Atheists vs. Believers (what makes them different)

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 :)

Atheism =/= Moral Relativity (an atheist's rant on morality)

If you are an atheist, and out-of-the-closet, chances are you have come across the argument that atheists have no source of morality. When they do this, they imply that an atheist cannot know the difference between right and wrong etc. In-fact, many atheists use the argument that all morality is relative. It seems both sides (atheists and believers) let their imagination get the better of them. For those atheists that view morality as being relative are ignoring the function of morality. Morality is (at least in my opinion) behavior that is beneficial for the functionality of a society (consciously or unconsciously).

For example, the statement "it is immoral to cheat on a spouse" is a true statement. However, many atheists will use their imagination to think of a scenario in which this statement wouldn't be true. This kind of moral reasoning misses the point. It cannot be denied that a society full of cheaters (especially before birth control) would leave many individuals without a fully-functioning family. A woman is hard-wired to not want their husband to run away with another woman, leaving her all of the burden of raising the kids; on the flip-side the guy doesn't want to waste energy raising some other man's child (the fruit of his energy-input is the passing on of his genes). If morality is behavior that is beneficial for the functionality of a society, then cheating in the general, realistic sense, is morally wrong.

The famous atheist author Sam Harris wrote a book claiming that morality is behavior that is beneficial for the well-being of conscious creatures. But I'm feel that this misses the evolutionary purpose of pain and pleasure (psychological or physiological). While it is true that there is a hardwired desire to feel good, and to avoid pain, the purpose of both are not for our enjoyment, but our survival (and exclusive to humanity, unless applying a certain morality to animals is beneficial for human-society). When we notice a certain behavior causes pain, this is the body/brain's way of telling us that we need to change course. Also, if we feel good, that is the body/mind's way of rewarding/creating incentive to continue what it perceives as good behavior. As stated before, the purpose of this is to provide behavioral guidelines.

As a social species, there are certain behaviors that are harmful to functionality of a society, and behaviors that are beneficial (but this does not imply relativity). While not all societies have the same functioning characteristics (morality), it cannot be denied that some societies function better than others. The reason morality is not completely instinctual is because human society is taking on factors that are previously unknown.

Also, I think morality should be divided up into two groups: instinctual/learned (i.e. hard-wired/soft-wired). Being that our species, from an evolutionary standpoint, is going into uncharted territory everyday, the old hard-wired behavior can be very problematic—this is where our learned-morality comes into play. Learned-morality is cognition that overrides perceived harmful-instinctual behavior.

All of this is to enunciate the point that not all behavior is created equal within a human society. There are moral truths within this society. An atheist can imagine circumstances in which a behavior that is normally beneficial to the functionality of a society (moral) would not be, but this is dodging the question. I.e. moral relativism is a pseudo-intellectual's way of dodging reality. No thoughtful atheist should argue moral relativism. If this is to become an atheist-world, we must stop dodging moral questions. Whether we atheists want to admit it or not, religion took on a big role for providing our soft-wired morality. As religion goes, so goes the soft-wiring we have relied upon as a society for many many years. As our society continues to evolves, so will evolve our hard-wired/soft-wired morality. It is not good that we have relied so heavily on religion to provide our soft-wired morality, with it gone, we are left with a void that must be filled (otherwise the functionality of society will suffer).

If you are an atheist reading this, try to think about moral questions in the context that I laid out; there are moral-truths to be found in this reality, never dodge the questions by imagining other realities (makes you and the atheism you represent appear void of morality). If you are a believer, then continue to argue against atheists that continue to believe in moral relativism by using secular-reasoning (instead of religious, which an atheist will easily brush off).

Be a thinking atheist, not one that avoids the truth.

Ray Comfort: Is it Wrong to Judge? (relativism)

I actually agree with some of what they say. Relativism-logic is taken way too far, and applied to way to many things (religion for example). Relativism is psuedo-intellectual word-play. All questions have an answer, regardless if we have access to that answer. I think many atheists agree (and probably many disagree), that there are moral truths (not just "opinions") within the context of a human society. Relativism just an easy way of dealing with reality, even though it provides no real answers, just false ones that satisfy the ego (like using God to explain everything).