The Unbelievers

PostmodernProphet said:
true enough.....but when I posted that I was thinking about the claim that atheism is nothing more than disbelief.....disbelief would be agnosticism.......atheism is more......it is an active belief and it certainly qualifies for the modern definitions of the sociological phenomena known as "religion".......perhaps the reason it didn't earlier was the fact that until forty or so years ago people didn't dare admit they were atheists.....there wasn't much "social" involved....
Click to expand...

It's not a religion any more than not believing in bigfoot is. Believing in bigfoot is not a religion either.
 
I found this and thought I would share:

1. Humanism is ethical. It affirms the worth, dignity and autonomy of the individual and the right of every human being to the greatest possible freedom compatible with the rights of others. Humanists have a duty of care to all of humanity including future generations. Humanists believe that morality is an intrinsic part of human nature based on understanding and a concern for others, needing no external sanction.
2. Humanism is rational. It seeks to use science creatively, not destructively. Humanists believe that the solutions to the world’s problems lie in human thought and action rather than divine intervention. Humanism advocates the application of the methods of science and free inquiry to the problems of human welfare. But Humanists also believe that the application of science and technology must be tempered by human values. Science gives us the means but human values must propose the ends.
3. Humanism supports democracy and human rights. Humanism aims at the fullest possible development of every human being. It holds that democracy and human development are matters of right. The principles of democracy and human rights can be applied to many human relationships and are not restricted to methods of government.
4. Humanism insists that personal liberty must be combined with social responsibility. Humanism ventures to build a world on the idea of the free person responsible to society, and recognizes our dependence on and responsibility for the natural world. Humanism is undogmatic, imposing no creed upon its adherents. It is thus committed to education free from indoctrination.
5. Humanism is a response to the widespread demand for an alternative to dogmatic religion. The world’s major religions claim to be based on revelations fixed for all time, and many seek to impose their world-views on all of humanity. Humanism recognizes that reliable knowledge of the world and ourselves arises through a continuing process. of observation, evaluation and revision.
6. Humanism values artistic creativity and imagination and recognizes the transforming power of art. Humanism affirms the importance of literature, music, and the visual and performing arts for personal development and fulfillment.
7. Humanism is a life stance aiming at the maximum possible fulfillment through the cultivation of ethical and creative living and offers an ethical and rational means of addressing the challenges of our times. Humanism can be a way of life for everyone everywhere.

http://freethoughtblogs.com/taslima...gn=Feed:+FreethoughtBlogs+(Freethought+Blogs)
 
Sir Digby Chicken Caesar said:
To say you do not believe in god(s) is not a positive assertion.
Click to expand...

that is true....but you will note I have not argued that agnostics were a religion......atheists are a completely different story......they make the positive assertion that there is no god.....of course you knew that before you posted......you just hoped we wouldn't notice......
 
Rana said:
I found this and thought I would share:

1. Humanism is ethical. It affirms the worth, dignity and autonomy of the individual and the right of every human being to the greatest possible freedom compatible with the rights of others. Humanists have a duty of care to all of humanity including future generations. Humanists believe that morality is an intrinsic part of human nature based on understanding and a concern for others, needing no external sanction.
2. Humanism is rational. It seeks to use science creatively, not destructively. Humanists believe that the solutions to the world’s problems lie in human thought and action rather than divine intervention. Humanism advocates the application of the methods of science and free inquiry to the problems of human welfare. But Humanists also believe that the application of science and technology must be tempered by human values. Science gives us the means but human values must propose the ends.
3. Humanism supports democracy and human rights. Humanism aims at the fullest possible development of every human being. It holds that democracy and human development are matters of right. The principles of democracy and human rights can be applied to many human relationships and are not restricted to methods of government.
4. Humanism insists that personal liberty must be combined with social responsibility. Humanism ventures to build a world on the idea of the free person responsible to society, and recognizes our dependence on and responsibility for the natural world. Humanism is undogmatic, imposing no creed upon its adherents. It is thus committed to education free from indoctrination.
5. Humanism is a response to the widespread demand for an alternative to dogmatic religion. The world’s major religions claim to be based on revelations fixed for all time, and many seek to impose their world-views on all of humanity. Humanism recognizes that reliable knowledge of the world and ourselves arises through a continuing process. of observation, evaluation and revision.
6. Humanism values artistic creativity and imagination and recognizes the transforming power of art. Humanism affirms the importance of literature, music, and the visual and performing arts for personal development and fulfillment.
7. Humanism is a life stance aiming at the maximum possible fulfillment through the cultivation of ethical and creative living and offers an ethical and rational means of addressing the challenges of our times. Humanism can be a way of life for everyone everywhere.

http://freethoughtblogs.com/taslima...gn=Feed:+FreethoughtBlogs+(Freethought+Blogs)
Click to expand...

gosh....humanism is Christianity and we never even knew it......
 
PostmodernProphet said:
agreed....for example, believing there is no god.....
Click to expand...

Dont be silly. I'll ask AGAIN. Show me incontrovertible evidence of the existence of a deity and I will listen, just as I listen to science discoveries.
I have asked this of you several times. There really is no point in your continuing to evangelise unless you can supply evidence.
Try not to be too much of a smart-arse in your response.
 
PostmodernProphet said:
I don't recall anyone who believes bigfoot does not exist taking the time to start threads on politics boards proclaiming his belief....he's not an evangelist like you are......
Click to expand...

Yeah, that's not what happened here. I posted a thread about a movie of interest and you started whining like a baby because it expressed views that challenge what you believe.
 
PostmodernProphet said:
that is true....but you will note I have not argued that agnostics were a religion......atheists are a completely different story......they make the positive assertion that there is no god.....of course you knew that before you posted......you just hoped we wouldn't notice......
Click to expand...

Why not?

According to wikipedia, my definition is accurate for atheism. Either way, it does not matter. Belief in bigfoot is a positive assertion. That does not make it a religion.
 
I would be interested to read PMP's comments about this. Indeed anyone who thinks that creationism and bible history is not completely stupid. How about it guys?

The Paradoxes of Darwinian Disorder. Towards an Ontological Reaffirmation of Order and Transcendence.
Robert A. Maundy, College of the Holy Cross, Reno, Nevada

In the Darwinian perspective, order is not immanent in reality, but it is a self-affirming aspect of reality in so far as it is experienced by situated subjects. However, it is not so much reality that is self-affirming, but the creative order structuring reality which manifests itself to us. Being-whole, as opposed to being-one, underwrites our fundamental sense of locatedness and particularity in the universe. The valuation of order qua meaningful order, rather than order-in-itself, has been thoroughly objectified in the Darwinian worldview. This process of de-contextualization and reification of meaning has ultimately led to the establishment of ‘dis-order’ rather than ‘this-order’. As a result, Darwinian materialism confronts us with an eradication of meaning from the phenomenological experience of reality. Negative theology however suggests a revaluation of disorder as a necessary precondition of order, as that without which order could not be thought of in an orderly fashion. In that sense, dis-order dissolves into the manifestations of order transcending the materialist realm. Indeed, order becomes only transparent qua order in so far as it is situated against a background of chaos and meaninglessness. This binary opposition between order and dis-order, or between order and that which disrupts order, embodies a central paradox of Darwinian thinking. As Whitehead suggests, reality is not composed of disordered material substances, but as serially-ordered events that are experienced in a subjectively meaningful way. The question is not what structures order, but what structure is imposed on our transcendent conception of order. By narrowly focusing on the disorderly state of present-being, or the “incoherence of a primordial multiplicity”, as John Haught put it, Darwinian materialists lose sense of the ultimate order unfolding in the not-yet-being. Contrary to what Dawkins asserts, if we reframe our sense of locatedness of existence within a the space of radical contingency of spiritual destiny, then absolute order reemerges as an ontological possibility. The discourse of dis-order always already incorporates a creative moment that allows the self to transcend the context in which it finds itself, but also to find solace and responsiveness in an absolute Order which both engenders and withholds meaning. Creation is the condition of possibility of discourse which, in turn, evokes itself as presenting creation itself. Darwinian discourse is therefore just an emanation of the absolute discourse of dis-order, and not the other way around, as crude materialists such as Dawkins suggest.
 
Sir Digby Chicken Caesar said:
Yeah, that's not what happened here. I posted a thread about a movie of interest and you started whining like a baby because it expressed views that challenge what you believe.
Click to expand...

lol....fortunately the posts are still there for anyone to read.......thus they will be able to see for themselves what a pile of crap that claim is......
 
Lowaicue said:
I would be interested to read PMP's comments about this. Indeed anyone who thinks that creationism and bible history is not completely stupid. How about it guys?

The Paradoxes of Darwinian Disorder. Towards an Ontological Reaffirmation of Order and Transcendence.
Robert A. Maundy, College of the Holy Cross, Reno, Nevada

In the Darwinian perspective, order is not immanent in reality, but it is a self-affirming aspect of reality in so far as it is experienced by situated subjects. However, it is not so much reality that is self-affirming, but the creative order structuring reality which manifests itself to us. Being-whole, as opposed to being-one, underwrites our fundamental sense of locatedness and particularity in the universe. The valuation of order qua meaningful order, rather than order-in-itself, has been thoroughly objectified in the Darwinian worldview. This process of de-contextualization and reification of meaning has ultimately led to the establishment of ‘dis-order’ rather than ‘this-order’. As a result, Darwinian materialism confronts us with an eradication of meaning from the phenomenological experience of reality. Negative theology however suggests a revaluation of disorder as a necessary precondition of order, as that without which order could not be thought of in an orderly fashion. In that sense, dis-order dissolves into the manifestations of order transcending the materialist realm. Indeed, order becomes only transparent qua order in so far as it is situated against a background of chaos and meaninglessness. This binary opposition between order and dis-order, or between order and that which disrupts order, embodies a central paradox of Darwinian thinking. As Whitehead suggests, reality is not composed of disordered material substances, but as serially-ordered events that are experienced in a subjectively meaningful way. The question is not what structures order, but what structure is imposed on our transcendent conception of order. By narrowly focusing on the disorderly state of present-being, or the “incoherence of a primordial multiplicity”, as John Haught put it, Darwinian materialists lose sense of the ultimate order unfolding in the not-yet-being. Contrary to what Dawkins asserts, if we reframe our sense of locatedness of existence within a the space of radical contingency of spiritual destiny, then absolute order reemerges as an ontological possibility. The discourse of dis-order always already incorporates a creative moment that allows the self to transcend the context in which it finds itself, but also to find solace and responsiveness in an absolute Order which both engenders and withholds meaning. Creation is the condition of possibility of discourse which, in turn, evokes itself as presenting creation itself. Darwinian discourse is therefore just an emanation of the absolute discourse of dis-order, and not the other way around, as crude materialists such as Dawkins suggest.
Click to expand...

lol, as a post-modernist, my first reaction is that one would need a five course studies series just to understand the messages he's trying to pack into code words.....he apparently assumes that everyone he is writing to already knows what HE means by things like absolute order or Darwinian materialism.....

without a handbook, phrases like "This process of de-contextualization and reification of meaning has ultimately led to the establishment of ‘dis-order’ rather than ‘this-order’." are meaningful as his grocery list.....
 
for example, when he talks about the Darwinian worldview do we assume he is talking about the world view of Darwin or the worldview of modern seculars who have put forward Darwinian evolution as the explanation for why we exist.......{by the way "worldview" is another way of saying "religion" in today's sociological circles}.........
 
Steelplate said:
The problem is the idea that it has to be "either/or". Why can't it be both?

Sometimes I find science to be almost as self limiting as religion. Our understanding of our natural world is ever expanding...but much of it is based on theory...nothing wrong with theory... but why can't our theories be God's Laws? Laws that we don't quite get.

IMO, God gave us the intellect to figure this stuff out. God gave us the power to save lives with modern medicine or to destroy lives with horrific tools of war.

Our grace lies in what we do with that power and intellect. Do we use it to create it destroy? Do we use it to serve ourselves personally and financially or to serve others?

Same with religion.... do we use it to serve or control society? Do we use it to forgive and love, or to condemn and despise?

It's not science that's the sin....it's the motivations behind it. It's not religion that's the enemy...it's the motives of the religious.
Click to expand...



there in lies the rub.

that is why I say to the religious please stop organizing.

when you organize you craft a leash and put the loop arround your neck and hand the lead ebnd to someone else.


If you believe jesus was a god then listen to his words and dont let others interprit them for you.


Then realise they were not exactly Jesus' words and may have been unwittinginly or wittingly twisted for someone to use them for power.


look at your human heart and listen to jesus in a way that you get his gist ( which was all about loving your fellow man and being forgiving).


Is building huge compounds in his name whatJesus would have wanted?


he would have taken that money and lived meagerly and used the funds to feed and house people.

what organized religion is in this modern world is all about collecting money and power so you can control people and then give them a few nice words and make them feel better than other people.


Its total crap and lacks compassion.
 
evince said:
there in lies the rub.

that is why I say to the DEMOCRATS please stop organizing.

when you organize you craft a leash and put the loop arround your neck and hand the lead ebnd to someone else.



what DEMOCRATSare in this modern world are all about collecting money and power so you can control people and then give them a few nice words and make them feel better than other people.


Its total crap and lacks compassion.
Click to expand...

Fixed it for ya
 
PostmodernProphet said:
if true, they don't know the difference between agnostics and atheists either.....agnostics state they do not know, atheists deny the possibility.....
Click to expand...

"Don't know" had nothing to do with the definition or any statement we were discussing. "Denying the possibility" is not an accurate description either.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top