Pretending to Believe

[tpir]

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Most leaders (whether political or in corporate america) attend church at least semi-regularly.

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Wouldn't this be a byproduct of people in general attending church "semi-regularly"? (whatever that means)


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In my experience, there are not many open non-believers in influential positions... I also suspect that a great many of the leaders in our country are actually fakers ala my OP.

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These statements are so vague as to almost not have any meaning at all.


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if you don't believe in god, why not lie when it serves your purpose?

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Because lying is a bad life strategy. The way you discuss lying makes it sound like a perfect tactic that we would never get caught using. It would be difficult to pull this off without becoming a sociopath of some sort. (Which is unhealthy along with being a bad life strategy.)


I see what you are getting at, and I don't necessarily disagree with your conclusion that power-players fake religion to further their own purposes. However, you are using an awful lot of faulty reasoning to get there.

[Duke]

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Shouldn't a rationally self-interested atheist pretend to be religious?

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I don't know. Let's see your argument.
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Church is a great place to socialize and network.

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No it isn't, since you're socializing and networking with people who go to church.

[Sisyphus' Rock]

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lol, all you want. It doesn't make it less true. It is impossible to construct an objective moral philosophy without at least one foundational moral premise.

[/ QUOTE ]Why does it have to be objective?
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If you don't have god to supply that premise, anything else is a personal preference. Your personal preferences are probably dictated by a combination of biology and socialization .

[/ QUOTE ]You mean a set of morals that has been created from evolution as a means to help further the species? You bet.

[knowledgeORbust]

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Not without god. You can't justify "human solidarity" (or anything else for that matter) as an end worth achieving without god.

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I guess I don’t really get this. I like being happy, and the thing that makes me the most happy seems to be helping other people, and helping mankind in general. Obviously this is my personal, subjective perception - but as others have pointed out, I'm not sure how far you'll get trying to establish THE ULTIMATE OBJECTIVE MORALITY! Anyways, I don’t see the need for God – I can still justify achieving my goals without this God dude.



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Shouldn't a rationally self-interested atheist pretend to be religious?

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I see your point, but it all depends on the individuals’ personal preference. It seems that pretending to be religious would provide a certain pragmatic, immediate comfort and happiness – but even the happiness would ultimately be superficial. I think in the long-run, most rationally self-interested persons would ultimately be more fulfilled staying true to themselves. The major exception I see would be to achieve political or business-oriented goals; and most of these goals can still be achieved by open-atheists.

[AlexM]

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Shouldn't a rationally self-interested amoral atheist pretend to be religious?

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FYP

As much as Christians like to believe that you have to have religion to have morals, you don't. There are plenty of atheists who do pretend to be Christians. They don't exactly admit it though! The atheists you see are just the honest ones.

[AlexM]

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Nearly all my friends think that the religious types are mental, especially the American religious right. Then again, I do live in live England where the church is nowhere near as influential. For example, I'm pretty sure that if any Prime Minister claimed God had told him/her to choose a certain policy he/she'd be laughed out of office. (Unfortunately, the likes of Blair just make up crap lies instead)

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Of course, you have the Church of England as your church. The origins of that organization are enough by itself to make its believers question the whole thing.

[JMAnon]

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Why does it have to be objective?


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Because, otherwise, we are just disagreeing about whether blue is a prettier color than red.

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You mean a set of morals that has been created from evolution as a means to help further the species? You bet.

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That was pretty much exactly what I meant.

[JMAnon]

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As has been gone over several times on this forum, absolute morality is not possible with . . .a god.


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I find the arguments against absolute morality if god exists unconvincing. It would be possible that there still was no objective morality, but not necessary. An all-powerful creator could, by definition, set the parameters of his creation. In other words, an all-powerful god that creates a universe could also define right and wrong for that universe. Moreover, if god (in the traditional sense) exists, we surely can't assert what god is or is not capable of doing.

[Kaj]

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Why does it have to be objective?


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Because, otherwise, we are just disagreeing about whether blue is a prettier color than red.


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Oh, but if "God" thinks blue is prettier than red, then blue is absolutely and objectively prettier than red. Do you see how silly objective morality is?

[JMAnon]

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Wouldn't this be a byproduct of people in general attending church "semi-regularly"? (whatever that means)


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Yes, which is exactly my point.

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These statements are so vague as to almost not have any meaning at all.


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I don't know how to be clearer. Most political and business leaders profess to be religious. I suspect that many of them (having had the intelligence and competence to rise to power) are smart enough to realize that Christian dogma is crap, but profess to be religious because it is useful.


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Because lying is a bad life strategy. The way you discuss lying makes it sound like a perfect tactic that we would never get caught using.


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I responded elsewhere in this thread that I think that a rationally self-interested person should seldom lie because reputation and credibility are so important to success in most endeavors. But when you essentially can't be caught, like professing to believe in god when you don't, those considerations don't apply.