Now it's personal

[Belacqua]

in the process of "deconstructing" (a term which I trust is familiar to many of you).

I'm a big fan of deconstructing and re-evaluating the things that we hold to be true. 

It seems like, for the purposes of honesty and accuracy, we ought to get some kind of periodic mental pop-up window that says: "You have held this idea to be true for 10 years now. Please deconstruct and re-evaluate before proceeding." It would keep us on our toes.

no longer just an academic matter. (This family member now self-identifies as an atheist.)

One important aspect of the deconstruction process will be difficult for people who don't know your family. I think a lot of people change their beliefs as a reaction to family issues, emotional changes, or other non-academic reasons. So just as someone might become Christian due to tragedy, without thinking clearly about it, another person might become an atheist as a way to individuate himself from his background. Once the emotional motivation is there, one might rummage around for more rational-sounding reasons. 

And I think there's a danger of polarization in today's discourse, which generally discourages nuance. On this forum, for example, it often seems as if the only two choices are 1) sola scriptura literalist talking snakes or 2) total atheism. Since you are not a talking-snake type Christian, I look forward to hearing more about your take on things as we go along. 

And you make a good first impression, because you come across as genuinely curious. A lot of people, on all sides of the debate, are just here to repeat their slogans. 

So I hope you find some good discussions here. It's nice to have a new voice.

[Rhizomorph13]

Welcome,

As others have said there really isn't an atheist world view. I consider myself a humanist and theological noncognitivist, those are part of my worldview.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

Moderator Notice
Just a quick, sincere ‘thank you’ to everyone in this thread for playing nice. It’s appreciated.

Boru

[JohnMBauer]

Falling away, quite concerned? Interesting choices. I think you might be more biased than you realize.

Yes, I probably am. However, I don't understand how you pulled "more biased" out of those two statements. On the one hand, "falling away from the faith" is merely Christian vernacular, and it should not be unexpected that a Christian would speak in his native tongue. As such, I don't see how it follows that this indicates I am "more biased" than simply biased. (I'll grant this may be a cognitive blind-spot, and trust that you'll expose it for me.)

On the other hand, it is just my observation that he has "suddenly become quite concerned" about logic and critical thinking. He had never cared about that sort of thing before, and now it pops up in nearly every other paragraph, with him reiterating, again and again, this desire to practice logical consistency and good critical thinking skills. Obviously I am biased—we all are, really—but how does this statement of my observation indicate a kind of "more" to my bias?

---

Do you intend to continue to have a close relationship with this family member?

Absolutely. I love him dearly. But I also think it's kind of important that we maintain this close relationship, as he has hemorrhaged so many supports since declaring his atheism. I don't want him isolating. It's not healthy. He still has a couple of good friends, but at this point I'm the only one interested in exploring the deep end of the pool with him, and (he said) he really appreciates having someone willing to engage these complicated questions and ideas with him.

Are you trying to convince them to revert back to religion?

No. I hope he does return, of course, but the Bible as I understand it is quite clear that we're unable to convert others, so I never bother trying. At this point what I'm trying to do is get him to explore why he lost his faith in the first place. We both shared a lot of doctrinal beliefs in common, but his deconstruction led to atheism while mine did not. I think that's interesting and I want to explore it. I know why mine did not, so I'm curious to learn why his did. And from what I've gathered so far, he doesn't know. So I think that's worth looking at.

Welcome to the boards.

Thank you very much.

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It seems like, for the purposes of honesty and accuracy, we ought to get some kind of periodic mental pop-up window that says: "You have held this idea to be true for 10 years now. Please deconstruct and re-evaluate before proceeding." It would keep us on our toes.

I love this. And I enthusiastically agree.

I think a lot of people change their beliefs as a reaction to family issues, emotional changes, or other non-academic reasons. ... Once the emotional motivation is there, one might rummage around for more rational-sounding reasons. 

Nailed it.

And I think there's a danger of polarization in today's discourse, which generally discourages nuance. On this forum, for example, it often seems as if the only two choices are 1) sola scriptura literalist talking snakes or 2) total atheism. Since you are not a talking-snake type Christian, I look forward to hearing more about your take on things as we go along. 

And you make a good first impression, because you come across as genuinely curious. A lot of people, on all sides of the debate, are just here to repeat their slogans. 

So I hope you find some good discussions here. It's nice to have a new voice.

I really appreciate that, thanks. Cheers, mate.

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As others have said there really isn't an atheist world view. I consider myself a humanist and theological noncognitivist, those are part of my worldview.

And, just to be clear, I never mentioned an atheist world-view—as I'm cognizant of the fact that atheism is not a world-view. Rather, I spoke of my interest in the atheist point of view (which is obviously not univocal). Given this experience I'm dealing with at the moment, those voices are relevant, important, and really hold my interest.

[GUBU]

I became atheist over a period of time, essentially from when I was old enough to start thinking independently. My beliefs became more nebulous until I was essentially an atheist without going so far as to admit my lack of belief.

What finally drove me to full admission was my realisation on watching a documentary about the September 11 attack, specifically a Puerto Rican family's response to the idea that their son might throw himself off one of the Twin Towers rather than suffer an agonising and slow death, that made me realise that a) I didn't believe in any god and b) that all gods I'd ever heard about were man made and less moral inventions than I was then as a person (I hope to be a more moral person now than 20 years ago).

[tackattack]

Welcome

[downbeatplumb]

I hadn't heard 'deconstructing' as a term for losing religious faith before; I have heard it referred to as 'deconverting'.

Deconstructing basically amounts to examining the infrastructure of your religious belief system and critically analyzing it for coherence and consistency. The parts that fail get tossed. For many, deconverting is the end result of deconstructing. But not all: My deconstruction resulted in a more coherent and self-consistent biblical world-view.

There is another term for this. We call it "cherry picking". (I'm not trying to be confrontational just pointing out a fact)

[Belacqua]

Deconstructing basically amounts to examining the infrastructure of your religious belief system and critically analyzing it for coherence and consistency. The parts that fail get tossed. For many, deconverting is the end result of deconstructing. But not all: My deconstruction resulted in a more coherent and self-consistent biblical world-view.

There is another term for this. We call it "cherry picking". (I'm not trying to be confrontational just pointing out a fact)

If conducted well and honestly, deconstructing a system will discover and eliminate cherry picking. For you to equate the terms either shows ignorance on your part or a desire to insult someone you've just met.

If it turns out later on that the OP is cherry picking, then you should point it out. But your accusation here is unfounded and unfair. And you can't claim it's not confrontational when you've just typed a stupid and unjustified insult. 

https://www.iep.utm.edu/deconst/

[Little lunch]

Just read that definition of deconstruction.
What a load of fucking shite.
Sounds exactly like cherry picking with a bunch of fancy intellectual words thrown in. :-)

[The Architect Of Fate]

I have nothing against the new guy . But this is another instance of bell covering for a theist using wordy sophistry