Yep, I think we can safely leave it there, George.

>>I can only promise to you that I’ll be more careful when assigning the adjective “atheist” (not to a belief - I never did that - but) to THE SET of beliefs of somebody who calls himself an atheist like e.g. Russell. I really do not know what else you want from me<<

If I have unpacked that correctly, it would appear that you agree with me that atheism is unable, by definition, to inform or underpin any individual's belief system. It may feature within those beliefs, but it does not inform that belief system by defining e.g. whether one may covet his neighbour's ass, or not. My only remaining quibble, which I won't bother to pursue unless you feel it necessary, is that atheism should not be considers a fully-formed "set of beliefs", but simply one feature amongst many.

Enjoy your day.

George,

“It was not I who suggested atheists should “proselytize”, it was Susan Jacoby…”

You have not disagreed with Jacoby but rather have supported her one –line notion, albeit in an unclear fashion. She was not speaking of proselytising atheism as such but addressing those who class themselves as freethinkers, agnostics, secular humanists etc. that they should rather, disregard the bad connotations of the word atheism and call themselves atheists and speak up about a rational and not just religious approach to world affairs.

May I suggest that you use language to express opinions clearly?

Your first post set the scene by asking the question should atheists and the theists be fearful of seeming-to-proselytise. As religion does proselytise and not just seems to, then you have made the same inference for atheism. That is, atheism is capable of being proselytised, which is utter unmitigated nonsense to which you now agree but did not before.

Here is the chain of events from your posts.

“Do our atheist friends here agree that not only those of the “secular community” but also of other, religious, persuasions should not be fearful of seeming to proselytize?” http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=5580#153000

The below sentence shows the same dichotomy of inference;

“…YES in both case, that you agree that in general theists and atheist should have the same rights to proselytize…” http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=5580#153102

Below is agreeing that atheism and theism with the sticking point of when and how;

“…on whether when and how to proselytize or not can be applied to both sides, theist or atheist. In particular,…” http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=5580#153188

Below you out-rightly state that atheism can be proselytised. The Stalinist inclusion was not necessary and does not explain away your statement. Of course you meant ‘Marxist–Leninist ideology’ that included forced atheism which has nothing to do with freely chosen atheism in a democracy.

“Imagine the reaction here if I did the same with atheism in its generality, based on my personal experience with “proselytized atheism” (well, our Stalinist teachers called it “scientific atheism”)” http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=5580#153336

Now that we agee that atheism cannot be proselytised, let’s drop the discussion.

David

David David (of AFoA),

>>Now that we agee that atheism cannot be proselytised,<<
I agree that atheism cannot be proselytized, as the term is understood by you. However, that was not my question since I did not know your definition of the term. I was asking that IF THEY (freethinkers, agnostics, secular humanists etc. as you wish) do proselytize (as the term is understood by Susan Jacoby) whether theists should be allowed to do THE SAME.

>>let’s drop the discussion.<<
A veru clever suggestion that I happily endorse.

Pericles,

I do not understand how an atheist should be concerned about coveting his neighbour’s ass (which, anyhow, is a moral instruction, commandment, not a belief).

As to atheism “informing” your belief system, it again, I think, depends on what you mean by that word and what is your belief system.

If by an atheist position you mean “absense of belief in the Spiritual, Divine or what you call it”, then such an absence will influence, make itself visible - is that “inform”? - the atheist’s belief system at least by the ABSENCE of some beliefs e.g. in God, in afterlife, etc.. For instance, Russell replaced the latter with “I believe that when I die that I shall rot and nothing of my ego shall survive”, which you would not find in my belief system. Materialists will have the belief in God replaced by the belief in “the doctrine that nothing exists except matter and its movements and modifications.”, as defined in my dictionary.”

>>atheism should not be considers a fully-formed "set of beliefs", but simply one feature amongst many.<<
Certainly, atheism is not a "set of beliefs", but the personal set of beliefs of an atheist will reflect (be informed by) the fact that the person is an atheist.

In general, I think it is easier to define who is an atheist than to define what is atheism (c.f. http://moses.creighton.edu/jrs/2009/2009-4.pdf).

Enjoy your summer days (it is freezing and snowy winter here) as well.

George,

"A veru clever suggestion that I happily endorse."

Not so much a 'clever' suggestion, but one that fulfils all the facts.

David

George,

<<Had I reacted inappropriately to david f’s post, he would have told me, and I’d probably have apologized TO HIM.>>

I disagree. I think david f is too polite to want to point that out. But that’s just my opinion and whether or not he would have, or did, is irrelevant anyway, as I have given ample reason to suggest suspicious motives regardless of how david f took your response.

I’m not sure what the capitals are about either. It’s not like anything I said suggested that I’d like you to apologise to me and the fact that the exchange didn’t include me doesn’t negate anything I’ve said either.

<<I really don’t know what it means an “objectively right and wrong way of interpreting” a text.>>

Well, you had said to csteele, “So … you believe in a God-Creator, and accept the Scripture as a source of wisdom if properly interpreted.”, which suggests that you believe there is a right and a wrong way to interpret scripture. You don’t have to know what the right way is to have an opinion on this, so whether or not you’re an expert in hermeneutics is completely irrelevant. I don’t have to be an expert in science to have an opinion on whether or not there is a right way of producing results.

<<You seem to know what I think or what motivates me to think the way I think and compose my world-view.>>

Well, spotting motives has always been one of my strengths. But I was only speculating as to why you would be so (or at least appear to be so) reluctant to give your particular interpretation of the binding of Isaac (perhaps I should have said “Your APPARENT reluctance…”). I had hoped that my question mark and inclusion of the word “perhaps” in, “Perhaps you are uncomfortable with the irreconcilability of the story with an omnibenevolent God?”, would prevent any accusations of presuming to know what motivates you.

Continued…

…Continued

Rather than getting personal, however, I was merely seizing the opportunity to point out the irreconcilability of such an immoral request from a supposedly omnibenevolent God, and it comes as no surprise to me that you chose not to address that aspect of what I had said.

Anyway, you reminded me that you were no expert on Biblical exegesis and only linked to the Wiki article when I asked for your interpretation of the binding of Isaac that apparently required one to be part of the ingroup to understand, but now you’re saying, “…as far as the Bible is concerned, you choose [your interpretation], I choose mine…” So does one need to be an expert in Biblical exegesis to have an interpretation or not? Is there a proper way to interpret scripture or not?

Those are now rhetorical questions, by the way. My point here is that if this kind of flailing doesn’t display a reluctance to give one’s own interpretation of the binding of Isaac, then I don’t know what does.

More importantly, I suppose, (and regardless of what your answer to the above questions would be) how does this all sit with a god that has an important message that he wants to share with mankind? Why would God communicate in such an obtuse way? And even if expert interpretations weren’t required, why would God communicate to us through ancient texts written by anonymous authors in languages that die out unless he didn’t care about those who actually understand the nature of evidence?

You can take these as rhetorical questions too, if you'd like. I think the answer is pretty obvious.