Atheist church has first schism

[Prometheus]

<snip>.... The closest thing an atheist "church" can have to a central purpose is attacking religion.<snip>....

Well, no. It could, for instance, promote the discussion of skepticism, critical thinking, the paranormal and science in a friendly and lively way...

 

[blutoski]

Well, no. It could, for instance, promote the discussion of skepticism, critical thinking, the paranormal and science in a friendly and lively way...

Which would probably make them a skeptical group, instead of an atheist group.
Most atheists would leave such a group, citing a clear conflict with their beliefs and values.

The point being that the overlap is too small.

 

[Dinwar]

I
Those atheist churches represent only their own members, and nobody else (I don't even think they try to represent anyone else).

No one's denying that. It's just that the fact that these people are having such a silly argument--one that is 100% the same as theist arguments, just with different words--demonstrates that religion isn't the problem. Take away gods, and people still do the same stupid stuff. Blaming these issues on religion or belief in the supernatural is demonstrably wrong.

 

[blutoski]

No one's denying that. It's just that the fact that these people are having such a silly argument--one that is 100% the same as theist arguments, just with different words--demonstrates that religion isn't the problem. Take away gods, and people still do the same stupid stuff. Blaming these issues on religion or belief in the supernatural is demonstrably wrong.

People are tribal, it's just the way we're wired.

A colleague of mine has impressed me by a reversal of a position he held a few years ago. He's been working in a forensic environment, and in five years of practicing, he's never met a criminal who broke the law for a religious reason. It's always a secular moral justification.

The position he's abandoned is the invented cliche that only religion makes people do the wrong thing for what they think is the right reason. He now knows that prisons are filled with people who did the wrong thing for what they thought was a morally justified secular reason. He doesn't use the word 'tribalism' but the general observation is that people often feel it's appropriate to protect themselves, their families, and members of their communities at all costs. He brought up soccer hooligans as a typical example.

And tribes split. We know that a community seems to be sustainable up to about 150 people before either a split or additional layer of organization is required. Atheists aren't immune from human foibles.

 

[blutoski]

Than they wouldn't be an atheist group, they'd be a skeptical group, as blutoski said (though I don't get the rest of that post).

I was mostly coming from an attempt to draw Venn diagrams of overlap between what we'd call skeptical and atheist beliefs. There are many more atheists than skeptics, obviously, and the overlap is pretty small. For example, most atheists are big fans of Traditional Chinese Medicine. They don't like hearing criticism about it.

I'll have to check my notes, but I think atheism is positively correlated with antivax sentiments as well (makes sense, since atheism is also positively correlated with education, which is in turn positively correlated with antivax sentiment... I don't have a theory of mechanism right now, just correlations).

And the list goes on.

The point is that while atheism is overrepresented in the smaller skeptical community, the reciprocal is not true.

 

[Craig4]

Okay, deep down I am really this shallow. I can't be the only person here that thinks that one of the best parts of being an atheist is sleeping in on Sunday morning.

 

[A'isha]

I was mostly coming from an attempt to draw Venn diagrams of overlap between what we'd call skeptical and atheist beliefs. There are many more atheists than skeptics, obviously, and the overlap is pretty small. For example, most atheists are big fans of Traditional Chinese Medicine. They don't like hearing criticism about it.

The perfect illustration of this being James Randi calling out Sam Harris for Harris' giving credence to things like psychic phenomena and reincarnation.

 

[Humes fork]

No one's denying that. It's just that the fact that these people are having such a silly argument--one that is 100% the same as theist arguments, just with different words--demonstrates that religion isn't the problem. Take away gods, and people still do the same stupid stuff. Blaming these issues on religion or belief in the supernatural is demonstrably wrong.

Of course religion is not the only form of irrationality. I don't think anyone has claimed that it is. Anyone who claims so is demonstrably wrong.

 

[A'isha]

Okay, deep down I am really this shallow. I can't be the only person here that thinks that one of the best parts of being an atheist is sleeping in on Sunday morning.

Pssst, Craig4!

 

[blutoski]

Okay, deep down I am really this shallow. I can't be the only person here that thinks that one of the best parts of being an atheist is sleeping in on Sunday morning.

From Steve Martin's "Atheists Ain't Got No Songs":

(Some folks sing)
Some folks sing a Bach cantata.
(Bach cantata)
Lutherans get Christmas trees.
Atheist songs add up to nada.
(Up to nada)
But they do have Sundays free.
(Have Sundays free)

 

[Humes fork]

I was mostly coming from an attempt to draw Venn diagrams of overlap between what we'd call skeptical and atheist beliefs. There are many more atheists than skeptics, obviously, and the overlap is pretty small. For example, most atheists are big fans of Traditional Chinese Medicine. They don't like hearing criticism about it.

I'll have to check my notes, but I think atheism is positively correlated with antivax sentiments as well (makes sense, since atheism is also positively correlated with education, which is in turn positively correlated with antivax sentiment... I don't have a theory of mechanism right now, just correlations).

And the list goes on.

The point is that while atheism is overrepresented in the smaller skeptical community, the reciprocal is not true.

If I'm not mistaken, most atheists in the world would be from China and neighbouring countries (Vietnam, Japan, etc). They would have very little in common with atheists from Europe-descended countries. Their history and background is just too different.

You are absolutely right that while most skeptics are atheists, most atheists are certainly not skeptics.

 

[Humes fork]

Which would probably make them a skeptical group, instead of an atheist group.
Most atheists would leave such a group, citing a clear conflict with their beliefs and values.

The point being that the overlap is too small.

I think you might find Daniel Loxton's Try Not to Lump Us Atheists in with the Skeptics interesting. When it comes to the prevalence of paranormal beliefs among different religious groups, those claiming no religion are in the middle of the pack, slightly less likely than Catholics to do so, slightly more likely than Jews. In all groups the majority affirmed at least one paranormal belief.

The end is accurate to my mind:

Atheists are not “different.” We are not Other. We are just regular people who happen to hold a minority viewpoint on some theological questions. What of it? Minority religious viewpoints are a dime a dozen. Atheism neither makes us less nor more than anyone else, and atheists are ill-served by anyone who tries to say it does. We are not stereotypes, but people—people with every bit of the diversity and complexity of any other large group of human beings.

We atheists pay taxes, and dodge them. We are polite and rude, young and old, kind and cruel. We are doctors and dancers, forklift drivers and cooks and politicians. We vaccinate, and we fear to. We fall in love with science, or are indifferent, or reject it as narrow, reductionist myopia. We atheists see ghosts, and read tea leaves, and recover memories of alien abductions. We write bad plays, transcendent novels, grocery lists. We suck at math, commit crimes, overlook the obvious, find ourselves unable to reason our way out of a paper bag. Just like everybody else.

We atheists are as wicked, as wooly-headed, as foolish and magical as anyone else—and as noble, and as compassionate, and as brilliant.

Why? Because atheists are just like everybody else.

 

[Prometheus]

Than they wouldn't be an atheist group, they'd be a skeptical group, as blutoski said (though I don't get the rest of that post). Such groups wouldn't waste time debating whether atheists don't believe in gods or believe there are no gods.

You're right, I've never seen that happen on this forum.

An atheist groupp AS AN ATHEIST GROUP only has one real topic of discussion: "Gods don't exist". This is due to the fact that atheism is merely the stance that gods don't exist<snip>

Well, my quoting the forum banner was meant as a tongue-in-cheek throw away line (hence the smilie) but I will nevertheless disagree with you here. While it's true that JREF takes some pains to point out that they are not, in fact, an atheist organization, there is no reason at all why an actual atheist group couldn't use exactly the same tag line, particularly if they were made up of atheists like myself who were ardent theists for decades and only became atheists later in life by way of skepticism and critical thinking. It's just silly to claim that an atheist group must only discuss atheism or else there not really an atheist group. I belong to a number of intentional organizations, and not one of them limits their discussion/activities strictly to their avowed central purpose. Why should an atheist group be required to do so.

 

[Prometheus]

I was mostly coming from an attempt to draw Venn diagrams of overlap between what we'd call skeptical and atheist beliefs. There are many more atheists than skeptics, obviously, and the overlap is pretty small. For example, most atheists are big fans of Traditional Chinese Medicine. They don't like hearing criticism about it.

I'll have to check my notes, but I think atheism is positively correlated with antivax sentiments as well (makes sense, since atheism is also positively correlated with education, which is in turn positively correlated with antivax sentiment... I don't have a theory of mechanism right now, just correlations).
And the list goes on.

The point is that while atheism is overrepresented in the smaller skeptical community, the reciprocal is not true.

This is very interesting, and may be worth a thread split, if anyone else is so inclined. For my own part, I've noticed a very strong anti-science sentiment within Education as a field of inquiry. Lot's of credulous adherence to various models that seem made up from whole cloth, and not a lot of interest in the science being done in other fields regarding how people actually learn stuff.

 

[Prometheus]

Okay, deep down I am really this shallow. I can't be the only person here that thinks that one of the best parts of being an atheist is sleeping in on Sunday morning.

Meh. I still have to get up on Sunday morning to drive my wife/kids to church.

 

[blutoski]

I think you might find Daniel Loxton's Try Not to Lump Us Atheists in with the Skeptics interesting. When it comes to the prevalence of paranormal beliefs among different religious groups, those claiming no religion are in the middle of the pack, slightly less likely than Catholics to do so, slightly more likely than Jews. In all groups the majority affirmed at least one paranormal belief.

The end is accurate to my mind:

It's not a coincidence that Daniel and I are highly aligned. We've collaborated in the past, and he may have been using my BCSkeptics surveys/research to have come to that conclusion. He lives nearby and we chat online occasionally.

That particular quote was about paranormal claims. I was more specifically talking about skeptical subject matter in general. Quackbusting is a topic where atheists are not in the middle of the pack - atheists are 'on average' biased against conventional medicine. The skeptical subsegment is an anomaly.

 

[blutoski]

I don't view that as obvious.

It's obvious to me, but maybe we're struggling with definitions?

Then again, I don't view theists as necessarily excluded from skeptics either.

I don't undestand what you mean by 'excluded' - this is why I think there's a misunderstanding.

I was just saying that the overlap is small between atheism and skepticism, at least from an atheism point of view.

I also agree with you about there being an overlap between theism and skepticism, which has certainly put me in the firing line many times.

 

[blutoski]

This is very interesting, and may be worth a thread split, if anyone else is so inclined. For my own part, I've noticed a very strong anti-science sentiment within Education as a field of inquiry. Lot's of credulous adherence to various models that seem made up from whole cloth, and not a lot of interest in the science being done in other fields regarding how people actually learn stuff.

I don't think the antivax motivations in this segment are specifically antiscience, though. More an antiauthoritarian streak. I get the impression that it is simply a segment of the population that overestimates their competence. They feel that their degree in computer science means they are 'a scientist' and browse Medline and can know more than their doctor by Wednesday.

They love science, think science is great, and think they are especially good at it, in contrast to Health Canada, which is just a bunch of bureaucrats who haven't read the studies.

 

[Humes fork]

It's not a coincidence that Daniel and I are highly aligned. We've collaborated in the past, and he may have been using my BCSkeptics surveys/research to have come to that conclusion. He lives nearby and we chat online occasionally.

Interesting, I didn't know that.

That particular quote was about paranormal claims. I was more specifically talking about skeptical subject matter in general. Quackbusting is a topic where atheists are not in the middle of the pack - atheists are 'on average' biased against conventional medicine. The skeptical subsegment is an anomaly.

Paraormalism is one skeptical subject that was brought up in that article. I never claimed it was the totality of skepticism.

When you say that atheists are on average biased against scientific medicine, which atheists are we talking about exactly? North American atheists? Atheists globally? In Sweden irreligion is so prevalent that such comparisons may be pointless in that context.

 

[blutoski]

When you say that atheists are on average biased against scientific medicine, which atheists are we talking about exactly? North American atheists? Atheists globally?

Certainly globally. BCSkeptics surveys were local, and we have a high Asian population. Just a case example is a friend since childhood who is a Buddhist atheist from Laos and also a reflexologist.

In Sweden irreligion is so prevalent that such comparisons may be pointless in that context.

And that's a good point... my analyses were either global or local to US/Canada. I didn't break it out to any European states.

It's worth observing that Europe has both high levels of atheism and correspondingly high levels of antivax, anti-GMO &c. I think this is consistent with my interpretation that antivax is not really anti-science. These regions are generally pro science. They just think vaccination and GMO crops are poor science.

I've been thinking about a way to categorize that attitude, and at the end of the day I think it qualifies as cargo cult science - using elements of science, but not actually doing science. People with science degrees seem to be surprisingly vulnerable to this.