RE: Serious Problems with Atheism
January 18, 2017 at 9:24 pm
(This post was last modified: January 18, 2017 at 9:28 pm by Simon Moon.)
(January 18, 2017 at 9:13 pm)Pulse Wrote:(January 18, 2017 at 9:01 pm)Simon Moon Wrote: I don't care what Dawkins says about atheism. I agree with some things he says, and not with others.
There is no such thing as an 'atheist apostle'. And certainly, Dawkins would not be it, if there were such a thing.
People act in 'good' and/or 'evil' ways, but evil or good do not exist as a force. If people did not exist, evil and good would not exist.
We all live in the same physical universe, subject to the same physical laws, with the same (more or less) physical bodies.
My well being is extremely important to me. I prefer: life over death, health over disease, freedom over slavery, comfort over torture, etc.
From that, I can easily extrapolate that the vast majority of my fellow humans want the same for their own lives.
Since I don't want to live in a society were my well being is threatened or compromised, I will not threaten of compromise other's well being. And I want laws in place that will assist in this outcome.
There, the basis for a moral system, no gods required.
That's because we have laws in this world that are mostly based on the Ten Commandments which are reflected in most religions and we thus no longer act like barbarians.
"There, the basis for a moral system, no gods required." I would think Mao would beg to differ with your moral system, if you lived under his rule. I don't think your logic would convince him to spare you from his policies;
Why would he be wrong and you right? All just a matter of opinion manufactured by our brains which are the result of random meaningless processes in a random meaningless Universe?
Sorry to inform you, but laws against murder, theft, a perjury far predate the 10 Commandments.
But then, Mao's totalitarian rule was not based on the secular moral system that I outlined. So his rule was not moral.
He was wrong because his system was not optimised for the well being of his people.
You know how you can tell his rule was immoral? Ask the people under his repressive rule.
You'd believe if you just opened your heart" is a terrible argument for religion. It's basically saying, "If you bias yourself enough, you can convince yourself that this is true." If religion were true, people wouldn't need faith to believe it -- it would be supported by good evidence.