There is a lot of grey area for what makes an atheist an atheist, and what makes a believer a believer. However, there appears to be certain behavioral tenancies that guide an individual to either atheism or belief.
What do I mean by this?
Let me provide an anecdote.
A few weeks ago, in philosophy class, a philosophical question was being discussed among the class. The question was whether it would be moral permissible to torture a terrorist in order to stop a nuclear explosion from occurring in New York City. It goes without saying, if a nuclear explosion happened in NYC, millions would die. Also, the terrorist would not be killed in the process. My stance was that there is a moral obligation to protect the lives of millions over the well-being of a terrorist. I would say a good majority of the class favored my position, and the other side was sharply opposed. It was quickly found out that those who opposed the torture of the terrorist were Christians. Their logic was that it would be better to let millions die than to torture. They are more worried about themselves (protecting a personal moral stance that "all torture is wrong") and the well-being of a terrorist over the millions of innocent people. The class never came together, but I feel the side that supported torture in this case won the exchange (professor seemed to agree with it). It also seemed fairly obvious that this was a debate between atheists and believers.
It seems they (the Christians) took such a stance because a few million people to them is a mere number (emotionless); but a terrorist, an individual, that is something their minds can analyze emotionally (the pain they will suffer etc). Numbers as large/larger than a million are too great comprehend using emotional-reasoning (empathy). Our capacity to empathize appears limited to only few individuals at any specific time. Like when a person thinks of a disaster that effects millions, an image of a few people probably comes to mind, and sad feelings are then associated (instead of, in reality, feeling bad for the entire group harmed).
The point of this is to show how a religiously-minded person is a person whose reasoning ability is fixated on the emotional, instead of the logical. Those that are atheists tend to look at moral issues like this from a logical/mathematical perspective (things like pain inflicted, death, etc. are weighed mathematically), and the believers look at it from an emotional-reasoning perspective (it is cognitively impossible to empathize with a million+ individuals).
Obviously there is not a perfect dichotomy here; everyone thinks with a mix of emotion and logic, but some lean one way more than the other. An atheist, in my opinion, is better able to deal with issues that come up in reality because they tend to be logical-thinkers. Typically issues have many factors, more than emotional-reasoning can handle, so factors like the death of millions, are easily ignored.
But, are all atheists totally logical? Not at all, but there does appear to be a some truth to this underlying stereotype. It also seems as if emotional-thinkers are more prone to violence (atheists are among the least likely to commit acts of terrorism, for example). Emotional-thinkers are very reactionary, and organize information in a way that attaches so much emotion that it leaves little room for logic. This is why many believers continue to believe in God, despite growing evidence that points against the creationist "theory". This doesn't matter to an emotional-thinker because evidence (logic) is not all that important to them. For an emotional-thinker, if something makes them feel good, they view it as both morally permissible and objectively correct.
Looking at the world with a solid logical base vs. a solid emotional base will lead to an individual to very different conclusions. For a logical thinker (tend to be atheist), things like science and mathematics underly reality. For an emotional thinker (tend to be religious), emotion and intuition underly reality.
Of course too much logic isn't a good thing either, it leads some atheists to beliefs like moral-relativity (does away with soft-morality), and obviously there are Christians that are moral-relativists as well. But that is a different discussion all together.
If you got this far, thanks for reading, and have a great day :)
What do I mean by this?
Let me provide an anecdote.
A few weeks ago, in philosophy class, a philosophical question was being discussed among the class. The question was whether it would be moral permissible to torture a terrorist in order to stop a nuclear explosion from occurring in New York City. It goes without saying, if a nuclear explosion happened in NYC, millions would die. Also, the terrorist would not be killed in the process. My stance was that there is a moral obligation to protect the lives of millions over the well-being of a terrorist. I would say a good majority of the class favored my position, and the other side was sharply opposed. It was quickly found out that those who opposed the torture of the terrorist were Christians. Their logic was that it would be better to let millions die than to torture. They are more worried about themselves (protecting a personal moral stance that "all torture is wrong") and the well-being of a terrorist over the millions of innocent people. The class never came together, but I feel the side that supported torture in this case won the exchange (professor seemed to agree with it). It also seemed fairly obvious that this was a debate between atheists and believers.
It seems they (the Christians) took such a stance because a few million people to them is a mere number (emotionless); but a terrorist, an individual, that is something their minds can analyze emotionally (the pain they will suffer etc). Numbers as large/larger than a million are too great comprehend using emotional-reasoning (empathy). Our capacity to empathize appears limited to only few individuals at any specific time. Like when a person thinks of a disaster that effects millions, an image of a few people probably comes to mind, and sad feelings are then associated (instead of, in reality, feeling bad for the entire group harmed).
The point of this is to show how a religiously-minded person is a person whose reasoning ability is fixated on the emotional, instead of the logical. Those that are atheists tend to look at moral issues like this from a logical/mathematical perspective (things like pain inflicted, death, etc. are weighed mathematically), and the believers look at it from an emotional-reasoning perspective (it is cognitively impossible to empathize with a million+ individuals).
Obviously there is not a perfect dichotomy here; everyone thinks with a mix of emotion and logic, but some lean one way more than the other. An atheist, in my opinion, is better able to deal with issues that come up in reality because they tend to be logical-thinkers. Typically issues have many factors, more than emotional-reasoning can handle, so factors like the death of millions, are easily ignored.
But, are all atheists totally logical? Not at all, but there does appear to be a some truth to this underlying stereotype. It also seems as if emotional-thinkers are more prone to violence (atheists are among the least likely to commit acts of terrorism, for example). Emotional-thinkers are very reactionary, and organize information in a way that attaches so much emotion that it leaves little room for logic. This is why many believers continue to believe in God, despite growing evidence that points against the creationist "theory". This doesn't matter to an emotional-thinker because evidence (logic) is not all that important to them. For an emotional-thinker, if something makes them feel good, they view it as both morally permissible and objectively correct.
Looking at the world with a solid logical base vs. a solid emotional base will lead to an individual to very different conclusions. For a logical thinker (tend to be atheist), things like science and mathematics underly reality. For an emotional thinker (tend to be religious), emotion and intuition underly reality.
Of course too much logic isn't a good thing either, it leads some atheists to beliefs like moral-relativity (does away with soft-morality), and obviously there are Christians that are moral-relativists as well. But that is a different discussion all together.
If you got this far, thanks for reading, and have a great day :)
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