Posted by Jason on December 27, 1996 at 14:17:39:
In Reply to: bugs and men posted by stephen snead on December 27, 1996 at 09:24:26:
: First I want to thank Jason for a very intelligent and honest response to my last post. The other day while in my bathroom I saw a very ugly sight. A waterbug. call orkin quick. Actually I smashed it. But,not untill I looked and thought about something. If the atheists were absolutley right. Then that bug had as much dignity as I do. The bug ends the same as a human. Now I want to be careful here because the internet is wide open and I don't want to say anything that would disturb any unstable folks. But,if I believed that there was no more to me than a bug. If I really thought that humans were simply intellegent beasts at heart. No soul. Then I would be the meanest s.o.b. on the planet. No limits. What ever I could get away with. You have absolutely no right to judge Hitler,Stalin or Manson or Dalmer. Now I am not and will never be a violent person. I think the people I just named were monsters. I'm simply giving you a point that any honest atheist has to at least aknowledge. Please don't start with the glourious evelution of mankind. It does not change the banility of a souless world. Fundlementalism always breaks down at it's core. Reliogous or Atheistic. It just will not stand up. to a thoughtfull mind. I think that evelution (and yeah I need spell checker) should be taught as the best answer biologically for science classes. But,be careful of substituting dogma for science. One thing I have learned in my life. Everyone has an agenda. on the new age pages you will get fluff and highminded cosmic evolved little gods. On religion you get some honest quest for understanding and some reliogous mind controll dogma. Same for the new agers. And on these pages you get the (we are to intellegent to believe in anything but ourselves and what mr.randi and mr.gardner will pat us on the back for. Well to all of you I say Your god's too small. And finally please remember. We can caricature anyone. From Carl Sagan to Hugh Ross. But,only when we listen and search can we learn.
Hello again, Stephen,
You're quite welcome but I'm not quite sure if you're referring to my post or
not. There appears to be another Jason lurking here. I'm a newbie here, by
the way.
What you have just presented is an argument for belief rather than evidence.
You are arguing for the benefits of a belief and the dangers of accepting
an alternative belief. Even if your argument is right, we could still be
living in an atheistic reality. I think we should pursue the truth even if
the truth may be uncomfortable.
In response to your argument, I would say that a soulless existence may have
the opposite effect. Since this is the only life that we'll have, we might
as well enjoy it to its fullest (I'll have to admit that I haven't learned
how to do this yet). In the movie "Unforgiven" there is a scene where
Clint Eastwood's character says, "It's a terrible thing to kill a man. You
take away everything he has and everthing he ever will have." (These aren't
the exact lines). It's through this kind of logic that we can have empathy
and respect for other people's lives. I have respect for human life because
of empathy and rationality, not because of a supernatural C.S. Lewis style
"natural law" in my mind.
In addition, another reason why we don't go out and murder and rape is
because we would soon find out it won't be in our best interest. Imagine a
world where you constantly have to watch your back, you can't trust anyone,
and you have to kill or be killed. Morality works because of logical
reasons. There is nothing inconsistent in saying, "God does not exist but
torturing little children is objectively wrong." Therefore, I think
humanists have every right to condemn people like Stalin and Hitler.
Finally, this is off topic, but I noticed you mentioned Carl Sagan. I was
a little distraught to see him go. I consider him a model humanist and a
heroic man. I really enjoyed his book, "The Demon Haunted World."
- Jason
F