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Not necessarily. For me it’s a subset of “answer it yourself”: it’s a way of asking myself “what is my potential? What was I put here for? If I had a perfect pa

Not necessarily. For me it’s a subset of “answer it yourself”: it’s a way of asking myself “what is my potential? What was I put here for? If I had a perfect parent, what would they expect of me?”

ImPostingOnHN 3y ago
It's the same for me, since none of those questions require a god or religion to answer. So, I'll have to disagree again with the premise that the alternative is "anything goes, you can be whatever you feel like and there's no judgement of any of your actions". If anything, that is more representative of religion, as long as you say that's what god wanted (e.g. discriminating against LGBT people, trying to overthrow the government, etc.) In contrast to non-theists, you simply employ a different way to ask yourself and society (albeit a subset of society which more rarely evolves their belief system to comport with the rest of society).
- ksenzee 3y ago
  Sorry, my “not necessarily” was too broadly scoped. I agree with you that “it’s either God or anything goes” is a false premise. It’s taught from the pulpit, which is why you hear it so often: people accept it without thinking it through and realizing it makes no sense. My “not necessarily” was intended for “You’d have to trust that society encoded the proper set of values and morals into the religion. Which sounds like ‘ask society’ but with extra steps, and also you’re asking the society of 1,000+ years ago instead of the society of today.” You don’t have to be asking society; you can ask yourself. As, I think, any sensible person does, regardless of their beliefs.
  - ImPostingOnHN 3y ago
    Gotcha. Well, if you're asking yourself, and your answer is biased/affected by religion, then you have to first trust that society encoded the proper set of values and morals into the religion, and then trust that the religion encoded the proper set of values and morals into you. On the other hand, if you're asking yourself, and your answer isn't biased/affected by religion, then religion is by definition extraneous to your values and morals, which was my position in the first place. The other side of the coin is, some of the worst atrocities in history were committed by people who asked themselves, and concluded that god wanted them to do it. Others were committed by people who asked themselves, and concluded that they wanted to do it. So religion doesn't seem to be either a good encouragement of good behavior or a good discouragement of bad.

ImPostingOnHN 3y ago

It's the same for me, since none of those questions require a god or religion to answer. So, I'll have to disagree again with the premise that the alternative is "anything goes, you can be whatever you feel like and there's no judgement of any of your actions". If anything, that is more representative of religion, as long as you say that's what god wanted (e.g. discriminating against LGBT people, trying to overthrow the government, etc.) In contrast to non-theists, you simply employ a different way to ask yourself and society (albeit a subset of society which more rarely evolves their belief system to comport with the rest of society).

ksenzee 3y ago
Sorry, my “not necessarily” was too broadly scoped. I agree with you that “it’s either God or anything goes” is a false premise. It’s taught from the pulpit, which is why you hear it so often: people accept it without thinking it through and realizing it makes no sense. My “not necessarily” was intended for “You’d have to trust that society encoded the proper set of values and morals into the religion. Which sounds like ‘ask society’ but with extra steps, and also you’re asking the society of 1,000+ years ago instead of the society of today.” You don’t have to be asking society; you can ask yourself. As, I think, any sensible person does, regardless of their beliefs.
- ImPostingOnHN 3y ago
  Gotcha. Well, if you're asking yourself, and your answer is biased/affected by religion, then you have to first trust that society encoded the proper set of values and morals into the religion, and then trust that the religion encoded the proper set of values and morals into you. On the other hand, if you're asking yourself, and your answer isn't biased/affected by religion, then religion is by definition extraneous to your values and morals, which was my position in the first place. The other side of the coin is, some of the worst atrocities in history were committed by people who asked themselves, and concluded that god wanted them to do it. Others were committed by people who asked themselves, and concluded that they wanted to do it. So religion doesn't seem to be either a good encouragement of good behavior or a good discouragement of bad.