What is good about religion?

[rocketdodger]

Where and when??

You tell me. Find a single quote, phrase, parable, anything, just a single one, from any religious source, that tells you nothing more than "follow your heart." You won't be able to, because that is tantamount to saying "don't listen to me, listen to yourself," and that is something no religion can tolerate.

Seriously, you are really starting to look like Kleinman.

 

[articulett]

Well, I do not think that genocide is a good thing because it involves hurting people.

But your god, does, right?

Neither Jesus or God endorse "not hurting" people. So who taught you that morality. Surely not your religion? I don't recall "don't torture" or "don't commit pedophilia" as being commandments. So how do you know your god cares about these things. And what morality did you need your god to tell you. And why do you ignore all the people he tells you to kill--when it's okay and such?

Hitler killed the jews among other reasons because they were "jesus killers"-- of course they were only fulfilling god's twisted plan for blood atonement that makes no sense... and how can you kill anyone who lives forever anyhow. Who would trade a day and a half of suffering for eternal bliss anyhow? Your beliefs make no sense. Neither do your beliefs about your beliefs.

 

[rocketdodger]

They obviously got it wrong. You know, "Love your neighbour as yourself" does not equal kill him...

Therein lies the problem, JetLeg -- what defines "neighbor?"

The KKK do love each other, all nasty and sweaty white-like, because they are neighbors. But they don't consider their enemies neighbors. And I could be wrong, but the bible sets a mean example with some pretty shady techniques for dealing with "non-neighbors."

 

[scotth]

Therein lies the problem, JetLeg -- what defines "neighbor?"

The KKK do love each other, all nasty and sweaty white-like, because they are neighbors. But they don't consider their enemies neighbors. And I could be wrong, but the bible sets a mean example with some pretty shady techniques for dealing with "non-neighbors."

This cuts directly to the heart of the matter. The bible is clear, if they are not of your 'tribe', they are only good for killing and making slaves.

ETA: Crap, I left out raping.

 

[articulett]

Nope, I can't. This is a bit confusing.


But when reading the philosophy of someone, should you not give him at least the benefit of the doubt that he is not a lunatic?

Who are you to define such words as lunacy if taken literally. You're the one doing the god interpreting... don't you trust your god to say what he meant? How can you trust your interpretation when there are so many? Why wouldn't he literally mean to give your possessions away if life really WAS a test that determined how you'd spend your eternity. What's the harm? Why take chances with your eternity? It sounds like you have more faith in your own interpretations than the actual words in the book you feel sure was inspired by god.

Why would god write a books so easy to misinterpret? How do you know what stuff he meant and what was a parable or meant something else. What exactly have you determined to be the "lesson" in those words? What about the part where he says it's easier for a camel to go through the eye of the needle than to get into heaven. It seems that if you really believed, you'd donate your money to JREF (most of whose members may suffer forever after all) to ensure your blissful eternity. I think you don't really have that much faith in your beliefs.

 

[JetLeg]

Neither do your beliefs about your beliefs.

What do you mean by that?

 

[scotth]

Any references?

How about ANY decent history book? You can't possibly be that ignorant, can you?

 

[JetLeg]

I think you don't really have that much faith in your beliefs.

What do you mean by that statement?

 

[articulett]

Come on, be serious.

How can he/she be serious. You say totally goofy childish things. People really don't feel with their heart--they feel with their brain... even if they are imagining they are feeling with your heart. And you can't "feel" the truth or "will yourself" to believe silly things anymore that you can will your brain to be damaged or to undamage itself.

 

[Apology]

Come on, be serious.

I was just joking around. When I do have strong feelings about something, I tend to distrust my own feelings and will wait until they subside before I take action. There are so many feelings one can have, such as jealousy, etc., that can be entirely wrong.

I admit to having a personal peeve about the semantics of "feeling things" with my "heart" since I doubt that's where feelings come from. Please forgive my nitpicking.

 

[JetLeg]

Who are you to define such words as lunacy if taken literally. You're the one doing the god interpreting... don't you trust your god to say what he meant? How can you trust your interpretation when there are so many? Why wouldn't he literally mean to give your possessions away if life really WAS a test that determined how you'd spend your eternity. What's the harm? Why take chances with your eternity? It sounds like you have more faith in your own interpretations than the actual words in the book you feel sure was inspired by god.

Why would god write a books so easy to misinterpret? How do you know what stuff he meant and what was a parable or meant something else. What exactly have you determined to be the "lesson" in those words? What about the part where he says it's easier for a camel to go through the eye of the needle than to get into heaven. It seems that if you really believed, you'd donate your money to JREF (most of whose members may suffer forever after all) to ensure your blissful eternity. I think you don't really have that much faith in your beliefs.

I must agree that there is something about it. But I don't like it too much. These ideas drive me into fundamentalism.

I agree that there are some inconsistencies in being a liberal. But the only alternative seems indeed to donate all of the money (not neccessarily to the JREF), AND to think that genocide is ok - for the sake of consistency.

 

[articulett]

The big benefit to religion that I see in history is the extent to which it drove literacy, writing, and education. It isn't too much of an exaggeration to say that writing and literacy were primarily developed so that religions could keep track of sacred stories and rules, and pass them on to believers without having to recite them from memory repeatedly.

That isn't to say that writing was invented for that purpose, but that its the primary reason people actually *did* learn to read and write.

Yes, that is true. Our ability to evolve language and culture and texts and storytelling were enhanced by the notion that our salvation depended upon such-- It was necessary for the birth of culture, I suppose-- like teething or the terrible twos or the mercurial petulance of adolescence. If you had no childhood, you could not become a functioning adult (which is another reason Adam and Eve make no sense--what language would they speak and how could they tell god from a schizophrenic delusion... based on what education or knowledge?)

I concede that religion allowed us to pass on useful knowledge in primitive times via compelling stories.... useless knowledge too... but even useless knowledge helps language, culture, and society evolve so that information can accumulate and be refined through time.

 

[scotth]

I must agree that there is something about it. But I don't like it too much. These ideas drive me into fundamentalism.

I agree that there are some inconsistencies in being a liberal. But the only alternative seems indeed to donate all of the money (not neccessarily to the JREF), AND to think that genocide is ok - for the sake of consistency.

Or how about the (seemingly deliberately) excluded possibility that all religions are giant steaming piles of manure and should be tossed on the scrap heap of human infancy?

Please offer me one solid reason to think that the bible is anything other than fiction?

 

[JetLeg]

I was just joking around. When I do have strong feelings about something, I tend to distrust my own feelings and will wait until they subside before I take action. There are so many feelings one can have, such as jealousy, etc., that can be entirely wrong.

I admit to having a personal peeve about the semantics of "feeling things" with my "heart" since I doubt that's where feelings come from. Please forgive my nitpicking.

Actually, it was funny.

 

[articulett]

Maybe life is just designed this way that the thing we feel best about (god) is also true? God wanted us to have a gateway to him - our deep feelings about him & the bible.

And maybe you're spewing stuff that doesn't really mean anything because someone indoctrinated you and you had a deep feeling that made this verbiage seem "true and meaningful". Or maybe you just want it to be true and such.

Not everyone has deep feelings about the bible. Millions have similarly deep feelings about the Quoran. There seems to be as many beliefs, feelings, and interpretation of scriptures as there are people. Hence, the importance of using the facts that are the same for everyone to assimilate actual testable useful truths.

 

[articulett]

I must agree that there is something about it. But I don't like it too much. These ideas drive me into fundamentalism.

Yes, they've driven many to fundamentalism-- if faith is good; extreme faith is better.

They've also created so much cognitive dissonance that many people begin questioning the faith they've been afraid to question... and it comes crumbling down and real thinking starts taking place. It's scary... but way, way better than anything you've convinced yourself has come from faith.

 

[articulett]

And in North Korea, the primary reason anything even remotely good happens is for the glory of Kimmy boy. Does that mean the reign of that bastard is a good thing?

The gaping flaw in your argument is the assumption that those things would not have happened in the absence of religion, or even under different, nicer religions.

Yeah... but it's still something good about religion-- not a reason to prop it up or anything... a reason to say that it has done some good. We've moved beyond the need for such... we've outgrown such methods-- but it had some positive side effects. It was a virulent meme spreader, language spreader, cultural spreader--it spawned the first printing press and learning to read and write for the masses-- but
it's vestigial at this point in our history and should start fading out or becoming less virulent.

 

[shadron]

Okay, let's take part of his clip for consideration, shall we? Islam. You might think that he has nothing good to say about Islam, but actually he likes their symbol, because it gives him the opportunity to be a jackass about Christianity's symbol. And heheh...he likes the synchronized bowing; and gosh, radical Islam sure is dangerous, which is conclusive proof that ... all religion is dangerous, I guess? (that appears to me to be what he's saying; since his medium is "sarcastic humor" I have to extrapolate a little)

How about the point that religion is so negative in outlook and effect on civilization that the only things to feel positive about are the trivial? Seems like a serious, meaningful point to me; I would even argue a valid one. Condell is not attempting to prove his point in his video; an exhaustive proof would take much, much longer than youtube would likely stand for, but he is trying to get people to see it and perhaps, to think about it, which you at first refused to do, and then were cajoled into.

Non-religionists can be sneaky, you see.

 

[Irony]

Eh... No. The morality of the Nazis involved

hm... killing Jews?

That's a remarkably ignorant statement.

The Nazi's were big on teaching things like community service, patriotism, family values, animal rights, etc.

Most of the Nazi citizens had blinded themselves to the evils done in the name of their ideology and only noticed the positives, sort of like the devoutly religious.

 

[JetLeg]

They've also created so much cognitive dissonance that many people begin questioning the faith they've been afraid to question...

The way to solve the dissonance is by becoming an extremist.



The best way to follow the OT is to become an ultra-orthodox jew, I guess. Or perhaps a killer of disobidient sons. But I do not really want that. On the other hand, god's word is more important than my wishes.