Atrocities In The Name Of Atheism.

Englishman

Name just 1.

Englishman.

Bring on the dancing girls!

ashitaka

Battlefield Earth, Scientology

Just joking...I see your point, Eman

Frenchy

While not performed 'in the name of', it doesn't keep atheists from performing atrocities. It seems that 'both sides' do plenty of that with, or without a 'cause'.

That atheistic little dicktata Stalin murdered a bothersome priest named Uri Limpov when he caught him making earnest supplication to the lord ... whilst boisterously humping his girlfriend oh my god ..OH MY GOD!!!

Stalin got a taste for it, copntinuing a trend dating from well before the godless moguls of Gengus Khan)

JanH

It is somewhat funny, but really a meaningless challenge, Englisman.

A religion scholar with a background in buddhism pointed out it was a western-centric position to call a belief system atheistic (as one can call Buddhism) as it is to call a religion a-nirvanic. Theism is a central tenet of many religions, in particular Christianity, Judaism and Islam. But in many eastern religions, like Hinduism and Buddhism, Nirvana is a central tenet.

Atheists merely have in common that they do not subscribe to theistic religious beliefs. Atheists may be Buddhists, Jainists, Humanists, Satanists, Communists. As a humanist, I have no more in common with communists than I have with Christians. Atheism is a negative term, like a-nirvanism would be. It describes what people do not believe in. I doubt lack of beliefs lead people to commit atrocities, while certain belief systems, including communism and Christianity, certainly have made people commit countless evil acts.

- Jan
--
"Doctor how can you diagnose someone with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and then act like I had some choice about barging in here right now?" -- As Good As It Gets

Englishman

Spot-on, Jan H, only a believer-in something will kill for an "ism", a non-belief never killed anyone.

Nice to see you surfacing again.

Englishman.

Bring on the dancing girls!

unclebruce

Mao Tze Tung anyone?

Shit you bastards just mucked up my communist manifesto!! and it took me half an hour to rant it. bugger! ROTFL

unclebruce a fool for a meaningless challenge

===

Perry

Jan wrote:

"Atheists merely have in common that they do not subscribe to theistic religious beliefs".

Jan,

I certainly have enjoyed your scholarly posts and find it refreshing that someone can so eleoquently express themselves from a position of fact and logic. It is so wonderful to be free of dogmatism isn't it? Therefore I was a little surprised to read your charaterization of athiesm as simply a lack of belief.

Are you implying that the lack of empirical evidence to support the existence of an intelligent Supreme Being that caused all things to come into existence frees the athiest from being held to the same standard of scientific method?

"Atheists may be Buddhists, Jainists, Humanists, Satanists, Communists."

Agreed.

"As a humanist, I have no more in common with communists than I have with Christians. Atheism is a negative term, like a-nirvanism would be. It describes what people do not believe in."

I understand clearly what you are proposing here and believe you to be sincere in your belief that atheism is free from "belief" labels because it is a vacuum position. I believe that position to be in error though. Surely, you must agree that it appears that we only have two options in considering our origins, either an intelligent being (himself infinite) instituted a "first cause" that set in motion the chain reaction of cause and effect events that shaped our universe or; an infinite digression of cause and effect events shaped our universe. Both are infinite, unverifiable and untestable. Therefore both are equally valid from a scientific standpoint.

Websters says about athiesm: ;"godlessness in belief or as a guide in conduct". [F. atheisme fr.Gk. a, without+theos, God]

The dictionary quote above seems to have merely stated your position in the default mode. It seems reasonable to me, and apparently the dictionary scholars as well, that the rejection of one position automatically necesitates the adoption of the other. Where am I going wrong here?

"I doubt lack of beliefs lead people to commit atrocities, while certain belief systems, including communism and Christianity, certainly have made people commit countless evil acts."

Are you suggesting that people can actually exist without beliefs of some sort? Short of a world where all are mentally challenged and incapable of even rudimentatry beliefs; wouldn't it be more accurate to say that many people commit attrocities irrespective of their beliefs?

Consider:

In "The Humanist" for Jan/Feb 1983 John J. Dunphy says: The [Humanist] teachers must embody the same selfless dedication as the most rabid fundamentalist preachers, for they will be ministers of another sort, utilizing a classroom instead of a pulpit to convey humanist values in whatever subject they teach.....The classroom must and will become an area of conflict between...the rotting corpse of Christianity together with its adjacent evils and misery and the new faith of Humanism, respendent in its promise of a world in which the never-realized Christian idea of 'Love Thy Neighbor' will finally be achieved."

Jan, it's important for you to know that I respect your religion that you admitted to subscribing to in your above post. However, your last post does seem to carry more of a religous utopian agenda rather than an apologetic for athiesm.

I was wondering: Do you consciously use this board to promote humanist values as part of an organized effort or just as your personal belief system?

I certainly have no quarrel with athiests and view it along with theism as equal positions and outside the realm of science and therefore only two sides of the same coin. I welcome discussions on the benefits of atheism, theism as well as any other worldview for that matter.

My main experience has been, when a person leaves one belief system there are countless evangelists out there to help you install another one, usually for a hidden agenda not initially stated. In my opinion, the tenet "life without belief" is a fiction used to anestheize the convert while the values of the new religion are inserted as painlessly as possible. Remember the early days of the WTBS....."WE'RE NOT A RELIGION?"

I believe, in the interest of freedom each should make his/her own decision regarding religion and belief. It is the double talk that so often accompanies frank, albeit passionate discusions that tends to mentally imprison rather that enlighten that I find morally repugnant, intellectually repulsive, and belonging to the graveyard of deceptive revulsion.

Atrocities In The Name Of Atheism.

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