God and Nihilism at College

Parent Cafe
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<p>“but I don’t feel it is a “God”.”</p>

<p>But if that source turned out to be God, would that fact diminish your fondness for its effects?</p>

<p>Reading back through the posts in this thread, I see mainly a reactionary intolerance of those people-of-faith who have lived their lives, however incompletely, according to their belief in something greater than themselves, by those who believe there is nothing greater than themselves—I suppose. </p>

<p>I haven’t seen many comments about “ignorant atheists” or “backward secularists” or “educated people of faith” or “charitable church goers” or “repentant Christians in prison”; they have all been the opposite of such comments as these. </p>

<p>Obviously, group think would dictate that all here, with their elite educations or children with or about to have elite educations are way to smart to believe what those who passed before them believed in…and relied on…and took comfort in throughout their short lives. </p>

<p>It seems strange that at 17 I would be defending morality, chastity, truth, absolute goodness, tolerance and self-sacrifice to those old enough to be my parents. I guess I’m a bit naïve; I had no idea that this was what it would be like with such educated and “enlightened” people.</p>

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<p>“If nobody chooses hatred over love, vice over virtue, cowardice over bravery, then we don’t need religion, do we?” </p>

<p>Yes, dstark, it seems that you personally have no need of religion. </p>

<p>Yet, there are those of us who do not make the correct choice 100% of the time (we are endowed with free-will after all…that is, the ability to choose right and WRONG) who may (or may not, like EK4) need a religion or a hope in something greater than themselves, to guide them through the wrong choices they make. Historically, most found themselves in my position, but who knows…it’s a brave new world.</p>

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<p>Fountainsiren, you asked how I came to the conclusion, " “It isn’t God, its nature" when I used penguin-culture as an example of following a virtuous set of community values without benefit of religion. I saw the penguin movie and there wasn’t any scene where they went to church or sang hymns, so I really don’t think that their very strong penguin-values of self-sacrifice and monogamy comes from their worship or religious beliefs. But you are right, maybe when they were all huddled together in the big snow storm they were praying and I just didn’t realize it. I will concede that have drawn some conclusions about the irreligousity of penguins without having actually discussed the matter with any real penguins.</p>

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<p>fondness?
I don’t think fondness is the appropriate term- for me anyway- but I could ask the same question of those who believe in a holy entity- would finding out that we are not the only living beings in this universe or other universes and that the conception of God could be xplained by science- would that affect your belief in a God?</p>

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<p>“maybe when they were all huddled together in the big snow storm they were praying and I just didn’t realize it”</p>

<p>Calmom,</p>

<p>Clearly, you have never taken the time to observe the penguins in a religious convent—though it is possible that they were really nuns as they claimed.</p>

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<p>EK4,</p>

<ol>
<li><p>Science makes no pretense to explain God, not now or in the future. It’s not part of its mission. I’m not waiting for any answers outside its door. </p></li>
<li><p>Having considered Pascal’s Wager and the principle’s involved in the bet, I believe this is a bet I cannot lose. If there is God, I can’t lose; if there isn’t a God, it doesn’t matter. This isn’t how I view these things, but for those of a gambling nature, I’d suggest they take the bet.</p></li>
</ol>

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<p>FS, </p>

<p>Can’t the ‘collective wisdom’ of a moral but totally secular point of view be passed down and refined through generations, just the same way the traditions of a religion can? Wouldn’t the accrued moral wisdom of numerous faith or non faith traditions be available to an aware and interested athiest, just as the accrued moral wisdom of a single rich tradition would be available to an adherent/believer of that faith? </p>

<p>After all, no matter what tradition or non-tradition you are born into, we all have the same life span to spend studying the world and refining ourselves-- becoming more fully human and more of a good person-- if we wish to. (In other words, if we are born into a 6000 year old faith tradition, we are not automatically 3x wiser than those from a 2000 year old faith tradition.) </p>

<p>I am just pointing out that non-belief in God has a very lengthy tradition too, and that secular people have also managed over millenia to seperate the wheat from the chaff where good moral policies are concerned. </p>

<p>I see the mirror image of many of your arguments. For example, if there is no God and we have one shot only-- that does not suggest “nihilism” to me (though it might to some.) Rather it <em>amplifies</em> my obligation to ‘do it right’ on my only go-around, it amplifies the beauty of the temporal world, it makes the whole trip more poignant and meaningful (to me.) I very much feel my obligation to build on what was given to me, to try to leave the world better for my children and theirs, to spend my limited coins wisely and well. To me, the absence of God necessitates greater *presence<a href=“mindfulness,%20caretaking”>/i</a> from humans.</p>

<p>I think because your faith is very precious to you, you may have trouble seeing that a non-faith position can have great beauty and power to motivate a conscious, caring way of life too. </p>

<p>Are you willing to expand your notion of “traditional” to include a non-nihilistic skeptical/athiest tradition? There is a well-beaten path of many secular people who have lived very decent and valuable lives. I do not feel at sea nor that I am inventing morality out of nothingness based on my own desires. I see dozens of religions running in parallel moral lines and I see good and decent athiests also going the same basic direction.</p>

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<p>I have spoken to a collective energy force and it has answered me- sounds odd I know- but I am open enough to beleive that it possibly could be a God or that science will be able to prove that all energy is tied in together and there is an explanation for my hands being hot and pulsating when stroking my daughter who was in critical intensive care and not expected to live ( but who made a full and thriving recovery), or that there is an explanation for my wedding ring all of a sudden appearing ( where I had already looked for it) after I pleaded with my “spirit guide” to aid me.</p>

<p>In the past there have been events which were explained by attributing them to “God” we now have scientific explanations for them.
as you say science makes no pretense to explain God but why are so many scientists also atheists?</p>

<p><a href="http://www.godlessgeeks.com/index.html[/url]“&gt;http://www.godlessgeeks.com/index.html&lt;/a&gt;”&lt;/p&gt;

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<p>FS… in this particular case, all the penguins were married. ;)</p>

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<p>SBmom & EK4,</p>

<p>When you say “collective wisdom” I’m led to wonder whose wisdom you consider is being collected. Is there a “moral school” of atheism? Is there a traditional “moral theory” involving—in a Kantian sense—practical reason? If there is, I am unaware of it. There is perhaps Jurgen Habermas and his “Theory of Communicative Action” but as best as I can understand it, this is far more ‘theory’ than ‘practice’ and it is highly unlikely that your average atheist or libertine is going to be able to spend the time with it to make heads or tales of Habermas’ morality in their own life. Perhaps atheism is so subtle and refined as to be “beyond good and evil” in a Nietzschean sense?</p>

<p>Perhaps Princeton’s Peter Singer and his “Theory of Interests” (much loved by vegans and PETA), a theory which I find abhorrent having spent the last two summers working with the disabled in North Jersey and students with disabilities as an intern at the University of Michigan, and this summer as an intern at the Shriner’s Hospital in Philadelphia working with pediatric orthopedic patients including those with severe physical disabilities:</p>

<p>Learning to help herself and others
Thursday, June 23, 2005
BY JACQUELENE WALLER
Star-Ledger Staff
<a href=“http://www.nj.com/news/ledger/uniontowns/index.ssf?/base/news-0/1119472276198030.xml&coll=1[/url]”>http://www.nj.com/news/ledger/uniontowns/index.ssf?/base/news-0/1119472276198030.xml&coll=1&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>—it certainly wouldn’t work out well for the disabled if Prof Singer becomes the new font of morality and ethics. </p>

<p>Which moral theory or practice is it that you refer to when you say “the absence of God necessitates greater presence (mindfulness, caretaking) from humans”? Do you mean to say that you have come up with an ethical, or moral theory on your own and in your lifetime? If so, how does it work, on what moral premise is it based, and do you expect that 17 year olds entering college will be as motivated as you must have been to have already worked out their own moral theory based upon the “accrued moral wisdom of numerous faith or non faith traditions” on their way to playing “pong” and “hooking-up”?</p>

<p>If not, what steps into the breach beyond conscience, which if it exists (I believe it does) is surely a metaphysical manifestation of a “greater universal mind.” Otherwise, why would ‘conscience’ be reliable to anyone? Where does it get its universal moral center or direction, in all times people and places? It seems to me that any morality that relies on ‘conscience’ implicitly accepts the notion of a universal morality that pre-exists their actual existence, i.e. God (if conscience is to be trusted—I believe it is, when fortified with wisdom).</p>

<p>You say, “if there is no God and we have one shot only-- that does not suggest “nihilism” to me (though it might to some.)” It certainly did to Jean Paul Sartre. He came to the same position as you but with a different conclusion. He called the condition that atheism left a human being in “Nausea” (AP lit.)—the title of his most famous novel—because the idea made his hero sick to the depth of his existence; life had no universal meaning, or meaning as such, for him and his hero.</p>

<p>Ivan Karamazov famously said (in Dostoevsky’s novel, The Brothers Karamazov) “if there is no god everything is permissible”. I don’t know if that is strictly true or not, but it does seem to me that if there is no god, life loses any meaning it could derive from anything that is not plainly and simply derived from the physical; and physicality itself seems to leave little room for transcendental concepts like love, hope and justice (beyond a physical definition of all three: sex, determinism and power).</p>

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<p>You ask,
“Are you willing to expand your notion of “traditional” to include a non-nihilistic skeptical/athiest tradition?”</p>

<p>If I was aware that such a “tradition” existed, I would certainly consider it. Perhaps you refer to Freud and his modern atheistic diagnosis of life (is there much in the way of non-industrial era atheistic moralities beyond a couple Roman Stoics?). Though I have not read Freud to any great degree what I have found in Freud I have found unappealing. </p>

<p>In this regard, I would recommend to you a book by Prof Armand Nicholi (Harvard School of Psychiatry), “The Question of God—Sigmund Freud and C. S. Lewis”. I found it fascinating and highly informative as it approaches the difference between an atheistic view of life and a theistic view of life and its practical consequences. Highly recommended! It got fantastic reviews in the NYT’s Book Review so it must be good for atheists too;)</p>

<p>Certainly we live in the “have it your way” era, from burgers to cameras to sexuality to moral theories. Everybody, it seems, knows best—and “best” is usually determined by sensual-physical pleasure and social-image (political-correctness). Yet, I look around me and I do not see waves of individuality but rather deserts of conformity. Difference, in its modern garb, looks very ‘the same’ to me. It seems to have little regard for the contemplative or for gentle-wisdom. Moreover, it seems pretty predictable: follow the thrill.</p>

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<p>Sorry the link above didn’t work…I guess it is time sensitive.</p>

<p>Learning to help herself and others
Thursday, June 23, 2005
BY JACQUELENE WALLER
Star-Ledger Staff
<a href=“http://www.nj.com/news/ledger/union...8030.xml&coll=1[/url]”>http://www.nj.com/news/ledger/union...8030.xml&coll=1&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>The article is about some of the things I have worked on at the UMich Department for Students with Disabilities, and disabled kids in New Jersey. It also speaks to what I an doing at Shriner’s Hospital in Philly.</p>

<p>Sorry, I tried to delete it when I saw it didn’t work but time had expired.</p>

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<p>FS, You have the right to believe that athiesm = nihilism and that there is no way for an athiest to have a reliable moral center, but you may need to meet more real live athiests and really listen to what they have to say. </p>

<p>Between conscience, nature, and common sense, most athiests manage to stay on track to decent lives. Luckily athiests have parents, FS, who can transmit mankind’s basic values. The example parents set and what values they emphasize provide a moral compass for any child. (A good thing, because few toddlers read philosophy.) This can involve religious “back up” or not. Conscience forms in early childhood, and “God says so” and “Mom says so” are equally effective statements to a five year old. In fact, Mom is probably more powerful ;). </p>

<p>I think it really baffles you how someone else does not need what you joyfully base your life on to arrive at decent, moral behavior & inner peace, and happiness. Try to wrap your mind around this idea.</p>

<p>The common human values (honesty, kindness, golden rule, etc) that are present in most world religions are–to you-- evidence of their divine nature. Great, Fine, Proceed! But to others they are <em>self-evident truths</em> (like the penguins’ altrusim) and do not imply, nor require, God.</p>

<p>Whether or not self-evident truth = glimpse of God, or something more “penguin”? Reasonable people can disagree on this. For me, as I said in the other thread, “it is the human that is the alien; the human that has no cousin in the moon.” God (as presented by religion) is too darned personified. The dogma feels too invented by man & too phony. For me, truths big enough to govern all of time, space & creation = truths rather bigger than the mind of man and rather more complicated. Less mysterious is (for me) less beautiful and less compelling.</p>

<p>Why does it matter to you, so long as the athiests, as a whole, are not screwing up to a greater degree than others are? You who are so tolerant of all religions have trouble tolerating well behaved athiests?</p>

<p>You remind me of the stage every baby goes through after birth; when without the pressure of the womb, he thinks his limbs will fly off unless he is tightly held or swaddled. Luckily over time, babies settle down and realize the world is not that threatening.</p>

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<p>*Is there a “moral school” of atheism? *</p>

<p>Does there need to be?
I don’t think that most people are hedonists without “God”
You apparently do-
If you pay much attention to popular TV & Movies & magazines like People et al. I suppose it would be easy to think that those who are not guided by a holy force to be only interested in sex- flash and what feels good.
Of my circle of friends a few are Jewish- one is Episcopalian,one is Catholic, and the rest were raised in various backgrounds but are now atheist. I see no differences in the way they live their day to day lives.( The episcopalian is a lot looser in regards to what she expects from her children and what she allows them to do than the others)
I am not aware of a “school of atheism” per se.
I don’t do what feels “good” I do what feels “right”
The Golden rule is incorporated in the worlds main religions but you don’t need to believe in a “God” to follow it.
I expand that to add Do no Harm- to include the earth.
I also have as a credo to add beauty. I garden, I volunteer, I try and contribute to harmony in my daily life.
I don’t need to be religous to do that.
I also don’t need to read Freud or Kant or Nietzche to find my philosophy of life-does any one?</p>

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<p>“FS, You have the right to believe that athiesm = nihilism” (SBmom)</p>

<p>“I don’t think that most people are hedonists without “God”
You apparently do-“ (EK4)</p>

<p>I do not believe this. I don’t believe I have said or even implied it. I, however, do think that atheism is a fertile field for nihilism and hedonism, and a necessary condition though not a sufficient condition. Clearly an atheist is as capable as a theist to make good moral choices…they have conscience and parents as you say. The raw material is there, the tools and supplies; however they may want to consider a journeyman’s field of study in the subject if they prefer to live moral lives, they may even find some literature on the subject to be as enjoyable as following the latest cultural trend, or very good literature; it is important to keep in mind that we are talking about the edification of students in an environment dedicated to learning: college. After all, you don’t need to be a transcendentalist to enjoy the deeply moving romantic-transcendental literature of the 1860s. Neither do you have to be a theist to enjoy the deeply moving literature of morality—both sacred and profane. Nobody gets hurt (although you would think so reading most of the posts in this thread)</p>

<p>Would someone be a good literary critique with a scant knowledge of the accumulated literature that historically precedes them? Could they begin and limit their knowledge of literature to post WWII authors? On the other hand, perhaps they simply don’t care that much about literature…maybe that don’t even want to be a literary critic. The problem, it seems to me, is that everyone needs to be the best moral being they can be…no one needs to be a literary critic—or a doctor, or plumber, all of which require dedicated knowledge because reasoning is involved. Reasoning is also involved in moral choices and long term contentment.</p>

<p>The thread began in reference to a college newspaper article. The subject: whether or not there needs to be a moral education in college. I believe there is a need…some don’t, they believe moral thinking is something like walking or reaching for your mother’s breast at birth or hitting a beer filled plastic cup with a ping-pong ball.</p>

<p>I do not long for the days of a denominational Sunday morning mass at college. But we are no where near that situation now, are we. </p>

<p>You say, “few toddlers read philosophy”, but why limit your survey, few if any teenagers do and I doubt that a plurality of adults have cracked many books on the subject, whether they be sacred or profane philosophy.</p>

<p>I don’t begrudge atheists a sense of morality; I applaud it as it exists. I have repeatedly stated that you cannot make yourself believe what you do not believe. However, when there are institutional structures that not only hinder but demean the very idea of “personal-faith” I am guessing that fewer and fewer students will “choose” to believe (as they now do) or even to believe that morality is anything more than “what you feel like” within the limits of criminality and political correctness.</p>

<p>“I also don’t need to read Freud or Kant or Nietzche to find my philosophy of life-does any one?”</p>

<p>Certainly people do not need to read philosophy if they receive morality from a traditional source. If they do not receive morality from a traditional source, then I believe they should consult a secular source, namely, philosophy. </p>

<p>Let me be very clear, it has not even crossed my mind that any of the people on this thread are immoral or lacking in morality. I always believe the best about people.</p>

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<p>re: hedonism- FS
I do not believe this. I don’t believe I have said or even implied it.</p>

<p>Certainly we live in the “have it your way” era, from burgers to cameras to sexuality to moral theories. Everybody, it seems, knows best—and “best” is usually determined by sensual-physical pleasure and social-image (political-correctness)…Moreover, it seems pretty predictable: follow the thrill.</p>

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<p>FountainSiren, believing and morality are two different things. </p>

<p>How is Dartmouth demeaning the very idea of “personal faith”?</p>

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<p>“I have repeatedly stated that you cannot make yourself believe what you do not believe. However, when there are institutional structures that not only hinder but demean the very idea of “personal-faith” I am guessing that fewer and fewer students will “choose” to believe (as they now do)”</p>

<p>Yup. Describes compulsory chapel at Dartmouth or Williams circa 1955 to a tee. Produced the God-is-Dead movement of the early 1960s; even made the cover of Time Magazine, October 22, 1965, spearheaded by the theologian Thomas Altizer at Emory University (where they still had compulsory chapel.)</p>

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<p>EK4, </p>

<p>I did not limit my comment to atheists as you say I did, I said “hedonists” not atheists. I assume there are even theists who over-indulge the senses.</p>

<p>Moreover, I have made a point to mention that those who are WITHOUT God but WITH “social/cultural parameters” will likely lead a moral life (i.e. not hedonistic).</p>

100

<p>I guess I misundertood FA then becuase I understood her to be saying that if you recieve morality from a “traditional source” then you already have a code of ethics to which you can refer- however if you do not then you are likely to derive your morality from the boundaries of “criminality and political correctness”</p>

<p>There certainly are those with a religious background who have a code of ethics similar to mine and those with a religious background who live their lives apparently feeling that if they go to confession & or repent then everythin is A OK.</p>