RE: Has anyone discovered a successful way to make religious people atheist?
April 11, 2016 at 7:45 pm
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You could make the same request of the theist towards the atheist and it still wouldn't quite work. To see theism as a theist requires, I think most if not all atheists would agree, them to employ cognitive dissidence, which is the exact thing the atheist by and large is trying to undo or remove. Likewise a theist would have to remove their own cognitive dissidence to see the atheist point of view and if they did that they'd turn into an atheist.
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Thats all true, but I am just going along with the theme of the thread. You can't control how another person acts but mimicking them doesn't validate theirs or your behavior. And I agree with what you're saying about cognitive dissonance, but that takes place usually when a deeply held belief comes under attack. So when the other party doesn't feel as threatened then the effects of cognitive dissonance are lessened. Obviously you can't control how they'll react to anything. But if the other party feels non-threatened by your line of questioning or points made, they're much more likely to be less swayed by that cognitive dissonance. Will they admit defeat and disown god in that moment? More than likely not, but they'll be pondering over their deeply held beliefs in a more honest way to themselves
You could make the same request of the theist towards the atheist and it still wouldn't quite work. To see theism as a theist requires, I think most if not all atheists would agree, them to employ cognitive dissidence, which is the exact thing the atheist by and large is trying to undo or remove. Likewise a theist would have to remove their own cognitive dissidence to see the atheist point of view and if they did that they'd turn into an atheist.
[/quote]
Thats all true, but I am just going along with the theme of the thread. You can't control how another person acts but mimicking them doesn't validate theirs or your behavior. And I agree with what you're saying about cognitive dissonance, but that takes place usually when a deeply held belief comes under attack. So when the other party doesn't feel as threatened then the effects of cognitive dissonance are lessened. Obviously you can't control how they'll react to anything. But if the other party feels non-threatened by your line of questioning or points made, they're much more likely to be less swayed by that cognitive dissonance. Will they admit defeat and disown god in that moment? More than likely not, but they'll be pondering over their deeply held beliefs in a more honest way to themselves
