(September 16, 2017 at 2:44 am)Kernel Sohcahtoa Wrote:(September 15, 2017 at 5:17 pm)Neo-Scholastic Wrote: (1) Teaching children to willfully ignore the evidence for God, (2) that they are biological robots in a meaningless universe, (3) that all the people the love who have passed will be eaten by worms, (4) and that they should mock, ridicule and wish for the death of those who believe otherwise....
That is pure evil.
I'm sorry if this is the experience that you have had with people from the secular community.
Regarding (1), I'm more interested in keeping an open-mind and being open to various modes of inquiry. Based on my observations on AF, I think that a theist's definition of evidence is different from a non-theist's definition of evidence. IMO, regarding the former, religious faith, personal experience, shared experiences, group solidarity/connection, preconceptions about reality, and the claims of holy books, all play a big part in believing that one's god belief is true; while the latter demands that any claim, statement, belief, etc., must be rationally proven (science, logical argumentation/proof, physical evidence, etc.) before it can be accepted as true. Thus, IMO, while some members of the secular community may be closed off to religious ideas and blindly opposed to them, there are plenty of people in this group who just see things differently than theists and are not willfully ignoring anything; they are simply asserting their individual uniqueness.
Regarding (2) and (3), I'm comfortable admitting that I do not have all of the facts about death, especially in a metaphysical/philosophical sense.
Regarding (4), I'm in agreement with you that such conduct is uncivil and reprehensible: it kills dialog and ensures that people stay entrenched in whatever misconceptions/misunderstandings that they hold toward people who are different than them.
Kernel, that's a sensible and sympathetic response to Neo, just as I've come to expect from you.
However, regarding (2) and (3), it should be noted that Neo has never shown the slightest concern with such honest agnosticism. If one is not a classical theist with all of the meaning and philosophical coherence that allegedly supplies, then one is by default a nihilist. He's ridden that hobby horse into the dust too many times to pretend otherwise now.