I was going to let this pass, but since you mentioned it. . .
Shouldn’t one evaluate complex theories with their brain/mind, not with other organs of the body? :dubious:
So being religious is now an “ethnic group” ?
Since when is hating a belief system bigotry ? Is hating Republicanism, Communism, Nazism, or racism “bigotry” as well ? Or is it only ( again ) religion that gets an exemption ?
The actual statement is: “Anybody who hates members of a religious group, indiscriminately, based on a prejudice is a bigot.” Not hating the system, hating members of the group.
I never said I hate all religious people, although I hardly respect them. Stretching the definition of “bigotry” that far is either dishonest, or foolish. If it’s done consistently, then you have to call anyone who hates Nazis a bigot. Or someone who doesn’t respect the opinion of Flat Earthers a bigot.
FinnAgain and those like him are simply trying to push a special definition of “bigotry” that only applies when religion is involved. Few if any would try applying it to anything else. If for no other reason than because it would underline the foolish and self serving nature of their definition.
Even taking into account the non-literal, commonly accepted meaning of “heart” and “gut”, it still makes no sense at all.
Sure. “Agree with me or suffer eternal torment” is pretty intolerant of other views.
Why on Earth not? Believers can be bigoted against all non-believers, and non-believers can be bigoted against all believers. Just because an accurate descriptor can be applied to both ‘sides’ doesn’t mean it has no meaning in the conversation. One would not, for instance, go wrong if they described both sides of a ‘race war’ as racists, for example.
The OP makes sense and sounds true to me, but I don’t see the point in people’s need to have dick-measuring contests about the relative amount good or evil done in religions or atheism’s name? Does anyone seriously believe that if religion does more good than atheism, then religion is true? Is it because of something else? Also, how does one do something in the name of atheism anyway? Why is this reminding me of Russel’s paradox? Like the following:
If I only believe in religions that don’t believe in themselves, would I be a a theist or an atheist?
In other news, blah blah blah atheism blah blah blah religion blah.
I find extremes among Christians and extremes among atheists. It is a waste of time to give the labels intelligent, rational, non-manipulative, compassionate to one group and gullible, delusional, irrational, pushy to the other group. Just as soon as I do, I discover that the father of modern genetics was a monk.
Those of you who say that one has to be delusional to believe in God should have more respect for the limits of what science can and cannot do at the moment.
I am a Christian originally from a rural Tennessee town of 2,000. Yet I think I agree with everything that was said in the OP except that I don’t judge Mormons so critically. That criticism seems to be a recent trend over the last fifteen years. I will admit that I don’t like the way that they devalue the women in their church. And I don’t know any Mormons personally. I have been reading about their faith since I was seventeen.
I do think there is something about the extremes of fundamentalism and the repression that it leads to that is basically unhealthy and leads to emotional problems, infidelity, hypocrisy, and divorce at a greater rate than mainline or liberal Christianity.
Christians are supposed to try to be decent, but there is nothing that guarantees that we will be any better than anyone else. There is no reason why an atheist can’t be as moral or moreso than a Christian. When atheists become buttholes about their non-belief, it isn’t because they are atheists. It’s because they are mean-spirited or pushy or vicious. And the same is true about Christians who are buttholes.
I don’t think anyone is going to “hell.”
Der Trihs generalizes too much to be very accurate when he talks about religious people. He just lumps everyone in together. For him, we are always living in the Dark Ages.
If you live your life according to a code set down 2,000 years ago, could that not be said to be true? In relation to the average person today who has access to almost instantaneous information, and an awareness of living in a world wide community, the people who wrote the bible and any other religious tracts, knew next to nothing. They were akin to gullible children with no idea how to question the information they were recieving - if that was ever the case!
p.s. And the people they were passing this message on to, were even more gullible!
Yeah. One could say that, but once it is established that everyone in the race war is racist, what is the point of one of them calling the other one that 30 times. It becomes senseless.
As for ‘Agree with me or suffer eternal torment’, I actually thought that was a viewpoint for which Christians didn’t even bother to apologize. Isn’t that what John 3:16 is all about? Even if we interpret ‘perish’ as death instead of eternal torment (which the Christians I know don’t do, but I am no Theologian), then you still have to admit that most Christians think that they are obligated to not be very tolerant of a world view that would deny a fellow man eternal happiness with the Lord in Heaven.
Yeah, but why turn to religion for what science ‘cannot do at the moment’? Why not turn to Artists or Poets?
Dawkins touches on this attitude. There is a whole movement about it that has been dubbed Non-Overlapping Magisteria’, or NOMA. His idea on that is even if we accept that there are questions that Science can’t answer, what gives any religion the authority to answer that question? God? Whose God? Anyone can just make up anything at all, so which people have the true authority to answer questions that science cannot?
A discussion about Nazis shouldn’t be considered to be Godwinized because Hitler is mentioned. Is it true that indoctrinating a child into a particular belief system is child abuse? If so, then stating so is a very important point that should be pursued. Does it matter if it offends to say it? I guess you could say that indoctrinating a child is ‘harmful’ to the child. Is that less offensive? A matter of degree, I guess.
Given that, isn’t it astounding that any of it has applicability today?! And yet, there are only a few issues of dispute between believers and non-believers. How do you account for that?
That’s one way of looking at it. Another way would posit huge philosophical differences between the way believers and non-believers view the universe, its purpose, how it functions in the most fundament sense, etc.
Could you give some examples in areas that are not in huge contention that affect our daily lives in a detrimental way?
*And please don’t do your Christmas song example. One can only go through that so many times. 
Well, if Yellowstone blew up, as the molten lava reached my doorstep I might think, “That’s a shame. Too bad geologic forces reached a crisis while I still had a few more viable years.” A theist might be thinking “Why is God displeased with me?” I call that a fairly large difference in philosophical outlook.
Yeah, OK, but at least you weren’t bothered by the theist’s crazy idea when you were just about to die. And while there might be at least one theist who thought that, there might be another that thought that their new TV was about to be crushed just as the lava engulfed them.
And btw, that didn’t rise to the level of detrimentally affecting anyone’s life but their own, so your example doesn’t count.
Okay, how about my first college roomate who wouldn’t shut up about the vital importance of my accepting Jesus Christ as my personal saviour even though I suggested that he was barking up a very wrong tree and if even after I suggested that he would have to stop discussing Jesus or else leave the room. By the window. (We were 13 stories up.) The RA heard that I threatened to kill my roommate and we soon were put in separate rooms. That made a crimp in my college experience, or at least the first month or so of it, and entirely due to religious differences.
Zat any good? I got a million of them.
I’m actually with you on most of your other points, but are you in fact saying that people who disagree with you should not vote for laws you don’t like? That’s what laws ARE: moral judgments that carry prescribed consequences. I’m not going to take this too far, and I’m sure you’re not actually fascist (seriously, I know you’re not), but these statements make me wonder if some people are kind of against the idea of democracy because they can’t win all the time.
OK, I’ll give you that one. . . somewhat. Proselytizing definitely can affect one’s daily life in a detrimental manner if the people don’t agree about it. But I was more talking about morality. And I think you’d agree that throwing him out the window wasn’t any more moral than he thought it was. Got one about morality?
I’m sure you do. 