Beleg Cúthalion on 4/8/2009 at 19:23
I never said anything indicating that I have a religious standpoint. What I care about in these bloody discussions is precision in argument and knowledge about the topic. You don't have to respect anything for now, just understand what I'm saying. ;) Might be my terrible English but maybe someone else can do this for me, I got some editor waiting for me....
jay pettitt on 4/8/2009 at 19:26
Why does this need to be about Dawkins? Do people practice anti-dawkins arguments or something?
First Beleg, I think you're a champ for taking this on.
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My personal interpretation of NOMA is that you'll never actually see (i.e. notice with our scientific means) the supernatural in this world.
I think that too.
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Scientists (atheists included) can tell us that they're there but not why.
Can you tell me, refering to physiology, why you get hungry?
Trust me, I can have a pretty good stab at telling you why I am here. It will involve my Mommy and Daddy, a game of consequences, exploring their motivations for forming and acting on an intimate relationship and a bit of biology. Science is very good at helping us answer 'why' questions.
If you want to ask "for what 'higher purpose' am I here?" then yes, I get stuck. That might actually be because I'm not here for a higher purpose and the question is faulty for assuming such a purpose in the first place. Why would I presume I'm here for a higher purpose?
Also, what qualities do you think religions have that make them adept for reliably arriving at answers to why questions?
I'm going to give Dawkins the benefit of the doubt and assume he's smarter than me - I presume he doesn't evade why questions generally either - but perhaps that is what you meant. I certainly think it's fair to look at questions and see if they're valid in the first place.
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That's again the people-and-not-religion thing.
I gotta say, I find it difficult to separate the two. Bet yeah, it's a fair point. Religions and super natural beliefs don't
only promote repulsive behaviour. I'm not sure that's a 'Get out of Jail Free' card though. That's just evading genuine criticism.
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If everyone was able to do this [be nice to each other], it'd be fine. But that's not the case.
Between you and me, I actually think people are naturally very socially aware and will generally want to act in a way that is socially beneficial, even if it is against there own interest (I'm sure I can find links if you're interested) - but that they are sensitive to anxiety about 'fitting in' and are thus easily exploited if you tell them they'll fail socially if they don't behave in certain ways - buy the right cloathes, look a certain way, behave a certain way. Things start to unravel when you create or have conditions where people feel the need to behave selfishly because they are, at heart, social creatures.
It might be that society benefits from education and some institutional rules and expectations that help keep us getting along (I happen to think we like social rules and expectations). But I'm not sure that makes a great defence for religious (or even personal) belief in the super-natural though.
oh god I'm a slow typer. Sorry.
*Zaccheus* on 4/8/2009 at 19:39
Quote Posted by addone
I am just curious as to who believes in god or gods and what their beliefs and faiths are. No slagging off other religions or anything, I don't want people to say what they think of the different religions, that's not the objective of this thread.
Ok, I'll bite. :)
I broadly agree with the following statement from the preface of one of the better bible translations of the previous century, the (
http://www.lockman.org/nasb/) NASB: "the words of Scripture, as originally penned in the Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek, were inspired by God".
It has to be said that a lot of time has passed since 'originally penned', and this needs to be taken into account.
Besides the obvious question of reliablility, which is something that has been discussed on this site already, it is important to be mindful of the many cultural contexts in which things were said. If someone literally translated "I will catch a bus" into another language, all kinds of hilarious mental images might be provoked.
Also if I write to one person saying that I went to work by train, and to another that I took my bike to work, it is important for a later reader to know that it was possible to take bikes on trains in those days, otherwise the two statements put together would make no sense.
So the a question that needs to be asked is: What did this text mean to the people for whom it was originally written? I am painfully aware of how little I know.
Never the less, here is a quick summary of what I
believe, without any attempt to explain why I reached these conclusions:
God made the world in 6 days and rested on the 7th. Why did he rest on the 7th? Good question. However, I'm glad he did, because that gave us the free weekends! Initially all the animals and humans were vegetarians, there was no death or suffering. Perhaps the idea was that other planets would have been made available for the rapidly growing population. It's a big universe out there.
However, one of God's angels decided to rebel against God and persuaded the first humans to ignore something God had told them; as a result the world became fundamentally broken. Why did God even let that be possible? Again, good question. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that God, being perfect, cannot do certain things. For example, he cannot lie. Perhaps this "being limited by perfection" meant that he had to allow the possibility of things going badly wrong.
A few centuries or so after that, things had gotten so bad that God decided to wipe out most life on earth, only a few people and animals survived. Following that event, generally known as Noah's flood, there was a very very very long time span, in which all kinds of changes took place, including countless species developing.
Eventually God made contact with Abraham and a chain of events unfolded which led to the jewish people appearing in history. God gave them specific laws to follow and they passed those laws on from generation to generation even though no one really kept them all.
In the end, God visited his people around 2000 years ago, told them to look at the heart of the law not the letter of the law, and then did something quite unbelievable: He allowed himself to be punished for everything everyone had ever done wrong, so that no human would need to be punished.
The offer, as it stands, is quite simply this: Acknowledge that God had taken that punishment, ask to be pardoned, and ask for help to live a better way.
That is what I think right now; none of my beliefs are set in concrete, but I've been thinking about these thing for a long time now.
SD on 4/8/2009 at 19:42
Personal fondness for Zaccheus prevents me from responding to that post in the way it deserves. Seriously though....
Taffer36 on 4/8/2009 at 19:46
Another interesting point about religion is the concept of REVENGE. It's something that I find quite interesting, this concept of retribution. Many believe it on a small scale, where people get what's coming to them. And some of us believe it on a divine scale, where people will be punished for their "sins".
I suppose this is another problem that I have with organized religion, the concept that a dictatorial force is choosing who to punish and who to reward based on their own accord. Why? Why is punishment necessary?
rachel on 4/8/2009 at 19:56
Because otherwise we have to face the fact that life is unfair and the bad guys win?
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What do you think becomes of your so-called common sense if the influence of egoism, survival of the fittest etc., all the - in the broadest sense - "economical" elements in our lives gain strength? Either you become that sort of animal or you have to invoke something intangible because only intangible ideas can protect humanity down to the last. And church, to sum this up just for you, is there to cultivate and balance this idea. In theory at least, but as I've hinted earlier you'll hardly have other possibilities to solve this.
But that's
public order. The church goes beyond that by dictating how you should behave in your own home, on account of a creature that may or may not exist and watch your every move at all times.
And it may have helped them that for a long time they pretty much ruled every aspect of your life, because the common sense laws such as "Don't be an ass and murder thy neighbour" actually make a pretty good point, so the rest went along, but nowadays, law and religion are separate. I don't deny that culturally religious influence was a big factor in shaping those laws, but we're way past that. And that makes religion as a law maker redundant, and if get down to it, what's left is a bunch of quaint rituals that you don't really
need.
You don't
need a church to lead a "virtuous" life. Churches only exist because men are a social species and like company and building communities centered around common interests.
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The fact that a church consists of more than one guy saying "what's right" shrinks the probability that they come up with a less reasonable decision than any guy on the street. It's a system to establish a reasonable sort of mainstream interpretation of faith among the people who belong to this community. Remember this comes from a time without Wikipedia.
It also gives a lot of power to the guys in charge to promote their agenda in guise of common good... (Though in all honesty that reasoning applies to any sufficiently large organisation
*/cue conspiracy theories*)
RavynousHunter on 4/8/2009 at 20:00
Quote Posted by Beleg Cúthalion
Oh, and I think "I kneel before no one" sounds incredibly stupid and even inhuman.
I'm inhuman? Why thank you! Seriously though, what the hell? What's wrong with never bowing down to anyone? If God is a prick and sends me to Hell because I'm not part of his glee club, then I'll go to Hell with my head held high, because I will know, in my heart, that I am a better person than a being who is supposedly "perfect."
If I have a God, he would judge you by what you do, not how much lip service you give him. A good person is good no matter what he believes in. That's what I believe in, just being a good person (or at least not being a complete dickhead) and doing what you will. Religion holds no sway over my morality or my view of how we came to be. As for where we're going or what we're here for, I really don't care because I, personally, don't need some all-consuming purpose to do what I do, I just do it. Yes, for me, it is
that simple.
jay pettitt on 4/8/2009 at 20:02
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Another interesting point about religion is the concept of REVENGE. It's something that I find quite interesting, this concept of retribution. Many believe it on a small scale, where people get what's coming to them. And some of us believe it on a divine scale, where people will be punished for their "sins".
I suppose this is another problem that I have with organized religion, the concept that a dictatorial force is choosing who to punish and who to reward based on their own accord. Why? Why is punishment necessary?
I think people have a desire to punish people for selfish behaviour or for breaking social rules and expectations because it keeps people from behaving anti-socially. I'm not sure it's solely a religion thing. You've probably got a point though. Certainly some people seem to like punishment a lot more than I do.
Sometimes our desire to punish seems bonkers. Currently in the UK cyclists are getting a huge amount of stick because they're a heinous subspecies that ride through stop-lights. That most (not all) cyclists approach stop lights with caution, give way to pedestrians and traffic before passing through and that stop-lights exist for the sole purposes of managing motor traffic is besides the point. Motorists and pedestrians alike (who are all closet socialists at heart, including Jeremy Clarkson) react because they see someone breaking accepted rules and conventions.
D'Juhn Keep on 4/8/2009 at 20:11
Quote Posted by Renzatic
I want to know where you're getting these numbers. From what I've gathered on reading up on the subject, only a relatively small (vocal) percentage of Christians even believe in Creationism. If you consider all the various religions with different creation standards and secular groups that dot the country, I find it very hard to believe that a full 50% of US citizens believe the Earth is less than 10,000 years old.
(
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PtzJhTfQiMA)
Taffer36 on 4/8/2009 at 20:12
Quote Posted by jay pettitt
I think people have a desire to punish people for selfish behaviour or for breaking social rules and expectations because it keeps people from behaving anti-socially. I'm not sure it's solely a religion thing. You've probably got a point though. Certainly some people seem to like punishment a lot more than I do.
Sometimes our desire to punish seems bonkers. Currently in the UK cyclists are getting a huge amount of stick because they're a heinous subspecies that ride through stop-lights. That most (not all) cyclists approach stop lights with caution, give way to pedestrians and traffic before passing through and that stop-lights exist for the sole purposes of managing motor traffic is besides the point. Motorists and pedestrians alike (who are all closet socialists at heart, including Jeremy Clarkson) react because they see someone breaking accepted rules and conventions.
That's the thing, though.
Certain rules are created for the purpose of determent. This is understandable. Certain laws are in place to prevent anti-social behavior, yes.
But this can reach a point where it transcends the purpose of halting said behavior, and it turns into a NEED to punish the offenders. Torment for all of eternity? That's a bit much, isn't it?
What if someone, in a fit of rage, murders somebody. But after this one death they will NOT kill anyone again (as a theoretical you can assume that this is true). Do you still want them punished?
