1 out of 5 Atheists in the U.S believe in a "higher power"

[paarsurrey]

1 out of 5 Atheists in the U.S believe in a "higher power"

Err, doesn't that mean they are not atheists?

Why don't the Atheism people excommunicate them from the Atheism (Faith/Religion), please?

Regards

 

[ChristineM]

Why don't the Atheism people excommunicate them from the Atheism (Faith/Religion), please?

Regards

Doh! Because it is not a faith/religion.

 

[paarsurrey]

It pretty much entirely comes down to whether or not they think of that higher power as a deity.
Atheism doesn't preclude belief in spirits, demons, ghosts, fairies or just a vague sense that there's some intelligence behind the universe. So long as you don't describe any of them as gods, you can believe in all manner of higher powers and still be an atheist.
From the pew research article:
This is a pretty common stance. Anything other than the Abrahamic concept of God doesn't count as a deity. That gives plenty of wiggle room for an atheist to believe in a higher power.

"Atheism doesn't preclude belief in spirits, demons, ghosts, fairies"

We already know that when some or most of the Atheism people if not all start seeing "a flying kettle around the earth" or a "big foot in their garage" or "an elephant in it" or "fairies in their houses" etc. Right?

Regards

 

[HonestJoe]

Maybe you should read the article. Its better to.

I read both articles, that doesn't change what I said. That fact remains that every individual who responded to those polls could have a different idea of what "higher power" means in this context (and also "Christian", "atheist", "biblical God" etc. for that matter).

You can't assume that for a given percentage of respondents said they believe in a "higher power", they were all thinking about exactly the same kind of thing. In fact, it seems highly unlikely that they did.

 

[Ponder This]

Wouldn't a "higher power" be anything that is a "power greater than ourselves"?
Higher Power
AA says it could be: nature, consciousness, existential freedom, God, science, Buddha... It doesn't seem to matter what it is, only that you believe there is a higher power and for the purposes of AA that that power is also "loving and caring".

If so, then it seems odd that anyone actually believes that there is no higher power than himself.
What is the deal with the other 4 out of 5 atheists? Do these atheists actually believe that they are the highest power in the universe? I am curious.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Maybe you should read the article. Its better to.

Unless you know their usage of "Higher Power" and their actual methodology in their sampling, you can't rule out, that they used a broad, open version of "Higher Power" and not just a theistic (modern version) one.

Peace

 

[Erebus]

"Atheism doesn't preclude belief in spirits, demons, ghosts, fairies"

We already know that when some or most of the Atheism people if not all start seeing "a flying kettle around the earth" or a "big foot in their garage" or "an elephant in it" or "fairies in their houses" etc. Right?

Regards

Sorry, I've read this a couple of times and I'm just not sure what you're trying to say?

 

[Samael_Khan]

Sorry brother. But I must say "absolutely not". I dont have any doubt that they are not deliberately twisting any meaning whatsoever.

This is relevant to only a few Atheists. 1/5 th is not a big percentage really. The thing is I dont have any research to back what I am saying about Atheists. But generally "theists" name themselves either Christian, Muslim, Hindu or something else not only because they are practicing their theology to the tee. It is an identity statement. Thats a sociology of religion topic.

Its the same with Atheists. Thus out of them a few might not be actually atheists by definition, but they would identify as one. This is normal across everything.

That makes sense.

 

[Samael_Khan]

There is no requirement of being rational for Atheism. Is there any, please?

Regards

You get rational atheist and irrational atheists. Logic drives the former while emotion drives the latter.

 

[Altfish]

Why don't the Atheism people excommunicate them from the Atheism (Faith/Religion), please?

Regards

Because it is not an organised group; we have no leader, we have no organisation.
We have some loose groups that meet in the same way that (say) a geographical society meet to discuss and debate

 

[Samael_Khan]

Brother. You see, this @Israel Khan person hit the nail right on the head about something. That is an important thing to note. I would rather ponder over that than a small side point.

It is true that they differentiate between "God" and "a Higher power". Only if you ponder over it you would start to think about the profound importance of that find.

I would rather beg you to recognise something like that.

@Israel Khan Once in a while brother someone like you come and make a point that can drive a sociology professor nuts. You know when I say nuts, I dont mean to the asylum. I mean he would go "how do I approach my next research and build my hypothesis with this thought".

It may have been a simple thought to you mate. But maybe one day you would see how someone else did the research and wrote a book and made some money while you were thinking about it in a forum on the internet long ago.

Thats the way the cookie crumbles.

That differentiation is very thought provoking. It brings to mind something that I have long suspected. I am very much an atheist in terms of travelling where the evidence leads me rather than an atheist who says that there is definitely no God. The latter I see as hypocrites as they follow faulty reasoning to come to their conclusions. So then it shouldn't surprise me that people with this line of thinking would contradict themselves and the identity that they hold. But it is definitely something to ponder over and a question that I should interrogate myself with.

I can only hope that my questions will impact society in some way, like the person might research what we are speaking about.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

You get rational atheist and irrational atheists. Logic drives the former while emotion drives the latter.

Yeah, but both have limits. I try to combine the 2, but it gets weird to someone, because they treat it as a dichotomy.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

Haggis is tame fare.
But these things, especially the first....
Live monkey brains
Raw oysters
Surstromming
Steak tartar
Bird's nest soup
Live bugs.....

:retch:

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

:retch:

Well, to some all meat is :retch:. Each to their own.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

Well, to some all meat is :retch:. Each to their own.

A lot of the time for me it's not :retch: but .
Except for seafood, especially shrimp. The proper place of seafood is in my belly.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

What does "Higher Power" mean in these two articles?

1. 10 facts about atheists
2. Americans' beliefs about the nature of God

I understand that Atheism is not believing in any theism or even anti-theism. Its pretty simple. But the atheists seem to grapple with the fact that some atheists yet believe in a "higher power". That goes against the definition atheism. But this is normal as anything can become an identity statement. But some atheists are fighting to redefine and reinterpret "Higher Power" to defend the tribe. I find it highly contradicting because atheists claim they are not a religion, while they also claim the religious people do just the same thing they are doing.

Thus. Let me ask again.

What does "Higher Power" mean in these two articles?

1. 10 facts about atheists
2. Americans' beliefs about the nature of God

In terms of the actual meaning of 'Higher Power' as it pertains to respondents here, sorry, but I can't really know. I strongly assume it would be a mish-mash of different things, including;
1) Some people erroneously describing themselves as atheists, when in fact they are non-religious.
2) Some people splitting hairs on the nature of the question (as in...sure, there is/may be a Higher Power, but that is not God, but rather aliens...or something...)
3) Depending on the wording (hard to tell from the article) you might also have atheists who have a 'spiritual' side. Whilst it never made a lot of sense to me, I've met more than one atheist who would fall into this category.

Ultimately, I have no control or say over other atheists. I've seen plenty try to make more of atheism that what it actually is (just as some theists do) and there is no test or education on 'atheism' you need to pass to declare yourself an atheist.

When they do these surveys with Catholics (for example) they regularly find a bunch of heretical beliefs amongst honest Catholics. In some ways this is much the same, albeit with atheism it's more an error of definition than dogma.

 

[paarsurrey]

Very good. At least someone who has read the article rather than giving a lot of apologetics.

This higher power they are referring to is distinguished from God because God for them is the Christian God. Read everything thoroughly. They are saying that they dont believe in the Christian God, but they believe in some higher power. Thats a divinity.

I agree with one.
This is because in the West usually they mean from G-d, the Pauline-Christian Jesus-God, while in the rest of the word Jesus is not G-d at all. The Western Atheism mainly deny this Pauline-Christian Jesus-God while the still believe that there is some Higher Power behind the working of the Universe. Eastern Atheism is therefore different from the Western Atheism. Right?

Regards

 

[paarsurrey]

You get rational atheist and irrational atheists. Logic drives the former while emotion drives the latter.

But in these forums the Atheism confirmed that the only requirement for being Atheist is ignorance and now being rational is also not a requirement. Right?

Regards

 

[paarsurrey]

Because it is not an organised group; we have no leader, we have no organisation.
We have some loose groups that meet in the same way that (say) a geographical society meet to discuss and debate

Poor Atheism people!!! Right?
But they are defendants of their "faith/religion", these forums testify. Better get organized, but how to organize a chaos?!!! Right?

Regards

 

[Samael_Khan]

Yeah, but both have limits. I try to combine the 2, but it gets weird to someone, because they treat it as a dichotomy.

Everybody has a combination of both. It is just where one leads on the spectrum.