Theism vs. Atheism ... will it ever be settled?

^ you want the moon on a stick Mike

^ I agree, but I would call it "erode" (courtesy of Dan Dennett) rather than "evolve" when it comes to religion. The funny thing is that they insist on keeping scripture (Bible, Qu'ran etc) unchanged, but simply choose to ignore more and more parts of it. This is fundamentally different from the scientific approach, where also flawed theories may be held for long periods of time, but when they happen to be identified as flawed, they are discarded. I see this as a major problem in religion, because keeping scriptures unchanged bears the risk of fundamentalists reviving them at times of crisis (when people are more vulnerable to manipulation).

Mr ProgFreak wrote: Dean wrote: ^ you want the moon on a stick Mike I could simply call it "better education". I know that it's not realistic to expect such a wave of enlightenment to happen - but what I don't understand is how people like Iván see my desire for that to happen as such a bad thing. I'm certainly not going from door to door, asking people whether they're religious and if so, talk them into the ground with scientific arguments.

I think I have it... Mike IS GOD! He's just trying to convince all of you that he doesn't exist so that he can go on screwing the world up without nobody blaming him ever again... 

The T wrote: I think I have it... Mike IS GOD! He's just trying to convince all of you that he doesn't exist so that he can go on screwing the world up without nobody blaming him ever again...

Mr ProgFreak wrote: Henry Plainview wrote: Atavachron wrote:   I meant that everyone may have a part of the puzzle right--  or put another way, couldn't there both be a 'higher power' and not?   This is a logical contradiction. People often like to show their enlightenment by admonishing dogmatics that they're "missing the forest for the trees", but their position is even more logically impossible to defend than any dogma. And I don't mean this as an insult towards you Atavachron, I don't think you're being a jerk, but the Christian, Muslim, and Hindu Gods would not get along very well, and it's ridiculous to act like they're all pretty much the same.  Religious leaders will often say that all the religions have much in common (especially Christians), but privately, when proselytizing or from the pulpit or in the mosque, they'll still say that only their particular denomination leads to salvation. Talking about cognitive dissonance ...

seventhsojourn wrote: Dean wrote: Mr ProgFreak wrote: Dean wrote: ^ you want the moon on a stick Mike I could simply call it "better education". I know that it's not realistic to expect such a wave of enlightenment to happen - but what I don't understand is how people like Iván see my desire for that to happen as such a bad thing. I'm certainly not going from door to door, asking people whether they're religious and if so, talk them into the ground with scientific arguments. As you know, I am a post-theist - I believe that there was a need for gods so we invented them, the world is currently in a post-theist transition where the knowledge obtained through science is steadily surplanting those ideas that we needed gods to explain. We are not done yet, and perhaps never will be, so there will always be gods of the gaps. Education will not fill those gaps with science, they will still be gaps, just scientific gaps instead of mystical ones.   ... but was there a need for Bigfoot? Think I must be a post-Bigfootist.

Interesting question Chris, I think that in all cryptozoological instances there probably was a local need for form of some supernatural creature or megafauna - either as a kind of boogie-man type creature to keep people away from a specific area (for whatever reason), or perhaps as an attraction to entice people into the area. Of course some of these have been merely mistaken identity for some perfectly natural creature (The Stronsay Beast or The Beast of Bodmin for example), in which case science (in the form of natural biology) has readily explained away a "supernatural" phenonima or instances of once-believed-to-be extinct-but-weren't-really creatures avoiding detection for years (Coelacanthe, Okapi) and other cases where mere superstition and mythology has been exagerated by locals so that the gulible will see what they want to see (Loch Ness Monster, Kelpie, Bigfoot, Yeti, Chupacabra, etc)

Mr ProgFreak wrote: jampa17 wrote: Mr ProgFreak wrote: Henry Plainview wrote: Atavachron wrote:   I meant that everyone may have a part of the puzzle right--  or put another way, couldn't there both be a 'higher power' and not?   This is a logical contradiction. People often like to show their enlightenment by admonishing dogmatics that they're "missing the forest for the trees", but their position is even more logically impossible to defend than any dogma. And I don't mean this as an insult towards you Atavachron, I don't think you're being a jerk, but the Christian, Muslim, and Hindu Gods would not get along very well, and it's ridiculous to act like they're all pretty much the same.  Religious leaders will often say that all the religions have much in common (especially Christians), but privately, when proselytizing or from the pulpit or in the mosque, they'll still say that only their particular denomination leads to salvation. Talking about cognitive dissonance ...   I'm sure you have been in many services, cults and gatherings of many religions, right?  Nothing like the knowledge from inside out... Are you honestly going to say that today catholics believe that people of all denomination will be absolved from sin and join them in heaven, as long as they believe in their god?

Mr ProgFreak wrote: Are you honestly going to say that today catholics believe that people of all denomination will be absolved from sin and join them in heaven, as long as they believe in their god?

Edited by Ivan_Melgar_M - July 08 2010 at 14:40

^^ What's the point of being a Catholic then, when denominations don't matter? I believe the world is God - and I surely believe in the world, so it's good to know that I won't go to hell.

Seriously, I have my doubts whether devout Catholics would subscribe to that. I'm sure though that many liberal Catholics do - in that case I would call them practical Atheists, since their religion has eroded to such an extent that it has little (if any) bearing on their life.


Edited by Mr ProgFreak - July 08 2010 at 14:44