Atheists

Why are “people of faith” critical of other people who do not share their beliefs? Is it rooted in a need “to belong”❓a tribal instinct based on a deeper belief that ‘there’s strength in numbers’❓

I thought that faith was a personal matter😎

Dr. Jordan Peterson critiqued atheism in The Problem with Atheism” from The Jordan B. Peterson Podcast, Episode 215, released on January 5, 2022. He explored the consequences of dismissing the religious instinct and what fills the resulting void, particularly in societies rooted in the Abrahamic tradition.

His argued that atheism, the rejection of God, leaves individuals and societies without a unifying moral framework or sense of purpose, leading to potential societal breakdown. He claimed that atheists often misunderstand the concept of God, viewing it too narrowly, and that morality requires a religious foundation to provide a coherent structure for meaning and responsibility.

Jordan’s Life Lens is solely his own.

I do not know Dr. Peterson. I can’t ever know or fully understand the events and circumstances of his life, and how he arrived at his views on faith and lack thereof. I acknowledged that Jordan has read much but, like him, each author puts his or her Life Lens on display when they publish their views.

In my own life, I travelled down an entirely different path that Jordan which inspired me to write The Mindverse Hypothesis.

This paper, which I hope will the published by the Journal of Consciousness Studies by September, reflects my own journey of 30 years which culminated in its writing.

Unlike Jordan, I am not famous.

Dr. Jordan Peterson has built a very successful public profile - one that has attracted literally millions of people know and respect him as a public intellectual. Everything he writes and says has a huge audience. I envy his reach even though I don’t agree with him on topics pertaining to faith.

I suspect that fewer than a dozen people will read The MINDVERSE Hypothesis. It is a wholly unique take on topics like Creation, Reality & Mind (Consciousness). If published in a Philosophy journal, it is likely that some professional thinkers, theologians and scientists will take a serious look at its premise and implications. I believe it to offers a lens on those topics that deserves attention and consideration.

A Course In Miracles (ACIM) could not compete with the Bible.

Jordan has invested his attention on the Bible - perhaps the best known and most widely read book in history. The institutional support for it is second to none, and Peterson suggests it as a source of great wisdom if the reader interprets its words appropriately.

I, on the other hard, see the Bible as a book of stories. It contains some wise, and some not-so-wise, lessons which were proposed by men many centuries ago under very different circumstances.

To me, much of the Bible comes across as mythology. It features unlikely characters who perform inhuman feats not unlike the gods of Mount Olympus. Like the myth of Santa Claus, those stories drifted into my past as quaint but insignificant to my life choices.

In the mid 1990s, I read and began to study A Course In Miracles. I practiced its daily meditations and found, over time, my perspective on many topics began to shift in ways that were enlightening. Over the next 30 years, those shifts deepened and evolved to the point that I felt compelled to record them. That record is The MINDVERSE Hypothesis.

Jordan, are you listening?

I wish that Dr. Jordan Peterson would read the 30 pages that constitute The MINDVERSE Hypothesis.

Then, I would love an invite on his podcast show to discuss it.

If Jordan is truly open-minded and an unbiased critical thinker, I suspect that he would embrace this discussion. While this Substack post is entitled “Atheism”, I am not sure if that label describes my Hypothesis. It would be interesting to see how Jordan views this question.

In any case, I suspect that Jordan will have difficulty with the fundamental premises and conclusions of The Mindverse Hypothesis, although he will surely have difficulty refuting these if it is even possible. His Life Lens has been shaped by deep biblical scholarship and likely carry a bias in that direction. It will be difficult for him not to defer to the Bible as his primary source of “truth”.

With this post…

I am putting my request out there in the web sphere.

It will be interesting to see of it reaches Jordan and he responds.