I attended the Unitarian service "topic:atheism" this morning.
I expected some mild, non-pushy arguments for theism -- perhaps not any new or convincing ones even though I would like to encounter some. Instead, they just defined atheism, talked about some common misconceptions, and related the extent to which atheism wasn't tolerated very well in my community, in the spirit of increasing awareness.
It hadn't occurred to me that atheists were a discriminated group. I recently moved to the "Bible-belt" from elsewhere, and haven't yet encountered the phenomenon of Nice-to-meet-you-what-church-do-you-go-to? (Or maybe I did and didn't notice and now my neighbors don't talk to me, which again I haven't noticed.)
Four years ago I wrote a research paper on discrimination against atheists in America. I can post it if anyone wants, but it's 10 pages long and I can just summarize the evidence.
*#1: Anti-atheist provisions in state constitutions of Arkansas, Maryland, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Texas. Delaware grants freedom of religion with the additional clause that “it is the duty of all men frequently to assemble together for the public worship of Almighty God” and that “the prosperity of communities” depends on “piety and morality.”...
I would like to argue that there could be a more tolerant view of religion/theism here on Less Wrong. The extent to which theism is vilified here seems disproportionate to me.
It depends on the specific scenario how terrible religion is. It is easy to look at the very worst examples of religion and conclude that religion can be irrational in a terribly wrong way. However, religion can also be nearly rational. Considering that any way we view the world is an illusion to some extent. Indeed the whole point of this site is to learn ways to shed more of our illusions, not that we have no illusions.
There are the religious beliefs that contradict empirical observation and those that are independent of it...
A) Could it be rational for a person to hold beliefs that are independent of empirical observation if (a) the person concedes that they are
irrationalnot empirically based and (b) is willing to drop them if they prove to not be useful?B) Could it be rational for a person to hold unusual beliefs as a result of contradicting empirical observations?
As a least convenient world exercise, what is the most rational belief in God that you can think of?