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Is Atheism just another cult, with their own dogma, like religious cults?
Is Atheism just another cult, like a religious cult, with people who believe there is no god, and in most cases also that what is presented by science is the absolute truth? Do people of an Agnostic persuasion believe, atheists have a blind faith in science, believing what they show, and measure is the last word about reality; believing that this Science supports their side of the debate while excluding the Religious view.
Those in the middle of the God/No God debate (Agnostics) have stated that such a claim is delusional and is indicative of cult mentality on par with religious cultism. It requires blind belief God does not exist which is dogmatic because there is no proof (currently) that is acceptably to the Agnostic crowd that God is or is not. Agnostics see the gaps in Scientific knowledge and try to keep an open mind pertaining to spiritual ideas and their connection to the real world. They have sometimes been accused of creating the Scientific idea of Creationism which has gathered steam in the last decade or so. Being in the middle, They are attacked by both sides of the debate, as will be demonstrated in this debate question.
Biting and Kicking is allowed by the Author and leaves it to TED to tell us where the limits lie.
Closing Statement from John Moonstroller
"Is Atheism just another cult, with their own dogma, like religious cults?"
“The word cult in current popular usage usually refers to a new religious movement or other group whose beliefs or practices are considered abnormal or bizarre.[1] The word originally denoted a system of ritual practices. The word was first used in the early 17th century denoting homage paid to a divinity and derived from the French culte or Latin cultus, ‘worship’, from cult-, ‘inhabited, cultivated, worshipped,’ from the verb colere, 'care, cultivation'.” ~ Wikipedia
“Dogma is the official system of belief or doctrine held by a religion, or a particular group or organization” ~ Wikipedia.
Organizations of atheists ritually denounce the existence of God. They have become an organization, dedicated to the activity of removing all relic’s of Theism from public places. Their dogma is based entirely on their notion or belief that God does not exist. These organizations work tirelessly towards this effort.
It is no longer possible for an individual to simply state they are an atheist, by reason of personal belief, and not be affiliated, by membership or indirect alignment with these organizations.
These organizations have an official system of belief and their doctrine is to end the belief of theism on this planet.
They are exclusive, ritualistic, and have a belief system which generates activity within and beyond the boundaries of the organization. They are a Cult.
Not everyone agrees with this interpretation but the meaning of words evolve over time. To be an Atheist is to believe in a dogma and be a member of a club or organization. In the least, an individual is indirectly aligned with these clubs or organizations by belief or personal assertion they are an atheist.
John Moonstroller
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Roy Bourque 20+
The mystics never saw God that way. They saw the universe as the product of a common denominator that could not be equated to any person, place, or thing. To the mystics, God was the power driving the creative processes of the universe. Because you couldn't put it into words, it was referred to as the ineffable mystery. The atheists haven't questioned the definition of God, they have thrown out the whole concept.
If you look at science, the ineffable mystery hasn't gone away. No one can explain why every atom in the universe conforms to the same model. No one can explain why every electron in the universe is exactly alike despite the fact that they are scattered throughout the universe, seemingly connected by nothing, the same being true for every proton and every neutron. No one can explain why the octet rule of chemistry works. No one can explain why electrons are arranged into orbital shells and subshells, each one of which contains a specified number of electrons, or why the shells and subshells are filled in a very specific order.
So let me get this straight; a universe, which may be infinitely old, is deaf, dumb, and blind. It has created stars, planets, solar systems, galaxies, quasars, black holes, and the like with no concept of what it is doing. The values of subatomic particles are just right so that life could evolve purely by chance. And after many billions of years, the end result is the only intelligence out of all this! And how do we know this? Because the visible universe, of which we are a part, makes up a whopping 4% of the total. Now why am I not convinced? Because I have seen what the mystics have seen.
John Moonstroller 20+
Obey No1kinobe 50+
John Moonstroller 20+
So, for TED's sake and to the confusion of everyone else but you and I, I'm trying to relate how this is significant to the discussion.
What does Einsteins Theory of Relativity say about infinity and how does it affect Physics theory when we take it to it's infinite end?
Short cut: division by zero is undefined. The knowledge of physics falls into the black hole.
Here is a huge stop sign that signals we have more work to do but there are no recommendations. I'm kinda stuck here Obey. Do you have any math skills?
:)
I'm going to delete this after I decide if it has any relevance to the discussion topic.
John Frum 30+
How do you suppose subatomic particles would differ from each other? Mass? Charge? Spin? We know that at such small scales, each particle can have very specific values. This means that there is very little room for variation. However, if you look at the quantum properties, you'll see that no two electrons have the same set of properties. i.e. no two electrons are alike. This is called the Pauli's exclusion principle. This, combined with the principle of least energy answers your questions about shells and subshells. Read http://www.dynamicscience.com.au/tester/solutions/chemistry/atomic%20structure/shellssubshells.htm.
Coming to "Now why am I not convinced?". Well, because you started out with lies and falsehoods. Who told you that life and intelligence began after many billion years? Life on earth? Sure. Why have you concluded that that's all there is?
Mystics have made all kinds of funny claims over the millennia. If only they had made concrete statements about the nature of things, we'd have always known that (1) the earth is spherical, (2) cowpox renders you immune to smallpox, (3) there are over 90 elements that make up everything we see around us, and so on, including the fact that they could have saved us from spending billions € on the LHC. Instead, mystics seem to be happy to always either lie about what science has already discovered, or make comments about which science itself is not developed enough to comment on. Since science is a moving target, mysticism also has changed accordingly. Earlier, the mystics were happy to pontificate on the 5 elements (earth, fire, etc.), and these days, since scientists have firmly demolished that, mystics have come up with "quantum philosophy".
Colour me unconvinced.
Roy Bourque 20+
Thanks for the link. It explains some things, but it still doesn't explain why the entire universe conforms to a common field theory. There is a unity that underlies all that exists that we accept without any understanding of why it is so.
Who told me that life and intelligence began after many billion years? The atheists, who else. Richard Dawkins says that we are the intelligent result of unintelligent beginnings. I was on the verge of being an atheist myself. But my own mystical experiences led me to accept that life is not limited to this dimension of reality.
Mystics don't see things in scientific ways, but they do see things that do not conform to what fundamentalists claim. What I experienced does not explain quantum physics, but is in total harmony with it. It allowed me to accept scientific claims without conflict to religious ideals, but it also caused me to question what religion is teaching and how religion conducts its business.
Mystics have always known that the earth is spherical but they couldn't get the fundamentalists to see it. And yes, the mystics don't see all. Many things we had to figure out for ourselves. Mysticism is more about transcendence and self control; some behaviors are self destructive, particularly those that are linked to the animal passions. To rise above that mentality is the root of all religious claims concerning demons.
I have no problem with atheists denying God based on the current definition. I deny it myself. But I have seen another view of what God means, and it is directly linked to the unified field theory. Quantum fields are everywhere, they are invisible, they are what is doing the creating. The right brain hemisphere sees the creative forces of nature as a creator, which is the root of all personifications concerning God as creator. But God is not the personification. God is what is being personified. Take it back to what is doing the creating, and it totally agrees with science.
John Frum 30+
You probably know this already, but I'll write it anyway: the only mechanism that we know that produces the complex elements that we are all made of (carbon, oxygen, etc.) is in supernova explosions, i.e. we are all made of exploded stars. These stars too lived very long lives. Given how common planets are, don't you think it is likely that some of them have conditions to support the initiation of life? I remind you again: some of the fundamental chemicals have already been found floating around in space.
I am not saying life is definitely out there. What I am saying is that it is wrong to draw one conclusion, or the other, and base an entire philosophy on that.
"Richard Dawkins says that we are the intelligent result of unintelligent beginnings."
Let's forget Dawkins for a while. Would you disagree with the statement that "intelligence" is not a binary state, but there is a lot of grey area between what is intelligent, and what is not? Some of the viruses are just fragments of DNA. Their behaviour is extremely deterministic. That's one end of the spectrum. From there, we have bacteria are capable of moving towards "food" or away from "danger". We have plants that have chemicals to enable phototrophic growth. We have animals with rudimentary muscles to enable them to move from place to place in search of "food". We have other animals that chase after some of these animals. Thus leading to an arms-race for faster and faster animals that chase after and/or run away from other animals. At each stage, we find animals that have moved one step closer to our own "intelligence
John Frum 30+
Looking at things in another way, we have extremely basic instruction sets on every computer around. Fundamentally, these instructions just control which set of wires current flows through in a circuit. From this we have developed all kinds of software. Some that can break Nazi communications code, some that can track a missile and fire another one to destroy it, some that can compress or decompress data, some that enable us to play games, etc. Then there are genetic algorithms (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_algorithm) that even evolve other programs. This playing field has several parallels with the chemical/biological playing field.
Will this, one day, result in an intelligence that can match or surpass our own? I don't know!
Keep in mind that every neuron in any animal (nematode or human) behaves in exactly the same way: an "analog summing circuit" that an electronic engineer can implement in just a few minutes.
Roy Bourque 20+
I can agree with everything that you said. I would take this one step further; that intelligence doesn't have to be physical. Are there other realms or dimensions in which intelligence exists? We are coming to realize that we know far less about the universe than we thought we did.
If biological life happened by chance, it still goes back to what supports it. Are you familiar with reductionism? Life unfolding is reductionism in reverse. Everything that is possible must be supported with what it is made of. And what everything is made of determines the processes through which chance operates. Is it entirely limited to chance? Evolutionists will admit that life goes through quantum leaps. And evolutionists haven't proven that chance alone is responsible for evolutionary changes.
John Frum 30+
This is quite like Monty Python's "Funniest Joke in the World". http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LhmnOpoGAPw If no one knows it, no one dies laughing from it. Likewise, a non-physical intelligence would have no effect on anything physical.
"And evolutionists haven't proven that chance alone is responsible for evolutionary changes."
This is not true. People in the drugs and genetics industry already have extremely accurate models of some lower-order life-forms. They can already predict in which ways, and in which sites along the DNA the life-form will mutate. This, again, is how genetic algorithms work too... by random mutations giving rise to slightly different offsprings, and then evolutionary pressure killing off offsprings that are unsuitable to the environment, and nurturing the ones that are.
Roy Bourque 20+
I have added your link to the Chinese room experiment to my bookmarks. Thank you.
If you think that intelligence is limited to the space between our ears, then you haven't had the experiences that I have had. I had an experience at the age of nine, that after fifty years, I haven't found fault with it yet. The ideas that it presented was confirmed by nuclear physics, but that wasn't until eleven years later. What I saw was clearly beyond anything that I was learning at the time. The only other explanation that I can think of is that the knowledge was already preprogrammed in my brain when I was born, and I just needed to access it. I suppose that is possible, but it has certain implications.
My wife's doctor said "pick your pill, pick your poison". When I look at the side effects of prescription drugs, I see a fallacy in your argument. I can accept that random chance can explain the differences in appearances and niches that life takes on. But I can't accept that pure random chance alone can explain the integration and networking of all our internal systems. There seems to be a directing force that is not limited to chance. I may be wrong, but show me the proof.
John Frum 30+
I am curious about the experience you had as a 9-year old. That age (9-10) is approximately when I realized that all the supernatural stuff that the elders were talking about was hokum.
"But I can't accept that pure random chance alone can explain the integration and networking of all our internal systems."
That's where you are right and wrong at the same time :-). You are right in that if mutations are random, there are chances that some offspring will be produced where the internal systems are NOT all well integrated. But consider the fact that not all mutations are conducive to a long, healthy life. Most mutations do not have much of an effect, as we can see in each healthy person around us. We then reproduce and pass on our mostly useless mutations to our children. Some mutations render the fetus even unable to develop long enough to develop into a baby. Others will leave them with diseases that would kill them before they are old enough to have kids and pass on their mutations. Yet others will develop diseases later on in life: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_genetic_disorders. Most commonly, many (all? I'm not sure) of our cancers are results of genetic mutations. This is exactly why we die from radiation poisoning. Look at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cancer to see how frequently and how prominently mutation features in the article.
Roy Bourque 20+
You may be surprised to know that many cancers are part of all of us, and that our mental health and eating habits have a lot to do with who gets them and who don't. Dr. Oz on TV speaks of cancer combating foods while Dr. Arthur Janov, author of "The New Primal Scream" says that many cancers are preventable by good mental health. He explains the process in his book.
Radiation poisoning is the cause of genetic mutations that are external. I don't believe that all genetic mutations are external, but external ones produce totally random mutations.
Roy Bourque 20+
At that point, I was in a quandary. I didn't know how to get alone with God because I didn't know who or what God was. One Sunday afternoon, I started meditating on God. I wanted God to reveal himself to me so that I could find the answers to my questions. As I meditated, a voice spoke saying "look around you". We often analyze things in our minds and we know the voice is our own thoughts. This voice wasn't mine. I realized that it might have been part of myself talking, but it was clearly foreign to me.
I expected some apparition to appear. I looked all around, but saw nothing. In disappointment, I continued meditating, and the same voice said the same thing. This time I decided to wait for what might appear as the first time brought no result. As i waited in anticipation for what might appear, the voice again spoke saying "why are you looking for what is not there and you can't see what is?"
I realized that I was looking for God as a male deity apart from reality because that is what I was taught. As I thought about what I just heard, I began to look deeply at what was there. In that moment, I found myself in an altered reality. I inherently knew that God was not a male deity, nor was apart from reality. God was the underlying forces of nature which were inherent in all that exists. What those forces were, I didn't know, but I knew that they were all reducible to a common denominator. The experience lasted about five minutes. I couldn't take all that I saw back with me when I came out of this experience, but my nuclear training began to bring it all back. Since then, much of the experience has been recounted through science.
John Frum 30+
John Smith 30+
"The values of subatomic particles are just right so that life could evolve purely by chance."
No, life evolved according to the constraints that the nature of the universe provided, we are adapted to the physical constants, not the other way! Also, it's very much possible the universe went through a gazillion iterations before and/or that there exists multiple universes concurrently, each with different physical constants.
Now explain to me why god could have appeared by chance out of nothingness, but not the universe as we know it?
Roy Bourque 20+
The right brain deals with integrity, honesty, moral character development, justice, etc. The left brain deals with structure, repetitive patterns, and processes. Neither one is wrong if you view them correctly. Both are wrong if you view them incorrectly. That is why deception is such an issue with religion. If only we could get them to see their own deceptions.