You are, of course, ignoring the simplest answer…that they are right.
Perfectly true–for atheism as well, of course. Thus the Christian belief “by their fruits ye shall know them.” We have to judge the goodness or badness of ideas by the actions of those who truly live by them (note I say ‘truly,’ because there are many who publicly profess one belief while clearly actually living by another), and most especially by the results obtained in our personal lives, since it it difficult to judge rightly about others’.
(Now, it is quite clear to us that slavery and genocide are wrong; but it was not at all clear to everyone throughout history. Many people have practiced slavery or even genocide (or imposed theism, or athiesm, on a populace by force) with a clear conscience. Undoubtedly there is something in our culture which we do not think about, but which people in 150 or 300 years will wonder how we could have countenanced. Interestingly, it is almost certainly something which would never occur to us–or of course we would already be arguing about it.)
That is quite probably true (again, also for atheists). However, by your own reasoning, that does not make those beliefs (of whatever system) false; it simply means that they are unexamined by many of those who go along with them. Another good chunk of the population may profess the belief because they are seriously committed to it, and have come to that committment through a long process of study, introspection, and thought–perhaps even having started from the opposite view, as C.S. Lewis did. In fact, people tend to fall all along a spectrum between the two, and it is often only possible to tell where they stand when the going gets rougher than usual. Luckily for me, it’s not my job to spend time trying to figure out whether my acqaintances are truly committed to their various beliefs or not; only to try to become better committed myself.
As for indoctrination, parents and society indoctrinate their children in everything, not just in religion or a belief in Atlantis. We are indoctrinated in thousands of ideas, some good, some bad. Equating that with true brain-washing is not useful, in medical terms, and brings us back to putting people of the wrong faith in asylums until they can be re-educated to the atheists’ satisfaction.
Is faith never delusional? If Joe Jones thinks Jesus is telling him to kill his neighbor, that’s a delusion, right. Now how about if Sid Smith thinks Jesus is telling him to do good works? Now, I can imagine you’d say Jesus would never talk to Joe that way, but who are you to decide what God will tell someone? We’d probably lock up Joe, and not Sid, because Joe’s delusion can be harmful to society. I don’t see any other difference. Therefore, saying that a religious person is delusional does not imply he should be institutionalized, and your argument is a strawman.
There are also different levels of faith. A deist who says that he believes there is a god, but who acknowledges the lack of a god in the world is neither irrational or delusional. Someone who refuses to acknowledge evidence that the earth is greater than six thousand years old is irrational at least. Someone who thinks a Boy Scout who helps her across the street is an angel in disguise is being delusional.
I’m curious - why is someone questioning your faith so threatening to you? You do realize that atheism is punishable by death in some religions, and was effectively a death sentence at some times in history in yours? I think you owe some people an apology.
Spoken from the perpective of a religion which believes that we go to heaven, the rest of you burn in hell. Nice. I guess atheists must have bought all those Left Behind books. And by the way, I don’t know any atheist who hasn’t given any thought to it. We get bombarded with religious propaganda enough. In my experience, atheists know the Bible better than theists, and we read all of it, not just the stuff they let you see in Sunday school.
I agree it is not a problem with god, since if such a thing does exist, it ain’t the one described in the Bible. Tyranny and evil often come from those who follow without question, who believe what a leader says a greater power is telling them to do - whether that greater power is Communism, Allah or Jesus. Those who park their morality at the door because God wants you to kill the heathen. The lambs following their shepherd.
Not everyone who is religious is a blind follower - but faith in that you cannot prove or understand is a virtue, right. Maybe for you, but not for me.
I think the appropriate retort to such a statement is “Sez you.” One’s personal conviction isn’t evidence, and provides no solid basis for others to form a rational judgement one way or another. You don’t provide any evidence, you just state your oppinion as if it were fact. Why should I, or anyone else, be swayed by such an argument?
Does this mean that they can’t be deluding themselves? Who decides what is rational, the majority? The majority of people believe in God. What if the majority of people believed in an Invisible Pink Unicorn, would it be any less of a delusional belief? I reject the idea that if enough people sincerely believe in a shared delusion that it is no longer a delusion.
Ahhhh the A-word. Always, without exception, paraded about whenever ahteism/theism is debated. Why is it arrogent to equate gnome delusions with God delusions? Because so many people believe in God but not in gnomes? This isn’t a popularity contest. Do you at least concede the possiblility that every single person that believes in God could be delusional? Is it not possible?
Many otherwise rational people do believe in God. Just as many otherwise rational people believe in John Edwards’ psychic ablility. But just because these folks are rational about most things, and just because many of them are undoubtably more intelligent than I, that doesn’t preclude them from being irrational about God.
It is not concieted to point out that the Emperor has no clothes, but it certainly is perceived that way by the believers in the Emperor’s lovely new (non-existent) threads.
I think he was being sarcastic.
In any case, I’m getting awful sick of people confusing physics and metaphysics. You can choose whether or not to believe in a god-force yourself, and define it how you will, but don’t say, “it isn’t there because I can’t see or measure it.”
You see, I’m stuck in this spiritual purgatory. I believe in a god-force, and I have it defined as I see fit, so I’m more than agnostic, and I participate in religious ritual. However, I don’t follow the “god is a big guy who made everything 6000 years ago” bit, so I’m stymied there.
It isn’t dellusional because my case isn’t that I see god in a physical form and talk to him. It is my case that the god-force is on an entirely different frequency than the physical world. That is a belief, not a dellusion. It isn’t faith, because I feel the effects of it daily.
This is why hard science should stay out of philosophy - and why philosophy should stay out of hard science.
I don’t remember mentioning which faith I follow, or even that I do follow one. As it happens, I am a person of faith, but your accusations do not apply to me. Never in the history of my church has atheism been punishable by death; indeed, it is an article of faith with us that each person must be free to worship or not as he sees fit. Nor do we believe in a firey pit of hell for those who do not toe our line. I’ve read and studied the entire Bible, as I’ve always been encouraged to do, and we’re against following without question. I will confess to having read part of the “Left Behind” series–I’m a librarian who did a thesis on Christian fiction about the time the third book was published. I do not, however, subscribe to Rapture theology.
Because religious people have fallen into the same trap of feeling superior, despite the admonitions of their own scriptures to avoid it, does not mean that atheists should not have it pointed out to them. It’s human nature to try to find something to tribalize over, to feel superior about. Philosophy/belief is a particularly potent subject for it–so we must all be aware of it.
Neither am I ‘threatened’ by atheism or questioning (heh, I’m pretty used to it by now, having spent a good portion of the past 2/3 of my life being grilled)–I simply wish to point out the dangers in feeling superior to large segments of humanity. The questions I ask have happened before, and they’ll happen again, to many people of all systems of thought. None of us are immune to the temptation to start thinking of some people as stupid or ‘less,’ and from there it progresses easily, as we’ve seen many times.
Yes, there are different levels of faith, and different levels of delusion. But they cannot be entirely classified at one stroke, as this thread has been doing. Defining faith as delusion is dangerous (as well as medically untenable), for it defines faith as an illness which needs a cure. When people can be said to be ill and delusioned, then they can be treated as children, and someone else gets to be in charge, and to define when the ‘cure’ has been acheived.
What Zagadka said. 
You do realize, don’t you, that not all Christians buy into those Left Behind books. Quite a few make fun of them or are critical of them (moreso than atheists are, because of the impression they give of what Christians believe); some enjoy them as cheesy sci-fi, or read them for what they can get out of them without swallowing them whole; and many (myself included) pretty much just ignore them.
Every valid criticism you could make against religion or religious people—and there are many (valid criticisms, I mean, not people)—has been made by Christians, and some by Christ himself. The difference is that religious people only want to throw out the bathwater, not the baby.
Irrelevant. dangermom was addressing the assertion (or proposition) that all faith is delusional.
Better check your own strawmen, since that wasn’t her argument. She was addressing the claim that religion itself is a manifestation of a delusion. It is a small step from claiming that all religion is delusional (which I’ve heard many times–moreso when dangermom and I were in college in Berkeley) to thus treating all logic from believers as flawed. It is a larger step to consider institutionalizing all believers–but the difference is one of degree, not of nature.
Again, that’s not the point. It is threatening when people question all faith as a delusion. Especially when Loopydude makes statements like: “wait for the religious to die off.”
Since dangermom and I are of the same faith (which works out well since we’re married) I’ll take this as directed at me as well. Disbelief was never punished of our religion. I think you owe dangermom an apology.
While I believe you have the right to believe that, I disagree strongly. I even question your logic at arriving at that conclusion. Should I call you deluded?
Or atheism, which is fundamentally important to Communism (which makes me wonder why you lumped Communism in with Allah and Jesus).
This is another (and interesting) debate in and of itself. Jews and Christians believe Abraham was commanded by God to sacrifice Isaac. What would the role of society be in that case. If you want that debate, by all means start a thread on it.
People have many different definitions of God. If one goes about defining God as an ‘apple’ or as ‘the Grand Canyon’ then it would be foolish to call that sort of God a delusion. Because we can clearly see that the apple and the Grand Canyon exist. The same goes for the pantheistic definition of God and probably many others.
The ‘God’ that I find it delusional to believe in is the “god is a big guy who made everything 6000 years ago” type of God. The God who is in the here and now exercising contol over the universe, the God who cares about what happens in the universe. I wish I knew the shorthand way to express that God-type.
All you’re suggesting is that if some folks practice what they preach, and you find those preachings agreeable, then those preachings are worthy of faith. Unfortunately, this isn’t much of a basis for a rational judgement. If you have no knowledge, a priori of “good” or “evil”, how shall you judge the fruits? Do you, or does anyone else, have the intrinsic ability to make such judgements? If this is true, where does this ability come from? If you answer God, your logic is recursive. If you answer otherwise, you’re saying you don’t need God to know right from wrong. All arguments for faith based upon such rationalizations end in tautology, as you have demonstrated clearly. Either that, or they deny the necessity of God.
This is a gross exaggeration of what I have stated. Sane people can be convinced of the truth of the irrational through simple conditioning, be that conditioning the aggressive and blatant kind employed in what we commonly know as “brainwashing”, or by the more insidious methods of organized faith. The end result can be exactly the same. So, why shouldn’t the two forms of “brainwashing” be viewed in a similar light? By what rational criteria do we distinguish them? Cruelty? How do we judge whether teaching our children that myths are true is cruel or not? Voluntary vs. involuntary? Do most people have a choice what faith they are raised in? Intent of the brainwasher(s)? What does that matter if the result is belief in the spurious? What are the “medical terms” you refer to? I can’t think of any “medical terms” that clearly deliniate faith in the unseen gained through habituation from any other kind of mental conditioning that leads to belief without evidence.
Institutionalization is for the insane. The faithful are not “insane”. They are merely deluded, which is entirely possible for a sane person. They simply learned how to approach knowledge incorrectly, or they learned double-standards for certain kinds of knowldedge vs. others, e.g. if somebody tells you they are God, you shouldn’t take their word on it, but if somebody tells you Jesus is God, you should…full stop. That’s pretty much what it boils down to with faith.
Confidence is quite something else. And one can be taught ways of approaching ideas through sceptical inquiry that help them use logic to determine if some concepts are worthy of confidence or not. This is not the same as “brainwashing”. Rather the opposite, it is the system of teaching that gives the individual no “factual” information but what has been gained through empirical study of the evidence available, and the methods by which any individual may judge this information for themselves. I submit that belief should never be encouraged, and that faith is not a virtue. There can be no ushakeable belief, and hence no rational faith. We never have all the information. Those who demand faith claim we do, or at least, we have enough. Organized faith never had a legitimate claim to any such thing, not now, not ever. Yet many “know” in their hearts their faith is true.
Brainwashing indeed.
This is just what I’m trying to get at with my OP–why it’s considered wacko if Joe Blow (or David Koresh) goes around saying he’s God, but if one claims that Jesus is God, all is fine with the world. Sorry, this sort of double standard doesn’t wash. Because really… what’s the difference? Either statement is equally implausable.
Oh certainly. After all, many of the leaders in the fight for religious tolerance are Christian ministers. I lived across the street from a Presbyterian minister who was the nicest person you’d ever want to know.
But, it is also true, in response to a rant that devolved into atheists wanting to lock up believers, that the Left Behind books are some of the biggest sellers ever, and they tell, with some delight, how the evil non-believers get it. I haven’t read them, my stomach couldn’t stand it. My wife tried, out of curiousity, but gave up 50 pages in because the writing was so dreadful.
This thread is about how the religious believe in things without logical cause. Some Christians in SDMB will happily own up to this - these are the ones against laws establishing their religious principles. But it appears the response to the accusation of a lack of rational justification of a belief is ranting at the supposed arrogance of atheists. I don’t consider this any more arrogant than an astronomer pointing out the flaws in astrology.
We all have our delusions and neuroses, and I don’t think they all need to get cured. Like I said, dangerous delusions need to be dealt with, innocent ones don’t.
I’d bet most atheists came from some sort of background of god belief. I did. But when I discovered the history of the Bible, and actually read it and analyzed it for myself, I found that the hypothesis that our Gods were made up fit reality much better than the hypothesis of the existence of any human worshipped god. That was only slightly shocking to me. What was far more shocking was the evidence that there was no Davidic empire.
Following the delusions of the mass culture is probably healthier than not. All societies have shared delusions. Think about how many people consider it vital to learn which small group of men put a sphere into a basket more often than another group of men. I’m not saying it’s not worth following for fun, but considering it important? No way.
Suppose someone believes in something really obviously dumb, like those supermarket-magazine psychics. I would not hesitate to call that delusional. Why? Several reasons:
-It it’s obviously nonsensical to think that someone who had the power to predict the future would waste their time being a supermarket-magazine psychic
-Their claims could easily be tested and verified or falsified. And let’s just say that they’re not verified
-(this a more subtle point) They make claims about something about which we have knowledge, namely, things that humans can do. I know what a human brain can do. I have one. I’ve talked to other people who have them. I’ve studied them, just by living in a human society. And nothing I’ve learned in that time leads me to believe that human brains can magically predict the future
So, overall, there are a variety of good reasons why their beliefs are bunk, and if they continue to ignore those reasons and hold to their beliefs, I call them delusional.
On the other hand, take someone who believes that there is a God, but makes no specific claims about that God interfering with the universe in any way.
I disagree with that belief, much as I disagree with the belief in the psychics. But I have no strong and evidence-backed arguments for my disagreement. In fact, it really just comes down to Occam’s Razor, which isn’t a proof of anything. And furthermore, a belief about God isn’t a belief in a field of belief that I feel like an authority in. If someone believes something about math, I feel that I can argue with that, because I know a lot about math, have learned many facts about various parts of math, and can compare their belief to those facts, and apply the rules of math, etc. But a belief about God is a belief in a category (massive things outside the universe) about which I know very very little. So I really have no argument to bring to bear against that belief.
On a somewhat different note, addressing the “well, if you believe in God, why don’t you believe in the Invisible Pink Unicorn” question, there’s a subtle but important response to that. Someone who believes in God is looking at two options (God, or no God, with no particular evidence for any of the above) and choosing the one that I feel is wrong. Someone who believes in an Invisible Pink Unicorn is looking at three options (God, no God, God-who-is-Invisible-and-Pink-and-a-Unicorn-despite-existing-outside-the-universe), with no real evidence between them, and choosing by far the most contrived choice possible.
To propose an analogy, the “you shouldn’t believe in God, because if you did, you might as well believe in the IPU argument” is like saying (I’m trying to think of an unanswered question from history here) “you shouldn’t believe that Lee Harvey Oswald was part of a conspiracy, because if you do, you might as well believe that he was conspiring with Martians, and that’s just idiotic”.
Disclaimer: I’m not talking in this post about religious assholes who believe that the universe is 6,000 years old and God Hates Fags. I’m talking about people like (if I may presume) Siege and Libertarian and Polycarp. Call one of them delusional to their face, and back it up with substantial arguments. C’mon! I dare you!
PS: On behalf of atheists and agnostics everywhere, I feel some urge to apologize for the extraordinary rudeness of some of the religion-bashing going on in this thread, although it’s not like all of us are responsible for the actions of the rest of us… (And if extreme atheism leads to arrogance and condescension, I’ll still take it over extreme religiousness any day of the week…)
Not at all. They are worthy of investigation.
(emphasis mine) Just to be clear: you are accusing all organized religion of something more insidious than brainwashing? Would you care to back that up? Because that statement is one of the loopiest I’ve ever seen.
I now expect a proof that God doesn’t exist.
And I’m very serious. Either put forth the proof, retract the statement, or disappear in a poof of logic.
Indeed. Anything to back that up?
I seem to recall a thread not that far back that debated the whole issue of different beliefs being equally implausible, but I can’t find it right now. Suffice it to say, there wasn’t consensus.
However, the above claims are strawmen. I know of no believers who ask someone to believe simply because they say so. Certainly I never have, and I spent 2 years as a missionary in South America. Furthermore, if Jesus claimed to be the Son of God, at least he is reported to have proven it (miracles, resurrection, etc.). Yet even so I don’t ask you to believe what the Bible says just because it’s written in the Bible. Jesus (and his followers) made specific promises which you can test for yourself. Their “fruits” are and were good and are worthy of investigation.
It’s statements like this that remind me that most people don’t have primary experience of religion and religious folks in the context of communities composed almost entirely of converts (who are in those communities as a result of seeking things more in accord with their experiences than the faiths of their parents).
Unfotunately, you’re won’t get it any sooner than you will give me proof there are no Leprechauns. Really, I could just as easily and rationally ask you to prove to me there are no Leprechauns. Thing is, you can’t. The nature of the concept of a Leprechaun makes empirical scrutiny impossible. If you claimed you looked behind every rainbow and found no Leprechauns, I could simply redefine a Leprechaun, and send you out on another snipe hunt. Telling people to disprove something that is by definition not subject to mortal scrutiny puts me in an impossible position. There’s no issue of logic in such a situation, and if you think there is, you are either being disingenuous, or you don’t understand logic. Perhaps your problem is you actually see a clear distinction between the concept of a God, and of a Leprechaun. In reality, the only distinction is one of scope, not of type. More people take God seriously than Leprechauns, but the logical basis for either conviction is essentially equal.
Then what do they offer as a basis for belief? Because the Bible says so? Or because people a long time ago said so? Or perhaps because I’ll feel it in my heart, and hence know it to be true? How are any of these things fundamentally different?
So what? Why should I take any story about Jesus’ purported miracles any more seriously than I should take stories that Davie Crockett shot him a bear when he was only three? Or that Paul Bunyan was fifteen feet tall and had a giant blue oxen named Babe? How are these things fundamentally different? Here’s a project for you: Prove to me that Jesus preached the truth. The Christians say Jesus was the Son of God, divine, and brought to us God’s new covenant. Now over here, there are the Muslims, who say the Angel Gabriel came to Muhammed, and commanded him to speak the word of God as his prophet. Here’s the thing: People who follow Jesus claim that he is God. They offer stories about his miracles and resurrection as proof. However, it seems Gabriel told Muhammed that, according to God…
“[9:30]…the Christians say: The Messiah is the son of Allah; these are the words of their mouths; they imitate the saying of those who disbelieved before; may Allah destroy them; how they are turned away!
[9.31] They have taken their doctors of law and their monks for lords besides Allah, and (also) the Messiah son of Marium and they were enjoined that they should serve one God only, there is no god but He; far from His glory be what they set up (with Him).
[9.32] They desire to put out the light of Allah with their mouths, and Allah will not consent save to perfect His light, though the unbelievers are averse.
[9.33] He it is Who sent His Apostle with guidance and the religion of truth, that He might cause it to prevail over all religions, though the polytheists may be averse.
[9.34] O you who believe! most surely many of the doctors of law and the monks eat away the property of men falsely, and turn (them) from Allah’s way; and (as for) those who hoard up gold and silver and do not spend it in Allah’s way, announce to them a painful chastisement,
[9.35] On the day when it shall be heated in the fire of hell, then their foreheads and their sides and their backs shall be branded with it; this is what you hoarded up for yourselves, therefore taste what you hoarded.”
The Immunity
So you can see the problem here. On the one hand, I’ve got all these Christians who say Jesus is God. Then, on the other hand, I’ve got these Muslims who say anyone who believes such a thing is a polytheistic apostate and will burn in Hell.
Both groups seem to feel they have it strait from God that they know the Truth. So, I’m going to give you an easy task. I would simply like you to prove to me that the Christians are right, that the events recorded in the New Testament are accurate, while those in the Koran are innaccurate. See, I’m not giving you a task that is, in principle, impossible, like you so rudely did to me. I’m not automatically setting you up for a fall. There’s history, archeology, purported eye-witness accounts, LOT’S of things that you can look at and study, and, hopefully, offer up to me as some proof that one or other set of teachings is right. Because, you see, they both can’t be correct. That’s impossible. It’s patently obvious that the teachings of Christianity, and those of Islam are, when it comes to the nature of Christ’s divinity, mutually exclusive. I think that’s a pretty logically sound statement.
You must understand, I have no reason, a priori to favor either view about the nature of Jesus Christ. I’ve just got two books, two huge bunches of people, two separate traditions. Both groups of people seem to be about as worthwhile as the other. They have moral standards, and so on. They try to do good, as they understand it. I certainly can’t question either groups’ sincerity. Thing is, I want to approach this problem empirically, like I’m expected to do with everything else in my life. I don’t want to trust mere feelings, and I’m not just going to take somebody’s say-so that Jesus or Muhammed had the right idea, especially if it’s about something as important as my mortal soul roasting for all enternity in Perdition. This is a decision worthy of some serious evidence, don’t yosu think?
I figure, since they both were real people (well, we know Muhammed was anyway, since non-Muslim contemporaries bothered to write about him, as opposed to Jesus, who didn’t even get written up by Christian contemporaries, if we are to pay heed to the Biblical scholars), there ought to be something some motivated Christian or Muslim can offer by way of hard evidence. After all, this is just history, right? As such, it’s not impossible that there is some record, some trace, some fragment of bone or parchment you could find and show me. I can be convinced if I have a sound basis for decision. I’d say this is pretty straightforward. These people walked around, did things, not out there in heaven some place, but right here, on Earth. So, you know, can you provide some proof? Can anyone?
And if not, can you explain to me why?
You are aware, of course, that this is not the only possible metaphysical configuration of the universe. For instance, if beings regularly appeared out of thin air and gave us missives from beings from without the material plane, and periodically, extreme emotions or divine intervention seem to alter reality contrary to normal expectations, it would change my, and certainly many other, person’s beliefs about the laws under which the universe operates.
For instance, if some sort of “aura” were regularly found in inanimate objects, showing that they had a residual afterglow when placed near persons, it would be evidence to reassess my materialism. It wouldnt disprove it, but I see no reason why observations cannot influence philosophy.
In another instance, I also doubt that the field of trying to prove/disprove God would be abstracted as much as it is right now if it were clear as day that God exists, for instance if God regularly appeared to us in the heavens and proclaimed to us His desires for us. As it stands right now, even if such a being were to exist and not be a delusion or illusion, the state of philosophy is such that that being would not necessarily be God! (for instance, it could just be a very powerful being controlled by a higher god.)
As for “delusions” about God versus other delusions, I see no reason to treat them differently than other delusions. However, one must never completely eliminate the possibility that the delusions are real, no matter what their source.
If a guy wanders around your neighborhood claiming he heard the word of the Lord and the Lord told him to walk around picking up garbage and paint pictures of Mary Kate and Ashley in various states of dress surrounded by plushy Cthulhus, I would think that was sort of humorous, but wouldn’t poke fun at the man himself.
If, on the other hand, the man were to harangue me about how the Lord told him directly that I needed to give up my lewd, dirty smegma-infested lifestyle, and bend over and let him insert his Rod of Power into my supple and prostrate mind, I would unleash my sarcasto-shank at him with all due power. I would dub him delusional, dangerous, and would belittle him to no end.
Religion is one of the main weapons used to gain power. Whether or not the persons at the top actually believe in their arsenal is another story. Some clearly do, some probably do not, however, that is immaterial.
It does not make religion itself bad. The truth or untruth of religion does. A lot of time religion makes a lot of transcendant sense to me, and I am “plugged in” to the reality of God.
Even those times, I still know that there is a great chance that when my life ends, my stream of consciousness will wink out like a candle. But when I am plugged in, it doesnt matter since I am one with the universe.
And then the drugs wear off…
All right then. You’re the one who asserted that “The faithful are not ‘insane’. They are merely deluded”. That’s your bald-faced assertion. You have nothing to back it up? Thought so.
I guess you’re not reading my posts before responding. I specifically said that “just because the Bible says so” is not sufficient for belief.
Again, I specifically said that the stories of Jesus’ miracles were not a proof text for Jesus’ divinity. I raised them only to differentiate him from others who might claim to be God.
When you start reading my posts, maybe we can have a dialogue.