The quote on that sign was written by the great Martin Luther. Seriously. Here’s another:
Reason is the Devil’s greatest whore; by nature and manner of being she is a noxious whore; she is a prostitute, the Devil’s appointed whore; whore eaten by scab and leprosy who ought to be trodden under foot and destroyed, she and her wisdom… Throw dung in her face to make her ugly. She is and she ought to be drowned in baptism… She would deserve, the wretch, to be banished to the filthiest place in the house, to the closets.
Martin Luther was a very intelligent man, but I think he was a little crazy.
You think? Only a little?
That’s roughly equivalent to saying, “Thanks, but I’d like to stay stupid, if it’s all the same to you.” The irony, of course, is that the quote itself is absolutely correct…
I don’t know about that. Reason can be, and often is, an enemy of faith. But I would hardly call someone like….CS Lewis or CK Chesterton or even Max Planck unreasonable. (Although I think Quantum Physics is very unreasonable :) )
But Reason is not the enemy of Faith (it can be, for some). It is entirely the enemy of Religion. Martin Luther is case in point; he was all about religion – the do’s, dont’s, doctrines, dogmas and heresies of his time, as well as the ones he went about creating.
Reason is the enemy of tyranny. Faith can, and often is, the friend of liberty. (Just read Jefferson, Madison, Adams etc on this subject)
How can anyone say quantum physics is unreasonable. What a twit! What an absolutely moronic thing to say. That’s like saying the earth is flat, or if I don’t understand it it’s not reasonable. Very fundie-like attitude. You need to read Thomas Paine. I see no friction between Deism and quantum physics. It’s “revealed” religion that is the enemy of the people, and it’s the people who herd together like sheep and believe what they’ve been told. Religion is a scam, but knocking science? Come on! Do you think they’re building another super collider on the basis of faith? Unbelievable comment.
“If you think you understand quantum mechanics, you don’t understand quantum mechanics”.
-Richard Feynman
I imagine Christian (?) said that quantum physics is unreasonaible in the sense that it defies common sense.
Faith and reason are contradictorty in the sense that faith is believing something without any reason. I don’t think either that Max Planck was unreasonaible, I think he was unreasonaible in some aspects of his life -as everyone. Anyway… argument of authority doesn’t count too much for me.
Hipmonky! Calm down dude. I’m pretty sure C.B. was joking. (Note the :) as a clue) You’ll give yourself ulcers if you seek to be offended like that. Worse yet you risk becoming a fundie yourself.
Quantum physics is not unreasonable, it is perhaps better described as incredible. There is a saying that “if you think you understand quantum mechanics, then you weren’t paying attention” that I think is quite true, except that quantum mechanics is in fact an almost unerringly accurate predictor of experimental results (Copenhagen model). It certainly does defy common sense- but that’s not surprising given we live on the macroscopic scale, and quantum mechanics deals with the subatomic level.
Martin Luther’s statement is absolutely accurate, but Luther was obviously on the side of religion rather than that of reason. Those who favor reason (myself included) would say that faith needs to be challenged with evidence, confronted, and its diaphanous, ephemeral, empty promises of easy truth dispelled with the brilliant light of clarity. The poetic description was expected of his day and age, and in the modern times it just makes his argument graphic, and probably more convincing to the faith-minded.
“Faith can, and often is, the friend of liberty. ”
Alright, I have to ask: what definition of faith are you using here? Because Jefferson and Madison were not considered very “faithful” in their day, and Adams was almost equally iconoclastic.
Au contraire, mon frere. They were one and all very ‘faithful’ just not very religious. The religious hiearchy of that time would have, and often did, paint Jefferson as an atheist and an apostate, Madison as a confused Christian and only Adams might have been considered a faithful man of God.
Yet Jefferson’s writings reveal that he had a deep faith, just no tolerance for religious hypocrisy and tyranny. Madison’s love of his faith compelled him to fight so strongly for the first amendment, knowing as he did that the union of government and religion would spell out fascism. And few knew that the ‘religious’ Adams had harbored doubts about Protestant orthodoxy and eventually came to be a Unitarian. He later came to agree with Jefferson on almost all points of the separation of government and religion.
Almost all the founders, not just those who earn chapters in our high school text books were men of faith, and they fully believed (as revealed in their letters and speeches) that they had a moral obligation to execute their offices according to the divine hand of Providence. (As they might put it).
“Founding Faith” by Steven Waldman is an excellent book, fully annotated, where he reveals the strong faith of the founders while thoroughly debunking the idea that this was ever a “Christian Nation”.
I don’t know very much about your nation’s founders, but…
Some greek philosophers claimed that their knowledge, their ideas, came from a goddess; it was kinda the habit in a period of history. The last philosophers who appeal to that goddess didn’t believed really in the greek pantheon – Am I wrong if I remember Socrates, who was condemned for unpiety, as one of those?
During medieval times, king’s power were based on God’s election.
What I’m saying is… maybe your founders had to say they were working as the hand of God in order to a large part of your society could accept the new rules.
Ah, I assume everyone agrees that faith is not religion nor does religion equal faith. Two distinct entities.
They are absolutely related. Religion is BASED on faith, and both faith and religion are incompatible with science and reason. Faith means that you determine a fact or a result, and you have to make all evidence correspond to that fact. And if it doesn’t work? Well, it may be irrational but that’s where “faith” comes in. It’s believing in something sans evidence. Science is absolutely the opposite of that. Scientific testing has no preconceived facts or results. It is open to whatever result the EVIDENCE points to. Faith and religion are belief in supernatural entities and magic. They are not that distinct.
I’m afraid that doesn’t really answer my question. If we take “faith” to mean something like “trust,” then I can only say that Jefferson had faith in reason, and that’s perhaps not what you mean. If we take faith in the sense of Hebrews 11:1 “the evidence of things not seen,” then I have to say that Jefferson wasn’t faithful. He had a restless mind and insisted that all things be subjected to reason and evidence, especially religious issues. In one of his more remarkable letters, he advises a young relative to evaluate his religious upbringing, his beliefs and his scriptures in light of reason. Jefferson rejected the trinity, miracles and the afterlife; hardly “the substance of things hoped for.”
If we take faith to mean something like Tillich defined, a centered conviction that focuses all the resources of the person, I’m still not sure that Jefferson was faithful. Jefferson was just too full of contradictions, and in many ways too unfocused for such a definition to work.
Why do we have to accept just one person’s definition of faith.(Even that definition Tillichs’ is an exaggeration. Who meets that description?)
Jefferson did reject most of the Christian doctrines but he maintained a belief in some sort of God and that is some sort of faith. Jefferson was only one of many men leading the country at that time and he was quite unique among them all. I am no Jefferson but I too have advised my own children to find their own way, using observation and reason but while maintaining an open mind. If faith is to be legitimate it must be discovered on our own and withstand the rigors of scrutiny.
Religious people would tend to agree with you, that one must be focused, centered and grounded in their spiritual convictions in order to be faithful to God. That, however, does not describe the typical man or woman of the Bible. The Jews understand that to have real faith in God, an honest faith, means acknowledging your doubts and challenging the current wisdom. The Psalms are full of angry rants and sad disappointments.
Only the fundamentalists are so definite about things spiritual.
Why do we have to accept just one person’s definition? You ask the same thing in a previous post when you “assume we all agree” You sound just like any other theist hypocrite. Faith and reason are, and always have been anathema to each other. To have faith, you must deny reason. To have reason, you must demand facts and proof, two things that are totally absent in faith.
Well, there has to be a definition of faith we can all agree on – that’s what dictionaries are for.
Jefferson seems to have been a deist who respected Christ as a great teacher without accepting his religious views. That’s why he rewrote the gospel without miracles, just focussing on the ideas, which seemed reasonable to him. He used his reason, rather than faith. I’m not really familiar with Madison and Adams, but I would suggest a better example would be if you could find someone who converted to the faith via rigorous reason.
Well, Chesterton and Lewis immediately come to mind. I kind of think I did as well. Reading about quantum mechanics nudged me in this direction.
“Reading about quantum mechanics nudged me in this direction”
Yeah, there are easiest things to understand that quantum mechanics, but you shouldn’t have gave up!
@Christian: As far as I know, Lewis didn’t explain his conversion rationally. Late one night Tolkien explained to him that Christianity was like “pagan mythology, but true” and that seemed to click for him and all his objections went down. Then he said he was riding in his brother’s motorcycle sidecar and he got in an unbeliever and got out a believer. His rational arguments seemed to come later.
I’m not sure about the specifics of Chesterton’s journey to Catholiclism, but I never found his Orthodoxy impressive. His arguments never seemed very rational, though they are very witty and well-worded. Do you find them compelling? If so, which ones?
That’s a popular sign for Baptists. I took this one earlier this year near my house: http://www.msatheists.org/2008/03/couldnt-have-said-it-better-myself.html
Yeah, Lewis definitely formulated his arguments after the fact. The Trilemma, for example, is only rational if you already accept religion.
Chesterton I’m not so familiar with, and theology makes me come out in a funny rash all over my brain – it’s almost like an acid burn.
I’m a fan of Lewis but I believe that his trilemma is flawed. I once posted on this:
http://sharpiron.wordpress.com/2008/01/14/the-dilemma-of-the-trilemma/
I should reconsider my argument here. I don’t believe that faith can be explained rationally at all. That doesn’t suggest that reason is not part of the process. Reasoning often requires a compromise between rationality and faith. This is one reason why some of the more preposterous ideas of quantum mechanics helped me to accept the preposterous ideas of God. Or the understanding that I won’t fly off into space or that I am moving at hundreds of thousands of miles an hour. Science explains things but at some point my mind must decide to ignore what my senses tell me and accept what is ‘truth’.
And I suppose only you know what truth is? Where did you learn it? You only know what you’ve been taught, like all of us. So what is truth? I say we are programmed enitities that have been taught lies about reality. We’ve lost the ability to think for ourselves. Life is then an illusion, a slave to the senses. Quantum physics may actually explain what god is someday. Sure, it may seem mystical or whatever your percieved problem with it is, but it’s grounded in reason. But it confused you, and rather than keep an open mind about it and research it more, you slammed your mind shut. That’s unreasonable, and I know you’ll comment back with some crap, possibly demeaning attacks on me – how do I know this? Look who’s hogging the comment section. You’re the type that has to have the last word. I’ll bet on it. What saddens me about that is you have intellectual potential and I hate to see it wasted. But that is the Western way of doing things.
What is truth? Truth is a Person, an eternal Person at that. You are correct, Quantum Physics is the “ground of God”, therein lies the model for the Unseen realm…of truth.
“But we speak the hidden (unseen), mystical wisdom of God which he ordained before the world for OUR glory” (1 Cor 2:7 &8)
Real truth, and not “truthiness”, is what is objectively real. I’m thinking we will never know real truth, not completely. I’ts like the 5 blindfolded people touching different parts of the elephant. One will say an elephant is long and hairy (tail). Another will say that it’s a big round blob (the torso), and yet another will say it’s like a snake (the trunk). They all have some truth, but not the whole truth. To say that we definitively know “Truth” capital T is arrogant and completely impossible. And to say that a person or entity is truth (like god) is quite silly. We are chipping away at truth and finding out more all the time. the bible clearly did not have much of a handle on truth. the writers didn’t know that murdering tribes, raping virgins or slavery were immoral. They didn’t know the earth was round and billions of years old. We are slowly coming to more truth, but we will never completely have it.
“What is truth? Truth is a Person, an eternal Person at that. You are correct, Quantum Physics is the “ground of Godâ€, therein lies the model for the Unseen realm…of truth.”
John, don’t go that way… Quantum Physics is a scientific theory and so, it may be changed in our future. You don’t know where lies the “model for the Unseen realm”. Or, as bible doesn’t speaks about quantum physics -what a surprise- should I believe that God has revealed that to you?
“1Co 2:4 And my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man’s wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power:”
Yea, that power!
One of my problems with the trilemma is that ignores the fraught history that humanity has with charismatic leaders. Should we attempt to use the trilemma on the other Jewish “messiahs” that Josephus mentions? How about Shimon bar Kokhba? Sabbatai Zevi? Throughout history, people have been claiming to have some special relationship with the divine. Many of them appeared to believe their own story, and many attracted large followings. Lunatics, liars or Lords?
Reason is the greates enemy that fait has… It is true.
Martin Luther said this:”Fait must trample under foot all reason ,sense and understanding” It is true ,too.
Faith and Rationality are two mode of belief. Faith is belief in inspiration, revelation or authority.Rationality is belief based on reason or evidence.
Many people believe in the Biblical story of Noah flood that entire the Earth was covered by water for forty days. They believe that was Global Flood. It is Faith-belief without evidence.
For example:
Western Media speaks the truth.
Western Media speak Serbs are bad-people.
I am Serbian woman
Therefore I am bad woman.
Many people when read these media they believe .It is belief without reason sense and evidence.
We often have belief witout evidence, or reason Why folks?
Svetlana
Svetlana, your question (Why, folks?) is the most heartfelt and profound question on this page – because it is personal. Too often we emulate Voltaire’s Candide & friends by trying to outdo one another in high minded intellectualism, while forgetting that this debate is about a topic that causes unimaginable pain and suffering and death throughout the world. It’s about people, not about ideals and concepts.
Religion and faith are not evil, folks. I know many people who honestly represent the highest ideals of humanity while adhering to their faith. Atheism & reason are not evil. I know many sincere, intellectual atheists who also meet high standards of ethics and compassion.
Evil is evil – whatever label or flag it operates under.
And so let us eschew labels and seek substance. A great teacher once said, “by their fruits you will know them” – we can tell the good guys from the bad guys by what they do. It’s a very simple lesson but one most of us fail to grasp. We can never get past the labels.
As to your question, Svetlana – there is no answer. Focusing on “why” causes us to lose sight of our purpose on this planet. Like Candide and his friends, we must cease exploring and debating and understand that for now, there is work to be done.
And Svetlana – you may be good or bad, I don’t know. I don’t know you well enough. But it never occurred to me to think you are “bad” simply because you are Serbian.
TM
because we don’t know everything and we have to fill in the gaps somehow
and I think most people realise that the western media couldn’t find the truth if it was tied to a flag and put on a hilltop.
Why compare Jefferson to Luther ?
Stick with the subject.
Religion is a ridiculous concept.
Personally, I would sooner believe in aliens than a god.
Religion is about control. You can’t control people who use their faculties of reasoning. They will question things that don’t make sense. Can’t have that.
EXACTLY !
The Ancient Booer:
Your true love lives. And you marry another.
True Love saved her in the Fire Swamp, and she treated it like garbage.
And that’s what she is, the Queen of Refuse.
So bow down to her if you want, bow to her.
Bow to the Queen of Slime, the Queen of Filth, the Queen of Putrescence.
Boo. Boo. Rubbish. Filth. Slime. Muck. Boo. Boo. Boo.
I urge you guys not to belittle the Word of God with analogies such of reasonable arguments because conclusions can be made with any false premise. I hope every reader of this will not become discouraged in finding truth and continue to question their thoughts and experiences and that maybe one day grace may hit you like a train and transform your life like it has mine. Keep the open mind and God Bless
OK Andrew. I’ll try not to let reasonable arguments interfere with blind faith.
There is no god. Get over it.
You’re drifting the wrong way there Phil…
I know John. Phil E. Drifter needs to accept Joe B as his personal lord and savior, to escape the double clutches of double hell and find his way to my eternal divine rockin’ ass party.
salvation is here
My closets are clean. Why do people think there is a god? If there is a god of what ever religion you believe in, why doesn’t he/she show up. The entire world (well almost) would become believers. If he/she has all those great powers attributed to a god the world would be a better place, maybe! We have wars, disease, famine, drought, floods the list is almost never ending. If a god exists it has a weird sense of humour.
Religions maintain that a true believer doesn’t need to see God in order to believe, and that this makes them holy. Those are the tenants of faith based religion. If God showed his face and proved to the world his existence, it would eliminate any necessity for the religion itself. Additionally, what fun would life be if God came down and wiped clean all of our problems? what purpose would we have? Sure there are these terrible things, and most times it seems that life just isn’t fair. But just as a movie with no conflict is boring, a life without suffering has no point. Instead of wondering why God won’t just come down and make everything all better, we should be focusing on using our collective power as humans to help correct the bad things in our world, not sitting around do nothing about it.
“If God showed his face and proved to the world his existence, it would eliminate any necessity for the religion itself”
No religion? No fundies? What’s the matter then?
“what purpose would we have?”
Are you sure there is a purpose?
“a life without suffering has no point”
ew… why?
“we should be focusing on using our collective power as humans to help correct the bad things in our world”
I fully agree with that part
I should point out that our philosophy lecturer also used the phrase “Reason is a whore”, because in metaphysics you can argue for anything and reason will do anything for you…
which is why metaphysics isn’t worth much
“If God showed his face and proved to the world his existence, it would eliminate any necessity for the religion itselfâ€
- Why do we need a religion in the first place?
“a life without suffering has no point.”
- That doesn’t make a whole lot of sense
“Instead of wondering why God won’t just come down and make everything all better, we should be focusing on using our collective power as humans to help correct the bad things in our world, not sitting around do nothing about it.”
- I think instead of wasting our time talking to walls and worshiping dolls, we should focus on solving the problems that actually exist.
What I meant is that if God exists, there would be no reason for him to show his powers, because then his subjects could not prove their loyalty.
I like to think of God as kind of like santa clause. people know hes not real, but yet he brings people together in the spirit of giving and charity, a sort of icon for goodwill.
Religion has many things to teach, such as morality and charity, along with many interesting thought provoking stories. it just becomes an evil entity when people kill and fight for it, which is unfortunate. Nevertheless, it isnt the church that kills people, but rather insane fanatics who mislead others based on their interpretations of these faiths. I maintain that it isn’t religion that harms, but rather human nature to fear what we don’t know or understand
There is very little the bible has to teach about morality. This blog has discussed time and time again the IMMORALITY of the bible. Things like not killing and stealing are common sense – societies cannot function if many people acted like that. Our morality has evolved far past the bible. The bible is mysogenist, racist, tribal, and violent. Even the concept of “original sin” is immoral, because it sets children up to be abused, and creates guilt, fear and low self-esteem. We would be far better off if we abandoned all religion and religious texts and use our common sense instead. What can the bible possibly teach us that decent people don’t already know?
“it isnt the church that kills people”
except when it is the church who kills people, of course. Witches? Heretics? Inquisition?
Until recently, the church was happy to kill off anyone who disagreed with them or challenge their rightness / power. The church hierarchy could not accept the Copernican view that the sun did not revolve around the earth because for them the theory tarnished the belief in the centrality of man in God’s plan. When the church was more powerful, it abused its power terribly. Now, there are enough secularists that the church can’t get away with literally murdering heretics. But the church has always fought progress, which is formed through reason and science. They can’t kill us now, but they can still infiltrate governments, harange (sp?), browbeat and terrorize people into believing. It’s scary how much power the evangelical church has gotten in the US over the past decade or two. Very, very bad sign.
Subjects? Why are we his “subjects”? Is your god some crazy feudal lord to have subjects? Would jive well with the stories, granted, but we’ve outgrown the Dark Ages, have we not? Why would a superpowerful being need our loyalty anyway?
I’m an atheist. I never believed in Santa Claus, either, as per my mother’s reports.
That idea of Santa Claus, at least today, is more about a veneer over blatant consumerism than goodwill, though.
Fear of what we do not understand created religion in the first place.
Why do we need religion to teach those things? I get good thought provoking stories from fiction all the time – that’s what fairytales and fables are for, are they not? Why blur the edges and become dependent on one – religion – and not the other?
So your point is you believe in something you can’t prove exists. So why not embrace all the
gods, you can’t prove they exist either. I’ve never read any religious text that promotes morality or
charity. I’m an atheist and I have morals and I give to charities. The idea that if god showed up
you wouldn’t need to be religious. Is that because the god that showed up might not the be god that
you believe in? Morals don’t come from a book they come from the society you live in. Different
societies have different morals even if they are reading the same book. As for thought provoking
stories, have you read any religious text?
Well considering that many of our modern societies are based off of religious backgrounds, i’d argue that societal values are the direct result of the religions that those societies were based on. Im not at all saying that atheists are evil or anything, but just read the bible and it is filled with stories of charity and compassion. one of the five pillars of Islam is support of the needy, to say that no religious text that you’ve read contains these things leads me to believe you havent read many religious texts.
When I open my bible, I have to look pretty hard to find “charity” and “compassion”. Even gentle jesus is the one who introduced the concept of hell, which is the most evil thing in the bible. I know many non-believers who are charitable and compassionate. I’m one of them. I had to reject superstition to find this within myself. People, just like plants and animals, flourish in an environment with love, nourishment, and NO FEAR.
Well I dont know if you guys have heard the good news yet… but God has shown himself rightious through the death of his only son Jesus Christ. It is true that religion does not make you rightious in front of God “Dikaiosyne Theo” it is only through Faith, by Grace, from the blood of Jesus, God has given you a chance to be justified.
Romans 3:23-26
http://www.blueletterbible.org/Bible.cfm?t=KJV&b=Rom&c=3&v=1&x=0&y=0
check it out
Yeah, I heard the good news that god tortured his son to death because of a pagan belief that there must be sacrifice to appease the gods. I don’t know about you guys, but stories about people suffering terribly is really inspirational to me.
So you pick another hypothetical story to prove a point. A god we can’t prove has sent a son we
can’t prove to save us from sins we didn’t do, and that’s the good news. Read the whole book,
not just the nice parts, that the preachers talk about. Now right from the beginng start counting
how many killings happen. Most of them are done in someones name, guess who.
I’m sure there are very few people here who believe what the bible says,its just ridiculous, thats why were bold enough to discuss these things, because we have put our faith in reason rather than in God or religious texts. I’m saying that instead of just bashing organized religion and billions of people’s faith, we as people of rationality instead take the good messages and lessons from those texts and use them to better ourselves, instead of perpetuating hostility.
Phil, I agree that I would prefer to live in a world without the divisiveness that religion causes. However, I don’t think this is sufficient reason for atheists not to stand up for truth. As MLK said, evil prospers when good men do nothing. Should we accept human rights abuses just to get along? I see religion as destructive – in fact, I’m with bill maher when he says that religion could destroy us. Either through holy war, or because religious leaders in the west believe the apocolyptic nonsense in Revelations. Or through not protecting our earth because jesus is coming soon anyway to destroy it. I could write for pages on the destructive influence of religion, and I’m not inclined to be quiet about it for the sake of peace.
I’m an atheist but I have no problems with people who have a religion. I think many people think
atheist are against religion. That’s not so, we just don’t believe. What ever makes you happy do it or believe it. As long as it doesn’t hurt those that don’t prescribe to your beliefs. Someone in an early texts mentioned quantum mechanic, Hawkings said that anyone who said then understood quantum didn’t know quantum mechanics. Gods are the same.
I am an atheist who is against religion. I think most deprogrammed ex-christians might agree, although some of us were hurt by religion more than others.
I was a firm catholic believer for the first 17 years of my life, but as of recently I just couldn’t stand the inconsistencies within the bible and in churches around the world. Its not that I dont believe in God persay, or some other all powerful being (who can prove that a God doesnt exist?) But I think I have learned to be a better person from at least the experiences that ive had at church. Goodwill in Africa, christmas presents for needy children, soup kitchens, mosquito nets, preventing genocide in darfur. Theses are all things ive helped my former church with personally. So I think it would be a stretch to say that religion is all evil, because I more often than not hear the good things from the bible rather than the bad. Thats what I want to pass on to others, don’t let both sides just hate one another, but rather live and let live, no matter how annoying people are when they try to convert you, who cares? why try to fight something that despite your best effort isn’t going to change?
yea, surrender to live and if not?
“who can prove that a God doesnt exist?”
You’re still approaching this from the wrong perspective. It’s not up to atheists to disprove the existence of God/Jesus. God is not our explanation for things; it’s the theist’s. It’s up to them to prove that God exists.
Only they can’t. They’ve never been able to.
1. First issue, others already responded to. That is the burden of proof re existence of god. When making a spectacular claim, there must be spectacular evidence. Theists must prove the existence of god, not the other way around. If I claim there is an invisible being that made the universe (in 6 days), controls good and evil, knows every thought, every minute, of every person, judges us, and will send us to hell if we don’t believe, well…frankly, that’s pretty wild. At this point, I see no evidence of the existence of god, therefore it’s far more rational to assume there isn’t one.
2. Re good works. Yes, religious organizations do a lot of good works, and I’m glad you had such positive experiences with catholicism. However, there are many secular organizations that also do equivalent works. Religiosity is not necessarily connected with generosity of spirit. My view is that the damage religion does far outweighs the good.
3. Which leads me to this. My annoyance at fundies trying to convert me is the least of my issues with religion. It’s dangerous – that’s why I’m against it. I wouldn’t be so passionate about the subject if it was just about me. There’s a whole world out there, living in superstition-land, and some of them even have their fingers on the nuke button. And these are people who believe in Revelations – that’s just scary. Others create public policy that impact all of us; climate change, women’s reproductive rights, gay rights, just to name a few. I suggest you watch Bill Maher’s Religulous – it’s entertaining and touches on why religion has outgrown its usefulness, and if we hang on to it past its prime (which is now), we may not survive. I know that sounds dramatic, but it’s scary because it’s true.
I know people have different views of religion because of personal experiences, and I’m aware that extremely negative religious experiences has fueled my passion for this subject. However, I feel that the arguments hold up.
janet check yo self before you wreck yo self.
maybe you should read about buddhism, tao, ancestral spiritualities of native cultures, or just invest a little thought in your concept of Self.
Faith isn’t always about religion, and while people are misguided in trying to ‘convert you’ to one particular view of the Godhead, you should take a leap of faith (haha) and try to understand the mind that believes these things that you do not.
May I ask what you believe in? I’m sure you’ve got faith in friends and family, or perhaps just in your own goodness.
Or maybe you are incapable of seeing beyond yourself into this realm. I cannot say.
one more thing, bil maher is a twat who can’t answer his own questions
don’t you see how he is preaching just the same? talking about dangerous ideas… athiesm and non-belief is just as much up there because it is capable of leaving your mind adrift and alone, with no foundation to stand on.
you may not realize it but bill maher’s belief in “I don’t know” is retarded. Who wants to live in a world of unanswered questions? Granted, you ahve to take everything with a grain of salt and find what works for YOU. but it damn better work or you’re wasting time
and you can tell how good it makes him feel to be a false prophet
I’d rather live in a world of unanswered questions than in a world of lies.
what lies?
if you believe something, act upon it, and make it real in the world via yourself, what lies are there?
i’m not talking about metaphysics on the whole, with metaphysics you have to take everything with a grain of salt (or sugar) because none of it is wholly proven yet. Some guy referenced that other dude talking about quantum physics, and that is sort of where its leading… but we don’t know YET.
First of all, I find certainty arrogant because there is no way we can know what’s “out there”, what happens after we die, etc. It is also ridiculous because we cannot know these things, at least not now. I agree that it takes courage to live in a world where there isn’t certainty. It’s called growing up and maturing. Just as we leave our parents, eventually we should leave the security of the “god fold” and live as adults, in the real world, where fantasy is hopefully a thing of the past.
That said, you asked about my spirituality, and what I do believe in. After I started questioning christianity, I immersed myself in the Canadian Aboriginal culture and spirituality. I attended sweatlodges, drum ceremonies, prayed with sweetgrass, the whole bit. I preferred this “creator” to the god of my youth because it was not judgmental. I continued searching, studying, and reading, and eventually it became clear to me that even though the “creator” wasn’t as psychotic a god as the christian god, it was still a crutch, with no basis in reality. It was superstitious belief with no evidence to back it up. The fog eventually cleared, and that was both scary and exciting to see things with clarity.
Now, I see “spirituality” as the joy we experience when we let go of negativity, anger, fear, and superstition; love for myself, other people, animals, nature, etc; romantic intimacy; becoming our best selves; and letting go of artificial addictions and crutches, including a “daddy in the sky”. Life now makes sense. We humans love to believe that there is a “plan” that we are supremely important in the universe. The truth, the way I see it, is that each of us are part of an amazing eco-system; along with plants and other animals, we are born, we die. After that, we just don’t know. But we are not special; the world was not created for us; we are PART of the world. Since I realized this, I feel much more connected to others and to the earth that sustains me.
As for faith, if you define faith as believing in something for which there is no evidence, I don’t have any. I believe in people who have proven themselves trustworthy; I have “faith” that the sun will come up tomorrow because it always has before; and that if I put positive energy out, I usually get positive energy back. These are some things I do believe in, because they are real. I do not believe in blind faith, in anything.
Hope this clears up your questions.
Bill Maher as a false prophet? I chuckled a little at that one. You’re getting a bit carried away. He points out the silliness of religious belief systems. Clearly you are threatened by that.
“if you believe something, act upon it, and make it real in the world via yourself, what lies are there?”
Lying to yourself is always a danger.
If you don’t agree, convince yourself that you can fly and hop off a tall building.
You also cause a danger to others.
The unfortunate people on the ground didn’t deserve to get splattered with your useless carcass.
John C’s brother has turned up … that’s nice.
bastard zen
“Reason” is the analytical or critical power in man. It assesses evidence, analyzes data, and discerns patterns. But it is not the only, nor even the primary faculty whereby we are in contact with the “outside world.” “Faith” is the creative power in man. It is a projection of willpower, love, desperation, and personality upon the whole world that flows out of some deep part of us.
Understood this way, it can be seen how faith reflects something primordial about humanity and human consciousness: namely, that we view the world in fundamentally ‘personal’ terms, that even though we can use ‘reason’ as a method, it is the well-spring of the creative ‘faith’ that lies in man’s heart that paves the way. This self-projection of hopeful and dynamic ‘faith’ is what even determines the playing field for what sorts of questions we will ask and what sort of issues we will set our reason to work upon.
I dare anyone here, atheist, Christian, deist, Muslim, or whatever, to read the following book without having their view of faith radically challenged: “The Tragic Sense of Life” by Miguel de Unamuno. I think that this author does a better job than anyone of showing what the human end of faith is all about, and how this relates to the thing we call reason. I think that ultimately, we will always need both, and that something about the way that we handle the ceaseless and unavoidable struggle that arises between them is the most characteristically human quality that we possess.
I can’t remember who on this blog mentioned Stanford’s Robert Sapolsky’s lecture on Evolution, religion, schizophrenia and the schizotypal personality. Thanks – it was amazing. Anyway, relating to Daniel’s original post on this thread, he mentioned that Martin Luther WAS crazy, in a sense. He was abused by an extremely domineering father, had terribly anxiety, and had almost crippling OCD which he then used to his advantage by being a religious leader – ie, religious rituals which are remarkably similar to the rituals of OCD patients. According to Sapolsky, when these rituals are shared among the whole congregation, it’s a way of sharing the anxiety that underlies the need for ritualistic behaviour. Really interesting stuff.
….Wait, what? You mean that’s actually what the sign is SUPPOSED to say? Someone didn’t mix up the letters?
The person who said faith in some strange deity is the inspiration that has advanced humans does not know much about science. Every living thing can learn and adapt to it’s surroundings. Humans just happen to have a brain that can do it better then others. We still have weeds and insects that adapt to are search to destroy them. If we are spending billions of dollars trying to kill a mosquito it kind of shows we don’t have much in the way of divine powers. Faith is just an excuse to hide are own failures. Blame has a very long finger.
i fear that most people are taking the words out of context, in a purely ‘western’ religious sense. You all have preconceptions about what ‘faith is.’ Reason and logic to anyone, seems like the only way to approach life and ‘faith’ is completely illogical, making it easily tossed aside and done away with as something only lunatics and religious fanatics deal with.
crazy? naw, he wasn’t crazy. yelling about whores isn’t crazy. If you can really see what this metaphor is pointing at, then kudos to you. Everyone else quit getting butthurt because your mom made you go to church. Faith is real, faith is important, faith represents the obtaining of ideals, and is of ideals themselves. Logic and reasoning is grounded in an impermanence, that when fully accepted as ‘truth’ or ‘reality’ is THE BIGGEST FLAW.
Why?
logic and reasoning exist in THIS situation that WILL change. if you rely too much on logic, you’re not giving yourself room to move beyond temporary situations.
impermanence is the key. faith looks beyond the NOW. it accepts things that cannot be ‘known’ until time passes and we are proven right or wrong.
Why does everyone always think of faith and belief in the regards to the western stereotype of God and angels and yadda yadda, sons dying for sins, etc etc.
i’m talking about ALL belief. I AM HERE. I AM A 21 YEAR OLD MALE. I AM A GOOD PERSON. I AM I AM I AM. My friend will come through for me in a pinch. The world is a good place. The world is a bad place. This is right. That is wrong. Your atheism or agnosticism is a belief as well! And you’re clinging to it just as hard as all the religious fundies! Not you personally, but you know.
I’m not taking sides here, because you can’t and that is the point. You’ve got faith already.
“Faith is real, faith is important, faith represents the obtaining of ideals, and is of ideals themselves. Logic and reasoning is grounded in an impermanence, that when fully accepted as ‘truth’ or ‘reality’ is THE BIGGEST FLAW.
Why?”
Because truth and reality have always been the bane of airy faerie headed make-believe.
oh gary, you’re only getting half of the picture
OK Daniel, paint me the other half. I understand that faith is real but religions and what they do are not permanent. Religions come and go or change to suit their environment. Very few if any would
attend a church if it were run the way it was 500 years ago. Societies change and churches change to reflect the views of the people they’re trying to attract. So morals and ideals don’t come from religion. It’s like the laws we live by. They are in a constant state of flux. Even 50 years ago who would have thought we would need laws to cover are online practises. Go back 125 years and we had no laws about cars.
You’ve got faith and you don’t realize it. It’s no excuse for anything. It’s part of being human. Read all of my posts throughout this thread and look at the concept I am pointing to.
philosophers and deists alike have pondered questions born of our experience of the way things are for thousands of years, and the ‘other half’ of the picture is what you MAKE FOR YOURSELF. believing can be dangerous yes, when you ignore logic and reasoning, but if you ignore belief for logic and reasoning wholly that is just as dangerous. we need to believe, to have ideals, to see beyond our current selves, we need imagination and to see possibilities no matter how far off they may seem to us when we are grounded in our current situation. If there was no left brain to match our right, we would all be biological robots. if you don’t bridge the gap between the two hemispheres, then you are flawed whether you are a religious nut or not. you believe in science and its capabilities for the future. you have your saints but they’re newton and Einstein or whoever. your god is the world as it unfolds scientifically, which, when you look at any belief system, is really what it is. we all believe in the universe. anyway i’m tired and i’m getting too pushy with what IIIIIII believe.
What is budhha telling you about Martin Luther and also the bridging of your unbridged brain?
“but if you ignore belief for logic and reasoning wholly that is just as dangerous”
Prove it. That assertion is not justified by your speech.
“to have ideals, to see beyond our current selves, we need imagination”
Nobody is diminishing imagination. It is part of our rational thinking.
“we would all be biological robots”
Well, it’s arguably wether we are or not.
“you believe in science and its capabilities for the future”
First, you admonish us about the danger of not having beliefs, then you repeat the so heard argument about “skepticism is belief in science”. So… I don’t know what are you accusing atheist of.
Daniel:Buddha said nothing was permanent! The fact that I know my book cases will hold my books is not faith, I built them to hold the books. I can look at the sky at night and have a hope we can get there someday. That’s not faith but hope. My right or left brain (a much overrated topic) is no different to my left or right arm. I don’t need faith to use my body parts. To believe or imagine or have ideas or ideals does not require faith. I have no saints, I don’t revere Newton or Einstein, though I do admire what they thought. Newton has been proved to be incorrect and Hawkings is usurping Einstein. We’re moving away from the topic. Reason vs Faith. Nothing in my reasoning includes faith. You seem to think reality requires faith. I know that some of the stars I look at may have ceased to exist millions of years ago, that’s science not faith. If a person has faith in some god, it does not mean they don’t have a brain that has reason. They are just shutting down some part of their reasoning. How or why I have no idea, but it does seem popular.
“How or why I have no idea”? The unreasonable have no faith in reason, reasoning that faith is a self fulfilling prophecy in that if you just wish fervently, reality will conform to your wishes.
GG, how or why I have an idea. You class people as unreasonable because they use reason that does not conform to yours. The use of reason is not black or white, there are a billion shades in between. Of course they have what some may call faith in their ability to reason, and in most it is not a wish. Reason is just knowledge acquired though life that you use in your own way. Every situation in your life requires some sort of thought process. Some may think faith is involved, most don’t. The original statement “Reason is the greatest enemy that faith has” leaves out the fact that reason can be very unreasonably. The ones with faith think they have a very good reason to think that way. If someone tries to use reason to make them loose faith then that someone is being unreasonable to their way of using reason. The circle has no end.
Here’s some more info about the deranged mind of Martin Luther:
http://home.comcast.net/~pobrien48/luther.htm
While driving to work the other day I passes a small church with a sign out front that said, “Don’t blame god for religion.” I found it to be very insightful and warranting of a post on this thread.
I would never blame god for religion. God doesn’t exist, so that wouldn’t make much sense. I blame people for religion.
Well at least you got one thing right there Ms. Janet! :) Religion is a man made institution, but God is very, very real. In fact in Him we (now) live and move and have our very being.
Prove it.
Janet- did you check out the site about Martin Luther. The person who posted it has many weird things to blither about. I said in an earlier post that no one would go to church if it was run as it was in the past. At one stage the catholic church had the biggest army in the world, and killed millions of people. At one stage they had two popes. Don’t just pick on Martin, by today’s standards they were all deranged by are standards. Many churches were against science and reason because in interfered with their hiracry. It’s not really possible to compare the past with the present. The site about Martin (I’m not defending him) but they were not his word. They are an interpretation of what some one many years later thought he said. If you enjoy history look up others from his era or slightly before or after. By are standards they all sound like barbarians, but that was what life was like.
I did not properly “vet” the site. I rather assumed that these were quotes from his writings, but I never checked out its accuracy. Maybe I should become a reporter on Fox News – I seem to have the right qualifications! lol. However, my understanding is that Luther stood out as a weirdo even among his crowd – he was quite mentally ill, and had major issues with an abusive father (from some accounts anyway). His obsession with the devil is about a loony-toon as you get. But I do give him credit for one thing. It was studying Luther (and our protestant roots) that got my former-christian sister to question, and finally abandon, christianity. So maybe I shouldn’t be so hard on him!
A slightly different view can be gained here.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_luther
This in no way means I condone the teachers of any religion during that period or this. Peoples lives were so foreign from us. Luther was excommunicated because he hated the sale of indulgences and
wrote a thesis about it. The catholic church said you could pay them to buy your way to heaven. This
was very popular with people who had a child die before baptism, or the rich who loved to sin. Luther was not the first man to say reason was wrong when used against the church.
Interesting points Gary. However, because Luther is the “father” of the protestant reformation, and I’m a victim of that, I have a special place in my heart for him. Influential people are held to a higher standard in my view.
I’ve never seen anything that states he was the father of the protestant reformation, the reformation gives a clue. He was one of many that disliked the way the catholic church was going. If he had been a lone voice the church would have killed him, in a legal manner of course. Even in his time the beliefs he held were splitting into splinter groups. How many different churches in the Lutheran tradition exist today? The majority of protestant churches do not think they are Lutheran churches. It would take a great tree to hold all the branches.
What guides scientific reasoning? How do we choose what to investigate? Why do we choose to ignore some parts of our existence and examine others?
On what basis can these questions be answered when we admit we have no knowledge until after we have made our choices and investigated?
Science is extremely important, but everyone has to make choices about what to do when they don’t know what to do. They hope they’ll choose something that will make their lives better. Is it reason that leads them to hope that their blind choices might lead to a better life?
If you are making blind choices hoping that it will lead to a better life, you are failing.
“Blind choices”? That’s what religious people do. They choose to believe something that logic and all observable evidence should tell them that “This cannot possibly be true.”
As Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain) said, “Faith is believing in what you know ain’t true.” But if your idea of a “better life” is spending a good proportion of your time and resources praising a non-existent deity that does not and never has done anything for anyone, then be happy, stay ignorant.
Cheers, dear compatriot!
As someone (Mr. Clemens? I never remember) said, I’d rather be sober and miserable (which I’m not) than drunk and merry…
Let me see, are you neither sober or miserable, or just one of those? These things can be so hard to grasp…. ;)
For sure, it could not have been either Winston Churchill or W.C. Fields! For that matter, I doubt it was Mr. Clemens either, as he had been known to “indulge” now and then!
“Religious hypocrisy and tyranny”? Isn’t that rather redundant? I have never known any religious person who was not a hypocrite, a liar, or a fool. Often, they are all three.
Most of the problems of the world are, and always have been caused by religion. Mankind will never truly be free until the dark yoke of religion is lifted by the clear light of truth and logic.
“Mankind will never truly be free until the dark yoke of religion is lifted by the clear light of truth”…
So true, “religion” is such a bondage, an oppressive burdensome thing and so the very “reason” why Christ despised it so, came to do away with it and saved His harshest rebukes for the hypocrites and long-robed ones. The effect of truth is always greater liberty.
Hmm…
I think this whole criticism to faith is hypocritical and exacerbated. Sure, we know that with most Christians, asking for the reasoning behind God usually ends with some form of circular reasoning or faith. But everything ends with circular reasoning or faith, so I can’t Atheists are much better.
For example: If I ask how you discover truth and you say through reason, I would ask how you figure that reason is the key to truth, to which you would answer that you reasoned so which is circular reasoning in itself.
My point is that when it comes down to it, we at some point have to hold some sort of faith or belief. Sure, some faith is more ridiculous than other, but who are we to criticize? I hope I don’t offend anyone, just giving an opinion.
“everything ends with circular reasoning or faith,” How ridiculous. That is patently untrue. But, like most theists, truth has no part in your world view.
If you ask how reason is the key to truth, the real answer is, the opposite of your thinking. Reason, is observing facts, and using related facts to arrive at a hypothesis. Then testing that hypothesis with more observations to learn more facts. When the facts consistently support the hypothesis, it is no longer theory, but an established truth. here is nothing circular about it.
Deists should leave thinking and rational discussion to those equipped to do it.
There really would be no arguments if the religious reich were content to live in their fantasy world and not try to force their evil beliefs on others by violence and the force of law, which is really just a form of threatened violence.
Yeah, they should show a little tolerance, help and forgive their enemies and love their neighbor. They should respect the ideals that make our world the world we most love. That would be the reasonable thing to do.
“That would be the reasonable thing to do.”
You see the problem.
Are you suggesting that it’s a problem because the reasonable thing to do in this case isn’t scientific, isn’t provable, and has a questionable history success?
I think he’s going for simply questioning their capacity to use reason. Not nice, but not necessarily inaccurate.
If one lacks the ability to reason, then on what basis does he determine the reasonableness of others? Who would he trust? Would he just say something like, “Yes, it’s reasonable to make another million land mines for the beaches of the world,” or, “Yes, it’s reasonable to consume resources in order to build technologies designed to destroy resources.”? Those are some branches of science and political science. They are forms of reason one could trust, if one wanted to.
I think he means more the meta-level of reasonable; i.e. being able to apply standards of evidence and logic to overarching life experiences, problems, beliefs, and actions. A person who knows that 2 + 2 = 4 may still not know when to or simply refuse to apply it correctly in real life situations. A person can be plenty reasonable and discerning when it comes to, for example, their job but still be a credulous irrational person when it comes to their marriage or their politics. Some (not all, but definitely many) religious people have a remarkable talent of sheltering their religious beliefs from the sorts of rational tests they are willing to subject their other beliefs to.
I’m okay with that idea. For example, choosing to talk to Leprechauns in my yard is not on par with choosing to spend two million dollars to destroy property worth twenty million dollars. The difference is, I can’t prove I’m talking to Leprechauns. Therefore talking to Leprechauns is less real, according to what some other people trust is true.
And yet, I’d rather talk to Leprechauns than spend two million dollars in order destroy twenty million dollars.
Others disagree with my preference, but I think they aren’t being real.