PSA?
I associate product with a desire to sell for profit. Religion or atheism.
I strongly disagree and I think it’s a crucial point in finding a common ground that allows all religions and those who prefer no religion or spiritual labels to come to a place of mutual respect and cooperation in progress.
I might agree that it is impossible to reconcile what I would call false faith and the kind of faith I’m talking about. True faith can and must consider the available evidence. That doesn’t prevent people from reaching different conclusions. When available evidence is denied or distorted to support and sustain a belief that is false faith. Not faith at all IMO.
Example; God belief is faith. Since it can be neither proved ot disproved people are free to fall on either side of the argument and still be true to themselves. Nobody is denying a preponderance of evidence. They are just interpreting their experiences differently.
Why do you say it’s impossible?
I take it that the answer is “no,” then?
I have asked you for some evidence that the marketing of atheism is anyway equivalent to the marketing of religion. Ideology need not enter in to it. I have made no assertions. I have no ideology, and therefore it does not need propping up.
I’ll give you another chance to answer. Can you provide any evidence thatatheism is sold on a scale approaching one billionth of that of religion? Where are the coffers to match the Vatican’s? Where are the billions of adherents? Where is the dogma? Where are the miracles? The demands that someone live his life just so?
Where are you getting that I referred to an exact equivalent?
If you cannot debate without this kind of shenanigans, why bother? You are the one who said that when we harm others we harm ourselves.
What did you mean, if not some kind of equivalency? (Not exact equivalent.) One harm is a bazooka blast, the other a bee sting. Hitler tortures six million to death and only dies once, at his own hand? You stretch the meaning of harm beyond useful purpose. What six million harms did he suffer, and how did he manage to do it? You mention harm. What do you mean by it?
Bah. Sheer flummery. He ordered the deaths of six million. Their blood is on his hands. According to you, Jesus said hatred equals murder. He hated the six million. Ergo, he harmed six million. What consequent six million harms did he suffer?
I never mentioned Jesus until you did. Can you please read more carefully, so we do not have to go over he same ground again and again?
Stop evading the question. Stipulated: There is a universal truth and harmony that applies to us all. Stipulated: Each must find his own path. How do you know that murder is not the way to harmony and truth? It worked for the Aztecs. Were they wrong? Perhaps the only consequences were to be that much closer to harmony. Unless you mean that murder brings negative consequences. Do yo?
So laws are a reflection of those who make them? No argument here. What has that to do with the path to harmony?
If I were to murder someone close to you, because to me murder is the surest path to universal harmony, you would accept that I have simply taken a step along that path?
No need for a clear definition of harmony. This is more of your rhetorical trickery. The statement you responded to said nothing about perfect harmony, and my response reflected that. You could just as well have asked whether conjunctions persist in applesauce. To pretend that somehow we have come together on an understanding of “perfect harmony,” when such an understanding has nothing to do with the exchange, is, frankly, dishonest.
It means what it says. My statement is not inconsistent with your statement.
The answer is, “Your question is loaded and based on a blanket generalization.”
Of course it’s equivalent. Atheistic marketing may not be on SCALE with religious “marketing,” but that’s certainly not for its lack of trying. The more people one “reaches” with one’s message, the more books one sells. This statement is as true with Bibles as it is with “The God Delusion.” Bibles are just more popular- which is the very thing you’re trying to rectify, isn’t it? And the more popular the atheistic message gets, the more rich atheists there will be. It’s exactly the same.
And of course you have an ideology. Your ideology is that mine is incorrect.
If you can do so without the snark, you’d be better served.
Atheism’s commercial pull is not equal to that of religion’s. But again, that’s not for lack of trying.
You’re making a broad generalization about religion and then refusing to see how it applies equally to atheism. You say that the religions are in it for the money and the message is a means to that end. Based on your parameters, the same exact thing could be said about atheism, with only your assurances to distinguish them.
Aren’t you working on that? In the name of “educating people,” of course.
“There is no God” sounds pretty dogmatic to me.
Well, there can’t be any miracles in atheism by definition, so I suppose I’m caught here.
You think atheists don’t demand this of the religious?
Well the whole aspect of the big bang and evolution would be pretty much a miracle without a God to guide it. The chance of it happening on it’s own is basically less then turning water into wine.
Or it was inevitable. On a universal scale probabilities are irrelevant. There is what has happened, what is happening, and what will happen. Whether or not it is unlikely doesn’t matter if it did in fact occur. That means that it was so likely that it actually happened. No one knows the why or the wherefore really, we’d have to be able to observe prior to the Big Bang to verify that.
When you have an eternity to work with, unless something is totally impossible it is eventually guaranteed to happen.
# S: (n) equivalent (a person or thing equal to another in value or measure or force or effect or significance etc) "send two dollars or the equivalent in stamps"From here. Value, measure, force, or effect. Vast differences of scale preclude equivalency.
Different degrees of scale mean no equivalency, by definition. Effort is meaningless, unless you suggest that, for example, two people who extend identical efforts but reach vastly different outcomes have achieved equivalent success.
I suspect you’ve got that turned around, but, no matter. In as much as “selling Bibles” equals “selling religion to the masses” you have a point. Which is to say, barely at all.
Am I? There is no evidence of that in this thread. I think you are overreaching.
Wow. “More rich Christians” is the goal of Christianity. I had really not suspected such a bold admission. Bravo sir.
Again, you overreach yourself. You have no basis for such a statement, merely your own assumptions.
Actually, all I have done is question your assertions. I never said that religions were in it for the money. Perhaps you have me confused with someone else.
I’m not working on anything at all, but even so, “working on it” and “having it” are two different things to most folks.
Until the existence of God is asserted, a denial of such existence would be incoherent.
I don’t think atheism demands anything of anyone. Shall we judge Christianity by the Christians?
Most atheists I know just want the religious to leave them alone. While there can be principled differences over where this crosses over into telling religious people how to live their lives, it ain’t the same thing.
I don’t see how the absence of “In God We Trust” from the currency* would impact believers’ lives any more than my being unable to buy liquor on Sundays when I visit my hometown impacts mine.
- I’m an atheist, and I don’t advocate the motto being removed.
from
and
If you don’t get my point or don’t find it meaningful fine. I’d rather you didn’t resort to accusing me of dishonest posting. I’ve attempted to explain it and although you don’t grasp or accept my explanation it is not dishonest or a rhetorical trick.
The harm occurs on another level besides physical, so the resulting consequence need not be an equivalent physical consequence.
Do you believe the people who obeyed his orders are also guilty? To what degree? How about those who simply did nothing to prevent these actions? Can withholding action in the eyes of heinous moral behavior be morally incorrect?
If you’d like to reduce the argument to this then I’d ask if Hitler was hated by 6 million people?Is that equivalent? I’m really not interested in that kind of discussion.
And you accuse me of being dishonest and not reading carefully? I mentioned something Jesus said as a philosophical point. Had you read it that way instead of making the god association that I never made, we wouldn’t need to discuss this.
Perhaps you could have just admitted I never made the god association rather than making a feeble defense and sarcastic remark.
I’m not evading anything. We make our choices individually but we live in a society , and then in a world in which societies interact. It is that interaction and the ongoing experience that reveals the universal truth. look at the overall changes in cultures since recorded history {which is only a blink btw} Have we moved toward murder or away from it? Slavery? Equal rights for people? How about our desire to help the needy? With all our problems it appears we are moving toward some moral agreement. The results of choices and consequences and a striving to be better. Believing we are all connected and my welfare is literally connected to the welfare of others murder doesn’t sound like progress to me. The self defense question is another issue which would be too much of a hijack.
Already answered.
Too often when I’m in these discussions people seem to think I’m advocating every action is acceptable. That’s not it. We choose individually and we interact with each other. If someone close to me was murdered I would have to deal with that experience as best I could. There are lots of variables. How much would I forgive? What would I see as justice? The murderer would have to accept the consequences of their action within the society they live in. Someone might sincerely believe god wants them to sacrifice my kids. even if I knew they believed that I wouldn’t step back and say “go for it” My truth would be to stop them and that interaction would be one more experience for both of us on the way to harmony.
The EFFORT is equivalent. The INTENTIONS are equivalent. But you knew that, didn’t you? Of course you did.
If you want to continue breaking my posts up into sentences that you can then twist, I am sorry to report that you will no longer have the opportunity.
You are presupposing your own conclusion and you are attempting to change the parameters when conrnered. It is uncivilized and I’ll have no more part of it.
cosmosdan said it better above but I would like to reiterate that you, Contrapuntal, are engaging in dishonest tactics, including, but not limited to, describing all the borders of a position but then refusing to admit you hold it. You’ve already won the debate in your own mind, so I don’t see the point in continuing to engage you if you aren’t willing to have an honest give-and-take. And you are unwilling.
Again with the accusations. It’s unfortunate if I’m not getting your point or you’re not getting mine but there’s no need for accusations of dishonesty and trickery.
The guitar metaphor you commented on was obviously about harmony. At least IMO.
A kind of “let’s live in harmony withe each other” generalization that I thought everyone would understand. You responded
which doesn’t seem to jive with the general concept of people living in harmony when you consider how the world is.
I fail to see how that has nothing to do with the exchange. Perhaps I misunderstood the metaphor. If so maybe the author will set me straight without needless accusations.
OKay… Still meaningless to me.
Public Service Announcement.
I also look at a product in that way. Religion profits. Atheism does not because it doesn’t have a product.
I think you’re using “religion” incorrectly.
“Religion” and “atheism” are two sides of the same coin.
An individual church may profit, but so does an individual atheist.
Oral Roberts and Richard Dawkins are doing the exact same thing. Roberts has more money than Dawkins because Roberts started first and because more people believe Roberts than Dawkins. I’m pretty sure that Dawkins would much rather more people believe him than believe Roberts, but then wouldn’t Dawkins have all the money?
Based on both men’s stated positions; i.e., that each has a message he wants to deliver to the masses and by buying his merchandise, you might receive that message and be enlightened by it, both men want the same thing.
Unless I’m misreading you. Please answer me this question, specifically:
HOW does “religion” profit?
But you don’t have a eternity but a finite amount of time from the big bang till either the big crunch, big rip or the heat death of the universe. And that gets even more finite as the time for the heavier elements came later.
<sarcasm deleted>
People as in individuals profit from religious products from the twelve apostle steak knife set to books and music. I mentioned two books about atheism that are also sold for profit. There are more. Individuals, both atheist and believer profit.
How do you view the books I mentioned? Are they not a product for profit?
Is it really? Would something be impossible then, if it just didn’t happen?
Okay I went back and read the original PSA post. Sorry for being slow. I get your point. Were you being serious? Those books may have a valid point to make but they are a product sold for profit are they not?
I think it’s pretty obvious that it is possible to make a buck on theories of existance.