religion, philosophy, beliefThere are plenty of belief systems that cover the nature/purpose of existence, morality, and other topics often associated with God but that do not include God. Do you follow any particular one? If so, why that one? If not, why not
[EDIT] Trying to keep to the author’s intent, offering this alternative to explain my critique.
There are plenty of belief systems that cover the nature/purpose of existence, morality, and other topics often associated with God but that do not include God. Do you follow any particular one? If so, why that one? If not, why not
Short version:
Rejecting religious philosophies seems to have had a direct impact on the developing philosophies related to world-wide human rights, womens rights, gay rights, animal rights, environmentalism, conventional attitudes regarding the sanctity of human life.
Long version:
Atheism seems to preclude human-centered philosophies. Remember, most theistic religions are intensely anthropocentric. They not only put humans in the center of the physical universe, but in the center of the moral universe as well. Compare:
Theism: gods are intimately interested in the goings on of people, their behavior, and social structures.
Atheism: nonexistent gods had nonexistent car or interest in human affairs.
In practice: atheism seems preclude a number of religious rituals, circumcision, building churches, prayer, etc. As an indirect consequence, it seems to de-sinnify (word of the day!) behaviors that harm no one but otherwise displease god in some way:homosexuality, masturbation, non-procreative sex, women showing their hair or face in public, working on the sabbath. Additionally, it de-legitimizes god-ordained social rules such as the belief that women are inferior to or must serve men, eliminates caste systems that divide people in social classes.
Theism: keeping in mind the great chain of being, beasts < humans < angels < god. Among humans, atheists < heathens < gods chosen people.
Atheism: great chain of being can be dismissed as pseudoscience. Differences between humans and non-human animals are a matter of degree, rather than kind.
In practice: When we accept that some humans are not intrinsically better than others, it leads to a more egalitarian, humanistic ethic that includes all humans worldwide as equals within the moral community. Additionally, if we reject the belief in some insuperable chasm between human and non-human life, then it opens the door to an ethic that includes non-human animals as members of the moral community as well.
Theism: humans and their affairs at at the center of all moral concerns and conflicts.
Atheism: seems quite rational to approach moral conflicts from “the point of view of the universe”, or a very egalitarian, non-human centric point of view.
In practice: seems to invite environmentalist considerations, where we have concern for how our actions affect the environment, even if those actions serve human interests.
Theism: humans have a god-given, intrinsic and absolute right to life.
Atheism: while atheism does not require a rejection of the sanctity of human life, rejecting religious grounding for it opens the door to philosophies where humans have an extrinsic/conditional right to life or a non-absolute right to life.
In practice: we have to think much harder about the answers to questions regarding the value of human life, particularly when quality of life conflicts with right to life. For example, whether abortion is acceptable in some cases, whether non-consentual euthanasia can be justified for people in persistent vegetative states or severely disabled infants, whether execution is a valid form punishment, whether we have obligations to people in distant countries equal to our obligations to people in our immediate vicinity, whether its fair for wealthy people to have preferential access to health care over poor people, etc.
Theism: humans have an intrinsic and exclusive moral excellence which does not extend to non-human animals.
Atheism: makes it plausible to extend our notion of “human excellence” to non-human animals, or as an alternative reject human excellence and reduce the status of humans to non-human animals.
In practice: there’s a good number of atheist philosophers like Peter Singer, Tom Regan, Gary Francione, Robert E Goodin, and others who connect the rejection of “uniquely human excellence” with development of the modern animal rights movement.
Philosophy has had many people try to reason out what rules someone should follow to live their life. Most of the time they do this without assuming the presence of a higher power.
One philosopher named John Stuart Mill came up with the idea of Utilitarianism. This is the main theory that I try to live my life by. The general principal of this idea is that one should do the thing that brings the most good to the world.
Another philosopher named Immanuel Kant came up with the Categorical imperative. This is another example of a moral code that does not assume some religion.
So, to answer the question in the title, No. An atheist is not precluded from following a moral code. There doesn't have to be a God to set rules for us. Humans are more than capable of coming up with rules governing our behavior by ourselves.
So the title of this post and the content seem to have two different questions.
The answer to the title is clearly "No". The definition of an atheist precludes you from believing in God. Interestingly though, if a creed is merely a statement of belief, then for those whose atheism means "Person X believes that no god exists," that is technically a belief. Not all atheists take that form of atheism to be their own (some, e.g. Rob Schneider on this website would argue that atheism is having a "lack of belief in God"), but all atheists who do take the stronger form of active belief do have a creed, their atheism.
As for the question raised in the text, I think you could turn to Dawkin's Unweaving the Rainbow if you wanted a thorough treatment of this issue (though he doesn't exclusively talk about this sort of thing within it, how to find purpose in our existences is a running them).
Another argument about morality and how it should be rooted in science is Harris' Moral Landscape. I haven't read it so I can't speak to anything within, but I have heard, on average, fairly positive reviews.
Still there is the question of whether our philosophies and creeds actually do anything to affect our behavior, which hasn't been super verified in research. For example, in the Good Samaritan study they had subjects who were training to be seminaries and normal people pass by someone who was in clear need of help(slumped in a corner of an alley way moaning). These participants behavior did not vary based on their seminarian status, but whether they were hurried or not made a huge impact on their stopping to help.
Still it is unclear what relationship moral beliefs has on moral behavior, one paper that explores an intermediate hypothesis and also nicely reviews the past research (as is available for free online) is Lombrozo's "The role of moral commitments in moral judgment".( 2009, Cognitive Science, 33, 273-286.)
It seems that the degree to which answers to your question matter is dependent on the relationship that Lombrozo explores. If it turns out that these attitudes do not majorly affect behavior, it seems a pretty irrelevant question (to me at least) what atheists actually believe, but rather their behavior should be investigated on its own. Now I doubt that that strong hypothesis will end up being true especially given Haidt's work on foundations of morality differing between political leanings. But still it'd be nice to see actual work on the relationship between atheist beliefs and moral behavior, which seems highly relevant to the underlying intent of your question.
Einstein had this to say:
"[A scientist] has no use for the religion of fear and equally little for social or moral religion. A God who rewards and punishes is inconceivable to him for the simple reason that a man's actions are determined by necessity, external and internal, so that in God's eyes he cannot be responsible, any more than an inanimate object is responsible for the motions it undergoes. Science has therefore been charged with undermining morality, but the charge is unjust. A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties and needs; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hopes of reward after death."
I personally draw a bit from some literature which might be considered “New Age” but is not theistic. I’ve always liked Jonathan Livingston Seagull, for instance. But as it’s a parable about a bird it’s not really something I can say I “follow”…beyond a sense that “there is no heaven but a better world found through perfection of knowledge”.
To be honest, I just live my life. I have never been a team player in anything. I have always hated or avoided anything a large group likes for no other reason that others like them too. I may like a band that is small and over time they may become huge, that I can handle.
Being an Atheist is something I came to almost by myself. I know very few people who would say they are one, I am happy to join with other Atheists and become a powerful group. The moment Atheists start to fight amongst themselves and form new groups I will just step back and be the lone non believer I have always been.
Is this an answer to your question? I am sorry if it is hard to follow, I am dislexic and find it hard to type a good, clean response.
In short, I have a no Philosophy of my own as it changes as my life changes.
Well, the traditional approaches have been to keep your ideas to yourself and either
Join whatever the religion your community seems to like, and sort of play along just for the sense of community, and the other attached benefits, like connections and access to schools, etc.
Actually become a leader in the religious community of choice. For a sociopath, not actually believing provides the room to manoeuvre necessary to rise in the politics of the religious organization.
Me, I don’t think I’d be able to pull it off because I have a habit of telling the truth at moments when it doesn’t help me at all. Oh well.
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