Atheist nonsense
As if atheists weren’t crazy enough, we now have some that are even crazier. According to Alternet’s recent article, Sam Harris’s Faith in Eastern Spirituality and Muslim Torture, atheists can “believe” (haha) any number of unprovable and wacky things.
I’ve always thought that atheism and theism were two beliefs that were equally illogical and equally closed-minded when it comes to rejecting or accepting other viewpoints. I believe that no one can prove or disprove God, so if you choose either end of the spectrum, you’re just going on faith.
Sam Harris goes on to show just how many strange things are “believable” to a skeptical disbeliever. ESP, reincarnation, torture and yes… killing. Not just killing, but killing in the name of his own beliefs.
His first strange belief: reincarnation is real. Amazingly, he gathered this belief after reading a book, he has no first-hand experience with it. (Sound like something familiar, Sam?)
Harris admits to being won over by accounts of “xenoglossy,” in which people abruptly begin speaking languages they don’t know. Remember the girl in “The Exorcist”? “When a kid starts speaking Bengali, we have no idea scientifically what’s going on.”
My first question (speaking as a fellow skeptic) would be, how did the researchers know that the kid was speaking Bengali? Is it a little unlikely that a (random?) child (under hypnosis?) began speaking Bengali and coincidentally, there just happened to be a Bangladeshi researcher in the room? If, as a later description tells, this particular case involved Ravi Shankar, I wonder if he was the one doing the translating? If so, why was he allowed near the “evidence”? Gotta read the book myself, I suppose.
Second strange belief, that torture is acceptable and it works!
“We know [torture] works. It has worked. It’s just a lie to say that it has never worked,” he says. “Accidentally torturing a few innocent people” is no big deal next to bombing them, he continues. Why sweat it?
His logic fails on this one. Saying “it’s a lie to say it has never worked” belies his presumed rationality. If we go by that standard, we may well say it’s a lie that domestic violence has never “worked”, it’s a lie that genocide never “worked”… etc. What level of “working” do we need to convince a skeptic like Harris? Due to the moral problems with research on torture, I don’t know if there exists any unbiased data on which we could base a “scientific” opinion. Simply, either you’re morally against it, or you’re immoral. :-) And you’ll see below that he actually doesn’t even mind if we bomb some of those innocent people.
Further, if we assume all enemies are lying, which ones do we torture? I know from my own experience that torturing my brother (hitting him or pinning him uncomfortably) never worked. He would either tell me a lie so I’d let him go, whereupon he laughed and ran away or he would yell for our parents in an attempt to scare me away. 
I must quote of the great comments on that article:
Let’s put his claim that torture works to the test. In 1690 several people were tortured in Salem, and gave all kinds of evidence that people around them were witches. Maybe Harris’ belief in psychic phenomena will explain how people who had never mentioned this before were suddenly seeing the light, but I gues they were all in on the witch conspiracy. But the people tortured testified that women flew through the air and sickened cows. I guess somewhere between now and 1690 we lost that particular technology.
Yes, torture works. It lets the interrogator hear what he wants to hear, and forces the tortured to tell them what they want to hear. That what the torturer wants to hear might diverge from reality Harris doesn’t seem to understand.
Just because I believe that someone planted a bomb in the Empire State Building doesn’t make it true-especially if I am tearing out his fingernails.
A third, among many irrational and offensive beliefs Harris holds… it’s okay to kill people who don’t agree with him. On reaching such a high level of enlightenment, he has reached a conclusion that some people (namely those with what he determines to be dangerous positions) can be killed. Whether he, himself would do the killing or would rather it be taken care of by an army of rationalists or atheist crusaders, he doesn’t say.
[T]he logic he lays out — that Islam itself is our enemy — invites the reader to feel comfort at the deaths of its believers. He writes: “Some propositions are so dangerous that it may even be ethical to kill people for believing them.”
Another commenter asks, “is this proposition meant to be one of them?”
I agree, holding such a belief that people who hold another belief are (or may) be ethically killed is a DANGEROUS belief. That’s likely why he’s against Muslims in the first place - they (to him) believe in killing those who disagree. What’s the difference???
Reincarnation is not a strange belief, it has been researched by scientists for years and if you do a research on it you will see some evidence supporting reincarnaton. Im not saying its true, im agnostic myself , im just saying its not a strange belief, 60% of the world believes in reincarnation. A strange belief in my opinion is believing you will get 12 virgins in the after life, that to me is a strange belief with no evidence supporting it at all, or paying 500$ to a pchychic so you can communicate with your dead grandma, well there are many strange beliefs, stay skeptial but keep an open mind because there’s so much about the universe we do not understand.
I still consider it a strange (odd, peculiar, inconsistent) belief for an atheist to have. I think of atheists as severe skeptics and anything outside the realm of pure reality, everything they can’t see or feel, is not real/true/believable.
For reincarnation, you must acknowledge some sort of external existence beyond your own body, a soul, a spiritual plane, whatever. Where is it? Can we see it, feel it… ? No, so why would an atheist believe in that, given his very high standards for religion, which offers beliefs in the same sorts of unobservable places and things?
In this instance, like I pointed out in the post, Mr. Harris read a book (like you did) and started to believe in reincarnation. This sounds an awful lot like other religious beliefs, we read it in a book and believe. I’m willing to bet he’s never done research of his own…
If you base your opinions on whether or not a large amount of people agree on it, then I suppose you’ll have to join the world of the believers, since around 90% of people around the world believe in some kind of religion, and Christians are the majority of them.
I do keep an open mind always. :-) Thanks for the comment!
PS Just thought of this… Why is it strange to try to communicate with a dead relative, but not strange that the relative’s soul may come back in the body of a 2-year-old living in another country?
Athiests generally don’t believe in reincarnation, most of them don’t believe in any sort of after life. Im not a athiest, im agnostic, im not ashamed to say im not sure what happens when we die. Reincarnation has evidence to support it, it has been studied for over 40 years at the university of virginia, they have on file over 2500 cases of children remembering past lives, that is the reason i consider it to be a possibility, even super skeptics like Carl Sagan has said it needs more research. I do not base my beliefs on a large number of people believing in it, but rather on evidence, and that is why i can’t rule out reincarnation because of the accumulating evidence it has had over the years. I cannot say im a true believer in reincarnation, i can only say i think its possible.
Telling me that children are recounting prior lives doesn’t really help your case much. Those same children may believe in Santa, faeries, the ability to fly and other nonsense. I did say I’d try to read the book that was mentioned, but for the time being, I’m remaining ultra skeptical of this one. Agnostics have my respect since they’re mostly neutral and admit that God can’t be proven (although I’m a believer, I agree with that) and I understand that you’re not saying either way (maybe a fault of agnostics lol) that it is true or isn’t, but keeping an open mind.
Basically, I’m asking: what is the evidence? Is it just based on what these children or adults tell the researchers? That is, where is the soul, have they noted an instance of one soul traveling around and going into another being (or whatever it does)? I think the “evidence” you’re mentioning is a little weak, being as no one has actually observed reincarnation, they’re just saying, “Well, what guy X says matches up with guy Z’s life, he must have been reincarnated!”
The number of people who would have to be tested and cross-examined and referenced and cataloged in order find out the truth is immense and I’d say that makes it highly improbable. How do they get details about a deceased person’s life? How do they know that the interviewee does not know the same details? I could go on and on with questions, but they’re not really for you to answer… I’ll read on my own. :-)
I respect your skeptical point of view on reincarnation, im skeptical about it myself, but i have seen enough evidence for me personally to say its possible. I have researched it for a few years and have read a lot of material on the subject. If you want to reasearch it for your own curiosity you can start with http://www.wie.org/unbound/media.asp?id=106 its a interview with jim tucker assistant professor in the division of personal studies at the university of Virginia. The evidence they have acculated over the years is interesting and not easily explained away, but that is my personal opinion, if you reasearch it yourself maybe you will have a different opinion and that is ok. You can also see a bbc documentry video on reincarnation at www.eso-garden.org/
All im really saying is for me reincarnation remains a possibilty. You ask where is the soul? well the best scientific evidence of our conscience can survive death is near death experiences. Many scientists have studied this phenomenon for years and is in my opinion the best scientific evidence we have that our conscience in not dependent on out brains. Reincarnation and near death experiences are not without their critics, but the reason im agnostic and not an athiest is because to me, i certainly seen enough evidence to consider it a possibily. I was raised a catholic but i started questioning religion when i was about 19 or 20. I guess for me i had a difficult time believing in a ressurection of Jesus based on a 2 thousand year old book written and rewritten by man, or that he could walk on water or turn water into wine and all the other miraculous things he supposed to have done. And i knew that other religions exsisted
in the world, so i was questioning to myself how do we know wich religion is the right one? Thats when i decided to make a personal quest for the truth, its a quest im still on now. I really hope we have an after life i really do, i mean who wants to cease to exsist? Maybe i will never see enough evidence to fully convince me, but i have seen enough to say its possible.
Thanks for the comments and links, Nick. :-)
As you may know, I’m a Muslim and I believe all souls are unique and don’t travel between bodies. I wasn’t judging reincarnation on its own, but I’m judging it using Sam Harris’ supposed standards for belief, I think he is being inconsistent as an atheist. Just my opinion. :-)
For the links, my initial glances at the pages still shows that they’re relying heavily on children to get the info. Do any of the children carry the soul of someone that no one knew and no evidence of the prior life exists?
I just don’t trust children. As a child, I carried on a tale for years of a family of elves who I used to visit after school. I told my family stories about the elf house and things we did and ate. But it was just imagination.
To me, it seems that if you believe this, then you should believe psychics like John Edward or Sylvia Browne as well. Some people claim that Edward or Browne have actually contacted their loved ones… Is it not the same?
What evidence do you have that we have souls, not just that they are unique? Are you comming to this conclusion based purely on faith? Why would the muslim religion be the correct one and not christianity? or buddism etc? Children do have imagination and they do tell fantasy tales, but what if a child can correctly identify a significant number of details of a past life whitout any way of knowing in the current life? Should we simply dismiss it as pure coincidence and disregard these cases outright? I guess its all a matter of opinion, as far as John Edward and Sylvia Brown, to tell you the truth i h’avent really researched these so called physchics enough to offer much of a opinion, i guess because i am extremely skeptical about these claims, and these people are probably just doing cold readings and are very good at it. Do you believe that they are for real? I have serious doubts, but like i said i haven’t really looked into it. I don’t have anything against Muslims, Christians or any other religious faith because i know one of them could be correct, but i want some evidence to support these religious claims. The world has dozen’s of religions how does one know wich is the correct one, wich one represent the truth if any?
See, you’re missing the point. My original intent was not to critique the idea of reincarnation based on whatever evidence there is but to show that believing in it, for an atheist, is strange. My own incomprehensible ideas don’t really come into play here, except that I discussed why it is strange to me that an atheist would believe in it.
It is true that I am a member of a faith-based group and my views about life and death are based on faith. If you want to discuss my personal views about these things, you’ll run around in circles, since the very nature of “faith” requires no proof! :-)
I personally do not consider proof to be necessary for belief, but an atheist usually does.
RE: belief
Belief Puzzle
http://beepbeepitsme.blogspot.com/2007/01/belief-puzzle.html
Let’s see here…I’m going to add my own thoughts. Since I’m an agnostic (although looking at the world as of late, maybe atheism is the way to go!), I don’t go much for religion in any form, although, I do find theology fascinating. As far as an atheist being able to believe in reincarnation, it’s possible and doesn’t necessarily go against atheism. Reincarnation to me is mystical in nature, much like ESP (meaning, not reliant on the belief of a deity). Therefore, it is logical that beliefs such as those can be expressed by atheists.
Since reincarnation is the rebirth of the soul (which you would assume shows the acknowledgment of a supreme being, but doesn’t require one) into a new body, I do agree it is an odd belief for atheists to hold, but not unheard of by any means.
As for the torture and killing, well, that’s just gratuitously stupid. Those are two general beliefs that I won’t won’t share with anyone.
Look, see what religious/non religious beliefs get us? I’m definitely one person, however, that believes in religious freedom and the equality of them all. Religion should be a personal matter, not public forum anyways.
Oh, and yeah Leena, I remember the elves!
One last thing, if you haven’t seen the movie “Birth” yet, with Nicole Kidman, I suggest watching it.
I agree it is unusual for an atheist to believe in reincarnation and esp but like Chad has mentioned, being an atheist is simply not to believe in god, so he can believe in those things and still be an atheist. Im sorry Leena if my previous posts were off topic, i guess when you mentioned that reincarnation was a strange belief, that i just wanted to point out its not stranger to believe in reincarnation as it is to believe in a religious faith. I think this guy belief that killing and torture are justified is much more disturbing than his beliefs in reincarnation and esp. Anyways a little about me, im 35 year old male from Canada, also married, i was raised christian , became agnostic at around 21, but i hold no prejudice against those that practice religious faith.
Thanks for the comments Chad and Nick.
I know what being an atheist means; I used to be one.
The reason I found Harris’ beliefs strange is because I imagine that atheists have a high standard for facts and they try to find out things using science or personal observation.
If, in reincarnation, there is an unseen thing (soul, mind) that travels, in my atheist days I would say that is nonsense. An atheist who accepts that there can be unseen spirits or souls, is being inconsistent if his rejection of God is based on not being able to see Him or not finding scientific evidence, unless reincarnation is the physical moving of brains from one body to another, which I doubt that it is.
My opinion on this is not unique, if you visit the page linked within the article, you’ll see many comments which go on this line and I know that most atheists would consider it strange as well, which is why the article was written in the first place.
Salaamun Alaykum Leena,
This is about the third time I’ve seen that article critiqued. I think it’s important to note that AlertNet isn’t showing Harris at his best — but his best ain’t much better than that. His argument for torture is as retarded as any (and you’ll note that he only acknowledges that torture works for people like you and me — I don’t think he’d agree that, for example, William Sampson’s confession to mass murder in Saudi Arabia should stand up).
Keep up the good work, sister!
Wasalaam,
A