Schism Among Atheists

Frustrated Mess wrote:

Oh, dear. As I recall, the latest major war in the mid-east was begun by two "men of God", one of whom had actually received messages from His highest of the highs and who was widely supported by anti-intellectual self-described christians.

Are you sure that wars aren't all about warfiteering and resource grabs waged on behalf of capitalists worshipping false Roman gods of war? Or do they make war because they actually do believe that some deity is instructing them to? I'd be even more worried if they are total psycopaths driven by insanity than mere appalling greed and their own amoral value system.

Tommy_Paine wrote:

Post Modernism is the rejection of all enlightenment in reaction to the occult, or hidden enlightenment. 

However, the danger in that is what we are experiencing today, where anything can be "true".  Where Newton's laws are a construct of white male european privelege, as if a person of Chinese ancestory might have a different outcome than mine if we didn't wear a seatbelt in a car accident.

And, the post modernist rejection of science, or the open enlightenment figures very much in neo liberal economics,  and it lends distructive creedence to all manner of dangerous claims.

Tommy, I think we've talked about this before, but postmodernism is really more of a historical mode than it is a philosophy. That means that if you think it "rejects" science--which I don't think it does, nor does it say "anything can be 'true'", although it's often caricatured in that way--in response to the enlightenment, you need to also consider how it is continuing the enlightenment project. Adorno isn't a postmodernist by the way--he thinks the enlightenment is spot on, we just don't know the maths anymore, and we need to get back on track. I definitely agree with you that some postmodern thought smacks of late capitalist economics and culture, but I'm encouraged to read it as dialectic--the same way Marx saw the revolutionary potential in the bourgeoisie, even as he saw how they had to be put down.

I do like the distinction between "open" science and "occult" science, and I think we could be on to something there. It's also a nice play that demonstrates religion doesn't have an exclusive on insularity, dogma and perverted moral imperatives.

ETA:

Unionist wrote:

Do you know of any other organizations that discourage intermarriage with non-members of the organization?

I dunno, white people?

I guess I'm missing your point, Unionist. Are you arguing that literalist religious institutions are unjust? Has anyone disagreed with you?

ETA: to elaborate, there are institutional, indexical and mostly oppressive strucures of religion that issue tyrannical edicts like the one you speak of. There are also cultural, social institutions also religiously rooted, that encourage the same kind of behaviour. And, of course, there are cultural, social institutions (eg, Western whiteness) that enact the same imperatives.

Frustrated Mess wrote:

I'm relatively certain it wouldn't matter to me if the killers of my family were purely insane or motivated by pure greed. In fact, I'd be hard pressed to know the difference. I have argued our capotalist system, motivated entirely by greed, is insane.Both Blair and Bush claim to be christian men and still engaged in an act of mass murder despite the tenets of their stated faith. But that is not my point. My point is the Iraq war was alternately sold as a religious war, a war on terrorism, a war against proliferation in the West to win the support of various constituentcies including so-called christians.

Okay I see your point. But wars have often been sold in the name of crusading religion. Iow's, no actual deities played a hand in the slaughter. When it comes right down to it, the immoral warfiteering and real estate grabs of history were actually orchestrated in the name of self-interest and appalling greed. The rape and plunder of new worlds was falsely justified in the name of any real god. Iow's, people were lied to. A lot. And they were lied to by mere mortal human beings.

And religion is being replaced by a new justification for attacking other countries. The Nazis started things off with marching into other countries without protest of the alleged democratic nations for a few years after and beginning with Spain in the late 1930's. The Nazis told people they were bombing other countries for humanitarian reasons. It's still happening today. And if bombing Yugoslavia to kingdom come was for humanitarian reasons, then what kind of humans have we become?

I agree that organized religion can serve as a veil for prejudice in many ways nowadays, but, to be frank, I think it is a bit more complicated than you are letting on. Take your example: "I want my child to marry a Catholic" is actually code for "I want my child to marry a white." Now, you might take this as evidence that religion divides people and encourages xenophobia; but I prefer to think of religion as our language of xenophobia--it's also our language for forgiveness, for trade, for romance and for war--it's humanity, bascially. Or, in much more poetic terms, it is the sigh of an oppressed people.

Part of me thinks that if you get rid of religion, we humans, flawed as we are, will simply find another way to veil our xenophobia and drive for division--but I think it's much more true to say: get rid of religion? Good luck with that.

Adorno isn't a postmodernist by the way--he thinks the enlightenment is spot on, we just don't know the maths anymore, and we need to get back on track.

No, I picked up on that from your quote, and was carefull-- I thought-- not to infer he was.  And yes, I do throw the word "post modern" around from time to time to describe schools of thought that might be described better with more precise labels. 

But then, I'm sure no post modernist would begrudge me describing it anyway I choose to.  It is my narrative after all. 

The only thing I have to add is that my nose is stuffed up again. I had the swine flu a few weeks ago, I thought I got over it, and now my nose is stuffed up again. I'm just way too immersed in self-pity to respond to any of the points anyone is raising here. 

Catchfire wrote:

Take your example: "I want my child to marry a Catholic" is actually code for "I want my child to marry a white."

Really. And when Jews in North America and Europe were taught to marry Jews, this was some colour thing? How about Ireland? And you think there are no non-white Catholics????? I think we're speaking different languages here, or emanating from different backgrounds.

Quote:

Part of me thinks that if you get rid of religion, we humans, flawed as we are, will simply find another way to veil our xenophobia and drive for division--but I think it's much more true to say: get rid of religion? Good luck with that.

I see. Who said, "get rid of religion?" I'm not on any crusade. But when religion is discussed, I do occasionally point out how it serves ignorance and hatred. It certainly isn't the [i]source[/i] of ignorance and hatred. So perhaps we agree after all?

In the interest of giving the two sides of the schizm something to talk about, I'll close this one for length myself.