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You could perhaps articulate that more accurately as "the bible has some nice quotes in it."
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Jun 13, 2016 04:36
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It is a bit weird the number of people reporting what I personally write off as hallucinations as divine inspiration.
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Jun 19, 2016 03:45
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Yes but it is incredibly unlikely that some things are real. It's surely harder to rewrite your entire cosmology and understanding of the fundamental nature of the universe than to say "Huh, that was weird, not sure what happened there but hopefully it doesn't happen again."
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Jun 19, 2016 04:20
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I... guess? I can't say I've ever really wanted to be religious, I was once but it was just... how i was brought up. Eventually I grew out of it. Though even then I didn't especially want to be atheist, both states were just informed by my perception of the world. When I was young I trusted what I was told, as I aged I trusted less and doubted more, so it stopped making sense. I guess the notion of desire informing perception and belief to that degree is a little alien to me. At least without being aware of the fact that you're just believing a thing because you want to. And the idea of an adult with an adult's capacity for doubt and cynicism being more inclined to jump to religion rather than brushing an odd experience off is again, kind of strange. "I like the idea of believing so I do" I can get, but "I was forced to believe by an experience" is just a very strange reason to me.
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Jun 19, 2016 05:35
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I was religious because I was raised that way. I'm sorry if you find that distasteful but it doesn't make it less true.
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Jun 19, 2016 06:22
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Crowsbeak posted:Can you explain how believing God is in anyway like someone hearing voices telling them constantly. "That guy is watching you, he is going to kill you". Please do. otherwise at the moment it just looks like your trying to justify your reddit atheism you had two semesters of psychology. That... would appear to fit the description of someone who believes that everything they do is judged by someone who is omniscient and who will make them suffer greatly if they displease the person watching.
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Jun 19, 2016 19:59
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Well no I assume you probably don't feel that way but it is sort of mechanically what is espoused by most forms of Christianity. I would imagine that you probably think of it more positively but you asked for why it would be similar. Functionally, it is.
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Jun 19, 2016 20:21
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I can't say I'm aware of any forms of Christianity off the top of my head that don't espouse that God sets forth rules for how you should live, knows if you break them, and determines what sort of afterlife and possibly favor while alive you'll receive based on your adherence to his rules. That's sort of the... basic tenet of Christianity. God exists, he wants you to do things a certain way, and there are consequences if you don't. Again I am sure you view your faith very positively, but I'm not sure that has a huge bearing on its foundations.
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Jun 19, 2016 20:31
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Well I was taught that god is literally with you all the time, and even absent that, it means you're living your life being judged by an omnipresent force and that dictates a pretty sizeable portion of your actions. Alternatively you could view a religious community as inherently judging of your actions as well though I would hope that generally they wouldn't take it upon themselves to start meting out punishments. Depends on how you want to look at it but either the belief that you're being judged by your peers, that there's an omnipresent force judging you, or that there is an invisible force in the back of your head judging you all fit fairly easily into the belief in a judging God and the practice of a communal religion. Certainly the two aren't completely dissimilar. The primary difference is that generally, I think, religious people don't tend to be put off by it. In my case I just accepted it, whether I liked it or not didn't really signify. God's there and watching everything I do, and judging me for it. And that's true whether or not I like it.
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Jun 19, 2016 20:47
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You asked how they are alike, that is my answer. I highly doubt you would think they are the same thing if you are religious because you obviously would believe that one is the actual ruler of the universe and one is a crazy person.
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Jun 19, 2016 21:31
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The Kingfish posted:The really bad stuff makes for even greater redemption. God "lets bad stuff happen" because from his perspective, (the correct perspective) these wrongs have already been righted. I really don't understand what that means.
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Jun 20, 2016 01:05
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The Kingfish posted:The final judgment will make right all earthly wrongs. God knows all that will occur and looks towards the end result of creation which is redemption. That doesn't really answer as to why they need to happen to begin with. Like even if God thinks they're fine the actual humans we're told he cares about most definitely don't when they experience them.
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Jun 20, 2016 01:35
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Crowsbeak posted:Well thats because humans are not pure slaves choose to allow evil to happen. We give in to the temptation of evil. Erm, no I think the overwhelming majority of people on the receiving end of suffering absolutely do not 'give in to the temptation of evil' and absolutely do not deserve to suffer. God has the capacity to do something about that.
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Jun 20, 2016 02:41
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Crowsbeak posted:When did I say that suffering was caused because you were evil? I said evil as a whole causes suffering to befall mankind. Another notch on my Athiest bingocard, misrepresentation. You don't think evil causes suffering but you think suffering causes evil to happen. What? I'm having a lot of trouble following you.
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Jun 20, 2016 03:39
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O...kay... I'm still not sure I follow but it still doesn't really seem to address the question of why God, who we know has the capacity to prevent suffering, permits it to happen. Like even if he fixes it later down the line it would be a lot better for the people experiencing it to... not experience it.
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Jun 20, 2016 04:10
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Crowsbeak posted:Ah yes, so the Serial killer would have always murdered right? You know the argument that they have no compulsion could be used to suggest we shouldn't be angry when they murder right? ALso it seems like your arguing God should turn us into slaves. Its always funny when Athiests admit what they really want is God to just turn them into unthinking drones. Well, yes actually ideally we shouldn't be angry when people murder, and Jesus absolutely would agree with that. Tt's certainly difficult to avoid it but people are not individuals, they're products of systems and environments which are beyond their control. Even if we believe they have agency and free will, they very manifestly don't have complete free will. A person can only make decisions within the environment of their minds, their information, their learned behaviours, and so on. We can desire that people do not murder but that doesn't require us to hate them and it definitely doesn't require us to believe that murder or other destructive acts are predominantly moral faults. People act according to their learned inclinations, which are a product of their environment and their environment is overwhelmingly beyond their control. People already are unthinking drones to the extent that what they think more of a multiple choice than complete freedom. If we trust that a God exists then God created the landscape that shapes people and is largely responsible for their actions. Further, I'm going to need to you justify why the limited human capacity for free will, or even hypothetical absolute free will, justifies suffering, because I don't take that as granted. Crowsbeak posted:I always love it when you get down to it that the Atheists in these threads want God to turn them into Pleasure drones. You seem to be suggesting that he's going to do that eventually anyway. Personally I would be quite happy with some fairly basic and immediate improvements to the world. The question hardly has to be absolute. OwlFancier fucked around with this message at 04:32 on Jun 20, 2016 |
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Jun 20, 2016 04:26
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It's a fairly important question if you believe in an all powerful and just creator. If your concept of religion is that Jesus existed, had magic powers, and was an all around excellent person to base your life off of, that's consistent. But if you believe in an actually omnipotent and ethical god, it does make said being somewhat inherently contradictory. To an atheist or to a theist who doesn't believe in an absolutely powerful and good god then it's not a hugely important question because it can be answered broadly by "because nobody has enough power to stop it" but it's quite relevant to most denominations of Christian I would think.
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Jun 20, 2016 04:41
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Crowsbeak posted:So you're perfectly fine when people ill others. Also people "act according to their moral faults". That doesn't mean they cannot correct their faults and need to know their are in fact consequences. I guess accoding to you their should beno consequences. Also how does free will justify suffering? I mean unless your suggesting someone would just be programmed to be deliberetley mean to others and can't decide to be nice ever. But then I guess we must as always be drones. No, again, as I said, we can desire to stop a thing without experiencing an emotional response to it. Jesus is quite clear about this, you should not hate or take vengeance on those who wrong you but you should work to reduce wrongdoing where you can. And again, destructive behavior is not, primarily, a moral fault. Moral faults assume that the person themselves is wrong and at fault and is the sole cause of their actions, which ignores the social nature of humans. We are products of our environments, and everything which creates that environment has a small hand in the resulting evil. Even if we believe humans have free will we can't reasonably ignore cumulative responsibility. If someone commits murder because they were raised in a violent household and because they were fired from their job, got drunk, got in a fight, and killed someone in the process then the reason that happened is the cumulative effect of all of those factors. The person, who taught them violence in youth, the person who fired them, the person who sold and produced the alcohol, the person who fought them, as well as the person themselves all contribute to the murder. We may reasonably place a little extra individual blame on the person performing the action but the lion's share should probably be assigned to their environment. It would be much easier to just say "oh the person who committed murder was evil and that's why they did it" but it doesn't really bear up to scrutiny. Free will doesn't justify suffering as far as I'm concerned but you seem to be suggesting that free will is why suffering exists, so God has the choice between letting humans suffer so they can have free will which would require free will to justify suffering, or taking away free will so that humans don't suffer, which you seem to be against. Crowsbeak posted:Well it is ethical to not turn humans into drones. I mean would you put a shock collar around your dog or cat for whenever they do bad? Or maybe if you could literally rewire their brain so they only did exactly as you said all the time? If we believe free will is good then yes, preserving free will is, in a vacuum, an ethical thing. But, this then creates the quandary, if free will is the cause of human suffering, is preserving it more ethical than simply eliminating both it and human suffering. OwlFancier fucked around with this message at 04:53 on Jun 20, 2016 |
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Jun 20, 2016 04:51
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Crowsbeak posted:I am saying people choose to use their free will to cause suffering. Also yes actually choosing to harm others is a moral fault. Someone hurting others suggest they need to be corrected not told that they can't help being destructive. Also lol at the "well its their environment". Yes we shouldn't let people live in filth and in horrible conditions, but just because more people when they do live in bad situations resort to bad actions, doesn't mean all do. We cannot let a person off the hook just because they had a lovely upbringing, because the argument that that is what we should primarily care about suggests they never ever had a choice. All people have the choice to do harm, if they didn't there would be no people who growing up in bad circumstances who could be peaceful. Well, yes, that's exactly correct, we should primarily care that people generally don't have much choice. Obviously everyone can choose to just roll over and die at any time without ever committing an evil act (unless you think that itself is evil) but that's a very poor choice. It is not justice for one person to have to choose to live ethically in the face of overwhelming adversity while others simply have to try not to be excessively indulgent. No righteous judge should assign the full weight of the fault at the feet of someone who does evil under crushing pressure from their environment to do so, and nobody concerned with ending evil in the world should rationally say "you just need to try harder" instead of first focusing on the environmental pressures which drive people to be destructive. And the question still remains, if free will results in suffering, is free will more important than ending human suffering?
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Jun 20, 2016 05:05
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Crowsbeak posted:Uh actually yes, some evil is just that evil, I mean if you knew others who raped and then were caught raping then the judge should jsut give you a year right? I mean you obviously couldn't help that you raped that women? Also being that people can choose to live ethically suggests a person could have but chose to instead do evil to others. Also I just argued for improving environment. But that doesn't mean that you absolve some thug of their crimes. Also yes free will is more important I would say then becoming a drone that just has their pleasure center turned on at all times. The judge should do what they have to to prevent the commission of further crime. More holistically, every individual should desire systemic change to prevent rape throughout society. Punishment alone obviously is not sufficient, nor rehabilitative, and again, ignores the environmental pressure which contributes overwhelmingly to evil acts. A rapist is not merely an individual choosing to rape, they are the society which minimizes the evil of rape and denigrates women, they are the people who failed to instill the proper understanding of sex and consent in the rapist. The fault lies in many places, not merely an individual deciding out of nowhere to just be evil. I would like you please to articulate why allowing humans free will justifies, say, the holocaust. What does it contribute which justifies that particular evil? You can pick other evils if you like but I will keep increasing the barrier because, ultimately, we are dealing with the problem of all evil here.
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Jun 20, 2016 05:22
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Crowsbeak posted:Really how does free will, say numerous people deciding they want to scapegoat another group for their problem and wanting to murder them, in the belief that they;ll solve their problems from mass murder explained by free will? The problem of evil is mans choice to commit evil against their fellow men. Also as I said earler na bad upbringing never justifies bad actions. Yes we should endeavor against evil that infects a society but that doesn't mean we excuse others who hurt. We should never excuse that. Yes we should endeavor to reform when we can but their are certain actions that are very hard to forgive. I really shouldn't be better at forgiving than a Christian. Vengeance isn't productive. It may be viscerally enjoyable but it isn't useful, and doesn't form a sensible basis for social policy. I don't understand your first sentence, can you rephrase it?
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Jun 20, 2016 05:36
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Crowsbeak posted:No Calvinists are the only Christians who by their very give a poo poo about if they go outside and have a bus hit them. Also I think it's time the majority of atheists here answer a question. What makes you so mad that people believe in God or Gods? Believing in Gods doesn't really make a lot of sense to me, I see no real reason why one should exist, nor any evidence to suggest one does. Faith to me is more superfluous than anything. I can't say I've ever felt much need to believe in God so I just... don't. Belief in god is... weird but fine I guess. Though it tends to come packaged with some pretty objectionable opinions regarding a bunch of other stuff which makes me kind of annoyed, but that's not really the god part that's doing it, it's the "and so I will start prescribing everyone else's life" part that's not really integral but, alas, is often present. I mean I do disagree with you regarding the fundamental nature of the universe, that's going to be a major feature of our conversation about religion. I also don't understand why you believe in god because as I said, it doesn't at all make sense to me. But that you hold the belief sincerely is OK in itself. But I do feel compelled to point out what appear to be logical inconsistencies. In part because I'd really, really like a good answer to stuff like the problem of evil. Because if someone could answer that it would really change my view of religion, it'd make it a lot more understandable. OwlFancier fucked around with this message at 07:00 on Jun 22, 2016 |
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Jun 22, 2016 06:55
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bitcoin bastard posted:This is something I can comment on. My feeling is that pain is necessary to enjoy pleasure*, if you don't understand how bad poo poo can suck, how can you possibly understand how good you have it right now? I cannot say the negative experiences in my life have at all contributed to my ability to enjoy the positive ones. If anything they've had the opposite effect.
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Jun 27, 2016 06:28
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SedanChair posted:Yeah nobody is interested in the standard arguments, we are interested in the opinion of individuals who profess to believe in God as to why those standard arguments have not wrecked their beliefs. I also still really really would like a good answer for the problem of evil, because it's literally the prime sticking point preventing me from having religious beliefs excluding my general lack of compelling evidence to hold them. Like I realise that it isn't a very original question but it's one that I know of absolutely no satisfactory answer to, within the confines of the benevolent, omnipotent idea of God. And I don't think it's especially prudent for a professed theist to complain about wanting answers to unoriginal questions. OwlFancier fucked around with this message at 19:50 on Jun 28, 2016 |
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Jun 28, 2016 19:43
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The issue I would take with that answer is, while admiring the honesty of it, that it remains easier to suggest that if the problem of evil represents a major issue with the idea of God existing as written, then perhaps God doesn't exist as written. That seems the rational takeaway from that. Moreso than continuing to assume that God exists in apparent contradiction to the problem of evil. Or, I suppose, suggesting that Evil doesn't actually exist like some kind of Christian Scientist.
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Jun 28, 2016 20:03
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Crowsbeak posted:Really it just sounds like you think any pain must be evil. Pain can be either evil, or amoral. If a human causes it, it's evil. If it just happens, it's amoral. However if we acknowledge that there is a Creator of everything, a sentient, self aware being with as much, or possibly more, capacity for reason and understanding as a human, then all things I personally would consider amoral-but-undesirable then immediately become simply part of a greater evil, set in motion by a greater being. So, either all suffering is evil, or there isn't a Creator.
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Jun 30, 2016 17:30
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I mean strictly even if we assume that God's understanding is amazingly beyond our own it would still be really silly to accept that. As a human, I must use the best of my human reasoning to decide what's best for me and the rest of my species, if something seems utterly opposed to my welfare I shouldn't take the considered response that it's actually a benevolent superintelligence and accept everything it does as being actually moral even though all evidence suggests it's not. Human morality necessarily requires human intelligence, an intelligence that ignores human morality is not benevolent, it's alien.
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Jun 30, 2016 17:48
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Who What Now posted:Why does God's position on the cross matter? That would broadly be my question also, I can't say I understand the purpose of the question.
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Jul 4, 2016 18:41
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I would take a lot less issue with worshipping a classical pantheon because I can't really see any sort of inconsistency with them. Like I don't see the point in it but, well, if you think Zeus is up there loving people as a bull and throwing lightning at people he doesn't like, that's fine. He doesn't claim to be benevolent, he's just big and powerful and will gently caress you up if you get on his bad side. I would be interested to hear a sincere defence of classical paganism.
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Jul 4, 2016 19:52
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Wine surely, and only during Saturnalia.
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Jul 4, 2016 19:58
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You are not seriously telling me that the Prose Edda contains the concept of pouring out a 40.
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Jul 4, 2016 20:21
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Well I guess it's not an unusual idea so I suppose it's probably been around as long as booze, it's just... odd seeing it so unchanged in something nearly a thousand years old.
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Jul 4, 2016 20:50
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My aztec mythology is terrible but I thought Quetzalcoatl ate people.
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Jul 4, 2016 21:19
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Ytlaya posted:(other than perhaps decreasing it due to there being fewer humans) That isn't quite how entropy works, all activity increases entropy. Though someone who worships the chaos of the universe would presumably have a somewhat odd worldview if they also believe in entropy given the universe's inexorable slide towards a completely uniform state. Or, well, I guess not that odd given that it's presumably a view shared by most secular scientists but I would think an awareness of the cosmic timescale combined with a specific appreciation for the disparity and disorder in the world would perhaps impart an emotional connection that most may lack. OwlFancier fucked around with this message at 22:43 on Jul 5, 2016 |
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Jul 5, 2016 22:39
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Well it's obviously utterly meangnless in context of the rest of the universe or even just our local star, but I suppose you could argue that conflict is a motivator of industrialization and that overall leads to massive energy expenditure that otherwise wouldn't occur on the planet.
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Jul 5, 2016 23:20
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If anything, Exodus reads more like God is mostly trying to either gently caress with Egypt or I guess charitably is only not teleporting the Israelites around because he thinks that suffering builds character. A need to work through humans I think is far less indicated than a desire to involve them.
OwlFancier fucked around with this message at 19:25 on Jul 7, 2016 |
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Jul 7, 2016 19:20
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I mean I'd personally say that modern medicine owes more to the classical Greeks than any Abrahamic religion.
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Jul 12, 2016 23:34
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Who What Now posted:Didn't a lot of medical discoveries and practices come from the Middle East as well? Not sure, my medical history education was extremely eurocentric but that could be reflective of the lack of communication throughout a lot of it. For a long time the greek treatises were just the thing to go by and people didn't pay attention to much else until surprisingly recently. It's a little depressing how long the four humours theory was used. OwlFancier fucked around with this message at 23:50 on Jul 12, 2016 |
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Jul 12, 2016 23:48
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Exactly the same, one would assume, except for the quarks.
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Jul 13, 2016 01:11
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Nude Bog Lurker posted:you are a sufficiently complex markov chain generator That would appear to fit the definition of sentience.
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Jul 17, 2016 19:08
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