RE: Is atheism a belief?
February 28, 2019 at 3:25 am
(This post was last modified: February 28, 2019 at 3:29 am by bennyboy.)
(February 28, 2019 at 1:18 am)Belaqua Wrote: What you say here is true. It also is tangential to what I'm talking about.
An atheist accepts or rejects claims based on reasons, which may be good or bad, but which should be examined.
You might care to examine their reasons, but unless they have a compelling reason to do so, I would in fact say that they should NOT bother to examine them themselves. This is because there are very many (like, millions) of claims which one might respond to, and examining your personal motivations in your positions on each of them would bring your ability to move through life to a grinding halt.
The most efficient way to move forward is an evolutionary process-- move ahead with your current world view, and examine it only when it proves faulty, insufficient, or incomplete in important ways. The first and primary reason by which one might reject any claim which demands a change in world view is "meh," which can be elaborated as something like, "I don't think the changes you are implying will solve any of the cognitive or practical problems I have right now, so I'm not going to invest the effort in seriously considering it."
The reasons don't have to be rational, because most atheists probably have fairly little interest in changing your opinion about the God idea; if they do not intend to persuade, then they do not need to formulate a compelling response to it.
That's the thing I want to express-- that religious arguments between religious-minded and atheist folks are asymmetrical: one party cares more than the other, bears a greater burden of proof, requires much tighter arguments and better evidence, and so on. If atheists really had a vested interest in changing YOUR mind, then they'd have a much harder time of things.
