Atheist fundamentalism

stevejazzx

I've just had a thought. I'm getting really fed up with religous extremism and it's ability to defend itself through gross misinterpretations of it's own supposedly sacred text.
No religous text ever condoned the killing of one human over the other.
But yet you hear (paraphrashing) 'In the Koran it says it we must be vigilant against non believers etc' and then suddenly this becomes a defense of murder. Obviously not just the Koran, passages from the bible can seemingly mean many different things at the same time.

So what if various Atheist sects of the world were to become fundamentalists? And their policy was to destroy all known religon and thier holy book was science and they claimed it's actions were for the good of mankind citing the wars that religon has caused and the countless casualties it has created using not some ancient holy book but real histroical factual texts, cross referneced, proven and held as fact?

After reading about the reaction to dainish cartoons depicting the profit Mohammed in Richard Dawkins 'the god delusion' it has become clear that what fundamentalists Muslims want is a holy war. Although I'm aware that jihad probably doesn't mean holy war but struggle most of the defence for these outragoues overreactions is jihad and the word itself has come to mean a holy war.

The hate in christian fundamentalist America is disgusting, particularly when it comes to Islam. A 12 year boy won the right(by suing his school) to wear a tshirt saying 'Islam is a lie.' What is going on here? Differnet religons gearing up for a huge ugly battle. All this while their own god has instructed them to love one another no matter what.

So my question is and i make it clear that i support no such idea, but the would the actions of Atheists extremists as described in paragraph 2 be more condemnable than the actions of current religous fundamentaslists?.

bonkey

stevejazzx wrote:

No religous text ever condoned the killing of one human over the other.

Sure they have, implicitly if not explicitly.

The God of the old testament helped the Israelites in wars, instructed people to kill their firstborn, etc.

How can this be anything other than the condoning of one person killing another?

So what if various Atheist sects of the world were to become fundamentalists? And their policy was to destroy all known religon and thier holy book was science and they claimed it's actions were for the good of mankind citing the wars that religon has caused and the countless casualties it has created using not some ancient holy book but real histroical factual texts, cross referneced, proven and held as fact?

Then they'd be called Richard Dawkins, right?

So my question is and i make it clear that i support no such idea, but the would the actions Atheists extremists as described in paragraph be more condemnable than the actions of current religous fundamentaslists?.

As condemndable. I don't think you can condemn one thing more than another. To me, it would be a bit like saying that if someone had been wearing their seatbelt in a carcrash they wouldn't have been killed so badly.

jc

Asiaprod

stevejazzx wrote:

So my question is and i make it clear that i support no such idea, but the would the actions of Atheists extremists as described in paragraph 2 be more condemnable than the actions of current religous fundamentaslists?.

No, it would be as bad as, if not worse than, what we were fighting against.
They can fight, I'll just watch.

stevejazzx

bonkey wrote:

Sure they have, implicitly if not explicitly.

The God of the old testament helped the Israelites in wars, instructed people to kill their firstborn, etc.

How can this be anything other than the condoning of one person killing another?

yep I know all this but the end product of any religous text I have ever read commands it followers against murder but you are perfectly right in saying that the God of the old testament did this and that but the message of the 10 commandments I think it is a more reliable source of christains teaching.

bonkey wrote:

Then they'd be called Richard Dawkins, right?

I imagine you mean that in a kind of humerous way but what I'm talking
about is Atheist sects going out and openly attacking religon possibly using violence, so not the quaint little chap known as Dawkins, no.

bonkey wrote:

As condemndable. I don't think you can condemn one thing more than another. To me, it would be a bit like saying that if someone had been wearing their seatbelt in a carcrash they wouldn't have been killed so badly.

jc

Of course you can condemn one thing more than another. For example a murderer more than a thief etc. The list is endless. What I meant though is would any Athiest organisiation carrying out such extremist action in order to eradicate religon be granted the same allowances that the world currently gives religon?

Son Goku

stevejazzx wrote:

So what if various Atheist sects of the world were to become fundamentalists? And their policy was to destroy all known religon and thier holy book was science and they claimed it's actions were for the good of mankind citing the wars that religon has caused and the countless casualties it has created using not some ancient holy book but real histroical factual texts, cross referneced, proven and held as fact?

If Atheists literally held to the above I couldn't see them doing anything. Remember 99% of pure science is mundane technical facts whose two purposes is the intellectual satisfaction of those in the appropriate area and later to be gathered together with other facts to form a cohesive area of understanding which can then be applied.

For instance it would be difficult to march on mecca armed only with a book on "The evolution of Chiroptera" and "Complex Analysis for Chemists" as your sacred texts.

I think instead of science being the holy text what atheists would really use is the general principles of post-enlightenment logic. In which case I'd say just as condemndable. Although I'd still find it hard to see such a movement starting.

stevejazzx

Asiaprod wrote:

No, it would be as bad as, if not worse than, what we were fighting against.
They can fight, I'll just watch.

Obviously more fighting in the world is worse but I'm not talking about that. Waht I'm asking is would they be afforded the same respect as an organisation that the world currently gives to organised religons.

stevejazzx

Son Goku wrote:

If Atheists literally held to the above I couldn't see them doing anything. Remember 99% of pure science is mundane technical facts whose two purposes is the intellectual satisfaction of those in the appropriate area and later to be gathered together with other facts to form a cohesive area of understanding which can then be applied.

For instance it would be difficult to march on mecca armed only with a book on "The evolution of Chiroptera" and "Complex Analysis for Chemists" as your sacred texts.

I think instead of science being the holy text what atheists would really use is the general principles of post-enlightenment logic. In which case I'd say just as condemndable. Although I'd still find it hard to see such a movement starting.

Surely one can use the advances in modern science as reproach to religous fundamentalism which seeks armageddon? Or less dramatically put, if religous fundamentalism were such that it treatened the continuity of the human race then surely the rational world would an obligation and right to intervene. Isn't Darwins theory of evolution the biggest single contributor to post-enlightenment. Science and enlightenment go hand in hand, it seems your comment attempts to remove science from the remit by appropriating it as just a technical process rather than what is really is, a method of explaining life. If we explain our origins sufficently then religon is debunked, therefore I think science is may indeed be called one of Holy Books of Atheism.

Sangre

I have no idea how 'science' could be used as a guiding book. If it does prove religion untrue then what? It gives no guidance beyond that.

Asiaprod

stevejazzx wrote:

Obviously more fighting in the world is worse but I'm not talking about that. Waht I'm asking is would they be afforded the same respect as an organisation that the world currently gives to organised religons.

I'm a little confused here. If they were fighting against all other religions, who 's respect would they be seeking. The respect of the remaining Atheists? The world does not give respect to organized religons. In short, people, in this case, representatives of areas, give the respect, I suppose in the name of the people they represent, to organised religons.

joe_chicken

Hmmm...

I'd think of it like:

A fundamentalist beats up an atheist because the atheist stood on his foot.
Then the atheist goes and beats up the fundamentalists family.

stevejazzx

Asiaprod wrote:

I'm a little confused here. If they were fighting against all other religions, who 's respect would they be seeking.

Not respect as such, but acknowledgement that they were an organisation and that their beliefs has been challenged. Currently the world seems to be affording such priveleges to extremist Islamic sects who appear capable of getting away with any kind of riduclous overreaction/behaviour even when serious violence ins involved.

asiaprod wrote:

The world does not give respect to organized religons. In short, people, in this case, representatives of areas, give the respect, I suppose in the name of the people they represent, to organised religons.

I would argue that the world does give respect to religon and a lot of it to organised religon. Not least tax breaks and law exemption but in the area of moralistic code the world would appaer to be very leninet and respectful for example the current furore with Christian fundamentalists claiming that it is thier rgiht and obligation outlaw homosexuality and there are courts in America apparently ready to uphold such rights.

Schuhart

stevejazzx wrote:

would they be afforded the same respect as an organisation that the world currently gives to organised religons.

Is Marxism not a candidate for this? Certainly there have been Marxist revolutionary movements who would regard religion as just a part of a generally oppressive social structure and at one time Communism would have been seen as a threat to Western society. Is that what you mean?

stevejazzx wrote:

If we explain our origins sufficently then religon is debunked, therefore I think science is indeed Holy Book of Atheism.

I don't agree. It just means that the other holy books have been created by men and not gods.

A Holy Book of Atheism would surely amount to more than saying 'everyone else is wrong'. What fit the bill would be a secular statement of the rights and obligations that people should respect.

Son Goku

stevejazzx wrote:

Isn't Darwins theory of evolution the biggest single contributor to post-enlightenment.

Yes, I said 99% of science would be useless. There are a few exceptions which can be used that I could count on one hand. They are the general principle of evolution and to be honest I'm already out of ideas as to what else would be useful. The Big Bang couldn't really be used, perhaps a few of the central facts from neurology. Outside that though, there isn't much.

stevejazzx wrote:

Science and enlightenment go hand in hand, it seems your comment attempts to remove science from the remit by appropriating it as just a technical process rather than what is really is, a method of explaining life. If we explain our origins sufficently then religon is debunked, therefore I think science is indeed Holy Book of Atheism.

I'm not saying science is just some technical process, rather that science is both very technical and an explanation of the natural, but you still have to remember how pervading the technicality is. Far to often people dismiss it. For instance alot of atomic chemistry is statements about the wavefunctions of electrons in certain elements. I find it interesting because it explains alot about how atoms function, but it would be difficult to use such a thing as inspiration behind a movement.

The explanations are themselves grossly technical.
Again I think all atheists could do is take a few rarified findings from science that wouldn't require them to read for six months to be understood and turn them into some philosophical principle.

Dades

If there's on thing that might unite the world religions, it would be 'atheist fundamentalists' declaring violent sci-had on the worlds religious. They'd soon remember that most of them worship the same god and come together to defeat the godless hordes.

stevejazzx

Sangre wrote:

I have no idea how 'science' could be used as a guiding book. If it does prove religion untrue then what? It gives no guidance beyond that.

You're taking the idea of science as a holy book litreally. It was a figurative example.
And Guidance for what exactly, humans are already equipped with a set of moral codes.

stevejazzx

Son Goku wrote:

... I find it interesting because it explains alot about how atoms function, but it would be difficult to use such a thing as inspiration behind a movement.

the explanations are themselves grossly technical.
Again I think all atheists could do is take a few rarified findings from science that wouldn't require them to read for six months to be understood and turn them into some philosophical principle.

I never meant to imply that an Athiest movement would technically decree Scientific texts as thier holy book. I meant that they would simply acknowledge science as one of the main reasons they held their position.
My original point attempted to stimulate the idea that if an extremist Athiest movement citing maily factual and strong scientific theory as it's excuse for violent action against other violent religous fundamentalists, would that be more rephrensible than what current Islamic organisations do when they cite religous texts (which are more than likley mythical and unreal) as their defence for violent action. If the answer is no and that an Atheist organisation would not be able to make this claim then this would reveal that the world is prepared to accept mythical legends over probable truths.

bonkey

Surely one can use the advances in modern science as reproach to religous fundamentalism which seeks armageddon?

How? Science can explain what armegeddon is. It can arguably (through sociology) explain why people may or may not head down a path which would lead to armegeddon.

At no point does it make a qualitative judgement regarding whether or not armegeddon is a desirable state, nor could science even qualify what desirable meant.

Or less dramatically put, if religous fundamentalism were such that it treatened the continuity of the human race then surely the rational world would an obligation and right to intervene.

Rationality is not a science.

The rational world may well do what you say, but it is not a position based on science. It is a position based on a set of subjective, qualitative desired states and a limited analysis of how certain outcomes would effect that.

Armegeddon may well be the best thing for mankinds future, but at an individual level looknig at the short-term timeframe that my lifetime would cover, its a bad thing.

Science doesn't make such distinctions.

Isn't Darwins theory of evolution the biggest single contributor to post-enlightenment.

Is it?

Even if it is, the implication is that post-enlightenment (and not science) is what would oppose religious fundamentalism. Showing that the acceptance of one scientific theory has been a significant contributor to post-enlightenment is nowhere close to showing that science is the sole root cause of said post-enlightenment, nor that this post-enlightenment state could not be reached in the absence of science.

Science and enlightenment go hand in hand,

Do they?

Simply asserting this, or presenting it as self-evident is, ironically, the antithesis of the scientific method and science.

it seems your comment attempts to remove science from the remit by appropriating it as just a technical process rather than what is really is, a method of explaining life.

The key to that sentence is that you acknowledge it is a method. By implication, it lays no claim to be the only method. It also does not get involved in subjective, qualitative issues such as the concept of morals, right-and-wrong, good-and-bad. From science's point of view, these are sociological traits that we as a species have evolved for whatever reason.

Interestingly, while you seek to elevate science above being a technical process, it is exactly this process which I would argue is what you should identify as the largest contributor to post-enlightenment. The scientific method is the root of critical analysis. It is central to ensuring that flights of fancy are not given equal weighting with scientific theories. It is what makes Darwin's theories so compellingly strong, as well as all other scientific theories. It is also - unlike Darwin's Theory - something that we can utilise directly in fields other than scientific research.

In short, the scientific method - the process you dismiss - is what has made science successful and this success is what has given the method widespread respectability as an approach to be adapted any form of rational problem-solving.

If we explain our origins sufficently then religon is debunked,

Perhaps, but I doubt it.

The catholic church has already reconciled itself to the teachings of modern science. It accepts that scientists are the best equipped to explain how the universe got from its beginnnigs to where it is now. It still lays claim to how those beginnings came about - an area where science by definition cannot go.

Put simply (though perhaps a bit too much so) , science deals with the how, where religion deals with the why. In the strictest sense, these are orthogonal systems that have no impact on each other.

Also, by its very nature, science can never claim to be complete. It is obversationally bound. If you learned chess by watching game after game, but had never once seen a pawn taken en passent then you would have no inkling that such a move was permissable. You could claim you understood all the rules, but without the rulebook thats not a proveable claim, merely a falsifiable one....just like scientific theory.

At the end of the day, science cannot distinguish between a model which says there was a big bang 14-ish billion years ago, followed by a rapid expansionary phase and so on and so forth, and a model which says teh universe was created yesterday but made to look exactly like one which had a big bang 14-ish billion years ago, followed by a rapid expansionary phase and so on and so forth.

We reject the latter as a scientific model purely because it involves extra complexity and assumption to no gain in accuracy of the predictive nature of the model. However, that does not say it isn't what happened. It says that from a modelling perspective, the two are indistinguishable so we discard the unncessary complexity.

therefore I think science is indeed Holy Book of Atheism.

A non-scientific conclusion if ever there was one...especially since you also believe that humans are already equipped with a set of moral codes. Surely those moral codes are the "Holy Book" of atheism?

L31mr0d

I think the topic is getting away from the OP's question. Its not whether Atheists would turn fundamentalist, its a hypothethical on if they did what would be the ramifications.

It is completely feasible that a sect of Atheism would form to rid the world of the cancer it sees as religion. A group of people who hold their beliefs so vehemently that they no longer want new generations being brought up with this false belief in a god. They do not need to be doing this with the holy book of science in their arms, they need only have the motive to remove the world of religion for the betterment of mankind as a whole, and they feel that religion is beyond reasoning and needs to be erradicated for there ever to be a ceasing of it.

I for one know many Atheists who hold their understandings a lot more vehemently than I hold mine, almost to the point of anger in some situations, which I understand is a result of frustration due to their opinion that religious people don't understand, it is possible that this anger and frustration would move someone/people to take violent action against those that they see as spreading lies about humanity to people.

stevejazzx

The Atheist wrote:

If there's on thing that might unite the world religions, it would be 'atheist fundamentalists' declaring violent sci-had on the worlds religious. They'd soon remember that most of them worship the same god and come together to defeat the godless hordes.

You probably don't realise but you've paraphrased a brilliant Voltaire bit about fanaticism.

They'd soon come together to punish the wrongdoer after which they go back to fighting amoung themsleves over which one of them had the right god and how long his hair was and what color his eyes etc.

Schuhart

bonkey wrote:

Surely those moral codes are the "Holy Book" of atheism?

I went looking for a post I remember making on the concept of an Atheist bible. It was only a few months back, but it strikes me as seeming like a terribly eager idea in retrospect. The key points, as I saw it, were

Where scripture is generally a block of text that cannot be changed, the model for an Atheist source book would be Wikipedia. It would start just with such understanding as any average non-believer might have, and accrete and change as knowledge changes.

I’d see it’s as starting with acknowledging that giving credence to the senses is the first step of any attempt to make sense of reality. There should also be acknowledgement of how human ideas are formed, and hidden assumptions and gaps in perception. Where religion seeks to find a fictional certainty, the secular view needs to be all grown up and borrow some of Johnson’s attitude.

The object would be a simple, coherent statement of what we know about Life the Universe and Everything, relating in non-technical language that relates the statement to the proof i.e. ‘We know the universe is expanding, because astronomers can see that galaxies are moving away from each other. That suggests at one stage everything was closer together. We know from the distances travelled that the time taken for the Universe to travel out this far is billions of years.’

It would also attempt to set out some kind of ethical conception – in one sense the most difficult part, but at the same time I’d start with the UN Declaration of Human Rights and see where people took it.

Follow that, anther poster supplied an interesting (to me, at any rate) essay on HP Lovecrafts’ Necronomicon. The essayist responds to the question of whether the Necronomicon exists by saying

I believe a book like the Necronomicon could not have existed in the past, and cannot exist in the present. It will exist in the future.

While he was coming to the topic from a very different starting point, the end of the process is not unlike what I’d see as the ultimate product of an Atheist Bible.

stevejazzx

bonkey wrote:

How? Science can explain what armegeddon is.

I think instead of Armeggedon you mean the end of the world.As Armeggedon includes angels and beasts and Gods judgement, to the very best of knowledge the current scientific method has no concievable explanation for any of these things.

bonkey wrote:

It can arguably (through sociology) explain why people may or may not head down a path which would lead to armegeddon.

You appear to be saying that

It can(I take it you mean science) explain the social circumstances that might lead to armeggedon? That is a complete nonsense statement, i don't say that a lot on these boards btw.

bonkey wrote:

At no point does it make a qualitative judgement regarding whether or not armegeddon is a desirable state, nor could science even qualify what desirable meant.

Again this means nothing, what are you going on about?

bonkey wrote:

Rationality is not a science.

But it is part of science, anyways who claimed that rationality was singulary a science?

bonkey wrote:

The rational world may well do what you say, but it is not a position based on science. It is a position based on a set of subjective, qualitative desired states and a limited analysis of how certain outcomes would effect that.

I don't follwow, sorry.

bonkey wrote:

Armegeddon may well be the best thing for mankinds future, but at an individual level looknig at the short-term timeframe that my lifetime would cover, its a bad thing.

Armeggedon would be good for mankind?
Fair enough assumption i suppose if you believe in God.

bonkey wrote:

Is it?

Even if it is, the implication is that post-enlightenment (and not science) is what would oppose religious fundamentalism. Showing that the acceptance of one scientific theory has been a significant contributor to post-enlightenment is nowhere close to showing that science is the sole root cause of said post-enlightenment, nor that this post-enlightenment state could not be reached in the absence of science.

I never said it was the 'sole root cause'. I said it was one of the biggest single contributors to post-enlightenment thinking.

bonkey wrote:

Do they?

Simply asserting this, or presenting it as self-evident is, ironically, the antithesis of the scientific method and science.

I made a simple obversation about how science leads to enlightenment and vice versa and you expect me to include a scinetific method bundled in with my 'off the cuff comment'. Presumably this new rule applies to everyone in which case i expect to be seeing much longer posts on these forums.

bonkey wrote:

Interestingly, while you seek to elevate science above being a technical process, it is exactly this process which I would argue is what you should identify as the largest contributor to post-enlightenment. The scientific method is the root of critical analysis. It is central to ensuring that flights of fancy are not given equal weighting with scientific theories. It is what makes Darwin's theories so compellingly strong, as well as all other scientific theories. It is also - unlike Darwin's Theory - something that we can utilise directly in fields other than scientific research.

But if I elevate science beyond just a technical process that doesn't mean or imply that I do away it or play down that process. So your point in relation to this is meaningless as you've misunderstood the comment.

bonkey wrote:

In short, the scientific method - the process you dismiss - is what has made science successful and this success is what has given the method widespread respectability as an approach to be adapted any form of rational problem-solving.

Your first line in this final paragraph is nothing short of extraordinary. You must be arguing against yourself. You appear to of whittled it down to me saying
'I dismiss the scientific process'

That is such an obscure and general statement that I can't imagine any context in which it would make any sense. What are you on about?

bonkey wrote:

Perhaps, but I doubt it.
Put simply (though perhaps a bit too much so) , science deals with the how, where religion deals with the why.

which hollywood movie did you get that cracker form?

bonkey wrote:

A non-scientific conclusion if ever there was one...especially since you also believe that humans are already equipped with a set of moral codes. Surely those moral codes are the "Holy Book" of atheism?

Yeah, with science etc..... ad infinitum.

stevejazzx

Schuhart wrote:

Is Marxism not a candidate for this? Certainly there have been Marxist revolutionary movements who would regard religion as just a part of a generally oppressive social structure and at one time Communism would have been seen as a threat to Western society. Is that what you mean?

Well communism was govenmental approach including atheism. I'm just hypothesizing about an independant body outside of government behaving the same way in realtion to it's beliefs as a fundamentalist Islamic organisation would behave in relation to it's beliefs.

schuart wrote:

I don't agree. It just means that the other holy books have been created by men and not gods.
A Holy Book of Atheism would surely amount to more than saying 'everyone else is wrong'.

I'm not sure i understand what yiu mean here exactly, can you clarify.

schuart wrote:

What fit the bill would be a secular statement of the rights and obligations that people should respect.

Yeah I'd go along with that.

Scofflaw

stevejaxx wrote:

Schuhart wrote:

What fit the bill would be a secular statement of the rights and obligations that people should respect.

Yeah I'd go along with that.

Secularism has been at war with religion for the past two centuries - and we are winning.

In the last 20-30 years the process has accelerated. This is pretty obvious in Ireland, where the power of the bishops is a pale shadow of what it was in the 80's. However, even the UK was much more dominated by religion 30 years ago than it is now - look at the number of local councils in the UK that banned "The Life of Brian" at the behest of local bishops and religious groups. Look at how careful they were to avoid a conviction under the blasphemy laws. That power is largely gone.

Indeed, the current "revival" of religion is nothing of the sort - it is the increased polarisation and fanaticism of those who are becoming aware that their cause is losing. The majority of people become steadily less and less religious, and the minority that subscribes to fundamentalist religion is not growing as fast as the non-religious. That is why they sound hysterical.

Yes, we lack any clear and obvious vision of what should replace the "religious society", except a general utilitarian yardstick. But that is right and proper - we need not replace one ideology wth another, but only with what is found to measurably increase the happiness of the majority.

The greatest happiness (felicity) of the greatest number is the goal, science the tool. Religion is an enemy only when it attributes greater truth to its own dogma than to objective fact - but so is any ideology.

cordially,
Scofflaw

stevejazzx

Funnily enough i was going to write a post similar to that initially, but i figured that when Schuart wrote 'secular' in that particular post he simply meant in a way that was representative of different peoples.

Scofflaw

stevejazzx wrote:

Funnily enough i was going to write a post similar to that initially, but i figured that when Schuart wrote 'secular' in that particular post he simply meant in a way that was representative of different peoples.

That's the power of secularism. Rather than atheism confronting religion directly, the best way forward is to respect all religions equally. Respect for religion is an enormously powerful tool.

Since religions all believe they have the only truth, they are incapable of compromising effectively with other religions. Since they cannot compromise with each other, they usually wind up accepting the scientific position by default - and so the secular agenda progresses...

cordially,
Scofflaw

stevejazzx

L31mr0d wrote:

I think the topic is getting away from the OP's question. Its not whether Atheists would turn fundamentalist, its a hypothethical on if they did what would be the ramifications.

It is completely feasible that a sect of Atheism would form to rid the world of the cancer it sees as religion. A group of people who hold their beliefs so vehemently that they no longer want new generations being brought up with this false belief in a god. They do not need to be doing this with the holy book of science in their arms, they need only have the motive to remove the world of religion for the betterment of mankind as a whole, and they feel that religion is beyond reasoning and needs to be erradicated for there ever to be a ceasing of it.

I for one know many Atheists who hold their understandings a lot more vehemently than I hold mine, almost to the point of anger in some situations, which I understand is a result of frustration due to their opinion that religious people don't understand, it is possible that this anger and frustration would move someone/people to take violent action against those that they see as spreading lies about humanity to people.

In the all kerfuffle I missed this.
At least 1 person seemed to get where I was coming from. I'm not suggesting it would be a good thing but it would be very interesting to see what kind reaction it would generate if a such a thing were ever to happen.

Schuhart

stevejazzx wrote:

I'm not sure i understand what yiu mean here exactly, can you clarify.

All I’m saying is that if religion is debunked, it simply means its basis is removed and, for example, Bible and Quran are simply written by men. In itself, it says nothing about what happens next.

Scofflaw wrote:

The greatest happiness (felicity) of the greatest number is the goal, science the tool.

Dogma is indeed the problem, and everyone thinks their dogma is a set of self-evident principles. But it seems inevitable that something fills the vacuum. Even that simple statement seems, to me, to require an amount of assumption to make it meaningful.

Why the greatest happiness of the greatest number? What if there’s a conflict between two people who want the same happiness? Could the greatest happiness be everyone forgetting they saw any of this and pretending the world is six thousand years old? Is it just the greatest number currently alive, or do we have to think about future generations? How do we handle someone who doesn’t want to be happy? What if, like Genghis Khan, someone thinks the greatest joy a man can know is to conquer his enemies and drive them before him, to ride their horses and take away their possessions, to see the faces of those who were dear to them bedewed with tears and to clasp their wives and daughters in his arms?

Scofflaw

Schuhart wrote:

Why the greatest happiness of the greatest number? What if there’s a conflict between two people who want the same happiness? Could the greatest happiness be everyone forgetting they saw any of this and pretending the world is six thousand years old? Is it just the greatest number currently alive, or do we have to think about future generations? How do we handle someone who doesn’t want to be happy? What if, like Genghis Khan, someone thinks the greatest joy a man can know is to conquer his enemies and drive them before him, to ride their horses and take away their possessions, to see the faces of those who were dear to them bedewed with tears and to clasp their wives and daughters in his arms?

These are fairly standard questions which the mention of utilitarianism virtually always provokes.

First, it's usual to point out at this point that we are not talking about "happiness" in the sense of "hey, I'm happy today, wahey!", but in the sense of a happy life.

In order after the first, the answers are: tough; possibly, but doubtful because of the impact on knowledge (we've already tried it!); future generations also - hence environmentalism; it's not really "happiness" - hence the parenthetical 'felicity' - his misery is his felicity; causes too much unhappiness to others.

As to why overall - utilitarianism is the only position that encompasses other philosophical goals. If your greatest 'happiness' is served by submitting to God, well, fine. If your greatest happiness is served by rejecting God, fine. So, whatever, unless it impacts the happiness of others.

Finally, yes, those are valid questions, but there is no philosophical system of living that does not raise as many. Even if it's only 90% good, it's still very good - I would hardly abandon it on foot of a couple of conundrums!

cordially,
Scofflaw

Schuhart

Scofflaw wrote:

These are fairly standard questions which the mention of utilitarianism virtually always provokes.

I don’t doubt we’re just repeating an old argument, but I had a feeling of confidence if these were fairly standard questions you’d have the fairly standard answers. I think what it shows is that the ‘greatest happiness of the greatest number’ doesn’t capture the full picture of what’s intended. ‘Do whatever you want to do, be whatever you want to be, just so long as you don’t hurt anyone’ sounds to me to be closer to the starting point (I think it’s a line from ‘Hair’.)

Scofflaw wrote:

First, it's usual to point out at this point that we are not talking about "happiness" in the sense of "hey, I'm happy today, wahey!", but in the sense of a happy life.

But there’s even more to that in how the ‘greatest happiness’ is understood. It’s not just the position of someone deciding for themselves they want to be miserable (I trying to remember which of the Iain M Banks Culture novels features the ship where the crew have all decided to have colds for diversion). It’s also that point of when individual freedom ends and mental illness begins. Also, we’d (probably) intuitively feel that real happiness is different to oblivion, but does respect for other people’s right to choose oblivion mean we should stop all public debate on the dodgy basis of the concept of God?

Scofflaw wrote:

Finally, yes, those are valid questions, but there is no philosophical system of living that does not raise as many. Even if it's only 90% good, it's still very good - I would hardly abandon it on foot of a couple of conundrums!

I’m not suggesting abandoning the outlook because it has some matters that need refining. I think there’s a world of difference between an outlook that (for the sake of argument) takes an issue like abortion and says ‘frankly, we have no objective way of determining when to start the clock on the right to life. We’ll just have to pragmatically set a threshold based on such sense as we can make of the whole process’ and one saying ‘every sperm is sacred’.

I suppose what I’m really saying is we can probably can advance our understanding of these questions, and come to improved but not final answers, if we put our minds to it.

joe_chicken

Schuhart wrote:

I’m not suggesting abandoning the outlook because it has some matters that need refining. I think there’s a world of difference between an outlook that (for the sake of argument) takes an issue like abortion and says ‘frankly, we have no objective way of determining when to start the clock on the right to life. We’ll just have to pragmatically set a threshold based on such sense as we can make of the whole process’ and one saying ‘every sperm is sacred’.

I agree totally. Morality is very rarely black and white, so to try grasp an idea of something being 100% good/bad is futile.

There's one problem with this though, people are lazy (well when it comes to matters of morality anyway)

Abortion=bad (or abortion=good) is a lot easier to understand than abortion=could be good/bad depending on how long into gestation it takes an embryo to attain a 'human' quality

To try to get a whole society to agree on what time does the human quality appear at, is as hard (if not harder) than proving whether abortion is completely good or bad.

Maybe on an individual basis, when they are faced with the morality of abortion, would they look into it. But as a rule that everyone feels happy with, I think it has to be kept simple.

And as far as your Atheistic Bible goes; I like it!
But there's not enough drinking of blood,violent killings or massive ecological miracles for me

bonkey

Schuhart wrote:

‘Do whatever you want to do, be whatever you want to be, just so long as you don’t hurt anyone’ sounds to me to be closer to the starting point (I think it’s a line from ‘Hair’.)

It might be...but its also probably a derivative of something much older:

These Eight words the Rede fulfill:

"An Ye Harm None, Do What Ye Will"