Random Christianity Discussion

[Kaylia]

Lol. Not really a personal attack unless you're willing to admit your post was stupid. I simply said I was not shocked that you were the author of that post.

In my eyes, you and Moosey are the same person.

Your logic is astonishing here. You act condescending, then pretend it's not a personal attack unless I admit that my post, which consist entirely of social phenomenon that are recognized by sciences, is stupid?

I'm sorry, but your not being intellectually honest here.

[Alleya]

Another discussion completely derailed by petty semantics. Godspeed, Kaylia.

[Demosthenes11]

Any religious belief that does not encourage curiosity and understand of the universe and our surroundings is detrimental to human progress. Ironically, any religion that does encourage that would disappear by it's own accord.

[Demosthenes11]

Another discussion completely derailed by petty semantics. Godspeed, Kaylia.

I'm quite ashamed that I fell into the trap again. I know better...

though I'm quite surprised AXIOM hasn't been mentioned yet.

[Uzor]

Thanks... the TED video was great as well. I was looking for some sense of how the concepts of religion could even fit into a world controlled by natural selection, and that did well to explain it.

I didn't watch the video, but I'll present my view on religion.

Religion was originally created by humans to explain stuff they didn't understand. Why is the wind blowing? Why does the sun come up every day? Why do we exist? What happens after death? It also served the purpose of giving comfort when relatives or friends die. This was the most basic form of religion thousands of years ago. Eventually, it expanded a bit, and had gods and/or ancestors that helped or punished you for various actions. Not pleasing them caused drought or disease, while pleasing them gave good crops and healthy children.

Eventually, as societies grew larger, it also started serving a secondary function; controlling the population. Scaring them in to obedience prevents them from committing crimes and other other actions detrimental to the society. In turn, a lot of laws and rules for the religion is created with various do's and dont's which the population is expected to follow. Christianity is a good example of this, where the threat of "heaven and hell" (that is; death) is used to scare people in to obedience.

This also causes a secondary effect; it causes stronger bonds and trust among people of the same religion, while causing distrust and animosity between people of different religions. In larger societies where everyone doesn't know each other, this was vital, as it allowed strangers to trust each other to a larger extent. This effect can be studied in real life, where a lot of Christians has a hard time trusting Muslims, and vice-versa. I believe this is also one of the reasons Christians dislike Atheists. It's an inherit trait of larger religions. If you're not a follower of the same religion, you're an outsider that can not be trusted.

Eventually, as even larger societies were created, and people started moving between regions with different religions to a larger extent, religions saw a need to make them more approachable, to find new followers. Converting other towns to a new religion were easier if you allowed the citizens to celebrate their old holidays on the same days they used to, so old holidays were celebrated in guise under a new religion. This, too, can be seen with a lot of religions sharing similar or the same dates. And some countries (like Sweden's "Lucia") have unique holidays they celebrate in the new religion, that can be traced back as a old holiday under the previous religion.

Therefor; I believe religion has been a vital part of society, and - in turn - human evolution. It isn't an evolutionary need; it's a tool, similar to fire and knife. The reason evolution is slowly dying out, is because it is simply not needed anymore. We have more effective ways of controlling the population now.

Edit: Also; we know better now. Which is also why a lot of people stop believing in religion. And, for that reason, churches (or whatever, depending on the religion), don't make as strong an effort anymore to keep their population indoctrinated, in part because of the other tools of control.

[Greatguardian]

Fundamental flaw #1: Premise of the argument is that religion is still around and thus society is not evolving to remove it

Counterpoint: Religion is significantly less prominent in every developed country in the world than it was as little as 200 years ago. Developed nations are almost unilaterally secular in their governing bodies. Political and economic influence of organized religion is at an all-time low, and shows no signs of recovering.

Fundamental flaw #2: Assuming there is a polar dichotomy between evolution and religion, as well as an intrinsic connection between pure science and atheism.

Counterpoint: Evolution is not at odds with religion. It is a fundamental first step in man's rationalization and understanding of the world around him. However, like dynastic rule, it is an outmoded concept and will fade away as our society advances. Likewise, there are not two polar states that men can inhabit - purely religious or purely analytical. Being an Atheist is as simple as not having the audacious ego to believe that man was hand crafted by a bigger man in the sky and made to be sovereign over the whole universe.

You see people all the time talking about how wonderful and special and unique we are, and that it is impossible for such wonders to exist if not for a God. Truth is, we're so absolutely insignificant I don't even know how to properly express to you how ridiculous that sounds. We're an adolescent civilization of primates floating around on a small rock, orbiting an equally small and plain star, in a no-name corner of a no-name galaxy. There are some truly wonderous and amazing things out there, but we are most certainly not one of them.

[Tagus]

Kaylia is pretty much spot on with what I was trying to get at. IDK, maybe it came across as dumb, although seeing that all of the constructive statements came from people not trolling me, and none came from those who were, I'm just guessing certain people were out of their element with the question. I scored a 28 on my ACT, which although not specifically remarkable, was higher above average than average is above a monkey with a pencil the last I checked, so I'm not really afraid of getting trolled for stupidity because I'd rather actually learn something... so I asked.

It just always struck me as odd. Atheists tend to think the scientific method, Darwinism, and logic and critical thinking are our greatest modes of intellectual thought. However while none of those things allow for an irrational concept or series of concepts to persist throughout our entire recorded history, religion exists. You can explain love as a reproductive tool, biblical laws as a variety of survival-enhancing "rules of thumb" (i.e.- the old testament law of not eating meat actually being a tool against teburculosis before refrigerators, symbolized by catholics not eating meat on Fridays), God looking like Zeus because the concept of him was stolen from the ancient Greeks, etc... but I wondered about how the simple survival of religion could be reasoned. Now I somewhat understand.

[Greatguardian]

I scored a 28 on my ACT, which although not specifically remarkable, was higher above average than average is above a monkey with a pencil the last I checked, so I'm not really afraid of getting trolled for stupidity because I'd rather actually learn something... so I asked.

I scored a 2400 on the SAT at age 14 and have a 175 IQ, don't fuck with my opinions on the internet because I'm totally incapable of saying dumb things.

Edit: Not even lyin', come at me bro

[Alleya]

The simple answer is that religion is useful as a control mechanism. That's why it survived. That does not make any of it true, and does not validate claims about transcendent truth or supernatural dictators. Since it's necessarily anti-freedom, anti-critical thought, and a tool only now useful for causing harm and misleading the ignorant, it no longer has a place as a cultural force and its influence should be fought. It's already held us back for centuries.

There, nutshelled.

[Kaylia]

Another discussion completely derailed by petty semantics. Godspeed, Kaylia.

Feel free to believe what you want, but Tagus post was misinterpreted considerably. You can play the "semantics" but the topic never changed. Until Sera's post, that's it.

The simple answer is that religion is useful as a control mechanism. That's why it survived. That does not make any of it true, and does not validate claims about transcendent truth or supernatural dictators. Since it's necessarily anti-freedom, anti-critical thought, and a tool only now useful for causing harm and misleading the ignorant, it no longer has a place as a cultural force and its influence should be fought. It's already held us back for centuries.

There, nutshelled.

"Control" almost implies that someone with ill-intent is always trying to manipulate everyone using religion. It was definitively the case occasionally, but I doubt it can be generalized.

[Tagus]

I scored a 2400 on the SAT at age 14 and have a 175 IQ, don't fuck with my opinions on the internet because I'm totally incapable of saying dumb things.

Edit: Not even lyin', come at me bro

I knew that was coming... demo called me dumb a few times. it seemed easier to quantify it than argue, not saying i'm all that.

[Yugl]

Fundamental flaw #1: Premise of the argument is that religion is still around and thus society is not evolving to remove it

Counterpoint: Religion is significantly less prominent in every developed country in the world than it was as little as 200 years ago. Developed nations are almost unilaterally secular in their governing bodies. Political and economic influence of organized religion is at an all-time low, and shows no signs of recovering.

Fundamental flaw #2: Assuming there is a polar dichotomy between evolution and religion, as well as an intrinsic connection between pure science and atheism.

Counterpoint: Evolution is not at odds with religion. It is a fundamental first step in man's rationalization and understanding of the world around him. However, like dynastic rule, it is an outmoded concept and will fade away as our society advances. Likewise, there are not two polar states that men can inhabit - purely religious or purely analytical. Being an Atheist is as simple as not having the audacious ego to believe that man was hand crafted by a bigger man in the sky and made to be sovereign over the whole universe.

You see people all the time talking about how wonderful and special and unique we are, and that it is impossible for such wonders to exist if not for a God. Truth is, we're so absolutely insignificant I don't even know how to properly express to you how ridiculous that sounds. We're an adolescent civilization of primates floating around on a small rock, orbiting an equally small and plain star, in a no-name corner of a no-name galaxy. There are some truly wonderous and amazing things out there, but we are most certainly not one of them.

Fundamental Flaw #3: Not believing that some man crafted the whole universe.

Counter: Tanaka. Fire crystal for Native Central Americans and Latinos. Earth Crystal for Asians. Ice Crystal for Eskimos. Thunder crystal for homosexuals. Light crystal for white people. Dark crystal for black people. Is it a coincidence that the remaining crystals are the precise colors of our most scientific sketches of Earth?

http://www.freeclipartnow.com/d/2164...rretrEarth.jpg

I think not.

[Alleya]

"Control" almost implies that someone with ill-intent is trying to manipulate everyone using religion. It was definitively the case occasionally, but I doubt we can generalize it.

Your implication is fatuous. Government is a control mechanism, too. So are gold stars on pop quizzes. Whether or not it's malicious in its intent is a separate issue. A religious, spiritual, numinous, whatever, form of existentialism is inherent to human nature. Organized religion is only ever a tool of the elite. Given that organized religion is based on superstitions at best, and outright lies at worst, it's hard to argue that it's anything else.

[Greatguardian]

I knew that was coming... demo called me dumb a few times. it seemed easier to quantify it than argue, not saying i'm all that.

Given my history of saying dumb things on the internet, I can promise you that such quantification does not really mean anything.

[Kaylia]

http://www.experienceproject.com/sto...iction/1297945

I doubt anyone will spend the time reading this short story (The Star), but it was a very interesting read for anyone who cares about this debate.

[ronin sparthos]

Any religious belief that does not encourage curiosity and understand of the universe and our surroundings is detrimental to human progress. Ironically, any religion that does encourage that would disappear by it's own accord.

Honestly if more religions acted like the Amish sects no one would care. You have your beliefs, you live by them and you leave others alone? Voila, enjoy your religion.

The problem is many aren't satisfied alone with infinite power in the afterlife but want to grab as much power in this life to briefly butcher a Hitchens quote. There is a distinct difference between having your beliefs and living by them (like the Amish) and wanting to impose those beliefs unilaterally across a populace. (like the born-again Christians)

[Greatguardian]

I like "The Star". They made a few different short screenplays of it too, for those who prefer to watch rather than read.

It had a rather fatalistic rationalization of the God figure, though. The priest was damned right to be freaked the fuck out that God destroyed an entire civilization just so Jesus would have a night-light.

Edit: Priest is a more prominent plot device in the shorts, upon re-reading the text version. There is more discussion on the last line of the story in the short a friend of mine used in class recently.

[Yugl]

Organized religion is only ever a tool of the elite.

Completely untrue. Past university education has introduced me to multiple historical events in Japan where the most destitute people have used religion to perpetuate the toppling of government and universal love bullshit. If you read "The road to Nihilism", you'll learn of people such as this crazy bitch. The Wikipedia is incomplete, so you'll have to read the book for full details. The short version is that she claims to be a spiritual fortune teller of sorts and her "miracle" is instantly learning how to read and write (A skill she, according to the community, lacked). I also disagree with your earlier ties of religion and dictatorship. When you discount the most developed European countries and the US/Canada (For obvious reasons), you see that dictatorships, specifically within Asia, have been economically successful and abstain from belief in some overarching deity. Comparatively, Japan is the exception to a string of poor democracies. The most that religion and dictatorship have in common is that both are primitive systems. However, neither depends on one another.

Edit: Should say "Their contingent relation is that . . ." rather than "The most they have in common."

[Sera]

Your logic is astonishing here. You act condescending, then pretend it's not a personal attack unless I admit that my post, which consist entirely of social phenomenon that are recognized by sciences, is stupid?

I'm sorry, but your not being intellectually honest here.

I simply said I was not shocked that your name was attached to that particular post. But keep going, please.

[hey]

You see people all the time talking about how wonderful and special and unique we are, and that it is impossible for such wonders to exist if not for a God. Truth is, we're so absolutely insignificant I don't even know how to properly express to you how ridiculous that sounds. We're an adolescent civilization of primates floating around on a small rock, orbiting an equally small and plain star, in a no-name corner of a no-name galaxy. There are some truly wonderous and amazing things out there, but we are most certainly not one of them.

I disagree, and frankly i'm not sure what could possibly be so amazing about the universe doing silly things like pulling matter together via gravity to form stars. Damn near everything that happens in the universe is basically guaranteed. I mean, sure the exact configuration of a particular galaxy would be up to chance, but it's all the same in the end anyway. The same cannot be said about life. Our galaxy, solar system, sun, etc may all be average, but earth is different than 99.99999999999999999999999999999999999999999999%+ of other planets.