The God Delusion

[Nalano]

Actually I haven't.

Actually, you have. You quoted something Shane said but labeled it as something I said.

[soldant]

Actually, you have. You quoted something Shane said but labeled it as something I said.

How the hell... okay, I swear I clicked the Multi-Quote button. I plead technological failures and blame RPS.

(But seriously the only time I manually add names to the quote tag is when quoting from external sources, I have no idea how this happened)

[Xercies]

I think Religion is humanity, it can be nice, ugly, and force people to do what higher up people want them to do. Do you really think we would not have those things if they dissapeared. Do you really think people would not have a problem with gays if religion was gone, Condoms, Abortion? No!

I like that people say Religion caused lots of wars, those wars would have been fought without religion we would of just made another excuse(and frankly even back then religion was the second excuse for going to war not the first).

If we didn't have religion we wouldn't of had the lovely comedy show called Rev and frankly I couldn't live in that type of world.

[Theblazeuk]

I don't think people would have a problem with condoms if religion was gone, unless it was some kind of allergic reaction/macho bullshit/personal preference (lets be honest its much better without). Religion doesn't cause wars, it excuses them and fuels their worst excesses and prevents them from ever being resolved. You can say the same of any ideological viewpoint, the real issue is that religion isn't based on an interpretation of events but an entirely fictional narrative of universal truths that remain forever untestable.

Anyway in short the only thing that really mattered to me about Dawkins book was the single, simple, central point.

"None of that stuff is real. If you think it is, why can't you prove it? And seriously, don't get so worked up when I ask you to prove it if you're going to claim a metaphysical justification for what amounts to your opinion."

One thing that hadn't really occured to me before I read the God Delusion was how the agnostic/secular reluctance to challenge religion based on all the nice, moderate things that good people do in the name of religion really does support the worst excesses of the horrible people. Both are using the exact same logic and often the same belief system, simply to different ends. By insisting that we respect one fiction we really leave no grounds for objecting to somebody else's fiction - it doesn't matter that we have the standard disclaimer of 'as long as it doesn't hurt anyone'. That's a secular idea that has no bearing on the very different reality inhabited by the faithful, whose moral and existential mandate cannot be constrained by such an idea; if there is a God and he wants you to hurt someone, that's what you should do. That is the right thing to do as far as you're concerned.

Luckily in the real world you meet very few religious people who actually adhere to everything they say. Certainly most people in my age group (20s + lower) seem to have a very new-age hodgepodge of spirtitual ideas even where they self-identify as a specific demonination. All well and good, utterly ridiculous when you consider the basic premise of this being in anyway connected to the material universe outside of their skulls.


I love religion, myth, fable, rituals and all that - but they're just stories.

[Theblazeuk]

I hate Dawkins. He's just out to be a dickhead. I'm an atheist but his offensive message is just as bad as the offensive extremists. .

Yeah, remember when Dawkins firebombed that church or said that all religious people deserved to be burned alive and tortured forever. Diddums.

Pretty sure The Pope didn't start WW2 tbh.

I'm pretty sure we're all pretty sure about that, but its a bit of a non-sequitur really.

[soldant]

Yeah, remember when Dawkins firebombed that church or said that all religious people deserved to be burned alive and tortured forever. Diddums.

You know, you don't have to be a holy insurgent firebombing churches to be an extremist...

[Lukasz]

It's kinda funny watching the militant evangelicals decide whether they hate the Black man or the Mormon the most.

(Hint: It's the Black man)

I am more shocked for seeing that almost 50% of Americans wouldn't choose an atheist as president. that is fucking scary.

[Shane]

I think Religion is humanity, it can be nice, ugly, and force people to do what higher up people want them to do. Do you really think we would not have those things if they dissapeared. Do you really think people would not have a problem with gays if religion was gone, Condoms, Abortion? No!
If we didn't have religion we wouldn't of had the lovely comedy show called Rev and frankly I couldn't live in that type of world.

Religion is ignorance. Religion is dogma and bigotry and intolerance. Yes, I agree that people will be cunts with or without religion but if destroying religion gives people one less an excuse to pull shit like this, I am all for it.

I am more shocked for seeing that almost 50% of Americans wouldn't choose an atheist as president. that is fucking scary.

I wonder what the percentage would be were he homosexual, transgender... or a muslim.

[Xune]

This brings back memories of a recent RSA talk about religion for athiests. The jist of it was, could you remove the religiosity from religous practices and have them be productive? Interesting stuff.



http://www.thersa.org/events/audio-a...n-for-atheists

[Berzee]

If I want to be told that my beliefs are pitiable and will possibly drive me insane (as we all want, sometimes), I have a big stack of G.K. Chesterton books left to read about how I really had ought to be Roman Catholic instead of Protestant. These books are sure to be full of amusing pleasantries, rambling good-natured philosophizing, ideas which are novel to me, and things I wish to quote on facebook.

Dawkins seems unlikely to provide these little extra luxuries which are so desirable for making the experience of a one-way beliefs-criticism more comfortable; I could be wrong, as all I have ever heard of him are some lil' quotes, but the same was once true of most of my favorite authors until their lil' quotes induced me to read bigger ones.

Therefore I think it will be a very, very long time before I get around to having read anything like that, unless he begins to display more cheerful good humor. (In other words I'm just echoing the common complain that in some few most infamous of his books he is reputed to be mean, but I don't complain that it affects the validity of what he says; it only affects my eagerness to seek him out. =P)

On the other hand maybe I shouldn't listen to rumors. On a third hand, offered from somewhere offscreen, I am in a thread dedicated at least originally to discussing his terribleness, so what am I doing here anyway if I haven't read the book? o_O

[Shane]

Yea, I'm totally not reading any of this stuff unless it comes with unicorn stickers and pull out drawings of cuddly little Scottish men doing pirouettes.

[Kaira-]

Oh boy religion threads, nothing good can come out of these.

Much like religions themselves. DING! I'll get me coat.

[Berzee]

Yea, I'm totally not reading any of this stuff unless it comes with unicorn stickers and pull out drawings of cuddly little Scottish men doing pirouettes.

I'm just sayin', unicorn stickers can give you that critical edge in the battle for my attentiveness.

[Bobtree]

I make an effort not to use religious phrases when I can avoid them, particularly when swearing. It is virtually impossible not to let one slip by now and then. They're just so deeply wired into our language.

Atheists regularly poll as the least trusted "group" (below rapists for example). Superstition of course is perfectly trustworthy. When reminded that there are other (lesser) authorities in life however, the atheists poll a bit more trustable. Funny that.

I very highly recommend reading "The Invisible Gorilla: And Other Ways Out Intuition Deceives Us." It is about the ways our intuitions about how our own brains work are generally misleading. Excellent book.

[Xercies]

Religion is ignorance. Religion is dogma and bigotry and intolerance. Yes, I agree that people will be cunts with or without religion but if destroying religion gives people one less an excuse to pull shit like

this

, I am all for it.

We will always have an excuse to be horrible to our fellow men and kill people we think our others. There have been many massacres of certain people that haven't really been excused by religion, they just didn't like those people. Its just humanity.

[The Mechanical Aggressor]

The second thing that Dawkins does that bothers me is he completely disregards the positive aspects of religion. Now I'm not going to defend it at all as societal force, I think no doubt, you look at history you look at modern day society and religion is little more than a justification for the most heinous activities. What religion has done during the Crusades, or the conquest of the Americas, to AIDS work in Africa, child abuse here in Ireland, what's currently going on in the US for LGBT rights, it's despicable and I'm not going to stand by any of that.

Religious belief has, and does, provide opportunities for wonderful and positive things. There're a whole range of activities we do, from charities to pilgrimages to rituals to artworks, that are fascinating and worthwhile and central to our nature, but Dawkins rubbishes them all as inconsequential.

Religion is useless at best and incredibly harmful at worst. Espousing the “positive aspects of religion” is like congratulating a serial killer for not also being a rapist.
Every positive thing done by religion could be achieved through secular means, without all the negative aspects.

However, to think it's something humanity needs to shake off is naive. Not only can we not - it's a part of us. You may as well say we should shake off our sexual jealousy - but we shouldn't try to.

Speak for yourself. Religion may be part of you, but it's not part of me. I prefer evidence and reason to wishful thinking and blind belief.

I find that so disrespectful, so obnoxious, and so ignorant.

I also find it interesting that you think religion is deserving of respect. It seems that even among people who don't identify as religious, religion is still given a privileged position where it is immune from criticism or any criticism should be carried out in a respectful manner, so no one is offended. Religion was immune to criticism for hundreds of years, under pain of death. It's not anymore , and no one should apologise for that. Something like religion, which makes enormous claims about the origins of the universe, how we should structure our society and how we should lead our private lives, needs to scrutinized, and if found to be lacking, it should be criticised the hell out of.

The majority of religious people are fine. They're benign. They cause no issues.

I agree with everything else you posted, but I disagree with this. If someone can read the Bible and think, “Hmm, that sounds good, I think I'll base my life on that”, then they are not fine. The problem is, most of the people who call themselves moderate Christians haven't actually read the Bible, except maybe the “nice” bits where Jesus was healing people with his bodily fluids. Religion is not reprehensible just because of the actions of its proponents, but also due to the nonsense contained in the holy books themselves. Things like blind belief, genocide, slavery, infinite punishment and torture for not worshipping a cruel master, original sin, coerciveness through fear, absolution of responsibility etc. The majority of religious people either think this stuff is fine or haven't read the principal text of their religion. Either way, I don't think this is a good state of affairs.

I'm an atheist, but I do think it's important to recognise that we wouldn't be where we are in terms of social, political and scientific advancement if it weren't for the efforts and endeavours of those who came before us and much of the what drove them up until the last few hundred years was belief in a higher order as well as the patronage of organised religion.

Are you saying that if people didn't once believe in a higher power, then we would be less socially, politically and scientifically advanced? Because if you're not saying that, then I don't see why we need to act as if we owe religion anything. I really don't see how belief in a higher power has advanced humanity in any of those three areas.

Christian morality is so heavily ingrained in the Western mindset that it pervades pretty much every aspect of our thinking.

Christian morality you say?

I haven't read The God Delusion so I can't comment on the intentions of author. However on the topic of religion, I tend to view it as being similar to a gun. In that you can blame the gun for the likes of Mass murder about as much as you can blame religion for (past) genocides, It wasn't religion or the gun, but the man wielding it. It's the people that let others use religion as an excuse that are part of the problem, being religious does not legitimise your racism, or your sexism, or what have you, and people need to stop acting like it does.
it.

No. This analogy does not work because religion itself incites people to do things that they would otherwise find immoral. If you follow organised religion, then you believe that God has revealed his will to you and others who follow that religion. This God will also burn you in hell forever if you refuse to follow his edicts. This God is all-powerful and all-knowing and basically cannot be wrong. Now, you read the holy book in which this God has revealed his divine message and you get to the part where it says:

“If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.”

If you believe that your God exists, is all-powerful, all-knowing, always right and will burn you in hell forever if you disobey, then its not much of a stretch to become a gay-hating bigot. Westboro Baptist Church believe “God Hates Fags” because the Bible told them so. The problem lies with religion.

[Berzee]

^ SOoo, does this mean that you like The God Delusion?

[Shane]

I'm just sayin', unicorn stickers can give you that critical edge in the battle for my attentiveness.

School must've been hell then.

[Donjonson]

I've only read a little of the God Delusion and, well, I agree with what I read. Living in an overly religious country rife with religious violence has made me scorn religion to the point that I'm judgmental towards people who follow one. All the good things points attributed to religion, charities, morality and shit, is stuff that should exist without religion in a sane society.

Still, I think it's wrong to criticize Christianity for priests that diddle kids. I mean, if the Ping Pong Association's coaches turned out be pedophiles that alone wouldn't make ping pong evil, would it?

If the ping pong coaches are all about indoctrinating children into believing that their bodies are evil and that salvation can only be brought through belief in ping pong, with the alternative being hell, and the coaches are celibate except often rape the children they're supposed to be protecting, and their bosses let them away with it and move them to another ping pong club so they can rape even more children then, yes, ping pong is evil and must be destroyed.

[Joseph-Sulphur]

I used to call myself an atheist. These days though, thanks to people like Dawkins, Althea and Nalano, I call myself agnostic.