Oh, no. Not again. It’s another arrogant wanker insisting that atheism is a religion, too, and of course, making dumbass arguments to do it. And here they are:
Atheists are, in fact, some of the most religious people.
First, they have a functioning God under whom they are subservient (normally it’s science or rationality, but mainly themselves), and that idea of God informs the way they live and interpret their lives. It informs their biases and determines their values, and governs any sense of morality or ethics they adhere too, or ignore.
So, if you believe in yourself or trust empirically determined facts about the universe, why, that’s exactly the same as believing in gods, therefore we’re all religious. Having any sense of morality is exactly the same as religion, even if it is a secular morality.
We’re not dealing with the most discerning intellect here, are we? Everything in the world is the same gray porridge to him; bicycles and elephants are all just objects, you know, so when people try to tell me they’re different, I’m going to say NO, and I will keep one in my garage and I will attach my pump to its toenails to inflate it and I will find a place to attach this spoke wrench.
The second argument is hilarious: keep in mind that this is a commentator on Fox News.
Once that’s all settled all that’s left is the preaching.
And they preach all the time.
This new breed of atheists is obsessed with the idea of God. They write books, deliver speeches, comment-bomb the evangelical blogosphere and generally rant on ad nauseam about the ills of believing in God.
So when anyone goes on a rant about the ills of liberalism on Fox, it means they really are a liberal themselves? I’ve tuned out that channel for so many years, but I guess I’ve been missing out on some great progressive discussions then.
Maybe, just maybe, we’re obsessed with how religion poisons our culture with endemic stupidity. I’m planning to cite Johnnie Moore, the author of the rant about atheism (oh, hey…I guess that makes him an atheist, too!) as a perfect case study in the future.
Another point he makes is that Richard Dawkins was defeated in a debate with Rowan Williams. It’s true, I looked it up: the audience voted 2:1 in favor of the Anglican priest.
Welp, I guess I gotta give up this atheism thing since a majority of people in England believe in god. Oh, wait…they don’t. It’s kind of evenly split right now.
So I guess I should adopt a faith because Dawkins had an off day?
If you read the summary of the debate, it was about whether religion had a place in modern society, and I thought this young person made a telling point about Dawkins’ performance:
One second year student told TCS: "He did not address the motion. His points focused only on debating whether religion is true, and ignored the question of whether it has a place in modern society."
Heh. Yes. I guess that’s quite perceptive. To some people, it’s completely irrelevant whether a claim is true or false, and they are quite happy to build a society around a lie.
I’m not one of those people. I guess I need to stay an atheist.
(via The Zingularity.)