Posting this because I think it’s an interesting examination of the overlap (or lack thereof) between atheists and general skeptics. It’s worth remembering that the term ‘atheism’ only means a rejection of theistic beliefs; non-theistic beliefs that are nonetheless irrational and unsupported by evidence are not relevant to the term. And yet one can easily see why there is an overlap between these two communities and why many atheists scoff at other atheists who profess belief in things like astrology, ghosts, reincarnation, etc.
I’m definitely one of those who doesn’t believe in anything supernatural, but I’ve certainly met atheists who do. It’s worth remembering the two groups aren’t synonymous.
Removed by mod
Before I even open the article: bad title. Without no context or restriction, “Atheists” conveys “Atheists in general; for all intents and purposes, all Atheists”. This sounds like bullshit from a distance (and it is). A better way to convey the findings would be to put “some”, “many”, “a few” etc. before “Atheists”, but plenty media sources give no fucks about being accurate or correct.
And did the writer really share a fucking print screen as source???
A quarter of Brazilian atheists believe in reincarnation
Plenty people in Brazil label themselves “Atheists” while being more accurately described as either Monotheists or Pan[en]theists. For example, people who say “I don’t believe in gods, I believe in one God”, or who’d rather not be associated with institutionalised religions; the later is specially relevant, I think, because they tend to gravitate towards new age and syncretic religions. So depending on the methodology, and how this data is being contrasted with people who pay taxes to other governments, data regarding Brazil may or may not be useful.
The study also found that non-believers are not all nihilistic, moral relativists, or unable to appreciate the inherent value of the world around them.
That’s roughly on the same level as saying “the study found that not all Jehovah’s Witnesses hate your Sunday morning sleep”. This sort of generalisation is expected to be false, at least for some members within the group; as such, the “not all” is not a piece of news, it’s rubbish.
So everybody chill out — across the spectrum, we all tend to believe in the uncanny.
And here the author bites his own generalisation fallacy.
While I understand your complaints and admit that the author of the article strays too far into a tone that discredits atheists than I’d personally like, that’s not the view I share and not the reason I posted it. Also, plenty of headlines adhere to the convention of “[x group] thinks [this]” without meaning all members of that group. Whether or not you think that’s a shitty editorial standard, it’s not unique to this article.
Understood within the context I’m trying to present it and to the audience I’m presenting it to, I felt this article was a worthwhile contribution to the forum. I’m sorry if you disagree.
that’s not the view I share and not the reason I posted it
I understand it - no assumption taken about your view; I was criticising the text itself.
Also, plenty of headlines adhere to the convention of “[x group] thinks [this]” without meaning all members of that group. Whether or not you think that’s a shitty editorial standard, it’s not unique to this article.
Not only a shitty editorial [lack of] standard, but also breeding grounds for misinformation. The fact that it’s more common makes it actually worse, as it lowers the awareness of people to point it out and say “wait a minute, this is bullshit!” at those headlines.
I’m sorry if you disagree.
There’s no reason to apologise for sharing a text, or for seeing some disagreement on anything. If I were to put words on your mouth (Reddit style), I’d be the one at fault; not you. And disagreements are to be expected, not to be taken as an offence.
Other points regarding the text (such as how lack of a certain belief doesn’t prevent people from being irrational) were already addressed by other comments, so I simply didn’t mention them.
Yeah I disagree. Your article should be titled “we found one random dude on earth who claims to be an atheist and believes in ghosts”. Also I don’t care that other “journalists” do this, the standard is good behavior not other people.
Being an atheist doesn’t mean you are immune from superstition. It means that you don’t believe in a single type of superstition.
Believing that there are things that our current knowledge and science can’t observe and measure is not the same as believing in what the article is calling “the supernatural”.
Up until quite recently we couldn’t detect or measure gravity waves, that did not make them “supernatural” and NOW we can detect and measure them, and even tell what direction they came from.
There are certainly STILL things that we cannot detect and measure, but, as always, we will learn and explain the “mystery”.
As a naturalist, I’m incidentally atheist. I don’t believe in the supernatural.
But this is to say I don’t think all UAP (UFOs) are weather balloons, but that they’re natural phenomena. We just can’t explain them yet. Much the way that we can’t (yet) fully explain ball lightning, but we know it happens and is (probably) natural phenomena.
There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy but so far all the things we’ve explored occur due to natural events and can be predicted according to mathematical models, which is why it is wise to ground your steeple with a lightning rod.
I think I fall into this category, but it’s complicated. How much I believe in the supernatural depends on how much the belief will benefit me in the moment. Most of the time, it only goes as far as making jokes, coping with grief, and explaining weird but mundane occurances. There are a few beliefs where I’m more into them, such as the idea of reincarnation, but I’m still aware that there’s no scientific evidence to support them and that “brains are weird” is the best explanation for them. In the end, it’s about what helps me feel better, and only me. When I mysteriously lose an object, sometimes it’s fun to say a ghost moved it. When I’m sad about the passing of a pet, imagining their spirit frolicking in pet heaven is comforting. I don’t really believe in these things with my whole heart. Sometimes it’s just nice to pretend.
With respect, I’m not sure I agree that you fall into the category of atheists who have supernatural beliefs. You seem to be saying that you entertain supernatural ideas conceptually for their utility to you in the moment, but that you don’t actually Believe (capital ‘b’) they’re true, even in that moment. I’ve had moments of what I call “uncanny coincidence,” in which two events seem connected in a way that goes against everything I know about how reality works (e.g. a friend calling precisely in the moment I’m thinking about how I haven’t heard from them in years). When something like that happens, I do have thoughts like, “wow, that’s weird, it’s almost like they read my mind or God’s real and is connecting me with my long-lost buddy,” but I don’t really believe them. Likewise, every time I contemplate my own death and try to imagine what my thoughts will be when it’s moments away and I’m staring oblivion in the face, I can’t escape the notion that—despite my firm belief that my brain will just stop working and my stream of consciousness will stutter and then stop completely—I will be terrified at my own ignorance of what is about to happen, what I’m about to experience. As much as my higher brain is thoroughly convinced that my experience will end and there is no “darkness” that follows it, a baser, more intuitive part of my brain still acts as though my consciousness will persist somehow and thus I feel afraid. Does that fact that I feel fear betray my professed belief and mean I lack conviction in them? No, it just means my brain is a complex system and not all of it is capable of accepting an unintuitive idea like the absence of my own mind.
I don’t mean to miscategorize you though, so if you feel I’ve misunderstood you, please correct me.
Many atheists I’ve spoken to still believe in free will, which is a faith based belief with no scientific basis. So I’m not too surprised that some of them also believe in ghosts and shit.
I’m a determinist myself, but my understanding from reading/listening to some articles and interviews with professional philosophers on the subject is that the concept of free will as the layperson tends to think of it doesn’t actually have much utility in philosophy discussions and that professional investigations of it have generally settled on some version of “it’s complicated” and “you’re asking the wrong question.” I don’t pretend to have a sophisticated understanding of it and it’s been a long time since I looked the issue up, but I’m not sure I would put people who believe in free will in the same “faith-based believers” category I would use for people who believe in ghosts.
I would. I generally need a reason to believe something. If there’s not a reason, and you believe it anyway, it’s faith. The fun thing about the free will debate is that there is only contrary evidence. So believing in free will is a lot like believing in flat earth. They have an intuitive understanding that they have free will in the same way a flat earther has an intuitive understanding that the earth is flat. It meshes with the subjective experiences that have shaped their schema. When information contradicts a persons schema, they tend to ignore it, and will cling to their belief regardless of contrary evidence. They’ll look for free will like it’s the god of the gap, hoping somehow that it’s hiding in quantum effects that they don’t understand. The kicker though is that people who believe in free will don’t choose to believe in free will. Because they don’t have free will, no one does. Everything that happens is a direct result of preceding events, even your thoughts and beliefs. It’s all cause and effect. I agree though that it is the wrong question. Even though on the macro scale humans don’t have free will, on the micro scale of a human life all of those variables are hidden from us and we have to act as if we had free will. Even though every decision we make is the product of hidden interactions. This makes believing in free will a very useful belief. Should we believe in things because they are useful, or should we believe in things because they are true.? Whatever answer you come up with to that question, just remember that it was the only answer you COULD have come up with, being the person that you are now in the circumstance that exist presently.
You’re kind of preaching to the choir, but I would also add that there’s a difference between the philosophical rejection of a belief in free will and the more pragmatic “belief” even determinists must engage with whenever we make a choice. Again, I’m no philosophical expert on the subject, but this was a key point of discussion for philosophers in the articles I read. If we’re all acting in accordance with the idea that we have free will, even if we believe otherwise in a more cerebral sense, what impact does that lack of belief really have on the world or even just our lives? There’s the argument that, if we truly live in a determinist reality, should we even be punishing criminals for the harm they do to society as opposed to just imprisoning them for safety purposes and trying to reform them? Does that mean all determinists should be prison reformists who think punishment has no place in the criminal justice system? I certainly don’t subscribe to that philosophy, but do reject the idea of free will.
Anyway, my overall point is simply that the philosophical question of whether or not free will exists is a lot more complicated than the question of whether or not ghosts exist, and that it’s not just about the evidence for/against it, but also about the role such a belief (or lack thereof) plays in our moment-to-moment lives.
Well guess it depends on what you mean by free will. If you mean it as agency then yes it clearly exists, I have more agency than a slave. If you mean in that a human behavior is not fully predictable then yes as of right now you still have it. If you mean in the supernatural sense then well there really is no evidence to support that.
There’s no reason to believe that you have agency. The slaves beliefs, attitudes and decisions are dictated by their circumstances, and those circumstances determine the slaves actions. You have different circumstances, but your decisions are no less governed by them. There is no “natural” fee will vs. “Supernatural” freewill. The idea that you have freewill, at all, is supernatural and faith based, yet many atheists do seem to believe in it anyway. Which was the topic of OPs link.
This is bull and you know it. If you honestly thought agency wasn’t a thing you would have zero problem giving it up and what’s more this is a very problematic view to have. You are seriously going to maintain that a sex slave has as much agency as some rich dude?
No. I’m saying that no one has any agency. Zero agency for anyone. Everything is the direct result of the moment that came before it. This includes your reaction to events, your thoughts, your feelings, your unseemly implication, and the actions you take in your life. If you would like to cause me to modify my view then you’d need to come up with a functional theory that explains how human beings are the exception in an otherwise deterministic universe and free will is possible. If I lost the comforting illusion of agency it would probably suck. Not having agency doesn’t mean we don’t suffer. That is a false dichotomy. Whatever circumstances we find ourselves in, be they good or bad, our reaction to those circumstances would be deterministic.
Removed by mod
They are describing a wholely deterministic universe (one we don’t currently know the math for). If the universe is 100% deterministic, freewill is an illusion and the argument is moot. If it is not deterministic, the freewill probably exists and this argument is stupid.
Either free will exists it you are deterministically defined to believe it does. It’s a stupid argument, but still valid.
Ok what is the difference between a sex slave and me? What word do you want to redefine for that concept?
If the subjective illusion of free will is not distinguishable from actual free will, does it matter?
Whether you decide that it matters or not, it was the only decision you could have made knowing what you know and being who you are at the moment you made it.
If believing in a faith based idea doesn’t matter does that mean we should adopt the belief?
You missed the point. Either you don’t have the ability to choose to believe… Or free will exists. The argument is moot in this context.
If you don’t have free will, the argument is irrelevant. If you do, then it matters but the argument is invalid due to false premise.
deleted by creator
Do you really find it convincing that quantum randomness and unpredictable errors could give humans free will?
deleted by creator
Belief is opt in, not opt out. There’s no reason to believe that free will exists, so I don’t believe that free will exists. I’m not going to believe that freewill exists by default, and wait for it to be debunked. That’s basically pascal’s wager. I’m going to NOT believe in freewill until I have a reason to. There’s no reason to believe that free will is hidden in quantum physics, so I don’t believe that free will is hidden in quantum physics. Quantum effects can be random and unpredictable, but it doesn’t mean they’re “free will” and you have no reason to think that they are free will. You have a desire to have free will, which is understandable because everyone wants to believe that they have agency, but it doesn’t make it true. you can’t just say “something something quantum physics” and call it a day. That’s just appealing to the god of the gap, you’re just swapping out “god” for free will. Both of these things are equally unlikely to exist. While it’s true that we cannot predict errors in complex systems, it doesn’t mean that those errors are unpredictable. It means we can’t predict them. When we’re a Kardishev type 3 civilization we’ll probably have that sorted out too. We don’t know if free will is possible, and the reason that we don’t know if it is possible is because there is no evidence to support it. So unless someone can come up with a functional model that explains a process by which free will might occur in the real cosmos, I’m not going to believe in free will. It’s not even a choice, it’s determinism.
Consciousness is not bound by physical laws. Just like a computer game can allow you to use magic or have superpowers or whatever the game designer desires, completely independent of reality. The consciousness exist in a virtual reality construct of the mind, and is not bound by the simple rules of physics.
This allows free will to exist, although we don’t yet understand exactly how.
I respect philosophers of consciousness such as for instance Daniell Denett, who has progressed my understanding of consciousness a lot.
He does not believe in free will, which has become a much more popular opinion the past couple of decades, and which I was pretty convinced about too. But as Daniell Denett says, it is a very convincing illusion.
I have come to believe that it’s like the moon landing, the reason it is so convincing, is because it’s true.
I’d say there is evidence either way, so you can’t say it’s without evidence, I also pose the claim that Quantum physics unpredictability is irrelevant to the existence of free will. That is not what free will or consciousness arises from.
But you are right we cannot prove truly free will exist, and maybe it comes down to definition. Because we cannot have freedom to think that which we are incapable of imagining. But we are free to think we can fly, and then build a flying machine.
lolnope
