Fundamentalist Atheism

Interbane · Posted: Mon Sep 29, 2008 3:31 pm Post subject:

Tulip: "As Tom Harpur says, this mythic re-reading only adds to the meaning, as we know the literal story is untrue. The Gospels had to be written in code in order to make them acceptable to a broad range of popular opinion, and it is hardly surprising that the keys to the code have been hidden and lost. This is the great challenge of theology – unlocking the messianic secret of the Bible. This has to start by junking conventional approaches which promote ideas we now know to be false."

It's amazing the magic rhetoric has to justify belief in the bible. It was written and rewritten hundreds of times by many different people, either in whole or different parts. Is your theory that they telepathically communicated through time to devise a 'coherent' bible code?

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Anyways, nihilism doesn't say there isn't such a thing as morality, just that there isn't objective morality. Which in my opinion is a ridiculous position anyway.

Back to my original thread. I reject the idea of fundamentalist atheism. Perhaps extremist atheism, where the idea is taken to extremes and everything is disbelieved, but fundamentalist? It could be semantics.

Dissident Heart · Posted: Mon Sep 29, 2008 4:25 pm Post subject:

Intrabane: Perhaps extremist atheism, where the idea is taken to extremes and everything is disbelieved, but fundamentalist? It could be semantics.

I think the fundamentalist is someone compelled to define religion for everyone and feels driven to explain how only he (or his community) has the correct idea about God: a compulsion and driven-ness to classify all persons in all places at all times as either right or wrong about God and religion...and, of course, they are right about both. To disagree with the fundamentalist about God and religion is to be ignorant, superstitious, deluded, or deceieved, sometimes by manipulators in high places, or by demons working to destroy the souls of sinful disbelievers. I think there are more than a few Atheists that fit this description...and Theists too.

DWill · Posted: Mon Sep 29, 2008 4:42 pm Post subject:

I think that what Robert Burton says in On Being Certain can be of much service in the debate that has been going on in this forum. I've posted about his chapter on faith, but the best thing to do is of course to read the chapter yourselves. Finding a way past the whole religion vs. science/theist vs. atheist opposition by referring everything to how the brain works, seems to me to be eminent good sense.
DWill

Interbane · Posted: Mon Sep 29, 2008 4:45 pm Post subject:

Wikipedia: "Fundamentalism refers to a "deep and totalistic commitment" to a belief in, and strict adherence to a set of basic principles..."

Perhaps if it said "disbelief in", but it doesn't. There is much that I believe. Then there is that which I strongly disbelieve. I do not believe 2+2=5, and I do not believe in any theism.

Belief is a state of mind, and I think you could say that someone could strongly believe in nonexistance of a God, with the strength of that belief being equal to their religious fanatic counterparts. But the subject of both beliefs are polar opposites. I disagree that they should be grouped together under the same term.

Interbane · Posted: Mon Sep 29, 2008 4:51 pm Post subject:

Double post, sorry.

DWill: "Finding a way past the whole religion vs. science/theist vs. atheist opposition by referring everything to how the brain works, seems to me to be eminent good sense."

Each are mutually exclusive. Objectively, either religion or science has greater verisimilitude than the other. Either the atheists are correct or the theists are correct. It is simple and shouldn't be overanalyzed.

DWill · Posted: Mon Sep 29, 2008 7:05 pm Post subject:

Interbane · Posted: Tue Sep 30, 2008 12:55 am Post subject:

Dwill: "Only if you think that the questions can be answered by exercise of rationality..."

I wouldn't presume to use irrationality to answer questions.

Dwill: "...and only if you believe in correctness or objectivity as an absolute."

Expand on this for me. Objectivity as an absolute... what do you mean?

Robert Tulip · Posted: Tue Sep 30, 2008 3:48 pm Post subject:

Interbane · Posted: Tue Sep 30, 2008 6:53 pm Post subject:

If that is the case, then the bible can mean whatever you want it to mean. That's actually the case for many incidents. People have used the bible to justify all sorts of torturous, insane, criminal acts. When it is thought of as ambiguous and able to be interpreted, it is then able to justify actions such as Hitler's persecution of the Jews. He quoted the bible during one of his speeches to explain part of his motive.

I'm sorry, but saying that it's a mythic code leaves too much room for extremism, and it's crap. I'm happy and fortunate that there's a separation of church and state in our day and age, otherwise this post would find me burning at the stake.

DWill · Posted: Tue Sep 30, 2008 8:03 pm Post subject:

Interbane · Posted: Tue Sep 30, 2008 8:23 pm Post subject:

Dwill: "What makes you think that science and religion are commensurate in the first place?"

Religion, or a specific religion. Let's say Christianity. Do you really think they could both be true?

Dwill: "The most we can hope for is partial objectivity, as contradictory as the two words might be together. We are stuck with minds that can never be autonomously rational."

That would ruin the word "objectivity." It is but a word, used to describe an idea. I think it is your understanding of the concept that is slightly off, no offense. It's an extremely controversial term in philosophy, so to claim to know the meaning with any confidence is overconfidence.

I have to ask what you mean again... what do you mean by "autonomously rational"? Are you referring to our actions in light of a mechanist view? If the entire universe is a robot, cannot a robot understand it?

DWill · Posted: Wed Oct 01, 2008 7:43 pm Post subject:

Dwill: "What makes you think that science and religion are commensurate in the first place?"

Interbane: "Religion, or a specific religion. Let's say Christianity. Do you really think they could both be true?"

What I mean is that for one thing (in this case science) to substitute for another thing (religion), the two have to be commensurate, that is reasonably equivalent in intention or purpose. I think this is not true of the relationship between science and religion. That is why many people "believe in" both, why scientists with religious beliefs are no rarity. Science and religion answer to entirely different purposes and needs.

Dwill: "The most we can hope for is partial objectivity, as contradictory as the two words might be together. We are stuck with minds that can never be autonomously rational."

Interbane: "That would ruin the word "objectivity." It is but a word, used to describe an idea. I think it is your understanding of the concept that is slightly off, no offense. It's an extremely controversial term in philosophy, so to claim to know the meaning with any confidence is overconfidence."

It would demote the word "objectivity," I admit, but it remains useful. I don't think I'm getting into philosophy here. I'm just saying that our minds do not have the ability to examine themselves from an objective point of view. We have no way to get away from either biases or distortions of thought and perception. The opposite point of view has been called "the myth of the autonomous rational mind." Going back to your post I first commented on, you said that "objectively" either science or religion had to true. Who is going to give us such an "objective" view? I say no one. Thanks for discussing this.
DWill

Interbane · Posted: Wed Oct 01, 2008 11:08 pm Post subject:

Dwill: "What I mean is that for one thing (in this case science) to substitute for another thing (religion), the two have to be commensurate"

Of course they don't. If the barest philosophical overlapping between the two is critical to the truth of either, they need not be commensurate.

Dwill: "I'm just saying that our minds do not have the ability to examine themselves from an objective point of view."

They sure don't. There's also no way to absolutely trust either our sense datum or our critical thinking conclusions. Before we can even define the term "objectivity", we must have faith in our sense datum with respect to communicating with other people. The last part is critical, since it is the communication with other people that validates our own perceptions. I trust more firmly that I just saw an octopus(rather than it being a hallucination) when another person confirms it. Needless to say, it is merely a faith that should be had and not certainty. We could always be the psychotic one without knowing it and be dreaming up our entire reality.

With that said, I don't think the term objectivity needs to be demoted. I think you need to replace your conceptualization of it with the phrase "absolute objectivity" and leave "objectivity" alone.


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