Aspergers and atheism

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Well, arguably I am standing in the way of such a monopoly. For the most part, I am contesting that this monopoly already exists by pointing out that it doesn't, and denying that the monopolizing effort has the normative force needed to attack people who use other definitions of the term would reasonably be construed as existing given the current state of the language. Technically, I am fine with the status quo though, especially given that any other effort to identify the sociological group will run afoul of the same rules being applied against "atheism" as the term for the sociological group, such as humanism applying to a larger group, such as skepticism having an already existing philosophical meaning, etc. The only effort I've seen at another word is Dan Dennett's "Brights" and frankly.... I am not accepting that name. It sounds stupid. It also hasn't caught on, and probably will never catch on. I can't imagine why anybody in their right mind would use that word.

I wasn't implying some polls have no bias. They can have significantly less though.

I don't quite think that "secular humanism" has the problem of already applying to a larger group. And, if it does, how about "materialistic scientific democratic secular humanism"?

Problem being that the community being addressed isn't necessarily all democratic, or all humanist. I mean, Luke Meuhlhauser is clearly a member of the community I am talking about in that he has an "atheist blog", one that is very popular, and he promotes all sorts of science and whatever related issues, even giving talks to people on the matter. However, he's not a humanist by his own proclamation. http://commonsenseatheism.com/?p=4630

I, in the past, haven't necessarily sided with democracy. In fact, I still have a lot of anti-democratic tendencies, and I believe in liberty more than democracy.

Both people are in this same supposed community for which we are trying to set the term for, but the strict definitions fail. Most of your proposed adjectives have one problem or another. The set of words is too lengthy to be of value either, as a label has to be usable, and that one has like 20 syllables or something.

To help with the linguistic debate may be looking into Alfred Korzybski's map-territory relation might help

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7OR7meRm71w&feature=related[/youtube]

To be honest, I don't think that video helps at all. Especially given that "atheism" is a much more "notional" or "folk psychological referential" concept than references to physical objects.

well i am a christian aspie. i find the bible true and correct and also believe in jesus and his teachings. i also found ways on how to manage my life better with his teachings along with some from proverbs and psalms (and many others but these two books is where i mostly found some). i have also come to find that god is very logical. if you just think about his actions carefully then you know why he did this or that. just be sure to also check your answers or ideas you have found with the bible. well thats how i searched for who god is.

ever since i started this journey lots of things have been happening in my life. like i was able to find out how to manage my sex drive, take control and make use of my autistic side, started to hear gods voice guide me like he would say "pull this, turn here, go there, talk to him, crank this, etc.". sometimes i would sometimes even see (well in my imagination but also feel) these lines guide me to places that i would go to. and i have talked some people on the way and also help them as well.

sometimes i even have dreams that usually predict my future. i know its dmt but i sometimes feel as if dmt is construction material used by god or jesus to "build" the dream and then show me my future that they have in plan for me or show me whats bothering me and i would try to find a way to solve it which i eventually do. (i am that kind of a person where if you point out what i am doing wrong and i notice its wrong then i fix it ). kind of reminds me of garrys mod a bit. i do have regular dreams if you must know.

but like i said lots of good things have been happening ever since i started to seek god with a open mind and open heart with some faith and thinking.

i hope what i said has made sense. dont flame at me for it if you may have had a hard time trying to find god as this journey wasn't easy for me as well.

Have you hear of the story of the blind men and an elephant?

That actually stumps me, as I'd have to admit that I've been one of those complexities for years of my life (blending Gnostic ideas, Buddhist ideas, etc.). The labeling just sucks because it does, it sounds like oxymorons on parade, I think agnostic, agnostic atheist or theo-agnostic (believe in something but your not sure what perhaps) is less of a mudbath for communication. Lol, I never said that I didn't believe that the things or people you're talking about didn't exist, just I think there's better ways to communicate.


Maybe that one does go over my head.... belief that the Christian God used to exist. I'll admit that I've never encountered a person who actually believes that, then again I've never met anyone who's been a John Frum convert either, I'm sure there's one or two out there.


I guess I take that back, I am ignorant to this one. I'll just have to be careful not to step on the toes as well of any Zoroastrian atheists, Islamic atheists, Rastafarian atheists, or perhaps those who might believe that the whole structure of Buddhism fell with the death of Siddhartha.

Now, if I decide to invent my own religion, just to make a buck, where I declare that there is only one soul in existence and that this soul threads through every living being and that some people are more or less advanced by the age that this particular spirit was when it lived within that person and that everyone has been experienced and saved for eternal life by this needle zipping its way across time and space.... we'll need a good name for that as well, perhaps a Firewire Buddhist?

My basic understanding is that no matter how neat you want to create things, there will always be some idea, person, or issue that will screw up your categorization system. For similar reasons to that, I also oppose strict interpretation ideas for law. So yeah, Christian atheists. I'd bet that all of the other possibilities you mention are possible as well. Let's just finally accept that reality is f***ed up and strange, and stop trying to rigidly impose structure on it as if we actually understand what's going on.

Its not that really, I think the reason why this touches a nerve with a lot of people is that when you try to put this much of a gallery of terms together its hard for people not to get the impression that its not about accuracy and more about blowing smoke. If a few women were told by their boyfriends that the got gonorrhea from evil spirits empowered by tequila under the control of Don Hoe and they believe it - we need yet another new label.

You don't like labels? Look, people hold to the myth of simplicity, probably one driven by our cognitive architecture, and to make it work, we continually generate oversimplified theories, cram reality into these oversimplified theories, use essences to make it all fit together, and then are somewhat shocked that our "simple theory" seems ridiculous.

Except that its not theories. You can have a million different theories, I suppose label them however needed, just that those that, say, less than 100 people around the world subscribe to, don't need to be brought to the forefront in public vernacular. Its a problem of human memory more than cognition. If every time you run a new label past someone and they look like you just dropped a bowling ball in their lap as they fumble for their reading glasses and a book of religious theory names that they have in their pockets, its a case of overdescription. Too much just like too little is caustic to the expediency and health of communication in a language.

We don't know how many people subscribe to each idea. In the case of Christian atheism, I would guess that it is more than 100 people though, as a number of intellectuals have taken to the title. Most do not follow in the footsteps of Altizer, but, the very notion has actually reached popular attention as Altizer and others were called the death of God movement, and I think even put onto Time Magazine.

Look, you dislike the number of labels, but the issue is that these labels we've spoken of so far all follow some notion of our labeling rules, it isn't as if people coined a new word, no, they created label made of two words put in conjunction, so the difficulty issue you speak of is rather questionable. The only other issue I can see is if you contest that this label tends to violate a central tendency of Christianity, and even then I am not sympathetic, as it is not as if Christianity really all coheres *that* well anyway. It's a broad web of theologies. The problem is that people, probably particularly aspies, try to focus on formal defining characteristics, but the way words work is family resemblances, a non-formal and holistic matter. So.... people get confused and go off in absurd directions because they somehow completely miss how their language works, only noticing it when it is called to their attention and they don't like it. It just ends up being absurd though, as the very *WEIGHT* of the corpus of language testifies against their ludicrous notions, to a degree where these protests are just absurd. We might as well start protesting feet or noses at this rate.

I guess its really just an issue of practical vs. impractical. If these people want to call themselves these things - more power to them, that's really their thing. I just don't see where it would be worth them expecting people to have a cognitive click on those labels immediately unless their numbers are upwards of several million and to the point where their ideas actually are shaping society in some way to where people have reason to need to know who they are.

I voted no, as I have been formally diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome and am not an atheist.