Sad News for Extreme Atheism
In his piece Sad News for Extreme Atheism, John Mark Reynolds rightly points out that “in parts of the culture, atheism is a lazy assumption in just the same way that being spiritual is a thoughtless assumption in others”.
Because asking for evidence is a sign of laziness? If there is a God and he wants worship, he can’t be too lazy to come to his followers.
@Samuel – Thanks for dropping by and commenting.
Regarding your comment:
I think Reynolds point is that just as there are spiritual persons who take a “leap of faith” and simply believe without considering whether or not they are justified in their beliefs, the same can be said of many cultural atheists who have been taught by their culture to adopt atheistic beliefs without questioning them. In either case, we have someone who is ignorant of the foundational evidences to support their claims.
Regardless of a person’s beliefs, those beliefs should correspond to reality. Reynolds is pointing out that many persons holding atheistic beliefs hold those beliefs simply because they are culturally “in fashion.” This is similar to persons who say they are Christian simply because they have grown up in the Bible-belt and attend a church service on Sunday mornings.
What matters in the case of both the atheist and the Christian is whether or not either person’s belief system is justified. There are both atheists and Christians/spiritual persons who are unable to give an intelligent defense of their beliefs. In other words, as Reynolds puts it, each person’s belief system is a “lazy assumption” that neither person has tested to see whether it actually corresponds the real world.
I agree with Samuel Skinner. Where is this god hiding?
Moreover, where has he been hiding all these years since his/it’s/her conception? I would think that this entity would show itself to maintain the control that is attributed to him/her/it.
If people attempt to use the excuse, “God made me do it”, in a court of law, it is not accepted as a defense. In fact it may lead to the court sending the accused to a mental hospital for observation. I don’t think god has ever shown up as a witness for any court proceedings.
God has never appeared to help any of the people on earth for sickness, starvation or anything of any use.
Fundies will point to a Sunami, an earthquake, 9-11, and any other disaster to show that he has all this control over the world. They haven’t been able to understand that disasters ruin the world and that giving help is left to humanity. Strange isn’t it?
@Samuel and Aspentroll – Allow me to pull this comment thread back on topic…
The reason why I lifted the above quote from Reynold’s piece is because it points out that just because someone claims to be an atheist doesn’t mean that person has taken the time to think out their position.
On the other hand, both of you are implying either explicitly (@Samuel) or implicitly (@Aspentroll) that, as a matter of course, if someone claims to be an atheist, he or she has carefully thought out his or her position. Unfortunately, as I observed during my trip to East Germany last year, this simply isn’t true.
During my trip, I talked with a couple of atheists who held their view simply because it had been the official position of the state prior to the fall of Communism. However, when I questioned one of them about topics such as why it appears that there are universal moral principles, he was unable to adequately explain this phenomena from a materialist/naturalistic perspective. His inability to respond left him open to the idea that universal moral truths point to the existence of a god who created them. This lack of thinking on his part could make him easy prey for the “fundies” @Aspentroll mentions in his post.
One does not have to be thoughtful to be an atheist, just as one doesn’t have to be thoughtful to be a theist. However, it is as if each of you are saying, “Of course there is no god, and there is no reason for you to even consider the question of his/her existence.” Do any of us actually want someone to simply take our word for it on an issue such as this? I for one do not. If someone is going to choose between atheism and theism, I would want that person to use their own mind to carefully reason this out.
I am not a “Johnny come lately” atheist. I was never “trained”or “brainwashed” to be a Christian as most fundamentalist type Christians are. I have reached the age of 76 years without ever committing any crimes. I have as high a moral set of standards as anyone could have, all without the help of any gods. Christians abhor atheists because they have been told we are all immoral terrible people. I think they are being told by their pastors and priests these lies. Atheists really want common sense taught in schools and used in Government. Believing and teaching Intelligent design is a step back and is detrimental. Progress can only be attained through rational thinking.
As an atheist I take offense when someone says I’m an atheist “just because”. I’m an atheist because I think, because I see, because I live in this world. I was born an atheist and I have been submitted to shameful brainwashing since childhood, it didn’t work. I would say that every person has the right to believe or to stay away from whatever form of a god he wants to believe or deny. But this personal position should reflect his own mind at work, his own set of principles being used. If you tell me that you believe in a god because a book tells you so, then I have no respect whatsoever for you. That’s the laziest way to acquire a moral guideline, and yet out of nowhere you are supposed to have better morals than me. Ridiculous. Excuse my english, I’m from Spain.
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I agree with Jeronimo. What if I choose to be atheist because I don’t want to be brainwashed by those religious people who want to convert me using all sorts of scary ways?
Then, I am considered a “lazy atheist”?
“in parts of the culture, atheism is a lazy assumption in just the same way that being spiritual is a thoughtless assumption in others”.
The statement is a carpet-bombing generalization modified only slightly by “in parts of the culture”, but I will admit that it could be true for certain individuals, just not me though.
As a former Muslim, it wasn’t easy becoming atheist. I didn’t just suddenly decide one day that it sucked not being able to drink alcohol or eat pork (still don’t in both cases, anyhow); it took a lot of research, thinking and soul-searching. It took years, thousands of miles of travelling, lots of studying, and lots of asking and discussing (most of which were heated and upsetting).
In some parts of the world, being Muslim is interwoven with ideas of cultural identity, which made it even more difficult for me. Deciding to that you don’t believe in god can be dangerous in many Muslim communities, even the ones that think of themselves as moderate. If I am not occupied with defending my personal worldview as if it were an graduate thesis, I am busy trying to figure out if some guy who calls me out on my atheism is crazy enough to drag me off into night to slit my throat in some god-forsaken (heh) jungle. So while I may agree that everyone deserves the right to choose for themselves what they believe, I would thoroughly disagree with anyone who suggests that I am a lazy atheist.