The Status of Atheists in America

Note the word "around". As with the other stats, the fundies will come out slightly higher, but, I repeat, both will be around the 50% mark if that is the overall U.S. average.Did you notice in the link in my original post that Catholics, Atheists and Lutherans have equal divorce rates (lower than the rest). The point is really, if you are someone socially conservative, that you have less to worry about with atheists than you think. The definition doesn't include any politics or philosophy beyond a lack of belief in Gods.Atheists can be Buddhists, Animists, marxists, capitalists, socialists, humanists, anarchists, and numerous other things. There are even "Christian Atheists", although, if you say that that goes beyond being an oxymoron and is a contradiction in terms, I'm inclined to agree. At this point, we can already tell that widespread loss of religion doesn't cause major behaviourial problems by comparing countries like Sweden and France with the U.S.As for individual atheists, they can be anything from saintly do-gooders to serial killers. Atheism means nothing about morals in itself. Humanism is a moral philosophy, but, obviously, saying that atheist=humanist is a bit like saying theist=Christian.Edited by bluegenes, : No reason given.

The theists I was referring to no more consider sex before marriage, homosexuality, occasional recreational drug use or many other things any more "sinful" or immoral than I do. Are you really saying that the vast majority of those who profess belief in a personal God and who lead very average 21st century western lifestyles actually secretly go around thinking that they are compulsive sinners?This seems ridiculous and totally at odds with the views of all the theists I know.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

George Barna is the president of a fundy research group.

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George Barna, president and founder of Barna Research Group, commented:

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"While it may be alarming to discover that born again Christians are more likely than others to experience a divorce, that pattern has been in place for quite some time. Even more disturbing, perhaps, is that when those individuals experience a divorce many of them feel their community of faith provides rejection rather than support and healing. But the research also raises questions regarding the effectiveness of how churches minister to families. The ultimate responsibility for a marriage belongs to the husband and wife, but the high incidence of divorce within the Christian community challenges the idea that churches provide truly practical and life-changing support for marriages."

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According to the Dallas Morning News, a Dallas TX newspaper, the national study "raised eyebrows, sowed confusion, [and] even brought on a little holy anger." This caused George Barna to write a letter to his supporters, saying that he is standing by his data, even though it is upsetting. He said that "We rarely find substantial differences" between the moral behavior of Christians and non-Christians. Barna Project Director Meg Flammang said: "We would love to be able to report that Christians are living very distinct lives and impacting the community, but ... in the area of divorce rates they continue to be the same." Both statements seem to be projecting the belief that conservative Christians and liberal Christians have the same divorce rate. This disagrees with their own data.

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U.S. divorce rates: for various faith groups, age groups and geographical areasThere's not really that much difference all round, but born-agains seem to have more problems than anyone else. I don't find that surprising.Many people think that the expressed political morality of individuals and groups indicate the reality, but we often see striking contradictions. It's hard to tell with conservative religious moralists how deep the Ted Haggard syndrome runs.

There are two problems it seems to me. Everyone is capable of sin, if you'll pardon the blatant religious connotation to mean something that is equivocally morally wrong. Religious people admit that they are capable of sin, but few are quick to admit it in terms of here and now. So the atheist sees this as being self-righteous, and feels as if the theist is being pious, not to mention hypocritical. And this where atheists have a lot of theists in their back pocket.However, while atheists have morals, they have no good philosophical reason to keep them, and indeed seem to invent mythical biological reasons in the absence of God. For theists the blanket answer to an unknown is "Goddidit." For atheists the blanket unknown answer is some speculative biological reason described in such a way that you get the feeling that nature would have a cognizant mind. It's quite amazing how many, while not meaning to, anthropomorphize nature.Theists do this because ultimately, and presumably, God has control over everything. While there may be physical reasons for something, it always comes back to God to answer the questions that have no answer. Atheists do this out of necessity because the buck stops at the material level. No answer are allowed to exist out of that realm.Theists believe that they are the glue that is holding the world from slipping in to complete debauchery. They get this esoteric notion that they are in on a very important decision, and in their zeal, they want to share it with the world. Atheists believe that religion is completely antiquated and creates more harm than good. The only real problem they have is the impossibility of objectifying philosophical reasons like "good and bad." I'd venture to say a lot, but not for purely biological reasons. Not only are Catholics missing the point about what Paul said, and by doing so make a personal choice compulsory, I believe it does damage to their mind by burdening themselves with something they were never meant to burden themselves with. Quite a bit I imagine. The only gay bashers I hear of are Neo-Nazis (not to say that they take all ownership over this crime), and Neo-Nazi's are generally emphatically atheist. It doesn't really matter either way, because I think most Westerners, whether they believe in God or not, end up borrowing from the Judeo-Christian world view. Consider this reason: If a feminist chooses atheism because she feels God has made her inferior to man, what does she replace her worth with? God doesn't respect her for her worth, but then she drops God for atheism where she has no worth at all. She is reduced to matter.

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“Tu ne cede malis sed contra audentior ito"

Hi, CS. It's understandable for them to have that viewpoint. But, just because it's understandable, doesn't mean it's acceptable. It's equally understandable for me to want to punch AlphaOmegakid in the nose, but that doesn't make it acceptable.If a Muslim were to call my wife immoral because she doesn't wear a hood over her head, that Muslim is out of line. If I, as a Mormon, were to tell my non-Mormon friends that they are immoral because they drink alcohol, I am out of line. If I, as an evolutionist, were to tell my Sunday School teacher that he is immoral because he told an inspirational story that included a logical fallacy, I am also out of line.Now, I know you're probably not arguing that it's acceptable for theists to say atheists are immoral, but, you do seem to be trying to defend, or at least trying to explain, the viewpoint. I think it's safe to say that everybody sees the viewpoint as understandable. Continuing in the debate seems to be making people think you're trying to argue that poor treatment of atheists is acceptable (even though I know you well enough to know that you don't believe that).

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-BluejayDarwin loves you.

Look at what you're writing. No-one "chooses" atheism because they feel god has made them inferior, superior, or anything else. Wow.The atheists don't believe that your god made them. Most of the world doesn't believe the Christian God made them.You approach the world as if your particular set of superstitions are the default.You, and Ravi, fail to understand that the feminist described does not believe the ridiculous myth that the pain of child bearing is a punishment to women for something someone else did. And she knows she's not an inferior being, as the middle-eastern patriachs responsible for the bible would have it, so she rejects the bible out of intelligent disagreement, and the realisation that it's outdated, superstitious rubbish belonging to another culture.She's not making a choice. She simply doesn't believe it.The best way for you to understand atheists is to think of something you don't believe in, like, say, "the moon is made of cheese". Now, try making a choice to believe it, and you'll find that it's not really a matter of choice. You still don't believe it.So, there you are. Atheists are to gods as you are to cheese moons. Really? Atheists lack faith in any Gods. Some believe in the soul. Some forms of Buddhism, Animism and some of the godless new age things, for example, combine atheism with a belief in an eternal spirit or soul.Why don't you write to Ravi and tell him that?And while you're at it, you could ask him to explain why things made of matter are of no worth at all. He's lying, because I value them, and many others do, meaning they do have worth. Can you, nemesis, think of nothing made of matter that has some worth to you? Your house, perhaps, or your wife's body, or your favourite book or picture?Ravi must be about the worst excuse for a philosopher in existence.

Sure they do, whether by deduction or by rebellion. God does not necessarily mean only a spiritual being. God represents many things. I approached it how the woman asking the question framed it. She stated that she has a friend (whom I suspect is actually her judging by her defensive posture) who chose not to believe in God on the basis of feeling as if she had no worth to God. So her question is why follow God if I have no worth? How you extrapolated this much elaboration out of what she stated is a mystery to me. Listen to what she said again. No, she sounds angry and chooses to rebel against the very notion of it. Listen to what she said. She claims to have asked her friend why she doesn't believe, and her friends alleged response was: Why believe in something that doesn't believe in me?"But look, I really don't want to argue over the semantics. If atheism were really that simple, that would be easy. Unfortunately atheism is not that simple, at least not for any notable philosopher who spend themselves on debating theology from a rational basis. Maybe it should be you to write to him about that since it is you who has taken exception to it. I happen to appreciate his train of logic. He is saying that naturalism itself does not impute any value in absolute terms. You're obviously taking what was said out of context, either by incident or by design. Or perhaps not since you to be growing increasingly hostile.

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“Tu ne cede malis sed contra audentior ito"

Debating theology on a rational basis?And what is the rationality of theology?I think Heinlein addressed this best when he wrote:

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Religious belief does not constitute scientific evidence, nor does it convey scientific knowledge.

Let me talk this through slowly. Atheists, by definition, do not believe they are created by a God. Therefore, they cannot be rejecting a God because of a belief that it created them wrongly! (Whether or not the girl in your film or her friend is an atheist is hard to tell, but this threads about atheists).This is like saying that you don't believe in Allah because you dislike the words he gave to Mohamed. It's contradictory, because if you believed he gave the words to Mo, you'd be a believer in Allah. That's what I'm saying is impossible. It doesn't make sense, and means she's an angry theist, not an atheist. It's like someone who gets angry with god because they've lost a loved one. They might reject god, but that is not atheism. It's like if you reject a one time friend, and say you never want to speak to him again. You still believe he exists.You can't be angry with something you don't believe in. I get annoyed with theists sometimes, but not their Gods, as I see these as figments of their imaginations. Ravi is rational? I'll tell you what, start a thread on him and I'll take all his points apart as you present them. This was nothing to do with logic. I was explaining a fact to you. Atheism is not the same thing as metaphysical naturalism. He says that if atheism is true, she has no value. So, his faith is that no-one has value unless there's a God. Yours too?But obviously, atheists do not share his faith. We do not depend on his imaginary friend for value. That girl has value to me whether there are gods or not, and whatever she believes. Ravi is a very sick man. That sounds like Ray's logic.

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However, while atheists have morals, they have no good philosophical reason to keep them...

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By which you mean that morality can only be arbitrary rules enforced by authority. I don't know why you have to phrase your arguments in such a misleading way.

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Consider this reason: If a feminist chooses atheism because she feels God has made her inferior to man, what does she replace her worth with? God doesn't respect her for her worth, but then she drops God for atheism where she has no worth at all. She is reduced to matter.

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Firstly that isn't what she says. So the argument is an evasion and it isn't even true.Now it may be that the only worth Ravi cares to accept is based on the assumption of some immaterial spirit. But that only indicates that it is theists who degrade humanity.

Nemesis writes, But what is moral and not moral? How is morality dictated? What was once considered moral 500 years ago would be a complete violation of human rights today(such as slavery), and yet religious scriptures have not changed in anyway, therefore how much of an impact are religious texts in dictaing morality? Atheist have morals because they live in moral societies which dictate the acceptable morality to the current culture. Theist also live in these societies and seem to follow the same rules that the CULTURE accepts as moral. Therefore neither God nor a 'mythical biological system', as you put it, dictates any morality, humans do a good job at policing themselves. To atheist the answer is 'humans figure this shit out for themselves'. The cognative reasoning is attributed to humans rise in intelligence, and our social living styles make morality a must for survival. As Christopher Hitchens put it: "Are we to believe that homo-sapiens walked around the planet for 100,000-200,000 years thinking that rape and murder were OK?" (1)I think the feminist is rejecting scripture, not God. Because if she rejects God on the bases of what He wrote, then she has accepted that He wrote it and that is not an ATHEIST. I am an atheist and I reject scripture not God. Scriptures are written by men, men with their own personal prejudice, those personal prejudice of MEN is what I reject, and should be what true atheist reject. God, to an atheist, is a conjured up idea that humans thought of therefore rejecting God would be the same as rejecting unicorns and faries.Edited by onifre, : spelling

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"All great truths begin as blasphemies""I smoke pot. If this bothers anyone, I suggest you look around at the world in which we live and shut your mouth."--Bill Hicks"I never knew there was another option other than to question everything"--Noam Chomsky

An interesting point. Further, if we accept, as many (perhaps most) Christians do, that the Bible contains both good moral examples and bad, it begs the questions of how we tell which is which.Slavery is endorsed in both the old and new testaments. I think we all accept that slavery is wrong, but how could we possibly come to this conclusion if our morality were based on scripture? The fact that most of us are able to disagree with the Bible on this clearly shows that we have a sense of morality that is completely independent of scripture, whatever its actual source. This includes theists as much as atheists.

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Mutate and Survive

Its typical us vs them mentality, and they're assholes for doing it (if they really think that I think its acceptable)If I don't support their position, then I must be supporting the opposing position I was honestly answering a specific question asking where the idea that atheists are immoral came from.It was an explanation and I didn't say it was acceptable. Then they try to push me into a position of explaining why its acceptable But actually, they never said that I said that it was acceptable. We're just arguing to be arguing, I guess, but I like it. Honestly, it really does hone your skillz and the improvements I've seen in my arguing abilities have helped me in RL.If we all just sit around and agree all day, then we won't have much to type about. Maybe we mean different things by the phrase "out of line", but I don't think any of those things are out of line. Why can't you tell someone they're being immoral? They can always just not agree with you.If someone walked up to you and told you that you were immoral for wearing those tennis shoes, you'd prolly respond in the same way as me with a: "pfft, whateva "IMHO, when people start getting "out of line", I start clenching my fists.

I think this is very true. I still don't think the vast majority of modern Westerners who happen to believe in a god consider themselves to be sinning when they have sex before marriage. For example.What society considers moral or immoral can change over time and this seems to apply to the vast majority of theists and atheists equally. The exceptions to this seem to exist at the more extreme fundamentaist end of the spectrum. If people are going to decide what they think is true about the world based solely on what provides them with the most self worth and emotional comfort then they are going to believe some very very very unreliable and silly things.
In my opinion the woman in the question needs to find better methods of deciding wht is true and what is not and seperate ways of stimulating her feelings of worth and self esteem.

Why not? I think that the opposing opinion thinks that providing self worth and emotional comfort makes a thing not-silly. The reliability is dependent on each belief, itself, and a lot of them are reliable because they are not falsifiable. and posting on anonymous forums tends to bring people towards the end of the spectrum, IMHO. None of this shit comes up in RL.