Thursday, March 29, 2012

A Spokesman For Atheism Speaks

David Silverman, President of American Atheists, organizer of the recent “Reason Rally” in Washington DC:
”What I am doing is not giving religion respect that it wants but it doesn’t deserve. I respect people; I respect humans. I do not respect religion. And I do not respect the idea that religion deserves respect.”
CNN:
”That attitude has made Silverman a bogeyman for religious groups, especially conservative ones who discern a secular assault on American religion.”
Bogeyman? No, an avowed enemy. Atheists who claim reason for their demonstrably irrational worldview are dangerous. They are reacting, in the same manner that skepticism only reacts, never creates, and is useless without the target of contempt; they are angry and they are deluded by their own self-endowed, self-perceived righteous elitism.

The “Reason Rally” was not an attempt to promote either deductive logic or Popperian empiricism; it was a venue for displaying their Atheist contempt. It was a celebration of adolescent cursing into loudspeakers on the national mall. Atheism has nothing of a positive nature to celebrate, because it has only rejection as a foundational base. But it generates plenty of contempt, and a surfeit when they assemble in order to disgorge it publically.

In order to laminate respectability over their purely negative rejection and contempt, they claim “reason” and “science” and “logic”, yet they have no idea regarding what reason entails, what science can and cannot do, or how to form an axiom-grounded deductive syllogism. What’s more, they don’t care. For them, it is enough to make the claim of possessing rationality for themselves as an idol, and then go straight to ridicule, derision and scorn, subsequently feeling quite fulfilled by that. And then demanding respect for their impropitious worldview and behaviors.

Atheism does not possess reason, nor does reason generate Atheism unless fallacy is allowed free run in the “reasoning” field. Reason is a disciplined path to knowledge; Atheism and skepticism are merely dead end rejectionism, with no ability in and of themselves to create anything other than more rejectionism. The veneer of rationality is too thin to even notice as it is punctured by actual logic. As we have observed here in the past, when the veneer is punctured, the typical Atheist response is to deny the validity of the tool which punctures, rather than to accept the existence of the wound. And that is where the individual Atheist rejects the Atheist claim of rationality in order to preserve the Atheist narrative: worldview death by non-coherence.

2 comments:

Paul Garrigan said...

If these people are successful in their goals they are going to disenfranchise many people from science. I’m agnostic but even I am starting to feel that science belongs to the other side – how must a religious person feel? The atheists are doing a good job at claiming science as their own because the current paradigm is scientific materialism which is atheistic in nature – it is positivism in a different wrapper. By making so many people feel alienated from science it is sure to end badly, and it will be a backward step for humanity. The idea that you are either with us or against us is below contempt

Stan said...

Hi Paul,
I think of it as being a confusion between two concepts: functional materialism, which is the voluntary, pragmatic stance of empirical science, and Philosophical Materialism which is a philosophy/worldview that is erroneous in its fundamental claims (~positivism, as you say).

Atheists do not seem willing to make this distinction, and they do not care to admit to their inability to prove their belief that there is only material existence. Nor do they admit to any limitations on the abilities of science to address every and all questions.

Atheism has two fundamental defects: it is intellectually dishonest and it comes without any morals or scruples. Their claims to the contrary are false.

It's not clear how the general public can come to know this, but it does seem that the Atheist attacks are not friendly persuasion. Derision does not equate to persuasion. I think Theism is safe, but I'm not sure how the conflict/war will go before it stops, if it does.