Atheism | The Armchair Antichrist

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Repetition Repetition Repetition

On June 12, 2010, In Answers to Stupid People, By The Armchair Antichrist

The Basics

1. Atheism is not the claim that God does not exist. It is simply the lack of belief in God. God may or may not exist and the same goes for the Invisible Pink Unicorn, Flying Spaghetti Monster, Santa Claus, and all the other deities and mystical creatures that may or may not exist.

2. Agnosticism is not a valid position. We are all agnostics in that we ultimately do not know whether God exists or not. If you lack faith in God you are an atheist. And if you have faith in God you are a believer. There is no middle ground. You can’t have 1/2, 1/3, 1/4 and so on belief in God (unless you really are extremely indecisive).

3. Atheism is the default position. God is not something that is obviously known. If you can demonstrate that God can be known please do not hesitate in the comments.

4. Respect for your religion and religious beliefs is not a right. Religious beliefs are opinions the same with political, musical, artistic and other opinions. The fact that you believe in something strongly does not make it any less of an opinion and does not mean they should be respected.

5. Atheists would gladly stop ‘caring about your religion’ if religion stopped interfering with and intruding into all areas of life. Unfortunately, we do not have that handy explanation that believers do of not being able to withhold information that could save someone’s soul.

6. Hitler, Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot are not evidence of atrocities committed in the name of atheism. You cannot do something in the name of not believing in something. Rather, they are evidence that blindly following anybody or anything can lead to atrocities (i.e. those who can make you believe in absurdities can make you commit atrocities).

7. It is not the safest bet to believe in God (Pascal’s Wager). There are thousands of gods that you could possibly choose from and infinitely more that could exist. Therefore, there are an infinite number of hells you could burn in. The probability that you pick the correct god and avoid all those hells is the same as any of the gods existing in the first place (about nil).

8. The fact that many religious people do good things is not evidence for the validity of a religion similar to how you say that bad things done by believers has nothing to do with religion. You can’t have it both ways. If confirming evidence is such then disconfirming evidence must be the exact opposite.

9. The stuff written in your holy books is not objective evidence. It’s just one huge circular argument.

10. God has nothing to do with morality. Morality is not based on commandments. God’s thumbs up or thumbs down does not make things moral or immoral. Morality is based on loyalty, honesty, promises and harm; very human things that we don’t need God to understand.

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Tagged with: agnostic • agnosticism • Atheism • atheist • believer • faith • flying spaghetti monster • god • hell • holy • invisible pink unicorn • Morality • Religion • religious

Sunshine and Lollipops

On April 5, 2010, In Christianity, Religious Arguments, Religious Stupidity, By The Armchair Antichrist

I’ve heard that atheism is a religion. But, there’s also this ‘Christianity isn’t a religion, it’s a way of life’ thing too which is just as absurd as the first statement. The fact that I have to write posts to correct these mistakes is a testament to the strength of the indoctrination that people who make these inane statements have received or given to themselves.

I’m sorry to be the one to burst your bubble, but Christianity is not merely a ‘way of life’ or a ‘personal relationship with Jesus’. It is a pervasive cultural phenomenon grounded in a set of supernatural beliefs and rituals with a whole social infrastructure behind it. So, yes it is a religion. If it was merely a way of life then it need not have all those supernatural beliefs and rituals (e.g. baptism).

Straight edge is an example of a ‘way of life’. It merely prescribes life without drugs, alcohol and for some even promiscuous sex. There is no mention of God or any deity because it isn’t necessary. If it takes faith to be a Christian then it cannot be just a ‘way of life’. It is much much more than that. At the very least Christianity includes the belief that there is a God who will send you to hell if you disobey him or even not believe in his existence. How this kind of perverse coercion can fit into the description of a ‘way of life’ is beyond me.

There is an easy way to test if you have a ‘way of life’ or a religion. If you have a holy book which you believe was written by God that holds infallible knowledge you have a religion. If you believe that there is an otherworldly being who watches your every move and cares about what you eat, who you are friends with and other mundane things you have a religion. Lastly, if you believe that you have a personal relationship with said otherwordly being you have a religion. However, if you have answered ‘no’ to the above you just might have a ‘way of life’.

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Tagged with: Atheism • christian • Christianity • deity • god • holy book • indoctrination • infallible • jesus • Religion • supernatural

In the Defence of Secularism

On March 21, 2010, In Politics, Religion, By The Armchair Antichrist

Secularism and separation of church and state are concepts that many religious people just don’t understand. One of the misconceptions is that you can have freedom of religion without having freedom from religion. This of course is wrong because if the government or any public institution were to privelege one religion over another then you would not have freedom of religion. Freedom from religion is necessarily tied to freedom of religion.

Another misconception is that secularism censors free expression of religious beliefs. This is another lie. Secularism is in fact what makes free expression of religious beliefs even possible. Because the government does not privelege one religion over others it provides equality for all beliefs. Only the government and public institutions are the ones who are censored in order to give private citizens the freedom to express themselves freely. So, secularism is not state established ‘non-belief’ because it doesn’t make sense that public institutions should believe in anything in terms of religion. For the government to properly serve and represent citizens from a host of diverse religious backgrounds it must stay neutral to religion.

So, it is without question that secularism is not state atheism. The government is not forcing all of its citizens to be atheists. It is not closing down religious buildings. There are no punishments for practicing your religion. Secularism and state atheism simply have nothing in common. You have the freedom to practice your religion and believe what you want to believe. But, to use the government or any public institution as a platform to push your religious beliefs onto others is not within your rights.

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Tagged with: Atheism • atheist • belief • censor • church • citizen • government • Religion • religious • separation • state

The Chaplain is Back for More

On March 18, 2010, In Answers to Stupid People, University, By The Armchair Antichrist

Brian Bork seriously does not understand the concept of separation of church and state. After my first response I thought he would, but I guess I was wrong.

People should be free to express their religious beliefs and they are. But, that is completely different from public institutions such as universities privileging one religion over others. Freedom of religion also means freedom from religion. You do not have the right to push your religious beliefs from the platform of a public institution.

He also claims that the questions “what is good?” or “what is best?” cannot be answered within a secular context. I wonder if he has ever heard of Socrates or Plato among others. I know he works at a university, but I’m beginning to wonder if he has ever attended one.

His entire argument is basically a false equivocation of secularism with state atheism. Secularism is not even close to becoming a “hegemonic force against religious points of view”. It is merely the concept that religion should be separate from the state which is one of the foundations of modern democracy. And only through secularism is freedom of religion even possible in the first place.

I also do not appreciate being indirectly accused of hiding behind a veil of secularism even if that accusation made sense in the first place. With all his talk about pluralism it is quite ironic that he is actually the one who is trying to justify his religion’s hegemony over the Chaplain’s Office.

The article I am responding to can be found here (http://thecord NULL.ca/articles/28714).

Read the heavily edited version on TheCord.ca (http://thecord NULL.ca/articles/29401)

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Tagged with: Atheism • brian bork • chaplain • church • democracy • plato • pluralism • Religion • religious • secular • secularism • separation • socrates • state • University

Intellectual Quote Mining

On March 2, 2010, In Funny Stuff, Religious Stupidity, By The Armchair Antichrist

Since right wing religious nuts like to quote mine so much I decided to help them out. While reading my philosophy textbook I came across a sentence in the Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1884 by Karl Marx which would make a great mined quote for their agenda.

Communism thus begins with atheism, but atheism is at the beginning still far from being communism since it is mostly an abstraction.

They could easily take that and change it into:

Communism begins with atheism.

With this quote I would imagine they would make it look like godlessness leads to communism which they believe to be a totalitarian baby skull factory. And the best part is them attributing it to Marx who they believe to be the God of communism. So since Marx believes this it must be true that all communists are atheists and all atheists become communists.

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Tagged with: agenda • Atheism • atheist • communism • communist • god • godless • karl marx • Philosophy • quote mine • religious • right wing • totalitarian

A Defence of New Atheism

On February 28, 2010, In Misconceptions About Atheism, Religious Arguments, By The Armchair Antichrist

New atheism isn’t actually anything new at all. Intellectual atheist thought in the Western world can be traced back to pre-Socratic Greek philosophy. What’s new is the attitude. It is the stance that all matters of discussion are at the same level. Nothing is given preferential treatment or respect including religion. This philosophical viewpoint is called freethought.

Unsurprisingly, some religious people don’t like this new attitude that atheists are adopting. They want the beliefs that they consider sacred and holy to be respected by everyone. And one of the methods they use to try to counter new atheism is by creating labels to demonize atheists. The ‘new’ atheists are called militant even though they maybe considered militant only in their words. Some of the religious even feign persecution when in reality they represent the vast majority of the population and suffer no threat from atheists.

But, the religious are not the only ones to be blamed. There are atheists, some trying to feel more unique and others too resistant to social change who try to distance themselves from new atheism. Particularly, they denounce Dawkins, Hitchens, Harris and other atheists leading the charge as too aggressive and as hindrances to fruitful discussion. These atheists have fallen blindly into the trap set by the religious. They have embraced the labels that were created by the religious to demonize new atheism.

The four horsemen of atheism and other prominent atheists have actually opened the door for discussion by destroying the stigma that made discussion of religion taboo. And in doing so they have given atheists a new found voice. Instead of being denounced they should be applauded for all they have done to advance social change.

Think about the labels: dogmatic, militant, fundamentalist and so on that have been given to atheists by the religious. These are only projections of all the faults they find in their religion. It is best to ignore these labels and not be distracted by them. We need to focus on the arguments (as in premises and conclusions) that make debate and discussion meaningful. Playing into the emotional games of the religious will go nowhere.

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Tagged with: Atheism • atheist • dawkins • freethought • fundamentalist • hitchens • militant • Philosophy • pre socratic • Religion • religious

A Failing Apologetics Indeed

On January 9, 2010, In Christianity, Religious Arguments, Religious Stupidity, University, By The Armchair Antichrist

Recently, I attended the first of a series of lectures by Peter Erb at St. Jerome’s University of the University of Waterloo. The series is titled “Facing a Secular Age: Notes for the Modern Sceptic”. And this first lecture was titled “The New Atheism and the Old Church: A failing apologetics”. More information for these lectures can be found here (http://www NULL.sju NULL.ca/centre/speakers/erb_january2010 NULL.html).

Given the title of the lectures and the lecture series I initially thought that they would lean towards a secular view of the world. I could never have been more wrong. This professor did not only promote Christianity, he promoted Catholicism in particular while putting down Protestantism at the same time as atheism and secularism.

There was a deja vu feeling with this lecture. I was mislead two months earlier by a student ministry called “The Embassy” on the topic of hell. But, with that presentation there was no pretension of scholarly work. It was straight up preaching without apologies. This time around the preaching was disguised behind an air of academia.

He correctly named Dawkins, Hitchens, Harris and Dennett as the prime movers of the “new atheist” movement. But, he brushed them off nonchalantly without any real critique and said that their books lacked depth. Meanwhile, he held up some books by religious authors which he gave praise to and recommended to the audience. So, much for being unbiased.

Next, he described “new atheism” as a phenomenon that emerged from Christianity itself. And he explained how “new atheism” wasn’t new at all. I don’t know why the religious think this something surprising. Philosophical atheist thought first appears in the 6th or 5th century BCE both in Europe and Asia, before Christianity was even a cult.

Further into the lecture he uses a series of religious paintings to illustrate his point. He uses these paintings to say that there was less of a boundary between the supernatural and the natural world before and later the boundary became more and more defined. This results in people are doing things less and less for God and more for humanity. I don’t know why, but this is something he regards as bad.

He also argues against people who tried to use reason to justify their belief in God. This he says leads to the creation of a deistic God which has nothing to do with Christianity. Instead he says that since God resides in the supernatural world we can only use faith. Apparently, he didn’t feel any pain from shooting himself in the foot.

Not surprisingly he also takes shots at Francis Bacon, the pioneer of the scientific method. He says that Bacon shifted the focus away from the final cause of explaining things by their (divine) purpose or goal to the material cause of explaining things by their composition and the efficient cause of explaining things by the mechanism of how they came to be. Thus, he claims that secularists are obssessed with origins. I guess he never heard of James Ussher.

He even takes a potshot at Galileo whom he says shifted the focus away from God and toward the self. Galileo, he explains did not move the centre of the universe from the Earth to the Sun, but to his own eye (i.e. himself). This is accompanied by a picture of Galileo looking through a telescope aimed at the stars. And since we have turned away from God he says that everything became subjective.

Throughout the lecture he also used many quotes from the likes of Pascal and other religious people to support his claims. These people he collectively calls “dead white guys”.

I was very disappointed in being mislead once again. I expected to hear a progressive presentation, but what I actually got was someone who wanted people to actually take steps backward (e.g. his anti-reason stance). This is a professor who I can honestly say is at the level of William Lane Craig in terms of bullshit. This guy was gifted with a silver tongue. He was a real propagandist.

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Tagged with: apologetics • Atheism • catholicism • Christianity • church • cult • philosophical • secular • supernatural • University • waterloo • william lane craig

Atheism is Just a Fad?

On December 10, 2009, In Atheism, Religious Arguments, By The Armchair Antichrist

You silly religious people. How can you make such an absurd claim? Atheism is not about being unique, trendy, or even rebellious. It is the conclusion that you come to when you follow the evidence and also the lack thereof.

Contrary to religious belief which is based in emotions, I as an atheist try to be as objective as possible. No amount of fear or hope is going to change my opinion on the cold hard facts of life. But, these very same emotional comforts and threats are the driving force behind religious belief.

Furthermore, if you make this claim you must be ignorant of history. There have been countless cults and religions in the past which promised the same things as yours. Today they make up the mythologies children learn in school. But, your religion is no different than those that have come and gone.

In fact, the religions of today can trace their common descent back in time. They have indeed evolved. Old ideas have been incorporated and refined. For example, Christianity is chock full of pagan influences.

Religion has been a fad since the very beginning. All claims of the uniqueness of this religion or that religion are nonsense. Religion has always needed to reinvent itself to lure in followers (even more than Madonna).

But, under all that smoke and mirrors all religions are the same. It is only a matter of time before children will be learning about the myth of the omnipotent, omniscient and personal god, the myth of heaven and hell, the myth of salvation and all the rest.

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Tagged with: Atheism • Christianity • cult • god • heaven • hell • omnipotent • omniscient • pagan • Religion • religious • salvation

More Special Pleading

On December 4, 2009, In Religious Arguments, By The Armchair Antichrist

The religious are quick to point out the “evils” of atheism and secularism. They say that more people have died under the “atheistic” regimes of Hitler, Stalin, and Pol Pot than by the hands of the religious or in religious conflicts. However, Hitler was a Christian and none of these other dictators killed in the name of atheism. I have demonstrated these points in my earlier posts: Hitler, Stalin, and Pol Pot and Hitler the Christian.

What I intend to do in this post is to reveal the hypocrisy that occurs when their argument is turned on them. When religious crimes against humanity such as the Crusades, the Inquisition, countless pogroms, and more recently the torture and killing of children accused of being witches in Africa are mentioned they are brushed off by the religious in two ways.

Firstly, they may use the no true Scotsman by saying that the people who committed those atrocities were not Christians. Even though they may have considered themselves Christians their actions demonstrate that they were not so. They will say that a true follower of Christ would never commit such heinous crimes. However, this approach does not work because it is an obvious logical fallacy.

Another way is to accept that the people who committed those crimes were Christian, but qualify that with “No man is without sin” or something of that sort. So, we are all sinful creatures who try to follow the path of Christ, but often stray from that path. But, this approach completely undermines Christianity. What is the point of being a Christian if you can’t follow some simple rules like don’t kill indiscriminately?

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