r/StreetEpistemology

I cannot defend this epistemological claim.

Paradoxically that itself is a claim that I may be asked to defend.

But asking the question, "is it possible to believe nothing?" is quite an epistemological exercise.

Because we're not just asking, is it possible to believe in the absence of belief, but it necessarily assumes that the absence of a belief is somehow attainable, whether or not one believes in it.

Which is not a state one can talk about anymore in abstract terms, as it must be demonstrated in practice by the subjective experiencer, who could not then communicate it.

And that is a struggle. I find it more interesting to contemplate how one would chose to believe less, and why.

Why would someone choose to believe less? To be less convicted?

Do we believe the person who says we should or could believe less? How confident are we they are right, and we also could achieve that state?

Do we believe that believing less is good for us? That it is somehow useful? Because those are, themselves, beliefs, are they not? At the minimum they're expectations. They assume some kind of predictive metric by which one would have achieved the state of believing less, as opposed to believing more or the same amount. It requires evidence one could interpret, and, therefore, believe more or less, is accurate.

To believe nothing would assume, functionally, zero expectations. No anticipation. And thus, it's kind of inherently pointless, meaningless, and in a very real way, useless.

Can one accept being useless against the incredible pressure to make it useful? And if one is so wrapped up in useful beliefs they hold as self evident and ultimately very important, why would they ever willingly drop them? Are we all stuck with that situation, right now, and are just unaware of it?

The stupidity of Atheism is the same form as the stupidity of Nihilism. Both have an inferior object from which they revolt.

If Atheism is just the lack of belief in Gods, then its object is just as dumb as the lack of belief in unicorns. One can’t really make a serious project of it, because the object from which it’s rebelling is unserious.

While it would be good if the world was full of Atheists, what we need are actions that facilitate, not just Atheism, but something better than Atheism. We need Scientific Skeptics and Secular Humanists to actively engage culture with knowledge (to assault superstition with knowledge). If Atheism doesn’t do this, because it’s just a lack of belief in fairytales, then Atheism isn’t the thing that society needs.

What we need are rational polemicists, who not only refute and expose the errors of religious apologists, but who also attack and expose the religious nature of philosophy.

Understand something: attacking and exposing the theological nature of philosophy is a higher pursuit than attacking the fairytale of religion. While both are important, it is philosophy from which apologists have drawn their techniques to try to keep religion alive. (Think about that).

Further, while religion is just the dumb, straightforward make believe, philosophy is far more sophisticated, which makes it a more worthy object of scrutiny.

In attacking religion one is rebelling from something as ridiculous as unicorns, in attacking philosophy one is rebelling from an intricate structure of sophistical and psychological techniques.