BY DR. AGONSON
Is it just me, or do atheists lack a “theory of mind”? I had to find the term again (thank you ChatGPT for understanding my garbled recollections), but I had remembered once learning that very young children don’t know that other people have their own internal life, that is, if they know something, then they assume you know it too. The knowledge that other people exist is a skill we have to learn, and it is apparently a skill which can be broken down into smaller elements such as this.
Yet, out there in the wild, wild web, one may find apparent adults who are generally capable of realizing the existence of others while still displaying incredible gaps in said knowledge. I myself would probably develop a headache if I had to keep the contradiction of both the knowledge and ignorance of someone’s disagreement with me in the forefront of my mind, and yet, in the ever turning soup of the internet, such mental monstrosities really do appear.
Perhaps the trick is that caveat, keeping it in the forefront of the mind, that is, the trick is in not doing so. To mentally engage with a disagreement while never engaging with one’s own conceit, might engender just such a stunted intellect: so, all the time a man is arguing over a disagreement, he might have a mental image of his opponent as a mere copy of himself believing the same things he does. So, he feels he’s caught his interlocutor by appealing to the very framework he thinks common between them, never realizing that he is the only one he has allowed into the picture.
And so, I have some real sympathy when just such a mental invalid wrote “Maybe I didn’t get your point because it didn’t make sense?” I’m glad I stayed my original tweet which would have inquired into what language he’d prefer us to communicate in with the addendum that I would attempt to obtain an interpreter. The temptation to simply provide him a link to some free English language course came upon the heels of what I’d assumed was a precipitate response by someone who’d found the toil of reading a tweet an all too cumbersome and time-consuming obstacle in responding to it.
I know little of the actual controversy which sparked this interaction. I am told that people are upset about a cartoon with the all-too-so-very-novel plot of calling good evil and evil good. “I have no idea why people are so upset…” decried self-proclaimed “professional idiot” Vito. It may be a foolish hope, but I generally think this character is more self-reflective than his persona lets on, and I felt the question elucidated a real issue: there’s seemingly a large group of atheists out there who cannot fathom that theists aren’t atheists. There’s a sort of revelatory aspect to the question, “How could people act as though there’s a God?” The question can only be asked if the answer, “God’s real,” is an absurdity that can hardly be credited to anyone.
So, I tried to transpose the issue into a materialist’s perspective:
(Link)
And was summarily met by the comically obtuse reply:
(Link)
Which brings us back to the beginning, the middle, and really the whole of my little diatribe. An actual troll could not have written something so earnestly banal. An S-poster could not have invented a more jarring response. A poor, retar…er, special needs child could not have said something so confused.
I tried to satisfy myself by the demur observation that the point had indeed gone over my opponent’s head, and was rewarded by the said opponent’s admission that what I said “…didn’t make sense.” It was a beautiful revelation; I seemed to be transported into a higher consciousness: While he was in the process of disagreeing with me, he could not fathom that I disagreed with him.
As a postscript, I admit that this is a departure from my usual cant. I am, in some way, letting off a bit of steam. I am sometimes shocked by the dimness of people on the internet, but I often keep my own self-righteousness to myself as it’s far too good for the mass of men.
Tale Told 