Posted: Jul 05, 2011 3:01 pm
me wrote:Averick wrote:me wrote:I see you set up the old chestnut about atheism resulting in a life that has no meaning, purpose or value. Did you ever once stop and consider what a ridiculous exposure of your inability to understand your interlocutors that represents? Did it never cross your mind to ask atheists what they think? My life has at least as much meaning, purpose, and value as yours… I am sure I could forward an argument that it has more, by the simple token of it not being basing on pleasant, comforting fantasy.
Sparhafoc,
“BY THE SIMPLE TOKEN OF IT NOT BEING BASED ON PLEASANT COMFORTING FANTASY.”
If God does not exist then we are here by pure fluke.
As Stephen J. Gould wrote, “we are here because one group of fishes had a peculiar fin anatomy that could turn into legs.”
All life on earth drowns in an ocean of insignificance when seen against the backdrop of the endless billions of galaxies in our universe. In actual objective reality your life and all other life has no significance at all. As Dawkins put it, “there is no design, no purpose, no good, no evil, only pitiless indifference.”
No human being can face this truth without experiencing total existential terror. What the atheist does is manufacture some sort of structure out of his imagination and calls it real. (For example: Humanism, Socialism, Communism, Morality,etc.) None of these systems have any actual reality. They mean as much as the individual wants them to mean. You are entitled to live with your fantasy if you choose, whatever floats your boat as they say. You have done the same thing that you accuse the believer of doing.
The difference between us is that I fully acknowledge that if God does not exist, my beliefs are a fantasy. But if God does not exist, the only question becomes, which fantasy will you choose, to be able to get through life; or perhaps you might decide that it’s a futile waste of time, and take a long walk off a short ledge.
“As Stephen J. Gould wrote, “we are here because one group of fishes had a peculiar fin anatomy that could turn into legs.” ”
And where did he derive that piece of information? Do you think he consulted scripture? Did he divine it by ancient magic? Did he perhaps pray for wisdom or attain enlightenment?
No, of course he didn’t… he’s talking about hard evidence taken directly from the natural world. These fossils need to be explained for the sake of the pursuit of knowledge, not for the sake of disproving mythology.
That they represent serious contradictions to the creation myths of all earthly religions is not the fault of the scientists locating these fossils. Nor is it the obligation of scientists finding these fossils to jerryrig some appeasing method of explaining them in order to make them fit with all the mutually incompatible creation myths humans have constructed over the millenia. It is a problem for you to address, personally, in the privacy of your own integrity to the truth.
“As Dawkins put it, “there is no design, no purpose, no good, no evil, only pitiless indifference.””
Dawkins is talking about the universe not having a purpose, not atheists. Of course we feel purpose and meaning in our lives; we are human are we not? If you prick us, do we not bleed? I have a family, I have friends, I have projects, I have an interest in preserving the environment, I have the universe to learn about. The latter alone will provide me with ample purpose right up until I succumb to the ‘pitiless indifference’ of the universe to my brief mammalian scramblings.
With luck, I might have made a small difference, or left a mark on my friends or children that will be of importance to them. If not, I will have at least earnestly followed the truth wherever it leads.
“No human being can face this truth without experiencing total existential terror.”
Please do not project your own feelings onto me. I’m afraid I grew out of this many years ago. Perhaps your clinging to a higher purpose, of a loving overbeing watching your every move, judging your every action is more symbolic of the ‘existential terror’ that you have not been able to get past. Perhaps it is the cause of your inability to achieve peace with the hard facts of reality. Is it not the mark of a man (and woman) in how they respond to the challenges that beset them? If they shrink from the facts, and hide behind a comforting construct, does this really make the sum of their lives ‘better’?
“What the atheist does is manufacture some sort of structure out of his imagination and calls it real.”
How ironic. I don’t manufacture anything with respect to looking at the brute facts of our existence. Instead, I follow the evidence in all earnestness. I studied anthropology because I wanted to know how we came to be. This developed into a passion for knowing about what came before us, and I was rather amazed, having been brought up in the Christian tradition, that our existence on this planet represents a tiny fraction of the diversity of life this planet has experienced. How small you would have us make this world and universe, created only for us, when the facts stand in direct opposition.
“But if God does not exist, the only question becomes, which fantasy will you choose, to be able to get through life; or perhaps you might decide that it’s a futile waste of time, and take a long walk off a short ledge.”
Is this the normal discourse for a spiritual leader? To tell their interlocutors to kill themselves? You do yourself no favours speaking to people like that.
I’ve already explained to you why my life has meaning. The funny thing is that your also share all those points, love of family and friends, desire to make a mark, or to achieve your goals, and to learn more about your existence. So you’ve added a god, big deal – I don’t need one and I find nothing lacking, nothing is smaller or more mundane. On the contrary, the universe is sufficiently mysterious, and the scope far larger and more interesting than the pedestrian recapitulation of bronze age dogma.