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Are most believers really atheists?
Posted: Sat Dec 21, 2024 5:25 pm
by Gadianton
I hate to be the inverse of Jordan Peterson and other culture warriors who say that atheists really believe, and claim believers really don't believe. But here I am. I've posted about this before but just realized the other day that the right framework to express the idea is ranked voting (instant runoff voting). If we took a representative sample of believers (perhaps nonbelievers also) and had them rank the options for God, who wins? Example:
a) Sunni Islam
b) Calvinism
c) Mormonism
d) Catholicism
e) Atheism
The gist of it is reacting to Pascal's Wager. Pascal, like most militant believers, seemed to think the option is between atheism and his own personal Santa Clause; between his own narrow view of the Christian God and the lack of any God. But most people who believe in God are going to be wrong about God. They are going to wind up in the real God's hell. It was common to hear sentiments from other Mormons back in the day that if Mormonism wasn't true, they wouldn't believe in anything; that's how much they detested other religions. I suspect most people feel the same about religions other than their own, whether it's fear of the other God's flames or supreme distaste for the other God's heaven. Most people, in my view, don't want any God if they can't have their specific God. Likewise, warmhearted universalists must consider the possibility that God is a fundamentalist. If I'm right, and most people put Atheism second, then I think it's fair to say most people are atheists. It's not surprising that by the same token, to even have religious freedom, society must first be secular.
You can reject ranked voting and maintain monotheistic purity that "God" is conceptually tied to your deity, but then there is no way to arbitrate between Warren Jeff's wager and Pascal's.
Re: Are most believers really atheists?
Posted: Sat Dec 21, 2024 5:39 pm
by drumdude
You can keep splitting God into narrower and narrower categories.
The God of the Jews, Christians and Muslims.
The God of only the Christians.
The God of only Mormons.
The God of only the Brighamite Mormons.
The God of only the Brighamite Mormons who ended polygamy in 1905.
The God of only the Brighamite Mormons who ended polygamy in 1905 and the priesthood ban in 1978.
The God of only the Brighamite Mormons who ended polygamy in 1905 and the priesthood ban in 1978 and thinks using the word Mormon is a victory for Satan.
Eventually all that exists is your own pet God who is obviously a creation of your own design.
Imagine how surprised a Mormon would be to die and discover that actually the Josephites were correct and the LDS church has been in apostasy since Brigham Young.
Re: Are most believers really atheists?
Posted: Sat Dec 21, 2024 5:40 pm
by IWMP
Kinda depressing to think about.
I think there is probably a lot more variations and it is probably more complex.
I think if people are praying to God of whatever form then they are still praying to whatever it is about existence that fits the characteristics of a god, regardless of how they worship. Because worship and praising something beyond a person is probably the same kind of chemical and psychological reaction within the body and around our energies.
I have in the past worried about whether I am praying to the wrong god or what if the god people worship is actually the devil. But then I have to bring it back to intention and the relationship being very much a personal one.
I had a belief system before my parents converted, so even without any religious activities, I always had a sense of something greater that I assumed to be God. I'm not sure my religious/spiritual upbringing was entirely normal now that I'm an adult. There are things I was reading and watching as a child that my kids don't know about. I was aware of tarot, magic, energies, psychic vampires, spirits, demons and all that sort of stuff from a young age. Not that it was going on in my house but it was talked about and discussed. I'd sit at my mum's friends house while they studied psychology and discussed and debates theology and other stuff. They talked about energies and telepathy and all sorts. We also watched psychic mediums on the TV ( my kids have zero exposure to this). So even without being a Christian, I had that sense of more and I believed in God.
Becoming Mormon, I assumed the Mormon god was the very same god that I already knew about. I don't believe God was once human. I didn't believe the Mormon God to be human even though they mentioned it a few times.
Re: Are most believers really atheists?
Posted: Sat Dec 21, 2024 6:15 pm
by Gadianton
drumdude wrote:The God of only the Brighamite Mormons who ended polygamy in 1905.
The God of only the Brighamite Mormons who ended polygamy in 1905 and the priesthood ban in 1978.
This is a good point, while sociologically it seems too granular, internally, this could be a really big deal. Members of the first group might vote like this:
a) The God of only the Brighamite Mormons who ended polygamy in 1905.
b) Muslims
c) atheists
d) Catholics
e) Heaven's Gate
f) Charles Manson
g) The God of only the Brighamite Mormons who ended polygamy in 1905 and the priesthood ban in 1978.
The worst offenders are often the closest to home. The worst Satanists are that splinter group who started a church down the road and taking away our tithe payers.
Re: Are most believers really atheists?
Posted: Sat Dec 21, 2024 10:12 pm
by Gadianton
IWMP wrote:I think if people are praying to God of whatever form then they are still praying to whatever it is about existence that fits the characteristics of a god, regardless of how they worship.
Universalists and sociologists would definitely agree. I would also agree. But the question is, do those saying the prayers agree? There are varying levels of universalism and tolerance among believers, and those who tend towards spiritualism (as you also mentioned energies and telepathy) are the most accepting of others but funny how it is, those are also the least likely to believe in "God" as such. You can be a pantheist or a Unitarian and accept everyone's prayers as valid, but you'll get a heck of a lot of pushback from the stalwarts who will say those who are so accepting are suspicious as actual theists.
Do Catholics view the rosary prayers as no more valid than any prayers anyone else says?
Re: Are most believers really atheists?
Posted: Sat Dec 21, 2024 10:20 pm
by ceeboo
Are most atheists really believers?
Re: Are most believers really atheists?
Posted: Sat Dec 21, 2024 10:24 pm
by Gadianton
ceeboo wrote: ↑Sat Dec 21, 2024 10:20 pm
Are most atheists really believers?
According to Jordan Peterson and a number of Christian apologists, yes. Of course, I did mention that in my first post.
Re: Are most believers really atheists?
Posted: Sat Dec 21, 2024 10:37 pm
by Kishkumen
There is no hell. It is a heresy. Putting that aside, why should any other Gods outside of heretical Christianity have a hell? How many do?
Re: Are most believers really atheists?
Posted: Sat Dec 21, 2024 11:02 pm
by huckelberry
Gadianton wrote: ↑Sat Dec 21, 2024 5:25 pm
I hate to be the inverse of Jordan Peterson and other culture warriors who say that atheists really believe, and claim believers really don't believe. But here I am. I've posted about this before but just realized the other day that the right framework to express the idea is ranked voting (instant runoff voting). If we took a representative sample of believers (perhaps nonbelievers also) and had them rank the options for God, who wins? Example:
a) Sunni Islam
b) Calvinism
c) Mormonism
d) Catholicism
e) Atheism
The gist of it is reacting to Pascal's Wager. Pascal, like most militant believers, seemed to think the option is between atheism and his own personal Santa Clause; between his own narrow view of the Christian God and the lack of any God. But most people who believe in God are going to be wrong about God. They are going to wind up in the real God's hell. It was common to hear sentiments from other Mormons back in the day that if Mormonism wasn't true, they wouldn't believe in anything; that's how much they detested other religions. I suspect most people feel the same about religions other than their own, whether it's fear of the other God's flames or supreme distaste for the other God's heaven. Most people, in my view, don't want any God if they can't have their specific God. Likewise, warmhearted universalists must consider the possibility that God is a fundamentalist. If I'm right, and most people put Atheism second, then I think it's fair to say most people are atheists. It's not surprising that by the same token, to even have religious freedom, society must first be secular.
You can reject ranked voting and maintain monotheistic purity that "God" is conceptually tied to your deity, but then there is no way to arbitrate between Warren Jeff's wager and Pascal's.
Gadianton, I was taken aback to think Jordan would float that lame thing about atheist but then thought that with his turn to Trump perhaps the Russians planted some mind worm in him during his extended treatement. I checked google for Jordan comments and found reference to him proposing some people have Pan as their God. Perhaps, I think Jordan does a bit of expermenting around with ideas to find which might suggest different and interesting viewpoints. To propose all atheist believe in god may not be so interesting.(what is believe supposed to mean?)
I am not much for Pascals wager, checking google to refresh my memory of the man I was impressed by his experimenting to find air pressure lowers at higher elevations.
Ranking options for god? Considering your list I notice I still fall in the category Calvinist yet I think that family of thinking contains some of the most unfeeling narrow wrong thinking about God that I can think of. I can look at each of those groups and think of some positives and negatives of each. Nobody truly comprehends God.
And there isn't more than one to choose from.
Re: Are most believers really atheists?
Posted: Sun Dec 22, 2024 5:36 am
by IWMP
I believe atheists to be people who believe that when we die there is nothing more and that there is nothing outside the realm that we experience in terms of intelligence that created us as an existence. But, I guess only an atheist would know.
I like pantheism. Not sure what extent I'd go to to say I believe in that but...
I see it as, like looking at a colour. We all, or most of us will look at the colour blue and we all perceive it as blue but we know that each others experience and perception of what blue looks like to them is very different but at the end of the day it's still the same colour we just read and respond to it based on a mixture of biological and brain processing characteristics within our individual selves.
Or like looking at a statue but no two people can stand in the same place. It's the same statue but we all see a different view and we don't have the ability to view all angles and combine the images to come up with a complete idea of that object. Doesn't mean it's a different object but how we relate to it will be different because of what we are able to understand.
That's just how I feel.