Observations and inanities by a second-shift assistant supervisor in the Puppy-Grinding division of the Evil Atheist Conspiracy® (our motto: "Sure it's cruel, but think of the jobs!"), your host, Brent Rasmussen.
10-Day Jane
Hahah! Surprise! It was all an art project!
[link] I feel a massive sense of responsibility to my art, but more importantly the readers of this blog. My closeness to this project must have made art seem like reality to many people. That is not a reaction that I expected nor can I morally justify. This is why my project, 90DayJane, will be taken down on day 80.
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Interesting
I had no idea this site even existed.
Her sidebar says, in part "... as an atheist I feel life has no greater purpose," and I object to that. Assuming I'd found the site early on, I'd have thought "What an asshat" for that statement alone.
I'm glad she's going to live. The world has far too few clueless, spotlight-grabbing posturers in it.
(And now if she really kills herself, I'll feel terrible. For at least 20 seconds.)
I was talking to a friend in a video store a while back about the famous people who died young, and I said, "Look at Britney Spears. If she'd died five years ago, we'd be saying 'What a loss of a monumental talent! Who knows what great music she would have created?'" A couple of people overheard me and laughed, and one guy said "No, we wouldn't. We'd still think she was a no-talent bimbo."
On the other hand...
On the other hand, Hank, I find that statement eminently rational. Life has no inherent greater purpose other than what the individual atheist decides what his or her purpose is (Im assuming that's what she meant). It is us theists who think life has an inherent greater purpose and there simply is no rational, er, reason for believing that, at least no reason that can be backed by objective criteria.
Life's purpose
I still think it's a misleading, snarky comment. It's got that nihilistic, depressive tone ... just what I want, to have people associate atheism and suicidal depression.
I feel the same way about this statement about life's purpose as I do about the silly, erroneous assumption that you can only be moral if you're a god-believer.
Life has a million inherent purposes. They're all around us, all through us. The problem is, you can't discover them if you're too busy believing life has no purpose other than what comes out of your tribe's little holy book.
In my experience, atheists are some of the most passionate, self-actualized people I know. The purpose they find beyond their own lives is a thousand times better than some silly afterlife or imagined rapture, because it encompasses REAL things.
As a for-instance, I happen to know that we humans have a capacity for compassion that's off the scale of anything else on the planet. We have such love in us that we can love people, animals, plants, cars, even IDEAS. With that faculty alone, and a real world to practice it on, there's enough purpose right there to fill a billion lifetimes.
This is not something you just make up. It's there in us, just waiting to be discovered and exercised. And there's loads more.
Life is full of purpose. It's only the dullard-Christian historical mindset that makes us think any different ... the same dullard-Christian historical mindset that makes us think goodness will die inside us the instant we step away from the Ten Commandments. (Whiny petulent voice: If there wasn't a God, what would keep people from just raping and killing all the time??)
Much as I hate to disagree
I am afraid I must. The universe has inherent laws, but no inherent purpose seems to spring out of them (except as I mention in another thread the efficient dissipation of the sun's energy). The only thing absolutely required of life is ensuring that offspring have the means to reach breeding age. Those organisms that fail at this, vanish. Everything else, including all the various fruits of civilization are nothing but frosting and they may be tasty frosting, but they are frosting nonetheless. People choose their purpose. Some choose a beautiful purpose, some a hideous one and some a homely one, but the universe doesn't gift you with one (although it certainly can limit the choices we make, at 6'4" I could never have chosen to be a successful jockey). It seems from what you have written that you know people who have fastened upon laudable purposes and that is good. Certainly it would make life more pleasant. I'm afraid I don't see what you see though. Certainly there is compassion, but I think it is dwarfed by the human capacity for selfishness, laziness and apathy. That is how our species has come to equality with the meteors and super-volcanoes as an extinction level event and why the words 'global warming' appear often in the news. The world is populated by primitive tribesmen (and tribeswomen) with advanced weapons. Compassion is a group survival mechanism and is not applied universally save by a tiny minority. All too often it is group specific. This is why the deaths of tens to hundreds of thousands of Iraqis don't weigh on the consciences of the people in power. They are not in their group. Their lives (and deaths) are meaningless. As to love, well that is nothing more or less than the relationship that we have with the image of someone or something in our minds. Possibly related to an exterior object, but not necessarily so. It is mental candy, sweet to roll around on the psychic tongue certainly, but I cannot see the hope or the purpose in it that you do.
In the end we each get our short stroll across the short valley between the great, black walls of Oblivion and that's all. The difference between the atheists and the believers is that on their walk they pretend there is something else beyond that far wall and/or something behind the rearward wall, but for all their pretending and talk of miracles they take the same walk as the rest of us do.
If you have bred then you can frame your purpose as being the latest link in a long chain and you just have to hope that the far end of that chain is attached to some meaning, but you'll never know if it was.
Heh.
I maxed out at 5'3". When I was in my teens and among my horsepeople friends, I must have heard a hundred times I should become a jockey. :)
One of the reasons compassion and love haven't gotten more play is that none of us are TAUGHT any of this stuff. We've been so insane for so long (with religion, among other things), we think selfishness and such is normal.
You have to practice these things. Work at them. Never give up trying to iron out your own shortcomings, striving to become better in yourself.
Given a choice of being one of the primitives and one of those "laudable people," I'd like to be one of the laudables. It's why I'm an atheist - I'm not willing to just give up my mind, my hope, to some Stone Age bullshit, no matter how hard it is to swim against it.
...
Given time, I'll bet I could talk you around on some of this stuff.
A too sharp scalpel
I will be the first to admit that I do not particularly like the conclusions that I have come to, but each of them seem inescapable. Once you have gained some practice dissecting religion there is really no reason to stop there. Nationalism, capitalism, patriotism, and yes even even compassion and love come under the knife. While others debate the shapes of the castles turrets and their various merits my predisposition is to seek for the foundation and ask - 'when you get to the bottom just what is this resting on?' The most popular religions in our world are based on something some guys in the desert wrote down millenia ago which someone more recent said was true - bottom line 'take my word for it.' Similarly what is 'America'? If you ask Barak Obama and Pat Robertson that question you will get two different answers. What is left then when you peel all of this away? There are the laws of physics which govern the functioning of our universe. There is the ecosphere of the earth which gave rise to us and there is our consciousness. Those nihilistic atheists who emphasize their isolation tend (from what I have seen) to forget or disparage the fact that they are part of Life on Earth and part of society. Because I have occasionally felt overwhelmed by the believing majority at times I have been guilty of such thoughts of profound alienation myself, but I realize that without my fellow humans I would likely have starved or perished at the first illness and certainly this is the first thing I reach for when confronted by believers with that old cliche that without god there would be no morality.
Taking as a given that life has no imposed exterior purpose I wondered what then might be possible and what I came up with is a theory of human potential which looks a lot like this.
Each of the circles represents an aspect of our lives: Mental, Physical and Social-Emotional. Naturally each of us does not fill each of those circles of potential (or at least damn few people do) but to fill them is the best that we might strive for - To be smart, strong and well loved seems to be the highest attainable goal of a human life. To do that in the face of inherent meaninglessness is a struggle, or it is for me at least.
Well Hank I am not sure how much work you think I need, but I'd be happy to let you have a shot at it. You are right though in selfishness being taught here in the U.S. and certainly if you have not seen this lady explain it you should.
Meaningless
That's just part of an older cliche we theists believe: Without God there wouldnt be anything. The only reason we have morality is that there is something instead of nothing.
I tend to think -- and I dont know if it's because Im a theist -- that 'rational' isnt really all that it's cracked up to be. I dont think a totally rational human is a goal worth achieving. "What is left then when you peel all of this away? There are the laws of physics which govern the functioning of our universe. There is the ecosphere of the earth which gave rise to us and there is our consciousness." But then where did all those come from? What is left when you peel the laws of physics away? The theist's answer is of course God, and the atheist question "Where did God come from?" is a fair one. The only honest answer is "I dont know." You always come down to I dont know. The answer, "There is nothing" is a rational answer, but it leads to meaninglessness and suicidal thoughts.
Im reminded of a post Jim Downey wrote once where he speculated that atheists might be missing a god-gene. I found that interesting. Since theists tend to have more children, maybe the atheist gene mutation will be selected for extinction by natural selection if they dont adapt. Meaning is what makes you want to live. To avoid that, the atheists then adapt by assimilating meaning from their environment. In the case of American atheists, they take concepts, some of them irrational, like freedom, basic inalienable rights, the value and dignity of a human life, compassion, charity -- wonderful American values -- because these will protect them and give their lives meaning and allow them to continue living rich, meaningful, productive lives.
Your thoughts?
The honest answer
You have asked a fair question.
I will give you my honest answer: I don't know. Perhaps one day some human or some computer will have an enormous flash of insight and The Answer will appear. Perhaps it will not, but one thing is certain and that is that that human will not be me. I guess one of the problems that I have with resorting to the God hypothesis is that on the one hand believers tell you "God feels these particular human emotions and wants you to do X, Y, Z and Q every other Thursday" and then when you try to pin them down on say the existence of evil question they say "God moves in mysterious ways." And there we are again smack in the middle of the "I don't know." Not knowing is fine, but trying to say that you do know when you don't isn't. I am speaking in general and not railing against you here Jeg. You have been quite civil and I am enjoying the discourse. ASCII does not convey tone so I wanted to make sure that was clear.
When I try to think of what came before the birth of our universe or whether there are other universes where the physical constants are different than they are here or even places where there are more (or less) than the basic four forces my mind just shuts down and I have to reboot it. My mind and body were 'designed' for hunting and gathering (and fornicating) on the veldt of East Africa. My brain was not designed to wrestle with such things. Its like trying to pave a road with a screwdriver. Pursuit of The Answer is one of the things I think would be a worthy purpose for our species. Unfortunately a majority of the species would disagree because they think they already have it. In a way the certainty of believers is much like the nihilism of atheists. There is no point looking for anything because all of the important answers have already been given. In the olden times the deity talked to people directly and said all that he/she/it needed or wanted to say. Most people who preach a new revelation or new miracles are met with derision and disbelief. After all why bother looking for anything new when the creator and maintainer of the entire universe has already told you everything you need to know? How can science compete with that?
I have heard the hypothesis that religion is a survival adaptation because it would presumably keep the meaninglessness and suicidal thoughts of a completely materialistic universe (and its inherent basic unfairness) at bay. That would certainly be logical if there were times when non-existence was preferable to a wretched life. Judging from the fact that there are now more obese than starving perhaps the pendulum of misery has swung and the survival utility of religion has passed.
Again I agree with Thameron! Wow.
And I think he is generally correct in his assessment of ultimate meaning (but I would add purpose, too). If you have to define your own meaning in life, then you are bowing to the truth that there is no overarching, universal truth or meaning, only what you make for yourself. If the only meaning is what you or I choose, then all we have done is find a way to entertain ourselves (and each other) in "our short stroll across the short valley between the great, black walls of Oblivion"
We're all headed for the top of a cliff. Only a few are willing to stare out into the void, the rest simply want to keep themselves busy ignoring it until they go off.
"I believe in preaching to the converted; for I have generally found that the converted do not understand their own religion." -G.K. Chesterton
So?
So, what's wrong with that? To quote myself:
I don't get where there has to be some meaning other than that which we create, or how that somehow lessens our small accomplishments.
Jim Downey
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Like Science Fiction? Read my novel, Communion of Dreams, for free.
Depressing
Yeah it is a depressing statement. In strictly Darwinian terms, such a 'worldview' has no survival value. That's why we humans want purpose in our lives. Purpose makes us want to live. But again going back, there is no reason to believe life has inherent purpose other than to propagate the species. Humans decide what that purpose is. Humans decide what the value of a human life is. Including 'Godders' like me. Theists have their texts to tell them that humans have value, but we dont need the text to feel love and compassion. Our text also says that even non-believers can have compassion and love for fellow man and all that and that sometimes they can put believers to shame. But to believe in inherent purpose is believing in something intangible. Not God belief, of course. You can still be atheist and believe that life has a 'higher' purpose other than propagation of the species. I suppose for an atheist, it would make sense to attribute the inherent purpose to the laws of nature, and not springing from his brain alone. Would that be accurate?
No higher purpose needed
"I suppose for an atheist, it would make sense to attribute the inherent purpose to the laws of nature, and not springing from his brain alone. Would that be accurate?"
Of course. Our brains are not isolated, self-contained units; they are the products of billions of years of evolution, and our thoughts and behavior are deeply influenced by that history, even if we are unaware of it. I can't think of any higher purpose I could have than nuturing my daughter, who I love with all my heart. A greater purpose by far, I think, than glorifying an imaginary God, even if I am in part programmed by evolution to raise the next generation.
I know that theists often take the position that because we believe that there is no God to give us an ultimate, eternal purpose, and that we and everyone we know and love are destined for oblivion, that makes our lives valueless and futile. But from what I can tell, this wonderful, meaningful purpose is to be one of the lucky few who get to spend eternity singing to God about how glorious he is, while the vast majority of mankind is roasting in hell for the crime of not successfully guessing the correct way to worship God. For myself, I would think after just a few decades of kissing God's butt it would all start to seem a little tedious, and doing it for eternity utterly pointless. I prefer one lifetime of loving living, breathing, flawed, unique humans.
Ecclesiastes
It's all so pointless. You might as well just enjoy yourself with a decent meal, a glass of beer, a good job and friends & family, for your life is short, and you will be dead for so long. You will not know whether what you have done will last, or if those who inherit it even deserve it. Rich or poor, wise or foolish, you will die and eventually be forgotten. It's better to go to a funeral than a birthday party, to be reminded that you, too, will have to take that long dirt nap. It's all so pointless, to have such short lives and still have a desire to live beyond and understand more - Who knows whether there even *is* an eternity, or even a reward for this life?
Yes, that *is* in the Bible.
"I believe in preaching to the converted; for I have generally found that the converted do not understand their own religion." -G.K. Chesterton
requiem
At least you've got 90 Day Jayne to keep your winter months busy.
I'll second Brent's "Brilliant"!
Shiny! I was sicker'n a dog what got in th' det cord, and missed this yesterday. Yer site rocks, Jayne - happy happy Reaver killin'!
Jim Downey
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Like Science Fiction? Read my novel, Communion of Dreams, for free.
Brilliant!
The Reavers ain't gotta
chance, Jayne. Rock on.
Firefly
Is this a "Firefly" reference? *sighs* Such a pity that show didn't continue on...
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