Can Atheists Be Good Citizens?

[godless dave]

So if say "fair," "just," and "rights", and get people to agree with us, then the content of those words is unimportant.

That doesn't follow at all. Those words can be defined. They're still abstract concepts, not universal truths.

A society that allowed atheists to be executed for no reason other than being atheists wouldn't be "fair" because of the definition of the word "fair".

 

[six7s]

Can an atheist be a good citizen^®©™?

 

[bokonon]

Can science discover rights? Are rights woo?

Science does not discover rights. Men agree on rights. No deity is required for this agreement. Indeed, in the case I noted earlier (U.S. slavery), a deity and some dusty writings attributed to it were used to justify denying rights to some men, and most women.

In some places, that is still the case today. All the belief in deities seems to do in these cases is retard the acquisition of rights by those whose rights are being denied.

Can atheists be good citizens, Stone Island?

 

[Stone Island]

That doesn't follow at all. Those words can be defined. They're still abstract concepts, not universal truths.

I presume that if they can be defined then they can be redefined, especially if they don't correspond to a universal truth.

We know that justice has been defined at least a thousand and one ways. Nietzsche's Zarathustra talks of the thousand and one goods. The real question, are any of them true in any non-trivial sense?

The American Founding in its way was an assertion of faith: that the way they defined justice and rights was universally true and were the necessary basis for any just society.

 

[Stone Island]

A society that allowed atheists to be executed for no reason other than being atheists wouldn't be "fair" because of the definition of the word "fair".

Aristotle refers to giving equal to equals and unequal to unequals. There could be a society that was dedicated to the proposition that atheists are not equal to theists. What is fair to give to them is different than what is fair to give to the other. It's fair to hang atheists and fair to not hang theists.

 

[bokonon]

If they're an abstract concept thought up by us, if they're not natural, then why should we respect them?

Because we've collectively agreed to. It's called the social contract.

In the United States, one aspect of the social contract is that we've agreed that the choice of religion is a man's private business. Anyone who argues that atheists who obey the law, and even contribute to society voluntarily over and above what is required by law, are not good citizens, is simply incorrect.

Can atheists be good citizens, Stone Island?

 

[godless dave]

I presume that if they can be defined then they can be redefined, especially if they don't correspond to a universal truth.

If it's redefined, then it's not the same concept.

We know that justice has been defined at least a thousand and one ways. Nietzsche's Zarathustra talks of the thousand and one goods. The real question, are any of them true in any non-trivial sense?

Depends what you mean by "true".

The American Founding in its way was an assertion of faith: that the way they defined justice and rights was universally true and were the necessary basis for any just society.

I agree. This does not at all conflict with justice and rights being abstract concepts.

 

[hilliag]

Dear Stone Island:
I have been following this thread all morning. Why do you not answer that simple question, whether atheists can be good citizens?

 

[godless dave]

Aristotle refers to giving equal to equals and unequal to unequals.

Who cares what Aristotle says about anything?

Stone Island, I suggest you read up on the concepts of "social contract" and "enlightened self-interest". I also strongly suggest reading some Thomas Paine.

 

[Fitter]

Stone Island, KingMerv00 wants to know if YOU think atheists can be good citizens. As a theist perhaps you could be a good member of this forum and respond to his question. Even if you say you choose not to answer it at least be polite enough to reply. I know I'm a good, not perfect but good, citizen and need neither your nor Neuhaus' validation thank you very much.

 

[Stone Island]

Because we've collectively agreed to. It's called the social contract.

What if we changed our minds, as a society, and the majority decided that atheists should be hung from trees until dead. What then? To what would you appeal?

Would you say, "Well, what about my right not to be hung from a tree?" What would that mean, that you said that? What would you be appealing to?

If you said, "Well, that's what our forefathers agreed to, that no one should be hung from a tree for not believing in God."

They might reply, "Well, people in the past were stupid, they didn't know all the things that we know now. We know now that it's much better and more just to hang atheists from trees until they're dead."

Then what?

 

[blobru]

Can Atheists Be Good Citizens?
by Richard John Neuhaus, (August/September 1991, First Things)
Full Article

That wasn’t a bad read. Thanks for posting.

A good citizen is able to give an account, a morally compelling account, of the regime of which he is part.

Neuhaus' thesis [my synopsis]: Every good citizen should be able to give a rational defense of the Union. The DoI which defines the American Union is based on God's granting the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Theists are good citizens because they know God exists; they know of God is good, so they know His laws are good; their rational defense is obvious. Atheists don't believe in God, and thus are free to doubt the very axioms on which the Union was founded. They cannot give a rational defense of the Union; therefore atheists are not good citizens.

“Every good citizen should be able to give a rational defense of the Union”: let's grant that, for argument's sake.
“The DoI which defines the American Union is based on God's granting the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness”: this too.

"Theists are good citizens because they know God exists; they know of God is good, so they know His laws are good; their rational defense is obvious": this puzzled me, reading the article. At one point Neuhaus argues against the Enlightenment enterprise of finding a rational basis for God:

Descartes determined that he would accept as true nothing that could be reasonably doubted, and Christians set about to prove that the existence of God could not be reasonably doubted. Thus did the defenders of religion set faith against the doubt that is integral to the life of faith.

He says this robs “God” of the doubt that is essential to the life of faith, turns theists into mere believers. Real theism then is an internal conflict, the victory of faith over doubt presumably, which amounts to knowledge of God.

This is a religious notion of "knowledge". It is not I would argue a very secure basis for rational argument. If religious "knowledge" is based in faith versus doubt, who's to say how strong those doubts are, and what effects they have on the theists conduct? Who's to say how exhausting this internal struggle is, how much energy it consumes, how little energy the theist may have left over for fulfilling his duties as a citizen? Who's to say that there aren't moments when doubt has the upper hand, when the theist by Neuhaus' definition isn't a good citizen at all, with no knowledge that the rights granted her by God are absolute, no ability to convincingly defend them?

Separating traditional theism from enlightened reason and then arguing only a traditional theist can adhere to the principles of an Enlightenment document seems a exercise in paradox and futility, to me at least. It seems Neuhaus is hoist by his own petard.

So before we answer the question: can an atheist be a good citizen? – we now, thanks to Neuhaus’ self-contradiction, have a new question to answer: can a theist be a good citizen? For by his own logic, Neuhaus and his theist are in no better shape than the atheist to claim a rational monopoly on good citizenship. Indeed, given the reluctance to believe there are any avenues to good citizenship other than theism, it is doubtful, again by his own logic, that Neuhaus the theist is a citizen at all.

Anyway, that's my first blush of the divine Mr. Neuhaus; just an atheist, what the hell would I know about it, eh?

 

[godless dave]

You would ask them to explain why it's better to hang atheists from trees. Fairness isn't defined by the majority of a population anyway.

What would you appeal to, Stone Island? God isn't exactly forthcoming about what he considers "fair" and "just" and what "rights" he thinks people should have. So the atheist and the theist have exactly the same recourse - concepts defined by humans.

 

[bokonon]

I presume that if they can be defined then they can be redefined, especially if they don't correspond to a universal truth.

You mean a universal truth like "Don't eat shellfish"?

The American Founding in its way was an assertion of faith: that the way they defined justice and rights was universally true and were the necessary basis for any just society.

Since the definition of justice and rights has obviously evolved to include former slaves, women, and men who don't own property, I'd say that any of them who thought they'd found the universal definition for those terms were mistaken.

Can atheists be good citizens, Stone Island?

 

[godless dave]

Let's assume, for the sake of argument, that "fairness", "justice", and "rights" are universal truths.

How do we know that the interpretation of those truths by the authors of the US constitution is the correct one? As you yourself have pointed out, Stone Island, others in history have interpreted them differently, and, as you claim the constitution's authors did, they claimed that their interpretation came from God. How do we determine whose interpretations are correct?

 

[Stone Island]

You mean a universal truth like "Don't eat shellfish"?


Since the definition of justice and rights has obviously evolved to include former slaves, women, and men who don't own property, I'd say that any of them who thought they'd found the universal definition for those terms were mistaken.

See, I've always thought that rights as understood by the founding generation included former slaves, women, and men who didn't own property, that they knew this, and that the injustices of our early history were the result of rank hypocrisy (which may be rather worse), some cynical but necessary political deals, the hope that while the country was flawed it would get better, and not ignorance of the extent right reached.

 

[godless dave]

Why would you assume that? They certainly didn't say so - most of them anyway. John Adams explicitly poo-pooed the idea that women should be able to vote.

It seems more likely that they disagreed on the meaning of those concepts.

 

[articulett]

Hitchens just achieved American citizenship... he apparently qualifies as a good citizen. He's an atheist. How can that be? Haven't the people in charge read Neuhaus??!?

 

[Stone Island]

How do we know that the interpretation of those truths by the authors of the US constitution is the correct one? As you yourself have pointed out, Stone Island, others in history have interpreted them differently, and, as you claim the constitution's authors did, they claimed that their interpretation came from God. How do we determine whose interpretations are correct?

Governments are founded by men to secure their rights. Rights are prior to governments.

The 9th Amendment to the Constitution is as good a place as any to start.

It's also why Madison and others didn't want to write a Bill of Rights. While they had faith that men had rights and that these rights were universal, they weren't exactly in agreement about what they were and what their extent was. They were humble enough to know that they any one of them could only see a small piece of the universal tapestry, as it were. They were afraid that if they wrote down the ones they agreed upon, that people would begin to think that those were the only rights we had, instead of just some of the rights we had. Personally, I think Madison was wrong on this point, and I think that in later years he began to see this position as mistaken, but I can see the point of his fears.

 

[bokonon]

What if we changed our minds, as a society, and the majority decided that atheists should be hung from trees until dead. What then? To what would you appeal?

Ain't nobody here but devoted believers in the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

Since only the principled individuals who wouldn't feign belief in some bogus deity to save their lives would actually be threatened by such nonsense, let's say the distopian straw man is that anyone older than 30 is to be killed instead. We can call it "Logan's Law."

If society descends to such a level of savagery, the only effective appeal I'll have is the price the savages will have to pay in enforcing such a decision on me or anyone close to me.

Before we reach that level, I'll be appealing to the sense of justice I perceive in my fellow man, whether in this country or another.

Appeal to some imaginary deity will be about as effective as it was for the Jews on the train to Auschwitz, don't you think?

Can atheists be good citizens, Stone?