300 Spartans had the way! Frank milller: Were all spoiled.

[Stryke]

Secularisim in the wetern word was part of the age of enlightenment .

where church and state hould be seperate , and rationality should be the leader of decision .

Why are people so bitter toward secularism?

fear of change , admission of a problem , relogious fanaticisim ( is that cultural or spiritual ? )

I might drop out at this point , I sure dont have the answers .....

[AAAhmed46]

I also have issues with religious people(insert faith) who view agnostic/athiests as evil.

Some of the nicest people ive met are atheists and agnostic

[IJ]

"I could easily argue, Ian, that your view of the average American shows a bit of elitism/arrogance on your part. In any case, your "buttons" are showing... "

Facts are facts, Bill. It should concern you, as well.

[Jake Steinmann]

I also have issues with religious people(insert faith) who view agnostic/athiests as evil.

Some of the nicest people ive met are atheists and agnostic

And some of the meanest, more horrible people I've met were atheists or agnostics.

Conversely, some of the nicest people I've met have been deeply religious. [I've met some not very nice people who were very religious as well, of course.]

No one place, people, or belief system has a monopoly on good behavior.

[AAAhmed46]

I also have issues with religious people(insert faith) who view agnostic/athiests as evil.

Some of the nicest people ive met are atheists and agnostic

And some of the meanest, more horrible people I've met were atheists or agnostics.

Conversely, some of the nicest people I've met have been deeply religious. [I've met some not very nice people who were very religious as well, of course.]

No one place, people, or belief system has a monopoly on good behavior.

Agreed.

[IJ]

As a means of explanation, the central beliefs of atheism have nothing to do with manners, but demanding evidence and explanation for what you think. In fact, that emphasis on testing ideas can make us a bit testy and argumentative.

[Valkenar]

As a means of explanation, the central beliefs of atheism have nothing to do with manners, but demanding evidence and explanation for what you think. In fact, that emphasis on testing ideas can make us a bit testy and argumentative.

Not neccesarily. A person could hold a general nihilistic atheism and still not be particularly interesting in evidence and explanation. It could be taken as a matter of faith that there is no God.

[Bill Glasheen]

It could be taken as a matter of faith that there is no God.

That's blasphemy to the traditional athiest, Justin!



- Bill

[Glenn]

There are atheists, those who simply do not believe in deities and afterlife as a result of personal exploration, and there are Atheists, those who preach a faith of non-belief and seek converts.

More of a paraphrase actually, but I believe I got it quoted right...can't remember where I heard it though. Naturally like anything else there's more of a range than a strict dichotomy, but this categorization always made sense to me, particularly since I view myself as the former and not the latter. I don't try to convert anyone, others believing in deities and what not is fine by me as long as it doesn't infringe on me.

[Valkenar]

The issue of the origin of your belief and whether you proselytize are really separate. For example, I am an atheist as a rational/logical premise. That is, the evidence for a god is not convincing, so I don't believe in it. Still, I don't go out of my way to proselytize, for a couple of reasons.

I doubt that people who prefer to live with a fantasy are going to be any happier if I break them of it. They're also not going to start making better decisions unless I can also convince them that a rational approach to life is better. It seems highly unlikely that I will be able to take a person who has taken an intuitive, emotional approach to decision making, and turn them into the kind of person that uses (or tries to use) logic for everything instead.

There's also a golden rule aspect to it. I don't like people proselytizing to me about their religion, so why should I do it to anyone else? Yes, I've decided that evidence, science, logical and rational thought are the best decision-making tools, but that's basically a choice I've made. Sure, I like my approach better and can give reasons why, but all my reasons for the desirability of reason and logic are ultimately grounded in logic. It would be circular to try to justify logic using logical principles. Someone who uses faith, emotion and intuition to make important decisions is operating outside the realm of logic, so a logical argument for why they should stop is begging the question.

All this is just to say that one can be an atheist by analysis and still not proselytize. One can also be an atheist by personal exploration, and do a lot of proselytizing.

[Bill Glasheen]

Justin

Irrespective of the existence of a God, there are good health reasons (physical and psychological) for having a belief system. There are also sound martial reasons. Rational research supports that. So that's another good reason not to proselytize.

Alas as an athiest, you likely won't get the same benefit. It's kind of like being in a control group in a double-blinded RCT, and being told you're the guy who got the dummy medicine.

But there are still benefits to spiritual pursuits irrespective of belief in a diety or dieties. That's part of what we do with these Eastern arts.

- Bill

[Glenn]

'Belief system' and spiritual are, in my opinion, tricky concepts and not exclusive to religion or the religiously faithful. Admittedly spiritual in its truest sense is a belief in the existence of a noncorporeal spirit that can exist separate from the physical body such as after death, but one definition for spiritual is "of or relating to the mind or intellect". My spirituality leans toward the latter definition, belief in the power of the mind and the individual.

Many people have spiritual views of physical nature, natural forces at work in the universe from the subatomic to the cosmological. These different spiritual concepts likely hold the same benefits as the religiously inspired. And at what point do spiritual views become a belief system?

I would consider these still atheistic though.

But there are still benefits to spiritual pursuits irrespective of belief in a diety or dieties. That's part of what we do with these Eastern arts.

This is the essence of Zen Buddhism, which does not depend on belief in deities.

The essential element of Zen Buddhism is found in its name, for Zen means "meditation." Zen teaches that enlightenment is achieved through the profound realization that one is already an enlightened being. This awakening can happen gradually or in a flash of insight (as emphasized by the Soto and Rinzai schools, respectively). But in either case, it is the result of one's own efforts. Deities and scriptures can offer only limited assistance.

I do not consider myself Zen Buddhist, but this is closer to my own spiritual nature than anything else I've found.

[jfinnivan]

Justin

Irrespective of the existence of a God, there are good health reasons (physical and psychological) for having a belief system. There are also sound martial reasons. Rational research supports that. So that's another good reason not to proselytize.

Alas as an athiest, you likely won't get the same benefit. It's kind of like being in a control group in a double-blinded RCT, and being told you're the guy who got the dummy medicine.

But there are still benefits to spiritual pursuits irrespective of belief in a diety or dieties. That's part of what we do with these Eastern arts.

- Bill

If you want to dig into details, technically, everybody has a belief system. It may not include belief in a deity, but there is a moral code of some kind. From this point of view, the only difference between a deist and an atheist is that the deist gets their moral code from an outside source (bible, koran, flying spaghetti monster, whatever), whereas an atheist derives theirs from introspection and deciding for themselves. Both are perfectly valid, in my view, and carries them through life. I don't see how a deist has any health advantage (except for attending cool church suppers) over an atheist. Where did you come up with your conclusion about this?

[IJ]

"It could be taken as a matter of faith that there is no God."

It could be, but it generally isn't. To be a devout religionist, you're supposed to be 100% convinced of something for which there is no evidence; it's hard on the other hand to prove the negative, so generally, atheists don't say they're 100% sure. There may be a few who set out to be irrationally atheistic for shock value or something, but I've never met one, and they would seem the exception not the rule (just as suicide bombings and abortionist shootings don't define religion). I'm certainly not sure. Dawkins isn't. I think Carl Sagan put it best: "I don't want to believe. I want to know."

"Irrespective of the existence of a God, there are good health reasons (physical and psychological) for having a belief system."

References? Besides, what's the point? You're not going to convince me or Dawkins or anyone else that we should believe that there's a teakettle orbiting the earth for health benefits, even if we wanted to. It doesn't work that way. But--as the point has already been made--I have a belief system. How odd that one could phrase it such that those without supernatural beliefs are cast as not having any belief!

"There are also sound martial reasons. Rational research supports that. So that's another good reason not to proselytize."

Martial? Christians outfight atheists, etc? I laugh out loud when I see the UFC fighters cross themselves, or, like Diego Sanchez, extend personal thanks to Jesus, who evidently did medicine ball work with him and guided his knee into Karo Parisian's jaw (must be an infidel). Curious to know data. Or did you mean marital? There may be some correlative studies, but you have to be careful about your control group selective. Correlation, is of course, not causation, and there is no evidence that speaking your mind about a scientific approach to the world (ie, a nonreligious one) disrupts either combat or marriage, whichever you were referring to, or whether you believe them related

"Alas as an athiest, you likely won't get the same benefit. It's kind of like being in a control group in a double-blinded RCT, and being told you're the guy who got the dummy medicine."

Funny you should mention the well designed RCT, as there's zero zilch none nada evidence of any such quality that belief in the supernatural is beneficial. As it turns out, the group that got prayer and knew it (in the only good study on prayer for healing) found they did worse, so maybe its good to go placebo here. Once that study was reported, of course, religious figures pounced on it as poorly conceived (science does not comment on faith), but I imagine their editorials would have been different if the study had shown an effect, no? Almost like the post "empty-force" test discussions.

"But there are still benefits to spiritual pursuits irrespective of belief in a diety or dieties. That's part of what we do with these Eastern arts."

Yup--I'm benefitting from my eastern (and brazilian--5 matches tonight and 5 straight submissions tonight on guys 20# heavier, sweet!) arts without faith, and I dare say most Americans, who hold noneastern religious views in general, wouldn't want their karate tempered with too much flavor from other spiritualities, right? (christians, jews, muslims?) I guess it depends on what you mean by spiritual. Lots of scientists use religious metaphors, but they don't often mean that there's a bearded tinkerer out there affecting happenings on earth. Awe for nature and discovery is a clearer term.

"From this point of view, the only difference between a deist and an atheist is that the deist gets their moral code from an outside source (bible, koran, flying spaghetti monster, whatever), whereas an atheist derives theirs from introspection and deciding for themselves."

Well, I'm totally with you in general, but I'm not sure about either asertion. Religious people don't usually get their moral code from their religious books. Dawkins has a great chapter on this in "The God Delusion." There's so much heinous stuff in the Bible that's ignored (rightly so) and then there are key ideas picked out at random (say, enforced codes vs neglected ones from Leviticus) that I believe most religious people get a moral code from their culture and their inner selves and then they justify it with scripture (not that there's anything wrong with that). And atheists can look within for their codes, but of course we all derive what we believe from what we're taught, in large part. For example, my ten commandments would START with the golden rule. That was taught to me by Christians. Doesn't make it bad at all!

[AAAhmed46]

300 PG edition!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gNqiSkd1M6k&eurl=