Psalm 14: Who was Jesus' grandpa?

[Fenn]

Sorry to interrupt you guys, you can continue, but I'm replying to Kodos.

So lets say we do eliminate religion from the world, since it's useless anyway. Now, if these billions of evil Christians were irrational enough to believe in religion, I feel like they're still going to be irrational enough to adopt other stupid and dangerous philosophies. Although truly evil people must take some blame for swaying others to evil, they only ever succeed when people blindly follow them.

For clarity's sake, I'm going to directly state my argument: the blame for the evil of religions, much like the evil of governments or businesses, lies more with the individuals and the portion of the general populace who blindly and/or illogically believes what they proclaim, than the instituion itself.

Also...

Except the fact is that it's still an eternal punishment that God allows to happen when he could easily prevent it. As long as God is omnipotent and omniscient you are confronted with the undeniable fact that anything that happens anywhere, at any time, is happening with his direct approval

I said this twice already in different words! It all leads back to: why would a perfect being create an imperfect world?

[Sawyer]

Huh? Any danger of an example here? And you're right that morals are subjective, so when has any 'militant atheist presented their own set of equally arbitrary moral beliefs'?

I didn't think an example was justified. Just look at almost any page in this thread. It's hard to draw any proper examples of arguments because everything is so fragmented; part of the reason why everyone's misunderstanding each other. But here, going back one a couple pages:

The adherents are at the least stupid, and the people who push it on them are evil. But there is a sort of low-level evil in willful ignorance.

Not the best example, but Cleveland's almost on and time is short. Here is an example of Kodos placing forward a moral/ethical belief that willful ignorance is a low-level evil. Let me make this clear. I am not necessarily disagreeing with this statement, but it is an example of one subjective belief being used as a form of attack on a Christian argument: that God exists.

I've made two real points. Let me put them across clearly:

1. I argue that the world would not be a better place if everyone woke up tomorrow as an atheist.
2. I argue that questions of morality, ethics, good or evil, and right and wrong, are not relevant to the existence or non-existence of a god or gods.

Sorry mate, I don't mean to be rude, but vague arguments have always annoyed me.

...but I'm a gurl.

[Harvester_Of_Sorrow]

1.I argue that the world would not be a better place if everyone woke up tomorrow as an atheist

Why not?

2.I argue that questions of morality, ethics, good or evil, and right and wrong, are not relevant to the existence or non-existence of a god or gods.

I dont think anyone would disagree with that. The reason morals are bought into these arguments is that, according to the religious, morals and ethics are a product of their religion, which said atheist will quickly point out is bullshit. Nothing to do with weather said being actually exists, just that if said being did exist, the morals and ethics they preach would be fucked.

...but I'm a gurl.

Where I come from, calling a girl 'mate' is perfectly acceptable

[Bacon_Barbarian]

2) How rude.

I mean no one ever said Sicence was Ethics. You didn't. Kodos didn't. It's rather obvious. Kodos' arguments are usually rooted in Science. ... He uses Ethics to point out hypocrisies in the Bible, not to argue God's lack of existence.

[Yara]

I mean no one ever said Sicence was Ethics. You didn't. Kodos didn't. It's rather obvious. Kodos' arguments are usually rooted in Science. ... He uses Ethics to point out hypocrisies in the Bible, not to argue God's lack of existence.

I thought he's atheist. Sorry for being out of topic =$
*goes out*

[Bacon_Barbarian]

I thought he's atheist. Sorry for being out of topic =$
*goes out*

He IS an atheist. He just wasn't using Ethos in his argument that God doesn't exist. He did use Ethos when arguing about why people shouldn't BE Christian.

[Yara]

He IS an atheist. He just wasn't using Ethos in his argument that God doesn't exist. He did use Ethos when arguing about why people shouldn't BE Christian.

Ah.. I see. Thanks for the clarification, Bacon ^_^

[Bacon_Barbarian]

Well, that may not be right, but that's how I understood it anyway.

[Fenn]

He IS an atheist. He just wasn't using Ethos in his argument that God doesn't exist. He did use Ethos when arguing about why people shouldn't BE Christian.

That sounds about right. Since I was trying to argue that its okay to be Christian, and he pointed out the ethical dangers posed by Christians on the world.

Of course now he decides to make me wait days hanging over my keyboard in suspense...no rush, but I'm dying for answers. Anyone else can feel free to reply to my post too, y'know.

[Kodos]

Sorry. Been a bit busy and tired the last few days. Haven't had the time to give this thread the attention it deserves.

Sorry to interrupt you guys, you can continue, but I'm replying to Kodos.

So lets say we do eliminate religion from the world, since it's useless anyway. Now, if these billions of evil Christians were irrational enough to believe in religion, I feel like they're still going to be irrational enough to adopt other stupid and dangerous philosophies.

Probably. But now they are forced to adopt philosophies that force them to use logic and argumentation to justify their beliefs. There is now a common ground between the evil and the good and the possibility for swaying them. A man who believes that it is okay to murder because of logical reasons is a man who can be reasoned with. A man who believes that it is okay to murder because a magical sky tyrant said so in a book written thousands of years ago that he knows is true by faith is impossible to be reasoned with.
Once faith is eliminated progress becomes possible.

Although truly evil people must take some blame for swaying others to evil, they only ever succeed when people blindly follow them.

For clarity's sake, I'm going to directly state my argument: the blame for the evil of religions, much like the evil of governments or businesses, lies more with the individuals and the portion of the general populace who blindly and/or illogically believes what they proclaim, than the instituion itself.

The fallacy here is that you assume organizations exist. They do not. An organization is simply an aggregate of individuals. "The Catholic Church" does not really exist. It is just a word we use to describe a large grouping of people behaving in a certain way. Groups are nothing more than collections of individuals. The Catholic Church is evil because the individuals making it up are evil (through either action or inaction). Groups may be prescriptive in that peer pressure or coercion causes members to behave in a certain way, but ultimately they are descriptive.

I said this twice already in different words! It all leads back to: why would a perfect being create an imperfect world?

Well the problem there is that it depends how you define perfect. If you include morally perfect then, yeah, it's a logical impossibility. If you don't include that, though, it's easy - he's a dick. Ever play the Sims, or even Sim City? Something tells me that if you did that you, at least once, decided to be a jerk to your virtual minions. Same thing. If an omnipotent and omniscient being exists the only logical conclusion that can be drawn about him/her/it is that he/she/it is the most evil being to ever exist, by definition, since literally every single bad thing that has ever happened or will ever happen is its fault.