How long could an atheist society last?

Great Debates
101

You know, Argent, you seem not to have read the people who have said that there are already plenty of atheist/apathist-majority countries in existance. And these countries are not hostile to religion, in fact, some of them have state churches and such. Japan maintains all sorts of Shinto/Buddhist traditions, even though most Japanese don’t believe in God, the head of state of the United Kingdom is also the head of the Anglican Church. There is no particular persecution of religion neccesary in these countries. Rather people are atheist because they aren’t brought up with any particular religion, and they don’t seem to feel the lack.

It’s theoretically possible that Muslim immigrants will outbreed the native Europeans, but it’s also equally possible that after another generation the “Muslims” will be just as atheistic/apathist as the native population.

As for the need to round up and shoot theists, that’s just nonsense. Religious freedom is a higher freedom than the right not to be annoyed by other people’s nonsense. Any religious test for immigration, citizenship, or public office is unacceptable. But of course, engaging in terrorism or rioting is still a crime, regardless of whether the terrorism is religious in character. And the fantasy that some Svengali could brainwash people is simply farcical.

And what percentage of religious people would my ideal atheist country be willing to tolerate? 100%. Even though I’m an atheist, I would vastly prefer to live in a country where the majority didn’t share my religion, yet had religious freedom, than in a country where most people were atheist yet had no religious freedom. And the worry that if the religious attain a majority they’ll repeal freedom of religion? Well, it hasn’t happened in the US, has it? Where 90% of the population professes to be Christian? If 90% Christian America can have freedom of religion, why can’t any country?

Religion is not fearsome. Totalitarianism justified by religious teaching is. My ideal schools would teach kids history, civics, ethics, economics, science. History clearly shows the results of various totalitarian experiments, so why would any modern person support totalitarianism? Why would I fear that the religious would be more likely to support dictatorship? Dictators often USE religion as one more method to control the population, that doesn’t mean religion is OFTEN used as a method to control the population. Does the head of state of the UK use her position as the head of the state church to control the citizenry?

If the citizens of a country want dictatorship, then dictatorship they will have. Dictatorial methods to prevent the citizenry from establishing a dictatorship are kind of paradoxical, don’t you think? If freedom of religion can only be enforced at the point of a gun, then there is no such thing as freedom of religion.

And religions don’t only spread, they also decline and become extinct. A hundred years ago 90% of the UK would have identified as Christian. Now a minority does. How could that happen, if religion always outspreads and outbreeds atheism? Religions spread because they meet the needs of human beings. When the religion ceases to meet the needs of human beings, it ceases to spread and begins to decline. Christianity no longer appeals to many people in Europe, when a few hundred years ago they were killing each other because they believed in their particular brand of Christianity. How did that happen?

Hint: it wasn’t because a bunch of atheists got together and moved to an island and declared that they’d shoot Christians on sight.

102

Argent, If they nipped the immigration in the bud, declared an isolationist policy, and enforced their border; they could last nigh indefinitely. Again, as per the OP, Athenesia is not listed as being party to any trade or human rights agreements. They could decide to cut themselves off and enforce their border, thus eliminating the threat, by simply not allowing anyone in until they decided that they have a significant enough population to ensure the continuance of their constitution. It is doubtful that any country is going to try the old imperialistic “force the ports open” tactic in this day and age. I should think that economic sanctions against the religious institutions alone would prevent most upstarts, cultural pressure the rest. The real danger comes from abroad, and is easily controlled. Athenesia per the OP is an island. All they would need is a decent coast guard for og’s sake.

103

Let’s turn this around, then. How long would a theist country last? A Christian majority country, for example?

Obviously, these countries (including the US) do quite fine with maintaining that religiosity while still having freedom of religion.

Why would a majority atheist state have problems? Do you see a minority atheist population in the US rising up anytime soon to completely wipe out religion? Do you even see that many atheists?

Of course not, the social pressure is enough to keep that from happening. Even without some kind of government mandate. In the atheist country, you start out with a majority atheist population and none of the little perks that make religion stand out as anything special. The social pressure and lack of benefit alone would keep people of reasonable education away from it.

For the record, I also know more than a handful of atheists who claim to be Christians just to get social benefit from it. They know they wouldn’t get the positions they want, the spouse they want, or the social status they want because of their lack of religion. The same social factors would be present in this hypothetical country.

To address your other point, the reason people believe in magic crystals and the like is because of the irrational “special” status we place on practices that are irrational. An atheist society will not place value on faith alone. Magic crystals, numerology, etc. will be nothing more than entertaining anachronisms of a primitive, backwards age in human thinking. There’s no reason to think that thousands of people in this society will be inclined to believe in this drivel at all.

104

I think this points up a problem that’s ongoing here.

I would argue that by the above description of Japan that it is NOT an atheist country, by my internal definition, since there’s a strong RELIGIOUS tradition and RELIGIOUS practice implied. Lemur866 seems to think, given his wording, that atheism is defined solely by belief in the Christian God (“even though most Japanese don’t believe in God”).

Besides which, no country in the world today was founded to be an atheist country, as the OP states its hypothetical to be, so how they treat things in the real world doesn’t seem that applicable.

105

You’re not understanding it. The Japanese, for the most part, don’t believe in any god.

106

Certainly the versions of Buddhism most practiced in Japan are atheist anyway. Shinto, of course, isn’t.

107

Problem is, when governments try to manipulate their demographics, that’s when you get some of the worst human rights abuses in history.

But are their people going to want to stay there in that situation? People generally like being able to trade with the rest of the world to get stuff that they don’t or can’t produce locally. I suspect there aren’t that many atheists who are willing to accept a drastically reduced standard of living to be able to live in an atheist society. If they’re intelligent and have marketable skills, there probably won’t be any shortage of other countries that do trade with the rest of the world and have enough religious freedom that an atheist can live pretty well there that would be willing to take them, either.

There was a society that tried to get its people to place less value on irrational practices. It was called the Soviet Union. Once the government relaxed its restrictions on stuff like UFOs, magic crystals, and the like, they skyrocketed in popularity, even though that kind of irrationality had been discouraged for more than a generation. That kind of thing may well appeal to part of human nature, in which case, good luck with changing that.

108

Regarding the OP, many are proposing that religious infiltration will eventually overtake and bring down any atheist society. Is there anything about the nature of atheism itself that would cause it to fail?

109

On the other hand, they’d been promoting irrationality for decades; they were suppressing competing brands of irrationality, not irrationality itself. Education is the best weapon against irrationality, not dogmatism and threats and abuse.

110

You don’t have to be a believer in Shinto to engage in activities at their shrine, though, right? My only source of info here is anime, which of course must be oh so reliable, but in various shows it portrayed people buying luck charms, visiting at new years and ringing the bell, drawing fortunes, and even donning the robes and working at shinto shrines, despite there being no indication whatsoever that these characters held any interest in the shinto religion at other times.

It struck me like people celebrating christmas or even putting stars on top of their trees and eating candy canes despite having no interest whatsoever in the christian religion. Cultural, not religious.
And personally, I don’t think we’ll ever entirely be rid of superstition; 50% of people have IQs less than 100, after all. Plus some ‘superstition’ is entertaining; I like to entertain a belief in the modern version of Murphy’s Law, myself. (Of course, superstition on its own is not necessarily theistic.)

111

From what Maastricht had to say earlier in this thread:

you’re probably right.

Superstition is very appealing. It gives you a way to feel like you’re in control of something you’re not. That’s hard to give up- witness the number of people who feel safer driving than flying, even though all statistics say you’re much safer flying, because they feel more in control when they’re driving.

112

Just write into the constitution of Athenesia that congress/parliament/whatever shall pass no law that has a solely- or largely-religious basis. Allow amendment of this article of the constitution with 90+% of the popular vote, with nonvoters counting as “nay”.

I figure if 90%+ of your voters have lost the, heh, “faith”, then your atheist utopia is toast, anyway. Barring that, religious groups are effectively barred from having their beliefs written into law, which neutralizes their power.

And, of course, secret government hit squads to liquidate troublesome individuals…

113

It will probably last a lot longer than a society based on religion. At least you won’t have the constant scams being run by the religions and the constant strife and discontent that they foment.

114

America has been around for awhile…hasn’t it?

115

Which clearly underscores the absurdity (or rather, the paranoia/hatred of atheists) of your claim that “Eventually, all the atheists would figure out some other way to annilate one another…mmmm 50 years would just about do it I think.”

Unless you have some actual reason to make such a ridiculous claim? Some argument, some evidence, some even halfway-sane reason to think that an atheist society is so much more more self-destructive than a christian one?

Go on, let’s hear it. Surprise me.