Re: Negativity defines me
 

It seems to me that a lot of peopel haven't actually thought through the implications of atheism. The misdeeds and misuses of religion have been documented since the dawn of writing. There was even a Buddhist empire that conducted a war of ethnic cleansing on one of its neighbors. However, what would actually happen if atheism took hold? We are familiar with the horror of a world without any god in the writings of Thomas Ligotti, for that is basically the starting point of his horror fiction. In the relative safety of fiction we can see that the universe would be without purpose or meaning. How would this translate to the social and political implications? First, the few pillars and supports that are holding up what is left of society would come crashing down. Since life is without meaning, and it is only religion that considers individual humans to be valuable in themselves and not for whatever they can do to serve the powerful, then no one would have any worth. The most powerful and the most clever would take what they wanted and the most powerful would take everything. The rest of us would be busy fighting for the crumbs. Since there was no ultimate authority there would be no intermediate authority, so the plundered and pillaged would have no recourse nor would they have any defenders. Since everything was on the same meaningless level of semi-existence there could be no love, no friendship nor any meaningful relationships of any kind. There would be no humans, only entities who would either use other entities for their appetites or, if they were weaker, then they would be entities who served the appetites of others. It is only because of religion that we have the idea that maybe we shouldn't rape and murder each other whenever the mood struck us. It is because of the religions of ancient Greece that we have the concept of democracy, just to give one example. Just because so many folks say that they are religious whet they are obviously not doesn't mean that there aren't a few believers of different religions who don't deserve respect.The current crop of Atheism Preachers (which is exactly what they are, just like Southern Baptist Preachers) either haven't thought their atheism through and are misguided, or they have and are trying to cynically create a power base. Just like Lenin in exile in Switzerland writing his newspaper articles and dreaming of the day he could create his own Secret Police to put the Class Enemies in their place, or Hitler in jail dictating Mein Kampf to his loyal pet Hess and dreaming of the day he could finally open a truely modern extermination camp, the professional atheists of today are planning some kind of terrible future that they are not talking about. If they are truely atheists then they are not our friends trying to save us for something. They are rather trying to remove a roadblock to their plans. Atheism does not free us to do something nor does it save us from something. Atheism is not freedom. It is slavery to our desires.I know that big-mouthed me will be one of the first to hear the 3 AM knock on the door when the Special Atheism Police are created, but I am not afraid. I don't know if there is a God or not, but I much prefer any kind of god to a future under atheism.

Re: Negativity defines me
 

and pretty scary too!

"And shalt say unto them, Thus saith the Lord of hosts; Even so will I break this people and this city, as one breaketh a potter's vessel, that cannot be made whole again: and they shall bury them in Tophet, till there be no place to bury"
Jeremiah 19:11, King James Version



"O god, the heathen are come into thine inheritance; thy holy temple have they defiled; they have laid Jerusalem on heaps.

The dead bodies of thy servants have they given to be meat unto the fowls of the heaven, the flesh of thy saints unto the beasts of the earth.

Their blood have they shed like water round about Jerusalem; and there was none to bury them.

We are become a reproach to our neighbours, a scorn and derision to them that are round about us.

How long, Lord? wilt thou be angry for ever? shall thy jealousy burn like fire?

Pour out thy wrath upon the heathen that have not known thee, and upon the kingdoms that have not called upon thy name.

For they have devoured Jacob, and laid waste his dwelling place."

Psalm 79 - Bible, King James Version

Re: Negativity defines me
 

Mr D:

The first obstacle I see here is to define the word "atheism", or according to any dictionary: the doctrine or belief that there is no God.

In my case I couldn't care less whether God exists or not. If God exists, what then? Even if the existence of God is scientifically proven, I will never worship God. So, I'm still an atheist even though God may exist indeed. Even if God exists and there is afterlife and I'm chosen to go to Heaven (impossible you may say), I would choose Hell. There is absolutely nothing God can do against my will. Didn't you read my story: "in Heaven, after the end of Hell"? If there is God, we will have the most amazing contradictions, like: my destiny is written from the beginning of time but I can be blamed for commiting a crime against society (crime already written beforehand by God).

Until now, we didn't have an atheist society. We had "Totalitarism", which is not the same at all. The fact that Hitler, Stalin, whoever you may mention, Were they atheists?, Who cares if they were?, doesn't mean that all atheist societies have to be like that. What you are saying is just an assumption which I consider to be wrong, or baseless. We don't know what is going to happen if in a few centuries the atheist population of the world increases to 50% +1.

I know this, I'm happy being atheist, I'm happy denying the existence of God, I'm happy not reading the bible (unless I need a quote from it), I'm happy not being baptized, I'm happy not teaching my family Christianity or any other religion, I'm happy. I get up every morning and I look at the mirror and I'm happy with what I see. But, don't scare me, Hell doesn't exist but here, living everyday.

Re: Negativity defines me
 

A few scattered thoughts. I'm not sure that widespread lack of belief would necessarily have such dire social and political consequences. I suspect that a general lack of communal feeling -- lack of social cohesiveness -- is what releases the psychopaths among us, many of whom, yes, wear suits and carry briefcases. As a look around the world reveals, this lack of social cohesiveness -- and the anarchic rapacity which results -- can occur in religious societies as well as in secular societies. In any case, I suspect that the trend toward secularism has a limited future. Human psychology just isn't very rational, even in those of us (I raise my hand) who value rationality.

I would be a religious believer if I could be. I'm not a happy atheist. It appears to me that, in most cases, happy atheists are people who grew up without religious beliefs, and so they don't feel that they're missing anything.

Atheism as a political-social program seems to assume that knowing the truth about anything and everything (to the extent we can know it) is necessarily beneficial. But is it really? It appears to me that knowing more and more about the universe and about ourselves may be inimical to human flourishing in many ways. Knowing more may be demoralizing. I certainly don't intend this as a call to endarkenment. But it may be a tragic and inescapable fact about human existence.

I don't have any positive answers here other than to deal with the situation as best we can. I think that constructive insights are more likely to come from atheist thinkers who are realistic and pessimistic, rather than from those who are primarily concerned with selling atheism.

Note: I hadn't read Russell Nash's last post when I wrote this, so nothing here is intended as a response to that.

Re: Negativity defines me
 

I think it is important to keep in mind that the argument that belief in God (or gods) is beneficial to society or even on an individual basis is a competely different argument than whether or not god is true.

Re: Negativity defines me
 

Superb points by Borges, Alberto! In addition to that, it is not just the idea of a perfect being but imagining anything beyond the scope of human existence appears to be part of the human consciousness. Hence, Scruton's essay about the sacred and the human. Part of us always wants to fly while another part tells us that we are meaningless. That is why like fantastic literature religion will probably never disappear.About Bendk's argument about the benefits of fantasizing and arguments concerning the existence of God, perhaps the arguments are part of our fantasizing.A final point about the references to Poe and Kafka. I think the incredible complexity of the human mind can be seen in Poe, if it is true that he was essentially a materialist and yet had horrible nightmares that plagued him much of his life. As for Kafka, I agree with one critic who argues that he encapsulates the very nature of the Biblical parable, which Christians and even atheists in general assume to be stories meant to inspire, when it is very likely that they are meant to provoke.Ultimately, we will all have to confront, and probably even accept, the contradictory aspects of the human being, that he is neither rational or irrational but both, and that life is absurd, although one would like to think that God rules over it while another reason.

Re: Negativity defines me
 

Thanks for the respectful replies to my post. I was afraid that I would get a lot of comments like: "See what happens when cousins marry," or something similar. I certainly am not trying to convince anyone either pro or contra some divine porsonage. All that I was really attempting to say is that tyrany has many masks but only one face (to use a Ligottian style metaphor). I ahve the greatest respect for all of the members of this network and this thread is utterly fascinating. If anyone is interested I have been a practicing Catholic all of my life. I call myself a practicing Catholic because I'm not very good at it yet, but I have hopes. (There was one period where I stopped going to church. All during high school the nuns and priests all tried to pressure me to become a priest. I thought that I would show them and stopped going to church for 10 years. Then realized that I was just being silly and went back.) I am just being true to myself. If I'm wrong I'll find out soon enough and I don't hurt anyone.
This thread was originally about negativity and, in my opinion, understanding and belief in religion help me a lot. It's a hard, lonely world no matter what and I think that we are all unhappy being here. To my limited thinking the world is much like the one described in the novel Catch-22 or in the works of Kafka. (Of course I work for the government.) Still, I remember that Kafka once wrote that: "writing is a form of prayer."

Re: Negativity defines me
 

"Existence is a condemnation without name and without redemption; there's nothing to be done against it. And perhaps it is only hope—our need to catch our breath, as if from the sharp pain of a wound—that allows us to imagine a state outside of existence; a nothingness. My God, perhaps everything exists, has existed and will exist in eternity. There is nothing we can do against life but live it, just as there is nothing to do in a closed, suffocating, smoke-filled room but go on smoking."

Tomasso Landolfi

-------------

I wish someone could answer my question:

Why is it that a person that reads the Bible or follows the precepts of a religion, reads or enjoys reading Ligotti's works? Most of his works are nihilist or/and atheist stories in themselves. The same with H. P. Lovecraft. Or someone is going to tell me that there is redemption in Ligotti's or Lovecarft's works? Bungalow House, for example. I found cruelty, despair, and unredeemable madness, in this story alone. Not to mention his entire body of work. How could someone read the Bible (or any other sacred book), believe on what is written, and read Ligotti?

I had the assumption (proved wrong by now) that most or all TLO members were either atheists or nihilists, or simply agnostics. Is it only me? Or anybody else really shares Ligotti's views?

Re: Negativity defines me
 

Mr. Hetman, I converted to Catholicism some time back. I actively practice the faith. I find that I personally have a fascination for the existential issues posed by Mr. Ligotti's fiction. I hope this partially answers your question.

Re: Negativity defines me
 

I am agnostic, but that does not mean i cannot read the Bible or any other book about religion or faith. Actually they are the books i enjoy most reading, because I find them fascinating as something I cannot really and fully grasp. It would be really boring reading books written by people who totally share my point of view.