Activist atheism

[mikkel_the_dane]

Other beliefs are always a threat to belief systems.

I really hope that you don't win. Your God is not mine. And I will fight you if I have to. I wish it wasn't so, but alas that is how the world works as long as we can't agree on that all humans are equal as humans and different as individuals.

 

[dad]

I really hope that you don't win. Your God is not mine. And I will fight you if I have to. I wish it wasn't so, but alas that is how the world works as long as we can't agree on that all humans are equal as humans and different as individuals.

Sorry, no idea what you are talking about

 

[Revoltingest]

Studying the viewpoints of various atheists?
Such as?
Let us join you in the study.

Hatred of spiritual beliefs? I'd really like to
see an example of this.

Now as for some atheists being roused to
action,sure. The goddies have run the
show, everywhere, for millenia-mostly
for the benefit of the "priests" and their
buddies the kings.

The Soviet revolution had much to do with
the centuries of oppression laid on society
by the Russian Orthodox Church. Not
"atheism" as such.

Then there is this...that improvements to our world are all the result of atheism, and that religion holds us back

All the result of atheism?
Argument against claim never made is, you know,
called a strawman.

However, if you wish to say that religion has never
held any society /culture back, that is seriously
ridiculous.

Look into the role of religion in Tibet prior to
the good folks from Beijing doing something
about it. Say, that was atheists v goddies!

I've known some Russians....Christian & Jew.
Religion for them did survive under the Soviets, who
appeared to care that it didn't gain power. But wipe
it out? Nah.

 

[PruePhillip]

You have optimism. Scientists who study this stuff do not share your optimism. What is your optimism based on? The fact that you don't agree with science?
Also see post # 579 above.
Whatever.

Western countries are vastly cleaner than they were even 50 years ago.
I recall this article
https://www.history.com/news/epa-earth-day-cleveland-cuyahoga-river-fire-clean-water-act

In all issues there are optimists and pessimists. You have to look at the bigger picture.
My fear is that the growing forests of the world will be largely empty of animals - you
can regrow trees but when the landscape was stripped the animals vanished, ie
orangutans in Indonesia.

 

[SomeRandom]

When paper mills sprang up along the Hudson River, I'm quite certain that some people warned that dumping all that waste into the river would damage it. I'm also sure that some people, paper mill owners, politicians, and hangers-on said such "predictions are hyperbolic and sensationalist, by nature".

Ditto the London smog
Ditto the Great Pacific garbage patch
Ditto the LA smog
Ditto, ditto, ditto.

I didn’t say all predictions. Calling for moderation is hardly an unreasonable request.
But people predicting the end times and everyone dying due to lack of resources are being hyperbolic and sensationalist.
I mean maybe we will die out, but I just don’t see it happening for at least a few generations yet. So there’s still time. Whether or not one thinks we have a chance in the long run, really depends on how much faith one places in the rest of humanity. So mileage may vary.

 

[ecco]

I do understand that English is not your first language, but I'm having a real problem trying to understand what you are trying to say.

All words including "false" and all the other words you use about religious humans come from the singularity and the physical. The behavior of religious humans in your model come the singularity and the physical...<snip remainder>

I do understand that English is not your first language, but I'm having a real problem trying to understand what you are trying to say.

 

[ecco]

Ecco. When we no longer require oil there will still be plenty of oil in the ground.
Populations might go way beyond 10 billion given the new tech of life extension
but we will learn to manage this.
Desalinization is getting better, so too is our understand of how to manage the
environment so it won't be needed as much. I do have optimism.

Western countries are vastly cleaner than they were even 50 years ago.
I recall this article
https://www.history.com/news/epa-earth-day-cleveland-cuyahoga-river-fire-clean-water-act

In all issues there are optimists and pessimists. You have to look at the bigger picture.
My fear is that the growing forests of the world will be largely empty of animals - you
can regrow trees but when the landscape was stripped the animals vanished, ie
orangutans in Indonesia.

Your optimism is based on the fact that we cleaned up some rivers and some smog? Really?

As I said, the people who really study this stuff, the grunts, not the paid for by lobbyists, say that we have pretty much run out of time to reverse, or even stem, the effects of AGW.

There were people living along the Hudson River who were committed to cleaning it up. There is no worldwide effort to reverse the effects of AGW.

I'm not going to be around in 2099 so I probably shouldn't care.

 

[ecco]

I didn’t say all predictions. Calling for moderation is hardly an unreasonable request.
But people predicting the end times and everyone dying due to lack of resources are being hyperbolic and sensationalist.
I mean maybe we will die out, but I just don’t see it happening for at least a few generations yet. So there’s still time. Whether or not one thinks we have a chance in the long run, really depends on how much faith one places in the rest of humanity. So mileage may vary.

I don't think many scientists are "predicting the end times and everyone dying". That's the hyperbolic strawmen that the anti-AGW folks like to put out there.

What they are saying is that a lot of lives are going to be severely disrupted. For some, perhaps many, this will lead to death from starvation and disease.

Just in this country, if low lying areas become uninhabitable, there will be huge negative economic impacts. I'm thinking of south Florida, New Orleans, and lower Manhattan/Brooklyn. How high can you build walls? How many pumps can you install?

 

[PruePhillip]

Your optimism is based on the fact that we cleaned up some rivers and some smog? Really?

As I said, the people who really study this stuff, the grunts, not the paid for by lobbyists, say that we have pretty much run out of time to reverse, or even stem, the effects of AGW.

There were people living along the Hudson River who were committed to cleaning it up. There is no worldwide effort to reverse the effects of AGW.

I'm not going to be around in 2099 so I probably shouldn't care.

Yes, the forests are returning, at least in Western countries.
Someone is going to come up with a way of removing carbon
dioxide from the atmosphere. Some extinct species will return
(including passenger pigeon, mammoth etc..)
Of course, it will get worse before it gets better.

 

[SomeRandom]

I don't think many scientists are "predicting the end times and everyone dying". That's the hyperbolic strawmen that the anti-AGW folks like to put out there.

What they are saying is that a lot of lives are going to be severely disrupted. For some, perhaps many, this will lead to death from starvation and disease.

Just in this country, if low lying areas become uninhabitable, there will be huge negative economic impacts. I'm thinking of south Florida, New Orleans, and lower Manhattan/Brooklyn. How high can you build walls? How many pumps can you install?

Well I wasn’t really referring to scientists at all actually. Since end times is usually a religious prediction I assumed that much was clear from my posts. My apologies if it wasn’t.

I’m not actually American. So your question about pumps and walls is lost on me, I’m afraid. I’m Australian and we live through some of the worst droughts on record every single year. Our cattle starve or burn every year. We still eat.
Okay that’s a little hyperbolic. But you want to talk natural disasters and lack of resources to me?
I walk out and smell bush fires thinking that’s just normal everyday routine. Never mind the poor farmers who have to live with that. So don’t talk to me about how harsh nature is. I dodge that everyday without thinking.
Mother Nature kicking our asses is considered everyday run of the mill averageness round here. Don’t talk to me about your petty walls.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

I do understand that English is not your first language, but I'm having a real problem trying to understand what you are trying to say.

This post here runs back in time through physical process all the way to the singularity, yes or no?
If, yes, then, that I believe in God, as it refers to the fact that I believe in God, runs runs back in time through physical process all the way to the singularity, yes or no?
If, yes, then believing in God is a part of how the world works, yes or no?
If, yes, then believing in God can't be wrong, because it is a part of how the world works.

I am doing a reductio ad absurdum: Reductio ad Absurdum

Description: A mode of argumentation or a form of argument in which a proposition is disproven by following its implications logically to an absurd conclusion. Arguments that use universals such as, “always”, “never”, “everyone”, “nobody”, etc., are prone to being reduced to absurd conclusions. The fallacy is in the argument that could be reduced to absurdity -- so in essence, reductio ad absurdum is a technique to expose the fallacy.

The world started with the singularity and the physical process and that is all that is going on up until this day. That is your claim.
The reductio ad absurdum is, that when I answer: No! - Then that is also a part of the world, that started with the singularity and the physical process and that is all that is going on up until this day including this: No!

The problem is, that the whole world including my "No!" and wrong beliefs can't be done in only physical terms. There is something more than just the physics and the singularity. And NO! - it doesn't have to be a god.

I am sorry to say this, but this is basic logic. You check any claim in part by checking how it holds up against a reductio ad absurdum.

 

[Audie]

Well I wasn’t really referring to scientists at all actually. Since end times is usually a religious prediction I assumed that much was clear from my posts. My apologies if it wasn’t.

I’m not actually American. So your question about pumps and walls is lost on me, I’m afraid. I’m Australian and we live through some of the worst droughts on record every single year. Our cattle starve or burn every year. We still eat.
Okay that’s a little hyperbolic. But you want to talk natural disasters and lack of resources to me?
I walk out and smell bush fires thinking that’s just normal everyday routine. Never mind the poor farmers who have to live with that. So don’t talk to me about how harsh nature is. I dodge that everyday without thinking.
Mother Nature kicking our asses is considered everyday run of the mill averageness round here. Don’t talk to me about your petty walls.

When people pick some place to go take over,
and the land does not happen to be suited to
the use they try to put it to, well, things dont go
to their advantage.

The dry shortgrass prairie of the American west
saw the end of many a person's life savings and
try for a better life when they believed the story
about how "rain follows the plow".

An overflight at low altitude and you see so many
remains of homesteads that still scar the terrain,
but the ranches now occupy thousands of
acres,not the 160 they homesteaders tried to work with.

The whole concept of work with the land, not against
it has not really caught on yet.

Oh, re "petty walls", the real estate of Manhattan
being discussed is like the capital of the world, and
worth at least one or two Oz provinces, esp considering
they should have just been left as Abo reserves in the
first place.

 

[ecco]

Yes, the forests are returning, at least in Western countries.

As long as the world's population continues to grow, poor(er) people will continue to cut down forests more quickly than "western" countries can plant them.

Someone is going to come up with a way of removing carbon
dioxide from the atmosphere.

Someone, someday. How will that work? Some countries may welcome higher sea levels and warmer temperatures. Are you suggesting going to war with them so that you can remove carbon dioxide from their atmosphere?

Some extinct species will return
(including passenger pigeon, mammoth etc..)

How did you come to that conclusion? What does that fantasy have to do with anything?

Of course, it will get worse before it gets better.

How many centuries of "worse" is it going to take before it gets better?

I'm sure mankind will survive. We survived the Black Death, didn't we?

 

[ecco]

Well I wasn’t really referring to scientists at all actually. Since end times is usually a religious prediction I assumed that much was clear from my posts. My apologies if it wasn’t.

I’m not actually American. So your question about pumps and walls is lost on me, I’m afraid. I’m Australian and we live through some of the worst droughts on record every single year. Our cattle starve or burn every year. We still eat.
Okay that’s a little hyperbolic. But you want to talk natural disasters and lack of resources to me?
I walk out and smell bush fires thinking that’s just normal everyday routine. Never mind the poor farmers who have to live with that. So don’t talk to me about how harsh nature is. I dodge that everyday without thinking.
Mother Nature kicking our asses is considered everyday run of the mill averageness round here. Don’t talk to me about your petty walls.

I really thought you were discussing AGW when you wrote...

I didn’t say all predictions. Calling for moderation is hardly an unreasonable request.
But people predicting the end times and everyone dying due to lack of resources are being hyperbolic and sensationalist.
I mean maybe we will die out, but I just don’t see it happening for at least a few generations yet. So there’s still time. Whether or not one thinks we have a chance in the long run, really depends on how much faith one places in the rest of humanity. So mileage may vary.

I guess there's a bigger language difference between "American English" and "Australian English" than I realized.

 

[SomeRandom]

I really thought you were discussing AGW when you wrote...


I guess there's a bigger language difference between "American English" and "Australian English" than I realized.

Australian English is a lot like the English spoken by the Brits, just more drunk.

 

[PruePhillip]

As long as the world's population continues to grow, poor(er) people will continue to cut down forests more quickly than "western" countries can plant them.
Someone, someday. How will that work? Some countries may welcome higher sea levels and warmer temperatures. Are you suggesting going to war with them so that you can remove carbon dioxide from their atmosphere?
How did you come to that conclusion? What does that fantasy have to do with anything?
How many centuries of "worse" is it going to take before it gets better?
I'm sure mankind will survive. We survived the Black Death, didn't we?

Europe, America and China come to mind when I think of new forests - but empty of much
of the species.
Carbon dioxide can be removed from the atmosphere - that's basic chemistry - the problem
is the scaling and energy requirements to do it on a global scale.
Bringing back the passenger pigeon is doable. It could be an early "de-extinction" demonstration
though it wouldn't be the first.
In my country we would like to bring back the Thylacine (Tasmanian tiger) as we have good DNA.

I would challenge anyone to consider bringing back the Neanderthal !!!!!!

 

[paarsurrey]

Lately I've been studying viewpoints of various atheists, and am disturbed at many of their radical agendas for society. They want to abolish religions, including home school and religious schools. Basically, they consider non-atheists as people not deserving of participation in society, because of viewpoints so obviously incorrect and untrue.

But considering that atheism merely assumes materialism and physicalism, explaining everything in terms of these, their hatred of spiritual beliefs seems unwarranted.

Ignoring atrocities by both atheists and religious, I don't see evidence that improvements to our world are all the result of atheism, and that religion holds us back.

I agree with one's argument.

Regards