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I am religious and believe in free will

71 (27.7%)

I am religious and do not believe in free will

10 (3.9%)

I am not religious and believe in free will

114 (44.5%)

I am not religious and do not believe in free will

61 (23.8%)

Total Members Voted: 251

[wierd]

My folks are super religious nondemoninational christians.

I have told them that if when I die, I see the big man himself, and he judges me unworthy, I understand the premise behind that determination well enough to not argue, and to accept decomissioning with dignity and grace.

(The concept of a burning hell that lasts forever as a source of eternal torment is a fairly modern interpretation. The phrase "forever and ever" relates to the smoke and fire of the place, not the act of being decomissioned. That part, as well as the name, "hell", comes from old norse mythology which was christianized when christianity converted europe (by force.) Looking at the greek texts, in conjunction with the old hebrew texts, the interpretation I get is that god decomissions the unworthy souls (including the fallen angels) using the lake of fire, and are completely and totally destroyed by this process. The lake itself burns forever, not the souls put into it.)

[Frumple]

Now, my premise might be wrong, but assuming an Atheist does not believe in an afterlife or even more basic, some sort of cosmic balance (a la Hinduism or Buddhism, among others), how do they reconcile (or even rationalize) the vast difference in standards of living between people in the world (especially in the western world, whose standard of living is vastly superior to rest)?

You do have a few wrong premises in there... atheism has nothing in particular to do with an afterlife, or belief in the just world hypothesis. It fairly specifically has to do with belief in gods. Buddhism, for example, is an atheist religion at its core (though it's compatible with theistic metaphysics), and there's a fair few examples of belief systems that believe in an afterlife or whatnot, but not gods. There's a greater breadth to metaphysics than the theistic, heh.

Beyond that, atheism isn't nearly cohesive enough to have a single answer to how atheists consider the issue of wealth disparity and whatnot. How any particular atheist thinks of that subject is going to vary entirely by individual. Some feel guilt at the disparity of situation, some don't. Some hold to a variation of the just world fallacy you were referencing, other don't. The list just kinda' goes on. Probably an unsatisfying answer, but it's about the only one that can accurately be given.

Me, I don't really hold to the guilt thing. There's a problem, and it's a problem that needs to be solved, but it's not a problem such that I personally caused it and should feel guilt because of it. Feel other things, yes, and it saddens me when my fellow human does not have the advantages I've chanced in to, but guilt, specifically... not so much. There's not really a dissonance there for me. The world's fundamentally unfair, and I got lucky. At that point, the only thing to really do is do what you can to make sure more people get lucky later on, yeah? Not because of any cosmic balance or anything, just because it's the nice thing to do, and I can largely afford to be nice.

On the subject of uncharitable theists, though, do note that a lot of religions are squirrelly as hell about that particular subject. Can't speak well of other countries, but it's an actual legitimate problem here in the US, churches abusing charitable status (and, among other things, funneling a lot of their charity resources into things of significantly questionable charitableness) and desultory donations to the church (instead of actual charitable works or whathaveyou) to half-heartedly fulfill tenets of charity being misappropriated, misused, etc., etc. And that's not even getting into nasty stuff like prosperity gospel, ugh. On the face of things, religious individuals are more charitable by the numbers, iirc, but it's a more questionable statement that it seems. Among other things, a lot of that charity just goes right back in to the religion, or is more about ministry than physical aid. Is a subject with a lot more nuance than people want to give, oft times.

[Harry Baldman]

That doesn't make much sense, since literally all of Judaism that I'm aware of is based off serving God in order to reap benefits. There isn't even an afterlife clause.

It's Judaism in the sense that it takes after the traditions, but for the sake of community and preserving one's roots, and has no religious element in it. It's like celebrating Christmas (rather than just the solstice) if you're an atheist.

Well, I like to think I'm not insane, and, well, yes. I tend to favour the annihilation theory rather than the loleternalpain theory, but it's rather vague and doesn't make much difference anyway. There's a reason I still hang around in this thread other than self-hatred.

The annihilation hypothesis, I find, is very convenient in that all parties get what they expected in the end. Well, except people from different religions with afterlives or reincarnation. They don't get what they expected, I surmise, whatever that might be.

[wierd]

It may not be helpful here, but I assert that I am already immortal, because I exist.

I just have a finite window of existence, as defined by a range of temporal coordinates.

EG, by existing now, my past MUST happen-- law of causality. Time is a dimension of our spacetime reality. It exists fundamentally in a timeless state if viewed from the outiside. So, to that observer, I exist, and always will exist, exactly as I am right now.

So, my "existence" does not end with my death.

[TempAcc]

That is actualy compatible with hermeticism. In fact, the greater chunk of hermeticism is compatible to what we currently know through physics :v

Hermeticism says that humans are immortal due to their minds, which is only limited by the senses and perception of time due to the physical body it inhabits.

[bahihs]

But atheists don't have this, so how do they manage the dissonance? Or do they not just think about it?

You have to admit it's very easy not to think about due to there being absolutely nothing one can do about their initial conditions in life, and lives tend to be very sensitive to initial conditions.

However, consider that for an atheist the afterlife (to address that part of the worldview) might be found in some way in what they leave behind. An atheist may admit that their own mind will cease to exist, but this hardly matters if one can identify with something broader than themselves - their family, their work, their community, civilization as a whole or something similar. A grounded afterlife of sorts. You can still feel like you are a part of a greater functioning whole even if you do not believe in the supernatural, and you can also believe this greater whole will endure past your death.

I agree that it's easy not to think about it (god knows modern life has plenty of distractions to make even it easier) but for your latter statement, if atheists do not believe in an afterlife but in a "grounded after-life" (i.e a material one, instead of an immaterial one) they must still cope with the inevitable fact that the universe will come to an end at some point and their actions (far as they may ripple) will eventually be dissipated by time. In other words, it won't endure.

This is why (in my humble opinion) religions seem to turn away from the material. Buddhism and Hinduism would argue that the material is subject to transience and therefore is not something one should ground themselves on, Abrahamic religions would probably say something similar, adding that the only ground is God. In any case, the point is religions tend to ground on what they perceive as the absolute (change, God, whatever it may be), are you then saying that Atheists perceive the Earth, familial connections etc. to be absolute?

Well, this thread of discussion starting with a question of semantics, about why I didn't like to call my atheism a belief. I readily admit that I do not KNOW that God doesn't exist, just as I do not KNOW that my garden is still there or that a teapot doesn't orbit Mars (An example, which I find much less loaded than your ant one). But I wouldn't walk to my sister and say "I belief the garden hasn't been replaced by a void".

Part of the issue there is that we do not have words to distinguish between stuff we know with absolute certainty, and stuff which we just know with a really, really high degree of certainty. Anyway, I don't think we should really be discussing atheism again, I was just answering a semantic question.

Bahihs, for your other question, I'm not sure what you mean. What do you mean by "deal"? Maybe it would help me if you told us how you see religious folks "dealing" with inequality.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Sure, by "deal" I mean something psychological and mental, but not necessarily limited only to the mind (i.e it may manifest in action).

The cognitive dissonance generated from the conflicting "I am living very comfortably" and "Others are suffering tremendously" has to be resolved (or if it isn't, should result in feelings of guilt). There are several ways to resolve this dissonance, religious people have two ways (I would say, "depending on the religion", but really it depends on the degree of spirituality)
1. Belief in an afterlife in which judgement will be metered out and rewards and punishments doled (thus, the disparity doesn't matter so long as the religion is followed)
2. Belief in a cosmic balance, in which everything is happening with a purpose and to an end (in Hinduism, Buddhism etc., this manifests itself in a cycle of rebirth, where past actions influence the current life)

Which leads to two manifested actions:
1. Do something (i.e do something about the disparity)
2. Do nothing (i.e leave everything alone)

Both are "justified" (in the sense that one resolves the dissonance) according to the above since I should do something to better my own religious standing (sustain the good life after death), or do nothing since whatever disparity exists was inevitable to begin with and everything will be balanced out in the end (this latter one, is quite prominent in Taoism, for example). Does that make it clearer?

Correct! we KNOW very little about gravity. That's why we are running tests at the LHC.

Unlike a question about a supernatural agency, we interact with gravity daily. We stand to profit immeasurably through a better understanding of it.

It is therefor worth the expense to try to find out.

That is not true of supernatural agencies, which by definition, are supernatural, and thus outside the scope of what natural science can investigate.

"Useful" in that there actually IS an application for the knowledge.

again, a supernatural agency presupposes a condition of being outside physical reality, through its definition. This means that while we might conjecturally come to "know" about supernatural events, if they are relayed to us by a supernatural actor, there is no actual utility to that "knowledge."

I used quote above for a very important reason-- that (above) is basically what is claimed by every book on witchcraft, magic, and religious tome out there. That isn't true knowledge, because you cannot test it yourself to verify it. It has to be taken on "good faith", and is thus wholly in the realm of belief.

supernatural things are supernatural, and we cannot test them. Physical things are physical  and we CAN test them.

debating about knowledge of a supernatural thing is a pointless exercise.

I...agree with you (about the pointlessness of arguing about the knowledge of a supernatural thing which cannot by, definition, be known). I'm just saying dismissing all "non-useful" things also dismisses things like discoveries which have no practical use, or activities for the sake of the activity (like art, or sports). Although I still think that's not what you meant, just trying to make sure.

This is a straight question, please don't take it in a sarcastic sense.

Now, my premise might be wrong, but assuming an Atheist does not believe in an afterlife or even more basic, some sort of cosmic balance (a la Hinduism or Buddhism, among others), how do they reconcile (or even rationalize) the vast difference in standards of living between people in the world (especially in the western world, whose standard of living is vastly superior to rest)?

Well, it depends on the atheist - Some forms of Buddhism are atheistic, for example. But for myself at least, I reconcile this by actively working to make the world a better place. You can check the Agora link in my sig for details.

This is a straight question, please don't take it in a sarcastic sense.

Now, my premise might be wrong, but assuming an Atheist does not believe in an afterlife or even more basic, some sort of cosmic balance (a la Hinduism or Buddhism, among others), how do they reconcile (or even rationalize) the vast difference in standards of living between people in the world (especially in the western world, whose standard of living is vastly superior to rest)?

It really sucks.  And as you point out, we don't believe that it's going to be rectified after death.  If the problems are going to be fixed, we have to do it ourselves, here and now.  Fortunately, almost all humans have compassion, so we feel the urge to help to some extent.

It's actually stranger that religions encourage charity, while at the same time saying that the downtrodden will be rewarded in the next life.  It's a bit inconsistent, but it makes sense in the context of seeking converts.  Religious charity almost always involves evangelism, a very effective combination.  The unfortunate person is offered food now, and a palace in heaven later.  The missionary feels like a good person because they're being charitable.  Everybody wins, especially the religion's population number.

The thing is, charity isn't a religious thing.  Everybody has an impulse for charity, that's the reason charitable missionaries feel good.  The reason religious groups are able to spend so much money on charity, besides being massive, ancient organizations, is that it's also their recruitment budget.

But atheists don't have this, so how do they manage the dissonance? Or do they not just think about it?

This is not to say there aren't charitable atheists (obviously there are) or uncharitable theists (unfortunately), but in the latter case it would be considered a sin and some sort of guilt associated with it, whereas in uncharitable atheists, my question is whether a similar guilt is felt, and if so how is it resolved?

Definitely.  And my opinion is that that "guilt" is behind all charity, but religions piggyback on it to gain converts.

And to be fair, all sorts of other groups attach their agendas to charity also.  Particularly governments or political groups.  But my point is that compassion is human, and certain groups just take credit for it.  Resulting in people wondering why nonbelievers would ever be compassionate...  As if we're all sociopaths.  Which is silly because we're not the ones being coerced to do good by religious doctrines.

The sad thing is that a lot of religious people seem to think they would be evil, if religion wasn't forcing them to do good    I don't believe that.  It's a false teaching which keeps people in line.

Well I actually don't believe the charity conflicts with ultimate salvation (well maybe how it's preached in the Abrahamic religions it seems contradictory at the surface), I think the point is a "progression". You start with "charity" which is this obligatory thing you do to get into heaven, but eventually "Neither shall they say, Lo here! or, lo there! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you." In other words, after ego-death, it becomes a "natural" thing, no longer delineated by "charity" (which intrinsically implies separation, a giver and receiver), so that it becomes like breathing.   

EDIT: One of my favorite lines from The Simpsons, is from that episode where Homer becomes Flanders friend and through a series of events, the town turns against Flander's. And at the end Homer says (to the townspeople) "Don't you see? If everyone were like this man [Flanders], we wouldn't need heaven, we'd already be there" or something like that.

I agree that compassion is human, regardless of religion (though boy, do we sometimes go wrong). The consensus seems to be that atheists resolve the dissonance by doing as much they personally can toward closing the disparity. And to that I ask (as I did above), how do you deal with the fact that your actions are not absolute and will be eroded away by time?

I've got a question similar to bahihs' one, but from the other side.

Let's say you are religious, and that this religion is the type that has an afterlife with qualifications, and a less preferable afterlife for those who don't qualify. You are judged by a divine entity of some sort to gauge whether you are going to get in.

Do non-batshit-insane religious people genuinely believe that someone does go to some form of hell after they die?

If so, do they ever really consider that they themselves may go to hell after they die? That a divine entity beyond their comprehension will look upon their souls and find them wanting for sins they have rationalized away or perhaps for sins that nobody has managed to commit in any form of document?

Or does every person assume by default that they will experience the better afterlife if they continue their chosen course in life working from the information available to them, or perhaps not consider the afterlife at all (it being their chosen gods that have the only right to decide, after all)?

Well I can only speak for myself, here is my reasoning: If I know I'm going to hell and there is nothing I can do about it, I should probably switch religions (I'm not even joking here). However Islam does allow for repentance even in hell (I can't speak for other religions, though having read most of the Bible, there really isn't that much mention of a Hell, and religions like Hinduism and Buddhism consider heaven and hell to be earthly rather than otherworldly, liberation is beyond those conceptions) and the punishment is not eternal, it last as long as it needs to. In the Quran it is written "My [God's] mercy is greater than my anger".

So there's that. Also, Islam puts a great deal of emphasis on repentance, it accepts the idea that man will inevitably sin, but regards repentance as the path to salvation. So the point is not to rationalize away sins, but to repent them. And divine justice is...divine, so if you genuinely didn't know you were sinning then it wasn't a sin. You have to know what you're doing is wrong and do it anyway to be blamed.

[Bohandas]

There are also atheistic interpretations of judaism, I think, but none that are too established, or that I know too well.

That doesn't make much sense, since literally all of Judaism that I'm aware of is based off serving God in order to reap benefits.

I think it's more that here are a lot of people who are still nominally Jewish but who don't believe in God anymore yet who still go throuh the motions on momentum

[TempAcc]

(...) and religions like Hinduism and Buddhism consider heaven and hell to be earthly rather than otherworldly, liberation is beyond those conceptions) and the punishment is not eternal.

Depends on what you consider earthly. Both Hinduism and Buddhist cosmology have several worlds in them, in which you are assigned according to the state of your soul. Naraka, for example, is an otherworldly realm of pure suffering, IE literal hell. It is temporary, however, but it lasts so long that it might as well be considered eternal

[wierd]

bahis:

Are you supposing that there is such a thing as useless knowledge? I do not ascribe to that idea at all!  While the knowledge may lack immediate application, that does not mean the knowledge has no quantitative value!!

EG, knowing about the pauli exclusion principle for subatomic particles with spin probably wouldnt be useful to a cromagnon from 20,000 years ago. It is however, very useful to us today. Same knowledge.

as I pointed out, anectdotal "knowledge" of a supernatural thing is not true knowledge, because it cannot be verified. it cannot be verified, because it deals with a subject completely outside the scope of our universe. Even if what we were told is 100% correct, there is nothing we could do with it at all.

All inquiries into things inside our universe reveal genuine knowledge, and and are thus useful, if for no other purpose, but to better understand the universe we live in.

[bahihs]

bahis:

Are you supposing that there is such a thing as useless knowledge? I do not ascribe to that idea at all!  While the knowledge may lack immediate application, that does not mean the knowledge has no quantitative value!!

EG, knowing about the pauli exclusion principle for subatomic particles with spin probably wouldnt be useful to a cromagnon from 20,000 years ago. It is however, very useful to us today. Same knowledge.

Right, that's exactly my argument (no such thing as useless knowledge). Good to know we are on the same page

[TD1]

I fail to see how it is pointless. You can compare it with beliefs which are the same barring the fact only a few believe them -Zeus, Santa, Thor, etc.- and then apply this evidence to the supernatural force being evaluated. If it is different in some drastic way, then it deserves a closer look. So far, I've yet to see a deity that doesn't seem man made.

As has been expressed before, it is a question of probability. We all presumably agree that the probability of Zeus existing is very far down there. Why, then, isn't God. As far as I can see, the only reason is because a lot of people currently hold that belief. Zeus doesn't exist if enough people think he does. Likewise, nor does God.

You are conflating "belief in judaeo christian god" with "Belief in A god".

an atheist says more than just "I dont believe in 'that' god."  he says "I dont believe gods arent all fiction."

This gets complicated by "hard" and "soft" atheism.

the hard atheist flatly says "There are NO gods."
the soft atheist says "I do not believe in any of the gods presented to me so far." --or there abouts.

Likewise, there are hard and soft agnostics.
The hard agnostic, like me, says "I have no knowledge that any god is real or unreal, and state from the basis of pure logic, that no such knowledge can ever be attained."
the soft agnostic says simply "I do not know if any god exists or not."

If you note, my argument was against hard atheism, not soft atheism-- I directly stated such in the opening paragraph.

You sound like a soft atheist. Sheb sounds like a hard atheist.

The Christian God is the example I'm most familiar with, and use most. I am not waiting for some form of religious epiphany. I am completely convinced there is no form of after life or metaphtsical being. I would like there to be, and as such I understand why they exist. Where there is a desire, someone eill make something to satisfy it.

[Bohandas]

re. Knowledge and the supernatural

It depends on how and what you define as supernatural. You're defining it as being unknowable and then arguing that it must be unknowable because it it defi ed as such.


If you merely defined it as "magic and ghosts and stuff like that" well... if those things were real we'd eventually be able to study and manipulate them. Like Ghostbusters-type technology would eventually be developed and more.

[Sheb]

I'm definitely a hard atheist, yeah.

Anyway, bahihs, I don't think you're using "cognitive dissonance" well. The fact that I'm better off than 95% of the world's population can be explained by chance of birth etc, etc. There is no cognitive dissonance here, it's just a fact. Now, I do try to make things better, but that's just because I believe one should do so, not out of some kind of desire to resolve an hypothetical "cognitive resonnance".

[Bohandas]

I fail to see how it is pointless. You can compare it with beliefs which are the same barring the fact only a few believe them -Zeus, Santa, Thor, etc.- and then apply this evidence to the supernatural force being evaluated. If it is different in some drastic way, then it deserves a closer look. So far, I've yet to see a deity that doesn't seem man made.

As has been expressed before, it is a question of probability. We all presumably agree that the probability of Zeus existing is very far down there. Why, then, isn't God. As far as I can see, the only reason is because a lot of people currently hold that belief. Zeus doesn't exist if enough people think he does. Likewise, nor does God.

You are conflating "belief in judaeo christian god" with "Belief in A god".

an atheist says more than just "I dont believe in 'that' god."  he says "I dont believe gods arent all fiction."

This actually brings up another issue, which is that a lot of ancient religions had really low standards. The argument could be put forth that any jackass with a tesla coil might qualify as a demigod.

ALSO:
Watch the double-negatives. I don't mind them used idiomatically, but I do mind them used in the way you have; it's confusing and unclear.

[TempAcc]

I fail to see how it is pointless. You can compare it with beliefs which are the same barring the fact only a few believe them -Zeus, Santa, Thor, etc.- and then apply this evidence to the supernatural force being evaluated. If it is different in some drastic way, then it deserves a closer look. So far, I've yet to see a deity that doesn't seem man made.

As has been expressed before, it is a question of probability. We all presumably agree that the probability of Zeus existing is very far down there. Why, then, isn't God. As far as I can see, the only reason is because a lot of people currently hold that belief. Zeus doesn't exist if enough people think he does. Likewise, nor does God.

You are conflating "belief in judaeo christian god" with "Belief in A god".

an atheist says more than just "I dont believe in 'that' god."  he says "I dont believe gods arent all fiction."

This actually brings up another issue, which is that a lot of ancient religions had really low standards. The argument could be put forth that any jackass with a tesla coil might qualify as a demigod.

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