You are right (religion does not change basic human nature), but I refer you to point no. 5 above. This community did what they did through bonding together under a shared set of ideals. The patient found them (and they found her) because she shared that framework of faith. Now sure, it doesn't need to be religion; any shared set of values, like a humanist framework works just as well. But in the end, in this case it was the religious group that delivered the goods. I'm just pointing out that religion is not unconditionally bad like a purely rational scientific viewpoint is not unconditionally good. It comes down to the people behind it: they will be good or bad regardless of what framework they are operating from, and will use it to justify/rationalise what they want.
You keep avoiding the point I'm trying to make though. Should people be tolerant of everyone's beliefs, no matter what those beliefs are? But you are agreeing with me there... I never said anyone has the right to take a spade to someone's head. I said just because we have "freedom", doesn't mean we are free to do and believe whatever we want and without question. Our freedom is very restricted and defined within a social and legal framework. So there shouldn't be an automatic right to believe in religion without question. Everything should be questioned. That is the point. Which again is agreeing with me. It's not a universal freedom, it's a freedom based largely on laws, and laws change... which is the entire point of the question in the first place. Just because something is law, doesn't mean we should all be a bunch of lemmings and accept it as right or normal without even thinking twice about it. Otherwise women would still not be allowed to vote, etc. But that is happening constantly. Paedophiles are punished and imprisoned left and right because they want sex with young people, even if it's consentual. In some time and in some cultures, that would be allowed. So the law here has stepped in and decided that it's wrong and should be punished. And speaking against blacks or asians or whites or whatever, even without actually DOING anything, is still considered "hate speech" and that is against the law too. But that is their belief, so why is that not allowed and believing in a religion is allowed *without question*. That is the entire point of the question. Your answer only seems to be to do with whether someone gets physically hurt or not by the belief. And that doesn't stand up when you consider how many people have been physically hurt in the name of religion. To counter that is the argument that it's only the extremists that do the hurting and so everyone else shouldn't be questioned. But there are people in the KKK or Al Queda who haven't actually gone out there and killed anyone (yet), so should they be accepted too? It gets all the more important when you say that people should be free to believe what they want as long as it doesn't physically hurt someone else. Because there are social and political (and personal) decisions made all the time, based on religion. So there should be more to it than simply whether it physically hurts people or not. It should take into account other things, like whether it's a sensible or good thing at all. That's the point. Says who? Atheists don't have a religion and it's not a problem for them. There are countless people who live good lives and were never religious. Oh come on! Do you REALLY think the problems with communist Russia and China came from a lack of religion?!?! AND you are suggesting that it is conclusive proof that religion is necessary?? No, tribalism is just an umbrella term for the beliefs of a tribe. Religions are belief systems so you can't dismiss the relevance of religion just because you chose to use a broader term. Wow. Nicely said. But everything you just said should be grounds to abolish the whole thing. You are basically saying that some humans are pathetic creatures who would self destruct without some kind of guidance, and so religion is a good thing because it serves as a big, stupid, fake story to placate these simple minded folk and save the world from falling in to chaos. We are all pointless specks in the cosmos so they need a lie that tells them they have purpose. They can't mentally cope with the acceptance of random events so they need a fake explanation for that too. They can't accept that they are individuals in control of themselves so they need to be told that there is a god looking after them etc.. Basically what you are talking about are mentally challenged or ill people who are 'medicated' with a fake story, which is suspiciously similar to all the people in mental institutions all over the world. Surely it would be better to teach people the truth and the facts as we know them? Let people deal with REALITY and come to terms with it in their own way, like most people do... And if someone can't handle it and starts freaking out, you deal with them as you would anyone else. To me it seems pretty perverse to lie to people and tell them these made up stories about obeying god's will or going to hell and being tortured. It's presumptuous that so many people are simple minded and hopeless and need this story. Surely in 2008 we should have evolved beyond that now? The majority of people don't run around murdering their enemies, and that's not because they don't want to upset god, it's because they have morals, they are well raised and have pride in themselves, they have common sense and a sense of self preservation, and they are obeying democratic laws etc. That is the majority, so if some can't behave in those conditions and need a religion to keep them in line, then surely they are a minority with problems that should be addressed in a more mature and sensible way instead of telling them some horror story filled with threats? It is parasitic because it's eating away at common sense and logic and knowledge. It is a placebo and it cons people, and it terrifies them in to not questioning it because they are brainwashed in to thinking that would be a terrible thing to do. It is an archaic, barbaric control system from thousands of years ago that should be questioned by modern advanced humans. We once lived in caves and communicated in grunts, but we advanced. It's human nature to question things and try things and that's why we advance. If nobody tried banging flint on a rock we wouldn't have found fire. Religion tells people to not question things, and to just have blind faith. That goes against human nature. Complex human thinking --->over 2000 years ago in a very primitive time. Not modern complex thinking. It's an ancient belief system and the entire thing is built around not being open to further complex thinking. So modern complex thinking faces major hurdles (which this thread proves) every step of the way, because people are so resistant to do what they have been conditioned in to not doing, and that is put their blind 'faith' on hold for a moment and actually think about things properly. That's the point of the sign on the bus. It wouldn't be so bad if everyone thought about it long and hard and still decided that they wanted to believe in their religion. But the problem is that most people don't think about it at all. No it's not. That is what science is about. Science questions everything and then goes with the most sensible and convincing conclusion unless a better one comes along, based on facts and not on feelings or survival instincts. It is based on provable fact, and if someone questions it, they can try to prove their theory instead and any good scientist is open to hearing about it and that's why we are so advanced today. Because it's a system that works, and at it's very core, it is based on the two heads are better than one theory that it's better to have beliefs constructed from the sum of all human research, than beliefs based on what one book and one organisation's interpretation of that book tells us to believe, and that we should not question it at all.
It seems it's your idea, unless by co-exist you mean "ignore each other" then sure. The meaning of my question is to proove that they cannot co-exist, as in "agree with each other". And there is very simple scientific proof that stone henge could have been built by a small group of men, and very easily with a large group. I think there was a thread here on bit about how a single man was close to replicating stonehenge. I meant religion in general, i'm just curious if there is any scientific proof other than written stories, that any religous beliefs are in fact true. I don't care how "reliable" people say a certain book is, how do i know it's correct? For me that's the difference between religion and science, one is proven, the other is a belief in things like god's, miracles, saints, devils, heaven, hell, etc Things that cannot be proven by science, we'll only definitely know what is true when we die. No, there are photo's & video & scars to proove that the stories of the holocaust are true. And yes, it's alot easier to proove events as false or true when they happened around 60 years ago, as opposed to a couple of thousand. I believe that dinosaurs existed for example, as i've seen the unique bones. I didn't say scientific proof of any religion would be easy, i just haven't seen it yet, sorry True. People do like to believe that a supposedly impossible thing could occur though, especially when times are tough. Just throwing it out there.
That's all woof was saying. You can still follow Christian values, and think that Jesus was a cool guy worth taking advice from, without believing that he was ressurected, could calm the sea and could walk on water. That is why your 'show me some proof' argument isn't relevant or valid in this case.
As it has already been said, that's simply a social framework, god not required. The difference is that within the context of that religious framework the group also believed that God gave the girl cancer in the first place, which really negates God's positive ethical value, right? ... To address another issue that has been raised - it is not the job of athiests to disprove the existence of god. It is the job of theists to prove the existence of God. The reason for that is that it's impossible to prove a negative. Here's a quote from Bertrand Russel on the subject: "If I were to suggest that between the Earth and Mars there is a china teapot revolving about the sun in an elliptical orbit, nobody would be able to disprove my assertion provided I were careful to add that the teapot is too small to be revealed even by our most powerful telescopes. But if I were to go on to say that, since my assertion cannot be disproved, it is an intolerable presumption on the part of human reason to doubt it, I should rightly be thought to be talking nonsense. If, however, the existence of such a teapot were affirmed in ancient books, taught as the sacred truth every Sunday, and instilled into the minds of children at school, hesitation to believe in its existence would become a mark of eccentricity and entitle the doubter to the attentions of the psychiatrist in an enlightened age or of the Inquisitor in an earlier time." ... Finally I present to you the worlds first religious-bit-tech.net review of the Noctua NH-C12P Page 1 - Richard Swinburne has a strong inner conviction that this heatsink performs the better than any other. Page 2 - Joe Martin was brought up to have total and unquestioning faith that there is no better heatsink. Page 3 - Tim Smalley has promogated an official dogma, binding all on all loyal bit-tech readers that this is the best heatsink. Page 4 - In our view there is only one heatsink. Would you stop reading bit-tech if it used religious rationale in its product reviews? So would I.
But you see, I think science and religion can exist in perfect harmony. There are plenty of pretty awesome scientists who have had a belief in a creator... (Hawking, Einstein, Galileo, Planck, Boyle, Newton, Faraday...)... and I believe that anything which has not been proven to be incorrect should still stand as being potentially correct. I just see too many people knocking off older ideas 'because science proved it wrong'. Maybe it is your own experience which perhaps jaundices your view on the ideas of religion. My experiences of the Christian bible aren't in the many, but from what I understand, there are passages which suggest that the rabbit chews cud, women's periods are able to corrode metal and Joseph apparently had a multitude of fathers... But the scripture I'm most fascinated by is the Muslim's Qu'ran. The Qu'ran's message was that the pursuit of knowledge is very important, and indeed if we look into the history books, the scientific wonders discovered by those who took on this message are pretty astounding. Arab scientists had a value for the circumference of the earth at a time when western scientists still thought the earth was flat. Whilst a vast wealth of information was acquired b the spread of the Muslim empire, the amount of discovery in the fields of astronomy, medicine and physics is something I find very fascinating. The other thing I find fascinating is how the qu'ran sort of implicitly says a lot of things which were to be discovered scientifically many hundreds of years later. For example, are suggestive of something like the Big Bang Theory, over 1500 years before such a thing was hypothesised by contemporary scientists. Islam also appears to have a lot to say on the aquatic origins of life: The qu'ran also has a startling level of detail about what goes on after conception, before childbirth. For a group of nomadic Arabs, over 1500 years ago, these ideas just seem to accurate and too complex to me to be made up. If Muhammed was illiterate, and the people of the time had no way to predict the beginnings of life, or the basics of embryology or indeed the big bang theory, I deduce that there must be something special there... hence my adherence to the Islamic faith. Thats just me though Either way though, I have only ever had positive experiences of religious people, so I have no reason to feel that they are bringing about any evil. I know individuals who are Christians, who are very good people, as do I know people who are Christians, who I would deem to be 'bad' people. The same applies to any faith or group of people. Blind adherence to baseless interpretations is one thing, open-minded faith in pursuit of a fulfilling life is another...
If they're not being violent because of it, sure. Let people believe whatever they want. You want to believe that all religion is bad, and everyone should believe what you believe? Go right ahead. Just be aware that some people feel that they NEED to have faith in something, and for the huge majority of religious people, that is what they do it for. My room mate believes that WoW is the best thing since sliced bread, better infact, and I think it's a piece of ****. Should I demand he belives what I believe because people have died through excessive use of WoW? No, because that would be ****ing retarded. Paedophiles are a different kettle of fish entirely - a manipulative person could easily convince a young child that they (the child) wants to have sex. For christ's sake, 99% of kids believe in Santa, the Easter Bunny and the tooth fairy, twisting their mind to your will is not going to be a challenge. A child is, regardless of supposed consent, NOT legally considered mature enough to work out the entire situation, and shouldn't be considered to be capable of that decision either. How many bad ideas did you have in your childhood? I had a shitload, looking back. I'm not saying people haven't been hurt by religion, to even think that would be stupid, but to say that because a small number of that religious group actively cause problems for other people of other faiths (Or lack of faith, whatever) means the entire religious group is like that is just raw, unadulterated stupidity. It's like saying "Hey, you like beer and you have a driving license. You are absolutely going to go drink and drive, because other people have done it." or, "Hey, you're human. You're gonna commit suicide because some other people have done it!". Generalising such a large group of people, because of a small number of people within the group, is stupid and very probably offensive to the 99% that're just normal people going about their lives and believing in the same God(s). The short answer is: Yes. People should be allowed to believe what they want, so long as they do so within the confines of the law of the host country. Paedophiles having sex with underage people? Against the law in most first world countries, for at least the reason mentioned above (Probably more - I'm no lawyer). It seems to me that you're suggesting that everyones beliefs need to be dictated by what you believe in (Or at least a very similar belief to yours). What happens when someone gets into a position of changing the 'public belief structure' and decides that everyone should believe that they can drink battery acid? Do you drink the battery acid and die, because it's the system you liked before, or do you tell them where to get off? As for 'sensible or good thing's, that is entirely subjective. To me, setting fire to the WoW servers and ****-canning the entire game is a good, sensible idea. To 10 million other people? Bad idea, very bad idea. Do I get to be automatically right because a handful, in comparison to the number that play it, of people have caused themselves harm, or others, over it? No, no it does not.
Hold on, just a quick opinion poll. Do you believe: a) All religions are stupid, and anybody who follows a religion is an idiot. Religion is the cause of all evil. And suicide bombing. b) All atheism is evil. Anybody who doesn't believe in god should burn in hell. Atheism is the cause of moral turmoil. or c) Do what you want man. I have my beliefs and you have yours. I would hope everyone here would pick C... is there anybody here who can provide a reason for picking the other two?
So you're basing your idea of how the entire universe and everything in it was created based on when those words (which could mean anything) were written. But let's say they do mean something. In evolutionary terms 1,500 yrs is nothing at all - We aren't more intelligent than people who lived 1,500 years ago...and yet children as young as five can understand the concepts of Big Bang theory, Origins of life and Embryology. Many ideas have been lost and re-discovered at a later date, but you're choosing to believe that because really basic concepts were jotted down in the most rudementary of ways a long time ago that it categorically proves the existence of Allah? Oh, and A - see previous posts.
Whilst a five year old could comprehend the big-bang theory, he probably couldn't discover it... people 1500 years ago were as developed as people are now. Except whereas a scientific thinker now has vest libraries of information and education systems to raise them up in a way that they can chew on these ideas, people then were brought up as shepherds and merchants. There was no A-Level Physics back then... My decision to stick with Islam was not based on these little points alone, but a multitude of reasons (multitude, don't you just love that word? ). I won't bore anyone with them just yet... IMO, anybody should be allowed to practice any religion they choose, be it Buddhism, atheism, Christianity, Islam, whatever... and IMO, and person who is normal in the head would not go out of their way to disprove other people's beliefs. The slogan on the bus which started this thread, IMO, had nothing wrong with it, apart from being a bit distasteful. In the same way, I would not be offended by a similar poster, asking me to consider Jainism, or one asking me to consider Islam. In the words of Butters, 'Why can't we all just g-get along?'
I think it's just the way i interpret "co-exist" i guess I'll take option d Modgodtanvir, which is something like: There are things we just don't know, so lets not waste time thinking that we know them, so as the slogan says, relax and enjoy life. How some people interpret relaxing & enjoying life can be a problem though. Allthough i have many large doubts about much of what is preached in many religions, i can't pretend to know for certain which are correct or incorrect. We shall find out one day what is on the other side, hopefully it's a heaven where the Ferrari's are free & never break down or even crash!
Can you prove beyond reasonable doubt that there is no God? Can anyone prove beyond reasonable doub that there is? The answer is no, to both. You can theorise, and speculate, but that's all. If you could prove it either way you would probably not be arguing about it on BT forums - You'd be out there making a goddamn mint.
Omg me and nexxo agree on something? WTF... I truly thought id never say those words. Yet each and every post added to my growing respect for you. You always make your views clear but unlike alot of people in modern society you explain your reasoning and the thought process behind it. While also recognizing the opposite view points valid arguments maintaining balance which is the key to every issue ever invented. First I think the only logical issue ppl can have with this ad campaign is its negative towards others beliefs. I don't see billboards that say "if you don't believe in god your going to hell" or "atheist are wrong" this is the key, religious messages at least in my experience are always positive. I feel freedom of speech is important and I don't think anyone should even think of limiting you until you cross the line of positive to negative in a direct form and even then its all based on circumstances. If I say I love apples and you say you love meat that's fine but if I say meat is for baby killers and you say apples are for bitches then its here we can begin to have a issue. So represent whatever you want as loud and as much as you want but like your mom said if you have nothing nice to say sometimes its better to just shut up. Do I personally have a issue with this kinda thing? No who cares honestly it may annoy me to see it and I would roll my eyes but I honestly don't think any amount of posters on public property could annoy me within reason of the content and the current "There's probably no God..." is perfectly fine. The only annoying part is I disagree with it, so due to basic human nature it slightly annoys me. It is not negative, and isnt brash or insensitive, if it becomes so then it needs to be dealt with. Unfortunately I don't think scientist are as honest as some of you seem to think. If you spent 30 years of your life proving that black holes were really all connected to one another and you truly believed that your results were 100% valid and had changed your view of space, wouldn't you maybe be a little one sighted when your ideas were criticized and maybe even "proven" to be wrong and a large number of your peers agreed with this new view. Don't you think it would be easy to overlook some inconsistency's and issues in your idea over the others due to the amount of work you put in? Can you think of people you know that if put in the same position would create any amount of lies and deceptions in order to protect there life's work? I know these seems very plausible to me, hell im sure many people would attack anyone in any way possible if there life's work were questioned. History always repeats its self, its showed us time and time again fanaticism always leads us away from reason and truth. Religion fell victim to this and it could be argued still is in some respects. What is there to keep science safe from the same issue? Now my question is, I saw some people ask "why do people have a right to believe in a god who doesn't exist?" my issue with this is, the biggest negative religion has ever brought to human culture is the fact it has at some points in time with some people blinded them into believing they needed to control people from believing in anything they didn't feel was correct. Which is exactly what that statement seems to want? So how is science preventing religion any different from religion preventing science? The key is always balance Should we? yes of course. Can we? Hell no its never going to happen. The reason is people disagree on too many things, like you said some people hate black people or white people so should they be able to tell other people this, without just spewing hatred at the people they hate sure, but should we let them stand outside someones home all hours of the night cursing them? no one can truly deal with that so it has to be stopped. Just like with pedophiles can they want to have sex with minors, sure that's fine but should they be allowed to? No because many people take issue with this and its been proven that it can create harmful psychological effects on the human mind. We need to balance it as well as possible, but unlike these very differing issues people practicing religion does nothing negative to scientist nor the opposite. sorry if I mistyped anything and I sound retarded...
I did ask if anyone could prove there is, too, you know.. My point is, there may be a god, there may not be. If someone wants to believe that there is, and isn't going out abusing other peoples rights to ignore the possability that there is a higher being, or breaking laws/being violent to get people into their religion, then it is an entirely harmless practice. You MAY think that they're throwing time away by believing it, and it is your RIGHT to believe that they're wrong. By the same token, it's their right to think you're wrong, and believe in God. Someone doesn't believe what you believe, but isn't causing a problem? Get over it. Tolerance is something we, as a race, don't have enough of.
As long as those beliefs do not result in actions that harm others, yes. I think you need to make a distinction between what people think and what they do. Thought police? How is that different from the Spanish Inquisition? Minors are not able to give valid and informed consent in such a sexual relationship (fact), hence the law. And paedophiles are not punished for their beliefs, but their actions. Actually, hate speech is defined as: The law is not about the beliefs behind the statement, but the actions that they incite. You're free to say that you don't like black people (it's socially frowned upon, but not illegal). You're not free to say that they should be killed or discriminated against. A comparison with religious beliefs is flawed in as far that most religious public statements do not incite hatred against non-believers. When they do (such as fundamentalist clerics advocating terrorist acts), proselytisers rightly get into legal trouble. I don't think so. First, there are a lot of belief systems which are (ab)used as motivation for some people to hurt others. Let's ban football matches, because that only leads to tribal displays of aggression and vandalism (you should see a city centre after a good match), and how rational is allegiance to a football club really? Let's ban capitalism, because we've all seen how people got hurt with the credit crunch recently. Let's ban democracy, because we went and turned Iraq into a battlefield in its name. Let's ban the war on terror, because we lock people up in Guantanamo Bay because we believe they may be terrorists (putting them on trial in an open criminal court would be the rough equivalent of a scientific test of the hypothesis with peer review, but the US seems to be backing away from that one). Jean Charles DeMenezes was exectuted based on a belief that he was a terrorist. I mean, how sensible and rational are those belief systems really? Anyone question them recently? Or will that get us into trouble with the Inquisition National Security? Which brings us to the second point: who decides what is "sensible" and how? Science? Yay for Eugenics, then. You know it makes sense... Science has a lot of good answers, but not necessarily all the answers. I'm saying that totalitarianism comes in non-religious flavours too (that's why religion was banned --the governments didn't like the competition). Yet people continued to practice it in the face of persecution and death --as, throughout history, many people have. So they must really get something out of it, don't you think? It must fulfill a strong need. NOW you're getting there. You focus on religion, but what you really should be doing is take a step back: if you argue against religion, you should argue against any tribalist belief systems: culture, ethnic identity, football clubs. Everyting that leads to in-group vs. out-group differentiation and subsequent violence. People tell themselves stories to make sense of the harsh realities of life. We, to a certain extent, are privilliged because we now have science to make our lives better (if not more meaningful), but even 200 years ago, things were very different (Infant mortality: 1 in 3. average life expectancy: 40 years. Plagues still happened --you could wake up with a mind fever in the morning and be dead by the evening, without identifiable cause or remedy). People needed something. Religion, a belief in reincarnation, taoism, anything to help them keep a mental balance in the onslaught of life. Religion is an opiate for the masses, alright, because real life was staggeringly crap. Tell me, do you play MMORPGs? How many hours? Same thing, really. Now how are you going to force people to consider the "truthfulness" of their beliefs? Torture them? The Spanish Inquisition did that. I saw a cancer patient last week. In remission for two years now, thanks to sophisiticated medicine. It saved her life. Science: it works. I saw another cancer patient last week. Today I heard she has died; the science obviously didn't work for her. She knew she was dying, this young woman, but she was reconciled and at peace. She had her faith and a belief in heaven. She died not terrified, but peacefully. Religion: it works too. Especially where the science doesn't. Yet you would force this woman to reconsider the possibility that there is no God, no heaven and no life everlasting? Such conceit. The sign of a real firebrand preacher. It seems pretty presumptuous to think of religion as only stories of fire and brimstone. And nobody tells people. People tell themselves. The church may advertise, but people are buying. They want a framework to make simple sense of a complex world. For some it's religion. For some it's White Pride. For some it's Manchester United. Look at voters: they categorise. Republicans, Democrats. Conservatives, Liberals. The democratic election process as a binary choice. You seem to think the same way: Science vs. Religion. Mutually exclusive choices, diametrically opposed, you're either with us or against us. Sounds a bit, well, fundamentalist to me. Saying that religion is a parasite is like saying: "The Devil made me do it". Bull. I can't repeat this enough: people tell themselves. Religion is not an external evil. It is the product of people's own insecurities and needs, their own flawed thinking process, and their own tendency to think in story, rather than facts. Religion is human nature. I mean, you think people are rational? Think again. The reason we need science as a discipline is because we can't reason straight and objectively without it. You think people think about science? Do you think most people know how planes fly? They just step on and expect it to fly them to Benidorm --talk about blind faith. Do people know how medicines work? They just take them because they believe it will work better than prayer (although some patients hedge their bets: the hospital has a prayer room too) --but I doubt that many people know why it does. Most people don't know science; they believe in it, because they see it work its miracles like the devout see God work His. But equally many people are sceptical about medicine, global warming, technology. Many people read the Horoscopes and use "systems" for picking the next winning lottery numbers. Ask them why. I doubt that they'll give you a scientific answer. We only achieved scientific thinking over the last 300 years. Religion has been around for 500.000 years. Give it time, FFS. We'll grow out of it. But we can't kick the dependency on Big Daddy before we grow up and become adults in our own right. We're very far from that right now. And we'll always need stories, because without them life is just cold and meaningless facts. Science is a good, solid discipline for thinking, but inherently, our brains don't think that way (that's why we need science). Inherently, we make up our mind based on gut feeling and find the rational explanations for it afterwards. We have huge gaps in our rather selective memory and we fill in the blanks and edit to suit our preconceptions. We project our thoughts and feelings onto other people. We are biased. We are prejudiced. What's more, we have no insight into that process because it is all pre-conscious. Our mind is not a little man in our head looking out thorough our eyes at the world. It is a multitude of different neurological systems all doing their own thing (which is why we can experience "being in two minds", or contradictory feelings, or doing something absent-mindedly without realising it). What we call consciousness is the brain trying to keep all that stuff coherent and in step with each other. Our brain strives for coherence, not truth, and it will sacrifice accuracy of perception, recall and reasoning to achieve that. And it will do the same to keep a coherent, simple worldview in the face of a complex, contradictory, uncertain reality. To argue against religion is, in the end, to argue against story telling, against spirituality and against human nature. And frankly, I rather live in a world with religion than a world without stories and spirituality.
