The God debate

[Icestorm2]

Also, warum ist ueberhabt etwas und nicht vielmehr nichts?

[Arntzen]

I guess I'll say my opinion on this matter. Was of course hoping for some more "deists" to join the discussion. And the one who did join didn't really answer any of the questions I gave him. Oh well let's go on.


What do I believe?
I believe there is no reason to believe in a God, any God. That includes Thor from Norse Mythology, The Flying Spaghetti Monster and the two most famous: God and Allah.
Reason for my belief:
There is just no data to support it. I'm not going to believe something because I "want to", or because it "feels right" or because many people believes it.


My view on Religion and religious people:
Almost everyone when discussing with someone of different belief starts with "I respect that you believe what you do but..". Well, I don't respect what people believe if they don't have data to support it.

Now, having a God and believing in him I have no problem with. But the second YOUR God starts telling you and others what to do, that's when I got a problem. It's really simple, the people who take orders from some guy they've never met, and have no idea if he exist or not, those people are in my opinion mentally insane.


Another problem with religious people is their cockiness. They "know" they are right. They have "proof" and if you don't believe them you're going to hell. Just look at herik and how he presented his links.

read this-
https://www.lds.org/ensign/1998/01/the- ... l?lang=eng
It is very long, but will explain Noah and the flood story, and why we speak different languages.

Some religious people even go seek out dieing people in hospitals trying to convince them to convert to their religion so they can go to their heaven. They are so cocky they even find this "morally acceptable" while I on the other hand would immediately call this abuse. Obviously not all religious people seek out dieing people, this was just an extreme example to show how far they can go in a civilized country.
Another example would be if you go on with more or less scientific questions to a religious guy like these: Why do you believe? What kind of proof do you have on Gods existence? Why do you praise a book when it's a minefield where priests have to be very careful what story they pick for it not to be about slavery or burning witches and wizards (doctors we call them today)?
Most peoples reaction is aggressive because apparently you're not allowed to ask "difficult" questions and if you do it's a disrespect to them and their religion. Yeah, maybe the last of those three questions were a bit loaded in a negative direction, but then again the answer to those first questions will 99,9% of the times be so ridiculous it almost forces a "loaded" follow up question. Which would be expected if you was asking about ANYTHING ELSE.


I think there is no doubt in anyone who's thinking freely that religion was made by men for power. I'm not saying there isn't a God, I'm saying there is no use what so ever for Churches and Mosque, Priests and Imams. Look around you, every city you go to in Europe as a huge Church "made" by some Saint. Where he got the resources to make the Church, and how many people died making it, is NEVER EVER mentioned in ANY tour around the Church. But, it's the first think that you're told if someone is talking about the Chinese Wall or the Pyramids. The difference tho, is that when Pyramids where made they were made by slaves because a selfish Pharaoh wanted it, where as a Church were made by some Saint who stole resources and forced people to make it threatening that if they didn't do what he said they would go to hell. He did this thinking it was morally right (many people today still agree with him), and this frightens me.

Many people think that religion today don't have much power, at least in European and North American countries. I strongly disagree. I remember very well the cartoon paintings of Mohammad, not only because it was close to home (Denmark), but also a newspaper in Norway posted it as well, so we could see Norwegian flags being burned next to Danish flags by Muslims in rage. That's one thing that worried me, but what's worrying me the most is the response EVERY COUNTRY'S NEWS STATIONS had. No one showed the paintings, "giving up" free speech because some God (there is no proof of exists) allegedly said it wasn't allowed to paint Mohammad. In other words, religion has power over one of the extremely important human rights I take very preciously. This made me offended.

Also, look at schools today. When I started in school here in Norway we had a class called "Christianity, Religion and Philosophy on life". Where as you can see by the name, Christianity was most important. When I got to Middle School, they changed the name of that class to "Morale and Ethics". This was a good step forward of course, but we still learned a ton about Christianity, and almost nothing on other religions. This class is one thing tho, what's scary is when I hear about the debates in USA where President Bush said both Creationism and Evolution should be taught in Science Class. As if Creationism had anything to do in such a class, ended up giving Bush a lot of votes because he was "open minded" from the religious voters.

Another point I would like to make is when I started in school, the first three, four years or so, I had the same teacher for almost every class. Which in it self is alright, but what's worrying me is that she was teaching mathematics saying 1+1=2 and the alphabet saying ABC, all of witch is true, but then switched over to CRPL Class and said (as if it was a fact) that God exists. My Brother who's in second grade (raised by two parents who don't believe in a God) came home one day from school and said he believed in God. That to me is nothing other than child abuse.


Social issues like if a woman is allowed to take abort or not, or who's allowed to adopt a child should not have anything to do with religion. The fact that two grown people have to be married to be able to adopt is just ridiculous.
When it comes to gay marriage, I got to say that if your religion don't allow it, I have no problem with it. It's not a human right to be married in whatever holy house you want. Tho I might add, that if your religion wants any chance of surviving stuff like this should be allowed.


Final thought:
I think religion does more harm than good. I think it's slowing down us as society and as humans. Our technology would definitely been greater, and we would have less wars. We would be more open minded and I think stuff like "being gay" would not exist. I think we wouldn't call it anything else than "being human". Religions label too much, and this causes conflicts.

[Captain Nemo]

Many people think that religion today don't have much power, at least in European and North American countries. I strongly disagree. I remember very well the cartoon paintings of Mohammad, not only because it was close to home (Denmark), but also a newspaper in Norway posted it as well, so we could see Norwegian flags being burned next to Danish flags by Muslims in rage. That's one thing that worried me, but what's worrying me the most is the response EVERY COUNTRY'S NEWS STATIONS had. No one showed the paintings, "giving up" free speech because some God (there is no proof of exists) allegedly said it wasn't allowed to paint Mohammad. In other words, religion has power over one of the extremely important human rights I take very preciously. This made me offended.

Maybe Norway sucks but every other major newspaper in Denmark reprinted the drawings in support to Jyllands-Posten, and news channels did in fact show the drawings aswell. Maybe it's more corrupt in Norway after all you're down on 7th in least corrupt countries

Also, look at schools today. When I started in school here in Norway we had a class called "Christianity, Religion and Philosophy on life". Where as you can see by the name, Christianity was most important. When I got to Middle School, they changed the name of that class to "Morale and Ethics". This was a good step forward of course, but we still learned a ton about Christianity, and almost nothing on other religions. This class is one thing tho, what's scary is when I hear about the debates in USA where President Bush said both Creationism and Evolution should be taught in Science Class. As if Creationism had anything to do in such a class, ended up giving Bush a lot of votes because he was "open minded" from the religious voters.

Our Christianity teacher in the small classes also tried to shove God down our throats and I realize now how wrong that was. However, it is not wrong to be taught about Christianity. Especially that religion because it's important to understand just how much our society has been built upon this religion. Even today when the most advanced countries have separated politics and religion (sry USA wtf is going on over there???), it's part of our history. It's also important to learn about other religions, mainly Islam because of the conflict and because so many Islamic immigrants come to our countries. It all must be taught in a non-preaching way though.

[Arntzen]

Maybe Norway sucks but every other major newspaper in Denmark reprinted the drawings in support to Jyllands-Posten, and news channels did in fact show the drawings aswell. Maybe it's more corrupt in Norway after all you're down on 7th in least corrupt countries

CNN, New Your times, BBC etc etc all had censor on the paintings. (psst: 1 Denmark 0 Rest of the world.) I wouldn't call it corrupt tho. More like we were pussies.

Our Christianity teacher in the small classes also tried to shove God down our throats and I realize now how wrong that was. However, it is not wrong to be taught about Christianity. Especially that religion because it's important to understand just how much our society has been built upon this religion. Even today when the most advanced countries have separated politics and religion (sry USA wtf is going on over there???), it's part of our history. It's also important to learn about other religions, mainly Islam because of the conflict and because so many Islamic immigrants come to our countries. It all must be taught in a non-preaching way though.

Teaching about religion is important, but should be done in a equal way. There should be NO WAY for a student to know what kind of religion the teacher has, exactly like when you learn about politics you shouldn't know which party your teacher is voting on.
And there is a big difference between saying "God exists", and later when learning about Islam the teacher saying "some people believe in Allah".

[P-51]

My view on Religion and religious people:
Almost everyone when discussing with someone of different belief starts with "I respect that you believe what you do but..". Well, I don't respect what people believe if they don't have data to support it.

Data is subjective. When one encounters something unexplainable, whether it be a feeling, experience, or event, it can be considered data if one chooses to interpret it in this way. Religion is personal, it is normal to not be able to understand why others feel religious But to not respect it is being just as bad as those who try to force their personal religion beliefs into other people's lives.

Now, having a God and believing in him I have no problem with. But the second YOUR God starts telling you and others what to do, that's when I got a problem. It's really simple, the people who take orders from some guy they've never met, and have no idea if he exist or not, those people are in my opinion mentally insane.

So then you should also have a problem with political officials telling you and others what to do.
This is a weak and inconsistent statement to use as opposition to religion.

Another problem with religious people is their cockiness. They "know" they are right. They have "proof" and if you don't believe them you're going to hell....wall of text

I know plenty of ignorant and arrogant atheists, probably even more than ignorant and arrogant religious people. Take the first quote of this post as an example of this.

Final thought:
I think religion does more harm than good. I think it's slowing down us as society and as humans. Our technology would definitely been greater, and we would have less wars. We would be more open minded and I think stuff like "being gay" would not exist. I think we wouldn't call it anything else than "being human". Religions label too much, and this causes conflicts.

Religion itself does not do harm. Only when it is abused as a form of political power, which is certainly much rarer in modern society. I would like to see you are someone write a good publication in an attempt to prove the rest of your statement. Because while I cannot disprove it, it is also not very logical.

People label too much, that's what we do. Religion has nothing to do with this, it is human nature.

[Omega]

Data is subjective.

No. Data are objective. You use a device to measure the temperature over a period of time, and you get temperature readings, and that's your data. There may be some uncertainty in the data, perhaps you're using a crude device that's only accurate to + or - 1 degree, and/or you're relying on a human to visually view and then record the data (possible source of error), but the data are still the data. Based on the known uncertainties associated with the data, the actual data, and the sample size, it's really easy to use statistics to figure out say, a 95% confidence interval for the mean temperature, or whatever kind of parameters you're interested in. As a note, data are plural, datum is singular, but no one talks about a single measurement, because that's utterly useless. Easiest way to spot native English speakers who don't have a science background (whether that be social science, or hard science

Or let's take a survey on attitudes regarding gun control. You give the survey to representative (of the population of interest, say adults in the USA who vote), and large enough sample, and you record their responses to the questions. It's a social science, so you have to be pretty careful about asking the questions in a way that doesn't introduce bias, and so on and so forth, but regardless, whatever the set of responses happens to be are your data. If your data are good data, meaning that you've got a good response rate, your sample is representative, and you have a large enough sample, you can do statistics again, and figure out whatever you want to figure out. Perhaps you want to perform a hypothesis test to see if more than 50% of the population favors stricter gun control laws? It's cake, and with the data, anyone who's taken a basic statistics course (or who has access to statistical software to make it easy) could do it.

If you have two reasonable people, they will agree on the data. Maybe one thinks the sampling procedure was a load of garbage and thus the data is unreliable, but that's a separate question. If people can't agree what the measurements are, one of them is obviously not a reasonable and rational person, or they're just horribly misinformed (in which case, they can be convinced should they be reasonable and rational).

When one encounters something unexplainable, whether it be a feeling, experience, or event, it can be considered data if one chooses to interpret it in this way.

When anyone with a science background speaks of data, they are speaking of reliable data, or at least data that's known to be reliable within a certain margin of error. You're talking about subjective experience, which isn't what they're talking about.

As for "unexplainable", that's the wrong word. You wanted to maybe use "unexplained".

Religion is personal, it is normal to not be able to understand why others feel religious But to not respect it is being just as bad as those who try to force their personal religion beliefs into other people's lives.

It's easy to understand why people are and religious if you know anything about human cognitive biases, or neuroscience.

Merely because someone possesses a belief does not mean it deserves respect. If I think it's OK to rape and murder your girlfriend, is that worthy of respect? Nope. Is it worthy if I make a cult out of it (a.k.a. a smaller religion)? Still, no. What if that cult gains a million followers, is it suddenly a respectable belief? I hope you say no. What about a billion? Two billion? Three? Maybe it's three billion AND there's a really old book that might say it's OK if you interpret it in a certain way?

You might respect my right to think that (see crazy example above), but you probably wouldn't even go that far, and you'd certainly tell me to fuck off, at the very least, if I started telling you how it was totally cool for anyone rape and murder your girlfriend because I had a divine revelation about it or something similar.

I know plenty of ignorant and arrogant atheists, probably even more than ignorant and arrogant religious people. Take the first quote of this post as an example of this.

I couldn't care less what atheists as a group think. It's a pretty silly classification anyway, because the only thing that all atheists share is a lack of belief in a god or gods. Most Buddhists are atheists, because they don't think the Buddha was a god. Raelians are atheists, too, and they're fucking off their rocker with the magic aliens bullshit.

You should more accurately have decided to make a statement about people who might describe themselves as material empirical rationalists, or any of the other similar labels that wholly encompasses the framework of material empirical rationalism, because those are the people you're trying to address.

Addressing the right group of people is important. Despite both agreeing the others are Christians only for surveys to make sure Christianity looks like the biggest religion in the world, and often denying it otherwise, it would be silly to start talking to some Protestant Christian about a Catholic doctrine they don't accept at all, and trying to bash them over the head with how silly that doctrine may or may not be. Similarly, it'd be crazy to try and address a Protestant who isn't a Calvinist and explain to them how fucked up, both rationally and morally, Calvinism must be as per it's own tenants/doctrine.

Religion itself does not do harm. Only when it is abused as a form of political power, which is certainly much rarer in modern society.

Inasmuch as religion is a framework of beliefs, and the beliefs of a person help to dictate their actions, of course religion does do harm.

Faith healers exist, and they convince people their cancer is cured and to stop accepting treatment because of it. They're scam artists of course, but it would NOT be possible without religion. If you think long and hard about this and can't come up with at least 100 more examples of how religion can be harmful when not exercised as a form of political power, then I'm not sure what to say. Maybe try thinking about how Islam, even non-political Islam, is harmful?

Plus, it's obvious that when religion is exercised politically, it must necessarily conform to the beliefs of that religion. Political Islam focuses on this Sharia law thing a lot, and I wonder if that might have something to do with it being a part of their religion? Political Islam also frequently focuses on killing all the Jews, and I wonder if that might have something to do with Islamic beliefs about the end times? (Hint, they both do, try reading the Quran)

I'm wondering if that Islamic dude is going to respond now that people are talking about Islam, hah.

Quran: http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/quran/index.htm
Bible: http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/
Book of Mormon: http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/BOM/index.htm

Go to one that you don't accept as being correct, have a look through, and see if the annotations aren't spot on. Then try for one you do accept (and if you don't like the translation they use, pull up another translation of your liking and see if the annotation doesn't still apply). Might be an interesting exercise for some of you.

I would like to see you are someone write a good publication in an attempt to prove the rest of your statement. Because while I cannot disprove it, it is also not very logical.

People label too much, that's what we do. Religion has nothing to do with this, it is human nature.

[/quote]

Religion slowing the progress of technology and knowledge: Obvious yes. Why do you think the so-called Dark Ages occurred? Why do you think the Library of Alexandria was destroyed? Why do you think that most stars have Arabic names, and why do you think our number system is known as Arabic numerals (Islam had a golden age of science and tolerance at one point in time... which... predictably ended due to, surprise, hardliners gaining popular support and power)?

Less Wars: Obviously yes. Find me a single war throughout human history which was not brought about by religious differences, or was not prolonged by the co-optation of religions differences to prolong and perpetuate the conflict by at least one if not both sides? You can't do it, because there are no examples of such a conflict in all of recorded human history.

People being more open minded on social issues: Obviously yes. There's a reason that people who oppose gay marriage like to cite passages from the Bible saying it's an abomination, and saying that gays should be killed (so they're super nice and tolerant by just not allowing them to marry). How about the role of women? Same deal, different period in history. Slaves? Same deal yet again, different period in history (there were opponents of slavery who were religious, obviously, and some claimed to be motivated by their religion to oppose it, but it's not like they were citing any of the Bible verses about it, because even Jesus implicitly and explicitly endorsed slavery, which you would have known if you read your Bible back to front).

---

Please note, saying that religion is bad is not the same as saying it's untrue, and one does not imply the other. They're both separate issues, although obviously if it's a core tenant of the religion that the religion is necessarily good and correct, and it's evidently not good and not correct on numerous things, the credibility of that religion for any believer of it, ought to decrease at least a little bit.

In a similar way, just because you have cancer and cancer is bad, doesn't mean you don't have cancer. Unless you're eC Dave.

[Fraktardo]

Religion causing wars is a joke.

People cause wars.

Religion is a convenient excuse. People aren't retards or scumbags because of religion, religion is just because of them.

Religion is even a good thing, for the few fools who believe and follow it. It tempers their instincts to commit evil because people only respond to rational incentives. So religion was invinted as a pretend arrangement to shape peoples behaviors, usually for the better.

The dumb shit and evil shit that is committed by people is not because of religion it is only because even religion isn't strong enough to reign in people's inate nature.

[eeralf_]

eeralf, do you still have that photo of yourself sleeping naked in an alley?

yes Ice, hahaha, u are real cool with a long time brain, i love it, bte: u have a FB name , lets friend, i try next post here that funny pic

[eeralf_]

Also, warum ist ueberhabt etwas und nicht vielmehr nichts?

u are maybe the only one who understand reli, hahahaha, its real easy and poor, not more

[Omega]

Religion causing wars is a joke.

People cause wars.

If it's a joke, it's not funny.

People do cause wars, but they cause them for reasons. That's right, people don't start wars unless they have some kind of compelling reason or motivation to start said wars. Beliefs those people hold *can* be a direct cause, or a contributory cause, of their actions, like say, starting a war.

Even the most rational reasons for starting a war come down to the belief state (but not necessarily regarding religious belief) of the persons making the decision to start said war, so you can't really say that beliefs can't be the cause of war.

How about the crusades, all 9 of them? Surely, religion had nothing to do with the motivation for those, right?

Or how about the conflict between Israel and Palestine? While there are socioeconomic reasons for the conflict as well, do you not think that it might be easier to say, find a compromise between the two parties if they weren't both under the illusion that the land is THEIRS, because God gave it to them? And in the case of Palestine, that goes doubly so due to Islamic beliefs concerning bringing about the end times, which incidentally involves genocide (that is, killing all the Jews).

Like really, have you people never learned anything about the history of religion, world history, or anything? Or do you just not think before you speak?

And before someone decides to go full retard, no one has stated that religion causes all or even most wars. Merely that it's a cause of some wars, and that a contributory factor to prolonging some wars.

[eeralf_]

man reli want war, cuz all mean have best reli, lol, its a war cuz no accepts any, but reli is fuck, its a regime manipulate, so all mean its ok, dan, all are silly, and sooooo on, grrr, why the brain so small of us insects

[eeralf_]

why do u believe?, cuz ur parents tell u a lie, and also u learn in school the lie, and also u learn in the world the lie, why u dont use ur brain for search the truth?
Ralf

[eeralf_]

why do u believe?, cuz ur parents tell u a lie, and also u learn in school the lie, and also u learn in the world the lie, why u dont use ur brain for search the truth?
Ralf

i have the aswer, lol, u are too lazy

[eeralf_]

ice here is damn, iam god???, lol no, a beer death, hahahaha

edit: 1982

ice i miss u come back here

[P-51]

Come on Omega you're smarter than that. Religion can be used as a cause of war, but there are always other purposes.

The idea that one would declare war simply to convert their enemy to their own religion is just as ridiculous as saying Lincoln declared war simply to abolish slavery.

People and their intentions start war. Religion may be manipulated to be used as justification for war, but religion itself is rarely, if ever, a cause.