Richard Dawkins Says Harry Potter is Evil

[Charla]

Guys. I've decided to convert to rapeism. I believe that the world was created when an omnipotent being raped an infant and the infant gave birth to the world, fully formed, with men and women already on it. The Great Rapist decreed that men shall forever have dominance over women, who are evil, and that it is the duty of every man on earth to rape as many women as possible to purge them of evil. I believe very strongly in this, and it gives me comfort to do so, so I'm sure you guys will offer me great compassion and understanding for my new faith. I've already started the government grant to get money for my faith-based initiative to build rape dungeons just like The Great Rapist commands. I look forward to spreading my message of compassion for women throughout all communities in the US (with government dollars of course). I'm going to start with a sunday school class to teach children the wonderful, compassionate ways of rapeism.

Not as original as you think.

[Mizango]

What I mean how is it possible or even (for the lack of a better word) fair to decredit someone like that off the bat? Do you personally believe in the things I named? If not what makes them any less "real" or make them so easily debunked? Why is one given a free pass but the others are dismissed instantly by well over 80% of the populous? That percentage includes believers and non-believers alike. Why are some entitled to believe and shove their belief system down my and anyone else's throat? This idea came to me a few days ago watching the sheer hatred in Mormon and Catholic groups and circles regarding California's Proposition 8 amendment up for vote Tuesday. Proof how someone's religious views are being showed down the collective throats of Americans.

A Christian conservative group was quoted as saying that "it would force churches to marry gays, force schools to teach gay marriage, settling off a snowball effect and opening the door to pedophilia and bestiality. A person could say, 'I love my dog, why should we not be married?'"

Saying that it does not promote hatred and prejudice is a delusion. How do you feel about Proposition 8? If it passes how will or would it affect you and how you live your life day to day? Do you agree with that this person said? Mind you, this is not a one person view but a view of an entire group or class of people.

Just trying to get some opinions to real life questions and topics. Not directed towards you solely per se, anyone feel free to chime in.

[Charla]

I'm sure the bigfoot society takes themselves just as seriously as any religion, the rest of us just don't hear about it much because they're so much less numerous. Had anyone here heard of the flat earth society (other than in the Bad Religion song) before that thread the other day?

[Alleya]

Not as original as you think.

Way to ignore the point of the post, lawl.

[Charla]

Straw man arguments are best ignored.

[Alleya]

Straw man arguments are best ignored.

I wasn't aware analogies were strawmen.

[Charla]

A straw man argument is an informal fallacy based on misrepresentation of an opponent's position.[1] To "set up a straw man," one describes a position that superficially resembles an opponent's actual view, yet is easier to refute.

Making an analogy between one thing and something that's easier to refute is what I would call a straw man argument.

[Kuya]

The only thing that could make this thread any worse than it already is, is Neosutra.

[Maxxthepenguin]

The only thing that could make this thread any worse than it already is, is Neosutra.

I'm waiting with bated breath.

[Churchill]

Guys. I've decided to convert to rapeism. I believe that the world was created when an omnipotent being raped an infant and the infant gave birth to the world, fully formed, with men and women already on it. The Great Rapist decreed that men shall forever have dominance over women, who are evil, and that it is the duty of every man on earth to rape as many women as possible to purge them of evil. I believe very strongly in this, and it gives me comfort to do so, so I'm sure you guys will offer me great compassion and understanding for my new faith. I've already started the government grant to get money for my faith-based initiative to build rape dungeons just like The Great Rapist commands. I look forward to spreading my message of compassion for women throughout all communities in the US (with government dollars of course). I'm going to start with a sunday school class to teach children the wonderful, compassionate ways of rapeism.

Where...do I sign?

[Kaelan?]

Wow this thread really went downhill fast.

I don't even know why I ever expect intelligent argument to last long on BG

[Denchi]

Charla makes good points.

I guess it's difficult for me to try and convey to anyone how scientific evidence isn't very applicable to the conversation. I'm not good at getting my points across, but go read David Hume, and the Rene Descartes, and then Immanuel Kant. Treatise of Human Nature, the Meditations, and then select part of the Critique of Pure reason.

My point isn't that I have stronger proof that a God exists, and less so a Christian God, but that that's simply what i believe. I also resent the arguments that state that "well I can empirically prove the existence of the world around me." Because that doesn't seem to be the issue at all. I make the statement that science is quantitative because it is, and I really liked the quote earlier "You can't weigh an angel." Meaning, if you can prove that 2+2 = 4, or that the earth is round, or that starts are 100 billion years old, you still haven't told me how I ought to act. And if you tried to empirically prove how I should act, you would be perverting science and crossing a bridge of reason that isn't there. Science doesn't answer those questions.

So, in light of the fact that science doesn't tell us how to act, I turn to what you guys think about how you act. It seems the response is more or less "Well I figure that stuff out for myself." This is why I think some of you guys are scary, because if you ACTUALLY BELIEVED that individual humans create morality, then that's scary, because you could never legitimately claim that Ted Bundy did anything morally wrong. Maybe wrong by societies standards, and requiring jail time, but not morally wrong, because maybe he was just following his own set of morals. Cannabalism, murder, torture, If we're simply sensory beings learning through experience, then why would any of that be morally reprehensible? Some people are masochists, are they wrong? I think the only way you could say they are, is by asserting that there's a moral standard that you don't control.

If you want to be an empiricist, then the burden of proof falls to YOU to prove empirically why one way is better than the other. I don't believe in God because I was told to, it's because I believe that certain things are right, and certain things are wrong, and the scientific method doesn't begin to touch on why i think that, or why anyone ever thought that. I think there are objective truths in the world, and the idea of anyone creating their own moral structure is WAY scarier than trying to identify objective truths for everyone to live by.

[Charla]

This is why I think some of you guys are scary, because if you ACTUALLY BELIEVED that individual humans create morality, then that's scary, because you could never legitimately claim that Ted Bundy did anything morally wrong. Maybe wrong by societies standards, and requiring jail time, but not morally wrong, because maybe he was just following his own set of morals. Cannabalism, murder, torture, If we're simply sensory beings learning through experience, then why would any of that be morally reprehensible?

I think the idea is that you don't actually need to. Why would something someone else did need to be wrong? And for that matter, why should humans be interested in deciding whether other humans are wrong?

[Kuya]

Same reason why one can argue that certain religious beliefs are dangerous, because they allow people to justify highly destructive behaviour. In any case, even if someone were to do something morally reprehensible, the fact that they acknowledge the moral depravity of it limits the scope of their actions, and up to which point the behaviour may spread.

[Alleya]

So, in light of the fact that science doesn't tell us how to act, I turn to what you guys think about how you act. It seems the response is more or less "Well I figure that stuff out for myself." This is why I think some of you guys are scary, because if you ACTUALLY BELIEVED that individual humans create morality, then that's scary, because you could never legitimately claim that Ted Bundy did anything morally wrong. Maybe wrong by societies standards, and requiring jail time, but not morally wrong, because maybe he was just following his own set of morals. Cannabalism, murder, torture, If we're simply sensory beings learning through experience, then why would any of that be morally reprehensible? Some people are masochists, are they wrong? I think the only way you could say they are, is by asserting that there's a moral standard that you don't control.

You're still ignoring the fact that YOU DO NOT FOLLOW THE BIBLE. You don't. If you live in this modern world and you are not in prison, YOU DON'T FOLLOW THE BIBLE. Your morality does not come from the bible. You cherry pick what you like and ignore the rest, and I ask you, where does that criteria come from? What allows you to choose what parts of religion you like and what parts you don't, and why is that same mechanism magically unavailable to atheists? Human behavior, even altruism (see: Richard Dawkins' books zomg!), can be explained by evolutionary psychology and the development of social constructs thereof. You do not need religion to have morality. Would you rather believe that the guy next to you on the bus isn't murdering you and raping your girlfriend because he's biologically, psychologically repulsed by the idea of doing so, or that he's only not doing those things because an intangible, unknowable force that does absolutely nothing to make its presence known might punish him, maybe, unless you're in infadel in his religion in which case it's cool if he does?

[Maxxthepenguin]

Alleya, the Bible contracts itself so much that you can't fucking follow the bible word for word. That's part of what makes it work. You talk about cherry picking, but you seem to ignore how it says over and over "Love the stranger in your midst". That doesn't go along with a lot of things it says, but the bible says that a lot. So stop thinking that just because people do something in the bible or god does something in the bible that it is what Christians should be doing to be Christians. It doesn't work that way. It's far more nuanced than that. Choosing to be a theological Luddite doesn't serve you well.

[Alleya]

Alleya, the Bible contracts itself so much that you can't fucking follow the bible word for word. That's part of what makes it work. You talk about cherry picking, but you seem to ignore how it says over and over "Love the stranger in your midst". That doesn't go along with a lot of things it says, but the bible says that a lot. So stop thinking that just because people do something in the bible or god does something in the bible that it is what Christians should be doing to be Christians. It doesn't work that way. It's far more nuanced than that. Choosing to be a theological Luddite doesn't serve you well.

If it contradicts itself so much then how can anyone who's religious be sure they're practicing the right religion? If what's written is so unreliable that you have to choose what parts to follow, how do you know you're choosing the right ones? If the bible is the source of moral authority and tells me how to live my life and more importantly gives other people the right to tell me how to live my life, then how are they choosing to use one part and not another? Why is it that something that was acceptable in the bible (eg, slavery), is now no longer acceptable to Christians when it was christians and the chuch just a few short centuries ago using the bible as their justification for slavery? If you say that the bible is proof of your religion and guides your faith, how can you ignore entire books of it and still make that claim?

[Beckwin]

Denchi, I suggest reading some Sartre, because I feel like he does a pretty good job explaining how morals are defined in a societal context versus whatever an individual may choose to do. In the sense that each individual is self-determined and unique, each collection of individuals is going to have different overall moral views, which explains relativism across the cultures/civilizations we've seen on earth, despite certain commonly recurring moral themes.

[Beckwin]

Alleya, the Bible contracts itself so much that you can't fucking follow the bible word for word. That's part of what makes it work. You talk about cherry picking, but you seem to ignore how it says over and over "Love the stranger in your midst". That doesn't go along with a lot of things it says, but the bible says that a lot. So stop thinking that just because people do something in the bible or god does something in the bible that it is what Christians should be doing to be Christians. It doesn't work that way. It's far more nuanced than that. Choosing to be a theological Luddite doesn't serve you well.

the fact that it's so contradictory and obviously edited goes to disprove the universal truths it preaches- that God is this infallible omnipotent being etc etc and the Bible is supposedly his word. Thomas Jefferson had a better approach where he cut all the bullshit out and treated the teachings of Christ as more of a philosophy with a Deist slant (somewhat of a theist agnostic perspective?), but sadly that's not the mainstream of Christian thought by a long shot. Pointing the nice stuff from the Bible as somehow a justification of the dogma and religion on a whole is silly and kinda pointless.

[Maxxthepenguin]

If it contradicts itself so much then how can anyone who's religious be sure they're practicing the right religion? If what's written is so unreliable that you have to choose what parts to follow, how do you know you're choosing the right ones? If the bible is the source of moral authority and tells me how to live my life and more importantly gives other people the right to tell me how to live my life, then how are they choosing to use one part and not another? Why is it that something that was acceptable in the bible (eg, slavery), is now no longer acceptable to Christians when it was christians and the chuch just a few short centuries ago using the bible as their justification for slavery? If you say that the bible is proof of your religion and guides your faith, how can you ignore entire books of it and still make that claim?

Well lets look back at the roots of the Protestant (IE non-catholic christian) movement to figure this puzzle out. You see, they were protesting excesses of the Catholic church, claiming it didn't interpret the bible correctly and didn't practice it well. The chief problem is often said to have been indulgences, where you could buy a get out of hell free card. So you had Martin Luther forming this new way to view Christianity, based strictly on your own interpretation of the bible. It turns out, that didn't work so well, in no small part because the Bible is confusing and contradictory. That's why we have so many different groups of Christianity now. The lutherans, episcopals, baptists, etc all have different interpretations of the bible and different ideas of how to worship god and practice biblical values and, yet, they have the same bible. This is all because protestant Christianity places tremendous value on a personal relationship with Jesus. That means that you are free to hear what you think you hear from your Bible. Now, many people take that to the extreme. People fight over what things mean. Many christians look towards their pastors to figure out what certain things mean because they have faith but lack understanding.

Basically, it's all faith. You're looking for it to be completely rational, but it's not because we, as humans, are not rational. A rationalization of some christian practices would be a falsehood.