Self Awareness

You may not be what you think you are. You may not be as clever or adept as you think you are either. According to this study done at Cornell, people with the worst skills in the different areas of the study thought they performed the best, while those with the highest skill levels were also more accurate at estimating their ability. The mere fact that you are seeking and evaluating yourself as an individual, is a good sign that you may be a little more savvy than the average joe.

As an atheist, as well as most atheists I am aware of, we have gone through critical phases of self evaluation. We all wondered if we were crazy for doubting, crazy for believing, and sought answers to difficult dilemmas in contradictions of the gospel, then sought information outside of our indoctrinated upbringing.

Breaking away from the numbing effects of acquiescence when so many are rolling along in a near stupor of acceptance of a thousand things that add up to zero. Zero evidence that god is good, god is love, god is merciful, or god is in control. When compared to what is seen in the real world the opposite is true, “if” there was a god. Microanalysis of prayer to seek a smidgen of answers adds up to pure rationalization for its ineffectiveness, then we accept a non answer as gods will. What is gods will? Well, nobody really knows, but a lifetime of indoctrination leads us down the path of excuses.

The study concludes that all hope is not lost if you are one of the trouble spots. With education the numbers changed to a noticeable improvement, but how do you get someone stuck in the trap to look outside of what they already know, which apparently isn’t much when it comes to knowledge outside what they want to believe.

“It didn’t even help the poor performers to be given a benchmark. In a later study, the most incompetent participants still failed to realise they were bottom of the pack even when given feedback on the performance of others”.

Most of us have lived the religion side and learned enough to walk away. Maybe it’s time they walked in our shoes to determine if our views have merits, instead of hand waving and discrediting the reality that there is no god.

Author: jimoeba

Alternatives to big box religions and dogmas

32 thoughts on “Self Awareness”

  4. “a thousand things that add up to zero”

    I’ve noticed this in speaking with religious people. They have a thousand “reasons” to be faithful, every one of them is fallacious. But because there is a thousand of them, they give it undeserved weight.

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      1. I noticed a while back the Caribs that were being tortured in Bartolo de las Casas account with Columbus, the natives did not fear death. They had no religion to condition them to such . Good point. I know in my own case when I realized there was no god, that fear that had been instilled for so many years went away. Fear is played at every turn in religion. Still a best seller.

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    2. A thousand points X zero = zero. It would actually be in the negative since the click phases are all misquoting the attributes

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  6. Jim, this is a GREAT post! Bravo! There is a ton I want to say about it — I’ve written 4-5 various posts from different perspectives about this very subject: How easily our brains are deceived and (biasedly) programmed. However, I simply do not have the time to put it all in a comment here. LOL 😛

    In an attempt to whittle it down to 3-4 sentences and GROSSLY oversimplify, I’ll say this… 🤣

    In a Universe-Cosmos with incomprehensible vastness and never-ending human “measurements” available, human unknowns (even on our own planet!), and macro-Cosmic down to subatomic FLUID systems everywhere around us, including INSIDE ourselves and brains, it is utterly LUDICROUS to think or believe this existence we are in is governed by Absolutism and/or Monism! LUD. I. CROUS!!! To put it another way, there are DEGREES of accuracy, probabilities, and most of all “unknowns”… or “To Be Determine.” And even then, it still may be a matter of degrees, but practically never 100% absolutely A or B, nothing in between. This fact SHOULD impose humility onto a person! Take our President tRump. 🤣

    When it does impose humility or a healthy acute awareness of one’s human limitations (to a degree) and it STICKS, as your BBC article shows Jim,

    …those with the highest skill levels were also more accurate at estimating their ability. The mere fact that you are seeking and evaluating yourself as an individual, is a good sign that you may be a little more savvy than the average joe.

    IOW, if you frequently or constantly self-examine and compare/contrast against a LARGE set of others, that is a good method (litmus test) to also check for any self-deluded pride, ego, or hyper-arrogance — i.e. Absolutism or Monism.

    How was that for 3-4 sentences!? HAH! 😛

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        1. Almost. Wiring the shop today. Hectic with daughters family just moved out here. Living in the camper and starting framing the house next week. Busy.

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            1. I’m taking it slow. Half days on the house then my regular job. Lol. Schools out in in three weeks. Ugh. I’ll keep hydrated.

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  7. As the study points out, the poor performers ignore the evidence of their poor performance and blithely go bumbling about in their ignorance. In the same way, any effort you make to change their minds is likely wasted time. No one changes until THEY decide they want to change. Then they will seek to educate themselves or look for guidance.

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    2. No one changes until THEY decide they want to change.

      Eilene, that is quite true. The sad context of an unchangeable or stubbornly immutable state is that Earth, time, and the Universe/Cosmos, everything around you, EVEN YOUR OWN BODY will leave you behind. Refuse to adapt and extinction is around the corner. All historical records show this. :/

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        1. Best gospel EVER. Nicodemus 23: 14-17 “And Longer said to his brother, Longinus, ‘Come, Longinus, let us depart this sermon on the mount. He is taking far too LONG to get to the ending of his story, and he is a LONG way away from us thus making him hard to hear. Let us take a LONG walk instead for as LONG as it takes us to exercise our LONG legs.'”

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  10. Atheists have learned how to reflect and question. I think that’s basically why we are atheists! As you said we have evaluated ourselves so many times. Also, we can question. Reflection, questioning, evaluation and correction are the most important parts of a corrective system! Now, is religion a corrective system?

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  11. I’m working on a theory that very little is what we think it is. Politics, for example, is taken at face value – only the superficial is examined. But what happens when we look at it from a macro perspective? When we follow the logical progression of specific ideologies, what’s the result?
    Have you considered that most conservative ideology boils down to enforced population growth? It’s essentially species reproductive strategy rationalised into everyday life.

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    1. It’s a thought all right, just not a reasonable one. Atheism is just a side job. I have fun pointing out the inconsistencies and ridiculous contradictions of religion. You and I are similar, but I just believe in one less god than you. Atheism is a lack of belief. What your saying is like saying abstinence is a sex position.

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      1. All humans a similar, it goes without saying.

        You stated — “Atheism is a lack of belief. ”

        My response — True, but you stated that you believe something. you stated: “the reality that there is no god”. Where is your evidence of no God?

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        1. Just on a short note, the evidence is tremendously overwhelming that what we see, actually observe, is directly contrary in every way to the scripture and feel good phrases of Christianity. Let’s do one. God is love. Prove that! What we see is not a god of love in the Bible, but a vengeful, jealous, genocidal maniac that requires countless excuses from his followers. And love in real time? Show me! The world is so full of depredation and misery outside of your small and insignificant, insulated life. He has not rescued one fucking person through prayer, pleading, begging, but no! Not one. And every topic is the same way with god. When you apply faith before knowledge then you spend the rest of your life at odds with the real world and trying to prove to yourself you’re not crazy. Not one prayer has ever been answered, not because of gods wisdom, but because he is an imagination of the human mind whose spectral evidential proofs can be duplicated in any study. There is no god that hears and answers prayer, but need and emotion and human frailties wishes for a king.

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          1. You’re talking about Christianity but I’m asking a question in relation to your statement, “the reality that there is no god”, where is your evidence of no God?

            I will answer your new question even though you have not answered mine yet.

            You asked — “God is love” Prove that!

            My response — It’s a nonsensical request, no individual is a single emotion, a person can be capable of love and be loving but a person cannot be a single emotion such as love. It would especially not make sense in respect to God since he would most likely be all things (thus more than one thing such as just love) There is nothing to prove here.

            You stated — “that requires countless excuses from his followers”

            My response — There is no knowledge of God requiring anything. What people do is up to them., it’s a choice.

            You stated — “When you apply faith before knowledge then you spend the rest of your life at odds with the real world and trying to prove to yourself you’re not crazy.”

            My response — Not me and I have used faith. I spend most of my time working on computer systems, eating pizza and watching TV with my wife. Not sure why I would have to prove anything. Either I am crazy or I am not and why would I care either way.

            You stated — “Not one prayer has ever been answered”

            My response — Where is your evidence for that?

            You stated — “There is no god that hears and answers prayer”

            My response — You believe there is no God yet you have no evidence to prove it.

            This may help:
            https://realitydecoded.blog/2017/10/12/mind-map/

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            1. Your insistence on proving something no one can see or comprehend and is inconceivable is another way of showing the likelihood of a god is unreasonable. The ball is in the theist court to prove a claim something exists, but you deny and flip because you can’t do it, so you try to pass it off. Prove to me your claim of god has a shred of evidence. I have bags of nonevidence for god, but your need to have an answer has succumbed to any old explanation will do, hence, god did it. That is unreasonably unreasonable and nonsensical.

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