RE: Does Atheism Lead to Nihilism?
March 10, 2015 at 4:19 pm
(This post was last modified: March 10, 2015 at 4:24 pm by SteveII.)
(March 10, 2015 at 2:21 pm)Esquilax Wrote:(March 10, 2015 at 2:14 pm)SteveII Wrote: So what "inspires us to live beyond selfish interests and so achieve social coherence...and compels us beyond self-interest, beyond ego, beyond family, nation, and race." Why don't we live only for self-interest like evolution taught us to do?
Here's a serious question: did you think about the world you live in at all before you wrote that post? I don't mean to be nasty, but come on: you live in a world in which social coherence is beneficial to your selfish interests! You don't have to grow your own food, be your own doctor, make your own clothes, you get to specialize and have your own career precisely because of social coherence. The idea that you can characterize society as nothing but some great sacrifice we're all making is completely baffling.
I was quoting the paper. This was the gist of address to the American Academy for the Advancement of Science in 1991 by Dr. L. D. Rue. It is also the conclusion of many (some famous) atheist philosophers. How is it that you do not come to the same conclusion. At what philosophical point do you part ways?
(March 10, 2015 at 2:31 pm)Parkers Tan Wrote:(March 10, 2015 at 12:36 pm)SteveII Wrote: An how does an atheist obtain ethics?
The same way everyone else does: a mixture of inheritance from parental views, human empathy, and the ability to use reason to apply those two bedrocks to novel experiences.
Yes, that includes religionists.
So, a different set of parents and a little less empathy would yield a different set of ethics? That does not seem shaky to you?