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Why Religion Is More Durable Than We Thought in Modern Society

57 points by el_duderino 10y ago

briga 10y ago
It's been suggested that humans have an innate biological desire to believe in religion. I think from an evolutionary perspective this hypothesis makes sense. Groups of humans inclined to believe in religions must have been selected for at some point in our evolutionary past, considering the great benefits in group morale and cohesion religion offers. A tribe of humans with a shared belief system and a sense of purpose and meaning beyond everyday human existence would be much more likely to survive a harsh winter, than say, a tribe of humans with no such belief system. Religion isn't going anywhere anytime soon.
- faitswulff 10y ago
  It could be an emergent property of the fact that our brains are pattern-recognition machines, even when there are no patterns to be had. Couple that with being social, conformist animals and it's easy to start seeing the invisible hand of god everywhere.
- kneel 10y ago
  Religions selected humans that grouped together, Religions evolved over time to have better fitness. Religion rewards it's followers with feelings of serenity and defends itself with violent hostile belligerence.
- Existenceblinks 10y ago
  Back then they believe in Fire, Sun, Ghost etc. Now they know Fire is just fire, Sun is just a star, and they believe in different kind of Gods instead. In future they would probably not believe in Gods and came up with another kind of unprovable thing. Actually, those are just indirect abstract of fear|hope|unawareness. Basically those human weaknesses. So I think Religion will exist forever.
pembrook 10y ago
This article uses the US as its example for a "modern society." However, our education levels are drastically lower than many European nations who are indeed becoming quickly non-religious. The most extreme levels of average education correspond with the highest level of secularization in the Nordic countries. As with many other things, the US is the bizarro outlier here, not the norm among industrialized nations.
- JBReefer 10y ago
  I see this opinion a lot, and it bothers me. The idea that Intelligence + Education == Secularism 100% of the time is kind of sad, because there is so much to be gained from reading religious texts and religious philosophy. I guess it's a part of that larger "everyone before us was stupid" thing that seems big now, but I promise, the major names in religious thinking were brilliant. There is something to believing in something greater than what we see, and when you go on atheist forums, they never really seem like enlightened or happy places. I don't really have a cogent argument here, but this smells like 1950s Utopianism, where everything that went before was considered obsolete, and many of the good parts of culture and our cities were just thrown away in the name of progress.
  - unclenoriega 10y ago
    I don't think that the ideas "Intelligence + Education == Secularism" and "religious texts are useful" are mutually exclusive.
  - tonyedgecombe 10y ago
    It might be sad but it is empirical: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religiosity_and_intelligence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religiosity_and_intelligence
    - edko 10y ago
      And yet, there are extremely smart people, like Donald Knuth, who are religious.
bengovero 10y ago
Religion, especially Judeo-Christianity, has existed longer than any empire, philosophy or worldview. It will outlive western modern secularism too. Only our groupthink and hubris leads us to believe otherwise.
- JBReefer 10y ago
  I agree. Look at religion in China - despite being incredibly secular during the Communist period, religion is starting to return despite a good deal of government resistance.
- unclenoriega 10y ago
  It seems like cheating to make a statement like this using "Judeo-Christianity". Judaism seems like a pretty different philosophy or worldview from Christianity. And, of course, both have evolved over time based on the needs of their adherents and the whims of their leaders.
  - j2bax 10y ago
    Many Christians would say they are part of spiritual Israel (or spiritual Jews). I don't think its unfair to pair them together like that. Christians just believe in the New Testament and that Jesus Christ is/was the prophesied Messiah from the old Testament.
- methodover 10y ago
  You qualified secularism there. How is western modern secularism different from plain ole secularism?
  - deleted 10y ago
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  - bengovero 10y ago
    Well, I'm no academic, but things like modernism, materialism, and scientism as epistemology would be distinguishing factors.
phoenixProgram 10y ago
A "modernist" is nothing more than a Christian who has decided that Buddhism is "at war" with Christianity and who thinks ignoring the teachings of Christ while demanding that everybody engage in some soul-destroying game played with monopoly money is what it means to be "Christian".
stcredzero 10y ago
"Religion provides people with a lot more than just explanations for the natural world," Schwadel said. "It provides community. It provides them with friends. It provides them with psychological support and economic support. It provides a lot more than simply an understanding of where they are in the world in relation to the afterlife." Daniel Dennett has talked about precisely this. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m5tGpMcFF7U https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m5tGpMcFF7U In particular, the major world religions are particularly good at creating community and support groups. In part, it's because the major world religions have an ideological emphasis on love and compassion. While this often fails when dealing with out-groups, it succeeds in making true communities where people feel emotionally safe. I say this as an Atheist: as a group, Atheists do many things that are the opposite of what religious communities do. In my experience, I am far more likely to be thrown under the bus in a group of people who announce themselves to be Atheists than, say, at some kind of a Unitarian or Episcopalian meeting. To go by my personal experience and the output of various YouTubers concerning the dramas and dissolution of various Atheist groups, it seems like Atheists spend a lot of time attacking each other and out-groups. In fact, this seems to apply almost universally to any kind of 21st century movement that spreads online and somehow involves politics. Outrage sells easily and goes viral easily. As a result, many 21st century movements, while professing the opposite, have a strong dependence on in-group/out-group hate.
- splawn 10y ago
  >it seems like Atheists spend a lot of time attacking each other and out-groups. Religious groups have done this famously throughout history at all scales. (from local in-church "drama" all the way up to full on international war) Edit: removed awkward wording
- nyolfen 10y ago
  > it seems like Atheists spend a lot of time attacking each other and out-groups. In fact, this seems to apply almost universally to any kind of 21st century movement that spreads online and somehow involves politics we are very tribal creatures, and it takes an accretion of theology -- religious or otherwise -- to counter our base impulses
- 10y ago
mmjaa 10y ago
I've never quite understood the predilection towards hatred of the subject of religion, and the persistent nagging claim that it must be eradicated. The world would be a very hard place if we couldn't just suddenly decide that our description of the universe didn't actually need to make sense, and isn't relevant anyway, "because <deity/concept/idea of some relevance>". Well, it just seems naive and reactive, to me, when I encounter the viewpoint that its all crap and must die. Its a very common thought.
- deleted 10y ago
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- plandis 10y ago
  Is it hatred toward religion or hatred towards some actions religious people take?
  - graphitezepp 10y ago
    Persecution of homosexuality and anti abortion crusading, among many other issues historically, may reasonably be seen as abhorrent for many. But as others are saying many go full reductionist and don't separate these actions from the idea as a whole.
- aaron-lebo 10y ago
  It's very reductionist, too. There's just too much that we simply don't know about ourselves and the universe. To assume that either we will eventually understand it all or that as we learn more we won't find something vaguely religious is arrogant and short-sighted. Eradication of religion is a dumb goal. There are many things people are "religious" about, and there's plenty to fight over other than gods. Religion has and will continue to be a very important part of giving people purpose and creating community. The goal should not be to eradicate that but to bring out the best parts.
- Analemma_ 10y ago
  > I've never quite understood the predilection towards hatred of the subject of religion, and the persistent nagging claim that it must be eradicated. Most of the really strident atheists and anti-theists grew up in very oppressive religious environments. The parenting of American evangelicals in particular can get pretty horrifying - not to say that it always does, but it can. It's easy to say that these atheists are going overboard, but bear in mind that often they grew up in the worst of the worst. I used to be like you and not understand why they were so loud about it, but then I realized that was partially because I've always been non-religious (my parents just didn't care) and I have not had their experience. I still don't think they're right-- my own attitude toward religion, which I think is the "most correct" one for an atheist to take, is total disinterest and not even taking any negative view-- but I see how they got there.
psyc 10y ago
I think the vast majority need some framework to cope with existential questions, even if that framework is atheism. No, I'm not saying atheism is a religion, but it has nevertheless spawned recognizable frameworks. The major religions remain the major frameworks, however. Getting people off of IE6 will prove to have been easier than getting them off major religions, assuming you wanted that in the first place.
betaby 10y ago
In US/Canada it's 'enforced' from the very top. It is mandatory to have 'religion' affiliation for a politician, even if your real moto 'grab her..' Starting from special treatment in constitution/constitutional act and all the way to the schools. Kids, for example, in 6th grade in more secular Quebec have more exposure to religious ideas than to basic geography. Religion in US/Canada is special kind of hypocrisy. Thus no surprise.
- douche 10y ago
  > more secular Quebec Really? I would have assumed Quebec would be more religious than the rest of Canada. Catholicism sunk its roots deep there.
  - betaby 10y ago
    As I recall concept of religious school boards was abandoned in Quebec in 1997. Plus there are other religions other than Christianity flavors. As for stats, they totally different in Quebec if one ask 'are you catholic/muslim/etc' or 'do you bel ive in god'. Also Montreal is good in converting churches to spas and condos.
    - jszymborski 10y ago
      Part of the reason Montreal has so many converted churches is because we have an insane amount of churches. Mark Twain famously said of Montreal, "This is the first time I was ever in a city where you couldn't throw a brick without breaking a church window." [0] [0] http://www.twainquotes.com/18811210.html http://www.twainquotes.com/18811210.html
  - jszymborski 10y ago
    The pendulum swung the other direction, and hard, in the late 70s during what's called The Quiet Revolution [0]. Now, the more nationalistic/sovereignist parties try to pass laws that push secularism in every way [1]. [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quiet_revolution https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quiet_revolution [1]http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/charter-of-quebec-values-would-ban-religious-symbols-for-public-workers-1.1699315 http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/charter-of-quebec-val...
taxicabjesus 10y ago
I spent my last two years of high school at a jesuit (catholic) school. The only thing I really remember from my senior religion class was "you have to believe something". The class' assignment was to write a paper about what you believe. I wrote a crappy paper about how I didn't believe in an afterlife anymore, on account of my head injury [1]. We all evaluated someone else's paper, and I got a paper from someone who talked about his out-of-body experiences, which I thought was a perfectly reasonable proposition, as I'd recently learned about "mental imagery" (this was before 'aphantasia' [2] was a term)... [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13123659 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13123659 [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aphantasia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aphantasia Modern science was founded on the predication that "everything in the universe can be explained in terms of matter." This was circa-1845. The predication would have been more useful if those early scientists thought in terms of 'energy', but we're still stuck with their mistake.
- theseatoms 10y ago
  In what way are we stuck with that mistake? Interesting story btw.
  - taxicabjesus 10y ago
    > In what way are we stuck with that mistake? Thermodynamics was useful to design better steam engines, circa-1845. Thermodynamics is a rigid straitjacket that limits modern astronomers' ability to explain their observations. > Interesting story btw. Thanks for this. Someone voted me down right away, then some other users canceled that downvote out. The crowd here is fickle. :)
systems 10y ago
why do we need to give up religion .. in modern society? this modern society thinking.. seems like a religion in itself
- iratewizard 10y ago
  Would having fewer people who use religion to define themselves reduce the "Us vs Them" mentality in your opinion? Is a sizable portion of the world ready to give their life up -- like dedicate it to spreading or supporting an ideology -- in hopes that they will live again? If people were less confident that there was an afterlife safety net, how might their behavior change? Now, that's just the surface of religion. Religions are directly associated with systematic problems in society. Child molesters en masse hiding behind the Vatican to continue molesting. The process of belief being pretty well catalogued as addictive and mentally damaging. Has the "Days since last jihadist attack in Europe" counter risen above 7 this year? Are there any religions that don't suffer from all of the symptoms of groupthink? I don't know exactly what you mean by "modern society thinking" because it's somewhat vague - but I think your sentiment is right. What we don't need is a movement towards ending religion or endless propaganda telling everyone to get with the times and abandon religion. Just some critical thinking.
  - systems 10y ago
    the term 'modern society' refers to a set a values, that presumably makes this society moderns any set of values, that you have to stick to, to be part of the 'group' .. is very much a religion .. or religion-like, if we limit the term religion to only sets or values/rules that link themselves to God or a divine force i think religion as in, set of guidelines to have or that describe a relationship with God .. doesn't necessarily contradict with progress .. or modernism
    - iratewizard 10y ago
      I can definitely agree with that. China is a great example of different but the same. For the most part an atheist country but one of the most superstitious in the world. A result of there superstition likely being much higher suicide rates stemming from the belief of reincarnation (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3205909/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3205909/).
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vijay_nair 10y ago
Religion and God are constructs defined to enable people to deal with situations and phenomena beyond their control. “By controlling this proxy that controls all situations and phenomena, I can indirectly control the outcomes of my current predicament” is a frame of mind that gives people hope and enables them to stick it out until the storm passes. From the cliff gods that give the bee-hunting Gurung of Nepal the courage to wade into a literal mountain of bees to collect honey, to Vishnu and Shiva who help the Hindu mother and child sleep at night while the father’s fighting for his life in the Intensive Care Unit, to Jesus helping a Christian couple deal with their childless marriage, there is a plethora of gods available for people to adopt and use to derive hope no matter who they are and what their situation is. Because without hope, even those who are otherwise fit to survive, often don’t. Religion is a placebo that has worked extremely well for thousands of years and rest assured it's not going away anytime soon. The alternative is to live a life of total control but boredom is as potent a killer of men as any other.
- helthanatos 10y ago
  You're throwing polytheistic religions together with monotheistic ones. You should not do that. Polytheistic religions give hope for short term goals and explanations about each part of the world. Monotheistic religions give explanation for the world and give hope for the afterlife.
  - vijay_nair 10y ago
    As do polytheistic religions. A placebo programme that offers several pills of varying shapes, sizes and colors is not less or more real than a placebo programme that offers just one pill of a standard shape, size and color.
carsongross 10y ago
Why Jordan Peterson still believes in God: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=28i3lWxW5xs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=28i3lWxW5xs
mnm1 10y ago
Humans are attracted to anything that has history regardless of its usefulness. If it was done in the past, it must be done in the future, even if it is harmful. This not only applies to religion, but just about everything. It's the reason we have such difficulty adjusting our societies to the reality of the day. People seem unable to let go of the things that are holding them back. Maybe it's nostalgia. Maybe it's the fear of having to provide and defend one's own interpretation of the world. Maybe it's just a desire to relax and not have to think for oneself. Either way, it's not surprising.
- helthanatos 10y ago
  It could be because religion is useful
  - mnm1 10y ago
    Oh yeah? Which one?
joshjkim 10y ago
A good example of the durability of religion in the heart of SF/tech: Reality SF, a thriving, fast-growing church in the Castro, made up mostly of under-35 tech professionals. One of my favorite sermons in recent memory is quite related to this topic: it was about "rootedness in community" in the context of SF, and talks about how most people in SF come with a miner's mentality (come here for material gain, extract as much value as possible, then move on), whereas the pastor challenges us to consider a farmer's mentality (invest in the land, care for it in the long run, treat it like a home for the long run - of course, big agra is probably more like mining at this point but you get the point!). highly worth anyone in SF checking the talk out here: http://realitysf.com/sermon/slow-church-we-value-rootedness/ http://realitysf.com/sermon/slow-church-we-value-rootedness/ some choice quotes he uses in the sermon that I really loved (admittedly a little romantic, but I think carry some good insight): "the 20th century will be remembered as an age of wondrous creativity, when Americans voluntarily shattered their lives into distant and dissonant fragments. America's industries learned how to assemble atomic bombs, airplanes, iPads and the genetic codes of life itself in the same era that American society disassembled the ancient overlap of family, food, faith and the field of work. Americans reached for the stars as they withered their roots, inhabited space but lost any sense of place." (David Janzen) "The failure of the urban promise: That promise concerned human person who could lead detached, unrooted lives of endless choice and no commitment. It was glamorized around the virtues of mobility and anonymity that seemed so full of promise for freedom and self-actualization. But it has failed...It is now clear that sense of place is a human hunger that urban promise has not met...It is rootlessness and not meaninglessness that characterizes the current crisis" (Walter Brueggerman) [full disclosure: I'm a member!]
- deleted 10y ago
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cpr 10y ago
Maybe because the Judeo-Christian (considered as one monotheistic religion developing from the other) tradition is true? Truth would have enduring qualities. ;-) (I know, infinite downvotes.) I don't see how anyone could be atheistic--how can you prove a negative? The modern scientific materialist creed is mighty hubristic--a religion in itself--in asserting there is nothing besides matter--an impossibility to prove.
- dvtv75 10y ago
  > I don't see how anyone could be atheistic--how can you prove a negative? From this, I take it that you believe we walk around disbelieving your god. "There's no god. Oh look, a tree, that wasn't created by a god. The sky? Not created by a god." I don't. I put no thought into religious fictions whatsoever, unless they're brought up by others. Right now, unless you're tripping on something, you don't believe there's a little man on the other side of the wall drilling into it with industrial mining equipment so he can get to you and paint your genitals purple. You weren't thinking about it until I mentioned it, you hadn't even considered it until I mentioned it. That's religious faith to me, right there - something that does not exist until you think about it, and equally unreal as you think about it. As a Christian, you're required to help people out selflessly to get into Heaven, but since your deeds are selfishly intended to get you into Heaven and avoid your particular god's wrath, you have a small problem. As an atheist, when I help someone out I do so because I can, because I can make someone's life a little better (or at least less terrible). I've known plenty of Christians who go out of their way to punish people for not being Christian. In the end, I like to think that asd I breathe my last breath, I'll be able to say "Someone's life was better because I lived." > The modern scientific materialist creed is mighty hubristic--a religion in itself--in asserting there is > nothing besides matter--an impossibility to prove. Science demands verifiable and repeatable proof. If you assert that your god exists, you have to meet a minimum standard of evidence. Remove that standard of evidence, and all claims become viable, from "I have a system that will let me win whenever I gamble!" through to the little man on the other side of your wall. If he didn't exist, you wouldn't hear noise from that side of that wall, now would you?

57 points by el_duderino 10y ago

briga 10y ago

It's been suggested that humans have an innate biological desire to believe in religion. I think from an evolutionary perspective this hypothesis makes sense. Groups of humans inclined to believe in religions must have been selected for at some point in our evolutionary past, considering the great benefits in group morale and cohesion religion offers. A tribe of humans with a shared belief system and a sense of purpose and meaning beyond everyday human existence would be much more likely to survive a harsh winter, than say, a tribe of humans with no such belief system. Religion isn't going anywhere anytime soon.

faitswulff 10y ago
It could be an emergent property of the fact that our brains are pattern-recognition machines, even when there are no patterns to be had. Couple that with being social, conformist animals and it's easy to start seeing the invisible hand of god everywhere.
kneel 10y ago
Religions selected humans that grouped together, Religions evolved over time to have better fitness. Religion rewards it's followers with feelings of serenity and defends itself with violent hostile belligerence.
Existenceblinks 10y ago
Back then they believe in Fire, Sun, Ghost etc. Now they know Fire is just fire, Sun is just a star, and they believe in different kind of Gods instead. In future they would probably not believe in Gods and came up with another kind of unprovable thing. Actually, those are just indirect abstract of fear|hope|unawareness. Basically those human weaknesses. So I think Religion will exist forever.

pembrook 10y ago

This article uses the US as its example for a "modern society." However, our education levels are drastically lower than many European nations who are indeed becoming quickly non-religious. The most extreme levels of average education correspond with the highest level of secularization in the Nordic countries. As with many other things, the US is the bizarro outlier here, not the norm among industrialized nations.

JBReefer 10y ago
I see this opinion a lot, and it bothers me. The idea that Intelligence + Education == Secularism 100% of the time is kind of sad, because there is so much to be gained from reading religious texts and religious philosophy. I guess it's a part of that larger "everyone before us was stupid" thing that seems big now, but I promise, the major names in religious thinking were brilliant. There is something to believing in something greater than what we see, and when you go on atheist forums, they never really seem like enlightened or happy places. I don't really have a cogent argument here, but this smells like 1950s Utopianism, where everything that went before was considered obsolete, and many of the good parts of culture and our cities were just thrown away in the name of progress.
- unclenoriega 10y ago
  I don't think that the ideas "Intelligence + Education == Secularism" and "religious texts are useful" are mutually exclusive.
- tonyedgecombe 10y ago
  It might be sad but it is empirical: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religiosity_and_intelligence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religiosity_and_intelligence
  - edko 10y ago
    And yet, there are extremely smart people, like Donald Knuth, who are religious.

bengovero 10y ago

Religion, especially Judeo-Christianity, has existed longer than any empire, philosophy or worldview. It will outlive western modern secularism too. Only our groupthink and hubris leads us to believe otherwise.

JBReefer 10y ago
I agree. Look at religion in China - despite being incredibly secular during the Communist period, religion is starting to return despite a good deal of government resistance.
unclenoriega 10y ago
It seems like cheating to make a statement like this using "Judeo-Christianity". Judaism seems like a pretty different philosophy or worldview from Christianity. And, of course, both have evolved over time based on the needs of their adherents and the whims of their leaders.
- j2bax 10y ago
  Many Christians would say they are part of spiritual Israel (or spiritual Jews). I don't think its unfair to pair them together like that. Christians just believe in the New Testament and that Jesus Christ is/was the prophesied Messiah from the old Testament.
methodover 10y ago
You qualified secularism there. How is western modern secularism different from plain ole secularism?
- deleted 10y ago
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- bengovero 10y ago
  Well, I'm no academic, but things like modernism, materialism, and scientism as epistemology would be distinguishing factors.

phoenixProgram 10y ago

A "modernist" is nothing more than a Christian who has decided that Buddhism is "at war" with Christianity and who thinks ignoring the teachings of Christ while demanding that everybody engage in some soul-destroying game played with monopoly money is what it means to be "Christian".

stcredzero 10y ago

"Religion provides people with a lot more than just explanations for the natural world," Schwadel said. "It provides community. It provides them with friends. It provides them with psychological support and economic support. It provides a lot more than simply an understanding of where they are in the world in relation to the afterlife." Daniel Dennett has talked about precisely this. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m5tGpMcFF7U https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m5tGpMcFF7U In particular, the major world religions are particularly good at creating community and support groups. In part, it's because the major world religions have an ideological emphasis on love and compassion. While this often fails when dealing with out-groups, it succeeds in making true communities where people feel emotionally safe. I say this as an Atheist: as a group, Atheists do many things that are the opposite of what religious communities do. In my experience, I am far more likely to be thrown under the bus in a group of people who announce themselves to be Atheists than, say, at some kind of a Unitarian or Episcopalian meeting. To go by my personal experience and the output of various YouTubers concerning the dramas and dissolution of various Atheist groups, it seems like Atheists spend a lot of time attacking each other and out-groups. In fact, this seems to apply almost universally to any kind of 21st century movement that spreads online and somehow involves politics. Outrage sells easily and goes viral easily. As a result, many 21st century movements, while professing the opposite, have a strong dependence on in-group/out-group hate.

splawn 10y ago
>it seems like Atheists spend a lot of time attacking each other and out-groups. Religious groups have done this famously throughout history at all scales. (from local in-church "drama" all the way up to full on international war) Edit: removed awkward wording
nyolfen 10y ago
> it seems like Atheists spend a lot of time attacking each other and out-groups. In fact, this seems to apply almost universally to any kind of 21st century movement that spreads online and somehow involves politics we are very tribal creatures, and it takes an accretion of theology -- religious or otherwise -- to counter our base impulses
10y ago

mmjaa 10y ago

I've never quite understood the predilection towards hatred of the subject of religion, and the persistent nagging claim that it must be eradicated. The world would be a very hard place if we couldn't just suddenly decide that our description of the universe didn't actually need to make sense, and isn't relevant anyway, "because <deity/concept/idea of some relevance>". Well, it just seems naive and reactive, to me, when I encounter the viewpoint that its all crap and must die. Its a very common thought.

deleted 10y ago
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plandis 10y ago
Is it hatred toward religion or hatred towards some actions religious people take?
- graphitezepp 10y ago
  Persecution of homosexuality and anti abortion crusading, among many other issues historically, may reasonably be seen as abhorrent for many. But as others are saying many go full reductionist and don't separate these actions from the idea as a whole.
aaron-lebo 10y ago
It's very reductionist, too. There's just too much that we simply don't know about ourselves and the universe. To assume that either we will eventually understand it all or that as we learn more we won't find something vaguely religious is arrogant and short-sighted. Eradication of religion is a dumb goal. There are many things people are "religious" about, and there's plenty to fight over other than gods. Religion has and will continue to be a very important part of giving people purpose and creating community. The goal should not be to eradicate that but to bring out the best parts.
Analemma_ 10y ago
> I've never quite understood the predilection towards hatred of the subject of religion, and the persistent nagging claim that it must be eradicated. Most of the really strident atheists and anti-theists grew up in very oppressive religious environments. The parenting of American evangelicals in particular can get pretty horrifying - not to say that it always does, but it can. It's easy to say that these atheists are going overboard, but bear in mind that often they grew up in the worst of the worst. I used to be like you and not understand why they were so loud about it, but then I realized that was partially because I've always been non-religious (my parents just didn't care) and I have not had their experience. I still don't think they're right-- my own attitude toward religion, which I think is the "most correct" one for an atheist to take, is total disinterest and not even taking any negative view-- but I see how they got there.

psyc 10y ago

I think the vast majority need some framework to cope with existential questions, even if that framework is atheism. No, I'm not saying atheism is a religion, but it has nevertheless spawned recognizable frameworks. The major religions remain the major frameworks, however. Getting people off of IE6 will prove to have been easier than getting them off major religions, assuming you wanted that in the first place.

betaby 10y ago

In US/Canada it's 'enforced' from the very top. It is mandatory to have 'religion' affiliation for a politician, even if your real moto 'grab her..' Starting from special treatment in constitution/constitutional act and all the way to the schools. Kids, for example, in 6th grade in more secular Quebec have more exposure to religious ideas than to basic geography. Religion in US/Canada is special kind of hypocrisy. Thus no surprise.

douche 10y ago
> more secular Quebec Really? I would have assumed Quebec would be more religious than the rest of Canada. Catholicism sunk its roots deep there.
- betaby 10y ago
  As I recall concept of religious school boards was abandoned in Quebec in 1997. Plus there are other religions other than Christianity flavors. As for stats, they totally different in Quebec if one ask 'are you catholic/muslim/etc' or 'do you bel ive in god'. Also Montreal is good in converting churches to spas and condos.
  - jszymborski 10y ago
    Part of the reason Montreal has so many converted churches is because we have an insane amount of churches. Mark Twain famously said of Montreal, "This is the first time I was ever in a city where you couldn't throw a brick without breaking a church window." [0] [0] http://www.twainquotes.com/18811210.html http://www.twainquotes.com/18811210.html
- jszymborski 10y ago
  The pendulum swung the other direction, and hard, in the late 70s during what's called The Quiet Revolution [0]. Now, the more nationalistic/sovereignist parties try to pass laws that push secularism in every way [1]. [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quiet_revolution https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quiet_revolution [1]http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/charter-of-quebec-values-would-ban-religious-symbols-for-public-workers-1.1699315 http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/charter-of-quebec-val...

taxicabjesus 10y ago

I spent my last two years of high school at a jesuit (catholic) school. The only thing I really remember from my senior religion class was "you have to believe something". The class' assignment was to write a paper about what you believe. I wrote a crappy paper about how I didn't believe in an afterlife anymore, on account of my head injury [1]. We all evaluated someone else's paper, and I got a paper from someone who talked about his out-of-body experiences, which I thought was a perfectly reasonable proposition, as I'd recently learned about "mental imagery" (this was before 'aphantasia' [2] was a term)... [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13123659 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13123659 [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aphantasia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aphantasia Modern science was founded on the predication that "everything in the universe can be explained in terms of matter." This was circa-1845. The predication would have been more useful if those early scientists thought in terms of 'energy', but we're still stuck with their mistake.

theseatoms 10y ago
In what way are we stuck with that mistake? Interesting story btw.
- taxicabjesus 10y ago
  > In what way are we stuck with that mistake? Thermodynamics was useful to design better steam engines, circa-1845. Thermodynamics is a rigid straitjacket that limits modern astronomers' ability to explain their observations. > Interesting story btw. Thanks for this. Someone voted me down right away, then some other users canceled that downvote out. The crowd here is fickle. :)

systems 10y ago

why do we need to give up religion .. in modern society? this modern society thinking.. seems like a religion in itself

iratewizard 10y ago
Would having fewer people who use religion to define themselves reduce the "Us vs Them" mentality in your opinion? Is a sizable portion of the world ready to give their life up -- like dedicate it to spreading or supporting an ideology -- in hopes that they will live again? If people were less confident that there was an afterlife safety net, how might their behavior change? Now, that's just the surface of religion. Religions are directly associated with systematic problems in society. Child molesters en masse hiding behind the Vatican to continue molesting. The process of belief being pretty well catalogued as addictive and mentally damaging. Has the "Days since last jihadist attack in Europe" counter risen above 7 this year? Are there any religions that don't suffer from all of the symptoms of groupthink? I don't know exactly what you mean by "modern society thinking" because it's somewhat vague - but I think your sentiment is right. What we don't need is a movement towards ending religion or endless propaganda telling everyone to get with the times and abandon religion. Just some critical thinking.
- systems 10y ago
  the term 'modern society' refers to a set a values, that presumably makes this society moderns any set of values, that you have to stick to, to be part of the 'group' .. is very much a religion .. or religion-like, if we limit the term religion to only sets or values/rules that link themselves to God or a divine force i think religion as in, set of guidelines to have or that describe a relationship with God .. doesn't necessarily contradict with progress .. or modernism
  - iratewizard 10y ago
    I can definitely agree with that. China is a great example of different but the same. For the most part an atheist country but one of the most superstitious in the world. A result of there superstition likely being much higher suicide rates stemming from the belief of reincarnation (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3205909/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3205909/).

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vijay_nair 10y ago

Religion and God are constructs defined to enable people to deal with situations and phenomena beyond their control. “By controlling this proxy that controls all situations and phenomena, I can indirectly control the outcomes of my current predicament” is a frame of mind that gives people hope and enables them to stick it out until the storm passes. From the cliff gods that give the bee-hunting Gurung of Nepal the courage to wade into a literal mountain of bees to collect honey, to Vishnu and Shiva who help the Hindu mother and child sleep at night while the father’s fighting for his life in the Intensive Care Unit, to Jesus helping a Christian couple deal with their childless marriage, there is a plethora of gods available for people to adopt and use to derive hope no matter who they are and what their situation is. Because without hope, even those who are otherwise fit to survive, often don’t. Religion is a placebo that has worked extremely well for thousands of years and rest assured it's not going away anytime soon. The alternative is to live a life of total control but boredom is as potent a killer of men as any other.

helthanatos 10y ago
You're throwing polytheistic religions together with monotheistic ones. You should not do that. Polytheistic religions give hope for short term goals and explanations about each part of the world. Monotheistic religions give explanation for the world and give hope for the afterlife.
- vijay_nair 10y ago
  As do polytheistic religions. A placebo programme that offers several pills of varying shapes, sizes and colors is not less or more real than a placebo programme that offers just one pill of a standard shape, size and color.

carsongross 10y ago

Why Jordan Peterson still believes in God: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=28i3lWxW5xs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=28i3lWxW5xs

mnm1 10y ago

Humans are attracted to anything that has history regardless of its usefulness. If it was done in the past, it must be done in the future, even if it is harmful. This not only applies to religion, but just about everything. It's the reason we have such difficulty adjusting our societies to the reality of the day. People seem unable to let go of the things that are holding them back. Maybe it's nostalgia. Maybe it's the fear of having to provide and defend one's own interpretation of the world. Maybe it's just a desire to relax and not have to think for oneself. Either way, it's not surprising.

helthanatos 10y ago
It could be because religion is useful
- mnm1 10y ago
  Oh yeah? Which one?

joshjkim 10y ago

A good example of the durability of religion in the heart of SF/tech: Reality SF, a thriving, fast-growing church in the Castro, made up mostly of under-35 tech professionals. One of my favorite sermons in recent memory is quite related to this topic: it was about "rootedness in community" in the context of SF, and talks about how most people in SF come with a miner's mentality (come here for material gain, extract as much value as possible, then move on), whereas the pastor challenges us to consider a farmer's mentality (invest in the land, care for it in the long run, treat it like a home for the long run - of course, big agra is probably more like mining at this point but you get the point!). highly worth anyone in SF checking the talk out here: http://realitysf.com/sermon/slow-church-we-value-rootedness/ http://realitysf.com/sermon/slow-church-we-value-rootedness/ some choice quotes he uses in the sermon that I really loved (admittedly a little romantic, but I think carry some good insight): "the 20th century will be remembered as an age of wondrous creativity, when Americans voluntarily shattered their lives into distant and dissonant fragments. America's industries learned how to assemble atomic bombs, airplanes, iPads and the genetic codes of life itself in the same era that American society disassembled the ancient overlap of family, food, faith and the field of work. Americans reached for the stars as they withered their roots, inhabited space but lost any sense of place." (David Janzen) "The failure of the urban promise: That promise concerned human person who could lead detached, unrooted lives of endless choice and no commitment. It was glamorized around the virtues of mobility and anonymity that seemed so full of promise for freedom and self-actualization. But it has failed...It is now clear that sense of place is a human hunger that urban promise has not met...It is rootlessness and not meaninglessness that characterizes the current crisis" (Walter Brueggerman) [full disclosure: I'm a member!]

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cpr 10y ago

Maybe because the Judeo-Christian (considered as one monotheistic religion developing from the other) tradition is true? Truth would have enduring qualities. ;-) (I know, infinite downvotes.) I don't see how anyone could be atheistic--how can you prove a negative? The modern scientific materialist creed is mighty hubristic--a religion in itself--in asserting there is nothing besides matter--an impossibility to prove.

dvtv75 10y ago
> I don't see how anyone could be atheistic--how can you prove a negative? From this, I take it that you believe we walk around disbelieving your god. "There's no god. Oh look, a tree, that wasn't created by a god. The sky? Not created by a god." I don't. I put no thought into religious fictions whatsoever, unless they're brought up by others. Right now, unless you're tripping on something, you don't believe there's a little man on the other side of the wall drilling into it with industrial mining equipment so he can get to you and paint your genitals purple. You weren't thinking about it until I mentioned it, you hadn't even considered it until I mentioned it. That's religious faith to me, right there - something that does not exist until you think about it, and equally unreal as you think about it. As a Christian, you're required to help people out selflessly to get into Heaven, but since your deeds are selfishly intended to get you into Heaven and avoid your particular god's wrath, you have a small problem. As an atheist, when I help someone out I do so because I can, because I can make someone's life a little better (or at least less terrible). I've known plenty of Christians who go out of their way to punish people for not being Christian. In the end, I like to think that asd I breathe my last breath, I'll be able to say "Someone's life was better because I lived." > The modern scientific materialist creed is mighty hubristic--a religion in itself--in asserting there is > nothing besides matter--an impossibility to prove. Science demands verifiable and repeatable proof. If you assert that your god exists, you have to meet a minimum standard of evidence. Remove that standard of evidence, and all claims become viable, from "I have a system that will let me win whenever I gamble!" through to the little man on the other side of your wall. If he didn't exist, you wouldn't hear noise from that side of that wall, now would you?