After realizing that (IMHO) gods and such are the ridiculous imaginings of primitive people before our species discovered science...

To these kind of arguments, I usually retort with one word: Newton.

You can say what you will, personally I prefer a hundred times an honest atheist(and I think there's nothing wrong with being one) than a bigot "christian", but I find it irritating that some people like to belittle those that believe in God with "you don't know much about science and you're just using religion because you're stupid".

And it seemed to me that, with your post, you shit on theists publicly, am I wrong?

I agree though that it's pointless to argue, if the goal is to "convert" one another. Dialogue is not pointless though, if understanding one another is the goal. Take your pick, I guess.

You can say what you will, personally I prefer a hundred times an honest atheist(and I think there's nothing wrong with being one) than a bigot "christian", but I find it irritating that some people like to belittle those that believe in God with "you don't know much about science and you're just using religion because you're stupid".

Einstein and Schroedinger also believed in God.

'mikeman' said:

You can say what you will, personally I prefer a hundred times an honest atheist(and I think there's nothing wrong with being one) than a bigot "christian", but I find it irritating that some people like to belittle those that believe in God with "you don't know much about science and you're just using religion because you're stupid".

Einstein and Schroedinger also believed in God.

I know, Leibniz too. Many top scientists believed. And I mention only those of the western world because that's what I'm familiar with. That doesn't really mean anything other than, if you believe, then you're in good company of some of top minds of mankind. There are of course many other top scientists that didn't or don't believe. I agree with Superpig, it's pointless to argue if *proof* is the point. With technology today, there can't be any external "proof" that can't be attributed to some very advanced tech. And it's destructive to decide that, if you believe, you have the right to play the "represantive of God on Earth", in the sense that you instruct people how to live their lives(advising and helping are something altogether different). I mean, hey, if you *really* believe in God, as in, the force/entity that created reality, then you also believe that you have no right to violently interfere with whatever plan is installed for everyone. The solution to me is to say "I have my beliefs, you have yours, let's go get a beer"

alright. this is not how a conversation is supposed to look. i'll be back when you sober up.

If the only replies you have to something that is laid out quite plainly is that you do not understand, then you need to reeducate yourself on logic. I am not going to hold your hand through the equivalent of a 4 month symbolic logic course to explain to you why your posit that "Religion is the clever explanation of WHY everything turns into misery in your life&quot; is the fallacy I showed you.<br /> <br /> edit: specifically in regards to Christianity and Buddhism.

'owl' said:

alright. this is not how a conversation is supposed to look. i'll be back when you sober up.

If the only replies you have to something that is laid out quite plainly is that you do not understand, then you need to reeducate yourself on logic. I am not going to hold your hand through the equivalent of a 4 month symbolic logic course to explain to you why your posit that "Religion is the clever explanation of WHY everything turns into misery in your life&quot; is the fallacy I showed you.<br /> <br /> edit: specifically in regards to Christianity and Buddhism.<br />

I'm not sure on what owl and you are disagreeing. Owl mention the sermon at the mount as an explanation on why our lives are miserable right now. It's the same thing as saying that the sermon is an explanation on how to make our lives less miserable in the future...if our lives weren't miserable then we wouldn't need a "cure", be it coming from religion or anywhere else. With the difference I think being that the speech does indeed touch on the "why".

I'm not sure on what owl and you are disagreeing. Owl mention the sermon at the mount as an explanation on why our lives are miserable right now. It's the same thing as saying that the sermon is an explanation on how to make our lives less miserable in the future...if our lives weren't miserable then we wouldn't need a "cure", be it coming from religion or anywhere else. With the difference I think being that the speech does indeed touch on the "why".

It's the focus of his statement.

[size=2]<span style="font-weight:bold;">The bible is more a guide to better your life than a laundry list of reasons you are miserable.</span>[size=2]<br /> [size=2]<br /> <br /> [size=2]It&#39;s a small change in language, but it&#39;s an enormous change in meaning.<br /> [size=2]<br /> <br /> [size=2]His argument is the following:<br /> [size=2]A is something that makes you miserable<br /> [size=2]B is something that makes you feel better<br /> [size=2]If A -&gt; B<br /> [size=2]B<br /> [size=2]Then A<br /> [size=2]<br /> <br /> [size=2]Using the counter example of telling a drowning man not to catch himself on fire; a drowning man is still miserable, but telling him not to catch himself on fire has nothing to do with why he is miserable despite it still being solid advice. Or the more realistic example of telling someone to exercise to help them feel better when their wife is about to leave them; exercise probably has very little to do with why he is miserable, nonetheless it may make him feel better.<br /> [size=2]<br /> <br /> [size=2]This is why he is affirming the consequent.<br /> [size=2]<br /> <br /> [size=2]To use a more biblical example, Jesus tells me that I should help others as I would him. I may be miserable because my fake wife is leaving me again say (and my fake wife is leaving me because she is cold hearted not because I did anything particularly wrong. Twice in one post. Why did I ever marry her?). I go to help others, and I feel better just because I am connecting with and helping people. Jesus&#39; teachings have nothing to do with explaining why I was miserable in the first place.

'krez' said:

After realizing that (IMHO) gods and such are the ridiculous imaginings of primitive people before our species discovered science…

To these kind of arguments, I usually retort with one word: Newton.

You can say what you will, personally I prefer a hundred times an honest atheist(and I think there's nothing wrong with being one) than a bigot "christian", but I find it irritating that some people like to belittle those that believe in God with "you don't know much about science and you're just using religion because you're stupid".

To be fair, though, this is not what krez said. There can be a fair bit of difference between why an idea was invented in the first place, and why it is kept alive. It's pretty clear that the concept of God comes from a time when humans just didn't know much of anything about science. The reasons it stays around are different, though. There are certainly people who perpetuate their beliefs because they just don't understand much about science - I would argue that a lot of creationists fall into this camp. For others, the reason may be different.

It seems to me that the fact that there are theist scientists is simply proof that scientists are human, too, and don't necessarily apply scientific principles to every aspect of their lives.

Think about it: there are scientists that smoke. How much sense does that make? Those scientists are probably perfectly aware of the issues of smoking, yet they keep smoking anyway. They probably even do so with much fancier rationalizations than the rest of the population.

The bottom line is simply that somebody who is highly intelligent, rational and logical in one part of their life can be just as illogical and emotionally driven in other parts of their life as anybody else. That's part of being human, and scientists are human.

'way2lazy2care' said:

'owl' said:

alright. this is not how a conversation is supposed to look. i'll be back when you sober up.

If the only replies you have to something that is laid out quite plainly is that you do not understand, then you need to reeducate yourself on logic. I am not going to hold your hand through the equivalent of a 4 month symbolic logic course to explain to you why your posit that "Religion is the clever explanation of WHY everything turns into misery in your life&quot; is the fallacy I showed you.<br /> <br /> edit: specifically in regards to Christianity and Buddhism.<br />

I'm not sure on what owl and you are disagreeing. Owl mention the sermon at the mount as an explanation on why our lives are miserable right now. It's the same thing as saying that the sermon is an explanation on how to make our lives less miserable in the future…if our lives weren't miserable then we wouldn't need a "cure", be it coming from religion or anywhere else. With the difference I think being that the speech does indeed touch on the "why".

I'm actually disagreeing with no one He seems to be in a train of thought where everything I say is ignorant and also a logical fallacy. Instead of trying to get the spirit of what I'm saying he's just having fun messing up the semantics.

The bottom line is simply that somebody who is highly intelligent, rational and logical in one part of their life can be just as illogical and emotionally driven in other parts of their life as anybody else. That's part of being human, and scientists are human.

Ok, but what is so "illogical" about the belief that the universe was created by a force/entity/being that actually cares about what's going on inside this universe? That's what I don't get. If you say "you have no proof of it", I'd say we have no proof for a *lot* of things. You have no proof that I'm an actual person and not some highly advanced chatbot.If the belief in such a benovelent creator actually makes your life better, is that illogical? It seems pretty weird for something illogical to make things better...would that mean that life in general is illogical? Would that even mean anything? Can you even *be* 100% logical? Would that even fix anything, do we even want that?

And please dude...I mean give me a break, ancient Greeks, amongst other cultures, had their own system of belief about the divine and that "God" is...don't tell me those people knew nothing of science or philosophy.

By the same token, I could say that the idea that the universe was created on its own, and all we are, are particles bouncing on each other for no purpose at all is highly "illogical". I won't say it, but the idea "all we are is masses of particles behaving according to impersonal physics laws" is a bit scary...so free will, thought, etc are just illusions? You do realize, that without the idea of a Creator that is beyond the physical laws, we are basically accepting that we have no free will at all(or is there something I'm missing?). That the particles inside my brain are behaving as indifferently as the particles inside the rock besides me. So, we are all as free as the electrons on my PC? And how come the universe even has laws that ensure the emergence of complex forms? We could imagine a universe were all forces between particles were repulsive for all the duration of this universe's life. Are we going to use the "multiverse" cop out again, which has found place in science, despite being something that *clearly* cannot be proven? Just wondering... If I say that this universe is the *only* one existing, I have ALL the evidence on my side. Noone has any evidence of other "parallel universes". None. If I start wondering how come the *only* universe in existence does make sense and has created life and sentient beings inside it, am I illogical? How so?

I have this beef with this "illogical" thing, that's all...Unless you mean the many superstitions that many religious people carry, which I fully agree with, those are best to be discarded.

And please dude...I mean give me a break, ancient Greeks, amongst other cultures, had their own system of belief about the divine and that "God" is...don't tell me those people knew nothing of science or philosophy.

They knew about science, as much as a people living 25 centuries ago could be expected to know. That is, not much compared to our current knowledge.

am I illogical? How so?

Because you say that the multiverse "cop out [...] *clearly* cannot be proven". Yes, this is completely illogical.

An anology: the ancient greeks couldn't prove whether the circle could or could not be squared. Why? Because they simply didn't have the necessary knowledge.

(For the record, this was proven impossible in 1882)