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From someone raised in the Christian church: I was taught from a very young age certain things about God and man: that God was all-knowing and all-powerful; th

From someone raised in the Christian church: I was taught from a very young age certain things about God and man: that God was all-knowing and all-powerful; that God was the creator of everything; that man was irrevocably prone to sin and therefore needed a savior; that God chose certain people to save; that heaven was the ultimate destination for those who were saved; etc... As I grew older, I began to realize that other people had substantially different beliefs from the ones with which I had been inculcated. This was a realization only because I had been intentionally isolated from people who thought differently from my parents and educators. I noticed that what these different belief systems had in common was their moral program. All Abrahamic religions, and many others, prescribe how people ought to behave. But this moral program is not much different from common sense under conditions of abundance. The ways in which they differ are more interesting and are mostly tuned to ensure their adherents perpetuate the system. So, with this in hand, it became readily apparent that the bulk of organized religion was a historical artifact from the time when peoples of old were figuring out how to treat one another (back at the emergence of what we term "civilization"). It is possible (and in my opinion, now necessary) to separate moral education from religious indoctrination since, ironically, much of the unrest in civilization is now caused by the differences in religious prescription rather than differences in morality. Either that, or religious thought reeks of delusion and lacks any evidence whatsoever for what it claims. Seriously, I don't know any religious person who can demonstrate any reason for their belief other than indoctrination. Prove me wrong.

albemuth 16y ago
Given the poll results, it seems like you're preaching to the choir ;)
aik 16y ago
If you truly are interested in being proven wrong or at least have your beliefs tried, there are plenty of books out there on non-religious people becoming religious.
rubinelli 16y ago
Faith is the belief in what you can't prove. From a strictly rational point of view, it's a kind of madness, and the gospels explicitly point it out. To use a source I'm sure you know, in I Corinthians 13 there is an apparent contradiction: even if you act piously, you act in vain if if you don't feel love. The religious experience is emotional and visceral, not logical. It comes before codes and rules. From this perspective, Pascal's Wager is irrelevant: if you don't follow a moral code because you believe in it, then you won't fool anyone, much less an omniscient God.
- aik 16y ago
  I'm not familiar with this contradiction. Could you explain further? Where does it mention it's important to "feel" love? I've always thought it says "have love" - as in your pious nature is pointless unless you are capable of loving; as in it serves no purpose because it will not be acted upon. Similar to the idea that knowledge is pointless unless used. Or ideas are pointless unless executed...
  - rubinelli 16y ago
    You're correct in that it uses the term have instead of feel, but my understanding is that it's the other way around: "And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing." In other words, if you act only because you expect a reward in the after-life, or because you want to show how pious you are, or simply because you are self-destructive, you aren't practicing true charity. I believe this is a deontological argument, but I'm not really equipped to discuss theology or ethics.
    - aik 16y ago
      I'm still not understanding. Christianity isn't a works-based religion, and so the passage referring to "profit" on an eternal scale wouldn't make sense. By "profit me nothing", I understand it as meaning: personally I am not in any way becoming a 'better' person through the good works that I am doing (regardless of whether the consequences are good), because I myself am not doing them for the right reasons (that's where the deontological part comes in). I've never understood this as meaning one should have good intentions because one will be rewarded in the after-life. Anyway, we're digressing. If you agree that it says "have love" (or charity), why in the first place would you take it as "feel"? They're two very different things.
loewenskind 16y ago
>much of the unrest in civilization is now caused by the differences in religious prescription rather than differences in morality. [citation needed] Most of the unrest in civilization has the same source it's always had: fighting over wealth and/or power. Often leaders of these fights will claim some religious reason but what you have to ask yourself is; if you took religion out of the equation would they stop fighting or would they come up with some other reason. I presume what you had in mind was the US vs. Iraq/Afghanistan but given that we know there were no terrorists (nor WMDs) in Iraq what "religious" component was there exactly? There are some pretty obvious "power" components though.

albemuth 16y ago

Given the poll results, it seems like you're preaching to the choir ;)

aik 16y ago

If you truly are interested in being proven wrong or at least have your beliefs tried, there are plenty of books out there on non-religious people becoming religious.

rubinelli 16y ago

Faith is the belief in what you can't prove. From a strictly rational point of view, it's a kind of madness, and the gospels explicitly point it out. To use a source I'm sure you know, in I Corinthians 13 there is an apparent contradiction: even if you act piously, you act in vain if if you don't feel love. The religious experience is emotional and visceral, not logical. It comes before codes and rules. From this perspective, Pascal's Wager is irrelevant: if you don't follow a moral code because you believe in it, then you won't fool anyone, much less an omniscient God.

aik 16y ago
I'm not familiar with this contradiction. Could you explain further? Where does it mention it's important to "feel" love? I've always thought it says "have love" - as in your pious nature is pointless unless you are capable of loving; as in it serves no purpose because it will not be acted upon. Similar to the idea that knowledge is pointless unless used. Or ideas are pointless unless executed...
- rubinelli 16y ago
  You're correct in that it uses the term have instead of feel, but my understanding is that it's the other way around: "And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing." In other words, if you act only because you expect a reward in the after-life, or because you want to show how pious you are, or simply because you are self-destructive, you aren't practicing true charity. I believe this is a deontological argument, but I'm not really equipped to discuss theology or ethics.
  - aik 16y ago
    I'm still not understanding. Christianity isn't a works-based religion, and so the passage referring to "profit" on an eternal scale wouldn't make sense. By "profit me nothing", I understand it as meaning: personally I am not in any way becoming a 'better' person through the good works that I am doing (regardless of whether the consequences are good), because I myself am not doing them for the right reasons (that's where the deontological part comes in). I've never understood this as meaning one should have good intentions because one will be rewarded in the after-life. Anyway, we're digressing. If you agree that it says "have love" (or charity), why in the first place would you take it as "feel"? They're two very different things.

loewenskind 16y ago

>much of the unrest in civilization is now caused by the differences in religious prescription rather than differences in morality. [citation needed] Most of the unrest in civilization has the same source it's always had: fighting over wealth and/or power. Often leaders of these fights will claim some religious reason but what you have to ask yourself is; if you took religion out of the equation would they stop fighting or would they come up with some other reason. I presume what you had in mind was the US vs. Iraq/Afghanistan but given that we know there were no terrorists (nor WMDs) in Iraq what "religious" component was there exactly? There are some pretty obvious "power" components though.