You discuss claims about the inferiority of black people and the immorality of Jews on a daily basis? Care to explain this?
To what end?
You are either not reasoning in good faith or you don’t recognize a rational chain of thought.
Your original premise had (in theory) a real world component - how real world atheists should behave in a certain situation.
Now, you wish to ignore that premise and deal with “my pretend atheists”?
Again, to what end? These “my pretend atheists” don’t resemble actual atheists, so how would any discussion of them be of any use in determining what actual atheists should do in the real world?
A “rational being” would recognize this contradiction and seek to correct it.
The only crap here is this type of approach.
I haven’t been convinced because people here don’t seem willing to discuss individual points in the lists presented. But they have the right to refuse and I don’t label anybody - yet I expect the same attitude in return.
See the OP-He discusses things with people that believe that killing atheists makes sense.
Alright, let’s start with the first claim on that list – if God doesn’t exist, than there is no life after death. Why does this follow? Why does life after death require a god or gods? Logically, the two things do not necessarily have anything to do with each other.
Why should you be convinced? Again, you either don’t recognize reasonable, rational premises or you aren’t arguing in good faith.
At this point, you’re leaning to the latter.
For example, you just did a total 180. Your initial position was, essentially, “Accept the premise, even if it is not valid in the real world, for purposes of a fruitful discussion”.
When I pointed out this contradicted your very own OP, you now try to backtrack. That’s not a sign of arguing in good faith.
It’s not my job to accept ridiculous premises. It’s nobody’s job to accept ridiculous premises unless given good reason. And you haven’t given any good reason to do so.
If you want your position to apply to the real world, your premises have to reflect reality.
If you want to play a game of philosophical masturbation, you have to accept the results of using fanciful premises will not necessarily apply in the real world.
Pick one.
You keep making this and similar claims. However, your arguments consist of such assertions as atheism is equivalent to, or integrally incorporates, nihilism.
This is simply false. Yet, you refuse to even entertain the idea that atheism and nihilism are indepent concepts.
How can someone argue with you when your foundational premises are just wrong.
Well, then throw “It doesn’t work” onto the pile of arguments; only psychopaths are willing to kill for no gain, and they are, thankfully, a small group.
That’ll be my contribution to the argument-pile, it’s not an orthodox atheist one, but neither is any other moral argument you’re going to find, as I and others have pointed out.
Probably because the summary list you quoted in and of itself strongly suggests that this paper is not worth the magnetic domain on a hard drive that it occupies or the server traffic it generates. Consider just the last point,
21. If there is no god, then anything goes.
That very statement sounds exactly like a theist trying to portray atheism in a negative light. A rational being, religious or atheist, realizes that we do have to deal with other humans in pragmatic, sensible and fair ways, because “anything goes” is a recipe for chaos and disorder. Not even the most dogmatic Objectivist Glibertarian would promote that kind of ethos.
From Randal Bradley’s introductory overview:
This jackass is no atheist.
Can’t use it for what?
Why not?
It answers the OP.
???
Bradley may or may not be an atheist, (he sounds, to me, more like a theist pretending to be an atheist).
He is not a philosopher and his claims are nonsense.
As a devout theist, I recognize the following errors in his list:
If God does not exist then:
- There is no life after death. Probably True, but hardly proven.
- There is no divine purpose or meaning to life. True.
- There is no absolute, objective purpose to life. Why not? This presumes, with no evidence, that only a god could provide purpose.
- Existence is ultimately meaningless. More nonsense.
- The meaninglessness of existence is not a philosophical problem. Just random silliness.
- There are no universal, objective values. This may or may not be true. If there is no god, there are no divinely established universal, objective values, but there could be natural universal, objective values that do not originate with a deity.
- Reason and logic are limited and cannot justify meaning, purpose, or values. More random silliness.
- Values are ultimately a matter of taste. Utter nonsense.
- There is no universal, objective morality. Only if one insists on a divinely inspired morality. There may well be universal, objective ethics.
- Human life is not sacred. This is a belief held by some atheists, but is not the result of atheism.
- No value is inherently superior to another value. This sort of nonsense is indicative of Bradley’s uninformed dabbling in philosophy.
- Justification of values is not necessary. What does this even mean?
- Meaning and purpose are possible. Justification is unnecessary. More words that appear to be without meaning, themselves, but are clearly not tied to atheism.
- Facts are facts and values are values. :rolleyes:
- Once value premises are chosen, logic and reason can by applied. True regardless of atheist, theist, or deist premises.
- Ethics is a wasteland. More rubbish; not an atheist position.
- It is not unsound to use values as a basis for judging and criticizing. Judgment and criticism is always based on values. Irrelevant silliness.
- Personal morality is possible. And how does this derive from atheism?
- Knowledge defined as certainty is not possible. More fluff that is not atheism specific.
- Truth and knowledge are ultimately meaningless. Nothing in atheism leads to any such conclusion.
- If there is no god, then anything goes. Utter horseshit. (This statement is the clearest example that the author is a theist, (with no philosophical background), pretending to be an atheist.
Presented with a list of this many errors regarding the actual beliefs or opinions of atheists, why should any atheist wish to waste his or her time discussing this nonsense?
It is a pastime of mine to discuss controversial or taboo issues with people willing to engage in rational conversations. I’m not saying I’m an infallible debater, far from it. I am simply devoted to some sort of Socratic method and Descartian doubt that enables me to better understand both my interlocutor’s and my own ideas.
I agree. Although I myself do my best not to fall prey to it. I did not start this thread to see my beliefs confirmed. I’m neither vain nor eager to proselytize.
Let’s say I equidistantly endeavor to argue against the people who condone terrorism against victims who hold atheist beliefs and notice that they make use of this logical fallacy. I will face difficult dilemma because I never attempt to disprove their system (they wouldn’t even bother to talk to me anymore if I alluded to their preconceived notions – I would rather try to understand their convictions and show their biased attitude doesn’t stand within their ideological framework. I know I’ve been warned I can’t argue rationally against an irrational people, but I know for a fact that everyone is irrational and yet capable of reason (more or less).
I’ll pick this last one since I have been blamed for it before in my conversations with Christian missionaries. Thus, the problem boils down to the question of “the real world.” I have presented some of the characteristics of atheists (other than their lack of belief in god) that distinguish them and make them blamable from a fundamentalist person’s perspective. Several atheist ideologies have been referred to within the thread, and they do include in part attitudes identified as atheist by my interlocutors. To what extent this is the real world (i.e. atheists think the universe and life are accidents, atheists do not think things have intrinsic values, atheists believe free will is an illusion, etc.) has become now the debate of the present thread and if we really want to get to the bottom of it I think we should accept that there aren’t as many atheist systems as atheists exist in the world and their attitudes and beliefs can be classified or categorized and these categories do include elements from the lists I have presented. However long, there is a limited list of properties that atheists as philosophical objects can have. A specific atheist may show only one property (other than the lack of belief in god) from the long list (for example, the lack of belief in an intrinsic purpose of life), but this would still qualify him as an atheist. I don’t think I would be credible to my interlocutors if I stated that there aren’t a lot of atheists who deny the existence of free will or that a typical atheist believes in objective values. If I did so, then I would be again accused of ignoring “the real world.”
I agree and it is really so obvious, but I often cope with the attitude we can see in hooligans who watch a soccer match. Their team is losing and is clearly inferior to their rivals, but they still enjoy it when a player from the opposing team has been injured and they themselves try to contribute to the damage by throwing objects at the goalkeeper. Why do I bother? Because this attitude exists in degrees and I hope that if people are willing to discuss their attitudes then they can objectify their bias and try to fix it.
And if someone claimed that God doesn’t exist and that theists were idiots for believing in him, or that all Muslims were evil terrorists, would you debate them?
Assessing evidence isn’t a facile process and I don’t think it fair to dismiss a person as non-philosophical just because s/he makes little sense at a first sight. This author displays knowledge that he uses to discuss problems. After reading the whole paper, he seems nihilistic to me, but whether or not he’s an atheist makes no difference to me in the context of this thread.
When arguing with my interlocutors, I am not presented a list. And they don’t think an atheist is characterized by all these attributes simultaneously. But if an atheist holds at least one of the beliefs in the list, then s/he automatically becomes blamable and unable to sympathize with. I repeat I find this reasoning wrong and really try to dismantle it in a peaceful and methodical way.
I have read your considerations carefully and saved them in the word document I have opened to store the ideas of this conversation. I appreciate your contribution and hope something fruitful will result from all this.
Of course I would, why wouldn’t I?
So if I, an Israeli, were to say that Arabs were evil and stupid and need to be exterminated, you’d calmly debate me? You’d never judge me for holding that opinion?
And if so, have you read Douglas Adams’ *the Restaurant at the End of the Universe?