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Agnosticism and theism are not incompatible. Agnosticism and atheism are not incompatible. Gnosticism is a statement of knowledge: I *know* that there is a god. Theism is a statement of belief: I *believe* that there is a god. One can be both atheist and agnostic: I *believe* that there is no god, but I do not *know* this for certain. That being said, it seems perfectly rational to be atheist, in light of the utter lack of evidence that an omnipotent, omniscient entity of any kind exists.

Such an imaginary construct does indeed fit the definition of psychosis by DSM

No, it doesn't. You are simply making that claim up. At worst, the religion could be incorrect. It could not be a "psychosis". Silly anti-science rhetorical amplification doesn't really add anything to your argument here.

As for your "enabling" claim, to what to you attribute the historical bloodbath existing previous to the presence of any religion, which undeniably according to your model, is the one-and-only reason you exist in the evolved form you do? What do you blame for these moral objections then? And while you're add it, on what basis are you implying such an objection, from -your- model?

Incidentally, maybe you can help me with a discussion with an acquaintance of mine. He has a philosophy he calls "fooism", and though it is suitably undefined and lacking in any actual demographic to compare with, and thus he can point out way more negative things done in the name of theism, he can also point out way more negative things done by atheism than fooism. Seems that when you have no admitted responsible adherents to your philosophy, other ones can be blamed for way more things, relatively. As an atheist, do you have some defense for how many more abhorrent things were done in the name of atheism than fooism? He's waiting.

My argument is that theism increases the chance of a person turning violent where there wouldn't have been a reason otherwise. So your logic is that if we remove theism, the murders the list I quoted would have happened anyway, for a different, non-religious reason? As to the IRA, those bombings could have been either religiously or politically motivated. In the former case, it supports my argument, although I'm sort of dubious that this is the case for the majority of the bombings.

I'm not clear on how you think this is different from the model you currently accept from a secular standpoint. We make people accountable by putting them in prison. That doesn't revert their actions, either. That isn't a part of the definition of "accountable", and you seem to be making up a definition according to whatever you need to say it is to attack theism, contradicting the system you already have and agree with every day.

What they "honestly think" they are doing is likewise irrelevant, same as people still go to prison even if they "honestly thought" robbing that bank was perfectly fine.

Your thought process here seems very convoluted, in a self-inflicted and rather hypocritical way.

As for the afterlife, though again whether or not it undid the damage would be irrelevant, "punishing them forever" is not a model I ascribe to nor IMHO the proper conclusion to draw from scriptural sources. I am a "conditionalist"--you do not have an immortal soul by default, you receive one through God's will and your faith. If you don't accept that, you ultimately get exactly what you demanded--nonexistence in every sense.

Simple: There are a lot of theists out there that actually have some respect for science and this is the only thing that works for them. They can neither accept the possibility that there is no start nor the current scientific state-of-the-art "we do not know". Hence they try to conjure up a starting point from science that says no such thing about physical reality, but merely suggests it as a possibility. The other reason is that it is an interesting mathematical _model_. A model for physical reality is not the same thing as physical reality. Theoretical physics has a lot to do with coming up with models and then see whether they hold up. Most do not, but it can take very long for that to be discovered. The thing is though, that there is a lot of white-space in physical theory at this time. When they have finally managed to get Quantum Theory and Relativity into one framework, _and_ really have understood Quantum Theory, then maybe we can begin to speculate further. That is however at least decades away, and maybe a lot longer.

The actual scientific state-of-the-art for the nature of the start of this observable physical universe is a resounding "we do not know", and it looks like that is not going to change anytime soon.

The other thing is that an enlightened theist stance is that there is not even a scientifically valid indication that a theist world model is accurate. Theism is about belief, not about facts. You are of course free to believe in it anyways, and I have no objection to that, but stop claiming science would give you any justification for it. It does not. Some science (psychology) offers alternative explanations why people would be theists, but there is no scientific fact either way at this time. Deal with it. And top trying to hijack science with invalid arguments.

Yes, I've seen the "we can believe in creation *AND* evolution" and it's BS. Here's why:

The theory of evolution, as a scientific theory, mandates that living organisms develop through a process of natural selection. It is absolutely imperative to the theory that the selection applied as a function of random mutation and selective pressure broad upon by the environment within which the organism finds itself. The moment God is "driving" evolution, it is not *natural* selection. If God set the rules of the universe up to one day produce the human form, then it is not *natural* selection either, but some kind of elaborate design. Supernatural teleology is not science, and can never be by definition, because God is defined to be outside of nature, and science is defined to be the study of nature.

Science and theism cannot ever be compatible as long as theists maintain that there is some "purpose", "goal" or "finish line". It does not matter how many back-flips you do - there is a fundamental, metaphysical incompatibility between how theism and science define "truth".

Stalin and Mao found no ideas in atheism -- lack of belief in a god or gods -- that led them to kill anyone. This simply because there are no such ideas. Atheism has no dogma, no canon, no nothing. The state of atheism consists of a lack of belief in a god or gods, and nothing else. Consequently, ideas like "kill some number of people" by definition come from another source. And in particular:

Stalin and Mao were psychopaths (crackpots, frankly), and that is where you want to look to find out what drove them to kill. Whatever you find, it is an absolute certainty it won't be atheism.

However, the crusades were, in fact, driven to a significant extent specifically by theist reasoning, canon and dogma. As were the murders and tortures perpetrated during the inquisitions, the witch-hunts and subsequent burnings, blood libel, and pogroms, many events such as the 9/11 incidents, various wars, as well as the lesser but still despicable centuries of subjugation of women, repression of sexuality, interference with relationships and legislation, social ostracism, and so on.

I will also say that theist thought has also been the prime motivator for a massive amount of great art in many forms -- sculpture, paintings, architecture, music and a whole host of various other artifacts, and when charity and compassion are foremost and the compulsion to impose belief is absent or at least minimal, theism is at its absolute best at doing little to no harm while doing extensive good. This does not, in any way, say that we should forget, or forgive, or ignore, the many evils done in the past, being done now, and those impending, in the cause of theism.

So you want to be very careful before you go waving Stalin and Mao around as examples of atheism causing problems, or, as a counter to the historical fact of the murders committed directly for the (various) causes of religion . Atheism providing a rationale to harm others is not the reality. It's never been the reality. Claiming it is the reality is either disingenuous or ignorant.

I suspect the AC doesn't care much about Bishop Ussher, nor about theism in general, but according to a recent Gallup poll 42% of Americans agree with Ussher's conclusion.

That's a lot of people. People who deserve to have their feelings hurt, because they believe something stupid. Ussher was merely wrong; they are being stupid.

Not everybody proceeds to generalize that to every religious believer. That would be similarly stupid, an obvious fallacy. But the young-earth creationists are nearly a majority of Americans, and a prominently pushy bunch attempting to have their long-disproven dogma treated as fact. They deserve to have their feelings hurt 10,000 times, and more, until they stop doing it.

Congratulations, you've made Bishop Ussher feel bad for the 10000'th time on Slashdot.

If you were under the impression you were making a point about theism in general, though, you aren't.

Not true. The dharma-karma reincarnation point of view is not mandatory in Hinduism, its but one point of view. One of the earliest schools of Hinduism was the Samkhya school. Which is an atheistic school with adherents even to this day in India. The later schools range between various shades of atheism to theism. Jainism and Buddhism are off-shoots of Hinduism and both are largely atheistic.

There is no contradiction. The agnostic believes it is impossible to KNOW, but the agnostic can still BELIEVE.

That would make agnosticism meaningless. Since it is not meaningless, but rather meaningful, and a position held by many thoughtful people, we can assume as a baseline that your conflation is an error.

Notwithstanding that, many (nearly all) theists hold that since deities are not empirical (i.e deities are non-deterministic from our reference frame) it is invalid to expect empirical evidence for a deity, and thus you've classified theists and agnostics together, but also atheists and agnostics together, so there is, in fact, no system of classification at all. Very unsatisfactory!

You've made this mistake by making several false assumptions:

The first assumption is that everyone must have a view. Imagine a child. A child, who has never been presented with the idea of a deity, has not been presented either with the opportunity to either accept or reject the existence of a deity. Neither can the child have decided that such a determination is impossible. Because the child is without knowledge. Ignorant. The child is not a theist, and not an atheist, since, if you asked the child "Is there a God or Gods?" they would only honestly be able to say "I don't know. What is a God?"

The child is without knowledge. They are agnostic.

The second false assumption is to assume that the underlying (fundamental) proposition is about process i.e. how we arrive at a conclusion to the question: "Is there a God or Gods?". This is incorrect. If a deity exists, they exist independently of whether we think they exist, or the process which drew us to that conclusion. If they don't exist, then their non-existence has more authority than the strength of the argument claiming that they do. So (in short) the question "Is there a God or Gods?" concerns not introspective views of the nature of belief, but whether something exists, like a chair, or a star, or a unicorn.

So: "Is there a God or Gods?" Has three potential answers: "I don't know" - Agnosticism. The question of why you don't know is secondary.

"No" - Atheism. The assertion "I have no belief" is not answering the question. No one cares whether you think you lack belief.

"Yes" - Theism.

You are equating belief and knowledge, a common misconception. They are not the same.

According to what ontology? See this classical definition of belief from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E...: In this broader sense "belief" simply means the acceptance as true of any cognitive content. . According to the common epistemology, there is no difference even in the general case. Since the question of a deity (or lack thereof) is in the non-deterministic space, with no empirical evidence either way to guide us. Therefore assertions on the matter e.g. "This a deity" or "There is no deity" are not expressions of knowledge, but belief.

Interesting counterpoint, but do note almost the entirely of your reasoning here is based either in being "not what theism says" or "parallel to what theism says".

I think you missed the point of my post. I said there isn't the merest beginnings to a functional "atheist ethics", and there won't be, because no consensus has occurred in secular philosophy in 2500 years, and you, well, simply have no means of connecting a material worldview with any particular norms in a rational way. That's called the "is-ought dichotomy" in philosophy, and it is indeed really difficult for atheism to address.

So, I'm not really denying you can't have an ethics, when it's almost entirely actually theistic ethics that you've absorbed by cultural exposure, and then denying its origins. I'm denying you can formulate anything functional of your own, and your reply has only amplified that for me.

And yes, you would be something of an outlier by even knowing what Utilitarianism is, but I'll put a rather simple question to you--what is your argument to someone who dismisses Utilitarianism and proposes the precise opposite of every principle it holds is the correct course of action? How do you resolve the question by reference to something (anything) objective, and not merely a "justification" that one can simply repeat "why?" to and to each subsequent rationale "justifying" the previous statement?

Since this seems to be an honest inquiry, I'll attempt to elaborate a bit.

Let's substitute for "the bible", say, Orwell's "Animal Farm". While I can agree or disagree with the assertions "the part about the farmer can be taken literally" or "the part about the talking animal is allegorical", atheism for me by analogy rejects the totality of the information conveyed in the work, for which the political and ethical views conveyed are clearly the most important attribute. Atheism for me does the equivalent of rejecting these ethics -per se-, and thereby any ethics or methodology toward it, and therefore is willfully wrongheaded and farther away from the truth or constructive engagement with the work than any position regarding the nature of the details of presentation.

Along with this is the view that although everyone is happy to congratulate themselves on being a "decent human being", the reality is the broad subjective range of this determination does not result in a decent society. For that, there must be some measure of consensus on core abstract norms, and I persistently find that people's attitude to theology and their attitude toward any type of systematic ethics at all, for which they'd actually accept adherence to, very closely mirror each other. I submit that people's actual, primary motivation to rejecting theology is a desire to reject ethics per se, or construct for themselves whatever subjective, easily-ignorable ethics may suit their purposes in doing whatever they wanted anyway while claiming an "ethics" which exists, in their reality as nothing more than a word in its specifics. As a practical thought-experiment I've suggested on this, gather 5 fellow atheists and each write down, independently, your top 10 most important ethical principles. Then check the correlation between them afterward. That should give a good indicator of the expected functionality of the application of this approach, if actually applied--when, I suspect, the whole point to anti-theism was to block application of -any- norms that would create any personal behavior expectations. I suggest we can then expect just as much energy being applied to attacking -whatever- norms were decided on, as is applied to attacking theism. One could say we don't have evidence of this. Or, one could say the reason we don't is that we have no place the merest beginnings of this has worked, that "atheist ethics" is a non-entity in theory and practice, and the average atheist would have it no other way.

From this standpoint, yes, I see atheism as more distant in its particulars and in its methodology toward the most -important- truths than either YEC or OEC. It's the difference between "we disagree on how to get there" and "there is no there, there".

I like what you are saying.

An elder Navaho woman once said to me that "We are the way that ideas move through time." I don't know whether this came from her experience or was rooted in her culture: I don't talk that language so Navaho culture is mostly opaque to me, and what I can see is probably distorted in more ways than I realize. But my basic point here is that the idea that human cultures evolve appears to be an old one that is present in several and probably all cultures.

To quote (almost) Robert Frost: We all dance in a circle and suppose; / The Secret sits in the middle and knows. It could well be that theism is to human culture as the center is to the circumference of the circle: it may be that human culture cannot exist without a God principle, just as a circle cannot exist without a center, BUT in both cases the God and the center --while absolutely necessary-- may be empty, without any independent existence.

That would not make the God principle any less real, but would mean that its reality is a necessary part of the way we experience the Universe. God might be an integral part of the Observer and have nothing at all to do with whatever is Objective Reality.

Thus spake me, who is a Goddess loving panentheist.

Perhaps theism has become so prevalent because without any ethical center beyond ourselves, we would all be narcissistic sociopaths like the guy you described.

This is obviously empirically false. In addition to the extreme rarity of "narcissistic sociopaths," despite the widespread lack of "ethical centers beyond the self," it completely ignores the fact that every major religion was and is propagated primarily by coercion if not outright violence, as well as the fact that there is extensive evidence for the selective advantage of altruistic behaviors at multiple levels of the animal kingdom.

Alternatively, it could be that some form of theism is inherent in the way humans have evolved.

One of the most interesting ideas I have ever encountered was that it is not just human individuals who have evolved, but entire human cultures. That from the invention of tribalism, memes (most importantly ideas about relating to other people, not internet jokes) have been going through millennia of evolution much like human genes. Therefore, many cultural, political, and even spiritual ideas may have become prominent today because they gave entire societies certain traits that made them more fit to pass on their memes than competing tribes, settlements, or nations.

Perhaps theism has become so prevalent because without any ethical center beyond ourselves, we would all be narcissistic sociopaths like the guy you described. If we truly believe there is no higher power than ourselves, we have no philosophical basis to believe that all the other people around us also think and hurt and have intent like we do. Theism is a very simple way to believe in a higher power, but it isn't the only one. It's also possible to believe ourselves less than our elders, the spirits of our elders, the natural world, or the political state in which we live. But theism may win out most of the time because a god is easy to personify and may take on any trait. This gives theism more adaptability, and therefore more potential for evolution to sort out the best kind of god in which to believe. Every society may believe in their own god that might prefer warfare, agriculture, the arts, or bureaucracy, and they instantly understand each others' concept of "god" even if it's different from theirs. The natural world, by contrast, is pretty much always the same, and serving the best interests of our local environment is actually very stifling to economic and technological progress.

Atheism has been [around] far longer than any sort of theism has, the idea of God is one that had to be invented by people.

Alternatively, it could be that some form of theism is inherent in the way humans have evolved.

The only true atheist I have met was a total sociopath of a man, completely oriented to narcisism.

I have also met a lot of people who describe themselves as atheists, but in each of these cases it seems that their definition of atheism involves negating the idea of Deity (where "Deity" is an inclusive term for belief in God, Gaia, Goddess, multiple gods, pantheistic spirits, etc). So Deity was, through its negation, very much a part of their world view. In each of these cases there seemed to be some sense of rightness that pretty much functioned as Deity no matter what the person chose to call it. That is, their "atheism" seemed to be of the "I am not a believer in God (but I have pantheistic belief, or believe I am myself sacred, etc).

That one true atheist, the sociopath, never stated a belief or disbelief. That was unimportant to him. The only thing that was important to him was enjoying himself as much as he possibly could without paying for his pleasure if he could possibly arrange for someone else to foot the bill. He was a thief of convenience, a great imposter, and a con artist. But he was rarely a burglar and never an armed robber-- I think those would have required too much work.

What's that got to do with it? Pagans weren't atheists, there were some pagans that probably didn't believe in any gods or supernatural phenomenon, but it's ridiculous to use them as the bar for atheists to pass as most of them weren't atheists. Paganism is a grouping of non-Christian religious ideologies.

Atheism has been a long far longer than any sort of theism has, the idea of God is one that had to be invented by people.

Perhaps they have never even thought about the topic at all (no thoughts == no knowledge). Nor do they form their identity through comparison with others.

These are not the issue, though.

I assure you it's an issue for agnostics. A taxonomy of belief which excludes/ignores a whole group of people or classifies them under positions which they strenuously disagree with is an invalid taxonomy.

If they hold a belief in a god or gods, they are theist. If they don't, they are atheist.

Incorrect.

"I have no belief" is not a valid answer to the question "Is there a deity or deities?" If there is a deity, it exists independently of what people believe, because belief doesn't actualise the deity into being, and non-belief doesn't cause the deity to stop existing.

There are only 3 possible answers to the question: is there a deity of deities:

1. Yes (Theism)

2. No (Atheism)

3. I don't know (Agnosticism)

Missed this, sorry:

Perhaps they have never even thought about the topic at all (no thoughts == no knowledge). Nor do they form their identity through comparison with others.

These are not the issue, though. If they hold a belief in a god or gods, they are theist. If they don't, they are atheist. You can change from one to the other, in fact many times, but at any point in time, you *are* one or the other.

That's all the theism / atheism issue addresses. Belief in a god or gods -- or not. Has nothing to do with why, how, which or one's idea of identity. It's a state of being, like being alive, or not, or being able to hear, or not.