Am 12.09.2015 um 10:13 schrieb Cousin Ricky:
> clipka <ano### [at] anonymousorg> wrote:
>> I guess when it comes to prominent figureheads claimed by contemporary
>> atheists, I'd pick Neil deGrasse Tyson any time:
>> https://youtu.be/Adg0I0nGczg?t=1h3m2s
> 
> More NdGT:  The bull vs. the china shop:
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4z4gISBuDVU

A very interesting conversation, especially the argument starting from
6:30 onward.

In this argument, Dawkins clearly shows himself as what I've called a
/fundamentalist/ atheist; in the continental Eurpean flavor of
secularism, Dawkins' position would be considered intolerable.

Yup, NdGT for me, please.

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clipka <ano### [at] anonymousorg> wrote:
> Maybe here in continental Europe we have the questionable benefit of
> having suffered from so many wars over religion -- even and especially
> between Christians -- that we have become weary of it and turned to a
> now deep-rooted secularism.

That has been my sense, but I don't have first hand experience in Europe.  The
last time I was in Europe, I was 11 years old, too young to know these issues
(and living in a Roman Catholic thought bubble, besides), and before religion
had taken over USA politics.

I was in West Germany, 25 years before the fall of the Berlin Wall.  From my
point of view it was western Europe = good Christians; eastern Europe = evil
atheists.  Nice and simple.

> It may also play a great role that many of the waves of emigration to
> America were motivated by religious persecution; such people obviously
> belonged to communities with strong religious beliefs. In addition, they
> were also more likely to not have had much exposure to secularist ideas
> (otherwise their oppressors would have been likely to have been exposed
> to those ideas, too, and might have exerted less pressure on the
> community in question), or dissent with spreading secularist ideas might
> even have been one of the reasons for emigration. Thus, such emigrants
> would have brought with them more religious fanatism and less secularism
> than what was the typical average at that same time in Europe.

Actually, religious sectarian conflict in Europe was precisely why the USA was
set up as a de jure secular republic.  The founding fathers did not want to see
such conflicts tear the USA apart.  Nevertheless, secularism wasn't enforced
below the federal level until 1868.  Until then, some states had official
religions.

You may have heard that the USA was founded as a Christian nation.  Don't
believe it; that fairy tale was invented out of whole cloth by the religious
right, which seems totally detached from factual reality.

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