Tuesday, July 23, 2013

Finding a Real Atheist

Monroe County

I thoroughly enjoyed John Gray's The Silence of Animals: On Progress and Other Modern Myths. Gray is an excellent writer with a broad, sweeping intellect. And he is an atheist.

I see Gray as the answer to Nietzsche's prophetic statement placed in the "madman's" mouth as he stared down the village atheists: "I came too early. My time is not yet." The village atheists did not understand,  upon their deconversion from Christianity, that they needed to leave the entire worldview. Gray understands this, and debunks today's atheistic humanists.

Gray is correct. On atheism, "progress" is a myth. And so are a lot of other village-atheistic claims.

I've added Gray's book to Julian Barnes's atheistic treatise on dying, Nothing to Be Frightened Of. Gray and Barnes give us non-internet atheism. I'm no atheist, but were I I'd be reading the likes of them and paying close attention. I'll use Gray in my philosophy of religion classes as exemplary of an atheistic worldview.