ProgrammingGodJordan
Banned
Regardless, religion contrasts science, and so, it should be purged from this planet.
Moderated Is belief itself dangerous for your brain? (A rethink is in order)
- Thread starter ProgrammingGodJordan
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Regardless, religion contrasts science, and so, it should be purged from this planet.
The whole idea of a god in the gaps is that there is no evidence against him/her. When evidence crops up, the god retreats to the remaining gaps. No evidence is ignored.
The Norseman
Meandering fecklessly
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Okay, well, sounds incredibly nit-picky to me; I would presume the god-botherer would have to first recognize at some level the evidence against their god for that particular area and therefore the god is molded to slither around that evidence. The evidence doesn't go away then, does it? The god-botherer must therefore ignore it.
But, I'm not sure why we're arguing because it seems to me we both essentially agree, unless I'm missing something.
Aridas
Crazy Little Green Dragon
I accept that that's your opinion, though it's entirely tangential to what you were responding to. I even agree that there are many cases where religion is distinctly harmful overall, and very likely should be purged... but that the basis for the purge would be because it is distinctly harmful overall and distinctly worse than the alternatives.
However, it would be utterly foolish to agree that anything that is strikingly different (you chose to use "contrasts," after all) than science should be purged, just because it is strikingly different than science. Replacing all religion, harmful or not, with an intolerant religion that worships science over critical thinking and logic isn't actually that much of a step forward. And yes, it would be definitely be such a religion if the current religions were to be purged simply because they are strikingly different from science.
Chanakya
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You’ve mixed up the telephone lines there, JayUtah! In my post that you quote, it was PGJ I was addressing, not you. I’d quoted your post there (which PGJ had been replying to) as context for PGJ’s reply, to highlight the absurdity of his word games.
PGJ’s line of reasoning, as regards word meanings, is interesting. Taking two different words, mining synonyms to find similar-sounding synonyms for those two different words, and using that to arrive at a position that the two original words themselves are synonyms: that is patently absurd.
In fact, like I mentioned in my comment, there is a children’s game that is similar to this : where you try to “prove” that two wholly dissimilar objects are similar. (Like : your friend XYZ has legs, and tables have legs, so your friend XYZ = table ; a table’s made of wood, wood comes from trees, fruit come from trees, so a table comes from trees ; and since your friend = table, therefore your friend XYZ is a fruit. And so on and on, as far as childish fancy and childish logic can take you.)
You’re right, that’s not how logic works. Not even children, playing at this game, would actually believe that their friend is actually a fruit. Not even children would reason in this manner. But amazingly, PGJ apparently does.
Especially in this second part of your post, I’m afraid you’ve been responding without first understanding what it is you were replying to, or perhaps without taking the time at all to read the original comment (which had been short enough) fully! No problem, I don’t mind, prolonged exposure to PGJ’s thought processes may well have that effect! We entertain ourselves with this amazing thread and indulge it by giving it our attention, but it seems we do that at our own peril!
This whole conversation, this whole thread, is not really a serious discussion, just a joke that has probably gone on too long to even be funny any more, and what one says here probably does not really matter at all one way or the other. But still, just to clarify :
If you go back and re-read my post, you’ll find that in this case I’d been responding to PGJ’s use of the table with those statistics, which shows that an overwhelmingly large number of people are believers in some religion or the other.
In the first part of my comment, you were (indirectly) involved since it was in response to you that PGJ unleashed his amazing synonym-logic (to which I’d responded). To this second part of my original response, where I quote PGJ’s table, you are nowhere in the picture, at all.
I was, basically, trying to point out to PGJ (God knows why I was doing that, since we all know by now that it isn’t possible to point anything out to him), by use of the Pastafarianism reference (and further by pointing him to Abaddon’s comment), that not everyone who ticks a particular religion box in a census form actually believes in that religion. It is often just a cultural thing, or simply a matter of not caring enough to correct an inherited label despite that label no longer really applying, or perhaps in some cases a pretend-conformity to protect oneself and protect one’s interests, etc. While the numbers of religious believers are still alarmingly large, they are probably nowhere as huge as that table of PGJ’s seems to indicate.
Chanakya
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You’re right, alarmingly large numbers of people still believe in religious tenets. However, I was trying to point out to you by using that Pastafarianism reference as shortcut (and also by referring you to Abaddon’s more detailed comment) that the numbers of believers in religions are probably nowhere as large as your table indicates. That is because people often tick census forms simply because they look on their particular religion as tradition, not something they actually believe in ; or because they are simply wholly apatheistic and don’t care about this issue at all, not even enough to change their inherited labels. Add to this the fact that in totalitarian theocratic countries, there are plenty who self-describe as belonging to certain religions only to ensure their safety or otherwise protect their interests, and you’ll see why that table of yours becomes practically meaningless by itself.
Your question, as you pose it, is a bit difficult to follow. (Like almost everything you say.) Some people believe in religions (although probably far less than your table indicates), while some don’t. Even those who don’t believe in religions per se sometimes believe in other kinds of “nonsense”. That’s obvious, isn’t it? So obvious and so trivial that it hardly bears mentioning? No, sorry, what you’re asking there isn’t clear enough for me to formulate a meaningful answer.
But in case you’re wondering (and like I said, I can’t really make out your intent clearly from the way your question is worded), no, I’m most certainly not in your particular camp. That camp is probably just a solitary space, a decidedly weird space, a space occupied by the one single person who set it up in the first place and who seems unable to move out of there despite the help from many kindly souls on here.
About your creative use of the thesaurus, which I’d commented on in my post (part of which you’ve quoted here) : Your poor English would normally not matter at all. In fact, not only would it normally be irrelevant, I personally would normally consider it very poor form to comment at all on your lack of language skills, and in even poorer taste to joke about it. However, language can affect how we think, and that is probably at the root of your particular errors in reasoning, which is what makes this relevant in this specific instance. Synonyms don’t work the way you think they do. Check out the children’s game I refer to in my comment and which I describe in more detail in my post addressed to JayUtah just now, immediately preceding : you’re using word meanings and synonyms exactly like children do in that game! (And going one step farther than those children would, you’re actually arriving at conclusions based on this asinine parody of logic, conclusions that you then try your very best to defend.) I think you keep on saying what you do about beliefs and science because you don’t seem to understand what “belief” means and what ‘science” means. To repeat that absurdly trivial point that has been pointed out so often by so many people on this thread : “Belief” encompasses both rational belief and irrational belief (and also, along a slightly different tack, correct beliefs and incorrect beliefs) ; and “science” is a method, a way of finding out how the real world works, it does not refer to the underlying reality that science studies (except, perhaps, colloquially and contextually, as in that Neil Tyson quote you use so often -- a usage that you unthinkingly latch on to out of context).
I mistook you for PGJ. We may be essentially in agreement, although I do not really see it right now. But that is OK. I am not going to press the point.
ProgrammingGodJordan
Banned
Simply one not worship science.
Science is thus far, mankind's best tool.
Albeit, it is unavoidable that religion need be purged.
ProgrammingGodJordan
Banned
Quote=Aridas]
...some intolerable religion that worships science....
[/quote]
Aridas, you need to get out of that state of mind.
That religion should be purged, doesn't necessitate that one need worship critical thinking/scientific methodology.
Must we require something to worship at all?
...some intolerable religion that worships science....
[/quote]
Aridas, you need to get out of that state of mind.
That religion should be purged, doesn't necessitate that one need worship critical thinking/scientific methodology.
Must we require something to worship at all?
Thermal
August Member
An interesting thought. Why? Religion does not so much contrast science, so much as runs off at a different angle.
I have found that any town I work in, in any state, will have churches in them where I can generally find people of good will. There are exceptions of course, but I know of very few secular organizations that so willingly offer help to a stranger knocking on the door, and in any town as well. Also anecdotally, my late grandfather was a minister, and spent the better part of his life serving God and doing His work as he believed he should. He helped countless addicts and the homeless in the Atlantic City, NJ USA area to get back on their feet. He did this in the name of his religion and service to God. So I ask you: why should religion be purged if it can do demonstrable good? Yes, we all know of times when bad things are done in the name of religion, but conversely, bad things are done by any grouping and none suggest purging them. Hell, humans do bad things sometimes, so should all humans be purged? (preemptively addressing the lame-o argument that some religious do bad things, thusly (drink!) all should rot in Hell)
ProgrammingGodJordan
Banned
Regardless, many a theist demonstrably believe in nonsense, and unavoidably, they ignore evidence.
ProgrammingGodJordan
Banned
Not my opinion, evidence shows this. (evidence)
Evidence persists regardless of my existence.
FOOTNOTE:
That religion is to be purged, doesn't suddenly warrant that science is to be worshiped (in the manner that deities or religious elements are worshiped).
Get out of that state of being.
Must we all worship something (as theists do)?
BStrong
Penultimate Amazing
That you filter through your pov, just like anyone else.
That does not in any way exclude the possibility that your point of view may be based on a misunderstanding of or misinterpretation of evidence, or that your particular confirmation biases lead you to make determinations that only support the conclusion you're fixated on.
I believe it has been well demonstrated in this thread wrt your inability to accept that the cherry picked selections you've cited are out of context at best, and deliberate misrepresentations at worst.
gigmaster
Scholar
That is quite true, but "many a theist" does not warrant your sweeping condemnation of all theists. That has been our point for many pages now.
Aridas
Crazy Little Green Dragon
This is not formulated well enough to determine your intent.
For a number of purposes. Tools, as a general rule, are not good for all purposes, though.
This conclusion is untenable.
Aridas
Crazy Little Green Dragon
Ahh. I missed including this in my initial response, but I firmly object to this made up quote, both on the basis that it's not actually my words and the basis that "some intolerable religion that worships science" means something notably different and more value based than the easily demonstrable fact that it would be the act of an intolerant religion if the current religions were being purged simply because they are significantly different than science, rather than for reasons like because they are more harmful than the other available options. The very attempt to do such for such a reason would, in fact, be the defining feature of an intolerant religion, no less. Without more information, though, "intolerable" is far from necessarily the case.
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Aridas
Crazy Little Green Dragon
Now that I'm back, I think I'll try resubmitting a response to some of the rest here.
Indeed, the claim that religion should be purged does not mean that either critical thinking and scientific methodology would need to be worshipped. I also didn't claim that it did, though, which makes your response here quite absent of value. Rather, the reasoning that you put forth for why religion should be purged is the reasoning of an intolerant religion and the logic being employed is actively hostile to both critical thinking and scientific methodology.
There is is certainly something very, very important to be seen here. Nothing in that article opposes anything that I actually said. Thus, your attempted use of it can only be indicative of errors made by you.
Indeed, the claim that religion should be purged does not mean that either critical thinking and scientific methodology would need to be worshipped. I also didn't claim that it did, though, which makes your response here quite absent of value. Rather, the reasoning that you put forth for why religion should be purged is the reasoning of an intolerant religion and the logic being employed is actively hostile to both critical thinking and scientific methodology.
There is is certainly something very, very important to be seen here. Nothing in that article opposes anything that I actually said. Thus, your attempted use of it can only be indicative of errors made by you.
ProgrammingGodJordan
Banned
I need not distort any data.
It is unavoidable that belief generally facilitates that one ignores evidence.
Such is the case, whether or not I am alive.
ProgrammingGodJordan
Banned