Apology

[sinewav]

LOL this topic has been quite hilarious. Your arguing is for nothing. Most religions can neither be proven or disproven and God definitely can't be proven or disproven.

Just for fun i'll say what i believe. I believe in the almighty god Anu(just kidding)!

Actually, your comment about Anu actually says something about religion and God being proven or dis-proven. Religion is a cultural artifact and changes as culture changes. It's entirely possible for a culture to move completely away from a religion. And while that doesn't prove a religion to be false, it does make it useless. I think the same thing will probably happen to the God of the monotheistic traditions, possibly in just a few generations. No one can prove God exists just like you can't prove Thor or Apollo exists, but belief in God might become as useless as believing in Thor or Apollo. The base of human knowledge is growing at such an enormous rate that God is finding fewer and fewer places to hide, and theologians are relying on increasingly obscure ways of defining God.

In the past, belief in gods and religious practice was part of the way humans explained the world and interacted with it. But today we have better explanations and we can see how superstitious practices are generally hollow. Today, religion's main offering is comfort to those who have a hard time dealing with their own mortality. It's possible that humans will find better ways to deal with this fear in the future.

[erocat]

Kittens

[epsy]

This doesn't look like a kitten to me.

[Jonathan]

LOL this topic has been quite hilarious. Your arguing is for nothing. Most religions can neither be proven or disproven and God definitely can't be proven or disproven.

You should be more precise. A god in the broadest sense, one that's just overseeing physics without influencing anything, can't be proved or disproved. But then that's a god that doesn't have any meaning within this universe, and it isn't the kind of god people tend to worship. The gods that people do worship have claims associated with them that can be tested. The corresponding religions also have a history that invariably suggests it's made up. If there is a god, and it is the sort of god that religious people have in mind, it must be a very devious god to destroy the evidence.

[Titanoboa]

Wow, 7 pages. I don't have the energy to read all of it right now, but it seems to be mostly off-topic anyway ^^

I won't apologize for making this thread because I felt that I had to say it, but I can apologize for not thinking things through entirely before I posted as it happened quite impulsively.

Anyway, a series of things have happened to me and I'm trying to change my ways a lil' bit... We'll see how that works out. Probably still the same old confused titan in the end ;p

[Lucifer]

In the past, belief in gods and religious practice was part of the way humans explained the world and interacted with it. But today we have better explanations and we can see how superstitious practices are generally hollow. Today, religion's main offering is comfort to those who have a hard time dealing with their own mortality. It's possible that humans will find better ways to deal with this fear in the future.

Never gonna happen. Just look at how many atheists are into aroma therapy and homeopathic medicine. Superstitions will always abound. The human brain is wired to believe in crazy stuff. That's a constant. The variable is the crazy stuff that's believed.

[sinewav]

The variable is the crazy stuff that's believed.

True. Let's hope we at least move away from superstitions that are used to justify bigotry, maltreatment, and even murder. I think that's a real possibility.

[Lucifer]

The variable is the crazy stuff that's believed.

True. Let's hope we at least move away from superstitions that are used to justify bigotry, maltreatment, and even murder. I think that's a real possibility.

I think the trend favors eliminating most forms of bigotry and maltreatment, but I have a sneaking suspicion it'll never reach zero, even if the limit as t goes to infinity is 0.

[chrisd]

Probably still the same old confused titan in the end ;p

Ow.... poor titan.... I do hope you can get unconfused some day......

[sinewav]

I think the trend favors eliminating most forms of bigotry and maltreatment, but I have a sneaking suspicion it'll never reach zero, even if the limit as t goes to infinity is 0.

Yes. I think we can see enough improvement to say a culture wouldn't be popularly defined by a specific superstition and leave the small pockets of ignorance to more manageable cults. E.g. The United States has no official state religion but it's widely seen as extremely Christian compared to other developed countries (embarrassingly). This is in contrast to countries like Sweden where religious adherents are in the minority and most have no religion or simply have some vague belief in "something" but no formal practice.

It's kind of a neat area for research and I wish I had time to learn more and see some actual data.

[Word]

It's not like a mostly Christian population is necessarily bad (as long as the state is secular)...I find it remarkable that the Southern American states have such a low suicide rate (although I realize they have a poverty/crime problem we are partly responsible for).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_co ... icide_rate

[Jonathan]

Wow, 7 pages. I don't have the energy to read all of it right now, but it seems to be mostly off-topic anyway ^^

It's just first-order off-topicness, really.

@ sinewav & Lucifer: I actually got the impression that some degree of moral relativism leads to slow secularization. It's one thing to pull fellow near-atheists over the line and encourage coming out, in the process often offending believers in practice. It's quite another to influence an entire population. That requires respect from all sides before people feel free to go where they really want to.

[Lucifer]

@ sinewav & Lucifer: I actually got the impression that some degree of moral relativism leads to slow secularization. It's one thing to pull fellow near-atheists over the line and encourage coming out, in the process often offending believers in practice. It's quite another to influence an entire population. That requires respect from all sides before people feel free to go where they really want to.

Hmmm, interesting idea. Do keep in mind that the religious revival in the US is a 20th century phenomenon. Collateral damage from the Cold War, a lot of it. It goes back to Prohibition, though, sorta. Well, anyway, it started up seriously in the 30s as a backlash from the roaring 20s and in response to the Great Depression, and then the Nazi threat, and then the Cold War, etc.

[Jonathan]

Yeah. The US is quite fierce, and I can hardly speak for it. I'm not asking you to stop fighting. Just think about the fights you pick, what's really important to you, what you'll really accomplish. Maybe concede a little here and there if it can lead to a greater good, in the future if not now. Mutual acceptance or respectful disagreement is a good step and a goal of itself.

Addendedit: This age of the Internet is also an age where it's easy to find good information. There are those spewing crap and their followers, but overall it's leading in the right direction. Anyone open to it will be able to find it. That's less work for you. The Internet is really one of the greatest things ever.

[Lucifer]

Yeah. The US is quite fierce, and I can hardly speak for it. I'm not asking you to stop fighting. Just think about the fights you pick, what's really important to you, what you'll really accomplish. Maybe concede a little here and there if it can lead to a greater good, in the future if not now. Mutual acceptance or respectful disagreement is a good step and a goal of itself.

I know how it often looks from the outside, but in my experience, most of the atheist population only fights discrimination. Acceptance is basically a given. And most of the Christian population doesn't engage in discrimination, but resists changes to discrimination that's already institutionalized. Acceptance is still basically a given.

The hate crimes are from fringe groups, and the way to adjust the extremes on either side is to move the middle to a different place. It only needs to go far enough that the hate crimes stop and liberty is secured for all.