, truth is constant, our understanding of it is what changes, this is why we value objective truth over subjective truth. We are interested in philosophy and science because for some reason we are drive towards truth, we thirst for it. We demand it. Also you say that i’m a long way from proving that if God does not exists there is no objective purpose, meaning and value to human life, in order for you to say there is objective meaning, purpose and value the onus is then on you to describe where this comes from? If one says that something that caused human life to exist also intended it to have objective purpose, meaning and value then you are very much going into the direction of a intelligent creator

 

[Russell_SA]

No sir, here is the difference in terms of belief, hope, and faith.
Take the experiment of rolling a 1d6 dice.
Belief: I believe a value out of all known possible values of the dice will appear. So a value of 1 to 6 will be the result based on what we know about the dice and how it repeatedly works in our reality.
Hope: I hope the specific value I want to appear will be the result out of all the other known possible results. Such as betting on a 5 to be the result.
Faith: Wanting the result to be something that has not been demonstrated as a possible result. Such as wanting a 7 to appear.
You sir are using faith as everyone else uses belief of how their senses work. I can demonstrate that my senses match reality. Which is why I don’t get hit by cars. Faith is the unjustified belief that walking in front of a moving car will not hurt. There is no justification for that position based on the evidence of reality.