Atheist or believer, I don’t think it leaves that suggestion with anyone.
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Not in this forum, please.
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Teehee!
I love you for that.
As for the bus ad, I think it’s cute, though more agnostic than atheist, but what’s wrong with that? If it rubs people the wrong way, they must not be so sure of their own faith. Boo hoo, says I. :rolleyes:
My impression is the ad is just a joke and not really an attempt to convert anyone. Adding to its amusement factor, it does appear to be giving some a taste of their own medicine. I personally don’t care much for religious people’s opinion in my face every time I open my wallet, but I’m feeling rather meh about it these days.
You’ve already said it does reek of the possibility of there being a god or gods. I don’t think that it is a call to take up Pascal’s wager in any formal sense, but if I find religion comforting and reality worrying, but am a little bit uncertain about whether there actually is a god, what does this ad say to me? It’s not going to stop me worrying, and it confirms that even atheists think there might be a god.
No, that’s what you said. I said without “probably,” it wouldn’t be funny, which was the primary goal, and the message would be harsher and more off-putting.
Review your post #17. You actually went even further. I said it was a statement that “reeks of the possibility” that there is a god or gods and you said “that’s exactly what “probably” means, so it doesn’t reek of anything; it’s right there”. I thought we agreed on this point.
You don’t really believe that. You’re just trying to suck the fun out of everything.
Typical.
It’s hard to argue about what “probably” means, so I concede that. 
I don’t think the ad will leave people with the feeling atheists are all riddled with doubt on this topic.
I just take the slogan as “There might or might not be any God. Why worry about it?”
I much prefer apatheism over atheism or agnosticism.
“The irony - it burns.” Presumedly Ms Lafaire has never considered how atheists feel about the prevalence of religious messages.
I certainly do. I’ve seen dozens of debates in which theists point out that atheists can’t prove there isn’t a god, and take atheists’ concession of this as some sort of confirmation that theism is appropriate because even atheists think a god is a real possibility.
What we really need is this concession, unqualified as to degree of likelihood, written in big letters on buses in ads place by atheists.
Natch. I’m trying to prove that us atheists are not the hedonistic and irresponsible people that our lack of strict moral code handed down by a deity allegedly permits, nay, forces us to be.
Princhester, you keep using the phrase “preaching to the choir” as if it were some huge mistake by the ad’s creators, but honestly 99% of advertising meets the definition of “preaching to the choir” that you appear to be using.
When I write an ad for an SUV, I don’t care about people who don’t drive. I don’t care about people who ride motorcycles. I don’t care about people looking to buy a compact. I don’t even care about people looking for a pickup truck. The ads are written only with people who already want the product in mind. Advertising to try and change the minds of people who actively don’t want what you’re selling is almost always a complete waste of time and money.
Besides, the goal of the ad was to raise money for the British Humanist Association, which it has done beyond the group’s wildest expectations ($150,000 compared to the hoped-for $8,000), so evidently preaching to the choir is exactly what was needed.
Yeah, but people that buy into this sort of ‘logic’ are, well, slightly impaired in their reasoning ability, so why care about what they think? There’s no need to ‘win over’ people in atheism, because it’s not the same kind of club/organization as religion, thus, there’s no need to cater to the lowest common denominator, or for recruitment drives. Atheism doesn’t need people; churches do.
To me, it’s simply the case that atheism shouldn’t enter into the competition for market share the various religions engage in, because if anything, that promotes the idea of atheism being ‘just another religion’.
Selling material goods and selling a philosophical viewpoint are not directly comparable at all. Heaps of political or lobbying style advertisements are clearly aimed at changing people’s minds.
Furthermore, brand advertising usually seeks to associate a brand with positivity and good stuff. Not shilly shallying and negativity.
Even were that not true, you are overlooking the obvious. Your ads are not aimed at those who already own the product you sell. That is, in this context, your ads would not be aimed at people who are already atheists or confirmed agnostics. That is who the choir is, and that is who this ad is aimed at.
Your ads would be aimed at those who are already thinking about becoming atheist or agnostic. They are not the choir
You’re misreading. The goal of the newspaper campaign was to raise money to put atheist slogans on buses. The slogans were the objective, not the means.
Your argument is one against using slogans on buses. It’s not much of an argument as to why to use a bad slogan on buses. Sure, we can say that a number of religious people are not the brightest bulbs in the box and there’s no point in trying to convince them of anything. Fine. What’s that got to do with me or my arguments against the particular slogan that someone else (not me) chose to use?
Nah, it’s an argument against using slogans on buses with the intent of ‘converting’ people to atheism.
Well, we could say that, only it would be rather lame and not what I was intending to convey at all. The way you say it implies that we (as atheists) only want the clever dudes; I on the other hand was saying that there are people that can’t be convinced no matter what, and that all in all, atheism shouldn’t want anybody to join, because it’s not dependent on the people who are atheists – put another way, if nobody is part of religion X, it ceases to exist, thus religion X needs to recruit people to sustain itself; on the other hand, even if there are no atheists in the whole wide world, atheism still remains a valid philosophical position, as negation of all forms of theism. That’s perhaps a subtle, but, to me, important distinction with far reaching implications on the ‘marketing’ for atheism.
Perhaps making the same point even more strongly, atheism can always be arrived at by pure reasoning; any given religion, once it’s dead and gone, it stays dead and gone.
It merely means that I feel you’re looking at it from the wrong perspective, implicitly equating religion and atheism in their need for marketing, which I think doesn’t work.
The ads were in response to a previous campaign by Christians. They were not intended to “recruit” atheists; they were, if you like, an effort to get equal time for an opposing viewpoint.
That the US and UK campaigns have prompted mass sense of humor failures is, sadly, not very surprising at all.
So you don’t think my assumptions about what is being attempted are correct. Why do you think the ads were placed?
Here’s what the campaign websitesays:
So amongst other things, the goal was to counter recruitment of people by religious campaigns. My view: fail, for reasons I’ve explained.
Another was to show atheism as positive and liberating. My view: fail, for reasons I’ve explained.
The goals of giving a visible presence, generating debate are probably achieved.
As I said, I thought it was to show presence and as a reaction to similar religious advertisements, which is more or less in line with what the website says; also note that it’s supposed to be the websites whose URLs the ad features that are to give more information about atheism as a ‘positive and liberating alternative to religion.’
But I fear we’re both digging ourselves in too deep, so I’d say we’d best just agree to disagree.
In the spirit of abiding advertising guideline, if a religious group wanted a campaign for “God loves you”, would that be,
God probably loves you
or
There is probably a God that loves you
or maybe
There is probably a God that probably loves you