h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Thank you for directing me to this guide entry. I haven't had a chance to read all the conversations yet - too busy reading 'The God Delusion' by Richard Dawkins! http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/brunel/F19585?thread=4005961 But please allow me one preliminary question. Why 'Atheist Fundamentalism' and not just 'Atheism'? I approach this subject from a Christian perspective and a scientific background and, like many people, link fundamentalism with extremism. Similarly I am suspicious of any fundamentalism, be it religious or atheistic. If, as atheists, you save your harshest criticism for religious fundamentalism, why do you give yourselves a label which may deny you a hearing because of people's perceptions? Best wishes, Random Mood

Well there is hardly any content on the page, so it is difficult to ask whether the label is appropriate.

Even a moderate Christian would probably consider atheism a bad thing, so I don't see how considering religion a bad thing makes one a fundamentalist atheist.

Perhaps you can tell us what you consider most clearly distinguishes the fundamentalist christian from the normal christian and we can go from there.

Well, largely it's 'pour épater les religieux' - a joke to wind up the easily offended.

But also it is precisely, to use your words, to "...give [myself] a label which may deny [me] a hearing because of people's perceptions." There are many other forums where faith-related issues are raised. I start from the (obvious) premise that there's no reason whatsoever to suppose the existence of god(s). Thus if I see an argument based on that supposition, that's grounds for arguing against it. It inevitably leads to having to go over the old atheism/god ground yet again when that wasn't even the topic at hand. Hypothetical example:
"I think penguins are evil because my religion says so"
"That's a nonsensical argument since its based on the false premise that god teaches us things through religion."
"Ah, but you can't prove that..."

Hence my setting up Atheism Fundamentalism where we can discuss The Big Ideas without having to address fundamentals every bleedin' time. The religious are welcome to participate but have been giving fair warning. I mean...I wouldn't gatecrash a bible studies group.

Also...I have to question your suspicion of fundamentalism. I suspect you are fundamentalist on many issues. For example, I'd be scared of anyone who didn't fundamentally oppose murder and oppressiion (I *assume* you do.). The differences between good and bad behaviour can easily be distinguished on purely Rationalist grounds, hence they cut across all faiths and none. In any religion, and amongst atheists, there are both good and bad people. (which suggests to me that religion doesn't actually deliver anything - but that's a side issue). But moving on from behaviour to *thinking*...It seems to me that religious ways of thinking can be used to argue for pretty much *any* course of behaviour. No religious argument can be gainsayed: any religious argument as as empirically valid as any other. So I'm a fundamentalist about valid and invalid forms of argument. The nice, fluffy believers, by tolerating unfounded beliefs, give comfort to the enemy.

But, yes, some people have a conniption fit when I refuse to tolerate their religion (especially new-age tree-hugging types )...and I rather enjoy that. As a (not very good) band sing:
If you tolerate this, your children will be next.

Fundamental

http://www.answers.com/fundamental&r=67

I think there is some dodgy philosophy implicit in this concept. So I'm not sure that I do 'fundamentally' oppose murder, for example - I do very much oppose it, but I don't think we are just using 'fundamentalist' to mean 'very much so' here.

Fundamental:
1. Relating to the foundation. No - I reject foundationalism. Foundationalist thinking relies on the existence of a foundation that cannot be justified at all. Or to put it another way there is a problem of infinite regress. But we do not know interesting things by deduction from other things, deductions are generally less interesting than the supposed universal laws or axioms, but do, importantly, give us a way to test universal theories.

2. An essential component. There is a whiff here of essentialism which I also reject. We can only know about things according to how they interact. Go beneath the surface and you get more exhaustive interactions, not essences.

Of course I am not suggesting that an ethical system wont have conceptual building blocks that are critical to the whole - it will. But I don't see how opposition to murder necessarily has a closer relation to any particular conceptual building block, than, say, opposition to coughing in the theatre.

Thank you for your responses, I will reply in due course.

See also

http://atheistself.blogspot.com/2007/03/we-are-we-arent-my-version.html

EB...

You make some good points, but beware of Argument By Dictionary.
1) Do dictionaries define what words mean? Or reflect what people use them to mean? If they do the latter...then they may well reflect a range of overlapping and perhaps incompatible meanings.
2) Even if we assume they define words...we still can't be sure that either party has understood the definitions...especially when there is more than one.

However...I'm happy with the word Fundamentalist. It is a mis-use to apply it to mean "The nasty religious people who do bad things". Quakers and Jains are fundamentalists, aren't they? And I'm happy if people are wound up by my refusal to accept that any given religion is merely one of a number of valid opinions.

On that blog...'Close Minded'

Ah, that old one. Yes, my mind is closed to many, many possibilities. I think it is highly unlikely that the sky is polka-dotted, there are fairies at the bottom of my garden or that Coldplay produce anything of value. My mind can only be opened by a decent evidence, not by willing suspension of disbelief.

I'm going to throw this one out..

Supposing.. supposing a fundamentalist can loosely be described as someone who is utterly convinced of their world view, so much so that they get incredibly angry and irritated with anyone who dissents from it.

So, you get a Jew and a Muslim "fundamentalist" (insert religion of choice) into a room to debate the rights and wrongs of their theologies and in a pretty short time they are at each other's necks.

Now substitute one of them for an atheist "fundamentalist" who is utterly convinced that the whole religion thing is absolute bunkum. Do you not think that in a fairly short period there would be plenty of neck-wringing on both sides? Purely from the perspective in which different views can generate anger and perhaps even violence is there much of a difference, I wonder?

Would atheists be happy to have someone try to force religion - any religion - down our throats? Atheists might think religious people to be merely deluded, but sometimes these people wield enormous power over people's lives and use religious principles to justify their actions, so it's quite feasible for atheists to get angry and even perhaps violent about religion.

Atheism is not a fluffy concept. It's not some sort of post-modern "you believe it so it must be true" kind of idea. There are ways in which the views professed are similar to most traditional religions. "God doesn't exist - get used to it" is as hard-line and no-nonsense a statement as "God exists and you'll go to Hell when you die, you sinner".

Even more, the "difficulty" (if I can call it that) with atheism, is that all the evidence points in its direction, whereas with most religions (all perhaps?), the evidence is decidedly shaky / non-existent. Even the debate is such that it seems wrong to give a religionist the same platform as an atheist in terms of debate. You have one side arguing from a position of pure faith (elevated only through tradition and strength of numbers), and the other from a position of evidence and probability. It's not a 50 / 50 type of argument is it?

But what about the 'Stalin and Mao were atheists' argument - as was put to me recently?

And, of course, it's true. Now probably (I've not verified this), their atheism was less a scientific matter and more one of opposition to the rival religious powers - but nevertheless we have to admit them into the (ahem) Broad Church of Atheist Fundamentalism. I'm quite comfortable with that. Atheism is defined by what it's not. However...based on what I'm *for*, I can come up with may arguments *against* Stalinism and Maoism. And so can the religious. The difference with mine, though, is I'm reasonably sure that the religious could buy in to mine. They're Rational arguments, based on mutually-agreeable premises.


On the other hand...Hitler said in Mein Kampf that he was defending Christian values, and more than one Cardinal agreed with him. Is there really a strong argument that they were mistaken in their view of Christianity? Or can we say for sure that the Qu'ran requires brotherhood and alms-giving rather than random murder? Etc. etc.

Of course, quite possibly, if you asked Stalin or Mao why they didn't believe in God, they might have given you a fairly cogent answer.

What they did however, was to go ahead and develop another house of cards belief system that has nothing at all to do with atheism. Just because you don't believe in something doesn't automatically mean that what you do believe in constitutes an atheist world-view.

Edward,

I know quite a few Quakers and it would never have occurred to me to describe any of them as fundamentalist.

Yes, what people mean by the word is a bit of a minefield. And maybe "the nasty religious people who do bad things" is quite a useful meaning.

IIRC the term originated in the US in the 1920s in reference to a literalist theological pamphlet and movement opposing a non-literalist trend in theology.

But if fundamentalist means literalist (and perhaps selectively literalist emphasising some of the nasty bits of scripture), then to be fundamentalist you have to have scripture. You could perhaps I suppose be a fundamentalist Dawkinsian, but not a fundamentalist atheist. Although it would be quite bizarre to treat the writing of any atheist as some kind of revelation.

--

Also

"my refusal to accept that any given religion is merely one of a number of valid opinions"

I'm curious, what does 'valid' mean in this context? Clearly religions are opinions, and lots of opinions are mistaken, but is a mistaken opinion, religous, political, aesthetic, etc, invalid?

I think that's what I'm trying to say.

However...their belief system was a house of cards in a rather different way, no? It was based on various Rationalist precepts, eg:
1. The world should be a better place than it is now.
2. It's bad because of capitalism.
3. The best way we can improve it is via a revolution leading to a Dictatorship of the Proletariat.
4. A beneficial step would be the violent suppression of religion.

Now I happen to disagree with 3 and 4 - but at least my arguments against them are also Rational - albeit that the evidence on either side is complex and incomplete. (although the clincher is probably that people weren't happy under Stalin or Mao).

That's a little different than something like (eg) "They are based on a Materialist worldview which does place God at the heart of morality". or even "God wouldn't approve." Arguments like those have a simple answer: "Pish!"

Here is my first response, as promised, to Extra Bold:

<> Post 2.

I would not class myself as a fundamental Christian, and don't automatically consider atheism bad. I would agree with Dawkins that atheists can be happy, balanced, moral, and intellectually fulfilled.

Regarding the definition of a fundamental Christian, I would go with Dawkins spectrum of belief (pages 50-51 of the hardback edition of TGD), and say number 1 - 'Strong theist. 100 per cent probability of God... 'I do not believe, I know.' I would link this to a literal understanding of the Bible, unwillingness to engage in discussion, arrogance, intolerance, and a denial of scientific explanations - although that is necessarily a generalisation as I know people in this category who do not show these characteristics.

The opposite end of Dawkins spectrum is number 7 - 100% atheist, knowing there is no God with the same conviction as those who say there is at the other end. I accept Dawkin's point that there are more in number 1 than in number 7, he himself puts himself as number 6 on the scale but leaning towards 7. Number 6 on the scale is defined as 'very low probability, but short of zero...' - someone who lives their life on the assumption there is no God.

I would expect theists to engage in discussion with integrity and not show any of the characteristics I have described above, and I would expect atheists to engage in a similar way. I have no reason to believe I will not be able to discuss on those terms here on h2g2. To me, the term 'fundamentalist' - applied to theists or atheists is a negative label.

Best wishes,
Random Mood

Response to Ed: post 3.

<>
Sorry, I'm not easily offended! If some theists weren't so easily offended religion might have a better name and the world a better place!

Much of what I want to say is in my previous response, and I am currently reading what Dawkins has to say about morals - so I'll come back to this subject. At this stage I would say that my ethics can be described as virtue ethics - how would a virtuous person behave in a given situation. I would see this as the ethics of Jesus (a virtuous person), although I fully recognise that virtue ethics is neither theist or atheist.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtue_ethics
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosalind_Hursthouse

Best wishes,
Random Mood

Thanks, Random,

I think the concept of being all-powerful is incoherent, and therefore an all-powerful being is impossible (7). If sufficiently powerful is good enough to earn the title God, then (6), but how do you distinguish such a "God" from a suitably technologically advanced alien?

The God of the Bible - defeated by iron chariots - is clearly not all powerful. But you have to virtually ignore a lot of text to get something that is not impossible and therefore deserving of a (7).

Sorry, I got carried away there and forgot the point I was going to make with all that. What I am saying is that I have a bit of a problem with Dawkins scale. I also have a problem with this cavalier use of probability that Dawkins and many others practise.

What does it mean to say that the probability that fairies exist is 0.2 or 0.8 or 0.0000001? What does that mean? I realise that it is a number used to indicate a strength of belief, but it doesn't seem to me to be doing much indicating, there is no scale, no yardstick, and fairies either exist or they don't, you can only be right or wrong by believing that they exist or not. Belief in a probability seems to be meaningless.

The scale was useful to illustrate my point.

RM - you should try Richard Hollaway's 'Godless Morality'. It's quite good, for something written by a Theist.

(At least I'm *assuming* he's a Theist. He was the Anglican Bishop of Edinburgh, but I'm not sure that the CofE require Theism as a prior qualification these days).

btw...my 'Fundamentalism' may be a joke - but it's a serious joke. I'm thinking....I might possibly place myself closer to the 7 than Dawkins. The concept of God, as described by the religious, simply doesn't make sense to me. Nor does it sound useful. I see no benefit in entertaining the possibility. Perhaps I'm asymptotically close to 7; like Dawkins, I'd have to re-evaluate if everything we understand about the universe is shown to be wrong.

So: Why be a Theist? It certainly puzzles me in a scientist.

Having finished Dawkins, I'm giving the book some thought, and I will be posting in due course. Enjoying the diaglogue, btw!