Atheism v Theism The Showdown! Part 1

What do the promoters of the conflict hope to achieve?

Robert Pape - http://political-science.uchicago.edu/faculty/pape.shtml

Discussion about his publication The Stategic Logic Of Suicide Terrorism - http://globetrotter.berkeley.edu/people6/Pape/pape-con3.html

Scott Atran - http://sitemaker.umich.edu/satran/home
Articles on Terorism - http://sitemaker.umich.edu/satran/relevant_articles_on_terrorism

Beyond Belief - http://thesciencenetwork.org/programs/beyond-belief-science-religion-reason-a...

Category:

Nonprofits & Activism

Tags:

• joebot1
• atheism
• theism
• god
• life
• death
• conflict
• hatred
• science
• christianity
• catholic
• ID
• creationism
• intelligent design
• terrorism
• suicide bombers

[rotcafarg]

Whew! Dynamic video.... I don't know what the evidence was that Sam Harris was ignoring, could you enlighten us?

Those bombers believed that they would go to heaven if they died killing us. If they did not believe in their particular version of life after death they would not have become suicide bombers. They and their organizations have made this pretty clear.

I think the problem with Dawkins et al is not *how* they say it, it's *that* they say it. That's what religious people don't like.

[ballyboneman]

Check the links. Religion is not a prerequisite for suicide bombing - a case in point; the Tamil Tigers. It seems to me that the New Atheists fall into the same dangerous trap as the religious fundamentalists ie externalising evil - 'the evil is in that group not us'. The capacity for atrocity lies within all of us.

[Jcolinsol]

@rotcafarg

I was suggesting that as an explanation to a question which naturally arises when people put the emphasis on ideology as an explanation for violent behavior.

Coolio, yo.

[rotcafarg]

@Jcolinsol I would think that NOT being a suicide bomber is the default position. The question is why some people DO become suicide bombers, not why some people don't.

Having said this, I'm not as sure of Harris's position as I was a year ago. I think now that just blaming it all on religion is a little simplistic.

[Jcolinsol]

@rotcafarg

I think that ideology follows psychology. It doesn't matter what ideology you are raised with, your behavior is going to be driven by your traumas. Regardless of your philosophical or religious background, if you have the right set of experiences to create the behavior, you are going to have suicide bombing. This would explain why Christians perpetrated mass murder, despite the admonitions in their bible. It also explains why not all Muslims become suicide bombers.

[addmoreice]

sure, but religion has a great history of using imbalances to get what it wants done (or at least those running the religion).

crusades where an effort to make money and gain land and slaves (also scientific texts). religion was the excuse to get it done, the common foot soldier had no option because there lords said to, the average lord had no say (and usually believed the cause), and your average king was all for it (made the church like them and was a great way to get rid of malcontents).

[ballyboneman]

Well I'm afraid that so far the evidence is against you. If life has taught me anything it is that 'obvious' things are usually a lot more complex than we think. The motivations for most suicide attacks are largely secular and stem from an imbalance in power.

[rotcafarg]

...I remember Hitchens saying in GING about how we are mammals with a cerebral cortex a little too big and a cerebral cortex not quite big enough. They have all said at one time or another that the enemy is dogma, irrational beliefs. Surely it's obvious that that is a prerequisite for the kind of mayhem of Al Qaeda, Nazis etc? The Tamil Tigers are an exception - there are always exceptions, but I maintain that to blow yourself up you have to have some irrational beliefs about life after death.

[rotcafarg]

I will give you that they could make it more apparent that the "capacity for atrocity lies within all of us." They do all say that in one way or another, but do not emphasize the point enough perhaps..... cont'd

[spikesmth]

Grouping into Us/Them is human nature. Atheism is more than that... it's rational thinking and secular humanism. These philosophies are justified in marginalizing religion because they are based in REALITY. We've been dragging the faithful kicking and screaming into the 21st century and for all the benefits of godless science they enjoy, what do we get in return? Suicide bombers, ID, and all the other primitive barbarian shit that we're trying to grow out of as a species.