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tonyrey
Guest
That’s an unusually weak response from you!
But you did agree that the teaching of Jesus was revolutionary.
I wonder why He had such extraordinary insight… (I don’t really!)
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But you did agree that the teaching of Jesus was revolutionary.
I wonder why He had such extraordinary insight… (I don’t really!)
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severntofall
Guest
He was one of many. Whenever I witness or read about a remarkable human I ussually don’t assume he must he a god. Must honest opinion (I’ll greant it could be 100% wrong) is that Paul was the source of most of the teaching creditied to Jesus. To me, Paul was a remarkable human who sought to modernize the sad faith of his fathers. The NT is filled with beauty, and yet it is somehow accociated with the monsterous tyrant of the OT: Yahweh. I believe Paul was attempting to undo that; however he knew that there were limits to how far he could push things (and he discovered those limits in Jerusalem). I believe that Marcionism was the result Paul ultimately sought. Again, just my opinion.That’s an unusually weak response from you!
But you did agree that the teaching of Jesus was revolutionary.
I wonder why He had such extraordinary insight… (I don’t really!)
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Charlemagne_II
Guest
severntofall
*I do believe that morality can be compaired to mathmatics when it comes to determining the nature of an action. Most if not all acts have evil and good effects, understanding which actions maximize good and minimize evil is could be considered the math of morality… *
Hmm. I wonder how we could sell a mathematical morality to the masses. Would we have to devise a calculus for sin, virtue, pleasure and pain? Sounds robotic. I like better the old fashioned love = heaven and hate = hell.
*I do believe that morality can be compaired to mathmatics when it comes to determining the nature of an action. Most if not all acts have evil and good effects, understanding which actions maximize good and minimize evil is could be considered the math of morality… *
Hmm. I wonder how we could sell a mathematical morality to the masses. Would we have to devise a calculus for sin, virtue, pleasure and pain? Sounds robotic. I like better the old fashioned love = heaven and hate = hell.
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Dameedna
Guest
We probably will end up with a “science” of morality. We already have ethics and a host of interesting mathematical formulas for logic.
We can probably even eventually find out the “why’s” of our moral desires(probably complicated but related to survival instinct).
Does it bother people to think that in the future, that can be a set of formuals that can be utilized to determine wether some-one will behave morally and a set of standards(mathematically) that can be used to determine what our moral code should be?
I think there is natural morality, which does exist…and then there is cultural morality which is learned.
Neither are bad or good as a whole, but are a result of human evolution and progression.
Anyway, I’ll read the thread now. Just wanted to respond first.
We can probably even eventually find out the “why’s” of our moral desires(probably complicated but related to survival instinct).
Does it bother people to think that in the future, that can be a set of formuals that can be utilized to determine wether some-one will behave morally and a set of standards(mathematically) that can be used to determine what our moral code should be?
I think there is natural morality, which does exist…and then there is cultural morality which is learned.
Neither are bad or good as a whole, but are a result of human evolution and progression.
Anyway, I’ll read the thread now. Just wanted to respond first.
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Dameedna
Guest
No. It will have to be a decision we make imo.
We can map out our behaviour and will continue to do so. We will make a decision about what is moral, then we will map out what constitutes moral behaviour and wether or not some-one can be.But the “decision” to invoke morality, will alway’s be subjective imo.
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Dameedna
Guest
There is no Authority. Neither God, nor science nor any human decision/group/culture/dictator hold such authority.
Whenever I see a question like this, I am reminded by the very wise and knowlegable John Shelby Spong, who says “Most humans turn to religion for security and comfort. They do not turn to religion to enter into the mystery that is life, that is love…and that is ultimately God”. That’s not a direct quote, but very close to what he say’s.
This is the kicker for so many religious people. If we do not have “God” as an authority, then we will become completely destructive. I believe that for many humans…I’d say at least 1/5 of us, without a belief in God…they would become exactly that. And I think those who ask these questions, are on the cusp of this group. This group is real and they will and can live their lives without conciensce.
Since God does not interfere in the majority of human “evil” it is not “God’s” actual authority that is making choices. It is the BELIEF in God and that people will be held accountable that curbs a large number of humans.
The big question for the athiest…the hardest question…should we encourage a lack of belief…or do we have more faith in humanity than we should have?
Was Nietchze right, in that christianity infantiles humanity by presuming humans cannot live without this authority…or is religion a necessary(evil), because as self-aware animals…the pain of our mortality and nihlism is too great…that we require religion to survive.
I simply do not know.And as an athiest, I’m no longer so militant or blind to religious devotion as a “cultural brainwashing phenomenom” to not consider the possibility we are better off with it, than without.
What I do know, is there is no authority that keeps us in line, but ourselves. Even…if it’s a simple belief…that a “choice” to follow God keeps us in line.
We are looking at a world filled with humans and their choices. Nothing, stops us from making them. No God, No Belief, No supernatural Authority.
It’s alway’s an interesting argument, but it usually boils down to some very simple ideas. Can humans survive without submitting to something bigger than themselves?
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liquidpele
Guest
Great points… I know what! Lets have an experiment! Some countries should be atheist and some religious, and some ultra-religious, and we’ll see which ones become destructive… Are there any countries that are actually mostly atheist though? My guess is that the nature of a society is not determined by it’s dominant religion though, but rather it’s social constructs determine how it’s religion is practiced.
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Charlemagne_II
Guest
dameedna
*But the “decision” to invoke morality, will alway’s be subjective imo. *
Then what will be the point of having laws and courtrooms if there is no objective criteria for right and wrong?
*But the “decision” to invoke morality, will alway’s be subjective imo. *
Then what will be the point of having laws and courtrooms if there is no objective criteria for right and wrong?
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Charlemagne_II
Guest
liquidpele
*
Are there any countries that are actually mostly atheist though? *
The former Soviet Union was and largely still is. The country that used to be East Germany still is. North Korea definitely is. People do not migrate into any of these places, and people have been trying to get out of them for a long time. Since Poland has got out from under the communist boot, it has been returning to its Catholic roots. The largely atheistic Mexican and Spanish governments back in the 30s tried to violently stamp out the Catholic Church. Fifteen Spanish bishops were executed.
To the best of my memory, I don’t recall any such large scale persecution of atheists by Christians. You figure out who takes the moral high ground over the last hundred years.
*
Are there any countries that are actually mostly atheist though? *
The former Soviet Union was and largely still is. The country that used to be East Germany still is. North Korea definitely is. People do not migrate into any of these places, and people have been trying to get out of them for a long time. Since Poland has got out from under the communist boot, it has been returning to its Catholic roots. The largely atheistic Mexican and Spanish governments back in the 30s tried to violently stamp out the Catholic Church. Fifteen Spanish bishops were executed.
To the best of my memory, I don’t recall any such large scale persecution of atheists by Christians. You figure out who takes the moral high ground over the last hundred years.
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Leela
Guest
Obviously we can’t actually do such an experiment, but according to the United Nations’ Human Development Report (2005), the most atheistic societies like Norway, Iceland, Australia, Canada, Sweden, Switzerland, Belgium, Japan, the Netherlands, Denmark, and the United Kingdom are actually the healthiest, as indicated by measures of life expectancy, adult literacy, per-capita income, educational attainment, gender equality, homicide rate, and infant mortality.
Conversely, the fifty nations now ranked lowest by the UN in terms of human development are unwaveringly religious.
We see the same sort of effect when we compare so-called red and blue states in the US and also when you break it down by counties. States or counties that are the most religious also have higher teen pregnancy rates and abortion rates.
Best,
Leela
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liquidpele
Guest
Sources? This one seems to disagree.
swivel.com/graphs/show/8244121
Also, lets not pretend that the inquisitions, witch hunts, crusades, and conquests over the years didn’t happen. Moral high ground indeed.
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Charlemagne_II
Guest
liquidpele
*Also, lets not pretend that the inquisitions, witch hunts, crusades, and conquests over the years didn’t happen. Moral high ground indeed. *
Oh, they happened for sure. But were never nearly so spectacular as the inquisitions, witch hunts, and conquests of atheists like Stalin, Hitler, and Mao … all in one century!
*Also, lets not pretend that the inquisitions, witch hunts, crusades, and conquests over the years didn’t happen. Moral high ground indeed. *
Oh, they happened for sure. But were never nearly so spectacular as the inquisitions, witch hunts, and conquests of atheists like Stalin, Hitler, and Mao … all in one century!
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Leela
Guest
It is very clear from both sets of examples that cults of personality and the rigid adherence to dogma that is not open to revision as new evidence and arguments become available is extremely dangerous. In other words, the problem with the regimes you cited is not that they weren’t religious enough, it is that they were too much like religions themselves.
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Charlemagne_II
Guest
Leela
*Conversely, the fifty nations now ranked lowest by the UN in terms of human development are unwaveringly religious. *
You want to see the undeveloped? Visit a few American prisons. Criminals don’t get into prison by loving God and obeying the commandments. They get into prison by getting as far away from God as they can get.
Sounds like the mission of most atheists?
*Conversely, the fifty nations now ranked lowest by the UN in terms of human development are unwaveringly religious. *
You want to see the undeveloped? Visit a few American prisons. Criminals don’t get into prison by loving God and obeying the commandments. They get into prison by getting as far away from God as they can get.
Sounds like the mission of most atheists?
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Leela
Guest
According to the Federal Bureau of Prisons, 0.21% of inmates were atheist. Can you guess which religion has the most prisoners?
The Federal Bureau of Prisons does have statistics on religious affiliations of inmates. The following are total number of inmates per religion category:
Catholic 29267 39.164%
Protestant 26162 35.008%
Muslim 5435 7.273%
American Indian 2408 3.222%
Nation 1734 2.320%
Rasta 1485 1.987%
Jewish 1325 1.773%
Church of Christ 1303 1.744%
Pentecostal 1093 1.463%
Moorish 1066 1.426%
Buddhist 882 1.180%
Jehovah Witness 665 0.890%
Adventist 621 0.831%
Orthodox 375 0.502%
Mormon 298 0.399%
Scientology 190 0.254%
Atheist 156 0.209%
Hindu 119 0.159%
Santeria 117 0.157%
Sikh 14 0.019%
Bahai 9 0.012%
Krishna 7 0.009%
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Charlemagne_II
Guest
Leela
Can you guess which religion has the most prisoners?
Can you guess when was the last time many of those Catholics or Protestants could be found in a church?
When a prisoner entrers prison, he gives the name of the denomination he was baptized in, not the name of the last church he went to (if ever).
As a prison ministry volunteer, I can tell you for a fact that very few prisoners in any prison attend chapel. That makes them atheist (without a God), no matter what religion they say they were born into.
Few people identify themselves as atheists upon entering prison because they don’t see it helping them at their parole hearing, just as hardly any atheist politicians would identfy themselves as atheists if they want to get elected.
If it’s religion that you think makes people criminals, you must think monasteries are the most evil places on earth.
adherents.com/misc/adh_prison.html
“A disproportionately high number of prisoners were not in any way practicing religionists prior to incarceration. That is, they exhibited none of the standard sociological measures of religiosity, such as regular prayer, scripture study, and attendance at worship services.”
Can you guess which religion has the most prisoners?
Can you guess when was the last time many of those Catholics or Protestants could be found in a church?
When a prisoner entrers prison, he gives the name of the denomination he was baptized in, not the name of the last church he went to (if ever).
As a prison ministry volunteer, I can tell you for a fact that very few prisoners in any prison attend chapel. That makes them atheist (without a God), no matter what religion they say they were born into.
Few people identify themselves as atheists upon entering prison because they don’t see it helping them at their parole hearing, just as hardly any atheist politicians would identfy themselves as atheists if they want to get elected.
If it’s religion that you think makes people criminals, you must think monasteries are the most evil places on earth.
adherents.com/misc/adh_prison.html
“A disproportionately high number of prisoners were not in any way practicing religionists prior to incarceration. That is, they exhibited none of the standard sociological measures of religiosity, such as regular prayer, scripture study, and attendance at worship services.”
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liquidpele
Guest
First off, being atheist means you think God does not exist. It does not mean that you just happen to reject God. Also, your argument smacks of the “No True Scottsman” fallacy.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_true_Scotsman
I will agree that the majority in prison are likely not practicing Christians though. However, I have a friend that got a degree in sociology from UGA that visited prisons on a few occasions, and that would disagree with you on their motivations for doing the things they did. I don’t have anything to cite offhand, but the gist is that people adjust to their environments, and there is a very high correlation between poor/high-crime areas and prison. Actually, I think there is an Eddie Murphy movie about it, not that that particular thing gives proof
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JDaniel
Guest
How old are you, dude? It seems that you are very young for you seem to know very little about who the major mass-murderers were in the history of the world. Have you ever heard of Communism, or Communist Russia and its other Communist States? Well, although the government could not completely eradicate religion from among the peasants, the government did a very good job of eliminating it from the ranks of the government officials and the soldiers. Here’s some numbers that might be of interest to you:
Atheistic communism: about 170 million killed.
hawaii.edu/powerkills/COM.ART.HTM
Have you ever heard of Communist China? The Number Two contender for the world championship of mass murderers by country. They, too, compelled their people and their soldiers to eliminate religion among their ranks.
Atheistic China: about 35 million killed.
Have you ever heard of Hitler’s atheistic Germany? The Number Three contender? About: 20 million killed.
Number Four is the Nationalist Chinese government of Chiang Kai-shek. They killed about 10 million.
Number Five is Japan, for about 6 million during WWII.
All of these had pretty much one thing in common: they were vehemently anti- Christian, anti-Muslim, and anti-Jew. And, these deaths were not sudden and painless; most were torturous and anguishing.
Compare them to the historical reality of Christianity, Judaism, or, even Islam. The number of deaths from the latter groups of people pale in comparison to the non-theist organized death history. R.J. Rummel says,
"But communists could not be wrong. After all, their knowledge was scientific, based on historical materialism, an understanding of the dialectical process in nature and human society, and a materialist (and thus realistic) view of nature. Marx has shown empirically where society has been and why, and he and his interpreters proved that it was destined for a communist end."
You really need to do more reading; no offense.
jd
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liquidpele
Guest
… Stalin I will give you. Hitler was not atheist in public, and had support of the Catholic Church:
nobeliefs.com/nazis.htm
Both China and Japan viewed their leaders as immortal… it was not religion in the classical sense, but they were worshiped as partly God.
Even with stalin though, the issue becomes politics and the cult of personality ( en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cult_of_personality ) and not so much the fact that they were atheists. Also, comparing the # of those dead is a little misleading, since the world population skyrocketed after the church lost most of it’s power and the ability to kill so many then became possible as well (can you imagine trying to kill that many with swords?). The interesting thing to me is that after the church lost power is when the governments started doing all the evil stuff… interesting that whoever is in power, whether the church or not, is causing the horror isn’t it? Almost as if the religion isn’t the cause or the solution.
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JDaniel
Guest
Can you guess which religion has proportionately more adherents? About 1.6 billion Catholics; about 200 million atheists. I’d be way more than willing to bet you that the vast majority of Catholics in prison populations are not practicing Catholics, and probably haven’t been for many, many years. I’d bet they are much more aligned to practicing atheists, or agnostics. Even Hitler was a fallen-away Catholic.
Try comparing this bunch of crud to the numbers killed by mass-murdering atheistic regimes just in the 20th century.
jd
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