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"Atheism is a superstition."

Gawdzilla Sama

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Gawdzilla Sama
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How Easter and Christianity undermine atheism
From USA today.

The superstition of atheism

Of course, it's not quite fair to say that atheists believe in nothing. They do believe in something — the philosophical theory known as Materialism, which states that the only thing that exists is matter; that all substances and all phenomena in the universe are purely physical.

The problem is that this really isn't a theory at all. It's a superstition; a myth that basically says that everything in life — our thoughts, our emotions, our hopes, our ambitions, our passions, our memories, our philosophies, our politics, our beliefs in God and salvation and damnation — that all of this is merely the result of biochemical reactions and the movement of molecules in our brain.

What nonsense.

We can't reduce the whole of reality to what our senses tell us for the simple reason that our senses are notorious for lying to us. Our senses tell us that the world is flat, and yet it's not. Our senses tell us that the world is chaotic, and yet we know that on both a micro and a macro level, it's incredibly organized. Our senses tell us that we're stationary, and yet we're really moving at incredible speeds. We just can't see it.
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We can't reduce the whole of reality to what our senses tell us for the simple reason that our senses are notorious for lying to us. Our senses tell us that the world is flat, and yet it's not. Our senses tell us that the world is chaotic, and yet we know that on both a micro and a macro level, it's incredibly organized. Our senses tell us that we're stationary, and yet we're really moving at incredible speeds. We just can't see it.
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Well if that's the only reason he believes it's nonsense, then...

My senses tell me the world is incredibly organized and incredibly chaotic. I can see that.

My senses tell me we're moving at incredible speeds. I can see how fast I am moving by watching the sky.
 
Here we go again, a blind bleever citing Einstein. "No less a genius than Albert Einstein once said: "The most beautiful thing we can experience in life is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: for his eyes are closed."

Of course Einstein wasn't referring to devils and fairies when he talked about the mysterious. He was talking about the wonders of the universe. The material one, not the imaginary one.
 
Jeff Corey said:
Here we go again, a blind bleever citing Einstein. "No less a genius than Albert Einstein once said: "The most beautiful thing we can experience in life is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: for his eyes are closed."

Of course Einstein wasn't referring to devils and fairies when he talked about the mysterious. He was talking about the wonders of the universe. The material one, not the imaginary one.
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You make quote-mining sound like a bad thing. What about all those quote-miners that risk their lives every day so you can have a nice piece of stupidity to rip apart? Would you stomp to the depths they do to provide us with our daily chuckles and guffaws? Oh, I don't think so. You probably think those just magically appear on the forum, without any blood being shed or lives being lost. Well, my friend, I dare you to go Googling by yourself some time! Copying random quotes without bothering to learn the context is dangerous, dirty and stupid work. Normal people just can't do it, it takes a special breed of fool to even want to try it.

You should be ashamed of yourself, really.

;)
 
I simply marvel at the irony of this:
We can't reduce the whole of reality to what our senses tell us for the simple reason that our senses are notorious for lying to us. Our senses tell us that the world is flat, and yet it's not. Our senses tell us that the world is chaotic, and yet we know that on both a micro and a macro level, it's incredibly organized. Our senses tell us that we're stationary, and yet we're really moving at incredible speeds. We just can't see it.
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The bible tells us that the world is flat, mentions nothing about the micro or macro level, other than that stars are hanging stationary in the firmament, and says absolutely nothing at all about how fast the earth is traveling, because the authors thought it was stationary while the sun and moon revolved around it to provide light during the day and night.

Science has helped us to look past our immediate senses, and given us insight into what's really going on in the physical universe. How is it superstitious to believe in repeated and verifiable empirical evidence? I really feel sorry for people who have to believe that they are somehow the most precious commodity in the entire universe, which was made exactly for them because god loved them so much (and he really really wants to kill them all because of what that idjit Adam did, but then remembered how much he loved them, so he killed his son instead).
 
Dear Mr DeStefano,

when you are playing Squash against yourself the ball is always in your court.

In other words, I don't see what I, for instance, have got to do with your, Mr DeStefano, problems, (mis-)conceptions, opinions etc. These all are your problems, (mis-)conceptions, opinions etc. Not mine. You must live with it. Not me.


Yours,

Ems
Atheist
 
Mr. De Stefano is an accomplished strawman erector. Note this effort:

Atheists, of course, claim that all of this is absurd. Christianity, especially, they say, with its belief in Easter and the Resurrection, is nothing but "wishful thinking" — the product of weak human psychology; a psychology that is so afraid of death that it must create "delusional fantasies" in order to make life on Earth bearable.

But is it wishful thinking to believe in hell, the devil and demons? Is it wishful thinking to believe we're going to be judged and held accountable for every sin we've ever committed? Is it wishful thinking to believe the best way to live our life is to sacrifice our own desires for the sake of others? Is it wishful thinking to believe that we should discipline our natural bodily urges for the sake of some unseen "kingdom"?
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But I jest. He's terrible at it.
 
Cognitive dissonance in the extreme.
He says this: "No less a genius than Albert Einstein once said: “The most beautiful thing we can experience in life is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: for his eyes are closed.”

And can somehow overlook the fact that "no less a genius than Albert Einstein" was able to say that and believe it without belief in his god. Which kind of shoots his argument in the foot.
 
Recurring theme: rather than looking at the difference and the reason why science is so successful, (robots on Mars, cancer cures, etc), and god beliefs are not (prayer does nothing, for example), theists try to equate science with religion.

EPIC FAIL.
 
"Of course, it's not quite fair to say that atheists believe in nothing. They do believe in something — the philosophical theory known as Materialism, which states that the only thing that exists is matter; that all substances and all phenomena in the universe are purely physical."

What a load of crap. The author is suggesting that this is the only thing that atheists believe. He seems to need to assure himself and his readers that atheists don't feel love, beauty or wonder. I guess it's very important to him to believe that atheists are people for whom he is justified to feel contempt. He strikes me as a small-minded bigot.
 
Skeptic Ginger said:
Recurring theme: rather than looking at the difference and the reason why science is so successful, (robots on Mars, cancer cures, etc), and god beliefs are not (prayer does nothing, for example), theists try to equate science with religion.
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Your attempt to credit science with success due to its marriage to atheism, which is non-existent in reality, is . . . well, I leave the conclusion to you.
EPIC FAIL.
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Wiki has an interesting paragraph on superstition -
...In 1948, behavioural psychologist B.F. Skinner published an article in the Journal of Experimental Psychology, in which he described his pigeons exhibiting what appeared to be superstitious behaviour. One pigeon was making turns in its cage, another would swing its head in a pendulum motion, while others also displayed a variety of other behaviours. Because these behaviours were all done ritualistically in an attempt to receive food from a dispenser, even though the dispenser had already been programmed to release food at set time intervals regardless of the pigeons' actions, Skinner believed that the pigeons were trying to influence their feeding schedule by performing these actions. He then extended this as a proposition regarding the nature of superstitious behaviour in humans

...natural selection will tend to reinforce a tendency to generate weak associations. If there is a strong survival advantage to making correct associations, then this will outweigh the negatives of making many incorrect, "superstitious" associations.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superstition
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So the USA Today editorial makes the mistake of assigning superstition to atheism when it is probably an evolved trait that is shared by all humans to some extent. The accusation that an atheist might make about religion is that religion uses superstition to thrive, while with atheism it is self destructive. While an atheist might certainly use superstition as a form of control, it is ultimately a process that is detremental to atheism.
 
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I think it's stupid for atheists to deride theists.

It is equally as stupid for theists to deride atheists.

'Nuff said.
 
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