The atheist mindset

RichieO

I have found that the vast majority of atheists seem to have a quite different mindset than theists, inasmuch that atheists also discard the likes of astrology, psychics, the supernatural, superstitions, lucky charms, magic, voodoo and just about everything that cannot be proven or explained in sensible, logical terms, on the other hand theists tend to accept some or many of these, so I was wondering is there a “gullible gene” or is it the way the brain is wired, or a combination of some other reasons…

Are there any atheists or agnostics who buy into any of the above mentioned?

Nervous Wreck

Thanks to my "atheist mindset," I don't believe in such hokey things as a "gullible gene".

jacksie66

This post has been deleted.

RichieO

Nervous Wreck wrote: »

Thanks to my "atheist mindset," I don't believe in such hokey things as a "gullible gene".

Me neither but although it's very unlikely, it's not entirely impossible, I am leaning towards religious brainwashing creating a "gullible mindset"...

uck51js9zml2yt

RichieO wrote: »

I have found that the vast majority of atheists seem to have a quite different mindset than theists, inasmuch that atheists also discard the likes of astrology, psychics, the supernatural, superstitions, lucky charms, magic, voodoo and just about everything that cannot be proven or explained in sensible, logical terms, on the other hand theists tend to accept some or many of these, so I was wondering is there a “gullible gene” or is it the way the brain is wired, or a combination of some other reasons…

Are there any atheists or agnostics who buy into any of the above mentioned?

I'm a theist and I totally discard the above list...what's your point?

Samaris

I've had lucky charms before now, although I tended to lose them, so I guess I can't have been too attached to them.

I suppose a willingness to believe in superstition is a religious trait, so it may well be less likely to appear amongst atheists, but at the same time, people are irrational in lots of different directions and I have no doubt but that some do touch wood, not walk under ladders, get confused as to whether the black cat is lucky or not and/or suddenly greet magpies who never look impressed by it.

I did once see seven magpies at once and picked up a £20 note while they were still whirling around overhead, so I kept that one up a bit longer!

"Touch wood" is one that I hear a lot, particularly connected to work and the likelihood of things going horribly wrong in the next twenty minutes. I hear that from believers, non-believers, one very-anti-religion and don't-carers. I think they're joking. Mostly. But given I will absolutely get the blame if I haven't touched wood and things DO go wrong (which is a continuous 50:50 chance it seems), I fall in with that one, even if I really do not see how a length of plasticated chipboard is going to prevent a machine break down across the room .

robindch

Nalani Thundering Stocking wrote: »

I'm a theist and I totally discard the above list...what's your point?

You're a theist who discards the supernatural?

Well, in Ireland at least, you may be in plentiful company - around 8% of catholics in a survey said that they don't believe in god:

https://radio.rte.ie/radio1highlights/8-irish-catholics-said-dont-believe-god-low-hurdle-catholic/

:eek:

robindch

Samaris wrote: »

I've had lucky charms before now, although I tended to lose them [...]

If I were you, I'd read that sentence a couple of times - leave the syllables roll around in your mouth for a while - have a think about the meaning of 'luck' and see what kind of thoughts might arise :pac:

Samaris

robindch wrote: »

If I were you, I'd read that sentence a couple of times - leave the syllables roll around in your mouth for a while - have a think about the meaning of 'luck' and see what kind of thoughts might arise :pac:

Aha, but who knows what important thing I might have lost if I hadn't had the lucky charm to lose first, huh?

looksee

Samaris wrote: »

I've had lucky charms before now, although I tended to lose them, so I guess I can't have been too attached to them.

I suppose a willingness to believe in superstition is a religious trait, so it may well be less likely to appear amongst atheists, but at the same time, people are irrational in lots of different directions and I have no doubt but that some do touch wood, not walk under ladders, get confused as to whether the black cat is lucky or not and/or suddenly greet magpies who never look impressed by it.

I did once see seven magpies at once and picked up a £20 note while they were still whirling around overhead, so I kept that one up a bit longer!

"Touch wood" is one that I hear a lot, particularly connected to work and the likelihood of things going horribly wrong in the next twenty minutes. I hear that from believers, non-believers, one very-anti-religion and don't-carers. I think they're joking. Mostly. But given I will absolutely get the blame if I haven't touched wood and things DO go wrong (which is a continuous 50:50 chance it seems), I fall in with that one, even if I really do not see how a length of plasticated chipboard is going to prevent a machine break down across the room .

Its five or six magpies you need for money, 'seven is a secret never to be told'. So obviously that was coincidence!

December2012

I'm not religious but I'm big on Santa with my kids.

Can't figure it out myself but happy with it for now!

Samaris

looksee wrote: »

Its five or six magpies you need for money, 'seven is a secret never to be told'. So obviously that was coincidence!

One might have been a spray-painted sparrow?

RichieO

Nalani Thundering Stocking wrote: »

I'm a theist and I totally discard the above list...what's your point?

Interesting, that anyone can classify a deity outside of the supernatural...?

Samaris

oldrnwiser, you seem to be able to quote the bible pretty thoroughly! Isn't there mentions of superstition in the Bible, probably mostly talking about other religions and how one should reject them as evil ideologies, etc. Could that make for a division for Christian theists between their religion and the sorts of superstitions we're talking about? I don't entirely include "thou shalt not suffer a witch to live" (not least as it may well be a mistranslation), but witches tended to be seen as followers of Lucifer so they kinda get a pass as being included in the whole outlook.

I know they are all much the same manifestations of the same types of thing (the supernatural), but religion is very good at dealing with that sort of cognitive dissonance.

branie2

December2012 wrote: »

I'm not religious but I'm big on Santa with my kids.

Can't figure it out myself but happy with it for now!

Are you the same with the Easter Bunny?

smacl

RichieO wrote: »

I have found that the vast majority of atheists seem to have a quite different mindset than theists

Have you met the majority of atheists?

December2012

branie2 wrote: »

Are you the same with the Easter Bunny?

Nope. Kids have fairy doors though and I'm not into that as a grown up, but they like it, tooth fairy, etc

recedite

Nervous Wreck wrote: »

Thanks to my "atheist mindset," I don't believe in such hokey things as a "gullible gene".

I don't believe you.

RichieO

smacl wrote: »

Have you met the majority of atheists?

I don't know, how many are there?

But of the majority I have encountered / listened to, some are overly pedantic too...

smacl

RichieO wrote: »

I don't know, how many are there?

But of the majority I have encountered / listened to, some are overly pedantic too...

Sure. And would you say most atheists are prone to making unsubstantiated sweeping generalisations too?

smacl

And FWIW I know a number of atheists into the liked if reiki, homeopathy, crystal healing and various other nonsense and mumbo jumbo. While critical thinking might leave you less inclined to believe in the supernatural, the reverse does not hold. Not believing in a god doesn't make you a critical thinker.

Samaris

smacl wrote: »

And FWIW I know a number of atheists into the liked if reiki, homeopathy, crystal healing and various other nonsense and mumbo jumbo. While critical thinking might leave you less inclined to believe in the supernatural, the reverse does not hold. Not believing in a god doesn't make you a critical thinker.

Mooost of the hrm...non-Christians? Non-mainstream religion? people I know who are into crystal healing and all the rest of it tend, in my experience, to be quite religious, just of a mix of various types of religion often wrapped up in "Pagan", which I'd definitely not call atheist. Even the ones that don't specifically call it pagan, there seems to be hefty drawing from gods or goddesses (usually goddesses as most - but not all - of the people I know into that are female) of various different cultures.

I have so far refrained from asking how they can deal with the cognitive dissonance of worshipping Hecate, Isis, Epona and occasionally the Christian Mary at once.

branie2

With regard to Mary, we pray to her, as opposed to worship her

smacl

Samaris wrote: »

Mooost of the hrm...non-Christians? Non-mainstream religion? people I know who are into crystal healing and all the rest of it tend, in my experience, to be quite religious, just of a mix of various types of religion often wrapped up in "Pagan", which I'd definitely not call atheist. Even the ones that don't specifically call it pagan, there seems to be hefty drawing from gods or goddesses (usually goddesses as most - but not all - of the people I know into that are female) of various different cultures.

I have so far refrained from asking how they can deal with the cognitive dissonance of worshipping Hecate, Isis, Epona and occasionally the Christian Mary at once.

The friends I'm thinking of are possibly substituting new age woo for religion having abandoned Catholicism for all the obvious reasons while still wanting the fantasy element. Homoeopathy in particular seems to go down well which always baffles me. That said, whatever floats your boat and I think of most of this as largely harmless. They take there little pills containing one quarter of three fifths of feck all, I have my pint of Guinness. Each to their own.

Harika

December2012 wrote: »

I'm not religious but I'm big on Santa with my kids.

Can't figure it out myself but happy with it for now!

That's because "do whatever I say, because santa is watching" is actually working

Ot: my guess is that more religious people buy into homoeopathy than atheists, still you find sceptic people wearing their lucky t-shirt to special occasions.

magicbastarder

i'm an atheist and i usually play the lotto once a week. does that count?

December2012

Harika wrote: »

That's because "do whatever I say, because santa is watching" is actually working

Ot: my guess is that more religious people buy into homoeopathy than atheists, still you find sceptic people wearing their lucky t-shirt to special occasions.

Ah we're not into the fear aspect, but I do like the tradition of it. Thankfully we're in a very diverse area so the kids know lots of non believers and people with religions or traditions

uck51js9zml2yt

RichieO wrote: »

Interesting, that anyone can classify a deity outside of the supernatural...?

I referred to the list in the op , read it again

Turtwig

You know, the most amazing thing happened to me tonight... I saw a car with the license plate ARW 357. Can you imagine? Of all the millions of license plates in the state, what was the chance that I would see that particular one tonight? Amazing!

We have a wonderful tendency to ascribe significance to things that may not be all that significant. The vast majority of atheists I know think the same way I do likely because I'll tend to follow like minded individuals. If you went to any mystic, psychic, ghost, new age health, supernaturalism group, you'd find atheists there. What I guess is the scientific question that you're asking is whether the amount of atheists there would be proportionally lower to their overall presence in the general population? To be honest, I don't think there is a way to actually answer that. I also don't think that's even the correct framing of the question.

smacl

Turtwig wrote: »

I also don't think that's even the correct framing of the question.

The problem I have with questions such as these as they imply atheists have more in common than simply not believing in a god or gods. This panders to a notion of atheists as a homogeneous group much like members of a religious group but without the god. While there are atheist groups that do have more in common than just atheism, so far as I know the vast majority of atheists are not part of such groups. While figures vary between 200 million and 750 million, there are a lot of atheists out there forming a very diverse group. Even locally, from Wikipedia, Atheist Ireland has ~500 members and I'm guessing HAI has a number of the same order of magnitude, where the census shows 468 thousand with no religion not to mention the 8% of Catholics in Robindch's post adding a further 298 thousand. Referring to the mindset of the majority of atheists compared to theists in this context is divisive nonsense.

Samaris

smacl wrote: »

The friends I'm thinking of are possibly substituting new age woo for religion having abandoned Catholicism for all the obvious reasons while still wanting the fantasy element. Homoeopathy in particular seems to go down well which always baffles me. That said, whatever floats your boat and I think of most of this as largely harmless. They take there little pills containing one quarter of three fifths of feck all, I have my pint of Guinness. Each to their own.

Ah yeah, it's pretty harmless, the folks into it tend to be very much of the peace, love and not being a dick to people sort and I'm as tolerant of what I see as their oddities as they are of my either presumed Catholicism or my actual non-religiousness, depending on whether I've ever had that conversation with them (which may not crop up at all). I even have a set of goddess cards because they're pretty and make nice decorations. Also, "pagan" shops (as they tend more to be the mixed hippy shops) tend to have nice stuff in and I am quite hippy.

kelly1

RichieO wrote: »

I have found that the vast majority of atheists seem to have a quite different mindset than theists, inasmuch that atheists also discard the likes of astrology, psychics, the supernatural, superstitions, lucky charms, magic, voodoo and just about everything that cannot be proven or explained in sensible, logical terms, on the other hand theists tend to accept some or many of these, so I was wondering is there a “gullible gene” or is it the way the brain is wired, or a combination of some other reasons…

Are there any atheists or agnostics who buy into any of the above mentioned?

Richie, you can't paint all theists, or atheists for that matter, with the same brush. There's a whole spectrum of beliefs.

Personally, I reject all the things you mentioned except the supernatural. I believe in God, his angels, fallen angels (daemons) and human spirits.

I have well thought out reasons for believing in God and the rest follows from that.

This whole debate has been going on since the dawn of civilization. There are intelligent people on both sides of the debate and it's pure arrogance for anyone to suggest that atheists are more intelligent or rational than theists.

There is an invisible bridge between belief and non-belief and those who cross that bridge often have a hard time explaining why they crossed over but they will tell you, it makes a world of difference. I can vouch for it. Short bridge in my case, but a bridge nonetheless.

My belief is that the invisible bridge is in keeping with God's desire to grant us genuine free-will. We are invited to cross that bridge and nobody is coerced. True love (on our part) can not come from being forced.

smacl

Odd to use the archaic spelling of demon, I tend to think of background computing tools, a decent sci-fi novel and Greek mythology. Is daemon often used in a Christian context?

kelly1

smacl wrote: »

Odd to use the archaic spelling of demon, I tend to think of background computing tools, a decent sci-fi novel and Greek mythology. Is daemon often used in a Christian context?

Ha ha, force of habit I'm a programmer working in a Unix environment, so I work with "daemons" daily.

smacl

kelly1 wrote: »

Ha ha, force of habit I'm a programmer working in a Unix environment, so I work with "daemons" daily.

OT, but the book of the same name is worth a punt too for a programmer if you're inclined towards sci-fi. Just noticed there's a sequel I wasn't aware which is now on my Kindle, so cheers for prompting that.

RichieO

kelly1 wrote: »

Richie, you can't paint all theists, or atheists for that matter, with the same brush. There's a whole spectrum of beliefs.

Personally, I reject all the things you mentioned except the supernatural. I believe in God, his angels, fallen angels (daemons) and human spirits.

I have well thought out reasons for believing in God and the rest follows from that.

This whole debate has been going on since the dawn of civilization. There are intelligent people on both sides of the debate and it's pure arrogance for anyone to suggest that atheists are more intelligent or rational than theists.

There is an invisible bridge between belief and non-belief and those who cross that bridge often have a hard time explaining why they crossed over but they will tell you, it makes a world of difference. I can vouch for it. Short bridge in my case, but a bridge nonetheless.

My belief is that the invisible bridge is in keeping with God's desire to grant us genuine free-will. We are invited to cross that bridge and nobody is coerced. True love (on our part) can not come from being forced.

First, I did not "paint any group with a brush" and second QED...

You cherry picked the list in same way way you have to cherry pick the bible, then makes sense to you because it now fits in with your beliefs...

Turtwig

smacl wrote: »

Odd to use the archaic spelling of demon, I tend to think of background computing tools, a decent sci-fi novel and Greek mythology. Is daemon often used in a Christian context?

Ever since I read his dark materials trilogy I subconsciously spell it daemon too.

branie2

How about Tarot cards and Ouija boards?

Samaris

With Tarot cards, I tend to find that the interpretations are so broad that one can find a connection to one's own circumstances pretty easily with them. Ouija boards are a nonsense party game that builds on the atmospherics of the lights being out, the tableful of people being nervous and everyone touching the pointer.

I do remember my religion teacher considering them the devil's work and thoroughly freaked out two of us at an age to be interested in playing with them by saying that it was opening a conversation, but we had no idea what with. (The implications were pretty clear regarding demons. It worked!)

Hotblack Desiato

branie2 wrote: »

With regard to Mary, we pray to her, as opposed to worship her

Who's we?

Samaris

branie2 wrote: »

With regard to Mary, we pray to her, as opposed to worship her

Missed that. Well, one of those goddess cards I mentioned was Mary, so apparently there are those who take her as part of their personal pantheon.

branie2

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

Who's we?

We, as in Catholics

Pherekydes

branie2 wrote: »

We, as in Catholics

Why would you pray to a dead person?

branie2

She's not dead, she was assumed into heaven.

Samaris

No-one was talking about Mary within the Christian tradition, so that's all a bit irrelevant. She's not a god in Christian lore, she's just been adopted as a minor goddess for certain spiritual folks who worship various unrelated deities.

robindch

branie2 wrote: »

She's not dead, she was assumed into heaven.

Feeling a bit embarrassed to have to point out that the Assumption of Mary has been catholic doctrine only since 1950:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Munificentissimus_Deus

Prior to that, the Assumption was - well - a bit of an assumption.

kelly1

robindch wrote: »

Prior to that, the Assumption was - well - a bit of an assumption.

https://www.ewtn.com/library/answers/aofmary.htm

Nervous Wreck

When you assume, you make an ass of you and Mary.

robindch

kelly1 wrote: »

https://www.ewtn.com/library/answers/aofmary.htm

Feeling a bit embarrassed to have to point out that the Assumption of Mary has been catholic doctrine only since 1950.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Munificentissimus_Deus

kelly1

robindch wrote: »

Feeling a bit embarrassed to have to point out that the Assumption of Mary has been catholic doctrine only since 1950.

I know that!

I was pointing out that it was a belief early on in the Church, not something fabricated for the fun of it.

robindch

kelly1 wrote: »

I was pointing out that it was a belief early on in the Church, not something fabricated for the fun of it.

You didn't point out anything - you posted a link to a page owned by a hard-right broadcasting organization.

Anyhow, yes, lots of people have believed different things down through the years about what happened to the woman generally known as "Mary" when she died.

Since 1950, though, catholics are required to believe that she physically flew up into the sky and somehow disappeared into heaven thataway.