Which religious situation would you prefer?

CaptainCourtesy said:

I was being sarcastic. The point I was making was precisely the point you just made. :2razz:

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lolz u had me thar!

A poor set of choices IMHO.

I voted for "several religions". Not because I necessarily think that is best, but because "one religion" or "no religion" would both require a totalitarian regime with the "thought police" monitoring everyone 24/7.

"No religion" would be a disaster. A belief system that is entirely materialistic, denying any spiritual dimension to life, is ultimately a nihilistic belief, espousing the ultimate futility of all existence. I tend to believe that such a world would be capable of horrors beyond imagining. Many people would indeed feel that in such a universe, nothing really mattered, and many people would thus find no moral restraint on their actions.

I know previous posters disagree... fine. I'm glad they'll never get to find out, since there will never be a world in which everyone is devoid of all spiritual beliefs.

"One religion"...heh, yeah right...who decides which one?? :doh I'd prefer my own of course, but I expect a few bah-zillion people would disagree. :mrgreen:

This question is essentially an exercise in intellectual masturbation, as it has no applicability to the real world. People will believe what they believe, and without universal mind control you can't stop them.


G.

UtahBill said:

Nice, a lot of words saying very little. How is it facts not in evidence? MODERN cultures in many places in this world use superstition, voodoo, magic, smoke and mirrors, etc.

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Your argument can only stand if you have complete and absolute factual knowledge of which beliefs are "superstition" and which beliefs are not "superstition". Such factual knowledge is not within the store of human knowledge, so far as I am aware, and certainly has not been presented here.

Even if you deride all religion as the product of "superstition", you still must confront a burden of proof, and you have presented none. You have not shown, not even by a preponderance of evidence, the merit of your position.

Thus your argument presumes facts not in evidence.

UtahBill said:

There is very little logical foundation for any religion on this planet with the one exception of a group of people using it to aid the survival of the group.

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To quote H.H. The Dalai Lama, in the Introduction to his treatise on The Four Noble Truths

Whether or not we like the philosophy of other religions isn't really the point. For a non-Buddhist, the idea of nirvana and a next life seems nonsensical. Similarly, to Buddhists the idea of a Creator God sometimes sounds like nonsense. But these things don't matter; we can drop them. The point is that through these different traditions, a very negative person can be transformed into a good person. That is the purpose of religion--and that is the actual result. This alone is a sufficient reason to respect other religions.

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Making "good" people is a very logical foundation for religion.

UtahBill said:

And survival instincts have done more than anything else to guarantee our continued existence on this planet.

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I disagree. Survival instinct is often the trigger for violence and war. Survival instinct does not inspire the Marine to throw himself on a grenade, or a parent to sacrifice himself or herself for the sake of children. Survival instinct does not advance science, or medicine, or law, or technology. Reason and ethics are the sources of such things.

UtahBill said:

Religious beliefs have been used to motivate more people than anything else. Sometimes the motivation and/or end result is good, sometimes not...depends on the leadership, the ones wielding the words and his agenda....

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Group behaviors are always subject to misuse and manipulation. Yet religious belief is not merely a group behavior; religious belief motivates the individual man daily, in the privacy of his or her own conscience, without incitement by a preacher or demagogue.

Goshin said:

A poor set of choices IMHO.

I voted for "several religions". Not because I necessarily think that is best, but because "one religion" or "no religion" would both require a totalitarian regime with the "thought police" monitoring everyone 24/7.

"No religion" would be a disaster. A belief system that is entirely materialistic, denying any spiritual dimension to life, is ultimately a nihilistic belief, espousing the ultimate futility of all existence. I tend to believe that such a world would be capable of horrors beyond imagining. Many people would indeed feel that in such a universe, nothing really mattered, and many people would thus find no moral restraint on their actions.

I know previous posters disagree... fine. I'm glad they'll never get to find out, since there will never be a world in which everyone is devoid of all spiritual beliefs.

"One religion"...heh, yeah right...who decides which one?? :doh I'd prefer my own of course, but I expect a few bah-zillion people would disagree. :mrgreen:

This question is essentially an exercise in intellectual masturbation, as it has no applicability to the real world. People will believe what they believe, and without universal mind control you can't stop them.


G.

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You can usually tell when someone doesn't totally agree with their own religion, as occurs with me. There are many subsets in the belief systems...

Agent Ferris said:

Yes but people invented religion and people use religion to indoctrinate the youth in order to have wars and kill people. What you're saying is akin to saying that the ideology of Nazism itself wasn't even part of the problem.

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There are no evil thoughts. There are only evil deeds.

A man may be the most rabid racist, the most sickening anti-Semite, yet so long as he is these things only in his mind, no evil arises; when that man gives form to those thoughts through action, that is when evil comes.

So yes, the ideology of Nazism is not a problem. The preaching and expostulating of that ideology can be a problem, and the acting upon that ideology most certainly is a problem.

So it is with religion; the good or the evil of religion is found in the deeds ascribed to religion, not in the religion itself.

Realistically, a world with multiple religions. While I personally believe the world would be better with no religion, I think people should have to have a choice in their beliefs. No one's beliefs should be dictated by what I, or any other person believes is best for the world. That is also why I would oppose a one-world religion; I believe in choice.

celticlord said:

Your argument can only stand if you have complete and absolute factual knowledge of which beliefs are "superstition" and which beliefs are not "superstition". Such factual knowledge is not within the store of human knowledge, so far as I am aware, and certainly has not been presented here.

Even if you deride all religion as the product of "superstition", you still must confront a burden of proof, and you have presented none. You have not shown, not even by a preponderance of evidence, the merit of your position.

Thus your argument presumes facts not in evidence.


To quote H.H. The Dalai Lama, in the Introduction to his treatise on The Four Noble Truths


Making "good" people is a very logical foundation for religion.


I disagree. Survival instinct is often the trigger for violence and war. Survival instinct does not inspire the Marine to throw himself on a grenade, or a parent to sacrifice himself or herself for the sake of children. Survival instinct does not advance science, or medicine, or law, or technology. Reason and ethics are the sources of such things.


Group behaviors are always subject to misuse and manipulation. Yet religious belief is not merely a group behavior; religious belief motivates the individual man daily, in the privacy of his or her own conscience, without incitement by a preacher or demagogue.

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you have been watching old perry mason shows, perhaps?
well, lumping together a bunch of quasi-related "facts" is not evidence or proof, whether it comes from me or you. LOGIC has to be considered, and you are all over the map with your lack of logic. If you want to believe that faith and/or religion preceded survival instincts, go ahead. Even ideas have an evolutionary trail.....and it makes sense that survival instincts were with us long before we were first able to think, communicate orally, etc.

celticlord said:

There are no evil thoughts. There are only evil deeds.

A man may be the most rabid racist, the most sickening anti-Semite, yet so long as he is these things only in his mind, no evil arises; when that man gives form to those thoughts through action, that is when evil comes.

So yes, the ideology of Nazism is not a problem. The preaching and expostulating of that ideology can be a problem, and the acting upon that ideology most certainly is a problem.

So it is with religion; the good or the evil of religion is found in the deeds ascribed to religion, not in the religion itself.

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yeah, sure, even when the religion requires you to do evil, as in parts of the OT, parts of Islamic scriptures, etc.
what dwells in the mind is likely to be converted to action, any shrink will tell you that...

UtahBill said:

you have been watching old perry mason shows, perhaps?
well, lumping together a bunch of quasi-related "facts" is not evidence or proof, whether it comes from me or you. LOGIC has to be considered, and you are all over the map with your lack of logic. If you want to believe that faith and/or religion preceded survival instincts, go ahead. Even ideas have an evolutionary trail.....and it makes sense that survival instincts were with us long before we were first able to think, communicate orally, etc.

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Sir, if you have some semblance of logic to present, please do so. I for one would find such logic a pleasant addition to your discourse.

UtahBill said:

yeah, sure, even when the religion requires you to do evil, as in parts of the OT, parts of Islamic scriptures, etc.
what dwells in the mind is likely to be converted to action, any shrink will tell you that...

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What is likely is not what is certain; what may be is not necessarily what will be. No matter how strong the compulsion or the coercion to do harm, no thought generates harm until it expressed as action, nor have you demonstrated otherwise.

Also, religions cannot require evil of anyone; whatsoever a religion requires of a man, within the context of that religion, it is necessarily good--it is good because the religion proclaims it as good. There is no religion that, within its moral framework, compels a person to violate that moral framework.

celticlord said:

What is likely is not what is certain; what may be is not necessarily what will be. No matter how strong the compulsion or the coercion to do harm, no thought generates harm until it expressed as action, nor have you demonstrated otherwise.

Also, religions cannot require evil of anyone; whatsoever a religion requires of a man, within the context of that religion, it is necessarily good--it is good because the religion proclaims it as good. There is no religion that, within its moral framework, compels a person to violate that moral framework.

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Ever read the OT? Maybe the citizens of that era didn't consider stoning difficult children to death evil...is that your point?
what color is the sky in this strange world you live in?
I give up, you are too strange for me....
did you, by any chance, help invent double speak?

First of all I don't claim to make perfect generalizations. That would be absurd.

celticlord said:

Your thesis requires several assumptions about religion that are questionable:
[*]Religious belief is "blind" belief: While not every human is a deep religious thinker, a good many, perhaps even most, do spend some time contemplating the meanings and implications of their beliefs. On what basis can we generalize that religious belief necessitates the willing suspension of reason intimated by the words "believing blindly"?

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If you ask the average person who considers themselves a "Christian" about the basic tenants of their faith most people would have very different and often wrong answers. The average Joe isn;t a bad person but he is quite ignorant to such things.

It takes far too much time and effort (its inefficient) to become educated or educate the masses in such things whereas its easier to simply teach "do this" and "do that" rather than "do this because of X".

celticlord said:

[*]Religions require an afterlife: This is just wrong. Some belief systems, such as Buddhism, impute a belief in rebirth, rendering an "afterlife" meaningless.

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If you re-read what I wrote I never claimed that ALL religions must have an afterlife. I used an example of a con of having no religion. But even Buddhism has an afterlife, per se. Nirvana, though it is non-existence is a claim to knowledge of what lies beyond this life I.E., an afterlife. Nearly all religions claim to know some details of what lies beyond death.

I don't claim to generalize all religions into perfect little pigeon holes. Try to see past that.

celticlord said:

[*]Lack of belief is preferable to "blind" belief: This normative position requires some exposition. One could easily argue that "blind" belief is better than lack of belief;

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Well feel free to argue that if you wish. I highly doubt intelligent rationale beings would find that "better" involves purposeful ignorance.

celticlord said:

[*]"No religion" is attainable within the human psyche:

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I don't remember making this claim. How did you extrapolate that?

celticlord said:

In my experience, man is, as I have noted, a religious animal. We believe in things; this is part of what it is to be human.

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And we also do a lot of other stupid stuff too. What is "natural" is not always optimal. And in this case I find that the scales ever so slightly tip against what you would find as natural belief. Nonetheless you bring up a good point which I was trying to get at: that for many, some type of supernatural/superstitious/religious belief is longed for and thus a lack of such may be detrimental.

celticlord said:

Belief does most people good.

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Yet we have innumerable examples of such beliefs causing human suffering and tragedy on extraordinary scales. Removing one more catalyst for such evil things would not solve the problem--there is no silver bullet for such a thing--but it would be a step toward a ideal world nonetheless.

A world with no religion, of course.

Remember, socialism is a religion.

UtahBill said:

Ever read the OT? Maybe the citizens of that era didn't consider stoning difficult children to death evil...is that your point?

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Is it so difficult a notion to grasp? How can religion, whose moral framework proposes a definition of what is "good", demand anything that, within that framework, be "bad"?

UtahBill said:

what color is the sky in this strange world you live in?

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Today the sky is blue. Yesterday it was gray, as there were a number of thunderstorms in the area.

UtahBill said:

did you, by any chance, help invent double speak?

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I am no Democrat, thank you very much.

Anima said:

Agreed. Religion practice has never killed anyone - that particular honour goes to hateful, angry, terrified people who hide their true motivations behind religion. And it's pretty hard to believe that those who bomb abortion clinics and hijack planes wouldn't have been drawn to some other way of dividing people into the good and the heathen vermin had religious faith not been a feature oftheir society.

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Oh.

Religion in practice has never killed anyone, you say?

Ever hear of those people we call "Aztecs"?

Goobieman said:

Put an ever- in front of it.


Good question.
First ask:
If everything is temproary, what meaning is there?

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The meaning the living give it.

That's all there's ever been.

The pyramids meant, to the living people who had it built, that their bodies would be preserved forever and their greatness remembered as long. To us they mean many things, not the least of which is the folly of government for wasting national treasure on such silliness.

The concept of "meaning" doesn't exist independently of living minds.

The invention of god served the purpose of creating a false permanence that satisfied their desires.

celticlord said:

Is it so difficult a notion to grasp? How can religion, whose moral framework proposes a definition of what is "good", demand anything that, within that framework, be "bad"?


Today the sky is blue. Yesterday it was gray, as there were a number of thunderstorms in the area.


I am no Democrat, thank you very much.

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I knew that, you aren't nearly smart enough for that. question is, are you dumb enough to be a dittohead?:2razz:

Anima said:

So, religious practice which does not demand human sacrifice has never killed a human being.

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Yeah, the religous practice of committing suicide with a bomb while in a crowded Isreali shopping mall has never killed anyone.

The religious practice of committing suicide by stealing an airplane full of passengers and flying them into a building filled with people has never killed anyone either.

:roll:

scourge99 said:

If you ask the average person who considers themselves a "Christian" about the basic tenants of their faith most people would have very different and often wrong answers. The average Joe isn;t a bad person but he is quite ignorant to such things.

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But is that "blind" faith? Or is it merely misinformed? More importantly, how can we be sure their view is incorrect?

scourge99 said:

It takes far too much time and effort (its inefficient) to become educated or educate the masses in such things whereas its easier to simply teach "do this" and "do that" rather than "do this because of X".

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Sunday schools and Bible study groups seem to me to contradict you on this. People do spend time at least attempting to become educated, and to educate others--with no doubt varying degrees of success.

scourge99 said:

If you re-read what I wrote I never claimed that ALL religions must have an afterlife. I used an example of a con of having no religion. But even Buddhism has an afterlife, per se. Nirvana, though it is non-existence is a claim to knowledge of what lies beyond this life I.E., an afterlife. Nearly all religions claim to know some details of what lies beyond death.

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You never made the explicit claim. However, your sole example pertained to the afterlife, thus implying the predicate. The significance of the predicate is that it inaccurately narrows the scope of religious belief and its significance to the individual. While what comes after death is of great importance to many, how one lives until death is for many a religious question of equal or greater importance.

scourge99 said:

Well feel free to argue that if you wish. I highly doubt intelligent rationale beings would find that "better" involves purposeful ignorance.

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"Ignorance is bliss". I will leave a judgment of the intelligence and rationality of the debaters to you.

scourge99 said:

I don't remember making this claim. How did you extrapolate that?

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From this:

scourge99 said:

Isn't that a good thing thus tipping the scales ever so slightly toward "no religion".

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How can the scales be tipped towards something not even feasible? My assertion has always been that religious belief of some form is intrinsic to the human condition. Religion--whether celebrated as moral guide or derided as voodoo and superstition--is one of the oldest and enduring aspects of human society and civilization; do we dismiss this as coincidence?

scourge99 said:

And we also do a lot of other stupid stuff too. What is "natural" is not always optimal. And in this case I find that the scales ever so slightly tip against what you would find as natural belief. Nonetheless you bring up a good point which I was trying to get at: that for many, some type of supernatural/superstitious/religious belief is longed for and thus a lack of such may be detrimental.

Yet we have innumerable examples of such beliefs causing human suffering and tragedy on extraordinary scales. Removing one more catalyst for such evil things would not solve the problem--there is no silver bullet for such a thing--but it would be a step toward a ideal world nonetheless.

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Yet there are also innumerable examples of beliefs working to alleviate human suffering: Mother Teresa, Damien de Veuster, Albert Schweitzer, Siddartha Gautama, Francis of Assissi, Mohandas "Mahatma" Ghandi, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., just to name a few. Is removing these definitive goods a worthy price to eradicate the putative evils?

Scarecrow Akhbar said:

The meaning the living give it.

That's all there's ever been.

The pyramids meant, to the living people who had it built, that their bodies would be preserved forever and their greatness remembered as long. To us they mean many things, not the least of which is the folly of government for wasting national treasure on such silliness.

The concept of "meaning" doesn't exist independently of living minds.

The invention of god served the purpose of creating a false permanence that satisfied their desires.

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agree, but I would have said desires and fears...
The unknown still scares people, even tho it has yet to hurt them...

celticlord said:

How can the scales be tipped towards something not even feasible? My assertion has always been that religious belief of some form is intrinsic to the human condition. Religion--whether celebrated as moral guide or derided as voodoo and superstition--is one of the oldest and enduring aspects of human society and civilization; do we dismiss this as coincidence?

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No. We recognize it for what it is, a conscious manifestation of subconscious instincts and desires that have no external validity.

There's no external evidence for the basis of the world's religions. God didn't make the world in seven days, evolution is an observed fact, Coyote isn't the "trickster", and there's no evidence for transmigration of souls, not when the personality is inextricably linked to the physical and chemical structure of the brain housing it.

But....the human mind is certainly well known for it's ability to believe things that aren't true to explain things that aren't clearly understood. That's were religion comes from.

The best world is the world were religion is recognized as a mental disorder and those suffering from it are provided with assistance to recover from it, not encouraged to practice it.

Scarecrow Akhbar said:

No. We recognize it for what it is, a conscious manifestation of subconscious instincts and desires that have no external validity.

There's no external evidence for the basis of the world's religions. God didn't make the world in seven days, evolution is an observed fact, Coyote isn't the "trickster", and there's no evidence for transmigration of souls, not when the personality is inextricably linked to the physical and chemical structure of the brain housing it.

But....the human mind is certainly well known for it's ability to believe things that aren't true to explain things that aren't clearly understood. That's were religion comes from.

The best world is the world were religion is recognized as a mental disorder and those suffering from it are provided with assistance to recover from it, not encouraged to practice it.

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Sounds...wow...sounds no better than nazism... Just replace "religion" with "conservativism", "capitalism", "judaism" etc. and, bang, atheist nazism.

Scarecrow Akhbar said:

No. We recognize it for what it is, a conscious manifestation of subconscious instincts and desires that have no external validity.

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This assertion is as much a statement of belief as the existence of the Creator Deity, and rests on as much empirical support.

Scarecrow Akhbar said:

There's no external evidence for the basis of the world's religions. God didn't make the world in seven days, evolution is an observed fact, Coyote isn't the "trickster", and there's no evidence for transmigration of souls, not when the personality is inextricably linked to the physical and chemical structure of the brain housing it.

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First, absence of proof is not proof of absence. In the particular phenomenon of religious belief, it necessarily exists in the absence of proof--hence the use of the word "faith".

Second, the Bible is not an historical document, nor does it necessarily contradict evolution. If one charts the progression of creation through the aforementioned seven days, one sees that there is no contradiction with evolutionary theory. The metaphorical creation myth of Genesis and Darwin are not necessarily in opposition to each other. Darwin neither proves nor disproves God.

Third, personality and "soul" are two different constructs: one an observed psychological phenomenon, the other a metaphysical construct whose import and even existence is a matter of debate among religious thinkers. Buddhism, for example, despite its assertion of rebirth, also asserts the doctrine of anatman--"no soul" in Sanskrit.

Scarecrow Akhbar said:

But....the human mind is certainly well known for it's ability to believe things that aren't true to explain things that aren't clearly understood. That's were religion comes from.

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Again, an assertion of belief.

Scarecrow Akhbar said:

The best world is the world were religion is recognized as a mental disorder and those suffering from it are provided with assistance to recover from it, not encouraged to practice it.

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I do not desire a world filled with recovering Catholics. I do not share your vision of what is "best".

DarkWizard12 said:

Sounds...wow...sounds no better than nazism... Just replace "religion" with "conservativism", "capitalism", "judaism" etc. and, bang, atheist nazism.

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It is worth noting that totalitarian regimes--most notably Stalinist Russia--have some history of using the rubric of mental disorder to marginalize and incarcerate their opponents.

celticlord said:

It is worth noting that totalitarian regimes--most notably Stalinist Russia--have some history of using the rubric of mental disorder to marginalize and incarcerate their opponents.

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That's true. Only problem is, if they are correct, then they need to justify how 75% of America and 30%(80% if you include all other religions beside christianity) of the entire world has, all of a sudden, a "mental disorder".