tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post7866664452745030345..comments2024-03-28T12:34:14.649-07:00Comments on dangerous idea: Why couldn't there be mass killings in the name of atheism? Victor Repperthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10962948073162156902noreply@blogger.comBlogger51125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-48262055694393316232012-09-03T10:40:30.358-07:002012-09-03T10:40:30.358-07:00Feser's argument can't be right because it...<i>Feser's argument can't be right because it is just the "No True Scotsman" fallacy. As much as he think he can, Feser can't determine the quality or validity of McGinn's beliefs, much less the beliefs of anyone else.</i><br /><br />Feser can't do that in the sense of reaching into McGinn's mind, cataloging each and every mental twist and turn and justification Mcginn has had that has led to atheism, etc.<br /><br />What Feser can do, however, is evaluate the arguments and reasons McGinn himself actually gives. That's exactly what he did in his exchange with McGinn. There's no "No True Scotsman" fallacy in play here - there's just the claim that McGinn, given his own statement, did not grapple with the oldest, most major (in the sense that they're the arguments of the Catholic Church, not exactly a small figure in these debates) views of and arguments for God.<br /><br />If I dismiss idea X because defenders with novel arguments A, B and C didn't impress me, but I never so much as looked at the oldest, most serious and time-tested arguments for X, I think someone could fairly say that intellectually, I've got more work ahead of me. Now, I'll always have my work cut out for me because there's a whole lot of arguments out there, things to learn. On the other hand, I also don't pronounce on the truth or falsity of various things quite the way McGinn did.<br /><br /><i>The rather sad reality is, McGinn owes it to no one to read and understand, and reply to sophisticated theist arguments.</i><br /><br />He doesn't - he can do what he likes. But the arguments he gives and the position he takes can still be evaluated.<br /><br />Let's flip this: the average guy owes it to no one to read and understand and reply to sophisticated arguments for evolutionary theory. They can reject it and that is simply that. But if they pronounce on it and give their reasons, others can say - fairly - that they haven't really begun to engage the arguments for evolution.<br /><br /><i>His failure to do so can't invalidate his atheism, or, as he puts it, his post-theism. Last word is yours.</i><br /><br />Feser didn't say that McGinn's atheism was "invalidated". He said his atheism was better described as pre-theism on the grounds of McGinn's understanding of the debate. McGinn is still, by Feser's right, an atheist - he's just failed to engage the classical arguments for God. Even you and McGinn don't seem to dispute that. I think you're attempting to salvage McGinn's position by making it not a question of intellectual thoroughness, but one of mere feeling - and I think if that's true, McGinn himself would reject your defense.<br /><br />Anyway, this was a pleasant discussion, so have a good day.Crudehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04178390947423928444noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-26173186209159820852012-09-03T09:06:34.301-07:002012-09-03T09:06:34.301-07:00Feser's argument can't be right because it...Feser's argument <i>can't</i> be right because it is just the "No True Scotsman" fallacy. As much as he think he can, Feser can't determine the quality or validity of McGinn's beliefs, much less the beliefs of anyone else. The rather sad reality is, McGinn owes it to no one to read and understand, and reply to sophisticated theist arguments. His failure to do so <i>can't</i> invalidate his atheism, or, as he puts it, his post-theism. Last word is yours.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12030785676230758243noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-740595950353944772012-09-02T13:11:25.234-07:002012-09-02T13:11:25.234-07:00he doesn't feel the need to address the argume...<i>he doesn't feel the need to address the arguments of sophisticated theism because he's bored by them.</i><br /><br />Actually, McGinn gives the impression he's not even aware of what those arguments actually are.<br /><br /><i>McGinn has earned the right to maintain his atheism by holding certain putative commonsense positions and their valid inferences.</i><br /><br />Really man, what you're coming across as saying here is that McGinn's position is reasonable because, and only because, he plays himself off as being ultimately apathetic to the whole debate. It doesn't matter that he's wrong about the arguments he does reject, it doesn't matter that there are whole classes of major arguments he ignores altogether despite their being the most prominent historical ones - you saw him as acting kind of apathetic, and darn it, that makes his position valid.<br /><br />Again, I think this defense of McGinn doesn't add up to much of a defense - it basically says, "Yeah, he probably hasn't even looked at the best and historically most popular arguments for theism. But that's okay, because he's not trying to argue atheism is true or theism is false. He's just saying he's an atheist, the arguments for theism he's aware of don't work in his opinion, and he doesn't care to justify that or examine the best arguments."<br /><br /><i>Frankly, Feser fails to make the case that McGinn should care, and that's why, in my view, Feser's argument ultimately fails.</i><br /><br />See, I think it's clear that Feser's goal wasn't to suggest that McGinn, personally, should care. I think it was to establish that McGinn hasn't really begun to argue for atheism, or against theism - ignoring whether he was right or wrong about the arguments he mentioned, he left classical theism entirely untouched. If the response is "That's right. But he just doesn't care.", I think the obvious conclusion is that Feser was right.Crudehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04178390947423928444noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-39475304266769796242012-09-02T09:17:08.989-07:002012-09-02T09:17:08.989-07:00I see a difference between McGinn's persuasive...I see a difference between McGinn's persuasive confession--I'm grasping for nomenclature for the purposes of making a distinction, bear with me--and Dawkins' argument in that, though he makes arguments of the same type as Dawkins, McGinn has a sort of ennui about the theism/atheism debate; he doesn't feel the need to address the arguments of sophisticated theism because he's bored by them. McGinn has earned the right to maintain his atheism by holding certain putative commonsense positions and their valid inferences. Frankly, Feser fails to make the case that McGinn should care, and that's why, in my view, Feser's argument ultimately fails.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12030785676230758243noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-39259988269404989642012-09-01T12:06:27.371-07:002012-09-01T12:06:27.371-07:00So, having boiled down McGinn's essay into its...<i>So, having boiled down McGinn's essay into its component parts, it becomes clear that it is more of a confession than an argument, an extended shoulder-shrug that uses argument merely to get the point across. What is there to "take down"?</i><br /><br />See, I don't think this works at all. This strikes me as the sort of defense I see of Dawkins all too often - where, once you expose the fact that Dawkins' arguments in TGD either fail, or are "not even wrong", the response comes that Dawkins wasn't even trying to mount a serious argument against God's existence. Instead he was arguing against the lowest of the low of theistic arguments and beliefs, the sort of people who really believe that God is literally a man on a throne out in space somewhere.<br /><br />Really, when your defense of McGinn is "well, the arguments and observations he were offering don't mean anything, it was just a personal confession...", that's no defense at all. It's a gutting of McGinn's essay, even if unintentional.<br /><br /><i>Feser tries, of course; he argues that until McGinn really deals with the arguments advanced by theism, the best he can be is a pre-theist. That's just Feser saying that McGinn isn't a good enough atheist, and it's not much of an argument.</i><br /><br />I think it's a pretty significant claim, forcefully argued for. Again, your reading requires dumping any and all of the arguments made by McGinn as irrelevant and cashing out his words as mere confession: "I don't believe in God. Why not? Meh, the arguments don't matter here. Just saying what I am." If that were the case, Feser's reply - that McGinn hasn't even begun to think about the question properly - would go through.<br /><br />The defense of "Yeah, McGinn doesn't have a response to the various arguments for theism, or any good arguments for atheism, but so what?" is no defense at all.Crudehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04178390947423928444noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-48554450067610805392012-08-31T09:31:46.060-07:002012-08-31T09:31:46.060-07:00Don't get me wrong: I think Feser's essay ...Don't get me wrong: I think Feser's essay is worth reading; but I also wanted to disabuse our friend of his fanboyishness.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12030785676230758243noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-26170578493765874732012-08-30T18:48:12.355-07:002012-08-30T18:48:12.355-07:00"Feser's take down of McGinn is worth a r...<i>"Feser's take down of McGinn is worth a read."</i><br /><br />Hardly, as Dan Gillson correctly notes.<br /><br />And Feser's reason for imagining where McGinn gets it wrong?<br /><br /><i>"McGinn’s mistake is a very common one among contemporary atheists. Nor is it entirely his fault. Ever since William Paley presented his feeble “design argument, ......”</i><br /><br />and then the catharsis,<br /><br /><i>"By the late twentieth century the tendency had even crept into academic philosophy of religion, leading to the partial displacement of the classical theistic conception of God by what Brian Davies (2004) has called a “theistic personalist” conception. This anthropomorphic conception of God is often read back into the arguments of older writers like Aquinas and he others mentioned above (who would have had no truck with it), severely distorting contemporary readers’ understanding of those arguments."</i> <br /><br />The ubiquitous 'theistic personalist' and 'classical theism' trope and old two-step shuffle, a fabriqué formulated from theo-logical musings unbounded by fact, unguided by proofs, nor founded on evidence. According to Feser, it's all the fault of the false and heretical ideas propounded by other christians who refuse to subscribe to the ineffable 'classic theist' model, and that McGinn would have seen and experienced the folly had he addressed his comments in the 'light' of 'classical theism'. This is not something of McGinn's making, mind you, and whatever the superstitious nonsense trotted out through the competing and conflicting ideas of christian belief, McGinn is perfectly entitled and warranted to challenge this nonsense whatever its form in the public domain, regardless of the sensitivities and stripe of a particular christian bibliolater. It is the responsibility of christians to internally sort out their definition of christian Scatology, not McGinn's. For Feser to cower behind this trope as a defense, or an attack on McGinn's perspective, simply underscores the paucity of evidence for the christian memeplex.<br /><br />McGinn poignantly ends his article ["Why I am an Atheist"]; <br /><br /><i>"Stories can, after all, be good, artistically, morally, without being true, that is, factual. There is no God, but the story of him has its attractions as a work of art (at least some of it does; not all of the God fiction is that useful). Living in that world, my state of belief with regard to God might include a good deal of make-believe in him, combined with adamant disbelief in his reality. My imaginative life already involves a lot of make-believe in relation to fictional characters, none of it confused with belief proper; I see no reason why I couldn't extend this attitude towards God, at least once other people stopped literally believing in him. I might then extract what is good in the concept, while discarding the metaphysical baggage. Religious language would then be more of a fun fiction than a cruel hoax, a kind of game."</i>Papalintonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03818630173726146048noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-18949569577674232752012-08-30T15:23:10.238-07:002012-08-30T15:23:10.238-07:00Feser's "take down" was hardly a tak...Feser's "take down" was hardly a take down, Ben. McGinn's essay was conversational, untechnical, and kind of funny. He stated that he found the question of God uninteresting because it seemed to him like believing in fairy tale things. He argued that, whether theist or atheist, we all disbelieve what we count as fiction, and, that after a certain point, an active disbelief is replaced by mere beliefs in other things. That's where McGinn is at, not anymore disbelieving, but believing other things. He's a <i>post</i>-theist.<br /><br />So, having boiled down McGinn's essay into its component parts, it becomes clear that it is more of a confession than an argument, an extended shoulder-shrug that uses argument merely to get the point across. What is there to "take down"? Feser tries, of course; he argues that until McGinn really deals with the arguments advanced by theism, the best he can be is a pre-theist. That's just Feser saying that McGinn isn't a good enough atheist, and it's not much of an argument.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12030785676230758243noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-20503515170934499272012-08-29T15:39:42.677-07:002012-08-29T15:39:42.677-07:00Feser's take down of McGinn is worth a read.
...<br />Feser's take down of McGinn is worth a read.<br /><br />McGinn is a pre-Theist.<br /><br />http://www.theoreticalandappliedethics.com/#!just-war-religion-issueSon of Ya'Kovhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05645132954231868592noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-70848260901998342012012-08-28T19:26:56.005-07:002012-08-28T19:26:56.005-07:00On the definition of atheism, I find myself more i...On the definition of atheism, I find myself more in agreement with many theists than I do with many people who self-identify as atheist. When I use the word "atheist," I use it to mean someone who holds the belief that God does not exist. Someone who merely lacks belief in God's existence, without necessarily holding the belief that God does not exist, may be called either a nontheist or agnostic. <br /><br />See <a href="http://secularoutpost.infidels.org/2012/06/brief-comment-on-terminology.html" rel="nofollow">here</a> and <a href="http://secularoutpost.infidels.org/2011/12/definition-of-atheism-anal-retentive.html" rel="nofollow">here</a>.Secular Outposthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10289884295542007401noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-38003223327107356152012-08-28T18:40:27.867-07:002012-08-28T18:40:27.867-07:00"In my mind, an atheist is someone who has co..."In my mind, an atheist is someone who has committed to the idea that he has no reason to believe in God."<br /><br />That's terribly ambiguous. It just as easily applies to agnostics, and they're not the same things as atheists.Syllabushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00563029287077473612noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-91481227784744697602012-08-28T15:51:12.961-07:002012-08-28T15:51:12.961-07:00Crude,
I should qualify my statement by clarifyin...Crude,<br /><br />I should qualify my statement by clarifying who I mean when I refer to "atheists". It's not people who don't know what they think. It's not pagans or new-agers who might call themselves atheists for lack of something better to call themselves. It's not people like Leah Libresco who said she was an atheist but entertained some idea of morality coming from an external source that turns out to be God.<br /><br />In my mind, an atheist is someone who has committed to the idea that he has no reason to believe in God.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-47461078478679749682012-08-28T15:39:52.691-07:002012-08-28T15:39:52.691-07:00"Fortunately, it's possible to accept som...<i>"Fortunately, it's possible to accept someone's good ideas while rejecting their bad ones."</i><br /><br />Then you would understand why it is that I too accept about 5% of the teachings in the bible that espouse the universal humanist principles while rejecting the remaining 95% primitive superstition. Papalintonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03818630173726146048noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-50365264157314865242012-08-28T15:38:03.927-07:002012-08-28T15:38:03.927-07:00This comment has been removed by the author.Papalintonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03818630173726146048noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-71691907095055755252012-08-28T15:31:36.978-07:002012-08-28T15:31:36.978-07:00Re McGinn, have a look at this video
I'm awar...<i>Re McGinn, have a look at this video</i><br /><br />I'm aware of McGinn's infantile objections to religion. Fortunately, it's possible to accept someone's good ideas while rejecting their bad ones.rank sophisthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01644531454383207175noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-50520149143276396532012-08-28T15:27:51.517-07:002012-08-28T15:27:51.517-07:00Rank
"It's an active rejection--a firm be...Rank<br /><i>"It's an active rejection--a firm belief that there are no gods."</i><br /><br />Re McGinn, have a look at <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uit_tZMNTHc" rel="nofollow">this video</a>Papalintonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03818630173726146048noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-4305121456471447232012-08-28T15:25:32.771-07:002012-08-28T15:25:32.771-07:00That being said, I think if you pick an atheist an...<i> That being said, I think if you pick an atheist and a theist at random from the population of atheists and theists, you will find that the atheist is more likely to have some rational justification for his lack of belief than the theist has for his belief. The reason is that for most of us, we have given the matter some consideration and made a conscious choice to be atheists.</i><br /><br />This is unsubstantiated and silly, especially given how many prominent atheists became so at a damn young age, by their own reckoning.<br /><br /><i>That can't be said of the typical religious believer, who has grown up believing what he was taught.</i><br /><br />Also unsubstantiated and silly, especially given studies of the changes in people's religious beliefs during their adult life - switching faiths, rethinking beliefs while remaining theist, etc.<br /><br />But so long as we're just speculating, I think if you dig into the atheist population, you'll find A) a surprising lack of deists and quasi-theists masquerading as atheists, and B) a lot of politically ginned up people who embrace atheism for social/political reasons, ie, 'they see Christianity, particularly conservative Christianity, as a bulwark against political goals they desire, and react against such'.Crudehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04178390947423928444noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-81042291922141791322012-08-28T15:10:32.333-07:002012-08-28T15:10:32.333-07:00ozero91,
I agree to some extent. A person who do...ozero91,<br /><br />I agree to some extent. A person who does not assert some particular thing really is under no obligation to justify his lack of assertion. That being said, I think if you pick an atheist and a theist at random from the population of atheists and theists, you will find that the atheist is more likely to have some rational justification for his lack of belief than the theist has for his belief. The reason is that for most of us, we have given the matter some consideration and made a conscious choice to be atheists. That can't be said of the typical religious believer, who has grown up believing what he was taught.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-22225051015498532972012-08-28T14:56:39.578-07:002012-08-28T14:56:39.578-07:00I'm in agreement with Colin McGinn on the defi...I'm in agreement with Colin McGinn on the definition of atheism. It's an active rejection--a firm belief that there are no gods. Agnosticism is a lack of belief. (Cite: http://www.theoreticalandappliedethics.com/#%21just-war-religion-issue)rank sophisthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01644531454383207175noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-6226497907613257682012-08-28T14:48:42.892-07:002012-08-28T14:48:42.892-07:00I think the theist's frustration with the defi...I think the theist's frustration with the definitions of atheism has to do with "armchair" skepticism. The atheist can claim that they lack a belief in God, so they can dismiss theistic claims without having to provide a a positive case for athiesm or a defense for their own view. Theres no need to justify your belief when the belief isnt (apparently) there in the first place!ozero91https://www.blogger.com/profile/15383910270101919080noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-49943715247622019762012-08-28T14:30:46.402-07:002012-08-28T14:30:46.402-07:00Bob,
You make the mistake of thinking that a lack...Bob,<br /><br />You make the mistake of thinking that a lack of religious beliefs implies a lack of any beliefs. This is another myth that seems to be widespread among theists. My lack of belief in your brand of god (or anyone else's) implies that I consider myself to be nothing but a blob of material with no intellect or opinions? Surely you can give me a little more credit than that.<br /><br />And Victor, I still say that there is no evidence that anyone has ever committed an atrocity for the sake of atheism in and of itself. Marx had a commitment to achieving an ideal socialist or communist state, not the goal of freeing the world from religion.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-9203147662317109862012-08-28T14:17:59.054-07:002012-08-28T14:17:59.054-07:00"what it means to be free of religious belief..."what it means to be free of religious belief"<br /><br />You are right. I cannot conceive of anyone free of faith-base beliefs. I know beliefs when I see them. You can claim you don't adhere to anyone's official tenants, but no one is so original. We all have concepts about reality that go beyond empirical evidence. If you deny you have beliefs, you are fooling yourself but no one else. You may be comforted that your convictions are not "religious" because they differ from established "religions",congratulations, you just created a new denomination.Mike Darushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06669617343235073078noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-1191349125276859602012-08-28T13:50:17.094-07:002012-08-28T13:50:17.094-07:00I think labelling atheism as a religion is a stret...I think labelling atheism as a religion is a stretch, but defining it as a "lack of belief" seems like an evasion. Whats wrong with just saying atheism is a belief that divine beings do not exist?ozero91https://www.blogger.com/profile/15383910270101919080noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-71312543657935436812012-08-28T13:42:20.721-07:002012-08-28T13:42:20.721-07:00Mike Darus has just confirmed what I said earlier ...Mike Darus has just confirmed what I said earlier about the myth of atheism. I think many theists just can't understand what it means to be free of religious belief, so they project their own dependence upon religion onto us atheists. If you want to know why I think it's good to be an atheist, I'd say it's because it gives me some hope of freeing my mind from superstition, dogmatism, and other forms of mumbo-jumbo. Perhaps some other atheists have a similar feeling. If so, they might even decide to form an association, but that doesn't mean it's some kind of religion.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10584495.post-79255676486972967782012-08-28T13:35:23.284-07:002012-08-28T13:35:23.284-07:00People do turn atheism in to a cause for which the...People do turn atheism in to a cause for which they could potentially be willing to kill or die for. People can have the same kind of devotion to atheism that they have to any religion. They can believe that "the end of faith" is a goal worth pursuing. People sometimes assume that heaven and hell make fanaticism possible, and since they are missing on atheism, it isn't possible to be a fanatical atheist. In Communism there was an equivalent to heaven, it was the socialist paradise promised by Marx, and people did kill and die for that. Hell for some atheists seems to be the obstruction of scientific progress, or religious taboos against certain types of sex behavior. <br /><br />It is also possible for atheists to disregard solid evidence because of their anti-religious convictions. I see little difference between Todd Akin's refusal to accept the existence of pregnancies produced by rape and Richard Dawkins' claim that a religious upbringing does more harm that child sexual abuse. In both cases, the evidence against these claims is overwhelming, but ideology trumps inconvenient facts in both cases. <br /><br />I do think that the Columbine case underscores another point, that the abandonment of traditional religious belief will not necessarily produce cheerful humanists. I remember when I was growing up there was a 18-year-old boy who killed 5 women with a knife at a beauty parlor, and what people could remember of him from high school was that he was an atheist. Now, there's nothing inevitable about this, but there is a route from atheism to nihilism to murder, and there is also the possibility of crimes of fanaticism to serve the end of faith and the advancement and glorification of science. Of course, there is also the religious justification for the 9/11 attacks, and for the crusades and wars of religion, but these are also not inevitable. <br />Victor Repperthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10962948073162156902noreply@blogger.com