Is Atheism a Belief System? (split from the Political Views thread)

[Lexicus]

The simplest definition of what a god is, is a being that exists outside the laws of our universe, who interacts in some way with our universe. Gods are typically conceived as having powers, or causing natural phenomena, or creating/destroying worlds, or having omniscience and/or omnipotence. But more to the point, they do meaningful stuff in our universe, meaningful enough to be worth paying attention to.

Well, I've never seen any reason to posit a god that interacts. I don't believe in magic and never really did, even as a child.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Who said magic?

 

[Estebonrober]

The simplest definition of what a god is, is a being that exists outside the laws of our universe, who interacts in some way with our universe. Gods are typically conceived as having powers, or causing natural phenomena, or creating/destroying worlds, or having omniscience and/or omnipotence. But more to the point, they do meaningful stuff in our universe, meaningful enough to be worth paying attention to.

Perhaps it is a useful definition mostly because it allows atheists and theists to rectify their beliefs, but I think it also captures the popular conception of what a "god" is.

Does creating it and setting the laws of physics in motion count?

 

[zxcvbob]

Oh, groovy. This argument again.

No, it is not a "belief system." It's a lack of belief. Yes, I acknowledge that most people in the world believe (or may have believed) in at least one supernatural being, if not more, and it may surprise people in this thread to know that in some of the stories I write, some of my characters do have a profound faith in their gods and whatever belief system is associated with them. I'm working on such a story now. But that doesn't mean I share those beliefs. I don't worship anything.

As I understand it, an atheist believes there is no God. (IMHO, that requires a lot of faith.) An agnostic doesn't believe one way or the other.

 

[Birdjaguar]

I think most atheists don't really care about god; they are more worried about 1) the prospect of religion gaining ground in the world and 2) keeping JW et al off their doorstep. They want reason and scientific methodology to be the only accepted path of discovery for what is true.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

To be honest, I've never met anyone that was all that concerned about people on their doorstep, other than Valka. At my gf's house we get about five times as many solar power or home security sales types as we get from all religions combined...and they are usually more rude and less attractive.

 

[Akka]

You could also be a strong atheist who truly 100% believes that gods don't exist, someone who meets with other similar atheists, have established a church within which they spread their message, meet on a regular basis, and have a tax free status.

Not sure this kind of person actually exists outside the fantasies of religious people.

The difference is between agnostic atheism and gnostic atheism. An agnostic atheist lacks a belief in god X, but does not feel they know that X does not exist. This could also be called weak atheism. A gnostic atheist on the other hand lacks a belief in X, but also feels he knows that X does not exist. This could be called strong atheism. On the opposite side of the spectrum you have gnostic and agnostic theists.

This remind me of one of the case where what someone said on the Internet actually made me change (well, in this case rather "make up") my mind.
I spent a long time saying that I was agnostic rather than atheist, because of, well, this reasoning. I certainly didn't believe in gods or other supernatural things, but I kept in mind the Matrix principle (that we might be blind to a whole part of existence due to our limited perceptions), and kept the door open for philosophical cases.

In one CFC discussion, someone basically called out the agnostic for simply taking the easy way out and just trying to look wiser. He pointed that if we used this idea our perception was limited to claim "we don't know", then we could as well say "I don't know if I'm actually sitting on my chair", "I don't know if I didn't actually sprang into being with made-up memories five seconds ago" and so on. Basically, it's something that can be used for everything, everywhere, without an answer, so : it's basically useless (unless it's the specific subject of the discussion).
This made me think, and conclude he was right. Hence I stopped calling myself "agnostic" just for a philosophical technicality (not to say ALL agnostic are actually atheist who chickens out, but it definitely is true in many cases, and was true in mine).

 

[formerdc81]

Atheism is not a belief system. Religious people think so because their worldview presupposes everyone having a religion. Hence, to understand atheists, they try to assume all atheists are simply adherents of a common faith. Of course, that's ridiculous.
However, certain modern atheists (i.e. New Atheists) act in a religious manner in the sense that they believe in winning a cultural war against believers (just as many believers have historically waged cultural and physical war against unbelievers or infidels or gentiles or whatever you call them). That is probably what amplifies such biases in the minds of religious people and neutral observers.

 

[Moriarte]

However, certain modern atheists (i.e. New Atheists) act in a religious manner in the sense that they believe in winning a cultural war against believers

That would be preferable, unless we want to live in a world torn and tilted by battles for religious influence masqueraded as spreading of (the one and only) truth, love, enlightenment or whatever. Having said that, I don’t consider religious people overly harmful lately, not to me, that is. They occupy a stretch somewhere between football club fans and roleplayers.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Anyone who knocks on my door and says: "Here is my thing! Look at it! I want you to embrace it!" is being rude. That's just my own personal opinion. I would not call it aggressive unless it was done before 10am though, although we'd probably disagree on what "aggressive" really means

To me, "aggressive" means not leaving when told "No" or "I'm not interested." And yes, it's also aggressive to get someone out of bed at 8 am on a Saturday (or any other day of the week).

"Aggressive" would also apply to the would-be doorknocker who buzzed several suites in my building awhile ago. She refused to leave when told "no/not interested" and continued arguing. The manager told me I wasn't the only person to complain about it, and he's in full agreement that such people are not to be allowed to get in here and harass people. It's an actual rule here that we're not supposed to buzz such people into the building (nor are we supposed to allow salespeople/solicitors to come in).

You could also be a strong atheist who truly 100% believes that gods don't exist, someone who meets with other similar atheists, have established a church within which they spread their message, meet on a regular basis, and have a tax free status.

Every atheist I've been acquainted with in RL and many who post on the CBC.ca website are of the view that churches should not be tax-exempt... particularly when they want the say over what laws politicians do and don't pass.

As I understand it, an atheist believes there is no God. (IMHO, that requires a lot of faith.) An agnostic doesn't believe one way or the other.

Why should it require faith?

I think most atheists don't really care about god; they are more worried about 1) the prospect of religion gaining ground in the world and 2) keeping JW et al off their doorstep. They want reason and scientific methodology to be the only accepted path of discovery for what is true.

There are two religion-based political issues going on right now in my province. One is GSAs (Gay-Straight Alliances) in schools. The government has threatened to pull funding from any publicly-funded faith-based school that refuses to allow these. The parents who oppose GSAs are livid that these alliances (school clubs) exist to provide a safe zone for LGBTQ students who may not have come out to their parents. A bill was passed that makes it illegal for schools to inform the parents if their child has joined a GSA.

The government gave these schools a generous amount of time to get their policies in step with the legislation. Many did, but some haven't, so they are about to lose their funding. Next year's election may see the government being formed by the United Conservative Party, which is led by a former Reformacon politician who was a cabinet minister under Stephen Harper (the PM we tossed out in 2015). Jason Kenney is a bigot who sees no need for protections for certain minorities in the population, and would certainly write legislation to repeal the laws pertaining to GSAs. He doesn't give a damn that kids should not be forcibly outed to parents who may kick them out into the street if their religious beliefs tell them that a gay son or daughter is some kind of abomination or needs to be forcibly "cured".


The other issue is MAiD (Medical Assistance in Death). Some nursing homes are run by a Christian organization called Covenant House (my dad is in one of them; it was the only L4 placement open here in Red Deer, so I had no choice but to send him there unless I wanted to leave him in a city I can't get to, for visiting or conferences). Some of these places would force residents who wanted medical assistance in dying to go elsewhere to receive assessments, keep appointments, or even to sign papers. The provincial health minister seemed in no great hurry to force these institutions to follow the laws that prohibit such restrictions.

These institutions receive government funding. They are not following the laws, citing religious reasons. Alberta is rife with ways in which the Catholic Church is allowed to do an end run around the Charter of Rights, and it has resulted in teachers losing jobs, nurses losing jobs, patients treated with either minimal care or being turned away, and people who qualify for physician-assisted death being forced to be wheeled off the premises into a bus shelter or park or onto the sidewalk just to sign a piece of paper.

That's not an ethical way to run a care facility.

To be honest, I've never met anyone that was all that concerned about people on their doorstep, other than Valka. At my gf's house we get about five times as many solar power or home security sales types as we get from all religions combined...and they are usually more rude and less attractive.

I'm not the one in my old neighborhood with a sign on the screen door that reads "We shoot every fifth JW. The fourth one just left in a hurry."

I doubt they're seriously engaging in murdering JWs. But it is an expression of antipathy toward them and an indication that when they arrive at the door and read it, they should immediately leave without ringing the bell, knocking on the door, or attempting to engage the residents in any way.

 

[Arakhor]

To be honest, I've never met anyone that was all that concerned about people on their doorstep, other than Valka. At my gf's house we get about five times as many solar power or home security sales types as we get from all religions combined...and they are usually more rude and less attractive.

I've had pushy Mormons literally try to stop me walking off without talking to them and one JW who just launched into reading Bible verses on my doorstop whilst I was in my pyjamas, I've also had a pair of nice old ladies who chatted to me pleasantly over the front gate.

 

[PPQ_Purple]

When a staff member posts in a thread like that it's a sign for me to bow out. I don't want to get banned from this forum over a conversation I don't much care about.

 

[Traitorfish]

Smug self-superiority is also a belief system.

Presbyterianism.

 

[stinkubus]

Next time you a Mormon or JW comes a knockin' (we have both in my neck of the woods) please use the following script:

"I'm sorry, but I don't have time to chat right now. Please provide me your home address. I'll stop by when it's convenient, and you can tell me all about it."

 

[El_Machinae]

I always greet and welcome Mormons. I tell them that the religious conversation should just be avoided as a waste of time, but I remember in head that these are young people who traveled to be here and they're trying to do the right thing. I welcome them, ask where they're from, and tell them I appreciate that they're trying to help people. The world can be a nicer place than it is.

I was thinking about people's avid definition of belief.

Think about these statements, they're all true. But some of them are positive beliefs and some of them are lack of beliefs due to lack of evidence.

I don't believe that Napoleon ate steak for his 12th birthday
I don't believe that Napoleon ate zebra for his 12th birthday
I don't believe that Napoleon ate McDonalds for his 12th birthday


On the first, I don't doubt it. I just don't believe it. It's information I don't have, and it's information I'll never have
The second seems possible, just unlikely
The third violates my internal paradigm

If some bloke came up to me and insisted that he had personal information about the factness of Napoleon's birthday meal being one of those three, based on a vision, it would still not wobble my lack of belief. I could be swayed into believing any of the three, but the evidence hurdle would be higher for some than for others.

 

[metalhead]

Well, I've never seen any reason to posit a god that interacts. I don't believe in magic and never really did, even as a child.

Well there is no "reason" behind the idea of gods at all. People used to believe that the sun moving across the sky and thunder and lightning and such were the manifestations of godly action in our world, because they had no other way of explaining those phenomena. The gods were, in essence, the absence of reason.

I think in large part, the gradual move away from organized religion we see in our world today is precisely because we have no need of "god" to explain the physical phenomena of our universe. As god has become wholly intangible and abstract, there is little reason to tie oneself to any one particular conception of "god." I think that's why a lot of religiously unattached people identify themselves as "spiritual but not religious." They have no need to worship a god that doesn't actually do anything, but recognize we still don't know, say, what happens to our consciousness when we die.

 

[Gori the Grey]

I always greet and welcome Mormons. I tell them that the religious conversation should just be avoided as a waste of time, but I remember in head that these are young people who traveled to be here and they're trying to do the right thing. I welcome them, ask where they're from, and tell them I appreciate that they're trying to help people. The world can be a nicer place than it is.

They have a service obligation. They'll do a little chore for you, if you ask them to do so. They're well intentioned, if nothing else, and that can be honored.

None of the Mormons or JWs I've encountered have been pushy or unwilling to respond to a polite indication that I'm not interested in hearing their message.

 

[EgonSpengler]

In one CFC discussion, someone basically called out the agnostic for simply taking the easy way out and just trying to look wiser. He pointed that if we used this idea our perception was limited to claim "we don't know", then we could as well say "I don't know if I'm actually sitting on my chair", "I don't know if I didn't actually sprang into being with made-up memories five seconds ago" and so on. Basically, it's something that can be used for everything, everywhere, without an answer, so : it's basically useless (unless it's the specific subject of the discussion).
This made me think, and conclude he was right. Hence I stopped calling myself "agnostic" just for a philosophical technicality (not to say ALL agnostic are actually atheist who chickens out, but it definitely is true in many cases, and was true in mine).

As agnosticism was explained to me, it was about things that are "unknowable." I think this is sometimes called strong, hard, or strict agnosticism. But I'm not satisfied with that version of agnosticism either, because it seemed to say that the existence of God and the non-existence of God are equally possible, because neither can be 'proven.' Simply put, I reject the idea that a hypothesis and its 'null hypothesis' (I think I'm misusing the term null hypothesis here, but hopefully you know what I mean) are equally possible until proven one way or the other. If we use the definition of agnosticism that says the existence of God is unknowable, then we have to reject the hypothesis.

I also think 'proof' and 'evidence' are two words that are frequently conflated but don't mean exactly the same thing (as are, in the context of discussions of religion, 'faith' and 'trust', and 'atheist' and 'secular'). The recent debate over accusations of misconduct by important men have raised the idea of "more likely to be true than not", and in the case of the existence of God, the available evidence seems not to support the hypothesis.

Atheism is not a belief system. Religious people think so because their worldview presupposes everyone having a religion. Hence, to understand atheists, they try to assume all atheists are simply adherents of a common faith. Of course, that's ridiculous.
However, certain modern atheists (i.e. New Atheists) act in a religious manner in the sense that they believe in winning a cultural war against believers (just as many believers have historically waged cultural and physical war against unbelievers or infidels or gentiles or whatever you call them). That is probably what amplifies such biases in the minds of religious people and neutral observers.

I think this is a place where 'atheist' and 'secular' can be a useful distinction. Likewise, 'religious' maybe should sometimes be replaced with 'ideological' or 'philosophical.' Here in the US, the 'culture war' is a political fight over different philosophies of governance. For example, our current, acting Attorney General does not believe in religious liberty. He believes that judges should be informed and/or influenced by the Christian Bible. Christopher Hitchens once said that he would have been happy to 'live and let live', on the topic of religion specifically, but unfortunately many religious people will not and/or cannot. And he was right. To Matthew Whitaker, it isn't enough to be allowed to believe what he wants and worship how he wants; he wants everyone to be governed not just by religion, but by the specific religion that he follows. Some number of Christians in this country simply cannot abide anyone or anything that is not Christian.

 

[warpus]

Not sure this kind of person actually exists outside the fantasies of religious people.

My point precisely.

If atheism is a belief system then saying: "I don't watch sports dude" makes you a sports fan.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

In regards to god you get to establish your own line. It applies only to you. Totally operating in hypotheticals out of the blue, let's say you are in a high stakes Yahtzee game and the only way you can snatch victory from the jaws of defeat is to roll three natural Yahtzees in a row. And you do. Maybe you write off this one in two billion event as coincidence, or maybe that crosses your line and you thank god for intervention. That's up to you. It isn't expected to convince anyone else but you. There are undoubtedly people who would walk away from any effort you made to use that to convince them just shaking their heads and muttering "well, ya play enough Yahtzee things like that are bound to happen." There are even more people who would just dismiss you as a liar. But the question is how you see it.

Even less plausible coincidences have happened...on average we'd expect many per year if talking about relatively minor coincidences that have a 1/2billion chance per day per person.

The fact of the matter is that no matter how I or someone else perceives that yahtzee outcome, the only knowledge I/we/whoever would have is that the three outcomes were rolled in a row. If any non-coincidence reason for that happening is as good as another based on evidence, there's no reason to privilege one conclusion (in other words, it's unreasonable to reject unicorns as an explanation but accept god, as they are equally likely by any measure we can use). As unlikely as the coincidence appears to be, it's one of the only conclusions with evidence supported by empirical reality (another being the winner cheated somehow, making the win more likely).

In reference to the story there, I can tell you that Mr Arrogant and his sidekick had given Mr Arrogant plenty of opportunities to see that his sidekick was tolerating his self perception of superiority, not agreeing it existed...but only when he set his own line was he forced to accept the reality. What is your personal line of coincidence? The line beyond which things are just too weird for you to mutter and walk away? Two billion to one? More? Less?

Evidence of direct divine intervention, similar to the evidence we have for gravity or magnetism. Huge bonus points if it's independently verified by other people so I have less reason to doubt my sanity.

Not sure this kind of person actually exists outside the fantasies of religious people.

Nearly every decent-sized population has outliers, so I would expect at least a few people like that.