http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...gospel_n_781535.html

Be sure to listen to the video....

Jeff

Jeff,

Interesting approach. I liked the song.

I am curious as to your position on this.

Do you consider atheism to be a religion?

I define a religion as a thought process where one takes certain things as true by definition. Then one argues from those principles. In the case of Christianity we have the Nicene Creed for example. Islam has similar sets of beliefs. As do all religions.

So where do you see atheism in all of this?

Regards,

Atheism is by definition not theism. Theism is the doctrine or belief in a God or gods. So an atheist is a person who does not believe God or gods exist. Atheism is NOT a religion.

I don't believe many things exist, including Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy, and the Easter Bunny. Or SpongeBob SquarePants. I don't think not believing in those things constitutes a religion or four religions.

Lack of a belief is not a religion.

Jeff

quote:

a religion as a thought process where one takes certain things as true by definition. Then one argues from those principles.

You are talking about dogmas. Atheism doesn't work the same way as something based on consistent dogma. A believer accepts certain things as proof that an atheist does not. Atheism is more like a refusal to accept the dogmas without certain kinds of proofs, often left unspecified. Where I live you may be driving down the highway and see a billboard that says "Well, you said you were looking for a sign. --God" That advertising was put up at the request of a religious group, and it did not need to be paid for as it was a tax write-off. It really makes a strong statement about how people think, always looking for signs. We are looking for signs of aliens in space, looking for signs of cures to cancer and looking for signs of what to do with our lives in general. When we do not see the signs we are looking for, we are disappointed.

quote:

Atheism is more like a refusal to accept the dogmas without certain kinds of proofs, often left unspecified.

It's complicated--but that's more the definition of an agnostic. An agnostic allows for the possible existence of a proof. An atheist has already decided that no such proof exists. In my view, an agnostic is a cowardly atheist.

Jeff

So if I may its like solid/liquid/gas, where the agnostic is a sort of liquid. Most people transfer between solid-liquid or between gas-liquid, which would be like going from atheist to agnostic or believer to agnostic or the reverse of either. It would be possible to sublimate or solidify directly between believer and atheist but only under much more narrow conditions. So what you have is a lot of agnostics who are neither gaseous atheists nor solid believers.

No adult is agnostic about the Tooth Fairy. People don't like to absolutely, positively say that no God or gods exist, so they say they're agnostic. But many really feel the same way about God as they do about the Tooth Fairy--there is really no significant chance of existence. That's why I call them cowardly atheists.

Jeff

Jeff, you said,

quote:

That's why I call them cowardly atheists.

Well, Dawkins entitles his Chapter 4 in the God Delusion book as "Why There Is Almost Certainly No God." I would say Dawkins is properly an Atheistic Evangelist. ("Evangelist" derives from the Greek Eu meaning good and angel meaning messenger.) I certainly think he has written some good books even if I disagree with some of the things he says. So if he is not liquid, he is at least "jello."

"Religion" has a multitude of definitions. I still like mine that religious dogma is taken as truth without proof. (Again, I like the way Dawkins probabilitizes it.) Then people argue from this framework. If there is no God, then the universe, its laws such as the speed of light and the gravitational constant just happened. Not to mention the evolution of life from presumably one single cell that magically came into existence all by itself all the way to the human brain.

On the other hand religion can be a real pain in the ass. It is a sin to drink good wine, a sin to have sex except under very rigid conditions. Not to mention ponying up a tenth of one's income for the Kingdom of God.

To me, then, another constituent of religion is how it affects one's life. For example, if someone is going to hell anyway, is it really wrong to help them get there sooner? So if you are a Christian in Afghanistan, killing a Muslim is sort of like eliminating a barking dog.

Regards,

quote:

If there is no God, then the universe, its laws such as the speed of light and the gravitational constant just happened.

No. There's a big difference between saying "God didn't do it--God doesn't exist" and saying "it just happened."

If I say an invisible genie doesn't make my refrigerator keep food cold, that's hardly the same as saying "cold just happens." There are other reasons besides God to explain what exists.

quote:

if you are a Christian in Afghanistan, killing a Muslim is sort of like eliminating a barking dog.

If that's what it means to be a Christian, one of us is misreading the teachings of Christ...and it's not me.

Jeff

Jeff

My wife found an excellent book by Rabbi David J. Wolpe, Why Faith Matters. He did his time as an atheist when a teenager after being shown the film, Night and Fog, with actual footage of the Holocaust camps. He then jumped into Bertrand Russell.

I'm just into it, and it is well written and honest, I think.

Donald

I'd add, too, that "God" isn't an explanation of anything. What have you gained by saying that the universe was made by God? You then have the obvious question--who/what made God...and what made the thing that made God...and so forth.

This argument is thousands of years old, but it's still valid.

If something can exist without an explanation, call it the universe itself. No reason to suppose a higher step called God.

I remain horrified by the notion that to a Christian killing a Muslim is like killing a dog. You didn't pick up on my horror and disgust at that comment. Were you kidding in some way, or do you really believe that?

Jeff

Jeff, you said,

quote:

I remain horrified by the notion that to a Christian killing a Muslim is like killing a dog.

To many Muslims, killing a Jew or a Christian is equivalent to killing a dog. You seem to forget the basic premise that if someone is going to hell anyway, what harm is done to get them there a bit sooner considering they will be there for all eternity?

Not all Christians and Muslims feel this way. Some do, however.

Regards,

quote:

To many Muslims, killing a Jew or a Christian is equivalent to killing a dog.

Not true at all. To a few fanatics, perhaps. But "many Muslims"? Mohammed and the Koran both honor Christ, Moses, and Abraham as true prophets. Wanton murder violates Muslim principles, just as it does Judaic-Christian principles.

Your comment reflects bigotry or ignorance or both.

Jeff

quote:

What have you gained by saying that the universe was made by God? You then have the obvious question--who/what made God...

Then there's the somewhat less obvious, but more scientifically relevant, question - in what ways would observable evidence be expected to differ between "God caused it" and "no she didn't"? IMO, without knowing the details of God's methods and goals, there is no answer to that, which makes it ineffective as a way of understanding the universe we live in.

quote:

Originally posted by Henry J:

quote:

What have you gained by saying that the universe was made by God? You then have the obvious question--who/what made God...

Then there's the somewhat less obvious, but more scientifically relevant, question - in what ways would observable evidence be expected to differ between "God caused it" and "no she didn't"? IMO, without knowing the details of God's methods and goals, there is no answer to that, which makes it ineffective as a way of understanding the universe we live in.

Then there's the idea that God is a conscious eternal simplex physics above the Planck energy and thus it's not so much that God made us but that we are a low energy version of God.

I'm not sure what that means.

Jeff, you said,

quote:

Your comment reflects bigotry or ignorance or both.

As for ignorance, I was amused that at church last Sunday (by the way, for the record, my wife and I are members both of the Episcopalian Church and the Humanist Society for Greater Phoenix. - we alternate Sundays.) Anyway, I was one of the few in the congregation who has studied Greek. Have translated much of the New Testament and some is on my web page
Glenn's Page

My wife and I have also taken several courses in Islam.

I am not ignorant nor am I particularly bigoted.

Jeff, I will be very honest with you. I just almost walked away from this board again, but want to make it work. Please stay away from personal insults and stick to the point.

Now then, I say atheism is a religion.

Regards,

Calling atheism a religion is like saying that atheists as a group belong to some particular organization that defines what that means, that they all follow some particular set of rules, and have some unifying behavior or set of rituals, or at least do something along those lines.

Somehow I seriously doubt that those things are the case.

Oh, I know that when categorizing people by religion, it's common for such thing to include atheist as one of the categories, but that's using a looser definition of the term "religion" than is generally used when talking about religions as such.

That's my 3 cents about that.

about the cowardice thing...

I see signs all over the world of people adopting religions for the sake of personal transformation, and the pagans are a good example. I am talking about people who literally take dead religions and try to pump new life into them. Many times I wracked my brain asking what is the deal with those people? Whatever the reason it is a very strong example to me that agnostics are not cowards but simply agnostic.

Two of my friends whom I met this year are converting to Christianity, each of whom was in an atheist family while growing up. One is from China and one is from my own state. The one from China one day starting telling me, without me asking, that he feels Christian society is better than secular, and that is why he wants to join. He has been making regular visits to a minister. He told me that a big part of it was because he was able to compare European society and Chinese atheism to believing cultures. He thinks belief in God has made the country better, friendlier, stronger all around. The other friend of mine is impressed by Christian society, and he was baptized just this week. Neither of them feels confident about believing in God or any particular doctrine though they do pray. They seem examples to me of agnostics who are not at all cowards.

Perhaps in my case there is some cowardice but then again I have reason to pause. I want to know why secular society has such a nasty reputation. A very funny movie that Steve Martin was in is called Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, and it is about a bunch of con-men and their silly antics and foibles extracting tons of cash from the weak and the over-cashed. While it is a comedy, it has its roots in truth. Life has a nasty edge, and people do not always grasp the value of making space for other people to live next to them. There are downtrodden people wherever I go. I think rather than cowardice it is a question of whether I can believe in secular society vs. a believing one.

quote:

Please stay away from personal insults and stick to the point.

You said:

quote:

If you are a Christian in Afghanistan, killing a Muslim is sort of like eliminating a barking dog.

And then you added:

quote:

To many Muslims, killing a Jew or a Christian is equivalent to killing a dog.

I regard both comments as prejudiced, bigoted, and horrific in the extreme. And against the teachings of Christ as well as common morality.

Maybe it's just a technical nicety to you, but I did not call you prejudiced or bigoted. I called your statements prejudiced and bigoted. And they are. You deny they arise from ignorance. So prejudice and bigotry are what's left

May God grant you the wisdom to recognize that.

I don't claim to be perfect in any way. But I can recognize hatred and prejudice. Why can't you?

And, by the way, rising up and pretending this was a personal insult is a nice way to avoid discussing what you said. The person not sticking to the point is you.

Jeff

quote:

agnostics are not cowards but simply agnostic

Oh, I agree that's true for some. There's a whole range of agnostics. Some basically believe in God but can't find proof, so call themselves agnostics. Some are at the other end--they think the idea of God is as ridiculous as the idea of Santa Claus visiting all the children of the world in one night--but they have to admit a faint possibility that God exists, so they call themselves agnostics. It's this latter group I'm calling cowardly atheists. When you're 99.99% sure there's no God or gods, you shouldn't call yourself agnostic, in my opinion anyway.

This goes back to the basic difference between engineers and mathematicians. A math professor is teaching a mixed group of (male, heterosexual) engineering students and math students. He poses the following problem. A beautiful, sexy coed is standing 6 feet away from you. Approach her by halving the distance between the two of you, and then halving the distance again, and so on. Will you reach the coed?

The mathematician explains that he will never reach the coed, because if he approaches in that manner there will always be a finite distance, albeit small, between them.

The engineer replies that he will get close enough for engineering purposes.

But I digress...

Jeff

quote:

Approach her by halving the distance between the two of you, and then halving the distance again, and so on. Will you reach the coed?

If the time used in each iteration is also halved each time, then yes.

quote:

Originally posted by Henry J:
I'm not sure what that means.

It's just a variation of the Universe is God theme.

http://www.valdostamuseum.org/....html#simplexconnect

http://www.valdostamuseum.org/hamsmith/simph.html

http://www.cassiopaea.org/forum/index.php?topic=19547

quote:

f the time used in each iteration is also halved each time, then yes.

I don't get that. The conclusion is independent of time--with each iteration, there's still a finite separation between the two. Time doesn't play a role. (At least in Newtonian physics--I'm not considering any possible limits of divisibility in matter or time...)

Jeff

1/2 + 1/4 + 1/8 + ... = 1, which is a finite amount of time.