How many of you are NOT materialists?

that's unfortunately not the sort of statement it's possible to argue with

are you referring to my statement, to the reason religious people use that sernse, or to my video I linked?

Which circles are going to understand the term...to broadly smear atheists?

The complex-sounding William Lane Craig types (Christian) and the complex-sounding B. Allan Wallace types (Buddhist) who have many religious followers who listen to them and are wow'd by the apparently valid criticisms of 'materialism' that they then project onto all atheists through a sleight-of-hand.

It's difficult to figure out what you are actually intending to say here (from sentence structure alone)

Well, I was referring to materialism as juxtaposed against idealism. It's been a centuries-long philosophical tension, and many idealists (not me but many) consider themselves not at all materialists.

the first sentence seems to be suggesting that you are a materialist - at least others would say so

If you just mean the slang which means that I like science and believe in physics, have a straightforward naturalistic view of the cosmos, and so-on. . . then yes I'm that kind of materialist.

You really need to elaborate on what you are even trying to say here.

Me? I originally asked you to elaborate on what you were trying to say, because you hadn't specified (and still haven't specified yet, except for implying that you are using materialism to mean 'others would say' it means). Unpacking what you meant by the term materialism, which has many definitions, would have been nice, or maybe you could place it against anything you imagine to be its opposite: ('are you materialist or a supernaturalist' would show us what you meant, 'are you a materialist or...not' isn't specific, 'are you a materialist or do you think consciousness is the most important element of the fabric of the cosmos?' and so on).

/r/TrueAtheism Thread Parent