Atheism vs. Religion Dead Horse Beating Round 473!

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Is Schroeder using pre-existing scientific theory to mould them into his beliefs? Or is he designing his own experiments to test his hypotheses and submitting his paper(s) to be peer-reviewed by the international scientific community.

 

Saber:
Yes, you are. Only, it looks like this time the characters can come out of the book in the end. Maybe. By a certain reading.

As to free will, welcome to the biggest single debate in Christianity. My personal perspective, you have absolute free will and none at all, both, at the same time. It's a matter of perspective. Following the book analogy, Frodo chose to do a ton of stuff. Mind you, he chose it because Tolkien wrote it, but the character chose for himself nonetheless. From the perspective of the book, each character has 100% free will. From the perspective of the author, none of them do.

Tassander, he's citing existing theory and experimentation, citing exiting theology, lining them up, and saying, "Y'know, the one sounds an aweful lot like the other. Gee, I guess there's no contradiction after all."

Think of it like a pseudo-scientific theory, in that it is a presentation of a plausible explanation that fits all the known facts (on both sides). It's not scientifically testable (at least beyond the acceptance of scientific experiments for the scientific theories), so it isn't purely scientific itself, but it has a similar relationship to fact and understanding as a scientific theory does.

 

On the subject of misunderstanding between religious and non-religious folks:

You naturally become more adept at stuff you're familiar with. Thus you could tell the difference between two events that someone without the same preknowledge wouldn't even notice were different. For example, there's no point in labeling stuff by their colours to a colourblind person, while an artist can easily relate to several dozen major hues, together with their thousands of different levels of intensity and luminosity.

Just tossing the idea that maybe, just MAYBE some of the misunderstandings between these two poles is caused by one part speaking of the fence, while the other one assumed the discussion was about the poles of said fence?

 

I think it's more to do with basic assumptions, which are related but slightly different. To fit your analogy, we theists are talking about a picket fence, while the atheists are talking about a chain-link fence.

The reason I say this is because there are people on both sides who specialize in this debate, but they still tend to fall into the same holes.

 

I have to say that this supports some of what NOG has been saying:

1. That atheists are somewhat organized, although not to a large extent.

2. That there are organized atheist groups that are actively trying to convince people that they don't "need God." It sounds like preaching a type of doctrine to me....

While this doesn't seem like a large group or movement atm, it could point to how a larger movement could take shape in the future.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33390216

 

I don't know about larger movements, but there have been more and more of these smaller organizations popping up. Anyone remember the London busses with the atheist ads on them? It caused quite a stir a few years back, I seem to recall. I think it has to do with atheism becoming a more mainstream and accepted philosophy. Like any such belief (or whatever you want to call it), it's starting quite small and localized (and, in the modern age, not limited by geography, but by technology). We'll see what happens in the years to come.

And yes, Chandos, those individual organizations are, in pretty much all significant ways, preaching a doctrine. Not that there's anything wrong with that, of couse. I do the same.

 

It should nevertheless be pointed out that their "doctrine" is far less inclusive than religious doctrine. They insist that they are good people, yet they still lack a cohesive set of moral values to which they all adhere. They are, in fact, rather fuzzy about the definition of "good".

 

Hmm... I don't believed I've ever based my opinion of religion on a cult (i.e., a small group, somewhat organized...).

 

Again, that's common of many early movements of the type (well, not so much "good" as other ideas). Such things typically start with some rough ideal ("there are no gods") which then gets hammered out into more details, has other ideas grafted onto it (people who believe in gods are fools, insane, or evil), etc. It's the process of refinement of an idealogical construct. Again, we'll only see what happens with atheism in the future.

 

I don't see the ads as anything but bringing awareness to the fact that atheism exists and is growing... the statement "One million New Yorkers are good without God... are you?" only implies that religion isn't necessary to be good. It isn't saying you should join or anything.

 

And we need ads for that? Why...?

 

I think the point is that adds like that require some substantial organized backing. I mean, Joe the atheist isn't going to be buying adds on the sides of busses.

 

Not saying we need ads for anything - advertising pisses me off in fact (mostly because I watch a lot of sports ). I was just saying that I don't see the ads as trying to convert people. I don't care if the ad exists or not.

 

Well, you've already said why the ads are NOT there, in your opinion, but you still havent' explained why they are there. Just as a public service?

As I see it, anyone who takes out an ad is selling something (the word "ad" is short for advertisment).

 

They are not there to convert people, but to reinforce the existing siege mentality of those who feel under assault by the godless hordes of atheists or secular progressives or whatever.

 

The only reason I even care about any of this is because of the context of this thread. IMO, most everyone is selling something, especially in this country. So, it's not surprising that atheists are organized to a small extent, and taking out ads for their particular ideology. That makes them no better or worse than any other "organized" group trying to influence others in some shape or manner with their agenda. When NOG brought this point up much earlier in this thread there was a lot of denial regarding these points.

 

Yeah, but citing a single example of an organized group of atheists does not convince me that atheists, taken as a whole, are organized. Sure, the sign says that one million New Yorkers are good people even though they don't believe in God (I'm paraphrasing), but it's not like those million people are all in some type of community together.

By contrast, any practicing Christian is part of a larger community, because, by definition, in order to be a practicing Christian, you go to church. Atheists don't go to anti-churches on Sunday...

 

Aldeth, you'd be surprised how much most Christians aren't organized on a larger basis. Most churches see all other churches (even ones of the same denomination) as competition rather than allies or friends. Even most denominations are little more than a loose organization, with some kind of overall head and little more detail than that.

Catholicism is the exception, not the norm. Unfortunate, but all too often true.

 

I think it's safe to say that most aethists are not organized, mostly they have singular beliefs. Of course there are the L. Ron Hubbard followers....

 

Believe it or not, I actually know people - lots of them in fact - who aren't Catholic, so I'm well aware of churches seeing other churches as competition. What I was surprised by is you seem to think that Catholic churches do not compete with one another for members.

But it's kind of moot, because I never claimed that practicing Christians are organized on a larger level than their local church. I merely pointed out that most atheists are not affiliated with any type of organized group, whereas any practicing Christian is at least affiliated with a community of people who attend the same church. Even a smaller church will have several dozen people for Sunday services, and there are thousands and thousands of such examples taking place all over the country. There certainly aren't thousands and thousands of atheist organizations drawing several dozen members each to a weekly event.