Can Atheists Be Good Citizens?

[ImaginalDisc]

You keep misunderstanding the argument.

Natural rights aren't supposed to be values in that sense, they're supposed to be true (see the Euthyphro by Plato for more information on this argument), transcendent, and imperative.

How is "natural rights" talk more meaningful, i.e., less arbitrary, than "God or gods" talk?

They're "supposed to be?" That's nice. The question is whether they actually are. there is no uniformity of morality or the recognition of rights across time, across different cultures, religions, or ethnic groups, or even within those very same groups.


There is not the slightest hint that rights are innate and immutable.

As a matter of fact, I'm very glad that rights are a social construct, and can shift and change. If we had been forever saddled with the morality of a certain Bronze Age collection of nomadic tribes we would murder people who disagreed with us about religion, murder adulterers, keep slaves, and in general act like baboons with a bipedal locomotion.

Whatever you may think you're saying, you cannot show that rights actually are derived from some pillar of perfection, or innate and unchanging. Those of us who aren't blinded by your style of lie-to-one's-self faith can see that rights, like laws, music, clothing styles, and taboos, are social constructs and though they are imperfect and man-made, there are people - atheist and theist alike - who daily struggle to improve society either by changing the rights we recognize or by preserving them from change.

 

[Foster Zygote]

You keep misunderstanding the argument.

Natural rights aren't supposed to be values in that sense, they're supposed to be true (see the Euthyphro by Plato for more information on this argument), transcendent, and imperative.

Right, just like so many other religious claims of TRUTHtm

How is "natural rights" talk more meaningful, i.e., less arbitrary, than "God or gods" talk?

It ain't.

 

[Stone Island]

Are they? According to whom? Anyone who says that must attempt to back it up logically, and there is no evidence that there are are universal and immutable natural rights.

Rights are a social construct.

Exactly my point: no scientific evidence. Natural rights fail the verificationist theory of meaning.

Are they merely a fancy way of saying, "I prefer". If they are merely a social contract then they aren't natural, they aren't universal, they aren't transcendent, and shooting people in their defense seems odd.

We have no way of judging between cannibal and natural rights societies other than what we prefer.

While it would be a fallacy to argue from consequence, I think it's clear that most of us would prefer the latter, and we have to realize that we don't have any non-arbitrary argument to back up our preferences.

 

[Belz...]

Atheism, theism and natural law are metaphysical claims.

Atheism is a non-claim. Get your facts straight.

 

[Belz...]

I'm sorry, but I don't really understand what it is you're trying to say. cgordon made a point that a theist's ties to her religion might cause her to be less tied or loyal to her country. I pointed out that someone much, much smarter than any of us here had already thought of that and put it in its strongest possible form, to the point where even families were sacrificed in the cause of loyalty to the state.

How was Plato smarter than any of us ?

 

[Belz...]

Joobz,

Actions aren't sufficient. The important question is whether those actions are justified or arbitrary.

Who cares ? A justification IS arbitrary, anyway.

Seriously, who cares WHY people do what they do, so long as they do it ?

 

[Foster Zygote]

Exactly my point: no scientific evidence. Natural rights fail the verificationist theory of meaning.

Are they merely a fancy way of saying, "I prefer". If they are merely a social contract then they aren't natural, they aren't universal, they aren't transcendent, and shooting people in their defense seems odd.

We have no way of judging between cannibal and natural rights societies other than what we prefer.

While it would be a fallacy to argue from consequence, I think it's clear that most of us would prefer the latter, and we have to realize that we don't have any non-arbitrary argument to back up our preferences.

I've seen much goal-post moving on this forum, not nearly so many own goals.

 

[Belz...]

Exactly my point: no scientific evidence. Natural rights fail the verificationist theory of meaning.

Are they merely a fancy way of saying, "I prefer".

Precisely. ALL are arbitrary. Thanks for playing.

If they are merely a social contract then they aren't natural, they aren't universal, they aren't transcendent

Few things are.

We have no way of judging between cannibal and natural rights societies other than what we prefer.

Yes, we do, because judgment is BASED on values.

 

[KingMerv00]

Bailed out of this thread a little while back. Is SI still using "proof by sleight of hand"?

Behold as this elephant vanishes before your very eyes!

Disclaimer:
By "this elephant", I mean "a shrew in Brazil". By "vanish", I mean "poops". By "your very eyes", I mean "on video I recorded 3 weeks ago"...but you can behold it for really reals.

 

[godless dave]

Joobz,

Actions aren't sufficient. The important question is whether those actions are justified or arbitrary.

Why is that an important question? Why aren't actions sufficient?

One cannot, as I said before, be a good citizen of a country that isn't itself good.

You said it before, and you were wrong. You're confusing two distinct meanings of the word "good".

When you modify the noun "citizen" with the adjective "good", you get a noun phrase which means "someone who is good at being a citizen". This meaning of "good" does not refer to morality, it refers to competence.

When you ask if a country is "good", you are asking a moral question.

A good citizen of Nazi Germany is someone who advances Nazi ideals; someone who advances Nazi ideals is a bad person. A good citizen of Nazi Germany would be a bad person.

Does a belief in a natural rights republic require the kind of belief that, like belief in a God or gods, an atheist must reject?

What does it mean to "believe in" a republic? Believe it exists? The United States exists; I'm sitting in the northern section of it right now. Our government exists; I can watch them on C-SPAN. Our constitution and laws exist; I can look them up online. Being an atheist does not require me to reject all that evidence.

By the by, from a utilitarian point of view, countries that are more religious tend to have citizens who are happier and wealthier. I can site the studies.

Please do because I'm pretty sure you're wrong. Iran and Yemen are quite a bit less wealthy and less happy than Norway or France.

You keep misunderstanding the argument.

Natural rights aren't supposed to be values in that sense, they're supposed to be true (see the Euthyphro by Plato for more information on this argument), transcendent, and imperative.

We're not misunderstanding the argument, we're disagreeing with the argument. I, and I imagine the other posters here, completely reject the idea that the US Constitution rests on the belief that rights are true, transcendent, and imperative.

 

[godless dave]

There is not the slightest hint that rights are innate and immutable.

As a matter of fact, I'm very glad that rights are a social construct, and can shift and change. If we had been forever saddled with the morality of a certain Bronze Age collection of nomadic tribes we would murder people who disagreed with us about religion, murder adulterers, keep slaves, and in general act like baboons with a bipedal locomotion.

And I'm glad we're not forever saddled with the morality of the people who wrote the US Constitution, because then women would still not have the vote, I myself wouldn't have gotten the vote until 7 years ago when I first moved out of a rental property and bought a house, and slavery would still be legal.

Fortunately, those authors recognized that concepts of human rights could change, and included in the Constitution a process for changing it.

Whatever you may think you're saying, you cannot show that rights actually are derived from some pillar of perfection, or innate and unchanging. Those of us who aren't blinded by your style of lie-to-one's-self faith can see that rights, like laws, music, clothing styles, and taboos, are social constructs and though they are imperfect and man-made, there are people - atheist and theist alike - who daily struggle to improve society either by changing the rights we recognize or by preserving them from change.

QFT.

 

[godless dave]

Exactly my point: no scientific evidence. Natural rights fail the verificationist theory of meaning.

Are they merely a fancy way of saying, "I prefer".

For the thousandth time, yes.

If they are merely a social contract then they aren't natural, they aren't universal, they aren't transcendent,

Exactly.

and shooting people in their defense seems odd.

Why does it seem odd? Something doesn't have to be natural, universal, or transcendent for people to value it.

We have no way of judging between cannibal and natural rights societies other than what we prefer.

That's correct.

While it would be a fallacy to argue from consequence, I think it's clear that most of us would prefer the latter, and we have to realize that we don't have any non-arbitrary argument to back up our preferences.

On the contrary, we have thousands of years worth of non-arbitrary arguments to back up our preferences.

 

[Stone Island]

Please do because I'm pretty sure you're wrong. Iran and Yemen are quite a bit less wealthy and less happy than Norway or France.

Re: wealth:

Barro, Robert J. and Rachel M. McCleary, "Religion and Economic Growth across Countries" in American Sociological Review, Vol. 68, No. 5. (Oct. 2003), pp. 760-781.

or, the working paper at his web page.

Just one for now. Obviously, it's social science, so a high degree of correlation is the best you can hope for. But interesting none the less.

I'm still looking for the paper that showed in a cross national study that highly religious people were more generally satisfied with their lives. It's been a while since I read it.

 

[ImaginalDisc]

I'm still looking for the paper that showed in a cross national study that highly religious people were more generally satisfied with their lives. It's been a while since I read it.

Utterly irrelevant, even if true.

For the sake of argement, let's concede your point. Let's say religious people tend to be nicer, happier, better adjusted, more charitable, and have whiter teeth. Would that answer your question, "Can atheists be good citizens?

No, it would not answer that question.

Try to focus.

 

[KingMerv00]

Utterly irrelevant, even if true.

For the sake of argement, let's concede your point. Let's say religious people tend to be nicer, happier, better adjusted, more charitable, and have whiter teeth. Would that answer your question, "Can atheists be good citizens?

No, it would not answer that question.

Try to focus.

Just to state the obvious...even if true, theism would still be groundless.

 

[NobbyNobbs]

Who decides what's arbitrary or not ?

Let's flip a coin to see who decides.

 

[ImaginalDisc]

Just to state the obvious...even if true, theism would still be groundless.

Stone Island just sent me a PM saying he's going to "plonk" me. That's either code for "ignore" or ****. In the later case, he's not my type. If it's the former, he's a coward.

 

[six7s]

Atheism, theism and natural law are metaphysical claims.

Atheism is a non-claim. Get your facts straight.

Priceless

 

[six7s]

Stone Island just sent me a PM saying he's going to "plonk" me. That's either code for "ignore" or ****. In the later case, he's not my type. If it's the former, he's a coward.

I too have received such a PM from the 'educator of our children'

If it's the latter, he's in for a very rude surprise

Either way, he's a coward - as demonstrated in his bully-boy tactics

 

[joobz]

Joobz,

Actions aren't sufficient. The important question is whether those actions are justified or arbitrary.

That's a mere assertion. (using admittedly vauge terms) You can do good things for bad reasons, and be rewarded by society for those things. You can also do bad things for good reasons, and be punished accordingly. Society reacts to the actions not the thoughts. We will sometimes excuse bad actions for right reasons, but we do not punish good things for wrong reasons.

As I said before, until thought crimes become a reality, good citizenry is defined by action not thought.

I suppose that I am trying to avoid a discussion of any particular individual's psychology; we're all hypocrites in one way or another. That's why I refused to comment on those examples and wanted to avoid a discussion of my opinion. It's the larger question of what's meaningful and true that interests me more.

This is irrelevant. Saying you hold to a set of governing axioms because they work in your best interests is not hypocritical or inconsistent. You keep attempting to create a staw-atheist and claim that atheists in general can't be good. This is just bizarre.

Can atheists have a justified, true belief in something more than themselves?

yes. See ALL of FZ's posts.

And I do see your point, though it raises the question: can any kind of government, other than a natural rights republic, be seen to be good? One cannot, as I said before, be a good citizen of a country that isn't itself good. Is a utilitarian form of government good in the common use of the word?

That wasn't your point and you keep shifting it.

Many atheists are secular humanists. Why not ask if secular humanist is a good form of government?

Does a belief in a natural rights republic require the kind of belief that, like belief in a God or gods, an atheist must reject? I think so.

You can believe in axioms that fit the natural law that you keep refering to. As such, atheists can indeed believe in it.

By the by, from a utilitarian point of view, countries that are more religious tend to have citizens who are happier and wealthier. I can site the studies. Obviously, someone is going to scream "correlation isn't causation" which is fair, but that's social science for you.

No, I'll just scream that your source doesn't say that.
from "working paper at his web page."
For instance...

The data reveal an overall pattern in which economic development is associated with less religiosity, measured by church attendance or religious beliefs.

less religion = more economic development...​

and​

Table 2 shows marginally significant negative relations between church

attendance and life expectancy. The estimated coefficient of 2.2 (s.e.=1.2) in column 1

means that a fall in the reciprocal of life expectancy by 0.08 (its sample standard
deviation) is associated with lower monthly church attendance by about 4 percentage
points.​

​

less church attendance = longer life..​

Although to be fair, the paper does explain that the elderly do believe in religion more, which contradicts this finding. As you said, correlation and causation aren't the same thing.

But I'll leave you with this bit as well.​

Finally, the inverse association between urbanization and church attendance is consistent with the view that church services have to compete in urban areas with many other leisure activities, such as museums, theatres, and political organizations. A possible explanation for this urban/rural pattern is that economies of scale are important for many​

social organizations but are less significant for houses of worship. Even sparsely populated rural towns can sustain a local congregation.​

​

in other words, when people have other fun things to do, they don't go to church. That seems rather contrary to your claims.​

Well, after that little sidepoint, which has no real bearing on the argument, I ask that you answer my question below.​

You've admited then that atheists can believe in something more than themselves (although you are only permitting utalitarianism for now) and are therefore capable of being good citizens of some government form. As such, your original claim, "atheists can't be good citizens" was proven false.
...

So, shall we admit that this is where we currently stand in the argument? ​

It is difficult to move a discussion forward until we agree upon what we are discussing. If you agree, than we can move forward into discussing why atheists could be good in a natural rights republic.​