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New Atheists?

lukethethird

unknown member
“There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments, and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance - that principle is contempt prior to investigation.”
- Herbert Spencer
Isn't that special, a principle barring against God of the gaps.
 

rational experiences

Veteran Member
What if the eternal status does exist. Consciousness being a self and a human is motivated with other humans all individuals to want everyone to believe?

First I would ask a basic question has the equal life changed for humans to want to make the advice noticed?

Yes.

Then you ask a question why did men want to time shift burning into a no burn if you want to question the determined human belief. Does a spirit being own the cause creation.

You can say to a human causes are natural first. Change exists by its own accord. Without any being.

Hence if a spirit existed in its state that already exhibited change. Then it knew change itself and could cause change.

A situation we express as scientists. Copying.

As we claim we are made in the image of our creator. And life cells formed in the image God O earth and womb O pressure.

Why couldn't another body own a womb as space having birthed a new form by bursting? And the change was the burning itself?

It isn't non sensical.

I always thought how could water being a flow mass become separate biology with water inside of my body? Unless I was a higher spirit being forced to enter the created change.

So I would teach it was my karma.

I would also teach so don't change anything again knowing lower form gets caused to the body spiritual being. Human.

We have lived that cause.

So if you ask how could I evolve again. Only water replacement owns that review. Taken away allowed to return.

Yet I would still die.

As very healthy humans die too.

If I believed I couldn't die why would my observation as scientific notice not accept human death as the end?

When biology in science says destroyed?

It could only mean we did come from a pre existing place of spirit. That is a part of conscious identity. Close but not a part of the atmosphere.

Which isn't space. As mass takes up more space than a gas.

Another reason. How else could you know such destructive conversion to mass? Unless your consciousness was in fact personally and bodily from an eternal being first?

A status of acute awareness of all things as its higher than created creation.

Unlike some hypocrites I applied the study myself. I had it proven. And yes I own the body that was changed. Yet the change was to feel intense whole love and acceptance. Something I never ever experienced again.

To learn. I gave myself one opportunity to learn. My motivation my humanity. My observation... so much destruction please stop.
 

It Aint Necessarily So

Veteran Member
Premium Member
“There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments, and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance - that principle is contempt prior to investigation.”
- Herbert Spencer

Agreed. That is the definition of closed-mindedness. I have some excellent examples of that to share. These are all people telling you that their minds are closed to evidence that might contradict their beliefs held by faith. I'd say that that qualifies as "contempt prior to investigation."
  • [1] "The way in which I know Christianity is true is first and foremost on the basis of the witness of the Holy Spirit in my heart. And this gives me a self-authenticating means of knowing Christianity is true wholly apart from the evidence. And therefore, even if in some historically contingent circumstances the evidence that I have available to me should turn against Christianity, I do not think that this controverts the witness of the Holy Spirit. In such a situation, I should regard that as simply a result of the contingent circumstances that I'm in, and that if I were to pursue this with due diligence and with time, I would discover that the evidence, if in fact I could get the correct picture, would support exactly what the witness of the Holy Spirit tells me. So I think that's very important to get the relationship between faith and reason right..." - William Lane Craig
  • [2] "The moderator in the debate between Bill Nye and Ken Ham on whether creationism is a viable scientific field of study asked, 'What would change your minds?' Scientist Bill Nye answered, 'Evidence.' Young Earth Creationist Ken Ham answered, 'Nothing. I'm a Christian.' Elsewhere, Ham stated, 'By definition, no apparent, perceived or claimed evidence in any field, including history and chronology, can be valid if it contradicts the scriptural record."
  • [3] “If somewhere in the Bible I were to find a passage that said 2 + 2 = 5, I wouldn't question what I am reading in the Bible. I would believe it, accept it as true, and do my best to work it out and understand it."- Pastor Peter laRuffa
  • [4] “When science and the Bible differ, science has obviously misinterpreted its data. The only Bible-honoring conclusion is, of course, that Genesis 1-11 is actual historical truth, regardless of any scientific or chronological problems thereby entailed.” –creationist Henry Morris
I'd say that this qualifies as that bar against all contradictory information, also known as a faith-based confirmation bias.

The skeptic is often criticized for being closed-minded because he won't believe by faith. That isn't the same thing at all. Open-mindedness doesn't mean relaxing or suspending one's standards for belief. It means the willingness to consider any proposition dispassionately by those standards. Rejecting unsupported claims because they are unsupported or insufficiently supported, for example, is not closed-mindedness.
 

KWED

Scratching head, scratching knee
The term is justified if it points to something meaningful and people can use it to convey information. Your post illustrates you haven't worked out what it is pointing to.

It may be beyond your grasp, but others manage to use it just fine in this manner.

As I said, don't qualify the term and people complain, qualify the term and they still complain.
You are simply wrong. Atheists don't generally complain when people don't qualify what type of atheism that are talking about. There are not "types of atheism", as the atheists on here keep telling you.

Oh, yeah. Forgot about that.

You don't actually think he is right do you?
Yes, he is. Christianity did play a part in the downfall of the Roman Empire. Many Greek works were translated into Arabic and built upon by the scholars in the Islamic empire. Galileo did complain about people from the establishment who refused to look through his telescope.

Yes, in the above video Sam Harris is totally in line with scholarly consensus
The three things you highlight are all accepted by historians as having some basis in fact.
Ironically, it seems to be you who needs the history lesson. Ouch!:tearsofjoy:

You never see New Atheist types parroting Conflict Thesis nonsense either. They are all massively knowledgeable and completely rational because they say they are rational sceptics.
There have been occasions where science has been in conflict with religion, both on an establishment and individual level. That is undeniable.

They are more comical than upsetting
You certainly seem oddly obsessed with them.
 

KWED

Scratching head, scratching knee
The problem is not that many atheists see religion as a crutch, it's that they are ignorant of the fact their own ideology is also a crutch.
1. Atheism isn't an ideology. It is a single issue, non-position.
2. In what way is atheism a crutch?
3. Why is it so important to you that you believe that atheism is an ideology?
 

KWED

Scratching head, scratching knee
Whether you have a religious worldview or an irreligious one, you still hold to an ideology to make sense of the world.
I don't. The world doesn't need to make sense. Perhaps it can't. I don't try.
 

KWED

Scratching head, scratching knee
If only someone had coined a term that referred to a specific movement comprised of atheists promoting a certain ideological outlook with the express purpose of differentiating their views from simple atheism... ;)
There is no such movement. They are just "atheists". It is others who have grouped them and labelled them.
 

KWED

Scratching head, scratching knee
Yeah, you keep telling me what Stephen Hawking meant, and citing his atheism. Read the concluding chapter of A Brief History of Time, and tell me what he’s saying - or rather, what he’s asking - there. You will find that he left a lot of questions open. Acknowledging the limits of our understanding, and that there will always be more questions than answers. This is what great thinkers always do, and what devotees of “scientism” as opposed to science, almost never do. Those of limited vision declare arguments closed; great minds always leave room for doubt.
You will struggle to find a scientist or any rational person with knowledge of science who claims that science has all the answers to everything, or that science deals in "absolute truth". Ironically though, religion makes both those claims.
 
You are simply wrong. Atheists don't generally complain when people don't qualify what type of atheism that are talking about. There are not "types of atheism", as the atheists on here keep telling you.

I'm an atheist, I understand what atheism is.

The point you are again missing is what is being discussed is ideological views about religion that are common among atheists, not simply disbelief in gods which is common to all atheists.

Hence New Atheists (not new atheists)

Yes, he is. Christianity did play a part in the downfall of the Roman Empire.

People thought that 250 years ago when Gibbon wrote it, modern historians don't actually think that anymore as they are less ideological and have better evidence.

Anyway, the Christian Roman Empire lasted until 1453, so it didn't seem to weaken it all much.

(Christianity did have something to do with its eventual fall in 1453, but Harris wasn't talking about the 4th Crusade)


Many Greek works were translated into Arabic and built upon by the scholars in the Islamic empire.

Scholars in the Arabic world certainly advanced many fields of knowledge, but that wasn't Harris' point.

He said the main reason we have the originals is they were preserved in the Arabic world which is false.

Every major text was preserved by Christians in the original Greek, none rely on Arabic translations.

Galileo did complain about people from the establishment who refused to look through his telescope.

Wrong again.

No one refused to look through anyone's telescope.

Galileo was in a minority of astronomers, and most scientists still promoted geocentrism.

Galileo couldn't prove his hypothesis at that point, it took another decade or so.

Look it up... :wink:

The three things you highlight are all accepted by historians as having some basis in fact.
Ironically, it seems to be you who needs the history lesson. Ouch!:tearsofjoy:

No they aren't, they are what passes for 'common knowledge' among people who don't actually read any actual scholarship.

Thank you for proving my point about New Atheists being ignorant of history though :wink:

There have been occasions where science has been in conflict with religion, both on an establishment and individual level. That is undeniable.

Yes, occasions. Far fewer in the pre-modern era than people assume.

How many scientists can you name who were persecuted for scientific research in the medieval period?

Even the one that people can name (but from the Renaissance) was more to do with Galileo being a **** than anything else. After all, Copernicus dedicated his work on heliocentrism to the Pope and it was published by a bishop.

On the other hand, the church was the biggest promoter and funder of scientific research and education for many centuries.

Hence no scholars seriously promote the Conflict Thesis any more. Many New Atheist on the other hand love it and will defend it till their dying breath.
 

Yazata

Active Member
I've heard the phrase "new atheist" before and I have no idea what it means.

I believe that it's a phrase coined by a book reviewer, a journalist.

What happened was that several atheist books came out around the same time that all shared similiarities. (Several of the authors knew each other.) They were exceedingly strident, very hostile towards what they termed "religion", and scathing towards anyone with any sense of religiosity. Each one raised science up as their new source of intellectual authority and set science against their own caricatures of religion.

Of course there's really nothing new about that, similar atheist books have been appearing since the 19th century, containing many of the same arguments.

But since this book reviewer sensed that he was seeing a new and more aggressive wave of atheist polemic in the books he was reviewing, he coined the term "the new atheists" for the authors of these titles. It stuck.
 

lukethethird

unknown member
I believe that it's a phrase coined by a book reviewer, a journalist.

What happened was that several atheist books came out around the same time that all shared similiarities. (Several of the authors knew each other.) They were exceedingly strident, very hostile towards what they termed "religion", and scathing towards anyone with any sense of religiosity. Each one raised science up as their new source of intellectual authority and set science against their own caricatures of religion.

Of course there's really nothing new about that, similar atheist books have been appearing since the 19th century, containing many of the same arguments.

But since this book reviewer sensed that he was seeing a new and more aggressive wave of atheist polemic in the books he was reviewing, he coined the term "the new atheists" for the authors of these titles. It stuck.
Imagine criticizing religion, how dare they.:rolleyes:
 
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You just said...
"[atheists] are ignorant of the fact their own ideology is also a crutch".

You do seem rather confused, tbf.

You appear to be the one that is confused tbf

Just read the words and you might be able to unconfuse yourself.

I don't. The world doesn't need to make sense. Perhaps it can't. I don't try.

Being ignorant of the fact you have an ideology doesn't mean you don't have one.

All humans have ideologies. They are an inescapable fact of cognition.

You're on a roll today... Quite the comedy of errors.
 
There is no such movement. They are just "atheists". It is others who have grouped them and labelled them.

Someone labelled a group of people promoting an identifiable set of values and beliefs.

Now people can use the term and others (including you) can know pretty clearly what they are referring to.

Ain't language great...

That you dislike the aesthetics of the term is neither here nor there.
 

KWED

Scratching head, scratching knee
I'm an atheist,
Really? You do a very good impression of a religious apologist.

I understand what atheism is.
Apparently not.

The point you are again missing is what is being discussed is ideological views about religion that are common among atheists, not simply disbelief in gods which is common to all atheists.
What "ideological views about religion"?

People thought that 250 years ago when Gibbon wrote it, modern historians don't actually think that anymore as they are less ideological and have better evidence.
Historians generally accept that Christianity played a part. Harris didn't claim that it was the only our even a major reason. Only that it was "in part responsible". Disagreement over the importance of that "part" can hardly be described as "historical ignorance". However, claiming that it played no part could.

Scholars in the Arabic world certainly advanced many fields of knowledge, but that wasn't Harris' point.
He said the main reason we have the originals is they were preserved in the Arabic world which is false.
Every major text was preserved by Christians in the original Greek, none rely on Arabic translations.
Wrong. He didn't claim "the main reason we have the originals" is because of Islam. He said the reboot of civilisation after the fall of the Roman Empire was because of the growing Islamic empire preserving those texts.

Many of the original Greek manuscripts only exist today in the form of palimpsests. Christians knowingly destroyed them (partially, at least).

Wrong again.
No one refused to look through anyone's telescope.] Oh dear...
"the principal philosophers of this academy who are filled with the stubbornness of an asp and do not want to look at either the planets, the moon or the telescope, even though I have freely and deliberately offered them the opportunity a thousand times?" (Galileo, letter to Kepler)

No they aren't, they are what passes for 'common knowledge' among people who don't actually read any actual scholarship.
So, your definition of "historically ignorant" is "not subscribing to a particular and specific academic historical school of thought". :tearsofjoy:

Thank you for proving my point about New Atheists being ignorant of history though
You have made several historical claims that are demonstrably false.
I have pointed out your error.
That is all.

Yes, occasions. Far fewer in the pre-modern era than people assume.
So you admit that conflict thesis isn't "nonsense".

How many scientists can you name who were persecuted for scientific research in the medieval period?
I haven't claimed that any were. :confused:
 
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