EPTReply to EtherealDeath's closed thread on beliefs - Page 2
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EtherealDeath
United States8366 Posts
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LxRogue
United States1415 Posts
On March 06 2008 23:14 BluzMan wrote: Well, that was a long introduction for a very short point. Faith is irrational. It doesn't have any basis and can't have one. You just believe in god, you draw him in whatever colors you want, and it's meant to make you happier. Nothing more, leave the explanation of the universe to science. Besides, science doesn't answer the question "why?", it only answers "how?", so the former one is still a matter of faith. Finishing the post with some offtopic, I'll quote one post from this thread: "If atheism is a religion then not collecting stamps is a hobby." This is both right and wrong. From one point of view, it's not a religion because it doesn't have the religious traits - no rites, no sacred texts, no clergy. But from another point of view, it IS a religion because believing god doesn't exist is just as irrational as believing it does. Agnosticism seems much more of a rational position. While i agree with most of what you say, i don't really follow your logic here. The biggest reason i'm an atheist is because i reject organized religion. If you think about the endless numbers of gods and religions that have been though up by humans, most people here will agree how logically inconsistent they are. So if you reject religion, but you don't reject god where does your definition of god come from? Is "he" all powerful and all seeing? Or is he just very powerful and have a physical form like ancient greek/roman gods? If you think the god that may or may not exist is an all-powerful supernatural being, then you haven't rejected any major religions have you? Because that definition just comes right from ancient Judaism. If we can't define god, how can you say you don't know whether or not he exists? It's like the flying teapot. Because the traditional notion of god is just as unbased as the religions, you can't say it's more likely that god exists than a magical flying teapot. So even though nobody can disproove the existance of any of these, it does lead me to to think it's highly unlikely. | ||
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L
Canada4732 Posts
what's to say the overarching themes in it are not bullshit as well? It's like saying, "well this book I'm reading is just so completely full of bullshit, but I'll believe this and that point selectively from it anyways". it's just....... I dunno what to call it. Its just proper reading? If a bunch of material is historically sensitive and doesn't apply anymore, then so be it. Would you call something as simple as the golden rule, or the ten commandments completely bullshit because they're in the same book that says that you shouldn't eat cockroaches on pain of being cast out of god's life? No. Classic fallacy in the same form of "oh, hitler was for xyz, thus it must be evil". Reading the books contextually just plain makes sense.I wouldn't read a Shakespearean play and say "wow, this shit is fucking stupid because these people didn't exist, and I'm sure the historical characters didn't say EXACTLY THESE LINES". That's not the point. The point is the messages and truths the books are supposed to impart. By looking for the general themes and lessons, you're cherry picking which values you find acceptable... If morality exists independent of religion, then you should be obeying morality and not the religion. You can if you want to be cynical about religion, but if you find a lesson that you don't want to learn, what then? You can apply that notion to any text or any form of morality, and that's a product of the person, not the code. You can challenge yourself with lessons and themes that aren't continuous with your own actions, or you can choose to take the challenge and live up to them. And if morality exists independent of religion, which it obviously must, the question is: who's morality. Mine sure as hell won't be the same as yours. Society can't judge you based on an ambiguous moral code, it codifies it in order to keep itself in order. The fact that most legal traditions are heavily derived from religious beliefs about the self and society shouldn't go unappreciated here. So no, I shouldn't be obeying 'morality', because I can make morality into whatever's convenient. Western religions have typically operated a few core ideas, one of which is the sanctity of life. If you remove that from our legal histories and our religions, and replace it with something like "efficiency is the highest virtue", then we'd start being able to rationalize, accept and promote the wholesale liquidation of the infirm, weak, mentally handicapped, criminals, etc. That wouldn't just be expedient, It would be moral. That's not to say that removing religion leads to mass slaughter, its just to show how powerful the underlying core 'axioms' of morality are in swaying morality. | ||
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EtherealDeath
United States8366 Posts
"Classic fallacy in the same form of "oh, hitler was for xyz, thus it must be evil"" Well, this is different. To modify that statement, it would be "Classic fallacy in the same form of "oh, God said to do xyz, thus it must be done". If you call that a fallacy, then that is cherry picking. From what I got through reading the Old Testament parts of the Bible, God's law is supposed to be perpetual and thorough. As such, lack of validiity of some commandments due to passage of time would seem to be a contradictory statement. http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Leviticus 11 So you shouldn't eat squid, shouldn't consume pork, etc. Yet clearly Christians do so nonetheless nowadays. Some say that the first few chapters of the Bible were meant for the Jews and thus they are not bound by it, but that seems bullshit to me cause it's in the Bible that they follow. So what then? Are such commandments bullshit nowadays due to different circumstances? | ||
Jibba
United States22883 Posts
The fact that most legal traditions are heavily derived from religious beliefs about the self and society shouldn't go unappreciated here. ... Western religions have typically operated a few core ideas, one of which is the sanctity of life. The codification of laws existed long before organized religion implemented them, and I assure you that the sanctity of life concept is not unique to Western religions. I don't see why people always bring this up. Society can absolutely judge you on moral code, because it's a collective of norms and ideas agreed upon by the people operating within it. It's simply absurd to look to parts of the Bible for morality when you find other parts of it immoral. Certainly you can highlight and agree with examples, but those examples should not be the basis of your morality, they should only supplement it. | ||
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ItsYoungLee
Korea (South)227 Posts
On March 07 2008 07:56 EtherealDeath wrote: If you call that a fallacy, then that is cherry picking. From what I got through reading the Old Testament parts of the Bible, God's law is supposed to be perpetual and thorough. As such, lack of validiity of some commandments due to passage of time would seem to be a contradictory statement. http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Leviticus 11 So you shouldn't eat squid, shouldn't consume pork, etc. Yet clearly Christians do so nonetheless nowadays. Some say that the first few chapters of the Bible were meant for the Jews and thus they are not bound by it, but that seems bullshit to me cause it's in the Bible that they follow. So what then? Are such commandments bullshit nowadays due to different circumstances? God's law is perpetual and thorough. However, you have to realize the old testament deals with the Old Covenant, with the chosen people, the Jews. Those laws were all before Jesus Christ came to this earth. Before that you had to be fucking careful, or God would just be like: "Ooops, you're dead" (Example... Uzzah and the Ark) After Jesus, there was the New Covenant, which is not just with the Jews, but now includes Gentiles. The New Covenant was based on forgiveness. That's why those laws were valid back then, but they can safely be ignored now. Of course, if you were a Jew, and you still believed you were bound by the "old covenant" then you shouldn't eat squid, pork, etc... (which is why Jews don't eat Pork?) All those rules handed down to Moses are crazy... hard to follow. Especially all the parts about cleanliness and not being in the presence of a woman in period, and subsequent quarantine, etc... | ||
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Jibba
United States22883 Posts
And the New Testament tells us we should still follow every word of the Old Testament. Plus the New Testament has some harsh things in it as well. Not to mention if God's law was perpetual, he shouldn't need to make a revision. >.> | ||
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ItsYoungLee
Korea (South)227 Posts
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EtherealDeath
United States8366 Posts
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L
Canada4732 Posts
The codification of laws existed long before organized religion implemented them, Actually, no, we have very little information on the timeframe of the first known codified legal system, which is the Egyptian one, and from what archaeological evidence we do have, their religion developed fairly early on. The Babylonian code, which was the first to be codified and accessible to the public does not predate Babylonian religion. Society can absolutely judge you on moral code, because it's a collective of norms and ideas agreed upon by the people operating within it. I didn't disagree with that. I said you can't be judged by an ambiguous personal moral code. A legal moral code is essentially the same thing as a religion's moral code. When the vast majority of norms and ideas that were included in said legal tradition are religious in foundation, which they are in pretty much every nation in the world, your legal system is founded on religious axioms. Even Nikita Khrushchev surmised that in trying to remove religion from the soviet union, they had created a religion of state. To take your own words, and what would make you choose the ten commandments over the rule saying that if you eat cockroaches, god casts you out? Just because one rule seems more valid than the other, so you choose to follow it over the other? No, because one rule makes sense in a historical context, and the other makes sense in an overarching context. I already said this. The bible is like a novel; You can open it up and read it literally, and come away with a single story which doesn't apply anywhere else in your life, or you can try to understand the metaphors and messages which aren't staring you in the face and discover more timely truths. That's kinda why the TNK has volumes and volumes of rabbinical interpretation of the text so that you can actually follow along what's being said. Not only that, but the rabbinic interpretation is the binding section of the text, and it changes over time as new rabbis add their reasoning to it. And yeah, new covenant makes nearly all of the old testament moot in terms of restrictions, otherwise god would quite literally get to smiting every time we married a non-jew, and much of the new testament is letters of the early church which are also subject to revision by future popes, who hold the same station as peter did when he wrote those letters. So what the heck is the purpose of the majority of the Old Testament being in the Bible? A nice excursion in history? o.O Context. | ||
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Jibba
United States22883 Posts
Thou art near, O LORD; and all thy commandments are truth. Concerning thy testimonies, I have known of old that thou hast founded them for ever. Psalm 119:160 Thy word is true from the beginning: and every one of thy righteous judgments endureth for ever. Malachi 4:4 Remember ye the law of Moses. Matthew 5:18-19 Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or tittle shall nowise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven. Luke 16:17 It is easier for heaven and earth to pass, than one tittle of the law to fail. Obviously these are contradictory to other parts of the New Testament which say Christians can forgo the original, which makes a good case for not committing yourself to an imperfect, man made document. | ||
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Southlight
United States11768 Posts
To quote, wikipedia, The Code of Hammurabi (also known as Codex Hammurabi) is one of the earliest and best preserved law codes from ancient Babylon, created ca. 1760 BC (middle chronology). It was enacted by the sixth Babylonian king, Hammurabi.[1] Earlier collections of laws include the codex of Ur-Nammu, king of Ur (ca. 2050 BC), the Codex of Eshnunna (ca. 1930 BC) and the codex of Lipit-Ishtar of Isin (ca. 1870 BC).[2] The earliest form of the bible is generally accepted to be the Hebrew Bible, of which the dating is a bit more haphazard because carbon dating isn't too specific and there's no clear significant author to relate it to (as opposed to ancient kings, for whom it's slightly easier to nail a relative date to). While the books of the New Testament may be dated with some confidence, the dates of many of the texts of the Hebrew Bible are difficult to establish. Textual criticism places all of them within the 1st millennium BC[citation needed], while traditionalist schools assign the Pentateuch a 15th century BC to 13th century BC date. At best, the Torah comes roughly 200 years after Hammurabi's Code, which is arguably not even the first true code of law. Hammurabi is simply famous for being the best preserved code. Given the state of human culture, it's quite reasonable to assume that there were plenty of oral and unsaid laws and morales that lorded over human societies during those times. After all, society cannot exist without a common mode of thought - you'd get anarchy and conflict otherwise. Thus, it is preposterous and egotistical to believe any incarnation of the Bible is the basis for many modern laws. Rather, most biblical references in laws are most likely the result of the Church having a significant impact on soverignties - you can attribute this to Charlemagne's Great Failure (being crowned Emperor by the Pope) as well as the incredible amount of faith held by believers during those times. | ||
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Southlight
United States11768 Posts
On March 07 2008 11:51 ItsYoungLee wrote: Where does the New Testament say that we need to follow Moses' Law? Sure, there are some harsh things, I don't deny it. He didn't make a revision. He recontracted on better terms for his subjects. Moses died. Sure, he supposedly lived to 120 (a theory, as it cannot be proven, but most people will accept it as fact because there's no real reason to argue otherwise), but he technically lived in 13th century BC, which would entail his death would have been around roughly 12th century BC. Then there is, technically, an inexplicable silence until Jesus at roughly 0 BC (1200 years to retract). For the sake of argument, we'll assume Jesus is a second prophet. We'll also assume he died somewhere around 30 AD. A number of New Testament works are dated around 100 AD. What happened? Did God come back down and say "oh shizzle, I forgots to tell y'all, I screwed up, take back what I says to Moses mmkay? I'll give y'all a new set, bit shorter so y'all can remember these ones, follow 'em well ya hear?" and tell these random people the new, condensed version? On the note of these supposed miracle-makers and the likes, I'd like to borrow the words of Thomas Hobbes (whose Leviathan you should check out): How then can he to whom God hath never revealed His will immediately (saving by the way of natural reason) know when he is to obey or not to obey His word, delivered by him that says he is a prophet? Of four hundred prophets, of whom the King of Israel, asked counsel concerning the war he made against Ramoth Gilead, only Micaiah was a true one. [I Kings, 22] The prophet that was sent to prophesy against the altar set up by Jeroboam, [Ibid., 13] though a true prophet, and that by two miracles done in his presence appears to be a prophet sent from God, was yet deceived by another old prophet that persuaded him, as from the mouth of God, to eat and drink with him. If one prophet deceive another, what certainty is there of knowing the will of God by other way than that of reason? To which I answer out of the Holy Scripture that there be two marks by which together, not asunder, a true prophet is to be known. One is the doing of miracles; the other is the not teaching any other religion than that which is already established. Asunder, I say, neither of these is sufficient. "If a prophet rise amongst you, or a dreamer of dreams, and shall pretend the doing of a miracle, and the miracle come to pass; if he say, Let us follow strange gods, which thou hast not known, thou shalt not hearken to him, etc. But that prophet and dreamer of dreams shall be put to death, because he hath spoken to you to revolt from the Lord your God." [Deuteronomy, 13. 1-5] In which words two things are to be observed; first, that God will not have miracles alone serve for arguments to approve the prophet's calling; but (as it is in the third verse) for an experiment of the constancy of our adherence to Himself. For the works of the Egyptian sorcerers, though not so great as those of Moses, yet were great miracles. Secondly, that how great soever the miracle be, yet if it tend to stir up revolt against the king or him that governeth by the king's authority, he that doth such miracle is not to be considered otherwise than as sent to make trial of their allegiance. For these words, revolt from the Lord your God, are in this place equivalent to revolt from your king. For they had made God their king by pact at the foot of Mount Sinai; who ruled them by Moses only; for he only spake with God, and from time to time declared God's commandments to the people. In like manner, after our Saviour Christ had made his Disciples acknowledge him for the Messiah (that is to say, for God's anointed, whom the nation of the Jews daily expected for their king, but refused when he came), he omitted not to advertise them of the danger of miracles. "There shall arise," saith he, "false Christs, and false prophets, and shall do great wonders and miracles, even to the seducing (if it were possible) of the very elect." [Matthew, 24. 24] By which it appears that false prophets may have the power of miracles; yet are we not to take their doctrine for God's word. St. Paul says further to the Galatians that "if himself or an angel from heaven preach another Gospel to them than he had preached, let him be accursed." [Galatians, 1. 8] That Gospel was that Christ was King; so that all preaching against the power of the king received, in consequence to these words, is by St. Paul accursed. For his speech is addressed to those who by his preaching had already received Jesus for the Christ, that is to say, for King of the Jews. | ||
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oneofthem
Cayman Islands24199 Posts
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oneofthem
Cayman Islands24199 Posts
On March 07 2008 07:56 EtherealDeath wrote: why can't you say it is an inferior position and all sorts of stupid without calling it a formal fallacy? situatiosn like this should illustrate the inadequacy of formal logic, rather than the other way around. To take your own words, and what would make you choose the ten commandments over the rule saying that if you eat cockroaches, god casts you out? Just because one rule seems more valid than the other, so you choose to follow it over the other? "Classic fallacy in the same form of "oh, hitler was for xyz, thus it must be evil"" Well, this is different. To modify that statement, it would be "Classic fallacy in the same form of "oh, God said to do xyz, thus it must be done". If you call that a fallacy, then that is cherry picking. From what I got through reading the Old Testament parts of the Bible, God's law is supposed to be perpetual and thorough. As such, lack of validiity of some commandments due to passage of time would seem to be a contradictory statement. http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Leviticus 11 So you shouldn't eat squid, shouldn't consume pork, etc. Yet clearly Christians do so nonetheless nowadays. Some say that the first few chapters of the Bible were meant for the Jews and thus they are not bound by it, but that seems bullshit to me cause it's in the Bible that they follow. So what then? Are such commandments bullshit nowadays due to different circumstances? | ||
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oneofthem
Cayman Islands24199 Posts
On March 07 2008 12:36 EtherealDeath wrote: So what the heck is the purpose of the majority of the Old Testament being in the Bible? A nice excursion in history? o.O there is no necessary purpose. it may be due to the historical development of the religion that defined what the bible is in the first place. | ||
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BluzMan
Russian Federation4235 Posts
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