Atheists don't need faith

[EdithSimcox]

Atheists don't need faith

Lots of interesting things here including:

• nearly half of us are non-religious but less than a fifth are atheist...
• atheists need "simply more than can be proved by logic and science"

Any thoughts? A view I've often seen expressed on MN is that logic and science are the end of the subject.

i give up.

Well, I will in a minute.

"I don't claim my position is entirely rational or more or less rational, than someone of no religious belief,"

Of course having a religious belief is less rational than not having one. That's not a judgement or a criticism- it's just fact.

There, your last post of 8.51, Bertrand is what I'm disputing. I said no more or no less. Atheism can be rationally thought through or not. There are rational thought processes within theism but within theism there is also the instinctive response. As humans we have capacity for both. Theists and atheists exhibit both rationalism and instictivism.

Instinctivism. Typo.

Even if you were a purely instinctive atheist, you could still justify it in a rational, logical evidential way. The same cannot be said of religious belief. Otherwise there would be no requirement for faith.

It would not, necessarily, be reflecting a person's true experience, though, of how their atheism was arrived at, Bertrand. This is what matters, people's true experiences.

Right. I've lost you now completely.

Atheism isn't 'arrived at' by a lot of people.

Atheism is a default.

Theism is 'arrived at'.

Theism requires thought, teaching, learning, analysis etc - actually needs an action if some kind to make it happen.

Atheism just is.

The only atheism which is 'arrived at' is the atheism of former theists.

"I don't claim my position is entirely rational or more or less rational, than someone of no religious belief,"

You can't because yours isn't.

I can because mine is.

But since atheism can be passive, which involves no active thought process, how can the reasons for this type of atheism be 'more rational' than the reasons for theism?

Spinnaker. It's been pointed out to you a number of times that this was not how I used the term passive in reference to atheism.

The fact you continue to pretend I and others have used it in this way makes me wonder if you are at all genuine.

Regardless, atheism as a concept is rationally justifiable regardless of the amount of thought a person has given it. Atheism is not like Christianity, where everyone's approach and belief system and experience of their god is quite distinct and personal. Atheism is an absence so how the individual 'arrived' there (which as Mango points out is only relevant for former theists) is quite irrelevant. There is no further shared experience beyond that of not believing in any gods in a world where many people have chosen to take the leap of faith beyond where rational thought will take them, and believe in a god.

"instinctive atheist"

I don't even know what that means. You have to think a bare minimum before rejecting the God story as one that has no evidence.

Atheism can be rationally thought through or not.

I have certainly met non religious people who haven't given the topic a moments thought, and are more or less like that from momentum.

But that doesn't say anything about atheism being a more or less rational position than being religious. All it is a statement about the amount of evidence for gods (virtually none).

Spinnaker, it's pretty obvious that you're being deliberately obtuse so you can place religion and science on a par with each other.

But if they were equally right then tell me why, whenever science makes a new discovery, the church has at first protested then gradually adapted its philosophy to fit science? Because even the Pope knows you can't argue against proven theories such as Evolution.

The story of Eden used to be literal. Now it's a metaphor. Likewise for all the other nonsense in the Bible.

Now why don't you try answering some questions instead of pretending you don't understand very simple logic in an attempt to make science seem as "logically indefensible" (V) as religion.

"atheism being a more or less rational position than being religious."

Atheism is a more rational position that religious belief, simply because the rational position to take when presented with zero evidence and asked to believe is to say "No, I'm not buying that".

"whenever science makes a new discovery, the church has at first protested then gradually adapted its philosophy to fit science"

Oh yes. Do you know when Catholic Church accepted that Galileo was right about the Earth turning around the sun?

Take a wild guess...

.
.
.
.
.

1992!

Thank you, et al, for your responses. I have been away from the iPad. I like getting responses because I feel I need, absolutely, to keep up with the real world. Although there is an apparent gulf between our understanding.

Something I will have to ruminate on. Simply because I cannot join up my thought processes with the experiences you have expressed. This is not contrived, I actually need time to process what you have said. Not that me is particularly important, but in my own life and understanding, me matters obviously.

"Simply because I cannot join up my thought processes with the experiences you have expressed. This is not contrived,"

Consider whether this is because you really don't want to. Other people!s experiences arnMt what you want them to be- so you are denying them.

Thank you, Bertrand, I have no overriding desire, but I still need to process. However, I am well aware, this discussion is not about me, so I will read with interest.

"I cannot join up my thought processes with the experiences you have expressed"

So your preconceptions were wrong, in other words. Yes, it sounds like you do need to reflect on what you have read on this thread.

There does seem to be something vaguely contradictory about some of the arguments made here:

It's been implied, if not outright stated (I haven't checked back through the thread), that atheists are more rational and theists.

And yet it has also been stated that atheism is the default position and doesn't have to be arrived it.

But the latter suggests that atheism doesn't have to be a rationally derived position, and that atheists don't necessarily have to be rational after all. If someone had been brought up as an atheist and never given the matter any consideration, then that wouldn't be a position held through reason, would it?

And what of someone who believes that there is no god because the gremlins living in her toaster told her? She qualifies as an atheist after all, but you'd be heard pressed to argue that it was a position reached through reason.

Atheism requires no departure from logic or evidence, and therefore is logically supportable regardless of the thought processes of any individual or mental illness they may have (charming, by the way).

But again you are falling into the trap of trying to place atheism in a line with religions as an equivalent end point to arrive at, rather than the natural starting point. No one knows anything about any religion or deity until they are told about it by another person, or they invent a belief system of their own. Atheism isn't equivalent to a belief system to be 'arrived at', necessarily, or a position to be held. It is simply a state that we only need have a word for due to the prevalence of theism. No gods, the same as no other supernatural beings.

No one has ever asked me to provide the rational justification for my lack of belief in ghosts or unicorns. They are content for me to say 'I see no reason to believe in unicorns or ghosts' and do not question the logic or thought processes I've used to 'arrive at' that position. Mostly they treat it as a natural state of being - given lack of evidence of their existence, I do not need to have made a rational decision not to believe in ghosts or unicorns.

You missed quite a lot of nuance from your summation there. Intentional or just sloppy?

But the latter suggests that atheism doesn't have to be a rationally derived position, and that atheists don't necessarily have to be rational after all.

apply what you said to the sasquatch.

And what of someone who believes that there is no god because the gremlins living in her toaster told her?

I don't know any such people, but indeed that would be irrational.

I have had an interesting thought:

If the rational thought process was internalised, so that it was performed subconsciously, would it cease to be rational?

Would the experience of an internalised and subconscious rational thought process be similar to the experience of faith? (Since evidence is nit consciously gathered or analysed)