Intellectual Laziness of Atheists

[protovack]

Evolution is highly debated and is increasingly being called into question for a variety of reasons. Many many scientists will tell you flat out that there is no real reason to accept it as conclusive or anywhere close to that right now. Its not like science is just some "obvious truth" that only lazy theists want to deny - plenty of scientists are putting it to the test daily and so far its got tons and tons of flaws.

HAHA. Bring it on. Let's see your cards

 

[Mike DMA]

Here's something controversial for all you conformists to think about.

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Intellectual Laziness of Atheists
by William Jeffreys

Atheists are intellectually lazy and seek to put finality and closure to the question of God's existence so they don't have to think about it any more.

In/out, up/down, right/left, hot/cold, tension and the release of tension, appetite and the removal of appetite, the passage of time as moments. These are all IDEAS. These ideas were conceived and executed. If you don't see the world as a construct of tremendous magnitude, you're just not looking at it.

It's right there in front of you, but you choose to ignore it. If you need more evidence to be convinced, then you will never be convinced, but I must state that because you choose to ignore and investigate this evidence, you are simply too lazy to ponder it.

Don't get caught up in the trap that God is all peace, love, and happiness stuff. This leads to all sorts of erroneous thinking. Take an honest look and try to see the world (reality, not man's world) as it really is, not through the haze of your preconceptions. Shut your internal dialogue up long enough to take a good look.

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being lazy is not a bad thing an sich!!!! didnt u know that???

u should read some more books to educate urself, i believe. there are many filosofers that claim that being lazy is somethin good. ( Pierre Sansot and Max Rubner to name 2)

what the f*ck r u tryin to say with a post like this anyway?? u ll have to be more straightforward...r u stoned or what?? ( i m just askin, no offence )

 

[Psychonaut777]

It may be awhile for me to find the evidence. I was biotech major a few years back and learned a lot about this so I'll have to look it all up again.

 

[ebola?]

>>HAHA. Bring it on. Let's see your cards >>

you are well aware of this, but...
evolution is hard-pressed to give an adaquate explaination of organogenesis. Think of the many hundreds of biochemical parts that would be required for a self-reproducing biochemical blob (i.e., life). All these parts would need to be interacting in just the perfect way for life to sustain itself. Alone, each of these biochemical parts would be useless and would not be selected by evolution.

>>Reason and evidence aren't just "there." They are useful tools. As such, religion has it's own useful tools as well.
>>

This is a great point. Science, if we believe it to deliver truth, requires faith, faith in a particular ontology which can be justified only axiomatically.
....
Another thing the irrelegious often forget is that religious people very often are working with different raw empirical data from the rest of us, i.e. religious experience, and are in that way not working on blind faith alone.

ebola

 

[protovack]

Evolution is highly debated and is increasingly being called into question for a variety of reasons.

First of all, *evolution* is not in question. We know that evolution exists because living things are evolving right now, in our lifetimes. Why do you think viruses mutate? Anyways, you probably already realize that the debate focuses on the *historical* evidence, rather than the realities of evolution.

An evolutionary argument for humans can be "called into question," for only 2 reasons:

1.) You believe that the skeletons we have excavated of pre-modern man are either fake or planted by God.
2.) You cling to the argument of 'irreducible complexity' (which ebola! stated).

Speaking from an empiricist's standpoint, I think the whole Irreducible complexity argument is striking. Nothing assembles itself right? Basically, irreducible complexity is just a re-hash of Paley's watchmaker argument. The chance that something with as few as 3 or 4 necessary parts could assemble itself in one "dice roll," is of course going to be rare. And the people espousing this viewpoing love to spout off incredibly low, and long numbers....and then make colorful analogies to further illustrate just how low the probablity is. This is all a smoke-screen. Think about the human eye (or any rod+cone and concave eye). It is so complex.......and irreducibly so, right? WRONG. Think of the first life-form ever to, by chance, be born with a photo-sensitive cell. It isn't just an abnormality. It actually functions and helps the lifeform find food sources. Maybe it allowed certain life-forms that didn't have good spatial ability (don't know what direction is up/down, can't feel gravitational cycles accurately), to finally be able to track the cycle of night and day, therefore allowing it to find food in a new place, or whatever. That is a dubious example, but the point is....If the genetic mutation which leads to an irreducibly complex system actually has functionality before it is complete, then irreducibly complex systems aren't so much of a problem for evolution. Obviously there are real-world examples where this is the case, and of course there are "true" irreducibly complex systems for which I have no answer. That is why I still find the argument interesting, because there are systems where I can't really see how they could work without every single part. Take for example, an immune system (or any irreducibly complex system which is composed mostly of cascading chemical reactions). Thousands of proteins, catalysts, enzymes, proteases, RNA, genes, many of which when fighting a disease require signals before they act, signals which are dependant upon still other chemicals acting first, and so on. Remove one enzyme and the whole thing ceases to function.

But just because something is unlikely in *one* way (irreducible complexity), doesn't mean it is JUST AS unlikely in all other ways. For example, imagine an evolving mouse-trap where on each dice-roll, it tries to assemble itself. It must have a base, a spring, a spring release, a bar, etc. Irreducible complexity arguments typically assume an "all-or-nothing" scenario. If the mouse-trap isn't completely put together, throw out that chance completely. But we know that individual types of proteins can mutate over time. What if the mouse-trap by chance assembled itself perfectly but with one error: the spring isn't strong enough to immobilize a mouse. Imagine that this is because some important protein in the spring has a 2 or 3 codon amino acid flaw resulting in a bad protein (there are human disease like this). Then imagine that in the very next dice roll, the amino acid gets translated correctly, resulting in the stronger protein and the tighter spring. Of course this is an outlandish example, but it shows one aspect that the irreducible complexity argument may not address. The *system* may be highly complex, but errors in the system are very simple.

Now moving on to the other reason that people call evolution "into question." It is so ridiculous that I don't think it's worth writing much on. It's an egotistical conspiracy theory:

"The skeletons were planted, I know it. The paleontologists, in concert with the CIA, Satan, and the atheists, planted the fossils which give evidence of evolution....just so they could destroy the institution of God."

So to conclude, evolution isn't being called into question for a "variety" of reasons, only two. Of those, one is compelling but nowhere near enough to actually deny evolution (even it's proponents admit this). The other reason is just plain stupid.

And I suppose there is a 3rd reason, but it's also stupid. Some people say, "I'll admit there is a human fossil-record. But there are gaps in that record, so I won't believe it until all the gaps are filled."

So then if we dig into the ground and as we dig deeper find 21, 18, 15, 14, 13, 9, 8, 5, 3, 1, then the person refuses to believe they are related to each other until we find 20, 19, 17, 16, 12, 11, 10, 7, 6, 4, and 2.

 

[killarava2day]

Originally posted by ebola!
evolution is hard-pressed to give an adaquate explaination of organogenesis. Think of the many hundreds of biochemical parts that would be required for a self-reproducing biochemical blob (i.e., life). All these parts would need to be interacting in just the perfect way for life to sustain itself. Alone, each of these biochemical parts would be useless and would not be selected by evolution.

The seemingly impossible nature of complex systems such as those that create life can be much easier to understand when viewed through Bohm's holographic paradigm, the non-locality of the universe means that the seperateness of each component involved in creating life is actually an illusion and that the reason they seem to behave as one is because they are one. It's all just a matter of perspective.

Not that knowing that negates the necessity for faith

 

[protovack]

^^^ Very good point!

 

[ebola?]

heh...im not sure if I actually buy the "irreducibly complex" argument.
And its not like creationists have posed a parsimonious alternative (see! scientists have faith in parsimony, in occum's razor!).
...

so, killarava, any suggested readings? Think I could find any Bohm at a Uni library?

ebola

 

[Molybdenum]

Atheists (here I'm talking skeptic atheists, not buddhist atheists, which would fit me as a mantle) aren't intellectually lazy; they actually overthink things. They believe that these thoughts actually define the core of reality rather than acknowledging that science and logic develop highly predictive constructs and models of reality. This is why different physical models, say, are needed at different scales and speeds... there's no absolute there there but rather something which can only be measured as closely as possible. As Stephen Hawking pointed out, these models describe what reality does but they do not really explain what the "fire" of reality is, what energy is. Anyone think we'll have a model of what energy *is* rather than what it does any time soon?

Atheists are, however, often emotionally lazy, or more to the point in pain. They don't want to look at the pain they are in (and most everyone is to some extent), they don't want to face reality, which is emotionally unpleasant without a lot of consciousness improvement, without the buffer of their thoughts. They get off on having easily winnable logical arguments with christians, who are using an unwieldy tool (the bible) to try to get past their logic and actually just end up feeding into it. (Well, the good ones anyway... the bad ones get more out of hate and fear than any atheist).

 

[killarava2day]

heh...im not sure if I actually buy the "irreducibly complex" argument.
And its not like creationists have posed a parsimonious alternative (see! scientists have faith in parsimony, in occum's razor!).
...

so, killarava, any suggested readings? Think I could find any Bohm at a Uni library?

ebola

Oh yeah, he should be... The book that got me was The Holographic Universe by Michael Talbot http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0060922583?v=glance

Heres a few links in the meantime http://www.spaceandmotion.com/Physics-David-Bohm-Holographic-Universe.htm
http://www.scienceforums.net/forums/showthread.php?t=4177&goto=nextnewest

 

[protovack]

Atheists are, however, often emotionally lazy, or more to the point in pain. They don't want to look at the pain they are in (and most everyone is to some extent), they don't want to face reality, which is emotionally unpleasant without a lot of consciousness improvement, without the buffer of their thoughts. They get off on having easily winnable logical arguments with christians

Is this autobiographical?

So atheists, who are atheist because there's no absolute but rather things which can only be measured, don't want to face reality?

It's not that atheists don't want to face reality. It's that their reality is different than yours.

 

[Pornaddict since '92]

I need to pull my pants up cuz the bullshit is getting a little thick...

I think so too, the person who started this tread, looks like a real "troll" ( excuzer moi pour le mot) to me, i could be wrong, but what he is sayin is absolute Bullshit and everyone in here is postin reply....fine with me, but your just feeding the troll, troll are smarter than me iguees

 

[Xherrus]

Thankyou everyone for all the responses, especially those that were well thought out and well-written. This has proven to be a very interesting thread.

As a matter of fact I am not trolling here (surprise surprise). This is a serious discussion intended to provoke intelligent thought, not rage. Rage, condescension and personal attacks have no place in this thread, and it doesn't need to get ugly at all.

As for the article I posted, I found it on Totse.com (oh, the irony) and it was written by SWIM called William Jeffreys. I anticipated that it would be inflammatory, and indeed some of you don't seem to like it one bit.

I myself disagree with his approach to the issue. His article seems liable to strengthen one's opinions (or preconceptions) instead of inspiring one to let go of them. In particular I disagree with his branding atheists as "intellectually lazy" and his assertion that "if you need more evidence to be convinced, then you will never be convinced" struck me as a bit off. (Actually my response to that is experience is a better teacher than any written or spoken evidence.)

With that said, there are also some parts of his argument that are thought-provoking. I wish to elaborate on the issue of seeking to put finality and closure to the question of God's existence. This is a very thorny issue. Disproof of God's existence doesn't hinge on a clever turn of phrase or a bit of logic, or the fact that it doesn't appeal to you (cf. Job). If something satisfies you that God doesn't exist, then there's your disproof for you, and it's clearly subjective. Thus, finality and closure come in a multitude of changing forms.

"Proof" resides in personal experience of the supernatural (i.e. "God"). However, that's spoken from my experience. YMMV.

being lazy is not a bad thing an sich!!!! didnt u know that???

u should read some more books to educate urself, i believe. there are many filosofers that claim that being lazy is somethin good. ( Pierre Sansot and Max Rubner to name 2)

what the f*ck r u tryin to say with a post like this anyway?? u ll have to be more straightforward...r u stoned or what?? ( i m just askin, no offence)

Mike DMA << No need for the ad hominem, dude, and thanks for the advice. Your post brought a grin to my face -- it was awesome.

To everyone else, thanks again for posting, this has been a great discussion so far and I hope you have all enjoyed participating in it... and maybe learnt a little too.

- Xherrus

 

[The HiVe MiND]

There is such a thing as Blind Doubt.
Some ppl just think it's cool to be skeptical.

 

[yougene]

There is such a thing as Blind Doubt.
Some ppl just think it's cool to be skeptical.

word

 

[antinazi77]

It sounds lazy believing in something because it is the way of 80 generations in which it's first cycles if interacted with today's believers, they would call them lunes and savages.

It sounds thoughtfull to take up a religion that does not impose the method of persicuting the question of existance.One would think a thoughtfull religion would instruct you to question everything including it's own principels this would be a religion of freedome and relentless thought, not lazyness.

 

[The HiVe MiND]

^and a perfect religion would answer all those questions

 

[Ansem]

Im atheist because i dont have any proof, it can go both ways, but why get all caught up to be let down? I dont even know this man and people TRY to force his beliefs down my throat, no thanks. I would rather be an individual and make my own beliefs.l

 

[Jhon]

OK, I haven't read the whole thread (call me intellectually lazy if you want) but I'd like to add my take.

First off, there are two separate points here that are not necessarily related to one another.

This:

Atheists are intellectually lazy and...

And this:

...seek to put finality and closure to the question of God's existence so they don't have to think about it any more.

The statement is put forward in a way that suggests the second part gives rise to the first part. Well some may see it that way, but others will agree with me when I say that the second part does not give rise to the first part. Whether or not you agree with me on this isn't really relevant, as we can deal with the second part first and then decide in our own way whether or not to proceed to the conclusion that atheists are intellectually lazy.

On to the interesting part.


Now, I am an atheist, and I agree with the second point.

Although not many religious people realise it (though some of course do), atheism (note the lower case initial letter) is not a system of belief. In fact by its very definition it is the absence of such a system.
The fact that I am an atheist does not mean I believe in an absence of God, rather, it means that I do not believe in the presence of God. There is a subtle difference here. Atheism is a lack of a religion. This means that as an atheist, I spend very little time pondering God, or indeed...

The question of God's existence

So I freely admit that I seek to put finality and closure to this question, in as short an order as possible, in fact, so I can spend my time thinking about things that I feel are relevant to my life.

 

[Molybdenum]

Is this autobiographical?

Not really, although I did spend some time on atheistic newsgroups back when I had more issues and actively enjoyed contributing to the argumentative polarity. I work in the sciences, so I'm surrounded by skeptic atheists every day. They sure do love their logic. The few times I've really gotten going in philosophical discussions, I find that most of them tend to derive a sense of security from the idea that we will one day manage to completely understand reality. There's no security in God or an afterlife (not that there should be - I'm a buddhist/atheist, remember), but there's still clinging to knowledge as some sort of absolute pure good. It looks like quite the religion once you distance yourself from it.

So atheists, who are atheist because there's no absolute but rather things which can only be measured, don't want to face reality?

There aren't defined things which can be measured. Measurement is an attempt to impose structure on a fluid reality.

It's not that atheists don't want to face reality. It's that their reality is different than yours.

If ya ask me, we all live in the same reality. We just have different (or no ) postulates about it.

Ultimately it comes down to a question of whether logic fully defines reality or merely does a very good job getting a practical handle on it. There really is no way to prove a case either way.