Spiritus
Exactly.
Well, a number of philosophers have debated the origins of morality over the years, from Aristotle’s virture theory, to Hobbe’s social contract, to Mill’s utilitarianism. One thing all of them agree on, true morality actually is not found from religious teachings. Religions have adopted morality that is based on human reason, but a person is only acting morally when they act out of a conscious decision on their part not made by an outside source. As I said on another MB somewhere, the 10 commandments aren’t true because god said them (well, the last few at any rate), god said them because they are true.
Hobbe’s argued that in our natural state, man is entirely self interested. He would do anything he needed to do to make his situation better at any expense. However, because he is reasonable, he would figure out that everyone else was the same way, and he would need to spend his entire life guarding what little he had and watching his back. As a result, man created the “Leviathan,” which would be government or religion, etc., a higher power to enforce basic standards that would make life bearable. Morality is a function solely of this man-made creation.
Mills uses utilitarianism, a form of consequentialism, which judges morality by looking at the consequences of our actions. In his case, he looks for what will lead to the greatest good. Take killing for example. Is it good. Well, if it’s ok for me to kill, then it’s ok for anyone else to kill, and overall that is bad for society. Is it ok to lie? Well, I lie to gain a short term benefit for myself. But again, if I can lie, anyone can, and therefore any benefit I’ve gained is negated because everyone now has that same opportunity, and there are a number of problems for society, so lying is bad also. All moral standards are developed in this manner according to him.
Most of the other major theorists like Kant, etc., reach these same conclusions based on a similar fashon. All of the latter of the 10 commandments can be justified in this same manner.
The problem comes with finer points of morality, which get argued by all of these theories and additional ones in any number of ways. Take homosexuality. Most anti-homosexuals who aren’t basing it solely on religious grounds will use a functionalist manner of arguing against it. The purpose of sex is procreation. Homosexuals cannot procreate, therefore them having sex is immoral. The same would be true for birth control, oral sex, etc. Some however would also argue that another purpose is for pleasure, human bonding, etc., and therefore as long as no one is being hurt by it it is ok. Utilitarians are very torn becaus eit’s hard to define what is for the greatest good. Is procreation necessarily a good thing? The world is becoming overpopulated, so maybe not. Is sex for pleasure a good thing, or does it lead to violent social behavior? A lot of judgement calls to be made here. This is why these finer points of morality are not as universal as the other major points. The answers aren’t as clear cut and different people reach very different conclusions about them.
Okay, let’s get to quotin’!
Not my mother, she is part of my social group, however, i have no qualms about killing your mother for her jewelery, she is not part of my social group, and her loss does not affect me.
Well, one advantage would be to be good so the government doesn’t get you, or if we are eliminating government also, then be good so the mob doesn’t get you. If i killed that person’s mama for her jewels, although the act would not affect me in a moral sense, if he found out that i did it, he’d get his friends and come a’shootin’. This seems to be substituting the “Big Brother” from God to local government. That may appeal to some, but there will be areas where the local government has different laws and reasources, and they will view the different factions differently, possibly as inferiors, and will want to take what they don’t have.
Yes, but far too few people. That’s the problem with the world (one of the problems).
So what happens when the different groups clash? There will still be boarders in this brave new world, people will still view outsiders with distrust, especially ones with different morals. There will still be fighting. It doesn’t take a religion for an Arab to see the Jewish settlers on his father’s land, or for men to try to hide their women so no one else will have sex with them. Eliminating religion would make the world an empty place for many people, new religions would start in order to deal with man’s need to fill spiritually. I myself cannot imagine my life without God in it, even though i do not go to church or do other “practicing Christian” things. If i were to become spiritually empty, i don’t know what i’d do. (Maybe i’d even start captializing my i’s! But why? There’s no Capital I Heaven to look forward to.)
I agree. Sorry if I implied differently.
For sake of this argument the above is conceded.
Actually, in the above case, Einsteins physics surplants Newtonian physics only on a large scale, like the universe. Newtonian physics are still used on the small scale like possibly the solar system. Neither of them invented physics, they just discovered and described it.
Neither do I and the only reason I surmised such a thing is that Spiritus Mundi straightened me out about this being a hypotetical situation (Imagine no religion).
Amen…ah…er…Cool
Sorry but I have no clue in regards to: (hu)m(a/e}n(s)
I believe that a lot of the other atheists would think that your assumptions are unfounded. I also would question them especially the latter one about forcing their beliefs on others.
Agreed
I feel the same way.
Now that could really be a problem. I agree with you, but I also love the beautiful arches and pillars (there are a couple in the Vatican that I’m not too crazy about). So in order to have a place for your stained glass (the larger the prettier) and to save my arches and pillars, we might as well save the whole structure. Of course there are some that would just have to go because they have no redeeming features.
I used to think this was the way all atheists felt. It made sense to me (part of my innocense as Lib points out). I have since learned that some atheists want to convert people, thus my reference to atheist fundies.
Recently on TV there was a minister, who said “When any religion makes the statement that they have the answer, that is the time for the atheists to step in and correct them. Even the atheists have a purpose”. I am not saying this is all that atheism has to offer, but it does agree with your point.
What can I say, they wouldn’t have picked you as a moderator if you were a closed minded S.O.B. like me.
Lordy, lordy, Miss Claudie, it sure looks good to me!
[Gaudere 9:42 Yea, and one day the lion shall lie down with the hind, and the conservative with the liberal, and the Machead with the PC user; and the cites from reputable, peer-reviewed sources will be as numerous as the stars in the sky; and for every [b] there shall be a [/b], and for every [i] there shall be an [/i], and for every [quote] there shall be an [/quote], for ever and ever, amen.][sup]*[/sup]
[sub]*In other words, watch your coding.[/sub]
[Edited by Gaudere on 07-04-2001 at 09:47 PM]
Of course, I’m not Gaudere (nor am I Clark Kend, dammit), but I can hit a couple points:
Well, kinda. As it turns out, Newtonian physics is always an approximation, everywhere, on all scales. It’s just an extremely accurate one for many things.
But substitute “Quantum” for “Einstein’s” above, and the statement holds without quibble, I trust.
Man/men/human/humans.
I submit you do not know many atheists. Literate, intellectual ones, that is, who reached their (lack of) belief on their own instead of as a blind rebellion.
I think you’ll find that such people are extremely few and far between.
But in this case, I’ll definitely pray:
*O Gaudere
Keeper of the Thread
And all that is Debatable,
Lead us not into the Pit,
and Deliver us from Alex Chiu.
Dear Lady of the online Bickering
Mistress of the Silicon Path,
Please fix poor Kniz’s coding
that We might read his words.
Amen.*
Right. The OP suggests that one day everyone wakes up, and there is no concept of religion. None. It’d be as if you’d never heard of God at all. Or does this mean something different to you?
Andros
What about the American Atheists? You know, the hand-stabbers.
<inane question>
Howdid that happen to his post? Computer glitch?
</inane question>
Please exercise caution when stacking nests.
Try leaving out the / from your [/end-tags]…
Fun for all the family!!
Gp
(Hand-stabbers?)
So they’re vocal. So is Fred Phelps. Doesn’t mean they’re ubiquitous. As kniz says, they’re out there–but I contend that proselytizing atheists are quite few in number.
Thanks for cleaning that up, Gaudere.
For those wondering, Kniz’s post above my prayer to Mod Almighty had text that extended past the right side of the screen.
When you quote, you can
If you miss the / in the close quote command, the left margin will continue to indent with every quote, eventually running off the right side of the screen.
While I’m sure there are members of AmAth who proselytize, the organization does not have that as one of its stated goals, SFAICT. Their goals appear to be equal civil rights for atheists and separation of church and state and an openness and acceptance of atheism, but they do not have missionaries or clearly state that it is one of their main goals to convert as many people as possible, unlike most Christian churches.
Be that as it may, they advise that, when revealing their position to believers, atheists “[m]ention bad religious people. Remember that Hitler was a Catholic, and that Jeffrey Dahmer said grace before he ate his victims. Mention also that one need only open a newspaper to find yet another story about allegations against priests for sexual misconduct, often with children. Don’t forget our good friends Jim Bakker (who swindled millions from his flock) and Jimmy Swaggart (asked for forgiveness only after being caught using prostitutes).”
It quacks a lot like tract language.
Tsk, tsk, tsk, Lib. Shame on you. I’m not going to apologize for American Atheists as an organization (I, after all, let my membership expire because I felt their message was often too shrill), but you cannot simply drop a quote like that out of context.
The quote comes from an essay called Coming Out – Atheism: The Other Closet. In it, the writer offers suggestions for those who have decided that they are atheists to “come out” publicly, as it were.
After offering several suggestions to those who have decided to let friends/family/whoever know that one is an atheist (To wit: 1) Be confident, 2) Be compassionate, 3) Hope for the best but prepare for the worst), the author then goes on to offer tips for responding to some likely arguments (emphases mine):
In summary, the author recommends you “mention bad religious people” when others accuse atheists of having no morals because they are atheists. It is not recommended anywhere on their website or in any literature I ever received from them that you use it as some sort of atheism-proselytizing tool.
Okay, Phil. I was wrong. But I still think the site, as a whole, (plus their magazine site) reads an awful lot like Jack Chick.
It’s not that you were “wrong,” per se, but that the context of the quote was pretty crucial. Like I said, I understand your distrust of the organization – I found them less constructive than confrontational. Their legislative aims are often worthy, but they have a habit of putting their collective foot in their collective mouth, too, and they also don’t engage in sufficient fact-checking for my taste. (Although I can also sympathize in general with atheists who say, “Hey, religion has had the floor for 2,000 years now, and we’d like to be heard, too.”)
If that quote had been on their website under the heading, “Do this in front of every church you pass,” I’d be right there condemning them with a lot of other people. Fortunately, it’s just the author’s snarky way of arguing what you and I both have argued in the past–that moral behavior is not contingent upon religion, and vice versa.
It’s like when the singer in my band saw, for the first time, the sticker on one of my bass cases (“Militant Agnostic: I Don’t Know And You Don’t Either”). He, being a person of faith, said, “How can you be an agnostic? You’re such a nice guy!” The nasty part of me wants to reply, “Well, one day I hope to be as faithful as Torquemada.” Instead, I just replied, “Well, that should tell you something. Anyway, I gave up baby-eating several months ago.”
Does anyone here seriously think religion is a reason to commit atrocities? It isn’t. It is an excuse. The kind of people who do such things would find some other excuse if there were no religion. If you’re an atheist, you’re kind of required to believe that what religion calls ‘evil’ comes from within men, so religion is not what causes it. Do you seriously think Torquemada would not have found some other excuse to torture people if the Catholic Church had not existed? Religion is used an excuse to do evil, it is not a cause of evil. (Substitute unethical or immoral behavior for evil if you’re uncomfortable with the word.)
As to the point about the percentage of atheists in prison, if the statistics are true (I saw no sources for the numbers, but then again I have no reason to doubt them - I guess I’m just skeptical), I would suspect two factors:
[ul]
[li]Most atheists, beleiving this life is all they have, would probably be more motivated to stay out of prison, and so would be less likely than religious people to risk going there (and while I personally think that fear of consequences is a better reason than none at all for being moral, it is the atheists on this thread who are denigrating that concept* - although they are using Albert Einstein, who did believe in God, as a support).[/li][li]Most atheists who do end up in prison probably ‘get religion’ while they are there.[/li][/ul]
I have no statisitcs to back any of this up - as I said, they are only suggestions. But it would be interesting to see a study done on the percentage of people who are atheist going into prison versus the perecentage who are atheist coming out.
*To clarify - I mean the concept of fear as a motivator, not the concept of such a motivation being better than no motivation at all.
I dunno. “Atrocities” (as opposed to everyday evil) are usually committed in the service of some transcendent “cause.” Religion is one of the big offenders.
I believe morality is innate, and dogma and zealotry intefere with it.
Anyway, as an atheist I’m required to believe that religion also comes from within humans. We clearly have a strong, universal instinct for it.
Maybe, but I’d suspect socioeconomic factors too.