Demons don't engage in self-delusion.

Pride? Greed? Actually, that's a really good question; want to ask it? (I don't have an answer. Although, I don't know that anyone does; God gave His Word for humans, not for demons.)

@Matthew It is unfortunate that your worldview seems to rely on / involve believing that all people who believe something different from what you believe are simply deluding themselves. I instead try to have at least a little respect for people with opposing worldviews.

@NotThatGuy, right. By calling them irrational. That's plenty respectful. I respect people that are respectful of my beliefs and are open minded, which unfortunately describes very few materialists in my experience. (I also find it interesting that you consider a term which is simply an accurate description of someone's beliefs to be condescending and dismissive. Why is that?)

@Beska The question would also be how this fits into Christianity, because it's difficult to maintain that (some) atheists, as they say, have concluded that there's insufficient evidence to believe that God exists, based on evidence and reason while also maintaining that God is all-powerful, all-knowing and all-loving and wants a personal relationship with every person. Most people are not going to let what others claim trump one of their most closely-held beliefs, so the reasons atheists give for their own lack of belief automatically goes into the bin as far as many Christians are concerned.

@Matthew This isn't the place to be digging up things that was said in chat, and I'm not going to get into another extended discussion with you where you just constantly strawman and say condescending and dismissive things (like saying that people are just deluding themselves). Isn't trying to convince others of the truth of Christianity a rather core part of Christianity? What you're doing seems closer to the opposite. I guess you prefer the "eye for an eye" idea, rather than being kind, even to your enemies, and "turning the other cheek", like Jesus said.

@NotThatGuy, it's rather hard to show someone the Gospel when their worldview doesn't even allow for the existence of God. Merely trying to convince someone to "be a good person" may have social value, but it has no eternal benefit. For that matter, allowing atheist world views to steamroller Christian world views isn't even socially beneficial in the long term. It's human nature to reject "hard" truths. (You've never heard of the "fire and brimstone" method of preaching?) Mostly, though, I've given up on trying to reach people that are completely close-minded.

@Matthew So... try to convince them of the flaws in their worldview? You might want to consider that people who can't be convinced to believe what you believe aren't "close-minded", but simply don't find your arguments to be convincing (and/or don't engage too deeply when faced with condescension). And I wonder whether you started trying to convince people as you're interacting here, and found that people weren't receptive to that, or whether you started by actually listening, representing other views accurately and being kind, because the former makes perfect sense, while I doubt the latter

@NotThatGuy, exactly how open-minded do you think someone is who defines "rational" as "people that agree with me"? Or responds to alternate views with "you're wrong" rather than "why do you believe that?". Who complains ironically about worldviews that "involve believing that all people who believe something different from what you believe are simply deluding themselves"? If someone has already decided they won't be convinced by arguments, what's the point in trying?

Your very first message to me (at least in the context of christianity.stackexchange.com/questions/92352) made it clear that you were hostile and unreceptive. Every following communication has only reaffirmed that first impression, as well as following a predictable pattern of unsupported accusations. Since I've not found discussion with such persons to be productive, my main concern is with having a counter view 'on record'.

If you want to have an actual discussion, I'd be happy to do so. If all you're going to do is call me irrational, dismiss my worldview, and hurl accusations, then there is no point in further conversation.

@NotThatGuy BTW, it's interesting you should have this observation and (seemingly?) not realize that it works both ways.

It's difficult to maintain that some have concluded that there's overwhelming cause to believe that God exists, based on evidence and reason, while also maintaining that God definitely does not exist and materialism can explain everything. Most people are not going to let what others claim trump one of their most closely-held beliefs, so the reasons non-materialists give for their own belief automatically goes into the bin as far as many materialists are concerned.

@Matthew, I've got no history with you at all. I'm an atheist. I reject the ontological argument as nonsense, the teleological argument as a massive non-sequitur, and the written gospel as a calculated attempt to use superstition to control people like you.

@Matthew you've spoken of respect and seem to value it. You've also brought up judging @NotThatGUy based on their very first message to you. The very first thing I have seen from you on this SE site was comparing atheists to demons, and concluding they are lesser than demons. I ask you this, as an atheist: are you deserving of my respect, given that the first thing I've seen from you was comparing me to what you believe to be evil and judging me lesser to it?

I left the church decades ago because eventually, people like you @Matthew showed up and leveled your self-righteousness at others, when the clear demand has been made to love the sinner. The righteousness is NOT YOURS to wield, only to live in.

@Nohbdy ...so it's okay for you to level your self-righteousness at others?

@Daevin Where was this, exactly?

...and how should I judge a philosophy that devalues human life? (For that matter — serious question — why, according to your philosophy, should you respect me? Or anyone else?)

@Matthew, I'm the one who thinks God is non-existent, powerless, or wicked. I'm the one who actively rejects your teachings and tries to make the world around me better ANYWAY. I don't think I'll be ANYWHERE when I pass. You actively flaunt disregard for your own manual on how to operate eternal life.

@Matthew Your very first comment on the question this chat was spawned from: "Demons don't engage in self-delusion." At the very least, you are granting demons, creatures that are evil and serve against virtue and God, a virtuosity above me.

@Nohbdy I genuinely hope you're right about that.

@Daevin Oh, please. Are you seriously going to tell me that humans don't engage in self-delusion? Especially when you literally accused me of exactly that two messages back?

(Thanks for the clarification, though.)

@Matthew atheism is not a philosophy, and it does not devalue human life. Atheism is simply not believing in a particular thing due to a lack of convincing evidence for it. To answer your question: I believe that every person deserves a base level of respect due to being a person. That respect can be strengthened or lessened based on their actions.

@Matthew When did I accuse you of self-delusion? I asked if you thought you deserved my respect after comparing me to what you believe is evil.

Right. So it's conservative Christians that promote abortion, euthanasia and eugenics.

@Daevin "...the written gospel as a calculated attempt to use superstition to control people like you."

@Matthew, people who believe that abortion and euthanasia are evil have never once in their lives encountered someone living a fate worse than death.

Please note I am not offended. I disagree, but I recognize your viewpoint, and humans definitely can delude themselves. (I'm sure if I tried, I could produce mountains of psychological studies to that effect.)

@Matthew Where did conservatism come into the conversation? Atheism does not promote abortion, euthanasia, nor eugenics. Atheism is simple a lack of belief in a god or gods.

@Matthew I would really appreciate if you did your due diligence before attributing words to me...

@Nohbdy Ah, yes, the old "safe, legal and rare" argument. How is eugenics 'good'?

I made no position on eugenics, because I disagree with it.

Also, whataboutisms are here, as everywhere, a distraction. I already KNOW what you think about my morality. I can't NOT know.

(Ugh, mixed conversations...)

@Daevin, that comment was not intended to say people are like demons. It was a brief, somewhat snarky "answer" to the question.

Demons are irredeemable. People aren't. However, people can either work toward God's purposes, or against God's purposes.

@Matthew Okay, I'll accept that you did not intent to compare me to a demon. So now I'm going to ask the same question, but instead I'll ask: do you deserve my respect after the first text I see from you on this site is mocking me? (Given that you said you were being "snarky", and the definition of "snarky" is open mockery via sarcasm).

Re: conservatism... as opposed to Christians that don't oppose abortion. (Which I consider an un-Christian stance, but let's not get too derailed, please...)

@Matthew Do I need to believe in the Christian God in order to work towards His purposes? If I have lived my life in ways that align with His rules, but without believing in Him, am I working against Him?

@Daevin That probably doesn't have a straight answer. God can use evil to accomplish good, so certainly he can use good intentions from non-believers to accomplish good as well. But that doesn't mean you aren't, at least at times, working against Him. Trying to bring others away from Christianity, for instance, is unlikely to be in line with God's purposes.

As to respect, should you respect someone that speaks an uncomfortable truth? Or should you only respect people that allow others to live in worldviews that are harmful?

@Matthew I haven't, nor would I, try to bring anyone away from their beliefs. I respect people and what they believe in, and do not try to sway them away from their beliefs. I am only honest about my beliefs.

Okay. To be clear, I'm not saying otherwise, I'm just bringing it up in an attempt to give an honest answer to your question.

...which may be "I don't know".

@Matthew you are making many presumptions. You assume you are the one with an uncomfortable truth, without being open-minded (a quality you previously indicated you valued) about any possibility to the contrary. It also seems like you're assuming atheism is a harmful worldview, which I would strongly contest.

@Daevin Question: if Christianity is correct, and non-believers are condemned to an eternity of torment, would you still contend that atheism isn't harmful?

I concede that from your perspective, you are the one with an uncomfortable truth. Can you make the same concession? (Am I, ahem, firm in my beliefs? Yes, I'll acknowledge that.)

@Nohbdy Now, hold on a second. God did not invent suffering. That would be us humans.

@Matthew I absolutely do understand that you believe you are the one with an uncomfortable truth. I have not contested that at any point. I have only, and repeatedly, asked if you deserved my respect due to your stated beliefs of what I am (which I have already indicated you have misconceptions of).

@Matthew, oh no, you're not sidestepping this with free will. The First Cause cannot be both the First Cause and blameless.

@Nohbdy Wait, does that mean you don't believe in free will?

@Daevin I have stated beliefs about materialists. If you aren't a materialist, as it seems you're claiming, then my statements may or may not apply to you.

@Matthew From your perspective, I understand how that is a conclusion you can draw... but you have constantly been dealing in black-and-white, with-or-against, cases. For example, you asked that I should respect you as the one with an uncomfortable truth while then implying that I only respect other people who are atheists (i.e. those you believe have harmful worldviews).

You've implied that because I'm an atheist I must thing that eugenics is good (I do not).

@Matthew I'd accept that humans keep choosing suffering. But whether creationist or not, the capacity for suffering is God's choice. And apparently mandate following original sin.

@Daevin biblegateway.com/passage/…?

("Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters.")

I also think you're projecting my response to NotThatGuy onto yourself.

@Daevin No, I said materialism promotes eugenics. It's a logical outcome of Darwinian belief.

@Nohbdy So you'd rather not have free will? (To be fair, I can relate.)

@Matthew Which response? Apologies if I'm wrong, but the only time I brought up NotThatGuy was to compare your assessment of their "first message to [you]" with the first message I saw from you, addressing atheism (which, as an atheist, addresses me).

@Matthew I've also already asked about this: if I have lived a life by His rules, but not due to belief in Him, am I against Him?

@Matthew, Darwinian evolution makes no measure of what man should or should not do with the knowledge of selection pressure. That's a slippery slope fallacy, just like it would be if I accused that Christianity always leads to violent extremism.

@Matthew bear in mind, I've already stated that I have not tried to sway anyone against their beliefs. I, in fact, have only encouraged others to follow their beliefs and live by the tenets of them.

@Daevin ...and as I tried to answer, that's... complicated. Not in the same way as someone that even atheists would call "evil". But I can't give you an unequivocal "no", either.

(I'm also trying to sort out at least three, if not four conversations here... Apologies if I'm doing that poorly.)

@Matthew you're doing fine.

@Nohbdy ...but do you disagree that eugenics, or the general devaluing of human life, are natural outcomes of Darwinian thought? I agree not everyone that believes in Common Descent is pro-eugenics; in fact I believe we've noted that in this chat. But I don't know many conservative Christian eugenicists. Or abortion advocates.

@Daevin To try to respond to this... I believe that the evidence of God is self-evident (n.b. Romans 1:20). I know humans can delude themselves. Therefore, in my worldview, anyone that doesn't believe in God is, on at least some level, denying the evidence. Should I be not respected for clearly stating my beliefs? Should I be not respected for my beliefs?

@Nohbdy That sounds like an excellent argument for medical intervention on the sake of the mother. Which is not what most pro-Abortionists promote. (I mean, they'd probably agree, but what they promote goes way, way past that.)

(So, speaking of misrepresenting positions...)

@Matthew formal logic only works in rigidly causative frameworks. If you try to bring it into real space you get Baudrillard doing a jig on reality's tombstone. It doesn't work unless the case is exceedingly simple. Like acrania.

(Sorry, I think you've lost me...)

@Matthew If you consider my first message to you to be "hostile and unreceptive", then I would recommend that you first remove the beam out of your own eye, and then you can see clearly to remove the speck out of your brother's eye. Because what I was responding to was far from perfect in that regard.

@Matthew I understand that you, as a conservative Christian, believe that the Bible is self-evident. I know that humans can delude themselves. I understand that in your worldview, you believe that I, as an atheist, am denying self-evident evidence. As for addressing the last 2 questions of that comment... this comes back to my first comment: are you deserving of my respect, given your open mockery for my beliefs? Have you shown respect for me, given your open mockery?

@Matthew, for context, Baudrillard is a recent philosopher who largely held that there is nothing real anymore, and he approached it with logic. Sometimes the approach is just automatically going to be absurd.

@NotThatGuy So your response to a broad, undirected statement is to immediately respond in kind? And then complain when the other party does likewise? Seems rather hypocritical. BTW, I still don't understand why you think assigning a label to a worldview is automatically "dismissive". But maybe the problem is that you can't see how your initial message was offensive? (To be fair, it seems I'm guilty of that as well.)

Your first message called me irrational (which I understand) and dismissive (for reasons I don't understand) and asserted that your view was correct. At least that's how I saw it. As to "counter view", I mostly mean in the sense 'not everyone agrees with these things being asserted as fact'.

You keep insisting that I misrepresent your views, but I'm still waiting on you to clarify how. Substantially, not just on definitional grounds. Stop saying "I don't believe what you're claiming I believe" and tell me what you believe.

"people have reached a different conclusion, which they consider to be rational, and there's no delusion involved". Right. I think what we have here is a failure to communicate. Assuming that truth exists, then someone that has reached a false conclusion is either a) unaware of all the evidence, or b) "delusional".

I'm not sure what definition you're ascribing to that word. I'm using it in the sense of someone that holds an untrue belief in spite of the availability of evidence to reach a correct belief.

For instance, if I convince myself that I can eat another scoop of ice cream without being sick later, I might well be engaging in self-delusion.

@Matthew, you're still not getting this. Stop trying to win. Go read Jesus's New Law again. Do the work. Give and love. All you're going to accomplish here is make more people like me.

@Nohbdy Question: What do you make of Matthew 12:34?

@Matthew, I left the church. I left. That's a book. Books teach. Being good requires nothing except a commitment to be the least bad I can.

I've done wrong, and I've done right. I've philandered and adulterated, and I've taken those who would be homeless into my own home. I've had to personally order the removal of both of my parents from life support. The world is awful and the beauty in it does not make up for it. I've seen enough and I do not want eternal life, but I can stand here and offer advice to a stranger who still believes, and I can tell them that winning is not what that man said was important.

@Matthew I basically said a rational person can't be irrational. That's true by definition. And you're saying I pointed out that something you said is dismissive, you didn't understand that and based on that you concluded that I was "hostile and unreceptive"? ... Really? I mean, even if I disagreed, I likely still wouldn't consider that to be "hostile and unreceptive". If I'm describing people in an offensive way, that seems good to know, so I'm generally quite open to that type of feedback.

@Nohbdy I don't know what I can offer you for that, other than my sympathies, and my contention that eternal life with God isn't going to be anything like this life. As to your last point... that was sort of mine. I'm not trying to "win", I'm trying to have a discussion.

If someone is going to read what I wrote, and take it in a way that lets them shut down any dialogue before it can start, then I may try to clarify my intent in the hope of actually having a discussion. Sometimes the other party just wants to "put me in my place". For now, for this conversation, I will reserve judgment.

And speaking of that... @Daevin, why does it matter if you respect me? From your POV, isn't it better if I'm just some crackpot religious <vulgar noun> that you can safely ignore who has no chance of influencing your views or those of anyone that shares your views?

And to give a possible answer... at least I stand by my views; I'm not afraid to share them, and I'm not willing to be bullied into silence. Which is more, unfortunately, than I can say for many Christians. I've been near the fence at times, and it's because of people who weren't afraid to speak boldly that I'm still where I am.

@NotThatGuy I think my problem is that I don't consider "materialist", in and of itself, to be any more "dismissive" than "Muslim". I don't agree with either of those beliefs, but the terms themselves are not dismissive. Thus, when someone makes a show of claiming otherwise, it comes across as a sort of passive-aggressive projection of how that person feels about Christians.

And, no, sorry, I still don't understand why having a label for a belief system makes the label dismissive. And I did ask you to clarify. (If I missed it, sorry, but please give me more specific pointers as apparently I'm dense.) I've spent more time than I'd like listening to materialists, however, so I'm not sure what you're trying to imply there. Also, if you disagree with Wikipedia's definition of "materialism", please edit the article.

...or else mention that you aren't a materialist and stop taking my observations of a group of which you aren't a member so personally? (I did ask what you believe. The best I've gotten is some muttering about 'RNA world', a conjecture that is still lacking in evidence and which many contend is effectively miraculous.)

One source says 'RNA world' is "almost certainly wrong", and "raises as many questions as it answers". Another, that it "does not provide a sufficient foundation for the evolutionary events that followed" and that "an RNA-only world could not explain the emergence of the genetic code".

To my knowledge, these aren't sources that are specifically hostile to Abiogenesis / Common Descent. The latter in particular appears to be proposing an alternate hypothesis.

Point being, most scientists that aren't trying to prop up Abiogenesis think it's a crock. Same with Common Descent. And that's just the tip of the iceberg of problems with the materialist explanation of our world. You say you don't believe in miracles? Fine; I concede that you don't believe you believe in miracles. That doesn't change my assessment of the likelihood of your beliefs.