Getting random stuff organised
Humans generally like to stay alive. There are a few who don’t, but they generally don’t last long enough to make it into the statistics. Because we need to eat and drink and sleep in a safe place to stay alive, humans who want to stay alive necessarily have purposes and values; we value food and drink …
Continue reading “Is there such a thing as a non-nihilistic world, if there is no God?”
Most atheists, like most non-atheists, don’t commit criminal acts, because they are rational people, and can see that generally speaking the returns from criminal acts aren’t worth taking the risks involved. And most atheists, like most non-atheists, include in those risks the risk of losing the affection and respect of their families and friends, as …
For people living in complex interdependent societies, ‘good’ behaviour is almost always rational behaviour. Even in cases where behaving badly may give someone a short-term advantage, that’s usually more than offset by a loss of trust and respect for that person in future transactions. As rational people, atheists can be expected to behave well most …
Continue reading “How is it that some atheists are good people despite not believing in God?”
There are no ‘judgements of God’ because gods don’t exist. All the actions of gods that we have reported to us come from the mouths and pens of human writers, and are as much open to criticism as any other fictional accounts which depict a particular kind of morality and a particular method of decision-making. …
I like to compare morality with language. I speak a language called ‘English’. It developed out of a number of other languages and it’s still developing. There’s no reason to think it will ever stop. I acquired it largely from my parents, with some input from other people as I was growing up. My version …
Obviously not. If you were confronted with a real individual who had behaved as the Christian God—whom I assume you’re asking about—is described to have done, your natural reactions would be: terror revulsion trying to prevent that person from doing any more evil if you can and if you can’t, getting as far away from …
If ‘answering the problem of goodness’ means explaining why people behave in ways that benefit their fellow human beings (and animals), even to their own short-term detriment, that’s easily explained by pointing out that we live in complex interdependent societies in an unpredictable world, that most of us expect to be around for quite some …
Continue reading “How does atheism answer the problem of goodness?”
You’re assuming ‘better lives’ are synonymous with ‘lives more in line with the Ten Commandments’. But that’s certainly not proven, and many people would disagree with you. The basic question here seems to be ‘Would we do what a god wants if we knew what it was?’ And the answer must be: ‘It depends on what he …
Committing murder, for most people, is not a pleasant or rewarding experience. (Of course, there are a few exceptions.) Apart from the strong social indoctrination that most people have into being kind and considerate, the majority of people have a visceral distaste for carrying out violent acts on others. People generally require a very strong …
Continue reading “What prevents an atheist from committing murder?”
Most atheists are rational people. ‘Moral atrocities’ are pretty well irrational by definition. In most cases there’s simply no reason why an atheist would want to do anything that would fall into that category. And in the rare situations where an atheist might otherwise benefit from committing a moral atrocity, society has gone to great lengths to …
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