Re: Re: Re: Questions for Atheists....
Re: Re: Re: Questions for Atheists....
Originally posted by Scrimshaw
Actually, most theists believe that humans possess a spiritual apsect to their existence as well.
If that means we are more then just our atoms, I think you are right. Both the whole is more as it's parts, but also the parts belonging to a whole, are different from parts not belonging to the whole. A DNA molecule outside of it's natural environment, is not the same as the DNA molecule residing in the cell nucleus, even if it contains the same atoms. Such a molecule acts entirely different, and therefore you can not claim it's the same.
But if our very existence is arbitrary, so is anything we care about, including caring about ourselves.
I don't agree, since (for the majority of manhood) that is not what we observe our behaviour to be.
You're missing the point. It is irrelevant what caused us to care about our survival. Our survival itself would be arbitrary, meaningless. Our survival would be POINTLESS because what is the point of surviving if your life inevitably ends in death anyway?? Why spend your whole life trying to avoid what is inevitably going to happen anyway. (Death) What an utterly futile waste of time; trying to survive when surviving is an impossible task to acheive. The fact is, survival would be irrelevant because our existence would be irrelvant. Our existence would be no more important or meaningful than that of an interstellar gas cloud.
Then I think you missed the point. If that was the case, manhood would already have gone extinct. Our biological nature provide us guidelines for our survival. Our feelings of happiness or misery determine what behaviour makes us feel good and what makes us feel bad, and for most people, they strive for happiness.
You are missing the point of what 3,2 billion years of evoultion did to our species. When we look around we can see that our species is the most evolved, even when not all of our organs are the best organs found in nature.
When we look back and see where we are now, you can not escape from caring about what so many billions of years of evolution and human development brought us, to be what we are now. And the ultimate goal of humans is freedom, to live in a environment in which our human goals can be fulfilled.
Wrong. The argument exposes that if there is no higher power that gives meaning to existence, and if our existence is the arbitrary by-product of a cosmic accident, then there is no point in living, arguing, debating, or caring about anything whatsoever. If all we are is merely another collection of molecules in a hostile universe, then we would have no logical reason to care about anything. Sure, you may say we can be puppets of our instincts and biological chemicals, like the rest of the animal kingdom, but the existence of our elaborate consciousness and self-awareness would never allows us to act as mere puppets - and be content. Our conscious intelligence overrides our instincts.
The rest of the universe cares for nothing at all, so if all we are is an arbitrary component of the universe, why should we care about anything either?
I don't think that our lives are arbitrary. At least not TO US.
And further I don't think, that you realy mean that.
In my opinion most people don't have to be convinced about these issues, and if we just observe behaviour of people, you don't find evidence for the fact that our lives would just be "arbitrary".
The question is then: why do you assume that it should be the case that all of material reality, including the fact we are living in that, is irrelevant? What makes you think it does?
Or, humans are nothing but an invention of a deity. :think:
While this thought might be "helpfull" to some, I could not escape thinking of what invented that deity then. :think:
All you're doing now is restating atheistic assumptions, not justifying or explaining atheism's end game. My post was about atheism's end game. Your response failed to give any meaningful answers to any of the questions I raised in my first post.
I think your post just shows your prejudice towards atheism, and neither reflect truly on what being human actually is like.
Your defense on theism is defended on the following reasoning:
1. If atheism is right, then human lives would just be arbitrary
2. Humans lives are not arbitrary
3. Therefore theism is right
Assumption 2 is I think correct, for the reasons I already mentioned. If a species would exist not taking care about it's own existence and survival, nature would already have let that species go extinct. So the fact that we exists, means that we had to be caring about our own survival.
However, I do not agree with assumption 1. It shows nothing but prejudice against the atheist point of view.
If you need those wrong assumption for defending your own viewpoints, then that is it, but it realy is not an argument pro theism or against atheism, in fact I think you do not realy understand what atheist actually think.
I can not think about a deity, who "created" the matter, time and space, cause this then would have had to happen at a moment, when there was no time, at a place where there was no space, and the universe would have been made from nothing at all.
This Deity would have had to reside then in no time and no space, which for me means, that it has no independend existence. This does not contradict the fact that deities can be hold to "exist", but that form of existence is entirely within our minds, and not outside of it.
Apart from the human mind (and perhaps some other intelligent species) I don't think that deities exist. That's my point.
While being an atheist and materialist, I however don't say that I can not understand the viewpoint of theism. I do understand it myself, I do know why people are tended to think that there must have been a deity.
And the issue on hand which brought me to this knowledge, resides within my own thinking, and concentrates on the issue of how being and thinking are interrelated.
The issue is this, is as you stated, the whole of the material world would be an arbitrary thing, if it realy would not matter wether there was a world, or not, then one could ask: why is there a world (a universe, a reality) in the first place, instead of nothing at all?
Think about that! :think: :think: :think:
As I digged into this question, my thinking went as follows. Think about anything that we know to exist, or that could exist, and in your thinking, assume that that would not exist. No people, no animals, no plants, no oceans, no land, no mountains, no earth, no moon, no sun, no planets no stars, no galaxies.... etc. etc.
After concentrating on that issue, you will arrive at a point of total darkness, a sort of total emptyness, a dark nothing, a void where no atoms, light, particles or fields exist.
But even that is not "nothing" because still time and space exist, and ..... me thinking that!
How could I get rid in my thinking of me thinking/imaginging about a "non-existing" world?????
Fact is: I could not. I can never imagine completely a world which is not even there, cause at least it would contain me thinking that thought.
And the meaning of this is as follows. Assuming that the world could as well be non-existing, brings me to the conclusion that that would also erase me from existence.
I can not help but to care about my own existence, which then for me means that it is an unpleasant idea to think that nothing whatsoever (including myself) does not exist.
So as to the issue wether or not it is important that there is a material world, I can definately say, that I do care, because without a material world, nothing would be there, not even me, and I do care about my own existence, and so it does matter to me, there is a material reality in the first place!
