How do atheists keep from becoming nihilistic hedonists?

The issue of where morality comes from is a red herring. Obviously anyone can come up with a moral code and follow it to some degree. The issue is that if there is no god, then no morality can bind anyone outside of those who personally consent to it.

You can be religious without a God tho, don't other religions have morals?

Anyone can have morals, but if there isn't a god, then there is no set of morals which can bind anyone. If a person, or group, or religion formulates a moral code, and there is no god, then that moral code, regardless of what it says, has no power to obligate any person or impose any sort of moral duty upon them. Someone can choose to consent to it on their own, but there's nothing beyond that. This is the issue that theists actually have, even if some don't know how to voice it.

what if there are many gods

autistic traditionalism

I don't know, but that doesn't obviate the problem.

What is with this influx of literal sub-90iq newfags

What the fuck does the first thing have to do with the other 2 ?

Christians are riskng an eternity of punishment by ignoring the Quran, indeed (or perhaps the Mithra cult?).

Because shockingly not believing in god doesn't mean being a dick, isn't still being a dick. It does make hedonism suddenly impact free. If I do a whole suitcase of coke I'm still going to die, if I eat nothing but bags of fast food I'm still going to get fat.

I know this is probably bait, but holy shit.

Christians are riskng an eternity of punishment by ignoring the Quran, indeed (or perhaps the Mithra cult?).

>Because shockingly not believing in god doesn't mean being a dick

It does if you're not an idiot. Why should you care about the wellbeing of others if its all meaningless

>don't be a dick, bro
>just, like, be a good person
>humans have worth because uhhh they just do, k?
Great.

that's actually funny because i've been here 8 years. to be fair, i do have a propensity to shitpost

if you're only behaving in a fashion deemed as "moral" by the general consensus to avoid later punishment then you're probably morally bankrupt. why must there be an externally motivating force to follow a moral code? the fact that there is no obligation to follow it, yet we choose to regardless, is kind of the point

>humans have worth because uhhh they just do, k?
not really though, we're just smarter animals, we have worth to each other and that's it

Who the fuck let you in?
If this universal human morality of yours is not divine, then what is it? Biological? Sociological? If it's not divine then why should we place it above all else?

Who the fuck let you in?
If this universal human morality of yours is not divine, then what is it? Biological? Sociological? If it's not divine then why should we care for it? It's idiocy to impose this morality on others without the authority, power or right to do so

>we have worth to each other and that's it

I would literally pay if I could make you not exist. You have negative worth to me

they don't

>we have worth to each other and that's it

I would literally pay if I could make you not exist. You have negative worth to me

Community, and art

Read Feuerbach brainlet

Betterment of the self and those around them

They act as if God does exist. I.e. they are not true atheists; our actions are the best measure of our true beliefs. This would be mostly fine, if atheists didn't have such flimsy, undeveloped understanding of their moral obligations.

The same way that thiests do.

Believing in something or worshiping something doesn't prevent anybody from becoming that way nor will it facilitate the inverse.

Remember, whether a person adheres to religion or not it's still a choice either way.

>implying thats a bad thing

Christcucks assmad.

Dionysian pessimism

>obligations

We don't. And very few religious people do either.

Plenty of religious people have no sense of morality, think "thou shalt not kill" etc. and the prevalence of executions in Southern (the most teligious) States (not to bag on the South), or the connections of religion and fascism, or the prevelance of religion in organised crime. Religion does not serve as a useful tool of morality unless combined with something like secular morality, that is to say a point in someones life when they consider morality and decide to adopt a moral stance.

As an atheist I remain moral through a constructed value system similar to religious morality, for me concepts of right and wrong exist for me and are largely reflections of literature I have read and agreed with. Yes, when I step back I am aware that it is a construct superimposed on the canvas of a inherently meaningless world but I still abide by it, because like other forms of beliefs & secular ideologies it affects my view of the world.

picture of dorian gray

There is no end all reason to, but it makes sense to. Egalitarianism was an evolutionary imperative. Its a strong part of our consciousness and the effects on well being to those who disregard morality are apparent.

>they act as god exists
bruh shitposting, faping, not praying and giving no fucks about muh commendments really is the way god wanted me to exist kek

>the effects on well being to those who disregard morality are apparent.

Eh no it isn't you fucking retard. One of them became President of the United States

*reads trumps twitter*
Yea I don't think he's doing alright

Hes been doing alright for +70 years dawg, stop implying that christians live the best life, because it can be easily refuted

I was more talking about eudaimonea than material success and power. There are countless examples where the absence of morality can correlate with success in that manner. I'm saying these people aren't happy apart from the non violent psychopaths in executive positions who aren't affected by morality.

where is the absence of morality? Seriously youre 300 years late to the discussion. Read Nietzschs take on this.
>eudaimonea
Hows Trump not fulfilled?

giv hipstur gf

by adopting the exact same values as christians and striving to distract themselves from the God-shaped hole in their heart with mediocre comforts.

He's a paranoid, angry manic depressive. Eudaimonea reconciles how to have laws without a lawgiver. Their basis becomes the fact that they promote human happiness.

Capitalism demands of you to enjoy. We're all marerialistic hedonists

/thread

Atheist here; have been one since birth.
Nihilism did come to me and what I saw with it was not ideal.
I don't think I can ever reconcile finding a faith in God with 2 decades worth of questioning...
however, I do support religion as a whole now. I want to see Christianity reinstalled firmly in Europe and I want to see faith flourish once more, even if I can't partake in it myself.

because morality has nothing to do with religion. plenty of religions do some amoral shit because its enshrined in dogma. nearly every human being is born with empathy. if you can feel pain, and understand that other people feel the same pain, in the same way, then you have the foundation for morality.

too bad religion is all about killing that natural empathy and burying your identity beneath the one dictated by religion. Roy Moore was accused of chasing teenage girls by dozens of people, yet 98% Christian Evangelicals voted him. the vast majority of Evangelicals voted for Trump, too. clearly being Christian doesn't even have anything to do with following Christ, just doing what your preacher tells you to do

Meself? Lack of money.

I dont fuck with no old hoes only new hoes

this is true of absolutely any social contract, though. there are harsh punishments for crimes, yet people still murder, steal, rape, and fuck farm animals. and with the legal system you KNOW there is a punishment. not like someone telling you fairy tales of a magic being who is going to judge you, after you die.

>not believing in god
>He still follows the abrahamic moral code believing this is his own choice
>He doesn't realize he is just following this code for the fear of being punished

because you are built to care about other people. if you can't care about another person, something is wrong with you. fuck, most people empathize so much they cry at cartoons and get upset when you break inanimate objects. even mute animals care for one another, and will be genuinely upset if they lose family members/mates/packmates.

and if you still can't be arsed to care about another person, consider that society is based on following social mores, laws, and norms. even moreso, genuinely caring about each other, and not wanting to do evil is ESSENTIAL for any kind of commerce, which is 90% of what human existence is. there is no market if everyone is paranoid about getting cheated and robbed. the cost of doing business is too high, and everyone would just live in tiny tribes, subsisting alone. empathy makes everyone healthier and richer

>nihilistic hedonists

This is not possible to avoid. Just look the hedonistic fest that is modern west society. The things that prevents us from anarchy are culture and the use of power.

"Nihilistic hedonist" is kind of a contradiction

why does it need to be divine? what is magic for? if you are hungry, eat something. if you are thirsty, drink. its not magic. its not the WORD OF GOD. it is physics, if you want to break it down, but really, it just feels right.

if you smack a kid, and the kid cries, you should feel bad, too. if you rape a woman, and she is traumatized with fear, you should feel bad, too. Guess what? most people do! most people deeply regret the bad things they do, and even more people fear doing bad things because they fear the regret and consequences. which means fewer kids get beat and fewer women get raped, and so on. it works just fine, without any magic. even ignorant, illiterate tribes out in the jungle get it.

disagree. blind adherence to dogma is how we got Islamist suicide bombers. those who place ideals above human life and comfort are a step away from murderers.

"Meaning" is such a meme word.
If you steal the money from a cancer patient, that they needed for chemo treatments, their death is "meaningless". The son of the cancer patient tortures you into permanent disability, your suffering is "meaningless".
People don't do certain things because there are physical and social consequences to doing those things. Laws of Thermodynamics.

Stop being retarded.

You can literally explain all of our thinking, starting from old tribalism to civilisation, with evolution.
Our old monkey selfes werent ontop of the foodchain nor in anyway special in speed or strength(though some developed into more strength e.g.Gorillas) so some of them grouped up and guess what, their chances of survival were higher, than being alone. This is the essence of our intellect, civilisation our best way of survival.

Trump is a useful idiot. people who are angry at the world saw that he was a useful weapon against... whatever, and voted for him. amoral oligarchs saw that he could be obedient to their causes, and supported him. deluded demagogues and like-minded sociopaths see a comrade in him, idiots terrified of the alternative and dopes who do what they are told enable him.

Trump is the core of a vast machine, but he controls very little of it

>Evolutionary psychology soundbites
This shit is so retarded it makes me miss the days when psychoanalysis was prominent.

agreed. we care because we are built to do so. but, we still have a good deal of free will. we can train ourselves to be hedonistic, or violently dogmatic, or apathetic, or whatever. there are still reasons to avoid these things and go with our first instinct, to care.

But you niggers are talking about morals, well there you have them. If you dont have morals, which are also ever changing, you are expelled or punished by civilisation.

You are talking on practical terms. You are trying to racionalizate the human being behavior. You can't deny the inherent irrationality of human condition. Some guys rape woman and they don't give a fuck. So, the ideal of goodness that you point is mostly an artificious construction. Pic strongly related.

>I have to be a good boy so that santa class gets me many gifts

If you dont believe in this you have no morals.

This is an Artifical Construction "dont step on somebodies grave", the fear of dying or punishment(they once went handinhand) isnt.
And yes we can explain psych and sociopathes, it might not be as deeply discovered, but its likelyhood is higher since it isnt founded on metadimensional belives but rather on reality.

Kant was a deistic retard.

Evolutionary psychology is a pseudoscience and has no validity. Fuck off, retard.

You've never once questioned anything, fuck off neo-Nazi.

Reality doesn't exist. Fuck off, neo-Nazi.

Happiness (the kind that only comes through perfect virtue) is the ultimate good.

by replacing moral absolutism with ethics systems

There is no ultimate good or any obligation to pursue it even if there were.

explain the idea of evolution with evolution

No god, no morality. Sorry, faggots. Kant failed.

>You can literally explain all of our thinking, starting from old tribalism to civilisation, with evolution.
Comments like these make me more upset than anything else on Veeky Forums, I think. It's like you read one Richard Dawkins book, misunderstood it, and then decided to parade your poor understanding of the topic as coherent and worthwhile.

Please stop.

I can explain your reaction to my comment evolutionarily.

With National Socialism.

By being intellectually lazy.

Yeah, this is one of the loopholes I am finding in many modern interpretations of older metalogic/nihilistic authors which were written during a period where belief in God was much more prominent and really the center of debate (whereas today most people acknowledge their agnosticism and spend their time debating the "meaning" of life or our existence instead). It's like how Dostoyevsky implies that morality is simply a tool used to secure a good afterlife. Nice try bucko, but consider this: perhaps its used to simply secure a good life?

>religious people are only good because they're afraid of eternal punishment
>o-only the faithful can be truly moral!
Not a very flattering picture your guys are painting of yourselves

By not behaving like man children. Most modern definitions of theism would conclude that Aristotle was at least an agnostic and he lived a far nobler life than half the saints that are salivated over in Catholicism. I personally know just as many """"Christian""" pleasure seekers as I do atheist hedonists.
Try a bit harder. I know its difficult to see people live well without subscribing to your faith but there's no excuse for such a lack of effort.

>Caring about others without the incentive of hellfire punishment makes you an idiot.
So this is the power of Christianity......

Because while an atheist might not have a religious reason to not become a hedonistic abomination, they might have other reasons.
An atheist might not become obese because they might be vain and obsessed with their looks, or they might like athletic hobbies.
An atheist might not be an alcoholic because they find the taste of alcohol offensive, or they might be frugal and greedy and not want to spend money on booze.
There are plenty of reasons to not become nihilistic or hedonistic, even if you are an atheist.

I understand your point. Morality is a survival tool among many other valid tools (abuse, stealing, murder exist in nature). The vast majory of us is designed to have some empathy, so act respecting the other individuals is probably the best option to survive as species. However, this is not a universal law, these codes are often broken. As evidence I can point the inherent chaos of human history. Horrors and suffering are spread across the whole history and these crimes were mostly committed by normal mens.

>because you are built to care about other people. if you can't care about another person, something is wrong with you.

Sounds like some spooky bullshit. I'm "built" to live in the woods and die at 30 too

Its more without the inherent divine significance of life.
I mean otherwise you're just a fool

Hedonism is about as compatible with nihilism as christianity is.

there are different kinds of hedonism, euripides already warned about mindlessly chasing sensual pleasures that they will turn to you with their bitter side, he suggested a simple life instead, but i bet that getting a pleasure in, say, serving the people can be considered a hedonism too. it's pretty much your choice (that's also possibly predetermined to you, but that's another question)

You're still on here after 8 years? And this is what you have to show for it? Jesus Christ user...

Can't you find anything divine in the concept of caring itself?

The joke is in the fact that hedonism will fail unless you are a brainlet. If carrot was enough, there wouldn't be a whip.

Am I an atheist if I worship Ron Paul?

Either way you wear a fedora