Home > Author > S.T. Joshi
61 " Religions have always used the inability of science definitively to disprove the existence of God as an excuse for continued belief, forgetting both that it is just as impossible to prove God’s existence. "
― S.T. Joshi , Atheism: A Reader
62 " The probable truth or falsity of religious beliefs seems nowadays to matter so little to the pious – or, rather, the truth of religion is regarded as something so incapable of challenge – that it is deemed rather offensive and disreputable even to make the attempt. "
63 " The overwhelming majority of people on this earth – including most of those 97 percent of the American population who profess belief in God in some form or other – are beyond persuasion on this matter. They are, quite literally, incapable of comprehending the issues at stake. It is not merely that they are unable to conduct a course of logical reasoning on this (or any other) matter; it is that, even if the scientific and philosophical evidence were presented to them in a form they could understand, they would rebel at the evidence, because their religious belief is so essential to their psychological well-being that they could not abandon it. "
64 " What religions, past and present, have done is to provide simple – and for a time, satisfying – answers to the questions that most perplex us as we gradually awaken to our position in the world and the universe. "
65 " How did we get here? What is our purpose in being here? Where will we be after we die? Of course, primitive peoples – and many not so primitive – are unaware that these questions are perhaps faulty in the very manner of their formulation. It is inconceivable to such people that we very likely “got” here by natural rather than supernatural means; that there is no “purpose” to our existence beyond the goals we envision for ourselves; that life ends utterly upon our deaths. When the advance of human knowledge presents answers such as these, many individuals rebel against them – not because they are not true (they are indeed overwhelmingly likely to be true), but because they are not the answers they hope for. The conclusions are rejected not because they are false, but because they are unpalatable. "
66 " The notion that the “soul” can survive the body is so obviously a holdover from primitive superstition that many theologians of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries seem to have all but abandoned it. The belief is founded strictly on fear – fear of death, or, more particularly, fear of the oblivion that we all know in our hearts will follow death. Believers overlook that what the great majority of people want is not immortality of the soul, but immortality of the body: they want to continue living in their current bodies indefinitely – with of course, mental and physical health magically preserved. But since even the most naïve and self-deluded of us realize that this is hopeless, they conveniently transfer their wishes to some airy substance that will magically revive after the dissolution of our bodies and allow us to continue sensation and consciousness. "
― S.T. Joshi
67 " What the atheist wishes to assert is that (a) religion is not necessary for moral behavior, and (b) religious ethics are themselves faulty and corrupt. "
68 " Religionists do not apparently wish to acknowledge the secularist’s claim that moral behavior is, or can be, a product of the individual’s rational decision as to what is honorable and conducive to the smooth running of society, or even the long-term advantage to oneself. They instead fear that the average person will “run amok” and be completely amoral without the impetus of religion – without, in other words, the heavy emotional burden of realizing that his or her actions are constantly being monitored by a supernatural scorekeeper who, upon the individual’s death, will make a tally and determine the person’s ultimate destination, either above or below. "
69 " Most religions have now concluded that it is, at the very least, rather tactless to maintain the mortal error of other beliefs than their own; perhaps they recognize secularism as their common enemy, so they band together like a circle of covered wagons in order to present a unified front to the infidel. "
70 " ….that witches should not be suffered to live; that those who violate the Sabbath should be killed; that women should not be permitted to speak in church; that slavery is to be condoned; perhaps the very existence of hell. Let it pass that all these things have now become embarrassing only because of the advance of secular knowledge; the true question is whether this kind of procedure – picking and choosing which parts of the Bible to believe in, and brushing the loathsome or embarrassing parts under the rug and hoping no one will notice – has any legitimacy beyond that of practical expediency. "
71 " The whole notion that the secularist wishes to “take away” someone’s religion is full of fallacies and paradoxes. No one would chastise a doctor for “taking away” a tumor from someone’s brain. "
72 " If people, by reading the writings of secularists, come to a rational conclusion that the tenets of religion are false and that they will henceforth put them aside, that is a decision that these people have reached on their own – no one has “taken” anything “away” from them. The frenetic efforts of religionists to silence opposition clearly arises from their fears that this exact procedure will indeed occur, as it has occurred many times in the past. "
73 " Is it not better to accommodate one’s beliefs, morals, and actions to what is true (or likely to be true) than to ignore or contradict the truth merely because it does not conform to one’s hopes and fears? This latter is the process called wishful thinking, and most people are of the opinion that is it not a very sound guide for belief or conduct. "