You better watch out. There is a new combatant in the Christmas wars.
Ads proclaiming, “Why believe in a god? Just be good for goodness’ sake,” will appear on Washington, D.C., buses starting next week and running through December. The American Humanist Association unveiled the provocative $40,000 holiday ad campaign Tuesday.
People who make their living by pretending there is a god are unthrilled.
The humanists’ entry into the marketplace of ideas did not impress AFA president Tim Wildmon.
“It’s a stupid ad,” he said. “How do we define ‘good’ if we don’t believe in God? God in his word, the Bible, tells us what’s good and bad and right and wrong. If we are each ourselves defining what’s good, it’s going to be a crazy world.”
Good thing everyone who reads the Bible agrees on what’s right and wrong, right? Not crazy at all.
I can’t decide which one I like more; this, or the one going on in England.
How about some more?
Update: Via Pharyngula, I notice that Bill Donahue, the angriest man in the world, has imploded on Fox News. Everyone gets a mention: Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, and the gay terrorists.
They also give the humanist guy about two seconds to rebut all this. If it were me, I hope I’d have said, “Bill, your religion obviously makes it hard for you to be happy or nice. I’m sure glad I don’t share it.”
Or just: “You’re like that Borat guy, aren’t you?”
13 November 2008 at 3:33 am
Unfortunately, the humanist axioms are just as arbitary as the moral values promoted by the sects. It seems reasonable that appealing to people’s conscience instead of their fear of authority (be it state or God) is less effective.
13 November 2008 at 5:24 am
It’s not about humanism as such. Just getting rid of an extraneous construct. Surely Occam would approve.
And look, Ma, no change in ethics, which a lot of people must be concerned about.
13 November 2008 at 5:58 am
But it does concern “do X or you’ll spend an eternity suffering” vs “do X or if everyone followed your lead it could lead to a finite period of reduced happiness for you”. The former is more formidable and therefore not extraneous in terms of coercion.
13 November 2008 at 6:19 am
I don’t know if you heard about the billboard in Washington D.C.?
“Don’t believe in God? You are not alone.”
http://raymondvanes.blogspot.com/2008/05/if-you-dont-believe-in-god-youre-not.html
13 November 2008 at 8:01 am
I have this idea that people with an internalised moral code are more moral than people who have an extrinsic value system based on punishments from a supernatural being who will forgive you if you ask him to.
I bet that’s testable.
13 November 2008 at 2:12 pm
I totally agree, Daniel; presupposing you can impress the internalised moral code over pure self-interest in the first place. I think legal punishment and social ostracism are the main incentives for moral behaviour; these are self-interest. Hard to test this (you need sovereigns).
As a side note, Dante’s inferno would have been a whole lot shorter if those dudes could just ask to leave.
13 November 2008 at 7:43 pm
Two things, First when I saw this campaign and the reaction to it I knew you were going to blog it.
second, aren’t people without internalized moral codes called sociopaths. 🙂
p.s. Daniel, Might it not be that the people with “internalized” moral codes YOU are talking about are actually the type of people that have an understanding that certain ethical behavior actually is pure self interest. Example, I don’t kill people because, 1. it makes me feel bad. 2. Devaluing any life devalues my own life. (simple example I know… but I’m simple.) Certainly no one needs a God or authority figure for that, (unless you consider the general health of society an authoritarian force, I guess) and we find that universally humans have an ethic around killing other humans (within context of course.)