Where is the hope in atheism?

[Quid est Veritas?]

I didn't really take you as the kind of person to resort to personal attacks. This isn't the first time you've said something like this to me in this thread though...so how else am I supposed to take it? If you genuinely believed this discussion to be a waste of time...why then continue engaging in it?

It comes off as you seeing me as so stupid that merely engaging in dialogue with me is somehow worthless. It's not because of the points I'm making, or you'd simply address the points. It's not because we see things differently and are unlikely to change our views because I'm sure you know that's the situation in the majority of discussions on here.

So I'm really just left with the idea that you're saying this as an attempt to degrade and insult me and frankly, I don't appreciate it. It's not as if I say things like this to you.

I apologise if you see this as a personal attack. That was not my intention. I merely meant that I do not feel that my further efforts are bearing fruit, nor that the discussion is worthwhile. As I said much earlier, we largely are at cross-purposes. It was not meant to degrade you in any way, though I do feel that you are not well versed in history, misunderstand quite a lot, and endorse a very narrow historic narrative.

For instance, I said the Church had to compromise on slavery, I never denied this. But a compromise or an appeasement of powerful interests, is not an endorsement or a theological justification. Dum Diversas makes this plain in never mentioning slavery, as well as ongoing Church efforts to limit the trade and enslavement of natives thereafter.
Likewise, the Nazis based morality off of what they considered factual, like Jewish inferiority, but it was still a created narrative of Teutonic Will. Morality was not real in and of itself, but the Will of the Superman. It is similar to how we say something is fact or 'true' when scientific, which is not what is at all established methodologically by the Sciences. It depends on how you define terms, and as I stated previously, we already do not even agree when someone is a moral 'realist' vs a 'relativist'.

We are simply not going to agree, as you ignore the nuance of history and the protean nature of the men that make it up, in my opinion. We also do not seem to be able to agree on terms of which we are speaking. I've stopped even trying to talk of Mass Hysteria and Conversion, as we are completely talking past each other.

Again, I hold no ill will, and bid you good day, but I do not think the effort responding here is worth it.

 

[Ana the Ist]

Nope, is there a reason why I should?

There is...you said this...

"I'm not going to presume to know anything about what's best for an unknown number of people, about whom, I know, next to nothing."

So there you have it. Are you going to stand by that statement? Or are you going to presume to know what's best for people you know next to nothing about?

OK, well let me know when that happens.

See above.

 

[Inkfingers]

So, 39 pages in, did you guys find any hope and meaning in Atheism yet?

 

[Silmarien]

So, 39 pages in, did you guys find any hope and meaning in Atheism yet?

Strangely, yes. I'm much more convinced that the natural world is value laden and that nihilism cannot coherently describe our world than I was 39 pages ago.

Which means that now omnibenevolence looks like less of a fever dream, lol. Thank you, atheism!

 

[Inkfingers]

Strangely, yes. I'm much more convinced that the natural world is value laden and that nihilism cannot coherently describe our world than I was 39 pages ago.

I don't know...after 39 pages of this stuff I'd drawn towards a clock tower and a high powered rifle

 

[apogee]

There is...you said this...

"I'm not going to presume to know anything about what's best for an unknown number of people, about whom, I know, next to nothing."

So there you have it. Are you going to stand by that statement? Or are you going to presume to know what's best for people you know next to nothing about?

See above.

Perhaps I just don't understand my own words quite as clearly as you evidently do, but I'm really not seeing any contradiction in any of my posts on this topic, although by all means, cut and paste stuff to suit your requirements.

I gave you a fairly simple illustration, that I hoped might have clarified this a little, perhaps it was not simple enough.

 

[apogee]

I don't know...after 39 pages of this stuff I'd drawn towards a clock tower and a high powered rifle

If you can bring some sandwiches and a flask, that would be great.

 

[Ana the Ist]

Perhaps I just don't understand my own words quite as clearly as you evidently do, but I'm really not seeing any contradiction in any of my posts on this topic, although by all means, cut and paste stuff to suit your requirements.

I gave you a fairly simple illustration, that I hoped might have clarified this a little, perhaps it was not simple enough.

Is this the fairly simple illustration you're referring to?

"I trust you would agree that as a rule, it is good for someone's wellbeing to have two hands rather than one."

I would agree it's fairly simple...I just don't see what it has to do with the topic at hand. Having two hands isn't a behavior like "being compassionate" is. You see the difference, don't you?

As for copying and pasting...you were acting like you either didn't understand the contradiction you had just made, or you had forgotten that you made it. I wasn't sure which...so I quoted your words for you.

So again, I'll ask....do you stand by your statement? Or are you going to presume to know what's best for people you know next to nothing about?

It's not complicated.

 

[Eudaimonist]

So, 39 pages in, did you guys find any hope and meaning in Atheism yet?

As always.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[bhsmte]

So, 39 pages in, did you guys find any hope and meaning in Atheism yet?

I guess only you and others who agree with your faith beliefs can have hope.

Feel better?

 

[Inkfingers]

I guess only you and others who agree with your faith beliefs can have hope.

Feel better?

Yup, much, thank you

 

[bhsmte]

Yup, much, thank you

Whatever it takes.

 

[Silmarien]

An interesting piece on Leo Tolstoy: Leo Tolstoy on Finding Meaning in a Meaningless World

If there's a way out of this besides faith (or drugs, I guess), I really have no idea what it is.

 

[Eudaimonist]

An interesting piece on Leo Tolstoy: Leo Tolstoy on Finding Meaning in a Meaningless World

If there's a way out of this besides faith (or drugs, I guess), I really have no idea what it is.

Stop reading Tolstoy. Stop reading any nihilistic author. You won't find the answer there.

It starts with viewing this life as worthwhile in itself, instead of just as a means to something else. The world isn't meaningless unless you treat it as unimportant to your life because you have an otherworldly metaphysics. There is plenty of meaning to find and create in one's life if one sets about doing so.



eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[Silmarien]

Stop reading Tolstoy. Stop reading any nihilistic author. You won't find the answer there.

It starts with viewing this life as worthwhile in itself, instead of just as a means to something else. The world isn't meaningless unless you treat it as unimportant to your life because you have an otherworldly metaphysics. There is plenty of meaning to find and create in one's life if one sets about doing so.

But what if nihilism is something that you actually start out with? I definitely started tearing apart all the constructs of human society at a very young age and ended up on the brink of nihilism all by myself, with more than a dash of solipsism tossed in for flavor. This isn't the sort of thing that a person can only pick up because they've been reading the wrong writers. (Assuming that there is any such thing as a wrong writer at all. Honestly, if you avoid reading this stuff when you actually feel this way, you're just going to end up isolated and thinking you're crazy.)

For all my former Sartreanism, I really do not know how to go about creating meaning. I try, but the illusion always just fades sooner or later. It's not really a matter of an otherworldly metaphysics making the world meaningless--the world never had any real substance to begin with. It was the means to no end at all.

This is obviously not good (except maybe to the subjectivists), but if you ultimately fail to see life as an intrinsic good, I do not see how anything short of a complete shift in metaphysics could change that. Or perhaps drugs, but treating existential nihilism like another form of depression seems like a matter of treating the symptoms and ignoring the cause.

In other news, I am still curious about your approach to moral realism.

 

[Quid est Veritas?]

Stop reading Tolstoy. Stop reading any nihilistic author. You won't find the answer there.

It starts with viewing this life as worthwhile in itself, instead of just as a means to something else. The world isn't meaningless unless you treat it as unimportant to your life because you have an otherworldly metaphysics. There is plenty of meaning to find and create in one's life if one sets about doing so.



eudaimonia,

Mark

Um, Tolstoy is a Christian author, like Dostoevsky. He writes contrasting Nihilist and Christian viewpoints, but the whole point was that faith was meaning ultimately to him, that he rejected Nihilism, as outlined in his Confession. He could not find meaning in life in and of itself.
Eudaimonia is well and good, but it is still based upon the metaphysics of the person seeking to live well. To dismiss 'otherwordly' metaphysics, you are merely substituting which 'otherworldly' metaphysic you would confirm, explicitly or implicitly, giving preference to one with a quotidian application. Not a consistent approach in my opinion.

 

[Eudaimonist]

Um, Tolstoy is a Christian author, like Dostoevsky.

Christians are often nihilists with respect to this-life. They see this-life as meaningless without some sort of afterlife consequences. To me, that is nihilism with respect to this-life because it treats this-life as a mere means, and therefore as worthless in itself.

He could not find meaning in life in and of itself.

Precisely!

Eudaimonia is well and good, but it is still based upon the metaphysics of the person seeking to live well.

Yeah, so? Life is an end-in-itself in that approach, and life doesn't lose meaning just because it is finite. It is this-worldly. It is not nihilistic in the sense I describe.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[HitchSlap]

So, 39 pages in, did you guys find any hope and meaning in Atheism yet?

Profound meaning.

 

[Silmarien]

Christians are often nihilists with respect to this-life. They see this-life as meaningless without some sort of afterlife consequences. To me, that is nihilism with respect to this-life because it treats this-life as a mere means, and therefore as worthless in itself.

I don't think this is fair. A Christian who thinks that the search for meaning is a transcendental endeavor is no more being nihilistic towards this life than a virtue ethicist would be by claiming that hedonism is ultimately an empty end goal. The question is simply being framed differently. Some Christians are certainly anti-life, especially with the rise of Protestant fundamentalism, but the religion is traditionally very pro-life with its insistence that physical reality is good.

If you want anti-life, I actually share the ancient Greek revulsion towards physical embodiment. The idea of an individuated afterlife makes me deeply uncomfortable because I would prefer the pseudo-oblivion of a world-soul: not precisely annihilation, but certainly not continuity either. I will be the first to admit that this makes life look completely pointless, but as far as I can tell, the only worldview that genuinely seems to escape this is Christianity. And aside from my anti-naturalism, I am pretty agnostic.

I would like to know how life can be an end in itself, though. Either that is subjectivism and therefore useless to anyone who feels differently, or teleological, in which case we have to worry if Aquinas's analysis of final causes is valid.

 

[bhsmte]

Christians are often nihilists with respect to this-life. They see this-life as meaningless without some sort of afterlife consequences. To me, that is nihilism with respect to this-life because it treats this-life as a mere means, and therefore as worthless in itself.



Precisely!



Yeah, so? Life is an end-in-itself in that approach, and life doesn't lose meaning just because it is finite. It is this-worldly. It is not nihilistic in the sense I describe.


eudaimonia,

Mark

But, some Christians, must think and convince themselves, there could be no meaning in life without their personal faith belief.

Otherwise, what benefit do they get from it? Acknowledging that others can find meaning, while disagreeing with their personal faith belief, is hard for them to swallow.