Church of the Athiest

Hello Pavlov:

— I don’t know so much about that. If an Athiest were to walk into a Christian Church, go up to the podium and start speaking I doubt if they would be heard for very long, and there would certainly be conditions.
O- Well of course. But my point is that a Church provides certain social advantages for it’s members. An atheist could not be a member of a theistic Church, so it would not apply. But that does not discount the benefits enjoyed by theists at theistic Churches, just as there could be at any other defining group. If you started an atheistic Church, for it to attract, it would probably have many features similar to it’s theistic counter-parts, as was seen in Communism.

— By the way, you could have a liturgy if you want to. Sure, it wouldn’t technically be worship, unless you want to worship life itself.
O- How would that differ from Pantheism or some forms of witchcraft?

— 1.) There are a variety of reasons. Not least of which is the complete lack of Empirical-Evidence.
O- “Evidence” is a value judgment, so what is the history behind such decision?

— I’m not saying there is any Empirical-Evidence necessarily suggestive of an alternative.
O- You can’t have it both ways Pavlov. If each is a matter of faith, then each alternative IS suggestive.

— However, if you think about other things in life, an unprovable negative is more readily acceptable than an unprovable positive.
O- Hardly, or else we would readily gravitate towards solipsism. Knowledge, or the posibility of it, depends on such disposition to imagine unprovable positives-- to take leaps of faith, of which atheism, you admitted, is but just another example of a leap of faith.

— 2.) The use of a Church would be for Athiests to congregate and discuss different viewpoints existing in support of Athiesm. Much like Bible Study, it would lead to a stronger and more well-read belief.
O- That sounds like in need of “unprovable positives”, and if an unprovable negative is “more readily acceptable”, then why the need to discuss different viewpoints. Have you ever attended Bible Study? It does not investigate the probability of the existence of God, but departs from the presupposition. Likewise, perhaps what you meant is discussions that follow from the inexistence of God, but as such, the Government would stipulate, these discussions represent scientific research which can be taxed.

— I think that an Athiest parent should listen with an open ear and give their kids freedom of choice.
O- To even choose to believe in God?

Indeed. At your command!

Oh crap I’m allergic to work, seriously every time I go to interviews they turn me down. Perhaps saying my bestest hobby is ham shandies is a tad off putting. :wink:

No seriously I wouldn’t work for any employer that would have me unless it involved being a titular nobody who does nothing ever and still gets paid as some sort of tax evasion thing.

Oh I’ll sell your DVD, car boot sale ok?

Hello, Omar.

Absolutely, youth retreats, after-school programs, extracurricular sports teams. All requiring a donation to the Church, of course.

It wouldn’t. Does it have to?

Well, we all have our own standard for what qualifies as Evidence. Apparently, if someone is an Atheist, what the Theists are bringing to the table is not enough.

Everyone has it both ways, Atheist arguments aren’t enough to sway Theists (Or, they would no longer be Theists) and vice-versa. That’s what I’m saying, there’s no Empirical-Evidence either way. “What we cannot speak about we must pass over in silence,”* unless it can make money.

For this, simply look to a court case. If someone was murdered, the cops could pretty much just pick any random person that lives alone and has no alibi and try that person. If unprovable positives were readily acceptable, such a person would probably be found guilty of the murder and such people would be randomly tried more often.

How can such a person defend themselves in the case? You can’t prove a negative, he can’t prove he was not there if he was home, alone, asleep. They have to be able to prove the guy was at the murder scene.

[/quote]
The scientific research cannot be taxed if the researching entity is an NPO.

*-Wittgenstein in quotes.

A sale is a sale.

Pav,

If God did not even exist conceptually, Pav, there would be no word ath[ei]st nor theist, nor agnostic nor anything at all that would pertain to a god. Right?

That post was very funny and creative. :laughing:

There would not be such a word, but a rose by any other name, or no name, would smell as sweet.

The example I threw out is before human created language and called ourselves, “Human,” were we any less human?

Pav,

That’s presupposing that there was a rose too.

i’m not sure…wouldn’t it depend at what point we evolved into being human?

Hello Pavlov:

— Absolutely, youth retreats, after-school programs, extracurricular sports teams. All requiring a donation to the Church, of course.
O- That in itself is no argument as to why such activities should be untaxable. Having youth retreats does not define your organization as a religion. It is still just a group of people united by nothing. Note that non-belief, even spun to appear a positive, still affirms only the absence (negative existence) of what is affirmed (positive existence) by others. Theists therefore have a basis from which rights or priviledge can be argued (“we’re” special because God blah, blah, blah), but I see no such basis from the position that no god exist. The repercusions of such faith in fact bring about no priviledge (we are not special because there is no god…) and the State is free to impose it’s will on you as a group, with your blessings, if you wish to remain consistent with your faith.

— It wouldn’t. Does it have to?
O- Pan-theism is not atheism. In fact it would be incompatible with atheism because it is not that it believes in no God but believes in too much God.

— Everyone has it both ways, Atheist arguments aren’t enough to sway Theists (Or, they would no longer be Theists) and vice-versa. That’s what I’m saying, there’s no Empirical-Evidence either way. “What we cannot speak about we must pass over in silence,”* unless it can make money.
O- But the issue is not whether either more suggestive than the other, but whether atheism should count as a Church and be granted tax priviledges. On the first, to me, it cannot count because it’s very belief system would act as an acid on any Church structure. You have to admit that the atheist’s movement did in fact sway and still sways many, regardless of whether they are former theists or agnostics. And we can see the effects of their influence from the time of Darwin. Kings, Popes, monks, all lost priviledges as a result and democracy became dominant. A Church implies a belief that atheists declare false. But if a Church was possible, then I would have to question the atheist’s claim that he or she believes in no god and/or any special status for human beings. Since no Church is sustainable based on the atheist’s own belief system, that cannot affirm a special priviledge of one author or one form of organization, it cannot be recognized by the State. What is there to be recognized is an attempt to evade taxes which of course the State will block. By the way, Witgenstein’s position seems to be more agnostic and even, at times, theistic (Negative Way).

— For this, simply look to a court case. If someone was murdered, the cops could pretty much just pick any random person that lives alone and has no alibi and try that person. If unprovable positives were readily acceptable, such a person would probably be found guilty of the murder and such people would be randomly tried more often.
O- I think that a murder case requires unprovable positive beliefs to be held. Stipulating that it is not enough for the lone person without an alibi to automatically be the murderer is yet another exampleof an unprovable but positive belief, not because we can doubt that he/she did it, but because we doubt that based on further beliefs about how we can find a murderer, such as “motive”. A murderer is not the lone person with no alibi because we go farther than that criteria in determining who is a murderer, including motive and opportunity, DNA, prints, prior record. As far as our subject is concerned, IF unprovable negative beliefs (“what if” scenarios) were more “readily acceptable”, THEN I doubt that we could reach a conviction even if we had more than just a loner without an alibi.

— The scientific research cannot be taxed if the researching entity is an NPO.
O- What the hell is an “NPO”?

Hello, Omar.

Perhaps not as a Religion, but being an organization that is not for profit typically defines you as a non-profit organization.

I meant to be an NPO. The only qualifications for being an NPO is that you are an organization of some kind and you exist for non-profit reasons.

Why do you have to have a God to have a church? Keep in mind, we are only calling it a church. I could open up a movie rental place and call it a church if I really wanted to, of course, I’d miss my target audience by a long shot.

The point is, in theory, you are innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. Proof is a positive, but what makes the unprovable negative easier to accept is that a Defendant, at no point, actually has to prove that he did not commit the crime, just that he might not have. Obviously, proving that you did not commit the crime helps, but it is not necessary to avoid a conviction. There are even some notable legal cases where charges were dropped when virtually everyone knew the Defendant was guilty as Hell.

There would be many more convictions if the standard was guilty until proven innocent, because in some cases, you would be attempting to prove an unprovable negative.

Non-Profit Organizations. Any entity that is a non-profit organization can receive tax exemption status in most states.

You can always join that out of the closet atheist thing.

outcampaign.org/

The Dawkinsian religion of choice for the discerning out, homosexuality is optional apparently.

There’s no prejudice if you are gay just to make that clear, and you don’t have to swing that way to join and you are not going to hell apparently after all for man on man action, should that be the way you chose to be in your life for which there is no extra fee, which is free anyway and strictly non profit.

I’m not a member so they are not paying me to advertise, I am agnostic or bi curious if it was a sexuality choice analogy. And by analogy I mean I was never confused! :smiley:

It’s been a while Pavlov, so you might not even be interested. But if you are…

— Perhaps not as a Religion, but being an organization that is not for profit typically defines you as a non-profit organization.
O- I think that enough organizations exists to meet any one ideal, goal or conscience cleaner need out there in the atheist community. What would be the purpose of the Church of the Atheist? What will profits be used for if they do not get routed to the owners of your Church? Feeding, sheltering and caring for the poor? Enviromental conservation? Legally persecuting theistic intrusions into daily life or science?

— The point is, in theory, you are innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. Proof is a positive, but what makes the unprovable negative easier to accept is that a Defendant, at no point, actually has to prove that he did not commit the crime, just that he might not have. Obviously, proving that you did not commit the crime helps, but it is not necessary to avoid a conviction. There are even some notable legal cases where charges were dropped when virtually everyone knew the Defendant was guilty as Hell.

There would be many more convictions if the standard was guilty until proven innocent, because in some cases, you would be attempting to prove an unprovable negative.
O- It is all about belief. In our legal system I remain a sceptic of someone’s guilt until “proven” beyond what I could reasonably continue to doubt. When enough evidence deny me the ability to reasonably continue to doubt the guilt of the man then I convict him. This is certainly more practical that the alternative of remaining a sceptic of someone’s innocent until proven beyond what I could reasonably continue to doubt. But this is within our legal system and not in human society in general, outside of the careful parameters of Law. In fact, our Law system illuminates the fact that we are naturally prone to believe someone as guilty until proven innocent. In the public opinion your life might very well be ruined even if you’re found “innocent” and you might remain a hero, in the public eye, even though you’re convicted.
You’re exactly right to say that there would be more convictions if the measure was a person’s innocense. Now, how would this apply to our subject? Well, I think that the case can be made that we are naturally born theist. That atheism, skepticism, are positions we have to will ourselves to assume, while credulity is easy and natural. Hume pointed to this already. The issue is not that we believe in gods as well as magiuc potions, evil eye, taboos, curses, lucky socks, lucky rituals…we have evolved a pattern seeking mind and this requires credulity to even engage in a process of filtering, of deselection of true patterns versus false patterns. As it applies to religious or spiritual belief, the problem is not belief in gods but in which gods.
The posture of atheistm, or skepticism, is a very advanced position, and it is, by necessity, highly selective. You can be an atheist but still retain unfounded belief that are necessary for human life to continue. The atheist simply dispenses with a belief he no longer finds necessary or even desirable. The pickle is that he might have lowered the evidence needed to reasonably doubt the existence of God or gods, but did he or she made reasonable doubt equally available for most other belief he or she holds or just had a bone to pick with the divine? Meaning, is a person consistent on his judgment of what belief is based on? And are not other belief, he or she must entretain in his or her daily life as dubious as the belief in something divine? Perhaps we continue to hold on to the belief in Self and in language because it is practical to do so, but then we leave the door open to a belief in God if only the believer finds such belief as practical for him, do we not?

O- I think that enough organizations exists to meet any one ideal, goal or conscience cleaner need out there in the atheist community. What would be the purpose of the Church of the Atheist? What will profits be used for if they do not get routed to the owners of your Church? Feeding, sheltering and caring for the poor? Enviromental conservation? Legally persecuting theistic intrusions into daily life or science?

PM146- The Church of the Athiest is not designed to profit, but is rather designed to break even. The main purpose of the Church of the Athiest would be licensing to other companies (owned by COTA higher-ups) for the sale of merchandise and things such as that. The goal is that a certain percentage of the proceeds must go to the COTA, but the markup on the items and the potential popularity thereof (especially amongst teenagers and collegiates) would be such to cover the percentage that is to be donated and still make a healthy profit.

The rest of it could be handled with liberal accounting principles that make any profits the COTA might otherwise see offset by expenditures presumably for the COTA. To this extent, we’re talking about dinners, plane trips, cars specifically for the use of the COTA and other things.

O- It is all about belief. In our legal system I remain a sceptic of someone’s guilt until “proven” beyond what I could reasonably continue to doubt. When enough evidence deny me the ability to reasonably continue to doubt the guilt of the man then I convict him. This is certainly more practical that the alternative of remaining a sceptic of someone’s innocent until proven beyond what I could reasonably continue to doubt. But this is within our legal system and not in human society in general, outside of the careful parameters of Law. In fact, our Law system illuminates the fact that we are naturally prone to believe someone as guilty until proven innocent. In the public opinion your life might very well be ruined even if you’re found “innocent” and you might remain a hero, in the public eye, even though you’re convicted.

PM146-That’s an excellent point, I think that you are right that the concept of, “Innocent until proven guilty,” often goes against the natural order of things.

O-You’re exactly right to say that there would be more convictions if the measure was a person’s innocense. Now, how would this apply to our subject? Well, I think that the case can be made that we are naturally born theist. That atheism, skepticism, are positions we have to will ourselves to assume, while credulity is easy and natural. Hume pointed to this already. The issue is not that we believe in gods as well as magiuc potions, evil eye, taboos, curses, lucky socks, lucky rituals…we have evolved a pattern seeking mind and this requires credulity to even engage in a process of filtering, of deselection of true patterns versus false patterns. As it applies to religious or spiritual belief, the problem is not belief in gods but in which gods.

PM146-I have to respectfully disagree with your assessment as well as Hume’s. If not an Athiest, then what is a person who is not schooled in any Religion whatsoever that also has no knowledge or experience of a Religion? The point here is that a Religion must be learned, but to be learned it must also have been initially created, and Nietzsche points out that Religion is a human construct. I think that if we accept Religion to at least be something that is created by humans, then by necessity, we could not conclude that Religion is part of the, “Natural order,” of things.

O-The posture of atheistm, or skepticism, is a very advanced position, and it is, by necessity, highly selective. You can be an atheist but still retain unfounded belief that are necessary for human life to continue. The atheist simply dispenses with a belief he no longer finds necessary or even desirable. The pickle is that he might have lowered the evidence needed to reasonably doubt the existence of God or gods, but did he or she made reasonable doubt equally available for most other belief he or she holds or just had a bone to pick with the divine? Meaning, is a person consistent on his judgment of what belief is based on? And are not other belief, he or she must entretain in his or her daily life as dubious as the belief in something divine? Perhaps we continue to hold on to the belief in Self and in language because it is practical to do so, but then we leave the door open to a belief in God if only the believer finds such belief as practical for him, do we not?

PM146-I understand what you are saying, but I think that the existence of the self is an unassailable concept whereas the existence of a deity or deities is not an unassailable concept. I don’t know at what point the belief in a God or Gods becomes more practical for an individual than its opposite, except for if someone decides to look at things in terms of liklihoods. In that event, it simply becomes a question of whether or not (to an individual) it is more likely that we are here because an intelligent and supreme being put us here, or whether any other possibility imaginable is more likely.

I think that both the positions of Athiesm or Thiesm are, “Advanced positions,” as you so put it, but then I think there are both equally impractical as they necessitate looking at things outside of the self that merely could be or could not be, but not what definitely is or is not.

Hello Pavlov:

— PM146- The Church of the Athiest is not designed to profit, but is rather designed to break even. The main purpose of the Church of the Athiest would be licensing to other companies (owned by COTA higher-ups) for the sale of merchandise and things such as that. The goal is that a certain percentage of the proceeds must go to the COTA, but the markup on the items and the potential popularity thereof (especially amongst teenagers and collegiates) would be such to cover the percentage that is to be donated and still make a healthy profit.
O- Whatever makes you a profit should be taxable. For example, the Church itself could be untaxed, just like theist churches, but retailers that sell christian cd’s, for example, coffey much and those ever-present bracelets “WWJD” do yield a profit and I do believe that they are treated as retail stores and not as NPOs, or am I wrong about this? Wherever there be a cash resgister there is probably a tax liability. Wherever you make a profit, the govt will find it’s way to get a cut of the booty…or am I missing something here?

— The rest of it could be handled with liberal accounting principles that make any profits the COTA might otherwise see offset by expenditures presumably for the COTA. To this extent, we’re talking about dinners, plane trips, cars specifically for the use of the COTA and other things.
O- I am not a CPA, but would not the balance of profit retained by the owners or higher ups at the COTA still remain taxable? What could keep COTA a lucrative enterprise is to declare purchases of homes, jets and other consummer goods as declared necessities for the purposes of the COTA, much as evangelists do.

— PM146-I have to respectfully disagree with your assessment as well as Hume’s. If not an Athiest, then what is a person who is not schooled in any Religion whatsoever that also has no knowledge or experience of a Religion?
O- Someone with no knowledge of gods may well be called an atheists, but that is not the point. The point is that if not gods, we remain credulous enough to believe in other measures of control. A person who has never been exposed to gods may still believe in ghosts and in their power, or in the power of other things, like ammulets. The point of religion is not god. God is just a means to an end and that end is control. Now “control of what?”…yes, yes, but we should also ask “fear of what?”. Man is as prone to credulous creations, supertitions as he is of inventing or feeling phobias. Each time he is in the grip of this human assett: imagination.

— The point here is that a Religion must be learned
O- Not really. In this I adhere to Paul and Luther. You cannot “teach” god, nor love of God, nor belief itself. You can direct the natural ability of man to believe. Thus you can take a credulous child and teach him about Santa Claus, but you cannot teach him to believe in the invisible and fantastic- that he brings to the table on his own. It is “by grace”. Some science has been directed at finding a gene for belief, a gene for God, sort of. I don’t think that this is a fruitful pursuit, because I think that we are just prone to believe. What we learn is what NOT TO believe.

— but to be learned it must also have been initially created, and Nietzsche points out that Religion is a human construct.
O- That says little. Mathematics is a human construct, so is language. It would be one thing if they were RANDOM constructs, but quite another when they represent a norm, and in that norm, I suppose, we can see a human phenomenon.

— I think that if we accept Religion to at least be something that is created by humans, then by necessity, we could not conclude that Religion is part of the, “Natural order,” of things.
O- Religion is created by humans and therefore a part of the natural order, as we humans are not unnatural, or are we? Wherever we see a bird’s nest we can conclude that it is a bird’s construct, but I wouldn’t say that a bird’s nest is unnatural, but that it is part of nature, just as the bird is part of nature, just as it’s feces are part of nature. Of course, religion is a product not of our physical necessities for shelter and digestion but our imagination. But it is as natural because wherever you find the human footprint you are likely to find religion. It defines us and separates us from the rest of the animal kingdom. And I don’t mean that religion defines humanity or that belief in God defines us, but that credulity does, that the predisposition for belief defines us and that God and religion are just outcrops or by products of this disposition for belief and pattern composition. Though, again, I do think that the ever presence of some form of religion makes the case that religion is “normal” to our species, part of our natural order, just like growing hair.

Howdy Omar:

O- Whatever makes you a profit should be taxable. For example, the Church itself could be untaxed, just like theist churches, but retailers that sell christian cd’s, for example, coffey much and those ever-present bracelets “WWJD” do yield a profit and I do believe that they are treated as retail stores and not as NPOs, or am I wrong about this? Wherever there be a cash resgister there is probably a tax liability. Wherever you make a profit, the govt will find it’s way to get a cut of the booty…or am I missing something here?

PM146- You’re absolutely right that any profits the business decides to show would be taxable, but they could always, “Donate,” the entirety of the net profits to the COTA at the end of the fiscal year. Like I said, though, if you want to keep it clean you expect to pay the tax, but the COTA legitimately existing is necessary for licensing to make the apparel official. The point is that there is a strong and untapped Athiest market out there and by having the COTA license its apparel to only one merchandiser (owned by individuals that represent the COTA) you monopolize the very market you created!

You gave me a good idea bringing up, “WWJD,” apparel. How about, “WWND,” which is, “What Would Nobody Do?”

O- I am not a CPA, but would not the balance of profit retained by the owners or higher ups at the COTA still remain taxable? What could keep COTA a lucrative enterprise is to declare purchases of homes, jets and other consummer goods as declared necessities for the purposes of the COTA, much as evangelists do.

That’s exactly what it would do, and it would also operate under a break-even Philosophy. However, with the COTA (itself) operating as an NPO it would not be subject to having its profits taxed, but it (again, itself) is not really designed to make a profit.

O- Someone with no knowledge of gods may well be called an atheists, but that is not the point. The point is that if not gods, we remain credulous enough to believe in other measures of control. A person who has never been exposed to gods may still believe in ghosts and in their power, or in the power of other things, like ammulets. The point of religion is not god. God is just a means to an end and that end is control. Now “control of what?”…yes, yes, but we should also ask “fear of what?”. Man is as prone to credulous creations, supertitions as he is of inventing or feeling phobias. Each time he is in the grip of this human assett: imagination.

PM146- I’m going to agree with all of that.

O- Not really. In this I adhere to Paul and Luther. You cannot “teach” god, nor love of God, nor belief itself. You can direct the natural ability of man to believe. Thus you can take a credulous child and teach him about Santa Claus, but you cannot teach him to believe in the invisible and fantastic- that he brings to the table on his own. It is “by grace”. Some science has been directed at finding a gene for belief, a gene for God, sort of. I don’t think that this is a fruitful pursuit, because I think that we are just prone to believe. What we learn is what NOT TO believe.

PM146- You might not be able to teach God, but you can condition a belief in God, which is essentially almost forcing a belief in God. All you would have to do is create a reward/punishment plan based upon how a child’s words/actions relate to the Christian teachings. As you know, there are many who become Athiests for specifically this reason, or do they merely think they became Athiests for just this reason? If you were to ask me, the very fact that they were ever able to question the existence of God at all is due to the fact that the conditioning program was not effective enough.

To that same extent, you could also condition Athiesm. My argument is that you don’t have to, though, because as you said, “What we learn is what not to believe.” I bring this up because the necessity to learn what not to believe wouldn’t be there if we had never been taught (or at the very least, exposed to) what it is that we are learning not to believe. For that reason, I still consider Athiesm to be the, “Natural,” way of things.

O- That says little. Mathematics is a human construct, so is language. It would be one thing if they were RANDOM constructs, but quite another when they represent a norm, and in that norm, I suppose, we can see a human phenomenon.

PM146- You can well make the argument that in the U.S.A. Christianity (or some form thereof) is representative of a norm, in fact, you could probably generally include the West in that argument. However, you should keep in mind that Christianity was closer to being a random construct than a norm prior to Constantine being the emperor of Rome.

O- Religion is created by humans and therefore a part of the natural order, as we humans are not unnatural, or are we? Wherever we see a bird’s nest we can conclude that it is a bird’s construct, but I wouldn’t say that a bird’s nest is unnatural, but that it is part of nature, just as the bird is part of nature, just as it’s feces are part of nature. Of course, religion is a product not of our physical necessities for shelter and digestion but our imagination. But it is as natural because wherever you find the human footprint you are likely to find religion. It defines us and separates us from the rest of the animal kingdom. And I don’t mean that religion defines humanity or that belief in God defines us, but that credulity does, that the predisposition for belief defines us and that God and religion are just outcrops or by products of this disposition for belief and pattern composition. Though, again, I do think that the ever presence of some form of religion makes the case that religion is “normal” to our species, part of our natural order, just like growing hair.

PM146-What should it be that tells us Religion is, “Ever-Present,” the Bible? How can we safely assume that Religion was ever-present prior to written language which documented that Religion for us?

If we do not assume that the Bible is correct, then I ask you, would you assume that the first man had a God or Gods?

Hey Pav,
rather than WWND, shouldn’t it be WWID? Or are we also teaching a No-Self schtick?

Oughtist,

I’ve always thought that the presumption behind WWJD is not knowing what you, yourself, would do and therefore deferring the matter to a higher authority?

Either way, we could try out the WWID bracelets and tee-shirts, but I’m only willing to do that if you agree that we do it on a test-market basis first. We could probably start with Congress whose necessary answer to the question is, “The will of whatever corporation, “Donated,” the most to my campaign. Indirectly, of course.” If we can perform well in that market, then we can expand it nationwide.

My only real concern is that isn’t there an actual Religion that actually worships the self? I mean, the Self as a God? I don’t want WWID to turn into anything like that. That’s actually what Satanism really is, is it not?

Maybe we could coopt “Song of Myself” somehow, and thereby worship Walt Whitman instead, i.e. WWWWD.

WWWWW What Would Walt Whitman Write?

Leaves of Grass.

…wouldn’t that be WWWWS? :laughing: