Sam Harris on Atheism

marmalade · 10-27-2007, 01:26 AM

Sam Harris at the Atheist Alliance International conference in Washington, DC. 2007

Sam Harris at AAI 07 pt1 of 2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ok2oJgsGR6c

This is the best presentation on atheism I've seen so far. I specially liked his thoughts about mysticism as a practice separate from religion and metaphysics.

Og · 10-27-2007, 07:47 AM

I don't like him. He's not a scientist. He hit some ecstasy, tripped out, and decided that he needed to find his spiritual center and share it with the world. Now he's perpetually "pursuing his PhD in Neuroscience" (how he is introduced) when touring for his book. He's really just doing FMRIs of people when they meditate or whatever.

At least dawkins and hitchens have credentials.. This guy has an undergrad degree in philosophy and a "religious experience" with "E"...

El_Mariachi64 · 10-29-2007, 11:56 PM

I really liked his presentation.

I think its inspired that we agnostics or atheists shouldn't label ourselves. We should just focus on arguing for reason and logic. Just focus on challenging the believes of others based on these things, no matter our personal understanding. That way we make sure that its about people seeing the truth for themselves, instead of following someone else.

marmalade · 10-30-2007, 01:29 AM

I know very little about him. I've never read any of his writings and this is the first video of him I've watched. All I know is that he sounded intelligent in that video.

As far as his taking ecstasy, I can't see how that discredits him in any way. Many people even with good credentials and high education have taken entheogens. Also, he seemed to be saying his experiences weren't limited to drugs. I got the sense that he had done some form of spiritual practice. Even a critic in the audience agreed with him about the usefulness of spiritual practice.

Og, why don't you like him? Do you not like him because he isn't a scientist? What does that have to do with his analysis of the label of 'atheism' and his advocating spiritual experience. A scientist wouldn't necessarily know anything more about such matters, but there have been plenty of scientists who have experimented with spiritual practices and entheogens.

Personally, I judge people more by their intelligence. Credentials are helpful, but don't say much about the intelligence or insight of a person. I've heard criticisms that Dawkins' understanding of religion is fairly simplistic, and obviously a scientist wouldn't likely be an expert on religion. A scientist is only an expert in their area of science, and any particular scientist may not have that much grand understanding even of science.

Maybe Harris said something really stupid elsewhere that annoyed you. All I can go by is this video which I considered a very good presentation. I'm not trying to defend him. I have no investment in his overall viewpoint because I don't even know what it is.

My only investment in his ideas is that I agreed with him. I've thought similar things as he brought up. I think atheism isn't the best label considering it is a term that was invented by Christians in order to have a general category to lump a certain kind of person they disagree with.

Og, I'd be interested about what specifically you disagreed with in the video I linked. You seem to have a strong response to what seemed like a fairly neutral video. I didn't notice him advocating anything extreme or unusual.