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Personally I've always found, ironically, some of my most ardent atheist friends to essentially treat the topic with a level of intensity you might expect from

Personally I've always found, ironically, some of my most ardent atheist friends to essentially treat the topic with a level of intensity you might expect from a religious evangelist. Often there's also a level of religious fervor they carry over to politics as well. I don't really care what other peoples religion/non-religion is anymore than what type of underwear they prefer, and yet...

bedobi 2y ago
i agree with your sentiment, but it bears pointing out that no one brandishes their underwear in people's faces screaming that they must wear the same ones, or use the political system to privilege people of the same underwear and punish others etc etc fwiw me personally i'm all in on uniqlo airism, there is no better underwear and if i could force everyone to wear them i would (for their own good, of course)
- steveBK123 2y ago
  Well there were the old Michael Jordan ads...
MrMcCall 2y ago
We already know that our science can simply not explain/understand what happened in the first 10e-33s after the Big Bang, which is just established science. There is nothing more "negatively religious" than believing that nothing caused that primal explosion of all that is. Unfortunately, they then proceed to throw out the positive aspects of some religious teachings concerning, e.g., compassionate concern for our fellow human beings. Regardless, religion is a personal thing; forcing any beliefs on others is always a problem and must be prevented. We are all free to choose our attitudes and behaviors. Behaviors that harm others, however, must -- in a just system -- be dealt with by the society, for the benefit of the whole, irrespective of belief system of perpetrator or victim. Using compassion to make such decisions is always the best way, for varying values of compassion.
- jfactorial 2y ago
  > We already know that our science can simply not explain/understand what happened in the first 10e-33s after the Big Bang, which is just established science. Yet. There's a very big difference in "I don't know," vs. "I know that no one can ever know."
  - MrMcCall 2y ago
    Absolutely. I actually know that (know that I don't know, but that my not knowing doesn't mean that no other person can know), but modern science will not be the source of such explanations. Those explanations can only be accessed once we understand that the universe itself is queryable (that is our joint purpose here, us and our expansive environment together) and that a human being needs to undergo a process of self-evolution to become aligned with the Creator's Intent such that we gain access to it. You could say that a person must learn of the challenge, accept the challenge, and then pass all the tests, thereby gaining access.
    - jfactorial 2y ago
      > once we understand that the universe itself is queryable We do understand that. "What happens when I push a rock off a cliff?" is a query to the universe. The universe's response is observable when the experiment is executed and the rock is pushed. > a human being needs to undergo a process of self-evolution to become aligned with the Creator's Intent I have no need for this hypothesis. We can query the universe at any time simply by observing it, proposing a falsifiable explanation for what is observed, and acting within it to test our explanations.
      - MrMcCall 2y ago
        There are deeper queries than "What happens when I push a rock off a height?" The science and math of Newton's laws of motion is enough for that, especially if combined with some materials science. I didn't say that you "needed" anything, but the fact remains that if you want to calculate the trajectory of something traveling at a significant percent of light speed, you will need some higher maths. Such calculations require advancing one's mind, as do other queries. But, no, none of that is necessary to find out what happens when a person's cat pushes something off the countertop. No observation was even feasible for Einstein to formulate GR or Feynman to formulate QED, so if all that matters to you is what you see, that's your choice; I wish you well.
add-sub-mul-div 2y ago
Feeling strongly about lack of belief in something wild without evidence is not congruent to strong belief in something wild without evidence. Even if the people in the former camp can be equally passionate or annoying. Suddenly there's this big unnamed (or is it named and I don't know it?) cognitive error that I see everywhere that is believing in an automatic symmetry between two opposing viewpoints. Sometimes one idea is better than another. No, you don't get "objectivity" points for virtue signaling that you're above the whole debate.
- steveBK123 2y ago
  It's funny that questioning evangelical atheism is getting me more downvotes than even questioning AI or Crypto..
  - add-sub-mul-div 2y ago
    Well, again, believing that modern AI is close to what human consciousness and intelligence are, or that coders will fix society without running into Chesterton's fence, are good examples of huge beliefs that require huge justification. For which faith isn't a good substitute. You shouldn't be made to feel like you're extremist in the opposite direction for requiring that justification.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]

bedobi 2y ago

i agree with your sentiment, but it bears pointing out that no one brandishes their underwear in people's faces screaming that they must wear the same ones, or use the political system to privilege people of the same underwear and punish others etc etc fwiw me personally i'm all in on uniqlo airism, there is no better underwear and if i could force everyone to wear them i would (for their own good, of course)

steveBK123 2y ago
Well there were the old Michael Jordan ads...

MrMcCall 2y ago

We already know that our science can simply not explain/understand what happened in the first 10e-33s after the Big Bang, which is just established science. There is nothing more "negatively religious" than believing that nothing caused that primal explosion of all that is. Unfortunately, they then proceed to throw out the positive aspects of some religious teachings concerning, e.g., compassionate concern for our fellow human beings. Regardless, religion is a personal thing; forcing any beliefs on others is always a problem and must be prevented. We are all free to choose our attitudes and behaviors. Behaviors that harm others, however, must -- in a just system -- be dealt with by the society, for the benefit of the whole, irrespective of belief system of perpetrator or victim. Using compassion to make such decisions is always the best way, for varying values of compassion.

jfactorial 2y ago
> We already know that our science can simply not explain/understand what happened in the first 10e-33s after the Big Bang, which is just established science. Yet. There's a very big difference in "I don't know," vs. "I know that no one can ever know."
- MrMcCall 2y ago
  Absolutely. I actually know that (know that I don't know, but that my not knowing doesn't mean that no other person can know), but modern science will not be the source of such explanations. Those explanations can only be accessed once we understand that the universe itself is queryable (that is our joint purpose here, us and our expansive environment together) and that a human being needs to undergo a process of self-evolution to become aligned with the Creator's Intent such that we gain access to it. You could say that a person must learn of the challenge, accept the challenge, and then pass all the tests, thereby gaining access.
  - jfactorial 2y ago
    > once we understand that the universe itself is queryable We do understand that. "What happens when I push a rock off a cliff?" is a query to the universe. The universe's response is observable when the experiment is executed and the rock is pushed. > a human being needs to undergo a process of self-evolution to become aligned with the Creator's Intent I have no need for this hypothesis. We can query the universe at any time simply by observing it, proposing a falsifiable explanation for what is observed, and acting within it to test our explanations.
    - MrMcCall 2y ago
      There are deeper queries than "What happens when I push a rock off a height?" The science and math of Newton's laws of motion is enough for that, especially if combined with some materials science. I didn't say that you "needed" anything, but the fact remains that if you want to calculate the trajectory of something traveling at a significant percent of light speed, you will need some higher maths. Such calculations require advancing one's mind, as do other queries. But, no, none of that is necessary to find out what happens when a person's cat pushes something off the countertop. No observation was even feasible for Einstein to formulate GR or Feynman to formulate QED, so if all that matters to you is what you see, that's your choice; I wish you well.

add-sub-mul-div 2y ago

Feeling strongly about lack of belief in something wild without evidence is not congruent to strong belief in something wild without evidence. Even if the people in the former camp can be equally passionate or annoying. Suddenly there's this big unnamed (or is it named and I don't know it?) cognitive error that I see everywhere that is believing in an automatic symmetry between two opposing viewpoints. Sometimes one idea is better than another. No, you don't get "objectivity" points for virtue signaling that you're above the whole debate.

steveBK123 2y ago
It's funny that questioning evangelical atheism is getting me more downvotes than even questioning AI or Crypto..
- add-sub-mul-div 2y ago
  Well, again, believing that modern AI is close to what human consciousness and intelligence are, or that coders will fix society without running into Chesterton's fence, are good examples of huge beliefs that require huge justification. For which faith isn't a good substitute. You shouldn't be made to feel like you're extremist in the opposite direction for requiring that justification.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]