Religion IS crazy!

[Value Collector]

Suspicion confirmed!!!

Guilty, I wanted tink to learn something,... not because of the glowing reviews, but simply because i suspect she takes things at face value, rather than taking a sceptical approach. I wanted her to at least examine this one claim for herself.

 

[cynic]

Guilty, I wanted tink to learn something,... not because of the glowing reviews, but simply because i suspect she takes things at face value, rather than taking a sceptical approach. I wanted her to at least examine this one claim for herself.

Thanks for acknowledging that VC. Your transparency on this matter is much appreciated.

 

[DeepState]

1. You have too rosy a picture of organised religious institutions.

2. How is it "narrative fallacy" when religion were being used in just about all of these genocides? Is it not organised, institutionalised, religion being use as a tool of state? And doesn't that make it true that organised religion are often cruel?

1. Tell me, did you once live under circumstances where religious tension was so high that you carried a passport at all times even though you were 5yrs old and had a perpetual airline ticket to get out of the country within an hour if things turned ugly? Where your father carried a loaded pistol in his brief case so he could protect his family despite also being an officer in the armed forces that was supposed to defend us from harm? Do I have a rosy picture? No, actually, I do not. Yours is a narrow perspective capable of seeing only shades of black and white without the colour in between. Actually, forget about the white.

I am aware that there are many churches who do not preach war. I am related to many devout Christians, one of whom is an ordained minister who leads a congregation. Two are missionaries. I know Muslims who would rank amongst the most decent and upstanding people that I have had the privilege to ever meet. They actively try to limit the extreme elements that emerge from the Muslim population. I know Buddhists whose sole aim is to earn enough in Australia so they can do development work in Cambodia without imposing hardship on their families. I have met athiests who are the cruelest and meanest f@ckwits I have had the misfortune to come across.

I object to your bigotry. I think it is extremely ill-founded and quite ludicrous. YouTube....you are joking, except I know you are not.


2. If the underlying basis for conflict is ultimately racially based and arose from this, then the rest are tools. Context can be created through a range of factors. This includes religion. Because religion often lines up strongly with ethnicity, ethnic conflicts can be associated with religion. When you look at an event and explain it backwards so that the story fits, that is attaching a narration. When that narration incorrectly attributes ultimate causative effect, it is a fallacy. If race caused the conflict, and religion was a tool to cause foment, race was the cause. Often it is labeled as religion because it correlates. It is not the cause but may have given it a push along. Two tribes go to war, one are given Glocks by their leaders, the other Berretts. Do we call this a gun war? It is tribal warfare, fomented by the presence of guns. This happens all day long in the financial press. Pick up a paper.

I'm off this exchange.

 

[bellenuit]

What a sad story.

Struggling to Keep Afghan Girl Safe After a Mullah Is Accused of Rape

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/20/w...l-safe-after-a-mullah-is-accused-of-rape.html

 

[luutzu]

1. Tell me, did you once live under circumstances where religious tension was so high that you carried a passport at all times even though you were 5yrs old and had a perpetual airline ticket to get out of the country within an hour if things turned ugly? Where your father carried a loaded pistol in his brief case so he could protect his family despite also being an officer in the armed forces that was supposed to defend us from harm? Do I have a rosy picture? No, actually, I do not. Yours is a narrow perspective capable of seeing only shades of black and white without the colour in between. Actually, forget about the white.

I am aware that there are many churches who do not preach war. I am related to many devout Christians, one of whom is an ordained minister who leads a congregation. Two are missionaries. I know Muslims who would rank amongst the most decent and upstanding people that I have had the privilege to ever meet. They actively try to limit the extreme elements that emerge from the Muslim population. I know Buddhists whose sole aim is to earn enough in Australia so they can do development work in Cambodia without imposing hardship on their families. I have met athiests who are the cruelest and meanest f@ckwits I have had the misfortune to come across.

I object to your bigotry. I think it is extremely ill-founded and quite ludicrous. YouTube....you are joking, except I know you are not.


2. If the underlying basis for conflict is ultimately racially based and arose from this, then the rest are tools. Context can be created through a range of factors. This includes religion. Because religion often lines up strongly with ethnicity, ethnic conflicts can be associated with religion. When you look at an event and explain it backwards so that the story fits, that is attaching a narration. When that narration incorrectly attributes ultimate causative effect, it is a fallacy. If race caused the conflict, and religion was a tool to cause foment, race was the cause. Often it is labeled as religion because it correlates. It is not the cause but may have given it a push along. Two tribes go to war, one are given Glocks by their leaders, the other Berretts. Do we call this a gun war? It is tribal warfare, fomented by the presence of guns. This happens all day long in the financial press. Pick up a paper.

I'm off this exchange.

How am I a bigot again?

Did I ever say that Christains or Muslims or Jews or Atheists are automatically one way or another?

I thought we were on about institutionalised religion and it's uses and abuses from the beginning of history to now. Am I wrong to say that quite often, those organisations, are cruel and closed minded?

Galileo was locked up and his books banned for saying maybe the earth rotate around the sun, what a reception Darwins book got too.

You seriously think he Church wouldn't do what they think the Bible tells them to if the democratic govt let them? They'll lock the science witches and burn them at the stake for thinking god didn't create the earth. They'd stone women to death for wearing jeans or look at a man funny.... They'd stopped abortion, contraception, stem cell research... And to hell with the lives that would save.

I don't do those things, I just say it as I see it.

Like I said before, if religion bring you peace, and I think alot, if not all, people seek it for enlightenment... That is great. But to take religion to an extreme and interpret it literally and take all it's teachings to heart as an institution must, a person that does that will laugh at the idea that there is another god but his, will allow their daughters to be stoned to death for dishonouring the family somehow... A person like that ban and punish scientific curiosity.

You can say that that's a few bad apples, I don't think so. Those few bad apples are religious ppl taking things literally. Pope John Paul, I'm sure, meant no harm to the potential AIds victims, he simply banned condoms because it is a sin to his God... Just the consequences are not good for people who may otherwise still be with their family.

 

[cynic]

What a sad story.

Struggling to Keep Afghan Girl Safe After a Mullah Is Accused of Rape

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/20/w...l-safe-after-a-mullah-is-accused-of-rape.html

Indeed it is!

Sadder yet is the sickening glee certain individuals take when capitalising on such abhorrent events in the pursuance and promotion of their personal agenda/s.

Does this sentiment resonate with anyone?

 

[Value Collector]

Thanks for acknowledging that VC. Your transparency on this matter is much appreciated.

So are you going to provide the verse?

 

[burglar]

So are you going to provide the verse?

Here you stand, having chosen a rapier!

We are waiting with bated breath, for cynic to appear with light sabre in hand.



It's not going to happen! :

 

[cynic]

artist, apologies for the confusion. The impatient manner of my response was only intended for the direct recipient.

If by NT you mean New Testament then my answer is no, but rest assured that the book of Genesis wasn't originally expressed in written English.

The discourse commenced with my response to a post by DB, (Page 87, post #1727) and continued over subsequent pages where it was debated hotly. The last words I had to say on the matter at the time appear on page 89 (post #1774).

I think we would like you to post the exact bible verse, and then explain why you think they are talking about chromosomes.

That's been done on this thread already! Should you find yourself genuinely interested in receiving answers to your questions, please let me know. Until then stop wasting my time!

Did you post the exact wording of the verse? If so can you let me know which verse it was

If memory serves me correctly, Bellenuit was kind enough to supply the relevant verse during our earlier discourse on this matter.

Bellenuit's post #1738 if I'm typing correctly.

So are you going to provide the verse?

Rather than having to repeat the discourse, wouldn't it be much easier for you to read the posts commencing from #1727 on page 87 of this thread?

 

[SirRumpole]

Please answer this one question for me,

Please name one positive effect religion has, that can not be achieved in another way.

The positive effects of religion could have been achieved in some other way eventually, but the fact is that religion got in first.

Putting "the fear of God" into people was the beginning of today's systems of Law and Order, the Ten Commandments were guidelines for moral behaviour, Christianity brought down a brutal Roman Empire and turned it away from conquest. Of course there were inquisitions and Holy Wars along the way where people misinterpreted religion and used it for their own ends, but that has to be expected from the bunch of savages that the human race was at the time (and still is but to a lesser degree).

We don't know how the human race would have turned out if it wasn't for religion, but at least we have some sense of right and wrong and law and order. If you look at societies such as China and the pagan Communism existing there and ask yourself is that the way we should be going, what do you say ?

 

[Tink]

Another great post, Rumpole.

VC, you talk a lot of dribble, I have already told you I have had my own experiences.
I have seen cynic's post and I commented on it. I understand it and that is why I mentioned it.
Maybe you don't want to find it because it may make you question some things, or maybe you don't want to.
That is your choice.

Excellent post Retired Young too, well said.

As said,

As you can see there are many religions in here.

Militant atheists with their messiah, Richard Dawkins.

Come one and all, today we are going to stop the Pope coming in England.
Follow me.......

....and they all jumped up and down.

Interesting that they look at the religious but they don't look at themselves.

 

[FxTrader]

We don't know how the human race would have turned out if it wasn't for religion, but at least we have some sense of right and wrong and law and order. If you look at societies such as China and the pagan Communism existing there and ask yourself is that the way we should be going, what do you say ?

It's worth mentioning yet again that religion is not true because it's useful. Christianity is simply a fraud and a hoax in terms of its key tenets, saying that such a foundation is useful for controlling people's behaviour is an argument of means justifies ends. So then, even if such a deception were useful in helping to define a moral code for society, it's still a deception!

Christian's certainly have and deserve no monopoly on defining what is moral and the Bible itself is hardly the best guide we have on how to treat one another. This should be evident to even the most moderately literate believer.

 

[Tink]

Don't say its Communism. All we need are a few more episodes of what happened with Dawkins in England, and we would end up like China, stopping any religious figures entering our country.

That is atheism.

 

[SirRumpole]

It's worth mentioning yet again that religion is not true because it's useful. Christianity is simply a fraud and a hoax in terms of its key tenets, saying that such a foundation is useful for controlling people's behaviour is an argument of means justifies ends. So then, even if such a deception were useful in helping to define a moral code for society, it's still a deception!

Christian's certainly have and deserve no monopoly on defining what is moral and the Bible itself is hardly the best guide we have on how to treat one another. This should be evident to even the most moderately literate believer.

So you agree that religion is useful ? I suppose that's a start.

Religion filled a void that existed where nothing else inhibited crass human behaviour that showed no respect to anyone else but individual pleasure and self satisfaction. Without it we may still be living in societies that threw people to lions for the pleasure of the masses. Deception or not, religion played a part in the civilisation of the human race that cannot be denied.

 

[Value Collector]

The positive effects of religion could have been achieved in some other way

I agree,

but the fact is that religion got in first.

So did the Air ships, But the Hindenburg disaster showed they had a fatal flaw, hence we changed what we did.

the Ten Commandments were guidelines for moral behaviour,

The ten commandments is a pretty rubbish list to base your moral behaviour on, There is only a few of the commandments that are good, and those rules aren't owned by religion, they are basic moral rules that cultures from all around the world had and they pre date the ten commandments.

any rational group of moral people can write up a list that would be 10 times better than the ten commandments.

but at least we have some sense of right and wrong and law and order.

Right and Wrong doesn't come from religion, Religion has just hijacked the topic.

 

[SirRumpole]

Another week, another argument eh VC

I think you are just envious that religion spread further and faster than your "other sources of morality", which I notice you haven't bothered to state. Can you name any successful atheist states that respect human rights and freedoms and where you would prefer to live in than this hotbed of religious strife called Australia ?

 

[SirRumpole]

I agree,



So did the Air ships, But the Hindenburg disaster showed they had a fatal flaw, hence we changed what we did.

The fatal flaw was hydrogen, helium powered airships are coming back

The ten commandments is a pretty rubbish list to base your moral behaviour on, There is only a few of the commandments that are good, and those rules aren't owned by religion, they are basic moral rules that cultures from all around the world had and they pre date the ten commandments.

please specify

any rational group of moral people can write up a list that would be 10 times better than the ten commandments.

Thousands of years later people could do better. At the time you had to make it simple for people.

Right and Wrong doesn't come from religion, Religion has just hijacked the topic.

From whom ? Ancient Rome ? Nero, Caligula ?

 

[Value Collector]

Bellenuit's post #1738 if I'm typing correctly.




Rather than having to repeat the discourse, wouldn't it be much easier for you to read the posts commencing from #1727 on page 87 of this thread?

So your claim was that the bible talks about chromosomes, and since this knowledge was unknown at the time, its evidence that the bible contains revealed information.

But, In reality the bible doesn't say anything about chromosomes, your simply saying that a monk mistranslated the original text, and when the bible talks about making eve from a rib, it actually meant chromosomes. And your evidence for this is that when you remove a rib you have 23 ribs left, which is the same number of chromosomes passed to offspring.

If you can't see the confirmation bias this takes to believe, I don't think you can be helped.

 

[bunyip]

There are numerous examples of saying/doing things that are meant with the nicest and sincerest intentions but really mean nothing. When I'm at the checkout I often say - "Thankyou, I hope you have a great day". Whether or not the person has a great day will have nothing to do with my hoping, but if it is said warmly and with sincerity the person almost always responds positively and with a smile - and with a "you to."

On a day such as today, to criticise and belittle a comment such as "You are in our thoughts and prayers" is petty, weak and largely immature. Regardless of religious beliefs, most emotionally and intellectually mature people would look behind the comment to the compassionate, wholehearted and genuine message it conveyed. Surely Australian haven't become that detached from their religious heritage, that this comment can cause offense and consternation

Duckman

As always, Duckman, I’m interested in your comments even when I don’t agree with them. I’ll resist the temptation to respond by pointing out a number of your views and attitudes that I find weak and immature.

I never see comments, viewpoints or attitudes as weak and immature if they’re based on honesty and reality. And the reality is that prayers, however sincere and well-intentioned, would have been useless in lessening the grief and sorrow of the poor people who lost loved ones in the Malaysian Airlines tragedy.
Such prayers don’t offend me, as you’ve suggested – I simply question their value and wonder why people would waste their time praying in this sort of situation.

The sort of attitudes and views that I find weak and immature are those that are not based on honesty and reality, such as many of the views and attitudes of Muslims, Christians, and the Catholic Church in particular.

 

[Value Collector]

The fatal flaw was hydrogen, helium powered airships are coming back

Yes, and religions fatal flaw is taking things on faith. Nothing wrong with getting together in social groups, singing, helping each other, group charity.

But just like an airships hydrogen, adding faith in bronze age myths brings in some fatal flaws.

please specify

Have you read the ten commandments? If the list was really meant to be a moral code for humans to live by, they really didn't do a good job.

the first 4 don't say anything I consider a morality rule, they are actually a waste of space.

1, Thou shalt have no other gods before me

2, Thou shalt not make graven images

3, Thou shalt not take the lords name in vain

4, Remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy

Then after this we get into some things ok things, but all are common in cultures from around the world and all predate the bible

5, Honor thy father and thy mother

6, Thou shalt not kill

7, Thou shalt not commit adultery

8, Thou shalt not steal

9,Thou shalt not lie

and number 10 basically tells us not to want your neighbour's things, now I agree jealousy is bad, but these nothing wrong with looking at what others have and thinking that you would like stuff like that too.

10, Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, wife, slave, ox or donkey

Thousands of years later people could do better. At the time you had to make it simple for people.

there is lots of very simple ways to improve this list.