A quote from Albert Camus

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deactivated-5a79221380856

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#1 deactivated-5a79221380856
Member since 2007 • 13125 Posts

"I would rather live my life as if there is a God and die to find out there isn't, than live my life as if there isn't and die to find out there is." -Albert Camus, an atheist existentialist. Which way would you prefer to live your life of these two alternatives?

Of course, in this one life in this universe, I would rather live my life as though there is no God and simply die. I find the belief that you can find out that there isn't a God once you've died as absurd, because for that to be true, there must be an afterlife, which calls into question how there can be an afterlife without a God.  If by God existing would change the course of the universe, then I would definitely believe in him and die to find out that he exists. Of course, that isn't an answer to the question, since my selection isn't an option.

My answer to the question would be to live like there is no God and die to find out there is one. The reason why is because I think that if God made the evidence for him so minimal, then surely he would forgive me for not believing me and reward me for doing good based on not what religion has subscribed for me, but based on what I thought was best on what an objective meaning of "good" would entail, assuming of course, that God would even give meaning to the word "good". I would imagine that he would be a deist God: one that created the universe and gave us the resources to live in, but let us choose how we live ourselves. If not a deist God, I would not be surprised if he did not support an objective definition of "good" especially considering how hard it is for me to wrap my head around the problem of evil, in which case I would not call him God and would not worship him.

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#2 foxhound_fox
Member since 2005 • 98532 Posts
All I see in the quote is a reprinting of Pascal's Wager.
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domatron23

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#3 domatron23
Member since 2007 • 6226 Posts

Are you sure the dude was an atheist? That sound like typical Christian consequentialist rhetoric to me.

I'd rather live my life sincerely and form my beliefs based on what I find likely to be true, not what will yield the best consequences if it is true.

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#4 deactivated-5a79221380856
Member since 2007 • 13125 Posts

Are you sure the dude was an atheist? That sound like typical Christian consequentialist rhetoric to me.

I'd rather live my life sincerely and form my beliefs based on what I find likely to be true, not what will yield the best consequences if it is true.

domatron23

Well, I don't much about him, but every website that mentions him, mentions him as an atheist. A naive one maybe, but an atheist at that. I understand what you're saying.

I agree. We should live by believing what's presented with us, not by appealling to the consequences.

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#5 foxhound_fox
Member since 2005 • 98532 Posts
He seems like one of those Christian apologists that "claims" to be an atheist, only to give them a bad name by misrepresenting the position. No atheist (I know) would "prefer" to play-it-safe and hope for a God, lest there be punishment.
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#6 ChiliDragon
Member since 2006 • 8444 Posts
That's not why he did it. Camus was an atheist in that he saw no compelling reasons to believe in a deity. From a moral standpoint he was described as a "secular humanist" in my old philosophy classes, way back when. Based on what I remember of his writing and thought processes, what he meant with "I would rather live my life as if there is a God and die to find out there isn't, than live my life as if there isn't and die to find out there is." was in part caused by the fact that though he couldn't convince himself to believe in God, he wasn't able to come up with a good explanation for why people should be nice to each other if there was no deity to base moral laws on (Dostojevskij had the same problem). So he thinks people should live as if there was a God, because without one we can have no concept of right and wrong, and if there isn't one, at least we had a good life on Earth because we could base our actions on concepts of right and wrong. If on the other hand we live as if there is no right or wrong in this world, and then find out that there was indeed a God that watched and now will punish us for it after death, then we're kind of screwed. Please don't nitpick this too much as I'm typing from hazy memory. My philosophy classes were a long time ago. I remember this guy because I though it was a glaring flaw in secular humanism that although they have rejected the basis for a "theist moral code" (for lack of a better label) they struggle stubbornly to find a justification for keeping it, at least he did. A few decades later they figured out that its okay to look for justification in other places. If I remember right, that is. :)
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#7 -Sun_Tzu-
Member since 2007 • 17384 Posts
Would you be able to give me the context of that quote, because that doesn't really accurately depict Camus' philosophy. This is a man who described theism as philosophical suicide, and wrote at the end of The Stranger (which is a fantastic novel that I highly recommend) via the protagonist Meursault, "I had only a little time left and I didn't want to waste it on God."

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#8 ChiliDragon
Member since 2006 • 8444 Posts
Would you be able to give me the context of that quote, because that doesn't really accurately depict Camus' philosophy. This is a man who described theism as philosophical suicide, and wrote at the end of The Stranger (which is a fantastic novel that I highly recommend) via the protagonist Meursault, "I had only a little time left and I didn't want to waste it on God."

-Sun_Tzu-
Could it have been a quote from a theist character in The Plague? I seem to recall there was at least one. You've obviously studied him either closer or more recently, or both, than I have, so I'll defer to your expertise on Camus, I think. :)
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#9 -Sun_Tzu-
Member since 2007 • 17384 Posts

[QUOTE="-Sun_Tzu-"]Would you be able to give me the context of that quote, because that doesn't really accurately depict Camus' philosophy. This is a man who described theism as philosophical suicide, and wrote at the end of The Stranger (which is a fantastic novel that I highly recommend) via the protagonist Meursault, "I had only a little time left and I didn't want to waste it on God."


ChiliDragon
Could it have been a quote from a theist character in The Plague? I seem to recall there was at least one. You've obviously studied him either closer or more recently, or both, than I have, so I'll defer to your expertise on Camus, I think. :)

 

I do have to confess that I am a huge Camus fanboy. :P

I'm not sure if it's from The Plague, or any of his other novels - unfortunately I haven't read them in quite some time.  

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#10 RationalAtheist
Member since 2007 • 4428 Posts

He seems like one of those Christian apologists that "claims" to be an atheist, only to give them a bad name by misrepresenting the position. No atheist (I know) would "prefer" to play-it-safe and hope for a God, lest there be punishment.foxhound_fox

Camus was a massively important atheist philosipher to me. I'm surprised that you seem to know so little about him, seeing as you specialise in learning about faith.

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#11 -Sun_Tzu-
Member since 2007 • 17384 Posts

On Wikiquote no one is able to cite the quote. Seems like words that don't belong there have been put in ole Al's mouth. 

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Talk:Albert_Camus 

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#12 foxhound_fox
Member since 2005 • 98532 Posts
Camus was a massively important atheist philosipher to me. I'm surprised that you seem to know so little about him, seeing as you specialise in learning about faith. RationalAtheist

Learning about faith, yes. I don't think I've actually ever learned anything academically (in university) about people of non-faith. Oddly enough, it doesn't seem like an important aspect of my university's religious studies department.
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#13 ChiliDragon
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Oddly enough, it doesn't seem like an important aspect of my university's religious studies department.foxhound_fox
I think they teach about the non-religious ones in the philosophy classes.