Mises and "New Atheism"

[Taraz]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Although I think Taraz means that Dawkins and co hate religion and are on a crusade to "unconvert" people

[/ QUOTE ]

I think they would claim 'educate"

[/ QUOTE ]

I would agree to some extent, but you can't educate people if you call them names at the outset. If you label someone dumb they will learn poorly. I also think it's a mistake to advocate the abandonment of religion as a whole. Why can't we educate without even making mention of God? All it does is put people in a defensive stance. If someone truly understand evolution for example, it becomes painfully obvious that God is unnecessary for the process (except possibly for a first cause).

[bobman0330]

[ QUOTE ]
An anti-something movement displays a purely negative attitude. It has no chance whatever to succeed. Its passionate diatribes virtually advertise the program they attack. People must fight for something that they want to achieve, not simply reject an evil, however bad it may be."

--Ludwig von Mises

[/ QUOTE ]

This quote sounds great, but I can't think of any reason to believe that it's true. Quite the opposite.

[Borodog]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
An anti-something movement displays a purely negative attitude. It has no chance whatever to succeed. Its passionate diatribes virtually advertise the program they attack. People must fight for something that they want to achieve, not simply reject an evil, however bad it may be."

--Ludwig von Mises

[/ QUOTE ]

This quote sounds great, but I can't think of any reason to believe that it's true. Quite the opposite.

[/ QUOTE ]

I find your position bizarre.

Regardless of how you personally feel about AC for example, do you think so many people around here would have converted if we did nothing but perpetually bitch about the state, and did not propose a positive alternative (i.e. social order based on peace, freedom, voluntary exchange, etc.)?

I think not.

[bobman0330]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
An anti-something movement displays a purely negative attitude. It has no chance whatever to succeed. Its passionate diatribes virtually advertise the program they attack. People must fight for something that they want to achieve, not simply reject an evil, however bad it may be."

--Ludwig von Mises

[/ QUOTE ]

This quote sounds great, but I can't think of any reason to believe that it's true. Quite the opposite.

[/ QUOTE ]

I find your position bizarre.

Regardless of how you personally feel about AC for example, do you think so many people around here would have converted if we did nothing but perpetually bitch about the state, and did not propose a positive alternative (i.e. social order based on peace, freedom, voluntary exchange, etc.)?

I think not.

[/ QUOTE ]

Actually, I think a lot of the success your philosophy has had is due to its open, amorphous nature. It appeals to people with a very wide range of beliefs because it's compatible (at least it can be believed compatible) with all sorts of ways you'd like the world to be.

But I was thinking more broadly. Negative campaign ads work more than positive ones. Rebels are great at overthrowing governments, but terrible at running their own. Irony is more prevalent than sentimentality. I don't know why, but it's easier to convince people that X is bad than that Y is good.

[Misfire]

[ QUOTE ]
But I was thinking more broadly. Negative campaign ads work more than positive ones. Rebels are great at overthrowing governments, but terrible at running their own. Irony is more prevalent than sentimentality. I don't know why, but it's easier to convince people that X is bad than that Y is good.

[/ QUOTE ]

Ronald Reagan would disagree with you.
John Kerry shows that Reagan was right.

[Borodog]

While some of your examples are well taken, I don't think there's an underlying principle at work. Rebels always promise a better government than the last one. I'm not sure irony exceeds sentimentality; maybe among males, but probably not among females.

I don't think it is inherently easier to convince people that X is bad than that Y is good. I believe this will be the case for some people. Hell, perhaps entire cultures. But I don't think that it's true universally.

In any event, I don't think it's something we'd be able to come up with definitive arguments for either way.

[moorobot]

If it is true that it is easier to convince someone that Y is bad than that X is good, it is likely because it is easier to criticize a theory, institution, form of social organization etc. than it is to come up with an unobjectionable theory etc.

[Misfire]

[ QUOTE ]

Regardless of how you personally feel about AC for example, do you think so many people around here would have converted if we did nothing but perpetually bitch about the state, and did not propose a positive alternative (i.e. social order based on peace, freedom, voluntary exchange, etc.)?

I think not.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yeah. Statists bitch about the state all the time, but still believe that it is a "necessary evil." Whether it is or not, nobody is going to change their view of it until a viable alternative is presented to fill it's place. While AC would literally fill it with "nothing," that space nonetheless is filled by the results of the absence of the state--supposedly freedom and peace--and THAT is what convinces statists to reconsider their stance.

[JayTee]

[ QUOTE ]
One of my big gripes with the new brand of atheism championed by Dawkins, Harris, and Hitchens is that they don't offer an alternative. They seem to simply say, "don't believe in God, it's dumb." Even though I agree to a certain extent, you can't just ask people to abandon a major part of their life and not offer anything to fill it with. And, unfortunately, I don't think science will fill the void.

Anyway, I found an interesting quote for those of you who happen to be both ACists and "militant atheists". It may make you reconsider how you approach religious conversations:

[ QUOTE ]
"An anti-something movement displays a purely negative attitude. It has no chance whatever to succeed. Its passionate diatribes virtually advertise the program they attack. People must fight for something that they want to achieve, not simply reject an evil, however bad it may be."

--Ludwig von Mises


[/ QUOTE ]

[/ QUOTE ]

You list an alternative, science, and then abruptly dismiss it. Why? From the paperback edition of The God Delusion (link):

[ QUOTE ]
“What are you going to put in its place? How are you going to fill the need, or comfort the bereaved?”

What patronising condescension! “You and I are too intelligent and well educated to need religion. But ordinary people, hoi polloi, Orwellian proles, Huxleian Deltas and Epsilons need religion.” In any case, the universe doesn’t owe us comfort, and the fact that a belief is comforting doesn’t make it true. The God Delusion doesn’t set out to be comforting, but at least it is not a placebo. I am pleased that the opening lines of my own Unweaving the Rainbow have been used to give solace at funerals.

When asked whether she believed in God, Golda Meir said: “I believe in the Jewish people, and the Jewish people believe in God.” I recently heard a prize specimen of I’m-an-atheist-buttery quote this and then substitute his own version: “I believe in people, and people believe in God.” I too believe in people. I believe that, given proper encouragement to think, and given the best information available, people will courageously cast aside celestial comfort blankets and lead intellectually fulfilled, emotionally liberated lives.

[/ QUOTE ]

[vhawk01]

I sort of think that, just as AC isn't really a "positive claim" type of system, neither is atheism. The person can fill in the details however they want, they just aren't "allowed" to fill them in in false ways. Thus, they aren't allowed to initiate force and violent coercion, and they aren't allowed to posit an infinite array of identically unverifiable pseudo-solutions to their problems. Atheism isn't a belief system and ACism isn't a political system. Both are the logical implication of certain axioms: self-ownership for ACism and parsimony/rationalism for atheism.