2021-03-12, 07:00 PM
Question to self: why do I feel so threatened when I read comments by atheists and materialists?
The more I wonder about that question, the more reasons I come up with and I'm not sure how much weight to give to each. For example, my immediate, almost knee-jerk, answer was that my very existence feels threatened. Not my human, biological existence but my spiritual existence. I have come to the point where I consider that my spiritual existence will continue beyond my biological life on this planet. I believe that I have come to that point by looking at the evidence in a rational and open-minded way. But then all of that research and contemplation and philosophising is challenged by some sarcastic quip that I read in an article or book which characterises me as some gullible fool for believing such nonsense. I want to jump up and shout, "No, you're a fool!" like some insulted child in the playground.
Another reason: most of the atheists who's views represent that challenge are people I would otherwise respect. I would probably agree with them on so many other subjects from politics to ideas of cultural and social progress. So, again, to have someone I respect tell me that I'm a fool really hurts.
Or perhaps it is the consensus? For me the only consensus that matters is the one held by people who think about their beliefs rather than just accept them as a matter of faith. And yet the consensus among rational, thinking people is atheism and materialism. This consensus is so heavily linked to science that to hold a different view has become heresy. I'm not anti-science yet I feel like an outcast among the people I would normally identify with.
Almost exactly ten years ago I found the Skeptiko forum and started to air my views. I wanted to take on the atheistic skeptics and show them that rational people could entertain ideas that were inimical to their worldview. But it soon became clear that these skeptics were every bit as dogmatic in their ideology as the religious people I had argued with since childhood.
So here I was (and here I am), stuck between two worldviews. I come here to this forum, as I did to the Skeptiko forum previously, to find a modicum of kinship. I come to reassure myself that I am not a gullible fool. This is my oasis but am I correct in my fear that there is only hostile desert out there? What do you think?
The more I wonder about that question, the more reasons I come up with and I'm not sure how much weight to give to each. For example, my immediate, almost knee-jerk, answer was that my very existence feels threatened. Not my human, biological existence but my spiritual existence. I have come to the point where I consider that my spiritual existence will continue beyond my biological life on this planet. I believe that I have come to that point by looking at the evidence in a rational and open-minded way. But then all of that research and contemplation and philosophising is challenged by some sarcastic quip that I read in an article or book which characterises me as some gullible fool for believing such nonsense. I want to jump up and shout, "No, you're a fool!" like some insulted child in the playground.
Another reason: most of the atheists who's views represent that challenge are people I would otherwise respect. I would probably agree with them on so many other subjects from politics to ideas of cultural and social progress. So, again, to have someone I respect tell me that I'm a fool really hurts.
Or perhaps it is the consensus? For me the only consensus that matters is the one held by people who think about their beliefs rather than just accept them as a matter of faith. And yet the consensus among rational, thinking people is atheism and materialism. This consensus is so heavily linked to science that to hold a different view has become heresy. I'm not anti-science yet I feel like an outcast among the people I would normally identify with.
Almost exactly ten years ago I found the Skeptiko forum and started to air my views. I wanted to take on the atheistic skeptics and show them that rational people could entertain ideas that were inimical to their worldview. But it soon became clear that these skeptics were every bit as dogmatic in their ideology as the religious people I had argued with since childhood.
So here I was (and here I am), stuck between two worldviews. I come here to this forum, as I did to the Skeptiko forum previously, to find a modicum of kinship. I come to reassure myself that I am not a gullible fool. This is my oasis but am I correct in my fear that there is only hostile desert out there? What do you think?