Of course not, but at the same time, it’s not a reason to think things are hopeless. One can still live one’s life well, even if it makes almost no difference to the universe at large 
Thank you for your posts
I do not mean to say that atheists can’t find meaning in their lives or are living amoral lives.
If God is taken out of the picture, we are left with a world where the only absolutes are physical (and this isn’t neccessarily true). But ethics and morality become arbitrary and based on consensus. If “right” and “wrong” are concepts created by society and that are subject to change, we end up living in a chaotic state. How can a person decide for himself what is the “right” thing to do since society isn’t always there to tell him what it is? I believe that there are some things that are absolutes. I have yet to meet a person who doesn’t believe in the power of love or doesn’t believe in love as an absolute good.
This is not intended to be rude, just inquisitive: If the very definitions of virtue and such are subject to change, how can anyone find meaning in their lives?
If “good” and “bad” are fluid concepts, does that mean all our current values are arbitrary and can be replaced with other values as long as society builds a consensus around it?
Some would argue that the set of morals and values granted to us by the Bible are pretty fluid - God changed his mind a lot between the old testament and the new. And then there is the whole interpretation thing, our understanding of the Bible is pretty fluid - at least as fluid as society’s mores. I think you could argue that our socieitial values are a reflection of our current interpretation of the Bible and vise versa.
Mambo, not all our morality comes from “society”. I hold that much of our morality is innate, we have it from birth. Some people seem to be born without it, and we call those people sociopaths. We don’t sit down and logically decide to love our children or refrain from killing and robbing. Those instincts are already present in us.
But how did those instincts get there? Through evolution of course. Every social animal has to have some method of creating social groups. Meaning that sociality is instinctive. So we like our friends and family because if we didn’t we’d be a solitary species like the orangutan. We can easily imagine a sentient species that doesn’t have these social and ethical instincts since there are many animals that live this way…their only social interactions are between mothers and offspring and during mating season.
So, our morality can be inborn and still not come from God. And you still don’t seem to grasp that even if atheism neccesarily meant amorality that still wouldn’t mean that God therefore must exist.
This is precisely why I want to do an experiment where we take a human baby and put it in a humanless environment and observe it for 30 years…
only kidding, but it would put an end to so many bullshit ideas about morality.
Two books you should read are Robert Wright’s “Moral Animal” and Nietzsche’s “Beyond Good and Evil”. Society DOES tell us what is wrong or right, that’s why morality is not constant throughout the world. Beyond Good and Evil, while dispelling the rumor that right and wrong are divine absolutes, explains how one can find meaning in his life without them. But most of us are so wrapped up in the good and evil thing that we can’t see it… Perhaps its one of those “you must forget yourself to know yourself” types of things…
As far as “love as absolute good”… um… what about the people who kill other people for “love”… As science progresses we understand more and more about emotions and what physiologically brings them about in the brain… For example, we can “cause” happiness by releasing seratonin. Love is both a chemical reaction in the brain and a psychological delusion to enlist spousal/parental involvement. Because love is tied to reproduction love has evolutionarily become a much sought-after emotion, much like the physical sensation of an orgasm… there’s nothing unexplainable or “pure” about it. We once thought illnesses were caused by evil spirits or an imbalance of humours, now we know better, and we’re getting closer and closer to the day when the myth of emotion is dispelled.
Eh, I’ll take the bait.
Sure, why not?
However, note that this does not automatically mean that an all-atheist society would flap freely in the wind and mindlessly condone wanton looting, pillaging, raping, and pro wrestling. Even if society is free to form a “morality consensus,” it is predisposed to form one that’s sustainable and supportable over the long run. That leaves violent and destructive behavior out of the picture, since you can’t sustain a society on such acts. As others have pointed out before, you don’t need (any) god to realize that treating other people well is beneficial to yourself in the long run.
Sure, an all-atheist society may condone some actions that an all-religious one would condem, such as open acceptance of homosexuals, or nondiscrimination against people by gender and skin color. But is that really such a bad thing?
Try this on for size:
Religion is a crutch for people who are too weak to face up to the immensity of the universe and their (relative) insignificance.
I would venture the opinion that a good many strong believers have at some point realized that the world is indifferent to them, and they back away into the safe haven of their religion which reassures them that they are indeed vastly important to some almighty but invisible god.
Atheists (I would classify my self as such) stand up and face their insignificance in the universe and live and enjoy their lives and do their best anyway.
Replace god? With what? Linus’s security blanket? No thank you. I get along just fine without either, and find my life fulfilling.
If not god then what? Not a freaking thing.
I don’t think so.
I think that most people, athiest and theist alike, simply do not think about it. Ever.
another thing to keep in mind is that human beings have long conquered and expanded (both in the ancestral environment and in recent history) through cooperation and tit-for-tat behavior. as such behavior was part of what helped us become the dominant species we are, we as a society have a genetic predisposition towards that kind of limited altruism organization. so whenever you “do the right thing,” part of that good feeling you get is your brain releasing endorphins for demonstrating good cooperative skills. which helps you get chicks. which helps you get laid. which sends your genes onward, onward!
but yeah, a large part of it is learned. look at infants and toddlers. they’re known to be “selfish.” we put quotes around it because we think they don’t know any better, which is true. they honestly think the world revolves around them. but i think there’s something there. a human first does everything it can to exploit the world around them and have everyone cater to them. every organism that can exploit without any sort of trade off does. sooner or later, they realize that this sort of strategy doesn’t work forever. only then does a child finally learn the finer points of cooperation and, later, deception.
Well, it’s not something I think about on a daily basis, but I definitely remember facing up to the realization that the universe doesn’t care one way or the other about me, making my peace with that, and going on with my merry atheistic life. I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that a lot of other atheists went through the same process, either, since the very idea of atheism requires reflection on what one’s role in the godless universe is.
Besides, I’m sure a lot of people (theist and otherwise) have pondered the issue, if only briefly. How many folks have heard Monty Python’s “The Universe Song,” for instance? 
[hijack]
I was engaging in a theological discussion with a few friends of mine a few months ago. I’m a self-professed agnostic, bordering on atheism. I was looking for logical reasons as to why this person, very logical or ordered in his life, would embrace something that relied on faith instead of hard fact. I asked him what he gained from being religious. His response was that he actually had nothing to lose.
[/hijack]
That’s my point–you don’t dwell on it. Universe Song notwithstanding, it’s essentially impossible for us to comprehend the vastness of the universe, so we all find ways to ignore it.
So . . . can we have your liver then?
Pascal’s Wager in short form.
As a logical argument, it’s fairly satisfactory, though it has some problems.
to be honest, i have to call myself agnostic. i agree with many points made here by atheists (though the whole “standing up bravely” thing sounds more like just a nice way to view oneself).
it’s not that i feel the world’s major religions hold some absolute cosmic answer. to me, as a point of logic, it just seems like one thing to rule out one “possible higher plane” (e.g., christianity) and an entirely other thing to claim that there is NO such thing as a higher plane. i mean, forget all the biblical crap; i’m not talking about that. i’m talking about the very basic idea that there might be something more. not necessarily a benevolent force or entity, but perhaps just a heightened state of existence or something. i mean, there’re a billion different definitions for “higher plane,” and if i say i’m atheist, i’m eliminating all of them along with the few i had a justifiable grudge against.
again, if i had to play the odds today, i’d go with atheist, but whatever.
As a summary, that’s very understated, bordering on misleading.
I guess it all depends upon what one finds satisfying, eh?
Of course it does, Spiritus. Apologies for not being more explicit, for those millions of you hanging on my every word. 
Here’s the accurate version:
A lot of people find Pascal’s Wager satisfies their needs. Thus, it’s “fairly satisfactory.”
Since the problems with it are primarily axiomatic in nature (presupposing a very specific and particular God), it’s an internally valid logical construct, and that makes many people happy.
I find it as oversimplified and silly as you.
It may be difficult to comprehend, but that doesn’t mean we have to ignore it. I don’t comprehend the federal interest rate, the appeal of pro wrestling, and voting Republican, but I don’t ignore them, either.
I mean, okay, yeah, I’m an insignificant speck of dust on the grand tapestry of the universe. So should I waste my time moping about it, or shrug my shoulders and move on? Since I know it’s nothing personal between me and the universe, there’s no reason to get all upset about it, is there?
When I’m done with it, sure.
rjung wrote:
Pah, that’s nothing. The universe itself is eventually going to either grind down to an eternal evenly-distributed tepid-soup of Heat Death, or come crashing back in on itself in the Big Crunch. In either case, all the structure in the current universe – people, stars, galaxies – are going to be so utterly wiped out that no one and no thing will be able to detect the structure it used to have.
Not that anyone or anything existing inside this universe will survive either Heat Death or the Big Crunch to talk about it. Or that anyone or anything existing outside this universe even knows, or can know, that we’re here.
Ah, tut tut, you signed that organ donor card, didn’t you? C’mon, up on the operating table with ya! This’ll only hurt for a little while.
As a brief aside to The Voice of Sanity, who signs his posts “Libertarian, Atheist, and Great American!”, I merely wish to point out that libertarianism, like hard atheism, is just another secular “religion”. You have indeed substituted one religious belief for another.
For the record, I’m an agnostic (sometimes called a soft atheist) and something of a pragmatist on economic issues. A more all-encompassing term for my views is skepticism, which shuns libertarianism as surely as any other religious or pseudo-religious dogma.
I find this kind of “substitution” of theistic religion with other irrational beliefs to be fairly common (present company excluded). It is seen most often in followers of new-age and paranormal beliefs, but certain economic world-views, like libertarianism and communism, are also a frequent God substitute. I suspect this is due to the notion of a perfectable society. The Will to Believe is a very powerful aspect of human nature which does not always reveal itself in traditional theism.
For those unaware of one of the easiest rebuttals for Pascal’s Wager, allow me to share it with you…
The premise of the Wager is that the consequences of not believing in the Christian God and being wrong are much worse than the consequences of believing as sort of a “cover your ass” proposition, even if no God actually exists.
It then follows logically that one should immediately convert to whatever religion postulates the very worst sort of punishment for failing to believe! There must be many belief systems out there that envision far worse suffering for disbelief than mere Christianity. If you accept Pascal’s “logic”, you’d better damn well abandon Christianity right away!
(Needless to say, I don’t think this was the goal Pascal had in mind…)