I have received an interesting critical comment to an older post. I have no way of knowing whether readers can tell when older posts get comments. So I will refer here to the post in question, one titled "Secondary Ruminations". The new commenter issued a challenge which I happily engaged and responded with comments of my own. These involve Materialist philosophers Haugeland, Hellman and Thompson.
It is an interesting exercise, supporting my intial point that materialists wish to prove an agenda, not to find objective truth, and also a secondary point which is that denigration frequently comes to the fore immediately when Materialists are confronted.
2 comments:
Dear Stan:
You had been an atheist for 40 years, then you decided to train the weapons of atheism, reason and logic, on atheism and atheists themselves, and you changed from atheist to theist.
Is that correct?
Tell me why you became an atheist and lasted in it for 40 years?
Did you find satisfaction in the life of an atheist, like sex, money, self interests in everything as long as you can get away with it?
Are you now more satisfied with life as a theist, and why?
Why did it take you so long, 40 years, to train reason and logic toward atheism and atheists, which reason and logic are what atheists so self-confidently feel so sure about themselves of having the facts and the truths about everything, starting with there is no God, or at most He is an invisible pink unicorn.
Best regards,
Yrger
Yrger,
Thanks for your question, and sorry it took so long to answer, I have been in recuperation mode after an operation.
I became an Atheist due to the common push-pull that is exerted on young people. The clergy pushed me away when I asked uncomfortable questions. They are not trained or experienced in apologetics or the basics of living thought, so they said things like, "well, that's just not a problem for me." This indicated to me that their "faith" was without a rational basis, and could not be substantial except through denial.
I was pulled by the aura of eliteness that surrounds the self-appelated "intelligentsia". The only cost for entering the domain of the intellectual-elite was to declare that there is no deity, and BAM, you may consider yourself elite.
After endowing myself with this eliteness I was able to consider myself superior to the irrational masses. So I dismissed them and went on to live my new pagan life.
This life had satisfactions, distractions, disappointments, and overall was pretty much like everyone else's life. I had unconsciously co-opted the Christian ethic for my own use even though I had rejected the source of the ethic.
And further, I never once considered that there were underlying irrationalities embedded within Atheism. In fact, I never thought about it seriously at all. There was no need: I considered myself superior and that my thoughts were therefore superior, and therefore correct. It is deceptively easy to lead an unexamined life, especially when endowed with self-superiority.
But when I had time to think about and observe the behaviors and thoughts of Atheist elitists, the irrationality became apparent and troubling. Had I been wrong? How could the elites hold such radically irrational positions? Isn't materialism a slam-dunk, logically?
That's when I began my second education. Or perhaps it should be called the real education after my formal academic training. (I think so).
Even though logic is my professional field, I was unprepared for the rigor of logically testing my thoughts. I found that it was necessary to reject everything that I had claimed to "know", and to begin again, this time from principles of rational thought and logic, instead of the push-pull of ecclesiaticism vs. elitism.
The journey from there was long (years), painful and joyful at the same time. And it overturned the irrationality of the elites in favor of truth.
Hope this answers your question.
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