"With a little work it will be the best introduction to atheism available."
Wow.
Doug also publicly debates Christians and/or theists when they will
have him. He is currently negotiating a debate with a Christian fellow
who made a challenge in The Skeptical Review. Doug's position will be:
"There is no God."
I think the other fellow will be asserting:
"There exists a gaseous invertebrate sky spook".
Or some variation of that....
cheers,
Darrel.
******************
Subj: Re: WHAT ATHEISM IS NOT --Michael Fisher roasts Walt Jr.
Date: 97-05-27 13:31:41 EDT
From: dkruege@comp.uark.edu (Douglas E. Krueger)
Reply-to: dkruege@comp.uark.edu (Douglas E. Krueger)
To: Dardedar@aol.com
CC: mwfisher@CTS.COM (Michael Fisher)
Darrell:
Thanks for forwarding the post. I read it and liked it. I would
only have added a few things here and there, as noted below. Fisher does
a great job.
> Walt Jr.;
> I am not arguing that there aren't people who argue for atheism being 'a
> lack of belief.' My argument was that there was a reason why atheists
> have historically defined atheism as an assertion/claim that there is no
> God.
DOUG
Historically, this is FALSE. Atheism was not distinguished
from agnosticism until Thomas Huxley's essay "Agnosticism" in 1889.
Many of those who are now called deists were called atheists. Since
atheism is defined in contrast with theism, if theism is defined (as it
sometimes is) as the belief that there is an omnipotent, omniscient,
omnibenevolent god who is active in the world, and deists deny the latter
clause, they were considered atheists.
> Walt Jr.;
> Even Paul Kurtz in his Encyclopedia of Philosophy (vol. 1) defines =
> atheism as maintaining that there is no god.
DOUG
The standard Encyclopedia of Philosophy, edited by Paul
Edwards (who is an atheist, and who wrote the article on atheism) (New
York: Macmillan Publishing Company and The Free Press, 1967) has
atheism defined as:
"one who rejects belief in God, regardless of whether or not his
reason for the rejection is the claim that "God exists" expresses a false
proposition."
(v. 1, pg. 175)
Edwards explains a number of other definitions, even ridiculous
ones like Fichte's: an atheist is "the person who, instead of following
the voice of conscience, always calculates the consequences before
acting in a moral situation" (Ibid., pg. 175).
Edwards explains that "it is common among contemporary
philosophers, and indeed it was not uncommon in earlier centuries, to
reject positions on the ground that they are meaningless" (Ibid., pg.
175).
Thus, Fisher is well within his rights to claim to be an atheist
and yet hold that the proposition "God exists" is, not false, but
meaningless. (If the proposition "Gods exists" makes sense then there
could be a possibility that there could be such a being but if the words
mean nothing then there is no possibility that there could be such a
being.)
> Walt Jr.
> It is an assertion. =
> B.C. Johnson in his "The Atheist Debater's Handbook" says this about
> atheists: "...the atheist may CLAIM TO KNOW that God does not
exist." =
DOUG
This is true in many senses, although I have not read Johnson's
book and I don't know what he means by this.
One can hold that god does not exist and yet hold that the term
"god" is nonsense. If the term "god" is nonsense, then it ipso facto does
not describe a state of affairs in which a particular being exists. If
there is no description of a being as existing, then there can be no being
which fits that description. If there is no being who fits that
description, since there is no coherent description, then it is accurate
to say that there is no such being, at least in some sense. After all,
wouldn't everyone agree that beings with contradictory attributes do not
exist?
> Walt Jr.;
> Give it up Michael, atheism has changed its face because it could not
prove a
> universal negative,
>
> MWF
> More like the theists keep shifting what they say they are willing
> to defend.
DOUG
The current literature in philosophy of religion suggests that
Fisher's statement is accurate. For example, some theists have even
advocated no longer calling god "omnipotent" because no theologian or
philosopher has been able to come up with a coherent definition of that
attribute.
Much of the academic literature in philosophy of religion is now
devoted to defending the view that claims about god and his supposed
attributes are logically possible (that is, not self-contradictory). Many
philosophers of religion and theologians have given up even attempting
to show that such claims are TRUE and will settle for the much weaker
claim that their claims are logically possible or not outright irrational.
> Walt Jr.
> Why don't you just be honest with yourself about this Michael?
Atheism
> makes the following claims:
>
> 1. There are no moral absolutes.
>
> MWF
> That is not a positive claim of the atheist. Its contrary, that there
are moral absolutes is the claim of certain theists. Who have done a
miserable job of defending that thesis, at least as it must be appurtenant
to a god.
> There are atheistic systems of belief which never the less assert
moral absolutes. Confucianism springs to mind. Taoism is much fuzzier.
>
DOUG
We needn't go abroad to find such systems. John Stuart Mill's
utilitarianism and Kant's system based on the categorical imperative
produce objective moral values, at least in the sense of objective in
which the wishes and needs of the agent do NOT affect the
determination of one's moral duty. Any person in the same situation,
regardless of his of her individual desires, would reach the same
conclusion in these systems.
> Walt Jr.
> 3. There is no afterlife.
>
DOUG
The Jains, whose religion in an offshoot of Hinduism, are
atheists. Yet they believe in reincarnation. The belief in a soul, an
afterlife, and so forth has NOTHING to do with belief in gods. There is
no logical connection between the two. There can be a god without there
being an afterlife, and there can be an afterlife without there being a
god.
> Walt Jr.
> 7. Survival is the ultimate goal of living things.
>
DOUG
This has nothing to do with nonbelief in gods. Mill, Kant and
other philosophers have explained IN DETAIL what life is all about
without recourse to gods. And mere survival was not considered the goal.
Walt Jr. is speaking from ignorance here. Maybe he ought to read
Kurtz's _Living Without Religion: Eupraxophy_ or _Exuberance_.
It is easy to see how someone who reads the bible, by the way,
would not see survival as a goal. God is depicted so often as making
sure that thousands do NOT survive!
Regarding Walt Jr.'s other claims, he ought to study Fisher's
responses long and hard.
___________________________________
Doug Krueger
Philosopher, Atheist, Champion of Reason
"All that is necessary, as it seems to me, to convince any reasonable
person that the Bible is simply and purely of human invention -- of
barbarian invention -- is to read it. Read it as you would any other book;
think of it as you would of any other; get the bandage of reverence from
your eyes; drive from your heart the phantom of fear; push from the
throne of your brain the coiled form of superstition -- then read the Holy
Bible, and you will be amazed that you ever, for one moment, supposed a
being of infinite wisdom, goodness and purity, to be the author of such
ignorance and of such atrocity."
[Robert G. Ingersoll, "The Gods", 1872]