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Robin: Look, I get it, Jaime. As an atheist, you think that God’s wisdom is foolishness, that God’s righteousness is wickedness, and that the bloody death of Jesus on the cross is hateful and ugly rather than the epitome of love and beauty that Christians like I think it is. The Bible makes it very [...]
Archive for the ‘Rationalism’ Category
God and Goodness
January 30th, 2012 
Daniel Fincke 
Posted in Arguments Against The Existence of God, Arguments Against The Existence of God, Arguments for the Existence of God, Arguments for the Existence of God, Authority, Authority, Bible, Bible, Christianity, Christianity, Ethics, God, God, Metaethics, Metaethics, Metaphysics, Metaphysics, Morality, Morality, Philosophical Ethics, Philosophical Ethics, Philosophy Of Religion, Problem of Evil, Problem of Evil, Rationalism, Religion, Religion 
Tags: Divine Command Theory, God and Goodness, God's goodness, Theological Voluntarism 
26 Comments »Can Utilitarians Properly Esteem The Intrinsic Value of Truth?
January 22nd, 2012 Daniel Fincke The Obvious Intrinsic and Instrumental Values of Truth It is prejudicial and fallacious to assume that the world is an inherently just place and that all the traits we idealize as virtues will always lead to the best possible outcomes. So if we are to be honest and realistic in assessing those traits which are [...]
Posted in Applied Ethics, Applied Ethics, Atheism, Atheism, Atheism, Atheistic Ethics, Atheistic Ethics, Contemporary Ethics, Contemporary Ethics, Ethics, Ethics, Intellectual Vices, Intellectual Vices, Metaethics, Metaethics, New Atheism, New Atheism, New Atheism, New Atheism, Philosophical Ethics, Philosophical Ethics, Philosophy, Rationalism, Religion, Religion, Virtues, Virtues Tags: Atheism and Truth, Atheism and Value of Truth, Consequentialism and Truthfulness, Faith in Truth, Moral Perfectionism and Truthfulness, Relative Value of Truth, Truthfulness, Useful Religious Fictions, Utilitarianism and Truthfulness, Value in Lying, Value of Falsehood, Value of Truthfulness 37 Comments »Atheistic Wicca
January 8th, 2012 Eric Steinhart [This is the next to last post in my long series on atheism and Wicca.] My approach to Wicca has been critical. For philosophers at least, and hopefully for any rational person, criticism is based on careful analysis; it points to both the good and to the bad, to the true and to the false. [...]
Posted in Atheism, Featured, Naturalism, Paganism, Philosophy, Rationalism, Religion and Science, Wicca 16 Comments »Criticizing Wicca: Magic is Unethical
January 7th, 2012 Eric Steinhart [This is part of a series looking at atheism and Wicca.] Many Wiccans practice magic. Skeptics, rationalists, and naturalists may all be tempted to try to use science to refute the effectiveness of magic. Although such refutations do persuade some people, they often fail to accomplish anything: despite the best efforts of scientific debunkers, magical [...]
Criticizing Wicca: Magic is Unreliable
January 7th, 2012 Eric Steinhart [This is part of a long series looking at atheism and Wicca.] Any procedure for changing an initial situation (the start) into a desired situation (the goal) can be tested for its effectiveness. As used here, effectiveness is a matter of degree, so that procedures can be more or less effective. The simplest way to measure [...]
Criticizing Wicca: Magic
January 6th, 2012 Eric Steinhart [Magic is a pseudo-technology based on the pseudo-science of mysterious energy. It’s purpose is to provide the illusion of control. This post briefly describes how some Wiccans conceive of magic. Many Wiccans reject the use of magic altogether, or consider it entirely independent of Wicca. Thus the two should not be confused. After this brief [...]
Posted in Atheism, Featured, Intellectual Vices, Naturalism, Paganism, Philosophy, Rationalism, Wicca 7 Comments »My Thoughts On Eric’s Wicca and Atheism Experiment
January 6th, 2012 Daniel Fincke In early December, after juggling 9 classes and a daily blog all semester, I got sick. Eric Steinhart, a previous guest contributor on the blog, stepped in and has been the primary blogger on the site for one month now. He has discussed possible connections between atheists and Wiccans. Thursday was my first day where [...]
Posted in Atheism, Atheistic Ethics, Atheistic Ethics, Metaphysics, Metaphysics, New Atheism, New Atheism, New Atheism, Paganism, Philosophy Of Religion, Pseudoscience, PZ Myers, PZ Myers, Rationalism, Religion, Religion, Religious Extremism, Religious Extremism, Religious Moderates, Religious Moderates, Wicca 85 Comments »The Atheism and Wicca Series So Far
January 5th, 2012 Eric Steinhart Some folks have jumped into this series just recently, and others have had some trouble following due to the server problems in the last two days. The point of this series is to critically examine Wicca (and other neo-paganisms) through the lens of atheistic analytic philosophy of religion. So here’s the list of links to [...]
Posted in Atheism, Featured, Metaphysics, Naturalism, Paganism, Philosophy, Rationalism, Religion and Science, Wicca 2 Comments »Spiritual Exercises for Atheists
January 5th, 2012 Eric Steinhart Spiritual exercises (askesis) are practical activities for mental self-empowerment. They are intended to facilitate successful achievement by increasing the degree to which the self is mentally or emotionally prepared to perform. Spiritual exercises are not magic. Spiritual exercises are distinct from magic because they focus on causing changes in the self while magic focuses on [...]
Posted in Atheism, Evidence, Featured, Naturalism, Paganism, Philosophy, Psychology, Rationalism, Religion and Science, Wicca 11 Comments »Rational Rebirth
January 5th, 2012 Eric Steinhart Kurt Gödel (1906-1978) was an Austrian-American logician and mathematician. He is best known for his incompleteness theorems and his work in axiomatic set theory. However, he also produced some deeply interesting philosophical arguments. Some of these are found in his unpublished papers and letters. One of these is an argument for life after death (for [...]
Posted in Atheism, Featured, Metaphysics, Paganism, Philosophy, Rationalism, Religion and Science, Wicca 80 Comments »The Eternal Return of the Same
January 4th, 2012 Eric Steinhart The classical versions of eternal recurrence say that recurrence occurs within our universe. Those classical versions say that there is a cyclical pattern of events in our space-time. Since the classical theory of eternal recurrence makes claims about our universe, it is open to scientific study. And it is almost certainly false. There is no [...]
From Aristotle through Buddhism to Nietzsche
January 4th, 2012 Eric Steinhart Among all the classical theories of life after death, the one that seems to be most consistent with naturalism is the ancient Buddhist concept of rebirth. This concept is developed in Theraveda Buddhism. Theravedic Buddhism is an atheistic (or non-theistic) religion. Rebirth is linked to the Theravedic doctrines of impermanence and no-self. These doctrines imply [...]
Criticizing Wicca: The Wheel of the Year
January 2nd, 2012 Eric Steinhart The Wheel of the Year is a division of the solar year into eight holidays (the solstices, the equinoxes, and four days in-between). Insofar as the days on the Wheel of the Year mark natural points in the orbit of the earth around the sun, the Wheel marks a natural pattern. It marks a natural [...]
Posted in Atheism, Featured, Naturalism, Paganism, Philosophy, Rationalism, Religion and Science, Wicca 1 Comment »Two Arguments for Evolution by Rational Selection
January 1st, 2012 Eric Steinhart Although there is some empirical justification for the Principles of Sufficient Reason and Plenitude, much of the discussion of the logic of creation and evolution by rational selection has been highly abstract. It has been a priori; a matter of pure reason. But it is reasonable to demand empirical justification for those metaphysical theories. To [...]
On Evolution by Rational Selection
January 1st, 2012 Eric Steinhart Almost all atheists are surely aware of Darwinian evolution, which is evolution by natural selection, and which explains the history of life on earth. Universal Darwinism is the thesis that evolutionary principles operate beyond earthly biology. Of course, not all things have genes or compete for survival in ecosystems. More general evolutionary theories need not [...]
Creation Stories
December 31st, 2011 Eric Steinhart Many religions have creation stories. The Judeo-Christian creation stories are found in the first chapters of Genesis, which is the first book of the Bible. There is no need to repeat the Genesis stories here. It can be agreed that there are some metaphorical or analogical correspondences between the Genesis stories and our best science. [...]
More on Religious Diversity among Atheists
December 30th, 2011 Eric Steinhart [I did a short post on this two days ago; I’ve since dug further into the full Pew report and found more and stranger religious diversity among atheists.] The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life conducts the US Religious Landscape Survey. The survey is statistically sound, and thus its percentages can be reasonably extrapolated [...]
Posted in Atheism, Culture, Featured, Law & Politics, Philosophy, Rationalism, Religion, Religion and Science 38 Comments »Revelation versus Manifestation
December 30th, 2011 Eric Steinhart The Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) are religions of revelation. As is well-known, these religions are derived from the experiences of religiously privileged individuals (prophets, messiahs, inspired writers) to whom it is alleged that God spoke. These religions say that God revealed special information to these privileged people. This information comes neither from our [...]
Criticizing Wicca: God and Goddess
December 29th, 2011 Eric Steinhart According to several Wiccan texts, the Wiccan ultimate deity manifests itself in two forms, the male god and the female goddess. The first way to think about the god and goddess is realistic. This is theological realism: the god and goddess are both real things. They exist. A Wiccan who thinks like this is ontologically [...]
On Participation in Being-Itself
December 29th, 2011 Eric Steinhart On Tillich’s view, since the divine is being-itself, all humans participate in the divine simply by existing. But that participation is not experiential. Any experiential participation in the divine can only be through the distinctive ways in which humans exist. We participate in being-itself through our own being. Since you are material, you experience being-itself [...]
The Wiccan God and Goddess: Reality and Mythology
December 28th, 2011 Eric Steinhart The Farrars have an intriguing discussion of the ontological commitments of Wiccans to their god and goddess. Their discussion has three parts: (1) the realist thesis; (2) the anti-realist antithesis; and (3) the pragmatic resolution. The more detailed version of the Farrar’s discussion goes like this: (1) The realist thesis says that the god and [...]
Posted in Atheism, Featured, Metaphysics, Naturalism, Paganism, Philosophy, Rationalism, Wicca 7 Comments »Wicca and the Problem of Evil
December 28th, 2011 Eric Steinhart Many Wiccan writers criticize Christians for dividing the ultimate deity into a purely good God and a purely evil Devil. They deny this division. Buckland writes: “the idea of dividing the Supreme Power into two – good and evil – is the idea of an advanced and complex civilization. The Old Gods . . . [...]
Criticizing Wicca: Rationality
December 26th, 2011 Eric Steinhart According to the Farrars, “Witches [that is, Wiccans] are neither fools, escapist nor superstitious. They are living in the twentieth century, not the Middle Ages” (1981: 105). The Farrars write that “Many witches are scientists and technicians . . . If modern witchcraft did not have a coherent rationale, such people could only keep going [...]
Atheism and Wicca: The Road Ahead
December 25th, 2011 Eric Steinhart I’ve been doing a long series of posts on atheism and Wicca. I’m working out the idea that atheistic and neo-pagan communities have more in common than they might think, and that, as American religiousity continues to shift away from Christianity, those two communities will increasingly be blended into each other. This will be messy [...]
Posted in Atheism, Featured, Metaphysics, Naturalism, Paganism, Philosophy, Rationalism, Religion and Science, Wicca 8 Comments »Atheism and Wicca: The Discussion So Far
December 24th, 2011 Eric Steinhart I’ve been doing a long series of posts on atheism and Wicca. I’m about mid-way through– after taking break for the weekend, I’ll be back on Monday with posts about the Wiccan god and goddess; then on to the Wheel of the Year, reincarnation, and magic. At this half-way point it’s a good idea to take [...]
Posted in Atheism, Featured, Paganism, Philosophy, Rationalism, Religion, Religion and Science, Science, Wicca 32 Comments »
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