2008-12-27, 21:10 | Link #1422 | |
思想工作
Join Date: Mar 2008
Location: Vereinigte Staaten
Age: 32
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yeah, i probably shouldn't have included him, i probably just didn't want to sound too anti-communist. |
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2008-12-27, 22:50 | Link #1423 | |
Le fou, c'est moi
Join Date: Dec 2007
Location: Las Vegas, NV, USA
Age: 35
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...although I admit I don't really know what went on in Hitler's head of all people. |
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2008-12-27, 23:31 | Link #1424 | |
Juanita/Kiteless
Join Date: Apr 2006
Location: New England
Age: 40
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Of course I was quick to be defensive, too many people are too biased against religion. *snicker* Number one, if you say religion makes manipulation easier, that still isn't the fault of a particular religion. This isn't a failing of a religion, this is a failing of corrupt men. It only makes manipulation easier because so many people deeply value religion and/or spirituality. That is not the fault of religion and spirituality, and these things being used to manipulate people for bad agendas is indeed a very immoral thing. Atheists never started holy wars, but they've started wars. And they can declare war over ideologies and principles they strongly believe in and push upon their societies. Also, Bush doesn't represent all Christians, not by a long shot. Religion, on the whole (please note that), spirituality, and the masses that abide to religion aren't really to blame with the whole "religion is dangerous and a plague to our planet" bull****. Those things stand for a lot of good, and many spiritual practicioners are good people that stand for good things. You wanna be mad at someone, be mad at the people pulling the strings of people, making them into puppets, for their own twisted agendas. Now don't get me wrong, I defend these things for getting too much flak, but I myself hate to see the manipulation taking place. I think there is much good to Christianity, and I'm frustrated to see many Christians being unfair in their thinking; quick to judge, vehemently opposing things they are told to without really forming their own opinions, being intolerant without taking the time to really think on a particular issue, and so on. Islam actually has some really good qualities, but the organized religion of Islam of today is really in very bad shape. My view is some people are just too biased against religion and so on. What I'd like to convey is that I myself see flaws in religion (much more so in certain ones than others) and can see how (again, as discussed earlier) it can be manipulated for bad means, but I really want some who are very anti-religious to try to see that there is a lot of good and merit to religion and spirituality. I definitely see the good things and acknowledge there are problems and that things can be exploited for bad ambitions. I want those who mostly see these things in a negative light to at least try to see more of the positive things and see things in a more balance and fair minded manner. Also, something I noticed with most people who are anti-religious: Most of their complaints and arguments center around Christianity and Islam. I for one believe they've fallen off their true paths the most of all the major world religions. Especially Christianity in the middle ages and Islam in the modern day era. However, I personally think that the Eastern religions have done better in certain regards than the Western religions. Of course, things haven't been perfect with them; of course not. But I can't think of any holy wars started by people abiding to them (there was Jihad in India several centuries ago, but the Muslims instigated that). I'm not saying there weren't any at all, but there haven't been as many as the ones from the Western religions, and nothing on the scale of the crusades in the west/Middle East. Most wars in Asia have come down to warfare not centered on religion. Mostly about cultural and ethnic conflicts and socio-political conflicts. Groups of people engage in wars. Sometimes religion is in the equation, and sometimes it isn't. Another thing I appreciate about Buddhism is that I think it is the religion that has practiced what it preaches the best (again, it is not perfect, by no means). Again, a lot of devoutly religious people and secular humanists and such butt heads, but for secular humanists, I encourage them to check out Buddhism and Taoism. I'm a spiritual person and value these religions and their philosophies, and I think atheists and agnostics can find value in their philosophies and teachings, which incorporate much logic and correlate well with science and scientific thought, and their ideas and teachings about ethics and good morals, which are mostly approached with logic.
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2008-12-28, 03:42 | Link #1425 | ||
Gregory House
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I'm not saying they were intentionally doing so in order to take advantage of others, but that's what, objectively speaking, it boiled down to. Quote:
Religion is, by definition, an organized set of irrational beliefs constituted by consensus of a number of people. And as soon as this consensus is formed, as with every organized corps in the history of humanity, a division is born between "the organizers" and "the rest", who follow the formers' directives. A single person believing the sun is a god does not make it a religion, especially when it lacks legitimacy with his or her peers. But take a sizable number of people within any given society, preferably the majority, who believe that--inherently, some sort of organization within such a group of people must be born, because it's necessary to maintain such a belief consistent amongst each individual person. And as soon as such an organization is born the religion is finally constituted, and a sector of the believing population find themselves with power over their peers, because they are the ones who determine the "truth", since they're the ones responsible for keeping the religion consistent. It's not much more complex than that. It's hard to picture it with modern religions, since they've been around for a long time and they're way too ingrained in our minds, but really, that's all it boils down to. The problem is, having an irrational belief (or set of beliefs) does not make you religious. Those beliefs must be shared, by consensus, amongst a number of people--and that's where the sticky part begins, as I mentioned before.
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2008-12-28, 05:28 | Link #1426 | ||
I disagree with you all.
Join Date: Dec 2005
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Note, "sheep mentality" is a survival trait. Fosters cooperation. But it also has its drawbacks. I'd also agree that religion has done us a lot of good, along with the bad. Even what WK would decry as an injustice, the funneling of resources toward people who've done nothing to deserve them so they can live in relative luxury, has given people the time and leisure to work on making human knowledge progress. Quote:
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2008-12-28, 09:01 | Link #1427 | |
Gregory House
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Mind you, there's another problem with blindly trusting everyone with some knowledge we supposedly don't have, but in a relatively more organized society, it's easier to trust someone with a medical degree than a random healer in a village where scientific medicine hasn't seen the light of the day. Religious "truth" is as arbitrary as it gets. I think we can all see it today, what with the Christian church's hatred for homosexuals, condoms and that sort of stuff. It all depends on the mood of the people making the rules.
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2008-12-28, 10:08 | Link #1428 |
Aspiring Aspirer
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This is getting nasty, of course I go through these arguments alot with people nowadays.
Interesting Point: Hitler was actually quite religious, you can go research it actually and he uses God not just as a tool to spur his crowds but as a reason and motivator also. Me and my buds have always laughed about Buddhism, because really we see it more as a philosophy than a religion (The Chinese Buddhism anyways). I think the problem with Christianity and its Bible or other religions and their source texts is that we actually have no idea how factual those things accounts are. Remember the saying "Don't believe everything you read?" the Bible isn't a very objective source, it's an account in favour of and it was meant to legitamize the religion, of course you could say all history is nonobjective "The winners write the history books." but that's beyond the point, what we have with the Bible and other texts is a single document retranslated over and over again and having no other supporting evidence for its cause than itself and now the breath of millions of people. But it's not all lies though, its been proved that the Bible included several factual locations of places, etc, but like for any other book, having somethings true doesn't make everything else true. And before I go offending anyone know this, I used to believe in God (When I was a kid some slightly older kid gasped at my disbelief and told me I was going to hell, which is WHY I dislike teaching religion to young impressionable children, let them choose one for themselves, or not when they are mature enough to understand it!) but as I grew older, I couldn't accept him because he didn't bring any fulfillment in my life, he may to any of you though and like I said I don't care. You can be anything you like so long you don't bother me, or do something monumentally stupid.
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2008-12-28, 10:44 | Link #1430 | |||||
I disagree with you all.
Join Date: Dec 2005
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I think it was too late from the moment you said you laughed at Buddhism. The next paragraph probably didn't help either. Quote:
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2008-12-28, 13:11 | Link #1431 |
Gregory House
IT Support
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@Ahn_Mihn:
I'm not judging them, saying they were evil or something like that. I'm not saying it didn't "work" for them. Feudalism "worked". Free-market liberalism "worked". Democracy "works". That is, until a better alternative levels up the field a bit. I'm not saying they should have come up with medical science at the time, or realized that religion was a glorified caste system. I'd be stupid if I thought that--they didn't even have the tools with which they could come up with those conclusions. But it's about progress. It takes time, but it happens... or at least I'd like to think it happens. It was natural for religion to occur, as it was natural for slavery to occur, and for feudalism to occur, and eventually, for slavery to be abolished, for free-market capitalism to crash and burn, and so on. And I believe it to be natural, if we wish to somehow attain a less inequal, more critical-thinking society, for religion to disappear, since the only thing it does, in its structure as an institution, is to establish inequality.
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2008-12-28, 14:05 | Link #1432 | |
Manifesto
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We'll establish a superior, classless society? |
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2008-12-28, 17:38 | Link #1433 |
Aspiring Aspirer
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@Anh_Minh
We always "laughed" at Buddhism because Chinese Buddhism never occured to us as religious because if you knew anything about it you'd realize that they objectively speaking there is no great worship of a spiritual being (Other than Buddah, whom was an actual guy, but really didn't do much to spread his "religion") Please, whatever you may do, do not try to take out a piece of my sentence in the intent to critize that single part and not at my whole argument, you clearly haven't read through it fully and only seem to enjoy responding to things that jump at you. And how is that criminal? Making a child believe in exactely what you believe in because you think its right, giving them no alternative and forcing them to believe in that thing without a full knowledge and understanding of it. How is that criminal? If anything trying to brainwash them without their consent is criminal, by your arguemnt you'd be legitamizing parents teaching their kids to be racist, intolerant, violent, or other nasty things; because they believe in those things. How is that anyway to raise children? I was being very objective, I've been doing alot of arguments and believe me I have many reasons to put down religion as a whole, but I'm not going to. I'm not going to try offend people because really, your beliefs are none of my business. But I've always held firm that every person has a right to their own beliefs and its unfair to children to influence them and in the same way block out other influences. And if you read the remainder of my fulfillment thing, I included that other people may gain the fulfillment from a religion which I don't happen to get. Soo good for them. Please, before you go trying to pick out my message of tolerance can you atleast also try to stay objective, or atleast read the whole argument?
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2008-12-28, 18:25 | Link #1435 | |||||||
I disagree with you all.
Join Date: Dec 2005
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And by the way, saying that "objectively", you have many reasons - that you're not even going to expose - to look down on religions, but that you're nice enough not to care isn't being tolerant. It's being condescending. |
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2008-12-28, 18:56 | Link #1436 | |||||||
Aspiring Aspirer
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I don't understand why you're try to make me look like a dick. I don't honestly believe for a moment that you have any right to attempt to belittle my own opinons. Literally you're not at all understanding what I'm trying to say, in fact you're doing the exact same thing which I pointed out; you're just looking at different points and attacking them and not the argument in whole, this is no time for a quote war, but if it is then fine;
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And believe it or not, not caring about other people's beliefs and such even though I have reasons to look down upon them is tolerant. If it isn't what is? Being a mighty person whom is accepting of everyone's religion in the same time? That's not very tolerant to the Athiest is it? Atleast I'm not saying that everyone else is wrong except for me. I'm stating an opinon, not an argumnt, which it now has become. Are you trying to make me out as some sort of crazy anti-religious scumbag? Because with your questioning and utter lack of evidence to back up your points (All I see are opinons) I find no actual value in your bickering. State your opinon and move along, I think that's the purpose of the thread, and attack me on it, just not here, go PM me or something. Or better yet at my member's space, it's been getting quite there.
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2008-12-28, 19:06 | Link #1437 | |
勇者
Join Date: Dec 2006
Location: Tesla Leicht Institute
Age: 34
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2008-12-28, 19:19 | Link #1438 | |||
Gregory House
IT Support
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Don't see too much equality going on there. Especially since it's the religious leaders the ones who dictate what should go in or out of a religion and what a good faithful follower should do. Quote:
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2008-12-28, 19:39 | Link #1439 | |
勇者
Join Date: Dec 2006
Location: Tesla Leicht Institute
Age: 34
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Well your second part yes there are religious leader but its like the society itself. It needs someone at the top. But one true thing that dicates the followers are the books or the core ideas, like the bible or the koran, which despite being written by man contains the core religious values. As long as people follow the core concepts instead of following blindly I believe that the world would be lot better place (with flowers and sunshine everywhere ). Imo these leaders are nothing more than a guide or a teacher who teaches the true value or religion to its people (but they do tend to mix their own ideas into it).
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2008-12-28, 20:03 | Link #1440 |
Aspiring Aspirer
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We can all become communists XD
In theory it's good, however it's impossible in reality because someone has to make the rules. I doubt that we'll ever reach such a great level of civility, after all humans will be humans, it what makes us all so likable . We can dream though, or atleast strive for a relatively good society. Religion certainly made it alittle easier to insert those morals we have today (Though many may argue that our morals are from other sources, like self preservation) I say that such things require too much thinking and best left to people with time on their hands (philosophers, eg people who enjoy giving advice to people whom are happier than they! )
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not a debate, philosophy, religion |
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