Sam Harris states a great deal of my thoughts on atheism and spirituality in this two part video. Here he makes the key distinction between iron age mythic belief and spirituality as a contemplative practice. These categories resemble the dichotomy William James makes in his descriptions of religion of the 'sick soul', and religion of the 'healthy minded'.
Sam Harris makes the following key points in the video:
- There is more to life than momentary pleasures
- We have an inability to break from discursive modes of thought
- We must first spend time building up our spiritual practice in order to fairly judge contemplative claims
- Atheists must not simply dismiss all spiritual experience as bad science or bad philosophy
- Atheism seems have a disinterest in such available experiences or equate them with banal pleasures
- Atheists may appear less wise than the religious opponents for their sloppy judgment of such experiences
- The universe is stranger than atheists tend to advocate
- We must convince a myth infatuated world that love and curiosity are sufficient
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