TNA's Archive

Hi.This blog, as you might know, hasn’t updated in a long time. That’s because I took over the blog formerly known as thehopefulheathen and started posting there. So, just in case someone still cares, you can find me at The Newer Atheist.  Whether or not you decide to follow me there, go ahead and unfollow this blog, because it’s not going anywhere post-wise.

As to this blog, it is and has been kept up as an archive of pre-move content. It’s going to stay up for a while, and you’re welcome to browse through it. Know that most links will take you to a 404 page on The Newer Atheist - you’ll need to manually change the url to “tna-archive”.

It’s been a lot of fun, guys. Hope to see some new faces on the new blog!

deconversionmovement:

“Jesus loves you” shouldn’t make an atheist mad at all.  Actually, hearing that puts a smile on my face because I am granted the opportunity to shake your arrogant faith.

“Wow, you know it’s actually really cool that you’re being an asshole to someone who believes in god, that’s great, um, because it makes us all look really good.”

zjemptv:

theneweratheist:

On every incarnation of this blog, I’ve had trouble with one thing I’d really like to grow better at - covering stories. Events which are super relevant to the topics at hand go completely unnoticed, or receive a half-assed summary days after everyone gets done talking about them.

However, I’ve managed, thanks to a particularly vile FTB, which has unfortunately been popping up in #religion, to stay informed on a big story in internet atheism. Leah Libresco, former blogger for the Patheos Atheist channel, converted to Catholicism recently. And of course, the atheist community being the friendly place it is, she was welcomed with open arms. Hah.

So, here’s my message to all those who decided to critique Leah after her conversion.

Fuck you. Damn straight, this is an angry post, and it’s completely justified.

Read More

My name has two I’s. I know not many people are named Zinnia, but there are probably even fewer named Zinna.

Thank you for your productive and informative addition to this discussion. The typo has been corrected.

I don’t have much to respond to with this first message, other than to note that your blog’s focus on the god question indicates that we have very different opinions on what constitutes a minor claim. I don’t consider the god claim major because its truth is irrelevant to its effect - but I’m getting ahead of myself. Second message:

As an aside I think you are quite off about belief in god not having an impact on actions or morality. Religion is quite often like a pump unduly inflating confidence in actions be they for good or bad. However, stopping thinking, otherwise known as having faith, is bad for human progress especially when moral truths are supported by faith claims. Simply put the best way to achieve our goals, no matter what they are, is to correctly model the world and faith isn’t a path to do so.

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As an aside I think you are quite off about belief in god not having an impact on actions or morality. Religion is quite often like a pump unduly inflating confidence in actions be they for good or bad.

Your second sentence is true. The issue with this logic is that religion is not merely a belief in a god, it also includes doctrines. (Which are quite separable from the belief in god, and historically have been outright changed or quietly less emphasized often.) Religion does act as a pump, but this is not because of the belief.

However, stopping thinking, otherwise known as having faith

Faith represents a stop in empirical proof-based thinking only. You consider empirical proof-based thinking to be the only legitimate thinking; the problem is on your end and not that of those with faith.

is bad for human progress especially when moral truths are supported by faith claims.

“Bad for human progress” is an unsupported claim for which the burden of proof lies on you. To support this claim you cannot simply show that lying about material facts is harmful to progress (I would agree with you there), but must show that lying on facts which do not affect our world one way or another (as in the so-called “atheist’s wager”) is also harmful.

As to moral truths of the religious being based on faith claims, even saying for the state of discussion I agree with you (I don’t), this still gives no reason to not simply target faulty moral truths rather than faith.

Simply put the best way to achieve our goals, no matter what they are, is to correctly model the world and faith isn’t a path to do so.

Again, your statement is correct because you unwittingly use terms that don’t support your broad agreement. Yes, we need to correctly model the world and its empirical realms. However, I have yet to see one good reason to apply empirical testing to non-material beliefs.

doubtingmarcus:

[Here]

You start this post with two quotes, and one contains the keyword to this discussion.

“Stop imposing your reason on me!”

Your reason, as evidenced by your blog, is a fact-centered reason based on empirical knowledge. While most people use this sort of reasoning at times - as you point out, no one wants to eat mercury - not everyone considers usage of that thinking reasonable at every moment.

The theists who speak quotes like those you’ve recorded, and I with them, would argue that your reason is unneeded in certain places. Like, say, the belief in God this whole unsubtle post jabs at.

Your reason is not needed in ‘the god realm’ by nature, because the factual accuracy of the belief makes no difference in how the belief affects the known world. A utilitarian sort of reason makes much more sense for handling this area, where the question of truth is skipped in favor of exploring any effects resulting from belief.

To use the quotes you list does not spit in the face of reason, it spits back your reason - because your reason is, believe it or not, occasionally unwarranted.

You’re right that the real question is what is “the appropriate amount of outside interference and encouragement.” For my part, I’ve already proposed a little test for deciding which claims need interference.

It’s been some time now since I’ve made a serious post for this blog.

I could list off excuses like tough courses in school or personal issues, but despite the presence of both those things, the underlying problem is I haven’t been excited about writing this for a while. It’s hard to fight 24/7 when you make little progress on a day-to-day basis. Maybe that’s the ol’ abyss staring back into me, or perhaps I just get cynical on occasion.

Either way, I’m still here, and rather rejuvenated. That in mind, I’m going to try to introduce some new content in the upcoming days.

One thing I plan on rolling out is some ‘atheist-POV’ content - posts critiquing the harm done by certain religious doctrines. Don’t run off just yet; these posts won’t be painted using the extremely broad anti-theistic brush. I prefer more calculated strokes.

The very idea behind this series, in fact, is to suggest ways to “tailor” doctrines with theism-friendly interpretations that cause no harm. As such, this series will be (tentatively) titled Tailoring Theology.

Perhaps as this series plays out, some of those who accuse my brand of atheism of giving theists free passes will learn that it’s not about arguing vs. staying silent, but learning what’s worth arguing about. Not holding my breath, though.

Thanks to everyone who’s stuck around this long!

- TNA

I went ahead and started another personal.

So uh, follow it if you want.