Failed The Test

[poliphilo]

I'd like to be an atheist, I really would.

A proper atheist, I mean- like Richard Dawkins- taking the fight to the fundies, telling them their Bibles and Korans are silly- just silly.

But I can't be, not quite.  I don't believe in God, but I do believe in Spirit. 

Is there a place in the ranks of proud and militant atheists for someone who suspects that trees have souls?

No, I thought not.

Reincarnation?

Yeah, sure; I'll close the door quietly behind me...

Comments

[airstrip.livejournal.com]

Reincarnation is hard but pantheism isn't so much, it's so close to Kantian/Hegelian idealism that it's hard to dismiss out of hand.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I believe Dawkins defines Pantheism as "sexed-up atheism."

[airstrip.livejournal.com]

Dawkins should stick to genetics. The reason pantheism works so well is that it accords with an intuition as real as any of the senses: that we are connected to everything else in a way that does not reduce to the material.

That's enough to believe in pantheism of some sort unless some hard contrary evidence comes up.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

That's it. Dawkins has no time for "intuition".

[airstrip.livejournal.com]

Dawkins should look up the trilemma.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

That's a new one on me. I like it.

[ibid.livejournal.com]

Dawkins claims not to be a fundamentalist Athiest because he would change his beliefs were he given proof of the existance of God - That's what gets me when the notion of God is fundamentally unprovable

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Dawkins is just too absolute. And, yes, I think he's a fundamentalist.

[hardrada.livejournal.com]

His arrogant stance of flat, outright denial certainly looks and feels more religious than scientific, but that doesn't undermine the quality of the work he has contributed to the canon of science.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I agree with Dawkins up to a point, then we part company- But I find his outspoken polemicism refreshing.