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On April 24 2013 18:26 woreyour wrote:Show nested quote +On April 24 2013 07:20 Fumanchu wrote:On April 24 2013 06:23 Feartheguru wrote:
This debate is truly pointless. Anyone that does not believe in the great magenta honeybadger is going to hell. It says so right on this piece of paper I just wrote on. I'll be laughing at all you atheists and christians burning while I enjoy my 40 virgins beside the great one. If you don't believe me prove me wrong. His son the ferret skinned himself to keep you guys warm and yet you refuse to believe in him? I feel bad for you guys I really do. But... the choice was yours and you chose willfully chose to ignore what's right beside your eyes, I wish it could be some other way but, sad life for you guys. If you believe it's pointless, then stop cluttering the thread with useless comments so that those of us who don't find it useless can discuss. I'm not atheist yet, but I feel I'm on the cusp of becoming one. I've been a Christian since I was 5, but I didn't really challenge the ideas of my religion or question the scripture I was being taught until about two years ago. I just followed what I followed blindly. I KNEW God existed and there wasn't anyone that could tell me different. I grew up in a bubble. But then I started travelling abroad and I ran into a vast array of people who all believed different things. People who were really nice and respectful and believed in their religions just as adamantly as I believed in mine. And like me, they weren't trying to convince anyone else of what they believed, but they also weren't up for any discussion of the possibility that they might be following the "wrong" religion. So I returned to the leaders of my church, and several other churches, and I began questioning them on the principles and practices that they had brought me up on. And every one of them directed me towards the scripture. But what if the scriptures were false I said? And no one that I talked to would deviate away from that. The scriptures were true because God wrote them through the people he chose. No one would even entertain the idea that maybe God doesn't exist. It seemed that when I had questions of God's plan for me, or his divinity, then I got tremendous support and outreach. However, when I started questioning my beliefs, I was pushed into a corner and left there. Which has forced me to sort of figure things out on my own. There's three things with which keep me back from becoming an atheist. 1) Logically it makes the most sense to be a Christian. I think about these four scenarios: A) I'm Christian, I die, God exists, I go to heaven B) I'm Christian, I die, God doesn't exist, I return to nothingness C) I'm an atheist, I die, God exists, I go to hell. D) I'm an atheist, I die, God doesn't exist, I return to nothingness When I look at these options, really it makes the most sense to be Christian. If I'm wrong I get the same reward as you when I die, but if I'm right, I get an eternity of happiness rather than an eternity of suffering. 2) I cannot as of yet wrap my head around returning to nothingness. Just in the same way that it hurts my brain to think that once there was nothing, and then all of a sudden there was something. I don't want my accumulation of experiences to end upon death. I just can't get past it. 3) Finally, and this ties in with number 1, is that being a Christian is not a suffering experience. At least not in North America. The only thing that I would struggle with is premarital sex. Every other commandment or teaching within in the bible is already followed by most people trying to live their lives. There's really no down side to being a Christian. Every person that has gotten to know me hasn't been affected by my Christian status. It's never hindered me in relationships of any kind, in any way. A lot of people liken a belief in God to a belief in santa, or the tooth fairy. I personally see no harm in a grown man who believes in santa or the tooth fairy. If you simply believe what you believe what you believe without trying to force others to believe it, most people respect you for it. Even if they don't agree with you. Anyway I'm really enjoying the different discussions in this thread so far, just thought I'd throw down where I'm at. I had this dilema once, but I did not just get safe with it. I resulted to "pimp my God" Started customizing him saying hmm my God would probably happy if I am happy. But I am not happy kneeling or going to church so my "God" would understand if I don't go to church and do "christian" stuff. But then I realized.. hey I just made an imaginary friend.. then I said screw this. I just don't believe in it to be safe, don't you have any problems with going christian? Don't you feel the guild everytime you commit "sin" or not follow the christian things? Doesn't it hinder you life? Also the point that what if christianity is not the "right" religion? What if the real god is Odin? What if the xelnaga made us? I have a suggestion, try to soft launch it, try to not believe in a month. You will notice you would feel lighter, free. No more guilts of nonsense, no hindrance, no stupid rules to follow.
I did the same thing when I was struggling with my faith. Of course he'd be fine with me not going to church, the circumstances were against me with working 2 jobs. In fact this is the argument I use with my mom when she tells me she's sad that I don't believe: "I imagine God to be a pretty cool dude, if he does exist. Now, I act as a good person for worldly reasons, rather than because he says so. If God were to send me, a great person, to hell because I simply don't believe in him, and ignoring every good deed and all the good aspects of my life, God would be kind of an asshole. My vision, if God exists, is that he's a cool guy, he'll see this and accept me into heaven regardless of my belief in him". This will sooth my mom temporarily.
Just don't label yourself as an atheist. But no reason to lie to yourself about his existence.
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I'm atheist mostly because I'm curious, to go back to the OP's question.
I went to catholic grade school, an all boys catholic high school, and a state university. I'd say around age 13-14 I began to really doubt the existence of God. It's quite interest to think about for me, honestly. You see as a catholic student, religion is interspersed in many courses. I'm from the deep south where 90% of the people around me behave and think a certain way. Catholicism is much more of a heritage than a fundamental truth.
None of my teachers, sometimes brothers or priests, would ever go about explaining Catholicism based on logic or reasoning. I'm the kid who had a woodburning set, a chemistry set, took part in science fair's and math competitions. I loved to read and learn more about what the world is really like. I can distinctly remember a Civics class and World History class taught by the same vice principal, Brother Barry. He was a fantastic professor, taught me a tremendous amount about what came before me and what else was out there in the world. It sort of sparked my curiosity to question my teachers at that time about what I was being taught by my parents which seemed to conflict with my school lessons.
Slowly I began to come to the realization that it was much more likely that the stories in the Bible were exaggerations meant to teach lessons and mold behaviors. Did the whale really swallow someone? Was there really a flood for 40 days? There couldn't actually be two of *every* animal on a boat. There were obviously benefits for the different nationalities and cultures that had religious beliefs to help shape their moral landscapes. At least I thought so, back then.
Eventually though, the more I learned about the world and the behaviors of humans - the more I saw that just because someone claimed to be catholic did not mean that they followed catholic teachings. I analyzed things like the fact that if I was born in India or China or Iraq or Israel or even the northern US vs. southern US, I likely would have had a completely different set of cultural and religious beliefs. What about the fact that religion becomes a tool to justify behaviors that otherwise cannot be rationalized? Suicide bombers, for instance, are justified in killing themselves because of their belief that they will be rewarded in the afterlife for their deeds.
By the time I was out of college, it really just coalesced into a very solid mental state where I'm supremely confident that religion does more to destabilize humankind's hope for survival in the long run than just about anything else. I'm not the type of person to try to attack other people for their beliefs, but I can't help but find staunchly religious people mildly repulsive at this point. Our understandings of the universe are not remotely complete, but the leap from "I don't understand" to "I need to fill in this gap in knowledge by creating a possible explanation" is too far.
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On April 25 2013 08:14 Birdie wrote:... Evolution is primarily covered by the study of biology, not physics.
This excuses his statements how, exactly?
You don't need to be a biology major to understand basic facets of science. In fact, you don't even need to be a scientist to understand basic facets of science.
The fact that he has a physics degree and is so horribly wrong on basic scientific knowledge is indicative that he either is lying about obtaining his degree or that he did not really learn much science to begin with.
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On April 25 2013 09:39 wherebugsgo wrote:Show nested quote +On April 25 2013 08:14 Birdie wrote:for having a degree in physics your knowledge of evolution is piss poor ... Evolution is primarily covered by the study of biology, not physics. This excuses his statements how, exactly? You don't need to be a biology major to understand basic facets of science. In fact, you don't even need to be a scientist to understand basic facets of science. The fact that he has a physics degree and is so horribly wrong on basic scientific knowledge is indicative that he either is lying about obtaining his degree or that he did not really learn much science to begin with.
Considering your dismissive and aggressive attitude given towards religion/religious people in this thread, I don't particularly want to argue with you as you'll most likely imply that I'm a liar, or stupid. However, I merely wanted to point out that it is entirely possible to have a degree in physics and not know the slightest thing about biology. Your response does nothing to change that.
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On April 25 2013 09:59 Birdie wrote:Show nested quote +On April 25 2013 09:39 wherebugsgo wrote:On April 25 2013 08:14 Birdie wrote:for having a degree in physics your knowledge of evolution is piss poor ... Evolution is primarily covered by the study of biology, not physics. This excuses his statements how, exactly? You don't need to be a biology major to understand basic facets of science. In fact, you don't even need to be a scientist to understand basic facets of science. The fact that he has a physics degree and is so horribly wrong on basic scientific knowledge is indicative that he either is lying about obtaining his degree or that he did not really learn much science to begin with. Considering your dismissive and aggressive attitude given towards religion/religious people in this thread, I don't particularly want to argue with you as you'll most likely imply that I'm a liar, or stupid. However, I merely wanted to point out that it is entirely possible to have a degree in physics and not know the slightest thing about biology. Your response does nothing to change that.
I am dismissive because there is no reason to take someone seriously when they make assertions about evolution without a shred of knowledge about the subject. Having a physics degree and not knowing high-school level biology is either a failure of the institution that gave him the degree or a failure on his own part to actually learn science.
This also does nothing to change the fact that he made this assertion with an air of confidence about knowing about evolution, which is clearly not true.
This kind of stuff is highly dangerous, and maybe to you I am being needlessly aggressive, but from my perspective this type of issue is incredibly important. Here in the United States we have enough religious fundamentalists who want to erase decades of scientific knowledge taught in high school biology classrooms and replace biology education focusing on evolution with a system that "teaches the controversy". It's absurd how much support this has.
When people like kerpal continue to misrepresent science, particularly issues that are contentious with the public, ignorance of the subject continues to fester very dangerous ideas that science is not as reliable as it actually is, which leads to poor decision making on the part of many voters and policy makers who consider these types of statements equally valid as those that actually represent science fairly and truly.
It's akin to the impact that climate change deniers have on climate policy, but arguably much worse, since the effects of misrepresenting basic scientific knowledge extend to the very core of a multitude of different public sectors.
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On April 25 2013 00:27 kerpal wrote:
Obviously just as a dog will not be able to understand using a stick to catch termites, a chimp will never understand quantum mechanics and humanity will never really understand anything of importance. Ultimately we're chimps poking the standard model with a supercollider and hoping we find termites. Or CP violation, I'm not fussed.
Obviously religion explains this because God makes the world, and humanity (whatever their origins) are chosen and special to him, and it is this belief which motivated people like Isaac Newton to seek to understand the world. If you believe there is no God, it is illogical to believe that science will ever come to any definite answer about anything. (Which is not to say that science can't provide us with a better standard of living, but again, that's just chimps and termites.)
On what do you base the bolded assertions?
What makes you think that we are inherently incapable of understanding 'anything of importance'?
dogs -> chimps -> humans may seem like a fine bit of conjured data to support your views, but as a physicist you should be aware that simply inventing an analogy, while perhaps making you sound like you know what you are talking about, doesn't actually prove anything.
Use actual evidence to back up your ideas...scientific method.
I mean yes, evolution got us here, but look at the leaps the human mind has brought about. Look at how we have harnessed evolution itself to create breeds of animals and plants that fit our needs and desires. We have built machines that 'think' for us. All this and you place limitations on us because your analogy says we can only be one intellectual step above our predecessors, and since they don't know the science behind capturing termites, we can't know 'anything of importance'.
This post was probably wasted on your tightly closed mind, but oh well, I'm just a chimp poking around for termites after all.
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When people like kerpal continue to misrepresent science, particularly issues that are contentious with the public, ignorance of the subject continues to fester very dangerous ideas that science is not as reliable as it actually is, which leads to poor decision making on the part of many voters and policy makers who consider these types of statements equally valid as those that actually represent science fairly and truly.
You make it sound as if science is Science and Science is consistent, rarely argued over, never fails, and never changes. But in reality there is a lot of scientific debate over almost every aspect of science and scientific consensus regularly changes on important and minor issues. An example is dopamine. Scientific consensus on what dopamine is actually for in the brain has changed quite a lot in the past few years, and will probably continue to change. Scientific consensus doesn't imply scientific truth, just the current agreed opinion of the majority of scientists on a particular subject. You may find the book The Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas Kuhn interesting, as it addresses the issue of paradigm shifts within the scientific community quite well.
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On April 25 2013 11:04 Lemonwalrus wrote:Show nested quote +On April 25 2013 00:27 kerpal wrote:
Obviously just as a dog will not be able to understand using a stick to catch termites, a chimp will never understand quantum mechanics and humanity will never really understand anything of importance. Ultimately we're chimps poking the standard model with a supercollider and hoping we find termites. Or CP violation, I'm not fussed.
Obviously religion explains this because God makes the world, and humanity (whatever their origins) are chosen and special to him, and it is this belief which motivated people like Isaac Newton to seek to understand the world. If you believe there is no God, it is illogical to believe that science will ever come to any definite answer about anything. (Which is not to say that science can't provide us with a better standard of living, but again, that's just chimps and termites.) On what do you base the bolded assertions? What makes you think that we are inherently incapable of understanding 'anything of importance'? dogs -> chimps -> humans may seem like a fine bit of conjured data to support your views, but as a physicist you should be aware that simply inventing an analogy, while perhaps making you sound like you know what you are talking about, doesn't actually prove anything. Use actual evidence to back up your ideas...scientific method. I mean yes, evolution got us here, but look at the leaps the human mind has brought about. Look at how we have harnessed evolution itself to create breeds of animals and plants that fit our needs and desires. We have built machines that 'think' for us. All this and you place limitations on us because your analogy says we can only be one intellectual step above our predecessors, and since they don't know the science behind capturing termites, we can't know 'anything of importance'. This post was probably wasted on your tightly closed mind, but oh well, I'm just a chimp poking around for termites after all.
thanks for actually engaging with the arguement (genuine, not sarcasm!) 
the analogy of chimps is meant to illustrate that the human mind is a product of a natural process, the same process that produced the intelligence we see in all other animals. I didn't feel that that needed evidence because... well, it's a pretty commonly held view. Would you disagree?
My position is that although we may be many steps beyond any other animal in our understanding (of science, I'm not even bringing God into this) we have no confidence in our conclusions because there is no evidence or argument that suggests that the human brain is capable of understanding the universe.
To put it another way: many many people have posted in this thread that they logically disproved God's existance, but what right have they to put their confidence in human logic? The human brain is (as I've said) the product of natural forces, working through chance, why should I believe that it is capable of truly understanding logic? Why should our logic be correct in the conclusions we come to?
+ Show Spoiler +I mean yes, evolution got us here, but look at the leaps the human mind has brought about. Look at how we have harnessed evolution itself to create breeds of animals and plants that fit our needs and desires. We have built machines that 'think' for us. All this and you place limitations on us because your analogy says we can only be one intellectual step above our predecessors, and since they don't know the science behind capturing termites, we can't know 'anything of importance'. we can be as many steps above them as you like. We can do amazing and wonderful things which to us feel as if we're plumbing the depths of the universe (and don't get me wrong, i really think we are) but what in your view suggests that our understanding is not as fundamentally flawed as that of any other creature. (and if someone says we're building computers to do our thinking for us, you have fundamentally misunderstood how computers are used in science)
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On April 25 2013 17:23 kerpal wrote:
My position is that although we may be many steps beyond any other animal in our understanding (of science, I'm not even bringing God into this) we have no confidence in our conclusions because there is no evidence or argument that suggests that the human brain is capable of understanding the universe.
Your whole argument is based on the idea that there's something beyond the universe as we humans understand it, so what we learn of the universe is meaningless, because it's not the "TRUE" universe, it's just the universe as we humans perceive it.
Fortunately though, whether that is true or not is completely irrelevant. If we can't perceive something, we can ignore it. Let's say the universe it a time-space loop and if you go too far in one direction, you end up where you started. However, this space-time loop is actually carried through space on the back of an infinitely big turtle. We as humans can never learn of this because anything we do will always be contained in the space-time loop. Again, fortunately for us, it doesn't matter. Since we can't perceive it, there's nothing useful coming out of knowing about it.
Even if we humans can't understand the real universe and are just looking for termites, these termites improve our quality of life and our understanding of our perceived universe... and that's all we need, it's in fact exactly what we need.
We can believe in a supernatural god, or we can disregard it. It doesn't affect us in any way and can't be proven or perceived, so it's completely irrelevant to our existence. Just like a human can laugh at a dog which doesn't understand how to get food out of a closed box, a higher being might laugh at us for not understanding the universe like they do... but it doesn't affect the dog when we laugh at it, and it shouldn't affect us that the higher being is laughing at us.
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On April 25 2013 17:23 kerpal wrote:
To put it another way: many many people have posted in this thread that they logically disproved God's existance, but what right have they to put their confidence in human logic? The human brain is (as I've said) the product of natural forces, working through chance, why should I believe that it is capable of truly understanding logic? Why should our logic be correct in the conclusions we come to?
As a continuation of my previous post: our logic is correct because it was defined by humans and it only has to be correct for us. An imagined higher being might disagree with our logic, but then he's obviously using his own logic which doesn't matter to us.
It's like the argument "What if 1+1 isn't actually 2, what if our logic is wrong?". Well, it can't be wrong because it's true by definition which is all that matters. Unless you change the definition of 1, 2, + and =, 1 + 1 = 2 is true and, by definition, HAS to be true. A higher being could say "Well, there's this situation on the other side of the universe where 1+1=2½", but we could tell him right away that he's wrong, because his concept of 1, or what 1 is in that side of the universe, is not what we define as 1, it's not included in our definition.
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Which is to say that humanity is only capable of knowing what we have defined. But we didn't invent the universe, so surely it is beyond our definitions. Your argument works well for pure math, which is a human construct, but what about the application of that in science?
You say our logic only has to be good enough for us, but we're trying to understand things beyond ourselves with that logic.
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The "God of the gaps" is such a vulgar and asinine concept. It's the ultimate straw grasping technique. Of course our reason is limited, and of course our modern natural sciences have their own metaphysical presuppositions that underlie their method (regardless of whether or not the scientists admit it or not - although Feynman was wrong and Feyerabend was right about the nature of the discipline of science, Feynman was right in that scientists don't really need to know about the metaphysical presuppositions in order to engage in scientific study). But at absolutely no point does the limits of our understanding lead us to a god or some kind of ultimate first principle or some teleological end.
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On April 25 2013 19:03 kerpal wrote:
Which is to say that humanity is only capable of knowing what we have defined. But we didn't invent the universe, so surely it is beyond our definitions. Your argument works well for pure math, which is a human construct, but what about the application of that in science?
You say our logic only has to be good enough for us, but we're trying to understand things beyond ourselves with that logic.
No, we're not trying to understand what's beyond us. We're trying to understand the parts which aren't beyond us, because the other parts are irrelevant. The scientific method depends on us being able to test our theories, we can't do that if it's not testable... which is why you don't have scientists trying to prove/disprove god, because it's irrelevant.
Think about gravity. We don't know exactly how gravity works, and we certainly don't know WHY it works... but that's not relevant. All we want is the simplest theory which doesn't have any glaring errors. Is space curved? Are there some form of graviton particles? If we can find out, that's great, but if we can't, that's fine as well, as long as our predictions hold. As long as 100% of our predictions work out, it doesn't matter if we work on the assumption that space is curved in a way we can't perceive it even though there's actually some other impercievable effect at hand; for all intents and purposes, our theory is true.
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But the predictions we make and the theories from which we make them are only ever a product of our own constructed thoughts. Understanding the universe is understanding things outside of our thoughts and constructions, so your 1+1=2 example only works because we have defined every part of the equation. When you talk about electrons or even gravitons then we are dealing with what is actually there, not what we have defined.
Also the gravity as you have stated it is a direct parallel to my example of chimps and termites. And reduces science to something that can make our lives more pleasant, but has no business talking about what is or isn't ACTUALLY true, which I don't think many scientists would be pleased with.
Koreasilver this is not "God of the gaps" this is an inherent contradiction within the humanist worldview. Perhaps you could all help me find its resolution.
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On April 25 2013 20:10 kerpal wrote:
But the predictions we make and the theories from which we make them are only ever a product of our own constructed thoughts. Understanding the universe is understanding things outside of our thoughts and constructions, so your 1+1=2 example only works because we have defined every part of the equation. When you talk about electrons or even gravitons then we are dealing with what is actually there, not what we have defined.
Also the gravity as you have stated it is a direct parallel to my example of chimps and termites. And reduces science to something that can make our lives more pleasant, but has no business talking about what is or isn't ACTUALLY true, which I don't think many scientists would be pleased with.
Koreasilver this is not "God of the gaps" this is an inherent contradiction within the humanist worldview. Perhaps you could all help me find its resolution.
But that is exactly what scientists are doing. Whether or not our truth is the actual absolute truth or something we only perceive as true, is a philosophical question, it doesn't matter to the science at hand. Maybe electrons, as we perceive them, do not exist. However, everything we perceive indicates they do and that lets us do amazing predictions. So we simply assume it's true and go from there.
You say "has no business talking about what is or isn't ACTUALLY true", but what is "ACTUALLY true"? If humans can't perceive it, it is once again not relevant, so it doesn't matter if it's "ACTUALLY" true or not, it's true for us which is all that matters.
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On April 25 2013 11:09 Birdie wrote:Show nested quote +When people like kerpal continue to misrepresent science, particularly issues that are contentious with the public, ignorance of the subject continues to fester very dangerous ideas that science is not as reliable as it actually is, which leads to poor decision making on the part of many voters and policy makers who consider these types of statements equally valid as those that actually represent science fairly and truly. You make it sound as if science is Science and Science is consistent, rarely argued over, never fails, and never changes. But in reality there is a lot of scientific debate over almost every aspect of science and scientific consensus regularly changes on important and minor issues. An example is dopamine. Scientific consensus on what dopamine is actually for in the brain has changed quite a lot in the past few years, and will probably continue to change. Scientific consensus doesn't imply scientific truth, just the current agreed opinion of the majority of scientists on a particular subject. You may find the book The Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas Kuhn interesting, as it addresses the issue of paradigm shifts within the scientific community quite well.
What does this post have to do with anything I've said so far? I'm not denying that science changes, I'm denying that his points have any worth to them because they are completely unfounded.
Science is debated and argued over when a side has evidence for a disagreement. Kerpal has no evidence for any of his assertions, and I seriously doubt you'd find a single scientist who would actually agree with what he said. Science doesn't work that way-you need empirical evidence before you can be taken seriously when you challenge a long-held consensus, because a mountain of evidence exists for that consensus.
This is why the actions of many conservatives in the U.S. when it comes to science education are so dangerous. They are threatening the replacement of science with nonscience (i.e. creationism) using arguments as silly as yours: "science can fail and can change therefore we should teach the controversy." Just because the first part is true it does NOT mean we should teach psuedoscience.
On April 25 2013 19:19 koreasilver wrote:
But at absolutely no point does the limits of our understanding lead us to a god or some kind of ultimate first principle or some teleological end.
sure it does.
Why did the Egyptians and Aztecs and Incas worship the sun?
Because it brought them prosperity and they didn't know why-they assumed it had to do with a higher power. Of course, when an eclipse or something like that occurred, they assumed they had done something terrible to deserve the misfortune, and tried to repent through sacrifice, at least in the case of the Incas.
We know now much more about the sun, enough to understand why it rises everyday. You're not likely to see a religion based on sun worship anymore.
Why did Christianity assume earth was at the center of the universe? Or that the sun orbited around the Earth? Or that the Earth is flat? Or that the Earth is 6000 years old? Plenty of people looked toward religion for these things because it purported to have the answers. Now we don't look to religion for any of these things because science contradicts them, with evidence. There are plenty of practical applications of this knowledge that we use everyday that underline the scientific truth behind them.
Why are less people religious now than at any point in our past? Again, probably because of the proliferation of knowledge, rational thinking, and science. People don't have to cling to unfounded beliefs to understand the world around them if they can use logic, reasoning, and a mountain of evidence through science that is based on a reliable and easily understandable methodology.
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On April 25 2013 21:56 wherebugsgo wrote:
Or that the Earth is flat?
It's actually a myth (and a widespread one at that) that historically christians (or any people at all really) widely believed the earth was flat. Since antiquity it has been known that the world is spherical, and there were only a vocal minority at various points in time claiming the earth was flat.
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On April 25 2013 23:13 Tobberoth wrote:It's actually a myth (and a widespread one at that) that historically christians (or any people at all really) widely believed the earth was flat. Since antiquity it has been known that the world is spherical, and there were only a vocal minority at various points in time claiming the earth was flat.
not according to the Bible-the Bible states numerous times that the world has corners.
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On April 22 2013 23:22 Treehead wrote:Show nested quote +On April 22 2013 22:58 woreyour wrote:I am mature enough to know what is right or wrong. I don't need that to be "moral"; I just don't need to be an asshole. And best of all, I can fap without feeling bad about it.  100% of the people who say that they are mature enough to "know right from wrong" are just not mature enough to know that the distinction isn't always easy. You have a strange sense of what morality is - it is intended to be the set of rules which prevent a person from being "an asshole". Also, please read this: http://www.teamliquid.net/blogs/viewblog.php?id=346001Consider that sociopaths also view their version of morality (whereby some people are just supposed to die) to be completely legitimate. Now, explain why your views are superior without using statements like "everyone knows..." and "well obviously...". This is where religion/morality comes in. It gives people a context in which to discuss right and wrong. Outside of religion, there is no good and evil, there is only legal and illegal.
That is completely absurd. Countless philosophers from Kant to J.S. Mill and all the way around the block and back have given fantastic moral theories that do not rely on religion. Religion is hardly necessary for morality and those that claim that it is tend to be acting out fear of religion becoming obsolete.
On topic, I was raised in a household devoid of religion (or anti-religion). My dad turned out to be an atheist and my mom a modest agnostic. However, my community was incredibly Christian. I wasn't really forced to confront religion and make a choice until later in high school, when my critical thinking skills actually developed to some modest extent, and by that point, it was incredibly obvious that Christianity had the ugly fingerprints of human influence all over it. It is simply implausible to think that the Bible and Christianity are works of God when they are so full of hatred, error, and hubris. Personally, I wouldn't be surprised or offended in any way if God existed; it could be possible, even if science explains everything we know so far. I just think that to claim that God works through organized religion is absolutely ridiculous.
being an atheist is pretty normal, most people grow out of it by the time they are capable of thinking for themself
Northern Europe is in the EXTREME minority. The vast, vast majority of every other part of the world is religious, and the U.S. is one of the most religious places out there.
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On April 25 2013 20:10 kerpal wrote:
But the predictions we make and the theories from which we make them are only ever a product of our own constructed thoughts. Understanding the universe is understanding things outside of our thoughts and constructions, so your 1+1=2 example only works because we have defined every part of the equation. When you talk about electrons or even gravitons then we are dealing with what is actually there, not what we have defined.
Also the gravity as you have stated it is a direct parallel to my example of chimps and termites. And reduces science to something that can make our lives more pleasant, but has no business talking about what is or isn't ACTUALLY true, which I don't think many scientists would be pleased with.
Koreasilver this is not "God of the gaps" this is an inherent contradiction within the humanist worldview. Perhaps you could all help me find its resolution.
Humanism has its own cracks since it is the offspring of the Enlightenment, which was thoroughly coloured by deism of varying sorts, and the liberal Protestantism that began with the 19th century. If you really think about it, secularism is grounded by the Protestant separation of the church and state. But the inherent problems within humanism still does not lead us to any kind of god or the divine or some first principle or a final end (which is what you have implicitly been attempting to salvage and what else is this besides some hackneyed apologia for a god that is identified between the gaps?). Furthermore, humanism is not synonymous with atheism either, so the entire conversation you've been having is flawed. As for "truth", you're trying to have a conversation about realism vs. anti-realism which also isn't directly about a conversation about a god, the absence of a god, or otherwise. That is strictly a philosophical problem.
edit: and it is extremely cringe-worthy to say that Kant didn't rely on Christianity even for his seemingly secularist morality. He was one of the great defenders of the faith during his time as much as he was a great critic of it (if anything he was one of the figures that laid the intellectual ground for Kierkegaard). There's a reason why Nietzsche said that German thinking was thoroughly permeated by theology - he was pointing most directly at Kant. If we are to continue with Nietzsche's critique of theology and the underlying theological thinking that underpins Western thinking, then most of our modern day Western atheists are still pseudo-Christians. "Atheist only in name" as Nietzsche said.
edit: But yes, it must be said that even morality is not synonymous with religion, and faith-in-itself is not about morality. The biggest issue with much of Christianity, be it conservative or liberal, is that faith and the religion has been reduced into morality. This is hilarious for the conservatives because despite all their rhetoric it just reflects that they are completely mired into the liberal Protestantism of Schleiermacher.
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