Sure, but that doesn’t make these groups sects.
I am not disputing the fact that Huxley defined it as such, rather, Huxley intended it to be something of a joke. Being a philosopher, he should know that “I don’t know” is not an answer to “Do you believe…?” There are only two acceptable answers, “I do” and “I don’t.”
Just because you hold that humans can never have sufficient knowledge to the question “Is there a god?” it does not make “I don’t know” to the question “Do you believe there is a god?” logically acceptable.
me-I’m a dyslexic insomniac agnostic- I lay awake all night wondering if there really is a DOG
Just because you hold that humans can never have sufficient knowledge to the question “Is there a god?” it does not make “I don’t know” to the question “Do you believe there is a god?” logically acceptable.
Abstention is the only intellectually honest thing to do if you feel you can’t know. Don’t know how logical that is, but why flip a coin when there is no need?
Usually it’s only when it’s specifically brought up that I think about it at all. Rarely in the day do I wonder if there is a god and if there is how he feels about something. I follow my own internal morals with a mind to societal morals. I have a feeling that’s the way most professed believers go through their day as well.
Another question follows the answer “I don’t” though: “Do you believe that there is no god?” The possible answers to that are also “I do” and “I don’t”. This we end up with three possibilities: belief that one or more gods exist (theism?), belief that no god exists (atheism), and between the two, an implied “I don’t know”.
It seems that sometimes some people strongly dislike the idea of not knowing, or don’t want to admit it; this third possibility often seems to fall through the cracks.
Aw Jesus Christ on a Pogo Stick. I misspelled “creator” in my SHOCKINGLY INSIGHTFUL POST.
Some of the larger organisations…
Freedom from Religion Foundation
http://www.ffrf.org/
The Secular Web
http://www.infidels.org/index.shtml
American Atheists
Atheist network radio
http://www.atheistnetwork.com/
Godless Americans and the march on Washington
http://www.godlessamericans.org/
Granted, UU accomodates atheists, but is still semi-religious. The Ethical Society, however, is completely unreligious. And yet the odd thing about it is that it deliberately fulfills the role that church plays in religious people’s lives. As if substituting to fill in the gap in lifestyle that’s left when you subtract church.
I see it as a relic of an earlier age in America, a time when all men wore suits, ties, and fedoras when they went out of the house, and all women wore gloves, hats with little net veils, stockings, etc. A time when church attendence on Sunday morning was de rigueur and an indispensable part of the American social fabric. In those days, bourgeois atheists could keep up their social pretensions as well as any other bourgeois citizens by attending UU or the Ethical Society. Nowadays, the role of church attendance in American life is so diminished that something like the Ethical Society would have no need to arise.
I must emphasize that it is a bourgeois atheist phenomenon; bold revolutionaries like, say, Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo could easily flout traditional social mores as part of their revolutionary lifestyle. The Ethical Society was created for bourgeois atheists who wanted to fit in with the prevailing gray-flannel conformity. But since the 60s and the Baby Boom hippie generation took over, nobody cares anymore what you wear or what you do with your free time. Membership in organizations has declined.
Well, there was in 2001, but their website is no longer around. However, courtesy of Archive.org:
My favourite of the Ten Wisdoms is,
You also misspelled “slices”, since you seem to be counting.
On the contrary, there are many sects which meet weekly (on different days of the week, of course). Namely;
Agnostics
Reformed Agnostics
Lapsed Agnostics
Orthodox Agnostics
Practicing Agnostics
Agnosto-atheists
Fundamental Atheists
Non-practicing Atheists
Freethinkers
Non-secular Atheists
Spiritual atheo-agnostics
Secular Hedonists
Rationalist Atheists, conference of Minnesota
Metroplex Atheists
American Human Atheists
Atheists and Agnostics of Wisconsin (you think I’m making this up, don’t you?)
Baptist Church-attending Atheists
Humanists
Enron executives
Secularists
Practical Atheists of Athens
Sober Agnostics
Diagnostics
to name a few
Skeptics
For a whole new can of worms, there’re pantheists, which come in various flavors. “Pan” = “all” and “theo” = “god” is variously interpreted as all things being part of “god” or “god” existing within all things. I don’t claim to know which (if either) of these is correct/what the coiner of the term meant, I’m just telling you what I’ve heard from folks who call themselves pantheists.
Within pantheism there are scientific pantheists, and most of the ones one the list where I used to hang out identified themselves as atheists, though there were some agnostics and the odd some-kinda-divinity believer (like me) in the bunch.
Mostly the conversation was interesting and thought-provoking: my favorite sentiment gleaned from it was the opinion of several of the atheists who said while they did not believe in a creator, they felt the universe itself was so magnificent that it was worthy of reverence, even absent any divinity.
On the other hand, arguments were not unknown. It’s kinda funny and sad at the same time watching avowed atheists play the “holier than thou” game with each other.
It may be worth noting that some folks who do not believe in a god do believe in things like spirits and/or souls, which as I recall were the matter of many of the debates.
Otherwise known as the Wife of Bath’s Rule.
There is a Rabbi (I believe in the US) who founded a sect based on the the idea that it is impossible to know whether god exists, so the question is irrelevant. I have seen their website, but after a half hour of googling I wasn’t able to turn it up again. It made an impression on me because that is exactly how I regard the question.