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Is there a God of atheism?

The difference between quoting Dawkins and quoting Jesus is that Dawkins has data to back up what he says.

Of course, Jesus wasn’t a scientist, either, and some of what he says is just good advice on how to exist in the world. But he also allegedly said — no one knows really what he said, or even with certainty that he existed — stuff about heaven and hell. Of course, in those cases, he could have been talking metaphorically, and really meant that the kingdom of heaven isn’t in the clouds but in you. And that hell is in you, too. Whatever. If you quote Dawkins on biology you’re probably on safe grounds. If you quote him on other stuff, political and sociological stuff, not so much.
 
It is the same leader-follower relationship. The form is always the same.

There are those who know little science yet express absolute faith in the truth of anything said by a 'scientist'. On the forum those who quote a scientist's philosophical osculations as truth.

Ignorance and blind faith is not the sole domain of religion.

How many atheists take what Dawkins says 'on faith'?
 
steve_bank said:
It is the same leader-follower relationship. The form is always the same.

There are those who know little science yet express absolute faith in the truth of anything said by a 'scientist'. On the forum those who quote a scientist's philosophical osculations as truth.

Ignorance and blind faith is not the sole domain of religion.

How many atheists take what Dawkins says 'on faith'?
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There may be some who do this but certainly not the learned ones. This forum is full of smart people, and I excpect a lot of people here, probably most, have actually read Dawkins. And I expect the ones who quote him in particular have read and understood him. But again, that’s about biology. When he steps outside his field, he becomes cringe-worthy, to me anyway.
 
steve_bank said:
How many atheists take what Dawkins says 'on faith'?
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Tbh, I doubt there are many, if any, who do this. What some people proabably do, if they have not read Dawkins, is give him the benefit of the doubt, because they understand he has data and the things he says are broadly agreed upon in a peer-review process with deep historical roots. That’s not taking anything on faith.
 
I don’t believe I’ve ever seen anyone here say anything remotely like, “Dawkins said it, I believe it, that settles it.” In other threads I know I’ve quoted Dawkins and extensively referenced his material to back up the points I was making.
 
steve_bank said:
There have been atheists on the forum who quote Dawkins like theists quote Jesus.
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Oh dang.
I just realized that you'd switched from Darwin to Dawkins.
I don't find either authorities to speak for me, but they share more than a similarity of names.

Christians love to hate them.

Oops.
My bad.
Tom
 
pood said:
I don’t believe I’ve ever seen anyone here say anything remotely like, “Dawkins said it, I believe it, that settles it.” In other threads I know I’ve quoted Dawkins and extensively referenced his material to back up the points I was making.
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And it depends on what he's talking about. But he's not an authority on my views.
Frankly, I found The God Delusion trite and stopped bothering a dozen or so pages into the book. I understood why other people would find it amazing and freeing, but it was old news to me.
But that's me.
Tom
 
I never read Thge God Delusion. My main Dawkins text is The Blind Watchmaker.
 
TomC said:
Most nontheists don't even know who she is.
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I had no idea until this thread; I still have very little idea. I didn't recognise the picture, but I vaguely recall hearing the name - though I couldn't have told you that she was an atheist, just that she was a well known American, famous for some reason that I probably wouldn't bother to look up.

Perhaps if I lived in the US I would be more familiar with her.
 
ideologyhunter said:
Madalyn Murray (or Madalyn Murray O'Hair) was very much a 60's phenom.
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Ah, that explains why I wasn't aware of her. I was born in 1970; Boomer idiosyncrasies and culture aren't much of an interest to me, perhaps because my parents were a touch too old to be boomers themselves (my dad was born in 1937), so boomer culture wasn't part of our household.
 
bilby said:
TomC said:
Most nontheists don't even know who she is.
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I had no idea until this thread; I still have very little idea. I didn't recognise the picture, but I vaguely recall hearing the name - though I couldn't have told you that she was an atheist, just that she was a well known American, famous for some reason that I probably wouldn't bother to look up.

Perhaps if I lived in the US I would be more familiar with her.
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You aren't missing much.

Apparently, she learned how to be an atheist from the Pentecostals or something.
Tom

ETA ~I didn't recognize the pic either. Apparently, it's almost entirely Christians who remember her so fondly.~
 
The relevant point, though, is that Unknown Soldier thinks atheists all worship Madalyn Murray O’Hair as a Goddess, and you know if US says it, it must be true, because of the compelling power of his argumentation.
 
pood said:
The relevant point, though, is that Unknown Soldier "Has Faith That" atheists all worship Madalyn Murray O’Hair as a Goddess, and you know if US says it, it must be true, because of the compelling power of his argumentation.
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FIFY.
Tom
 
pood said:
The difference between quoting Dawkins and quoting Jesus is that Dawkins has data to back up what he says.

Of course, Jesus wasn’t a scientist, either, and some of what he says is just good advice on how to exist in the world. But he also allegedly said — no one knows really what he said, or even with certainty that he existed — stuff about heaven and hell. Of course, in those cases, he could have been talking metaphorically, and really meant that the kingdom of heaven isn’t in the clouds but in you. And that hell is in you, too. Whatever. If you quote Dawkins on biology you’re probably on safe grounds. If you quote him on other stuff, political and sociological stuff, not so much.
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Taking the idea of heaven or hell being in you…. It could also be the surroundings your behaviour puts you in. My life is pretty good right now, not heaven due to health issues, and I would like a bit more money so I can retire, but pretty damn close to it.

Previously, with a narcissistic abusive gambling alcoholic prick of a partner who truly made me think he was the best I could do, my life was hell!
 
Another pointless thread started by an op who doesn't have anything even remotely interesting to say. Only vitriol directed at atheists and a seemingly gigantic ego that is quick to bruise and wrinkle. He comes across as desperately unhappy in his posts, and I wish he would reach out and get the professional help he appears to need so badly.
 
Unknown Soldier said:
I've often heard the religious, Christians in particular, refer to a "God of atheism." Depending on where you get your definitions, "God of atheism" appears to be an oxymoron. Many atheists define themselves as people without belief in God(s). Other atheists might see themselves as those who deny and argue against the objective existence of God(s). For them, God is just a figment of the imagination. They can't have a God if God is merely what other people cook up.

So although a God of atheism appears to be a very implausible idea, I don't see it as completely wrong-headed. Atheists can defend their faith with tenacity at least as fierce as theists defend their beliefs. Atheists have some unproved ideas that are upheld not with valid reason or strong evidence but with anger, abuse, and if possible, forced silence. That kind of behavior appears indicative of theistic belief--you must help God if he is to help you. Now, I'm not saying that atheists actually worship an all-mighty, anthropomorphic God sitting on a throne in the sky. But there does seem to be a counterpart there. Some central figure of existence who is truth itself who is to be served and pleased.
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I list the traits of what we call a fundamentalist. Then I predict how an atheist would sound with those traits. From a distance, they sound the same.

No, there are no atheist gods. But there are faith based, religion-ist type, atheist for sure sure. Fundy think type atheist. They are not the ones that bother me, they are just broken. The ones that bother me are the atheist that use Lennon style political tactics to "save us". You know, because they know better.

The belief that we are part of a larger more complex system is just basic. It may be alive. That is a very reasonable stance. Fundy think type atheist that avoid that discussion because "It doesn't get us anywhere" are just as dangerous to liberty and freedom as any theist I know. One atheist actually told me "Don't connect the dots>", lmao, that what engineers do. Fundy think types are afraid. theist or atheist doesn't matter.
 
SIB said:
It may be alive. That is a very reasonable stance.
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Well, maybe. It is, of course, predicated on our having a sound working definition of "alive" - which most people think we have, but which we actually haven't.

"alive" vs "not alive" seems to be a reflection of humanity's need to pigeonhole everything; Like many such categorisations, it's superficially obvious that it's a reflection of a real dichotomy - but when we look at the details, we find that it really isn't.

Reality is more complex than that. We can easily place most things into one of the two boxes; But there are plenty of edge cases, and when we try to deal with those, we discover that any criteria we use cause problems - they put at least some things into the box we know they don't belong in.

This implies that the entire concept is flawed - that is, it doesn't reflect a factual characteristic of the universe.

The idea that complex systems might be "alive" is entertaining, but cannot be edifying without a detailed and accurate definition of "alive", and no such definition exists (or can be agreed upon). All attempts to define "life" have failed.

Mostly people get around this problem in typical human fashion, by ignoring it and pretending that the edge cases are unimportant and therefore nonexistent. It's possible that they might be the former, but not that they might be the latter.
 
steve_bank said:
On that I have to disagree.

There have been atheists on the forum who quote Dawkins like theists quote Jesus. Organized theism is on a par with organized Christianity, albeit on a smaller scale.

Conservative Evangelicals can be strongly anti government. The RCC has long belved they alience is to a higher power than civil law.

As I see it all human social groups exhibit the same tendemcy to hierarchical structures.
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agreed. They are religion-ist mind sets. Some of us atheist have blind faith. We can't think past what we are told or what happened to us. We can't strike the offender so we strike everything to do with the offender. The shame is the some of us stand around and let them reek havoc.

But their is no deity type god. well, at least the ones I know of anyway. Dawkins is their savor, true enough, but Dawkins isn't ready to send us to hell if we don't believe in him. lmao, although some atheist will kill us if we don't.

I love when some atheist argue from "practical" stances and not "observation". yeah, they aint my type of theist. they are religious and just fighting another religion and forcing theirs on me too.
 
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