If you see criticism of belief as personal attack — S
I see criticism of believers as personal attack, which it is. If you have anything substantive to add to the discussion, go ahead. So far, all I have seen is you being rude about those who believe.... — Pattern-chaser
But there would be no point having a philosophical argument over whether reincarnation or resurrection is true, for example, as such dogmas are taken on faith, and are not supportable by philosophical argument. — Janus
My theory is that at some point in human history this "lost in thought" experience became dominant enough that the loss of psychic connection with reality became problematic and we began looking for solutions, and religion was invented. Religion personalized reality in the form of a God to make it more relatable, and the focus became "getting back to God", or re-establishing the connection with reality. — Jake
The Bible, for example, sounds every bit like a story developed by human beings, so itβs like God is designed by human beings.
β praxis
Actually, the Jehovah character seems remarkably similar to nature. He's both a gloriously beautiful giver of life, and an utterly ruthless killer of the innocent, just like the real world is. — Jake
But we do have a tendency to think, speak and act so as to establish ourselves as separate from 'nature', even though, as you say, we are not. — Pattern-chaser
Making reality relatable via a theistic narrative is a step removed from reality. — praxis
But at least you seem to have moved from pointing to the 'process of conceptual division' as the core issue to that of being 'lost in thought', so we appear to be making progress. — praxis
Some people have a need for proving themselves to be More-Scientific-Than-Thou. So, latch on to the Materialist dogma, and then, having cloaked oneself in that official holy mantle, one entitles oneself to abuse those who don't share that belief — Michael Ossipoff
It is hardly a personal attack to claim that a large segment of the population ascertain certain religious beliefs in an uncritical manner, through dogmatic faith — S
No, they just kind of make sense of some things like (possibly) suffering and why people abuse power.Do these non-religious "aspects" offer a unifying vision of life? — Janus
Religious positions attempt to explain the mysteries that science doesn't touch on. They are in essence pre-scientific answers that are easily reinterpreted by modern findings. To me, evolution doesn't cancel out divinity.This also raises the question of what counts as religious. — Janus
You might have just lead me to my next thread question. Thanks.Religion is only good if a community finds it meaningful. — praxis
You know, I don't think that's all religion does. People are given ethical codes to live by through religion. And no, I'm not saying that people can't be moral without religion. Creating religions are fun too. Just to see what kind of stuff you can come up with.hence the function of religion to placate those who can't cope with the world as it is. — S
Quite the LaVeyan statement. The reformers knew Christianity would have to change with time. Search semper reformanda in Google.It didn't go far enough, and it can't go far enough without ceasing to be Christianity. — S
I would agree. I wrote a paper in my intro to philosophy class about Thomas Aquinas being a theologian rather than a philosopher.Therefore religion has no place in philosophy — Janus
Go ahead and say it the way you want to, Jake:
Religion is about our RELATIONSHIP with God. — praxis
This is the same nonsense I read in the "Gender" Identity thread - that gender is subjective and means different things to different people. The problem is that no one is being consistent, which just means that concept ("god" or "gender") is meaningless. When there is no consistent definition of some term, then we have essentially defined that thing as nothing other than a "feeling".God is about different things to different people. God is an impression, an inspiration, a role model, and so on. Religion is a belief system. It is not based in science, or on science, which is fine. God is not an Objective concept. Neither is religion. If it is important to you, or to anyone reading this, I (as a believer) am happy to agree with you that God and religion cannot be Objectively or scientifically justified. There is no such justification, as far as I know. And this does not devalue God or religion in the slightest. — Pattern-chaser
We consider ourselves apart from nature because we consider ourselves as specially-created by some omnipotent entity. It's like our belief that Earth was the center of the universe at one point in our history. Science has shown in both cases that Earth is not special, and humans are not special. Earth is one planet among an uncountable number of start, galaxies and planets, hidden away in a distant corner of the universe. We are just one species out of millions on the evolutionary tree that continues to grow new branches while pruning others.But that's ought, not is. What is is that we consider ourselves apart from the rest of nature. Why do we do this, I wonder? Is it wrong of us to think this way? If so, in what way? Perhaps there's a good reason for us to act this way, although I can't think of one. Let's not just dismiss this attitude; let's try to understand it. Maybe then we can reach useful and helpful conclusions.... — Pattern-chaser
The problem is that no one is being consistent, which just means that concept ("god" or "gender") is meaningless. — Harry Hindu
Reincarnation follows from the Eliminative Ontic Structural Subjective Idealism metaphysics that I've been describing here. — Michael Ossipoff
Agreed. And it's equally true that a large segment of the population clings to certain atheist beliefs in an uncritical manner, through dogmatic faith. Faith is the human condition, not the religious condition. — Jake
You know, I don't think that's all religion does. — MountainDwarf
People are given ethical codes to live by through religion. — MountainDwarf
Quite the LaVeyan statement. The reformers knew Christianity would have to change with time. Search semper reformanda in Google. — MountainDwarf
I have inspirations, role models, experience wonder, etc., but I don't call those things "god". — Harry Hindu
I think it means that the concept - "God", in this case - is not well defined. Not undefined, but only not defined precisely. There are very many such concepts. Quality, beauty, consciousness, and so on. These terms are vague and ill-defined, but they are not meaningless. Our challenge is to learn how to deal with such concepts. ... Or we could take your route, and dismiss or ignore them. Maybe they'll just go away if we do...? :confused: — Pattern-chaser
most people believe in God through either faith or erroneous reasoning. — S
This misunderstanding is why I keep making the comparison. — Jake
As for faith, it has an obvious link to religion, and a greater link to religion than atheism. β S
This misunderstanding is why I keep making the comparison. — Jake
Yes, those links are of exactly the same strength as each other. :up: — Pattern-chaser
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