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To say that "religion is not good for society" makes the same error every anti-theist I have ever talked to makes: The error of thinking that all religion is belief in the BBWG and all religion is about electing idiots like Bush and banning gay marriage and leading crusades etc.
Society is a collection of individuals...the anti-mystics have not won, and this is not a Borg collective consciousness or a totalitarian destopia alla "Brave New World", so, society remains a collection of individuals.
So, if an individual is a part of a religion that A , does not force them to suspend belief in science, does not force them to be slaves to dogma or some institution, does not make them intolerant of others with differing views, does not force them to believe in the "pie-in-the-sky-when-you-die" only to the detriment of their "real life" and does not make them believe in some outside force doing the work for them and B, the said religion causes the said individual to be allot happier and more fulfilled and causes the said individual to be a MORE PRODUCTIVE MEMBER OF SOCIETY....than how, pray tell, is that religion "not good for society"?
Those are the conclusions I have drawn from my religion and have been bringing up within the context of the topic of this thread as a way of framing the argument (and there are other religions that achieve both A and B besides mine as well)...if you continue ignoring the fact that I rebuttalled your hypothesis you run the risk of looking just as ridiculous as those literalist who ignore the fact that evolution is the reality.
Sorry...I have a habit of doing this with anti-theists (notice I did not say "atheists", as they are two different things)
When a anti-theists brings those same, tired Dawkin-esque arguments to a Gnostic he is bringing a knife to a gun fight.
Ohh, btw, my "ridiculous claim" is that my religion is based on Myth which probably did not happen and the fact that it is based on Myth means nothing because it's the teachings that count and the teachings I believe in...now, if you are trying to tell me that the idea that "The Gnostic Gospels" are real written books is "ridiculous", than please explain what the heck this is:
The Myth is there to teach us something about ourselves through metaphor and the great metaphor of GOD...if that is a "ridiculous claim", than I am in good company...
"God is a metaphor for that which trancends all levels of intellectual thought. It's as simple as that."-
Joseph Campbell
What are you 10? I have never seen such flawed arguments in my life. It is not even worth addressing all that is wrong with this post. You just keep typing the same BS over and over, yet you don't seem to be making any progress. I wonder why? Maybe because it makes no sense. If you don't have anything fresh to add to the thread I'm just going to stop reading your posts.
Do you all have a book that explains atheism and morality... would love to brush up on it.
godspeed,
freedom
Dense? I believe you have been told many times that atheism is not a system of beliefs. It is simply a person who does not believe in God. My morals are based off of natural morality which is a product of evolution. Morality predates religion. We do the right thing because it is the right thing to do, not because we want reward in heaven or fear hell. Get it through your thick skull.
Do you all have a book that explains atheism and morality... would love to brush up on it.
godspeed,
freedom
Michael Shermer's book, 'The Science of good and evil,' describes why people are moral rather well. Morality(for all humans) comes from evolution and the moral zeitgeist. Evolution produced someone's moral sense(feeling good when someone does something good and feeling bad when they do something bad). The other is the moral zeitgeist(spirit of the times), which are the norms and morals of the given culture. For example, American society used to consider slavery an acceptable act, although now it is considered immoral and despicable. Morals also tend to be handed down by parents to their offspring and gradually change over time. Atheism in and of itself is inherently amoral, in the sense that it doesn't give a prescribed moral code that humans are supposed to abide by, whereas religion does. Although, that doesn't mean that atheists are amoral or immoral. Most atheists tend to adopt some form of secular ethic such as humanism or utilitarianism.
I think this man had a real understanding of this issue.
Religion is based, I think, primarily and mainly upon fear. It is partly the terror of the unknown and partly, as I have said, the wish to feel that you have a kind of elder brother who will stand by you in all your troubles and disputes....A good world needs knowledge, kindliness, and courage; it does not need a regretful hankering after the past or a fettering of the free intelligence by the words uttered long ago by ignorant men.......Bertrand Russell
No, it's not religion that is based on fear but the lack thereof, of any belief in God. Religion is based upon love, mercy and the grace of God. You don't fetter free intelligence by believing in God you expand it. And if by uttering something said or written long ago makes the utterer ignorant than, well, Bertrand Russell's been dead for about 40 years. He was a mathematician and couldn't understand anything that couldn't be proved by a formula. He was an agnostic but only because he realized that even though you can't prove there is a God you can neither prove that there is not. For me there is God, for you there is not. I choose the light over the darkness because I like to see where I am going.
No, it's not religion that is based on fear but the lack thereof, of any belief in God. Religion is based upon love, mercy and the grace of God. You don't fetter free intelligence by believing in God you expand it. And if by uttering something said or written long ago makes the utterer ignorant than, well, Bertrand Russell's been dead for about 40 years. He was a mathematician and couldn't understand anything that couldn't be proved by a formula. He was an agnostic but only because he realized that even though you can't prove there is a God you can neither prove that there is not. For me there is God, for you there is not. I choose the light over the darkness because I like to see where I am going.
Keith G.
Atheism isn't fear based, it's the liberation from mental tyranny. Religion(at least the Abrahamic religions) is fear based because it says that if you don't believe in what it teaches and if you don't follow x arbitrary moral law then you'll burn in agony forever and ever and all eternity. If god is merciful, loving and full of grace then why does he send all virtous atheists to hell for something as menial as unbelief. Also religion fetters free intelligence because it makes you base all your beliefs on what someone's faith says what is true and untrue, they are only able to pursue what is true within the confines of their faith rather than what has actual evidence to support it.
No, it's not religion that is based on fear but the lack thereof, of any belief in God. Religion is based upon love, mercy and the grace of God. You don't fetter free intelligence by believing in God you expand it. And if by uttering something said or written long ago makes the utterer ignorant than, well, Bertrand Russell's been dead for about 40 years. He was a mathematician and couldn't understand anything that couldn't be proved by a formula. He was an agnostic but only because he realized that even though you can't prove there is a God you can neither prove that there is not. For me there is God, for you there is not. I choose the light over the darkness because I like to see where I am going.
Keith G.
You can read about the atrocities and genocide in the bible and still claim that it is based on love and mercy? I sure can't do that.
I chose reality over myth instead of thinking within the box of Christianity which can be a very small box indeed if one is a bible literalist. If you are you must ignore the fact that the earth is billions of years old, that evolution is a fact and man is a species of ape. You must either deny new discoveries or somehow fit them into the confines of your biblical box.
There is no light in any religion that would drag civilization back to the dark ages if it could. Fortunately more people are seeing the truth each day, and we will not let that happen.
What are you 10? I have never seen such flawed arguments in my life.
So, Joesph Campbell, the greatest Anthropologist of all time and the greatest scholor of Myth and it's place in human history has the arguments of a ten year old? Right....
Quote:
It is not even worth addressing all that is wrong with this post.
Translation: You cannot find a way to attack the substance, so you just attack the author of the said substance.
Quote:
You just keep typing the same BS over and over, yet you don't seem to be making any progress. I wonder why?
Maybe because the person I am directing it at does not understand the said "BS"? One would have a similarly difficult time time "making progress" as I have had if one was attempting to argue the meaning of Nietzsche's "Ubermensch" with a five year old child.
Quote:
Maybe because it makes no sense.
So, a non-literalist view on religion which seeks syncretism between science, the human condition as a whole, and the said religious belief "makes no sense"? (btw, religious systems like that exist all over the place)....yes, it makes no sense to someone who never actually scratched bellow the surface of the study of religion.
Ignorance makes one look foolish. If a person starts a thread titled "religion isn't good for society", one would think that the author of the said thread would actually know something about religion.
Instead of saying that my reply to the topic at hand (which, btw, I am still waiting for a rebuttal to, if you can...) "makes no sense", I think the more accurate statement from you would be "it's over my head"
Quote:
If you don't have anything fresh to add to the thread I'm just going to stop reading your posts.
Translation:you are going to ignore the points I have made so far as you have been ignoring them and if I keep proving you wrong, you will ignore me.
In short: You attacked me, but did not manage to attack my argument and instead used the familiar statement of one unable to come up with a reply and yet lacking the grace to admit intellectual defeat, which is, needless to say, the statement "it's not even worth a reply!" In so doing, it is clear that you have lost the said argument.
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