 |
| Photo: Elyaqim Mosheh Adam.Making reasonable choices is an essential part of life. (Trade Fair, 75-07 37th Avenue, Jackson Heights, 14 August 2009.) ──────── |
Is atheism a choice? … I’m inclined to say no. While it’s a conscious effort that leads us to seek out the truth through study and reflection, we can’t decide ahead of time what the evidence will say. Evaluating evidence is in the domain of our subconscious. … In my conception of belief—confidence that something is true—it’s very difficult to argue that my atheism is a choice. … ¶ Theists often seem quite capable of talking themselves into belief without evidence. I find this to be delusional. But it explains why religious believers often think that our atheism is a choice: if they put evidence aside to believe, they assume we can, too. …[T]his is begging the question—in essence, I’m simply asserting that I’m incapable of accepting something as true without evidence.—Jesse Galef, “Is Atheism a Choice?,” Friendly Atheist, 2 December 2009.
• A version of this article is reproduced at webcitation.org/5mOvM1XmV.
• Additional comments on this article may be available on FriendFeed, Jaiku and Jaiku (and FriendFeed).
No comments:
Post a Comment
Comments are welcome, but all comments on all articles are moderated, so quarrelsome or irrelevant ones might not be published. (If you believe this to be censorship or squelching of free speech, please open a blog of your own with any of the many sites that offer free accounts, and comment to your heart’s content.)