A question to atheists. Most atheist hold an extremely materialistic view of the mind, that it's entire thought process is performed by the physical brain operating according to predictable, arguably deterministic mechanics. There is a pattern and order to thinking. We also know that the subconscious and instincts are inseperatly from the conscious mind and constantly exerting influence.
So why deny spirituality? Doctor Jung believed systems of spirituality and religion were essential to keeping the brain operating, to satisfy the subconscious's craving for symbols and myth. He also beleived when the mind is deprived of it's necessary diet of myths than it creates or seeks new ones. Since myth and spirtuality has been a part of the human condition for so many thousands of years is it really so hard to believe the brain would evolve to crave them. Religious artifacts are found among the earliest humans. What's so hard to believe that biological determinism has us respond to mother goddesses and animal spirits?
I personally think the public's increasing interest with fantasy and super hero media is related to the decline in spirituality.
oxygen is necessary to keep the brain operating.
>>985719
There's a difference in values here. You are absolutely correct that the brain evolved to crave myths and spirituality. But just because the human brain "naturally" wants something doesn't mean that I'm gonna let it tend towards that something. If the myths aren't likely, I get rid of it, period. Just like other cognitive biases the human brain has, you have to get rid of it if you want to know how things actually are.
>>985741
One of my points is I don't think you can subvert the brains desire for myth, at least no easier than you can subvert the brain's desire to socialize or find common kin.
If you deny your brain access to the mainstream religions and myths it will just gravitate to other things that satisfy it. The role of characters from a work of fiction may become the new mother goddess. The most dangerous thing would be that the brain starts interpreting the real world to see mythical characters. While religion and myth provide a clear barrier between the world of the mythical arch-types, denying yourself that barrier means the subconscious is unchecked. The cult worship of political or celebrity figures may be the result of the brain trying to interpret them in mythical terms.
Jung believed religion and myth were a sort of box, that allowed us to seal and control the subconscious's cravings. The destruction of spirituality just makes it harder, not easier to maintain control over the darker sides of the mind.
>>985771
>One of my points is I don't think you can subvert the brains desire for myth
How do you explain atheists then?
>no easier than you can subvert the brain's desire to socialize or find common kin
Not the same.
>>985771
I'm not sure. Unless I've missed it, I don't think I escalate anyone or anything up to a cult-like figure or something like that. But if what you're saying is true, I'll have to be careful not to join or fall into anything cult-like.
>>985771
Waifuism in a nutshell.
>>985792
>How do you explain atheists then?
Come on this shouldn't even the be a question. Atheists just reject established notions of religions, this doesn't magically switch off thousands of years of evolution.
It's like saying being a vegetarian means you can turn off the part of your body that wants protein. Just as a vegetarian gets protein from sources other than meet the atheist gets his spiritual nutrition from sources other than what is normally called "spiritual". As for as the subconscious is concerned anything can be a mother goddess, it could be a video or anime character, it could be a real life person. Just as the body will make the vegeterian feel more attached to foods with protein the spirtit-seeking subconscious will make the atheist starting treating other things with religious veneration.
You can't out-run 50,000 years of evolution just because you stopped going to church.
>>985822
So you're saying your argument goes from scientific biology based to psychobabble in a moment? and you're ready to diagnose pornography and anime as 'a corrupt mother goddess' that the brain is trying to replace god with? yeah, okay. Problem is you have no falsifiable evidence.
>>985719
>So why deny spirituality?
Why do you assume that I'm denying it?
I've never believed in any religion in the first place, never had an instinct to take any particular religion as fact as I was not raised in a religious household.
From my perspective, it's that everyone else is forcing "spirituality" onto everything, and they only have it because they were brainwashed/raised into thinking in such a way. Even more so because the only religious person in my family was an atheist too until he literally went to a church out of sheer boredom and got "saved" and now he is a hardcore christian, conveniently the same denomination as that church he went to. What are the chances that the first religion he actually bothered with happened to be the One True Religion, eh?
Or maybe I'm just autistic.
>>985771
>The role of characters from a work of fiction may become the new mother goddess
specifically a mother goddess? You won't find me reading Michael Crighton in order to get a good harvest
>>985826
Not all science is falsfiable. For instance the theory of evolution is pretty hard to falsify. Instead some things have to be based on observation
Comparative mythology has long seen that there are certain patterns and arch-types amoung them all. A look into the origin of religious myths often reveals the gods or mythical heroes were based on real people. In other words there is already a pattern of taking things that already exist in real life and interpreting them mythological.
>>985834
By deny I mean try to say it should be purged. If it follows that the brain has innate cravings for spirtual things than it should be regulated rather than run rampant. Jung thought if you were not part of a religion you should be reading mythology and trying to allegorically relate it to your current life: in other words we need a way to satisfy the brain's appetite for spiritual matters in a safe way. If you do not find a way to regulate it's diet, than your instincts will find it ways for you which can lead to potentially dangerous outcomes.
>>985719
You seem to think rejecting various religious dogmas is the same as denying the spiritual aspects of the human intellect. One can easily indulge these things without accepting the literal existence of a God or spirit world on a logical level.
>>985792
>Atheists
>not believing in myths
>>985866
Evolution as we currently understand it would be pretty easily falsified by, for example, a fish giving birth to a frog.
>it's a naturalistic fallacy thread
As an atheist, I don't know that I do deny my "spirituality" at all.
First, what does that really mean anyway? What does spirituality give to my life that having good relationships with friends, family, and other loved ones not give that a relationship with God would?
Personally, I just hope God doesn't exist. The universe and everything in it is so beautiful to me. The fact it all sort of coalesced and formed out of itself very beautiful. It puts me in my place. It broadens my view of the world, it makes me realize how precious my life is. That I get to experience this wonderful thing just by chance, and that its here with or without me.
The idea of any sort of anthropomorphic being created me and everything else ruins all that. So I'm just an ant in a cosmic ant farm. Everything was made for me and I'm just so special I get special attention from our Master. What a lovely thought that is.
"The public" didn't start the interest in superheroes and fantasy though, hollywood did. So you should be testing your hypothesis on directors and producers instead of plebs. Is Michael Bay an atheist? If he is, is he a strong materialist? Does he deny spirituality?
>>985886
I hope for your sake that this was bait
>>985908
He isn't wrong.
A fish if it were to give birth to a frog would disprove evolution, or it would change it to be unrecognizable as we know it.
Fish don't give birth to frogs under evolutionary theory. If a fish were to do so, it would throw everything out of whack. It would prove we were wrong about what we thought
>>985903
Holleywood has been making super heroes all the time. There are tons of ones in history that were did not draw crowds They were not giant cash cows until awhile ago, which also happened to be the same time were atheism amoung youth was particularly high. Today Super hero movies represent the biggest money making genre in the business. The other mega giant are the fantasy series of LoTR and Harry Potter. In the past fantasy movies were not as popular of a genre, many fantasy books were adopted into movies but none got as a big response until recently.
Do you even understand how movies work? The industry make all sorts of movies and the public decide what gets the most sales, this in turn cause the industry to make more of that type of movie.
If you look at the top grossing films fantasy movies+super hero movies represent the big bulk. If you were to go back even 30 years ago this wasn't the case at all. The public has responded to the genres with overwhelming affirmation in the same decades where religion is dropping at record levels.
>>985914
oh, nevermind. i read it as a Kent Hovind-tier attack on evolution
>>985719
Yeah, I read books to fill the gap, and draw/paint from imagination. Secretly I love cartoons and animation as a media form. I also study philosophy and take classes in it for fun and easy As while studying geophysics for my degree.
Religions just rub me the wrong way. How am I supposed to just accept that some random special guys thousands of years ago were able to talk with a god, immediately discrediting all past people who could talk to a god, and asserting their beliefs as truths? It simply doesn't make sense to me. I've read the old and new testaments and while they have some interesting stories and prose, they do not ring as truth at all. I get more out of reading the Greeks.
>>985919
that's not what I said. I didn't say "hollywood started making superhero movies in 2002", I said "hollywood started the interest in superhero and fantasy movies". These are two different things that are fairly easy to distinguish. Please respond to the second one instead of the first.
(PS: I'm also not denying that a loss of religion and an increase in the popularity of these movies co-occur, so I don't know why you're telling me this co-occurrence exists)
>>985942
I believe super hero movies are a result of the public demand more than holleywood forcing it on them. This represents a demand by the public for something mythical as super heroes and fantasy movies borrow heavily from mythology.
>>985931
Well there's more to spirituality than organized religion. I am not advocating a specific religion or a specific approach to it. I just think a complete aboundement of it is undesirable. Even something as simple as reading myths/holy books as 100% allegeory is fine.
>>985719
>So why deny spirituality?
I don't. I think spirituality is fine as long as we keep it to it's own domain. Jung is a hack though.
Ideally we would be like asia where there is little conflict between spirtuality and materialism but unfortunately I think that is impossible in any Abrahamic country.
>>985961
>I believe super hero movies are a result of the public demand more than holleywood forcing it on them.
again, I didn't say hollywood "forced" anything on anybody. I don't know why you feel the need to read all these hidden meanings into my words. People clearly want superhero movies--we're in agreement about this, but the question is how did they start wanting them, and you clearly understand this is the question since that's the one you're answering. They want them because god is dead or whatever. But where's your *argument* for this claim? Have you considered confounding factors like the question of whether religious people watch superhero movies in lesser numbers?
I don't think the claim that it's simply a matter of marketing has to deal with this many problems because marketing does this stuff all the time. There was no spiritual void that needed to be filled by coca cola.
>>985961
>Well there's more to spirituality than organized religion.
what is your definition of "spirituality" anyways?
>>985719
>So why deny spirituality?
I don't.
Granted, I don't believe many "spiritual teachings" are strictly true... but clearly we have a need for these things even if they do not exist literally.
>>985719
>So why deny spirituality
for the same reaosn normal people deny magic
>tfw atheist but still believe in the soul
Not in the "it's a real thing that will ascend to heaven" way. It's simply a useful metaphor to describe the totality of character, including morals. Kierkegaard and others in the 19th century who wrote extensively on the self had the best conception, paraphrased as "the soul is the watcher and the watched, the interplay between asking a question and answering it all within."
>>985719
Maybe atheist brains are just damaged and don't seek symbolism.
>>985719
>I personally think the public's increasing interest with fantasy and super hero media is related to the decline in spirituality.
Just prosperity, escapism, and insulation from difficulty in general.
>So why deny spirituality?
Their spirituality is to consume fiction and masturbate.
>>987491
speak for yourself. those actions fulfill my corporeal wants.
>>987501
Are you a dualist or something? Spiritual needs are from and of the body too.
>>987507
No but I am a welder, comic book fan, DM (2nd Ed, 3.5, and 5th Ed) and amateur history fan.
>>987522
If you are not a dualist, then why are you acting like spiritual needs are not corporeal?
>>987528
Because Spirituality doesn't cross my mind when I'm cumming to muted JAV girls, reading civil war II (skip it), DMing for friends.
I haven't initiated myself into the world of philosophical wankery, but I feel confident about the above.
>>987544
>Spirituality doesn't cross my mind
How is that relevant?
The physiology of breathing doesn't cross the mind of most people when they're breathing, in fact the act of breathing itself for the most part doesn't either, but it doesn't make its teachings incorrect or... "incorporeal."
>I haven't initiated myself into the world of philosophical wankery
But you're sure making a lot of it in this thread, even though it -wait for it- doesn't cross your mind.
>>987559
>wait for it
kill yourself
also shitting doesn't cross my mind when i shit, i just do
>>985719
>So why deny spirituality?
I see no evidence to believe in anything spiritual. It's not that I deny spirituality outright, it's that I see no reason to accept it.
Also, have Jung's theories actually been substantiated?
>>987559
Disputing that the association of two actions I partake in as something (spirituality) often associated with active thoughts of self improvement and the search for divinity when in my experience it's gratifying without approaching the above.
We might be working with different definitions of spiritual.
>>985719
>I personally think the public's increasing interest with fantasy and super hero media is related to the decline in spirituality.
I'm sure it was Tolkien's and Lewis's lack of spirituality that led them to invent the high fantasy genre.
>>985920
Yes, it was sublimely made and truthful.
It's funny to me that Mr. Garrison on South Park can explain evolution better than you can. Enjoy your retarded fish-frogs!
>>987593
Broke my heart that Lewis believed Darwin. Just broke my heart.
>>985719
You mean denying spirituality as psychological mechanism or deny spirituality as pseudo-hindu Evolababble?
>>985866
Evolution is easily falsifiable. The origin of species by natural selection or evolution is not falsifiable.
>>987582
Jungian spirituality comes from the subconscious (i.e. your damn body).
As OP put it succintly:
>satisfy the subconscious's craving for symbols and myth
For example, you may have noticed that sex plays an important role in mythologies and religions, it also does in your subconscious and wet dreams.
Now people look for 'goddesses' on the internet rather than temples.
>>987569
>Also, have Jung's theories actually been substantiated?
There's most certainly a lot of what he claims that appears to be unfalsifiable, still I regard the whole unconscious business to be the best contribution psychoanalysis had to offer.
Researchers continue to come up with studies to see -empirically this time- how choice-making can be affected by the subconscious. Look up:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unconscious_thought_theory
>>987620
The former.
Some atheists, or at least the ones I have met, think that because a lot of events in religious text have been disproven that there is no evidence that there is a god. This is very hypocritical because there is no evidence against it.
