If the whole world were atheist, would the world be a better place?

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Counter question, would a world with God look any different than a world without God?

Depends on the God.

 

[Nakosis]

My question is for atheists. If the whole world was atheist, do you think the world would be a better place?

We have our system of laws. I suspect as long as we could agree to follow our civil laws, allowed each other to believe as we wished and long as our activities did transgress against these civil laws the world would be a better place.

 

[Hockeycowboy]

As much as I am disgusted with so much of what I see in abrahamic monotheism, I don't think the world would be better off without it.

A lot of people are kind and honest because they fear God. A lot of people are charitable and honest because they love God.

I know that there are many times I was honest and charitable because I believed that those actions were pleasing to Mother Mary, Denise Naslund, and God.

Furthermore, there is something transforming about prayer. I used to be a sociopath, now I greatly love people, am deeply compassionate, hate to see suffering, and haven't needed to be physically restrained in years. I give all the credit to a power greater than myself and the transformation received through prayer and meditation.

Would I be a worse person as an atheist? Absolutely! Been there, done that, it was a total **** show!

My question is for atheists. If the whole world was atheist, do you think the world would be a better place?

Although definitely not atheist, I’ll put in my two cents:
Religion for the most part really has failed mankind. That being said, if no one thought there was a Higher Power (which belief in, acts as a restraint....or should), I think there’d be even more selfishness in the world, among individuals! It would lead to even more distress.

 

[Hockeycowboy]

Depends on the God.

Or, it depends on how the followers interpret their god to be. Whether loving, hateful, vindictive, etc.

 

[ChristineM]

I think Stalin's regime shows that no, the world would not be better if everyone was Atheist. People are s**t, regardless of doctrine or creed.

Stalin was christian. The regime he dictated over crushed the church, headed by tzars as demigods, in the name of nationalism, not atheism

 

[George-ananda]

I've never found that there's a shortage of stuff in my godless worldview to inspire interest, wonder, awe, and happiness. I have trouble understanding a mindset that considers the natural world "boring and depressing."

What is the future for you and your loved ones? Decrepitude and death and non-existence. And meaningful memories of you last only until everyone that ever knew you is also dead. Whose view is subjectively better? I judge my non-atheist view subjectivity better.

By comparison I hold the atheistic view to be the more depressing one.

 

[ChristineM]

Unfortunately there will always be tyrants who want to control other people. Currently many of these achieve this through religion. If religion was to vanish they would find other ways, look at North Korea or China.

NK is very religious. There is nothing in the constitution to discourage religion and it has its own personal god/president which every inhabitant is required to worship.

 

[Quintessence]

Not necessarily, but I guess it would be if there was a general consensus that Gods didn't exist, would the world be better off?

That doesn't mean people agree with each other on everything, just that issue. People would find other things to kill each other over I'm sure.

Pardon, I suppose I should expand upon my meaning as my wording was perhaps not the best - I kept to brevity because I'm not really the intended audience of your question.

Any claims of what makes for a "better world" - aside from requiring no small amount of hubris, ethnocentrism, and anthropocentrism - are inevitably grounded in personal values and desires. Thus, it seems to me that whenever someone asks "would the world be better if X" basically boils down to "do I value and desire X?" It logically follows that if someone is X, they're going to be inclined to say "yes, the world would be better if everyone did X." It strikes me as something of an ego/vanity thing, especially when X = (ir)religion or (a)theism.

 

[Jesster]

People will always find reasons to be terrible to each other. Religion's disappearance would just give people one less major reason to be terrible. We can still build quality moral systems without religion, such as Humanism, without the need for the rest of the religious doctrine.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Or, it depends on how the followers interpret their god to be. Whether loving, hateful, vindictive, etc.

I understood the question to be about if a hypothetical God actually existed. A world that's the product of a loving God would look different from one made by a hateful God, regardless of people's personal opinions.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Pardon, I suppose I should expand upon my meaning as my wording was perhaps not the best - I kept to brevity because I'm not really the intended audience of your question.

Any claims of what makes for a "better world" - aside from requiring no small amount of hubris, ethnocentrism, and anthropocentrism - are inevitably grounded in personal values and desires. Thus, it seems to me that whenever someone asks "would the world be better if X" basically boils down to "do I value and desire X?" It logically follows that if someone is X, they're going to be inclined to say "yes, the world would be better if everyone did X." It strikes me as something of an ego/vanity thing, especially when X = (ir)religion or (a)theism.

Most people, theists or atheists alike, can agree on plenty of values: pleasure is better than suffering, being free is better than not, life is preferable to death, etc. If we consider this stuff where we have common ground, there's plenty of basis to compare.

Do I value and desire freedom? Most atheists and theists alike would answer "yes." So which option provides more freedom?

Do I value and desire pain - for myself or others? Most atheists and theists alike would answer "no." So which option results in less pain?

When I say that a society of skeptics would make the world a better place, I'm referring mainly to these sorts of measures of "better" that theists would generally also agree are good things.

 

[Augustus]

It might be better, but there is absolutely no rational reason to believe so.

It's not like atheistic ideologies have any better a track record than theistic ones (actually, they have a pound-for-pound worse one).

It is the ultimate in unknowable questions though, but people will see what they want to see in their crystal ball. I'd go with better the devil you know though.

 

[The Kilted Heathen]

Stalin was christian. The regime he dictated over crushed the church, headed by tzars as demigods, in the name of nationalism, not atheism

If the regime that Stalin dictated over crushed the church and worked with such entities as the League of Militant Atheists, one would rightfully assume that Stalin himself was an atheist. In a book chronicling the life of Stalin (Landmarks in the Life of Stalin, by E. Yaroslavsky) he is quoted as saying "You know, they are fooling us; there is no god. All this talk about god is sheer nonsense."

You will not hear me say that Atheism led him to do the things he did, or that atheists are somehow less moral or whatever. The point is plain that even atheists can be dicks, so it's foolish to assume the world would be better if there were nothing but.

 

[David T]

I thought 95% was already I assumed it was just a disagreement on the details is all.

 

[ChristineM]

If the regime that Stalin dictated over crushed the church and worked with such entities as the League of Militant Atheists, one would rightfully assume that Stalin himself was an atheist. In a book chronicling the life of Stalin (Landmarks in the Life of Stalin, by E. Yaroslavsky) he is quoted as saying "You know, they are fooling us; there is no god. All this talk about god is sheer nonsense."

You will not hear me say that Atheism led him to do the things he did, or that atheists are somehow less moral or whatever. The point is plain that even atheists can be dicks, so it's foolish to assume the world would be better if there were nothing but.

That quotation is from an unnamed third party, (claimed as a boyhood friend or a fellow student at Tiflis) not from Stalin, it was "re" told many years after said events and after Stalin's death so i take it with a pinch of salt.

It was said that Stalin was the only christian in the Kremlin, the dismantling of the church on nationalistic principals to remove opposition to the new order, note the russian church was at that time a tsarist organisation with tsars as a layer of hierarchy between priest and god.
Stalin (eventually) reinstated the church without that extra non christian layer of demigods. He donated billions of rubles to the church and had not one, not 2 but 3 archbishops officiate at his funeral.

One thing for sure, if there were no religion in history, more than 800 million deaths could have been avoided. I'd count that as a plus for humanity.

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

I've never found that there's a shortage of stuff in my godless worldview to inspire interest, wonder, awe, and happiness. I have trouble understanding a mindset that considers the natural world "boring and depressing."

What is the future for you and your loved ones? Decrepitude and death and non-existence. And meaningful memories of you last only until everyone that ever knew you is also dead. Whose view is subjectively better? I judge my non-atheist view subjectivity better.

I judge that the atheistic view is better. I've learned to live with the possibility that death is the end and that I will eventually be forgotten. You seem to need your beliefs to find meaning in life. Others find it without them.

By comparison I hold the atheistic view to be the more depressing one.

That is probably because of the life you have lived. The god belief can create the need for itself and make the thought of living without it frightening.

Atheism is probably not for anybody that has learned to depend on a god belief to find purpose and direction in life for most of their lives. Making the transition should be done in the first half of life, or the cost becomes much higher and the benefit reduced.

One might compare this to the advice one would give to an unhappily married young person, which might be different than that which one would give a retiree. Divorce is also a painful and difficult transition, but if one waits too long, there is much more cost if your earning years are over or nearly so and you have to divide the savings you were planning to live on, and much less potential benefit. The chances of finding happiness with another partner is lower, and if you're lucky enough to do so, you won't get to enjoy it as long.

Likewise with transitioning into atheism.

But don't confuse your present status with how living life as an atheist would have been had you learned how to live without a god belief. I think that you would have been as happy or happier raised as an atheist. I am. Penguin seems content, as do most of the other atheists posting in these threads.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

What is the future for you and your loved ones? Decrepitude and death and non-existence. And meaningful memories of you last only until everyone that ever knew you is also dead. Whose view is subjectively better? I judge my non-atheist view subjectivity better.

By comparison I hold the atheistic view to be the more depressing one.

There's an old joke about the guy who fell off the roof of a 40-floor building: as he was falling, the people in a 20th floor office heard him say "so far, so good!"

Any judgement of your worldview as subjectively better depends on it being objectively true. If your worldview is a denial of reality, then it's not "better"... even if it helps you avoid asking yourself uncomfortable questions.

 

[George-ananda]

Any judgement of your worldview as subjectively better depends on it being objectively true. If your worldview is a denial of reality, then it's not "better"... even if it helps you avoid asking yourself uncomfortable questions.

I would prefer to believe the truth than a comfortable fairy tale myself.

I argue that belief in the afterlife is both subjectively and objectively better from my analysis of the (link)afterlife evidence in several subfields of so-called paranormal phenomena.

 

[ChristineM]

I would prefer to believe the truth than a comfortable fairy tale myself.

I argue that belief in the afterlife is both subjectively and objectively better from my analysis of the afterlife evidence in several subfields of so-called paranormal phenomena.

You have analysed the evidence of an afterlife? How? What?

 

[George-ananda]

I judge that the atheistic view is better. I've learned to live with the possibility that death is the end and that I will eventually be forgotten.

But nothing there tells us why the atheist view is better. It just says you've learned to live with it.

You seem to need your beliefs to find meaning in life. Others find it without them.

All I said was the atheist view is more depressing.

That is probably because of the life you have lived. The god belief can create the need for itself and make the thought of living without it frightening.

Atheism is probably not for anybody that has learned to depend on a god belief to find purpose and direction in life for most of their lives. Making the transition should be done in the first half of life, or the cost becomes much higher and the benefit reduced.

One might compare this to the advice one would give to an unhappily married young person, which might be different than that which one would give a retiree. Divorce is also a painful and difficult transition, but if one waits too long, there is much more cost if your earning years are over or nearly so and you have to divide the savings you were planning to live on, and much less potential benefit. The chances of finding happiness with another partner is lower, and if you're lucky enough to do so, you won't get to enjoy it as long.

Likewise with transitioning into atheism.

But don't confuse your present status with how living life as an atheist would have been had you learned how to live without a god belief. I think that you would have been as happy or happier raised as an atheist. I am. Penguin seems content, as do most of the other atheists posting in these threads.

I agree with what you say.

HOWEVER, I honestly believe belief in the afterlife is objectively the more reasonable belief based on decades of interest in various subfields of the paranormal. Here's a link Evidence

As for God. I am actually a pantheist for what it is worth.

Many atheists want to imply the afterlife is believed in for subjective reasons, but for me the objective reasons have to come first. The subjective value is just a bonus you might say.