Is Atheism Intellectual Cowardice?

[Oldandeasilyconfused]

Agnosticism is atheism lite, like intelligent design is creationism lite

A common misconception. The two terms are not directly related. 'atheism' refers to a lack of BELIEF (a=not theos=god) 'Agnostic' refers to a lack of KNOWLEDGE. ( a= no gnosis =knowledge)

The atheist simply asserts lack of belief.The agnostic asserts lack of knowledge. He may be claiming god exists but is unknowable, or that he simply does not know.

However,I think it's also common for people who are atheists to call themselves 'agnostic'. That may be a matter of denial,misunderstanding of terms,or simply because they've never thought about the issue.

I called myself an agnostic for many years .I simply did not understand the meaning of the word 'atheism",believing it entailed a positive claim of "there is no god ". I could not and cannot make such an assertion. I am only able to assert "I do not believe due to lack of evidence" that makes me an agnostic atheist..

I think the claim that agnosticism is atheism lite or intellectually dishonest is no doubt true for many people. However, I think those claims are facile and arrogant as general principles.

[SleepingDemon]

That was my attempt at satire :-p It seems to me that agnosticism is simply the safe position in most cases. I have a friend who is agnostic because he simply doesn't care either way. I get that. While some people see religion as a massive threat to civilization, I don't, I simply think it is beneath us. I choose atheism as I feel I can move forward having completely dismissed the idea. Diffidus has made several posts where it appears he is torn on the subject, I antagonized him as I felt he needs to confront it and move on.

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@diffidus. You still haven't addressed my point that if we are to remain agnostic in regards to supreme beings, we would have to do the same with all mythology, with every creature or being created by man. We would have to take cryptozoologists seriously as scientists because they take a video camera into the wilderness looking to prove Bigfoot is real. We can only speculate the probable, the possible is far too vast. Lines have to be drawn, especially when laws are built around mythological beings. People go to prison in Iran for summoning genies. We have to outgrow this nonsense.

[Oldandeasilyconfused]

That was my attempt at satire

Oh, sorry. Hard to tell sometimes .

[diffidus]

That was my attempt at satire :-p It seems to me that agnosticism is simply the safe position in most cases. I have a friend who is agnostic because he simply doesn't care either way. I get that. While some people see religion as a massive threat to civilization, I don't, I simply think it is beneath us. I choose atheism as I feel I can move forward having completely dismissed the idea. Diffidus has made several posts where it appears he is torn on the subject, I antagonized him as I felt he needs to confront it and move on.

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@diffidus. You still haven't addressed my point that if we are to remain agnostic in regards to supreme beings, we would have to do the same with all mythology, with every creature or being created by man. We would have to take cryptozoologists seriously as scientists because they take a video camera into the wilderness looking to prove Bigfoot is real. We can only speculate the probable, the possible is far too vast. Lines have to be drawn, especially when laws are built around mythological beings. People go to prison in Iran for summoning genies. We have to outgrow this nonsense.

@SleepingDemon

Religion, seems to me, to be on a different footing to some of the examples you are using. I feel safe in the notion that pink unicorns do not exist on earth, no rational person would claim otherwise. But some other examples, such as telepathy, seem incredibly low in probability, but I cannot claim to know it is impossible - I keep a sceptical but open mind.

However, religions are much more widely spread and are believed by millions of people around the world. While this does not make them true, it certainly is a distinguishing feature from the examples you quote. As for evidence, what evidence is there for most historical events - usually historical writings that were written by the victors in some clash - such as the Anglo Saxon chronicles. If you take Christianity, as an example, and ask what is the evidence that there was a great preacher who died on a cross and who was ressurected? The answer is the Gospels, which are supposedly a collection of accounts of the events in Christ's life. Do I believe the Gospels? - Not Really. Can I state that they are definitely fiction? Again - not really. If I am to be truly courageous, I have to admit, I just don't have sufficient knowledge to rule out the fact that thay could be true. I say courageous, because it is a most uncomfortable position to be in, since every Human Being would prefer to be in a mental state of resolution. It is really difficult to stay on track with the facts, with actuality as it really is.

[SleepingDemon]

Every civilization on every continent believed in dragons at one point or another, not as a source of mythology, but in a "We don't go up that mountain, dragons live there" sort of belief. But we have to go with what we know, what is most likely. Is it possible that fire breathing, village destroying reptiles existed? Or did people find dinosaur fossils and extrapolate from that fantastic creatures? There is a great series of documentaries about that btw. Anyway the point is that the fact that it is widely accepted doesn't mean that it is more credible. The gospels are easy to dismiss man, none of it was written while Jesus was alive. And if you look at 1st and 2nd century christians, you will find that there was no uniform doctrine, some christians didn't believe Jesus was a real person around the time the gospels were being written. How could something be true when people whose parents and grandparents were alive when he was raising the dead?

[diffidus]

Every civilization on every continent believed in dragons at one point or another, not as a source of mythology, but in a "We don't go up that mountain, dragons live there" sort of belief. But we have to go with what we know, what is most likely. Is it possible that fire breathing, village destroying reptiles existed? Or did people find dinosaur fossils and extrapolate from that fantastic creatures? There is a great series of documentaries about that btw. Anyway the point is that the fact that it is widely accepted doesn't mean that it is more credible. The gospels are easy to dismiss man, none of it was written while Jesus was alive. And if you look at 1st and 2nd century christians, you will find that there was no uniform doctrine, some christians didn't believe Jesus was a real person around the time the gospels were being written. How could something be true when people whose parents and grandparents were alive when he was raising the dead?

Your first point is made with the full force of history behind you. I think it likely that if I were living in a village, at the time when the orthodox view was belief in Dragon's, given the state of man's knowledge at the time, I think I would face the mountain with some trepidation (and I suspect that, if you were brutally honest - so would have you)

Dismissiing the Gospels on the grounds that they were written after the events would mean dismissing most historical records. The earliest Gospel is said to have been in existence by approximatley 65AD. If Christ died at age ~ 30, then this was written ~35 years after the event. Not so long really, I can easily remember incidents that ocurred in the mid 1970's, so there is no real reason to belief that the authors were not recording events in good faith. (Unless you belief that they set out to create one enormous lie). But would such a lie become so easily accepted by huge masses of people - who knows? This is the problem - who knows?

[SleepingDemon]

Mark is the earliest gospel, and it is dated to about 100 CE.

[Gawdzilla]

Mark is the earliest gospel, and it is dated to about 100 CE.

A propaganda specialist once told me, "Never lie in round numbers."

[diffidus]

Mark is the earliest gospel, and it is dated to about 100 CE.

A propaganda specialist once told me, "Never lie in round numbers."

I agree with you on this latter point. Various dates seem to exist for the completion of the Gospels. A range is given in the following link under the heading of dating:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospel

Non of the dates seem to agree with your estimate for Mark as being 100 CE. (the latest date is given as 70 CE.)

[SleepingDemon]

That'll teach me to pick a random date :-p In any event, even 35-40 years is a long time to wait to write about the prophecized messiah. Not to mention the fact that historians who were alive during the reign of Tiberius said nothing of a man walking around, healing the sick and walking on water. I'm not entirely sure what the average lifespan was 2000 years ago, but it couldn't have been that high. So Mark would have been writing presumably near the end of his life, about the man who profoundly changed his life? It seems at the very least that the single most important figure in history had so few autobiographies during his life, much less mentions of him at all within the 1st and 2nd centuries, which would have been crucial to maintaining a respectful level of accuracy. If Jesus of Nazareth existed, we don't know very much about him.