Is Atheism Fundamentally Evil?

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Re: Is Atheism Fundamentally Evil?

Post by JimC » Tue Nov 29, 2016 11:12 pm

They should be stamped out! :lay:
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Re: Is Atheism Fundamentally Evil?

Post by Hermit » Tue Nov 29, 2016 11:25 pm

Brian Peacock wrote:...ask yourself why some religious people do bad things in the name of their religion and why most atheists don't do bad things in no-name of nothing.
Stand by for Stalin's, Mao's et cetera 27 zillion murders, everybody.
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Re: Is Atheism Fundamentally Evil?

Post by pErvinalia » Tue Nov 29, 2016 11:27 pm

The stupidity at this site is really starting to get to me.. :sigh:
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Re: Is Atheism Fundamentally Evil?

Post by Brian Peacock » Wed Nov 30, 2016 1:44 am

Have you tried winking? ;)
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Re: Is Atheism Fundamentally Evil?

Post by Seth » Wed Nov 30, 2016 1:48 am

pErvin wrote:The stupidity at this site is really starting to get to me.. :sigh:
Then stop posting your stupidity. Problem solved!
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Re: Is Atheism Fundamentally Evil?

Post by Seth » Wed Nov 30, 2016 1:57 am

Hermit wrote:
Seth wrote:But atheism has no moral compass as a fundamental component. Atheism is, by your own arguments, absolutely nothing other than a "lack of belief in god or gods." That's what's nihilistic about it. It poses nothing positive, it's negative philosophical space. It states no premises or beliefs that can be examined for moral strength, it says only one thing and is otherwise an empty vessel that the atheist may fill up with anything he pleases, or nothing, provided only that he doesn't try to fill it up with "belief in god or gods."
That is a very common view taken by Christians and Muslims. They proceed to conflate amorality with immorality and regard it as evil. This train of thought is not universal, but it is all too common.

Atheism is indeed nothing other than a "lack of belief in god or gods", but it is nihilistic only in regard to the supernatural - except to those who keep asserting that morals are god-given, which is an assertion most theists hold to be true.
Incorrect. It's an empty philosophy by its very nature. It offers nothing, suggests nothing, provides no guidance or advice, it's a big, fat zero of a philosophy. It's only assertion is a negative; "god does not exist." It's not forward-looking, it's not helpful, it's not even rational, as I have demonstrated countless times here. This doesn't stop Atheists from building an entire religious cult around that nullity, which kind of beggars the rational imagination.

Whatever morality Atheists might have they obtained from somewhere other than atheism, and the vast majority of the time, if they have a moral compass at all, it's derived more or less directly from...wait for it...Christianity.

But Atheists are loathe to admit this and go through all sorts of gyrations and evasions to deny that their existing moral code is soundly founded in Christian theology and belief simply because western society is all but universally based in Judeo-Christian philosophy. Atheists can't even get as far as "murder is immoral" without running smack into the Ten Commandments.

Immoral Atheists are not necessarily immoral because they lack a belief in god or gods, they are immoral because their philosophy offers nothing by way of moral guidance so they have to seek that somewhere else, and in doing so may well find it in immorality and mistake it for morality because there is no higher judge of their actions than themselves.
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"All that is required for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." Edmund Burke

"Those who support denying anyone the right to keep and bear arms for personal defense are fully complicit in every crime that might have been prevented had the victim been effectively armed." Seth

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Re: Is Atheism Fundamentally Evil?

Post by Seth » Wed Nov 30, 2016 1:59 am

Hermit wrote:
Svartalf wrote:I've never eaten a baby either...
Neither have I, but I've eaten a babysitter. Does that count?
Only if she was underage. Well, not quite, sorry, if she was your employee then you are guilty of sexual harassment even if she came...
"Seth is Grandmaster Zen Troll who trains his victims to troll themselves every time they think of him" Robert_S

"All that is required for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." Edmund Burke

"Those who support denying anyone the right to keep and bear arms for personal defense are fully complicit in every crime that might have been prevented had the victim been effectively armed." Seth

© 2013/2014/2015/2016 Seth, all rights reserved. No reuse, republication, duplication, or derivative work is authorized.

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Re: Is Atheism Fundamentally Evil?

Post by Seth » Wed Nov 30, 2016 2:15 am

Brian Peacock wrote: Yes, atheists reject religioys claims and assertion made on behalf of supernatural entities, but atheists don't lack moral capacity or reasoning as a consequence of that simply because morality isn't the preserve of religion or the religious.
True, and I didn't suggest that it was. I merely point out that religion is the dominant source of moral instruction in human society and always has been, by an extremely large margin. There is a very good reason that this is true and why it's remained true throughout human history.
Now, if you think that morality is the preserve of religion then you're likely to assume that atheists are going to be lacking some necessary moral component that only religion can provide, and as a result you may feel that atheism is open to the charge of immorality.
I don't, so we can dispense with this argument.
Why you think that atheism should entail a specific moral code, and that that code should essentially follow a religious model, is, frankly, as ludicrous as it is rationally incoherent. If religiosity acts as some kind of moral compass or brake then ask yourself why some religious people do bad things in the name of their religion and why most atheists don't do bad things in no-name of nothing.
It's a compass, not an autopilot. It gives guidance but it doesn't control the steering. It's like a GPS. It'll tell you the correct way to go, and it'll try to correct you if you go off course, but ultimately you're in charge of your route and destination. Therefore, religious people doing bad things doesn't impeach religion or its moral compass at all. It provides the guidance, but you can choose to ignore it.

Atheism, on the other hand, is like staring at a GPS that's turned off and trying to use it for navigating. Doesn't work. So, instead maybe you look out the window to the side and see the verge and focus on it for keeping your path straight only to run into a wall because you're looking in the wrong place for navigational advice. Now, maybe instead of the GPS of religion you have a map, and you try to focus on following the map, but you still run off the road because the map is old and the information out of date. Or maybe it's written in Farsi and you can't understand the directions and labels. Not much help. Or perhaps you ask a pedestrian for directions to your home, but he directs you to a brothel full of trafficked children instead where you succumb to evil.

As for what Atheists do in the name of Atheism, there are plenty of examples of Atheists acting exactly like the religious zealots many of them actually are and using Atheism as a weapon against their enemies. That happens here on an almost daily basis. Of course not all atheists are Atheists, and some Atheists are more religiously zealous than others.

In other words, you're effectively saying that good can only be verified and validated in terms of religion and that atheists must therefore be bad for rejecting religion.
No, that's not what I'm saying at all. And that is why the rest of your argument is essentially a strawman, but I'll address it anyway.
This is the same sort of doctrinal nonsense as highlighted in the OP, but when one considers the plethora of religions and their subordinate denominations, all of which lay a claim to moral truth, how are you to alight upon the proper authority capable of determining the bounds of good and evil, right and wrong, by which all should live (including true believers, different believers, indifferent believers, and non-believers), and from where or what is that authority drawn?
Nobody said religious faith was easy. The place to start, I suppose, is by carefully educating yourself in the fine points of various religions so you can intelligently decide whether or not any particular religion's beliefs and moral guidance are likely to be useful to you. Willful ignorance of religions of the world using the specious excuse that you don't want to be polluted by religiosity is the last refuge of the inferior mind.

As I prove, it is possible to know and understand a religion quite well without, as Aristotle put it "accepting the idea."

But the one thing that Atheists are notorious for is their gross and deliberate willful ignorance of the religions and people they attack and claim moral and intellectual superiority over. And nowhere is that more true than here.
"Seth is Grandmaster Zen Troll who trains his victims to troll themselves every time they think of him" Robert_S

"All that is required for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." Edmund Burke

"Those who support denying anyone the right to keep and bear arms for personal defense are fully complicit in every crime that might have been prevented had the victim been effectively armed." Seth

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Re: Is Atheism Fundamentally Evil?

Post by Seth » Wed Nov 30, 2016 2:20 am

Brian Peacock wrote:Have you tried winking? ;)
Did you mean "wanking?"
"Seth is Grandmaster Zen Troll who trains his victims to troll themselves every time they think of him" Robert_S

"All that is required for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." Edmund Burke

"Those who support denying anyone the right to keep and bear arms for personal defense are fully complicit in every crime that might have been prevented had the victim been effectively armed." Seth

© 2013/2014/2015/2016 Seth, all rights reserved. No reuse, republication, duplication, or derivative work is authorized.

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Re: Is Atheism Fundamentally Evil?

Post by Hermit » Wed Nov 30, 2016 3:09 am

Seth wrote:
Hermit wrote:
Seth wrote:But atheism has no moral compass as a fundamental component. Atheism is, by your own arguments, absolutely nothing other than a "lack of belief in god or gods." That's what's nihilistic about it. It poses nothing positive, it's negative philosophical space. It states no premises or beliefs that can be examined for moral strength, it says only one thing and is otherwise an empty vessel that the atheist may fill up with anything he pleases, or nothing, provided only that he doesn't try to fill it up with "belief in god or gods."
That is a very common view taken by Christians and Muslims. They proceed to conflate amorality with immorality and regard it as evil. This train of thought is not universal, but it is all too common.

Atheism is indeed nothing other than a "lack of belief in god or gods", but it is nihilistic only in regard to the supernatural - except to those who keep asserting that morals are god-given, which is an assertion most theists hold to be true.
Incorrect. It's an empty philosophy by its very nature. It offers nothing, suggests nothing, provides no guidance or advice, it's a big, fat zero of a philosophy. It's only assertion is a negative; "god does not exist." It's not forward-looking, it's not helpful, it's not even rational, as I have demonstrated countless times here. This doesn't stop Atheists from building an entire religious cult around that nullity, which kind of beggars the rational imagination.

Whatever morality Atheists might have they obtained from somewhere other than atheism, and the vast majority of the time, if they have a moral compass at all, it's derived more or less directly from...wait for it...Christianity.

But Atheists are loathe to admit this and go through all sorts of gyrations and evasions to deny that their existing moral code is soundly founded in Christian theology and belief simply because western society is all but universally based in Judeo-Christian philosophy. Atheists can't even get as far as "murder is immoral" without running smack into the Ten Commandments.

Immoral Atheists are not necessarily immoral because they lack a belief in god or gods, they are immoral because their philosophy offers nothing by way of moral guidance so they have to seek that somewhere else, and in doing so may well find it in immorality and mistake it for morality because there is no higher judge of their actions than themselves.
You were spot on when you said: "Atheism is, by your own arguments, absolutely nothing other than a "lack of belief in god or gods."' That is actually all there is to it. It neither aims nor needs to provide anything else. Not even morality. Just speaking for myself, I try to live by what Charles Gibbon dubbed the Golden Rule in 1604: "Do unto others as you would they do unto you." Yes, you can find words to that effect in the Bible but the rule itself predates Luke 6:31 by a long shot. Not only that, but it has emerged in many places independently from each other. That should give you a hint that its origin is not so much found in religion per se, but in the need for humans to get along with each other and the desire to do so in the most pleasant way possible.We found out that these goals are more likely to be realised if we adopt the above principle of reciprocity. As such, it can be regarded as a social construct rather than a god-given one. You can even argue that it precedes human existence. Altruism abounds in the animal world as well. Immoral atheists are not immoral because what you call the philosophy of atheism does not provide morals. Immoral atheists are immoral for the same reason immoral theist are immoral: They care not for reciprocity and altruism in the conduct of their lives.
I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein’s brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops. - Stephen J. Gould

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Re: Is Atheism Fundamentally Evil?

Post by Hermit » Wed Nov 30, 2016 3:17 am

Seth wrote:
Hermit wrote:
Svartalf wrote:I've never eaten a baby either...
Neither have I, but I've eaten a babysitter. Does that count?
Only if she was underage. Well, not quite, sorry, if she was your employee then you are guilty of sexual harassment even if she came...
She was no more underage than I and definitely not my employee. She just rang me up to keep her company while minding one of her aunt's brats, which was usually every other Sunday afternoon when aunty and uncle had away rubbers of bridge.
I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein’s brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops. - Stephen J. Gould

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Re: Is Atheism Fundamentally Evil?

Post by Seth » Wed Nov 30, 2016 3:24 am

Hermit wrote:
Seth wrote:
Hermit wrote:
Svartalf wrote:I've never eaten a baby either...
Neither have I, but I've eaten a babysitter. Does that count?
Only if she was underage. Well, not quite, sorry, if she was your employee then you are guilty of sexual harassment even if she came...
She was no more underage than I and definitely not my employee. She just rang me up to keep her company while minding one of her aunt's brats, which was usually every other Sunday afternoon when aunty and uncle had away rubbers of bridge.
Heh, heh...he said "rubbers"....heh heh heh.
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"All that is required for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." Edmund Burke

"Those who support denying anyone the right to keep and bear arms for personal defense are fully complicit in every crime that might have been prevented had the victim been effectively armed." Seth

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Re: Is Atheism Fundamentally Evil?

Post by Hermit » Wed Nov 30, 2016 3:31 am

Seth wrote:
Hermit wrote:
Seth wrote:
Hermit wrote:
Svartalf wrote:I've never eaten a baby either...
Neither have I, but I've eaten a babysitter. Does that count?
Only if she was underage. Well, not quite, sorry, if she was your employee then you are guilty of sexual harassment even if she came...
She was no more underage than I and definitely not my employee. She just rang me up to keep her company while minding one of her aunt's brats, which was usually every other Sunday afternoon when aunty and uncle had away rubbers of bridge.
Heh, heh...he said "rubbers"....heh heh heh.
Better still, Rubber bridge is a form of contract bridge played by two competing pairs using a particular method of scoring. Mind you, we kids were not as particular about how we scored as aunty and uncle, and though their game involved interaction between two couples, ours was more breathtaking.
I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein’s brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops. - Stephen J. Gould

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Re: Is Atheism Fundamentally Evil?

Post by Seth » Wed Nov 30, 2016 3:33 am

Hermit wrote:
Seth wrote:
Hermit wrote:
Seth wrote:But atheism has no moral compass as a fundamental component. Atheism is, by your own arguments, absolutely nothing other than a "lack of belief in god or gods." That's what's nihilistic about it. It poses nothing positive, it's negative philosophical space. It states no premises or beliefs that can be examined for moral strength, it says only one thing and is otherwise an empty vessel that the atheist may fill up with anything he pleases, or nothing, provided only that he doesn't try to fill it up with "belief in god or gods."
That is a very common view taken by Christians and Muslims. They proceed to conflate amorality with immorality and regard it as evil. This train of thought is not universal, but it is all too common.

Atheism is indeed nothing other than a "lack of belief in god or gods", but it is nihilistic only in regard to the supernatural - except to those who keep asserting that morals are god-given, which is an assertion most theists hold to be true.
Incorrect. It's an empty philosophy by its very nature. It offers nothing, suggests nothing, provides no guidance or advice, it's a big, fat zero of a philosophy. It's only assertion is a negative; "god does not exist." It's not forward-looking, it's not helpful, it's not even rational, as I have demonstrated countless times here. This doesn't stop Atheists from building an entire religious cult around that nullity, which kind of beggars the rational imagination.

Whatever morality Atheists might have they obtained from somewhere other than atheism, and the vast majority of the time, if they have a moral compass at all, it's derived more or less directly from...wait for it...Christianity.

But Atheists are loathe to admit this and go through all sorts of gyrations and evasions to deny that their existing moral code is soundly founded in Christian theology and belief simply because western society is all but universally based in Judeo-Christian philosophy. Atheists can't even get as far as "murder is immoral" without running smack into the Ten Commandments.

Immoral Atheists are not necessarily immoral because they lack a belief in god or gods, they are immoral because their philosophy offers nothing by way of moral guidance so they have to seek that somewhere else, and in doing so may well find it in immorality and mistake it for morality because there is no higher judge of their actions than themselves.
You were spot on when you said: "Atheism is, by your own arguments, absolutely nothing other than a "lack of belief in god or gods."' That is actually all there is to it. It neither aims nor needs to provide anything else. Not even morality. Just speaking for myself, I try to live by what Charles Gibbon dubbed the Golden Rule in 1604: "Do unto others as you would they do unto you." Yes, you can find words to that effect in the Bible but the rule itself predates Luke 6:31 by a long shot. Not only that, but it has emerged in many places independently from each other. That should give you a hint that its origin is not so much found in religion per se, but in the need for humans to get along with each other and the desire to do so in the most pleasant way possible.We found out that these goals are more likely to be realised if we adopt the above principle of reciprocity. As such, it can be regarded as a social construct rather than a god-given one. You can even argue that it precedes human existence. Altruism abounds in the animal world as well. Immoral atheists are not immoral because what you call the philosophy of atheism does not provide morals. Immoral atheists are immoral for the same reason immoral theist are immoral: They care not for reciprocity and altruism in the conduct of their lives.
Well said!

The reason to prefer religion over irreligion generally is that for the vast majority of people finding a moral compass in a church is both easier and more reliable than seeking it out elsewhere. Too often people in search of a moral compass who don't participate in a religion fail to find a good one and they fall into evil behavior as a result.

It seems to me that one of the goals of civilization is to provide the tools that the average can make use of to find his or her way to moral behavior in ways that doesn't leave them scrabbling in the dark. Religion generally offers just that, and because it is so pervasive and ubiquitous most people don't have to go looking at all, it's taught to them from the very beginning of their lives. In a just society they are free to choose to continue down that path or not when they become intellectually capable of making that decision. Prior to that time it is the parents who instill morality in their children and religious practice is a great way to do that, and that is in the best interests of both the child and society in general. And religion offers far more than just moral instruction, it also offers community and fellowship, which are an essential part of the proper formation of a competent adult personality. Those who grow up isolated from community and fellowship can have a really, really hard time as they get older.

The false presumptions of Atheism as stated by religious Atheists, that religion is inherently harmful, especially to children, and therefore should be eliminated from society, is a demonstration of the inability of religious Atheists to see beyond their own prejudices and dogmas.
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"All that is required for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." Edmund Burke

"Those who support denying anyone the right to keep and bear arms for personal defense are fully complicit in every crime that might have been prevented had the victim been effectively armed." Seth

© 2013/2014/2015/2016 Seth, all rights reserved. No reuse, republication, duplication, or derivative work is authorized.

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Re: Is Atheism Fundamentally Evil?

Post by Seth » Wed Nov 30, 2016 3:35 am

Hermit wrote: She just rang me up to keep her company while minding one of her aunt's brats, which was usually every other Sunday afternoon when aunty and uncle had away rubbers of bridge.
Heh, heh...he said "rubbers"....heh heh heh.[/quote]Better still, Rubber bridge is a form of contract bridge played by two competing pairs using a particular method of scoring. Mind you, we kids were not as particular about how we scored as aunty and uncle, and though their game involved interaction between two couples, ours was more breathtaking.[/quote]

Heh heh heh...he said "rubber" and "score" and "two competing pairs"...heh heh heh...whoa....orgy...cool...heh heh heh.
"Seth is Grandmaster Zen Troll who trains his victims to troll themselves every time they think of him" Robert_S

"All that is required for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." Edmund Burke

"Those who support denying anyone the right to keep and bear arms for personal defense are fully complicit in every crime that might have been prevented had the victim been effectively armed." Seth

© 2013/2014/2015/2016 Seth, all rights reserved. No reuse, republication, duplication, or derivative work is authorized.

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