Why are you an Atheist? - Catholic Answers Live - 12Nov2018

[HarryStotle]

Sorry but worship is not in the bone for me as it were. I don’t find bending the knee to be an ethical thing to do or an idea to live up to or promote.
Worship, to me, means to give up your doubt, reasoning, analytical and moral analysis, etc. and just let that thing you are worshiping rule over you. Making you a serf and a slave to its whelms and desires. And since you’ve shelved all moral assessment of the whelms and desires of this thing, you are no longer acting as a moral agent, but a trained pet following orders of your master. Makes my skin crawl.

I heard Christopher Hitchens make this point once. I didn’t find it very convincing then and I don’t now that you make it.

If you don’t “bend the knee” (metaphorically speaking) to something you bend it to nothing, which is hardly a benevolent master.

That nothing, the absence of something to bend the knee to, is what begins to rule over you. Where nothing rules, the state is one of stagnation.

If there is truth – and there is – then truth is what ought to rule our reason and be that which moves us towards knowing what is true. Thus, bending the knee to the truth beats not bending the knee to anything at all, because it demands we move beyond our narcissistic nothingness.

Worship does not mean giving up “your doubt, reasoning, analytical and moral analysis, etc. and just let that thing you are worshiping rule over you.” It means using all of your intellectual faculties to their fullest because you worship (revere) the truth and are moved to find it – all of it – with your entire being. That is heroic virtue.

And worship does not mean shelving “all moral assessment,” it means that knowing, loving and having a clear view of the absolute good moves you with your entire being to aim at THE Good.

You actually become free and not a slave because your grasp of the True, the Good and the Beautiful overcomes your slavish and petty whims and desires, and frees you from them. Morality is demanding and difficult, it isn’t easy because it demands virtue overcomes the banality of weakness and vice.

Courage, fortitude, temperance and justice are exacting, and they demand that we move beyond the inertial stagnation that is what concupiscence holds us to. Without the challenges of morality – the worship of the good – we lapse into acedia. That is slavery of the worst possible kind.

Far from being a “trained pet” to what is worshiped, worshiping what is the True, the Good and the Beautiful moves us to become free, whole and complete, growing beyond our mediocre selves to far exceeding our limitations.

Absent the worship of what is infinitely beyond what we are, we fall into the rut of becoming slaves to our narcissistic nothingness.

It isn’t, in the end, just your skin that will crawl. Why do you suppose Satan is depicted as a serpent crawling on its belly?

On the other hand, if frailty and mediocrity are “in your bone,” then your objection to worshiping truth and goodness makes sense.

Continued…

 

[HarryStotle]

But, then again, so does Christianity…

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.
He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him. He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God. (John 1:1-13)

 

[Damian]

Yes it should break, once there is a justified conclusion that forces me to update my internal model of reality. However, there has yet to be a demonstration of the supernatural’s existence in our reality at all at this point, just like there has yet to be a demonstration of the existence of magic and Hogwarts as well. Once that is provided, that is when my model gets updated. Not a moment before, regardless of any idea that I would wish reality would have or not have.

 

[Damian]

I am not talking about what your target is for driving your decisions for becoming a better person. (It’s Human Well-Being for almost everyone I’ve ever met though.)
I am addressing the way people are taught to pursue an assigned reference point (a diety in the religious’ case).
The “truth” as I understand it, is to create the most accurate model of reality we can in reference to actual reality, regardless of what we would want or not want reality to be.

Everything you listed after “Worship does not…” is what humanists, secularists, and every other world view believes about their world view as well. This is not worship though. Again, here is the religious moving the bar, when the non-religious have pushed back against theocracy until it comes out as just Humanism. The religious are redefining their terms but keeping the spiritual language. Faith becomes hope or belief. Worship becomes no different in practice compared to the world view of Humanism. The evidence of the supernatural is no longer associated with anything demonstrable in reality, but is just an intellectual concept. But this is progress for humanity where the only way you know someone is religious is by their terms they use. Future of religion is becoming benign and irrelevant to society as any other tribal label for their special version of Secular Humanism.
Worship, as I see it being actually exercised, is to follow the orders of a deity regardless of any serious moral assessment of its character or orders. Why does religious language remove the nuance between respect and zealotry? Between love and fanaticism? Between respect of self and deprecation? It’s following the most powerful entity you can think of because of its power, not moral leadership. So you worship the powerful since might makes right. I don’t see how referencing the bible makes an argument for your case since the bible is the written record of this deity and its moral character. We all know what it does when it’s in a bad mood or tricked by a devil; that bankrupts its moral authority and anyone that aligns themself with it still. This deity is, without question, the most immoral entity ever imagined, but because its the most powerful and plays with you for eternity, might as well make the best out of a bad situation then? Make a religion and apologetics to dance around its bad days so that it won’t beat you or so you can direct its wrath to your own enemies. That’s cowardice or just wanting to channel its power so that the religious can claim have actual supernatural power over their fellow people in the only reality that makes a difference.

 

[goout]

Yes it should break, once there is a justified conclusion that forces me to update my internal model of reality. However, there has yet to be a demonstration of the supernatural’s existence in our reality at all at this point,

Apply your standards to love, or joy, or peace. You might reduce these to chemicals coursing through someone’s body that elicit feelings.
But your own standard of evidence falls waaaay short here.

I’m not sure how anyone can reject super-nature, or that which transcends the material.

 

[Damian]

Apply your standards to love, or joy, or peace. You might reduce these to chemicals coursing through someone’s body that elicit feelings.

Understanding how something works does not diminish its importance. It actually helps you understand how to fix it when things don’t work.

But your own standard of evidence falls waaaay short here.

Way short of what?

I’m not sure how anyone can reject super-nature, or that which transcends the material.

What is super-nature to you?

Does everyone notice how I define my terms and give examples where they are applied for clarification of communicating ideas? Could I please get that back in equal measure please.

 

[HarryStotle]

I am not talking about what your target is for driving your decisions for becoming a better person. (It’s Human Well-Being for almost everyone I’ve ever met though.)

There are a number of issues with merely asserting “human well-being,” and not defining precisely what that involves. There are issues, as well, for atheists with prioritizing individual human well-being as against the well-being of humanity at large.

Some humanists are very willing to place the survival of humanity as a whole at the top of the priority pile, and are quite willing to minimize the well-being of individual human beings. The issue then becomes how do you as a humanist resolve that little problem since you have no recourse to a method of arbitrating between the two views on priority?

Another issue is with the obligatory nature of morality. It is all well and good to assert that a humanist’s view of well-being is indistinguishable from a theist’s, but absent any independent ground for morality beyond human subjectivity there is no warrant for claiming morality is obligatory for those who have no interest in being moral. An atheist “inhumanist” has the same grounds in atheism as the atheist humanist. Both are equally “legitimate” views as far as atheism goes. Neither view has any more warrant than the other.

The theist, however, does have an objective ground for morality which is transcendent to this or that view of human individuals. If God exists as the ground of Being Itself, that means the existence of all is intended and has a purpose, an inherent telos or end for which all things, including human beings, actually exists. That end good becomes the ground upon which morality becomes obligatory.

Absent an inbuilt purpose for existing, human beings are left to their own individual purposes, none of which has any stronger grounds for moral legitimacy than any other. If you wish to propose humanism, you are free to do that, but genocidal dictators are under no compulsion to follow your lead, other than you calling them inhuman, as if they care.

You might argue that respecting human well-being is more moral than genocide, but that would be a view grounded in nothing but your subjective perspective, if atheism is true, and your mere say-so obligates no one else.

Continued…

 

[HarryStotle]

At this point, you might attempt to reduce the theistic view of obligation to “fear of hell,” but that would be to misconstrue completely what is being proposed here.

You claimed, in your post, that humanism has human “well-being” as its end, but well-being can only be depicted with regard to what qualifies as a “good end” for human beings, i.e., what is “good for” human beings is what defines whether human well-being is being furthered. Absent that defined reason for why we exist, well-being is an empty notion.

This is what I am getting at here: If there is purpose to existence as determined by the reason for which all things exist, according to the purposeful creative intention of the Living Ground of Being, aka God, then defining well-being is doable. If there is no actual purpose in existing, then morality becomes entirely subjective with no grounding in existence, merely in subjective purpose.

The theistic view of moral grounding is not reducible to “hell if you don’t comply,” by the way, so I wouldn’t make that case. It won’t stand up to scrutiny.

If there is no grounding purpose in existence itself, then well-being is an open-ended, undefined and empty concept based upon individual subjective views of purpose or ends. That, however, doesn’t get us to obligation. Nor does it get us to the imperative that acting humanely is better than acting inhumanely, except in the very tenuous sense that you claim it to be.

 

[HarryStotle]

What is super-nature to you?

At its most basic is the claim that much of reality doesn’t reduce to materialism nor to mere causation.

Absent a reality transcendent to the material – I.e., super-nature, that which is beyond natural materialism – it makes not sense to speak of moral responsibility or obligation.

If everything that occurs is inherently causal then there is no room for moral choices for which we are responsible, nor regarding certain actions which are obligatory.

 

[goout]

Damian:

What is super-nature to you?

At its most basic is the claim that much of reality doesn’t reduce to materialism nor to mere causation.

Absent a reality transcendent to the material – I.e., super-nature, that which is beyond natural materialism – it makes not sense to speak of moral responsibility or obligation.

If everything that occurs is inherently causal then there is no room for moral choices for which we are responsible, nor regarding certain actions which are obligatory.

Exactly. Damian you are demanding materialst proof for God, and using the absence of that materialist evidence as evidence no God can exist. If you have even thought twice about all this, you know the illogic of your paradigm.

Which is why I pointed out to you: the very standards by which you judge do not hold up for anything non-material.
By your own standards, you can have nothing to say about love, joy, peace, the meaning of your life, etc…
All these transcend the natural materialist realm you confine yourself to.

 

[Crocus]

This conversation has helped me to understand “Why are you an Atheist?” You are an Atheist because the god you adamantly believe in, really and truly does not exist and Christians agree with you on that. The One that Christians relate to, at this time exists beyond what your mind is willing to contemplate.

 

[CaptainPrudeman]

The god they adamantly believe we believe in*

Telling an atheist that they actually do believe is insulting and patronizing. I reacted with repulsion when they said that i’m only pretending to believe. We have to hold ourselves to the standard we expect, including not telling someone what they believe.

 

[Damian]

Clarification - I am stating that what has been presented to me so far, not from this thread but rather from theists, is a deity that can not be distinguished between an idea of a deity and an actual deity. How do you distinguish between the two? I don’t see how you can. The way we currently have justified belief about a claim that directly references reality, is to test that claim against what reality actually demonstrates to be the case. Otherwise, every idea, true or imagined, are valid to conclude as a true statement about reality since you can not falsify either claim. How do you determine that the theistic deity presented so far is anymore than just an idea? The process for determining fantasy from reality can’t be distinguished, apparently, from the theist process of making claims about reality.

 

[Damian]

At its most basic is the claim that much of reality doesn’t reduce to materialism nor to mere causation.

Can you give me positive descriptors of what something is, instead of what it isn’t? Its like asking what a shoe is and someone telling me its not a glove. Still doesn’t tell me about the positive descriptors of the shoe at all now does it?

Absent a reality transcendent to the material – I.e., super-nature, that which is beyond natural materialism – it makes not sense to speak of moral responsibility or obligation.

A shoe is not a glove description again.

If everything that occurs is inherently causal then there is no room for moral choices for which we are responsible, nor regarding certain actions which are obligatory.

If we can’t tell the difference between the unconscious drivers of our evolution, sociology, genetics, etc that restrict our choices, then this question is irrelevant. All those material drivers are what will limit our sane “choices” about a situation. For example, in reference to nutrition, our evolution, sociology, genetics, etc will direct us to select eating fruit over drinking battery acid. We can still choose what piece of fruit to eat, but no sane person will choose to drink the battery acid. Lots of these scientists, that are studying ‘choice’ are arguing over this point still. However, since the supernatural has not been demonstrated to exist at all or a soul or anything else, its not allowed as a solution to any of our actual problems. Otherwise, you can replace the term ‘supernatural’ with ‘magic’ or ‘god of the gaps’ and it still works. Only after you can demonstrate your solution is actually part of reality, that is when you argue that it is part of the cause to the observed effect.

 

[Damian]

Exactly. Damian you are demanding materialst proof for God,

We can observe the non-material as well on its repeatable affects on reality. We can see the bend of space from a black hole, the iron fragments align with a magnetic field, etc. For something to exist in reality for us, it necessarily has to be affecting reality in some way for us to see what reality is without that affect and with the affect. There needs to be a contrast somewhere. Otherwise, how do you determine that something about reality is part of reality, if experience A is no different than experience B in reality? A = B in that case, therefore, no justified reason to believe there is anything additional there at all. No supernatural, no magic, no trolls under the bridge, etc. Demonstrate anything in reality that is different about reality with the supernatural and an event without the supernatural. That is where we can start first. Otherwise all youre doing is saying, “this event B with no change from event A is evidence of the supernatural.” well okay if zero evidence and zero difference is your supernatural, then I hope you see why that doesn’t work for anyone else not primed to want that to be there.

 

[goout]

goout:

Exactly. Damian you are demanding materialst proof for God,

We can observe the non-material as well on its repeatable affects on reality. We can see the bend of space from a black hole, the iron fragments align with a magnetic field, etc. For something to exist in reality for us, it necessarily has to be affecting reality in some way for us to see what reality is without that affect and with the affect. There needs to be a contrast somewhere. Otherwise, how do you determine that something about reality is part of reality, if experience A is no different than experience B in reality? A = B in that case, therefore, no justified reason to believe there is anything additional there at all. No supernatural, no magic, no trolls under the bridge, etc. Demonstrate anything in reality that is different about reality with the supernatural and an event without the supernatural. That is where we can start first. Otherwise all youre doing is saying, “this event B with no change from event A is evidence of the supernatural.” well okay if zero evidence and zero difference is your supernatural, then I hope you see why that doesn’t work for anyone else not primed to want that to be there.

You can do all the mental gymnastics you want, you still cannot apply your own standards to things like “love, joy, peace”.
And so there are things that you cannot test materially, that exist. And your philosophy fails there.

 

[Crocus]

The god they adamantly believe we believe in*

Telling an atheist that they actually do believe is insulting and patronizing. I reacted with repulsion when they said that i’m only pretending to believe. We have to hold ourselves to the standard we expect, including not telling someone what they believe.

I do respect your approach. I apologize to the OP for my simple bluntness.

And yet, some Athiests seem content to go about their lives, from birth to death without actively engaging those who believe in God. Others “religiously” try to poke holes, in Christian beliefs especially. To my observation, that looks like active practice of beliefs.

 

[Damian]

“Human well-being” is our reference point for moral assessment of commandments, when they are in reference to issues that affect people. you can be commanded to build a box, well that’s not a moral or immoral commandment. But if you are commanded to do something that affects the psychological and biological well-being of people, then we can morally assess it to see if it is good or not from what we can understand about the issue.

Some humanists are very willing to place the survival of humanity as a whole at the top of the priority pile, and are quite willing to minimize the well-being of individual human beings.

Yes its called resource management. Like the boat example: if two people are in a boat with supplies for one to survive the trip, will one person take all the food and let the other starve? or is it better that they both try to survive together for as long as possible, even if they understand that they will both probably die. I subscribe to the philosophy of we all die together, since we can not know the future and can work towards survival together since having someone else to help will better our chances to solve the problem. The tribes that subscribe to take all and let the rest die off, well those tribes all eventually die off more often than the ones that care for the group.

 

[Damian]

The issue then becomes how do you as a humanist resolve that little problem since you have no recourse to a method of arbitrating between the two views on priority?

It’s called the Socratic debate method of reasoning and discussion with actual testable justifications. If your tribe’s goal places no value on sacrifice now for future reward, then it will die off sooner than later. This is because we can not know what the future holds, so the more we sacrifice our next meal for three additional meals in the future, then that society flourishes more. That is why society A that doesn’t value civilization over the savanna stayed in the savanna while the other tribe built roads, medicine, agriculture, etc.

Another issue is with the obligatory nature of morality. It is all well and good to assert that a humanist’s view of well-being is indistinguishable from a theist’s, but absent any independent ground for morality beyond human subjectivity there is no warrant for claiming morality is obligatory for those who have no interest in being moral.

Other than we are social creatures that rely on each other for our biological and psychological well-being. You do understand that humans have developed differently from reptiles right? We will be mentally broken without socialization, community, touch, etc. We will kill ourselves trying to get back to each other. Besides, the external reference point of moral decisions is just your reference point for the problem you are trying to solve. So what is “good” for people, is in reference to what people tell you is good for them as they understand it. That is why we can say that X is bad in reference to human well-being, like slavery, infanticide, rape, etc. It’s like the nutrition example: we can argue over whether pears or apples are better, but no one is arguing that drinking battery acid is okay.

 

[Damian]

You might argue that respecting human well-being is more moral than genocide, but that would be a view grounded in nothing but your subjective perspective

No more than saying Deity A did it due to its own subjective perspective. I can demonstrate how genocide affects the betterment of people. So if something is bad due to its ‘betterment’ of people, then we are using “human well-being” as our reference point of what is good or bad.

At this point, you might attempt to reduce the theistic view of obligation to “fear of hell,” but that would be to misconstrue completely what is being proposed here.

And to want actual supernatural power over people in the only reality that actually matters.

Absent that defined reason for why we exist, well-being is an empty notion.

Yes and absent 2 from 1+2=3, you would not get 3 either. But 3 is the goal. Human well-being is the goal. Change the goal and you can change the equation all you want. But right now, that is the goal of humanity. To flourish.

If there is purpose to existence as determined by the reason for which all things exist, according to the purposeful creative intention of the Living Ground of Being, aka God, then defining well-being is doable.

You have to agree with your deity’s conclusion before you’ll accept it as the goal. Otherwise, again, you are shelving your ability to morally assess your deity and are just following orders, aka worship. I can actually demonstrate that human well-being makes the world better for people as a reference point for what is good or bad. Can you demonstrate your deity is there at all and why we should agree on its reference point for what is good or bad? The devil was able to do this, why can’t we?