Identifying with Non-Belief

by Brian on 02-01-2009

It has taken me a while to comment on the little hoohaw caused by Barack Obama’s inaugural acknowledgment of “non-believers.” That’s roughly the category I belong to so it was encouraging to hear…

I was going to post a hasty retort to this from Chris Selley at National Post’s Full Comment:

Though no doubt well intentioned, it’s a weirdly formulated argument that smacks of a last-minute, ballpoint pen addition. Not believing in God isn’t a heritage, and to the extent non-believers form a community—which is quite a limited and annoying extent—I can’t think of a single thing that community has done to strengthen the nation. (Ed note: Just to be perfectly clear, I mean I can’t think of a single accomplishment of the community of atheists, as opposed to individual atheists, who have of course done many super things.) In fact, non-belief in God isn’t just not a heritage; it isn’t anything.

At first I just thought that was stupid, but as I tried to put my thoughts into words I realized that Selley raised some questions I couldn’t just pass over.

The question wasn’t just about is or is not atheism a “heritage”; I had questions about why and how we have heritages at all, and whether they’re necessary — whether being ”not a heritage” is a warranted demerit.

I’m not going to answer yet. I’m just setting things up for a sustained inquiry. (If it generates discussion, great. If not, that’s fine: I’m trying to spread myself out more evenly, with more regularity, instead of dropping everything every few days to write a spontaneous essay, and going through the anxiety of having nothing to think or write about for the rest of the week.)

But I will say I don’t call myself an atheist. I don’t endorse much of what’s said and done under that banner. I’ve got no intention of reading or talking about The God Delusion or God is Not Great (though I love Daniel Dennett and recommend Breaking the Spell… and Darwin’s Dangerous Idea is one of my very favourite books). I actually admire the Templeton crowd of spiritually-oriented philosophers and scientists (e.g. Charles Taylor, Robert Bellah) more than the arch atheists like Dawkins.

I don’t like the term “non-believer” either because I do have beliefs — strong ones — they just don’t happen to be religious in the conventional sense. And I don’t really see any need to identify myself in contrast with other people’s beliefs. I’m not non-something or anti-anything or a-whatever; I am what I am.

I sort of liked Eliezer Yudkowsky’s use of “reality-based community” in his recent Bloggingheads diavlog with Will Wilkinson (see below) — though it seems like it’s intended to bait religious believers.

I have more to say on that Bloggingheads discussion. For now I’m just going to come out as a full-circle skeptic: I’m not just skeptical of religion, I’m skeptical of skepticism too. That needs a lot of explaining, and you’d be right to be skeptical of it…

Let me just say that it would be nearly impossible for you to convince me to believe in God, but at the same time I don’t see enough evidence against religious belief to make go around trying to convince people out of their own beliefs… Though it is essential for us to have a dialogue.

My beliefs are all provisional, pending further evidence (the essence of science). This full-circle “epistemological hygene” (another term used by Yudkowski) is how I practice good “cognitive citizenship” (that one is Wilkinson’s), how I find meaning and goodness and belonging — and a sense of truth and faith in life. Contrary to the intuitions of Chris Selleys of the world, this is not incompatible with heritage, community, substance, and integrity.

I’ll explain it further over the next week or so.

http://www.phronk.com Phronk

Sounds like you have a good rational set of beliefs. Blind atheism is just as bad as blind faith in a religion, so I think that actively being doubtful and skeptical is the only route to the best current approximation of the truth.

I guess this Selley guy does have a point. Atheism shouldn’t be a “heritage” or an organized community, any more than people who don’t believe in Bigfoot are an organized community. It’s just the default position; you don’t define a group by nonbelief. However, the ubiquity of belief in religious ideas is so vast, and their pressure to convert others often so great, that it does sorta make atheists bunch together. Also, people who DO believe in something that happens to contradict a lot of religious doctrine – like, say, scientists – are responsible for great, great things. The computer that Selley wrote that on wouldn’t exist, and he might not even be alive to write it, if people went on believing that lightning was the gods fighting and the only way to heal someone was through prayer.

Oh and about Dawkins…I think the thing with him is that people criticizing his ideas haven’t actually read The God Delusion (or other books of that type). That book directly addresses many of these potential criticisms, and it’s very mild, cautious, and non-dickish in its tone. Perhaps people just see the arrogant title and make assumptions about what is inside.

What do you think about the bus ads that say “there probably is no God. Stop worrying and enjoy life” (or something like that)?
http://www.phronk.com Phronk

Sounds like you have a good rational set of beliefs. Blind atheism is just as bad as blind faith in a religion, so I think that actively being doubtful and skeptical is the only route to the best current approximation of the truth.

I guess this Selley guy does have a point. Atheism shouldn’t be a “heritage” or an organized community, any more than people who don’t believe in Bigfoot are an organized community. It’s just the default position; you don’t define a group by nonbelief. However, the ubiquity of belief in religious ideas is so vast, and their pressure to convert others often so great, that it does sorta make atheists bunch together. Also, people who DO believe in something that happens to contradict a lot of religious doctrine – like, say, scientists – are responsible for great, great things. The computer that Selley wrote that on wouldn’t exist, and he might not even be alive to write it, if people went on believing that lightning was the gods fighting and the only way to heal someone was through prayer.

Oh and about Dawkins…I think the thing with him is that people criticizing his ideas haven’t actually read The God Delusion (or other books of that type). That book directly addresses many of these potential criticisms, and it’s very mild, cautious, and non-dickish in its tone. Perhaps people just see the arrogant title and make assumptions about what is inside.

What do you think about the bus ads that say “there probably is no God. Stop worrying and enjoy life” (or something like that)?
http://brianfrank.ca Brian Frank

I actually just saw the counter-ads from the United Church’s “WonderCafe” an hour ago. I don’t know. I think maybe most people (90%?) really are better off enjoying life and observing whatever sort of, um, observances or whatever are already there, given to them.

Only a few of us care enough about all the tensions to try working them out (or even recognize them). It’s kind of ironic that the reason I don’t follow any traditional religions is that I have a kind of religious temperament: I need rules about what’s good and true, and none of the given systems were consistent enough with what I actually experienced.

Something I thought of after writing this was the way people compartmentalize their religious stuff and their secular stuff so the two sets of practices and ideas never really mix at the same time. Most of the great achievements in the past couple centuries are belief-ambivalent: certainly not done in the name of God, but not at odds with going to church on Sundays either… I’m still thinking about this…

You see the recent discussion on edge.org, “Does the empirical nature of science contradict the revelatory nature of faith?”?
http://brianfrank.ca Brian Frank

I actually just saw the counter-ads from the United Church’s “WonderCafe” an hour ago. I don’t know. I think maybe most people (90%?) really are better off enjoying life and observing whatever sort of, um, observances or whatever are already there, given to them.

Only a few of us care enough about all the tensions to try working them out (or even recognize them). It’s kind of ironic that the reason I don’t follow any traditional religions is that I have a kind of religious temperament: I need rules about what’s good and true, and none of the given systems were consistent enough with what I actually experienced.

Something I thought of after writing this was the way people compartmentalize their religious stuff and their secular stuff so the two sets of practices and ideas never really mix at the same time. Most of the great achievements in the past couple centuries are belief-ambivalent: certainly not done in the name of God, but not at odds with going to church on Sundays either… I’m still thinking about this…

You see the recent discussion on edge.org, “Does the empirical nature of science contradict the revelatory nature of faith?”?
shawmutt

“My beliefs are all provisional, pending further evidence (the essence of science).”

And the essence of skepticism. You aren’t skeptical of skepticism, you are skeptical of atheism–more specifically “strong” atheism.
shawmutt

“My beliefs are all provisional, pending further evidence (the essence of science).”

And the essence of skepticism. You aren’t skeptical of skepticism, you are skeptical of atheism–more specifically “strong” atheism.
http://brianfrank.ca Brian Frank

@shawmutt What I’m skeptical of is any inert idea — any ideological system or claim to absolute truth… And even that (or this) is something I have to be skeptical of because there’s a danger it could turn into an inert, ideological system. I’m skeptical of “Skepticism,” but, you’re right, not the act of being skeptical.
http://brianfrank.ca Brian Frank

@shawmutt What I’m skeptical of is any inert idea — any ideological system or claim to absolute truth… And even that (or this) is something I have to be skeptical of because there’s a danger it could turn into an inert, ideological system. I’m skeptical of “Skepticism,” but, you’re right, not the act of being skeptical.
Pingback: Skeptical of Skepticism | B Frank
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Identifying with Non-Belief

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