Perhaps there are atheists in foxholes, but they are coping through meds, hard data, and reason. Yet the shells keep coming!
Not only are there atheists in foxholes, but there's even a war veteran organization that uses as its motto, "Atheists in Foxholes"; from the Wikipedia page on the subject (my emphasis added):
quote:Usage
... Although the adage occasionally means that all soldiers in combat are "converted" under fire, it is most often used to express the belief of the speaker that all people seek a divine power when they are facing an extreme threat. The quote is also referenced when discussing the opposite effect — that warfare causes some soldiers to question their existing belief in God due to the death and violence around them. . . .
Criticism
Several atheist organizations object to the phrase. The Military Association of Atheists & Freethinkers has adopted the catch-phrase "Atheists in Foxholes" to criticise the aphorism. Author James Morrow said: "That maxim, 'There are no atheists in foxholes,' it's not an argument against atheism — it's an argument against foxholes." In 2015, describing the phrase as a "tired, old, untrue cliché", the Freedom From Religion Foundation erected a monument to "Atheists in Foxholes", commemorating American atheist, agnostic, freethinking and skeptical US armed services veterans.
(go to Wikipedia linked above for the links in the article)
I know I've recounted this story before. A fellow diner at the monthly Atheists United Orange County brunch, Gene, gave us this war story (an actual war story from Nam). He and another atheist were sitting in the base club one night when the base came under mortar attack. They grabbed a bottle of whiskey and took cover under the table to calmly wait out the attack.
At the table next to them was a group of "sky pilots", religious fanatics who would constantly make obnoxious nuisances of themselves by preaching and trying to "save" the others, which included invoking that old "no atheists in foxholes" canard. During that attack, they also took cover under their table. The only difference was that instead of calmly awaiting the outcome, or even eagerly anticipating these as their last moments before being joined with their beloved Savior, they were howling and fouling themselves in absolute terror of dying. Despite using their "Christian Death Threat" (as I call it, the playing on their intended victim's innate fear of death), it was they who were terrified of meeting their Maker, whereas for the atheists death would be the end of it.
I have been following World War II week by week through the Time Ghost Army's weekly coverage with coverage of each week delivered each Saturday (plus their special series, such as "War Against Humanity" ("Never forget!"), "Spies and Ties", and "On the Homefront"). At Timemark 22:52 of yesterday's episode for Week 267 of the war, Week 267 - The End of the Warsaw Uprising - WW2 - October 7, 1944, Indy Neidell covers the effects of prolonged combat on the soldiers' psyche:
My father was a Seabee serving on Saipan after its liberation, but what he saw affected him strongly for the rest of his life; besides his drinking having become much worse, he wouldn't talk about the war to anyone for 20 years and then, I think, only to inform me, after which he started to open up.
He described sitting on their ship waiting for a week before disembarking with bombs and shells constantly falling around them. He also described everybody yelling and cursing every time a shell had come too close for comfort. They made it through alright ... -ish. There were also those who were to brave to show any fear or to react. They were the ones who cracked up, who couldn't take it.
Disclaimer:
I think he was recounting the story of others there. His unit arrived a couple months after the island had been liberated and so their disembarking would not have been opposed.
... but they are coping through meds, hard data, and reason. Yet the shells keep coming!
You are engaging in stereotyping and caricatures. We are not ÜberVulkaner guided solely by logic while suppressing all emotional response (not sure of the exact terminology there, since I have not yet encountered the proper terminology while watching Star Trek in the original German). We are still human with human responses; to quote Shylock:
Shylock: If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die? And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge?
Why would you think that we are so much different from yourself?
In the meantime, there are breathing exercises for calming and focusing yourself before an operation; from multiple sources I've been informed that it's part of SEAL training.
atheists are more likely to man up....alcohol notwithstanding...because they don't have God as a fallback option. Whimpering is optional.
Whimpering is apparently mandatory for believers, or at least a natural reaction to being faced with Judgement and fearing that they might not be saved.
Sure, their preachers tell them that they're saved, but deep down many of them still harbor doubts. For one thing, they don't see the changes in themselves that they've been told they should, like the Fruit of the Holy Spirit (Galatians 5:22-26). That lack can be especially damaging for teenagers raised in the faith who see having been given that Fruit as evidence that they are indeed saved, or at least the strong lack as evidence that they aren't actually saved. Deconversion stories (eg, https://www.ex-christian.net/...imonies-of-former-christians ) describe the psychological and emotional scarring from such teachings. Adults are able to rationalize that kind of stuff away, but kids actually take it quite seriously.
But if having "God as a fallback option" helps them, then that is a good thing. But if it causes them to quite literally lose their shit (as happened in that war story I shared in Message 18), then they have some serious rethinking to do.
But, as I also mentioned in Message 18, that argument is just the "Christian Death Threat" again. I think I'm the only one to call it that, but it's the last parting shot that a Christian proselytizer will resort to when he fails to convert an atheist: "Just think of what will happen to you when you face God after you die!" or the bumper sticker slogan "Don't be caught dead without Jesus!" Everybody has some fear and uncertainty about death, but preying on that fear and uncertainty really is a low blow.
That is what "no atheists in foxholes" amounts to: a poor man's Christian Death Threat.
Though it did come up last month at our Atheists United breakfast. One member's father had used it to get out of military duty (or at least combat duty) by arguing that since he was an atheist, that meant that he wasn't allowed in the foxholes. Great loophole!
I'll mention some good thoughtful videos on YouTube by Genetically Modified Skeptic, such as this one:
He's an ex-Christian who is still processing his deconversion and how his mind used to work as a Christian. Part of that process is guided by his psychology major in college. His presentations are calm and well reasoned and guided much more by how people think than complaining of abuses.
I'm pretty sure this video is where he talks about having been involved in a "essential oils" marketing scheme which was Christian-based and seeing them dealing with critics and former members using the same kinds of arguments as they do in their religion. And with his psych studies he was able to identify what they were doing. I think this one also gets into apologetics with its reasoned arguments and why that has nothing to do with why believers believe.
This interview from three days ago with Kate Cohen by Seth Andrews (host of The Thinking Atheist) popped up on YouTube: We of Little Faith: Why I Stopped Pretending to Believe (with Kate Cohen) .
She discusses the pressures faced by those who have stopped believing to not tell anyone about it, but rather to try to fit in and pretend to still believe.
What intrigued me was her reasoning for not becoming an agnostic. What's so dishonest about admitting a lack of knowledge?
"Agnostic" is not the only word to be used differently by different people, including in ways that vary widely from any kind of official definition. I've even heard creationist Dr. Duane Gish, ICR, say, "'Agnostic' is just a nice word for 'atheist'."
Your use agrees with both mine and Huxley's (according to the Wikipedia link), that it describes lack of knowledge. In my usage, one could be either an atheistic agnostic or a theistic agnostic, the choice between atheism or theism being the reaction to realizing that we cannot actually know. Basically, a theistic agnostic would choose to believe while realizing that he cannot actually know (hence faith) such that, to remain honest, his faith would need to be one of seeking to understand and learn instead of dogmatically insisting on possessing The Truth without question (Unitarian "To question is the answer", in part because if you don't question your misunderstandings you will never be able to correct them nor to learn anything; that applies to all matters, not just religion).
A common variant use is as "squishy atheism", doubting but not knowing whether you believe or not. In that sense, she chose the label of "atheist" instead of "agnostic" because she knew that she did not believe, that she had no doubt about that. In that sense, an "agnostic" would continue to pretend to believe instead of just making the break -- "No no no no, I don't think that no more, I'm tired of waking up on the floor. Please mister please it only makes me sneeze, then it's so hard to find the door."
And isn't making that break what her writing is all about?
As for Seth Andrews, he struck me as a bit smug.
You do the same thing with Mr.Deity, complaining about his voice.
The strength of an idea does not depend on what you think about how someone parts their hair.
Actually, creationists do. Even though they may lack the courage to call them that to their faces, that is in what they teach.
Despite creationists' determined refusal to tell us what they are talking about (eg, "what do you think evolution is?", "what is an 'evolutionist'?"), we can deduce what they mean by observing their statements and their writings.
In those writings, an "evolutionist" is simply one who accepts "evolution" (whatever their bizarre Earth-2 misdefinition of it is). They go on to describe "evolutionism" is being "atheistic" (another word they have a unique unstated definition for, no surprise there). Therefore, in their logic all "evolutionists" are "atheists". And since many believing practicing Christians do accept evolution (the real thing, that is) then they are "evolutionists" and therefore, according to creationist teachings, are atheists.
One noted example is biologist Dr. Kenneth R. Miller whom leading creationists Drs. Henry Morris and Duane Gish acknowledged as one of their most effective opponents. Creationists, would immediately identify him as an "atheistic evolutionist" (thinking that term to be redundant), but in his essay, Scientific Creationism versus Evolution: The Mislabeled Debate (by Kenneth R. Miller, Science and Creationism, ed. Ashley Montagu, 1984, pp 18-63), Dr. Miller describes himself as a "creationist" in addition to clearly not being an atheist:
quote:The Scientific Creationists
We begin with a dilemma. Who are the creationists? Simply stated, a creationist should be anyone who believes in creation, in a universe formed by a supreme being. In other words, a creationist is someone who believes in God. By that standard of ordinary usage, I am a creationist (I'm a Roman catholic), and so is any other scientist who professes a religious belief. However, in the context in which I must write this article, ordinary usage will not do. We will be forced to use another definition for the word creationist, a definition which has been forced on us by the current of political debate in the United States.
Another example is paleontologist Dr. Mary Schweitzer whose work is constantly and widely lied about by creationists, including our own ever-unrepentant candle2, as "blood cells and soft tissue found in T Rex fossils" (see my replies to candle2's repeated use of those lies; eg, Message 2930, Message 2943, Message 2948, Message 2954). She used to be a YEC and indeed entered into her doctorate program for the purpose of gathering data to be used to disprove evolution. Instead, she now accepts evolution because of all the massive amounts of data indicating and supporting evolution. She is still a strongly believing Christian, just no longer a YEC (whom she's very upset with for their constant lies about her and her work). And I have no doubt that creationists denounce her as "just another atheistic evolutionist."
Of course, if you try to pin a creationist down for a definitive statement, they will waffle and weasel every way that they can; I have heard Dr. Duane Gish doing that on the question of other non-YEC forms of creationism (which according to their Two Model Approach would be consigned to their "atheistic evolution model" along with "most of the world's religions, ancient and modern" (Dr. Henry Morris).
All churches are Man-made. All religions are Man-made (despite any claims of being based on supernatural revelations, the "resultant" religions are still constructed through fallible human interpretation and extrapolation performed by fallible humans.
The problem is that so many believers believe in human INfallibility. T'ain't no such thing.
™ Version 4.2
(1)