The effects of Atheism and Christianity. (a reply to a science thead, but suits here

[Mandalorious]

Since this would really throw that other thead off track, I decided that this would be a better place for it, and it'll be a good starting point for a new thread where we won't get any of the other stuff there tossed into this discussion.

(not sure if this fits in the rules, ?"Crossposting"? but I don't think that the "science" forum would be a good place to discuss this, so I'll take what I hope is the "lesser of two evils", but anyway) :

Today @ 12:05 PM post located here
Richard Romano:



Dear M.

Tell me, when atheists ruled in the Soviet Union and other parts of the world, what were the casualties then? This is as unfair as your gross oversimplification. The fact that you remain unspecific is an even worse logical error.

I’m just providing “the other side” of the story that AIG and other YEC groups dish out. In their writings they give christianity the credit for anything good, and blame “evolution” for anything that’s bad. You want “gross oversimplification”? Spend an afternoon at AIG reading their stuff. Especially any of those “CreationWise” cartoons, or the “editorials”.

Now, about those casuality rates, under “atheism”, the reason that they’re so high, is: 1) more people alive, due to better agricultural practices 2)more efficient weaponry. What Carl Weiland in his “Bloodstained Century of Evolution” article doesn’t mention. As for oversimplification, he, as does any good creationist, blame the Holocaust on evolution. But, he fails to take into account that the Jews were persecuted for CENTURIES before Darwin came along. To that matter, Darwin never said anything against the jews, and didn’t even believe that the human race could be divided up into distinct “races”. That doesn’t stop the YECs, though from saying that racism/nazism is “consistent” with evolution!

No wonder the creationists aren’t taken seriously in the scientific community.

But the real issue is that you are taking on a self-righteous attitude that condemns Christians, period, without looking at the benefits that Christians have provided to our world.

Again, read AIG’s stuff or ICR’s stuff. To hear them talk, christians have done nothing BUT good, yet history shows that to be not the case. You want “self-righteous attitude”? Again, just read their sites. All I’m doing, to paraphrase Rush Limbaugh is: “I don’t give equal time, I am equal time”.

The only difference is, on those creationist sites, evolutionists do not really get a chance to defend themselves. Any response they make, is selected before it’s posted! By posting on this board, I am giving christians a chance to defend themselves. When you complain to AIG and ICR, etc about their “self-righteous attitude” then you’ll be consistent in it’s condemnation.

Do you know of an atheist foundation that founded a hospital, or built a school for underprivileged people? If there is one, I'll gladly salute their sacrifice, but from what I have seen, such has not been the case.

There is this in India,

Now, to get to our speaker: Lavanam -- single name -- that's it! He is the head of the Atheist Center in India which is a large organization. They do incredible works. They have schools; they have hospitals; they have farms for poor people. They have all kinds of active things and Lavanam is and has been, for all of his life, a Very Positive Atheist. He is going to talk to us about some of the things they are doing in India -- some of the very positive Atheist things that are happening throughout the world and I don't want to take up the hour and a half we have allotted to this for a long introduction, so let's bring on:

but apparently Secular Humanists have set up some…maybe more later.
http://www.holysmoke.org/sdhok/jp-ath.htm


Well, speaking of self-righteousness, read a little about Florence Nightingale

As Faulkenberry noted, many of the heroes and leaders of recent history could reasonably be considered freethinkers or secular humanists: Florence Nightingale, Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, Carl Sagan, Bertrand Russell, Matilda Joslyn Gage, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and many others. Nightingale did more for health than any founders of hospitals, and Jefferson did found a college, the University of Virginia, that was one of the first anywhere not to have a theological school.

Here’s something for you to look at.

"And where are the atheist hospitals?" they tauntingly ask. "We don't see any atheist programs to help the poor and needy," they jeer.

But these claims are far weaker than they may appear. In Muslim countries, for example, there are Muslim schools and charities. In countries dominated by Buddhists we see Buddhist institutions. Even in Cuba, there are schools, hospitals, and public aid organizations, a fact that is frequently pointed to by apologists for Castro. So why should it be thought unusual that, where Christians are to be found in great numbers, there also are to be found Christian-sponsored charitable organizations?

If Christianity were so spectacularly marked by the urge to give to others without asking anything in return, Christian institutions would have done far more than they have. As it is, almost all religious hospitals, clinics, schools, and colleges charge and collect fees that are the same as, or very little different than, similar non-religious organizations. Those associated with religious groups may receive modest or token subsidies, either in the form of cash from generous believers (and unbelievers!) or in the form of free labor provided by an order of monks, nuns, priests, and other volunteers. But the secular organizations engaged in the same activities manage not only to survive without such help but pay taxes to the state and dividends to their shareholders as well. A reasonable person would conclude that the religiously-affiliated schools and hospitals, far from being praiseworthy examples of altruism, are, in fact, inefficient and wasteful of money and resources.

Little wonder why Socrates doesn't take you seriously.

I’ll lose a lot of sleep over that.

regards,

Richard.

Just as Socrates, ICR, AIG, CRF, etc. takes a self-righteous attitude that condemns all non-christians, period, and calls them a bunch of names to boot! How is one worse than the other?

About Atheist hospitals, given that they only account for ~14% of the population, how many hospitals do you think they could set up, especially in a religious society that’s hostile to them? Besides, out of all the hospitals that exist, how many are christian, how many are secular? The athiests see no reason to set up pulic services to convert people. Remember how the Salvation Army got started? They have no reason to force their views on anyone. Besides, we have SECULAR hospitals.

Ah well, here’s a little something:
http://www.atheists.org/tn/johnson.html

Madalyn O’Hair, Jon Murray and Bill Talley of Colorado (who is now deceased) established an American Atheists Alcohol Recovery Group which was able to have the Veteran’s Administration rule that veterans in veteran’s hospitals must be provided secular services in addition to the Christian Alcoholics Anonymous and Palmer Drug Abuse methods.

Atheists have to fight to get non religious alternatives!

Madalyn O’Hair and Jon Murray worked with Arnold Via of Virginia, a former board member, to create the first Atheist cemetery in the United States. It is no longer available for use.

American Atheists opened the first full-fledged, all-Atheist book store in the United States in Denver, Colorado, and the second in Austin, Texas. Madalyn O’Hair was able to obtain a ruling from the Veterans’ Administration to add to the grave markers in veteran’s cemeteries the symbol of American Atheism.

Non-religious groups: Amnesty International, UNESCO, UNICEF, Secular Organizations for Sobriety

http://www.atheists.org/Atheism/ingersollsermon.html
Hospitals:

It is cheerfully admitted that hospitals and asylums have been built by Christians in Christian countries, and it is also admitted that hospitals and asylums have been built in countries not Christian; that there were such institutions in China thousands of years before Christ was born, and that many centuries before the establishment of any orthodox church there were asylums on the banks of the Nile -- asylums for the old, the poor, the infirm -- asylums for the blind and for the insane. and that the Egyptians, even of those days. endeavored to cure insanity with kindness and affection. The same is true of India and probably of most ancient nations.

So in ancient Greece it is said that "from the hands of the priest the cure of the disordered mind first passed into the domain of medicine, with the philosophers. Pythagoras is said to have employed music for the cure of mental diseases. The order of the day for his disciples exhibits a profound knowledge of the relations of body and mind. The early morning was divided between gentle exercise, conversation and music. Then came conversation, followed by gymnastic exercise and a temperate diet. Afterward, a bath and supper with a sparing allowance of wine; then reading, music and conversation concluded the day."

So "Asclupiades was celebrated for his treatment of mental disorders. He recommended that bodily restraint should be avoided as much as possible." It is also stated that "the philosophy and arts of Greece spread to Rome, and the first special treatise on insanity is that of Celsus, which distinguishes varieties of insanity and their proper treatment."

You’re not going to claim that christianity is responsible for the establishment of hospitals in the world, are you? Non-christians, indeed “pagan” set that up first!



PS: about your sig: You do realize that Werner Braun was a Nazi?
From Time, Online Edition:

Tuesday, Mar. 26, 2002
The Rocket Man's Dark Side
Many scientists insist Wernher von Braun only observed German concentration camps. New revelations tell a very different story
BY LEON JAROFF

For reasons best known to von Braun, who held the rank of colonel in the dreaded Nazi SS, the prisoners were ordered to turn their backs whenever he came into view. Those caught stealing glances at him were hung. One survivor recalled that von Braun, after inspecting a rocket component, charged, "That is clear sabotage." His unquestioned judgment resulted in eleven men being hanged on the spot. Says Gehrels, "von Braun was directly involved in hangings."

Hangings were commonplace, and Dora inmates remember von Braun arriving in the morning with an unidentified woman, having to step between bodies of dead prisoners and under others still hanging from a crane. These were not ordinary hangings, Gehrels says, "not hanging that breaks the neck of the prisoner, but they were slowly choked to death with a kind of baling wire around their neck."

In the early days at Dora, condemned men often shouted anti-Nazi slogans to the other prisoners, who were forced to watch the hangings. But the SS soon put an end to that. It became routine to silence the condemned by propping open their mouths with little sticks held in place by baling wire looped around their necks. In a postwar visit to the museum set up at Dora to document the horrors of the camp, Gehrels saw some of those sticks on display, as well as photographs of von Braun at Dora, lest anyone believe that he wasn't present to witness and help perpetrate the horrors.

That's that for now...

[Mandalorious]

http://www.infidels.org/library/maga...3/993faces.htm

[wwatts]

Yesterday @ 12:27 AM post located here
Mandalorious:

Since this would really throw that other thead off track, I decided that this would be a better place for it, and it'll be a good starting point for a new thread where we won't get any of the other stuff there tossed into this discussion.

(not sure if this fits in the rules, ?"Crossposting"? but I don't think that the "science" forum would be a good place to discuss this, so I'll take what I hope is the "lesser of two evils", but anyway) :

I’m just providing “the other side” of the story that AIG and other YEC groups dish out. In their writings they give christianity the credit for anything good, and blame “evolution” for anything that’s bad. You want “gross oversimplification”? Spend an afternoon at AIG reading their stuff. Especially any of those “CreationWise” cartoons, or the “editorials”.

Now, about those casuality rates, under “atheism”, the reason that they’re so high, is: 1) more people alive, due to better agricultural practices 2)more efficient weaponry. What Carl Weiland in his “Bloodstained Century of Evolution” article doesn’t mention. As for oversimplification, he, as does any good creationist, blame the Holocaust on evolution. But, he fails to take into account that the Jews were persecuted for CENTURIES before Darwin came along. To that matter, Darwin never said anything against the jews, and didn’t even believe that the human race could be divided up into distinct “races”. That doesn’t stop the YECs, though from saying that racism/nazism is “consistent” with evolution!

No wonder the creationists aren’t taken seriously in the scientific community.

Again, read AIG’s stuff or ICR’s stuff. To hear them talk, christians have done nothing BUT good, yet history shows that to be not the case. You want “self-righteous attitude”? Again, just read their sites. All I’m doing, to paraphrase Rush Limbaugh is: “I don’t give equal time, I am equal time”.

The only difference is, on those creationist sites, evolutionists do not really get a chance to defend themselves. Any response they make, is selected before it’s posted! By posting on this board, I am giving christians a chance to defend themselves. When you complain to AIG and ICR, etc about their “self-righteous attitude” then you’ll be consistent in it’s condemnation.


There is this in India,




but apparently Secular Humanists have set up some…maybe more later.
http://www.holysmoke.org/sdhok/jp-ath.htm


Well, speaking of self-righteousness, read a little about Florence Nightingale


Here’s something for you to look at.




I’ll lose a lot of sleep over that.

Just as Socrates, ICR, AIG, CRF, etc. takes a self-righteous attitude that condemns all non-christians, period, and calls them a bunch of names to boot! How is one worse than the other?

About Atheist hospitals, given that they only account for ~14% of the population, how many hospitals do you think they could set up, especially in a religious society that’s hostile to them? Besides, out of all the hospitals that exist, how many are christian, how many are secular? The athiests see no reason to set up pulic services to convert people. Remember how the Salvation Army got started? They have no reason to force their views on anyone. Besides, we have SECULAR hospitals.

Ah well, here’s a little something:
http://www.atheists.org/tn/johnson.html
Atheists have to fight to get non religious alternatives!





Non-religious groups: Amnesty International, UNESCO, UNICEF, Secular Organizations for Sobriety

http://www.atheists.org/Atheism/ingersollsermon.html
Hospitals:



You’re not going to claim that christianity is responsible for the establishment of hospitals in the world, are you? Non-christians, indeed “pagan” set that up first!



PS: about your sig: You do realize that Werner Braun was a Nazi?
From Time, Online Edition:






That's that for now...

What does this have to do with philosophy? Besides the fact that it is fallacious to say that a world view is true or untrue based upon how good or bad they are? The reasoning goes like this

1) Christianity did X amount of morally bad things
2) Therefore Christianity is false

Or

1) Atheism did X amount of bad things
2) Therefore Atheism is false

Or

1) Evolution did X amount of morally bad things
2) Therefore evolution is false

(2) doesn't follow from (1).

[Captain Ochre]

Yesterday @ 12:27 AM post located here
Mandalorious:

To that matter, Darwin never said anything against the jews,

Perhaps not, but his writings bear a strong hint of evolution toward higher states from lower. It's a little like excusing a racist on the basis that he wasn't an antisemite.

and didn’t even believe that the human race could be divided up into distinct “races”.

Darwin's quandary was the classification of human races as distinct species.
http://www.infidels.org/library/hist...hapter_07.html

Your claim is in need of support, or at least clarification.

That doesn’t stop the YECs, though from saying that racism/nazism is “consistent” with evolution!

Why should it?

[HRG_new]

Yesterday @ 08:17 PM post located here
Captain Ochre:

<snip>

"That doesn’t stop the YECs, though from saying that racism/nazism is “consistent” with evolution!"


Why should it?

OK. I'll tell you.

Because nazism is an ideology which includes prescriptive statements ("what should be done"), while evolutionary biology is purely descriptive ("what is").

You might equally say that electromagnetism is consistent with the death penalty by electrocution, or that gravity is consistent with pushing people off tall cliffs - or that racism is consistent with the biblical curse on Ham.

What is even funnier is that differences between subgroups of humanity would be consequences of micro-evolution (aka evolution within a species) - a process that even most creationists do not deny.

Regards,
HRG.

"Macroevolution: that which has been established beyond a reasonable doubt.
"Microevolution: that which has been established even beyond creationists' doubts" (S. Johannsen)

[Captain Ochre]

Today @ 08:42 AM post located here
HRG_new:



OK. I'll tell you.

You'll tell me why the fact that Hitler didn't express antisemitism or (supposedly) didn't view races as distinct should discourage the claim that racism is consistent with evolution? Because that that was the point of my question, if it had stayed married to its original context.

Because nazism is an ideology which includes prescriptive statements (&quot;what should be done&quot;), while evolutionary biology is purely descriptive (&quot;what is&quot;).

So, prescriptives are automatically inconsistent with descriptives (iyo)?
Or no?

You might equally say that electromagnetism is consistent with the death penalty by electrocution, or that gravity is consistent with pushing people off tall cliffs - or that racism is consistent with the biblical curse on Ham.

I would say each of the above (albeit I might stick with "electricity" instead of "electomagnetism"). Why aren't each of the supposed prescriptives consistent with the descriptives?

What is even funnier is that differences between subgroups of humanity would be consequences of micro-evolution (aka evolution within a species) - a process that even most creationists do not deny.

The funny part is that skeptic Joe Meert was the one apparently denying applicability of selection to any part of the population below the species level--in our related thread.

Check your private message box, HR.

[John Powell]

POWELL:
I am curious about the subject of this thread, specifically the relative amount good vs bad that has been done under Christianity and atheism. I'm wondering how life on Earth would be different if religion was essentially non-existent among the educated. I'm trying to imagine the world of the future.

I believe that ancient atheist cultures were at a distinct disadvantage compared with their religious neighbors and, so, were typically eliminated or absorbed by them, but things have changed.

I believe atheists are generally more resistant than theists to join "good" causes, especially if death is a significant possibility. Is this good or bad?

On the other hand, I wonder to what extent atheists try extra hard to behave in outwardly ethical ways to discourage the idea that atheists are a social liability. I wonder if it's the same kind of pressure that's felt by other minority groups (e.g., homosexuals, recent emigrants, etc.) to try extra hard to appear good to their majority neighbors.

It's true that an argument of the following form would be an invalid deductive argument,

1. All people who have promoted philosophical position P have done a total of X amount of good and Y amount of bad
2. X >> Y
3. Therefore, P is true.

However, it might be a reasonably strong inductive argument if the conclusion includes "probably" or the idea that "P is more likely true than philosophical position R in which (X_P - Y_P) >> (X_R - Y_R), that is where the good - bad of P is much larger than the good - bad of R."

So, the question is whether the proponents of Christianity have done more good than bad per capita per time period than the proponents of atheism have.

I don't have the answer, yet.

John Powell

[Mandalorious]

06-13-2003 @ 08:17 PM post located here
Captain Ochre:



Perhaps not, but his writings bear a strong hint of evolution toward higher states from lower. It's a little like excusing a racist on the basis that he wasn't an antisemite.

You really need to read some more of his stuff, then. See the quotes I have below, and especially that last one!

Darwin's quandary was the classification of human races as distinct species.
http://www.infidels.org/library/hist...hapter_07.html

, because he couldn't. Nor did he himself really regard that as true, anyway.

Your claim is in need of support, or at least clarification.

Here is some, then: http://www.talkorigins.org/origins/feedback/oct02.html

<~~replying to a questioner asking if Darwin was a racist:

No it is not. The last remaining scientific creationist, during Darwin's day, Louis Agassiz was definitely a racist, but Darwin, and his family, had opposed slavery well before Darwin developed the theory of evolution, adopting the slogan "Am I [the slave} not a Man and a Brother?" and this did not change after he developed the theories for which he is famous.

One thing that has led many to suppose Darwin was a racist is that he was definitely a Eurocentrist. He, like many of his contemporaries, took it as an article of faith that the British, and more specifically the English, civilisation was the very pinnacle of civilisation, and that the indigenous peoples of the colonised world were "savages".

In modern terms, this is "culturist", not racist. However, since the very notion of "race" in the human species is culturally defined, to that extent, and that extent only, one might call Darwin racist. In so doing, one would have to call everyone who thinks their society is better than others to be racist.

When asked if creationists will stop saying that evolution and racism are consistent:

Why should it?

Because there isn't a lick of truth to that statement (that racism is consistent with evolution) at all?

Again, read the above, and read the below quotes: Darwin did NOT believe that humanity could be justifiably divided up into separate races (as we use the word)! If he did, why would he have considered the slaves to be his "brothers"?

Here's the quote I mentioned previously:

But the most weighty of all the arguments against treating the races of man as distinct species, is that they graduate into each other, independently in many cases, as far as we can judge, of their having intercrossed. Man has been studied more carefully than any other animal, and yet there is the greatest possible diversity amongst capable judges whether he should be classed as a single species or race, or as two (Virey), as three (Jacquinot), as four (Kant), five (Blumenbach), six (Buffon), seven (Hunter), eight (Agassiz), eleven (Pickering), fifteen (Bory de St-Vincent), sixteen (Desmoulins), twenty-two (Morton), sixty (Crawfurd), or as sixty-three, according to Burke. This diversity of judgment does not prove that the races ought not to be ranked as species, but it shews that they graduate into each other, and that it is hardly possible to discover clear distinctive characters between them.

(you do realize that all people thought like the first part of the last sentence above in Darwin’s time, but it’s Darwin’s observations that led him to say "it is hardly possible to discover distinictive character between them.~~>From Darwin's "Descent of Man" published in 1871, a dozen years after "Origin":
Is that the quote you had in mind, from the "Infidels" site?

Perhaps some more reading will help you get the full context:

As man advances in civilisation, and small tribes are united into larger communities, the simplest reason would tell each individual that he ought to extend his social instincts and sympathies to all members of the same nation, though personally unknown to him. This point being once reached, there is only an artificial barrier to prevent his sympathies being extended to men of all nations and races.

Charles Darwin, 1872, The Descent of Man and Selection in
Relation to Sex (2nd.ed., 1901:187-8).

Also, this site may help put things in perspective for you, if you seem to think that Darwin wanted to divide up the human race into different races (at least in terms WE use the word)...

This is how Darwin and his contemporaries used it:

So, was Darwin a racist? By today's, hopefully, more enlightened standards he most probably was, in that if you were to ask him straight out if Europeans were intellectually superior to non-Europeans

See the TO quote I had above?

, he would no doubt have said that they are. In this, he was a man of his time and place. This had nothing to do with his evolutionism because there were many creationists at the time, Louise Agassiz for example, who not only considered non-Europeans inferior, but who denied that whites and blacks were even the same species believing that they were independently created by God (polygenism).[/b][u]

However, for a mid-19th century upper class, white, English male, Darwin was very enlightened and "liberal" minded. As one can see from reading the above quotes, he was a staunch abolitionist, he considered blacks and Indians to be people, and he felt disgust and horror at their mistreatment, and he had much sympathy for their plight. Therefore singling Darwin out among 19th century scientists for the label of racist is hardly fair.

As an aside many creationists point to the complete title of Darwin's seminal work; On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection or the Preservation of Favored Races in the Struggle for Life, and claim that the reference to "favored races" illustrates that his evolutionary theories were intended to support racism. Contrary to such assertions this was not a reference to human races per se (one should note that Darwin barely mentioned humans at all in this book). Rather it was merely a reference to localized variations within a species (generic), which may, in a changing environment, grant greater survival value. None of the racist rhetoric about the supposed inherent superiority of certain human races over others was suggested or implied in this.

So, from the beginning the "originator" of the modern theory of evolution was against slavery and did not believe that one could divide humanity up into "sub-species" or "races". Modern science has borne this out. Indeed, there are likely few if any evolutionist scientists who now believes that, yet there still are christian groups who do, and did for hundreds of years. And now, the creationists are trying to pin racism on evolution?? News flash, not only is evolution NOT consistent with racism, it hasn't been around NEAR LONG enough for it to be the cause!

Meanwhile, for centuries, the church had other ideas, and to an extent, still has them today:
http://pages.prodigy.net/aesir/rrr.htm

http://www.televar.com/~vb11thhr/index.html

http://www.kingidentity.com/index.html




We've jusified our claims that evolution and racism are not in the least consistent; now will creationists stop using that lie, or is it too useful?


Ah well...
The "science" of racism

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/racism.html

Rebuttal to 2 AIG articles linking evolution and racism

Hitler and evolution

Hitler's goal was the "purification" of the "Aryan race" through the elimination of "subhumans", which included Jews, gypsies, Asians, black Africans, and everyone else who was not a white Aryan. Despite the creationists claims that this was based on Darwinain evolutionary theory, Hitler's own writings give quite a different story. The ICR claims that "Hitler used the German word for evolution (Entwicklung) over and over again in his book." (ICR Impact, "The Ascent of Racism", Paul Humber Feb 1987) Like so many of ICR's claims, this one is simply not true---a quick scan of several online English translations of Mein Kampf shows only ONE use of the word "evolution", in a context which does not refer at all to biological evolution, but instead to the development of political ideas in Germany: "This evolution has not yet taken the shape of a conscious intention and movement to restore the political power and independence of our nation."

<~~something to remember for the "hitler hate and evolution thread, maybe**


For a look on how Darwin used the term "races" see here.

In the response to someone who asked them about Darwin's book and "favoured races":

The second important point is read the book. Evidently you have not read the book, or absorbed little if you did. If the book was actually racist, as implied, then we should be able to find the relevant passages in the book, where Darwin describes the differential reproductive success and survival rates for the various human races (in the modern sense).
Since we have been dared to cite the full title, and have complied, then I return the challenge. I dare Mr. Cole, or anyone else, to cite the relevant passages from the pages of Darwins book, where he shows his alleged racism. I contend that there are no such passages to cite, and the implication of racism falls away.

<~~challenge to Captain Ochre

[Mandalorious]

Yesterday @ 06:17 PM post located here
John Powell:

POWELL:
I am curious about the subject of this thread, specifically the relative amount good vs bad that has been done under Christianity and atheism. I'm wondering how life on Earth would be different if religion was essentially non-existent among the educated. I'm trying to imagine the world of the future.

I believe that ancient atheist cultures were at a distinct disadvantage compared with their religious neighbors and, so, were typically eliminated or absorbed by them, but things have changed.

I believe atheists are generally more resistant than theists to join &quot;good&quot; causes, especially if death is a significant possibility. Is this good or bad?

First off, what evidence at all do you have to back that up? You do realize there are athiest veterans, (Military Association of Atheists and Freethinkers), and atheist firemen, policemen, etc? See here.

On the other hand, I wonder to what extent atheists try extra hard to behave in outwardly ethical ways to discourage the idea that atheists are a social liability. I wonder if it's the same kind of pressure that's felt by other minority groups (e.g., homosexuals, recent emigrants, etc.) to try extra hard to appear good to their majority neighbors.

I wonder to what extent christians try extra hard to behave in outwardly ethical ways to discourage the idea that christians are a social liability.

Gee, I wonder where the idea came from in the first place that athiests are a "social liabiltiy"? Could it have been, <gasp> Christians??

Well, let's look at one variation of that argument:

Second, if it were true that "atheists have no reason for behaving morally when they get away with behaving immorally," then there should be empirical evidence that purely secular societies have more crime and immoral behavior than theistic societies. Yet the available evidence does not seem to demonstrate that. Indeed, the evidence actually contradicts that prediction. As Adolf Grünbaum writes:

Furthermore, comparison of the crime statistics in the predominantly theist U.S.A. with the largely irreligious countries of Western Europe and Scandinavia resoundingly discredits the recurring claim that the moral conduct of theists is statistically superior to that of secularists, let alone of secular humanists. A fortiori, these statistics belie the smug thesis that the fear or love of God is motivationally necessary, in point of psychological fact, to assure such adherence to moral standards and good citizenship as there is in society at large.

Thus, the U.S.A. has by far the highest percentage of religious worshippers in its population of any Western nation, and presidents from Nixon to Clinton recurrently give prayer breakfasts. In Great Britain, for example, which has the Anglican state church, only about 3 percent of its citizens attend a place of worship, whereas in the U.S., the figure is approximately 33 percent, i.e., greater by a factor of eleven! In the U.S., about 90 percent of the population profess belief in God, whereas in Western Europe and Scandinavia the percentage is very considerably below 50 percent. Nor is the black population in the U.S., in which the crime rate is high, at all predominantly irreligious. Yet the percentage incidence of homicides and other crimes in the God-fearing U.S. is much higher than in the heavily secularized Western countries. And a corresponding disparity exists between the respective percentages of the prison populations in these societies.

See Adolf Grünbaum, "The Povery of Theistic Morality" Science, Mind and Art (Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1995), pp. 203-242; Avi Sagi and Daniel Statman, Religion and Morality (trans. Batya Stein, Atlanta: Rodopi, 1995), pp. 107-112; Theodore M. Drange, "Why Be Moral?"; and Richard Carrier, "Does the Christian Theism Advocated by J.P. Moreland Provide a Better Reason to be Moral than Secular Humanism?".

from here
So, maybe a few cases can be dismissed as "acting", but whole nations of secularists? Maybe your assumption about atheists being a "social liability" is wrong?


Well, here's some examples of these "socail liabilites" for you, John. Of course the strength in his arguement is, that no matter how many examples I bring up, he can just say "they're trying to "behave in outwardly ethical ways to discourage the idea that they're a social liability" ad infinitum:
http://www.ffrf.org/fttoday/september2000/monson.html

Voltaire

Secular Organizations for Sobriety : SOS National Clearinghouse PO Box 5 Buffalo, NY 14215-0005.

It's true that an argument of the following form would be an invalid deductive argument,

1. All people who have promoted philosophical position P have done a total of X amount of good and Y amount of bad
2. X &gt;&gt; Y
3. Therefore, P is true.

However, it might be a reasonably strong inductive argument if the conclusion includes &quot;probably&quot; or the idea that &quot;P is more likely true than philosophical position R in which (X_P - Y_P) &gt;&gt; (X_R - Y_R), that is where the good - bad of P is much larger than the good - bad of R.&quot;

So, the question is whether the proponents of Christianity have done more good than bad per capita per time period than the proponents of atheism have.

Actually, the point of this thread was to say that christians should stop blaming all sorts of evils on evolution/athiesm, because their own hands are far from clean, and yes, atheists actually CAN be moral people, just like anyone else!

I don't have the answer, yet.

John Powell

Well, hopefully the links and quotes I gave will help you in looking for it.