Are Atheists Potentially Morally Superior to Theists?

[Danmark]

The proposition is that atheists have the potential of being morally superior to theists because to the extent the atheist does good works, he does them because he wants to, because she thinks it right. Whereas the theist acts out of religious necessity or compulsion; the threat of hell or deprivation of heaven.

[stubbornone]

@ Bust Nak

I put Stubbornone on ignore due to obvious reason so I won't see any of his posts and also won't be answering any.

I find it amusing that people are taking offense as if they are being called immoral or slavers and rapers when no one has done such. Since Christians get their morals from the bible, when we point out bad things in that book they get all bent out of shape. No one is calling anyone immoral from the atheists side. We are just pointing out that the bible is inconsitent with a benevolent absolute moral giver. If god's bible is the moral standard and the law was given to bring forth the recognition of sin then a rebuke of slavery would have been nice. We atheists don't need a rebuke of slavery to understand it is bad, and from our current culture we are moving forward morally.

It is also funny that when you list all of these morals they are in agreement with our society. Just as slavery was once condone in our society and accepted, now it is not and Christians and non alike have changed together. The whole society changed. It wasn't one group who changed and everyone else followed. We see this in every society.

I find it amusing that a poster would repeatedly dump offensive statements into the middle of the discussion, get called to back them up .... fail repeatedly do do, and now publically state, after a warning from the moderators, that he paced the person calling him on his antics on ignore ... because he is a victim?

And yes, when one looks at actual history, it was very much Christian groups who made the difference.

But why let facts interrupt a perfectly good bash?

And therein lies the problem with atheists and their so called morality, nothing but bland double standards and tawdry accusations. Thankfully, its a type of morality mostly rejected in our society.

A reminder Nick, this thread was just fine until you repeatedly dumped and then failed to support a number of statements that were highly accusatory and derogatory.

[stubbornone]

I think that this is true whether or not there is a God. Atheists (most atheists) solve this problem when they discover humanism, or another philosophy that gives them something 'bigger' to believe in and to answer to; a set of ethics or morals that work in the place of religion.

That would be the other way around of course. Religion and belief in the teachings of some religious moral teacher or scriptures makes people behave morally to catch those who aren't moral or don't understand how and why morals evolved in the first place and why it's important to be moral as I explained earlier. Animal altruism existed long before any religions.

So does the opposite. Animals to horrible things ... yet these do not make it into the scions of Dawkins analysis for some reason.

Which, once again, when claiming a genetic basis of something, you must have GENETIC evidence - not deliberately scoped evidence that 'proves' a point while ignoring all contrary evidence.

We call that confirmation bias, indeed the bias sample fallacy, and both are well known logical shortfalls.

Not surprised to see them advocated in support of atheism ... especially given that Dawkins published it in a book that has ZERO scientific following.

[stubbornone]

(grin) Be careful....have you actually been reading my exchange with Nickman? What happens to atheists who get the power to enforce their opinions?

Or rather, what happens to the people atheists enforce their opinions upon?

I'm an atheist with the power to enforce my opinion on others through voting. I don't think anything too terrible has happened to the people affected by my exercise of power, but perhaps I'm not powerful enough yet?

I also agree with Bust Nak that it is up to me (along with every other individual) to decide what is good for the whole of humanity.

P.S. a side remark about your eariler point. I don't think anyone on our side has ever implied that atheism is anything more than not believing in gods. No one is crediting atheism with empathy, logic, morality etc.

Then you haven't been reading the posts. In fact, almost all of you do exactly that.

I challenge you to quote statements by other posters to this effect. If you cannot, please withdraw your blanket accusation.

To put the point I am attempting to make in as simple and short a manner as possible, I think it is obvious that power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely....but no theist ever gets absolute power. If he is a believer, he will be tempered by the rules of his belief. If he isn't, he is tempered by those who ARE true believers of the religion he is using. His power is never, quite, absolute.

What if someone believes in a god that wants to do everything that they want to do? What if someone believes in a god that wants them to annihilate the human race?

Your point fails because theism is simply the opposite of atheism. Theism in and of itself provides nothing in the way of moral guidelines.

Theism postulates that there is a God ... and from that reference point certain inferences can be made. Its the whole Hegelian dialectic thingy ...

Second, if you are claiming that empowered atheism has no historical basis .. yet .. then I would invite you to check out the Paris communes, some of the natier bits of the French and Russian Revolution, Stalin, Moa, and good ol Kim Jung Il/Un.

What is an atheist, believing we are nothing but a random collection of molecules, decides that life is pointless and goes on a the same gun rampage?

I fail to see how these hyperbolic situations allow anyone to arrive a position of morality rather than mutual bashing?

Atheism has its faults, so does religion. Only one has a defined mechanism that aids a person in the objective examination of their morality and an instrument to improve said morality.

It isn't atheism.

[d.thomas]

(grin) Be careful....have you actually been reading my exchange with Nickman? What happens to atheists who get the power to enforce their opinions?

Or rather, what happens to the people atheists enforce their opinions upon?

I'm an atheist with the power to enforce my opinion on others through voting. I don't think anything too terrible has happened to the people affected by my exercise of power, but perhaps I'm not powerful enough yet?

I also agree with Bust Nak that it is up to me (along with every other individual) to decide what is good for the whole of humanity.

P.S. a side remark about your eariler point. I don't think anyone on our side has ever implied that atheism is anything more than not believing in gods. No one is crediting atheism with empathy, logic, morality etc.

Then you haven't been reading the posts. In fact, almost all of you do exactly that.

I challenge you to quote statements by other posters to this effect. If you cannot, please withdraw your blanket accusation.

To put the point I am attempting to make in as simple and short a manner as possible, I think it is obvious that power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely....but no theist ever gets absolute power. If he is a believer, he will be tempered by the rules of his belief. If he isn't, he is tempered by those who ARE true believers of the religion he is using. His power is never, quite, absolute.

What if someone believes in a god that wants to do everything that they want to do? What if someone believes in a god that wants them to annihilate the human race?

Your point fails because theism is simply the opposite of atheism. Theism in and of itself provides nothing in the way of moral guidelines.

Theism postulates that there is a God ... and from that reference point certain inferences can be made. Its the whole Hegelian dialectic thingy ...

Second, if you are claiming that empowered atheism has no historical basis .. yet .. then I would invite you to check out the Paris communes, some of the natier bits of the French and Russian Revolution, Stalin, Moa, and good ol Kim Jung Il/Un.

What is an atheist, believing we are nothing but a random collection of molecules, decides that life is pointless and goes on a the same gun rampage?

I fail to see how these hyperbolic situations allow anyone to arrive a position of morality rather than mutual bashing?

Atheism has its faults, so does religion. Only one has a defined mechanism that aids a person in the objective examination of their morality and an instrument to improve said morality.

It isn't atheism.

If you believe there is an ancient invisible god out there I would say that I don't believe you, that makes me an atheist. It says nothing of what I do believe so you can make all the accusations about atheists you like. If you think atheists are evil for not believing you, then that's your problem, rant all you like, besides, your rants tell us more about you and your so called morals than it does atheists.

[stubbornone]

(grin) Be careful....have you actually been reading my exchange with Nickman? What happens to atheists who get the power to enforce their opinions?

Or rather, what happens to the people atheists enforce their opinions upon?

I'm an atheist with the power to enforce my opinion on others through voting. I don't think anything too terrible has happened to the people affected by my exercise of power, but perhaps I'm not powerful enough yet?

I also agree with Bust Nak that it is up to me (along with every other individual) to decide what is good for the whole of humanity.

P.S. a side remark about your eariler point. I don't think anyone on our side has ever implied that atheism is anything more than not believing in gods. No one is crediting atheism with empathy, logic, morality etc.

Then you haven't been reading the posts. In fact, almost all of you do exactly that.

I challenge you to quote statements by other posters to this effect. If you cannot, please withdraw your blanket accusation.

To put the point I am attempting to make in as simple and short a manner as possible, I think it is obvious that power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely....but no theist ever gets absolute power. If he is a believer, he will be tempered by the rules of his belief. If he isn't, he is tempered by those who ARE true believers of the religion he is using. His power is never, quite, absolute.

What if someone believes in a god that wants to do everything that they want to do? What if someone believes in a god that wants them to annihilate the human race?

Your point fails because theism is simply the opposite of atheism. Theism in and of itself provides nothing in the way of moral guidelines.

Theism postulates that there is a God ... and from that reference point certain inferences can be made. Its the whole Hegelian dialectic thingy ...

Second, if you are claiming that empowered atheism has no historical basis .. yet .. then I would invite you to check out the Paris communes, some of the natier bits of the French and Russian Revolution, Stalin, Moa, and good ol Kim Jung Il/Un.

What is an atheist, believing we are nothing but a random collection of molecules, decides that life is pointless and goes on a the same gun rampage?

I fail to see how these hyperbolic situations allow anyone to arrive a position of morality rather than mutual bashing?

Atheism has its faults, so does religion. Only one has a defined mechanism that aids a person in the objective examination of their morality and an instrument to improve said morality.

It isn't atheism.

If you believe there is an ancient invisible god out there I would say that I don't believe you, that makes me an atheist. It says nothing of what I do believe so you can make all the accusations about atheists you like. If you think atheists are evil for not believing you, then that's your problem, rant all you like, besides, your rants tell us more about you and your so called morals than it does atheists.

I would say you are simply employing a well known argumentative style known as an argument from absurdity in which you aren't inerested much in evidence or logic, indeed you don;t use it at all in your position, and a healthy dose of arrogance to boot ... by unilaterally declaring YOURSELF to be the judge of everyone else's position in a highly generic and utterly dismissive way.

There is a point at which attempting to engage those obviously engaged in an argument from absurdity is simply pointless.

You have to support your cliams, not reject everyone else is some absurd (hence the title of the argumentative style) position that you are judge of all. Indeed, arguementation is about convincing others ... not yourself ... hence the argument from absurdity ...

Do you see the thread title? Why o why are you postulated your absurd position on evidence for God in two threads now? Did it occur to you to postulate the idea that whether or no God actually exists is irrelevant to the acceptance of his moral standards?

Is this to state that all the morality in atheism flows from the unevidenced and absurd rejection of everything but ones own opinion? Well, there are indeed many theologians, and indeed laity, who claim that atheism is simply self worship.

Would you care to address such criticism?

[d.thomas]

(grin) Be careful....have you actually been reading my exchange with Nickman? What happens to atheists who get the power to enforce their opinions?

Or rather, what happens to the people atheists enforce their opinions upon?

I'm an atheist with the power to enforce my opinion on others through voting. I don't think anything too terrible has happened to the people affected by my exercise of power, but perhaps I'm not powerful enough yet?

I also agree with Bust Nak that it is up to me (along with every other individual) to decide what is good for the whole of humanity.

P.S. a side remark about your eariler point. I don't think anyone on our side has ever implied that atheism is anything more than not believing in gods. No one is crediting atheism with empathy, logic, morality etc.

Then you haven't been reading the posts. In fact, almost all of you do exactly that.

I challenge you to quote statements by other posters to this effect. If you cannot, please withdraw your blanket accusation.

To put the point I am attempting to make in as simple and short a manner as possible, I think it is obvious that power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely....but no theist ever gets absolute power. If he is a believer, he will be tempered by the rules of his belief. If he isn't, he is tempered by those who ARE true believers of the religion he is using. His power is never, quite, absolute.

What if someone believes in a god that wants to do everything that they want to do? What if someone believes in a god that wants them to annihilate the human race?

Your point fails because theism is simply the opposite of atheism. Theism in and of itself provides nothing in the way of moral guidelines.

Theism postulates that there is a God ... and from that reference point certain inferences can be made. Its the whole Hegelian dialectic thingy ...

Second, if you are claiming that empowered atheism has no historical basis .. yet .. then I would invite you to check out the Paris communes, some of the natier bits of the French and Russian Revolution, Stalin, Moa, and good ol Kim Jung Il/Un.

What is an atheist, believing we are nothing but a random collection of molecules, decides that life is pointless and goes on a the same gun rampage?

I fail to see how these hyperbolic situations allow anyone to arrive a position of morality rather than mutual bashing?

Atheism has its faults, so does religion. Only one has a defined mechanism that aids a person in the objective examination of their morality and an instrument to improve said morality.

It isn't atheism.

If you believe there is an ancient invisible god out there I would say that I don't believe you, that makes me an atheist. It says nothing of what I do believe so you can make all the accusations about atheists you like. If you think atheists are evil for not believing you, then that's your problem, rant all you like, besides, your rants tell us more about you and your so called morals than it does atheists.

I would say you are simply employing a well known argumentative style known as an argument from absurdity in which you aren't inerested much in evidence or logic, indeed you don;t use it at all in your position, and a healthy dose of arrogance to boot ... by unilaterally declaring YOURSELF to be the judge of everyone else's position in a highly generic and utterly dismissive way.

There is a point at which attempting to engage those obviously engaged in an argument from absurdity is simply pointless.

You have to support your cliams, not reject everyone else is some absurd (hence the title of the argumentative style) position that you are judge of all. Indeed, arguementation is about convincing others ... not yourself ... hence the argument from absurdity ...

Do you see the thread title? Why o why are you postulated your absurd position on evidence for God in two threads now? Did it occur to you to postulate the idea that whether or no God actually exists is irrelevant to the acceptance of his moral standards?

Is this to state that all the morality in atheism flows from the unevidenced and absurd rejection of everything but ones own opinion? Well, there are indeed many theologians, and indeed laity, who claim that atheism is simply self worship.

Would you care to address such criticism?

God is a faith belief. Why? Because there is no evidence to draw a conclusion from.

[Artie]

So does the opposite. Animals to horrible things ... yet these do not make it into the scions of Dawkins analysis for some reason.

Because of course when we are discussing how morality evolved we use animals who display moral behavior as examples. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altruism_in_animals

Which, once again, when claiming a genetic basis of something, you must have GENETIC evidence - not deliberately scoped evidence that 'proves' a point while ignoring all contrary evidence.

You mean the "Altruism Gene"?
http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article ... ruism_gene
http://io9.com/5859786/is-this-the-altruism-gene

[stubbornone]

(grin) Be careful....have you actually been reading my exchange with Nickman? What happens to atheists who get the power to enforce their opinions?

Or rather, what happens to the people atheists enforce their opinions upon?

I'm an atheist with the power to enforce my opinion on others through voting. I don't think anything too terrible has happened to the people affected by my exercise of power, but perhaps I'm not powerful enough yet?

I also agree with Bust Nak that it is up to me (along with every other individual) to decide what is good for the whole of humanity.

P.S. a side remark about your eariler point. I don't think anyone on our side has ever implied that atheism is anything more than not believing in gods. No one is crediting atheism with empathy, logic, morality etc.

Then you haven't been reading the posts. In fact, almost all of you do exactly that.

I challenge you to quote statements by other posters to this effect. If you cannot, please withdraw your blanket accusation.

To put the point I am attempting to make in as simple and short a manner as possible, I think it is obvious that power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely....but no theist ever gets absolute power. If he is a believer, he will be tempered by the rules of his belief. If he isn't, he is tempered by those who ARE true believers of the religion he is using. His power is never, quite, absolute.

What if someone believes in a god that wants to do everything that they want to do? What if someone believes in a god that wants them to annihilate the human race?

Your point fails because theism is simply the opposite of atheism. Theism in and of itself provides nothing in the way of moral guidelines.

Theism postulates that there is a God ... and from that reference point certain inferences can be made. Its the whole Hegelian dialectic thingy ...

Second, if you are claiming that empowered atheism has no historical basis .. yet .. then I would invite you to check out the Paris communes, some of the natier bits of the French and Russian Revolution, Stalin, Moa, and good ol Kim Jung Il/Un.

What is an atheist, believing we are nothing but a random collection of molecules, decides that life is pointless and goes on a the same gun rampage?

I fail to see how these hyperbolic situations allow anyone to arrive a position of morality rather than mutual bashing?

Atheism has its faults, so does religion. Only one has a defined mechanism that aids a person in the objective examination of their morality and an instrument to improve said morality.

It isn't atheism.

If you believe there is an ancient invisible god out there I would say that I don't believe you, that makes me an atheist. It says nothing of what I do believe so you can make all the accusations about atheists you like. If you think atheists are evil for not believing you, then that's your problem, rant all you like, besides, your rants tell us more about you and your so called morals than it does atheists.

I would say you are simply employing a well known argumentative style known as an argument from absurdity in which you aren't inerested much in evidence or logic, indeed you don;t use it at all in your position, and a healthy dose of arrogance to boot ... by unilaterally declaring YOURSELF to be the judge of everyone else's position in a highly generic and utterly dismissive way.

There is a point at which attempting to engage those obviously engaged in an argument from absurdity is simply pointless.

You have to support your cliams, not reject everyone else is some absurd (hence the title of the argumentative style) position that you are judge of all. Indeed, arguementation is about convincing others ... not yourself ... hence the argument from absurdity ...

Do you see the thread title? Why o why are you postulated your absurd position on evidence for God in two threads now? Did it occur to you to postulate the idea that whether or no God actually exists is irrelevant to the acceptance of his moral standards?

Is this to state that all the morality in atheism flows from the unevidenced and absurd rejection of everything but ones own opinion? Well, there are indeed many theologians, and indeed laity, who claim that atheism is simply self worship.

Would you care to address such criticism?

God is a faith belief. Why? Because there is no evidence to draw a conclusion from.

So is atheism. Which you have no problem with apparently?

Indeed, if yours is NOT faith, then it SHOULD have a great deal of obviously convincing evidence shouldn't it?

Well, as you just claimed that faith was terrible, we now have a definitive burden of proof on atheism to PROVE that there is no God as there can be NO faith aspect to atheism.

Now, morality is all about standards, as is this forum BTW, and I hereby demand you prove unequivocally that there is no God - or acknowledge that your position rests upon faith rather than evidence.

Go ahead.

[stubbornone]

So does the opposite. Animals to horrible things ... yet these do not make it into the scions of Dawkins analysis for some reason.

Because of course when we are discussing how morality evolved we use animals who display moral behavior as examples. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altruism_in_animals

Which, once again, when claiming a genetic basis of something, you must have GENETIC evidence - not deliberately scoped evidence that 'proves' a point while ignoring all contrary evidence.

You mean the "Altruism Gene"?
http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article ... ruism_gene
http://io9.com/5859786/is-this-the-altruism-gene

Let me again draw you back to a couple of points:

#1 - I have already addressed your sources and keep pointing you toward behavior that does not conform to supposed genetic altruism, and have examined the evidence provided, like endorphin, and demonstrated that these are at best teases of possibility rather than proof.

#2 - As has been explained multiple times, simply dumping the same sources without comment and without regard to the rebuttals is not debate ... its called googling.

Here you go, let me show you how this works:

"we reached the conclusion that happiness is the ultimate value and we should strive to increase it. This result can be formalized into a secular ethical system I call universal utilitarianism"

http://www.daylightatheism.org/2006/09/ ... y-iii.html

So we have atheists claiming it happiness that drives morality?

http://www.thecommentfactory.com/if-ath ... ates-1784/

Nope, morality is clearly cultural ... also argued and not supported on this thread.

Our own intuition guides our morality.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/20 ... 142545.htm

Morality is learned.

http://www.allaboutphilosophy.org/morality.htm

Unfortunately, all of those, and I can find many more, have been PROVEN to exactly the same level as your claim.

That Dawkins and a few ardent followers published some arguments does not equate to proof, particularly when their claims fail entirely to even acknowlegde the wider debate on the subject.

In short, I can google too ... so please ACTUALLY make an argument.

[d.thomas]

(grin) Be careful....have you actually been reading my exchange with Nickman? What happens to atheists who get the power to enforce their opinions?

Or rather, what happens to the people atheists enforce their opinions upon?

I'm an atheist with the power to enforce my opinion on others through voting. I don't think anything too terrible has happened to the people affected by my exercise of power, but perhaps I'm not powerful enough yet?

I also agree with Bust Nak that it is up to me (along with every other individual) to decide what is good for the whole of humanity.

P.S. a side remark about your eariler point. I don't think anyone on our side has ever implied that atheism is anything more than not believing in gods. No one is crediting atheism with empathy, logic, morality etc.

Then you haven't been reading the posts. In fact, almost all of you do exactly that.

I challenge you to quote statements by other posters to this effect. If you cannot, please withdraw your blanket accusation.

To put the point I am attempting to make in as simple and short a manner as possible, I think it is obvious that power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely....but no theist ever gets absolute power. If he is a believer, he will be tempered by the rules of his belief. If he isn't, he is tempered by those who ARE true believers of the religion he is using. His power is never, quite, absolute.

What if someone believes in a god that wants to do everything that they want to do? What if someone believes in a god that wants them to annihilate the human race?

Your point fails because theism is simply the opposite of atheism. Theism in and of itself provides nothing in the way of moral guidelines.

Theism postulates that there is a God ... and from that reference point certain inferences can be made. Its the whole Hegelian dialectic thingy ...

Second, if you are claiming that empowered atheism has no historical basis .. yet .. then I would invite you to check out the Paris communes, some of the natier bits of the French and Russian Revolution, Stalin, Moa, and good ol Kim Jung Il/Un.

What is an atheist, believing we are nothing but a random collection of molecules, decides that life is pointless and goes on a the same gun rampage?

I fail to see how these hyperbolic situations allow anyone to arrive a position of morality rather than mutual bashing?

Atheism has its faults, so does religion. Only one has a defined mechanism that aids a person in the objective examination of their morality and an instrument to improve said morality.

It isn't atheism.

If you believe there is an ancient invisible god out there I would say that I don't believe you, that makes me an atheist. It says nothing of what I do believe so you can make all the accusations about atheists you like. If you think atheists are evil for not believing you, then that's your problem, rant all you like, besides, your rants tell us more about you and your so called morals than it does atheists.

I would say you are simply employing a well known argumentative style known as an argument from absurdity in which you aren't inerested much in evidence or logic, indeed you don;t use it at all in your position, and a healthy dose of arrogance to boot ... by unilaterally declaring YOURSELF to be the judge of everyone else's position in a highly generic and utterly dismissive way.

There is a point at which attempting to engage those obviously engaged in an argument from absurdity is simply pointless.

You have to support your cliams, not reject everyone else is some absurd (hence the title of the argumentative style) position that you are judge of all. Indeed, arguementation is about convincing others ... not yourself ... hence the argument from absurdity ...

Do you see the thread title? Why o why are you postulated your absurd position on evidence for God in two threads now? Did it occur to you to postulate the idea that whether or no God actually exists is irrelevant to the acceptance of his moral standards?

Is this to state that all the morality in atheism flows from the unevidenced and absurd rejection of everything but ones own opinion? Well, there are indeed many theologians, and indeed laity, who claim that atheism is simply self worship.

Would you care to address such criticism?

God is a faith belief. Why? Because there is no evidence to draw a conclusion from.

So is atheism. Which you have no problem with apparently?

Indeed, if yours is NOT faith, then it SHOULD have a great deal of obviously convincing evidence shouldn't it?

Well, as you just claimed that faith was terrible, we now have a definitive burden of proof on atheism to PROVE that there is no God as there can be NO faith aspect to atheism.

Now, morality is all about standards, as is this forum BTW, and I hereby demand you prove unequivocally that there is no God - or acknowledge that your position rests upon faith rather than evidence.

Go ahead.

I don't believe your claim of ancient invisible gods out there because you can't provide evidence. I have nothing to prove but it certainly appears that you do. BTW, does your invisible god coincidentally happen to have the same morals as you? Maybe you're just projecting.