Posted on 03/30/2007 6:20:58 PM PDT by buccaneer81
Atheists Split Over Message By JAY LINDSAY
BOSTON -
Atheists are under attack these days for being too militant, for not just disbelieving in religious faith but for trying to eradicate it. And who's leveling these accusations? Other atheists, it turns out.
Among the millions of Americans who don't believe God exists, there's a split between people such as Greg Epstein, who holds the partially endowed post of humanist chaplain at Harvard University, and so-called "New Atheists."
Epstein and other humanists feel their movement is on the verge of explosive growth, but are concerned it will be dragged down by what they see as the militancy of New Atheism.
The most pre-eminent New Atheists include best-selling authors Richard Dawkins, who has called the God of the Old Testament "a psychotic delinquent," and Sam Harris, who foresees global catastrophe unless faith is renounced. They say religious belief is so harmful it must be defeated and replaced by science and reason.
Epstein calls them "atheist fundamentalists." He sees them as rigid in their dogma, and as intolerant as some of the faith leaders with whom atheists share the most obvious differences.
Next month, as Harvard celebrates the 30th anniversary of its humanist chaplaincy - part of the school's chaplaincy corps - Epstein will use the occasion to provide a counterpoint to the New Atheists.
"Humanism is not about erasing religion," he said. "It's an embracing philosophy."
In general, humanism rejects supernaturalism, while stressing principles such as dignity of the individual, equality and social justice. If there's no God to help humanity, it holds, people better do the work.
The celebration of a "New Humanism" will emphasize inclusion and diversity within the movement, and will include Pulitzer Prize-winning scientist E.O. Wilson, a humanist who has made well-chronicled efforts to team with evangelical Christians to fight global warming.
Part of the New Humanism, Wilson said, is "an invitation to a common search for morally based action in areas agreement can be reached in."
The tone of the New Atheists will only alienate important faith groups whose help is needed to solve the world's problems, Wilson said.
"I would suggest possibly that while there is use in the critiques by Dawkins and Harris, that they've overdone it," he said.
Harris, author of "Letter to a Christian Nation," sees the disagreement as overblown. He thinks there's room for multiple arguments in the debate between scientific rationalism and religious dogmatism. "I don't think everyone needs to take as uncompromising a stance as I have against faith," he said.
But, he added, an intellectual intolerance of people who strongly believe things on bad evidence is just "basic human sanity."
"We do not jail people for being stupid, but we do stop listening to them after a while," he said in e-mailed comments.
Harris also rejected the term "atheist fundamentalist," calling it "a silly play upon words." He noted that, when it comes to the ancient Greek gods, everyone is an atheist and no one is asked to justify that to pagans who want to believe in Zeus.
"Likewise with the God of Abraham," he said. "There is nothing 'fundamentalist' about finding the claims of religious demagogues implausible."
Some of the participants in Harvard's celebration of its humanist chaplaincy have no problem with the New Atheists' tone.
Harvard psychologist and author Steven Pinker said the forcefulness of their criticism is standard in scientific and political debate, and "far milder than what we accept in book and movie reviews."
"It's only the sense that religion deserves special respect - the exact taboo that Dawkins and Harris are arguing against - that people feel that those guys are being meanies when applying ordinary standards of evaluation to religion," Pinker said in e-mailed comments.
Dawkins did not respond to requests for comment. He has questioned whether teaching children they could go to hell is worse in the long term than sexually abusing them, and compares the evidence of God to evidence for unicorns, fairies and a "Flying Spaghetti Monster." His attempt to win converts is clear in "The God Delusion," when he writes of his hope that "religious readers who open it will be atheists when they put it down."
A 2006 Baylor University survey estimates about 15 million atheists in the United States.
Not all nonbelievers identify as humanists or atheists, with some calling themselves agnostics, freethinkers or skeptics. But humanists see the potential for unifying the groups under their banner, creating a large, powerful minority that can't be ignored or disdained by mainstream political and social thinkers.
Lori Lipman Brown, director of the Secular Coalition of America, sees a growing public acceptance of people who don't believe in God, pointing to California U.S. Rep. Pete Stark's statement this month that he doesn't believe in a supreme being. Stark is the first congressman to acknowledge being an atheist.
As more prominent people such as Stark publicly acknowledge they don't believe in God, "I think it will make it more palatable," Brown said.
But Epstein worries the attacks on religion by the New Atheists will keep converts away.
"The philosophy of the future is not going to be one that tries to erase its enemies," he said. "The future is going to be people coming together from what motivates them."
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Actually, South Park borrowing from MP. "Isn't that right, Cockathree?"
I'd still like to know how atheists believe in "matter in motion".
Rocks, dirt, minerals, etc. don't move on their own. "A body at rest stays at rest" as Newton pointed out.
So what is the source of movement in the cosmos and on earth?
What gives living things the ability to move, but dead things cannot? The chemical composition of a recently dead person and a person about to die is identical, but one can do many things the other cannot. What is the atheist's explanation?
Why didn't I get the memo?
So much for "for what fellowship have righteousness and iniquity? or what communion hath light with DARKNESS?..." Sigh
Depends on your definition of 'atheism.' If by atheism you refer to militant atheism, where the possibility that any sort of deity might exist is denied in priciple, then you are correct. But that definition of atheism is a strawman lacking any utility, since few 'atheits' are actually that dogmatic and closed-minded.
The preferred definition of atheism refers to the belief that the evidence for the existence of deity is so weak that it's safe to assume in practice that it doesn't exist, even though in principle (in theory) deity may in fact exist.
There are perfectly logical non-supernatural explanations for everything you mention. One can believe in life without believing in God.
Forgive me, but I don't understand your comment. My comments mentioned neither the word 'message,' nor any synonym thereof. Please explain?
I didn't get it either.
The article is essentially about a split between militant and moderate atheists.
The preferred definition of atheism
Preferred by whom?
I don't believe in a god, but cannot rule out the fact that a god may exist. In other words, my lack of belief is not proof of the non-existence of a god.
Furthermore, I do not find the concepts of Christianity (as emulated by Jesus, not the subsequent church) objectionable (like the guy who wears the T-shirt that says "Atheists for Jesus".
Who could object to Jesus, a man who taught total love and brotherhood and who laid down his life for those beliefs? Whether or not he was the son of God, the guy had balls.
I'm a little foggy on the difference between agnostic and atheist. Can someone tell me where I fall?
Agnosticism is uncertainly as to the existence of a god, atheism is outright disbelief. I don't know wbout you, but I'm pretty sure I fall in the latter category.
Atheists get angry when one points out that they hold to a non-diety religion. But their's is a belief based upon at least as much faith as any "normal" religion.
- G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy
Actually, agnosticicm is quite different, since it involves indecision/uncertainty not only in principle/theory, but also in practice. The agnostic is actively unsure. The atheist has decided the question does not deserve active consideration, and the possibility that God might exist, although not zero, is too small to be given any weight in making practical, strategic, hard decisions.
In other words, the atheist juror is sure beyond a reasonable doubt that there is no God (and so votes 'Guilty/No-God.') The agnostic juror is not sure beyond a reasonable doubt, and so votes 'Not-Guilty/Unsure.'
Preferred by whom?
By atheists.
I think you'll have to look a schleptillion miles.
Straight up.
< };^)
I regret any confusion my post has caused, unless you're on the other side of the split from me, in which case you're a heretical, schismatic so-and-so and woe be unto you, etc.
No. It'll be the Front for the Liberation of Atheism. Wait--I mean, the Atheist Liberation Front. No, wait--
Wouldn't it just be simpler to follow the gourd?
Firstly, not everyone means the same thing by the word 'religion.' (Or by the word 'atheist,' for that matter.)
Secondly, if you define religion as belief, then all beliefs are religious--including the belief that the Sun will rise the next morning. Think of what that definition would do to the scope of the First Ammendment's guarantee of Freedom Of Religion.
Thirdly, both atheism and science are fundamentally different from religion (as I define those terms, at least): Both science and atheism are subdomains of an epistemelogical paradigm where there are no absolute beliefs. Scientific theories are not absolute beliefs that must be taken on faith--and that's true by definition.
By definition, a scientific theory (belief) must be falsifiable. Scientists must accept that, in principle, any of their theories/beliefs might be wrong, that new evidence may require that any belief/theory be discarded. Some even have begun to realize that the rationalist epistemology itself must also be falsifable (subject to the possibility of disproof, at least in principle.)
Oh--got it. Actually, that's funny :-)
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