The psychology of atheism?
- Image by BinJabreel (Is on Hiatus) via Flickr
So I’m playing around with DirecTV’s search for a program feature and wonder what might come up if I typed in “atheist.” Sure enough, a single program populated in the list: “The Psychology of Atheism,” which was on a show hosted by R.C. Sproul.
So I scheduled it and promptly forgot about it.
Until I was looking at my recordings list and noticed it recorded this morning. It was only a half-hour show and, even though I knew Sproul was a Christian apologist and not likely to have anything rational to say, I decided I could stand it for 30 minutes.
The presentation actually began very rationally and sensible. He quoted some preeminent philosophers and made some very objective observations about the theist-atheist debate on whether or not a god exists. One of these (and I’m paraphrasing) was that we can all agree that the question of god is one that automatically comes with psychological baggage. I can agree with that.
He made a few observations like simply stating that without God, life would be meaningless (a la Kant) isn’t sufficient enough of an argument to say that a god exists. I can agree with that, obviously.
But then Sproul uses not logic, reason or scientific observation to arrive at his conclusion that a god -and not just any god but his God- exists! What then, does R.C. Sproul use to defend his position that a god, his God, exists?
The Apostle Paul.
I shit you not.
He makes the GIANT leap of moving from the question about the existence of a god to affirming that existence with the writings of an Iron Age misogynist. He interprets Paul as stating that the “denial of God” is a moral issue not an intellectual issue. Yet Sproul does nothing to create an intellectual link between the existence of a god in the universe and that god being his God; the god of Sproul’s own culture. And he has the gall to state it’s a “moral question” and makes an argument that atheists are immoral since they deny the “truth of God revealed in nature.”
And, no, Sproul doesn’t give an intellectual example of this “natural evidence” either. We are left to take it on faith that what he’s saying is true. What he’s saying about truth is true, that is.
This is coming from the guy who’s son was defrocked for tax fraud, identity theft, and “spiritual abuse” (whatever that means). Oh, and Jr. was a misogynist as well, referring to his wife as “barren” even though she already gave him 6 children. I’m betting the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.
Such presentations by apologists are never really intended for viewing or attendance by atheists and skeptics, however. They’re presentations probably designed with the primary intention of maintaining the flock and keeping the flock close, pointing out the dangers of thinking for yourself or asking the wrong questions, after all, those atheists are immoral and you don’t want to go down the path of immorality. Do you?
The flock and their shepherd.
Don’t forget, flock: the best shepherds eventually slaughter their flocks after fleecing them for years.
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January 14, 2010
Tags: atheism, Existence of God, god, morality Posted in: Myths of Atheism
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4 Responses
Atheism: What It Is And Why It Is « Noreligion Blog - January 31, 2010
[...] The psychology of atheism? [...]
atheists are irrational and intellectually inferior. Atheism is the disease of the lumpen proletariat, the ignorant, the rebel. They used to pride themselves on being intellectuals but that was before one-dimensional man caught up with American society. Now most atheists are so illiterate they don’t know what an intellectual is.
Members of this “irrational” and “intellectually inferior” club include Carl Sagan, Richard Feynman, Stephen Hawking, and Warren Buffet. Each of these should need no introduction even to the most ignorant among us. But Google them if you’re curious. Other “irrational” and “intellectually inferior” atheists include Jodi Foster, one of the most renowned and prolific actors of our time; Sean Carroll, a theoretical cosmologist; Douglas Adams, author of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy; Steve Wozniak, the computer engineer who founded Apple along with Steve Jobs; Richard Leakey, one of the most important anthropologists of our time -the discoverer of many fossil species of ancient Homo; Bruce Lee, martial artist and found of the Jeet Kune Do system; Steven Weinberg, a Nobel Prize winning physicist; James Watson and Francis Crick, the discoverers of DNA; Katherine Hepburn, winner of 12 Academy Awards.
In addition, 93% of the members of the National Academy of Sciences proclaim to be atheists. Many would argue that all these are smart, rational, and intellectual folks. Perhaps those with their cranial sections firmly planted in a silica stratum would disagree.
You seem to be misusing the term lumpenproletariat. Also, the word is German and not split in the ignorant fashion you’ve applied. The term was invented by Marx and Engles in their The German Ideology (if memory serves correct) and it refers to the portion of the working class that enjoys the status quo, all the while exploiting the remainder of the working class. They certainly aren’t the “rebel” in the sense you wish to convey. Indeed, if there is a lumpenproletariat in modern American society, it is likely the swindling religionists who pass collection plates, request federal and local funding for unproven and non-efficacious “faith-based” programs, and cheat society by side-stepping tax law with their “religious” status.
“Most atheists?” Please, tell us all how you came to quantify this claim. What measurement did you apply to arrive at this conclusion? Your faulty premises above have been riddled with holes and shredded with facts.
Thank you for stopping by and posting. Seemingly undereducated trolls are always welcome since it gives an “irrational” and “intellectually inferior” atheist like me something to point and laugh at.
I listened to this podcast today and quickly came to the same conclusion as you – to argue that the bible is true because it says so in the bible is just wrong.
Also, psychology is a science, therefore you can’t really quote sources that are thousands of years old, you need to quote the latest research.
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