Atheism:The New Intolerance

[MaxWeiss]

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Atheists may be a minority (from 8 percent to 27 percent of the American population, depending on the poll and the questions asked), but they tend to dominate elite institutions.

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Does anyone know why this is?
Do you have to sign the Atheist Creed to gain entry or is some other factor at play?

luckyme

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Exactly.... and people don't see the correlation of why it's always those "academic types" and "smart people" who don't believe. "It's science! Science is wrong!!!" Some people are stupid, and some people are really stupid.

[MaxWeiss]

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Just as most progress against racist view points is made when we encourage intolerance against racism.

Most progress will be made against anti-knowledge (anti-science) viewpoints when we encourage intolerance towards people who (dangerously) refuse to accept commonly available knowledge in their dealings with the world.

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[madnak]

I don't want to get too political, but... Unfortunately there is a strong wing of self-described "liberals" who are more concerned with enforcing their views of propriety than with anything related to freedom. It's not politically correct to attack religion - organized religion maybe, but not religion in general. The typical view that's developing is one of "admiring Christ for his teachings" and "acknowledging that all religions teach the same enriching things."

Obviously I don't think such a perspective begins to be rationally justified, and I think it's more a reflection of pathological conflict avoidance than anything, but regardless of whether it's a cultural myth or a valid idea, it has a lot of power among many representatives of "liberal" culture.

[txag007]

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Atheists may be a minority (from 8 percent to 27 percent of the American population, depending on the poll and the questions asked), but they tend to dominate elite institutions.

[/ QUOTE ]

Does anyone know why this is?
Do you have to sign the Atheist Creed to gain entry or is some other factor at play?

luckyme

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Exactly.... and people don't see the correlation of why it's always those "academic types" and "smart people" who don't believe. "It's science! Science is wrong!!!" Some people are stupid, and some people are really stupid.

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http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/sh...4922&page=

[txag007]

The rise of fundamentalism???

Secular values under siege???

Are you crazy?

[oneeye13]

i feel that my intolerance is justified.

[Alex-db]

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Atheists may be a minority (from 8 percent to 27 percent of the American population, depending on the poll and the questions asked), but they tend to dominate elite institutions.

[/ QUOTE ]

Does anyone know why this is?
Do you have to sign the Atheist Creed to gain entry or is some other factor at play?

luckyme

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Exactly.... and people don't see the correlation of why it's always those "academic types" and "smart people" who don't believe. "It's science! Science is wrong!!!" Some people are stupid, and some people are really stupid.

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http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/sh...4922&page=

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Isn't that thread asking, "if something fictional were true, who would believe in it?"

Isn't the answer almost, by definition, everyone.

Except those who do not accept rational up-to-date knowledge in favour of old-fashioned mythology.

So guess the groups most susceptible to attractive delusions would be the most likely not to believe this hypothetical fact. So I guess the answer is which ever of those groups currently have the highest predisposition to religion/occult/supernatural ideas.

[txag007]

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Isn't that thread asking, "if something fictional were true, who would believe in it?"


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No.

[Alex-db]

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Isn't that thread asking, "if something fictional were true, who would believe in it?"


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No.

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"If something fictional were instead true, but not verifiably so, so that it cannot be distinguished objectively from a delusion or from fiction, who would believe in it?"

Unfortunately I think it is logically impossible to provide a real-world example of this, since if we know its true, then we know its true.

I think its like saying "if that undetectable orbiting china teapot was there, who would believe in it?"

Obviously the same people that are prepared to believe in a made up one.

To get back on topic, if a group of people, say, tried to bring undetectable-china-teapot politics into parliament and their views contradict common sense, it would be correct to be intolerent of that view until they found some detectability, otherwise he have to open up our social systems to any random schizophrenic whim.

[txag007]

Again. That's not what the thread was asking, but rather, if the undetectable orbiting china teapot were really there, what type of person would fail to realize it? What aspects of a person's life present a bias against recognizing the truth of the undetectable orbiting china teapot?